My car broke down this week. Probably fried my engine. Woo-hoo.
Somehow, the car breaking down led me down a very dangerous road - wondering if I should have left him, wondering if this would have happened if I were still with him, wondering if I really am doing the right thing with my life.
The clowns have been very loud in this regard, as well as others.
The clowns in my head have been fairly tame lately, occasionally shouting out from their cages and their hot air balloons but I have been able to pretty much ignore them.
But they apparently have figured out how to escape.
I have circled the barricades but they seem to be able to heckle from a distance.
The heckling goes something like this:
You should have never left him. At least there’d be someone to hold when times get tough like this. At least there’d be someone to help out at times like this. At least there’d be another income. At least there’d be -- you get the idea.
What the clowns don’t seem to want to acknowledge is the other side of staying with him.
There would be anger. A great deal of anger. And accusations. And ridicule. And defamation about all of my personal attributes. I would be reduced to hanging my head in shame and tiptoeing around, trying to be the perfect wife and the perfect woman and the perfect whatever he wanted me to be.
And probably by this time, I would be dead. Either by my own hand or his. Okay, so I don’t think he’d kill me but his anger and his irrational lashing out would probably have led to serious injury at some point. There were many times when we were together where things flew and luckily did not connect. They were theoretically not aimed at me but sometimes aim doesn’t matter.
So the clowns change tact and tackle the other things I’m doing in my life. Chanting? Really? Buddhism? Really? You’re just trying to impress the Chanting Guy. And you know that’s a dead end so why are you doing it? It’ll just end badly with heartache and pain and… So just stop it. It doesn’t matter. He’s not impressed. He never will be. He has a gorgeous, YOUNG, THING girlfriend, things which you are not. He doesn’t care, just like all the others. You’re making an ass of yourself so stop it.
They don’t acknowledge the other side of that, which is, I have been interested in Buddhism since I could spell it. I’ve always wanted to explore chanting and see what it does and how it feels. My grandfather was a Buddhist, which has somehow seeped into my soul. And I choose to believe he cares, because he has shown me such. And it doesn’t matter what our relationship is or may be, I am glad he’s in my life for this moment, in whatever way he is in my life.
And then the money issue. You suck with money. You should be a grown up and stop screwing around with this directing thing. You should give up the art thing because, really, that doesn’t really do much for you because you don’t make enough money at it. Get a real job with real money and just do the directing thing when you can. After all, it’s ridiculous to think there’s a living to be made out of it. Be a grown up. Stop kidding yourself. And if you had never left him, you would not have been distracted by all this stupidity. You’d have a real job and a real life and a real husband and all of this would never happen.
But, again, we’re back to there would be anger and I would be dead.
But the hamster wheel in my head is hard to stop once the clowns get it spinning. You should have never left him is the litany that repeats over and over, all the other things splintering off of that.
And lonely times like this make me want to see him again, want to be with him again, want to just give up and admit that this life is not what I thought it would be. That maybe the biggest mistake I’ve ever made was walking away from almost 18 years of a relationship. Just because it’s familiar. Just because I know that relationship and because the clowns can be very convincing when they’re this loud.
I have to stop and check in with reality. Yes, it’s tough. Yes, I’m irresponsible with money. Yes, I don’t make enough money. Yes, I’m alone. Yes, Chanting Guy probably doesn’t care for me as anything other than a friend and, yes, I can’t compete with a young, thin, gorgeous girlfriend. And a lot of the other points that the clowns make.
But this I do know. This is my life, hard or easy, empty or full, heartful or heartbroken. I know what I love in my life - my art, my directing, my writing, my creative soul. A soul that was smothered and almost killed in my previous life. I have a strong, caring, amazing group of friends who have rallied around me to try and help me through this current ordeal so I am not alone. And they feed my creativity in a way that no group of friends has ever fed me before.
And, yes, while I may never have Chanting Guy in my life the way I’d like to, I think he’s going to be an amazing friend like Ranger Smith - someone I can love and someone who loves me for who I am, without trying to change me, without trying to qualify me. Someone who accepts my affection for them without running away and pushing me away.
So while I chant tonight before I go to bed, I’m going to focus on sending those chants to the clowns, to drive them back to their cages and their hot air balloons and replace their negative, angry “these are the days” thoughts with Keith Urban’s song --
My grandma was a wise old soul
Took me by the hand not long ago
Said, "Son, what's your hurry, boy slow it down
Taste the wild honey, listen to the sound
Of the wind that's blowin' through the trees
Rivers flowin' to the sea
Yeah they're all headin' home just like you and me
Life's for livin' child, can't you see?"
These are the days we will remember
These are the times that won't come again
The highest of flames become an ember
And you gotta live 'em while you can
These are the days we will remember
These are the days we will remember
These are the days we will remember
These are the days we will remember
So take 'em by the hand, they're yours and mine
Take 'em by the hand and live your life
Take 'em by the hand don't let 'em all fly by
C'mon, C'mon now
Ooo days go by
Yeah, just like a hand out the window wavin' in the wind as the cars go by
Days go by
Take that, clowns.
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