Growing up again

During the last year many expressed sympathy along with “I can’t imagine what you’re going through.”

Hmmm, how to describe the experience without being committed.  I suspect my paid friends will have a field day with this blog.

It’s like two parallel people exist.  An adult you, the face you present to the public, and a private you, the face you keep hidden, the part of you starting over, a newborn you.

The adult you, that public face, makes it through the early days in a fog, doing things more from memory than meaning or thinking.

The newborn you behaves very much like an infant.  You eat and sleep, sleep, and sleep and are finicky.  You cry a lot. You even get your nights and days mixed up.

Eventually though, time passes and you open your eyes and start observing the world around you, the lights, the sounds, the faces.  It all seems new and unfamiliar.

You discover you still have hands and feet.  Perhaps that startles you.

You start to crawl, to explore again.  You start to stand, holding on desperately to everything within your reach, trying not to fall.  You look around but don’t move, too unsteady, still unsure of yourself in this new world.

You stand up; you fall down.  You move forward with uncertain, wobbly steps.  Eventually you run. 

And then you progress to the terrible twos, the equivalent of finding your mad.  You cry no! You throw a temper tantrum, and this child side of you finds it quite tempting to throw one’s self on the floor and wail.

Eventually you get through the threes, the fours, the fives and back to kindergarten, where you perhaps find new friends.

Eventually this child you converges back with the adult you that has been there all along, albeit in a fog.  Slowly, eventually, the fog lifts.

And if you’re lucky, you blend that adult you with childlike wonder and see your new world as an adult but with a newly remembered sense of curiosity.

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