Decorum and the Wild Woman

Maybe you can feel it?

There’s a growing… Tension.

Only maybe “growing” isn’t the right word. Expanding, pulling, stretching, rolling. Insistent. Immense.

Like that tension I remember in my belly in the last weeks before I gave birth. Full up. No more room. Itchy, pressing, dragging, about to pop. Threatening. Looming. Potential.

The voice in my head says that when I get out of my car and stand up, I shouldn’t pull my underwear out from neverwhere until I’ve checked to see that no one is watching (at least, no one I can see). That same voice tells me I will have to wait and deal with it if someone does happen to be in close proximity. It would be shameful if I was seen… Adjusting. The voice in my body replies, “But it’s uncomfortable NOW!”

The voice in my head says that when I go out walking, I should stick to the walking. Perhaps jog a bit, but only if it won’t cause that same underwear issue as sitting in a vehicle does. And never if it will look like I’m straining too much. That would make me look pathetic and vulnerable. The voice in my body replies, “But what if I want to skip? Or dance? Or run flat out like a grizzly is on my heels? What if I prefer to perambulate for pleasure instead of pound the pavement with purpose?”

The voice is my head says that when I write my blog posts, I should never curse. There are too many people out there, too many people listening who wouldn’t approve. It certainly wouldn’t do for me to scandalize someone else’s sensibilities! I could even get in trouble. The voice in my body replies, “Goddamn it – we cuss all the time! Why the shit would we hold back here, in OUR space?”

(Can you fathom how much Decorum wants me to take those last two sentences back? Can you feel the weight of their presence there, a punctuation stronger that any exclamation point?)

I’ve been trying to write this post since I posted last week and the tension is painful. Delete it all and write something else. Put it out in the world and see what happens. Maybe no one will see it! Maybe a thousand people – a HUNDRED thousand – will see it.

(Maybe it doesn’t really matter.)

One voice is getting shriller, the other more sure. For sure.

And, this time, I know which one has my (h)ear(t).