I have not always been honest
Apr 16, 2009 The Story of My Life
I’m pretty sure this is the last of these posts for now.
I’ve not always been honest with myself about Joaquin. It took me a long time to get over him — well, not him so much as the relationship. I get into these funks where I’m thinking on it hard (I’m in one now, obviously) and I used to think it was about him but now I know it’s me trying to figure out me. Why did I love him? Why couldn’t I stay away? What part of me was hurting then and is it still present now? And this time around I’m also wondering, how was I complicit?
In one version of the story of our relationsip’s demise (this is the version I worked over for years), Joaquin throws me over several times. First with someone who went to high school with us, then with a woman with my exact same first name thereby obliterating me. (Even now I occasionally meet someone who can’t quite place me and then it ends up they have me mixed up with her.) In this version of events, I am the victim. Sure, I’m jealous and clingy but he’s the one ripping me apart into teensie-weenie little pieces and then using my attachment (addiction) to him to keep me in his back pocket as a just-in-case. This is all true.
But the other version of the story is also true and it’s one I hadn’t thought on much that has to do with my culpability. So I was thinking about how he used to say that I loved him but I didn’t like him and thinking about how it took me a few years (full of slammed locker doors, hysterical phone calls on either side and heady reunions) to realize he was right. I thought then that he probably didn’t care but maybe he did. It’s probably not a whole lot of fun to realize your girlfriend doesn’t like you all that much.
I disapproved of a lot of his choices and I disagreed with a lot of his values but I was so insecure and so defensive that I couldn’t own this and instead I would try to tear him down the same way he tried to tear me down. Because I saw him as invincible, I never thought that I could really hurt him even though I wanted him to hurt because he hurt me. But while I’m the type of gal whose feelings get hurt if the wind blows too hard, Joaquin was made of tougher stuff and so I had to work a lot harder and I could get pretty freakin’ mean. I’ve forgiven him for being a jerk but (I realize as I type this) I need to forgive myself for my own jerkiness so that I won’t be so desperate to pretend it was all on him.
(There was a lot of unkindness in me during the five years between 15 and 20; I took all of my essential hurt and tried to spread it around.)
I tried to control him as much as he tried to control me (again, with far less success since he had oodles more self-confidence than I did). I remember once in particular that I tried to get him to quit his band and focus more on his painting and I couched it in concern about his art but the truth was I was just tired of his groupies. I mean, if you really love someone you don’t try to make them give up something that they love.
I don’t really know when we stopped loving each other but I always think that if I’d just gotten over it when he dumped me for the girl in our class, we could have remained fond of each other. But I couldn’t let him go. And I guess he couldn’t let me go because he didn’t for a long time.
I used to feel invisible with him but what did I want him to do to prove that he saw me? I felt hemmed in by my girlhood — it was certainly easier for him to be a boy in a band than it was for me to be a girl who wrote poetry — but that wasn’t his fault. I was jealous of his autonomy and the room the world gave him to step out of bounds. I’d get mad when he’d declaim on feminism and ignore what I was going through right in front of him. I had sex with him and it freed him; I guess I can’t really hold him responsible for not seeing how it locked me down. He was 16! Then 17! (The last time we slept together I want to say that I was 19 and he was 21 but honestly I’m just not sure.) We were young and dumb and locked in a pattern that wasn’t kind to either of us.
If we’d just let each other go earlier! If only we hadn’t raked each other over hot coals and trampled over any good feelings we might have had for each other!
THAT is my big Joaquin regret — that I wouldn’t let it go and instead helped throttle my first love into a wilted broken thing.
Ahh well. Youth. Ignorance.
(sigh)
And this really is the last of these posts for now. (I got off subject anyway.)
The night my world caved in
Feb 18, 2009 Favorites, Parenting, The Story of My Life
I am blurry on the details. Both my parents were home, which makes me think it may have been a weekend. (My dad traveled most weekdays.) Also it was summer. I know this because I was in my underwear and a t-shirt. We were not a walk-around-in-your-underwear kind of family (not like my kids who regularly streak down the hall in little else) and I remember feeling quite daring for wearing a t-shirt and underwear to bed like my friend said she did. So I know I was already feeling a little over-exposed. And it must have been evening since I was (un)dressed for bed but I’m not sure how old I was. I want to say ten, maybe. Maybe eleven. It was before the divorce (because my dad was there) so let’s say ten.
I can’t remember — did my parents call me downstairs? Or did I come down to tell them something on my own? I also don’t remember exactly what they said but I do remember their worried, compassionate wrinkled brows and their assurances that they loved me. And I remember something vague about my dad having been a fat kid and how he didn’t want me to suffer the way he’d suffered. (But this adds to my confusion — maybe my father wasn’t there. Maybe he left it to my mom to tell me and I remember him being there because I remember my mom saying this. Or maybe she said this after this initial confrontation. It’s all a blur.)
I know they told me I was putting on a little too much weight, that maybe I needed to watch it a little because I was getting, well, I was getting chubby.
This is what stays with me: The cold, cold shame freezing my stomach and making my vision turn wide then small. My awareness of my physical vulnerability in my t-shirt and underwear. My want to disappear, pull a blanket over me. And my shock because no one — NO ONE — ever told me I was fat. No one had ever said these words to me. So the irony is that my parents wanted to protect me from the cruelty of other children but the only people who had ever told me I was fat were my parents who were telling me now. And this is also what stays with me: that spinning, empty feeling around my limbs as I realized that I did not know myself or my body. That my legs and arms and tummy were no longer close and familiar but were enemies bent on fooling me. Where I had felt strong and pretty, I now knew I had been mistaken and then I realized I had been a fool walking around in the world feeling good about myself because it was a secret from me, the way that other people saw me. And that was the shame that has, frankly, never left me. And this is a shame that I still feel around my family more than I feel it around anyone else because they were the ones to tell me.
It sounds like I’m damning my parents and I’m not. My parents really were trying to be helpful. I believe their intentions were good and loving because the bulk of my experiences otherwise at that time in my childhood were good and loving and supportive and encouraging. So I forgive them for doing their best even though it ended up causing me harm. My father was a fat kid and he carried those scars. On the other hand, my mom was always a skinny, skinny kid and likely didn’t know what to make of her sturdy, stocky daughter. Perhaps I was getting too chubby although pictures I have of that time show only me at my most Dawnest self — neither big nor small. Plain, sturdy, short of limb and stern of face.
I do wonder though what they thought I would do as a ten or eleven year old. We already ate well because my mom controlled the food in our cupboards and on our dining room table. We had lots of fruits and veggies; we had few sweets or processed food. I was one of the few kids who never had Hostess cupcakes in my lunch and when we drank kool-aid, she made it with a fraction of the sugar. I rode my bike a lot, too, although truth be told, I was more of a bookworm. My body at that age (I say, gazing at the pictures) was simply a sturdy, stocky body and this I already knew. My best friend was younger and a full head taller with long, long legs and her tummy never curved out in her bathing suit. But that was how she looked and this was how I looked and it didn’t occur to me that one was better than the other until I heard it. Until my parents told me directly and until I overhead adults talking about Annie’s body and how they envied her her legs, shaking their heads in rueful admiration.
What happened after this momentous day is that I quit walking like I was the person inhabiting my limbs. I felt self-conscious as I moved through space. I doubted the me I saw in the mirror and no longer trusted my ability to know what I looked like. I began to look at other people with suspicion and self-consciousness. In short, I became less likely to want to run or ride or dance or be active anyplace people might see. Which is obviously what my parents were trying to avoid. And this has never left me. Nor has the feeling of powerlessness over my body, this sense that it will do what it wants and I am disconnected — body separate from soul. This is a disconnect that feels like I am a poorly dubbed movie with a body that will not co-operate with my thoughts.
I think about this so much lately because I am now a mother to a sturdy, stocky daughter and I feel like high-kicking the world under its collective chin when I think of anyone — ANYONE — visiting any of this on her. I know she is beautiful like I knew I was beautiful. Because looking back, I can see that my parents were wrong. They were wrong to tell me and they were wrong in their assumptions in the first place because I wasn’t fat. I was lovely. And strong and sturdy and exactly how I was meant to be. I know this because my mom fed me well and I rode my bike and ran around the neighborhood and so the body I carried was the perfect body for me. But I can’t get back to that place and so I’m deathly afraid that someone with the best intentions will steal Madison’s sense of self.
So I will tell you now: My daughter is perfect. And so is my son. They are exactly who they are meant to be. They own the ground they walk over. They own the air they move through. They are grace even when they stumble. They are strong and free and masters of their beings. Their bodies will change — filling and stretching — and the change will be perfect even during those awkward times when their knees don’t seem to work right and their elbows knock into things. I feed them well, they run around — they are nourished and active and so I won’t let anyone else’s worries come to visit them.
When we talk about health, we don’t talk about weight. When we say “diet” we mean “food you put in your body.” We mean vitamins and minerals and diversity in your menu. We get off the elliptical trainer or back home from a walk or a run and say, “Wow, that really helped my stress levels! That made me feel strong! I’m going to sleep well tonight!” Because that’s the equation that will build the bodies they are meant to have and those bodies may be slim or round. They may be heavier or lighter or taller or shorter but they will be perfect and my children will never ever ever (god willing) have to lose ownership the way I did when I was ten.
Tags: body image, Madison, my dad, my mom, Parenting, weight
Crossposted from Facebook
Dec 15, 2008 The Story of My Life
I did a meme on there and I’m copying it here not because I’m lazy but because I’m busy. That’s just how it is. Half the people I read on twitter are having eye twitches and headaches and stomach flus because December is NOT the most wonderful time of the year; it’s the most stressful.
Ok, onto the meme! The rule was to say 16 things about yourself but being a busy person in need of structure, I made it 16 holiday gifts that stick in my memory. If you’re stuck on coming up with a blog and want to be tagged, I hereby tag you!
1. My set of moomintroll books, which I got when I was five or six. I was very disappointed in them because I’d never heard of moomins. I didn’t read them for a couple of years until I was desperate for something to read and they were the only thing left unread in my bookshelf. Turns out I LOVE them and they remain among my most favorite of all books. Plus it gave me the internet handle I’d use for years. (moominmama)
2. We always got sets of books for the last night of Chanukkah and that’s how I got my Laura Ingalls set and this awful set of “Stories for Girls,” which convinced me that the teen years were going to suck because apparently the teen years made girls boring. My sister, I think, still has those books and she can confirm their unintentional hilarity.
3. One year I accidentally opened my sister’s Holly Hobby-branded Easy Bake Oven and she opened my Raggedy Ann dollhouse. We looked at each other horrified and my mom quickly switched the packages right. But for a minute the world tilted uncomfortably on its axis.
4. The first year Brett and I were together he asked me what I wanted for Christmas and I said, “Oh I don’t know. Just don’t get me something boring like, say, shoes.” As it happens, the package he’d already bought was shoes but the most comfortable, adorable shoes I ever had in my life. I still miss those wonderful, fabulous shoes.
5. For Christmas one year my inlaw’s got me a Bose CD stereo. We’d been struggling with some conflict between us and I hate to admit being this shallow but when they gave me the Bose, all was forgiven. Having a decent stereo to listen to my music on made my life immeasurably better so how could I not forgive them for all the petty (likely imaginary) slights? The Bose is getting a little trashed now because the kids are always slamming their CDs into it.
6. When I was 16 my dad got me a bright purple sweater and a white button up shirt printed all over with purple cowboys. Both of these things came from Express and he thought I shopped at Express (I mostly shopped at Limited but I did get my favorite black flippy miniskirt from Express). I was not gracious upon opening this because of the purple cowboys. I gave the sweater to my sister (purple! bright!) but ended up swiping it back when I grew back into wearing colors. (If you are a certain age, you probably had this sweater in some version, too. It had 3/4 length sleeves and came past your hips.) I had one in dark blue and one in black — it was an Express signature sweater. Remember?)
7. My ex-stepmom ( my little sisters’ mom) used to get us Ultima makeup kits every year. They were those big kits with several eyeshadows and lipsticks and stuff. This was the 80s when a person might wear four eyeshadows at a time so these gifts were much appreciated.
8. Last year for Chanukkah the kids got me six candle holders and two huge packages of scented tealight candles. The candle holders are clear glass in different colors and I love them. I loved getting to see which color I’d open up every night.
9. This is harder than I thought. Ummm, I got my giant Raggedy Ann for christmas when I was about five. I’ve written about her on my blog before.
10. I also used to get a Tender Love baby every Christmas. One year I got Kiss Me Baby Tender Love and one year I got Bless You Baby Tender Love. My sister had Happy Birthday Baby Tender Love. I can’t remember the other ones we got but this was back when you could just squeeze a doll’s stomach to make it do stuff and they didn’t need batteries.
11. Oh one year for Christmas we all got a shared gift — the complete Star Wars Deathstar. You know that three story building with all the guys. When we moved my mom accidentally left it in the attic and my brother is still really sad about that.
12. I think one of my favorite presents was the Ginny Sweet Shop I got when I was about nine. To go with my Ginny doll. I don’t know why I liked it so much since she was the only doll that fit into it. Which meant that basically she’d go to the Sweet Shop and sit there sadly alone.
13. Another year I got this great wooden kitchen set. I was maybe four? It had all the plastic food and little tin pots and a plastic sink you could pop out. It was, as the kids say, teh awesome. I sold it when I was about 12 for twenty-five dollars at a garage sale. I wish I had that kitchen set now but whenever I remember the parents gleefully piling it into the car (they exchanged looks and they were both grinning like mad), I feel ok about it. Because I know how I feel when I get an amazing steal for my kids at a garage sale and as I recall, I was pretty damn happy to get the $25.
14. When we first moved back here Brett bought me a sweater pantsuit. I’m not kidding. It had light blue sweater pants and a light blue cardigan. I looked like a giant squishy blue marshmallow in it. I wore it on Christmas in honor of the day and then never wore the pieces together again. It was so not my thing being essentially sweatpants and a sweatshirt only in a very fancy knit. Brett got it for me because it was my first year as a stay-at-home mom and he wanted to indulge me in something I could wear around the house comfortably but still look nice. (The nice is open to opinion — it was really ridiculous.) I found out later that it cost something like two hundred dollars and that’s when he was making less than $20k/year. This is why he’s not allowed to buy Christmas gifts unsupervised. (At least his heart is in the right place!)
15. When I was ten I asked my mom for a classical music album. She bought me Mantovani and the Boston Pops (it was a double album). I felt very sophisticated when I would sit and listen to the orchestral version of Windmills of Your Mind. This was back when I thought classical meant violins.
16. The same year I got the moomin books we also got a shared present for the three of us. It was a set of four albums called Cock-A-Doodle-Doo and it was nursery rhymes. I was insulted. Wasn’t I long past the preschool age of nursery rhymes? But then later on I listened to them and loved them so that when we moved to Chicago, the record player and those records were in my room. (Along with the Gilbert & Sullivan album and Boris Karloff reciting Sleepy Hollow and all the Disney long-playing records.) I was happy to find Sharon Lois & Bram for my own kids because those records are long gone and I think every kid should have a foundation of nursery rhymes to be culturally literate.
Tags: chanukkah, christmas, gifts, mantovani, meme, memes, moominmama, moomins, Music, my dad, my mom, preschool, presents
