“Thoughts From Under the Hood”

“I was bruised and battered, I couldn’t tell what I felt.
I was unrecognizable to myself.
Saw my reflection in a window and didn’t know my own face.
Oh brother are you gonna leave me wastin’ away”

~ Bruce Springsteen

For the last three years I have been a shitty person. Now, this isn’t a sad, depressing diatribe or rant about how awful things have been. I already know how awful my life has been these last few years, what its become and a lot of others I’m beginning to realize know as well. I’ve gotten so use to people saying in general, that I am still a “good” person or something along those lines,  something usually to make me feel better in good sentiment, but I’m beginning to listen to myself, to that part of me that used to be and do right. I believe it’s referred to as a conscience.

To some it all up in a list, a list that explains why maybe my karma’s so fucked up or the lack of grace I’ve had:

• I abandoned my old faith, a thing of beauty that I once had, however rocky and shaky it was.
• I stole from friends, acquaintances and roommates on five separate occasions (one of which was a felony).
• I consistently and consciously relied on the kindness of others for help and then threw their       help away.
• I became a smoker, a drinker, and a drug user all in the same period of time and to the point of excessive.
• I once committed an act, as harmless as it my seem (and admittedly more to the harm of myself) that verged on the edge of sex offender status (no reason to hide your children I assure you).
• Laid awake for countless nights cutting myself
• Had zero to none commitment to over nineteen jobs, an internship, a community and an education
• Unpaid traffic tickets of up to a year and a half to the effect of loss of license
• Countless lies and misleads

And the list could go on…

What I’m beginning to understand about myself is that I need help. I’ve been waiting around and sitting around and surfing around from house to house searching for some mystical, magical, fable of an answer to my problems and I must, for the sake of myself and the people I truly (somewhere deep and forgotten within myself) care about. I must reclaim the person I used to be to some degree or another.

Their was a time when I was a blessing to those around me, a time when I was a gift and  lovely and good. Now I feel as though I am toxic and without reason, a holocaust of grace bound to break out like a lifeless fungus. (Insert better analogy here)

I’m not quite sure of what route to take on this new 2.0 journey of self rediscovery. Most of the folks I know would say, “Return to Jesus, repent of your sins and move on,” while others would simply say, “Grow up and move on.”

I have been trying to “grow up” since I was fourteen and could barely make it through a conversation without blurting out some obscure, garbled, incoherent joke or noise and the Jesus thing didn’t really work out very well did it?

Now, I’ve gotten over (for the most part anyway) my bitterness and feelings toward the Lord and both the good and bad times we spent together, but that is not who I am anymore nor do I see myself returning to that lifestyle. It ran its course and took everything I had out of me. I still believe in him, the things he taught me and I still thank him for the people he put in my life but I never want to go through any of that stuff again. My faith is practical to nonexistent and I am finally okay with that.

I am feeling clearer headed than I have in a long time. Perhaps its the season. I tend to think better when its summertime. I wish to make amends and repay and do my time begging the forgiveness of others. I am tired, and exhausted, and weary of this journey, of this rebellion, of this fight. I want to move on and reclaim anything of my former, happier self.

I haven’t lost control of my laughter in too long of a time. I haven’t been rabidly joyful for even longer and I miss myself something fierce. I want to return. I miss being gut wrenchingly honest with people, the openness and tenderness of my own heart, and painfully truthful. I miss being confided in. I miss the people who helped me become something more than human. I miss my friends, my extended relatives (the folks who took care of me when I was alone), the people who made me smile day in and day out, week after week, year after year, the people and the tribe who took me in when I sought shelter from the storm. The people who listened to my nonsense and occasional spouts of wisdom. The people I blamed for too long for things I did that I didn’t understand. The people whose homes were open to me, whose couches I dented in my many slumbers, whose yards I mowed, whose food I ate, whose children I cherished. The people whose weddings I attended because they still thought of me when my true self had vanished and the ones whose weddings I missed because they never figured out what happened to me. The folks who have forgiven me abundantly and the people who loved me.

I want to be alive again and breathe again and grow again and move the hell on with my life. I have wrecked the old person I used to be and much of it will not be recovered and I’m learning to deal with that. This new me, the one just now beginning to tip-toe through the veil of darkness and shrewdness and cynicism, will do just fine. I believe these experiences we have in life are where our character come from. I really do. I may not run as fast, or think as fast, and hopefully won’t talk as much, but I do feel more confident in myself and the hopes I have in the future.

And if we may cross paths again, whether old friend or new, may it be delightful and touching and warm. May we meet happily and merrily, gay and bright.

Your old friend – KJ