finding the proper forum

I would like to make an amending entry on my feelings on Mother's Day. I spent this weekend with my two closest friends, the two women in the world who - as they once again proved this weekend - often know me better than I know myself. These two friends sat me down (on the hallway steps at 4 in the morning after countless Bloody Marys and beers... as only best friends can) and told me about myself.

First, they held a mirror up to me on my feelings about Mother's Day. What I am coming to realize is that for 15 years, I have been basically a miserable, angry, bitter sap who has made it her mission to stew in sadness while making all those around her feel guilty and rotten. I've allowed myself to take the residual anger of an 11-year-old who lost her mother to cancer and save it up for this one day. I've managed to (for the most part) channel that anger into pride, strength, love and celebration on other days, such as the holidays or anniversaries. Most other days, I hold my head high with the knowledge of who she was, what she gave me, and who I am because of her.

Not so on Mother's Day. Instead, I had allotted one day to feel like total shit. And until now, I thought that was OK. I thought, hey, it's my prerogative. I'm allowed to feel this way, to allow for this hurt, and no one can tell me otherwise. Wrong. My best friends can - and did - tell me otherwise. Turns out, I was making others around me miserable and uncomfortable, and in the end, it wasn't doing much for my mental health either. So I am beginning to realize that the day will always be hard, but rather than curse those who enjoy it, I have find ways to channel the hurt productively. Rather than set aside a day for the years of compounding anger and bitterness, I have to accept it. I have to find a way to celebrate my mother, and allow those around me to do the same.

*****

On a somewhat unrelated note, I am also reconsidering the fate of this blog. It has been brought to my attention that perhaps the subject matter of these entries is not entirely appropriate for publication.

When I sit down to write to this blog, I try to consider that someone might be reading it, including those I am writing about. I know the best writing comes from personal experience. All the entries about pop culture and media are filler, just to keep words flowing in between real entries, those about the moments that mean the most to me. Writing makes what has happened more real to me, more important, sorting out my thoughts through words and somehow making a record of these moments, and I chose to write the more personal entries mainly for myself, because when I do, I feel freer, and fuller and more in control. And if there is one single reader who reads something I wrote and then thinks about their own life - their own mothers, best friends, insecurities, anxieties, for example - then there is a sliver of reward in that for me as well.

However, I now realize that while I often try to censor myself a bit to avoid offending someone in my stories or simplify the complexities of my relationships to make the stories palpable for an (albeit small) audience, I am at the same time short changing them. I'm not doing them justice. And in the end, that censorship isn't doing the stories justice either.

Plus, here I have the control over the story. I control what to write about and what details to put in, taking the control away from people who ultimately see their lives written about here. I appreciate that not having control over how your life or shared experiences are portrayed is frustrating.

Perhaps I hadn't really defined what I wanted this forum to be, which explains why I fluctuate between musings on pop culture and intensely personal moments, a combination that perhaps seems a bit nasty or degrading. But I struggle with wanting to write about what is really in my heart, and I am just not sure I have enough to say about the filler stuff to fill a blog.

I never intended to insult or degrade the people closest to me or cheapen the experiences that clearly define who I am. But perhaps this blog isn't the proper forum for what I really want to write about.

So I am not sure what I am going to do next, but it's looking like this might be it for this blog. I'll at least need to take a little hiatus to work out my intentions and the proper place to write. If I find that I either have enough to say about the world or that I am prepared to take on the task as a writer (and the risk of overexposing and offending those close to me) of pouring my life out onto these pages, then I'll be back.