Lately, I've been doing a lot of thinking. Just thinking. Not writing, not talking, just thinking. I've been meaning to get it all down on paper, but until now, overcoming the inertia to pick up a pen has seemed an physically insurmountable task. It's just easier to think. But I do recognize that there is value to getting it down on paper - working through my feelings, organizing my thoughts coherently, and like she said, "if you're a writer, put that shit on paper".
So after this almost two month hiatus, I'm back at it. Trying, yet again.
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Nice Shot. Wrong Direction.
Last fall, I started playing disc golf and immediately fell in love with the sport. Disc golf is like regular golf, except instead of hitting a ball with a club into a hole, you throw a frisbee (disc) into a basket.
Yesterday, I went to play disc golf with a couple of people who are much better than me. One of them said to me, many times yesterday, "Nice shot. Wrong direction."
After I heard it for maybe the third or fourth time, it dawned on me that this would be a good title for my autobiography, were I to write it today.
Nice Shot. Wrong Direction. The Autobiography of Anne Shirley.
It pretty much sums up how I feel about how I've lived my life to date. I have tried. My intentions have been good. But somehow, it all seems to go askew. School, work, relationships with family, friends and partners. I can find many examples of this very sentiment throughout my whole life.
Nice shot. Wrong Direction. Truer words were never spoken.
Yesterday, I went to play disc golf with a couple of people who are much better than me. One of them said to me, many times yesterday, "Nice shot. Wrong direction."
After I heard it for maybe the third or fourth time, it dawned on me that this would be a good title for my autobiography, were I to write it today.
Nice Shot. Wrong Direction. The Autobiography of Anne Shirley.
It pretty much sums up how I feel about how I've lived my life to date. I have tried. My intentions have been good. But somehow, it all seems to go askew. School, work, relationships with family, friends and partners. I can find many examples of this very sentiment throughout my whole life.
Nice shot. Wrong Direction. Truer words were never spoken.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
The Wife
WARNING: BOOK SPOILERS IN THIS POST
A few days ago, I finished a really awful book titled 'The Wife'. The book was about a woman whose husband is a huge literary success. He has published a large body of work, received accolades and awards, and ends up winning one huge literary award in particular, immediately after which he dies. Of course, it is apparent to the reader very early on (though it is not explicitly revealed to the reader until later in the book) that his wife was the one writing all his books. The book is written in first person, from the wife's point of view, and though the plot is thin, the characters are flat and the story is ultimately not well developed (at least in the opinion of this lay critic), there were a few keys lines in the book which caught my attention.
Everyone knows how women soldier on, how women dream up blue prints, recipes, ideas for a better world, and then sometimes lose them on the way to the crib in the middle of the night, on the way to the Stop & Shop, or the bath. They lose them on the way to greasing the path on which their husband and children will ride serenely through life.
Everyone needs a wife; even wives need wives. Wives tend, they hover. Their ears are twin sensitive instruments, satellites picking up the slightest scrape of disatisfaction. Wives bring broth, we bring paper clips, we bring ourselves and our pliant, warm bodies. We know just what to say to the men who for some reason have a great deal of trouble taking consistent care of themselves, or anyone else.
"Listen," we say. "Everything will be okay."
And then, as if our lives depend on it, we make sure it is.
I read the above and wondered how many women would read it and, like me, think "I could have written that myself".
I was a wife. I may be one again one day. Some days I feel like one now, though I am acutely aware of the distinction in my own brain which is brought by signing my name on a dotted line. But the author very clearly captured what I have heard from women every day, what I have seen women around me do - what I did myself to a certain extent.
When we are girls, we have goals and dreams and sometimes a certain whimsy about our lives - what they mean and where they may go. We imagine who we will become. But even those of us who imagine becoming wives (and mothers - an angle which I speak of with a certainty born not of experience as a mother but of experience as someone who has been mothered, and who is highly aware of the sacrifice which often comes with the title) - do we ever imagine what we will give up to do so? How our lives - big decisions and small - will be shaped so sharply by the dreams, desires and even comforts of another person? Do we all step off our own paths to pave the way for someone else?
Maybe a successful relationship is when each does that for the other. Or perhaps it is one foot on your path, one foot paving theirs. I never imagined that I would so easily make the sacrifices I did when I held the title of Wife. And they weren't all bad. But I made them quickly and easily and without much thought to what I may be giving up to ensure the comfort, success and desires fulfilled of another.
Ultimately, the problem for me was paving someone else's way without neither him or I paying attention to my own. Let's try to avoid that again.
A few days ago, I finished a really awful book titled 'The Wife'. The book was about a woman whose husband is a huge literary success. He has published a large body of work, received accolades and awards, and ends up winning one huge literary award in particular, immediately after which he dies. Of course, it is apparent to the reader very early on (though it is not explicitly revealed to the reader until later in the book) that his wife was the one writing all his books. The book is written in first person, from the wife's point of view, and though the plot is thin, the characters are flat and the story is ultimately not well developed (at least in the opinion of this lay critic), there were a few keys lines in the book which caught my attention.
Everyone knows how women soldier on, how women dream up blue prints, recipes, ideas for a better world, and then sometimes lose them on the way to the crib in the middle of the night, on the way to the Stop & Shop, or the bath. They lose them on the way to greasing the path on which their husband and children will ride serenely through life.
Everyone needs a wife; even wives need wives. Wives tend, they hover. Their ears are twin sensitive instruments, satellites picking up the slightest scrape of disatisfaction. Wives bring broth, we bring paper clips, we bring ourselves and our pliant, warm bodies. We know just what to say to the men who for some reason have a great deal of trouble taking consistent care of themselves, or anyone else.
"Listen," we say. "Everything will be okay."
And then, as if our lives depend on it, we make sure it is.
I read the above and wondered how many women would read it and, like me, think "I could have written that myself".
I was a wife. I may be one again one day. Some days I feel like one now, though I am acutely aware of the distinction in my own brain which is brought by signing my name on a dotted line. But the author very clearly captured what I have heard from women every day, what I have seen women around me do - what I did myself to a certain extent.
When we are girls, we have goals and dreams and sometimes a certain whimsy about our lives - what they mean and where they may go. We imagine who we will become. But even those of us who imagine becoming wives (and mothers - an angle which I speak of with a certainty born not of experience as a mother but of experience as someone who has been mothered, and who is highly aware of the sacrifice which often comes with the title) - do we ever imagine what we will give up to do so? How our lives - big decisions and small - will be shaped so sharply by the dreams, desires and even comforts of another person? Do we all step off our own paths to pave the way for someone else?
Maybe a successful relationship is when each does that for the other. Or perhaps it is one foot on your path, one foot paving theirs. I never imagined that I would so easily make the sacrifices I did when I held the title of Wife. And they weren't all bad. But I made them quickly and easily and without much thought to what I may be giving up to ensure the comfort, success and desires fulfilled of another.
Ultimately, the problem for me was paving someone else's way without neither him or I paying attention to my own. Let's try to avoid that again.
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Bleed, throw it out, move on.
Years ago, I took a road trip with a couple of friends. Two of us were going through bad breakups at the time, and the lone voice of reason in the car gave us some sound words which I still carry with me today:
Losing a relationship is like a plate breaking on the floor. It sucks, and there's glass all around, and you get cut and you bleed but you pick up the pieces and move on. But a few weeks or even several months later, you'll find a piece you missed. You may find it by moving a table or chair and there it is. You pick it up, deal with it, throw it out and move on. Or maybe you find it because you accidentally step on it. You bleed a bit (though not as much and not as long as you did with the big pieces in the beginning), but the bleeding subsides, you deal with it, throw it out and move on.
Losing a relationship is like a plate breaking on the floor. It sucks, and there's glass all around, and you get cut and you bleed but you pick up the pieces and move on. But a few weeks or even several months later, you'll find a piece you missed. You may find it by moving a table or chair and there it is. You pick it up, deal with it, throw it out and move on. Or maybe you find it because you accidentally step on it. You bleed a bit (though not as much and not as long as you did with the big pieces in the beginning), but the bleeding subsides, you deal with it, throw it out and move on.
Monday, April 20, 2009
Orphaned
I read a book recently which included an idea that triggered something inside me. Though the exact line escapes me right now, it was something like we are orphaned over and over again.
I thought about this for a long time.
Merriam-Webster defines orphan as a child deprived by death of one or both parents, a young animal that has lost its mother, and closer to home for me, one deprived of some protection or advantage.
I am lucky to still have both my parents alive and kicking, but I imagine the loss of a parent to be significantly greater than the loss of another in one's life, because this loss represents not just a person, but a resource, comfort and security. The loss of this person, or people, changes everything, forever. I am a 31-year-old woman who has only very recently accepted that her parents are mortal beings with their own lives, feelings, problems and dreams. To lose one or both of them now would be unimaginable.
But the loss of resource, comfort and security - a loss that would change a life, is not necessarily that of a parent. In my life, I have lost two best friends and a husband. Each of those losses affected me greatly, and after each of them, I knew things had been changed forever. To use the term "orphaned" to describe how I felt when these people were no longer in my life is not a stretch. They each touched me greatly, and though their hand prints remain on my heart, the cool breeze over the spot which their hands kept warm has been felt for a long time.
I thought about this for a long time.
Merriam-Webster defines orphan as a child deprived by death of one or both parents, a young animal that has lost its mother, and closer to home for me, one deprived of some protection or advantage.
I am lucky to still have both my parents alive and kicking, but I imagine the loss of a parent to be significantly greater than the loss of another in one's life, because this loss represents not just a person, but a resource, comfort and security. The loss of this person, or people, changes everything, forever. I am a 31-year-old woman who has only very recently accepted that her parents are mortal beings with their own lives, feelings, problems and dreams. To lose one or both of them now would be unimaginable.
But the loss of resource, comfort and security - a loss that would change a life, is not necessarily that of a parent. In my life, I have lost two best friends and a husband. Each of those losses affected me greatly, and after each of them, I knew things had been changed forever. To use the term "orphaned" to describe how I felt when these people were no longer in my life is not a stretch. They each touched me greatly, and though their hand prints remain on my heart, the cool breeze over the spot which their hands kept warm has been felt for a long time.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
They're Just Dreams
Just over a year ago, I had a dream that T&R had put Nadira into an institution because she had been diagnosed with depression, at the ripe old age of 4. The dream took place in the institution - I was standing in a room with T, looking through a one-way mirror into a room where Nadira sat on a chair in a circle with several other children, who were presumably there for the treatment of similar ailments. There was a woman there too, on her own chair in the circle. She was talking to the kids, and Nadira was sitting there calmly listening, but I lost it. I began to cry, and begged T to bring her home. I told her that I knew it was hard, but that we'd all help her, and please please don't keep Nadira in there, please bring her home.
I woke up from that dream crying, and called T immediately to make sure Nadira was okay, which of course, she was.
Almost exactly a year later, I have another dream. This time, I'm on the second floor of a school, looking through a window into the gymnasium on the first floor. Nadira is there, as she is now at 5 years old, in her gym class with several other girls. Nadira is content playing on her own, but I can her the other girls talking behind her back, saying "she's so mean" and "she's so selfish, she never shares" and "I hate her". Then one of the girls walks up behind Nadira, grabs her by the hair, throws her on the floor and proceeds to beat on her. And nobody does anything. I begin crying and screaming for somebody to help, but for the few more moments that I lived this dream, nobody helped her, and I didn't know how to stop it.
Again, I woke up crying hysterically. I couldn't even talk for several minutes to explain why I was crying - probably not a nice situation for the company I kept that night to wake up to himself.
I relayed this dream to T, and we talked about the similarities to the dream I had the year before. Nadira being in a bad situation, being unable to help, always watching from the outside. Nadira of course is fine, and T asked the inevitable question: "Are you sure these dreams are about Nadira? Maybe in your dream she represents someone else...maybe you?"
Nadira is a crazy, kooky, amazing kid. She's loud and outgoing, and in many of her loud and boisterous ways, she's like neither of her parents. They are both so easy going and relaxed, and she's always on 11. She does remind me a lot of me when I was little. Maybe it is me in the dreams after all.
I woke up from that dream crying, and called T immediately to make sure Nadira was okay, which of course, she was.
Almost exactly a year later, I have another dream. This time, I'm on the second floor of a school, looking through a window into the gymnasium on the first floor. Nadira is there, as she is now at 5 years old, in her gym class with several other girls. Nadira is content playing on her own, but I can her the other girls talking behind her back, saying "she's so mean" and "she's so selfish, she never shares" and "I hate her". Then one of the girls walks up behind Nadira, grabs her by the hair, throws her on the floor and proceeds to beat on her. And nobody does anything. I begin crying and screaming for somebody to help, but for the few more moments that I lived this dream, nobody helped her, and I didn't know how to stop it.
Again, I woke up crying hysterically. I couldn't even talk for several minutes to explain why I was crying - probably not a nice situation for the company I kept that night to wake up to himself.
I relayed this dream to T, and we talked about the similarities to the dream I had the year before. Nadira being in a bad situation, being unable to help, always watching from the outside. Nadira of course is fine, and T asked the inevitable question: "Are you sure these dreams are about Nadira? Maybe in your dream she represents someone else...maybe you?"
Nadira is a crazy, kooky, amazing kid. She's loud and outgoing, and in many of her loud and boisterous ways, she's like neither of her parents. They are both so easy going and relaxed, and she's always on 11. She does remind me a lot of me when I was little. Maybe it is me in the dreams after all.
Thursday, March 12, 2009
Black Cloud
There is a monster on the television show LOST. To call it a monster sounds a bit simple and childish, but that's what they call it. They don't know what it is or where it came from. It comes out of nowhere - though often it is probably triggered by something. Maybe if they knew the trigger they could stop it.
It is a huge, black, dense cloud of smoke. It comes from above or under the ground or out of the woods. It appears out of nowhere, and then wraps itself around you, enveloping you, suffocating you. Or it can grab your legs right out from underneath you and pull you down into a hole that's impossible to get out of. While you're in that hole, or enveloped, suffocating in the black cloud, you can hear the monster mimicking your own voice, telling everyone you're okay. You don't know how to stop it, or at least how to use your own voice to say you're not okay, and you need help.
For me, depression is that black cloud. Usually triggered by something - any myriad of things. I know I spend my life standing on the brink, waiting for it again. It grabs me out of nowhere, enveloping me and suffocating me. Or it grabs my legs and pulls me down, further and further underground. I hear my own voice saying I'm okay. So often that's not true, but I don't know how to stop it. I don't know how to get out of its grip, and get away.
So I run. I put my running shoes on, and sometimes a hat, and sometimes gloves, and sometimes when it's so cold that my eyelashes freeze together and sometimes when it's so hot that I've been on the verge of heatstroke. I run. I run because I often feel that it's the only thing that keeps that black cloud at bay, but sometimes it's like I just can't run fast enough or far enough. It's always nipping at my heels, waiting for me to stumble so it can grab me and feed on me once more.
I've gotten better at recognizing the signs when it's coming. I can sense it before it grabs me full force. Sometimes I can stop it, but when I can't, I know what I need to do. I run.
It is a huge, black, dense cloud of smoke. It comes from above or under the ground or out of the woods. It appears out of nowhere, and then wraps itself around you, enveloping you, suffocating you. Or it can grab your legs right out from underneath you and pull you down into a hole that's impossible to get out of. While you're in that hole, or enveloped, suffocating in the black cloud, you can hear the monster mimicking your own voice, telling everyone you're okay. You don't know how to stop it, or at least how to use your own voice to say you're not okay, and you need help.
For me, depression is that black cloud. Usually triggered by something - any myriad of things. I know I spend my life standing on the brink, waiting for it again. It grabs me out of nowhere, enveloping me and suffocating me. Or it grabs my legs and pulls me down, further and further underground. I hear my own voice saying I'm okay. So often that's not true, but I don't know how to stop it. I don't know how to get out of its grip, and get away.
So I run. I put my running shoes on, and sometimes a hat, and sometimes gloves, and sometimes when it's so cold that my eyelashes freeze together and sometimes when it's so hot that I've been on the verge of heatstroke. I run. I run because I often feel that it's the only thing that keeps that black cloud at bay, but sometimes it's like I just can't run fast enough or far enough. It's always nipping at my heels, waiting for me to stumble so it can grab me and feed on me once more.
I've gotten better at recognizing the signs when it's coming. I can sense it before it grabs me full force. Sometimes I can stop it, but when I can't, I know what I need to do. I run.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
