The Kitchen Sink

I've been working on killing Wonder Woman. I should rephrase that, though. The reality is less violent but still painful. It's probably more accurate to say I've been working on birthing myself. Some more.

I've had a long battle with the dishes. It's been years of sinks piled high with embarrassing levels and layers of gunk. I'll get to the point where it's finally unbearable and take hours to tackle the mountain and get the sinks empty. I'll swear to myself it won't get to that point ever again. Just 15 minutes a day--or less--and it'll be taken care of. Just take 15 minutes a day. I can handle that.

Before I know it, the mountain is back.

This time, it was different.

Over the last couple of weeks, I've dug away at the dishes again--not in one vengeful surge as is my usual custom, but bit by bit, 15 minutes here, half an hour there. They've piled up again just a little, and I've whittled them away a little more. Today, I washed the last dish and put it in the drying rack, but I didn't feel finished. 

I got out the the steel wool and the cleaner and went to work at the sink itself. I scrubbed the hard water stains around the edges and disinfected the basin. I even went after the ring around the spigot where the water comes out and the buildup sits. After I finished, it felt good. It felt done. It usually doesn't feel done. I usually know it's going to last about five minutes until another dish begins the mountain again. This time, it was done.

Something happened in my psyche when I "finished" cleaning out that sink.

I started to comprehend things.

So many realities started clicking into place for me. The reason why certain of my "friends" have irritated me so much: because they remind me of who I don't want to be anymore. The reason why I just can't quite get that stack of papers sorted or that room cleaned out: because if there's more to be done on the outside, I don't have to look too deeply on the inside. 

I started to see things from outside of myself and understand how deeply held my walls of denial really are.

I'm still quite sick, and I used to be even worse than I ever realized.

Denial is so extremely powerful. Denial is delusion, and it halts progress.

I've done so much work and come so far, but I had no comprehension of how bad things used to be, and how much farther I still need to go. It's okay that I didn't know. I had to survive. It's okay that I figured out how to let it be okay that things were the way they were. It was the only way I could keep moving forward. Now I'm ready to see a little more clearly, understand a little better.

I was taking out the trash when this all really hit me, and I sobbed in the backyard for a few minutes.

"I'm sorry, and I love you," I told myself, again. Recently, I connected with my childhood self and saw and heard her, but today, I connected with myself of the last few years. So weary. So weighted down. So much pain squashed inside because there was too much else to do, too many others who needed. Way, way too much time trying to be Wonder Woman. Now that I see it, I can sit in it and work on it.

I'm no longer willing to lie to myself. I'm no longer willing to hide. Let it out, let it be seen. Let the layers and the build-up and the gunk and the mountains that I've been avoiding with my eyes cast elsewhere finally come into view. I'll dig in and chip away until I find the next layer and the next realization.

Enlightenment. Acceptance.

Let the scrubbing begin.