Find my jazz

and said something like, “I’m working on my house and garden and just GLOATING because I’m so happy. Don’t want to go anywhere/do anything else!”

I was thinking about this today while driving to the antique store; it’s true. I am back to that nearly incandescent glow of happiness, but this time I think I know why it’s there. I’m letting myself enjoy not hurting; I’m turning my space into a home; and maybe, just maybe for the first time in my life I feel mostly safe and loved. (Or at least for the first time since I was 3.)

And, yeah, I’m gloating. 50+ years of pain gone is a pretty

stupendous

thing, feeling almost safe and being pretty sure I’m loved is even better.

Better than the deal with the farm stand four years ago, this doesn’t have anything to do with WHERE I am or WHAT I’m doing; it’s just me.

I’m happy…

And that is just about the weirdest, and most wonderful thing that’s ever happened to me!

jkd

and I must say I’m astounded… I didn’t remember that I’d written that much, about that many topics! I did good!

jkd

I have this very large problem I contemplate now and then, nothing to do with me, just a thing to worry at as an exercise and a fascination on my part.

One part of the continual problem with it is that there are a huge number of unknowns. It’s one of those “You don’t know what you don’t know…” sort of things.

How do you find something that you don’t know? How do you find it when you don’t even know how to ask the question?

That has stumped me for quite some time. Today I had a flash, or something. It occurred to me that the problem is very like the blind men and the elephant…that is, what’s obvious is a single piece of information, but the conclusion that can be easily drawn from that data is false, as the actual conclusion incorporates much that the blind man does not know.

I realized that the way you do this is to correlate data and get more of it.What if all the blind men are right? What if you find the edges and realize the “sail” parts do not touch the ground, the “trees” do and there are four of them, and…
couldn’t you use that as a systmetology for solving a problem whose scope you know but where all the data are not available?

Well, maybe not, but it seems like a sound start.

I was impressed with myself, I have been mulling this around for quite some time and there it was!

DH was unimpressed. The last time this happened, I don’t even remember what the AHA! was; I told him in detail, and he was not impressed then either. Now I cannot even remember wtf I was thinking about, only the “feel” of it. So this is my record AND my validation.

My DH is almost always a very supportive individual. I can’t figure out when/why he sometimes isn’t. (Another elephant!)

Ah well, more brain work req’d!

jkd

The rug is stalled for the moment. DH worked on the “insulate the basement” project at lunchtime…this house is colder than it has ever been we both think. It’s impossible to tell if that is so, or it’s just that we’re older than we’ve ever been? Anyway, the insulation project is something that’s been a priority off and on for a month or so.

I worked on the memoir some…the piece I’m writing involves writing s/f authors about my mother and her first husband, my brother’s dad. I solved the “my brother” problem by calling him (his dad’s first name)’s son. If, acc. to his wife, I’m not a member of his family, then this is the proper address. I can’t explain why the writers would write to me about my mother (and they did) unless I explain that she was once married to an s/f writer. So, this is my solution.

My solution re my sister so far has been to simply call her “family” and not explain the relationship at all. I think I’ll use the same dodge (as above) when it gets where I have to speak of her. This will be good practice, describing them accurately within the family, while avoiding any connection with me.

Well, because of what’s happened recently, not just the Thanksgiving thing (the fellow I had a lunch meeting with yesterday knows my brother!) working on the memoir was uncomfortable. I started to wander around the house, mumbling to myself, a modified version of the internal riot/churning, rationalizing what had happened, how I felt, etc.

When I noticed what I was doing I said, “What can I do that is positive rather than doing this pointless exercise, again?” and I started working on the house.

The small sign that had been over the shop door was up in my office. That got taken down so DH can add it to the stairwell signs. A modern (reproduction) sign that says “library” will go up in my office over the door this afternoon. I also started clearing out the small teak display case that’s going into DH’s office this a.m. too.

I need to go find something else to do on the house. With luck, I’ll find the anti-fray stuff that I misplaced, so I can continue working on the next piece of the rug!

Maybe I’ll just pick a room and clean it? Naw…I have Christmas presents to wrap/mail… that means the dining room, as the table is covered in gifts, paper, tape, stickers, etc.

I’m off!

jkd

I didn’t find the open anti fray stuff…but I DID find the two new packages of exactly the same thing, so I opened one of those. Yay!

Well, in the process of doing this and that, of course I found the missing tube of fray stuff, so now I know where all 3 are, and two of them are open, alas. Oh well, that just means that part of what I have to do tomorrow is make up the squares for the rug.

I wanted to share it. I was reviewing the pieces in my current writing file and found a version of this. Comments are requested. If I’ve inflicted this on you here before, I’ll apologize in advance.

The formatting doesn’t work here, sorry.

This still needs work, darn it!

jkd

A Ming vase shatteriing into a million pieces in a museum’s workshop is followed by an unearthly silence. But that is the rush and roar of a city’s gridock by comparison.

An arctic stillness slithers down your back as the abuser walks in. The depthless electric ice cube screams down your back.

Instanteous spot check:
How are they?
Do they look mad
pleased
tired
happy
drunk?
Are they smiling?

Victims know the landscape of the pores in their abuser’s faces and other telltales better than their own names; survival depends upon it, daily.

because I’m superstitious…I haven’t posted anything about this.

But the jazz? Well, it’s is also happening. The flip side of the near-depression and shame spiral is this reverberating joy that is buzzing through my life.

We are working on our home…A couple of days ago, DH started on his lunch hour and I finished painting part of a wall. Yesterday he installed our new sink faucet. I also got him to put the hooks on the 2nd basket and now the baby rail is as close to done as it can get until we move things around. Every day we’re working on making this mess of a place into our home, a little at a time.

And there is this hosanna chorus just bubbling, vibrating, and buzzing like a not-so distant swarm of bees going through me.

I’m _{scared to death}...Really! I’m afraid to claim it, celebrate it, or that somehow it will be snatched away before we finish. The house will burn down, some one will rob us, we’ll have a home invasion, I’ll die, DH will get disabled…etc. [There’s probably 100 more I could come up with!]

But it’s still bubbling down there!

jkd

must include some lessening of my guilt/depression cycle. If I do something that isn’t right during the day, it circles through my head for the rest of the day and sometimes for days afterwards. It’s the PTSD, but it is absolutely UNproductive.

I used to do the anguished cycle at night and try and “talk it out” with the wall, didn’t work well, but that’s what I did.

The later incarnation of this is that when I commit a gaffe (and don’t we all?) it hangs on like a great white shark and chomps away at my well being all day.

I called a friend at work today about something for her daughter. It was not a good time to be calling, by all indicators. Okay, I goofed. I should have written an email.

I sent an apology email later today.

It’s probably 9 hours later and it will likely keep me up tonight, maybe until the wee hours.

Okay, I goofed. It happens. I apologized. There’s NOTHING else I can do except remind myself that my friend is a consummate professional at work and because she’s a very unstuffy person (at least with me) I tend to forget that.

Okay. That’s it.

So…should it keep me up tonight?

No.

Will it?

Probably!

I’d really, really like my “jazz” to include a piece about being able to just stop beating myself up emotionally when I goof. Okay I goofed, big deal.

I did.

Sigh.

If I’m up at 1 am (likely!) I’ll check in.

I HATE this!!!

jkd

Home by Rybczynski. I always thought my lack of understanding what “home” was could be attributed to my questionable upbringing…but acc. to this history, humanity had as hard a time getting there as I have!

It’s well written, interesting, and has caused me to see interior decoration and architecture in a new light.

jkd

but I’ve got a box of books to catalog tonight…bored…bored…bored with this already!!!

jkd

to Moganstern’s method… that is:

Conceptualize what’s wanted
Original Design
Remove Excess
Edit Design

Because it seems that doing it her way

Savor the treasures,
Heave the junk,
Embrace your identity, and
Drive yourself towards where you want to be

has only a limited use for us. There’s a lot of junk…but a lot of the problem is that we buy treasures, a lot, and without some way of editing THOSE, it will still be too much stuff….

What I have come up with is doing it like retail space and redecorating seasonally. But to me that means that I need a much more concrete plan of what goes in and out and what is constant.

In the bookstore, the decorations were signs and gimcracks that went along with them, hearts for valentine’s etc. In the house, it isn’t as easy. For example, even with the extra 2 I sold off last year, I have 4 (5?) couch throws. I only have one couch, but you see what I mean.

If I design the house like a large, ever-changing retail space, it would probably also help with the emotional backwash from the kid shit. I have no problems with decorating retail space, just my space.

Hmmm….

jkd