Sunday Creative: Comfort

I did not complete the creative prompt this week.  I started to write a character sketch but instead ended up with this:

This week I've been teetering between comfort and discomfort.

The discomfort of my childhood and adolescence, with its glasses-wearing, braces-needing, bad haired, uncertain where to sit at lunch, stumbling over words, awkward self.

The comfort of being a woman, being loved and loving.

The discomfort in exploring the possibility of a new job, learning new people, cultures, systems, deciding if I would fit in, succeed.  The discomfort of turning it down; the greater discomfort of quitting.

The comfort of a team, co-workers, clients, my tiny office with its golden light, the predictability of me, knowing my role and my possibilities.

The discomfort of fear and anxiety.

The comfort of rhythm, pattern.

Deciding how much discomfort I can tolerate.  And recognizing how much I already tolerate well.  Knowing that I sit in my discomfort quite often:  listening to and sitting with pain, tears, hurt, hatred; riding through another's anxiety; searching and probing; knowing when I am being lied to and not being able to do a thing about it; talking to people who should be helping who are not.  I handle more than a lot.

I recently read about the transformative power of sitting in something distinctly uncomfortable, like anger, and exploring the intensity, the jagged edges of the feeling, the power.  I'm learning that it tells me that I am alive.  If I can sit in my discomfort, I can tolerate another's.

Somewhere along the way I grew so comfortable in discomfort that I forgot that it was okay to push myself within the parameters of my comfortable boundaries instead of picking up completely and moving squarely into the middle of uncomfortable.  I tend to use that escape to mask the need to focus on something else uncomfortable.  I may change my mind by tomorrow but right now I am going to stay in comfortable, but push some of the other uncomfortables that I have.  That's a new discomfort, staying put.

Sunday Creative: Timeworn

She stepped out of the silent gloom of the train station into the heartbeat of the city, a frenetic pace timed by pinstriped men and sensible heeled women racing against the countdown of the stop lights, a rhythm accompanied by the low grumble that breathed off of the homeless tucked in corners and edges.  A skyline of towering buildings lumbered over her, rendering her dizzy.  Her legs hurt, her heart raced; she felt overwhelmed and stunned.

Her granddaughter reappeared, demanding that she keep up, stay with her, don't get lost.  'I am lost', she thought.  'I belong in the country, why have I come here?'  She gripped the strap on her purse, dry swallowed and took a lurch forward, the buildings weighing her down, bringing her tiny frame closer to the earth.  Car horns, hands on her arms pulling her back.  "Not yet!  I'll help you!"  Impatient, ready to prove that she had conquered the rhythm, that it had not defeated her, her granddaughter glared at the masses around her little grandmother, thinking 'she is eighty, what have I done, inviting her here?  How do I keep her safe?'

The granddaughter glanced around for their third party member, finding him with camera up to eye, proclaiming the magnificence of the architecture while reaching out one hand to find his wife.  A habitual act, one that mimed taking care of while belying his own uncertainty and fear.  In one smooth motion, they were linked.  Sixty years of births, deaths, accidents, poverty, loss, jobs, moves led to this crossing of a busy street in Boston.  Those towering buildings sat back, the car horns grew muted, the business people arced their paths to flow around the elderly couple, faces growing gentler, hands reaching out to hold doors.

She felt her heart return to the rhythm of the wind in the trees in their backyard, the predictable flow of raucous morning bird calls into the silent evening chase of fireflies.  Two lifelines worn into matching patterns, the steady pulse of safety and trust.  They smiled at each other, and at their granddaughter, flitting about trying to prove her competence, and stepped into Boston.

Happy Anniversary.

already solving my dilemmas...

Wow, I solved my first problem without too much effort using this tutorial.  Now all comments can be replied to.  Plus, your comments are on the sidebar instead of only hidden in the posts.  Yay!  Another quick tutorial here.  And, I created an extra page to start listing all my favorite links.  I read a lot of blogs thanks to my google reader, but I want to make sure they get some link-love.

Finally, I figure its a good time of year to start things (hmm, although mercury is in retrograde), so I am going to start the Sunday Creative.  I meant to pick up on the Sunday Creative when the Creative Bootcamp ended, and I of course punked out.  I'm working on something for this week's prompt to solidify my commitment.   And I'm also going to try the 365 photo project.   I only have a tiny little camera but it takes some darn good photos, and for me, its about practice not product.  I took some photos today, but I'll post them all at once at the end of the week.  But first, a teaser...

punking out: a manifesto

I've really neglected this blog, and I've been searching for a way to revive things and get it going again. 

I recently read one of those "10 things to do to be a better blogger" posts, and chafed at the suggestions.  I've been realizing that a big part of me has a problem with blogging in general.  I don't care for the ads, or the lists of things garnished from other blogs, or having to run around and comment for the sake of commenting just to have people come over and comment back.  It feels like business with a sprinkle of b.s.  I'm not on facebook and I don't twitter.  I can't imagine the time it takes to manage all of that.  I comment when I really like something.  And I mean it.

I'm also being fourth grade style lame:  I want people to read me and like me but I'm afraid of being me, whoever that is.  I'm also mega-frustrated with life and am tired of writing about the same things and being nowhere closer to achieving them.  But I do like thinking, and writing, and taking a photo and having somewhere to put it.  It helps me to synthesize my thoughts, so thank you for reading them. 

I originally started this to just do that, to serve as a place to post the process of my 900 projects that never get finished.  Plus, I am bored with looking at the same page.  So I updated it. 

But I'm still frustrated:

• I want to figure out how to reply to a comment.
• I want you to comment.  I love it, and so that's why I want to figure out how to reply to your comments.
• I want a fancy camera (and a bike, and a house).  I want to challenge myself to take and edit better photos. 
• I want to practice writing.
• I want to put a list of blogs I read somewhere on this website.
• I want to decide if using google reader keeps me away from visiting websites. 
• I want my husband to read one damn blog post.
• And I think I better do another challenge to keep me posting. 

listening more deeply

I've spent weeks trying to figure out how to start this post.  So forgive me if this feels a little loose and kooky.  And it won't adequately convey my thinking right now, but I wanted to get something down.

Let the sewing begin

I spent a night this weekend laying out the entire quilt.  I've already sewn together the blues and purples, and I am loving how this looks.  I'm not the best sewer - I can't even seem to sew straight - but I don't care. 

Squares

I finally finished cutting out the squares, all 320 of them.  Seriously, fabric is so darn pretty and smells so good (mmm, spray starch).  Next step, pining them together and pulling out the sewing machine.  

140 down, a lot more to go...

Started cutting out the squares for a new quilt and then started getting tons of ideas for other ones...

Creative Bootcamp: Day Twelve - Smile

I struggled with the word "smile."  So I let the word smile become "hope" because those words are synonymous to me. 

During graduate school, our teachers often referred to our primary job as clinicians to be holders of hope.  Often our clients are stuck, life changes numerous and insurmountable, symptoms all consuming and painful.  And the truth is that life can suck, and suck big.  That's the reality that we sit with, hour after hour.  Add to that the pressures of short-term therapy pushed on us by insurance companies, well-meaning but ignorant family members, parents looking for quick fixes, and a lifetime of terrible things, holding onto hope is an impossible task.  I want to walk away often.

And then a client says something like "I am doing so much better!" or a child who used to hide under his hoodie is playing ball with you and talking about how angry he is.  I can't begin to tell you what a moment it is to think "holy crap, holy crap, we're talking about feelings, feelings!"  These are profound, fleeting moments.  Sometimes I can see those moments coming; I want to shout "I knew it!" and to tell everyone to be patient and trust the process.  But then I forget to trust the process, and I get impatient, and I forget those moments will come.  I judge myself according to other's eyes, not my own trained ones.

Bolts and Fabric

I have a strange issue with bolts.  Meaning, I seem to like to drive right over them and end up puncturing tires in the process.  I have fantastic aim.

The first time, I was driving back from a home visit in Dorchester.  I heard the clunk and kept driving like a loon because there was no way I was going to break down in Dorchester.  The second one I hit at eighty mph returning from NY to MA.  Oops.  We pulled over to the side of the highway (holy jeez, the scariest thing ever), switched drivers and headed to the next rest stop.  My husband put on our skinny little donut in the evil New-England-goes-desert heat and we drove 50 mph on the highway until we could finally pull off an exit.  Many thanks to all the people who had to swerve around us.  I documented it all for posterity ("this is so going on my blog!") and my husband gets the new tires we were arguing about earlier today.