January 2024 – Stained Glass Butterfly

Stagnant

It seems like the older I get, the faster time is flying by. It would be dangerous to settle complacently into a corner and get too comfortable. Before I know it, days turn into months, then years, in the blink of an eye. If I don’t remain actively aware of it, what will ever change?

For better or worse, I have a shockingly stark example of what could happen if I never change.

When I first met my husband over 17 years ago, I was also unfortunately faced with his pestilent ex, Psycho. I attempted once — only once — to have a rational conversation with her about being civil for the sake of the kids. Her response was so execrable that it left no doubt that sense and sanity would never have a place in any interactions with her.

But people learn and change, right? Well, ideally, yes, they do. Seventeen years later, however, not one septic thought or action of Psycho’s has changed even the slightest. Still ragingly jealous. Still pathologically obsessed. Still no hesitation to gluttonously cannibalize the kids to placate her hollow ego. Same tirades, same games, same silly lies on repeat, stunted and stale and predictable.

Seventeen years have passed, one day at a time, and Psycho is content to be exactly the same as she was back then. No improvement, no learning, not one single step forward, and a mortifying lack of pride, class, or self-awareness to even be properly embarrassed by that.

It used to drive me crazy. Surely, someday, she must change, because how could anyone remain gratified with being nothing but trash with a pulse?

One major thing has changed, but on my part, not hers. I finally made myself accept that it wasn’t a temporary flaw or a momentary blunder of hers. It is exactly who she is at heart, and I don’t need to understand it. In fact, I prefer that I never do. It’s simply not worth the time or energy to ponder her countless shortcomings when she will remain precisely the same years from now, decades from now, at best garnering some charitable pity here and there, but never respect or admiration or genuine affection. The nothing she is today is the same nothing she will be the day she dries up and withers away.

What about me? I can’t believe it’s been over 17 years already since I met my husband. Psycho is the only scenery standing still. Everything and everyone else is racing by, changing on fast forward. The kids are no longer small. This spring will be the last high school graduation for us. The oldest child is now married. My husband and I, once just friends nervously getting to know each other, are also married, with our own home, building memories and making plans and looking forward to our future together, and I can’t imagine life without him at my side.

In the same time period, what has Psycho done? Well…nothing. She chose to root herself long ago in bitterness, jealousy, and hatred, and each passing year buries her even deeper in her self-dug crypt. Still wholly supported by her father’s handouts well into her 50s, still destroying every relationship she touches. She denies reality by self-servingly patting herself on the back, calling herself an independent woman, filtering her pictures with a heavier (and more obvious) hand with each passing year, and shoveling more and more absurd lies to whitewash her meaningless life instead of attempting any real growth or advancement.

Psycho wears the foulness of her inside in the lines, sags, and folds of her outside. There is no light, or kindness, or goodness to soften the harshness of her decline. It’s more than merely aging: it’s stagnancy, putrefying from the inside out. It’s the opposite of living.

Time is supposed to bring change. It’s part of life. The flipping of calendar pages should bring evolution, adaptation, development. Stagnancy is unhealthy and crippling, a sure sign that something is malfunctioning. It’s a brightly blazing check engine light, a red flag a mile wide.

It scares me to look back and realize how quickly time has slipped by already. It’s like watching the road streak by from a speeding car. The only guarantee is that it’s going to keep rushing by, whether I’m ready or not.

I still have some control over my destination. I know two things for sure: what I want to drive toward, and what I want to steer clear from.

I want to drive my life toward: love. Peace. Happiness. Honesty. Clarity. As close to my husband as I can get, making sure he never doubts how much I adore him and cherish him in my life. Contributing to the world around me, teaching as I learn, appreciating the beauty in the most simple things around me, and discovering more about myself and the world as I try new things.

I want to be sure that stagnancy stays far, far in the rearview mirror. I don’t understand being satisfied with a gangrenous soul or rotted psyche, but there is freedom in no longer attempting to understand. It’s not my burden to fathom anyone’s poor life choices.

I have far more important things to concentrate on, like fully and truly living my life, holding onto the light and love of each day, enjoying many more adventures with my husband, laughing as much as possible, helping whenever I can, feeling and savoring and experiencing every single thing that life has to offer me, and making sure I don’t miss the lesson or blessing between every beautiful sunrise and sunset of the rest of my days.

Protected: For My Birthday…

The House in the Magazine

When I was a teenager, I fell into a Victorian phase and never fully recovered. I loved long dresses, lace collars, velvet, wicker furniture, vintage jewelry. I discovered Victoria magazine in high school, and I swear I had every single issue until I graduated.

One particular issue sat on the desk in my bedroom for a long time. Turning the pages one day, I came across the most adorable little Victorian cottage, white with black shutters, with steps up to the front door and an American flag proudly flying from a porch post. Circling the yard was a beautiful white picket fence with a gate. Something about it struck me. It wasn’t the biggest house. It wasn’t the fanciest. But it was so unbelievably cute, so inviting, and I loved it. Every time I looked at it, I vowed I would live in a house like that someday.

I kept that magazine and enjoyed turning the pages over and over again, looking at the same pictures but still finding happiness in the beauty and femininity on the glossy pages. I would tilt back in my desk chair and prop my feet on the edge of my desk (something my mother would walk by and yell at me to stop doing because I was certain to crash backwards and split my thick skull open like a hardboiled egg).

At some point while leaving for college, shuffling back and forth, then moving out completely, I lost track of that magazine. I imagine it got thrown away. I still flip through Victoria magazine at bookstores, and I never forgot the picture of that little Victorian house that I adored so much.

Something got me to thinking about it more than usual lately. I decided I wanted a copy of that magazine with the house in it, but there was a problem: I didn’t know what issue it was. I didn’t remember what year, or even what the cover looked like. I clearly remembered the picture of that house, but not much more.

I started with Victoria magazine’s website, but their past issues only go back ten years, and my high school days were just a tiny smidgen past ten years ago (*ahem*). I tried eBay next and was pleased to see so many people selling old copies of Victoria, but again, I didn’t know which specific issue I was looking for.

Well, let’s see…I know what years I was in high school, so I narrowed it down to that. It was still a lot of issues, and while I recognized some of the covers, I had no idea which one was the right one.

I was just about to give up when one particular cover seemed to ask me to look closer. It looked just a little bit more familiar than the others. Luckily, the seller had opened the magazine and taken pictures of a few of the pages inside. About three or pictures down in the item description, there it was: the page with my adorable Victorian cottage at the top.

I couldn’t believe I had found it. I couldn’t race to the checkout fast enough, as if a stampede of people were waving fistfuls of cash to land that decades-old copy of a magazine (not likely).

Yesterday, it arrived in the mail. I sat down on the couch and carefully opened the magazine, not wanting to damage it, and gently turned the pages until I found it:

Isn’t it just the cutest thing? I still love it. I showed the picture to my husband, and he liked it, too.

It was so odd, holding that magazine again, looking at that picture again, just like I did over 30 years ago. I felt like I should have permed hair and frosted pink lipstick, Def Leppard blaring from my cassette player, with my feet kicked up on the edge of my desk in my old bedroom, dreaming about someday.

I thought about the house I now share with my husband, my best friend. And then, with a smile, it struck me: our house isn’t the biggest house. It isn’t the fanciest. But it is so unbelievably cute, so inviting, and we love it.

I had promised myself I would someday live in house that I love –and I do. I hadn’t pictured the husband part as a teenager, though. I suppose he is just a lucky (and very happy) bonus!

I am Ready

When I look at blog posts from years ago, I can’t help but notice the stark difference in my writing style. My older posts are much more open, candid. I wrote about anything and everything, and I didn’t hold back expressing how I felt about anything.

I don’t like that I slowly started to censor myself. Any form of silencing myself is very unappealing to me.

One topic I have been avoiding was deliberate, though.

Before my mom was taken to the hospital last fall, I was sooooo close to my goal weight. Tantalizingly close. So close I could already taste victory. I loved how I felt and how I looked, and the frequent compliments were certainly nice, too.

Worry, stress, endless phone calls with doctors and nurses, crack-of-dawn flights, and weekends at a hospital over 900 miles away were a dangerous recipe for inevitable exhaustion, both physical and mental. In the few moments I would have even been able to work out, it was by far the last thing on my mind.

Then, when she passed away, I gave up completely. I didn’t care what I ate. I didn’t give a damn about working out. I felt my clothes getting tighter, but I just shrugged, got bigger pants, and kept on. I didn’t like it, not even a little bit, but I also was nowhere near ready to face it or do anything about it yet.

I have been embarrassed by my weight gain. I have pondered using my blog to restart my get-healthy efforts, then repeatedly shied away from it. In reality, how damn silly is that? A 50+ pound weight gain is pretty obvious! People notice whether I talk about it or not.

So…let’s talk about it.

I found myself finally getting angry recently, but not about gaining the weight. I was getting pissed about putting myself down for it. My mother died, and I gained weight. Jeez, aren’t there worse things I could have done? All the horrible things people do to each other every day, without remorse, and here I am, kicking myself all over the place for a number on a scale. It’s time to put this where it belongs: something I need to address, for my own health and happiness, but certainly not something to continue to punish and berate myself about endlessly, which has done nothing but delay my willingness or motivation to start working on it.

A few comments on some of my posts reminded me that I am not the only one facing this struggle, and likely not the only one who could use a few blogging buddies in the same corner. Sharing my journey (yeah, I know “journey” is an overused word, but it feels right for this) might help more than me. Who knows, maybe I can inspire and motivate someone else to take better care of themselves, too. Maybe sharing my battles will help others see they are not alone in theirs.

Avoiding the topic has also let me avoid taking action, but doing nothing is just no longer acceptable. It’s not who I am. Giving up is not what I do.

I’ve had a nice, long break, but now it’s time to focus on my health and well-being and happiness. And it’s definitely time to stop punishing myself for grieving my mother and temporarily losing my way. Time to stop doubting myself. Time to stop feeling embarrassed for simply being human. Time to remember just who I am and what I can do when I am finally ready.