asleep awake

i've perfected the art of sleeping with my eyes open. i stand there, mind gone blank, in the shape and form of someone present. but i'm off, away, in dreamland. but this is a different kind of dreaming than i typically do. this is, hole up, hide inside and rest for a while.

jaded,

my best friend called it.

tired,

i counter.

i have about a thousand plates spinning and i have to just do the very next thing. there is no thing after for me. ask me about my plans, i have none. i have the direction i'm headed, that's about it.

i've found, curiously, that what needs to happen, does. the timing of it is perfect if i don't meddle, which i can't.

when will you be back?

(meaning, inhabiting my body, instead of just being in the room).

i won't be out of the woods until july.

then your residency.

yes.

so, maybe august.

next semester, i will have a critical thesis to write. and only that. i've been told by my current prof that the way that i write i can knock it out in two packets. semesters are typically five. i will probably let it ride, not rush it. not ask of myself more than a gentle easy pace. since this semester has felt like an endless sprint so far.

the thing about it is, i would do this now in a second, rather than be where i was two years ago. i wasn't just asleep i was dead. or at least dying. now, i'm alive. tired, but alive.

she shook her head in understanding. and we left. i called my sister to help with the drive home, because at least if someone keeps me talking, i have a better chance of making it home. understand that this day of fun (though i was anything but), came after a day of work. i get up at 4am, though yesterday i allowed myself a precious half hour more to sleep. so at 10:30, i'm finally home, and fried.

so, to not stressing about my paper due monday, which i have not finished.

they always come. always. i know it will happen again.

last time, i wrote a six page paper in about two hours before it was due. i don't like waiting that long, but i'm not sure i could have pulled it together before then. i'm sure i couldn't have. so, i will trust the muse to emerge when she is ready. in the meantime, i wait.

i sleep.

i rest.

with eyes closed. and that's a luxury.

divesting energies

i'm trying to take back what i've given away. break down the fortresses i built up in my mind. and i realize, the more i think about it, contemplate how to glut this one of power, the more power i empower the image. the idea.

i sit here with a knot in my chest. trying to breathe deeply, but only able to distract myself from the thing i want to think about. or not want to. the source of my comfort of late. but it's false comfort. it's faulty reasoning that has brought me here. i know this.

still i cling.

that is what i'm trying to let myself see, that i am building up castles in my mind that are only shadows. illusions. i have to wake myself up and see reality. and sometimes i wonder if i know how.

i have long loved the ally mcbeal series. my library just got it, so i'm indulging.

she's a hopeless romantic. so much in her own world, i understand.

my world is a wonderful place too. but i want to be present. deal in reality. and it's difficult. i knew this would happen, that by going there, reentering the poetic stream and reliving everything i've chronicalled, i have to relive it to chronical it, that i would end up someplace i may not like. not so much that i don't like it, but that the object of my scrutiny doesn't like.

so here i am. behind enemy lines.

those enemies that take residence in your arms, whose voice you hear in your head, who you dream of at night. those are the worst enemies of all.

they come offering something that will not satisfy.

and now, how to walk away.

freak me out

so, last night we're making our way home, later than usual. sometime after tenish. not too late. but the weather was INSANE. i see a bunch of cars stopped, some maneuvering, but i'm quick and go around a median to get by, only to find, it's a flooded intersection they are retreating from, and i'm driving into.

i turned my pony around and got the hell out of there as fast as i could, even driving on the wrong side of the road to get out. a couple cars passed me, we were all doing five or so miles an hour, but i was legitimately on the wrong side of the road trying to get the hell out of dodge before my engine flooded.

so, i zip away, and it's pouring, endlessly pouring. so much rain i've not seen in a great while. we come home and my girl is freaked out. i wasn't so freaked out, but just glad we didn't get stuck in north bergen on some dark flooded road with about a zillion other people. there were cars stuck on the medians, spinning out on the flooded grass. it was crazy.

my pony is very reliable.

and now, we're still recovering it seems.

we're supposed to be at a friend's house at 1pm, but it's nearly that and we're still in bed. i just called and got another hour. so we can zip over there. but the rain hasn't let up.

and our bathroom is flooded.

so, it's making for an interesting time. i just hope we have a safe journey over there. as we're leaving soon. i wasn't going to go, but i really want to see this person and spend time with her. she's amazing.

her kids are looking forward to playing with my teenager, too.

so. we're off. venturing out into the big wet world again.

when i pulled up to my friend's house in north bergen, i was hoping for a close parking spot. because the weather was so wild (the sign posts were all shaking furiously in the winds and rain). i parked right outside their front door. in good weather, that never happens. i'm so grateful it happened last night.

hoping for another run of favor today.

i seem to depend on it.

walk alone

i have turned back, turned aside, so many times. sought companionship on a journey i am to take alone. i understand this. perhaps i'm coward. perhaps i'm brave. i can no longer distinguish the two. but i know this. i am alone.

as i have touched upon before, autonomy is profoundly more difficult than subjugation. that these are the only things i see is testament to my nature. i have been told by so many to not be how i am. to feel less. when i began shutting down the feeling apparatus, to feel more. to be myself. and i wish i had just not sought companionship for the journey. that i would have just trusted myself from the beginning.

but i like people as much as i hate them.

picking up the mats and hearing the difficulties between two lovely souls at my work, i said,

this job would be great if it weren't for people.

and they both laughed. i was ready to off a customer for being a bitch, and they were at each other's throats. trouble is, i understood them both completely. i having been the supervisor trying to keep it cool and enforce the standard. i having been the one with hurt in my eyes at being misunderstood.

my advice to him,

know who you're working with and just go with it.

my advice to her,

he's inquisitive. just give him tasks and let it go.

they both mean well. hell, we all mean well. but it doesn't come off that way sometimes. and i struggle to know how to help. how to listen. how to offer support from the middle.

sometimes, the best help is to leave it alone. to walk away. there is no intervention that can soothe it. there is no way it will change soon. they have to figure it out, come to the answers themselves. everyone else is just taking sides.

that's the bottom line.

i won't take sides. i see both perspectives.

i have remembered so much of what i'd lost. forsaken, actually.

and i think, being alone is what needs to happen now.

but i miss my friends. the ones who soothe me.

it is that comfort that keeps me blind sometimes though.

does it follow then that discomfort helps me see? i don't think so.

i just want to forego dependence at this point. let me stand alone if i must.

my will is strong. and it will prevail. whether or not there is someone, or others beside me remains to be seen. but i cannot live my life counting the spectators in the stands. i have to be engaged in the game. play my part well.

and then, let the rest tend to itself.

i want to write. that's all i want to do.

that is not something done in a crowd.

inspiration, though, comes from unlikely sources.

work, work, work

so, i finally had the meetings that were cancelled due to snow. i can't believe it's only been two weeks since then. it feels like forever, but it also feels like no time has passed. how these two contradictions co-exist, i do not know.

met with my literacy program boss yesterday for an hour. it was a fruitful discussion and his head was spinning with all the details we discussed and that i've been working through. the minutia has only just begun.

so, i am rolling again. spent the morning drafting emails and trying to track people down. it's not easy when there is no budget for expenses. i read on the grant website that the grant is seed money, and fundraising will broaden your outreach. yeah right. maybe if i signed on months ago. this has to happen now.

and as we get closer, the stakes go up. i'm just trying to meet the grant verbiage at the barest level. any flourishes will be appreciated but not expected at this point. the trouble is, when they drafted this grant they made it very pie in the sky. they never checked to see if we could have an exhibit at the museum. i called to set it up and was met with a

we're booked until 2011.

but fortunately, people like me and i don't know how to take no for an answer, very pisecean that way, and so my will prevailed and we're going to have a small exhibition space. whew.

i keep saying, to fulfill the requirements of the grant. and to promote literacy, how can they argue with these things. though, we are drawing on their resources and utilizing their staff, i am grateful for the offer, and i am scheduling according to their availability--it's nice to have complete control of this thing.

so, if it goes off well, i will be commended.

if it flops, i will have done my best. it's tough, making something out of nothing.

so, i await the flurry of responses and prepare to have a whole weekend off. i'm so excited. officially done at my old store, permanently at my new store. and loving it.

i work in a few hours, until then, i'll just try to rest or get some schoolwork done. i've got two critical papers to write and absolutely nothing to say. (what else is new).

so, the wheel keeps turning and i endeavor to keep up.

it's all good. i'm forty now. and loving it.

wanted

i think i just worked my last day at my current store. now i'm free to be at my new store. i'm so, so glad. i hate being somewhere i'm not wanted. i asked my new boss how it's going yesterday, and she said,

i'm happy.

which is nice.

i just have to work. there is nothing else to the equation. i watched some pretty petty stuff go down the other day, but i can't get in the middle of it. i have no interest in the drama.

so i open the next two days, and then a day off. my belly dance class starts that day, and pilates. i am also going to spend the day with my best friend which keeps me sane.

i have all of next weekend off, which NEVER happens.

hopefully i will be able to see my best friend in new jersey on saturday. she's going to try to make it happen though things are going on in her life and it may not. in that case, i'll just spend the days with my kid celebrating. not sure what we'll do. we're supposed to go bowling, but i don't know if we'll do that.

i guess i'll get up and read. i am tired, but i can't stop doing school work. i have a couple books to get through for this next packet, though i have already completed all the required revision work. i banged it all out one day so i didn't have to worry about it. now, i'm glad i did that, because my brain is tired. just like the rest of me.

but it won't be forever. just a semester of this chaos.

and i am grateful it is my foray into my field. that i am moving forward in my life.

it is all good.

bodily weary

yesterday, i felt like i was asleep with my eyes open.

i went to see some old friends and one said,

go home, you need to get there safe.

i must have looked pretty bad.

came home, lay down, and couldn't sleep. my mind kept whirring and whirring. not in a bad way, just the way it does.

finally, i slept. and twelve hours later, i'm up. my body is tired. and i am glad my belly dance and pilates classes start this next week. i'm such a slug right now, it's not good. i've been told the only way to make more energy is to burn energy. so, since i quit my gym, i've been lazing a lot more than before. i force myself to the gym when i'm a member, so i need to join some gym, soon.

but this is just a season. so i am a mid today, and open the store for three days after that. i don't know that i'll accomplish much personally, but at least my schedule is consistent and sleep will be easier. meaning i can get some schoolwork done.

i was so fried yesterday i called my friend because the thought of trying to read or do work was beyond me.

she hugged me and cried, because i haven't seen her since halloween, haven't spent time alone with her since before that. before i got my kid. i've lost touch with a few people i care about, but it's not them. it's my life. my life is demanding at the moment.

so we ate, talked, and i am glad i forced myself to do that. it was long overdue.

now, the apartment looks like a bomb hit it, and i've got to go to work soon. will force myself into the shower, then get productive before i jet out.

sometimes, the body just has to do what it's told. it's no different from the gym. things have to be done. and done now.

i wish, in some ways, i could live up to the standards others have. that my apartment would be presentable at all times. etc. that i could have fabulous meals prepared for my kid, but i can't. i do the best i can. with my crock pot as my ally, and much forgiveness, we make it through.

even created a few dishes we really enjoy lately.

i did all the revision work required of me this packet, so i've just got reading and two critical papers to write. this is the easy part of the packet. the hard part was making sure my revision work got done. and it did. i just forced myself through it.

now, to think about all the other things that demand my attention.

finding my way, slowly, sometimes. but finding my way.

at last.