Where Ye'at?

Cloudy Evening Skyline©08 Photograph from the Naturalized series-North Carolina

By Jacquelyn Hughes Mooney

Today as I was packing boxes for my new adventure in life and sorting through things my mind was busy sorting and boxing up things to. For what ever reasons why something that happened to me over 38 years ago popped in my head that I had not thought of in years. It was mind boggling, heart rendering and what I cannot think of anyone I dislike enough to wish on. I will spare the painful details as what occurred is not important here.

When I survived/ fought/begged/ tried to get solace or at least compassion from the very people who should have had my back, been my corner, and been an ally to me turned their backs I grieved & became numb. However underneath the numbness were deep rage, betrayal & loss. This profound loss I lugged for an excruciatingly long time. That anger morph into scores of forms with which I repeated with a variety of people with a profound sadness, a melancholy, a yearning or aching for what I never have had. People who are exploiters or lost souls themselves have an innate almost uncanny ability of sensing vulnerability in another & will use it for what they need at your expense. Yet I smiled put on the face pretending and aching for their love & protection which was not forthcoming & I know it was not theirs to give. I expected them to be there for me & based on where there were at, it should have happened. But my expectation was on where they were at not where they were at.

While it has taken a seemingly extraordinarily long time to get here took on dissimilar faces as I veered back to the side to the fore and then back again. Part of that process was living (and did I), acquiring knowledge and some wisdom along the way. At a point when my life really took hold well came with it a time when it became de rigueur to attend to matters now I had a distinct strength & the fortitude mixed with the wisdom to set matters straight.

I can look back at that time with the sadness & honor it deserves, yet I do not suffer. I’ve just let it be. By no shape of the imagination am I anywhere near where I was then, but I have worked really hard not to. I was not trying to counteract something I am hardwired for but knowing that I have the skills, the intelligence, the resiliency borne of experience that having expectations of people based on my reality and not of what they are or not has been a liberating experience.

No one is impervious to having a story to sing that while it can be fraught with trials, tribulations and travail when and how we get to a point of know where yer’at is highly individualized. So while it does not mean I am dismissive of “dem”, though there are some because where they are in their lives are not healthy for me, but it gives me the security knowing that I do not have to drag them along with me, or ” ’dem” expectations.

So today where am I? Is there a moral to the story? I cannot tell you there is a happy ending because the ending hasn’t happened (yet). But I can tell you unequivocally where I am is absolutely not where I’ve been though I have not gone to (yet) where I have boldly not gone before.

But it’s coming…

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