Saint or Salmon

Being a saint is a difficult job!  My goals in life did not include becoming a super woman to rise above all others, I had no dreams of standing upon a pedestal looking down at those who just couldn’t do what I could.  Between you and me, answering questions politely when you want to shout “really this is none of your business” is actually by far more challenging. 

I am not a saint, I am not a super woman.   I only do what I can, not what everyone else can’t.    My view of myself is not of a martyr but more like a little fish swimming upstream, navigating the current.  A spirited little fish maybe to have taken on such a powerful current but a far cry from the saint I seem to be so often labeled.  

There are a few who falsely put me up on a pedestal, to whom I willing tell that I will fall fast and I will fall hard. The majority of time I am called a “saint” or a “patient woman” I recognize it not as a compliment but rather as a discomfort with either my choices or their own. Any criticisms that come my way in that vein are more about the criticizer than me.

 It has taken me a while, 11 years in fact, to come to an understanding that my choices are not necessarily better.  Not that I thought I ever deserved any such title or believed that my choices were flawless but there certainly were some painful moments while I took up a lot of room to grow into the woman I am and the woman I am still hoping to become.  Somewhere along the way I have stopped trying to defend my choices and in that I found freedom.   

My new found liberty has not really sat well with everyone.  I have found that it is expected that I should defend myself.  It seems when I don’t I may appear weak or undecided.  It has confused some people, clearly it can take a rather strong and decisive person to pick the less travelled path.   Aside from letting go of the need to defend it really would be hard to defend something that is ever changing.  The core of my beliefs remains constant, the execution of them can change by the hour.  Defending is tiring, swimming is so much better.