Category Archives: humanity

Weekend Wildcard (Flashback #3: Doing it Anyway)

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WILDCARD lifting

Flashback #3 in my re-posting from a blog I wrote several years ago about my struggles with depression.

My purpose in revisiting the “old” me is to remind myself and any others who care to read, to:

claim the positive energy that is available to each of us for our own benefit and for the benefit of others.

This is a post from July 14, 2012:

Doing It Anyway

One of the difficulties when trying to work one’s way out of a deep depression is facing the conundrum:  We don’t feel up to doing the things that are going to make us feel up to doing things. At the depths of depression, it might become a challenge even to get out of bed, let alone actually take part in any meaningful activity.

During my various stints in intensive behavioral health outpatient treatment programs (which I prefer to just call “brain school”), I was taught a lot of things about dealing with depression. Some of those things I even remember. Then again, some things I remember probably weren’t really the things they were trying to teach me. So take what I say I learned with a grain of salt.

One thing I learned about doing the work I need to do to get better is that if I don’t think I can do something, or don’t feel I can do it, or don’t believe I can do it, that’s the time to do it anyway.

teddy bearDo what I just said I can’t do? In a word, yes. Maybe I’m telling myself that I can’t get out of bed and face the day. But if my body is physically capable of lifting itself out of the bed, then indeed I can get up. If I survived the challenges of yesterday, chances are I can survive today, too. No matter what it feels like.

And if getting up and doing something is going to help me get up and do things, then perhaps I truly can take that first step. It’s kind of like practicing tough love on myself. Gently, though. Lovingly.

I’m not saying it’s easy. I can’t just turn on a switch and suddenly have the energy, the insight, or even the will to do something, even if I know it would be to my benefit. It’s hard, very hard. But if I can just make a slight movement forward, I can begin to overcome the inertia that feels like a 10,000 ton weight holding me down.

This all comes to mind today because I am heading out on an overnight camping excursion with my daughter. An absolute and utter miracle, if I look back on how I felt four months ago. Back then it was a major undertaking to get myself to the grocery store. Unless I had to buy food for the cats, it was just easier for me not to eat.

I am thankful for the therapists at brain school who told me to just do it anyway.

Wishing you a good day today.
Maggie

Only a Dream

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NaPoWriMo, Day 26. The prompt:

Write a poem that uses repetition.

dream

Only a Dream

I dreamt last night,
but I can’t recall
what happened in the dream.

I dreamt last night
and when I awoke,
I felt lesser than.

I dreamt last night.
Whatever happened in the dream,
I let myself down somehow.

I dreamt last night,
You were in the dream.
And someone else.

I dreamt last night.
You found out what I did,
but I chose to lie about it.

I dreamt last night.
It didn’t really happen.
I did not let myself down,

nor you.

Tax Day

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Columbia River bank

April Fifteen, Tax Day.
Doesn’t much matter to me, mine are pretty simple.
No investments, no dependents, one job.

On the job that day, as a matter of fact.
Working the southbound toll booth
where traffic comes off the bridge that crosses
the mighty Columbia.

A truck has stalled somewhere on the span.
A state police car passes northbound and,
several minutes later, returns.
I flag it through; no toll for State vehicles.
It stops anyway.

“You’re Margaret, right?” the trooper asks.
Well, not really… that’s my first name,
but I go by my middle name.
My driver’s license, however,
would show Margaret.

The trooper, who apparently has run my license plate,
invites me for coffee when my shift ends.
I accept.

April Fifteen, seventeen years later.
That’s the day our divorce papers go through.
Like many other folks I know,
I do not like Tax Day.

V.J.’s Weekly Challenge: Anniversary

If You Give a Man a Shovel: a story for Earth Day

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shovel5

If you give a man a shovel, he’s going to want to dig.

He will dig holes in the ground.

He’ll want to plant something in the holes, so he’ll ask you for some seeds.

The plants growing from the seeds turn out to be edible, and lots of people will want to eat these plants.

shovel1

He will want to dig more holes and plant more plants, so he’ll ask for more land and more shovels. You will have to clear the land of all vegetation and wildlife so he can grow his crops.

He will make lots of money selling his plants, so he will keep planting the same thing season after season in his fields, and he will invent easier ways to harvest his crops.

shovel2

The soil will deteriorate from his harvesting methods and from his single crop farming. He will ask you for fertilizer to make the soil better and the plants grow faster.

The fertilizer will encourage weeds to grow in the fields, so he will ask you for an herbicide to kill the weeds.

The insects that have been eating the weeds will need a new food source, so they will start eating his crops. He will ask you to make insecticides to kill the bugs.

There are lots of bugs on the lots of plants, so he will need lots of insecticide. And more fertilizer. And more herbicide to kill the weeds that regrow in the re-fertilized soil.

shovel3

As his crops get bigger and bigger, he will glut the market, so he will ask you for money to subsidize his farming.

He will look for new ways to market his crops, and will invent high-fructose plant syrup (hfps) and people will begin putting hfps in all manner of food.

shovel4

As processed foods containing hfps become more and more unhealthy, people will begin to die prematurely from their poor eating habits.

He will need to dig holes to bury the people who die prematurely from poor eating habits, and since he needs to dig holes…

shovel6

he will probably ask you for a shovel.

The end?

“In nature, nothing exists alone.”
~ Rachel Carson, 1962

Earth Day 2019: Protect our Species

Weekend Wildcard (Flashback #2: Brushing off my Faith)

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WILDCARD liftingThis is my second time of re-posting from a no longer active blog I started in 2012. The blog was my way of working through a rather severe episode of depression.

My purpose in revisiting the “old” me is — I guess — the same as it was then, to remind myself and any others who care to read, to:

claim the positive energy that is available to each of us for our own benefit and for the benefit of others.

This entry was posted on July 13, 2012:

Brushing Off My Faith

While we can control a lot of things in our lives — probably a lot more than our depressed minds allow us to believe — there are certain things that will play out for us however they will, with very little input potential from us.

So what do we do? Sit there and be the victim? Stick our heads in the sand and hope the problem goes away? Mindlessly bash away at the problem with futile “solutions” that don’t really solve anything? I don’t know about you, but those have been my top go-to responses. How’s that working for me? Not very well, thanks for asking.

Since my last mental melt down (maybe not the proper medical terminology, but you get the gist), I have been unable to return to my job. Bills are mounting up and prospects for work that I can do in the future without relapsing back into “melt down” mode seem few and far between at the moment. I don’t consider myself handicapped by depression, but I am extremely cautious about the choices I will need to make moving forward.

Buddha smallThe big question for me is: what am I going to do about these concerns? Obviously worrying about them, ignoring them, or trying to bull my way through some desperate stop-gap measure isn’t going to help. So I am choosing to turn to another resource: faith.

That doesn’t mean that I have dusted off my Sunday School shoes, or that I let someone dunk me underwater in a lake somewhere. Not that those would be bad scenarios per se, it’s just not what I am talking about at this moment. I guess I am talking about what some might consider that “mumbo jumbo” kind of faith. Putting my situation out there into the Universe and trusting that things happen for a reason. I am here for a reason. I am in the situation I am in for a reason, and there is some (Divine, if you will) plan to all of this.

I don’t know the plan. That would take all the fun out of it, I suppose. I hear the Universe has a rather quirky sense of humor that way. But I am willing to trust that there is something bigger than me and that that “something” has my back. Something’s gotta give eventually, and my part in this is to be ready, receptive and proactive when opportunity comes my way.

A tall order, to say the least. It’s all too tempting to rehash every negative thing that has ever happened in my life and say, “See? Nothing ever works out for me. Why should this situation be any different?” But what does that line of thinking get me? Nothing good, for sure.

I am fortunate that I still have some wiggle room. There is still a roof over my head. And maybe that makes this whole faith thing a lot easier to swallow. My inner naysayer is telling me to just wait and see how I feel about all this Universe stuff once my back is really to the wall. That’s my typical depressed person thought, always waiting for the other shoe to drop. And sometimes the naysayer is right. Time will tell.

In the meantime, I have a choice in how I respond to my situation, and I am choosing to trust, to put my faith in an outcome that I cannot see at this point. I will do the leg work once I figure out what that is. I don’t expect anything to be handed down to me from the clouds.

We’ll see… a great experiment. If it fails, I guess my naysayer can say it told me so. But if it succeeds… ah, there’s the faith!

All my best,
Maggie

Exhale

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NaPoWriMo, Day 19.

The prompt:

Today, I’d like to challenge you to write an abecedarian poem – a poem in which the word choice follows the words/order of the alphabet. You could write a very strict abecedarian poem, in which there are twenty-six words in alphabetical order, or you could write one in which each line begins with a word that follows the order of the alphabet.

Okay, the directions seemed simple enough, but somehow I got it backwards.

Exhale

Zoey
Yearned to
eXhale.
While breathing is indeed a
Valuable asset for living, it is generally
Understood that if one goes to the
Trouble of inhaling, it’s
Simply impossible to
Refrain from exhaling. The obvious
Question, then, is what
Prompted Zoey to possess this
Oddly understated desire.

Needless to say – one would hope — the perpetual
Mishandling, neglect and abuse of an animal will
Lead to mistrust, fear and – in Zoey’s case – a
Keen sense of danger such that
Just by exhaling, she might incur the
Inability to protect herself from harm.

Her wish for safety and security was
Granted one day in the
Form of earthbound angels who
Extricated her from her dire,
Debilitating situation, and through
Care and love and patience, Zoey was
Bestowed once again with her rightful
Ability to fully, exhilaratingly exhale.

When It’s Time

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NaPoWriMo, Day 18.

Our optional prompt for the day takes its cue from how poetry can help us to make concrete the wild abstraction of a feeling like grief…

Today, I’d like to challenge you to write an elegy of your own, one in which the abstraction of sadness is communicated not through abstract words, but physical detail. This may not be a “fun” prompt, but loss is one of the most universal and human experiences, and some of the world’s most moving art is an effort to understand and deal with it.

When It’s Time

I wonder how they know.
They make the call.
It’s time to come.
But how do they know?

He’s been gone for years already.
The memory, the recognition, and —
eventually — even the words.

But now he lies here, eyes closed,
erratic breathing, pale skin.
The phrase “death warmed over”
comes (irreverently) to mind.

Still, how do they know?
Mightn’t he wake up tomorrow with
that good-humored sparkle in his eye
and say something silly?
“You’ve grown so tall now;
your legs go all the way down to your feet!”

No, of course not. But still…

His skin is hot.
His breathing is ragged.
I expected clammy and shallow,
respectively.

I kiss his forehead, pat his hand.
I feel embarrassed that I don’t know what to say,
even though he can’t hear me.

I don’t say goodbye, because —
well — he’s still here. For now.
Then again, as I said before,
he’s been gone a long time already.

I wonder how they know.

Things People Say

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Day Nine of NaPoWriMo.

Today’s prompt is inspired by the work of Sei Shonagon, a Japanese writer who lived more than 1000 years ago. She wrote a journal that came to be known as The Pillow Book. In it she recorded daily observations, court gossip, poems, aphorisms, and musings, including lists with titles like “Things That Have Lost Their Power,” “Adorable Things,” and “Things That Make Your Heart Beat Faster.”

The prompt:

Today, I’d like to challenge you to write your own Sei Shonagon-style list of “things.” What things? Well, that’s for you to decide!

And so:

Things People Say

“I understand.” A phrase often misunderstood.
If one truly understands,
there are many more effective ways to say so.
Better yet,
illustrate the understanding through actions.
Show, don’t tell.

“Are we there yet?”
Often responded to with a white lie:
“Almost.”
If one feels compelled to ask, the answer is
most likely “no.”

“I love you.” Best said when true.
Often withheld until one’s paramour has said it first.
Show, but also tell.

“Thank you.” Not said often enough.
Tell, and show,
at minimum seventeen times per day.

Weekend Wildcard (Flashback #1: Free Fall)

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WILDCARD liftingIn 2012, I began my first of many blogs, entitled “Lifting the Weight.” Seems like eons ago. I looked this week and was surprised to see the blog still sitting out there in the ether, looking none the worse for it’s many years of neglect.

I decided to repost some of the content from that site on this one.

As described in the “About” statement from my “Lifting” blog,

July 11, 2012 —
Having suffered at the hands of my own negativity for far too long, I decided it was time to claim the positive energy that is available to each of us for our own benefit and for the benefit of others. Hence, I’ve begun the process of “lifting the weight” of depression from my soul and moving into a lighter, freer space. Please join me in finding a way to a more balanced, affirming life.

I continue that journey to this day, and I must say I see much more light than darkness these days. For that I am eternally grateful. So why revisit the “me” of seven years ago? It might provide inspiration to those still weighted down. It might provide insight to me for continuing to follow the light. If you want to skip my indulgences into the past, just forego reading my Flashbacks. Don’t worry, I’ll never know, and even if I did, I wouldn’t mind.

Here’s an entry to “Lifting the Weight,” posted on July 31, 2012:

Free Fall

“Now that my storehouse has burned down, nothing conceals the moon.”
Mizuta Masahide, poet and samurai
1657–1723

I got depressed and lost my job. In that order. And while my depression has abated, I have yet to recover from my joblessness. I am totally clueless as to what that recovery is going to look like. Yet despite my total lack of financial security, I am finding myself feeling unusually at peace; feeling, in fact, downright serene. I’ve never felt this way before.

It’s almost like I am a dissociated observer of my own life. I am watching myself with curiosity, waiting to see what’s going to happen next. I’m not judging what got me here, not dwelling on where I currently find myself, and not stressing about where I will end up. If I weren’t so mellow, I might find my attitude a bit disconcerting.

The reality is that in losing my job, I have gained the time and freedom and ability to concentrate on myself and my health, both mental and physical. I’m not working nine hours a day at a stressful job, spending seven hours trying to de-stress from my stressful job, and then going to sleep to avoid stressing about my stress. I am able to broaden my thinking, to look around and see more, to appreciate more, and to feel more. I am gaining balance in my life as I focus on healthy eating and exercise and sorting through thoughts and emotions.

I am experiencing all of these blessings while nonetheless being in a financial free fall. In the olden day cartoons, when characters fell off a cliff and started hurtling to the canyon floor, they would serendipitously get snagged mid-fall by a gnarled branch of some sort poking conveniently out of the otherwise barren cliff side.

That is, unless the character was Wile E Coyote, in which case he invariably smacked prostrate at the base of the cliff, ending up flatter than the proverbial pancake. By the next scene, though, he was re-inflated into his usual 2-dimensional self and was ready for his next adventure, something that would probably put him at the losing end of a stick of dynamite that had been purchased by Bugs Bunny from the Acme Company. Some coyotes just can’t win.

I’m not exactly banking on the notion that I will be snagged from my demise at the last minute. I’m not really banking on anything. I’m just watching. I don’t advocate this approach to life. If I fall flat on my face, there’s no saying that I will bounce back like Wile E Coyote. Time will tell.

In the meantime, I’m going to appreciate my view of the moon.
Maggie

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If and When

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Day Six of NaPoWriMo. The prompt:

Today, we’d like to challenge you to write a poem of the possible… not on what has happened, or what will happen, but on what might happen if the conditions are right. Today, write a poem that emphasizes the power of “if,” of the woulds and coulds and shoulds of the world.

If that’s what you want, I guess I could do that:

oceanside

If and When

If
you got to work in the early morning and began wondering what time I would rise from bed and what I might make for breakfast and whether I preferred my eggs scrambled or poached and did I sit at the kitchen table with the newspaper as I ate or maybe on the porch swing so I could smell the spring flowers,

would you call me and ask?

If
I wondered what you were thinking as you gazed silently out the car window on those hot summer days when we drove through the valley with the fields full of big round hay bales that remind me of cinnamon rolls,

would you tell me when I asked?

If
we walked together along the beach in the waning hours of a warm autumn day and spoke of our dreams and hopes and fears and those silly notions that pop into our minds sometimes or the songs that get stuck in our head all day or what we like most about Sunday mornings,

what might happen then?

When
winter comes, perhaps we can sit at home before a warm hearth, enjoying one another’s company, comfortable in our answers,

no questions asked.