Lost along the way

It's funny, the things you take with you and the things you lose along the way. 

For instance, the food in the hospital was so terrible that the only thing I would eat was the yogurt parfait. I'd pick out the fruit and just eat the yogurt and granola. Since I've gotten out of the hospital, two of my three meals a day have been vanilla Greek yogurt with granola. It's all I've ever wanted to eat since I've been out. I won't make anything else for myself, and even if offered other food, I usually turn it down. I have no idea if this diet will make me gain or lose weight or drop dead from malnutrition, but I don't care at this point. It's all I'll eat.

On the other hand, my favorite memories of my childhood were playing Uno with my dad's family, packed around my grandmoother's kitchen table, it was so much fun. When she died mad they divided her possessions, my only request was a deck of uno cards.

In the psych ward, we had about 70% of a deck of Uno. One of the first nights there, I taught the other patients. It didn't quite work perfectly, we were missing some cards, but it was something to do. And at every opportunity - between meetings with the doctor and group therapy - someone was begging me to teach or play Uno. All I wanted to do was read and write, but I obliged, because there wasn't much to do anyway. We played again and again, me and the other patients, a revolving door of bipolar and scichzohrenics, recovering alcoholics and patients going through drug detox. Sometimes it was 2 of us and sometimes it was 10. But we played a lot.

I tought I would forever have fond memories of Uno with my family, of my cousins sitting next to my dad to hit him with all the Draw 4 Wildcards. But the game has completely changed for me. It's no longer what we did for fun on those Kentucky holidays. Now it's what I did when I was at my craziest, surrounded by other crazy people, barely hanging on. Gone are the happy memories.Well, not gone, but tucked away deep in my mind, locked away where no one else can harm them. In their place, a feeling of dread, of fear, of anxiety and hopelessness. Because that's what I felt every time I played with these people.

Somehow, I doubt I will ever play Uno again. And yet even now, I want a yogurt with granola.

The mind is a funny thing.