“And without each other we will go extinct.” The words float in from the other room – the show Community is on in the background, I finally figured it out after pacing around the silent house all day, now late night, I remember that I saw my “comfort show” the other night when my mom was scrolling Netflix. Today I have a quiet space to work that is warm and semi comfortable.. the first time in a while. My mom and her husband are out of town for a few days. It is raining and I am grateful for being indoors, I can just stay here for a moment without having to figure out where to shuffle my body off to next, and there is no drama going on to energetically have to ward off. The silence, now finally with a moment of peace to work, is also a little deadly, but in this moment feels better than the alternative.
I have lost most of today in a disoriented daze, not knowing where to start after unloading the bags from the car. Where to begin for this fleeting moment…
“We have the strength to overcome anything, what’s the worst that could happen to Chang?” the tv says from the other room.
I felt like Chang last month, going insane, living in solitude in the air ducts. Technically my version of this was in an RV in the middle of nowhere, where everything that could have gone wrong went wrong – ice cold sink showers, power outages, bursting pipes, septic issues… fucking yuuuuck, needless to say I didn’t stay out there often. Incidentally, many of the nights I tried to stay there landed me sleeping curled up in my car with the words “She’s not gonna make it!! She’s not gonna make it!!” running through my head…. A memorable sound byte that my grandmother expressed to me/about me/about herself/in front of me on the phone to my mother, last winter during an emotional narcissist fit. In my lowest moments it has crept in repeatedly to try to overpower my psyche. It is good for me to understand certain aspects of my upbringing that have haunted my subconscious most of my life, brutal sometimes, but very important for healing. Now I can work to separate those voices of my grandmother from my own, remembering my shine, my beauty, an inner glow that nobody can take from me. Now that I am here standing tall by my own side, the slings and arrows can’t phase me. (I sure hope)
After sleeping in a house for a few consecutive nights I feel a bit more grounded.. I saw gram a few days ago actually, for the first time in a while after being quite angry. I told her all about the detours, bumps, and postponings that have come up in my house search, but that I am feeling strong in myself (I might even love myself, even through my own darkness) – and ya know what she she said? – “You’re gonna make it, of course you’re gonna make it”
I will admit that hearing her say that gave me a moment to breathe peace into the wounding. Most importantly I have seen enough and undone enough of the past that has bound me, and I am finally proud of myself, believing this about myself – that I am in fact gonna make it. I finally see how magical I am, my own bright and theatrical self, and I wouldn’t want to spend an entire lifetime with anyone else. I also hope one day soon to finally invite somebody else in enough to love me… What has become one of my greatest life challenges – letting down the walls and barriers around my heart, and actually allowing myself to be loved. The song “nature boy” comes to mind.
I told myself from an early age that relationships just weren’t my thing, understanding – if you had met some of the men my mom dragged in off the street when I was a kid. I have mostly done my best to avoid relationships. Fear of intimacy combined with judgement, external judgement +/= self judgement, nobody was ever good enough for me, and I was never gonna be good enough for someone I might actually want to love. I always just preferred to be with my friends, with the music, or with my artwork. I have always just been super low-grade scared, like really scared of getting hurt. I’ve built up many walls and masks to try and trick myself out of noticing what I have been trying to avoid forever, something very tender inside that hasn’t seen the light of the sun for a very long time.
Breathe. Don’t resist. Breathe. Don’t edit. Ugh can’t I go one day without bossing myself around and then getting huffy about it?! Haha, seems like the majority of the work is overcoming resistance, I guess maybe that is where art comes from – it is the outcome of friction, a chance to transmute the suffering into something beautiful. This is an option we are given, a power one might say that we are all given at birth, the ability to transmute pain into beauty. I don’t think many people take the opportunity very fully. I keep trying, over and over it seems. In a sense I feel like I should just relax into the perspective of having fun with the turbulence, and allow it to motivate my creativity. I do believe that is the right kind of spirit, but I also feel just so very exhausted, beaten up, metaphorically bludgeoned & pulverized after going through the long body of the snake, the trials of my universe, spit out the other side, sticky with amniotic fluid… poked at and prodded a couple times over with a stick. “Do you think it’s alive?”
I notice a fuzz around me today, kinda groggy, distant.. my spirit must be off somewhere else looking for that lost unicorn, or exploring a dream she once had back when dreams were still free…. (me joking from the perspective of earth – 2033)
In terms of speculating on reasons for humans to experience emotions, it makes sense to me in a way, that apathy would show up during “more difficult times” – in order to numb the pain and decrease the spectrum of emotion available from which to feel.
It is my least favorite place to get stuck in.
I would take mania over apathy any day.
That being said, I feel stronger than I did yesterday. And I am in fact writing today, so today I have something.
I remember two years ago, this time of year – winter, that was when I first discovered the show Community. I was quite sick, and mostly bed ridden – with what, I didn’t know exactly – some sort of systemic grief sickness I would say (among other things that have forced me to learn how to heal myself through first hand fire). It was very difficult to move, and most food seemed to throw my body into an attack mode that sent me right back to bed. It was, I believe, worse at this point, than it had ever been.
I’ve never been big into tv, when alone I mostly work on art. I tend to feel like I always have to be producing something, and I get a little bit anxious when I’m not creating. But in this instance, the opportunity to binge watch a 6 season show that made me laugh out loud, came at the right time, and I was able to call it “research” to myself, feeling in some way like it was “homework” or an important prerequisite for my work..
Lots of funny coincidences I recall, symmetry of the sagas in my life with the storyline of the show – for instance, first time watching the space simulator episode was IMMEDIATELY after beginning the spaceship console build in my room…. many odd ways in which I could relate to the themes…. It felt like they were inside my strange little dreamworld, projecting my thoughts on the big screen and doing it a million times better. I felt like I could relate.
It’s nice to laugh out loud at the jokes again for a moment, remembering some of the fun we all had in the darkness at that time. Remembering also, that here was beautiful music there.
The last episode has ended in the other room, and it is all quiet in the house, just the rhythm of the rain outside, and the keys of my keyboard typing. Not the worst way I could be ending my night. I do hope, also, that the sun comes up again tomorrow for a brighter day.
