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Day 299
Lucy and I drove to the vet this morning in a drizzle rain, the colors of fall popping along the roadside, her nose resolutely out the window, even as she (and the Jeep) got wet. The sky looked ominous, dark, swirling, thick grey. It felt like the perfect, stormy fall morning. I loved every second of it and thought about how small the moment was in the grand scheme of my life.
Which brought me to the fleeting nature of existence, how small things make up all the big things — small triumphs, small beauties, small moments of happiness. It isn’t about the next big thing … it’s about all the little things that happen along the way to the next big thing. The nuances and rhythms of life. The blending of smoothies and guzzling of water, the unending laundry pile, the doctor appointments and the insurance payments. All of those things make up the big picture, like pointillism in art. Small together makes large.
John bought tickets this morning to see a re-release of “Rocky IV” in the theatre next month. We’d talked about it and he’d been of two minds; but I knew it was under his skin, something he wanted to do without a specific reason. Just a feeling. Nagging at him, circling back to him when he thought it had gone away. It isn’t playing at a convenient time or even on a convenient date … but we will go and it will be wonderful. Because life is about the small things — the small joys and shared moments. Walks with Lucy in the rain and a good run of songs on Pandora … the recognition that we all have a finite amount of time here on Earth, in these bodies, with these people.
xoxo, g
Day 294
I love chilly mornings. Waking up snuggled in bed, listening to the even breath of husby, the snurfling of Lucy Lou. Knowing there is time before anyone moves, before the day begins.
Recently they ‘trimmed’ the trees along the road below our house and now, it sounds like a Nascar racetrack most early mornings, when the sun is just beginning to lighten the sky — deep blues and purples turning to grays and violets.
The sun rises from the behind the hills that we see from our bedroom windows. A horizon of red and orange melting to pink and then corn yellow before opening up into a crisp blue-white morning. Birds are chirping and life is humming.
It’s been a strange October … it’s been a strange year. Nothing will ever be the ‘same’ again … we have irrevocably shifted course and we must acknowledge that and move forward within that … even if it feels as though no one is on the same page.
Maybe it’s always been that way. Maybe I’m only just seeing it now, as I come around the corner of ‘middle age’ … and begin to realize that nothing is as we were taught. None of the rules mean anything. No one knows what they are doing – no one. We are all just making it up as we go.
I feel suspended in time, not quite here and not quite there. Anticipating the future, mourning the past. But not quite present. I long to find the person I used to be but also, wonder if she even exists anymore. It’s been a long time since March 2020 when the whole world changed. It feels longer still since May 2020 when George Floyd died. I cannot unsee what I have seen … and yet nothing has changed. Isn’t that peculiar and also so indicative of our culture? Disappointing. Infuriating. Exhausting.
I move through the day doing what I ‘should’ do … according to … I don’t know. Me? The world? Social media?
I read once that we are not who we think we are. And we are not who other people think we are. We are who we think other people think we are.
So does that mean we are self-imposing uncomfortable and unnatural guidelines to our lives? How do we shake that overly layered and unnecessarily complicated filter?
I can tell you one thing – I do not know.
I know that I come here to speak to the void, but also to speak to anyone who stumbles upon this page and keeps reading. I am speaking to the other curious people out there, feeling lost and looking for answers.
I do not think answers will ever exist.
And getting comfortable with *that* is the hardest task of all.
xoxo, g
Day 290
I recently became friends on social media with someone I haven’t seen or talked to in over ten years (if I’m being conservative). Re-connecting in the virtual age has sent me into a tailspin of memories, thought patterns and regrets that have been uncomfortable … unpleasant. And most importantly, unnecessary.
And it got me thinking. Were we meant to stay in touch with all the people throughout our lives? Were we meant to be reminded daily of who we used to be? Reminded of the person we grew from, the mistakes we made…. Were we meant to stay stuck in a circle, in a box of who we once were?
I don’t think so. I think social media has created a problem … not just with perfect lives and filtered photos, but with keeping us all stuck in one position, unable to move forward or change without the constant reminder of what once was.
In the end, I’ll probably end up un-friending this person because what does it serve to be connected, virtually, after years of growing into different people? How am I served by seeing this person’s life but not having conversations? Having this person see my life, without knowing the roads I walked to get here.
This is what I think about on five hour road trips through the changing colors of autumn.
xoxo, g
Day 76
I think being an adult is recognizing the need to “do the things.”
A woman in class today confessed that it took effort to leave her comfortable chair, snuggling with her dog, to get herself to yoga today. A chorus around the room of other women, myself included, confessed they never regretted coming to class — that class itself was amazing — but getting there, especially on cold, grey days was the real challenge.
I know that even if I am tired and angry and frustrated and depressed the best thing for me to do is get dressed and get out of the house. I think that’s why Covid affected me in a such an insidious way. I am a loner, I am an introvert … but to stay balanced, I need to get out of the house. I need social interaction and routine. All that disappeared a year ago. And while it’s come back in fits and starts, it isn’t the same. There’s an underlying fear, there’s a wary gaze — politics and pandemics and civil rights have divided all of us and we don’t know who is “safe” anymore.
Even on my mat— socially distanced and wearing a mask— it doesn’t feel the same as class used to feel. It feels close, don’t get me wrong. But not the same.
I also know that to save myself, to keep myself from spiraling, it’s imperative that I get on my mat, that I sweat and wobble and struggle through class, breathing heavily through a sweat-soaked mask.
And that is adulting. It’s knowing that I could choose sadness and depression and sweatpants and junk food … and choosing something else instead. Something better for me.
Adulting is really effing hard sometimes.
Xox, g
Day 75
We are all on journeys.
Sometimes we don’t know where we are going or why … but we are traveling. Aimlessly, with laser focus … everything in between. Traveling along the road of time.
I think about time a lot.
Time is funny and tricky – like an optical illusion. Fast and slow simultaneously. I remember when my mother turned forty — she knew everything, she was glamorous and smart and had it all together. She had the answers to all the questions. She was everything.
I didn’t feel that way when I turned forty. I felt like I was still fifteen — unsure and unknowing. A little lost, a little reckless, a little afraid. Still trying to figure it out, this adulting thing. Still looking for answers to unanswerable questions.
Did she feel that way, too? Probably. But she never let on.
I feel young and old every day. Lost and found every day. I feel like my journey is a lazy drift down a winding river and also, a jump out of a plane.
And I am always, always tired.
Xoxo, g
Day 74
Ever have a moment when you pause – or full out stop — and look around your house and marvel at the fact that it’s all yours?
I had a moment like that today. As I surveyed the first floor of our house and thought – somewhat in wonderment — that this grown-up house with dishes and a dining room table and a phonograph and clean dish towels and furniture is John + mine. We curated it (an obnoxious phrase but unfortunately, fitting). Not only that, but we use our pots and pans and dishes and dining room table. We even listen to records on the weekend while drinking coffee and talking about … well, everything and nothing and all the stuff in between.
It looks like a grown-ups house and I forget that’s what we are. I got my first vaccine shot today (because I know good people not because I was necessarily responsible in any way). I wished for my mother, or even just my husband — someone to be with me in case it was intimidating or scary or confusing. I couldn’t find the office when I arrived and walked around the entire complex in the cold wind, my poor feet dragging on the ground as I tried to walk faster than I am able. I wished for someone, anyone, to be there and be more responsible than me, to hold my hand and guide me. But I have passed that part of life and know, deep in my soul, that I have to own my self.
The shot wasn’t intimidating. It felt bizarrely fast and the clinic was disorganized but efficient. My arm aches and I hope that’s my only side effect.
Lucy is staring at me, wanting her dinner. Daylight savings sucks sometimes.
Xoxo, g
Day 70
Sometimes I have moments when I think of younger me, and I don’t feel as though I know her anymore. I don’t understand her choices, I think she must have been a completely different person than I am today. She feels unrecognizable.
And then, by luck or circumstance, I find something I wrote years ago. And in those words, in those sentences and paragraphs I hear myself and remember that even if years have passed and I have changed, it hasn’t been so much as to render my younger self obsolete.
Today, in my pursuit of a more organized office, I happened upon something random — not in a journal and not properly dated. But as I read it I knew exactly when I’d written it and I felt it as though it were yesterday. I saw my more naive self, I read her feelings and my heart beat for her. I thought of a time when the amount of tragedy that I had endured was much less than it is today. When smaller things felt more seismic. When I didn’t fully understand loss.
Time is such a trickster. I feel young and simultaneously, old. I remember days when I felt like I ruled the world — in such contrast with the feeling of knowing nothing – the feeling of being constantly out of my depth. I lost my mother yesterday and years ago … memories faded with time. Pain faded with time. Pain so acute that I feel it in my heartbeat, pulsing in my ears.
In ten years time will I recognize this version of me? Will I re-read my words and marvel at my innocence; will my heart break for the naive joy that still exists within me? I don’t know.
But I hope so.
Xox, g
Day 69
When I first lost feeling in my feet, it was December 23rd and I woke up in the spare bedroom of my in-laws. I thought maybe I slept badly, pinched a nerve. My feet felt floppy, as though they couldn’t hold shoes. As though I had pins & needles … that never ended.
Even when I finally got on a therapy that helped with my walking and my balance and my energy … my feet stayed stubbornly numb. I look at them and am thankful they are pretty feet. In my dark moments, I wish fervently to feel them again and hot tears sting my eyes. I smile at the tattoos that adorn my right foot — tattoos that I barely felt being inked. A tear slips down my cheek and catches in the upward crease of my mouth.
I try not to be angry at the things I’ve lost. I’ve gained as well, and mourning my losses won’t change their absence. I reminded myself of this as I struggled and wobbled and dragged my feet through a yoga practice today. Comparing today to five months ago is useless and honestly, both sad and pointless. Time marches on, my disease marches on and I can only be in my body of today.
It doesn’t change the deep despondence that exists in the dark corners of my soul. That is my truth, parts of the truth I carry behind my smile.
Xox, g
Day 66
John always says that he needs all four seasons.
And while I might not love the heavy, oppressive heat of the summer — it might cripple me and cause staggering physical ailments for me — I can say, I am mostly in complete agreement with him.
How can you appreciate the gifts of your life if you have never suffered? How can you see the sunshine in all her glory if you have never weathered a storm?
My homework — to re-write my story — has taken on a life of its own. It has challenged me to re-frame so many parts of my life. I think about why I believe the things I believe, what the roots are. It can be raw and uncomfortable to realize that sometimes, I don’t know.
I heard once that so much of what each of us believe can be attributed to “some guy said it somewhere?”. When I first heard that, I balked. I thought – I have beliefs that are rooted in my choices. But when I thought about it on a macro level, I realized that so many of us believe things and can’t actually trace it to the root, myself included. It’s just something we’ve always believed. It’s seemingly universally accepted.
It’s hard to break those ties. It’s hard to say, “Well, maybe what I believed isn’t actually an accurate reflection of me … perhaps it puts faith in institutions that I inherently don’t agree with ….”. It’s hard to shake off society and opinions and peer pressure. It’s hard to say — No.
Anyway. I love winter. I love spring and I especially love autumn. But could I love the exquisiteness of all those seasons if I also didn’t know summer?
Probably not.
Xox, g
Day 58
Once upon a time there lived a girl who believed she was much less than she actually was.
She spent years believing this story of not deserving and not accomplishing. She believed the people who both subtly and not-so-subtley reinforced the narrative.
And yet somehow, some way, she clawed her way out of the darkness and doubt and misery, and discovered that in fact, her life had more character and value than she’d ever thought possible.
This is everyone’s story. It is mine. It is yours.
We all believe we are less than we truly are; we deserve less, we are worth less. There are voices in our lives who confirm those things.
The voices are wrong.
I’m forty-one years old and I’m just now learning I don’t have to listen to those voices. I can straighten my back and lift my chin and walk away.
Life is about learning and growing. It isn’t always easy. But it’s usually worth it.
Xoxo, g
D5 Creation