Love Song

Red peeling paint Jesus sign on the side of the road. arrow  pointing no where man. No where. No direction for us either. I never saw a sign of RG leaving. No peeling paint on the edges of our marriage that only lasted eight months. No peeling paint , nothing left out for the weather to ruin. Left out and left behind. Maybe I was the peeling paint, unloved and left out to ruin. Still I wonder if there was something I could say to fix what I didn't know was broken. But that summer I couldn't even fix what was broken in me. My PTSD. My broken record that no one wants to hear. My sad song of life that I can't stop from repeating. I wish instead I could give RG a love song. Some magical sweet melody that could remind him of everything good and kind about us. Remind him of huge home cooked meals. Simmering soups, perfuming the whole house, roasted chickens that he adored. Remind him of playing in the rain, kisses in the rain. Remind him when I drove him to work for three and a half years no matter what. That I just and still love him no matter what. Write him a love song that reminds him when our kisses were fireworks and birthday cake. The only kisses worth remembering my whole life. Something anything to take away his hate, make him remember when he didn't believe I was ugly and crazy.

Heart in a million pieces by Nate Maingard

Heart in a Million pieces by Nate Maingard

What is it about a song that the words can sink into your life and it just makes you think for days. In the song "Heart in a million pieces" by Nate Maingard writes:

"I don't think I can bear this again
My heart's in a million pieces"

With this song I think about is losing my husband over and over. The love of my life is gone, his hatred of me is huge. But I also think what if he came back? Could I survive this break up again? It took five people to keep me from being homeless. When I lost my husband I was evicted from our house and now live in the poorer side of town where I rent a room. Just a room. I was in a nice house with my nice husband with a big back yard now I am in a small room.

The gossip surrounding our break up traveled through parts of the nursing community in this small town. I was vilified and slut shamed. My PTSD because of my rapist wasn't the gossip that was repeated through the girl world at the hospital my hospital my husband works.  My depression at times is crippling. The air gets thick with it, it feels like the swamp air in the Chickahominy swamp in July. Since my rapist has spent his whole life working at grocery stores that's where I have panic attacks. Every time I have run into him for the last twenty five years it was at a grocery store. A simple run for milk and bread sometimes isn't so simple.

So here I am listening to this song and it does makes me think. I have told RG that if he could only forgive me I would marry him over and over a million times. He still hasn't divorced me yet, but his hatred is still there. He said things too mean to repeat. I cry going to the grocery store at times, and my name is a curse to him. I remember being a girl so long ago wanting to fall in love with my Prince Charming. A super hero that loved me so much that the mere sight of me took his breath away and he would have to say my name just to breathe. A million miles from that my husband despises me, and my rapist is working at the corner grocery store. 

I'm thankful for this song, this true artist. While I'm curled up scared of life, I watch his videos. I can barely go a mile up the road sometimes, but he travels and lives a fascinating life. Playing guitar from South Africa to London, Amsterdam. His talent impresses me. His lifestyle fascinates me. Well today I never left the house, but I did write today and I will cook something healthy, kinda like him.

A simple prayer

Yesterday I walked down the hall at work and saw the moment the sunset. The right moment looking out the right window. It was a beautiful sight, a sight that you know you can see the Lord.  I gave a simple prayer for RG. As always I pray for RG to forgive me, to be safe, to remember something kind about me. But this prayer was simpler. I prayed he could see this same sunset. Perhaps he could see this fleeting moment and see something kind in this world.

Sushi on a Sunday

It had been over a year since I could take my daughter to a nice sushi restaurant. We were in Carytown in Richmond, VA and I was so excited to treat her to good sushi. Well this blog post will have the story but not the name of the restaurant. I don't want to be rude and name a restaurant with the persons way of living with my negative opinion. If it was great, yeah I'll name it all day long, bad food, nope just the tale not the name. I actually wanted to take my daughter to the fancy french restaurant in Carytown but she freaked at the prices. My daughter is amazing with money and the biggest cheapskate I have ever met. I mean that in a good way. So we walked around in the swampy Virginia heat searching for sushi. Our favorite place in that neighborhood, Moshi Moshi had closed its doors permanently while I was financially strapped. So cue the music, we were looking for a new love baby. This place was not it. We walked in and I tend to enjoy a lot of air conditioning when I eat raw fish. This place wasn't much cooler than the outside. The decor was plain and dark and pretty empty. We were seated promptly and we stuck with just ice water. This was not the sushi orgy of greed from the late nineties. When my daughter was seven she could eat over fifty dollars of sushi by herself. It's been a while since we ordered like that. I only ordered tuna and octopus and a spider roll, she ordered a shrimp roll and some other low priced roll. We picked a moderately priced roll to share. The waitress brought my seaweed salad and it was so tiny, the bowl could have been part of a doll's tea party set. The flavor was normal, just like the seaweed salad at the old Ukrop's. Then the sushi came and the small portions were aggravating me. First time in over a year I could afford sushi, I was hoping to have a memorable meal. The spider roll had a sweet sauce on it that took away from the crab flavor. Oh, wait a minute I really couldn't taste the crab flavor. Back in the late nineties Hana Zushi had the biggest spider rolls, they were amazing. The claws were coming out the edge of the roll and the pieces of the backfin were so huge in the roll, that you knew exactly what you were eating. My octopus was tiny and just okay. Please don't kill the baby octopus just for me, kill a grownup octopus so I can have a grownup size order. The tuna was medium size, but not the pretty shade of pink. It was kinda dark. The roll that we shared had no rice, and instead of seaweed was rolled in cucumber. The cucumber was too much, you tasted the cucumber instead of the tuna. When we were done, I was still starving. Literally starving. I ordered a bowl of rice just to tide me over until we got home. When we got the check, it was twenty over what I had thought we had ordered. And about twenty five more than what I would have spent at the French place. Next time in Carytown it will be ooh la la at the French restaurant and the next sushi trip, we will play it safe in Shockoe Slip.

Saying Grace

Every meal is started with saying grace. A solid tradition. Gratitude for the meal, gratitude for your spiritual beliefs. At this house, the gratitude is genuine, you can feel the compassion rolling off in waves. A kind house. The meal was simple. Fried croaker on a white oval plate. The father caught the croaker and fried it for his wife. Lima's and corn in a casserole dish, french fries on another white oval plate. You could see how much this man loved his wife with every part of his life. From the way his fishing boat was named after her to the way he cooked dinner for her. The way he smiled when he looked at her, the kindness when he he greeted her with a kiss. They have been married for around fifty years give or take. The parents of a high school friend. Seeing this couple made me think about my short marriage. Fifty years ago marriages weren't so disposable. A man would have been shamed for abandoning his wife during a health crisis. No social media to congratulate him, shame her. In another value system a man never called his wife ugly, evil, or a psycho. No lies of soap opera worthy crimes leveled against the wives of yesteryear. Maybe I'm looking at that generation with rose colored glasses. Two weeks ago I met a man in his nineties, he talked of his wife, and their sixty-two year marriage. He said she was his true asset. This man, his walls are covered with his accomplishments in business, agriculture and county politics, does he boast or brag? No, his asset was his wife. I wonder how RG thinks of me. Does he remember the way I drove him to work everyday for three and a half years. Every meal I cooked for him. The pork butt I dry rubbed and roasted for hours a month before he left me. The flour tortillas I made by hand that same last month. With the gossip I heard about me, I imagine not. I still remember every kind thing he did, every meal he cooked for me. I wonder if our meals had started with grace from the beginning  would last September had steam rolled over us? If we had a home filled with grace from the beginning, a kind house, a compassionate home. What if? Perhaps if our meals had started with grace, it could have been a tradition to last fifty years, give or take.

My mother's shoes

They were brown hard leather with intricate holes, dirty and turned up at the toes with the wrinkled crease broken in across the top of the shoe. Black footprints melted into the inside where my moms feet were always dirty and she didn't were socks, she ran around barefoot a majority of the time a throw back to her days of poverty growing up in West Virginia. Those aren't the shoes I'm walking in now. It's my depression to her bipolar. I spent four days in the same hospital unit as her. She was always able to come home with her life intact, my father took care of her. Took her to the hospital, brought her clothes to wear, allowed me to visit. I had no visitors, no clothes not even a pair of underwear to change into. I remember being heavily sedated, bare butt in a hospital gown, eating breakfast and lunch at the table in the middle of the unit. The food was cold and bland and I was a zombie, oblivious to my lack of clothes in public. I have never gone without underwear in public a day in my life. That's not the worst, I wish my lack of underwear was my rock bottom. Not even the top ten. Instead of going through the laundry list of what happened to me, I wonder how my mother dealt with it. I never once wondered that before. Before I made rude jokes about how bad could it be to in a psych unit, I joked that's where all the good drugs are. No, that's where lives can end if your not careful. Being over sedated, my head felt like it was wrapped in bubble wrap. Under water, where every thing is muffled and you can't speak. All the words are gone. Is that why she hated going, getting lost inside your mind, no words, no map, no trail of crumbs to your old life. When she came home what was it really like? I remember the house had to be cleaned, dinner had to be made, she got to come home to a comfortable home. What was life like outside of our house? Did rumors fall like rain about the details of her hospital stay? Tall tales and exaggerated stories of oh my lawd did you know what that woman did? Was she publicly shamed, water cooler gossip, lied about or was anyone kind to her?

Lip gloss and poverty

How many times have you bought an expensive lip gloss that never even got used. Forgotten and unopened at the bottom of a drawer or left in the original bag. I never thought about it before. I didn't care before. One of the biggest mistakes was my choice to take a break from nursing to work in the food industry. I under employed my own self and thought it was a brilliant and brave choice. I had no comprehension how huge the pay cut really was. I took a huge pay cut, and didn't even budget my money. RG was worried about the power bill and I was clueless about how bad my pay cut was and I was still buying make up. And fake eyelashes. And you name it. Six months after the break up I am trying to learn how to budget. I write every purchase down in a budget book. I have a bottom of the tube make up rule. Finish a lip gloss before you buy another one, which means all the tubes in the drawer have to be used. If I want a new foundation, than I need to use up the cakey bottle, period. I have wasted money my whole life, but now that I am dancing on the edge of being homeless, one financial crisis away from losing my place to live, it's a lot easier to see that greedy amounts of sushi and twenty two dollar lip gloss was a waste of money. There is bitter sadness that permeates poverty, it's the regret. Regretting ever bad choice you made to get there and the person you can't apologize to.