Hand Towels

I have this thing about them. They have to be folded in half, with the tag to the inside and draped over the bar with the tag in the back and the "fold" toward the center, so that the two identical towels are symmetrical and neat in appearance.

I don't make my bed daily or mop my floors, well, ever. But the towels must stay perfect.

No one else who visits my bathroom notices they are this way, and I quietly fix them each time someone has used them and draped them back incorrectly. I needn't worry others with this small anal idiosyncrasy of mine.

I recall one of the first times an important character in my life came to my house. He commented that it was nice we had hand towels, that it's a small detail that he appreciates that often people miss. I think it's nice to have a place to dry your hands that doesn't seem to be someone's used bath towel.

Connect the dots, la la la la

I had a dream last night that I was in some sort of hospital lobby or some institutional type of place, it was in another city...maybe Orlando? While there, I ran into Karen Rausch, a friend from high school who I was always fond of. In the dream, I was so excited to see her (in reality, we lost touch after college, and she isn't even on facebook), gave her huge hug, and then she went back to work (she worked wherever I was - they were all wearing blue). Then I mistook someone else for her, talked to this other woman in blue who resembled Karen, and exchanged numbers with her before realizing it wasn't Karen. Then Karen found me again, and we exchanged emails. Later I got an email from her saying "the coke broke me up" I'm sure you could tell by my teeth (?)...in the dream I recall thinking how I hadn't noticed and never suspected she'd done drugs, and that I should tell Eric, a mutual friend of ours in college, that I ran into her...

Karen was in chorus with me, had perfect pitch and a beautiful voice, and I haven't thought of her in years. Why now, or is her character in my dream something else? What is it telling me? Hmmm?

Wisdom of friends

I have friends whose influence on me could not be more positive. I am going to listen to them.

One said to me last night that I may be taking comfort in continuing to feel the way I do, that sometimes the familiar pain can be easier than letting it go, and that it is only a conversation with myself at this point. She recommended a ceremony to finally break free, and I am thinking of little ceremonies I can use to clear out the emotional clutter left behind that is no longer serving me.

It is not the first time the idea has surfaced, I just realize now that it is the only way.

Break

Maybe I should take a break from everything for a while. I spend a lot of time doing. Things for others, things for me, but I don't often just sit still with myself. So after the play closes this weekend, I'm going to quit the Kickstand, not help with another show, and just go to work every day and try to spend quality time with myself. I know this sounds like a lot of people who complain they are overextended, need their "me" time, and excuse themselves from dinner with the kids to take a bath, but it isn't that. I enjoy my life very much, and love the people in it, and the activities I involve myself in, but I use those things (my friends, my hobbies, etc.) maybe a little too much to fill every day with distraction, when maybe I need to get a little inside.

I recently applied for a part-time position as an on call victim advocate, which was filled before I applied. I'll take that as a sign it isn't time just yet for me to take on something else. Maybe if they have another opening in a few months.

In the me(an)time, I'm going to redecorate my house and make lots of delicious food.

Circle

"You have been to hell, Ketut?"
He smiled. Of course he's been there.
"What's it like in hell?"
"Same like in heaven," he said.
He saw my confusion and tried to explain. "Universe is a circle, Liss."
He said. "To up, to down -- all same, at end."
I remembered an old Christian mystic notion: As above, so below.
I asked. "Then how can you tell the difference between heaven and hell?"
"Because of how you go. Heaven, you go up, through seven happy places. Hell, you go down, through seven sad places. This is why it better for you to go up, Liss." He laughed.
"Same-same," he said. "Same in end, so better to be happy in journey."
I said, "So, if heaven is love, then hell is.. "
"Love, too," he said.
Ketut laughed again, "Always so difficult for young people to understand this!"
— Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love)

Spring

"Whenever there is turmoil in a relationship, I think if truth is pursued, the relationship will take it's proper form."

A dear friend said this to me the other day and it keeps turning over in my mind. We were chatting after he gave me a massage in the beautiful sunshine, a trade for my feeding him. It is a study in mutual benefit and giving we only recently got back to after quite a long time. He and I have an easy friendship that tends to come and go, but does so with ease.

If only all of my relationships could exist this way. But of course, then I would not have anything to help me appreciate this one.

Hopefully soon, the rest of mine will take their "proper forms," whatever they may be, and I will feel more ease with those I care most about.

a new chapter

My dad and i share a love for music, and we have a little routine where he starts playing and i start singing. This is how i learned to sing when i was young, and whenever we perform in the living room, it's a cherished moment. We have "songs" that remind me of moments from childhood, "our" song ("That's what Friends are For" - Dionne Warwick and friends) that describes my relationship with my dad at its best, others that we just both love. My dad has a binder with sheet music for most every song the beatles recorded, and during a very sad and painful weekend back in July, we were doing one Beatles tune after another when we came to "For No One."

“For No One” by the Beatles

Your day breaks, your mind aches,
You find that all her words of kindness linger on,
When she no longer needs you.

She wakes up, she makes up,
She takes her time and doesn't feel she has to hurry,
She no longer needs you.

And in her eyes you see nothing,
No sign of love behind the tears cried for no one,
A love that should have lasted years.

You want her, you need her,
And yet you don't believe her,
When she says her love is dead,
You think she needs you.

And in her eyes you see nothing,
No sign of love behind the tears cried for no one,
A love that should have lasted years.

You stay home, she goes out,
She says that long ago she knew someone but now,
He's gone, she doesn't need him.

Your day breaks, your mind aches,
There will be times when all the things she said will fill your head,
You won't forget her.

And in her eyes you see nothing,
No sign of love behind the tears cried for no one,
A love that should have lasted years.

I couldn't finish the song, for tears were raining down my face and my voice became very weak. I quickly turned the page and focused on another, so that my husband would hopefully not notice my reaction to the song or the song itself. It's one example of the lengths I've gone to hide myself from him over the past year or so, fears of what my emotions, or lack thereof, meant, overwhelming the potential relief that would come from "coming clean." That phrase sticks in my mind, as now that's how i feel. Though there is much instability and uncertainty, I feel clean and unmuddy.

And so now we've turned a page, and my goal in moving forward is to feel the truth inside me, to share it without hesitation, and to remain unattached to the outcome. Believe it or not, this may prove to be a great effort for me, but i'm now willing to undertake it.