I’m Tired ( Rant)

Sometimes I just want to scream, to lie down on a soft space and let it all go…

It’s been a fight, an enormous struggle for the last 4 years. I’ve wanted to just say “fuck it” and let everything crumble, yet the fighter in me just can’t lie down in surrender to the shit storms I’ve experienced. I just growl, tighten my chin strap, and move forward.

I rarely complain about it. I rarely tell anyone about the struggles. I rarely dive into the self-pity that such things can provide, and I rarely make my way behind the shadows that seem to sometime surround me. I stand up, growl, and get ready for the fight. it’s been like that my entire life.

Yet, I’m tired. So tired. I’ve not known a real respite from the struggle. I’ve not felt complete peace in my life. I’ve not experienced the type of joy that spreads out beyond the small pockets of happy moments. There’s always been something.

I realize I am a master of me. I’ve chosen to need certain things in my life. I’ve chosen to adopt a certain paradigm in this existence. I’ve made agreements that make these things necessary, and ending those agreements just doesn’t seem possible.

So, I suffer. My body breaks down, the muscles constantly tense, the energy constantly wound into small balls in my back. My mind worries. I look at my children and hope for so much more. I want memories with them. I want their smiles and their laughter. I want them to have “remember whens” after I am long gone back to the dust from whence I came.

Things. This existence seems all about things. When does it all end?

I know, when i decide it ends. When I decide I’ve had enough. I decide when the old agreements need redoing. I am the Master.

I look back on the pathways I’ve walked. So much change has occurred there. I am nothing like I was, yet I am much more me than I’ve ever been. I’ve not been “fixed”, there was nothing ever broken. Things had to be, they had to happen the way they happened. Now, I scratch and claw to climb out of the holes I’ve dug, and I realize I will never get to this place again.

I will not dig myself into a hole. I will not be someone’s pet project. I will not succumb to the whims of the voices I was taught to hear. I will not fill my arms with empty potential, with angry rocks I can use to throw at myself.

There have been people who have helped out as I’ve walked along the way. There has been so much love shown there, so much understanding and acceptance. For the most part, though, I’ve been an island unto myself. I am here, just me usually, throwing punches at the shadows and slipping counters only I can see. Yes, they are invisible to most, but I can see them. And they sting when they land, especially since it seems I rarely land any shots of my own.

Not that I need many. When i land, I land good. When i miss, I miss just as good, and I stumble around like some punch-drunk has been who has fought for way too long.

Well, I know where I need to be, and what I need to do. Now that this rant is over, it’s time to get back to the business at hand. Surviving. Rebuilding. Working toward a goal that one day I’m part of something greater, something not so alone and not so tiring.

Ah, the lessons I’m learning. The truths I am gaining from tremendous loss. The strength I am finding in this enormous fatigue. The willingness to accept the hands of others as they extend them, the knowledge that in receipt of the gift I offer one of my own.

There is great wisdom in this life. Great wisdom, indeed.