I started another blog--


for about a week.
Way too much lamentation though.


I am not even sure what the reasoning was, but it just seemed too hard to put up here or to even address at all..


These things... they have been hard for awhile.


but,


I think I am in some sort of remission now. I don't know if I stopped struggling or the struggle stopped in me.
*smallish shrug/smaller smile

I do know, if I don't take care of some fundamental issues things will just come back and bite me on the ass sooner or later and when I don't know again-- I get reminded and the reminders are starting to hurt the back of my head...where they slap me. Hard.

I'm a slow learner.


but then, I guess they do for all of us--
bite us I mean...


some things you see coming


and some you don't


or maybe sometimes you just don't want to see it coming when it is

or see it coming when it really isn't...



but--
It's been raining down on my head intermittently for as long as I can remember.


I liken it to being chased by a beast intent on eating you alive.


See beast.
Run.
Don't look back.
Just run like hell.
Feel the blood pumping,
the burn in your lungs
you just go
and pretty soon
the beast gets tired and
moves on to someone or something else


nothing in life, good or bad, is as focused on you as your own paranoia would have you believe--as focused as you can be on you.


only it doesn't matter if you know this or not
because


you are still running


just running


and running


and in the process


you grow pretty confident in your ability to outrun it


and you don't give a shit

if it's still behind you or not anymore.


it becomes immaterial in light of the fact that


now you feel safe in the knowledge


you are fine as long as you


are running.


it's stupid

and

flawed

and exquisitely safe.


or was--

was because it was a false sense of security,
feeling on top of things because one is moving.

I don't think that tactic is entriely without merit...a moving target is harder to get to, but no matter what that mindset still makes me a target. I make myself a target.

This summer...

exhaling

it was the worst one I ever had.

No point in getting into all the gory details, I was pretty through trying to figure out how to live and be a good mom/person/wife though.

I won't say it's all better, but I think it could be. If I keep my own mitts out of it so much. I tried to tell those around me I trusted just how bad it was getting but, I couldn't seem to get my voice to carry through this clear sound proof bubble I was hunkered down in. Really I was resentful no one who supposedly cared about me bothered to learn to read lips or take up sign language in their free time. WTF?!

And I wonder if tempting the current to carry me away in the middle of a moonlit night or not being able to tell the most important people in my life just how bad it was getting was a function of feeling Godless or untethered/forsaken...I don't know. I only know that I didn't do it, but I had never wanted out--just out as much as I did this summer.


There's a line in a Gary Paulsen book called Hatchet. The main character in the book, faces utter desolation when he watches his rescue plane flying away leaving him to fend for himself in the Canadian wilderness. After he deals with the absolute desire to no longer live-- he found, left in the indelible groove his own attempts at self destruction made in his being, this realization:

"He had to find new ways to be what he had become."


Find. new. ways.

I think I have--

while storming around like a bull in a china shop--

maybe found some new ways

or maybe been given some new ways is more accurate.

I don't pray for things to happenso much anymore. I pray for the clarity to see when they are happening because more likely they are happening all the time in perfection and only skewed when I get my mitts on them...

so things are maybe clearer, I think?

Working again.

Using my mind at a profession,

Using my body in a gym-- a hard place-- figuratively and literally. I never go there thinking I can really do it and I always come out wondering how the hell I did.

cherishing my friends...

Sarah, Lisa and Chris who always have my back without asking for a job description.

Jeanni, Marci and Lana--who know who I am, who I want to be and the parts of me I hate-- you all know.

Ken and Jolie-- You've been there and you keep reminding me it's all part of the process. Man! I'm glad you have senses of humor and short term memory problems so I can keep repeating myself.

To J'son--you don't lie. I don't always like what you have to say, but I always trust it.

To Mike. What can I say that wouldn't be redundant? Only don't let it all go to your head, boy, 'cause you are not only a brother, but also proof positive I am a masochist.

and finally Tony, my husband. You remain unwavering and dedicated and loving.

New ways...and old ways made new.