awareness

group last night was once again very small.  group seems to be disintegrating, and it makes us very sad.  we don’t know if it can be saved.  and, if it can, we don’t know how to do it.  or, if i should just let it die naturally.  sigh…

christmas is coming.  christmas is like thanksgiving for us, in that we have such mixed feelings.  the origins of christmas are clearly christian and we are so very not christian.  we don’t want to give the appearance of agreeing with said christian beliefs.  on the secular side of things, we really hate how crazy it has gotten…how badly capitalism rears its ugly head.  where all that’s important is spending and buying.  i have been in many situations in stores where people are so incredibly rude because they were so focused on material crap.

it also holds a lot of traumatic history for us because of the abuse we lived in until we were able to get out at age 21.  This history can make it really hard to enjoy christmas even without thinking about the christian origins and the capitalism.  but we have vowed to not let them take things from us…nevertheless, it is a force to be reckoned with.  we struggle with it all the time.

but the kids adore christmas.  they don’t care what the origins are.  to them christmas is about pretty lights, presents, giving to others (we always adopt needy people from the giving trees), holiday carousel, big tasty meal, people being nice to each other, and being with people we care about.  so for them we have worked hard to take the holidays back from “the bad people” and create meaningful traditions.  but the conflicts do not simply just go away.

when you’re poor, and you’re multiple, it can be really hard to be consistent with the things you believe in.  but we do the best we can…it’s all we can do.  and that has to be good enough.

“People will show you who they are, but we ignore it because we want them to be who we want them to be.”  (- Don Draper)

this is a constant issue for us…we don’t trust what we are seeing or feeling.  so we let people in who are not good for us…even though there are very clear red flags.  what does it take to change this?  i know the first step is awareness, and we are very aware of it now.

time and waiting to adjust

i know we’re supposed to go to the art thing at full life today…i know we’ve missed it for a while now…sigh.  but we are struggling with it today.  we couldn’t get up until 9.  we just couldn’t.  and then there is the time it takes for our morning rituals.  and we feel like we really need to make sure we are doing those.  and, to top it all off, we are feeling overwhelmed at the idea of going out.  so overwhelmed that we don’t know if we can make it out the door.  i am trying not to overreact to that, as we usually do.  it’s that we have been busy every days for quite a while now.  we are craving some time home.  plus, we need to do the chorus retreat work  that we have been procrastinating.  so i am not sure what is going to happen…but if it follows history, we probably won’t make it out the door.

we just had an insight into how we are feeling at these times of overwhelmed and not able to leave…we feel raw and exposed, like every important sensitive bit of us is showing for everyone to see.  and for everyone to hurt.  it is no wonder that at these times we want to stay home…we feel protected here.  only those we invite in can see those parts of us.  at home we don’t have to be afraid of some hurt these most tender parts of us.  the earlier the time, the harder it is for us to go out…because we have less time to gather and protect and feel safe and ready to venture out.

thank you, mouse. thank you for you continued lessons of scrutiny.  it *is* good medicine to look closely.  i think we shall keep mouse around for today as well.

we are feeling sad.  we are feeling loss.  and we are feeling lost…set adrift.  perhaps that is part of the tender, raw experience.  our heart is aching…and i have a feeling that right this moment nothing but time is going to help.

“If you’re sitting in pitch black darkness, all you can really do is sit tight and wait for your eyes to adjust.”

- Criminal Minds  (TV show)

no one thing

nothing is coming to me.  that is a weird sensation…usually i’m hearing lots of things from inside. i do know that people where really scared last night, because we were suddenly experiencing really bad dental pain again.  but it seems to have been transitory, much to our relief.  we still have several days of antibiotics [...]