I’ve begun formulating a plan to have a ceremonious (perhaps even incendiary) desecration of the worth-o-meter, a la Hunter S. Thompson.  It’s definitely going to involve a long gun if I can convince my friend Boom Boom to “borry me” his 12-gauge and his wife’s approval. (For people who did not grow up with a housekeeper from West Virginia, that’s a word meaning “to loan” from the incorrect usage of the verb “to borrow.”)

I know it ‘all sounds very untoward,' to quote that hot strawberry blond dumb guy, Mr. Bingley, in Pride and Prejudice.  But some things must be done up Fourth of July style to really have an impact. Since this is a liberation or an emancipation of sorts, I think explosives or at least exploSIONS are in order.

It turns out that the less time I have spent worrying about an arbitrary number on an arbitrary instrument this past week, the more time I have had for friends, kids, yard work, smiling, sleeping, talking to nice people, noticing things around me, eating nice meals while seated, not being totally freaked out all the time, etc.   It’s also been nice disappearing into some creative doings.  Little art projects with and without the boys.  Disappearing into something nice. Ahhhh. It’s been so long since I have experienced that.  It’s been just SUPER not having to say ‘f**k’ emphatically all the time, too.  Loses impact after a while and I just started to sound insane.

It’s great to read again and go to meetings to share others’ experiences, strengths, hopes and struggles.  I have been lost inside my own struggle for quite some time.  It was insidious, really. Not a grand battle like that beautiful story about that little boy who died of a brain tumor I posted on facebook. That story crushed my guts.  Ugh…

Not at all a great slide from reality into some abyss.  It was more death-of-a-1000-cuts fashion.   In fact, at the end, what? I was smoking maybe 10-12 cigarettes a week---not a day but a week.  I was weighing myself once or twice a day.  But still stuck and still sick.  It’s what happens when my behavior doesn’t line up with my ethos.

The result was not as dramatic and action-packed as somebody with a kilo of Columbian Bam Bam taped to the undercarriage of his ’69 Chevelle being chased by the DEA or anything. It was just a middle-aged woman imploding from the pressure of perfectionism.  And imploding is not really an option for mothers, wives of busy executives, bus drivers, laundry-doers. Let’s face it. It’s not much of an option for anybody.  

Anyway, I am quite sure that my kids would take matters into their own hands.  Opportunistic little shitakes that they are. All kids, really. They’re wired to find the breach and exploit it! Find/Exploit.  I love my kids and think that they are the reasons I came to this planet. But, Henry, at 6, can already reach the pedals in my SUV and he knows what the important letters mean: R & D and I am not talking about Research and Development.  So I might be able to take the day off and hide in my bed (something I’ve never done but have dreamt of doing for ages) but those kids, they’d be halfway down Pratt Road jamming The Decemberists, smoking stale American Spirits from underneath the seat, calling China on the Onstar and ordering take-out from Knights before my Klonopin kicked in.  So…imploding? Not much of an option.

But Exploding, now there’s an idea…