So Many Springs

It's still cold outside, when I take the dog out. The wind blows, and blows, and blows. We are deep in the heart of Spring, in this small corner of the world. Even Rat Cat hesitates to go out...those cupped ears catch the wind too well. And everyone moans and complains, as if we were stuck in Laura Ingalls Wilder's The Long, Dark, Cold, Harsh, Incredibly Long, We May Have To Eat Carrie, Winter. 

The sky was blue yesterday, with gale force winds to keep the chill up. I particularly love the feel of the wind on my skin, and in my hair. I am just not used to living in a mini-Chicago: I saw a full grown St. Bernard lifted off of his feet yesterday, and whip past, with his human holding tightly onto the leash. Max manages to keep himself on the ground by the fact that he is so close to it. While muscular and strong, he is quite the 'low rider,' and so he is an unnoticeable speed bump in the wind's path.

                                                       Max, in full 'speed bump' mode

And, like a friend I can't get rid of, my yearly sore throat has appeared, magically borne on the wind from the flowers and the thawing earth. I remember distinctly thinking, yesterday, about the day, 'the tickle' disappeared, along with the last day of cleaning the pool, and the last day of mowing the lawn. I remember the last fall twilight. I watched the stars rise, I had shorts on. I remember swimming on the last night I swam, the last time the pool was so warm, and the wind not so much, anymore. It was an incredible feeling, to be rocked by the dark, warm water and look up at the summer night, with the stars hung low, in the twilight fading, fading.

These memories survive. Others fade too quickly, whipped by the wind of bipolar change. But the feeling that I stand on the edge of summer, at the beginning of twilight, has never changed. It comes easily in the spring, the memory of the last days of summer.

Today is my brother, Marc's birthday! It's so cold that I had forgotten!

It Bugs Me

Getting over another Facebook post about how all military veterans are mentally ill and shouldn't have guns. Ok. I am all for gun reform. I am all for military veterans. And God forbid that being in a war, in whatever capacity, shouldn't change a person. It's going to, Ladies and Gents. It's called 'experience' and 'education.'

Just to clear up the nit picky stuff ahead of time.

And we certainly know where I stand on mental health diagnoses. What triggers fear for me? The implication that violent, killer predators are just your average Joe with a mental health diagnoses. This is called demonization, folks. It's called stereotyping. It's called prejudice.

Believe it or not, I am on the verge of dating. You know, a cup of coffee (what the hell else?) and some pleasant conversation, meeting people with common interests. Some of my friends tell me, "Don't tell them about all your issues up front." I don't, but have in the past, in the interest of education and advocacy about people with mental diagnoses.

What comes up, is a look at my Facebook page, with the little notation under "About," with a link to this blog. The manner in which I was raised, I am not sure that my diagnoses are an "issue." Anymore than my father's attendance at the "March on Washington" at Dr. King's invitation, so long ago. Believe it or not, my father's participation in that famous event, in the past, has lost me friends, and dates. I can't say that I regret those losses.

And I suppose, in a way, my friend is right. It's society's stage of development, the very reason I speak out, the fact that there is a terrible stigma associated with mental health diagnoses. I suppose that it would be like showing up on a date, with an extra finger on one hand. Only, somehow, we are "sneaky" about it...it doesn't show.

No, it's not something I want to bring to the conversation.  I am more advocate, than agitator. Education, and not aggression, is needed. However, I would not invite someone to inspect my appendectomy scar...TMI, Ladies and Gentlemen. Too much Information.  And yes, there is that slight nod to, 'what is expected.'

It's the turn of the century version of a '60's mindset. "We lay our cards out front, so there is no excuse for confrontation or suspicion, later." Transparency is the term today. It's the subject of I'm Ok, You're Ok, which was a definitive book in the '70's. "Let it all hang out" has become, "Let your freak flag fly."

Now that I have that off of my chest: I am simply going to enjoy several cups of coffee with possible friends. I am not my diagnoses, although there can be amazing gifts to a 'disorder,' there can also be unimaginable pain. But there is always Me down in there. The Me that almost everyone else has, excepting Karl Rove.

A Thousand Suns

After a wild and crazy 5 inches of snow, I wait to see what today will be like. It turned to beautiful yesterday, with the bluest of skies, but windy. The wind blew from the north, and then the south, the south, and then the north. Dark clouds appeared, and broke before the sun. Then the sun disappeared behind dark clouds...the unicorn herds move too swiftly for the cats to hunt. And the wind blows, and blows, and skitters, and wraps around the tree tops and spins them. Scarves are twisted up into the sky, along with hair, and faces are turned left, right, to face and unface the wind.

The wind forms eddies, to snatch hats from heads, and conspires to lift my own self above the ground. Leaves are everywhere in the yard, they bang against the dog on his lead, and cover my face when I go out. There are millions of leaves, and each one raked, returns to it's place every night, or closer to the door, where they crouch like hungry mice trying to get in. The cats chase them, or hurry past, as if they were beggars on the street.

The ground is wet, and covers shoes, and ramps, and sidewalks. Pieces of snow still piled here and there, white and mud colored in the field, grey in the City. Rampant water, the snow melt, flows over everything, and the sun shines too bright, glinting, yes, actual glinting off of the snow, and the running water. There are a thousand suns.

Breath steams, or blows, or is taken by the wind. The tulips and trees drink and drink and drink more. Sometimes I step out, and return to take off, or to add a scarf, or a coat. Sometimes my feet freeze but I only wear a shirt and a scarf. The wind dries the land, but there is always more water, running in streamlets down the buildings and cars, across the ground. It pools in hollows.  The dog walks through a small lake to get to high ground, under his tree. The pool fills with snow and sleet and rain.

And the dog wants out now, into the dawn, and the first glimmer and the cats huddle next to the heater. I sit here with my coffee, and wait for the sun.

Error in Music

I realize that most of my posts are simply read by my friends, and I don't mean to alarm anyone. I would like to think this blog is read far and wide by people who: have been diagnosed with a mental health issue, or have been raped, or are in recovery. But it's simply not true, unless my stats are lying to me.

However, I do continue to post in the hopes that someone will be helped, in some small way, by my words. Either those with a diagnoses, or friends and family of those who have been diagnosed. It eases some portion of the pain to write, and be read.

I realize most of my problems don't show in my everyday life. That's why they are invisible disabilities. And I walk a fine line in this blog to keep from being committed, or have some other horrible action taken, which is society's current answer to a mental health diagnoses. Too, there are friends I adore, that I really have no wish to alarm. But shit happens in a mental illness kind of way sometimes, and I have become careless this winter. I am simply not taking care of my physical body. And I can beat myself over the head with that fact and still do nothing to take care of it.

I wait for a sign of some sort. I listen to invisible music, hold my instrument, wait for the interval to come to make it speak. I have listened to this cosmic music, and wonder if anyone else hears it. I know now, that others do hear it.

Meanwhile, as I wait, and whisper to the musicians on each side of me,  I wait to take my pills, I wait to walk the dog, I wait to eat as I know I should eat, until the signal comes. But I was only partially able to wait to cut, and I wait to drink, with no feeling of having any time in sobriety behind me now. And I do have that time behind me. But everyday, I wake from dreams of drinking, and I am born down with the burden of it. I do see that my Higher Power keeps sending them to me, to keep from being tempted. My support network is all that I could ask for, and more. And today, I am determined, and ask that the disease be lifted from me. Every night, I crawl into bed and thank whatever rules me that it has taken my burdens away for that day.

Although I cut one night, the next night I acted against the current of the music, and spent an evening with friends. I did not feel like being happy, cheerful, whatever. It's not that I don't want to be happy; it's that I feel I don't deserve it, as a Bubba pointed out to me, long ago.

There is this beautiful day, today, complete with snow. I want to go to the food bank, but don't even know yet if they will be open. I don't want to take my pills, but will. I didn't want to eat well, but did. The pause in the music, although it overwhelms me by its own beauty, cannot last as long as I may like... 

TRIGGER, TRIGGER, Saturday

It's happening again. I am becoming paranoid. I wrote a friend this morning, something coalesced for me. The last time in my life I kept waking at a ridiculous time and drinking massive amounts of caffeine and eating sugar, my mother was dying. I have to find out what is triggering this kind of stress in my life.

On one hand, my mother asked me to single-handedly help her 'into death.' And at this time, I feel I am being asked to participate in a project too big for me to handle. Borderline people show signs of extreme stress when they think that the load of what they are responsible for, is being increased. I AM trying to think of a better sentence in English to explain it. But I fail.

It looks like another talk this morning with my therapist, and my sponsor, and thank god I have an appointment with my psychiatrist, soon. In group, I am taught that perception is what it is all about. My interpretation of an event(s), makes, shapes my world.

Big things are going on in the life of a friend. I am being asked to invest. I feel I can't say no. Voila. Illness. And this morning, I feel the full realization and weight of my diagnoses. I feel sick as shit. I wait patiently, and not so patiently, but forcibly, for the rest of my support network to wake up, so I can talk to someone. It's just my illness. It is terrible at this hour. But I can't keep my support without consideration that my support network sleeps normally. I have to wait. Somehow, for the next three hours, I must keep from cutting, or drinking.

It really is that bad right now. I want to cry. I am crying. Suddenly, every character defect and every fear of abandonment, is right here with me. I am overwhelmed, and I wish I could call someone. I realize that I don't have to 'past trip' as my therapist calls it, to realize I am caught in a pattern from the past.

Does my 'bestest' friend love me? Will she tell me this morning, she just can't live with my disorders any more?

I just cut. Can I call my therapist now?

Sweetening Toward Spring

Nothing is more life-affirming than a good round of applause. The reading at Liminal went well, last night. I am decided that I have removed myself from the Arts scene in this small corner of the world, quite long enough...The withdrawal started with my Father's passing. It's full time to move on.

We wait for the snow again;  what a Spring this is turning out to be! The animals sleep softly, although Georgia is up and about. I have just played Chopin's "Berceuse, Op 57" for the dog, and was going back to sleep, but remembered that you wait here for me. 

I see more pink trees around me, everyday. It was tulip trees, last night, in the twilight, ghostly. They are my favorites, and I had one at the Old House. I can only hope that last night's frigid temperatures won't harm them.

 I love trees, especially to hold one, feel the bark, and stand on the roots. I have been healed more than once, since childhood, by standing on tree roots. They have an electric feel to them, that is soft and strong and gentle. In the winter, trees are iron sharp, cutting the land. In spring, they are softer, and float in a green mist. I have forgot, this long winter, that sometimes the mist is also pink, purple and white.

So, today, I can float on my feelings, and the knowledge of the coming of Spring; although I don't have a feel for the Spring, yet. I hope it comes soon.

You Hate This Title

I am reading at Liminal: An Alternative Artspace tonight, at 5:30 for the Roanoke peeps. Make note that the address is 302 Campbell Ave. SE, not SW. So, it's not down by 3rd St., but in the opposite direction...over the railroad tracks, down by the railyard. Yeah, yeah, where the hookers hang...

I am moderately nervous. By the time I graduated Hollins University, I had been taught to read aloud, and practiced it a lot. But it's been a while. I know things will go just fine however...a few of my friends have promised to be there...I'll be reading to a small sea of loving faces. What could be better?

I'll let the rest of you know how it went, tomorrow. That's barring loss of limb, tonight, as Sev Snape said. Meanwhile, I don't have much this morning. Last night I proved again that I cannot have chocolate in the house without eating it. The dog, cats and I slept ok, what there was of it. And I am planning to start my day soon.

I hang on until I see my shrink again. He reduced my Prozac in February, because I had the stupid idea that I felt just fine. You've heard that joke...I feel fine, why take my meds? And I regret telling him I felt good. He won't just put me back on a higher dosage for fear he will trigger one of my disorders. It's much easier for me to just be miserable. It's a hard job for him.

It's already a struggle with my love/hate thing going on, but then I want him to micromanage my meds, which he just can't/won't do. He is a stable force in my life and very qualified for his job. Although being stable makes him supremely irritating at times.

I have one friend who is a very stabilizing influence in my life: Dark Star. But she is so loving and charming and compassionate, I never feel irritated at her. I am, like Anne Boleyn, "Most Fortunate" in this friendship.

One of the 'Borderline' books I have read suggest every person with bpd (Borderline Personality Disorder) have as many such stable relationships as they can. This is a joke. Not too many volatile, emotionally unstable people who form intense love/hate relationships, attract very stable people. It's a lot of bother, in the first place, and can run the gamut of intense suspicion and paranoia, to idealization of that friend. Just sloppin' over with love...and then there is being impulsive. Combined with bipolar, it can reach extremes. One Hollins alumna took a trip to Turkey to get a tattoo. It's something like that.

I once went to Scotland, on impulse. Nothing could keep me from it. Great experience but rather frightening for my brother, who I dragged along. And we toured Scotland from Edinburgh, to the Orkneys, to the Western Isles at break neck speed. We landed in Edinburgh, spent the day in travel to Inverness (our base) and spent the next day in travel to Orkney. By then, I had triggered mania, borderline and my PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder.)

We had an absolutely wonderful, life-altering time, but my poor brother Marc, got the worst of it. By the last day, I had pulled a hamstring and ate an entire pound of fudge by myself. It was destined for my sister-in-law, but never made it home.

Life can be that topsy-turvy. And thank God I wasn't drinking! It would have been much more impulsive. The worse part about it is, I used to think that, when I was impulsive, it was a 'sending' from God to do something or say some particular thing. That was a disaster.

I say the most provoking things, or contact friends on impulse, at work or wherever, without considering the consequences first. It must be from God, I thought! I have learned from the results, and years of therapy, that anything I do on impulse, is WRONG. It's hard to describe the heartache...

But these things pass. It is Spring now, and more spring-like than it has been in years. Cool and misty outside today, where the skies are bluest of blue, and yet, the morning dew hangs in the air. It's too cool for the cats, I have decided...on this day of excitement and the resultant paranoia, they will just have to stay in. I am afraid on this beautiful day.

The Bellwether

I know! I'm late!

But after a 3 am binge on doughnuts, (borderline), I went back to sleep. So, now, I run to catch up. It's amazes me how far behind I am, waking at a normal hour. How do everyday people do it?

Speaking of the binge: I am a train wreck in progress. The psychotropic drug I am taking, Abilify, can put weight on me, as a side effect. Gaining weight is one thing I will not do. Meanwhile, I am binging on doughnuts and cake, ice cream, gaining weight and blaming the pills. So I can go back to being miserable? You see what my long suffering shrink puts up with?

I don't eat or exercise as he has taught me; I don't want to take the anti-Evil pills. This is one of the few things I am taught that I have a choice over. That binging is a symptom of borderline personality disorder, doesn't/can't figure into it. I know I should be med compliant, and eat and exercise 'right', but I sometimes don't. Sometimes, I think I self mutilate this way...

It doesn't help that America seems to be on the same diet as I am. But, that's just an excuse. As a person in recovery, I should look at how I am responsible...that's my first 'should' on myself today. Ok, I am going to start this morning over...

So it's time to talk about the real world: I have been out this morning, on this first day of Spring. In this small corner of the world, it's chilly, as it should be. There is a fine mist on everything, and it is weather that horses are most frisky in. The cats are eager to hunt unicorns; the herds migrate north at this time of year. Each blade of grass, still winter colored, is laden with dew, since the wind has died during the night. The glass door to the outside is coated with moisture, where the cool air meets the warm. The dog is sleeping peacefully now, having gone out and come back.

Minkins stays out later and later in the morning. He is a good bellwether of what it will be like today. He knows it's Spring.

The Edge of Tuesday

I haven't really had enough coffee yet, so forgive me if I fall asleep sometime while posting...I ran into a blog last night, about Steubenville again, called: "Black Girl Dangerous". I am going to give you the link here, because her writing style and content is simply amazing: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Black-Girl-Dangerous/184890874945927

Good luck following that link. I told you it was early.

Of course, I don't want to have to pay the price she must have, as a lesbian, black chick, but I would love to write the way she does. She has a brilliance and a fire I haven't seen since I first read Toni Morrison in Beloved.

Getting to see my therapist yesterday, was a stunning feat for me. I couldn't manage a shower, but I did take the anti-Evil pills, and ate. But this is why I do therapy. I found out that I can change my own mind and the way I think if my therapist helps me re-think. So, sometime this morning, I will take a shower and act as if I were an 'everyday' person and run errands. At least, those are my plans. Not very exciting I know. But it is soothing to concentrate on the most ordinary of tasks sometimes, and draw the mind away from excitement. With the news coming out of our heartlands, Sandy Hook (remember that?) and Steubenville, I think we need less excitement, not more...

It truly is as if, as Jerold J. Kreisman, M.D. and Hal Strause suggested in their book, I Hate You, Don't Leave Me: Understanding the Borderline Personality, have suggested. That we have become a Borderline Society, scrabbling at the sides of the well we have fallen into; afraid of abandonment, or separation, real or imagined. We are impulsive: it takes a lot of that kind of thinking to send a death threat to a 16 year old girl, who did nothing to merit that kind of attention. We are intense: idealizing the 'new love' in our lives, Sandy Hook, Steubenville, guns, and then demonizing them. I could go on all day about our illnesses, the rape culture, the gun culture, the prison culture, we live in. We are a mess, and it's going to take some long haul work to straighten us out. But if I can do it, anyone can.


But let's turn our mind away from 'The World' for a moment. Everyone needs a time of reflection during one's awake time. It is a deep spring in this small corner of the world. Just last summer, I was hoping for the kind of spring we used to have before climate change started kicking our butt; the kind of spring we are having this year. It is cold and blustery, well into March, although the ground is softening under the rain. The daffodils are long since up, and yesterday-and I have saved this in my memory for you here-I saw two, unashamedly pink trees. They are glorious: I am holding them in my eyes until the trees around my yard start assuming color. And the pool outside is more like a pond than any other time of year. I simply wait for the frogs.

Some nocturnal creature has chewed a hole in the bag of trash I set out last night. Most likely, it is a raccoon. The rain is supposed to clear up sometime today, but the March winds will be blowing a storm our way. I love the wind driving the clouds and rain before it. It would simply be more pleasant at a warmer temperature. I hold onto the thought that this year perhaps, as a fluke, we do not go back into a drought, with derechos, and storms of that order.

It is much simpler to wish for a more ordered Universe...one we see in our mind's eye as safer, more perfect, than what we have today. I particularly long for a remembered Easter, in my grandparents' back yard. I have a distant memory: of a new pink dress, and white gloves, of a blooming dogwood, and grass emerald. Of my brother's hair, shining in the sunlight and his blue suit the same color as his eyes. It is a memory before alcohol, rapes, creative, mental disorders: there are two small baskets waiting for us in the house. My father is taking pictures of us, wandering around on the grass, like two small calves bathing in the sunlight. My mother is beautiful, like a Spanish princess with her red lips, like my father used to say.


You should know by now, from too many sources over the centuries to list here, that rebirth is possible only through change and struggle. So take deep breaths, the Quickening is started.

Don't Panic*

To my regular readers: Don't Panic.* I have changed the look of my blog because I was bored silly with the windmill, and it's my blog. And I know, I know, what's with the posting at night time? I can hear you asking, "Are we still going to get our 4 am posts?"

Yes, you will! You know how much I love our time together, and just because I finally went to my therapist today, after a small hiatus, never fear. I am still taking my anti-Evil pills and the unicorn meat eating cats are still breathing on my fingers, as I write.

I have just decided that I need some golden color in my life. I hope you don't mind. The unicorn meat eating cats, the one cat still on ostrich meat, all voted for a golden, bubbley background, with the dog voting for green.

Then we tried the green and I almost got a hernia getting the text back to black. It was woeful. And pink was right out.#  So I have stopped my efforts at this point, to keep from deleting my blog altogether...and in my own borderline way, I really do hope you don't mind. I lost so many of you when I went from my old blog, Whisper of Fields to Fields of the Mind.

Well, it's time to kick back, and watch the teev. I will see you in 6 hours...I'll bring the cigarettes if you have coffee...

*Douglas Adams
#Monty Python

Steubenville

I am disturbed this morning by some news that I would like to share with you. I don't know if you have heard of Steubenville, Ohio, but I would like to tell you about it.

Once upon a time, there was a party composed of drunk teenagers, who had learned not to drink and drive. What they hadn't learned was: what rape is. The boys involved in the rape of a 16 year old, teenagers themselves, were convicted as juveniles, of rape.

Now, this is disturbing for everyone involved, as well as those who just read about it. But, the rape hasn't ended yet. Jane Doe/Steubenville is now receiving death threats.

So now this issue is about the adults in the case: the adults before, beyond, and in charge of the boys, the families. They are sending death threats to a rape victim, just in case she hasn't had enough.

This is disturbing enough in so many ways. But what bothers me at this hour of the morning is seeing some posts on Facebook addressed to Kimberley A. Johnson, who is a women's rights advocate from California. Apparently, she too, is appalled that adults and family and friends of the convicted rapists are sending death threats to Jane Doe/Steubensville.

In the middle of a discussion on rape and rape culture, one man, we'll call him Tomm, cause that's his name, pulled the "You gotta pay for it" card. He asked if women could be convicted of rape under the same conditions. Of course they can, was Kimberley's reply.

His response goes on, though: 'Are ya sure? Cause if you want equal rights, you know we'll hold you to the same standard...' I am paraphrasing here.

Apparently Tomm thinks that we love the convenience of Ladies' Nights at bars so much, and hold the tradition of having doors opened for us, (except in any real way) so tightly, and we are so frightened of being held accountable under the law, that we will give up equal consideration under the Law for it.

Bring it out into the sunlight, Tomm!

Just say what you are thinking: That the threat, and it is phrased as a threat, of Equal Rights is just too much for us to handle in this great big, bad world. Why, if women were held accountable under the Law, common courtesy and the lovely tenets of the world we live in would just crumble! 'Equal pay for equal work means no frilly skirts and lipstick, you ladies know you just love lipstick: it's a dog eat dog world out there, and you ladies just couldn't handle it. ' Again I am extrapolating from his word and tone.

That many women deal with issues too much for many, is part of the picture that Tomm doesn't get. Golly Gee, Batman! The world he is defending never existed. Women and rape and violence have co-existed with all of Humanity. For every '50's housewife and Victorian 'Lady' protected by common assumptions of what society should be, there was always another in mortal danger to being raped and beaten everyday. Because there was no Equality under the Law.

That is what I am tired of hearing: that women, given the choice of wearing lipstick and pencil skirts, and having equal rights, SHOULD choose the lipstick, every time. Why, what would this world be, if we valued women's gifts?

And I have no pretty thoughts today, although I feel fine. I just hold an anonymous 16 year old in my thoughts, who has learned too early just how despicable some people can be. She is now serving a life sentence for rape. Apparently, some people would like it to be a short one.

St. Patrick's Day

I never celebrated St. Patrick's Day growing up, and didn't as an adult, until I found out that he was Scottish. Now, it's the time of the wearin' of the green! Have at it...and drink a green beer for me.

I missed my therapy session this week, yesterday, in fact. I just could not leave the house. Isolation is common for those with bpd (borderline personality disorder.) And I am showing classic symptoms this week. But I did take my anti-evil pills, and got a shower, both of which are the biggest hurdles to my morning. So, there is that.

In other news, it is shaping up to be a fine, Irish/Scottish day...warm with rain. Although the warm part is iffy...I have visited Scotland in March and there is nothing warm about it. For those who have not been able to make it 'home,' it is easy to see why so many Scot and Irish folk got to the foot of the Blue Ridge and Appalachian mountains, and decided to settle. It is so like to Scotland in this small corner of the world.

In the real world, the cats have settled down, like a coating of dust on fine wood. They always get stirred up when I wake, but quiet down if I don't let them out. And it is not so warm as all that. I am caught changing out the winter clothes for the summer, and they have made beds on the clothes where they could. I have shared my breakfast with the dog...he loves bananas.

There is no fine mist of green on the trees, yet. But the tulips are coming up and the daffodils came up two weeks ago. The pool outside my door once again resembles a pond, although it has not birthed any frogs as yet, and there are less leaves in it than last year. And while the grass is green in Scotland, year round, ours is still winter gold shot with green, as it gets in the winter. The shadows of the trees are softer now, not iron sharp. Everything drips with moisture, as it should here, but has not been, with climate change. We hope again for a summer filled with rainy days and summer clouds. Enough rain to feed the tomatoes and enough sun to help them.

Soon, it will officially be spring, and we will celebrate Easter. Persephone will come out of Hades, where she lives with her lord, and reside again with her mother, bringing flowers and food crops and fruit.

Here's hoping you can make it out of your own house, on this day, on this preliminary celebration of spring.

Whistling my Whims

Now that the weather has dipped back into winter for a day...it snowed yesterday in this small corner of the world, the unicorn meat eating cats are back in hibernation. Which is quite all right with me. I love having them around this early in the morning, even if they are asleep. Of course the dog, Max, is asleep. He is so over rolling out of bed when I wake up.

Let's see how the new Vicar of Christ shapes up. Really, the Congress and Catholicism both need purging at the highest levels...their adherents deserve it.

Yesterday was a challenge in so many ways. Still exhausted from this syndrome I associate as a physical manifestation of PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), it was group therapy day for Borderline Personality Disorder. I personally love this group of women. The first thing we do is Now time. Sometimes we play games, but yesterday we colored mandalas with crayons. I am moved enough by the design that I picked that I plan to finish it with pencils.

It seems silly, doesn't it? A group of grown women, with a host of life problems, coloring as therapy. It's not silly though. Most always, Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) is acquired through molestation, or abandonment, in childhood. These women are subsequently challenged, their entire lives, to find and have normal relations with other people.

So, while we color, we are in the here and now, and we are also all children together again. I cannot tell you how deeply I care for these women. Or how much stigma we face because of our diagnoses. I have seen even health care professionals recoil when I filled them in.

I know when I was first diagnosed, my reaction was, "What, something else to deal with?" and "O, my god, am I that monstrous?" Now that I have done my research on the disorder, I realize it is not such a bad thing to be. There are so many other diagnoses and disorders that I could be, but am not. And those are the ones I fear now: sociopath, narcissist, etc.

I have yet to master the swing of bi-polar disorder, with the PTSD, and the BPD...I can't tell where one ends and the next one begins.

All I know is that they can be managed, theoretically, with the help of this group and a sterling support network. I am so very fortunate that way, in my support. I have an AA sponsor, who is well-read and thoughtful. She is a rock. My best friend Dark Star, of Dark Star and Schrodinger fame, is startlingly intelligent and compassionate: she will drop everything to talk for a bit when I am at my worst. I have my groups, AA and BPD, at my back. And then my therapist, who has gone to the trouble to take hundreds of hours of classes, and to specialize in the treatment of, BPD.

There is also a man who does not get enough praise from me: my psychiatrist, my shrink; although he is certainly not looking for praise or credit. I have felt and spoken bitterly about and to this man...we'll call him G2. But he has a marvelous sense of humor, and I am grateful that he lets my sometimes unendurable criticism roll off of him, like water off of a duck's back. I am lucky that he is patient and kind, in a world where so many aren't.

I don't know from where all this gratitude has come this morning. Really, I am much more hard-bitten, and bitter when one meets me in person. A cynic, in all her glory. But perhaps the spring rains are softening more than my flower beds.

There will come soft rains and the smell of the ground,
And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;
And frogs in the pools singing at night,
And wild plum trees in tremulous white;
Robins will wear their feathery fire,
Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire;
And not one will know of the war, not one
Will care at last when it is done.
Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree,
If mankind perished utterly;

And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn
Would scarcely know that we were gone."

Sara Teasdale

Bah humbug.
Tomorrow.

Oh, That Thing

Well, I figured out my downswing and complete fatigue yesterday, when I developed the bumps and sensitive spots in and around my mouth that signal fever blisters and canker sores, all at the same time. Now, it's not very pleasant to discuss, but I am determined to be frank with you. And if I am helping anyone with this blog, I want to be factual. Even if it's a bit uncalled for at this hour of the morning.
It explains the chills, the fatigue, the stomach twists, and the emotional upheaval. I woke up with the thought, "Oh, it's that thing!"

Now for the important news. I am considering fostering kittens sometime in the near future. I may end up not going through with it, of course, but it is Spring, and that means tons of unwanted kittens and puppies at the local pound and shelters. If I feel that I just can't foster, then I will substitute my time with donations of litter and scoops, and towels and blankets, and paper towels, etc...all the things that small bunches of very tiny kittens need, to be comfortable.

I don't deny that I am a cat person, who had a dog donated to her, long ago. He was trained as a service animal. That was the love of my life, Eddie. But still, I remain a cat person. Besides the fact that they are as cute as 'all get out' I love the way they take to a litter box from the very beginning. Dogs must be housebroken, or trained to 'go' outside, but cats? No, no. It's just natural. How adorable is that?

The fact that they can squeeze into the space between the ceiling tiles and the floorboards of the next story to the point where they can't be gotten out, is purely apocryphal in nature...they can squeeze into many spaces that are smaller than their volume, and hold a special fascination for physicists that way, or so I am told. And how cute that, when they discover they cannot get out, they meow helplessly, for hours, ever increasing in volume the closer one's hand gets.

They show their finest at that hour. No amount of food and water can tempt them. They are suddenly on a diet. It is an exercise in futility, and the result is skinned and bloodied hands, and a blood pressure reading that would land one in the hospital. The resultant relief of 'getting them out,' is tempered by their climbing the tallest tree in the neighborhood the next time they are let out. Usually that day. Nay, even that hour they are freed. And there they sit, once more on a diet.

Having a kitten, or multiples thereof, in the house is much the same, only they can squeeze into even tighter spaces. Any cat aficionado knows that their cries are louder in proportion, the smaller they get. Their teeth are also infinitely sharper, needle-like, in fact. I admire also, that kittens have no fear of anything on the earth, except being plainly in the open, where I can see them, and an overwhelming curiosity to boot. That is, the smaller the kitten, the more they turn into what I like to call, "Danger Dan."
And I purely love the impulse that makes their day start at 2 am, and end at never, o'clock. Until that time it is, to go to bed, which is only when you are not there. They are small springs, covered with fur and entirely run by air-power.

I am hoping the day is spring like enough for me to want to wander out. I have to go out this morning, and all that's lacking is the will to do so. There is that.

Until tomorrow.

Share and Enjoy*

It's hard to wake and have to call my therapist in the morning. Some stress relief, in the form of tears and bad dreams hit me last night, and I am still trying to figure it all out. After all, it was a very happy day, being what would have been Douglas Adams 61st birthday, and recognized by Google and various pages on Facebook and whatnot.

It's almost, but not quite, like it's not Spring. Usually I save my crying jags for the middle of winter, or for the consumption of too much caffeine (every day), or lack of sleep (doesn't happen). But this has set in out of nowhere, and right as I plan to change my winter clothes out for my cheerful summer clothes...

But I have not, as they say, been med compliant, and so should expect something like this. All that means is I haven't been taking the anti-Evil pill as I should, and some mood yo-yo is what I get for not following my psychiatrist's directions. On the other hand, in the spirit of Douglas Adams, why my doctors think I am going to lay down and take everything they give me, exactly as prescribed, is beyond me. Share and Enjoy.*

I bet they wouldn't.

But instead of "I should" on myself today, I am just going to let myself feel what I will feel, and let it go at that. Everyone has down days and a very wise man told me one time: "Everyone has nights where they lie awake at night and think over their regrets..."  My therapist is going to tell me the same thing...feel what I will, and do something to cheer myself along.

At the moment, it's writing to you, and the scent of the lilac candle on my bedside table, and Ratty and Max relaxing on the bed...I'm facing the hurdles of bathing and pill-taking at 8 am, but won't think of them now that I am here with you.

The skies are darker in the mornings now that the time has changed, and that suits me just as well. It might rain today and that is acceptable, too. It will be a Spring rain, with not too much cold in it. It's softening the flower and vegetable beds up for planting, and I can dream some more about flowers.

*Douglas Adams

Diet Adult Content

Good morning and welcome to this small corner of the world: important news first. The unicorn meat eating cats are excited about the warming temperatures and the daffodils are up. My fingers itch to plant something, but I know it won't be until next month...the ground needs to warm a bit. But I can see the colors and the green mist that floats above the trees.

I had a dream the other night about how Jean Luc Picard helped Harry Potter overcome Lord Voldemort. We all celebrated with shots in an airport. If you are new here, I am in recovery. What is bothersome about a drinking dream...almost all alcoholics in recovery have them, is this: it is just like drinking. I have gotten drunk in some of my dreams. I have chosen and not chosen to drink in the dreams. Sometimes I 'wake up', in the dream itself, to find a beer in my hand, having just taken a sip. At other times, I decide to take a shot, neat.

Now, they used to be so real that I woke and looked around to see if I really had been drinking. Were there cans or a bottle on my bedside table? I would search the house, convinced I had drank. Now, when I have drinking dreams, I know when I wake that I have not been drinking. In my dream, I know that I dream.

I don't know what that portends, to know I dream, and choose to drink, anyway. I have been viewing it as a dire warning, meriting discussion with my therapist and my sponsor. I don't know of anyone else who drinks subconsciously, but maybe you know. Any ideas?

Drinking dreams seem to be standard fare for all alcoholics in recovery. It has nothing to do with my psychiatric diagnoses, I don't think. Speaking of, that seems to have leveled out a bit. I am happily enjoying the effects of less paranoia, and less happily, the ensuing weight gain. Be happy, and easier to live with, and be fat, and have problems with my sex life? And by "easier to live with", I mean to have friends. There is nothing like a blast of paranoia radiating out of my apartment to scare friends and foes alike. It is agony, and I have begged, almost on my knees, for my psychiatrist to end the ordeal.

With this new-to-me medication, it controls the symptoms, but doesn't eliminate them. I have much smaller attacks of paranoia, and less of an idea that the world is out to get me. I suffered one recently, and it is listed on my posts as "Storm on the North Sea." That is a small attack, calling the police and checking reality with a friend...that is all beside the racing thoughts, and the desperation; to not even know I am insane, having insane ideas...it all seems routine.

Then there is this relief, this pill that stops some of it, but adds some serious problems. It doesn't stop my sex drive, but stops me from relieving it...and the horrible and instant weight gain.

Now I will be frank: I have been having problems with eating since last November. I will actually wake myself eating...how is that for a dream state? And I have been trying to surrender to the power of food. There is one Overeater's Anonymous in this small corner of the world, and I may have to search them out. Add that to the sprained ankle in October, and I have a recipe for disaster.

But, today is new. Actually it's newer than I would like; it's an outrageous hour to wake up, and the dog objects mightily. There is no more sweets to eat in the apartment, I took care of that last night, and I am not planning to get any more. Like everything else, I will have to take it one small step at a time. Hand over my love of sweets to my Higher Power, and concentrate on being the best me I can, today.

I will close with an update. Ratty has gone insane with Spring fever and just finished serenading me, very loudly, with his desires to go outside. Usually I ignore him at this hour, but just couldn't handle his song anymore and let him out. Georgia has her paw on the keyboard, and I am trying to keep her from writing for me. And Minkin has settled into his pet bed. The dog is waiting for me to turn out the light again, which will be later on this morning, as I settle back into this bad sleeping pattern. "9+-*" That's a quote directly from Georgia to let you know how she feels. And I agree wholeheartedly.

Change

Not only is there enough change in our world, but we must change something artificially, too. Of course, I am speaking of the time changing last night/this morning. Only on this day of the year, is my gift for waking in the wee hours welcome. Really, at 3 a.m. or 4 a.m., who the hell cares if the clock moves back or forward? If it happened during nap time, in the middle of the day, it would be a whole different story...

Only the promise of more daylight in the evening gets most folks to change their clocks. Although if you live in Arizona, it is not enough of an incentive. They do not change their time, but sit and wait for the rest of the U.S. to change back. How fun is that?

As I have stated before, February is really Spring for me, and I plan my small garden. Although I fall back on old favorites every year, daisies, lavender, impatiens, I like to play around with growing something a bit more exotic, if only in my mind. I love viney, climbey things: roses, bougainvillaea, wisteria, even ivy. And it's a good thing I love ivy, and moss, and impatiens, as I have a garden spot, just outside my door, that is perfect for all these shade lovers.

Of course, I miss the garden at the Old House, which was so established I didn't have to do anything to it...but now I have a chance to change around every year. I think I would like to change more, as I grow older, so it works for me.

I believe I have had enough coffee for this morning, and wonder when my friends on Facebook are planning to wake. Will they let themselves sleep in, or try to switch to the new time today? It's a toss up, really.

Path in the Forest

First, news of the real world. Maxwell, the smallish, happy mutt mix of my home, had a seizure yesterday. They aren't too bad, although I am speaking from this side of the fence. But they frighten him. He does manage to make it to the floor, and I hold him, as he trembles and licks his lips, and drools. In a small while, he acts as happy as he always does. He sleeps now, beside me.

At least I was able to be there for him, having just returned home. The unicorn meat eating cats are well, as always, although impatient, very, for the temperatures to rise, and the winds to subside. They know in their bones that spring is here. The very earth speaks to them, as does the geese flying over, headed north. That the weather frustrates them, is just something in their small cat lives, that they must live with.

The only light in Washington D.C. is the signing into law of the Violence Against Women Act. The expanded version, mind you.

*******
The floor of the grove is a long oval, set with the green grass of spring. It is spring. The sunlight is marvelously new, and clear and soft, almost white. Trees lean in overhead, I am enclosed in a green globe. The sun is coming up behind me, and shafts of light illuminate the Tree. It's a very old oak, and the bark is grey, at least in my remembrance. I tilt my head back to see the leaves far above me. But I am surrounded by leaves, of younger trees, vines, small bushes in the underbrush.

I look behind me, and see a small tunnel of vines, covered in greenery, and the hint of white blossoms. It is as if the grove has created a wedding bower, all on it's own. I was to find out later that the vines were tall enough to ride under them on a horse, and it was a delight to do so, many times.

I look toward the Oak again, and there is a small creek, at my left hand. Stunned by the quality of greens and gold,  I cannot move. Eventually, I walk over to a very large grapevine, which hangs suspended from the nearest trees. It is large enough, and bent, so that I can sit on it. A few steps more, and I am at the creek, which makes a placid sound. It is the voice of the creek I hear and it is a very small murmur. Moss coats the bank, and I look onto the sand and water-shaped rocks below. The scent of the forest rises from the creek, a loamy, leaf-ridden smell that reminds me of the scent of rain and snow.

I walk back to the vine, and carefully sink to the ground. I smile and pull in the clean air. Thoughts fade  as joy takes their place. I can stay here forever, in this green wildness. There is no path through it. The path passes by, up the hill, to the top of the mountain, preserving this spot. Could it be really true that, long ago, the whole world was like this?

But that the forest and the rocky path pass other places of beauty, there is none like this place. There is nothing like this whirl of spring color, with no flowers in sight. I see green, and gray, and gold sand. The wet leaves under the brush, gleam an earth brown, and the tunnel of vines holds only a promise of the hundreds of white and pink blossoms that will bloom later, when the blackberry blooms.

The blue sky is irrelevant here. There is only this green, and the morning light. Here, in this small corner of the world, are green places that you cannot be separated from. Take refuge, and listen to the sounds of birds carried by the wind.

This Wood in Light

I am at the end of a very long day. Lean in, so I can feel your breath on my cheek. I want to whisper in your ear...

It's not been a day for drink, or drugs. It's not been a day for fun, either. It's just been a long, long day. I know when the time changes the day will go quickly, and that is soon enough. It's just that no time change, or spring or end of winter, can alter today.

I know some pills that would make this mood more bearable, but it's not even an option. The next best thing is some coffee ice cream at the local store. It's a mile away through a dark, cold night. I would like a text from my therapist, but will have to do without. It's been a very long day for him too, evidently.

The Next Morning:

I did get my ice cream. It wasn't all that cold...32F. By Sunday it's supposed to be 66F in this small corner of the world. And that, Ladies and Gentlemen, is Spring.

After the emergency yesterday, I am left feeling ok; I am just waiting for my body to explode. The attendant symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) kept twinging on me. There are physical symptoms with PTSD. A multitude of them too many to list here. Some of mine include: shooting pains in my hands and head, pain at the nerve junctions in my mouth, chest pain. It feels as if a small but powerful electrode is searching here and there for weak spots from head to toe. In the ensuing days, I will develop: mouth sores, (inside and out), gastroenteritis, and more chest pains; maybe bronchitis. I might have another head spin; another attack of paranoia, racing thoughts and a flare up of my diagnoses.

So I am come here to lay all this on you. I search for words to tell you how I feel, and find myself frustrated. So I retreat to metaphors: storms, forests and fields. Because that is the best that I can do.

I had lived in darkness for several years, hiding in a room, when a woman took me in hand. She convinced me to walk across a field and over a hill. When we dropped down into the other side, we stood in a forest. I woke up as I walked onto a small, green space, which was bordered by a small creek, and protected by the hill. In front of us, was the largest tree I have ever met, in person. It would have taken five people, holding hands, to span it's trunk.

There will never be enough, or the right kind of words, to describe those moments in time, or how beautiful that place was. I stood stunned and astonished. I felt awe. I felt light as a bird, and my whole body opened, after years of being enclosed. I felt delight, as I feel it now, thinking of it. I have never been so overwhelmed by joy. It astonished me, this joy, and I knew I would be able to keep that memory, and emotion in my mind forever. I knew I would never have to leave.

I carry that memory into my work, when I write, for you, about the forest, and the fields behind my house. My delight is revealed in my description of the "unicorn meat eating" cats, and their adventures. I sit in this small corner of the world, and try to find the words to describe that moment. There is nothing I will not write about to bring to you the memory of that darkness, and the memory of the light in that woodland.

I bring you all of the words I heard as a child. So much of it is standard Romantic fare, high-flown and desperately in need of trimming. I bring you all of the movies and music and fantasy that I live in, silly as they may seem. I bring you my body, and my diagnoses, my therapists, and my shrink. Sometimes I drag the outside world, the headlines, in. Popular stories of the day, to try to stay relevant and earthbound.

To my delight, I still stand in that grove, where the darkness recedes. I pour the words on the page, and hope you find joy; I hope you find yourself; I hope you find help for a friend; I hope you find each other.

Mostly, I find myself, the most private of persons, and I stand vulnerable and open to your view. Every instinct and cultural more I have wants to hide everything. It is very difficult to stand open to investigation every day, hoping you will find something that you like, and take it home with you.

Because I am that grove, and that hill, and that tree. It was hidden then, and lives now only in me, a place of almost unendurable beauty, revealed for a small space of time on this world. Many groves and people like that exist, seemingly lost in the vastness and busyness of our lives, and of this world, so big and so full of people. Seemingly lost in time, as well. Because there are many lives that have remained unwritten, and will remain unwritten in the past, present and future.

I am here, I sit in this wood, and I try to open a window in time, to a day, and a place that exists, that is not present in the material world.

So, what I have come here and now to whisper to you is this. If I fail, then it is not for lack of trying. I cannot open myself more to the eye than I have, and remain an integrated soul. No more than the grove would survive by having ten thousand people walk through to admire it's beauty.

And if I succeed, which is every artist's desire, then in a small way, I have started your morning out well. I will receive validation...that the darkness did exist for a reason. And the pouring out of every particular of my life is worth it, if someone who is mentally 'ill', or a rape survivor, or alcoholic, drug addict, can take something away with them from this blog. If anyone at all can take something from my words, then the darkness is gone, and only the wood, and that morning in the sunlight, exists.

Imprint in the Forest

The unicorn meat eating cats are jockeying for position on my bed...I can tell that it snowed last night. They will sleep in a bit, when I stop moving them.

I have come out of my head spin. I loathe them, and can't escape. If life was like that everyday, I wouldn't survive...to go crazy and know it. To feel the edge of reason slip away, and know I now have no control over what and how I think...to see the storm coming, with no forest in sight.

I do have friends, who can accept insanity. They can watch me run for the edge of the forest. We discuss my gait and the wattage of the moonlight as it shines on the path. It is a difficult thing to do; it must be. I have lost friends over my madness. I imagine that they think that I can wrestle my thoughts from the whirlwind, or take a pill, or worse: to be shut up until it is over.

When I drink, the storms come in and out regularly, like tides. I was in one maelstrom for several years. It's like a handful of dried leaves to say that; the colors are lost, but the memory is golden, and burnt orange and red. Years. Years. Just like that.



I can read description after description of the effect of psychotropic medication, and they all say the same thing. It makes me want to laugh, "It is not known how (name of your favorite pharmaceutical) works." Suffice it to say that they work to some degree, as my therapist reminded me several days ago, but will not eliminate all the symptoms. I cannot, with all my art, tell you what, in his own voice kept me from letting the storm surge drag me down. The pull and delight of the wind is very strong, sometimes. I have to accept that. There is a point where I wish it weren't true. But, right now, sitting calm and rational in front of the computer, I can accept it, as evidence of the mystery.

What, you might be asking, are the aftereffects? Some that I love, hold me closer and dearer. I cling to them with all I have. Some who love me, move quietly away. I hope that I haven't lost the friend I obsessed over. But I truly don't know. I suppose that I will glean some clues from our future conversations. I don't really like to ask her how my insanity struck her.

Today, I will pour the anti-Evil pills, and think about not taking them before I swallow them. The gleaming teeth of the broken trees shine in the dark. There are small rustlings near the lady-slippers, and an imprint on the pine needles under the fern.

The Edge of a Small Field

The storm has passed in time for the actual snowstorm coming our way, toward this small corner of the world. The unicorn meat eating cats frantically go out and in, in and out; as if they know they will soon be all indoors. Ratty is awake with me now, content for once. He can howl as loud as Kerouac ever could.

I wish I felt new, after this latest storm, but I do feel clear, like the storm clouds leaving yesterday before the sun, to reveal a blue that I had forgotten. I love rain and snow. It's a real grief I can't hear the rain in my new apartment. But grinding gray skies, day after day, is too much. The only remedy yesterday, was some dark pink tulips, and yellow daffodils.

Gray skies like that remind me of ancient gods making weapons. The gold fields and the razor sharp shadows fill the fields with ominous signs. The trees are a refuge, as always, but now the underbrush is cold. In the fall, the underbrush is newly brown, and drips of moisture onto the dark, crisp leaves below. The naked shadows of the trees is new and their silhouettes are beautiful holding the stars in their hair. But now, I am desperate for the daffodils coming up eagerly, and the hyacinth, and all the spring flowers that herald the change.

There is no green mist. The green mist that hovers over the trees before the blossoms come out. How do people who live in large cities endure? It is no wonder to me that Detroit is falling, like some medieval city, to a neighboring king. I have seen pictures, and there is no green thing there that I can see. The city has ground down it's citizens with it's gray temperament, and now they have nothing to give it in relief.

I have been to the green places in Washington, D.C., but the gray winter has taken hold there. Freezing the hearts of a political party, so that they deny the old their food, and the young their caregivers. I, in my anger, roll the legends of the fall of Rome around in my hands. It is not as if the history of Rome is obscure in any way.

The Congress has forgot the end of the story...the bread and circuses, now with not even bread to appease the populi. They only remember the arrogance of the order that set the  last legion, onward to march as long as one man could move forward, to the ends of the earth. Which small village saw the last man lay the banner down? In what place had he eaten when his life overcame duty, and the pride of Rome?

I know Sequestering will affect me in real ways, the longer it goes. I have a food bank now, of which I am not ashamed. Desperate times call for desperate measures, as they say, and Congress has forgotten that, too. So I will have something to eat.

But after the storm of the last week, the prospect of facing lack of mental health care is truly frightening. Daily, psychologists already labor with very little compensation...and that's about to be cut, which is already down to the bone. My psychologist is a specialist, in Borderline Personality disorder, and should be coaching two people, at maximum. He is currently coaching fifteen, all women.

And while Spring in no way affects these burdens we all share, still it is something: to stand on the edge of a field on the edge of winter, and watch the small life come out to feed.

Monday Dreams on Sunday

To realize I am mad...means I am come back to reality for a moment. I reach for help, a hand to grasp, anything to keep from being drawn down further into the maelstrom. Nightmares beget dark imaginings. They don't go away when I wake up. I call a friend. I hope for an answer and receive reassurance. Meanwhile, I chat on Facebook to another friend. I am insane in my chats. I scrabble at the sides of a well, with no bucket or chain to grab hold of.

I call others to help me. Someone must offer reality. Someone tells me that my thoughts are delusional. It's not real. That is reality, but not for me. Surely my dark thoughts are more real than the truth. Coffee, breakfast, pills, shower: they whirl around me, demanding attention. I do not have it to give them...toss something overboard: breakfast, shower. I drink coffee and take my pills. Did I eat something, too? I can't remember. My body is not shaking. Maybe I ate something. Too much planning to take a shower, although there is a new shampoo I would like to try. Something I bought several days ago. It is a long time ago, now. And I am far away from it.

My madness, on chat with the same friend, reaches a fever that will not break. She has to get off of chat. She has things to do. I call someone else and cry over the phone. The world is mad, my street in particular, and nothing exists outside of my street. There are tasks to perform. If I drank, I wouldn't be able to make it. My success is problematic as it is.

I have spent many years in reality. It's like riding a bike. It requires a small trip down the road, with a bad tire on my car. Then I am back. My favorite thing to do in the morning: making my bed. It is tidy, but luxurious in it's own spartan way. A Queen retires to a nunnery. The bed and floor are plain, dark wood, and gray carpet, with the simplest of cream blankets. But there is a pink, silk pillow, and a silk embroidered footstool, and a lamp made of marble. Other dark woods gleam in the corners, concrete. Wood is as concrete as stone to me.

I still cannot take a shower. There is no reason to be so vulnerable. I layer up against the cool of my rooms. The kitchen is disorganized some. But everything is in it's place, where it needs to be. This week, there are lemons to put in my water, and the slice floats there, like a small whale sunning.

I put in "The Sorcerer's Stone". I call the friend I am having delusions about, that day. The soul I have picked to obsess on. It so happens it is someone thoroughly grounded in reality. I can hear my unreality babbling the details to her. I have to confess to hallucinations to keep from sounding insane. I tell her casually that I have contacted the authorities about them. I was treated courteously by them. A Queen in a nunnery, indeed.

No pill or therapist, or shower or pillow can help me now. I am alone on the phone. Is everything tidy? In case the authorities show up? Are my animals safe? Not too much on the carpet...I couldn't vacuum if I wanted to. I have been diligent. Not too much dust on the cherry wood, or the gray carpet. The heirlooms in the glass cabinet gleam as they have since the days when my mother gave them to me. I think I am surrounded by my mother, and settle in to watch Harry Potter's adventures.

It is too fraught with danger to light a candle. Did I eat something? I am not hungry. My stomach is full enough with the pills and the water. I interact with another household resident. He would understand how I feel if I let him know, but I hang onto what reality there is by chatting cheerily. It's not the world that is slanted, it's me. That has sunk in, after a week of denying it. Why stop taking my pills?

My therapist is upset I have contacted the authorities. Me, too.  We have to stay off the radar, really. How could I explain to them that I am not a danger to myself or others? Prisons are full of people gone mad. Is my apartment clean, in case my friend turns me in? Do I look like a Queen in a nunnery? I don't dare ask. Tidy some more, in case they show up. This is sanity, watching a movie and playing with the dog and the cats.

The storm subsides. Last night I dream of my weight problem. My pills turn everything to fat. That's why I stop taking them in the middle of the week. Med-compliant today. I eat nothing but peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and am sick of them. My stomach wants a banana and a boiled egg today. No bananas. There is a need for a shower today. After the boiled egg. On chat again. Others wake, and I am not alone.

Thank god today is Sunday...Harry Potter movies all day. I will tidy some more, and wash some dishes, so the apartment will be warm and steamy with it. It will smell cleaner.

Trying to assess damage today. I am able to write my blog, after two failed attempts yesterday. I will write two blogs today. I am more than normal.  

Storm on the North Sea

If I could think at this hour, I might have something profound to say. As it is, I simply want to wake up with you, have some coffee, and listen to the small, night sounds that are the unicorn meat eating cats way of being communal with me. Cats are pre-dawn feeders primarily, and the small crunches, as they eat, are counterpointed by the sound of the clock on the dresser. I hate those digital clocks...I like one with hands that makes a small, ticking sound.

And I desperately need a quiet morning for a change. The past few days, I have woken from nightmares, some remembered, some not. Yesterday, I had to call my therapist, instead of just texting him. Then my sponsor, and a friend...none of it could keep me from crashing onto the rocks like some lost wave. There are no sea birds on that ocean, and no life swimming below, just the everlasting deep. I tried to carry on my morning, and write my blog, and my delusional thinking and hallucinations followed me there. My shrink is in India.

Life turns into one slow, dragging step after another. I have to get up. I have to do certain tasks that day. Putting one foot in front of the other, turns into more than the cliched herculean problem. I am really moving underwater, torn from the rocks and shore, again and again. I perform my tasks, in what shape does not matter. I haven't had a shower in four days. I cannot bring myself to the effort it takes to groom, and be clean. I can't concentrate that much.

Now, I am the only sea bird alive on the rocks...I get up to shake the nest, tidying here and there, so I can enclose myself against the writhing waves below. You may get a laugh out of this, but the surest way to calm myself is to clean the apartment as best I can, and watch the Harry Potter series, one after the other. It is a continuity; it is reality, surrounded by the memories of Christmases past, spent with the dearest of friends.

It is a well-ordered and known universe. I can hold it at arm's length, and examine it. That makes it unlike my reality, which is seething and swirling around me. But if I pay enough attention to make the time pass, then the real world ceases to move quite so much. There is a small break in the storm, and I start climbing.

Last night, no nightmares to wake from. Not that I remember, just dreams that vaguely bother me, and reflect reality. I dreamed of a place in England that I saw on the computer...a vast estate, complete with follies, an owlry, and a dovecote. That is reality. The swirling sea is not. Not outwardly, anyway. I can climb away from the nightmares, and the storm.

Today, I may even take a shower.

In Like a Lion

I just can't tell you how happy I am that it is March.

And speaking of lions; I had a friend find a picture of Alan Rickman in the nude last night. And someone as sophisticated and professional as Mr. Rickman, is the definition of nude...not naked. Naked implies a vulnerability that belongs mainly to Americans. Any picture of Alan Rickman without clothing is a nude.  I know each of you that love his work, Jeannine. But the majority of people think of him as Hans Gruber from "Die Hard", that evil villain, or Severus Snape, from the Harry Potter series...consummate spy, noble lover, and the last person on any Earth to be caught with no clothes on. Professor Snape, with no clothes on, is naked. Hans Gruber, with no clothes on, is a nude.

I could wax on all day about this topic, but I know my audience consists of more people than Jeannine...so.

In another in like a lion: the Sequester is upon us. Looking at the effects in Virginia, what catches my eye is the cut in funding for meals for seniors. Damn all of Congress for their petty fogging, mind-blowing, f-idiocy! Really, folks: Damn them to Hell. Of course, the cuts in Head Start aren't going to make life easy for the low income parents who participate in this program. But who is Congress is thinking about low income citizens? It's absolutely amazing they passed the Violence Against Women Act. I suspect that it is because 55% of the population of the country are women, and women vote: at least, for now, they do. Apparently, Judge Scalia thinks all that is some kind of entitlement...

But, every morning, at some point, I have to let the world go. Nude, naked, the invulnerable, and the vulnerable...just for a time. Clouds are building up outside, but behind them the stars are bright. I can see them when the wind shifts a cloud for a moment...the Huntsman is a particular favorite. The trees are breathing now, rested, and ready for the tiny buds of that soft green I love. There is no other color I love so much than that pale green...I painted the floor in the Old House that color.

The daffodils, my favorite, are shyly up, and the hyacinths, as well. The tulips, another favorite, are showing their reds, and pinks, and yellows. I fall in love with them every year. The shadows of the trees are still sharp as an iron blade across the grass, covered with a frost. They say a storm is coming. A snow such as we in this smallish valley have not seen for years, and I live in anticipation.

This, then, is Spring!