This is the theme for the S-Project this month.

And ever since I read the theme, I’ve been playing it over in my mind. What do I not allow myself to want?  It’s hard to think of an answer to that question. I want a lot of things. I want to not be fat, or at least be comfortable with being fat. I want to quit my job and stay at home and write between the hours of 10 p.m. and 2 a.m. and sleep until 11. I want chocolate to make you lose weight. I want lots of money so that I can carry out some of my pet projects (and have some fun as well). I want to live forever. I want everyone in my life to be strong and healthy and happy.

I don’t allow myself to want things I know I can’t have, though. And I’m not talking about the silly things I just listed. I’m talking about reality. I don’t allow myself to want kids. That’s the biggest of the things I know I can’t have. I always wanted to be a mother. It never dawned on me that I wouldn’t be, frankly. But I know it’s not going to happen. I’m not going to give birth (no uterus, kinda puts a damper on things) and I’m not going to adopt. No kids. It’s a fact. So I don’t allow myself to want it, and when those moments come up that the facts sting unbearably I allow myself to have a little weep and then I try to move on.

But there’s something else that has kept coming to mind as I’ve pondered this question. Rainbow joy. I don’t allow myself to want rainbow joy.  I remember reading one of the Emily books, and Emily has shown her poetry to her favourite teacher. One poem starts off, “Life, as thy gift I ask no rainbow joy.” Her teacher asks her if that’s true, and she mulishly replies, “No! I want rainbow joy, and lots of it.”  And–I’m paraphrasing here–her irascible teacher says, “Of course you do. You won’t get it, nobody does, but you want it. Don’t be a hypocrite in your poetry.”

I want it, of course. But I guess maybe that, like children, it’s something I know I can’t have so wanting it is futile. Life’s been hard. I’m not unaware of my blessings, and I know there are many. But rainbow joy? Not so much.

I think I’m seeing a thread here. I let myself want things I know I can have–either easily or with some effort–and I let myself want silly things that cannot be. But the things that really mean a lot to me, and I know they’re forever beyond my grasp–those things I don’t let myself want. Even though I really do, deep down, want those more than anything else.

I don’t know if this even makes any sense. I’ve been pondering this for days, and this is the best I can come up with. I just don’t know how to express it any more clearly.