...wasted breath...

"I'm tired of wasting my breath."

Those words...last night...in a phone call.

Not mine.

Nor the caller's.

Rather, a related message from a third-party...someone tired of 'wasting his breath' in expectation of what was both absolutely due him and realistically never going to happen.

For some reason, those are the words that stuck with me, rattling around in this skull of mine...pinging off the various other detritus of the day.

6 words.

Strung together.

A simple sentence.

Fully loaded.

Bearing the weight of disappointment. Of frustration.  Of neglect and need and willful ignorance.

6 words that triggered in me a flood of response.

Righteous anger...disgust...pity.

And under it all, the ever-present spark of disbelief...the "how can this possibly be?" of taking 2 + 2 and somehow not getting 4.  

"I'm tired of wasting my breath."

The answer to "why not ask...why not try...why not...?"

And, honestly, given the extenuating circumstances of the conversation that prompted the reply?  Completely justified.  Completely appropriate.  Completely expected.

Completely devastating.

We've been there, you and I.  Countless times.  We know the feeling well.

"I'm tired of wasting my breath..."

~explaining my feelings

~defending myself

~hoping to be recognized

~asking for help

~reminding you

~holding you accountable

~teaching you

~trying to help

I lay in bed, hours after that phone call, book in hand...but the pages were empty to sightless eyes as my brain puzzled out all the bits and pieces of fact and apparent fiction.

"I'm tired of wasting my breath."

We've been there, you and I.

I've been there.

Years ago.

Moments ago.

We've our limits, you and I.

The walls we bang our heads against until, one day, we're simply done.

Bruised.

And done.

We've our limits.

Some of them clear and well-defined.  Lit up like neon signs.  Do not pass go!

Others, stealth bombers...sneaking up from beyond the periphery to drop us on our asses in the midst of what we thought heroic effort.

Limits we set for ourselves, founded in self-love and self-care.

Limits of nature and physicality and strength...or weakness.

Limits of experiential knowledge and growth and perception.

Limits that define what we can do and what we can take.

Limits that define what we are able to shake off.

He had reached his, the speaker of those 6 words.

He had reached his limit of what he could do and what he could expect would be done.

He had reached the limit...finally conceding the loss of hope to grim reality.

He had felt the wasted effort of words...of wants and wishes and needs expressed...of his very breath.

And I, a phone call and an intermediary of repeated words away, heard.  Understood.  Recognized the declaration and the desperation and the devastation. 

I heard those words and felt the welling up of emotion...familiar with those feelings from my own experience and righteously indignant that someone else should be similarly impacted.  I heard them, and they burrowed deep within me...finding their kin amongst my own disappointments.  

I heard those words and knew them to be true, even as I wished they were but the stuff of melodrama.

"I'm tired of wasting my breath."

I agree.

I, too, am tired.

I, too, have hit the limit.

I, too, see the waste of my breath and my time and my effort.

You are tired.  And rightly so.

You have not been afforded what you should have been.

You have not been cared for the way you should have been.

You have not been helped and taught and nurtured in any of the ways you should have been.

And they are remarkable...your 6 words.

A statement of fact that you, somehow, inherently or instinctively know that you deserve more, but know, as well, that more is unlikely to manifest.


Your breath has been wasted.

Mine, too.

You are allowed to be tired.

You are allowed to give up.

You are allowed to break.

You are allowed to give in to the considerable odds stacked up against  you.

I am too far away to be of any consequence, and yet, I will be here...hoping...

Hoping that after you give in and give up, that you will be able to get back up again...

That you will start breathing again...

And blow away the pain and the heartache like so many dandelion seeds...

Just Breathe

~Leanna

...the holes...

We rent.

We rent what, by some standards, would be considered a postage-stamp sized apartment.  It's the 'garage apartment' of our landlords' home...an afterthought of sorts...a subdivided use of what was extra space, walled off and renovated into living quarters.    

It is, by some standards, far too small for family life.

It is, by all standards, in constant need of t.l.c. after countless (preceeding occupant) years of neglect.

It is also, seemingly, forever in need of fixing.  Something of a d.i.y. renovator's daydream, I suppose.  I have done what I can.  I do what I can.  There's been sanding and scrubbing.  Tightening of screws and replacing of fixtures.  Refitting and refurbishment.  Caulking and re-caulking.  Painting and repainting.  Little fixes and big fixes.

And it remains.  Unchanged.  In steady decline.

Pieced together of spare parts and looking every bit the temporary shelter that it is.

It is...

At best...

Quirky.

Cantankerous, even.

Floors sloping in all directions.  Cabinets that won't be orderly no matter how often I re-organize.  Drawers that stick or jam.  Surfaces stained by age, bleach-resistant.  Walls that show their seams.

And holes.

Oh, the holes.

Round the frames and doors and windows.  Where the insulation has rotted away. In the roof and in the ceiling.  In the walls, before I filled them.  The cracks and holes of mis-measured and old and settling.  The holes of nature wearing away.  And, in some cases, the holes we've made throughout the years...from the ever-changing displays of elementary art projects and holiday decorations.

I've fixed them all.  Or, rather, I've tried.  I've bought the spackle and the drywall.  Applied it liberally, then sanded.  I've fixed so many.  Too many.  I've filled in the cracks and the crevasses.  I've color-corrected with woodpaint in hopes of blending.  I've covered up with photos and artwork; those shiny happy things that distract from the disorder they hide.

But there are more. Always more.

I have fixed the holes in the walls.  Countless hours of labor consumed by delicate work.

Fill...Sand...Paint.

I have fixed the ones that are in ready view...the ones at eye-level...the obvious ones.

But there are more.

There are cracks in the ceiling.  Stains, as well.

Holes in the roof that let in all manner of waste and weather and wildlife.

Those holes remain.

They continue...they grow.

(They are, most would agree, not my responsibility.  But they are my burden.)

I know they are there.

I know there is erosion in the very framework.

I have fixed what I can of the obvious gaps...fixed that which others would easily see.

But the structural damage remains.

(The kitchen ceiling)

The holes in the very construction remain.  Out of sight...sometimes even out of mind...but there, nonetheless.  Impactful, nonetheless.  Burdensome, nonetheless.  Slowly and steadily eating away at themselves until they chew right through the walls and ceilings in more obvious ways.  Sure to suddenly reveal themselves only once it is far too late for damage control.

The holes remain.

Where this person ripped off a piece.

Where that person tore out a chunk.

Where someone else left without shoring things up.

The holes remain.

In him.

In me.

In this quirky, cantankerous life made up of spare parts and temporary fixes.

~Leanna