I was sitting in the backyard a few days ago, watching Addy sit in the muddy bushes. As there is table in the backyard, I can journal and write while she sits and watches the surrounding area for any small movement of any mouse.
Like everyday, look around and I think, wow, what just happened, this ah-ha moment, will be the piece that moves everything forward, or why wasn’t that the final piece to the puzzle, what is happening?
Yesterday, I woke up at a decent time, fed Addy and Izzy, and myself, as I was writing my journal, I realized full ideas weren’t coming from my pen, if another person was sharing my space, conversations couldn’t be had.
Movie quotes, past conversations, full flash images of times and places and memories I lived and those that have never existed. I was exhausted. I went back to sleep until noon.
As I left the apartment complex, the bus stopped and let some kids out. For a moment I was disoriented enough to ask one of the mom’s, who I worked with (and was on my offline time for a couple years) if the kids finished school early or if something happened to my space time continuum in all he one liners and flash backs and flashbacks that never happened.
“You’re good Candice, school, got off early.” I know to expect one of my weekend days to be wiped from the plan books for sleep. Although I’ve gradated from I’m going to die, especially if this lasts forever, to full body pain for a day, I decided yesterday I was good to get some groceries and check on the prices for things like litter boxes and at the hardware store. I had two days of stuff to do.
I decided to go for it, despite the rocky start.
And that’s when I realized the missing piece. I wasn’t going to talk to a doctor, or professional or politician, or creative that was going to make it work for me. I’m not going to be able navigate anything days or hours in advance- I had time to sing today for 20 minutes I will be able to do this tomorrow, easy right? No.
I have to drop “when I fix this, when my life is a little more stable, when it’s easy to wake up in the morning…”
It doesn’t matter that I said goodbye to the people who hurt me, the food that hurt me, that I work in the evening, my physical and mental health is still moment to moment.
It disappoints me, distresses me, confuses others, makes me feel lazy, like a loser.
The truth is, this is it, the missing piece of the puzzle, isn’t missing, I just have to see this is the piece I have to navigate around. Having a life partner, or a different job, or “a bunch of good girlfriends,” isn’t going to change the exhaustion and the inability to do what I want, and 80 percent of the time, make decisions to do what I need.
That not only is the task at hand not easy, my mind and body is carrying a mountain behind it that makes doing it double difficult.
And that will knock a lot of wind out of me for the next few days.
