safe.

adjective /sāf/ 

Protected from or not exposed to danger or risk; not likely to be harmed or lost

i had this epiphany yesterday, that pretty much my whole life has had this lingering sense of danger hanging over it. i've always been aware of a need to be careful. and i don't mean some sort of phobia or false sense of impeding doom. I don't mean the whole "don't talk to strangers" thing you learned in school. I remember being able to rattle off my full name, phone number with area code, full address and the name of my doctor by the time I was two. It wasn't just to show off the parenting skills of my parents and my impressionable mind, but rather things were going on with my father at the time, where my mom and I had to go into hiding... restraining orders... the brake lines on the car were cut - my mom and i were about to get in it. And, this would only be the beginning. I knew about drug dealers, crack houses and saw a kid's gun-shot wound. My family did an amazing job of maintaining a stable home life for me... a wonderful private education at a school where I was nurtured by a genuine staff. One in a million. I had music lessons... and my teacher was like another mother to me. In fact, should anything happen to my family, she was to be my legal guardian. (The kinds of things I knew as a little girl.)

In many strange ways, I can be thankful for all that happened. I don't feel sorry for myself... because it all helped to make me the way that I am. It's helped to make me the adventurous thing I've turned out to be.

At the same time, I've realised it has caused an inability to really rest in a lot of situations. It goes a lot deeper than abandonment issues. It goes further than rejection issues. It's about feeling and knowing that I'm safe. All of this was triggered when finding out that a couple thugs were just kickin it in my house until 5am the other night. But, that, my friends, is another story.

Like my little blog header says, I'm going to tell the truth here...

I'm tired of not feeling safe...

In a neighborhood... in my home...

To be alone with certain people, especially men I don't know very well.

Of not feeling safe in my job... like my job is at risk if I make a wrong move.

In friendships.

In relationships.

I want to know I'm safe.