It’s a head cold, probably. I’m fine for most of the important values of “fine”, and this will pass. I got home on…Tuesday? Tuesday. I went to bed almost immediately, and crashed hard. I slept for hours, until my Traveling Partner woke me to be sure I took my routine medications and had some calories. We hung out a little while until feeling crappy sent me back to bed.
[No AI is used in writing or editing this blog. This is human content for human readers.]
I woke yesterday, Wednesday, and it was all I could do to drag myself through an abbreviated form of my morning routine and drop my dumb ass into my office chair and log into work tools. I’d have called out were it not for several items due that day that could neither be delayed nor delegated. So I did the thing. Very American of me. I’m a dumbass.
I did my best to juggle self-care and work, all day, and when the day ended? I went back to bed. No lie. I slept until the evening, got up for meds, calories, and some lovely quiet time with my beloved… and then went back to bed. Again. I slept through the night.
Here it is a new day. I hope I feel more better as the day progresses. I hate being ill. I miss my walk. (Very human). It’s fine. Tomorrow I can begin again.
Okay so, yeah, I’m having a lot of bad dreams lately. Even when they aren’t “nightmares”, they’re often deeply unpleasant.
[No AI is used in writing or editing this blog. This is human content for human readers.]
I woke this morning, grateful for the bright light of my silent alarm; better than the dream I was having. Hell, I’m not surprised by the bad dreams – have you seen the state of the world? The shameless exploitative corporate greed? The thoroughly corrupt government? The war in Ukraine? The genocides? Oh yeah, more than one of those going on, it isn’t limited to Palestine. How can human beings be so incredibly vile?
I’m struggling to maintain perspective, I admit it. I feel disappointed (in humanity, generally) and I feel betrayed on an unreasonable personal level. I was stationed in Germany when the Berlin Wall came down. It was such a proud moment for humanity and I felt such hope for the world. I sigh quietly as I walk the dark trail with my dark thoughts.
I get to my halfway point and stop. I just stand there in the dark awhile, after turning off my headlamp, letting my eyes adjust, watching the stars. After a handful of uncounted minutes gazing into the eternal darkness of the vast night sky, I sit down and cry awhile. I don’t fight the tears. No shame. No guilt. Only emotions I can’t quite process without allowing for the grief. Grieving is powerful stuff and difficult to control or limit or reason with, and now and then I am flooded with tears over what we have all lost – all those lives, all the wasted potential, all the hurting and the sorrow.
…We could do better…
I was once a soldier in an army. I have been to war. I have looked directly into the eyes of my enemy and found that he was every bit as human as I am myself. No one walks away unchanged. We live with the consequences of our actions, that’s just real. I sigh to myself. I’m grateful to have gotten out alive. I’m grateful to see another sunrise. I’m grateful to have my Traveling Partner’s warm, loving embrace when the weight of the world threatens to pull me down into the depths of madness and grief (and even when he’s dealing with his own shit, he is there for me).
Being human is hard. Being the best human being the resources and experience available permit a person to be is harder still, and it for sure feels like a lot of people aren’t even trying.
I’m grateful for this solitary time to just get shit right in my head before a new day begins. Most days this is the only solitude I have. The rest of my day is interacting with people at work, and out in the world, some days so continuously that by the time I get home to my beloved I have nothing left to give. That seems thoroughly unfair, to the two of us. I embrace the little bit of “me time” life permits me to have and try not to bitch about it not feeling like enough. …At least I don’t also have children.
My beloved pings me. We converse a bit. The clock ticks on. My head aches ferociously and slow tears fall for a moment and stop. At 14 I once felt very similarly, I think, sort of lost, and frustrated-angry-sad. I dealt with it by packing a small bag with everything I thought I would need (it wasn’t), and I walked away. (It would be weeks before I turned up and ultimately went back, but that’s a story for another time.) I hadn’t yet learned that we cannot escape who we are so easily. I’d hug her if I could and assure her it gets better…then wonder if I should also tell her it’s going to get so much worse, first?
I breathe, exhale, and relax. The world is a pretty chaotic and sometimes grotesquely frightening place, but right here? Right now? This moment? It’s fine. A woman on a hiking trail looking at the stars. It is peaceful and beautiful. I make room to enjoy this moment as it is. A lifetime is built on moments; it important to savor the pleasant ones, whatever the circumstances.
The mild almost warm morning wraps me gently. The first hints of daybreak begin to develop. I watch the sky quietly. I think about these mortal lives and the place we hold in the cosmos. We are so tiny, so fragile and finite – how is it these moments feel so important? I sit with my thoughts until it is time to begin again.
Sometimes it happens. A sound. A weird shadow. A scent. Something “brings it all back”, and I find myself triggered. Again. This is always unpleasant. When I’m at work, and my time is not my own, it’s beyond unpleasant, and worse than “not ideal”, by far. It has career limiting potential.
[No AI is used in writing or editing this blog. This is human content for human readers.]
…When a colleague leaves work abruptly for no obvious reason, dropping everything to make haste for the exit, it’s the kind and compassionate option to assume positive intent, and to understand that we all go through some shit…
Well, I haven’t left work (abruptly or otherwise), I guess maybe that’s a win? But I’m sitting here shaking uncontrollably, as if shivering from the cold (it’s not cold in this library, and I have a fleece on). Back to back messages from my Traveling Partner, followed by a phone call (while I was already on a work call) – an emergency? I mean, for some values of “emergency” I guess. No one was bleeding. No one was at risk of imminent death. Nothing was on fire. Being triggered does not ask those kinds of questions or set those kind of limits. My beloved brought his stress to the person he felt could most likely resolve it – totally makes sense. Unfortunately, the details, and the emotional load, were such that I also became triggered.
…Now I’m dealing with my shit. At work. No one needs this. I definitely don’t need this. (I’m sure he didn’t either.) So… now what? My personal demons are taking great delight with the circumstances as I sit here shaking. My headache tears through the left side of my face as the tension causes whatever causes my occipital neuralgia to flare up. I feel my clenched jaw being… clenched. Fucking hell.
No seriously – now what? Now-fucking-what, b1tches?! (Inappropriate. I can do better.)
I take a breath, and exhale slowly. I take another. I keep breathing. Exhaling. Relaxing – or at least trying to. I pull my posture more upright. I stand and stretch – still taking those deep cleansing breaths. I let work fall by the wayside for a moment – well, for 10 minutes, with a timer. I don’t think about it piling up. I don’t think about who may be waiting for a question they need an answer to. I just breath. Stretch. Let my mind wander a bit.
…Type a few words…
It’s not a perfect solution. It doesn’t always resolve the panic of being triggered – but it beats nothing at all. I dig around in my purse; this calls for prescription strength anxiety relief. I take a moment to appreciate how rare that really is these days…
I dance around the room on stiff legs, feeling the sore muscles of a good weekend of painting, and starting the packing. It’s a different playlist this morning, different songs, and a different path – back to life, back to reality. Four new paintings – not a bad weekend of painting. I’m pleased with the work. The coffee in the room isn’t terrible this morning, either – it’s almost good. It’s definitely coffee.
[No AI is used in writing or editing this blog. This is human content for human readers.]
Home this morning, later. Each time I pass the new work as I move between tasks, I feel “lifted”. I feel restored and recharged and satisfied. It’s not the satisfaction of cheesecake, or even of good coffee. It isn’t the satisfaction of good sex. It seems very much it’s own thing, most closely similar to the satisfaction of “coming up for air” after reading a really great book… only… I “wrote the book”, too. I only achieve this feeling from painting, and occasionally from writing (poetry, generally, when that happens). Is it about creating – or expressing? I’m not sure. Maybe answering that riddle will “break the spell”?
One measure of satisfaction.
I sigh to myself happily. Oh definitely actually happy; it is a wonderful feeling, however fleeting. It is no wonder people chase this emotion (although that’s no way to achieve it). I sip my coffee and reflect on the weekend. It has had some lovely high points.
Serendipity and timing; getting that lucky shot isn’t something to plan.
I still can’t quite believe I slept in so effortlessly, every morning, waking to the sound of gulls and morning sunshine, or the alarm for my morning medication, or some other “not early” event. It was delightful. I was unsurprised and did not resist when I woke at my usual time this morning, well ahead of the sun. I got up, showered, dressed, and got a walk in, down on the beach in the darkness (with my headlamp on). The tide was out, and the broad expanse of firm beach let me get a good mile or so of walking before my coffee. The resumed routines click into place like dominoes made of comfort and familiarity.
I’m out of coffee, and don’t feel like upsetting my tummy with black tea. I decide to walk down to the closest cafe, which makes an excellent cup of coffee, and maybe a breakfast sandwich? I give that some thought, staring out the open balcony door at the misty foggy morning beyond the hotel. A good day to return home, I think to myself, lacing up my boots. I gather a couple packed items already ready for loading into the car; if I take them down with me now, it’ll feel less like hustling later.
Foggy misty morning. Time to go home.
Back with coffee, and a small fresh almond croissant – I don’t think I’d have believed these were made in-house if I hadn’t seen her rolling out layers of pastry dough yesterday afternoon, and seen them pulled from the oven this morning. The pleasing, somewhat grainy coarseness of the marzipan suggests that, too, was made right there. It’s a treat, and I savor it with my coffee and watch sea gulls on invisible air currents watching me, in case I might decide to share.
It is clear this pigeon considers this balcony “theirs”.
I breathe, exhale, and relax. A wee bite of breakfast and a good cup of coffee help get me going for the day, for real. There’s packing yet to do, and maybe I have time to paint just one more piece… I think about it and sip my coffee. I remind myself that I don’t need to be here, to paint; my studio is well-equipped for it. I didn’t even come here for inspiration – I brought an ample supply with me. I simply needed a bit of a break, and some solo time. I could have come here for inspiration – and surely would have found it – but that was not the need being addressed this time. I needed time in my own head, uninterrupted, focused, creative time spent immersed in the processes to do with painting. One challenge my Traveling Partner and I share is my apnea; I’m as prone to sometimes just not breathing when I’m awake, as I am when I sleep. It’s been that way for some unknown measure of time, and while the CPAP machine is a great solution for sleepapnea, it’s not particularly well-suited to daytime hours. The result is that I sometimes stop breathing while I’m deeply engaged in painting (or thinking, or reading), and as my SpO2 level drops and my body begins to do what bodies do when someone isn’t breathing, the signs of physical stress (unnoticed by me, often), get to my Traveling Partner and cause him stress, too. We are social mammals. We’re made to detect stress in “the herd”.
[Note: I’m not a doctor, nor am I a biologist, nor scientist armed with rigorous research, just a human being, being human, and noticing some things – don’t make important life decisions based on what some blogger said!]
The result of me not breathing goes beyond the eventual stress it will also cause to my beloved, himself; he will seek me out, interrupt whatever I am doing, and remind me to breathe. He’s not being mean or undermining my focus deliberately for some ill purpose, he’s taking care of me (and himself). It is also an interruption, and it does mess with my creative headspace, and that can make it hard to paint and enjoy the experience. (So, um, breathe, bitch, jeez.) Staying “too aware” of my breathing can also undermine my creative focus. It is a difficult path to follow. …But this fragile vessel does need oxygen. That’s pretty much non-negotiable. I smile to myself, grateful to have a partner who really does care whether I live or die. It’s a nice feeling to be loved.
I look over the new work again, before gently packing it for the trip home. This is always a process I face with a hint of concern, working in pastels. The work is relatively fragile, especially compared to the highly durable nature of acrylic work. I worried it will become smudged or scraped, or bent, or damaged in some way before I can place it somewhere carefully until it is framed. Oh, not worried enough to wreck a lovely morning, but there in the back of my mind is always that bit of concern. I know to work with care, when I pack them.
I sip my coffee contentedly. Gratefully. It’s been a splendid break. I think I found some shards and lost bits of myself over the course of these few days. Handy, and also worth further reflection. A stripe of blue sky tears the dense gray clouds with a bit of color. Pretty. A good time to begin again, I suppose…
I sip my coffee gratefully. It’s good. Really good. I am having a lovely ham and cheddar scone (“Made right here!,” the barista told me proudly). The scone is also quite good. It is a pleasant beginning to a day of painting. I smirk at myself, aware that although I did sleep in, I was up quite early, and I’ve already gotten a pleasant walk along the beach at low tide, before getting my coffee at the (new) cafe that is very near to the hotel. For most values of “beginning the day”, this misses the mark. It’s fine. Close enough.
[No AI is used in writing or editing this blog. This is human content for human readers.]
So, yeah, in spite of the title, my coffee was not actually “a beginning” in any meaningful way, it’s more “between” things. It is between my waking and my painting. It is between my walking and picking up more bottled water for drinking. It is between planning to shower, and actually showering. It is, however, before any painting that I may do today. (Fucking writers, man, always twisting things and making shit up. Damn it, words are not toys! LOL)
…It’s good coffee, though, and I’m glad to have it, and I will enjoy it before I begin to paint, sitting here on the balcony of my hotel room, watching the tide come in, feeling the playfulness of this moment in the morning…
Siletz Bay, low tide.
A gull sails back and forth just beyond the balcony, watching me (or more specifically, this scone I’m nibbling on). My laptop is balanced on my lap as I sit here, feet up on the other chair, writing and drinking my coffee. I know how this works; if I take my eye off that scone once I’ve set it down to put fingers to the keys, that scone is immediately at risk of being snatched by a quick and wily seagull. A ham and cheddar scone is probably not the best food for a seagull, but neither are crisps, or cookies, and I’ve seen the gulls snatch those from careless snackers many times. I’m tempted to toss a piece of my scone out beyond the balcony rail to watch the gull skillfully snatch it from the air, but doing so will only bring more gulls, and sometimes they can be aggressive about grabbing snacks, so I decide against doing that.
A view of the channel through which the bay empties into the sea. (Squint and you may see fisher-folk enjoying the season.)
It another gray morning. I take my time with my coffee while it is still hot; the light is not yet sufficient to paint by the natural light coming in through the open balcony door, and I dislike the yellow-y light of the overhead light or the table lamp. I think I’ve always disliked that strange stale-looking yellow light of incandescent bulbs. I find something sad and sinister about incandescent lighting, most especially in overhead lighting fixtures. I sigh contentedly, in spite of having to “wait for the light” this morning; this cup of coffee is really good. Also, my beloved Traveling Partner pinged me a good morning greeting, and we exchanged a few words and a couple selfies. Of all the uses of a selfie, this is the one I find most suited to living well; sharing one with someone fondly, to connect and close the distance between us, out of love. That’s beautiful. So is my beloved. I sit grinning at the picture he sent me, sipping my coffee and feeling love, loved, and grateful.
I breathe, exhale, and relax, and enjoy the moment.
A gull lands on the balcony quite near me, eyeing the last bite of scone sitting beside me. I’m a little intimidated by the size of this gull, and I sit quite still to see what is to come of this moment, here, now. The gull steps toward me, one step at a time, slowly, then reaches his neck out and takes the prize, and hops backward quite suddenly, and rather awkwardly, with the last bite of scone in his beak. Fair enough, enjoy that bite, silly bird. “Go on with you, then, you got what you came for,” I say out loud. I reach for my camera – if he’s going to linger, I’m going to get a picture, I think to myself. He immediately takes flight, and soars out across the bay before landing on a broad expanse of exposed mud flat.
I sigh to myself. It’s hard to beat coastal time for relaxation (in my experience). Even the dense beautiful green solitude in the forest doesn’t hit these heights of “chill time” in the same way. The wind and the waves here silence my tinnitus in the most remarkable way, and unless I go to one of the sloughs or marshes, I’m unlikely to be dealing with a lot of buzzing or biting insects. The tides almost beg to be watched, coming and going, for long lazy hours of uncounted minutes. The clock seems to stop ticking. Funny thing, I don’t think of myself as “a seashore person”, and I don’t swim often (I don’t prefer to be immersed in water at all, really, unless it is a deep hot bath). I don’t sail or aspire to it, and don’t own a boat, or spend time on them. It’s the sight of the sea, the smell of the wind and the sound of the waves, that hold my attention. They connect me with my Granny, who loved the sea and life on the Chesapeake. They connect me with my Mother. They connect me with my Dear Friend. I love being here by the sea, and for my own reasons I enjoy this strange shallow muddy bay, along the rocky coastline of Oregon. It empties until only a thin ribbon of the Siletz River winds through it, emptying into the ocean through a small channel between Salishan Beach and the beach here at Taft, where this hotel sits. Yesterday at high tide, I watched a man and his dog playfully wade out almost to the other side of the bay, without ever stepping into water more than waist high. I’ve stayed in this very hotel during a season of “king tides” that were extraordinary, and feeling the hotel rocked by the waves crashing into the rip-rap holding back the sand and the tide, and keeping the hotel on it’s foundation, was quite terrifying at times, and I definitely regretted my ground floor room on that visit, although I don’t think I’d have enjoyed the swaying reported by guests in 4th floor rooms, either.
…this coffee is quite good…
I sigh contentedly, feet up, coffee cup warm in my hand, the sound of the wind and the waves in my ears, and grateful for this chance to really rest and put aside the routine of a typical Monday in favor of this calm joy. “Home, tomorrow,” I think to myself – and I’m happy about that, too. I miss my beloved. I feel the change of the season coming, and I will find comfort in his strong embrace. Soon. In the meantime, I’ve got this day to myself, to paint, and to reflect, and to be. It’s enough. More than enough. I finish my coffee, ready to begin (again).
