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Reflections

October 22, 2024 //
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I’ve always liked my appearance seen as a reflection in a window. I don’t know why this is, somehow it just seems to be “the best view” of myself, a little diluted, a little less specific somehow, softened a bit… less “real”. I almost always find myself quite beautiful as a reflection in a window. I don’t see myself quite that way in a mirror, or a photograph. Peculiar. Today is no different. I see my reflection and marvel at that woman, there, seen as if through the trees beyond the window, somehow younger than my years, and no hint of the tears in my eyes, or on my face.

…Crying in my office, again? What is this, the 00s??

Things seem harder than necessary lately. By “lately”, I mean most of the last year, honestly. It comes and goes. It’s been the worst since late February, since my Dear Friend died. Yeah, okay, so – grieving is hard. We don’t control how that goes, it just goes. I’m learning more about actual loneliness than I ever imagined I could. I wasn’t particularly prone to feelings of loneliness, before. I’m so very very prone to them now. With my Traveling Partner having the challenges he is, and the one woman I’d have felt free to discuss it with, without reservations, simply… gone… I feel so incredibly alone, now. I chastise myself for a moment; I could have done a better job of maintaining other cherished friendships and preserving more closeness with more dear friends than I have. I enjoy my solitude, and I’ve taken too much for granted. I still enjoy my solitude…but when I need someone, I’m often going to find myself going it alone nonetheless. Often. I’m not bitching – it’s not a bad life, and things could be so much worse. I’m just feeling my years, and feeling lonely as I face inevitable mortality, seeing some vague younger version of me reflected in a window, and wondering what the point of any of this actually is… yeesh. Grim. I ache with it. And also just with pain, physical pain. Fucking hell that just blows. Fuck pain.

…Oh, right… I maxed out all my pain management medication yesterday and here I am today, managing on less, and not hurting quite so much, but… now my mind is altered, and I’m feeling very blue, partly because I did so much yesterday to attempt to manage yesterday’s pain, and I’m paying the price emotionally, now. So… am I actually feeling “lonely”, or is this just “the down” from opiate pain management? Fuck. This shit is complicated. I simultaneously want very much to simply be entirely alone with this crap, and also very much miss someone to talk to about it – and about life, and how difficult some of this very human crap very much is. Too real. Fuck pain. Fuck drama. Fuck this particular moment, right here.

I put my head down on my desk and cry for awhile. This too will pass. Feelings are feelings, only that. Emotional weather. Small frustrations pile on top of other small frustrations and assorted inconveniences; it feels like a big pile. Heavy. Tears flow after other tears. Moments follow other moments. The clock is ticking. Eventually tears dry. Eventually, I can begin again.

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Categories Allegories, anhedonia, Anxiety, autumn, Brain Injury, breathe, Despair, forgiveness, Frustration, grief, health, loneliness, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships

In the Fog

October 20, 2024 //
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No point taking any pictures this morning, not yet anyway. It’s a foggy, chilly autumn morning, before daybreak. Everything seems supernaturally quiet and still. The air seems motionless. There’s no traffic on the nearby highway. On my way out, this morning, my Traveling Partner wishes me well, commenting that “it looks shitty out there,” and reminding me to “be careful”. He loves me and wants me to return home. It’s nice to feel his love follow me on the journey.

I hit the trail with my headlamp on, creating a spooky effect in the darkness. I’m glad I have my cane and regret, at least a little bit, not waiting for the sun. I just really wanted to walk. The moon peeks at me high overhead, through the fog. The trail crunches under my footsteps, gravel and leaves. I hear something in the brush, alongside the trail as it passes by the river. Probably racoons or a possum, but I can’t really see anything but the fog. This is a suitably spooky walk for an October morning, I think to myself and involuntarily quicken my pace. I have the trail to myself. Me, and everything else that lives in the meadow, or on the marsh between the creek and the river. lol

I get to a favorite halfway spot and stop. It’s chilly. There’s a bench here and a view out over the marshy meadow. With the moonlight I would be able to see across to the highway on a different day, but this morning there’s only fog. I write a few words, then jam my cold hands into my warm pockets for a few minutes, laughing at myself for leaving behind the gloves, scarf, and much warmer fleece that are in my gear in the back of the car. It’s there for a reason, obviously, and left behind thoughtlessly in my eagerness to hit the trail this morning. I roll my eyes and remind myself irritably, “that’s how people die in the wilderness, idiot”. Autumn has come. I won’t forget next time, I promise myself.

I sit quietly with my thoughts in the fog. The sky is beginning to lighten on the eastern horizon. I finish my writing. Daybreak soon. Then I’ll finish this walk and begin again.

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Categories Allegories, autumn, breathe, Free Will, Love, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Oregon Trails, Perspective, Practices, Relationships, solo hiking, The Art of Being

Like a Countdown

September 23, 2024 //
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I’m sitting quietly, waiting for the sun. It’s a Monday. It is also 10 days until my upcoming coastal getaway. I’m not really counting down the days, although I am eager to enjoy the time painting and savoring my own company. I’m here, now. This isn’t a bad place or time to be. I even got some painting done yesterday. Amusingly, one of the two pieces is a recollection of a foggy sort of misty morning at the very location I plan to stay.

I had originally planned to camp and even try a new spot, but I needed to change the dates to fit my Traveling Partner’s care needs and PT schedule, and the new timeframe has less pleasant weather in the forecast, and I’m not even actually up to the amount of manual labor solo tent camping would require – and it would be a huge struggle to paint outdoors on rainy days. With all that in mind I finally yielded to the obvious and booked a room with an ocean view. Good enough. Better than that, actually, and I am excited.

..I’m also here, now…

My getaway is coming up. I’m pretty much always ready. I’m not emotionally attached to the outcome, because it could be that my partner won’t be enough recovered to really get by adequately without my care. If that’s the case, I’ll cancel with regret, get over my moment of disappointment, and move on. Priorities.

This morning I briefly went over all that in my head, again, and moved on. Again.

My dreams the last several days have been full of war and images of the planet burning. Grim. I avoid taking them personally, or blowing them up into more than what they are – only dreams. Almost unavoidably, the images turn up in my art anyway. My dreams sometimes fuel my inspiration. Modern warfare (any warfare, really) is pretty fucking terrifying. The cost is high. The price of victory excessive in a reality where there are no real “winners”. War makes everyone a loser. Death and destruction and chaos and trauma…no good outcomes in war. The other painting I painted over the weekend comes directly from my nightmares.

Drone warfare and it’s far reaching consequences, reaching even into my art, and my dreams.

Still, painting feels good, and it helps to paint. There was nothing on fire in my dreams last night, although my sleep was restless and interrupted. It’s been pretty bad lately, actually, and I’m not certain why. Maybe physical pain? Background anxiety over distant world events I can’t control? Concern over the upcoming election? (Did you also feel it as a direct threat to your personhood when you read or heard that Trump said “women won’t have to think about abortion anymore” if he is reelected?) It’s a scary world sometimes. I’m glad painting gives me a voice for things I don’t know how to say with words.

Huh. This morning started out fairly cheerful. I find myself wondering if that was a bit forced, or whether I’ve simply managed to make a “wrong turn” somewhere along the way. I give myself time with my thoughts. I’ve got shit on my mind, clearly, and the way out is, reliably, through. I feel that aching need to be heard. To be “visible”. To be understood and validated. Tears well up and spill over. I miss my Dear Friend who died shortly before Spring. There are very few people I feel emotionally safe unburdening myself to, specifically regarding war and trauma and misogyny, and the lingering wounds of ancient personal horrors that follow me still. She was one. Gone now. My Traveling Partner has long been another (but for now I’m in the role of caregiver and must be sparing and deeply considerate about burdening him while he heals). I guess practical wisdom suggests I make an appointment with my damned therapist. That’d be pretty grown up of me.

For now, I breathe, exhale, and relax – and let the tears fall. It’ll pass. That’s predictable and reliable, and there is no shame in honest tears, and there’s rather a lot going on in the world worth crying over.

I look to the sky for any hint of daybreak. Soon. I’ll get a lovely walk in, along a favorite trail, then head home to begin an ordinary enough Monday. My tears will dry, and I’ll begin again.

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Categories Allegories, Anxiety, Art, art and the artist, autumn, Brain Injury, breathe, Free Will, grief, inspiration, Love, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Oregon Trails, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, solo hiking, The Art of Being, War and News of War

Doing & Being

August 31, 2024 //
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I have some quiet time in the middle of this lovely Saturday. It’s pleasant. The day looks likely to be a hot one, and there’s the air show… Any time now, the background experience will become so so noisy. I’m not looking forward to it. My Traveling Partner sleeps, for now. That won’t last. I sigh quietly. There’s pleasant music playing quietly in the background. Quite a lovely moment for reflection.

I think over the tasks on my list of things to get done this weekend, all of it on top of the everyday effort to be the person I most want to be, moment-by-moment. That’s sometimes like a whole extra job. LOL I give myself a moment to acknowledge that although it sometimes feels as if it’s truly an uphill climb to make progress some days, progress does get made. It’s a journey, and the journey itself is the destination. It’s about being, and it’s about becoming. There is always more to do. There is effort involved, and practice, and my results vary. I’m very human.

I breathe, exhale, and relax. This is a pleasant morning. I’ve finished most of the basic household stuff I’d planned to do. I’ve done the trip to the store, and figured out what to do, later, about dinner. Now I’ve got some time for me. Paint? Nap? I don’t know. This headache may make the decision for me, and I’ll be honest that I resent the fuck out of that. lol

…Still…perhaps it will be easier to begin again on the other side of this stupid headache, anyway…

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Categories Allegories, art and the artist, Brain Injury, breathe, forgiveness, Free Will, Frustration, gratitude, health, inspiration, Love, meditation, Mindfulness, Moments, pain, Perspective, Practices, The Art of Being

Perspectives

June 5, 2024 //
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My walk this morning was early, quiet, solitary, and thoughtful. Pleasant. Nice way to begin a new day.

When I started down the trail, a glance at the sky in one direction revealed dense dark storm clouds, homogenous and gray. Looking the opposite direction the sky was bright with promised sunshine later, and shades of peach and gold. Between these, fingers of clouds stretched across from one perspective to the other, feathering away to nothing into the clear skies from the stormier view. I walked along thinking about perspective.

This morning I am missing my Dear Friend who died earlier this Spring. There is so much I would share and talk over with her. There’s a particular feeling of rather acute loneliness that turns up within me each time I remember, again, that there’s no point in writing an email to share some particular moment with her, to get her perspective, or to share my own. She was always first to see new paintings (after my Traveling Partner, who is right here), and first to read new writing. Now… funny; I haven’t painted anything at all since she’s been gone. I take fewer pictures and rarely share them. I walk on with my thoughts, feeling the solitude from a different perspective.

…I have an appointment with my therapist later this month, but it’s nothing like talking and sharing with a Dear Friend…

I’m 61 this year. In about 7 days actually… I feel strange that there are so few around anymore who will care about that at all, or even know about it, if I don’t mention it. 61 doesn’t “feel old”, from this lived perspective, but I’ve lost (or lost touch with) many friends and family members who might once have been celebrating my birthday. It’s a strange feeling. I walk on.

I find myself feeling a bit blue as I walk. I wonder whether it may be some lingering effect from tinkering with my medication in order to do the requested diagnostic test. Seems possible, but I don’t really know. I keep walking.

By the time I am back to the car, I feel rather as if I’ve experienced an entire day’s worth of emotion and shifts in perspective, simply walking along with my solitary thoughts. I’m okay, and I am okay with having emotions (and thoughts about those), but it still feels strange and somewhat empty this lack of my Dear Friend to share some of this with. It’s not as if she were my only friend, nor even the only friend I regularly email… but it’s her perspective I am missing so painfully. I’m very aware of that, this morning.

…Every time I think I might like to paint, or feel inspired, or feel that inner tug to return to the studio, my heart seems to answer “why bother?”. This is an unexpected outcome of my grief over this particular loss…

I relied on this Dear Friend’s perspective as counterpoint or reinforcement of my own for some 25 years. I guess I am not surprised that I miss that. I know I am not surprised that I miss her.

Tears fall as I sit with my unexpected moment of grief. My grief expands as my tears fall. I cry over the loss of my Mother, although we never forged a close adult relationship, and were rarely closer than “pleasantly civil”. I grieve that lack of intimacy and connection. My tears fall for my Granny,  too; she did much to raise me and prepare me to find my own way as an adult and she was more mother to me than my Mother was. I’m not criticizing; we expect too much of women, and motherhood isn’t a good fit for all of us.

…I guess I am just feeling kind of alone with the years this morning, as I approach 61. Strange that it hits so hard on this quiet morning, 7 days from my birthday. Stranger still to feel this way when I am truly not “alone” in life. I have a loving partnership, and a handful of good friends (though some are distant), and the fond regard and esteem of many others…

Feelings are not facts. The map is not the world. The forecast is not the weather. I sit with my emotions and breathe. This will pass. I will begin again. I’m okay for most values of okay.

I give myself a moment for gratitude and reflection. I take time to consider more immediate worries than my lingering grief over lost dear ones. My Traveling Partner’s health is top of mind, often, lately and I find myself wondering if the weight of my worry over that may have provoked my thoughts to turn elsewhere for something that feels more “manageable”? Interesting perspective…

…My Traveling Partner pings me a greeting. He’s awake. It’s time to head home, and begin again.

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Categories Allegories, Anxiety, Art, art and the artist, Brain Injury, breathe, gratitude, grief, health, inspiration, loneliness, Love, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, solo hiking, Spring, women
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