Picture shows me at computer a couple days ago.
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There is a place in some of my fantasies and in stories I try to write. It's called "behind the windbreak, stage left --" a real wysiwyg -- what else can I say? I think it grew out of my early impressions of my Aunt's house, one of the most familiar places in my life. She moved into it when I was little and she has almost always had something at least resembling a wind-break to the right of her front yard. That's where we all headed to take walks in the woods when we were little. At least once we all went back there to ride the pony, but pretty soon I got too big for the pony and the others quickly followed suit.
Behind the windbreak, stage left doesn't always figure prominently in the stories. It's just there. I'm like, "OK, the character escapes. Then where to? Behind the windbreak..."
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In the middle of the night we were out at my woodland road-frontage with a pick axe, head lamps and shovels. Krissy and I shared a laugh over the impression others might have that we were up to no good. But in fact we were only planting flowers. The guy who sold me the bulbs was so late that planting time ended up being extremely late. In fact, that's why he gave me more than ten times what I had paid for, and why we were out there so long fighting the hard ground to put in countless plants. Some of them were still flowering and looked really special with the roses and the vase of cut flowers by September's (cat) grave.
Krissy and I had a real good time together, something that hasn't happened in a while. Then I rushed to my mother's house some 40 miles away, fighting sleep behind the wheel. When I arrived I couldn't even take a shower if I had been awake enough to do it because a thunderstorm had blown in on my heels. Well, I don't actually know what direction it had come from, but it arrived just after I did. Throughout the trip I could see lightning in the south, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't have seen any in the north if I had been driving the other way (does it?)
The dogs were afraid of the storm, which may sound unnatural for dogs ages 8 and 13, but there is a possible explanation. The elder dog must have told the younger about the time lightning struck the dormer and tore a hole in the house. And dogs don't lie, so the younger dog had to believe him.
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When I was young I didn't always have very much control over when I could sleep and wake. But now that I do, 2:30 PM seems to be my natural, preferred time to kick into gear and get stuff done. As in former times, though, 6PM is when I really hit my stride.
One of the things I think is responsible for my increasing control in this area is melatonin. It's my miracle drug. I've also learned to do things that improve my health in general -- like watching my diet, exercising (though not as much as I'd like,) and taking nutritional supplements. Also, the doctor involved in my "inverted circadian rythm" diagnosis of 1984 said that in my thirties I would find my states of consciousness easier to manage. I didn't fare particularly well in my thirties, but that could be because of medication I was taking then that I have tapered to a maintenance dose now. In fact, just before I started taking them I was 28 and was just starting to realize an impressive level of control; but this vanished when I went on the drug -- paxil.
Paxil has also been implicated in memory loss and weigh gain, both of which I suffered right on schedule when I started on the drug. I hope naturopathy catches on with insurers (including Uncle Sam -- are you listening, President Obama?) so that people don't automatically resort to iffy drugs before exploring wholesome alternatives.
The body is a wonderful healing machine. Just give it what it needs and it knows what to do.
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I have this annoying friend -- I'll call him Jake -- that I probably hung around too much. He was always putting me down, and (as he himself warned me he would) he was unfair about the arguments this caused. "I don't lose arguments," he'd said, "That has nothing to do with who's right." I'm afraid I might have unwittingly internalized too much of his negativity towards me. I think I realized this maybe a few months ago but it was a while before I could get a wholesome distance.
Jake says that people aren't rational, but that instead they rationalize. It's clear that he's talking about himself; but he certainly doesn't speak for me, and I'm sure he doesn't speak for most people. It seems to me, from long experience with people who actually do argue with fairness and integrity, that all the rest of us really want is for people to be fair to us. You see it all the time in magazines, "Just show hubby/junior/mother that you appreciate his point of view, and then he'll be more open to yours."
Fairness is certainly all I want when I talk to people, and when I don't get it I'm hurt. So until I got some distance from Jake, I'd been kinda hurt. It still hurts. I even admitted it to him because I figured I'd ultimately feel better that way than if I continued to eye-roll it whenever I remembered it. I mean, it's a weight off my shoulders and he could actually turn around and help me with it.
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