Life doesn’t stop
Life doesn’t stop because you were raped. It takes into account no matters of physical pain or mental anguish. Life is harsh like this, yet equal. There are bills to pay, jobs to work, meals to be prepared.
There are matters to tend to of daily consequence, there is life and it spins all around you while you cry in your car without being able to explain why. The responsibilities sing quietly in your ear at first, then rise to a scream as you try to ignore them as you try with all of the might you can muster to break apart. There is no time to come apart in life. The rent doesn’t care that you can’t sleep. The car doesn’t care that you are still scared to walk into public restrooms alone.
The breezes blow the flowers of spring up and around and they settle into the hair you haven’t washed. Their smell opens up something old and scarred in you and it bleeds fresh- and the flowers? They don’t care. The slight tilt of the Earth on her axis makes you drag your feet just so slightly. Never enough for anyone to notice because life doesn’t stop.
Your brave face may slip a little and you may have cracks just underneath the surface that open up and bruise. But you are so ‘tough’ that the blood just pools and no one sees, no one sees as the pressure builds. You feel like you may burst open from the strain, but life doesn’t stop.
Life just doesn’t stop.
June 9th, 2008 at 5:25 pm
I think about this all the time. Just like how it doesn’t stop when you lose a loved one. And it sucks, because the cars keep driving by and the clocks keep spinning and people keep laughing at the grocery store and you just want to grab them and scream, “how do you not know what just happened?? How do you keep on going like nothing did??”
June 9th, 2008 at 5:40 pm
no, it never does. it doesn’t let up depending on who is watching. things don’t sneak by. and yet, somehow all i’m thinking is that old phrase: if you’re not outraged, you’re not paying attention.
*hugs*
June 9th, 2008 at 5:50 pm
It’s so true. Harsh and true.
(I also think about this when I see someone in public, teary and weepy or even rude. You just never know what someone is going through; maybe they are getting gas or grabbing groceries while their world is coming down.)
June 9th, 2008 at 6:47 pm
I know. It just amazes me that when such trauma and losses occur the rest of the world just carries on, blissfully unaware.
June 9th, 2008 at 6:52 pm
hugs. Big big hugs….
June 9th, 2008 at 6:54 pm
Yeah, that’s the cruel thing about life. And yet some people never stop to consider this fact. They brush all the hurt under their rug and put on, as you and Rush said, their “Bravest Face.” Two sides to the coin, and it’s a bugger to flip . . .
June 9th, 2008 at 6:56 pm
Life does not stop, and either have you.
You are strong. You are good. You are surviving.
XO,
Ivy
June 9th, 2008 at 7:12 pm
Life doesn’t stop. And neither should you, Flutter.
June 9th, 2008 at 7:14 pm
Hey! I just noticed that I stole Ivy Brown’s mojo. By accident. Honest. You see, I’m an egotist and never read anyone else’s comments. WHAT? WHAT? If I don’t think I’m fantastic, how can I expect anyone else to think I’m fantastic?
June 9th, 2008 at 7:27 pm
It doesn’t stop…and then it does.
It’s surreal, isn’t it, to carry so much pain in the face of all that living. You’re amongst us, though, hold on…
I hope you do find happiness in your days, in and around your pain.
June 9th, 2008 at 7:55 pm
i feel you, my friend.
you haven’t stopped either, you know.
June 9th, 2008 at 8:12 pm
no lie: i wrote the exact words “life doesn’t stop when your daddy dies” once in my own healing process. i know, i know, it’s not at all the same thing. just, in a tiny, tiny way, i kind of understand.
June 9th, 2008 at 8:19 pm
That’s correct. Life is unfair and ugly, and then sometimes it is beautiful.
June 9th, 2008 at 8:34 pm
So often whenI hear of unbearable tragedies i wonder how people can carry on. It’s what we do. We carry on. Or you don’t. I suppose it’s a choice. Keep moving, find now, and do it again tomorrow.
Some people, people like you, teach us how it’s done.
June 9th, 2008 at 8:54 pm
Life stops for nothing and no one, it’s true. It just feels like it should.
June 9th, 2008 at 8:55 pm
We have to carry on. If we quit and give up, then there is nothing, absolutely nothing. I like carrying on better, much better, especially when you now have us with you Flutter, with hugs, thoughts, and prayers to help sooth your soul… and carry on.
June 9th, 2008 at 9:11 pm
Life doesn’t stop, even if our world stops at that moment. The rest of the world continues, ignorant to our pain. We can pick up and move forward, but those moments when the wound is ripped open again cause us to stop, even if only for a minute. Take a brief moment to know that while the world keeps going, so do you. Maybe only with the momentum, but momentum may be just the push you need.
Been reading a while, never commented before, but I know this feeling too well.
June 9th, 2008 at 9:53 pm
I so much like that quote Liv included, about paying attention and outrage. As I read your post–gorgeous as always–I realized I’ve never endured and lived with the trauma of a rape, but I have felt the same way after lesser life slaps: being dumped ignominiously and weeping in the back of my classroom, behind students’ backs, as I had them “freewrite”…moments like that.
June 9th, 2008 at 10:17 pm
Life doesn’t stop, but sometimes I think it should pause for awhile, just so there’s time to breathe.
June 9th, 2008 at 10:32 pm
It does seem impossible that no one sees or notices.
Big hug.
June 9th, 2008 at 11:47 pm
No one ever talks about this aspect of rape. It is important. And real. Thanks for letting us see a bit through your eyes.
June 10th, 2008 at 3:55 am
Yes. It’s very true.
But here’s something to ponder — would you really want it to? Really?
June 10th, 2008 at 4:11 am
i’m glad that my life didn’t stop, i just wish that i hadn’t let him get away with it either. at the very least i wish i had shamed him, the way that i felt shamed, especially since i did nothing wrong.
it took 3 decades for me to recognize that.
June 10th, 2008 at 6:02 am
We drink from the same cup, sister. And no, it doesn’t stop. Because it happens to someone else every day. That is almost a greater tragedy.
June 10th, 2008 at 6:19 am
In a way, though, I think it’s the fact that life goes on that makes the pain bearable. If it all stopped, if it was completely still and silent and empty and quiet around the gaping wounds, I wonder if the focus on all the feelings would make them swallow one whole.
June 10th, 2008 at 6:46 am
Nope, it sure doesn’t stop for anything – and it can be both a source of anguish and a source of comfort – its all in where you are.
Purge it girl – at least it can’t fester as much, right?
Beautiful imagery in this, btw.
June 10th, 2008 at 7:42 am
No, it doesn’t. But you don’t either. Look at you… pushing, trying, learning and growing. You are unstoppable ~ despite your past. There are no limits to where you will go.
June 10th, 2008 at 7:49 am
I’ve been writing about this lately, too… how when I get frustrated I want to sit on the sidewalk and scream, but sooner or later I have to get up and catch up with life, cuz it just doesn’t stop for me… I guess it’s all about finding the strength to keep going knowing that you really have no choice.
June 10th, 2008 at 9:35 am
Life might not stop yet I believe that it admires the courage of you*
And your beautiful and powerful journey gladdens its heart because of the intricate pattern of hope it adds to the tapestry it is continuously weaving.
And everyday the pace of my life slows down as I take the time to learn from you*
June 10th, 2008 at 9:45 am
It’s terrible, and brutal, and yet somehow reassuring, how life just keeps going on, isn’t it?
There have been a handful of times in my life where I couldn’t understand why everything didn’t just grind to a halt, respect my abject misery or sorrow or shame; now I think it would have been the worst possible thing that could have happened to me if it had.
There’s no tangible reward in being tough, I know, but there is a certain grim satisfaction in being able to grit your teeth and just keep moving, pile driving through the obstacles that are your own grief and anger and suffering.
One of the best and saddest things about human nature is our ability to just. keep. going through almost anything life throws at us. As I tell my daughters, life is a juggernaut. It doesn’t care if *you* stop. It will just run you over if you do. I tell them they have to fight to stay abreast. And most of us find a way to do just that. As you have, as I love you for having done.
June 10th, 2008 at 10:10 am
How true this in for any event that snaps us out of our day-to-day with sudden sharp tragedy. Our world spins differently on our axis and then we have to fit that in with the demands and expectations built from before. That can be the hard part in a way. I left off the p and had “hard art.” I fixed it but it may have been right the first time.
June 10th, 2008 at 11:30 am
You’ve nailed it. That is the thing about life. It just doesn’t stop.
June 10th, 2008 at 11:37 am
Oh God, I am so sorry for you.
No, unfortunately life doesn’t stop. For anything. Time keeps moving foward, and so do we.
Thoughts are with you.
June 10th, 2008 at 11:49 am
sometimes the best thing is to have other things to do, to keep us from becoming too engrossed in the morass of the past. it can be comforting, knowing that life does keep on happening, a reminder that our world hasn’t come to an end.
June 10th, 2008 at 11:52 am
It doesn’t stop, but I wish that it would treat you a little better, because it’s hard enough as it is.
June 10th, 2008 at 12:30 pm
Life, like men… can’t live with it, can’t life without it, pass the beer nuts.
I do wish at times that there was at least a pause button. A means to slow things down just to catch your breath. It would be nice, but unfortunately it doesn’t work that way. I guess all we can hope for is a hot bath at the end of the day, and a well timmed mental health day, or two, or three, or four.
June 10th, 2008 at 12:48 pm
it’s always easier to say it than to do it…
June 10th, 2008 at 2:15 pm
its good it doesn’t stop – it makes us get back on the horse
June 10th, 2008 at 2:45 pm
It is always amazing to me that life never stops for any kind of trauma you may have…Things just stop in your immediate life, like feathers floating down from the sky to rest beneath your feet, all while things swirl madly on around you. Tiny deaths every moment that are noticed by no one but you…as life rudely elbows it’s way past.
June 10th, 2008 at 2:48 pm
It doesn’t stop. But sometimes I wish it would give the people I love a break now and again.
June 10th, 2008 at 3:35 pm
Well slap me in the face with the beauty and painful truth of this post why don’t you! Reading it brought me to the worst time in my life when I couldn’t press a pause button and wishing I could go back to that time and give myself a hug because I had no one then. No one. Maybe life doesn’t stop because we don’t let it. We can’t let it. At least I couldn’t. It would do me in. I needed all those mundane, mindless life tasks to keep me going. It’s what got me through. After a hard time is past, we realize we were stronger than we thought. I hate it when I hear someone say that too! But it’s true. Reading this post, I couldn’t breathe for a second. The truth of it is deafening.
You’re so brave.
June 10th, 2008 at 5:14 pm
I don’t think there is anything I can add that you haven’t already heard or read and surely there is nothing I could say that you do not already know except maybe this: that I read your post and I wanted you to know that what comes across is strength and determination. If those are not motors mighty enough to give the unstoppable day to day a run for its money, then I do not know what can Flutter.
June 10th, 2008 at 5:39 pm
And in this way, life just totally sucks. When my faith in a higher power waivers at times, it is often this fact that causes that to happen. Today is the third anniversary of my father in law’s death. When he died, people brought casseroles and sent cards. People took time off. This does not happen with silent tragedies like yours. And that is just….well, shitty.
June 10th, 2008 at 6:41 pm
This. All so tragically true. I wonder if you know the power of your words. You have enlightened so many flutter.
June 10th, 2008 at 7:49 pm
This may sound odd, but when i was going through the worst pain of my life, it helped me to think that there were people out there who were unaware of my pain, just living life. I liked knowing that somewhere, people didn’t have a destroyed life.
June 10th, 2008 at 7:58 pm
It is difficult when life goes on, despite our personal pain. It’s one of the hardest things about the grieving process. Beautiful post.
June 10th, 2008 at 9:21 pm
Sheesh, how did you fall off of my reader? I’ve been wondering, thinking that you hadn’t been around for a while, and then I find out that you have, apparently, it’s me that hasn’t. Glad to see you haven’t disappeared off the face of the earth. I’m going to have a serious talk with my Google Reader.
June 10th, 2008 at 9:40 pm
Life doesn’t stop, but we can take a moment to take a deep breath huh?
June 11th, 2008 at 12:13 am
I feel you. Right there with you.
June 11th, 2008 at 2:30 am
Every day, you get further away from it.
Someday, it’ll be over the horizon behind you.
June 11th, 2008 at 9:57 am
It doesn’t stop for anything. But oh, how I wish that it would. I wish it would rewind and this whole horrible week would never have happened . . .
June 11th, 2008 at 10:17 am
You’re right: we can’t make it stop. But there is something to be said for giving yourself permission to slow it down a little, to take a break from the dizzying pace from time to time.
June 11th, 2008 at 10:39 am
Nope. It doesn’t. And sometimes that smarts, eh?
June 11th, 2008 at 10:42 am
I thought about this too. And often times I think that I’m glad it doesn’t. Too much time alone to think about the woes of our past can be unhealthy. Not that thinking them through is bad, but I have a tendency to wallow and I would so wallow if there weren’t things that needed doing.
June 11th, 2008 at 7:39 pm
No…you’re right. Thank goodness it doesn’t. It moves on, gently (and sometimes not so gently) coaxing us to as well…
But Christine, you remind me of a mighty Oak. And even though a Winter can last an awfully long time…and there can be many of them, that Oak stands firm…and in Spring, it takes its deep breaths again, and blossoms out its leaves…and letting them “flutter” in a breeze or high winds, it stands there saying, “Guess what, suckas? I’m still here…Dis bish ain’t goin’ down that easy…yo.”
And I think that’s how you roll.
June 13th, 2008 at 9:28 am
Oh how I wish it would stop, just sometimes, just long enough for me to catch my breath. But I like to think that Life knows something I don’t and that stopping would actually be a really bad idea. I find it hard to believe sometimes though, when the relentless pushing on of life just feels cruel.