Dirty Dishes

For the first time since I have lived in this home I came back from a long day to dirty dishes in the sink.

I always wash my dishes.

Always.

But.

Fuck.

I totally screwed up this morning.

I was late and I had no idea.

I mean.

I had not one single clue.

I had gotten up with my alarm, took a nice hot shower, dried my hair, got dressed, made the bed, chatted with my best friend, did some morning reading, did some prayers, I had made breakfast, a lovely latte and I was slowly digging into some emails when I had this moment of.

Oh.

It looks like I need to go in about fifteen minutes.

I had just started eating my breakfast.

Does not compute.

I looked at my watch.

I looked at my computer clock.

What the hell was wrong?

I’m doing exactly what I would be doing on a normal morning and I’m not writing and I, oh shit, I realized right then and there.

I had set my alarm a half hour later than I should have.

If I have a shower before work I have to give myself an extra half hour, mostly for dealing with my hair.

But I hadn’t factored that in.

Oh.

I thought I had.

I mean I was right on schedule, except for being a half hour behind.

I shoveled in my oatmeal.

I mean.

It was not pretty.

I tried to drink some of my coffee down but it was too hot.

I like to leisurely sip my coffee, look over emails, check my schedule, peep my blog see if anyone’s read it, then do my morning writing.

Mornings that I shower before work I also don’t typically write, so my brain was all wired that I had this extra half hour.

In reality.

In that half hour I had to be at therapy in Noe Valley and I had not put on my face yet.

Oh no.

I mean.

I was dressed and I could have gone out without make up on, but you know, I like to put on a face.

I made the executive decision to not wash my breakfast dishes, dashed into the bathroom, did the fastest make up ever, grabbed my stuff and flew out the door.

I made it.

I found parking with three minutes to spare to dash down the block, let myself in the building, and have a cup of water from the fountain in my hand as my therapist open the door to her office.

I sort of sat and had to catch my breath.

It was a good session though, not a lot of tears, a little when I got into the feeling zone of what it was like when I heard the news that my landlady wanted me to move out, but for the most part I was able to make some serious connections, talked a lot about fear and moving forward and about self-advocacy and how it allows others to have strength and how I wanted to grow.

I talked about things I have to walk through, partially for myself, and also for my clients, as a therapist I always need to be doing some growing.  I need to always be integrating new experiences into my life and though I may never tell a client what is going on in my life, it will be in the therapy room.

My experiences are pure freaking gold.

I caught up with my old friend from high school today.

And although we did not get a chance to talk as long as I wanted, it was so good to hear his voice and to catch up.

I got to tell him a bit of what has been going on, but our conversation was cut short when the mom came back unexpectedly early.

One thing that stood out to me though, was his perception of me always being a therapist.

I had been telling him about the process and graduation and getting in my AMFT# application to the BBS and accruing hours and all the things and he laughed, because he didn’t understand half of what I said, but then when I said, “you know, all the stuff one needs to become a therapist,” he replied, “you mean what you’ve been doing all your life?”

I laughed out loud.

He was right.

I have been a therapist all my life, although I had no idea that was what I was doing.

Being kind, lending an ear, giving so many of the people I worked with a shoulder to cry on, I had an open door policy at one of the places I worked and managed and people would just come in and talk about things and tell me stuff that no one else was privy to.

I liked it.

I liked feeling needed and I liked listening.

I am a good listener and I remember a lot.

I also have a very good way of seeing something with perspective.

Oh.

Sure.

Not about myself, my vision there is skewed, but in others, I can see things fairly quickly and clearly make connections that they might not see.

Or might not want to see.

“If a client doesn’t want to take it in, or can’t accept it, they won’t,” my supervisor once told me.

It’s ultimately not up to me if the message lands or not, but it is up to me to show how I see it and to be an advocate for what the client wants to change in their life.

So being in my therapist’s office today I could see very clearly that the challenges ahead are an extraordinary opportunity for growth and for service.

I have to walk through this for my self and I have to do it for others to.

“It’s a political act,” she ended, my therapist, in regards to some actions I’ll soon be taking, “I’m in awe of how beautifully you just put it, thank you for letting me witness you.”

Anytime.

And hopefully next time I’ll remember to set the alarm another half hour early.

Fingers crossed.

Nobody likes to come home to dirty dishes.

At least not me.

Today’s Stats

Sometimes I just don’t know what to make of my stats.

Not the body ones.

Or the emotional ones.

Even the mental ones.

Nope.

I literally mean the ones on my blog.

How come so many people are searching that one particular thing?

Why would someone in Mexico want to read my blog?

Who is creeping on my page?

Cuz.

That shit happens yo.

Sometimes I get a great big spike in reads and it’s typically, from my experience, one reader going deep into the blog.

It always leaves me curious.

Who is that person?

Or what are they looking for?

Do they just want to get to know me better, but just a little too shy to ask?

Are they just keeping up with the life and times of Auntie Bubba?

I mean.

Today was not super exciting, but it was special, as is any day I get through without picking up or using and as I was surprise popped to speak at the place tonight, it astounded me, once again, how much my life has changed and how very much I have to be grateful for.

Even when I don’t want to lighten up or have fun.

My life is light and fun.

That does not mean frothy or insubstantial.

If anything.

I believe that it is ever more expansive and open and wonderful.

Deep and complex.

Yet.

Utterly simple.

Easy?

No.

My life is not easy, but by following some simple suggestions.

Well.

Life is manageable and I can let go of the results and just see what happens.

So much can happen.

Least of all when I expect it.

I mean.

Shit.

I’m going to New Orleans on Thursday and three weeks ago that wasn’t even on my plate, let alone an idea in my head, let alone an actual reality, a plane ticket, a room to stay in, a place to meet my fellows, a French Quarter to explore.

I was talking to a dear friend of mine last night on the phone and she mentioned that she has always wanted to move there.

Me too.

It’s been one of those places always on my radar, even though I haven’t been back in so very long.

I made her a promise that I would report back and let her know how it was.

I suspect it will be fabulous.

I suspect I have no idea what will happen.

But it will be good.

I know this.

Having done enough traveling in my life at this point I know how to do a couple of things, pack, and navigate around and get in and out of an airport.

Those things used to cause me an unbearable amount of anxiety.

Just getting to the airport was excruciating and exciting and flavored with fraught anxiety and a curious longing for the uplift of the wings, the expanse of land below me, the clouds and sky alongside my face.

How often have I pressed my face against a window portal, dreaming dreams and aching with some unnamable feeling, some longing for shift in perspective and the glorious wonder of new things to be seen and experienced.

New faces.

New foods.

New streets to wander.

New art to see and be exposed to.

So much wonder in the travel.

The escape from the mundane, well, I don’t think my daily routine is mundane, I should re-word that, the exodus from the routine, to the new and the glad return, the gratitude I have when I land back at SFO and the chill fog coolness swirls about me and the doors open from the baggage claim gates to the outside world.

I am reminded of every time I have flown in and out of the airport.

Of the first trip here when I returned to the land of my birth.

To my last trip from New York.

All the Paris’s and Chicago’s and Minneapolis’s in between.

The Orlando trips, the Madison, Wisconsin trips, those times to Maine and back, Anchorage, Los Angeles, Austin, London, San Juan, Puerto Rico, Boston.

There are still so many places to go and visit.

But there is always home to return to.

And I normally do with a renewed vigor and love for where I am and what I am doing.

I do a lot.

Even when I am loathe to admit that.

I do a lot.

Just writing this blog.

I mean.

I forget that.

The work here.

The graduate school program.

The nannying.

The doing the deal and going to yoga and cooking all my own food (for the most part).

The showing up and be willing to take suggestions even when I want to blow a big raspberry at the person making it.

The willingness to be wrong.

The ability to make mistakes and not beat myself up for not being perfect.

The trying.

The dating.

The sex.

The life.

The love.

The music.

The words.

All the things.

I mean.

I am many, many things.

I am certainly not perfect and I am a pretty open book, although sometimes I can retire into silence and not know what to say to someone or I will lose my voice when I need to self-assert, I will second guess, and not trust my gut.

Or.

Worse.

I will hear that still small voice and ignore it.

There’s a big difference in not trusting your gut versus hearing something, knowing it’s not good for you, or that there’s a lot of information to look at and choosing to ignore it.

Hope for a different outcome.

And even these mistakes.

They are not really mistakes at all.

Just another foot fall on the path to where ever I am going.

To what ever destination God has in mind for me.

This week it happens to be New Orleans.

Who knows where I will go next?

I certainly don’t.

But.

I’m game and excited and over joyed with it.

The ability to do these things that were once such fantasies.

Sitting at the end of the bar at the end of the night rattling off tales of where I was going to go and things I was going to try and places I wanted to see and things I was going to accomplish.

Most of the time it was no further than the floor underneath the stool I toppled from.

Or.

Some strangers bed.

Most often, a miserable repeat of what had happened the night before and the night before that and so on ad nauseam.

There are things that repeat for me today.

Routines, roads I travel, steps I take.

But instead of them being a horrid Ground Hog’s day of terror.

The repetition breeds awareness and it deepens more and more with perspective and experience.

Revealing a steadfast love that takes care of me no matter what.

Always.

Always here.

Always there.

Everywhere I go.

This extraordinary gift.

This.

Overwhelming.

Overarching.

Expansive.

And.

Genuine.

Love.

 

Reflections

I was thinking a lot about Paris the last few days.

Yesterday the youngest baby slept for an hour and a half, snugged tight into the Snugli, and after going through the newspaper, the facecracking, and the e-mail catching up, I found myself scrolling through my home page on Instagram.

I had forgotten so many of the photos that I had taken.

There were some that just knocked my socks off and I was re-awed that the experience actually did happen.

I shared a bit more about it tonight.

Sometimes what I need is a little time and perspective to see what I have gotten.

Man, what a fucking gift I gave myself.

That leap.

I am so glad I did it.

And I am glad to be here, now, in San Francisco.

I also was thinking about Paris as I threw a few more dollars into my savings account.

I really would like to pay off that airplane ticket debt.

I don’t care to owe anyone money and I haven’t in over eight and a half years, to have even just a little over my head is uncomfortable.

I’ll get there, I am sure.

I remember talking to Barnaby about how far to push out that return ticket.

One that I don’t belive I will be using, although, who knows.

Take that with a grain of salt, Martines, I am thinking to myself.

I am not moving back to Paris.

Yet.

Or soon.

I have a feeling I will be back.

I certainly plan on seeing more of Europe–Amsterdam, Bruges, Berlin, Toulouse, Madrid, Barcelona–there are a lot of places that I did not get to that I want to see.

I could visualize flying on that one way ticket (it was round trip from Paris) and perhaps popping about for a bit.  Stay with friends there, I think there may be a couch or two that I could crash on, and maybe take a train down to Spain or over to Amsterdam, fly a one way ticket back.

That seems like an interesting idea.

It has gently been simmering away in the back of my head as a possibility.

I mean, it seems a waste to not use that ticket back to Paris if I am going to pay for it.

I get ahead of myself.

But the looking back had me hatching ideas that I was not even cognizant of having until I found myself writing about them after seeing those photos.

God only knows what will happen if I really look through the archives of my Paris photographs.

I may forget that I was ever terrified and had a hard time and got lost all the time.

I will just remember that Paris tasted like crisp, sweet apples from the markets and smelled like baking baguette, and sounded like accordions in the Metro stations.

I will forget the crush of bodies on the trains and the body odor and the pickpockets, thieves, hustlers, junkies, and trinket hawkers in the tourist areas.

I will have forgotten the constant dog shit on the sidewalks and see only the groomed paths of Luxembourg Gardens, or the trees dappling the Jardin de Plantes.

Truth be told, I do wish to go back.

But I also wish to stay here.

I wish to stay here more.

At least for a while yet.

I need to get re-rooted.

I am feeling that it is happening.

I am committing to certain places on a weekly basis and seeing some faces that are becoming more familiar, and my coffee shop, Trouble, knows my name and order, and I get waved to by the barristas even when I am not going to get a cup.

I am seeing the glory of the light bouncing off the ocean and feeling the warm kiss of the sun, followed by the bite of the wind ushering in the autumn weather, oh it is coming.

I don’t want to be anywhere else.

I do want to continue exploring this space and this home and getting settled in.

I also want to commit to relationships, friendships, work.

I want to be a stable person.

I am done searching for what is already in front of me.

Me.

I am still uncomfortable at times, but taking some actions, everyday, even just little ones, pushes away those erstwhile reminders and I change how I see myself as I see myself reflected back so kind in the eyes of the people I am meeting out here.

To be told you are glowing is a nice thing.

And to be offered a ride home when you did not ride your bike is awesome.

Especially when it is from a woman I met just this last week.

I like that I am meeting people and being welcomed into the neighborhood.

I will go back to Paris, for a visit, to live, to study, who knows, retire, but it’s not now and I don’t foresee it being soon, just that it is still out there for me.

“Honey, Paris isn’t going anywhere,” she said to me as I sat on her couch and cried about having to leave.

Thing is I am not going anywhere either.

Paris gets to be over there and I get to be over here.

Still discovering all the things that I learned there which haven’t surfaced yet for me.

Last year at this time I was busy throwing it all at the board to see what was going to stick.

I had the goodbye to the city by the Bay.

I went and had my last moments in neighborhoods and beaches and captured sunsets and cried on friends shoulders and jumped up and down with excitement and worry and wonder.

I was almost done working at the bike shop.

I was almost done with being me.

Or so I secretly hoped.

I did not pull a geographic, I took a leap of faith, I just thought I would be leaving a few parts of myself behind.

It all came with me.

And I can see in those first photographs how scared I was and how thrilled I was and how amazing it all was.

Reflecting, revelling really in my own fortune, looking around my little room here in the Outer Sunset at all the small pieces of Paris that I brought back.

The magenta bunny bank from the store in the Marais, the coffee mug from the Louvre with pens in it on my table, the maps of the Metro on my fridge, the magnets from the Musee D’Orsay and the Pompidou, the Musee Monet Marmottan, the posters from the book sellers on the Seine, The Bastille, with my short story in it, all the notebooks I filled up, the Jack-a-lope tattoo on my fore arm.

I brought me there and brought me back.

I am finally ok with that.

I did not fail.

Nope.

Look at all the things I did.

Reflect on that.