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| Self-portrait, Polaroid SX-70, PX70 Colorshade Push film. |
I was a quiet little girl. I hid behind my mom and dad in social situations, and didn’t like playing with the neighborhood kids. When they came to the door, I asked my mom to tell them I wasn’t able to play outside that day, for reasons I can’t recall. There were times when she would make me go, and now I understand why. I feel terribly guilty these days when I don’t feel like doing kid stuff with Bee, and wish there was someone her age in the neighborhood that would come over and ask her to play.
The only thing I really liked to do was read. If I was forced into an uncomfortable situation where I had to play with neighborhood kids, I preferred to climb trees or ride bikes. I always felt better in nature, or reading library books. Not much has changed since then.
It surprises and interests me when people tell me they never would have been able to guess I was innately shy. Maybe because once I reached high school, alcohol and drugs turned me from introverted to extroverted. That, puberty, and recognizable bipolar symptoms changed my personality in strange ways for the next few decades.
To exist within a certain level of awareness, and to be able to decide your own path of recovery from this or that is a powerful thing. Whatever the issue or malady may be, to continue living each day as it comes can be a struggle. Self-medication is a risk, but lithium + antidepressant cocktail is, too. Choices must be made in desperation, prodded by survival instincts, and the outlook is dire, dismal, and very expensive at the pharmacy.
I am waiting (rather impatiently, but I have managed to function alright regardless so far) for the day when I will be free to decide which pharmaceutical (s) can help me feel more at ease in my own skin-in a socially responsible, educated manner. I am so tired of the hypocrisy, capitalist intervention, and self-serving politics involved.
It’s time for change! Decriminalization is the answer. Congress needs a way to put a dent in the deficit. The threat of national bankruptcy should scare them straight! Hopefully, it will scare them more than the drug cartels murdering thousands of people across the border, in Juarez, Mexico, just a half-an-hour away from where I live in El Paso, TX.
I have faith that the right thing will be done, possibly, hopefully in the next decade. I am a very patriotic girl, always have been. I love my country. I’ll still be singing the Star-Spangled Banner on the 4th of July, like the good American that I am, because I do have faith, and will continue to hope for true freedom.