TooUnfazed

One day I'll tell you why I am too unfazed. But not today. Today I will tell you why having nothing at all is more secure than appearing to have everything. I never was allowed to have anything. It was destroyed, trashed, tossed at the whim of my mother. Or my sister, or my brother, maybe even my father, but I'm not sure about that.

When I was about three years old I remember gathing my "things" into my bed and covering us up in the heat of a hot Florida night. I kept my little hands and feet away from the edges of the bed because I knew that something would get me and take my security if I didn't protect myself. It was a few more years before I knew what it was that would take my security. It wasn't the boogy man in the closet or under the bed. It was my mother. I can say it now without feeling as though a mother is any sort of comfort or security. Definitely I tried to be more of a comfort and definitely security to my own children. But the foundations where laid out then. Less is more, security is nothing at all.

I can't lose much more. There is precious little left. A fire could wipe away everything I claim as my own today and I would survive, unfazed. I'm a Phoenix arising from the ashes. I need to burn it all away to find out who I am. I am more than nothing, and less than everything. Today I came over to my son's to find that he had taken a VCR tape from my private box of things and played it in the VCR. The tapes are over 20 years old and need to be restored, not played. They are reminders of a happier time. He left the tape in the VCR and it was taped over by a soap opera. The lack of respect from a favorite son is overshadowed by the knowledge that I shouldn't take it seriously. I have nothing anyway, what is one more perceived loss?

Brutus said something profound when he first met me. He said I lived like a college student. I had a four bedroom house, but at that point I had sold most everything of value while I tried to figure out how to keep up the mortgage and keep the house. In my room that he saw, I had my PC, printer, mattress on the floor, and the beginnings of my online business. What he will never understand and I doubt I can share with him is that I never had anything, and anything I appeared to have was merely an illusion. So, I continue to divest myself of earthly possessions and ties. And I will see someone about this. Because it will be another path to freedom.

This is really pragmatism on my part. I have never felt as though I had a tie to a place or a thing. I have ties to people, especially my children, grandchildren, and to special friends. I am the cat who walks by himself and all places are alike to me. I read on a formerly homeless woman's blog that she "lost" things in storage when she didn't pay for them. For a brief second I congratulate myself that I cleared my storage room and didn't "lose" anything. But, I can't lose what I never really had. Wow, that hurt to put it into words, yet it is strangely freeing to admit. I feel like I will have the strength to go on for another year or two, as I form a purposeful life and tie up the loose ends of the life I never really expected or wanted.

I used to pride myself on my willingness and ability to think of others and to help them. I find that nobody is left to help me. Of course, what was I thinking? Like Mavis said, you have to take care of yourself first. She is quite liking the idea of me having a van to live in. I respect her opinion. If she says it's ok then I should do it, and soon.