Growing up is a weird thing. I just came back from my mentor's 50th birthday party. She and her family were a major part of the wallpaper of my teenage years. Those were tender, vulnerable years. I was awakening from the deep slumber of a shaky, unstable childhood. Yes, trying to find my way. Would I survive the perils of teenagehood without a lot of parental guidance? Thank God, I did. I've turned out pretty well if I do say so myself. :-)
My mentor had a lot to do with that, so perhaps that's part of the strain I feel when I hang out with her family and the people that filled that time in my life. Maybe when a butterfly immerges from a cocoon it doesn't want to remember that it used to be a fat, vulnerable caterpillar.
Most of the people there were part of the legacy of the OB years. I remember that humble beach house packed with visitors and teenagers on that extremely wide street. I used to just go over there randomly and grab the key off the nail in the community laundry room. I would let myself in sometimes in the wee hours of the morning, wake up my mentor to talk about life and my worries.
At the party I was talking with a girl from those years. She's now in her 20's but I remember when she was half my size. She and her mom lived down the street from the OB house. She was deathly quiet back then. I could tell that she was much more outgoing now but that it was easy to sink back into "quiet Tracy mode" when she was around this crowd. I could relate to her. That's the weird thing about growing up. Even though my mentor's son is now a foot taller than me it's hard for me to not see him as the 5 year old that kicked me from under the kitchen table.
And perhaps some people at that party looked at me in a similar way. Yes, as I looked around that room I felt the tugs of my ill-fitting past. It’s that residual memory that makes the growing up process weird. Being reminded of who you are in a historical, cumulative sense when you see yourself through the eyes of others and then comparing that with what you see when you look in the mirror.
Sunday, November 14, 2004
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5 comments:
i'm paralyzed by the seriousness of this post. what could i possibly say to match the depth of that post. oh,oh what shall i do.
Wow.
No, really. Wow.
I'll say it again. Wow.
(This is where I was going to post a comment, but it got too long. So I posted it on my blog. Check it out! trethar.blogspot.com)
Joyce, you are cool. I have been thinking about my own break from the past lately. I haven't wrote about it yet it is still something I have to sort out. You are really briave to go back home and live... I have decided to do the same for a while,,, though most of my friends are married or gone, I think it will be good for me to be honest with who I was. humm I guess you never told me abou the OB house before. Do you have something in an earlier post I can refer to to read abou those days? Thank you again you have really helped me in trying to take an honest look in the mirror. By the way the wedding pictures are great I am glad you girls could all hang out again. God is good.
hi james,
about the OB house. No, I've never mentioned it before in my writing. OB stands for Ocean Beach which is a part of San Diego that holds a lot of memories from that period in my life. The OB house is just the house my mentor lived in during that time. She doesn't live there anymore. yeah, thanks for asking about that.
you know, from the moment I heard you give your testimony in church I knew you were my brother. In the Christian sense but also in the sense that had both overcome difficult childhoods. So I think we can relate in a special way. :-) So you've decided to go home after the military before you go to college? What have you decided about college? (go liberal arts! I hope you've decided against Bible college :-)) But of course, let His will prevail!
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