Maybe cycle of insanity – I do not know

When you were little, did you practice screaming just to see if you could do it? Just in case you needed to scream, you would know how so that people could hear you? I would go into the woods behind my house and try it out sometimes. When we moved away from the woods and into the outskirts of a European city in my 6th grade year, I tried to find a screaming practice place, but I couldn’t, so I stopped practicing.

My screaming practice resumed when I went to university.

The main road between my house and my university (about 30 minutes away but felt like a million) is route 27, aka the highway to heaven. It is a dinky little twisty farmlandish 2 lane road leading up to an isolated liberal arts university. Its “highway to heaven” moniker was a result of so many fatal/near fatal accidents along the route due to a bunch of crazy privileged university students zooming up and down with various levels of illegal substance brain effects. I drove a very very old baby blue VW beetle bug car at the time. I loved that car so very much. When it broke down (often), I could usually temporarily fix the problem with a bit of this and that (metal twist-ties) to get me on my way. On very hot days, I used my 2/55 air conditioning – roll two windows down and drive 55mph. With the engine heat blasting across the floorboard, I would hang my left foot out the window for a bit of extra cooling. Sometimes I had a companion in the passenger seat. If my companion was a girlfriend, we would sing Judd harmonies on the 30 minute drive. Most of the time, I was on my own, free spiriting down 27, dreaming of the life I would be creating or some current boy-man infatuation.

While Highway to Heaven driving, I often wondered about seeing things without looking and would close my eyes and count seconds (1 Mississippi, 2 Mississippi…) as I pushed the gas pedal down hard, driving as fast as I dared. Sometimes I would play a passing game of how many cars I could pass in one go – forcing my little baby blue buggy’s speedometer to hit its highest marking point. Other times I would scream as loudly as I could, over and over until the painful terror decibels scratched my throat raw, just to be sure that I could still do it. I would practice with the windows rolled up, windows rolled down, with passengers, or alone. Don’t worry, I always gave my passengers warning and gave them the option of participating too. Some of them did and they were great screamers!

I stopped screaming when I left that university and that cozy little blue buggy was replaced with a sleek 4-door dark green (tan leather interior, natch) respectable Toyota. I thought this was how life goes. You grow, mature, get the things under control, put on your grown-up panties, and the things of life-ing life themselves right up.

f^cking bullshit as it turns out

A critical piece missing in that narrative is knowing that control is an illusion outside of how your mind processes life. Also, that there isn’t a prescriptive path that works out for most people. Many things (emotions, experiences) sometimes are in a loop. You age, of course, as you move along the outside, or stumble into feeling stuck on the inside, or float untethered on the outside. I see it is a seasonal loop like a circular calendar hoop. I teeter and totter here and there and everywhere – but there’s always the forward movement of something cycling in this life.

And cycle I must – we must. On my cycle, if I do not do routine things in an exact order, I cannot remember if I have done them or not. Regular things disappear very quickly from my brain. I cannot remember if/when I took a shower unless there is a little towel on my pillow from sleeping with wet hair. I cannot remember if I ate food unless I leave the dishes in the sink until I do final cleanup in the evening. I cannot remember if my teeth are brushed unless my toothbrush topper has been moved as a reminder that I already did that. My patterns and rituals of each day. And as far as my lady cycle, I have never been great at tracking it other than if I couldn’t remember the last time I had it, and I was thinking about menstruation, then it was time in the next few days. Of course, as I am slipping into olden lady times, this will no longer work. This is one reason why it took me so long to recognize what was happening in my marriage – I truly could not remember things well enough to see the deception. Oiy my broken braniac.

There is an abundance of information about an overwhelming amount of things combined with regular life happenings (at least regular for my life). Climate, Health rights, War, Treason, Resource Allocation, Data Brokerage, etc. Along with MrexH wanting to send SonHerisme a birthday gift, knowing I am months behind on the court ordered weekly updates (YUP still doing these), MotherHerisme’s ailments and care, FatherHerisme’s ailments and care, SonHerisme preparing to move up to a new school, sweet puppers need more teeth extracted, my house/deck/garden need attention, and me… well I am… eh, who knows? I am not walking with a steady gait around the loop, that’s for sure.

In honor of chaos overload, I decided to try a scream in my 14 year old car. I was driving past a farm on my street (not the goat king farm, a corn/soy rotation farm field before the little bridge – I live on a long road) and decided to see if I was brave enough to scream, or even if I could remember how to scream.

I took a few very deep cleansing breaths before grabbing the steering wheel firmly at 10 and 2 with both hands, finally pushing out a monstrously high pitched horrific scream from the darkest pit of my stomach. Then I burst into a crazy fit of giggles – at myself, alone in my car, on a country road rainy day.

I’m sure I’m fine.

My throat hurt for days. But I am glad that I did it.

A little girl in the back of my car last week told me how lucky SonHerisme is that he gets kisses when he gets in and out of my car. She wishes someone would kiss her too. She says her momma (single mom with past addiction issues, parent of two awesome kids) gives her kisses about five times a year because her momma is just too sad on the other days. I want to hold that momma and give her all of the comforting soup and tea in the universe. We are breaking our babies, y’all. Check on your neighbors. I’m the neighbor driving next to you screaming in my car to get the things out of me so that I can drive the babies home, be there to receive their worries and lessen the burdens placed on them, and to give ten million kisses to SonHerisme. And by screaming in my car, I mean internally horror film over-paid under-skilled actor screaming whilst exuding a bizarre sense of calm. Until I can no longer hold it in.

Hope is still here somewhere. I see evidence of it every time I plant something, or take my leftover lettuce, leeks, celery and such, attempting a new growth from the leftover stems.

I see evidence of hope when another crazy busy momma takes a moment out of her day to acknowledge the realness of us. I see evidence of hope in a 6’2″ 13-year-old creative learner’s hazel golden caramel windows to his soul. I see it in all of our babies walking around experiencing the things of life.

Yours in constant off-balance of hope and chaos,

Love, Ms. Herisme xoxo

ps I secretly cried y’all. For a hawt minute I welled up when my teensy tinsy giant newborn baby-boy-teen-man told me he would empty the dishwasher and fill it up for me, at the same time a thoughtful husband of a very sweet friend, sent an old video to me of him singing(he’s a professional singer/songwriter) a Happy Mother’s Day song with their then tiny toddler baby girl… We need our village people. Even if it is one or two people, we need them so very much. If I think on this right now, I will break until I river myself out. I wish a squeezy village for you too.

COVID is insanity y’all – please take good care of you and your community. Health/Humane rights are insane to debate y’all – please take good care of you and your community.