All In Your Mind

Whenever we complained about feeling ill, my mother would shrug and say, It's all in your mind. Don't think about it and it'll go away. We didn't like being accused of malingering - especially because there were times when it was undeniably true - but we were still children and being believed mattered. Besides, we were to learn, just because it's in your mind, doesn't make it less real, just less apparent.

My mind is a jumble most of the time, a junk drawer I never get around to cleaning out. I do the odd rearranging when I get frustrated at not being able to find something but mostly I only open it when I've exhausted all the other possibilities. Here I keep all the old grievances, the memories of what might have been, the dreams and ambitions I gave up and still trip over every now and then - the sidewalk cracks I stepped on with a vengeance, the beer cans hidden under the floorboards, the words I wish I'd never said and those I wish I had - the ABC's of denial, all crammed up and tangled together.

Still and all, I may be healthier and more organized than I think. Taking my friend Henry home last night was a challenge as he is wheelchair bound and his left side is useless. A ramp was in place from the driveway to the front porch landing but then, confronted by no space to navigate a wheel stair and three unramped steps, I was at a loss for our next move. His wife opened the front door and immediately began a stream of profanity and abuse, very loud and startlingly obscene, so much so that I wondered the neighbors didn't call the police. Like a madwoman, she shrieked and cursed, heaping one accusation after another on her semi-paralyzed husband, demanding that he cooperate and have some concern for her. This is why I won't take you out, you selfish, f**king cripple! she wailed. I watched and listened to all this in dazed silence until he was finally inside and the door slammed with a final curse.

I may be scattered and still searching, hung up on the past and uncertain of the future, but at least I'm not

certifiable. I drove home replaying this sick scene in my mind and thinking about how what's all in your mind can be so real and so damaging. After some thirty years of marriage, how one human being could treat another this way mystifies me - I shudder to think about what goes on with the two of them locked in that little house together but what must go on in the trainwreck of her mind scares me more.