I do believe in faeries

had wanted so much to journal last night, but was so so exhausted, it was a crazy day.

Shadowplay was really nice Thursday night, despite the unsavory elements in the club. Its location is sketchy and there is no admittance policy, no cover, no dress code, for Thursday nights, so literally anyone off the street can wander in, and they do. My shirt got moved which never happens, I tucked it back behind Derek like I used to always do, and I stuck a little closer to him than usual. He asked if I was okay at one point, and I said sure, it's just too noisy a place to chat about my health problems. "I'm okay just my left boob hurts so much I can't raise my arm because it got stabbed with a giant needle and also they found a potential precursor to cancer and they want to chop it all out of me and I'm a bit freaked out but yeah I'm good" is not an appropriate late night answer to shout over the music, yanno.

( breast health issues. )

There was a moment at Shadowplay when an unsavory dude who was vaping asked me my name while I was trying to dance. I shook my head in a silent decline but there wasn't much space to get away from him, and he stayed leaning over me. A new-ish regular who is this lovely svelte older gentleman who always wears skin tight vinyl shorts, stiletto heels, leather straps, and a mask, carefully, thoughtfully, wedged his little body between me and the vape dude. I have not even learned this guy's name yet, though we have been dancing together for two or three months now. I was so grateful.

One would think at age 50 I wouldn't have to deal with this anymore, but here we are.

It was a lovely night regardless, I got long snuggly hugs with Derek and Manders and I danced some, I am a little annoyed that after her slight breast cancer scare earlier this year that she didn't even acknowledge that I had a biopsy, let alone bothered to ask about the results. But whatevs. It's just more clarity for me that she is not someone I can invest energy into, it's just sad.

I went home sort of early for me, so I was able to get up early enough to clean the entire apartment before work, which felt really, really good. I baked a pumpkin pie, I did all the dishes, I cooked my mushrooms and vegetables and made a really beautiful healthy lunch, I am determined to work on my snacking issues and get back down to a shape I don't dislike so much. I am only 5-8lbs overweight, it's not catastrophic and it is fixable, so I am focusing on this as much as I can, went back to my weight loss meditations, part of this is the breast health scare and wanting to avoid sugar and processed foods as much as possible. Back to cruciferous vegetables on a daily basis for me, hopefully!

The morning Friday was sort of the quiet before the storm, I was able to get outside for my usual ten minutes of outside time with my self-care app and coffee before the rain started. I met a cute little doggie named Georgie. The sky was beautiful and moody as the storm rolled in. By the time I was fed and packed up for work and heading out, it was dumping rain. It did that allllllll day.

Work was intense. I had new people, familiar people, someone who asked for a lesson, someone who I often find challenging to be in the same room with, and then the darling lovely Alisa for two hours straight in the afternoon. She had asked me for extra sparkles as she has multiple trips coming up and also had to put down her 18 year old cat a few days ago. I gave her a little sympathy card, not much but it was something, I drew little paw-prints on it while I had my coffee break at Albina Press before sparkling her. I stood inside and doodled on her card while the rain poured down through the open door next to me, it was so beautiful. I love open air but cozy covered areas like that when it's pouring but not very cold, like it was yesterday.

Alisa wants to go for the world record of most sparkles in her hair of anyone ever, and I am more than happy to help her. Her appt alone cost as much as I sometimes made in an entire day's work, I was very very grateful. But also completely wiped out and exhausted, after. It took forever to clean up all the little sparkle remnants all over the floor, and of course it's a lot to talk about dead animals, a topic that is so hard to avoid when it has just happened to someone. She's delightful and I loved every minute of it but boy was I tired after. I think the dancing the night before plus cleaning the entire apartment the next morning (an hour and a half straight of physical work) was part of it, too, of course.

After I finally had everything cleaned and put away, the sun popped out and there was the most vivid, bright, spectacular rainbow I can ever remember seeing. I just stood and gazed, and took my time picking wet persimmons while watching the leaves of all the trees around me glowing in the sun under that stunning rainbow. It's such a beautiful phenomenon, how lucky are we to live in such a shockingly gorgeous universe.

Went to the grocery store and it was so hard to go inside because the sky was so beautiful. The rainbow faded and all this blue sky with whispy white and golden clouds showed up, colliding with the dark grey and orange roiling storm clouds that had moved east. Watching these two cold fronts come together was a wonder to witness, and I couldn't stop staring for quite a while.

Got home and kind of collapsed. I had hoped to do more chores but I couldn't even journal, I just slept and set an alarm so I could go pick up Josh at the airport later. His flight was delayed so he didn't land until 11:30pm, I was able to fill his tank on the way there, so at least one chore happened. I've been back on my physical therapy and vitamins and skin routine and all of that, my diet is better, I'm starting to perk back up after a slight crash, I think all the sudden scans and procedures after my first mammogram kind of messed me up. I'll be okay.

Looking forward to checking out a new venue with Josh this evening, need to hop in the shower and get ready. My DJ is playing! I'm excited to try out a new place. I skipped Thriller for the first time in like, 15 years today. I just didn't want to be a zombie and go dance in the rain (it's covered, but still, it's outside and one gets muddy getting in and out of the park). I didn't want to dress up, and it still hurts to raise my left arm. Alas. Hopefully I can go back next year. I just... didn't want to? And it seems like they had good attendance and support, this year, without me, which I am glad for. It was a labor of love and maybe I just fell a little bit out of love with it.

Speaking of falling out of love, I should probably tell Finley that I'm leaving.

I haven't gotten my halloween decorations out yet and I'm actually okay with it. There are extenuating circumstances this year, it's okay. I might still grab a few things tomorrow, we'll see how much energy I have. If not, that's fine. I've been wearing all of my halloween clothes and halloween is always alive in my heart, that counts for a lot.

...

Avalanche is doing well, she's a happy kitty. I brushed her for a bit while trying to write this. She's passed out with her favorite toys on the bed, now.

Before Josh got home, I finished off a bin of peanut butter I was saving for when he was gone. I had it with cinnamon and apple slices and it was the most delicious dinner imaginable. I love apples and peanut butter so much.

Excited for sweater weather, soup, and more pies.

I'm soooooooo sad, I had to get a sudden breast biopsy yesterday with no warning, and I'm not supposed to do anything exerting, so I cannot climb Dog Mountain today as planned, I wanted to go sooooooo badly.

I took a walk around my old neighborhood, bought way too expensive groceries, and got a coffee that was way too sweet (it was called "butter coffee" but it's just a boatload of sugar, gross - I was expecting like a paleo MCT oil aka "bullet coffee" type flavor, sigh, sugar is the last thing I need when I have suspicious looking calcifications and am getting checked for cancer) after taking Josh to the airport for another work trip. He hasn't recovered from the last trip and is nervous about traveling again so soon, I worry for him.

I thought, okay, I will pivot and FINALLY get the floors swept and pull out Halloween decorations, since I can't hikw, but here it is 2pm and I'm shut down and not moving :(

My boob hurts :(

Trying to journal myself out of the paralysis.

I want to bake, also, I need to use up pumpkin and sweet potato.

Most important is cleaning, Avalanche is starting to get irritated from the dirty floors (her eyes swell up if I let it go too long, poor baby).

The sun popped back out, I wish I were on a hike in the gorge, I thought about doing something smaller like Angel's Rest, but it's so pretty here today I think I will try to just do a bike ride later instead, sunset-ish bike rides can be nice, despite the traffic - once I get off the busy streets it can be quite pleasant. I like watching the sky change and the crows head to roost. Sunrise this morning was glorious.

Maybe if I eat a microgreens salad to balance out that gross sugar coffee - my throat is sore from it, which is a common reaction when I have too much sugar, it's very toxic to this little fragile body. It gets hard to resist this time of year with all the candy everywhere. I want! But it makes me sick! But I want!

I have two massive long work days ahead of me and it will be stormy the rest of the month which means we lost our window to get the roof on the house which is sad. But we have a house which is crazy, I know I should be grateful but I'm still mostly just scared and a little bit in shock.

...

We saw Tron: Ares last night and I LOVED it so much! It is wonderful. It might help that I am old enough to have an emotional attachment to the first movie, so all the throwbacks were delightful, and I've had a crush on Jared Leto since MSCL back when I was a teenager. It is, I must say, SO refreshing to see someone in their 50s doing action sequences, it makes me feel less hobbled and feeble and what is the word I'm looking for, haggard I guess - I feel like I can't move smoothly or gracefully like I used to, my quick-twitch movements are fading, I cannot sprint or jump anymore, but Jared did just fine, he could pull off the "superhuman strength" appearance just fine at his age. Maybe all is not quite lost, just yet.

I mean, I have early onset arthritis so part of it is not my age but my genetics.

I feel 60-80 years old, most days. I've felt older than I am since my chronic pain began at age 22, before my hip dysplasia got diagnosed, and after hip reconstruction at age 28 I never really felt youthful again. I've always felt vaguely crippled but making the best of it.

uuugghhh so much of me wants to just curl back up into bed. But a clean apartment would be so wonderful. I will watch some housekeeping videos and eat some salad and see how I feel.

...

A dear friend of mine who has always dealt with her high levels of trauma with avoidance is thinking about seeking therapy due to her crippling anxiety, which she feels is a result of not dealing with her trauma. It makes me think about my obscene level of acceptance of mine, to the point that I have been skirting the edge of ego death for a while, now. I think about my insignificance and lack of mattering in this universe alllll the time. I think about how the self is a made-up concept ALL of the time. How my reactions are just biological results of whatever this body has experienced in its 50 years of existence, how little control I have over anything ever. How I'm never really safe, never really held, never really witnessed fully, never really anything meaningful in this world. I get smaller and smaller and little things mean more and more. I am sinking into that elderly space where just looking at the sky is joyful enough to keep going through the day. simple beauty. I will never matter in whatever way I thought I was supposed do. I am a fleeting speck of dust, will not be missed when I am absorbed back into the un-life-ness of existence. It doesn't matter. But it seems like it does, that's the part that can be hard to contend with. I look it right smack in the face, a LOT. It's not normal. I've been forced into this. It can be really scary and a very sickening, empty feeling. But it's important in order to be okay with the imperfection of this little fleeting life I get to live, for however long. I just. Wish I didn't hate beautiful spectacles of wildlife - I became unable to enjoy any wildlife videos after the polar bears started dying of starvation in the 90s. I can't watch oceans or jungles or birds or anything without a sickening sense of dread, due to the mass extinction event that is happening to all of it. And it is my absolute favorite thing ABOUT this planet. It makes me so sad that I have to turn away from what I love most, because it is too painful to think about it all going away.

Anyway. I have been crippled and an emotional wreck for most of my life, but I still think it's a better tactic to look this sort of messy emotional stuff straight in the face, rather than run from it.

When nearly all of your grandparents and parents die horrifically in front of you, each in their own slow terrible way, each in their own time, there isn't anymore hiding from the painful cruelty of a mortal existence. There are of course beautiful things, too, and it is absolutely critical to focus on those, and not let the horrors take over entirely. But awareness is key. Living in the darkness makes the brightness all the more precious and beautiful and a balm to this frightened, aching, tiny little spirit. Closing the door on it jut makes it loom larger in the background, I suspect. Just the charming twist and twirl of the stem of a pumpkin can be enough to get me through the day. When I'm always aware that nothing will save me and I am doomed to pain and oblivion, eventually. For the moment, I live in heaven, and I try my best to appreciate and relish it and not take it for granted. Look at this sunshine! Look at these stunningly vibrant leaves! Look at these clever, funny crows. Today, despite the pain and difficulty motivating, I can be happy and feel some sense of peace, however fleeting.