Last fall I had a particularly hard time. Between September to January I had three emotional surprises, which took me out. Looking back now I can tell myself, they were no big deal: a break-up, a spiritual dumping, and a date gone badly, very badly. In light of what is going on right now, it seems insignificant, but I can tell you, it was not.
I know this zone. I was on the verge of literally coming apart, and I’ve been here before. I started writing letters to an old friend I feel really ‘seen’ by.
This is one of them.
As I read it just a few months into this pandemic, I can’t help but notice how prophetic it sounds. I needed this. Not what happened in the fall. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.
But this.
This time we’re in.
This pause which has changed everything.
It has given me what I’d been crying out for.
Dear A,
I’ve begun working again like she’s a lover.
Damn.
It’s not that I don’t enjoy working, I do. Like I really do. Like I’m kind of obsessive about it, but once I finally stop for the day, I can’t help but hear in my head:
‘this was supposed to be the fall-back plan’.
You know?
It’s always been my ‘fall back plan’ but for all the reasons, it keeps becoming my actual plan. If I am honest, which I’m not, not about this anyway. I never wanted this life. I have created it. I’m not complaining. This is the coping that looks like happiness and keeps me away from knowing what love is.
When I was sixteen I had five jobs. I’m not even kidding. How on earth did I ever think that was normal? You’re going to laugh… Wanna know what I did?
I was a birthday party clown on Saturdays at a community centre… seriously.
I was a Saturday morning receptionist at a realty office, for three hours only, 9am to noon, and it took me 90 minutes to get there by bus… seriously again.
I was a late night waitress at a pizza joint. I started at 11pm and worked until 3am, on Friday nights — which comes before the ninety minute commute to my 9am job the next day (see above)…yep, still seriously.
I worked at Kentucky Fried Chicken during the week… not even kidding. I was Miss KFC in the Miss Teen Vancouver Pageant.
And I can’t remember the fifth. Hmmm…what on earth was it? Maybe I was teaching cooking or running a spring break day-camp for kids, or who knows what else. That was me at 16 years old. I worked.
I worked hard.
I still work hard.
Back then, I did all of that and sang in three choirs, and was the lead in the musical, and and and and and and…
Back then I worked because I never wanted to go home and I needed the money. I moved out at seventeen and was making my own way in the world. I work now because I have three kids, I live in a stupidly expensive part of the world, and there’s no one at home to nestle in with but me. Yes, I’m a mom and everything but they’re getting older and who wants to hang out with your mom? And I don’t want that for them either. Go. Get. Your. Life. is what I always say to them.
And this. This. What I’m doing right now. It’s ridiculous really. I woke up at 2am and couldn’t get back to sleep so I started scrolling, then the obsessive thoughts started as they do for me, so I had to shut it down by writing to you, so thanks once again for being the ear I can go to. But this. This isn’t what I want at 2am.
Last fall when I started my Ministry of Story, and I was leading at church, the rhythm of my life was just starting to feel ‘right’, like my true rhythm. I was excited to get up every morning. My timing was slow and my days were full. I do love full days. I want to squeeze every ounce of life out of each beautiful moment. Slow is good, and full is good.
I was beginning to let my guard down.
I was married for 17 years and all I wanted was that rhythm and I did have it briefly when we first met, but it didn’t last. He fell into a massive depression which lasted for years and I filled in the emotional and financial gaps for all of us, by working, baking, crafting, and everything else you do when you are loving on a family. When he left, I had to throw myself back into work again to keep the lights on, and I have been functioning on and off of overdrive for the last three years. I swear I’m sixteen again and working five jobs. I’m never home. I’m clutching my way to get there, and scrambling just as fast to get away.
But that’s the piece I’m craving.
I want to be ‘at home’ somewhere.
When the Ministry work arrived in my life it was if God was saying: Read. Write. Walk. Listen. Share. Rest Tina. Rest.
Rest into this.
I’m not a religious person, and I wrestle with the Minister part of my nature but it’s actually what I want.
I want a contemplative life.
I want a rhythm of love.
I want to drift through my days.
I want time to listen.
But right now, my time is so full. There isn’t a minute in my day when I’m not doing something and I’m scared I will lose another ten years of my life running away from the quietness I crave.
And yet I am starting over and work is required. I don’t own a home and I would like to. I pay my way. I have very little debt. I will be able to pay for my kid’s education — somehow. And I’m building multiple streams of income so I have a retirement plan to move forward with. But hon… it’s still too fucking fast for me, and it’s too much.
That’s the truth I’m afraid to say. I actually don’t have enough space in my life to say it.
It’s too fast.
It’s too full.
And it’s actually not who I am.
I just needed to say that out loud so I can wake the fuck up and stop before it takes over. I know this path and it ramps up slowly. I have lived this cyclical rhythm my entire life. First at 16 to survive. Then in my 20’s to feel worthy. Then in my marriage to feel wanted. And it’s starting again so I can run faster than rejection. Because work doesn’t leave. It’s actually the one part of my life I can hold on to and I won’t be alone there.
That therapist I started seeing last week (she’s lovely btw) did the usual ‘story collecting’ process with me, her pen and her pad of paper to map out my relationship with attachment. I don’t want to spend ten sessions just talking about my past so I blasted her like a fire hose with all of my details in the fifty minutes we had together. I haven’t told my story in awhile. Not like that anyway — all at once, and not in the experience of asking for help.
At one point she looked at me, down at her page, then back up at me again and asked ‘have you ever been in a relationship where you can let guard down?’.
It’s a funny question, because the answer is yes, but then maybe the answer is no.
I know that the way I’m working right now is not sustainable, nor is it going to make me happy. I will get all ‘the things’ I tell myself I need like: a house, a car, no debt, my kids education paid for, a business that pays me… And I do need some of those things, but not at the expense of me.
I don’t want to be an expense. I want to be a treasure.
I don’t know how to do that.
I can self-care. I can therapy. I can consciousness group. I can exercise. I can mastermind. I can wisdom circle. I can pray. I can I can I can I can…
What I want right now, is the I without the can.
I want to let my guard down and rest for awhile. Oh God. I just really want to rest for awhile.
I want the rhythm that started to happen for me last August before everything blew up. Work is not the lover I want, nor the partner, and definitely not the rhythm I am.
There. I said it.
And you heard it.
And now I can hear it too.
I know you work as much as I do. I’m not sure what your story is here, but maybe one day we can just sit for awhile and not talk about it or do anything. I’d like that. You can pull out your kite on the beach. That would be fun.
Thanks for listening. I think I’ll try to go back to sleep now. I made it to 5am.
hahahaha…
Love you.
xxT
p.s. I’m so glad the fires are out over there. My heart my heart my heart.
This poem was originally published on Medium.
If you’d like to know more about TinaO’s upcoming book: Story Stones or performance dates about her upcoming show O MY GOD, click here.
TinaO is a storyteller, performer, and a professional listener who works with narrative and story structure as a vehicle for human connection. Her work is rooted in Myth, Mysticism, and the practice of personal faith. She is the founder of Live Your Best Story, a weekend retreat of deep listening held on Bowen Island, BC, Canada and is the voice and story behind TinaOLife. Tina is a proud associate of PowHERhouse Impact Media Group where she listens and supports the ‘stories’ of whole and integrated leaders of tomorrow.
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