What is this feeling that came over me just before Bill and I walked under the I94 underpass this afternoon? It was as if everything that I had held together, or had held ME together, suddenly drifted away from me. I could feel the cords connecting all the parts, pieces of me, cut with a giant scissors, and I watched as everything just ... floated away. I didn’t even slow down my pace, or stumble. I just kept walking. Nobody could’ve seen it from the outside. I guess only I felt it on the inside. I’m restless. I feel ungrounded. And you may say, “Ah, that’s a grand place to be. From that point of nothingness you are now free to create your world in a conscious way.” But I say back to you, “ I do NOT like this feeling - it is very uncomfortable.” Everything I count on, my foundation, my rudder, my North Star - everything feels vanished from my life. I look around my house and feel paralyzed. I got 6 books from the library, and I look at my personal library of unread books and wonder what in the hell is wrong with me?
I’ve started exercising again, my foot feeling good enough to put full weight on it. I’ve stopped eating sugar, have limited my carbs, and the scale says I’ve gained 5 pounds. I don’t care. Yes, I DO care, but I’ll just keep going anyway. I know it’s good to do what I’m doing, even if the scale says I weigh more than I want to weigh. Everybody else is feeling the same way, which doesn’t make it any ‘better’, just more understandable. I don’t feel quite so alone. I’m a little pissy, a little on edge, a lot restless, and I think I need to make some lists so I can get things done.
I told one counselor 12 years ago that when I get like this the only thing that helps is to make a daily list of things to finish. 1. Brush teeth (which includes flossing, thank you!) 2. pay bills (AND mail them, not just let them sit on the table), and on. Simple things. I found myself with Castille Peppermint soap-drenched washcloth scrubbing down the walls of the utility room, grimy with dirty and god knows what else, from the years of the dogs being back there. I didn’t clean it ALL, but enough so it doesn’t look so awful. It made me feel a little better, but it’s not enough. Then my narrative returns - is it EVER enough? Someone once said that to me a billion years ago: “Nothing is ever enough for you, Sue.” I hate being called Sue, but that aside, I get afraid sometimes that it’s true. I’m afraid that I’m never satisfied with just HERE, or just BEING here, or being ME, so I keep… I don’t know what I keep doing, but I think I keep doing it.
I am a free spirit, I admit it. I love spontaneity and sudden plans. But I think that’s also why I need structure, I need a schedule, I need a foundation, otherwise I’m a kite without anyone holding the string. I just keep flying away into the sky. Is it the eclipse? Is it the changes this summer is bringing? Is it restlessness tied into turning 50? I don’t know. I don’t know much of anything right now, other than just breathing and taking one step at a time. It isn’t a New Age light quote, nor an Alcoholics Anonymous pledge. It’s just what I’m doing, and about the only thing that makes any sense these days. So I leave to go start on my list. Maybe eat some leftover Chinese, maybe go scrub some more walls. I don’t know. I will just be 100% honest to say that I will be GD glad when this whole energy ‘thing’ is over with, and we can all breathe a little easier, sleep at night, smile a little more spontaneously, feel calm and ‘normal’ again. Even if it’s a new normal - I will be glad for any kind of ‘normal’ at all. Won’t you?