"I Took a Look at Myself" by Nellie

I took a look at myself.  My mother had embarrassingly shouted “I am so proud of you, have a great day at school, Nellie.”  As if it weren’t enough for a grown woman to have to get dropped off?

Sidling up behind me was my former boss, the one from the place I had just left.  The one with all the complicated feelings attached. 

“Nel?”  

How awkward every moment is when you are not introspective.  Hornets to hornet. 

“Oh, I heard that in HR that you were…” 

“You heard how I talked you up, I hope?”

Or sometimes you are introspective, or at least trying. And the efforting  becomes a yoga breathing exercise where you are not sure if you can breathe…I had a director whom I hated in college with her decaf-half-calf-nutmeg-sprinkled soy lattes and back massages; I know now that she’s who I talk like now, and that I would have be delighted to know her now if she were part of my current sangha. She would make us do some hippy-dippy breath work, and I would excuse myself to go out for a smoke.

I just got a message that in this interim job, I have a pay cut, and I got a message that a dress I like is on sale for less than 4 dollars.  I have been buying so many clothes trying to reconstruct my life, that I cannot even get a sense of what I am doing.  

I want to work where I am needed. I need to be values-based, fall in love with my experience, every move needs to be one from a deeper, higher part of me. I have always been the eager puppy on staff.  

I did not realize how much money I made last year.  

I spent it all on worry. I spent it on economic insecurity.

I took a look at myself when my friend fell on the step, so many people rushed to help her.  Grabbed her book, wallet, eyeglass case… handed them to me. When a young man asked if he could help her, she turned to him fully, and said, ‘yes’.  She’s the kind of woman who in asking for help, knows how to pull up her pants— proverbially, and literally. 

"It's how we deal with aging," she quipped.

Over the ensuing coffee, she helped me with these conversation threads and sewed them together in a beautiful recovery sweater,

whom to trust: (me) 

how not to spend money,

 how to find self-worth, 

(punctuating some of the stories with a well tied knot of, "that's ridiculous!" "You were doing the best you could." "No one could have done what you were asked to do in the circumstances you were doing that." "That reminds me of..." "and I think about that person, trying to hang on, and it kept me doing service for that meeting maybe a little longer than I should." "There's no way we will ever get a topic about 'gut transplants & fecal matter' ever again... we had something special, and now, it's just another meeting.")

how to get out without escaping.

Even when there's this new look at myself, I may still keep looking.