why on earth can i not get my shit together lately? i'm so very tired of dealing with depression. i sit here day after day, trying to make sense of life, not living it. that's sort of how depression works. you just wait for the exit. nobody tells you which one it is or how long you'll be driving, you just have to guess at it and hope.
it hurts to feel so alone with depression. it feels like you can't make sense of anything real and you end up interpreting dreams to your partner, trying to squirm out of the muck by some symbolic means. maybe in my dreams i am not depressed... maybe that means some place in me isn't suffering. you hold that there in your mind for a few days and pretend until you wake up weak again without reason. you just trudge on again, another day, another false exit.
in your heart, everything feels blank paged, white and fuzzy. like an old tv station, the black and white sandstorm just blows around not making any sense. you know you can love. you know you are lovable. but not now. not like this. it's hard to press GO on anything because it feels like one big constant fuck up. one huge mistake you're about to make after another. i can do the sexual side of love, because it's a certain exit. but the emotional side of love feels broken into many pieces scattered all over. hurt and resentments keep blowing over the warmth and generous nature i am so used to.
i try and impregnate my ideas with objective thinking and logic. i try and reason with an insane and illogical illness. depression doesn't really care if my house is clean. clean sheets feel good, but it's not helping me get out of bed. if anything, it's the opposite. i drive and get a coffee. it's like the three bears- too sweet, too strong or too cold. nothing fits, emotionally speaking.
healing takes so much courage because it's working hard. it's practice, just living [surviving] with depression. I'm sitting across from my 17 year old, doing her homework, trying to understand how i got here? how on earth did i go from 25 to 45 year old? why did i waste the years right after my gastric bypass, the skinny years, holed up inside my house, dating someone in another country? i have to accept that repeatedly, i have made so many irrational decisions i can't even blame anyone else for what a state i am in. looking back, i did this things to myself. i gave up on me and either on purpose or subconsciously, i failed my dreams.
i regained weight, i started smoking or drinking again, i stopped working out or even walking, i'd repeatedly buy crap i didn't need, i ate horribly, i sank further into the lowest career one could have- and neglected all my bright shiny starstuff in favor of someone who would be jealous, dampening and completely wrong for me. what do i do these things for? how do these people even come into my life? it's as if by some strange law of fatal attraction, the worst things keep denting my armor.
i don't really have any armor now to dent. i just don't try. i guess that's a lot of this depressive episode... i really just gave up on myself. i figured i'll not go back to school, or change my status or class or net worth- i'm 45, not going to be a hot market item, why bother? why not just scrub floors and go to AA meetings and give up? hell, i even gave up talking. i really can't even do that any more. i don't talk. i think that's kind of a big deal, maybe i should mention to my doctor...? who is verbal and sassy for 25 years, then just gives up speaking?
anyway. i am small and i have caused a lo of my own troubles. i have been a selfish child or a traumatized adult and what is left at my age is a really, really exhausted woman who has no idea what to do next.
Sunday, December 1, 2019
Tuesday, November 26, 2019
Monday, November 25, 2019
in dreams begin responsibility- yeats
i sat and applied makeup, arduous as it might be for someone with depression. i have this thing to moisturize, this other bottle to eliminate deep pores, a concealer for wrinkles, dark spots, heavy eyes. this one tube contours, this one makes a highlight across my cheek like a ray of sunlight. this one makes eyes less saggy, this color detracts for thinning eyelids. it's a ritual and one i have not performed in many weeks.
i go to my regular checkup for my adrenal glands today and another nuance of growing older; having my hormones checked. what a wackadoodle sort of career aging is, in itself. someone has seen these posts lately, i wonder who, then i melt away from those thoughts and stop caring again. i have two bets: someone who loves me very much or someone who really hates me, or both. i won't bet on anything or anyone today.
applying makeup is a form of art that i used to rush, because in youth, i could afford to. now it must be quality products, tasteful and not too dry, not too dark. as i watch myself turning this mid-40s alien, i love myself for it. what bravery to just age and grow up without much fussing. i admire women who can do it well. it's a quiet battle, not like puberty where curves jut out suddenly, attracting opinions on various ways to flatten them. it's a slow process, middle age, of daily changes that add up to big changes. gray hair, the relaxation of once tight skin, sagging this or that, little lines here, wrinkles there, slower walking, hips that ache at night before bed. the loss of sexual desire. the thinning out of friends. the contemplation, JEEZ, the sudden realizations about one's own life.
it takes imagination and responsibility. i was reading haruki murakami and something about imagination being a responsibility grabbed at me. aging, living even, takes both -and it takes guts. it's not for the faint of heart. strength, to me, has always taken shape in the form of creativity and imagination, but during depression, like other illnesses, i just want the current pain to be over and done with. i have to literally imagine myself once happy, or future selves happier. that's literally what it takes to muddle through and trudge out of the tunnel of a depressive episode.
this very adult responsibility to stay breathing, to stay alive amidst despair, can require a huge amount of energy. that's not counting the myriad ways one must survive, much less carry responsibilities, like bills, kid, relationship, dogs, home, food, sleep, makeup, doctors, driving, reading, self care. imagine trying to always imagine one's self happy, not just existentially, but truly, a sick brain that cannot remember. a brain that thinks it has always been like this and will always be like this. that's the kind of depression i have. it strikes writers, artists, musicians, mailmen, housewives, book lovers, people who aren't very smart, kids, the elderly... it's not really a type of brain as much as it appears to be a type of universal pattern. every race, every religion, every kind of human can develop this.
i wonder sometimes if the universe places us like sentinels for the rest of the normal people, just to throw them into a state of chaos or gratitude? i really have no idea what kind of God would create depression so i can't say i believe much in them/him/it, to be honest. i also can't say that i don't believe in Gods or Universal jokes as much as i believe that anything can be a better written story through imagination. my reality, it's not terrible, but it's not wonderful.
it's ok. i survive and sometimes i make art about it. writing the story is far more interesting.
that feels more spiritual that just surviving depression. it's the story i tell about it, before, during and after that seems to be magical. there is something in the writing that i process as a neutral being. a meta self, that is in an imaginative dream state, rather than survival mode. that is mainly why i must write. i don't think i figured that out until just now, just to show how writing it out- works. more than medication or talk therapy [those have a great place in my recovery] writing takes center stage as an act of defiance and resistance to depression.
you can have all these things, you shitty mental illness, but not this.
i look fairly decent today, for a middle aged woman, but i guess i am not as interested in looks as much as substance. beautiful people are as they do, not as they appear. in my experience the bee with honey its mouth always had a sting in its tail anyway.
responsibility. i don't have to write. but i have a part to play in my depression recovery, which writing has become a part of more than i care to admit. i am afraid a lot. i will say it's not a very rational sort of fear. it's not like i have anxiety or anything, i just have a healthy, realistic awareness of growing older that is a little unsettling. it's the kind of fear that leads you outside the house, having coffee with older women and going to volunteer so you're not just taking up space. i do plenty, but i really do seek out things beyond my own existence, even if i secretly don't enjoy them.
but again, one can't be too certain about what is enjoyed or not in the midst of a depressive episode. i doubt very much i could or would enjoy my favorite things, because i know that reality and it's true. if i'm being honest, i probably enjoy sleeping and eating way too much when i am depressed. it can be a herculean task to not sleep and eat all day when these episodes appear. so you see, it's not just about a clean happy home, looking good, eating right, sleeping well, getting out, coffee dates or even knowing this is depression. it's a mental illness. it's not an attitude. it's a warped lens that quite truly skews the entire perception of reality. a reality that was fine three months ago, humming along, making jokes, wearing makeup, going to galleries and making salads from vegetables bought at the farmer's market or grown from my own garden.
it's perceptive amnesia -and it kills people.
it has not got me yet. i guess today, i am most grateful to be reminded i am actively participating in my life, however it looks or feels. no matter how much i must imagine myself happy in order to make it through another day. where i wait. and wait. and wait...
to exit this tunnel.
i go to my regular checkup for my adrenal glands today and another nuance of growing older; having my hormones checked. what a wackadoodle sort of career aging is, in itself. someone has seen these posts lately, i wonder who, then i melt away from those thoughts and stop caring again. i have two bets: someone who loves me very much or someone who really hates me, or both. i won't bet on anything or anyone today.
applying makeup is a form of art that i used to rush, because in youth, i could afford to. now it must be quality products, tasteful and not too dry, not too dark. as i watch myself turning this mid-40s alien, i love myself for it. what bravery to just age and grow up without much fussing. i admire women who can do it well. it's a quiet battle, not like puberty where curves jut out suddenly, attracting opinions on various ways to flatten them. it's a slow process, middle age, of daily changes that add up to big changes. gray hair, the relaxation of once tight skin, sagging this or that, little lines here, wrinkles there, slower walking, hips that ache at night before bed. the loss of sexual desire. the thinning out of friends. the contemplation, JEEZ, the sudden realizations about one's own life.
it takes imagination and responsibility. i was reading haruki murakami and something about imagination being a responsibility grabbed at me. aging, living even, takes both -and it takes guts. it's not for the faint of heart. strength, to me, has always taken shape in the form of creativity and imagination, but during depression, like other illnesses, i just want the current pain to be over and done with. i have to literally imagine myself once happy, or future selves happier. that's literally what it takes to muddle through and trudge out of the tunnel of a depressive episode.
this very adult responsibility to stay breathing, to stay alive amidst despair, can require a huge amount of energy. that's not counting the myriad ways one must survive, much less carry responsibilities, like bills, kid, relationship, dogs, home, food, sleep, makeup, doctors, driving, reading, self care. imagine trying to always imagine one's self happy, not just existentially, but truly, a sick brain that cannot remember. a brain that thinks it has always been like this and will always be like this. that's the kind of depression i have. it strikes writers, artists, musicians, mailmen, housewives, book lovers, people who aren't very smart, kids, the elderly... it's not really a type of brain as much as it appears to be a type of universal pattern. every race, every religion, every kind of human can develop this.
i wonder sometimes if the universe places us like sentinels for the rest of the normal people, just to throw them into a state of chaos or gratitude? i really have no idea what kind of God would create depression so i can't say i believe much in them/him/it, to be honest. i also can't say that i don't believe in Gods or Universal jokes as much as i believe that anything can be a better written story through imagination. my reality, it's not terrible, but it's not wonderful.
it's ok. i survive and sometimes i make art about it. writing the story is far more interesting.
that feels more spiritual that just surviving depression. it's the story i tell about it, before, during and after that seems to be magical. there is something in the writing that i process as a neutral being. a meta self, that is in an imaginative dream state, rather than survival mode. that is mainly why i must write. i don't think i figured that out until just now, just to show how writing it out- works. more than medication or talk therapy [those have a great place in my recovery] writing takes center stage as an act of defiance and resistance to depression.
you can have all these things, you shitty mental illness, but not this.
i look fairly decent today, for a middle aged woman, but i guess i am not as interested in looks as much as substance. beautiful people are as they do, not as they appear. in my experience the bee with honey its mouth always had a sting in its tail anyway.
responsibility. i don't have to write. but i have a part to play in my depression recovery, which writing has become a part of more than i care to admit. i am afraid a lot. i will say it's not a very rational sort of fear. it's not like i have anxiety or anything, i just have a healthy, realistic awareness of growing older that is a little unsettling. it's the kind of fear that leads you outside the house, having coffee with older women and going to volunteer so you're not just taking up space. i do plenty, but i really do seek out things beyond my own existence, even if i secretly don't enjoy them.
but again, one can't be too certain about what is enjoyed or not in the midst of a depressive episode. i doubt very much i could or would enjoy my favorite things, because i know that reality and it's true. if i'm being honest, i probably enjoy sleeping and eating way too much when i am depressed. it can be a herculean task to not sleep and eat all day when these episodes appear. so you see, it's not just about a clean happy home, looking good, eating right, sleeping well, getting out, coffee dates or even knowing this is depression. it's a mental illness. it's not an attitude. it's a warped lens that quite truly skews the entire perception of reality. a reality that was fine three months ago, humming along, making jokes, wearing makeup, going to galleries and making salads from vegetables bought at the farmer's market or grown from my own garden.
it's perceptive amnesia -and it kills people.
it has not got me yet. i guess today, i am most grateful to be reminded i am actively participating in my life, however it looks or feels. no matter how much i must imagine myself happy in order to make it through another day. where i wait. and wait. and wait...
to exit this tunnel.
Saturday, November 23, 2019
purging the clutter
I have a naughty dog who likes to pee in my crawl space, despite his doggie door. despite having a large back yard enough room for fifteen dogs to all go piss on shrubs and trees and fences, he wants to piss inside. i am displeased tonight.
I have been purging things from my house. general disorder and clutter wear on me, mentally. I do this about once every five years, where it feels like EVERYTHING MUST GO. The only way for me to come out of depressions is to make major shifts. I am better at not ending relationships in the midst of depressive episodes now. that took a long time to hurdle over.
i am lucky in that i own nothing of value, really. i have mostly thriftt store items decorating my home and so it' not a big loss when i let go. it gets easier to just box it up and take it to goodwill, knowing it already had a second or third life with me and will move along the conveyor belt to some other home.
i don't know why i write any more. i know i have to, for some reason. i have learned that a depressed mind is an unquiet mind, despite the silent way i go about life these days. i was once loud, obnoxious even, and would write or tell anything to anyone. then a wall slowly started building and since then, i have become a quiet person. my mind, however, is not quiet. it runs through scenarios and obstacles and past traumas and failures every day.
i think the need to declutter is to give my very real life a larger, more vast space for this mind. i need an echo, something large and empty to speak into. besides my partner, i am mostly alone. i don't gravitate toward people or social places. i think i used to in order to feel i had a place i belonged, but i really don't crave that in my mid-40s. i don't really crave much of anything, but writing and reading, the occasional classical music listening... a walk, fruit. i really like fruit now, which is not something i ever enjoyed much in the past.
[still pissed at the dog for his naughty pee jobs]
you'd think having a mate in the mental health field, i'd be more prone to talk to him about when i am not well. you'd think that, but the opposite is true. i find myself having surface conversations to avoid telling him i am not doing great. you'd think a partner in the mental health field would notice small signs or ask important questions, but it's just not true. maybe i'm just too prideful or maybe i just don't want to have anyone make a fuss over me any more. i feel like i ran out of my fussing over chances long ago.
being lonely is a gift, really. it's sort of easy to eschew responsibility and just wander off into whatever i'm doing that day. it's also a curse in that i never feel known, looked after, respected, missed or maybe, probably, truly loved. i guess that's just the way it goes. i'm fortunate to have a home, a car, insurance, a computer to write, sweet dogs that unnerve me, a tasteful life, nothing too frilly or big. the same with people. it's a tasteful one or two people i trust. there is not pretense there. they know my mental health sucks. they dig me anyway. nobody in my life expects me to be anything i am not. i worked hard for that. when you have BPD, you have to be so transparent for so long, eventually you really do just stop saying much of anything at all. giving back all those personalities to the wind... you kind of become the wind. untouchable, ungraspable, this wild and unseen force.
i am so protective of my recovery that i don't make mention of things like common grief. losing both my parents and still dealing with those losses, 2 years after. Mother was hardest of all. Dad just sort of disappeared. Mom dying after i cared for her for 5 months, watching cancer eat her, that wasn't really what i was expecting. i was hoping she might live forever, i guess. or until i was old. right where i am sitting writing, she laid there and died in my arms. not something you just get over, especially living in the same house, sitting in the same spot she took her last breath.
i'm glad i have my computer back up and running. it feels like an old friend.
i am grateful i have this naughty dog and my two other old, not naughty dogs. after doggie girlfriend died last month, it has been hard to really connect to the dogs. what a loss that was.
she was my sweet girl. :(
anyway, maybe one day i'll have the balls to talk to a partner about depression without being terrified. maybe someday i can just be fully in a relationships without my secrets and silences or muffled resentments that turn everything cold and indifferent in my unresolved mind.
maybe...
I have been purging things from my house. general disorder and clutter wear on me, mentally. I do this about once every five years, where it feels like EVERYTHING MUST GO. The only way for me to come out of depressions is to make major shifts. I am better at not ending relationships in the midst of depressive episodes now. that took a long time to hurdle over.
i am lucky in that i own nothing of value, really. i have mostly thriftt store items decorating my home and so it' not a big loss when i let go. it gets easier to just box it up and take it to goodwill, knowing it already had a second or third life with me and will move along the conveyor belt to some other home.
i don't know why i write any more. i know i have to, for some reason. i have learned that a depressed mind is an unquiet mind, despite the silent way i go about life these days. i was once loud, obnoxious even, and would write or tell anything to anyone. then a wall slowly started building and since then, i have become a quiet person. my mind, however, is not quiet. it runs through scenarios and obstacles and past traumas and failures every day.
i think the need to declutter is to give my very real life a larger, more vast space for this mind. i need an echo, something large and empty to speak into. besides my partner, i am mostly alone. i don't gravitate toward people or social places. i think i used to in order to feel i had a place i belonged, but i really don't crave that in my mid-40s. i don't really crave much of anything, but writing and reading, the occasional classical music listening... a walk, fruit. i really like fruit now, which is not something i ever enjoyed much in the past.
[still pissed at the dog for his naughty pee jobs]
you'd think having a mate in the mental health field, i'd be more prone to talk to him about when i am not well. you'd think that, but the opposite is true. i find myself having surface conversations to avoid telling him i am not doing great. you'd think a partner in the mental health field would notice small signs or ask important questions, but it's just not true. maybe i'm just too prideful or maybe i just don't want to have anyone make a fuss over me any more. i feel like i ran out of my fussing over chances long ago.
being lonely is a gift, really. it's sort of easy to eschew responsibility and just wander off into whatever i'm doing that day. it's also a curse in that i never feel known, looked after, respected, missed or maybe, probably, truly loved. i guess that's just the way it goes. i'm fortunate to have a home, a car, insurance, a computer to write, sweet dogs that unnerve me, a tasteful life, nothing too frilly or big. the same with people. it's a tasteful one or two people i trust. there is not pretense there. they know my mental health sucks. they dig me anyway. nobody in my life expects me to be anything i am not. i worked hard for that. when you have BPD, you have to be so transparent for so long, eventually you really do just stop saying much of anything at all. giving back all those personalities to the wind... you kind of become the wind. untouchable, ungraspable, this wild and unseen force.
i am so protective of my recovery that i don't make mention of things like common grief. losing both my parents and still dealing with those losses, 2 years after. Mother was hardest of all. Dad just sort of disappeared. Mom dying after i cared for her for 5 months, watching cancer eat her, that wasn't really what i was expecting. i was hoping she might live forever, i guess. or until i was old. right where i am sitting writing, she laid there and died in my arms. not something you just get over, especially living in the same house, sitting in the same spot she took her last breath.
i'm glad i have my computer back up and running. it feels like an old friend.
i am grateful i have this naughty dog and my two other old, not naughty dogs. after doggie girlfriend died last month, it has been hard to really connect to the dogs. what a loss that was.
she was my sweet girl. :(
anyway, maybe one day i'll have the balls to talk to a partner about depression without being terrified. maybe someday i can just be fully in a relationships without my secrets and silences or muffled resentments that turn everything cold and indifferent in my unresolved mind.
maybe...
Friday, November 15, 2019
The Familiarity of Seasons
I am not supposed to be writing. I am supposed to be moisturizing me face and playing makeup for a family dinner to celebrate my partner’s last day at work. i am not supposed to be reading Murakami or listening to Chopin & Liszt. i am supposed to be turning the lights on in the house, feeding our little dogs, being careful and correct. i am not supposed to be writing again, with some maniacs urge that dwells silent for months, then frantically rushes to my mind, unable to be contained. But i am not doing anything to make it better. i am doing what I have to do. i have always tried to blame myself for doing what i was not supposed to do. i lost whole lives, whole relationships over this kind of thing. Lost years and babies and travels to new places, writing in an old second hand chair, because I have to. because i must.
I twiddle my ring finger and smile, because i know i am loved. I love him, too. My partner brought me a gift yesterday. a coffee tumbler with a little owlet in a snow hat, one of those ear-flap hats, the illustration reminds me of a children’s book cover. the title could be the little winter owl, the snowy day, owlet takes off, the owl that couldn’t stop rushing her writing because she had to. The owlet that is loved by John.
i am not supposed to be typing. i am supposed to be putting on lipstick. i should have perfume on by now.
The dogs know when we are leaving by the scent of my perfume in the air. they get excited and start moaning and whimpering because they think it’s car riding time. It’s not. It’s a simple diner, john’s choice, maybe taxi, maybe indian, probably mexican food. I text John:
What do you want for dinner out tonight?
He replies…
I want
You
your skin
on my
Skin
Sometimes i feel breathless. I am older than breathless. flushed maybe. A hopeful sigh, more like. I have aged into the category of “will my hormones cooperate?” sex. It’s not Velvet underground sex. it’s chopin sex, and i am trying not to berate myself with the musts in this category. I must write. i must have hot, passionate sex. I must eat healthy food. I must feed the dogs. must give feminist advice to my daughter with a broken heart. i must quote anne sexton and margaret atwood. i must apply lipstick, staining my 45 year old lips with the crimson of the 90s riot grrl i once was. Still am. Must be. all the obligatory categories carefully crafted into a well-balanced, cohesive narrative. a brand. fuck that.
i am writing while the bird clock whistles. The yellow finch. 6pm and i am full of supposed to dos and failures, despite the fact that i am writing again. something private just for me. you might read it, there is a you out there, for whatever reason, i count on that to keep me going or else i think i’d probably just throw in the old towel.
there is a you. so many. a woman in a college classroom teaching young women about feminism in literature. There is a you in a bookshop where it snows and the walks are long and white. a you in California where the kitchen smells like comfort food. A you in atlanta that is a doctor who is also my half sister, whom i have never met. a you who is a radio dj who is the reason i was able to escape 18 years ago. a you that is the rich guy who wouldn’t know how to react to anything brilliant because his head’s up his ass. A you that is an ex. a you that is an alcoholic. a you that is still trapped. a you that has a cage for a heart and can’t cum because it’s too depressing. a you that is a drag queen. a you that makes small gifts for friends who stays quiet. a you who has a house full of kids who never dared to write again.
and there is a me.
a me who is not supposed to, but must.
When John gets home and is in the shower, i might stop writing, just to go see his skin, his chest hair, the little black circles of fur around his nipples. his long hair wet and soggy like an afghan hound in the rain. his hips, just in the right light, make me grin devilishly and i still feel in awe of the other things. I am not supposed to be writing.
This Murakami novel is not bad. Now, i am not even doing that. The classical piano in the background,a warring faux fireplace, a dog snore, a dog sigh, a little happy home full of sounds and life and musts. I have an inexorable urge to write these things down, lest i lose my mind or memory or both. I have done both already, many times.
today is ordinary. except i had a feminist art urge to show someone my bloody maxi pad. I talked about periods with a friend i ran into at walgreen’s. i painted my nails red. this shade of red is called “berry” but the last one was called “daddy’s girl.” but fuck that.
i am not Velvet Underground sex. i am a slow, sunday morning drive that crescendos into hills and valleys in autumn. A familiar season. A haunting cold, followed by the flushed cheeks of a once-been Lolita. I am a fund and full, healthy mother, full os sex in everything I do. A lazy & phone-it-in sometimes partner, sometimes hot. Not usually. I have to stop debating what my sexuality is supposed to feel and look and smell like at my age. i don’t know. It’s ripe. It’s maybe a little over ripe. does this matter to the man who wants to come home and feel my skin on his skin for dinner?
not really.
Tuesday, August 20, 2019
the ghost in scotland
I have been doing little else besides saying "dinna fash" to my 3 dogs and staying cooler by watching outlander & enjoying cooking. i had a big garden this year and made lots of food from it. my eyes finally went south this year, i don't draw or make much or write often. so frustrating to lose the gift of sight. i do wear readers, but it's not the same. i also developed a lot of grey streaking in my hair. i imagine due to age & the stress of losing both parents in the last 4 years, 2 years apart. Dad died on mom's birthday and then mom passed away on my sister's 50th. I held out for a few years even writing about it. there was a time i couldn't imagine being silent, creatively, but i have a community now. people who need me and who i am grateful to in my recovery. i suppose i spend more time living, than creating art about living.
it's in the 90s today here in arkansas. i am book-ended by hot and cold extremes, very few places on the planet experience. I miss writing. i miss the sound of my keys and my voice overlapping in the written word, not silent, but not spoken. I actually speak a lot. MANY time over women and men have heard my story in public, and it has been therapeutic, but it's grown almost, dare i say, annoying and cringy to hear my own voice. I do love saying things in an accent, however. not a lot changes in that world. New week, new accent! My dogs & daughter think i'm kooky and that's fine. i am. Worse things than kooky, if you ask me.
I feel that grief plays a large role in creative block. Also, depression. I have learned so much about the process of being a person with a disability & that sort of liminal existence, as well as being very successful and happy where i am, but only due to gratitude. this year, i gave away more time than i earned a wage for. but it has a incredible feeling of joy behind it. money canna buy that. sassenach. :) I always hope, in some delusional part of me, that certain people I have loved will read my blog. without interrupting their lives or emailing or causing a muck, I hope people can see an update & figure i'm still out here, alive and hopeful. I never sold rings or got desperate and left my home. i am in the same spot now 5 years later. My mother passed away here. I developed my spirituality here. i made recovery happen here. sometimes, i feel it's time to move on, but my kid is only a single year from college now. i stay put & wait for that. then i can go... to california. to scotland. to just about anywhere i please. that was the right path and that was smart. i do not regret the wonderful relationship we have, nor choosing it.
i might also never wander off this arkansas hill, and that's okay too.
i might make art again. i might follow my lover to colorado in a converted camper van and sell trinkets and crystals. i certainly have so much vitality and life left in me. in many ways, i feel this is just the beginning of another entirely different story. letting go all the frustrations of the past and moving forward without them weighing me down any more. not trauma or resentments or addictions to feed- but just one unceremoniously serene day after the next, which are all just fine. unremarkable is, as unremarkable does. i certainly have had a huge adventure in life. i hope to have many more.
it's in the 90s today here in arkansas. i am book-ended by hot and cold extremes, very few places on the planet experience. I miss writing. i miss the sound of my keys and my voice overlapping in the written word, not silent, but not spoken. I actually speak a lot. MANY time over women and men have heard my story in public, and it has been therapeutic, but it's grown almost, dare i say, annoying and cringy to hear my own voice. I do love saying things in an accent, however. not a lot changes in that world. New week, new accent! My dogs & daughter think i'm kooky and that's fine. i am. Worse things than kooky, if you ask me.
I feel that grief plays a large role in creative block. Also, depression. I have learned so much about the process of being a person with a disability & that sort of liminal existence, as well as being very successful and happy where i am, but only due to gratitude. this year, i gave away more time than i earned a wage for. but it has a incredible feeling of joy behind it. money canna buy that. sassenach. :) I always hope, in some delusional part of me, that certain people I have loved will read my blog. without interrupting their lives or emailing or causing a muck, I hope people can see an update & figure i'm still out here, alive and hopeful. I never sold rings or got desperate and left my home. i am in the same spot now 5 years later. My mother passed away here. I developed my spirituality here. i made recovery happen here. sometimes, i feel it's time to move on, but my kid is only a single year from college now. i stay put & wait for that. then i can go... to california. to scotland. to just about anywhere i please. that was the right path and that was smart. i do not regret the wonderful relationship we have, nor choosing it.
i might also never wander off this arkansas hill, and that's okay too.
i might make art again. i might follow my lover to colorado in a converted camper van and sell trinkets and crystals. i certainly have so much vitality and life left in me. in many ways, i feel this is just the beginning of another entirely different story. letting go all the frustrations of the past and moving forward without them weighing me down any more. not trauma or resentments or addictions to feed- but just one unceremoniously serene day after the next, which are all just fine. unremarkable is, as unremarkable does. i certainly have had a huge adventure in life. i hope to have many more.
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| my work and publications in a stack in my studio |
Monday, August 14, 2017
when is it time to let go?
when is it time to let go? that has been a daunting task since i was a kid. then as a wife and a mother, i faced a similar task. i am a bit of a serial monogamist, but largely, living with mental illness has kept me from truly coming out of my box. a friend once told me i kept my world very small. they were right. as i sat on my back porch again today, i thought "kelly, you have not written in so, so long... what's going on with you?" so i decided to write.
i am really stressed right now. i have been caring for my mother who has stage 4 cancer. i have a teenager who is going through an immense amount of teenage stuff and also social and existential stuff. not to mention, being the teen of parents who divorced when they were 10 months old. i am a gastric bypass survivor and my youtube channel has had hundreds of thousands of views on that topic. but mostly, i am a free spirit, or so i thought. when i was 38, i developed some of the worst depression symptoms i had ever know, after i was sexually assaulted. it was not easy to talk about, so nobody knew that happened. my engagement the year prior ended to dishonesty after we had bought a house and i started living my dream. when that fell apart, i turned to an old friend who then assaulted me in my home. i spent months drinking and trying to figure out what had happened to my life. i asked myself many times, why i, as someone who had endured so much, now had to face this? it would be 3 years later before i went into therapy. my therapist is my most favorite part of my story. she has been the one person who has cheered me on for years, even when i was just about to flunk out of life.
the last year has been trying, difficult, but not impossible. i have learned to live one day at a time, not getting to far into the story before have thought things through. i do have a tendency to overthink now, which makes me slower to act on what needs to change rather quickly. i had been with an alcoholic for a few years, who was sober. when things started really heading downward, we decided to separate but he drank and continued to drink heavily until i faced the decision to end it completely. letting go is so very hard. when you love someone, it can seem like a job you will never be able to complete. i had to decided to make the break and move away from all contact. when my mother got sick & came to live with me, he really emotionally bailed & i was actually fine with that. it helped me grow and be a caregiver to mom, but it also helped me to see that i wouldn't be able to depend on this person after several 'emotional check outs' so i just stopped contact. occasionally i think about it and if i made the right decision, but i always come back to a few dramatic moments that were key and free me up to feel anger and disappointment rather than guilt or sadness.
i started to make more art in that space. i started to stick up for myself and ask for more out of those around me. my teen, included. it was time for those whom associated with me, do more to be like my therapist and support me, not ignore and check out on me. that is not a demand, but it means i am now discussing what i need from people as a caretaker, parent and friend. i am no where near the romance arena. i have a lot of growing to do before that. i am in the art-making and processing [and now, writing it out] phase of my recovery. it is not easy to care for someone who is dying. especially while going through a breakup and having a teenager who needs a lot of love & supervision. but i am meeting the task most days. a few days i am troubled by small stuff, but i have no way of eliminating the small stuff. noisy neighbors, barking dogs, mosquitoes, weight gain and aging are just not the most important things any more. so i try to just take a few deep breaths and get it out on paper. [or screen, as it were]
i miss my art being a source of secondary income. i certainly miss two incomes and a shoulder to cry on... BUT i am so grateful i have stability and when i need to step away from the world, i can, by and large. i hope to keep writing, to keep letting the emotions flow. i know that is healthy. i have been discouraged from writing before due to over-sharing, so i went very quiet for many years. i became a silent social media voyeur but that has been way too stressful to watch lately. so i am returning to my blog, a small little corner of the world where i can express what is really going on with me.
this drawing is from a few weeks ago.
it's me handing it over to the universe...
and letting go.
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