Crying over my balloon - Trying to give frustration expression     by Bobbie C.

Do I handle such things any better now that I'm older? Maybe not... And maybe this is not the time to think about the greener side of life. Being an adult isn't all that it's cracked up to be.

As a child, did you ever experience a time when an adult openly blamed you for some wrongdoing — maybe for something kids usually do, but you knew it was your mistake and, tail between your legs, you apologized in front of everyone, enduring the shame that only a child can feel when having to do so in front of people?

And when you did, your voice shook, and your body shivered in suppressed shame-slash-embarrassment - and all you wanted to do was to run away, but your child's conscience wouldn’t allow you to. And then, soon after, that same adult does something wrong by you, but pulls you aside in some secluded corner, hidden away where no one can see or hear, and apologize as if it was of no importance, and are told she didn’t mean it? Anger surges through your little body but are unable to express it. Should you call her out? She was an adult after all. And three times your size besides. Again your body thrums, but this time in angry frustration. In your mind, you cannot believe it. You are unable to respond, fearing retaliation from her, the people around you, and even your folks. You cry, not because of sadness but because of sheer frustration.

Happened to me a few times when I was a little boy. But there is this one time that sticks in my mind, the one that I have never forgotten. True story.

By the way, I am writing all this because it is part of an exercise to exorcize my personal demons. My therapist says it's a good thing to do, especially during important dates in one's life. Couples renew vows on their tenth wedding anniversary; people make New Year’s resolutions. What I’m doing is similar, I think. And since my birthday's coming up, my therapist suggested to unload as much emotional baggage as I could, and face my birthday “lighter.” Everyone has emotional baggage, you know - small, big, in between. This is one of the small ones that I'd like to unload. Can everyone say "cathartic”? heheh (I learned that word from her, too.)

Anyway, back to the blog.

It was that time, oh, more than twenty-five years ago, when my mom had to leave me with my cousins so she could go meet my big sister at my uncle's tailor shop for some kind of fitting (we couldn't afford to go to a real dress shop, and besides, my uncle did make girls' dresses occasionally). So, like the cliché Italian mom that she was, on the way, as her way of apologizing for having to leave me with my cousins, she bought me an ice cream cone and a big red balloon from a vendor at the Farmers Market street fair that happened near our place regularly (they still have those up to now, actually, weather permitting. I think.). I waved goodbye as she drove away in our decrepit old car and I turned to my cousins, the end of the balloon’s string tied around my wrist, and a big old ice cream cone in my chubby fist. I was all of three years old (I think) and my cousins and their friends were like seven and nine-year-old giants. I happily babbled (I'm sure I did) at them about my big red balloon, and how I think it could float away and fly forever, and that it was my favorite balloon in the whole world. My aunt heard my babbling, and she very loudly and publicly lectured me in front my cousins and their friends, with all of them looking at me disapprovingly, about how I shouldn't show off in front of others with stuff only I had. I tried to explain that I was just telling them about my balloon, but she wouldn't listen. But I knew I had to take my medicine because I knew I was in the wrong, even if I didn't do it deliberately. My voice shaking, I said sorry to everyone individually and in turn as my mom taught us - to my cousins and their four giant friends. To make amends, I offered them my ice cream cone, but they wouldn't take anything that I had been eating. So I offered my new favorite balloon, which my younger cousin took pretty quickly, too.

I tried to be a brave boy and not think of my lost balloon, and turned to go inside their house, trailing after my aunt. My aunt opened the screen door, and the edge of the door banged against my knuckles and knocked my lickey out of my hand (I know it's gross but that's what my mom, sister and I called ice cream cones when we were kids). The kids looked at me and laughed. Almost crying, and not just because of my bruised knuckles, I went inside and told her she knocked my cone into the dirt. She looked around, perhaps to make sure no one was around, closed the door and casually said, "I did? Sorry. It was an accident," and she went inside their kitchen like nothing happened, to do whatever magic mothers did in kitchens. "You did that on purpose just to punish me!" my little-boy voice screamed inside me, "and even if you didn't, you gotta tell Sheila!" Do I tell my cousins myself? But I was also scared that my aunt might get mad, or that my cousins wouldn't care or, worse, that they might not believe me. And I lost my balloon and my lickey.

My aunt made a frantic call to my mom at my uncle's shop because I had crouched behind their living room couch and bawled my eyes out, not stopping, and refusing to leave my little corner. Mom came to fetch me, and as she carried me in her arms to the car, I wanted to articulate my frustration at the unfairness of it all, but my child's mind didn't have the wherewithal to form the words.

Now that I'm all grown up, with the appropriate vocabulary at my beck and call, I cannot help but wish for the ability to go back in time and help my little-boy self oh those many years ago, give him the ammunition to fight back and tell my mean old aunt off, or at least allow him to vent his frustration at the injustice of it all.

Now that I am a big girl, an adult, I can somewhat hold my own against the same kind of situation now, and to be able to not just explain my side properly, but perhaps even to correct the situation altogether.

A little while back, something similar happened again - a mistake was made, publicly, at my expense, and I was asked by the powers that be to just ignore it, sweep it under the rug and let it pass, I suppose like one of those midnight deals that politicians do, with the public none the wiser. My sense of fairness was sorely put upon, but in the end, I "quit making myself the victim." I was afraid of repercussions were I to pursue it, and in the end, it was quietly swept under the rug. All that was left was for me to swallow my indignation.

My new-and-improved cynical sensibilities have helped me understand my younger me's problem, too. Way back then, whether or not my mean old aunt intended to knock that cone out of my hand was beside the point. She couldn't tell her kids, as her kids may, like me, think it was deliberate, and where would her parental moral high ground be then. In the future, will her kids always think that way? How can she get them to believe her anymore if this sets some kind of precedent? (Hiding her culpability from everyone is just incidental.) So she protects her reputation at my expense, her welfare being more important was a foregone conclusion.

Rank and connections trumps everything, regardless. Any logic or rationalization cannot stand up to that. Best to know when things are stacked against you and you can't win. Best to know that being right isn't always enough. Best to know when to back off.

But y'know, understanding things doesn't make things better. At least, not always.

At least now I didn't hide behind the couch his time, and cry my anger and frustration out until my chest hurt and I had no tears to cry anymore. I am not that little boy now. And besides, in the larger scheme of things, it’s not that important - just like the balloon. Best to stop being a baby. Best to stop making myself out as the victim. Good advise, that. Because whether or not I WAS a victim was beside the point. Fight only the fights that you have a chance of winning.

Cynicism really is the best armor. Naive little boys as well as big naive girls need to learn that lesson pretty quick. If they don't... well, at least people don't think too badly of a girl if she cries, even an adult girl. At least I have that going for me now.

Well. That's a big load off. Curiously, it DOES make me feel lighter unloading some of this emotional baggage.

Anyway, thanks for listening. Seeya!

   

To see Bobbie's stories in BCTS, click this link: http://bigclosetr.us/topshelf/book/14775/roberta-j-cabot
To see Bobbie's "Working Girl" blogs, click this link: http://bigclosetr.us/topshelf/book/19261/working-girl-blogs
To see ALL of Bobbie's blogposts, click this link: http://bigclosetr.us/topshelf/blog/bobbie-c