The gift

I wasn't ever one for new-years resolutions. Personally, I think if you have to wait until the new year to make a resolution, you're unlikely to stick to it. Unfortunately, my unique way of thinking isn't catered to as they don't make page a day diaries that begin on the twenty-eleventh of some month or other. And, being a living breathing mess, I knew I would need the rigid structure of a lined, ruled and dated diary in which to encourage me to stick to my perhaps unrealistic but well intended pledge to write a poem a day. Fate, (or a well written google search), led me to a little black book, my now beloved moleskine, and so it began.

Seventy three days now I have sat down, putting pen to paper, and divulging the poetic musings from my deepest traumas to the most comedic trivialities of daily life. This daily ritual brought a calm my mind longed for, previously hindered by the ceaseless tempest of my memories. Today would be no different. I readied my pen and allowed my mind to wander, exploring the realms of my intellect for some familiar melodic sentence, memory or rhyme, trusting in the process that had allowed me to render the swirling shadows and fractured thoughts within. I was ritualistically lost in the archives of my mind when my ringtone snapped me back to reality.

'Hey Kiva’, I recognised the voice. This wasn't a social call. My sister and I hadn't spoken since she was thirteen years old, when I had to cut our mother out of my life. It wasn't what I wanted but having a relationship with a sibling when the mere thought of your mother fills you with terror isn't exactly a good time. Yet, it was relieving to hear her voice. At least, until I noticed a subtle undertone of anxiety becoming more apparent.

‘Mum... I mean Annie, died’, she said, ‘I'm calling about the will’.

‘What?’ I laughed, barely able to contain an awkward giggle. For as long as I can remember ‘mummy dearest’ had well and truly beaten it into me that I would receive nothing when she was dead and cold.

‘We've divided it equally, and there's approximately 20,000 dollars for each of us’, she said, cutting through my laughter.

‘But I don't... why would... the only thing that woman ever gave me was complex PTSD and a fear of women with red hair.’

‘Relatable’, she half- laughed back.

What I would do with this money, if anything, was beyond me. I needed it desperately; the abused child syndrome my mother had so generously gifted me had limited my ability to work. On top of that, the anxiety from years of psychological abuse had made the simple act, such as attending a job interview, an adrenaline fuelled event. Money was a source of anxiety, but so was she. I knew that if hell existed, she’d be there, burning for all eternity, but still expecting my forgiveness if I took her blood money. I honestly couldn’t afford to forgive her, my self worth couldn't. Leaving me anything after all these years was just like her. One last jab. My thoughts were coming aggressive and loud, and the storm in my mind was reaching its peak, through it I could make out a faint voice. It was coming from somewhere beyond the numerous passageways in my head, the ones which I had begun to retreat into. Like the calm after a storm, my sister's voice penetrated the cloud bringing me back from the edge of dissociation.

‘Sorry, I have to go’, I said, hoping she'd understand.

Fuck. How was I... what was I going to do? I always knew when my mother died I wouldn't mourn her as I had already mourned the loss or the lack of a mother my whole life. That wasn't the problem, the problem was the familiar insecurity that had begun to spread like a virus in my body since I had hung up on my sister. The same insecurity that had festered inside of me for decades because of my mother, my first and last bully. My only true tormentor. It was an insecurity I had rid myself of through intense self reflection and psychotherapy. The familiarity I felt to this insecurity made me deeply uncomfortable in my own skin. Skin I believed I had shed long ago.

I had started to dissociate from my body and my surroundings. Unbalanced, my hands slipped from my forehead where they had been supporting my head. By chance, my right hand landed on my diary. There it was - I almost laughed - the answer, or the answer I needed right now. The object of my affection, the soothing daily ritual that had brought so much calm. I did not know what to do, but I knew what to do right now. Entrusting my current affliction to the process that had resolved so many directionless thoughts before, I began to write.

Twenty seventh,

Of the eleventh

I was born

But only now.

Reborn -

Twenty seven

Long years beyond

Relearning.

To talk, crawl

And walk -

By myself.

I can grow,

Finally.

It’s time to

Be myself -

Wonderful,

Isn't it?

Those life gifted

Things - beyond

Your control

Forcefully

Given to you.

They are theirs,

Not yours

To possess

If you don't

Desire so.