Emily Dickinson famously said “Hope is the thing with feathers.” Bullshit.

Dr. House once said, “Hope is for sissies”. I agree. Hope is the anchor that keeps your boat docked while it waits for a passenger who won’t likely come. Hope envelopes you in a thicket of thorns while you wait for someone to come along an axe so to spare yourself scratches and pricks. And while we’re on the subject, hope is the thing that keeps abused wives with their batterers, husbands with constant nagging, and makes a smart Ivy league graduate stay with an arrogant alcoholic because you keep telling yourself this time he’ll change. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and waiting for a different result. Hope has imprisoned me my whole life. For some reason hope gets a good rap but it’s really just a rationalization for keeping the peace and staying still. It’s waiting for a better tomorrow that’s proven not likely to come.

I’ve been a hopeful person my whole life, mostly because I never seem to know when I’m licked. I’ve had complete faith that if I only say it again, if I only try a different way, if I only improve the way I look, if I’m only even nicer, loser or softer, things will change. People will change. But they never do. Ever. All that’s happened is me digging an even deeper hole in the half-century certainty of my unlovability. That’s probably why things can hurt so much, much more than they should. All because of f**king hope.

Months of this, years of this, have really taken a toll – on my heart and my health.  Not always so much because what people did or said, but because of what they didn’t do or say. It’s well-known that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome. But it can also be waiting for something time and time again when nothing ever changes. You can’t make people love you or care about you. Hell, I learned that lesson almost 60 years ago. So, this particular breed of insanity, hope, is all on me. I’m the crazy one.

Though it’s only the beginning, already I miss being a wife. I miss the joy, the work and relaxation of being a partner. I miss looking down at my sparkly ring. But despite my health challenges, despite being unlovable yet again, I know that everything is going to be alright. I’m not “hoping” everything is going to be alright. That’s crazy. I’m going to do whatever I have in me to make everything alright. The doctors say I have a 10-20% chance of getting better. Pfffft, that’s what they think. I’ve been on Poshmark getting all kinds of outrageous shoes with heels, and I’ve lined them up across from my bed on the console under the TV. I’m going to not only walk around again, I’m going to wear these rockers. I’m going to be that old broad.  I will have energy again, and someone will love me again.  I’m an Aries Jewish girl who reads the Stoics: I don’t tap out and I don’t stay down. I’m talking real “my head is bloodied but unbowed”* sh-t y’all. This isn’t about hope any more. It’s about me being “the captain of my soul.”* It may not get me very far, but hey, at least I’m captain! (Way better than not being the captain.)

 Hope, you can go f–k yourself.

*From the famous poem, “Invictus”.