This week has been loud noises and bright colors and a very bad day and a slightly less bad day and deep gravity and relearning a quilting needle and good behavior and season 5 of Mad Men and surprise Starbucks from a favorite student assistant and a decent amount of time on my bike and bright spring flowers stopping me in my tracks and lots of tzatziki sauce and bocce ball in a cool grassy evening with bare feet and grilled chicken and big trucks and stubborn love from my husband. I'm still kicking. I'm glad it's Friday.
4.26.2013
4.23.2013
step 2
I am getting too achy and inflexible to keep sitting on a slant and standing with my right butt cheek popped up and my legs in a knot. I need to shoot for symmetry or I'll end up curled into a ball unable to curl back.
4.22.2013
heels in
I'd forgotten how cold my thumbs get when I bike through a chilly morning and how crusty the outside corners of my eyes.
I'd also forgotten how good then bad then good it feels to be active all weekend and then to realize I've scheduled myself into a sort of knot for the upcoming week, and it's probably ok, but it's much, much more.
There are things in my life right now that hadn't been, on purpose, for more than a year, because I couldn't handle them. The biking is one, the eating things made from scratch is another, and the tickets for events and the lunch dates and weekend mornings in a sunny park and dinner plans and moving next month and a calender full of out of town weekend trips all summer. I do NOT trust myself. I give that list and my hackles raise because my mindset is not there yet. I worry that I'm skipping the gray area again and going straight from one extreme to another, because I often do this: I am on or I am off. I am on, and I'm worried that I still should be off. I'm worried that I'm going to fail/fall/regress. I burst into tears yesterday afternoon because of this. But it's ok not to keep sitting down. If I have the guts I'm going to get stronger and sleeker and rosy. I don't reeeeally have a choice.
I'd also forgotten how good then bad then good it feels to be active all weekend and then to realize I've scheduled myself into a sort of knot for the upcoming week, and it's probably ok, but it's much, much more.
There are things in my life right now that hadn't been, on purpose, for more than a year, because I couldn't handle them. The biking is one, the eating things made from scratch is another, and the tickets for events and the lunch dates and weekend mornings in a sunny park and dinner plans and moving next month and a calender full of out of town weekend trips all summer. I do NOT trust myself. I give that list and my hackles raise because my mindset is not there yet. I worry that I'm skipping the gray area again and going straight from one extreme to another, because I often do this: I am on or I am off. I am on, and I'm worried that I still should be off. I'm worried that I'm going to fail/fall/regress. I burst into tears yesterday afternoon because of this. But it's ok not to keep sitting down. If I have the guts I'm going to get stronger and sleeker and rosy. I don't reeeeally have a choice.
4.19.2013
4.18.2013
THIRTEEN WAYS OF LOOKING AT A BLACKBIRD
I
Among twenty snowy mountains,
The only moving thing
Was the eye of the blackbird.
II
I was of three minds,
Like a tree
In which there are three blackbirds.
III
The blackbird whirled in the autumn winds.
It was a small part of the pantomime.
IV
A man and a woman
Are one.
A man and a woman and a blackbird
Are one.
V
I do not know which to prefer,
The beauty of inflections
Or the beauty of innuendoes,
The blackbird whistling
Or just after.
VI
Icicles filled the long window
With barbaric glass.
The shadow of the blackbird
Crossed it, to and fro.
The mood
Traced in the shadow
An indecipherable cause.
VII
O thin men of Haddam,
Why do you imagine golden birds?
Do you not see how the blackbird
Walks around the feet
Of the women about you?
VIII
I know noble accents
And lucid, inescapable rhythms;
But I know, too,
That the blackbird is involved
In what I know.
IX
When the blackbird flew out of sight,
It marked the edge
Of one of many circles.
X
At the sight of blackbirds
Flying in a green light,
Even the bawds of euphony
Would cry out sharply.
XI
He rode over Connecticut
In a glass coach.
Once, a fear pierced him,
In that he mistook
The shadow of his equipage
For blackbirds.
XII
The river is moving.
The blackbird must be flying.
XIII
It was evening all afternoon.
It was snowing
And it was going to snow.
The blackbird sat
In the cedar-limbs.
~Wallace Stevens
Among twenty snowy mountains,
The only moving thing
Was the eye of the blackbird.
II
I was of three minds,
Like a tree
In which there are three blackbirds.
III
The blackbird whirled in the autumn winds.
It was a small part of the pantomime.
IV
A man and a woman
Are one.
A man and a woman and a blackbird
Are one.
V
I do not know which to prefer,
The beauty of inflections
Or the beauty of innuendoes,
The blackbird whistling
Or just after.
VI
Icicles filled the long window
With barbaric glass.
The shadow of the blackbird
Crossed it, to and fro.
The mood
Traced in the shadow
An indecipherable cause.
VII
O thin men of Haddam,
Why do you imagine golden birds?
Do you not see how the blackbird
Walks around the feet
Of the women about you?
VIII
I know noble accents
And lucid, inescapable rhythms;
But I know, too,
That the blackbird is involved
In what I know.
IX
When the blackbird flew out of sight,
It marked the edge
Of one of many circles.
X
At the sight of blackbirds
Flying in a green light,
Even the bawds of euphony
Would cry out sharply.
XI
He rode over Connecticut
In a glass coach.
Once, a fear pierced him,
In that he mistook
The shadow of his equipage
For blackbirds.
XII
The river is moving.
The blackbird must be flying.
XIII
It was evening all afternoon.
It was snowing
And it was going to snow.
The blackbird sat
In the cedar-limbs.
~Wallace Stevens
4.17.2013
4.12.2013
4.10.2013
what's going on
I biked to work today (!?!) and you'd think my hands would stop being dry and cracky now that it's warm again but they're not, so I should buy myself some healthy lotion as a birthday present, and this morning our apartment is being shown because we're moving out.
I'm pink and shaky and not at all sure that a hilly 3.5 miles is the best way for the current (weak, fuzzy, chubby) me to start a day, but I did make it the whole way here and I did NOT take it easy, because I am genetically incapable of anything between inactive and full speed. So I was full speed. This afternoon will likely be the worst part. More uphilly, after a long day at work, through what they're saying will be 87° air.
I'm about to be in the last year of my 20s, and I feel like I should make it a monumental one. My capabilities and goals have been shrunk to the point of pinpricks over the past year and a half and it has gotten to the point where I'm pretty sure I'm just S's wife. I'm really good at that, I know I am, but I need (I wish someone could just give me a bulleted list to tell me how) to be living at least a little for April and making decisions for April. I think I really need to get myself a good notebook or journal or something, to use with a pen, not with a keyboard, and keep it with me and use it to digest the news and ideas that I am always insatiable for and then forget right after the podcast ends or I move on to the next article. That'd be a good way to prepare for being 30. Try to maybe internalize all the things that (briefly) make my brain dance. I will never not have a sieve for a memory, but at least I can finally, this year, acknowledge the fact that I need the crutch of writing things down, because no, April, you will not (and have not, ever) remember on your own.
I'd like to get back to a reasonable state of health. I'm honestly not sure if I'll ever have the cocky, easy body confidence I had before I got sick. I do not take for granted my ability to keep going. I'm still having late waves of malaise and dizziness and thick, gooey headedness from time to time, although I barely notice, unless it's really bad, and even then, I deal. I deal with it really well. And I have been doing more better than worse. The doctors still think it's just some sort of bacterial infection that my immune system can't reach, or it's some iteration of post-viral fatigue, or it's something else? but you're probably going to be ok? you're not getting worse, right? I never really managed to get answers, and I'm running out of a desire to keep searching as I get better at managing/better.
For the past year and a half I've embraced the doubt and anxiety and sloth that was the natural result of being sick and tired and unable to control any damn thing about it and it's led to a holy crapload of new emotional baggage and 30 pounds. With S's help, my emotional baggage is being turned to emotional maturity and with time maybe I'll be able to turn 30 pounds back into muscles and the ability to walk/run/bike the way I used to. For all of our sakes.
We're moving. 3 miles away. In with S's parents. In May. I feel about this a loud screeching in my head while I'm nodding and smiling. It's actually going to be, I think, ok. They have a mostly unfinished basement with one medium sized finished room and a bathroom. So, we're going to move in there. The one room will be kitchen/living room/bedroom, and then, um. I don't know yet how exactly we're going to handle this. It's a good damn thing I love my husband so much, and believe in him with all my heart, because that's why we're doing this--he's going back to school this fall full-time to get an RN. My man's going to be a nurse. He's going to be the best nurse in the world. But it's expensive, and he'll be quitting his job, and, there we have it. Two years or so of living in a one room basement and pinching pennies because I love the man and would do anything to make his dreams come true. And honestly, yeah, underneath the screeching I do realize this is a good call. It'll be nice to be so close to his family, and it's not as if we'll spend all our time there sequestered in a dark, windowless room. Their house is in the country, and it's welcoming enough to imagine evenings in the hammock and walks up grassy hills, and I know for a fact his mom will try to feed us all the time even when we have (an itty bitty, in our bedroom) kitchen of our own in the basement, and I know it'll be good to be able to be near to his dad if his health deteriorates and I know it's the best thing for right now, and I know it'll set us up well for the next stage of life which just may include a big ol' house and kids and genuine adultness, but the logistics and the general tragedy of moving from an airy, comfortable two bedroom apartment full of Things We Use! to a one room, dark and damp basement with very little space to take the Things We Use out of their boxed is a heavy one.
So anyway, that's what's going on these days. I'm turning 29 tomorrow and next month we're going underground and I really hope I'll be able to make it home from work this afternoon without death.
I'm pink and shaky and not at all sure that a hilly 3.5 miles is the best way for the current (weak, fuzzy, chubby) me to start a day, but I did make it the whole way here and I did NOT take it easy, because I am genetically incapable of anything between inactive and full speed. So I was full speed. This afternoon will likely be the worst part. More uphilly, after a long day at work, through what they're saying will be 87° air.
I'm about to be in the last year of my 20s, and I feel like I should make it a monumental one. My capabilities and goals have been shrunk to the point of pinpricks over the past year and a half and it has gotten to the point where I'm pretty sure I'm just S's wife. I'm really good at that, I know I am, but I need (I wish someone could just give me a bulleted list to tell me how) to be living at least a little for April and making decisions for April. I think I really need to get myself a good notebook or journal or something, to use with a pen, not with a keyboard, and keep it with me and use it to digest the news and ideas that I am always insatiable for and then forget right after the podcast ends or I move on to the next article. That'd be a good way to prepare for being 30. Try to maybe internalize all the things that (briefly) make my brain dance. I will never not have a sieve for a memory, but at least I can finally, this year, acknowledge the fact that I need the crutch of writing things down, because no, April, you will not (and have not, ever) remember on your own.
I'd like to get back to a reasonable state of health. I'm honestly not sure if I'll ever have the cocky, easy body confidence I had before I got sick. I do not take for granted my ability to keep going. I'm still having late waves of malaise and dizziness and thick, gooey headedness from time to time, although I barely notice, unless it's really bad, and even then, I deal. I deal with it really well. And I have been doing more better than worse. The doctors still think it's just some sort of bacterial infection that my immune system can't reach, or it's some iteration of post-viral fatigue, or it's something else? but you're probably going to be ok? you're not getting worse, right? I never really managed to get answers, and I'm running out of a desire to keep searching as I get better at managing/better.
For the past year and a half I've embraced the doubt and anxiety and sloth that was the natural result of being sick and tired and unable to control any damn thing about it and it's led to a holy crapload of new emotional baggage and 30 pounds. With S's help, my emotional baggage is being turned to emotional maturity and with time maybe I'll be able to turn 30 pounds back into muscles and the ability to walk/run/bike the way I used to. For all of our sakes.
We're moving. 3 miles away. In with S's parents. In May. I feel about this a loud screeching in my head while I'm nodding and smiling. It's actually going to be, I think, ok. They have a mostly unfinished basement with one medium sized finished room and a bathroom. So, we're going to move in there. The one room will be kitchen/living room/bedroom, and then, um. I don't know yet how exactly we're going to handle this. It's a good damn thing I love my husband so much, and believe in him with all my heart, because that's why we're doing this--he's going back to school this fall full-time to get an RN. My man's going to be a nurse. He's going to be the best nurse in the world. But it's expensive, and he'll be quitting his job, and, there we have it. Two years or so of living in a one room basement and pinching pennies because I love the man and would do anything to make his dreams come true. And honestly, yeah, underneath the screeching I do realize this is a good call. It'll be nice to be so close to his family, and it's not as if we'll spend all our time there sequestered in a dark, windowless room. Their house is in the country, and it's welcoming enough to imagine evenings in the hammock and walks up grassy hills, and I know for a fact his mom will try to feed us all the time even when we have (an itty bitty, in our bedroom) kitchen of our own in the basement, and I know it'll be good to be able to be near to his dad if his health deteriorates and I know it's the best thing for right now, and I know it'll set us up well for the next stage of life which just may include a big ol' house and kids and genuine adultness, but the logistics and the general tragedy of moving from an airy, comfortable two bedroom apartment full of Things We Use! to a one room, dark and damp basement with very little space to take the Things We Use out of their boxed is a heavy one.
So anyway, that's what's going on these days. I'm turning 29 tomorrow and next month we're going underground and I really hope I'll be able to make it home from work this afternoon without death.
4.08.2013
surviving
I wore my jacket inside out this morning and my hair is good today and I got my way, anyway, and I'm glad I'm a human being, and my grandpa's in the hospital, and I'm so glad my begonia kind of survived the winter.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)