Happy Birthday

I'm standing outside and the sound of rain envelopes me, and that's the way I like it. It's dark out and the trees create a cover so somehow I'm not getting wet. I think I smell cigarettes nearby.
It's late, I'm tired and my body needs rest. But my brain is on high alert. It's hard talking to people all the time. I need a break.

I'm thinking about leaving. I think about that a lot these days. That seems to be the theme of my life. Things go well and then they don't anymore and then I just want to leave. Only this time, I'm actually doing it.

I can't say for sure where I'm going and I don't know how long I'll be gone.

Sometimes I wish I didn't feel so alone.

But I look up at the sky and it's not black and it's not invisible. Without the city lights and sounds the sky is indigo blue, it has a color. Who knew.

The trees create a clearing and I can see the sky. Tilt my head up and I see the outlines of the trees etched out as a boarder.

I breathe in the country air. This is the place for me.

27 years ago a soul fell down from heaven and chose to enter me. It's a hard journey. It really is.

I wish I had a projector and could run slides of all my years. I wish I could remember it all. It's a wonder I remember anything at all.

I don't know what this year will hold. I wish I could say. I wish I had a plan, a goal, a dream. I wish I could glimpse into the future. But what would be the fun in knowing?

I guess in some way this trip is a gift to myself. It's better to look at it like that then saying that I'm running away. Because I don't think I can run anymore. I'm tired. It's exhausting. I want to settle down. I don't want to avoid life anymore.

I need to dim my phone so I can see the blackness, the beauty of the night sky. Isn't that what life is all about? Tuning out so we can appreciate what's really important in life.

I'm making this up as I go. Maybe you can tell. Don't take my word for it. I'm clueless.

Happy birthday to me and a good year for all.

Self Discovery

I'm scared and nervous.
I'm doing this.
I don't want to.
Don't make me go.
But no one's making me, are they.
I want to go.
It's exciting.
But I'm scared of being alone.
Out there in the world
All alone.
I'm never really alone am I.
Why am I doing this again.
Because I have to.
But why.
Why
Why
Why.
I'm turning 27 this week and I don't understand why some people have their lives all sorted out
And I'm quitting my boring job to go traipsing across the world.
I want to make it sound exciting.
I know some people will be jealous.
They wish they could do it too.
That's not my intentions.
I just want to feel a little less lonely
A little less confused.
I don't know when I'm coming back.
I don't know where I'm going exactly.
I don't really have a plan.
I should make a plan.
I hate planning.
Should I ditch it and not go?
Should I stay here forever with the covers over my head, pretending that everything's ok?
What's the point?
I wish I was married and settled.
I wish I knew what I wanted to do with my life.
I wish 8 years hadn't passed with nothing noteworthy to say of it.
I wish a lot of things.
Will I feel any different coming back from my travels?
Will I feel accomplished
Calm
Focused
Clear-headed
Or will everything be as foggy as when I left.
I wish I didn't have to do this alone.
I know,
I know there are people who care about me and support me.
But at the end of the day
The coming and going
Is up to me.
Call it an adventure
I call it the lonely journey
Of self discovery.

Leaving Time

The leaving is always the hardest part.

The part right after that is hard, it's sad and heavy and it'll take some time for the fog to pass.

But the act of leaving, of saying goodbye and walking out the door for the last time and leaving your key card behind since you won't be needing it anymore, that is hard.

Saying goodbye and knowing you might very well not keep in touch. Saying things like, "I'll stop in to say hi when I'm back in the neighborhood" but knowing that might never happen.

It's only been a year at this job but I like these people. They're good people and as each day passes which brings me closer to my last here it gets a little more sad. They'll all carry on their day to day and I'll be trudging around Europe trying to find myself as if that's where I lost myself.

I know I'll get through it and this job will soon be only a blip on my resume, but I do think I'll miss these people more than some other jobs I had.

Such is life. Lol.

Base Line

The sign said "Park closes at dusk" which I expected, but I went in anyway.
The path wound along the water and I followed it, I wanted to get to the end and see where it led to. Just around that bend, maybe the next one... But no, it never ended and it got darker and darker as more people passed me on their way out of the park while I made my way deeper in.

Suddenly I looked around me and could barely see anything, that's how dark it got. I took the headphones out of my ears and listened to the silence.

I didn't feel calm or peaceful, I felt anxious. And lonely, like I had reached the ends of the Earth and this was it, no one would ever find me here. I wonder if anyone could even see me here, this tiny little dot.

I feel like that sometimes, you know. There are days like that, and that's​ okay, that's okay because I know it gets better. And I'm learning to check in with myself when I start to feel anxious, ask myself- what level is your anxiety, and if it's a one or two I try breathing and pulling myself back. If it's higher I try figuring out what's causing it, or simply doing something that will help me not think about it.

It's easier being in large crowded places when I feel like that, like a supermarket or the gym. It helps being around other people, even strangers.

I read an article about depression.  I liked this part:

"You explain to everyone that just because you’re sad doesn’t mean you’re going to swallow a bottle of pills. Expressing an emotion isn’t always a harbinger of the extreme, it’s not always a cry for help — it’s what makes us human. You are human and sometimes you are sad and you draw diagrams to explain that sadness is a spectrum. On a scale of 1–10, 10 being it’s impossible to go on, you can’t go on, last year you were an even 20, but this year you’re possibly a 2 or 3, but all everyone remembers was the torching. They sound their five-alarms and the motley lot race to your house with their pain extinguishers and grief hoses, and you tell them, in the calmest voice you can fathom, that you were cooking steak when you set off the fire alarm. See the charred bits. See all the windows open. The smoke rising from the stove. You were just cooking steak; you hadn’t planned on torching the joint.
Before they leave they offer advice: maybe it’s best you not cook steak in the house. Have you considered greens? A vegan caesar salad? You add don’t make steak to the list of things people don’t want you to say or do lest it make them feel…uncomfortable. 
After they leave, you fry hamburgers with the windows and doors open, fans on full-blast.
When will they allow you to remove this mask from your face, because they are smothering you more than yourself?"

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Some friends get it and some don't, some I'm just better at hiding it with, and some get really worried at times which is why I try to hide it. 
Sometimes just listening is okay too, not saying anything.

I'm tired. My body is begging me to go to sleep, but I need to tire myself out just enough to do so without thinking. Bring the anxiety down to a zero, and then fall into a dreamless sleep. 

If you haven't already stopped reading this, I suggest you do so. It can't be all that great reading about somebody else's problems.

And yet, as a society that's what writers thrive on. Feel, understand, listen to my pain. I know all about it so I'm an expert.

I'm not an expert at anything, I can't even do sleeping right.

My body bids you a goodnight.