Wednesday, September 24, 2014

dream break (rain check)

I once had a therapist, an older Native American woman who worked out of the house she shared with her grandson, and what I loved about her is that she didn't always make me talk. If I felt like talking, that was great, but some days I just didn't have it. I just didn't want to. And on those days, she'd hand me some paper and some crayons or markers, and I'd draw whatever I felt like with my non-dominant hand, like having a dream on paper. Sometimes the picture would spark a discussion, and sometimes we'd just look at it and say, "Okay."

(It was a wonderful little house, by the way, with an inviting room for her clients. There were shelves and shelves of wooden animals and statues and rocks and figurines that I'd look at while she made us mugs of tea. And in the bathroom she had this great lavender hand soap and a purple hand towel and a painted wooden stepladder for her phantom grandson, and the bathtub was always filled with his toy boats. It was such a charming bathroom experience that I went out and bought—and to this day still use—the same hand soap.) 

As you can see up there with that drawing/partial collage I've made for you in lieu of a regular post, I just don't have it. I don't want to today. It's closer even to a can't. There are too many things working their way through my body, there's too heavy an energy pressing me down. Half the day I feel like I have some high-powered vacuum attached to the top of my head, reaching down and sucking out all the ancient muck in my insides. There's no fighting it. I don't even know exactly what it's doing, but it's a literal, non-metaphorical, physical sensation. I guess I'm processing some things. 

I didn't want to show up with nothing for you but I didn't have the energy to post something serious, and I wasn't in the right mood to post something light. Goldilocks here said no to both of those options. So here's my picture, presented without explanation. 

Yep.

Okay. See you next week, when I hope to have some words with me. And thank you, as always, for being so damn great.  

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is my favorite blog of all time. So real. So honest. Thank you, thank you for your writing and for sharing yourself.

Anonymous said...

As your wonderful therapist said, Okay. I enjoy, am moved by, am provoked to deeper thought by *everything* you write, Tina.

Unknown said...

I'm reading a book right now that you might find interesting. It's called Rapt:Attention and the Focused Life. I just started it but I heard an interview with the writer and she was just so damn smart and the subject matter was intriguing. For some reason this post made me think of that book.