Unrelated things:
I spent the first half of the day fighting buses and heat. I lost both battles soundly. I made it to the saint shop, but most of the cards were laminated which was disappointing. Plastic spoils everything. I still got some cool things, and finished up the shadow box, I think.
I am getting all sorts of opportunities to practice my "skills" from therapy in my everyday life. I always have a hard time drawing the line between doormat and generous/thoughtful/giving. But the more often I say "No" when I mean it, and "I need this" when I do, and "I do not want that" when I don't, the stronger I feel. It's like a tonic. And I don't feel I'm losing any of my thoughtful/generous/giving nature through all this. In fact, I'm discovering how much more honest it is, and what a relief it is not to walk around covered in the weight of a thousand little "this does not bother me" lies.
Finally caught in the snare of the LaRouche Cult, I spent a good 1/2 hour in the sun debating Canadian (!) politics with a very very very veryveryvery earnest boy my own age. My usual dismissal of canvassers with "I'm Canadian!" didn't work this time, cause he was too, which is weird. Long discussion about imperialism and why Canada never had a revolution. Learned some scary things about the Canadian constitution, which I am afraid I had never read before. I went home and looked it up and it's all true. Anyway, I finally admitted that the questions they are asking sound interesting but the answers (and the org) are a bit (!) frightening. Walked away with a pamphlet but did a good job explaining why I was not going to make a donation of any type. In the old days I would have given away money I didn't have to an organization I didn't care about, just out of some odd sense of not wanting to hurt the other person's feelings.
Had an entirely random interaction with a tiny Irish Mr. Clean. He was almost unintelligible as he walked by me sweating miserably at the bus stop, (and I'm usually not bad at understanding people through accents) but once I'd run the translation, I realized he'd said "Ah, didn't you hear all the buses are broken down for the day! Ha, just kidding you! Ha ha!" At least he seemed to be enjoying himself. He was so cheerful it almost knocked me over.
I've been laughing a lot recently, and it feels very good. I'm still really depressed, and there are moments when it stops me in my tracks, when I can't catch my breath and I think my heart is going to stop from sheer sadness, but there have been as many (possibly more) moments of full, real laughter. It's good.
What is not funny are the last six rows of this thing I am knitting. I keep messing up somewhere critical, and I try to fix it until I am wild with frustration, and then I put it away for three days, rinse and repeat. I may have lost to the buses and the sun, but I am going to win the battle of the sticky pink yarn.
Of The Best Stuff, but Cracked
Monday, July 30, 2007
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Three Things I Did Not Write
These are three moment in literature that I have found tremendously helpful and healing. None of it is...cheerful. People might cry "Macabre! Depressing! Why are you reading this stuff!? Here is a nice book about puppies and rainbows, it's much better for you." But people rarely understand that one of the worst sufferings of mental illness is how unnameable and unutterable the sensations and emotions can be, even within oneself, let alone in beginning to describe or share them with another person. Each of these writings names some emotion in a way that heals me to read. And so I read them and read them, because I am in need of healing. So I read them over some more. And then I copy them into my blog just in case somebody else could use them.
One:
From A Moment's Liberty: The Shorter Diaries, Virginia Woolf. This entry always stuns me with its graphically, technically detailed, accurate description of a few moments in the life of a depressive.
Wednesday 15 September
"A State of Mind. Woke up perhaps at 3. Oh its beginning its coming - the horror - physically like a painful wave swelling about the heart - tossing me up. I'm unhappy unhappy! Down - God, I wish I were dead. Pause. But why am I feeling like this? Let me watch the wave rise. I watch. Vanessa. Children. Failure. Yes, I detect that. Failure failure. (The wave rises). Oh they laughed at my taste in green paint! Wave crashes. I wish I were dead! I've only a few years to live I hope. I can't face this horror any more - (this is the wave spreading out over me). This goes on; several times, with varieties of horror. Then, at the crisis, instead of the pain remaining intense, it becomes rather vauge. I doze. I wake with a start. The wave again! The irrational pain: the sense of failure; generally some specific incident, as for example my taste in green paint, or buying a new dress, or asking Dadie for the week-end, tacked on. At last I say, watching as dispassionately as I can, Now take a pull of yourself. No more of this. I reason. I take a census of happy people and unhappy. I brace myself to shrove to throw to batter down. I begin to march blindly forward. I feel obstacles go down. I say it doesn't matter. Nothing matters. I become rigid and straight, and sleep again, and half wake and feel the wave beginning and watch the light whitening and wonder how, this time, breakfast and daylight will overcome it; and then hear L. in the passage and simulate, for myself as well as for him, great cheerfulness, and generally am cheerful, by the time breakfast is over. Does everyone go through this state? Why have I so little control? It is the cause of much waste and pain in my life."
Two:
From The Essential Rilke, trans. Galway Kinnell. Every woman closest to Jesus was named Mary. And the name Mary means "bitterness" or sorrow. The sadness and wholeness and wistful longing and love in this poem smooth something out inside of me that usually prefers to stay twisted.
The Quieting of Mary With The Resurrected One
What they felt then, is it not
above all other mysteries the sweetest
and yet still earthly:
when he, pale from the grave,
his burdens laid down, went to her:
risen in all places.
Oh, first to her. how they
inexpressibly began to heal.
Yes, to heal: that simple. They felt no need
to touch each other strongly.
He placed his hand, which next
would be eternal, for scarcely
a second on her womanly shoulder.
And they began
quietly as trees in spring
in infinite simultaneity
their season
of ultimate communing.
Three:
The Only Animal by Franz Wright. Especially if you are identified as depressed, people really freak out about poems with first lines mentioning suicide. But this is not a poem about suicide. It's a poem about the gift of life, the most forgiving poem I've ever read, a poem that God must have written first and then passed on to Wright, a poem I come to again and again and again whether I need tears or hope. It's visited this blog before, and it will probably visit it again. I'll probably have something from it carved on my urn. I love this poem, have you noticed?
The only animal that commits suicide
went for a walk in the park,
basked on a hard bench
in the first star,
traveled to the edge of space
in an armchair
while company quietly
talked and abruptly
returned,
the room empty.
The only animal that cries
that takes off its clothes
and reports to the mirror, the one
and only animal
that brushes its own teeth—
Somewhere
the only animal that smokes a cigarette,
that lies down and flies backward in time,
that rises and walks to a book
and looks up a word
heard the telephone ringing
in the darkness downstairs and decided
to answer no more.
And I understand,
too well: how many times
have I made the decision to dwell
from now on
in the hour of my death
(the space I took up here
scarlessly closing like water)
and said I’m never coming back
and yet
this morning
I stood once again
in this world, the garden
ark and vacant
tomb of what
I can’t imagine,
between twin eternities,
some sort of wings,
more or less equidistantly
exiled from both,
hovering in the dreaming called
being awake, where
You gave me
in secret one thing
to perceive, the
tall blue starry
strangeness of being
here at all.
You gave us each in secret something to perceive.
Furless now, upright, My banished
and experimental
child
You said, though your own heart condemn you
I do not condemn you.
One:
From A Moment's Liberty: The Shorter Diaries, Virginia Woolf. This entry always stuns me with its graphically, technically detailed, accurate description of a few moments in the life of a depressive.
Wednesday 15 September
"A State of Mind. Woke up perhaps at 3. Oh its beginning its coming - the horror - physically like a painful wave swelling about the heart - tossing me up. I'm unhappy unhappy! Down - God, I wish I were dead. Pause. But why am I feeling like this? Let me watch the wave rise. I watch. Vanessa. Children. Failure. Yes, I detect that. Failure failure. (The wave rises). Oh they laughed at my taste in green paint! Wave crashes. I wish I were dead! I've only a few years to live I hope. I can't face this horror any more - (this is the wave spreading out over me). This goes on; several times, with varieties of horror. Then, at the crisis, instead of the pain remaining intense, it becomes rather vauge. I doze. I wake with a start. The wave again! The irrational pain: the sense of failure; generally some specific incident, as for example my taste in green paint, or buying a new dress, or asking Dadie for the week-end, tacked on. At last I say, watching as dispassionately as I can, Now take a pull of yourself. No more of this. I reason. I take a census of happy people and unhappy. I brace myself to shrove to throw to batter down. I begin to march blindly forward. I feel obstacles go down. I say it doesn't matter. Nothing matters. I become rigid and straight, and sleep again, and half wake and feel the wave beginning and watch the light whitening and wonder how, this time, breakfast and daylight will overcome it; and then hear L. in the passage and simulate, for myself as well as for him, great cheerfulness, and generally am cheerful, by the time breakfast is over. Does everyone go through this state? Why have I so little control? It is the cause of much waste and pain in my life."
Two:
From The Essential Rilke, trans. Galway Kinnell. Every woman closest to Jesus was named Mary. And the name Mary means "bitterness" or sorrow. The sadness and wholeness and wistful longing and love in this poem smooth something out inside of me that usually prefers to stay twisted.
The Quieting of Mary With The Resurrected One
What they felt then, is it not
above all other mysteries the sweetest
and yet still earthly:
when he, pale from the grave,
his burdens laid down, went to her:
risen in all places.
Oh, first to her. how they
inexpressibly began to heal.
Yes, to heal: that simple. They felt no need
to touch each other strongly.
He placed his hand, which next
would be eternal, for scarcely
a second on her womanly shoulder.
And they began
quietly as trees in spring
in infinite simultaneity
their season
of ultimate communing.
Three:
The Only Animal by Franz Wright. Especially if you are identified as depressed, people really freak out about poems with first lines mentioning suicide. But this is not a poem about suicide. It's a poem about the gift of life, the most forgiving poem I've ever read, a poem that God must have written first and then passed on to Wright, a poem I come to again and again and again whether I need tears or hope. It's visited this blog before, and it will probably visit it again. I'll probably have something from it carved on my urn. I love this poem, have you noticed?
The only animal that commits suicide
went for a walk in the park,
basked on a hard bench
in the first star,
traveled to the edge of space
in an armchair
while company quietly
talked and abruptly
returned,
the room empty.
The only animal that cries
that takes off its clothes
and reports to the mirror, the one
and only animal
that brushes its own teeth—
Somewhere
the only animal that smokes a cigarette,
that lies down and flies backward in time,
that rises and walks to a book
and looks up a word
heard the telephone ringing
in the darkness downstairs and decided
to answer no more.
And I understand,
too well: how many times
have I made the decision to dwell
from now on
in the hour of my death
(the space I took up here
scarlessly closing like water)
and said I’m never coming back
and yet
this morning
I stood once again
in this world, the garden
ark and vacant
tomb of what
I can’t imagine,
between twin eternities,
some sort of wings,
more or less equidistantly
exiled from both,
hovering in the dreaming called
being awake, where
You gave me
in secret one thing
to perceive, the
tall blue starry
strangeness of being
here at all.
You gave us each in secret something to perceive.
Furless now, upright, My banished
and experimental
child
You said, though your own heart condemn you
I do not condemn you.
Saturday, July 28, 2007
I spent a large part of my day today
on a wild-goose chase. I have been making a lot of art recently, mostly collage. Right now I am working on a shadowbox based on a few lines of an Elizabeth Barrett Browning poem that have always haunted me:
"I love thee with a passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints..."
In the box already are a picture of myself at one with my teddy bear and a bottle hanging out of my mouth, a picture of myself at six with my pony, a pile of tiny rocks from the Canadian maritimes, two tiny naked dolls, some lavender, some gold stars, a candy necklace, curtains made of the silk gauze from my wedding veil, and a blue enameled pendant I bought one day dreaming of a possible wedding some other day in the future. But I need some of those old-fashioned gold-bordered "holy cards" -- little trading-card type devotionals with pictures of different saints. I have some coming from ebay but I was caught up in the inspiration of the moment and wanted them NOW so went on a mission to find a Catholic gift store. It was hard! I traveled all over Boston from the North End to the South End, from the Italians to the Irish, and for all the billions of Catholics around I couldn't find a single store! Several trails went cold when I arrived at a site only to find yet another benchfull of old men or old women who would tell me that the nuns had packed up and gone to the suburbs, but they thought maybe there was a "saint store" over in...
With the help of a savvy friend I finally tracked down the mildly startling SOCIETY FOR THE PROPAGATION OF THE FAITH store, and from the window it looks promising, but it is closed on the weekend, so my quest will have to slumber till Monday.
Working on this project and meditating on the lines of the poem remind me of when I was first learning about God. I was shown the tabernacle behind the altar and told that Jesus lived there. My six-year-old mind imagines a tiny dollhouse holy palace with a four inch Jesus waiting for someone to open the door, and I am crazy with desire to see it. But it was only opened at the end of mass, and the priest's wide vestments always obscured the view as he put the host away, much to my pained frustration. I don't remember how long it took me to realize that there was no golden doll furniture, and no little walking talking Jesus to be found behind the little locked door, but I'm afraid it was a disappointment.
I reach back and try to remember what it felt like to so easily believe that you could just open a door and find God sitting on a little golden chair, waiting for a chat, if only somebody would unlock it for you.
PS: I think I am going to start linking to a few ancient "greatest hits" posts from the past when they feel relevant to my condition. I've been doing some re-reading, and damn if that bright, energetic, verbose little girlio wasn't fairly awesome. She certainly had no idea. I want to find her again someday. So:
December 21, 2004 (I'd just turned 22. Gawd that feels like ancient history somehow.)
"I love thee with a passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints..."
In the box already are a picture of myself at one with my teddy bear and a bottle hanging out of my mouth, a picture of myself at six with my pony, a pile of tiny rocks from the Canadian maritimes, two tiny naked dolls, some lavender, some gold stars, a candy necklace, curtains made of the silk gauze from my wedding veil, and a blue enameled pendant I bought one day dreaming of a possible wedding some other day in the future. But I need some of those old-fashioned gold-bordered "holy cards" -- little trading-card type devotionals with pictures of different saints. I have some coming from ebay but I was caught up in the inspiration of the moment and wanted them NOW so went on a mission to find a Catholic gift store. It was hard! I traveled all over Boston from the North End to the South End, from the Italians to the Irish, and for all the billions of Catholics around I couldn't find a single store! Several trails went cold when I arrived at a site only to find yet another benchfull of old men or old women who would tell me that the nuns had packed up and gone to the suburbs, but they thought maybe there was a "saint store" over in...
With the help of a savvy friend I finally tracked down the mildly startling SOCIETY FOR THE PROPAGATION OF THE FAITH store, and from the window it looks promising, but it is closed on the weekend, so my quest will have to slumber till Monday.
Working on this project and meditating on the lines of the poem remind me of when I was first learning about God. I was shown the tabernacle behind the altar and told that Jesus lived there. My six-year-old mind imagines a tiny dollhouse holy palace with a four inch Jesus waiting for someone to open the door, and I am crazy with desire to see it. But it was only opened at the end of mass, and the priest's wide vestments always obscured the view as he put the host away, much to my pained frustration. I don't remember how long it took me to realize that there was no golden doll furniture, and no little walking talking Jesus to be found behind the little locked door, but I'm afraid it was a disappointment.
I reach back and try to remember what it felt like to so easily believe that you could just open a door and find God sitting on a little golden chair, waiting for a chat, if only somebody would unlock it for you.
PS: I think I am going to start linking to a few ancient "greatest hits" posts from the past when they feel relevant to my condition. I've been doing some re-reading, and damn if that bright, energetic, verbose little girlio wasn't fairly awesome. She certainly had no idea. I want to find her again someday. So:
December 21, 2004 (I'd just turned 22. Gawd that feels like ancient history somehow.)
Friday, July 27, 2007
Somewhere today
I got an idea for a post, but I forget what it was. Oh well.
I took it easy today. I finally slept after three days but it was a sick drugged kind of sleep so it took me a long time to ease into the morning. Once I got outside I cleared up remarkably. I ran an errand, and went to therapy.
You know, they do this thing on a person's last day in the group that I used to think was really stupid and cloying. They have a "rock ceremony" where the person picks a little rock out of a bowl and then it is passed around the group and everyone takes a turn saying something about the person and "infusing" the rock with some quality, commonly peace, love, strength, fortitude, etc. and then the person takes the rock home and treasures it for life, etc. I spent a good deal of time fretting about how I was going to deal with the rock ceremony of a certain person who was leaving today. I really disliked this person, found them abrasive, consistently negative, whining, always talking but never having anything to say, and so on. (interesting how we loathe in others the very things we are paranoid and insecure about in ourselves) I really had tried to support this person all along but I couldn't think of anything genuinely good to say about her, no matter how I'd sought that of God inside her, which was confounding. I was trying to dream up not-untrue positive phrases but feared they'd be transparent and I would hurt this person by being false.
Finally I decided that I would just make my message about rest and peace, because they were two things I could see this woman really needed, and I could be genuine about it, and I'd let it go from there.
And you know, when I held that rock in my hand and opened my mouth, the spirit moved in me and suddenly I could see a dozen little beautiful things about this person and her way of moving in the world, and I said them. And it was a gift for both of us, because my eyes were opened in such a peculiar way. I always thought I'd been trying to see the good in her, and apparently I was noticing things all along but hadn't registered them. The Spirit was seeking more deeply than I was, or rather, I guess the Spirit knew what I had not perceived.
I don't know. But it was cool.
As for me I'm grieving today but steady. I've been given a good dose of grace to deal with the latest Sad Thing in my life, and one blessing of this S.T. is that I've been able to see a little fruit from the weary tedious work I have been doing in therapy these months. In the past, a S.T. like this would have sent me directly to some sort of self-destructive act, some sort of self-loathing reinforcement, some sort of despair. And I don't feel any of those things. I can't express how deeply sad I am, but it's a purer sadness, with the hatred (self hatred, but still hatred) that I've lain with in the past removed. So that is good.
Amen.
I took it easy today. I finally slept after three days but it was a sick drugged kind of sleep so it took me a long time to ease into the morning. Once I got outside I cleared up remarkably. I ran an errand, and went to therapy.
You know, they do this thing on a person's last day in the group that I used to think was really stupid and cloying. They have a "rock ceremony" where the person picks a little rock out of a bowl and then it is passed around the group and everyone takes a turn saying something about the person and "infusing" the rock with some quality, commonly peace, love, strength, fortitude, etc. and then the person takes the rock home and treasures it for life, etc. I spent a good deal of time fretting about how I was going to deal with the rock ceremony of a certain person who was leaving today. I really disliked this person, found them abrasive, consistently negative, whining, always talking but never having anything to say, and so on. (interesting how we loathe in others the very things we are paranoid and insecure about in ourselves) I really had tried to support this person all along but I couldn't think of anything genuinely good to say about her, no matter how I'd sought that of God inside her, which was confounding. I was trying to dream up not-untrue positive phrases but feared they'd be transparent and I would hurt this person by being false.
Finally I decided that I would just make my message about rest and peace, because they were two things I could see this woman really needed, and I could be genuine about it, and I'd let it go from there.
And you know, when I held that rock in my hand and opened my mouth, the spirit moved in me and suddenly I could see a dozen little beautiful things about this person and her way of moving in the world, and I said them. And it was a gift for both of us, because my eyes were opened in such a peculiar way. I always thought I'd been trying to see the good in her, and apparently I was noticing things all along but hadn't registered them. The Spirit was seeking more deeply than I was, or rather, I guess the Spirit knew what I had not perceived.
I don't know. But it was cool.
As for me I'm grieving today but steady. I've been given a good dose of grace to deal with the latest Sad Thing in my life, and one blessing of this S.T. is that I've been able to see a little fruit from the weary tedious work I have been doing in therapy these months. In the past, a S.T. like this would have sent me directly to some sort of self-destructive act, some sort of self-loathing reinforcement, some sort of despair. And I don't feel any of those things. I can't express how deeply sad I am, but it's a purer sadness, with the hatred (self hatred, but still hatred) that I've lain with in the past removed. So that is good.
Amen.
Thursday, July 26, 2007
Little bird
Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all,
And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.
I’ve heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
~Emily Dickinson
I took out my window screen to put in a fan. I turned off the fan when I left the house. I came home and was home for an hour before I realized that there was a sparrow hiding in the corner of my room: I heard it rustle. It didn't move as I came towards it, but it didn't look petrified. It just looked at me. I betrayed his trust but saved his life (there is a cat) by throwing a towel over him and then tossing him out the window.
I feel like someone has thrown a towel over me and tossed me out the window. Only question is whether I can fly away sputtering madly but free, too.
I've learned of a new artist
named Elvis Perkins, and he is a connoisseur of grief. People yell at me for listening to sad music when I am sad, but they don't understand what ballad writers have always known, and Shakespeare said best:
Give sorrow words
The grief that does not speak
whispers the o'er-fraught heart
and bids it break
Anyway, I am listening to Perkins' It's a Sad World After All, and it's helping.
Stay if you want, there is enough
sadness for the both of us
Follow the sound to the table underground
there will be plenty tears goin' round
And I would be happy for you to stay
with me till tomorrow can be called today
In a sad world, in a sad world.
But when you leave
my powders and my teas
will speak their heads off to me
Here everyone knows their own name
in a sad world no two are the same.
"Real soon," assures the spoon,
"Watch out" says the twine
"Water, give me water,
Remember me," begs the rain
of a sad world, of a sad world.
Laugh and the world laughs with you. Cry, and iTunes has got your back. :)
For good measure, here I am crying at my sister's wedding:
Give sorrow words
The grief that does not speak
whispers the o'er-fraught heart
and bids it break
Anyway, I am listening to Perkins' It's a Sad World After All, and it's helping.
Stay if you want, there is enough
sadness for the both of us
Follow the sound to the table underground
there will be plenty tears goin' round
And I would be happy for you to stay
with me till tomorrow can be called today
In a sad world, in a sad world.
But when you leave
my powders and my teas
will speak their heads off to me
Here everyone knows their own name
in a sad world no two are the same.
"Real soon," assures the spoon,
"Watch out" says the twine
"Water, give me water,
Remember me," begs the rain
of a sad world, of a sad world.
Laugh and the world laughs with you. Cry, and iTunes has got your back. :)
For good measure, here I am crying at my sister's wedding:
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Blaugh
Okay, so it was technically already today when I posted, but I have something of note to say: not two hours later and I got the 2nd worst fit of gastroenteritis I have ever had (#1 was las Christmas) and spent the rest of the night in the emergency room, being given IV fluids and giving large quantities of my blood in return. I also got some nifty dissolves-in-your-mouth-not in-your-stomach anti-nausea meds, but even those made me barf, so I ended up getting a miracle Please Stop Vomiting Already, Vomit Girl, Okay, Thanks drug in the arm instead. And I did stop barfing. But before that I barfed on my Harry Potter book, a little, when I was trying to read it to distract myself and my IV got in the way of moving it fast enough. And all I could think of were Puking Pastilles.
I have never horked on a book before. It feels terrible. Also, it's nausiatingly lovely how many words there are for vomiting: heave, hurl, keck, regurgitate, spew...
My mood is surprisingly good given the no sleep and the upchuck festival. Which is a little worrying, maybe. But then, I did regurgitate all my meds.
*urp*
Of the best stuff, but cracked.
"When you are insane, you are busy being insane - all the time...When I was crazy, that's all I was." ~ Sylvia Plath
It's been a long, long time since I've posted anything here, let alone kept up with the blogosphere, and there's a good reason for that. For the past long time I've been bearing the heavy burden of mental illness, and it has ravaged not only my blog, but my job, my school-life, my faith-life, and my relationship. For the past 4 months I've been on leave from work, and hospitalized or in 5-day a week therapy the entire time. I've been on and off of a total of 14 different psychoactive drugs and 5 different diagnoses. (They've finally settled on Bipolar II and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder). I've been in some really dark places. I just got out of the hospital again today, a particularly brutal and unhappy stay.
I've finally decided to re-vamp this blog and write again. I've been aching to write, but my identity as Quaker has been being nudged out of the way by my new identity as Mentally Ill. I've found myself feeling increasingly alienated from my own blog, my own voice. I haven't known what to say, in part because I've been alienated from a lot of other things as well.. In fact, I can't go to Yearly Meeting this year because of the financial and personal toll the Crazy extracts from me. How can I sit in Sessions when I've got 5 "sessions" a day to attend at a partial hospital program?
I've decided to be open about this because I know for sure that there is a deep and important nexus somehow in this kind of suffering and faith.
In Let your Life Speak, Parker Palmer devotes an entire chapter to depression: "All The Way Down," and he begins it with a quotation from Pinsky's translation of the Inferno:
"Midway on our life's journey, I found myself
In dark woods, the right road lost. To tell
About those woods is hard--so tangled and rough
And savage thinking of it now, I feel
The old fear stirring: death is hardly more bitter.
And yet, to treat the good I found there as well
I'll tell what I saw. . ."
and it's a good preface to my own writing on the subject, as well. I'd like to share some of Parker's words, too.
"Hour by hour, day by day, I wrestled with the desire to die, sometimes so feeble in my resistance that I "practiced" ways of doing myself in. I could feel nothing except the burden of my own life and the exhaustion, the apparent futility, of trying to sustain it.
I understand why some depressed people kill themselves: they need the rest. But I do not understand why others are able to find new life in the midst of a living death, though I am one of them. I can tell you what I did to survive and, eventually, to thrive--but I cannot tell you why I was able to do these things before it was too late."
And that's what I want to do here now. In this space, as I struggle to survive and thrive, I want to share "the good I find there as well" when it comes. I know that just the sharing of it, the writing of it, will be part of that good. I am going to make a commitment to write here every day, even if it's just a line, circumstances and God permitting, for at least the next month. Maybe it'll be my own yearly meeting, to start with.
Much love to all my Friends. See you tomorrow.
It's been a long, long time since I've posted anything here, let alone kept up with the blogosphere, and there's a good reason for that. For the past long time I've been bearing the heavy burden of mental illness, and it has ravaged not only my blog, but my job, my school-life, my faith-life, and my relationship. For the past 4 months I've been on leave from work, and hospitalized or in 5-day a week therapy the entire time. I've been on and off of a total of 14 different psychoactive drugs and 5 different diagnoses. (They've finally settled on Bipolar II and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder). I've been in some really dark places. I just got out of the hospital again today, a particularly brutal and unhappy stay.
I've finally decided to re-vamp this blog and write again. I've been aching to write, but my identity as Quaker has been being nudged out of the way by my new identity as Mentally Ill. I've found myself feeling increasingly alienated from my own blog, my own voice. I haven't known what to say, in part because I've been alienated from a lot of other things as well.. In fact, I can't go to Yearly Meeting this year because of the financial and personal toll the Crazy extracts from me. How can I sit in Sessions when I've got 5 "sessions" a day to attend at a partial hospital program?
I've decided to be open about this because I know for sure that there is a deep and important nexus somehow in this kind of suffering and faith.
In Let your Life Speak, Parker Palmer devotes an entire chapter to depression: "All The Way Down," and he begins it with a quotation from Pinsky's translation of the Inferno:
"Midway on our life's journey, I found myself
In dark woods, the right road lost. To tell
About those woods is hard--so tangled and rough
And savage thinking of it now, I feel
The old fear stirring: death is hardly more bitter.
And yet, to treat the good I found there as well
I'll tell what I saw. . ."
and it's a good preface to my own writing on the subject, as well. I'd like to share some of Parker's words, too.
"Hour by hour, day by day, I wrestled with the desire to die, sometimes so feeble in my resistance that I "practiced" ways of doing myself in. I could feel nothing except the burden of my own life and the exhaustion, the apparent futility, of trying to sustain it.
I understand why some depressed people kill themselves: they need the rest. But I do not understand why others are able to find new life in the midst of a living death, though I am one of them. I can tell you what I did to survive and, eventually, to thrive--but I cannot tell you why I was able to do these things before it was too late."
And that's what I want to do here now. In this space, as I struggle to survive and thrive, I want to share "the good I find there as well" when it comes. I know that just the sharing of it, the writing of it, will be part of that good. I am going to make a commitment to write here every day, even if it's just a line, circumstances and God permitting, for at least the next month. Maybe it'll be my own yearly meeting, to start with.
Much love to all my Friends. See you tomorrow.
Wednesday, May 09, 2007
Suddenly Summer
I don't know what happened...I guess May! It's hot as blazes here and I haven't got any idea what to wear. All my more summery clothes are buried under mounds of sweaters. Also, I have a feeling that if I did dig them out they wouldn't even fit. Grr.
Hey, here's a picture of me in character for my upcoming show. Yikes, right?
Vice, vice, vice. I do a good job playing the washed up Girl Gone Wrong, even in front of a blackboard. Finally, the anti-ingenue!
I think that's enough for now.
Hey, here's a picture of me in character for my upcoming show. Yikes, right?
Vice, vice, vice. I do a good job playing the washed up Girl Gone Wrong, even in front of a blackboard. Finally, the anti-ingenue!
I think that's enough for now.
Monday, May 07, 2007
Hoo boy
What a month. I don't even know where to start...
Well, I did not get into school. But I did get the "good" rejection letter that says something like "Please try again next year. No, really, please try again next year. No, really, I'll call you sometime, we should...hang out...or something sometime. Yeah. Yeah. Good to meet you. Bye."
Okay, I am a little bitter. It really was the good letter and they are offering to help me out with my application next year. But still, sigh.
It is almost time for finals. I have one paper, one big final to study for, and a song to whip into shape for public performance. Well, and then another paper talking about my experience in the singing class.
At this moment I am in my last Conspiracy class. The class itself was fascinating. The question-and-answer section often gets a bit boring, though. And we're having an extra-long one because it's the last class.
I got really sick early this month and spend three weeks in the hospital or under daily care. It seems to be under control, and I got a lot of good help and new medication. But it sure threw a wrench in my life. I'm still really tired and kind of just plain wiped out from the whole thing, but I am slowly scraping all the bits together and carrying on. I used up all my vacation time, all my sick time, and all my personal days. Luckily, some of those should accrue back pretty fast.
I'm going to be taking an intensive Spanish Class this summer, 8 weeks, 5 days a week, 3 hours a day. I'm really excited about it, except that it has suddenly occurred to me that this will make Sessions really difficult for me. (that and my lack of Vacation days) I don't see that I can miss an entire week of class right before exams. I need to think about this. I'm on the Correspondence committee for the YM, so I kind of need to be there.
Okay, grad students are presenting papers. Off to listen.
Well, I did not get into school. But I did get the "good" rejection letter that says something like "Please try again next year. No, really, please try again next year. No, really, I'll call you sometime, we should...hang out...or something sometime. Yeah. Yeah. Good to meet you. Bye."
Okay, I am a little bitter. It really was the good letter and they are offering to help me out with my application next year. But still, sigh.
It is almost time for finals. I have one paper, one big final to study for, and a song to whip into shape for public performance. Well, and then another paper talking about my experience in the singing class.
At this moment I am in my last Conspiracy class. The class itself was fascinating. The question-and-answer section often gets a bit boring, though. And we're having an extra-long one because it's the last class.
I got really sick early this month and spend three weeks in the hospital or under daily care. It seems to be under control, and I got a lot of good help and new medication. But it sure threw a wrench in my life. I'm still really tired and kind of just plain wiped out from the whole thing, but I am slowly scraping all the bits together and carrying on. I used up all my vacation time, all my sick time, and all my personal days. Luckily, some of those should accrue back pretty fast.
I'm going to be taking an intensive Spanish Class this summer, 8 weeks, 5 days a week, 3 hours a day. I'm really excited about it, except that it has suddenly occurred to me that this will make Sessions really difficult for me. (that and my lack of Vacation days) I don't see that I can miss an entire week of class right before exams. I need to think about this. I'm on the Correspondence committee for the YM, so I kind of need to be there.
Okay, grad students are presenting papers. Off to listen.
Wednesday, April 04, 2007
The Beggar's Song
Always I go from gate to gate
rained on, scorched by the sun,
suddenly I press my right ear
into my right hand.
And now my own voice comes to me
as if I'd never known it.
So that I'm not certain who's crying out,
I or someone else.
I cry for a pittance.
The poets cry for more.
At last I close my face
by closing both my eyes,
lying so heavily in my hand
it almost looks like rest.
So they won't think I hadn't
a place to lay my head.
~Rilke.
rained on, scorched by the sun,
suddenly I press my right ear
into my right hand.
And now my own voice comes to me
as if I'd never known it.
So that I'm not certain who's crying out,
I or someone else.
I cry for a pittance.
The poets cry for more.
At last I close my face
by closing both my eyes,
lying so heavily in my hand
it almost looks like rest.
So they won't think I hadn't
a place to lay my head.
~Rilke.
Monday, April 02, 2007
Waiting for notification. The Letter From The College, and other things, too.
Thursday, March 29, 2007
Prayers, please
My (big) little brother, age 20, has had Viral Myrocarditis that went undiagnosed for over a year. The past month he's been under treatment, but had to rush to the ER today with severe chest pains. I'm awfully worried about him, even though he is so big and strong. I hope he is okay. It is hard to be so far away.
Saturday, March 24, 2007
Rememberance
A few months before the final end of my ill-starred marriage years ago, I had a temp job at a big Halloween-costume factory store. It was a fun job, wearing costumes, counseling customers around their disguise, getting side-jobs as a makeup artist.
I met two people there.
One was a beautiful woman, whose name I am ashamed to say I do not remember. She, like me, was in an abusive marriage and afraid to get out. Somewhere inside me I found the courage to help her do what I could not. There were several weeks of bargaining and wavering. I helped her get away, and I stayed several scary nights with her in her apartment while her ex beat on the door. We cowered in her bed and turned up the volume on 3am Oprah re-runs. Eventually he gave up. There were several weeks of tears and I made her a birthday party a week later to help her cheer up. In helping her I learned about what I could and would do when my time came.
I don't know where she is now.
I prayed for her tonight.
Another was a beautiful boy named Jesse. All the blond cheerleader teenage employees were drooling after him, being too young and innocent to have any sense of gaydar. Jesse and I somehow bonded instantly. He was a mess, lovely and vulnerable, also with a taste in abusive men. He was funny, bold...lovely, lovable, fragile and joyful and childlike despite his almost thirty years. I was a mess, a child bride, frightened, lonely, overworked with no sense of fun. I found in Jesse the solace and attention and care-free, strings-free love I had always missed, and he found in me a confidant, a protector, a loyal and gentle friend. Jesse gave me the adolescence I'd missed along the way. I got to pretend to be bad, after so many years of being the good one. We played jokes, we walked around the mall wisecracking. He took me to my first drag show. We shared cigarettes outside unspeakably filthy bars. I got into my one and only physical fight defending him in a bar fight. (I won, though I still bear the scar to prove it.) One of the few gay bars in our southern town was also the only goth bar, once a week. We'd dress up in baby-goth drag, calling ourselves the "Dark Children," both skinny kids, me a dapper, hip young man with huge eyes, and him my slithery date in too much eyeliner. We'd go out and dance till 3 am. I was still underage, so he'd buy gin and tonics and we'd share them, giggling, in adjoining stalls in the men's room, passing the glass back and forth under the partition. I loved him. When I finally fled my terrible, abused existence, we lost touch.
I don't know where he is now.
I prayed for him tonight.
I've been grieved many times over the fate of these troubled lost friends. My prayer is that they have both been somehow lead to a place of faith and healing, like me. Slowly, step by step.
I pray for them tonight.
I remebered the first friend's name. It was Diamond.
I met two people there.
One was a beautiful woman, whose name I am ashamed to say I do not remember. She, like me, was in an abusive marriage and afraid to get out. Somewhere inside me I found the courage to help her do what I could not. There were several weeks of bargaining and wavering. I helped her get away, and I stayed several scary nights with her in her apartment while her ex beat on the door. We cowered in her bed and turned up the volume on 3am Oprah re-runs. Eventually he gave up. There were several weeks of tears and I made her a birthday party a week later to help her cheer up. In helping her I learned about what I could and would do when my time came.
I don't know where she is now.
I prayed for her tonight.
Another was a beautiful boy named Jesse. All the blond cheerleader teenage employees were drooling after him, being too young and innocent to have any sense of gaydar. Jesse and I somehow bonded instantly. He was a mess, lovely and vulnerable, also with a taste in abusive men. He was funny, bold...lovely, lovable, fragile and joyful and childlike despite his almost thirty years. I was a mess, a child bride, frightened, lonely, overworked with no sense of fun. I found in Jesse the solace and attention and care-free, strings-free love I had always missed, and he found in me a confidant, a protector, a loyal and gentle friend. Jesse gave me the adolescence I'd missed along the way. I got to pretend to be bad, after so many years of being the good one. We played jokes, we walked around the mall wisecracking. He took me to my first drag show. We shared cigarettes outside unspeakably filthy bars. I got into my one and only physical fight defending him in a bar fight. (I won, though I still bear the scar to prove it.) One of the few gay bars in our southern town was also the only goth bar, once a week. We'd dress up in baby-goth drag, calling ourselves the "Dark Children," both skinny kids, me a dapper, hip young man with huge eyes, and him my slithery date in too much eyeliner. We'd go out and dance till 3 am. I was still underage, so he'd buy gin and tonics and we'd share them, giggling, in adjoining stalls in the men's room, passing the glass back and forth under the partition. I loved him. When I finally fled my terrible, abused existence, we lost touch.
I don't know where he is now.
I prayed for him tonight.
I've been grieved many times over the fate of these troubled lost friends. My prayer is that they have both been somehow lead to a place of faith and healing, like me. Slowly, step by step.
I pray for them tonight.
I remebered the first friend's name. It was Diamond.
Sunday, March 18, 2007
Another dream:
I was at a meeting for worship and it began with random people blessing each other with water and setting up for a mock-mass. I was horrified and left the meetinghouse and sat outside with my family, who appeared out of nowhere. I was very upset that the meeting was doing this, and decided my time would be better spent with my family, since this meeting was obviously going to be terrible, and my time with my family was limited. So I chatted uncomfortably with my parents and cuddled the little kids.
After meeting a group of weighty Friends surrounded me and began to elder me "If you're serious about joining the meeting you are going to have to submit to the sense of the meeting, even if it includes sham sacraments." I was torn and confused and felt ill. My parents seemed triumphant at this failure of Quakerism, and I felt shamed in their sight and the meeting's.
And then I woke up.
Gah! Commitment-phobia, anyone?
I had a (much!) better real-life time with Quakers tonight, getting together with Liz Opp, Robin, Will Taber, Rob, and many other wonderful Friends for a lovely dinner of pizza and conversation. There was a traveling Friend from El Salvador with us, and for some reason I was deeply moved by the rhythm the conversation took on from the process of translation--rather than being choppy it seemed more quietly fluid, with the natural pauses for the translation giving a graceful, thoughtful sway to what was being said. Translation of conversation is very different than translations of speeches or messages, I think. I am not sure why. But there is an added earnestness for understanding and listening and clarity that stirs my heart. Thanks, God, and Friends, for a beautiful evening.
After meeting a group of weighty Friends surrounded me and began to elder me "If you're serious about joining the meeting you are going to have to submit to the sense of the meeting, even if it includes sham sacraments." I was torn and confused and felt ill. My parents seemed triumphant at this failure of Quakerism, and I felt shamed in their sight and the meeting's.
And then I woke up.
Gah! Commitment-phobia, anyone?
I had a (much!) better real-life time with Quakers tonight, getting together with Liz Opp, Robin, Will Taber, Rob, and many other wonderful Friends for a lovely dinner of pizza and conversation. There was a traveling Friend from El Salvador with us, and for some reason I was deeply moved by the rhythm the conversation took on from the process of translation--rather than being choppy it seemed more quietly fluid, with the natural pauses for the translation giving a graceful, thoughtful sway to what was being said. Translation of conversation is very different than translations of speeches or messages, I think. I am not sure why. But there is an added earnestness for understanding and listening and clarity that stirs my heart. Thanks, God, and Friends, for a beautiful evening.
Thursday, March 15, 2007
I promise not to make this a diet blog!
But this is a big part of my life right now, and I feel the need to talk about it.
I am using www.sparkpeople.com to track my food intake. It's pretty eye-opening. I thought I was pretty good about portion control, but it turns out that I've been eating a lot more than I thought I was. It's also very good for me as a vegetarian, because it's confirming what I suspected: my fat intake is pretty good, but I consume way more carbs than I need and way less protein than I need. Maybe if I ate more protein I'd be less exhausted all the time. It's hard for a veggie on the go to the get the protein she needs. It's much easier to grab a cookie or a bagel than to cook up beans and lentils and tofu. I think I will be eating more hard-boiled eggs. It's hard to stay in the recommended calorie allotment, too. I think it's a matter of re-training the body. Anyway, tracking my intake and nutrients this way is educational, even though it's hard.
I am hoping to use this diet as a bit of an exercise in simplicity. Not surprisingly, the packaged and take-out foods my regular diet relies on are high in calories. It's no secret that good home cooking, if you're gentle with the butter and cheese, tends to be better for you (and often, the world.) I'm working on buying less processed ingredients and making the time to pre-pack lunches and breakfasts, and even dinners for school days, where I often don't get home till 10pm. It is a struggle, but it's good stewardship in more ways than one.
I'm also having to cut down my alcohol calories. I'm not a big boozer, but my delicious beer is at least 200-300 calories a hit. Gone are the days where I could absentmindedly spend a few hours in the pub with some friends and slowly down 3 pints. That's most of my daily calorie allowance! And that sort of liquid diet's not overly recommended.
Ah me.
Anyhow, maybe I'll save some money and spend my time a little better while I'm being careful about what I eat.
I'm waiting on a dreaded scale to arrive.
I am using www.sparkpeople.com to track my food intake. It's pretty eye-opening. I thought I was pretty good about portion control, but it turns out that I've been eating a lot more than I thought I was. It's also very good for me as a vegetarian, because it's confirming what I suspected: my fat intake is pretty good, but I consume way more carbs than I need and way less protein than I need. Maybe if I ate more protein I'd be less exhausted all the time. It's hard for a veggie on the go to the get the protein she needs. It's much easier to grab a cookie or a bagel than to cook up beans and lentils and tofu. I think I will be eating more hard-boiled eggs. It's hard to stay in the recommended calorie allotment, too. I think it's a matter of re-training the body. Anyway, tracking my intake and nutrients this way is educational, even though it's hard.
I am hoping to use this diet as a bit of an exercise in simplicity. Not surprisingly, the packaged and take-out foods my regular diet relies on are high in calories. It's no secret that good home cooking, if you're gentle with the butter and cheese, tends to be better for you (and often, the world.) I'm working on buying less processed ingredients and making the time to pre-pack lunches and breakfasts, and even dinners for school days, where I often don't get home till 10pm. It is a struggle, but it's good stewardship in more ways than one.
I'm also having to cut down my alcohol calories. I'm not a big boozer, but my delicious beer is at least 200-300 calories a hit. Gone are the days where I could absentmindedly spend a few hours in the pub with some friends and slowly down 3 pints. That's most of my daily calorie allowance! And that sort of liquid diet's not overly recommended.
Ah me.
Anyhow, maybe I'll save some money and spend my time a little better while I'm being careful about what I eat.
I'm waiting on a dreaded scale to arrive.
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Blog and it shall be given unto you.
Hey! SAT scores and an email saying the old transcript is on its way! All in one day! Whoo!
Thanks, Universe. I needed that.
Thanks, Universe. I needed that.
Dream dream dream
When I do sleep, I have intense dreams. They are always very specific. These days they are often medical, which I think is a combination of my hopes for medical school, my general physical health, and a sense of continuing healing/sickness around my emotional life.
I had a very detailed dream about having leukemia last night. And it was so matter of fact. I just went in, was diagnosed and listened to what they told me I'd have to do. Then I sat down and rolled up my sleeve and got the IV push of drugs while watching some sort of historical romance movie on a tiny, tiny television. And then I went and laid down outside. I felt spinny, like I'd had too much to drink or had stood up too quickly. The ground was damp but the sky was blue, and I closed my eyes to rest. And then I opened them and I was awake.
Very strange.
I had a very detailed dream about having leukemia last night. And it was so matter of fact. I just went in, was diagnosed and listened to what they told me I'd have to do. Then I sat down and rolled up my sleeve and got the IV push of drugs while watching some sort of historical romance movie on a tiny, tiny television. And then I went and laid down outside. I felt spinny, like I'd had too much to drink or had stood up too quickly. The ground was damp but the sky was blue, and I closed my eyes to rest. And then I opened them and I was awake.
Very strange.
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Cloudy today
But still with a warm breeze. La la la see me blog about the weather.
Giant but exciting project at work is eating my life. It should be over this week, God willing. Also, the ballet theatre has a show opening this Friday. I've been too sick and tired to do anything about it until now (my involvement was supposed to be minimal anyhow) so we are kind of scrambling to get costumes together. As usual. It's a ballet I have done with them before so I know my way around the costumes. I was hoping to do some fun embellishment stuff with them, back in the planning stages, but I think as of now we'll just be glad if everyone fits in something before we push them out onstage. I was there first thing this morning with my measuring tape and pins, and now I am drooping a little at my desk. I am still intensely sleepy and hoping to find some time for a nap between work and class tonight.
Mmm. Nap.
You know, I was really annoyed with the time change, but last night, when quitting time came and I could still see my hand in front of my face, I was happy for the extra daylight. So I am grudgingly approving Daylight Savings Time, even though it doesn't make the giant task of waking up any easier.
Hey, I think I see a little sun peeking through. A square inch of sun!
Now I need to go climb into the library and photocopy my boss's essays out of a book that does not circulate. Sometimes I wonder if repeatedly photocopying one's head would be an antidote to SAD.
Not that I've ever been diagnosed with SAD. I just wonder.
I had some nice quiet time over my sandwich this afternoon and did some praying along with my chewing. Mostly just holding-so-and-so-and-this-and-that in the Light stuff. Not any deep conversation with God or anything. But still nice and grounding.
Okay, off to the books and the photocopier bay. Maybe I can catch a few Zs in the stacks.
A Prayer in Spring
Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers to-day;
And give us not to think so far away
As the uncertain harvest; keep us here
All simply in the springing of the year.
Oh, give us pleasure in the orchard white,
Like nothing else by day, like ghosts by night;
And make us happy in the happy bees,
The swarm dilating round the perfect trees.
And make us happy in the darting bird
That suddenly above the bees is heard,
The meteor that thrusts in with needle bill,
And off a blossom in mid air stands still.
For this is love and nothing else is love,
The which it is reserved for God above
To sanctify to what far ends He will,
But which it only needs that we fulfil.
~Robert Frost
PS. Perfect A on the midterm! Hurrah!
PPS. Sun came all the way out! Double hurrah!
Giant but exciting project at work is eating my life. It should be over this week, God willing. Also, the ballet theatre has a show opening this Friday. I've been too sick and tired to do anything about it until now (my involvement was supposed to be minimal anyhow) so we are kind of scrambling to get costumes together. As usual. It's a ballet I have done with them before so I know my way around the costumes. I was hoping to do some fun embellishment stuff with them, back in the planning stages, but I think as of now we'll just be glad if everyone fits in something before we push them out onstage. I was there first thing this morning with my measuring tape and pins, and now I am drooping a little at my desk. I am still intensely sleepy and hoping to find some time for a nap between work and class tonight.
Mmm. Nap.
You know, I was really annoyed with the time change, but last night, when quitting time came and I could still see my hand in front of my face, I was happy for the extra daylight. So I am grudgingly approving Daylight Savings Time, even though it doesn't make the giant task of waking up any easier.
Hey, I think I see a little sun peeking through. A square inch of sun!
Now I need to go climb into the library and photocopy my boss's essays out of a book that does not circulate. Sometimes I wonder if repeatedly photocopying one's head would be an antidote to SAD.
Not that I've ever been diagnosed with SAD. I just wonder.
I had some nice quiet time over my sandwich this afternoon and did some praying along with my chewing. Mostly just holding-so-and-so-and-this-and-that in the Light stuff. Not any deep conversation with God or anything. But still nice and grounding.
Okay, off to the books and the photocopier bay. Maybe I can catch a few Zs in the stacks.
A Prayer in Spring
Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers to-day;
And give us not to think so far away
As the uncertain harvest; keep us here
All simply in the springing of the year.
Oh, give us pleasure in the orchard white,
Like nothing else by day, like ghosts by night;
And make us happy in the happy bees,
The swarm dilating round the perfect trees.
And make us happy in the darting bird
That suddenly above the bees is heard,
The meteor that thrusts in with needle bill,
And off a blossom in mid air stands still.
For this is love and nothing else is love,
The which it is reserved for God above
To sanctify to what far ends He will,
But which it only needs that we fulfil.
~Robert Frost
PS. Perfect A on the midterm! Hurrah!
PPS. Sun came all the way out! Double hurrah!
Monday, March 12, 2007
Spring! And things.
After several weeks of hellish coldness (heh.) today has a warm wind blowing. It is lovely.
I am doing some great Quaker reading that I hope to share about soon once I've done some more processing. Going to Business meeting has done a lot to re-invest me in my search, and I'm really glad that I started that again, though there are so many frustrations and heartbreaks to be had down those lines, as well.
One of the main reasons my blogging has been so sparse is that I'm just exhausted. I've always struggled with fatigue, but this no-sleep-without-pills or 12-hrs-of-sleep's-not-enough-with-pills cycle is pretty merciless. I have a good new doctor and I am hopeful that things will straighten out someday soon. I have already found my mood greatly improved, and I think the new medicines combined with the return of the sun are responsible for that. I haven't had a meltdown or any big Days of Darkness in months, and that's amazing. So, if I could just not be tired, that would be so great. Right now sleeping is my main leisure activity, before knitting, cooking, even reading. And that's not a great way to be burning calories.
Speaking of calories, thanks for the words of wisdom on the last post. One of the great things that came out of my foray into plain dress was a certain degree of freedom from worries about my looks. Though, as Cat says, simplicity may be cuter on a size 6 frame, I haven't been a size 6 in years and don't really expect to be again. Wearing one of three generously-cut, un-sized dresses every day made obsessing over pant-size irrelevant. I wasn't likely to notice small day-to-day fluctuations in weight. None of the three dresses "made my butt look big" and that was that.
I stepped away from traditional plain dressing because I grew increasingly uneasy with the fundamentalist politics the dress seemed to broadcast. Traditional plain-dressing, especially for women, came to seem inextricable from certain ideas about gender-roles and misogynistic sexual morality, wherein some man has care of rationing out a given woman's virtue. And to be honest, with a new desk-job, it no longer felt at all suited to my way of life. I didn't feel as though I was witnessing, I felt awkward and out-of-place. I could have just switched to wearing less distinctive plain dress, but instead I simply drifted back into regular clothes, though 99% second-hand.
I'm not blaming this switch, because I DID gain 60 lbs. And I am fairly content with my wardrobe as it is. But it is interesting to me how quickly I can fall back into freaking out about a pant-size. I know there is vanity involved, certainly. Not so much about the way I look, because I am tall and I don't look that different, especially in the still fairly-plain clothes I wear day-to-day (I'm not trying to fit into a mini-dress or hip-huggers.) But I think I am vain just about the "thought" of my weight. Maybe I was proud of the old one.
Still, I want to lose it, for health-reasons and for self-esteem reasons, even if there's some vanity involved. So it's something I am thinking about.
I've also been dealing with huge frustrations with my application to school. I've got my heart set on it more than I should, and I am trying to let go a bit and just wait and see if way opens. In the meantime, way is being continually obstructed by bureaucratic idiocy, not on the part of the school I want to go to, but on both a larger and smaller scale. The school I went to (where I flushed away my anti-depressants and then proceeded to waste the next three years of my life in a miserable abusive relationship) no longer really "exists" and getting paperwork from them is like pulling teeth from a chicken. I'm angry that I have to think about it so much. The process is reminding me of my divorce: the impossible paperwork, the indifferent and unresponsive other party, the dredging up of horrible memories, and the drawn-out aggravation. Also, the College Board has hung me out to dry for over a month as they do an "archive search" for my ancient (6 year old) SAT scores, which they wouldn't need if I had gone to a "proper" highschool with a "proper" transcript, instead of reading the Western literary canon at home while helping to raise a passle of children. Everything has to be official, ratified, signed, undersigned, cataloged, numbered, ordered, serialized and stamped by some Authority, and it's making me crazy. I am running out of time to get these documents and can't help feeling annoyed that I even need them. I am smart! I work hard! Why is that not enough?
/rant.
This is not ruining my life, despite my vehemence. I'm feeling pretty happy, believe it or not. But it's sure taking away a lot of my energy.
But then, I saw a crocus today.
I am doing some great Quaker reading that I hope to share about soon once I've done some more processing. Going to Business meeting has done a lot to re-invest me in my search, and I'm really glad that I started that again, though there are so many frustrations and heartbreaks to be had down those lines, as well.
One of the main reasons my blogging has been so sparse is that I'm just exhausted. I've always struggled with fatigue, but this no-sleep-without-pills or 12-hrs-of-sleep's-not-enough-with-pills cycle is pretty merciless. I have a good new doctor and I am hopeful that things will straighten out someday soon. I have already found my mood greatly improved, and I think the new medicines combined with the return of the sun are responsible for that. I haven't had a meltdown or any big Days of Darkness in months, and that's amazing. So, if I could just not be tired, that would be so great. Right now sleeping is my main leisure activity, before knitting, cooking, even reading. And that's not a great way to be burning calories.
Speaking of calories, thanks for the words of wisdom on the last post. One of the great things that came out of my foray into plain dress was a certain degree of freedom from worries about my looks. Though, as Cat says, simplicity may be cuter on a size 6 frame, I haven't been a size 6 in years and don't really expect to be again. Wearing one of three generously-cut, un-sized dresses every day made obsessing over pant-size irrelevant. I wasn't likely to notice small day-to-day fluctuations in weight. None of the three dresses "made my butt look big" and that was that.
I stepped away from traditional plain dressing because I grew increasingly uneasy with the fundamentalist politics the dress seemed to broadcast. Traditional plain-dressing, especially for women, came to seem inextricable from certain ideas about gender-roles and misogynistic sexual morality, wherein some man has care of rationing out a given woman's virtue. And to be honest, with a new desk-job, it no longer felt at all suited to my way of life. I didn't feel as though I was witnessing, I felt awkward and out-of-place. I could have just switched to wearing less distinctive plain dress, but instead I simply drifted back into regular clothes, though 99% second-hand.
I'm not blaming this switch, because I DID gain 60 lbs. And I am fairly content with my wardrobe as it is. But it is interesting to me how quickly I can fall back into freaking out about a pant-size. I know there is vanity involved, certainly. Not so much about the way I look, because I am tall and I don't look that different, especially in the still fairly-plain clothes I wear day-to-day (I'm not trying to fit into a mini-dress or hip-huggers.) But I think I am vain just about the "thought" of my weight. Maybe I was proud of the old one.
Still, I want to lose it, for health-reasons and for self-esteem reasons, even if there's some vanity involved. So it's something I am thinking about.
I've also been dealing with huge frustrations with my application to school. I've got my heart set on it more than I should, and I am trying to let go a bit and just wait and see if way opens. In the meantime, way is being continually obstructed by bureaucratic idiocy, not on the part of the school I want to go to, but on both a larger and smaller scale. The school I went to (where I flushed away my anti-depressants and then proceeded to waste the next three years of my life in a miserable abusive relationship) no longer really "exists" and getting paperwork from them is like pulling teeth from a chicken. I'm angry that I have to think about it so much. The process is reminding me of my divorce: the impossible paperwork, the indifferent and unresponsive other party, the dredging up of horrible memories, and the drawn-out aggravation. Also, the College Board has hung me out to dry for over a month as they do an "archive search" for my ancient (6 year old) SAT scores, which they wouldn't need if I had gone to a "proper" highschool with a "proper" transcript, instead of reading the Western literary canon at home while helping to raise a passle of children. Everything has to be official, ratified, signed, undersigned, cataloged, numbered, ordered, serialized and stamped by some Authority, and it's making me crazy. I am running out of time to get these documents and can't help feeling annoyed that I even need them. I am smart! I work hard! Why is that not enough?
/rant.
This is not ruining my life, despite my vehemence. I'm feeling pretty happy, believe it or not. But it's sure taking away a lot of my energy.
But then, I saw a crocus today.
Saturday, March 10, 2007
Oh my goodness
This has nothing to do with Quakerness, but maybe to do with Lent. I just went to the Dr. and I have gained almost 60 lbs in a year! A lot of it has to do with meds, but still! WOAH.
Man.
I am trying to figure out a response. Um, gym, much? AAAAAAAAAAAAAAH/
In other news, after several trying meetings for business, God told me to apply for membership.
Well, okay.
So I did. I am now nominated for Care and Support, pending my membership. I feel like maybe this is where my gifts lie, if I can ever stop thinking/talking about myself.
(ME = MOST FASCINATING SUBJECT EVER)
Oh god.
I think If I felt more honest I would blog every day. But I am afraid of the family and friends. Maybe I should go back to anon blogging. Who knows.
Life seems suspended until April, first week, when I learn if Welles*ey wants me or not.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH.
Could I be more obsessed with myself?
SIXTY POUNDS. FIVE POUNDS AWAY FROM OBESE. HOW CAN I BE DEEP RIGHT NOW?
Man.
I am trying to figure out a response. Um, gym, much? AAAAAAAAAAAAAAH/
In other news, after several trying meetings for business, God told me to apply for membership.
Well, okay.
So I did. I am now nominated for Care and Support, pending my membership. I feel like maybe this is where my gifts lie, if I can ever stop thinking/talking about myself.
(ME = MOST FASCINATING SUBJECT EVER)
Oh god.
I think If I felt more honest I would blog every day. But I am afraid of the family and friends. Maybe I should go back to anon blogging. Who knows.
Life seems suspended until April, first week, when I learn if Welles*ey wants me or not.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH.
Could I be more obsessed with myself?
SIXTY POUNDS. FIVE POUNDS AWAY FROM OBESE. HOW CAN I BE DEEP RIGHT NOW?
Thursday, February 22, 2007
My application is in!
I've worked so hard on these entrance essays, and learned so much in the process that I want to blog them. They'll be slightly edited for confidential content, but largely intact. Without further ado, I present:
Essay one: Autobiographical statment discussing previous academic experience and the reasons for interuption in education:
I spent my home-schooled years in
At eighteen, my passions were split cleanly three ways. The first was science. I’d tasted the possibilities in local classes and teetered at the edge of pursuing a degree in computational chemistry. But left to my own devices with a dry textbook, I’d floundered in math and doubted my ability. Worse, a warning rang in my head: “A doctor? Why spend nearly a decade in school when you’ll be staying home with your children in the end?”
Directly opposite lay my desire to perform. In the last months before college, I’d won a place in a regional theatre camp: eight blissful weeks of eight-hour-a-day immersion in improvisation, choral singing, stage-fighting and prop-building. Joyfully, I imagined four more years of the same. I was accepted to UNC-Greensboro, intending to double-major in music and theatre.
Superseding even my love of science and theatre, my Catholic faith was the underlying principle of my life. Throughout my intensely religious childhood I had courted the possibility of a religious vocation. The seeming hugeness of this first life-decision (magnified in my mind by its potentially eternal consequences) haunted me, and I was racked with doubt over my choice. If this life was simply preparation for a heavenly career, it would be a terrible vanity to waste my time with art! Mere weeks before check-in at UNC-G, I performed a repentant about-face. A flurry of paperwork and phone-calls secured me a place in an extremely conservative Catholic college. It promised a rigorous liberal-arts education and daily religious formation: a chance to steep myself in both books and faith until God decided what to do with me.
My first year broke my resolve and my heart. It truly was a school for full immersion in a certain worldview. It was the worldview I’d assumed I’d always hold, but as the straight and narrow path closed in, I stumbled against the restrictions. I was scolded for reading Joyce (“a mere profane stylist”) and forbidden to produce a play by (“the scandalously homosexual”) Wilde. Turning to the library for comfort, I found that it lacked even Yeats (“a known occultist”). Disappointed and confused—in the throes of my first crisis of faith—I withdrew my heart and my mind from my studies. Ready to flee one disappointment for another, I left school behind.
Wednesday, February 21, 2007
Nap time?
Alas, it is not. I am at work during a slow period where my only duty is to man the phone. I have been a busy girl, though. Yes, I have.
I've been writing and re-writing my personal statements. I think I am almost there. I've found two references and am pondering the third. I have copied, researched, emailed, typed, faxed, labled, mailed and fed-exed nearly non-stop. I've dredged up the ancient memories of my unschooling homeschooling experience. It really wasn't that long ago, but I feel as though I've had so many lives between now and then--it is like stretching back into the dark reaches of time. It's been an exciting and exhausting experience, but I have to say I am feeling proud of myself. None of this sort of thing comes easily to me. I can write a thousand exposés of my life: pulp fiction, inspirational fiction, narrative non-fiction, whatever. But to truthfully share the light and dark of those times in a way that is quiet, calm, measured, and mature takes a great deal of thought and strength. It's been a good exercise, and I'm not done yet.
A week after I first learned about the main program I am applying to, I had my first dream of flying. Most accounts of flying dreams seem to feature soaring, swooping, and watching vivid scenery flash by far below. When my dream began I was standing still in a dark place, looking at my feet. I had gone to bed with aching shoulders from several days of shovelling and ice-chopping. In the dream I was very aware of my arms, but when I looked at them, they had been replaced by the huge, soft, strong white wings of a snowy owl. The atmosphere was cold, thicker than water. I raised my wings above my head with great effort and slowly brought them down through the congealed air. The physics of dreams are uncertain at best, but I rose a few inches from the ground and hung suspended, resting. Each time I repeated the action I rose a little higher. It was extremely difficult, and sometimes I would stop and rest in mid-air for whole minutes at a time. As I gained altitude the air grew more clear and bright, and my wingbeats more free and easy. Before I woke up, I had reached no final destination: the only direction was a slow staccato ascending.
Waking from the dream, I lay very still and heard the phrase "trample down" resting in my mind.
Go through the work, and be valiant for the truth upon earth; tread and trample down all that is contrary.
--George Fox
I seemed that in the dream I was pushing down this dark air, but it was beyond a mere trampling: the dark air was also the means by which I rose above the worst of it: the resistance was necessary.
It was a fruitful dream, and I find it interesting that past transformative dreams have also featured large white birds.
And I know other people's dreams can be boring, but I had another meaningful one: I was dying of a blood infection. A doctor came up to me and told me I was septic, and that doctor was also me. Doctor-me gave patient-me a transfusion and I was cured. The end. Huh.
And I know other people's dreams can be boring, but I had another meaningful one: I was dying of a blood infection. A doctor came up to me and told me I was septic, and that doctor was also me. Doctor-me gave patient-me a transfusion and I was cured. The end. Huh.
Thursday, February 15, 2007
Step up to the line
I've been tangled in a morass of possibilities these past few days. My iTunes are echoing my reality...
But you'll fight and you'll make it through
You'll fake it if you have to
And you'll show up for work with a smile
And you'll be better
You'll be smarter
More grown up and a better daughter or son
And a real good friend
And you'll be awake
You'll be alert
You'll be positive though it hurts
And you'll laugh and embrace all of your friends
And you'll be a real good listener
You'll be honest
You'll be brave
You'll be handsome and you'll be beautiful
You'll be happy
I am busy being an insomniac and making insomniac promises to myself. I am applying for two "non traditional scholar" programs now that I am finally elderly enough and quailing before all the lines and lines and lines and lines of self-aggrandizement and assessment required. How many qualified people can check the "exceptional" box for me? What has my life been up till now (and from now)? Can I explain myself in 250 to 500 words? Can I make an account of the blessed disaster of my past five years? Can I tell them what I thought would happen to me at eighteen, what happened to me at twenty-one, what's different at twenty-four, and what I hope for myself at twenty-nine, all in the space allotted? Can I plead my case? Can I beg forgiveness, earn a second chance? Can I prove that I was worth it all this time? Can I compress my years of pain and doubt and fear and hatred and coffee-shops and learning and growth and despair and hope all into one essay?
I don't know. In the meantime I think I will cry a little bit. Heh.
In my dreams
I see myself hitting a baseball
In a green field somewhere near a freeway
I'm all tan and smiling and running from 3rd base
And it's hot and
The kids keep on playing the driving game
And they're singing the same goddamn refrain
And the sky is a blueish grey.
And its become just like a chemical stress
Tracing the lines in my face for
Something more beautiful than is there
I've barely been gone.
In my dreams
I see you at the foot of some mountains.
And we're taking some pictures or something
And we'd better hurry up
And it's late and
The sun keeps on shooting through pine trees
And the grass stains are wet on your new jeans
And we'd better hurry up
And I've become just like a terrible mess
searching the lines in my face for
something more beautiful than is there
the crowds keep me coming back. Cheering.
In my dreams
I see you asleep on a twin bed
The covers pulled up over your head
Am I asleep or awake?
And it's morning
And the captain is playing the radio
And hes just put the paint on his new boat
Am I asleep or awake?
And it just feels good when you're waking up
And it just feels good when you're next to me
And it just feels good when you're coming home
And it just feels good when it's waking up
And I've become just like a chemical stress
Tracing the lines of my face for
Something more beautiful than is there
I've barely been gone
and I'm not a failure
I swear
I wish you could see it from over there
I've got a lot over here without you
I've barely been gone
gone
dreaming
(All lyrics courtesy Rilo Kiley)
But you'll fight and you'll make it through
You'll fake it if you have to
And you'll show up for work with a smile
And you'll be better
You'll be smarter
More grown up and a better daughter or son
And a real good friend
And you'll be awake
You'll be alert
You'll be positive though it hurts
And you'll laugh and embrace all of your friends
And you'll be a real good listener
You'll be honest
You'll be brave
You'll be handsome and you'll be beautiful
You'll be happy
I am busy being an insomniac and making insomniac promises to myself. I am applying for two "non traditional scholar" programs now that I am finally elderly enough and quailing before all the lines and lines and lines and lines of self-aggrandizement and assessment required. How many qualified people can check the "exceptional" box for me? What has my life been up till now (and from now)? Can I explain myself in 250 to 500 words? Can I make an account of the blessed disaster of my past five years? Can I tell them what I thought would happen to me at eighteen, what happened to me at twenty-one, what's different at twenty-four, and what I hope for myself at twenty-nine, all in the space allotted? Can I plead my case? Can I beg forgiveness, earn a second chance? Can I prove that I was worth it all this time? Can I compress my years of pain and doubt and fear and hatred and coffee-shops and learning and growth and despair and hope all into one essay?
I don't know. In the meantime I think I will cry a little bit. Heh.
In my dreams
I see myself hitting a baseball
In a green field somewhere near a freeway
I'm all tan and smiling and running from 3rd base
And it's hot and
The kids keep on playing the driving game
And they're singing the same goddamn refrain
And the sky is a blueish grey.
And its become just like a chemical stress
Tracing the lines in my face for
Something more beautiful than is there
I've barely been gone.
In my dreams
I see you at the foot of some mountains.
And we're taking some pictures or something
And we'd better hurry up
And it's late and
The sun keeps on shooting through pine trees
And the grass stains are wet on your new jeans
And we'd better hurry up
And I've become just like a terrible mess
searching the lines in my face for
something more beautiful than is there
the crowds keep me coming back. Cheering.
In my dreams
I see you asleep on a twin bed
The covers pulled up over your head
Am I asleep or awake?
And it's morning
And the captain is playing the radio
And hes just put the paint on his new boat
Am I asleep or awake?
And it just feels good when you're waking up
And it just feels good when you're next to me
And it just feels good when you're coming home
And it just feels good when it's waking up
And I've become just like a chemical stress
Tracing the lines of my face for
Something more beautiful than is there
I've barely been gone
and I'm not a failure
I swear
I wish you could see it from over there
I've got a lot over here without you
I've barely been gone
gone
dreaming
(All lyrics courtesy Rilo Kiley)
Saturday, February 10, 2007
How to shed 20 years in 20 seconds
Oh man. I just spent a few minutes on youtube watching commercials from the 80's. It is amazing how nothing else can take me back so forcefully. GI Joe, Transformers, My Little Pony, Care Bears, Rainbow Brite, The Chipmunks, My Pet Monster, Teddy Ruxpin, "The Real Ghostbusters"!
One 20 second commercial and I'm once again below the age of reason.
Wow.
(I know these latest posts haven't been too heavy, but this one is for real! How is it that an entire childhood can be summoned by a few flashing images and a theme song? Eek! And this was TWENTY YEARS AGO. OH MY GOD.)
Also, every single animated series of the period seemed to be a 20 minute commercial for the matching toys. Sigh.
What Generation am I? Somewhere in between X and Y. (Born at the tail end of 1982) Whoever we are, somehow it seems like we got the biggest blast of unadulterated commercialization, before irony and savvy marketing caught on. I think maybe we did have it balder (but maybe better) than the target-marketed kids of today. (Even if I did own 10 My Little Ponies, and even if I did constantly try to trade them for Transformers!)
One 20 second commercial and I'm once again below the age of reason.
Wow.
(I know these latest posts haven't been too heavy, but this one is for real! How is it that an entire childhood can be summoned by a few flashing images and a theme song? Eek! And this was TWENTY YEARS AGO. OH MY GOD.)
Also, every single animated series of the period seemed to be a 20 minute commercial for the matching toys. Sigh.
What Generation am I? Somewhere in between X and Y. (Born at the tail end of 1982) Whoever we are, somehow it seems like we got the biggest blast of unadulterated commercialization, before irony and savvy marketing caught on. I think maybe we did have it balder (but maybe better) than the target-marketed kids of today. (Even if I did own 10 My Little Ponies, and even if I did constantly try to trade them for Transformers!)
Monday, February 05, 2007
Hee
In class again, during Q&A, and I just found this quote, which made my evening.
"Adults are just outdated children, and the hell with them." - Dr. Suess
"Adults are just outdated children, and the hell with them." - Dr. Suess
Monday, January 29, 2007
A Few Things
1.) Thoughts on laptops in class:
a.) good! taking notes is awesome with typing ability.
b.) good! can ignore people who are asking boring questions by blogging.
c.) bad! blogging during class bad!
2.) Thoughts in worship:
a.)"It can be hard to tell the difference between a stomach ache and a message."
b.)"I think I have both."
c.)"Meeting is too chatty to tell for sure."
3.)Oh my crap:
a.)Most boring guy in last semester's class who asked the most inane questions is here!
b.)Asking the same questions again!
c.)And making the same inane comments!
d.)Will never stop talking, which is why I am blogging.
e.)He is still TALKING.
a.) good! taking notes is awesome with typing ability.
b.) good! can ignore people who are asking boring questions by blogging.
c.) bad! blogging during class bad!
2.) Thoughts in worship:
a.)"It can be hard to tell the difference between a stomach ache and a message."
b.)"I think I have both."
c.)"Meeting is too chatty to tell for sure."
3.)Oh my crap:
a.)Most boring guy in last semester's class who asked the most inane questions is here!
b.)Asking the same questions again!
c.)And making the same inane comments!
d.)Will never stop talking, which is why I am blogging.
e.)He is still TALKING.
Thursday, January 25, 2007
Some poems to take into worship
1.
Inside this new love, die.
Your way begins on the other side.
Become the sky.
Take an axe to the prison wall.
Escape. Walk out
like someone suddenly born into color.
Do it now.
You are covered with think cloud.
Slide out the side.
Die,
and be quiet.
Quietness is the surest
sign that you've died.
Your old life was a frantic running
from silence.
The speechless full moon comes out now.
2.
There is a way between voice and presence
where information flows.
In disciplied silence it opens.
With wandering talk it closes.
3.
The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you.
Don't go back to sleep.
You must ask for what you truly want.
Dont go back to sleep.
People are going back and forth across the doorsill.
where the two worlds touch.
The door is round and open.
Don't go back to sleep.
~Rumi
Trans. Coleman Barks.
Inside this new love, die.
Your way begins on the other side.
Become the sky.
Take an axe to the prison wall.
Escape. Walk out
like someone suddenly born into color.
Do it now.
You are covered with think cloud.
Slide out the side.
Die,
and be quiet.
Quietness is the surest
sign that you've died.
Your old life was a frantic running
from silence.
The speechless full moon comes out now.
2.
There is a way between voice and presence
where information flows.
In disciplied silence it opens.
With wandering talk it closes.
3.
The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you.
Don't go back to sleep.
You must ask for what you truly want.
Dont go back to sleep.
People are going back and forth across the doorsill.
where the two worlds touch.
The door is round and open.
Don't go back to sleep.
~Rumi
Trans. Coleman Barks.
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Borderlines
I am being all skittery about changing to the new google blogger. Darn all these ongoing innovations.
It's interesting times here. Trying to get a grip on the monster final paper due tomorrow. I also just realized we're supposed to go out for drinks when we hand it in, but I'm down the dregs of the bank account. Poop. I am working on fixing up my financial life so that I don't spend so much of my mental area chanting almostfridayalmostfridayalmostfridayalmostfridaaaaay... though I've been financially independent (oh, so very different from independently wealthy) for six or so years now, I still generally end the pay cycle with -3.98 plus -58.00 bank fees. Eeep! Enough! I need to work my way past my financial puberty and become some kind of fiscal grown-up. I'm also trying to tidy up some messes left behind with ancient unpaid medical and cell phone bills and other things that make for ugly credit. And trying to get one of those “build your credit” credit cards without a billion dollar annual fee. Yawn! Why am I still typing about this? I bore myself. Ick.
I went to my first business meeting at the "new" meeting (the one I've been attending for 18 months and living at for 12? Yes. That new meeting) It was pretty powerful and I've resolved to go more often. Several long-long term weighty attenders applied for membership this round, which made me feel like less of a waffler. Other people wait a long time to join, too! Nyah! Ahh, defensiveness.
The "thereness" of my spiritual life waxes and wanes with my moods. I am still battling chronic depression, but I'm well armed this time with therapist and other helpers. Okay, lots of unquakerly word choices there. But it gets the point across. A lot of the time it is a battle, with all the weariness and bloodiness the word implies, but hopefully, in the end, with a much more positive outcome. It is kind of depressing, how much energy it takes to be depressed. Or, rather, to try not to be depressed. Sometimes I think that if I didn’t have to spend most of my time managing my mood, I would make a million dollars and take over the world. Le sigh.
I've been spending a lot of time sinking into a search for the core of my spirituality…sort of plumbing the depths to see what’s in there, what’s solid. I am always sort of doing this, but recent events have driven me to a deeper, more methodical exploration. As usual, I’m not entirely sure what I am coming up with, but I am getting an idea.
Christmas was a very hard time. I was physically depleted by a violent attack of viral gastroenteritis that left me sniveling and shaking on the bathroom floor and delaying my flight to NC. There was also had a big emotional and spiritual purge that left me feeling similarly drained and shaky: my parents, who love me very much, informed me that any hypothetical Quaker wedding of mine with my dear, Queer friends invited will be unattended by the family.
Which, while still hypothetical, is really, really sad. It has been hard to work through the initial shock and grief into a better place of spiritual adulthood (not that I am there, yet.) It left me feeling a bit orphaned, though I know my family meant nothing of the kind. But I guess a line was finally drawn, a wall was finally raised, and in the end, I found myself standing outside.
It is a perplexing reality that my parents and I are standing on opposite sides of the same Bible verse:
Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me
and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me.
with both parties feeling a little bit crucified. I cannot deny the truth I feel is revealed in my heart without being unfaithful to my revelation of Christ. My parents cannot deny the truth they feel is revealed by the Church without being unfaithful to their revelation of Christ. I can feel their pain because I'm sharing it, but through the looking-glass.
Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.
For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother...
What does this even mean? I've always struggled with this text, but unlike other trying verses, I've never been able to properly discard it. Obviously a loving God can gain no satisfaction from family strife. In a sanctified world, there would be none.
I know I am growing, in many ways, because of this separation, and I know that is good, and holy. But what a price.
And it is a separation. Even though we are still communicating with love, and still trying to be there for each other in all tenderness, there is a breach. There is a tear. There is a wound.
When the news hit, the first warning that my heart gave me was the extreme importance of not snapping up a martyr role. (Woe is me, as I suffer for my faith!) The second was to examine my soul and make certain that I was sure. Sure of what?
Of my conviction that I have found a true and fruitful spiritual home outside of the Catholic church, one which is founded on solid ground, no matter how fragile my day-to-day practice. Of my conviction that God blesses each and every relationship founded on openness, generosity, and deep love, that the fruits of love are holy, and that all true love is sacred in the eyes of God, without regard to exterior gender or preference.
And the answer is, I am sure.
I am ashamed, in a way, that it has taken me this long to post that. I have hidden much of my own declaration of faith, especially the part about the equality of same-sex relationships, out of fear of rejection and outright condemnation from my family. I have not denied, but I have not affirmed.
I am blessed that my family does not reject me or condemn me outright. Their love for me is strong, and I have great faith in that love to keep our relationship intact over these walls and these seeming chasms of difference in faith. Their courage in drawing the line as lovingly as they can has lent me the courage to examine and declare where I stand. In my deepest heart, I wish that this were a simple matter of difference of opinion, as I had hoped it might be. I would give up my attachment to a great many opinions for the sake of my family, and I think they would do the same for me. But in the end, this is not a difference of opinion, but a difference of conviction.
Please pray for us all, friends.
It's interesting times here. Trying to get a grip on the monster final paper due tomorrow. I also just realized we're supposed to go out for drinks when we hand it in, but I'm down the dregs of the bank account. Poop. I am working on fixing up my financial life so that I don't spend so much of my mental area chanting almostfridayalmostfridayalmostfridayalmostfridaaaaay... though I've been financially independent (oh, so very different from independently wealthy) for six or so years now, I still generally end the pay cycle with -3.98 plus -58.00 bank fees. Eeep! Enough! I need to work my way past my financial puberty and become some kind of fiscal grown-up. I'm also trying to tidy up some messes left behind with ancient unpaid medical and cell phone bills and other things that make for ugly credit. And trying to get one of those “build your credit” credit cards without a billion dollar annual fee. Yawn! Why am I still typing about this? I bore myself. Ick.
I went to my first business meeting at the "new" meeting (the one I've been attending for 18 months and living at for 12? Yes. That new meeting) It was pretty powerful and I've resolved to go more often. Several long-long term weighty attenders applied for membership this round, which made me feel like less of a waffler. Other people wait a long time to join, too! Nyah! Ahh, defensiveness.
The "thereness" of my spiritual life waxes and wanes with my moods. I am still battling chronic depression, but I'm well armed this time with therapist and other helpers. Okay, lots of unquakerly word choices there. But it gets the point across. A lot of the time it is a battle, with all the weariness and bloodiness the word implies, but hopefully, in the end, with a much more positive outcome. It is kind of depressing, how much energy it takes to be depressed. Or, rather, to try not to be depressed. Sometimes I think that if I didn’t have to spend most of my time managing my mood, I would make a million dollars and take over the world. Le sigh.
I've been spending a lot of time sinking into a search for the core of my spirituality…sort of plumbing the depths to see what’s in there, what’s solid. I am always sort of doing this, but recent events have driven me to a deeper, more methodical exploration. As usual, I’m not entirely sure what I am coming up with, but I am getting an idea.
Christmas was a very hard time. I was physically depleted by a violent attack of viral gastroenteritis that left me sniveling and shaking on the bathroom floor and delaying my flight to NC. There was also had a big emotional and spiritual purge that left me feeling similarly drained and shaky: my parents, who love me very much, informed me that any hypothetical Quaker wedding of mine with my dear, Queer friends invited will be unattended by the family.
Which, while still hypothetical, is really, really sad. It has been hard to work through the initial shock and grief into a better place of spiritual adulthood (not that I am there, yet.) It left me feeling a bit orphaned, though I know my family meant nothing of the kind. But I guess a line was finally drawn, a wall was finally raised, and in the end, I found myself standing outside.
It is a perplexing reality that my parents and I are standing on opposite sides of the same Bible verse:
Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me
and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me.
with both parties feeling a little bit crucified. I cannot deny the truth I feel is revealed in my heart without being unfaithful to my revelation of Christ. My parents cannot deny the truth they feel is revealed by the Church without being unfaithful to their revelation of Christ. I can feel their pain because I'm sharing it, but through the looking-glass.
Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.
For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother...
What does this even mean? I've always struggled with this text, but unlike other trying verses, I've never been able to properly discard it. Obviously a loving God can gain no satisfaction from family strife. In a sanctified world, there would be none.
I know I am growing, in many ways, because of this separation, and I know that is good, and holy. But what a price.
And it is a separation. Even though we are still communicating with love, and still trying to be there for each other in all tenderness, there is a breach. There is a tear. There is a wound.
When the news hit, the first warning that my heart gave me was the extreme importance of not snapping up a martyr role. (Woe is me, as I suffer for my faith!) The second was to examine my soul and make certain that I was sure. Sure of what?
Of my conviction that I have found a true and fruitful spiritual home outside of the Catholic church, one which is founded on solid ground, no matter how fragile my day-to-day practice. Of my conviction that God blesses each and every relationship founded on openness, generosity, and deep love, that the fruits of love are holy, and that all true love is sacred in the eyes of God, without regard to exterior gender or preference.
And the answer is, I am sure.
I am ashamed, in a way, that it has taken me this long to post that. I have hidden much of my own declaration of faith, especially the part about the equality of same-sex relationships, out of fear of rejection and outright condemnation from my family. I have not denied, but I have not affirmed.
I am blessed that my family does not reject me or condemn me outright. Their love for me is strong, and I have great faith in that love to keep our relationship intact over these walls and these seeming chasms of difference in faith. Their courage in drawing the line as lovingly as they can has lent me the courage to examine and declare where I stand. In my deepest heart, I wish that this were a simple matter of difference of opinion, as I had hoped it might be. I would give up my attachment to a great many opinions for the sake of my family, and I think they would do the same for me. But in the end, this is not a difference of opinion, but a difference of conviction.
Please pray for us all, friends.
Wednesday, December 27, 2006
Thoughts on John 14 in times of Loneliness
"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me.
In my Father's house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?
And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.
And you know the place where I am going...
I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you.
In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live you also will live.
On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me and I in you...
I have said these things to you while I am still with you
But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all I have said to you.
Peace I leave with you, my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid...
In my Father's house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?
And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.
And you know the place where I am going...
I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you.
In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live you also will live.
On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me and I in you...
I have said these things to you while I am still with you
But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all I have said to you.
Peace I leave with you, my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid...
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Oh Happy Day
Two years ago, after coming home from a champagne birthday celebration with two of my dearest friends, I opened my email, slighly tipsy and feeling warm and loved, to an email from a mysterious gentleman who said:
"I pulled your e-mail address off a comment that you left on the Quaker Ranter – hope
you don't mind! (I'm not a stalker, just a resourceful former journalist.)"
And then said a whole bunch of funny, balanced, and perceptive stuff about plain dress. And then emailed me nearly a hundred more funny, balanced, and perceptive notes. He lived in MA, and I was cosily tucked into NY. And then he came to NYC to fall headfirst into a caravan of my silliness, survived my attempts not to kiss him (I was DONE. WITH. BOYS.) and had me head over heels in love with him before he had to get on the next chinatown bus home. We took pictures, I cried, he got on the bus. And we emailed more. We talked on the phone late into the night, and often ended with periods of silent worship, faint rustling and powerful feeling coming over the line as we each sat and pressed our cell-phones to the sides of our bent heads.
Then a job came and I moved to Cambridge to be with him and to seek my fortune and my degree. In the past two years he has seen me through a tedious and wrenching legal process, a nervous breakdown, and countless tantrums and crises of faith (often the two are conflated.) He has prayed with me and joked with me and comforted me and challenged me. We have travelled together and watched bad 80s TV together. He has lent me his Pug and his unique point of view. We have brewed beer, drunk beer, and read about how to make better beer. He makes the most ridiculous silly noises and the most annoying silly characters. He is tolerant when I forget everything and remembers everything I forget. Also, he is adorable.
He's the best, and he loves me.
He was the best birthday present ever. I love you Jeff!
"Two are better than one; because they have a good reward for their labor.
For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow: but woe unto him that is alone when he falleth; for he hath not another to help him up."
--Ecclesiastes 4:9-10.
PS: I wrote this post two days ago and tried to post-date it for Dec. 15th, my birthday, but it didn't work. grr.
"I pulled your e-mail address off a comment that you left on the Quaker Ranter – hope
you don't mind! (I'm not a stalker, just a resourceful former journalist.)"
And then said a whole bunch of funny, balanced, and perceptive stuff about plain dress. And then emailed me nearly a hundred more funny, balanced, and perceptive notes. He lived in MA, and I was cosily tucked into NY. And then he came to NYC to fall headfirst into a caravan of my silliness, survived my attempts not to kiss him (I was DONE. WITH. BOYS.) and had me head over heels in love with him before he had to get on the next chinatown bus home. We took pictures, I cried, he got on the bus. And we emailed more. We talked on the phone late into the night, and often ended with periods of silent worship, faint rustling and powerful feeling coming over the line as we each sat and pressed our cell-phones to the sides of our bent heads.
Then a job came and I moved to Cambridge to be with him and to seek my fortune and my degree. In the past two years he has seen me through a tedious and wrenching legal process, a nervous breakdown, and countless tantrums and crises of faith (often the two are conflated.) He has prayed with me and joked with me and comforted me and challenged me. We have travelled together and watched bad 80s TV together. He has lent me his Pug and his unique point of view. We have brewed beer, drunk beer, and read about how to make better beer. He makes the most ridiculous silly noises and the most annoying silly characters. He is tolerant when I forget everything and remembers everything I forget. Also, he is adorable.
He's the best, and he loves me.
He was the best birthday present ever. I love you Jeff!
"Two are better than one; because they have a good reward for their labor.
For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow: but woe unto him that is alone when he falleth; for he hath not another to help him up."
--Ecclesiastes 4:9-10.
PS: I wrote this post two days ago and tried to post-date it for Dec. 15th, my birthday, but it didn't work. grr.
Monday, December 11, 2006
I do believe
the most of me
floats under water.
And men see
above the wave,
a jagged, small
mountain of ice
and that is all.
Only the depths
of other peaks -
may know my substance
when it speaks
and steadfast
through the grinding jam
remain aware of what I am.
Myself I think
shall never know -
how far beneath the wave I go.
~Edna St. Vincent Millay
the most of me
floats under water.
And men see
above the wave,
a jagged, small
mountain of ice
and that is all.
Only the depths
of other peaks -
may know my substance
when it speaks
and steadfast
through the grinding jam
remain aware of what I am.
Myself I think
shall never know -
how far beneath the wave I go.
~Edna St. Vincent Millay
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
Winter Trees
All the complicated details
of the attiring and
the disattiring are completed!
A liquid moon
moves gently among
the long branches.
Thus having prepared their buds
against a sure winter
the wise trees
stand sleeping in the cold.
~William Carlos Williams
of the attiring and
the disattiring are completed!
A liquid moon
moves gently among
the long branches.
Thus having prepared their buds
against a sure winter
the wise trees
stand sleeping in the cold.
~William Carlos Williams
Belated Bloggiversary to me!
I have posts brewing, but in the meantime I just wanted to say Holy Cow! Two years!
And I am still kind of here. :)
And I am still kind of here. :)
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
A Very Long and True Sentence.
"All that each person is, and experiences, and shall ever experience, in body and in mind, all these things are differing expressions of himself and of one root, and are identical: and not one of these things nor one of these persons is ever quite to be duplicated, nor replaced, nor has it ever quite had precedent: but each is a new and incommunicably tender life, wounded in every breath, and almost as hardly killed as easily wounded: sustaining, for a while, without defence, the enormous assaults of the universe."
~James Agee
In other news, I crashed my bike again last night but got away with only an acre of immensely stinging road-rash and a pumpkin-sized bruise. (bah!) Everything hurts, but not in a for-12-weeks way. Also I need to write a response paper. Also the semester is almost over and how did that happen? Also things are still as tough as always (maybe recently a bit tougher) and I still need prayers.
~James Agee
In other news, I crashed my bike again last night but got away with only an acre of immensely stinging road-rash and a pumpkin-sized bruise. (bah!) Everything hurts, but not in a for-12-weeks way. Also I need to write a response paper. Also the semester is almost over and how did that happen? Also things are still as tough as always (maybe recently a bit tougher) and I still need prayers.
Wednesday, November 15, 2006
The more often you say "doom" the less it sounds like a word.
So, maybe it is the weather or the season or the sleep deprivation, or the fact that many people are dying these days, but I've been suffering with a mundane but sticky case of existential horror. I was hauling a half-dozen water-logged barrels of dead leaves to the curb, and thought, "gee, why can't leaves be more durable? How come the tree needs to lose them and regrow them every year, and I have to rake them up every year? Inefficient! Grr."
Then in meeting, whenever I closed my eyes I was filled with images of everyone I love eventually dying, and their precious bodies turning to dust. And then I looked around the meeting room, and saw everybody there turning to dust. And then I watched a documentary about the 80's club scene in New York, and almost everyone featured in the movie was dead from some combination of drugs and AIDS. And then I was in my 100-student strong psychology class, and realized, "in less than 80 years, everyone in this room will be dead." Then I went home and read some bible out loud to my walls, including the part where God is solidly cursing Adam "you are dirt, and to the dirt you shall return." And I thought, what a waste. And then I realized that it's not exactly a waste, since all these someday-to-be-dead people are loving, reproducing, producing, etc, but then I thought well, what extravagance then. Imagine buying a new car each morning, driving it to work and back, and then sending it off that evening to the junkyard to be scrapped for metal for a new car. Imagine a whole new set of people every generation.
But I figure if God can afford it, then that's cool.
"We owe something to extravagance, for thrift and adventure seldom go hand in hand."
Jennie Jerome Churchill
ETA: I sound like a total materialist in this post and I don't necessarily mean that, but I haven't got any coherent information about the afterlife, so I'm just talking about the here and now and the dying part. I also mean this post in sort of a "woah" sense rather than a doom sense. Doom. Doom Doom.
Then in meeting, whenever I closed my eyes I was filled with images of everyone I love eventually dying, and their precious bodies turning to dust. And then I looked around the meeting room, and saw everybody there turning to dust. And then I watched a documentary about the 80's club scene in New York, and almost everyone featured in the movie was dead from some combination of drugs and AIDS. And then I was in my 100-student strong psychology class, and realized, "in less than 80 years, everyone in this room will be dead." Then I went home and read some bible out loud to my walls, including the part where God is solidly cursing Adam "you are dirt, and to the dirt you shall return." And I thought, what a waste. And then I realized that it's not exactly a waste, since all these someday-to-be-dead people are loving, reproducing, producing, etc, but then I thought well, what extravagance then. Imagine buying a new car each morning, driving it to work and back, and then sending it off that evening to the junkyard to be scrapped for metal for a new car. Imagine a whole new set of people every generation.
But I figure if God can afford it, then that's cool.
"We owe something to extravagance, for thrift and adventure seldom go hand in hand."
Jennie Jerome Churchill
ETA: I sound like a total materialist in this post and I don't necessarily mean that, but I haven't got any coherent information about the afterlife, so I'm just talking about the here and now and the dying part. I also mean this post in sort of a "woah" sense rather than a doom sense. Doom. Doom Doom.
Monday, November 13, 2006
Speaking of doom,
I am sitting here shuddering at the Monday before me. I'm much luckier than most, I don't have to face Mondays until lunchtime. But still. It always seems like you are going to go into work and find that the world has fallen down over the weekend. Eek!
Enough whining. I did have a very good weekend. Friday night I went to my friend Holly's house and we cooked a pseudo-thanksgiving dinner, and it was delicious. So was the company and conversation. On Saturday I went out and had lunch and a movie with another friend, and then window-shopped and toddled around the Square not doing much of anything until it was time for my hair-cut. It was kind of an expensive hair-cut, but it should last a while, and I like it. Then Jeff came home and there was much rejoicing. His mom is doing much better but still has a long road of recovery and enforced rest ahead. On Sunday we went to Fresh Pond meeting and were pleasantly suprised to see some of our friends were visiting there, too. It was a strange meeting for me, with a lot of fearful thoughts about death and decay that I was unable to banish, but I came out of it with a job: to read the whole bible to myself, out loud. This should be interesting. Perhaps I will be released from it before I get to Leviticus. Eek again. Then we biked back to Cambridge in the freezing rain, which was equal parts exhilarating and unpleasant, and Jeff went to business meeting while I went to bed. Bad Quaker!
Oh, Monday. Why must you have so much week ahead of you?
Enough whining. I did have a very good weekend. Friday night I went to my friend Holly's house and we cooked a pseudo-thanksgiving dinner, and it was delicious. So was the company and conversation. On Saturday I went out and had lunch and a movie with another friend, and then window-shopped and toddled around the Square not doing much of anything until it was time for my hair-cut. It was kind of an expensive hair-cut, but it should last a while, and I like it. Then Jeff came home and there was much rejoicing. His mom is doing much better but still has a long road of recovery and enforced rest ahead. On Sunday we went to Fresh Pond meeting and were pleasantly suprised to see some of our friends were visiting there, too. It was a strange meeting for me, with a lot of fearful thoughts about death and decay that I was unable to banish, but I came out of it with a job: to read the whole bible to myself, out loud. This should be interesting. Perhaps I will be released from it before I get to Leviticus. Eek again. Then we biked back to Cambridge in the freezing rain, which was equal parts exhilarating and unpleasant, and Jeff went to business meeting while I went to bed. Bad Quaker!
Oh, Monday. Why must you have so much week ahead of you?
Thursday, November 09, 2006
less doom
more cooking. I just found this blog and I am charmed and itching to make something:
http://seriouslygood.kdweeks.com/index.html
it is a little heavy on the meat for a grass and cheese eater like me, but I still really like it.
Also, more laughing. This little dude had my sides aching with sympathy. I love him!
http://seriouslygood.kdweeks.com/index.html
it is a little heavy on the meat for a grass and cheese eater like me, but I still really like it.
Also, more laughing. This little dude had my sides aching with sympathy. I love him!
my gosh
This blogging comes in spurts, doesn't it?
I'm on a couch with Jeff's pug. Jeff's mom is in the hospital, and so he's taken off or Texas to be with his family. As of the last report, things are improving, but still serious. Pray, please.
The pug is very happy for any company. He's here, sharing my lap with the iBook, dribbling on my arm and the keyboard in turns.
Last night Jeff and I went to the apple store to get a new computer that would better serve his burgeoning design and layout skillz. That means I get to inherit the old laptop, on an installment plan, even. Once this mac-baby is mine I will be so cool I won't even know myself. Ah, sweet consumerism.
(I kid, I kid. Even my computer will be second-hand. My shoes leak! I ride my bike everywhere? What do you want from me?! :) )
I've been thinking a lot about paralysis. There are times when I cannot rouse myself to do a single thing. There are other times, only marginally better, when I can only rouse myself to put on the outside trappings of life, and stumble through the day, week, month, waiting for something else to start, for some spout of energy to get me through. I coast, for shameful amounts of time. I hibernate, if only internally. I cocoon, but without any promise of metamorphosis. Sometimes I feel like I'm parked on the side of the freeway in the driving rain, watching cars shoot by, unsure if I can make it back into a lane, unsure of my courage to try, unsure if my car would even start if I tried. I hate freeways, and I can't drive, but it's a good metaphor.
Sometimes my whole life is like this, with only my close relationships spared. Work, school, daily eating/walking/breathing/doing can all pass in a blur, and the only time I feel anchored and present is when I am engaging one-on-one. I'm trying to branch out in my Quakerism, trying not to be a Quaker-In-A-Can, but I freeze at the thought of the expectations any group involvement might require of me. It's not that I fear committee work or community involvement per se, it just seems like I'd be adding a new group of people to let down, and there are times (too many times) that I can't avoid that letting-down. When it is just me and a friend, interacting, talking, sharing a beer, knitting scarves, I can be true, I can be real, I can be present, and sometimes I can even be on time.
The mantra my therapist sent me off with last week was "it's okay to make mistakes", and I am really struggling with that one. It is okay to put too much baking powder in the muffins. It is okay to put a red facecloth with the white sheets. It's alright if you overdraw your bank account by $3.58. But there are so many possible mistakes.
My mother quoted my grandfather: "Once is a mistake, Twice is stupidity." I guess my mind has always translated that as "if you can see ahead, if you have experience, and you still screw up, The End." Add to that a fear of outrunning one's guide, of assuming anything, of 'writing checks your ass can't cash' . . .
I know I am babbling, but sometimes it feels as if that's the best blogging for me. I'm so afraid most of the time. There are mistakes, and there are consequences for those mistakes. Hearts, minds, fortunes, lives, souls, happiness, futures . . . so much hangs in the balance. I could be careful, or I could be a coward, I'm never sure.
Encourage the exhausted, and strengthen the feeble.
Say to those with anxious heart,
"Take courage, fear not.
Behold, your God will come with vengeance;
The recompense of God will come,
But He will save you."
Then the eyes of the blind will be opened
And the ears of the deaf will be unstopped.
Then the lame will leap like a deer,
And the tongue of the mute will shout for joy.
For waters will break forth in the wilderness
And streams in the Arabah.
The scorched land will become a pool
And the thirsty ground springs of water;
In the haunt of jackals, its resting place,
Grass becomes reeds and rushes.
A highway will be there, a roadway,
And it will be called the Highway of Holiness.
The unclean will not travel on it,
But it will be for him who walks that way,
And fools will not wander on it.
No lion will be there,
Nor will any vicious beast go up on it;
These will not be found there.
But the redeemed will walk there,
And the ransomed of the LORD will return
And come with joyful shouting to Zion,
With everlasting joy upon their heads.
They will find gladness and joy,
And sorrow and sighing will flee away.
Isaiah 35:3-10
I'm on a couch with Jeff's pug. Jeff's mom is in the hospital, and so he's taken off or Texas to be with his family. As of the last report, things are improving, but still serious. Pray, please.
The pug is very happy for any company. He's here, sharing my lap with the iBook, dribbling on my arm and the keyboard in turns.
Last night Jeff and I went to the apple store to get a new computer that would better serve his burgeoning design and layout skillz. That means I get to inherit the old laptop, on an installment plan, even. Once this mac-baby is mine I will be so cool I won't even know myself. Ah, sweet consumerism.
(I kid, I kid. Even my computer will be second-hand. My shoes leak! I ride my bike everywhere? What do you want from me?! :) )
I've been thinking a lot about paralysis. There are times when I cannot rouse myself to do a single thing. There are other times, only marginally better, when I can only rouse myself to put on the outside trappings of life, and stumble through the day, week, month, waiting for something else to start, for some spout of energy to get me through. I coast, for shameful amounts of time. I hibernate, if only internally. I cocoon, but without any promise of metamorphosis. Sometimes I feel like I'm parked on the side of the freeway in the driving rain, watching cars shoot by, unsure if I can make it back into a lane, unsure of my courage to try, unsure if my car would even start if I tried. I hate freeways, and I can't drive, but it's a good metaphor.
Sometimes my whole life is like this, with only my close relationships spared. Work, school, daily eating/walking/breathing/doing can all pass in a blur, and the only time I feel anchored and present is when I am engaging one-on-one. I'm trying to branch out in my Quakerism, trying not to be a Quaker-In-A-Can, but I freeze at the thought of the expectations any group involvement might require of me. It's not that I fear committee work or community involvement per se, it just seems like I'd be adding a new group of people to let down, and there are times (too many times) that I can't avoid that letting-down. When it is just me and a friend, interacting, talking, sharing a beer, knitting scarves, I can be true, I can be real, I can be present, and sometimes I can even be on time.
The mantra my therapist sent me off with last week was "it's okay to make mistakes", and I am really struggling with that one. It is okay to put too much baking powder in the muffins. It is okay to put a red facecloth with the white sheets. It's alright if you overdraw your bank account by $3.58. But there are so many possible mistakes.
My mother quoted my grandfather: "Once is a mistake, Twice is stupidity." I guess my mind has always translated that as "if you can see ahead, if you have experience, and you still screw up, The End." Add to that a fear of outrunning one's guide, of assuming anything, of 'writing checks your ass can't cash' . . .
I know I am babbling, but sometimes it feels as if that's the best blogging for me. I'm so afraid most of the time. There are mistakes, and there are consequences for those mistakes. Hearts, minds, fortunes, lives, souls, happiness, futures . . . so much hangs in the balance. I could be careful, or I could be a coward, I'm never sure.
Encourage the exhausted, and strengthen the feeble.
Say to those with anxious heart,
"Take courage, fear not.
Behold, your God will come with vengeance;
The recompense of God will come,
But He will save you."
Then the eyes of the blind will be opened
And the ears of the deaf will be unstopped.
Then the lame will leap like a deer,
And the tongue of the mute will shout for joy.
For waters will break forth in the wilderness
And streams in the Arabah.
The scorched land will become a pool
And the thirsty ground springs of water;
In the haunt of jackals, its resting place,
Grass becomes reeds and rushes.
A highway will be there, a roadway,
And it will be called the Highway of Holiness.
The unclean will not travel on it,
But it will be for him who walks that way,
And fools will not wander on it.
No lion will be there,
Nor will any vicious beast go up on it;
These will not be found there.
But the redeemed will walk there,
And the ransomed of the LORD will return
And come with joyful shouting to Zion,
With everlasting joy upon their heads.
They will find gladness and joy,
And sorrow and sighing will flee away.
Isaiah 35:3-10
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
Okay, nifty!
So, this is just a Meme, but it's a pretty good one. I wasn't tagged, I just grabbed it off another blog because it appealed to me:
1. Grab the nearest book. If you are currently reading something, that'll be fine too.
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the next 4 sentences on your Blog along with these instructions.
5. Don't you dare dig for that "cool" or "intellectual" book in your closet I know that is what you were thinking!
6. Tag 5 people
Here is mine:
"And so, late last week, on the advice of his professors, he had packed up and left St. Louis. They had advised him to go home and look for a job that would not tax his moral sensibilities and maybe next fall he could resume his studies. They told him if he could learn not to be quite so hard on himself and on the rest of humanity, if he could learn to relax, then he would be free to develop into one of the most brilliant ministers that the seminary had yet produced. They said they'd pray for him"
--from Grand Opening by John Hassler
I've spent this week having conversations about seminaries (no, I'm not thinking of going!) and ministries, and praying, and being able to deal with jobs, and being hard on oneself. I am reading this random novel I bought at a book sale for 25 cents, and I haven't even decided if it is any good yet, but this snippet is pretty interesting, given all that.
As far as tagging people goes, that always feels wierd to me, (is it the chain-letter thing, or the popularity contest thing?) so I'll just say, do it if you want to, and let me know where to find the results.
1. Grab the nearest book. If you are currently reading something, that'll be fine too.
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the next 4 sentences on your Blog along with these instructions.
5. Don't you dare dig for that "cool" or "intellectual" book in your closet I know that is what you were thinking!
6. Tag 5 people
Here is mine:
"And so, late last week, on the advice of his professors, he had packed up and left St. Louis. They had advised him to go home and look for a job that would not tax his moral sensibilities and maybe next fall he could resume his studies. They told him if he could learn not to be quite so hard on himself and on the rest of humanity, if he could learn to relax, then he would be free to develop into one of the most brilliant ministers that the seminary had yet produced. They said they'd pray for him"
--from Grand Opening by John Hassler
I've spent this week having conversations about seminaries (no, I'm not thinking of going!) and ministries, and praying, and being able to deal with jobs, and being hard on oneself. I am reading this random novel I bought at a book sale for 25 cents, and I haven't even decided if it is any good yet, but this snippet is pretty interesting, given all that.
As far as tagging people goes, that always feels wierd to me, (is it the chain-letter thing, or the popularity contest thing?) so I'll just say, do it if you want to, and let me know where to find the results.
Thursday, November 02, 2006
Blogless in Cambridge
School and work have conspired with volunteering and exhaustion to just about kill every ounce of blogger-urge I once posessed. Every now and again, I'll have a thought creep in and I'll start mentally composing a blog post. This often happens, uh, in meeting for worship, when a message will stir but not rise up, or rises up, but the room is already too full of words. But I don't follow through, and the idea or message passes. This may be for the best, anyway.
Things were tough here in Amanda-land for a while, emotionally and mentally, but most of the bits seem to be sticking back together. I think maybe the anticipation of spilling my guts in a weekly therapy session has also curbed some of the confessional impulses I used to indulge in with the blog.
The best thing I have going on these days is volunteering with a healthcare for the homeless program at a veteran's shelter. My responsibilities are minor--I'm mostly just cleaning up the occasional bit of pee and taking vital signs, and filling basins for the weekly foot-clinic soaks, but on a selfish level, it feels like a tangible step towards medical school, and on a deeper level, it's humbling and grounding to work with these men who have given so much and gotten so little in return. For the most part there is only occasional bitterness, and disproportionate gratitude for the little services we can offer. Here's a bandaid, here's some antifungal powder, here's some socks. Have a cough-drop. Almost every single man I've come across there has a powerful sense of humour, and the friendships that seem to exist between most of them are fully of lightness and in-jokes. I feel strange whenever I try to write about it, because the homeless are so consistently sentimentalized, and there's a lot at the shelter that is bleak and painful. At first, I was a little embarassed to make conversation with the clients. (that's most of the reason I'm there: to set up the clinic and then stay with the men and talk to them while they soak their feet) It's gotten easier as I get to know the regulars, and the things we have in common, like halloween, can lead to fascinating stories of pranks and costumes past. Other subjects can get sticky in ways you never expected. When they find out that I want to be a doctor, there are lots of jokes about me getting rich and forgetting them. If I mention off hand that it's cold outside, I can be sobered by tales of being homeless in January and losing toes to frostbite. These moments, where the distance between us is underlined (namely, my relative privilege, youth, opportunity and wealth) are generally brief, but leave me sheepish and speechless.
But I always feel human and connected at the clinic. When struggling with depression, or even just the esoteric demands of homework, those feelings can sometimes be in short supply. I am glad I'm getting to do this.
I guess that's all for now.
Things were tough here in Amanda-land for a while, emotionally and mentally, but most of the bits seem to be sticking back together. I think maybe the anticipation of spilling my guts in a weekly therapy session has also curbed some of the confessional impulses I used to indulge in with the blog.
The best thing I have going on these days is volunteering with a healthcare for the homeless program at a veteran's shelter. My responsibilities are minor--I'm mostly just cleaning up the occasional bit of pee and taking vital signs, and filling basins for the weekly foot-clinic soaks, but on a selfish level, it feels like a tangible step towards medical school, and on a deeper level, it's humbling and grounding to work with these men who have given so much and gotten so little in return. For the most part there is only occasional bitterness, and disproportionate gratitude for the little services we can offer. Here's a bandaid, here's some antifungal powder, here's some socks. Have a cough-drop. Almost every single man I've come across there has a powerful sense of humour, and the friendships that seem to exist between most of them are fully of lightness and in-jokes. I feel strange whenever I try to write about it, because the homeless are so consistently sentimentalized, and there's a lot at the shelter that is bleak and painful. At first, I was a little embarassed to make conversation with the clients. (that's most of the reason I'm there: to set up the clinic and then stay with the men and talk to them while they soak their feet) It's gotten easier as I get to know the regulars, and the things we have in common, like halloween, can lead to fascinating stories of pranks and costumes past. Other subjects can get sticky in ways you never expected. When they find out that I want to be a doctor, there are lots of jokes about me getting rich and forgetting them. If I mention off hand that it's cold outside, I can be sobered by tales of being homeless in January and losing toes to frostbite. These moments, where the distance between us is underlined (namely, my relative privilege, youth, opportunity and wealth) are generally brief, but leave me sheepish and speechless.
But I always feel human and connected at the clinic. When struggling with depression, or even just the esoteric demands of homework, those feelings can sometimes be in short supply. I am glad I'm getting to do this.
I guess that's all for now.
Tuesday, October 03, 2006
Home
The Journey
by Mary Oliver
One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice--
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do--
determined to save
the only life you could save.
Mobtown sent me this poem in an email, which I know, but have never really owned before. I am back from the last leg of the harrowing journey to put an offical end to a terrible, hateful, grief-filled chapter in my life. Another thirty days before the weight lifts all the way off my shoulders but I'll never have to pass through this particular tunnel again. Now I can settle down to the task of rebuilding that I've already been at (with amazing amounts of support) for several years.
Amen!
by Mary Oliver
One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice--
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do--
determined to save
the only life you could save.
Mobtown sent me this poem in an email, which I know, but have never really owned before. I am back from the last leg of the harrowing journey to put an offical end to a terrible, hateful, grief-filled chapter in my life. Another thirty days before the weight lifts all the way off my shoulders but I'll never have to pass through this particular tunnel again. Now I can settle down to the task of rebuilding that I've already been at (with amazing amounts of support) for several years.
Amen!
Monday, October 02, 2006
Today was filled with unexpected blessings. Alone in a strange city, I was dismayed to find that I couldn't get to Meeting as I had planned--the train does not wake up until eleven in the morning on Sundays. I sulked in the lobby over lukewarm vending-machine coffee and a syrupy blueberry muffin, annoyed that I'd turned in my room key too quickly. But dear Mr. Mobtown Blues, whose blog is a favourite, still managed to make conact, and I was treated to a drive around Baltimore . . . it is a lovely city, and I found myself unable to harbour hard feelings against it despite the unpleasantness of my errand. Mobtown and his wife, the lovely Meerkat, took me to brunch in a colourful and funky cafe full of prints and paintings of the Last Supper and skinny hipster waiters with braids and messenger caps. We talked about Meetings and music and starvation over plates heaped with lox and fried dough. I talked a lot, and they listened a lot, and they had a lot to share. Meeting Friends in such a sweet and unexpected way warmed me to the core. I'd gone to bed expecting a few cold days of unrelenting dreariness, but woke up to find friendship and sunshine. It was a beautiful day here too, the sun was warm, and there was a steady, cool, clear wind. I got to listen to a tape of Shape Note Singing for the first time, and in that abbreviated taste of the sacred music I could already hear the space it contained for heartbreak and hope: music into which one may empty an overburdened heart.
After I took my leave of the Mobtown-Meerkats, I strolled through the streets. I scrolled the ipod to Johnny Cash and drank a fresh, bitter, expensive, and exceedingly refreshing gingerale and I walked, smiling at the strange film mundane city life made when watched to the soundtrack of "So Doggone Lonesome". I called up a friend I've known since I was fifteen. We've never been close, but we shared a love of ninjas and Diablo II and fart jokes, and stayed up way too late together with my brothers, playing Risk or Warcraft, back in the day. He and his wife have recently moved to Baltimore and they took me in for the night. I made them Mexican food and scones for dinner, and we laughed at all the stupid internet videos that have been making us laugh since 1997. I was afraid it might be awkward after several years, but I slipped back into old times like an old coat, and it was immensely cheering to be transported back to easier, sillier days. Other friends, and family, called and texted and emailed, weaving a solid net of comfort to hold these long intervening hours. Now everyone is asleep and I am on the couch, pondering what is to come, wishing prayer would arrive a little more easily. But today has been a prayer: a breath of thankgiving to find myself falling into open arms and a sense of awe when I realize the expected shock of hard and rocky ground has not reached me. I am afraid to pray about tomorrow, but emboldened by the blessings of today, I will try to face it with a clear heart and a measure of trust.
As usual I am trolling my poetry for comfort, and Emily Dickinson knows all about tomorrow:
A darting fear -- a pomp -- a tear --
A waking on a morn
To find that what one waked for,
Inhales the different dawn.
~Emily Dickinson
After I took my leave of the Mobtown-Meerkats, I strolled through the streets. I scrolled the ipod to Johnny Cash and drank a fresh, bitter, expensive, and exceedingly refreshing gingerale and I walked, smiling at the strange film mundane city life made when watched to the soundtrack of "So Doggone Lonesome". I called up a friend I've known since I was fifteen. We've never been close, but we shared a love of ninjas and Diablo II and fart jokes, and stayed up way too late together with my brothers, playing Risk or Warcraft, back in the day. He and his wife have recently moved to Baltimore and they took me in for the night. I made them Mexican food and scones for dinner, and we laughed at all the stupid internet videos that have been making us laugh since 1997. I was afraid it might be awkward after several years, but I slipped back into old times like an old coat, and it was immensely cheering to be transported back to easier, sillier days. Other friends, and family, called and texted and emailed, weaving a solid net of comfort to hold these long intervening hours. Now everyone is asleep and I am on the couch, pondering what is to come, wishing prayer would arrive a little more easily. But today has been a prayer: a breath of thankgiving to find myself falling into open arms and a sense of awe when I realize the expected shock of hard and rocky ground has not reached me. I am afraid to pray about tomorrow, but emboldened by the blessings of today, I will try to face it with a clear heart and a measure of trust.
As usual I am trolling my poetry for comfort, and Emily Dickinson knows all about tomorrow:
A darting fear -- a pomp -- a tear --
A waking on a morn
To find that what one waked for,
Inhales the different dawn.
~Emily Dickinson
Sunday, October 01, 2006
Sleepless in Baltimore.
Jeff lent me his beloved Ipod for this trip. It was a great comfort and an agile companion as I hurtled through the skies. Belle and Sebastian played on...
"I'm lucky, I can open the door and I can walk down the street
Unlucky, I've got noplace to go and so I follow my feet
A choice is facing you, a healthy dose of pain
A choice is facing you as you stare through the rain
A choice is facing you but I choose to refrain for today
Tomorrow we'll be back in trouble again...
Why is this happening to you? You are not a child
Why is this happening? You've too much on your mind
Things creep up on you when you are fast asleep
You are dreaming, you are sleepy
You are stuck to the sheets
In a town so small there's no escaping you
In a town so small there's no escape from view
In a town so small there's nothing left to do"
The sunset clouds from the plane were infinitely forgiving and welcoming, tipped with light: a pink and fertile field. Come to me, all you who are weary . . . I listed to The Postal Service sing a familiar song and realized with a sudden rush
of understanding and a flush of stupidity that it had always been about airplanes.
Knuckles clenched to white
as the landing gear detract for flight
My head's a balloon
inflating with the altitude
...
I watch the patchwork farms' slow fade into the ocean's arms
And from here they can't see me stare
The stale taste of recycled air
I watch the patchwork farms' slow fade into the ocean's arms
Calm down, release your cares
The stale taste of recycled air
I imagined the plane was going to crash, and I looked at the sleeping young man beside me who was shedding years with every moment he slept until he looked almost new-born, and I started to cry, and Sufjan Stevens sang.
"Oh the glory that the lord has made
And the complications when I see his face
In the morning in the window
Oh the glory when he took our place
But he took my shoulders and he shook my face
And he takes and he takes and he takes"
The clouds grew thicker and warmer and pinker, and I began to cry a little harder, good hot tears. I'd upgraded to first class, for the first time in my life and thirty dollars, so I had a lot of room to bury my face, and extra-deluxe napkins for my tears to go with my complimentary mint cookies. I woke up the sleeping innocent beside me and when he looked frightened I scoffed away my tears. It was Bright Eyes when I really wanted Simon and Garfunkle, but it did the job.
"if you swear that there's no truth and who cares
How come you say it like you're right?
Why are you scared to dream of God
When it's salvation that you want?
You see stars that clear have been dead for years
But the idea just lives on...
We are nowhere and it's now
We are nowhere and it's now
Like a ten minute dream in the passenger's seat
While the world was flying by
You haven't been gone very long
But it feels like a lifetime "
Now I am sleepless in my hotel. I floated in the hot pool in boy shorts and a tank-top, not having bought a bathing suit since my teenage years. The room was close and empty, and the heavily chlorinated steam stung my lately dried eyes. I went up to the cable TV and every channel was murder, save one, which had the Osbornes unintelligibly swearing at each other and dogs. I plugged my dying cell-phone into the wall and woke up a couple of friends and a sister for the company and drank a glass of wine. Billy Bragg sang.
"Thank you for the things you bought me--thank you for the card
Thank you for the things you taught me when you hit me hard
That love between two people must be based on understanding
Until that's true you'll find your things
All stacked out on the landing, surprise, surprise..."
And then I read my favourite poem again. (if you've been reading this blog for long, you have likely read this poem.)
The Only Animal
by Franz Wright
The only animal that commits suicide
went for a walk in the park,
basked on a hard bench
in the first star,
traveled to the edge of space
in an armchair
while company quietly
talked, and abruptly
returned,
the room empty
The only animal that cries,
that takes off its clothes
and reports to the mirror, the one
and only animal
that brushes its own teeth
somewhere
the only animal that smokes a cigarette,
that lies down and flies backward in time,
that rises and walks to a book
and looks up a word
heard the telephone ringing
in the darkness downstairs and decided
to answer no more.
And I understand,
too well: how many times
have I made the decision to dwell
from now on
in the hour of my death
(the space I took up here
scarlessly closing like water)
and said I'm never coming back,
and yet
this morning
I stood once again
in this world,
the garden
ark and vacant
tomb of what
I can't imagine,
between twin eternities,
some sort of wings,
more or less equidistantly
exiled from both,
hovering in the dreaming called
being awake, where
You gave me
in secret one thing
to perceive, the
tall blue starry
strangeness of being
here at all.
You gave us each in secret one thing to perceive.
Furless now, upright, My banished
and experimental
child
You said, though your own heart condemn you
I do not condemn you.
In gratefulness for the tall blue starry strangeness that is me, and gratefulness for Jeff and ipods and clouds, and turning my face to the morning, now I'll try to go to sleep.
"I'm lucky, I can open the door and I can walk down the street
Unlucky, I've got noplace to go and so I follow my feet
A choice is facing you, a healthy dose of pain
A choice is facing you as you stare through the rain
A choice is facing you but I choose to refrain for today
Tomorrow we'll be back in trouble again...
Why is this happening to you? You are not a child
Why is this happening? You've too much on your mind
Things creep up on you when you are fast asleep
You are dreaming, you are sleepy
You are stuck to the sheets
In a town so small there's no escaping you
In a town so small there's no escape from view
In a town so small there's nothing left to do"
The sunset clouds from the plane were infinitely forgiving and welcoming, tipped with light: a pink and fertile field. Come to me, all you who are weary . . . I listed to The Postal Service sing a familiar song and realized with a sudden rush
of understanding and a flush of stupidity that it had always been about airplanes.
Knuckles clenched to white
as the landing gear detract for flight
My head's a balloon
inflating with the altitude
...
I watch the patchwork farms' slow fade into the ocean's arms
And from here they can't see me stare
The stale taste of recycled air
I watch the patchwork farms' slow fade into the ocean's arms
Calm down, release your cares
The stale taste of recycled air
I imagined the plane was going to crash, and I looked at the sleeping young man beside me who was shedding years with every moment he slept until he looked almost new-born, and I started to cry, and Sufjan Stevens sang.
"Oh the glory that the lord has made
And the complications when I see his face
In the morning in the window
Oh the glory when he took our place
But he took my shoulders and he shook my face
And he takes and he takes and he takes"
The clouds grew thicker and warmer and pinker, and I began to cry a little harder, good hot tears. I'd upgraded to first class, for the first time in my life and thirty dollars, so I had a lot of room to bury my face, and extra-deluxe napkins for my tears to go with my complimentary mint cookies. I woke up the sleeping innocent beside me and when he looked frightened I scoffed away my tears. It was Bright Eyes when I really wanted Simon and Garfunkle, but it did the job.
"if you swear that there's no truth and who cares
How come you say it like you're right?
Why are you scared to dream of God
When it's salvation that you want?
You see stars that clear have been dead for years
But the idea just lives on...
We are nowhere and it's now
We are nowhere and it's now
Like a ten minute dream in the passenger's seat
While the world was flying by
You haven't been gone very long
But it feels like a lifetime "
Now I am sleepless in my hotel. I floated in the hot pool in boy shorts and a tank-top, not having bought a bathing suit since my teenage years. The room was close and empty, and the heavily chlorinated steam stung my lately dried eyes. I went up to the cable TV and every channel was murder, save one, which had the Osbornes unintelligibly swearing at each other and dogs. I plugged my dying cell-phone into the wall and woke up a couple of friends and a sister for the company and drank a glass of wine. Billy Bragg sang.
"Thank you for the things you bought me--thank you for the card
Thank you for the things you taught me when you hit me hard
That love between two people must be based on understanding
Until that's true you'll find your things
All stacked out on the landing, surprise, surprise..."
And then I read my favourite poem again. (if you've been reading this blog for long, you have likely read this poem.)
The Only Animal
by Franz Wright
The only animal that commits suicide
went for a walk in the park,
basked on a hard bench
in the first star,
traveled to the edge of space
in an armchair
while company quietly
talked, and abruptly
returned,
the room empty
The only animal that cries,
that takes off its clothes
and reports to the mirror, the one
and only animal
that brushes its own teeth
somewhere
the only animal that smokes a cigarette,
that lies down and flies backward in time,
that rises and walks to a book
and looks up a word
heard the telephone ringing
in the darkness downstairs and decided
to answer no more.
And I understand,
too well: how many times
have I made the decision to dwell
from now on
in the hour of my death
(the space I took up here
scarlessly closing like water)
and said I'm never coming back,
and yet
this morning
I stood once again
in this world,
the garden
ark and vacant
tomb of what
I can't imagine,
between twin eternities,
some sort of wings,
more or less equidistantly
exiled from both,
hovering in the dreaming called
being awake, where
You gave me
in secret one thing
to perceive, the
tall blue starry
strangeness of being
here at all.
You gave us each in secret one thing to perceive.
Furless now, upright, My banished
and experimental
child
You said, though your own heart condemn you
I do not condemn you.
In gratefulness for the tall blue starry strangeness that is me, and gratefulness for Jeff and ipods and clouds, and turning my face to the morning, now I'll try to go to sleep.
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