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Sanity Sucks (even on a Good Day)!


I’m not nearly  as crazy as I used to be.  Now you could say I’m even semi-sane–though I’m not sure that’s always an advisable way to survive the madness that is image-obsessed, media-driven, fast-food-consuming  middle America.

We may all be better off a little more crazy and a lot less obsessed with success.

However, and this is an over-sized qualifier indeed, my head has never quite figured out how to do sanity full-time.  If only it were 9 to 5 instead of 24/7.  That’s a lot more normal than I’m able to manage–even on a good day.

Too often still, my brain looks like this:


I feel the surreal that is this:

Eclipse
 
I enter the tangle
     of sleep
                    walk
     beside you into the thick
     of camel hair
                    coarse
     and without water
 
the hand, a sudden
     five-pointed mutiny
     against the decay
 
                    a nightmare
of folded sheets
 

So don’t worry if the dishes aren’t done, the laundry looms.  The kids are bound to grow into semi-civilized adults despite your best efforts.

Normal’s not all it’s cracked up to be.  So go a little crazy today.

Do something radical and off the wall:  GIVE YOURSELF A BREAK!

32 thoughts on “Sanity Sucks (even on a Good Day)!”

  1. I don’t remember what I said last night, but we were at a grocery store, I said something crazy, my 8 yo looked at me, shook his head and said dryly, “Mom, sometimes I wish I were not your kid.” Then we laughed.

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  3. “The kids are bound to grow into semi-civilized adults despite your best efforts.” Haha! I sure hope so 🙂
    Oddly, I am fully aware that I am “not right”. About ten times a day I stop and think “A normal person probably does not do/say that”. Almost always this thought is followed by laughter and an “Oh well”.

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    • How do I already know this about you? Oh, yeah, that blog where you ramble on, circling sanity, never quite making it to the middle–the center that says, “I am oh so sane and so damn proud of it!” !’m like you, I mimic sanity at my best. But that’s what I love about you, Tori!

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  4. Let’s hear it for the crazies, the broader definition and pharmaceutical managed crazies! I, myself, perfer well managed crazies. Some people call it -being a risk taker-. (“”she’s crazy to do that”), or -artistic-, (“look at that crazy painting”).
    Then there are those who love -walking in the rain–, (she’s crazy to be out walking in this weather”). Or moving alone a “million” miles away where you don’t know anyone and working for less pay, or throwing yourself a birthday party in place of a funeral? – I mean I could go on and on . . . the fun of well- managed crazies!
    Having been raised in a strict parochial boarding school (which I loved, by the way), and coming home to a fun loving, smoking, drinking, non-sabbath keeping family – It made me “crazy”.
    I learned to play many people to make it work. However, once I gave up the guilt of it all, I realized I had experienced a much broader perspective of people and life, and with acceptance, it would give me the advantage -increasing my interest in, acceptance for and love of many different points of view!
    I don’t intend to make light of a illness. But when well managed, the creativity, tallant and loveliness is amazing – and fun!
    As you say, we are all a little crazy – how else could we manage in this world?

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    • I love you, Marlene! This is one of the best comments ever. You are making me laugh, laugh, laugh!

      By the way, the contrast between home and boarding school for you sounds like the same kind of disparity that existed between my two parents!

      Hugs to you,my friend!

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  5. Kathy,

    I needed to hear this today. In the light of my grief, I’ve been crazy a whole lot of late….driving off from the gas station with the nozzle still in the tank; eating salmon and capers at 3am (this really puzzled the animals); finding my cell phone in the bread-bin. …and crazy’s becoming quite comfortable. Thanks for the endorsement.
    Hugs,

    nikki

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  6. So, this begs the question: Have you listened to Next to Normal? This post reminds me of Diana, Dan…her quest of “as much of normal” as she can handle…

    blessings
    jane

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  7. Once again, you rang the bell off the scale.
    My insanity makes me the hot, desirable Chiquita I’ve learned to prefer over gray-suited mundaneness. It’s nice to be lucid once in a while, but it passes.

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  8. ‘Semi-civilized adults’ would be a perfect level for those who control muct of the fate of the world because of their power….it certainly would be an improvement. 😉

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  9. Mental illness is a love/hate relationship. You have to learn to love who you are inspite of it, and at the same time you hate it for all that it does. And normal. I’ve learned to loathe the word normal.

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    • You have articulated perfectly a balance I try to maintain! I largely don’t succeed–but I try and fail and try again! Thanks so much for reading and taking the time to comment–and thanks even more for subscribing. I look forward to checking out your blog!

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  10. Sanity is overrated sometimes, no? Our “crazy” thing for today was to take the day off, even though it was gorgeous and sunny outside. And then we spent all day INSIDE! It nearly killed Marty, but I loved every second of it. 🙂

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    • Oh, good for you, Dana, and good for Marty–what a great guy to give you what you needed! Sometimes you just need to do what seems most counter-intuitive and be okay with that–no? Happy summer to you, my friend!

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  13. There’s great irony in that statement “normal’s not all it’s cracked up to be.” And I agree with that theme. A little insanity here and there makes the world a far more interesting place!

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  14. I absolutely love that bit in your poem ‘ the hand, a sudden five pointed mutiny against the decay’
    Is that your hand ‘fixing up’ against the decay of housework, of the craziness?, or another’s hand reaching out to you in some way? I just love the ‘sudden ness’ of it in the poem and the images it conveys to me. Or, is this just a little of my madness?
    I really don’t know how or why Kathy but I just find your writing so powerful. Because it speaks to me I guess, reaches my own little crazy maybe, and like all the best writing, makes me think. Five star stuff!

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    • Ah, Penny, you are so sweet! I expect the hand could be any of those. When I wrote the poem, I thought of it literally as a star– I liked the 5 pointed conectedness between the hand and star–but your interpretations add so much more in evocative terms. And–you are not mad–if so, only in the wonderful way that all of us who create walk close to insanity when we are at our best artistically. And see you did get the star thing even–5 star! Ha, ha!

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  15. “Do something radical and off the wall”…I did…I stayed up until 11:30 last night and didn’t get up until 9 this morning! You’re right too…the dishes aren’t done (but I’ll have to wash some pots to make supper), but I’m slowly working my way through the laundry…sigh…

    Hope you’re having a good day, Kathy!

    Hugs,
    Wendy

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