expansion on writing for lesson #12
audio: https://soundcloud.com/tia-188659352/tiakeo_findyourvoice_13
Her bare feet were placed squarely beneath her on the cool tile floor, her seat planted snugly in the orange designer arm chair at her desk. The studio was silent apart from the soft purring of office electronics and energy efficient bulbs and the periodic tap-tap-tap of her boys walking between the kitchen and their room upstairs. Stacks of papers rested to the left and right of her chair and her arms slid in around the stack in the middle until her fingers reached the keyboard. She dropped her head to view the pile in front of her. Her work day always started with the sheet she'd laid on top the night before - her way of plugging back into her work-brain despite the fact that she was physically still in her home. "The clutter has no problem crossing the line" she thought, as the feeling of overwhelm found her.
If she closed her eyes she was back in time, on that wicked carnival ride. What was it called? The Zipper? Her body had been strapped, tied-tight to the metal seat. As the disheveled ride operator went through the motions of locking them into the cage, her eyes moved for the rest of her body. The flashing lights merged with the quick motion of other rides. She could see her young kids with their father looking up at her from a safe distance with a slight bit of worry. The noisy discord that resulted from too many digitized melodies made it impossible to hear anything beyond the confines of their pod. Were their mouths moving? Once all points had been secured and without notice, the half-baked Carny released them from the platform and their vessel swung into a state of imbalance - a soft back and forth that could have felt soothing were it not for the odd center of gravity.
As she sat at her desk now, facing the to-do list at the top of the stack, she could feel the ride hum into action. The movement of the arm temporarily settled their cart and she found herself exhaling as they rose higher to the top of their ascent. They rounded the peak and she recalled how quickly the ride turned for her. How suddenly all points of reference were lost except for the metal bars in front of her. Her orientation went unsubstantiated at first. After several seconds of waiting for it to settle, things only got worse. They were spinning on multiple axes at once and there was no ground or sky, no east or west. Every swear word had come to the front of her mouth then and she'd released them like a plea to who-ever could hear her. "This is awesome!" her brother had responded, assuming her cursing was done in excitement. He loved the thrill, the letting go. She'd tried to go inward, to hold her organs in place, her brain and eyes and stomach. Everything went silent, moving in slow motion. For some reason this didn't feel like letting go, it felt like giving-up, surrendering to the pressure.
That was it!
For so many years she'd surrendered to the pressure of others, while kicking and screaming in a way that wouldn't get her in trouble with her mother. Loud mouth complaints, while buckling at the knees and doing precisely what was expected of her. Was it any wonder that their attitude became dismissive towards her? Pointing out the discrepancy with no agency to change it only perpetuated a futile resistance. She'd resisted so hard and for so long, that now, when she had a real chance to be free, to react from within herself, she was too disoriented to know where to begin. She hadn't practiced that part. This was her desk, in her house. It was her mess, her stacks of papers, her ability to decide and she wasn't. The same silence emerged from the spinning and she could hear her own voice in her head. "What was it all for anymore?" What was happiness? ... Purpose? In the whirling of her mind, the big things became little and the little became big. Had she had it all wrong all this time?
She took her hands off the keys, quickly as if the truth were too hot to touch. The clicking of the keyboard fell silent and the cursor blinked inaudibly. Resting her face in her hands, it was like she was in that carnival cage again - She had no idea which end was up.