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My life has been turned upside down these past six months; I've made discoveries about myself and my life that I wish I could repackage neatly and put back in their psychic holes, never to resurface again. Infidelity. Deception. Adolescent children. Early menopause. Each new blow delivered with the precision of a prizefighter: I cheated on you! BAM. You are a bitch! BAM. We don't need you anymore, Mom. BAM! Uppercut to the gut...Your womanhood is dying. BAM!BAM!BAM! You are no longer desirable to anyone...BAM!KO punch, down for the count. Just let me lie here and bleed, please. I'll get up tomorrow. I find that I am less likely to talk to my family and friends about my feelings now; what good is it to make everyone miserable with my pains and frustrations? Better to suffer alone, to put on my pretend face and act like things are OK. It's easier that way. I walk through crowds of people, and I find myself wondering things like, " I wonder if she's ever been cheated on? No, her breasts are too high and perfect. " Or, " I wonder if her student loan debts kept her from buying a house? No, she probably didn't have to take out loans, probably got a scholarship." I walk amongst the better off people of the world, trying to absorb whatever positive energy I can, waiting for the hope I've always preached to others to find me in some small way. I feel invisible, aimless, ridiculous. Of course he cheated on me; look at me, after all. I am not beautiful. I NEVER was. Not even as a teen, when my estrogen levels were at their peak. I am not smart enough to fend for myself yet. I am not wise enough to hold the ears of others very long. I am a fraud. I am a waste of flesh. I am so far from who I thought I would be at this age, if I'd placed a bet, I'd be indebted to the bookie for life. I expected to be present, alive, purposeful at 35. I expected to have a load of friends and business associates, to have 'connections' and be more valuable professionally. I expected to be witty and silver-tongued, enchanting all I met with my perfect speech and appropriate, but humorous, anecdotes and stories. I expected my life to have 'panned out', for my finances to have settled into a predictable pattern, for my love life to be stable, but true. I expected to be and have and do more than I am right now. I have always been just mediocrely good; not good enough to set myself apart from the crowd, but not bad enough to be an example of badness either. I am a C+ person; no scholarships or 'free rides' for me, thank you. Gotta work it out on your own, girlie, and it will be all by yourself, because you haven't captivated anyone with your beauty, brains or a combination of both, so good luck. So, I've been trying to 'revive' the person I thought I'd become by doing things I assume 'she' would do: performing my music live in front of people I don't know. Researching new business ideas, preparing to make long-term changes in my career. Brushing up on my linguistic skills, both foreign and domestic. Reading as much as I can. Working out as I can. And still, I am a ghost in the crowd, walking through, never being touched or felt by those around me. I am not present, or visible or powerful. I am just me. A 35 year old woman with two kids and no real life to speak of. I did what I thought was right: I married the man who I slept with and got pregnant by at 18. I 'worked' on my marriage and myself, constantly. Even when I realized that my work wouldn't fix him, or his past, or his present and future. I've often thought of the horse in that story 'Animal Farm' by George Orwell. The one that just keeps working, no matter how hard or terrible or treacherous things become, until he dies and is sent off to the glue factory anyway. I feel like that: working for no real 'end'. You know what though? I'm TIRED of being the damn horse. Maybe I wanted to be a pig, dammit. Maybe I wanted to lie and cheat and steal my way to the top, but I
