leslieism

About 4 months ago…

Is it possible to gently careen into that ditch and come out alive, just in a bit of a coma?  A 3 to 5 day “vacation coma”?  I estimate the speed at which I’m driving, combined with the velocity of the current wind factor… I then generate an algorithm based on the quantum variables per the celerity ratios.  I did the fake math and it just didn’t add up (or make sense) and resolved to keep my Civic on the highway.

Upon arriving at my destination, I quickly glance in the mirror, cringe, tuck my loose hair behind my ears, and pull the brim of my faded Twins hat down to the top of my glasses.  When I’m in my “vacation coma” mood, I tend to look like a disheveled, broken, divorced, soccer mom.  Although I’m about to enter a building I loosely refer to as, “the worst place ever”, I commence forward with my mom-on-a-mission-walk; also, commonly referred to as my, I-worked-at-a-grocery-store-for-seventeen years-walk.  Fast.  It means I was walking fast and with a purpose.

I pull open the door and abruptly start to sweat.  I think that’s why I’m pretty sure this place is Hades summer home; I always sweat profusely while visiting………the Mall.  In hopes to quash my sorry plight, I navigate my feet in the direction of T-Mobile.  About halfway there and I feel a warm sensation working its way up from my toes to my neck…the innocuous mall noises suddenly sound as if they are coming from a parallel universe…and I’m starting to see stars.  I know that if I close my eyes and allow the warm sensation to surpass my ears; if I let my breath out slowly and concede to the darkness I now see with my eyes wide open, I will faint.  I am no stranger to fainting.  Therefore, I also know how to stop the mind obfuscating development.  I only have a half second to once again do the math.  Let’s be honest, half a second is not nearly enough time for me to do my fake math; I decided it was not the best idea to faint and fall onto the tiled Mall floor.  No “vacation coma” for me today.

I feel like at this point you might have a couple questions?  Maybe, “what’s a vacation coma” and/or “has she lost her marbles”?  Well, before you freak out and call my mom and tell her that, “Leslie is talking about jumping off a cliff”, get it straight, it’s just my car in a ditch.  And no.  She has not lost her marbles.  In fact, her insuppressible cognitive processes are what keep her marbles in the jar, so to speak.  If I acted on every inane thought, I would’ve been extradited to Russia years ago due to espionage, as well as own a factory fashioned like Mr. Wonka’s; producing all things pumpkin.

Now, “vacation coma”.  How do I explain this…hmmm, I think it stems from, “Hi, I’m Leslie, and I’m an alcoholic”.  Before I got sober, five thousand, five hundred, and eighty-two days ago, (but who’s counting), I used alcohol as a way to detach from my hurting heart and/or daily life stresses.  I never blacked out for more than a night, but you can bet your face I definitely hoped for longer.  So, without alcohol, I have to actually feel my damn feelings (and mind you, I’m a bona fide sensitive Sally), and actually confront every damn daily life stress head on (like driving into a ditch…head on…see how I just brought this full circle?  I amaze myself sometimes.  And by sometimes, I mean, like all the time.)

With age, and wisdom, and mentoring, and motherhooding, and a little help from my friends, and God; the aptitude with which I face and conquer life in general today, is unprecedented (maybe unprecedented is a dramatic exaggeration, but I really wanted to use that word).   That being said (my unprecedented approach to conquering life), well, although I can face it…and know that I will eventually conquer it, I sometimes wish I could fall into a “vacation coma”; sleep through it and let everything work itself out, either on its own or by the help of some kind of wizard.

To be continued…