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So I check my email this morning and amongst all of the spam was a trackback to one of my posts telling me this:

Wow. How cool is that? Especially since it came from Jenny a/k/a/ The Bloggess who I think is really cool and I wanna, like, hang out with her whose blog I really enjoy.

Anyway I was reading some of the other featured posts and found a few that really struck a chord with me. I love reading blogs by people who face some of the same obstacles that I do. Not in a “misery loves company” kind of way but in a comforting “you’re not alone” kind of way.

‘Alice in Wonderland’ is one of my all-time favorite stories (and Disney movies). I love the Cheshire Cat so much I almost had him tattooed on my shoulder. And one of the best lines in the whole movie is “We’re all MAD here.”

Ain’t that the truth?

But while most people are afraid of the madness, I embrace it.

The first post I felt compelled to comment on was ‘Manic Depression’ by NakedJen. She writes:

I remember looking at him with a very strange curiosity.  And then thinking to myself, honestly, that my mother had put him up to this.  That the two of them were in cahoots and that this was just her way of controlling me further.  That I was, in fact, perfectly fine.  In my mind, a person with mental illness is not the Valedictorian.  She did not graduate Summa Cum Laude from college.  She didn’t get straight A’s.  She didn’t win national playwriting awards.  A person with mental illness lived in a box.  And drank vodka straight from a bottle to keep the demons at bay.  She didn’t function in every day society.

See, I’m one of those people who truly believes there is a fine line between genius and insanity. Einstein was crazy. Charles Manson was brilliant. No, that’s not an insult to Albert or a compliment to ol’ Chuck. Its true that they were both highly intelligent as well as mentally ill. They both walked that fine line and fell off of it onto opposite sides.

That fine line scares me though. What is it that seperates a brilliant philosopher from the crazy cat lady? If you’ve been reading my blog and following me on Twitter, you’ve probably already safely assumed that I will be falling into the latter category.

Anyway, then there’s this from a woman who calls herself Sugar that wrote this post:

I once had a daughter that was spirited and willful, too. Life was so difficult. Every little thing turned into some huge catastrophe that was impossibly insurmountable. We screamed our hatred and loathing at each other with reckless abandon. How had flesh of my flesh become so hurtful and cruel? How had I become the monster that would yell so many ugly words back at her? I couldn’t handle the chaos any longer and thought that her father could take over. In giving her the space I thought she needed, I’ve allowed a wider gap to grow. In a time when I thought we’d understand one another, I am instead experiencing her cold silence. We have not spoken in nearly six months. I call… I text… I email… to no avail. What does she want from me? I’ve cried that to the night sky so many times lately.

I know the feeling. Sissy and I butted heads for years. Our relationship went from one extreme to the other. We were always either really close to the point where she considered me her best friend and had me in her Number One spot on her MySpace friends list (hey, if you have teenagers, you know that’s a HUGE deal!) or we were screaming at each other with threats coming from me to kick her out and threats coming from her to run away. Then back in February she carried hers out, even though she blamed me and told anyone who would listen - including Princess’ dad and Bubba’s dad - that I kicked her out.

Just a few days ago she told me to fuck off because I told her I don’t have her W-2 forms. Nice, huh? Yet when she sent me a text a couple days later apologizing, my response was not “Yeah, me too. It was “What do you want?”

And then Sugar ends her post with this:

My heart and prayers go out to all the parents that have this heaviness to bear. Remember, though, no matter how difficult your “spirited” child may be, a life without that precious one is immeasurably more painful. Seek assistance in any way, I implore you. Love your child through it all and they will grow and love you back… eventually.

Ouch.

Screw it, I’m gonna go talk to my cats.

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