"I was eating my bitterness"

Century plant on the Lamar St. bridge

One of my sisters gently suggested that my last post was perhaps a little too harsh. Perhaps. Sometimes a girl just has to let go. Kinda like the flight attendant yesterday who got fed up with a passenger's abuse, cursed him out over the intercom, grabbed a beer, opened the emergency slide exit, and WALKED AWAY. He was later jailed, but I am savoring what he must have felt, the burden he must have shed, the sense of freedom he tasted, if only for a short while.

It didn't help that physical therapy is kicking my ass (in a good way--I'm gaining mobility and strength), my lower back was out like a fault line slipping, and for some reason (probably stress-induced IBS), my lower intestines turned to water.

I still don't like what's happening, but I don't know of a single soul who WOULD enjoy this particular segment of my life. I give myself permission to be a cranky bitch when on overwhelm. I'm way too old for the "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger" line, it all kills you. Period. Not especially learning anything new about myself, at this point it's simply a matter of endurance.

The quote above is from Anna Deveare Smith's one-woman show, "Twilight: Los Angeles." With minimal props/items of clothing taken from a trunk on-stage, she transforms herself into a dozen or so survivors of the Rodney King riots. in the '90's. I saw the production in Princeton and was deeply moved, both by the stories she told, and her exquisite ability to shape-shift.

One of the stories was about an elderly Korean woman, a shop-keeper who had lost her husband, along with other tragic situations. It was such a stark line, so visceral, that it has stuck with me all these years.

I think I must have been channeling this woman and the flight attendant when I wrote the last post. I stand behind what I wrote; however, I will admit that one can get a fairly decent education for less tuition than most US universities at UT. It's the politics and the way staff are treated that stick in my craw. Just had to cough it up, kinda like a hairball...