10. My Scared Little One

My inner-child's experience visiting family after 3.5 years in Hawaii

Blog Overview: Compassion // Accomplishments // Hurting Inside

Once upon a time, there was a little girl with blonde ringlets who was “wise for her age.” Her singular pigtail waved like a feather atop a crown and her chipmunk cheeks burst with soft pink pleasure at the very nature of Being. She screamed with glee at the swing’s peak, her laughter in crescendo as her belly dropped with the plummeting pendulum.

She bore no resentments, nor did she feign her pains.

Those tendencies she learned later on from adults living in their chosen ignorance, using their preconceived constructs of “right” and “wrong” to prop up not just their world, but hers.

They clipped her wings early to keep her close. No dragons could inhabit their structures.

And yet sometimes she flew in the belly of an imaginary metal dragon to another world across the sea where bratwurst snuggled between fresh baked bread and football was played with feet. In the land of gold, red and black, there was more room to soar. That lasted for the summers, then she’d return to the “land of the free”.

To school she went, where she learned to conform. There her wisdom was misconstrued for intelligence, which was sucked out of her like a dried-up pen. She was eager to please, and so she raised her hand to plead permission to pee. She listened well and for that she received praises, not to mention a tolerance for the carrot and the stick. During recess, she unwound from the dizziness of the constant movement within the school’s sharp edges, spinning in circles until she could no longer find point-center. From that teetering tipsiness, she chased and caught butterflies.

I’m back in her room now, the one that used to have soft, blue clouds painted on the ceiling. Everything is in the same order as she left it, for the most part. Relics and hoodies from her days as a Bulldog at Goochland High School are scattered about, as well as her meticulous notes and lengthy essays from her days of college.

I remember when she left her warm clothes on their hangers, expecting to reclaim them within a year. Well, it’s been over three and a half years now. There’s no dust or mold, just a girl forgotten, one who used to wear those pinstriped pants and cozy scarves, feeling classy with her Eric Clapton records spinning, her walls adorned with souvenirs from Sevilla or Salcombe or some other dreamy seaside sanctuary she visited.

In the backyard, the basketball court is covered with the tree’s decay, ankle deep winter shedding preventing her from a dribble, a kind of mechanical meditation that turns off her exhausting stream of thoughts. As a girl, that was her way of finding relief. Sports in general were her way to drop into the Body and let go of any struggles.

She used to be a trophied athlete, the best in her class.

On paper, she was the “best” at most things. Captain of most sports teams, all A-s throughout high school, first chair in the trombone section of the orchestra. Valedictorian, which her fifth-grade teacher predicted, and she lived up to.

Even when she trained for sports well after the final school bell rang, she went home and finished her homework. She was constantly training for achievements.

And boy did she find plenty of validation, from accolades to local newspaper features. Time and time again, she learned to push her way into success. More often than not it came naturally, but she always worked for it. Yet she suffered immensely when she didn’t live up to expectations, which no one yet everyone seemed to place upon her. She was the big sister, the example. She was inherently gifted, but it all got so tainted.

She tells me, “I got you to where you are now. Don’t forget me. Come back, it’s cozier in the confines the rush. You know it well. Why would you ever leave this world?”

She thinks a lot, her Mind on a rampage, like gazelles fleeing a hungry lion, pouncing in every which direction, survival their primary concern.

She forgets her nature.

“MOM! DAD! Can you hear me?”

She’s clawing at my insides begging them to listen. Invisible as a sovereign entity, dismissed when she shares the personal, and suffocating on the surface level. She’s starving for company and play. She wants me to find the courage to make requests of her kin, because it hurts when they don’t ask questions when she’s been gone for so long. She wants them to feel her pain. She wants them to care. If she had her way, she’d scream for attention.

But I must deny her. She has to learn that I am in charge now. She will only get hurt if I let her run the show. She’ll get nurturance from me, as well as stability. The Divine Mother and Father do not exist outside herself, at least not within her bloodline. I’m with her through it all, committed to be the parent she has always needed.

With an ego that operates with a checklist, this little girl lost her way. Now she’s angry. She wants to blame everyone who guided her astray. She wants to prove to the world that they have wronged her. She’s hurting and wants them to know.

But I’m in charge.

So, little girl, please tell me…

Do you feel the contraction in your heart? Do you notice how you are solution-driven in the mindscape? Can you see your radiance dimming? When did you last put your feet on the Earth? How did you feel after seeing those hawks? Wasn’t that candle-lit bath relaxing? Do you know that I treasure you more than anything in the world?

I’m in my childhood room looking through photo albums and yearbooks. I see who I once was. I remember recovering from three of my four ACL surgeries, utterly defeated by life, expecting the worse of my future. I remember it like yesterday. But my eyes have softened in color. There is less tenseness in my brow and fewer toxins in my food. The portal opened for my return and will close as soon as I part ways. I will be missed, but they won’t know what they’re missing. She would tell them, “Your loss.”

She is a ball of grief, but I’m taking care of her.

She never expected me to be able to dance the way I do now. Or the way I play the piano and draw. She can’t believe I live on the Hawaiian Islands and that I’ve traveled to so many places in the world. My little girl is speechless, amazed beyond words.

She is glad to see her old room and old ways, but she feels more comfortable in her naked body when she can sprawl on black sand beaches and bask in her silence with nowhere to run to.

I’m the adult caring for my grieving little girl…as well as the hurting inner-children within my parents who don’t even recognize how much they suffer, nor the relief that could come from a hard cry.

We all have our hurting pieces.

I’m reminded that compassion goes a long way. What must they have endured? Why do they hurt so? I want to know so I can love them the way they need, but asking feels scary. I can feel all the layers protecting those hurting parts, fragments of totality that have been so utterly neglected.

Once upon a time, there was a little girl with blonde ringlets. She was pure joy. She did not love with borders. Somewhere along the way, I forgot her.

How would I love before I knew hurt, before my innocence was tarnished?

Well, I would ask my parents more questions. I would spend more time in silence doing the mundane for the sake of showing them that I care. And I would share more of my radiance.

So, here goes nothing! I may crash and fail, but…

“GOD FORSAKE I FAIL! THEY'LL REJECT ME!”

It’s okay, little one, I’ll catch you when you fall and I'll always accept you!

To all the scared parts,

It is understandable that you want to be seen and heard.

Just know that I'll take care of you.

Riddlez

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