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Alone in the Dark

February 10, 2026 //
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It is well before dawn. I’m at a local trailhead waiting for the sun, or maybe just waiting.

My Traveling Partner had a rough night, sick. I felt bad for him, and woke every time he did, but I had wisely gone to bed at my usual early time, and this morning I woke clear eyed and clearheaded, feeling pretty well rested. I hope he managed to get enough rest, himself.

Yesterday was weird. Sort of blurry and surreal from fatigue, I went through the motions of work, and once I had completed everything that was time sensitive and due, I went home and crashed hard. A two hour nap put me right, enough to make a good meal for us to enjoy as a family. Not enough to put forth the effort to clean up. I was grateful to have the Anxious Adventurer’s help with that.

Another day begins. I sit in the dark with my thoughts, grateful for the quiet time alone. My beloved encouraged me to sleep in and work from home this morning. I may yet work from home, but sleeping in? Not gonna happen. I woke at my usual time, feeling quite alert and rested. 😆 I got up, dressed, and headed out into the predawn darkness, rather than risk waking everyone by bumbling around the house or tapping away on my keyboard.

It is a chilly morning, although not particularly wintry (here). It is a mild 40F (about 4.4C), and the night sky is clear and starry for the moment. The weather says a foggy morning, but so far it is not that, at all. Not in this location – and I’m certainly close enough to a creek that feeds into the Yamhill River very nearby to see some fog. On foggy mornings, it’s usually quite thick here. Perhaps the temperature will drop and a fog will develop?

I sit quietly thinking about people and places. Friends. Lovers. Family. Colleagues. Strangers who crossed my path in some meaningful way. People. Lives that matter. Lived moments, shared and unshared. Family, community, and society. Human potential.

I sigh to myself, feeling vaguely disappointed by humanity “as a whole”, but realistically, I am most disappointed with those who contribute to human misery directly through their cruelty, pettiness, violence, indifference to human suffering, and/or self-serving profit seeking at the expense of, and through the misfortune of, others. Exploitative greed and capitalistic callousness is so toxic. We could do better, but to do so would require real change, right down to the deepest layers of what individuals value. We may never be ready to become better than what we are, as a species, and it will likely be our undoing.

… Dark thoughts in the darkness. Fitting, I guess…

I breathe, exhale, and relax. I let go of my dark musings, and my mind wanders on.

I’m in more than a little pain this morning, but it’s manageable for the moment, and I don’t cling to the experience, I just note the feeling and let that go, too. I’m grateful that chronic pain and some fairly minor limitations to movement and flexibility are generally the worst of it for me. I’m still walking. I sit with my gratitude for the surgeon that day (maybe it was night?) so long ago (more than 40 years now). He was frank with me that if I didn’t have surgery to attempt to repair my fractured spine, I’d be in a wheelchair, and partially paralyzed. There was no guarantee that the surgery would be successful, and there were experimental techniques involved. Two of my vertebrae were basically crushed, and would be rebuilt using hardware and bone grafts. 16 hours of surgery… Weeks in the hospital… Months in a body cast… More months of physical and occupational therapy and restrictions on what work I could do… And eventually, the osteoarthritis arthritis and the chronic pain setting in a couple years later. Small price to pay; I survived that injury, and that marriage. The pain reminds me that freedom has a price, and that the bill will come due.

… What price are you willing to pay for your freedom? Your rights? Your survival?  The price may be quite high. Paying that bill is not optional. You may only have seconds to decide…

Choose wisely.

My tinnitus is loud in my ears. My head aches. I take notice and let those go, too. I “flip a coin” in my head; walk or don’t walk? I make my choice, and begin again.

A new day dawning, a light in the distance. Yes, it’s a metaphor.
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Categories Allegories, Brain Injury, breathe, forgiveness, Free Will, gratitude, health, Healthy Living, meditation, Metaphors, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, Oregon Trails, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, solo hiking, The Art of Being, The Big 5, War and News of War, winter, women, Words

Wanting to Make It Work Isn’t Enough

February 8, 2026 //
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Yesterday… fucking hell.

The details don’t much matter, and the decision to have the Anxious Adventurer move out was already made (planned for April, after winter weather is not a serious risk). I had hoped we’d all coexist relatively peacefully in the meantime. Yesterday evening was revealing, and unfortunately nonnegotiable boundaries were violated (and had been for some time, although I was not explicitly aware of it, yet). I’m disappointed, and honestly still rather angry. The plan is still locked in, that hasn’t changed. How I feel about this third human being under my roof has changed –  a lot. I sigh to myself, annoyed to be sitting here dealing with that bullshit at all.

Well shit. I really wanted to make things work comfortably well with the Anxious Adventurer coming to move in with us. There are a lot of potential advantages to shared living, and our society places value on family.

…Wanting something isn’t enough…

I am disappointed that this won’t work long-term, and my Traveling Partner admitted that the downsides and inconveniences outweigh the value for him, too. I know the additional emotional labor, for me, has outpaced the day-to-day advantages to having an additional family member in the household. This shit is hard. I keep asking myself if I’ve done my best, and wondering if I have failed to be… something. If we were each different people dealing with different issues, this totally could work. I keep thinking about that, too. Am I depriving my beloved Traveling Partner of the opportunity to be close to his son? I think I’ve been persistently encouraging and supportive, coaching where I could…

I’ve struggled with having less privacy, with being required to do too much emotional labor, with the lack of personal space, and the frustration of trying to cohabitate with someone who showed up wholly ignorant of some commonplace life skills, and basic manners, but I am not looking forward to the practical requirements of the changes ahead; more g’damned work. I’m simultaneously very much not sorry this will soon be over, and also deeply regretful and disappointed that it didn’t work out.

…If you invite a feral animal into your home, you mustn’t be surprised when it shits on the carpet, but you also don’t have to let it stay if it won’t learn new ways…

I breathe, exhale, and relax. Human beings being human. Communication is complicated. Moving into a strange household in a faraway place where the manners and expectations are new is challenging. I knew going into this that it would present some variety of difficulties, but figured we’d work them out together, as families do. Like an orchestra with musicians looking at different sheet music than the players alongside them, there was little harmony and a lot of wrong notes. I’m fucking over it. I’m annoyed with myself for being as angry as I am. It’s not reasonable to blame a feral animal for not being well brought up. I just also don’t want to deal with the associated bullshit.

We each make choices. The Anxious Adventurer made his. He chose poorly, in my opinion, and in spite of steady support, encouragement, coaching and guidance. I sigh in frustration and disappointment. I don’t wish him ill, but I do wish I weren’t dealing with these circumstances at all. I remind myself how close April really is. I lived in a tent for almost a year with 15 guys, most of whom i barely knew, a couple of whom I actively disliked, and it was…fine. I can endure 60 days more of this crap, too. It will pass.

Once he’s gone, I have no doubt there will be things I miss. He’s my Traveling Partner’s son, and I hope he visits in the future – I just don’t want to live with him, at least not right now, and I don’t think I can persuade myself to trust him again. If nothing else, he needs to take some time and work on the man he wishes to become, and I really can’t help him with that (and he does not know how to accept help yet). Sitting here this morning, listening to the rain falling, and waiting for the sun, I don’t even want to try to help him further than I have. It’s not a useful way to spend my time.

A new day dawns, full of promise and opportunities, but we’ve each got to make our own choices, and do our own work.

I breathe, exhale, and relax. I feel settled with myself and my decision making. I feel comfortable in my skin, and accepting of the person I have grown to be over time. The journey is the destination. There is further to go on this path. We each walk our own mile, each having our own experience. I do hope the Anxious Adventurer finds his way.

I turn my attention to this moment here, now. The rain falls steadily. I watch the predawn twilight become the dawn of a new day, and in spite of the dreary gray of this rainy morning, I’m filled with eagerness. I am having brunch with the Chaotic Comic this morning. She shares some of the communication challenges of the Anxious Adventurer (as do many others in their general age group). There is a key difference that limits my irritation with those challenges in our friendship; I’m not having to live with them. My friend is also more receptive to discussion, and more open to considering suggestions for potentially useful changes and able to speak up to explicitly reject suggestions she does not favor. It feels like a conversation – because it is. Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised; she’s a comedian and “yes, and…” is an important part of improvisation, a learned skill.

We become what we practice.

… Still… I do wish I could have made things work, for my Traveling Partner and his son. I’d have liked to provide a firm foundation for them to deepen and build on their relationship, and I’m disappointed to have failed. I sit listening to the rain and considering what I could have done differently, myself, but it mostly isn’t about that. I can’t do that work for someone else, only for me. I’m walking my own path.

I sigh to myself and make room for gratitude. I have much to be grateful for, even within the context of this disappointing and aggravating shared living experience. I’ve learned some things about myself. Having some help was… helpful. I truly needed it, so many times. I breathe, exhale, and let my anger go. It has served its purpose and only gets in the way, now. Brunch soon, and a chance to begin again.

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Categories Allegories, anger, Anxiety, breathe, forgiveness, Free Will, Frustration, gratitude, Healthy Living, Love, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, winter, Words

Maybe Don’t

February 7, 2026 //
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If you are an American citizen, maybe don’t be a racist sh1thead, and you won’t have to endure the bitter fruits of our racist colonizer forefathers. We live on stolen land. Humanity is potentially already on borrowed time. It matters very little to our dead ancestors, now, but how we treat each other certainly matters to the living. Personally, I’d much rather see our government give broad, compassionate amnesty to every immigrant in the nation, along with a clear reasonable path to citizenship than see masked government thugs in our streets harassing, assaulting, kidnapping, and murdering human beings whose sole crime was crossing a fucking line on a map. Our hands are not clean with regard to matters of territory,  even within our own borders.

… And in case you hadn’t noticed, these government goons are violating the rights of citizens, too, and yes, even murdering them. How do you reconcile that with your values and understanding of our civil rights? Asking for everyone who thinks this shit is pretty g’damned terrible and inexcusable…

G’damn, I wish America didn’t have so many petty assholes and racists in it. We didn’t do right by the indigenous peoples of this continent, and we are failing the immigrants who risk so much for the dream of becoming American. Do better America.

I sigh to myself, wondering where this path leads. We are facing a new cold war era, it looks like. This saddens me deeply. We had come so far as a global society, but rather stupidly we’ve allowed fascists and authoritarians to move into power again, and here we all are. Be more careful with your vote, people, for fucks sake, this crap actually matters! Pay attention.

Yes, I’m angry about this stuff, no I won’t shut up about it.

I breathe, exhale, and relax, and pull myself back to this moment, right here. It’s hard sometimes; I want so much to be able to do more. 

Waiting for the sun.

I get comfortable in my Traveling Partner’s truck, here at the trailhead. I’m waiting for the sun, or at least enough daylight to make out the trail ahead of me. It’s a familiar trail and a mild morning. I’ve got my headlamp, somewhere down in my purse, I just don’t feel like walking in the dark this morning, and my time is my own, for the moment. Hopefully my beloved gets to enjoy sleeping in. I’m in no hurry.

I spend peaceful minutes meditating, watching the sunrise-to-come slowly touch the horizon with streaks of a hue I have no word for. Something between tangerine and magenta, and striped with clouds that want to be lavender, perhaps, but are a grayer hue entirely. Well above the horizon, almost overhead, spots of cerulean peek playfully through the clouds, hinting at blue skies to come. The view isn’t ideal for photograhs; it is obscured by signage, and the highway and power lines cross my field of vision, but I look past all of that and watch the colors and clouds shift with the evolution of dawn into day. Nice morning for it.

Today I’m not alone. Already the parking outside the gate is filling, and space is limited. This hour, this weather, it’s a near certainty these are birdwatchers and photographers, rather than casual walkers or noisy friend groups. It’s fine. I don’t prefer to share the trail, but that’s probably a pretty common sentiment in this group. 😆

Perfection isn’t part of the experience.

The main gate opens with a groan and clangs into place. The trail, and this moment, await me. It’s already time to begin again.

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Categories 2024 Election, Allegories, anger, breathe, forgiveness, Free Will, Frustration, Love, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, Oregon Trails, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, solo hiking, The Art of Being, The Big 5, War and News of War, winter, women, Words

What To Do About Nothing

February 6, 2026 //
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I woke abruptly from a deep sleep. Someone had cried out, loud. My Traveling Partner! I got up before I was fully awake, and headed quickly to the sound I had heard. Pain has a specific sound, and I am still “tuned” to be alert for his voice in the night, since his injury a couple years ago (has it been so long already?). This morning? Broken toe. Ouch. Painful, but maybe not an emergency. After some conversation, he assures me he’d rather I went to the library to work, than have me stay home. He’s been trying to get some time to himself for a few days. I’m sure not going to mess that up for him.

…I am alert for him to reach out to me, anyway, my phone turned up louder than usual, and next to me on the table where I can see it if it lights up with a notification…

For almost an hour, I’ve been sitting with my coffee. Just sitting. Not writing. Not drinking coffee. Just sitting. I’m not complaining, just taking note. Weird morning. I feel a purposeful frown on my face. I am “triggered”, not so much my anxiety though, this is a different “feature” of the PTSD – this feeling of purpose on the edge of action; readiness. A left over of domestic violence bug-outs and military deployments, mostly, I guess. I tend to feel more comfortable day-to-day if this particular need to be “ready to go on a moment’s notice” is gently supported (the gear bin my SUV, water, emergency rations, and my backpack, too, are elements of supporting this need, as much as they are simply useful for camping or emergencies). Other than that, I don’t give it much thought. Fighting it definitely does not help. This morning, I have no action to take right now, but I am “on alert” nonetheless. It may last awhile. I could do without the acid reflux though. lol

I take a deliberate willful sip of my coffee. It’s just the right drinking temperature. I take a longer drink of it. I definitely appreciate it this morning. Rough way to wake up from a rare deep sound sleep. I’m not exactly groggy. I’m not quite entirely awake. I feel fired up by a sense of urgency that has no outlet, and not grounded in this moment, here, now. I feel connected to each of the many past versions of this woman that I am, who has waited on the edge of urgency, so many times, for the action yet to come. I breathe, exhale, and relax. I offer myself a silent assurance that this too will pass, and sit with the experience, waiting for that. I’m grateful for the good cup of coffee this morning. I’m grateful that I will see the sunrise a little later, as I make my way from this cafe to the university library to finish the work week, instead of from the ER waiting room.

A broken toe is not “nothing” – hell, even a stubbed toe is crazy painful (and the pain lingers). The titular “nothing” in the subject line this morning is to do with the “nothing” in my head, sitting here triggered, waiting for action that is not necessary, and is not now. I consider the sensation – it is an uncomfortable one mingled with unease this morning, which puzzles me. It’s a bit like picking up a mug I know to be white, and perceiving it as some other color entirely in spite of that knowledge. I solve it when I remember I am driving my Traveling Partner’s pickup; my car is at the body shop. My gear and preparedness are not conveniently at hand – and a sick feeling of panic surges and I feel a chill of tension sweep over me. Well, shit. Okay, so that’s not necessary. I chuckle to myself, feeling entirely too human, but appreciative to have picked up on the subtle signals from within that something didn’t feel right. Much harder to deal with a feeling that is not clearly identified, I find. I breathe, exhale, and relax; my Traveling Partner is as well prepared as I am (maybe better, considering the differences in our vehicles). I don’t have my backpack – but his is in the truck, and equally well-equipped with basics. I don’t have my gear bin, but his is there, and there’s quite an assortment of useful stuff tucked here and there. I’m less than 2 miles from home. Less than two miles from the storage unit into which I put my gear while the car is in the body shop. The panic subsides.

I sigh to myself. I feel worn down and tired. I feel more than a little “anti social”. I’d like to hop in my car and drive to the horizon just to see what might await me there. I’d very much like to… something. I don’t know. I feel a certain yearning, but it’s not clear why, and I find myself wondering if it is simply nothing more than the shifting sands of my emotions as the biochemistry of emotional experience has its way with me? I breathe, exhale, and breathe again, letting the breaths come and go, without much else going on. This is the moment I am having, now. That’s fine. “Nothing to see here.”

My mind wanders to summer camping, spring flowers, and new trails. Maybe tomorrow I’ll drive out to Chehalem Ridge, or Miller Woods? I sit with my coffee and my thoughts. Brunch with the Chaotic Comic on Sunday – unless one of us flakes on that. We often do. We don’t take it personally; we’re having our own experiences, and sometimes we need to change our plans. The friendship is worth accommodating our quirks in an understanding way. I’ve got the truck, and mild weather – maybe a drive to the coast and a visit to Fogarty Creek and the private cove beach there? The thought of a taking a different direction, tomorrow, appeals to me. I sit with my thoughts awhile longer.

…It’s already time to begin again…

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Categories Allegories, Anxiety, breathe, Free Will, gratitude, Love, meditation, Mindfulness, Moments, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, solo hiking, The Art of Being, The Big 5, winter, women, Words

Dream a Little Dream

February 5, 2026 //
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I woke rather oddly thinking I was already awake, and uncertain how I “suddenly ended up” horizontal, wrapped in a comforter, on a soft surface, when I’d been contentedly seated at my desk, drinking coffee and writing – “finishing my book” – happy to be done with it. It was an odd sensation. For some minutes, the phrases I’d been typing (in my dream) were still lingering in my thoughts, becoming a sense that it would be a good topic to write about, and slowly dissipating from my recollection as dreams generally do.

Now, I’m up, out of the house, sitting with a cup of coffee and my thoughts, on a chilly Thursday. It’s not cold. 40F (4.4C) – so relatively mild for February. The whole season has been “relatively mild” in this location, although elsewhere, in many places, blizzards rage and snow piles up. I hope you are safe and warm, wherever you may be. I sip my coffee wondering how bad the fire season will be this year, having so little rain over the autumn and winter months, and so little snow in the higher elevations. Today’s forecast was precise as to temperature and quite accurate, but the car was frosted over in spite of the mild temperature. The morning manages to feel like it’s almost winter. Early Spring? Late autumn? The seasons “don’t feel quite right” anymore. I fear we’ve broken our planet beyond repair. This does not bode well for humanity, nor for many other creatures whose lives depend on climate. Scary. I’m no expert, and I’m not interested in succumbing to this or that whispered conspiracy, I just see what I see, and live my experience; this very mild winter can be expected to be followed by a difficult summer of wildfires dotted around the state. I’ll have to be very careful when and where I camp this summer, and plan on closely monitored very contained cooking fires (I like my Jetboil best).

I remind myself not to forget coffee!

I sigh to myself. I miss being out in the trees, listening to birds and chipmunks and forest breezes, and watching the sun rise and set filtered through trees that have seen more years than I have myself. I don’t have to wait on camping… I could drive out into one of several large wilderness areas and be among those trees in less than an hour, being fortunate to live approximately midway between the coast and Mt Hood National Forest. The thought jolts me back to this moment; today I have to take my car to the body shop to have the damage done on New Year’s Eve (day) repaired. I won’t have my Mazda for some little while. Weeks maybe? Days definitely. My Traveling Partner graciously offers me the use of his truck in the meantime, and it’s a dream to drive (so much so that I’m planning to buy that make of SUV to replace my Mazda when the time comes). So, today I’ll drop off the car, and he’ll pick me up in the truck. The work day will bookend that errand, and for the most part life will be remarkably unchanged – except tomorrow morning when I step out of the house and am reminded that my car is gone. I’m sure I’ll forget, until I see it missing. lol Very human.

Life is filled with adventure – and misadventure. Choices. Opportunities. Change. Getting hung up on some particular detail is often a poor choice. Mostly the details don’t matter to anyone else; they are having their own experience. We’re all in this together, in a grander sense, though we regularly forget that and start giving people on hard times side-eye, like we have never struggled, or fallen on hard times, or failed to choose wisely. Human beings can be jerks. We like to talk about “pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps” in spite of the practical matter that every one of us relies upon others, depends on others, and probably wouldn’t survive long isolated and utterly alone (think “no internet”, “no credit cards or banking system”, “no infrastructure”…). If you’re feeling quite smugly independent about your individual success, I’d like to point out that the infrastructure, delivery systems, and basic building blocks of your experience are not things you did “all by yourself”. lol

I sip my coffee and smile to myself. The morning feels relaxed and peaceful, and I realize one reason why that is; there is no background music playing this morning in this chain coffee shop. One less bit of noise to filter out as I sip coffee and consider life, this moment, and this woman that I most want to be. Nice morning for it. Chilly, though. I’m grateful for this hot coffee. I’m not too proud to drink branded industrial chain coffee from a Big Coffee Chain Cafe in my neighborhood. lol I don’t necessarily prefer it. I’m that coffee drinker who prefers carefully brewed freshly ground coffee from estate-grown varietal beans imported from the cradle of civilization…but will most definitely lick the bitter dregs out of a packet of instant coffee moistened with a tablespoon of tepid water rather than go without. LOL I have abruptly returned home from a camping trip I was excited about – broke camp and returned home less than 24 hours into it, after driving hours – over forgetting to bring coffee!

…Would I survive without coffee? Sure. Getting past the first few deeply irritating days without would be annoying, but I’d survive – I just don’t want to. I recognize that this is characteristic of addiction. I’m grateful it’s just coffee.

I breathe, exhale, and relax. I consider logging into work tools and beginning that part of my day a little early, but I don’t have to; this moment is mine. I smile to myself happily. Nice moment, this. I sip my coffee and enjoy that feeling. So much less anxiety this morning. Like… none. I slow down and appreciate that, for what it is. I’m grateful. I’ve endured much over the past two years, and it’s been harder than I imagined it could be, and I’ve done more/better with most of it than I would have expected myself to be up for. Things are turning a corner. Change is. Hard times come and go. This too will pass. Impermanence is a characteristic of life – even our human lives, however much control we seek to exert over events. I don’t necessarily like that – I’m a big fan of stability and comfort and ease – but reality does not care about my preferences, and having an easy life was unlikely to turn up in the hand I was dealt; the odds were poor (still are for me, and for most human beings). I’m okay with “okay”. I’m grateful for my good fortune in life, wherever it finds me. Enough really is enough, although I sometimes have to pause and consider my blessings, and take a moment to be aware (again) of how fortunate I truly am. (Like anyone, I find a stupid about of bullshit to bitch about rather pointlessly some days.)

Walking my own path, one step at a time.

Crazy world we are living in right now, eh? There’s a lot of terrible stuff going on here in the US and in the world. What we say about it matters. What we do about it matters more, if we can be moved to action. Heroes will rise. Villains will fall. I feel hopeful this morning (probably because I am not looking at the news). I breathe, exhale, and relax, and prepare to begin again.

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Categories 2024 Election, Allegories, Anxiety, Brain Injury, breathe, Frustration, gratitude, Healthy Living, inspiration, joy, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, The Art of Being, winter, Words
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