Wishing_Moon

30 Days of Bliss

Oh my goodness! I've neglected this blog. Mostly because I use it mostly for art postings and I haven't had significant amounts of time to make art. Most of my blogging has been done on my livejournal blog. http://www.livejournal.com/ I have made an attempt to post there on a semi-daily basis about my daily thoughts and happenings. Most are public posts, but I do keep some private or friends only.

I'm back to working a fulltime caseload again. While I'm happy to be busy again and anticipating eventual larger paychecks to pay off some more bills, I'm going to miss the spare time!

I'm participating in Sheri Gaynor's Creative Awareness 30 Day Bliss Challenge and so will try to keep this blog more updated as part of that. :-)

Blogging gives me joy. I love to write and blogging brings me a sense of bliss. I manage to find time to blog each day even when I can't get out my art supplies.

Heading into the holiday season brings all kinds of busy-ness that eats up time, but I am working on some major lifestyle changes and taking time for myself to rejuvenate is one of them that I'm making.

My house is finally in pretty good shape once again. I was a cleaning whirlwind for the week preceding Thanksgiving in prep for a special guest. Our daughter brought her boyfriend home for the Thanksgiving holiday. This was HUGE, he may be "the one". We had a lovely weekend and absolutely love this sensitive, thoughtful, bright, affectionate young man! To see his face light up like Christmas when she walks in the room brought me such joy! Julie Wren is a very special woman and he is worthy of her!

I am taking a lifestyle class at the local hospital, meeting weekly and it's been fantastic. It runs for 4 months. I've lost nearly 30lbs since the first of October and have started exercising on a regular basis. I feel so much better! The group is great! I'm enjoying the members and the lifestyle coaches are fabulous! With the rejuventation of physical energy and the banishment of depression I find that my muse is busy whispering to me once again.

We're keeping the holidays simple this year. Julie will come home for Christmas but we will be getting together after Christmas at our son's house in Fargo and will draw names for Christmas so there is a minimum of Christmas shopping to do this year. Tom and I will exchange small gifts and will exchange with Julie when she comes home for Christmas as well. I'm giving small homemade gifts that I will make or purchase from other artist/crafters to the others I need to give gifts to this year. Giving handmade gifts, mine or others gives me bliss!

I will find 20 minutes of bliss each day, sipping a cup of holiday tea, and sitting in candlelight and tree light to let my dreams surface.

LOSS AND DEPRESSION

grief
Originally uploaded by porcelaindoll13

My home office has been so badly neglected that I can't find anything and have been working elsewhere in the house. There are piles upon piles up there. The state that the house has been in is a reflection of the mess and disorder in my head before and after my fall into the abyss. This morning I am feeling even better than I did yesterday. My rump is firmly planted on the lip of the abyss, legs dangling, looking at the darkness from which I have pulled myself out. It's a dark overcast morning in the northwoods, but it feels as if the sun is peeking through the clouds in my soul. Little by little the things in my life I can control are slipping back into place and I'm discovering strategies for dealing with, sitting with, accepting, the things that I can not. With clinical depression it is hard to say which comes first, the chemical misfiring in the brain or the losses that led to it. I believe that for many, at the root of depression is unprocessed grief, and the inability to name the losses that led to the grief. Loss comes in all sizes, shapes and colors. What is loss for one person is just a minor annoyance for another. One loss triggers reliving other losses when one is not mindful of being in a state of grief. The experience of a loss is not a one time thing, grief is part of being human. Every loss is unique to the individual.

In some cultures it is believed that knowing someone's name gives you power over that person. I suppose that may be true. I see the verity of that in being able to name the losses that wound us. Sometimes we hesitate to name outloud the losses that we feel, fearing the judgement of others who might see us shallow, or their lack of understanding of the depth of our loss, dismissal of our loss as insignifcant.

Now that my head is clearing a bit with the help of Zoloft and my attempts to step back and self-nurture I am able to name at least some of the losses. Loss is like a family tree made up of lots of members. Disappointment, Disillusionment, Disenchantment, Death, Denial, Loss of Sense of Self/Self Sufficiency, Loss of Sense of Self Worth, All of my losses fall into those categories. the only way through grief/loss is to go through it. There are no fast routes or shortcuts, the journey takes it's own sweet time with the path unfolding slowly presenting the tasks that need to be completed before moving forward.

I'm off to take another step, I'm cleaning my office this morning.

Pomegranate

Pomegranate heart
Originally uploaded by Vanessa Pike-Russell

Kelly Rae Roberts kellyraeroberts.blogspot.com/ wrote in her blog this morning, "we are more than our struggle". I needed to hear that. We may all have different struggles, but struggle we do. If we allow the struggles to limit us to living less than enthusiasticly what's the point at all? Ultimately it is our choice whether or not we allow our struggles to convince us that we're hopelessly broken, isolating our selves from the very connections and activities that give quality to our lives. But when caught in the grips of a major depressive episode sometimes we need a little help to get there. The Zoloft is beginning to work. Each morning that I wake up I realize I've recovered a fragment of my old self in the previous day and find myself feeling less brittle, less powerless. Today I feel stronger, more focused, and on my way back to the land of the living.

Yesterday was a quiet day with Tom away. I worked on decluttering the living room/dining room and dusted and vaccumed. (Thank heaven for the Dyson for houses with pets! It's amazing what it picks up!) I took some time to read and made a point of making myself get up and move,

Yesterday I ate a pomegranate. I wonder what it's like to live somewhere where you can get a fresh pomegranate? :-) At my request, Tom brought me 2 of them back from the Twin Cities. They are sad and battered, not too fresh looking, but rich and colorful on the inside, bursting, spattering, when opened to the rich fragrant juicy seeds. They are so sensual, with their ripe blood red, tart, sweet, sticky seeds, waiting to be devoured. I asked him to bring me pomegranates. They have been showing up synchronistically everywhere for me of late. In poems, in myth, in literature, in recipes I've come across. An image search on Google resulted in over a million results for pomgranates. A pomegranate wears a crown, but to get to the jewels inside the crown must be removed, the pomegranate humbled, wounded. Pomegranates hold a sacredness and a profoundness hidden beneath their leathery skin. My poor battered pomegrantes have lessons to teach me. I don't know at this time whether I am Demeter or Persephone, but perhaps both are seeking to reunite with the other in my soul. Maybe I am the pomegranate herself.

Eee-Ayyy-EEE-AYYY-OOO

Eee-Ayyy-EEE-AYYY-OOO
Originally uploaded by northwoodsluna

Daddy was singing OLD MCDONALD to Ashlyn. She loves it. His friends make fun of him for putting in animals other than farm animals when he sings it to her, he doesn't care, he does it anyway. It's so darned tender cute! 6'2" and 200 something lbs. down on the floor clowning for his baby girl. Makes a mother's heart melt! (I accidentally captured him singing to her on my camera in video format, it's precious! But I wouldn't share it without his permission) Ashlyn will be 6 mo. old next week. She's been in her walker for a couple of weeks now and loves being mobile. She's gotten so long/tall! Her giggle and laugh were infectious! John and Angie told me that she doesnt' respond to Angie's parents like she does to us. She cries when they're around. They're really nice people. J &A. think that she bonded with us when we cared for her the week they were out of town in June. It's so hard to say goodbye to her when we leave. She's such a bubbly happy baby

Her bright blue eyes light up my life. When I'm feeling sour or down in teh dumps I look at pictures of her.

MIZ CRANKY PANTS

WOW! It’s already a new day, Sunday, I’m not done with Saturday yet!

I woke up very cranky. I didn’t get enough sleep. It was hard to get out of bed. I didn’t want to go to the women’s retreat at the church. I posted to Facebook that I woke up on the wrong side of the bed and all I could find to wear was my cranky pants. I did not want to be a grownup and put on my big girl panties to deal with it. Cranky pants pretty much described exactly what I was feeling. I had to laugh at some of the responses from my Facebook friends. I think the funniest was to suggest that cranky pants take turns getting worn by everyone rather like SISTERHOOD OF THE TRAVELING PANTS. “SISTERHOOD OF THE TRAVELING CRANKY PANTS”, I like that idea! I’ve had my turn, now it’s someone else’s!

The women’s retreat was about what I expected it to be, but I think it was good that I went. There was a small turnout. I think I gave them some food for thought, and enlightenment about what some of them think about Catholic devotion to Mary as idol worship. Some protestants have such an anti-Catholic mindset. I reminded them that I was raised Catholic and that if they come ot my house they will see evidence of my love for Mary all over the house. (I didn't go to deep into that as I didn't want to hurt or enrage anyone, but did say that I missed devotion to Mary in the Lutheran Church. The woman who worte the bible study for the national women's church group obviously ahd a really traditional protestant mind set and wants to keep Mary sexless, powerless and in the closet. We finished at 2:00 so I was able to come home for a little bit before we had to leave to go to our young friend Becca’s 4^th birthday party in late afternoon.  I love that little girl so much. She had a gumdrop themed birthday party with lots of young friends and family attending. It was a lot of fun. Before I left for the party I started a cranky pants page in my journal. I finished it tonight, it helped me work through my cloudy mood. Changing into jammies was the closer on the day.

Big Headed Girls and Birds

LIttle Bird
Originally uploaded by northwoodsluna

We left home Sunday afternoon to go to Fargo for the night. Visited with John, Angie and Ashlyn. It was a joy playing with Ashlyn and I got to put her to bed. Monday morning I had staff meeting/clinical supervision across the river in Moorhead. After that we went to the synod rostered leader retreat at Fair Hills Resort. The weather was so-so but it was a lovely time away, with lots of good food, nature, and R&R I really needed. I wrote about it in my "everyday blog" http://hartsong1972.livejournal.com/

I spent some time practicing my drawing while away. The past weeks have been so insane that I haven't done much artistically. It seems that I've been drawing a lot of big headed girls and birds of late. The pencil is so clumsy in my hand. Today I'm going to make a couple of small dolls for a couple of wee friends who have birthdays.

I have today off and then work tomorrow. But have M. thru Wed. off next week. I plan to use the days to putter with artsy stuff. Tom has recovered very well from the surgery he had last week. Today he gets his stitches out.

The Sacred Ordinary

Fly in formation… Canada Geese come home
Originally uploaded by NaPix -- Hmong Life

It’s a lovely quiet fall morning here in the northwoods. the windows are open treating me to birdsong. It makes me think of music class in my convent boarding school days at St. Clara’s Academy, back in the mid 60s when Sister Mary Geneva would clap her hands loudly exclaiming “Girls, Girls, Girls! You’re not in harmony, mind the punctums and dotted punctums!”, as sitting on the edge or our chairs, we labored to achieve the perfect harmony of the Gregorian chants we struggled through. I wonder if Sister Geneva ever listed to the birds? How could she not appreciate the beauty in their cacophony? She never smiled, I think it would have been painful for her with the ultra tight wimple she wore. I sometimes wondered how she didn’t choke from its tightness. This morning I am remembering the smell of the starch in her habit and the clatter of her big rosary on her cincture, and the click of her sensible black nun shoes as she rustled by, her back as stiff as a board. I remember wondering if she ever had a girlhood or if she had always been a nun.

The sun is filtering through the trees that cocoon our house, casting dancing lace on the walls and carpet. Here on the table where I’m typing I’ve a candle lit for all those I have remembered in my morning prayers. At one point the flickering light of the candle and the dancing sunshine are mingling. It amazes me that one is not canceling out the other, yet coexisting to brighten the space where I sit here typing. Canada geese are in the sky teaching the younger ones how to fly in formation before the great migration that will begin soon. Tom is on the couch sleeping peacefully this morning after the trauma of yesterday. My heart is full.

Tom had his surgery (to repair a hernia) yesterday. We were at the hospital by 8AM. We were especially thankful that he was first in the queue of surgeries and procedures lined up for the day. The surgeon was three in time, but there was a delay as our wee airport was fogged in so that the anesthetist who flies in every two weeks to our small local hospital couldn’t land. His surgery originally scheduled for 10AM didn’t happen until about 11:15 after the fog cleared enough for him to land. He was back in his room by 12:30PM. (Surgery to repair a hernia). After a few hours recovery he was released and we were home by 4:30PM. He took an oxycodone and slept a couple of hours with ice packs before he ate the chicken vegetable soup and fluffy dumplings I cooked for him. It’s our comfort meal when in need of healing. He had a rough evening,. He’s very stoic about pain and I could tell he was in agony. I felt so helpless, wishing I could do something to take his pain away. All I could do was commiserate and do whatever I could to make him comfortable. He took 2 oxycodone at 10:00PM and eventually they took the edge off the pain and he slept through ‘til 6:30 when he took a couple more. I got him settled in on the couch for the night with everything within reach. He was not feeling like he was able to manage all the steps upstairs to the bedroom. I was exhausted to the point were every muscle in my body was screaming so that when I took a couple of Tylenol PM and went to bed at 12:30 I was asleep when my head hit the pillow. I slept ’til shortly after 9Am this morning. He is feeling much better this morning, has been up moving around, and is again asleep in his “nest” on the couch. I am surrounded by snoring husband, and snoring dogs. It’s music to my ears.

The church in town sent a beautiful floral arrangement that cheered him. I bought him the 3 remastered Beatles CDs released recently. He never had his own copy of Abbey Road so was quite pleased to finally have that. I’m looking forward to hearing them today. I’ll have to make a run to Baudette to get some things for his recovery that I forgot when I picked up his pills yesterday.

My morning is coming to an end. The breeze has picked up, the wind chimes sound like the call to Matins. There is the sacred ordinary to attend to, dishes to be done, dogs to be fed.

Blood, Thorn, Rose

rose
Originally uploaded by SarahHowellPhotography

Following a link from Suzan Buckner's blog http://thriftycollageartist.blogspot.com/ I found a lovely short poem on Chuck Buckner"s blog http://chuckbuckner.blogspot.com/ (The Adventures of Nature Boy and Petey the Wonder Dog)


Blood dripped from the thorn
almost the same color
as the Rose I was reaching for.
by Chuck Buckner

these few words really grabbed me and grew in immensity.
Isn't Chuck's poem a metaphor for life?

The things of beauty that we reach for, strive for, often require pain and sacrifice of some sort? Finding beauty among the thorns of life brings a bittersweetness to our struggles.

Truth is never so eloquently spoken than in a single drop of blood.

The beautiful photo is by http://www.flickr.com/photos/superdupersarahrocks

rose

rose
Originally uploaded by SarahHowellPhotography

Following a link from Suzan Buckner's blog http://thriftycollageartist.blogspot.com/ I found a lovely short poem on Chuck Buckner"s blog http://chuckbuckner.blogspot.com/ (The Adventures of Nature Boy and Petey the Wonder Dog)


Blood dripped from the thorn
almost the same color
as the Rose I was reaching for.
by Chuck Buckner

these few words really grabbed me and grew in immensity.
Isn't Chuck's poem a metaphor for life?

The things of beauty that we reach for, strive for, often require pain and sacrifice of some sort? Finding beauty among the thorns of life brings a bittersweetness to our struggles.

Truth is never so eloquently spoken than in a single drop of blood.

(the beautiful photo is by http://www.flickr.com/photos/superdupersarahrocks/

County Fair

County Fair
Originally uploaded by northwoodsluna

Last winter I made a bunch of these snowmen, bottles filled with beads and bits and bobs white and silver, paper clay head with nails, copper sheeting nose, beads and pins, fibers, charms and glitter, (lots of glitter!) for family and friends. This one I gave to my friend Becky. Her daughter entered it in our county fair last week. It took second place in the snowman division. That was a rather pleasant surprise. :-)