Sadomasochist Poetry

I hurt. 

Inside me, I feel a flood rising, waiting to spill out of my eyes at any moment. A mass has pooled in my heart, of anger and fear and worry. At any moment, one word or one look or one silence could send the liquid of my feelings forth into the world, via tears or words or a slap across that arrogant, unfeeling face I have to look at a few times a week. 

I hurt.

It's partly self inflicted. I question, I rail, I ask why, why, why? I ask, when I know there is no answer I can hear that will satisfy me. I ask, knowing full well the answers will only tear apart the already shredded entrails of my spirit. I ask, as though I am unaware of the verbal onslaught that will happen occur each time I do. 

I hurt. 

Him. I hurt him, or at least he would hurt if he was capable of feeling anything. I use the only weapon I have, the sharp sting of cruel words. Like I sword, I wield them, cutting into wounds I know exist even if he's spent so much time trying to cover them up. With strokes swift and lashing, cold and calculating, I send the daggers of my words to where his heart must surely feel it. I can see it in his eyes and when I do, I cut deeper. As his pain grows, mine must surely lessen. 

I hurt.

Despair. I despair what we have become. Made in the image of God? I've never felt such moments of contempt in my life, both being given and received. I sorrow for what we could have been, what we should have been. What have we to show for the years? Weakness of character, weakness of will and weakness of spirit; a pair of cowards. 

I hurt. 

Inevitable

This will not come as a shock.

Six weeks ago, someone asked me how my relationship with the man was going.

"We're doing well." I responded. "I think we are going to make it."

This last year has been the year that I have waited for. He and I finally lived together as a couple after a lengthy separation. We spent every night together. No deployments, no trainings, no obligations to the "other woman" (the USMC). Raising our kids together, going to school, working, supporting each other, living our American dream: the house, the kids, the dogs, the whole kit and caboodle.

Five weeks ago, I could tell something was bothering him.

Four weeks ago, he told me he wanted a divorce.

Three weeks ago he went to a lawyer and filed for one.

Last week he moved out.

By the end of September, the end of the mandatory ninety day waiting period, he and I will no longer be he and I.

My emotions have run the gauntlet this month from denial to anger to sadness and everything in between. Senseless. That's my word for all of this: Senseless. It makes no sense to me why this is happening. I simply don't understand.

I'm beginning to realize, after asking the same question for the millionth time ("why?"), that I don't have to understand. But I do have to accept.

There are so many things I want to say, eleven years worth of things. Those closest to me have already had to hear them. "Didn't I give, didn't I love, didn't I forgive, didn't I stay?" On and on and on. I can talk about all the things that I think contributed to the marriage but in the end, none of those things matter.

No, seriously. None of those things matter if he doesn't look at them and see love. That doesn't mean love isn't there, no. That means it's not being shown in a way that he can recognize. The fault for that lies with both of us: him for not being able to communicate to me what it was that he wanted, and me for assuming that what I had to give was what he wanted.

Last night it occurred to me that my biggest struggle in all this will be learning to be content with this aspect of my life. I can accept that this is happening, but am I happy about it? Absolutely not. No, not when I look at my children and wonder how this will affect them, or when I struggle with all the spiritual questions that arise from these situations, or when I see him and want to slap him because, damn it, I thought we were finally ok.

But there are things that I am truly joyful about, and that is that both he and I have people in our lives that truly care about us. I have family and friends who, instead of telling me what I ought to do, simply ask what it is that I need. We are surrounded by prayers, for us and for the children. And most important of all, no matter how thick the fog of this situation becomes, I can look through the haze and see the Light and believe that the Light is good.

Continual Blindside

I can't decide if this hopeless optimism I feel is a gift or a curse, or is it optimism at all? Perhaps it's only naivete. Or perhaps it's a mixture of both. 

Synonyms for the word "naivete" include: artlessness, unsophistication, trustfulness and innocence. For the word "optimism" we have: hope, confidence, buoyancy, cheerfulness. 

I am confident that I am completely unsophisticated. Artlessness is the boat set sail by my buoyancy. I am cheerfully innocent. I am hopefully trustful. 

Therefore I don't see the train wreck coming at me in my periphery. There's no warning whistle, no rumbling of the tracks, no red lights flashing and arms dropping to stop me from standing in it's path. No, I let it hit me with the full force of its uncommunicative fury. Then I lay there in a soul shredded heap as each coal car runs me over again, and again and again. And in the milliseconds between each jarring hit, I think, "This won't happen again. This is the last one. I can change this." 

One of my favorite songs of all time is called, "Waiting for the Train to Come In." It goes like this:

"Waiting for the train to come in. Waiting for my man to come home. 

I've counted every minute of each live long day. Been so melancholy since he went away.

I've shed a million tear drops or more, waiting on the one I adore.

I'm waiting in the depot by the railroad tracks, looking for the choo-choo train that brings him back.

Waiting for my life to begin, waiting for the train to come in."

It's a song I have sung to each one of my children as I rocked them to sleep as babies. 

Truth be told, I waited so long for the train that I gave no thought to how it would arrive or in what condition. I thought I would be so content with the presence of the train that I didn't think about the actual content of the train. Certainly I expected the train to be at the station for the long haul. Instead, the engine has hitched itself to another set of cars, and made sure I felt each one of them on its way out. 

I'm not angry with the train. After all, it's just a machine. I'm angry I wasted so much time waiting for it.  

Questions in Poetry

How long did I dream about you?
How many days spent waiting,
Praying for your safety,
Pining and aching, those nights I'd dread waking,
To the sunrise alone, it's true,
For I'd much rather dream about you.

How long did I dream about you?
For the day you'd remember,
What we had together,
Leave your ghosts forever,
Cling to me as your tether,
And when we make it through,
I won't have to dream about you.

How long will I dream about you?
Knowing how you regret me,
And how fast you'll forget me,
Just after you've left me,
God help me, I'm such a fool.
How long will I dream about you?

Words Can Hurt

Back when my eldest was in preschool, we had the misfortune of working with a particular speech therapist that I genuinely disliked.

On paper, she looked like the perfect individual to work with deaf children. She had her masters in Deaf Education. She was young, she was energetic, she was blonde and beautiful.

"How long have you been signing?" I asked, assuming that since she had her masters in Deaf Ed, she'd be an ASL pro.

"Oh, I don't often use sign. I work on speaking and listening." In other words, auditory/oral.

In other words, we were destined to be rivals.

I remember visiting the classroom one day, and watching her interact with my daughter. She would come up behind her and talk directly into her implant. She would take my daughters processor off without warning. She would speak to deaf children like they could hear. It was difficult to not stand up and shout to her, "THEY CAN'T HEAR YOU!"

In my head, I often referred to this woman as "Nazi Prison Matron." In my opinion, there is something wrong with a person who masters in Deaf Education and doesn't even use the language of the deaf. There is something wrong with the notion that a deaf child must learn to listen for a language they cannot hear, and speak a language that they cannot hear. I'm not saying that a deaf child can't learn to speak, I'm only wondering why it's necessary. What good will speaking do when they can't hear the response given?

The idea that a deaf child MUST learn to talk is ridiculous, and frankly that mindset is dangerous. I've seen in my own work place education professionals who sometimes visit the classroom hardly give a second thought to a child, who didn't have language for the first year of their life, signing a whole story. My heart bursts with pride because they have finally been given the means to express themselves.

When that same child vocalizes at all, even if it's just sounds, they are highly praised for it. And when that happens, all I can think in my head is, "That's right, little monkey! Dance!" As if the deaf children are pets or play things. As if they are poor, disabled creatures with no understanding. As if the strides they have made learning a language they can use mean nothing without verbal communication.

Please.

Just a few weeks ago, a woman I hadn't seen in over two years came up to me and asked how my daughter was. "Great!" I responded, "She's in first grade, she's on the honors reading program, she's taking ballet, etc."

"Huh." She responded, "And is she talking now?"

Because none of the other things she's accomplished mean anything if she can't say the word "purple" clearly.

I'm not at all ashamed to say that I lied to that woman. "No." I responded, "She uses sign almost exclusively."

Is that true? Not really. But my daughter isn't her pet, or her plaything. She's not a parrot, or a dancing monkey. And being able to speak doesn't make her better at any of the things she managed to accomplish.

And personally, I believe that she isn't doing well in spite of her deafness. She's doing well because of it. I'm proud of the strides she has made in her communication skills, be they sign or verbal, because I am proud of her. Period.

I guess my whole point to all of this is check your attitude. Maybe some deaf children will never learn to speak. That doesn't make them any less valuable, or smart. Be proud of what they can accomplish, because they are capable of anything as long as their time isn't wasted on nearly pointless pursuits or the agendas of people who think they know better.

For Love and the Game

I like a lot of sports, but in particular I love soccer and football.

My two favorite football teams are the Dallas Cowboys and the New England Patriots, but I will cheer on just about any team because I love the game.

I grew up in Virginia, and people who know that are sometimes surprised by my choice of football teams. Often times, by way of explanation, I just give the short answer of, "I lived in Texas for a while, and my dad's from Massachusetts." Both those things are true, but that's not quite all there is to it.

Football, and those two teams, are connected to exactly one thing: Happier times.

I remember being the age my oldest daughter is now, watching football games in Allen, TX with my family. Football is the unifier in my young mind, the common denominator in a family where my older siblings and the younger were quite spread apart in age. I became a Cowboys fan in Texas, watching those games in which Aikman, Irvin, Sanders and Smith ruled the field.

And then, just a few short years later, everything fell apart. My parents split up, we moved away from Texas and for a long time, things weren't very happy for anyone.

But there was still football. There were games with my siblings, and neighborhood games that I wasn't often allowed to play in but would still watch. Backyard games and churchyard games. And there was still the Cowboys.

My parents divorce was not an amicable one, and I didn't see my dad for almost a decade. I became a Patriots fan because it was a way to hold on to something that connected me to him.

Football remained in my life, morphing in my teen years from a unifying force to an equalizing one. As a girl who struggled all her life with her self image and her self worth, playing football on Sundays brought a sense that I was just as good as anyone else, at least for a few hours.

Maybe it's silly to attach so much emotion and sentiment into something so trivial. After all, it is just a game.

Isn't it?

Double Vision

On this, the last day of 2014, I consider what matters.

At this moment, I am on a medicine called Triazolam because in about half an hour, I go to my dentist to end the year with not one, but two root canals. During one of those, he will remove a stainless steel cap that has been over my molar for over a decade, nearly two. There may not be a tooth under there. Who knows?

Teeth matter. I should stop abusing them with soda and sugar.

Triazolam matters. If I wasn't on this, I wouldn't be able to go through with dental appointments.

Vision matters. Without it, I wouldn't be able to function well in the world I live in. Right now I can't seem to focus on anything further than the computer screen. If I do venture a look at the tv, I find myself asking which one is the real tv.

Perspective matters. The way we view an object or person is essential to the way that we treat them. Lately I find that I have been treating most people, and some objects, with remarkable amounts of disdain.  

Disdain - feeling that someone is unworthy of your consideration or respect.

I've not often thought of myself as high amongst men, but I am guilty of thinking that others are the lowest among then. I am a Judgy McJudgerson. You should read the post I wrote on our way to MT. You will know in an instant the bitterness and hatred I feel in my heart.

Disdain matters. Because it's the exact opposite of what my God would teach me is correct.

God matters. In recent months I've allowed myself to fall into a passive relationship with Him. He's kind of like that brother I super love but don't often speak about. God has once again become a "Maybe you should stay over here and I'll just be doing my own thing" type of God.

God matters, because without Him, I am the ultimate dill weed.

Here's that thing I wrote on the way to MT for Chistmas:

I got off facebook a few weeks ago because I noticed myself being filled with rage at some of the things I was seeing. That isn't necessarily the problem of the poster, but the reader. So I deactivated for a bit. the reality is, though, that facebook is the easiest way for me to communicate to my east coast family. And so I signed on once more.

Not five minutes later, I saw a picture: It was a Christmas tree. It was presents. It was one particular present. And then I saw red.

Stories from the man's childhood are typically tragic and usually connected with an object of some kind. I don't think I need to speak again about the Legos. There was another story he told me, about a beloved stuffed animal, a favorite present: a giant dinosaur from The Land Before Time.

It was cherished. It was loved. And, for no particular reason, it was unceremoniously tossed for the sake of convenience without regard to the feeling of the owner, a young boy who'd already had to experience more tragedy in his few years on earth than some people experience at all. 

I'm no stranger to favorite childhood toys being pulled from your arms and thrown away or, in my case, tossed into a fire. I had a favorite Cabbage Patch doll. Her name was Esther Lyn. She was one of those "preemie" dolls with a bald head, and she smelled like baby powder. I remember one year for our churches Harvest Party, I dressed up as the biblical Esther, but I carried my doll with me and told everyone that I was "Esther Lyn."

That doll was with me when my parents split up, when we moved from Texas to Virginia, in a time when I, as a young girl, couldn't fully comprehend what was happening to my family. 

Then one day, a few years later, we joined a homeschool group that mistakenly believed that inanimate objects could be possessed by demons or have demonic influence. One night, we went to our friends house for a bonfire, where instead of wood for burning, it was Care Bears and My Little Ponies and rock and roll albums, and secular books. It was troll dolls, and board games and movies. It was cabbage patch dolls. 

It was Esther Lyn.

One of the many differences between the man and me - he acknowledges what happened and moves on. Not so for me. I am still standing at the bonfire, feeling the injustice done to innocent ones who don't understand. I feel it for myself and I feel it for him. It's a burden I have no right to carry and I should let it go. But I look at him, and imagine that he was the age of my own children when it happened and I was not much older as well. Letting it go becomes much harder with that perspective, especially when no one has any remorse or regret.  

There is a verse in the bible that says by showing kindness to your enemies, you will heap burning coals on their heads. Part of me wonders if I can find it in my heart to be kind to my enemies one day.

Because I want to watch them burn.

My word for the New Year is "Active." I want to be active in all areas of my life, but spiritually is the main one. Passive faith is not where it's at, obviously. It hasn't worked for me all year.

I want to actively be a better person than the one in italics, and the only way I know how to do that is to actively pursue the God who is Love and not just wait for a miracle change without actually working toward it.

Pray for me this New Year, and I shall do the same for you.

Happy 2015.