ON A DIME: The skies were building in direct proportion to my level of anxiety at the impending weekend away. Anxiety: it was a word I’d become accustomed to hearing. ‘Do you know why you’re so anxious?’ my counselor asked me on a regular basis, to which I wanted to scream, ‘If I knew why, I would not be spending such exorbitant amounts on coming here.’ I threw my eyes to the heavens; heavens that now resembled an abused woman’s body—bruised, angry, purple... the clouds building to a crescendo before bursting like erupting blood vessels across the sky. I decided to wait until the contused sky began to heal. As with all bruises, I knew they would eventually turn to a yellowish brown before fading into oblivion. I let go of a long sigh. My release felt good, cathartic. No one ever understood my apprehension, nervousness, when a significant event was about to take place. No one. Not my husband of twenty years, not my friends, not my kids, and certainly not my mother. ‘If only you’d had to go through what I have had to in my life. Perhaps then I could understand your changing moods. With what your father put me through, it’s a wonder I’m alive.’ But you are, I often thought. Alive and kicking, that is; operating on a functional level. As opposed to me, a woman always in stress. Always nervous—a mouse desperate to grab the baited cheese, but smart enough to know that to win the prize on offer I would need to accept a crushing defeat of myself. Dramatic—that’s how they described me: my parents, siblings and partners—a drama queen, one who could turn the simplest of outings into a major event. Like the one I was preparing to attend this weekend. The skies opened, and the first, fat, juicy plop of moisture landed at my feet, rapidly followed by a flash of lightning, a roll of thunder and a downpour of rain in river-like quantities. But it would soon clear. And I knew would go. I always did...
Posted on: Sun, 07 Dec 2014 07:39:03 +0000