GBE2 Challenge: Strength

As I sit amidst the swirling chaos that is summer "vacation" here in New York State, (notice how I put that word in quotations? "Vacation"--pish!) I have been challenged by my blogging group to write this week about the topic of "strength".

Strength.

Yes, oh, yes. I understand strength in this house. "Strength" as in the way my third grader, crippled with anxiety, still wakes every day and faces life. "Strength", the quality I see in my older son, basically non-verbal his whole life yet one of the happiest people I know.

Strength.

Yeah, yeah. I know it.



But, I don't wanna write about it. It's so boooorrrring! I don't CARE about it, not in the traditional sense, anyway. I'm sick of it. It's a tired topic here.

So, as I often do when I have writer's block, I searched some famous quotations on the topic, and this week I came up with things such as:


“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.”
― Albert Camus

Well said, kind sir. I do hear what you were saying. I'm just over it.

“Be strong. Live honorably and with dignity. When you don't think you can, hold on.”
― James Frey, A Million Little Pieces

Sigh. Equally as solid, but the "holding on" notions are overdone in this neck of the woods.

“That which does not kill us makes us stronger.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche

With all due respect, this one GETS ON MY NERVES!!! Someone made me the test dummy for this theory without my consent. I want out.

But then, I saw THIS quote:


“Strength is the capacity to break a Hershey bar into four pieces with your bare hands - and then eat just one of the pieces.”
― Judith Viorst, Love & Guilt & The Meaning Of Life, Etc

Hmm. Right about now, I'd like to wring someone's neck with my bare hands! "Strength" is walking away. Yes. This afternoon, this quotation spoke to me.

Understanding the obvious in my household, here is how I am viewing "strength" right here, right now, in the middle of school "vacation", with the little Cave People running around me at a frantic pace:

My Top Ten Examples of "Strength"

10. Being able to listen to a dissertation on the specific parasite that grows on the eyeballs of the Greenland Shark without running away screaming five hours into it.

9. Accepting when the day starts at 1am

8. Repeating the script to a specific Teletubbies segment, verbatim and ad nauseum because it produces a smile.

7. Cleaning a child's runny poop from the floor of a park restroom and NOT saying, "Ew." Not even once.

6. Escalators up. Escalators down. Escalators up. Escalators down. Embrace it.

5. Not ducking when you hear a back seat snot rocket take flight.


4. Messy husband? What messy husband?

3. Looking "specialists" in the eye and just...saying..."NO!"

2. Barfing dog. Fish swimming in sludge. Tank of tadpoles. Special diets. Hyperactivity. Toilet regression. School avoidance. Life avoidance. Gastric pain. Life's a pain. Remembering to laugh. It will all blow over.




1. Bags, sags, dark circles, tears, fears, joys and mistakes. Knowing that on my worst day, I am still a beautiful person.

***********************************
This entry was written in response to a Group Blogging Experience 2 (GBE2) word prompt.

***********************************
Visit MorgueFile for your one-stop blogging photographic needs--free of charge and free for public use.