There is nothing about me that's okay right now. I'm falling asleep by 9p to get up at 6a to work anywhere between 2-12 hours at my day job and then I come home and I try to write something for my blog or my novel because I can't concentrate enough right now to research. I have three shows this weekend in three totally different venues (ladies who lunch/church ladies/people who like to recreate the middle age through clothing, fights and craftsmanship) so it's going to be a total headfuck going from "Oh darling, these scarves go for $200 at Neimans." to "No, my dyes aren't period. My artwork isn't either. I know, women didn't wear corsets on the outside." to "Your granddaughter would love a special perfume oil that her friends don't have!"
I wake up exhausted. I go to sleep exhausted. I hurt because I have fibromyalgia which doesn't magically go away when I need it to. I will set up and take down three times this week which means bins full of my wares, figuring everything out just to shlep it back to my car. No one helps me. I have to put on my most joyful smile, my best most appropriate dress for each venue and be winsome and not socially anxious. My reward for this is to come home and get my Etsy shop ready for the flurry of sales that will happen starting on Wednesday.
And my uncle is still dead and there will still be an empty seat at Thanksgiving. No matter what we do.
I have a broken heart, unwashed hair, unpolished fingernails, pain in my knees and ankles. I promised myself last year that after the holidaze I would get to rest. But I didn't. I applied for scholarships for spinning, I applied to big sheep and wool festivals even though I was terrified and rejection letters are rolling out all over my Facebook and I don't know if I should be more scared if we got in or more disappointed if we don't, I did more shows than I've ever done, I wrote three pieces for Llewellyn that will be published in their 2015 annuals, I kept my mother company, I kept my uncle company and mostly I couldn't remember what it felt like to be happy or carefree. I stay in this purgatory where I am never quite good enough to rest but never bad enough to quit. I make micromovements towards success. Towards freedom. Mostly, I burn. I've burnt through the tears of last year, burnt through the crippling anxiety, burnt through the self doubt that chained me, burnt through my physical pain, burnt through my emotional pain. I've made myself barren. My dreams are full of being buried in graveyard dirt, the insects cleaning my skeleton while I still breath, waiting to see what I'll become. I'm nothing but fire, bone, blood and ash now. So I rise.
C'est la vie, C'est la mort./ You and me, /Forevermore. /Let's walk down the road that has no end/ Steal away where only angels tread /Heaven or hell or somewhere in between /Cross your heart to take me when you leave /Don't go /Please don't go
Don't go without me
"He didn't even buy anything good with the money he got! No boat, no fast car, nothing! Can you believe that?" He was laughing, but I could tell he was worried. I was worried too. It's all we ever did together anymore. I would spin, my roving cascading over the oxygen tubes. We can't say the things we're thinking. That he's dying. That he's scared. That I'm worried that my mother won't be able to weather losing him. That I won't be able to weather losing him.
The Civil Wars/Jow/On Almost Dying/The Morrigan
(decemberists next)