Best story continued… #2 Brendon

Another best friend… my son… Brendon.  For some reason I can feel everything about him.  When I was bullimic, it was easier, because when you bury the hurt with food, you can’t feel the choke in the throat, the pain in the heart, the need to reach out and hug and can’t because he’s too far away, or just doesn’t want to.

Brendon… special.  Not in ANY more loved than my other two, but more connected with my intuitive feelings for some reason.  Brendon.  My first born and someone I was with alone many, many months and he was like attached to my hip.  He was there for me for the next two beautiful babies and never left my side when I was pregnant.  Touched their little kicks, listened to their heart beat.  He was a very big part of my life when it came to support…. except when his dad came home, in later years, he would be angry.

I told my son tonight that I understood my grandmother.  I told him how she didn’t want anyone to love her because it would make it easier when she died.  I’ve felt that forever.  But when my nephew Ross died I realized something.  No matter how far you are, how mean you are, how distant you are, how much you try to numb the love and make others numb too towards you – if that human being truly loves you it’s not possible.  It just isn’t.

To Brendon, thank you.  Thank you for loving me through my most awful motherly periods, for when I left, for when I moved, … thank you for never giving up on me.  Here’s a tear for a parent that has just realized I actually have many years to catch up on with my parents, my sister, and my children.  Years when I didn’t want to connect because not only was I NOT wanting you to love me, I equally was so afraid to love too much.

…. didn’t work.  I am destined to love too much – my children, my parents, my sister, my best friends, my children’s father…. you can’t bury that in food.  It may hurt to face it, but in the end it would have hurt more not to hurt.

Mom

The Best Story I’ll ever write… before I go…

I have best friends.  All of them mean alot to me. I’m going to write about one of them here, and then the other ones, but I have to write about him first. I hope my other best friends don’t take offence. This is about Mau. Mau was, is, was, is, my BFF. Was is was is my boyfriend. My best friend. Some people would ask why. He called me nasty names at one time. You know the kind… the “c” word, the “s” word and so on. That then. This now (no bad words and cool) But even then he taught me many things. He taught me how beautiful a car could be. He taught me how fixing one that was bruised could be an art to fix it. He babied cars that he fixed and touched them like a man should touch a lady. OK… we fought. But we fought well. He gave to me the right of letting go. When I was first with Mau I was hurting. I was hurting because of someone else. He was hurting because of more than just one else. He was hurting. Abandoned by his mom, back with his mom and then losing her to a stroke, then to the reason why his mom left? There is so much in this story. I can’t write it all here. But here are my points that need to be said:

1. He knew I was bullimic and loved me anyway
2. He knew I needed to lash out and let me lash out anyway
3. He drove 3.5 hours to bring me tylenol when I was sick and a Big Mac!!
4. He was always my best friend from the time I met him!
5. He didn’t look for money… he looked for a heart
6. He was okay when I wanted a good argument, and even a fight
7. It wasn’t all him… it was me too
8. He gave me space
9. He was respectful in ways I didn’t know existed
10. He took care of his daughter when he had to
11. He dealt with the abuse of his daughter in a very commandeering way
12. And… in all that with her teenage craze, still found time to be my best friend
13. Loved by my children
14. Admired by others
15. Not wanting a “will” of anything
16. Nor I.
17. We get along because neither one of us are wanting for much but for a happy ending… fun, happy, laughter, best friend, hugs, and understanding.  Not $1 (or what we call loony here in Canada) could buy a fraction of that.. nor could any MaxMillions.

I’ll end this one here with my wish my new wish forward, as my last one came true… NO LIE.  http://www.wishawish.wordpress.com.  Sing up, I wish it forward, then you do to others.

HEY MAU!!! Where are you???

Note:

If I have to choose between my parents and Mau, my best friend, it’s painful.  Mau has heard all the world of my bullimia, accepted and loved me no matter what.  It’s not about money, it’s about the heart.

I just wish I could ask my parents to let me go.  Let go.  Sign me away from any “will” you might have.  Let me be free to not even worry about what YOU think.  Let me be me.  It’s a hard thing here, the battle of the parents who don’t want their daughter with a man who looks like a whatever.  To me?  He looks like my favourite actor, Sam Elliott.  Shorter, but same character.  A man who loves cars…. touches them and fixes them like he does a lady. And a man who loves family and wants to become a part of one that he doesn’t really have.

We’ve had our moments, but he’s never let me down.  He’s up there in the “go up and above the call of duty” in that group I have few.  And they will be blogged here after him.  Janet, Denise, Joe, Breanna,Brent .. and not necessarily in that order.  After all, there is no order when it comes to friends.

Dad and mom, if you ever read this.  Write me off.  I don’t want anything.  I just want you and my friends.  I will love you till death do us part for being the awesome parents that you have been… and you are with all above, the “people who have built me”.

Thanks Janet… Like that one. 🙂

The House That Built Me is a beautiful song, but.. it’s not just one…

I love that song.  Obviously.  Look below.

I have many… many homes and friends that built me…. Follow me… you find me as I blog in each memory in the houses that built me…

Do we ever know how truly beautiful we are? Did you see your smile?

Okay, this is silly.  I can say I love myself today.  Oh.. and yes, I mean it.  Wrinkles, judgments on me for my past and all.  Something I wonder sometimes, and please, no, I’m not obsessed, but in the last two days wonder.  Why did Karen Carpenter not know how to stop before she ended what was so beautiful. Okay, there were her songs with her brother, but there was also her.  Karen.  Not drop-dead, Botox-ed, freakishly re-done, just beautiful in all of her performances, and what exuded and IN ALL HER IMPERFECTIONS.  She taught me a lot in a way I can’t explain.  I was 18.  She was 30ish (think 31)… history to follow.  I tried to figure out why she did what she did while I was doing it.  I wasn’t at the point she got to.  It doesn’t happen overnight.  It happens over years.  It’s too encompassing.

I wish I could meet her brother.  I wish I could ask him if she ever opened up to him about all this strange internalized feelings we mirrored into food.  I wish.  I had, as I said in an earlier blog, their first album.  She was my role model, the “perfect, beautiful, smiling, not-so-perfect, but so perfect in her imperfections… “… Karen, thank you.  Wish we could have spoken, but I understand you now.  Thank you for being my friend.

What a Night… of just thinking.

Songs, remembories, love, hope and faith. I’m not sure how many of you out there know the story about Karen Carpenter. It may be a small thing to some, but unfortunately her untimely death brought forth the reality of this disease. Not one so much that is horrendous in its simplicity, but it is in its insimplicity. Okay. So I’m using words here in the non-dictionary format, but they’re real words. Bulimia? Bull-im-addict? I like my play on words. They make me smile. Sometimes even laugh and that in itself makes me feel better. It makes me not want that next bite of food. Laughter. Fun. Positive. These all see so simple but there not. When I put in my mind the “virtual” dart board, I go for the L, F, P’s even if they don’t have them written down. I could be that I choose a 1 to be laughter, a 7 to be fun and a 15 to be positive. I always give them equal billing so such that (love my grammar!! Ha!) they are worth more than their weight in gold. So I give myself the feeling that if I hit those numbers… 1 means I’ll laugh more, 7 have more fun, 15 continue to see things in a positive life. I think, if I can hit one of each of them only, I’ll have won. And to all of you out there that are reading this that think bulimia is something weird? You’re absolutely right. Why? Because no one other than those who have (and hope not, but yes ARE) experiencing it know… Love yourself, no matter how many times you throw up and if you really want to heal, check out what had to have been a human being just angry because they didn’t think he understood that.

Take care of them on the farm and they’ll be okay.

Remember When? 1982.. Karen Carpenter, my hero since I had her album when I was 10. I miss you, but thanks for the heads up on the not+so+goods=hurt/pain/loss in more ways than you could imagine… for those out there.