admit what I really want

that I want this very smooth, very articulate, very talkative homeless woman to leave my office, especially since we’re not open to the public today, have no resources to help her and I’ve already faxed three things for her and let her use the phone for a half hour and if she mentions Jesus or Satan again, I may lose what little patience I have.

This may sound heartless. I can’t help this woman and she’s starting to press for money. It does no good to encourage her when I know that we help homeless and working poor through support of a program she refuses to visit because she has bigger plans and considers herself several steps above their usual clientele.

She’s got 15 minutes and I’m kicking her out. I also really want to not feel guilty when I do so.

more time. I want to write, paint, see my sweetheart, see my friends, see my parents, do EMDR every week, go to the gym and still have time to read or do nothing. The job is 9 or more hours a day, including commute. Then there are the things that need to get done, like laundry and grocery shopping and eating and sleeping. How do people with children get anything done?

If I stick to a strict schedule, it could work, but then I’m locked into a strict schedule, with no time to meander, ponder, daydream, drape myself languidly over the furniture or bed. This week is particularly crammed full of stuff: appts, blood draw, movie, daily practices, conference calls, etc. I think I’ll take Friday to do nothing after work. But then when will the laundry get done? I hate feeling so rushed and controlled.

I requested three days off between now and the end of the year to spend catching up or opting out. I hope they help.

Last Friday, a bunch of rockclimbers and I met at Mr. Yes’s house and headed up to Truckee for a weekend of climbing (for them) and mindless staring at trees and taking pictures (me). I had a crazy day at work Friday, with ceiling tiles dangling, the chapel a/c not working, the copier having issues, etc., etc., etc. Driving over to Mr. Yes’s place, I started to feel sad. Really sad. Wish I had time for a good cry sad. I chalked it up to a very hectic week.

Driving up, I was near tears. Mr. Yes asked me when I had last been in the Sierras and it hit me that it had been with my husband AND it was where we were married and I hadn’t been there since 2000. We talked a little about my anxiety and me getting EMDR. It felt like Mr. Yes was telling me not to dwell on the past. That hurt. I don’t want to, but it swamps me sometimes. I told him so. I would have loved to burst into tears, if we weren’t about to join a bunch of people I didn’t know (and one friend).

We had a good time over the weekend, except for the unexpectedly rugged hike to the climbing site. Mr. Yes was very affectionate on Saturday and decided not to climb on Sunday just so we could have time together. We spent last night together and it was hot and sweet.

I’m doing a 30-day process to respond to anxiety with curiosity and kindness. Today’s the second day and the feelings of sadness are welling up again. I think the anxiety may be covering up old grief. I asked the sadness what it wanted me to know (part of the process with anxiety) and it told me I needed to mourn my husband. Great. Four and a half years later and I have to go back into that minefield. Researching EMDR to handle the PTSD that emerged after my husband’s death seems to have unearthed a pocket of sadness in me.

How do I tell my boyfriend I need to mourn my husband when my boyfriend thinks people shouldn’t dwell on past sorrows? What happened to the boyfriend who comforted me and told me that sometimes there isn’t a “done” for PTSD? And most of all, why can’t I be done, ffs! He’s dead. He did awful things. It’s over. I went to therapy weekly for months. I deserve a life where the past doesn’t clobber me over the head whenever I relax my guard. How can it still hurt so damn much? I think back to Mr. Yes saying, the night we decided to become an exclusive couple, that relationships don’t have to be complicated. Then he went and fell in love with me and I am complicated. He knew my history and he’s not a stupid or insensitive man.

I was hoping that writing this out would help clarify things. No such luck. Guess I’ll post it anyway, as a marker of where I am now. Sad, tired, and discouraged.

is to sit in the corner of the couch or on the floor in a nest of pillows with a huge pot of my mother’s homemade minestrone, preferably on the second day after it’s made, and have a good meal, a good cry and then fall into a deep sleep that lasts 18 hours. Then I want to stretch, shower and enjoy a big mug of coffee while I wait for Mr. Yes to pick me up and take me to his house for cuddling, massage and napping.

I forget to ask myself what I want. I get swept into what other people want for me.

People want me to publish my poems.
People want me to marry Mr. Yes.

The publishing doesn’t concern me. The poems will get published or not and I don’t much care either way. Writing poems is fun. Publishing seems like less so.

The marriage one comes from people who know us well and it’s been amusing and unsettling me. There seems to be an assumption that if we don’t marry each other, it isn’t a devoted relationship. So I asked myself, “Do you want to marry Mr. Yes?” There was a bit of silence, then the answer. No. I want to be with Mr. Yes. I would like to spend more time and more nights with him. We’ve taken out seven year leases on each other with an option to renew and that suits us for now. Whatever form our relationship takes in future, my heart is telling me now that I definitely don’t want to marry him or anyone.

It’s good to know what you don’t want.

a huge bacon cheeseburger. Not gonna have one, since I’ve been a vegetarian for 16 years, but I can almost taste the damn thing.

I really want to get through the next 45 minutes without falling asleep on my desk. I am soooo sleepy.

I really want to get through the next six exercises in Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain.

I really want to sleep well tonight.

I really want to enjoy Mr. Yes right now without thinking about the future.

I am so obsessing over that damn cheeseburger. Maybe I’ll buy one. I’d probably cry and not be able to eat it and it would be out of my damn head!

clarity
passion
mobility

How to pursue? I’m praying for clarity, especially about my passion. Time to start asking myself some basic questions. Mobility, in this area, comes with a car and that will come, I hope, at the end of the summer. Doing research now and saving money. Going to look at the rental company sales lots in August.

I feel flat. There are things and people I like, but I’m not passionate about anything other than sex, having time to myself and encouraging the people I love. It circles around to life coach training again, as I do love asking questions and seeing people build better lives for themselves.

this kidney infection to clear up! I thought it was a UTI, then I blacked out at the hospital pharmacy and walked into a wall. A very sweet patient caught me before I could fall, then I passed out again. Turns out I was losing a lot of blood (my urine sample might as well have been a blood sample) and I spent over six hours in the ER. Ugh. These things HURT! I nearly didn’t fill the Percocet prescription and now I’m so glad my godmother and the doc insisted. Two days out of work, during Holy Week no less! At least I had all the bulletins done.

Ugh. Going back to bed.

to work fewer hours and keep my benefits. Once I’ve got a car and can see how my money is flowing, I’ll consider this. Even leaving a half hour earlier every day would be great. I get benefits as long as I’m working 30+ hours. This might be hard to sell to my boss. I think I’ll wait until I’ve been here a year and gone through a full liturgical cycle, so I know what’s required. I could maybe work more hours as needed? She really wants the office open 9-5, M-F. Hmmm, maybe take every other Friday off? Half-day Fridays? We’re not open to the public on Fridays.

Right now I see Mr. Yes on most Saturday afternoons/nights, Sunday mornings until about noon and for a few hours on Wednesday nights. When we can, we get together Friday nights, too. I really want to spend more time with him. This might shift once I have a car.

I really want to have more time to do nothing. I really, really want this.

If the man had knocked me up on the day I left North Carolina, our baby would be more than a month old and I STILL DON’T HAVE MY STUFF! I requested when we talked last night that he let me send him a check, since he says he doesn’t have the money to send me the stuff.

“I don’t want you to send me a check.”
“So you won’t let me pay ransom?”

::silence::

FFS! My friend who is a waitress and hair salon manager can send me a t-shirt but you, who make more than double her salary and have about the same expenses, can’t manage it? I’m calling in the troops to rescue the package from his car so I can send a check to someone back there and we can be done with this.

I want to slap him bald, put his hair back on with hot tar and slap him bald again.