like a little kid
It's 11:21pm and I don't want to go to bed. My plants are all growing and it makes me excited. My land-person, Jen, called today to discuss gardening. I could hear her walking around upstairs as I talked to her and I thought how silly it was to be wasting cell phone minutes when we're basically in the same house. We could just yell to each other through the vents if we were too lazy to actually walk up or down to meet face to face.
She called to offer me a patch of yard to put my tomato and basil plants in. She described a huge mound of organic compost in the side yard and encouraged me to use it. What with the two-year-old and the newborn, she's got her hands a little too full this year for gardening. It was sweet of her, but in order for me to use the plot of land in her yard, I have to shift my assemblage point (as the process workers might say). I have to become a different person. Right now, I'm the troll who lives in the basement. Right now I feel self-conscious just walking into their backyard to dump my trash into their garbage can. Why? Because right now, I'm still the unwanted kid who tries to blend into the scenery so as not to piss anybody off. To use the mound of organic compost (which would mean walking into their yard regularly to plant and then tend to my little "garden"), I would have to become a person who is comfortable. A person who belongs somewhere and hasn't made an identity of being unwelcome.
I want Jen to call me just to chat about regular things. No, I want her to actually show up on my doorstep. She's up there with kids all day long. Isn't she going nuts? I want her to show up and ask questions about my life and I want us to just hang out and get to know each other and blah blah blah, but that can't and won't happen as long as I continue to think of myself as the troll who lives in the basement.
Amazing how these demons haunt us. Living out these childhood myths -- we could be living out these childhood myths forever if it weren't for some kind of awareness. First step is just seeing it all. Change will follow.
She called to offer me a patch of yard to put my tomato and basil plants in. She described a huge mound of organic compost in the side yard and encouraged me to use it. What with the two-year-old and the newborn, she's got her hands a little too full this year for gardening. It was sweet of her, but in order for me to use the plot of land in her yard, I have to shift my assemblage point (as the process workers might say). I have to become a different person. Right now, I'm the troll who lives in the basement. Right now I feel self-conscious just walking into their backyard to dump my trash into their garbage can. Why? Because right now, I'm still the unwanted kid who tries to blend into the scenery so as not to piss anybody off. To use the mound of organic compost (which would mean walking into their yard regularly to plant and then tend to my little "garden"), I would have to become a person who is comfortable. A person who belongs somewhere and hasn't made an identity of being unwelcome.
I want Jen to call me just to chat about regular things. No, I want her to actually show up on my doorstep. She's up there with kids all day long. Isn't she going nuts? I want her to show up and ask questions about my life and I want us to just hang out and get to know each other and blah blah blah, but that can't and won't happen as long as I continue to think of myself as the troll who lives in the basement.
Amazing how these demons haunt us. Living out these childhood myths -- we could be living out these childhood myths forever if it weren't for some kind of awareness. First step is just seeing it all. Change will follow.
posted by reasonably prudent poet at 11:22 PM
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