Sistersteel
07-20-2009, 12:51 AM
I am looking to stir your feelings and spark some change...so here is a true story I would like to share, a chapter in my book of life, my attempt at describing the pain of the psychological and emotional struggles we experience as rational and emotional beings. My intentions are to invoke an emotional response that might give substance and meaning to intangible sentiments ... a close encounter with feelings numbed by a corrupt spirit ... a reality that manifests itself in every aspect of life in the world around us...
Your contributions, and thoughts are appreciated.
I met a girl at my local gym a while back..lovely girl from Israel who seemed to enjoy the routine chit chat about nothing and everything. She was the one who actually approached me, one fine day, all inquisitive about my hair, my training, my ethnicity, my grocery list...despite my instantaneous animosity towards her for having interrupted my workout, my resentful feelings quickly subsided. She seemed to emanate such a radiant positive energy that I warmed up to her rather quickly. I let down my guard, letting this woman in...I found her rather pleasant and easy to converse with, despite my selfish first impression of her.
Let me paint a better mental picture of my new friend for you by describing her in more vivid detail. Perhaps if I made her more tangible, you would relate to her better. She was a very beautiful woman, with long straight black hair, green eyes and a flawless olive complexion. She looked like she weighed about 120lb when we first met, maybe 5'7", always dressed in skin tight workout attire that had that "brand new" crisp look to it. She wore tennis shoes, that matched her socks, and her bra straps and, of course, matched her gstring that always seemed to be ever so conveniently exposed. She had a different outfit on every single day and seemed so exhausted all the time despite my never ever seeing her break a sweat. You cannot blame the woman! If I had to match my socks, my shoes and my underwear with the the stellar constellation of today's horoscope, I'd be exhausted too! :)
She did have more baseball caps than I have shoes though, and that alone earns her my respect. In fact, not only did her baseball caps match her outfits, they almost looked entirely hand woven with as intricate as the threading and stitching appeared to be. You needed shades to just look at her with the blinding reflections from the rhinestones and glitter everywhere.
My friend was easy on the eyes, you could say, but had a very heavy accent and a voice that sounded more like a whistling kettle around tea time than the sweet purr you would expect, matching the rest of her.
She is a very sociable woman, this lady friend of mine. Yes indeed. In fact, she is SO sociable, she would stare at you and try to communicate with hand gestures with little to no regards to whatever the hell is was you were doing. No matter how zoned out you appear to be, or how strained you looked under twenty times her body weight's worth in rattling iron plates...when this bitch had something to say, she was just gonna fucking say it. And you sweaty ass, nasty motherfucker under that bending bar had to LISTEN INTENTLY and RESPOND WITH ENTHUSIASM! When that urge to talk consumed her, she would command your attention by emanating a high pitched squeal so loud, you could literally hear her voice resonate through your ears, despite the blast of heavy metal playing on your ipod.
I could not help but like her. She was utterly clueless in a very cool way :cool:
I rarely find myself in the company of such a woman, let alone be actually telling a story revolving around her warped, yet admirable qualities. She certainly had my full and undivided attention.
Funny thing is, I am Lebanese and she Is Israeli. We are the same age and both of us were born and raised in the Middle East, halfway across the world during times of war and bloodshed, a time when people like us would have killed each other on sight. We were separated by land mines and snipers, and joint by hate and endless political strife. The Israeli-Lebanese conflict is no secret to the rest of the world. We've made world news more than all other countries combined. Yet, here we were. Two very different women, worlds apart, with nothing and everything in common. We were bonding and laughing with each other like reunited old friends.
And so my friend comes up to me early January to bid me farewell. She was going back to Israel to visit her family. Months went by with no news from her..until I bumped into her again 2 weeks ago. I was on the stairmaster, out of breathe, about 45 minutes into my cardio, soaked and drowning in a puddle of my own sweat, when she hopped on the machine right next to me. She immediately sparked up a conversation, all smiles, just being her usual, pleasantly warped, unthoughtful self...
But my friend was not the same. That spark in her eyes was gone and I honestly did not even recognize her at first glance. She was in a tank top and little Grey shorts, her socks and tennis shoes a total mismatch, a ragged looking baseball hat covering her nappy hair. Her arms and legs were sticks, her face sunken in, her hip bones protruding...she had lost so much weight, you could see her spine, her bony hands barely holding her feeble little body on that stairmaster...yet she was smiling and chatting me up like it was only yesterday. I was in utter shock. I asked her what was wrong, asked if she was sick, asked her why she had lost so much weight...she looked like she had dropped from what was a relatively tight and toned 120lb, to a bony stringy sickly looking nothing. She might have been 80lb soaking wet that day. She gave me one of her rants and tried to act surprised like she had not even noticed, yet she did not neglect to mention that her boyfriend had also been expressing concern about her drastic drop in weight... She ended that conversation very quickly and ran off to make herself busy on a treadmill. I was spent after my cardio and honestly did not get the chance to talk to her before I left that day.
Today...my friend shows us and hops on a treadmill in front of me, avoids harassing me as is customary, and proceeds to make herself very busy. I had to stop my workout, which I would not have done had Jesus himself walked into the gym and summoned me over, and walked up to her. I walked slowly, taking my time, catching my breath, gathering my thoughts, looking for the right words to express myself, trying to hide the horrified look on my face...She had to have lost at least another 15lb from our last encounter 2 weeks ago...
and I just lost it. I just fucking lost it. I almost dragged her by her hair off the fucking treadmill and out of the gym to strap her down in my car and shove a damn IV up her arm to force feed her. I was appalled at how NO ONE had the fucking DECENCY to SAY ANYTHING TO HER, guys who used to stare at her, going about their merry way oblivious to her illness, stalking new fleshy prey like she did not even exist.
And she did not exist, not anymore. Not like that. She was so consumed in illness it made me sick to look at her. She was starving herself to death before my very eyes... and I could no NOTHING about it. Again, she proceeded to tell me how good she felt, and how regularly she was eating. She tries to convince me she is right as rain by using her regular workouts as an excuse. She was running on nothing but adrenaline and in her sick mind, as long as she could workout, she was OK.
My words were harsh and I cut her deeply...so deep she walked away from me for good. She is unresponsive and withdrawn, distant...dying. I have all the tools and means to save her, yet I cannot enforce a change on her until she desires it for herself and asks for my help.
A woman took notice of us and came up to me after my friend ran away to purge herself on a treadmill...out of sight out of mind. She told me she had noticed us on many occasions and as a friend, I needed to do something to save my friend from hurting herself. So obviously everyone had noticed.
Yet the gym welcomed her every day, took her money every month, greeted her on her way in and bid her "good night and see you tomorrow" on her way out...everyone watched her wither away to a bag of bones...indifferent....oblivious to her pain.
Just another anorexic. Oh well. She has a current memership..that is all that matters.
Every day, in this world, someone gets paid so that someone else can die, and the whole world watches in silence as it happens over and over again...we watch power and money take precedence over our humanity as our lives lose substance..a day at a time.
SS
Your contributions, and thoughts are appreciated.
I met a girl at my local gym a while back..lovely girl from Israel who seemed to enjoy the routine chit chat about nothing and everything. She was the one who actually approached me, one fine day, all inquisitive about my hair, my training, my ethnicity, my grocery list...despite my instantaneous animosity towards her for having interrupted my workout, my resentful feelings quickly subsided. She seemed to emanate such a radiant positive energy that I warmed up to her rather quickly. I let down my guard, letting this woman in...I found her rather pleasant and easy to converse with, despite my selfish first impression of her.
Let me paint a better mental picture of my new friend for you by describing her in more vivid detail. Perhaps if I made her more tangible, you would relate to her better. She was a very beautiful woman, with long straight black hair, green eyes and a flawless olive complexion. She looked like she weighed about 120lb when we first met, maybe 5'7", always dressed in skin tight workout attire that had that "brand new" crisp look to it. She wore tennis shoes, that matched her socks, and her bra straps and, of course, matched her gstring that always seemed to be ever so conveniently exposed. She had a different outfit on every single day and seemed so exhausted all the time despite my never ever seeing her break a sweat. You cannot blame the woman! If I had to match my socks, my shoes and my underwear with the the stellar constellation of today's horoscope, I'd be exhausted too! :)
She did have more baseball caps than I have shoes though, and that alone earns her my respect. In fact, not only did her baseball caps match her outfits, they almost looked entirely hand woven with as intricate as the threading and stitching appeared to be. You needed shades to just look at her with the blinding reflections from the rhinestones and glitter everywhere.
My friend was easy on the eyes, you could say, but had a very heavy accent and a voice that sounded more like a whistling kettle around tea time than the sweet purr you would expect, matching the rest of her.
She is a very sociable woman, this lady friend of mine. Yes indeed. In fact, she is SO sociable, she would stare at you and try to communicate with hand gestures with little to no regards to whatever the hell is was you were doing. No matter how zoned out you appear to be, or how strained you looked under twenty times her body weight's worth in rattling iron plates...when this bitch had something to say, she was just gonna fucking say it. And you sweaty ass, nasty motherfucker under that bending bar had to LISTEN INTENTLY and RESPOND WITH ENTHUSIASM! When that urge to talk consumed her, she would command your attention by emanating a high pitched squeal so loud, you could literally hear her voice resonate through your ears, despite the blast of heavy metal playing on your ipod.
I could not help but like her. She was utterly clueless in a very cool way :cool:
I rarely find myself in the company of such a woman, let alone be actually telling a story revolving around her warped, yet admirable qualities. She certainly had my full and undivided attention.
Funny thing is, I am Lebanese and she Is Israeli. We are the same age and both of us were born and raised in the Middle East, halfway across the world during times of war and bloodshed, a time when people like us would have killed each other on sight. We were separated by land mines and snipers, and joint by hate and endless political strife. The Israeli-Lebanese conflict is no secret to the rest of the world. We've made world news more than all other countries combined. Yet, here we were. Two very different women, worlds apart, with nothing and everything in common. We were bonding and laughing with each other like reunited old friends.
And so my friend comes up to me early January to bid me farewell. She was going back to Israel to visit her family. Months went by with no news from her..until I bumped into her again 2 weeks ago. I was on the stairmaster, out of breathe, about 45 minutes into my cardio, soaked and drowning in a puddle of my own sweat, when she hopped on the machine right next to me. She immediately sparked up a conversation, all smiles, just being her usual, pleasantly warped, unthoughtful self...
But my friend was not the same. That spark in her eyes was gone and I honestly did not even recognize her at first glance. She was in a tank top and little Grey shorts, her socks and tennis shoes a total mismatch, a ragged looking baseball hat covering her nappy hair. Her arms and legs were sticks, her face sunken in, her hip bones protruding...she had lost so much weight, you could see her spine, her bony hands barely holding her feeble little body on that stairmaster...yet she was smiling and chatting me up like it was only yesterday. I was in utter shock. I asked her what was wrong, asked if she was sick, asked her why she had lost so much weight...she looked like she had dropped from what was a relatively tight and toned 120lb, to a bony stringy sickly looking nothing. She might have been 80lb soaking wet that day. She gave me one of her rants and tried to act surprised like she had not even noticed, yet she did not neglect to mention that her boyfriend had also been expressing concern about her drastic drop in weight... She ended that conversation very quickly and ran off to make herself busy on a treadmill. I was spent after my cardio and honestly did not get the chance to talk to her before I left that day.
Today...my friend shows us and hops on a treadmill in front of me, avoids harassing me as is customary, and proceeds to make herself very busy. I had to stop my workout, which I would not have done had Jesus himself walked into the gym and summoned me over, and walked up to her. I walked slowly, taking my time, catching my breath, gathering my thoughts, looking for the right words to express myself, trying to hide the horrified look on my face...She had to have lost at least another 15lb from our last encounter 2 weeks ago...
and I just lost it. I just fucking lost it. I almost dragged her by her hair off the fucking treadmill and out of the gym to strap her down in my car and shove a damn IV up her arm to force feed her. I was appalled at how NO ONE had the fucking DECENCY to SAY ANYTHING TO HER, guys who used to stare at her, going about their merry way oblivious to her illness, stalking new fleshy prey like she did not even exist.
And she did not exist, not anymore. Not like that. She was so consumed in illness it made me sick to look at her. She was starving herself to death before my very eyes... and I could no NOTHING about it. Again, she proceeded to tell me how good she felt, and how regularly she was eating. She tries to convince me she is right as rain by using her regular workouts as an excuse. She was running on nothing but adrenaline and in her sick mind, as long as she could workout, she was OK.
My words were harsh and I cut her deeply...so deep she walked away from me for good. She is unresponsive and withdrawn, distant...dying. I have all the tools and means to save her, yet I cannot enforce a change on her until she desires it for herself and asks for my help.
A woman took notice of us and came up to me after my friend ran away to purge herself on a treadmill...out of sight out of mind. She told me she had noticed us on many occasions and as a friend, I needed to do something to save my friend from hurting herself. So obviously everyone had noticed.
Yet the gym welcomed her every day, took her money every month, greeted her on her way in and bid her "good night and see you tomorrow" on her way out...everyone watched her wither away to a bag of bones...indifferent....oblivious to her pain.
Just another anorexic. Oh well. She has a current memership..that is all that matters.
Every day, in this world, someone gets paid so that someone else can die, and the whole world watches in silence as it happens over and over again...we watch power and money take precedence over our humanity as our lives lose substance..a day at a time.
SS