Archives for posts with tag: time travel

I drove in to the office this morning baffled by how much the air felt and smelled of summer – but not necessarily my expectation of this summer, here, now. It felt and smelled like some long ago summer in a different place, at a different point in time, in another life. I was transported back to muggy childhood summer mornings in Maryland, near the Chesapeake Bay. Swim lessons. Lazy afternoons at Grandmother’s house, sipping ice cold rootbeer on the screened in porch, listening to the fan turn. Early mornings outside under the clear blue sky. Afternoons curled up with a book, in front of the air conditioner in my bedroom window. Pool parties and barbecues. Nostalgia triggered by the warm summer morning and air scented with summer flowers and mown grass. The recollections this evoked were clear and sharp and seemed more real than the commute itself felt in the moment.

I breathe, exhale, and relax, and move on from the moment of nostalgia to face the new work day (and week). It takes me a few minutes and an additional cup of coffee to gather my thoughts and feel more organized – being away for a few days can do that. lol Generally speaking, though, things are already quite routine and ordinary. Suits me fine.

The office ventiliation is already working pretty hard, and soon I’ll have to close the blinds on these big windows to prevent this small space from becoming uncomfortably warm. S’ok – I expect it from summer days. I smile, thinking of my Traveling Partner at home. I miss him – we’ve had quite a few lovely days just being together recently, and I enjoy that time we spend together very much. I yawn, unexpectedly tired – tired? Am I actually tired, or just feeling relaxed? I look out the windows into the clear blue summer sky. It’s a good day to laze in a hammock in the shade, sipping iced tea and trying again to read Proust. lol That’s not what is on today’s agenda, though; there’s just me and this work in front of me, and it’s time to get on with that. It’s time to begin again.

I woke abruptly shortly before my silent alarm lit the room. I lay still and quiet, wondering what woke me, and still sensing the lingering remnants of my dreams. There was, rather oddly, an old Juice Newton song stuck in my head – not music I listen to, nor have I heard it recently. Peculiar, especially knowing I have not heard it recently (on background music in the grocery store or something of that sort). 1981 – I was finishing high school and preparing to head to basic training that year. It was a year of a lot of change. I was 17.

By the time I reached the office, the music in my head had shifted. 1975 – 10cc. Weird way to time travel, eh? I’d have been… 11? 12? Not long after my (most significant) TBI. It was a strange time, and I still lived at home, with my family of origin. I guess I could just say “with my family” – but that means different things to different people these days, and I’m specifically referencing my mother, father, and my two sisters, in this case. As I settled in to work, the music in my head moved on with the years… Alice CooperVan HalenAC/DC… I listen to songs from other times, still loving them, still moved by them, and just a little astonished by how much my tastes have changed over the years, with moods, with moments, with circumstances, and with relationships. I shake off a moment of soft sorrow, and choose a playlist from a more recent time, more upbeat, associated with happier memories and easier times. “A better groove“. Music is almost a kind of magic, I sometimes think – a way of casting a spell over ourselves, and carrying our heart back to another time, a different place.

I grin to myself and think of my beloved Traveling Partner and his exceptional gift for creating an emotional moment using music. He has inspired me so often, and moved me to laughter, to tears, to passion, so many times. I remember that I don’t have to sit with my pain just because a song plays… I can change the music.

It doesn’t do to dwell on sorrow and pain, and it’s very much a choice I can make – to let that go, to control the mood in the moment, to grab the wheel and drive. It’s my journey, after all.

I breathe, exhale, and relax. There’s a horizon in the distance, and a journey to make between here and there. It’s time to begin again.

I woke during the night rather abruptly. I was “stuck on a thought” that surfaced in a dream, a hint of a recollection that was sufficiently unclear that it “broke the flow” of my dreams. Over my coffee, this morning, I searched my archived emails for a related email thread I was certain existed “in real life” to see if I could clear up the vagueness in my recollection. It wasn’t all that difficult, and I quickly found the email exchange with my recently deceased dear friend that I recalled when I woke during the wee hours. I read it, and one or two that followed it. Now I sit, memories refreshed based on that “there/then” perspective, sipping my coffee and amusing myself with how very like “time travel” this felt. I’d forgotten quite a lot that had seemed significant to me then.

The email exchange, generally, was on themes of love and the work that goes into that, and it’s interesting to me how very much the love between my Traveling Partner and I has continued to deepen and grow over time. I reflect on other partnerships I’ve invested some portion of a life time in, and it has not been the case that those relationships improved, deepened, or grew over time. Rather, it has been my experience of other long-term relationships that they tend to weaken, to grow stale, to become a burden over time, and I would myself wondering (near the end) how it was that joy could so steadily erode between people who were still trying to call it “love” so long after the love seemed to have slipped away.

I am so grateful for this love I share with my Traveling Partner! I see subtle changes over time reflected in my emails with my dear friend. Instead of playfulness becoming aggravation, our playfulness with each other developed further, becoming cherished inside jokes and lasting affection. Instead of romantic passion and lust waning over the years, we continue to yearn for each other’s touch and to reach for each other. The wanting lasts (in spite of occasional circumstances when it is difficult to fulfill those needs). Our understanding of each other has become deeper, more nuanced, more reliably accurate, instead of feeling as if we are “growing apart” experience by experience. I am so fortunate to be in this place in life, with this human being.

…I sit awhile, thinking about love…

I sip my coffee thinking about “where we began”, colleagues, then friends, later lovers, eventually living together… each step further taking us to new places as human beings on life’s journey. Now here we are. I’m glad to continue to share this journey with this human being. No, it’s not always “easy” – but many of things I enjoy most require quite a bit of sustained effort, attention, and continued reinvestment of time and resources. Why would I be surprised that love similarly requires these things? It’s like… one of the best things ever and worth the time and the verbs. πŸ˜€ I entertain myself awhile longer, reading tales of this love I share with my Traveling Partner, as told in emails between my dear friend and I. My heart feels lifted. Her wisdom was so helpful at so many steps along the way, too. The wisdom of a good and very dear friend with my best interests in mind is a beautiful and rare thing.

…What a pleasant morning. I reflect on my good fortune, and feel myself wrapped in love as I start my work day. It’s already time to get going on that. Already time to begin again. πŸ˜€

Just me and this moment, right here, at least for now. My Traveling Partner still sleeping, the sun not yet up – the day feels built on potential and hot coffee; pleasant, warming, and lacking in substance. lol No idea what today holds. I’m okay with that. I take another sip of my still-too-hot-to-drink coffee. I sit quietly, watching the RGB lighting in my computer chase itself. I watch the fish swim in the small aquarium in my office, and remember that more fish are coming, today.

My studio gets tidier each day. Stay-at-home has been helpful for such often-set-aside tasks. I’m getting rather a lot done.

My attention is snatched from this moment by some sub-conscious reminder to back-up various files from various places, in a more organized way on the bigger hard drive now in my computer… I start some downloads, and smile at how far this technology has come in my adult lifetime. I mean… just “wow”. Seriously. I can zip and download a 16 gig file of high resolution photographs, move it, and unzip it so fast; I just did in minutes what would have taken me… days? Even a decade ago. Just wow.

…I’m smiling so hard. lol Happy Saturday. Yep. This is the sort of thing that brings me a moment of great delight. What about you? Where do you find your moment of joy on a Saturday morning? My fingers dance across the keys of my RGB keyboard in time with the music. How could it be otherwise? πŸ™‚

There’s no pressure, no agenda, no urgent meetings or calls… just a woman, and a cup of coffee; I let myself “time travel” by way of my playlist… all the way back to 1997, but with a much improved perspective… It was a different life. I remind myself to reach out to old friends.

…Then I notice, it’s time to begin again. πŸ™‚

 

The day is nearly at an end. It is quiet. I feel calm. The night falls gently. There is more I could do, if I chose, and nothing so pressing that it is a duty to myself or an obligation to another. So, I take some quiet time for me.

Autumn at twilight.

Autumn at twilight.

Tomorrow is mine, too, and a rare treat. Β With my therapist on vacation this week, I’ve got the day without a solid agenda of errands or tasks. I decided to take advantage of the general nature of Thursday being planned around ‘taking care of me’. Β I usually spend the time after my appointment working through ‘homework’, finding balance, study & reflection, observation and awareness – and crying, sometimes there is a lot of crying – so rather than cancel my take care of me time… I am taking the time and taking care of me. πŸ™‚ Β I’ll be up at the usual early hour and headed to the coast for a day of analog life: walking on the beach, writing, meditating, sketching, talking live and unscripted to actual human beings in their natural environment, and much much more! (Well… not much more at all. A bite of lunch, probably… lol)

Technology will wait. It wasn’t so long ago that once a person walked away from their home, they were no longer ‘connected’. There was life before the digital age. I’m going to live some of that, tomorrow. Eyes open and smiling.

Evening is past. Night has fallen. I am thinking of love, and enjoying this nice gentle place I find myself; a little wistful about how challenging it is lately to share this… ‘place’.

Tomorrow is a new experience. Will I have a chance to inspire someone? Will I be inspired? Will life unfold a wonderful lesson for me? I will tell you about it later, maybe… on a Friday. πŸ˜€