reality check

Pinch me. I am still here, and I.'s trouble with math, her sheer panic and anxiety are not going away. Especially not when I am grumpy and impatient. I know this, and yet I still can't be better than I am. So how can I expect better from other people?

I ride her hard, make her answer faster and faster. "I bet you were a genius at math" she states, but I wasn't. "Not a genius." I don't tell her about the abject terror I would experience in Pre-calculus, how I had to take practice tests for weeks until I dominated the panic, how I would tear at my skin until I drew blood...

I have always been so hard on myself. I forget that she isn't an extension of me, she is a separate entity. It is easy to forget this, of course, because she knows with precision the angle of my heart's movements. She can determine with aquiline accuracy the beats that it skips, the tears that bubble up from beneath the surface, the sound of silent pain, the smell of abandonment. Her tears match my tears, she climbs from the back seat into the front to kiss my cheeks, even when I have been so hard on her. I am blessed, and cursed. I don't deserve such love.