Archive for blogging
Random Tuesday Ramblings
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It’s Tuesday, which means random ramblings. To read the random thoughts of others and see the master who created the blogging phenomenon, check out the Unmom.
One. Happy Birthday, dear blog, happy birthday to you.
For some reason, I had it in my head that human, being was born in early February 2009. Nope. Last night, I checked and she was born on Jan. 4, 2009.
I remember coming up with the idea of this blog while walking to my car after work. I had shut down another long-term blog and was writing notes on Facebook. I wanted a bigger audience, so I found WordPress and started making a new blog.
I’ve always tended to write a rather open journal/life blog about the condition of being human. I had also just read something about the idea that we are spiritual beings having human experiences, and part of our struggle as humans is to be rather than do.
Since I’m on the path of learning how to just be, I thought I’d title the new blog human (comma) being. As in I’m a human working on being who I am. And that’s how the sausage was made.
I think it takes most bloggers a year or so to really figure out what their blog is about. This blog is about telling my story so that I can inspire, inform, amuse and entertain you. Some of what I write is a cautionary tale. Some of what I write is about getting the poison out of me so I can move on. Some of what I write is about gratitude. And most of it is probably TMI. Oh well. Hi, I’m Lynn, and I’m addicted to telling my story with very little filter.
I’m so grateful for every single person who reads human, being. I’m grateful for my handful of subscribers, and for the people who comment. I’m grateful for the people who send me emails. I’m even grateful for all the weirdos who find this blog by searching for naked kids (because my most successful post is about nudist camps for kids).
I love my blog. I don’t know what I’d do without it. I don’t know who I’d be without it, because it (and you) have become a key part of where I’m going and how I’m growing. Thank you.
Two. I’m being inundated by offers of retreats and classes and journeys.
Lately, I’ve unsubscribed to most of the mommybloggers I used to read because I’m not getting much out of them, and subscribed to a bunch of people who I think will help me along the new trajectory of growth I can feel myself beginning. The trick is that all of them offer retreats and coaching and eBooks and classes and interesting journeys. And, I want to do every single one of them.
Which is part of why I wrote the blog last night about what I need, right now. I feel overwhelmed by gurus.
I’d like to do some of this retreat work. I think it would be a) fun and b) forward-moving and c) inspiring. It’s been a while since I’ve done anything like a retreat or class. But how to choose? And how to pay? Dilemmas. Universe? Any help here?
Three. Depression check-in.
I think the combination of counseling and homeopathy and Vitamin D and T3 has really helped my feelings of depression this season. The physical symptoms are still there–lack of motivation is strong, lack of focus is strong, sugar cravings are moderate. But the actual sadness and irritation and seething rage that usually make up the end of January and early February are just hovering along the edges.
What I have felt, though, is anxiety. Crushing, can’t leave the house anxiety. As I’ve felt this, I’ve come to realize that anxiety has always been part of my SAD picture. I didn’t recognize it before. I have no good tools for managing anxiety, separately from the depression, aside from valium, which I have taken to get out of the house on a couple of days. Last Thursday, when I couldn’t go to work, anxiety was my jailer. Yet another layer in the complicated physiology of Lynn to understand.
Four. Salsa partner search.
On Sunday, I went to a party at Motion en Fuego, Brigette Ellis’s studio, that was designated as a partner search. And, once again, I was disappointed. Male salsa dancers in Denver tend to get to the advanced beginner/early intermediate level and stall out. There were a lot of guys there, but only one was interested in performing and none were interested in competing.
So, since I’m working on listening to the universe (as always) and letting go of the HARD to make way for the EASY, I think I’m going to change my Very Personal Ad, which I posted on Havi Brooks’ The Fluent Self blog on Sunday. I do not want to find a salsa partner. I want a salsa partner to find me. I am taking the search off my plate, and asking the universe and all who are in it to bring me someone who wants to practice, perform and compete. (and so it is, amen)
Five. Car conversations.
For most of first and second grade, Lauren hated to talk to me about school. I’d ask her questions, and she’d get more and more obstinate, which led to me trying to force her to talk to me, which led to her literally pinching her lips shut and shaking her head with her fingers in her ears. Nice.
Something happened in third grade. Now, she volunteers information about what she’s learning as soon as she gets in the car. She’s very engaged while discussing what they’re learning about the Gold Rush, and this book called Shiloh she’s reading in her book club. She loves me to quiz her on her times tables and her spelling challenge words. And, she’s even volunteering information about her social life, which before seemed to be the greatest secret on earth.
When you have a baby, for the first many years you know almost everything that happens in her life. When I got divorced, I lost the experience of half of her life–the time she spends with her dad. The 8 o’clock phone call ritual rarely bears much more fruit than a quick goodnight. It’s both great and weird to be getting (finally) this glimpse into my daughter as a real person with real feelings and thoughts and fears and frustrations. Yes, she’s always had those, but at 8 and two-thirds she finally has the intellect and vocabulary to express all of it.
And I’m loving it. Especially the car conversations. They rock.
Six. Girl stuff.
Tomorrow I’m going to upload some old blogs about my struggles with the Fucking Mirena and the Aftermath, which is basically abnormal cycles to the max. I think, like my blog on Vitamin D (my second most popular blog), these tales can help other women who think they are losing their minds, as I did, but rather are just having bad side effects from progestin.
Dear body, please decide. Am I still fertile, or not? Because this 35 days of bleeding, followed by 40+ days (now) of not bleeding, with little hints that you might be letting it flow any day, then not, is on my last nerve.
Yes, 40 and a half is a little early for menopause. I tried progesterone cream and re-entered puberty. I tried Vitex and had cycles like I’m having now without taking anything. I’m grateful that I’m not having hot flashes or night sweats. I’d just really like some regularity, you know? So I know when to wear my $20 fancy panties and when to wear the $2 granny panties. Thanks for listening.
Readers #Delurk!
Posted by: | CommentsAccording to my little stats machine, more than 2 people actually read the words on this blog on a daily basis. This, being Official Delurker Day 2010, is the perfect time for you to say hi in my comments section, tell me you’re reading, tell me what you like here, tell me about YOUR blog so I can go read it, hell, tell me to fuck off … whatever. Whether you’re a regular commenter or you quietly read this in the background, I’d love to know you.
Readers, delurk!
The Great Interview Experiment: Meet Amy from Girl in the Room
Posted by: | CommentsFor the past several months, I’ve noticed favorite bloggers posting interviews of other bloggers on their sites in a game called The Great Interview Experiment. GIE was conceived three years ago by Neil of Citizen of the Month:
“In my mind, I visualize a permanent interview site where Dooce would interview a clueless newbie, a liberal would interview a conservative, and a religious fundamentalist would interview a feminist lesbian. It wouldn’t matter if you liked or agreed with other person. We would still be neighbors, in a Mister Rogers sense.The interviews are random. You may be paired with a Nobel Laureate or an insane person — and it doesn’t matter.”
I’m a joiner, so I posted a comment right after the lovely Amy of Girl in the Room. Therefore, she was my interview subject. (Also, Cyndy from Putting the Fun in Dysfunctional interviewed me. You can read my Q & A on her blog.)
Meet Amy, Girl in the Room
This is Amy, and she's cool.Amy describes herself as "a Los Angeles expatriate currently living in exile in the desert. I share this world with my beautiful and brilliant daughter and two less than brilliant and very needy canine companions. Oh, and my husband who commutes to Los Angeles. We get him on the weekends."
Q. When you were 18, how did you imagine your life would be when you were 36, and how close is it to that life you imagined?
Let’s see, when I was 18, I wanted to live out of hotel rooms around the world. Now, I wish we could find a clean , safe, liberal, little town and live in an inexpensive house.
My life is definitely NOT what I expected it would be. I thought it would be much more exciting and a little less mundane.
Q. Why did you decide to get your MFA? Have you “used” it?
It was the late 90′s and everyone was doing it? No Seriously, I had my undergraduate degree in film and literature and was working as an editor and doing freelance stuff and really wanted to pursue the creative arts and I really loved being in art school. CalArts is a little haven for artists and there are very few places like that left and so even though my loans are a monkey on my back, I treasure and feel very lucky for the experience.
I tend to dumb myself down in in everyday life because it is sometimes easier when people think I am just a blonde So Cal airhead. But yes, I taught film while working as the Administrative Director at a private school in West LA and every now and then my successful friends ask me for help or an opinion on a project. High School teaching isn’t really my gig though. I would LOVE nothing more than to teach on the college level but that is pretty much a pipe dream in my field and I have accepted that fact.
Q. What, so far, is the biggest delight of motherhood? The biggest surprise? The biggest challenge?
The biggest delight (oh hard to pick just one) is when she runs toward me with a smile so wide it could save the world yelling “Mommy” and literally leaps into my arms. Who wouldn’t melt?
The biggest surprise is the intensity of emotion that comes with mothering. The love I feel for this kid is almost painful. Actually, it sometimes is painful.
The biggest challenge, hands down, the utter lack of sleep. I have decided that it is torture and I am certain it is outlawed somewhere in the Geneva Convention.
Q. You wrote early on in your blog that you started it as a journal of sorts. Does your blog still feel like a journal to you? Has knowing that others read it affected what you write about?
In some ways, it is more of a journal now than it was when I first started. This comes from needing a place to vent, sorry peeps. When I started I had to be totally anonymous because of my job. Now that I am no longer working, I am much more open. Yes, I still question “how much” to tell. Some things should be kept private, in my opinion.
Q. How has blogging affected your life?
Blogging started as just a personal exercise. I didn’t really think about other people reading it. But being a mother and a natural introvert, blogging has become a bit of a lifeline for me. I have met other mothers that I relate to and I can pop over and check in on them and they can check in on me.
Q. Since you’re living on one income now, what are some ways you have adapted your life and spending habits? What don’t you miss buying?
We don’t get to eat out much. Though that may have to do more with the crazy elimination diet that Bug and I have been on for far to many months.
And I haven’t been to Nordstroms or bought jeans over 100 buckaroos since long before Bug was born.
I without a doubt do NOT miss buying gas to make my insane commute from East to West Los Angeles for work. The amount we spent in gas makes me a little sick to my stomach. My carbon footprint shrunk significantly when I quite working.
Q. Outside of your family, what are you most passionate about?
I am passionate about human rights though I think pedophiles should have none and should be eradicated from the planet. Is that a contradiction? Maybe. But that is how I see it. I think children get a really raw deal in most places around the world and should all have basic healthcare, food, shelter, people who love them, and peace.
I think that mothers and fathers in the US should have longer maternity/paternity leave. Americans are always throwing around family values crap yet our country does little or nil to support the family.
Aside, from that I really really like Top Chef, Project Runway, Desperate Housewives, The Rich Little Dudes that Sell Real Estate, Say Yes To The Dress, What Not To Wear, Tabitha’s Salon Takeover…
Q. What are the three physical items you’d save from your burning house?
I know you might not believe this, but there really is not one single object that I am tied to. As long as I got my daughter and my Hubs out and I guess the dogs too, I’d be fine.
Q. Who do you want to be 18 years from now?
Wow. That is a tough one. I have kind of given up on projecting into the future and am focusing on living in the moment. If I were going to go there, however, for a moment, I would hope that I am living somewhere other than Los Angeles in a nice little liberal town. That we have a comfortable house and that our financial house is in order. I hope Bug is happy and healthy and ready to go off into the world and conquer.
Who do you want your daughter to be 18 years from now?
I want Bug to be a loving, kind, and compassionate person who follows her dreams and has the self-confidence to go out into the world and explore. I want her to know she is loved and supported.
Best of ’09: Project #best09
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I’m really proud of two projects I started this year: this blog and my wedding.
human, being
About a year ago, I was blogging to a narrower audience, and I found myself wanting to push my boundaries wide open to the entire world. I conceived of this space called human, being as a place for me to tell stories about my life, and especially my inner life, that would help me better understand who I am. I am someone who needs to talk it out in order to go deeper and understand more, and by talking I mean writing, and by writing I mean writing for an audience. I also knew from my previous blog that when I work out my shit in public, it helps others who are going through what I am.
I first created human, being on a free WordPress account and that worked OK for a while. In June, I moved to my self-hosted platform, where I gained a lot of functionality and design control–and my own URL. As I worked on the technicalities, I also sought my authentic voice. I believe I’ve found it, although I know that voice changes from topic to topic, and it will continue evolving as time goes on. I’m still growing my audience, and I’m delighted when you introduce yourself to me in a comment or in an email. I love my blog. I’m proud of what I’ve done here–how I’ve stuck to it, especially.
10.03.09
Planning a wedding in three months is no easy feat, but with some help from Steve and my wedding coordinator, Dana Dunphy of Revel & Bloom, I pulled it off. Oh, and I must not forget Microsoft Excel, my saving grace of organization. We had some trying episodes, such as all the red tape in trying to get married on the Millennium Bridge, and finding a bridesmaid dress for Lauren and getting her healed from H1N1 the week before. But the day, oh the day, was glorious and perfect. Most of all, it was us in every way, from the location to our clothes and headpieces and accessories and flowers to the cupcakes and the reception space and to the words we said or heard. I did go over budget by $2,000, but what’s money? (ha!) That’s a credit card bill I’m happy to pay. Our guests had a wonderful time, and our wedding day is something that neither Steve nor I will forget. What a great project, and a great way to start off the rest of our life together.
Blogger Extraordinaire Gwen Bell has issued a blogging challenge for each day of December–a “Best of” for 2009. I’m joining in as I have time and as the topics interest me.
Best of ’09: Word or Phrase: Working out my shit #best09
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Hayman Fire burnline, on a random roadtrip from Deckers to Manitou Springs.
In 2009, I turned 40. It seems remarkable to me, that number. It’s solid, the mile marker smack dab in the middle of my road trip called this life.
The first part of any road trip is filled with moments of my settling in, figuring out the best place for my sunflower seeds, selecting the best CDs or playlist, moving the cooler around until it’s firmly in the middle of the backseat. I usually find myself taking more pit stops in the first half of a long road trip. I look around more. I worry about getting there–wherever ‘there’ is–safely and on time.
The first half of a road trip feels like a dress rehearsal for the second half, the time where you really sink into the seat, elbow on the ledge of your open window, and sing over the wind at the top of your lungs even when the hot guy in the convertible pulls up beside you. Who cares what he thinks anyway. This is your trip, not his.
Someplace in the middle of my roadtrips, I usually stop, stretch my legs, get my bearings, and settle back in. I do a little reorganization, toss the empty soda cans in the garbage, work the knots out of my back. That’s exactly what this year has been like. I’ve been working my shit out, often in public here on this blog.
- I’ve been doing therapy weekly since May, using PSYCH-K techniques to unearth and resolve deep-held beliefs about myself and life. Some of the work as been successful, other parts not so much, but the fact that I’m dedicated to this journey to the point of spending 7% of my monthly income on it tells me this time around–because boy, have I tried this before–I’m ready to resolve and let go.
- I got married, throwing my lifetime fear of abandonment out the window as I said I DO to Steve. I am so committed that I even changed my name, something I didn’t do the first time around.
- I became committed to figuring out the best way to deal with my bipolar disorder–the best way for ME that is.
- I have become much better at quickly coming to understand how I feel and why I feel it. Where it used to take me days or even weeks to get it, now I can usually get to it in one conversation, or one blog.
- I decided that yes, I will write the novel. Nothing’s on paper yet, but the outline’s almost done in my head. And, because I am nuts, I also have started thinking about a second novel, to be written under my pen name, which will be an erotic romance. 2010 will be the year I actually write these books, now that the process doesn’t seem insurmountable. I still have some confidence issues to work out, but those will come by starting the damn things.
- I started taking pictures again. I love taking photos, and while I want to get better, I’m willing to ask questions and look dumb and have a lot of failures along the way. I’m hoping that someday I can make a buck or two on my work, either by taking portraits or selling calendars (ha!). But for now, I love that I have a hobby I can play in minus the need to be the World’s Greatest.
- I have written more this year than ever before, thanks to this blog. Yes, yes, sometimes I’m funny (by accident) and other times I’m downright depressing, and the Days of Grace project has become tedious for me, and maybe even for the 50 people or so who read this every day. However, I have been writing. And not writing was part of the shit I wanted to work out this year.
- I stopped trying to lose weight. Since I’ve been dieting in one way or another for most of my life, deciding that if my body wants to be a size 12, so be it, took more weight off me than South Beach or Atkins or fasting ever did. Figuratively, of course, because I’m still a size 12. However, this morning, when I looked at my naked body in the mirrors, I was fine with what I saw. This time last year, I looked pretty much the same, and I hated what I saw.
- I started to heal my relationship with my sister, which has been estranged for the most part since she was born.
- I have become a better, more loving mother to my daughter.
- I’ve mastered the double spin in salsa dancing.
- I’ve learned to better speak my mind even when it’s uncomfortable to do so.
- I’m still a slob, although I have had moments of neatness.
If you follow numerology at all, you understand that life comes in cycles. Numerologists say that those cycles are 9 years long. For me, 2009 was a 1 year–a year of rebirth, and of continuing to let go of what I started to let go of in year 9. I’m halfway through it, and I can feel the momentum for my next new adventure building inside and outside of me. I will continue to work on my depression, my perfectionism, my body image and identifying goals and values so that I can launch myself into whatever comes my way with a new vision of who I am and where I’m going on the second half this roadtrip called my life.
Blogger Extraordinaire Gwen Bell has issued a blogging challenge for each day of December–a “Best of” for 2009. I’m joining in as I have time and as the topics interest me.
Blogging is dangerous
Posted by: | CommentsI’ve tried to keep journals and diaries since I was a kid, and in every single one, I lie. The innate secrecy of those books (most of which are blank halfway through, because I can’t keep them up) causes me to fictionalize, leave out, redact my thoughts and feelings. Take my childhood diary, which is filled with boy crush after boy crush, yet nothing about my suicide fantasies, about the fights with girls, about always feeling left out or just on the edge of fitting in. When I wrote in that book about losing my virginity, I redacted most of the experience–and I lied about how I felt about it. I protected myself because I knew that someone might find the writing. I was right, because my brother stole my diary and shared it with the neighborhood kids. It was awful.
You’d think that I’d be more closed off in this public space. More careful.
This space is about me, about how I’m feeling at the moment, thinking (or likely, obsessing) about at the moment. I share my thoughts and feelings and life with people who stumble upon or seek out this site in an attempt to authentically speak my truth. I lay myself out bare here sometimes. I’m working my shit out in public.
I admit that I forget occasionally that people I work with may read my blog. Also, family members. Maybe my ex–I don’t know. I try to keep it secret from him. Sometimes when I look at my Google Analytics and I see that people often search for human being blog to get here, I wonder who it is and who told them about my blog. I know that everything I write on the Internet is permanent, that even though I don’t use my last name here it’s not that hard to figure out who I am with a little creative searching. I know that what I write here can come back and bite me in the ass. Blogging can be dangerous.
Take my conversation with my boss at the end of a recent weekly meeting: She told me that she had been at a national meeting, and someone pulled her aside and told her a friend of hers reads my blog, and that I’d written negative stuff about my job recently. Now my boss is great, and she told me that she’s a big believer in freedom of speech and doesn’t care what I’m writing on my personal website. Great news, right? However, she said if, say, someone in our leadership read that I’m dissing my job, they might not be too pleased. She wasn’t telling me to censor myself necessarily, but cautioning me that maybe I’m not as anonymous as I think I am, and I might want to think twice before I publish something here that could hurt me professionally.
I just finished reading Jen Lancaster’s Bitter is the New Black, a memoir about that blogger’s year of unemployment. Lancaster did not get hired for a job because of her blog content. Now she was specifically dissing all the companies who had not hired her or responded to her applications–companies that would be potential clients in this job she was seeking. Yeah, I think that was pretty dumb of her to do. And Heather Armstrong of Dooce.com was famously fired over her blog content. Both of these bloggers are snarky. Armstrong specifically got fired for snarking about her coworkers and her company.
I believe I’m really careful about what I write about work here. But am I careful enough?
The blog in question is one I wrote a couple of weeks ago. In that blog, I wondered whether my job is a good fit for me now. I honestly wrote about my feelings about my place in the organization. If asked, I would say the same things to my boss. In fact, I have.
Does what I wrote about how I feel about my job mean I’m not grateful to have it, especially in this economy? Or that I’m not dedicated to doing the best job possible? No. Does that mean that I want to get fired (no) or quit (maybe)? Could what I write here come back to bite me in the ass like it did Lancaster and Armstrong? Yes.
Unlike in my diaries, I don’t lie here. I do refrain from writing about Steve’s son, because he’s not mine to write about, and at age 12 he deserves privacy. I don’t write much about Lauren and parenting here because this is not a mommy blog. I write about my relationship to Steve in some capacity, but there are many things that are off limit, including our sex life. I don’t snark about others, because I loathe snark. I am not a mean person. And, snark means the blog is about those people.
This blog is about me, and how I feel. Not about them. My job is a big part of my life, and right now, I’m feeling quite unsettled about it. So I will probably be writing about how I feel as I explore, but this situation makes me cautious. If I start a job search, I won’t be writing about it because that could be cutting my own throat. (Or maybe, I’ll write it in a password-protected post, which you’re welcome to ask me to unlock for you.) I won’t write anything here that I wouldn’t say to my boss if asked. (Or to anyone else I write about–that’s my litmus test: If I can’t say it to your face, I won’t write it here in a public post.)
It’s odd that the woman who went to my boss didn’t come to me. She knows me too. That’s the most upsetting part of all this. However, I acknowledge that it’s out of my control. It’s also slightly embarrassing that my boss talked to me about it. I spent hours worrying that I should delete that entry, and that I shouldn’t write about work at all. I wound up password protecting the post.
This blog is about me being honest with myself, feeling my feelings, and working my shit out. All personal bloggers take a risk in doing what we do. This situation is a good reminder that, even as I think my only readers are strangers, what I write here may have consequences, even if it’s only a little embarrassment.
Life, edited
Posted by: | CommentsCatherine of Her Bad Mother recently lost her father, and in helping her mother sort through his things stumbled upon love letters from a woman he had an affair with. In her blog, she writes about feeling every letter, photo, item of her father’s–even these papers that feel like razors to her mother–are sacred artifacts. She wants to keep them, hold them dear, even if doing so is painful, because the items are her father now. She also says she will not edit her own history.
Someday, I will want my own children to know me better, to know the stories, to know the woman, to know that I was far, far more than just mom and wife, to know that the partiality of their experience and memory concealed details that they possibly couldn’t have imagined. And (or?), perhaps, to discover (as I have also done, in some important part), that they did know me, that they did understand me, and that all the partially hidden details, once brought to light, just reveal nuance and insight. Understanding.
Which is why I will never destroy my own narrative record. Which is why I will treasure my dad’s. Which is why I will keep recording these – telling these – stories. Even when it stings, even when it hurts.
(Will you do the same with yours? Or is there a shredder in your future?)
When I was about 15, I found my mom’s childhood diaries in a dresser drawer. I stole them and read every page, trying to know her better. I learned she once loved a boy named Forrest, and she wore bobby socks and pin curled her hair. Not much more. I was glad I got that much.
When I was married, the ex made me go through my keepsakes box and burn–yes BURN–all old photos of me with Dan, my first fiance, all the love letters, all the poetry about him. He was jealous, and rightfully so because I was still in love with Dan and he knew it. I knew that if I didn’t do as he told me, I’d lose him, and back then, I thought no one would ever really love me. So I edited the Dan chapter of my life. I was able to hide away a few photos–the one Dan’s dad took of us when we were newly in love, standing in front of Dan’s house in Ft. Collins, me blonde and permed and grinning ear to ear, so happy, and Dan happier still, one arm around my shoulders, the other hand tucked into the pocket of his acid-washed jeans. Another of us, drunk, at a fraternity party two months after we had broken up but weren’t done with each other. I couldn’t save the classified ad I’d taken out in the college paper, trying to find him after our first meeting, or the tickets from the Prince concert we attended the night he proposed. I remember feeling like I was dying all over again as I watched the artifacts of my love for Dan turn to char in my fireplace. I pretended to be happy to do it.
When I got divorced, the ex and I split out the photos. I wanted our wedding album, I think, to spite him. I had albums upon albums of photos of our trips together–Las Vegas, Cozumel, Snowmass. Photos of us renovating each house, with each new car, with our dog, Duncan, with Lauren at various stages of babyhood. I buried them all in a box shoved under the basement stairs. One day about two years ago I found myself looking through the photos and our wedding album and discarding most pictures. I saved pictures of me with my grandparents, now all deceased. I saved a few of the ex and I, because even though he and I are through, we were together for 12 years. That’s a lot of life. The cards and love letters I tossed without a second thought. It felt good to let go of that stuff because I no longer loved him. The other night I came across some photos of us in Mexico, when we were infatuated, and I’m glad I kept them. They remind me that it wasn’t always bad, and I did genuinely feel something good for him. Someday, Lauren may appreciate having that record of her parents’ love for each other because she will not remember us being together.
Recently, when things got sticky between my ex and me, I purged another three years of my life. Things that were none of his business, but should he find them, could have been fodder to use against me. Most of it was my writing, stories I’ve published under other names, made only for adult eyes, the story of my unfreezing, how I learned to accept myself as a sexual being. I panicked, and I destroyed it all. I panicked, and photos and letters and blogs and stories disappeared. Some of it was the best work I’ve ever done. And it’s gone. Big, big regrets there. Steve and I used to joke that we needed friends who would clear off the hard drive and trash the sex toy box should we die in a fiery plane crash (Destroy the Evidence!). I just never thought it would be me doing the trashing.
But all is not lost for my life’s excavators. Downstairs in the lateral file is a drawer full of my writing–poems, stories, papers, news clips, work product–going back three decades. A whole box of half-filled journals lives under the stairs. Sometimes I revisit them to remember who I used to be, all those people ago. I astonish myself for how far I’ve come, what I’ve walked through barefooted and naked, and that I’m standing on this side of it all intact after thinking I’d never survive. And this blog, which is nine months old and finally finding its pacing, provides more insight than anything stored on paper. This blog is a love letter to my future selves, a letter of gratitude, proof that I have lived.
