Sixteen days

Sixteen days since I last wrote and I'm finding it hard to get back into the rhythm of writing a blog post. I had it, even though many of my 'daily' entries were in fact last minute, even spilled over into the next day. Today, I talked to my dad about where the posts had wandered off to and I lacked a good excuse to explain the leave of absence I granted myself, so here I am. Presenting what comes from my heart.

Since childhood, I've had a tendency to hole up and forget that I have a whole tribe of people I love who love me. I'm not sure when that started; the earliest memory I have of hermit behavior is day one in first grade when I climbed to the top of the tallest tree at the bus stop in the hopes I would be forgotten. I liked being by my self, since my imagination conjured numerous friends to share adventures, and books supplied even more. These days, I hide out in the frantic pace I committed myself to Jackson for a working summer.

It's been a long while since I wrote, called, emailed, even peeked at your pictures on Facebook. I'm not connected, even though I have the power of numerous devices to shrink the distance between me and you. I've cultivated this reclusive role in the three years I've lived in this town and have avoided the headlong plunge into it, afraid to trust the waters and their depths to hold space for the parts of me that seem to belong somewhere other than here. I feel as adrift and wonky as my choices and inclinations have decided.

For years, I've struggled to find balance in my life. I either don't work or I'm a workaholic. I drink responsibly until one night I implode from poor choices, and give thanks that there was only a little fall out. I shrink away from writing in a public venue for years, then start a blog which becomes an almost daily habit for a month and then I quit cold, moldy turkey for over two weeks. I treat myself fair until I treat myself like shit.

And then comes the mean goad - how harsh can I talk to myself and what do I hold over my head to make a change, a new habit? I rail and flail and find my head in a spin as thoughts and emotions flood and all the debris of a lifetime gets flushed out of memory and it's shaken, stirred and mixed. There's flotsam and jetsam, a cocktail of chemicals and oil slicks that look like rainbows the way the light falls. If I'd just let go of the past instead of making a collection of all that garbage the suffering would lessen, I'd be free.

It'd just be Egypt before the dams, as the waters of the Nile rise over the land and seem to wreak destruction but instead bring new life to the earth. The kind goad arrives in spring, when flood waters from the delta provide a tonic to heal, to make fecund, to rebirth self. I can become someone who transmutes the burdens of regret, past wounds and unresolved emotions into my fullest potential.

You are as you decide. I am as I decide. I sit, write and author a blog and the writing might be solo but the inspiration that creates isn't birthed in isolation. I'm also part of a tribe (which I define as the web of kinship that includes family of blood and choice) and I have a responsibility not only to myself but to you to connect. I can be an introvert and an open hearted part of the world - but the goad must be kindness and love.

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