When You Don't Like What You See Around You...

Look within you.

Sometimes when I get really stressed, my knee-jerk reaction is to, well, be a jerk.  It's easy; I can say something mean, which, for the moment is a relief, and then when aforementioned relief wears off, I can then wallow in self-pity.  Somehow this cycle of frustration and angst feeds ever so nicely into my perception of things, and then, well... watch out world!

As I get older, I am slowly learning that the idea of perpetuating this cycle of juvenile self-absorbed angst is only so helpful.  Although there is that momentary relief that comes from the comfort and familiarity of this twelve-year old reaction to a situation, there is then the later regret - the hesitation when you realize that just maybe someone saw your actions as reprehensible as you now find them.

I'm learning to appreciate the view around me.

In an attempt to stop chasing a life outside someone else's window, I've had to look at the view I have and try to figure out where the pieces fit together.  There are things I've seen I do not like, and with the help of some guidance from a very zen friend, I've learned that much of that comes from the way I project into the world.  If you don't like what you're experiencing, look at what you're doing to contribute to that experience - odds are, your actions have more to do with the result than you'd think.

Some people say things that are hurtful, and whether they mean it or not, they don't quite realize that in letting that kind of energy out into the world, it perpetuates and feeds, changing the way others experience the world in which they live.  I have, for many years, thought that if the view sucked, I could quite simply walk away.

That old adage - the one we all love to hate - says the grass is always greener on the other side.  Too bad we don't realize that until, after having crossed to the 'other side', we look back and realize that once again, we've pitted ourselves directly across from what we want.  There is no perfect nor is there a reasonable facsimile of it, but there is a way to see more of what you want in the world at large.

My current goal, instead of planning a great escape from these four walls and windows, is to look out, and appreciate my view, and then realize how good it is to see yourself reflected in the world.  Not to say I don't want to move on, forward, away... but for now I want to be that person who, in some way or another, manages to kiss the universe goodnight and hug the stars.

Cloudy Perception and Inherent Goodness

Fridays are, by all counts, my favourite day of the week.  Not only do I begin my weekend, where inevitably I will do very little but enjoy it greatly, but there's a nice sense of finality to the week that allows me to feel accomplished.  Whether that sense of accomplishment stems from a job well done, or as in the case of this week, merely surviving the five days since my last reprieve, it's always lovely to look back and realize that, like it or not, there's a new week coming.  I enjoy that sense of rebirth that happens very late on Sunday night, as I crawl into bed and start to plan the week ahead.

My day started out quite regularly, and nice as it was to be predictable, it felt somewhat mundane.

My first patient changed everything.  You see, sometimes I get so stuck in the appearances of the things I see that I forget that my perception can be skewed.  The woman who presented herself to me - bright and early, I might add - was in earlier this week to place her order.  I diligently did the job quickly because it was easy and I had nothing better to do at the time.  Now, this woman is not indicative of our typical clientele (which, more often are upper-middle class or affluent citizens of the world; numerous addresses in our database are international) and I made the first-glance (mis)judgement that she would be a handful, or so over-the-top as to be unbearable.

Not only was she fabulously kind and sweet, she was also very appreciative of what we'd done for her - more so than I've ever seen a patient be.  The gratitude she expressed was incredible, and she was so genuinely kind and warm that for a while, I almost hoped she'd stick around longer.

The thing is, my judgement of her - my very skewed perception of this variation in our clientele - was to assume that she was (excuse me for saying this) ghetto-trash.

I have a keen ghetto-radar because, as I am quite proud to admit, I am a former ghetto-dweller.  Ok, fine, I have no snazzy sense of street talk, nor do I particularly enjoy things like road hockey, however after years of living in those sorts of neighborhoods (the ones you don't actually tell people you live in for fear of being blacklisted) I do have a pretty good eye for these things.

All too often, I can spot the telltale signs of poverty (the ones that those who have nothing are equally well-trained in hiding) from a mile away, and though it makes me terribly sad, I also think about what sorts of obstacles they have to overcome.  The horrendous lack of viable social programming, affordable education, and of course lack of money are all further hardening their struggle.

The fact of the matter is, this woman who had very few material possessions to speak of (as she didn't hesitate to discuss with me) had a radiating kindness within her that overshadowed her somewhat slanted view of reality.  In her eyes, there was something about us that made us 'better' than her - she'd said as much while we were chatting away - and for a moment I wanted to kick myself because, when she'd approached me earlier, I had a fleeting momentary thought that I was somehow better than her.

At the end of our fitting, she smiled kindly, thanked me emphatically, and then stopped to tell me a bit more about her goings-on.  It was refreshing to have such an exuberant explanation of how she perceived the world around her, and in a way to be reminded that the circumstances in which one lives is not defining of a person's worth, nor is it indicative of their value in the community.

I left my ghetto quite a while ago, and for a long time I was trying to change it for something better - to learn to see a different view of what I always hated - but maybe what I should have been doing all along was trying to focus my perception on the inherent goodness that lives in all sorts of communities, in various economic standings, and across socio-economic terms.

I'm grateful for that woman for starting my day in such a way as to make me question the notions I otherwise took for 'solid' and for letting me see a little of the world from her view - try as I may to be a good person, it takes someone like her to remind me that there's no such thing as better, just worse.

A Little Bit of Alcohol, a Lot of Introspection

I had a business dinner tonight: the kind where you go out, talk a little bit of shop, and then imbibe multiple bottles of wine and gossip while pretending it's business related?  (I'm sure you know those dinners; they're really all the rage these days - with ample alcohol and a little of necessary business-related propaganda?)  These dinners are entirely justifiable because a) they're on the tab of a multi-billion dollar international distributor and b) we so rarely get them normally that even though they've become 'monthly' events, we still find them to be novel and exciting.  

Dinner was one of those things where, because the view was so different from where I've spent most of my life, I spent equal parts awkwardly grasping for things to say, and otherwise trying to figure out the acceptable way to behave.  Reasonably upscale restaurants, with 90$ bottles of wine flowing freely, are not the kind of places I've spent much time in as of late.  Or ever, for that matter.  

My knee-jerk reaction is to be introverted, and to allow the world to happen around me.  I find this inherently sad, but very much the way I tend to deal with things.  If I force myself to participate, the reaction then becomes something different - a mix of an alcohol-induced bravery and a boisterous extroversion that makes no sense to my logical mind.  I do try to avoid that sort of out-going behavior, all too familiar with the knowledge that I tend to regret it fairly soon thereafter, if not immediately.  

Tonight, as we sat hunched around the table, our fancy wine and several cocktails spread over the table, I realized several things.  

Most impressively, I realized that palm reading is alive and well in upper-middle class society, and based on a novice reading of my palm, not only will I live a long time (too bad!) but I will also have at least one great romance (that fizzles in senior-citizenship) and no children (I could have told you that).  I also learned that apparently (according to my palm) I'm more level-headed than creative, and that I am destined to own property (either purchased or inherited).  These realizations are sort of what I would have called no-brainers.  Being not particularly well-behaved, I have long subscribed to 'only the good die young' - and as such, I have determined a long life to be my punishment for past indiscretions - and the reality of 'relationships' have long been lost on me.  It amuses me that this 'palm reading' could be taken seriously at all, considering how completely open to interpretation it is, though I suppose that is what makes it fun.  

I also realized that when placed around a table together, women of all ages let loose and have little to no fear as to what they say.  Menopause, PMS, breast size, breast texture, and various degrees of mutual admiration all featured as topics of conversation, and it was normal.  It really was - we didn't seem to think twice about saying these incredibly personal, incredibly intense things.  

And this was, in some small way, a business dinner.  

Sometimes I forget that the view I have now - the life I have now - is so vastly different than the life I've lived, that it becomes a crazy, intangible reality.  700$ dinners and posh bottles of wine that I will never again be able to order (without immense anxiety at the expense) are things that are so distant from my view that I don't quite know how to justify them even now, when they're 'free'.  

But nothing's free, and somehow even though tonight was fun, I do still feel like there is a little piece of my soul bartered for one more flirtini and a heavenly slice of flourless chocolate cake.  Every day that I get further from the girl I used to be, I wonder if I'll be able to go back - if $12 bottles of wine will ever seem acceptable again or if I'm permanently corrupted and destined to yearn for those things well beyond my means. 

Tonight felt like a little bit of faking, and a healthy dose of alcohol...  I lost count somewhere around seven drinks, and though I'm not drunk, I've had enough to wonder just what I was thinking when I thought I belonged there.