hello you lovely people!

just a note to say i arrived in one piece yesterday — and i visited a psychiatrist today. yesyesyes, i did it. that deserves a long entry, though, so i’m going to share all that with you tomorrow. it was a positive experience, i must say.

and well, im having fun, chilling out, doing silly stuff. it’s such a relief to have a life again!

talk to you all soon *hugs*

defender of the faith
man of absolutism
dyed red or crossing self
scheming; wielding schism
doctrinaire of dissonance
into pure and naive he delves
forgive us, lord, who trespass against
ourselves

sitting on a small hill of crumpled bedclothes, telling myself that here and now, an atwood in my hand, alone and growing slowly intolerant of the hysterical chirping of birds outside my window, is where i’m meant to be. it’s ok, it’s alright, take a deep breath and count to 3, shashka’d tell me, if he were here. it’s strange, shashka is thousands of miles away in new zealand and equally unhappy.

i have read this book before, cat’s eye, though only snippets of it seem recognisable. it feels like i might have read it in another life, because i can predict with clarity some parts of the story, yet others are as new to me. i flip back, check the first page: published 1988. so unless i’m living in a time warp and existing in two or more eras simultaneously, i haven’t read this one in a past life, i’m older than the book.

there’s a knock at my door, a girl from upstairs smiles and hands me a plastic bag with a large box of pizza in it. “from n.,” she says. dear darling n. dear silly, innocent, trusting and affectionate n — what would i do without you? even on days you’ve committed to going out with someone else, you make sure you take care of me. without you i would be even more lost, if possible. they say men and women can’t have deep platonic relationships — they’re all idiots. we don’t need to listen to them.

a boy told me today he thinks i’m not beautiful. it was an odd, out-of-place statement, and i was taken by surprise. i laughed it off, what else could i do? and though it stung, it didn’t upset me as much as it would have some years ago. i’ve been told enough times since then that i am — and some part of me, some wise, calm, hidden part of me, estimates both positive and negative opinions equally, distrusts both of them. i am, i exist, and beautiful or not is quite irrelevant, don’t you think? but people do say the oddest things, without a thought as to whether they’re hurtful or not, or perhaps they intend them to hurt, to pinch, they enjoy that look of vulnerability on the face of the victim, that momentary panic when you’re entirely unsure of how to respond, that breaking point when the ego lies bare and challenged, writhing in all its ugly pride, deformed, snakelike, hiding under a pale fleshy covering that only barely conceals the truth of its manipulations —
but i digress.

i have shared my living space for three years now with a girl who is nice, yes, but living together has gotten way too much for both of us now, and we spend long periods of time not speaking a word to each other, not in animosity, you understand, just a sense of helplessness at having no privacy, no domain of the self that we can secure physically with lock and key of stainless steel. i trust the next few months will pass soon, and i’ll get my own room. we’ll both be thankful, and much better friends, once that happens.

i’ve been sleeping a lot again. it always happens during these phases of gloom. i must have clocked in at least 15 hours of sleep in the last 24. i have nothing to do, i make sure i have nothing to do by blatantly disregarding the piles of work waiting to be tackled, and i lie limply in my bed. and then a sort of shapeless, bland sleep descends, a sleep from which i wake feeling ill with unused energy, to be greeted by the blazing afternoon sun that makes any sort of coherent thinking well-nigh impossible.

i tell myself as always that tomorrow is a new day, i drink some water and swallow some vitamins and listen to rimsky-korsakov and reassure myself that i must, that i do, at any cost, feel better.

Let us understand that the jerk who cut us off in traffic last night is a single mother who worked nine hours that day and is rushing home to cook dinner, help with homework, do the laundry and spend a few precious moments with her children. Let us think kindly towards the pierced, tattooed, disinterested young man who can’t make change correctly, he is a worried 19-year-old college student, balancing his apprehension over final exams with his fear of not getting his student loans for the next semester. Let us be kind to that scary-looking bum, begging for money in the same spot everyday (who really ought to get a job!), he is a slave to addictions that we can only imagine in our worst nightmares. Let us be patient with the old couple walking annoyingly slow through the store aisles and blocking our shopping progress, they are savouring this moment, knowing that, based on the biopsy report she got back last week, this will be the last year that they go shopping together. Let us live each day mindful that the greatest gift is love. It is not enough to share that love with those we hold dear. Open your heart, not just to those who are close to us, but to all humanity. Let us be slow to judge and quick to forgive, show patience, empathy and love.

I found this at another blog — no one seems to know who the author is, but it hit me hard. I hope it impressed you as much as it impressed me. I found on introspection that there’s a major attitude change I need to bring about in myself.