Morning until night is not a problem. In the morning the sun comes up and the birds sing. Squirrels run across the roof. There are children's voices and the sound of doors opening and closing. At night there is the sound of stories being read. The leftover smell of dinner and the hum of the dishwasher. Failing light and soft wind. Or thunderous clouds spilling frozen rain.
Only the one day to the next is the problem. Are there numbers attached to the day? Are there words? Do the same things happen? If they don't, do you notice? How is this confusing? I can't make the words fit the meaning. There are stretches of time. Months even. They skitter across the calendar and bump into one another. They press their weight upon me. They squeeze the air from my lungs. And somehow people around me continue at a speed that makes sense and I am plowing through sludge. My feet stuck in treacle. In tar. Something thick and unpleasant. I move and there is only the hint of motion. Yet all around there is activity. And people's voices speaking of the wonders of the ordinary. The beauty of the routine. Simplicity that is beyond my reach. And the sun comes up and the sun goes down. And the only thing that happens is the lengthening of the things I Meant To Do. The Things About Which I Feel Guilt. This weight. The incredible weight of air as it pushes against the earth. Spinning me into the ground. Time is eating my words and soon it will swallow me too. I don't like the feeling. I want to rest. But rest doesn't work. Only fighting works. Only the long, punishing pugilism of beating back the beast. And I am so tired. Can't I appoint a champion? I will give my favor-- a sleeve or a scented handkerchief. I will watch from the stands and wave. Someone else can do this. I just need a rest. To step out of time and return without this sense of unreality. Maudlin. This is what five days of gray and rain can do. Gratefully: the sun came out at some point Daily Convexions: Absolute Squat (other than religiously taking my meds) My phone battery died some time. Didn't notice. Still afraid to open personal email. I should do that tonight. It is not going to get any more or less terrible.
Frickin' frackin' shoulder/neck still hurts. Apparently I should now try heat on it. We'll ses if that helps. It woke me up last night from stupid pain. And then I coughed a bunch and had trouble getting back to sleep. My smile muscles feel somewhat underutilized. Or maybe it is just the rain/snow that it falling. Maybe I am fine. Maybe. I have been staying up late. Reading. Now reading is the only thing I do. I am a serial monogomist to my pursuits. Sometimes all I do is knit. Or bead. Or sew. Or clean. Or write. Or read. So now it is reading. I discovered that escapist romance novels available for free on the Amazon Kindle are, in general, crap. However, I also figured out how to check out books from the library on the fire. Which is good. Or bad. I don't know. I have not read this genre (escapist romance novels) on purpose for some time (discounting Jane Austen or L.M. Montgomery, which hardly counts). Or ever? So I am pretty much randomly grabbing novels with no idea of their possible interest to me. Here are things I have noticed:
Typically Good: Characters motivated by something other than lust/power Complex male and female characters Always Bad Rakes vs Ingenues (Regency Historical Cage Match) Me Viking. You Celtic woman. You mine. (Semi-linguistic, semi-consentual) Too Much Drama (End of World Presaged by failure of Cute Boy to notice the New Bow in my hair) p.s. I thought I had posted this. But then my computer battery died and I forgot. Mentioned to spouse that I had been hacking up a lung for 10 days since it looked like I had been sick since April 9th. I then realized (only with prompting) that it was not April 19.
I have been avoiding the computer. I feel like I have let things slide and I don't want to know about them. My personal email is likely a quagmire of ten thousand emails that I will never sort through. And some of them are likely important. Some probably even have good things to say. But I am afraid to look. Afraid that it will tank my day and I won't be able to get up from my computer to do anything else. Paralyzed with guilt. So instead I am only semi-paralyzed with anxiety and the potential for guilt. Precursors. Proto-guilt. I have allowed the house to slide back into states of chaos that I had previously conquered. My shoulder still hurts from the excessive cleaning at the start of April (was that when it was?). On April 21 I was reminded that my IQ drops 50 points when my children are crying. I thought maybe it was just my infant children that had that effect on me. But it turns out that when my 3yo cries without explanation for two hours solid, I am unable to process complex (or even simple) information. The Sad has been somewhat replaced by The Numb. I am not bothered by things that might have been hurtful in the past, but I get the feeling it is only because I don't give a crap. Not because I am exhibiting a healthy response. Maybe not giving a crap is the definition of a healthy response. I hope not. Grateful Crap: A List of my Big Little Accomplishments in the Ass-Kicking of Depression... 1. I no longer stay up until after midnight routinely (often turning in at the same time as spouse) 2. I do not forget to take my medications 3. I do not take the incorrect dose of medications 4. I am still blogging-- although with occasional lapses. I should view it like the weavers who purposely leave flaws in their work. Perfect is the enemy of good. 5. Decluttering as a process is still in motion 6. Have learned to say no-- not involved in very many things at all. I miss some of them. Daily Convexions: always, always, always took meds. (although once I almost took them at night AND in the morning) iced shoulder and heated forehead got plenty of sleep decided I need to avoid wheat and dairy for a while because they seem to worsen my asthma goo. This sucks because all the really awesome foods (and all of them that I wish to consume to excess) have wheat or dairy. Or both. *sigh* I realized that part of the reason I thought it was March is that the calendar in the kitchen-- the dry-erase one-- is still set for the second half of March. The rest of the month is missing. How poetic. I would like to make an argument for just separating the whole mind-body thing. See because when I try to work on getting one better, the other one just throws a wrench in the works and things slide. I am tired of being dependent on physical health in order to work on my mental health. I am tired of being mildly ill-- just a cold really-- and having that side-track my plans to improve my overall health. Tired of the lack of exercise and healthful eating putting strain on my mental health. If it were possible to just focus on one thing without having everything unravel... If only things were not so inextricably tangled. Unrelated Seasonal Rant (of Crabby Old Non-theist Quaker)t: Dear Strangers: please do not ask my children if the Easter Bunny or Santa Claus or Thor or Superman or Glenda the Good Witch or the Great Pumpkin is going to visit them to bring them presents. First off, why do you care? You are strangers. You have never seen us before. You will likely never see us again. Second off, why do you assume that we are follwers of the Norse Gods or worshippers of Kal-el? Doesn't this seem a bit presumptuous. And even if we do worship the deity that you presume we do... what makes you think that we observe the tradition of having mystical creatures invade our houses at night while the children are asleep? It is creepy. Family and friends, you are excused from this rant. I have already explained to my children that a belief in Easter Bunnies is important to some of their relatives and they just need to nod and smile and not say anything to hurt people's feelings. I will try to remind myself of this too and not trod on other people's traditions as I would not have them trample over mine. Come Again We got more snow. The goo in my lungs is gurgling. Which is never a good thing. There is a song going through my head: "Walking pneumonia, walking pneumonia will you go a-walking pneumonia with me..." Which I am pretty sure is not a real song. I am also pretty sure that I do not have walking or sitting or lying-down pneumonia. The gurgling is just reminiscent of that. Went to kids' conferences and talked to all their teachers including the specialists. I remember being a specialist on conference days... you have to be there the same amount of time but many parents don't think to speak to you. I feel like I am losing time a bit. And like maybe I am having a harder time shaking the Sad than I first expected. I know that cortisol and stress crap is harder for folks with chronic Depression to get rid of. I'm not sure about the Sad. It's really hard to find any information on whether people being treated for clinical Depression hang on to Sad mood. Because mood and sad and depressed are all tangled together. And most searches I do just help differentiate between sadness and Depression. But there's a more complex layer. Because moods don't just disappear. There are ups and downs whether you are being treated or not. And Depressed does not mean crying non-stop for 24 hours per day. Sometimes it doesn't even feel Sad. Just Empty. Feeling sad. Feeling removed. Feeling like time is getting away from me. I'm pretty sure it is still March. The outside temperatures seem to corroborate this. Grateful Crap: pediatrician: Is snoring a problem for her? me: no 3yo: yes. my papa snores. it is very loud. Daily Convexions: took meds and stuff slept a lot (not the Big Fatigue, but just a medium tired) kept house mostly not horrible; did not overclean Once again, chest cold. Makes it hard to get back on the whole exercise thing. Also, eating all kinds of comfort food. I have not done a good job of listing grateful crap or daily convexions.
I am grateful for having a roof over my head, my relative health and the health of my family. Daily I have done a fantastic job of taking my meds, a less good job of using the net-pot and an okay job of not manically (figuratively, not medically) cleaning the house. Shoulder is mending. Still sore. I would like to refer back to my posts from a year ago to see progress. Hopefully more interesting posts starting tomorrow. I am in full-on crabby old lady mode. Some people lit off a bucket of fireworks a half-block away and sparks and pieces of rockets landed in my back yard. Raining down on my 3-year-old who was outside. This picture to the left is not a picture of the fireworks. It is actuall of my mom's birthday one year that my brothers hosted... they rented a fog machine to play Guitar Hero. Admitedly, the fog machine was not for the birthday gathering, but for an event the night before with friends. Right. Kids were really shaken by the event. All in all that's all I hve for this day. I mostly just stayed in the cold, gray, rainy house doing lazy Saturday things. Including, however, writing some fiction. Not the long-languishing novel. But a new piece of something. Don't know much about it yet. Just excited that I can access that part of my creative brain. It has me doing research on Conscientious Objectors during World War II in the Civilian Public Service. I think I slept for most of Sunday. A very long nap, at any rate. I don't like it when I miss day and days and days of posting. I missed them this time because I was feeling under-the-weather and because I mostly didn't want to touch my computer for fear that i would be sucked into the vortex. Emails Teaching perparations Obligations Invitations Congratulations Salutations Trepidations Graduations I have not been good recently about seeing anyone. I get nervous sometimes when I haven't seen people for a while. That they will be upset that I haven't been in regular contact. Or that they will be all judgy about my... I don't even know. Quite frankly, my friends are just not very judgy people. I don't think the nervous is rational. I think it just is. Much coughing at night. Was semi-tempted to not volunteer on Friday with the ECFE class due to the terrible sounding cough. But then I went. Which was good. I didn't cough on anyone. I think... yes that's right... on Thursday I invaded a friend's house to make myself tea, due some prep and make a bunch of work-related phone calls. Kind of a renegade portable office. I felt very piratical. Friday was so long ago I don't remember it. I might have gone to bed really early. Or that might have been Thursday. Feeling a bit floaty. And clingy. And I don't know. managed to get a lovely chest cold. To avoid it becoming a full-blown sinus infection (AGAIN!) I did everything that my doctor recommended:
And following that I felt like I just had a regular cold. I have now called for an appointment with my allergist to have skin-testing done. Grateful Crap: pro-active steps to combat infection Daily Convexions: took meds rested hydrated |
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K. BuchananQuaker, teacher, parent, |