20 things : Positivity

So for those of you who read my blog and think that I've fallen into an abyss of morbid reflection... you may be right. However, DBT is all about the "and." Simultaneously acting on behalf of your recovery while accumulating and acknowledging positive experiences. I wanted to make this entry b/c I need you to know, and to remind myself as well, that there are positive things in my life. These are in no particular order.

1. I helped Mike re-jigger his office set-up in the apartment last weekend, which involved the purchasing of a desk, the disassembling of another desk. I felt... well... helpful and not burdensome. It was a really REALLY good feeling. And the new set-up, although it will not be complete until December, is already looking smashing. It unblocks some energy in the apartment, allowing for new openness and flow.

2. I've taken advantage of National Novel Writing Month to write a poem a day. The official NaPoWriMo isn't until April, but I wanted a project for November to push through my writer's block. In regards to beginning a draft, Stacey Waite said "writing ain't no thing." Because all my emotions have been so weighty lately, it's bled into my attitude about writing as well. Every possibility becomes too heavy, too important. When you write a poem a day, they just can't all be important. So far it's working out well. I'm eleven poems in.

3. Autumn: the colors, scents, tastes, sounds... except the sound of leaf blowers. Use a rake, dammit.

4. I lost a lot of weight and thus dropped some sizes. I went from a size 12 to a size 6 or 8. Probably I'll opt for 8 because I like things to not be too tight. I like jeans better now. So I bought myself some pairs of jeans. The losing weight did not make me happy or sad --I did not intend to lose the weight. But I'm trying to keep it off. The reason this qualifies for Positivity is the jeans. Jeans are nice sometimes.You can just put them on. I forgot. (for those of you who don't know me IRL, I wear dresses and skirts).

5. I've been making a lot of progress in my healing process. I don't really want to talk about it right now though. But I can notice the progress, which gives me hope for the future.

6. I've had the fleeting desire that it's time to consider making a plan to go back to teaching.

7. I like Thanksgiving and Christmas. And my birthday. They all take place in November and December. It's like bathing one's brain in mulled cider to make January and February go down more smoothly. Not saying it works 100%. But I'll deal with January when it happens.

8. Friends. They are good to me. I value them like family. I love them. I need them. They mean more to me than words can say. 

9. Shutterdown <<< this is a friend's project. It's also the music of dream alchemy. You should click / listen / support.

10. I made soup for the first time this year. It's possible that I made soup for the first time in two years, because I may not have made soup at all last year. Now I have a lot of soup. Chicken soup anyone?

11. The art community at Polyvore. This site may look commercial and material on the outside but once you peel back the layers you find many amazing sub-communities of collage artists.It's not actually all about clothes.

12. Our apartment keeps getting cuter as we make improvements to its layout and decor. I'm tentatively planning a crepe party for my birthday. Like, I make crepes and everyone brings a topping and then there's a lot of eating and celebration.

13. It's a year since I started IOP and I can notice how much better I am. I'm listing this one separately from #5. [It's my blog and I can list stuff how I want to.] It's just that... at the time, I didn't / couldn't see ANY way that my life could get better. It was all raw emotion. There are still days when I take life in hourly chunks. Sometimes minute-ly chunks. But that is okay.

14. I've gotten back into yoga. Yoga is good.

15. I can read stuff again. You might not know this b/c I've kept it quiet, but a year ago my concentration was so bad I could barely watch a half-hour sitcom without getting restless and amped up. I wasn't able to read a magazine, much less poetry. Reading poetry made me cry. It reminded me of how much I [thought that I had] lost in a short period of time. But last week I read a fucking essay on poetic theory by Lyn Hejinian, and it made sense to me --relatively speaking-- the argument was not very accessible. So yay for the restoration of cognitive function. Therapist N said it would come back.

16. I had both kitties with me on the couch the other day. 

17. I've managed to not fall off the DBT wagon, and my last IOP stint ended in early August.

18. My hair came out this really unexpected, pretty color the last time I dyed it. 

19. I've made the decision that in January, I'm going to start again to send work out on a schedule. Last January I was not ready. I'm taking it slow this time. Planning two months ahead. I'm excited that my psyche has / will have mended to the point where I can actually consider a work schedule again and not just make stabs at it and beat myself up when I don't fulfill my expectations. Even though January 2013 did not work out so well, the month of January has momentum. I broke away from university and started my full-time devotion to writing in January 2012. It feels like longer. Can you believe I only got seven months into my one-year [ha!] sabbatical when my mom did what she did? I was at the top of my game. It was like being smacked down by a force of nature. 

20. My dad and Pam said they were gonna come to Pittsburgh and visit me. Maybe it will be near my birthday. I really miss my folks and although they can probably only do 48 hours, it will still be good to see them.

20things : motivation routine waking sleeping

1. At 6:35, my brain turns on. This is the absolute latest it has turned itself on in months. This is how late I sleep, and I have no reason to get up this early. This is off-time, healing time. I don't have to go to work.
2. Telepathically, Rus knows I'm awake and so comes over and yowls for breakfast.
3. I don't want to wake Mike up so I get up.
4. The moment my feet hit the floor I'm like fuck, another day. Weren't we just here yesterday?

A flower I clipped from the long-lasting Valentines bouquet to cheer myself.

5. Get up make coffee cat meds cat food human food computer facebook email blog surf internet until my conscience says I can't possibly procrastinate anymore shower start day.
6. From within my metaphorical nautilus, last night, I wrote down a list of things to do in the morning before I have to leave the house.
7. I put cardamom and ginger in the coffee this morning. Also to cheer myself.
8. It's sort of working.
9. Today I have to leave at 12:30 and I won't get back until 9:30.
10. Nine hours is a long time to be out for someone with fibro, okay, for ME with fibro and attendant visual difficulties that make me so tired. Nine hours is a long time to be up w/o a nap.
11. Okay now you know one (another?) of my embarrassing secrets.
12. On a normal day, I can't go more than nine hours w/o sleeping.
13. Today I will have woken up at 6:30 {math math math} I think that's 15 hours.
14. Most people go w/o sleeping for at least 15 hours.
15. Right now at this very moment I can hear a little voice going there's nothing wrong with you; you're just lazy.
16. But shit, there's a DBT skill for that. It's called "non-judgmental stance." It's like "be aware of when you're judging and stop that."
17. Easy, right?

Luna stole my flower.

18. I'm excited about my impending haircut.

19. Anybody wanna go with me to a reading at the Sphinx tonight? That place is designed to kill me, with its dim light, cramped space, and many overlapping floor rugs that stick to my feet, causing me to wobble.

20. Except it also has the atmosphere of an opium den, which is very relaxing, which is what I want my whole house / apartment to look like. The end.

moving on -- new creative project

So they'll be discharging me from group a week from Friday. I was wondering if perhaps I would feel All Better. The answer to this question would be nay. What I've gleaned is that all this time (all this time) spent in group was to give me the skills to enable me to process the emotions --especially regarding my mom, what she chose and how it ended --while taking responsibility for my own safety. I have to say that before I started I was pushing emotions away. Some of you who know me may that is ridiculous --you see an expressive person who is in touch with her emotions. I have been through so much therapy that I can talk about my emotions on an intellectual level. But feeling them is a different matter. I could talk about the origin of the problem, but right now it does not seem appropriate. The point is, the therps stripped off some layers of varnish and I got my emotions back.

But between the times when I'm forced to reckon with Mom and It, I need a bigger-than-ever creative project to pull my attention and charge my brain to do its very best work.

So I had an idea a few weeks ago.

Not gonna tell you what it is yet, but here's some notes as I was thinking about a mission statement, Submission Guidelines, and/or a letter from the editor.

People have bodies. Animals have bodies. Hybrid human animal-bodies exist in the realm of myth or just beyond your closed eyelids. A body can be a force of locomotion, or a body may require augmentation to move itself. A body can be a metaphor. A body can be a source of pleasure. Pain can be a muse. Not psychic pain but actual visceral pain pain. Where does psychic pain end and visceral pain begin? When I say sensuality does that connote pain or pleasure? Senses. Viscera. Writing the body = writing what we know because we inhabit it. Writing your lover’s body so you can keep it on paper. From three dimensions into two. When I hold your hand do you feel it? Do you feel it with your brain or your skin?  Our bodies can make us feel like amateurs. Strength in vulnerability. Taking a risk and writing about the body can make you feel like an amateur. When I wake and put my feet on the floor I feel like an amateur. I would like to reclaim the word amateur to mean risk-taker. Yang energy pushes us forward while Yin energy causes us to reflect. What does that mean? I am forever striving. I’m not good at being. I mistyped there and had to correct it. For a second it said I am not god at being. We are gods of our own bodies. We are slaves of our own bodies. I watch your body when you sit across from me on the bus. I was mainstreamed and then I started to use a white cane, then stopped, then started, now I’ve stopped again. Am I blind or not? Our bodies are signifiers. Our bodies are false signifiers. Our bodies are liars. Our bodies are storytellers. I want to tell stories about the body. I want to hear your stories about the poem that is the body.

The good news and bad news about this jambalaya

(Yes, this jambalaya)

is that 

1) it weighs ten pounds. And I never measure or write anything down. Or follow recipes really, unless I'm baking. Thus:

2) You will have it for a week.

3) And then you will never taste it again.

Easier to spell

A guy in the rooms said, "I call it god because it's easier to spell."
By pray --and I wish I could express the act with a word other than that one --I mean, mostly, speaking out loud to the darkness. Sometimes, just thinking at the darkness [....]
Sometimes, in a freakout on the subway, in a theater, in the park, I'll type long stream-of-consciousness prayers into my phone.

Mike Doughty
The Book of Drugs

one vegas moment

More than once, someone has looked at me quizzically and said, "you don't seem to me like a Vegas person." That makes sense to me. I don't gamble, easily get overstimulated by crowds and loud noise, and can take-or-leave massive entertainment spectacles. Liking Vegas happened by accident. Five years ago this January, Mike and I were searching (and *searching* --he kept vetoing my ideas) for places to elope. I was getting rather cranky. I would have gone down to the courthouse and signed a document, except I wanted a good wedding story to match my good engagement story. We both did. So we ended up getting married at Valley of Fire State Park. The photo on the main page of their site is rather boring. If you are curious google-images "valley of fire" to get a better idea of the glorious nature that surrounded us. And so we spent a few days in Vegas. The place has become special to me. While I don't really take advantage of the high profile opportunities that it offers (mostly opportunities to lose lots and lots of money) I'm sort of obsessed with the interior design of the hotels.

The place we stayed this time was a delicious resort built around at least three separate water attractions. There was a wave pool, a "lazy river" pool, and a topless beach. Guess which one we didn't go to? Anyway, it's not often that I go in the water, even though I love water. I guess the last time was jet skiing on the lake near my uncle's house in Georgia. I'm rather shy about my body. It's pretty average looking, I guess, but I have all the stereotypical female insecurities: too small here, too large there, lumpy, etc. And I inherited my father's translucent skin and varicosities in my legs and ankles.

When I asked Mike if I could blog this next part, he sort of scowled and said, "you'd better make it about your other husband." So to be clear, this is about my *other husband*, not the one I married five years ago. My other husband, for reasons he has no control over, is a bit short-statured and slender. If you know him, you know why, and if you don't, he'd probably say it was none or your business (or he might just tell you... he is a gracious person-- moreso than I) He has trouble keeping weight on. While I, like many women, work to keep it off. It's not hard to feel, well, kind of big, around him. Even though I'm not "big." I would say I'm medium. But I'm bigger than my husband. (I mean, my other husband.) I know he feels the counterpart of my feelings. The man is "supposed" to be built this way and the woman built this way. Even though we are both intellectuals and know that this is socially constructed BS.... well ... we live in the world.

But here's why I bring it up. Because this was the best moment in Vegas. And I'm blogging it, even though it was a sort-of-private-in-public moment, because I have shared lots of shitty, demoralizing, sad, and achy things on this blog and I need something to balance it out.

We, my other husband and I, went into the wave pool. I don't think I'd ever been in a pool with him before. And here's the thing about a pool. You're weightless. He carried me in his arms and we whirled and spun around. I almost cry just thinking about it. I almost choke on this beauty. I wished all the other people gone, or at least to the edges away from us, just so we could dance and spin and feel completely alone. I feel like I got my fairy tale moment, you know? I'm sharing this because I want the positive energy to radiate among you, readers. And so that I can look back on this entry when (24 hours from now) I write about something sad or complicated or weird.

Small successes

1) I made a to-do list.
2) I've already done at least two items on it and it's before noon.
3) I snagged a late lunch with D and Vivacious P for later on today. Double-yays!

Since I've finally got around to ordering it, I want my new white cane NOW. Instant gratification! No patience! I wonder if it will be heavier, lighter, or the same. I wonder if the white will be just brilliantly white, as it is in the picture. I wonder what the handle will be like, and whether it will resist or accept my decoupaging efforts. The sooner I get it, the sooner I can pretty it up, the sooner I can use it. In my head I've already prettied it and the glue is drying. In my head the glue has dried and I'm taking it for a walk. The sun is wicked bright, and the cane is like, glowingly white.

The sun is not actually that bright outside right now.

But I'm excited anyway. Six inches will really make a difference.

Sorry, my inner 13-year-old thought that was really funny.

I want a rock

As I walked to the bus stop this morning, mostly stepping around the discarded packaging that people leave to scatter on the sidewalk and blow against the banked edges of our yardlets (observed today: the wrappings and vessels of beverages, snack foods, cigarettes, and condoms), I spied-with-my-little-eye a perfect rock. Egg-shaped, but larger. Butterscotch colored. A smooth finished surface. Like one of those purchased river rocks that escaped from a garden or the concrete island of a gas station.

Every time I see a lone rock, I really really wanna throw it through a window. No one's in particular. But I am thinking house or storefront rather than car. I can imagine the heft, how it will fit the curve of my palm.

I have never thrown a rock through a window. How hard would I have to throw it?  I'm thinking of the big panes of glass on front windows. Would the window break all the way or would it just make those cool cracks like a huge jagged asterisk? With my luck, there would be a window screen that I hadn't discerned and the rock would bounce right off. But if all went as planned, I imagine myself as immensely satisfied.

This reminds me: at the university where I used to teach, they offered a major called Entrepreneurship. I thought this was bogus until at lunch one day I eavesdropped on this student, surely a product of that major, who had an idea for a business that I thought was pretty genius.

Basically, he wanted to rent a warehouse where he could amass unusable breakable items. He would give people skin/eye protection and weapons and let them beat the crap out of stuff that was destined for the landfill. He would employ people to load in the items and then to clean them up after. You would pay by the hour and/or the types of items.

Maybe because I'm a girl and socialized thusly, but I have rarely engaged in the on-purpose breaking of things for my own delight. How awesome would it be to whip rocks at an abandoned greenhouse or bust up a console tv with a sledge hammer? Very.