Usually I wait, this could not wait I don't feel.
I have recently been helping a completely distraught best friend of mine. She has been going through a very messy separation from a man she has been with since high school, going on 20 years. Pretty much the only relationship she has ever had, with a man who was condescendingly manipulative. This man taught me what a piece of trash looked and acted like (he was also a small little man... sorry - no offense... just had to get that totally obnoxious jab in.) Even through all of this, her mental state, which she has had for a very long time, won't let her walk away quietly. She is plagued constantly with anxiety and self worthlessness he has spent their entire relationship instilling in her. Combined with a lot of unwarranted arrogance on her part. Needless to say it is a volatile and chaotic combination that she is struggling through trying to find her way.
I also read almost every blog, every blog that has a personal story, a lot of forum posts; I comment when I think I have something positive (even critically positive) to say. This is the same with my best friend. I have had to scold her like a child who does not know what is best for her, verbally slap her across the face to get her to take action and see reason. Harsh, but necessary. She knows me, knows this is who I am, knows that I am rational and I do not cradle people. I understand them wholly, nothing I say is superficial. She knows how much I love her. Similarly, I see many MANY people on the cage, in this community, in life in general, struggling in these times. If November was hard, Christmas and this time of year, followed by January - the most depressing month of the year (on a normal year) will be much worse. (There I go with that blunt honesty again).
Usually, I am drowned in my own failures, my own shortcomings, my own depression (not crippling, more just a natural state I live in) that when the people around me are suffering, I feel it is alongside them. I can relate - I have been through a divorce, nasty breakups, losing jobs, moving across the country to get dumped with nothing but the shirt on my back, family issues, more family issues, being raised in poverty, living in dilapidated structures melting snow for water, drowning in debt and dealing with a work like always trying to hold my head under the water (as a female in a male dominated career). On and on I could go I suppose... The point is: I live alongside each of those people.
I always said I am blessed... Blessed by the God of Irony. I am the human embodiment of his living joke.
I do know I have some advantages in life. I hold on to them with every fiber of my being. I have good health, I have ambition, and I have tirelessly climbed the corporate ladder. I have major successes I fought tooth and nail for. But every time I looked back, wanting to rest, I saw that boulder and chain attached to me, making sure I knew, that any relent would give it the momentum it needed to drag me right back down that mountain side.
Where am I going with all this... This year... 2020 - I did lose my job, I did get left with nothing and no way to pay bills and pay for my schooling. However... 2020 has been a year of triumphs for me. Strangely enough... Or is it strange? It just fortifies that the God of Irony is truly smiling on me. Where everyone else is succumbing to this terrible year, I am actually happy. Good old land of irony for yours truly. Amazingly so, I got some major wins. Everything in my old life ended, but what it left behind was miraculous. Everything I have worked for in the last 15 years of my life, it all has lined up in this one upside down of a year - promising a life changing 2021 - all I have to do is reach out and grab it. Trust me, I plan to.
So... Where am I going with all of this!? Sorry!! I am getting there!! Usually I pass alongside people who are struggling, I offer them support, but pay them no mind, we all struggle. Today though, this month, this year... I am particularly susceptible to peoples struggles. It hurts my empathetic heart, makes me want to wallow right down there along side them, shoulder their pain. It hurts more than it did when I was living it along with them. Almost a guilt, but more it is just I feel them much stronger, because they are living something much different than my own.
So if this is you, I have something for you.
Last year, around this time. I watched Frozen II - I was not expecting much - sequel and all, plus Frozen wasn't like my ALL TIME FOVRITE DISNEY MOVE OF ALL TIME ... Olaf kinda annoyed me (love the actor... on Broadway) but I gave it my time. I owe it to them, I suppose. I had just finished watching The Mandalorian, which is what I bought Disney+ for, so I was just looking for things to squeeze the monthly fee from. The songs were m'eh, done poorly. But there was a song: "The Next Right Thing" by Kirsten Belle (or Anna) and the lyrics hit me hard. I cried... I mean I cry for a lot of Disney songs, usually not the first time, usually the first time I am critical and absorbing the story and what not... not really looking for an emotional blind side (I used it right that time 😉 ) Anywhoo. That song broke me. I was not expecting it, and I did not know why. I tried to analyze my way out of it (I tend to do that >.>) By the end of it, I just kept that song in my back pocket... thinking there must be a reason I needed it, not knowing why; why it impacted me so much.
Fast forward a year. My best friend, my cage friends. Everyone is hurting (at least if that is you) I am not. My life is better than it has ever been... Gosh I tear up even thinking of that in this scenario. F-You Irony.. but also thank you.
So I think this is it. I think this is why I needed it all those months ago. For my girlfriend, for you all. I think it is my task to bring this to you, in your time of need. So if you need it: I am sorry for the hardship that you are going through. There is good advice here. Not mine. I am just the messenger, sent from something I didn't understand then, but I do now.
Good Luck my cage Friends. This year will not define you!
~Oracle.
