Holiday’s revolve around food and my bipolar mother. It’s filled with disappointment, encouragement, guilt and hope. And despite all of it, I know I’ll be back again soon.
Growing up with my mother around brought me into a different circle of peers. My father was distantly attentive if I needed money he was there, but I never expected much else. Mom, on the other hand, was everywhere. I’m fearful of disappointing her mostly because I know it will lead to a downward spiral with her emotions that I wasn’t willing to take the blame for.
So when I walked into the house for Easter I was expecting the worst, hoping for the best, but would settle somewhere in the middle. I made deviled eggs; symbolism that I haven’t forgotten I’m 30, single and childless. Which ultimately made my mother cry. I want kids, a house, a marriage (not a wedding like most girls, but an actual fucking marriage); it just seems that at this point in my life it’s not in my cards, no matter how hard my mother pushes for it. Granted, my track recorder of finding people to fall in love with seems to be shittier than a cesspool.
“Vivian, what are all these bruises from?” my mother precariously asked me after drying her eyes. I looked down at what she was gawking at to see the handprint left by Chaps McGee who I had hooked up with just a few days before.
He was gentle and caring, until blast off. In a way, his death grip got me off. “Ran into something,” I said passing the sweet potatoes around the table.
“Looks like a hand” my brother chimed in.
“Vivian, you aren’t back with that asshat are you?” my mother questioned in sheer terror.
By “asshat” she’s meaning my ex who deserves less than a full moments time, but also seems to be the one who took up most of my brain cells these days. “Wouldn’t dare try that again,” I said taking a fork full of ham and stuffing my face.
The reality was the hand print was from the forceful pulling of my arm as he lifted me into the air like an acrobat, except instead of swings, silk, and netting I had bondage rope and spring links holding me above the ground. Chaps McGee was just someone I met at a party, he had strung me up a few times. Both of our satisfactions being accomplished mine was choice, his was dominance. Despite the ravishing energy that I got from these conquests, the assless chaps were the one thing that bothered me. My therapist questioned these choices as if they were ones I made as a psychological form of punishing myself. Under my dress housed bruises across my legs, torso, and pelvis; they felt like badges of honor. I had a choice this time and I was going to take it.
What I wanted to say was that it was my rigger, my rope boy, my domm (despite this being true), but instead, I swallowed my ham and my pride as her tear stained face turned into a smile.
Melissa In Words 