Archives for category: Metaphors
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Happy VD!

February 14, 2018 //
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Well… Happy Valentine’s Day, at any rate. Try to avoid getting VD (venereal disease) – it would be sure to detract from any potential holiday joy. 😀

“Lovers” 8″ x 10″ watercolor on paper 1992

I have a lot of thoughts about Valentine’s Day, few of them are G-rated. My personal take on Valentine’s Day, as a holiday, is that it is the one holiday on the calendar specifically devoted to sexual love. Romance. Not “family life”, not little kids giving paper cards, not “hearts and flowers” in any casual sense (“I sent my Mom flowers for Valentine’s Day” is definitely not in the spirit of the holiday as I understand it, myself). Valentine’s Day is a holiday to celebrate sensual pleasure, sexual pleasure, physical connections and bonds, the delights of romance of all sorts, and not some watered-down Hallmark holiday at all.

Is love a journey or a destination? Or… is love a verb?

Having said all that… I’m alone this Valentine’s Day, and lacking co-celebrants of any sort in any near-at-hand physical sense. LOL 😀 Somehow, I manage not to be bitter about Valentine’s Day. Some years I’ve been partnered. Some years I’ve been solo. Some years being partnered hasn’t resulted in sex on Valentine’s Day… which is like the worst way to celebrate this holiday. LOL At least have some smooches and snuggles, y’all. 😀

Be love. It’s a choice. Love is a verb.

Somewhere a long the way, people seem to have gotten the idea that “inclusion” and “inclusivity” means everyone can, and must always have access to be able to, celebrate and/or enjoy everything available to be celebrated and/or enjoyed by anyone at all. I don’t think life really works quite that way. This is a really good example. I see Valentine’s Day as a specifically quite carnal sexual celebration of love… I also don’t have a partner at hand with whom to celebrate this holiday, on this day, in this year. Those are all true things. Does this, then, mean I am entitled to celebrate nonetheless and all such celebrations must now be tailored to enable and accommodate my participation? And what if the pre-requisite for such requires that I be fundamentally other than I am? What must change? Just something I turn over in my head now and then. I’m a huge fan of inclusion – sorting out what precisely that actually means is tougher. I mean, I will nonetheless “celebrate” the holiday – by noting that it exists, and quite probably enjoying a lovely meal later, and maybe a very tasty glass of sherry or port – but it is a pale comparison to my preferred ways of celebrating sexual love. LOL 😀

Love matters most.

Valentine’s Day-wise, Love gets to lead a lot of the conversation. Love has a lot to say. I don’t know what it says about love – or folks who read my blog – but this post on Valentine’s Day, from 2013, is my most popular post ever of always to date. So, this year, remember – even if you can’t “get lucky” this Valentine’s Day, how lucky you are simply to be, and to be you; you matter. Celebrate with the person in the mirror (<groan> lol, sorry, I could not resist, but sure, if you’ve got the time and inclination, do you. LMAO). Enjoy you. Lavish yourself with your own affection this year – why not? You may begin the best relationship of your life, by beginning a better one with the person in the mirror.

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Categories Allegories, Art, art and the artist, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, loneliness, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Words

The Ringing In My Ears

February 13, 2018 //
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Tonight the “silence” sounds reminiscent of a hot summer evening, sweltering temperatures, and the night air filled with the sounds of insects. Crickets. Mosquitoes. All of the many kinds of buzzing and crawling and flying things… and maybe a street light buzzing along with all of them. Dense. “Shimmer-y”. My tinnitus has been with me a long while. I don’t have a clear recollection of not having it. It differs left and right.

Why mention it at all? No reason really. I’m sitting here listening to it, which gets me to contemplating it with greater care. Sometimes I might start to panic, thinking I can’t hear anything else now, and have to pause to very willfully listen to other sounds to coax the tinnitus to recede into the background of my awareness once more.

Why on earth am I sitting here listening to my tinnitus? I didn’t mean to be, actually. I sat down to exchange courtesies with my Traveling Partner, check in with some friends, and catch up my personal email for the day before moving on with the evening. I put on headphones with the intention of listening to music. lol I never got that far. Something distracted me, and I’ve been sitting here listening to the sound of my poor judgement. (I don’t actually know for sure what causes all of my tinnitus sounds. I do feel pretty certain it would not be this bad if I had been a committed fan of hearing protection in my 20s and 30s.)

Funny what can catch my attention for a moment. I smile to myself, hit “play”, and begin again.

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, pain, Perspective, The Art of Being

More Rest, More Beginnings

February 12, 2018 //
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I have managed to get genuinely rested over the past couple weeks, a bit at a time. Good sleep hygiene restored after a carefree disregard for it through the holidays that required another 3 weeks or so of recovery time. We’ve all got to pay for our thrills. lol

It’s an ordinary Monday following a chill, modestly productive, imperfect, still adequately restful weekend. I miss my Traveling Partner on this whole other level that nags at me in the background. I remind myself that the upcoming weekend will see me heading down the highway for another visit. 🙂

The week will end on yet another visit with yet another doctor. I honestly have too much other shit to do, but with these being health-related concerns, getting them seen to is sort of non-negotiable. So. Doctor’s appointments it is.

I look around, coffee in hand, and notice a few things I’d prefer not to return home to, and lacking a full-time domestic in residence (a level of luxury I don’t aspire to), I decide to give up a bit of leisure morning to finish up some housekeeping left from the weekend list of things to do. This is a “me thing”; I find that my thinking is more orderly when my environment is also orderly. I finish my coffee. Finish this lackluster bit of writing. I look my Monday in the face with a smile and begin again.

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, loneliness, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships

What, Morning Again?

February 9, 2018 //
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I woke much earlier than my alarm. Early enough to do yoga, shower, dress, and make an Americano before my alarm would have gone off. I’m quite alert and wide awake, and feel rather as if weeks and weeks of fatigue and illness are finally behind me. Still have the weird headache. Still have more future appointments to deal with it. Still have the arthritis pain. Still bitching about that. It is morning. I am human. 🙂

I sip my coffee contentedly, noting how good it is this morning and just really enjoying that. It is a Friday, tomorrow is the weekend. I feel relaxed and at ease – because, partly, I’ve chosen to practice having this experience of relaxed contentment, learned to build and sustain that over time, and it’s become (if not my default “state of being”) quite common to feel this way. It is a huge improvement over being mired in despair, chronically frustrated, and wondering endlessly what the point even is to living. 😀 I’ll straight up say it; I got here with my choices. I got here with practice. There were – and are – verbs involved. Practicing practices is an ongoing thing; this is not a task, these are processes. This is me, living my life, and my results vary – right now, this moment here? It’s very pleasant. 🙂

There is stuff yet to do. Housekeeping. Tidying up. Maintenance. Repairing, cleaning and maintaining. lol There’s also brunch with a friend, hang out time with another, and perhaps a lovely hike with a new camera on a pleasant Sunday morning. 😀 I get to choose. 🙂

I’m ready to begin again. Let’s start this day!

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Categories anger, anhedonia, Anxiety, art and the artist, Brain Injury, Free Will, Frustration, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Oregon Trails, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, solo hiking, Spring, The Art of Being, winter

Some Routine

February 7, 2018 //
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Well, shit. Writing in the evening is a very hit or miss thing for me, isn’t it? How… disappointing? Inconvenient? Well, something – it definitely falls far short of being a routine. lol I am fortunate that it isn’t an obligation. 🙂

I consider the nature of routines, and the consequences of undermining routines that work in pursuit of some other ideal, or the satisfaction of some other need. In this instance, less than ideally successfully. There are so many small details that are not obvious – nor obviously related. Is there a relationship between the lack of writing, and the more frequent occurrence of dishes in my sink? Or that growing pile of earrings that hasn’t been getting put away? Or the fact that (although steady progress is being made) Giftmas is still not quite entirely put away? Did breaking a longstanding routine “cause” all this? Was the desire to break that routine and try something else part of what has also “caused” all these other strange eruptions of chaos around me? Are these questions that need answering at all?

I guess one way to learn more is to return to writing in the morning. Will the result be a sudden return to unyielding orderliness? I guess I’ll be finding out. 🙂

A rainy day, a squirrel, a new camera.

I love the new camera. I caught myself continuing to grab my camera phone, though, for “difficult” or out of reach shots. I found myself agreeing with my own observation that “the camera phone is by far superior [for me] for opportunities requiring speed or nimbleness” – getting from “no camera” to “camera in hand” very quickly, I mean. It was a thought that resulted in more camera phone, and less camera. I considered that with great care for a day or two, and realized that to achieve that kind of speed-to-image nimbleness with my new camera, I need to do one thing I’ve tend not to do; I’ve got to carry my camera everywhere I go. It’s what I do with my phone. lol Of course speed-to-image is faster with a camera phone – the fucking thing is always already in my damned hand. LOL  It is an observation that seems beyond obvious. I feel just a bit dim that I didn’t have that concept firmly in mind in the first place, but I am okay letting that go, and picking up my camera. 🙂

A new day begins. I begin again, myself. I’m bringing my camera. 🙂

 

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Categories art and the artist, Brain Injury, Free Will, Frustration, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Oregon Trails, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, solo hiking, The Art of Being
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