I am three days away from making a major shift in my life, even if just for a few months. At moments like these I am reminded that an occasional review of my life assists me in assessing where I've been, what patterns have shifted and what patterns may still need to shift. So over the next three days, I will take a quick life review by dividing my age into three. Review #1: birth to eighteen.
As Charles Dickens wrote in A Tale of Two Cities, "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair..."
It was more memories than you will ever want to know. It was memories of deaths, embarrassments and joys.
The big deaths? My paternal grandmother when I was six (don't remember her but remember the time around her funeral because my mother was bedridden due to menopause side effects). My 6 yr old neighbor when I was seven (he was a twin and his stitches came out after a tonsillectomy and he bled to death). I'm still a little afraid of stitches. My maternal grandmother when I was 15. I was never close to her and I felt no sadness when she died. But I felt guilty because I felt no sadness. Although my mother tried to assure me it was okay, I carried that guilt with me for several more years. It was a lesson on honoring my feelings for what they are, just feelings that come and go. My best friend's sister in a car accident when I was fifteen. The poem's my friend wrote afterwards were haunting and beautiful and helped me understand the pain and sorrow of death in a new way. Although I have become more comfortable with death, it still looms out in the future, frightening me occasionally.
Embarrassments? In first grade, when the nun forced me to eat the hotdog and I made myself throw up. I'm still not fond of hotdogs. Plus I believe this was my first big "lie." Coming in as runner-up in cheerleading tryouts. From that incident I allowed myself to feel like a runner-up for years to come. I have worked hard to clear that crazy thought from my mind and today I no longer think like a runner-up. A boy once said, "Oh yuck," when he saw me after someone tried to set us up. That incident haunted me for years, as I thought I was too ugly for boys to like me. Today, the emotion of that moment is gone but I still remember the distorted conclusions I came to at the time and feel sorrow for that young girl and her insecurities. My father's drinking. Although there is not one incident that sticks out in my mind, it was the "secret" of it that bothered me. Over the years I learned that it's the "secrets" that will kill us.
Joys? Being the flower girl in my sister's wedding, the bicycle I got for Christmas, my uncle, who lived in Japan, riding with me that next summer, the Operations game, hours and hours spent wandering the woods at our cabin, swimming in the lake, my dog and I whiling away the hours at the train trestle creek, leaving Catholic school behind, playing coronet in the band, vice president in honor society, singing with Madrigals at all the basketball games, playing Bloody Mary in South Pacific, vacations to Florida, long hours hanging with my girlfriends trying to solve the world's problems, journalism class, yearbook ad sales, moving to Florida with my parents after high school.
These are just a highlight of the inexhaustible memories tuck inside my mind. Now looking back I can see patterns I have released. The lying (I was notorious for it in elementary school) and the insecurity (staring in the mirror as a teenager and coming up wanting). One's I still need to work on? The stubbornness (still hate to admit I'm wrong) and the independence (still have trouble asking for help although I am getting better at it). My favorite pattern I want to maintain? My positive attitude for which I thank my parents. Someone once called me Pollyanna and it took me years to realize it was a compliment (although they didn't mean it that way). Now I call it Faith and relish the strength it gave me through the good, the bad and the ugly. It still does.
Tomorrow? Eighteen to Thirty six. See you then.......
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