New Year, New Post

Last post: March 10, 2009.

Yikes.

Well, I can't say it wasn't my fault - life does have a way of becoming similar, day in and day out, when you're working the same job, but that doesn't mean that I didn't see funny people on the underground, or participate in kooky stunts at work, or occasionally get outside to see the weather continue to do its thing in such an awe-inspiring fashion if we'd bother to take more than three seconds to consider what we're looking at. Still, the fact remains that I let almost 10 months go by without a post, all the while mentally complaining that friends and family never updated theirs, or gearing up for Nanowrimo when I didn't have the dedication to sit down and write a blog post every week or so. So, one of my resolutions for the New Year is to make this blog a happening place to check in - to remember small moments in life, to take my camera out more often, to keep anyone out there listening more in tune with the rhythm and melodies of my life as it happens. (You know, alongside finding a new job, potentially a new flat, new friends, and a few new directions to find and pursue)

The difficulty, of course, is the ultimate sitting down and writing down. I have trouble finally drifting off at night because my mind starts busily talking on a non-stop natter just as soon as I set my head down on the pillow. I could have been brain-deadedly watching a movie or cleaning the flat, letting my mind clear into a state of zen-like nothingness as the evening winds down, but once the alarm is set and the light turned off, my brain turns into a bounding child, dumping his clothes all over the floor I'd just nicely cleaned up, turning on the music and the TV, asking me questions then, before I can answer them, moving on to talking about a friend from school I've never met, then clattering all the pots and pans to the floor while asking where that one can of chocolate frosting went to - you know, that one - no, not that one! The one that hardens when it hits the cold ice cream, I think we had a it a few years back; Susie really likes that stuff, but Jordan's allergic - kind of like George, only he's allergic to beestings. I don't remember ever being stung by a bee, so I don't know whether I'm allergic or not; I remember Scott getting stung by wasps one year at Camp Casey - maybe the same Fourth of July when it raining so hard that they kept ducking out at any break in the weather to light off fireworks - unless that the was summer when we finally had to go to a hotel, because it started thundering and lighting...ing - what is the past tense for a thunder and lightning for a verb?

You begin to wish up a way of inventing earplugs for the mind - let it go on formatting and refrag-ing itself, sorting things into their own little places, but let the rest of the mind -the older, exhausted mother who's been nagging at me all day to take my coat, check that the phone is charged, carry that basket correctly- get the sleep it needs. However, as soon as I finally drop off, I suspect this child-like brain must keep going, as I've always been a heavy dreamer. I can generally catch hold of the last dream I had before waking if I'm quick enough - it leisurely floats around my head like a butterfly made of dust, disintegrating slowly as it shimmers through the dust it leaves behind. Try to grab it too violently and it crumbles in your hand - sneak up on it, however, and net it and you might just be able to sneak a peak into those last few images before you returned to the dullness of reality. On nights where I haven't slept well, or nights where the dreams link from one to the next, I can follow the dreams backwards, as though pulling the winding film cartridge from out of my ear. I tend to shift back and forth from being in the dream (first person) and then standing back and directing the action, crafting the story as it happens and only stepping back into the flowing river of the story when so inclined (or when a new one fades into the old)

I rarely have nightmares - and even those are generally only in times of my life where I feel like I'm not in control, and are generally situations that reflect this state of mind: no monsters or creepy crawlies, just a car that drives too fast or only backwards, or the inability to wake myself up. The more common "bad" dream for me is when my mind decides to create a really sad story - and I'm almost never "in" these stories, just watching from the vantage point of the first balcony or the director's chair. I fill myself with the pathos and emotional manipulation and have, on many occasions, woken up sobbing from the beauty of the storyline which, in the light of day, always sounds like something Anne Shirley would've written, or one of those terrible Romance Novelists who frame the covers with a woman in a dress blown in the wind looking out over the sea or a large field of wheat, attempting to convey the impression that she carries the weight of true sorrow in her bosom, whilst instead she just looks like the eternal complainer/martyr that you always get stuck talking to, and spend the whole conversation trying to find a way out of. "Yes, the crops burnt down and ol' Rusty was taken up to heaven, but... [a "sad" smile with a single tear in the corner of her eye as she fumbles with her handkerchief] I'll get by... somehow..." "Yeah, really sorry to hear that," you half-heartedly mutter while glancing to her right. "Oh, look, the crab dip is getting kind of low... I should go refill that...."