Mama Kat's Losin' It Writing Prompt September 1, 2011: Write about a time you disappointed yourself

2.) Write about a time you disappointed yourself.


Well, this isn't a difficult writing prompt is it? I write about it all the time. My life seems to be a constant disappointment to myself. The more difficult prompt might be "write about a time you were proud of yourself". But, I digress. Most recently, I suppose, I've been obsessing about something. There really is no other way to describe it. Obsession is kind of what I do. I get it into my head and then think about it until it's all I can think about and then I've blown it completely out of proportion and what it began as was nothing more than a passing comment or a glance or a touch and now I've thought it to death. What the hell is wrong with me? I really do want to be like normal people. (Though, who gets to decide what's normal, right?) I just can't get this out of my head and I can't write it down and I can't talk about it because I don't think my family or friends would understand. Or they probably wouldn't understand what I've blown up a nothing into. They would probably understand the nothing. How funny. But I can't go back to the nothing. It's already gone. I occasionally think about when it was nothing, but my brain has the incredible, surprisingly super-fast ability to fast-forward to what everything has exploded into and all of a sudden I can't even see what all of this began as.


So disappointed in myself, yet again. Just one more thing to add to the rapidly increasing pile of things I do or have do and probably will do to disappoint myself.

The last 8 months...

So, it's more than half way through the year and I thought I would update what I have accomplished this year so far....

(1) I lost my job.
(2) I sent my baby to preschool for the first time.
(3) I have been keeping my weekly therapy appointments and really feel like they've been useful.
(4) I've lost about 20 pounds. (Go ME!)
(5) I've cut some unhealthy people out of my life. Painfully, but necessarily.
(6) I've said goodbye to one of my best friend's, Kaiser.
(7) I've had surgery twice. (My insurance company must love me.)
(8) I've watched my beautiful baby grow into a beautiful, grumpy, active, fussy, funny, firecracker of a toddler.


In all, when I think about it, it's been a pretty uneventful year. Boring even. Painful.

When Lord? When's my time?

When is everything going to make some sense? My brain is constantly running a mile a minute about everything and is making sense of nothing. Since I last wrote, my body has been through a plethora of pain and indignities, but even that has not bothered me nearly as much as not being able to make sense of what is going through my head. What happens when you think about the same thing literally a million different times, in a million different ways and it doesn't matter because the likelihood of any of it mattering is so infantile, so miniscule, so remote that I would likelier be a can-can dancer in Tijuana before any of it ever happened. (Which is to really say, never.)

Why must I do these things to myself? Why can't I just let it go? Obsession is not the same thing as determination and determination can sometimes be useless when you can't really make sense of the ridiculousness of what is happening anyway.


I feel like I am completely losing control and getting better at the same time.

WHAT IS HAPPENING TO ME?

Guilty as charged

[...] If I were better at physics, I could probably create an equation for this: It is not so much the piano falling; it is the constant potential that the piano will fall. It is an imagined piano, endlessly falling, waiting to take shape the minute I stop looking for it. As soon as I relax, it will form out of the air molecules. I am guilty of the happiness that comes from feeling good, from not craning my neck. That loose space, the space unwatched, the life lived."

- Aimee Bender, "House of Love and Bragging", The Modern Jewish Girl's Guide to Guilt

So, as it turns out, this book isn't as funny as I thought it would be. No, indeed. It's far more serious and thought-provoking which is exactly what I WASN'T looking for. Alas, I'm reading it because there is something compelling about it that urges me to read on. The passage above by Aimee Bender is just one of many I could have quoted as though the writers were writing just for me. I realize, though I think I have always known, as I was reading that I live my life waiting for the next bad thing to happen because bad things always happen. The piano is hovering above me waiting to fall and the moment I think things are okay, or I stop waiting for the piano to fall, it crushes me like a pancake. Bender says the guilt is from happiness, of not waiting for the piano to fall and that this is our lot in life. I long ago accepted that this was my lot in life. The piano mercilessly hovering, waiting to crush me. I need no prompting to feel guilt. Guilt is like a weight around my neck and though there are moments I feel as though I can see rays of sunshine, I am dragged back down into the bog by this mass slowly pulling me down and drowning me in the mud.

As it turns out, this book is totally enlightening in a totally heavy and depressing way. It's telling me what I already know, but much more eloquently and with beautiful prose, as if that makes the pill easier to swallow. Oh, the guilt I feel. About everything. Even about being happy.

Swallowed

Shattered, Battered and Weathered

Remember when?

Your broken mirrored promises

tied knots in ribbons long ago frayed and a

Broken heart left

Swallowed.

Promises, so many

Patience, so little

Crushing pain and despair

A seeming disconnect

A knowing hurt.

Endless waiting

hoping

wishing

Now, years in shambles

WHY?

Different than me has always been an enemy.

Mama Kat's Writing Prompt 7.5.2011:We just celebrated America’s Independence! Write a poem about what freedom means to you.

We just celebrated America’s Independence! Write a poem about what freedom means to you.

Freedom is...

Freedom

A double edged sword

But expected

respected?

Freedom to believe, hope and love

It fits me

But

Horrific War

Death and Heartache

Patriotism in every form

Given to every American when their born

But are we free

Certainly

Compare your lives

To those who strive

to live

Oppression

www.mamakatslosinit.com

HAPPY 4TH OF JULY!!!!!!

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY!!!!!!!