Great expectations

I can blame it on my maternal grandmother. After drinking whiskey she would get into fights, all 5 feet and 100 lbs of her, pummeling drunk men at the bar. Really, what else would make such a tiny woman use her fists on men twice her size? The connection is in my DNA, whiskey and anger, intertwined, in between near-sightedness and high blood pressure. What else, other than the whiskey, would have made me such a bitch today?

It couldn’t have been my crush (my crutch?). So nice to him with no response other than workplace flirting. No true interest, just light, casual interactions. Nice but it’s going nowhere. And wow do I need more.

Great expectations. More like fantasy. The complete confusion of relating to other individual humans. We put out the effort, work hard, do all the right things. In our work we are rewarded, good grades, promotions, pay. But in our relationships we think, we analyze, we try to do well. Instead of success, really connecting with people, we are left empty. No reward, no prize, no A+. No grade at all, just a big old question mark taking the place of the fantasy that was supposed to take on flesh.

So do we learn from the experience? Pick ourselves up, dust off the sparkly shoes, move along? Or just sit dumbfounded, staring at the damn question mark and saying “what the fuck?”

My grandmother was never silenced, never hesitant, never confused. Maybe that’s the generational difference. Rather than saying “what the fuck?,” she fought back, she pounded her fists, she screamed back at life: “fuck you!”