Owning Orange

So, I've been invited to write for this blog called: owningpink
Trouble is:  I haven't been writing.
I go onto the site and it's all about the transformative power of telling your own story.
It says if I can teach what I know, to even a handful of people, I will be amazed.
And I am.
I know.
This last year of writing Chrysalisbreak has brought me to tears on so many mornings.
It made me hear my Sarah voice again.  The one I never doubted as a young girl.  She is the one who has always known where home is.  The one who wrote pure poetry at the age of 11 and never stopped.
But I undervalue her still.
Because it is still easier to have no needs.
My writing has stopped because I have stopped valuing her - me- whatever.
And now I'm crying again.  It happens so subtly, like falling out of love.
I don't understand these airbrushed photos of women who always have time to wash their hair....and blow-dry it.
I don't understand their struggle and how they turned it into money.
I don't understand how I would ever fit.
I don't know that I want to.

looks simple right?

Because women who are sick don't believe women who are well.
At least not that well.
Not well enough to be on Oprah.

But I started out this whole thing because I realize I will never be "fixed."
There is nothing to fix. I wanted to help people like me, if I could.  I thought, "At least we won't be alone, and maybe we could have less shame.  Maybe I will learn something."
Apparently, I was not the first one to have this thought.  People are making money with this idea all over the internet.
They're called life coaches, and they are replacing God.  Or maybe they're just supposed to be the conduit, I don't know.

Last weekend I sat in my kitchen with a good friend picking at my salad.
Not eating it.
"I don't know,"  I trickled, "I've never known this version of myself.  I'm afraid I will look back and realize that I was asleep.  That I should've been more passionate or that I mistook slumber for peace.  Maybe I just feel quiet because actually I am asleep......I probably am."

But if I'm writing.  I know I'm not asleep.  It flows like water, even if it has to find the one crack left, it will come out.  And by "it" I mean the truth.  I know it because I cry and I find myself writing things I never would have known were there.

What is there now?
I am afraid I will be absorbed by my husband and my kids.
I'm afraid I already am.

Yesterday I went climbing and remembered what I am capable of.
I realized, I am not 20.  I realize it even more today.  I walk like an arthritic woman up the stairs.  I have to gather my breath when I pick up a kid, and I make a funny face like I've just sucked on an atomic fireball jawbreaker.
My thighs ache.  My ass aches.  My lats ache.  My abs ache.
I felt fear.  I dragged my kids through the dirt.  I carried two toddlers up and down mountains.
I climbed a crack that kicked my ass 12 years ago, and it did it again...but not quite as bad.
It was me - it was Sarah - doing all that.  Sarah whose hair turns to fire in the sun.

I watched 10 year-old Sophie climb a 5.10a crack.  She never voiced fear.  She was a tiny woman in her taut calves and the arms of her father.
The trail up to the climb  is the same one I hiked 11 years ago when I was in labor with her.
I called my Aunt from the top,
"I think I'm in labor."
"Where are you?"
"Up in the canyon rock climbing."
"Why are you in the mountains if you're in labor!?  Get down and go to the hospital!"
"It's not that bad yet.  I'll go down soon..."

I can withstand so much, but not stagnation.  It will kill me faster than anything.

Sophie took this picture of me, and I didn't know it.  So I guess it's pretty accurate.