In which I cover the good stuff and the hard stuff in my week, trying for the non-preachy, non-annoying side of ritual and self-reflection.
And you get to join in if you feel like it.
The high point of this week was eating spicy cheese curds in a bed that both President Obama and Bruce Willis have slept in. Though not at the same time.
That may also have been the low point of the week, it’s kind of hard to say.
The hard stuff
The roller derby bout against Chicago.
Torture.
Windy City played fine. If fine includes throwing a lot of elbows. Rose City, on the other hand, was a mess. We played like we were permanent residents of the alternate universe where we’d already lost by a hundred points.
The last two minutes redeemed the whole thing. But aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh.
What a train wreck.
Depletion and exhaustion.
Yet again I overestimate the gap between almost out of gas and completely stalled.
Tried to run away on Emergency Vacation and it didn’t work.
Yup.
Oh so many mistakes. So much pain about the mistakes.
That was the theme of the week.
Nudnik at the bar.
Talked my ear off.
In related news: I’m opening a bar for introverts.
Force field troubles.
That’s never good.
No kidding.
Massage therapist: “Wow, so you’re really, really tense. So much tension here.”
Me (in my head): “Hmmm, I wonder why that would be. It can’t be because I’m launching five businesses and everything is behind schedule and my staff have either quit or are two minutes from having a gigantic mental breakdown, and it’s all on me to make this happen. Oh, wait. That IS why.”
Very upset about a thing.
And not sure what to do about it. Feeling helpless, vulnerable and frustrated.
And I’ll silent retreat the rest.
The good stuff
The last two minutes of the bout.
The last jam.
When Scald Eagle decided that winning had to happen
What followed was the most miraculous, spectacular, exciting, heart-breakingly gorgeous comeback in the world of athletics. Possibly in all of time.
Go immediately to the boutcast video and start at ONE HOUR AND NINETEEN MINUTES. And then watch it a bunch more times.
Also note that when Randy Pan says that Rose City can still pull it off, he does not actually think there’s a chance in hell it’s going to happen.
Those two minutes. Hall of fame.
I win!
I sneakily won an ebay bid in the very last second before it closed. While on the train. Oho!
Spontaneous joyful play time..
I was walking down the street to do a nice thing for myself when I ran into Chuck and she kept me company!
Epiphanies like crazy.
Thank you, Shiva Nata.
Thank you, mad processings at the Floop.
Found a clew
The nudnik had a clew for me.
A night away from it all.
It helped.
Massage.
That helps too.
Progress.
Gott sei dank.
Found the shoes I’ve been dreaming of.
Well, not so much dreaming of as wishing they existed. They do!
Last pair. In my exact size. Half off.
They are crazy gorgeous. And I am just ridiculously hot.
Rally starts on Monday.
Hooray for Rally (Rally!)
It’s going to be amazing.
Also this will be the first time that Rallions get to use the brand new Playground in addition to the former Playground (now the Caboose).
Very exciting.
Help and support from friends..
Thank you, Mechaieh for the beautiful package (and wow, calligraphy!) of playground presents.
Thank you, Danielle for endless schlepping.
Thank you, Chuck for drawing The Most Beautiful Map ever and
Playing live at the meme beach house — it’s the Fake Band of the Week!
Background? Ez and I make up bands. Stu (retired Bolshevik-fearing voice-to-text software) once translated “people will hate me and be jealous” to “they’ll hang out at my Meme Beach House“. It’s just one guy.
This week’s band is named for the happiest little girl in a stroller:
Fistfuls of Dandelions
Though, of course, it’s really just one guy.
Hallo Hallo! I am saying Hallo Hallo. Announcement time.
Picture me wearing that crazy hat…
We’re getting ready to re-organize the shop so if there’s something you’ve been wanting, you should probably get it now. The copy is kind of terrible copy, because I wrote it three or four years ago. But stuff you get is amazing.
That’s it for me …
Join my Friday ritual in the comments if you feel like it. Or call silent retreat!
We let people have their own experience. We’re supportive and welcoming. And we don’t give advice (unless people specifically ask for it).
Wishing you a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious day, a restful weekend and a happy week to come.
Shabbat shalom.
p.s. It’s fine if it’s not Friday anymore. There’s complete chicken amnesty — join in whenever (or not) and it’s no big deal.
Follow
The high point of my week was finally getting an office with a door on it!
The low point of my week- The anniversary flowers from Josh are too embarrassingly dead to keep on my desk.
Oh well, 49 weeks til next year.
This week! It’s been a week.
The Hard:
– Being lied to about gluten and dairy being in food. And then having an entire day of nearly suicidal thoughts and intense pain as a result. BUTTER IS DAIRY! WHEAT NOODLES CONTAIN GLUTEN! DON’T POISON ME!!
– Feeling tired and sick in the days after the worst of the accidental ingestion.
– Things that need doing not being done.
– My gentleman friend being out of town, and that being hard. And then him being back, and that being hard.
– Stupid shoulder hurting all the stupid time. Stupidly.
– Nothing fits in our apartment anymore and we haven’t heard back about the status of the houses that have to sell so we can buy a house. Blargh.
The Good:
– I asked someone to hang out with me and I asked them to do it exactly the way I wanted and they agreed and we had a great time. (I got to eat sushi without having to drive myself downtown!)
– We went to the midwife and got to hear the HEARTBEAT. And it was fast and strong and hanging out near my heartbeat because it likes me.
– The midwife told me a bunch of times how she much she respects my knowledge + experience, which is a little bit freaking me out but also really nice.
– Excellent shopping trip today.
– Someone who owes me several thousand dollars just got the money they need to pay me back.
– All the grandparents-to-be are happy with me right now because of 1 easy e-mail and 2 easy phonecalls.
– Big Shivanautical breakthrough I don’t know what to do about yet, but which is definitely “the answer.”
Cheers Chickeneers!
The Hard:
– The Not Enough Time Monsters are out in full force
– having that feeling like I’m forgetting something important
– weather-changing-induced knee pain
The Good:
– massive progress on converting piles of paper notes into an easy-to-search digital format
– good scotch
– many complements on my new blazers for work
A bar for introverts is the BEST IDEA EVER. And, hey, you’re already doing FIVE businesses, why not throw in #6! 🙂
@Danielle, @Havi:
The Playground, THE BAR. Except Havi never has to be the bartender, because enough already! And no one is ever annoyingly drunk because everybody respects their limits, stays in their force fields all the time, and uses NVC in their interactions. Also, we will only serve excellent beer and excellent bourbon. Also water with cucumber in it.
Yes! I’ll meet you at the introvert bar. We’ll make eye contact and I’ll smile at you warmly, then go back to my book.
Hard stuff:
–I have to silent retreat on this week’s hardest thing to protect the privacy of someone I love. All I can offer is a few adjectives: stunning, scary, stressful, sinking feeling.
–My first sunburn this year. The first one always catches me off guard.
–Well-intentioned criticism, and the effort it takes for me to metabolize same.
Good stuff:
–Choral rehearsals with the orchestra this week! So glorious. This weekend, we’re performing Rossini’s Stabat Mater and the “Ode to Joy” movement of Beethoven’s 9th Symphony.
–Juicy, wonderful things to read.
–Epiphanies.
–Shared laughter.
Both hard and good (but mostly good):
This morning, I dreamed I was at Rally. It felt so real.
sending you rest, love, and appreciation havi.
Week, I am wrung out. So much that I am going to sack out as soon as I finish typing this.
Hard:
* failed root canal –> massive bacterial infection –> losing much of the week to being out of my mind with pain
* assessing, removing, and rearranging dominoes for least crashiness and collateral damage
* hotel could be cleaner. It is off-putting to spot other people’s nail clippings when I set down my dinner to unlock my door.
Good:
* packages reaching destinations 🙂
* my room is clean and warm enough. I’ve stayed in far, far worse places claiming to be so much better.
* 21st-century medical options. I think back to even a single generation ago and get the shudders.
* mega-relief at several decisions turning out to be the right ones. Especially the one where I had to overrule the urge to select the cheapest rather than the right-for-me option. And the one where I prevailed over the part of me itching to indulge in a cheap shot.
* grand plan by the HUUmanists to smuggle banned books to Arizona
* still in the lead in fantasy tennis league, at least for a few more hours
* friends making/selling/publishing stories
* more sales of my book, and a highly entertaining review of it (“the number I’m citing is the number of lines in it that drive me crazy”)
Sending everyone good wishes for the week to come.
*slipping both pocket change and neon-pink glitter into Fistfuls of Dandelions’ tip fedora*
yay, a bar for introverts– where you can always hear yourself think!
the ick
-oh the crying, first me.
-work stress from the re-org.
-missing favorite meditation group due to lack of planning.
-best friend crying from weeks of pain.
-unhappy gut and missing grains.
the lovely
-the knitting volunteer gig.
-prefect simple solution arriving..
-alignment exercise and remembering to do it.
-two dance classes.
-got help when I asked.
-sweetie punkin.
here’s hoping you all have a fab weekend! M xo
I would drive Seattle to Portland monthly to hang out at a bar for introverts. This may be the single best idea I’ve heard in years. 🙂 yea havi!
I love you all!
Yay! for all the good stuff
@Mechaieh – I’m imagining Fistfuls of Dandilions tipping her fedora at you from her stroller.
And now-
The Good
-Waiting til now to chicken and knowing why
– a really Pretty small simple grey rock in my driveway, next to a grey hairband. Two very different colors of grey, so I didn’t even realize they were the same color until I wrote this
– Learning a new song on guitar, and having it be easy, and being out of my strumming pattern rut for the second time, and thinking I can learn things!
– Finishing all of my reading for next week today!! And then reading more because I liked the book (but also because of hard thing #1
Hard things:
– my power cord is fried, no CPU until tbd
– can’t apply for that awesome perfect job I found last night before my CPU failed
– didn’t get the other job I applied for last week 🙁 but know there must be something more perfect
– three people not calling me back all week. Grr
– not being able to combine my punch cards from spending $100 on school supplies to buy a $10 birthday present for my daughter’s friend, and not having any other money with me so our two hour bus/walk trip was for naught, other than finding out my shoes give me blisters
I’m going to call that good for tonight, except:
Dessert:
– Sweetie buying me delicious dinner and taking me out to look at planets and finding two deer lying down in our yard, and watching them eat for a half hour. They were soooo pretty!
– and I sewed! With a machine, and by hand, and changed the bobbin and the thread! And made a thing that did not exist before and made at least one person very happy and probably one more! And now I don’t have to feel as stupid for taking our machine back from sweetie’s mom in October when I asked for fabric and knitting supplies and craft books for my birthday and made grand plans to use them.
– and I found gwishes, and even though i didn’t share them, I thought them, and I was delighted to see some of my deepest longings reflected by other gwishers and I felt so relaxed knowing how much easier they will be to create when I’m not the only one gwishing them.
Thank you Havi, I am also gwishing to visit your playground someday, and I promise to save all my other gwishes for my VPAs.
The Hard:
Physical stuffs: some sort of tummy unhappiness, followed by being completely zonked on Wednesday, and now throat/tonsil inflammation.
Things seeming to take forver to get done.
Not sleeping at all well Tuesday night.
Kitty having fleas + allergy to fleas meaning she was nibbling chunks of fur off and bleeding. The difficulty in getting frontline on her.
The Good:
Kitty succesfully frontlined and now much better.
Discovering the work on Yayoi Kusama. Such beauty! Having the Alice in Wonderland book in my posession! Planning a trip to see her exhibition at the Tate!
Really wonderful stuff happening at Ardis.
Not hating on myself for feeling less than 100% and for things getting done slowly. Miracle! And, I’ve actually got everything done that I wanted to.
Tuesday! Meeting up with a friend and having great conversation + going to the V&A and seeing some very inspiring photography. Then having a good time at the UCF LBF party. Yay!
Meditating. I am really enjoying it right now.
Good wishes to all for the week ahead!
The hard:
– Finishing a job that was meant to be temporary but that had meant a lot to me.
– Having to say good-bye to people it was wonderful to work with.
– Having to hand job back over to someone who in no time messed up a few things I had been putting lots of effort into.
– Brief explosive arguments with husband about silly things.
– My money patterns.
The good:
– Joyful overwhelm at all the thoughtful little presents and signs of affections that I got when I finished my job.
– Being able to help friends in the middle of the night when their new Bolivian was about to arrive.
– Going away for 4 days to stay with people who have absolutely zero to do with my work environment and know nothing about it turned out to be perfect transition ritual.
– Spending time with relatives that mean a lot to me.
– Long walks, tons of fresh air, mediterranean scents.
– Offering the “Book of Qualities” to someone who was ever so pleased and appreciative about my present.
– Finding myself at a wonderful yoga class more or less out of the blue.
The Hard:
So sick all week. Everything I put in my body was wrong. Even though it used to be right.
Lungs that hate running. That make me gasp like a fish on a dock and then cry because I just want them to work right.
The man at the beach lecturing his son about how extraordinarily dangerous the beach is for 15 minutes. Forgot to send blessings and instead hushly-yelled “shut up! Why are you even at the beach?!”
The cat squeaks and meeps and mews at me but I don’t know what she wants. Actually, I think what she wants is for me to sit on the floor so she can walk in circles around me but I don’t always want to do that.
The Good:
Eventually found something that was right (a bowl of rice and avocado) and then more things that were right.
2 mile run. Less walking than before. Didn’t pass out. Did turn bright red. No one else is that color when they run.
15 mile bike ride followed by a nap on a bench on the Common under a blue sky under pink flowers next to the white church. So much beauty.
The hard:
I’ve got either bronchitis or pneumonia. Not sure which. Apparently the only way to tell for sure is with an x-ray, and since they’re treated the same, and since my insurance is really crappy, I decided I didn’t really need to know.
So I have absolutely no energy, and I’ve coughed up at least 15 lungs in the last week. I had to cancel a show I was supposed to go to this weekend. And now my voice is gone. Well, I guess I didn’t need it anyway.
The good:
Um, I’m not quite dead yet.
And before I got sick, I added a wholesale section to my website with a registration and login.
And my bed is really comfortable.
Hello, Chickeneers, sorry for all your hard stuff, and hooray for all the good!
Mine:
The Hard —
– Misunderstandings coming at the last minute, and my annoyed reactions to them.
– Not enough sleep.
The Good —
+ Many productive hours decluttering, including but not limited to group coaching with Jen Hoffman of Inspired Home Office (“Gentle Spring Cleaning”) and individual coaching with my organizer.
+ Tolerating the piles generated by the decluttering process, since I know they will actually get cleaned up.
+ Mailed four years’ worth of back tax returns! Only three more to go! (Plus mailed an extension request for 2011.)
+ Colored paper lanterns! Mmmmmm!
+ Mammogram/ultrasound results good!
+ A Spring wildflower walk, first one in about 30 years. (Actually, it’s the second one, but the first was with a breast cancer survivor group and that is a separate category entirely.)
Week two of the “new normal” at work.
The hard:
So tired of being in tears on the way home from work. It’s no way to live.
I survived two years of corporate upheaval for THIS? (I really need to drop this case, btw.)
Confidential to xxx: How can I miss you if you won’t go away?
Overwhelmed to the extent that I’m forgetting things, such as peoples’ names and various words occasionally.
Interviewed for job but salary is less than half what I currently make, alas.
The good:
Like an awkwardly put together tractor, jerryrigged with random wheels, the team lumbers on. This week was a bit better than last.
Meditation. 20 minutes a morning brought up huge resistance but 10 minutes a morning seems to be OK.
Some things I was left “holding the bag” on have fallen into place.
Realization that whatever misfortune befalls me next at this workplace will just strengthen my resolve to get out of here. All sorts of plans for how this could work.
Happy weekend to all chickeneers. Reading the above comments helps so much.
HARD
+seemingly endless work on “backlog” projects
+seemingly endless things to be cleaned
+the incident with the biker, and the residual aftermath, and then not leaving my apartment for the whole week
+accepting that [a community I am part of] is actually kind of obnoxious as a community even though there are lots of wonderful people there
+discovering my headlights are fucked up while driving after dark, freaking the fuck out, auuughhhhh
+so many do-not-drive triggers! ugh!
+chemical sensitivities set off at [a place I went]
+negotiations with my dreamformation
+my tapestry needle broke! it had sentimental value! I am sad.
GOOD
+road trip with R!
+cupcakapocalypse in my kitchen!
+solving problems with vegan buttercream frosting!
+my new altar table!
+finding the Magic Envelope in the table
+starting Dianne Sylvan’s Spiritual Nomad class
+good phone date with Mom
+did a really good job PREPARING for phone call with mom, yay me
+The Old Man and the Dolphin
+still excited about Trans-Health Conference coming up
+making my Safe Room and welcoming people into it. noticing that creating safe spaces for others makes me feel safe!
+discovering MUG MUFFINS!! ahhhhHHHH mug muffins! (http://chocolatecoveredkatie.com/2010/11/03/microwave-cookie-dough-muffins/)
+I auditioned for a solo and I didn’t get it! Which is awesome because the person who did get it sounds so wonderful, and now I never have to sing it in that awful key again!
+Dar Williams! has made a concept album! about Greek mythology! I have listened to it about 7 times already
+Sesame Street!
+beginning the new rainbow shawl project, with fractal flowers and fabulousness!
@seagirl – I don’t know if it will help you to know this, but my best friend gets really, *really* bright red when she runs too. She is very self-conscious about it as well. I thought it might help to know that you’re not the only one? <3 for your hard.
My week –
The Hard (so much hard this week. Too much to be detailed about so, in short):
– Grief
– Guilt
– "Fear of abandonment"
– the I-will-never-get-out-of-bed pattern
– Shoulder/arm pain from being in bed and not being careful of how arm was positioned
– that I'm-about-to-get-a-headache feeling, for several days, not unrelated to bed
– can't tell if respiratory tract infection is getting better or worse, and lots of resistance to going to doctor
– Feeling depleted
– Making up excuses to not do this one thing that I really want to do
– being completely, totally misunderstood by someone that I love very much. Not knowing how to address it. Feeling like there was no space for me.
– Forgetting that now is not then, in a really painful, frightening way.
– Feeling the effects of crappy exam-time diet.
The Good:
– Hyacinth handled the talk wonderfully. Such a relief. I'm so glad to have found her.
– I was able to handle the grief – it looks like a droplet of liquid crystal, as big as my hand. I can take it out of my chest and hold it for a little while. This makes things easier.
– Was also able to handle the weird "now is then" feeling by doing that grounding exercise (thank you, Havi!)
– I went for a walk. I spoke/wrote to Bunny. I think I will do this more often.
– I wrote the essay I was stuck on in one day, after speaking with Hyacinth, so the block really had nothing to do with the essay itself.
– Last exam on Monday! Finally!
– Moving into new place on the 29th! (hello, slight anxiety)
– Getting sleep. And rest, and much needed isolation/recuperation time.
Happy Chickening, all 🙂
Hello all chicken-boks! Wishing all sorts of ease and epiphanies for you all.
@seagirl – I don’t know if this will help: I turn bright red when I do any exercise at all, except for dancing. I even get red doing Shiva Nata.
My hard:
– I am currently in the throes of moving. While I did get the VPA of getting a marvelous new space, I didn’t get any of the VPAs around peace and ease.
My good:
* I am currently in the process of moving!! Even though there were loads of stresses and we’re not done yet, my OOD on it had me prepared for the drama and both Lovelyman and I are seeing very positive changes in ourselves from being in this place. Lots of joy attached to that.
Silent retreat on the rest.
Tons of love to you all. Hoping and wishing for brilliant blooms for you.
Hello all! and holy crap how is it already this late in April?
The Hard:
~realizing that my partner is not a good listener, and feeling all the attendant sadness, hurt and anger that come with the realization
~weird low-grade headaches all week….what the what?
~self-judgment in all of its tenacious glory
~there was a suicide at the school this weekend
The Good:
~having the opportunity to listen to a really amazing talk given by Brene Brown (online, but still!)
~being able to gentle through the self-judgment
~amazing amazing weather coupled with early and heady lilacs
~there is an art thing by david michalek going at the school that is eerie and breathtaking and magnificent and surprising…yowza
I *love* the bar for introverts.
This week’s hard:
– Stress over a situation I have no control over. Being lied to. Being forced to trust and feeling like a sucker, but I have to trust or things will immediately implode.
– Realizing a realization. Meditating on what that might mean.
– Piles and piles of work.
– My poor sweetie has a bad cold, and there’s nothing I can do to make it better.
This week’s good:
– My favorite clients sending me more and more work, fun stuff that pays well.
– Got a little time in the garden, despite piles and piles of work.
– Found out that the Habitat Restore was having a dropoff point today very close to my house and was able to get some stuff leftover from renovations out of the house.
– Good news from my doctor all around.
– Progress on the Experiment.
Happy weekend, Chickeneers!
@Riin:
My doctor recommended an old remedy that cured me from the bronchitis of my life last year: mustard powder (which you should get at pharmacies). Put a table spoon of powder onto some old cloth and wrap it into a little packet. Dip the packet into about 50°C hot water and make sure the powder turns into a paste, it doesn’t soak up the water easily. Put this little packet onto your chest and cover it with a dry towel and put a hot water bottle at your feet. Remove mustard poweder packet after about 5 – max. 10 minutes and keep resting for a while. But be careful, the powder can irritate the skin because it develops strong heat.
@seagirl: I am turning very red after running as well.
@Loon, @Risa and @Leocadia, thank you for sharing that you get red too! I always feel like it’s just me. But then I met another woman yesterday who said she can’t breathe during running either, so I know there are others out there. I like to think that all the extra blood in my face keeps my skin young and fresh and wrinkle free.
yay ! for reading the word NUDNIK ! my yiddish class spent about 10 mins explaining all about Nudniks when I enquired last year 🙂
Oh, the chicken I forgot – although it was great to read everyone’s! @seagirl, chiming in with another me-too on the red-face exertion – people ask me if I’m ok all the time. Even when I’m in perfect shape.
This week! Yes.
Hards:
*sooper-busy. Lots of driving. Lots of working. Lots of packed evenings.
*some snappishness from the busy.
*getting sucked into a very long story, and not wanting to come out for anything. i love reading, but compulsiveness feels icky.
*inappropriate flirting (read: any) from clients that makes me (mentally) fire them on the spot. resulting feelings: completely unsafe. like an unfun prude. omg i’m never going to have trustable clients and make any money.
*avoiding phone calls. why do i do that to myself?
Goods:
*a fairly lot of le moneys from all the teaching/working!
*some awesome people snapping up the dealio!
*complete non-triggering of an issue i thought would certainly be triggered
*a plan for the week that WORKED!!! huge 😀
*conscious entries that are marvelous and effective
*soooo much shiva nata
*finishing 18 hours with a class and getting sincere appreciations and likings
*proper sun’n’outdoors’n’body time
*not much, but very good, time with the sweetheart
*small but awesome: my new deliciously clean smelling rosemary’n’mint shampoo/ conditioner… and noticing I may have outgrown (finally!) my chronic allergies to any and all hair-cleaning stuffs
Happy Earth Day, everyone!
Wow, this week! Just wow.
There was so much. So I want to put it here. But I don’t really want to talk about it.
So this is what I am going to do.
The Hard
{Silent Retreat}
So hard. So so hard.
The Good
{Silent Retreat}
So good. So so good.
Cluck cluck going to try and do a quick chicken
Hards
– grieving for little lad and his struggles and mine. Some of the less-fit-for-social-institutions-like-school-and-common-social-interaction features of his autistesque personality are becoming more pronounced. Also when he
ignoresappears to ignore me which may or may not be what is happening and I have my hands full of baby Igo a bit battyfind it very frustrating. Andsometimesoften I end up shouting. Which is not good for either of us.– money blues. Not woes, but blues. Bleerrgghh bureaucracy boredom *siiiiiiggghh*
– debt dragon taming is still scary. Definitely feeds into the blues.
– I have never been so hungry in all my life. I am eating myself out of house and home! Honestly I just did a week’s worth of shopping four days ago and we’re nearly out of food again!
– mental chatter continues, although I’ve been meditating on [what yoga means to me which is ummmmmmm i don’t know how to define it…… kind of: how you experience and receive and approach EVERYTHING including your thoughts and feelings and sensations] and it helps. Receiving, letting go, exactly what our breath is THERE for, to remind us of this. As well as useful functions like carrying oxygen to the bloodstream and disposing of CO2 etc.
Okay!
Goods
– Yoga om meditations
– Baby. Ohhhhh baby. And she started smiling this week, proper I’m-so-happy-to-see-you smiles. She’s beautiful.
– Little lad loves me despite my less-good-than-I-would-like-it-to-be parenting and I don’t think I’m mortally fucking him up…. and I am working on it.
Lots ofsome Yes-No-Yes and NVC and visual supports to verbal cues and schedules and allowances for his vulnerabilities.– Occupational therapy. It is completely fascinating. As is pretty much anything to do with child development, learning, education and psychology.
– Speaking of which: came up with a one word answer for my ultimate superpower! Collage. Pulling together elements that someone else has created to create a cohesive whole new thing. Event. Understanding. ?Theory? (one day!). ??Philosophy??
– Merry-go-rollercoaster relationship stuff is waaaaaaay down lately. Still spots of tension and grunge but mostly quite to very good.
– Discovered that I can enrol in a course on gvmt-loan-fee-help-system! Either I had completely misunderstood the way things worked for years or they’ve changed it since I last dropped out of Uni. Very pleased. Have found a course and am delightedly trawling the internet for subject descriptions and revelling in how curriculums can be devised and analysed and described. LOVE it!
– Got over my chronic shyness and ‘made friends’ with a neighbour we’ve kind of been friendly with for… oh I don’t know about THREE YEARS!! Will drop in an invitation to dinner soon. Roll on the commune!! Or, at least, community. Yes.
– Autumn colours in the lush, leafy suburbs we drive through to get to kinder. One day I will get to Yellowstone in the ‘fall’. Mmmmm…. new desktop picture might be in order I think!
Cluck Cluck on to the VPAs!!
xxoxxo
*sneaky quick dashing-in chicken*
The Hard:
Fight with J.
OVERWHELM. Reams of notes, repetitious. To-frickin-do’s, and no idea what goes first.
Money pain & silent retreat.
The Good:
Interrupted pattern after fight. Let myself grieve for old hurt that fight triggered.
Shifting things. Exploring things. Looking at processes.
Money possibilities and I sent out the newsletter, have potential students, am facing things (tiny woot!)
Happy week, peeps. 🙂
Wheeeeeeeeeeee introvert bar, I;ll join!
The Crazy Hard
– Being in the office environment with all its shoes. Students, teaching assistents, colleagues. Button-pushing and seeing how far Hannah’s button’s can be pushed.
– Visiting friends who knew the Ex. Lovely friends; but talking about how things ended brought back schtuff. Also: seeing the niceness of togetherness brought back schtuff.
– Still sick. Wanting not to be sick but being slowed down in everythng.
– knowing there is travel evey day in the week coming up. not excited about it and wanting more quiet times in one place.
The Good
+ patience for me. I haz it!
+ the excitment of being invited to this women & leadership seminar.
+ getting back on track in meeting outside expectations. lowering the inside expectations. just being done with internalizing stuff.
+ floop! epiphanies and sharing and chickening.
Jeez, what a week!
The Hard:
-contemplating my surgery options
-doc not calling me despite meesages = abandonment issues
-abandonment issues! nasty hard now-is-not-then process led thru recent trauma to older trauma back to the ur-text of all trauma:my abandonment issues
-Not Chasing the Cat led to a whole slew of Acting Out on my part. weird ugliness. shame.
-which i tried to forgive myself for, cuz that’s SO easy
-allowed yuk relationship patterning–not even the first time or the tenth, but each timke it’s like the first
-last nite: my kids pointedly ignoring me when i told them to go to bed, husband working on 12th hour of online stupidity in the basment, FIL smoking in his room, uninvolved and unhelpful. Is this my fucking life?
-the depths of sorrow, anger, rage and disrespect that follwoed the above
-ansd the pissed-off-ness because I allowed myself to be agry and sad and did NOT return back to my computer to work, becvauyse OF COURSE everyone will let me down, but do I have to let myself down?? I PROMISED we’d go back and start that other chapter
-because my editor does not give two shits what the hell my life is liek
-4 weeks til I deliver the manuscript. fear, panic, resistace and 5 flavors of the imposter syndrome.
-plus i’m fat. i gained 5 pounds since going on raw juice and i’m boated too and I had to skip Ballet sculpt last week and I may need to skip it gaain and AAARRRRGH!
-i’m a drug addict. shame, inconvenience etc
The Yum:
-husband telloing me he’s proud of how brave and pro-active i am regarding surgery
-the clear calm mental state that comes when I deal with the surgery (owl stickers on the paperwork helps!)
-juice.
-going back to Level One to get them in my body, and not worrying about the epiphanies, because i’m neck-deep in my process anyway
-stone skipping and other tools
-finding the Containment for the SDcary project! Effective and silly
-more dancing, more music, more silliness
-loving my kids
-gorgeous weather.
-getting thru my writing tasks. DOING IT
-being in a bad sad mad place, and still being loved
-not doing my self-care, and not being the Best Me, and not being good perfect or fair, and still forgiving myself
-purple silk lingerie. new lace panties. they amke me happy.
But I need to ake one reuqest: I need to stop feeling suiicidal over my failures of yesterday. That was one nigth, and everything that ahppened was triggered and normal for someone as repressed and scared and lonely and disrespected as me. I need to just let og of this and be okay with myself.
Oh, hugs for the hard, and darling. Your copy. It is never terrible. <3 The sheer fresh actually-a-real-human-being-actually-talking-to-another-human-being… THING that you do is something brand agencies get paid thousands to fake (I know, I worked for one) and nobody… NOBODY I've ever come across can do it like you. I think it's the genuine lack of emotional manipulation that's just such a relief and so refreshing, it's like biting into a big juicy orange after you haven't tasted fruit for weeks and thought you were fine until that juice exploded into your mouth and your whole body went OMG WANT.
Yeah, I went off on one there… 😀