Maybe This is It....

I’ve posted very little in this horrible year of 2020. My blog's been completely inactive, probably because the world right now defies description, and I have been (and continue to be) unable to put on a smileyface mask and write words of hope and encouragement.

So today I went online to delete it. And then I noticed some unfinished posts.... Rereading them reminded me that back at the sort-of beginning of this horrible year I was almost hopeful. And this amuses me. Because I am not hopeful now.

My last published post was at the beginning of the Pandemic lockdown here in my state. On March 20th I wrote:

"I noticed yesterday that there were no idling diesel trucks or muffler-problematic vehicles revving up and roaring down the street outside my window between 5 and 6:30 a.m.

And the constant drone and twice-daily Rush Hour roar of nearby Hwy 10 couldn't be heard from my house.

An actual bird woke me! And it wasn't my screaming cockatiels or my little roo 'Dash'....

Today was the same.

And I woke and was immediately grateful for it."

I remember entering that state lockdown period feeling anxious and apprehensive, but also ready to pitch in and do my part. Here was my chance to prove that I could be a team player like folks of the Greatest Generation, with my mask and my victory garden and my yeastless bread recipes! And I'd be online every day with something positive and hopeful to share so that others would be inspired to hang in there, too, and stay the course! And I'd blog about the quarantine so that my grandkids and their grandkids can someday read a firsthand account of these Interesting Times!

That was my plan. My big plan.

Five days later, on March 25^th, I began a post that I never published, and I'm not sure why, unless I crashed and burned shortly after typing it.... I wrote:

"I dreamed last night that the Darkness tasted us and was repelled by the intensity of our colors, our creativity.

It reached out its tendrils and tasted us all but couldn't compete with our dance, our musicmaking, our storytelling, our laughter. It shrank from our voices raised in song. It cringed away from our colorful creations.

The Earth needs an infusion of our creative energies right now, so let's do it ALL, use our voices, tell our stories, move our bodies, wear our colors, make our art.

I dreamed last night that color will get us through this."

I still believe that Creative People will get us through this -- not just the Pandemic, but also the current political climate and all the hurtful stuff it's caused. 

But less than a week after writing that post, I wrote another that went on to languish in my Drafts folder (until today). On March 30^th, I wrote:

"My community is either stupid or in denial. 

I checked a moment ago online and there are comments upon comments on a neighborhood message board asking folks in the area to please not congregate in big groups, to which others responded that we should quit panicking and over-reacting, to get off our ‘high horse’ and stop taking this whole thing so seriously. 

Some info there tells me that there are at least ten cases in the area, and the local hospital is already asking for handmade facemasks to help add to their already short supply. (Even the local newspaper had an article about it….) Way to help lessen the curve, Anoka – keep dismissing the quarantine while the ER steadily fills…. 

And what am I doing? I should be on top of that sewing, shouldn’t I? I should be making facemasks. 

I should be drawing cheery chalk pics on my driveway and painting cheery spring art on my front window so people out for a walk can walk away with a smile…. 

I should be livestreaming myself making art so others can join me. 

I should be sending thank you messages to everyone out there on the ‘front lines’ keeping business going as normally as possible. 

I should be keeping a quarantine diary for future generations. 

I should be joining an online art community, making a painting a day during this isolation period. 

I should be doing a lot of things. But I’m not. 

Because I’m tired. Exhausted, really. I’ve got nuthin’. I can’t even draw…."

Well, WOW. That happened fast.... 

It'd been what? DAYS? And already my own neighbors were resisting science and making those of us diligently doing our part to keep our community safe feel like assholes. It was so hard to believe!

But what was even harder to believe (to the point of heartbreak and grief) was that among their ranks were fellow graduates, friends I've known and loved since childhood, even members of my own family. What was happening? I thought I knew these people....

Two months later, on May 20th, I wrote this:

"Don't laugh...

But I think I may be on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

I know that sounds dramatic, but I don't know what else to call it. I've experienced something similar before and it was frippin' traumatic, but it was at a turbulent time in my life and I didn't get a lot of positive support then. Even now, Family refers to that period as The Time I Got So Sick. (The first time that was used in a conversation, I had no idea what anyone was talking about. And then when I did, I felt awful that the people I love felt like they could only talk about it by dipping it in layers of euphemism.)

Because of that Time I Got So Sick I think I can recognize it when it happens again. But this time it came out of nowhere. I'm doing All The Things: eating right, drinking lots of water, taking my meds, getting sunshine and fresh air and exercise and LOTS of sleep. I'm even managing not to pickle myself with alcohol (one of my coping mechanisms) because I know being inebriated FEELS like it's helping (there is nothing better than reaching that point where the noise is silenced and the imagination feels like it can just let go and float away....), but it's not.

Unlike last time, I now have a pretty good support team. And I've been noticing occasional periods of cheerfulness that make me feel as though I've got this licked. The only thing missing is a therapist, and I can't even think about trying to navigate the healthcare system and try to set something up that's virtual right now because my whole world is weird.

This feels almost like a PTSD experience, a reaction to Global Trauma or something. And because I am cocooned from everything right now -- seeing no one, not even creating -- I feel like I am in freefall...."

Well, that was a lifetime ago. Correction: four months ago, LOL, but it sure feels like a lifetime ago.... And everything's just gotten worse. WORSE. I cannot even begin to describe it! And it's not just the Pandemic, it's EVERYTHING. And blanketing it all is a divided America hell bent on destroying itself while the president and his evil administration eggs it on.

And what am I doing during this unbelievably awful time? I could've been and could still be someone uplifting, a light in all of this despair and darkness. I could be creating little joyful Leaflings and sending them out into the world to spread good energy. I could be making art and giving it away just to make a fellow human -- perhaps one who is as despondent and despairing as I am -- smile right now. 

But I am not.

It feels like the end of the world. Like the end of human kindness. Like the end of human sanity.

It's not. And I know this. But it certainly FEELS like the end....

...

BOOM! -- 2020

Today I feel a LOT like this little chickadee I witnessed on New Years Eve, so dazed and bewildered after accidentally crashing into my mother's patio door that it had all it could do to sit upright again without my assistance. And I blame it all on what I call the promise of my 'hibernation season' and the ultimate reality of it....

What was I thinking, anyway? On the heels of Fest came birthdays and my much-anticipated Halloween, followed by ramping up production again for my final art show of the year, then said art show occurring on the same weekend as Thanksgiving.... But I'd no sooner returned home again from the art show than I hopped a plane for Arkansas to spend as much time as possible with my Eldest and her family. It was a wonderful whirlwind! And during my absence James planned a Christmas vacation for the two of us to our favorite destination, hoping that by 'running away' for the holidays we could finally recuperate by avoiding all the usual Christmas stress.

So no sooner was I home again from Arkansas than James and I flew away. We'd purposely made zero plans for the holiday, hoping that our respective families would carry on without us. But if we thought we were making things easier for anyone, we were mistaken....

Christmas was just waiting for us when we got back. Family obligations were so immediate that I didn't even unpack (still haven't, really), just grabbed my suitcase and headed north until New Years Eve. Snow buried us. New Years Eve blew past us. And New Years Day found me finally home again and toasting the new year with the champagne James had bought for the night before. And suddenly I felt like I had been picked up and thrown into 2020. So much so that today I am that bird in the photo, blinking confusedly and wondering what the hell happened.

I slept until noon today, my first day alone at Tumbledown. And I'm tip-toeing and whispering in my shadowy house. There's no TV, no music, no lights. No sound save the click of my fingers on the computer keyboard. Even my Zoo is being especially gentle with me. It's like my normally exuberant Petz can sense that my nerve endings have been sanded raw and my brains are still addled. All around me Tumbledown looks like it did back in October after the end of Fest. As if I haven't had a moment since to deal with the after-season chaos....

When I think of my year, when I imagine it in my head -- all the months stretching out like a Year-at-a-Glance calendar -- October and November and December are empty. Blank. Like a hibernation period in my imagination. Full of rest and recuperation, and days when I can happily create, bake, decorate, dream, listen to carols and make handmade gifts while the snow falls outside, enveloping me in my cozy cocoon. I don't know why I still see it that way because it's never been that way, yet every year after Fest I still look forward to the fantasy of it with delightful anticipation.

All the additional unnecessary stress I caused for myself in the final weeks of 2019 did one thing positive, though: it shook every one of my cells by the hair until their eyes rattled. It spun me around until I had no idea which way I was facing. And I don’t think I’ve ever approached a New Year from this perspective before. 2019 ended seismically and chaotically and without any seasonal traditions to hang on to, and now 2020 feels like I'm still buried deep under the mess of it all even as the dust continues to fall and settle.

So here's to the dust settling already! And to the promise of a new year and a fresh sheet of paper. I am interested to see what transpires from here, both personally and artistically, and I look forward to sharing it with you.

Happy new year, my friend! Thank you for being in my life.

...me.
...