Can I just say that shaving a story down to 500 words from 548 is the most frustrating process I have ever had to go through. I was literally about to throw my computer out the window. Along with my dog if she kept breathing on me. ANYHOO I titled it "The Scenic Route".
I was an overachiever: the worst kind. The kind that's forced into it. My mom wasn't; she played hooky during high school, opting for rides in rich boys' cars, outings with people now famous, and adventures that are the stuff of stories.
But that's all she has now, those stories. Those stories to tell at the dinner table, to guests on holidays. So I can understand; she wants me to have what she didn't after youth is gone. I want that too, but not like this. Not with the constant tightness in my chest reminding me I'm not good enough. I feel as a hiker would, climbing the steepest of mountains and being unable to see the peak. Do they keep ascending, never to reach their destination, or do they turn back and live with the regret of having given up on all their work? Neither option appeals to me.
And so now I look at the contest forms on the wall, the e-mails open in my inbox. I look to the pens and journals stacked under more important papers, the words, lyrics, verses in them drowned out by the concise statements of documents. I look to the dust-coated keys of my piano, not stroked for so long because the imperfect chords and melodies they sing have no place on my resume. And lastly I look to my pin board, and the pictures I displayed there. The verdant greens of forest trails, the muted blue seascapes. Quotes from poets long gone, their words still alive in my mind. Backwoods cottages tucked away in the moss.
These places I have never been, these people I have never met. But others have, which means these aren't dreams, but realities. They could be my reality, too, if I work for them. And I want to.
It's not that I don't want to achieve; I do. When I see an A on my paper, I can't help but be proud. I want to enter contests, I want to win. But so easily an A can turn into "not an A+", an entry can turn into "not good enough to win". What were positives in my eyes turn to negatives in those of my mother. She sees the empty space instead of what is there.
I don't know how to please her; I'm not sure I ever will. But I have figured out how to please myself. I neither want to continue climbing straight up the mountain or take the easy road back down. What I want is to take the scenic route. I want to forget about the peak and enjoy the mountain itself. I want to travel along those richly-hued forest paths, I want to look out and see the blue of the ocean. I want to come to understand those quotes I know by heart, and I want to be able to stay awhile at a little stone cottage amid the moss. I want to enjoy my life as I live it.
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