The great thing about having friends is that sometimes they express your thoughts more accurately than you do.


I'm analyzing the situation intellectually and finding irony or amusement or a familiar aesthetic in its informational topology. But once I stop doing that, once I recognize that it's my body that's living this surprising disappointment, once I give up on using thinking as a barrier to feeling, wow it's going to hurt. --Sumana

This isn't a comment on my current state of mind; it's more a note that when I am in pain, this post of hers is remarkably accurate, down to the phrase "shield frequencies." I'm fascinated by my pain, my fear... and when I'm curious, I want to be aware of what I'm fascinated by. Sometimes it makes for quite a battering.

The other day I found out I'll be rooming in the sink (a room named for the sink that it contains) this summer with Matt Ritter, the original Oliner-turned-pikan. Both of us are hyperactive. Both of us encourage the other to be excited. This dual positive feedback loop has usually been terminated by one of us having to go to class, or catch a bus, or otherwise not be in close proximity. It's been predicted that we'll either wear each other out or spontaneously combust in mid-July from being overly enthusiastic about everything. I'm looking forward to this! Also happy: borrowing Spang's fire staff while she's away this summer.

Liz came out today; we played some piano and made an apple/almond/dried-cranberry/candied-ginger salad with homemade raspberry dressing for pika's dinner, which went over very well. Andrew is back in Nashville, and I miss him already. It's not often that I get to hang out with these folks, and they're good company. Mark has been back in Texas since Monday. You know someone's your friend when you see each other for the first time in two years and immediately start arguing. Well, debating. In the challenge-thoughts-but-don't-get-angry way.

I'm still stunned - and I think I always will be - that this having friends and being happy, feeling good thing can be normal. In one sense, it's normal. In another sense, it's never going to be. And sometime, probably sometime soon, I'm going to have to learn that I can go back to the way I was before, and be okay; living, maybe not thriving, but coping. That I can still handle it, being alone and overworked, and that I can consciously choose to climb back out. I don't want to be so afraid of losing what I have that I hold on to it too tightly and end up smothering it.

Right now, I'm rather tired. (It's interesting to note the subtle variations "tired" can have when you're not always cranked up to 11 to drown out exhaustion all the time.) My eyes are gently fatigued, my thoughts are kind of fuzzy, the large muscles of my body feel heavier and the small ones are picking up the slack by slowly pulling into tension. I'm going to try and counteract this, go lie down, rest without sleeping for a while, and then sleep. See what that feels like. I already found out this afternoon that I still have the ability to banish tiredness at will; now I'm going to practice not using it.

Oh. And I've started learning how to document things. It took a while to type this post because I read it out loud first, then wrote it down. I'm not sure if it makes my writing any clearer, but it definitely slowed it down.

Time to rest. Tomorrow I will be more graceful, more reliable, and more aware. That sounds insanely corny, but it's all actually going to be true.

*sleep!*