Contemplations of a Shopping List

AHHHH!! This is a full week today of not feeling great... I am getting really tired of solitary confinement to bed.  Anyway, all this alone time has left me lots and lots of time to think and contemplate which got me thinking about a subject a few of my friends and I have been joking about recently....

We are all semi-recently single and have begun to look at ourselves and our relationship patterns- what works, what doesn't... seems fairly simple until you are really tasked with doing it...then the water gets a little murky.  So, we have realized that finding a mate is a lot like shopping.  One friend put it very succinctly- I will paraphrase to the best of my memory- "I like shopping at Target.  They have tons of selection for many different things and I can generally go there and get all of my shopping done in just one trip.  But sometimes, they don't have exactly what I am looking for.  They may have a cheaper, chintzier version, but for the investment I am about to make, it simply is not what I want or need.  It is tough not to just say screw it and buy the inferior product... it is right here, much more convenient then having to schlep around to various stores looking for the right thing... I could just buy this inferior product and try to repair it down the road when it breaks... or I could even throw it out when it malfunctions and purchase an entirely new one.  It's an impulse buy really."  And boy am I a sucker for an impulse buy... it is not at all what I need or want, but it's right there, lookin so cute and stylish...  My other issue is that I tend to find something that works for me (maybe not what works best, but works) and purchase ten of the same item... this explains why 99% of my wardrobe is black.  Black shirts, black dresses, black shirt dresses... more then once I have been accused of being 'Gothic' and while I am not sure what exactly that entails, I do get that it may be an easy conclusion to come to based upon what I wear day in and day out. 

But those black items... most of them are faves in my wardrobe... everyone is always encouraging me to 'step out on a limb' wear some color... and I have...I recently purchased a red dress.  Phew! talk about stepping out on a limb! I feel as though I am screaming at everyone when I wear it... HEY! HEY YOU! LOOK AT ME, I AM WEARING A BRIGHT RED DRESS! Of course, that is not what I mean when I wear it, and I am guessing most people don't see it that way, but I feel funny none the less... I suppose coming out of my comfort zone is going to come with a certain amount of...well, discomfort.  And, no pain no gain right?

So, you get the picture right? I have toyed with this story in my head for the last couple of months and now I think it is time to take the next step.  I need a shopping list.  Every single time I go to the grocery without a list I end up regretting it... I forget the one damned thing I went to the store for to begin with or I come home with a bunch of ridiculous ingredients that do not go together what-so-ever, or I spend a fortune on junk.  Same thing happens when I go to Target- no list and I walk out with makeup, shoes and jewelry when what I needed was deodorant, shampoo and face wash.  It is tough not to get distracted by all the pretty, shiny trinkets in the store- even if I walk in with the best of responsible intentions, my inner three-year-old-impulsive-self-gratification kicks in and I walk straight past the deodorant to the nail polish.  What I need, you can't get at Target, it is more of an 'investment piece'- something I need to shop around for so I can be sure to get the best possible product for my time, money and energy. 

So in a preemptive effort to derail my inner self saboteur, I think it is necessary to compile a list of what I am shopping for... and after hours of further contemplation I now realize this is not going to be an easy list to put together.  I did not realize how tough it is to put some of this into word form... I'll get there though... I can't make a purchase until I finish the list and I can't make the list until I figure out exactly what I need!

Bassett Hounds in the Sahara

Well, I am attempting to come in for a (shaky) landing to the world of the living today.  It has been a long time coming. I had the tonsils yanked on Tuesday, and despite my best intentions to be in tip top shape by Wednesday...to no avail!  When the body demands us be still-still is the only thing we can be.  Half way through Wednesday when I realized a miraculous bounce back would not be in the cards, I decided that I would sleep until I felt better.  No such luck on that front either. I should have known this- taking prednisone (a steroid prescribed to help reduce the swelling) is NEVER pleasant or restful.  Combine that with codeine elixir and you get relatively the same result as if you were to go out on a vodka energy drink bender... NOT PLEASANT!! Your body and brain move in slow motion due to the pain meds, while your heart races and your hands tremble from the steroids...perhaps the most attractive combination ever, especially at night when the night soaks come from the steroids.  It is tough to describe in words the kind of disharmony my body has been going through the last few days...

Western medicine is a funny thing, we take pills to 'feel better' but often suffer more from the side effects than from the original symptoms... we have all seen  the anti-depressant commercials on TV... the side effects for those meds are enough to make a depressed person say 'you know what, fuck it, it isn't worth it.'  Sure, we will relieve your depression, but in turn you will gain 75 lbs, be unable to control your bladder or rectal functions or facial expressions, you will drool on your self non-stop, your hair is going to fall out and one in 10,000,000 start lactating, which is fine because not only are you now wholly unattractive, but even if you have an ounce of libido left these meds will turn your vagina into the sandy, arid Sahara or have your dick standing at attention like the floppy ears of a bassett hound.  But, hey it could be worse right? AT LEAST your not depressed.

When I arrived at the hospital to be prepped for surgery the nice lady getting me ready told me that she was going to be giving me a shot to numb the spot they would be inserting the IV in.  Really? So, you are giving me a needle to numb the spot where you are sticking a needle?!  I have had IV's before, they are not extremely pleasant, but no worse than the numbing shot for the shot. They gave me a pill to empty my stomach, and then one to counteract the heartburn that would come from that AND THEN one for the nausea that would undoubtedly result from ingesting all those pills on an empty stomach.  Talk about the long way around eh?! What are we coming to in this world?  We have pills to counteract the pills we take to feel better which inadvertently make us feel worse... kind of like once you have your tonsils removed you'll never have a sore throat again, you just have to endure two weeks of the worse sore throat ever after having them removed then- your in the clear! Awesome.

So, what's my point in all of this? Hell, I don't know, I forgot what I was trying to say five words into this post.  I sit hear today, wanting desperately to articulate all the stuff that has been rotting in my brain for the past 5 days and I am stuck.  My brain's still stuck in the codeine cloud, my fingers are heavy to drag across the keyboard, and I am not feeling particularly articulatory today.  But alas, I will carry on... perhaps tomorrow I will be blessed with making a little more sense out of it all...maybe my throat will be a little less sore and my brain a slight bit sharper... I guess we shall see.

Ode to my Tonsils

Haha, I thought of writing a good bye poem to my tonsils today, but then I thought- I will not give them one more iota of my time and energy;) they have taken enough of my that already.  But,  I really wish I had tough bitch today! I feel like a child... I am more scared and nervous than I thought I would be. Really nervous, like tummy in knots nervous.  I know, I know, it is a 'routine procedure' blah blah blah.  I get that.  I am not worried I won't make it through the surgery, or anything overly dramatic; I am just worried about having to check out of my life to recover.  I don't have time to miss work, next week is the last week of the quarter for school- I have to write two papers, and the list goes on and on.

I guess this is yet another nudge from whatever the fuck is out there that I must make time.  This is what I have to do to take care of myself, and sometimes taking care of myself takes time (actually, I suppose if I were to be totally honest-taking care of oneself ALWAYS takes time, which is probably why I avoid it like the mother fucking plague...) But, I hear ya universe, I'm doing it- I'm certainly not thrilled about it, but I am doing it.

I went to a meeting at a B&B little ways outside of Yellow Springs today... it was BEAUTIFUL!!! the most tranquil, quaint, out of the way restored log cabin on a bunch of acreage... that is the kind of 'taking care of myself' I want to do.  Made me think of the B&B's in Ireland...I could easily convince myself I was some where far far away at this cabin.  I want to dissapear there for a weekend! No phone. No computer. No work. No school.  No stupid tonsils. Just peace.  Oh well.  someday soon I will be swept off my feet, until then... I guess I will just have to settle for good drugs and ice chips;)

Impermanently Permanent

I hate fighting.  I hate fighting with myself the most... I used to always lose, but now... now I am starting to understand the strategy to winning the war with myself.  It is merely a series of battles, and the key is to remember that while this one battle will not over take me, I cannot be fooled by the rush of victory from one small battle, because there will be another, and another after that.  My most divine inspiration comes in those tiny moments where I realize that I am always on my team... which makes me realize how lucky I am.  I am a loyal team mate and a fierce competitor... which is why it seems so scary and overwhelming when I fight myself!  But, the more time I spend in that place if divine inspiration, the more peaceful I become.

I'd be lying if I said I spend all my time in this sort of self awareness...I definitely do not..but each time I do take shelter from my inner-war-world;basking in the sun on the island oasis of self awareness, I pick up one more bit of beauty and take it with me.  It is a breath- taking place, the island of self awareness... the days I have spent there have been warm and sunny with the most gentle of breezes... the beach is bathed in beautiful white sand, the water is so brilliantly blue, the vegetation is lush and green, the place exudes the kind of serenity that cannot be found in the inner-world-war.  For the most part it is a welcomed vacation from the inner-war battles of my day to day.  The only catch is that, while I love it there, it is not without struggles.  Sometimes the beach is too hot for my feet...sometimes I get so lost in introspection I get stung by a jelly fish...sometimes the tides come in and instead of retreating to my bungalow until the tide subsides, I slip back to the inner-war world and sometimes, I get stuck for a while. 

Just as it takes a considerable amount of effort to stay in the inner-war-world, the island of self-awareness demands attention and commitment... the difference is that one world drains me, drags me down and puts me at a place with myself that I do not at all enjoy.  The other recharges me, provides me with the emotional nourishment and fulfillment to continue on my way.  It seems like a no brainer for one to do everything possible to stay on that island at all costs.  But life demands a certain amount of ebb and flow... it is indeed a balancing act.  If I were to simply retire to the island of self awareness and spend all of my days there it would soon loose it's mystical, passionate and energizing sensibilities for me... and thus, the island of self awareness would decline and decay until suddenly, I would find myself waging my inner war on that same island that I had once regarded as paradise.  So, while today I drink up the cobalt water and bask in the brilliance of the sunlight refracting off the sand... I accept that the I must return to the inner-world-war now and then so that I may once again circle back to the island.  My time on the island-however brief or extended it may be has allowed me to accept the impermanence that is life- nothing is everlasting...and this too, as they say, shall pass.

Atop the Soap Box...

What is it about us humans that makes us so resistant to change and growth?  Why does it take the equivalent of near personal catastrophe for us to remove our heads from our asses and realize where the stench is coming from?!  Yes, I am at times a bit cynical, but really, it's the truth.  I have got catalogs of examples from my own life, and more recently I am becoming aware of it in the lives of people I am (or once was) close to.  I wonder what would happen if we all had that ah-ha moment, you know the one where you realize that after all these years it was you who held the key to your own destiny...

Please get, I am not taking a dualistic viewpoint here- I do not believe that those who make the decision to get up off the couch of their lives and make things happen are necessarily better than those who continue to toke on the joint of complacency.  Complacency can be comfortable, if we wriggle around now and then and adjust ourselves so as not to have our entire body succumb to the pins and needles of apathy, it can be a very warm and familiar place.  And let's face it... growing up, maturing, setting goals for oneself and developing some sort of mantra from which to live by-aint no immediate buzz... I suppose if anything it is the buzz kill for complacency... generally evolving as a being has little immediate gratification- it is not likely that the decision to go to school, or get a new job, or move, or any others of the major life decisions we all have to make at some point are going to result in some amazing and immediate high...

Nope, change comes with an entirely different set of feelings- some that are difficult, many that are good, but all are rewarding in some way, shape, or form.  As opposed to those days of excess-long lost to work, school, families and responsibilities- growing teaches us how to sustain that good feeling we lived for as kids- we still enjoy peaks (although, most often not the chemically induced ones of days of yore-why? there is no need!), but now those peaks are sweeten with the addition of valleys.  Of course, not even someone making the conscious effort to expand their awareness likes to be in those valleys, but after a certain point we come to realize how much more brilliant and rich those peaks are for it.

So, to those of you fighting the good fight to figure out yourself and your place in this world, to those of you making an effort to go about your life emulating positivity and awareness, to those of you committed to doing whatever you have to in order to be your best self, to those of you struggling to figure out what that looks like to you-I raise my glass to you.  Making our state or country or world a better place starts with each one of us at the most personal level.  If we can first commit to ourselves, we can then take that commitment to the streets!  To those of you immersed in the murky bong water of complacency,your life is waiting for you to live it-so come on up for air....

Be Here Now.

So, I write about school a lot, I know.  But it takes up a great deal of my time...and happens to be the current catalyst for new personal awareness's and what not.  It seems like I have been in school for decades...wait. I guess I have been!  Straight out of high school I went to Sinclair-   After spending three years getting my associate degree I moved on to the University of Cincinnati. In  my time at UC I figured out that I really wanted nothing to do with the degree path I had chosen (I know, great decision after 200+ credits with one year left).  I really wanted nothing to do with higher ed.  I felt like all I was doing was jumping through hoops to obtain a piece of paper that basically certified me as a hoop jumper. So, I dropped out. 

When I finally made the decision to go back, I went back on my terms- I was NOT going to jump through hoops anymore... if I were to obtain another degree it would be for the sole purpose of expanding my mind... the piece of paper would be secondary.  So, I did that, I went back, studied my ass off, learned a metric shit ton about the world and myself, and when graduation time came around I kinda flipped out... What in the hell was I supposed to do without school?  Who was I if not a student?  So I did the only logical thing and applied to grad school.

I guess I should say, it was logical to me, at the time.  My professor/mentor (who has one of the most amazing and brilliant minds I have ever encountered and is also a psychotherapist) was absolutely dead set against it.  She kept asking me why?  Why would you go to grad school?  You do not belong in grad school, you belong in culinary school she said.  All this did was piss me off really... why the fuck wouldn't I belong in grad school?!  Did I want to go to culinary school? Well, truth be told, yes, yes I did.  But anyone who knows me can attest to the fact that the surest way to get me to do anything is to tell me I can't, shouldn't or won't... then it becomes my own personal challenge to prove you wrong.  Seeing red flags as personal challenges is nothing new for me-it should be a red flag to me-about myself, but it isn't- I am still working on that.

So, here I am in grad school, learning heaps and loads about myself at the bargain rate of $500 per credit hour X 8 credits per quarter.  If you do the math, that is one FUCKING EXPENSIVE personal challenge.  Like I have said before, I love what I am learning, I am expanding my knowledge about myself and others at a rapid rate- but, I am not so sure how I feel about the academic part.  I am a lot of things, but I am not an academic.  And, if I were to stay quiet and still for just a few moments, I would realize that I am jumping through hoops-my own fucking hoops.  It seems as though, while I wasn't looking I snuck up on myself, hung several hoops out in front of me, and lit them on fire! Damn it Holly! For all your self proclaimed awareness, you still have some serious blind spots honey.

But, that's alright, how boring would life be if any of us had it all figured out at any particular moment? I'm not going to drop out and go to culinary school-yet.  But I am going to drop down to half time next quarter, and I am going to stay with this new-found self acceptance. Sometimes, I need reminded of the brand I had stamped on my back-to thine own self be true- that means you! I still have no answer to the age old question 'what do you want to be when you grow up', but I think everyday I get a bit closer to what I want to be now.

Always coming home to you...

Ahh, deep breath in... the sun is out!!! Yay!  Just when I thought I might fall into the never ending hole of the grayness of winter! Warm days... the kind that they have in LA 325 days out of the year... I think about the fact that I was supposed to move there with my best friend after high school and in the gray of winter I think... WHY didn't I? Well, because it is 95% concrete, both the environmental and human landscapes are artificial for the most part, there is WAY too much traffic, no dependable public transit and there is very little sense of community... So, basically the only items on my pro-list were Charlie, warm weather and the beach...

I have thought about other places since then... I have been obsessed with Portland for years now... they have much of what LA lacks, public transit, community, outdoor beauty, an amazing art/music/ culture scene...there culinary scene is exploding right now-I dream about moving there and opening my own restaurant. this sounds great except that I am guessing it would take a month or two before the severe lack of sunlight rendered me useless in life.  So I guess maybe Portland would not be so great right now.

  Then I think about living somewhere on the east coast...Maine, Massachusetts, or upstate New York.  My favorite season is fall, and a few years ago I got to experience the Northeast fall all the way up and down the coast... It was absolutely beautiful.  The air was clean and crisp, the trees were breathtakingly stunning, between the coastline and the mountains there was very little left to be desired up there... except maybe a culture that is slightly more personable... people in the Northeast were snobby! Now, in all fairness, I will strike up a conversation with anyone about anything and I am sure for those who have grown up under non-Midwestern social circumstances that friendliness can be equally as off-putting, but I don't know how anyone can live with that much disconnect to others...the Northeast would be an amazing place to be hermit, but maybe not to live and work.

So then, there are only two places left: Canada, and Ireland. Canada is where all of my family lives except my parents, and , they do have it all, they have beauty, amazing seasonal changes, beaches, and serious community... where my family lives is as close to perfect as you can get...it is Yellow Springs with a pier and a beach.  And Ireland is much the same, my favorite town that I visited there was Galway, the people were tremendous as was nearly every thing I experienced there... It was so gorgeous in almost every way.  There is only one thing keeping me from packing up and moving up there... me. 

Everyone always seems to have some sort of shit to talk about the place in which they are from... but I don't.  In high school it was a different story, I just want to move to LA and be a rockstar (nvrmnd the fact that I had no apparent rockstar talents!), but, in the last ten years I have seriously come to appreciate living in the Midwest.  All of things I would look for if I were to relocate are here, (except maybe a good public transit system, but hey, you can't have it all all the time).  My family is here.  And while I may not have a ton of friends, most of the people that I really and sincerely care about are here.  I have a job, two of them actually... and there is much beauty to behold right here in my own extended backyard.  So, I guess for now, I'll just stay where I am and soak in the sun.