Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Pacing

"I understand now why people drink.  It's makes everything go away."

I said that one night well past my bedtime, fully aware that my alarm clock was set for 4:30 am for work the next day.  Shawn and I hadn't been in business for even a month.  Technically it wasn't a business yet; we were still setting up equipment.  It was nothing--and I mean nothing--but problems from the very beginning.  We were putting in hours at our jobs and even more hours at the shop.

Shawn was showing a side of himself that very few people have seen.  If something went wrong, then something bigger went wrong, and then something that should be easy went horribly wrong, he would snap and take it out on me in a terribly mean way.

At least he was always only verbal.  Unless you count the time he slammed a drill to the concrete floor while screaming and cussing that it was my fault for buying the wrong size bolt.  But it's not just him.  I once threw a remote control, sending pieces of plastic and batteries flying in all directions.  He'd badgered me to come to a charity benefit that he'd provided for.  I was dripping snot, oozing of a cold and had been running all over town that morning in the cold rain for something he needed.  I did not feel like going, nor that my presence was absolutely necessary.  And I felt like he cared more about an appearance than how I felt.  He became very angry with me, making snide remarks and saying that I didn't care.  So I threw the remote control.

When he worked for Kenny, he would come home, furious every single day.  He'd stomp around, pace with the heavy step of a work boot, cuss and shout.  I thought maybe once he got away from that job, he'd be a little better, a little happier.  Or at least a little less angry all the time.  It's very difficult to live with a person that's angry, no--furious for 98% of the time that they're awake.

But instead he became so much worse.  He now calls me in the middle of the day to bitch about what's going wrong.  Almost every day.  He tells me again when he comes home, and again after supper.  Then he loudly tells the same story to someone on the phone.  He still stomps around, throws fits and cusses and shouts, only with more gusto. 

I used to be afraid of alcohol to a degree.  I have Irish and alcoholism on either side of my parents so a child born out of this, logically should stay away from booze or settle or tiny sips from time to time.  Sometime around the middle of the day, I look forward to bedtime.  At least at bedtime, I can enjoy a half hour to an hour of pure numbness.  I can watch something on TV and actually enjoy it.  I can laugh at my dogs.  I am careful to not get so drunk that I couldn't save myself (or my critters, for that matter) in a fire, I just get a little....numb.

It surprised even me that I could become so good at hiding my emotions.  For someone who goes around with a thin filter and telling it like it is, I really have become quite good at waiting till I take a shower to let it out.  It's not like I'm holding back, striving to get into the privacy of the bathroom.  Sometimes I want to cry and bawl & scream but nothing happens.  Sometimes I think I'm OK, but once in the seclusion of a private room with background noise I fall apart and fall to the floor in a heap of tears.

Every once in a long while I get the chance to escape from everything, truly escape and not into booze.  It's not a Carribean vacation, of course, simply a small distraction.  I cooked for my mother-in-law for her birthday & she and I must have talked for an hour.  For that entire hour I had forgotten about my job, my other job, my lack of money, my surplus of worry, my anxiety, my anger and my sadness.  For that hour, I was not numb but engaged.

Oh, good.  Look at the clock.  It'll be getting close to bedtime soon again and I can once again can slip into my drug induced forgetfulness.
And make it all go away.