T is for too many things.

                                                                                                                     
Letter T
 
Even when I daydreamed as a little girl — or more like, lay in bed and fantasized I was some sort of hero — it had to have a basis in reality. I could be saving the helpless from a gang of villains by somersault-dodging Jackie Chan-style and ingeniously using alley props, like garbage cans rolling underfoot or feral cats to the face. But I couldn’t simply beat up the goons and cast myself as that strong. Having the strength to beat up six goons on my own was impossible, but outwitting them in some farfetched way was merely farfetched, therefore perfect fodder for the stories in my head.

Why I had fantasies typically ascribed to little boys, I’ll never know. But in them, I was super cool, and cool has no gender.

This little field trip into the mind of baby GG is my roundabout way of making a point about the title of this post, which we’ll get to. It’s flipping October, and I’m still trapped between the teeth of the evil alphabet from April. Almost nobody will know or care what I mean, and you’d think that would give me permission to be through with this self-imposed trap. But no, apparently I’m obsessed with seeing my self-punishment through. Yes, I’m playing with the damn word “through.”

Freaking letter T. Possibly the easiest letter in the blasted alphabet with which to begin a word or topic.

Trap, trip, torment.

For the most part, I like to keep the alphabet post titles general because they’re supposed to be quick anecdotes, the decluttering of the constantly buzzing, obsessive GG brain. Any number of vague yet just-intriguing-enough titles would do to garner a click or two. But dammit, no, prior to “Through,” self-punishing me came up with “Tiles” as a potential title! “Tiles” as in the picture boxes below, taken during the time I became fixated with patterns, shapes and bars (as in cages, not alcohol dispensaries).

Who in their right mind would click to read something entitled “Tiles”? Not me. Not even if I was re-doing my bathroom. So I came to the conclusion that the post needed to be about fixations — like the one with patterns — with a T word thrown in the title. Total Obsession. That would certainly attract clicks. Here’s where we finally get back to my little girl daydreams and how they had to have some basis in reality:

“Total Obsession” would generate clicks, but would also be misleading because of its salacious implication. Even those too savvy to fall for bait-and-switch titles would expect something like, I don’t know, chocolate, and for sure, not tiles!

As you can see, I settled on “Through,” because I have plenty of “through” pictures too. Through arches. Through windows.

It could’ve been about anything, really, this post.

But between the “total obsession” with collecting like items together and the (still-upcoming) treasure hunt, the mind that needed an element of truth in childhood fantasies, in adulthood needs to keep on the pictorial track she set out, be it commitment or punishment at this point. To think the squiggly torture devices known as the alphabet were meant to be my throwaway posts…

Track. True. Throwaway.

You can’t do throwaways when you’re incapable of throwing away. May as well stay true and suffer through.

~ Part of the A to Z Challenge ~
A post a day except Sunday for the month of April to cover topics beginning with each letter of the alphabet. Events always real, names always changed.
Cathartic Monkeyism returns in May.

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