revelation

revelation: a surprising and previously unknown fact; the making known of a secret or the unknown


I had a strange revelation tonight.  Well, less of a revelation, and more of a final clear understanding. Which is almost satirical considering it was explained to me, no unveiled rather, by a heavily intoxicated individual.  We were on our way home from Quinn's, a local bar in Boise that hosts our "post bout functions" for roller derby (a.k.a. after parties).  It was 2 am and I had successfully gotten my roommate, Highway, into the car without tripping or puking.  The streets were dark, except for the occasional ominous red glow of a stop light, or the flicker of a passing porch. The night air was rushing in through the windows, chilling my cheeks.  I was quite, Highway was sleepy, but chatting up a storm.  In her slurred speech, she started to talk about how our next bout is on mother's day weekend and how she was bad at mother's day.  "How do you mean?" I asked.  "Well I hate Mother's day, because I grew up with thousands of mother figures who all feel worthy of a card or a gift or a gesture."  Now remember, Highway, similar to me, was abandoned by a parent at a young age.  In the brief moment of silence that followed her explanation, everything clicked. The light in my head had turned green and I empathized, "yeah, as a kid who has been abandoned at a young age, you have to grow up quickly and as a byproduct adopt this mantra that the only person that cares or matters in your life is you...even if the other people in your life don't feel the same way." Highway nodded her tipsy head and replied, "It's a cold cold coping mechanism, but it sure as hell works, look at us, we're fucking amazing."  True.

Considering our lives, statistically we should have had a child at a young age, been addicted to some sort of substance, had an eating disorder, a gambling problem, or a number of other debilitating troubles by now.  But no, when you do things for yourself and by yourself, when you are your own world, you can accomplish a lot...like putting yourself through law school, like being the youngest historical records archivist in the inter-mountain west, like kicking ass at skating derby, like overall generally being amazing, beautiful, strong, confident, courageous, and intelligent women. I'm proud of who I am and know that I owe a large part of this to, well, myself.  Living life like this way is effective.  Individualism is fantastic means by which to protect yourself from disappointment and all the other shit life tries to through at you. It makes you resilient.  But it wasn't until tonight that I realized that individualism and resilience aren't always valued by other people, nor understood by them.  I have struggled to explain this to my mother, for example.  Through words, I couldn't ever tell her fully why I don't need/want any "help" or why I can seem "coldhearted" sometimes.  And surely, my "selfishness" and "intensity" have been an ongoing battle in every relationship I have ever had.  But now I get it, I understand why they don't understand.

So now the question is, do I change? Uh. Will I ever value codependency?  Or, do I simply need to come, prepackaged, with an asterisk explaining who I am and why I am the way I am. Ha! Like a tag with wash and wear instructions.  Best invention ever.