An attempt to just “Let it Be” in a new year

Making New Years resolutions is much like moving to a new city. It is exciting. We are going to be new people, losing weight, quitting smoking, making better decisions with our finances, hell maybe we will read more. There is no limit of what we will do and how we will change. As if somehow on December 31st at 11:59:59 we will blossom into our new selves ready to conquer all of our bad habits. And it is all, well and good – that is until we fail.

I have never been good at making resolutions. Maybe because I know deep down that in order to change or eliminate the bad habit or behavior, I need to change the reason I developed it. And well everyone is looking forward to a Zen 2010; I am still just not buying it.

Rather, I am pretty anxious about it. Friends around me are still losing their jobs, friends who have lost jobs still can’t find new ones and my own job now hangs in the balance. What will be of me this year? My family, my stability.

If one door shall close will another magically open?

2010 brings forth some other new endeavors in my family. My son will start high school this year and at the turn of 15 will get his driver’s learners permit. Anxiety…oh yeah.

I will also be submitting my manuscript, “Vindicating Mya” to Literary Agents this year. I don’t know exactly when but I expect before October. Will it get a bite? I am getting anxious just thinking about it.

My Christmas children’s story “A Monkey for Christmas” will be completed this year and I am thinking about self-publishing it this year as well. I have lots of exciting dreams of what I can do with this story…so I really have to think it through.

In trying to keep with the “What will be’s?” I have decided to just let it be and let fate lay her cards. I will continue on my path to discover me and through self-discovery I look to cure those areas that have developed those nasty bad habits. I will though, initiate meditation into my daily routine and will hopefully brave each new challenge with a positive outlook. On my path to clearing, it is out with the old and in with the new and I anticipate many new “new’s” in 2010.

Clearing-a new beginning

Junk drawers. The dark endless abyss where we place those items we just can’t seem to throw away but really have no use for. Communities of pens, pencils, half charged batteries, old cell phone chargers, a deck of cards with a missing queen of hearts are bound together and tossed around once every three to four months when we decide to revisit the void we think a paper clip may be inhabiting. A simple gang of misfits.

I have two of them.

Why? Well, you never know when I am going to need those “extra” parts to the playpen I built fifteen years ago. And then there are those religious pamphlets that I receive from my loving overbearing mother. And while I don’t really want to start a collection of the material there is just something about throwing God material in the trash that really, really bothers me. So, it ends up in the drawer along with that really cool pen I received as a thank you gift from an office supply store five years ago.

I, my friends, am a pack rat.

But a new year is brewing and as I barrel ass into my late thirties it is time to set a path to a more peaceful and simpler way of life. And that starts with cleaning out the junk drawers. I know this because every time I open one of these drawers the anxiety begins to set in. I know this because every time I slice my finger on whatever it is that is stuck in between the mini tape recorder and the candle that would never burn, I sing out a string of insanities that I would be ashamed for you to hear. I know this because if I ever expect to have a clear mind and body, my home must be free of the clutter that surrounds me. For some odd reason, this became important while I was plagued with the flu.

So I engaged myself with thoughts on how I would accomplish the task at hand and I opened the drawer. A string of blue spirally Christmas ribbon from 2007 popped out and as I pulled to clear it free a mass of entangled “things” came with it. Really, this was how it was going to be. I had to ask myself the question, “What are you missing in there?” I came up with nothing. It was time to just remove the drawer and because it was overflowing with more “things” I had to grab a pan to collect what was falling. It was crazy. I grabbed a clean new trash bag and emptied the drawer (and the pan) right into it.

It was like a breath of fresh air. Immediately, I was freed. And while it may seem simple, it was truly a defining moment. But still, I tied up my trash bag filled with things from the drawer and neatly placed it besides my trash to go out and I carried my flu ridden body back to the couch.

I must have thought about that bag for two hours until I realized that its mere existence still haunted me and still chained me to old ideals. No more. Enough is enough and I charged myself to the kitchen. In a brilliant attempt, I emptied out the chicken from last nights dinner in the bag that held me captive and I stormed out the front door and took the trash where it belonged. And right then I committed myself to NEVER collecting another needless item again.

The air lifted. The positive balance is shifting. But progress is achieved in steps…and there is another drawer awaiting me tomorrow.

the delusion – a poem

The cold dark canvass of the pond
Is perfected for natures art
Thriving by the light of its moon
The pond flickers with life
Yet, remains ever still
Waiting
Wanting

Capturing only what is real
Its reflections are distorted
By what lies deep underneath
Habiting murky souls
It remains ever still
Waiting
Wanting

Mesmerizing the mind, it calls
With promises of friendship, peace
But its haunting breath enfolds you
Bequeathing you with fear
Yet, remains ever still
Waiting
Wanting

There is a lone tree by the pond
You run for its stability
Trusting in its deep seeded source
But it is the Delusion
It possesses and leaves you
Waiting
Wanting

Doll Eyes

I saw it in my own eyes. A disconnection. Desperately searching for a sense of self, I studied my portrait in the mirror. It was a courageous move on my behalf. Since the onset of the increasing weight gain, it has been very difficult for me to look at my own image in the mirror. Why should I? The person staring back at me is someone I barely recognize much less someone I truly know. But this time I did. My face was much fuller than the thin heart shape face I once arrogantly carried. Still, I could almost see it, as if it was still there…hiding. My complexion was blotchy, my skin had lost its luster and drooped heavily around my eyes signaling what I already know…I am not well.

I have fooled myself into thinking that I am a warrioress. The past fifteen years have been challenging. A fight for survival. A fight to build a career on minimal higher education. And a fight to raise a healthy well rounded son. My bold independence took over to ensure that I did it on my own, never allowing the influence of others to stop me from reaching what I considered success and never allowing public influence to determine the outcome of my child. I was out to beat the odds and they weren’t in my favor. I have fallen and I have got right back up. Ready for more, ready to conquer. And then fell again…even harder. I have lost everything and gained only some. I learned that dignity was just a word when it came to survival. I endured humiliation to just make it. But here I sit, today, to tell you that thus far I have succeeded although the battle has taken its toll. The lines around my eyes are deep and saddened showing the years of worry and the endless nights of crying myself off to sleep – alone, in the dark, where no one saw me, where no one heard me. Unanswered prayers and a smidgeon of hope. And I begin to wonder…Do I have enough fight in me for the next round? – The teen years.

Ha Ha…Do I have a choice? Hell, no. I am responsible for a life much more important than my own.

There is a truth about oneself at two in the morning that is not seen amongst the rest of the busy day. As I looked deeply into my eyes I saw coldness, disconnection, like looking into the eyes of a doll, it was almost haunting. Where am I? I have sacrificed my life, given most of me to others. I have lost dear friends, waved off love and paved a way for a life of loneliness. I forgot to heal what hurt and instead let it fester into a lifetime of anger and bitter resentment. One of my favorite quotes from Ghandi states “An eye for an eye makes us all blind” and so I try to live my life in such a way that I wish well on all those who have crossed me. I state allowed that I forgive them for the pain they have caused and then I swallow hard and sow the seed were depression lies.

I am thankful though, for I wear a tough coat of armor and I have a great innate ability to humor myself. These two things are what hold the core. I am thankful too for my beautiful friends both past and present, for without them…well.

But it is time for me to focus on me. My child deserves it, my work deserves it, my friends deserve it, my family deserves it…I deserve it.

The holidays remind me of how unsettled I really am. They remind me a new year is quickly approaching and a new birthday is just around the corner. I will be 38 in January and so the climb to 40 begins. I am reminded of what I will never get back and reminded of what I need to do before I reach that milestone day. The race to discover Dawn is on and that thought alone is exhausting.

Bitter Cold – A Poem

For months that I have suffered
My story must be told
I stand in defiance
But the air is bitter cold

I have learned to be my voice
Events yet to enfold
I fight for survival
But the air is bitter cold

My body slowly dying
Too young to be so old
I face mortality
And the air is bitter cold

Too much has been left undone
Sons hand in need to hold
I question my demise
Though the air is bitter cold

I want to live forever
I need to break the mold
To make a difference
But the air is bitter cold

A something is not quite right
For this they must be sold
Beg for diagnosis
But the air is bitter cold

The sooner it is found out
The treatment could be gold
To save my life, my sons
Though the air is bitter cold

Fear to face the mystery
But bravery is bold
Will fight to live for him
Even though,
The air is bitter cold

Prepping for Nano and Cheering NYY

Twenty-two days left to go and the race for Nanowrimo is on!

First, I have donated back to Nano-because that site is amazing and has absolutely changed my life. If you are reading this and are currently not a fellow wrimo but dream of completing a novel and if you love to write-please check it out (www.nanowrimo.org) and sign up.

Ok, so now I have created a title and a plot. My word count spreadsheet is ready to go, and I have set my goal-75, 000 words. Can I do it? Hell yeah!!! I can do it…remember there is nothing that this girl cannot accomplish. I just need to stay motivated and on my daily goal of 2500 words. Cake walk, even with a full time job, hormonal teenager, my very own mental issues and a very painful neck! Yes, a cake walk…staying positive….Yes I can! I will pull it off!

So my 2009 Nano titled, The Delusion, has its very brief synopsis posted, here it is:

“Psychic dreamer and cartoonist Holland Wylde follows a string of murders after he foresees them in his dreams. The time clock is ticking and he must do everything he can to stop the murders and find the culprit. He is on the case until he discovers through his drawings that in order to find the answers and stop the madness he must begin by looking within.”

The novel is going to be a fast paced, suspenseful mystery mixed with blood, love, truth and discovery and will even host eerie messages from guardian angels. You think you will know who the crazed murderer is and then BAM-there will be a huge twist at the end…

well that is my goal anyway!

So what do you think? I would be interested to see what other wrimo’s will be writing about this year.

All there is left to do is make my outline, which will take deep concentration….and at the moment it is October baseball and Derek Jeter just made another amazing play….So I pause Nano writing and this blog for the time being so I can yell and holler while the boys from New York close this part of the division! GO YANKEES!!

God, he is HOT!

finding answers in tears

I promised myself that I would write in this blog every day but I must say that my recent decline in health has kept me captive within my own depression. Depression-what an ugly word. Yes, I suffer from it and at times there seems to be no escape. My thoughts bring me back to last October when my son and I went to an annual Halloween Festival. We were going on a haunted hayride, it would be fun and that, I decided, was the medicine I needed. Fun-escape from reality. When we arrived at the festival l I was excited to see that they brought back a fan favorite. The psychic, Madam So-and-So… I begged my then thirteen-year-old son to stand in line with me. It would be fun-it was a festival, after all how keen could her all seeing eye really be? And the trooper he was, he caved in and we stood in line for an hour and forty-five minutes. We got to know everyone in line and we all had a great time talking about psychics and whether or not we believed in them. Coming from a family that had a “true” psychic, I was convinced that the gift did exist but not in this medium. This was nothing more than for the “fun” of it. After all, this Madam So-and-So, if she did truly have the gift, would be drained of energy by the time she got to us.

After about twenty-five overpriced four-ounce drinks and two trips to the port-a-potty each it was finally our turn. I let my son go first. He came out beaming telling us all that when he grew up he was going to be traveling a lot as she saw my son on many plane trips. “Mom, you know directors have to travel a lot. Do you think that is what it could mean?” Knowing that my sons dream was to became a famous movie director I wasn’t about to discredit Madam-So-and-So. “Could be Ryan, keep working hard to make that come true ok?” Now it was my turn.

Madam So-and-So was dressed in her Halloween garb but her face was soft. I can’t remember her name but I can still picture her face. Creamy porcelain skin that was elegantly highlighted by wavy silver hair, her eyes were a soft white blue and when she spoke she had a calming that was irrefutable. “We only have twenty minutes so focus on one area only, ok.” I knew instantly what I wanted to ask, since this was just for fun she would probably give me the answer I really wanted to hear! “Will I ever be published?” She laid the tarot cards down. She concentrated deeply before she let out a long “hmmmm”. Hello woman I am here for fun, I paid the twenty bucks, now tell me what I want to hear!

“Well, not your first book. But while I do see you achieving high success in the future, I do not think it will be with the first book you publish.” Thank you, now that was what I wanted to hear. However, she was a writer with a book published in her real name, so she gave me some insights on publishing and even facing rejection. Great experience. But as I stood from my seat to walk out the door she said something to me that would make me stop and stutter. “What about your depression?” What about it? Of course, I didn’t say that out loud. “You need to get that in order before it spirals out of control.” SLAM. “I just met your son and I have to say that it seems you have done an incredible job raising him. Is there a father in the home? Because I see the only connection to him through you.” Well, uhm no, Ryan what did you tell this woman? “Balancing a single household can be hard. You seem to have found the balance between parent and friend but are you sure that you are not hiding behind him? What do you do that is just for you? Answer that question for yourself before it is too late.” Ok, can I just say, there went the fun.

But she was right. I have spiraled out of control knowing every step of the way that I wasn’t doing what I needed to do to heal myself. So I find myself struggling for the answers…how do I find myself, how do I discover Dawn? I know from my last post that I can obtain anything. I have learned that messes are just messes, and they can be cleaned up. But how do I find the motivation to put all this into practice. How do I fix what is broken inside me.

I had a brief trip down memory lane this evening when I ran into the mother of a very ex-ex boyfriend and it festered up an overload of emotions. I found myself on the self-pity roller coaster that led me to every past event of anyone who had ever wronged me. I blamed them all for who I have become today very careful not to place blame on myself, where most of it really belonged.

I threw myself into a hot shower knowing that water is the purest healer of anything and though my swollen eyes burned, I did feel better. And, the experience this evening did make me realize that I needed to start forgiving those for the damages they helped caused. So I forgive you Robert Campbell for never looking (did I just write that out loud)…may your soul rest in peace and be filled with pure love, I release you.

But here I am now…waiting for an answer…. And hoping upon hope that this post brings me closer to it. Baby steps I guess, if you reread the first line…I guess I could say that it is time to stop making excuses! And it is time that I get back to my novel.

Whimsical moments and Guardian Angels

There are times in life when we are gifted whimsical moments. I had mine this morning. Read on.

I woke this morning plagued by my own emotions. Another Monday morning awaited me. Too much to do and not enough hours to do it. The stress was already mounting and it was only 7 a.m. I moaned and groaned as I commuted to work telling myself once again that I wasn’t doing what I was meant to do, that I haven’t given my life purpose, and that my life was standing still. I had turned my life over to others and forgot to take care of me.

What a horrible way to begin a day!

I started the workday as normal. Grabbed a cup of coffee and shuffled slowly to my desk. My neck and lower back screaming at me to SIT DOWN. “Man, I wished those damned doctors would find out what is wrong with me.” I snarled in distaste.

Now, it is only 8:30 a.m. – fair to say the day isn’t going well.

I checked my phone messages, took some notes and opened my email. As I scrolled through the thirty new messages I received over the weekend, I began weeding out trash (spam) and what was from a list serve. I barely got a swig of coffee down my throat when I choked it back after stumbling upon a dreaded email. It was from my Assistant Manager and the header had a name that I new all to well. For the purpose of this post, I will call her Helen Smith.

Helen is a long time property owner in our community. She is very elderly and very sweet, she lost her husband to cancer a little less than a year ago and then found out she had brain stem cell cancer immediately thereafter. Poor Helen. Now there had been some mix-ups and problems in our records regarding Ms. Helen and I thought I had successfully solved the problem by sending her letters.

NOPE-not today.

Now, you are probably wondering why I am even bothered by talking to this sweet old lady? Well Helen has a gift – the gift of gab. And she loves to quote scripture. Mark an hour off the calendar; I had to call Ms. Helen.

The conversation was progressing as it normally had when I would talk to Ms. Helen. She went on and on and on about life and I remained calm and passive offering in uh-huh’s and oh my’s and I am so sorry’s to the conversation when it required me to do so.

If I added anything more, I could spend as long as two hours on the phone with her-and I just didn’t have the time. So as she continued on, I wrote letters, filed files and papers, wrote my to do lists. I had no idea what she was talking about until she said something that made me stop. As I am spiritual (not religious) in nature the two words that she spoke caught my undivided attention.

“What did you say, Ms. Helen?” I asked with all heightened concentration.

“Guardian angels my dear, do you believe in them?”

“Very much so, Ms. Helen, why do you ask?” It wasn’t business talk but I was interested.

“Well cancer had taken my husbands body and God has taken his soul. I feel things around me, good things. There have been many gifted moments right here in my home and I feel my husband is here holding hands with my guardian angels.”

It was a touching moment and I told her warmly that I was sure he was. But she continued on.

“Well the reason I tell you this, is because as you called me I was reviewing a subscription that had run out in my husbands name. It has little sayings of scriptures and positive tones and as you rang my phone I thought it was odd that I was compelled to read something to you. Do you have just a few more minutes?”

Uhmm…it’s already been an hour and ten minutes, “Yes of course, Ms. Helen.”

She began reading me a story about old China and the fish markets. About how the fish would stink if wrapped in paper bags and how they solved the problem by beating some type of leaf into the bag to create wax paper. She went on and on with the story but I wasn’t sure exactly how it related to me.

“You understand dear, that this message is telling you that you have the ability to solve any problem if you creatively and patiently attempt to fix it. Nothing is unobtainable. Strange how we are all connected in one way isn’t it Dawn?”

I was immediately shamed! This kind, dear woman had offered me a gift and I not so much had given her the time of day.

I told myself: Slow down Dawn, listen and give love to those around you, even when you don’t have time to. Keep working on your strengths, don’t define your weaknesses.

There is nothing I cannot obtain.

Thank you, YM!!! I received your message and those of my guardian angels. I hope you are wrapped warmly in their love.

Nano 2008 – time is creeping up on me!

Last year, I joined this site called Nanowrimo. National Novel Writing Month and the contest is to write an entire novel of no less than 50, 000 words in 30 days. I did it! I wrote a murder mystery, police procedural in the first person and I felt so proud and accomplished. I even bought myself a brown Nano “AUTHOR” coffee mug which I so arrogantly displayed to all my co-workers. I was a writer, a novelist.

But, then reality set in. I had this first very rough draft and decided with all the advice that I would shelf my Nano project for six months before I began editing it. They (those that gave me advice) say that by shelfing your novel for that long that you actually have a fresher mind when you revisit it. Okay, great!

In May, when I pulled my Nano novel off the shelf, I reread my novel…..hmmm. I decided that I didn’t it like in the first person, so I began editing it to reflect the third person. And then about halfway through the novel, I decided that it didn’t really show the story well in the third person and that the voice of the main character needed to be heard. So I began to rewrite from the beginning in the first person. Well, then about a third of the way, I got bored and decided to re-shelf my Nano novel for another thirty days. Did I mention that I may be touched with ADD…

So in July, about 45 days later, I revisited my little project and decided that not only did I absolutely hate the first chapter as the first chapter but that the entire book that is written as police procedural should be something else. My main character who was a female cop, is now a would be novelist. Uggh. I am my own worst enemy.

I wrote a new first chapter. Hey I like it! Now my old first chapter is my new second chapter (edit headings) and its place is right. However, I now have a novel written half in first person, half in third and over half the novel is written as if the main character is a cop (lots of new edits).

November 2009 is right around the corner….and I have a brand new great idea for a new novel this year. I have to plot and develop characters all while having this other novel hanging over my head. But I can’t give up on it. Did I mention that I threw my neck out a couple months ago. Ergo…little hard to type. Could time please just stand still?