Hermit

The strangest thing about swimming is that the longer you do it, the more it feels like you are doing nothing. You get to this place where you don’t feel anything, no pain, no exhaustion, nothing. You feel like you can do it forever just as long as you don’t stop. You just move your arms, kick, and don’t forget to breathe. Stroke, stroke, stroke, breathe, stroke, stroke, stroke breathe, flip. Over and over.

 

But then, when you get out of the water, its like you can feel weight go from your head, through your body, into your toes. Gravity sinks down into you. Your back hunches over, your muscles tense, your feet feel like lead, and you don’t dare move an inch for fear of feeling the ache.

 

So the only thing you can think is: “get back into the water, get back into the water where it doesn’t hurt.”

 

But then you will notice how illogical that is. The water is kind of what hurt you in the first place, you just didn’t notice it at the time. Just because something made you numb does not mean it made you better.

Being home has made me feel like that.

 

Time for honesty: I have found that while I know home is the right place for me at this time, it is not where I want to be entirely. It’s hard to admit that even though I went to Australia with nothing, I ended up leaving something there when I came home again.  

 

The life I have built for the past 5 years (In Montana, and Asia, and Australia) is completely gone, and I feel like I am starting from scratch. Ground zero. And just the thought of this is overwhelming enough to make me shut down from it. It seems as though the easiest way for me to get through this transition is to take myself out of the situation all together. So, I pretend that the things that are happening are not really happening to me at all. I mean, I didn’t really have to go through court crap for the whole month of February; my dog did not die last week. I’m not the one who has not hung out with friends for the better part of 10 months. No that is not me. Certainly, not.       

 

I feel like, in order to protect my feelings, I’ve shut the real Janie away, and turned into this robot of sorts, just going through the motions. School, Work. Everything. Check. Check. Check.

 

But I can’t feel anything any more. I don’t know how to answer the question: “how are you?”

 

((note: people will read this and suggest YWAM again, but I know that is not the answer, that is just like getting back into the water and delaying the inevitable))

 

I guess what all these words are trying to say, is that I am starting to understand the importance of having people in your life to see you for who you really are. It seems like having friends in your life is the only thing that really makes you exist at all.

 

It would seem that a person cannot exist without the presence of others. 

I kind of miss playing the trombone. 

“what will be your space jam?”

And. The writer said, speak to us of life. And he answered: Have you not had the answer before you as you have an image before you in a clear pond? It is when you ask about life that you begin to sense that spirited charge racing within your mind. Could you have turned away the real meaning to life as you turned away the begger on the street? Or as you turned away the beauty of the full moon or the orchestration of the surf? Life is from birth to funeral and all that lies therein is called tact. We strive to stay within the lines drawn for us by others. Should we not cross over the line? Should we not set our own pace? Might we have failed to sense our deep-set feelings, as they cried out for recognition? Those that cross over the lines are extremists – those that conform to the line are lost! Could it be that man is condemned to be free? Life is a formula that each must solve for himself, using his own variables and his own unknowns. The self, the inner-self, is the most dependable guide and guardian that one can ever have. Follow your own star! Follow your own God! And don’t trip on the steps of others as they follow theirs.

 

 

LFB

 

Today my mother gave me a book of my Grandfathers that I have been wanting for a while. (“The Prophet” by Kahlil Gibran.) When I opened the book I found this typed message from my grandfather dated between 1975 and 1980 and labeled as “thoughts.”

I didn’t really get to know my grandfather as he died when I was about 3, but I am pretty sure that we would have been the very best of friends. We would go on hikes with our German Shepherds and talk about life and stars and books and what it means to grow. 

Tell you nostalgia, its like a drug, it keeps you from seing things the way they are
The Walking Dead 205