![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
I mean...I'm trying.
We've entered the hard half of the year. Mid-October until Mid-April, this is the time where it's cold, where it's dark, where I can't manage to keep myself running in the ways I feel I ought.1 And I've recognized that here we are, so I'm trying the things I always try, trying to hold myself together and sane and present. Trying to not let everything slip into pieces. I've talked with my therapist occasionally about the idea of hibernation, of going dormant, on focusing on just existing and not on growth or spark or life, but the idea...chafes.
So I'm trying, like every year. Here are some of my priorities, going into the cold and dark this year:
*I have made it three years without catching the ubiquitous plague. I will continue to mask, to be cautious, to test regularly. I can say, with confidence, that I have not passed this suffering to another person, and as long as I don't get sick myself, I can continue that confidence. I do need to get my newest vaccine, and ideally soon? Remind me, if you haven't heard more.
*Near the very end of last year, I realized I could maybe walk to school while reading a book sometimes. It involves leaving the house earlier than otherwise, but not very much so, maybe fifteen minutes? I don't do it every day, maybe not even most days right now, but I'd like to keep trying. I need to ask Ricky again what ebook reader he has, and look into getting something with a physical clicky button I can hold in well begloved hands when the weather gets too cold to turn pages.
*I spent over a month at Pinewoods this past summer, and the thing it taught me most was that I _really fucking like people_. I mean, I've known I was an extrovert for approximately forever. But there's an evidence to how much it matters to regularly and routinely have a variety of support and community around me. More parties seem to contradict point one, but maybe outside? Certainly more small interactions, scheduled chats, impromptu work-in-company over a camera, watch television with them, have dates with them, let myself be more outside my head than in.
*But then, last night, I did the thing I do sometimes, rarely. I find a song that is exactly right, and I listen to it on repeat until it empties me, and then continue until it fills me back up. I didn't empty the same way I used to (but I think that's probably good, I went back after it was all over last night and reread some old words and...it's better if I cannot empty as deeply as then.) I filled more than I expected, overfilled, spilling out into my loves. It is good to listen to music. It is good to connect to myself.
*It is good to dance, they continued, one point flowing unbroken to the next. It is good to do all the kinds of dancing I do, the precise and the social and the community and the loving and the sexy and the silly and the _solo_. It is good to dance.
None of these mention work specific, but maybe they don't need to. Maybe I can fit in work around the rest of my life, maybe I can find a way to take the hundreds of hours necessary and condense them, maybe I can prioritize, maybe I can take better advantage of the groundwork laid by others. And maybe I can remember that though I love my job, there are a lot of other things I love equally, more, dear.
I'm trying. I will keep trying. Onwards.
~Sor
MOOP!
1: I've heard the year divided into just two seasons - Horny and Spooky, the former starting on the First of May and the latter on Halloween. I...don't think it's a wrong distinction sometimes, and it's not surprising to me to find that I am a creature who exists so much more strongly on one side of that particular unexpected dichotomy than the other. I have witchery, I have magic, I have horror, I have occasional spooky. But I am so much more for the growing and the loving and the laughter.
(And I didn't do it on purpose, but look again at the distinction between what I had and what I am.)
We've entered the hard half of the year. Mid-October until Mid-April, this is the time where it's cold, where it's dark, where I can't manage to keep myself running in the ways I feel I ought.1 And I've recognized that here we are, so I'm trying the things I always try, trying to hold myself together and sane and present. Trying to not let everything slip into pieces. I've talked with my therapist occasionally about the idea of hibernation, of going dormant, on focusing on just existing and not on growth or spark or life, but the idea...chafes.
So I'm trying, like every year. Here are some of my priorities, going into the cold and dark this year:
*I have made it three years without catching the ubiquitous plague. I will continue to mask, to be cautious, to test regularly. I can say, with confidence, that I have not passed this suffering to another person, and as long as I don't get sick myself, I can continue that confidence. I do need to get my newest vaccine, and ideally soon? Remind me, if you haven't heard more.
*Near the very end of last year, I realized I could maybe walk to school while reading a book sometimes. It involves leaving the house earlier than otherwise, but not very much so, maybe fifteen minutes? I don't do it every day, maybe not even most days right now, but I'd like to keep trying. I need to ask Ricky again what ebook reader he has, and look into getting something with a physical clicky button I can hold in well begloved hands when the weather gets too cold to turn pages.
*I spent over a month at Pinewoods this past summer, and the thing it taught me most was that I _really fucking like people_. I mean, I've known I was an extrovert for approximately forever. But there's an evidence to how much it matters to regularly and routinely have a variety of support and community around me. More parties seem to contradict point one, but maybe outside? Certainly more small interactions, scheduled chats, impromptu work-in-company over a camera, watch television with them, have dates with them, let myself be more outside my head than in.
*But then, last night, I did the thing I do sometimes, rarely. I find a song that is exactly right, and I listen to it on repeat until it empties me, and then continue until it fills me back up. I didn't empty the same way I used to (but I think that's probably good, I went back after it was all over last night and reread some old words and...it's better if I cannot empty as deeply as then.) I filled more than I expected, overfilled, spilling out into my loves. It is good to listen to music. It is good to connect to myself.
*It is good to dance, they continued, one point flowing unbroken to the next. It is good to do all the kinds of dancing I do, the precise and the social and the community and the loving and the sexy and the silly and the _solo_. It is good to dance.
None of these mention work specific, but maybe they don't need to. Maybe I can fit in work around the rest of my life, maybe I can find a way to take the hundreds of hours necessary and condense them, maybe I can prioritize, maybe I can take better advantage of the groundwork laid by others. And maybe I can remember that though I love my job, there are a lot of other things I love equally, more, dear.
I'm trying. I will keep trying. Onwards.
~Sor
MOOP!
1: I've heard the year divided into just two seasons - Horny and Spooky, the former starting on the First of May and the latter on Halloween. I...don't think it's a wrong distinction sometimes, and it's not surprising to me to find that I am a creature who exists so much more strongly on one side of that particular unexpected dichotomy than the other. I have witchery, I have magic, I have horror, I have occasional spooky. But I am so much more for the growing and the loving and the laughter.
(And I didn't do it on purpose, but look again at the distinction between what I had and what I am.)