A- for accountability

Sleeping is for sissies… eating is for grazing cows… dreaming is for sleeping, when we rather rest…

We change when we grow up and when we fall in love, when we move to another town and when we become parents. Knowing this does not make the process any easier and while we expect it, drops like a bomb when it actually does. Processing my son’s birth with little sleep leads me to believe I was destined to be his mother, along with the fact that my daughter needs someone else to torture. My expectations shrunk like little old ladies while my hopes still soar, it’s just I can see them, not touch them. My entire pregnancy I spent in silence and as far as I could from electronic equipment… except from this here laptop and only for homework. How could I possibly ever reconcile earning a degree in psychology while dealing with life as I do? I could find out more about myself if I looked in the mirror more often. I enjoy being as flawed as I am… today.

People, people…

“Show me the dirt pile and I will pray,
that the soul can take,
three stowaways…” -from Interpol’s “Pioneer To The Falls”

Why is it that “the best things that could happen” always comes with just enough bitter to make you remember? Your memory’s the first to go when you get older and at thirty, I can’t remember what it’s like to jump without looking. I don’t remember the taste of those chocolate treats my grandpa used to buy me after school (yep, I was a fat kid!) that are no longer sold anywhere -not even in those old candy websites you can order a box of malnutrition in bulk. And I don’t remember the first time I cried over a boy, all I know is that the opposite sex has been making me cry as far as I can remember, even before I knew why. So feminism came into my life in the form of abandon and one day it was the second or third grade and I got cold chills when this particular boy walked in the room…. what was that?! Now I understand that it was me, some women choose to keep the butterflies to themselves and keep ANYONE that could hurt them at bay, intuitive they are! I wore my heart on my sleeve for many years and the sucker would bleed out for everyone to gawk; when I finally got it and put it away, things got better for me. We had boyfriends and realizing it early, I had girlfriends and friends and good times and fun… with this, I started hurting people just in time -right before they left. This is how I know about karma, this is how we learn if we choose to so at this age now, right after the kids and the vanishing cash, there’s no misunderstanding as to why. The women in my life are, for the most part, stubborn and independent creatures; the men in my life try really hard, enough to get it right more than we give them credit for. If I hadn’t wasted all of those years with a bitter heart for the mistakes I had made myself, maybe I would have appreciated the men I knew then… even the jerks. Another sub-category of love, maybe right above hate.

In other news, I have picked up the manuscript once again and hopefully soon I will find another excuse not to finish it for another five years. Also, a new business venture in the horizon, progressive libertarians with hippie tendencies have to make bread too, man! We’ve smiled a bit too much lately and it’s worrying the watchdogs of emotional health -they think I’m not so ready to breathe. I have met some cool people lately, there’s hope for humanity yet!

(Footnote: I’m confident about my looks, every flaw I have will stay like that forever. I’m confident about my smarts, I’m stupid enough to give it all a second shot.)

Zen and the upkeep of mental illness…

There was no block no tragedy, no heartbreak nor disappointment, and certainly I was not in despair. When it was time to return to life like most live it, the decision was made to write down what I thought…

It took me three more weeks after I wrote that to actually make it back to the computer. Scrobbled some tunes and checked my email, put on noggin for the kid and settled back into this life, including this dear blog. I wanted to say a lot, of how difficult it has been and how putting one foot in front of the other was the hardest thing to do in order to get my life back. I’m so tired of reaffirmation and what does God have to do with the whole thing? Maybe I would become a role model and other people would look to me for advice, then I could star in my own mental illness commercials to reassure “normies” that their children will be safe with people like us roaming the streets and… not so funny when deep down that’s all you want, someone to tell you it’s okay. I’m not violent, never been; I don’t have hallucinations where I think I’m someone else entirely, nor do I cry because my hot dog fell on the ground (Seinfeld, anyone?). I just happened to get sad one morning and wasn’t able to shake it off as easily. Now we shower and take care of a whole ‘nother human again, anything in between happens to be a trade secret, how I finally did “get over it.” It’s in the philosophy you adopt -and even your own creation is inspired by others- and what you put in your body to sustain and entertain it, how you treat others (even in times like those). It reminds me of that one nurse I had one particularly rough evening two days after my daughter was born, I was rude to her for one reason or another and in a haze she basically taught me a lesson on how to speak and conduct myself around others. I apologized and was given exactly what I needed. It’s worrisome how people treat each other these days, so this is where wanting to be left alone and keeping the courtesy you have been given become a task, a rather difficult one given the physical attributes of depression. So, whatever, I’ve kept most of my friendships throughout the years and still intact through this… and maybe that they weren’t used to but thank you. Also to those who missed me, or at least what I have to say (which sometimes means a lot more than a kiss), thank you for waiting and hoping I’d be back, at least with my dramatic ass intact -yeah, that’s you, Nic, I finally read your tribes message… missed you too!

I’ll have more to say about the following quite soon: puppies, who is wordpuppet, incense, and fun shopping for birth control! In the meantime, this song helped and I sang it often…

Lua

I know that it is freezin’
But I think we have to walk
I keep wavin’ at the taxis
They keep turnin’ their lights off

But Julie knows a party
At some actor’s west side loft
Supplies are endless in the evenin’
By the mornin’, they’ll be gone

When everything is lonely
I can be my own best friend
I’ll get a coffee and the paper
Have my own conversation

With the sidewalk and the pigeons
And my window reflection
The mask I polish in the evenin’
By the mornin’, looks like shit

And I know you have a heavy heart
I can feel it when we kiss
So many men stronger than me
Have thrown their backs out trying to lift…it

But me I’m not a gamble
You can count on me to split
The love I sell you in the evenin’
By the mornin’, won’t exist

You’re lookin’ skinny like a model
With your eyes all painted black
You just keep going to the bathroom
Always say you’ll be right back

Well, it takes one to know one, kid
I think you’ve got it bad
But what’s so easy in the evenin’
By the mornin’s such a drag

I got a flask inside my pocket
We can share it on the train
And if you promise to stay conscious
I will try and do the same

Well, we might die from medication
But we sure killed all of the pain
But what was normal in the evenin’
By the mornin’, seems insane

And I’m not sure what the trouble was
That started all of this
The reasons all have run away
But the feeling never did

It’s not somethin’ I would recommend
But it is one way to live
Cause what is simple in the moonlight
By the mornin’ never is

It was so simple in the moonlight
Now it’s so complicated
It was so simple in the moonlight
So simple in the moonlight, so simple in the moonlight… -Bright Eyes, “Fevers & Mirrors”