This week, I felt like an exposed nerve and an empty bowl under a faucet and the theme could have been OPEN if I was going to name my week. Maybe next week will be named CLOSED, but either way is OK. We have seasons.
My friend Danielle makes the best lists and sells things I like over here. I am having that kind of week/season where I find it hard to organize my thoughts. So, here we are with a list. About the week. Written on a Sunday night, under a pile of pets and anxieties and joyful memories from the last 7 days. Here are some:
- I was social. And I tiptoed into it. And then I opened up. And I realized that it’s OK to hide when you need to hide. People will wait. They might even wait a little longer than you think they will. We all have seasons.
- I got up early. I did hard workouts that made me feel good and clean some days and exhausted and gross other days.
- I slept in. I felt manic and woke up wired and some days woke up zombie-tired.
- I learned that someone important from my past was sober and had been for almost as long as I had been. We exchanged a small handful of words about this, they were all peaceful, and I felt, for the first time really genuinely, that our past selves, the ones that loved each other and were intertwined so fiercely, and unkind to each other at times, were dead. I felt free. I was happy for our new selves.
- I spent a lot of time with kids and felt like maybe I didn’t want to have kids because holy shit they require so much energy.
- I spent a lot of time with kids and felt the weight of sadness over not having kids and feeling like I had majorly fucked up by not having them yet. I have these two conflicting feelings on a daily basis and this week was just more of each.
- I had hard conversations and felt really good about them one day and then felt awful about them the next . I doubt myself when I least expect it.
- I ate so much ice cream this week. I feel really good about that choice. It’s the end of July. This is like the holiday season of ice cream eating.
- I went out to my car tonight, to get my laundry, because I do my laundry at my boyfriend’s house. I was standing next to the car, getting ready to hike the basket up on my hip when I heard a scratching sound. I thought it was a cricket and I thought that maybe there was a cricket on this branch right by my head, resting on top of the car. And I stared at the branch. And I listened. And I realized that the noise was the light scratching of the leaf against the roof. A breeze would come, and lift it up for a moment, and then bring it back down to resume the uneven scratching noise. I felt the message “breathe, and just keep breathing when you feel too heavy” and that was perhaps god and perhaps not. And I don’t mind if that sounds nuts.
- Sometimes editing is good and other times, it feels like starting to clean for your friends who are coming over and then saying “you know what my house looks like, fuck it” and putting the lint roller down. I’m glad that you’re reading about this season, and that you don’t mind the mess.
mistakes by the lake 