Hi, it�s Missy, queen of the cooties. That little sniffle and bit of congestion turned out to be a doozy. Friday I went home early, having stayed at work as long as I could possibly could. I stuck it out, yo!
Most of the weekend I spent on the couch, watching movies. Saturday I did have to venture out to get honey, a filter and gerbil food. I didn�t want to go, but I didn�t want my little rodents chewing off a leg or something either.
I didn�t want to go far so I went to the K-Mart by my house, knowing as I parked that if I was sweating like a pig in the ac, then I was going to be pouring buckets in the heat as I trekked to the front door.
It seemed like forever. Finally, I am inside and all wrapped up in the faintly stale smell, along with the hideous florescent lighting that makes up the ambiance of K-Mart.
I am now feeling like, say, limp, and practically rode the cart around the store looking for air filters. I was hot, flushed and nauseous.
I grab germ killing supplies and head toward the back. Finally, I spot the filters and head toward the back wall they�re located on. Uh, they have every size but mine, dangit. Now I know I have to go to Home Depot, which insures another long trek to get them, since they are also located in Siberia, I mean along the outer wall. Jackie begs me to go home, I�m now guessing she has succumbed to the effects of St. Louis� notoriously high mold count. She is looking very pale.
�I�m sorry precious. We will go home after we get a new filter.� I am convinced that one of the reasons we are sick is that I haven�t changed our filter in a month. Most folks change their filter once every three months, but my kid has allergies, so I don�t fool around. I don�t buy the 57c ones either, I pay around $5.00 for one.
Confident that the filter is part of the problem, I quickly pay for our supplies: Lysol wipes (for surfaces), vanish drop in�s (duh), oust air sanitizer, Advil cold and sinus, gerbil food, a bottle of water for Jackie and TP. I blithely tell the nice cashier that she needs to wash her hands because I�m sick. She thanks me profusely.
As soon as we approach the automatic door and it opens, we are greeted with what seems to me, as hot dry air. A wave of dizziness hits me. I steady myself on the cart, grab Jackie�s hand, and squint my way to my car. Ick. The sun is bright. Hurts. Must go now.
We load everything in the trunk. Great, we got some old couple waiting for our space. Hello, even after I put the cart back I gotta strap my kid into her car seat. I guess they�re gonna have to wait.
I know I have to put the cart in one of those cart depots, because K-Mart is on a hill and a cart left in a space will most certainly roll down the hill and cause certain disaster. I have no energy, but I must do the right thing.
I tell Jackie to stand by the car while I put the car back. Moving with the speed of a tortoise, I am almost to the depot when Jackie says, �Mommy, my water!� She had dropped it and it was rolling down hill. Not only that, Jackie was chasing it. I shove the cart in the direction of the depot while screaming at Jackie to stay right there, let it go, that I�ll get it.
Only, the cart makes a left hand turn toward a maroon Lincoln town car. In an instant I see instant rate hikes in my insurance and my daughter flat as a pancake. I grab the cart, quickly shove it into the depot. Then, I run like Forest Gump to Jackie and grab her water. I mean, this is happening to me while I�m sick. I�m pissed.
It would�ve been funny if it wasn�t me.
The old crotchety couple eyes me, irritation mirrored in their eyes. Jeez, get a life. I throw up my hands as if to say, �This sucks� and the husband puts his foot on the gas and they screech by.
�The hell with you too,� I think as I start the car, flip the ac switch on high for Ms. Allergies. I look in the mirror. I am wet, my hair is sopping, my skin is sweaty, my shirt clings to me.
I flip on the radio, and it�s on a commercial break. The DJ says that it�s 84 degrees. You�ve got to be kidding, I think to myself. It feels like 100.
We go to Home Depot and from a mile away, I see Mums. Mums are good because my track record this year with flowers has not been so good. I had planned on buying them later this month. However, when I approach them I see that they are $1.72 and I cannot resist.
Jackie and I pick up lavender, white, daisy, and crimson mums. I grab one of those pull carts for heavy stuff like lumber and pile these 9 plants on it. Then Jackie plopped on there too.
I drag the pull-cart inside and there is a very sweet military veteran door greeter there by the front door. Any other day, I�d have picked that opportunity to educate Jackie again about veterans. Instead, I�m standing there, rocking from one side to another, my hair plastered to my head with sweat, while the man talks to Jackie about school.
I tried saying, �I�m sick and I don�t want to get you sick�. I tried, �Well, we really have to go�, �She�s gotta go to the bathroom� and �We have to get going. Have a nice day,� but each time he talked over to me. Eventually, we inched away. I felt very guilty.
We buy the filter and the plants. Jackie and I go home and we veg.
Sunday night, Salsalita drags me and Wacky out to Wal-Mart. I have to get honey anyway because my auntie swears it will make me well. I don�t remember really whatever else I bought, except that it was food.
Then, we go to Hollywood Video because Salsalita wants to buy, �Enough� with Jennifer Lopez. While we�re in there, (me having decided to go in at the last minute) there�s a display of movies and a sign that we can buy any four movies for $20.00.
I love a sale. I bought, �A Beautiful Mind�, �Panic Room�, �Bless the Child�, �Scary Movie 2�, �Stuart Little 2�, �For Richer or for Poorer�, � �Independence Day� and one other.
Lisa got scabies; I mean four movies too.
We went to my crib, giddy, having shopped smartly.
One could argue we didn�t need those movies, thus telling us we didn�t really save anything by buying so many. Whatever.
I sleep like a babe Saturday night after watching movies all evening with Salsalita and Wacky. "Enough" is an awesome movie.
Sunday arrives and I know that I cannot put my laundry off one more day. I�m still sweating like a horse. But, the laundry has now grown to mammoth size and it threatens to overtake the hallway.
I grudgingly sort the laundry, cursing that I didn�t move into a place with hookups and mentally smacking myself in the back of the head for doing so.
We get to the Laundromat and Yay! The parking lot is empty except for one car. There is an older man taking hangers from his car. Jackie embarrasses me and tells him, �You�re cute�.
He tells her �Bless you, little one�.
It takes a lot of my reserve energy but I drag two heavy buckets inside. I walk over to the change machine and instantly notice that it is not in service.
The nice older man says apologizes and says �I�ll watch your laundry for you,� and �Nobody wants dirty laundry anyway.� In an unusual moment, I instantly know I can trust him. Jackie and I hop in the car and go down to the car wash and get change.
When we come back inside, Jackie takes to the man instantly. He reminds me of a preacher, in a good way. Reassuring in his quiet faith.
We talked for a while, about his church (in which I find out he�s an apostolic Pentecostal, no thanks) and also about this virus that I have that�s slowly sucking the life out of me.
Suddenly, with a look of realization he says, �I saw you on the news a while ago�. I said, �Yeah, I�m trying to keep El Creepo in jail.�
He said, �You should forgive and forget, that�s what the bible says,� I told him, incredulously, that I�m not at that stage and probably never will be.
He says, �God says to love your enemy� and I replied testily that, �I�m sure God understands why I can�t forgive that pig�.
In which he replies, undaunted, that this must be evidence of the devil�s influence on me.
�They killed Jesus�, he said, with a smug look on his face. �God forgave them.�
I retorted, �I�m not God, and my mother wasn�t Jesus.�
He says, �What if he made peace with God? Would you hug him?� (oh yeah, I�d hug a rattlesnake too) and I said, �Hell no I wouldn�t. Good for him. I don�t believe that people who hurt children like that are ever gonna be forgiven. Since children are the closest thing to Jesus� heart, I believe there is a special place in hell for people that molest and abuse and attack kids.�
My voice is now escalating, and he is puffing up; getting full of that self-righteous, good old fashioned fire and brimstone rebuking and is ready to level it at me. Oh, that is so familiar. Many of my childhood Sundays were spent in churches where these self-righteous preachers, since I wasn�t interested, told me I was going to hell.
�Look, Sir, I am not going to sit here and defend myself to you. I was the one who was victimized, I was the one who took care of my sister whose throat was slit, and I was the one who was stabbed 27 times. I was the only who was sexually assaulted and I was the one who lost her mother to the same man�s wraith.�
�When you walk a day in my shoes, then you can tell me how to feel. You don�t tell a victim how to feel. If you were a true Christian Brother you�d say, �What can I do to help?..instead of judging me.�
I am just sobbing now. I am hysterical. In this moment, I am completely lost, and my soul is gaping open, and raw. He is judging me, and his punishment is that I�m telling a total stranger everything that ever hurt me, and what still hurts me. I�m no longer angry, I�m wrung out.
I look up and his eyes are filled with a regretful realization. His pale blue eyes are brimming with tears and his thin little lips are quivering. He abruptly says, �I�m so sorry. You didn�t deserve that. I have some things that have happened to me that I haven�t been able to forgive either. Please forgive me.� He stares at me, balancing on one leg, then the other. He was unsure of how to extend that white flag.
Finally, I gather myself and I walk around the table. He looks unsure, almost afraid. I said, �Give me a hug.� He obliges me, and then steps back.
I say, �I know where you were coming from with what you said. It was heartfelt but misguided. You don�t like to see people hurt. But I use what I learned growing up in church to apply to my life. Unfortunately, sometimes, things that happen to you aren�t mirrored anywhere in your scripture. I think God knows that I�m just doing my best to be the best person I can be. It�s a process, and I�m still healing. I may never be on a spiritual level to where I can forgive him. That�s something I take a chance with.�
He apologized a little more, and then he quietly left, after making sure there was no hard feelings.
And there weren�t. I had just leveled every hurt, every insecurity, at a man of God who was a complete stranger. I felt a little guilty, but I had learned something too. That you can know everything there is to know about God, or believe you do. You can have learned your religion inside and out. You can be perfect and abide by every commandment. But if you do not see god�s people as humans, and you judge them, you haven�t learned quite enough.
If you do not see the beauty in life itself, then you are lacking.
I know everything I know about god not from church, but from his people. I don�t have a religion. And yet I see God in my friends, my child, nature, and those seemingly innocent coincidences. My life itself is a miracle.
My relationship with God is much more than any religion can ever do justice. It�s knowing that I was blessed with a second chance at life. That the warmth I feel in my darkest moments comes from him. That courage in the time of fear comes from him.
I hope the preacher learned that it isn�t as simple as Christ�s examples would seem to convey. Life isn�t simple and people aren�t either. *****************************************
Well, after the big to-do at the Laundro-Mat, I was very tired, almost relieved. I felt like I let go of something that was toxic, sorry Mr. PreacherMan!
I have been emotional since this whole DNA thing began, and to tell ya the truth I�m quite sick of having PMS on a daily basis. I cried at the laundro-mat, I cried two weeks ago while talking to the circuit attorney. You guessed it, I cried again Sunday night. One minute, I�m fine, the next, I�m looking like Tammy Faye Bakker cryin� over Jim, that pig. I�m tired of getting all raccoon eyed with no warning.
I was sitting here with Jackie, minding my own business, when Mr. Sweatpants showed up. I told him about the incident at the laundry, and I don�t know what happened.
Before I knew it I was bawling all over him, a big heaving, sniveling mess. I was even stuttering, I was so upset.
I told him, �Rene�, there�s something wrong with me. You got to take me to the doctor,� and he grabbed me and put his arms around me. He assured me he would this week. He knows I�m afraid of doctors and dentists, just the same, as I�m afraid of the highway and the dark. I can manage the last two with help. But Doctors and dentists terrify me most days.
Last night, I tossed and turned all night long. It was awful. I think I woke up every hour. I�m afraid. Of a lot of things.
12:33 p.m. - 2003-08-11
Recent entries:
What you missed - January 16, 2012
%%older_entries%%From hell - October 19, 2010
%%older_entries%%a rant from a few weeks ago - August 17, 2010
%%older_entries%%Tired - June 20, 2010
%%older_entries%%A beautiful lie - March 11, 2010
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