Summer's End

The summer is cooling down, coming to an end.  Not just according to the calendar, convention, and school year, but also because football season has started and it's now after Labor Day.  The day after Labor Day last year is when I started wearing my Halloween dresses.  I normally detest rushing the holidays, but I had already waited nine months to wear those dresses, which I had bought just post christmas the previous year.

But this past year, I've made a few minor changes to my wardrobe, which was pretty major for me.  For one thing, I tend to wear things for decades.  I also don't really follow fads, or seasonal fashions that are trending.  I find something that I like to wear, that fits and that flatters, that feels good and is comfortable.  Then I get it in every color I can and wear the shit out of it.  This explains why I have this off the off the shoulder, lacy, fit and flare dress in green, purple, royal blue, navy blue, red, and black.

I also have many maxi dresses, thin nylon beach wear that is super easy to wash, pretty much wrinkle resistant, and that makes them the perfect travel garments.  So in March when my husband and I set off on our train trip across the states to San Diego and then cruised thru the South Pacific Islands, flying back home five weeks after we left, the majority of my clothing was suitably tropical.  We had a great time, an ideal way to celebrate our tenth anniversary.

Last year, prior to the holidays, there was a commercial that used Redbone's Come & Get Your Love.  I love that song, it always makes me feel like dancing in that sort of carefree way I did as a child, when it was popular the first time around.  February of this year, I played that song all the time, because it made me feel encouraged, to be brave and go for what I want, even tho I have self doubts, and worry about flaws with my beautiful mind.  It was my "psych me up" song, a sort of "you can do this, cuz it's alright"; I got this.  And I did.

For two years now, I've done an incredible amount of non~stop work, delving into some deeper, scarier issues that I felt like I was ready to face.  It hasn't been easy, it has been messy, I've made some mistakes along the way; but overall, it was so worth it.  And it continues to be a self discovery, gaining some confidence, some experience, some knowledge about myself, and lots and lots of acceptance of all my aspects, or most of them, anyway.

This summer started with a huge revelation that I was unprepared for, but was so thankful to realize that I could experience joy and exuberance, that those emotions were not lost to me and that I was not muted, dampened, or dead inside~~which is what I'd been resigning myself to, as I had been feeling almost affectless for awhile, but not really.  I was experiencing all the not quite pleasant emotions and states, like anxiety, fear, anger, hurt, etc.  But not the sustained happiness or joyful zest that I'd been striving for.  Tho I love my life and my husband, I felt like the happiness that would be completely appropriate to be feeling was absent and I worried that those positive feelings had bowed out, leaving me with the head knowledge but not the heartfelt feelings of grateful, blissful, joy.

So when I experiences the physical sensation along with the emotional feelings, I was even happier because of the discovery that they hadn't fled.  That I could indeed enjoy those feelings and so I really craved them, eagerly anticipating experiencing them more often.  I wanted to learn how to call forth those feelings for myself, when I wanted them.

Immediately, I experienced that in order to be open to feeling those positive rushes, I might experience gutwrenching painful episodes too.  I knew that, but was surprised that even in those times, I was learning more and more about me, being vulnerable to some very deep seated, old fears; like fear of rejection and abandonment.  I attempted something that was and still is, tho less so, scary for me and that is having hope.  It's not that unbridled joyful hope that demands so much trust and faith, I'm not that brave...yet.  But I did take some baby steps and just being aware of it, being able to identify it, was a huge step for me.  It potentially opens me to many possibilities.  That's great, scary, but great.  Some days, not always, but some times, it means that I grow too scared and need to pull back into a safer place and not be so vulnerable, so hopeful.

That means tho, that I can do some counterproductive things, that may not be in my own best interest.  But at the time, it felt safer to not have hope.  It felt safer to think that I should prepare for the worst and not expect the best.  It felt like if I expected failure, then I wouldn't be hurt when it happened.

Over the summer, I tried to not let myself get stuck in that tho.  If I did admit defeat, even if it was for a few days, I let myself rest and rethink, then brave being vulnerable again.  Allow myself to have hope, to leave myself open to possibilities.  It's scary, and it's hard, I won't lie.  Sometimes it takes all I have not to retreat and throw up my shields and guards, cowering behind thick unfeeling armor that demands that I shun my desires, my hopes, my dreams, my happiness in favor of being safely predictable and deny myself pleasure, because having hope is risky.  It means that I have to trust in myself and others, I have to have faith and believe, instead of know for certain.  And that is terrifying for me.

So this past week, I lost my patience, I threw up my hands in exasperation and said, "I give up.   I can't do this anymore.  It hurts too much" and then I did a mean hurtful harmful thing.  Instead of facing the fear and dealing with it, by sitting with it, getting to know it, and being curious about it.  I tried to rid myself of it immediately, I tried to block it and deflect it with that stiff armor that weighs me down and holds me back.  I lashed out, spewing meanness, taking all my hurt and turning it into daggers, spearing another person with my words.  I was so hateful to them that even while I was doing that, I was horrified at my own behavior.

I'm so regretful.  I'm so sorry.  I have no excuses, really.  I can explain myself as I just did, but that doesn't excuse or justify my actions.  And what's really scary is that I did pretty devastating harm.  It might even be irreparable.  The only redeemable thing that I can see is that I am learning, the awareness means that I catch is sooner and that I am less likely to do it as often.  But it doesn't erase what's been said, what's been done.  I can't take that back.

I can only move forward, with the intention to be better more often.  Hopefully, my autumn will see me holding space for hope with out the need for reassurance.  Hopefully, hoping.