About Those Prickles #236

All narratives, written and lived, are not just about the flowers because as works of art they are the stories of the highs and the lows that challenge us to understand that life is really just like the painful and yet rewarding process of creating a bed of roses as well as a wished-for place in the sun that feels out of reach when the view of it is from the midst of our messes. Even those authentic “mystical creatures” that appear to be an impasse on our journeys are a particular of the pitch that slows us down in the weeds so that we may discover that the pursuit of happiness is not merely a place to arrive at but one that lives along the way in the sweet blooms that grow from the things that we never ever imagined could hug our hearts or cause us to cry tears from laughing until our stomachs hurt. It’s hard, though, to imagine let alone see all the details that it takes to be all right wherever you are when the appearance of a finished product or a goal has us believing that we are left empty-handed if we don’t have it or we take too long to get to it. There is an object in my home that is a visual representative of my safe-enough and fear invoking rollercoaster ride as the mother of an addict but to most people, its image is just of an inanimate item used to cover food. The definition of that device is understood but the emotions that are connected to what’s there are where it becomes so very personal. What would you think and feel if you had seen me in the yesterdays collapsed on the floor crying hysterically while holding the empty box of what is meant to be used for enclosing food? Would you have perceived of the summary that it shared about just a part of the whole of Ryan’s life? Would you have been able to sit with me while I “flipped out” even if you didn’t feel the same way about that product or what it represented? The thing about those prickles, or dragons or weeds or triggers or whatever word you want to use, is that they are filled with the unseen distinctive details of our stories that pierce us until our pain and fear finds any kind of voice to express what our hearts need to be heard. Funny thing about those very same prickles is that eventually its possible for them to turn and become the reason for the boxes of tissues that we wipe our tears away with as our pain blooms into the funny memories that we presently laugh about. If you look through those different but still real truths about sharp-pointed outgrowths or pain, it’s the place that you are at that determines which one you are seeing and feeling but it doesn’t mean it’s the only position that you will ever hold. Even now as I reach for that inanimate object, with a smile on my face and in my heart, I loudly announce, “There better be foil in the pantry Ryan!” knowing that wherever he is, he’s smiling with his twinkling blue eyes while yelling back “There is today, Mom!” just as the last year and a half of his life had been, but I also laugh because if it’s not there, I am the reason for it. Once in a while I also pause to think about the yesterdays and how the absence of that food cover had the strength to push me off of a cliff even when the last piece covered our leftovers or how for some time seeing it brought me to my knees with the reminder of the loss of him. I never imagined that such a simple item could become a part of the weight of the world for so long and the problem wasn’t what it was, but rather what it had become on the inside of each of us until that long process that works of art go through changed it again. Now, just a glimpse of it on the shelf reminds me that together we gave everything to battle and slay so many dragons in our epic tale where the sometime warriors in the story fell down a lot while learning that there are always details that we can’t see about each other that lead to the different truths and the understandings that take a word like impossible and rearrange it into the ability to breathe while on a trail in hell. After all, a food covering is just a finished product until we give it power with our emotions that come from our pain as well as our fear. What about those prickles of yours? Have you found any blooms amongst them? What do those look like? Or do you need a moment to just sit with you? Have the best day POSSIBLE for you because it’s most definitely about those prickles and the happiness that can be found as you go through them on your way to wherever your wished-for place in the light is. Love Always, Heavell. Seriously though, Love Always, Heaven and Hell