Life tends to throw curves. I think most of us throw our own curves then run lickty-split and try to hit them. Problem is, too many of us can throw ourselves a mean curve, the unhittable type, the kind that cannot be analyzed before it crosses the strike zone. And it is a terrible habit that is very hard to break. Habits are like that, they beget all kinds of rituals, the kind that one can become totally dependent on. Without ever giving our rituals a moments thought, bam, another habit is formed that reinforces the preceding habit. This consequence tends to hamper our swing many fold over time. I have been there and done that like so many others. Couldn't stop until I could not do it any longer. I am not sure I made a choice, there was a wall that was far thicker than I could crash threw, far higher than I could scale, and it was cold, very cold. So cold in fact that all I could sense was numbness, and all I could see was darkness, and all I could feel was emptiness and the authentic kind of desperation that I suspect a whole lot of people know about but just lack the skills to come to grips with. It's a terrible way to live, or maybe just survive. I enjoy thinking about those times every once in a while, especially when I start whining about my current life status. I may not be where I want to be but I sure ain't where I was and for that I am grateful. Following is a reminder that came out of my still sick but healing sense of self sometime in 2005. Best.
Empty Kingdom
A young womyn
Sitting in a room she calls her own
Silently wondering
Trying to understand
How she came to be so all alone
Just sitting
Sad, confused
Driven to the edge of madness
For the people, places, and things she'd used
Merely existing
In her secret room
Held in the darkest darkness
By the pleasures she'd abused
And
Sometimes drooling
Living in envy of the Christ
Trying when she could
To reconcile a broken life
All the while
Concocting new understandings
With fantasies of glorious sacrifice
Until the moment of crucifixion
Even with the knowledge
She will once again rise
Unwilling to surrender
For fear of fatal sacrifice
©Douglass Jungquist 2005