Happy Chinese New Year; Beginnings

Happy New Year! Yes, New Year, new look! And since this is just part of my experimenting phase with the what and how of the blog, there may be more cosmetic changes. It's just one new beginning. Meredith's was the first blog on which I saw a similar change, and then I found it on several more that same day. It's time, with gratitude for the inspiration/reminder.

from  http://tinyurl.com/asy56nz

I didn't make any kind of resolution/intention/goal/orienting-of-self-in-universe post around January 1st, or at all this year yet. I knew I'd be getting a second opportunity. Today is Chinese New Year's Day, although celebrations began about a week ago. The beginning is not always the beginning. This is also the Year of the Snake, the year in which I was born. The Chinese zodiac goes by lunar years rather than months, so the animals recur every twelve years. This is the fourth Snake year of my life, including the year I was born. The annual cycle also maps to the Chinese elements. I was born in the year of the Fire Snake; my brother, who was born when I was twelve, is an Earth Snake baby; my friend's son born in 2001 is a Metal Snake baby, and this is the Year of the Water Snake. Well, being surrounded by water sounds like a tricky proposition for a fire person!

I ran my date/time/place of birth through a Chinese Astrology interpreter and was given, among other things, a decade-by-decade analysis of how my fortune/well being would be; the "Rise and Fall Chart" of my life. 
Source

Age	0	1-10	11-20	21-30	31-40	41-50	51-60	61-70	71-80	81-90

The Blue Bar stands for the beginning Luck Level when you were born. Each Red Bar stands for the Luck Level for 10 years. When you are in luck, the Red Bar is longer than the Blue Bar. Your good marriage should be in the longest Red Bar or a longer Red Bar period during the marriage age. Your career should begin in a longer Red Bar too. Usually, you can find two consecutive longer Red Bars together, which are your best 20 years.

Well, that didn't work so well. It looks great in my 'writing' place, but not so good published. If you care, you can click where I put "Source" above and see it. Important points: my 31-40 decade, which I'm in the middle of now, is just about a flatline (and I thought my 20's were worse than now). 41-50 looks somewhat better but still poor, and the remaining decades look great, although you have to wonder if they've just been put that way because I won't be there to see them--why else would there be so many of them and so much better than any preceding?. The admonition is not to start anything important, like a marriage or a work vocation, until you have two good decades in a row. I don't get that until I'm 51! The beginning is not always the beginning.

It's always fascinating when astrological-type stuff matches up with what one's experiencing in life. But given that the descriptions of a Fire Snake's personality scarcely describe me (extroverted, charismatic, judgmental, guarded and suspicious (really?), ruthless in pursuit of success (really??))* I'm reminded to take all with the requisite seasoning. In so doing, I avoid considering any of the predictive stuff explanation or excuse, just like it's being increasingly understood that genes are not inevitable predictors of health manifestations. I had this new science of epigenetics explained to me succinctly and unassumingly by my parents' dentist, mine as a little kid; when I went to see him on a visit back there once. He commented that my teeth were in really good shape. I said I was grateful for it, reminding him that he'd warned me as a teenager that both my parents have issues with their teeth and I should take care. "Genetics isn't a blueprint, he said, "It's just something that may be more likely to happen. You still have control over how things turn out."
*For those of you who don't know me, extroverted is not the same as manic, and I'm not always manic. I'm decidedly uncharismatic. I'm not guarded--in fact, I'm notorious for talking poop with complete strangers. Well, if you read this blog you've seen how transgressive of normal "OK to talk about" lines I can be. And I seem to self-sabotage rather handily when it comes to desire for success, although that is changing.

So, supposing this decade of mine is as horrible as that table above suggests, it still doesn't mean I need to be in purgatory. In spite of the tendency created by the relevant positioning of planets and atoms (in which I do believe, btw), I can still move into self actualization, become a writer who is well-read and well-loved, continue to find ways to support myself that are meaningful and that utilize my particular and unusual expertise ("ruthless pursuit of success?"). I can come to a more peaceful place with the health issues that partially define the shape of my life. Most important, perhaps, I can create for myself a good definition of what is well being, success, happiness. Is there any more beautiful perspective on light than from the bottom of a well?

Happy New Year! And shaping up to be a(nother) year of immense change in my life. I don't yet know exactly how all the details are going to work out, but already, as misaligned and misbegotten and sick unto death as I have sometimes felt in recent months, I'm also already being fed from plants raised in that compost. Opportunities have presented themselves, offering completely new directions, and I am exploring them with open mind and heart.

Yes, last year I was also fixated on the "beginning is not the beginning" thing with my attempt at a "fifty first weeks" series. As a writer, and as anyone with spiritual inclinations, it's virtually essential that there be not just one starting line. And so, over and over, I mull on the first word of Genesis, b'resheet which means, not "In the beginning," as usually translated, but "In a beginning." One of many possible beginnings. The quantum version of the Bible! And meanwhile the oral tradition most in my head, that of the Homeric bards, comes in with the invocation to the Muse at the beginning of The Odyssey--to tell us of these things "starting from some point or another." So, in the context of a song/story/performance, a beginning can be made at any point in the story. We think of that more as a lyric impulse nowadays, but narratives structured that way are usually the ones I find most compelling. 

Why this is all so important to me is that the final year of my MFA program is heaving into view, which will be my thesis year. In the past month I've been getting clarity, at least in outline, on what that thesis will be. And the major theme, metaphor, story, lyric construct--yes, all of these, from which its stories, poems, reflections, notes, memoir--yes, all of these--will suspend is that of crossings, of passage, of movement from one place or time or inner or outer to another. Yes, it's all huge-picture excitement at this point. But--especially in a decade of anni horribiles such as I'm supposed to find myself, the only way I could possibly feel as much excitement about this project as I do is through belief shading into knowledge that there is no single beginning.

I'm writing about myself because that's what I don't-know most intimately. There are many other things this blog could be "about." I have a tongue-in-cheek and rueful yen to start including food posts if there is interest. And book reviews! I love to do those. And all the Alaska stuff, of course, and travels elsewhere in the near future...

Sunt Lacrima Rerum -- Always in Season

Three times in the past three weeks. On Monday, it was around "sixteen-one thousand" in my litany, standing on one leg in front of the cop car; my car in the ditch, eleven below zero. The day before, it was seeing Tom and Jeanie's movie for the first time since Lucas died. A couple weeks before that, it was being unable to remember a friend's phone number as I continued in the downward spiral now thankfully reversed.

Sunt lacrima rerum, says Vergil. Literally, "There are tears for things." As humans, with human experiences we have tears.

I find myself seasonal like the Nile in this. At times, I don't cry for months on end. Other times, I cry nonstop. At the treatment centers this summer it got to be embarrassing at times--I'd say my goal for the day was not to cry, and would be crying twenty minutes later. But until these past few weeks, I hadn't cried since getting out of treatment.

I accept my small bouts of weeping with gratitude, an opportunity to allow some balance in the water table. Laughter's similarly seasonal. Lately, I've found myself laughing more, where it had stopped pretty much entirely. I welcome small bouts of laughter. Why not laugh a little, weep a little, every day? Why can't the grace of being moved by life be an everyday nourishment?

As a writer, I wish to make myself laugh and cry every day as I engage with the wonder of the universe. To make others laugh and cry also. If I can't find it within myself, I can read and watch movies to educate me and make up the deficit as I laugh and cry (I am so far deficient in film education, and am grateful every time I watch a single film to fill the gap a little).

The obvious metaphor: I have gone from habitually eating almost nothing to eating everything I could hold and more, for an ultimatum. One whole week later, the barren season beckons with siren song; the complications of appetite strike fear. Why can't daily nourishment be part of a full life, like tears and laughter, and the ecstatic connectedness to which they are a response?

Tears, laughter, adequate and appropriate sustenance. May they always be in season.

Rock Jockey Gets to Keep Riding--Toward Where?

Yesterday was the other end of the ultimatum that's been causing me so much anxiety for the past month or so. I know I have the potential for leaving things to the last minute, but the combination of last minute-ness, physical and physiological effects of full-on masochistic foie gras action, and anxiety, was indescribable. 
Yesterday's drive to Anchorage was cold, but not freezingfreezing; the radiator was managing to put out at least a modicum of heat.
In my pocket, my most special of special rocks...

...in my cooler, wrapped in down pants, my scale: I couldn't bear the idea of losing this bid because of some
"nearly but not quite" owing to dehydration from a long, cold drive. As stupid and arbitrary and imprecise as I know scale numbers to be (especially in the afternoon with clothes on), I had to respect the "minimum" with the inflexibility of a Lubavitch rabbi or a Roman flamen (no disrespect to them).

I'm so glad I brought the scale. I was right about the dehydration: who knew you could lose three pounds driving less than three hundred miles? So, a big, hurried lunch. Anyone who knows me at all knows that "hurried" and "eating" cannot co-occur. I showed up to my appointment, head spinning; had my vitals taken...all very good. But then, let's say, my rabbit almost came out of the hat! I had to excuse myself from my appointment before it had even started. Not the start I would have hoped for. 

I was much better after that, and was able to offer my psychiatrist enough confidence that I had seen a full spectrum of reasons why it's worth it to me, even lithium aside, to stay physiologically stable, so she's willing to let me continue--but still under the same rabbinically strict stipulation.
Relief...

Rock Jockey keeps on riding!
Why "rock jockey?" -- Lithium means "made of rock." 
-- For as long as I've been taking medications to help stabilize my moods, whether naturopathic, homeopathic, or conventional, I've had a visceral perception of myself as riding the medication. Sometimes it's a better ride than others. Sometimes I'm just running alongside; sometimes the mount is bogged down and I'm running ahead. Sometimes I'm bogged down and the mount is out of sight.

This picture is as much about the rocks as it is about the persimmons.

Obviously, it would be ridiculous for me to imply that everyone who loves rocks has bipolar disorder or schizophrenia!

However, I'm working on an essay about water as an element. I'm writing a section on elements (earth, water, fire, air) as used to categorize people's natures and characters, including my own. Where I'm getting to (although I didn't know it when I started) is that I'm predominantly an "air" person, and greatly lacking in "earth." So I'm floating away on my helium (= of the sun, element #2) balloon, and am grounded by being tied to my lithium (made of rock, element #3).

Oh, and the "jockey" part reminds me not to put myself on a guilt trip for imagining anyone who doesn't have to live with me would be interested in my cliffhanger over enforced and significant weight gain, or in whether I got to stay on my meds. Jockeys have to put on or off weight all the time.

I have to go finish that essay. On Monday, I'll have written a post both about the "masochistic gratification" I keep going on about, and about what it means to have met the ultimatum--what scary places of growth it's hurled me into, what I was hiding from, how I hope to utilize and share the renewed positivity and energy. What am I riding for now?
A beautiful weekend to you!

On Integrity (Part 1) I Know I Will Fall

My thanks to a very wise friend for our conversation around today's post topic. 
Before I get to it, today's funny thought:

All year, I've been habituating myself to the 'cold rinse'--cold water for the last seconds of my shower, as long as I can stand it up to 30 seconds or so. This practice is supposed to be so good for you, it can help you lose weight, lol, by stimulating 'brown fat.'  (I'm not going to risk giving a mangled explanation, so there's a link if you like.)

As most of you know, we don't even have a shower, so our washing is inevitably a chilly process when not skipped altogether. Showers are another luxury of house-sitting, or being in treatment ;) . Well, after all that habituation, with outside temperatures down in the teens and twenties now, let me tell you my enthusiasm for the slap-in-the-face-tingle stimulation has plummeted. Wimp that I am! Or not... See next topic.

On Integrity
As I've been settling back into working and, hallelujah, writing, I've been trying to learn co-ordinates. What the co-ordinates of my own life are now, with all the different parameters like medications, ultimatums, needing to be accountable to others over basic things like nutrition. My co-ordinates given the apparently endless upheaval of moving, traveling, shifting in our life. Basic things that become oh so complicated. What the co-ordinates of this blog. What the co-ordinates of my creative writing, with the specific issues and topics I'm working on this  year.

The concept I keep being sent to, over and over, on the Internet, in books, in conversations; as if it's pinned on the teleprompter or supertitle or in the sky everywhichway I turn; on the insides of my eyelids as I sleep, is:

Have Integrity of Speech

Speak in Congruence with Reality 

Be Impeccable with Your Word

I started getting this message soon after beginning to realize how awful my self-talk is (has been). So, above, I confess to being deterred from cold showers by its being very cold outside, and immediately call myself a wimp! Is this being congruent with reality? What kind of reality am I trying to co-create?

A lot is at stake here, as I have been tapping on the communication 'nut' for several months now--I've mentioned it before here several times. Initially, it was just a matter of developing greater sensitivity to the 'between the lines' portion of what people say, that I never used to understand (and that isn't really speaking in full integrity anyway). Then, it was intense vigilance of myself, mostly choosing not to say things that I knew would not be productive of anything except a same-old same-old fight. Vigilance including not beating up on myself when I messed up. (That might have been the hardest part.)

So, up to this point, my efforts have touched on exterior areas, ensuring that communication is a functional bridge between people.

Now, though--truth, impeccability, congruence? In my speech, in my writing, in my actions?

This is exciting. Also scary, as I know I will fail over and over as I learn how to do this. I have the feet to walk this path, but they've been tucked away for centuries as I slide around on my butt, so they are fast asleep and will have to go through painful pins and needles to awaken. I will do my best as I find my feet and my feet find the path.

I've messed up at least once today already. But when I'm sitting quiet, not really thinking about anything, the idea "I'm having integrity in my words now" often enters my head, with excitement and a smile.

The most recent poem I worked on also made efforts in this direction, with the intent to include both heart and rational impulses as its wings. I feel like I'm making the same efforts with my blog writing too, including expression of my honest uncertainty where to 'position' the blog and how/when to add food/recipes back into the mix.

Speaking of food, the 'food' area may be the last unconquered territory. The ultimatum issue is very scary for me. Perhaps the scariest part of it at this point is the prospect of having to eat a caloric surplus at all, let alone consistently enough to add a lot of pounds. (See, I can't be complete even there!) I've had two weeks, I have two more weeks. I can do superficial things with water and clothes, but my cosmic message is to move away from the exterior and into core truth. Can I be impeccable here? Can I be impeccable without manipulating the nature of intentions around this? Impeccable in my actions and in what I say about them?

Maybe not yet.

If you can bear it, in my next post I'll give a short explanation of why there's a circle graphic around 'integrity.'

Much love.

Touchstones--50 First Weeks Resumed

Remember all the way back in the third week of January, I started my "Fifty First Weeks" series of Monday posts, intended as all Mondays the rest of the year? Things went a bit off course, didn't they. But (not to steal my own thunder) the whole principle of "Fifty First Weeks" is that one can always start a day, or a time of day, as fresh time.

(Have you ever tried to braid rocks? Me either, but I'm trying to now, to braid touchstones with a return to returning, and returning, and returning to the metaphorical saddle.)
Stones can impress, can be similes in their very being. They can also protect. Helmet rock:

Things went off track and I went away, and then I came home and things continued hectic; I didn't get back on track and I didn't get back in the saddle and I didn't write all that was in my head, and I felt like an unmilked cow.

Glittery objects picked up don't always retain their luster, and the perspective is very different on opposite sides of a hill.

I knew my attitude was wrong: that I should have seen spending time with my mother-in-law in a beautiful house, taking care of cute chickens and a pair of neurotic little dogs who somehow like me, as a wonderful opportunity; possibly a source of much poetic inspiration; rather than a tightening in my throat. The same for numerous other activities this past month or two.

I forgot to remember where I came from this lifetime, or three months ago.

I forgot to remember where I came from on the scale of this universe.

I forgot the ease that comes out of moving with the flow. Actually, that's seldom been easy for me, and I also know that the flow can be a destructive onslaught--the rocks underneath our own home are under its threat.

What flows can move rocks and pile up mountains out of what has been moved.

 I need to accept that our life here is going to be studded with visitors and travel and other chaos, and not use that as an excuse to fall in the hole. Learning to work around these must be part of my challenge in life, which means at some level I have chosen it.

After all, I seem to pick up the same rocks over and over again...

I always have potential poems going through my head, and wish I were better at making the time to write them. The most upsetting part about the recent sequence was the feeling that that voice had gone quiet; that only the disinfectant tinnitus was left, more unbearable than silence

I'm finding my way back to that little opening of space in the midst of the heavy clay (a different sort of hole to fall into), since...

There's constriction in my throat, a lot of 'throat chakra' "stuff," energy I need to work with.

...even a stone can mime singing. 

The message over and over is, Do the work. Do it no matter your complaints about the circumstances. Mess up, and start over.

And sometimes, you'll pick up a rock entirely different from all the others, with a whole new metaphor within it.

I was gone for a long time over the summer. Physically, I've lost almost all my reluctant gains during that time. However, all along and even at the time I said the most useful aspect of the whole experience was all that I learned about communication, boundaries, awareness of other people's intended self-portrayals rather than blurt-empathy. 

And these past few days, I keep getting the message to be more precise in my own communication, more fearlessly honest, more impeccable with my word. I take that to heart in my conversations; I take it to heart in my creative writing also. Thus far, I've been pretty cranky a few times--but I can always start over.

Speaking of which, I'm aware that I haven't posted a single recipe since I got home. The reasons for that may be obvious superficially; I'm also still puzzling over what this blog is about. I'm ready to make some changes, even if they're just cosmetic, but recipes at some level of frequency will return.
Much love.

Frank Talk about Post-Treatment: (1) Food: A Return to the Exquisite Privateness

What happens when you get out of treatment? First of all, you don't want any special attention as a result of where you've just been; especially, you don't want to appear to be making any special efforts around food. 
Do you?
I didn't. On reflection, actually, some of my fellow travelers took pride in the prospect of showing their loved ones that they were doing things differently, better. So perhaps I just speak for myself. What I do know is that nobody wants the "Oh, you've gained weight! You look great!" comment. I've had that one a few times on previous go-rounds and it is an enforced lesson in grace.

In view of this, I was lucky: the day after I left treatment I went to our MFA residency, at which the majority didn't know me well enough to know where I'd been for the previous ten weeks and probably hadn't noticed my food oddities the year before or remembered them if they had. I left the residency to a freewheeling crazed run of travel and family stuff, during which there were far greater priorities to attend to. My friends and family, most of whom didn't see me until a month or so after I got free anyway, are dazzlingly tactful.

Additionally, I don't talk about it. Not-talking, like talking, is powerful energy.
I'm choosing to talk about it now because I suspect it may be helpful for someone else, and possibly even useful information for people who know me. For this post, I'll talk mostly about the food aspect, but in a later post I'll talk about other aspects of life affected; not least among them, not-talking in a different context.

Being on the outside is not the same as being in treatment. The only reason I state something so obvious is because when you get out of treatment, the otherness is such a shock. Even stepping down from five weeks inpatient on a campus in the middle of nowhere to a day program in a city, with streets and cars and stuff, was overwhelming to the point that I was barely coherent at first. From there to 'total freedom' was another rush of adrenaline. In theory at least, they don't let you out the door of a treatment center without a multifaceted "plan," including an individualized meal-plan (considered the foundation of all growth both metaphorical and literal (!)), a therapist, a doctor, a dietitian and, if necessary, a psychiatrist (it usually is necessary), plus scheduled appointments with each of these. There are always people who fall through the cracks and get home without any of the support system, at which time the meal-plan is down to their discretion alone. Back home is where all the restricting and other 'disordered' habits are at home too. Without some kind of serious support--with it, even--it's easy for the meal-plan to fade from consideration. Last time I got out, I didn't have support and it was a big train-wreck. This time, you've all heard me talk about how much I love my naturopath and therapist. I don't know the psychiatrist as well, but she is formidably impressive.

Within this paradigm, the meal-plan makes a lot of sense. I have to admire it, even if I kick against it. The aim is to ensure you get enough food, while also eating a variety of food and avoiding calorie-counting or other ways to marshal food into controlled units. Most places use some variation on the "exchange" system, so that you should have a prescribed number of servings of carbs, protein, fat at each meal. Different food items in various quantities can be counted as a serving size for different macronutrients. The one many of us found crazymaking was that two teaspoons of nut butter counts as a fat serving, but two tablespoons of nut butter counts as a protein! And you're not allowed to double-count any one food item; in other words, you take nut butter as your protein and you still need your serving(s) of fat. Depending on what food items you chose, you could end up with a meal hundreds of calories more or less. But that's falling back into the regimented thinking, and since the meal plan's designed with the intent that exchanges are not exactly equal, and that you should pick different items at each meal, and that those items should go together: no beans and guacamole with your oatmeal, now!--the point is to relax and recognize that if you vary enough, it all evens out.

On top of this abandon-counting-but-commit-to-variation twister, depending on our weight, some of us leave treatment with supplements on our meal-plans still.

Three cups of coconut cream and three cups of either juice or full-calorie nondairy milk on top of all that food??
Could you do that?
I don't think anyone could make me get that all in in one day outside of treatment, myself included--often enough, it didn't happen in treatment unless a lot of the solid food was 'exchanged' for yet more coconut cream. But the point is, I don't think anyone really expects me to do all that: they are professionals, they recognize it's much tougher 'on the outside.' Most importantly, they recognize this recovery thing is a process. It's not a linear progression of physical and metaphysical growth to lasting happiness and total comfort around food.

I suspect their hope for all of us is that eventually we can eat enough, not too much or too little, in an intuitive way, listening to our bodies, gradually letting go of the 'exchanges' like training wheels, and that we can love our bodies at 'normal' sizes, and be comfortable eating in any situation.

So, where am I in all this? From what I've already said, I'm sure it's pretty clear that I'm not following my meal-plan 100%. But I have wonderful care providers and they're not worried, because they understand that it's a process.
I think of the meal-plan occasionally, and it helps me to evaluate how what I've been doing instead measures up. If I think I ate too much, running what I ate by my theoretical plan helps provide a reality check. Still how you'd express some of my smoothies in terms of carb/protein/fat exchanges is a question without an answer, and these can be quite substantial smoothies.
Some things slide around. I haven't had three cups of it on any day, but the coconut cream has morphed from 'supplement on top of everything else' to 'insurance,' making sure I got at least a certain amount of nutrition down, to not having it at all, to 'insurance' again. Once it's in the mix as insurance, I find it hard not to think that that's all I should have. This is a tricky dance. Right now, I'm committed to three quarter-cups of coconut cream per day. Three quarter-cups is not three cups, but this is a process, and having the commitment in place is like creating a rung on the ladder up to the trapdoor.

Pitfalls and Trapdoors. I mentioned having fallen through some trapdoors in my previous post. Here's some of what I meant. If you feel you may be triggered, please do not read on.

First big trapdoor: going too long without a snack, after an inadequate meal, hiking, and getting low-blood-sugared to that state of stare-eyed, whirly but still able to hold a conversation. This was a trapdoor because it reminded me of that feeling, that emptiness, that exquisite privateness to which I hadn't yet returned. In treatment, I was always so full that even half that amount of food in a day was still overly filling. Getting back to that reminds me of how easy it is to be in that place, how functional I seem to myself to be when I'm like that. If I feel like I'm functional, it's easy to say no need to eat more.
Second trapdoor: restricting/bipolar one-two punch. Letting dinnertime get too late, working too hard and too fast, paying too much attention to the monsters/hallucinations, and getting to the meltdown point. That nothing was smashed, nothing bigger than a piece of paper thrown, is testament to how much better things are now.
Pitfalls: -Counting calories and doing lots of math to determine portion sizes while preparing a meal.
-Poring over recipe books like novels and either making nothing or making lots and stashing it all in the freezer.
-Telling yourself "No"..."No"..."No"...over and over because you're too hungry to focus but have decreed you cannot have a snack.
-Deciding to eat only three (or four, or whatever, plus carrots) specified foods on a particular day.
-Throwing lots of good food away by various mechanisms.
HOWEVER--throwing some food away is actually a good sign for me because of this:
Danger Sign: -Intense fascination with food that's going bad, has fallen on the floor, is about to be thrown away, etc. Learning to feel ok about eating food that isn't about to be tossed--high-grading--was one of the biggest benefits of the enforced abundance of being in treatment.

There is so much more to write, but this is already long, and has taken me so long to write because I really want to be clear and nonjudgmental and as little triggering as possible. Another post soon with some more of the benefits of being 'inside.'

Sliding Scale/Erratum, Two Months, Questions

I'm feeling full of words and lost for words. I finished and sent in my packet that was due the day after my last post. Relief followed, and hot on its heels a bunch of second-guessing, worrying that this or that piece was too long or too short or no good--all the standard stuff! Finding a way to remain in the writerly furrow and simultaneously work in the upcoming work deadlines is a deliciously acute challenge. Phil and I have been hiking the various beaches around town every day. When we first got back, that felt like good exercise and part of an obligation to spend time with Phil. Now, I'm loving the hiking and glad for the spending time with Phil part. There's a chance of snow in the forecast as early as next week.

Two months since getting out of treatment, I said. Apparently it bears repeating. There are some things to be said about it. I tell everyone and myself that I'm doing pretty well, but I've also fallen through a couple of trapdoors. I call them trapdoors, because they seem to go mostly one way--harder to crawl back up! Let's just say there's a certain degree to which I push myself that one isn't able to even approach in treatment, beyond which it's continuously easier to 'go there.' On the other hand, I'm taking my meds very consistently, which I wasn't pre-treatment with many disastrous consequences, and the positive changes brought about by that deserve a post all of their own, if it seems right to do so.

Yes, I'm very unsure about what it is right to post about at this point.

An erratum on my post about daily weigh-ins and the enormous fluctuations that seemed normal:- Turns out, those fluctuations were accented by the fact that I had the scale stashed under our tiny desk and was sliding it out between desk and chair where the floor isn't level and there's barely room for it to sit or me to stand! Since I moved its resting spot to under the fridge, whence I can slide it out and set it on a level surface, I have noted a far smaller fluctuation, although it still does fluctuate. This made me laugh at myself; also cautioned me to guard against panicking about fluctuations since the period of that wave now seems to be smaller. In some ways it makes the whole numerical tyranny seem very ridiculous.

Sliding scale is a funny play on words here, but it got me thinking about how many ways it's applicable in my current situation. 
Being fully in the groove of writing--vs--letting days go by in chores and social obligations and getting no writing in #"unmilked cow". 
Talking to no one all day--vs--talking until my throat hurts
Following my 'meal plan' 100% (have I ever?)--vs--eating almost nothing.
Allowing my appetite to emerge and embracing it--vs--still manipulating it.
Being totally uninterested in food and swearing off preparing for myself any other than the most basic (saving that exclusively for making food for others--vs--reading recipes as if they were novels (something I thought I'd entirely outgrown) and making four or five different Ela-friendly creations in a single afternoon.
Considering myself in the midst of a "process"--vs--thinking I'm out of treatment so we're all good now. 
OR--somewhere in between ??? 

How to write my blog--to change it altogether, to make some subtle changes, what to do?... 
It's essential in my life and valuable in the life of others--vs--it's narcissistic and I should channel my creative writing differently...
That's not so much a 'somewhere in between'-type situation.

This may be partly being a bipolar person, but it's surely partly just being a person, and it is a rocking backward and forward toward settling, like the ball rolling around the rim before dropping into the basket. Perhaps I'll always rock back and forth.

Am I being too indirect?

Looking for some answers, whether they agree or not. I'll take more questions too, if you have 'em.

Continuing with Words; Resuming Habits; Picture Questions

My words are being judged and condemned--words I did say, words I did not say and might/should have said, words I did not say inferred from words I did say.

This, after all the progress I felt I'd made in the months away specifically on communication, hurts.

My hand keeps seeking the heart chakra area at the center of my chest, as if looking for a talisman to clutch; but perhaps I need to accept that my bones are my only talismans, my own thorax my only armor.

I find myself thinking I need to take a vow of silence: a thought that occurred many times during the hard work away from here, whether reacting to my perception that I talked too much in group therapy or recoiling from my horror at having said something inappropriate. Stop talking except to answer questions; delete the blog; write poetry only about the weather or the beautiful changing tidescapes of our beach and seasons.

But then again, I am a writer! In so being, I lay myself open a willing victim for judgment and condemnation of my words, and so must it always be! The fact that it's happening in a more domestic sphere simply gives me a very high-stake opportunity to evaluate what I say and how I say it (although there's less I can do about what I don't say that, in someone else's view, I should have said, or about inferences drawn from what I say).

So, I'll continue this writing habit and hold that little frisson of anxiety as to how it may be judged for a spiky, reminding talisman at my heart.

Meanwhile, I'm continuing to look at those habits last-mentioned, to attempt to sanify some elements of their resumption at least. I had grated carrot for breakfast yesterday, but I did at least have a decent amount of coconut cream, chia meal and fruit with it. I used my Vitamix finally-finally yesterday, and it contained more than just ice and spirulina ;) although how its contents would map onto the 'exchanges' of my supposed meal plan would have to remain a mystery.

Two days ago, the dehydrator came out. I made my own granola--not even something I ever ate before I left. Very simple--gf oats, coconut, dried mulberries and cherries, some cacao nibs, a little maple syrup, a little coconut oil, a little salt. As I would like it, but without all the calories stripped out! The presenting cause for the dehydrator was to make kale chips, as a friend who I knew loved them was coming through town. Perhaps this was easier because they were for someone else, but I put a lot more oil than when I made them last year (salt, pepper, balsamic vinegar, extra virgin olive oil). Since both last year and this, my oil-adding was by eye, that's an interesting by-eye measurement of how much less minimalist I've become. Even Phil thought these chips tasted good, and he loathes kale!

Before any of those things, since really I'm not obsessed with food, boys and girls, I had resumed daily beach hikes with Phil. This is a habit that was always good for us, and that had pretty much faded out to 2-3 times per week in the nadir of my overwork/health trouble vortex last winter/spring. So its resumption seems like an unqualified goodness. And my beloved rebounder (I always call it that, don't I?) came back out almost as soon as we were home. Hey, I'd forgotten how much that exercise uses your core muscles! I was super-sore right in the middle there for about two days. Impressed too by how fast the soreness went away.

Another sunny day today--we actually slept outside last night, in sleeping bags right on the edge of the bluff. Both of us slept better than for days. Almost time to head out for our hike in the sun and wind today. Speaking of which, as could be seen in my previous post, I do have the camera out and in hand again, but I've become somewhat loathe to post yet another picture of our raised beds, let alone of a green smoothie. There are often posts I write that don't have an obvious visual that isn't either redundant or hard to do. And yet, I like to have at least one picture in my posts. I've seen a lot of bloggers post several photos in a single post that clearly aren't their own--cartoons, fluffy kittens, and the like. And I never knew how to find such pics and feel a clear conscience that they weren't copyrighted. I have used a few pics in the past few months that fall into that category, but perhaps my poor sleep owes some of itself to that.

But here's a website I found, whose url handily declares its function. I think it'll help me a lot, so I wanted to share: http://www.stickyreaders.com/where-to-get-public-domain-or-free-images.html

Any thoughts or stories on your words and their consequences in a more intimate sphere?

Springtime in Anchorage; Levels of Sharing

While I was taking this photograph, I heard rapid, scuffling footsteps coming up behind me.

Before I could whip around, a gentle voice said, "Would you like a photo with you in it?" I said "Oh, no, thanks" with a big smile before even really considering the question; before registering the lanky man about my age pushing his stroller full of sleeping baby. Friendly place, kind people everywhere.  
But this picture's probably better without me in it. I wish the picture could capture the salty, boggy stink of the mudflats. A slight change of angle, and you can see downtown Anchorage, breast to breast with the wilderness.

I knew that if I drove due west from the internet cafe I'd parked myself at, I'd find a park and a branch of the Coastal Trail, to take a late lunch (carrot, lettuce, spirulina shake) and to look at spring springing, enjoy the sunshine.


The willows are lasciviously pussied out--

 The dogwoods are putting out, although I couldn't get a non-blurry picture.

Hungry moose had eaten much of the life out of many trees, but the scars are like artwork. 

Patches of snow amid the sunshine, birches still sleepy, the moss underneath them almost greener than the budding angiosperms. 

I spent yesterday evening with my wonderful friend Lynn. The air in her light, spacious home was resinous-resonant with balm of Gilead--she'd harvested a bunch of cottonwood branches over the weekend, and they had leafed out and budded on her table, were shedding their sticky buds with that wonderful, mystical, healing balm. 

Lynn had been reading my blog, and had some concerns and questions, both about my situation and about her own process as a writer and figuring out how to become more comfortable with putting "personal stuff" out there. Obviously, I don't have the answers to that question, but as I discussed yesterday, there are issues I'm feeling compelled to write about. It's a mutually reinforcing process, I'm finding: as a writer, everything in life is potentially material for my writing, so writing about intense personal experience might help me to write my best. On the other hand, writing my best about my personal life might actually give me insights that help me to live my life the best I can. Even better, they might strike chords, inspire, or otherwise be helpful to other people. 


The fact that so much of what I've been sharing here had been a surprise to Lynn, whom I've known for three years, also brought home to me a discrepancy between how I present myself in different social groups. Since Phil was the draw that brought me to Alaska, many of my friends are originally friends of his. Lynn had been friends with Phil for at least a decade before I ever came on the scene. Phil is the most expansive, generous, out-there guy you could meet, but he's also very private, and doesn't gossip, or talk about personal struggles much. I've always been someone people entrust with secrets, and have always proven that trust, but I've also always been willing to converse about just about any subject in my experience or imagination, which is probably why people often describe me as "innocent". But around friends who were originally Phil's friends, and even beyond to some degree, I've been very quiet--"mysterious," Lynn said--about what's going on with me, why I'm always going to Anchorage for appointments, etc--I've tried to be more like Phil in terms of my level of disclosure. I wear baggy clothes.


So that's another issue opened up by the last month of frank posts! I'm still processing--so grateful to Lynn for the conversation opening all that up. I'd love any of your thoughts on that too.


Another springtime thing: I went into an ethnic clothing/images/incense store like I just adore, and looked at more hats! So many beautiful hats, and the guy said he invented the fleece lining so many of those hats feature, which I love so much.

I've wanted a "rainbow" hat for years, but have never found one that both fit my small head and was actually warm enough. The rainbow hat pictured above could have been made specially for me, and I think I might have bought it even if it hadn't been on sale.


I also adored this idea--a Ganesh made of leaves. Might have to go back and buy some as gifts.

First time in a month I don't have a logo at the bottom of the post!
Tomorrow, Phil is coming home. I may take a day off posting--I want it to be "his" day. But sending love nonetheless.

Six(th) Sen(se)tence Story--Penultimate HAWMC!

After all that drenching sunshine, a band of cloud came in yesterday. You can see it wreathing the mountains across the bay. When the sun isn't out, it feels so much colder here, even if it's only a couple degrees lower.

Today's penultimate prompt is inspired by the Six Sentences blog, and asks us to write a six sentence post--tell a story, make it short and sweet.

Six sentences--is that like a sixth sense? That the overall message of the story will be something beyond the sum of the six parts? I love any kind of challenge to impose a formal structure on my words, and I have no idea what I'm going to write! To make up for the paucity of words in this post, I have some springtime pictures to share afterwards.

In Six Sentences: Centrifugal, Centripetal

Living in Alaska has made me acutely aware of a year's passage as a journey around the sun--the face of the earth, the texture of the air, are so different in different seasons, I might as well have traveled to a different place. At times (equinoxes, solstices), the rate of change seems to accelerate and I am conscious of myself as a fly, a mote of dust, on the back of a stampeding elephant. The scanty hairs on the elephant's back are too stout for me to grab on to; the sticky filaments on my own legs have little traction against the wind in my face. Will the G-forces pressing on my back push me down through pachydermic skin, vortexing like water through a plughole, into the warm center, or will the headwind rip my grip loose and send me spiraling into orbit? Connections with loved ones reticulate the slippy surface of my ride, modulate the forces. Someone folds paper, concertina-fashion, draws a figure, cuts it out; opens up a chain of dancers, holding hands, links of the chain that keeps me here.

Springtime Pictures

I ate my first fresh nettles last night! If you've been reading this blog, you'll know how much I adore nettles.  

This moose and yearling calf were eating fresh green beside our road yesterday afternoon. With the angle of the ditch, they didn't even have to go on their knees. Baby went into the woods, but mama wasn't bothered by me at all, so I got a closer shot--

After such a hard winter, she looks to be in wonderful shape. Her coat is glossy, she's not near as skinny as some of the moose we've seen. And she didn't have to abandon her baby/now-yearling, who was also looking good.

Happy Sunday!

Bargaining for My Autonomy, End of the Chocolate Streak ("50 First Weeks")

A new week, a new opportunity to set intentions for the best. Still snow everywhere, but more thaw than freeze, and some brilliant sunshine. Made it down to the beach for a sunset hike, and there's very little snow down there...but worrying amounts of erosion.  

This week brings a very serious and challenging resolution imperative. I mentioned an ultimatum from my Naturopath in my last post. What's at stake is nothing short of my own autonomy and ability to be out in the world. This is a bald and alarming threat to face. When a person is overextended and under a lot of stress, it's not that abnormal for her to pull several all-nighters consecutively, use a lot of caffeine, and fail to eat adequately or take prescribed medication, is it?


What my ND told me was that my doing so, given my health conditions, is creating a potentially dangerous and life-threatening situation, and I had to admit that he wasn't sensationalizing or exaggerating: it was the simple truth. So, I have a contract with him agreeing to a prescribed bedtime, agreeing to abstain from caffeine, agreeing to take medications. (There's probably something about food on there too, but I don't listen to anyone else when it comes to food.) 
And I still have to get all my work done without staying up all night!


I feel torn between recognition that this agreement is going to save my life and health, and irritation that I have to agree to go to bed like a little kid and not just do as I please! But since I recognize that what's at stake is my autonomy, my ability to live my own life in my own home, and the alternative is so distasteful, I have given up a little of my autonomy in order to preserve the major part of it. And I realize that really, as momentous as all this might sound, it's just like any other part of life. Not one of us is truly autonomous. I write this blog because you will read it. Even my most independent actions, like solo hikes in the wilderness, are having or will have an effect on someone at some time. Most people work at a job that makes demands on their freedom, so that they're free to do what they want with the rest of their lives.
This week I intend to examine the ways in which I am dependent and interdependent with everything and everyone else in my life.


This post is also an explanation of why there probably won't be many more "chocolate" recipes on here for a while. Speaking of which, if you enjoyed the brownie bite recipe I just posted, please check back, because I edited to add an ingredient I'd forgotten from the list! I've written so many times before about not being able to have chocolate, and have posted all kinds of chocolate alternative recipes. But on my recent caffeine kick, I've eased up on the ban, hence the brownie bites recipe; a typical recent lunch has looked like this: 

An apple, a carrot, and a smoothie made out of fresh local snow, spinach, spirulina, stevia, and cacao powder, with cacao nibs on top. My Naturopath says a tiny piece of chocolate occasionally is ok, but throwing cacao powder into smoothies made of nothing else but ice and greens every day is not.


So, time to make some changes here--I love my freedom, so I'll trade a little freedom to keep it, right?

How do you trade your autonomy in order to have your freedom?

"50 First Weeks:" Chinese New Year and Backyard Wildlife

It's still Monday here! (I know I'm late getting my post out today....) Welcome to the second of "50 First Weeks." And Happy Year of the Dragon! Oh, and one other "happy" thing this week: I got a prize for my participation in "6 Weeks of Bliss:" for my "community cheerleading" via Facebook shares! Now I need to get used to the idea of myself as a community cheerleader!

Before I talk about how this week will be a "first week" for me, I want to share some backyard wildlife from up here, together with the joyous pronouncement that the days are definitely getting longer.

This big guy by our outhouse has some vestiges of sunrise in the background, but barely 9am and it's definitely daylight.

But what do you think of this little guy?

 Too cute for words, but he thinks he is the most vicious, dangerous, fearless villain. He's a "least weasel," or ermine, and it's probably not such a good thing that he's taken up residence under our cabin. Weasels have a habit of tunneling through insulation and reducing its effectiveness.

Here's the moose again. This one's a bull--his antlers have fallen off and you can see the stubs, but maybe not in the picture. Somehow that picture (taken from inside the cabin) brings home to me how close to the edge of the bluff we are!

And one more with the sun coming up.

Last week was my "first week" of picking back up on housekeeping and getting the house in order a little better. But it was also my first week teaching, and of course, there were glitches with the new software almost every day, and a whole group of people to get to know through the veil of the internet, and grading, and.... Truthfully, I think every week will be a "first week" picking up on getting the house in order. Which seems apt, given the entropic inevitability of everything ending up in a mess all over again!

Given the many hours I'm spending at the computer, though, between teaching a web-based course, writing, and my other jobs--and blogging, of course!--this week is going to be the "first week" I finally get serious about ergonomics. I've regarded the injunctions to stop and stretch every 20 minutes max, to do my foam roll and other physical therapy exercises, to adjust my equipment to improve my posture, all as things that I'd probably resolve to do "some time in the future." Meanwhile, my back, neck, shoulders and hands continue to be stressed and strained. Why not now? Especially with this "50 First Weeks" idea--if I don't do well this week, next week will be another opportunity to start afresh.

I've already ordered an external keyboard, so I'll be able to put the laptop at eye level and type comfortably. Um, I forgot to order a mouse at the same time. Duh?! Probably not too hard to get one locally. Oh, and lots of hardback books while I was at it ordering, so that I could make a good tower for the computer to sit on and have good reading for when I take a break ;) I spent much of today standing at the counter with the computer perched atop a pile like that.

This is something I've procrastinated taking seriously for so long, it seems seriously daunting. But the "50 First Weeks" idea helps to detract from that apprehension, and really, it shouldn't be that hard to tear myself away and stretch (or pee, for that matter)!

I hope that my choices for the "first weeks" don't seem unrealistic or overambitious. I'll be glad to do better at ergonomics.

I'm going to leave it at that for tonight, but I promise I'll be back by Wednesday, and will even share this Thai-flavored 'slaw (yes, of course it involves carrots!) that was so good it had to be made twice (and I still almost forgot to take a picture)! OK--now I should go stretch!

Much love. What will be a "first" for you this week?