Mental wander

Graphic snuck from MSNBC, one of their slideshows. Feels appropriate. Was chatting up a college friend online last night and it's got my mind wandering...

College was painful for me. I was a late bloomer, afraid of life, and had no clue about my chemical imbalance. I tried counseling time and again, cut and bruised myself to release the ache, and sleepwalked through my degree. My friends were all guys, so they rarely saw how screwed up I was. I made an effort to fit in with them and must've been a good actress. And with memory, there exists an idealization of the facts.

It's not a cliché: with age comes wisdom. I'm not that person anymore. With Les, I opened like a flower, discovered my balance, his unconditional love allowed me to think for myself, and the proper medication has repaired my addled psyche. What's more, I'm able to handle myself, able to step back. I haven't been on the lithium for 2 years now, because you can't take it while trying to make babies. I miss it like being on a deserted island with no Starbucks sometimes. But maturity allows me to see the kinks in my psyche now, where my mannerisms are caused by that lack, and I'm able to better handle myself. It's hard...can't sit still in work meetings when people are whining rather than being productive, but I'm mostly able to keep hold.

I muse sometimes that I wish my college friends could know me now. We'd disagree pretty wholeheartedly on matters of politics, but I think about how I'd love them to see "how far I've come." I put that in quotes, because it's also a cliché, and I'm not sure I knew that until last night. The friend I spoke to last night...we shared passion at one time...and he knew parts of me I couldn't see at the time, because they were buried so far under the fear. I saw my crazy as the sum total of me, but there was always a little part of the real person shining through. When you're knee-deep in the crazy, you don't see the good; you just see the pain. There's something sort of liberating in the realization that I was there all along, that the me I know now was a part of the me that existed back then.

This train of thought's getting wooly...it's no wonder my first novel was about a girl with a borderline split personality /:)...man, I gotta rewrite that thing; it had some gems in it.

This week...brain's not quite back from vacay yet. The kitchen's gone to seed a bit and I'm looking forward to tackling the apartment after a short nap on Saturday. I'm doing the Trail of Tails walk with my mom (annual fundraising walk for the local Humane Society - everybody brings their dogs) Saturday. Also need to get cracking on intent letters for potential employers in Charlotte and budget for the next 6 months.

Still reading about farming...interesting stuff...gotta renew the library books this weekend. Jenna continues to inspire...every time I read a post like Tuesday's, I want to comment to thank her, but I can be stalkerish, so I'm keeping it at a minimum. But her writing so clearly describes what I want in life, what I'm hoping to start really planning for, once we clear the first hurdle of getting the hell out of this city. I hold it in my heart (heh, my Barnheart), and it drives my dreams and my goals.

Knitting stalled again, but there's socks on the horizon. The weather turned chill again, and the Floridians are baffled. I throw on a scarf, let the wind blow my coat open, and drink deeply.