Hello, Don is back

My husband was off on an “epic adventure” with two of his buddies.  They did all the things that men do, bonding in that man-way.  Traveling to ridiculous locations to play golf and eat pub food and drink Guinness from the tap and watch their favorite hockey players bash the c__p out of each other.  Playing sophomoric jokes on each other that my husband would regal me with, on the phone at night, and I would pretend that I understood how hilariously funny these incidents were, but really, if he had played those tricks on me, it might have hurt my feelings.

Ah… the male code.  Totally foreign to me.  Even after raising two boys.

Oh, and here’s another weird thing though.  I’ve had two dreams in the last few days, where I was a man.  I kid you not.  This is the first time, ever, (that I know of anyway) that I’ve had these kinds of dreams.  And they are very detailed and real.  And one of them was really weird, because my mind to body impulses were WAY different than anything I’ve ever experienced.  I won’t go into detail, because, well, it’s private.  But I have to say, they were both very, very interesting and have stayed with me.

So, anyway, that’s why I didn’t blog.  I used the Thanksgiving weekend excuse, but really, it was hard to blog about what was going on, and not mention that Don was gone and he doesn’t like me to let people know when he’s out of town, because he worries that it isn’t safe for people to know that. 

But honestly… I am way better in emergencies and at personal safety than Don.  I may look all fragile and motherly, but PULEASE… I didn’t live through my childhood for nothing. 

And when I realized that the predators could sniff me out, could on some cellular level recognize me as someone who was familiar with abuse and that trapped in the headlights feeling, I did something about it. 

It took me a while, a few unfortunate incidents as an actress and a grown woman, but once I figured it out, I changed my physicality.  I took martial arts, I took Impact Personal Safety, a multitude of times.  And the weird thing is, now that I would have no hesitation to defend my body, it is no longer necessary.  They don’t target me anymore.  And I can’t tell you how good it feels. 

Now, maybe it’s because I hold myself different?  Or maybe it’s because I’ve (thankfully) arrived at that comfortable age where a woman is invisible to the male population?  But whatever it is, it feels so much better to be living in my skin.

Speaking of comfortable, I just got back from nice walk in the woods with K.C Dyer and my face can still feel the tang of the air outside, my fingers haven’t quite defrosted yet and are slow on the keyboard.  It was a beautiful crisp Autumn day and the dogs romped and rolled in the mud and we talked and walked and breathed in deep and the woods smelt of Christmas because of the damp on the ground and all the evergreen needles underfoot.

Posted by Meg Tilly on Tuesday, October 14, 2008 in Chewing the Fat