I apologize in advance for how segmented this entry may become.
"You can't control how other people behave (act, feel, react, say, etc), the only thing you can control is you and your reaction to it." This is something I stepped into last year, but it has only started to make more and more sense to me the more time I put into thinking about it. (For those of you who haven't noticed, I think a lot.) Most of my life I have spent worrying what other people think of me. How I look, the things I do, how I react to those things. I feel like eyes have always been on me in regards to how I'm raising my son, first, because I was SO young when I had him, and secondly, because I essentially have been doing it alone. I have let these things destroy relationships. My friends have always been aware of my issues, mostly because I'm pretty vocal about my own short comings to people I'm comfortable with, and it's usually a non-issue with them, but when it comes to relationships? Shoot-me-now is usually the reaction I get.
I am also extremely, acutely aware of how my parents may perceive things I do, or don't do. For 28 years I've worried about disappointing my parents. This has lead to secret keeping that was unnecessary and did nothing but eat me from the inside out. This last weekend, I sat down with my mother, and I said very plainly, "Sometimes your distaste for what I have chosen to do comes across as disappointment, and all I really want from you is your support, regardless of what I do." This was a huge step forward for me. I think my mother would say the same.
I'm not saying that I don't have to stop myself about fifty times a day, think to myself, "Sadie, now why are you worrying about that? You have no control over that. Stop it." But I have slowly been able to alter my thought process into worrying only about the things that may be changeable.
In terms of my body, I have spent the last week beating it up in ways it hasn't been beat up in a long time. Five solid days of the gym, followed by five days of walking, three days of jogging, three days of lifting and I've been sore. It's such a GOOD sore, though.
I haven't really tried to take up running in about two years. I thought pretty seriously about it this last spring, but nothing moved forward on it. Two years ago I hurt not only my knees, but my shins. This put me out of commission for longer than I would have liked, and when I was able to try running again I was terrified. Subtract sixty pounds, and today I'm running again. I can feel in my body the difference. My foot strike is what it should be, my knees are bending the way the need to be, my body is propelling me forward. My legs and knees and ankles are strong, and I feel all of that. I feel good after I get done running, when before I would feel exhausted and sore. I can pace myself. Short bursts of an 8 minute mile? Yes, please!
This last week, I had to break someone's heart. In the same breath, an old flame and I have reconnected. I'm apprehensive to write too much about it just yet, since pretty much all it is, is talking. But we have opened doors that hadn't been opened when we were together, through all of that talking. There are things that need to be put back together, things inside of me (and I'm sure him, too) that need to heal, but for now it just feels good to have my friend back.
On a side note, due to some issues with my previous birth control, I had that changed a little over a month ago. Hormones are crazy fucking things. I think my new outlook has a lot to do with some sort of chemical imbalance that was going on inside of me. Acne, gone. Breast tenderness (and I'm not talking a couple of days, but for three weeks a month, EVERY month), gone. Crazy, hypersensitive, bitchy, snappy Sadie, gone. Let's hope it stays that way.
A new year, a new outlook, a new chance at everything I could have ever hoped for. Now to roll back my sleeves, and do the hard work.
The following poem was something my good friend Clare posted on her facebook wall yesterday. It is so perfect, and exactly what I needed to read.
"Regret nothing. Not the cruel novels you read
to the end just to find out who killed the cook.
Not the insipid movies that made you cry in the dark,
in spite of your intelligence, your sophistication.
Not the lover you left quivering in a hotel parking lot,
the one you beat to the punchline, the door, or the one
who left you in your red dress and shoes, the ones
that crimped your toes, don’t regret those.
Not the nights you called god names and cursed
your mother, sunk like a dog in the living room couch,
chewing your nails and crushed by loneliness.
You were meant to inhale those smoky nights
over a bottle of flat beer, to sweep stuck onion rings
across the dirty restaurant floor, to wear the frayed
coat with its loose buttons, its pockets full of struck matches.
You’ve walked those streets a thousand times and still
you end up here. Regret none of it, not one
of the wasted days you wanted to know nothing,
when the lights from the carnival rides
were the only stars you believed in, loving them
for their uselessness, not wanting to be saved.
You’ve traveled this far on the back of every mistake,
ridden in dark-eyed and morose but calm as a house
after the TV set has been pitched out the upstairs
window. Harmless as a broken ax. Emptied
of expectation. Relax. Don’t bother remembering
any of it. Let’s stop here, under the lit sign
on the corner, and watch all the people walk by."
-Antilamentation | Dorianne Laux
