21st Birthday

I had gone to ROTC basic training camp for 4 weeks in the summer when I was 20. It was grueling and character building and I copped out of a few things and carried the guilt around for a long time. Still, looking back, I have a lot to be proud of, but it’s my nature to focus on the negative aspect and never look at the positive. I had no freedom those 4 weeks and was so happy to be home. It was my 21st birthday. My parents were going to take me to the Country Club for dinner and my mom wanted me to wear a dress. I didn’t want to wear a dress, and she was insisting on it. I remember the frustration I felt as I sat there saying I didn’t want to wear a dress. And really, who’s birthday was it, anyway? She was always more concerned about how I looked...how I made her look, to her friends and others. That’s got to be what that was about. I exploded. I lunged from my chair and cleared a shelf, throwing books and knick-knacks onto the floor as I screamed, “Help me!!” My Dad, feeling helpless, walked over to me and threw his soda in my face and said, “Help yourself.” I guess he thought he was showing me tough love. It was so pitiful. I ran out of the house and sat between carports for a while.

When I came back in I went straight to my room and sat on the floor. My Dad came in and sat on the floor next to me. That was a first. He comforted me in a way I had never experienced with him. But my Mom never came in, nor did she apologize. We never talked about it and I don’t even remember if we went to the Club for dinner or what I ended up doing for my 21st birthday.

Square Peg, Round Hole

I don't have memories of my Mom cuddling with me or reading to me before bed. I think that she probably did on occasion but i don't have any clarity about it. Sometimes I think that's strange because I was her first girl after five boys, and being such a feminine women, you'd think that she would have smothered me with motherness.

She enrolled me in ballet class. It was there I experienced my first humiliation. "How come you're the only one here who's fat?" At the time, I had prepubescent chub, I wasn't fat. But I didn't know it.

I just remember she had me in different classes at community centers and such. I always felt painfully shy and incapable of doing what the other kids were doing. They were so outgoing and energetic. My mom said I shouldn't be a quitter. So I always felt like one.

For some reason, shopping was the main source of our difficulty, and we always fought when we shopped. It was also the thing we always wanted to do together. Weird. Who can explain it. I would see something I liked, and she would say, "Where are you going to wear that?" Why did I have to have a time and place in order to buy it? She always questioned my choices. My taste. I never really developed it because she head it off at the pass. It was the expectations that done her in. I think she had an idea of me. What she wanted me to be, what she thought having a daughter would or should be, and we weren't or I wasn't. Why aren't you? Why can't you? Where are you going to wear a thing like that? I DON'T KNOW BUT I LIKE IT!!! Isn't that enough?

She made me so angry once I tried to think of how I could really hurt her back. So I took some of her favorite things and hid them. It just tears my heart now to remember. But I wanted her to know how badly, deeply she had affected me. When it all came out, she was mad at me, but I don’t think she ever understood why I did such a thing.

One time I was so angry I screamed at her, “You want me to just off myself? Is that it?” That’s got to be one of the worst things a kid can say to their parent. And I was in college. Not a lost pre-teen or high schooler. That had to scare her. I was always trying to shock, to say the worst thing, to demonstrate my pain and frustration.

My whole adolescence felt like a big WHY CAN’T YOU?! or WHY AREN’T YOU?!

My New Blog Site

Ok. Here is my new blogsite. And here is my first blog. I've spent the better part of my Saturday trying to figure all of its ins and outs. I hope you enjoy visiting me here. I like it better than the one my web space came with. Ick. Here you can post a comment. And please do.

FYI: My profile at right has the same text as my Helen's Girl blog profile. This is a temporary problem that I hope will be solved soon. It is describing my Helen's Girl blog, not Maryland. The photo is also not for Maryland.

Ok. I just checked it and now it's fine. It goes back and forth. If it has a "thought for today," it's correct. And if it's a picture of me with a cigarette and newspaper at a young age, it's correct. It's a glitch. But it's not Glinda, the good Glitch.

Prodigal Martha

My last blog (really just a matter of minutes ago) was a downer, huh? I am afraid of letting people (especially family) see me feeling weak. But my life is an open book and that's just how it is. How else are they going to know me? (Not that they read this anyway). These lyrics from a Kate Miner song are new and so for me at this moment:

Let me say again that I need you
Let me say again that I'm thankful for You
Every breath I have is Yours, do what You will
Now say again that You love me
Say again that You're so proud of me
Tell me You'll never leave me alone
How will I know it's You?
Will I recognize Your face?
It's been so long since I've sat at Your feet
Will You recognize me?

Thursday's Child

Sometimes life is so hard. I know. Everyone knows this. It's no revelation, but I don't mean for it to be. I got an e-mail today from missionary friends who have been studying bible languages in France and are just now moving to Africa (their dream) to witness to people in languages never before witnessed in. They've been married three years and just had a perfect baby girl, who has a head full of bright, red hair. It makes me wonder again, if I'm doing something wrong. They have degrees, and masters, and a child. They're living their dream. My throat tightened up.

I am trying to move forward: this web site, my writing, finally putting it out there, looking into publication. I'm painting, scheduling rest. Not white-knuckled when I drive now. I am growing. But it still feels like life is passing me by. Like I'm being left behind. I've no one to influence. No one to raise. My family is older and has no need for me (as if they ever did). Ah yes, woe is me. Poor little sister. I know. I hear it. But this is a blog, and I am blogging. I do remember that day, the second blog called "Hope." I don't disbelieve it. But the Enemy knows where to poke me. And it hurts. I won't fall. It just hurts.

God's Nature

Something in nature compels me. It must be God. It’s His nature to compel. When I am anywhere in the midst of the natural beauty in this world, I breathe deep breaths that cause my muscles to unclench and my mind to free itself. I know this is not a new discovery, but for me, it is a miracle.

A few years ago, I was suffering with panic attacks. I was actually having them while I slept. That was the year we went to Yosemite. And it is that experience I’m referring to when I say that camping saved my life. I don’t know how I blew past so much during my life, but I am so happy now to be fully awake to it. I have for so long pined to travel to other countries. I’ve had several friends this summer travel to Europe. One went to Spain, the other Ireland. We went to Big Sur. Big deal. Yes, it was. In the middle of it, I lost all envy for the European travelers, because I too was in the beauty of God’s very nature. I was speechless standing in fields of wildflowers overlooking the dramatic jagged coast. I could sit for hours staring into the eternity of the ocean, its size somehow larger there. I awoke every morning tucked inside a forest of redwoods. Peace settled in my heart and I experienced a stillness that I find impossible in my daily life. I cry out to God. I can’t hear Him. I pray and my mind wanders. After a week of observing Him in His very essence, I am still. My mind, clear.

Sleepyheadface

That's what my husband calls me. It's what I am. See the picture here? That's me at about five years old, I think. It's how I look now every morning. Much, much older of course, but that's me. Every morning. Pulling myself from bed like warm taffy from its wrapper on a hot day.