It is a lovely Sunday afternoon

Not bright-shiny like the inside of a mall, but sunny enough to see the leaves sway on branches, unaffected by autumn brown. It is a common complaint that in Southern California we do not have proper seasons. It is a balmy 21 degrees Celsius. After the unusual long periods of rain that we have been having the past week, along with the cold and gloom, this is a refreshing change.

We usher in the seasons differently here. Fall and winter are coming, dragged by the feet and sending us rainstorms, unusually hot days sandwiched between cold ones, and all other weather anomalies, but we are prepared. Rain boots make their cheery multicoloured appearance, while on some days I still come out unprepared in my flip flops.

It is a lovely Sunday afternoon, and I am puzzled that you are not online. I have work to do, but the edge of panic has been taken off by working through a Saturday night. I am content to stay in today, on this balmy beautiful day looking out the window, and work on my bed.

What would make this day thrice lovelier would be if you were here, working intensely on your laptop. Maybe once in a while we'd both break from our fixed sight on the screens, look up, and stare at each other -- disbelieving the fact that the 't' has been taken away from there, that we are both here, now. I know we would treasure each frame in the montage of our togetherness, beautiful and ridiculous alike, finding precious gems in activities others may find mundane.

When I screw up

An emotional wrecking ball, that’s what my life has been like. Little things, little signs adding up and I don’t see it coming till it hits me in the face. Unanticipated, and yet once I know of it, the dread starts building up and it grows, grows and it does not make the fall any better.
More to come, more to come. Prescient awareness, one of the unique things about being human, is a double-edged sword.

I have decided

as far as I can, as much as I can, as long as I can; to live without substitutes.

Without deadeners.

Without mind-altering, numbing substances.

Without caffeine.

We can live without life and we can smile without happiness. We can touch without feeling, we can speak without understanding, we can sit together and talk without ever once making a connection.

Part of the responsibility of living is to live truly, and boldly.

Otherwise, all of life is just palliative care. And that would truly be a tragedy no drug can ease, though it may take the edge off it.

We cannot afford

to disconnect like this, to have long silences not looking at each other, to be immersed in our own mundane lives.

I cannot afford to live like this. Trenches. Trudging. Toiling. There's trouble in the air, turmoil in the soundwaves.

My cryptic messages shroud the confusion of my soul. Deep inside I know my subconscious, my soul, is thinking.

I'm just trying to unearth what it wants me to hear.

Push, pull, wind, unwind

[Free write]

There's a tension, a balance in everything

Even this blog! I want to use this space to sort through, untangle my most inner thoughts and feelings, but I am afraid of what my readers will think

And yet, there is a motivation coming from a different part of me that just wants to be known, to be understood.

Tiredness and elation.

Just a drip of caffeine away.

Funny how something that is so simple can change my mood so dramatically

Make me instantly awake, open to possibilities and filled with the energy to take action on them

And yet leaves me feeling tired, drained, out-of-sorts, unable to focus and feeling generally unsatisfied. Centreless, that cuppa just knocked me out of my chalk-drawn circle, smudged the lines as I slid out of it and into the chaotic outside world.

I want to fall into the dark formless dreamless world of sleep, but my cares and concerns and hunger for connection won't let go easily.

I teeter on the edge of chaos, but the light over the edge is just so seductive, and if I step with the beat of my heart it looks like a dance to anyone who's watching...

Anchors

On this great expansive journey of life, it feels sometimes that we are nothing but little boats set adrift, bobbing along the gentle waters with no land in sight. No navigation points. The stars are invisible during the bright light of day and taunting, meaningless harbingers in the black night. Most of the time life goes by without much rocking; each day you move forward, backward, left or right, not that you would know because direction are relative and the only point of reference you have is you.

But one day, we realize that we are all anchored. It doesn’t matter how deep the anchor is embedded into the seabed or how long the chain. Maybe you were almost flipped over in a storm and wrecked, and then you noticed a little weight in the hull that you’d never discerned before. The knowledge that an anchor exists, that you are attached to it, refocuses your existence. Suddenly it is not just you just struggling to stay above water, knowing that one day you too will be dashed to pieces by a tremendous wave. The anchor, the anchor -- who put it there? Why am I attached to it? How far can I stray before the anchor pulls me back? And perhaps even - how can I get away from this?

Anchors pull back when a boat drifts too far. Anchors strain. They hurt, sometimes. But anchors are there for a reason - to secure a boat. And anchors can be removed, can be shifted when the boat needs to move, although that takes deliberate effort. More than all that, though, anchors remind us that we exist for a purpose. Someone put that anchor down. We are not set adrift. We may not find out who, and our anchors’ positions may not obviously communicate why we are where we are, but it gives us boats a place to start.

Anchors give us dignity. Tiny fishing boats do not have anchors because they do not sail far enough into the sea or long enough to need them. Realizing that we are anchored triggers a re-evaluation of ourselves. Perhaps we are more than cheap bits of wood nailed together. Perhaps we are merchant ships. Perhaps we are luxury cruises. Perhaps we are anything in between. But we have value. We have purpose. We contribute to bettering others’ lives.

Find your anchor. Pull it a little, test it a tad. but don’t resent it. It’s more important to you than you think.

30/7/2010

Just to balance things out, you know. Not to brag or anything.

I am so very happy right now. Content, and excited for the future, and exhausted at a job well done but in a good way.

But most of all, I feel inexpressibly grateful that out of the gut-wrenching mess of the past, good things can and do happen. I have been redeemed. And it makes me feel a little closer to God again.