Encouragement

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Aint Hess, no, not Aunt Hess, they were much to hick for that, and the one-armed Jim Bo told us there was a green-eyed monster in the garden. It was the old couple’s way of keeping us out of there. I stayed out of the garden all right. It had nothing to do with being scared of some made up monster though. I was smarter than your average eight-year-old. It had everything to do with my hiney never being able to adjust to those thin switches Aint Hess used to stripe me with. Green-eyed monster, humph. More like a gray-haired monster.

I don’t know what happened to Jim Bo. I think he got remarried shortly after Aint Hess died. They weren’t really our aunt and uncle. They just babysat us while Mother worked. I grew up and moved away from everything that was familiar to me as a child. Everything, that is, until I came to battle with a green-eyed monster of my own.

Ah, envy. But I conquered that ugly demon.

I envied those whose childhoods were more pleasant than my own. I envied those who lived in big houses and those who drove fancy cars. But the worst envy I had to deal with was directed toward those in a happy marriage. It just wasn’t fair! The green-eyed monster was turning me into a bitter woman. Of course, deep down, I was usually happy for people who prospered. It was just those that threw it in your face that sent me fuming. Half the time, they didn’t even know that that’s what it was they were doing. It was those half smiles that did it every time.

Now that I’ve conquered that green-eyed monster, I’m in a place of rest. I’ve made my peace with envy. Perhaps I’ll never live in a big home, drive a fancy car, or remarry. Perhaps I will walk in a garden overflowing with milk and honey. None of it is important to me anymore.

The key - I learned how to appreciate who I am and what I have to offer life, rather than what life has to offer me. I look every day into a mirror and green eyes stare back at me, those of a green-eyed princess who is afraid of neither monster.
© Joyce Pool

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