Free to be me

I read a friend’s blog. She spoke of harsh words running through her like a stick of rock, the core of her being as it were. She described them as invisible scars.

As I was running this morning (run #29/40 for the GNR solo) I thought about her words. I wondered first, how do they put the letters into a stick of rock? Then I began to ponder the words that run through me. Would the words which others read in me differ from the ones I feel myself?

Earlier this week, my mum described me as ‘independent’. She’s labelled me in many ways over the years: it didn’t necessarily feel like a compliment. She’s understandably angry and fed up at the loss of her own independence right now. There was a sense that she would like to maintain more control.

Sometimes it feels as though I’ve spent too much of my life trying not to rock the boat. Not always with success. Maybe I have occasionally felt that I have lost sight of myself, the person I was created to be. Now I’m thinking it will take a lifetime to fully become that person.

Not independent but interdependent: a tiny efficient cog working within a complex machine. Life is dynamic; we can’t stand still.