Did I mention that we won a painting from the Octopus Initiative this month? The program is awesome. The way it works is you log into their website every month and select which paintings you like. If you win, you get to take the piece home and keep it for up to 10 months.
Today we went to pick it up, and I did my best to enjoy being out of the house. I’ve been spending too many weekends cooped up and though I’d love to go on being cooped up I have a feeling it’s not the healthiest way to spend my winter. The weekends are my best chance to see the sun and remember there is more than work, and sleep, and darkness.
It doesn’t feel very much like a Friday. Getting up was very hard this morning. So hard I almost opted to spend the day in bed. I’ve decided I get one day a month to do nothing when I should be doing something but November’s mental health day has already passed.
So, I went in, and then worked much more than I wanted to. We moved around office furniture and I ate lunch at a desk. At least we ordered out and at least I got to eat with the best coworkers around. And now I’ve been left to work alone. I sound like I hate it but I’m flattered by the opportunity to play boss.
Looking back on the day I’m grateful for a job where I can get up and move, where I get to be with my friends and laugh, where I have a team and where I know I’m wanted and doing well. I don’t think most people have that.
I’m trying.
It has been a good week for reading. I finished Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst by Robert M. Sapolsky on Sunday, The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller this morning, started Zen in the Art of Writing by Ray Bradbury, and made slow progress through Moral Letters to Lucilius: Volume 1 by Seneca nearly every day.
It feels good to spend so much time with books again, but I’m also disappointed and perplexed in my inability to keep up the habit given how much I enjoy it. Why am I like this? People are weird and I guess I am no exception.
This week is long, they always are after I take a day off. I think there is a lot of anticipation in the week too. It’s the last empty week of the year. After this there will be Thanksgiving, there will be Christmas shopping, there will be Christmas, and then there will be a whole New Year. It’s a week of waiting and waiting makes the time pass slow.
I started a new post for Z+P. I started with a quote and a dim idea and I’m just exploring it. I’m writing to figure out what I think rather than beginning with my point already in mind. I’ll grow this piece one sentence at a time.
It’s raining now, but it’s not the kind of rain I like. It’s the kind of rain that you know will turn to snow any second. It’s cold, dark, and dreary outside. It’s only 5:00 PM, but it feels like 8:00 PM. I hate winter, the time change, the weather, the feeling that there is nothing to do but sleep and work. I hardly see the sun anymore. Tomorrow is forecasted to be even worse. I don’t even want to think about the coming months.
I think this weekend I need to get out of the house. These last few weekends I’ve stayed inside to clean or to try to write but I suddenly feel cooped up. Maybe I’ll start my Christmas shopping early, or pick up the piece of art I won from the Octopus Initiative? I just need to get out.
The worst way to start the workweek is to start it on a Tuesday. Nothing went the way I meant for it to though it didn’t necessarily turn out bad. I’m off my path but I’m still moving and that’s something.
I did have time to catch up on some things here and to get some reading in but not much more. This evening I spent with my wife. Between work, my personal pursuits, and my poor health there has been little left of me for her at the end of the night. I have to be mindful of the time I give to her just as I do the time I claim for myself and I realize that lately I have been coming up short.
The rest of the week looks bleak with lots of work, cold temperatures, and snow. I’m ready for the weekend again already.
I took off from work today to act be an “emotional support sibling” for my youngest sister. I can’t say why (it’s not my story to tell) but I will say that I enjoy the hell out of helping her whenever I can.
I’ve been thinking a lot about the way every (or at least a vast majority) of our acts of kindness come tinged with self-interest. I used to feel bad about it but, hell, if helping someone else makes me feel good too isn’t that just twice the reason why we should be kind? Knowing this, accepting this, has not only made compassion feel even better but has freed me from the pressure to always put myself first.
Other people are a prison, even when they are also a paradise. To balance freedom with expectation, your own needs and what they need from you, what you want me to be and who they wish you were is a daily struggle. I wonder sometimes who I would be if there were no other people in the world. Nothing like myself at all I suppose but what if everyone disappeared tomorrow? Who would I be without those eyes on me and the voices asking and imploring? Without ever having to wear the mask again would I finally get a chance to see myself fully? Would I be happy?
I don’t think so, now that I really try to imagine it. I quite like my paradise thank you very much, even when the bars become visible and I remember there is no way out.
Last night we went out for dinner and drinks with our “couples group”. I had a great time while we were out but all last night I laid wide awake in the dark replaying every interaction and word I said. I analyzed every response and tried to decipher tones and facial expressions looking for reasons to be embarrassed. I didn’t want to do this but my mind wouldn’t stop. The night was like a song stuck in my head. There was nothing I could do but wait it out.
I hate that I am like this.
My brother just called, waking me from a short nap I needed after my late night of self depreciation. He needs someone to watch the kids, and I am his last resort and hope. I agreed, reluctantly. I love my niece and nephew so much, but I am not good with kids. I prefer supervised visitations where I am not the sole responsible adult. I agreed though, it’s only for a few hours. My wife is on her way to buy snacks and we have Disney+ already up and ready.
Update: The kids were fine. We watched Frozen and Wreck It Ralph. We ate snacks. They broke a few things but nothing important. I feel much more confident and would agree to watch them again, but just as reluctantly as I did this time.
Today doesn’t feel very much like a Friday. Everything around me is happening so fast but time is crawling. I feel confused, clumsy, and very much in everyone’s way. I can’t keep up with the chaos today.
I’m here physically but mentally I’m just waiting around for the week to end. I’m unproductive and uncaring. I’m irritated with everyone else because I’m disappointed in myself.
There was so much I wanted to do but yesterday afternoon I lost the mojo I’d had all week. I suppose a day or two of rest is not only nothing to be ashamed of but also required. I just wish I could be more like everyone else and make it through the whole week before fizzling out.
I’m doing well again this morning. I have my energy back and my perspective is well to the positive side of things. I suspect the highs and lows I’ve been experiencing are hormonal, or maybe it’s only the weather, or maybe I’m not feeling anything abnormal at all. Maybe everyone goes through this.
There’s a new post up at Zen and Pi, the first new piece of writing there in a year or more, and a tweaked About page. It felt so good to write something outside of journal entries and updates that I am already hard at work on another. I’m hoping for weekly writing but will settle for biweekly or monthly if I have to.
The rest of the day I spent reading. I’m about 50 pages from finishing Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst by Robert M. Sapolsky and things are getting very exciting. I’m ready to give up the whole notion of free will and the tear down the entire justice system to make way for more understand, compassionate, and constructive institutions. As tough as this book has been, I honestly cannot wait to read it again someday.
Lisa Marie Blair 