A Revisit

It was very difficult falling asleep last night. Thanks, in part, to the last gasp of the humid and stuffy weather before the beauty of today rolled in, and the throbbing of the broken 5th metatarsal in my left foot ~ more on this later but to set the scene...I was in the wrong place at the wrong time and was unfortunately trampled by crazed Justin Bieber fans. Not really, that's a lie...but it seems so much better than what really happened ~ I tossed and turned.

Once asleep, however, I had a dream that brought me right back to a period in my life I'd hoped never to revisit and have tirelessly striven to overcome - my (alleged) inability to cut.

I have never been nimble-fingered. With my clunky little clunkers, aka fingers, if I had been a villain in a Batman movie, I would have been called "Fumbles."

Never was this more upsetting than about a thousand years ago when my friend was vying for the best lemonade stand in the neighbourhood. Last night, through the hi-def clarity of an unexpected dream, I was transported back to an awful day.

I must have been no older than seven or eight when I was invited to help make posters and decorations for the stand. I vividly remember crossing the street and making my way over to my friend's garage - Lemonade Headquarters - to a table piled high with sheets of colourful construction paper, piles of glitter, crepe paper and scissors.

My little heart beat with excitement as it was explained what needed to be done. It involved cutting and lots of it. I loved to cut! 

The were a few older kids that were there to handle the glitter (a terrible disappointment) but I was anxious to get going. Here I was...involved...and cutting!

Shortly after getting started, my little hands working those scissors, cutting away...I noticed a few of the older kids whispering in the corner and looking at me and before I knew it I was whisked off to another table and asked to twirl crepe paper. No cutting. I was stunned.

My friend came over and explained that since I was a "terrible cutter" they had given me another job.

Terrible cutter??

I had no idea that I had a rep as a "terrible cutter."

I think I tried to laugh it off, having learned...by a very early age...to make light of horrifying inadequacies, but my little seven year old heart fell to the floor.

From that moment on, I have...literally...devoted my life to becoming an excellent cutter. I trained through tireless practice, to be able to snip, trim and shape with the best of them. I thought I had successfully submerged this memory under the blanket of near total memory loss years ago but apparently my subconscious had other ideas and returned me, last night, to that day and the pitying stares of the better cutters.

I"ll show you, subconscious! I am going to spend the day making beautiful doilies out of paper napkins.

By the way, my friend's lemonade stand was a total failure. Maybe if they'd let me cut...things just might have been different.

Scissors by Jennopolis via Etsy