Have your cake and eat it too.

Seriously, people, this is how I eat cake and practically everything else. Instead of cutting a piece of cheese I just get the whole chunk out of the fridge, take a bite and return it in the package. I know… I know… unladylike, not polite, unhygienic, not the done thing, etc. etc. etc. But that’s me. I drink water straight from the bottle also but refused to drink the last remaining bit at the bottom. Don’t ask me for a reason, I just don’t know.  I eat also food straight from the pot. Sometimes, while sitting in the middle of the table instead of a chair. I don’t mind sharing a plate either. I eat leftovers of D. and give him mine or the pieces I don’t like. There are lots of things I do differently, like most people I guess. But I will not name them here one by one or otherwise, we are in for a long haul. Perhaps I will share some of them once in a while if I’m feeling courageous or just plain crazy.

See you next time.

Better Than Here

You got a fast car
I want a ticket to anywhere
Maybe we make a deal
Maybe together we can get somewhere
Anyplace is_____

Deep End

Fishes in deep water

(Being in their element)

For the life of them

Cannot comprehend

Our fear of drowning

~ Out of Africa

Bottled Up

I was angry with my friend: I told my wrath, my wrath did end. I was angry with my foe: I told it not, my wrath did grow. ~ William Blake

---

repressed

pent-up

stifled

---

bitter

begrudging

resentful

---

envy

jealousy

spite

---

scheme

action

danger

---

Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured. ― Mark Twain

---

 

Saying Goodbye

Why the things that hurt the most are the ones that are also liberating

It is painful but at the same time lighter

As if there is this massive weight that has been taken off your shoulder

Suddenly you feel light, happier, inspired, more positive and at the same time

Hurting like hell.

You feel like laughing and crying at the same time

Because though it pierces your heart you also realized that

You know where you stand and at last, you are finally free!

The Pursuit Of Happiness

Not all addictions are rooted in abuse or trauma, but I do believe they can all be traced to painful experiences. A hurt is at the center of all addictive behaviors. It is present in the gambler, the Internet addict, the compulsive shopper, and the workaholic. The wound may not be as deep and the ache not as excruciating, and it may even be entirely hidden—but it’s there. As we’ll see, the effects of early stress or adverse experiences directly shape both the psychology and the neurobiology of addiction in the brain.

– Dr. Gabor Maté

And what if one doesn’t have an addiction? Just a momentarily diversion that dwindles over time and starts again in another form?

I have that with things… One day it was shawls, another week bags, could be pizza also or smoothies. Then I get tired of them all and forget. During my wildest years, I used to drink ten screwdrivers on a Saturday night but never had a craving during weekdays. It went on for at least eight years or so and then from one day to another, I just woke up not wanting to touch alcohol anymore. No reasons, no purpose, just like that.

My momentarily “addiction” always starts with “liking” the taste, the touch, the looks… Then I want to have more of those. But no matter how hard I tried to be addicted to anything, I always get over it after a time without trying. The novelty disappears over time and it always never comes back.

Perhaps my addiction is (if you can call that an addiction) probably books. I can’t live without. And taking long walks and discovering new places. I become agitated if I can’t go out there and wander. And writing of course. I have got to write. I will go crazy if I would not be able to express my thoughts in writing.

For the rest, like a butterfly that flutters from bloom to bloom, I will continue to dance from one fleeting interest to one fleeting interest savoring the momentarily pleasure that the experience gives.

Till it is time to move on again___

when I lost the enjoyment.

The difference between a drinker and an alcoholic is; the one merely reads books, the other needs books to make it through the day. ― Gail Carriger

We all matter – maybe less than a lot but always more than none.

The chance of the bread falling with the buttered side down is directly proportional to the cost of the carpet.

What this mean? If the sacrifice is lesser than the damage is it okay? Or it’s the other way around?

Oh, I know…

Care!

It’s about how important is something to you. Personally.

The value of something increases when you attach importance to it.

Yes!

That’s it!

Am I right?

An Acquired Taste That Is Me

Maybe being oneself is always an acquired taste. 

To me, you will always be the one that got away.

When you experience loss, people say you’ll move through the five stages of grief…
Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance. What they don’t tell you is that you’ll cycle through them all every day.

Mirror, Mirror…

Do Not Define Me

Bohemian…
A person, as an artist, who lives and acts free of regard for conventional rules and practices. A free spirit and open-minded thinker.

Hmmm… My son once described me to his friends as a MILF. To my face he said I’m a bohemian. My ex said to one of his ladies that I was magic, but to me, he said I was a short fat and ugly gold-digging flirt head hunter who was holier than thou one of a kind spirit who got nothing to offer to a man. A man-hater frigid who pretends to be intelligent but otherwise stupid who got a limited taste in music and to top it all manic-depressive. Let’s not talk about how my daughter sees me. That would be a long and complicated story. The point of all of these…

The point is_  we are a lot of things to a lot of people. Each of them has their own version of us. None of those matches the image we have of ourselves in our heads. Not even close.

I see myself as a plain Jane of average intelligence. Aloof and introvert, shy melancholic and highly sensitive.

So many people will disagree. For most, I am confident, assertive smart outgoing social.

Alpha they say.

I’m not an Alpha. I’m not even Bravo Charlie or Delta. Just kidding. I’m more of an Omega. Really.

No. Seriously, I don’t give a damn how people see me. As long as their opinions are not interfering with my existence, they can draw/paint every picture they want.

Oh.

My husband puts me on a pedestal. For him, I can do no wrong.

Easy you might say. No, it isn’t. You don’t get feedback that way. You don’t get constructive criticism which helps you to grow and improve as a person.

He was brought up in this fashion, believing he is a shining golden boy who is perfect in every way. The result? He has a problem with anything that defies that image of him, hindering him to grow to his full potential and evolve as a human being supposed to be through years of experience and making mistakes. The consequences of that upbringing he is still reaping to this day via his work, social contacts, relationships in general. Whenever troubles reach his shore, he automatically assumes that it is because of an external factor, others, not him, never him.

I don’t want to be like that. Just hand me a mirror.

I want the truth.

But what is the truth?

Everybody has their own truths.

You know… That image again we have in our heads? That doesn’t match with the ones they have in theirs? That.

Now, the circle is complete.

A Quote that will either Utterly Depress or Completely Inspire You.

By Emily Bartran

I should probably preface this by saying that to see the beauty in this quote, you might have to be a little dark and twisted.

Not, like, Marla Singer dark and twisted.

Just enough to acknowledge that life, in its entirety, is as tragic as it is joyous, as painfully lonely as it is rich with love and friendship and serendipitous-bordering-on-fateful connection, and as unconcerned with our individual sufferings as it is generous with extra servings of the good stuff.

Basically, it’s an unpredictable mess, but it’s the only unpredictable mess we’ve got, and at the end of the day it’s usually pretty enjoyable.

I struggle, sometimes, to remember the latter halves of all those extremes life seems to hand us—you know, the halves that are actually good. Instead, I get caught up in the waiting game: once this is over I’ll be happy again, when I move here it will be easier to make friends, my life will really get started once I do this/that/the other.

Instead of figuring out how to make the life I’m currently living work best for me, instead of actually making a change, I make plans for a change. There is a lot of list-writing and smugness for having successfully “figured it all out” involved.

But I stumbled across a David Foster Wallace quote that simultaneously felt like a punch in the face and the tender kind of hug only a consoling mama-bear can offer.

It openly acknowledges the (really) bad stuff, but it doesn’t allow me to wallow in the waiting game.

It starts like this:

“…the horrific struggle to establish a human self results in a self whose humanity is inseparable from that horrific struggle…our endless and impossible journey toward home is, in fact, our home.”

My first reaction to this was a previously unexperienced emotional combination of emphatic agreement and the immediate disillusionment of the trajectory of the rest of my life.

Trying to figure out who we are is hard and horrific and only ever vaguely successful, but because this is what society has loosely defined as part of our “purpose,” that hard and horrific and only-ever-vaguely-successful struggle has become all-consuming. It’s what we aim to resolve every day, from choosing our career path to choosing the Instagram filter that best fits our virtual aesthetic. Cue emphatic agreement.

But—this struggle is my home? No no, that’s not right. This struggle is a means to an end. This struggle is taking me somewhere.

Once I figure out who I am, once I conquer this struggle…

And it was this exact moment in my train of thought that I found myself playing that pesky waiting game again. Cue disillusionment and metaphorical punch in the face.

The aim of trying to figure out who we are is nearly impossible to separate from the massive and minuscule decisions we make as we go about our daily lives. And you know what our daily lives are? Our entire lives.

We fall in love at a bar on an otherwise unremarkable Tuesday evening. We get the call that a loved one died while we’re grocery shopping. We take a business card from the guy sitting next to us on an exhausting plane ride and that business card changes the course of our career three months later.

The journey to establish our self—to build a home that is complete with four walls and a roof and has a concrete definition of You sitting at the dinner table—is never-ending, because every experience and decision we make further informs and develops that definition. 

That means the struggle that comes along with it never ends, either.

Now that I’ve spent 613 words’ worth of your time presenting you with what probably seems like an absolute bummer of a quote, here are 119 more that will (maybe, hopefully) turn that perception around.

I think I may have audibly sighed with relief and solace when I read the rest of Foster Wallace’s quote. If words had the power to physically tuck the anxiety and expectations surrounding life, in general, away into a dusty little corner of my mind, that’s exactly what these words would have done.

Interestingly, though, I’ve shown this to a few people and each of them had completely different interpretations and responses to it.

So, the rest of the quote will be left here without any other comment. I hope you feel the comforting arms of a mama-bear around you: 

“…finally, the door opens, and it opens outward: we’ve been inside what we wanted all along. Das ist komisch.”

Deep Down Below The Surface

I have a different idea of elegance. I don’t dress like a fop, it’s true, but my moral grooming is impeccable. I never appear in public with a soiled conscience, a tarnished honor, threadbare scruples, or an insult that I haven’t washed away. I’m always immaculately clean, adorned with independence and frankness. I may not cut a stylish figure, but I hold my soul erect. I wear my deeds as ribbons, my wit is sharper and when I walk among men I make truths ring like spurs.” 

― Edmond Rostand

Le Mot Juste

“There are only three kinds of scenes: A fight, a seduction, or a negotiation.” – Mike Nichols