The 8th Nerve

Tomorrow, very, VERY early in the morning, we’re off to Florida to visit family. It will be surreal to walk around in 75 degree weather in December. I packed everything I need for four days into a backpack to carry on the plane. The simpler the better. I love being able to just walk on and off the plane without having to check in baggage.

The side of my family that we are visiting is the side that completes more good works before breakfast than most of us do in a lifetime. They have tons of photo albums detailing their missions to Mexico or Africa or South Korea. Their energy is nonstop. Whenever I’ve gotten in the car with them, it’s never a simple trip straight to the destination. There are always stops on the way to visit someone at the hospice, to bring groceries to a housebound elderly widow, and to pick up a child who never gets to go anywhere to join us for a day at Disney world. I’m not even exaggerating, those are real examples. This is the side of the family that cheerfully sacrifices Christmas so that families they have taken under their wing will have one. Their capacity for giving is nothing short of amazing.

Hopefully we’ll soak up enough sun this weekend to last us the rest of the Vermont winter.

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Nov 30th 2005Family & Trips

I had no idea I was so lucky with the job thing when I graduated from college. I found a job within a month. Two years later, thoroughly burned out, I had one interview and immediately got another job. Another year later, after the organization continued collapsing from within due to low morale, low pay and dwindling benefits, I had a new job after two rounds of interviewing. Then I landed an ideal internship. And when I needed a back up job to do in addition to my internship, getting that was no problem either. It seemed that whenever I needed to move on, I could do it.

Now, the number of jobs I have applied to totals: 15. At least. I’m sure there are a few more I forgot about. I am in a strange limbo- overqualified for some and turned down for others because I don’t have my masters yet, even though I have completed over 60 credits, finished all the necessary coursework and internships, and I merely have to complete the last major paper.

I have been careful to avoid the pitfalls, the jobs that drain you of heart and soul, the jobs I did for years before I realized that I don’t even LIKE what I’m doing. I refuse for my life to be about a sense of dread when I wake up in the mornings during the week, stress and enduring, then the foul mood that sets in Sunday evenings when the week ahead of me sets in like the weight of the world. I had positive experiences, rewarding moments, and valuable learning experiences to be sure. This is about the limits of myself as it is about the jobs. Sometimes we get so mired into the routine that we don’t even realize life is like that, and that it doesn’t have to be.

I just want to be energized, challenged, and enjoy what I am doing overall. Doesn’t have to be all the time, just enough.

But if you have higher standards about the work you want to do, I suppose it is easy to end up doing a lot of waiting. The waiting period is an interesting time period, and overall will take up a fraction of my life, but right now, while I’m in it, it feels overwhelming. Like it has filled up my whole life and will never end. Steve keeps reminding me to ENJOY this time while I have it, but it’s hard to hold on to perspective and have faith. My degree is not far off and more opportunities will open up once I have it. I know all that.

There’s always the little voice that whispers What if this never happens? What if you have no choice and must always do what you mostly don’t like, and your life gets used up this way? I have to remember, my energy, fulfillment and integrity is more important, and in the end, things always have a way of working out.

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Nov 29th 2005Everyday life & the Past

I think it would be funny if one went around saying “Happy Spanksgiving”- just to see how many people would actually register what they said and how many would automatically reply “Happy Thanksgiving.” In fact, one could do a whole spiel at the dinner table this way and maybe no one would notice. “I want to give spanks for my many blessings. I am spankful for my friends and family. I want to spank my wife for putting on this wonderful meal..” But I digress. This is really one of things where I crack myself up thinking about it but everyone else just looks at me blankly.

Steve and I drove up to Morgan to spend the holiday with his parents. I don’t think I have ever seen so much snow at this time of year. Snow blanketed the landscape entirely and was blown heavily across the road in many areas. It felt like Christmas-time.

After snowshoeing in the woods, we had a fantastic meal. Billie put a neat twist on all the usual Thanksgiving food- mashed potatoes with whipped cream cheese with chives, green beans with goat cheese, smoked turkey, cranberry relish. Oh and a creamy version of pumpkin pie for dessert. Yum yum yum.

We went snowshoeing again at nighttime, with headlights and flashlights, using the trail that we broke in earlier. The stars shone overhead and the trees were muffled under all the snow. We could see the prints of deer and rabbit all over the woods.

We stopped at Cedar and Jen’s on the way back and spent another night there. More delicious homemade food, most of which came from their land. We also sampled of 120 minute IPA Dogfish Head beer that packed a major punch. An attempt to start a card game turned into flicking cards all over the room and absurd drawings on the white board. This sunlit morning, after a fantastic brunch one can only experience at a Vermont farm, we headed back home.

My paper is hanging over my head as always. I have at least 85 pages of single space typed notes. I always do extensive typing and note-taking, weeding out the information in an entirely intuitive manner. By the time I’m done with that process, the paper practically writes itself. All the papers I’ve ever written have been completed in two or three sittings on average. This paper though is probably too long for that kind of crankage.

I was still seeing the ideas and concepts in this big picture. This is further complicated by the fact that I am writing about a topic under a paradigm shift. So you have to explain the lens and how it has shifted, and what it means for the topic as seen in this light. Is it possible to suspend the reader’s ingrained assumptions long enough for them to truly understand what you are saying?

So the biggest issue is figuring out where to begin and how to make it linear. You have to find the beginning of the thread, then the spool will start spinning naturally. I sat down with my notes and then immediately found it. I wrote the outline and it shook itself right out.

I have beautiful, beautiful linear structure. I feel as if a weight has been lifted. I know how to begin.

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Nov 27th 2005Family & Friends

So I set about finding a picture of the happy couple, one where they have both remained still long enough for the camera…

No

Nope

Nuh uh

Guys?

You might think that I am being selective and just posting pictures from crazy outings like Las Vegas and Montreal, but seriously, this is a couple that make each other that giddy and happy every time I see them..

Ah here we go, if you excuse Eric’s party wig:

Congratulations Eric and Kristi!!

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Nov 19th 2005Family & Pictures

I couldn’t resist trying the dictionary trick that I read about here. My word was….multiplex. “designating a system for sending two or more signals simultaneously over a common circuit, etc.”

Now why conclude with “etc”? On and on with the multitude of simultaneous signals over the circuit, and the like, and again, some more with the signal sending, apparently? Are the signals conveying the same message or are different signals occurring at the same time and simultaneously relaying different messages? Steve would probably say that my brain is a multiplex and that is why I have the problem with the thinking too much in the same circuit about various things.

Try again. Concentrate harder this time.

Enamel. Eh. Never mind.

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Nov 17th 2005Everyday life

During the five years that we lived in apartments and a condo, Steve’s drums, guitars and keyboard sat pretty much unused. He longed to play but our living situation was just too cramped and the neighbors were too close. We moved to our house, and not long after another couple our age moved into a house up the road. We had all kinds of things in common- Jen and I are in graduate school for the same degree, Steve is a rural Vermonter and Josh is a rural Mainah who absolutely kills us with one liners about bean suppahs and buttah sanwiches. Then when Josh found out that Steve is a drummah and plays the guitah, the deal was sealed. At least twice a week now, the house is shaking with crazy music as they jam in the basement.

Meanwhile, Jen and I have been bemoaning the hazards of writing papers and working in human services. We went to a craft fair last weekend and when we pulled into the parking lot, we discovered that my car had a flat tire. I realized that it was time to pull out the handy book What the heck was THAT!?! Scary noises and other car stuff every woman should know! that my mom got me one Christmas.

In the end I had a couple realizations- one being that we automatically got all nervous because it was a flat tire and we didn’t know what to DO because we’re GIRLS. And two, the best kept secret is that changing a flat tire is easy and anyone can do it. I don’t know why but it’s still like the 1950s when it comes to changing tires.

I read from the book while Jen put the wrench on one of the lugnuts and hopped up and down on top of it. The book was full of condescending language in an attempt to be funny about how you’re a woman but you’re somehow in a situation where you have to deal with your car. Seriously:

“When you are changing a flat on the side of the road, bend at the knees. Bending from the waist could cause a 15-car pileup as male drivers gaze at your shapely derriere and forget they’re at the wheel.”

or

“Now is time to jack the car up. First make sure this delightful gadget (doesn’t it look like some kind of torture device?) is level on the ground. Check for rocks or pebbles underneath that could make it wobbly. Remember: Wobbly means dangerous. Then start SLOWLY. Speak nicely to it. Flatter it. “You’re a wonderful jack. Very handsome. I’ve never met a jack more handsome than you.”

or

“Take the tire off. Be ready, because it will be HEAVY. Much heavier than the bag of groceries that goofy teenage bagger at the grocery store gave you when he put your laundry detergent, bleach, and 20 juice boxes together. Now is time to use the gardening gloves you have in the trunk.”

First of all, the goddam tire is not that heavy. Second of all, SHUT UP.

At any rate, those were all realizations I had after the event. While it was going on I found myself automatically falling into the assumption that changing a tire was too hard for women to do and feeling intimidated about it. We were making headway on it though (with lots of hopping up and down), but then the nice man parked next to us offered to help and did the rest of it for us. The whole process is so easy that I just wanted to clutch my head and groan “I can’t believe I fell for that one.”

Tomorrow night Jen and I are going to a sex toy party at one of her co-worker’s. Apparently it is the NEW tupperware party. The tupperware party of the 00s. What do you call this decade? The two thousands? The Oh-Ohs? Between our newfound tire-changing knowledge and this party, we may have just rendered the role of man completely moot.

I guess there is still opening the salsa jar once in a while.

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Nov 17th 2005Friends & Introspection

With the advent of DVR, I’m finding that I am picking up more shows than I usually watch. But I like to think that I am not wasting any more time because I am fast forwarding through the commercials on triple FFF. I’m still watching Everwood and that show would have been ditched long ago if DVR didn’t still tape it faithfully every week. (Steve is tearing out his hair right now “It doesn’t tape, it RECORDS!”). Does any one else feel a little pit of fear in their stomach when Ephram turns to the side and you can see his profile? The forehead just keeps going and going, and then… I feel afraid, like he will grab me by my hair and drag me out of the cave and feed me to a saber tooth tiger.

Tonight I watched House, which was about the mysterious medical case of the professional cyclist. In the episode, the cyclist admits to using undetectable, illegal methods to boost his performance. The other doctors disapprove of this and they are appalled that even though CHILDREN worship him, he does not stop or show remorse.

Repeatedly, there is mentioned the concern that the cyclist brought this illness on himself because of the illegally used drugs/transfusions/etc. THEN, when the doctors entertain the possibility that it might be cancer, the manager leaks the story to the press. One of the doctors tells the cyclist that if it is cancer, then he may have brought it on himself from the illegal methods he was using. In the end, they find that the cyclist does not have cancer, but the manager thinks that they should go with this, let the public believe he has cancer, and his career would skyrocket as a result.

This seemed like a very transparent attempt to imply that Lance Armstrong cheated using various methods, made up the fact that he had cancer to cover up ill effects on his health from cheating (or that the cancer was caused by him cheating), and that he benefits from it without any conscience even though CHILDREN look up to him. I mean, what about the CHILDREN?

It’s Not about the Bike: My Journey back to Life is one of my favorite books, and I believe what Lance wrote. I wonder if there will be controversy or backlash as a result of this episode. I suppose I would be more upset about it if I wasn’t too busy wondering what will happen next on Lost and how the mean girl who shot Shannon needs to be nicer and explain WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON.

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Nov 16th 2005Books & tv

Do you ever have one of those restless moments when you just want to immediately go do something adventurous, crazy and unpredictable? Just to see bright lights and music pounding and energy spilling over. Then you go to (pester) your spouse and he’s working and gives you a look like “If I didn’t love you, I’d strangle you with my bare hands”? So it’s like no one is realistically able to suddenly take off for, say, Montreal on a Thursday night, and besides aren’t you supposed to be working on that paper?

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Nov 10th 2005Everyday life

There is so much emphasis in our culture on our performance and appearance that we have been conditioned to experience our selves-as-objects. We speak about our thoughts, feelings and experiences from a distance. We play many roles in our lives. Our intellect is at the reins, our bodies at its mercy.

True authenticity and emotional intimacy lies at the heart of the subjective experience. The whole self lies in the integration of the body and the mind. Embodying our direct experiencing requires the existential terror of dropping away false roles and defenses.

It is so difficult to do when the culture believes so strongly in the self and other-as-object. To truly become who you are, you cannot be intellectual or objective about your life or your self. This is a spiritual endeavor, not a scientific one. In short, it is about changing your way of being in the world.

I feel the boundary between this one and the next, a boundary made by the constraints of the culture. I feel pressed up against it. Right now the boundary feels as massive and unbreakable as a wall or a dam. One day, it will dissolve and the transition will be as easy and natural as flowing downstream.

I have recurring dreams of ghosts, of sensing frightening presences, of haunted places. This past week, I dreamed simply a message, the shocking news that I died when I was 25. Somehow I died, yet still lived. This was emotional news for me. I woke up and realized that I was the ghost that I feared in my dreams. The ghost represents the fear that if I strip away my roles and defenses, there would be nothing there, just the presence of the Shadow.

A couple days later I came across this quote in The Art of the Psychotherapist by Bugental:

There comes a point at which it is imminent that there will be a confrontation of the fundamental disjunctures between the client’s construct system and what is being disclosed as the resistances roll back. This is a time fraught with potency for life change… Simply but starkly conceived, what must occur is for one or more ways in which the client has been in her life and in her world to die in order for newer and more healthful and authentic ways to emerge. What must die may be a cherished way of identifying oneself or it may be coming fully into a dreaded possibility.

The word ‘die’ is a dramatic one, of course, but it best captures the depth of this crisis. Clients often have dreams, fantasies and even impulses about death and dying at this point, for they intuitively know that death must occur. [195-196]

This is not remotely easy, but at the same time it is exciting. There is so much more to living, there are realms and ways of being many of us have not even begun to experience. And it waits for us.

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Nov 9th 2005Books & Introspection

Steve: We could look at nutritional facts.

Me: Christian frats??

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Nov 5th 2005I Misheard When