Monday, August 8, 2016

Never Imagined

Life has a way of taking you on a journey. You set your course and plod away and before you know it the paths twist and turn. Some will merge others will go in an entirely different direction. It is important to stay focused on what's before you. Hold your memories tight in your heart, but don't let the broken dreams or past heartaches snag you in their branches.

The possibilities of what could or could not happen are endless. You hold the decision making tool in your hands. When standing at the edge of dark forest, or endless cornfield, it is up to you whether or not you enter. But fate may play a hand or two on what you will encounter.

One day you will wake up and realize that you are no where near where you thought you might be. The people around you have most likely changed numerous times along the way. Look up and thank God that you are where you are. Why? That is exactly where you need to be.

Over the years my life has changed direction many different times. From childhoods angst and darkness, shrouded in confusion and lack of true guidance I gained a hardened heart. Into young adulthood and supposed true love and selfishness I found myself at the edge of freedom's vast meadow. Through wild grasses blowing against my face as a warm breeze blows. The taste for alcohol acquired and desired.

A pregnancy at a time when wild oats were still being sown. Heartache, shame, anger, and hatred are boiling emotions deep within my soul. This journey would begin at the bottom of a mountain and lead me up into the snowy peaks of frozen hopes and dreams. Down into warmer valleys that would flood from never ending rain leaving me to find a way through roiling water and mud. The debris around me swirling and leading me down a darker path.

When at the bottom I look up and see the blue sky and know that for a time I may have found my rainbows end. Where once I was shiftless and belonging nowhere I now had a permanent address that was MINE. My child's laughter would ring through the halls. The yard forever a mess of toys and dogs. My Mother's issues and my desire to improve clashing like cold and hot air. Thunderclouds rolling above and below. And still this child hyper as can be could often find happiness everywhere.

Not to last as he grew older he became more sullen. Medication turning him into a strange being who didn't want to eat or sleep at normal times. Now his anger was competing with the adults. This house that he called home. This house that he knew was his.

Change.

In a moment's notice it all changed.

His world went from perceived normal to a new reality. A man has moved in and a baby is to come. Wedding bells and new rules and stipulations. How to fit in, how to get through the webs of confusion. Crying mother and frustrated step father. A new baby is here and what to do with him. He is different and in a hospital and when he comes home chaos rules.

Suddenly everything is about that baby.

What about me? The son? The one who came first, the one you swore would always be your only baby? And now suddenly this house you promised me. The car that you said would be mine at sixteen.

Nothing is mine.

Not even my own mother. A stranger living inside of her body. Her laughter is forced. Her smiles are rare. Her stress radiates through the house like a minefield. No one knows their place only that treading lightly is the way to go.

And now the house is for sale. It will belong to none of us.

And the son's place will be lost for sure. His angry father lashing out to him about his mother.

He is torn between a world of normalcy and kindness, manners and thoughtfulness. And one much darker where it is everyone for themselves, racism and chauvinism.

Many moments he knows not who to love. His father who tries to make him realize what an awful uncaring mother he has. Or his mother who tries too hard to remain neutral.

Chaos.

That is the new reality.

As the house that once promised stability and a future is put on the market ready to be sold.

Chaos that could never have been imagined.

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