More practice

More found art. To me it looks like a blurry watercolor landscape. In a way, that's exactly what it is. What it really is, is a piece of aluminum flashing that washed down the creek the last time it flooded and got stranded in this spot just under the bridge, where it basked in the sun (still under water) and grew a beautiful soft-colored skin of brown and green algae. I like the way the sun catches on the metal at the top and reflects the sky, so that the whole piece sort of radiates light. Maybe the photo doesn't quite capture that part.

The day after I took the picture it started to rain again and the whole thing washed away.

Work has been fast & furious every day for the last week or so. It's mostly fun stuff – much more interesting to create something new than to just drop content into an existing format – and it's occupying my mind so much that at night I'm having a hard time making it quiet down and let me sleep. I just lie there thinking and thinking and thinking, and when I close my eyes all I see is art – photos to be photoshopped, blocks of text to be formatted, colors to be mixed and applied. When I finally do fall asleep, my mind goes immediately back to work. It's exhausting and also kind of exhilirating.

Today a photo came through of this 21-year-old beautiful kid who died this week in some kind of medical mishap. And just now one of the photographers left to check out a multi-car pile-up with 15 squad cars responding. Normally these days I avoid the news as much as possible, but since I work at, you know, a NEWSpaper, a lot gets through to me anyway. I do feel extraordinarily stressed out by these two particular pieces of news today, though, for some reason.

Actually I've been feeling a lot more sensitive than usual for about two or three weeks now. Welling up with tears at the sight of blossoms opening on our little pear tree, getting all googley-eyed with luv for Tater and snuggling & petting on him until even he gets embarrassed and wants some space, going into such extreme raptures over a decaf cappuccino that I actually had to close my eyes and was unable to speak – it was so good I can hardly even bring myself to write about it even now.

In the not so distant past this kind of hypersensitivity has usually meant I was about to start descending into a clinical depression again. Right now I'm mostly experiencing the overwhelm as intensely pleasureful, not paralyzing (not in a bad way, anyway) – but all the same, I'm keeping an eye on things. I cut out the caffeine again, for one thing, even though there's hardly any in the tea I've been drinking ... because why take the chance? And I'm embarrassed to admit that I need to get back on the bike, which I stopped riding three weeks ago because I was worried, since Mr. A was traveling, that if I got run over by a truck on my way home there would be nobody to notice when I didn't arrive (except the dogs wanting their dinner), and I might therefore end up lying in a ditch in the howling rain all night long, cold and dead and alone.

Hmm. Interesting how I stopped riding three weeks ago, and that's about the same amount of time I've been noticing my emotions sliding toward the extreme end of the spectrum. So maybe it's true about the endorphins, then! Everyone seems to like to emphasize their mood elevating capabilities, but for me, the biggest benefit might be their mood stabilizing effects. But do endorphins actually have mood stabilizing effects? Maybe it's something else. Maybe the complete and utter lack of sugar!

I want to write more about this soon. Not endorphins or chemicals, exactly, but the mystery of mental illness ... thinking about my cousin who I just found out suffers (in a very real way, SUFFERS) with bipolar disorder, and an alcoholic uncle it kind of broke my heart to see last month. Thinking about it all just strengthens my resolve to take good care of myself and Mr. A and everyone I love. I want to stay alive. To keep myself open. To keep making an effort.