When I was going through my journal entries from this period of time in Miami, I came across an entry that brought back a sharp and very dark memory for me. I’m going cite my own (very dramatic) words right here:
“No one is honest. No one keeps their word. And that includes me. Everything about the world I know started with a lie. I’ve believed in lies, and I’ve successfully lived off of them for years. But then one day, I saw a fleeting reflection of the truth, and suddenly, the lie was exposed, and my beliefs had to change. I didn’t know if I could trust anyone anymore. But I was hungry, and just barely surviving. When a starving person like me is offered a beautiful apple, they take it because it seems right. It seems like a gift, really. So that’s what I did. I took the apple, and put my faith in it. But after the first bite, everything changed. The taste was instantly bitter in my mouth. I tried to believe bitter was good, but it wasn’t. And I told myself that the apple would save me, but now I know it can’t. So all I can do is spit out the bits that remain in my mouth, and try to purge my system. But I’m so trapped by my own decision to take the bite. Now, even my own words are suddenly filled with lies, too. I make promises to people even when I know I might not be able to keep them. And every promise I make is based on a promise someone else made to me. But I think we are all dying from the same poison apple. So how can I be angry? We are all just trying to survive on fruit laced with deceit, and no one can save themselves from any of it.”
Reading that entry reminds me of how compromised I felt about my life at that time. I was just coming to terms with the fact that I was suddenly in a place I swore I’d never put myself in ever again. I was living in a life I couldn’t afford. I was making commitments to pay for things based on promises and words of assurance that money was coming my way, but there was little evidence that the words were true.
Sound familiar?
Back then I couldn’t understand how this happened to us again. How did we miss the signs? I was angry with myself for not “doing” better, and I was devastated by the fact that my survival was in jeopardy once again because I trusted someone else too much.
I was pretty much overwhelmed with fear and panic the whole time we lived in Miami. I had my greatest gut check about how seriously ill my husband was, and, I was consumed with trying to find a sense of home for us in such a dark and twisty place. But this latest reality that my beautiful loft condo wasn’t a place I could truly call my home hit me harder than I ever expected.
In many ways, the realities I was facing in Miami knocked me back to a darker place than my original fall from the top. I wasn’t naive this time, and I had life experiences that should’ve helped me know better than to spend money we didn’t already have in our pocket. But when I think of all the things that happened in such a short span of time, I realize the only thing I ever considered was our immediate survival — nothing more.
Looking back on my journal entry now, I wish I could go back in time and comfort my stressed out little self. I see the old me, hiding in a dark corner of the guest room, hunched over the keyboard of the same computer I’m using now, trying to write out a journal entry to explain how I came to be a fraud all over again. I know I could at least help my former self find more peace because I understand a few things better now, and I’ve accepted certain facts that I never realized were in play back then.
Everyone — and I mean everyone — is trying to survive something.
Whether it’s surviving middle school, or fighting to keep from bankrupting your life, the battles we wage with ourselves and each other take a toll on us all. The weapons we each use to help us “win” our battles can cut both ways, and they leave deep wounds in our spirits. And, the greater the amount of trust we put in people we think are in the battle with us, the more massive the breach will be when they let us down to save themselves.
When it became clear to me that things weren’t working out for Lou, I knew that in the unraveling, Steve and Hans were always going to save themselves. And their decision to never issue Lou a written contract gave them their justification for their actions. The fact is… Steve and Hans were never in a common foxhole, or a common battle with us.
Lou and I were surviving a different reality — one that was ultimately no more important to us than the battles Steve and Hans were facing in their own lives. So even though a lot of people have let me down in the midst of the many battles I’ve experienced, I will never judge anyone for how they choose to survive because I will never fully understand anyone else’s battle like I know my own.
All I do know is that no one is the best version of themselves when avoiding loss or maintaining an allusive status is the primary driver of their purpose. That kind of survival is insular and selfish — but it’s familiar to me because I did it for so long. I understand the desperate need to save the things you think you’re entitled to, and now I understand how much courage it takes to face the fact that your things and money can’t save you from hardships.
I have a strange kind of grace and empathy for people who can’t let go of their things or their expectations in life because I know how difficult it has been for me to surrender my empty battles so I can stop fighting so hard to keep the things that won’t save me.
They say when you try to save a drowning man you put yourself at risk of downing, too. But it might surprise you to know that I don’t think the drowning party in this situation was Lou or me.
