My Red Cape Lost At The Cleaners

Now mind you Dear Readers, my cape is at the cleaners due to lint & dust-bunny build up, not from stains obtained in rugged in-battle use. Lost at the cleaners, yes, probably they are trying to sew together holes worn in it from moths. Yup, you got it, I am a lackadaisical Non-Super-mom/wife/human-being.

From time to time I am faced with a question: "Do I make a difference?" I would love to be one of those dynamic women with a revered career & a super mom. In another lifetime ago I did have such a career, I volunteered at my children's school one day a week after working 4 10 hour days. I was a member of Soroptimist, etc. but like I said, that was another lifetime ago. So, what about this lifetime, the last decade? What's happened? I no longer enthusiastically do crafts with my kids on a regular basis, I sometimes beg their older siblings or my niece to take them to the park in my place, I don't even volunteer a half day a week in spite of not working a job at all. It isn't that I don't want to do these things, it's that for one reason or another I am no longer capable of many of these things. So, are we, as human beings, defined for who we are, or what we do? Is it a question of "What do you want to do with your life?" or one of "What do you want to be?" I think we incorrectly ask the latter when we mean the former. If it were "What do I want to be" I would have to answer happy, well adjusted, healthy & in a good & respectful, loving relationship if possible.

I would love it if my house would be impeccably neat, tidy & spotlessly cleaned at all times. My animals would be perfectly groomed & cared for. My children & I would learn foreign languages together just for fun & even the parrot would catch on. I'd fix delicious meals which never required opening a box or packet or frozen package & our menu would delightfully vary from one yummy meal to the next, rotating so as not to repeat within the same month. Dinner conversation with the whole family - or as close as possible' would lilt through the dining room with laughter mingled in. Unexpected strays dragged home by teenagers would always be a welcome addition & there'd always be enough food & room at the table. my houseplants would abound throughout our home & flourish without being silk fakes. My yard would always be weed free & beautiful due to my enjoyment of working in it. My car would be immaculately clean & organized, as would be my purse - outfitted to be prepared for any occasion & always matching my outfits while being seasonally appropriate. My children would not be pushed or forced into sport participation or various other activities, but would do the ones which interested them with our spare time filled as mentioned previously. I would go on bike rides with them & learn to ice skate with them & so on.

I want desperately to be this person! To be respected & admired by family, friends, community & strangers alike. To donate time/services & goods to various charitable organizations as well as make it to church more than once a year. I want to be this person or even just 1/10th of what this person is...but I am not & I have no hope of achieving it. I would settle for keeping our bills paid on time, being able to walk down my stairs to my mailbox pain free & find something other than collection notices or past-due warnings. I had previously prided myself on my lone independence & strength but those qualities are all but distant memories now. My older children don't remember the "healthy" me & what all I did. My younger children have only known the unhealthy me. The mother who hides under the covers, sometimes crying, wanting to scream to the heavens for a chance to be the mother who does so much more. More than lying on a heating pad filled with medication, calling it a great victory if I carry my laundry basket up & down the stairs. I want to be the person who can lift a milk jug out of the fridge without dislocating my wrist.

I'm tired, so very tired. Tired of being misunderstood. Tired of my health insurance company denying everything possible when we pay such outrageously high rates. I'm tired of mustering an unbelievable amount of willpower just to get dressed & pick up my 3 1/2 year old for a hug. Tired of feeling like I've just done 3 rounds of a major workout when I 1st wake up in the morning. Tired of feeling like I've been beaten with baseball bats while I ran a tread climber with 20 pound weights strapped to each leg & arm. Tired of not living up to others' expectations nor my own.

What do I contribute? My medicine co-pays could buy more groceries which we are low on, yet another humiliation. If I wasn't here, since I don't really see how I make a difference anyway, I would be 1 less mouth to feed, 1 less person to have to roll eyes at & shake heads accusing me of being phony when I'm happy to see company of any sort since most don't care to deal with me & my laundry list of problems. Are they right? Am I just crazy? I don't know, I just know I'm less than who I really am. That realization alone hurts to no end.

Maybe all this pain & angst is to propel me into motion somehow, to creatively deal with the laundry list of problems & moth riddled, dust-bunny collector that my "red cape" has become. If so, I pray this propulsion comes soon. A friend of mine mentioned to me in an email how things in life can come at us in waves, just ride it out. Rather than picturing a svelte woman in an awesomely fashionable wetsuit with matching surfboard carving up a wave, I picture myself more as Shamu, but what can I say, I do make a splash of one sort or another don't I? Maybe that is yet another problem to add to the list.

Well Dear Readers, my dusty, moth holed cape & I are seeking a jet-propulsion pack to launch us into productivity that makes a difference-maybe today, that will be walking my own stairs without gritting my teeth in pain & hanging on to the railing, maybe something more grand, like pushing my 3 younger boys on the tire swing, who knows? I wish you a bit of mystery as to what awaits you on your red-cape ride of life & to be blessed by whomever your higher power may be.