Deadline crunch

I am in a mad dash to finish a story, so instead of a real post, here’s a teacup I bought the other day as an early Bribe to survive February.

Parenting stress. I has it.

I am just as deaf as I am blind. The problems of deafness are deeper and more complex, if not more important than those of blindness. Deafness is a much worse misfortune. For it means the loss of the most vital stimulus– the sound of the voice that brings language, sets thoughts astir, and keeps us in the intellectual company of man.

Blindness separates us from things but deafness separates us from people.

Children who hear acquire language without any particular effort; the words that fall from others’ lips they catch on the wing, as it were, delightedly, while the little deaf child must trap them by a slow and often painful process. But whatever the process, the result is wonderful. Gradually from naming an object we advance step by step until we have traversed the vast distance between our first stammered syllable and the sweep of thought in a line of Shakespeare.

Helen Keller

Tomorrow, I’ll probably post more about this.   My son has a bilateral sensorineural hearing impairment that he was born with.  Right now, he’s having a really hard time in school because of it, even with aids. I am having a really hard time getting his primary teachers to understand what they are dealing with.

Numbers and satellites and holidays and I’m probably coming off as crazy here

You know what I like?  New stuff.  New foods, new experiences, new technology, new ideas, and new people with whom I can make their acquaintance.  New stuff absolutely rocks my world.  If I have ever claimed innovation fatigue, I was probably just feeling cranky.  The only category of new I can think of solidly that I will refuse to like is that of new horror movies.  And that is because I’m a big weenie.  And new horror movies suck.  It’s just the facts, y’all.

Right now, we have a new moon.  Yay!

What I’m saying is, new stuff is pretty awesome.

Also, I like numbers.  For the longest time, I never really had a lucky number.  It comes back to when someone asks me to name my favorite x (x being animal, plant, food, book, song, etc) .  How can I pick just one?  They’re all so cool, and for so many reasons.  Ultimately, though, I can narrow it down to two numbers.  Three and Seven.   So I like 37 and and 73 and any combination of those digits, as long as they are both there.  The challenge comes in when trying to pick out what day of the month I would then like best, because there is no 37 on the calendar.  Over time, I realized that 23 is my favorite calendar day.  I guess the two looks enough like a seven?  I don’t know.  As I said.  Crazy.

I like 23 so much that I moved my alternate birthday to June 23 (from February 10, because February is the worst month ever.  Cold.  Gray.  Dismal.  That’s why it’s the shortest month, because everyone hates it.)

So today, I’ve got my new (in the moon) and my stand-in favorite number (23).  Also, it’s the beginning of the Chinese New Year.  Not my tradition, but it’s a whole lot of people celebrating the new.

Every bit of this post could and should be explained in a way that doesn’t make me seem quite so … we’ll go with quirky, but I need to be working on a short story for a competition, and then I need to make dinner for some friends who are coming over.  I simply don’t have the time to seem like a functioning and totally not crazy member of society right now.

Plus, I love the word crazy.  Way more fun than going by a diagnosis all the time.

 

Also, I can’t seem to find a good way to end this.  I don’t want anyone to think I’m making light of mental health issues.  I am actually diagnosed bipolar.

 

But really, doesn’t crazy seem more fun?

 

Peace.

And then I cried to Bittersweet Symphony. Don’t judge.

Last night, after I tearfully posted the things I am trying to improve about myself, “Bittersweet Symphony” by The Verve came on Pandora.  I cried until I started laughing.  Because seriously, weeping silently to Bittersweet Symphony is such a hallmark of my late adolescence that it could have its own category on TV Tropes … if my life had all been televised.  After the laugh, I was still very keyed up, so I proceeded to watch United States of Tara on Netflix streaming until four in the morning.  I reached the end of the second episode of the first season, and as the screen returned to the menu, something clicked in my brain.  Clicked in a good way, not in a “oh no, she’s off her damn rocker again, y’all”.

I toastered up an Eggo waffle, then sat down at the desk and wrote this on some post it notes.

Yeah. Don't.

Then I went to bed.

When I woke up this morning, I got up, got dressed, made a pot of tea and a batch of oatmeal scones.  I read stories and caught up with some old friends.  I caught up with myself a bit, too.  I haven’t felt the gnawing hunger in my gut that I’ve felt since last Monday.  I have been kinder in my thoughts and words.  I’ve been alone most of the day, but no lonely.  And despite a near-tragic lack of sleep from going to bed so into the quiet hours of the morning, I am not physically and mentally tired the way I’ve been for the past week.

Also, this was dinner, so that helped.

Ain't nothin' that some stir fried veggies and udon noodles can't fix, y'all.

 

Am I fixed?  No.  It’d be silly to think that one cathartic moment fixes the years of bad mental training I’ve forced upon myself.  But I’m trying.  And I feel very optimistic.  And a little silly.  In a good way.

By the way, if you haven’t seen United States of Tara yet, try to check it out.  The writing is superb, as is Toni Collette (duh.  Isn’t she always?)

The Feminine Critique

Last week, a friend told me that everyone thinks I come off as believing I am superior to others. What’s more, that I always make her feel badly about herself. My gut reaction is to defend myself: my words and my actions.  I spend a lot of my time feeling deeply unworthy of the company of others, and that would be my defense against believing I am superior.  I would never believe I was superior to anyone, because I know that I am barely deserving of a human classification, so shitty can I be.  But those are just feelings.  Poorly worded feelings, no doubt.  And ultimately, it does not change or fix the damage this person feels I have done.

Every time I am told that I have hurt someone, it wounds me.  I focus on it for weeks on end, ultimately compressing that injury into a tiny ball of scar tissue that hangs around in my heart.  When I want to sink into my own neuroses, I pull out that little ball of scar tissue, roll it around in my hands, taste it.  Remember why I am unworthy of even basic human respect … unworthy of treating myself kindly.

That’s pretty shitty behavior.  I don’t like about myself that I can wallow so effectively, and yet still find that I have done harm to others.  So the methods I have used (defending my actions, holding onto my offenses) hasn’t been effective.  It’s time to make a change.  So for that change, rather than defend myself, I’m going to explore all the ways my friend has a valid perception of me.

I try to parent my friends.  I want them to be safe, well, and very very happy.  I offer too much advice, too much unasked-for guidance to them, because I want them to find all the beauty and peace that they each deserve.  Though my motives are good, it is overbearing, and comes off as the behavior of a judgemental know-it-all.

I am opinionated.  So very opinionated.  And my opinions often come out before I word them carefully.  My opinions also often arrive before I realize that no one asked my opinion at all.

I can be very abrasive.  In the options of fight or flight, if I believe the wellbeing or feelings of my loved ones are at stake, I always choose fight.  I am often wrong that anything at all is at stake, and I therefore come off unnecessarily confrontational to the people I consider to be a threat to the ones I love.  Also, I am far too prone to believe that the danger to the person I love is themselves.  Fighting a friend to save that same friend is … well, fucking ridiculous.

I am sensitive.  Not sensitive … I am raw.  I am so easily hurt, or reminded of past hurts, by almost anything.  If I mention a personal interest and don’t receive a response, I know that I am being slighted.  If no one laughs at my jokes, I know that I will always be that awkward ugly girl in sixth grade who laughed at her own jokes.  That girl who still feels easily how mean the cool kids can be when you are a know-it-all weirdo.  That sensitivity feeds into how opinionated I can be, and a cycle gets created.

I am a procrastinator.  I wait to share all the ugly little scars and bruises that make up my psyche until everything in me is so tense and taut that I am more likely to lash out.

I wallow.  Hell, this whole post is about me trying to stop wallowing and continue to be a better person, so that probably goes without explanation.

The things above … I own those.  Those are in me.  I am that person.  All things that I can work on, do work on, and will continue to work on.  I can be more trusting of people in my life to make their own decisions.  I can be more patient with my opinions.  I can share more and judge less.

But I cannot quit wanting desperately for all the people I love to have all the happiness and beauty that their awesome existence (and their awesome gift to me by their existence) demands.  I will always want so much for everyone to find all the wonders of the world.  But maybe I can learn to accept that I don’t always have the right answers for them.  I can let them find these things for themselves, and just be so fucking thankful that I get to witness them doing so.

And maybe if I see it enough, I’ll start seeing more of the things that have got to be there for me to discover as well.  No one hates me as much as I do.  I have to believe that I am the one who has been wrong all along.

Peace.

An embarrassment of complaining

I’ve been a moody little cuss the past few days, but I seem to be recovering from that thanks to a steady diet of learning to the fuck up about it.  Unfortunately, days of quieting my awful inner monologue means that I didn’t have a lot of other rich inner life shit out of which to create my wonderfully witty posts.  Or really bad posts.  Whatever.

So instead, today, I give you a list of what’s coming up in my world.

1. I signed up for NYC Midnight’s short story challenge, and that begins tomorrow.  I’ve been involved in a few of their past contests, and managed to win the 100 Character Micro-fiction contest back in the summer.  It’s all good fun, and the prompts tend to get my creativity fueled for a few months after any challenge.  Win either way.
2. I finished the unending scarf, and the rug-hooked pineapple.  I’ve now moved on to deciding what the next finished project will be, but my marathon rug-hooking session (I initially left out the rug from that phrase and it had a whole new meaning) left me with a weirdly sore and swollen middle finger, so I have to wait before I can craft again.  I used to be terrified of amputation, but now I’m only afraid of losing my middle finger.  I use it a lot.  Crafting.  Flipping birds.  Flipping OFF birds (fuckin’ birds).
3. I picked up a case for my phone today.  And some earbuds.  But the earbuds suck so I’m taking them back to the store.  I know you wanted to know.  You are welcome.
4. I am starting to crave the creation of some visual art.  I’m bad at art, but it’s all I can think about.  I’ll draw some stick figures soon, or something.

Peace!

Then there’s today

I finished that rug-hooked pineapple last night, because I stayed up until 5am obsessed with doing so. Now today all the noises inside and outside my head are too loud. I’m too sad, too tired, and too sensitive to make the day into more than it is. Also all of the above for how I feel about writing this entry today.

I Need a Win 2: Still Winning after all these … Day

I realized after I published my post yesterday one of the main things that has been tanking my mood lately.  I’m having some Self-Awareness Fatigue.  Part of what has previously caused me to fail with resolutions (New Year’s and otherwise) as any major life improvement, for me, requires a lot of reflection on why what I was doing previously wasn’t working.  After awhile, I get tired of looking at all my physical and metaphorical scars, my poorly-trained thought patterns, and all the other flaws that make up a significant portion of how I live my life.

After a few weeks, it all becomes an internal battle between loving myself for who I am and trying to be the best I can be, and absolutely loathing everything from my opinionated statements to the blackheads on the side of my nose to the sound of my own breathing.  Yesterday was a day where the loathing was beating up on the loving.  So I decided to finish the neverending scarf.

It finally ended.

Now that that is blocking, I had to decide on another long-delayed project from the craft cabinet/hellpit of making shit.  So speaking of hellpit:

Motherfucking rug-hooked pineapple, yo. Hardcore.

I can’t remember why I wanted to rug hook a pineapple, and I have no guesses as to how long ago I started this thing.  I picked up the kit at a Fiber Festival, maybe in Ohio, maybe in Wisconsin, maybe from the depths of home decor’s nightmares.  But here it is, a rug-hooked pineapple.  Or some of it.

By the rules of the challenge, until I finish this thing, I can’t work on anything else.   I’m hoping that is motivation enough to finish it quickly, because seriously.  Rug-hooked pineapple.

Peace.

 

I need a win

Last week, I posted about my craft cabinet, and how it shows my record of not following through with tasks.  Today, I decided to try to clean that sucker out.  It didn’t go well.  I found some stamps and ink pads I was willing to get rid of, some mail that never belonged there in the first place, and found a piece of board that will make a most excellent doormat for the weird mystery door that I want to put into my blocked up fireplace.  (Seriously, it’ll be adorable.  I have quite a few friends that will probably try to open the door when I’m not looking.  My people are curious.)

Oh, the potential!

This meager attempt at destashing means that, though there has been improvement, the craft cabinet still looks like this.

Improvement? Technically. I guess.

Realizing that I can’t let go of all the potential contained therein without a fight, I am making a rule for myself.  I am going to enter a state of heightened productivity, forgoing my puzzle games that I play when I’m bored or stressed, and instead working on a project from that cabinet every day.  I will pick one, finish it, put away the tools involved in making it (or put them in the giveaway pile if I don’t need them anymore), and give away or put away whatever I made.  Then I move onto the next one.

The first project I’ve chosen from the pile is this scarf:

It is possible that I've been working on this since the beginning of time.

I  realized a little over halfway through that I don’t care for the colors or the pattern.  Someone will love it, just not me.  I tried to give it away to anyone in my knitting group, but no one wanted to finish such an intensive small-gauge project either.   I am going to work a few more repeats on it, bind it off, and send it to my friend who puts together emergency bags with supplies for local people in need.  It’s a beautiful scarf, it’s just not meant for me.

And finishing it will be a win.  Then I can pull something else out of that cabinet, make it into something amazing, and pass that on too.  Happy Monday, everyone.