chaos

The chairs were broken, the cheap furniture chipped and peeling. Outside the office, the thrump of workout machines hummed, the air permeated by sweat.

“… and now we will have you step up on the scale…” the personal trainer said.

I felt like I’d gotten stuck to the chair, perhaps grown roots. Trying to seem normal, I shrugged off my sweatshirt and shoes, tittering nervously about how I hadn’t been on the scale in a while. While my vision closed in, the sweat dripped down my back and the thrump-thrump-thrump of that goddamn treadmill, I stepped on the machine.

The print out told me I had gained 30 pounds since the last time I had really weighed myself. Right there. Black and white. I sat down and wrestled my socks on, trying to ignore the stinging warning of tears.

“Well, really 25 pounds since I really was on that weight train. And when was that? 12…18 months ago? Well, before we moved…When did this go so sideways?” I thought to myself.

Irregardless, it was high. And scary. As I sat through the rest of the session, a slideshow of the past two years started to flip through my mind. On warp speed, it profiled the highs, and lows, of the year.

Masters by correspondence (full course load). Full time job (full x 2). Job hunting (and failing). Buying a condo (and moving ourselves, over the course of weeks in the middle of the night). Getting married (and planning the wedding). Death. Death. Trip to my roots (to cry and laugh and graduate). More trips. Adopting a dog (the absolute best).

Some of the highest highs and lowest lows happened in the last few years. Prideful moments of extreme accomplishment, scary new things that frightened me while they pushed me, the sweetest love I could ever feel, the fluffiest dog there ever was. And those things make up the tapestry of my life. They caused questions and anger, the full spectrum of emotions tied up with the most enriching experiences. With tears, wine and takeout layered over it all.

However, as these things shift into the rearview mirror, allowing me to sidle by (sometimes just barely), I’m starting to realize I’m okay. That chaos, so woven into so much, can subside. Or perhaps it never really subsides. It is a hurdle or a roadblock. A personal Everest to summit, allowing you to leave chaos in your wake. Because that chaos is important to understanding who you are, what you have done. It can be crazy and fun, a building block or an experience to push you forward. It can hurt, leaving you raw and exposed, seeking answers to questions you don’t fully know yet.

So perhaps I’ve gone sideways, picking up however many pounds along the way. But it has given me just a little more chaos and crazy to pack in my suitcase, a few more bumps, scraps, laugh lines and perspective to draw from. Fortunately, I get to keep my partner in crime, as well as the fluffy dog, in the front seat with me.

It has taken me some time to be okay with this 20…25…30… whatever… bits of me that jumped on for part of the ride. Honestly, I’m not even sure it is fully in the rearview just yet. But I’m trying to cast that light of perspective on it, valuing each experience for the impact it made. And letting the guilt go allows me to look ahead.

Sandwiches

I’m standing in my uncle’s kitchen, watching him make a sandwich for me. It is the same kitchen I’ve known for the last twenty years, although the last time I was here, it was a lot more complex. This time, he is making me a sandwich before I hit the road for a seven hour drive home.

But the sandwich. He wrinkles his nose as he pulls ingredients from the fridge.

“Mustard? Mayo?”

I tell him that ham and bread and butter is fine by me.

“Not even a tomato? Or lettuce?”

Again with the wrinkle of the nose, in utter disbelief that my sandwich be so plain.

The floor creaks and the soft September breeze comes in the open window. It is an old farmhouse with yellow walls, an eclectic collection on the porch and a woodpile that stretches the length of the driveway. Walking up steps that I hadn’t been up for 13 years and I feel like I’m home. To be clear, I never lived here, but it is familiar. And for me, I’ve realized recently, that is huge.

As I sit at the table, my uncle crafting the world’s most simple and apparently most uninventive sandwich, the parallel hits me square in the face, almost as though it were a freight train.

Six months prior, I was standing in another kitchen, with another uncle, who was making  the same boring sandwich for me. But this time, it was Ireland and it was a whole different branch of the family. But the same – familiarity, love and me, about to hit the road.

Typically, I hate sandwiches. I never make them and will shy away at meetings or conferences when there is a sandwich. There is a lot that can be put between two pieces of bread and typically, I want nothing to do with that. Too much room for error. Or slimy mayonnaise.

But these two experiences were so perfect. A moment where I was taken care of, where a sandwich symbolized so much more. I think there is no more poignant act of love than when someone cooks for you – an offering that nourishes. And both were at a time where I felt root-less. That I had grown up with few family members and that I was missing out on something (perhaps this is to blame for my largely sandwich-less existence).

In those moments, I felt like I belonged, that I was part of something bigger and that scattered across the globe were family members who wanted to take care of me by filling my belly. The simplest act conveyed so much.

My uncle places our plates on the table and starts to eat.

“Do you want a pickle???”

I smile and decline – everything is perfect just as it is.

yellow car

There is a man with a yellow car. It is a flashy muscle car– something with a big engine. And there is no mistaking the colour– it isn’t a goldenrod, a sunset yellow, a warm golden. It is yellow. Crayola yellow. He used to sit for hours outside my old apartment building. Rarely did I ever see him arrive or leave, but I could pick out the bright primary colour of his car from blocks away. When you would get close to the car, the sunny colour gave away to chips and a neglected interior. It was clear to see that this car was older and tired, but had a proud owner. Stuck on the back is a perfectly straight sticker, bearing the Portuguese flag. Yellow car and home country. But this man was more than just his car. Without fail, almost on a daily basis, he would park on this city side street and feed the birds. Strategically parked next to a coffee shop, which I think must have supplied his crumbs, this man would stand or sit, feeding the birds. Scattering crumbs and watching the pigeons, the man would stand there for what felt like forever. Inquisitive in nature, I felt like I had to know what his deal was. What brought him to this area of town? Why the flashy yellow car? Why the pigeons? Did he own the coffee shop? Donuts or bagels for the birds? But I never did. Perhaps because I never wanted to disrupt his quiet ritual, inquire into his prideful moments, or frighten the birds.

cause + effect

My foot aches.

I’m living in a fog wherein my headaches most hours of the day.

My skin, normally so calm and smooth, is covered in an angry rash of red, raised bumps. Having had them before, I know it is a matter of time until they become itchy and bothersome.

Physical ailments that normally would have no consequence on my life. But today, this gorgeous morning with a brilliant sky that just begs for activity, smiles and grace, I feel that it is all a manifestation of the disaster of my life. It is a physical indication of stress, a visual reminder that I need to slow down.

However, I don’t feel I deserve a slow down. I feel as though I am barely clinging on to the top things in my life, that they are all poised on the edge of a waterfall, ready to go tumbling over if it wasn’t for the last of my nails digging deeply into these priorities. Work, school, life events– they all present themselves as priority number one. My inability to satisfy them all leaves me frantically trying to work on them in fits and spurts, never finding solace in accomplishment.

Even working on this post, I’m flitting around, satisfying work obligations and checking in on various things.

The thing is, is that I am not sure a vacation, or a reduction in responsibility would help, for I’d be far too consumed with guilt. I view inaction as something to be ashamed as, but can wile away the hours like no one else. Procrastination and productivity– those are my two extremes. It is a bipolar work ethic, laden with guilt and fear of not being good enough.

I know everything will get done. There isn’t an option for it to not. But sometimes I wonder why I’m doing things. For guilt? Loyalty? For brownie points in life? That’s terribly ambiguous and leaves me feeling as though I have no ambition. Or that the ambition I do have is centred on the incorrect target.

Yoga, one of my true loves that has been sorely neglected in the name of completing everything else in my life, reminds students to let go of anything that isn’t serving them. I’ve been tossing this around in my head (perhaps this ping-ponging is to blame for my incessant headaches), trying to pinpoint what I must let go. The answer is obvious– the overwhelming guilt and fear of inadequacy. But those, like my red bumps, headache and foot pain, are symptoms. Not the cause. Finding that requires going deeper. Something, if I am to be quite frank, scares the shit out of me.