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I woke up this morning with the feeling that a small, evil animal is attempting to claw its way out of my uterus. Lots of drugs have pacified the creature somewhat, but it�s still rather angry.
Some days, I really hate being a woman of reproductive age.
The rest of the day has pretty much followed suit. I�ve accomplished very little. I think it�s hormonal. I always seem to be useless the day my period starts. (TMI for you? Too bad. My diary. Deal with it.)
I let the kids next door paint my fingernails yesterday. Just one coat. It�s clear polish with teensy gold sparkles and bigger blue sparkles. There were silver stars on several of my fingers, too, but they peeled off. I keep thinking there�s dirt on my hands. I think it�ll be gone before I go to bed tonight.
Couldn�t sleep once I finally got into bed last night. I was still thinking about the �what if�s� I�d posted in my last entry. I don�t walk around through most of my days feeling regretful about the path I�ve chosen in my life. Sure, I�ve made mistakes, decisions that maybe, given the chance to go back and redirect myself, I might have made differently, but I don�t feel like I�ve done a bad job of becoming the me that I am now, and I�m pretty happy with who that �me� is.
I do regret the college thing. I�m sorry that I couldn�t find it in myself to do the traditional school path. I think a lot of things would have been easier for me if I had. But I also know that I wasn�t in the right place for that then. Part of my not being school-minded was Lorne. I don�t blame myself for that part. What happened that night was not my fault. I�ve never felt like it was. And the months that came next�well�I was trying to find a way to feel safe in my own skin again. I�m not the least bit surprised that I failed all my classes. I was busy learning not to be afraid to get out of bed.
My time at Northeastern was different. My failure to survive there as a student was my own fault. Or maybe fault is the wrong word. My time at Northeastern, my inability to be a successful student, just served to prove to me that I didn�t want to be there.
My dad and I had a conversation one night a long time ago. It was actually the night before he moved to California, the last night I ever spent with him on the East Coast. He and I went to dinner at Franco�s. He tried to make it a festive meal. I ordered Fettuccini Carbonara, my favorite. The waitress set it in front of me and I forced a smile. I spent most of the meal silently pushing the noodles around in the cream sauce. When she came back to bring us our check, I�d eaten two bites. I declined her offer to pack it up. She offered to take the meal off the bill, thinking the quality of the food.
I told him that night that he was suffering from Oz Syndrome, moving to California the way Dorothy had traveled off to see the Wizard, believing he could answer all her problems, when the truth was that the answers lay at home. I told him that going away wouldn�t fix anything, that changing the scenery wouldn�t change what was inside him. I called him a coward. I was hurt and angry and feeling abandoned. I was twenty years old and my daddy was leaving, walking out of my life.
I didn�t know then that running away was what he did best, what he�d been doing his whole life. I didn�t know then that I was the fourth child he�d abandoned. With me, at least he looked back.
He told me a lot of things that night. He tried to explain why he was leaving. I wouldn�t let myself hear any sense in his words. He promised me that his leaving wouldn�t change anything about our relationship, that I would always be his little girl, that I was the only one that mattered in his life. His voice was hollow.
Lies, all of it.
Of course, that isn�t what I started off to write about. Somewhere in the course of our conversation, we talked about Jill. She had said or done something that had hurt my feelings, and I had told him about it. He said to me, �The thing about Jill is, Jennifer, that her life is always going to be ordinary. Average. There won�t be anything really bad that happens to her, but nothing spectacular will happen, either. She�ll stay in the middle of the road. Not you. You, my daughter, are destined for greatness. There will never be anything ordinary about your life.�
Somewhere in my head, his voice is on constant replay.
Perhaps that�s part of my problem with my what if�s. I guess I wonder if somewhere, I�ve missed my chance at that greatness. Was it in not going to school the �right way�? Was it somewhere mixed in with all that crap I went through with the Artboy? Is the regret I feel at losing him more truly regret at not being part of the up-and-coming-in-the-city-of-Boston crowd he plays in all the time? Is it in the fact that instead of getting my butt in gear and writing something other than administrative meeting minutes, I spend my time sitting on my ever-widening ass in the Radiology administration offices?
Should I just refrain from thinking too hard, ever, on the first day of my period?
Am I way too hard on myself?
Not that there aren�t moments of greatness in my life.
Perhaps it�s all just a matter of how you look at it.
I�m distracted and disturbed this afternoon. I�m not sure writing all of this down is helping.
It was just Monday, wasn�t it, that I was feeling all content with my life?
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