Not Sure Where to Begin

But apparently I’m ready for dating.

I wasn’t expecting that when I told my therapist last Tuesday about some recent experiences doing inventory work.

Man.

I did some self-searching, some fearless and deep, and thoughtful, insightful thinking and writing.

I saw my patterns.

Especially my patterns around dating.

My ex fell into my patterns and completely obliterated them too.

He was much more than just another guy.

He broke the pattern.

He didn’t break me.

Although he did absolutely break my heart.

I seem, however, to be healing and the writing helps.

And the longer days of sunshine help and being busy as fuck wrapping up this semester of school certainly keeps my brain occupied.

My brain would like to create some trouble.

Like, Friday night coming home after work and seeing therapy clients it starts telling me this story about this place I used to go to on Friday nights.

Our Lady of Safeway.

This church on Church Street and Market.

I spent many, many, many Friday nights in that church.

It is in fact where I met my ex.

Oh how he used to shine at me.

Still makes me quiver thinking about that.

Sometimes the thoughts slip in and I don’t try too hard to keep them at bay.

Sometimes they are just sweet and sad and nostalgic, I find myself thinking about him as I fall asleep, the first time he said he loved me, the first time he brought me flowers after he had said he loved me, his face over the bouquet of flowers, so open and vulnerable and full of love, his eyes.

Oof.

Yeah, I might be getting through all of this but I’m still not over you lover.

And that’s ok.

I have given up on trying to be over you.

And as I mentioned, apparently I might be ready to date.

It just sort of popped out in my therapy session last week, all about seeing the patterns and seeing where I need to look at myself and what I want.

I have some very specific needs and wants and really being open and honest about them to myself.

As I expressed all of it my therapist stopped me and said, “wait, are you saying you’re ready to date?!”

“Yes!” I said without a pause and holy shit, I felt it, I am ready to date.

Oh.

I suppose.

A little weirded out by it too.

I basically haven’t dated in two years and over these last two years there were more than a few moments of me thinking, this is it he’s the love of my life, my soulmate, my best friend, he’s going to be the one, I don’t have to think about dating again or finding love.

I had found it.

But.

Well.

Though the love didn’t leave me, he did.

And that was his choice and I won’t disparage him for it.

So now I have to get the fuck on with my life.

To that end.

I wrote up my sexual ideal and really dug into it, basically coming up with a three page essay on what I am looking for in a partner, mate, boyfriend.

I really want a monogamous, committed, romantic, sober, non-smoking relationship.

And yeah, three other pages of things.

I read them out loud in my parked car on the corner of Cesar Chavez and Noe Street this past Saturday night to my person after we had done the deal up in Potrero Hill.

He then suggested I go home and read it out loud in first person.

See what I had to grow towards.

And the really awesome thing, I already have the majority of qualities I’m looking for in a partner.

I’m quite happy about that.

The surprise that came up for me is that I want to cohabitate with a partner.

I haven’t lived with a boyfriend in, wait for it, twenty years.

I’m ready to live with someone again.

Yeah.

I also had hopes that the person I was going to be living with was my ex, but that was just fantasy, wasn’t it.

Everything was just fantasy, beautiful, romantic, lovely, fantasy.

Exquisite in the night, sweeping, and intoxicating, but in reality, the light of day, it fell short and left me with such a hurting heart all the time.

I want reality now.

I am ready for that.

And I’m not expecting a Knight on a white horse, I’ve never needed a man to rescue me, but I do want a partner to compliment me.

Someone to travel with!

My person really made a point of that, “I see you going to Paris and staying in that gorgeous apartment in the Marais with a boyfriend,” he told me after I had finished reading out my ideal.

Me too!

I booked it thinking about how romantic it was and yeah, I certainly have some big high hopes that I will be traveling with a partner this Christmas.

My birthday and Christmas in the City of Lights with my boyfriend.

I know it’s a little early to ask for a Christmas present, but well, when you know you know.

I can’t quite envision it, but I can feel it.

And I have done so much work.

God, I have worked through so much grief over this break up, I could use a break.

So.

Yeah.

Hey God, it’s me.

I’m ready to date again.

Really.

Committed Monogamous

Relationships are dangerous.

Oh holy fucking shit.

That’s it.

It only took 44 plus years.

And one scary, traumatizing, controlling partner to ruin me for traditional dating.

Not that I think that traditional dating is the answer.

There is no answer.

There is no right.

There is no wrong.

There is only the feeling of love and I don’t have a particular expectation around how I find that love or let myself have that love.

Oh.

I suppose I have definitely introjected the idea that I need to be married to be a whole person, to be enough, that I am somehow not lovable unless married.

And then.

There is the other, not so conscious thing that has been happening for me for over past eighteen years.

I say eighteen years because that is when I broke up with the one man I was in a significant long-term relationship.

We were together for five years.

We probably shouldn’t have been together for more than five minutes, but I’m not going to judge that young very lost, very sad, very fearful woman.

I didn’t know better and I got sucked in.

I got suckered in by my own naive ideas about what love was and how to be in a relationship.

What the fuck did I know about being in a relationship that had any kind of sustainability at the age of 21?

Especially when I look at where I had been the few years prior to the start of the relationship.

Homeless.

Helping out with my sister and her daughter and her first husband.

Helping out my mom, my dad, anyone who fucking asked because I only had this idea that if people needed me I had some sort of value.

That I might be enough, when I felt, although it was not acknowledged, I couldn’t acknowledge it to myself until I had two, almost three years sober, that I didn’t love myself.

That I had no idea how to do it because the love I had been shown was so deadly that I couldn’t escape it fast enough.

In fantasy, in sci-fi books, in chocolate bars, in music, in school, in the backyard of the house in Windsor, in crushing on “unattainable” boys who weren’t interested in me.

It was safer that way.

I found ways to fill that hole of loss of love.

Food became a big one.

Taking care of other people, that was great, focus on someone else and don’t think about myself, my needs, my wants, my desires.

I mean.

I wasn’t allowed to have needs, wants desires, so why even bother?

I would only be disappointed.

I came into my therapy session today talking about the weather, the turn of seasons into Fall, that I was being proactive, that I had purchased a light box to deal with the SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder) that I have a history of experiencing.

I segued into a being proud of myself moment for acknowledging that yes, I could have gone to a 7 a.m. yoga class today, but then I would have been crazy pressured to make my therapy session, I would have gotten a quick fast shower, but no coffee, no breakfast, and just barely slapping some make up on and well, I like my makeup.

Not to mention my morning latte and bowl of oatmeal.

Plus I also knew that I wanted to be available for a phone call and if I went to yoga, I’d get less sleep, not eat, no coffee, and miss a phone call from a very important person.

I woke up this morning and reset my alarm, I knew I wasn’t going to yoga and I knew it was the thing to do.

I had my nice breakfast, I had my nice latte, I put on my makeup.

I do remember thinking to myself, heck, I could wear eyeliner today, but therapy.

I mean.

I do have a tendency to cry.

Then I thought, fuck, life is wonderful, what do I have to cry about?

But.

I trusted my gut.

Yeah, I still wore blue eye shadow, it was tasteful, I swear, but I didn’t give myself the winged black kohl liner look that would have put the vavoom on my makeup.

I restrained myself just in case I might cry.

Guess what?

I cried.

My therapist and I were talking about relationships, marriage, family and then I was talking about my ex.

I was talking about five years of living with an addict who was super controlling, although I had no idea at the time.

I talked about what it was like when I decided to break up with him and what happened.

I talked about how he hit me.

I talked about how he knew that I had been hit as a child and it was my boundary, and how he broke it.

I talked about being scared.

I talked about how he stalked me for two years before I could finally pull the trigger and call the cops.

I didn’t talk about the nightmares, but, ugh, they were awful.

I did talk about the police being called and that there were messages on my machine and how not even after listening to a half of the first one the police were ordering a restraining order on my ex.

We went to court after the initial one was filed.

My ex stood in court and asked for the longest one he could get

He knew himself.

He knew he would keep haunting me if he didn’t ask for the longest restraining order he could get.

It was for two years.

We saw each other about two weeks after it expired.

We had one last 24 hours of trying to make something work that was never meant to work.

I said my goodbye.

I was moving to California.

We spoke one last time when his grandmother died.

I had helped with her when she was becoming to senile to help herself.

I will never forget giving her a bath and her tiny frail little body and how she just sat in the tub and let me bathe her and wash her hair.

He thought I should know.

A lot of emotions came up as I talked to my therapist.

How I didn’t want to tell her about how he spit on me in front of my friends, in the face, because I was leaving him.

I will never forget the shocked look on my best friends husbands face, he was frozen in active disbelief of what was happening.

Another friends’ boyfriend intervened.

We drove back to my house with my ex tailing us like an insane man.

My friend’s husband managed to lose him and we took a circuitous way back to my house and, yes, I literally threw clothes into garbage bags and ran back to my friend’s car.

It was January.

It was cold.

I was heart-broken, lost, and in shock.

“Committed monogamous relationships are dangerous for you,” my therapist said with distinct clarity.

I had expressed that I hadn’t really been in a long-term relationship since I had left my ex.

And then she flipped the frame.

And then she gave me the most beautiful perspective.

She told me how it was something a lot of people did, they replicated the same relationships they grew up.

My father, alcoholic, violent.

My stepfather, misogynist, violent, I always remember the blood on the floor from the broken back window of the kitchen in Windsor when my mother had locked him out and he broke the window with his bare fist and turned the lock, the look of his hand, that image is frozen in my brain, bloodied grasping for the lock and turning it, how we ran out the front door and spent the night at my grandparents.

How we went back the next day.

The years of terror that followed that I wouldn’t let myself see as terrorizing.

Of course committed monogamous relationships are dangerous.

Jesus Fuck did you see what happened to my mom?

Did you see what happened to me the one time I get into a long-term relationship.

Not to mention the three-month crazy man I dated when I was 19 who introduced me to crack cocaine and threatened to kill me in a drug induced delusional state.

But who’s counting.

Then she gave me the gift.

She showed me that I had done the best I could to keep myself safe, that I had rules and bylaws  and ways of keeping myself so busy that I couldn’t date.

I spent the last fifteen years trying to figure it out and she went and did it in a session.

Oh.

Of course.

I did a lot of the work too, and she’s right, I did keep myself protected, but I also acknowledge that after a while it stopped working and I longed for a different experience.

And I’m having one and I’m amazed at my life and I’m ok with the fact that I spent so much time and effort taking care of that small little girl who kept being put in dangerous situations through efforts to maintain a “committed monogamous relationship.”

But.

Well.

I’ve grown up.

And emotional intimacy, though still a frightening area, is not the scary thing that I thought it was, it is sweet and sacred and amazing.

I had to go what I went through and I’m not sorry for it.

I am so grateful for getting out, that’s all, that I got out, that I grew, that I changed, it took years and so much work.

So much work.

But.

Fuck.

Worth it.

So worth all of it.

My therapist went over time with me today, it was the first time ever I had talked about the relationship in therapy and I touched into the terror and fear and pain that I was so busy keeping at bay, she brought me back.

She made sure I was back in the present.

She let me talk about the love in my life, the resources I have, my resiliency and that I wasn’t that person anymore, and that I had done an amazing job at taking care of myself.

She urged self-care and tender compassion for myself today.

I think I did ok.

I showed up at work and I showed up for my clients.

And I bought chocolate persimmons today at the market after I got out of my session.

I love persimmons.

I love myself.

I am lovable and worthy of love.

I am enough.

God damn.

Am I ever.

I fucking did it.

 

Once More Into

The breach, my friends.

Once more, into the.

Oops.

Ha.

I meant, books, once more into the books.

Yes.

I have started in on the reading that will need to be done for the next weekend of classes.

I got a new trauma book in the mail today and that has been cracked, as well as getting into the next chapter in one of my couples therapy books.

There is so much reading.

But.

It is so much better than the reading I was doing last semester, the DSM V is a little, ahem, dry.

I just knocked through a chapter and a half in “The Body Keeps the Score,” which is a book about healing trauma.

I am all down for that.

Yes.

Yes I am.

It’s fascinating reading and I’m a little surprised it’s just now that I am getting into it, but as I know so well, my past experiences will guide me and though I may not have much experience with healing trauma, although that could be argued I tried a lot of different things, I do have plenty of experience with having been exposed to trauma.

“Like to like,” I said in class as we were setting up the parameters for how we as a class were going to move forward.

I meant, that like attracts like.

I reflect that I don’t know exactly, consciously, why, but there is something there, I have worked with too many women who have had identical if not highly similar trauma stories as I have.

I have sought out to work, like wise, with women that I have found out later, had the same experience or sets of traumatic experiences that I had as well.

It’s shocking.

And it’s not, all at the same time.

I am grateful to be doing the work now as a student and I have always had an inkling that what and where I land will have a great deal to do with how I have walked through my own trauma spaces.

And not walked through.

There are spots and things and big old cheesy holes in my memory.

But.

The body remembers.

And that’s what I find fascinating and curative in its own way.

I have done an extraordinary amount of self-work and I wonder how much I saved myself without even realizing that I was saving myself.

And I wonder how much more saving there is to do.

Plenty I am sure.

I can often see when a behavior is not serving me, for instance, but it takes a great deal of effort to not continue to engage with something that isn’t good for me.

Men who are not divorced, emotionally available, or hmm, live in another part of the country.

So sexy.

I mean.

Even a novice in psychology would say, oh, I bet her dad wasn’t around when she was a kid.

I mean.

Duh.

And perhaps I am dumbing it down a little, but it’s a cliché because there’s some truth there.

The child like need to reconstruct the past in my present circumstances so that I may resolve an old psychological wounding.

I had nothing to do with the break up of my parents marriage, I gather it was breaking apart before it had really solidified.

Yet, how many times have I been involved with a man who is going through a bad divorce or break up with children of certain age?

And better yet, with those children being girls?

Ack.

It’s embarrassing.

I will be going into therapy soon enough to deal with that, but I do wonder, sometimes more than I wish, wouldn’t it just be nice to get involved with a straight edge kind of guy, one with good morals, who’s single, not married, doesn’t have kids, isn’t an active drug addict, isn’t alcoholic, or, I don’t know, not a felon or a convict?

Fuck.

That sounds boring!

There is comfort in the known.

I once was told, “Honey, I know five things about the man you are dating without you having to tell me anything,” pause, “he’s homeless, jobless, he’s got less than thirty days sober, doesn’t have any money, and has holes in his socks.”

I was aghast.

It was like he’d just looked into my bedroom.

I’m not joking.

I was mortified to recall that the paramour at my apartment the night before had holes in his socks, I remember finding that distasteful and I was ashamed that my person knew me so well.

I have since had lovers who have stellar socks.

But occasionally I do fall for the emotionally unavailable man.

And boy howdy, they’re just like a big box of chocolates.

Another thing I can’t have.

But my mind has a sweet tooth for the emotionally unavailable man.

They are so tender and deletable.

And.

Safe.

Fuck me.

They are so safe.

They are not available for romantic, emotional commitment, and great!

Because.

Neither am I!

Or so the story goes and then I’ll be safe and not get my feelings hurt and not have all that past trauma drug up and tossed about.

Except.

Well.

None of that works for me.

And as I read more and more and go through more and more of my program I am in fact, looking to heal those places, to let in new scenarios.

To dump the box of temptation in the trash rather than fondly sift through the contents and ponder what it would be like if I just had a tiny little taste.

NO.

It’s just not good for me and I keep finding resolution in the way the material works on me and through me and I am excited and gratified to know that I can change, am changing, am growing.

That the trauma will get worked out, it’s been getting worked out, and that I am allowed to work it out.

Maybe my best efforts at keeping a true emotional and romantic and spiritual relationship with a man would have once been too threatening, that I kept going back to the known trauma of the relational field to keep some sort of fresh wounding intact.

I wouldn’t forget my father that way and I might somehow figure it out.

How to save him.

But.

Really.

I think.

Saving me at this point is more to the point.

And ultimately.

What my father would have wished for me if he could.

This I believe.

And in that knowing, which will sink from head to heart to gut, I will heal.

I will grow.

And I will let go of those old ideas that no longer serve.

For something new and wonderful.

I fucking deserve it.

I really.

Really.

REALLY.

Do.

On The Upswing

I still called in sick today.

But.

I am feeling better.

Better and better and better.

I am listening to music.

Always a good sign.

I took a hot shower, really good sign, I couldn’t fathom getting in the shower yesterday, the fact that I managed to brush my teeth yesterday felt like a hero move.

Today I brushed them and flossed them and hey, I might do that one more time before I go to bed.

I am feeling a bit sassier.

A bit sexier.

Doesn’t hurt that a lady took care of her lady needs.

I mean.

I had a window.

I took it.

Ahem.

I went grocery shopping.

Although, it was the biggest challenge of my day and I did have a few minutes in the store when I found myself just standing in an aisle wondering what the fuck I was there for and whether once I remembered it was going to be worth it to be in the aisle at all.

I missed a few things.

But I got most of what I needed to get and really it was enough.

It was enough.

I was scared to call in sick this morning, but I knew I was going to.

Especially as last night I lay in my pillows, propped three high so that I could breathe, and cried because the pain in my face-my cheeks were so sore from the sinus pain-was too much for me to go to sleep.

I was tired and I couldn’t sleep.

I finally fell asleep almost two hours after I had gone to bed.

No good.

I woke up feeling tentatively better, but in no way ready or prepared to get up and go to work.

I sent a message to the mom and the dad and said hey, I am calling in, I’m still too symptomatic, I am so very sorry.

They were very sweet.

The mom said no worries, rest and get better soon.

I turned off my phone, closed my eyes and slept for four hours.

Four hours.

And when I woke up I felt like I might actually be able to face the world.

Granted, it was 11:30 a.m.

The world had already been doing much its own thing for hours.

I stripped my bed and re-made it with fresh sheets and threw some laundry in the wash.

I made some coffee and oatmeal and returned a few messages.

I did my morning prayer and routine.

I sent out some gratitude lists to some folks and I did some writing.

Four pages.

And I knew I had it in me to get out to the grocery store.

Maybe not much further than that.

But that I could do.

I am grateful I did.

I am now set and stocked for the school weekend.

Yeah.

That.

Starts tomorrow.

Second semester of my second year of the three-year program.

Gett’er done.

I made a nice lunch.

I sat and did some reading.

And I got it all done.

All that I could get done.

I am still shy a couple of books for my Trauma class.

But I finished all the readings for my Couples Therapy Class and for my Community Mental Health class.

I am a little astounded that I got through all that reading.

Slow and steady and two days home sick.

I didn’t gel out in front of my laptop and watch a bunch of videos.

And because I got so much sleep today I didn’t feel the need to nap.

I mean.

I lay low.

I didn’t go out again after I went grocery shopping and the extent of my exercise was folding my laundry and making my bed and taking out the recycling.

I took the homeopath cold remedy medicine and sucked on a few zinc lozenges.

I read.

I chatted with a friend who later Facetimed me.

You know you’re friends when you accept a Facetime call in no make up and your hair in braids.

I mean at least my socks matched my pajama top and my pajama pants were right side in the entire day, so I suppose I was in a great position to take a call.

But it was super sweet to see her face and I’m excited to reconnect with all my school friends tomorrow.

I showed her the dozen roses I bought myself today at the store.

Buy your own damn flowers.

They are pretty soft pink roses tipped darker pink, long-stemmed and an apt dozen.

Because when you got twelve years (t-minus two hours and twenty-two minutes, unless I decided to run over to the 7-11 and score some crap.) you get yourself a dozen roses.

I wanted to wake up tomorrow on my anniversary with a pretty reminder of how far I have come and to acknowledge to myself that I am capable of giving myself everything I need.

I will gladly accept and take in your love but first I have to love myself enough to know that I am worthy.

I am worthy of your love.

As I am worthy of loving myself.

Such a fucking simple concept.

So hard to get.

“We’ll love you until you learn to love yourself,” he said to me, gripping my shoulders and looking at me with his sweet piercing blue eyes.

I believed him then.

I believe him now.

He has long passed, but his words remain with me, deeply entrenched into my being.

An affirmation of my basic humanity that I had so long stifled I didn’t even realize I had buried it.

There.

Right there.

And shoved it down and denied it and let it fester and rankle in the recesses of my heart where there should be light and not canker sores and sorrow.

The balm of that love settled upon me and care took me until I could take care of myself.

Until I could happily buy myself a dozen roses, cook myself a damn fine dinner (roasted chicken, hello and thank you) to take care of my sexual needs myself, to do my laundry, to comfort and soothe myself, to wear nice warm socks and drink tea that I like.

To listen to music I like.

Her good teeth smile was winding down.

Engines sputter ghosts out of gasoline fumes.

You had it but you sold it.

I am literally in tears of gratitude and joy.

The first time I heard this song.

True dreams.

True dreams.

True dreams.

Of Wichita.

Dancing in the living room at the house on Franklin Street.

My boyfriend had put the cassette in the boom box and when it came on I was floored I was sideways plastered with the glory of the words and how they resonated.

Listening to an updated version of it on the eve of this anniversary.

So many days and years and drunks and drugs later.

So many hang overs and calling in sick when I wasn’t really sick.

The bushes I threw up in before going into my lunch shift at Hawthorne Lane.

The demoralization of listening to what the line cooks side about what I was up to last night.

All the girls who were in relationships and said, “hey girl, take one for the team,” and then tell us all about it, in gory, glorious detail.

All those humiliations and stumbles.

And then the ultimate bottom and the climb up.

The long, slow, stupid, terrifying climb out.

Into the sunshine.

Blinding and overwhelming.

Held and taken care of and carried.

To this moment.

Full of light and love and music and joy.

My musical hero singing to me on the stereo.

A man I met in person and got to talk to and hang out with in someone’s kitchen this past September.

No biggie.

Because that’s my life now.

Full of surprises and insights and gifts.

Dozens of gifts.

Too many to list or count.

But I hold them all here.

In my heart.

Which is so much bigger than I ever knew.

Full of love for you.

For of love for me.

Seriously.

I let you love me until I learned to love myself.

I did it.

I really.

Really.

Did.

 

 

Be Flexible

And I’m not talking yoga.

I am talking to myself.

I am about to embark on the summer time schedule at work, aka, the boys full time.

However the family has a lot of traveling, summer camps, swimming time, and activities planned, it’s going to be busy and the mom has asked me to work 10 a.m. to 6p.m. Monday through Friday.

Except next week Tuesday when I’ll work 12-7p.m.

Or the next week when I’ll be on call for jury duty, so who knows if I’ll be working or not.

Oh!

And that Friday, the 17th, I’ll have it off completely!

They will be out of town visiting family in the Midwest.

And although they won’t be back until the following Tuesday, I will work that Monday for them, just to let the housekeeper in to clean the house and also for me to accept whatever Instacart order the mom has placed so I’ll be there cooking food for them.

Like this week: oatmeal for the boys breakfast, broccoli soup for the mom over the weekend, pitted 6 pints of cherries for snacks, hulled an entire flat of strawberries, roasted cauliflower twice, homemade baked macaroni with cheese, homemade beef stroganoff with bow tie noodles, cheese tortellini with pesto, plus lots of peeling of carrots and chopping of raw veggies.

Yeah.

Like that.

Then the next week.

Well.

Who the hell knows.

I did ask that I have a set schedule, but the mom has other ideas and I’m ok with it to a point, I do need some regularity in my schedule.

Or.

Do I?

Can I be flexible?

I want to be flexible, I want this job through the school year, through all my school years if I can, and that means trying to fit myself of maximum service to the situation.

I did ask that I have a weeks time to negotiate my own schedule.

Seeing as how I already went ahead and offered my time to one of my ladies for next Tuesday thinking I had the schedule all figured out.

Nope.

Ugh.

Fortunately she’s flexible too and all the women I work with are sweet about my school schedule and work schedule and I’m just going to do my best to stay in the moment.

Each moment.

To each moment.

To each moment.

It’s really the best I can do.

Like not trying to figure out my weekend plans.

Because.

Um.

I have none.

That would have once thrown me into paroxym of terror.

Unscheduled down time?

NO!!!

I’ll do yoga.

Or not.

I’ll sleep in.

Or not.

Probably not, although I did a little today and  that was lovely, my Fridays previous for the last year have been days when I got up early to do reading and school work, today I slept in long, did lots of reading, loads of writing and did some laundry, putting fresh sheets on the bed.

I’d like to get them rumpled up.

My possible date has not gotten back to me and I have eschewed chasing him down to nail down a time this weekend.

It will happen.

Or.

It will not.

I’m being flexible.

I’m doing my best to lighten up.

“I’m open to be available for what you need,” I told my boss, in sincerity, once I had a moment to breathe and realize that though it was not my ideal, the change in my schedule that she was out lining, “even if you want to have a date night in there, just let me know.”

Um.

Hey.

Lady.

Before you give it all away, remember, there is too flexible too.

I want to bend, but not break.

I will need fun time for me too.

Especially since the rest of my summer vacation time is not vacation time–it will be my second year school retreat.

Even if I’m not sure what I want to do on my weekends, aside from getting my hair colored the weekend of the 18th and being interviewed the weekend of the 25th.

Wait.

What?

Yeah.

I’m super excited about that, and a bit nervous too.

I actually have to confirm it and let her in on some of my creative process and see what she wants from me in regards to the filming.

It’s a podcast, so I’ll keep you posted as to when it airs.

Fuck.

I don’t even know what that means, podcast.

Bwahahaha.

I have to, scratch that, I get, to talk about my creative process and what that looks like, what I’m working on, what the fuck am I working on?

Inspirations, loads of those, but a definitive list, and so on.

Ooh.

I just realized, heh, I’ll have had my hair done pink from the previous weekend.

Nice.

I’ll be on film with pink hair.

Heh.

I have actually practiced reading the sonnet sequence that I wrote for the gentleman I met last year at Burning Man, I like how I sound in my head reading it, of course, I don’t like hearing myself so much, but I have been told many times I have a nice voice and I do believe that as well.

Plus there’s a couple of longer poems I have memorized that I could perform.

But.

I haven’t done an open mic in a while.

And I’m not sure what exactly I am working on.

I have had a thought about re-working a short story I wrote years ago and sending it to Glimmer Train, they have a “new writer” contest deadline coming up–they send me updates all the time since I have applied to the contest before.

That could be something I’m working on.

And of course.

This blog.

I am always working on this blog, or it is working on me.

The blog works me.

It is where I find solace.

It is where I find my truth.

It’s not always pretty.

But once in a while, I believe, it is searing in its honesty.

And once in a great while.

It is beautiful.

I have no idea which blogs those would be, I don’t go back and re-read them once they have posted unless I feel like I need to do some grammatical editing, or, ugh, I have written something that affects someone in a negative manner.

Really.

I can only write about myself.

I cannot judge another.

Fuck.

I’m not allowed to judge myself.

See.

There!

That!

I am searching for the things to show this artist who wants to film me about all the things I am doing and already I am not enough and I am judging myself.

Wrong.

This is not how it works.

I show up.

Every day.

Or damn near close.

And put my heart on my sleeve and let you in.

I show up.

And that may be the best artistry I am capable of at any moment.

It is not the awards or accolades.

It is the daily grind.

The words mount and flow and I can sit on them and bury my heart.

Or.

I can show up.

Let them out.

Have a little dance party.

And surrender to the art of what is happening.

Not to worry about what I have published, accomplished, or succeeded with.

The failure is just as important.

Every experience and opportunity.

For love.

Art.

Poetry.

More love.

All the time.

As long as I show up.

That’s it.

Oh yeah.

And let go of the results.

That too.

Always that.

Always.

And A Razor Of Love

You have been unfriended.

I let you go.

“Let him go,” my person said to me tonight, eyes warm, soft, gentle, holding me every step of the way.

I have.

I have let so much go.

So much it is unreal.

I have walked through an unwieldy mess of emotions and feelings, grief, sorrow, joy, reprise, replete, repeat, let go, surrender.

And breathe.

There were many tears tonight when I met my person.

That happens.

Especially when I feel safe, I can be vulnerable and express my feelings and though there were many tears, they were great big tears of relief.

“This is a huge forgiveness piece for you around your mother,” my person said.

Yes.

Oh yes.

I could have easily called this blog, “If it’s not you, it’s my mother.”

I laughed out loud when I heard that.

But it’s the truth.

There has been a seismic shift in my relationship with my mother, my memory, my life, my childhood, all the things and place and sorrows whereof.

An easing.

A, yes, a deep forgiveness.

“You still need to bring up all this with a therapist,” my person said, “that’s going to be a part of your program, isn’t it?”

A yup.

The therapist in training, moi, will be doing therapy as a part of my Masters in Psychology program.

It doesn’t happen for a little while yet, but I have already experienced some of it in the work that I have done with my cohort and to be honest, it has been the school work that has helped lead me to this opening in my heart and this re-organizing of my emotions around my mom.

I used to joke, I guess used to is not exactly on point, since i said it on Sunday to an acquaintance at the cafe, “I was raised by wolves, well meaning wolves, but wolves nonetheless.”

Then.

Yesterday I had this very insightful conversation with my mom about some family origin stuff, I found out some things about my mom, about my dad, about my beginnings, and it was like so many puzzle pieces connecting.

I saw blue skies.

I saw joy.

I saw so much sorrow and grief and I saw a way out and through.

I have been on this way out and through for a very long time.

I have done so much work.

SO MUCH.

I suppose the gift is that I will continue to get to do this work, there are new places to delve, new revelations to be had, new angles, there will be more of this path to walk down.

I had this strange moment while I was out at the park with my charges and it just ran through me, call your mom.

And I did.

And we talked.

Suffice to say it was pretty private and personal and because so much of what was revealed was not actually about me, although it affected me greatly and a times very gravely, it is not my place to reveal what was revealed to me.

At least not in this forum.

I have already decided that I will be writing a paper on it, the experience and the exchange of information, it was very relevant to a final paper project that I have to work on for school.

I’ll be hitting that bad boy out of the park come Sunday.

I’m not ready for Sunday yet, let me stay here in today for a little while yet.

However.

I can say, quite unequivocally that I am no longer going to carry around grief that is not mine.

I am not a repository for my mother’s grief any longer.

I did not say that to her, that shift in perspective did not happen until today, this morning, when, yes, ugh, I was at yoga and I was in a bind.

LITERALLY!

I did a binding pose that I have not hit once since starting yoga two months ago, but today, I reached for it and my heart lifted and I felt this burst of joy, a great wave of it, a tidal pool of it, a tsunami of emotions.

I almost laughed out loud with the happy.

Then, yes.

Of course.

I cried.

I bawled.

Well.

Maybe not bawled, that sounds like it was loud, it was not loud, although it felt deafening at one point to be so sluiced in feelings.

I’m not going to carry her sorrow any more, I told myself.

It was washed away, my mother’s grief and pain and sorrow, her losses and misfortunes these are not my burdens, I don’t have to carry them.

I don’t know that I was ever properly asked and the tragedy of that is that I am only realizing this now.

And.

The amazing, awesome, hot damn news.

Is that I am realizing it at all.

I love my mom.

She did the best she could and if you had said that to me at certain points in my life I would have told you to go hit the crack pipe again and get back to me.

I always felt like that was an excuse, sorry it was so rough kiddo, I was just doing the best I could.

But in between the spaces, the lines of telephone wires looping through the history of our shared and divergent paths, there was a shift and I got it.

I got it.

I got it!

And it’s not mine to carry, never was, I don’t own it, I can let it go, I can be washed away, the names and places, the stories and traumas and dramas, all just crenellated peaks in the dunes at Ocean Beach, the stars wink back to me over the storm dark seas and I was washed clean.

Gasping for breath, yet, so in my body, so present, tears leaking down my face, but also a joy and gratitude.

A happiness that was solace to my soul.

A lifting up.

A, yes, heart opening.

And I walk through.

Flew through.

Drifted into the happy, joyous, free of the deep blue sky.

The sky of my childhood, bright blue, like his eyes when I was a young girl, face pressed to the window of the long yellow school bus as it rolled in between the cornfields on the way to school in Wisconsin.

The woman burgeoning with promise, escaping still, for many year yet to go, but she is there in my heart, and she is free to move on.

Let him go.

Let her go.

Let myself go.

Fly so high into the promise of those bright blue skies.

Above this world, the cusp of the soul of God calling to me.

The smile of heaven above me.

And all the world below me.

Love.

Love.

It’s all love.

That’s all the feeling I need now from my mother.

Just the love and letting go of anything other than that.

Awareness.

Acceptance.

Action.

I act on my own.

As my own woman.

Here.

Now.

Always.

I am free.

Free to move about my world carrying only those things and feelings that serve me in joy.

And.

That.

Well.

Not only is that all.

It is.

Everything.

All Showered Up

And ready for Daylight Savings!

Not fucking really.

Not really excited to be losing an hour of sleep on the last day of my three day weekend of school.

It’s supposed to rain again tomorrow, I won’t even notice the difference, it’ll still be gray.

That being said, I am sure that by Monday the extra hour of daylight will be lovely.

Just contemplating the loss of the hour is not fun.

Oh well.

Class, again, went well today.

I am feeling the material and understanding it and doing well and I got to say thank you and good bye to the woman I was the therapist for in the last six sessions of class.

It is a powerful thing to do this work and again, a powerful thing to be told that I am doing well.

I sure hope so.

It did feel like I got a lot out of the work and also that my client did as well.

We lost one of our cohort today.

That was sad.

And yet, despite the confirmation for the student that the program was not a good fit, it confirmed, again, for me, that I am on the right track.

I am not always on the right track anywhere else.

Or at least that I can readily see, but I think, I feel like I’m doing alright.

I’m also going to need to reach out to the relatives on my father’s side of the family and get some more information about the family history for one of my papers.

It’s big stuff.

I’m excited to learn more about my family and as I was thinking about it during class, I had two thoughts, one I wonder if my fondness from mangoes has anything to do with the lineage of my family.

And two.

I really want to go to Hawaii.

I have never been and I have been sticking money away for a while now in an online savings account that I have titled “Paia, Maui.”

That’s where my grandmother was born in 1928.

I really want to see that.

I really want to connect to that history and culture and be there.

It may not be for a bit.

I don’t have vacation time for it at this time.

Although I do have the money to go.

I have thought about when would be a good time, summer, fall, winter, I assume that Christmas is a really busy season.

I have a four day weekend in July for the holiday.

Although I was also keeping that tentatively on my plate for a possible travel to Wisconsin to see my best friend and her skulk.

Ultimately, seeing my friend is the priority, Hawaii can wait, but I feel that it is very much in the near future.

New York and Burning Man, my retreat for school, and possibly a dash back to Wisconsin for a long weekend of hanging out with the best friend.

It’s a good year of traveling.

Who knows what else may come into the mix.

Opportunities seem to be everywhere.

But yes, Hawaii, I would love to go and see you.

It really is about time.

There are stories to write here, experiences to be had, reconnection to be made.

I felt that today, sitting in class, talking about the traumas associated with immigration and exile and how displaced people, refugees, slaves, indentured servants, get moved around, how solace is found in the mothering environment.

I feel that I would find solace there.

I just peeped around the interwebs and I can definitely afford to go.

It’s going to be a matter of when.

I have a odd feeling that it may be sooner than I think but I cannot put my finger on why, I know the family I work for is going to be going on a trip around the time that I will be going to the retreat in Petaluma for my retreat, but I actually am wondering if the dates are lined up.

I think they may not be, I think, in fact, that the family may be gone the week before my retreat?

If that is the case, then maybe then.

It would certainly make for a very busy August.

Which reminds me.

Start thinking about what I want to take with me to Burning Man.

I have a very nice set up for the job I will be doing out there, but I know from my own personal experience, there a few things that I will want to have with me.

It’s nice to order them and have them and stock them up and not think about it too much.

Replace my shoulder harness or get it stitched up.

Check in with my OP (Original Playa) family and get the status on my playa bike.

I know it will need some tending to and might as well get things going.

This is also just a way to make busy, I’m aware of that, but it is a kind of busy that I find fun and engaging and a nice mental break from all the school stuff.

One more day.

And thank God it’s a short day.

I will be done by 4 p.m.

Then off to the Castro.

Hang out with my Puerto Rican fairy godfather.

I’ll pick his brains about Puerto Rico.

Another place I would like to go back to.

I have been once, but it was quite some time ago.

It would be fantastic to go back with a little more family history and also to go sea kayaking again and swim in the bioluminescent sea.

All the things.

All the places.

All the reconnecting.

It’s a good life, my little life, down by the sea, that rain is falling and the wind is blowing, but hopefully soon, sun.

And until then.

I will be the sunshine in my own life.

I’m getting pretty good at it.

Happy.

Joyous.

Free.

It’s Not The App

It’s you.

That is a direct quote.

I was sharing something with my person about the frustrations of online dating and then I said something, for the life of me (unconsciously don’t want to embarrass myself?) I cannot remember exactly what I said, but I basically blamed Tinder for my inability to score a date.

“It’s not the app, it’s you,” she said again.

I know, I know.

Cue a lot of school reading today, a lot of introspection, and a lot of writing.

The normal writing I do, every morning, although I did have a different tack today than typical.

I found myself waking up with my alarm and feeling that instead of taking the time to make breakfast and do my morning pages, the thing to do would be to get up and go right to the yoga class at 9 a.m. instead of the one I had signed up for at 10:30 a.m.

I wasn’t hungry, I had a late snack last night with my tea and I knew that if I did eat breakfast and go to the class I might feel a little bogged down with the oatmeal in my body.

So.

I hopped up, striped my bed–Sunday is bed sheet day, fresh sheets are a must to start off the we–drank some water, brushed my teeth, threw my hair up into a messy bun, re-made my bed with clean sheets, read some stuff, said some stuff, drank a quick shot of iced coffee with unsweetened vanilla almond milk and strolled the 1/2 block to Yoga Beach for the Vinyasa Flow class.

Today was my 9th day of yoga.

I have been going for fifteen days.

Not bad.

And I recognized the yoga instructor!

An acquaintance from the hood who I had no idea worked at the studio.

“I was wondering when I would see you here!” He said with a big smile.

I told him that it was class number 9 and I was pretty into it, although very humbled by the experience.

I have also been enjoying the feeling in my body though, of length, of my core getting stronger, of not losing the bicycle muscle I have in my legs, my hips have been feeling looser, not so tight, and my knees have also felt better.

And yes.

Thank you ego for the reminder.

I’ve lost a little weight.

Not the goal, but a nice side benefit.

Mostly from the exercise I presume, but also I have noticed a distinct tendency to eat even cleaner than I typically do.

Yes, that is kale in my fridge.

The class was good and I actually was able to do one of the poses that the first time I saw it demonstrated I was like, um, no.

Except.

Today.

Well.

I just did it.

It wasn’t a big deal move, I’m not standing on my head or anything, but it was fun to see myself stretch and try for something that just a week ago seemed intimidating and impossible.

Sometimes great change can happen quickly.

I just have to be flexible to the situation when things happen.

I left the studio with an open heart and a great deal of gratitude.

I walked past a huddle of neighbors on a stoop outside smoking cigarettes and lounging in the only real sun the day was to have, with some humor in my heart.

I used to be that girl on the front porch steps smoking cigarettes and hanging with the boys.

Not anymore.

Nope.

Today I was the girl all blissed out with the yoga mat in her bag strolling home to eat a bowl of organic oatmeal and apples with blueberries.

Heh.

“Just getting out of yoga?” One of the guys asked and drew on his cigarette, “down the block, Yoga Beach, right, they just opened, yeah.”

“Yeah, I just started a couple of weeks ago,” I said and smiled, we all silently acknowledged the humor of the moment, two bros and a gal smoking in the sun, obviously all a touch hung over.

“Gotta check that out, you know, soon, ease it in the schedule,” he smiled.

I patted the dog lolling in front of the stoop, “you should, it’s great,” and I walked home happy and a tiny bit incredulous to be this woman who gets up and goes to yoga before eating a healthy breakfast and doing fabulous self-care.

Said self-care meant also not re-employing the dating app on my phone.

This is not to say that I might not or that I may not go back to OkCupid.

I had a really enlightening day about it yesterday from not just my person’s viewpoint, but also from another woman.

Ironically, the woman who saw me walk down to cafe.

They both intimated that it was a job, it would take work, that it would not be without effort and I realized how much I had expected, in some odd ball kind of way, without really realizing it, that I wanted fairy tale pixie dust magic with the damn thing.

Instantaneous gratification.

Which on one hand there is the illusion there to it.

But.

On the other.

It’s not the app, it’s me.

Cue all the reading for school and the paper I wrote, second one in the weekend!

I realized some things, other than some discomfort to see that I was great at dating narcissists, border line personalities, and where I had negative counter transference in a variety of work and personal relationships.

Yeesh.

It was intense to read it and also to know that knowledge of self does not always avail me.

But taking different actions certainly does.

So when I wanted to use the app I did not re-install it, because it would have been avoidance of doing the school work that I needed to do–checking out through fantasy.

However.

I also see the benefits of trying again.

Pick myself up and try again.

The change is not the app, the change is me.

How I see the world, how I operate, how I move in it.

And learn, accept, forgive, and grow.

I don’t know that I’m going to find true love on Tinder or Match.com or OKCupid or Bumble or Hinge or Facebook or Myspace.

Ok.

That last one might have been reaching, but I think you understand the gist.

That being said.

I won’t also find it if I don’t try.

Those things worth having are worth working for.

I am not afraid of the work.

And I’m not too busy to do it.

When I say I’m too busy, that’s me pushing you out of my life.

I can, however, know what my needs are and if I need to study I can refrain from engaging with the dating, but if I need to have some fun and try getting out of my comfort zone.

Well.

I’m going to damn it.

Because I’m worth it and I deserve to be happy.

No man will ever complete me, but I do believe that some one may well be my companion and my compliment.

That is something to strive for.

And to continue to lighten up.

Take it easy.

And laugh at myself.

There’s a good few chuckles in there to be had.

Seriously.

More than a few.

Heh.

Sometimes I Wonder

About that blog of yours.

A friend of mine said today after I explained why I wanted to vomit and had been crying all morning.

Nobody wants to wake up to an alarm.

But I would have happily.

Except nope.

My internal alarm went off five minutes before my alarm went off.

I had a hard time falling asleep and I used a little vibrating help to put me down, then slept all the way through until 8:25 a.m.

I looked at my phone to check the time.

I saw a few texts.

I rubbed my eyes.

I stared at the little tiny letters.

Oh.

Oh.

Oh fuck my life.

FUCKFUCKFUCKFUCKFUCKFUCFUCKFUCK.

Aw.

Man.

“Did you now your IG account links to your blog?”

“Glad you ‘gave it the old college try’.”

Oh fuck me people.

He read the blog.

He found the blog.

I am an asshole.

ASSHOLE.

Cue why I should never date.

No wait.

Cue to why I should never write about other people when I am mad at myself.

I wasn’t nice to dude and dude found out.

Dude did I feel awful, I’m not excusing my actions, I’m just going to write about what’s been on my mind all day, because that’s what I do.

“You really put it all out there,” a friend of mine said once, “that’s what makes it so good to read, but you know, I get worried about you sometimes,” he said with a look.

“I mean, I can’t write about the stuff you put out there, I just can’t,” he paused, “I’m glad you do, but you sure as shit put your heart on your sleeve.”

Yeah.

I do.

And I was sad and mad at myself this morning, I took out my frustrations about myself and my inability to ask for what I need or to say, hey, this isn’t working for me, thanks for coming out, I’m glad to have met.”

Because part of it was a lot of fun, the texting, the flirting, it inured my little heart for a while.

My starving, foolish, idiotic heart that doesn’t want to feel all the feels, so yeah, let’s check out with a little text flirtation.

Harmless, right?

Except then I poured some gasoline on the bonfire of my vanity.

I have absolutely no leg to stand on.

I hurt someone’s feelings and I was told.

Ugh.

How do I get myself in scrapes like this?

I wasn’t honest.

I wasn’t up front right away.

Instead of a moment of discomfort, instead of saying, hey, you know, maybe not the best match after all, I just played along like nothing was happening, like it was all good, all fine.

I basically fucking lied.

“Oh my God, you look great,” she said to me as I bumped into her on the street heading down to the scene of the crime last night.

“I’m heading to a first date,” I said, “I’m nervous.”

“You look great! He’s not good enough for you,” she laughed, “it’s an interview, not a date! Have fun!”

Turns out I wasn’t good enough for him.

I did, however, make amends.

Oh humility, isn’t there a better way to get to thee?

I mean, yeah, there is, you’re honest right from the get go, instead of stifling it, you address it, by “you” I mean of course, “me.”

I have to change, I have to become better, I hate that I was awful to this man.

I really thought I was a better person, nope, just another asshole on a dating app.

App, if you didn’t already read yesterday’s missive, has been deleted.

I shouldn’t online date, I probably shouldn’t date at all, I keep fucking it up.

Focus on myself, focus on yoga, focus on work, recovery, my job, school.

Or.

I could also say, hey, chalk it up, you made a mistake, yes, you hurt someone, but you don’t have to do it again and I won’t.

That’s the thing, this will not happen again.

I immediately made phone calls, I checked in with my people, I wrote two separate inventories and made those phone calls.

I got one immediate answer, “you absolutely owe him an amends, you hurt his feelings, I’ll call you back in a few.”

Ugh.

Fuck.

More tears.

And a sick stomach.

I wanted to throw up.

Note to self, trust your body, if it doesn’t feel right, that’s your barometer, use it.

I drank some water, put on my kettle, made some coffee, I started to boil an egg, but I actually felt sick thinking about eating it.

I confirmed my yoga class and sat down and really wrote.

I had a great phone call back from a girl friend and she helped me hash it out.

I went to yoga and I did not die.

But fuck, I cried on the mat.

I let it go, I got into the poses, I dashed to the bathroom and honked my nose hard and cleared it and got back on the mat.

By the time the class was over I felt better.

I saw some light in the day.

I got home, intercepted a text from one of my people, took a hot shower, threw laundry in the wash, and made breakfast.

I dressed, got my scooter ready, and went to work.

I worked.

I showed up.

I cleaned and laundered and stripped beds and made food and I sat in the knowledge of what I had done and how it had affected me and this other person and what I could have done different, what I should have done instead.

I got the call back right before I was sitting down to have dinner with my instructions to the amends.

I got off the phone, but on an audio story for the boys, made sure they were set up with their dinners, kissed them both and walked into the front room to make the call.

He answered on the first ring.

Oh holy fuck.

“Hey, _____________,  I just wanted to call and let you know I realize that my actions hurt you and I apologize, it was not my intention to do so, I am sorry.”

He said thanks for calling, he accepted my apology.

I asked if there was anything else I could do, he said no, I said, again, my apologies, please take good care. And hung up.

I think that’s called “adulting.”

Fuck.

I didn’t want to write about it, but there it is, I don’t know how to write about anything but my fucking self, I’m my best, worst material, I am my worst enemy.

I love my little blog, but I will not use it as a mass weapon of destruction.

So.

I got to keep it clean.

I have to keep my side of the street clean.

That’s the best I got today.

I still feel a bit rotten about it, but I also know that not forgiving myself, and oh, the insights I have gotten to see in myself today, better days come around, get better, get better, better days come around get better.

Sun, sun, sun, will come up now.

My insights, too much to put down right now because I do not want to misconstrue anyone with the idea that there was anything wrong with the other person, this shit all falls right in my lap.

I didn’t like going through it, but I have seen what I needed to see and I will be better.

I will.

I promise.

I can’t go through that again.

I just can’t.

Grateful that tomorrow is a new day for me to be a better woman.

I am going to do better.

I just am.

 

Waiting For Life To Begin

I was alone.

You were just around the corner from me.

I am never going to know exactly which corner he is just around, but he is.

I texted back a dear heart who asked someone out on a date tonight how that was amazing and acknowledged, that yeah, it’s a lot harder than you’d think.

But.

Oh.

The freedom that I get when I get that shit out-of-the-way.

I’m free to notice the proliferation of flowers blooming in Golden Gate Park on my ride home from work.

On Wednesday’s I ride straight home and either meet with a lady at my place or take a shower and hit the spot up the street in my pajamas.

Yeah.

Like that.

I am not at all ashamed of the fact that I went up the street to 44th and Judah in my Hello Kitty night-shirt and yoga pants.

If Hello Kitty is good enough for Burning Man, she sure is good enough for the Outer Sunset.

It felt rather freeing.

No make up.

Hair down.

Flip flops.

Sweatshirt.

I’m in my hood, yo’ I can roll out like this.

It made me realize how grateful I am to be out here and also that I really am home.

“I like thinking out you out by the beach,” she said to me this Saturday at the celebration dinner in Oakland at the Lake Merrit Chalet House.

I like thinking of me out by the beach too.

And now that it’s Day light Savings time, I was able to catch the sunset on my ride home to the Sunset.

It was delirious.

And the flowers in the park were going off.

I even saw the buffalo in the paddock.

I don’t often see them as I usually am riding home in the dark.

There is so much to see when I allow myself the space to see it.

The gaggle of frisbee golf players tee’ing off as the dusk settles over the trees for one last round before night arrives.

A robin hopping in the soft dirt of a tree next to Spreckles Lake, the bright orange of his proud chest.

When I realized that I was moving on and pushing forward and making the next decisions on what I need to do now with graduate school, um, nothing, that I could in fact, uh, just you know, enjoy the show for a moment.

I believe I actually relaxed a little.

I mean I have plenty going on in my life, lots of wonderful ladies to hang out with, I’ll be heading to Berkeley this Saturday for a baby shower, spending the Saturday following going out to my inaugural visit to Alcatraz.

However, there is a tendency with me to be onto the next thing right away, that I must have something to shoot forward to.

That is me checking out of the here and now.

It’s not enjoying the song on the stereo, waiting for the next track, which will be better, and then the next after that.

I have been messaging back and forth with a gentleman on OkCupid and though he hasn’t asked me on a date yet, and I’m not concerned if he does or doesn’t, I think he will soon.

He’s French and the French do things slightly different.

There’s this lovely getting to know you period that I am enjoying.

And it doesn’t hurt that he says extraordinarily flattering things to me in French.

I don’t know which is better.

The things he is saying.

Or.

That I understand what he is saying, because my French is good enough to comprehend when a sexy French man is telling me he finds me ravishing.

Either way it feels a little like a courtship and that’s nice.

It’s also a slowing down.

He mentioned that in a message when expressed that although he really likes living in the United States, there’s two things that bother him.

The first is that we all seem to have a fear of each other.

Yup.

I can relate to that.

And that as a culture we are never quite happy with what we have, there is this constant striving for more.

Oh.

Yeah.

I know that too.

What was your favorite drug?

More.

I remember how my perspective shifted the first time I heard someone say, “if you don’t like what you have, why would more make it better?”

That gave me pause.

I love what I have.

My lovely little home by the sea.

My bicycle.

Even my Vespa.

Yeah, it’s not working and I’m not riding it, but I know how to get it fixed, and when I have the time to spare I will.

I have a great job with a family that loves me.

I got kisses galore from the boys today and snuggles and that was really nice, especially the reading time before nap time, oh the cuddles today were just smashing.

I am in great health.

My phone bill is paid.

I have money in savings for when my laptop goes kaput.

And I also realized after checking out the new MacBook Air on-line, that I now qualify for an educational discount through Apple.

Hell yes.

There is so much for me to be grateful for.

I have a purpose.

I have a point.

I am of service.

I have family and friends and love.

Oh love.

So much of that.

I don’t have to wait for my life to start, there’s nowhere I have to get to for it to be better.

It’s the best it’s ever been.

Even if I don’t have all the things I thought I would at this point in my life.

I have something far better.

Peace of mind.

Serenity.

Abundance.

Joy.

Prosperity.

Spiritual richness.

Oh gosh.

I guess that ‘hippy’ school I got into is indeed the right fit for me.

Who knew?

I still need to buy myself some flowers to celebrate that achievement, but I can feel myself being a lot happier about it and sharing it with my fellows has been really gratifying.

If I can do it.

So can you.

“You’re going to love school,” he said to me tonight.

And I will.

But I don’t have to wait for it to get here to enjoy right now.

Right now is pretty fabulous.

Me and Hello Kitty.

We’re just perfect.