Jennifer L. Place's Blog
June 9, 2015
Gratitude - The Sequel
Nine days ago, I published my third book via my wee publisher. Book birthdays are a wonderful and terrifying time.
There is the excitement of putting something new into the world that you created out of the mists of your own imagination, that you slaved over for uncounted hours, that you accosted friends and family to read or reread or edit or just listen to you rant on and on about your characters or the plot.
Then there is the terror of releasing something you created out into the world - a world that is full of people who aren't your friends and family, who won't spare your feelings in a review, who won't necessarily love your creation just because it's yours.
That's an entirely separate issue, really - the putting yourself out there with your pants down. I'm not comfortable with it - but I do it anyway.
Because I love to write. I love it, love it, love it. And there are times when I hate it just as fiercely.
As long as I can remember, this is what I wanted from life - to see my words in print.
And I have. Three times now.
It's still pretty unreal to me.
I'm not featured in magazines, I'm not in the tabloids or on television or hounded by paparazzi. I'm not on a bestseller list, not competing with JK Rowling in terms of net worth.
And I am fine with all of that - because none of that was ever the point.
This was the point.
I've done great things - I married a great man, I'm raising a great kid, I've got a job that doesn't give me panic attacks, and I've published three books.
The ridiculous advances and the fame may never come - and that's okay.
Why?
Because my goal was accomplished. The one thing I set out to do that I never allowed myself to give up on, I saw it through to the end.
I tried in 2002 to publish the first book I ever wrote. I wrote query letter after query letter, made self addressed stamped envelope after self addressed stamped envelope and then collected one rejection letter after another.
It slowed me down for a long time.
But I tried again in 2003 - writing a second book and did it all over again.
And again, failed.
Until 2010, when I sent out my last query letter that I would ever write, knowing that if it didn't work this time, that was it, I was self publishing.
And this time, it worked.
I got to talk to high school kids about being published. I got to talk to them in a real way about not giving up on what you're passionate about. And to a few of them - I even made a bit of difference.
I have tremendous self doubt when it comes to writing but I plug on despite those feelings. This is what I wanted - and I'll be damned if I'm going to give up.
And at the end of the day - after all of this and all these words I've just written about all this nonsense comes the entire reason why I started writing this blog today in the first place -
Gratitude.
I am thankful for every person who has ever listened to me blather on about writing. Or about my books. Or about my characters. Or anything to do with writing. Please know that it's hard for me to talk about, and I usually hate talking about it. I can't generally verbalize my book titles without doing a weird inward squirm.
I am thankful for every person who has ever purchased one of my books. Thank you for spending your hard earned money on my typed daydreams.
I am thankful for every person who has ever read any of my books. Thanks for coming along for the ride - and I hope you didn't want your ticket back at the end, but I know not everyone likes the Gravitron. I'm more of a Scrambler girl, myself.
I am thankful for every person who helped to promote me, who spread word of mouth that, "Hey - remember that chick? Yeah, she wrote a book." Or, "Hey, buy this book that my relative/friend/insert relationship here wrote".
There are people who shared my Facebook posts about my book that I haven't seen in the flesh in twenty years or have never met in person at all - but still shared it, still spread the word, still spent their money on it.
And I can't accurately say how much that means to me.
I tell stories because I love to - and sometimes because I have to or they'll drive me mad.
No one has to share anything, buy anything, say anything. And yet so many of you have. And for a girl who grew up not really sure of where she fit into the universe and who still thinks, more often than not, that her stories are ridiculous this is better than being a bestseller. Talking to kids who might have the same worries and telling them not to give up - that's better than having a Maserati in my driveway. Showing my son that if you want something bad enough, you fight for it no matter how afraid you are - that's better than being on a talk show.
So thank you. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for your support, whether it be as unflagging as my husband and my family or if it was just a moment of clicking "share now" on Facebook. I'm grateful and appreciative of it all.
There is the excitement of putting something new into the world that you created out of the mists of your own imagination, that you slaved over for uncounted hours, that you accosted friends and family to read or reread or edit or just listen to you rant on and on about your characters or the plot.
Then there is the terror of releasing something you created out into the world - a world that is full of people who aren't your friends and family, who won't spare your feelings in a review, who won't necessarily love your creation just because it's yours.
That's an entirely separate issue, really - the putting yourself out there with your pants down. I'm not comfortable with it - but I do it anyway.
Because I love to write. I love it, love it, love it. And there are times when I hate it just as fiercely.
As long as I can remember, this is what I wanted from life - to see my words in print.
And I have. Three times now.
It's still pretty unreal to me.
I'm not featured in magazines, I'm not in the tabloids or on television or hounded by paparazzi. I'm not on a bestseller list, not competing with JK Rowling in terms of net worth.
And I am fine with all of that - because none of that was ever the point.
This was the point.
I've done great things - I married a great man, I'm raising a great kid, I've got a job that doesn't give me panic attacks, and I've published three books.
The ridiculous advances and the fame may never come - and that's okay.
Why?
Because my goal was accomplished. The one thing I set out to do that I never allowed myself to give up on, I saw it through to the end.
I tried in 2002 to publish the first book I ever wrote. I wrote query letter after query letter, made self addressed stamped envelope after self addressed stamped envelope and then collected one rejection letter after another.
It slowed me down for a long time.
But I tried again in 2003 - writing a second book and did it all over again.
And again, failed.
Until 2010, when I sent out my last query letter that I would ever write, knowing that if it didn't work this time, that was it, I was self publishing.
And this time, it worked.
I got to talk to high school kids about being published. I got to talk to them in a real way about not giving up on what you're passionate about. And to a few of them - I even made a bit of difference.
I have tremendous self doubt when it comes to writing but I plug on despite those feelings. This is what I wanted - and I'll be damned if I'm going to give up.
And at the end of the day - after all of this and all these words I've just written about all this nonsense comes the entire reason why I started writing this blog today in the first place -
Gratitude.
I am thankful for every person who has ever listened to me blather on about writing. Or about my books. Or about my characters. Or anything to do with writing. Please know that it's hard for me to talk about, and I usually hate talking about it. I can't generally verbalize my book titles without doing a weird inward squirm.
I am thankful for every person who has ever purchased one of my books. Thank you for spending your hard earned money on my typed daydreams.
I am thankful for every person who has ever read any of my books. Thanks for coming along for the ride - and I hope you didn't want your ticket back at the end, but I know not everyone likes the Gravitron. I'm more of a Scrambler girl, myself.
I am thankful for every person who helped to promote me, who spread word of mouth that, "Hey - remember that chick? Yeah, she wrote a book." Or, "Hey, buy this book that my relative/friend/insert relationship here wrote".
There are people who shared my Facebook posts about my book that I haven't seen in the flesh in twenty years or have never met in person at all - but still shared it, still spread the word, still spent their money on it.
And I can't accurately say how much that means to me.
I tell stories because I love to - and sometimes because I have to or they'll drive me mad.
No one has to share anything, buy anything, say anything. And yet so many of you have. And for a girl who grew up not really sure of where she fit into the universe and who still thinks, more often than not, that her stories are ridiculous this is better than being a bestseller. Talking to kids who might have the same worries and telling them not to give up - that's better than having a Maserati in my driveway. Showing my son that if you want something bad enough, you fight for it no matter how afraid you are - that's better than being on a talk show.
So thank you. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for your support, whether it be as unflagging as my husband and my family or if it was just a moment of clicking "share now" on Facebook. I'm grateful and appreciative of it all.
January 7, 2015
We get by with a little help from our friends....
I created this flyer this morning to aid a friend in her fight against cancer. One of the perks of being with a small publisher is the ability to do this, to donate my royalties to my friend to help where I can.
Please consider buying a book - and if you can't, if you could share the flyer, or share the post, you would be doing a good deed.
Let's help Kim fight the good fight. Thank you!
Links to purchase are below:
Second Chances:
Amazon.com
Barnes & Noble
Letters to My Child:
Amazon.com
Barnes & Noble
August 19, 2014
This Charming Man
I wrote earlier in the year about an anniversary that was coming up. The date has passed and since "unpacking" that piece of baggage, I've been far less affected by its existence.
Recently, I was going through old boxes of papers stored in the attic, little bits of memory. Old letters, report cards, photos. The kind of box everyone has with remnants of their past they cannot seem to be able to part with inside of it.
Within this box, I found a padded envelope. No postmark, no address. Only "pictures of Jen" scrawled upon it in pencil.
I knew then where the envelope came from. It was a collection of photos I'd given to my old boyfriend which he had kept for an unexpected amount of time, considering we'd broken up when I was sixteen and he had returned them all to me when I was 29. And in turn, I had put the envelope into a box and hadn't looked at it until now, at 38.
Inside, it was as it claimed to be - a small pile of photographs of me, maybe 10 in all, stretching from baby pictures to mid-high school. One of my middle school honor passes was in there as well.
There was a stray sheet of folded notebook paper inside as well. I unfolded it, not sure what it would be. To quote my favorite line from John Travolta in the classic film, "Look Who's Talking", - 'Could be lunchmeat, could be peaches. Who knows?'
But I knew.
The top of the page held the date of that anniversary for all the world to see - 3/3. And then, the opening paragraph.
The remorse was a good plan, as openers go. Hell, after reading through it, I almost feel bad for the guy. It goes on like this for a little while.
And then, we close with this:
Charming. No time for a signature, apparently. Not that I wouldn't know who had written it.
There are so many sick things wrong with this letter, not even mentioning the fact that it was written to begin with, or the events that inspired its writing.
You could point out that it reads like abuse itself. It starts out innocuous, apologetic, sorrowful. Genuinely remorseful for what happened. Then it moves on to blaming the victim. And then, the threat.
In retrospect, this letter is the best summary of what that relationship was like. What I thought I wanted in life, what I thought I deserved.
Part of me wonders why he wrote it to begin with, but more than that, why he held onto it for close to fifteen years without giving it to me.
It makes me wonder what kind of sick partnership I was involved in for so long. Such a sick relationship I was only able to completely walk away from a handful of years ago.
I often felt unworthy of love when I was younger, and I fell prey to it when I started dating This Charming Man. He saw that in me and used it. It made me try all the harder to be worthy of what he called love. To try not to do things wrong. To be better. To be prettier. To be thinner. To look more like the girls he always cheated on me with.
Walking away for good was one of the hardest things I'd ever done. There was still a part of me, years later, that felt some tie to him. No matter my anger, my sadness, or how what I had suffered in the past manifested in me, I still struggled with that connection. Even though we were never "together" again, there was still this sick, weird "friendship" between us. Some unexplainable tie, some reason I felt responsible for him.
Had I read this "apology" twenty-two years ago for my public beating, who knows how I would have reacted? I'd like to say that I'd have rejected it out of hand, walked away and been done with him forever. But I know better. Honestly? I think if I had read this back then, I'd have gone right back. I'd have been swayed by his words and the fact that he said he loved me. I'd have eaten it up and thought it was romantic.
And probably, I never would have seen my 38th birthday.
So I guess the point of all this is that, despite the years it took and the convoluted way I got there, is that I did find it in me to walk away. That I was able to finally say "fuck you" to the bullshit connection I had felt. To know that I was worthy of far more than This Charming Man would ever have been able to give and that he was far sicker than I had previously given him credit for.
This letter, this horrid piece of paper, is a road map for me - of where I've been.
And how very, very far I've come.
Recently, I was going through old boxes of papers stored in the attic, little bits of memory. Old letters, report cards, photos. The kind of box everyone has with remnants of their past they cannot seem to be able to part with inside of it.
Within this box, I found a padded envelope. No postmark, no address. Only "pictures of Jen" scrawled upon it in pencil.
I knew then where the envelope came from. It was a collection of photos I'd given to my old boyfriend which he had kept for an unexpected amount of time, considering we'd broken up when I was sixteen and he had returned them all to me when I was 29. And in turn, I had put the envelope into a box and hadn't looked at it until now, at 38.
Inside, it was as it claimed to be - a small pile of photographs of me, maybe 10 in all, stretching from baby pictures to mid-high school. One of my middle school honor passes was in there as well.
There was a stray sheet of folded notebook paper inside as well. I unfolded it, not sure what it would be. To quote my favorite line from John Travolta in the classic film, "Look Who's Talking", - 'Could be lunchmeat, could be peaches. Who knows?'
But I knew.
The top of the page held the date of that anniversary for all the world to see - 3/3. And then, the opening paragraph.
The remorse was a good plan, as openers go. Hell, after reading through it, I almost feel bad for the guy. It goes on like this for a little while.
And then, we close with this:
Charming. No time for a signature, apparently. Not that I wouldn't know who had written it.
There are so many sick things wrong with this letter, not even mentioning the fact that it was written to begin with, or the events that inspired its writing.
You could point out that it reads like abuse itself. It starts out innocuous, apologetic, sorrowful. Genuinely remorseful for what happened. Then it moves on to blaming the victim. And then, the threat.
In retrospect, this letter is the best summary of what that relationship was like. What I thought I wanted in life, what I thought I deserved.
Part of me wonders why he wrote it to begin with, but more than that, why he held onto it for close to fifteen years without giving it to me.
It makes me wonder what kind of sick partnership I was involved in for so long. Such a sick relationship I was only able to completely walk away from a handful of years ago.
I often felt unworthy of love when I was younger, and I fell prey to it when I started dating This Charming Man. He saw that in me and used it. It made me try all the harder to be worthy of what he called love. To try not to do things wrong. To be better. To be prettier. To be thinner. To look more like the girls he always cheated on me with.
Walking away for good was one of the hardest things I'd ever done. There was still a part of me, years later, that felt some tie to him. No matter my anger, my sadness, or how what I had suffered in the past manifested in me, I still struggled with that connection. Even though we were never "together" again, there was still this sick, weird "friendship" between us. Some unexplainable tie, some reason I felt responsible for him.
Had I read this "apology" twenty-two years ago for my public beating, who knows how I would have reacted? I'd like to say that I'd have rejected it out of hand, walked away and been done with him forever. But I know better. Honestly? I think if I had read this back then, I'd have gone right back. I'd have been swayed by his words and the fact that he said he loved me. I'd have eaten it up and thought it was romantic.
And probably, I never would have seen my 38th birthday.
So I guess the point of all this is that, despite the years it took and the convoluted way I got there, is that I did find it in me to walk away. That I was able to finally say "fuck you" to the bullshit connection I had felt. To know that I was worthy of far more than This Charming Man would ever have been able to give and that he was far sicker than I had previously given him credit for.
This letter, this horrid piece of paper, is a road map for me - of where I've been.
And how very, very far I've come.
August 14, 2014
How Far We Haven't Come
The internet’s response to what happened to Christy Mack has bothered me on so many levels. It fills me with horror that someone would beat someone so viciously. That if she hadn’t gotten away when she did, he could have killed her.
It frightens me that the majority of the responses have been that she deserved it. That she asked for it. Along the lines of “What did she expect?”
Unless the specific words “Please beat me and break my bones and turn me into someone unrecognizable” pass your lips to someone else, no one, NO ONE, asks for this.
No one wants to have to face their bruises in the mirror. To ache and wince when moving. To hide behind long sleeves or sunglasses. To make up flimsy excuses to doctors or friends or loved ones.
And certainly this woman who happens to have a profession so many deems “unsavory” didn’t ask for it or deserve it either.
Let me ask you this: If the pornography industry is so disgusting, so beneath them, then why does it generate millions of dollars in revenue every year? If it’s the worst thing on earth, who’s watching it? Have we compartmentalized this into believing that the bodies belonging to the genitalia on screen aren’t actually people? Do we view them as being subhuman because of their profession?
I can’t look at those pictures of her without wanting to cry. I don’t give a good god damn what she does for a living. No profession, no matter how lowly you might consider it, makes a person deserving of treatment of that nature.
What we do to rape survivors in the age of the internet and its anonymity isn’t enough? Now we’ll add in domestic violence. We are an awful, shameful species if this is what we have come to as a people.
Technology may have progressed but it’s left humanity far behind. It’s opened the door for every ignorant and hateful person to have a voice and express that voice without thought of its impact. It’s allowed humanity to regress into a dark mob carrying torches and pitchforks. It scares the hell out of me.
How can you bring awareness to an issue that’s been going on for time out of mind when the overwhelming response is “She asked for it”, or to be called a whore, or worse?
I feel compassion for what happened to Christy Mack. I feel empathy for her. I feel admiration for being brave enough to post her statement and her photos of the abuse knowing what sort of response she could anticipate from the masses – and she did it anyway. I don’t care what her profession is. Wouldn’t matter if she was a porn star or a particle physicist. Because no one deserves to be beaten. No one asks to have 18 bones in their face broken. Men have been beating women – and women have been beating men – forever. It shouldn’t be acceptable. Victim shaming shouldn’t be a thing. And it is. And it breaks my goddamn heart.
February 28, 2014
An Anniversary
March 3, 1992
We all have moments in our lives that leave a tattoo on us, seen or unseen, be it a scar, a disfigurement, or a memory so powerful and vivid that no passage of time will fade its edges to grey.
There is always the choice with those moments - we can let them define us and the path we choose to follow or we can absorb them, find a lesson and move on whilst carrying them.
This moment, or series of them, this memory is one that I fight recall on. There are glimpses, there are portions that I can see in my mind with perfect clarity and there are others that are completely gone, as if someone took a cigarette and randomly burned holes in them.
It took me years to process and internalize the lessons this day contained. There were too many to take in that day, or even that year.
Each year that has passed since that day, almost 22 of them now, I remember. Some years it's nothing, just a flash of the past and gone and some it's a whirlwind. I'm still a few days out from the day and for whatever reason, it's weighing on my mind. It's compelled me to put these thoughts down in hopes to empty them from my head.
It was my shadow for two years, following me wherever I went. How often everyone else talked about it I will never know in the days that followed the event, but that is less important than how much it was in my thoughts. How it hid in the back of my mind during every class, every conversation, every party, every moment spent with friends. It went with me everywhere, it became my birthmark. I was "that girl", the one that, for a short time, was gossip fodder.
To me, I was unremarkable in school. I was smart, I had good friends, I was on the outskirts of popularity. I was fine with that, I never yearned for the upper echelons of high school society. I loved where I was, with my fellow damaged and broken kids who were the best friends you could have asked for.
Despite having wonderful friends, I had secrets. I know we all do. But my secrets came to light on March 3rd. And when they did, I saw the true colors of the world in a lot of ways.
I'm reliving it in my head as I write this and despite being 22 years out, the hurt hasn't dampened. The shame hasn't either. The disgust that I was a different person, a weaker person than I am now. That I fought to be after that day.
I had a boyfriend back then. I'd fallen for him hard in the seventh grade. He was as broken as I was, was even less popular than I was, and was, in a junior high sense, a bad boy. Street wise but not book smart, I found him devastating. We dated off and on. We were volatile and he was manipulative. We hated or loved one another depending upon the day.
My friends hated him. My parents hated him. He wasn't very nice to me. He had moments of being very kind and thoughtful and he had moments where his evil showed in his eyes. My own self loathing kept me wrapped up in it all.
This day in particular, we were arguing. He was high, as he often was during school. It got him through the day.
I was losing patience with him for some reason. He was belligerent. We were standing in the hallway, outside of my math class where I would enter when the bell rang. My classroom was in the same hallway where my locker was housed. The hallway was full of yelling students, a cacophony of teenagers and banging locker doors and the squeak of sneakers on linoleum. The kids lining the hall at their lockers were my friends, my classmates. People who knew me. In a school with a total population of 500, there were few faces you wouldn't at least recognize.
We started to argue. About what I don't recall. I do remember him being angry about how I was speaking to him, telling me that I was acting like an asshole to him because I was in front of my friends.
This statement, for whatever reason in that moment, made my temper flare. I did something I'd never done before. I slapped him across the face.
The force of the slap doesn't matter. I felt it wasn't very hard but that doesn't change what I did, doesn't make it better.
His countermeasure was to punch me in the head. Punch me on the side of my head that wasn't against the concrete wall of the hallway that drove me into the wall. There are moments that followed the blow that I don't recall.
What I do remember was the look in his eyes before he struck. I remember that. Cold. Angry. Unbelieving. Betrayed.
He hit me and walked away. Walked to his class. Turned his back as if nothing had happened, as if fifty of our fellow students and a few teachers weren't standing in his wake.
The bystanders didn't really matter, in the grand scheme. Sure, they witnessed the abuse - the revealed secret being that this wasn't the first time I'd had hands laid on me - but they stood there. I remember some of the faces but not many. I remember the noise and then the silence.
I remember standing alone.
I remember walking dazedly into my classroom, unable to say much of anything.
One person came to my aid. One.
He was a boy in my class. Not one of my circle of friends. We had classes together and more often than not, I ridiculed him. Not in a bullying, go out of my way sort, but in an opposing political viewpoint kind of way. His enjoyment of arguing with our global studies teacher was often more than I could take, his conservative leaning in opposition to my liberal views.
But he walked to me in that math class and put his arm around me and steered me to the guidance office, into the welcoming arms of my guidance counselor. She knew me well, knew most of my secrets, knew my history. I don't think she was surprised to hear what had happened. She listened, she hugged me. She and the boy took care of me before determining I needed the nurse's office.
She knew better than I that the nurse's office was where rumors went to be born. We crafted a futile, temporary cover story that I'd hit my head on a door when a classmate had closed it on me accidentally. I think we all knew better. There had been too many witnesses and it would only be a matter of time before everyone knew. This was a band aid, enough to maybe get me through the afternoon.
I hid in the nurse's office for the afternoon. I had a concussion. Couldn't go to sleep, not that it would have come anyway. My mom was called. I don't know who called her, don't remember that at all.
Then came the vice principal's office. I was never a troublemaker, had never spent time in the office. I sat before his big desk; head pounding, heart racing. I had no idea at that moment what was going on in my life.
I listened to him drone on about how he'd been informed of what had gone on and that my boyfriend (ex boyfriend now? I wondered then) had been spoken to. That he had been suspended for the following day despite the fact that I had hit him first and that I should be punished as well.
I should be punished as well.
I hit him first.
I remember being dumbstruck at those words. I had hit him. But I was positive I was living - and would continue to - my punishment for rising up to make a statement about what abuse I would continue to take.
I'd attempted to stand up for myself and got slapped down. Not just by someone I loved but by a school administration.
Life is a fucked up place. I saw that day that the herd isn't likely to stand up and do the right thing and that rescue can come from the least likely places. I saw in the days that followed that you can't anticipate how people will react to much of anything.
I had a teacher try to get me to talk by pulling me out of class- not out of the goodness of her heart, but because she wanted gossip. I had a classmate who I'd known since first grade tell me that I was a bitch, with the most contempt in his voice that I'd ever heard, for getting him suspended. Such venom from him, such hatred.
If there was other gossip, I was insulated from it. I can most likely thank my friends for that. I had enough without any more nonsense from acquaintances.
If that's how my classmates remember me, the girl who got the shit beaten out of her, that's fine. I was that girl.
But I'm not just that girl anymore. I was 16 then and had no idea how to cope with it. I'm 38 now and there are moments when I'm still not sure. I cry for that girl, that 16 year old who had been through so much already and was then presented with this. I refuse to feel another ounce of shame for what happened, a second of embarrassment.
In those few moments, I learned so much that it took years to understand. People you know will disappoint you when you need them most. People who mean nothing to you can be the most helpful. People charged to protect you can be your biggest betrayer.
And now that I've unpacked this bag I've carried for 22 years, maybe it's put away for good. And March 3rd can pass every year from now on without the twinge of memory.
We all have moments in our lives that leave a tattoo on us, seen or unseen, be it a scar, a disfigurement, or a memory so powerful and vivid that no passage of time will fade its edges to grey.
There is always the choice with those moments - we can let them define us and the path we choose to follow or we can absorb them, find a lesson and move on whilst carrying them.
This moment, or series of them, this memory is one that I fight recall on. There are glimpses, there are portions that I can see in my mind with perfect clarity and there are others that are completely gone, as if someone took a cigarette and randomly burned holes in them.
It took me years to process and internalize the lessons this day contained. There were too many to take in that day, or even that year.
Each year that has passed since that day, almost 22 of them now, I remember. Some years it's nothing, just a flash of the past and gone and some it's a whirlwind. I'm still a few days out from the day and for whatever reason, it's weighing on my mind. It's compelled me to put these thoughts down in hopes to empty them from my head.
It was my shadow for two years, following me wherever I went. How often everyone else talked about it I will never know in the days that followed the event, but that is less important than how much it was in my thoughts. How it hid in the back of my mind during every class, every conversation, every party, every moment spent with friends. It went with me everywhere, it became my birthmark. I was "that girl", the one that, for a short time, was gossip fodder.
To me, I was unremarkable in school. I was smart, I had good friends, I was on the outskirts of popularity. I was fine with that, I never yearned for the upper echelons of high school society. I loved where I was, with my fellow damaged and broken kids who were the best friends you could have asked for.
Despite having wonderful friends, I had secrets. I know we all do. But my secrets came to light on March 3rd. And when they did, I saw the true colors of the world in a lot of ways.
I'm reliving it in my head as I write this and despite being 22 years out, the hurt hasn't dampened. The shame hasn't either. The disgust that I was a different person, a weaker person than I am now. That I fought to be after that day.
I had a boyfriend back then. I'd fallen for him hard in the seventh grade. He was as broken as I was, was even less popular than I was, and was, in a junior high sense, a bad boy. Street wise but not book smart, I found him devastating. We dated off and on. We were volatile and he was manipulative. We hated or loved one another depending upon the day.
My friends hated him. My parents hated him. He wasn't very nice to me. He had moments of being very kind and thoughtful and he had moments where his evil showed in his eyes. My own self loathing kept me wrapped up in it all.
This day in particular, we were arguing. He was high, as he often was during school. It got him through the day.
I was losing patience with him for some reason. He was belligerent. We were standing in the hallway, outside of my math class where I would enter when the bell rang. My classroom was in the same hallway where my locker was housed. The hallway was full of yelling students, a cacophony of teenagers and banging locker doors and the squeak of sneakers on linoleum. The kids lining the hall at their lockers were my friends, my classmates. People who knew me. In a school with a total population of 500, there were few faces you wouldn't at least recognize.
We started to argue. About what I don't recall. I do remember him being angry about how I was speaking to him, telling me that I was acting like an asshole to him because I was in front of my friends.
This statement, for whatever reason in that moment, made my temper flare. I did something I'd never done before. I slapped him across the face.
The force of the slap doesn't matter. I felt it wasn't very hard but that doesn't change what I did, doesn't make it better.
His countermeasure was to punch me in the head. Punch me on the side of my head that wasn't against the concrete wall of the hallway that drove me into the wall. There are moments that followed the blow that I don't recall.
What I do remember was the look in his eyes before he struck. I remember that. Cold. Angry. Unbelieving. Betrayed.
He hit me and walked away. Walked to his class. Turned his back as if nothing had happened, as if fifty of our fellow students and a few teachers weren't standing in his wake.
The bystanders didn't really matter, in the grand scheme. Sure, they witnessed the abuse - the revealed secret being that this wasn't the first time I'd had hands laid on me - but they stood there. I remember some of the faces but not many. I remember the noise and then the silence.
I remember standing alone.
I remember walking dazedly into my classroom, unable to say much of anything.
One person came to my aid. One.
He was a boy in my class. Not one of my circle of friends. We had classes together and more often than not, I ridiculed him. Not in a bullying, go out of my way sort, but in an opposing political viewpoint kind of way. His enjoyment of arguing with our global studies teacher was often more than I could take, his conservative leaning in opposition to my liberal views.
But he walked to me in that math class and put his arm around me and steered me to the guidance office, into the welcoming arms of my guidance counselor. She knew me well, knew most of my secrets, knew my history. I don't think she was surprised to hear what had happened. She listened, she hugged me. She and the boy took care of me before determining I needed the nurse's office.
She knew better than I that the nurse's office was where rumors went to be born. We crafted a futile, temporary cover story that I'd hit my head on a door when a classmate had closed it on me accidentally. I think we all knew better. There had been too many witnesses and it would only be a matter of time before everyone knew. This was a band aid, enough to maybe get me through the afternoon.
I hid in the nurse's office for the afternoon. I had a concussion. Couldn't go to sleep, not that it would have come anyway. My mom was called. I don't know who called her, don't remember that at all.
Then came the vice principal's office. I was never a troublemaker, had never spent time in the office. I sat before his big desk; head pounding, heart racing. I had no idea at that moment what was going on in my life.
I listened to him drone on about how he'd been informed of what had gone on and that my boyfriend (ex boyfriend now? I wondered then) had been spoken to. That he had been suspended for the following day despite the fact that I had hit him first and that I should be punished as well.
I should be punished as well.
I hit him first.
I remember being dumbstruck at those words. I had hit him. But I was positive I was living - and would continue to - my punishment for rising up to make a statement about what abuse I would continue to take.
I'd attempted to stand up for myself and got slapped down. Not just by someone I loved but by a school administration.
Life is a fucked up place. I saw that day that the herd isn't likely to stand up and do the right thing and that rescue can come from the least likely places. I saw in the days that followed that you can't anticipate how people will react to much of anything.
I had a teacher try to get me to talk by pulling me out of class- not out of the goodness of her heart, but because she wanted gossip. I had a classmate who I'd known since first grade tell me that I was a bitch, with the most contempt in his voice that I'd ever heard, for getting him suspended. Such venom from him, such hatred.
If there was other gossip, I was insulated from it. I can most likely thank my friends for that. I had enough without any more nonsense from acquaintances.
If that's how my classmates remember me, the girl who got the shit beaten out of her, that's fine. I was that girl.
But I'm not just that girl anymore. I was 16 then and had no idea how to cope with it. I'm 38 now and there are moments when I'm still not sure. I cry for that girl, that 16 year old who had been through so much already and was then presented with this. I refuse to feel another ounce of shame for what happened, a second of embarrassment.
In those few moments, I learned so much that it took years to understand. People you know will disappoint you when you need them most. People who mean nothing to you can be the most helpful. People charged to protect you can be your biggest betrayer.
And now that I've unpacked this bag I've carried for 22 years, maybe it's put away for good. And March 3rd can pass every year from now on without the twinge of memory.
January 14, 2014
Gratitude
Today is my birthday. I'm not huge on birthdays, never have been. I think that happens to most people, especially as we grow older, but having one in the dreary midst of winter always makes it more complicated to celebrate, if you do celebrate. Countless plans changed and parties cancelled due to snowstorms....yeah, it was a pain in the ass as a kid. Plus having both of your siblings' birthdays within two weeks of your own....further complications. Lots of sharing.
So thanks to Facebook and my own lack of "privacy", the whole world knows that I turned 38 today. Another year older....
Except it's really only in years. In maturity, I waver somewhere between my son's age (6) and early to mid high school (16). Fart jokes are still funny. I'm guessing they probably always will be.
I've spent a lot of time over the course of the past year working on who I am, how I feel about that person, and how to be better at being me. How to be better to those around me as well. And that's why I'm writing this now - not to ask for more birthday wishes or to garner center of attention status because I'm the birthday girl. I left my tiara at home.
I'm thankful. I have gratitude for a million things - at all times but today, seeing the outpouring of "happy birthday" messages has been overwhelming.
I know that Facebook tells you that it's my birthday - just like it does for everyone else who posts it. And I know we all have that moment of freedom where we can decide to wish someone a happy birthday or not. To those of you who decided to do so - thank you.
I'm grateful that I woke up on my birthday to my husband who inspires me and loves me no matter my faults every single day and to my son who wants nothing more than to sit on my lap and play video games with me. I'm grateful for the phone call from my mother this morning, when I got to listen to her sing Happy Birthday off key after only two sips of coffee. I'm grateful that I will get to listen to my grandmother do the same after I get home from work tonight. I'm grateful for my favorite coworker ever, Gloria, who makes me see the world a little different every day and who brought me flowers and a card (and cake pops) this morning.
I'm grateful for every message, text, phone call and post that I've received today. Some made me cry a little, some offered a chance to reconnect with people with whom I haven't spoken in a long time, some made me laugh, and all of them made me smile.
This birthday, I see the world from different eyes. I see it with hope and happiness and peace and perspective. I see what I have and what I cherish and what I want to keep.
I see promise.
And as it grows closer to the time to blow the candles out on this day, I don't think anyone could wish for much more than that.
So thanks to Facebook and my own lack of "privacy", the whole world knows that I turned 38 today. Another year older....
Except it's really only in years. In maturity, I waver somewhere between my son's age (6) and early to mid high school (16). Fart jokes are still funny. I'm guessing they probably always will be.
I've spent a lot of time over the course of the past year working on who I am, how I feel about that person, and how to be better at being me. How to be better to those around me as well. And that's why I'm writing this now - not to ask for more birthday wishes or to garner center of attention status because I'm the birthday girl. I left my tiara at home.
I'm thankful. I have gratitude for a million things - at all times but today, seeing the outpouring of "happy birthday" messages has been overwhelming.
I know that Facebook tells you that it's my birthday - just like it does for everyone else who posts it. And I know we all have that moment of freedom where we can decide to wish someone a happy birthday or not. To those of you who decided to do so - thank you.
I'm grateful that I woke up on my birthday to my husband who inspires me and loves me no matter my faults every single day and to my son who wants nothing more than to sit on my lap and play video games with me. I'm grateful for the phone call from my mother this morning, when I got to listen to her sing Happy Birthday off key after only two sips of coffee. I'm grateful that I will get to listen to my grandmother do the same after I get home from work tonight. I'm grateful for my favorite coworker ever, Gloria, who makes me see the world a little different every day and who brought me flowers and a card (and cake pops) this morning.
I'm grateful for every message, text, phone call and post that I've received today. Some made me cry a little, some offered a chance to reconnect with people with whom I haven't spoken in a long time, some made me laugh, and all of them made me smile.
This birthday, I see the world from different eyes. I see it with hope and happiness and peace and perspective. I see what I have and what I cherish and what I want to keep.
I see promise.
And as it grows closer to the time to blow the candles out on this day, I don't think anyone could wish for much more than that.
December 31, 2013
The end....and a beginning
The only regularity I seem to have for blogging is at the end of the year. It's the one time when I always feel compelled to write something down before one year ends and a new one begins. Any other time during the year, consistency be damned, apparently. So here is my End o' '13 Blog.
I've spent many years of my life, and I've said this before, lamenting the things that I don't have instead of seeing the blessings in the things that I do. Most of my almost 38 years have been spent being upset about what didn't happen instead of what did. I thought I'd been learning lessons at the hardships in life and instead I was so focused on all of the negative that it's exactly the same energy I kept drawing to me. Instead of seeing the good in my life, I was angry that it wasn't great. I focused on what went wrong, what could have happened, what should have happened. I was determined to believe that my life was more garbage than good and that conviction made it so.
Over the years, I have repeatedly heard the phrase that you need to hit the bottom before things will change. And sometimes you think you've hit the bottom and then discover that the bottom has an underground garage. And other sundry tunnels and levels you never discovered.
I started to outline my list of good and bad for the year and just deleted it all. Suffice to say that the ups and downs were plentiful for 2013 - as they are for everyone in every year. Bad things happened. Good things happened. New people came into my life. Old friends came back into it. Some grew apart. Some left like the diseases they are. There were some near misses, some blessings, and all in all, there were moments that sucked out loud and moments that were magical beyond words.
A new friend and influence in my life this year has taught me that it's all in our perspective. All of our years have good and bad. And they aren't always in equal measure. But it's within our own power in how we see it all. If we convince ourselves that the bad is all we're ever destined for, then that's how it shall be. Positive brings positive, or so the self helper's sayings go. And as much as I would like to refute that or argue it, it isn't wrong. As much as I've always said that things needed to change - most of all, I needed to change.
I'm not walking into the future in a stupidly optimistic fog where I think everything is made of hearts and stars and unicorns. I'm no Pollyanna. What I am doing is spending less time freaking out about the things that I cannot change, finding lessons and nuggets to be grateful for in the things that aren't so great.
I lost things this year - but could have lost more. I gained things and I'm grateful. So 2014 is soon to be upon us and I'm most grateful to start the new year with a better mindset and perspective to take on the challenges that those 365 days will bring to my door.
I've spent many years of my life, and I've said this before, lamenting the things that I don't have instead of seeing the blessings in the things that I do. Most of my almost 38 years have been spent being upset about what didn't happen instead of what did. I thought I'd been learning lessons at the hardships in life and instead I was so focused on all of the negative that it's exactly the same energy I kept drawing to me. Instead of seeing the good in my life, I was angry that it wasn't great. I focused on what went wrong, what could have happened, what should have happened. I was determined to believe that my life was more garbage than good and that conviction made it so.
Over the years, I have repeatedly heard the phrase that you need to hit the bottom before things will change. And sometimes you think you've hit the bottom and then discover that the bottom has an underground garage. And other sundry tunnels and levels you never discovered.
I started to outline my list of good and bad for the year and just deleted it all. Suffice to say that the ups and downs were plentiful for 2013 - as they are for everyone in every year. Bad things happened. Good things happened. New people came into my life. Old friends came back into it. Some grew apart. Some left like the diseases they are. There were some near misses, some blessings, and all in all, there were moments that sucked out loud and moments that were magical beyond words.
A new friend and influence in my life this year has taught me that it's all in our perspective. All of our years have good and bad. And they aren't always in equal measure. But it's within our own power in how we see it all. If we convince ourselves that the bad is all we're ever destined for, then that's how it shall be. Positive brings positive, or so the self helper's sayings go. And as much as I would like to refute that or argue it, it isn't wrong. As much as I've always said that things needed to change - most of all, I needed to change.
I'm not walking into the future in a stupidly optimistic fog where I think everything is made of hearts and stars and unicorns. I'm no Pollyanna. What I am doing is spending less time freaking out about the things that I cannot change, finding lessons and nuggets to be grateful for in the things that aren't so great.
I lost things this year - but could have lost more. I gained things and I'm grateful. So 2014 is soon to be upon us and I'm most grateful to start the new year with a better mindset and perspective to take on the challenges that those 365 days will bring to my door.
December 13, 2013
The Holidays
Here we are again at the Christmas season, a place that despite the many warnings and commercials and stores setting up for it around Easter, always seems to sneak up on me. I’m terrible at preparing for it, horrible at decorating for it. A few years ago, we put our tree up on Christmas Eve and then I took it down the day after Christmas.
I’m not the only person who struggles at Christmas. There are plenty. And there are many who struggle with issues far worse than my own. I never forget that – and I do appreciate what I have.
I don’t want to hate Christmas. I never wanted to hate it. I try to put my game face on and enjoy the time spent with my family, the cheery songs, watching my cats find a peaceful moment together as they sleep under the twinkling lights. But in my heart, it’s the depths of winter when the holidays roll around.
I had seven Christmases that were great – and I can remember none of them, really. My eighth Christmas came six months after losing my brother suddenly. He was 5, I was 8. We had our little family of my parents, my sister, brother and me – and then we didn’t. There was a piece missing in our house, under our tree, and in our hearts.
And you don’t get that back.
I don’t remember what that first Christmas was like without him. I remember what they felt like after that – empty. My family, my normal, fractured irreparably.
There is so much in my life to be thankful for – so much that I have that others do not. And for all of that, I am truly grateful. I spent a lot of years focusing on what I didn’t instead of what I do. I’ve spent most of this year retraining my head and my heart to be more thankful, be more positive, be a better me.
I’ve done my best to make Christmas wonderful for my son since he was born. But I did it all half-heartedly. It was appearance only. I wanted him, in his innocence, to love the magic of the holiday. Family and love and presents and joy. But for me, it was all façade.
I don’t want to hate it anymore.
I had convinced myself that my son wouldn’t see this Christmas – if for no other reason than my brother, who my son is named for – didn’t get to have one at age six. It was a completely irrational fear – but an all-encompassing one. I’d been terrified that he wouldn’t live past five and a half. And when he did, I had a huge sigh of relief.
That this year has been one of so much change for me has made me want to try to change how I feel about the holidays. Not just for my son – but for me, too. I don’t want to dread a season that for so many heralds joy.
This morning, Aaron brought me a project Michael had done yesterday. It was Santa’s head drawn on a piece of paper that Michael had colored in and below it, he had written a note. “Dear Santa, ples cum to my hous on Christmas Eve.”
I lost it. I just started to cry while I was trying to get ready for work. And I couldn’t stop crying. I’m crying again now thinking about it.
That little boy has his innocence and believes in the magic of Christmas. Maybe mostly for presents, because he IS six after all, but he’s all in on Christmas. He gets excited about snow, about wearing his gloves and his snow boots and putting up the tree and watching holiday movies. He has this exuberance for the holiday that I don’t remember ever having.
My brother died almost 30 years ago. I’ve spent so many years holding on to unhappiness and not allowing myself to feel anything good about it. He didn’t do this to me – I did. So now it’s time to be done doing this to myself. He wouldn’t have wanted this for me, and I don’t want it anymore, either.
So this year, I make it better. I take baby steps to enjoying instead of dreading. We make new traditions for our little family. And maybe next year, I’ll be better equipped and prepared.
We start tonight with taking a ride with the boy to look at the Christmas lights that people put up outside, armed with hot chocolate in the car. Maybe we'll even listen to some Christmas songs. Maybe we'll listen to Volbeat. Who knows? The point is that we're doing this as a family, making traditions, and approaching the holiday in a new way with open minds and open hearts. I owe it to my brother, my son, my husband....and I owe it to myself to retrain myself.
I’m not the only person who struggles at Christmas. There are plenty. And there are many who struggle with issues far worse than my own. I never forget that – and I do appreciate what I have.
I don’t want to hate Christmas. I never wanted to hate it. I try to put my game face on and enjoy the time spent with my family, the cheery songs, watching my cats find a peaceful moment together as they sleep under the twinkling lights. But in my heart, it’s the depths of winter when the holidays roll around.
I had seven Christmases that were great – and I can remember none of them, really. My eighth Christmas came six months after losing my brother suddenly. He was 5, I was 8. We had our little family of my parents, my sister, brother and me – and then we didn’t. There was a piece missing in our house, under our tree, and in our hearts.
And you don’t get that back.
I don’t remember what that first Christmas was like without him. I remember what they felt like after that – empty. My family, my normal, fractured irreparably.
There is so much in my life to be thankful for – so much that I have that others do not. And for all of that, I am truly grateful. I spent a lot of years focusing on what I didn’t instead of what I do. I’ve spent most of this year retraining my head and my heart to be more thankful, be more positive, be a better me.
I’ve done my best to make Christmas wonderful for my son since he was born. But I did it all half-heartedly. It was appearance only. I wanted him, in his innocence, to love the magic of the holiday. Family and love and presents and joy. But for me, it was all façade.
I don’t want to hate it anymore.
I had convinced myself that my son wouldn’t see this Christmas – if for no other reason than my brother, who my son is named for – didn’t get to have one at age six. It was a completely irrational fear – but an all-encompassing one. I’d been terrified that he wouldn’t live past five and a half. And when he did, I had a huge sigh of relief.
That this year has been one of so much change for me has made me want to try to change how I feel about the holidays. Not just for my son – but for me, too. I don’t want to dread a season that for so many heralds joy.
This morning, Aaron brought me a project Michael had done yesterday. It was Santa’s head drawn on a piece of paper that Michael had colored in and below it, he had written a note. “Dear Santa, ples cum to my hous on Christmas Eve.”
I lost it. I just started to cry while I was trying to get ready for work. And I couldn’t stop crying. I’m crying again now thinking about it.
That little boy has his innocence and believes in the magic of Christmas. Maybe mostly for presents, because he IS six after all, but he’s all in on Christmas. He gets excited about snow, about wearing his gloves and his snow boots and putting up the tree and watching holiday movies. He has this exuberance for the holiday that I don’t remember ever having.
My brother died almost 30 years ago. I’ve spent so many years holding on to unhappiness and not allowing myself to feel anything good about it. He didn’t do this to me – I did. So now it’s time to be done doing this to myself. He wouldn’t have wanted this for me, and I don’t want it anymore, either.
So this year, I make it better. I take baby steps to enjoying instead of dreading. We make new traditions for our little family. And maybe next year, I’ll be better equipped and prepared.
We start tonight with taking a ride with the boy to look at the Christmas lights that people put up outside, armed with hot chocolate in the car. Maybe we'll even listen to some Christmas songs. Maybe we'll listen to Volbeat. Who knows? The point is that we're doing this as a family, making traditions, and approaching the holiday in a new way with open minds and open hearts. I owe it to my brother, my son, my husband....and I owe it to myself to retrain myself.
August 3, 2013
The Stage is Yours Trailer
Below is the trailer for a site I posted about a few days ago - a site I believe can help to change the world - can help to heal those who need help, who need inspiration, who need to tell their own stories.
Please watch, visit the site, share it, and tell your own story.
The Stage is Yours
July 30, 2013
The Stage is Yours...
"What we do for ourselves dies with us. What we do for others and the world remains and is immortal."
- Albert Pine
This blog offers us all the chance to do all of these things - to say something for ourselves. To say something for someone, anyone else who may need to see it. To inspire others and leave a mark on the world. An indelible tattoo, your words that can affect and possibly change someone else's life.
I urge you to take a look. Read what's been written. See what affects others. Tell your own story. Give yourself a voice where maybe before, you've never been able to find it.
A place to speak without judgment. Without ridicule. Without disappointment. Where you can help, where you can inspire others and maybe yourself too.Make your mark.
The stage is yours.The Stage is Yours
- Albert Pine
This blog offers us all the chance to do all of these things - to say something for ourselves. To say something for someone, anyone else who may need to see it. To inspire others and leave a mark on the world. An indelible tattoo, your words that can affect and possibly change someone else's life.
I urge you to take a look. Read what's been written. See what affects others. Tell your own story. Give yourself a voice where maybe before, you've never been able to find it.
A place to speak without judgment. Without ridicule. Without disappointment. Where you can help, where you can inspire others and maybe yourself too.Make your mark.
The stage is yours.The Stage is Yours
