May 01, 2003

the body bears the burden

too tired to link to the book of this title. let me say that I had my first massage today--holy fucking fantastic! Wow. I'm so sore. So, I'm supposing if you had the money to go to massage three times a week, you wouldn't really need to exercise at all. If I were a rich man, ladi da da da da da da da da da da dadi da...

But that's not the interesting part.

The interesting part was what happened at the first touch. It was, well, goodness. It's hard to put words around the images that came. Laying face down with my face in soft cotton, on a soft massage bed, those cool cotton sheets i like so well, and she started, and I'm in complete darkness with my head buried, but suddenly I'm watching a movie in techno color.

I see my father in paisley pajamas I forgot he had, white pajamas with a gold/green paisly pattern. I am on his bed with him, and he is at first kind of faded. All there, and not see-through, more like that 20 percent grey shading in the microsoft color palatte, you know?

But then he becomes clearer, finely tuned, adjusted for color, and I flash on so many of his expressions I didn't know I remembered, and now she's digging in deeper into my muscle and by now I'm crying, and she doesn't know this, because it's that kind of silent scream where if it were audible it would be a wail. Eucalyptus oil is opening my sinuses and I feel tears soaking the cotton.

And then I'm dancing with him--my God I didn't remember how we danced, and it is so real, and he is so very much smiling in his crisply ironed pajamas. I have been in his skin for so many years, and he is so happy I'm getting out of it before it's too late. This is what the looks say, to do that. And I love you. I love you.

We hold hands and walk down the stairs together and when we open the front door, the colors of the field across the street are brighter than I remember them being, and my father is in his clothes now, and handsome and strong and not sick at all, and I am healthy and strong and not sick or needing anything, no craving, no cigarette, no needing, just being, and my Aunt Penny, the aunt who has always loved me so, my aunt with MS who relies on her wheel chair, she is with us, standing tall and happy on the front steps with us, and there we are, the three of us, laughing and standing, and now I'm smiling into my cotton towel and she's digging into my shoulders and neck not knowing everything that is going on inside this cotton.

And it is absolutely tremendous.

Tremendous, painful, joyous.

I hear there is a lot going on in the world and in blogland. I've read some things that make me insane. Because they are. Insane that is.

time to read, then rest.

April 30, 2003

Um, Hi. or 16 things to read while I go off and play with my mind again

1) I think I'm getting better. Than I was. I've been sick. Had a scare over the weekend, during which my left leg swelled up in some unusual bodily joke, making it difficult to, say, walk, bend, sit, think. By Monday I thought I should let the doctor see it. I was glad I had opted for COBRA (bounced check notwithstanding) because he took one look at it and said, it could be a blood clot so we need to get it scanned. He sent me forthwith to a vascular surgeon's office, to which I drove more than a little frightened, waiting for the eventual clot dislodging, black out, vehicle wreck, and ultimate death, as I drove. Thankfully for me and the rest of the drivers on I-75, this didn't happen. They scanned both legs, no clot, overjoyed I went home and collapsed.

2) Decided that I've been dissociated from my own body for a very long time and that I'd better get re-aquainted with it before I kill it, either accidentally or more accurately on purpose. Called massage therapist.

3) Found my trauma therapists email, finally, and emailed her to set up an appointment. Hoping she can help me find out where my life went. The last time I saw her was five minutes before Ketchum called to say boy did they have a deal for me!

4) I love my kid. I want to be the source of her happiness and well being, not her the source of mine.

5) Still miss my husband. I have not heard his voice in two weeks. Thank God for email.

6) I hear spammers in Virginia can face two years in prison now for spamming--did I hear that right?

7) An earthquake apparently rocked our house yesterday morning. Jenna and I slept through it. I got her to school late, and the teacher said--Oh, was it the earthquake? And I said, earthquake? And she said YES! You heard about it, right? The earthquake? And I said, Earthquake? The rest of the day went similarly.

8) I had two calls from clients/prospects today. And it's only 2.

9) I have received no check for work I did a month ago from one client. And it's already 2.

10) Taxes are in.

11) Knee socks are out.

12) It's hotter than a witch's tit here. We need a new furnace/central air system. Don't get me started.

13) I have decided there is some fundamental and very profound difference between consuming and beholding, between the predatory and the empathetic, which I am having fun drawing about in powerpoint.

14) I am reading

15) Gary Turner still scares me.

16) Did I miss something on social software this week?