I've been working on the following concepts this year, which range from sneaking suspicions to epiphanies. In Douglas Adams' "Long Dark Tea Time of the Soul", these would be the boxes packed away in the subconscious that, very very rarely, one has the opportunity to unpack.

Mine are not full of penguins.

~*~ Just because someone is a narcissistic bully does not mean a damned thing on my end. This has involved some pretty intensive moments of not reacting in the moment, then vivisecting the fuck out of the big red candy-like buttons said bully had been punching on my personality. In other words things are much calmer at work, even though the job itself is underemployment to a comic degree.

~*~ People react very differently now that my work-personality flavor has switched from "terrified of being fired" to "indifferent competence". Confidence keeps out the riff-raff, apparently.

~*~ When I'm on campus I'm so damned content that random strangers have struck up conversations with me, as one lady said while we waited for the walk signal, "You just look so happy." Strangers, small talk, smiles; the last three things I'd ever suspect to coincide.

~*~ Elementary school laid several head trips on me that I'm only now seeing as lies. It's now sunk in that smart /= effortless learning, and I've gotten the hang of persistent effort in the last few years. The most recent realization is still so new as to be a bizarre hypothesis: I'm not really lazy. Mr. F tells me he's never understood that belief of mine, where it could even come from, but in school I was always "irresponsible, a procrastinator and unwilling to do the work". I was also reading my mom's scifi and college textbooks in fourth grade, daydreaming when I wasn't outright reading (for pleasure) in class, and have always had problems with meaningless work. Add in the seasonal depression right after the teens and 'laziness' feels true. But I begin to think it never really was true.

~*~ I am not entirely neurotypical. I need to stop thinking that if I just tried harder and was tougher and more disciplined I could finally achieve normalcy. These little things that make me comfortable are not barriers I need to get over, they're tools like taking extra oxygen up a mountainside. The big flaming sign on this one was that my dad quit smoking and in short order took up one said comforting habit big time. Self-care by way of harmless oddity=good. Yeah, so not fighting that battle anymore.

~*~ My next area of concentration is to embrace the shitty first draft. The latest development of this is to write the sparkly thing right away and then worry about how the story gets there, instead of worrying about context and never getting that inspiring image solidly down.

I could say I've been busy, which is true. But the real deal is that 2009 was very hard to write about at it was happening.

The bad stuff was like a marathon session of pink-belly; a never-ending series of slaps to the solar plexus. The good stuff consisted of the mundane miracle of domesticity, which is only interesting if you have the time to distill it into good writing. There was no small measure of comfort and joy, but when you're grasping at it like a flotation-device seat cushion after a crash landing, the charm of rough upholstery and nacho farts is lost on the objective reader.

Nobody wants that.

So I think I'll simply pick up where I left off, because I miss the casual contemplation and charming conversation that regular posting offers. And while I never insinuated that I was sane, the lifestyle is on more of an even keel than it has been for a long damn while.

Which makes it sound like I was hospitalized or something, but it was more like doing a masters thesis in mid-life administrivia with a special research focus in financial meltdown.

As an exercise in picking this journal back up in media res, I will simply close by saying that I'm up way the hell past my bedtime, and I have a question: was there a mass exodus to Dreamwidth while I was away? Or is there cross-posting synergy?

I've been scarce, I know. Things have been quite hairy, with no sign of let-up. This is the year everything changes, good and ill, and while it beats being stuck in a rut it's far easier to post regularly from a rut.

How the hell is everyone?

More things have transpired since my last update than I had realized.

1. We are now a one cat household, instead of two. Squeak was sixteen, in pain, and ready to rest. She was my best kitty, and I miss her.

2. Fairy Grandmother now recognizes me mainly in context with my mother, and does not know me as an adult. She can still make the leap and speak to me as her granddaughter, but the conversation spans a gulf of years. Gesturing to the Cmonkey, she asks me "Do you have a good family? Are you happy?"

3. I have an amazing family. I am unhappy for entirely different reasons.

4. Rehab has done wonders for the entire length of my back, but I'll be glad to have those three nights a week free once the last of the mess is cleaned up. I really could become Batman now that I don't hurt every damn day.

5. Though I may keep going to that clinic, if they let me volunteer.

7. I'm now simultaneously enrolled in two colleges, though only for half a credit so far (CPR certification).

8. On Friday, that bumps up to 4.5 credits (adding Intermediate Algebra).

9. Tonight I'm attending an info meeting for the physical therapy program I want to apply for, after another 30 credits of math, chem and physics.

10. I've given up a year of sleep for the sake of love and responsibility. I can do the same for my own sanity and the chance to do something that fucking matters.

11. Which is better; struggling every day to give a shit about make-work in a 6'x6' charcoal grey cube making squat (either in contribution to society or in the paycheck), or graduating with a debt load 2x your new yearly salary at a job that makes a difference in the world?

"The forms of kanly have been obeyed!" --Dune

There's a formal precision to the old school work ethic: work, then leisure. You do your homework, then you go outside to play. This has never worked for me. No matter how hard I have tried to shift gears in the approved manner, my brain doesn't have that kind of transmission. Work and play must be mixed for me, if only by proximity of space and time, if not also by content.

In school I always brought a book to read, and wrote correspondence to classmates. This was before phones and text, when we passed letters written on notebook paper between hours and across desks. I also did my homework during other classes (when I bothered), and rarely took school books home.

Home was for writing, hot typewriter humming on my lap through the evenings and all summer long.

Then I found my way into the cube mines, like a pebble rolling into the storm drain, and now I spend the workweek producing little that is tangible or creative (much like school)--with liberal access to a pipeline that's like a Wonka jawbreaker of staring out at the squirrels, writing notes to friends, reading a fuckton of books and having a self-cooling typewriter on my lap all at once.

So the concept of "work, then leisure" is not only antithetical to how I am wired, it's also damned ridiculous in context. I do a great deal better when I remember this, when I throw out the idea of every task in it's box of time, and simply produce. When I open the throttle and do what I've always done: read, write, work, daydream, solve.

Open 'er up.

Um. Hello

Hola!

In lieu of an update, here is a list of things that will swallow one's time if given the chance:

1. parenthood
2. midlife crisis
3. injury sequelae in the middle-aged body
4. jobs with ill-defined descriptions

Like any prodigal child, I come bearing a dilemma. Namely, Cmonkey.

Cmonkey is now 2.75 years of age and has grown as many inches in the last two months. Her vocabulary is gobsmacking and she's learning how to read. She is bent on world domination. She has also begun to manifest a devastating perfectionism that I know too damned well, having struggled with it myself and having seen my brother wrestle with it as well.

My brother, for context, drew realistic suspension bridges at age 3. They created a gifted program for him in elementary school, and relaxed the entry standard so he wouldn't be the only one in it. As a hobby, he converted his automatic car to a manual trans. He's now an urban planner. I still don't think he realizes how brilliant he is.

Cmonkey has been out of diapers for about six months now. She's also contending with occasional growth-spurt related digestion issues in which there will be a pause of a few days and then suddenly she will unleash a turd the approximate size and shape of a guinea pig. Yesterday, she ate lightly, and her belly was hurting her. We rubbed it for her when it bothered her, went to the potty unproductively several times, put her in comfy pajamas and went to sleep (prunes being the next line of attack come morning).

I'm awakened last night when she comes to our bed to cuddle, occasionally whimpering. We soothe her, but she's not buying it, and I realize she's wearing jeans.

ME: What happened to your jamma pants, beanie?
CM (quietly): I pooped in them.

Let me give some context here:

1. We have two 16 year old cats, one of whom is dealing with incontinence. More to the point, Mr. F and I are now quite adept at gamely cleaning up mammal excrement around the casa. No big deal. We've also weathered poop in the bath with aplomb.

2. Upon study of the scene, not only did Cmonkey rouse from a sound sleep to poop, she also:
a. made it to the bathroom
b. got mostly onto the potty
c. caught a turd the size and shape of a doublewide railroad spike in her jamma pants
d. removed said pants and set them neatly on the stepstool with the turd inside
e. wiped effectively
f. found clean jeans
g. zipped and *buttoned* them
h. alone
i. in the dark
before coming upstairs for support.

3. For someone aged 2.75 years, who only transitioned to the full-size toilet 2 months ago, this is equivalent to leading a mission to Mars.

Here's the kicker: she sees this as a failure. As she's not ashamed of poop itself, or us helping to clean her up, I'm not even sure what standard it is she's envisioned and not met.

I have no idea how to even begin to address this.

The winter solstice is coming, the traditional nadir for my brain, and yet I am still wide awake and functional. On the contrary, handling quite a bit of stress these days and not shutting down, freaking out or falling apart.

My latest sun replacement strategy: begin each week day with a hit from the light box and a rather large dose of vitamin D. Also, Mr. F believes that having a kid re-wired parts of my brain, which is an interesting idea. So many things have changed it's been like a second puberty: a few things softer, a few more sensitive, everything else souped up in strange ways. So the whole "maid, mother, crone" thing seems to have a basis in phenotype, and I'm finally getting the hang of how my mortal coil works in this second phase.

The upshot is that while my current dilemmas may appear intractable, I've been able to focus on them instead of curling up to sleep and feel like utter crap. I've been able to chip away at them, cut paths around them, identify the keystones holding them in place, draft plans and begin making war machines from local materials to lay siege and obliterate them from my kingdom.

In recent months I've stopped debating if I'm worth the risk of pursuing my dreams, stopped putting obstacles in between to prove my desires again and again. I've begun simply moving toward what I want, from tiny to huge. If it turns out I don't want it when I get it, I've learned something, and can pick a better target next time.

I don't have to stick with what doesn't work for me. I must only change myself for the better, and keep looking for where I fit most comfortably.

I can handle a year-round commitment now, and I've finally taken that to heart. I can tackle whatever needs doing, be it daunting or draining--so now I turn my sight to what calls to be done, what will feed me instead of devour me by inches.

I'm not working from a finite source of Energy, I can draw and channel far more than I'd ever thought possible. I am indeed working from a finite source of Time. It's one thing to know it as a concept, quite another to put it into practice.

FeldDad and I share a peculiar pinky toe, which leans over its buddy and never actually touches the ground. In concert with a family tendency to very sturdy skeletons, short of a car crash I never expected to break a bone. Much less my Congenitally Vestigial Toe.

Apparently if you miscalculate a doorway and kick a wall hard enough, and that wall is fifty-year-old wet plaster and ceramic tile, the wall will handily win over the Vestigial Toe.

Points when I should have known I'd fucked up:

T minues zero: when a distinct part of the sensation was a wet crack like breaking into a crab claw.

T plus one minute: after hopping into the Cmonkey's room, gripping her bed and trying not to swear--and having to breathe before overcoming the urge and unleashing a resounding "FUCK!" gasp, "Oh, fucking fuck!"

To her credit, Cmonkey simply asked from her seat on the little potty, "You hurt your leg? Let me kiss it."

T plus five minutes: crouching to pull up Cmonkey's pants, the toe burned. I've never had an impact injury burn before, much less in a second-degree way.

Then we continued to swim class, which is normally a family proposition, but Mr. F had to work so we went solo. This is the depth of my zombiesque stoicism: driving a toddler to swim class, wrangling us into suits, swimming, wrangling us into dry clothes and driving back with only a pause to take some ibuprofen because man, that toe still really hurt.

T plus three hours: Mr. F transplanted Cmonkey from her carseat, tucked her in for a nap, and I'd only made it ten feet up the driveway. I'm summarily sent to the couch with an icepack and buddy-taped toes.

T plus five hours: Vestigial Toe now looks like it's been crossed with a rainbow and a balloon animal. I'm given the choice whether to go to the ER. After ten minutes of deliberation, Mr. F withdraws the question and starts packing for the wait involved in "this is so not an emergency, but it also can't wait two days for office hours".

T plus seven hours: radiologist informs me that congenitally crooked toe's buddy is also crooked in a complementary way. I must tell FeldDad.

T plus nine hours: Random dude in black scrubs comes by and says, "So it looks like it's broken."

Mistaking his offhand diagnosis for introductory small talk, I reply, "Yeah, it does, doesn't it?"

"No, on the x-ray. It's subtle, but it's fractured right there." Black Scubs Dude--apparently a newbie doctor who's watched too much House to feel my injury merits my knowing his name--deigns (dares!) to trace a finger across the base of Vestigial Toe. I only know his name now because the name on my scrip for Happy Meds isn't the other doctor who talked to me (his BOSS, who INTRODUCED HIMSELF AND SHOOK MY HAND BEFORE FEELING UP MY OUCHIE THANKS EVER SO FUCKING MUCH BLACK SCRUBS JACKHOLE).

At least he asked me what my favorite flavor of painkiller was, because if they'd tried passing off any lameass Vicodin I'd've humped back into the building and skullfucked him with a crutch.

Oh, hey, guess what's worn off?

ETA:
So they gave me my x-rays on a cd, and the dude in black scrubs was right, subtle is a nice word for "seriously, that's it?". I have to say, if this much ouch can come out of a crack that tiny, my appalled sympathies go out to anyone who's ever truly broken anything. Like in actual pieces. Or through the skin. Or a bone bigger than a frickin' piece of gum to begin with:

(I bumped up the contrast and added notes, cropping out my Bruce Wayne id. So not Batman!)

1. Last week's "Bones". Although I missed what Booth says at the very end, after "As much as any good dog could hope for" which I think might have made me cry, considering what they were also talking about.
( Spoilers for  )

2. The second cover here (spoilers for Farscape comic). Crichton rocking the mei tai! Mr. F noticed it first, the peeky baby over the shoulder. I SO CALLED THAT ONE!!! Plus, now that I've actually had to accomplish things with a kid in tow, nothing beats being able to just strap the baby on and let 'em gawk at the world from your level while both your hands are free.

3. Cmonkey starts swim school today!