Uncaging Courage

January 1, 2020 by

What’s got your courage caged? I have been walking around in a fog for days trying to figure out how I am going to walk into the new year with no real answer or where to start or where I want to go.

Couple of things (not literally because I am not sure how many things I have). First, this time of the year is always amazing for me. My brain is perpetually opening loops. Therefore, I have to be consistent about closing them or they will drive me absolutely crazy. They hook into each other and mesh where they have no commonality. They will bleed into each other creating their own new brand of loop that seems real but it completely fictitious. They will connect together to form themselves into big giant distractions of paralyzing mazes of “what if”s. Therefore, I have made it a habit each year to take the six days between Christmas and New Year’s to wrap up the old year and make welcome the new. Kinda like a cache clean out or a car detail. Not so much a focus on resolutions or declarations, just a little wash down.

Second, I haven’t been able to write lately. I know I have all these ideas about writer’s block and making time and schedules and priorities. But I just didn’t have it in me. Not being able to write, not having the words – or rather, not letting the words have me – create for a tough time of untangling thoughts.

Third, well, life is pretty great. I am a blessed woman. I am safer, more loved, better couched, more stable, than I have ever been. So when my brain goes into the all the “should” – I should be better to myself, I should exercise more, I should be more productive, I should have more accomplished, I should focus, I should be a better (insert whatever role happens to be forefront at the moment) – I begin to feel guilty for being unappreciative of all my haves. It takes a minute to get to the point where I remember that life is not a vacuum. Many things can be true at the same time – even when they seem to be at odds with each other. I could be more intentional about my gratitude practice – that does not mean I am ungrateful. There are improvements I can make. In fact, it is my belief that there are always improvements that can be made – that does not mean my place in life isn’t magnificent.

So now here I am, the second to the last day of the year, and I have spent more time than is typical trying to find the first word, the first idea, that will act as the catalyst and detangler for all the other ideas. That momentum that closes and sorts loops into something I can use when I sit down with my Happy Planner without feeling completely overwhelmed and deflated.

To that end, I have found a few things. The first was from my journal, the second from my husband, the third from a woman I don’t know. They have come together to give me just a hint of where I need to start. I am currently 539 words in attempting to avoid writing the truest sentence I know. The sentence that is clogging up everything else…

I am still afraid.

There it is. That’s not so bad. Actually, it sucks pretty good. I hate everything about it except that it’s finally released from my fingers. It has been haunting around my head for a few months now waiting to be acknowledged as the next thing that I really need to deal with. I said it once to my husband. Well, I didn’t really say it. I wasn’t very direct so it didn’t really do what it needed to do. I called up my therapist who I have not seen in over a year and asked if I could come by, but I didn’t say it at all then. I have heard it echo loudly in my brain more than once, but never gave it the space it needed.

But, I am still afraid. I am more secure and more loved and happier than I have ever been. My bent towards fear should be straightening out. Interesting thing I am learning – fear follows the same rules as all other energy. You can’t just dispel it – it has to be transformed into something else. The dispel part was great. I regained my life, my heart, my peace of mind. It is good. However, I have so much more to lose now, if I were to fall, the drop is steeper, the stakes higher. There is no longer that fear, but there is this fear.

I have found that I have gone back to editing myself to protect against the scary things. Not in the whitewash, fake way I used to (win!) but in a subtler way that leaves me feeling a bit muted. It is frustrating to be in this place but I am finding encouragement in the real things. Most importantly, this edit, while not ideal, is more palatable as it is a condition I place upon myself versus the feeling of being put upon. While there is fear and cautious movement, it is of my own doing and therefore in my control. Realizing you are in control of nothing but yourself is a powerful position if you understand what you are working with. It is also scary because there is no scapegoat – it is all you.

Now that I have that out of the way, I have some decisions to make…some truths to figure out.

“What’s got your courage caged?”

That one is easy – fear. Fear has my courage caged.

I want it to keep being easy. The next obvious question is, “Fear of what?” This is a question I ask myself regularly. However, it is usually in response to a particular situation, feeling, instance. Tackling it as a 360 degree life view is something else entirely. It’s deeper, rooted in soil I haven’t turned in a long time, shaded by uncertainty, and covered in years of push down.

What I do know today is that I do not know the answer. If I had to guess, there’s probably some fear of loss, abandonment, attachment, and just a general fear of being unworthy of love or goodness. Unfortunately, even if that turns out to be right, I have learned I can’t dispel it by simply naming it. I have to understand it, I have to overcome it and convert the negative energy into a usable one.

The Motives of People

While it may not seem like I have made any real headway in this journey today, I can assure you it doesn’t feel that way. The questions that may come up may not always be fun, but they are necessary to keep out the crazies. And that negative kind of way? I’m just going to keep leaning into the support that I couldn’t be more thankful to have. Hello 2020…let’s see about uncaging some courage…

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Sunflower Truth

September 15, 2019 by

Just saw this amazingly awesome meme and

Me: OMG! That’s the most beautiful thing ever! Nature is the OG harbinger of a wonderful, beautiful life

Other Me: I bet that’s a total crock of internet shit

Yeah, it’s like living with two squabbling siblings in your head. Don’t feel sorry for me, it’s my husband that’s the saint.

Anyway, Me and Other Me had to know so we go to the googles

Fact is, sunflowers don’t turn and face each other.

Other Me: Told you

Another fact, they don’t track the sun during the day either.

All the Mes: Huh?

Nope. If you simulate a different sun pattern time, the flowers will stick to their own rhythm and become off sync with the movement of the “sun”. Sunflowers are inner wired with a circadian rhythm that varies their stem growth which tracks the flower head east to west. Once the flower fully matures, the flower head will stay facing permanently east.

Therefore, they neither react to cloudy and gray nor the sunny and bright. Additionally, what this picture has captured is a grown, and not yet grown sunflower occupying the same place.

Other Me: That shit about the sun is a little sad, but worth it to obliterate another piece of internet drivel.

Me: A little sad?? A little?? It’s a lot sad. They are sunflowers for crying out loud and the symbol of keeping your chin up and face in the light, and reaching up, and…and…and…well, now I just can’t.

I thought about the sunflower a little longer in an effort to find an appropriate middle ground for my inappropriately dramatic selves. And, in sincerity, I do think that much of every question is already answered somewhere in the cycles and behavior of nature.  

So I propose this about our friend the sunflower.

I agree it was a little cool to think about this flower hanging out in nature doing whatever its little flower self had to do to keep its face in the sun. But honestly, this is way cooler. The sunflower is nobody’s punk – not even then sun. Sure, Sunflower bounces around giving off the airy vibe of peace, love, and sunshine, but don’t mistake its daily yoga practice for putting up with just anybody’s bitch ass. Sunflower has its own shit to handle.  Sunflower has its own groove, its own rhythm. And Sunflower is gonna follow it – rainy day or no.

Bonus thought. Yes, I know if is just a meme. By the way, this last idea is probably gonna sound a bit heavier than I intend it to, but whatevs. I think it’s important that you know I thought it in the midst of everything going on up there.

Anyway, I know it is just a meme. I also know that, unlike many memes, this small bit of misinformation is pretty benign and harmless. But it is still misinformation. And, if I tie back into my thought that answers to our greatest challenges are probably waiting to be found in the natural, then misinformation can be detrimental.  

More over (and this is where I know it gets a little much, but still true), the past few years have made owing, speaking, protecting my truth top priority. A by product of that is the allowance, hope, and expectation that those around me have some of that going on themselves. Sunflower has that and deserves to be appreciated for its actual truth, not some truth some internet meme maker created about it. I get super defensive of truth – even the little Sunflower’s.

Although, honestly, Sunflower probably doesn’t care what you think about it. There’s another life lesson in nature.

Filed Under: Chrysalis, The Thinking Chair Tagged With: , ,

I am a Terrible Person

April 15, 2019 by

Saying what’s true, or rather working through what feels true to get to what is actually true, fucks me up sometimes. It actually fucks me up a lot of the time. I am working on getting comfortable with what is rather than my judgement (or the judgement of others) of what should be. Those thoughts, those feelings, rather than the actual thing itself will tug my heart, strain it to the point that my feels and my tear ducts try to take their turn.

I sat on the porch with myself for quite some time. He looked at me and said, “What’s wrong?”

I love that about him, by the way. Even when he is pretty sure he knows what my problem is (and he is almost always right), he never assumes. He doesn’t try to make me simple in his head so he can manage me. He doesn’t skip the part of the conversation where I have to own what I feel at least enough to say it out loud to him. He doesn’t save me from my fear that I will say something he will find distasteful. He doesn’t try to live for me in an attempt to make me comfortable for him. He insists that I do these things for myself. You wouldn’t think there was so much packed into asking a question you probably already know the answer to, but there is.

We talked for awhile about ancillary woes. He let me move through my process of getting to the thing. Finally, I didn’t look at him (of course, I’d like to tell you I looked square in his handsome face and declared my truth – that isn’t how it happened). “I think I might be a terrible person or at the very least, not a very good one. I don’t think I feel the way a normal person feels.”

And that’s it really. If you take 100 things I get twisted up in my brain about, I would bet at least 50% of them (modest guestimation as I don’t want to exaggerate and I certainly am not going to launch an inventory) pare down to “I think I might be a terrible person or, at the very least, not a very good one. I don’t think I feel the way a normal person feels.”

Here’s the funny thing – and seriously, I don’t care how this sounds – out of all the feels I catch, that one is probably the most ridiculous. Allow me to set down my loosely held humility card for a minute and be clear. If there is anything I know about myself unequivocally, it is that I am a good person.

Now, that isn’t to say I don’t have a good row with my share of selfishness, pettiness, judgement, and many other baser emotions. I absolutely do. I am human after all, and a flawed one at that. Catch me in a bad moment, push the wrong buttons, pull the wrong strings and I have been known to behave less than my raising. But, at my core, I am a good person. The idea that I could be labeled as otherwise is Ludacris (and my autocorrect totally just made that the rapper and not the word and for reasons that I just can’t pinpoint, I am not compelled to change it.)

All that being true, once again on my back porch, I battled with the idea that I was, in fact, a terrible person. And, because one of my greatest goals in life is to be great for him, I knew I had to get to the point where I said it out loud. Because here is another feel almost as ludicrous as the other; I am actually afraid he will agree with me. I am afraid I will say that I am feeling some less than emotion and he will either realize some inner truth about me and be disgusted, or seize the opportunity to finally tell me how he really feels. Either way, I am ruined.

Roll your eyes, I don’t give a shit. I would rather you roll your eyes at my absolute and acknowledged crazy than to go one more day pretending I have something together that I do not. I spent a lot of years that way. It turns that’s a real good way to turn fake crazy into real crazy. Yeah, I’m out.

Anyway, I looked him dead in the other direction and said “I think I might be a terrible person or at the very least, not a very good one. I don’t think I feel the way a normal person feels.”

I could feel him looking at me. I could feel him looking at me in such a way that said, “I am not going to stop looking at you until you look at this expression on my face.” This is a nonverbal conversation that happens between us regularly. But I wouldn’t turn. I was immensely engrossed in the leaf on the tree that was holding on to its branch as desperately as I was holding on to my courage. I hear him say, “look at me.” While you can ignore what might be a nonverbal feeling, an actual request requires acknowledgment. My head turn is met with a solid “bitchpleaseareyouseriousyougottobekiddingme” face.

Funny thing about that. I believe he is being completely honest with me. His complete and utter dismissal of my lack as a person takes every bit of fear I have in sharing this revelation and transforms it into a fierce defense of the feeling regardless of its validity. Yeah, he’s a saint.

“I am serious,” I insist. “A normal person wouldn’t feel this way. A normal person would not be okay. A normal person would feel something different. I think I am broken. I think there is something wrong with me.”

I was grateful when I saw his face change from the “maybe I can make her laugh at the ridiculousness” to the “okay, so we are doing this” look.

“I think that you are just stronger than most. You are able to do things that other people just aren’t built for. You are going to handle what needs to be handled. You always do. That doesn’t make you a terrible person. That makes you the best person I know.”

Okay, some intellectual honesty here. The quotes are used to designate mostly what he said. It’s edited to eliminate some name dropping, situation specifics, and other stuff that is important to us but not for public consumption and would just distract from the main point.

The main point is, by the way, I do forget who I am sometimes. Either due to the opinions of others or because of the Many in my own head. I don’t think I’m far off in my thinking that most of us do.  Having a partner who is gifted in reminding you who are when you forget is a gift. Being able to hear it is a product of the work. Both together, well, that’s just worthy of next level gratitude.

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Choosing the Feels

April 8, 2019 by

A few days ago (or maybe more at this point – the days are kinds running together due to the pace at which my life is currently moving) a girlfriend asked me how my book was going. My answer to her was “which one?” She seemed a little shocked at my confusion and said, “well, your novel, of course.”

The truth is my writing is more important to me than I think it has ever been. Mostly because it is less stifled, more accepted by those I care about, and something I am starting to feel less self-conscious about.

But I am still feeling self-conscious. It’s a feeling I am working on. Mostly because I know it is real. Mostly because I know it is ridiculous. Yes, that was two “mostly”s. Yes, I know how math works. No, this isn’t a math problem.

One of the hardest parts of putting nouns and verbs together on the page these days is the feeling of unworthiness. I think I may have mentioned this publicly before and I am currently resisting the urge to stop typing and go search to see. I won’t because the intention of that act is unproductive. If I were going to do it as a point of reference to further the work, that would be one thing. It isn’t that. It is simply a stall tactic. A visit into the past so that I do not have to stay present here, in the now, in the midst of this current work.

And I digress. I digress because I don’t want to address the idea of feeling unworthy. I attempt to skirt it for a few reasons, I think. But the most overwhelming one is, in the words of the wonderfully blunt Simon Cowell, it feels indulgent.

It has the air of wallow and the assumption self-deprecating behavior that begs for those who encounter it to shower me with platitudes of my wonderfulness. It feels like it could be misconstrued as the worst type of fishing expedition.

I have analyzed that idea for longer than maybe I should have. But that’s just my way. There’s probably a whole conversation I could have about that (and perhaps will), however for now, I will just leave it right there and you will just have to trust that I know myself pretty well and gave it more than a shallow thought. And after much contemplation, it isn’t indulgent or panderous (which isn’t technically a word but should be).

What it is, is honest. It is the way I feel. It is the accumulation of a lot of years of self-doubt and manipulation. It had it’s culminating moment when I heard someone say to me, “I don’t know why you write the way you do. You look silly. You write like you are somebody and you are just not. I don’t mean to hurt your feelings. It’s just that I love you and I don’t want you to make a fool of yourself.” That kind of shit, as fucked up and asinine as it is, will stick to a person. It stuck to me. It rooted and cross pollinated and had little demon spawn like a weed infestation all in my brain.

More than once I have crossed paths with folks who look at me like I am crazy. They have disapproved, publicly and privately, about my life choices. For a while I considered giving those opinions some weight – or at least time for consideration. Fairly quickly, I decided that wasn’t how I was moving into the second half of my life.

Keeping with weed analogy, I’ll explain it this way. When I was a kid, my dad would burn our yard every few years in the colder months, right before spring was scheduled to do what she does. It was supposed to get the junk out so the grass could grow back fuller. I later learned that this happens in forests and tree farms on occasion when the undergrowth starts to take over. The unproductive gets burnt away so that the good, the intentional, the real, can flourish.

I participated in a bit of “scorch the earth.” It probably wasn’t my finest hour, but I own it. And, even in hindsight, even when I see all the ways I could have done it different, even when I know I could have been better, I still don’t regret it. It was one of the few times, up to that point in my life, I lived in the present. Because I hadn’t done very much of that, I wasn’t very good at it. I am getting much better.

The scorch took care of a wide range of ills. However, as anyone knows, the process looks ugly, and it takes a while for the new and better to grow back. During that time, you have to be watchful for the weeds that survive, the hearty ones with deeper roots, darker places to hide. They will grow back. They are familiar and comfortable and will take back over if you let them. They will have the help of shit fertilizer more commonly known as the judgement and opinions of others who only see your mess. The crazy thing is, part of you will want to let them grow. You will look at the shit and put stock in the idea that maybe the others are right. There is the comfort of the things you know – good for you or not, and the exhaustion from doing the work otherwise.

I lived that part too. I weeded and I weeded and I weeded my new growth. It was hard and uncomfortable and draining. But the work was good. The tiredness, the soreness, was much like that physical feeling of a job well done. I am also fortunate enough to have a broad-shouldered husband who carries what I cannot. A family who gives me life. Friends who give me respite. I have moments when I feel weathered and acutely sense unfairness. It is in these times I look around and see how amazingly blessed I am. Those blessings are my strength.

I sit here tonight, over a week after I first started putting these thoughts to ink, and I can’t really remember all the places I intended to go when I first started. My husband and I exchange more words with each other during a day than I think most people do with every single person they come into contact with. There have been two recent conversations that give my initial sit down with myself a completely different perspective.

The first addresses ridiculous feelings and that I have come to terms with the fact that I have them. One of the greatest gifts of being overly self-aware is that I understand that just because I feel something doesn’t mean that I am, or anything else is, that something. It simply means I have a feel. My feelings are not a representation of fact – they are a suggestion of opinion and an indicator of external factors. Therefore, just because I feel unworthy doesn’t mean that I am unworthy. It simply means that there is a feel, a fear, that I need to root out and dispatch properly. It probably means I am giving the opinions of others more weight than they merit.

The other was a little more ego boost with a touch of tough love. Truth is, we have had this conversation before…more than once. Sometimes it takes more than we would like to make sure the message takes hold. Honestly, I am mostly okay with that. I am 42 years old. I spent a long time dealing in unhealthy habits attempting to function in disfunction and presenting to the world an “everything is wonderful” face. If that takes me a bit to work all that out, so be it.

My husband adores me. He makes it a point to make sure that I know that there is nothing I could do to change that. He makes it a point to be clear that he loves me just the way I am. In fact, in the very beginning of our reconnection, when I knew that he loved me, when I knew he wanted to be with me, when we knew how many challenges that created, he offered to let me go. He made the offer with the assurance that he would love me anyway, as he had always loved me. He had loved me a long time without having any hope that I would love him back. He didn’t see how that would change. He didn’t ask me to do or be anything for him. He asked me to be and do for me. That’s how he loves me. And if that meant him, great. And if it didn’t, well, he was okay with that too.

He reminded me again the other day his love was unconditional. I could function inside myself without fear. That if we agreed or didn’t wouldn’t change the fact that I was his girl and he had me. I could step into whatever it was I stepping into and know, with certainty, that he was there. And, because that is true, if I choose to keep holding myself back, freaking myself out, getting twisted in my own head, well, that was on me. I can’t blame that one anyone else.

In the words of Mike Trepagnier, “Choices. We all have them. I can only control mine.”

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“April is Weak”

February 17, 2019 by

This. This was the unfinished journal musings from November that made yesterday’s go at Freeman a tangled mess. Now that this is addressed, I can get back to the other…

November 25, 2018
The idea had actually lingered for days. Better put, it seeded more than a year ago. A recent conversation, one that incidentally shouldn’t have mattered to me at all, sparked a need to flesh the idea out, to put real thought and understanding into the wisp in my brain. To understand it better because it was a route to understanding myself better.

I have long been aware that the way in which people know, or think they know, me is varied. I think all people, whether they acknowledge it or not, can claim this statement true for themselves. As individuals, we consider ourselves for ourselves. When we consider others, or are considered by others, additional histories, perceptions, and ideas come into play. More importantly, we rarely offer the same pieces of ourselves to others uniformly. What I share with my closest is different from what I share with my casuals, with my family is different depending on how we are family, with professionals is different than personals. And what I am and share with my beloved is wholly different and in a league all its own.

The Motives of People

That awareness is paramount in my work to release myself from the effect that the opinions of others have on me. In the not so distant past, those effects were pretty embarrassing. More than once I have berated myself for being a grown woman and still not having better control over my own emotions. I am all too aware of the debilitating effects the thoughts of others can have on me. I have made it no secret that Mike’s support and simple council – the motives of people who seek to make you feel a negative kind of way are always suspect and should be disregarded as unimportant – has been instrumental.

But I still get caught. I suppose I will always have moments when I get caught. As such, I have revised my intention for the work. To think that I will never be moved by the thoughts, feelings, or opinions of others is unrealistic. It’s not that I can’t do it; I won’t do it. It’s not who I am as a person. I am not that hard. I don’t have those kinds of edges. Moreover, I don’t want to be that hard or sharpen those edges.

I feel compelled to note that I do not see those traits as negative. Mike has them and I love it about him. He is my rock and his shoulders carry a lot of weight. I am able to be more fully who I am because he is my safe place. In return, I provide a safe place for him to rest. He has found the balance that allows him to be all the things that he is. That balance has become the new focus of my intention.

Overthinker Truth

I was described as weak. I am certain it is not the first time. I have long held suspicions that this was an idea held by others who make assumptions about a life they know very little about. I’ve never thought too much (relatively speaking) about it. I understand how the opinion could be contrived. To be completely truthful, I take a small amount of pride in knowing the secrets and nuances that make it untrue; a knowing others wanted to have but never obtained. Maybe it was larger than a small amount…

Maybe it was that pride that gave me comfort and counterbalanced the feelings of anxiety that come when you put too much stock in another person’s opinions. Before actual words were conveyed, there was also a vagueness to the assumption. I wasn’t entirely certain it was being said and, therefore, couldn’t be certain of the other opinions that extrapolated from there. It was easy to make up the asinine things being said about me and then neutralize their effect with laughter.  After that, the work was pretty much over in this regard. I was able to move past my tendency to lose myself in what I assumed the opinions of others were and I was satisfied.

An unfortunate fact of life is that fake monsters are much easier to defeat than real ones. While getting past made up shit in my own head was great practice, facing the real thing took a bit more work. Instead of assumptions and guesses, it was concrete and tangible. That I was thought weak was definitive and clear. The causes and effects were included. The whole of it was in writing, the gift of which is to be able to revisit and reread as many times as your crazy brain desires. 

Call it out from the push back

I am a little embarrassed to tell you how much this instance affected me. But, my experience has shown that if I speak it, name it, call it out from the push back and into the upfront where we can all see it, the work to dismantle it and make it appropriate is much, much easier.

I was angry. Angry at all of it. Interestingly enough, being called weak was at the bottom of the list of things about the situation that pissed me off. I realized I didn’t even care that this particular person held this opinion. I have learned that we are notoriously famous as people for transferring the things we despise about ourselves onto others. Like if we can identify it in someone else (correctly or not is unimportant) then it must not be true about ourselves. It is for this reason you will almost never hear me refer to others as loud, sensitive, or selfish. These are foremost thoughts I have about myself so I know that I am likely to misattribute them to others. Therefore, I was not surprised in this instance that “weak” was the adjective used to describe me. It is probably one of the foremost things they are afraid is true about themselves. They won’t admit it, they aren’t there yet. I get it.

Here’s where practice with the fake monsters shows its usefulness come game time. The opinion of others – the focus of the fake monster work – is found in the primary “April is weak.” I have fought the illusion of this monster before. I found the actual to be pretty much what I thought: an opinion offered by an irrelevant person whose motive is not in my best interest, born out of their own unaddressed inadequacies as an attempt to shift focus from the consequences of their personal choices by creating a version of reality that allows them to blame someone – anyone – else.

Understanding this made getting past the whole “April is weak” pretty quick and short work.

But the nag in my brain was obviously still there. It became increasingly frustrating and emotionally exhausting as I went back to the old hurt, over and over again, thinking maybe I hadn’t let it all go. But each time I went back, there was nothing there. It occurred to me that I was not finding anything because I was continually going back to a place I already looked – the primary.

The fuckery was in the ancillary. It almost always is. That’s why it is so often hard to get to, tough to identify, complicated to remove from the mess. So I put the entirety of the conversation back together again, the whole of the situation, the perspectives of all the parties. Then I felt around in the weeds, looked for the soft spots. Once again, the primary wasn’t it. But the bruise was all around it.

“April is weak” was couched in a history that wasn’t mine, tactics that weren’t his, and a truth that isn’t ours. And that’s where my anger lived. While I was encouraged that I found it, I was confused at the same time. This was more of the same, it should follow the same path as the original work. It didn’t. The only option was to put it through new work.

Am I afraid

“Am I afraid?” This, in so much that I can control my process, is always my first question. While I hold love as a higher emotional priority, and the question is essentially the same if I phrase it, “Am I feeling love or fear,” I have found that I am capable of being more honest with myself if I directly ask the question, “April, are you scared?”

I am not afraid. The anger comes from a place of protection, not defense. That is my truth. I fought pretty hard to be comfortable speaking it and getting real with myself and those around me. To have others take second and third hand information and have the audacity to attempt to have any confidence that they can begin to know a sliver about me is insulting. I am angry that my story was hijacked, sensationalized, and wielded by mouths who hold no honor for it.  

I immediately went for the easy route, the path that laughs at the audacity of others to put names in their mouth that they have no frame of reference for. That shit really is funny – most of the time. I could not find it funny today. I considered maybe I was taking myself too seriously. I decided that just this once, I was not. I was angry and I felt justified in my anger. Today, that emotion was not going to acquiesce to the more civilized, “Fuck ‘em, they’re stupid.”

There are moments when I will concede that my emotions get the better of me and they are unreasonable. However, that does not mean they are always unreasonable. There are times, such as this, where my ire is created by an encroached boundary.

And now that I have had better than a week to process and work through, I have come to a place where I realize the goal of my anger is to ensure that I have clearly stated my boundaries, not really to you, but most assuredly myself.

Protecting My Truth

My truth is an ever evolving, dynamic discovery that was breathed into being before me, molded in my yesterday, experienced in my today, and unfolding in my tomorrow. It has been hidden, muted, condemned, manipulated, misunderstood, edited, abused, ridiculed, and despised. I did those things. My truth is my responsibility and I take ownership of every unfortunate thing that has ever happened to it. I have apologized to and forgiven myself for living a life that was less than in exchange for what I thought was less strife and conflict. I have also promised to work every day towards becoming a person that protects my truth from such slights.

In that work I know a few things. One, not every argument, accusation, threat, slight, opinion, deserves a response. Depending on the narrative or the narrator, it is often beneath me to address it directly – especially when I haven’t been addressed directly. It’s hard to take opinions about you seriously when those holding them are incapable of adult conversation.

Elicit a Response

Two, because it is mine, I have the option of responding whenever I chose. I need no reason, good or otherwise, to engage when called out. It is ignorance to assume you can continually exhibit behavior for the express purpose of eliciting a response and then clutch pearls over the response you receive. There’s an old saying, Moses maybe, “Don’t start no shit, it won’t be no shit.” Actually, that was Lil Jon, but I am sure Moses thought it too.

Lastly, I am not ashamed to be a complex person. I am love and forgiveness. I am also cut you off and kiss my ass. I am enlightenment and growth. I am also a little trailer with a healthy helping of petty. A little bless your heart, a little fuck you. No, those aren’t the same thing.

Really last, you are welcome to think me weak. Better have thought worse. Smarter have been wrong.

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There is so much more going on here…

February 16, 2019 by

When I came across this quote last week, I knew there was a lot there. I also knew I wasn’t going to wait to figure out what all the a lot was before I shared it. It is one of those that, on its face is fine…but the more, the more is where the goods are.

Before we go any further, let me clarify that although Morgan Freeman is in the picture, I’m not sure he said this. Even if he did, British philosopher James Allen said it first – or something pretty damn close to it. And since he was born in the 1800’s, he probably is older than Morgan. For those who are super curious, the Allen work is As a Man Thinketh and the actual quote is, “Self-control is strength. Right thought is mastery. Calmness is power.” There, I feel better. On to our regularly scheduled program.

The More. There is so much more going on here. The kicks are in the qualifiers… “based on” … “insignificant” … “others to control” … “overpower.”

Seems like a small thing. It isn’t. It throws back to a bit of the “don’t mistake my kindness for weakness” idea, although not quite.

I’ve been mulling over this idea for a week and I’m still not quite sure how to noun and verb my intent.

Figured it out…it’s in my journal and must be addressed first. Let me go clean it up and then we will circle back…

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The Wife Between Us – Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen

January 13, 2019 by
The Wife Between Us - Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen

I wasn’t really sure about The Wife Between Us by Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen when I originally picked it out. I couldn’t figure out if it was chick lit or women’s fiction; the difference is important to me. Don’t misunderstand, I am not a snob about it. I enjoy both styles. However, I wasn’t in the mood for chick lit. I wanted something that didn’t require a highlighter, but had some teeth to it.

I also needed to clean my house. I didn’t have all day to figure this out. Because I am attempting to be a more focused reader and writer, I dusted off my Goodreads app and (after I reset the password I couldn’t remember and handled the barrage of notifications I hadn’t answered) peeked at the suggestions from one my neglected reading groups.

Each month, Bound Together has three category of books: one Member Choice title and two “find a title that fits.” In January, Beneath a Scarlet Sky was the Member Choice. As I am still trying to get through The Tattooist of Auschwitz, I passed. “Off the Shelf” was to read a work that had something magical about the story or cover. I was not feeling it. “Author Read” did not designate a particular author this month. Instead, it required that the book be written by two people – with both their names presented on the book. I scrolled through the comments and someone suggested The Wife Between Us. What the hell, I needed to get on with my day so I spent the Audible credit and moved on.

My. House. Is. So. Clean. Seriously, I organized the armoire, cleaned out the pantry, decluttered the office, caught up the laundry – all of it. For two days I found reasons not to sit down so I could justify leaving the book playing in my ear.

Vanessa and Richard are recently divorced. Nelly and Richard are getting married. Vanessa is having a hard time holding her new job and controlling her booze. Nelly is preparing to transition to a whole other life. Vanessa is completely preoccupied with the woman Richard has replaced her for. Nelly swears someone is following her. Aunt Charolette and Sam are side-eyeing the whole thing.

Two things. First, if you think you know what you are getting into based on that synopsis, you would be wrong. Second, I can’t really tell you anything else without spoilers.

This is probably the most fun I’ve had listening to a book in a while. There was constant tension between the characters and in my own head. The authors gave just enough so that I knew there was something else going on and, if I didn’t figure it out, they were going to get me. There were moments I thought I had it. I didn’t, and they did, in fact, get me with the “holy shit where did THAT come from.” Then the real neat thing happened – the story didn’t end. They. Just. Kept. Doing. It. Even in the Epilogue.

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Fixing April

January 10, 2019 by

One of the healthiest decisions I ever made (that I honestly didn’t even realize I was making) was the choice to leave my menstrual cycle alone.

(Edit – keep reading. Turns out we aren’t talking about periods at all today)

I really wasn’t going to lead with that, but I figured I should go ahead and just put it out there. I realize it’s 2019 but there are still some folks who are funny about talking about that kind of thing and I respect it. I didn’t want them to get a little bit in and feel ambushed by hormones and biology.

Anyway, I really thought I was going to start out by telling you about when I started taking the pill. Funny thing about that – I can’t remember. I just assumed that it would have been a pretty big deal to me back in 199whatever and I would recall the memory upon reflection. I can’t. I can’t even tell you if it was high school or the Navy. At some point, I transitioned to the Depo shot, stayed there for a while, and went back to the pill. But I can’t remember the particulars of those times either.

How interesting is it that there was a large chunk of my life I so misunderstood and underappreciated one of my body’s major rhythm and energy centers that I routinely fucked with it flippantly enough that it didn’t even create a lasting memory. Wow. That’s not quite where I thought this was going as it was a detail I hadn’t considered until just now. Makes me even more glad I just went ahead and put the whole period thing out there in the beginning because evidently, I don’t even know where we are headed this morning.

What I do remember is how emotional my second pregnancy was compared to my first. I remember what postpartum depression felt like. I was lucky that it was the second and not the first. Had it been my first maybe I would have dismissed it as normal or labeled it as a failure on my part. It was 2001 after all. The legions of mommy bloggers, Pinterest boards, Facebook groups, and Instagram inspiration weren’t around. Hell, MySpace wasn’t even a thing yet. Double hell, we had just reached the “more adults own cell phones than don’t” mark. Access to information was markedly different.

I knew something was different and it was probably me. April Trepagnier, See the Butterfly

What I lacked in outside information, I made up for in self awareness and experience. I knew this wasn’t what all pregnancies felt like. I knew this wasn’t what bringing home all newborn babies felt like. I knew something was different and it was probably me.

That was my first experience with mental health pharmaceuticals and, in all honesty, it was very helpful. I’m thankful it went as well as it did as it was the time before a person could do a whole lot of research on their own or discuss with a larger group of people. It took the edge off long enough for me to “get myself right” which, gratefully, didn’t take very long. I am nearly certain that can be attributed to my immediate focus on diet and exercise. Of course, I didn’t realize that at the time. I just saw it as the appropriate steps needed to take off the massive amounts of baby weight I had packed on. It worked; the medication was appreciated and short lived.

My head rested on his back, my sobs transferred the weight from my heart to his shoulders. April Trepagnier, See the Butterfly

In 2005 I lost my baby. That was a situation I had no frame of reference for. Again, the internet wasn’t huge. You knew who you knew, and a lot of business was still private. To say I was devastated and unhinged would be an understatement. In fact, it would be 2017, over a decade later, that I would find any comfort, peace, or closure.  On our back porch in the middle of a sunny day, I told him my story, Gracie’s story. My head rested on his back, my sobs transferred the weight from my heart to his shoulders. In 2005 however, I was medicated. Again, it was helpful, and I was thankful. And again, I wasn’t on it for very long. I got pregnant again quickly and stopped taking them.

Prior to that loss would be the last time things were easy for me emotionally. The next decade would bring a roller coaster of life with one real exception – you can see the drops coming on an amusement park ride; not so much with life.

In 2010 I was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder II. This piece of information was not devastating. In all actuality, it was a comfort. It settled the air around me for a while. Those who routinely thought less of my personality felt comfortable “letting it be” and were patient in waiting for me “to get right.” It was a box I could step into, a shield I could hold up when judgements got to be overwhelming.

Unfortunately, it required me to agree that something was “wrong with me” and I had to take the steps to “fix it.” For the first time doctors were attempting to figure out which meds would effectively make me, at a person level, “better” instead of supporting me while I worked through a tough spot.

The last go at “fixing April” was Seroquel. It is an antipsychotic commonly used to treat depression, schizophrenia, and bipolar disorder. In my body, it was a nightmare. For three days, from the time my kids left for school until after lunchtime, I would sit, white knuckle clutching the arms of a chair, trying desperately to remember that I did not really want to hurt myself or someone else. After the first day, I called the doctor and was told the meds just needed time to even out. After the third day I flushed it all down the toilet. I didn’t have whatever amount of time those meds needed.

At this point, the internet is moving along pretty good. I start trying to learn if there is a way to fix myself. I refuse anymore prescriptions – even my birth control. I focus again on diet and exercise. I learn about mindful cognitive behavior. I’m vegan for over a year. I finish a 50 mile run. I discover chiropractic care and acupuncture. I get a great therapist. The only medicine I agree to is to control my high blood pressure because, for the life of me, I can’t figure out how to do it on my own. Even then, I am guarded and questioning. The one time the docs tried to increase my dosage as the effectiveness was waning, I declined in favor of giving my acupuncturist a go at it first. She handled it.

I burnt it all down. What would stay would stay and what wouldn’t, well, it just wouldn’t. April Trepagnier, See the Butterfly

I wish I could tell you I got real and strong and balanced. I didn’t. I got scared. The more effective and healthy I became, the more I realized I was never “broken” to begin with. But that truth didn’t coincide at all with the reality I was living. Worse, it was beginning to become very apparent that they never would. I was turning 40 and had been battling with myself for over a decade. I was scared to choose between the woman I was and the woman I was. That is not a typo. So, I burnt it all down. What would stay would stay and what wouldn’t, well, it just wouldn’t.

For what it’s worth, that was not the approach the therapist suggested. In fact, she strongly urged against it. But call it impatient, weak, scared, frustrated, whatever, I did not have one more measured step in me. I was too scared, too tired, and too over it.

What stayed was my desire to be better, my want of happy, my love of humanity, my need to know myself. What didn’t was the box, the shield, and the bipolar diagnosis. It took several months to let the embers of my inferno cool off, but when the dust settled, the diagnosis was rescinded. Turns out I wasn’t cycling through mood swings. I simply had allowed myself to attempt to function in an unfunctioning environment for far too long.

I will include the passage I encountered in my reading this morning that prompted this whole thing…but it probably won’t make any sense. I am already over 1300 words in and I really just wanted to tell you about how acupuncture fixed my damn periods and how embracing my natural cycle allows me to feel more connected to my Wild Woman nature. Oh well, maybe tomorrow.

“Over time, we have seen the feminine instinctive nature looted, driven back, and overbuilt. For long periods it has been mismanaged like the wildlife and the wildlands. For several thousand years, as soon and as often as we turn our backs, it is relegated to the poorest land in the psyche. The spiritual lands of the Wild Woman have, throughout history, been plundered or burnt, dens bulldozed, and natural cycles forced into unnatural rhythms to please others.”

~ Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Women Who Run With the Wolves
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Nine Perfect Strangers – Laine Moriarty

January 9, 2019 by

I absolutely adore Liane Moriarty. I first encountered her with What Alice Forgot. That one is still my favorite. It feels a little disloyal to Liane to write about this one first before I have taken the time to tell about all the other ones, but alas, here we are. There’s a character…I’m getting ahead of myself…

Nine Perfect Strangers started out slow for me. In fact, there was a point where I was worried I wouldn’t enjoy it at all. I was wrong.

Liane’s approach to this story is slightly different than she has taken in the past. Her character development is super segmented in the beginning and finding the point to the story (and thus my interest in it) was difficult at first.

But then she does what she does best – just enough twist to rock your socks and just enough formula to be comfortable.

Some may see formula writing as a negative. I do not at all. I read for a number of different reasons, one of which is to be delighted. I am most often delighted when I encounter engaging characters in a familiar way with an interesting turn. Liane is one of my favorite go to writers when this is the read I am looking for.

Nine people from different points of life converge together for a 10 day wellness retreat hosted by former corporate diva Masha, and her direct help, Yao and Delilah. Liane does an excellent job of mixing up each characters’ real motivation and personality with subtle hints to the actual and swerves to catch you off guard later.

I suppose Frances should be my favorite character. She is a successful romance writer with a charmingly quirky personality. She reminds me a lot of me in a silly and shallow way and I enjoyed meeting her very much.

But she isn’t. The AT favorite character award goes to Tony. I adored him from the moment he is introduced, through his smiley face butt tattoos, all the way to the last page.

As is with most of her works, it’s hard to explain anything else about the book without ruining the adventure. She will deliver on the obvious and surprise you with left field.

As a complete side note to the review itself, a passage in Nine Perfect Strangers reminded me why it is imperative for writers to read and read often. It is no secret that I have had quite the time lately putting nouns and verbs together. It has been a painful process to get in the chair and write, much less find the ability to stay there. You can read more about that passage here.

In fairness, this is probably not intended to be the most profound message in the story. In fact, you’ll see so many other important ideas in the book, I am sure. However, on this particular day, in this particular reading, it was, hands down for me. There was no other close second. For that, I am immensely grateful and, flaws and all, give it five big gold stars.


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A Discussion on Book Reviews

January 8, 2019 by

I always intend to do better about reviewing, discussing, documenting, whatever, the books I read – then I obviously don’t. I am pretty sure it has a whole bunch to do with my lack of consistency in putting words on a page. I am pretty sure that comes from my lack of confidence in making nouns and verbs do what I want them to do when I want them to do it. Couple that with my lack of discipline in waiting to start another book before I write about the one I just finished. Next thing you know, I just refuse to do it at all.

Additionally, I read different books different ways. I enjoy audiobooks, e-readers, and paper. Typically the method depends on the book. Audiobooks are usually fiction or easier reads. I save the non-fiction or “those likely to need a highlighter” for my iPad or paper. I own many of my favorites in multiple formats. You would think that lends itself to easy, quality, book write ups.

Sometimes I just have to dig my thoughts deep to keep the critics in my head quiet

You would be forgetting that I am the quintessential over thinker.

Instead what happens is one of a few things…

With audiobooks, I am a staunch “unabridged version only” snob. This is a deep seated, personal prejudice born from my buy in on the format in its super early days when you still had to get the tapes (yes, the cassette kind). Back then (you will still hear it occasionally today, but I find it is pretty rare anymore), folks who utilized audiobooks weren’t considered actual readers. You were guffawed if you claimed to have “read” a book you “only,” in fact, “just listened” to. Therefore, I pledged to be an unabridged listener or bust.

But I never just sit down and listen to an audiobook. I am always doing something else – driving, cleaning, running. That is the beauty of the unabridged audiobook. I can read books I would NEVER have time to get to otherwise. The downside is obviously divided attention and no pencil (I love to read with a pencil). Maybe, on a super rare occasion, I will take the time to hit the “+ clip” button on my Audible app to mark a particular passage or section that strikes me as profound or compelling. However, qualifying those times as “super rare” is not an overstatement.

In a weird and self conscious way, that creates a distrust in myself whenever I sit down to write about an audiobook I just finished. “Weird” because it doesn’t slow me down one second when suggesting a book to a friend or discussing the work with someone that has also read it. It probably has something to do with the difference in words on the page and words on the air. I would guess this was the main argument of the “no you didn’t read it, you listened to it” crowd. There is a small bit of truth in that. I didn’t see the names, I don’t know how they were spelled. I didn’t see the layout of the words on the page, I had the inflection bias of the narrator. These things matter.

But I have decided they don’t matter enough to prevent the recording of my experience with them. They don’t change the fact that I encountered a piece of work and that encounter created perspective, emotion, and memory. They don’t matter enough to make me question the validity of my thoughts. Seems a bit heavy I know. It really isn’t. Sometimes I just have to dig my thoughts deep to keep the critics in my head quiet.

I get all up in my feelings over some arbitrary bullshit that, in the real world, doesn’t really mean anything. I have cost myself a lot of good days getting tied up like that.

Then there are books I pay a lot of attention to. There are a quite a few in my collection that have numerous passages underlined and notes in the margin. There are even a couple that have warranted their own notebook. These I have tried to write about and the work falls prey to my inconsistency or perceived expectations of “timely manner.” That timely manner shit gets me on the regular. Like if I haven’t accomplished a thing on a certain time schedule I have failed in some way. Then I get all up in my feelings over some arbitrary bullshit that, in the real world, doesn’t really mean anything. I have cost myself a lot of good days getting tied up like that.

To this, I have finally come to the place where I am comfortable with the idea that I write for free. There is no revenue generated here. I am not letting my family down with my inability to pay the bills. I am not being professionally irresponsible by ignoring deadlines. So if I write an installation of a reflection on a particular work and never come back to it again, whatever. There’s nothing to feel any kind of way about. That freedom is game changing.

The hardest are the books I didn’t particular like or the ones that were just okay. As a reader/writer I have dueling opinions. As a reader, I should be able to honestly discuss my thoughts in a constructive way. As a writer, I should have thick enough skin to expect that there are people who don’t like my style or story. As a reader, maybe the work was good and the failure was mine. As a writer, shouldn’t I have some sense of solidarity and support for my fellow writers because I know just how fucking hard this is.

Enter stage left two of the most valuable lessons I have learned in the past two years as it relates to words on a page: First, I don’t have to publicly publish everything I think. Second, everything I do publish doesn’t necessarily have to be rose colored, positive, clean, popular, tidy, polished, resolved, enjoyed, or profound.

I simply have to write.

Filed Under: Paraphernalia