KITTEN

Still I Rise

“Do you want to go to a support group meeting with me tonight?” Jen asked.

“What are we supporting?” I asked. We were out for a run, except we were walking. Jen started breathing hard less than 5 minutes into the run and stopped. I waited for her to catch up and fell in step beside her. I needed a firmer sports bra to do the kind of running I wanted to do anyway.

“It’s a support group for women who are dealing with some heavy issues,” she said.

“Sure. I’ll go,” I said. “Did you just join?”

“I've been a member for years,” She said.

“Why am I just finding out about this group?”

“It’s not your kind of group, Kit. These women have had horrible experiences with men. They've given up on love. They are sensitive, and sometimes you’re too opinionated,”

“I’m too opinionated?" I asked, a bit surprised by the observation especially coming from Jen.

“Yes, you are,"

“It doesn't sound like it’s your kind of group either. You haven’t given up on love. However, one could argue that since you won’t leave John-with-a-wife that you have given up on love,”

She chuckled, “See what I mean about opinionated? Maybe I have given up on love,”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said.

“Promise me that if you come, you’ll keep your thoughts to yourself.”

“Can I write my thoughts?” I asked.

The women in the group seemed perfectly fine – and at first, I didn't understand what Jen was worried about. The first part of the evening was spent catching up on the happenings in their lives. I was surprised to find out that the meeting was a support group for rape victims.

“Who here has gotten what they wanted from life and is happy with the way their life has turned out thus far?” Theresa, matriarch of the group and organizer asked.

I forgot that I wasn't supposed to talk and raised my hand like a second grader, joined only by Corrine, the lesbian, who informed us that her name was now officially Cory.

“I’m happy because I live my life the way I want, I don’t give a shit about most things, and I don’t care what anyone thinks anymore,” Cory said.

We smiled at each other.

“What are you happy about?” Theresa tossed the question at me.

“I’m not unhappy about anything,” I said. “I feel that my life thus far has been a great adventure filled with obstacles that I never saw coming. But I've come to accept that the life I think I want, may not be the life I was meant to live. I still go after what I want, but when life throws me a curve, I take my hits, learn my lessons, and roll with the punches. I’ve taught my heart to approach life with humor and be adaptable,”

Theresa laughed. “I like you. I like your friend,” She said to Jen. “There is old age, sickness and death, in the future too,”

“Yes. But there may also be another great love, a closer relationship with my boys, many more valuable life lessons to learn, the living of my dreams….” I said.

“Just don’t be disappointed if you don’t get any of that,”

“I understand that nothing is promised,” I said.

Jen was giving me the stop talking eye, so I observed in silence the rest of the evening.

The women relived their stories from which they have never healed–and spoke of the stolen lives that they have not reclaimed.

They spoke of wearing their experience and anger as a protective shield so that they may never forget their pain, and so that they may never again be a victim. I stood across the room and watched them huddle, chanting, never forgive, never forget, never be a victim again!

A sense of sadness overwhelmed me. Did they not realize that the cloak of bitterness and hate within which they wrapped themselves to keep safe from harm was laced with poison?

How do you prevent the purse- snatcher from grabbing your purse as you walk down the street? The criminal from breaking into your home, holding you hostage at gun-point and stealing your belongings? Can you stop a rapist from deciding to rape you? Or stop people you love and trust from hurting and betraying you?

I have found that it's best to accept the bad things that happens to me as part of my life journey - see my abusers for the dregs that they are - fight to hold on to myself and not allow anyone to rob me of my life. It’s not easy I know. The kind of violation the women suffered is deep. But so is our ability to overcome.

There is a great line by Johnny Depp in his role as Captain Jack Sparrow, You've stolen me. And I've come to take myself back,”
I felt as if I were standing in a room of stolen lives and it bothered me.

Jen and I left the group in silence. She had brought me to the meeting to find a piece of her puzzle. I drove her to the park and we sat on a bench by the lake. The sun was shining when we arrived at the meeting, but darkness had descended and several geese were floating on the stilled water. The delightful screams of children pierced the night as they ran from the lighted fountain that sprayed them at random. The sound of their tiny feet hit the bricked ground in musical thumps and joined the tune of the little man with purple hair nearby strumming his guitar and belting Peter Gabriel’s, In your eyes.

“What do you think?” Jen asked after she had spent a long time staring at the lake.

“How long have you been in the group?” I asked.

“About three years,”

“Does it help ease your pain?” I asked.

“It’s not meant to ease my pain, Kit,”

“Why didn't you tell me? We've been friends for so long.”

“I’ve never told anyone except the women in that group,”

“I’m glad that they've been there for you,” I said.

“But?” she asked.

“But what?” I asked.

“I know you, Kit. I saw the look on your face. And you’re itching to tell me to get the hell out of there,”

“No. It’s great to have a support group. But I think the group’s mantra should be about survival and strength and leading healthy lives. I think that holding on to your pain and anger enslaves you,”

She stared at me.

"Have you ever been raped?"

“No,”

“Then what do you know?” she asked.

"I know that I will not allow a rapist or anyone to rob me of my life. If someone steals me, I'm going to take myself back,"

"What?"

I did a mock version of Johnny Depp, "You've stolen me and I've come to take myself back."

She laughed. Jen is one of the few people I know who thinks that I'm funny.

I climbed into bed that night with the events of the evening clinging to my skin. I pictured time and again the women huddled in their grief – my Jen among them - unable to climb out of the abyss where some man had left them.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.

Maya Angelou’s epic Still I Rise poem resounded in my head full of struggle and pain, yes, but the poem also spoke of an unrelenting spirit - that was beyond reach and could not be broken.

…Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

In honor of the late great Dr. Maya Angelou who spoke to the heart of millions.

Fight or Flight

“When I was your age, I was dating up a storm and raising hell, not hanging out with a decrepit old man,” Tyson said when he came back from his morning hike and found me standing in the sunlight that streamed through his kitchen window waiting for him.

“I happen to like this decrepit old man with talons for eyebrows,” I said.

He laughed, pressing his cold lips to my forehead. “It’s good to see you, Kiddo,” He held me away from him and looked at me with grey eyes ancient and kind. “Is everything OK with you?”

I gave him an update on dating, work, school, and the boys.

Thorr is still struggling to find himself and making poor decisions. But he is only twenty years old and I know his potential, so I am ever hopeful. As for Caesar, I am constantly reminded why a joint parenting partnership with CX could never work. My last two scheduled visits with Caesar served as a reminder that nothing had changed with CX.

The weekend of April 25th – the 27th, I was schedule to pick up Caesar on Friday evening around 7 pm. Task with communicating for CX, Caesar called me at 5:41 pm (1 hour 19 minutes before I was to pick him up) to tell me that he had youth marine on Saturday and would not be coming. My previous weekend, (11th-13th) I received a call from Caesar on Thursday night that again he had youth marine and would not be dropped off on Friday, but could see me on Saturday after youth marine - and even that turned into a mess. I emailed CX both weekends that I was not in agreement with him changing plans at the last minute without adequate notification and requested to have my scheduled time with Caesar. He did not respond to my emails.

I did alone the plans I made for us. I have become quite adept at putting my emotions in perspective. I hurt and move on. The alternative is to end up back in court embroiled in another battle with CX that will not solve anything, tear Caesar to pieces and rob him of more of his childhood innocence. Haven’t we robbed him of enough? I’m done with court battles and engaging in any conflict with CX even if it means I miss out on time with Caesar.

“Cry and be done with it,” Tyson said. “Remember that patience though it may be a passive response, is an active force. One needs only to wait for the tide to change. And the tide is rolling in, Kitten,”

We had coffee and spent half the day in silence, Tyson painting, me reading - together, yet lost in a world all our own. If we had grown old together, I imagined this is how we would spend our days. My time with him is magical. There is nothing about me that he doesn't know, love, accept – just the way I am, and I him. There is a shared respect of each other that I cannot help but bask in. Betti said, "There is always a certain peace in being what one is, in being that completely."

“What’s going on with that Cally friend of yours – the one with the husband who likes to use his fist?” Tyson tossed the question over his shoulder.

“Ally,” I said, smiling. “She’s still waiting for the husband to change. She says she knows he has it in him,” Tyson made a guttural sound and continued painting.

And I went back to my own time and place now filled with thoughts of Ally. Few days before I had sat with her – her feet rested on my lap, I looked at her tiny toes – with nails painted blood red. The cut over her left eye required stitching. Her right arm was in a sling.

She has yet to realize what I discovered few years ago, that the power to change my life was not in anyone's hands but my own. And that fear can be the most potent prison that keeps us trapped even when there are no prison bars.

“What do you think happens when you lose everything that you do not think that you can live without?” I asked.

“Many people commit suicide,” she said. “Not that I would do something crazy like that. But I’m not strong, Kit,”

Eleanor Roosevelt said, “A woman is like a tea bag; you never know how strong it is until it's in hot water.”

I've known Ally half her life and know that she just hasn't realized yet how fiercely capable she is. She stared at me through droopy eye-lids made heavy with painkillers and fell asleep.

I wish that I could make her understand that her story is not for him to write. She tells me to mind my business whenever I suggest leaving as an option. Is that possible? Can we stand silent by and watch the people we love suffer?

“Would you mind your business and keep silent if I had a husband who slaps me around and leaves me with broken bones? Would you pretend not to see the bruises I try to mask with make-up that you know are there?”

“Probably not. But that’s what I want you to do,” she said.

“I can’t mind my business about this,” I said.

She smiled. “I figured you’d say that. You’re stubborn, Kit. Sometimes you don’t know when to throw in the towel and negotiate,”

“Some things cannot be negotiated,” I’d said.

I watched her, remembering how I had tried to hold on to Caesar as if my life depended on it – thinking that my life depended it. I remember the terror etched into my skin with which I walked into court – alone, emotional and penniless to stand my ground against CX, his lawyer, a GAL and a judge. Out-numbered and out-gunned, I knew that I would walk out without my son and barely my name. But I showed up anyway, armed only with my story, and my truth - not because I was brave, I don’t think, but because life presented me with only two plausible options – fight or flight. If I didn't fight, I was going to remain trapped living the same miserable, fearful life in an endless battle that none of us could win.

In what I decided would be my final battle with CX - I fought to my death – literally - realizing the depth of the situation, it was more than Caesar that I fought - it was my survival- and my name. I walked away stripped of everything except my will and what little of my name I was able to salvage. I had no choice but to go back to my beginning when all I had was the piercing wail with which I came into the world.

That experience that many and which even I had seen as tragedy, introduced me to myself. In all the ruin - I saw me standing there, broken - yet brand new. Vulnerable, but stronger than I had ever been. It was a moment in which I had both lost and found myself - it was a mind-blowing discovery.

I watched Ally sleep knowing that she was in her moment of fight or flight and she alone could make the decision to change her story. She doesn't want to leave the house, the clothes, bank accounts…

I know that none of that really matters. I think sometimes we have to burn the fucking house down and walk away - naked if necessary.

“Sometimes you’ve got to let everything go – purge yourself. If you are unhappy with anything . . . whatever is bringing you down, get rid of it. Because you’ll find that when you’re free, your true creativity, your true self comes out.” – Tina Turner

I look forward to being older...

I've been struggling with this as of late - feeling like I'm not being seen. In fact, that's what my next post will be about. I will no longer lay naked with a man who knows nothing of who I am beyond the way I look standing beside and naked beneath him.

I once asked Kenny, "What comes to mind when you think of me?"
And even though he often had me before bed, in the middle of the night and before he went to work most mornings - of all the things he listed, fucking you wasn't one them.

Curled by the fireplace with a book, and the look on your face when you disappear into whatever world you've entered.
The straightness of your back when you stand at the window and stare at the world.
You may not be present for all my good times, but you never miss one of my bad moments.
The things you know that I would never try to explain to anyone how you know them.
That you cry more than anyone I know, and your tears are not all of sadness.
I think that you are one of the most courageous people I've ever met.
The way you feel everything - and cannot seem to help yourself.
The mother, sister, lover, friend that you are.
That you are a strategic thinker.
Your brilliant mind .
Your big heart.
Your laugh.
That I want to hold you - forever...

It dawned on me recently, that I had put very little thought into being known before. Perhaps the problem existed not in the way others saw me, but the way I saw myself. Growing into my skin and knowing who I am - has changed everything.

The Principle of Reverse

I haven’t had time to write lately, which bothers me. I’ve grown restless and out-of-sort in the past few weeks - my bottled thoughts and emotions spills unchecked in mutterings. At times over a cup of tea, doing laundry, soaking in the tub, or in this particular case, cutting cheese into cubes to serve with grapes and wine.

Jen’s chuckle interrupted me. “Kit, you’ve been talking to yourself for the last ten minutes. What’s going on in that head of yours?”

“I need to write,” I said.

She stared at me as if waiting for me to make sense.

“That’s why I’m talking to myself,” I said. "I haven't written in weeks, the words are spilling out of my mind,"

She giggled.

I don’t know when or how it was decided that I am deep, but that’s the word floating around the friendship circle. I’m not sure what it means to be deep. Is it a compliment?

She had stopped by unannounced. When my friends cannot get in contact with me, they show up. That’s the agreement. I opened the door to a pissed off friend, demanding to know why I did not return any of her calls. “I’ve been studying,” I said. “I meant to call, I’m sorry,”

I finished piling grapes onto the tray and poured two glasses of wine. We took our booze and snack tray to the balcony, and I introduced her to my new wind chime that for some strange reason does not chime even in the strongest wind.

“Listen,” she said, after two glasses. “When I call and you don’t answer, I worry. I know that you get into your Zen moments, but you still need to answer the phone or send a text...something to let me know that you're ok. I can’t imagine what I would do without you, Cunt-ina,”

“Nor I you, Whore-lene. Thanks for checking in," I said giggling at the use of our chick names and raising my glass in a toast. Jen is still estranged from her family for dating John. They are Christians, and felt that she disgraced them and the church dating a married man. She jokes sometimes that I am the only one left.

“I keep waiting for you to break,” she said, “And when you don’t answer, I think that it’s finally here, the moment when you fall and we’ll need to scrape you off the floor. I don't want you to need me and I'm not here,”

Except for Allan and Tyson, my friends thought that I should've backed away from the trial. I'd sat them down and told them that I was going to be beaten bloody and left for dead - and still lose Caesar, but that I was going to fight anyway. And that I may need them to help me get back up.

They told me to back away. I said no.

"Why not?" They wanted to know.

"Because my name and my character is important to me. I refuse to be taken captive, and negotiate for my life on lies," I knew that I would've been forever trapped in them.

Despite the warning, Jen and Ally still wonders if I regret my decision to go down fighting.

I do not.

“The moment when I fall apart has come and gone,” I said. Didn’t you read,Transformation?

“Yes,”

“That was the moment. You just didn’t witness it,” I said.

“You were a caterpillar and you became a butterfly?" she asked.

"Yes," I said. “Ever hear the saying, Anything that works against you, can also work for you once you understand the Principle of Reverse?” I asked.

“No. Where did you hear that?”

"Tyson told me. This knowledge has become vital in my life,"

She stared blankly at me. “Have more wine,” I said.

Maya Angelou said...
“My life has been one great big joke,
A dance that's walked, A song that's spoke,
I laugh so hard I almost choke,
When I think about myself.”

These days I laugh far more than I cry. My life – though tragic in some respect, is also a comic show, even the parts where I am dragged off stage kicking and screaming. And those where I stand against harsh elements half-clothed. And others, when I dared to stand for what I believe in knowing that the outcome would not be favorable. These piratical decisions has led to some of the proudest moments of my life.

I was once told by an ex that my life was full of bad decisions, marrying Thomas, getting involved with CX, being a mother so young.... He didn't see the person I was becoming because of them. Through his eyes, I used to think that I had completely screwed up my life, and constantly apologized for myself. Now, I wouldn’t trade my experiences and or poor choices for anything. I have come to recognize them as the cornerstones of my life. I dared to follow my restless heart into adventure. I have touched and tasted of forbidden fruits - I dared to love and lost time and again and not lose hope. I dared to stand so naked before a man, not just in flesh, but in all that I am, that he couldn’t help but fall to his knees before me. And now, I stand on the doorstep of self-discovery looking back at all the places that I have been. And I laugh at it all – what a magnificent life I’ve lived so far and still so young. I don’t think that life’s been unkind to me at all – I think that life has gifted me.

“You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. In fact, it may be necessary to encounter the defeats, so you can know who you are, what you can rise from, how you can still come out of it.”
- Maya Angelou -

Lessons from my younger self

The questions were once haunting…

I was an enemy to myself. Realizing that I have done far more damage to me than anyone ever has - was not easy to accept. It was never intentional. No. My decisions came from a place that I did not understand. I knew this…still there were times when I raged at my younger self with questions that were harsh, and unkind. Why? I demanded. Why did you take me down this road of despair?

There were times when the consequences of her actions felt too heavy to bear, and I would go inside to the place where my innocence lives.

The journey back to my inner child is buried deep beneath the cracks and crevices of time. To get to her, I had to peel back the layers of my life the way one plucks every petal from a rose to get to its womb.

But I've been there enough times to navigate my way through the twists and turns. She is always waiting - as if she knew that I would come - as if her purpose was to heal the wounds she knew that life would inflict upon me. I have come to recognize her as the very best of me. She is untouched. She is the well from which my energy flows.

Jane Hirshfield said, “And that other self, who watches me from the distance of decades, what will she say? Will she look at me with hatred or with compassion,
I whose choices made her what she will be?”

Last time I called upon my younger self, she surprised me by answering back. And it is from this place of knowing and acceptance that I now live.

I know that you do not understand some of the decisions I made for us. Yes, I've taken you down some dark and dangerous roads. But don't forget the good ones too. I know your pain, I also your triumphs. I am your teacher.

You said that I should have made better decisions for us.
I made the ‘right’ decisions for us.

You said that I should have stopped and think before I acted.
I did. And still I did what had to be done.

You said that I should have been wiser.
I was wise enough to know the lessons that you needed to learn to become the woman you are - the woman you are going to be. That has always been my purpose.

You feel betrayed by me.
I did betray you. I married a man who would abandon you with a child to raise on your own so that you would learn how to fight for survival.

And did you not survive? Did you not find food when I left you hungry? Did you not save your home when I threatened you with homelessness? Did you not learn responsibility when all you had in the world was a child for whom you were responsible? Did you not become more than you thought you could because of me?

Who made you strong if not my choices? Who challenged you?

Why did I break Rey’s heart when he gave us everything? You ask.
Did breaking his heart not teach you loyalty?

How could I have been so blind to fall for a madman’s lies? What took me so long to figure out that he would've delivered the fatal wound?
What fatal wound? Did I not prepare you for what was to come? And did you not rise like a Phoenix from the ashes of despair stronger, and more powerful than you've ever been?

Why did I waste so many years with Kenny? I could have had a thousand more nights in his arms, a thousand more kisses, a thousand more everything.
I did it so that you could understand love. Did loving him the way you did not leave you helpless in his arms? Did you not open your eyes one day and the world looked different because the fog had cleared and you could see him clearly? Did the day not come when you realized that you could trust him with your heart, your life despite all that I have put you through?

I made you weep, I know. Forgive me and trust that I will never abandon you. I can’t. Are we not one?

Know this… everything that I have done, I did so that you may become the woman who looks back at you in the mirror. The day will come when you will ask of that woman, why? How could you? Why didn't you know better? You will ask these questions because your life is still unfolding. Life has much more to teach you.

Embrace me, Kitten. I am a friend. I will wound you but we will heal you, the child who keeps safe your innocence – the young woman who made the tough choices – the woman who suffered the consequences and discovered herself.

Trust me.

And that's how it came to be that a pact was made. I trust her with all that I am and hope to be. The lessons have been invaluable. And as I take my next step into the unknown - we walk together. The child who has the power to heal me. The young woman who had the courage to make the tough decisions because they were necessary despite the pain - and me. I trust me.

You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face...You must do the thing you think you cannot do.
- Eleanor Roosevelt