Some days I feel like I missed my calling. I should have packed my bags, hitched a ride west and tried my luck in Hollywood. After all, I have spent the last 14 years of my life living a play - acting out each moment in front of, well, everyone pretty much. I am the supreme actress. I wake up and have to bargain with myself to get out of bed. My body screams in protest, my brain yells at me to just stop, to yield, to fall back into the blissful sleep stupid! And yet, I roll out of bed, my feet pushing down into the floor with each step - feeling as though the bone with shatter, as though our cold hardwood floors have turned into hot lava. I push on, knowing that if I can keep it up, the adrenaline will kick in soon and help me over come the urge to puke. As I sit in silence, eating my cereal, rereading a book I've read hundreds of times before, I have to continually stop my hand from reaching down and brushing my ankle...it feels as though I have blood oozing down the outside of my leg. I know that there is no blood running down the side, I know that when I touch my leg I won't feel blood but I will feel pain from the touch - and yet sometimes I can't help myself.
Somehow, by the time I get to work, I have numbed my brain enough to the pain to put on that blank smile. That half chirpy "good morning" and mumble a sorry I'm a little late. Yes, it's true. I do tend to run 15 minutes late...but then, I figure that most people given the pain I'm in, would throw themselves down into traffic, beg for morphine, or worse...so I figure 15 with a smile and no complaining is really quite a feat.
I spend my day focusing on my walk - am I walking without a limp, am I hunched over from the pain? I smile, reply "great!" when asked how I'm doing...worst case scenario I answer "fine" or "good". I push on, not asking for favors, refusing the opiates that they suggest would help so much, my pride preventing me from getting a handicap sticker.....
And as I sit here and write this, I wonder why I bother. Who am I saving? No one cares that I hurt or don't hurt. I work in a crass environment. I have more and more work piled on me - physical demands and comments about my health that cross the line and all I say is "thank you m'am may I have another?".
I have come to realize that I am not happy with where I am at. I do not enjoy what I am doing. I do not find my work fulfilling, my coworkers are not supportive - they sabotage and back-stab, I am supremely frightened that I am killing myself and ruining what is left of my health for a job that, well, I hate. And for a mission I do not believe in.
I am starting to realize that I need to make changes. In the climate we are in, some changes are easier to make than others. That said, we are not locked into this town (no home ownership for us -thank goodness we saw early on that this town was not where we wanted to put down roots!), I am not going to chain my brain to the job on "off-hours" and I am no longer going to be such an Oscar worthy actress. I am going to be a little more real. I am going to be a little more honest and open.
So, excuse if the next time you ask, I might say "Been better, thanks."
