I have a full pot brewing…c’mon, it’s not even dark out.
We can lounge on my couch and watch an old movie…or new, Anna Karenina is on demand. I’ll tell you my plan for getting in shape that includes a two-week sugar detox and a month-unlimited membership to a Bikram yoga studio–of course, we’ll discuss all of it while eating the last of the Girl Scout Thin Mints I have hidden in the back of the freezer. (“Small moves, Ellie, small moves.”)
You can tell me about how your year is going so far. Work. Writing. Putting up with family who never change. I’ll tell you about finally sending the scariest email of my life, with lines like:
…when I was 17, you made sexual advances toward me…It was not my fault…I do not want to continue to live in denial…I simply want time and space to determine what’s best for me…
I’m officially a writer who gets paid to write from the comfort of her home office.
We can fix more coffee while I do my best to convince you that these two events–the email and my new job–are connected in the most cosmic way. I will explain how defining what happened to me as wrong and not my fault–out loud and to the very person who perpetrated the abuse–freed me to a new world of possibilities.
Here’s what I think happened. I believe a sacred part of myself has been living in denial, acting as if what happened hadn’t happened, or, at the very least, wasn’t as bad as the rest of me kept trying to demonstrate. (“What you experienced wasn’t right. You were betrayed on the deepest level by the very people whose primary job was to protect and nurture you. How could you possibly have a clear view of all that is possible when your psychic vision has been so skewed from the very start of trying to figure out who you want to be?!!” says me, defiantly to myself as I think this thing through.)
The most sacred core of my being was going along with a lie that blocked me in ways I couldn’t even define until I said, “This was wrong. It wasn’t my fault, and it scarred me so deeply I don’t even know where the damage ends.”
Turning that lie into a truth allowed me to start clearing out all the junk around it and has started opening doors that lead to better possibilities. It’s like crossing a bridge during a heavy fog when you can barely see the rails on either side of you. But then the fog clears and you realize you’re in a whole new place.
So that’s what I’m thinking–cookies, coffee, good conversation and a comfy couch and maybe a period piece movie with Kiera Knightly’s perfectly-pouty lips.
(Shit…I just finished most of the Thin Mints, you’ll have to pick up some more on your way here.)
Oh my goodness. We need to catch up. It was my fault for not responding to the last email. February was a ridiculously long month for me. No excuses. Lets schedule something. Lets celebrate me turning 40 (what?!) and lets celebrate you just because you are amazing and work harder on yourself than anyone I know. (I promise that is a compliment of the highest order)
What’s good for you?!
Kristi Sent from my iPhone
no faults. we’re women with kids…not replying to an email is part of the gig. (How about you let me steal, “February was a ridiculously long month for me.” as a first sentence for a novel and we’ll call it even.)
I take your compliment in the highest order, especially since it comes from someone who has known me since 7th grade.
i’ll email you.
Good. For. You.
Thank. You.
Ditto. Good for you. And congratulations on the writer job. How cool is that?
I just put the kids to bed and wish that I lived close enough that I could get in the car and drive so that I could give you a hug in person and tell you that you are one of the bravest, strongest souls I know. But for know, this must suffice.
Suffice it does. Thank you for the hug-across-wordpress.
Please tell me you got into the car at once and restocked up on those Thin Mints for yourself, my dear–and more treats to celebrate all you have to toast. I raise my coffee to you this morning and to the journey you are beginning, the road you’ve left behind and the one that is spreading out in front of you. I am so, so excited for what’s to come for you–and can’t wait to hear more.
right now, i am trying my damnedest to write my long and short author bio. dear lord…it’s like trying to write a college entrance exam. i have no fucking idea what to say. i’m going to be up all night on this assignment.
This is the first year in my memory that I didn’t buy Thin Mints, so I read this post with the worst kind of frozen cookie longing. I’m never bypassing the Girl Scout cookies again!!!
I’m so excited for you that this new landscape has opened up before you —- working at home, as a WRITER, sending your stepdad that email, also WRITING, writing of the most courageous kind there is. The door didn’t just open. You opened it. I’m so proud of you!!
here is our girl scout cookie story this year:
a few weeks back, my husband comes to me in the bedroom just after i had stepped out of the shower and says, “there are some girls selling girl scout cookies at our door…what do you want to order.”
We were on our way out to dinner and I was STARVING. I ordered $20+ worth of cookies. We filled out our form, and wrote the check and he handed it back to the two girl scouts who were patiently waiting on our front porch.
fast forward to a week or so ago and i asked him if he had any idea who the girls/family were that we bought cookies from.
“I have no idea–I’ve never seen them before.”
And then we patiently waited to see if we’d ever get our order. Obviously, it all worked out in our favor.
Sign me UP for that coffee, friend. Oh wow. You are brave and amazing. First, congrats again on the new job, which is just fantastic. And now of course I’m wondering at the response to the email, and how the two events are connected….I would sit drinking coffee with you until my hands started shaking.
awwww…that response. it could have it’s very own chapter. i doubt i’ll be able to keep from writing about it for too long.
My heart is bursting for you. I would be honored to have coffee with you any time. I’ll even bring the thin mints.
you’re next (on the writing/job front). one day, we’ll all get to have coffee together at the same table in some perfect little cafe across the street from the bookstore where one of us has a signing.
You continue to impress the hell out of me. Congratulations on following your own wise advice, congratulations on the job, the email, the courage. May this be the start of something big.
P.S. Will Caramel Delites do?
Caramel Delites? Absolutely–I am nondiscriminatory when it comes to cookies…and ice cream.
Congratulations, that is such fantastic news. The working at home as a writer gig is gold.
Am so happy for you, but knew you’d make it happen. You are a wonder!
When do you suppose GS will sell gluten-free cookies?
Congratulations on both counts. All counts. The unblocking idea is inspiring in many ways. I need to put some things down in order to move forward.
Love the bravery. The world needs more people like you, Josey.
What a lovely, perfectly honest piece. My favorite kind. Congratulations on the job and the freedom of sending that email. I 100% believe they were connected cosmically. Isn’t everything?
thank you! (sorry it took so long to get back in here…i’m not quite in the new groove with my work writing and my writing writing…)