Reasons to Stay Alive

 Today, I finally finished a book that's been on my "book-it list"  for a while: Reasons to Stay Alive. 

More or less, it's what you think--a book about depression. It's mostly memoir with a smidge of self-help; the author shares his struggles with depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation, and also his gradual recovery. Parts of it were a rough read, as one might expect, but parts of it were extraordinarily comforting. On the one hand, the author didn't say anything that I didn't already know...but on the other hand, I felt seen. One of depression's most common weapons is its way of isolating us, making us feel completely alone and like no one else has ever gone through anything like it. So, it's reassuring to once again see a fellow soldier in the trenches. 

Towards the back of the book, the author shares some reasons to stay alive, reasons he had crowdsourced from people online. The reasons were in turns poignant, petty, painful, profound--and all resonated, in some way or another. And it made me think--it can't hurt to have my own list of reasons to stay alive. It's probably a good thing to have in my "toolkit." So, without further ado...

Reasons to Keep Buggering On

• First and foremost: there is a small clutch of people who would be left completely devastated if I exited this Earth. So, I gotta stick around. In other words: Love and duty are the foremost reasons to stay alive. 
• My cats. I'm responsible for these handsome, entitled little fuckers; I give them love and cuddles and food and kindness and shelter, and they are my responsibility. 
• The music of First Aid Kit--both their existing body of work, and whatever future delights they will produce
• Thunderstorms, particularly as they are approaching
• The cacophony of crickets and cicadas on warm summer nights
• The silent glow of fireflies lighting up those same summer nights
• The hugs of both of my brothers-in-law. Seriously, those dudes can hug.
• My Aunt Jo's cooking
• My Eldest Sister's Cooking
• Chris Evans as Captain America
• David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor
• All the books that I still have to read
• The words "crockery" and "cookery". Seriously, what great words!
• My sisters
• Tacos!
• Also, cupcakes. 
• All the places I haven't yet explored with my Travel Companion and North Star, Brian
• The simple contentment that comes on a random day, on which nothing remarkable happens one way or the other
• The sound of ocean waves breaking on the shore
• A good night of sleep, and the feeling of refreshment that comes in the morning
• Also, the feeling of faith that I cannot shake when I say, things may look better in the morning.

What are your reasons to stay alive?

10 Instagrammers Getting Me Through the Pandemic

Social media is a tricky, tricky thing. For more than a decade, we've been posting, sharing, liking, friending, blocking, trolling, streaming, gaming, flaming, shaming, doxxing, bullying, bonding, hooking up, ghosting, YouTubing, Facebooking, TikTokking, Zooming, Skyping, Facetiming, Pinning, Tweeting, vlogging, blogging, Instagramming, and god only knows what else. We've been suffering from FOMO (except, perhaps, for the first three months of the pandemic) and we've been comparing ourselves to the "best lives" and wit and pictures and statuses that we see through the various social media outlets to which we're addicted. We know it can get ugly, and toxic.

And yet. And yet. 

I can't speak for anyone but myself when I say, this last year has been made all the more bearable through social media. It's helped me to keep far more connected with people than I would otherwise have been; it's been a comfort and even an inspiration. Except when it hasn't been. 

I'm looking at you, here, Facebook. Last summer, when (especially) America was at its (then) most racist and anti-masking, and I maybe got into more than one scrap online that ended with people threatening me, I decided it was time to step away. I didn't deactivate my profile or anything, but I uninstalled the app from my phone, which sharply reduced my habitual access to that particular outlet. 

Well, nature abhors a vacuum, and during the middle of a pandemic, so do I. Before much time at all passed, I found myself scrolling more through Instagram, looking and saving and liking and basically being the creeper that I am. Food and travel and hobbies and seasons and animals and home decor, as well as the quotidian minutiae of everyday life, all of it represented in my Instagram feed; all of it beckoning and beguiling and inspiring and tempting and sometimes even encouraging me to live a better, or even best, life. I could look, and watch, and dream, and oh! it was a visual feast. 

Here are 10 of my favorite Instagrammers at present; they share highlights of their lives and creations, and I can't help but to feel a little bit inspired when I look at them.

Planning and Planners: 

Planning With Bumble creates fun and gorgeous Happy Planner layouts, shares snipits of her life, and provides little doodling tutorials; her results are invariably fun and pretty.

Sarahboparah is a bullet journaler based out of Yorkshire, England. Every time I look at her impeccably tidy, orderly handwriting, I feel a little calmer and even a little inspired. Like, maybe we can bring order into our own lives if we just write neatly?

Home Decor

offbeat.vintage.girl, based out of Canada, posts pictures of her abode, in which she somehow pulls together Victorian, Craftsman, and Art Nouveau vibes, along with a subtle edge of boho funk. The result is a home that somehow projects a carefully controlled, discreetly colourful chaos and dignified fun.  

On the other end of the home decor spectrum is mycambridgefairytale, whose home is cosy country shabby chic. Weirdly, this is not at all my style, but golly, I do find this a soothing and inspiring Instagrammer to creep on. 

Miniatures

Wildwood_miniatures was probably the first miniature account that began to suck me in, late last summer. At first, I thought I was looking at pictures of "real life" scenes, AKA not miniature. That's how realistic these creations are. 

Cheries_mini likewise showcases a lot of realistic miniature setups. Someone needs to tell this Instagrammer they should have pursued a career in interior design. 

Art/Creativity

2020 and 2021 have been the year of hobbies, haven't they? I certainly haven't been immune to this. I find mandala artwork to be particularly soothing and fun

_inkreations provides both videos of their drawing process, as well as tutorials. I love it when craftspeople share their knowledge, don't you?

Sanafloral's mandala and zentangle creations are a bit more freehand and informal, and therefore a bit less intimidating for those aspiring creatives who might be a bit timid.

Food

2020 and 2021 have also been the years for home cooks to really come into their own. Thank god for the Internet and these wonderful folks, jocooks and saltandlavender, who are so generous when it comes to sharing their delicious recipes. 

A Frank Conversation

Little-known but VERY cool fact; remember those self-helpy Skeletor memes that ran rampant
 aroundteh Interwebs close to 10 years back? Eldest Sister was the original creator. 

For fifteen years, I have been on antidepressants. I've been in therapy on and off throughout most my adult life. I'm very frank about my struggles with mental health--mainly dysthymia and free-floating anxiety, but also, now, increasingly, my unaddressed traumas from childhood. I try to be frank about this because "if you mention it, you can manage it"--in other words, I am a big believer in the need to be honest about humanity's need to achieve better mental and emotional health, and no one is well-served by surrounding illness of any sort with silence and stigma. 

So, in a lot of ways, I feel like I was lucky--I already had some tools in place to deal with the stress and disruptions of this past year. But nonetheless, it's been a fucking awful time for me, particularly the first 6 months. Y'all, I was not okay. To be honest, I'm still not okay. I'm exhausted, and sad, and isolated, and burnt out, and I feel like a failure, and like I will lose my shit if something else goes wrong. I am responsible for a lot of folks at my work, and I feel like I am disappointing them every day. I try to check in with my friends regularly, but I feel like I should be doing so much more for them. I know I'm not taking care of myself. I'm not sleeping well. I feel like I'm screaming into a fucking void.  I'm not okay. And that's okay. Ultimately, I'll be okay, at least for a while. Because that's how depression works, at least for me, even during a pandemic. I'll be okay. I have to be. But my depression and mental health struggles are not the same as your struggles. 

I'm worried about us. I'm worried about the people who report to me; I'm worried about my colleagues and my supervisors and my family and friends; I'm worried about the millions of children who are missing out on the structure and routines of formal, in-person education; I'm worried about the people out of work; I'm worried about what the suicide statistics are going to look like when this is all said and done. Let's just be very clear about this: most of us, the whole world over, are experiencing a massive, ongoing trauma. Acknowledge that. Sit with that. And then ask yourself, what next? 

You don't have to talk with me. But if you want to come out on the other side of this fucking nightmare, if you want to not just survive, but thrive, be honest with yourself. How are you feeling? How are you doing? How can you do one thing, just one thing (but hopefully more than just one thing) to help manage your situation? Who can you talk to? Do you feel like one more thing will just break you? Step back. If you can, take a mental health day, take stock, reach out to the people you trust most, and plan some next steps. Because things can get better. Everything is a fucking pointless, ceaseless struggle right now, for each of us, in completely unique ways. My pandemic and struggles are not your pandemic and struggles, but it's not a pissing contest to prove who hurts the most. We're all struggling, but acknowledging that struggle is the first step towards making shit better.  Talking about it helps. If we can mention it, we can manage it. 

Below are a few (US-based) resources, in case you want to try to get some help through this: 

National Suicide Prevention Hotline provides 24/7, free, confidential support for people in distress/

National Alliance on Mental Illness has a lot of great resources, including a helpline you can call for initial guidance and support. 

Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, provides a confidential, free, 24-hour-a-day, 365-day-a-year, information service, and referrals to local services.  

Find a Therapist: If you are privileged enough to have health insurance, or the financial means to afford therapy, this resource, provided by Psyschology Today, is 100% everything you need to find the right counselor for you. You can start by searching by zipcode, and narrow down from there what you're looking for. 

If you're enrolled in college classes, check in with your campus's health services. Some of the best counselors I've ever visited were through my college. 

A lot of local organizations provide referrals to therapists who charge on a sliding scale; I believe some of the above-mentioned sources can get you turned into the right direction for those local sources. 

Keep buggering on, folks. I'll see you on the other side. 

Better Days

Today was an inexplicably, impossibly stupid day, for no particular reason other than I slept badly, and when that happens, everything seems so much worse than it would otherwise be. I dragged myself through the day without making anyone cry (other than myself), and some days, that's the best one can aspire to. 

But! Instead of fixating on grumpy things, I'm going to turn what little energy I have towards making a list of the things I'm looking forward to "when the war is over."

In no particular order:

• Concerts: First Aid Kit, Dropkick Murphys, the Decemberists, The Avett Brothers, Def Leppard, Tim Grimm, Dar Williams, whatever. I'm here for it. 

• Happy hours, or hell, any hour spent at Bloomington's skeeziest bar, the Vid

• Haircuts: Oh my god, y'all. I'm turning into Cousin Itt over here. Either him (them? It?) or Thing One or Thing Two. Possibly Thing One and Thing Two. 

• Hugs and handshakes: Seriously, if it weren't for my cats and my neighbor's dog and the fucking technician who gave me my mammogram last summer, I wouldn't have gotten any touch at all. Watch out, is all I'm saying. 

• Cuddling my friends' kids.

• Movie theatres, preferably the ones with big, capacious seating. 

• Buffets. Yes, I'm an American. Deal with it. I want nothing more than to get the meat sweats at Fogo de Chao. That is the summit of my ambitions and desires, y'all. This is what it's come to. 

• Getting within 6 feet of a friend or colleague without feeling guilty, scared, ashamed, worried, twitchy, or some combination thereof. 

• Everything else: travel, state fairs, casual shopping excursions, visiting friends overnight, sporting events, museums, swimming in public places, fuck, even going to the gym or talking with strangers or getting on an airplane. And of course, not worrying about everyone I know and love. 

Reading over this list, I'm acutely aware of how privileged I am. I know this. This isn't a lament of all the things I am lacking (or at least, it's not intended to be); it's an anticipatory celebration of the gradual, safe return of so many things, customs, events, freedoms, options, and interactions I took for granted. It's a persistent hope and belief in brighter, better days ahead. Hopefully days much better than this one. 

It's All About the Little Things

Sometimes, it's good to celebrate the little things that make us happy...

Vaccine rollout is happening something fierce, it seems, at least here in Indiana! Right now it's available to people 50 and above. My Duncle and Aunt are fully vaccinated. Some of my colleagues are now either fully vaccinated, or halfway vaccinated, or have their appointments booked for their first shot. AND my Middle Sister and her husband, down in Florida, have gotten their first shot! (She's in education; he has risks.) We're starting to talk about actually seeing each other, somewhat soonish. 

Gorgeous (almost) spring weather: It's not spring yet. But the lonely grey and the cold of February have given way to what seems to be shaping up for a glorious March. It's in the low 60s, and the sun has been shining for days, and there's a gentle breeze during the day. On the one hand, it's kind of giving me flashbacks to last spring, when the world ended, but I'm still really digging it. Of course, it won't last...

Cooking! Meal planning and grocery acquisition are still about as pleasurable to me as snorting snake venom, but the meal kit delivery service I'm using is helping me to get more confident in the kitchen, and I'm actually starting to take some pleasure in preparing my meals. Chopping vegetables, especially, I find very enjoyable. I don't know that I'll ever just know recipes, the way my grandmother did, or carelessly, confidently experiment and multitask the way Eldest sister does, but I don't need to! I just need to, you know, not undercook my chicken, and enjoy the meals I make.

This falafel spinach salad was fucking magical.

What are the little things giving you pleasure right now?

Delicious food, and the joy I'm taking in cooking

Weekly Craft Update

Time to give my first weekly report on crafting my way through March!

At the top of the week, I had a fairly ambitious checklist of creative work at which I wanted to peck away: 

As it turns out, my ambitions outstripped my energy.

But as is so often the case, the week started to peck away at me, instead. Work left me both exhausted and tapped out, so much so that by the time I got home, I didn't have a lot left in me for the more ambitious projects. Nonetheless, I did manage to do some creative work, including:

• Blogging: So far, I'm 7/7 in terms of my goal to blog each day this month. With the help of Eldest Sister, I came up with a basic "itinerary" for each day's blog posts, subject to change. And while sometimes it's a bit of a struggle to start typing away at 10 PM when I'd really rather simply become one with the couch, I've powered through, and I am noticing that there is some truth in what Eldest says--the more you do something, the more ideas you have. 

• Knitting: Okay, so I know this one is a stretch. A year or two back, my friend Jessica taught me how to cast on, and then moved on to teach me the next step...and I just, I dunno, got stuck. It takes me a while to learn shit, okay? So I decided to perfect my ability to cast on before moving on to anything else. And then the Apocalypse happened, and I haven't had the opportunity to learn anything else from Jessica...so I just cast on, unwind, and cast on, in perpetuity. Or at least until Herd Day. Cast on, unwind, cast on...

When I do this, I feel like I am possibly the fourth Fate from Greek
mythology,the one who didn't make it past the auditions."You can't even
 properly knit; why should we let you help out with weaving the lives of
 mortals? For your hubris,we condemn you to a life of pointlessly casting on!" 
(Yes, I'm aware, that got dark fast.)

Nonetheless, Indiana is happy with this state of affairs. 

• Mandala art: My devotion to this has somewhat waxed and waned over the last few months. I don't have a very sturdy compass, which seems to be one of the basic tools of drawing mandalas. So until such time as I remedy that, I decided to do a little bit of...I dunno...doodling a hybrid of mandala/zentangles? With a little bit of mehndi for inspiration? (I want to be very very careful about cultural appropriation with regards to mehndi creations; although it seems like there is a great deal of mehndi influence in mandalas. It's often difficult to judge where one ends and the other begins.)

Personally, I feel like this is obviously very crudely executed,
 but it's freehand, dammit. That's gotta be something, right?

• Colouring:  On the nights when I was just too done in for much at all, there's my endless colouring habit. Here's what I did this week, as I binged Elementary.

I'm making very tentative travel plans to hit the beaches of Florida
over Thanksgiving, so this nautically-themed colouring
page is a happy reminder that better days are coming. 

So what about you? What are you crafting and creating right now?

Corners of My Home, Part 1

"Stay the fuck at home."

That was one of the earliest mantras of the 2020 Apocalypse, preceding everything from "Hey, all you cool cats and kittens!" to "wear your fucking mask or get the fuck out of my face, you selfish ignorant fuckwad who really must not give a fuck about anything other than your own fucking need to be right." Home became The Place To Be. If we were unlucky, we hunkered down with asshole roommates and shitty partners; if we were lucky, we spent our solitary days cooking and crafting and purging and redecorating and renovating and sometimes, even moving. I seem to remember reading somewhere, last summer, that the pandemic and the quarantine was actually a wake-up call for a lot of people, who then went on to sell their homes. Having to spend so much time in them, folks realized all the things that they didn't like about where they lived. I realized, myself, that when I look for my next home to buy or rent, I need to ask myself, "Once I'm moved in with all my shit, and my cats, could I picture myself being quarantined here?"

I was one of the fortunate ones. It's been six years since I extracted myself from an unhappy marriage, and three years since I've lived with an asshole roommate. It's just me and my cats and my stuff; and over the course of the last year, I found ways to both purge and acquire more. (Stuff, not cats.) Oh, capitalism and consumerism. Even when we're balls-deep in a pandemic, we can still count on you, as evidenced by Jeff Bezos's ever-increasing value. 

ANYWAY.

Over the course of the last year, I've tidied and cleaned and purged and rearranged, and have done so repeatedly, all to make my home the most homey version of itself it could be. But it's funny, when you're living alone and staying the fuck at home and but not entertaining, sometimes without that outside accountability, you start to go feral, just a wee bit. 

It's spring, right? Time for some spring cleaning and whatnot. And that's what I'm getting on with, this weekend. If you're anything like me, you're nosy as fuck. I love seeing folks' homes; love seeing how they live and decorate and order their lives.  So! lucky you! I've decided to share some of the "corners" of my home, post-nesting. It's a snapshot in time, and won't stay this clean or cosy or collected for that long, but whatever. And if you don't like it, you can fuck off into the void. Happy viewing!

This is the living room. This is where the living happens. (Hey, I just made that connection! That's
why they call it the living room!) This is where I puzzle and watch TV and colour and read.)

This is where we used to get the party started. Alas, not anymore. 

My kitchen is an unholy mess (why the hell won't my cats clean up? I do the cooking, after all),
  but I managed to clean up this particular corner. (Also, side note: I love the colour teal)

One of my many, many bookshelves. 

My colouring station. Yes, I am aware, I have a problem.

Good-bye.