Shoddy Memories

The other day my kids were having a bit of a tiff. As usually happens, I was forced to wade into the centre of it and fish out the perpetrator. I pulled Jacqueline from the melee to give her a 'time-in' (special attention time during which the shit disturber gets to sit on my lap and receive soothing hugs and kisses). I could tell by looking at her face that I was heading into stormy weather. I swear, that kid is just too small to house all of her emotions. You can actually feel the hurt and sadness rolling off of her if you lean in close enough. It sometimes takes my breath away when I hold her as she sobs and cries -- you can almost hear the pieces of her heart breaking.

Last night as I was falling asleep, I had a brief flashback of a long forgotten memory. It was from my elementary school days when I was about ten or so. I had this best friend, my only friend actually. We played together every day during lunches and recesses. I looked forward to going to school so I could spend time with her. She made life bearable for me. Under her gaze, I felt acceptable and accepted, where before I had been a complete social klutz. After about a year of constant playdates and shared secrets, she suddenly started getting chummy with another classmate. I took this to be a rejection of our friendship. It never occurred to me at the time that perhaps she just wanted to include someone else in our games. I thought instead that she was choosing another girl over me and that this was her way of trying to dump me. This caused me to act like a jealous mental case. I started trying to dream up ways of wooing her back, while simultaneously, attempting to get rid of this intruder.

Of course, my attempts to maintain an exclusive friendship just drove her further away. Who wants to play with an obsessive maniac? I spent the rest of the academic year alone and desperately lonely.

I can't even begin to describe how sad and rejected I felt. Suddenly, I started dreading school. Life became instantly unbearable again. And yet as painful as the whole experience had been, I'd forgotten all about it until just the other day. Stuff you swear you're never going to get over just disappears into the Bermuda Triangle we call "long term memory overload".

Weird how you can feel so disconnected from past versions of yourself. Until you have kids, and suddenly collide with a mini you.

It took me a very long time to get over the pain of losing my one and only friend. After about a year of watching her form a friendship with two other girls (who weren't psychotic like I was), she then moved away to the States. We became penpals, and were uncomfortable in our new roles because by this point, we'd moved so far away from the initial closeness of our friendship, and it felt hollow and false to write these emotionally distant letters.

Remembering this made me look somewhat differently at my daughter today. The frustration that I've felt with regards to her occasional social inabilities and her immobilisation when she gets into hurtful situations, suddenly dissipated. The apple really didn't fall very far from the tree after all.

My hope is that the rest of Jacqueline catches up and eventually grows into her heart while sustaining minimal damage. My hope also is that I don't lose sight of the experiences which might help me to understand those around me; that I can occasionally if I strain hard enough, catch a glimpse of a younger self.