I’m not going to lie: my crazy days were truly that. My past behavior burned a memory into my family’s psyche that I may never be able to recast.
A while ago, my sister-in-law asked if my husband and I would agree to be named guardians for their children. It was a big moment. She’d been contemplating the what-if of death, thinking how no one could parent their children the way they did. I was honored and accepted the invitation. Then she asked me if I’d had any “incidents.”
We’d been going on walks for years where I demonstrated nothing but sanity. She was desperate: in her brain, she could still see a snapshot of me in the late eighties, deluded and psychotic. Her mind forgot all she’d seen in the years since.
But I expect my kids to be exempt from membership in The Worriers’ Club. They were toddlers back in the day. All they have are a few stories to paint the picture of my manic past, yet apparently they carry the same snapshot my sister-in-law does.
In an art gallery with my sister, a woman devoted to reading every plaque next to every painting, I became bored. I sat down on a bench and texted my kids, telling them I’d licked a painting. Now, my story went, I had a green chip of oil paint on my tongue. They texted back that I had to rinse my mouth and leave the museum. It was important to elude the guard.
I thought this was just fun between a wacky mom and her children. They, however, were serious. It was devastating. All their lives I’ve told them stories, glossed reality with a little sugar of the make believe. Added to my sadness that they’d taken my story seriously, was the thought they could imagine me licking a painting. My kind of crazy is the sort where I emerge larger than the mortals surrounding me. Lick a painting, bah!
I may never shed the reality of my past and the faint image of fear it has left on my loved ones. All I can do is devote myself to mental health, and try to be understanding when their perspective is off.
Jolly Sad Sack 