Today

I started to write something two days ago because I hadn't written anything in so long, and I thought I might have something to reveal, but then I just sat there. 

I'll stick with stories and keep the poetry at bay where it's been for some time now. 

A week ago my ego got the better of me and I found myself releasing contempt on a stranger attempting to collect on a bill I believed was paid.  It was only for $25, but the medical billing process is a Rube Goldberg machine with only some of the intricate machinery showing on any given invoice.

I invested a lot of energy into the notion that I was being wronged, and feeling deeply the meal on the table that $25 represents.   It's so rare for me to lose my poise and grace and even rarer for me to abuse a stranger who likely makes less money than I do and who is just doing her job.  So there was remorse about that, then karmic events on the heels of that.  The next day someone tried to use my debit card number to buy $600 worth of merchandise at a Meijer in Royal Oak.  (My bank was onto them from the start, thankfully, and blocked the transactions.)

Yesterday I sent a thank you email to three employees who gave input on a document I was preparing.  The third person to give feedback gave much more valuable, substantive feedback than the other two, but I thanked them together.  An hour later the woman of the best feedback sent me email noting that I had listed her name last, and how that implied I valued her feedback the least.  I simply listed the names in the order in which they had provided the feedback.  The accusation from this woman I've known for 25 years was completely unexpected, out of the blue.  She's indulging a compulsive insecurity about her worth and imposing it onto a neutral pattern.  That felt familiar though.  I think I just did something like that.  Going down the stairs of my work building shortly thereafter, I looked upward and whispered "When are you going to deliver me from this?"  Knowing full well that "this" is life, and I don't feel all that ready for delivery/deliverance just yet.