Change

 

Change is hard. Why? For me, it’s hard to change a part of myself that I’ve carried for years; in some cases my whole life. I’m talking about the things that I’ve held close to my heart. It’s like taking all of these precious moments, thoughts, and beliefs that need to change and throwing them into a blender and drinking the concoction. It’s hard to swallow the new ways of thinking. Sometimes, bits and pieces of my former existence don’t mix in well. At this point, I either have to continue to blend, hoping that they will grind down, sift them out, or just swallow the hard changes. For the longest time, whenever something needed changed, it would easily blend together easily, making it easy to swallow. 

In 2007, a big change bloomed. It sprouted during a time of tremendous darkness for me.  I was distraught. Confused. I felt alone. This was the first time I remember not being willing to make a change. The concept of change in this magnitude was foreign to me. Instead of blending, I put my change inside a small cupboard, locked the door, and walked away. It wasn’t until five years ago that I opened the doors to the small cabinet. As it opened, my nose was bombarded with putrid smells of fermentation. When the thick putrid smells evaporated, I couldn’t believe what I was looking at. My change had mutated. It had doubled in size and had a bright new sheen to it. As I took it out, I noticed that there were more changes sitting on the shelf in the cupboard, staring blankly at me. My change had created new changes.

I turned my back on new ones and briskly walked my change over to the blender and threw it in. I blended it down until the majority of the change had mixed together. As I poured it into a glass, I noticed chunks of change that hadn’t been blended. I stuck my hands into the mix and gingerly sifted out the chunks, throwing them onto the floor. I then swallowed the change left behind. I felt liberated. Relieved. It was life changing.

 It wasn’t enough though, to keep the changes in place. I fell into the same problems I had before I drank the change. I felt guilty and manipulated into wanting this change. I picked up the chunks that I had thrown on the floor and threw them back into the cupboard with the other changes that had grown out of nowhere. I locked the door and vowed that I’d never open the little chest ever again. I went on with my life. I continued to think, feel, and do the same things that I had always done. I became hollow. Robotic. I did things simply because it was what I was supposed to do. A rotten smell began following me where ever I went. It hovered below my nose and wouldn’t leave me alone. No amount of oils or ointments would get rid of the smell. Where ever I went this smell floated in front of me. I sought refuge in the places where I had been told I would find safety, only to have the small break through the flimsy glass windows and attack me. It attached to my clothes and clung onto every fiber of the cloth no matter how many times I washed them. I tried everything to get rid of the smell but it dodged the onslaught I threw at it. It wouldn’t leave me alone. It wanted to be there. It wanted to exist.

The smell overpowered me and I knew that until I accepted the changes I had buried in the small cupboard, the smell wasn’t going to go away. As I pulled the cupboard towards me, I notice thick colorless smoke billowing from the cracks and seams in the door. The change would no longer be contained. When the door opened, hordes of change fell onto the floor, tripping anyone that walked into it. I began apologizing for my change, making excuses for it, being embarrassed by it. As I tried to manage it, it simply adapted to where I put it, growing with a disturbing sense of glee.

Recently, I came to the conclusion that I needed to stop fighting my change. I learned while I was busy trying to be rid of it, my friends and family had already embraced it and were wondering what I was doing. This was my change. It belonged to me and I needed to let it live. Last week I pulled out my old blender and began dumping my change into it. I swept every ounce out of the cupboard, not leaving a speck or crumb. I picked all of the bits from the bottoms of my shoes. I tracked down the change that had gone home with others and put it all into the blender. I blended and blended until there were no more chunks. I blended until everything was liquid. I was convinced that I had all of the change that had ever been created until I realized that I was still being accosted by the putrid smell. Then, I remembered my clothes. The smell was still attached to them. I stripped. I threw the clothes I was wearing into the blender. I ran around and gathered every garment I owned and threw them in. I stood there naked, blending the last bits of change I possessed. When the blades stopped, I noticed the sweet scent of new life flowing up through my change. I took a large glass and filled it the brim. I made sure that not even the smallest drop was left in the blender. I needed it all. As I looked at the glass I noticed chunks of change that managed to escape the chopper. These changes were too hard to blend away. I was going to have to swallow them how they were. I took my large glass to the kitchen table, sat down, and started to drink. 

-Jer