there was a storm

it had been building up for a few days i suppose. i could feel it in the atmosphere. unsettled. angry. roiling. gathering up for big gale (or should i say gayle?) force winds; torrential downpours; bolts of lightening.

you'd think after all these years i'd see the warning signs....like those that flash across the bottom of the tv screen....high winds; tornado watch. but, much like the weather outside, i can't control myself when i get to this point. if i were a smarter person i might figure out what my trigger is. for decades i've chalked it up to pms, and maybe that could be part of it, but i don't unleash this crazy storm on a monthly basis. and i think the older i get the further apart the storms are.

i think it always starts the same way. i get my feelings hurt or something insignificant in the grand scheme of life gets under my skin and starts growing like an evil, deformed pearl in an oyster. i start cussing at people in my head. i check out, briefly, when i am fed up and i'm quite certain my eyes glaze over. i become a little despondent. i get weepy and high strung and oh so very huffy over every damn thing. i rant and rave (sometimes in emails, sometimes in my head) about things i might let slide or mildly get annoyed with were it any other day of the year/month/week. i blow things out of proportion.

there is this....scourge inside me that keeps growing and no matter how hard i try to reason with it or dismiss it or ignore it it keeps rising to the surface until i explode. i say mean things. i use words like always and never (as in, you always do this or you never do that)---words i hate when they're used on me. i give voice to feelings i did truly feel....but when i say them out loud they seem ridiculous. thoughts, feelings, words that made perfect sense in the cyclonic brew of my brain for a few days seem vile and hateful and...just wrong when they are spoken.

and then i cry. the crying where your head hurts and your nose keeps running and for lack of a tissue you wipe it on your pajama top. and the sane part of you is standing outside your body saying, oh.my.god. you are certifiably nuts; you are insane; you really are trying to fuck up a perfectly good/happy/loving thing aren't you?; you are your own worst enemy when you are like this; and you're wiping your nose on your shirt? what is WRONG with you? why are you like this?

and then it gets a little quieter. and the storm has petered out. it dissipates. waking up the next morning after a big storm i'm a little skittish. was anything damaged? how bad was it? is it fixable? and i'm overcome with remorse for my behavior. and i'm drained and exhausted from the emotional turmoil. i wonder how anything can survive and be strong when faced with this type of storm off and on for decades.

maybe this is one of the many, many reasons we're meant to be together. he's the only one who can...and will...weather all the storms with me.