Spunky Callahan

 

So let me introduce Spunky Callahan.  She is something magnificent, and amazing but she doesn't have a clue.  She thinks all these things inside her head and keeps them all to herself.  She has a story that is longing to be told but fears the things that others will think and feel about her.  As scared as she is in every moment of life, she has this side of her that can always find something funny.  Ok, well almost always. She has a wild imagination that always helped her survive the unthinkable.  She has this amazing hope that someday; someday she is going to find all the things that she is looking for.  She lives a life that very few can understand. 

 She is different, unique and hence the name spunky. Her entire life she has had to see things different, she has had to survive and find ways to keep herself alive.  She took every evil that was thrown her way and was a master at pretending she was fine. She thrives on kindness and found little.  She always had a connection to nature, because the wind, the trees the birds ;those were all things that allowed her to escape.  She could sit outside for hours taking in the breeze, listening to the rustling branches and watching the birds.  At least she knows that nature, the beautiful things around her are the only things that will never hurt her.  That is when she can rest and find some peace.  

She hides everything so well, always trying to be fine, wanting to be ok.  Really, she isn't ok 99.99% of the time but she always keeps smiling.  She is a fighter, in a every sense of the word and even when she wants to give up, she never does.  She sees things different; she knows the world is a dangerous place and keeps trying to get others to understand and do things different. I believe she has lived hundreds of lifetimes in her one short life.  She struggles to find joy, and longs for a time when her heart will be at peace and that spunky girl no longer is suffering. 

Her mind is a busy place always watching and learning. She remembers the smallest details and recalls the most insignificant details about things. Not often but when she does let some of that spunk of hers out, she has this giggle that is pure delight. She has an attitude that wants to let you know exactly what she thinks.  She asks questions more than she makes statements.  She is curious and wants to understand the who, how and why of how things work.  She takes whatever is handed to her and keeps going.  At this moment in time, she feels pretty defeated.  She is so afraid, yet still trying to trust and believe in the people around her. She is terrified of being hurt again, at this point she knows that she wouldn't make it.  I think even more than that she wouldn't want to make it. She has no idea how strong she is, often feels less than all those people around her. She is always behind, in every way of life and wants more than anything not to be alone and to belong somewhere and not have to change the person that she is. 

There have been times when this girl has made me more than proud. When she spoke what she needed to say, or when she was able to laugh at the absurd and survive another day.  These are two stories about this spunky girl, that always make me smile. Though they are sad, and desperate they are also something amazing.  Even in hell she found a way to survive, she found a way to giggle to keep her little spirit alive. 

The first one was early middle school maybe.  I was sick and not feeling well at all.  I was unable to swallow regular Tylenol.  I guess that this afternoon my father had had enough.  He screamed and yelled saying that I was costing him too much in chewable Tylenol.  Things get a little fuzzy, I was told to climb on the kitchen table and lay down.  He was going to try and shove the pills down my throat.  My brother was standing there watching, my mother not even 10 feet away.   He scratched my already sore throat with his jagged nails as he tried to shove the pills down my throat.  I was devastated and ashamed, there was an audience and there I was laying on the dining room table, the same table where we ate dinner.  I remember climbing on the chairs, to get on the table terrified of what was going to happen.  I wonder what his thoughts were, making me lay on the table.  The more he tried the more I fought.  Not meaning to, my body could not swallow those pills.  He tried for what felt like a very long time, finally screaming at me to get off the table, and go to my room.  So, I did.  I did go to my room.  And that spunky girl spit those pills out of her mouth with such a feeling of accomplishment.  I can remember sitting in my yellow room, on the floor at the foot of my bed holding them in my hand and almost being proud of myself.  I put those fucking pills on my dresser, and there was a relief. There was a sense that she stood up to him.  As bad as my throat hurt, Tasting the blood in my mouth and as devasted as I felt; He didn't win. At least in this moment he didn't win and that was a celebration. 

Another time was when I was in high school. There was a part of her that literally didn't care anymore.  Everything that mattered and was important to her was taken away.  She was breathing and barely surviving.  She was going through the motions.  Her family was all involved in church, and she wanted nothing to do with it.  She didn't believe in the idea of religion that was spoken about in her house.  They all talked about prayer, God and forgiveness.  None of that made sense with the things that were happening to me in my own home. My father's hobbies included always reading the bible out loud or playing one form or the other on the stereo.  Well, the thing was the stereo was more advanced than him and he couldn't get it to work.  He would play this like cricket music.  So annoying and he pretended nothing was strange as that music was on and he read from the bible.  If anyone could have been a fly on the wall in my house, I would give anything for their interpretation of the day.  So, I am standing there as he is trying to get this thousand-dollar stereo to work.  He is swearing, the Fu's were flying and all of the sudden I couldn't catch my words. I just watched and out of nowhere the words just came out "what an asshole:" I quickly grabbed my mouth not believing what I had just let slip. I looked around at my mom, thinking I am dead, I am totally dead.  I ran to my room closed the door and after a few minutes when I realized he wasn't coming to end my life I couldn't stop laughing. I was shocked at the words that came out of my mouth and relieved that either he didn't hear me or was so shocked that he would just rather keep screaming at the stereo.  I can remember feeling so alive laughing in my room.  It felt so good calling him an asshole.  I had to put my hand over my own mouth to muffle the gleefulness that I felt in my bones. I was so proud of that girl for speaking. He was an ass hole in every sense of the word.

We had so few moments of joy.  Every small thing was always taken away and stolen before we had the chance to enjoy it. I think that I am finally seeing her as the little girl that she was.  She was not a woman; she was not an adult.  She just had to make adult decisions, about so many things and there was no other choice. She feels guilty, she feels scared and so alone.  She knows that she is different and doesn't have a clue how to fit into the world that never seemed to want her in it. Her heart hurts all the time. She lives in a state of panic, even though she knows it's been a long time since anything has happened to her,  she lives in the place where it does.  Where she lives and the things, she has experienced are things you couldn't imagine.  I can see the strong brave girl.  I can see the girl I see the pain, the terror the lonliness and I just want her to be free, I just want her to let that spunky girl out.  I want the world to know and love this spunky girl, as it should have always been. Let her breathe free air and feel all the belly laughs that she had to swallow.  I want her to sit, comfortable in her story in her own skin and revel in the girl that she has always been. I want her to feel safe and sound and know that I am here and can handle her deepest darkest secrets.  Sweet girl, my spunky girl you don't have to hide, for one more single second.  I am here. 

I heart your heart.