Quiet days aren't that funny to me

I just posted a status update on Facebook that mocked the fact that the longest adult conversation I've had today was the three sentence exchange between me and the grocery store clerk. It was funny when I posted it and I even laughed at some of the banter that followed.

It's really not that funny, though.

I'm typically a very gregarious person. I get energized by being around people. I find ways to make it happen. But then there are days....days like today....when I just try to hide. I don't talk. I don't socialize. I got mad because I burned myself six different times on different appliances. I scratched my leg on the fence around the garden when I was getting rid of the mowing grass clippings. The bag I held to pick up dog poop in the back yard conveniently ripped, leaving canine excrement to find it's way underneath my fingernails. When I sat down to write, I jammed my left kneecap into the handle of a drawer. When things feel like they're going bad (or not how I imagined they would),  I allow thoughts into my head that have no business being there and in comes a downward spiral of giving negativity a voice to shout lies into my already struggling heart.

That's not all that funny either.

You ever had one of those days when you probably blink twice as much during the day in an attempt to simply hold back, heaven forbid they find their way from my eyes to the ground. Heaven forbid my fortress of emotion be let down for a moment or two...

I spent most of my quiet day cooking and cleaning and baking and doing laundry. As odd as it sounds, it's therapeutic for me to exercise my domestic passions from time to time. I'm one of those rare people that actually finds solace in channeling my inner Donna Reed from time to time. When I was little, I would put on a dress and heels and construct a wedding ring out of aluminum foil and walk around the house, dusting and vacuuming.

I do on thing I don't ever remember seeing Donna Reed do, however. When I clean, I go through things. I find notebooks and there will be quotes from a movie or something inspirational I heard or watched or read. There will be doodles and I will laugh because I remember who I was talking to during those doodles. I'll find drawings from the kids, ideas that I had for something that never made it's way to an actual plan and notes for newsletters, blogs, school and more.

Today, I found something I had written awhile ago during a time when I was going through some counseling. I stopped blinking so much as I read it and low and behold, the tears fell on the now-smudged writing and I found myself, because of my already radically emotional day, empty.

I wondered if I should share it. It's hard for me to have my words expose the nakedness of my emotion anyway. But I decided I would share it anyway. I'm not going to promote this blog post like I normally do, in any way...I just figure that whoever needs to read it will read it and perhaps find a hint of encouragement  or ability to relate. I don't have a title for it. It's just words from deep in my soul in an attempt to process a pain I had done everything in my power to eliminate.

Here it is, open and real:

"I can't get anything out of my head. It breeds it's poison into the deepest crevices of my mind as it pollutes my thoughts and mind. I am a six year old girl in an adult body.

Scared. Shaking. Wondering.
Where is everyone? Why aren't they here to see my hurt and pain?
My fear? My shame?

Of course I'm going to continue to be silent about it. It's all I've ever known.

I try to find myself in the reflection of my mirror, my reflection of innocence and purity that I know I once had.

I know I had pigtails and a deep dimple and genuine smile.

I can't find it. I don't want to look in the mirror anymore. I don't want to see who I am or even the woman I am trying to become.

Silence is all I know.
But this silence is the hell my soul is aching to escape.

I try to believe the things my mind knows as truth, but my heart has trained itself to believe the lies.

I just want to feel beautiful again.
I want to see the reflection of the beauty of the cross and redemption.
I want to feel beautiful and unashamed and loved.

I want to believe in my innocence again. But I can't. I fear I never will."