I have the hands of a seventy year old woman. I have since i was in highschool. Perhaps they were the hands of a fourty year old, back when i was sixteen.
I have never had long nails. I have never been in any obvious way "girly."
As an adult i have come to realize that girly does not always translate to womanly. And by womanly i mean sexy. I know we tend to make a connotation between womanly and old, or at the very least "round." If someone says you have a womanly figure, or at least says that to me, my brain tells me "fat." But now, as i rapidly approach middle age, womanly is taking on a whole new definition to me. Something i want to be. I want to be womanly. I have produced four children, my body oozes womanly. And i like it.
Womanly means that i feel more beautiful with each passing year. That i accept the inevitability of time. That time does not define me. That age does not define me. That there is beauty in wisdom and lines and experience. That beauty is depth.
I was sitting here enjoying some soup, trying to think of something to write, browsing blogs when i checked out my home page and what to my horrified eyes did appear?
In my Lijit widget the search cloud said in bold "jess is horrible, jess is a cheater and jess is an adulterer." I have been fortunate with this blog to have a minimum amount of nastiness come way, especially considering the content. There was that one time i was featured on trainwrecks.com (gone away), but other than that nothing that has really hurt me.
But those words hurt me. I have removed the search terms from the widget, but i was able to pinpoint exactly where those searches came from and let me tell you, this town is so small. In every sense of the word.
Words hurt. They are like silent daggers that pierce through the heart of someone sensitive. I may have been those words at some point, but i am definitely not alone in that. My actions have been wrong. I know that. I still am, and always was, a good person. Ask my husband.
There is something to be said for a passing fancy. Something that is just there. When your heart tempts you.
There is also something to be said for love.
When something you love walks past you and becomes a passing fancy.
Knowing that fancy is momentary, but love is monumental.
I just spent an hour reading this article about David Foster Wallace (via Sweetney).
My chest is literally aching now. A short sharp pain that is just sitting there. DFW was an amazing man, An amazing, tortured, man. What moved me so deeply about the article was the similarities i felt with his life. The pain of being alive. The torment of being a quiet observer. The humiliation of mental illness. The shame.
The searching for something to make it better, to justify who you are, to make yourself better, prove yourself to the world.
The drugs. The pharmaceuticals that just don't work, or worse, change who you are. Make the world a dull, foggy, harsh place to be. And the fear of life without them. The fear of being helpless, of getting to a place when death seems the best solution to put an end to the suffering that is killing you anyway.
It also made me thankful that i've been to that place and have come back. That i am better.
Also fearful. Fearful for the day depression creeps back in, because i know it will. To believe otherwise would be foolish.
