I’ve always thought of myself as a jane of all trades, mistress of none. I’ve done a bunch of things, none of them particularly well. I was a mayor (didn't run for re-election), a bestselling (if not financially successful) author, a magazine editor, and five other careers in-between. I’m currently a candlemaker. I love it. I’m stressed beyond words because managing a brick and mortar building (a shop and beachcombing museum) has me in far over my head. Labor Day is the one-year anniversary of the opening and I’m glad to have survived; just barely.
I’ve always said I have “undiagnosed ADHD.” A friend who’s a PhD told me: “I’ll diagnose you, you have it.” I have a hard time completing tasks—I’m scatterbrained, disorganized and have a terrible memory. One of my best skills as a sufferer of Borderline Personality Disorder is my ability to gaslight myself (thanks, dysfunctional childhood!), but I’ve found that skill doesn’t come in handy.
I wrote about having a tough time lately. I’m trying to see this “crossroads” in my life as an opportunity. When a tall tower of Legos you build as a kid falls, and all the brightly-colored green, blue and red primary-colored rainbow has shattered, clattered and scattered all over the floor, you have choices. You can deny they fell and be delusional and wail and complain about your perfect little masterpiece falling all to hell. You can blame the heavens or other people or the crack in the floor, or even yourself for being a shitty Lego architect. Will this accomplish anything, or get even one Lego put back together? Nope.
You could sit for days, months and years being sad about the fall of the house of Legos. You can mourn the death of the dream of the Legos. You spent so much time, you had dreams about the Legos, you had arranged them just so, there’s so much agony and heartache over their loss you just can’t imagine life without that arrangement, you could never put them together that same way again.
You can grieve over the Lego shitshow all over the floor, but in the meantime you’ll be tripping over them. Hell, you could even slip and fall on one of them—maybe down the steps. One of your fallen Legos could end you if you let it. Will you? Because the only other choice you have is to finish up feeling sorry for yourself and then make a decision to pick your fucking Legos up and eventually find a way to put them the hell back together.
Maybe you sort them first. You get some cute little containers at the Target, and you sort those little fuckers. Put the blues with the blues, the greens with the greens, and so on, because building from scratch might be easier if your shit is sorted and you take some time for planning. Maybe you talk to a Lego architect. You can’t afford one and end up getting wasted and having a one-night stand with a Lego architect? Don’t shame yourself, they were hot! And thank God for your Lego therapist; we all need to take care of our mental health. Legos are a pain in the ass- ever step on one? The key is having people to remind you that the only way the Legos will go back together is one Lego at a time.
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