November PAD Challenge 2022: Day 9: Life Under the Three of Swords

 

Image by Melissa G from Pixabay

My late father sometimes reminded me of a day when we traveled to the Happy Jack recreation area. My family lived in Laramie at the time. My father was attending the University of Wyoming and was also earning his keep as a teacher’s assistant. My father told me that I stood up on a ridge and shouted to the wind, “I’m happy!”

I may have been happy. I honestly don’t remember the incident or the place. I can recall moments from that year, 1968. I remember some of the dreams I had. I seemed to be nothing but trouble for my mother. I was an overly curious child who was always getting into things.

My lifetime has been spent beneath the shadow of the Three of Swords. To put this in poetic terms, I’ve always been melancholy in varying degrees. If I were to choose poetry to describe my life, the first poem I’d select would be Alone by Edgar Allan Poe. I was reading Poe’s works at six years old and I related to this poem. I also loved The Goblin Market by Christina Rossetti. What would it be like, I wondered, to have a sister who was such a dear friend that she would put herself in danger to rescue me from the goblins who were draining me of my joy?

I did not have a sister. I had friends here and there, now and then, but they always left. I loved creating, but it wouldn’t be until later in life that I reconciled myself to the fact that my stories were my constant companions. I was not destined to have lasting friendships or find happy ever after romantic love.

To put it in clinical terms (alas, how very dull!) I have always lived with varying degrees of depression. I’ve been told I should medicate away the Three of Swords. Attempts at doing so failed spectacularly. The Tower fractured beneath me, plunging me into madness.

I can exist beneath the shadow of the Three of Swords. When the swords increase to nine or ten, atmospheric conditions present danger not only to happiness but to my very corporeal existence.

directionless me

spinning twilight I wander

without any guide

~Ornery Owl Has Spoken~

Image by 0fjd125gk87 from Pixabay

Some of us are destined to fly solo

prompts used

https://poetsandstorytellersunited.blogspot.com/2022/11/friday-writings-51-power-of-three.html

Prompt: The power of three. Any style, 369-word limit.

https://amanpan.blog/2022/11/08/moonwashed-musings-weekly-prompt-directionless-november-8-2022/

Prompt word: Directionless

https://www.writersdigest.com/write-better-poetry/2022-november-pad-chapbook-challenge-day-9

For today's prompt, take the phrase "(blank) of the (blank)," replace the blanks with a word or phrase, make the new phrase the title of your poem, and then, write your poem.

I changed it up a little, as the title of the poem is Life Under the Three of Swords rather than, say Life Of the Three of Swords. I'm not submitting this one to the chapbook of 20 poems that won't be selected anyway. A long Haibun like this one is much to prose-y to be the right kind of rosy for a chapbook bouquet.

It may seem odd for me to request this, but past experiences dictate that I must. For the love of all that is holy and otherwise, do NOT give me advice about "changing my meds." I don't take psych meds, see "the tower fractured beneath me and I plunged into madness. Similarly, don't suggest that I seek out such meds. See "the tower fractured beneath me and I plunged into madness." 

Also, do not suggest that I "seek counseling." I've done so in the past and it hasn't done much for me. Plus I now live in the middle of nowhere and, yeah, I'm not driving a hundred-mile round trip for something that probably won't do me any favors, thanks anyway.

This is a prose poem, not a request for someone to come fix or rescue me. I'm not a damsel in distress, I'm a hideous swamp witch (okay, prairie witch) who writes poetry. If you can't be dark, dramatic, and hyperbolic in your poetry, I probably don't want to read your poetry. See Alone, by Poe, Edgar Allan. That's my kind of poem!

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46477/alone-56d2265f2667d

Maybe I should try to revive my poetry channel on Odysee. Or maybe I've already got too much on my plate. Eh, I'm rambling now.

I actually do know how to have fun. For instance, this collection of olde tyme Halloween-themed songs is my bag.

Here's the link in case you can't see the player.

https://odysee.com/@thymeandplace:9/vintagehalloween1:5?r=GTwnGJ4fFBQfzuJgpHVpfKBKaC9b8B16

November PAD Challenge 2022: Day 3: The Golden Apples Left to Rot

Image by jhenning from Pixabay

You encouraged me from an early age

To learn about so many things

You read to me about the golden apples of the sun

You'll be gone twelve years at the end of this month

But even if you were still here and still you

I could never ask

Because you would only say

That you were right

And I was misguided

That's the way it always was

No sense in denying it now

Why did you teach me

All of those wonderful things

And then try to turn me away from them?

Why did you tell me

I needed to get a practical job

As a secretary or a nurse

When time and time again

I proved to have no aptitude

For such professions

I spent most of my life

Believing I was broken

When maybe I just didn't fit

Where I was told I ought to

I was misguided

But maybe so were you

At least when it comes to this

You planted the seed of the golden apples in my mind

I will cultivate this orchard of my imagination now

While there's still a little time

I wish that you could see the results

Maybe you do

Maybe now you can understand me 

I wasn't like you

I couldn't be

I can only be like me

Is that really such a bad thing after all?

I will always love you, Dad

But the hurt of never knowing your approval

Never ends

Even now as I approach the twilight of my life

Your daughter,

Ornery Owl

Image by Willgard Krause from Pixabay

notes and prompts used

"The golden apples of the sun" is a line from the poem The Song of Wandering Aengus by William Butler Yeats.

https://poets.org/poem/song-wandering-aengus

It is also the title of a collection of stories by Ray Bradbury published in 1953.

My father was a professor of arts and humanities. I can remember him reading The Song of Wandering Aengus and The Tyger by William Blake.

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43687/the-tyger

I learned how to read by the time I was four years old. My father wanted me to be a prodigy. I have no idea if I have the intellectual capacity for such. After all, I was labeled borderline retarded when I was eleven years old. 

I know for a fact that I don't have the patience to be a prodigy. I know now that I have ADHD, but that's a whole other story unto itself, so we'll save it for another time, possibly the same bat-channel, possibly not. It remains to be seen.

I always questioned how I could be retarded when I was reading and writing at an eighth grade level when I was in the fifth grade. However, I was terrible at anything beyond addition and subtraction, and I earned the borderline retarded label by spectacularly bombing on the Ravens IQ Assessment, which is based around pattern recognition. 

I also had some physical coordination problems courtesy of frequent ear infections in early childhood, and I had to use a special trick to determine left from right. I still use this trick at nearly 58 years old. Just last year, I added the Never Eat Shredded Wheat mnemonic to my arsenal, so I finally can work out direction. This is an excellent tool as I have no internal compass whatsoever.

When I was 23 years old, I learned that I was not retarded, I was somewhat dyslexic. That explained a lot, and it also made me want to go back in time and slap the school psychologist, the gym teacher who put me in the special gym class, and also my sixth-grade teacher. Granted, I already wanted to smack my sixth-grade teacher because he was an abusive asshole, but that's another story for another time.

As I moved into my teen years, my parents tried to push me in directions I wasn't interested in. I now understand some of their concerns, but they went about things the wrong way. Folks, if you try to browbeat a teenager into doing something, they will either push back and do the opposite of what you want, or they will comply and resent you. Neither of those is something you want, so here's what you need to do instead.

Many of us cursed by a love for artistic endeavors know how hard it is to make a living at our obsession. This is why those with a love for the arts should also be encouraged to learn a trade they can tolerate. It needs to be a trade of their choosing, not of yours.

I did a Book Blogger Hop post about a book called Reconfigurement. It was written to help older adults find a new career path, but many of the exercises can also help people of any age figure out what careers they might enjoy. You can read the post at the following link

https://ornerybookemporium.blogspot.com/2022/09/friday-book-blog-hop-reconfigurement.html

Or just head over to Amazon and check it out.

https://amzn.to/3KkbJFg

I will earn a small commission from Amazon for anything purchased through the above link.

And now, without further ado-doo, I will share the prompts that prompted me to create today's poem and post.

https://earthweal.com/2022/10/31/first-poems-door-to-the-wilder-eye/

The weekly challenge from Earthweal asks poets to "look back at our younger selves, back to the first poems that made us notice them, and see where they have taken us." Some of my earliest memories involve my father reading to me the poems mentioned above.

https://www.writersdigest.com/write-better-poetry/2022-november-pad-chapbook-challenge-day-3

Today's prompt asks poets to craft a "misguided" poem. Some readers may think this entire post is misguided. You are within your rights to think that, just as I am within mine to give no fucks what anyone else thinks.

Image by Thomas from Pixabay

Critical Chicken is judging you

30 Days of Haiga 2022: Remembering When

 

Original photo

Taken 7 May 2017

Denver Aquarium 

Haiga created 18 September 2022

text

remembering when

like passing through a doorway

looking back on then

such a wonderful moment

treasured point in history

notes

You are welcome to use both the photo and the Haiga, but please credit Cara Hartley/Ornery Owl and provide a link back to this blog.

The photo was taken on 7 May 2017 at the Denver Aquarium restaurant. My son and I were celebrating his 27th birthday (which actually falls on May 8) and Mother's Day. It's a wonderful day that I'll always remember.

The following prompt inspired me:

https://reinventionsreena.wordpress.com/2022/09/15/reenas-xploration-challenge-248/

Prompt phrase:

passing through a doorway in history

I will also be sharing this post with:

http://myjustsostory.blogspot.com

Charity Sunday: In Memory of my Dad

 

Today is the eleventh anniversary of my father's passing. He had a serious hemorrhagic stroke in 2006. In the following years he had more strokes, developing vascular dementia. During his working life he had been a college professor. Towards the end of his life, he would read and re-read the same line in a catalog. He also developed congestive heart failure. His circulation was so poor that at the time of his passing, his lower legs were purple.

Collier Hospice in Wheat Ridge, Colorado was the second best thing to being able to pass away at home. The room was spacious, pleasant, and quiet. The staff were attentive but allowed for plenty of private family time. On the night before he departed, I read my father A Child's Christmas in Wales by Dylan Thomas. He always read it to my brother and me when we were kids, along with Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. I know that in this lifetime, I will never again be able to read A Child's Christmas in Wales aloud because I can't get through it without breaking down.

I will donate a dollar for every comment received on this post to SCL Health in honor of my father.

Link to learn more about Collier Hospice.

https://www.sclhealth.org/locations/lutheran-hospice/services/hospice/

Link for the SCL Health Foundation donation page.

https://www.sclhealth.org/ways-to-give/

I apologize, but NaNoWriMo in conjunction with the November Poem-a-Day Brain-Dissolving Challenge has dissolved my brain and I can't think of an excerpt to post. If you would like to read a gloomy holiday-related poem that will appear in a future anthology, follow the link.

https://poetryofthenetherworld.blogspot.com/2021/11/november-pad-challenge-2021-ghost-of.html

I'm adding in the 28th chapter of my NaNoHellMo project. I'm 1000 words from being able to stick a fork in that fucker. Be forewarned, it's a long read.

Day 28

28 November 2021

Spirit of the Universe, please set aside everything I think I know about myself, about my story, about my need for validation, and especially about you, Universe, so that I may have an open mind and a new experience with myself, with my story, with my need for validation, and with you, Universe. Please help me to see the truth. Amen.

Today is the 11^th anniversary of my dad’s passing. It was about a half-hour ago that the hospice called my mother to inform her that he was gone. The ringer on my phone wasn’t working so she had to call twice. On the second time she said something hurtful that has stuck with me. She said “you’re never here for me.”

I don’t want to sit too long in this place. My mother is better these days, not as angry any more. However, my parents’ disappointment in me has always been palpable to me. I think it’s been a driving force in my life. I want to show them that I can be successful without having to do what they want me to do because I can’t do what they wanted me to do.

My parents helped me a lot financially over the years but it always came at the price of having to listen to how disappointed they were in me. I felt like I was always begging them to see what a mess I was, to please have some understanding for me and to let me get better so I could succeed on my terms.

I remember when I got the job in the independent living section of the retirement community where I worked. It was such a relief to not have to kill myself in the long-term care center anymore. Part of what got me the job was my EMT license. I was never able to work as an EMT because I would have had to take a $4 per hour pay as an entry level EMT over what I was making as a C.N.A., but the license still helped me.

I liked the job in the independent living section much better. I had a lot more autonomy and there was far less heavy lifting. I was proud when I told my father that I’d finally found a job that I thought I could stick with. His response was “well, we’ll have to see about that.” He and my mother were hell-bent on having me get my nursing license so I could make more money. There went my feeling of pride in one fell swoop.

When I did get the nursing license some six years later, I made between $2 and $6 more per hour than I had made working as a resident assistant, and I was killing myself working 60-hour weeks. My sciatica got better because the first case I had involved working with a one-year-old infant whose case resolved.

The next major case I had would be the main client I worked with for the rest of my career in nursing. It might have been okay if the patient had stayed with the agency that I was working with, but there was a serious disagreement between the agency and the patient’s mother, so he was transferred to a different agency.

I signed on with the new agency but kept my foot in the water, so to speak, at the agency I was already with. I had good (though expensive) health insurance through them. I did not know about the Medicaid buy-in if it existed, and I don’t know if it existed in 2016. There can be dry spells working for homecare agencies, so I figured it was smart to be signed on with more than one.

Working as much as I did fucked my health to hell. One of my patients developed a severe respiratory infection which he passed on to me. I had to call off from my other assignments so I wouldn’t pass it on to those patients, but my coordinator told me that I could keep working with the patient from whom I’d picked up the illness because I couldn't re-infect him and laid on the guilt by saying “the family really needs you.”

My diabetes was getting worse and I wasn’t on insulin yet. I was really, really sick. There is no way under the sun that I should have been working. During the night, I sat by this patient’s bedside. I would play games on my tablet or write on my laptop. Sometimes I dozed off, but it was a light sleep and I would always snap to if something were amiss.

I didn’t snap to on this occasion. I recall looking at the time when I started feeling so drowsy that I knew I was going to go under. I was in a state of complete unconsciousness for the next 20 minutes. When I woke up, the patient’s father was sitting at the end of the patient’s bed glaring at me. I collected my things, apologized profusely, and left. I knew what was coming.

I think that I had a T.I.A. (transient ischemic attack) brought on by all the stress that my body was undergoing. I was well and truly unconscious. I was, unsurprisingly, fired from the first agency. I wanted to rail at my coordinator for putting me in that position, but I remained stoic during the process, responding only with “yep” and “nope” and finally saying “okay, bye,” and leaving.

It wasn’t so bad at first because the second agency kept me on with the patient I’d been working with before. Unfortunately, his case worsened to the point where he needed more care than a regular LPN could provide. He had a rare x-linked genetic disease and was going to start needing infusions. I am unsure if he is still alive. He had lived longer than most kids diagnosed with this condition.

I tried to go back to work in a long-term care center when the homecare agency was unable to find me another suitable client. It didn’t work out. The diabetes had taken a lot out of me physically by then and I felt like I was going to pass out. I also felt confused, probably as a result of my blood sugar taking a dive.

There is a high rate of burnout in long-term care and this is because they work their staff to death.

I made a promise to my father that I haven’t been able to keep when I was sitting beside his body in his room at the hospice. I promised that I would finish my Bachelor’s degree in English. My father was a college professor and was always disappointed that I only had an associate's degree. Unfortunately, I am too busy to take on even one more thing.

One always hears these stories about people getting a lucky break after years of hard work. I honestly don’t think I’m ever going to be able to join that crowd.

https://lisabetsarai.blogspot.com/2021/11/this-coming-sunday-28th-of-november-is.html

November PAD Challenge 2021: The Thanksgiving Visitor

 

Image by John Hain from Pixabay

My brother unplugged from his normal busy life in Tucson to visit family and friends in Colorado for Thanksgiving. He tries to come down here twice a year. We were close as close could be in childhood. As adults, the distance between us widened, although we are working to bridge the gap.

My brother stayed with my mother, and my son and I made the two-and-a-half-hour drive from our home in Northeastern Colorado to Golden. We had leftover meatloaf rather than turkey with all the trimmings as was always the norm in years past. My son and my brother had a good conversation while I dozed. I did not sleep well the night before.

I hope that you know

I'm always glad to see you

may you travel well

~ornery owl~

prompts

https://godoggocafe.com/2021/10/23/brave-recklesss-november-creativity-prompt-challenge-autumnblings/

https://godoggocafe.com/2021/10/23/brave-recklesss-november-creativity-prompt-challenge-autumnblings/

Prompt: Write a Haibun about something you are thankful for.

https://www.writersdigest.com/write-better-poetry/2021-november-pad-chapbook-challenge-day-23

Prompt: Write an unplug or plug in poem

The Icky, Sticky, Nit-Picky Legalese If You Please (Or Don't Please)

Creative Commons License

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This work is the intellectual property of Naughty Netherworld Press/Poetry of the Netherworld.

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Sharing a link to the post is acceptable.

Quoting portions of the post for educational or review purposes is acceptable if proper credit is given.

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November PAD Challenge 2021: The Ghost of Thanksgiving

 

Image by Oberholster Venita from Pixabay

Ornery Owl Sez: This Bop is a Bit Bleak. 

If you prefer to avoid morose verse, you have been warned.

As a child, I could look forward to the third Thursday in November

Being a time to refresh and connect, a day of quiet, untroubled play

In the home where I lived during the year that everything was almost perfect

Except for the ferocious bullying I endured at school, but so it goes

There may have been a fire burning bright in the fireplace

When we sat down at the table, I was truly thankful

For whom the bell tolls, time marches on

In current times I've found that everything has changed 

Time does not crawl, it hurtles forth like a bullet train

Crushing my memories beneath its merciless wheels

It took loved ones and ideas from me without a backward glance

There is no doorway through which I can return to that year of perfect holidays

But if I could find a filament of the hopefulness I felt

Perhaps I could sew patches over the holes in my heart

Maybe I could recall the feeling of the third Thursday in November

For whom the bell tolls, time marches on

I sit staring out the window wondering who I think I'm fooling

For decades now Thanksgiving has only been a harried mess

We usually don't even celebrate it on Thursday if we bother with it at all

It's just a day when the stores won't be open if I need something

My father believed in the promise of Thanksgiving

But he has been gone now for eleven years

For whom the bell tolls, time marches on

~ornery owl~

prompts

https://godoggocafe.com/2021/10/23/brave-recklesss-november-creativity-prompt-challenge-autumnblings/

I changed the poem's title from "The Ghost at the Table" to "The Ghost of Thanksgiving" as I thought it was a better fit.

https://dversepoets.com/2021/11/16/poetics-epiphany-in-the-time-of-holiday/

Prompt: Write a poem about an epiphany experienced regarding the holidays. 

Perhaps the child I was experienced the unfortunate epiphany that a happy holiday does not guarantee a lifetime of happiness.

Perhaps the older adult me experienced the epiphany that although the holidays can never be the same I can still make them happy if I care to.

Perhaps it's a bit of both.

https://www.writersdigest.com/write-better-poetry/2021-november-pad-chapbook-challenge-day-18

Prompt: Write a Thursday poem

http://www.octpowrimo.com/2021/10/octpowrimo-day-9.html

Prompt: Write a Bop poem

https://www.pw.org/content/the_bop#:~:text=The%20Bop%20is%20a%20form%20of%20poetic%20argument,or%20documents%20the%20failure%20of%20resolving%20the%20problem.

https://sundayswhirligig.blogspot.com/2021/11/whirligig-345.html

The Icky, Sticky, Nit-Picky Legalese If You Please (Or Don't Please)

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

This work is the intellectual property of Naughty Netherworld Press/Poetry of the Netherworld.

Reblogging is acceptable on platforms that allow it. Odysee’s reblog function is called repost, which makes things confusing since reposting is considered a no-no on most platforms. It’s fine to share the post using the repost function on Odysee. It is not okay to copy-paste the material into a new post.

Sharing a link to the post is acceptable.

Quoting portions of the post for educational or review purposes is acceptable if proper credit is given.

Want more poetry?

Get it here!

http://bit.ly/getmorepoetry

Buy me a coffee

http://bit.ly/NNPCoffee

Or buy me a coffee here

http://bit.ly/NNPKOFI

Join me on Odysee

https://bit.ly/POTNOdysee

Join me on Patreon!

Subscribe for as little as $1 per month.

http://bit.ly/NNPPatreon

Get the latest literary happenings and slices of life in your inbox!

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Ornery Poetry + Haiku My Heart: Senryu For a Lost World

Image copyright Cara Hartley

Taken Mother's Day 2017 at the Denver Aquarium 

We were also celebrating my son's 27th birthday

a faraway day

we had lunch with the fishes

in a world that's gone

~cie~

https://corazon.typepad.com/recuerda_mi_corazon/

Copyright Information

The Icky, Sticky, Nit-Picky Legalese If You Please (Or Don't Please)

Copyright 2020 by Naughty Netherworld Press/Poetry of the Netherworld

Reblogging is acceptable on platforms that allow it. LBRY’s reblog function is called repost, which makes things confusing since reposting is considered a no-no on most platforms. It’s fine to share the post using the repost function on LBRY. It is not okay to copy-paste the material into a new post.

Sharing a link to the post is acceptable.

Quoting portions of the post for educational or review purposes is acceptable if proper credit is given.

This poem was posted to these places:

http://poetryofthenetherworld.blogspot.com

http://fishypoets.blogspot.com

https://lbry.tv/@poetryofthenetherworld:9

Want more Ornery Poetry?

http://bit.ly/getmorepoetry

Flashing Back and Forth: Wisteria & A Birthday

Image copyright Vũ Đỗ

https://pixabay.com/photos/chinese-wisteria-bee-insect-flower-5112048/#_=_

In the moonlight,

The color and scent of the wisteria

Seems far away.

As far away I think as

My sense of belonging here

Buson & Cie

Join Friday Flashback at:

http://fivedotoh.com

Join Haiku My Heart at:
http://corazon.typepad.com

http://chevrefeuillescarpediem.blogspot.com/2019/05/carpe-diem-1660-tan-renga-challenge.html

New Notes:

This will be a long post, so if you only came for the poetry, this is your stop!

Today is my son's thirtieth birthday. It is also Friday Flashback day. So I am leaving the notes from last year when I wrote the post.

Last year at this time, my son, his dad, and I were in the process of trying to get things in order to purchase the property that my son says is his literal dream house. I often say that I'm a pretty useless excuse for a person and pretty much a waste of oxygen and skin cells, but I am the one who found the house, so I have done two good things in this life. I brought my son into the world, which he sometimes may not think is such a great thing as it has been a bit of an uphill fight for him given that he lives with anxiety, high-functioning autism, and major depression in a society that demands a very rigid degree of impossible perfection and an ability to play by certain rigid rules.

This is the house, and you can well believe that I nearly peed myself when I saw that this property was being sold for $90,000. We had just finished looking at a very "meh" three-bedroom townhome in southeast Denver that cost $240,000 and kicking the worst real estate agent ever to the curb. Thanks for sucking, Matt. You did us a huge favor.

If you're interested in seeing just what this clown did, you can read this post.

https://www.ciethehuntress.com/2019/04/crap-not-to-do-as-real-estate-agent.html

I'd like to thank Xenia, the real estate agent we had prior to Matt, for sucking too. Rather than being a professional and telling us that she wasn't the right real estate agent for us, she did the bad high school break-up thing, hung up on me, and refused to return my calls. It was very unprofessional. Note that we didn't do anything wrong to her, we were always polite. We were looking for land, and she only wanted to sell upscale properties in Denver. Also, note that she approached us first, touting her abilities as a real estate agent. 

We instead ended up with Jason Wadsworth, who is a fantastic real estate agent. If you are ever interested in buying a property in Northern Colorado, Jason is your go-to guy. He can be reached at jwadsworth@remax.net

I am glad that my son's dream house is now a reality. There has been a lot of work done on it, and more still needs to be done. We are also still tackling the nightmare that is my old mobile home and hope to have it on the market this summer. I will be extremely happy when it's gone.

I couldn't end this post without giving a shout-out to Ghost Town Grover and Cactus Clem. I hope to be giving more attention to their adventures once the whole trailer mess has been wrangled.

Ghost Town Grover

https://pixabay.com/vectors/man-hat-bearded-cowboy-male-311670/

Cactus Clem

https://pixabay.com/vectors/cactus-character-man-western-154386/

Ye Olde Notes:

The Hokku (Haiku) stanza of the poem was written by Yosa Buson (1716 - 1784). The Akegu (closing) stanza was written by me.

I have never felt that I belonged in this world. When I was younger, I always hoped I'd find people I belonged with. There have been a few where I feel like they put up with me to a degree or felt sympathy for me, but I have never had a sense of finding my "tribe." The only person I'm really at all close with is my son. I tend to form only very superficial relationships with other people.

Dinners with my mother are perilous and fraught with small talk. She has never approved of any of my choices, and she knows almost nothing about what is really transpiring in my life.

I am not at all close with the other members of my family. I would not recognize most of them if I passed them in the street.

At this point in my life, I do not wish to party and socialize. I have one friend whom I confide in via email, and that means a lot. This friend lives a few thousand miles away from me, so it isn't as if we could get together for coffee.

I have felt a degree of understanding and acceptance from the people participating in this little Tan Renga challenge, which I usually don't get a sense of during such challenges.

I usually feel as if I am an outsider who has crashed a party when participating in blog hops, and the general sense is "what is that freak doing here at our exclusive soiree?" Some of the blog hops I participate in are very focused on clothing and fashion although other sorts of posts are allowed, and if you don't think I'm an absolute outlier when it comes to fashion, you don't know me at all. I can't afford nice clothes or even new clothes, and I look like an unmade bed most of the time.

One would think that I would feel more at home with creative blog hops, but I usually don't. I've been surprised by the feeling of peace I've gained participating in this one. Maybe it's just that no-one has attacked me yet. Hopefully, we can do without that happening this time.

The Inevitable Legalese and Other Blah-Blah

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NaPoWriMo 2020 Day 14 + April PAD Challenge 2020 Day 14: Your Legacy

Image by Barbara Bonanno from Pixabay

I

am not

what you hoped

but I am, nonetheless

the legacy that you created

I am your Frankenstein monster

built from the things

that made your life

worth living

I am a

twisted

sorry

awful

mockery

a failure

of a person

I am not 

what you hoped

but I am, nonetheless

the gifts you gave me

~cie~

NaPoWriMo: write a poem about the people who inspired you to write poems

April PAD Challenge: write a form poem

notes

I think the shape above is a chess pawn. It started out as a simple diamante but turned into what you see. It is what it is.

This poem addresses my late father. He was a professor of literature and humanities who also taught technical writing. I was a precocious little skidmark who learned to read and write by the time I was four years old. I think my father believed that this prodigious spark meant that I was destined for greatness. He read poetry to me. I started reading Edgar Allan Poe's works when I was six years old.

My father wound up tremendously disappointed in me. I was a fuckup who could never do anything right and I had a slew of psychological problems. I was singled out and abused by my peers. I married too young. I had one abusive relationship after another. I engaged in self-harm. Possibly, worst of all, between a fucked endocrine system and years of yo-yo dieting, I ended up fat. My father believed that being fat was a sign of failure. He always went to great lengths to prevent himself from being fat. He ran six miles a day for many years. However, his vascular system was a disaster. He had a major hemorrhagic stroke at 68 years old. At the time of his death at age 74, he had suffered several more strokes, had congestive heart failure and vascular dementia, and was confined to a wheelchair.

If anyone's first inclination is to tell me "cHeEr Up, U cAn StiLLL LUz3 tEh WaTeZ!!111!!!" my suggestion to you is to check the ever-loving fuck out of yourself. Preferably on ice during a hockey game. I tried to hate myself thin for 33 years. With my endocrine problems, it is highly unlikely that I will ever be thin unless I do what my great-grandmother did. She developed acute myelogenous leukemia, dropped from 300 pounds to 95 in the space of a year, and dropped dead. But hey, she cut a svelte figure in her coffin, and, apparently, that's the only fucking thing that counts. Never mind that she was now, you know, DEAD.

In any case, I'm not going to waste another goddamn minute of my time trying to hate myself into the body that other people think I'm supposed to have. Thirty-three years of that shit is long enough. People who think I, or anyone else should do that, can slam down a hot, steaming cup of STFU, read the following fine books, and fuck off forever. Or if you're not a brainwashed, narrow-minded asswipe and you simply think: "say, those books look like they have some good information," you can read them while drinking what you want and omit the fucking off part. I'd think that was pretty cool.