Turtlenecks // Selfwardness

 I always think of Diane Keaton's character in Something's Gotta Give when I wear turtlenecks. Probably because I like the idea of becoming a successful writer who weekends at a crisp, white oceanfront house on the East Coast and casually strolls the beach in thick, throat-warming sweaters. The turtleneck: nature's ultimate calefacient. Right? Right?My grandma won't wear turtlenecks. She says they're always "choking her neck, choking her neck." I have five in my closet. I hope they're still cool. I mean, Audrey Hepburn wore them. And Bill Gates. So...(The most tangental side note of all time: Something's Gotta Give came out in 2003. Which probably means they're not THE coolest of cool. But! a 2016 New York Times article argues it "is scaled to suit a sweatshirt aesthetic, rendering this turtleneck perfectly contemporary." Because, guys, NFL players wear them now. Colin Kaepernick wears them. I mean, I know his Nike ad stirred the interweb waters for a bit, but why was everyone quick to gloss over his turtleneck choices? I don't understand. Zero turtleneck web waves)I do sympathize with my grandma. I have one kelly green turtleneck from Anthropologie that clings a little too tightly to my throatage area. I don't want to give it away because it's so soft, and it reminds me of the two blissful, candlefilled years I worked at Anthro after college. But, sometimes I feel like I have to pry its sneaky little fingers away from my skin. I don't like that feeling.Recently, I felt a whole lot of that feeling -- like my throat was captive, like my voice and my work and my art didn't matter. I think all creatives have a tendency to occasionally go inward, to go dark on themselves. Sometimes without provocation. Sometimes for no reason. I talked to my husband about it. I really wanted him to say, "Your work is great. Your work matters. Your mothering matters. Your contribution matters." And he did. In better, more sophisticated, more comforting words. And I believed him. I trust him.But I still felt like something was choking my neck.Sunday night, I needed a book to accompany me to the bathtub -- the first bath I've taken in months, compliments of Mr. Daylight Savings who tricked my infant baby into believing her bedtime was one hour earlier than it actually was. (SUCKER.) So, I casually picked Tattoos on the Heart from my shelf of unread books and flipped it open. After 16 pages of reading about the life work of Gregory Boyle, a Jesuit priest who started Homeboy Industries because of his heart for the gang community, I paused, put the book down, and took off my turtleneck. (Figuratively, people, come on. No one wears turtlenecks in the bathtub anymore.) My voice matters. Yes, of course it matters. But that's not the point. I'm not the point.In his book Boyle writes, "They say 'a person becomes a person through other people.' There can be no doubt that the homies have returned me to myself... Perhaps together, we can teach each other how to bear the beams of love, persons becoming persons, right before our eyes. Returned to ourselves."Time and time again, I find myself looking inward, toward myself -- a kind of selfwardness --  and then I wonder why I'm left crosseyed. I lean closer and closer and closer into my bathroom mirror until my forehead presses against the glass, and then I wonder why my vision is blurred. And dark.I am not the point of my own life. You, my friends, are the the point of my life. You, my acquaintances, are the point of my life. You, my husband, my baby, my neighbors, my family, my people, are the point of my life.I'm going to try to love you and serve you like Jesus did. But, it's hard. And I'm pretty bad at it.I'm also going to try to stop wondering if my voice or my art or my life matters. It does. But, that's not the point.