Archives for posts with tag: taking care of me
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Finishing Touches

June 17, 2026 //
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I woke early, but after daybreak, and headed down to the beach to walk as the sun rose. The tide is going out, and as it recedes, rock formations and tide pools are revealed. As I begin, everything is in shades of gray, the foam crests of each wave seeming luminous on the opaque gray of the ocean. As I return, the sky is lit with shades of pink and edged with pale blue. There are gray clouds on the horizon. Feels cool enough for rain, but my bones say “not today”. I return to the room too early for a better coffee in town, and settle for the coffee in my hotel room. It’s enough.

[No AI is used in writing or editing this blog. This is human content for human readers.]

I sit down at the table with my coffee and this lovely view, ocean waves below, sky streaked with pink and blue above, horizon beyond. I could sit with this view for days and never miss television or videos at all.

Another sunrise.

As I sip my coffee, I notice a detail on one of the new paintings that I am not ideally satisfied with, and since I still have all my pastels out, I get up and make some final changes. “Finishing touches.” I listen to the wind and the waves, and watch the tide recede.

…I’ve still got to pack…

An hour, minimum, to a better cup of coffee, or a bite of breakfast. I don’t feel like going out, then coming back to the room, though… I sigh to myself thinking about the packing. A shower. Reloading the car. I can feel my eagerness to return home beginning to replace my enthusiasm for this place. When I notice I’m lost in moments that are not now, I pull myself back. It is worth it to enjoy here, now, just as it is, awhile longer.

…I’ll be home soon, I’m here, now…

The waves approaching the shore appear quite a bit larger than previous days, and I find myself wondering whether it is an illusion. As if on cue a tiny man down on the beach below walks into my view. Assuming he is of average height, the waves are larger than they have generally been. They appear almost surf-able, aside from the flesh-shredding bone-breaking truth of the multitude of jagged rocks unseen, barely covered by the ebb tide. This would not be safe location for surfing, I suspect. I chuckle to myself; Oregon beaches are not known for being great surfing locations, as far as I know. Not my sport, though, and I know only that I would not myself be interested in surfing here, nor even swimming in that icy cold water.

I sip my coffee, watch the tide go out, and think about art. This has been a nice bit of time away. I’ve gotten some beautiful pictures, and a lot of inspiration for future work in pastels. I’ve gotten a few miles on my boots, and spent some time “hearing myself think”. I finished reading Jurassic Park, which was much better than the movie adaptation. I slept in. I took naps. I felt the burden and stress of work lifted from my shoulders and from my thoughts. I have had a chance to miss my Traveling Partner for a little while – and I’m eager to return home. It’s time to get “back to life“.

The sun begins to light the crests of waves further down the beach, but I know they’ll reach the section of beach directly beyond my window shortly. I put on a playlist with a good groove for dancing and packing things up. It’s time to put the finishing touches on this coastal getaway, meditate, and think about better coffee and a bite to eat.

Wind, waves, a ticking clock.

…I’m definitely missing my Traveling Partner. Of all my choices in life, the choice to travel through life with this particular human as my companion on this journey is probably one of my best. I grin into my empty coffee cup. It’s for sure time to begin again.

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Categories Allegories, art and the artist, breathe, Free Will, gratitude, inspiration, joy, Love, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, Spring, Summer, The Art of Being, women, Words

Pink, Gray, and Pain

June 16, 2026 //
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Some of the most useful “tools” in my self-care/mental health “toolbox” seem to be those to do with pain management, or which serve some other purpose, but also make it maybe a bit easier to manage pain. This seems odd to me any time I’m not in pain, but when I wake twisted with arthritis pain early on some morning, I’m grateful.

The view I woke to is no less beautiful because of pain.

[No AI is used in writing or editing this blog. This is human content for human readers.]

I woke in pain to a cooler morning. The sunrise isn’t visible from here, but I see it reflected in the pink hues of the dawn sky over the western horizon. A distant bank of stormy looking clouds hangs above the horizon, a dark gray beneath fluffy white. The ocean reflects back silver gray like brushed aluminum, each wave reaching the shore crested in a curl of white. The ebb tide seems to sound different to me than the flood tide that will come later today, sometime in the afternoon.

…If the beach were just a little bit easier to get to from here, I’d already be headed down there to check out the tide pools before the day warms up, and while the beach is deserted. I hurt too much for that right now, and I want to paint later, so I sip my coffee and avoid exhausting myself…

Gulls fly by the window, calling to each other. A crow flies by. The morning sky continues to evolve. I sip my coffee letting the dawn sky and the beach scene beyond the window entice me with inspiration. Swallows swoop and dive just beyond the window. There are so many! The textured gray of the ocean holds my attention for a while, working out just how to capture that in pastels. Breakfast crosses my mind, and more coffee.

A beautiful view is sometimes enough distraction.

One of the most powerful pain management tools I’ve got doesn’t come in a pill. It’s distraction. Simply that; distracting myself from focusing on my pain prevents it from dominating my experience in the moment and frees my attention for other things. By itself, it may not reliably be enough to manage my pain, but it is useful, and it really does help to focus on other things, most particularly things that may evoke wonder, curiosity, awe, joy, or delight. I’m grateful for this beautiful view.

…I’m grateful for this solitary time…

I stretch and sigh to myself. Practices being what they are, there are things yet to do this morning to begin the day. Meditation. A walk (yes, even in this amount of pain, I just have to go to a beach access point that doesn’t involve endless stairs down a cliff to get to the beach) – my morning never feels quite right if I don’t get a walk in more or less first thing. lol My bones feel less stiff, and I know a hot shower will help more. I think about the day ahead as the view continues to evolve.

…Ooh, breakfast…

It’s as good a time as any to begin again.

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Categories Allegories, art and the artist, Brain Injury, breathe, Free Will, gratitude, inspiration, joy, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, solo hiking, Spring, Summer, The Art of Being

Better Than Bad

June 15, 2026 //
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“Are we there yet?” What a strange journey. I sip my morning coffee looking out over the beach at the ocean. I woke to a lovely pearly dawn – and I slept in! What a treat. My first cup of coffee this morning is better than it was last time I stayed here. There is a new and very clean coffee machine in the room. It’s not fantastic coffee, but it’s not bad. I sip it carefully as it cools a bit, contemplating what it takes to make a truly exceptional cup of coffee. What do I even consider to be “a truly exceptional cup of coffee”? I sigh and let it go; as with most things, enough is truly enough.

[No AI is used in writing or editing this blog. This is human content for human readers.]

The view I woke to this morning.

I think further about sufficiency, and remind myself that there are circumstances in which “sufficiency” is easily conflated with some compromise in cost or availability or timing that renders something wholly inadequate to the purpose at hand – in which case that isn’t “sufficient” at all, it’s an unfortunate compromise that does not work out well.

…We have to balance a lot of choices in this human life…

I sip my coffee thinking about tools, and how having the right tool for the job is pretty important. A poor choice of tool can ruin delicate work, or slow down completion of an important task. Living a life in which “sufficiency” is an important practice doesn’t mean making poor choices, it’s more about making wise ones. It’s an important distinction. Sometimes what is “sufficient” is actually a whole lot more in some way that I expect it to be. What is “enough” for me, in this moment or for this purpose, may not be “enough” for someone else, or for some other need, or some other time. It feels a bit like a moving goal post, but it is more to do with context and understanding.

…My Mazda is entirely sufficient for my own needs, but it made for a very poor substitute for a pick-up truck for my Traveling Partner’s work needs…

I listen to the waves crash in as I sip my coffee. Is it “sufficient”? Probably. Will I still go forth into the world for something better? Yes, I will. I’m not visiting the coast to experience austerity or seeking to limit myself solely to what is sufficient, this morning – I’m here to paint and to fill my senses with the wind and the waves, and my mind with inspiration. I’m not saying that requires a better cup of coffee, but I would enjoy one. Maybe with a freshly made bagel, down on the beach, perched on the end of some massive driftwood log, with a good view of the rock formation beyond my window, and shaded by the cliff that separates the town from the sea? That sounds pretty good. Definitely better than bad.

What will I find down on the beach?

Yesterday was hot. This hotel room does not have AC (it was built before climate change brought seriously hot days to the summers in this region). I had the window open to the cool sea breeze, but after miles of beach walking in the morning, the heat of the afternoon knocked me out and I napped on and off into the evening – and then still slept through the night! It was a delight to wake to the morning light flooding the room. This room has a nice angle and the light will be good for painting, a little later. I feel rested and alert and alive. I finish my coffee, and morning meditation. I sit awhile, letting my mind wander, listening to the waves.

Each time for the first time. Each moment the only moment. Ichi-go ichi-e. Be here now. Vita contemplativa. The clock is ticking – so what? Let it tick. There is time for “now”.

Give me a minute – in due time I’ll begin again.

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Categories Allegories, art and the artist, Brain Injury, breathe, Free Will, gratitude, inspiration, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Spring, Summer, The Art of Being, Words

Choices and Practices

May 28, 2026 //
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I feel pretty good this morning. I probably have my Traveling Partner to thank for that, this morning. I’m grateful for the care and consideration he shows me.

[No AI is used in writing or editing this blog. This is human content for human readers.]

Yesterday was a busy one at work. Busy and chaotic and filled with pressure to complete tasks. It was filled with “wins”, but also? It was a lot of work. Cognitive effort is still effort. Cognitive fatigue is still fatigue. Exhaustion doesn’t care how you got there. My capacity for manual labor and physically taxing tasks isn’t what it was at 30. The work I do now isn’t dependent on that. I can still manage to thoroughly exhaust myself over the course of a busy week or day. Yesterday, I returned home from work so completely “used up” that I could not visualize food sufficiently well to prepare a meal, and when my beloved suggested I should take some time to take care of myself and not just sit on the couch numbly hanging out with him (but not really present), I started crying. Fatigue.

He was right though; I very much needed to take care of myself rather urgently.

…If I had rejected his suggestion I might not be where I am this morning, relaxing at a favorite spot along a favorite trail as the sun rises, feeling merry and rested…

Sunrise

I chose self-care. I withdrew to a quiet room with my paper journal (it’s barely that, it’s more a combination coloring book, sticker collage, and poetry notebook) and my stickers. That doesn’t sound “grown up”, I know – but self-care isn’t about appearances or performance. I sat in a dimly lit room, resting my display-fatigued eyes for a little while. I meditated. In the stillness, notifications and phone silenced, I breathed and exhaled and relaxed, letting the stress of the exceptionally busy day recede into the past.  I looked over my stickers contentedly and began decorating a new page (with various sizes of colorful butterflies). Later I might add words to the page, a poem, a thought, something interesting I’ve noticed maybe. The result is a sort of illuminated book of…notions? It’s a very calming practice for me, and another contemplative practice I can choose when I need to nurture something within myself that has been spent.

… Your results may vary; choose nurturing restorative practices that work for you…

Once I had rested my mind, my eyes, and my senses, I returned to the living room feeling much refreshed. The evening was a pleasant one spent hanging out in the good company of my beloved. I went to bed at the usual time (pretty early, but I’m up early, and trying to keep later hours hasn’t managed to shift that waking time at all). I slept well and deeply. I woke feeling fresh and ready to take on a new day, and another mile.

Self-care matters.

I promise myself that I will be more considerate of this fragile mortal vessel today. There is more work to be done. I remind myself to protect my time – and my peace – and to make wise choices about the quality and quantity of the media I consume. There’s a lot out there that has no relevance or importance to me at all, and there is no need to waste my attention on it.

I breathe, exhale, and relax. It’s a new day full of opportunities and choices. I remind myself to choose wisely. There is so much to learn and see and do in one mortal life, and it isn’t all about me, all the time. Life is bigger than that. Choose easy or choose hard, we’ve only got so much to give and our time is finite.

I’ll make my walk a short one today, my aching knee tells me that’s a smart choice. I’m grateful for my Leki trekking pole that is my everyday cane (very light weight, has some shock absorbtion built in). It has been durable and worth what I paid for it, some 10 years ago. I wonder again why we burden our elders with the poor quality rather heavy canes I see used commonly… don’t we care enough to make life just a little bit easier for our elders? Haven’t they worked hard enough already?

I sigh and get to my feet, ready to begin again.

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Categories Allegories, Brain Injury, breathe, Free Will, gratitude, health, Healthy Living, meditation, Mindfulness, Moments, Oregon Trails, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, solo hiking, Spring, The Art of Being

Interference Patterns

May 16, 2026 //
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Why do I keep coming back to this place? Surely it isn’t just convenience, ritual, or nostalgia? (I mean… but it could be though…)

[No AI is used in writing or editing this blog. This is human content for human readers.]

I think about it for a long while, maybe instead of the thoughts I may have thought brought me here. Too long, maybe, between chapters of “A Canticle for Leibowitz”, which I was finishing, and pages of “The Conspiracy Against The Human Race “, which I am only just beginning, both of which feel significant and well-timed. Cycles and patterns in life and living occur often in this mortal experience. I watch the waves of the ebb tide reach the shore, and return to cross and mingle with the next row coming in. It is late afternoon.

Waves against a rocky shore.

I consider the phenomenon of the double slit experiment, and of watching the ripples of water expanding out from a stone cast into the shallow water at the edge of my grandfather’s pier on Weems Creek on a summer morning. Interference patterns fascinate me endlessly. Interference is a subtle thing, natural and irresistible, and perhaps that is why I come to this place, to listen to sea breezes whisper truths that might escape my awareness in the busy-ness of life, as I contemplate the patterns in the waves as they reach the shore?

Sometimes I just need quiet and solitude – some time alone to “hear myself think”. I have been needing it so much lately, I guess, that any effort to do something else has been met with a feeling of profound discontent, and a sense of resisting what is needful, as if I were interfering with my own sense of purpose. What feels useful and right is to sit gazing out at the sea, or to relax with a coffee by the fire. My initial reluctance to fully yield to “wasting my time” on nothing more (or less) than my own thoughts quickly passed once I yielded to it without reservation (or interference).

I sit with my thoughts. That is, after all, what I come here for. What I came here for this time, too.

The medium brown strands of my hair fall in waves down my bosom. There’s not much gray. The auburn highlights sparkle where the afternoon sun reaches me through the window, hinting at red-headed-ness in my ancestry. One notable indulgence on this trip will be a long overdue haircut with a stylist I really like. I didn’t plan ahead, and I am grateful she was willing to make an appointment for me on a Sunday morning, just before I return home.

… Shit. I miss my Traveling Partner. The poignant feeling of loss and absence strikes me hard, abruptly. Yeah… I come here alone also to escape the subtle interference patterns of love, too. It’s a bit harder to focus on me when my heart is focused on my beloved. Here, for a couple of days, my thoughts are truly my own, entirely. At home, and this is not a criticism, my thoughts and the very fabric of my life is woven and intertwined with his. Every thread connects the two of us. My heart shifts gears now, from missing him to feeling incredibly loved. His love gives me ample room to step away, care for myself, and return more whole and more capable, and more able to partner with him in this life we share. That’s so beautiful…

I smile and set aside writing for some other moment, and return to my thoughts.

(Some time later)

My thoughts became, at some point, an unexpected nap listening to the waves through the open window. I woke, soon enough to think about some dinner and a bit more reading. I exchange welcome words with my beloved. He misses me. I am missing him too. Tomorrow is soon, and I’m looking forward to his embrace when I get home.

I breathe, exhale, and relax. I sit in the evening light, watching the day dwindle away to night. Tomorrow I’ll begin again.

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Categories Allegories, breathe, Free Will, gratitude, inspiration, Logic & Reason, Love, meditation, Metaphors, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, Spring, The Art of Being, women, Words
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