The Good or Bad Life Coin Toss

I bumped into someone I once knew last week and it revealed some important thoughts of shame about me and my life I didn’t realize I had. Shame had tackled my confidence as I spoke to this individual. You are so pathetic, I kept hearing it say. I walked away as quickly as I could and ran to my car when the coast was clear. Sure, a part of me was really happy to see them but the other much bigger part of me wanted to do like an ostrich and stick my head in the ground. I didn’t do that but I was very tempted. Instead, I drove us all to the beach because there’s nothing like the healing powers of the ocean. The beach wasn’t crowded and I got to park under a big beautiful tree which was a good start. This particular spot was full baby crabs so as Celest giggled and screamed her way comfortable I began working on the sandcastle. Something about using your hands to mold and create something that brings upon good things. I could feel my black shorts get damp as I sat down but no matter I had bigger things to tend to. Am I ashamed of everything my life has been and how I’ve overcome it all? Was I ashamed of who I was now? And was I aware that this person that I was stuffing back into a little box of shame was the same person my people celebrate on the daily? I continued to shape and mold my castle drowning out life happening around me, horrible pun intended. Celest now joined me and began shifting her small hands to pat and mold the wet sand along with me. Eventually, my Styrofoam cup broke but simultaneously settled on one question; What was there to be ashamed of?? My neck was beginning to hurt and the sun was dehydrating but I stayed regardless. Many rooms inside of myself began opening and revealing their stuffing to me. I was going back and forth trying to unravel the shameful thoughts. Trying to create any sort of platform to help me understand why I felt ashamed of my journey and how I’ve lived through it. I began to see a pattern. Have I believed this whole time that I’ve lived a bad life and so in turn I believed myself to be less than??

Yes I did and is it all true? No, absolutely not.  Lifes worth is not determined by how bad or good or how easy or hard it has been. One life does not outrank another life. Perhaps that is how society-politics-whatever else can convince us to believe but let us not be fools any longer people! Granted some people do hold other lives like children, animals, special needs, elderly, etc with special grace but that is not what I am referring to here. I am talking about the shame that comes with having lived/ing in poverty. The shame that comes with the making of poor decisions due to a lack of education. I am talking about the shame that comes with dealing or watching the cycle of abuse whether its physical harm to ourselves or the ones we love. The shame of just becoming another statistic and then there’s the shame of not getting ahead quick enough. The shame I struggle with greatly on a day to day basis. My struggle is not the definition of my worth or lack of. My life is not outranked by another life. We are all equal. That’s what I work on believing on a daily basis. That’s what I unraveled as I was making a sandcastle with my eleven year old. Tell you, this creating stuff with our hands and pain brings upon good things. My shame was rooted in how I viewed my life. My life has been hard, yes but not bad. Life will always hit hard but it will also always allow the universe to send me healing and for me healing looks like friends-dogs-pancakes- trees-the ocean. I have begun to understand that life as a whole is not a bad thing so consequently my life too cannot be a bad thing. The good and bad equally co-exist just as much as sadness and joy do. I do not believe that I am a sad person. I do believe that I feel great sadness, deep rooted peace, and joy together to which are the roots of me. Even if I may be pulled more to sadness than to joy, that is not all that makes up who I am. So I ask myself why then can’t I have many “bad” things happen in my life without them outweighing all the very good things in-between. The joy and good things always seem to wisp away much faster but if we experience them fully they can give us just enough to get by.

There shame is taken care of and out with the garbage. NOT. Oh how I wish it were that easy to just throw away my shame but nooo the universe wants me to be hands on and creative and stuff. Maybe I can’t throw my shame out with the garbage but maybe I can transform it just like I do with my pain. I see pain like a big heavy anchor and its heavy and big and loud and even though sometimes sitting with your pain is necessary staying there can be harmful so I’ve learned to transform my heavy anchor pain into fuel. I use it to move forward and maybe theres my answer. Maybe all I need to do is throw my shame in the compost bin and let it become worm poop HAH no but really maybe my shame can be transformed into much more useful things that can help me heal and move forward. Yes, that!!

I think back to my encounter with that old friend and if I could go back when he asked what my life has been like since we’ve seen each other I would say hard but fruitful and even though my life now is still really hard I have the most beautiful loving tribe living and breathing right alongside me. I would say how at peace I am with who I am or how I work hard to keep that peace on the daily. I’d tell him how much wiser I am because of my difficult experiences. I would stand up straight and smile even if my hair was horribly tangled and frizzy. Even with my linty cut up shorts and faded sweatshirt even if I hadn’t showered in days. I’d tell him that my heart is bursting at the seams with all there is to feel and its spectacular. The pain and the sadness but the joy and the peace too!! Or I could just go with “I’ve been okay” smile and walk out the door because I’m pretty sure my breath smelled of onions and my armpits were killing fruit flies with their stench. Totally missed putting on deodorant on earlier that morning. OH well. EVERYBODY HAS ARMPITS OOKAAYY! jeeeez.

Life, The Cheese Grater

Source- Tumblr- Artist Unknown

I sat in a dark blue plastic chair, set in a small hallway manually reminding myself to breathe slowly to possibly calm the anxiety that was boiling over inside me. It was the kind of setting that took you back to sitting outside the principal’s office in middle school. “You’re okay. You’re okay. You’re okay.” I repeated internally. I quickly gave up trying to smooth out my blue button up shirt with the wrinkles then claiming victory. The long cardigan I threw on over it was supposed to deter attention and make my appearance look more professional than lazy. I tried to go for the “I didn’t sleep and get ready in my car this morning” look. Pretty much nailed that one. I was now surrounded by three guys who looked like they knew what they were doing and what was happening, which by the way was very annoying. They should have done that somewhere else, somewhere far far away from my insecure self. I sat up as straight as I could and put on my most convincing face of “I know what the hell I’m doing”. A short, smiley woman with wavy blonde hair came out to give me a paper to fill out while I waited. I filled it out and hoped the guy standing next to me wouldn’t choke on the strong anxiety I was now polluting the air with. The guys got called in which made me feel better to be alone but also nervous because my “I got this” face was fading quickly. A tall guy with blue eyes and messy curls atop his head came and asked me to sit inside. I found a seat away from people because at this point I was positive I had sweated through my deodorant. There was a group of people watching a video while an older woman lectured them about how important their jobs were. I steered my focus onto my breathing again and hoped the uncomfortable, awkward feelings weren’t oozing out through my face too much. The fake smile on my face was beginning to hurt. The older woman dismissed them all and suddenly there was fast paced movement everywhere. The room was still and quiet after they’d gone. It turns out the older woman was the one who was supposed to interview me and she stepped right out the door along with the group. When I discovered this I felt so ridiculous that I felt like getting up and running out of the room without looking back. After a couple minutes the blonde haired woman came in short of breath and let me know she’d be conducting the interview herself. We stepped into a smaller room with two desks that were much too big for the space. I sat down and nervously straightened out my shirt. She acted kind and began asking me questions. Then after a few minutes she asked “Tell me more about yourself? What are some important things I should know about you?” I looked at her and stayed quiet for a moment too long and laughed to myself because the first thing that popped into my mind to answer her question was that I was homeless. I could think of nothing else about my entire identity other than the fact that I was homeless.

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That was an exclusive interview I had weeks ago with the Save The Children Organization which I did not get a call back from. Maybe it was my wrinkly shirt or maybe it was because I could not answer the last question she asked me. My identity had completely lost itself to my situation. or Maybe I just sucked. Maybe people just don’t hire homeless people. I did end up admitting that I was homeless at the end of the interview which was a big mistake. My intentions and efforts were surely snubbed by fate for the umpteenth time. Oh well.

Its so easy to lose yourself in something painful and hard. I hadn’t realized I was so far gone until that day and that question. I had put my whole identity into what was happening to me instead of the things that actually make me well me. I am homeless. Homeless is not me. I have experienced trauma. Trauma is not me. There are so many things that we can attach ourselves to. I've stripped homeless from my identity since then and its left me feeling really confused.

After I desperately tried to answer the blonde ladies question she told me she would talk to the boss lady and that I should expect a call between 4-6 in the afternoon the very same day. I got up and thanked her for her time and that I looked forward to hearing from them later. I got out of the small office and the office outside of that one and took a deep breath once I got back to that suffocated hallway from earlier. I raced down the stairs and opened the door to freshly polluted air and people walking briskly to wherever they needed to be. The noise of it all brought me back to a calmer state and I was able to smile without hurting myself. I did something brave I told myself. Holy SHIT I did something really brave. I went to an interview and I got dressed up to the best of my ability and I worked through my anxiety even though I was shaking so much I had to put both feet on the floor to find some form of balance. I tried, oh hell yes, I tried. I didn't know it then but I was holding the pieces of my identity in that moment. That very moment explained more of who I am than homeless ever could. 

Coming on our second summer in this same situation my heart is beyond broken and heavy. I feel like this whole time my heart has lay in a pile of quick sand and the more I move to get out the deeper I sink. My ability to feel is now beyond anything to be described. My hope faces extinction on the daily but thankfully each time has overcome. I have a grand fear though for the day when my hope dies and my ability to see beautiful possibilities goes along with it. I push and fight to stay in a space where I allow myself and my life healing Now more than ever do I understand how fascinating and frustrating healing can actually be. It never uses the timeline we lay out in front of us.  I have come to understand that healing happens slowly, terribly, and completely out of order. 

"Never discourage anyone who continually makes progress, no matter how small." -Plato

Yeah, that. My life has become a consistent murmur of small progress. Of small, slow, fascinating, frustrating progress. Buuut to be a bit more blunt it is complete shit. My identities co-dependency with my situation is not a healthy place to be but the longer we stay here the more fighting I seem to have to be doing. Life can sometimes be the cheese grater against our skin shaving off layer by layer the good things that we're made of. I'm here to tell you that although difficult and painful you can heal and work towards wholeness. We can be forever working towards wholeness. Forever trying and yes, oh my god, YES, its really shitty and you will get tired of people saying over and over that gods got a plan so you'll scream out BULLSHIT and you still won't feel any better but listen...healing is real and it happens. It happens. It happens. It happens. I'm trying not to bullshit myself here but I do believe that. I do believe that healing happens. Its all shitty. It really is but its also creative and in a weird way quite magnificently beautiful.

'Til next time. Soon I hope.
Love. Love. Love your people hard for me, please.
Hug them too. Hugs and laughter are healing for just about everyone.
Life is hard.

“Life turns me into a ghost 

but then hope happens and 

I am human again.”

-VàZaki Nada

Hummingbird Beauty

We rescued a baby hummingbird just now from a huge terrifying parking lot. It kept trying to fly but kept slipping and plummeting to the ground. At first I let it go thinking it could fly but I soon realized it was too small so we put it in Celests soft pocket and continued walking, terrified and concerned out of our minds for this precious creature. I looked online because google always knows. I read and walked, miraculously not walking into anything or tripping. Google said to call the professionals if there was no nest around or sign it could fly away on its own. So we continued walking and I remembered we stay right by a animal hospital so we walked faster. My legs began to shake and my heart was pounding so much I felt like I was going to throw up. I was terrified because this gentle, beautiful creature's well-being fell into our hands. Literally! We were almost there when Celest reminded me of her bird book and how it says that hummingbirds are said to be peace and healing. OH NO BIG DEAL because we were only carrying the mascot of life!!!!! My stomach turned into knots and my mind was going a thousand miles per hour. I could not process what was happening but I was trying and it was scary and invigorating at the same time kinda like life. I hope we're doing the right thing I kept repeating to myself. Oh please let this be okay. Let us be doing the right thing. I'd check up on it every couple minutes and it would stare at me with such trust that my heart would swell up and exolode until tears were running down my face. We got to the vets and I told them what happened and they called the special people and right before leaving her she stared at me for what felt like eternity and it was so sweet my heart did like fireworks. You gonna be okay, baby. You gonna be strong and fly some day soon.

We left and now I'm here reminiscing. Tearing up from the beauty. Lifes been especially hard lately and not just for me but for my peoples so hearts are heavy all around.

Hope just doesn't seem to hang around me amd my grumpy, hurt self anymore and healing well I keep on trying to hold hands with it but my hands keep slipping.

This made me rethink stuff.

Sometimes healing and hope aren't big, strong fliers sometimes they can come to us gentle and small. Maybe this whole time i was looking for big, loud and bold when i should have been searching for the small, gentle and fierce. The stuff we can nurture and hold it in a soft warm pocket inside ourselves and maybe its okay if its not loud and maybe its okay if we need to nurture these things. Maybe thats how we make it. Gently, slowly, bravely. Flying then plummeting then resting then trying again.

I find comfort in knowing my healing, hope, courage WHATEVER it is for each of us doesn't need to be huge and bold. It can be small and clumsy and still be fierce and beautiful.

I'm gonna go shed a few tears and air out because apparently sweat doesn't care if you're having a moment.

Did you get all that? I sure hope I made sense. ❤

Theres Something About Mothers Day

I wrote a Mothers Day essay last year and if haven’t read it then maybe do that now because you’ll have a better understanding of what I write here today.

That’s here.

Read it? Okay great.

I was sitting in the back seat of a friends car the other day after picking Celest up from school when Mother’s Day came into the conversation. I got uneasy real fast. I sat there remembering when I wrote about how Mother’s Day was hard for me. Friends were reading then private messaging me letting me know they were thinking of me. I was not left out in the cold, people met me right there in the hurt and pain. Brutifal.

Celest took out the heavy binder she carries in her backpack to get some papers she had quickly drawn up for Mothers day and I sat there anticipating, teetering on the edges of despair and joy. She had a paper with a big heart smack dab in the middle of it with the words Happy Mothers Day written across it then at the bottom it said “To mom- From Celest”. I was hanging from the edge of despair trying to talk myself into feeling okay some damn how. It must have all shown on my face because she handed me some lose papers with hearts drawn on them except I laughed and told her that she had put “To Alison” at the bottom. Life can break your heart a thousand ways to Sunday a wise prophet once said or maybe that was Bradley cooper in the Silver Linings movie, whatever. As I felt myself getting into a bad mood I focused on the joy that being able to mother this child sitting beside me has brought to me. I focused on my breathing and the scenery just outside the window in hopes of settling down.

Earlier that day I had gotten into an argument just like I’ve done many times before with my mother. We have a very complicated relationship, her and I, that’s been strained and stretched by the chaos of life. Its been a couple years now where Mothers day is not only difficult because of my reasons with Celest but because the relationship with my mother has mostly been artificially forced. The shame that comes along with not wanting to celebrate her is real and very much alive. Don’t get me wrong, I love my mother, I do, and think shes an amazing woman but due to the intense situations life has put us through theres just not much left to uphold. We are only human and am grateful for what we do have but still I have the strong urge to hide under my blankets until all the commotion passes. Stuffing my face with pie sounds quite appealing too.

A couple minutes passed and Celest tapped me on the shoulder to show me another picture she had just drawn to give to mom. I smiled seeing that all that time we spent practicing her handwriting has paid off. Happy with my acknowledgment she continued drawing. When she finished she ripped out the paper then handed it to my mom. She then turned to me and asked me if I would like one and how could I turn those big dark brown eyes down. I drifted towards the window again when a little while later a paper was shoved into my hand. It was a big heart with an arrow through it. I turned to her and asked her why she hadn't written Happy Mother’s Day on it and she said "Oh" so nonchalantly I didn't know whether to burst into tears or rip all my eye lashes off. She scribbled some words down, smiled then handed it back to me. Oh my, your heart would explode just as mine did by reading what she wrote at the bottom of that page.

At the bottom of the page were the words “Happy Nani Day!” I smiled really big and looked at Celest with gratitude. That little rascal knew I was happy with her gift and just like a lot of kids her age would she shrugged her shoulders smirked really big and with an elongated whaaaat made my heart soar. I have been trying so hard for so long to find an opening that would bring me to a place of peace with all of this and I've finally been gifted with it. I don’t need to be wished Happy Mother’s Day by Celest because I have my own damn day. Celest may not call me mom but she knows that I’m nothing short of it. I have made such an impact in her life that when I tell her to write Happy Mother’s Day she writes Happy Nani Day because she feels I deserve my own day. How heart breakingly beautiful is that.

So even though for the past couple of days I have been avoiding facebook with its piles of mother’s day posts and even though my own mother and I have a complicated relationship I will not hide under my blankets this time. I will feel it all. I will feel the hurt of my life and those of my friends.  I will hold space for all the mothers who've lost a child, who've never been recognized and with the sons and daughters who have to crawl through today missing their moms and those who feel shame because of their lack of urge to celebrate. Hurt and gratitude are going to be snuggled up next to each other today. Pain and beauty are married to each other forever walking hand in hand.

I have yet to meet a woman who has not mothered someone. We are all tenderly and fiercely mothering our people and its so freaking beautiful. Each one of us with our own brutifal stories, I am with you, remembering you, feeling with you. Standing with soft strength at the shore letting the waves bring in hurt while simultaneously soothing it away. I may stuff my face today with lots and lots of food all the while thinking of the beautiful mothers dreading and celebrating today. You’ll find me snuggling next to hurt and gratitude. 

PS. About the picture, it was just a stamp. One day maybe.