Brave Enough To Be Bliss

I saw the Native American boy, but it wasn’t horror I saw in his eyes this time. It was compassion in his eyes when he looked at me. Before he had been horrified at what he was witnessing. He didn’t do it. It had been done to him and he wanted to save me , but he couldn’t. So, all he could do was kill the chickens.

So much blood had been spilled, literally and figuratively.

But that’s how the horror ends. That’s how the cycle stops.

We talk about it all.

That’s it. We talk about the pain. The misery. The horror.

Because then we can live lives where we can breathe. Where we can inhabit our bodies. Where we can feel everything. Where there is no shame. There is no pain that has to be hidden anymore. We are free to talk about it all. It just happened, and th at’s ok. Hurt people hurt people. But when we talk about it the pain can stop and the hurt people can get stopped from hurting other people. And we can have calm because it’s not the end of the world that it happened, it’s the end of the horror because we ha ve talked about it. And we are free. And we have the power to be, to exist, to breathe. It is over. After writing that, I rolled over, hoping to get a little more sleep. My body automatically moved into a fetal position with legs pulled up and pressed together as tightly as possible, ankles crossed, arms pulled close and crossed over my chest, neck and c hin tucked down and pulled in. It didn’t feel like there was a muscle in my entire body that wasn’t contracted. My body was trying to prevent access. When I realized this, I knew sleep wasn’t possible. I wasn’t really upset; my body just wasn’t in a relaxed state where sleep would be remotely possible. I had slept in this position for most of my life, but after working with Andrea, I had been doing better with relaxing and straightening out somewhat. But not on this morning. As I started to release some of the tension in my arms, I also realized that with my arms crossed, my hands were actually in a position like they were trying to hold me. I was attempting to be held in the only way possible at that time. After I realized I wasn’t going to get any rest, I decided it was time to get up and start working on the book again. I could still do whatever I had to do and the thought of taking my mind off that memory was enticing, so I vowed not to think about it again until I was back in Kansas City or Hutchinson after completing the book. Being back in Kansas City was good and yet hard sometimes. Unexpectedly, memories and the feelings that went with them flooded my mind. Some good, some bad…but every once in a while, there was a small part of me that wished to go back to the safety of them, even if I knew they weren’t healthy for me. In an odd way, they felt safer than what I was presently feeling. Those times were infrequent, and I quickly recognized it was just those old Ginger 1.0 voices that were surfacing again. I didn’t let them stay out of the basement long at all before I shoved them back down the stairs and locked the door. I was able to spend some time with Kylee and Will, and it always feels good to be with them. One morning when I woke up after Kylee had gone to work, I had a text message from her telling me that John had finally replied to the text she sent him when she was visiting me at Table Rock Lake in early April. She and I had been sitting in the sun on the deck one afternoon and she handed me her phone and asked if she could send a text to John. I read it and told her she was an adult, and she could do whatever she wanted, but cautioned her against having any expectation of a response. She did send the text and the last part said , “I’ve seen her truly love two things in my whole life. One is me and one is you. I’m by no means saying she is perfect, but she cares so much about you! Just don’t let her walk away.”

In his reply, John said, “Making certain you know it was a pleasure watching you grow up. All love for you, KB.”

I was so excited because to me, it signaled that John was reconnecting with his heart. He was feeling something and that was always a good thing for him. It gave me hope that maybe even with the loss of his uncle, he was doing well. I explained that in my reply to her and felt light all day, happy they had communicated.

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