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The waves of existence, they’ve struck me yet again. Subtle at first but even the smallest one leaves a wild ripple on my day to day tasks. It is always the best mood that takes me out, never the worst. The longest grief, the sharpest sword, the most painful day will bring me right to my knees in prayer. Right to my morning pages, my candles, my meetings, my recovery, my phone calls, my writing.
But a big splash of ecstasy and serotonin and a good mood for more than a day and a little shopping and a trip and one single skip of a heartbeat and suddenly I forget what it is that got me there. Call whoever makes Google Calendar and tell them to remove the delete button from my regularly scheduled activities and to add in a blocked out morning routine that cannot be erased.
When I am steady it is simple for me to stay disciplined. When I am single, when I am home, when I am in my routine, when I am committed to the daily tasks that keep me in the middle.
What I have learned from writing about this part of myself for years is not to hate myself for this pattern, but to resume prayer as soon as possible. To resume action and habit and just begin again. In this moment of review I want to become a researcher of the self. WHICH crazed feeling or thought hooked me in this time? What made me forget to do the two things I do multiple times a week that keep me on track?
Instead of saying to myself - wow Mar look at you go! You feel so big that when the big feeling sweeps you up you just can’t help but follow it to the end of the trail. More often than not though the voice is harsh and scolds me - How did you get here again? Instead of - We got here again like we always do and we know just how to get back.
In this active season of returning to myself while joy emerges with the Spring flowers, I see with added clarity how much I abandoned myself the last few years. How far from reality I had gotten, how far from myself I went. In an effort to not be abandoned by another person I left myself behind.
Perhaps this is the How to Not Always Be Working of it all. Perhaps the habits that keep me in the middle are there so that I CAN afford to stray from them for a few days to a week. To drive to a different city, go out to a fancy dinner, celebrate myself, relax, not always be inventing the next class or the next thing.
Sometimes my habits of care are there not just to keep me steady but to keep my work flowing out of me. When my work grounds me so deeply it can be scary to not be in work flow, not be in habit flow, and just be … floating. It seems like that might be the whole point though - to be able to float for a minute.
The fear of straying makes sense with my history of leaving myself behind. The fear that if I skip one commitment or one habit of care that I am suddenly reckless. But this Winter brought me into the New Trust. The space of knowing I would never go back there again. The space of knowing that if I started to, which I can almost guarantee I will, I could return with a swiftness so loving to myself that it would be a mere blip.
To trust that a break in creation, in rigid morning routine, in teaching, in invention, and in action is safe. I am safe to float. And I trust myself to return.
PAYING ATTENTION TO :
YOU KNOW WHAT TIME IT IS
As the gender euphoria unfolds Mar feels so true to who I am. Marlee still works too :) Thank you to all my friends for calling me that, and especially to Bob who has always seen me as Mar
My favorite song favorite place favorite boys favorite music video
I have stopped only listening to the hits and now I listen to the whole album
Thinking a lot about Linda McCartney’s polaroids lately
New Kendrick <3
I love watching basketball so much, especially with Katie who knows so much about the teams. I always root for whatever team makes the prettiest passes to each other before they score.
Self Trust with Alex Elle
So incredibly proud of my dear friend Emily Reinhardt for simply THRIVING in Kansas City at her shop Duet where she also has her studio/ceramics business The Object Enthusiast. Emily was an early Have Company resident (2014?!) and it is so special and amazing to me to keep in touch and get to watch alumni bloom and grow and make the world a beautiful place filled with art. Like literally perhaps my favorite thing about being alive! On Earth! WOW!
10. Prepare for me EVERY WEEK to remind you to preorder Fariha’s book WHO IS WELLNESS FOR? And if you don’t well … it will probably be bad and your bookshelf will break and all your other books won’t make sense so do it for the books! DO IT FOR EACH OTHER
xo
mar
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