Fiends and fears

It was coffee time and Benji and I watched the clock tick away our allotted minutes until someone came to deem us ready to leave for the small upstairs cafe.

“I’m going to give them until 8:47 to get their act together before I start pestering them about leaving.” Benji was speaking of whichever one of the 3 staff members would be escorting us upstairs as his knee jumped in antsy anticipation. “We are running out of time!”

“I know, I know,” I said as I shuffled cards around in my computer solitaire game, “I don’t know why they put groups back to back with fresh air time when we are always running late in the mornings.”

“And its only the mornings!” Benji exclaimed, as he peered around the corner at the front desk for the umpteenth time. “All i ask for is my coffee in the mornings. Is that too much? It would be good to have more than 10 minutes to drink it in too. This standing around chatting like they are doing right now – this is crap!”

Just then Cora walked into the tiny day room. Cora was a larger woman, one of the nursing staff, who had a fluctuating attitude that she didn’t attempt to hide.  “What was going on with Elle at breakfast? What was the problem there?” She eyeballed the unkempt stack of magazines on the coffee table for a moment before looking from Benji to me and back again.

“Oh, she was just having some problems with the peanut butter. Its one of her fear foods.” Benji glanced past Cora at the front desk once more.

“She did a good job though. She ate it all in the end. It had just been causing some anxiety.” I added.

“I don’t understand. i just don’t get how someone could be scared of something like peanut butter.” Cora said with a gesture of her hands that displayed her giving up of comprehension. “In my house peanut butter is normal. The kids all eat it, everyone eats it no problem. Why would someone be scared of it…its just peanuts and sugar!”

Benji and I tripped over each others words as we both jumped in at once to try and explain the thought process behind “fear foods”. By the time we had sorted out who was going to say what though Cora had already turned and walked away. Benji looked at me.

“Well shes not known for her niceties.”

“I know,” I said, “but what I don’t understand is how someone who works on an eating disorder unit hasn’t had training in basic ED habits. Not only that but her walking away like she did just shows that shes not even going to try…”

“Coffee!” The call echoed around the room cutting our conversation short, that one word trumping all else.

Thought provoking

Two sentences creep their way into my head like thieves as I walk around the small yard after dinner. I don’t know how they got in and I don’t know where they came from. All I know is that they are taking something from me by even just being there. They are:

1. I don’t have any friends.

2. I have people who will forget about me as soon as I’m not around.

Soon the first two are joined by a third and possibly the most scary of the trio:  3. At least I have a daily schedule I can rely on.

I try and drive the sentences out but each time I cut one off another starts fresh. i can feel them stealing life from me.

I know they are wrong though, they have to be. There is just no way something like that could really be true…but doubt is a devious monster. I watch the ground as I walk and adjust my comfy weekend pajamaish pants so they don’t drag in the newly wet grass. Elle and Benji are playing catch again and Molly, Carrina, and Tiffany are halfway around the same loop that I’m on, chattering away. For once its not stroke-inducing hot out and Sunday winds down again as Monday prepares itself for dawn.

I know I have friends. I’m 30 and its almost ridiculous to be reassuring myself of such a basic statement. If wisdom comes with age then I would think I shouldn’t really need to be even forming those words into a sentence. Its something I know – I have friends. I also understand the meaning of the phrase “out of sight, out of mind”. Its not a hard concept to grasp and perfectly understandable with us all being human and what-not.

The guidelines for friendship are something I have had trouble defining my whole life and what I feel it comes down to is that there aren’t really any. many people have many different definitions of what a friend should be but I’ve come to realize that, for me, a definition of that word shouldn’t be made. If I were to sit down and make a list to answer the question “what is a friend?” I would be following that criteria every time I met someone new whether I was conscious of it or not. Then, inevitably, something wouldn’t fit. Anxiety would set in and I’d start stressing out about the validity of people I considered my friends and thats a hole I know I don’t want to have to try and get out of.

The scarier thing though, the one about the routine, really snuck up. I can’t help but question the subconscious validity of that statement. Is that why I’m so strict with my schedule? Is it so that I don’t have to rely on people to do what they say they will because I already have the daily structure so definitively planned out? A routine is not a replacement for a friend. Again, a basic thought. It doesn’t matter that I know I can count on it to do what its agenda says it will. Its hard to differentiate because I know I can trust the routine. I can rely on the fact that it will be there when I need it and it won’t let me down, but does that really mean that I don’t have to rely on anybody else?

People are fallible. They will make mistakes just as I do on a regular daily basis, but that does not mean that they are not deserving of trust. A lot of thought has gone into this and I think more is needed still but, for now, I have enough to work with. The sun is setting. Its time to head back inside. As I meander up the stone walk to the double doors a comforting calm sets in and I smile to myself before jogging ahead to join my friends.