more than the dream, i miss the dreaming: the dull grey expanse of illusion
created because reality would destroy me. more than the touch i miss
the grating, sandpaper surety of not touching, of silent enforcement,
how much language is packed into your sighs and the turn of your neck.

in the long green lakes of tennessee it is possible to swim for miles
toward nothing, no horizon, no destination, just forest and ferns 
and cattails and mud, green and black and brown. when allowed to swim
i ducked head and shoulders down immediately for the green silence. 

in abuse there is clarity of self. i cannot explain the world or other people
but i know my bone structure, i know where all the breaks are. i know
my bruise patterns, i know my blood. when finally i am allowed to dream
i duck head and shoulders down into the mud, the black ferment. 

 

Elaine Schleiffer <elaineschleiffer@gmail.com>	Mon, Feb 6, 2023, 2:42 PM
to Dorene

I don't understand why you think I would lean on any part of this family tree for support when I have been so completely abandoned by it my entire life. 

Dana and I have the exact same memories, word for word, from Margaret and Deb, one generation apart. Psychologists term this a cycle of abuse. In the conversation in which we realized that, I comforted Dana. 

i wanna cuss out my dad so badly just once. just once. just once keith. hey keith the women are talking. hey keith don't fucking interrupt. keith did you know that parenting requires more than just feeding and housing? hey keith did you know that you shouldn't let your partner abuse your kids?

and what happened to you? your mom is a soft, toothless story in our family, a woman defined by baltimore and the beehive hair and canned vegetables. a woman somehow undefined by the man she married, richard, a veteran, a veteran with PTSD, a veteran with untreated PTSD who came home from normandy and then went to work for motorola. i would like to think that i know how loud the house was. i would like to think that i understand when the dangerous silences would occur. 

but in those silences i see margaret, i see my mother's history of church cult, i see my grandmother's history of perfectionism, i see all the women architecting a single stalwart story of single family home two parents two kids white picket fence suburban success. i see my mother's chokehold on you, i see her demands, i see her volume, i see the way she takes up space, and she must have been taught that. i see the estranged sister in that generation, i see the story of abuse. i would like to think that i know how loud the house was. i would like to think that i understand when the dangerous silences would occur. 

family, if i could tell you anything, it would be that i myself am now a dangerous silence. there is no genetic or social or cultural history i did not consume and emulate and digest. there is no story of family abuse or violence or substance use or gaslighting or ignorance or hatred or racism or homophobia or sexism that i did not consume and emulate and digest. i have eaten it all. 

i have eaten it all and can boast the digestive diagnoses that offer proof. when the psychics tell me i am breaking a generational cycle all i can do is laugh. i know. i know, and if my grandma, if my great grandma, if my great great grandma, if any of my ancestors is here within earshot of my voice, if anyone genetically related to me has ever heard me or ever will.

fuck you for leaving me alone with this. yes, i am strong enough. strong enough to break it, strong enough to heal it, strong enough to never forgive you weak generations of weak humans with weak minds and weak willpower and weak hearts and no fucking love for family or community for what you bequeathed to me. i know my inheritance. i have eaten it all. 

i don't think our accepted business practices are normal

i don't think the way we are socialized to build and explore friendships is normal

i don't think the way we interact as genders, as races, as age groups, as neighborhoods, or as anything else is normal 

i don't think the way we build families is normal, i don't think the way we marry is normal, i don't think the way we parent is normal, i don't think what we "think" about kids is normal or grounded in any kind of fact or sense 

i don't think it is religion that makes people crazy 

i am not your mom friend, i am not your activist friend, i am not your girlfriend, i am not your queer family, i am not anything that you can label and categorize and sort easily

and that means no one knows how to easily interact with me 

and that means interacting with everyone is tiring and stupid and irritating

 i read the job listings and the job titles and think I DO NOT WANT TO DO THAT WORK 

communications manager public relations manager writer editor content manager digital marketing digital content curation I DO NOT WANT TO DO IT i do not want to. 

largely i do not want to do this work for for profit companies! i do not want to do anything that is not for the direct and mutual benefit of myself and my community. my time and my energy and my purpose is for myself and my community. not shareholder value. 

i like the phrase "leave me alone" because it suggests no action at all: that you should simply exit, and leave me, exactly where i have always been, alone. 

it is not enough twenty years later for the adults who were charged with loving me to realize they failed to do so. it is not enough for them to acknowledge that we have something to talk about, since they are not actually capable of speaking.

it is not enough.

"you can be flight or freeze or fawn if you want but i am a FIGHTER-- and i choose myself above your comfort, always."

is maybe the only true sentence i have ever written 

In the end it doesn’t matter how many people abandon me, only that I have abandoned myself 

I can no longer smile when I’m angry, flirt when I’m scared, smooth out someone else when I’m flatlining. I cannot. It is not a choice any more 

With Jared I am trying to react in defense of myself to the full extent needed, and whatever balance is left goes to preserve a relationship with the only man who I think loves me. He will never be with me 

old enough to see things coming full circle. the wounds of my childhood coming out of my mouth as an adult. i will not be shamed for my reactions to abuse. 

i genuinely do not know why other people don't choose painful growth over comfortable stagnation. i do not understand why others don't seem motivated to push harder or go farther. i have had to walk so far. i am still not anything like a human. i am still inclined to judge others for their inability to balance as much pain and stress and hate as i do. 

none of this even matters. it will all disappear off the face of the planet when i do. 

an abridged list of people who abandoned me 

my mom
my dad
my sister
dorene
dana
the lawyer i talked to about emancipation in high school
sara because i was too loud and smart
katie because i was too focused and smart 
meredith and the cousins because i was too liberal
sean because i refused to stagnate
andrea because i refused to stand still
rachel because i was not a priority
lydia because i was not sober 
nicole because i was too complicated 
libby because i refused to support her abuser
katy because i refused to stagnate 
olivia because i was too loud and smart
cynthia because i was community over corporate
emily because i refused to lie 
ray because i refused to lie
deb because i refused to lie
greg because i refused to lie

that he doesn't get upset until i say that i regret the feelings that i have 

that i need to prepare myself to live alone, always, until i am done 

that i need to accrue enough financial resources to be able to purchase assistance when i need it

that i am not currently mentally stable enough to hold a job down to earn that money 

that 98% of all women get to acquiesce to partnership, but i probably will not 

always on the outside, always looking in