Paper Hoarding

I have a confession to make.  I am an office supply hoarder.  Nothing makes me happier than a new notebook of paper, or a different color or texture of pen, or a box of lovely crisp stationary.  It’s a problem as it is overflowing from my desk, work table, and cabinets.  I also hate to give any of it up.  I mourn when a pen that I’ve loved to write with because of the way it smoothly flows across the page while I write suddenly runs out of ink without a way to refill it. 

 

I’ve recently thought about why I have this problem.  It started before I worked in offices so it’s not a job-related hoarding issue.  After looking through a box of some of my older writings and journals I realized how this deep-seated hoarding issue began.  My obsession with keeping pen and paper at hand started with my writing.  Not just because I was expressing my creativity but what happened when, as an impressionable child, I shared my writing with my mother.

My sisters will tell you that I have always had an active imagination.  They are all much older than me and thus did not want to be made to play with a silly little kid.  This may be what led me to make up stories for my dolls and toys to act out.  As I got older these tales for the toys became more detailed and complicated.  When I was eleven, the idea hit me to try to write one of these stories down.  It was only one loose-leaf sheet of paper, basically hitting the high points of the story I was trying to convey.  I was alive with the excitement of having created something when I looked down at the paper with all my scrawling awkward letters that bled into words and sentences.  I made this.  It came from me.  This was mine.  All mine. And I had made it.

In my deep excitement I ran into the kitchen of our early 20^th century farm style house.  My mother had worked all day in a hot factory making boots.  After a 9 hour shift she came home and started making dinner for the family.  There she was at the stove hovering over a black iron skillet cooking while something else bubbled in the pot on one of the other stove eyes.  I pulled on her arm to get her attention and begged her to look at the paper in my other hand.  She stopped momentarily and read it.  If I’m being honest, she probably did it so that I’d leave her alone.  But then when she was finished, she smiled at me and told me it was pretty good as she handed it back to me.  What more could make a child’s soul sing with joy than the approval of a parent? 

Unfortunately, it was about that time that my step-father walked in the door, dirty and sweaty from working all day in a hot foundry where metal was poured to create different parts.  In my excitement I didn’t hear the heavy thunk of his steel-toed shoes coming across the threshold.  Too late I heard the screen door slam and was left without time to scurry off.  He had heard my mother telling me that what was on the paper was good.  He looked mad.  He had come in looking for trouble, looking for control of any little thing. 

“Is that homework?” he asked loudly as he walked through the living room stopping only to take off his safety hat. 

I cast my eyes down at my feet and quietly answered no. 

He snatched the paper from my hands and glanced over it.  I doubt that he really read any of it (after all he only had a 5^th grade education at best and was never really a "reader").  He crumpled it up then held iit n his fist as he shook it in my face and screamed, “You better look at me!”  I looked up while flinching back.  He moved so that his face was inches from mine.  “This paper is for your school work!”  He continued, spit flying with his words, “I better not catch you wasting it on this play shit again!  You hear me?”  I was nodding and flinch and starting to cry.  “I said, did you hear me?!” He screamed so loud so close to my ear.

“Yes, sir,” I managed to squeak out as he glared at me.  Then I watch as he threw the balled up piece of paper into the woodstove that heated our small house.  Tears flowed openly down my cheeks but I knew to keep quiet.

He shut the stove door and glared at me again.  “What are you still stand there for?!” he barked.  “Get your ass in there and finish your school work!  And if you don’t have any I can find something for you to be doing!”

I took my chance and scurried from the room.  I sat down on the bed and pulled out the book I had already finished the chapter assignment in.  I cried quietly to myself over this little death.  In the living room I heard him thump down on the couch after switching on the black and white tv to hear the news and begin unlacing his steel-toed shoes.

I don’t think I ever forgave him.  Not for this soul crushing scene nor the many other crimes he wrought in my childhood.  He grew up poor during the depression years.  To him if something didn’t lead to providing food on the table or making money, then it wasn’t worth the time, effort, or expense.  Even if that expense was a piece of paper and bit of ink. 

I guess somewhere within me there is still a small child wanting to scribble down my stories, my poems, my musings and there is a deeply imbedded fear that there won’t be paper for that kind of frivolousness.  An even deeper fear is that once scribbled, the words might be lost, forever destroyed, and never able to be repeated again. 

Quilting

When I have the chance I like to quilt.  There's something about piecing together different patterns and colors that is exciting and sparks my creativity.  It makes me happy and gives me a sense of satisfation when I complete one.  When I make a quilt it is usually as a gift.  The following quilts I made for two of my nephews.  It's my way of wrapping them in my love.

This last quilt is called "Card Trick" and it is the most recent quilt I created.  Each block has 24 triangles of different sizes.  It was difficult to create but very worth while.  My nephew who is 2 loved it and loves to search the materials for all the different animals.  Here's a close up of the block.

I hope that you enjoy this other form of my creativity.  I'll soon be back to writing.

Avoiding the Aftermath

At this point everyone and their brother has said something about the horrendous shootings in Colorado.  Part of me wants to have something to say too.  Another part of me doesn’t want to be a tag-along to such an unspeakable tragedy.  I also don’t want to bitch and moan about being ill or the things that aren’t going right in my life because – hey- at least I’m alive, my family is well, and I have a job.

I could talk about my cats.  They are as beautiful and loving as ever.  Ginger, my gold striped little huntress, is regal, demanding, and a bit haughty.  Beggar, my demure ten year old who came to my doorstep by chance, is a bit skittish but has lately been requesting love from everyone in the house.  Lucky, my black cat who rules my yard (she knows it’s hers to rule), still follows me around when I’m in the garden or watering my flowers.  I love them all.  They are my fur babies and each one gives me delight in her own way.  They are a comfort to me.

I could talk about my garden and how it is currently over-producing.  I spend most weekends lately canning or freezing the fruits of our labors. My family will not go hungry come winter.  There are few things more beautiful than a canning jar full of ruby tomatoes.

Basically I just want to focus on the positives.  There are so many things in this life to be thankful for.  There are so many reasons to not focus on the negatives - or the continuous wall to wall coverage of the savageness in Aurora.  The stories of both the brutality and of the heroism break my heart.  So I simply turn to the everyday simple things around me in my life.  My cats love me unconditionally.  My garden grows and produces calmness as well as fruits from our labors.  Life goes on in the heat of this summer.  Soon the news coverage will cool as will the weather.  And then the colors of autumn will be a new reason to smile.

P/S:  I was not trying to be cold or frivolous when I wrote this.  I had a friend who was killed in a church shoot in Knoxville, TN.  I have see the aftermath and know what family and friends go through.  I pray for them.  I just can't watch the continuous newscoverabe any more.

Cuddling up with FUR

Over the weekend I watched the movie FUR starring Nichole Kidman and Robert Downey, Jr.  This movie was made in 2006 and I didn’t remember it being advertised at that time but saw it on the shelf of the video store (my mate dragged me in there) and decided to take a chance. 

The movie is an “imaginary biography” of Diane Arbus, a groundbreaking avant-garde photographer known for taking black and white photos of people on the fringe of society - dwarfs, trans-gender people, nudists, circus performers.  However ,she didn’t start out that way. 

 As the movie opens, she is a buttoned-up frustrated housewife in the last 1950’s.  She feels confined to her life even though she sees her world differently than others.  Then a new upstairs neighbor ,Lionel Sweeney, moves in and their eyes meet through a window.  Lionel is a most non-traditional neighbor and his own differentness shows her a different way that life could be lived.  His openness during their late night travels allows her to let go of the buttoned-up “normality” that stifled her creativity and her life.

FUR is a slow motion seduction.  It gets under your skin.  It makes you a little uncomfortable but you cannot turn away.  Robert Downey, Jr. played the part well while in heavy costume and make-up.  His character was strong and moving through use of mostly his satiny voice and soulful looks .  As Lionel’s door is closing he wants desperately to open a door for Diane and this he did well.  In the end she is transformed by his love into the photographer of the freaks and more fully opened to who she really is on the inside.  She embraces herself.

The freak in me was deeply drawn into this movie.  The differentness that I just can’t seem to completely hide, opened itself up and embraced the love that poured from the movie.  As Diane Arbus was seduced by Lionel so was I.  FUR is an odd little turn on that leaves you wanting passion, wanting to make some difference in your life or touch the lives of others.  It was breathtakingly, achingly beautiful without regret. 

Life in Slow Motion

Written June17, 2012

It is close to sundown, that perfect part of the day when sitting out on the patio, drink in hand, as the temperature concedes to a break and all can seem right in the world for at least a little bit.

It's been a long day.  Not because we are approaching the summer solstice but because of the depth of complication that's been felt.  I have worked off and on all day to complete the laundry, a simple task that should be taxing, but for me it is.  Each year the simple tasks of life become less easy for me. I did a bit of shopping yesterday at three different stores, which for the average person would have been no trouble at all.  However, because of those two hours of walking, standing, and carrying, my body is alive with pain.  This is what comes with the diagnosis of fibromyalgia.  Couple that with my other health issues - migraines, allergies, interstitial cystitis, IBS, PTSD, and depression - and there are days when simply functioning is near impossible.

There are days when I am beyond frustrated.  I feel so much pain that I move at a pace even a senior citizen would consider slow.  On really bad days, I am slowed not only physically but mentally as well.  Those are the days when the depression and/or the PTSD have reared their ugly heads.  (I am thankful to the Bloggess for her "Depression Lies" campaign - there are times when it's hard to remember that simple truth.)  The fibromyalgia can make bad days worse as well with its "fibro fog".  Those are days when one can't be certain that 2+2 is such an easy equation.

Somehow, though, I muddle through.  I have survived much longer than I ever thought I would.  I feel I have finally breached that plane of existence where I can look past all the obstacles and see my life's goals clearly.  It's just taking me much longer than anticipated to reach them.  It's like trying to run in water or thick mud (depending on the physical and/or mental pain level of the day).  The prize is coming into view.  Even if the day is foggy now, I have focus.  I know I will reach my dream with patience and time.

Melancholia Speaks Depression

I watched the movie MELANCHOLIA recently.  This is not a movie I would recommend to just anyone.  Most people will find it tedious and annoying.  However, I saw it for its artistic merit.  It is a beautiful study on depression, its affects on a personal level, and how the family and friends of the person suffering from depression are affected.  As a person who has battled with depression for most of my life, I found it haunting.  It echoed deep within me.  At the end of the movie when all hope is lost, those who were "normal" fell apart and could not handle the idea of their eminent demise.  They fell to pieces.  However, the character, whom everyone had remained annoyed with due to her horrible bouts of depression and need for constant care, was the one who took over the caretaker role.  She embraced the moment and was able to help those who had previously cared for her through the moment of transition as all life was ending.  This film is not for everyone.  After the credits rolled, I confess I felt my own my own melancholy seep through.  Life is a beautiful fractured mess but it is not pointless.  It is given meaning when one forgets oneself and bends to help another in their time of need.

Transit of Venus

Is the Transit of Venus an omen of good or a harbinger of doom?  I have heard it argued both ways.  When linked to the end of the Mayan Calendar (December 21, 2012), it is said to be the first sign of the end of time.  however, I choose to see it more of a harbinger of change.  Or as Bob Dylan famously sang, "Oh the times, they are a changin'."

I have had a lot of changes that have already happened this year - some good and some bad - and I know that there are more changes to come.  As the planetary bodies have moved through the heavens, month by month this year, my life has had changes bit by bit.  So far I've done fair to middlin' on my New Year's resolutions - I'm counting this as a plus.  But I also lost a friend this year when the head of my department suddenly passed away.  I self-published my first book this year.  A compilation of poems entitled "Making Poe Proud" which has made me proud of the accomplishment and the lovely reviews I've received.  Then I had to have major surgery, for which I am still recovering.

The heavenly bodies move across the skies above us.  The paths can be charted mathematically and anticipated far in advance, as proven by the Mayans.  I am not convinced, as yet, that the heavenly bodies take any notice of us at all, though we have admired them for centuries.

I know that change is coming.  I didn't need a darkened spot traveling across the sun to tell me that.  But it does make us stop, momentarily, look up at the beauty with amazement, and take stock of our lives.  Perhaps this is why we decide to make changes.  As the celestial bodies dance, they inspire us to move and change our own patterns as well.