Posts Tagged ‘water’

39 results.

Unfair

by CMcL on October 30, 2011 at 12:10 PM
Unfair

The earliest memories I have of my father are of him yelling at me and hitting me.

The lesson I refused to learn as a child was “keep quiet, stay out of his way, don’t say anything to piss him off.” My siblings, who were close enough to each other in age to grow up with each other’s support, evidently were able to manage this to some extent. I, on my own with only an elderly mother, a sister who despised me, and a rebellious spirit, somehow couldn’t grasp this.

I was aware, from a very early age, that the things my father was doing were wrong, that other kids didn’t have to put up with this crap, and that it wasn’t fair. Why should I have to sneak around just because I made friends with the black kid down the street? Why did I deserve to get beaten for greeting the Jehovah’s Witnesses who knocked on our door? “It’s not fair,” I growled into the mattress over and over at night.

Fairness can be a terrible thing to teach children. Play fair, do unto others as you would have them do unto you, turn the other cheek, don’t cheat, don’t bully the younger kids. Sure, great advice, but the moment when you begin to realize that those rules don’t apply to everybody else is a moment of impotent rage when you’re a kid. And if you weren’t taught how to deal with the unfairness of the world at the same time you were taught to be fair, well, that snotty little “Who told you life was going to be fair?” crack that people can’t seem to help making, it’s like spittle in your face.

The fact that my father was allowed to get away with the things he did to me only fueled my percolating bitterness. It was years before I was able to separate the notions of simple unfairness and outright injustice, and sometimes the line is still hopelessly blurred for me.

I remain baffled, to this day, as to why my brothers and sisters never made any attempt to shield me from what they knew I would grow up with. Presumably, having survived and successfully escaped, they assumed that I would too, without doing the math and taking into account the fact that I was alone, whereas they’d had each other. When I finally went to the police at the age of sixteen, they resented me for the embarrassment, for my failure to just grit my teeth, keep quiet, and accept the unfairness of it all until I could move out. I’m still not sure whether their rejection of me was unjust or simply unfair.

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Talking to the Wall

by CMcL on October 23, 2011 at 11:34 PM
Talking to the Wall

Lately there’s been a rash of people posting letters to their 16-year-old selves online. “Dear Me, It gets better.” “Dear Me, You will get through this. Don’t worry so much about your weight.” “Dear Me, He’s not right for you. He will destroy your soul and leave you thinking it was your fault. Run.”

While I’m no stranger to navel-gazing (People’s Exhibit A: THIS ENTIRE SITE), I can’t help but feel that the whole “what I would say to my younger self” conceit is, well, pretty useless, for various reasons. I mean, aside from the obvious fact that one cannot literally go back in time and change anything. Even if that were possible, and even in the highly unlikely event that teenage C had the capacity to take any such advice and encouragement to heart and act upon it — what then?

Is there value in considering what would have happened, what might have happened? The only possible utility I can see in such self-indulgent whimsy is cautionary example, but caution is ever wasted on the young. “Learn from my mistakes,” we say to the current generation, which in turn rolls its eyes just as we did.

Write your own letter. Would you have listened to you?

Dear C,

None of your suicide attempts will succeed, nor will they result in any effective mental health care or family support.

The police, the State, the psychiatric hospital, and the group home will do absolutely nothing but make your relatives resent you for embarrassing them.

Your father will never acknowledge that what he did was abuse. Don’t waste years trying to punish him.

Your mother is mentally ill. Don’t base your idea of normal on her.

Your siblings will always see you as the black sheep. Don’t give yourself a lifetime of grief trying to fit in and maintain relations with them.

You are, in actual fact, intelligent and attractive. Don’t believe you have to have sex with everyone who tells you so because no one ever will again.

God loves you unconditionally. Come to him sooner rather than later.

Sincerely,
Grownup C with decades of scar tissue.

P.S.

No one will ever care about your school attendance record. Don’t sweat the demerits.

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Depression

by CMcL on October 16, 2011 at 10:56 PM
Depression

You’re drowning, literally drowning in the ocean. You’re fighting to keep your body afloat, fighting for your life. You see a lifeguard. You cry out for help. The lifeguard says, “Do you have insurance? No? Sorry, I can’t help you.”

You keep fighting. The waves are crashing over your head. You see another lifeguard. You cry out for help. The lifeguard says, “I’m sorry, but you don’t qualify for assistance. You’re not disadvantaged enough. You don’t meet the eligibility requirements.”

You continue to fight, but your strength is fading. The wind is picking up. You see another lifeguard. You cry out for help. The lifeguard says, “I’d like to help you, but I can’t fit you in my schedule for at least another month. I can put you on the waiting list.”

You’re starting to sink. The sun is going down and your strength is almost gone. You see another lifeguard. You cry out for help. The lifeguard says, “Honey, there are people way worse off than you. Quit your whining, suck it up, and swim yourself to shore. Nobody else can do it for you.”

Meanwhile, on land, people who are not lifeguards walk by. They see you clearly. Some of them mock you for being so lazy, so stupid, so weak. Some of them carry their own life vests, but they aren’t lifeguards; it’s not their job to save you. They call out to you encouragingly: “Just keep swimming! Don’t worry, there are good lifeguards out there! You’ll find one if you just try hard enough! You have to do it yourself, you have to want to be rescued!”

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Go

by CMcL on October 14, 2011 at 1:14 PM
The last words ever spoken to me by my own flesh and blood, after a large natural disaster left me homeless. (P.S. The Red Cross did not, in fact, help me.)

The last words ever spoken to me by my own flesh and blood, after a large natural disaster left me homeless. (P.S. The Red Cross did not, in fact, help me.)

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Sudden Memory

by CMcL on October 2, 2011 at 8:55 PM
Sudden Memory

Although I have a good life and good friends and a good job and good hobbies, I still spend a lot of time alone. That, combined with the fact that my car radio doesn’t work, results in me providing my own life soundtrack much of the time. When I’m solo, I talk to myself, whether I’m driving or cooking or hiking through the woods on a photographic trek. Sometimes I sing. Sometimes I pray. Sometimes I try to be still (Psalm 46:10, “Be still, and know that I am God”).

But stillness doesn’t come naturally to me, and so even when I’m quiet on the outside, my mind is often racing. Not like running a marathon, with a clear goal or finish line in mind, or even a logical progression from Point A to Point B, but much more like running away from something, running from some pursuing agent, running aimlessly with no direction other than away, away, away. During those times, when my thoughts are crashing blindly into the fruit carts that line the streets in my head and careening off passersby, memories intrude. Unbidden, they reach up and grab me like zombies coming out of manholes, and I can never shake them off. I have no choice but to stop, stop and remember.

And just like that, a sudden memory:

I was eleven or twelve, sleeping in one day. I never had a real bed. Throughout my childhood, I slept in what I later learned was an institutional cot. It was small, smaller than a twin-size bed, with a foam mattress a couple of inches thick, and a wire spring. I could lift it up on one end to make more space in my bedroom, like Linda Hamilton in Terminator II doing chin-ups in the insane asylum, though this was long before that movie came out. I vaguely knew that other kids had real beds, but still hadn’t quite grasped the fact that we were poor and that’s why we didn’t have things like other people had.

From my room that day, I heard my mother’s and sister’s voices downstairs, thought I heard them say the word “boiler.” Groggy with sleep, I remained in bed, but soon got up and realized that I was alone in the house. My mother seldom went outside. The addled abacus of my mind started adding things up, and I imagined that there was something wrong with the boiler in the cellar, that it was about to explode and my mother and sister had left the house, leaving me there. I was in a panic and called my brother across town, wanting to know if anyone had heard from my mother, if they knew whether something was wrong.

It didn’t occur to me that day that my mother would never, ever leave me alone in the house if she knew there was any danger. I loved my mother and I knew that she loved me (my sister, not so much), but for some reason in that moment, I was afraid that I had been left alone to die. Those were the sort of thoughts that I had, all the more bizarre because of how specific they were. Those were the places my mind had learned to go, before puberty and the craze of hormones could be blamed for anything I thought or did.

Not long after, my mother and sister came home. I don’t remember where they had gone. I only remember the terror. Perhaps tellingly, my paranoid ideation went unremarked. In more than twenty-five years, this memory has never left me.

This is the new Sunday feature: Glimpses into my head. Be afraid. Be very afraid. But enjoy the bigger pictures.

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Spam and Eggs: Thirty-Fifth Course

by CMcL on October 1, 2011 at 8:04 PM
Spam and Eggs: Thirty-Fifth Course

Spam and Eggs is a weekly collection of some of the poorly-disguised sales pitches my little site collects.

Comment: “Thank you, this is the worst thing I’ve read” — Re: Spam and Eggs: Thirty-Third Course

You’re…welcome?

Comment: “You couldnt be more correct” — Re: Tales of the BossLady: And They Say I’m Oversensitive (cont’d)

Thanks, I feel vindicated now. You hear that, BossLady? Random Internet Person says I was right!

Comment: “You’r exactly correct on this blog” — Re: Tales of the BossLady: Bliss, Ignorance

I know, right? BossLady and her kooky notions, man, what a trip. What? No, thanks I don’t need any Irish satellite whatever-you’re-selling. But that BossLady, what a nut, right?

Comment: “You’re quite correct with this piece” — Re: Tales of the BossLady: Bliss, Ignorance

I heard you the first two times.

Comment: “I am not new to blogging and really value your blog. There is much prime subject that peaks my interest. I am going to bookmark your blog and keep checking you out. Wish you good luck.” — Re: Good Dog

I bow in the presence of a Master Blogger.

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Spam and Eggs: Thirty-First Course

by CMcL on September 3, 2011 at 10:14 PM
Spam and Eggs: Thirty-First Course

Spam and Eggs is a weekly hodgepodge of some of the doofy spam and occasional insult comments I get here.

Comment: “You my friend are a genius” — Re: Tales of the BossLady: Uneventful Exposition

You, my friend, are mistaken.

Comment: “Hello There. I found your blog using msn. This is an extremely well written article. I will make sure to bookmark it and return to read more of your useful information. Thanks for the post. I’ll definitely comeback.” — Re: Spam and Eggs: Intermission

You do realize that not only is there no article, there’s not even any content on that page because I was fresh out of spam that day, right?

Comment: “LOL, Are you serious?” — Re: Outta Here

Holy crap, it’s Harold Perrineau, you guys! Harold Perrineau commenting on my site! I can tell it’s really him because he linked back to his Wikipedia entry in the comment form! Harold Perrineau!

Comment: “Some time ago, I did need to buy a good car for my firm but I did not earn enough cash and couldn’t buy something. Thank heaven my sister suggested to get the loan at reliable creditors. Thence, I did so and was satisfied with my short term loan.” — Re: About/FAQ

Thanks for sharing.

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See a Dolphin

by CMcL on May 4, 2011 at 9:51 AM
Pay no attention to the headless dog, you should be lookin' for dolphins.

Pay no attention to the headless dog, you should be lookin’ for dolphins.

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Tales of the BossLady: “Who’s On First” in the New Millennium

by CMcL on March 13, 2011 at 1:00 AM
Tales of the BossLady:

Tales of the BossLady are tales of a BossLady I once had several years ago. She and her boyfriend were Realtors, and I was their long-suffering assistant. I no longer suffer, but I kept the tales knowing that I would one day share them with the world.

So recently, BossLady’s been all hot to order some cheap signs from the Internet to put on our listed properties. Something eye-catching that would be visible as people drive by, with our Web address and a special phone number so people can call and get information about individual properties, rather than “bothering” BossMan by calling him directly. She eventually ordered the special toll-free phone system, and she asked me to design a sign. BossMan didn’t care for my original design, so BossLady played around with it on her own, but ultimately she decided that my design was best after all (I kept telling her that yellow and black produces the most visible combination), so she wanted to go ahead with ordering the sign. We had a bit of a snafu going on where I wasn’t finished creating it before she was leaving for a weeklong convention, so she had to call me from the road to give me final ordering instructions for the sign.

It should have been fairly simple, and it started out simply enough: “One hundred signs, double-sided, one color, black text on yellow [unintelligible word]…” I interrupted to ask what that last word was.

And thus began the game. (This is another one of those situations where BossLady gets on a train of thought that’s headed for Seattle when you’re desperately trying to tell her she needs to be on the train to Syracuse.)

Me: “I’m sorry, wait, what was that last thing? Yellow what?”

BossLady: “The sign is yellow, with black text.”

“I know what the colors are, but what was that last thing you said?”

“They have the ability to print black on a yellow sign.”

“I understand about the colors, but what was that word you said, ‘Black text on yellow…something?’”

“The sign is yellow and the text is black.”

“I understand about the colors, but was that something important, ‘Black text on yellow something?’”

“The way it works is, it’s only one color because the background is already yellow, and the text is black.”

“I understand about the colors, but was that ‘yellow something something’ something important?”

“Okay, we’d better start over. One hundred signs, double-sided, one color with black text. And order one hundred H-wires.”

At this point, I gave up. I was trying to find out if it was “yellow plasticboard” or “yellow cardboard” or something, since it did sound kinda like “yellow something-board.” I was so irritated that I was repeating over and over, “I understand about the colors,” and yet she kept talking about the colors as if I was some retard who couldn’t comprehend that the sign was black on yellow. We ordered the sign, and if it shows up on cardboard that washes out after one rain, serves her right for being a moron. Gah.

I realize now, as I write this, that I could have come up with a better question, something like, “What material is the sign printed on?” But see, in my admittedly tiny little universe, when you ask someone what they just said, or, “What was that last word,” they tell you what they just said because they have the mental capacity to remember what they just said two seconds ago.

Things like this make me irrationally angry, because of the attendant “you’re not too smart, are you?” attitude that BossLady often projects when she’s being especially thick. I know, in my heart of hearts, that it really comes from a deep-seated insecurity on her part, but it still irritates me beyond belief when it happens.

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Funny

by CMcL on March 9, 2011 at 1:00 AM
Some people don't appreciate the humor in my woodland adventures.

Some people don’t appreciate the humor in my woodland adventures.

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