One Certain Precise Push
Content note: family estrangement and emotional harm.
I didn’t know there was a hole I danced joyfully in our meadow “Come join us, come dance,” I called I thought you were celebrating with me then you shoved one certain precise push I tumbled and tumbled watching them hug you and dry your tears at my choice to descend into the hole. In quiet dark damp soil and roots I watched the light above me, the shadows continue to dance without me When the dark threatened to consume me I would call out, and someone would answer “Come join us, come dance” Sometimes I would try to climb the walls, try to bridge the distance “Come join us, come dance” There was never a ladder, a rope, a handhold You never reached back. You made sure no one reached back lest I pull them down You shoved left me in the hole left no uncertainty that it was my choice to dwell in the hole. I found other people trying to remember how to dance, surrounded by quiet dark damp soil and roots We made our own music, we made our own joy Some days your noise recedes and we dance joyfully in the earth Some days your noise drowns us All it takes is one certain precise push to remind us where we belong No matter the genes, the blood, the time spent together we are not one of you and our greatest sin is finding joy near you. Come join us, come dance In quiet dark damp soil and roots that nourish your meadow I miss the meadow
Thank you for this powerful writing. I think at this time of year, many of us miss the meadow. 🙏
Estrangement between family members is so very common. I have a lifetime of experiences of many varieties of those. Many combinations of the same theme. I have spent almost 10 years in therapy, sorting out some of those. It was a fantastic journey, and the last 2 years I have been living a healed life. One can wonder: why this estrangements? One answer is Fear. Why did no one reach for you in that hole, throwing you a ladder? Fear that you would pull them down too. And they saw to it that it was clear that it was YOUR choice to dwell there. Until we have more understanding many of us are strangers to ourselves, and this engenders fear and a need to protect our shaky boundaries. Healing is the journey out of that trap. You can make that journey yourself if you want (preferably with therapy help), and for that you need not have any cooperation from family members. (Not likely that you will get it anyway.) If you free yourself, you will be even more of a threat. It's often a hard choice to make: freedom and integrity away from the family bosom, or continuing captivity and conditional acceptance into the fold. But once YOU are truly free, which equals Self-love, you will create your own dance meadow, your own fold. Blood is not always thicker than water. From a place of freedom you will attract others who are also free, no one a threat to anyone else. Make your own music and joy.