Too Loud. Too Passionate. Too Opinionated. Too Quicksilver. Too Sensitive.
Too Much.
I was consoling one of my adult children last night, talking them down off the ledge of hurt feelings when I said, “Honey, it is just that we are too much for some people.”
This morning as I drink my second cup of coffee, those words are swirling around in my head.
Too Much. Too Theatrical. Too Sensitive.
I put on my skin each time I go out into public because I don’t really like going out into public that much. I don’t like being with people at the same time as I adore being with people.
I put on my costume and I perform.
Stage fright hits just before I go into a crowded room, a paralyzing millisecond of forgetting who I am supposed to be, what stories I am supposed to tell, what role I am playing today.
Because it is all theatre really.
Constructs. Slices of realities offered up begrudgingly. A sliver here, a glimpse there.
I learned very early on to hide who I was, to hide my thoughts. I learned to lie and to lie convincingly, because in that closed confessional box the priest’s snort of disbelief echoed like judgement. The burden of a whole rosary in penance is a heavy weight for a sinless six year old to carry. Good children sin and ask for forgiveness for that sin, it is a rule.
Hello Father I have sinned, here is my childish lie and in return I will take your single Hail Mary. I will kneel and offer up my penance and skip away relieved but uneasy because isn’t lying to a priest a mortal sin in itself?
I see myself in my grand daughter Amy and I see my mother in Evelyn. The female line was strong, we were strong, there was power in our shared stories and I did not have to pretend. I did not have to put on my skin to be with these women, I could be in a stage fright free zone.
Now I am the Matriarch, I hold the stories, the fragments of stories, the memories of shared pasts. Of past lives and future lives entwined in blood, my blood. I miss my mother with a sharp knife edge of longing. I grieve, I grieve, I grieve for the softness my mother brought to my sharp edges. I miss my grandmother, I miss our shared reticence to show more than a flash of our souls, offering only glimpses. Slices of ourselves that we kept for ourselves. My grandmother understood silence, she understood the need for silence.
Not all stories need to be told, though they burn with the untold telling, sometimes silence is a gift in itself.
I am relaxed and comfortable in ambiguity, the nagging voices of my teachers demanding that I explain my motivations have faded into a shared echo of memory along with the priests. It was as easy to lie to both, to make up a flippant response to the demand for articulation. They brought their own expectations and motivations to the table and only heard the words they were expecting to hear, but still the flippancy was uneasy, is an uneasy armour and so I embrace silence
I am no longer a child, I am no longer an art student.
The work, all the work has a story but I am loathe to share that story with strangers. I resist the telling as I resist a tide of expectation. The work is what it is, I offer it up, I offer it up with nothing more than a suggestion of the direction you might want to take. A sand map as fleeting and fragile as the stories in the stones.
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“The work, all the work has a story but I am loathe to share that story with strangers. ”
And hence my ongoing tale of Alexandria. there is so much “now” in those posts, about the thoughts and heartaches and worries. Drama is so much more easy to write about the joy, isn’t it? But I rarely publish those posts immediately. I leave time for the events to smooth out, so that by the time they are read, their truth is blurred to all but me.
I was telling the GOFA that the Indonesian artists (might have been Thai, but definitely one of the two) believe that a piece of their soul becomes embedded in the artwork they produce. Not such a strange concept, really, if you create from the heart. If we could decipher the code in the works of art created, we would understand so much more about each other. But art is our safe place.
Oh yes, Watershedd, many pieces of my soul 🙂
From another who is “too much”, I hear ya. You’re not too much for me, though x
Too much of a good thing is never enough. And you are most definitely a good thing. And an inspirational one too.
I hate that you feel the need to censor yourself (and do it myself).
Stop making me cry! Nothing wrong with being cautious when your instinct tells you to be – it’s a sick feeling when we’ve cast pearls before swine. If being “too much” is being honest, vehement, warm, emotional, vulnerable, kind-hearted, blah blah blah, carry on.
A beautiful and painful post.
Your writing moves me and I am so glad that you do it.
I am also, too much – too much for my children, when they do not want to be responsible or when they are hiding at times, and sometimes they need the silence;
too much for my sister , who lives in the past; too much for my ex, ( who likes to sweep life under the carpet and most of all – do not rock the boat, do not be real )
– too much for some people, in the classes that I learn in.
Sometimes, and mostly, because I ‘see’ too much, and sometimes, when I say too much.
I’ve been learning not to say too much, not always successfully, especially to my children but sometimes, that is too much, and the words escape my lips.
Not too much for my closest friends.
Sensitivity, theatrical, passionate., opinionated. quicksilver – are all attributes of a lively, intelligent mind.
Sometimes a person that is considered ‘too much’ is a catalyst.
I think because you, I, and your caring friends in the above posts, are ‘authentic” in our work – whether it is clay, drawing, painting, writing,
and the engagement of it is like being laid bare, and raw, exposed.
Art reveals – whether you want it too or not , and self expression, the important part, is a brave and vulnerable act that takes courage.
And for your soul’s sake – you must keep doing it – besides being, a safe place, art , writing , self expression is your own healing tool, a wand for understanding. a language that reveals who you are, to yourself.
It is natural to want to protect your inner self, laid bare, when your instincts tell you to cover and protect.
Because, when we move through our daily, public life we are constantly having to adjust to strangers, semi strangers and more familiar associates.
I also think you may have been more intelligent than those around you, even as a child, the fact that you are wise, and you are;
Your wisdom has come through by the evidence of your life;
because :
you clearly took on board, your own life lessons, challenges, growth and understandings, that, knowledge and life experience you accrued, in turn, you passed on, to your children and all the while nurturing your own children, who have benefited from you, being who you are,- and the strong women in your family who came before you.
The lies of childhood sometimes are about survival , and also having survived a part Catholic education, as well, I have come to think about it in these terms and I think that:
A religiously governed environment is a very complicated and particular kind of jungle, where judgement is constant, accountability is insisted upon, inexorably. Censorship is imposed on you, by those around you, because in that system, you are not really allowed to question or disagree or have your own ideas about the world and spirituality, ethics, justice, good, bad etc
In that belief system you learn to impose self-censorship, to protect yourself, your life is always exposed, always having to reveal your stuff ups,
protecting yourself or need to forestall reactions and judgements.
You develop an over scrupulous conscience, forever.
Because of it ( scrupulous conscience) you are always at war with yourself in matters of absolute truth and reality.
Or there are always consequences: if you question, or think in ways different to that which have been presented to you.
In this system of beliefs , rules of conduct, if you are part of it , one has to conform to these sets of beliefs as being, the only acceptable reality
Sometime the consequences of not conforming is too bloody much.
On top of that you are presented with a set of beliefs and a history that is imposed on you, and one not based on your own experiences or you doubt your own experiences which are always measured against these beliefs. You are also asked to accept and believe in what you have not seen, and you always have to take the word of a relative stranger.
Bring a blank slate, a mind yet unformed, a malleable child in to that reality, a top heavy, with unrealistically, high expectations, of a constructed, right behaviour, moralistic, world.
You questioned it and that is the most important response, understood the rules, rejected it, played the game.
A child is a child, and children like to fit in, and approval matters, the whole religion is based on being watched and judged, more constructs than you can wave a stick at. I think what one learns from that structure- one learns duality – and truth and not truth and then you face the rest of the world and you are exposed to the notion that there are many realities.
Who knows what truth is? That was the question asked in the brilliant Japanese film,
Rashomon. Four characters told the same story four different ways. Which way did it
really happen? Who told the truth? Who even knows the truth?
I just know it is important to keep telling those stories whether they are shared or not. The act of making, the love of it, which I know you have.
Your soul yearns to express itself, because it has led you to circumstances where you were moved to make.
Self expression is, and the process of it, is the heart of the matter. The outcome is always mysterious.
Sharing it – only when you are ready – ready to let it go. In time.
I’m so glad I decided to read this piece today. It really moved me. We all identify with aspects of your amazing story. You have incredible insight into what makes you tick. Thanks for sharing with us.
Sometimes the greatest wisdom is in knowing you don’t know it all. And that’s ok. People who judge almost never have the whole story anyway. God bless.
This is so beautiful. I read the first few lines and formed a comment in my mind, but I get to the end and have nothing to ad but thank you. Thank you for sharing yourself. x