I don't think I've ever written a post that's just a blah blah about how the week's been, or the day for that matter. But I kinda felt like writing, so here I am, trying it out.
So, I get home and Jamie's got the rear chassis wiring loom from the Defender on the kitchen island and he's been working on it for the last 5 hours. God I can't live without this man. He's so practical, and persistant, and patient. We've been talking about moving to England again, which I had to say I might, but I really don't want to. As much as I love country England and miss it, I don't want to leave my family, especially my son. But I'm worried he'll be unhappy. Mum tells my my Yorkshire granddad missed England all his life.
I've been helping Jamie a bit with unscrewing things and using the sandblaster to get paint off parts. I figure I better learn to do a few things if we're going to get these cars fixed like ever. We want to get the Defender roadworthy by Easter, so we can have a trip to West Oz - there's some amazing beaches in the South West. That is if we can cross borders by then. Part of us is scared to go anywhere.
Sometimes my life feels like that crappy wiring loom.
All exposed wires and surplus tape and mess. You try taping it up with heatshrink and snipping off the bits that don't go anywhere but you've still got this massive tangle that's messy and impossible to order.
Sometimes I live this beautiful spiritual poetic life and I am connected to all things and being the bestest, beautiful and most brave person I can be. I step lightly on the earth and love with all my heart.
Sometimes, the exposed wires touch and fizz and spark and I'm not who I should be.
I was telling my bestie about it today (she flew over from Tassie for her Mum's 70th today), about how we want to drive to London. It's a long time dream. She really annoyed me as she said 'We'll see'. You know the 'we'll see' parable? I'll copy the first part verbatim from here - it's a zen story.
There lived an old farmer who had worked in his fields for many, many years. One day, his horse bolted away. His neighbors dropped in to commiserate with him. “What awful luck,” they tut-tutted sympathetically, to which the farmer only replied, “We’ll see.”
Next morning, to everyone’s surprise, the horse returned, bringing with it three other wild horses. “How amazing is that!” they exclaimed in excitement. The old man replied, “We’ll see.”
A day later, the farmer’s son tried to mount one of the wild horses. He was thrown on the ground and broke his leg. Once more, the neighbors came by to express their sympathies for this stroke of bad luck. “We’ll see,” said the farmer politely.
The next day, the village had some visitors – military officers who had come with the purpose of drafting young men into the army. They passed over the farmer’s son, thanks to his broken leg. The neighbors patted the farmer on his back – how lucky he was to not have his son join the army! “We’ll see,” was all that the farmer said!
So the moral is a bit about how time will tell the whole story. Nothing's either good or bad, and 'we'll see' what happens - don't attach to the outcome, I guess. I was a little peeved as I felt like saying 'I know that' - because in the back of my mind, I know this is just a dream, and it might not ever happen. At the moment there's no way it'll happen - we aren't even allowed to leave the country. Maybe the world is ending and we won't go anywhere ever. But what this year, in part, has told me is that I think hope is an active thing. Hope enables you to manifest your dreams, to focus on the positive, to bring into reality something good. And sure, if it doesn't work out how you want, you need to live with that too, and be happy. 2020 has taught us that, too. But when she said 'we'll see', I felt a little crushed. It'll pass, and I'll keep working towards this dream, and be prepared in some way that it might not happen, but I just felt I didn't want anyone telling me that. It felt - mean. And I felt disappointed in myself for not being as resilient as I could have been. Part of me wanted to give up now.
I feel a little - prickly right now. My skin is prickly. I've been at a friend's afternoon party for her Mum's birthday, with a whole heap of people I don't know. My hypersensitivity was really on fire - a very physical sensation that makes me want to go crawl into a ball with a blanket over my head in a dark room, turtle like. Although I try to be kind to myself, today I just felt really shitty, and down. Why can't I just be like a normal person? I started feeling really worried about going back to work in the new year, and worrying I'll not be able to cope with it. Too many people gets me really, really rattled. Anxious, wired, full of cortisol. But I can't live like a hermit either.
I feel very conscious that I write about the good stuff on HIVE, and rarely the bad. On Instagram life seems rosy. It seems pretty darn rosy for everyone else too - Christmas parties and beach time, smiles and the like. No one posts the misery. In reality, my life is really darn good. Doesn't mean that sometimes I feel self doubt, frustration, worry, anger and a lack of confidence. Sometimes I can't get off the couch. Sometimes I cannot be bothered being better. Sometimes I buy a plastic bottle and don't put it in the recycling bin. Sometimes I eat too much crap. Sometimes I feel the world is ending and I'm so angry at humanity for letting that happen, and I'm angry at myself for contributing to the problem. Sometimes I'm angry at other people for being happy. Sometimes I drink too much red wine. Sometimes I don't meditate and I don't do yoga or follow any of my own advice. Sometimes I am not brave, or clever, or even kind. Sometimes my phone is in selfie mode and I recoil from my own image.
So here I am, in that limbo between Christmas and New Years, being a little raw about how I'm living this moment on the blockchain, god forbid.
And I think about going and deleting all of my posts - of course, if you know how to find them, they will be there - but for the joe blow, there will just be big blank posts with maybe a semi colon or a full stop to mark the page and an irreverent title, like 'ciao, it's been real'.
And then tomorrow, I'll wake up and shake off this - ennui? - and be a better person for a while.
Sort out those wires into some kind of working order for a while.