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Ghosts of Giftmas Past

December 22, 2024 //
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I have been taking a look back at Giftmas holidays past… Thinking and remembering, and considering the gaps in my recollections, that – in spite of being “gaps” – are part of what makes this holiday so “magical” and wonderful for me.

My childhood memories, though few, are visceral, powerful memories triggered by scents, by colors, by the twinkle of lights in the periphery of my vision on a winter day. They tend to be what continues to provoke me to “chase the dream” and try to hard, year after year, to recapture that magic. (Sometimes this has led me to stray from my path.) I don’t remember early Christmases, aside from a few lingering recollections of a particular gift item – a bicycle with a purple “banana seat”, a Barbie van, a kitchen playset, roller skates… they aren’t attached to years or context, I just remember those things as existing, connected to Christmases past.

The Ghosts of Christmas Magic.

My most intensely magical recollection of Christmas was a particular year… 1972? 1973? The tree stood in a bucket on the front porch, all the way to Christmas Eve. More than once that year my Dad snarled “if you kids don’t behave, there won’t be any Christmas!” Which terrified me to my child-soul. (Was I really that bad?! That Santa wouldn’t come at all…??) I had no understanding of adult hardship, or adult anxiety, or the pressure parents might face to “deliver” on the promise of Christmas to a child.

Two people who understood Christmas magic.

I went to bed that night, the house entirely ordinary in every way, feeling a bit saddened by my apparent naughtiness. I woke later, in the wee hours, to sounds I didn’t understand, and crept down the stairs very quietly – I could see light, around the corner of the landing. I peered down and around, hoping not to be seen, and… the wonder. The pure magic of the tree fully decorated, fully lit, stockings hanging from the mantlepiece. The piled up presents shimmered and sparkled as the tree lights twinkled. Wow! Santa had come!! I ran back up the stairs and crept close to my Dad, sleeping in my parent’s big bed. “Daddy? Daddy!” I wispered, “Santa came! He was here!” My father sleepily replied “You must not have been as naughty as I thought. Go back to sleep for a little while, it’s too early – he’s probably still working on things in the livingroom. If he sees you up, he’ll take it all back.” I raced quietly back to bed, and lay still and awake, listening carefully, for what seemed like hours, until my next youngest sister also woke, and also crept down the stairs, and came hollering back up like a storm “Santa was here! Santa was here!” and waking the household.

The morning became a chaos of wrapping paper shredded then discarded, a fire in the fireplace, and the arrival later of grandparents with more presents, Mom in the kitchen making breakfast, and Daddy making Bloody Mary’s. I only understood later how late into the night they’d been up, sharing the evening over package wrapping and toy assembling and tree decorating, and how little sleep they’d actually gotten that night (because I’d woken up around 5 a.m.) – but the magic lives with me even to this day. Real Christmas magic, created by mortal parents, for the delight of little girls. Beautiful. I don’t remember a single thing I got that Christmas – but I sure remember that Christmas.

Something changed after that Christmas, in a wonderful and unexpected way. The very next Christmas, Santa rather unexpectedly left our stockings at the foot of our beds! I remember waking (again, too early) and seeing/feeling it there… my stocking! Full of… Christmas! I surreptitiously dumped it on my bed, and gently looked through it, certain I shouldn’t be. I crept quietly to my parent’s bedroom, and gently woke my Dad to tell him, “Santa made a mistake and left my stocking on my bed, Daddy!” he opened one eye, reluctantly it seemed, and eyed the clock on his nightstand – 4 a.m. – “Go ahead and open it quietly, Babygirl, it’s okay. You can enjoy anything you find there as long as you’re quiet until at least 7 o’clock. If your sisters wake up, tell them, too, okay? Daddy wants to sleep until 7 o’clock, okay?” “Okay, Daddy,” I wispered, and softly slipped away to my room, closed the door and turned on my light.

Christmas had come! There were chocolates and lollies, and maple sugar candy, and little toys and puzzles, and a necklace of sparkly beads, and a tangerine in the toe of my stocking – I ate it first, feeling very “good” to save the chocolate for later. By 7 a.m., I was waiting impatiently, all sugared up, and so were my sisters. We three went to the door of my parents room promptly at 7 o’clock, “Daddy? Daddy… it’s 7 o’clock. Santa was here. It’s Christmas.” I heard my Mom groan from the other side of the bed. “Ern, couldn’t you have said 9??” (Ever after that Christmas, the stockings were always on the foot of our beds. A tradition I still adore, and what a creative way for exhausted hungover parents to get just a little more sleep. lol)

There were other merry Christmas holidays with family, and I enjoyed them. The holidays with my Granny as a teenager, spent visiting my various aunts and sharing the holiday with younger cousins, were lovely and safe and warm and joyful and full of light and love and tasty homemade cookies. I remember some of those moments, and what I remember I remember quite fondly. They blur together a bit, forming neither recollections of heartache nor recollections of profound joy. That’s okay, too; I know I was loved.

The Ghosts of Christmas Trauma

I’ll tread lightly here, because it’s a bit of a buzz kill; my first marriage was full of violence, terror, and trauma. Peculiarly, it was also were I found my earliest artistic encouragement, and Christmases were strange, sorrowful, scary, beautiful and full of madness. We were both trying to capture magic we remembered, but it all went terribly wrong as often as it ever went right. I developed a real terror around putting lights on the tree, and a profound, lasting, gut-wrenching anxiety that any single light might be placed “incorrectly”, resulting in unspeakable punishment.

The eagerness of Christmas morning was outweighed by the fear that a gift might be the wrong size, or color, or brand, or type of thing. My joy and my terror competed for attention, every year. I have magical memories of the Augsburg Kristkindlesmarket those years that we lived in that beautiful city, but I also remember walking without a coat on a snowy Christmas Day hoping to find any shop open wherein I could buy something special to replace something that wasn’t “good enough”, tears freezing on my face, ankles cold in the snow, shaking as much with fear as with the cold.

The first Yule season holiday after I finally left that nightmare was… strange. My Granny was fearful that I wasn’t ready to be alone, and invited me out to spend Christmas with her. It was lovely and warm and gentle, and I’m so glad I went. It was a time of healing, and I definitely needed that. When I wept over the loss of all my precious ornaments collected over the previous 14 years, she reminded me that I could start over (and she had sent me a box of antique ornaments she knew had been special to me as a child, that I would find waiting for me when I returned home. I still have those). She sent me home with something to think about, too; I could make Christmas over into something that felt right to me. My values. My idea of magical. No fear. The seeds of my own Giftmas traditions were born in that gentle holiday spent with my Granny, in 1995, as we talked about love and marriage and trauma and divorce and the challenges of finding our way through the chaos in life.

Tales of Giftmas Present(s)

Ever since that Christmas back in 1995, I’ve cherished the holiday season from Thanksgiving to New Year’s my own way and shared that love and joy with my partner(s), over various relationships over the years. I have ornaments from so many years – each year I add at least one new one, something special that says something about the year that has passed, and what made it special.

This year’s special ornament, made by my beloved Traveling Partner, favorite “sticker” characters we have swapped back and forth in our DMs all year, Peach and Goma.

I think about my Dear Friend, and Giftmases we shared over the years. So many special ones.

I enjoy really celebrating each year as it draws to a close. I love finding gifts to delight friends, family, loved ones. I love filling stockings each Giftmas Eve. I enjoy the shopping. The wrapping. The presents under the tree. I love the memories – year by year new beautiful memories add to those that have come before, crowding out the memories of terror or of sorrow. I remember the gifts, and the moments, and the love, every year. It’s not about gifts for me (though I definitely do love presents!); it’s about the gratitude, the appreciation, the fondness, and the celebration – and showing that joy through gift-giving as a tradition. The giving (and even the shopping) is a special thing of its own, and it has importance to the celebration, for me. Giftmas is built on these moments of giving and sharing:  shared moments of light in a world that sometimes feels filled with darkness,  moments to share “enough” and make it feel bountiful, and moments to set aside life’s challenges in favor of shared comfort and joy.

That very first Giftmas I spent with my Traveling Partner is a particularly fond memory filled with adult holiday magic, joy, and love. 2010. We had moved in together, and we didn’t have a lot (we’d both recently been through bad breakups and a lot of upheaval, moving suddenly had been very costly). We didn’t make much money, and rent was a bigger piece of our budget than ideal. It was hard times. We were doing our best, and agreed that maybe this year we’d “just skip Giftmas”. Wasn’t love enough, after all? I didn’t cry over it (at least not where he could see me), because it just made sense. Practical. Real. We were, after all, both adults.

I came home from work feeling a little blue one cold afternoon to a little tree in the corner of the livingroom, decorated for Giftmas, lights ornaments and little presents underneath. I remember the happy tears, and the joy on his face to see me so delighted. I remember his strong arms around me. I remember the love. More Giftmas magic. No fear. No sorrow.

So much love captured in a moment.

One of the most beautiful things my Traveling Partner did for me was buy me my first pre-lit fake tree, so I wouldn’t have to string the lights every year. He had seen (the prior year, before we moved in together) how much it hurt me, and how I struggled happy/sad with it, and he made it right. (I fucking love that guy.) Another beautiful memory of Giftmas magic. The real caring and consideration, the thoughtfulness, and the love; if I hadn’t understood how much these are part of Giftmas before, I surely knew then.

Along the way there have been so many lovely holidays. Beautiful moments. Giftmas magic. Thanksgiving feasts and New Years’ toasts. It’s a beautiful season and I do it my way – I’ve learned. There have been ups and downs and challenges, and years when there just wasn’t any money to be fancy, and years when somehow things were amazing in spite of that. Eventually, I enjoyed some Giftmas holidays “all alone” – and I enjoyed those my way, too. They were beautiful and bright and full of love, and solitude did not diminish that. One of those is among my favorites.

The more recent years are reflected in my writing (and I’ve grown along the way):

I sit for moment, thinking about how fortunate I am, and how far I’ve come. I’m grateful for every sparkle of Giftmas magic, and every year that I’ve enjoyed some little moment that continues to stand out for me now. No doubt there’s more to say, and I thought I had some kind of point… I guess I’m saying “begin again” when things seem to be sliding sideways unexpectedly. Put love first, and take care of yourself. Be kind and be compassionate and thoughtful, and take time to enjoy little moments of joy and delight – and make the holiday magic on your own terms. It’s not a contest, or a race, and there’s no report card at the end. There’s nothing to live up to that you didn’t make up on your own. I smile and sigh to myself, feeling content, feeling merry, feeling grateful and incredibly fortunate – and excited about Giftmas day. It’s only 3 days away!

Merry Giftmas, indeed.
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Categories Allegories, Anxiety, Brain Injury, breathe, forgiveness, Free Will, gratitude, Healthy Living, inspiration, Love, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, winter

Strategies

May 15, 2024 //
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I’m sipping my coffee and thinking about brain damage. Specifically, one of the consequences (for me, of mine) and the way I have (and do) cope with it – poor memory. It’s not that the memories don’t get into “long-term storage” at all, it’s more that “my file system is corrupted” and I have difficulty retrieving them – or recognizing they are still available. Having an object or photo associated with an event has long been my preferred strategy for dealing with that. Handling something as mundane as a rock picked up on a beach can do so much to help me recall that day, that beach, that memory… Without the rock? No recollection. Same with pictures; a picture of a particular dewy rose brings to mind that specific spring morning, a walk after a rainstorm, the scents of the flowers all around, the feel of the sunshine in that moment – and even the thoughts I was thinking at the time. No picture? No memory. This coping strategy, unfortunately, has a noteworthy downside. Clutter. Mementos that are meaningless to anyone but me, and lacking in any intrinsic value.

Yesterday evening my Traveling Partner delighted me with a (second) new earring rack for all my many (many, soooo many) pairs of earrings, so that they can be more organized, and available at a glance. So convenient. It’s too much to put them all in the bathroom, though. So… casual fun 3D printed earrings are right there in the bathroom by the mirror – great for every day. The second rack? In my bedroom, with my somewhat less casual semi-precious gemstone earrings, and earrings of great sentimental value or a bit more worth. My best/fanciest earrings are safely tucked away in my jewelry box for “occasions”. Seems quite tidy, which I enjoy. Getting to that point, though, brought me up close and personal with the clutter that had definitely been accumulating in my personal spaces on this whole other level since my partner’s injury last fall, and the dust… omg, the fucking dust. I’ve been letting my spaces go to shit because I just don’t have the energy to keep up with every-fucking-thing all the damned time. It’s hard. I’ve failed myself in a number of small ways that, initially, don’t matter as much to me and feel more negotiable…but… I have gotten to that place where the clutter and untidiness (and the fucking dust) are unhealthy for me. It’s been on my to-do list for a while now. Yesterday I just felt pushed to do some small thing about it.

…I managed to tidy up one entire wall of my bedroom, including 3 bookcases (13 shelves, many dozens of books) and all the miscellany that had accumulated on their shelves. Knick-knacks, bits of things, scraps of paper, just… junk and crap and whatnot to deal with. So… I mostly dealt with it. Meaning to say, I grabbed a small box and anything I couldn’t figure out “where it goes” at a glance (to put it there immediately), I dropped into the box. (I dusted as I went.) At the end of this process, once the entire room is thusly dealt with, I’ll go through the items in the box one by one and probably throw a ton of that shit out – or put it where it obviously belongs, because by that point it should become clear. It felt good to get some of that done, and to have a strategy. I had my Traveling Partner’s support and he didn’t grief me over not hanging out – having that encouragement and emotional safety to do the thing needing to be done helps make it doable at all. Now I just need to keep at it.

One of the challenges is that this process involves touching a ton of little items that evoke memories. Some good. Some less so. It can be an emotional process, and I’m less skilled at making it less so. The way out is through; there are no shortcuts on emotional journeys. I say something about it, generally, to my Traveling Partner, and he comments that perhaps some of these memories are not worth keeping, or working so hard to keep, maybe. His memory works very differently; he struggles to let things go, and remembers too well, too long, too easily. That’s a struggle of another sort, for sure. I’m not saying I’d rather have that one, either, it just means we have a very different perspective on memory and memories. Useful, actually. That rock I handled while I took things from shelves and placed them in the box? The one that reminded me of that very blue sunny afternoon when I lived at #59, feeling alone and unloved, lonely not solitary, mired in despair? Finding that whimsically painted rock in the fork of a tree on my rather sad walk that day really lifted me up, but when I handle the rock now, I remember finding it, yes, and the joy that came of that moment, but I also remember that very blue afternoon, and how heavy my heart was. It’s a visceral memory of sorrow and aloneness. Do I need to keep that one? Is there value in feeling that feeling just because I handled a rock?? My Traveling Partner’s observations with regard to memory are, even now, quite thought-provoking for me.

I make some notes for later. Things to do to get ready for camping. A note to remember to go to the store for some essentials. Lists and notes and reminders are another way I cope with the consequences of brain damage (and PTSD). They reduce the likelihood I’ll forget some time-sensitive task, which is definitely a thing I am prone to. All the bills are on auto-pay, where that’s available – just another strategy for coping with poor memory. Effective.

Is the strategy effective?

Is the outcome useful – and intended?

I sip my coffee and consider strategies – and brain damage. It’s been a lifetime. Some of my strategies were formed before I understood what I was coping with in the first place. Some of my strategies have been less than ideally effective. Some of them even had problematic unanticipated other results. This too, has been a journey. I breathe, exhale, and relax. It’s a lovely sunny morning, and there’s work to be done. I have that moment of amusement that I often do when I take notice of “how easy” work often feels compared to life – and in this particular moment I realize it’s likely because the strategies are purpose-built, and often built on foundations of many people and processes over long periods of time, tested and refined and reviewed and analyzed. Of course that feels easier; I’m not making it up as I go along. lol Something to think about.

I sometimes borrow work strategies and try them out in my life (sometimes they work very well). That’s okay, too – it’s just another strategy. What works, works. I try not to continue practices that don’t work, and try to avoid relying on strategies that are not effective. My results vary. I keep practicing.

I smile at the blue sky beyond the window. It’s a nice day to begin again. I’ve got a strategy in mind… and that’s a good place to start. 😀

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Categories Allegories, Brain Injury, breathe, Healthy Living, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Spring, The Art of Being

Small Things, Big Wins

July 7, 2019 //
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I spent yesterday pretty gently, relaxing at home, seeking small distractions to take my mind off this wound in my jaw (from a recent tooth extraction). I alternated between considerable pain, discomfort, and bitching about those – and the inconvenience of all that – and being mostly pretty okay, generally, aside from the occasionally more intense pain, and near-continuous discomfort. In any moment that I noticed I was not in considerable pain, I made a point to really notice that, and explicitly enjoy it. I found small distractions to take my mind off of the pain, whenever it seemed to worsen. My Traveling Partner helped with that, rather a lot.

Brunch with a friend helped; uncomfortably, but yeah, it was a nice distraction, in spite of my self-consciousness about trying to drink any sort of beverage in a public place without either causing myself more pain (and potentially prolonging the healing process) or dripping it all down the front of myself, awkwardly.

Time in the garden, observing the young praying mantises that have just hatched, renewed my joie de vivre more than once, over the course of the day.

…and, I just find them terrifically fun to watch.

We watched a favorite movie together, in the evening, and a variety of interesting video content from favored content creators. I read, played video games, and went out into the world once or twice – mostly just to take my mind off the pain of this healing process.

Healing processes can be painful. Read that again. Breathe. Exhale. Relax. Take that in for a moment, it’s very real; healing processes can be painful. All kinds of healing processes, for all manner of wounds. Absorb that observation, and let it be a stepping stone to letting something go, and stepping off on a new beginning, if you can. 🙂

I’d honestly prefer that any given healing process be truly a matter of feeling reliably progressively better, moment-to-moment, but giving the matter some thought, and considering other wounds, other hurts, injuries incurred over a lifetime, I find myself inclined to be fairly certain that no particular healing process has been pain-free – or even reliably less painful in a clearly improving way, over time. It’s often been a matter of surges of increased pain, interspersed with considerable improvement, or even lingering significant chronic pain over a prolonged period that rather abruptly resolved at some later point. Some healing processes have even seemed to hurt worse than the original injury/condition, to get to an outcome that felt wholly better than I’d ever previously experienced. Weird, right? I mean, that healing hurts. That doesn’t seem intuitive to me, and I suspect my lack of preparedness and acceptance that healing processes can be painful, themselves, has held me back from healing most efficiently (and quickly), in some circumstances.

Yesterday had some seemingly excessively painful moments. I fussed about it. I fretted over it. I self-threatened to go back to the dentist this week so he can look in my mouth and tell me “yep, it’s coming along just fine” – because when I hurt, I doubt that it is. I forget, over and over again, that healing processes can be painful. lol

I think it complicates things that it is also needful to distinguish between the routine painfulness one might expect while healing from some kind of wound, and the painfulness of not healing – of getting worse – as from an infection of a wound that would ideally be healing. Damn it. Well, that results in a few more verbs, more awareness, more commitment to self-care, more presence, more attention to details, more non-attachment… Shit. Adulting is hard. I don’t like pain. So… having to sort out the pain of healing from the pain of “oh hey, this is getting worse, I should see to that”, and the pain of “this new thing” from “that chronic thing”, and the pain of “this’ll take a while to heal” from “holy crap that hurt just now, but it’ll pass quickly” is, sort of, um… a pain in the ass. LOL

I have a few contented swallows of cold coffee with my mouth half open (to avoid creating any suction in my mouth as I drink and swallow). I’m getting good at this, as small a thing as it is. (I was having trouble staying hydrated the first two days.) I’ve gotten the timing on the Ibuprofen down, such that I generally avoid any significant increase in pain between doses. I’ll be glad to stop taking it altogether; it’s not really a good choice for me, in the context of my general health.

Today feels some better, though… maybe it even actually is some better? I don’t actually know that, one way or the other. I know I am, in this moment right here, in somewhat less pain. 🙂 Good enough. Small steps. Small victories. Slow progress. I’m okay with that.

More of the same, today: small distractions, garden flowers, and slow progress.

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, gardening, gratitude, health, Healthy Living, Mindfulness, Moments, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Summer, The Art of Being

Well… That Was Different…

July 4, 2019 //
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Tooth extraction. I guess I’m more than a little grateful how far dentistry has come. It was, as suggested, not all that painful. Even getting the shots to numb the area was insignificant, pain-wise. The extraction, itself, was peculiarly… forceful. I mean, seriously? My dentist basically pulled a living tooth with no interest in being removed right on out of my jaw, where it was pretty permanently lodged, right? The amount of force required was… impressive. I couldn’t really feel anything but the pulling, and even now, I am ever-so-grateful for the advances modern dentistry has made. It got a tad grim when I could literally hear bone snapping, breaking free, and the taste of blood isn’t particularly pleasant. Still… no pain.

“…Oh, just one thing to cover before you leave… after we get an x-ray…” Yeah, well… okay. A “complication”. A small perforation of my lower sinus, which is, I guess, not an especially uncommon complication of an extraction of one of those back molars. I walked away, face beginning to ache, equipped with care instructions, and feeling very grown-up; I got through it, and it’s done, and I’m fine.

I arrived home. Relaxed for a few minutes with my Traveling Partner. Reviewed those care instructions… carefully. Wondered about what I’d be able to eat for the next few days. Frowned at the likelihood that it may be 2-3 weeks before I could vape again, or drink through a straw, or do literally anything that results in any notable amount of suction (trust me, this affects my quality of life! lol). I was pretty quickly overcome with a serious case of “I don’t actually care about any of this, actually”, and crashed out for a “nap”, that turned into about 18 hours of solid sleep, interrupted only long enough for interludes to sip water, sit up for a handful of minutes, go to the bathroom, and have a few very finely minced calories with great care. lol I still feel like I’ve been hit hard in the face, several times. I still taste blood, faintly. I’m still incredibly careful about every swallow of liquid, every bite of food.

…2-3 weeks??

Fourth of July. Well… no BBQ for me. I’m still “injured” enough that I don’t actually much care about that. I’m grateful for Ibuprofen; it’s getting me by nicely for pain management. My mouth “feels weird”. Talking, too, seems affected by the change in the shape of my mouth, the swollenness of my gum, and the pain in my jaw. I know it will pass.

…I think I’ll have another nap. LOL

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Categories anhedonia, gratitude, health, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, pain, Perspective, Summer

Softly…

July 12, 2013 //
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…As in a morning sunrise…

It is a quiet morning, beyond my common understanding of quiet. I am still and serene. I am… ok. It’s been a couple of days to take care of my fragile heart, to heal and to rest. My eyes still tear up when I think about Tuesday morning, and I hurt down deep that ancient pain can still touch me at all. That it can reach through progress and every day delight to grab hold of my experience and continue to torment me saddens me a great deal, and so much of that vague simmering undercurrent of anger in ‘who I am’ is about this…that the pain of what-has-been can still touch me.

I see the reflection of my face in the dark mirror of the unused side monitor…I don’t look broken. I don’t look like I’ve lost my mind. I see the hint of a smile, and a subtle knowing look that suggests ‘you can’t fuck with my head so easily’…although I don’t think that’s accurate, as much as how I see that reflection; a hint of a woman I am becoming, more than the woman I have been in the past. There are also big colorful earrings…which is for the moment more relevant to my pleasure in that reflection. They match my shirt. I feel a moment of familiar affection for this complicated being that I am. Becoming more…’aware’…has also resulted in some fun moments of friendly exasperation over being so very human. I’m endlessly amused by my vanity…do earrings really matter? That the purple of these bold cheap purple and green daisies is quite the same purple as the hand-me-down purple thermal delights me in a sweet and simple way. It isn’t that the purple is a match that matters, as much as the delight. The delight is more about where the earrings and shirt came from. Every material thing I cherish has a story, or holds a memory.

Today isn’t trivial. Today isn’t tragic, either. It’s just a day. It is, however, a day that has started well and for now that is more than enough to put a smile on my face. It was a tough week…strangely, and wonderfully, it’s an enormous improvement over other, older, more difficult weeks.  It’s been about resting, recovering, healing…instead of ‘more of the same’ and the pain and anger and the tears.  The mindfulness practices I am learning have helped more than I can describe; imperfect perfection. I need a lot more practice. lol. Progress, though, is enough to show me I am choosing a path that is taking me to some desirable destination. Again, that’s enough. It wasn’t so long ago that I’d have spent days bouncing in and out of horrible states of rage and despair, frustration and tears, unable to get ‘unstuck’ from ancient pain, unable to be aided or consoled, begging for mercy, unheard. Then there’d have been days and days of fatigue and exhaustion, wandering around in a blue funk, teetering on the edge of ‘more of the same’, until it all finally ran its course. This is so much better.

It is Friday, though…and that means therapy. Progress is awesome. Doing the work that supports further progress…not always so awesome. It’s ok, though. I have the support of my partners, and 50 years of life experience to remind me that my demons only have the power I give them, and that the journey is not about the goal, or measuring the distance walked, as much as enjoying the experience over time.

No pictures today, and far fewer than a thousand words.

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Menopause, Mindfulness, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Turning 50
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