My sister used this image in her blog today, used the title "In Pieces" and described her struggle with the day.
Today. I feel incompetent. Foolish. Behind. Anxious. Scared, maybe just Nervous. I feel mean. Cold. Angry. Biting. Today I do not like myself. My stupid boots. Shaggy pants. Limp hair. Taut mouth. Today my heart is in my stomach. And I didn’t poop. And my voice is weak. And I both yelled and cried on the street. Over nothing much actually. Just a little stress and a kink in the plan. How easily I was overcome. I didn’t put up a fight. Allowed the day to pass without joy. This poor Tuesday.
I prefer hard days to be well earned.
Tomorrow.
She lives far away, nine hours by car. At this point it might as well be on the other side of the Earth in terms of being able to physically see her, but she mentions things that make me curious, like "shaggy pants" and "stupid boots", little descriptions without a description that make me want to knock on her door and ask a million questions. Is she talking about dog hair? Is that why her pants are shaggy? Is it the Dansko boots she thinks are stupid? Because I've always thought those were just the cutest things ever...
But of course I can't knock on her door, in fact she didn't even answer her phone tonight, in truth she seldom does even on a fantastic day, and it doesn't matter what I think anyway. If you aren't feeling right, if your dial is turned to Shitty, then no boot is going to appear attractive, or useful, or good in any way, and reassurance by an outside body isn't helpful. I think my sister is the bees-knees, the yummiest, funniest, feels-good-to-my-soul lady in town, but that opinion is simply trivia, simply an opinion. An irrelevant one.
Solutions suck too. Recommendations and practical suggestions, blech.
So do stories that start with Oh, I had a day like that yesterday... or, Yeah, I've been totally PMSing too... Even if offers of chocolate and female camaraderie are made, hearing someone else's troubles when you can barely see through the veil of your own is no kind of balm.
She feels bad. Mean. Tired. Angry. Biting. Nervous. Anxious. Incompetent. Cold. Scared. Foolish.
And I love her for spreading it out like that, for not couching it. For not worrying about our reaction to that kind of display so much that a watering down is necessary, or a platitude. Or two.
I love honesty.
She's doing us a favor really, by revealing in this way. Of course I don't want her to feel horrible, would love her with empathy in person if I could. I guess cyber-empathy might look something like:
:(
or:
Dang.
or:
Crap. That totally sucks.
And that might help. But in any case it's okay if it doesn't, I certainly don't need her to change. Feelings are feelings and by the time she sifts through them all and returns to the top of the pile they will have changed of their own accord.
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