Bless technology

So, even for me, this past month has been profoundly obnoxious as far as communication devices. Between laptops left on airplanes, rescued from airports, then dying monitors and viruses and volatage differences and chargers that do not work and tri-band cell phones that don't work in Ireland or even in the states, and a microphone and headphone jack that won't let Skype function, etc etc etc I have disappeared from the face of the earth. Only my poor mother has seen my shadow bobbing by now and then.

Right now I am in Boston. F. came back to the States with me and we spent a week between Boston, NYC, and the mountains. It was the first truly lovely weather of the year and this past month together has been so right and so natural that while I am already missing him something fierce (he left last night) I am feeling pretty subdued and deeply, gently happy about the whole thing. We'll be together again in a few weeks, and for the entire summer. There are already a tonne of things to look forward to...we have little house projects and a bunch of concerts and festivals lined up, and maybe even a



!!!

and again I say

!!!

My time in Galway was wonderful. Most of it was actually very low key...lots of cooking dinner together and watching DVDs of shows like Father Ted and Extras. Lots of afternoon or evening pints and some drives out over the country where I sickened everyone with my sincere (and very chaste!) love of sheep. Sheep are awesome. Lucky for me, there are more sheep in Ireland than people. There are also genuinely enormous cows and the smallest ponies I have ever seen. You could put one of those ponies in a Christmas stocking, and only its forelock would stick out. Tiny! Very, very small! Minuscule! Tiny.

It's hard for me to describe Ireland, because while Galway is a truly beautiful city, (just the right size for me, parks, colourful houses and pubs, water, etc.) my whole trip was about the people. And while of course it was one person in particular who mattered the most, it was also about everyone I met. One of my favourite things in the world is strike up conversations with strangers, and so far it seems as if there's a conversation on every seat and above every pair of shoes in Galway. The people I met were warm, smart, verbal, excitable, and funny as hell. To be very *cough*narcissism*cough humble, they reminded me of me. All kidding aside, the Galway people I met were almost all incredibly easy to hang out with. There was a minimum of gesturing and social goofery, and then everyone just gathered together and got down to the business of enjoying the evening. I made friends in Ireland that I've only known three weeks, but have already claimed a sizable space in my heart. The best and worst part about moving so often and so widely is that wherever I go now, there is always someone to miss.

I'm enjoying my little time in Boston so far, though I miss F. more than I can say. I'm staying with one of my dearest friends in the world, who's doing a slew of shows I wouldn't miss, and another friend is getting married next weekend. I am back at the flower shop and actually really enjoying it. After weeks of gentle dissipation (I was productive and useful in Ireland, don't get me wrong, but I was unemployed and encountering everything for the first time) it's kind of cool to re-submerge myself in the familiarity of something I know and do well. I am a really good florist. Put that on my gravestone. :)

I don't have much more news than that. I just know that I am happier than I've ever been in my life. I know that anyone who hasn't seen me for a few months is shocked at how different I look. I can breathe. I don't think I even knew how to be this happy before I came through the other side of my breakdown. I just passed the one year anniversary of my first hospitalization last week, and I look back at that very recent Amanda and feel much more compassion for than identification with her. I still don't know what I am doing with my life in particular, I still don't have a degree. I am still fairly good at angsting if given a topic and sufficient naval-gazing time. I am still having mild depressive/manic streaks. (look at the word count for this post and guess which I'm in now) but the periods in between are becoming smoother and longer.

I am not sick anymore. I have a condition to manage, but the hardest work of managing it is behind me. My meds are pretty stable, only tweaked when they have to be, and while taking these pills every day is still intrusive, I just have to take a deep breath and think back to what my life was one year ago.

I was going through some things I wrote at that time, and this one caught me. I wrote this March 30th, 2007, just days before I had my big break down:

Sometimes I wish I could just go to sleep. For a long time. My doctor asked me about death or suicidal thoughts. Sometimes I wish I could be "put to sleep" but that is it, and I am not sure what that means. I get very tired. I love people, and I enjoy stuff, but sometimes it feels like I am either Crazy or Tired, and I don't like either choice. Of course, right now I am typing at almost 2 am insomnia, so that counts, too. I don't get how I can feel so happy and content and grateful for life for a little while and then just be so Tired of everything that I just wish there was an off switch.

One of my close friends asked "is it always hard? Is every day hard?" and I didn't know what to say. Parts of every day are hard. Half of all days are all hard. But I guess I often don't know how "hard" life is for everyone else. I expect quite a bit harder than my "hard".

I get mad at myself because nothing in my life is that hard. Great friends, great boyfriend, great job, almost free rent. You know? So how come I always just want to be asleep?

I am not feeling sad most of the time now that the freaky panic attacks are gone. Just Tired. And kind of sad that I am always so, so tired living a cushy life at 24.

That slowly ebbing fatigue and apathy led to another series of crippling panic attacks, dissociation, and other PTSD symptoms. A few days later I was very quietly psychotic, a danger to myself, and hospitalized.

I am so incredibly blessed, looking back. I did have friends and doctors and communities that worked really hard, individually and together, to hold me up. And I was held up. it was horrible, but I was held.

And now I walk down the street and if I'm not stepping in a puddle, swearing at a bus, or spilling coffee on my coat, I am smiling. Just plain smiling. Almost always. Until recently, I didn't know what a habitual or reflexive smile felt like. Most of the time, smiling was an act that I did consciously and with some effort, like a sit up or a push up.

Now my face smiles truly and randomly and often, all by itself.

In a few weeks, I'll be heading back to Ireland to smile up at the face I love most in the world.