elainegrey

I dreamed office HQ was eight hours of driving away. Did the basin and range and the rockies disappear? At least dream geography got I-80 correct.

My new year is in the spring, the beginning of March with my birthday. I've tried to use January and February as a dreaming time, a time to evaluate and set course. I'm not sure i want to change course this year, though.

The Elephant in the Room has been an overwhelming aspect of the past few years. We're in a phase where Christine is slowly assembling a vessel from shattered pieces of the past. I can see the progress, remember when all there were were shattered pieces. I know she's making progress, but it's still a difficult task.

I note that, because i feel aware of how the antidepressants i use cut me off from a treasured part of myself. Maybe i will see about reducing the medications, replacing with caffeine as necessary. Still, i make significant effort to keep an even keel with the Elephant in the Room shifting its weight unpredictably. I trust that the antidepressants keep my resources available to me and provide a type of predictability.

The focus on building habits, finishing projects, releasing the things we've accumulated that marked last year still seem valuable. I can't help but start new creative efforts, but the scope seems more focussed.

One lesson of the past year is that i am incredibly challenged when it comes to developing habits of doing things. I think it was a year ago i tried starting some basic intentional habits of the sort that most people have had since they were small children. I must still make a conscious effort.

My new year is with my birthday in early March. I'm in a much better position to be optimistic then with the lengthening of the days and the greening of the year.

But in getting the piles of reminders for December and early January sorted, i ran across an e-workbook for preparing for a new year, spread out over four weeks. Given my life, spreading it out over eight weeks seemed wise.

It starts with wishing.

I'm not sure how good a wisher i am, but i wrote out wishes for different parts of my life, scribbling away with the digital pen on my iPad. I do like the combination of tactile with digital!

Wishing does lead me to some awareness of being thankful. I am particularly aware that i am delighted to find that Travelsmith makes dresses that are consistently sized and cut in a way that is both flattering and fits. I have been buying them for a couple years now (gifts from the catalog, and then filling in as dresses come in at my budget price of $20 on eBay). Pants have never fit me right, not when i was a skinny stick as a teen nor as my full figured self now. In general, I am very comfortable about my appearance.

Not my fitness level: the last half of the year was even more sedentary than before -- and i would have had to describe myself as sedentary then. But my ankles and feet are mostly happy these days, and i have no excuse to not walk. Christine's got the bike back and happy, so even if (when, please) we have another spate of rain, i should be able to exercise. (We have a stand that converts the bike to a stationary bike.)

--==∞==--

One of the gifts received this year was Plenty: Vibrant Recipes from London's Ottolenghi. I am not very good at following recipes, usually with acceptable results. Last night's attempt at making turnip dumplings inspired by the parsnip dumplings was as disaster. The first fail was not recognizing how important it was for the batter to be stiff and to follow the direction to steam off water from the mashed veggie. I made another fail by folding in crepe batter: this was also far too runny.

Even after adding much more dry mix, the batter seemed more fluid, like cake batter, than stiff, so i poured it all into a pan and baked it. I think i have turnip bread now. And it needs salt.

OK, overconfidence in the kitchen has now been adjusted to an appropriate level of humility.

Leek fritters are next from the cookbook.

Yesterday's wishing exercise felt good to me. I felt that by stating some wishes that were obviously impossible i made some space to listen to parts of me that are frustrated and angry. For example, I am aware how much i want to feel healthy and well. Last therapy session's break through was about how scared i am to claim when i do feel well for fear of disappointing that desire when i no longer feel well. So that deep desire, need, want, wish, needs to come forward.

songquake commented on how much the wishes sounded like self criticisms. I reread them and i see how that read can be there. There are things that one could change and things that one can't and they're all jumbled together.

I think one is the "i wish i could crochet faster." Songquake is right that the real wish is something else: i wish i could make all the projects that i visualize. Part of it is the unreasonable, impossible wish: i don't want to have to practice making beaded ropes before i master them. I want to master them immediately so i can then create what i have in mind.

The good news, though, as i reread those and think about Songquake's suggestion to wish actions, is that my current actions are (mostly) aligned with my deeper wishes (desires, dreams). I'm pointed towards what i want; i just want to be there already. [The work realm is where the alignment isn't as good as i would like.] The wishes that came out were mostly wishing the road were clear and shorter.

Yup, i'm irritated that making a crocheted rope is not coming to me like ... um ... managing a server. I wish i mastered it. I wish i made beautiful crocheted beaded ropes in moments.

There are things that come to me quickly, that i do master quickly, and there are alternatives to beaded ropes when making jewelry. Then there are things where there are no alternatives: building habits is hard for me, but i don't see any way around working to develop those.

One thing not evident in the writing is the solutions that came to mind as i was naming things. The desire for perfect furniture for the living room triggered an idea of putting the video display over the fireplace, creating a single point of focus in the room as opposed to the current dual focus. That will make setting up L shaped seating easier (and we'd found a really fabulous L).

Healthwise: ( TMI )
Meanwhile, my colleague's wife's cancer has now partially paralyzed her vocal cords, making breathing difficult. They're trying one drug thing before going to a tracheotomy. Meanwhile, her cancer is not responding to the current chemo so she's moving on to something that will likely damage her heart. From her blog, "This is the last chemo before clinical trials. So then I am into experimental stuff and it is just for the good of science."

Here i whine about my canker sores (my colleague pointed out that one of his wife's cancer drugs gave her cankers, and we discussed how medical science has found that pretty much the only thing you can do is apply topical anesthetics) and low energy.

I know comparing is not what life is about, but all sorts of little voices use their situation to apply guilt in a variety of ways: "Look at how active their family is! And what do you do? Squat!" These voices are mostly not rational. (I tried transcribing others but they didn't make sense AT ALL. When i tried to clarify what their point was, they ran away.) The one voice that seems to stay is this one simple comparison which (a) is not true in its evaluation of me, i do not do "squat" but actually do many things (b) is based on a thin slice of evidence about their life, which i extrapolate into the most active, most involved possibility (like given a brick, extrapolating a city).

Friday i slept very late (for me) and the day seemed to just wash away. Since i was taking it off to rest, that's probably OK. This morning has also dissolved into distraction, although i did have a nice Skype chat with my parents.

I'm feeling some resistance around thinking about the coming year this [Saturday] morning. More after the cut.

--==++==--

It's Sunday morning now. Christine is sleeping off a migraine. We went to be incredibly early but that's where our energy level was. We'd gone to Chipolte to get dinner between 6 and 7, and driving home i noted that it felt much later than it really was. After watching the last half of _Encounters at the End of the World_ by Werner Herzog, i was done with the day, and so was Christine.

Yesterday it seems all i did was make deviled eggs for a brunch and then go to the brunch (three hours). Time just slips away.

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PREVIOUSLY: http://elainegrey.livejournal.com/tag/new+year%27s+dreams
Lesson 3: Finding Time for Your Dreams
(I realize i haven't given the source for this work, New Years Wishes E-Book , http://www.schooloftheseasons.com/store.html#naturalplanner )

( ponderous planning and framing and thinking )

Yesterday was weird -- there were many instances of not wanting to commit. Emails unfinished, journal entry unfinished.

My Dad was in surgery for his eye. It ran longer as they found more things wrong. Some issue with his retina, some "bad" vitreous humor, the old lens removed and completely replaced with new sutures. It ran a good deal longer than expected: my sister was at the hospital because my mother is still recovering from pneumonia. She's blaming the doctors for giving her the wrong antibiotics in the first place -- however, she did feel better for a while, so i'm going with everyone else's assessment that she didn't rest long enough to recuperate.

I am continuing to balance doing with the asthma flare. I have a sneaking suspicion that i may still be sick. The cough is still somewhat productive. I may go back to the doctor if it remains a productive cough.... I *AM* taking it easy though, damnit.


( Notes from the morning workbook )