Sometimes, doing the right thing can be exhausting. Even though it is my bedtime, I finally feel like I’m ready to share my thoughts about the past couple of weeks. Well, realistically, it all started decades ago, but today’s events have kind of tied it all up into a pretty pink flamingo bow.
A couple of weeks ago, I told a friend at work that whenever I step outside of the store, I swear I smell fried chicken. Odds are, the aroma is coming from the restaurant in the plaza, frying up some egg rolls, but it smells like fried chicken to me, probably because I love it so much. When I was a kid, we had a Brown’s Fried Chicken near the Jewel. My mom and I would be walking, to do our grocery shopping and she would stop, inhale deeply and say to herself, “It’s just the smell of the oil Lorraine, you don’t need the fried chicken.” Inevitably, we would stop for a treat, the humble beginning of my life long love affair with fried chicken. In a way, eating fried chicken takes me back, it allows me to be with her, just for a moment, and remember how happy it made her.
I continued to tell my friend about my other food passion, tacos! I love tacos, all kinds of tacos, but nothing compares to making them the American way, the way my mom did with McCormick taco seasoning mix. It has to be the original blend, not low salt (eww!) or spicey, only the original will do. I love tacos so much, that one time when I needed assistance with an online account I didn’t remember setting up, they asked me my security question, “What’s your favorite thing for dinner?” and I said, “I don’t know. Tacos?” I’m glad somethings never change.
I left the sales floor and went to the office. I checked my phone and saw a message about an upcoming high school reunion. Part of me wanted to go, to be a part of the whole experience, but a bigger part of me knew it would be stressful for me. Big surprise, I was never one of the popular girls, the whole idea of revisiting that moment in time made me feel a bit unhinged. When I returned to the sales floor, I told my friend, that I now needed fried chicken and tacos! Better yet, I would love a fried chicken taco! I continued by saying that I didn’t want some KFC chicken tender wrap, no, it had to be a real taco. I thought I had a novel idea, who knew that if you Google “fried chicken tacos” a plethora of recipes and images appear. Maybe not an original thought, but a good one just the same.
That evening, I contacted an old school chum and asked about the reunion. He told me that I should go, that I would have fun. I told him that I think he and I had different ideas about what fun was and besides, he used to hang out those people. I existed on the fringe and didn’t think that going to the reunion would be a great experience for me. I had no idea, the impact my statement would make. He wrote back, that he would now feel that he was one of “those” people. It was never my intention to make him feel badly, but the reality was, he was one of the popular kids and I was not.
I wrote him a long email explaining some of the details of my high school experience. One of the stories I shared was about how I really liked this one guy, but he only thought of me as a friend. However, we had agreed to go to the Homecoming dance together, as friends. I was thrilled to be going, I even went looking for something to wear, but alas, I never made it to the dance. A week before Homecoming, I saw him in the hallway at school and when I approached him, he didn’t even look at me. He stared into space and said that he had nothing to say to me, ever again. I had no idea what had happened and to this day, I still don’t and yes, he never spoke to me again. Odds are, someone told him something that I said or did that I really didn’t say or do and that was that. Instead of trying to win back his friendship, I quietly walked away from the situation. Besides, why would I want to be with someone who thought so little of me to not even question what someone else may have said about me. To accept their words as the truth without a doubt? I was heartbroken, but it probably saved me from years of chasing someone who was not worthy of my love.
Writing about that story made me realize that this is what I do. I give and I give and I give some more and when someone is done with me, they just walk away. I don’t chase them, I don’t confront them, I never know and will never know the whys of it all and pondering them, makes me angry and resentful. It’s a vicious circle, but eventually, I find a way to step off of the merry-go-round and move forward with my life and onto the next relationship that frighteningly resembles the last, so maybe I’m not really moving forward, I guess I just move sideways or worse yet, backwards.
However, I don’t really believe that to be true, because I do know that I am the better person for not fighting a fight I know I cannot win and by doing so, I think I do end up winning. It’s easy to be bitter and spiteful, it’s easy to call names and curse, it takes strength to turn the other cheek, to be silent and in that silence know that I did nothing to deserve being left. I’m not saying that I am perfect, but I’m not going to waste my energy on someone who thinks so little of me.
At work, we receive our groceries from a distributor that like most businesses these days, is dealing with a lack of labor, especially truck drivers. Our delivery was running late today, but I was told that the driver said he would make it to our store. The driver was new to our location and called for directions. Our area can be tricky and I actually saw the truck drive pass our store without stopping. We received another call from the driver, but this time, I took the call. He explained that he couldn’t find us and now, he was stuck. I was like, “How can you be stuck?” As he explained, I realized that he was a block away and had turned onto a street that was closed for construction. The only way he was going to get out, was to back out onto a very busy street. I told him that I would help.
I walked down to where he was and when I looked into the cab, I saw a very young and slightly frightened man. I told him not to worry, that I would stop the traffic so he could back out. I told him where he needed to drive and that I would go meet him at the street he needed to find. Then, I stopped traffic. Yes, I went into the very busy street and halted traffic so this inexperienced truck driver could carefully back out and be on his way. The cars that I had stopped were understanding, no one yelled, no one honked their horn at me. However, a driver on the other side of the road, someone who was not affected by my actions at all, took the time to stop his car and yell out to me, “You look like an idiot!” because I was waving my arms to direct traffic. You know what I said, without thinking about it at all, “Thank you!” and kept helping the young truck driver. Once he was safely on his way, I bowed to the stopped cars in a namaste fashion and said thank you. I gave them all a thumbs up and let them be on their way.
I hurried back to the store to let my team know what was going on and then because I am so out of shape, I drove my car to the street he needed to find to be able to make it to our receiving door. It took a moment or two, maybe three, but he found his way. Turning into our parking lot, he almost hit a parked car, but he managed to maneuver around it and deliver our load safely. When I met him at the door I said, “You did it!” He was so incredibly grateful and said that he couldn’t have done it without me. I told him, that’s what people are supposed to do, were supposed to help each other.
I worked the load with my team of two and then, the adrenalin wore off and I felt like I was going to collapse. I was on my eleventh hour at work and I needed to go home. I sat in my car for a moment, wondering if I had the strength to drive, but I knew I had to, so I backed up my car and headed out. I could feel the tears begin to well up in my eyes and I knew I needed to decompress, so I called my eldest. I was so grateful that I had someone to talk to and share my tale of the man who yelled at me, calling me an idiot for no apparent reason, but to be mean. In hindsight, I would have loved to yell back at him, “Is your penis really that small?”, but what good would that have done? All it would have done is lower me to his level.
I think that is what I’ve been trying to realize over the past two weeks. Maybe I’m not an “idiot” for being someone who turns the other cheek. I choose to believe that it makes me stronger to be that way. Yes, I’ve been blind, blindsided and I’ve intentionally refused to see glaring red flags, but that didn’t make me an idiot. I would have been one if I kept trying to resuscitate relationships that no longer wished to live or never truly existed to begin with, but I like to think I knew when enough was enough and walked away. I’ve learned how to pick and choose my battles carefully and thus far, I have yet to be in a relationship that warrants the risk of scar tissue.
Maybe the smell of the fried chicken would be enough, but only for a moment. One needs to savor the flavor of one’s desires, to at least try to know what it’s like to have something or someone they desire. Overindulgence is always a risk, especially when it comes to tacos, but it doesn’t make one an idiot. I know myself; I don’t do anything small, I’m all in or I’m all out and I guess that’s why I will never be a single digit size, but I really don’t care. I’d rather love and lose than to never have loved at all. I’d rather stop traffic on a busy street, on a Friday evening then yell at a kid who’s trying to make a first-time delivery. And, I most definitely would rather pig out on fried chicken and tacos and think about my mom, even if it’s just for a moment because she is the reason, she is the one who unknowing taught me how to be this way.
I bet she would have known how to make a perfect fried chicken taco, but I’ll have to figure that one out on my own. I have the skill set, now I need to find the will to try, one more time.
#thelieswechoosetolivewith
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