A couple of my very favorite people in the world have conspired against my natural tendencies to give me something I've too long refused to give myself. I may have had a choice in the matter, however, it would most likely have caused them to reformulate their plans into one where I didn't, and it didn't seem wise to force their hand. Besides, I can't remember the last time I sat alone for an extended period of time with no company except for my own, and with no one to tend to but myself. And occasionally Pandora.....

My son is presently n the care of the love of my life, and my daughter at the zoo with my dearest friend who has also loaned me the use of her laptop, and cozy, quiet, and all-around adorable apartment. With a pumpkin liquer latte waiting for me upon my arrival.

I am refusing to allow myself to think about laundry, or work, or yard chores. There is nothing here calling me away from my task.... whatever that task is.

I've had two weeks to prepare for what I would do when I got here; I knew this was coming, it wasn't a surprise. I tried to plan it out, to make sure my time here was spent as efficiently as possible, but apparently, I am not only incapable of doing anyting for myself under everyday circumstances, I am also incapable of deciding what I would do with myself were my circumstances other than what they presently are. I live in survival mode. I would love to not.

 I have three hours ,a spiked latte, a gentle breeze, and a relatively high level of intelligence, and so it seems most appropriate to me to use this opportunity to address the barriers that keep me from being able to progress past the point where I am capable of no more than making it through the day.

 I blame my children, but my lack of knowledge of myself is only partially their fault. Inarguably, becoming a mother at the age of 19 isn't really conducive to robust personal development, but surely it doesn't have to be prohibitive. If I can organize myself, allocate my resources properly, there is no reason why I can't become on the outside the person I see inside of myself.

Well, shit. Now what?

Am I angry? Not at the moment. Will I be in ten minutes? Well, there's really no telling, but I know that if I am it will pass. This was supposed to be my great exodus, my escape from the non-nutritive void that I'd outgrown years ago. No more driving down the same old streets and feeling suffocated by onslaughts of memories and bad vibes that spring out of broad daylight for no apparent reason. No more rehashing the same old experiences under only barely modified circumstances. It was going to be my fresh start, my defining moment, my throwing off of the chains, etc.

I had pictured, at least a hundred times while I was packing, myself unpacking in the new house I had found. I'd imagined myself sitting, bored but invigorated by the change, in an orientation session at Vanderbilt. I saw myself driving around Hermitage, temporarily reliant on TomTom to get me to the nearest grocery store, or Walgreens. I had visions of walking the kids to the bus stop, of picking them up at new schools, of driving Tim to the train station so he could spend a much needed weekend away in the city. I saw new opportunities for friendship, creativity, for love everywhere my imagination looked. As of Thursday morning, I expected a phone call, but never imagined the voice on the other end to say what it did.

I was trying to get Lane to take a nap, but it wasn't happening. I hadn't slept the night before, and had spent most of the day crying from a combination of exhaustion and frustration. The truck had been almost completely loaded by family and friendsWednesday night when I arrived home from court, and I spent Thursday morning packing the remainder of my odds and ends, and cleaning while I waited for a call from my attorney with the judge's decision. Finally there was nothing to do but let my mind rest, but Lane wiggled and squirmed and got up and came back, and the phone rang. I heard the words, but I don't remember them, just what they meant. I swear, over all this time I've had such trouble breathing because I've been so stressed, so anxious about moving, I had never felt like I had the wind knocked out of me until that moment, but I waited until the call ended to cry.

Angry? Not at first. Stunned. I felt such loss. Mom drafted a very articulate email to the recruiter and the manager of the SICU at Vanderbilt. I called the property manager to notify her that I would not be in need of the adorable little house I had put a deposit and taken over utilities on. The entire time I planned this move, I left myself an out at every detail. My current position was maintained for me at OSF; they knew the situation I was in, and were good enough to accomodate it. My family had no plans with the house I was vacating until they had done some renovations. I made provisions to be able to resume life here, but I never expected to be required to fall back on them.

The house has been repainted, the carpets clean. The bathroom is stripped, in the process of a total makeover. An army of family came over Saturday and cleaned, unloaded the truck into the garage of the place it was so recently loaded from. Furniture made its way back in Sunday, a new set of bunkbeds for Leah, a new bed for Lane, and everything put into places different enough to make us feel like there had been a change in the absence of any actual one.

Tomorrow I will go back to work at OSF. I'll have the same position I did on the SICU. I'll wear the new scrubs I bought to wear at Vanderbilt. Maybe I'll start wearing makeup. I've wanted to for some time, but never did because it felt silly to start doing something new all of a sudden.

Am I angry? He couldn't have cared less what I did with his children until I made him pay child support. I knew he'd get nasty after I did, but he was usually nasty anyway. He has told me a number of times that everything he does that I don't like (like avoiding Lane while taking visitation with Leah) is because I took him to court. I know that he didn't oppose my moving to Nashville out of concern for my ability to provide a good life for them there. He did it to prevent me from getting something I wanted. Am I angry? No. He is. And insecure and rotten with hate, and I won't be. I don't believe that he alone is capable of stopping me from anything, but I do believe that the Universe watches out for me, even when it means breaking my heart in the process. I pushed for this, and I pushed goddamned hard. I made it happen; I worked, I saved money, then shelled it out. I made plans, signed paperwork, but I know that had I gotten there last Thursday as I had hoped to, that something would have been askew. I have theories, but I'll never know for sure. All I know is that I did everything I could to get there.... I offered up a prayer and backed it with blood, sweat and tears. My greatest consolation is that I'll never be able to say to myself, "You're only stuck here out of complacency, just like your father." Who, incidentally says, "Alana, you'd better make that motherfucker pay." The beauty of it is that I don't have to. That 'motherfucker' already has the cancer that will eat him alive. I've done angry before. I've done hate, rage and resentment to death. He'll take care of his, and I don't even feel the need to watch him consume himself. Planting season starts in March, and I'm mapping out a garden that will put my last one to shame.

Samson

"He came home to surprise me. Maybe I'd already started to acclimate to life on my own, maybe there's some other reason beyond my understanding and awareness, but I felt frustrated at the physical/mental/emotional difficulty that my life (still) caused him, at the fact that I'm not even organized enough to be able to make a grocery list, let alone remember to take it with me to the store. I was dismayed at how rapidly our interactions degraded into the day to day drudgery that we'd been stuck in before he left, that I was so glad to break free of, even though I knew it would mean missing him every day. I was graced with a week, no, two with him, and I completely took it for granted. I could try to blame it on stress, or work, or any number of possibly imaginary factors. I think it's more likely that I interrogate our relationship tirelessly, relentlessly.... the guys at Guantanamo have nothing on me. I've turned it upside down, strangled its wrists, pounded questions at it for hours, deprived it of nourishment, and left it naked and starving in a solitary cell, not knowing that the only answers to the questions I presented would have to come from inside myself."


He followed me back. He did it because he knew, despite my denials, that I couldn't hold it together on my own. If I had presented a stronger defense, been more convincing somehow, put my foot down where I'm used to it being, the outcome would have been drastically different. Being that I could not, he has propped me upright and propelled me forward. Yes, it's been mostly my own muscles doing the work, making the strides, but without the rod in my spine, I would have soon crumpled into a writhing heap on the floor. We're moving. No, we're leaving, and if he hadn't followed me back, it would never have happened. When I realized that I couldn't (easily) talk him out of it, a feeling of exhaustion like a brick wall which my arguments to the contrary could not overcome, I let go. Of what? Probably my pride. Germans, as a rule, don't do it very often, and it was quite possibly yet another example of the universe exerting its force on the outcome of the events that ensued.

When we got home from that awful, defining adventure, I realized something: We are a team. We're partners, and we're there to take care of each other, to have the other's back when wanted, needed or when it's understood to be needed, but denied to be so. I noticed a difference in the way that I saw him from that point on. While I'm still nervous about the future away from the only place I've ever lived, I'm only nervous. I'm not the only engine for this ship anymore, I don't have to be forged from iron and crafted without flaw. I can be human again. And that is an incredible gift, one that he may not even know he's giving me. Will I grow in that new place? Thrive? Flourish? You have no idea.

If you feel I'm not listening, you're probably right; if you think I'm not paying attention, it's probably even closer to the truth, but if you believe that I don't care, you couldn't be more wrong. It's just not showing. The divide is spreading between what I do and what I love. I feel it every day like a great chasm opening between my feet. I'm good at my job. It comes naturally to me (well, most of it anyway). But to do it and to be successful at it mean that I feel obligated to neglect the things that are most important to me; the things that propel me forward on a daily basis.... the touch of a lover's hand...... a text message reminding me that warm thoughts are sent towards me whether I'm capable of responding or not..... a little girl's plea for a bedtime story after a twelve hour shift....

I am giving myself up to be devoured by something that I do not love, and which does not love me. This is an abominable way to conduct one's life.

I didn't mean to alarm you.

It wasn't intended to make anyone feel sad. It wasn't intended to do anything except to convey that part of the difficulty I have with writing lately is that I'm in 'experience mode'. And I'm happy. Christ, I'm HAPPY (?!). At 530am no less, with a 12 hour shift ahead of me. I may not leave them the next brilliant work of art to read that will change their lives twenty years after I'm dead, but personally, I really don't think they're worthy of that. If they're paying attention, if they have the eyes, to see, honey, I (WE) can change their lives right. Now. <3

I feel like maybe I advertised myself falsely. I thought I liked to write, I thought I was good at communicating myself that way. But ever since I met you, I've had the most frustrating case of writer's block. Frustrating in that I get frustrated when I think about it, but I don't think about it. Ever. I'm too busy absorbing the experience that I don't want to take any effort away from the feeling of what's here right now. And I'm afraid that if I turn my back on it, if I stop bathing in it, it will disappear. That's ridiculous, I know. But see, it's not. Because I just read what you wrote, and now I don't want to do anything besides sit behind you and play Super Mario World, while you talk in your best 'Vietnam Vet' voice about killing Americans, and Egyptian Jasmine floats around the kitchen, and the peace that I've found here with you (the peace I was telling you about this morning, remember? It's profound.) emanates from and inundates everything in a cycle around me. I love you. Maybe Plants vs. Zombies....

Sometimes the best years start off as the worst years. And some of the worst years start off the best. This year, I am going to refuse to make a value judgement. We put so much importance on the idea of 'New Year'. We end each one trying to bring it into perspective, and honestly, no matter what's happened to us, we can choose to frame it however we want to. "2010 was the year my career tanked." vs. "2010 was the year I received a new opportunity to explore other directions for my life". "2010 was the year my relationship ended" vs. 2010 was the year I shed a layer of skin that no longer fit me." Regardless of the challenges we faced, there is always the possibility of redemption through language. The language, when repeated becomes an idea, which becomes a belief, which becomes our reality....which is unique and exclusive to each individual. We can use that process to the advantage of creating the environment around us to be a positive, healing, nurturing one, rather than an atmosphere where there is only fear, hate, and negativity. Here's to 2011.