I never had a baby blanket as a kid. Or a blankey or a binky or whatever you call it.
I didn't like playing with dolls either.
That may have been because of my sneaking suspicion that being a mom would be hard work, rewarding but sacrificial. And as a selfish child I didn't want to have to take care of my pretend baby when it was pretend crying, and then change its full diaper of pretend poop.
Playing pretend isn't supposed to be work. So I just played dress up most of the time and pranced about.
I am afraid I have taken that mindset into adulthood.
I still like to prance and wish work wasn't a part of the whole growing up thing.
I was listening to the radio this morning, and the host was talking about how they sell these fake cigarettes that actually blow smoke and light up and everything.
Why anyone would want this, I don't know, but my wheels starting oscillating.
He made a comment about how he would probably convince himself that he got fake cancer from this fake cigarette in which there was no fake cure, and he in turn would die a slow, painful fake death.
I couldn't help but laugh. Not because it was funny, but because I believed him.
We all have committed the crime of telling ourself absurdities to the point of believing them.
We believe things about ourselves like, I am not pretty enough. So since I am not pretty enough, I will have to find some way to make people like me. I guess I will be a doormat. All people like a doormat.
Or I am not smart enough. So since I am not smart enough, I will just make other people feel dumb.
For me, I pretend all the time that I am not a gloriously flawed person. I pretend that I am a person that doesn't continually base her worth on performance, whether that be at work, in the gym or just when I am alone wondering if the life choices I have made are the right ones.
This is just another form of fake living. Living in the state of second guessing oneself.
I think things that I dare not say.
I dream things that I dare not chase.
I hope for things that I believe are hopeless.
Life is a constant prism of change. We lose things we love, and have to deal with things we hate. We get surprised with gifts of grace, and we get buried under mounds of shame.
No matter which way you slice it, we are all pretending for some reason. I can only equate it to the emptiness that this life can't ever fill. We are made to be eternal beings yet we live in a mortal world. Our fake lives are crying out to be paid attention to, and so we have convinced ourselves that the details in the design must be more important the the plan itself.
It isn't until we have lived the entire spectrum of life that we can ever truly have the appreciation for it; time has a way of percolating meaning beyond all the fodder and facade.
I imagine that is why older people always walk a little slower. They are tired of pretending they are important or have somewhere to be. All the "important" things they used to do have become antiquated; all of the places they used to be needed have now become obsolete.
What is important to them now, is to drink in the beauty of the day. Perhaps because they missed so many "in the moment" moments while they spent their youth chasing after fake cigarettes.
Fake paychecks.
Fake perfection.
Fake happiness.
Anthony De Mello,an amazing author, wrote in his book, The Way to Love,
"Just take a look around you: Everywhere around you people have actually built their lives on the unquestioned belief that without certain things- money, power, success, approval, a good reputation, love, friendship, spirituality, God- they cannot be happy. Once you swallowed your belief you naturally developed an attachment to this person or thing you were convinced you could not be happy without."
My husband still has an attachment to his baby blanket. Which I am sure he would hate me sharing.
While he doesn't sleep with it, he does hide it under the bed on his side where he doesn't think that I see it.
I have tried to throw it out, or just ask him if we could get rid of this tattered rag. In his eyes he can't imagine detaching himself from something that was at one time so attaching. Something that gave him comfort, that helped him sleep, that reminds him of his mom.
Perhaps I am a little insensitive, but to me its just an ugly old blanket.
To him, it is so much more.
This is where we all compartmentalize what is important to us, whether its a baby blanket or our prized accolades or visceral pats on the back.
Whether you are smoking fake cigarettes to look cool or clinging to securities of the past, there has to come a time when we look at life through the lens of detachment. We have to de-program our computers, as De Mello calls it, and reinvent the meaning of purpose.
I need to rename the building blocks that I have used to build my life, I need to quit sectioning off hollow sections of my soul's asylum in accordance with societal pressure.
Maybe when I was a young girl, shunning dolls and blankies, I had more wisdom than I realized.
If we are all going to play pretend we might as well spend more time prancing and less time blowing smoke.
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