Short Days to Longer Sanity

Short days, short month, short tempers. I have come to loathe February.

The pomp and circumstance surrounding a rodent with ridiculous expectations to fail to bring the warmth and new life of Spring ever closer. The abundance of pinks and reds and hearts and all things love related in a Hallmark calculated holiday creating pressure to live up to relationship perfections, or remind those who are alone just how alone they are. And the reminder that another year goes by where on my father's birthday he doesn't get to age another year. Doesn't get to grow old gracefully, but decay farther in the box he resides in the ground.

I start every year resolute that the next will be better, hopeful wishful thinker closeted behind cynical eyes. Yet every year, come this second month I am assured that in no way is it possible for this to be so. At least not for me. I should be accustomed to it. Should change my middle name forever to "Disappointment" much like Austin Powers his to "Danger".

It's always different yet the same. The ins and outs of people, faces changing but the situations always remain the same. Never for the better. If ever I glimpse that elusive silver lining, it's quickly stripped away and replaced again with that looming black cloud, hovering over me. Following as Winnie the Pooh over his Bee's nest in disguise after his honey, though honey is not the prize, my dissatisfaction is.

I think and think and wrack my brain of things I could have done. Wrongs I may have committed for the bottom of my life to continuously drop out time and time again. For surely Karma has it out for me, if only I can find it's reason.

So finally when dust seems to settle, I start to let down a wall, slowly, surely...and for what? To have it invaded. Vulnerability stabbed again through the heart like a sword, a reminder of why it had been built in the first place. A place you vowed to yourself you wouldn't go back to.

But it all comes tumbling down in February. You lose your job, you lose your stability, you lose your mind. You think every day, day to night of how disappointed your father would be with you. How if he was here he would fix things, only he could fix things. That was what he did. You need him, only him and he isn't here.

3 years gone and you still can't breathe. The ground above him frozen and him inside, and you want to dig, dig deep not only into the ground but into yourself and pull him out and you can't find him. He's slipping away and you're afraid. What if he's lost? What if you lose him forever? Shut out everything else. Nothing else matters.

And all that happens, all that revolves around you this month, your head is spiraling, spinning. It's crashing down too fast and you can't control it. You think back and back as far back as you can. What did you do then? How did you go wrong?

And suddenly ghosts from the past come out of the woodwork, and you're already in a tailspin. And suddenly everything you feel is a fault. It's a complication to someone else's life. But it's not about them. You can’t get out of your own way and no one can see it. You're a mime trapped in an invisible box and you're screaming. Screaming so loud that no one can hear you. So loud that your throat is aching and your eyes are tired and soon enough you just give up.

Crawl back inside yourself. Where it's safe, it's quiet. Back into your quiet calloused solitude. Behind your bitchiness and sarcasm where no one can hurt you, where nothing can get to you. Where you can hide in plain sight.

Counting the days, those ominous increments of 24 hours when it will all be over. When the clock ticks away this month and you can maybe start again. Try again. Be again.

And hope for longer days, and longer bouts of sanity.