the stretches aren't a 100% miracle cure
learning that c adopted a very cute dog named claudette and showed me the hilarious dog resume she made for her for an apartment application
eating cold sweet mango every day, which feels like such a luxury (also, the best cherries of the year so far and a two pound container of blueberries, all of them on sale). fruit as dessert continues to feel possible and i crave pastries and candy less (though of course i still crave them).
i put fresh strings on my guitars after putting that off forever and because of not wanting to mess up the cycle down/cycle up of my meds, i've been filling my day of the week pill organizer, a habit i had lost. i'm thankful to generally be trying to do a better job of interrogating myself in the moment when i do something that i know i'm doing in an ad hoc inefficient one-off way that i could instead do in a more durable and better way with a little bit more time and energy. excited to increase lamictal dosage this week and see where that takes me.
the small toolbox of stretches i do every day now (mostly hip openers: downward dog with a leg lift on each side, pigeon pose, virasana, malasana, seated forward bend), which, i am annoyed to have to do one form of exercise in order to do another exercise, but the various aches and pains that use to stop or slow me are basically erased (and i run faster and longer) if i just take 5 minutes and do these simple things.
that doing those stretches also means that i don't have to be as diligent about never going barefoot and always wearing slippers inside the house, which i have grown tired of (though i still need to try to do it sometimes, i think; the stretches aren't a 100% miracle cure)
that d, who has always struggled with hikes, got a pair of boots from REI on friday and had a really good time on a long hike with friends yesterday. that i didn't go on the hiking trip (though it would have been fun, i'm sure) and instead had my best 10 mile run of the year so far. i'm thankful for the different routes i've built up around our house and for how my mental map has filled in.
talking with d about a struggle i've had with a friendship asymmetry lately; that the person who is currently my closest friend (from my perspective) has so many people in her life who care for her and who she cares for and who have deeper and longer-lived connections with her than me and this was not exactly news to me and i've sensed it in the past before but for some reason i got thinking about it stuck looping in my head the other day in a way that made me feel kind of cruddy and sad, like i'm not special enough (which as a scorpio is such a wound lol),
i'm thankful, though, to feel that uncomfortable feeling in order to recognize an opportunity for growth, how it is maybe, in part, a sign that i am investing an excess amount of emotional energy into this particular friendship and it would be healthier for me and the friendship to pull back a little into more moderation (while also continuing to be a good friend). it's also a good opportunity to reflect on situations i've been in where i know the roles have been reversed and a person might have felt the same way about me that i feel about her, and of course all the times when, as a hermit introvert, i've (often happily) not spent the time or energy that bonds can require to be sustained (or have intentionally chosen not to engage with people who i was friends with in what feel like past lives to me, discontinuous and unbridgeable, but that to them feel like the same lives they've always been living, that i used to be a good part of).
i'm thankful i have a group of really wonderful friends right now who make me so happy and that i get to spend more time with than i've spent with friends since grad school. remembering coming back after the summer for my sophomore year of undergrad and my friend s, who i had been kind of close with my freshman year and had stayed in town over the summer and made a bunch of friends, and i remember one point her posting on livejournal about how it was hard to hang out with everyone and me saying something like "having too many friends seems like a pretty good problem to have").
the turntable t shared with d, even though i've always been resistant to vinyl (for reasons of laziness, cheapness, dislike of physical objects, and the fact that i've always very happily listened to and made digital music) and d and i got into a little argument about it at first before i realized that i was putting my baggage on her and not being a good and supportive partner. i'm thankful to be listening to blonde for the first time in a while while writing this and that maybe it's just a placebo effect, but there is a nice thick roundness to the bass and the kicks.
ipad garageband, which is limited in ways that are occasionally annoying but the limitations are somewhat made up for the tactility—it doesn't work for me for making big music, but i've made so many enjoyable little 8 bar loops, which seem to just pour right out of my fingers and the sounds in the program
two good horoscopes for me for this week:
"'How can you hold on to something that won't hold still?' asked Scorpio poet Benjamin Fondane. In general, you Scorpios have more talent than every other sign of the zodiac at doing just that: corralling wiggly, slippery things and making them work for you. And I expect this skill will be especially in play for you during the coming weeks. Your grasp on the elusive assets won't ever be perfect, but it will be sufficiently effective to accomplish small wonders"
"You can be sure of so many things now. There is a momentum to the way that the future is building. Make sure you don't forget to bring anything with you. You will want to see the green sky. You will like listening to the rain"
the sky outside is so blue right now
eating cold sweet mango every day, which feels like such a luxury (also, the best cherries of the year so far and a two pound container of blueberries, all of them on sale). fruit as dessert continues to feel possible and i crave pastries and candy less (though of course i still crave them).
i put fresh strings on my guitars after putting that off forever and because of not wanting to mess up the cycle down/cycle up of my meds, i've been filling my day of the week pill organizer, a habit i had lost. i'm thankful to generally be trying to do a better job of interrogating myself in the moment when i do something that i know i'm doing in an ad hoc inefficient one-off way that i could instead do in a more durable and better way with a little bit more time and energy. excited to increase lamictal dosage this week and see where that takes me.
the small toolbox of stretches i do every day now (mostly hip openers: downward dog with a leg lift on each side, pigeon pose, virasana, malasana, seated forward bend), which, i am annoyed to have to do one form of exercise in order to do another exercise, but the various aches and pains that use to stop or slow me are basically erased (and i run faster and longer) if i just take 5 minutes and do these simple things.
that doing those stretches also means that i don't have to be as diligent about never going barefoot and always wearing slippers inside the house, which i have grown tired of (though i still need to try to do it sometimes, i think; the stretches aren't a 100% miracle cure)
that d, who has always struggled with hikes, got a pair of boots from REI on friday and had a really good time on a long hike with friends yesterday. that i didn't go on the hiking trip (though it would have been fun, i'm sure) and instead had my best 10 mile run of the year so far. i'm thankful for the different routes i've built up around our house and for how my mental map has filled in.
talking with d about a struggle i've had with a friendship asymmetry lately; that the person who is currently my closest friend (from my perspective) has so many people in her life who care for her and who she cares for and who have deeper and longer-lived connections with her than me and this was not exactly news to me and i've sensed it in the past before but for some reason i got thinking about it stuck looping in my head the other day in a way that made me feel kind of cruddy and sad, like i'm not special enough (which as a scorpio is such a wound lol),
i'm thankful, though, to feel that uncomfortable feeling in order to recognize an opportunity for growth, how it is maybe, in part, a sign that i am investing an excess amount of emotional energy into this particular friendship and it would be healthier for me and the friendship to pull back a little into more moderation (while also continuing to be a good friend). it's also a good opportunity to reflect on situations i've been in where i know the roles have been reversed and a person might have felt the same way about me that i feel about her, and of course all the times when, as a hermit introvert, i've (often happily) not spent the time or energy that bonds can require to be sustained (or have intentionally chosen not to engage with people who i was friends with in what feel like past lives to me, discontinuous and unbridgeable, but that to them feel like the same lives they've always been living, that i used to be a good part of).
i'm thankful i have a group of really wonderful friends right now who make me so happy and that i get to spend more time with than i've spent with friends since grad school. remembering coming back after the summer for my sophomore year of undergrad and my friend s, who i had been kind of close with my freshman year and had stayed in town over the summer and made a bunch of friends, and i remember one point her posting on livejournal about how it was hard to hang out with everyone and me saying something like "having too many friends seems like a pretty good problem to have").
the turntable t shared with d, even though i've always been resistant to vinyl (for reasons of laziness, cheapness, dislike of physical objects, and the fact that i've always very happily listened to and made digital music) and d and i got into a little argument about it at first before i realized that i was putting my baggage on her and not being a good and supportive partner. i'm thankful to be listening to blonde for the first time in a while while writing this and that maybe it's just a placebo effect, but there is a nice thick roundness to the bass and the kicks.
ipad garageband, which is limited in ways that are occasionally annoying but the limitations are somewhat made up for the tactility—it doesn't work for me for making big music, but i've made so many enjoyable little 8 bar loops, which seem to just pour right out of my fingers and the sounds in the program
two good horoscopes for me for this week:
"'How can you hold on to something that won't hold still?' asked Scorpio poet Benjamin Fondane. In general, you Scorpios have more talent than every other sign of the zodiac at doing just that: corralling wiggly, slippery things and making them work for you. And I expect this skill will be especially in play for you during the coming weeks. Your grasp on the elusive assets won't ever be perfect, but it will be sufficiently effective to accomplish small wonders"
"You can be sure of so many things now. There is a momentum to the way that the future is building. Make sure you don't forget to bring anything with you. You will want to see the green sky. You will like listening to the rain"
the sky outside is so blue right now
Don't miss what's next. Subscribe to thank you notes: