Arrested Development

December 1

ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT

Arrested development was bad enough; the living death sentence it imposes is completely unacceptable.  My childhood ran down the hill away from the mountain of confusion that is life in this society.  My ability to mature was damaged and what I learned to do was mutate.  I could move laterally but never grow up.  I became the goose being grown for its liver.  All the honk and squawk in the world couldn’t change my plight.  I don’t have to understand how I was let out of the prison of addiction.  As long as I don’t go back I’ll never fear breaking out in handcuffs or getting locked in my crib.

Effort is already made, just add your hand.

*

Flower Power

The man with the chrysanthemum on his head

walks up and down the isle.

Do I look like that, I wonder to myself?

Have I taken personal style to the point of caricature?

What is the boundary by which

the embarrassment is kept at bay?

Is there a point at which I can overcome

who I present myself as,

and represent the best of who I can be?

Who I might be if only I can manage

not to get carried away by impressionism?

I am given this dwelling and it suits me quite well,

when I treat it as a temple and not simply as a shrine.

Vlog: http://youtu.be/yHOob7gAEMQ

You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

http://www.amazon.com/Sober-On-The-Way-Sane/dp/1440417342/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1388576888&sr=8-1&keywords=sober+on+the+way+to+sane

http://www.amazon.com/More-Lines-From-My-Life/dp/1448677203/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1388576956&sr=8-1&keywords=More+Lines+From+My+Life

Touch Your Toes

December 20

Touch Your Toes

Funny how we deal with feet.  I have seen a woman cradle hers and treat it like the dearest babe. I know some folks who shun their feet; can barely stand to think of them, let alone to touch them.  There are the Mani-Pedi people who leave it in the hands of others.  I met a guy who soaks them soft and tucks little bits of cotton under the corners of his nails.  I know too, the woman with the snarling crusty dogs that serve to others as a warning.  My grandma warns me not complain about my shoes lest I meet the man who has no feet, but I doubt I would fit in his.

Borrow brilliance

*

MUD PIES

Mud pies and retro-childhood
Are for the hurt ones, small and angry inside me.
They require care and special attention
But I can’t stop with them.

Saving children to starve the adolescents is a sad fate
Or abandoning adults after bringing them all this way
Is indescribably cruel.

I cannot work on healing
All the while waiting for some ice flow
To shove myself off on.

There is never a time I am not the responsible party
For the people who inhabit my interior life
I live their reflections every day.

There is no one-way mirror
With which to hide unresolved issues
No rug to sweep them under
They flow through me like a river

I must return them to breed new health
As a salmon swims back to the waters
Of its birth to bring new life.

I must brave the complexities of maturity
I cannot just sit in the mud

You are reading selections from More Sober on the Way to Sane and Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

http://www.amazon.com/More-Sober-The-Way-Sane/dp/144141231X/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1374072329&sr=8-3&keywords=sober+on+the+way+to+sane

http://www.amazon.com/Lines-My-Life-Sherrie-Theriault/dp/1448652820/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1374072576&sr=1-1&keywords=Lines+from+my+life%2C+Sherrie+theriault

What I Take from Laban's House

April 20

What I Take from Laban’s House

If I have the audacity to have a problem I must provide the instantaneous solution or be the cause of world-wide panic.  Additionally it is the height of rudeness to have open-ended dilemma.  It makes the gods uncomfortable don’t you know; makes them shift in their seats and wish me away.  I prevent banishment by either, being problem free or solution-full and when the answers are not to their liking, I exile myself saving them the inconvenience and me the embarrassment.  It is never good to implode the household deities; you never know when you might need one for historic perspective or a door stop.  

Inventory your reservations

*

WHEN A SNAPPER CROSSES THE ROAD

What should I do?

I see the soggy green/gray lump creeping the macadam

Too slow to survive for long

The urge in me to aim

And end the duckling-eaters life

Is short lived but a palpable surge

My Disney style justice is dismissed

But heard from nonetheless

Shall I pull over and assist?

This turtle is as ill equipped

For this stretch of road

As I am ill equipped to aid in its conveyance

Should I reach with my fingers or toes

To something I know can extend its neck

And sever me from parts I hold dear?

The ever present missionary in me has spoken and is silenced

In fact what I can do is slow down and give wide birth

I know this creature is a danger but never more so than me.

Resistance

March 8

Résistance

Resisting tough love is approaching long run action with short run thinking.  I hate to set the toddling babe down lest he fall, but in the end if I do not put him down he and I will both be the worse for it.  Whether I see a forest or I see trees depends so very much on my perspective, also on my willingness to delay the prevention of minor scrapes to eliminate the need for permanent scaring.    The theme is greater personal responsibility and less irrational fear. Guarding tomorrow’s possibilities by not hamstringing them today through the resistance of tough love saves lives, it saves mine.

Raise the roof on your thinking

*

PICTURES & FRAMES

I paint my way into the corners of the frames.
Each picture I fill diligently,
Color, texture, all the tricks I use.
I work hard to get the desired effect.
I hold nothing back, I put heart and hopes forward.
I load my brush with pigment,
I propel my tongue out of my mouth,
I use it for balance like a kangaroo uses it's tail.
Stroke after stroke I layer the image
My depiction is fresh to me,
I bring the green, the red, the blue,
All of them flow from me.
The canvas fills, my soul soars through the tinctures
Then the disappointment begins,
The complaints, the lamentations,
The perspective is off.
I can't seem to contain this scene
Within the confines of this gilded prison.
I readjust, I tilt my head
I paint from the bottom up, then the top town, No---No.
I must pick up a new canvas and frame.
The oak, burnished and honeyed brown.
I cast to the side the gilt and sculptured casing.
I lay it along the wall with the others.
The many discards of my life
As yet the obvious has escaped me.
The tint, the hue, the angle
Size may diverge but that is all.
I have recreated the same scene
In all the frames,
In all my attempts,
I have painted only one picture.

correction Yesterday's actual post today

June 18

CLONING DAYS

The novelty of sobriety causing sweet days wore to gauze and I attempted control.  I cut, pasted and sutured elements of good living in an effort to make 24 hours of personal perfection.  I was so sure I could replicate these jewel like days.  I would make perfect spheres, everything round and even, one after another like a string of pearls.  The more I tried the harder God laughed.  Days are their own planets; Saturn is different from Mars and today will have just as little to do with tomorrow if I let it all work out.  Perfection is a thing, which is born to live, not a thing I can craft in a dish or a test tube.  Life must will-out or chaos will prevail.

Take two words and make a seesaw in your mind.

*

Who is Who

Remake the bed for the restless child in you

who sleeps better if attention is paid to the small kindnesses.

Placating her saves you the sound of her plaintive cry.

If you teach yourself

or allow yourself to grow fond of her, this child you,

these simple chores will seem light, refreshing, natural.

If you fight her she will grow strong

and you will grow weak.

Don’t resist nature.

Don’t resist your nature.

Take a hug to share

as you would take an apple divided

on a walk in the woods with a companion.

Share emotional embraces,

let your thoughts surround her

when you make plans and do deals.

If you treat her as if she is the best of you,

you will become the best of her.