My hands are rough. On my palms and finger tips, for maybe the past week or two, my hands have been covered with tiny white blisters. The blisters peel almost instantaneously, leaving little broken white pieces of skin attached to my fingertips and the heel of my hand.
This also leaves my fingertips red and raw-looking. Today is the first day it's started to hurt, just a teeny bit.
Before any blisters appeared, my palms showed little red dots underneath the skin, as though they pushed through the skin to form the blisters.
Dr. Google suggests it is a form of eczema that comes and goes. Dr. Google tells me it is stress related.
I'll buy that for a dollar.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Monday, March 9, 2009
Money money money
It's all about the Benjamins these days. I should be working right now, as a matter of fact. I have two projects to work on. I think I'm scared-- scared that I don't know how to do this anymore, when, in fact, it's a lot like riding a bike. What I need to do is go out to the studio, pop a DVD of House in and just do the work. Instead, I am sitting in my living room, listening to Rent, and blogging.
Back to money. We have been having some serious conversations this week about where we can cut corners. Last Thursday, for the first time, we went grocery shopping at Aldi's. I have never been there before, and from what others have told me about it-- dirty, bad produce, no shopping bags, extremely cheap-- I was scared to go. So, the fact that we decided to do our shopping there felt ominous: Okay, here we go, we have hit rock bottom. We are shopping at Aldi's.
I was pleasantly surprised. It was clean, organized, the produce looked fine, they had really an amazing selection to choose from. We got almost everything on our list there, and saved, we estimate, between $40-$60 on our groceries. That makes shopping at Walmart or Hy-Vee hard to justify, except for things like meat.
One of the reasons we have been talking about money is that last week I made a misstep when I was making credit card payments and left myself with very little money with which to get through the rest of the month... unless I run the cards back up, which I'd like to avoid.
In the midst of conversations about getting rid of cable and eating out less, deciding not to head down to Dem Days in Hannibal (thereby saving $50 on a dinner and $70 on a hotel; we spent about $20 going to see Watchmen instead), an old college friend (haha, you're 40, so you're old!) invited me to read his blog about the recession and how he and his family are handling it. It's a sobering read. He and his wife are both artists, so things are tight.
One of my friends here in town, though, is defying the odds by landing his first professional job (he's a young 'un). So great is his relief that for the first time he has been telling me stories about the poverty he has faced during his college career: Eating raw potatoes; sitting on the steps of his apartment listening to his landlord pound on his door asking for rent... Stories that made my jaw drop. He wins: I've never known that kind of poverty. And Aldi's actually gave me a lot of piece of mind: We will probably be able to feed our family just fine. The kind of poverty that we are facing means that we will have to think more seriously about spending money for entertainment, not that we are in imminent danger of losing our home. It's very different. And we are very lucky.
I have two projects to work on-- and I can't bill for them until I work on them. I have one more coming in next week. Sometimes I look at the statcounter for my business website and feel happy-- people are looking! And then days go by with no email and no calls and I feel despondent.
I toyed with the idea of applying for a position at the university. I am not yet ready to change careers, though. If I got the position (big if), I would surrender days of complete freedom, summers with my children, the flexibility to fly out to care for my parents at a moment's notice. I would rather continue having faith in my company and hoping that more projects will come. How long can I continue to do that? How long before I have to face "facts" and change careers? I could get a job at the convenience store to tide us over, or some other kind of fast food job. In some ways, that kind of solution is preferable to a career change. A career change would involve a commitment. A commitment to not quitting, to making the best of that choice. I am not yet ready for a career change.
I realize how this sounds: It's easy, when you are on the outside, to say, "Get over yourself. Get a fucking job. Support your family. Get your head out of your ass and do your projects."
Or, perhaps, to say to my artist friends, "What are you thinking? If you can't afford to be an artist, then maybe you should get a real job."
It's hard to explain why we can't.
Back to money. We have been having some serious conversations this week about where we can cut corners. Last Thursday, for the first time, we went grocery shopping at Aldi's. I have never been there before, and from what others have told me about it-- dirty, bad produce, no shopping bags, extremely cheap-- I was scared to go. So, the fact that we decided to do our shopping there felt ominous: Okay, here we go, we have hit rock bottom. We are shopping at Aldi's.
I was pleasantly surprised. It was clean, organized, the produce looked fine, they had really an amazing selection to choose from. We got almost everything on our list there, and saved, we estimate, between $40-$60 on our groceries. That makes shopping at Walmart or Hy-Vee hard to justify, except for things like meat.
One of the reasons we have been talking about money is that last week I made a misstep when I was making credit card payments and left myself with very little money with which to get through the rest of the month... unless I run the cards back up, which I'd like to avoid.
In the midst of conversations about getting rid of cable and eating out less, deciding not to head down to Dem Days in Hannibal (thereby saving $50 on a dinner and $70 on a hotel; we spent about $20 going to see Watchmen instead), an old college friend (haha, you're 40, so you're old!) invited me to read his blog about the recession and how he and his family are handling it. It's a sobering read. He and his wife are both artists, so things are tight.
One of my friends here in town, though, is defying the odds by landing his first professional job (he's a young 'un). So great is his relief that for the first time he has been telling me stories about the poverty he has faced during his college career: Eating raw potatoes; sitting on the steps of his apartment listening to his landlord pound on his door asking for rent... Stories that made my jaw drop. He wins: I've never known that kind of poverty. And Aldi's actually gave me a lot of piece of mind: We will probably be able to feed our family just fine. The kind of poverty that we are facing means that we will have to think more seriously about spending money for entertainment, not that we are in imminent danger of losing our home. It's very different. And we are very lucky.
I have two projects to work on-- and I can't bill for them until I work on them. I have one more coming in next week. Sometimes I look at the statcounter for my business website and feel happy-- people are looking! And then days go by with no email and no calls and I feel despondent.
I toyed with the idea of applying for a position at the university. I am not yet ready to change careers, though. If I got the position (big if), I would surrender days of complete freedom, summers with my children, the flexibility to fly out to care for my parents at a moment's notice. I would rather continue having faith in my company and hoping that more projects will come. How long can I continue to do that? How long before I have to face "facts" and change careers? I could get a job at the convenience store to tide us over, or some other kind of fast food job. In some ways, that kind of solution is preferable to a career change. A career change would involve a commitment. A commitment to not quitting, to making the best of that choice. I am not yet ready for a career change.
I realize how this sounds: It's easy, when you are on the outside, to say, "Get over yourself. Get a fucking job. Support your family. Get your head out of your ass and do your projects."
Or, perhaps, to say to my artist friends, "What are you thinking? If you can't afford to be an artist, then maybe you should get a real job."
It's hard to explain why we can't.
Thursday, March 5, 2009
I thought you might find this amusing
I recently took a chance on adding one of my ex-husband's friends as a Facebook friend. He recently commented that he was going out to his car in a parking garage, and I asked them if there was a strange man sitting in this car... this time. So, he posted a story this incident, which I later wrote a poem about.
So, without further ado:
So, without further ado:
Get the f*** out of my car!
Per request:
The infamous story was that I went back to my car in my downtown work parking garage after a Springsteen concert some years ago (about midnight). The garage was mostly empty as it was where I parked for work, and my brother (the cop) and I had walked to the concert from there. I opened my door--and found some guy sitting in my car! It was a really cold January night, and I assumed he was a homeless guy looking for shelter. That was my first thought. My second thought was then "why does a cold homeless guy have a large screwdriver, and what is wrong with the face of my radio?"
Ah, crap. I'm being robbed, I then thought. And, I realized, he's using MY screwdriver to rip out my radio! Now, keep in mind, it's midnight and there's no one around (my brother is waiting on the top floor of the garage in his pickup, waiting for me to drive up from a floor down; "You wait up here; I'll be fine" were my last words to him). This is not a good situation.
So, I yelled at him, "What are you doing in my car?!" He has this shocked look on his face, but does nothing. "Get the f*** out of my car!" I yelled. That helped. He was, luckily, in the passenger seat and I was on the driver's side. He started to get out, but I noticed he was taking my screwdriver with him. I said, "Leave the screwdriver!" He put it on the seat and got out and stood there looking at me. All I could think was that I wanted to be in the car and I wanted him OUT of the car. But he's just standing there with the door open.
"Close the door!" I told him. He started to close it. But then I thought, how do I know he won't jump in with me once I get in? So, I gave him this exasperated look (like he should know better) and said, "Lock it first." He did. "Now shut it." He did. But, he's still standing there.
"Now get the hell out of here!"
He turned around and started walking away. I jumped in, started the car--and realzed he'd taken my visor CD holder. Bastard. I drove upstairs, jumped out of the car and told my brother what happened. "Was he wearing a green Army jacket?" he asked.
"Yeah, I think so."
"He walked just past me! Get in! Let's get him!"
Let's get him? Then what? I'm thinking.
So, we drove pointlessly around the Warehouse District looking for a guy in an Army jacket who had a soon-to-be-disappointing collection of R.E.M. and Indigo Girls CDs. My brother the cop berated me the whole time for not tackling the guy and making a citizen's arrest or something. Thankfully, we never found him, and I got to drive home a weary victim of Cleveland street crime once again (third time's the charm!).
As a coda to this story, Jen wrote a poem about it, which I had completely forgotten until she reminded me. Some of the details were off, as I recall, but art is art and I trust her judgment. Now, if one of you is a musician and would like to set it to music...
And here is the poem:
Did you hear about the guy, this young guy, well, okay, maybe not so young, he was thirty-three, who walked out to his car one night... Oh forgive me, I'm getting ahead of myself.
One night this not-so-young guy kissed his new wife (his second, actually) before he went to a Springsteen concert (his second wife didn't want him to go; his first wife wouldn't have *let* him go, so he thought he was making progress). So anyway, this guy walked out this car after the concert, downtown Cleveland, parked in the same spot he uses for work, and when he opened his car to get inside, there was a strange woman in the passenger seat, actually sitting in the passenger seat of his car! The guy who was not young and not so newly married felt angry, scared, excited by the woman in his car, who was neither young nor old, and apparently not doing anything in his car besides sitting, so he asked her, and he felt his hand trembling around his tightly clenched keys, *What the hell are you doing in my car?* And she did not look at him, did not answer, so he told her to *Get the hell out of my car!* And she did it so quietly he couldn't remember hearing the door of the car click open. *Now lock the door and close it,* the guy told this woman, late at night in the parking garage, where they were the only two people in the world. And she did. So the not-so-young guy got into his car, locked his door, turned on his lights, and drove away from the strange woman who had occupied his car, who remained standing in the darkness as quietly as she had sat.
As you can imagine, there was great excitement when the guy told his second wife about the woman sitting in the passenger seat, which is usually the wife's seat in the car, which used to be the first wife's seat in that car, and his now wife told him he should not have gone to that concert (progress takes a step back) and she was glad she had not gone to that concert, and wait a minute,
why didn't he call the police?
The guy and his wife are talking about this in bed now (after all, they have to get up early for work tomorrow), they are in their pajamas, they have brushed their teeth, and all the while his wife has been talking about The Woman Who Sat in the Car (and who now seems to occupy the space between them). *How did she get into the car?* Had he locked it? Was he sure? Maybe he shouldn't use that parking space anymore. And he lies on his side of the marital bed and hears his wife, his new wife, his second wife, his current wife, say that maybe the woman was crazy, maybe she was dangerous, maybe she was waiting for a boyfriend who could have killed him or cut him or maimed him, and maybe he was lucky,
he could have been changed for life.
The infamous story was that I went back to my car in my downtown work parking garage after a Springsteen concert some years ago (about midnight). The garage was mostly empty as it was where I parked for work, and my brother (the cop) and I had walked to the concert from there. I opened my door--and found some guy sitting in my car! It was a really cold January night, and I assumed he was a homeless guy looking for shelter. That was my first thought. My second thought was then "why does a cold homeless guy have a large screwdriver, and what is wrong with the face of my radio?"
Ah, crap. I'm being robbed, I then thought. And, I realized, he's using MY screwdriver to rip out my radio! Now, keep in mind, it's midnight and there's no one around (my brother is waiting on the top floor of the garage in his pickup, waiting for me to drive up from a floor down; "You wait up here; I'll be fine" were my last words to him). This is not a good situation.
So, I yelled at him, "What are you doing in my car?!" He has this shocked look on his face, but does nothing. "Get the f*** out of my car!" I yelled. That helped. He was, luckily, in the passenger seat and I was on the driver's side. He started to get out, but I noticed he was taking my screwdriver with him. I said, "Leave the screwdriver!" He put it on the seat and got out and stood there looking at me. All I could think was that I wanted to be in the car and I wanted him OUT of the car. But he's just standing there with the door open.
"Close the door!" I told him. He started to close it. But then I thought, how do I know he won't jump in with me once I get in? So, I gave him this exasperated look (like he should know better) and said, "Lock it first." He did. "Now shut it." He did. But, he's still standing there.
"Now get the hell out of here!"
He turned around and started walking away. I jumped in, started the car--and realzed he'd taken my visor CD holder. Bastard. I drove upstairs, jumped out of the car and told my brother what happened. "Was he wearing a green Army jacket?" he asked.
"Yeah, I think so."
"He walked just past me! Get in! Let's get him!"
Let's get him? Then what? I'm thinking.
So, we drove pointlessly around the Warehouse District looking for a guy in an Army jacket who had a soon-to-be-disappointing collection of R.E.M. and Indigo Girls CDs. My brother the cop berated me the whole time for not tackling the guy and making a citizen's arrest or something. Thankfully, we never found him, and I got to drive home a weary victim of Cleveland street crime once again (third time's the charm!).
As a coda to this story, Jen wrote a poem about it, which I had completely forgotten until she reminded me. Some of the details were off, as I recall, but art is art and I trust her judgment. Now, if one of you is a musician and would like to set it to music...
And here is the poem:
The Woman Who Sat in the Car
Did you hear about the guy, this young guy, well, okay, maybe not so young, he was thirty-three, who walked out to his car one night... Oh forgive me, I'm getting ahead of myself.
One night this not-so-young guy kissed his new wife (his second, actually) before he went to a Springsteen concert (his second wife didn't want him to go; his first wife wouldn't have *let* him go, so he thought he was making progress). So anyway, this guy walked out this car after the concert, downtown Cleveland, parked in the same spot he uses for work, and when he opened his car to get inside, there was a strange woman in the passenger seat, actually sitting in the passenger seat of his car! The guy who was not young and not so newly married felt angry, scared, excited by the woman in his car, who was neither young nor old, and apparently not doing anything in his car besides sitting, so he asked her, and he felt his hand trembling around his tightly clenched keys, *What the hell are you doing in my car?* And she did not look at him, did not answer, so he told her to *Get the hell out of my car!* And she did it so quietly he couldn't remember hearing the door of the car click open. *Now lock the door and close it,* the guy told this woman, late at night in the parking garage, where they were the only two people in the world. And she did. So the not-so-young guy got into his car, locked his door, turned on his lights, and drove away from the strange woman who had occupied his car, who remained standing in the darkness as quietly as she had sat.
As you can imagine, there was great excitement when the guy told his second wife about the woman sitting in the passenger seat, which is usually the wife's seat in the car, which used to be the first wife's seat in that car, and his now wife told him he should not have gone to that concert (progress takes a step back) and she was glad she had not gone to that concert, and wait a minute,
why didn't he call the police?
The guy and his wife are talking about this in bed now (after all, they have to get up early for work tomorrow), they are in their pajamas, they have brushed their teeth, and all the while his wife has been talking about The Woman Who Sat in the Car (and who now seems to occupy the space between them). *How did she get into the car?* Had he locked it? Was he sure? Maybe he shouldn't use that parking space anymore. And he lies on his side of the marital bed and hears his wife, his new wife, his second wife, his current wife, say that maybe the woman was crazy, maybe she was dangerous, maybe she was waiting for a boyfriend who could have killed him or cut him or maimed him, and maybe he was lucky,
he could have been changed for life.
The not-so-young guy lies in his bed next to his second wife, whom he has newly married, one arm folded behind his head in the dark, staring at the ceiling, and he sees the strange woman sitting in the car, the exquisite stillness of her hands folded on her lap, the way her hair dipped forward so he couldn't see her face, the way she was sitting so quietly maybe she *was* waiting for someone.
And the last thought he has before he lies awake all night is that maybe,
maybe,
*maybe*
she was waiting there for him.
And the last thought he has before he lies awake all night is that maybe,
maybe,
*maybe*
she was waiting there for him.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Not the State of the Union Address
I seem to be able to speak cogently about depression, even when I am in the midst of a bad patch, like I am right now, like I was on Friday. Actually, today isn't bad. Saturday, I was almost manic with my energy levels and good mood. But on Friday, I was in the vice grips of despair.
The thing that really pisses me off about depression is that nothing triggered Friday's "episode" as I like to think of it. I woke up, had lunch with friends, but suddenly I found myself sitting on a stool at Il Spazio, talking to my friend John, unable to accept even a coke to drink. I realized I was in danger of breaking down into tears there, so I called another friend and spent the rest of the day watching re-runs of House and smoking cigarettes. I smoked 21 cigarettes on Friday, if you're interested. I had 4 on Sunday. Yesterday, I had none. Today, I have had none.
The reduction in smoking isn't deliberate. I am not trying to cut down. It's just the way things go: When things suck, I smoke more. When things are better, I smoke less.
__________________________________________________________________
For what it's worth, since I'm talking about depression, I would say that I have been in a depression since August 22, 2008. Amazing how you can sometimes pinpoint things exactly like that.
I would define my depression as causing everything to be more difficult. I used to be able to make bread, edit a manuscript, make dinner, and go for a run, all in the same day. Now, I can do one of those things. I have to make a choice. I sat on the couch for about two hours this morning before I forced myself to move to a different couch to watch television so I could write about it. I have not yet written about it. It's like I am paralyzed and I can't move. The only things I am fully capable of doing are getting the children picked up, dropped off, homeworked, fed, and bedded down for the night.
This is the longest funk I've had. At least that I can remember. The huge grant project that almost killed me still makes me tired and still makes me not want to work. I long for structure, I have some client work now, and yet I can't do the work. I was talking to a friend on Friday, we were smoking together outside Il Spazio while I was still there. I said, "I have work to do."
He said, "Then you should do it."
"I can't."
"I know."
I don't know how to explain this to people who haven't experienced it for themselves.
__________________________________________________________________
Okay, I have now showered and dressed. My son is home with me today-- he pulled his neck yesterday by stretching, so we went to the ER. They gave muscle relaxers and recommended cold compresses. He has more range of movement today and less pain, but I am glad he is home and not at school. He still has trouble turning his head to the left.
We have to make flan today for a school project. A friend tells me not to think of what I *have* to do today, but to think of what I *can* do today.
1) I can take a shower and get dressed.
2) I can go pick up lunch (I promised Taco Bell in return for him reading this essay).
3) I can make flan with him for his Spanish class.
4) I can blog!
After that, we'll see.
The thing that really pisses me off about depression is that nothing triggered Friday's "episode" as I like to think of it. I woke up, had lunch with friends, but suddenly I found myself sitting on a stool at Il Spazio, talking to my friend John, unable to accept even a coke to drink. I realized I was in danger of breaking down into tears there, so I called another friend and spent the rest of the day watching re-runs of House and smoking cigarettes. I smoked 21 cigarettes on Friday, if you're interested. I had 4 on Sunday. Yesterday, I had none. Today, I have had none.
The reduction in smoking isn't deliberate. I am not trying to cut down. It's just the way things go: When things suck, I smoke more. When things are better, I smoke less.
__________________________________________________________________
For what it's worth, since I'm talking about depression, I would say that I have been in a depression since August 22, 2008. Amazing how you can sometimes pinpoint things exactly like that.
I would define my depression as causing everything to be more difficult. I used to be able to make bread, edit a manuscript, make dinner, and go for a run, all in the same day. Now, I can do one of those things. I have to make a choice. I sat on the couch for about two hours this morning before I forced myself to move to a different couch to watch television so I could write about it. I have not yet written about it. It's like I am paralyzed and I can't move. The only things I am fully capable of doing are getting the children picked up, dropped off, homeworked, fed, and bedded down for the night.
This is the longest funk I've had. At least that I can remember. The huge grant project that almost killed me still makes me tired and still makes me not want to work. I long for structure, I have some client work now, and yet I can't do the work. I was talking to a friend on Friday, we were smoking together outside Il Spazio while I was still there. I said, "I have work to do."
He said, "Then you should do it."
"I can't."
"I know."
I don't know how to explain this to people who haven't experienced it for themselves.
__________________________________________________________________
Okay, I have now showered and dressed. My son is home with me today-- he pulled his neck yesterday by stretching, so we went to the ER. They gave muscle relaxers and recommended cold compresses. He has more range of movement today and less pain, but I am glad he is home and not at school. He still has trouble turning his head to the left.
We have to make flan today for a school project. A friend tells me not to think of what I *have* to do today, but to think of what I *can* do today.
After that, we'll see.
Friday, February 27, 2009
The Material and The Spiritual
My friends Jack, Melissa and I have been gathering for lunches on Fridays at the coffeeshop. Jack and I are sometime writing partners. However, we were both pretty lame last year about actually writing anything, so we sort of stopped. Now, we have started again with short assignments. Two pages. This week's theme was The Material and The Spiritual. Here is what I wrote in my little notebook.
(I showed it to my friend Chris later and he said, "I don't know whether you wrote this because you're depressed or whether you're depressed because you wrote this."
Probably both.)
Let's say that humans have a soul, or some tangible, spiritual, ethereal self. Let's say this is a conscious self also that is reincarted many times, without memory, into may different bodies and lives.
We know that from our observations, the universe tends toward chaos, toward entropy. This is true of the universe and its expansion, of decay and erosion on earth, and also of our bodies. Our bodies slowly break down and erode until they fail and die, so the soul moves on.
If entropy is true of the entirety of the universe, then wouldn't it stand to reason that it also holds true for the soul?
Entropy manifests itself in the body in a slow breakdown of organ function, a drying up of skin elasticity. It take years or even a lifetime.
How does entropy occur in the soul? I have heard that there are "old" souls, and this makes sense. But it also makes sense that old souls are identifiable by a maturity, a melancholy, a sadness that has no tangential relationship to that particular body, lifetime, or experience.
Perhaps depression is an indication of a soul's aging and entropy. The soul breaks down in the body and decays. This causes the body to need more sleep and causes depression symptoms like not looking forward to anything, inability to enjoy life.
What if depressed people have souls nearing the end of their cycle? How do souls stop the endless iterations of life and bodies and experiences?
Maybe they can't. Or maybe this is one explanation for why people kill themselves [I am not suicidal]-- they somehow know that this will make things stop, not just for this turn in the cyle, but STOP.
If there is a God, then does God also tend toward entropy? A topic for another day...
What is eternity? A bird's wing can cause the most undetectable kind of erosion when it tips the edge of a mountain. Perhaps the entire universe is slowly decaying at a rate that will take eternity.
(I showed it to my friend Chris later and he said, "I don't know whether you wrote this because you're depressed or whether you're depressed because you wrote this."
Probably both.)
Let's say that humans have a soul, or some tangible, spiritual, ethereal self. Let's say this is a conscious self also that is reincarted many times, without memory, into may different bodies and lives.
We know that from our observations, the universe tends toward chaos, toward entropy. This is true of the universe and its expansion, of decay and erosion on earth, and also of our bodies. Our bodies slowly break down and erode until they fail and die, so the soul moves on.
If entropy is true of the entirety of the universe, then wouldn't it stand to reason that it also holds true for the soul?
Entropy manifests itself in the body in a slow breakdown of organ function, a drying up of skin elasticity. It take years or even a lifetime.
How does entropy occur in the soul? I have heard that there are "old" souls, and this makes sense. But it also makes sense that old souls are identifiable by a maturity, a melancholy, a sadness that has no tangential relationship to that particular body, lifetime, or experience.
Perhaps depression is an indication of a soul's aging and entropy. The soul breaks down in the body and decays. This causes the body to need more sleep and causes depression symptoms like not looking forward to anything, inability to enjoy life.
What if depressed people have souls nearing the end of their cycle? How do souls stop the endless iterations of life and bodies and experiences?
Maybe they can't. Or maybe this is one explanation for why people kill themselves [I am not suicidal]-- they somehow know that this will make things stop, not just for this turn in the cyle, but STOP.
If there is a God, then does God also tend toward entropy? A topic for another day...
What is eternity? A bird's wing can cause the most undetectable kind of erosion when it tips the edge of a mountain. Perhaps the entire universe is slowly decaying at a rate that will take eternity.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Bubble Berry Pie
Most of the blog titles I liked were already taken: blueberry pie, bumbleberry pie, blueberry bubble gum, bubbleberry pie.
The only explanation for why I like these blog titles is the "b" sounds. That's it.
I didn't want to choose anything resembling my real name this time. Not because of privacy issues-- I'm far too big-mouthed for that. I am not trying to conceal my identity here, but I'm sure it will come up. It's because I am trying to create something a little new here, even if my blog posts end up sounding exactly the same as they did on my old blog.
I have to look at a new page, a new place. I just needed something new.
It has taken me months even to be able to create just this. You have no idea how hard it was to post this, how resistant I have been even to doing it.
__________________________________________________________________
Part of the reason it was hard for me to begin blogging again is that everything is hard these days. Getting out of bed is the hardest. I can sleep for twelve hours and still want to take a nap later when faced with the prospect of cooking dinner or washing dishes.
Yes, I know this means I am depressed. Last night, I was recounting to friends the fact that when my doctor initially diagnosed me with depression, I started to cry. I was crying because it seemed OBVIOUS to me that I was depressed-- but depression wasn't, I thought at the time, the problem that needed to be fixed.
Apparently, I was wrong.
I still take anti-depressants, but sometimes life whammies you anyway. I suppose I could ask for a new pill or a larger dose, but that just seems like effort to me. Here is what I think: In Anne Lamott's great book Operating Instructions, she tells the story of a friend who has a sick cat. The cat lies in a puddle, in the middle of a great rain, and doesn't move. People want to take the cat to the vet. Someone stops them and says, "The cat is doing what it needs to be doing right now. If you move it, it will die."
Sure enough, after a few days of lying in the puddle, the cat is fine.
I am doing the human equivalent of lying in that puddle. I know my head is up my ass. But that is where it seems to need to be. And whenever I try to take major steps to get myself out of the puddle or take myself to the vet, some small voice tells me that I am exactly where I need to be, doing what I need to be doing. I can pay my bills, I care for my children, I shower, the dishes get done. There is just a tremendous amount of sleeping in between.
__________________________________________________________________
Isn't it funny how even though there is not a whole lot going on, I finally decided to write about it?
The only explanation for why I like these blog titles is the "b" sounds. That's it.
I didn't want to choose anything resembling my real name this time. Not because of privacy issues-- I'm far too big-mouthed for that. I am not trying to conceal my identity here, but I'm sure it will come up. It's because I am trying to create something a little new here, even if my blog posts end up sounding exactly the same as they did on my old blog.
I have to look at a new page, a new place. I just needed something new.
It has taken me months even to be able to create just this. You have no idea how hard it was to post this, how resistant I have been even to doing it.
__________________________________________________________________
Part of the reason it was hard for me to begin blogging again is that everything is hard these days. Getting out of bed is the hardest. I can sleep for twelve hours and still want to take a nap later when faced with the prospect of cooking dinner or washing dishes.
Yes, I know this means I am depressed. Last night, I was recounting to friends the fact that when my doctor initially diagnosed me with depression, I started to cry. I was crying because it seemed OBVIOUS to me that I was depressed-- but depression wasn't, I thought at the time, the problem that needed to be fixed.
Apparently, I was wrong.
I still take anti-depressants, but sometimes life whammies you anyway. I suppose I could ask for a new pill or a larger dose, but that just seems like effort to me. Here is what I think: In Anne Lamott's great book Operating Instructions, she tells the story of a friend who has a sick cat. The cat lies in a puddle, in the middle of a great rain, and doesn't move. People want to take the cat to the vet. Someone stops them and says, "The cat is doing what it needs to be doing right now. If you move it, it will die."
Sure enough, after a few days of lying in the puddle, the cat is fine.
I am doing the human equivalent of lying in that puddle. I know my head is up my ass. But that is where it seems to need to be. And whenever I try to take major steps to get myself out of the puddle or take myself to the vet, some small voice tells me that I am exactly where I need to be, doing what I need to be doing. I can pay my bills, I care for my children, I shower, the dishes get done. There is just a tremendous amount of sleeping in between.
__________________________________________________________________
Isn't it funny how even though there is not a whole lot going on, I finally decided to write about it?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Candles in the dark
I do want to talk about Kairos more sometime when I can think more about it. Just a quick thought, stealing more from Standing at the Cor...
