Honey Honey, Hey Sugar Sugar

Well for some reason, and one never knows why, I feel kind of upbeat at the moment, and the song by the Archies, "Honey, Honey, Hey Sugar Sugar" just popped into my mind as bizarre as that is. I was reading my post from the other day, and suddenly I wanted to sing that to the person who wrote that post (me of course.)

See this is this bullshit journey, because today is kind of good, and not one thing is different from Saturday, nothing. Well I am reading books on witchcraft so maybe I am getting some good ideas :) Seriously, though, I recommend them. Way more interesting that I realized.

I believe life is this odd thing. It is so a product of the environment we are born into and grown into. We are conditioned to want and need love as we grow up--do we really need it to be happy, or has that so been drilled into us, that we don't know any other way. I really wonder on that thought. I mean romantic love. I mean having a significant other. We live in a couples world, at least in North America, so this is the world I know. Can life really be fulfilling without a significant other, or do we just try to fill it in with book clubs, and vacations, and exercise and girls night, and everything else, just to keep the fact that we are alone not knocking on our door...or are we really okay with it..I don't know, clearly. Because for the most part, everyone I know is a couple or looking to be one. My friend made a great comment the other day as she bagged the dating sites..she said she really saw that it is almost a way for everyone to be a community of single people together looking, to feel like they are in action, but at the end of the day how many real relationships come out of those sites. I don't know the stats, but I don't think that many compared to how many people are on there looking.

I like to think of life as all these dimensions, like little doors that we open, or rabbit holes that we fall down, or wardrobes we walk through, and poof we are in some other life. It really is not worth fighting, because for the most part, it will just happen. One day we will wake up in a whole other life. One day we won't wake up at all, or as I see it, we will then be in another dimension.When I look at things this broadly, I don't feel so bad, so alone, so left. I just feel kind of here for the moment, and wonder where I am going.

Creative Journey

This past year, out of despair, the need to have something to show for the year, feelings to put somewhere, I don't know exactly, but I decided one day I was going to do oil paintings. I went to the store and bought a canvas, some paints, brushes, and an easy to read book (which I barely even paid attention to) and sketched my first painting. Now keep in mind that I have never painted anything, except rooms and picture frames, and a lot of these, oh and a garage floor, and rocks for my garden. But I have never painted anything to put on the wall, I don't think I ever even considered it. Oh, I just had a quick memory--with the divorce, certain artwork left the house. I needed a large piece of art for one wall--and buying something seemed expensive, that is right, that is why I painted my first piece.

Anyhow, I had no idea of the feelings that would come over me while painting. It is like submerging oneself in their own, very small world, in space, but very large in the mind, like one's mind becomes part of some other dimension. Like the clocks stop. The creativity flows so quickly at times it can be hard to keep up, and there are times, when it is a lot of work, it it not always so easy to p a i n t. How many times have we all said, "I could have done that!!" Usually in reaction to some bizarre maybe even horrible abstract mess and it cost hundreds if not thousands..Maybe we could have, maybe not. Just like all those movies, books, plays, "I could have not that!" Maybe, maybe not.

I have come to see that creating is so easy in one way and also so challenging in other ways. It is consuming. Like romantic relationships, but this is just you and your canvas. It is so similar to writing, it is a world one falls into and hopefully the thoughts come like waves and there is no time or space. I love both. Both take considerable work, and yet at the same time are very easy for me.

But I do feel a sense of accomplishment at the completion of each painting--I have done 7 now. It is like giving birth (which is also no easy task--from conception to birth.) And that is a creative process as well. I find myself looking at my painting over and over, I even said today to myself, alone in my office, "I love my painting!" I mean I really do. It is so romantic, and the colors are heavenly, and it invokes in me just what I am looking for, "cannot live without each other love."
My posting from a month or so ago, where I put the picture from Sound of Music, that was my inspiration for my latest painting. http://findingsaratoga.blogspot.com/2009/08/it-is-last-day-of-august.html

And then it is done, and like myself washing back to shore to me, I come back to this time and space. It is like a journey each time. It is like I am having all these journeys this year, without for the most part, leaving my home.

Walking the Trail

I read the other day, that if everything is good in your life, be grateful, because one day it will change. If everything is bad in your life, don't despair, because one day it will change. The cycle of life I suppose. But it seems that we are only programmed and able to really accept the good times. Those are "the" times. The times that are painful, and stumbling and all encompassing grief, are times we are not really trained for. It is like everything just falls apart. Things don't fall apart when life is good. It is only when we start to fall, that we begin to fall apart, and then seemingly cannot catch ourselves and we keep falling. It seems that after the amazing amount of time man has roamed this earth, that we would cope better. People generally don't seek guidance and counseling and support when their lives are great, but watch out when their lives are going bad--they cannot find enough support, looking anywhere they can--I know this too well. .

As I write this, I see dozens of photos go across the screen on my other computer. So many of me, smiling away. These are all happy times. It is so easy when things are good. The smiles just leap from your lips. You don't need to think ahead of what will make you happy, how to side step difficult subjects, how to make it through, because there is nothing you are hiding from. But watch out when things fall apart. The day will stretch on for an endless amount of time, you will yearn for sleep and quiet and steer clear of social settings that might expose you, might expose the sadness that lives just underneath the facade of the happy face to make it through the day. The tears that will spill over if the slightest memory is invoked in the simplest conversation.

It is like this section of a trail, that is endless, with nothing to do but walk. The first part was brutal, rugged, one could barely breathe. Then it opened up to nothingness. There just is this trail, endless, and there is no way back, only forward. That is where I am at these days. I often feel lost in thought, thoughts that do not serve me or help me, but spring up all over the place. I live in kind of a place of past memories and present upset with no future around the corner. Just this endless trail. It is hard to know unless one has been on a trail like this. Even though I have, it is not like I resort back to my "survivor training." It is like doing it all over again for the first time. The mind seems to forget these things as quickly as they are over. It is like we are all alone with ourself. Helpful guides do pop up along the trail if we seek them, and they are useful, so loving and helpful, but as the day fades and the next one starts, the guides too have their own trails to attend to. At some point every day, the trail must be walked alone.

Cancelled

I have missed my blog. I have been so awash in grief and uncertainty that there have been days I can barely get through. I should have been blogging, it would be good to look back on and see my steps, but I could not, it was like another door had shut on me. There was no access to me.

The other day I thought about my breakup of my marriage and my divorce that is just waiting out there, and felt like I had booked a wonderful trip to Europe but somewhere in route ended up in a third world country on the street, alone and afraid. How did my plans get so changed? But I suppose that I am in that third world country right now on the street, and alone and afraid, so I may as well start walking and see what I come to. Maybe around a corner, or somewhere down the road there will be something astounding that I had not expected. One thing for sure, the trip to Europe has been cancelled, not rescheduled, cancelled.

I have felt like a ghost in my own life, floating through the days. It is totally surreal to me and there is no safety zone, at any moment, anything could totally disrupt me and cause me to fall apart, if only inside, or at least until I am back to the safety of my 4 walls. Every day is different than the one before, but not in a good way but more so in a way that is completely undependable and without instructions on how to handle.

I am just rambling tonight as I am exhausted from the past few weeks of turning a huge ship around and taking a course that I really have no idea where it is going. What a terribly unsettling feeling. And the world goes on. No one really stops for you, they cannot.

In the midst of it all, one of our dogs died. His death to me was such a metaphor for our life, ending in its final days, in pain, slowly slipping away, but the end was right there, staring at one in the face. He may have died at the end of it all from his own broken heart beyond being old and sick and feeble. He left his brother behind who is now alone and lonely and I am sure so confused about it all, having moved away from his home.

And the snow and the rain just keep coming and winter seems to be endless this year, and there is a part of me that does not want it to end, does not want to see long sunny beautiful days, as I feel I will have to use them and be part of them, where with winter it is so much easier to hide.

I search for meaning, am looking for new paths, and read the other day that sometimes we cannot live without someone, but that we have to let them go anyway, and that is how I feel, and what a tough thought that is, I can hardly get my arms around it.

Safe and Snug

I just have not been "finding Saratoga" lately. I just read my last blog and don't feel bad for writing it, which is a good thing. Have you ever felt like, "gee I should not have said that or written that..?" like we have to make everything we do or say in life be nice and sweet and upbeat or otherwise people will look at us and say "gee what a downer you are!" Oh well, too bad. I cannot be upbeat and fun all the time, that alone I find exhausting. Nor do I want to be a downer too much. Somewhere in the middle, safe and snug, now there is the place to be.

If I had to give myself some points, I am going to score well on the past week for exercise. I ran 3 times, total about 10 miles, and also did yoga every single day. Now this is a miracle for me. I have not done that, I don't know, in years? Now is the question, hanging over me, "well you made a week, can you keep it up?" I am afraid to answer that with a resounding "yes!" What if I don't..? But I have to say, I have become a fan of yoga. I never really wanted to consider it. Eight years ago when my daughter was born, I bought a yoga video tape, and never opened it! Eight years, that is a hell of a long time. But my daughter showed me the section on On Demand on TV, she even put on her little yoga outfit, and I thought "maybe I could give this a whirl." So far so good. Really good. What have I been missing?

Running, it has been great. I don't know if I could run without loud music in my ears. I love the new music players (I go all the way back to the heavy and cumberson Walkmans--I mean, that is a longgggg time ago) now the Apple Shuffle is so small, it feels like a paper clip clipped to me. When one runs with music, it really is like being in a scene from a movie, and that has some sort of magical quality for me.

So I will give myself the thumbs up for making it for one week with exercise. Now of course I worry that weeks will pass, and I will read this and feel bad. But I hope not. I cannot say at the moment it improved my week, it really didn't. I almost felt like it brought me down. It might just be I am stirring myself up, and there is all this junk and ash that has been just sitting there and it is trying desparately to get out. So maybe I am still in the "clearing out phase."

So stay tuned. Maybe I will "find Saratoga" yet in the next day, or right around the upcoming corner.

Finding Me

Some times, days just seem like a whirlwind. Time is so precious, and I often feel like there is just not enough time in my day. And I use my time, all of it. If I sit down to watch TV, it is like a treat, something I earned, because I almost always feel like there is something I should be doing.

And one thing I really like to do, this, blogging, is also so often a treat, because as it is sitting out there, waiting for me, it is almost like the last little boat to a remote island, and sometimes no matter how fast I run with my little travel bag in hand, I cannot get there in time, that is it for the day, and I stuck staying in the land of big reality and unable to escape even for an overnight getaway.

That sounds so inviting to me, I never have put that in words before, my feeling for writing and how it sometimes is elusive. Never thought about it is a quiet little refuge on a beautiful and quiet island, I think tropical gets my heart pumping that much more.I have often felt like a visitor in my own life. Somewhat incapable of making long term plans to live into, living rather in short term plans that seem to spin on, but not with enough thought to get someplace in 10 or 20 years. It is on my mind, as I wonder what I really did with the last 25 years besides have two children, as my major accomplishment--and both awesome girls. Beyond that, I cannot point to anything dramatically exciting I have done, and that troubles me. I almost wonder "where have "I" been in my life."

It is really weird to see how life is always moving and it is like there are all these doors that open and close and we jump now and then into something and see how long we stay there...but they all just become moments in time, that loop together and time down the road often become less important or not significant at all.

So when I am able to jump into that little boat, and make it away even for an overnight getaway, there is a peace that fills me like no other. Writing on a keyboard is like composing to me. Time floats by and memories pile up and I am inspired. And then I have to take the little boat back to the main shore, and I tend to lose so much of me, so quickly.

This is what I see of me these days--who am I? Not in a desperate sense, no craziness going on, like the woman who packs up her bag and leaves while her child is in school, never to be heard of again, but more so like the little 7th grader, who never did get to take the class "Who Am I?," and still wishes she did. But I was in band (I was terrible) and I was taking Spanish, because I could get good at it and get further ahead in high school, and it would be a one of my sparkling stars on my high school transcript when I applied to college. But I ended up not going to college anyhow, and should have taken the class Who Am I.