I’ve always loved that song by Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel, Sounds of Silence. It’s always spoken to me and is a go to song when I get a little twisted. Today is such a day.
The news feeds on social media is full of crap (like that’s unusual), but the death of yet another celebrity due to drug use and the over philosophizing and woe is me from many sets my teeth on edge. A throw off comment from a friend caught me off guard.”Not many are as strong as you”. Strong? Moi? I’d better check that mirror again. Know what I see? A woman who still feels the sting of her raising, the losses of family that didn’t/doesn’t want to know her. That child who endured so much, coming so close to ending everything because she could not see the light nor feel warmth in the abyss she found herself in.
Want details? Yeah… Today you shall have them because you dared judge something you know nothing about. I grew up in a household that was seriously flawed. My dad was an alcoholic. He claimed he didn’t since he just drank beer, but he lost rank, money, and driving privileges because of it. He was raised by his grandmother because his alcoholic mother ran off and deserted him and his siblings for other men. Seriously skewed his view of women. (I’ll get to that later). Then there was my mother the enabler. She went out of her way to protect his career since it allowed her to walk away from near squalor of 11 kids and share cropper parents. To the exclusion of ignoring her children. As the oldest I was put in charge of the other two. Cleaned house, put supper on the table etc. It wasn’t until I was grown did I understand the magnitude of what it cost me. As I grew up, and I hit puberty, the names started when I did as normal children do and make friends with the opposite sex. Whore,slut were the tame ones. At the tender age of 11 and in Jr high… I had no clue what they meant or why. I just knew that to speak to a boy got me slapped across the face or worse. I’ve lost count of the times I went to school with bruises, black eyes, busted lips. Fell down the stairs was normal excuse. Nobody said a damn thing. All my life I kept thinking there was something wrong with me. It did not matter that I kept straight A average, stayed out of trouble. I was worthless to those who brought me into this world. I held/hold my mother accountable because I believe mother’s protect their young.. Yeah. That makes me clueless I guess.
As an adult, it does little to my wounded self to understand that violence is often included in an addicts world. It affects those closest to them. It matters not that I understand my mother operated barely walking the ledge of sanity her whole life (she was diagnosed schizophrenic after my dad died and had probably had been my whole life). What matters is that each day I climb out of the abyss, facing the day, one foot at a time, making each moment count. Not for others approval anymore. This time I do it for myself. Does that make me strong? ~snort~ I think it makes me crazy. I mean seriously, who would keep trying? Maybe it makes me a little wiser. I no longer make excuses for others nor accept them. I refuse to allow lies clutter up relationships. In short, I demand accountability. And I set a damn high bar.
If that means after reading the pain bled out above that you still don’t get it, just move along.. You just had to be there I guess.