The Dirty Laundry Truth

I don't know why today has been particularly vexing. Well...maybe I do.
All God's children got problems. That's right. I said problems.

Big glaring ugly problems with a capital P.  Can we be real?  People don't want to talk about their real problems. Myself included. I'd rather you think I have it all together all the time, that my nails never break and my heart is always singing Disney songs I actually despise most Disney songs  and nobody, not nobody, leaves dirt on Bloggingham's floor. I don't want to tell you about the latest romantic disaster (he-who-abruptly-left-in-a-rude-asinine-manner) and the way I deleted my dating profile for the umpteenth time out of disgust for men in general, nor the frustrated way I war with myself over feeling guilty because I'm feeling guilty that I'm feeling guilty (did you get that?) because I might let a selfish thought waft right into the castle walls and into my heart because dammit I don't want to cuss on the blog

and be real

And then the day got worse. You can't go anywhere or read anything without people judging you or breaking off friendships based on the color of your politics or the length of your skirt. Enter sarcasm.  Enter snark.  Enter hate.  Enter division.

And just when I thought I had had enough, the universe callously reminded me I hadn't.
So I'm walking back and forth in my house today trying to answer multiple phone calls from dentists and doctors, nursing a toothache, making appointments and trying to find huge amounts of money to finance the dentist's yacht apparently and wondering all the while how people on fixed incomes survive in this economy when a couple of porcelain crowns cost more than a used car. I don't want to admit to anyone I'm struggling to deal with this. How embarrassing. Right?

A full grown woman shouldn't be worried about a few thousand dollars in the scheme of things. Should she? And why did I have to open the mailbox today and find my projected Social Security earnings for retirement summary? I don't need anymore bad financial news today!! Did you know, Bloggy People, that by the time some of us are ready to retire they might make us work 'til we're eighty??!!


Meanwhile the dentist can't see me for two weeks and my eldest and only son is having a meltdown on the phone needing his mama and mama ain't no good to nobody today.
Which brings me to the real crux of the dilemma for me:
I can't do anything about any of this. It just is.
I want to fix everyone's problem and make it better.  I'm like The.Closer.       The.One.People.Come.To.Talk.To         First.Born.Strong
I should be able to handle a little porcelain scandal, right? Knock over the cobwebs of bad dreams at fifty-something-or-other. NOT care whether or not anyone sees the dark circles. Right?
Nope. Not today.

Any one of us could name dozens of people and situations where life is really hard. I mean losing-your-children hard. Hunger hard. Jobless hard. Dying hard. Addiction hard.  Heart attack hard. Gunfire hard.
Staying alive gets in the way of life.
Have you noticed?

We live in a world where every neighbor you have on each side of the street usually IS the he-who-has-it-harder person in your life. And you just want to run from your car into the house and cover your head with a blanket and a pint of alcohol so you don't have to see one more day of bad news in the neighborhood. Or in the world.
But the truth is that some days I just can't get by with my standard other-people-have-it-worse-than-you-do-Mimi schtick to make myself feel better or more grateful. That theory took a turn for the gutter this afternoon. I wanted to roll around in it for awhile and see if it would work. But I just couldn't make it stick.


I popped this status up on social media, whining about Mercury Retrograde, and let the Universe send what gifts I knew my friends to possess. Thankful to receive them and blessed to have such friendships.  Then something happened on Facebook.

It was Janice. That cookery one.

and on and on they came to my rescue....




And I was just about to call it a day when Janice said,
"If you have any leftover good thoughts, can you share?"
and that comment pushed me right over the edge to the little window I'm typing inside the Bloggingham blog. Where I belong. See what I told you? That Janice is always talking about cooking. Leftovers. Indeed.
'Cause here's the deal.
We're all in the same leftover boat. Swimming in the greasy gravy. 
It wasn't her mission today to send me a lifeline or solve my problem. It was her mission to be real...by admitting that she needed some help too. While she was being real drowning in the greasy gravy, she also put a boot up my whiny skirt and challenged me to do the same.

Nobody likes a public drowning more than the Internet.

And I'm doing a fine job of that today.

There's not enough soap in New Zealand to clean my dirty laundry.

It really doesn't matter that I had a possessed cellphone disaster of epic proportions today because truly it wasn't epic at all. It was just piled on top of a bunch of other emotional things in the laundry basket. And I'm not going to hell because I had a huge gigantic small twinge of jealousy over the romantic trip my Canadian mon ami Dawn, is taking with her love right now to Niagara Falls.  And let's face it, nobody's going to fire me from peace globes just because I can't walk on water today.
And even though I wanted to cry a few times today over the frustrations of REAL LIFE - oh, wait - let's be real. I did cry. 
Like a baby.

And no it didn't make me feel better. It made me feel like a baby.

See? Nobody was here to hear it but Homer and he didn't want to hear it either. 

"Somebody else always has it worse than you do, Mimi. Buck up," whispered the voice of Jonathan Edwards. (look it up)

OH. SHUT. UP.

You see... the trouble with Pollyanna thinking is that Polly never gets a break. And Polly is human. She has laundry too.
Which led me right back to that cookery woman's question. Could I find a good 'ole leftover thought for her or anybody else today? And isn't that my real mission?

'Cause here's the dirty laundry truth:
We might not be able to always fix the steady diet of carpe life throws at us, but if we pay attention to what our neighbor needs instead of covering up and running in the house, we might be able to fix theirs. Isn't that what my brother's keeper means?
 I'm not going to wait around 'til I'm too old to swim in a little grease now and then. I'm gonna make a few gravy waves in the neighborhood and shake up some status quo. I'm gonna make some noise when noise needs making.  And even though I've cussed on my blog two three times today,  the point really is that the somebody-else-has-it-worse mantra only matters when it's followed by a plan to serve. Them. Not you. 

 Otherwise, I'm just greasing a squeaky wheel feeling sooo superior that I don't have their problems.  
No one should have to fend for themselves in a world this big. 
  Janice with her cookery ways and me with my words and you with your wholly personal gifts that only you can give. 
Now that's gravy. 

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