I Am Bee Mice Elf

“It ain't what they call you, it's what you answer to.” ~W.C. Fields

The Shape of My Damage – Kintsugi

Written By: IAmBeeMiceElf - Dec• 28•13

I don’t cry in front of people- it means I’m “a baby” and I’m weak,  at least that’s what I was told.  I don’t talk about the things closest to my heart, like my kids or my deepest fears, I don’t talk about the shape of my damage – because people will use those things against me to hurt me.  BUT – If you cry in front of me, or tell me your thoughts and dreams – it means you trust me and that you are strong enough to have an open heart.

I become weirdly attached to my possessions; my clothes and tchotchkes – because as punishment my most prized stuff was often thrown in bonfires. If I throw them out it means they meant nothing to me either.. BUT – every few years I clean out a bin or closet and I find something I forgot I had. It’s like my own personalized thrift store.  I AM getting much better at throwing away the “junk” and keeping just the important things. I got rid of all the Jordache and acid washed jeans (no matter HOW good they DID look on me back in the day…) and kept the one pair all my friends signed one day after finals. I remember sitting on the front lawn of the high school  —  Joe, Charlie, Carl, Eddie, Bobbie, Andrea, Kelly – “I hate jocks” “Sex Pistols” “POWARE” {punks on warpath anarchy rules evolution} “Plasmatics” a random “I heart Japan”, which, I’m sure, at the time, meant something – all permanently recorded in black marker like a denim time capsule. I still have a long way to go in parting with things though.

I’ve never read any of the classic books like Tom Sawyer or To Kill a Mockingbird because I would be punished if I was caught reading.  If you read for fun when you were young, I’m almost jealous – I couldn’t even imagine the joy of reading without the fear of “getting caught”.  BUT – nothing is stopping me from reading them now, although, I’m sure it would have been more meaningful if I had read them during my formative years.  I was 40 by the time I heard of Hunter Thompson and only recently read Animal Farm and Brave New World – it’s the best kind of second childhood! Finding new thoughts and ideas for the first time, well after I thought I was all done growing.

I distrust most grown-ups and authority figures – I question their motives – I wonder if they are the ones who go home and kick their dog and beat their kids…. because it’s NEVER the ones you suspect — so EVERYONE is suspect!  …and even though I AM loud and opinionated – when faced with said grown-ups and authority figures, I sometimes become like a 2nd grader being sent to the principal – almost afraid and VERY uncharacteristically insecure and self conscious. BUT -I don’t see adults as automatically deserving of respect.  “They” are all hypocrites – every single one! I might be fearful or insecure but I’ve only recently come to realize (even though I don’t like it) I AM one of “them”.  I love to see kids stick up for themselves against adults. I have the odd? nice? UNIQUE! perspective of vividly remembering what made adults seem like douche-wads when I was young.  Mostly, treating kids like “non-people”, like their opinions and feelings and their (however limited) experiences don’t matter.  Why do grownups forget how awful it was being young? It was ONLY “the best time of our lives” because we have 40+ years of perspective. It sucked! Other kids were horrible, grownups were horrible, we had raging hormones that we had no concept of, we are expected to “act” like adults but still treated as “children”.

I (mostly) love the analogy that children are like clay – that we mold and sculpt them with everything we impress upon them – the good and the bad! We leave a mark, we shape them. I say “mostly” because unlike clay, people have will and spirit and can help shape themselves.   I can’t completely buff out the dents that were imprinted upon me and I wouldn’t want to.  I like my perspective and I wouldn’t be able to see things the way I do if I was impressed upon any other way.

Kintsukuroi or kintsugi is the Japanese tradition of fixing broken pottery with gold. I like that idea.  Instead of seeing my shape as “damaged”, I see the “mistakes” fixed with something beautiful.  I had no control of the damage that was put on me, but I can fill it in with something beautiful.  I am a gold filled, cracked pot! I can’t think of better way to describe myself.

I might be damaged because I don’t stick up for myself, but the gold I filled it in with let’s me loudly and vocally stick up for a child.  I might be all scared with a polka dotted pattern of randomly sprayed drunkin’ fighting and violence but the perforations have been filled with gold.   The broken part of me thinks, putting stuff like this out there, it’s too much information, it’s none of anyone’s business.  Nobody gives a crap because everyone is damaged.

The golden part of me knows … There is a “grown up” somewhere, right now, who had a shitty childhood and feels damaged.  They tried to fix it with clear glue, so they would “blend” – They don’t see why they are perfectly broken, why they should embrace the cracks. There’s a kid somewhere -RIGHT NOW- being wronged and NO ONE is listening, no one sees what’s right in front of their face, no one wants to “get involved”.  Maybe, someone does see, but they don’t know what to do, because they don’t trust other adults either. I put this out there for the ONE kid – who MIGHT read this – and KNOW – he is being shaped and molded and maybe even “damaged”, but if he keeps his will and spirit, if he knows that he can fill the damage with gold  – so he never gives up on himself.  Even if it breaks my first rule – of not putting my damage out there.

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3 Comments

  1. I love reading your thoughts. They are very down to earth and are a lot on the lines in the way I think also. *hugs* keep blogging!

  2. Lori walton says:

    Love this. Now I see you. In life we have friends and even family we think we see what kind of a person they are..its not until the heart opens up that we actually see them for who they are. I’m happy Charlie was your friend in school..otherwise I might not have ever met you. I love your posts and can relate to most of them. Your a funny, strange but familiar person, who feels deeply about the important things in life. I’m happy I know you!

  3. Gregory Scaturro says:

    Wow I’m totally impressed .God knows I need A lot of gold glue Myself I think this is the best example of someone opening the door to their life awesome honest & powerful words love it, just love it !!! thank you.

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