January 11, 2007

• Back at last…

  Well, after a much longer than expected absence from blogging, I am trying the waters once again.  Shortly after my last entry I went up to my Dad’s family farm to spend Thanksgiving with lots of relatives.  It was really nice to see them, and also really nice that I had a private hotel room to retreat to when I needed quiet.  I am glad my aunt and uncle live there in the old farmhouse, so nice that that piece of family history lives on.  Then I proceeded eastward on to my parents house and passed a very nice December there with them.  My dog and cat were with me and they seemed to enjoy their visit as well.   The time with them went by too quickly!

  I had my first class of beginning watercolor at the art gallery this week.  I think I am really going to like watercolor.  While in the city that day I went to the Y and had a long swim which felt wonderful.  The setting, aesthetics, and chlorine there makes the experience fall far short of swims in the relatively pristine river near the cabin, but in the winter the heated pool is the clear choice.  It has felt really good to be back walking my trail to the spring, and being nestled in the woods in the cabin.  It has been wonderful to be able to reconnect with the natural world that surrounds me here and spend time outside in these woods again.

  Meanwhile, I have found my concentration and mental energy levels especially low this week, and have been finding it really difficult to even keep up with basic email correspondence.  I seem to have periods in the day where my mood feels pretty level, and other periods where it tends to fall.  I have ideas of things I would really like to do, like work on my photography, practice with watercolors, do laundry, clean this place up, make a home cooked meal, but can’t quite seem to manage any of it.  Right now I seem to have my hands full just walking in the woods, tending to the critters, microwaving tv dinners, and trying to keep up a positive outlook.  I am feeling rather discouraged, it seems I am accomplishing so little in this phase of my life.  Yet I am also very grateful I am not experiencing the weighty sense of hopelessness and despair I have felt so often before.  I guess I am still in the process of revamping my standards for evaluating the worth of my life while impaired by mental illness, especially since I am not able to “work” at all at this point in my life.  I have much greater compassion for others than I do for me.  I need to stop judging myself by my concept of society’s expectations of me, particularly since I have much gentler expectations for others.

  • 9:50 pm
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