Category: Humility

Dark Chapter

52 chapters/stories for my book…that’s how many I have written but the rape chapter is the hardest.

I started out being kind of namby-pamby about it. That’s the feedback I got from my mentor/auntie, an author I deeply respect. She said “Kathie, you have to remove the sugar coating and tell us what actually happened.”

It took many years, but I finally did what she asked, leaving out no disturbing detail. To that version, she responded with “Well, maybe not THAT detailed!”

So I am trying a completely different approach this time.

I am house-sitting for dear friends as I write this. I am in a situation I rarely put myself in…alone for days (and worse, nights) in an unfamiliar house, in a very remote setting. I did all the things that for me are normal when I am in any new place… checked out all conceivable exits…found the quickest routes away from the house, noticing fast exit dangers, like locked gates, stuff to trip over, etc.….discovered any weaknesses in normal security (windows, door locks) and tested how they all sound. And I found the best hiding places inside the house in case escape is not an option.

It’s a pain in the butt to be me.

The point of telling you this is that even though I have done a shitload of therapy and healing work on having been raped, one result remains the same. I live my life differently than most people.

Here’s the opening I wrote when my mentor requested a more “detailed version”, but I edited it in this draft to honor her feedback to not be THAT detailed….

If I do ever get this chapter on paper the way I want it, I will keep my original title.

What I want to know is would you want to read a story that starts like this???

“Being Raped”

Being Raped has to be the title of this chapter. The odd tense of the word “being” implies a current circumstance that captures the experience, as if describing a state of being rather than an action.

That’s why it’s perfect.

In an instant, an event like this can become the definition of WHO you are. There is a part of the act, the trauma, the experience that continues in your body, your psyche, your mind, and your heart…as if it is in fact, still happening right now, always in the present tense.

If you have been raped, the incident just goes on and on and on, granted less loudly with time. But for you, intrusion, in any form will shock your body right back awake, no matter how far into the back of your Secret’s Closet you’ve shoved that rape, hoping to keep it fast asleep.

This will be true for the rest of your life…no matter how much therapeutic work you do. No matter how deeply you are able to heal.

You will never not know the terror of being awakened with a knife at your throat.

You will never not remember the feeling of being held down in your own bed by two men.

And you will never forget the popping sound of a gun being fired, RIGHT BY YOUR HEAD, in the middle of this surprisingly quiet chaos… rousing the thought that though you may survive this knife, you still might end up getting shot!

All comments welcome! Thank you.

Black and White, Dark and Light

Black and White, Light and Dark

The link above is to a disclaimer I wrote back in January, expecting maybe to share more dark true stories, but only a couple thus far have insisted on being written.

I also wrote it when I only had a handful of followers. I am delighted and so surprised that I now have 142 amazing people who read what I write and who look at my photos. I feel so honored.

I love the exchanges I am having with so many of you. I feel like I am actually forming friendships, not something I really expected from blogging! (even though you told me I would, Karuna!) And it may be those friendships that are inspiring me to dig a bit deeper now in my sharing.

Anyway, I thought I would repeat the warning, you know, just in case you are not in the mood for “dark”. I can feel a couple of those stories bubbling up to the surface here soon.

If you do read them, I’d love a comment, any response, but especially if you think the story might have value for someone maybe working through something similar.

Thanks so much.

Kathie

 

“featured image” above is artwork by 10 year old Julius. A gift for the wall by my writing desk.

Song Lyric Sunday 8/14/16

The Song Lyric Sunday theme for this week was to share a song you’ve heard recently for the first time and fell in love with.  It is open to anyone who wants to share music, so please feel free to click the link, read the rules and post one of your own.

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Not sure I could say I’m in love with it but my oldest grandson likes it and it actually choked him up a bit at first! That’s more than enough of a recommendation for me. It’s from a year or so ago and I remember hearing it often on the radio for a while and thinking “white rap”, hmmm. Judged it and never listened for the lyrics.

I love all the symbolism in their video!!

It’s called  Stressed Out by 21 Pilots (Tyler Joseph)

Lyrics by https://play.google.com/music/preview/Tflgczyzw5lup64b4ksw7l4ccj4?lyrics=1&utm_source=google&utm_medium=search&utm_campaign=lyrics&pcampaignid=kp-lyrics&u=0#

I wish I found some better sounds no one’s ever heard
I wish I had a better voice that sang some better words
I wish I found some chords in an order that is new
I wish I didn’t have to rhyme every time I sang

I was told when I get older all my fears would shrink
But now I’m insecure and I care what people think

My name’s Blurryface and I care what you think
My name’s Blurryface and I care what you think

Wish we could turn back time, to the good old days
When our momma sang us to sleep but now we’re stressed out
Wish we could turn back time, to the good old days
When our momma sang us to sleep but now we’re stressed out

We’re stressed out

Sometimes a certain smell will take me back to when I was young
How come I’m never able to identify where it’s coming from
I’d make a candle out of it if I ever found it
Try to sell it, never sell out of it, I’d probably only sell one

It’d be to my brother, ’cause we have the same nose
Same clothes homegrown a stone’s throw from a creek we used to roam
But it would remind us of when nothing really mattered
Out of student loans and tree-house homes we all would take the latter

My name’s Blurryface and I care what you think
My name’s Blurryface and I care what you think

Wish we could turn back time, to the good old days
When our momma sang us to sleep but now we’re stressed out
Wish we could turn back time, to the good old days
When our momma sang us to sleep but now we’re stressed out

We used to play pretend, give each other different names
We would build a rocket ship and then we’d fly it far away
Used to dream of outer space but now they’re laughing at our face
Saying, “Wake up, you need to make money”
Yeah

We used to play pretend, give each other different names
We would build a rocket ship and then we’d fly it far away
Used to dream of outer space but now they’re laughing at our face
Saying, “Wake up, you need to make money”
Yeah

Wish we could turn back time, to the good old days
When our momma sang us to sleep but now we’re stressed out
Wish we could turn back time, to the good old days
When our momma sang us to sleep but now we’re stressed out

Used to play pretend, used to play pretend, bunny
We used to play pretend, wake up, you need the money
Used to play pretend, used to play pretend, bunny
We used to play pretend, wake up, you need the money
We used to play pretend, give each other different names
We would build a rocket ship and then we’d fly it far away
Used to dream of outer space but now they’re laughing at our face
Saying, “Wake up, you need to make money”
Yeah

Hair, for Marilyn (surface, my A_ _!)

 

These are all pictures I have already posted at one time or another but Marilyn, at Serendipity recently wrote such a delightful piece on her hair,

THE SURFACE REPORT: TODAY WE ARE SHALLOW

I am choosing to respond this way.

I have never considered myself particularly pretty. I came of age in the Sixties, with a backdrop of Hair, the Musical, and CSNY defending long hair

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XWmwvT8bCw)

and we were not supposed to care about such things as physical beauty, but I secretly did anyway. (I wore nice, handmade Hippie clothes and always made sure my hair was clean and shiny before I put those flowers in it!)

HippieKathie       IMG_7364

Tail end of California Color                                       Living in the Northwest color

After some therapy (in search of my self-esteem) I was finally able to claim for myself, the descriptor “fairly attractive”….and the fact that I had great hair! It has always been too straight and obnoxiously thick, but I liked it anyway. When others were going in for cuts, straightening or perms, I’d have mine “thinned”. Oh, I tried the perms (we’re never happy with the hair we get) but those amazing waves would only last about 2 weeks. Then, having a mind of its own, my hair would spring right back to absolute curl-lessness.

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                                 80’s Big Hair Perm

I really relate to some of what Marilyn describes about the hassles of hair. I thought I would have to shave my head during menopause to avoid that hot, “Itchy blanket” feel on my neck. Pulling it all up in what she called a “scrungy elastic and fabric thingie” was the only option. And my biggest issue was where the heck to put it all when wearing my motorcycle helmet?? It simply would not fit up in there and what was left out would take hours to comb through after a ride. (Don’t even get me started on Helmet Hair!)

Oh and the whole thing of trusting another to actually cut my hair?? I’ve been with Kelly for more than 30 years and she knows she is not allowed to retire before I die!! We are great friends by now, and sometimes, I even bring my own finishing equipment if it’s a day when I want my hair a certain way. She is so great and patient, especially when she has to repair those in-between-appointments bangs cuts I try to give myself.

I can finally acknowledge that I have actually received positive attention for my hair since I was a surfer girl on the beach. In my high school annual (you know that comment they put with your senior picture?) mine was not about talent or intelligence or future success. It was about my friggin hair!

My whole life, total strangers have come up to me in stores, airports, libraries and not just commented on my hair. Sometimes they even TOUCH it!!

I actually like the attention, the compliments, the questions about where I get it cut, what shampoo I use, etc. But not so much the touching. (Hey, I have enough PTSD triggers to master. Strangers suddenly touching me is NOT OK!)

There were also debates with those complete intruders who felt the need to lecture me on my choice “at my age” not to dye! (My hair was white by 42 or so.) Or, to still wear my hair long when “really, that should be for a younger woman, don’t you think?” (f. you!!)

Anyway, now at 68 years old, when I look in a mirror, I don’t see much left of “fairly attractive”. (See my earlier post on “Time”) https://chosenperspectives.com/2016/02/11/time-warning-to-young-women-rated-r-for-terror/ )

But it has not bothered me much. The Sixties actually did teach us about much deeper and more important things than our appearance.

And besides, I still had my hair! Until recently, that is.

I haven’t felt well for almost 2 years now. All my symptoms have pointed to a thyroid problem but no one seems to be able to diagnose anything because the “numbers” haven’t matched what their specialty says they should be. So, trying to track down the cause of some pretty bothersome symptoms, I have seen a cardiologist, a pulmonologist, a dentist, rheumatologist, a gastroenterologist, and ENT, a dermatologist, a polysomnographist and two endocrinologists. (I remember the “old days”, before medicare, when I had a fantastic Internist for 35 years, who was the best detective and considered ALL systems when I had a malady!! Sigh…)

Anyway, while they are all trying to figure out (each looking only in their field) what the heck is wrong with me, my teeth, skin and hair are biting the dust. I have always shed a lot but had so much hair I never cared. Now, my eyebrows and eyelashes are completely gone, and my hair is coming out in piles! I had to give up really long hair (my favorite style) early last year but have refused to go short short as it is just not me.

But it gets thinner every day and I no longer like it. I am disgusted with myself but I feel all self-conscious (again) and am pretty depressed about the whole thing. I really did expect to like my hair until the end, wearing a long gray braid down my back, like a proper elder, looking the part of a sage, a crone.

As my self-esteem is once again plummeting, I read Marilyn’s delightful post. She wrote it for the word prompt Surface, and used the word shallow, but I found such deep relief to know I am not alone with my hair issues. Thanks Marilyn and to your commenters as well.

Then yesterday I took James to the VA Hospital for his colonoscopy.

I passed a young-ish, white haired nurse on my way to the waiting room. She stopped me, hand on my arm, and whispered “Oh yay, another beautiful white haired woman!” Then she asked if everyone tried to get me to dye it. We had a quite a sweet moment!

My first thought, in my lost hair, lowered self-esteem state? “Wow, they sure train the employees here to be nice to visitors.”

But then I had to go to the car for something and a guy driving a truck in the garage stopped, hand-rolled down the passenger side window and said “Wow, I really love your hair!”

Hmmm, maybe I’ve still got it???

 

Marilyn, if you are reading this, THANKS AGAIN!!

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Song Lyric Sunday 7-10-16

Helen Espinosa poses this challenge each Sunday…

The rules are as follows:

  • Post the lyrics to a favorite song or a new song you want to share
  • Please try to include the songwriter(s) – it’s a good idea to give credit where credit is due and it’s honestly just a simple Google search
  • Make sure you also credit the singer/band and provide a link to where you found the lyrics
  • Link to the YouTube video, or pull it into your post so others can listen to the song
  • Ping back to this post or my own Song Lyric Sunday post
  • Read at least one other person’s blog so we can all share new and fantastic music and create amazing new blogging friends in the process (Not sure how to do this one!!!)

Feel free to use the Song Lyric Sunday badge by copying it into your post or add it to your site to show you are participating.

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https://helenespinosa.wordpress.com/2016/07/10/song-lyric-sunday-blank-sheet-of-paper-by-tim-mcgraw/

This week Helen asks us to relate a “guilty pleasure”, but other than the fact that I LOVE to sing along LOUDLY with ABBA, I don’t really have any. I love almost all music, unabashedly!

I do have a song though that I feel so guilty about!! And Helen’s music choice today about a hard to express apology made me remember it immediately.

Here’s the short version of the story.

Way back in the 90’s, I had a wonderful 16 year old stepson, J.P.,who in a heartfelt attempt to connect with me, gave me a CD for Christmas. I gushed my thank you but also judged the choice of music so harshly I never even bothered to listen to it. I mean, I like music but a group called the Goo Goo Dolls, give me a break.

A few months later, he and I are riding in the car and a song comes on the radio that blows my musical mind…the lyrics, the sound, the powerful hammering guitar BRIDGE that demands top volume, all of it! I asked my step son if he knew who was singing this poignant song and Oh my God, you guessed it, it was the Goo Goo Dolls.

He just said, “this song is the reason I gave you the album…” I made the lyrics connection to his life immediately. And I learned, painfully, the meaning of the words humility and chagrined in that car.

So my song this week is “Name” by the Goo Goo Dolls. Some of the things written about John Rzeznik’s life made me think of my own, especially raising my younger sisters.

Lead singer John Rzeznik wrote this about his childhood. He sings it to his sisters who raised him; both his parents died when he was young and his father was an alcoholic. The line, “We’re grown up orphans who never knew their names” reflects his past. (thanks, Caitlin – Yardley, PA) http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=656

Here’s my song for the week, dedicated to J.P. with BIG LOVE wherever he is now!

Name by the Goo Goo Dolls

Lyrics from A to Z Lyrics 

And even though the moment passed me by
I still can’t turn away
Cuz all the dreams you never thought you’d lose
Got tossed along the way
And letters that you never meant to send
Got lost or thrown away

And now we’re grown up orphans
And never knew their names
We don’t belong to no one
That’s a shame
But you could hide beside me
Maybe for a while
And I won’t tell no one your name
And I won’t tell ’em your name

And scars are souvenirs you never lose
The past is never far
Did you lose yourself somewhere out there?
Did you get to be a star?
And don’t it make you sad to know that life
Is more than who we are

We grew up way too fast
And now there’s nothing to believe
And reruns all become our history
A tired song keeps playing on a tired radio
And I won’t tell no one your name
And I won’t tell ’em your name
I won’t tell em’ your name
Oooh, oooh, oooh
I won’t tell em’ your name
Ow!

I think about you all the time
But I don’t need the same
It’s lonely where you are
Come back down
And I won’t tell ’em your name

 

 

found a couple of interesting covers also.

Happy Father’s Day to my Son

 

The Reward

“You can’t trust kids; they’ll grow up while your back is turned.”    Teresa Bloomingdale
Ever witness something so beautiful, it hurts. Ever come across a scene that freezes you in your tracks and makes you wish fervently that you had a camera with you, or the talent of a poet so you could really convey what you are seeing to others.

Ever see or hear something you are desperate to share with others only to realize that it might actually be happening just for you.

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Ever feel that tidal wave of gratitude when you realize you are finally being rewarded for your endless, sometimes heartbreaking work all those years as a parent?

I have.

After my precious two year old grandson, JuJu, had been terribly sick for days, his parents asked me if I could come and sit with him while they went to an afternoon movie for a much needed break.

I spit out an unqualified YES before they finished verbalizing the request.

My grandson Julius and I are seriously bonded. I would do anything for him. I am fueled by a shameless, unconditional love over which I am completely powerless. I consider my life exceptional in the sheer number of opportunities I have been given to love deeply but no one could have prepared me for the quality and quantity of this affection and protection I feel toward him.

 

I am not that grandparent who enjoys spoiling the grand kids but am relieved to send them home. (This might be a little bit about being a mom who had to raise a son alone, riddled with guilt while working three jobs and going to school, but getting a second chance to “do it right” with her grandsons.)

Because of proximity, I have been given the profound honor of participating in the lives of my grandsons daily. Like an old-fashioned extended family tradition, (at the time of this writing) they live directly across the street.

Reactions to our family’s living circumstance range from dismay at the imagined expectation of responsibility, to blatant and petulant jealousy at my fortunate nearness to my grandchildren….this latter being primarily (and naturally) from Julius and Luca’s other grandparents.

For us, it just plain works. We all seem to love it and benefit from it. I was raised myself, without any extended family in the picture, but in what might be described as the forerunner to the 1960’s commune type of life. Created Family. My Mom adopted stray kids right and left like others adopt cats.  And, after some of my teens and early twenties were spent in actual communes, I continued a form of that tradition with my son, always sharing our uniquely configured house, with at least two or three people, often other single parents struggling to raise children of various ages. Over the years, we would start out calling them “renters” but before long each new group became like family.

I have always believed “It takes a Village”….

Anyway, on this particular day, an extremely ill JuJu had awakened from his third or fourth nap of the day, but this time he was pulled from the relief of sleep because he had one of those sick-kid, diarrhea blowouts that required not only a diaper change but an entire load of laundry to clean up. After taking him into the shower to remove his clothes and to, in essence, hose him down, Michael had dressed Julius in fresh PJs and was drying his hair with a towel. Julius had been the kind of sick that has you achy all over, writhing and stretching for some kind, any kind of relief. Poor baby had not been able to lie still or stop whimpering for days, except during his frequent, fevered naps.

So, unnoticed by either of them I enter the bedroom and see the following scene. Michael and Julius are on the bed with Juju’s tiny limp legs draped over his father’s so that they are two overlapping bodies. This Dad is leaning close to his boy and whispering something over and over that I can’t make out. All the while Dad is ever so slowly and gently rubbing, fluffing and massaging Julius’s long and curly wet hair with a big fluffy towel. He does this well after JuJu’s hair is dry. It is obvious that Michael is continuing because Julius is finally quiet, so relaxed, completely mesmerized by this gentle, nurturing gesture from his “DaDa”.

Julius, already a gorgeous child, has the lovely, peaceful face of an angel. He never takes his eyes from his Daddy’s.

I can remember the exact sensation of a dangerously hot-faced little boy’s cheek next to my own. I know, in the muscle-memory of my arms, if I were to pick up this tiny boy right now he would be a noodle…like sleeping-baby dead weight. He is so tranquil and blissfully pain free for the first time in days.

This father/son love scene continues for a very, very long time…..until Julius drifts off to sleep again. I take over so his Mom and Dad can get out for a bit. It’s been a long week.

Skip ahead to later that evening. I go back across the street to check on Michael and the patient. Juju’s fever has broken and he is on the mend.

As I am leaving, though I don’t want to intrude or embarrass my son, I tell him what I saw earlier in the day. I tell him how beautiful it was to spy on such profound father/son love. I apologize to him for my part in his never having had a father to do this for him when he was a child. I thank Michael for being the Dad I always knew he would be but that no one else would have ever believed.

He gently took me by the shoulders, looked into my eyes and said (with that slightly impatient tone of his that says duhhh), “Mom. I’m just doing for my boy exactly what you used to do for me.”

wow.

safe nap

SAN JUAN'S 4-09 047

(excerpt from a chapter of my book)

*A minor disclaimer about the top photo. Those are not scars on Michael’s face or holes in his t-shirt. My scanner was down so I had to photograph an old photo that was wrinkled and full of pinholes.

The Seeker’s Dungeon “On Living and Dying” event

https://theseekersdungeon.com/2016/06/09/on-living-and-dying-day-20-by-kathie-arcide/ (Trying this link again…)

It’s one thing to write something for my much appreciated 87 “followers” but to be included on a Blog that has thousands is both awesome and intimidating!

My contribution to The Seeker’s Dungeon “On Living and Dying” event is up. It is one of my all-time favorite and very best true stories!

You can find my post at: https://theseekersdungeon.com/2016/06/09/on-living-and-dying-day-20-by-kathie-arcide/

I have loved reading the various guest posts in this series, (and actually everything on this Blog). If you visit The Seeker’s Dungeon, consider checking them out!

If you’d like to become one of the guest authors there, you can learn more about the event here: 365 Days On Living and Dying.