serafaery

It's 1am and I should be asleep, normally I would be winding down at Coffin Club, but I am still just too exhausted and also a bloody mess right now (sorry TMI, it's an extra heavy flow month this time, thanks perimenopause).

Crashed when I got home from my first day of in-person work (I am kind of always working) since we moved on Sunday. I wanted to cry all day. I feel bad, I couldn't hide it. Ginny, one of my 70+ ladies, always brightens my day and she made me feel a lot better, she's very upbeat and also gentle and also wise and also funny and kind, she is affluent and has a huge family and loves to travel to all sorts of exotic locations, but she is also very sensitive to those of us who don't have those things, she didn't always have it easy, she is understanding and sympathetic - you can be rich without being disconnected, turns out. She is a rare bird. Very precious.

It's been difficult, I am so tired, I am trying very hard to be grateful. Josh is clingy and I just want to be left alone, but it will get better. I fear I have made him too dependent on me. He simply went without eating yesterday, because I wasn't cooking for him like usual - I had stayed up late multiple nights trying to clean and set up the kitchen, I did grocery shopping and thought I set him up with everything he needed to fend for himself, but he just... didn't. He said there was nothing to eat. The fridge is full of food. What more can I do? I didn't have time to cook and box up ready-to-eat meals for him. The pantry is full of food. He just doesn't know how to eat it, unless it's prepared and plated, I guess? He said he doesn't know how this kitchen works yet, which I do understand. But he also hasn't lifted a finger to get it set up, it has taken me so many late nights and long hours of cleaning and sorting and organizing. If he'd helped at all, he'd know how it works.

I went and got more groceries of things that are healthy but easier to put together, things like a bag of baby carrots and hummus and crackers, and bagged spinach and a package of roasted chicken and sliced and shredded cheeses so he can make salad, and I was able to cook him dinner last night so he had leftovers for lunch and dinner today, he is much happier and more functional, now that he is fed.

I am not.

Because I've focused on the kitchen and dining room and living room and bathrooms, my own living space still looks like a tornado hit it, everything is still in boxes, I can't find things I need, I have no idea where medications and makeup and personal care items are, etc., it's completely non-functional and really uncomfortable. But his comfort came first.

I need to do laundry and build my dressers and organize and so many other things, it's overwhelming. I am so tired.

I miss the crows. I was at the old apartment today, checking mail and walking through to see how the cleaners did (it looks great, and they found a little basket of cookie cutters and sprinkles I'd not seen in a cupboard, grateful for that), and I had such a flush of anger for the upstairs neighbor letting his dog off leash to barge into our apartment and attack my cat and I last year and basically ruin my life. I was sick with a cascade of infections resulting from that attack for months, and we never felt safe after that, so we had to move. Awful, awful, awful. I'm so angry I got chased out of my home by a negligent dog owner. Who just gets to go about his life like nothing happened.

I miss the east side a lot. I am glad I still work there. There is just more light. The west side of portland is dark and damp and depressing. We don't get clouds of crows, here. I am making friends with a local pair, they have met Avalanche and are already (correctly) convinced she is not a threat.

There was a soft rainbow and a hazy orange sunset that flared into fiery pinks and oranges with swaths of bright turquoise sky showing through, at the old apartment, so beautiful.

My porch spider is still here, looking fat and happy. It is getting colder and rainier but she has shelter and her trusty porchlight to attract dinner.

I love the little thrift store chairs I got for the backyard, they were $8 and they are so comfy and perfect. I got $6 little stools too, that can hold drinks or be sat on. I got a little chair for the front porch too, though that's not a fun place to hang out, so might just be a spot to set groceries while unlocking.

We still need proper stools for the kitchen bar area.

My commute is not bad. My shins hurt from all the extra driving, though, it's 26 miles instead of 4, to get there and back.

...

There was a wreck on my way from aerial to errands on Wednesday and due to some confusion and distraction, my car gently bumped another car as we were trying to get around it (it was straddling a lane and I didn't see it behind me, I was trying to get out of the way by rolling backward slowly and our cars touched - probably more my fault, but we were both doing weird things). I pulled over, so did the other driver. A shiny black SUV with a not small dent on one side. The driver was a beautiful younger lighter skinned black lady with bright green eyes that sparkled in the sun, and beautiful full curls. She smiled softly, and looked relaxed, I also smiled as reassuringly as I could, we both checked our cars, no real damage, "let's just say nothing happened!" we smiled and waved each other off. There are good people out there and good things happen every day. It was so scary to hear that metal-on-metal sound, especially while looking at the results of a very recent very bad collision (the guy was out on the street examining his extensive truck damage while large metal pieces were falling off of it), but it was nothing worrisome at all. I have not had a vehicle collision, other then a tiny rear-end collision once in LA when I was 24, so this felt like the end of the world for a few seconds, I thought my bumper would be scrunched, but there was barely a scratch on either of our cars.

..

Josh has been very patient and very supportive in the ways he is good at. It is hard setting up the entire house (other than his office and bedroom) alone, I wasn't expecting it to all be me, and I keep finding unexpected gross hidden messes that I have to furiously clean. It felt like too much to expect me to cook meals for him in the midst of all this, I thought he understood this, at the very least he could just go buy food somewhere, but we do this so rarely it's just not a thing he can automatically do, I guess. Now that I've unearthed mostly everything, like say, the can opener, he can manage better. I think he's starting to figure it out, he actually cooked himself eggs this morning and unloaded the dishwasher at some point today.

..

Work again tomorrow, I have to get up early for counseling, I am in need of a shower, but I think I can get through it.

I need to change my address with the post office in the morning, as Saturday is technically our last day of renting the apartment. I need to change it everywhere else, too. It's an endless to-do list and I just want to rest. And be in nature again.

...

Unfortunately, my surgery and the procedures that precede it are all scheduled for December, which is my busiest month for work usually. It will mean losing the last half of December, which is my favorite time to work. But I couldn't choose, they want to do this asap, and with so many other breast cancer horror stories I don't want to let it linger, in case it is something worse than they think. I just want to get it done with as soon as possible. After this, I will have annual MRIs for my breasts for the rest of my life, as my level 4 density doesn't scan well in mammography or ultrasound, and I have high risk factors.

I met a new physical therapist on Wednesday and I kind of love him. We have a plan for my back, he is very reassuring and encouraging, and he thinks he can help with my foot, too. I feel the most hopeful for my body than I've felt in a very long time. After the spring, I have felt so scared and defeated. This PT wants to reverse all of that. I hope it is not all smoke and mirrors and empty promises, but, he seems to know his stuff and I am willing to give it a go, at least for now. I do not think any of my previous providers have been bad, in retrospect. I didn't get what I needed from them but that isn't really their fault, I only got what I could hear from them at the time, if that makes sense. Piecing all of their efforts together, I think, is the best way for me to achieve optimum health.

One of the odd things about the breast health issue is the way everyone said "how high" when my biopsy results said "jump." All my life I feel like I've had lackadaisical health care from providers that didn't really want to help with insurance fighting every inch of the way. But all of my needs up until this point have been preventative or quality-of-life issues, not actually life-or-death issues.

Turns out in the American healthcare system, as soon as something comes anywhere close to life-threatening, the care suddenly gets extremely good. Nobody wants to hear us whining about being in pain, nobody wants to prioritize quality of life, and I get that it's a vague target and some people may never be satisfied. But with my mood disorders, my migraines, even my congenital hip dysplasia, these were all considered elective treatments. I always felt an underlying current of, "would you please leave us alone to do real work and just suck it up." A very American attitude toward pain and disability.

But this breast stuff? Nothing "elective" about it. They're super stoked to slice and dice. They haven't given me an option to decline.

It's such a weird feeling.

This and my broken arm (my brother broke my arm when I was four), and maybe my wisdom teeth surgery? Are the only times I felt like my healthcare providers actually *wanted* to help me, are eager and even excited to help me, without me having to drag them into it kicking and screaming.

I am sort of looking forward to a very quiet xmas, hunkered down in recovery mode on the couch with tea and an electric blanket and my cat.

I am considering making Josh and Tyler go with me to a u-cut xmas tree farm, for our first xmas in this house. Maybe Cynthia and Derrick, too. I don't know how to strap a tree to my car? But I am willing to try. It doesn't have to be big. But I want one. Not every year. But this year. It's been so long. It will help me recover, to have a real tree, I think. I think of it like a giant cut flower. It's sad to cut them but that's what they grow them for, it's okay. I have used a fake tree for so many years and I will keep doing so. I just, this time, want to try, maybe. If I can get some friends to help. My MRI is scheduled for Dec 4, maybe for the weekend after that? I don't have to get a real tree. just a fun idea to think about. Josh loves my little fake one, it's light and easy to assemble and looks pretty nice actually.

I wonder if my xmas tree ornaments made it through the move in tact. I always try to pack them carefully but being loaded in an out of a big truck is more than they usually endure. We'll see.

Just a list of things I want to do regarding the house, starred is urgent/needs to happen today.

I am on three hours of sleep, so this is going to be hard. I'm in a terrible mood but mostly I think that is from the lack of sleep and this resulting headache. I need some food.

I decided my mission last night was to set up the kitchen, but it took me three hours to pack the rest of the kitchen up at the old apartment and get everything over here, and then when I started to try to put things away, I realized the inside of the cabinets here were super grody. Spilled sauces, grime and grease and stains, everything had to be wiped down multiple times. So I was up until four in the morning wiping and scrubbing and scrubbing and wiping. I found moldy left-behind items all over the place. I think I found the culprit of the yucky house-wide perfume smell that hits when one first enters the home that makes it smell like a cheap motel. Hopefully getting rid of that will help? I have been lighting really delicious candles in the meantime, to combat the scent, but it is pervasive and not letting go easily.

The tops of the cabinets have literally never been cleaned, there is a layer of 25 years of dust and grime up there, so, saving that for another time.

There is not as much cabinet space as the apartment and the fridge is smaller, but I think we can pare down a bit and work with it, we'll figure it out. The cabinets are just poorly designed, there is a ton of lost space in the corner.

There is lots of counter space so that's where everything is spilling out for now.

I need a spice rack. That can happen later.

I bought a vacuum, it'll get here tomorrow or Thursday. The carpets are already dirty and it's only our second morning here.

The granite countertops are pretty, but it's impossible to see dirt, which is frustrating because I will wipe down a spot three times, set something on it, and end up with black gunk (this happened after I was cleaning the cabinets and black gunk kept falling out onto the counters) on whatever I set there, and have to go over it again, then try again, find more gunk, and repeat. I would rather see the dirt. But we're stuck with it.

I am not complaining! There is just a lot to adjust to. The location is just not peaceful. I kind of knew that, but I didn't think it would be possible that we are under a flight path. It must be for the Hillsboro airport at Intel. We are so far from PDX, air traffic noise did not cross my mind, it's not terrible, I will get used to it. I grew up not far from PDX, it's something your brain just learns to tune out.

We are kind of sunk down with high walls all around us so we can't see much sky. I couldn't see the sunrise this morning. But my window does allow a view of the moon at night, which I love. The road noise is audible in the back yard when going outside for coffee in the morning, and there's nothing for Avalanche to see or do really, inside a little box of six foot fences. It will take some time to get the small backyard space set up better. I am envisioning a makeshift ramp or way up to the roof of the gazebo for Avalanche, to give her more lift and perspective but not in a place where she could escape. She's not super keen on going outside, there's just not much for her to do or see in such an enclosed space. I dunno.

There are other things I am in awe of, like the dishwasher, and the multiple bathrooms. We were able to fit Josh's car into the garage even with all of my stuff, which is heartening.

I want him to be able to park in there. I have a lot of guilt and shame about how much junk I have. It has caused a lot of distress during the move. I got rid of more than I ever have (the movers even commented that the garage looked more empty than the photos, which was true), and unfortunately Josh's reaction to this was to put a whole bunch more pressure to do more, and I cracked. He held me when I was sobbing throwing mom's clothes away, that was so much harder and more painful than I was expecting, for totally different reasons than one would think.

I had read this thing when my mom died in 2021 that said, don't throw away your parents' stuff right after they die. Give it some time and go back to it later. You might want to keep one or two articles that smell like her, it suggested.

I am more than happy to avoid purging. I have lost irreplaceable things and have deep wounds and regrets about things I have lost while purging under pressure of someone who didn't understand the significance of the stuff - precious, irreplaceable things, gone forever. I am so afraid to make a wrong choice. I get paralyzed.

But keeping mom's clothes was a terrible idea in retrospect. Because these weren't really her clothes at all. These were dementia clothes. Nothing that she picked out herself, or understood or cared about. All of those clothes are long gone, they all got ruined while she was sick. My poor mom. God. It's just so awful to think about how bad that all was. In the beginning, she got really mad that the laundry service at the elder care center was ruining her things (probably too much bleach and sanitization for her more delicate items) and she wouldn't let them wash her clothes at all, but she lost her ability to hand-wash, and everything ended up stained and reeking and even moldy. I tried to reason with her, but there is no reasoning with severe mental illness. I started to foreceably intervene with her clothes and bathing when I found mold in her hair. She wouldn't let anyone help her stay clean but she couldn't do it herself, but she literally didn't understand that she was dirty and couldn't clean herself properly on her own anymore. It was so awful.

She did eventually let me bathe her, or rather, she would say no, but I would do it anyway, and she didn't physically fight me, and afterward she would be happy and grateful.

So, even after going into higher level memory care and then hospice, all of mom's old clothes still reeked. That smell never really totally goes away. And when I opened the bin, the smell brought back too strongly all of those memories of struggling through her illness, and fighting with her just to get her a little bit more clean. It was so many years of this fight. Eleven years. It was so, so awful.

It wasn't just mom's old stuff that was a problem. (I still have quite a bit of it.) It's lots of things.

I have some hoarding disorder traits. I have been working so, so hard on this, this year, on understanding it and taking small, gentle steps toward retraining. (Some are less gentle, such as repeating the mantra to myself, "nobody wants your shit," which I absolutely agree with.)

So, for my very fraught, hard-earned progress to be rewarded with, "Now do more! omg you have so much shit, get rid of it! Right now! I want a place for a bike stand!" is not great. when I still don't know where my toothbrush is and am missing medications and supplements that I need to feel well and function optimally, and cannot complete orders that I need to process for my business - there are other more pressing matters in the middle of moving into a new house.

He listened and has calmed down and he's really good at hearing me. I do my best to take ownership for my unhealthy reactions and explain that my emotional triggers are not his fault, it's my own unhealthy issues that I am working on. I apologize for my illness spilling out onto him at times. He's very kind and patient about it.

There are lots of good things about the house and location, we will be okay. There is not so much vagrant activity and active crime and mental health crises happening right outside our windows. Our bedrooms are upstairs so we are insulated from most of the street noise.

With our budget, we could get an okay house in a crappy location, or a crappy house in an okay location, one isn't necessarily better than the other, so, we are adjusting and working with what we have.

At least, with the nicer house (despite the griminess), once things are set up, when we are inside, we are comfortable, and it is functional.

List time.

* set up home office (this will require many steps, heavy lifting, and moving multiple pieces of furniture, so it's not really one thing.)
* printer
* fairy hair storage shelf
* misc fairy hair shipping items

* print labels and ship orders

...

* find and take progesterone this morning
* set up dresser

........

* get those little stools I liked at the Goodwill, drop off donations

* see if there's a small shelf that will work in the smaller bathroom

* check new swim schedule at comm center

* get more 3/4 brackets at Home Depot so we can finish the barrier along the banisters for Avalanche

...

* Finish cleaning out old apartment today, get the last few remnants of stuff. (There is like, half a cabinet here and there and a few random odds and ends, the cleaning supplies cabinet also, if I can't get it all I can just stick it in the storage unit in the basement before the cleaners come tomorrow, but I should be able to get all of it in one trip, I think.)

* copy trash key

* ugh brain stopped working I can't remember what else to do lol.

....

Being on three hours of sleep is not good, I'm going to go eat and see how much I can do before I crash, I guess.

At least the kitchen is clean, the fridge has food, we can eat. My room is very cold, I might need to get a space heater (we got rid of our small one, pretty sure, but I'll dig around and see if I can unearth it).

The most important things are getting my office at least partially functional and finishing the old apartment. Everything else can be tackled tomorrow or later. I have to work all day Thursday and Friday. I miss the outdoors and aerial and exercise, none of that has happened in over a week. But this is temporarily, eventually I'll be settled and can get back to taking care of myself appropriately.

Seeing a new physical therapist about my back, tomorrow. We'll see if they can help at all. I'm in so much pain.

I am grateful that we can be in a house for a bit. I am totally overwhelmed by the cost, I do not consider it ours, I consider it on loan from the bank with a balance I can literally never fathom paying off. We do not own a home, we live in a house that could be yanked away at any moment and what we own is an insurmountable mountain of debt.

Josh thinks he can surmount it, eventually. Or, we will sell and go back to apartment living. We'll see how it goes.

Maybe I am just feeling negative because I am underslept and underfed and have a raging headache and too much to do with too little time and not enough support. Josh is gentle and a wonderful partner, but all he managed to do in the kitchen yesterday was dump chicken noodle soup all over the gas range. It is a 25 year old stove and I am nervous it can't handle a soup dumping. It took me half an hour to try to clean everything. He did not help. But maybe that was because I spent too much time scolding him and freaking out. We're both struggling and tired and scared. I am trying to be more forgiving and kind. I made him coffee this morning. We're doing okay.

I am grateful. I know I am very privileged, and to many my life would be an absolute dream. Just very stressed and tired.

keplers_angels posted a book meme and I will play, I do need to say that I viscerally dislike a lot of books I've read, I have some particular sort of sensitivity that makes reading stories really painful when they don't resonate well with me, like I really severely dislike that feeling and I avoid a lot of classic fiction reading for this reason. I have been able to pick up more reading in the last 3-4 years and it's been great, I am slowly getting better at finding things I like and immediately putting down things I don't (like that Italo Calvino, I wish I'd just stopped one chapter in instead of pushing through that painful hautiness and distain for anything gentle).

"bold what you've read, italicize what you intend to read, and underline what you loved"

1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling (started it and hated it. I think I suffered all the way through book 1.)
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee (pretty sure I read this and blocked it out.)
6 The Bible (way too much of it)
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 1984 - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller (I have a vague feeling I read this in college but I don't remember)
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare (most?)
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald (I just think of this guy as Hemmingway's friend lol)
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy (I tried, alas)
25 The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams (I liked it a lot and it lives rent free inside my head but a lot of it also makes me uncomfortable because of the sarcasm, so not sure I can say I love it, but I did read it twice. I did carry a towel for a while. I did get excited when I turned 42. He has a book I much prefer called Last Chance to See.)
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll (and Through the Looking Glass)
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame (foundational)
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy (I couldn't finish it)
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis (I loved them at the time)
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez (That fish swimming through the window scene)
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood (I want to read others by her but not this one.)
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley (I might have not finished it)
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck (so sad)
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac (boring)
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones's Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville (boring - maybe coming-of-age boy stories are dull for me)
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett (foundational)
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce (I tried! I got part way! I felt like I read for an eternity and was still at the very beginning)
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens The only thing I don't like about this is how it feeds the compulsive drive to over-give when one is already an over-giver and does not actually have resources to spend on lavishing others with gifts.
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte's Web - EB White Foundational. I love spiders always and forever. I have a porch spider at the new house and I am so in love with her.
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (read one of them! Kinda fun I guess but again, very male oriented)
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery (I feel like I've tried on recommendation and couldn't get into it? Maybe I should try again.)
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams (I hated this as an adolescent because of all the death, but I feel a lot better about it now. I sometimes dress as the Black Rabbit of Inle for Halloween.)
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare I love how "to be or not to be" is one of the least interesting moments in this play.
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl Loved it so much I read the sequel. It was fun too!
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo (Josh seemed too sad after this one.)

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"All the world will be your enemy, Prince With A Thousand Enemies. And whenever they catch you, they will kill you. But first, they must catch you. Digger, listener, runner, Prince With A Swift Warning. Be cunning, and your people will never be destroyed." - Richard Adams, Watership Down

posted a huge long to-do list when I got home from my surgery consultation this morning but it's lunch time and I have totally crashed, and am fighting an oncoming paralysis, it is an odd sensation, a slowing, an ache, a sudden total loss of energy, a stiffening - it feels like rigor mortis is trying to set in.

The visit was a little strange. Tyler came with me, I am so grateful. I was just really stressed when I got there, as it is a place for surgical oncology; even though I do not have cancer, they sent me to a cancer surgeon. She does a lot of these though, she reassured me, and the surgery itself will be (spoiler alert, there is no "if") less invasive than I feared. Just a small chunk of tissue being removed, like the size of a dime or so I guess, I will be sedated but not under general anesthesia thank goodness. She just needs to take out a bigger chunk of tissue, to a) make sure everything is out, although it looks like the biopsy did get most of it and very likely all, and b) to test this bigger sample of tissue to make totally sure this is just atypia and not a pre-cancerous development/growth. The majority of these never develop into anything. But since I have a high risk for breast cancer due to my breast tissue density (the highest level density is level 4, which I have) and now this atypia, it is recommended that I get annual MRI imaging going forward. Fun times! My friend Liz has to do this too, as her family has rampant breast cancer and she already in her early 40s is starting to show some calcifications which can be nothing but can also indicate trouble - they are unusual at her age.

We will get a baseline MRI before the surgery.

Surgery will most likely be in December.

I won't be jumping or bouncing, or heavy lifting for a couple weeks after. "No raking leaves" she said, this time of year. But by December that won't be thing.

I might go rake leaves at the house today? Our poor deck is covered. I love the oak trees though (One is half on our property, the other is in a neighbor's yard, they are big and lovely. I love trees.)

I tried to eat some food to perk myself up but I still just want to stop moving altogether. Maybe I can try to make myself go swimming, today. I am going to skip most of the smaller chores - hair henna can wait, I think. No dancing tonight most likely, I have gained so much belly pooch from all this stress, I feel so bloated and uncomfortable, not a state I want to dance in.

Tyler and I talked about doctors and why they choose what they do. He has been shadowing one and said often the harder part of the job is dealing with the children of older sick parents. I did not have this issue when my mom got cancer, because her dementia had already severely progressed and I had long since given up the idea of having a mom - anyway she disowned me in my mid-30s - but Tyler explained that most people in their 40s or 50s still see their parents as their attachment point, the place they would retreat to if everything in their world fell apart, Tyler says he still feels this way about his mom, and when these people who are parents get sick in their 70s, the kids freak out and cause a lot of stress around an already very difficult situation.

I guess I see this with Karissa, she loses her shit whenever her dad's health is unstable - he had stomach cancer six years ago and has been in remission since but occasionally has difficulty since he does not have a stomach at all anymore - she gets all teary and irrational and I can't help but think, what a luxury.

Cynthia and I don't really have this problem. Cynthia's dad died during covid and she's been taking care of her mom financially for as long as I've known her.

Just makes me think about compassion, and love, and sadness, and grief.

I had an extremely intense and strange day yesterday, part of which involved getting trapped at the post office while shipping out an order, and witnessing Tigard police surround and take down a guy who had been threatening people with a knife on the street. He was carrying a jug of booze in one hand and a gallon of water in the other, looked homeless and unwashed, and very out of control. He did not obey their commands but didn't seem to understand them? He was shot with some non-lethal rounds of something and then slipped on some slimy leaves in the rain and the guy who was closest to him grabbed his arm and wrestled him to the ground and that was it. He was okay, still talking and able to stand when I finally abandoned my blocked-in car and walked three blocks down the main street in Tigard to the coffee shop I have already fallen in love with. I waited out the clog of police vehicles with a latte and some apples and peanut butter, I love that this is on their menu, it is a favorite snack of mine and I can't have it at home, as Josh is deathly allergic to peanuts.

Watching the slipperiness of the leaves take this guy out I wondered why police don't just throw lubricant on the ground whenever they want to hobble someone. That would keep them from running or being able to get away. I guess then all the cops would be sliding around too, lol - that would be a fun game to watch. Anyway, slippery leaves, can be powerful.

The rest of the day involved admin work and a lot of house stuff, internet is set up and I got a couple patio chairs, two padded folding chairs, and a single bar stool from the thrift store. The kitchen has a bar along one side. It's a start, at least there's somewhere to sit. I registered our appliances and ran my first load of laundry, figured out the solar patio lights, stuff like that.

I want to go back there. I really enjoyed it. The house is not perfect but it's comfortable and big and pleasant and it feels really safe. There's something very safe about the vibe, there. We're boxed in and off a busy street and it's hard to park and we can't see much sky, but it feels safe.

The crawlspace is sealed. The windows are done. Now all we need urgently is to fix the fence. One thing at a time.

We move Sunday! I need to build a railing upstairs for Avalanche today if I can, I'm going to try to at least get started on it. That might be more important than swimming, today. We'll see.

I'm so tired. I couldn't sleep last night in anticipation of my appointment, I was so nervous and stressed out. My surgeon is a bit too upbeat and sing-songy for me, but it could be worse. She's nice.

It feels a little weird to just be told what's going to happen to my body, and to be asked if I understand, and not be asked for input or for any questions about me (other than "do you do drugs" and "how many family members have you lost to cancer" but nothing about how that feels or what it means to me personally), as if I am just a malfunctioning car or something.

crashed super hard after my halloween high. this is expected, anytime I am happy, but I hit a bit harder than usual. I think all of the unknowns with my breast problem (will they take the whole thing? both of them? or just cut a little? or will I have a non-surgical option - guessing this is unlikely as my referral is with an oncology surgeon), along with just hating to move - I am glad to leave this apartment but the new house is so far away, I don't like that part of the city at all, I know I can find things to not hate but it's just a sickening feeling to realize I have to live there, I will have to drive through that every day for the next 10-20 years at least, oof. It will not be sickening overall, I will get used to it and the house it self and our neighbors are lovely, it'll be fine, it's just so hard not to spin out about all the bad stuff, right now. there is a bunch of damage to the siding right now, post-roofing, and the roofers aren't responding to my messages? I realize it's Sunday. I think they are finishing up tomorrow and I don't know, I guess we will have to paint the sections of siding they cut off and replaced with bare siding that doesn't match the house? I was not expecting that. :(

On the plus side, somehow my porch spider friend is still there. I thought for sure they would murder her. I'm glad to still have her. I hope Josh's parents don't try to kill her as a favor to me. (I like Josh's parents and they would only do this out of well-intentioned kindness, but they spray their yard for bugs 2x a month, something I find abhorrent, environmentally, but hold my tongue about.)

I wasn't able to work yesterday and I am still not able to, so far, today, I really need to get my appointments opened but after last week I am dreading it so much. Tomorrow is going to be so hard. Two new people and one disabled one so I will have to set up downstairs for her, and then re-set everything halfway between the other clients. I am already tired tomorrow.

Cynthia and Derrick invited us over for dinner and I wanted to bake pie and cookies but seriously right now all I want to do is curl up in bed and cry.

It is the *prettiest* day outside today. There are good things. It's just hard to enjoy them in this condition.

We had a really beautiful birthday brunch with Josh's parents, to celebrate his mom's birthday. I sparkled her hair. They gave us a big table. It was really fun. We have lots of leftovers.

I am not hungry and have been eating anyway. I am allowing this. There are worse things. Mostly it's been fruit. And some chocolate pretzels (not too many). I'm just... still full from brunch and have no business eating more at all. It's okay.

I just want this week to be over. I have to meet with rat people, figure out how to keep Avalanche safe from the high ledges in the house before we move her over, set up cable internet, find help for the crawlspace before it gets soaked and rat infested (if it isn't already), I have to take another orange cone to the house after dinner tonight because the one I left last week already went missing? (No reply from the movers about this.) I guess I have to write my address and DO NOT MOVE on the cone, this time.

I will need to rent a carpet shampooer since Josh is hiring movers and their muddy boots will be tracking all over the fully carpeted house. Have I mentioned how much I hate carpet. We will rip it all out some time in the next five years, whenever we've saved up enough to do so.

I really wasn't planning to be a homeowner. I hope it doesn't feel so awful all winter. I hope I can adjust. I don't have a choice, I guess. It's all just really overwhelming.

I am grateful for my husband, for his parents, for my job, grateful to have a place to live, even if it is expensive and stressful to make it work.

I am dreading telling the step-fam I am not coming for Thanksgiving. I just. Don't want to go. It feels terrible to not go. It feels terrible to go. There is no winning. My step-dad stole from my mom, while she was sick and disabled. He stole from my brother. He indirectly stole from me (did not repay debt, took money that could have been used to help care for mom before she died. He even kept the spousal death credit after he abandoned her at her time of most need and lied to me about having divorced her before she died). They all act like this didn't happen, and/or like all should be forgiven anyway, because "we are family." I can't play along with this anymore.

Exhausted from staying out until well after 2am last night. Doing it again tonight! I need a nap!

Wanted to make a wish list of things I want to do today, all or none or some might happen lol.

* take a nap

* get Halloween stuff out of the garage, find tote bag for treats and devil tail! Do I have red glitter horns? I feel like I did once but now I am unsure.

* carve Jack pumpkin (this will only take me about half an hour, needs to happen! I did carve pumpkins earlier but they died already. I need at least one! Even though we are technically not allowed to put decorations outside at this apartment. I always do, on this night.)

* get costume pieces together for tonight

* make pumpkin pie or pumpkin bread or pumpkin shortbread or oat cookies? (I want to make all of these things but it's already 2pm and I haven't napped yet!)

* swing by Andrea's with reverse trick-or-treat gift

* get ready for Ben and Deb's party and Halloween at Coffin tonight! It starts at 8!!! Not sure what time we will get there but I feel like I should get deviled up by 6 at the latest.

I am soooooooooooooooooooooooooo happy. Halloween is my absolute favorite. Need to go get a PSL! And then nap hahahaha. I am the queen of the coffee nap lol.

Might grab a matcha for Josh while I'm there.

Just roasted a new to me organic pumpkin from the haunted corn maze farm (Bella Organic) that was touted as "the sweetest" pumpkin for pies, has a french name I don't remember, it's a pretty peach shade with sugar warts all over it (indicates sweetness as these are created by sugar seeping out of the skin)

The seeds are wonderful! Just roasted them. Excited to bake with the pumpkin. I'm a little nervous that it's on the watery side but we'll see how it goes. I enjoy Buttercup and Kabocha for their dryness (makes dense, fluorescent orange pies).

Blissssssssssssssssssed out beyond belief omg. Had such a wonderful night dancing at Shadowplay last night. Halloween edition was INSANE but Derek made space behind his booth and took care of me. He came out to fetch me from the street before I even asked! (There was a line.) So grateful. I will wear my belt tonight so he doesn't have to stash my stuff.

I keep posting publicly and then locking it. Not willing to share so openly about this current health scare, but need to get it out at least for a short while here and there.

Saw the new PCP today and I am not a fan, but beggars can't be choosers I guess, it's just not a good personality fit. I get that people avoid vaccines for dumb reasons, but getting such bad vertigo that I couldn't do aerial for a month is not a dumb reason to avoid further covid vaccines, and I did FOUR of them before that happened, so it's not like I'm an anti-vaxxer - I *required* people to be vaccinated to get hair sparkles. But she's acting like I'm uneducated for refusing. I always had bad reactions to flu vaccines and have always avoided them, but I got my TDAP and my TB and several others that she should be able to see on my chart. Dismissing me as brainwashed by chatgpt is not fair, I don't even use chatgpt or AI at all, I don't trust it one bit. It hallucinates, I've seen it make really bad mistakes and it's getting worse, not better.

So that's annoying.

She's also overly fakey-nice and hyper-apologetic. Like, please just be real. Like has kicked the shit out of me and I'm still standing, don't treat me like a wounded animal. I'm tougher than I look. I think all my trauma in my chart and all the family deaths and cancer have her a bit scared of me. I guess rightly so. I do feel like a walking corpse, often. Most people can't relate to my experience unless they're in their 60s and beyond.

Anyway. This is my only option. I guess I know now why she had availability. Sigh.

When I told her how I bristled at the term "pre-cancer," she explained why that's a normal term people use for my condition. Because it "could" evolve into cancer. Great, thanks for making it worse, I guess? Can't that happen anyway? Just call life "pre-death" then while you're at it? Can we focus on the fact that I don't have cancer because that's what I'd like to do.

It's okay, I know she's doing her best, she's just doing the best she can with the information she has. Maybe if she gets to know me she'll realize I'm actually not AI-addicted or a tiktoker.

I did lecture at Harvard once. I am smarter than I look, in this little skeleton hoodie.

Maybe that was a wrong choice for a hospital, oops.

I think it just started raining.

I need to jump in the shower and get ready for the club, I guess. I want to go but I'm kind of dreading the post-show vibe. I will go late and stay late and I do want to see Duncan. It's a costume night but I will just zip on my skeleton onesie. I wish I were in better shape, it looks better on me when I'm skinny. But. I'm not willing to go on a GLP1 shot like all of my skinny friends just yet.

Maybe swimming will help with that, once I move.

I worry about everyone with the benefits getting cut in a couple days. I know people on food assistance. I was on it for several years.

I do wish I could give back more, volunteer, provide real hands on support to people. But I still feel like I can barely keep myself afloat, and expending energy to help others when I'm barely hanging on by a thread does not feel like the responsible choice, at this time in my life. I'm focusing my helping efforts on Josh and Avalanche. Josh is eternally grateful. I think my support genuinely helps his life go more smoothly, and helps him perform better at work, and I'm grateful for that.

I feel like ass.

Maybe a shower will fix it.

I don't have to wear a costume. We'll see how I feel once I'm cleaned up a bit.

They tried to draw my blood at my appointment this morning, which was not in the plan, so I didn't prepare, which I need to. I tried to explain this, and I explained that I am very difficult to get blood from. My doctor insisted that her assistant is "the one I call" for tough cases. But, of course, instead of getting my vein, she stabbed my muscle and proceeded to dig around trying to find purchase. I did not give her a second try and I refused the pneumonia vaccine that this doctor insisted I get, the day before Halloween, which is as sacred to me as Christmas is to most Americans. Not a fair suggestion to spring on me like that. "But I see sick people in the hospital" yeah I'm sure you do and I'm sure it sucks but I'm not ruining my most important holiday to make you feel better about how you're able to control your patients' decisions.

Sorry feeling bristly.

Upset about all of it. I feel dismissed and like a statistic to these people a lot of the time.

I have been unbelievably stressed. My regular self-care routine is falling apart. I burst into tears today with a customer at work whose mom died from alcoholism, I don't know how we got on that topic but I had to drop into silence to hide my tears from her, I did not want her to realize I was crying while sparkling her. Her poor mom. (Alcohol also killed my mother, slowly and insidiously in an indirect way.)

Maybe dancing will help.

Because I LOVED Tron, and I loved the first Tron that came out when I was 7, I need to share - this moment in Tron: Ares when I almost lost it for the adorableness of the throwback action that was happening (it happened a lot in this movie).

( Positive and Negative, huh? )

had wanted so much to journal last night, but was so so exhausted, it was a crazy day.

Shadowplay was really nice Thursday night, despite the unsavory elements in the club. Its location is sketchy and there is no admittance policy, no cover, no dress code, for Thursday nights, so literally anyone off the street can wander in, and they do. My shirt got moved which never happens, I tucked it back behind Derek like I used to always do, and I stuck a little closer to him than usual. He asked if I was okay at one point, and I said sure, it's just too noisy a place to chat about my health problems. "I'm okay just my left boob hurts so much I can't raise my arm because it got stabbed with a giant needle and also they found a potential precursor to cancer and they want to chop it all out of me and I'm a bit freaked out but yeah I'm good" is not an appropriate late night answer to shout over the music, yanno.

( breast health issues. )

There was a moment at Shadowplay when an unsavory dude who was vaping asked me my name while I was trying to dance. I shook my head in a silent decline but there wasn't much space to get away from him, and he stayed leaning over me. A new-ish regular who is this lovely svelte older gentleman who always wears skin tight vinyl shorts, stiletto heels, leather straps, and a mask, carefully, thoughtfully, wedged his little body between me and the vape dude. I have not even learned this guy's name yet, though we have been dancing together for two or three months now. I was so grateful.

One would think at age 50 I wouldn't have to deal with this anymore, but here we are.

It was a lovely night regardless, I got long snuggly hugs with Derek and Manders and I danced some, I am a little annoyed that after her slight breast cancer scare earlier this year that she didn't even acknowledge that I had a biopsy, let alone bothered to ask about the results. But whatevs. It's just more clarity for me that she is not someone I can invest energy into, it's just sad.

I went home sort of early for me, so I was able to get up early enough to clean the entire apartment before work, which felt really, really good. I baked a pumpkin pie, I did all the dishes, I cooked my mushrooms and vegetables and made a really beautiful healthy lunch, I am determined to work on my snacking issues and get back down to a shape I don't dislike so much. I am only 5-8lbs overweight, it's not catastrophic and it is fixable, so I am focusing on this as much as I can, went back to my weight loss meditations, part of this is the breast health scare and wanting to avoid sugar and processed foods as much as possible. Back to cruciferous vegetables on a daily basis for me, hopefully!

The morning Friday was sort of the quiet before the storm, I was able to get outside for my usual ten minutes of outside time with my self-care app and coffee before the rain started. I met a cute little doggie named Georgie. The sky was beautiful and moody as the storm rolled in. By the time I was fed and packed up for work and heading out, it was dumping rain. It did that allllllll day.

Work was intense. I had new people, familiar people, someone who asked for a lesson, someone who I often find challenging to be in the same room with, and then the darling lovely Alisa for two hours straight in the afternoon. She had asked me for extra sparkles as she has multiple trips coming up and also had to put down her 18 year old cat a few days ago. I gave her a little sympathy card, not much but it was something, I drew little paw-prints on it while I had my coffee break at Albina Press before sparkling her. I stood inside and doodled on her card while the rain poured down through the open door next to me, it was so beautiful. I love open air but cozy covered areas like that when it's pouring but not very cold, like it was yesterday.

Alisa wants to go for the world record of most sparkles in her hair of anyone ever, and I am more than happy to help her. Her appt alone cost as much as I sometimes made in an entire day's work, I was very very grateful. But also completely wiped out and exhausted, after. It took forever to clean up all the little sparkle remnants all over the floor, and of course it's a lot to talk about dead animals, a topic that is so hard to avoid when it has just happened to someone. She's delightful and I loved every minute of it but boy was I tired after. I think the dancing the night before plus cleaning the entire apartment the next morning (an hour and a half straight of physical work) was part of it, too, of course.

After I finally had everything cleaned and put away, the sun popped out and there was the most vivid, bright, spectacular rainbow I can ever remember seeing. I just stood and gazed, and took my time picking wet persimmons while watching the leaves of all the trees around me glowing in the sun under that stunning rainbow. It's such a beautiful phenomenon, how lucky are we to live in such a shockingly gorgeous universe.

Went to the grocery store and it was so hard to go inside because the sky was so beautiful. The rainbow faded and all this blue sky with whispy white and golden clouds showed up, colliding with the dark grey and orange roiling storm clouds that had moved east. Watching these two cold fronts come together was a wonder to witness, and I couldn't stop staring for quite a while.

Got home and kind of collapsed. I had hoped to do more chores but I couldn't even journal, I just slept and set an alarm so I could go pick up Josh at the airport later. His flight was delayed so he didn't land until 11:30pm, I was able to fill his tank on the way there, so at least one chore happened. I've been back on my physical therapy and vitamins and skin routine and all of that, my diet is better, I'm starting to perk back up after a slight crash, I think all the sudden scans and procedures after my first mammogram kind of messed me up. I'll be okay.

Looking forward to checking out a new venue with Josh this evening, need to hop in the shower and get ready. My DJ is playing! I'm excited to try out a new place. I skipped Thriller for the first time in like, 15 years today. I just didn't want to be a zombie and go dance in the rain (it's covered, but still, it's outside and one gets muddy getting in and out of the park). I didn't want to dress up, and it still hurts to raise my left arm. Alas. Hopefully I can go back next year. I just... didn't want to? And it seems like they had good attendance and support, this year, without me, which I am glad for. It was a labor of love and maybe I just fell a little bit out of love with it.

Speaking of falling out of love, I should probably tell Finley that I'm leaving.

I haven't gotten my halloween decorations out yet and I'm actually okay with it. There are extenuating circumstances this year, it's okay. I might still grab a few things tomorrow, we'll see how much energy I have. If not, that's fine. I've been wearing all of my halloween clothes and halloween is always alive in my heart, that counts for a lot.

...

Avalanche is doing well, she's a happy kitty. I brushed her for a bit while trying to write this. She's passed out with her favorite toys on the bed, now.

Before Josh got home, I finished off a bin of peanut butter I was saving for when he was gone. I had it with cinnamon and apple slices and it was the most delicious dinner imaginable. I love apples and peanut butter so much.

Excited for sweater weather, soup, and more pies.

I'm soooooooo sad, I had to get a sudden breast biopsy yesterday with no warning, and I'm not supposed to do anything exerting, so I cannot climb Dog Mountain today as planned, I wanted to go sooooooo badly.

I took a walk around my old neighborhood, bought way too expensive groceries, and got a coffee that was way too sweet (it was called "butter coffee" but it's just a boatload of sugar, gross - I was expecting like a paleo MCT oil aka "bullet coffee" type flavor, sigh, sugar is the last thing I need when I have suspicious looking calcifications and am getting checked for cancer) after taking Josh to the airport for another work trip. He hasn't recovered from the last trip and is nervous about traveling again so soon, I worry for him.

I thought, okay, I will pivot and FINALLY get the floors swept and pull out Halloween decorations, since I can't hikw, but here it is 2pm and I'm shut down and not moving :(

My boob hurts :(

Trying to journal myself out of the paralysis.

I want to bake, also, I need to use up pumpkin and sweet potato.

Most important is cleaning, Avalanche is starting to get irritated from the dirty floors (her eyes swell up if I let it go too long, poor baby).

The sun popped back out, I wish I were on a hike in the gorge, I thought about doing something smaller like Angel's Rest, but it's so pretty here today I think I will try to just do a bike ride later instead, sunset-ish bike rides can be nice, despite the traffic - once I get off the busy streets it can be quite pleasant. I like watching the sky change and the crows head to roost. Sunrise this morning was glorious.

Maybe if I eat a microgreens salad to balance out that gross sugar coffee - my throat is sore from it, which is a common reaction when I have too much sugar, it's very toxic to this little fragile body. It gets hard to resist this time of year with all the candy everywhere. I want! But it makes me sick! But I want!

I have two massive long work days ahead of me and it will be stormy the rest of the month which means we lost our window to get the roof on the house which is sad. But we have a house which is crazy, I know I should be grateful but I'm still mostly just scared and a little bit in shock.

...

We saw Tron: Ares last night and I LOVED it so much! It is wonderful. It might help that I am old enough to have an emotional attachment to the first movie, so all the throwbacks were delightful, and I've had a crush on Jared Leto since MSCL back when I was a teenager. It is, I must say, SO refreshing to see someone in their 50s doing action sequences, it makes me feel less hobbled and feeble and what is the word I'm looking for, haggard I guess - I feel like I can't move smoothly or gracefully like I used to, my quick-twitch movements are fading, I cannot sprint or jump anymore, but Jared did just fine, he could pull off the "superhuman strength" appearance just fine at his age. Maybe all is not quite lost, just yet.

I mean, I have early onset arthritis so part of it is not my age but my genetics.

I feel 60-80 years old, most days. I've felt older than I am since my chronic pain began at age 22, before my hip dysplasia got diagnosed, and after hip reconstruction at age 28 I never really felt youthful again. I've always felt vaguely crippled but making the best of it.

uuugghhh so much of me wants to just curl back up into bed. But a clean apartment would be so wonderful. I will watch some housekeeping videos and eat some salad and see how I feel.

...

A dear friend of mine who has always dealt with her high levels of trauma with avoidance is thinking about seeking therapy due to her crippling anxiety, which she feels is a result of not dealing with her trauma. It makes me think about my obscene level of acceptance of mine, to the point that I have been skirting the edge of ego death for a while, now. I think about my insignificance and lack of mattering in this universe alllll the time. I think about how the self is a made-up concept ALL of the time. How my reactions are just biological results of whatever this body has experienced in its 50 years of existence, how little control I have over anything ever. How I'm never really safe, never really held, never really witnessed fully, never really anything meaningful in this world. I get smaller and smaller and little things mean more and more. I am sinking into that elderly space where just looking at the sky is joyful enough to keep going through the day. simple beauty. I will never matter in whatever way I thought I was supposed do. I am a fleeting speck of dust, will not be missed when I am absorbed back into the un-life-ness of existence. It doesn't matter. But it seems like it does, that's the part that can be hard to contend with. I look it right smack in the face, a LOT. It's not normal. I've been forced into this. It can be really scary and a very sickening, empty feeling. But it's important in order to be okay with the imperfection of this little fleeting life I get to live, for however long. I just. Wish I didn't hate beautiful spectacles of wildlife - I became unable to enjoy any wildlife videos after the polar bears started dying of starvation in the 90s. I can't watch oceans or jungles or birds or anything without a sickening sense of dread, due to the mass extinction event that is happening to all of it. And it is my absolute favorite thing ABOUT this planet. It makes me so sad that I have to turn away from what I love most, because it is too painful to think about it all going away.

Anyway. I have been crippled and an emotional wreck for most of my life, but I still think it's a better tactic to look this sort of messy emotional stuff straight in the face, rather than run from it.

When nearly all of your grandparents and parents die horrifically in front of you, each in their own slow terrible way, each in their own time, there isn't anymore hiding from the painful cruelty of a mortal existence. There are of course beautiful things, too, and it is absolutely critical to focus on those, and not let the horrors take over entirely. But awareness is key. Living in the darkness makes the brightness all the more precious and beautiful and a balm to this frightened, aching, tiny little spirit. Closing the door on it jut makes it loom larger in the background, I suspect. Just the charming twist and twirl of the stem of a pumpkin can be enough to get me through the day. When I'm always aware that nothing will save me and I am doomed to pain and oblivion, eventually. For the moment, I live in heaven, and I try my best to appreciate and relish it and not take it for granted. Look at this sunshine! Look at these stunningly vibrant leaves! Look at these clever, funny crows. Today, despite the pain and difficulty motivating, I can be happy and feel some sense of peace, however fleeting.

It is the most spectacularly beautiful October day in all of existence. I had a beautiful bike ride with Cynthia this morning, after using my jumper cables and car battery to jump start a homeless guy's car who was parked where the city wanted to do some tree-trimming. He was super nice, I am sad for his circumstances.

I have to go get a biopsy of my left breast today and I am angry and scared. I don't think there is anything to worry about, it is just because I have "extremely dense breasts" and didn't have a baseline for my first scan because I have always found mammography to be barbaric - I read a history of its development when I was younger and it is sexist as fuck. I am quite certain that this is not how they scan for testicular cancer - so I waited until age 50 to do it. This is my punishment. I am still in pain from the additional scans I had to do yesterday, I am considering taking some ancient hoarded vicodin before I leave, though I probably shouldn't be driving on that stuff. Even if it's ten years old and has lost most of its potency.

Sigh.

I had a biopsy on my cervix that was painful and barbaric and ended up being absolutely unnecessary and a couple years later the news hit that having women do that particular kind of screening was a scam from the health care industry to make more money by creating false fear and recommending unnecessary painful invasive procedures for women. I was in pain and bleeding for weeks. For nothing. And here we are again.

But later tonight I will take my husband on a double date with some very kind friends and I will gaze at Robot Jared Leto for ~2 hrs while listening to NIN. Possibly while on drugs.

Things my Finch app has helped me with:

* getting out of my youtube addiction
* taking supplements daily
* physical therapy daily
* teeth brushing daily (this used to upset me so much, missing this basic task so often)
* reaching out to friends more often
* appreciating the beauty around me in small quiet moments
* reading
* getting 10 min of natural light in the mornings outside
* taking permission for rest breaks
* accepting myself where I am at in the moment
* regularly revisiting favorite memories
* breaking through blockages to do hard things like fill out closing document forms and other hard things
* staying consistent with hormones
* red light therapy, skin care and such

Things the app has yet to impact much:

* work procrastination/avoidance
* housework (it helps a tiiiiiny bit, I need some heavy lifting, here)
* snacking (seemed like it helped for a moment but now not so much)
* evening walks (again, it seemed like it helped the first week and now not so much, maybe I need a different schedule or phrasing on the goal to try to trigger this to happen)
* bank runs
* overall mood (remains unchanged)
* grief (no help at all whatsoever as far as I can tell)
* guilt and discomfort over family dynamics with my brother and step-fam
* exercise
* showering more frequently (maybe once or twice has it helped with this)
* staying on top of car maintenance
* creativity or art, writing or decorating, very little of this is happening, still

Just reflecting. I'm grateful for everything it is helping with!

I hit a wall on my list of things to do today while driving around like a madwoman trying to get it all done and realizing I was dangerously overdue for an oil change. I got that done but it was SLOW and I was just done after that.

Lots of documents to go through for the house but we're chipping away at it, look at us, being adults together.

I think because of the house buying process, because of my mammogram tomorrow and my friend's breast cancer not responding to chemo, remembering my mom's house getting foreclosed on, watching her lose everything and become a ward of the state with alcohol-induced dementia, and then having to escort her through endometrial cancer radiation and surgeries, the childlike nostalgia I have over the changing weather and Halloween, I just hit a tsunami of unbearable grief, in the midst of all the errands, today.

( dreams )

...

Missing my mom suddenly and devastatingly, today.
I miss my dad, too. He died 25 years ago.
I miss what it felt like to have grandparents, as a small child (my dad's parents were no longer living when I was born, but my mom's were around when I was little.)
Wishing for a relative to laugh/cry over the osteo-arthritis in my hands commonly termed "Mommy Thumbs," while never having had the chance to be a mommy.
There are many blessings in my life. But also many gaping black holes of loss that I sometimes stumble into, unaware, unexpectedly, and then I'm lost in the dark for a few moments/hours/days.

I think I have a ghost child who has unintentionally injured my hands with her invisible yet chronic neediness. Maybe she made friends with Lunar, who has haunted our apartment since his death. I don't believe in ghosts, not even cat ghosts, but that doesn't change the fact that Lunar is haunting this apartment.

Chaos in my mind, swimming swimming spiraling thoughts, need to make a list!

( list for moi )

I feel really good after getting up at 6am today, still in the darkness, to fill water jugs and the tea kettle and get henna in my hair and do all the dishes and shower and such before the water got shut off at 8am this morning. It will be off until 2pm. I am not sad to be leaving this problematic apartment complex. All apartments have their issues, but I have literally lost count of how many days we have had to go without water this year. It's at least 2x per month on average, for a while there it was every week. Power often gets shut off as well. I hope such things are more consistent where we are going. The house we will have more control over, but public utilities are another matter. Hopefully it will be okay.

I am *so nervous* about every aspect of home ownership. I could not sleep at all last night, so worried about the loan and mortgage and how to keep the house in tact and clean and in working order and comfortable and everything. It's daunting, to say the least. Nothing like say, parenting, but still.

Going to run off to silks soon, but I also wanted to journal about yesterday.

Had a ton of work to get done in the morning so I spent my day until about 1pm boxing up orders and cooking meals for Josh and such.

Finally got out the door and grabbed a latte, shipped my orders, and drove out to Saddle Mountain.

It was warm and sunny and I didn't get on the trail until 3:40pm, so I motored up as fast as I could within reason. Enjoyed the birds and chipmunks and squirrels, ravens and swallows and the autumn dryness and late flowers, most stuff has gone to seed at this point. Lots of mushrooms but I wasn't looking for them - the shaggy chanterelle were especially cute.

Reached the summit at 4:51, had it to myself, took ten minutes to hydrate and snack and gaze at the ocean and surrounding hills.

I'm really grateful to my body for being able to do this. My hands and hip and feet hurt a bit when I was done, but not too bad. I feel like I'm re-building my fitness after a really sad spring and summer. I feel hopeful this can continue. I just sort of had to re-set how hard I can actually push myself, and adjust my activity levels, but I'm slowly filling back in some of the activities I lost, and feel able to do them at a slightly softer pace. This is appropriate for my age and where I am in life, it's okay. It was really difficult to be forced to slow down, but I'm okay.

Looking forward to more time for art and wings and letter writing/snail mail and reading and today the weather is shifting, high of 62 and mostly overcast, and tomorrow the rain begins again. I'm actually excited for sweater weather and snuggly evenings on the couch with Josh watching spooky movies.

I'm tiiirrreeeed - got up too early lol. But need to grab some snacks and run off to silks!

I have my first mammogram tomorrow and I am DREADING it, I have to work all day tomorrow and Friday, but I have the weekend to myself, yay! Hopefully Saturday will be visiting a donkey sanctuary and carving pumpkins with Steph, that would be so nice.

just wanted to relay the most fascinating moment experienced with Joshter recently, I meant to mention it in therapy but maybe I'll just reflect on it here - I need to make this quick because I need to pick up prescriptions and come home and bake a pie, but first I just don't want to forget....

We had been talking about really deep stuff, we've been doing this more lately, he's gotten more tolerant of it and I'm so grateful, and were exploring the topic of selfhood, and somehow swerved into this idea I've been playing with that nothing I do is ever really in my control, that selfhood/ego is a useful illusion but that everything is predestined by our genetics and we aren't really at any sort of steering wheel - that is just a useful concept to keep us feeling engaged in a chaotic world where all control is an illusion. It would be really hard to relate to others and navigate without this pretend sense of self, and that itself is also predetermined genetically.

I related to him this experience of seeing my dog's puppies come out with fully in tact, distinct personalities from day 1 of their little lives that never changed at all, no matter what they experienced. And I reminded Josh about that experience he had of reading a book written by a cousin of his who he had never known, and seeing the extreme parallels of their two lives, to the point that Josh suddenly felt like he wasn't his own person at all, that he was just a carbon copy of this cousin.

"Isn't it the most wonderful feeling?" I was expressing to him happily.

"It was HORRIBLE!" he exclaimed in abject revulsion.

It took a while for me to tease out why it felt so bad to him to feel this sensation, when it felt good to me.

But it's because - Josh's life has been great! Barely anything bad has ever happened to him. And this unwell society we live in teaches us that if we have good lives, it's because we're good people who did good things and worked hard and deserved it, and people who have difficult lives are bad people who did bad things and deserve it.

But that's completely untrue. Some of us (hi! I'm some of us) have a terrible hand of cards dealt to us through absolutely no fault of our own, and have a shitton of miserable experiences that have nothing to do with our moral capacity or self-discipline or ability to work hard or make good choices or do right things, and none of it has anything to do with deserving anything.

I'm not saying we have zero responsibility - we absolutely do have full responsibility over our lives and we have to recognize and claim that, no matter what. Who else will? This is our life, we didn't ask for it, but we have to work with what we are given as best we can. There is no other way to exist.

But we also need to understand the privilege and circumstances that brought us to good things and bad things, bad choices and good choices, the ability to see clearly enough to make needed changes, and to give others grace (while not forgiving or allowing harmful behavior) who have failed in whatever way, for not having the best chances for success.

Anyway, just something I wanted to make a note of. It was just such a funny contrast. And a fun thing to explore and share together.

all is right with the world for there are persimmons on a neighborhood tree that are ready to pick and take home for the most delicious snax.

my happiness calendar for today reads: You are the only magic you need

:)

I am exhausted. I had an amaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaazing time at coffin club last night, that was the best night i can remember there in recent memory, definitely the best since my birthday or perhaps for the entire calendar year. Was grateful that some folks were away and the crowd was young and sparkly and so sweet, I felt so safe. I cannot even count how many compliments I got, almost all from women, they were all so kind, and the men were respectful and easy to be around. People were happy but not *too* happy (read: not wasted). Derek SERVED. The music was HOT.

I stayed too late and then had sexytime with Joshter and then just could not sleep, my sleep tracker says I got 3 1/2 hours of sleep, oops. I will crash any moment.

Still have soooooooooooooo much to catch up on, Wednesday wrecked me and Thursday was rough too, I am so so tired omg. But I MUST upload documents and pay rents, and I *really* want to be baking an apple pie by 4pm so that I can bring it to Cynthia at 6pm. If I want a nap, it has to start very very soon. I can hopefully upload documents while the pie is in the oven?

I had a big long hard bike ride with Cynthia this morning and it was exactly what I needed.

Her friend Hanne is not doing great with her breast cancer treatment - the chemo is really rough on her and so far her tumors are not shrinking :( We are worried.

I am just finishing up All the way to the River by Elizabeth Gilbert and I do NOT recommend it. I do think it is heartfelt but unfortunately there is too much privilege wrapped up in it for me, personally. And wow, the way some people handle death is so... repulsive. (This book documents the author's falling in love with her best friend and then watching her die of pancreatic and liver cancer.) I feel very, VERY bristly at anyone who treats the dying as if they are already dead. And also at enablers who abandon their charges when they become "unmanageable." (But that's my recovery talking, and Liz does discover her own addictions and codependency issues in this book and goes to 12 step to get sober. So that's progress. It's just sad it took her that long to figure it out.)

I unfortunately stumbled upon a review of this book yesterday that called her style "priv-lit" (privileged literature - aka rich white american lady lit) and suggested a re-titling of "All the way to the Bank," and talked about it being exploitative of her partner's death. :( I dunno. I was hoping I could find some gems but. I dunno. I regret trying.

It is GRIPPING, though, there is no arguing that Liz is a wonderful writer and I could not put it down and I will finish it (I'm almost done). For a very dark bummer of a distraction, it would do in a pinch.

I am so lucky in so many ways, the sun is out and I feel so so hopeful. Dancing hurt my foot and my back a little, but not so much that I couldn't bike up a storm with Cynthia this morning, I was able to keep up with that beast of a biker (she used to be a professional distance road racer) through a sleep-deprived mania of happiness just to be in her presence and up and moving in the morning in a body that was only very quietly achey, instead of the screaming it's been doing for the last several months.

I have hope that I can work around my arthritis, going forward, and that I am making the right decisions, so far, in my communication with this newly fragile form of a body I have been gifted with.

I am endlessly grateful for this gift.

I am also SO GLAD the house I work out of was booked today so that I was forced to take an extra day off, I need it desperately after getting raked over the coals this week - Josh and I both.

Cannot wait to spend tonight and tomorrow night with my best friends. I will mushroom hunt with Tyler tomorrow afternoon. I will work all day Sunday and Monday. All is well. I even cleaned the bathroom sink and swept the floors! I've been cooking tons of beautiful food and eating well, my body is thankful and so am I.

As I was getting dressed and debating the skimpy strappy shorts or the tendril skirt, Josh and I agreed that I should go for the skimpy stuff, because, "who knows how much longer I'll be able to get away with it. I doubt I'll be wearing these when I'm 60." :)

Coffin Club is so spiritually nourishing, for me. So so grateful for the goth community, and my little dark spooky home away from home.

The Finch self-care app has a spooky manor theme this month, speaking of spooky! At the end we get a little black cat micropet! I am over the moon about this :D

In a lot of physical pain today, I guess I messed up my back doing silks yesterday. Maybe doing silks while crying is not ideal.

The tears were mostly from the stress of the home buying process. It's gutting in its terror, for me, but Josh wants this so badly and I have let him down enough times. He has done so, so much for me, I need to put some faith in him that we can do this. I would rather not. My childhood home was foreclosed on. Watching the bank take back your parents' house is an awful experience, there are no words for the way it disrupts, permanently, any psychological notions (however false) of safely, stability, a place to call home, any sort of safety net. (My grandparents died when I was young or before I was born, sick and in pain, we have no other connected relatives, there has never been anything left to fall back on.) I don't want to experience anything like that ever again.

So, I cried a lot, yesterday, signing away my life savings for an unknown risk.

I was not happy with my realtor, and then embarrassed at my own behavior (I picked him out, after all), and he called me specifically to try to help calm me down a little bit, and offered gently that he could understand, because his parents also had their house foreclosed on, so, he could see why I would feel fearful and overwhelmed. It was kind of him to listen and have some real patience with my over-emotional over-sharing. It was nice not to feel judged or dismissed for being silly or overdramatic, as is usually the way when I try to make adult/major financial decisions and get overwhelmed and paralyzed.

It's an odd sensation, to take on a massive, incomprehensible debt, and pour ones life's savings (however meager mine happens to be) but a debt that at least you can live inside? How bizarre.

Anyway it's not set in stone until closing so we'll see how it goes.

I wanted to get SO MUCH done today, but I still haven't even managed to get my appointment schedule out to open appts for the month, and here it is 3pm, the sun is out after hours of rain, most of the day is already gone and I feel like I've done nothing. But I've been busy and nauseated all day working. I wish I had more to show for it. I'll get there.

Hot flashes get more bearable when the weather cools, lol.

I need a shower desperately.

Need to box up an order and ship it, visit the neighbor's plants one last time, send out checks and pay rent and pick up prescriptions and I reeeeeeeeeally wanted to get housework done today, sigh. My back says otherwise.

Viewing this talk is just as helpful now as it was when I first found it in 2018.

Watch on YouTube

Still absolutely loving the little Finch self care app, but one downside is that I have not been journaling much at all.

It got me off my social media and youtube addiction, but it has also taken my attention away from here, and I don't love that. I will figure out a way to come back. I think maybe eventually the novelty will wear off and it won't captivate me quite so much. One issue is that it asks for "reflections" and other journal-like prompts, but they are only a couple of sentences and not stored anywhere, so it really just evaporates into space and I can't learn from myself that way, the way I can here. Here I can see my thoughts and review them and look at them from a distance and it helps *so much* in processing the often unhealthy ways I view and internally express what I am feeling or struggling with. I need to get back here.

That said, I put on my app a goal of at least doing a 3 thing per day gratitude practice, here, so I will try that, starting tonight (separate entries for daily gratitude list).

...

Today I was able to do some chores in the morning, hash out some issues with Josh surrounding the house that it looks as if we may purchase together (EEP), and took a nice long hard bike ride in the last of the sunny beautiful early fall days before the rain starts in earnest, tomorrow. I will hopefully pivot to housework and baking, lol.

During the bike ride I picked up a glass vase out of a free pile, while starting the (audio) book All The Way To The River by Elizabeth Gilbert. Though I've watched a few of her TED talks, I haven't read any of her books since Eat Pray Love, but despite the fact that her concept of "souls" and "god" does not resonate with me at all and seems childish and cliche and shallow, she is charming and disarmingly honest, her love is real, she is as true to herself as she knows how to be, and that's all that really matters.

I am noticing a theme of following along with people my age, and what happens when we hit our 50s. I actually loved that Jennifer Grey wrote her memoir in her early 60s, and I want to keep an eye out for more books from women of that age, as I resonate with them more than women my own age, who seem to be lagging behind a little, mostly because most of them still have parents, haven't even been without their grandparents for very long, and haven't lost several close friends to cancer, as I have. I feel closer in spirit to 70 year olds than 50 year olds. This is not an exaggeration. I know several 70 year olds and they are just further along in life, in so many ways, that I was forced to be, way too young. Not in every way. Of course there is tons I still have to learn, I am not 70. I am not confident I will reach that age.

Anyway.

After the vase pickup I went to the farmers market for the last ten minutes, was able to get delicious brewed coffee and picked up some veggies and an inexpensive bundle of sunflowers that fit perfectly in the vase I found. Josh met me at a nearby coffee shop and we discussed/resolved more house stuff and I'm terrified but feeling a bit better about it. I still need to finish the home buyers education modules I downloaded, I am going to try to work on those in the morning. I am too tired, tonight. It's stressful but important. I want to understand the closing process better before I actually move forward.

Got a big hug from Ian at the market. I should have messaged Karissa. I will reach out tomorrow.

I didn't journal about Jasmine thinking she lost our mutual friend's cat, and then the cat turning back up magically (I suspect she may have never left and was just hiding).

I have not journaled about the festival, or the vampire ball, or the second trip to Timberline, yet. I want to write about these things, I do. But right now, I want to read my friends page and listen to my new weird quirky river book.

Going to sip this sweet gentle cup of chamomile tea and turn in early, I think. Been really enjoying the red light mask Tyler gave me. I need more mushroom hunting with that guy.

..

trimmed Avalanche's claws while she was sleeping. It's the best time to do it, sometimes she barely wakes up to protest. I had to treat her for fleas last week, after several days of suspecting I might need to - but I brushed her with a flea comb every day and never found any signs, until one day I saw flea dirt on her chin (I think the flea was also there but by the time I grabbed her to look it ran off and only the dirt was left, but it was unmistakable. But after I treated her, I checked and checked and checked multiple times a day for dead fleas or more dirt and found not a single molecule of evidence of anything. So maybe I really did catch it before they had a chance to reproduce, and there was really only one? Fortunately she tolerated the medication (pesticide) just fine and now I know she's good for a while.

...

I cried and cried and cried over my mom this morning. This happens a lot. Most days lately I don't cry as much, but today it was half an hour of soft sobbing. I don't know what to do, this sadness haunts me constantly. I need to find a healthier way to process it. Maybe I can do some research on how to process unresolved grief. I am so sad about how she died, it was a traumatic process to witness at such close proximity, for so many slow, long, painful years. I am so sad about how I treated her when I was younger, how she treated me, how it was never really anyone's fault, how I know she was doing the best she could with the tools she was given, and so was I. But it wasn't good. Except for the parts that were wonderful. It's just all so heartbreaking and gutwrenching. I get overwhelmed and paralyzed by all of it, regularly. My dad's death is even sadder in many ways, and my grandparents both also died so painfully and miserably, long before dad died, which was 25 years ago now, it's all just too awful to bear. They were all so wonderful in their ways. They seemed powerful and magical to me as a small child. (Well, I never met my dad's parents, but I remember my mom's.) They seemed like everything. To have seen all of them reduced to ash and forgotten is just... untenably sad.

...

I showed Josh the 90s movie The Birdcage last night. He asked me why Robin Williams was depressed. He looked so worried. He's seen me so sad for so long, it scares him sometimes. I don't have any way to reassure him, because it feels scary to me too, how sad I get. I do think the app is helping. I think if I can get through menopause, and get more stable, after that I will be in better shape, emotionally. We'll see I guess.

been in a state of grief the last three days. this happens sometimes. it's okay. it's appropriate given the losses i've experienced.

spent some tearful moments missing Maru this morning. a cat i've adored since his internet introduction some 18 years ago.

Watch on YouTube

the weather is blissfully perfect and josh wants to come join me at the fairy festival for a little while. i will make myself as comfortable as possible, not too elaborate with costumes or makeup because i don't want to cry off a design and make a mess. i just want to wander around and relax, get some inspiration for future festivals when i am feeling more like myself. which i still have hope is possible. aging isn't a direct flat downward slope, there are rolling hills, and i think things will feel not so dire in the coming few years, between now and 60. i will consider reaching 60 a major accomplishment, if it happens, as my dad did not make it that far.

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