Update. I'm Too Balanced.

Strangely, (or not) the really erratic one at work came to me today and asked me what had happened over the last few weeks - what conclusion or understanding I had come to inside myself that has changed how I deal with everything (they've noticed, obviously).

I told her that it's because I've finally adjusted to all the changes in my life in the last year. That I'm careful about what I eat, that I don't drink much these days, that I exercise, that I manage my stress more diligently than I did before. That I view this as just a job and not an end result. That I'm feeling more confident in my job now that I've learned a bit more about what I'm doing. That I've worked out the group dynamics.

And all those things are true.

I just don't mention the other bit. It's a bit stupid and not entirely true to say... "Well, it's the drugs, don'tcha know." ... not because I'm ashamed of this but because of the *weight* those words carry in our society. The importance that others bestow of their own accord upon those simple words.

There is no part of me that cares what other people think about this. James and I talked again about this on the weekend - this is something "the drugged ones" run into all the time - because people treat you differently.

I've had something wrong with me all this time, I have friends that say, "but how could you not know that something was wrong?", but all this time - all these years, at least 15 - no one's treated me differently than they've treated anyone else.

But once those words come out, then suddenly, you are a foreigner, an alien, someone who's no longer in 'control' of themselves. Suddenly, it's hide the butter knives, walk on glass and we are going to blame every moment of every mood of every decision of every comment of every day on YOUR ILLNESS.

It's not the illness that makes it real to everyone else - it's the drugs. To us, it's been real for far too long and the drugs make it, finally, an illness with hope.

The pathetic thing is... what they don't get ... and what you can never explain to them is - I'm not ill. I WAS. Now, I'm NORMAL. I'm not happy because I'm DRUGGED. I'm happy because this is WHO I AM, who I always should have been and that person you've known all these years was the chemically imbalanced, uncontrolled one.

They've got it all backwards.

And they are *so* missing out on something great that's been years in the finding.

It makes me wonder sometimes why people would be more comfortable with that person than with the real one, why people would rather support the 'crazy' instead of the 'sane'. And then I realize that *that* can of worms is the size of the universe and I'm just one tiny little blade of grass and so I let it go.

Mostly, these days, I just don't have the inclination, the energy, or the time to carry their stuff. This is their perception. This is their judgement.

My doctor tells me yesterday that because of the history behind this - I may very well be one of those people who will never be without these little pills for the rest of my life. We'll try. We'll monitor. But, frankly, does it make me unhappy or scare me to think I might be *happy and normal* for the rest of my life? Uh. No.

So, in the normal course of my days I just keep my mouth shut and stick with the decision that this is one battle I'm going to turn down. The battle I'm not going to pick.

I've got better things to do.

Finally.

Who Rocks? Chris Rocks. Oh, Yes She Does!

For those of you who don't know (and I can't honestly believe there's anyone *on the planet* who doesn't know by now) I hate being called "CHICK".... beyond hate, actually but that's a slippery slope....

But sometimes, oh so very rarely, but sometimes, ladies and gentleman, being called a chick will make me laugh and laugh and smile and laugh some more.

Getting this T-shirt in the mail today, was one of those sometimes.

Thank you Chrissykins, you are THE rock in Wyoming, not that silly Devil's Tower thing from that movie, what was that called?.

And here's a quote I especially like from the book that came along with it (plus the magnet is pretty damn cute as well). I am very spoiled.
.

Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born.

Anais Nin

Ahhhhhhh!

Today, nay, this very moment, marks the first time that Blogger has gone *bye-bye* (or that I've noticed it's gone tits up) since I moved me-self over to my lovely new Squarespace.

As you clearly can see - !clearly I say! - I AM HAVING NO PROBLEMS POSTING!!!!!

Wheeeeeeeeee! Tee hee hee.

Missing

Yes, I am still trying to write my goddamn Thanksgiving post from last year. It's just so hard to explain and I'm trying to make it stand-alone so that you wouldn't have had to have been here with me for the last year and a half to understand what I'm going on about.

For now, it's about T3. And it's going to be long. And so, I'm still going through IM conversations and piecing anecdotes together.

And this one.... made my heart squeeze in with the ache of missing his smart ass.

10/9/2004 8:10:10 PM
timmy --...and you'll be down under before too long
Jen-- true. maybe sooner than I'd originally planned. ss long as you know I'm coming to visit. you could put me to work. make me earn my supper.
timmy -- no worries tiger. we'll have you butchering sheep and skinning roos in no time. unless you just wanna play with the little lambies.....
Jen. -- shh. you're nasty. we had dinner with my mom and she ate lamb in honor of Matt, it's not bad but that's the first time I ever had it. you never know, I might start running them down and killing them with my bare hands.
timmy -- yeah - I actually ordered it the other night here. first time in a while for me too
Jen. -- it must be strange, lamb in canada - I think most of ours is imported from New Zealand.
timmy -- probably - it tasted 'abused'..........

Negligence Remedied

It's been a while since we've had a poem and being reminded while searching the online library catalogue for books from my reading list - and not finding any of the poetry ones - I went to my own often-ignored stack to drag one out.

Avoiding, this time, a dry biography on this Canadian poet I've linked to this article which tells an interesting story of a shy and reclusive banker.

Although, if you really insist on the dry biography type thing, I suppose I must supply that as well.

I think he's the first one, here, who's still alive.

---

All This Slow Afternoon

All this slow afternoon
the May winds blowing
honey of the lilacs,
sounds of waves washing
through the highest branches
of my poplar tree.

Enough in such hours
to be simply alive;
I will take death tomorrow
without bitterness.

Today all I ask
is to be left alone
in the wind
in the sunshine
with the honey of lilacs
down the garden;

to fall asleep tired
of small birds' gossip,
of so much greeness
pushed behind my eyes.

Raymond Souster

'Light' Precipitation

It's the small realizations sometimes that have the biggest effect, like the ripples of a tiny stone dropped in a pond that seem to go on forever.

I woke up this morning with my period (sorry boys). Which is not a weird thing. It always comes on a weekend. Okay, *that's* weird, the weekend thing, but it's not my point. Ever since the nastiness with the hormones in the pill and the endometriosis, I don't take birth control and the scar tissue that was left behind from the surgeries precludes any reason to take it unless I need to control my period. (sorry again, boys)

ANYWAYS, whilst having coffee and listening to the rain on my roof, I realized that the atmosphere this last week has been different around the little village in my head.

The family shit, it only upset me for a DAY. I wrote it all down but I didn't post it because, somehow, it just didn't belong here. Those people's issues didn't belong here, in my place. This place is about my bag of issues and they're just going to have to get their own carryall and stop filling up mine and expecting me to haul it around for them.

I realized that I had no warning of said period. I didn't spend the last ten days going from 0 - 60 in two seconds flat. I wasn't pissed off, erratic, grouchy..etc..etc

Then, a little farther into my coffee as I was creating titles for Lacey's gallery, I realized that the pictures make me smile (as they always do) but that I wasn't crying for the missing of her (like I always do).

That, as an appreciator and former owner of (pet) rats, I wasn't twisting myself into a frenzy of guilt and sadness that last night we put out poison for the farm rat who's been hoarding my chocolate covered raisons. For a couple months, judging by the pile in the cupboard.

That, the innumerable tiny things over the last week that would have normally set me off - didn't. Didn't faze me in the slightest.

And, I realized, that what these things mean is that maybe, finally, hopefully, after 13 months - we've found the right things to make *me* right. I can't say right *again* because, as you know, and the doctor's believe, and my friends think - I've never actually *been* right. Now matter how interesting, or cute, or quirky.

The Celexa is bad for me though, the weight I lost last year has never come back and in the last two weeks I lost another 3 pounds, as well as yawned constantly and didn't sleep as well so I'm sure we'll need to find another when I go to see my loverly doctor tomorrow. But that's just details, really.

And I remember from last year how great the first couple weeks are when these things kick in, like a tiny compensation for the shit times, before the level normalizes.

BUT.

This time it feels different. I think I finally believe my last two doctors. I think I finally really believe that this hasn't been ME. No matter how well it's been hidden or tucked away or denied. That it hasn't gotten worse the last few years because I just somehow lost my ability to compensate for it.

That the things I've been working on for me are exactly the right things but that they haven't been the answer I thought they were because they weren't the underlying problem. Yet, still, I've reaped the benefits.

That this place, and you, have helped immeasurably with those things.

That I'm not hoping for a light at the end of the tunnel that I can't even imagine because that light went on over my head this week sometime and I barely even noticed it.

That, I sit here and listen to my interior self and she's not angry, she's not manic, she's not *over* or *under* - she's just quiet, and even, and facing fully forward.

That, she IS shedding a tear or two and these words are a little blurry...

...but that she cries, now, for entirely different reasons.

Peace.

Balance.

Someone Else's Profundity

...Because although I DID (yay!) make the entire bike ride without stopping or giving into the urge to get a free ride home by swerving in front of a car (or that tractor that I had to pass), I can no longer get off the couch. I have also no ability to drag myself around using my arms since the 'training' for the push-up portion of my physical testing has pulled every muscle along my entire rib cage. And so I am going to stop uploading photos (which are now hidden until I can arrange 'em all), plug in Blade III set it to repeat and not get up until tomorrow morning.

When I shall try to do it again.

In the meantime....

By the time I managed to repress my ex-boyfriend, I was half way to the subway station, sweating and rather shaky and I thought, well, should I go to therapy? Am I repressing lots of stuff? Of course I fucking am. No prizes for figuring that out. Am I going fucking mad, at last? It's been a rough couple of weeks for me, for various reasons. Maybe finally, I've reached breaking point. I've repressed too much. I'm going to burst in some horrible way. Mentally only, I hope. Physical bursting would be messy and painful and grim.

But then I remembered the couple of times I have dabbled in therapy. It usually comprised of me sitting remembering miserable things that had happened to me for an hour a week and receiving 'explanations' of stuff I'd already figured out, that made absolutely no dent in the mountain of misery that engulfed me. Analysis is one thing I'm actually good at. I can make sense of it all now. I just can't change what happened, and I never seemed to get any more cheerful about it all. Talking about it didn't actually make it any better. I've been talking about it for years. And I'm still a miserable bastard.

When my mother was dying, I went to see a very wise counsellor indeed, called Angela. She told me you don't have to spend all your time obssessing on the bad stuff that happened to you. You can just decide to let it go. Forgive it and dump it like a heavy lump of bricks you've been carrying around with you everywhere unnecessarily. So I did. And it felt much better. It took a bit of work over the years, but I figured I'd made some progress getting on with my life. I'm miserable, sure, but I'm functional.

come have a drink, with the thirsty love guzzler
from the darkside, baby, don't be afraid
you can't fight the thirst, nor escape the Blade