Dreamweaving

Last night I woke up abruptly at 3 AM to the faint blue color of my TV screen clashing against the darkness of night.  My dog was next to me in a sound sleep but I was as awake as I would have been had I just finished a cup of extra strong coffee.  Remnants of my horrible dream began flooding me and I recognized the fear as familiar;  this was the same fear I experienced as a child and adolescent when I woke up from a nightmare. 

My grandmother was laying in the same hospital bed that my grandfather was laying in just a few months ago, right before he died.  We were all crowded around her bed, just as we were with him.  Only she was much more lucid and coherent than he.  She was crying and begging us not to let her go.  She didn't want to leave.  She looked around at us as if we held the key to her destiny, to her life.  But I knew in my heart that we didn't.  That it was so much bigger than us.  Than her.

She didn't say it, but she was begging us not to let her die.  And the pain I felt in my heart was physical as well as emotional - if I could have, I would have given her life, just as I would have given life to my grandfather had I possessed that power.

After coming to my more rational and stable senses, the fear and sadness I felt began to pass.  I scanned my surroundings again, feeling comforted by my blankets and pillows cacooning me.  I reached for my dog and felt her safe and familiar body.

It's now clear to me that even when we are not knowingly processing grief and loss, our subconscious is turning those pages for us in our sleep.  My inner dreamer is trying to make sense of what's passed and perhaps reminding me that more loss will come. 

I haven't written much or spoken much about my Gramps' death since it occurred, quite possibly because I've never dealt with death so up-close before.  I don't quite know how I feel other than missing his smile while simultaneously sighing in relief that his pain is gone.  To watch someone you love endure such tribulation is something that I think most of us can't quite make sense of.  Why do good people leave us so early?  Why must strong people endure such pain? 

There are so many unanswered questions that life presents us as is relates to death--questions we may not have the right to know.  Whether you believe in a God, a Higher Power, The Universe, or yourself, you cannot argue that you have no power over death and when it comes.  Something larger blows the candle out for us.
Which leaves me with one last remark: when I am able to swim with the current of life, I am able to live in the moments as they happen and fear LESS what I don't understand.  I have lived so long wanting to know everything, wanting to uncover all truths and analyze all options.  It began to prove to be an exhausting and distracting way of life.  I struggle with "letting it be."  I'd much rather just give up the illusory control I think I have and let life unfold as it should.
And if I'm struggling with something, perhaps I'll meet it in my dreams.

I love you John Staniec, Schwartz.  And I love you Angela Longo Staniec just the same. 

Steel beams and lyrics

You painted the picture for me once.

We are all walking along steel beams in life,
Beams like the ones that create the structure of the high-rise buildings we saw in the city,
When we walked the streets together often.

And most of us, the lucky ones, the ones who believe in love,
Once we reach the end of one beam,
Instead of falling to our deaths into the darkness below,
Are picked up by another,
That suddenly appears just in time.

These beams come in the form of new people,
New loves,
New faith,
High Powers,
Hope.

Why was it never me?

I sit here listening to, "Say Hello, Wave Goodbye" by David Gray -
A song you told me you loved.
I said the lyrics were powerful, describing a relationship with pieces that didn't quite fit together
You said it wasn't the lyrics that touched you.
I didn't believe you.

You never wanted to admit you related,
Especially when it came to lovers, to break ups,
To anything that may have related to me.

And why was I always looking?

For the answers in songs, in your antecdotal thoughts.
I was always reaching for a way to get there,
To that space that I hoped was reserved only for me and my love.

Now I see that it may have never existed.

Truthfully, I think I see that there isn't really space for anyone-
inside of you -
for someone else.

I will tell you that our kisses were just as powerful to me as the David Gray lyrics.
We were often unable to fit together.
We were often unable to catch each other as one of us fell off one of our steal beams.
We fell to the darkness below, to our deaths,
And then tried to re-birth ourselves, come back to life.

How can one do that when the other won't catch them before they fall?
How can trust be built on something that dies again and again and then tries to rebuild itself on nothing?

While I remember our devastating misses,
I will remember our kisses.

I will say hello and wave goodbye.

26

Oh, words.
Most of my life you have been all I need.
You began with me in Winnie the Pooh diaries.
We then graduated to thick woven journals with covers etched in Chinese symbols.
The symbols meant nothing to us, what we shared in our pages meant everything.

Oh, words.
Downstairs we could still hear the turbulence of our loved ones roaring.
Other words were being used as stabbing knives, striking the heart and the gut.
Upstairs you and I met in our secret space, my tears blurring the ink of the feelings we recorded.
We had each other, words; to soothe the pain of what we heard.

Oh, words.
Do you remember when I left you?
I was lost for a bit; hiding from myself.
I was feeding an insatiable thirst that tried to destroy the me that you needed to come alive.
I forgot that I had you to comfort me, to bring me back to the place of truth.

Oh, words.
When we reuinted, I must say it was out of desperation.
I had finally starved the deadly thirst and felt a terrible void.
It was then I reached out for you; you were waiting as you always are.
We had so much to share; we had so much to say. 
We wrote pages, we filled journals, we uncovered who we were again, but also for the first time.

Oh, words.
Tears are dropping on these keys, but they do not stop me.
I am needing you like I always have.
Below I hear again, the roaring of voices who are abusing you, and each other.
And here I am, soothing the pain with you, because you're always all I have.

Words.

it's been a while

When I neglect to write for an extended amount of time, the act of starting again can seem overwhelming and annoying.  I don't particularly feel like posting right now but I know it is so good for me!  I have neglected this part of me for far too long this time.

I'm not sure I've spoken in depth about my current job yet.  I am now a pharmaceutical sales representative.  It's funny to think back to when this blog was born; after I was laid off from a commercial real estate firm where I was a marketing assistant, also known as the team's punching bag.  I remember feeling secretly relieved to say good bye to such a negative place, but also so scared of the amount of time I had on my hands!  Thank God a friend introduced me to her blog which sparked such a deep interest in me to begin expressing my thoughts regularly on a blog of my own.  I posted pretty much daily during my "lay off" months and absolutely adored it.  I also got into painting again.  Oh, I also got into unearthing past flames that I had laid to rest years earlier.  So, it was a time of great decisions and then some not so bright ones.

Then!  I realized I needed another "real" job.  Somehow I found myself as the executive assistant to an egotistical asshole CEO at a global bank.  He was cool at first, but I can't decide what happened first:  he decided to leave the company and thus became a raging whacko, or I decided I wanted to leave the company and thus became a useless employee.  (I believe that attitude is everything in life and when one spends 9 hours a day doing something they don't feel any passion for, well, in my case, my attitude suffered.)

I began picking my feet up and looking for something different.  It became clear to me I wasn't meant for office work.  At least not now -- I was too full of energy!  I needed to be challenged! 

I am now in pharmaceutical sales.  I don't have an office.  Well, that's not entirely true, I have a car-office.  I drive around all day by myself, listening to kick-ass music, visiting dermatologists and forming relationships with them.  I get to learn about their lives, how many kids they have, what kind of day they're having, what kind of day their medical assistants are having, whose boyfriend was an ass over the weekend, whose husband totally dropped the ball on their anniversary, who did some amazing retail therapy and last but certaintly not least, we discuss my products and how they fit into their practice. 

No one bothers me or micromanages me, no one questions what I do (although I'm sure they would if I was doing a shitty job), but they don't have to because I've found something I really enjoy doing.  I always thought that I belonged in an agency of some kind, doing creative work, but I have found that I feel really happy getting to "creatively" know the people I'm selling to each day.  I enjoy the relationships I've built, I enjoy knowing that they like me enough to listen to what I have to say about my products and I like looking at my data and seeing that a doctor who wouldn't give me the time of day a few months ago is now prescribing my product because we struck up a conversation about how we both haven't been to Hawaii and would like to go. 

That being said, I do sometimes miss the slow days of office work.  Don't judge me, we all love those days at our desk where we can see what J.Crew's new spring line looks like, we can pay our cell phone bills before lunch and we can walk around the office talking to friends who work down the hall.

However, I wouldn't trade the fast-paced, appointment packed days for anything right now.  And when I feel I'm becoming too isolative and blah, I find new musisc to download and listen to that brings me alive and keeps me pumped throughout the day.  Most recently, I've discovered Spoon.  I don't know what kept me away from them for so long but their tunes are so fun and the sounds are somehow so new. 

I am so glad I've been able to check in and write tonight and I intend to continue.  If anyone reading this post knows me, you're probably wondering when I'm going to dish on my emotional, spiritual or romantic life.  I'm usually pouring out emo rant and raves like it's my job when I write on this thing.

But not tonight, I don't think my computer has enough juice to stay alive for as long as I would need to discuss my personal matters :) 

Until we meet again...