the end of self-flagellation?

Published
by
alison
on July 2, 2009
in bluishorange, lists and travel
. 5 Comments

When I first started seeing my current therapist last year, he told me that part of my problem was that I thought I was SUPPOSED TO do too many things.  There are, of course, things that one really IS supposed to do, like eat and sleep, pay the bills, feed the dog, etc.  Those items were getting accomplished, but I was also thinking about all the other SUPPOSED TO things.  When I came home from work in the evening, I was doing the same stuff other people do–eating dinner, checking the internet, reading, watching tv–but in the back of my head was this flashing, scrolling marquee that read, “I’m supposed to be writing! I’m supposed to be posting to my website! I’m supposed to be doing something productive!” Half the time I didn’t even have anything in mind for the “something productive,” but it really bothered me that I wasn’t doing it, whatever it was.

At the height of the SUPPOSED-TOs, I wasn’t enjoying anything I was doing, because whatever I did paled in comparison to some nebulous task I should have been accomplishing instead.

Last night I got home from work at 6, hot and tired from my commute. My evening plans had fallen through, so I had some ideas about other tasks–putting hooks in the bathroom for swimsuits and extra towels, moving the folding chairs to make room for the vacuum cleaner, straightening up the living room, and so forth.

But then I decided to finish watching the episode of True Blood* I’d started on Tuesday, so I got in bed with the dog and my computer** and watched it. Then I didn’t want to get up because I was comfortable, so I put on a South Park episode, and then I fell asleep.  When I woke up at 10, I took the dog out, called my boyfriend, read a little, and ate some grapes while watching another South Park. Then I fell asleep again.

And I didn’t feel guilty about it at all.  The scrolling marquee in the back of my head hasn’t disappeared, but it’s off a lot of the time these days. I can come home and watch TV and fall asleep on the bed, and when I wake up three hours later, instead of thinking “OH MY GOD I DIDN’T GET ANYTHING DONE!” I think, “Gosh, I must have needed that.”

In part I have therapy to credit for this, but I think I’ve also come to terms with what it means to suffer from chronic (albeit well-treated) depression and anxiety.  To keep myself on an even keel, I need to get enough sleep. I need to leave the house every day. I need to eat right and try to exercise. And sometimes I need to turn myself off and do absolutely nothing. If that means I get fewer things done than other people do, that’s okay. Those other people aren’t me.

And I’m getting pretty good at recognizing when I need to turn myself off.  Having my brain is pretty stressful most of the time: I overthink everything, I’m always planning and planning and worrying about worst-case scenarios, and I almost never truly relax.  A brain like that can’t keep going without a little rest, and whether that rest is sleep or just spending an evening doing nothing at all doesn’t seem to matter.

I’m off work all next week, and for awhile I thought I wanted to take a trip somewhere. Why waste my week off staying at home and doing nothing? I thought. But look at this list of places I’ve been so far this year:

Fredericksburg, TX
Houston, TX
Bryan, OH
Long Island, NY
Des Moines, IA

I’m planning a trip to New Orleans this month and a trip to Minnesota for a wedding in September and a trip to St. Louis for Christmas probably, and who knows where else I’ll go. When I thought about that, staying in Austin started to sound pretty good. I can read and sew and do stuff to my apartment, I can go swimming a LOT, I can take day trips to San Antonio and the Guadalupe.

Or if I want, I can do nothing at all.

*This show is not good. But I’m invested in the plot for the time being, so I watch it anyway.

**When I go to work in the mornings, I leave the bedroom A/C on and the living room A/C off, since the former has a thermostat and runs more efficiently.  I turn on the living-room unit when I get home, and then hang out in the bedroom until the living room cools down.  This makes for a lot of watching DVDs and such on my computer after work.

grace in small dogs

Published
by
alison
on June 15, 2009
in lists and maude
. 7 Comments

These days Maude seems to have forgotten how to go up and down the stairs.  I taught her (or coaxed her) way back when I got her five years ago, but now we’re back to square one. Every time I take her outside I have to talk her into going down the stairs, and sometimes even that doesn’t work. She stands on the top step and paces back and forth, staring down at me.

I’m not overly concerned about this, since her behavior is normal otherwise, but I am a little worried. Things have been tough for me lately, especially work-wise, and some days Maude is one of the only things I can think of that makes me happy.  What would life be like without her?

My friend Helen Jane has been doing a series of posts on her site called Grace in Small Things. Every day she lists a few of the small things she really loves. Maude’s a pretty small thing, but she’s not the only good thing, so I’m going to make a list of my own.

1. The way Maude’s upper lip catches on her left canine tooth, making her look sort of snarly in an adorable quiet Chihuahua way.

2. Hummus with snap peas for dipping.

3. The swimming pool at the apartment building next door. My landlord owns those apartments, too, and told the people in my building that we could use the pool.
3a. A new swimsuit that fits.
3b. Drinking Lone Star while swimming.

4. Sushi from Whole Foods–spicy tuna and a rainbow roll–eaten at home while watching old episodes of South Park. Lots of wasabi.

5. Old episodes of South Park, all available online for free. I know they’ve been there for awhile, but I’ve just started to take advantage of that, and boy do I love it.

6. Mending vintage clothes to make them look better and fit just right. Finding vintage sandals that are lovely and comfortable.

7. The view of the Pennybacker Bridge while sitting right in the lake.

8. Watching B. watch Breaking Bad for the first time. That show is wonderful, and I love that he likes it almost as much as I do. Yes, almost, but I don’t know if anyone likes that show as much as I do.

9. Sitting outside with friends after the sun goes down.

10. Walking into my apartment when I get home from work. Looking around my beautiful living room with a big sigh of relief. Getting a happy greeting from Maude before trying to coax her down the stairs.

i thought my life would be different somehow

Published
by
alison
on May 5, 2009
in bluishorange and childhood
. 15 Comments

I turn thirty-one tomorrow. Tonight I vacuumed my apartment, washed the dishes, dusted the furniture, dyed my hair, painted my toenails, and put all my clothes away. I was thinking about what it was like when I was a kid and I would always feel different on my birthday.  I would wake up on May 6 feeling as though some subtle thing about me had changed overnight. I wasn’t nine anymore, I was ten, and that meant something.

I miss that feeling. Maybe waking up to a clean apartment and pretty red toenails is the next best thing.

These days I have a hard time focusing on the good things in my life. I have a great apartment, an adorable dog, good friends and family, a job, a car that works, a city in which I finally feel at home. I can make almost anything that doesn’t involve welding or a saw, my hair looks great, and sushi is readily available.  These are things I need to remember.

Oh, nine-year-old website, what will I do with you?

hello, internets!

Published
by
alison
on March 4, 2009
in bluishorange, craft, lists, photos and sxsw
. 9 Comments

How’s it going?  Man, it’s been a little while.  Things still all right with you?  Still Twittering?  Far out.

Anyway, here’s what I’ve been up to lately:

1. Adding things to the walls and ceiling of my apartment. B and I put up these shelves:

new shelves in the bedroom craft area!

Since I live in an apartment that was built in the fifties, my walls are made of spit and old newspapers, which I guess is what they had available at the time.  To get these shelves to stay, we put something like 30 holes in the wall, a few of them MASSIVE and unnecessary, most of them with hefty amounts of wood glue applied to them.  I think we did a decent job of making them look nice, but they do not look nice if you get too close.  Don’t get too close!

I put my bike up on the ceiling like this:

does this look just a little bit stupid or, like, monumentally stupid?

It does not look good, and I know it.  Several of my friends expressed concern that they’d come over, have a couple of drinks, and then end up with their hair tangled in the handlebars of a bicycle.  It’s a valid concern. Maybe I should all make them sign waivers when they come over.  Or maybe I should just think of something else.

2. Taking a photo every day.  This has been interesting, in the sense that I didn’t really think I had good things to take pictures of every day.  But I’ve improvised quite a bit, and despite a few lifeless outings I think the first month has gone pretty well.

What has not gone well is this. But I don’t really want to talk about that.

3. Trying out Weight Watchers.

not the kind of photo I'm going to post very often

I’ve been hesitant to talk about this because I know I’m within the healthy weight range for my height. I know I look fine. But I’m doing it anyway because of the following things:

a. I don’t feel quite comfortable in my body right now.

b. I’ve gained 30 pounds in the past seven years. I know that part of that is because I’m getting older and my metabolism is slowing down, but

c. The other part of it is that I don’t pay attention to what I eat.  I cook for myself more often than most, I eat more vegetables than most, and I don’t drink sodas very often, but I have a definite portion-control problem.  When I buy a frozen Amy’s pizza or a box of macaroni and cheese, I eat the whole thing.  When I go out to dinner with B I’ll usually eat everything on my plate and a few things from his, and I’ve still got room for dessert.

d. I have a closet full of beloved vintage and handmade clothing that fit me last year or the year before, but does not fit me now.  This is monumentally depressing.  I can’t re-make the handmade stuff, nor can I replace the vintage stuff easily.

If a-c weren’t factors I’d just let d go, but all four of these things have combined into one unhappy Alison. So Weight Watchers it is.  Thus far I’m happy with it. I’ll keep you posted, unless of course it doesn’t go well, in which case I’ll never mention it again!  Har har.

little tumblr-sized thoughts I’d write on tumblr if I had one (which I do, but there’s nothing there, and I only got it because I didn’t want anyone to take “bluishorange” before I did)

Published
by
alison
on February 13, 2009
in bluishorange, lists, maude and television
. 9 Comments

1. Last week I bought one of those digital-tv converter boxes so I can still watch Lost* after my television has become obsolete. This week I checked my mail and found the $40-off coupon for said box, which coupon I requested a month ago. If I were 45 years older and a lot crankier I’d take that coupon to Target and ask the returns desk to give me forty dollars. Then after they refused to give me forty dollars, I’d write a stern letter to the digital-tv converter box people and ask THEM to give me forty dollars.

But I’m 30 and not very cranky, so I’m not going to do any of that stuff. Instead I’m just going to pretend that coupon doesn’t exist, as is my custom with all such things I’m too lazy to do.

2. Freebirds, what is the point of selling me this chocolate-chip cookie if I can’t open it.  If I were 45 years older and a lot crankier I’d drive back over to your store and demand a different cookie, or my money back.**

3. I do not like spending the Friday before Valentine’s Day in an office setting.  My coworkers get flowers, and I say, ooh, sweet, you got flowers, and they say thanks!  And I feel like they’re thinking,*** I bet she wishes SHE’d gotten flowers.

What they don’t know is that I do not, in fact, wish I’d gotten flowers.  I’m not into Valentine’s Day at all, and in fact I told my potential flower-giver that while I’m glad we’ll be hanging out on the 14th doing whatever it is we usually do, I am not interested in gifts or cards or plants or edibles of any kind, thank you.****

But there’s no polite way to dispel their hypothetical thoughts without sounding weird or going off on an unnecessary and impolite tirade about how lame V-Day is.  So instead I just say ooh, sweet, you got flowers, and then walk back to my desk and put my headphones on.

4. The other day I was heard to remark, “Is it possible that I love my dog too much?” For those of you who think that it’s possible, I invite you to look upon her and tell me you don’t love her a bit too much, too:

my funny baby

She’ll be approximately nine in April, which will also mark her five-year anniversary of being my dog.  I think she looks much happier now than she did five years ago, don’t you?

*Also Dollhouse! Dollhouse comes on tonight!

**I got it open, though, aren’t you glad?

***I am not what I think other people might think of me, etc.

****I said it nicer than this.

why do you overestimate the size of the lie?

Published
by
alison
on February 10, 2009
in bluishorange and lists
. 5 Comments

My recent dreams come with vivid background music.  A few weeks back I dreamt that my friend Kari and I were on our way to meet B at the movies, and Ani DiFranco’s “32 Flavors” was playing on the car stereo.  We both sang along for the whole song, in real-time.  The other night Mike Doughty’s “Rising Sign”* was playing in the background while something or other dreamlike happened, I can’t remember what.  But the song was very real.

Two days ago someone wrote me an e-mail that contained the following sentence: “Nostalgia, for me, is as deadly as heroin.”  When I read this, I knew exactly what it meant.  Too often I become so mired in my own past that nothing happening presently is as good/bad as what happened before.  It’s dangerous in the sense that it prevents me from enjoying what’s happening presently, and renders me unable to view what happened before in an accurate light.

When I am thus mired (or mired in any swamp of negative thought as I’ve been lately), it becomes important to remember the following things:

I am not what my friends think of me.

I am not what I think my friends might think of me.

I am not my friends.

I am not my ex-boyfriends.

I am not my boyfriend.

I am not what anyone I used to know used to think of me or thinks of me now.

I am not anyone I used to know.

I am not the way I look.

I am not how much I weigh.

I am not what anyone says about me.

*Which I’m now playing on repeat, and I don’t know why.

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