Showing posts with label Yeah Write. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Yeah Write. Show all posts

Wednesday, July 25, 2012

The Yardstick


Sister Miriam Anne stoically stood at the front of the classroom.  As I reached down to scratch my shin beneath my burgundy wool knee sock, I was terrified she would notice, then crack her yardstick on her desk, the sound causing my body to release the contents of my bladder to the floor.  I was never good at using my time wisely during recess.  And now I sat wishing I would have used the restroom.

I noticed Sister scratch at the edge of her habit, just above her silver gray eyebrows.  She was hot and uncomfortable, too.

We were not allowed to move in Sister Miriam Anne’s second grade classroom.  I am not talking about getting up out of your seat without permission.  I am talking about sitting like a statue, legs crossed at the ankles, hands folded on top of the desk, eyes forward.

I never understood why she did not open the windows to let air flow through the ancient classroom.  I never understood why she refused to excuse us to use the restroom, even if we appropriately raised our hand and respectfully asked.  Wouldn't those things make it easier to sit still?

I could feel my nylon slip beginning to soak with sweat.  The exposed parts of my legs began sticking to the seat of the desk.

Two rows over, closer to the windows, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a swoop in burgundy plaid. 

Someone was moving.

Crack.

Crack.

But the one wearing the uniform, my classmate Amy, was not deterred by the sound.

Amy was fixed to the window, tugging at the handle with every ounce of muscle she had in her tiny arms, disguised so neatly beneath her white blouse.

Sister Miriam Anne strode from her desk toward the window with the yardstick held high in the air.  I allowed my head to turn at the sight.  My eyes followed until she reached an empty desk, nearest to Amy and the window.

Crack.

Down went the yardstick on Amy’s bottom.

With a crackle, clunk, and whoosh, the window opened.

Amy, without a flinch, and seeming unaffected by the whack to her behind, went back to her desk.

Sister Miriam Ann returned to the front of the room.

As I listened to her explain the reason Christ died for my sins, I silently prayed to Mary:

Please, dearest holy Mother, make my tears invisible.  Make my tears invisible.  Make my tears invisible.

When I got home from school that day, I did not fight my mother on changing out of my uniform.  I hurried up to my room, buried my urine-soaked slip and jumper at the bottom of the hamper and prayed.  Prayed my mom would do the laundry that night.  Prayed no one noticed.  Prayed that the window Amy miraculously lifted would still be open when I got to school in the morning—another hot, late-August morning, at the beginning of my second grade year.



photo credit: lissalou66 via photo pin cc read to be read at yeahwrite.me

Thursday, July 12, 2012

Hot Air Balloons


No one has asked if I have ever been on a hot air balloon ride. 

I wonder why?

Maybe it’s a question that belongs in the middle atmosphere of relationship development—a place I tend to skip, traveling directly from the troposphere up to the heights of the ionosphere?

Maybe my swift ascent into too much self-disclosure turns people off?  Then, they forget the middle-atmospheric question about the hot air balloons.

As we know from Altman and Taylor’s social penetration theory, getting to know someone requires self-disclosure in steps, starting with a little and ending with a lot.  Altman and Taylor think intimate relationships can develop in no other way. 

The tough thing is, self-disclosure begets vulnerability.  Vulnerability brings discomfort. 

If I choose to dive into discomfort and tell, and it turns out well, or, it is reciprocated, then it’s a victory.

Contrarily, if I choose to sink into discomfort and it bites me on the ass . . . hopefully there are thick enough Band-Aids to absorb all the blood oozing from my bleeding cheek.

Contrarily to the contrary, if I choose to disclose nothing at all, I end up alone, isolated, and living in my own head, spinning in my imaginary world of wondering what others think of me:

Am I too fat?

Am I too dumb?

Do I seem too old?

Do they know I am broken and afraid?

And when it seems others are okay with my brokenness, it all comes pouring out, in one swift wave of self-disclosure.  Too much, too soon, off they run.  I float dangerously in the upper atmosphere, alone.

. . . sexual abuse is probably the most emotionally loaded inhibitor to communications and the surrounding atmosphere of trust and equality that must exist for intimacy to occur. Amid the psychological aberrations of the survivor's world are two key concepts whose mixture acts as a formidable barrier to successful interpersonal communication and, therefore, intimacy. These bywords for the unconscious dysfunction of the survivor of sexual abuse are trust and secrecy. (Engle, 1991)

I once lived in Clinton, New Jersey, in a nice condo with a husband and a baby.  Behind the sparkling, sprawling, new living community, off in the distance, I regularly saw hot air balloons being launched into the lower bit of the sky.

I have never been on a hot air balloon ride.  Have you?


read to be read at yeahwrite.me

photo credit: lunamom58 via photo pin cc

Saturday, May 19, 2012

I Know This Blogger. . .


I know this blogger who likes my blog.  She’s really cool and can write really well.  Her name is Michelle Longo.

I admire Michelle’s ability to tell a story—her story.  Her writing is powerful and pulls emotion from the reader without being flowery in her use of prose.  It’s real.  When I read her work, I feel it.  You will, too.  She blogs at The Journey.

Appreciative of the reading recommendation?  Wondering why I am plugging someone else’s blog?

Well, that’s how bloggers roll when they are in an awesome writing community.

Our community is Yeah Write.  If you are a blogger who writes, a writer who blogs, or someone who enjoys a good read of less than 500 words, Yeah Write is the place for you.  For a little review on Yeah Write, check out Michelle’s recent post Thanks.  She says it all and says it well.

In that same post, she nominated me and four other bloggers for the Liebster Blogging Award.  I am grateful.  

Thank you, Michelle. 




When you get a Liebster, here's what you do:
  1. Thank the blogger who nominated you for it.  
  2. Link back to the nominator blogger(s).  See above.  Then click the links!
  3. Display the Liebster Award Logo.  Proudly.
  4. Nominate 5 bloggers with fewer than 200 followers - actual followers, not Facebook friends or Twitter followers.
  5. Let your nominees know so that they can do the same and keep the awards rolling.


My Nominees 
(I highly recommend you visit these blogs)


I am uncertain if the above have exactly less than 200 followers.  
If I'm wrong, who cares.  
Just go read them.