So Much To Do, So Much To Say...*

'Cos here we have been standing for a long, long time
Can't see the light
Treading trodden trails for a long, long time...*

I haven't been writing much of anything anywhere lately. It's not due to being silent; in some ways, actually, it's due to speaking a great deal elsewhere. I'm back in therapy, focusing on deep root issues that have spread their tendrils throughout almost every area of my mind and life. It's very much like after facing down depression and divorce and those dragons, others wormed their way up from the depths and waved. Hello, still here. Wanna play?

They don't play nicely.

I'm talking, yes. Talking and wringing hands and, apparently, digging my nails into my skin until the morass of red crescents becomes raw enough to realize what I'm doing. It's hard work, this therapy. Then when I leave the War Room of my therapist's office, I dive into processing and digging deeper in my own mind. And talking some more: with MTL and with my dear friends J and A and H, spread out from coast to coast of the country though they are. Thank God for email and g-chat and phones, I say.

Elsewhere, with other people, however, I find myself silent. There are ideas I have to process, issues I have to solve, emotions I have to face before I can open my mouth and speak. My therapist agrees, by the way, with this instinct. And I find myself thinking of the words of Solomon, who wrote in his time of struggle, facing dragons of his own:

1 For everything there is a season,
      a time for every activity under heaven.
2 A time to be born and a time to die.
      A time to plant and a time to harvest.
3 A time to kill and a time to heal.
      A time to tear down and a time to build up.
4 A time to cry and a time to laugh.
      A time to grieve and a time to dance.
5 A time to scatter stones and a time to gather stones.
      A time to embrace and a time to turn away.
6 A time to search and a time to quit searching.
      A time to keep and a time to throw away.
7 A time to tear and a time to mend.
      A time to be quiet and a time to speak.
8 A time to love and a time to hate.
      A time for war and a time for peace. 
--Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 (New Living Translation, emphasis added)

For now, in some ways, it is a season to be quiet, to be silent, to be "mindful," as my therapist says.

But oh, Dear Readers, how tired I am!

Add to all this hard work of the mind the busy-ness of the end of the Marking Period, and Parent Teacher Conferences last week, and fighting off my fifth? sixth? seventh? urinary tract infection of the year...Oh yes, I know that's not a good thing at all. And I'm sorry if it's a bit TMI, but hello, I Have A Problem. I'm scheduled to see a urologist on December 1st, because when someone (aka ME) is averaging between six and ten UTIs per year for three years straight, something is going on.

Granted, I don't take care of myself terribly well. I've been working on that recently: drinking water much more throughout the day, even at work; heading to the bathroom much more often; avoiding an overabundance of sugary junk at work instead of real food. Hopefully that will also help.

But I seem to have reached the ceiling, so to speak, with the heavy-duty antibiotics. My body is building resistance. I've been on Cipro for almost a full week, with no missed doses, and I'm still developing fevers and experiencing discomfort--including, the last couple days, an ache in my lower back that makes me nervous about my kidneys.

So I'm headed back to the doctor this afternoon, and I'm dragging myself somehow through the day and trying not to think too longingly of my bed (oh lovely bed with your soft pillows and fluffy comforter) when I'm supposed to be teaching kids about sonnet forms and the consequences of overweening ambition as shown in Macbeth and the abuse of authority as demonstrated in Oedipus Rex and dramatic irony and the emptiness of the American Dream when lacking solid foundations as shown in The Great Gatsby and oh yes, the historical context for all of those texts and let's not forget vocabulary and grammar and dear God what was I thinking when I said I'd take on three preps this year? Oh right, helping out the department because we were losing teachers.

Also, I'm trying very hard to be grateful for having a job when so many others do not, trying hard not to be bitterly cynical about politics (and losing that battle rapidly, may I say), and trying exceedingly hard not to panic about the upcoming contract negotiations which, hey, may become moot anyhow if The Powers That Newly Be in this state have anything to say about it.

I will say this, though: I'm deeply--bone deeply, really--grateful for having friends with whom I can talk so rawly and honestly; for a partner who is my best friend, and who loves me even when I'm dragged down by it all and being infuriating, and who loves me more because of than in spite of my moments of batshit crazy; for the strength to even face this all in the first place. Even when, on days like this, I feel like doing nothing more than crawling into my very own padded room and staying there for a while.

Or taking a holiday from my Self. Just for a little while.

I find sometimes it's easy to be myself
Sometimes I find it's better to be someone else...*

-----------------------------------------
*From Dave Matthews Band "So Much To Say":