Both Sides Now

Two birthday presents.  Two friends.  Two sides to the same person.

As I sat, admiring the two gifts that I received from two women whom I greatly admire, I reflected on the marked difference.  Yet each pleased me.  Each bore the unmistakeable stamp of the giver and of the disparate views of my persona that I imagine each has.

One delicate, symbolic, religious.

One vivid, bold, modern.

I’ve recently been pegged, again, as damaged and needing therapy.  The remarks resonated with me, but I’m “not the therapy kind”, to quote a former client.  I’ve tried it; I get its virtues, but as a methodology, it falls flat for me.  So I plug away at reintegrating the cracked pieces.  The jigsaw of my shattered soul comes together slowly, with a few ragged edges.  I strain to figure out where all the dicey bits fit.  I gather the discarded hammers left by the brutes who broke me.  I tuck them away in a jumble of tools which I keep on the off-chance that they might one day be useful.  It’s a messy process but by and by, I will succeed.

Meanwhile, here at  my elbow, I have two wildly different pendants which I will wear from time to time to adorn myself for the world to see.  One demonstrates my underpinnings and casts a gentle glint from a gilded edge.  One glistens with the flickering lights, mesmerizing, flashy.  I like them both.  I’ve a love/hate relationship with the religion from which one comes.  I have an aversion to seeming even mildly sure of my looks, which causes me to hesitate before donning the other.  So wearing either will force me to confront my own humanity, not to mention reminding me of the affection of each giver.

Life brings me so many chances to reintegrate my splintered self.  Here beside me, two lovely presents bring my opposing halves together, side by side, in unexpected harmony.

It’s the sixth day of the forty-fifth month of My Year Without Complaining.  Life continues.

 

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