It takes an army to fend off your love
by JMEC
Between the me I want to be and the rest of the world are a few versions of me that have been battered and are a little worse for the wear. They step in and answer for me and try to let me be because they know I have little to nothing left and need to recharge. They are imperfect defenders.
When you ask me questions, offer advice, try to help, and mean to soothe me;
there are times that one of my damaged selves plays gatekeeper
and tries clumsily to handle my business while I am elsewhere unable, recovering.
One, of which I am least proud, is gruffly impatient, having no time for extraneous information. You’d do best to steer clear of her unless you have a real emergency or are truly in need. She will slice your head clean off with her tongue if you ask for something you can easily do yourself.
Another seems sweet and kind, but she is faking. She doesn’t want to hurt your feelings. That part is true.She wishes things were different and wants to help, but she can only keep up this facade for a short time before she begins to tire and wonder why you need her and why you can’t help yourself when it’s clear she is not ok. So please, don’t overstay with her or she can turn on you or become wildly emotional.
Real me is under all of that, flat and bored and glazed over. She wears headphones and eats too much and smokes too much and would crawl into a thick Nerf ball and live there undisturbed if she could; if it was air conditioned and had food delivery service and television, that is. She is tuning you out. She doesn’t mean to. She just wants quiet and wants you to take a hint.
I’d love to be the inspirational story of triumph over pain and spiraling poor health that you want me to be. I dream of it, when I am lucky enough to sleep. I pray for the strength and the courage and the tolerance to “push past the pain” and exercise my way to fitness and health.
I did that for a while. Tried. Pushed. I still do. You can’t see it. I am doing it now. My shoulder burning and my hand numb as I type. My knee throbbing. My fingers stiff and swollen. My guts ever burning and rejecting most of what I provide.
I have had a fever for the better part of 2 years now. Do you know what that feels like? Truly? The next time you have a fever and your eyeballs ache and you are exhausted and your arms feel so heavy that changing the channel makes you want to take a nap, try to remember that I have actually had a fever for 2 years now. And no, I don’t just get used to it. And no, I can’t just exercise it away.
It takes an army to fend off your love, all of you who mean well and don’t know what to do and who don’t want to hear about it, but wish I’d just be like I once was and say something funny like I used to over drinks and cigarettes on the back porch late into the night. I used to be hilarious. Remember? I do. I miss her too. We have that in common.