Prayer

I said I wouldn’t but I looked back. I’ve cried wolf and now no one believes me. I don’t know what to do about that, or what to say. I’m listening and nodding and saying “I know” a lot which is not what I feel like doing, so that sucks. But I don’t know how to explain that this is just how I am. I don’t know how to sell it. I’m like a product that no one needs; impractical, costly, and not even sparkly or fun unless it’s been mixed with alcohol. I do shit that I’m not proud of. I house a lot of fear and anxiety, and some regrets. There are things that I have forgiven myself for even though what I’ve done may easily be denominated a deadly sin. It’s not because I’m wicked. It’s not because I’m uncertain. It’s because I’m a foolish, and ingenuous, creature. Because I fancy myself the Steve Jobs of brutally fucked up and addictive behaviors. I think I can revolutionize it if I can just really get to know it, like inside out. I’m the visionary, flying-by-the-seat-of-my-pants, fuck-it, free-spirit, life-is-hard type of chick. I don’t need to be rescued. I have a “Woz”, his name is God, and he’s the backbone, mastermind, keeping-shit-together-and making-magic-happen kind of dude. This is probably what all the fucked up addicts say about themselves. I know.

I understand what I’m supposed to do to make my life better and sometimes I’m actually good at doing it. But this is how I roll. Parts of my life are lived on the edge. Of reality… insanity… flip cup and beer bong alley. I have a soft spot for the person who brutally attacks me. I’m sometimes the sorta crazy chick who gets tangled with the seriously crazy people. It seems like I’m always one step away from pure madness, but I feel so obligated all the fucking time to keep everyone else’s lives looking shiny and seemingly so high and mighty that I just commit to keep going. I get lucky, and I don’t fall apart. I’m not wallowing in my exploits as if I’m a victim. I’m not that. This is an act of self-preservation. It’s so uncomfortable that it’s soothing. And it’s easier. In my experience so far, every time I’ve attempted to defrost from the bitter truth and all of it’s obscurity, a sweltering force sweeps in and burns me alive. It starts as a tingling flame, a lamplight with the tiniest hope of a genie, but soon the oil spills over and it consumes everything. So I start again at the random and the appalling. It’s damp and harsh there but I can assemble that fire from the ashes. I can control the fuck out of that blaze. Ya, I know.

It’s a terrible amount of undoing. I can’t dismantle it in a tidy black and white process. Adios motherfucker! Nope. I’m gonna take a couple of steps backwards and I’m gonna make mistakes. And I don’t expect anyone to understand. I’m experiencing it in my own way, and I truly don’t know what I’m doing. Some days I’m telling myself that I don’t care when I wake up late for work, or I look in the mirror but don’t put any makeup on, or I’ve worn the same pair of jeans every day this week. But I’m waking up, and I’m looking in the mirror, and I’m getting dressed. I have so much faith in me! I’m in a glorious trust fall with Woz and this thing we’re doing together is pretty awesome. He’s teaching me about genius-y stuff… groovy, graceful, embedded, motherboard stuff. Things that are painful but of which I’d never know if I didn’t fall backwards. I get to see many truths from this perspective, secrets that I would have skipped right over if I hadn’t exposed myself to the risk. I’m honoring the dark and ugly places that I’ve been because for me it’s a deeper, more connected, and alluring way of being alive. I’m allowing that space. It’s easy to say no to something that doesn’t exist, and then to carry the pattern forward. There’s no freedom in that. I can’t be in alignment with my own truth if some part of it isn’t brutal. This life has bent us all to our knees, but there are some who don’t surrender. Some who march and don’t retreat, some who assail but never reflect inward. It’s no bother to judge someone for their poor choice when you’re looking at the moat from the castle. But a queen is loyal and generous with the enemy even as she orders the drawbridge closed, simply because she’s the queen. She wields a sword that she plunged first into her own chest. Her assailant never had any true power.

There is an invasion of joy once she realizes this. And she does move forward. And she does reign free.