maggie and milly and molly and may

maggie and milly and molly and may by e.e.cummings

maggie and milly and molly and may
went down to the beach (to play one day)

and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn’t remember her troubles,and

milly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:and

may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.

For whatever we lose(like a you or a me)
it’s always ourselves we find in the sea

— phfina commentary.

May I tell you about my day yesterday? May I tell you about my day today?

Okay, yesterday.

Yesterday rocked.

I was in group yesterday, and it was my time to share. No, that's not correct. What is correct is that I raised my hand to share (*le gasp!*) and then I got up in front of everybody and said, 'Hi, my name is Violet, and I'm an sbux barista.' and everybody said 'Hi, Violet!' all friendly and expectant.

And then I told them. I told them how I had been suffering. How I was just perfect and everybody else was wrong, and how I was really this ball of spite and suffering, and I didn't want to be around anybody, and that worked really well, because nobody really wanted to be around me, Miss Party Pooper.

And then I told them, my perfection? my smarty pants and remarks? it was really just hiding that I'm really, still, a scared little girl, but all I really want ...

All I really want is for people to be happy.

And this spite and suffering was just protecting me from getting hurt again ... by hurting others first.

And I told them. I told them my new game in life, my hug game, my love game, the game I'm playing to win, where it's not about only me anymore. It's about you. And I love you. And I want you to be happy. And when you're happy, I am so happy ... fit to burst with joy.

And then I sat down.

maggie and milly and molly and may.
may I please tell you about yesterday?

maggie/Marigold came up to me afterwards. She had brought a guest, and she told me that my story of my suffering brought that strong, strict, firm, disciplined woman to tears, and how she had opened her heart to maggie and had shared her own sorrow and asked for forgiveness.

milly/Madison talked with me after group. I'm going to be not participating this weekend: I'm going to be assisting. And milly brought me her mom (dragged her over to us, in fact) and told me she was so thankful I would be assisting, because there would be a friendly face in the room — mine — and she was so glad I would be there because whenever I come into a room, she sees it light up.

molly/Eric talked with me afterward and he told me that he had seen me when I first came to group, and he said — God! — he said he was so proud of me on how I've taken on taking on my life and how he admired me standing for other people now, that whenever I was with somebody, I would see the good in them.

may/Ieva was in the parking lot. She's in her late 60s and she's writing her first book, and she said she thinks about me all the time, how she had sold out on her life up to now and how she was just rejoicing in me that I didn't wait all this time to start to get my life back and how courageous I am to be writing what I do and how she said she was called mousy and how much that hurt, but seeing little me running up in front of group and bouncing and just sharing from my heart gave her courage and how she would be a lion now and follow her dreams with passion.

Can I tell you about my yesterday? My yesterday rocked.

Can I tell you about my today?

It didn't start well, as you can see from my 'your shit' entry. Because I got back from group and I got a PM that just cut me to the quick, and all my happiness just bled out of my cut wrists as I saw what I saw in that PM. And I spent all today just bleak and black and sad! — you know? — just sad. I put it out there: don't be my friend anymore, dear friend. I really would've felt better gnawing off my own arm than write the PM I wrote at lunch break.

And then, instead of calling me the fucking bitch that I am, and telling me I should just jump, just die, ... instead of that, she forgave me.

She forgave me. And she told me she loved me, and that she would always be my friend.

How do you weigh the value of friendship? How can you put a price on it?

You can't, right? You can sing about it, or something, but where love and affinity is, there is life, and where it isn't, there isn't.

Can I tell you about today? Today I had lost a friend of the heart, because I ripped my own heart out and threw it onto the floor. But instead of stomping on it — like I deserved — my friend? — she picked up my heart, and said: "Here, you dropped something," and put it back into my chest, healing my wound.

When I wrote about love, here's what massrié wrote back:

"I love you for your spirit. Your body, while beautiful, is not as precious to me. I love you for the way your hair sticks up in the morning, the same as everyone else. I love that when you close your eyes at night, you spend the same amount of time trying to find your dreams.

I love that you can be exuberantly happy one moment and melancholy and desolate the next. Do you know why I love those things about you?

Because you are the same as any other human on this world. Love is blind. There's no doubt about that. Love doesn't see race / religion / beauty / health / sickness. It just is.

Just as you are. You are yourself. Uniquely individual and at the same time, like any hundreds of others.

Love to me, means loving without reserve. It means baking cookies with your grandma to spend time with her, or giving your mother figure a hug just because she looks sad. Its picking a friend up by the bootstraps, or holding one tight while tears spill down their face. Its late nights on the computer, spent trying to reach out across a distance. Its the most precious gift in the world.

That's love. Unconditional. Supportive. Ultimately given freely without choice.

I love you 'Phfina, just the way you are."

Can I tell you about my today? My today rocked.