Tired of livin, scared of dyin... that's what Jimi Malone usta say. I just took a walk along the cape, found a group of birch and followed a couple of downed trees, killed by spikes from someone's deer stand; another killing machine. I followed the two dead logs with their spiked heads sticking out of them like some long ago bayonet, and neatly tucked my pipe and the last of my stash into earth beneath the log.
Edie tells me in a no nonsense sort of fashion to get rid of the dope.
Of course. Stop eating! I tell myself.
Of course. Breathe into your life.
Breathe into your fucking life. It is what it is. Step into it. Stop standing on the sidelines. Stop fucking obsessing, already. Enough!
OK. So your life didn't turn out exactly as you'd imagined it would. Recreate the image.
What makes you happy chica? Routine.
Really? Yes.
Peaceful company.
Imagination. Kindness. Healthy Food.
Power.
Yes. I like Power.
Have you ever really had power? Yes.
I like looking good. I really like the power of being a good looking woman. Even an old, but good looking woman.
What would happen if you were an old, but good looking woman and still lived with Peter? I don't know.
What would happen if you stopped your smoking addiction and ate healthy and exercised? What would happen? How would your life be different? Would you be relaxed? Would you be happy? I don't know.
I wish someone would clean the house.
I resent that I've been convalescing since Monday till Friday. Took the girls on Friday. Home late. Ate dinner on Tuesday or was it Wednesday? Not sure. It was pork chops. The dishes haven't been done since then. Peter is busy with other projects. I see that. He's very busy organizing over in his world. He bought a $600 couch today. Leather. And a cloth one too. $50. The car needs to be worked on. I clung to my $300 for the car. I cling to something in the savings account. $85 today. Is that the issue though? No. Of course not. The issue is that we're not on the same page and he isn't looking out for the details of what it takes to keep things in a peaceful hum. His inattention creates anxiety and chaos. I hate chaos. I hate that I am all alone, and powerless and unseen. Unseen because I am fat and undesirable to look upon. They don't look at me because I am fat. They do not want to see that which is no longer pretty or attractive. I am frumpy, dull and fat. Accept it. Now change it if that is what you want. Stop living in the imagined future of some better person or time.
Do I need to move out to be happy, peaceful, free and thin? Do I?
I can count on PT to be unreliable. Make peace with it. Am I disappointed? Of course. I wanted to play grown up games. I wanted to be in a mature partnership. Perhaps that will come. Everything I understand teaches me that I must trust and flow. I must stop the resistance. I must stop the fretting. I have to practice loving myself. When i treat myself with love and kindness, everything else falls into place.
Who can I be if I stop the fight, stop the yearning, stop the sorrow, stop the complaining? Who am I without the pain? Who am I with the pain, all raw and exposed? Am I strong?
I wasn't very strong with this past surgery. I hate pain. I fucking hate physical pain. I hate living in this house of chaos, filth and noise.
I want to live in a clean tranquil serene house. I want it to make sense.
Sometimes this house is clean and serene.
Just, not now.
I feel like screaming, yelling, crying. Sleeping.
I want the feeling of trying to get caught up to go. I want the anxiety of overeating and of eating poison and garbage to go. I want to stop the fight.
I revisit earlier writings... two months ago I am in touch with this sense of hopelessness. I need to take it in... ---
"In Geneen Roth's book I read a passage about parallel lives... She writes that "we construct Parallel lives based on what we think will make us feel worthy, beautiful, loved, while the real think, our lives, as they are, spread before us, unused, unsung. We become so convinced we have to look, think, feel act in ways that match our parallel lives. we miss the moment-to-moment unfolding that could, as last, satisfy us.
Buried beneath all of this is the root cause, she argues... of not facing the truth of our hopelessness with the situation that was so unbearable as children. She says that "when, as children, we understood that we were not going to get that love, we made up stories, created fantasy lives, tried to be someone else... our parallel life, our fantasy of what will happen when we finally find the love, respect, visibility, and abundance that's eluded us for a lifetime - is the adult version of the child longing to be seen and loved.
She goes on to discuss the three obstacles that interfere with the parallel life fantasy... which I'd like to dive into some more, but what I am taking away with me this morning is that the real work is to allow ourselves to be who we already are, and to have what we already have. We also have to allow ourselves to FEEL that original hopelessness. I get it. I think too, that part of whats happening in my life right now, even with the eating is that I've been digging deep into this stuff. Making peace with the idea that my life, my love life is hopeless. Its not going to magically change. I can feel my core understanding changing. I can see how my work with practicing mindfulness over the past year is starting to pay off.
The big question as the heart of all of this work around moving beyond compulsive eating is what is enough?
"If we learn to open our hearts, anyone, including the people who drive us crazy, can be our teacher."
I called Mom. I cried. She listened. It felt good to talk with my mother. I feel so alone sometimes. She says that Shari is coming back to NY. I'm glad. I miss her. I'm so glad she is coming home. It made me sad, jealous, and amplified my sense of being all a lone in the world when she told me that Shari will stay at Tom and Rhonda's. That they are paying for her tickets to come home.
