i've done a lot of traveling this summer.
bali and los angeles and now i'm in new york. (i know. it's not technically summer anymore.)
on all of the trips, away from home, i hoped for something. i'm not sure what i specifically was hoping for. maybe just a lot of fun. LOTS of fun. like, amazing, face hurting, the best time ever fun. and all the trips have been/were/are wonderful. but i've brought this cloud of sadness with me everywhere i went. i think i must have been expecting to shake it at some point, like taking a vacation from my problems (a la 'what about bob'.) and that didn't end up happening. i stayed sad, and most of all, lonely.
i've never really been a melancholy person, nor would i have described myself as chronically lonely. i have a lot of really good friends, all of whom i feel totally comfortable being myself with. i don't keep a lot of me in reserve for special times or something. i feel pretty darn comfortable exposing all of my deepest, darkest secrets to nearly anyone. so this constant feeling of isolation is pretty new for me. not totally unprecedented (see los angeles years) but not my usual way of being.
but everything since my mom died is so weird and not normal to me. i look at my life now and i realize i have basically no idea who i am, what i'm doing, where i'm going, what i want - anything. i'm a total mystery to myself. if i run down the basic details of my life: marriage, living in petaluma, no job, pilates, mom dead, puppy, cat - they all add up to a life i totally don't recognize as mine. i think a huge portion of my cloud can be chalked up to Life Post-Mom.
i'm so much sadder, as a person, than i ever was before. my basic faith in the rightness of the universe, that things happen for a reason and i can trust that everything will work out for the best, is fucking shot to shit. that rationale - the idea that things happen for a reason - can go fuck itself. no, sorry. i don't accept happiness now as necessarily predicated upon my mom's heartbreaking, untimely death from a fucking brain tumor. so, i also have to give up the idea that "god" has a plan for me, and that everything is happening according to that plan, because any plan that requires the death of my mom can go fuck itself, too. so, rather than accepting there's a god that makes things happen and made my mom die in order for something good to happen for me is not welcome in my heart. i feel much more peaceful with a worldview where bad and good things just happen and we attempt to cope with everything gracefully. no smugness at the good, no bitterness at the bad.
anyway, i digressed onto a well-worn track. god: yes or no? not what i meant to talk about.
i am sad. i continue to be sad. i continue to be stymied about who i want to be, and what i want my life to look like. i am not sure who i am if i'm married and can't rely on my looks for attention. seriously, this is a question i am wrestling with. also, i'm not sure how to experience joy anymore. the happiest i've been in a long time was when i was meditating, so maybe i'll start that again, in hopes of recapturing that.
in the meantime, i'm just kinda schlepping along my cloud. lonelies, sads, uncomfies. not my favorite chapter of my life.
Showing posts with label faith. Show all posts
Showing posts with label faith. Show all posts
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Monday, June 8, 2009
body.
hey!
it's been a while!
i'm not going to get into a recap.
i'm fine.
doing well.
but i'm here to talk about something specific.
i'm having some body issues.
i just started pilates teacher training.
it's very exciting, but mostly totally terrifying.
i never did sports. i never took dance or gymnastics. PE was often the only class keeping me from getting straight A's in grade school. i have never been in great shape. i've always been a reader, or a TV watcher, or a sitter-arounder-and-chat-and-smoker.
but when i was grieving so intensely the winter after mom died, i spent a lot of time working out. i did a lot of cardio and i did weight training at the gym. and i really liked it! i was very, very surprised because i'd never really enjoyed anything athletic before, but it totally hit the spot for me.
then i fizzled some on the gym, and i've been pretty sporadic about it, up until a couple of months ago, when i got really serious again.
i work out for many reasons, but the main one is that i want to lose weight and have a better body. when i was working out before i totally didn't see a difference, at all. shannon swears he did, but i don't really remember him ever telling me. i was mindful of what i ate, but i didn't sweat it too much. so i always assumed that the reason i never noticed more of a change, with my sudden dramatic increase in exercise, was that i wasn't eating right. maybe i needed to decrease my calories?
so this time around i've been trying to monitor really closely. i'm counting calories. i'm logging work outs. i'm measuring myself and weighing myself. and i'm still not really seeing anything.
so, it's only been a couple of months. that's one factor, i'm sure. i'm 30 and i'm sure my metabolism is slowing down, so i need to be patient. i still eat some carbs, and have to really struggle to keep myself away from sweets. i should probably quit all breads, but no carb diets just aren't sustainable, and i don't think carbs are inherently bad. i'm all about some complex carbs. but i should definitely quit sugar, and maybe gluten.
i dunno.
i'm just feeling really discouraged. i'm working so hard and it's hard to want to keep going when you're not really seeing the results. i know the goal is to be healthier overall, and it's a lifestyle change, not just trying to get thinner, but let's be realistic... I WANT TO LOSE SOME FUCKING WEIGHT.
i'm starting to get a little bit crazy. i feel like everywhere i go there are women/girls of all ages who have way better bodies and in my head i semi-obsess over what they know that i don't know. i lost a bunch of weight right before i met shannon, because i was eating these gross energy bars for breakfast and lunch and drinking tons of coffee and smoking cigarettes. one of his first orders of business after we met was to wrench the nasty bars from my hands, and shame me into smoking less, and i totally gained all the weight back, which is obviously fine and much better. but on some level, i consider buying a case of those bars from costco. i consider only eating bars, and taking vitamins and drinking water. i sometimes feel like i can only handle total control (basically anorexia, which i absolutely don't have) or no control (eating whatever.)
i don't really think i'm "fat" by conventional standards, and i'm totally within my healthy weight range for my height. but i don't want to be on the outer edge. i want to be in the middle, or towards the lower end. i am sick of feeling like i'm a bit chubby, or being embarrassed about my soft tummy. i feel like my difficulty losing weight is a total condemnation of my willpower, that i'm weak and a quitter and can't do it.
the person i see in the mirror is different all the time. somedays i feel nearly willowy, which is kinda my dream. many, many says i wake up feeling gigantic. not really gigantic. just kinda swollen. big. heavy. ungainly.
i'm trying to forge a new relationship with my body, after barely communicating with it for about 27 years. i don't understand how it works and i find it totally mystifying and very frustrating.
i wish i could see myself through a few other people's eyes, so i could get a better sense of how i'm doing and what i look like.
anyway, i'm not quitting. i'm going to be a pilates teacher someday, and so help me god, i will not be the chubby teacher. (i go to spin class and whenever there's a chubby teacher i can't help but wonder if they're doing it right, because if you're doing spin all the time, i'd think you'd we 90 lbs.) i'm not quitting, i'm going to keep on working on it and i'm not going to give up.
but i'm really discouraged and afraid nothing i do will make any difference, i'm just destined to be 'the birth of venus' forever. it could be worse.
it's been a while!
i'm not going to get into a recap.
i'm fine.
doing well.
but i'm here to talk about something specific.
i'm having some body issues.
i just started pilates teacher training.
it's very exciting, but mostly totally terrifying.
i never did sports. i never took dance or gymnastics. PE was often the only class keeping me from getting straight A's in grade school. i have never been in great shape. i've always been a reader, or a TV watcher, or a sitter-arounder-and-chat-and-smoker.
but when i was grieving so intensely the winter after mom died, i spent a lot of time working out. i did a lot of cardio and i did weight training at the gym. and i really liked it! i was very, very surprised because i'd never really enjoyed anything athletic before, but it totally hit the spot for me.
then i fizzled some on the gym, and i've been pretty sporadic about it, up until a couple of months ago, when i got really serious again.
i work out for many reasons, but the main one is that i want to lose weight and have a better body. when i was working out before i totally didn't see a difference, at all. shannon swears he did, but i don't really remember him ever telling me. i was mindful of what i ate, but i didn't sweat it too much. so i always assumed that the reason i never noticed more of a change, with my sudden dramatic increase in exercise, was that i wasn't eating right. maybe i needed to decrease my calories?
so this time around i've been trying to monitor really closely. i'm counting calories. i'm logging work outs. i'm measuring myself and weighing myself. and i'm still not really seeing anything.
so, it's only been a couple of months. that's one factor, i'm sure. i'm 30 and i'm sure my metabolism is slowing down, so i need to be patient. i still eat some carbs, and have to really struggle to keep myself away from sweets. i should probably quit all breads, but no carb diets just aren't sustainable, and i don't think carbs are inherently bad. i'm all about some complex carbs. but i should definitely quit sugar, and maybe gluten.
i dunno.
i'm just feeling really discouraged. i'm working so hard and it's hard to want to keep going when you're not really seeing the results. i know the goal is to be healthier overall, and it's a lifestyle change, not just trying to get thinner, but let's be realistic... I WANT TO LOSE SOME FUCKING WEIGHT.
i'm starting to get a little bit crazy. i feel like everywhere i go there are women/girls of all ages who have way better bodies and in my head i semi-obsess over what they know that i don't know. i lost a bunch of weight right before i met shannon, because i was eating these gross energy bars for breakfast and lunch and drinking tons of coffee and smoking cigarettes. one of his first orders of business after we met was to wrench the nasty bars from my hands, and shame me into smoking less, and i totally gained all the weight back, which is obviously fine and much better. but on some level, i consider buying a case of those bars from costco. i consider only eating bars, and taking vitamins and drinking water. i sometimes feel like i can only handle total control (basically anorexia, which i absolutely don't have) or no control (eating whatever.)
i don't really think i'm "fat" by conventional standards, and i'm totally within my healthy weight range for my height. but i don't want to be on the outer edge. i want to be in the middle, or towards the lower end. i am sick of feeling like i'm a bit chubby, or being embarrassed about my soft tummy. i feel like my difficulty losing weight is a total condemnation of my willpower, that i'm weak and a quitter and can't do it.
the person i see in the mirror is different all the time. somedays i feel nearly willowy, which is kinda my dream. many, many says i wake up feeling gigantic. not really gigantic. just kinda swollen. big. heavy. ungainly.
i'm trying to forge a new relationship with my body, after barely communicating with it for about 27 years. i don't understand how it works and i find it totally mystifying and very frustrating.
i wish i could see myself through a few other people's eyes, so i could get a better sense of how i'm doing and what i look like.
anyway, i'm not quitting. i'm going to be a pilates teacher someday, and so help me god, i will not be the chubby teacher. (i go to spin class and whenever there's a chubby teacher i can't help but wonder if they're doing it right, because if you're doing spin all the time, i'd think you'd we 90 lbs.) i'm not quitting, i'm going to keep on working on it and i'm not going to give up.
but i'm really discouraged and afraid nothing i do will make any difference, i'm just destined to be 'the birth of venus' forever. it could be worse.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
how am i doing?
i'm okay.
thanks for asking.
lacking a bit in the joie-de-vivre, but i think it's unrealistic to expect myself to greet every day with a twinkle in my eye and a song in my heart. sometimes you're just plodding along, the best you can, keeping on keeping on.
i've been thinking a lot about time and mortality.
i feel a little silly getting morbid at 30, since my grandmother still referred to women in the 40s as 'young ladies,' but i have actually been having 'i wish i could go back in time and re-do things' thoughts.
i'm only getting older, guys.
i know we all are, and that's not a revelation, but it's sobering to be faced by mortality, even for a moment. given how much of our time is spent pretending we'll never die, it's a shock to get it.
TIME MARCHES INEXORABLY ON.
this is my only chance to be me.
i don't exactly feel like i've wasted my life up until this point. i certainly haven't been living large, or doing extraordinary things, but i also haven't been hurting people on purpose or causing harm or anything. my life so far hasn't been a failure, but it hasn't been what i thought it would be. i think teenage kira would be a little disappointed. of course, teenage kira was a bit of an asshole, so her opinions aren't the most reliable.
i just am feeling time passing, and myself getting older.
i have this weird thing under my chin, like i'm developing an wattle. that's time, right there. gross.
i'm meditating again, and reading my buddhism books.
whenever i remember that there is no 'good' or 'bad,' just things that happen and my evaluations about them, it's a relief.
working on mindfulness. working on stillness. working on doing no harm, which isn't hard in some ways (like not hitting people) but is hard in other ways (not thinking negative things about other drivers.) it all counts though.
also, letting go of the idea that i am going to change, going to get better, that my life should be different than it is...such a shock.
i am who i am.
not that i have no interest in consciously avoiding behavior that causes harm, because i do.
but letting go of the illusion that i am ever not going to be filled with concerns and insecurities and regrets and unfriendly thoughts. it'll always be there. and there's nothing wrong with it. it just is the way that it is.
what would life be like if we remembered all the time that we are fine already?
i honestly can't imagine.
and again, the goal isn't to never suffer again, because it'll happen.
i'll disappoint myself. i'll disappoint others. i'll make huge mistakes that i can barely face.
it'll just happen, so i can let go of being worried about it.
the goal is to be gentle about it.
to treat myself and others like my favorite person, for whom i have infinite forgiveness.
obvs not the point of letting myself be an asshole or letting other people treat me like crap.
i know that this isn't a life's plan, but while i am chewing over the idea of a life plan, this is a very nice way to spend my time.
not writing in my novel at all, but writing in my blogs a lot more.
that's something, i think.
thanks for asking.
lacking a bit in the joie-de-vivre, but i think it's unrealistic to expect myself to greet every day with a twinkle in my eye and a song in my heart. sometimes you're just plodding along, the best you can, keeping on keeping on.
i've been thinking a lot about time and mortality.
i feel a little silly getting morbid at 30, since my grandmother still referred to women in the 40s as 'young ladies,' but i have actually been having 'i wish i could go back in time and re-do things' thoughts.
i'm only getting older, guys.
i know we all are, and that's not a revelation, but it's sobering to be faced by mortality, even for a moment. given how much of our time is spent pretending we'll never die, it's a shock to get it.
TIME MARCHES INEXORABLY ON.
this is my only chance to be me.
i don't exactly feel like i've wasted my life up until this point. i certainly haven't been living large, or doing extraordinary things, but i also haven't been hurting people on purpose or causing harm or anything. my life so far hasn't been a failure, but it hasn't been what i thought it would be. i think teenage kira would be a little disappointed. of course, teenage kira was a bit of an asshole, so her opinions aren't the most reliable.
i just am feeling time passing, and myself getting older.
i have this weird thing under my chin, like i'm developing an wattle. that's time, right there. gross.
i'm meditating again, and reading my buddhism books.
whenever i remember that there is no 'good' or 'bad,' just things that happen and my evaluations about them, it's a relief.
working on mindfulness. working on stillness. working on doing no harm, which isn't hard in some ways (like not hitting people) but is hard in other ways (not thinking negative things about other drivers.) it all counts though.
also, letting go of the idea that i am going to change, going to get better, that my life should be different than it is...such a shock.
i am who i am.
not that i have no interest in consciously avoiding behavior that causes harm, because i do.
but letting go of the illusion that i am ever not going to be filled with concerns and insecurities and regrets and unfriendly thoughts. it'll always be there. and there's nothing wrong with it. it just is the way that it is.
what would life be like if we remembered all the time that we are fine already?
i honestly can't imagine.
and again, the goal isn't to never suffer again, because it'll happen.
i'll disappoint myself. i'll disappoint others. i'll make huge mistakes that i can barely face.
it'll just happen, so i can let go of being worried about it.
the goal is to be gentle about it.
to treat myself and others like my favorite person, for whom i have infinite forgiveness.
obvs not the point of letting myself be an asshole or letting other people treat me like crap.
i know that this isn't a life's plan, but while i am chewing over the idea of a life plan, this is a very nice way to spend my time.
not writing in my novel at all, but writing in my blogs a lot more.
that's something, i think.
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
new year.
so, 2009, huh?
2008, not my favorite year.
i know i said the same thing about 2007, too, but the statement is no less true for being repeated. basically, the late Aughts have been tough for me and mine. it pains me to become all eeyore about stuff, but i think i'm over hoping that next year will be better. pema chodron is anti-hope anyway, so i don't feel like it's the worst thing ever to let go of hoping things will be different than they are. thing will be however they will be (isn't there a song about that?) and i'll just keep moving forward. like a glacier. except they're receding with global warming, i think. still. i'll move forward like a thing that moves inexorably forward. (pulitzer price committee, there's no 'c' in fisher.)
i had a talk with lu and tab about my state of mind/heart a couple of days after christmas. certainly it fluctuates a bit on a day-to-day basis, and it might even change a bit within one day, but if we were to smooth the little ups and downs into a general curve, in order to make a blanket statement, i'd describe my general state of mind as 'poor.' i'm still In It, as they say. i'm trying to be done. i am trying to move on to the next phase, where things feel more manageable, and i even got there for a while, i think. but i'm not there anymore. i'm back in the wanting to wear pajamas all day phase. i'm finding it hard to get even the most basic things done. i have no energy for any of the things that made me feel happier before - writing, cooking, the gym. it's not happening for me.
i'm having a REALLY hard time taking care of The Kid. whatever stores of nurturing energy i had in reserve is completely tapped out right now. even the idea of having a baby is exhausting and deeply unpleasant right now, whereas a couple of months ago, i was pretty much set on it. i've been daydreaming about never having a kid lately, just having myself to take care of.
looking back over the last few years, i've spent a lot of time taking care of other people and creatures. no need to list them all here, though if you'd like one, i'm happy to supply it. i don't regret learning how to care for others. i think that was a muscle that was weak to the point of being non-existent prior to mom's cancer, so it was good for me to learn it, though it would've been nice to have a gentler learning curve. i am a softer, better person for it, absolutely. but i could really use some more time to take care of myself. i actually feel like my need to take care of myself is nearly impossible to satisfy. like, no matter how much time i have to focus on myself, i feel like i'll never be done with needing more. and i'm feeling an insatiable need for others to take care of me, too.
in my buddhist practice, i am working on compassion for myself and others. in fact, i have never been one for new year's resolutions, but i made an informal one this year, which is just that: to practice compassion for myself at all times, even when i feel like i don't deserve it. even when i am really sure that i am The Worst and totally shouldn't be treated with love and respect, i am going to endeavor to STILL greet myself with as much forgiveness and love as i can muster. the voice of compassion to me is my mom's voice, which makes the practice painful. when i'm really filled with self-loathing and shame, the way i often bring myself back is my imagining what my mom would say if i were discussing it with her. she had a low tolerance for other people beating themselves up, and an infinite capacity to forgive. there is something so comforting about the idea of her reminding me that i am doing the best i can do, and that that's enough. for some reason telling myself that doesn't mean anything at all. it has to be in my mom's voice.
i worry a bit that i have lost the capacity for self-forgiveness and receiving comfort from others because no one does it the way i want it done, because my mom is the person who i want to be comforted by. it's like every shoulder i cry on is just not quite right. no one pets my head the right way. but what do i do now, since that perfect shoulder is gone? i can't just spend the rest of my life unsatisfied with the comfort i am offered, by myself or others. that sounds shitty.
i feel like people are sick of me being so sad. i feel like everyone thinks i am faking. i think on some level i actually believe i am faking - that i could be trying harder, doing better, and i'm choosing not to, because i'm lazy or something. i feel like people are sick of me being so needy for reassurance. i feel like people hate the new sad kira and miss the old fun selfish kira. (i know i certainly miss her sometimes.) i guess all these things i am imagining other people thinking are just the things i'm thinking. "why aren't you better yet? it's been more than a year. you're not that sad. you just spent hours laughing with friends, so you can't be that sad. get over it. you're just pretending you're sad because you're lazy and you don't want to get anything done and this is a good excuse that no one will be allowed to call you on. look at other people - they're going through worse things than you and they're working, spending time with friends, calling people, grocery shopping, vaccuming. what's your fucking problem, aside from being a lazy piece of crap?"
that monologue feels way more real and truthful to me than the good stuff. the 'i'm doing the best i can. if i could be doing better, i would be. even when i fail, that was the best i could do that day.' that seems pretty flimsy to me. 'i really miss my mom' seems like the lamest excuse in the world.
but you guys, i really miss her.
today, right now, i'm not doing well.
maybe tomorrow it'll feel more manageable, but right now, i feel like i'm smothering under this and like it's never, ever going to get better.
i've been thinking a lot about john travolta and kelly preston. i finally understand why people write letters to celebrities, especially after tragedies like this. i thought a lot about jennifer hudson, too, after her family got killed. i just keep thinking about the sadness i struggle with, the loss, the hopelessness, and i think about how fresh it all is for them, and how terrible every morning must feel right now. before mom got sick, i think i consciously muted my ability to take in sadnesses around me. i don't think having a filter is wrong. without a damper, how would anyone get out of bed in the morning in a world with darfurs and gazas and the drug epidemic and the situation in the inner cities. so much misery. but being in the midst of it myself RIGHT NOW, i find my ability to mute it mostly gone. i don't know john travolta at all, obviously, but i find myself crying for him, and how sad him and his wife must be. it's sort of embarrassing to me, actually. mostly because it's involuntary, like hiccuping or something. i can't help thinking about them all the time, and since i'm always a bit on the verge of tears, there they are again. (the fact that they're scientologists and didn't get their probably autistic son any kind of treatment is beside the point. they loved him and showed it in a way that was meaningful for them, and their loss is no less profound for them being scientologists and wingnuts.)
i'm just really tired.
i wish everything and everyone would take a break from needing me to manage them, even a little, and i could have some time to do whatever i want or need to without any scrutiny. i mean EVERYTHING and EVERYONE. houseplants, cats, puppy, husband, friends, bills, dust, self-esteem...i want everything to stop asking me for something for some length of time - just take care of yourself or accept that i have nothing to offer right now, but still need a lot of giving from you - and i'll see if i can fill this bottomless pit.
(obviously i know everyone and everything have already kind of been needing to do this, since my capacity to fully participate in anything is entirely intermittent and has been for a couple of years now, and i totally appreciate everything that everyone has done for me. this isn't to suggest that i am not being given enough, or that i am being asked for more than is fair. quite the contrary. i am just still not done needing really intensive nurturing, i feel like, but i also feel like i have moved past the point where anyone finds that acceptable or an idea worth entertaining.)
i've had a few ideas about writing. i think i might have a kid's book floating around in my head. i'm wanting to write, but haven't gotten there in a couple of weeks.
the pup continues to be so cute it's a little annoying. he's just relentless. i want to talk all about him, but i think that might be boring for everyone, though why i should feel like the minutiae of my puppy's life would be less interesting that the minutiae of my emotional life is a mystery.
been doing some clothes shopping with my christmas money. lotsa good sales right now.
the puppy has mastered the doggie door, but i can't for the life of me master the art of walking my dog, the way cesar millan wants us to.
i need a hair cut and i haven't gotten waxed in months.
my house constantly looks like crap with the dog added into the equation. i was barely holding steady with the cats, but with the dog added in, i'm getting trounced.
i'm worried i've lost the ability to be cheerful, in general, and that i'm just going to be a sad person forever.
oh well.
a new year, another chance to do my best and see what happens, i guess.
the second year of my life that mom wasn't alive for.
2008, not my favorite year.
i know i said the same thing about 2007, too, but the statement is no less true for being repeated. basically, the late Aughts have been tough for me and mine. it pains me to become all eeyore about stuff, but i think i'm over hoping that next year will be better. pema chodron is anti-hope anyway, so i don't feel like it's the worst thing ever to let go of hoping things will be different than they are. thing will be however they will be (isn't there a song about that?) and i'll just keep moving forward. like a glacier. except they're receding with global warming, i think. still. i'll move forward like a thing that moves inexorably forward. (pulitzer price committee, there's no 'c' in fisher.)
i had a talk with lu and tab about my state of mind/heart a couple of days after christmas. certainly it fluctuates a bit on a day-to-day basis, and it might even change a bit within one day, but if we were to smooth the little ups and downs into a general curve, in order to make a blanket statement, i'd describe my general state of mind as 'poor.' i'm still In It, as they say. i'm trying to be done. i am trying to move on to the next phase, where things feel more manageable, and i even got there for a while, i think. but i'm not there anymore. i'm back in the wanting to wear pajamas all day phase. i'm finding it hard to get even the most basic things done. i have no energy for any of the things that made me feel happier before - writing, cooking, the gym. it's not happening for me.
i'm having a REALLY hard time taking care of The Kid. whatever stores of nurturing energy i had in reserve is completely tapped out right now. even the idea of having a baby is exhausting and deeply unpleasant right now, whereas a couple of months ago, i was pretty much set on it. i've been daydreaming about never having a kid lately, just having myself to take care of.
looking back over the last few years, i've spent a lot of time taking care of other people and creatures. no need to list them all here, though if you'd like one, i'm happy to supply it. i don't regret learning how to care for others. i think that was a muscle that was weak to the point of being non-existent prior to mom's cancer, so it was good for me to learn it, though it would've been nice to have a gentler learning curve. i am a softer, better person for it, absolutely. but i could really use some more time to take care of myself. i actually feel like my need to take care of myself is nearly impossible to satisfy. like, no matter how much time i have to focus on myself, i feel like i'll never be done with needing more. and i'm feeling an insatiable need for others to take care of me, too.
in my buddhist practice, i am working on compassion for myself and others. in fact, i have never been one for new year's resolutions, but i made an informal one this year, which is just that: to practice compassion for myself at all times, even when i feel like i don't deserve it. even when i am really sure that i am The Worst and totally shouldn't be treated with love and respect, i am going to endeavor to STILL greet myself with as much forgiveness and love as i can muster. the voice of compassion to me is my mom's voice, which makes the practice painful. when i'm really filled with self-loathing and shame, the way i often bring myself back is my imagining what my mom would say if i were discussing it with her. she had a low tolerance for other people beating themselves up, and an infinite capacity to forgive. there is something so comforting about the idea of her reminding me that i am doing the best i can do, and that that's enough. for some reason telling myself that doesn't mean anything at all. it has to be in my mom's voice.
i worry a bit that i have lost the capacity for self-forgiveness and receiving comfort from others because no one does it the way i want it done, because my mom is the person who i want to be comforted by. it's like every shoulder i cry on is just not quite right. no one pets my head the right way. but what do i do now, since that perfect shoulder is gone? i can't just spend the rest of my life unsatisfied with the comfort i am offered, by myself or others. that sounds shitty.
i feel like people are sick of me being so sad. i feel like everyone thinks i am faking. i think on some level i actually believe i am faking - that i could be trying harder, doing better, and i'm choosing not to, because i'm lazy or something. i feel like people are sick of me being so needy for reassurance. i feel like people hate the new sad kira and miss the old fun selfish kira. (i know i certainly miss her sometimes.) i guess all these things i am imagining other people thinking are just the things i'm thinking. "why aren't you better yet? it's been more than a year. you're not that sad. you just spent hours laughing with friends, so you can't be that sad. get over it. you're just pretending you're sad because you're lazy and you don't want to get anything done and this is a good excuse that no one will be allowed to call you on. look at other people - they're going through worse things than you and they're working, spending time with friends, calling people, grocery shopping, vaccuming. what's your fucking problem, aside from being a lazy piece of crap?"
that monologue feels way more real and truthful to me than the good stuff. the 'i'm doing the best i can. if i could be doing better, i would be. even when i fail, that was the best i could do that day.' that seems pretty flimsy to me. 'i really miss my mom' seems like the lamest excuse in the world.
but you guys, i really miss her.
today, right now, i'm not doing well.
maybe tomorrow it'll feel more manageable, but right now, i feel like i'm smothering under this and like it's never, ever going to get better.
i've been thinking a lot about john travolta and kelly preston. i finally understand why people write letters to celebrities, especially after tragedies like this. i thought a lot about jennifer hudson, too, after her family got killed. i just keep thinking about the sadness i struggle with, the loss, the hopelessness, and i think about how fresh it all is for them, and how terrible every morning must feel right now. before mom got sick, i think i consciously muted my ability to take in sadnesses around me. i don't think having a filter is wrong. without a damper, how would anyone get out of bed in the morning in a world with darfurs and gazas and the drug epidemic and the situation in the inner cities. so much misery. but being in the midst of it myself RIGHT NOW, i find my ability to mute it mostly gone. i don't know john travolta at all, obviously, but i find myself crying for him, and how sad him and his wife must be. it's sort of embarrassing to me, actually. mostly because it's involuntary, like hiccuping or something. i can't help thinking about them all the time, and since i'm always a bit on the verge of tears, there they are again. (the fact that they're scientologists and didn't get their probably autistic son any kind of treatment is beside the point. they loved him and showed it in a way that was meaningful for them, and their loss is no less profound for them being scientologists and wingnuts.)
i'm just really tired.
i wish everything and everyone would take a break from needing me to manage them, even a little, and i could have some time to do whatever i want or need to without any scrutiny. i mean EVERYTHING and EVERYONE. houseplants, cats, puppy, husband, friends, bills, dust, self-esteem...i want everything to stop asking me for something for some length of time - just take care of yourself or accept that i have nothing to offer right now, but still need a lot of giving from you - and i'll see if i can fill this bottomless pit.
(obviously i know everyone and everything have already kind of been needing to do this, since my capacity to fully participate in anything is entirely intermittent and has been for a couple of years now, and i totally appreciate everything that everyone has done for me. this isn't to suggest that i am not being given enough, or that i am being asked for more than is fair. quite the contrary. i am just still not done needing really intensive nurturing, i feel like, but i also feel like i have moved past the point where anyone finds that acceptable or an idea worth entertaining.)
i've had a few ideas about writing. i think i might have a kid's book floating around in my head. i'm wanting to write, but haven't gotten there in a couple of weeks.
the pup continues to be so cute it's a little annoying. he's just relentless. i want to talk all about him, but i think that might be boring for everyone, though why i should feel like the minutiae of my puppy's life would be less interesting that the minutiae of my emotional life is a mystery.
been doing some clothes shopping with my christmas money. lotsa good sales right now.
the puppy has mastered the doggie door, but i can't for the life of me master the art of walking my dog, the way cesar millan wants us to.
i need a hair cut and i haven't gotten waxed in months.
my house constantly looks like crap with the dog added into the equation. i was barely holding steady with the cats, but with the dog added in, i'm getting trounced.
i'm worried i've lost the ability to be cheerful, in general, and that i'm just going to be a sad person forever.
oh well.
a new year, another chance to do my best and see what happens, i guess.
the second year of my life that mom wasn't alive for.
Friday, October 3, 2008
this just in...
oh, hi!
haven't been here in a while!
i mean, i posted that 'west wing' thing, because duh, but i haven't really been keeping this thingie up-to-date. here's a grab bag of things going on...
1) lucy is in town right now, visiting from NYC. her fam is having some health stuff going on, so she came home to see them. lucky jerk gets to go to hawaii to visit her sister and the kids in a week. yo soy hellsa jealous. it's VERY nice having her here. it's like visiting home when you move away, where it's so good it kills you a little and you almost wish you hadn't gone home because it just makes it harder to be away. we went to get our hairs did all fancy today, washed and styled and stuff on account of...
2) brian and libby's wedding is tomorrow. i am feeling for them because it's supposed to rain and they had NOT planned on rain. i'm really excited and nervous for them. i know how much stress they've gone through to get everything ready and how fucking relieved they'll be to have it done with. also, afterwards, they'll be mr. and mrs. halpin, which is pretty exciting. it's made me think a lot about how sure me and brian were that WE would get married and how not correct we were. it's also made me even more and more grateful for how beautifully everything has evolved with our friendship. i consider my ex-boyfriend and his soon-to-be wife some of my closest, most important friends, and i am very, very lucky to still have all the benefits of our relationship, as well as a fantastic partner of my own.
3) so, in preparation for the wedding, which feels pretty high stakes, as far as social events go, with all the long-time friends attending, i have purchased my first pair of spanx. my dress isn't super va-va-voom, but it's made of a clingy jersey material that will do a person no favors, so i bought some crazy girdle bike shorts to smooth stuff out. totally embarrassing and old-lady feeling, but if they let me relax in my dress and know everything is where it should be, then it'll be worth swallowing my pride.
4) mom's house (a.k.a. money pit #1) is officially On The Market. anyone want to buy a lovely house in redwood valley, ca for a good price and save me and my husband from impending destitution in the process? anyone? anyone? it has taken a lot of stress and annoyance but it's up and running. please aid us in thinking desirable thoughts about the property. please envision the PERFECT buyers being drawn to it like magnets. allen tried his hardest to alienate all the real estate agents by totally losing his shit today, as only allen can, but i think it's going to be fine. oh, allen.
5) 2 or 3 months ago i started meditating regularly. me and LW took a seriously life changing class together in berkeley, led my a freaking amazing teacher named james baraz. on the first day of the class he made the statement that meditation has made the difference in his life. liesl and i came away wondering what he meant by that, and feeling admittedly skeptical, but i can honestly say i get it now. the change for LW has been the most dramatic, just the level of peace it has brought her, but i have experienced a profound transformation, too. (ugh, with the healie-feelie talk, i know. but really, homeys. it's unlike anything i have ever experienced.) you might recall that i read a lot of pema chodron while i was coming to terms with mom's illness initially, especially 'when things fall apart.' i found that book to be so comforting and calming, in a way that nothing else was. believing in a god whose plan is for my mom to die slowly of brain cancer is totally unacceptable, but the idea that there is only this moment and how i live it and the courage and wonder with which i greet it feels true to me. so, taking it a step further and meditating felt really natural. i have slacked a bit on it, not doing it everyday like i was, but i am in it to win it. more on that forever, probably.
4) lots of mykhail time. we watch him two days and two nights a week now. he is funny and HARD and growing so fast. (such a cliche, but still true.) seeing his verbal skills develop is just mind blowing. from "dat?" (what is that?) to "cow!" to "see cow!" to now "auntie, see cow eating!" dude, that is language, RIGHT THERE. no wonder linguistic anthropologists love to study speech and language development in kids - it's so easy to see the changes! and so satisfying! my last blog was me being scared and feeling like i might suck as a parent and not be able to take it, but things are fine now. it's still overwhelming sometimes, but also really gratifying to know i am good at this. dudes, seriously, i am GOOD at this. i'm like the dog whisperer - totally the pack leader. i have healthy boundaries, i am good at being fun. i am getting a lot better at working myself out of snits when he's being crabby. having kids is going to be fine. not a piece of cake because duh but totally fine. shannon is so cute with kel that it makes me spontaneously ovulate just listening to them.
5) we have two cats now. they were my mom's cats and, rather than give them away to strangers or something, we took them. we love/hate them. one might call us 'frenemies' with them. love the funny animalness they bring to the house. hate the fur, the smell of cats, the catbox, the sometimes scratching. oh well. we sometimes joke that i am a part-time crap handler now, since i spent so much time taking bags of crap out to the garbage can, between the cats and kel. i'm mostly used to it. i think i might be allergic to one or both of the cats because of the re-occurrence of an uncomfortable, unsightly rash, whose presence i have been free of for years, but i am not yet ready to jettison the cats to save myself. getting there, but not quite.
that's enough for now.
i'm going to try not to be such a stranger, though.
haven't been here in a while!
i mean, i posted that 'west wing' thing, because duh, but i haven't really been keeping this thingie up-to-date. here's a grab bag of things going on...
1) lucy is in town right now, visiting from NYC. her fam is having some health stuff going on, so she came home to see them. lucky jerk gets to go to hawaii to visit her sister and the kids in a week. yo soy hellsa jealous. it's VERY nice having her here. it's like visiting home when you move away, where it's so good it kills you a little and you almost wish you hadn't gone home because it just makes it harder to be away. we went to get our hairs did all fancy today, washed and styled and stuff on account of...
2) brian and libby's wedding is tomorrow. i am feeling for them because it's supposed to rain and they had NOT planned on rain. i'm really excited and nervous for them. i know how much stress they've gone through to get everything ready and how fucking relieved they'll be to have it done with. also, afterwards, they'll be mr. and mrs. halpin, which is pretty exciting. it's made me think a lot about how sure me and brian were that WE would get married and how not correct we were. it's also made me even more and more grateful for how beautifully everything has evolved with our friendship. i consider my ex-boyfriend and his soon-to-be wife some of my closest, most important friends, and i am very, very lucky to still have all the benefits of our relationship, as well as a fantastic partner of my own.
3) so, in preparation for the wedding, which feels pretty high stakes, as far as social events go, with all the long-time friends attending, i have purchased my first pair of spanx. my dress isn't super va-va-voom, but it's made of a clingy jersey material that will do a person no favors, so i bought some crazy girdle bike shorts to smooth stuff out. totally embarrassing and old-lady feeling, but if they let me relax in my dress and know everything is where it should be, then it'll be worth swallowing my pride.
4) mom's house (a.k.a. money pit #1) is officially On The Market. anyone want to buy a lovely house in redwood valley, ca for a good price and save me and my husband from impending destitution in the process? anyone? anyone?
5) 2 or 3 months ago i started meditating regularly. me and LW took a seriously life changing class together in berkeley, led my a freaking amazing teacher named james baraz. on the first day of the class he made the statement that meditation has made the difference in his life. liesl and i came away wondering what he meant by that, and feeling admittedly skeptical, but i can honestly say i get it now. the change for LW has been the most dramatic, just the level of peace it has brought her, but i have experienced a profound transformation, too. (ugh, with the healie-feelie talk, i know. but really, homeys. it's unlike anything i have ever experienced.) you might recall that i read a lot of pema chodron while i was coming to terms with mom's illness initially, especially 'when things fall apart.' i found that book to be so comforting and calming, in a way that nothing else was. believing in a god whose plan is for my mom to die slowly of brain cancer is totally unacceptable, but the idea that there is only this moment and how i live it and the courage and wonder with which i greet it feels true to me. so, taking it a step further and meditating felt really natural. i have slacked a bit on it, not doing it everyday like i was, but i am in it to win it. more on that forever, probably.
4) lots of mykhail time. we watch him two days and two nights a week now. he is funny and HARD and growing so fast. (such a cliche, but still true.) seeing his verbal skills develop is just mind blowing. from "dat?" (what is that?) to "cow!" to "see cow!" to now "auntie, see cow eating!" dude, that is language, RIGHT THERE. no wonder linguistic anthropologists love to study speech and language development in kids - it's so easy to see the changes! and so satisfying! my last blog was me being scared and feeling like i might suck as a parent and not be able to take it, but things are fine now. it's still overwhelming sometimes, but also really gratifying to know i am good at this. dudes, seriously, i am GOOD at this. i'm like the dog whisperer - totally the pack leader. i have healthy boundaries, i am good at being fun. i am getting a lot better at working myself out of snits when he's being crabby. having kids is going to be fine. not a piece of cake because duh but totally fine. shannon is so cute with kel that it makes me spontaneously ovulate just listening to them.
5) we have two cats now. they were my mom's cats and, rather than give them away to strangers or something, we took them. we love/hate them. one might call us 'frenemies' with them. love the funny animalness they bring to the house. hate the fur, the smell of cats, the catbox, the sometimes scratching. oh well. we sometimes joke that i am a part-time crap handler now, since i spent so much time taking bags of crap out to the garbage can, between the cats and kel. i'm mostly used to it. i think i might be allergic to one or both of the cats because of the re-occurrence of an uncomfortable, unsightly rash, whose presence i have been free of for years, but i am not yet ready to jettison the cats to save myself. getting there, but not quite.
that's enough for now.
i'm going to try not to be such a stranger, though.
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
I WANT TO BELIEVE.
(that makes me think of 'The X Files,' which makes me miss that show...oh fox mulder...)
as i have rattled on about, at length, i have been chewing on the issue of my spirituality, and how i kinda gave up on the idea of god after mom got cancer. i could believe in god when other people had bad things happen to them, but i just couldn't believe he'd make something so bad, so fucking terrible, happen to me and my mom. that seemed to totally negate everything i'd thought was true about how the world and the universe worked.
as part of my process working through this, my therapist, barbara, recommended that i go to see this woman, karen peterson. she's a medium, and she does bereavement counseling sessions, for free. she also does group sessions, for money, where a bunch of people come and she just kinda passes along messages. usually she does her bereavement stuff every other month, but it just so happened that at the time i decided to try one, she canceled several, to give herself some more time, which kinda sucks, but oh well.
i had to schedule months in advance. i think i emailed her about coming in march or something. it felt kinda silly, since that was so far away at the time, and it seemed like i might not need it very much, but i kept the spot saved for me, since barbara had suggested it. on a side note, barbara's mom died not long ago, and barbara went to one of karen's sessions and the experienced really helped her, and gave her a different, positive perspective on death and stuff. so, even if i wasn't a walking open wound of sadness, it couldn't hurt to get a better perspective, i thought.
the meeting was last night. i felt yucky all day yesterday, like maybe i was coming down with something. i called the registrar of voters to tell them i couldn't work the polls today because i had the flu, and was considering not going to the meeting, with the logical rationale that if i am too sick to do something i didn't want to do very much (work the polls) then i am too sick to do something i want to do, too (the meeting.) but then i decided i've waited an awfully long time for this thing, and the next one was in december. so, i went anyway.
i had asked a few people if they wanted to come, but none of them worked out for whatever reason, and i ended up going by myself. i've been listening to the 'west side story' soundtrack in my car for the last couple of days, which always makes me think of mom, since she loved that movie when she was young and she had a crush on the SUPER gay jet, whose nickname is 'ice.' when i got to the meeting place, there were a bunch of middle aged ladies lurking around their cars, in the parking lot. and then there was me. i felt a little weird, partly because of the brewing illness and partly from unsureness at the situation. the woman parked next to me was in a metallic blue suv, with magnetic rose decals on it. i expected to see a plastic angel air freshener hanging from her rear-view mirror, and worried it was going to be all ladies like that. seeing a medium is awfully...i don't know.
something.
embarrassing.
inspiring of skepticism.
not the sort of thing an intelligent, well-read person would usually be open to.
i was early. i thought i was on time, but i was early, but it looked like a lot of other ladies were, too. in my head, i had imagined 12 people in a circle, but we were led to this meeting room, with rows and rows of chairs, like it was a workshop. karen was really normal looking. pretty. young. dressed cute. friendly. she said that 'they' had told her to set up for 80 people, in this particular format. she said 'they' had told her she was going to teach tonight, so she was just rolling with it. i felt an inner cringe at the references to 'they.'
i sat in the second row of the section farthest from the door. a bunch of ladies already knew karen, and there were lots of hugs and stuff. i was actually in the minority for not having beek before. i felt shy. i brought my 'new york review of books' (to prove i am an intellectual heavyweight) and i just read and watched the room fill up. and it filled up.
seriously, it was more than 80 people. they had to go get more chairs from her office. lots and lots of people. i was disappointed because i wanted more of an intimate experience, but i tried to stay open-minded.
she answered some questions while people were getting there, but mostly it was about her, and all her info is on her website, so if you want to know, check it out.
when the session started, she just said she was going to teach a bit, so she would explain to us how she communicates with the people on the Other Side, and so we can learn to do it ourselves. she said she was feeling like she should lead us in a little guided visualization, about grounding us, opening us up, inviting our loved ones to visit, and protecting ourselves. it was short, which was nice, because i am pretty much crap at that stuff. i can't visualize well at all.
she gave some general info, about how the information comes to her, all of which is also on her website, but which was informative. she talked about meditation as a good way to quiet ourselves enough to receive messages. if we're listening to the chatter in our heads all the time, our peops might not be able to get through the buzz. i already know i ought to be meditating, so that was a little annoying. could i get the messages from more places? I KNOW. I SHOULD WORK ON MEDITATING. sheesh.
then she had some questions, that she said she had been told to ask.
so she asked these questions to the room. they were kinda general questions/suggestions, but she used them as jumping off points to get info out.
so, she had us visualize a room in our houses. then people began raising their hands and she would call on them, asking them what room they pictured. she'd ask them questions, like, 'did your son spend a lot of time in that room?' and it would just kinda go from there. like:
"i thought of my family room."
"did your person spend a lot of time in that room?"
"yes. we spent all our family time there."
"do you have a lot of pictures of your son in there?"
"yeah, we have a corner with the pictures in them."
"okay. i'm seeing a bunch of pictures of the same person, in a line. is that meaningful to you?"
"yes, my daughter just reorganized my son's pictures and put them all in a line."
"okay. i think that your son just wants to let you know that he spends time in there still, and that he saw your daughter move the pictures. would you tell your daughter? i think this is a message to her, letting her know he's watching."
that kind of thing.
sometimes it would start with someone, but the message wouldn't really be for them, and karen would spread out a little, asking other people in that area of the room if the image she was getting was meaningful to them. and invariably someone would say yes, and there would be more of the questioning and answering.
the biggest, most meaningful, most difficult to swallow thing she said is that if you think that something is a message from 'them,' it is. and that communicating with them means trusting yourself, and trusting the message. she said it will feel like you're making it up, like it's wishful thinking, like it's a coincidence, but that there are no coincidences. she said that when she started getting messages, she had thought she was just making up stories, but when she would tell other people these little stories they were really meaningful to these other people, so she had to start accepting that it might be real. but she admitted, it's hard to believe at first.
of course my skepticism alert went off. duh, it's totally wishful thinking. yeah, we want to believe that our people are hanging out, watching us, supporting us, in a place that is beautiful and perfect, but that's just not realistic, right?
but i kept thinking, 'so what? if it makes me, or these people, feel better, who cares if it's true or not?'
and then right afterwards i'd think, 'yeah, but what if it's wrong? like, WRONG? what if it's totally not true and it's pathetic and sad and desperate?'
and again, 'who cares? why can't you just choose to believe something that brings you peace?'
i didn't get to a good conclusion with this debate, and it's still raging inside my head.
anyway, the session lasted two hours, and the whole time she was just talking to people, asking questions, answering questions, getting messages, interpreting them, trying to find the person the message was for. she was really kind and open and loving, so much it made me kinda embarrassed, but, as always, i think my embarrassment is a defense mechanism against looking like an asshole, and being a totally gooey, cheesy loveball all the time.
she asked us to think about a bird. of course, i thought of chickens, since i was already thinking of mom. i didn't feel like that was meaningful enough to raise my hand for. but right afterwards
another woman in the room told a story about buying her (now deceased) son a calendar made up of pictures of different outhouses, which was kinda weird, since mom bought allen the same calendar. that seemed like a pretty crazy coincidence, since who beside this lady (who was a bit of a weirdo) and allen (totally a weirdo) would be taken by this calendar? what are the chances of that happening? so, huh.
karen said wearing our loved ones' clothing or jewelry as a good way to connect with them, that their energy was strongly in their clothes. that made me cry, because i wear my mom's jewelry more than my own these days. and, interestingly, i had changed out of the sweater i had been wearing into my mom's flannel shirt right before i left. i didn't even really think about it, i just grabbed it. so, that felt kinda meaningful.
she said that when our loved ones visit us in our dreams that it's a 'true visit,' and that that sort of thing takes a lot of energy for them, and it's a big deal. i raised my hand and shared about the dreams i had about mom right after she died.
(have i mentioned them? i think i did, but to recap: right after mom died, i had three really vivid dreams in a week - which i noteworthy since i never remember my dreams clearly. in the dreams, all of which were different in their details but similar in their tone, mom was back. not that she wasn't dead, but she was back to visit. rather than feeling glad to see her in the dreams, i was filled with anxiety and questions. how long will you be here? can you come back all the time? should i tell other people, so they can see you, too? i just felt really upset and worried in the dreams. i would wake up feeling unsettled and unhappy. so, i told mom, right before bed one night, 'i don't know if this is you communicating with me, but i'm not ready yet. i need to get used to you being gone before you start coming back.' and the dreams stopped. i haven't had a dream like that since, not really. i've had more vague dreams, but nothing so clear.)
i shared about the dreams, and how estranged i felt from god, and not ready for her yet.
karen asked me if i had been part of mom's hospice care team, and i said yes. (i felt like it was kinda amazing that she knew mom did hospice, but i did mention mom had died of cancer, so maybe it was obvious.) she said that mom wanted me to know that she knew how hard it had been for me. i said how funny and embarrassing it would have been for mom to have been present to see herself in diapers. mom would have had a lot of jokes to make about it, and she would have hated to inconvenience everyone.
karen said that the stuff that seems like a big deal here isn't that big a deal on the other side, which seemed obvious to me, but was nice to hear.
she said we may not ever come to understand why things happen, and that that's okay. it's okay to not know why, and the best thing we can do is seek acceptance. that also seemed a little obvious, but maybe only because i am me and that's how i think.
she said that mom wanted me to know that i should think about doing some kind of work in hospice later on, that i had a healing energy and that i could do a lot of good helping other people go through their hard times.
karen asked us to imagine, if there were jobs in heaven, what job would our loved ones have?
i told the story about my dream, where i had asked mom if she was going to get in trouble for showing up and she'd scoffed at me, saying 'kira. i'm a pretty big deal up here.' like it was silly for me to even worry about it, because she was the VP of heaven or something. everyone laughed.
it was all kinda like that. like, you could choose to believe it or not, i guess. but her message is 'believe it.'
at the end of the session, i started chatting with the lady next to me. in the middle of us talking, a young woman who had sat in another part of the room came over to give me a hug. she said she just really felt like she should. we were both wearing necklaces with initials on them. a lot of people checked in with me, to make sure i was okay, because i cried a lot. it was nice having everyone be so considerate, and it was nice to feel surrounded by people who felt like i do, who were still struggling and finding it hard sometimes.
i feel really supported by my loved ones, and still, it was different being in this room full of strangers, for whom their grief and loss were real enough to bring them to this meeting. everyone was so hungry for peace, for understanding, for some kind of validation of their loss and their desire to feel connected to their lost person. even though going was scary and i felt like a yokel, one step away from sending money to jerry falwell or something or believing in faith healing, it felt safe because all these other people believed, too. they weren't people i would have normally put myself with, but there was a kindness in the room.
i don't know what i think now.
i am reluctant to just go for it, believe it. maybe i am afraid of being wrong again. i felt so wrong about god when mom got cancer, and it was a terrifically painful shock. maybe i don't want to open myself to that kind of pain again, so i'd rather be safer or something.
but so much of it was stuff that mom said, that she believed and felt was true, so all this felt like mom just telling me the same stuff in a new way, so i could hear it again. and i know that mom would be sad that her death was the thing that left me estranged from god and 'spirit.'
so, i have some stuff to mull over.
what do you think?
as i have rattled on about, at length, i have been chewing on the issue of my spirituality, and how i kinda gave up on the idea of god after mom got cancer. i could believe in god when other people had bad things happen to them, but i just couldn't believe he'd make something so bad, so fucking terrible, happen to me and my mom. that seemed to totally negate everything i'd thought was true about how the world and the universe worked.
as part of my process working through this, my therapist, barbara, recommended that i go to see this woman, karen peterson. she's a medium, and she does bereavement counseling sessions, for free. she also does group sessions, for money, where a bunch of people come and she just kinda passes along messages. usually she does her bereavement stuff every other month, but it just so happened that at the time i decided to try one, she canceled several, to give herself some more time, which kinda sucks, but oh well.
i had to schedule months in advance. i think i emailed her about coming in march or something. it felt kinda silly, since that was so far away at the time, and it seemed like i might not need it very much, but i kept the spot saved for me, since barbara had suggested it. on a side note, barbara's mom died not long ago, and barbara went to one of karen's sessions and the experienced really helped her, and gave her a different, positive perspective on death and stuff. so, even if i wasn't a walking open wound of sadness, it couldn't hurt to get a better perspective, i thought.
the meeting was last night. i felt yucky all day yesterday, like maybe i was coming down with something. i called the registrar of voters to tell them i couldn't work the polls today because i had the flu, and was considering not going to the meeting, with the logical rationale that if i am too sick to do something i didn't want to do very much (work the polls) then i am too sick to do something i want to do, too (the meeting.) but then i decided i've waited an awfully long time for this thing, and the next one was in december. so, i went anyway.
i had asked a few people if they wanted to come, but none of them worked out for whatever reason, and i ended up going by myself. i've been listening to the 'west side story' soundtrack in my car for the last couple of days, which always makes me think of mom, since she loved that movie when she was young and she had a crush on the SUPER gay jet, whose nickname is 'ice.' when i got to the meeting place, there were a bunch of middle aged ladies lurking around their cars, in the parking lot. and then there was me. i felt a little weird, partly because of the brewing illness and partly from unsureness at the situation. the woman parked next to me was in a metallic blue suv, with magnetic rose decals on it. i expected to see a plastic angel air freshener hanging from her rear-view mirror, and worried it was going to be all ladies like that. seeing a medium is awfully...i don't know.
something.
embarrassing.
inspiring of skepticism.
not the sort of thing an intelligent, well-read person would usually be open to.
i was early. i thought i was on time, but i was early, but it looked like a lot of other ladies were, too. in my head, i had imagined 12 people in a circle, but we were led to this meeting room, with rows and rows of chairs, like it was a workshop. karen was really normal looking. pretty. young. dressed cute. friendly. she said that 'they' had told her to set up for 80 people, in this particular format. she said 'they' had told her she was going to teach tonight, so she was just rolling with it. i felt an inner cringe at the references to 'they.'
i sat in the second row of the section farthest from the door. a bunch of ladies already knew karen, and there were lots of hugs and stuff. i was actually in the minority for not having beek before. i felt shy. i brought my 'new york review of books' (to prove i am an intellectual heavyweight) and i just read and watched the room fill up. and it filled up.
seriously, it was more than 80 people. they had to go get more chairs from her office. lots and lots of people. i was disappointed because i wanted more of an intimate experience, but i tried to stay open-minded.
she answered some questions while people were getting there, but mostly it was about her, and all her info is on her website, so if you want to know, check it out.
when the session started, she just said she was going to teach a bit, so she would explain to us how she communicates with the people on the Other Side, and so we can learn to do it ourselves. she said she was feeling like she should lead us in a little guided visualization, about grounding us, opening us up, inviting our loved ones to visit, and protecting ourselves. it was short, which was nice, because i am pretty much crap at that stuff. i can't visualize well at all.
she gave some general info, about how the information comes to her, all of which is also on her website, but which was informative. she talked about meditation as a good way to quiet ourselves enough to receive messages. if we're listening to the chatter in our heads all the time, our peops might not be able to get through the buzz. i already know i ought to be meditating, so that was a little annoying. could i get the messages from more places? I KNOW. I SHOULD WORK ON MEDITATING. sheesh.
then she had some questions, that she said she had been told to ask.
so she asked these questions to the room. they were kinda general questions/suggestions, but she used them as jumping off points to get info out.
so, she had us visualize a room in our houses. then people began raising their hands and she would call on them, asking them what room they pictured. she'd ask them questions, like, 'did your son spend a lot of time in that room?' and it would just kinda go from there. like:
"i thought of my family room."
"did your person spend a lot of time in that room?"
"yes. we spent all our family time there."
"do you have a lot of pictures of your son in there?"
"yeah, we have a corner with the pictures in them."
"okay. i'm seeing a bunch of pictures of the same person, in a line. is that meaningful to you?"
"yes, my daughter just reorganized my son's pictures and put them all in a line."
"okay. i think that your son just wants to let you know that he spends time in there still, and that he saw your daughter move the pictures. would you tell your daughter? i think this is a message to her, letting her know he's watching."
that kind of thing.
sometimes it would start with someone, but the message wouldn't really be for them, and karen would spread out a little, asking other people in that area of the room if the image she was getting was meaningful to them. and invariably someone would say yes, and there would be more of the questioning and answering.
the biggest, most meaningful, most difficult to swallow thing she said is that if you think that something is a message from 'them,' it is. and that communicating with them means trusting yourself, and trusting the message. she said it will feel like you're making it up, like it's wishful thinking, like it's a coincidence, but that there are no coincidences. she said that when she started getting messages, she had thought she was just making up stories, but when she would tell other people these little stories they were really meaningful to these other people, so she had to start accepting that it might be real. but she admitted, it's hard to believe at first.
of course my skepticism alert went off. duh, it's totally wishful thinking. yeah, we want to believe that our people are hanging out, watching us, supporting us, in a place that is beautiful and perfect, but that's just not realistic, right?
but i kept thinking, 'so what? if it makes me, or these people, feel better, who cares if it's true or not?'
and then right afterwards i'd think, 'yeah, but what if it's wrong? like, WRONG? what if it's totally not true and it's pathetic and sad and desperate?'
and again, 'who cares? why can't you just choose to believe something that brings you peace?'
i didn't get to a good conclusion with this debate, and it's still raging inside my head.
anyway, the session lasted two hours, and the whole time she was just talking to people, asking questions, answering questions, getting messages, interpreting them, trying to find the person the message was for. she was really kind and open and loving, so much it made me kinda embarrassed, but, as always, i think my embarrassment is a defense mechanism against looking like an asshole, and being a totally gooey, cheesy loveball all the time.
she asked us to think about a bird. of course, i thought of chickens, since i was already thinking of mom. i didn't feel like that was meaningful enough to raise my hand for. but right afterwards
another woman in the room told a story about buying her (now deceased) son a calendar made up of pictures of different outhouses, which was kinda weird, since mom bought allen the same calendar. that seemed like a pretty crazy coincidence, since who beside this lady (who was a bit of a weirdo) and allen (totally a weirdo) would be taken by this calendar? what are the chances of that happening? so, huh.
karen said wearing our loved ones' clothing or jewelry as a good way to connect with them, that their energy was strongly in their clothes. that made me cry, because i wear my mom's jewelry more than my own these days. and, interestingly, i had changed out of the sweater i had been wearing into my mom's flannel shirt right before i left. i didn't even really think about it, i just grabbed it. so, that felt kinda meaningful.
she said that when our loved ones visit us in our dreams that it's a 'true visit,' and that that sort of thing takes a lot of energy for them, and it's a big deal. i raised my hand and shared about the dreams i had about mom right after she died.
(have i mentioned them? i think i did, but to recap: right after mom died, i had three really vivid dreams in a week - which i noteworthy since i never remember my dreams clearly. in the dreams, all of which were different in their details but similar in their tone, mom was back. not that she wasn't dead, but she was back to visit. rather than feeling glad to see her in the dreams, i was filled with anxiety and questions. how long will you be here? can you come back all the time? should i tell other people, so they can see you, too? i just felt really upset and worried in the dreams. i would wake up feeling unsettled and unhappy. so, i told mom, right before bed one night, 'i don't know if this is you communicating with me, but i'm not ready yet. i need to get used to you being gone before you start coming back.' and the dreams stopped. i haven't had a dream like that since, not really. i've had more vague dreams, but nothing so clear.)
i shared about the dreams, and how estranged i felt from god, and not ready for her yet.
karen asked me if i had been part of mom's hospice care team, and i said yes. (i felt like it was kinda amazing that she knew mom did hospice, but i did mention mom had died of cancer, so maybe it was obvious.) she said that mom wanted me to know that she knew how hard it had been for me. i said how funny and embarrassing it would have been for mom to have been present to see herself in diapers. mom would have had a lot of jokes to make about it, and she would have hated to inconvenience everyone.
karen said that the stuff that seems like a big deal here isn't that big a deal on the other side, which seemed obvious to me, but was nice to hear.
she said we may not ever come to understand why things happen, and that that's okay. it's okay to not know why, and the best thing we can do is seek acceptance. that also seemed a little obvious, but maybe only because i am me and that's how i think.
she said that mom wanted me to know that i should think about doing some kind of work in hospice later on, that i had a healing energy and that i could do a lot of good helping other people go through their hard times.
karen asked us to imagine, if there were jobs in heaven, what job would our loved ones have?
i told the story about my dream, where i had asked mom if she was going to get in trouble for showing up and she'd scoffed at me, saying 'kira. i'm a pretty big deal up here.' like it was silly for me to even worry about it, because she was the VP of heaven or something. everyone laughed.
it was all kinda like that. like, you could choose to believe it or not, i guess. but her message is 'believe it.'
at the end of the session, i started chatting with the lady next to me. in the middle of us talking, a young woman who had sat in another part of the room came over to give me a hug. she said she just really felt like she should. we were both wearing necklaces with initials on them. a lot of people checked in with me, to make sure i was okay, because i cried a lot. it was nice having everyone be so considerate, and it was nice to feel surrounded by people who felt like i do, who were still struggling and finding it hard sometimes.
i feel really supported by my loved ones, and still, it was different being in this room full of strangers, for whom their grief and loss were real enough to bring them to this meeting. everyone was so hungry for peace, for understanding, for some kind of validation of their loss and their desire to feel connected to their lost person. even though going was scary and i felt like a yokel, one step away from sending money to jerry falwell or something or believing in faith healing, it felt safe because all these other people believed, too. they weren't people i would have normally put myself with, but there was a kindness in the room.
i don't know what i think now.
i am reluctant to just go for it, believe it. maybe i am afraid of being wrong again. i felt so wrong about god when mom got cancer, and it was a terrifically painful shock. maybe i don't want to open myself to that kind of pain again, so i'd rather be safer or something.
but so much of it was stuff that mom said, that she believed and felt was true, so all this felt like mom just telling me the same stuff in a new way, so i could hear it again. and i know that mom would be sad that her death was the thing that left me estranged from god and 'spirit.'
so, i have some stuff to mull over.
what do you think?
Friday, March 7, 2008
not sure...
how do i know if the difficulties i'm having with the memoir are healthy challenges, to be transcended for a glorious finale OR the natural obstacles of something that needs to be given some space and rest, i.e. take a break from the memoir for a bit?
i don't want to be a quitter, and give up because it's hard, because writing is hard, and that's part of what makes it satisfying, is grappling with something so slippery and occasionally feeling like you get a handhold on it. and yet....
i am not enjoying writing the memoir. since i started the fiction project, writing the memoir feels like homework. fiction feels so much more natural, but still hard, whereas the memoir writing is just hard, in general. after writing so much about what happened this way, in my blog, letting it all come out as it would, sitting down and writing it all over again, in a more rigid way, with forced dialogue, just isn't working. after discussing it in class so many time, i am SO self conscious, SO concerned about making the dialogue gel, making sure it's not too much in my head and that i'm setting it firmly in a concrete place, that the story is moving along at a steady enough pace, etc. etc. etc.
you know what i've realized, guys? i write crap dialogue. i can't write it for shit. it sounds dumb and stilted and unreal. at least, i can't recreate dialogue from something that actually happened and have it not sound bad.
i felt like my writing on here was good, strong. it felt real and honest. and the things i am writing in my memoir don't feel honest or real. they feel forced. but the feedback i got from my writing class, both the teacher and students, was that having everything be like this, like my blog, was suffocating, there was no perspective and no air. i can understand that, after reading a couple of smothersome books, with narrators that barely ever come up for breath out of their own consciousness. you want to know what the air smells like, what the nurses look like. you want to be able to sink your feet a little in the setting before being carried off in someone's rickety little rollercoaster of a train of thought.
but how do i do that, if this is what feels the best? and i don't mean the writing of it feels the best, though it certainly feels better than what i have been doing, but this writing, to me, is more honest. i can remember and recreate what i was feeling and thinking and how i responded to a certain situation and why, but i can't remember what was said, specifically, and every time i try to bring it back it immediately bleaches all the color out.
i just don't know.
maybe i have already written everything i needed to about this, in here.
maybe i need to focus more on THIS, the writing that's here, and fill in periodically with setting and stuff.
maybe i need to just write about it the way i want to write about it, if i want to write about it at all, and let go of writing it the way my class is encouraging me to write about it.
it just feels like i am trying to walk around in shoes that are too small. yeah, i can probably get used to it, but there have got to be shoes that fit better, right?
last week, after having some stuckness problems and feelings like i wasn't enjoying my project, my writing partner, clara, suggested that i take a break from writing episodes and just write for a while on characters. i was having trouble creating everyone with my writing so she thought, why not JUST write about your characters, to make them real for you?
so, i did.
in the midst of my illness, i did some writing, describing my mom. i wasn't really trying to tell a story or even writing anything that fit in any obvious way into my memoir, just writing about her. anne lamott wrote two of her books for other people, one for her father as he died of a brain tumor (fuck you, brain cancer) and one for her best friend as she died of breast cancer, i think. (fuck you, cancer, in general.) her goal for writing them was as a gift, as they died, a love letter to them. she talks some in her book about writing your stories not for publication, but you have them written so other people can read them and know you better. so, i felt like i was writing about my mom for me, for when i miss her, and for my kids, who won't get to meet my mom, but will hopefully be able to know her through me, and you, too. so, i wrote and wrote and it was fun to just write without the self-consciousness.
i read that stuff in class last night and two people said that they liked it the best out of everything i've read thus far, which was nice to hear but really surprising, because i was totally ignoring all the rules we've been taught and just 'going for it,' as they say. my teacher was one of the people who said it was my best work, and i was just stumped. i didn't really follow any of the rules, there is no dialogue or anything, it's all just skipping from one place to the next, one time to the next, but that's the best? why isn't that suffocating? because being smothered by mom is interesting and evocative but being smothered by me is boring? i don't fully understand. i'll need to email him about it.
an interesting thing happened, later on in my writing about mom.
i switched from talking about her past, before me, and was writing about her with her cancer, trying to describe the change in her from the cancer.
one of the hardest things i have had to chew on, while processing my mom's death, has been how hard a time i had connecting with her, in a way that felt meaningful to me. i felt farther away from her at the time of her death than i ever have, because it came after years of living apart, where allen had taken up so much space in her life.
she was so close-mouthed about her illness, and i just wanted to talk and talk and talk about it.
are you scared?
are you mad?
are you sad?
do you have regrets?
she just wasn't really open about it. all of my tearful monologuing led to not one instance of her really opening up with me about what was going on inside her.
it was so frustrating and scary for me, kira fisher, who can't have an emotion without observing, labeling it and discussing it. i assumed she had all these teaming emotions inside of her that she wasn't dealing with, because she wasn't talking to me, she wasn't talking to allen, she wasn't talking to her friends... there was so deep depression when faced with her mortality, no dizzying highs of elation over the preciousness of life, and i really wanted that, with her, because that was what *i* was having.
but, while writing, i thought about her, and how she processed things.
she didn't seem like someone tormented by inner demons. she was peaceful, all the way up to her death.
yes, she was probably avoiding some of the unpleasantness, but she didn't seem troubled.
and i thought about how she didn't talk to us about hew feelings and how she was doing much, in sickness or in health.
and then i thought about her relationship with god and how supported and confident she felt through that.
she found peace in giving things she couldn't process by herself over to god. she described this place, her mental altar, to me once. there is a dense forest, and in the center of the dense forest is a clearing, of grass and sun. in the center of this clearing is a boulder that's flat on top. and when she is troubled by something, she'd go to this clearing and lay out her problem on this rock, to dry out in the sun. she'd tell god that she had done everything she could with that problem and she was going to give it to him to handle. and she felt like letting it dry out in the sun, flattened out on a rock to bake clean, was usually enough for her. she'd taken it as far as she could and now it was out of her hands.
so, why wouldn't she have done the same things with her fears about death?
all of my questions:
are you scared? duh.
are you mad? duh.
are you sad? duh.
do you have regrets? duh.
but she didn't need to talk to me about those things because what could i do about them? nothing. i couldn't give her peace. i couldn't take those fears away.
but talking to god could.
she could take all those fears and regrets and angers and she could lay them on her altar to dry out in the sun, so nothing was left of them but powder, and so she was left with just the sweetness of it all.
doesn't that make sense?
there will always be regrets, it will always be too soon. but it seems like the goal would be to end your life in the presence of what worked and what was good and what joys you brought and received.
and it seems so much more like her to have been there at her death, rather than tormented by the loss of it all.
the realization brought me a whole new sense of peace about her death. i would have loved to be more a part of her processing but just getting that she processed it successfully in her own way, and that the pain came from me wanting to see her process MY way, rather than recognizing her own ways, was a big relief.
i think mom was probably totally at peace with herself and me and everyone when she died. i think she was ready, in every sense, as best she could be. i think she felt safe and protected, like she was heading home. which sounds corny, but is nonetheless true.
i don't want to be a quitter, and give up because it's hard, because writing is hard, and that's part of what makes it satisfying, is grappling with something so slippery and occasionally feeling like you get a handhold on it. and yet....
i am not enjoying writing the memoir. since i started the fiction project, writing the memoir feels like homework. fiction feels so much more natural, but still hard, whereas the memoir writing is just hard, in general. after writing so much about what happened this way, in my blog, letting it all come out as it would, sitting down and writing it all over again, in a more rigid way, with forced dialogue, just isn't working. after discussing it in class so many time, i am SO self conscious, SO concerned about making the dialogue gel, making sure it's not too much in my head and that i'm setting it firmly in a concrete place, that the story is moving along at a steady enough pace, etc. etc. etc.
you know what i've realized, guys? i write crap dialogue. i can't write it for shit. it sounds dumb and stilted and unreal. at least, i can't recreate dialogue from something that actually happened and have it not sound bad.
i felt like my writing on here was good, strong. it felt real and honest. and the things i am writing in my memoir don't feel honest or real. they feel forced. but the feedback i got from my writing class, both the teacher and students, was that having everything be like this, like my blog, was suffocating, there was no perspective and no air. i can understand that, after reading a couple of smothersome books, with narrators that barely ever come up for breath out of their own consciousness. you want to know what the air smells like, what the nurses look like. you want to be able to sink your feet a little in the setting before being carried off in someone's rickety little rollercoaster of a train of thought.
but how do i do that, if this is what feels the best? and i don't mean the writing of it feels the best, though it certainly feels better than what i have been doing, but this writing, to me, is more honest. i can remember and recreate what i was feeling and thinking and how i responded to a certain situation and why, but i can't remember what was said, specifically, and every time i try to bring it back it immediately bleaches all the color out.
i just don't know.
maybe i have already written everything i needed to about this, in here.
maybe i need to focus more on THIS, the writing that's here, and fill in periodically with setting and stuff.
maybe i need to just write about it the way i want to write about it, if i want to write about it at all, and let go of writing it the way my class is encouraging me to write about it.
it just feels like i am trying to walk around in shoes that are too small. yeah, i can probably get used to it, but there have got to be shoes that fit better, right?
last week, after having some stuckness problems and feelings like i wasn't enjoying my project, my writing partner, clara, suggested that i take a break from writing episodes and just write for a while on characters. i was having trouble creating everyone with my writing so she thought, why not JUST write about your characters, to make them real for you?
so, i did.
in the midst of my illness, i did some writing, describing my mom. i wasn't really trying to tell a story or even writing anything that fit in any obvious way into my memoir, just writing about her. anne lamott wrote two of her books for other people, one for her father as he died of a brain tumor (fuck you, brain cancer) and one for her best friend as she died of breast cancer, i think. (fuck you, cancer, in general.) her goal for writing them was as a gift, as they died, a love letter to them. she talks some in her book about writing your stories not for publication, but you have them written so other people can read them and know you better. so, i felt like i was writing about my mom for me, for when i miss her, and for my kids, who won't get to meet my mom, but will hopefully be able to know her through me, and you, too. so, i wrote and wrote and it was fun to just write without the self-consciousness.
i read that stuff in class last night and two people said that they liked it the best out of everything i've read thus far, which was nice to hear but really surprising, because i was totally ignoring all the rules we've been taught and just 'going for it,' as they say. my teacher was one of the people who said it was my best work, and i was just stumped. i didn't really follow any of the rules, there is no dialogue or anything, it's all just skipping from one place to the next, one time to the next, but that's the best? why isn't that suffocating? because being smothered by mom is interesting and evocative but being smothered by me is boring? i don't fully understand. i'll need to email him about it.
an interesting thing happened, later on in my writing about mom.
i switched from talking about her past, before me, and was writing about her with her cancer, trying to describe the change in her from the cancer.
one of the hardest things i have had to chew on, while processing my mom's death, has been how hard a time i had connecting with her, in a way that felt meaningful to me. i felt farther away from her at the time of her death than i ever have, because it came after years of living apart, where allen had taken up so much space in her life.
she was so close-mouthed about her illness, and i just wanted to talk and talk and talk about it.
are you scared?
are you mad?
are you sad?
do you have regrets?
she just wasn't really open about it. all of my tearful monologuing led to not one instance of her really opening up with me about what was going on inside her.
it was so frustrating and scary for me, kira fisher, who can't have an emotion without observing, labeling it and discussing it. i assumed she had all these teaming emotions inside of her that she wasn't dealing with, because she wasn't talking to me, she wasn't talking to allen, she wasn't talking to her friends... there was so deep depression when faced with her mortality, no dizzying highs of elation over the preciousness of life, and i really wanted that, with her, because that was what *i* was having.
but, while writing, i thought about her, and how she processed things.
she didn't seem like someone tormented by inner demons. she was peaceful, all the way up to her death.
yes, she was probably avoiding some of the unpleasantness, but she didn't seem troubled.
and i thought about how she didn't talk to us about hew feelings and how she was doing much, in sickness or in health.
and then i thought about her relationship with god and how supported and confident she felt through that.
she found peace in giving things she couldn't process by herself over to god. she described this place, her mental altar, to me once. there is a dense forest, and in the center of the dense forest is a clearing, of grass and sun. in the center of this clearing is a boulder that's flat on top. and when she is troubled by something, she'd go to this clearing and lay out her problem on this rock, to dry out in the sun. she'd tell god that she had done everything she could with that problem and she was going to give it to him to handle. and she felt like letting it dry out in the sun, flattened out on a rock to bake clean, was usually enough for her. she'd taken it as far as she could and now it was out of her hands.
so, why wouldn't she have done the same things with her fears about death?
all of my questions:
are you scared? duh.
are you mad? duh.
are you sad? duh.
do you have regrets? duh.
but she didn't need to talk to me about those things because what could i do about them? nothing. i couldn't give her peace. i couldn't take those fears away.
but talking to god could.
she could take all those fears and regrets and angers and she could lay them on her altar to dry out in the sun, so nothing was left of them but powder, and so she was left with just the sweetness of it all.
doesn't that make sense?
there will always be regrets, it will always be too soon. but it seems like the goal would be to end your life in the presence of what worked and what was good and what joys you brought and received.
and it seems so much more like her to have been there at her death, rather than tormented by the loss of it all.
the realization brought me a whole new sense of peace about her death. i would have loved to be more a part of her processing but just getting that she processed it successfully in her own way, and that the pain came from me wanting to see her process MY way, rather than recognizing her own ways, was a big relief.
i think mom was probably totally at peace with herself and me and everyone when she died. i think she was ready, in every sense, as best she could be. i think she felt safe and protected, like she was heading home. which sounds corny, but is nonetheless true.
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
hey jealousy.
(remember that song? i wonder what the gin blossoms are doing now... not much, i'd guess.)
anne lamott, who wrote the book on writing that i talked about a little while ago, talks a lot about jealousy. how jealous she feels when a writer friend of hers is succeeding and she's not. she talks about the illusion of 'getting published,' like getting published is the beginning of everything unsolved in your life getting handled. she talks about filling the spaces inside yourself with the writing, not the dream of being published.
i'm feeling jealous of other people's connections. i'm feeling caught up in the illusion of getting published, being a gajillionaire and having all my problems solved. i am feeling empty, not writing enough in the last week from my sickness, not feeding myself with the stuff i have in front of me - the writing - and hungry for what's not in front of me - making money doing this.
there's no moral or anything, i'm just stating this stuff publicly, to get it out of myself, so it doesn't feel so sneaky and secret and moldy.
my cough lingers on, making me feel like a pariah in my own home. i mean, i am grossed out and repulsed by my cough, and i imagine myself cringing away from someone else with my cough, so i cringe from myself every time i am wracked by a coughing jag that leaves me crunched up and heaving. i'm so embarrassed by uncontrollable coughing. i wonder why. i recall a time i was on the bus, having a tickle in my throat that i couldn't get out, and needing to cough in that kind of unbridled way that can feel so urgent. like, eyes bulging, deep breaths for deep explosions, that feeling like every time you inhale you're choking because of that goddamned tickle. and i remember trying to cough a little bit, on the bus, demurely, really aware of all the other bus riders and how bummed they'd be about me having a nasty coughing fit, how worried they'd probably be that i was sick. and i remember this feeling of panic because i COULD NOT get that damn tickle handled and every inhale was torture, and barely breathing until my stop came, so i could get off the bus, bend over, and cough myself hoarse. that's how i feel now, with this damn cough. so urgent, so embarrassing, so painful. why do i give a shit if people think i have TB? why was i so okay with choking/smothering to death, so i didn't bum a bunch of strangers out? weird. so unlike me.
i'm reading a book by joyce carol oates. for my writing class, we're supposed to be reading books by one author, submerging ourselves in this writer's work, in a kind of dialogue with them while we are writing. i chose philip roth, mostly because i had a book by him that i'd started but not finished. so i read one book by him and it was good, moved well, i felt good about it. i chose my next one by him, a pulitzer prize winner, and was struck by how similar it was to the other one. i mean, the story was totally different, but both narrators were jewish guys from newark. lots of details about newark and being a jew. the stories were about other things, but the voice, if you will, was dang near identical. also, the majority of this second book takes place in the mind of one character, him imagining the mind of another character. there was setting, but it was very much mental. i have been struggling with this in my memoir, my difficulty setting my story in a concrete time and place, with details that let the reader settle in, so i thought it was ironic that this book, very good, was entirely based on the exact same thing that i was trying to NOT do. and i saw how tricky it can be, and i saw where some of the feedback from my classmates was coming from, how being led by the train of thought of the narrator can be dizzying and disorienting. it can really work, but it's not easy, and even a well respected author like philip roth was struggling with it.
so, my teacher said maybe philip roth wasn't right for me, given the navel gazing, so he suggested i find another writer. so, i went to the library and was looking around for an author with a HUGE section. we're looking for someone prolific, so we don't run out of books by them before we're done with the project. i ended up with joyce carol oates, which is a bit of a cop out. my teacher read joyce carol oates for his memoir writing, and he recommended her to my writing partner, who was having trouble finding the right author for herself. so, that i ended up with her too seems kinda uninventive. but, i will say, that woman is prolific. sheesh. does she even sleep? but this book, which i chose basically at random, is EXACTLY the same thing as the others - this hallucinatory, out of it, stream of consciousness. the physical setting is unclear sometimes, because the characters are mentally unhinged.
it's just so weird that, of all her many, many, MANY books, i chose this one. clara, my writing partner, was saying how she was really compelled to keep reading the JCO book she was reading, but couldn't really figure out why, and i kinda agree. i am not really enjoying the book, in a traditional sense. it's unsettling, filled with isolated, crazy people. and yet i am continuing. interesting. even if we factor in my personal weirdness about finishing books once i've started, there is no good reason for it.
tomorrow i head back to the gym for the first time in a week. i've felt bad about not going, but also shy about my cough and how wheezy i am with the coughing. plus, a little weird and light-headed off and on. so, it'll be nice to go again and i hope it feels good and not depressing because i have become a jelly donut in the week that has elapsed.
i inched my way back into the real world today, after my week of sickness exile. well, i got groceries yesterday and went to therapy, so i was started inching then, i guess. today, the dentist for a teeth cleaning (i was a year and a half overdue, which is actually pretty good for me) and then to a cafe for an iced coffee. i sat in the sun drinking my drink and eating a piece of coffee cake. made some phone calls, paid some bills, wondered where my money would come from.
who do i appeal to for help with things, now that i don't feel connected to god or the universe? if the only thing that's real is >this<, our physical bodies and our mental capabilities, how do i make things happen that feel impossibly big and out of my range? usually i'd talk to the universe about it, but since i'm not sure that i believe in it, it seems unfair for me to ask for a favor. so, who do i ask? how do i make it happen?
anne lamott, who wrote the book on writing that i talked about a little while ago, talks a lot about jealousy. how jealous she feels when a writer friend of hers is succeeding and she's not. she talks about the illusion of 'getting published,' like getting published is the beginning of everything unsolved in your life getting handled. she talks about filling the spaces inside yourself with the writing, not the dream of being published.
i'm feeling jealous of other people's connections. i'm feeling caught up in the illusion of getting published, being a gajillionaire and having all my problems solved. i am feeling empty, not writing enough in the last week from my sickness, not feeding myself with the stuff i have in front of me - the writing - and hungry for what's not in front of me - making money doing this.
there's no moral or anything, i'm just stating this stuff publicly, to get it out of myself, so it doesn't feel so sneaky and secret and moldy.
my cough lingers on, making me feel like a pariah in my own home. i mean, i am grossed out and repulsed by my cough, and i imagine myself cringing away from someone else with my cough, so i cringe from myself every time i am wracked by a coughing jag that leaves me crunched up and heaving. i'm so embarrassed by uncontrollable coughing. i wonder why. i recall a time i was on the bus, having a tickle in my throat that i couldn't get out, and needing to cough in that kind of unbridled way that can feel so urgent. like, eyes bulging, deep breaths for deep explosions, that feeling like every time you inhale you're choking because of that goddamned tickle. and i remember trying to cough a little bit, on the bus, demurely, really aware of all the other bus riders and how bummed they'd be about me having a nasty coughing fit, how worried they'd probably be that i was sick. and i remember this feeling of panic because i COULD NOT get that damn tickle handled and every inhale was torture, and barely breathing until my stop came, so i could get off the bus, bend over, and cough myself hoarse. that's how i feel now, with this damn cough. so urgent, so embarrassing, so painful. why do i give a shit if people think i have TB? why was i so okay with choking/smothering to death, so i didn't bum a bunch of strangers out? weird. so unlike me.
i'm reading a book by joyce carol oates. for my writing class, we're supposed to be reading books by one author, submerging ourselves in this writer's work, in a kind of dialogue with them while we are writing. i chose philip roth, mostly because i had a book by him that i'd started but not finished. so i read one book by him and it was good, moved well, i felt good about it. i chose my next one by him, a pulitzer prize winner, and was struck by how similar it was to the other one. i mean, the story was totally different, but both narrators were jewish guys from newark. lots of details about newark and being a jew. the stories were about other things, but the voice, if you will, was dang near identical. also, the majority of this second book takes place in the mind of one character, him imagining the mind of another character. there was setting, but it was very much mental. i have been struggling with this in my memoir, my difficulty setting my story in a concrete time and place, with details that let the reader settle in, so i thought it was ironic that this book, very good, was entirely based on the exact same thing that i was trying to NOT do. and i saw how tricky it can be, and i saw where some of the feedback from my classmates was coming from, how being led by the train of thought of the narrator can be dizzying and disorienting. it can really work, but it's not easy, and even a well respected author like philip roth was struggling with it.
so, my teacher said maybe philip roth wasn't right for me, given the navel gazing, so he suggested i find another writer. so, i went to the library and was looking around for an author with a HUGE section. we're looking for someone prolific, so we don't run out of books by them before we're done with the project. i ended up with joyce carol oates, which is a bit of a cop out. my teacher read joyce carol oates for his memoir writing, and he recommended her to my writing partner, who was having trouble finding the right author for herself. so, that i ended up with her too seems kinda uninventive. but, i will say, that woman is prolific. sheesh. does she even sleep? but this book, which i chose basically at random, is EXACTLY the same thing as the others - this hallucinatory, out of it, stream of consciousness. the physical setting is unclear sometimes, because the characters are mentally unhinged.
it's just so weird that, of all her many, many, MANY books, i chose this one. clara, my writing partner, was saying how she was really compelled to keep reading the JCO book she was reading, but couldn't really figure out why, and i kinda agree. i am not really enjoying the book, in a traditional sense. it's unsettling, filled with isolated, crazy people. and yet i am continuing. interesting. even if we factor in my personal weirdness about finishing books once i've started, there is no good reason for it.
tomorrow i head back to the gym for the first time in a week. i've felt bad about not going, but also shy about my cough and how wheezy i am with the coughing. plus, a little weird and light-headed off and on. so, it'll be nice to go again and i hope it feels good and not depressing because i have become a jelly donut in the week that has elapsed.
i inched my way back into the real world today, after my week of sickness exile. well, i got groceries yesterday and went to therapy, so i was started inching then, i guess. today, the dentist for a teeth cleaning (i was a year and a half overdue, which is actually pretty good for me) and then to a cafe for an iced coffee. i sat in the sun drinking my drink and eating a piece of coffee cake. made some phone calls, paid some bills, wondered where my money would come from.
who do i appeal to for help with things, now that i don't feel connected to god or the universe? if the only thing that's real is >this<, our physical bodies and our mental capabilities, how do i make things happen that feel impossibly big and out of my range? usually i'd talk to the universe about it, but since i'm not sure that i believe in it, it seems unfair for me to ask for a favor. so, who do i ask? how do i make it happen?
Wednesday, January 2, 2008
new year, new (old) me.
2007 was a year where i relearned who i am.
obviously the stuff with mom opened the door to skill sets that had thus far remained dormant, but i'm talking about more secondary stuff than that.
i learned that i really, really, really like working out.
i've been doing personal training, twice a week for a couple of months. i've been averaging cardio 3 times a week. and the simple act of working out has become the most important part of it, not the results. i've always gotten frustrated at how long it takes to see results from working out, and have never really developed that fire for it. i don't know if the one causes the other, but they've certainly both been true in the past.
this year, since mom died, i suddenly get why everyone likes working out so much.
it's because it's fucking awesome.
i've never been sporty and have never really had a strong relationship with my body, in the sense that athletic people do, where it's your mind and your body kicking ass together. but i get it now.
i'll get so stoked during my cardio that i'll start laughing.
i'll grunt and groan like a real weight lifter.
i look forward to my training sessions with mingled dread and excitement, every time, because i know that he's going to make me do things that are unbelievably uncomfortable, but that i'm going to be able to do them, even when it seems like i can't.
i hit a wall during my training today, and i came really close to asking my trainer to cut stuff short. the second set of exercises he had me doing were crazy hard, and i was feeling tired and weak. but i didn't ask, and he didn't offer (because he's awesome) and i pushed through that resistance into that thing we call The Second Wind. i ended the session feeling stronger and more focused, happier, lighter...just all around better.
you guys, i can't overstate what a huge transformation this is for me.
another thing i learned about myself this year is that i am way less willing to sacrifice my physical comfort for style now. i have been wearing a pair of my mom's dansko clogs a couple of days a week, and while i still don't think they're necessarily cute, i find them tolerable, which is not something i would have ever imagined myself saying. also, they're so comfortable, it doesn't even matter that much. i went to shoe pavillion the other day and i bought a new pair of fake uggs for new york and a pair of birkenstock slip ons, like the pair i have already, but in bright yellow patent leather. so cute. but i would not have guessed that THOSE would be the shoes i would leave with. not heels. not fancy flats. comfy shoes. also, i bought a polar fleece zip up at REI because new york is going to be crazy cold and i need to be prepared. these things are also huge transformations. i have always been so judgmental about clothing and really focused on what looks cool, and while i still think about that stuff, and try to mix in the comfy stuff in a way that doesn't make me look like a jammie monster, i am more comfortable with being a jammie monster.
i learned that i'm not afraid to try new things, the way i once was. i was almost paralyzed by fear of trying new things, specifically skills, but this year that just kinda disappeared. suddenly i'm cooking and teaching myself the autoharp, working out, slogging through french language magazines. i just don't care whether or not i'm the best anymore. i just want to try it out.
i realized i'm an artist. i'm a writer. while my dad and mom would roll their eyes and say 'duh' about this, it's a huge revelation for me, and fundamentally changes the way i look at myself. suddenly i'm part of this community of people who struggle with their creative demons, battle a sense that they're fooling themselves to even try this, self-analyze, but ultimately breakthrough their own mental resistance to create things that are Theirs. that's me. that's what i do. after years of paddling around in the baby pool of academia, i am suddenly edging myself into a deep end that scares the pee out of me. but is also exciting.
i'm not going to say that the good stuff makes the bad stuff worth it, because that's a bunch of crap. the good stuff makes the bad stuff tolerable. nothing makes it worth it. but i am thankful for the things that happened this year that acted as sugar in my spoonful of harsh, sad medicine. many of you were part of that, sugar cubes that sweetened my life, and i am grateful for you, too. i meet 2008 not with defiance, because i learned this year how hard times can get, but with steady acceptance. whatever happens, i'll be okay.
obviously the stuff with mom opened the door to skill sets that had thus far remained dormant, but i'm talking about more secondary stuff than that.
i learned that i really, really, really like working out.
i've been doing personal training, twice a week for a couple of months. i've been averaging cardio 3 times a week. and the simple act of working out has become the most important part of it, not the results. i've always gotten frustrated at how long it takes to see results from working out, and have never really developed that fire for it. i don't know if the one causes the other, but they've certainly both been true in the past.
this year, since mom died, i suddenly get why everyone likes working out so much.
it's because it's fucking awesome.
i've never been sporty and have never really had a strong relationship with my body, in the sense that athletic people do, where it's your mind and your body kicking ass together. but i get it now.
i'll get so stoked during my cardio that i'll start laughing.
i'll grunt and groan like a real weight lifter.
i look forward to my training sessions with mingled dread and excitement, every time, because i know that he's going to make me do things that are unbelievably uncomfortable, but that i'm going to be able to do them, even when it seems like i can't.
i hit a wall during my training today, and i came really close to asking my trainer to cut stuff short. the second set of exercises he had me doing were crazy hard, and i was feeling tired and weak. but i didn't ask, and he didn't offer (because he's awesome) and i pushed through that resistance into that thing we call The Second Wind. i ended the session feeling stronger and more focused, happier, lighter...just all around better.
you guys, i can't overstate what a huge transformation this is for me.
another thing i learned about myself this year is that i am way less willing to sacrifice my physical comfort for style now. i have been wearing a pair of my mom's dansko clogs a couple of days a week, and while i still don't think they're necessarily cute, i find them tolerable, which is not something i would have ever imagined myself saying. also, they're so comfortable, it doesn't even matter that much. i went to shoe pavillion the other day and i bought a new pair of fake uggs for new york and a pair of birkenstock slip ons, like the pair i have already, but in bright yellow patent leather. so cute. but i would not have guessed that THOSE would be the shoes i would leave with. not heels. not fancy flats. comfy shoes. also, i bought a polar fleece zip up at REI because new york is going to be crazy cold and i need to be prepared. these things are also huge transformations. i have always been so judgmental about clothing and really focused on what looks cool, and while i still think about that stuff, and try to mix in the comfy stuff in a way that doesn't make me look like a jammie monster, i am more comfortable with being a jammie monster.
i learned that i'm not afraid to try new things, the way i once was. i was almost paralyzed by fear of trying new things, specifically skills, but this year that just kinda disappeared. suddenly i'm cooking and teaching myself the autoharp, working out, slogging through french language magazines. i just don't care whether or not i'm the best anymore. i just want to try it out.
i realized i'm an artist. i'm a writer. while my dad and mom would roll their eyes and say 'duh' about this, it's a huge revelation for me, and fundamentally changes the way i look at myself. suddenly i'm part of this community of people who struggle with their creative demons, battle a sense that they're fooling themselves to even try this, self-analyze, but ultimately breakthrough their own mental resistance to create things that are Theirs. that's me. that's what i do. after years of paddling around in the baby pool of academia, i am suddenly edging myself into a deep end that scares the pee out of me. but is also exciting.
i'm not going to say that the good stuff makes the bad stuff worth it, because that's a bunch of crap. the good stuff makes the bad stuff tolerable. nothing makes it worth it. but i am thankful for the things that happened this year that acted as sugar in my spoonful of harsh, sad medicine. many of you were part of that, sugar cubes that sweetened my life, and i am grateful for you, too. i meet 2008 not with defiance, because i learned this year how hard times can get, but with steady acceptance. whatever happens, i'll be okay.
Friday, December 14, 2007
kindness.
i had therapy today.
in recapping my last couple of weeks, i explained how i felt like last week i had kicked ass, from a productivity stand point, and i totally blew it this week.
i barely got anything done.
i didn't work out at all. (except for today. i had training today.)
the house is looking barfy/embarrassing.
i haven't finished my xmas cards.
barbara was a little bit firm with me about backing off myself.
she reminded me that the holidays are a stressful time anyway, and then to add in my mom's still resent death - it's just unfair for me to expect myself to be setting records in productivity.
i hadn't really thought about that.
i just thought i was a lazy sack of shit who couldn't manage to be consistent with anything if her life depended on it.
and, admittedly, that's not a very nice thing to think about oneself. (onesself? one's self?)
that's a crappy message to be sending myself.
i am so scared of taking advantage of my mom's death, and so worried about other people thinking that i am taking advantage of it, that i perhaps rush myself.
also, in my minute to minute experience, it feels like it's been a really long time since my mom died.
but really, 4 months ago today, she was alive, and recognized me and was able to carry on a conversation of some sort.
one year ago today she was recuperating from her first brain surgery. we had only known she had cancer for about a week. if she was home from the hospital, it was only just barely.
maybe it's okay if i just kind of inch my way through the holidays this year.
maybe i could just focus on my dinner party xmas eve and getting married and going to the gym and give myself permission to go back to reading more and taking myself out to breakfast.
i might have been hasty in deciding it was time to let that go.
i don't think i'm done.
last night, in the midst of bickering with shannon about something totally unrelated to my mom, i mentally hopscotched to my mom and her being dead and i just melted down. still in my peacoat and hat and gloves from outside, i curled up on my bed, on top of a pile of clean laundry, and cried until i was hoarse. it was that ragged, choking, ugly crying, not the delicate quiet, lady-like tears. the way it does sometimes, it just became unbearable again that my mom is dead and i'll never see her again.
no wonder every culture everywhere comes up with ideas and belief about what happens to us after we die.
the idea that death is absolutely final and irrevocable and that that person is gone to us forever is not really acceptable.
of course we want to believe in a heaven where people look the way we remember them looking and we can spend time together just like we did when we were alive together. that's way more appealing than the alternative - that your time with that loved one is over forever and there's nothing to be done but accept it. who the hell wants to accept that? that totally sucks.
okay, shannon just got home from work.
i'm going to go into the kitchen with him and the pooch and discuss our plans for date night.
in recapping my last couple of weeks, i explained how i felt like last week i had kicked ass, from a productivity stand point, and i totally blew it this week.
i barely got anything done.
i didn't work out at all. (except for today. i had training today.)
the house is looking barfy/embarrassing.
i haven't finished my xmas cards.
barbara was a little bit firm with me about backing off myself.
she reminded me that the holidays are a stressful time anyway, and then to add in my mom's still resent death - it's just unfair for me to expect myself to be setting records in productivity.
i hadn't really thought about that.
i just thought i was a lazy sack of shit who couldn't manage to be consistent with anything if her life depended on it.
and, admittedly, that's not a very nice thing to think about oneself. (onesself? one's self?)
that's a crappy message to be sending myself.
i am so scared of taking advantage of my mom's death, and so worried about other people thinking that i am taking advantage of it, that i perhaps rush myself.
also, in my minute to minute experience, it feels like it's been a really long time since my mom died.
but really, 4 months ago today, she was alive, and recognized me and was able to carry on a conversation of some sort.
one year ago today she was recuperating from her first brain surgery. we had only known she had cancer for about a week. if she was home from the hospital, it was only just barely.
maybe it's okay if i just kind of inch my way through the holidays this year.
maybe i could just focus on my dinner party xmas eve and getting married and going to the gym and give myself permission to go back to reading more and taking myself out to breakfast.
i might have been hasty in deciding it was time to let that go.
i don't think i'm done.
last night, in the midst of bickering with shannon about something totally unrelated to my mom, i mentally hopscotched to my mom and her being dead and i just melted down. still in my peacoat and hat and gloves from outside, i curled up on my bed, on top of a pile of clean laundry, and cried until i was hoarse. it was that ragged, choking, ugly crying, not the delicate quiet, lady-like tears. the way it does sometimes, it just became unbearable again that my mom is dead and i'll never see her again.
no wonder every culture everywhere comes up with ideas and belief about what happens to us after we die.
the idea that death is absolutely final and irrevocable and that that person is gone to us forever is not really acceptable.
of course we want to believe in a heaven where people look the way we remember them looking and we can spend time together just like we did when we were alive together. that's way more appealing than the alternative - that your time with that loved one is over forever and there's nothing to be done but accept it. who the hell wants to accept that? that totally sucks.
okay, shannon just got home from work.
i'm going to go into the kitchen with him and the pooch and discuss our plans for date night.
Thursday, December 6, 2007
peace.
i've been writing a lot.
2 hrs a day, 5 days a week.
so far it's torture most of the time, and the majority of what i write feels like it's probably crap, but the point is to write.
at least right now.
once i have consistent enough habits, i can focus more on self-criticism, but for now, my mantra is: just write.
i'm considering a creative writing class, starting in january.
it's a little pricey for me, but i might just go for it.
it would be a good way for me to put my literal money where my mouth is.
i've been working hard on developing better personal time management skills.
it's been only moderately successful so far, but every day teaches me something new, like what NOT to do.
so, it can't be said to be a failure, even if it's not an unqualified success.
i'm feeling hopeful in a way that i haven't in a really long time.
i felt little sparks of it this year, during the quiet periods of mom's illness. post-treatment, pre-death.
we're planning a wedding, talking about kids, making plans for the house.
it's a level of domesticity that i wondered if i'd ever achieve.
i'm throwing our family's annual christmas eve dinner at my house this year.
it's terrifying, because i've never had a dinner at my house, really, and our house is so little that it's going to be a bit of feat fitting everyone in.
but i just felt like a) i can totally do this; b) these are the people i want to come, and i am not going to make my invites smaller because i am nervous; c) this year is really important, as the first year after mom's death, given that mom was an integral part of this tradition, and it was important that this year feel like the beginning of a positive new time, not the end of a sad, painful time. obviously my mom's absence will be impossible to ignore, so i want some added sweetness to even out the sadness.
i'm doing well.
ariana's dad died at the end of last week.
i've been thinking about her and her family constantly. they didn't expect him to die so quickly, so the whole thing was a real surprise. it couldn't have been more than a month or so after his diagnosis.
having just gone through something similar so recently, i have been feeling a little bit raw for her. just so sad she has to have this in her life. i just want nothing but peace and happiness for my people, you know? not that anyone wants bad things for their loved ones. but still. it's like now that i know about sadness, i wish no one else had to experience it. again, not like i've cornered the market on it, or have experienced it so fully. when i re-read that, it sounds a little pompous and self-important, which isn't how i mean it to. i just want us all to have a break, you know?
that's my holiday wish for everyone - a perfect crystalline period of joy and peace.
please, universe or god or whoever handles these things, please be kind to everyone for a while. this has been such a hard time, for so long, and we are all exhausted. please protect everyone, in whatever way you do or can, holding them in one figurative hand and protecting them from harm with the other.
2 hrs a day, 5 days a week.
so far it's torture most of the time, and the majority of what i write feels like it's probably crap, but the point is to write.
at least right now.
once i have consistent enough habits, i can focus more on self-criticism, but for now, my mantra is: just write.
i'm considering a creative writing class, starting in january.
it's a little pricey for me, but i might just go for it.
it would be a good way for me to put my literal money where my mouth is.
i've been working hard on developing better personal time management skills.
it's been only moderately successful so far, but every day teaches me something new, like what NOT to do.
so, it can't be said to be a failure, even if it's not an unqualified success.
i'm feeling hopeful in a way that i haven't in a really long time.
i felt little sparks of it this year, during the quiet periods of mom's illness. post-treatment, pre-death.
we're planning a wedding, talking about kids, making plans for the house.
it's a level of domesticity that i wondered if i'd ever achieve.
i'm throwing our family's annual christmas eve dinner at my house this year.
it's terrifying, because i've never had a dinner at my house, really, and our house is so little that it's going to be a bit of feat fitting everyone in.
but i just felt like a) i can totally do this; b) these are the people i want to come, and i am not going to make my invites smaller because i am nervous; c) this year is really important, as the first year after mom's death, given that mom was an integral part of this tradition, and it was important that this year feel like the beginning of a positive new time, not the end of a sad, painful time. obviously my mom's absence will be impossible to ignore, so i want some added sweetness to even out the sadness.
i'm doing well.
ariana's dad died at the end of last week.
i've been thinking about her and her family constantly. they didn't expect him to die so quickly, so the whole thing was a real surprise. it couldn't have been more than a month or so after his diagnosis.
having just gone through something similar so recently, i have been feeling a little bit raw for her. just so sad she has to have this in her life. i just want nothing but peace and happiness for my people, you know? not that anyone wants bad things for their loved ones. but still. it's like now that i know about sadness, i wish no one else had to experience it. again, not like i've cornered the market on it, or have experienced it so fully. when i re-read that, it sounds a little pompous and self-important, which isn't how i mean it to. i just want us all to have a break, you know?
that's my holiday wish for everyone - a perfect crystalline period of joy and peace.
please, universe or god or whoever handles these things, please be kind to everyone for a while. this has been such a hard time, for so long, and we are all exhausted. please protect everyone, in whatever way you do or can, holding them in one figurative hand and protecting them from harm with the other.
Monday, November 19, 2007
a list.
things i miss about mom:
- the embarrassing mom nicknames she called me, in notes, emails and voicemails
- the sound of her voice
- her laugh
- imagining us as we got older
- the answers to all the questions i forgot to ask
- looking forward to going to redwood valley, to see her
ana's dad is dying of cancer right now.
they're doing hospice, and she's wrestling with all the stuff we all have to wrestle with in that sort of situation.
that feeling of fear, like you're fucking things up.
that feeling of having no idea what you're supposed to do.
that feeling of standing on unsteady ground, where just as you get used to the situation one way, it changes forever.
all the changes are for the 'worse.' (who knows what's better or worse, but the changes are not usually improvements in the usual sense.)
once something is gone, it's gone forever.
now is the time of Lasts.
Last time you heard their laugh.
Last time they went outside.
Last time they fed themselves.
Last time they walked unassisted.
death is the winding up of the spool of thread we've spent our lives unraveling.
then, in reverse, we unlearn the things we learned.
walking. eating. talking.
until we're babies again, sleeping most of the time, except to eat or poop or gaze into space. maybe cry and get cranky.
you guys, it's all so precious.
i know i'm not the first, or last, or most eloquent person to try to address these issues, and obviously they are the kernel of all of human existence, but still.
please endeavor to make them as important as they are.
please don't say things in haste.
please don't leave things unsaid, undone, unexplored.
it WILL all end.
it's just a matter of time.
and since we never know when we're getting towards the end of our lives, we really must assume it'll happen at any moment.
please do everything you've every really wanted to.
please do not assume you have unlimited time.
be so brave.
please live in the middle of knowing that this all could be over any second, so everything is important, because it all is.
i know it's a cliche, but it's also the most important thing in the world.
more important than hurt feelings or embarrassment or fear or self-preservation.
okay.
i'm done preaching.
i am going to my dad's now, to pick up me and shannon's plane tickets to la.
we're leaving for disneyland tomorrow.
if i don't talk to you before-hand, have a wonderful thanksgiving.
please give genuine thanks for everything in your life, the good and the bad.
- the embarrassing mom nicknames she called me, in notes, emails and voicemails
- the sound of her voice
- her laugh
- imagining us as we got older
- the answers to all the questions i forgot to ask
- looking forward to going to redwood valley, to see her
ana's dad is dying of cancer right now.
they're doing hospice, and she's wrestling with all the stuff we all have to wrestle with in that sort of situation.
that feeling of fear, like you're fucking things up.
that feeling of having no idea what you're supposed to do.
that feeling of standing on unsteady ground, where just as you get used to the situation one way, it changes forever.
all the changes are for the 'worse.' (who knows what's better or worse, but the changes are not usually improvements in the usual sense.)
once something is gone, it's gone forever.
now is the time of Lasts.
Last time you heard their laugh.
Last time they went outside.
Last time they fed themselves.
Last time they walked unassisted.
death is the winding up of the spool of thread we've spent our lives unraveling.
then, in reverse, we unlearn the things we learned.
walking. eating. talking.
until we're babies again, sleeping most of the time, except to eat or poop or gaze into space. maybe cry and get cranky.
you guys, it's all so precious.
i know i'm not the first, or last, or most eloquent person to try to address these issues, and obviously they are the kernel of all of human existence, but still.
please endeavor to make them as important as they are.
please don't say things in haste.
please don't leave things unsaid, undone, unexplored.
it WILL all end.
it's just a matter of time.
and since we never know when we're getting towards the end of our lives, we really must assume it'll happen at any moment.
please do everything you've every really wanted to.
please do not assume you have unlimited time.
be so brave.
please live in the middle of knowing that this all could be over any second, so everything is important, because it all is.
i know it's a cliche, but it's also the most important thing in the world.
more important than hurt feelings or embarrassment or fear or self-preservation.
okay.
i'm done preaching.
i am going to my dad's now, to pick up me and shannon's plane tickets to la.
we're leaving for disneyland tomorrow.
if i don't talk to you before-hand, have a wonderful thanksgiving.
please give genuine thanks for everything in your life, the good and the bad.
Monday, October 22, 2007
The Path.
something about me that will both surprise and probably mostly not surprise at all is this:
i LOVE recommending books to people. ask me and i will put together a long, long list of books, of all different types, that you just have to read.
also, i almost never read anything that anyone recommends to me. it's the very recommendation that almost always poisons it for me. i'll read books that are universally accepted to be worth reading (a heartbreaking work of staggering genius, love in the time of cholera, roots, etc.) but the thrill of discovery and my own personal yearning to read is what makes reading worthwhile to me, and there is something about someone else doing the discovering for me that kinda deflates me.
it's so typically me. do as i say. period. i am not interested in what you have to say. just do as i say.
so, as i have realized this trait about myself, and in my endless pursuit for refining myself into the best possible version of myself that i can be, i have starting reading books that are recommended to me. a little bit. not all the time, and often it is with reluctance, but i have done it before, and i will do it again.
and, or course, often it's totally wonderful, and i am grateful to have been offered the opportunity to share something so special and transformative with someone i care about.
books i have read at the recommendation of other people:
-the secret life of bees
-east of eden
-sho-gun
-jonathan lethem, in general
-the wind-up bird chronicle
and now, the newest addition to the list...
-eat pray love.
lu recommended it to me, while i was going through my stuff with mom. she brought it up, gently but repeatedly, mentioning it in conversation, slipping me little bits of information about it.
with ill grace, i bought it from a little bookstore in ukiah, a week or so before mom died. i didn't particularly *want* to read it, but, because i am trying to not be the person who doesn't take suggestions, i bought it.
i brought it with me, from redwood valley to fairfax, and then from fairfax to petaluma.
i read about 15 books before-hand, but a few days ago i said, alright, kira, enough is enough. just read it.
so, i did.
you guys, it was just so lovely.
it gave me a glimpse of what reading my blog must be like to people who don't know me personally. following the journey of someone who you don't know but are rooting for whole-heartedly, as the struggle and strut their way through both happy and sad times. i only hope i am a smidgen as likeable as elizabeth gilbert (the author.)
i laughed many times, i cried many times, and i was just filled with a commitment and determination to make sure i always, always, always get back in the saddle, no matter how unceremoniously i am ejected from it, and how tired i am of it.
this book might not be for everyone, but ladies and gentlemen on the path, it is fucking wonderful.
as does anyone who will read the book, i felt such a kinship with the author. substitute her terrible divorce and ensuing messy romance for my own life from december 2006 and 2007, and we are like soul mates. bossy, friendly, funny, desperately trying to find peace and maybe even God in the midst of our darkest times.
i was terribly inspired by her book.
*i* want an indian guru.
*i* want to spend months in italy (or maybe france) eating amazing food and speaking a language i love.
*i* want to ride my bike around bali, hanging out with a wrinkly old medicine man.
she spends a large portion of the book (like, all of it) trying to get closer to God. talking to him, praying, meditating, journaling, eating, humping - everything is trying to closer to the core of who she is, and thus closer to God.
i am afraid i'll never feel close to God again, and it'll just be me and my skeptical, proud, bossy brain, trying to be Right all the time, forever.
on some level, i feel like maybe God knows what i'm going through and is just giving me space to do my thing, knowing i'll be back when i am ready.
but i just felt so abandoned by God, and my entire sense of spirit, when mom got sick, and in the state of emergency, i just chucked the whole thing and relied on myself, not something outside of myself, to handle everything.
i am afraid of being disappointed again.
as i am sure i will, because life is the way it is, full of disappointments for every surprising success.
i think i am sulking, is the honest truth.
i am mad at God and i am maybe not ready to talk to him again yet.
how could my God, the God that i thought i knew, let this happen to us? how could he take mom from me, the way he took her mom from her? how could he shower me with ease, cradle me so tenderly for 28 years, and then just drop me?
the only thing that made sense at the time was that there is no God, there's just me and my grief and my situation, and i need to save the questions for another time. at the time, answers didn't matter. what mattered was, in the eloquent words of larry the cable guy, getting 'er done.
so, in the eloquent words of a baby announcement shannon received, i 'got 'er done.'
but here i am now, the proverbial 'er has been gotten done, and i have nothing but time now to float around in my emotions - emotions i realize now i have only barely dealt with as i went through everything. i mean, duh, i cried my guts out, but i never got mad and anyone or anything except my poor mom, and i only allowed myself to really be broken for little bits of time, and then always grudgingly. and i always pull myself back together as soon as humanly possible.
i am afraid of all this emotion, and all my neediness for the past year, and all my confusion and not-knowingness. i am afraid of the future, and of letting go of missing mom and of letting go of hating allen, and of school and babies and homeownership and money and housekeeping. i am just full of fear over my situation right now. well, *right now* i am full of fear.
a couple of days ago i was pretty stoked about the vast horizons of my charred and blackened life, but today it just feels like it's too much for me.
this is a poem i have carried around with me for roughly 10 years. it's by david whyte. i think about it really a lot, especially lately.
THE JOURNEY
Above the mountains
the geese turn into
the light again
painting their
black silhouettes
on an open sky.
Sometimes everything
has to be
enscribed across
the heavens
so you can find
the one line
already written
inside you.
Sometimes it takes
a great sky
to find that
small, bright
and indescribable
wedge of freedom
in your own heart.
Sometimes with
the bones of the black
sticks left when the fire
has gone out
someone has written
something new
in the ashes
of your life.
You are not leaving
you are arriving.
so, i am looking at the ashes of my life, and trying to see what's written for me.
and i am arriving at my new life, not leaving my old life.
but it's still a lot for one person, even a big-inside person like me, to manage alone.
and i don't mean alone, like without loved ones, because i positively buffeted and carried and in all ways supported by the loves of my life.
but i mean alone, like, without God or anything.
i have said quite a few times, to quite a few people, that there has been only so far that my mental coping mechanisms can take me, and then there is the vast chasm that i can't cross without something outside myself. i can't think myself through this. i can't talk my way over this chasm. it's the kind of chasm you have to just close your eyes and step into, and have faith that something unseen will catch you.
and thus far i haven't been ready to do that, for fear that nothing will catch me, and i'll disappear into this canyon of pain that i'm not prepared to really get out of alone.
but if the whole idea of God is that you're never alone, and that all you have to do is ask for help and it's yours, and that every kind of support and love in the universe is available to you when you're ready to have it, then the only thing stopping me is my unreadiness to have it. and my fear of finding out that i am alone.
so, this is what i am thinking about, home alone on monday afternoon, in my pajamas.
and still, i am on The Path, because The Path only asks that you keep asking your questions, keep turning over the moldy old rocks inside yourself and be open to what you find. so, i turn my rocks over and try to greet my discoveries with love, even when they are slimy and smelly.
i LOVE recommending books to people. ask me and i will put together a long, long list of books, of all different types, that you just have to read.
also, i almost never read anything that anyone recommends to me. it's the very recommendation that almost always poisons it for me. i'll read books that are universally accepted to be worth reading (a heartbreaking work of staggering genius, love in the time of cholera, roots, etc.) but the thrill of discovery and my own personal yearning to read is what makes reading worthwhile to me, and there is something about someone else doing the discovering for me that kinda deflates me.
it's so typically me. do as i say. period. i am not interested in what you have to say. just do as i say.
so, as i have realized this trait about myself, and in my endless pursuit for refining myself into the best possible version of myself that i can be, i have starting reading books that are recommended to me. a little bit. not all the time, and often it is with reluctance, but i have done it before, and i will do it again.
and, or course, often it's totally wonderful, and i am grateful to have been offered the opportunity to share something so special and transformative with someone i care about.
books i have read at the recommendation of other people:
-the secret life of bees
-east of eden
-sho-gun
-jonathan lethem, in general
-the wind-up bird chronicle
and now, the newest addition to the list...
-eat pray love.
lu recommended it to me, while i was going through my stuff with mom. she brought it up, gently but repeatedly, mentioning it in conversation, slipping me little bits of information about it.
with ill grace, i bought it from a little bookstore in ukiah, a week or so before mom died. i didn't particularly *want* to read it, but, because i am trying to not be the person who doesn't take suggestions, i bought it.
i brought it with me, from redwood valley to fairfax, and then from fairfax to petaluma.
i read about 15 books before-hand, but a few days ago i said, alright, kira, enough is enough. just read it.
so, i did.
you guys, it was just so lovely.
it gave me a glimpse of what reading my blog must be like to people who don't know me personally. following the journey of someone who you don't know but are rooting for whole-heartedly, as the struggle and strut their way through both happy and sad times. i only hope i am a smidgen as likeable as elizabeth gilbert (the author.)
i laughed many times, i cried many times, and i was just filled with a commitment and determination to make sure i always, always, always get back in the saddle, no matter how unceremoniously i am ejected from it, and how tired i am of it.
this book might not be for everyone, but ladies and gentlemen on the path, it is fucking wonderful.
as does anyone who will read the book, i felt such a kinship with the author. substitute her terrible divorce and ensuing messy romance for my own life from december 2006 and 2007, and we are like soul mates. bossy, friendly, funny, desperately trying to find peace and maybe even God in the midst of our darkest times.
i was terribly inspired by her book.
*i* want an indian guru.
*i* want to spend months in italy (or maybe france) eating amazing food and speaking a language i love.
*i* want to ride my bike around bali, hanging out with a wrinkly old medicine man.
she spends a large portion of the book (like, all of it) trying to get closer to God. talking to him, praying, meditating, journaling, eating, humping - everything is trying to closer to the core of who she is, and thus closer to God.
i am afraid i'll never feel close to God again, and it'll just be me and my skeptical, proud, bossy brain, trying to be Right all the time, forever.
on some level, i feel like maybe God knows what i'm going through and is just giving me space to do my thing, knowing i'll be back when i am ready.
but i just felt so abandoned by God, and my entire sense of spirit, when mom got sick, and in the state of emergency, i just chucked the whole thing and relied on myself, not something outside of myself, to handle everything.
i am afraid of being disappointed again.
as i am sure i will, because life is the way it is, full of disappointments for every surprising success.
i think i am sulking, is the honest truth.
i am mad at God and i am maybe not ready to talk to him again yet.
how could my God, the God that i thought i knew, let this happen to us? how could he take mom from me, the way he took her mom from her? how could he shower me with ease, cradle me so tenderly for 28 years, and then just drop me?
the only thing that made sense at the time was that there is no God, there's just me and my grief and my situation, and i need to save the questions for another time. at the time, answers didn't matter. what mattered was, in the eloquent words of larry the cable guy, getting 'er done.
so, in the eloquent words of a baby announcement shannon received, i 'got 'er done.'
but here i am now, the proverbial 'er has been gotten done, and i have nothing but time now to float around in my emotions - emotions i realize now i have only barely dealt with as i went through everything. i mean, duh, i cried my guts out, but i never got mad and anyone or anything except my poor mom, and i only allowed myself to really be broken for little bits of time, and then always grudgingly. and i always pull myself back together as soon as humanly possible.
i am afraid of all this emotion, and all my neediness for the past year, and all my confusion and not-knowingness. i am afraid of the future, and of letting go of missing mom and of letting go of hating allen, and of school and babies and homeownership and money and housekeeping. i am just full of fear over my situation right now. well, *right now* i am full of fear.
a couple of days ago i was pretty stoked about the vast horizons of my charred and blackened life, but today it just feels like it's too much for me.
this is a poem i have carried around with me for roughly 10 years. it's by david whyte. i think about it really a lot, especially lately.
THE JOURNEY
Above the mountains
the geese turn into
the light again
painting their
black silhouettes
on an open sky.
Sometimes everything
has to be
enscribed across
the heavens
so you can find
the one line
already written
inside you.
Sometimes it takes
a great sky
to find that
small, bright
and indescribable
wedge of freedom
in your own heart.
Sometimes with
the bones of the black
sticks left when the fire
has gone out
someone has written
something new
in the ashes
of your life.
You are not leaving
you are arriving.
so, i am looking at the ashes of my life, and trying to see what's written for me.
and i am arriving at my new life, not leaving my old life.
but it's still a lot for one person, even a big-inside person like me, to manage alone.
and i don't mean alone, like without loved ones, because i positively buffeted and carried and in all ways supported by the loves of my life.
but i mean alone, like, without God or anything.
i have said quite a few times, to quite a few people, that there has been only so far that my mental coping mechanisms can take me, and then there is the vast chasm that i can't cross without something outside myself. i can't think myself through this. i can't talk my way over this chasm. it's the kind of chasm you have to just close your eyes and step into, and have faith that something unseen will catch you.
and thus far i haven't been ready to do that, for fear that nothing will catch me, and i'll disappear into this canyon of pain that i'm not prepared to really get out of alone.
but if the whole idea of God is that you're never alone, and that all you have to do is ask for help and it's yours, and that every kind of support and love in the universe is available to you when you're ready to have it, then the only thing stopping me is my unreadiness to have it. and my fear of finding out that i am alone.
so, this is what i am thinking about, home alone on monday afternoon, in my pajamas.
and still, i am on The Path, because The Path only asks that you keep asking your questions, keep turning over the moldy old rocks inside yourself and be open to what you find. so, i turn my rocks over and try to greet my discoveries with love, even when they are slimy and smelly.
Tuesday, October 9, 2007
dear mom, #1.
dear mom,
i stayed home today, after a week of pretty much constant activity.
even yesterday, the day after your triumphant memorial party, i was so giddy and insane with relief over the weight of that responsibility being lifted that i still ran around like a crazy person. it was wonderful to be running around doing mostly things that i *wanted* to do, but it was a long day of no rest.
so, today i stayed home.
i went into town to find a breakfast place. we have some left over pizza, the remains of shannon's lonely pizza dinner last night while i gadded about, but the single piece i ate last night when i got home at 10:00pm left me nervous. i woke up at 3am with cramps like i had never experienced, so intense i couldn't tell if i was going to vomit or not from the pain and the just patently new quality of pain. it was terrible. given that i hadn't eaten anything since my lunch with keith and ginny and the ladies at 11:30am, i felt like the pizza had to be to blame, so i was understandably reluctant to roll the dice on that again.
so, i wandered into my newly adopted downtown. i was aiming for a particular breakfast place that i had seen, but, having forgotten my book, i asked a woman in the nearby grocery store if there was a bookstore within easy walking distance. she was very nice, and gave me good directions to a street that i have never been on before, despite it being one of maybe 5 main streets in petaluma. there, directly across from me, lay copperfield's books. it was glorious. a huge independent book store, right in my downtown! i can ride my bike there!! ohman, i am still a-flutter from the excitement of it. the rest of that street's offerings were mixed. a couple of 'nyeh' clothing stores, a bompin' looking antiques store, a nice looking art supply store, and i finally found aram's after michael klein hyped it so much! i ended up eating there. the mediterranean plate was so-so. pita too doughy, hummus too salty, way too much tabouleh (maybe add another thing, guys), but the mediterranean chicken soup was really good. i'll definitely go back again. mike was scared he'd overhyped it, but i felt like it was a really good find. i read a new book i was unable to resist buying at the book store, which is so far not great, but we'll see. it's still early.
came home to a mailbox full of stuff and a package for shannon, from one of his canoe buddies. finally got my new check card. thank heavens. i felt naked without it. i haven't written so many checks in years.
my deal with myself about staying home today was that i'd get some real business taken care of. but upon entering me and shannon's shared office, i realized that my desk was useful only as fuel for a mighty bonfire in its then-state. so, i dragged out the boxes of office stuff that were waiting patiently for me in the spare room, and i started digging through my desk piles. it's absolutely not done, but it's so much better now. as i went through my piles, i came across so much stuff about you that i ended up having to start a big pile in the middle of the floor. cards to reply to, the binder i used to organize business stuff for you, the expandy file thingie holding your medical bill info, the death certificates that the county of mendocino sent... i'm not sure what to do with those things yet, so i'll just leave them. i unearthed a hip-high stack of cds that i have been listening to, to decide whether or not to keep them or sell them. i got stopped on that project, so i guess i should start it up again. i found my student loan paperwork and, seeing that i was already a few payments behind, i decided to just pay them off, which i can do now, thanks to the money you left me. i was lucky that my loans were weeny, as far as student loans go (huzzah to grants and public colleges!) but that was still $7k more than i'd have had anyway.
thanks for leaving me that money, mom. i'd rather spend the rest of my life struggling with bills than have this money, if it meant that you'd live to be 105, but i am appreciative of this gift and trying to find things to feel glad about. so, i am glad i can pay off my student loans, or pay for my car insurance for the next few months in one shot. and i really miss you and i'm sorry that *this* is how this came about.
mom, your party was so fucking amazing. i feel a little self-conscious telling you, because so many people felt like you were 'there' during the party, so maybe i'm boring you by telling you what you already know. but still. you would have loved it, ma. you would have been so damn proud. it was like a birthday party for you, where people from all areas of your life came to celebrate you, only you weren't able to come, so we had to just do it without you. if one's ears can burn in the Beyond, yours might have melted off your spirit-head, because we all just talked and talked and talked about you. if you weren't already dead, you might have died of bliss. there was the requisite crazy guy, a friend of al's who freaked everyone out. there were platters of sandwich fixings and chinese chicken salad from comfort's and wine (that annie brought) and beer (from dr. baeza) and balloons EVERYWHERE. (ben brought those.) we hung huge glittery fish in the trees in the little garden, and you would have wanted to keep the fish, and i would have let you, thought i'd also have fretted about what you'd do with them. we created an altar for you in one corner of the room, with pictures and crystals all sorts of odds and ends. so many pictures of you, mom. from elodie (you with your shaved head and yarn braids, riding the elephant with elodie) and suzanne (from every era of your life, and some of mine i'd rather not have recalled.) cards from well-wishers and all my ladies brought candles. holly went to the flower mart to get fresh flowers, and they were in vases all over. linda strung christmas lights over the raised end of the room (what's it called? where the pastor would do her speaking or whatever?) and with the lights down for the ceremony, they twinkled and shimmered. the whole space was just packed with people. mom, so many people showed up to help. it was just like at the hospital, where we were totally knocked on our asses by all the people in the waiting room - like you were a rock star. i started crying, i was just so overwhelmed by the support. i really barely did anything to set up, i was just wandering around, answering questions and saying 'hi' to people. i worked on the altar, mostly. but mom, tab was the real star. she just did it ALL. every question, tab knew what she wanted and who to speak to. she was everywhere, doing everything. as if we didn't have enough reasons to be thankful for her, this was sort of like the biggest, best reason ever. the whole thing was her creation, and it was so YOU. god, it was all so you. daddy made a spiral out of river rocks, and everyone took one into the sanctuary for the service.
oh, and the service! so, the pastor, who is our newest addition to the tribe, basically, spoke, called in the four corners (less wicca 'hail to the guardians of the watchtowers of the west' and more relaxed), read some lovely stuff and then invited people to come up to speak about you, then put their stone in the big bowl of water and GLITTER!!! in the center of the room. i had been nervous about not enough people wanting to speak, because that's how i roll, but mom, people couldn't say enough about you. seriously. tab and daddy had the most to say (of course) and tab blew everyone's hair back with her singing for you. marissa came from tahoe and played a gorgeous song on the piano that made me cry. people were so funny, so loving, so generous and openly effusive about you. (i guess there's no better time to gush than a memorial, but i was still really pleasantly surprised.) i felt so shy and nervous and worried about speaking. my outfit wasn't exactly what i wanted to wear (though i wore the bottle green silk top you gave me and a white skirt that belonged to tab's grandma, so that was nice) and i felt like i'd get up there and my skirt would probably be stuck in my undies, or i'd trip, or i'd just cry and cry and make everyone really uncomfortable. but i thought about you and how little time you wasted on shyness, and i thought about how much everyone's contributions to the party would have meant to you, so i felt like i could stand and say something about that. so i did. i thanked everyone for their support and love this year, and at the party, and i thanked tab especially, and i put my rock in the bowl with the others and i didn't throw up or fall. so, that was successful.
at the end, we played 'i'll fly away' from the 'oh brother' soundtrack, and then everyone went out to eat and mingle. i got LOTS of hugs. sososo many hugs. people came from every aspect of my life, too. old friends, new friends, friends of friends. mom, our people are so amazing. for someone who considered herself a lone wolf, you sure did build bonds with people, and you sure did raise a daughter who craves community. and mom, our community it just the best thing about this year, and really this lifetime. i think a lot of people feel like their friends are great, but i also feel like our friendfamily, with everyone's parents and friends and partners and babies....it's just so beautiful and precious. and while you might not really feel like that's you, it totally is.
i miss you, ma. i bought an amber scented candle and i'm burning it. i took one of your pashminas (i gave one to lu and tab, too) and it smells like you still and i'm afraid to wear it and make it smell like me, so i just keep snuffling it and putting it down. i know i already said this, but it was so hard to really take in that you were dead, at the party. the pictures of you, from a few years ago, looked so much like you. so much the mom i know. so while i can believe that cancer mom is dead, because she was new to me anyway, the older, healthy mom is the one who i keep on getting jolted by. i am still struggling to believe that she's gone.
okay, i have to call mendocino county and deal with the property taxes that i've been avoiding. owning a house is a lot to deal with.
i love you so much, and i miss you, and i wish i was able to feel you nearer to me. everyone talks about you visiting, or you being here, and i am still not feeling it. i feel your influences inside me, so maybe that's what they mean. i just don't feel a sense of you, external to me, and that's what i am yearning for. maybe i need to experiment more with hallucinogens, or open myself to things i find a little silly or hard to believe in. maybe i just need to choose to believe, to make myself feel better. maybe. but i'm not there yet. so far, i do feel you strongly, and i can feel what you'd do, or what you'd think or want, and that's pretty nice, too.
talk to you soon,
kira
i stayed home today, after a week of pretty much constant activity.
even yesterday, the day after your triumphant memorial party, i was so giddy and insane with relief over the weight of that responsibility being lifted that i still ran around like a crazy person. it was wonderful to be running around doing mostly things that i *wanted* to do, but it was a long day of no rest.
so, today i stayed home.
i went into town to find a breakfast place. we have some left over pizza, the remains of shannon's lonely pizza dinner last night while i gadded about, but the single piece i ate last night when i got home at 10:00pm left me nervous. i woke up at 3am with cramps like i had never experienced, so intense i couldn't tell if i was going to vomit or not from the pain and the just patently new quality of pain. it was terrible. given that i hadn't eaten anything since my lunch with keith and ginny and the ladies at 11:30am, i felt like the pizza had to be to blame, so i was understandably reluctant to roll the dice on that again.
so, i wandered into my newly adopted downtown. i was aiming for a particular breakfast place that i had seen, but, having forgotten my book, i asked a woman in the nearby grocery store if there was a bookstore within easy walking distance. she was very nice, and gave me good directions to a street that i have never been on before, despite it being one of maybe 5 main streets in petaluma. there, directly across from me, lay copperfield's books. it was glorious. a huge independent book store, right in my downtown! i can ride my bike there!! ohman, i am still a-flutter from the excitement of it. the rest of that street's offerings were mixed. a couple of 'nyeh' clothing stores, a bompin' looking antiques store, a nice looking art supply store, and i finally found aram's after michael klein hyped it so much! i ended up eating there. the mediterranean plate was so-so. pita too doughy, hummus too salty, way too much tabouleh (maybe add another thing, guys), but the mediterranean chicken soup was really good. i'll definitely go back again. mike was scared he'd overhyped it, but i felt like it was a really good find. i read a new book i was unable to resist buying at the book store, which is so far not great, but we'll see. it's still early.
came home to a mailbox full of stuff and a package for shannon, from one of his canoe buddies. finally got my new check card. thank heavens. i felt naked without it. i haven't written so many checks in years.
my deal with myself about staying home today was that i'd get some real business taken care of. but upon entering me and shannon's shared office, i realized that my desk was useful only as fuel for a mighty bonfire in its then-state. so, i dragged out the boxes of office stuff that were waiting patiently for me in the spare room, and i started digging through my desk piles. it's absolutely not done, but it's so much better now. as i went through my piles, i came across so much stuff about you that i ended up having to start a big pile in the middle of the floor. cards to reply to, the binder i used to organize business stuff for you, the expandy file thingie holding your medical bill info, the death certificates that the county of mendocino sent... i'm not sure what to do with those things yet, so i'll just leave them. i unearthed a hip-high stack of cds that i have been listening to, to decide whether or not to keep them or sell them. i got stopped on that project, so i guess i should start it up again. i found my student loan paperwork and, seeing that i was already a few payments behind, i decided to just pay them off, which i can do now, thanks to the money you left me. i was lucky that my loans were weeny, as far as student loans go (huzzah to grants and public colleges!) but that was still $7k more than i'd have had anyway.
thanks for leaving me that money, mom. i'd rather spend the rest of my life struggling with bills than have this money, if it meant that you'd live to be 105, but i am appreciative of this gift and trying to find things to feel glad about. so, i am glad i can pay off my student loans, or pay for my car insurance for the next few months in one shot. and i really miss you and i'm sorry that *this* is how this came about.
mom, your party was so fucking amazing. i feel a little self-conscious telling you, because so many people felt like you were 'there' during the party, so maybe i'm boring you by telling you what you already know. but still. you would have loved it, ma. you would have been so damn proud. it was like a birthday party for you, where people from all areas of your life came to celebrate you, only you weren't able to come, so we had to just do it without you. if one's ears can burn in the Beyond, yours might have melted off your spirit-head, because we all just talked and talked and talked about you. if you weren't already dead, you might have died of bliss. there was the requisite crazy guy, a friend of al's who freaked everyone out. there were platters of sandwich fixings and chinese chicken salad from comfort's and wine (that annie brought) and beer (from dr. baeza) and balloons EVERYWHERE. (ben brought those.) we hung huge glittery fish in the trees in the little garden, and you would have wanted to keep the fish, and i would have let you, thought i'd also have fretted about what you'd do with them. we created an altar for you in one corner of the room, with pictures and crystals all sorts of odds and ends. so many pictures of you, mom. from elodie (you with your shaved head and yarn braids, riding the elephant with elodie) and suzanne (from every era of your life, and some of mine i'd rather not have recalled.) cards from well-wishers and all my ladies brought candles. holly went to the flower mart to get fresh flowers, and they were in vases all over. linda strung christmas lights over the raised end of the room (what's it called? where the pastor would do her speaking or whatever?) and with the lights down for the ceremony, they twinkled and shimmered. the whole space was just packed with people. mom, so many people showed up to help. it was just like at the hospital, where we were totally knocked on our asses by all the people in the waiting room - like you were a rock star. i started crying, i was just so overwhelmed by the support. i really barely did anything to set up, i was just wandering around, answering questions and saying 'hi' to people. i worked on the altar, mostly. but mom, tab was the real star. she just did it ALL. every question, tab knew what she wanted and who to speak to. she was everywhere, doing everything. as if we didn't have enough reasons to be thankful for her, this was sort of like the biggest, best reason ever. the whole thing was her creation, and it was so YOU. god, it was all so you. daddy made a spiral out of river rocks, and everyone took one into the sanctuary for the service.
oh, and the service! so, the pastor, who is our newest addition to the tribe, basically, spoke, called in the four corners (less wicca 'hail to the guardians of the watchtowers of the west' and more relaxed), read some lovely stuff and then invited people to come up to speak about you, then put their stone in the big bowl of water and GLITTER!!! in the center of the room. i had been nervous about not enough people wanting to speak, because that's how i roll, but mom, people couldn't say enough about you. seriously. tab and daddy had the most to say (of course) and tab blew everyone's hair back with her singing for you. marissa came from tahoe and played a gorgeous song on the piano that made me cry. people were so funny, so loving, so generous and openly effusive about you. (i guess there's no better time to gush than a memorial, but i was still really pleasantly surprised.) i felt so shy and nervous and worried about speaking. my outfit wasn't exactly what i wanted to wear (though i wore the bottle green silk top you gave me and a white skirt that belonged to tab's grandma, so that was nice) and i felt like i'd get up there and my skirt would probably be stuck in my undies, or i'd trip, or i'd just cry and cry and make everyone really uncomfortable. but i thought about you and how little time you wasted on shyness, and i thought about how much everyone's contributions to the party would have meant to you, so i felt like i could stand and say something about that. so i did. i thanked everyone for their support and love this year, and at the party, and i thanked tab especially, and i put my rock in the bowl with the others and i didn't throw up or fall. so, that was successful.
at the end, we played 'i'll fly away' from the 'oh brother' soundtrack, and then everyone went out to eat and mingle. i got LOTS of hugs. sososo many hugs. people came from every aspect of my life, too. old friends, new friends, friends of friends. mom, our people are so amazing. for someone who considered herself a lone wolf, you sure did build bonds with people, and you sure did raise a daughter who craves community. and mom, our community it just the best thing about this year, and really this lifetime. i think a lot of people feel like their friends are great, but i also feel like our friendfamily, with everyone's parents and friends and partners and babies....it's just so beautiful and precious. and while you might not really feel like that's you, it totally is.
i miss you, ma. i bought an amber scented candle and i'm burning it. i took one of your pashminas (i gave one to lu and tab, too) and it smells like you still and i'm afraid to wear it and make it smell like me, so i just keep snuffling it and putting it down. i know i already said this, but it was so hard to really take in that you were dead, at the party. the pictures of you, from a few years ago, looked so much like you. so much the mom i know. so while i can believe that cancer mom is dead, because she was new to me anyway, the older, healthy mom is the one who i keep on getting jolted by. i am still struggling to believe that she's gone.
okay, i have to call mendocino county and deal with the property taxes that i've been avoiding. owning a house is a lot to deal with.
i love you so much, and i miss you, and i wish i was able to feel you nearer to me. everyone talks about you visiting, or you being here, and i am still not feeling it. i feel your influences inside me, so maybe that's what they mean. i just don't feel a sense of you, external to me, and that's what i am yearning for. maybe i need to experiment more with hallucinogens, or open myself to things i find a little silly or hard to believe in. maybe i just need to choose to believe, to make myself feel better. maybe. but i'm not there yet. so far, i do feel you strongly, and i can feel what you'd do, or what you'd think or want, and that's pretty nice, too.
talk to you soon,
kira
Saturday, September 29, 2007
sleep.
sleep makes certain things feel better.
at least you have some hours of not being inside your head.
house is still messy, still being buried under the stuff i need to do, mom's still dead, but i'm not sleepy anymore, so that's something.
i woke up this morning from the middle of a dream about getting busy, in a three way, with barack obama. umm....whoa.
where'd that come from?
ran errands today with tab, working on the party.
seems like it'll be fine.
it's hard getting out of the mindset of this being a party of the traditional kind.
i keep getting scared no one will come, or they'll come and won't think it's "fun."
fun? as if that's the point.
okay.
usually i'd stay here and blog my face off, then poke around on the internet, then do some myspace snooping, but instead i'm going to go deal with some stuff in my life that needs dealing with.
step 1) unload car
step 2) unpack refrigerator-sized suitcase from new york
step 3) (which i might not get to tonight) unpack boxes from mom's
step 4) (on-going) work on unpacking from the move
step 5) (on-going) take breaks when i feel i must
right before i got out of the car, my book-on-cd of 'the prisoner from azkaban' got to a point where harry and professor dumbledore are talking about harry's dad.
professor dumbledore tells harry that the people that we really love are never really dead to us, because they live forever, inside of us - more strongly during times of trouble.
i cried a little bit.
i hope that's true.
i hope that my skepticism about spirituality isn't blocking mom from coming to talk to me, or visit.
at least you have some hours of not being inside your head.
house is still messy, still being buried under the stuff i need to do, mom's still dead, but i'm not sleepy anymore, so that's something.
i woke up this morning from the middle of a dream about getting busy, in a three way, with barack obama. umm....whoa.
where'd that come from?
ran errands today with tab, working on the party.
seems like it'll be fine.
it's hard getting out of the mindset of this being a party of the traditional kind.
i keep getting scared no one will come, or they'll come and won't think it's "fun."
fun? as if that's the point.
okay.
usually i'd stay here and blog my face off, then poke around on the internet, then do some myspace snooping, but instead i'm going to go deal with some stuff in my life that needs dealing with.
step 1) unload car
step 2) unpack refrigerator-sized suitcase from new york
step 3) (which i might not get to tonight) unpack boxes from mom's
step 4) (on-going) work on unpacking from the move
step 5) (on-going) take breaks when i feel i must
right before i got out of the car, my book-on-cd of 'the prisoner from azkaban' got to a point where harry and professor dumbledore are talking about harry's dad.
professor dumbledore tells harry that the people that we really love are never really dead to us, because they live forever, inside of us - more strongly during times of trouble.
i cried a little bit.
i hope that's true.
i hope that my skepticism about spirituality isn't blocking mom from coming to talk to me, or visit.
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
cavorting.
'cavorting' is one of my mom's favorite words.
when i was little, and we'd wrestle and tickle each other 'til we cried, or take turns waiting for the other one to drop their guard, so we could lick the other person's face, we called it 'cavorting.'
so, the other day, tab was in here with mom in the early morning, while allen did morning chores around the house.
tab is connects with my mom on a spiritual level, more than anything i can manage. even at my most healy-feelie, i am a heady, brainy lass who has difficult getting her mind to shut its trap. but tab lives a huge portion of her life on her spiritual level, and mom did/does, too. so, that morning, tab sat with mom and watched the sun rise, sang her songs and talked to her. she asked mom how she was doing, and mom said, clear as day, in her normal mom voice,
'i'm cavorting.'
because tab is tab, her response was a deep and soulful, 'word.'
that feels so right.
people here have talked about how aware mom is. how responsive and alert. i have been dubious about this. maybe she's slipping out whenever i get into the room, but i am not seeing a whole lot of alertness from her. perhaps she is responsive sometimes, but i don't imagine her spirit hanging out in this dying body very often. given how comfortable she was/is on a spiritual level, i imagine her slipping out freely, to get herself acclimated with the Beyond, and then popping in every once in a while, to see how we're doing, and how much longer she has to wait for her body to give out.
i just don't feel her here at all.
then again, i have also been thinking really a lot about reality.
in light of my crisis of faith, where thoughts or beliefs that previously brought me comfort now seem empty, i have been looking at the things we tell ourselves to come to terms with reality.
for example, mom not responding to me.
what is true and real is that she doesn't respond to me all the time, at least not in a way that i can recognize.
i can explain that any way i want to.
she's mad at me.
she's out cavorting on the spiritual level.
she's not really aware at all, only awake sometimes. her responses are the result of impulses in her brain that sometimes coincide with what is happening around her and sometimes don't.
all those explanations are just ideas that i have come up with to try to bridge the gap between reality and my understanding.
the truth is, she doesn't always respond to my presence, and i don't know why.
*that* is something i can grab hold of, because it's not open to interpretation.
everything else that i try to grab hold of feels slippery to me, because i just am not sure whether it's true or not, and i am not in a place right now where i am able to just choose to believe because i want to.
i *hope* that she's cavorting on the spirit plane.
i *hope* there is a spirit plain for her to cavort on.
i *hope* that the essence of who we are is eternal, and that some element of her remains available for me to tap into, or will visit me sometimes.
and, what i know for certain is that her life as i know it will end. and our relationship as i know it will end.
i was telling the girls last night, i am not concerned about losing the important aspects of her and my relationship - the intangibles, like our love, or the depth of our connections, or the feeling of her totally nonjudgmental love for me.
the things i am concerned about losing are the physical aspects of her.
like i said before - the texture of her skin; the sound of her voice; her smell; her facial expressions.
those are the things that don't stick around, it seems, and which i am already mourning the loss of.
who we are together, and what we mean to each other, won't ever change.
when i was little, and we'd wrestle and tickle each other 'til we cried, or take turns waiting for the other one to drop their guard, so we could lick the other person's face, we called it 'cavorting.'
so, the other day, tab was in here with mom in the early morning, while allen did morning chores around the house.
tab is connects with my mom on a spiritual level, more than anything i can manage. even at my most healy-feelie, i am a heady, brainy lass who has difficult getting her mind to shut its trap. but tab lives a huge portion of her life on her spiritual level, and mom did/does, too. so, that morning, tab sat with mom and watched the sun rise, sang her songs and talked to her. she asked mom how she was doing, and mom said, clear as day, in her normal mom voice,
'i'm cavorting.'
because tab is tab, her response was a deep and soulful, 'word.'
that feels so right.
people here have talked about how aware mom is. how responsive and alert. i have been dubious about this. maybe she's slipping out whenever i get into the room, but i am not seeing a whole lot of alertness from her. perhaps she is responsive sometimes, but i don't imagine her spirit hanging out in this dying body very often. given how comfortable she was/is on a spiritual level, i imagine her slipping out freely, to get herself acclimated with the Beyond, and then popping in every once in a while, to see how we're doing, and how much longer she has to wait for her body to give out.
i just don't feel her here at all.
then again, i have also been thinking really a lot about reality.
in light of my crisis of faith, where thoughts or beliefs that previously brought me comfort now seem empty, i have been looking at the things we tell ourselves to come to terms with reality.
for example, mom not responding to me.
what is true and real is that she doesn't respond to me all the time, at least not in a way that i can recognize.
i can explain that any way i want to.
she's mad at me.
she's out cavorting on the spiritual level.
she's not really aware at all, only awake sometimes. her responses are the result of impulses in her brain that sometimes coincide with what is happening around her and sometimes don't.
all those explanations are just ideas that i have come up with to try to bridge the gap between reality and my understanding.
the truth is, she doesn't always respond to my presence, and i don't know why.
*that* is something i can grab hold of, because it's not open to interpretation.
everything else that i try to grab hold of feels slippery to me, because i just am not sure whether it's true or not, and i am not in a place right now where i am able to just choose to believe because i want to.
i *hope* that she's cavorting on the spirit plane.
i *hope* there is a spirit plain for her to cavort on.
i *hope* that the essence of who we are is eternal, and that some element of her remains available for me to tap into, or will visit me sometimes.
and, what i know for certain is that her life as i know it will end. and our relationship as i know it will end.
i was telling the girls last night, i am not concerned about losing the important aspects of her and my relationship - the intangibles, like our love, or the depth of our connections, or the feeling of her totally nonjudgmental love for me.
the things i am concerned about losing are the physical aspects of her.
like i said before - the texture of her skin; the sound of her voice; her smell; her facial expressions.
those are the things that don't stick around, it seems, and which i am already mourning the loss of.
who we are together, and what we mean to each other, won't ever change.
Saturday, August 25, 2007
agitation.
allen felt like mom was in pain a little bit ago, which set off a flurry of activity and worrying inside me.
he feels like he can ask her questions and she'll answer them, but i think that most of the time he's just projecting. i think those days are past.
so, we couldn't figure out if she was in pain or not. i don't want to start giving her morphine for no reason (because then i won't have any for myself - wockawocka) but obviously i don't want to let her just hang out, in pain but unable to express herself.
eventually we all agreed that it wasn't pain, so much as agitation.
in hospice, they say that people often get agitated before they die. they thrash around, or make discontented noises. they try to grab for things, to try to lurch out of bed. our nurse calls it 'getting away behavior,' like they're trying to jump out of bed and get away from death. which is might very well be.
we were given a plastic bag full of medications for mom, for different uses. phenobarbitol, lorazepam, acetominophen, morphine...the usual suspects. i couldn't find the one i wanted and thought it wasn't in there, so i called the nurse on call and had her paged.
then i lay down on the sofa and cried for a while.
mom isn't the only one experiencing some agitation, truth be told. i, too, am starting to exhibit some 'getting away behavior.'
i have been wanting to spend time by myself. i have been really lucky to have a lot of visitors lately, which is lovely, and i am also wanting more alone time. but when i am alone, i don't really know what i'm doing. i cry some, which helps, but then i'm done and the sadness is still there. i wrote in my art book some last night, which helped me get some stuff out of my head. i am missing having a god to ask for peace, or a universe to ask for help. now i just have to breathe through things feeling hard.
i want to call people, specific people, but then when i really think about it, i don't want to talk to them. i want to lie down, but i just lie there staring. i want to sit next to mom, but being around her when i am really emotional is hard and i try not to bring in my unpredictable energy.
allen is annoying me, but i think it's me and not him.
i am just agitated. maybe i need some ativan/lorazepam, too. i am not much for meds, honestly. i don't trust them.
any number of unhealthy avoidance urges have been floating across my mind - smoking, drinking, driving away forever, getting mad...but still i just stay here.
i am not feeling comfortable.
this is not a comfortable time.
someone posted a comment on my blog, that ended with the statement that everything happens for a reason.
i am not so sure about that.
when me and brian were going out, he said he didn't believe in destiny or anything because that was like saying it was good that his dad died when he did.
i have been thinking about that a lot now. people want to help and be comforting, and they feel like hinting at the big picture will be helpful.
i think that's getting it backwards.
i think things happen. period.
we can't get to where we are now without having passed through what happened before, but that doesn't mean that Now is the reason why Then happened.
that's like saying that God is looking down, checking the game plan, and regretfully sacrificing certain players for the good of the team, and that's bullshit.
i don't accept that mom HAS to die in order for my future to be bright.
mom is not a necessary sacrifice to the rosy future.
there is no Plan.
there is just what happens.
yes, the past prepares us for the future, if we're wise enough to let it.
but i don't accept the premise that the past happens so that the future can.
that doesn't feel right to me.
holly was saying that people tried to comfort her, during her mother's death, with 'it's going to be fine.'
she was saying how, no, actually it's not going to be fine.
cancer is not fine at all.
it fucking sucks.
*we* will be fine.
but the situation is not fine, nor will losing a loved one be 'fine.'
i know, i'm agitated.
i know that people say these things to offer comfort in whatever way they know.
i know it's coming from a place of love.
i accept it as such.
but i am done with 'everything happens for a reason.'
i am interested in 'things happen and we have the opportunity of learning lessons as they do.'
i would like to learn how to have faith in something aside from myself.
i lost my faith in external saving, but i have become a whole-hearted believer in myself, and my own ability to abide. the kira abides, as the film says.
he feels like he can ask her questions and she'll answer them, but i think that most of the time he's just projecting. i think those days are past.
so, we couldn't figure out if she was in pain or not. i don't want to start giving her morphine for no reason (because then i won't have any for myself - wockawocka) but obviously i don't want to let her just hang out, in pain but unable to express herself.
eventually we all agreed that it wasn't pain, so much as agitation.
in hospice, they say that people often get agitated before they die. they thrash around, or make discontented noises. they try to grab for things, to try to lurch out of bed. our nurse calls it 'getting away behavior,' like they're trying to jump out of bed and get away from death. which is might very well be.
we were given a plastic bag full of medications for mom, for different uses. phenobarbitol, lorazepam, acetominophen, morphine...the usual suspects. i couldn't find the one i wanted and thought it wasn't in there, so i called the nurse on call and had her paged.
then i lay down on the sofa and cried for a while.
mom isn't the only one experiencing some agitation, truth be told. i, too, am starting to exhibit some 'getting away behavior.'
i have been wanting to spend time by myself. i have been really lucky to have a lot of visitors lately, which is lovely, and i am also wanting more alone time. but when i am alone, i don't really know what i'm doing. i cry some, which helps, but then i'm done and the sadness is still there. i wrote in my art book some last night, which helped me get some stuff out of my head. i am missing having a god to ask for peace, or a universe to ask for help. now i just have to breathe through things feeling hard.
i want to call people, specific people, but then when i really think about it, i don't want to talk to them. i want to lie down, but i just lie there staring. i want to sit next to mom, but being around her when i am really emotional is hard and i try not to bring in my unpredictable energy.
allen is annoying me, but i think it's me and not him.
i am just agitated. maybe i need some ativan/lorazepam, too. i am not much for meds, honestly. i don't trust them.
any number of unhealthy avoidance urges have been floating across my mind - smoking, drinking, driving away forever, getting mad...but still i just stay here.
i am not feeling comfortable.
this is not a comfortable time.
someone posted a comment on my blog, that ended with the statement that everything happens for a reason.
i am not so sure about that.
when me and brian were going out, he said he didn't believe in destiny or anything because that was like saying it was good that his dad died when he did.
i have been thinking about that a lot now. people want to help and be comforting, and they feel like hinting at the big picture will be helpful.
i think that's getting it backwards.
i think things happen. period.
we can't get to where we are now without having passed through what happened before, but that doesn't mean that Now is the reason why Then happened.
that's like saying that God is looking down, checking the game plan, and regretfully sacrificing certain players for the good of the team, and that's bullshit.
i don't accept that mom HAS to die in order for my future to be bright.
mom is not a necessary sacrifice to the rosy future.
there is no Plan.
there is just what happens.
yes, the past prepares us for the future, if we're wise enough to let it.
but i don't accept the premise that the past happens so that the future can.
that doesn't feel right to me.
holly was saying that people tried to comfort her, during her mother's death, with 'it's going to be fine.'
she was saying how, no, actually it's not going to be fine.
cancer is not fine at all.
it fucking sucks.
*we* will be fine.
but the situation is not fine, nor will losing a loved one be 'fine.'
i know, i'm agitated.
i know that people say these things to offer comfort in whatever way they know.
i know it's coming from a place of love.
i accept it as such.
but i am done with 'everything happens for a reason.'
i am interested in 'things happen and we have the opportunity of learning lessons as they do.'
i would like to learn how to have faith in something aside from myself.
i lost my faith in external saving, but i have become a whole-hearted believer in myself, and my own ability to abide. the kira abides, as the film says.
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