Focusing Inward

Today is a weird day, I am alone in the house, have been since about 10 P.M. last night. I cannot remember the last time that happened.

It has been a very lazy day so far. I stayed up way way late last night, or really this morning, enjoying the opportunity I had to write, to visit with some friends online. It was wonderful, not having to shrink my blog page all the time. Which is usually the case, always having someone walk in on me, and some of my writings....and I am just not quite ready for my children to read those......and I really somehow doubt they are too :) ( I mean what kid wants to know their mother's sexual fantasies, god wouldn't that be a major eewww!)

Sometimes I have this very small, wee little wish that my husband could read what I have written, would he then realize that he is married to a pretty great person...if not the female equivalent of a "horn-dog"? But I also cringe at that thought, because my marriage is the most fucked up part of my life, the area in which I am so very confused, so very unready to address in the terms I know I have to....so it is best that he not know the real me, the hidden me.

My thoughts have drifted to so many places today, I am facing a birthday next weekend, and a part of me thinks I don't care, because I love what my 40's have brought to me....but another part of me...stands in front of the mirror, and I see the aging flesh that no longer has the firmness of youth, I see the lines around my eyes....luckily mostly from smiling....I was told that the other day at work...that it seemed no matter how I felt...I always had a smile for everyone. Is that my mask? My way of hiding? Most likely, it is so much easier to smile, wish the world good cheer, than let that smile be replaced with the anquish I sometimes feel.

Anyway...back to the aging thing....I have lived my life in various types of isolation since the age of 17. In the beginning it was a way to keep my love (now husband) happy, if I was isolated from everyone but him, then he felt secure in me and my love for him. I was able to maintain that for many years, in fact almost 13, then I had a daughter. Her birth broke loose my self-imposed bonds, I had to face the fears, the demons, the loss of myself.

I have very few memories of my childhood, for good reason, but what memories and feelings from childhood I have, have made me who I am today. So, even though there are days when I feel as if life can feel no worse, I still have that snall kernal of me, my soul, that knows I am OKAY, I am a good person, a loving person, I even have occasional moments of brillance, and I like all of that.

With the birth of my daughter, I made a decision, I could not live with the fear that she would suffer the tattered edges to her soul that I have lived most of my live with. I wanted her to grow into a strong, self-assured, confident, outspoken, loving, empathetic, whole woman. Even though she is only 16, she is so close to that....she has her fears, her teen-age demons, but her inner and outer beauty, her intelligence, her innate common sense have all added to what I know will be a wonderfully incredible woman someday. And even though I can only take some small credit for guiding her in that direction, I do take that credit. She is amazing, she has taught me so much, both of my children have. Those two wonderful beings are the very best thing that has or will ever happen to me in my lifetime....they are the blessings and the bliss in my life.

Today, reaching in deep to examine what I want, what I need, looking at some of my mistakes in life...the worst mistake of this past year has been my insulating myself from those two beautiful people...my inner pain has been so great at times, that I could not be available mentally to them, I had to hold back a part of me from them that I never have before, or at least I thought I did. But the great thing about these beings in my life..is that they didn't give up on me...they let me know....and let me know...and let me know...that my retreat was not allowed....that they still need me...that I am not allowed to hide from them...that it is okay if I allow them to see my pain...that it was worse for them to sense it and not understand it..than to just know....I have always wanted to be as open with them as possible, teaching them everything I could about our wonderful world, teaching them to embrace the diversity we live with daily. But somehow, I forgot that they were as strong as they are....they are vulnerable, but so am I , and they let me know that my vulnerabilty is okay, they can take it, that occasionally I am allowed to weaken, and allow them to comfort me.

So even though there are many days, when I feel my self-imposed isolation has cut me off from everyone and everything...I can look at my children...and know, just know, I am loved.

In other ways I hid from the world by losing myself in writing, reading, not even allowing current events of our world to intrude. I didn't even realize that, until a very good friend would say something about a recent world happening, and I would have no idea what he was talking about.....and it was then that I realized, in my retreat from my inner losses, I had cut myself off from the entire world. I went from a woman who had to try to at least catch the morning and evening news everyday, to a headline skimmer. I let my ability to lose focus capture me, entrap me within my own little self-imposed drama.

When we do that, become so self-absorbed that we lose sight of the world at large, things only become worse, more dreary, it feeds on itself until it can become almost a deep self-loathing depression, and for someone who already battles SAD, along with fairly overt symptoms of adult ADD, that is one thing I did not need. To have to battle the inertia of depression, I am not sure that would have been a battle I could have won. The loss of dear dear friend, also helped to wake me up, his death, his choice of death, made me look at life, his life, my life, and know that even though he pissed me off no end by taking his life....that he also left a legacy behind....and that is to fight....fight for what we need to live...to love...to be HERE...NOW.

I feel as if Iam rambling all over the place without really saying anything at all....but it has been so long since I have truly just put the words out there, without some sort of self-protection in place.

My thoughts keep returning to the age thing...in a few short years I reach 50, another one of those ages that in my youth I thought would be a milestone, a time when I would have that autonomy of soul...but it isn't the years that do that, it is the living we allow ourselves...that is what lets us find that center-being with ourselves...the MEness of being alive.

But gawd damn! I am also pissed that I allowed myself to miss so much of the things in life that I wanted, just because of a weakness of spirit.....I wanted to travel, I wanted to wake up in unusual places, doing out of the ordinary things....but instead I lived someone else's dream...oh, a portion of it was mine....especially when my children entered my life...their future well-being became my main focus for over 20 years....I took them to the one day drive places to experience our little world....but in that process I feel as if I lost chances to grow.

I face a fear that I will never have those chances now, that they are something I had within my grasp, but floated out of reach. I hope not.

I do not know what tomorrow will bring, I know what I hope it brings...but it will only come, if I do not allow the outer age of my body to stifle the inner seeking of the real me. I never want to stop seeking, I fear my fears, I fear the unknown, but I keep telling myself, that if I let it, my time will come, I will embrace more and more and more.....I will, gawddamnitalltofuckinghell, I WILL!

Since I am letting some of my anger finally take hold, I am going to say something to all the people that visit my blogs.....leave a fucking comment, even if it is a fucking, "I was fucking here today!"

It is another little thing I didn't realize, that comments mean a lot, more than I would have ever imagined....I have read so many blogs recently that the blogger decided to close down because no one commented....putting a site meter in was probably one of the worse things I have ever done, because then I check it, and see all of these visitors who stop by, and then leave, without saying anything, and it gives one the feeling that you are too fing boring to be bothered with, if that is so, then say so damnit, maybe the blog should be deleted, maybe the blog is a bunch of worthless drivel, maybe it is just a place to rant, rave, puts thoughts in type face so they are easier to examine.

I am guilty also of not commenting on occasion, but that is usually because it takes so damn long for those little haloscan comment boxes to load...there is a lot that goes wrong with blogger, but at least the comment section loads a bit faster! Sometimes I don't leave a comment because I am out of time, and plan on returning later, sometimes I don't leave a comment because whatever the blogger has written has hit me deep and hard, and I have no idea what to say...so from now on, I will write just that..."you made me think, you opened up a thought process that has me pondering..or maybe I will just say, great post, and give them a smile."