It's all happening

Well, I sent off my grad school application today. Now, except for finishing my statistics class, there's nothing left to do but wait to find out if I got in. I'm feeling good about my application; I actually had it ready to send yesterday, then decided to sleep on it one more night, and when I went over it again this morning I was able to make it even just a little bit more perfect. My therapist (did I mention she was one of the founding teachers in the program I'm applying to?) predicts I'll be receiving my acceptance before the end of March. We shall see. In any case, I'm feeling good, and very glad to have it done.

Maybe it was the unexpected disruption/destruction of my routine, or the winter darkness, or my insecurity about what the hell I'm going to do with my life, or some of the other harrowing events that I've had to deal with in the last few months, but wow – this winter has been intense. This last week is the first time since I got laid off that I've started feeling somewhat normal again. This afternoon I was walking Tater down our road and felt a huge surge of joy that almost made me cry. After the walk we went back to the creek and I noticed one of our pine trees in bloom – I'd never thought of the little clusters of baby pine cones that way, but they are definitely flowers, small and delicate and dusty with yellow pollen that puffed out in little clouds when I lifted a branch that was drooping across the path. Standing on the creek bank, watching Tater playing in the waves and listening to the sound of the water bubbling and falling over the rocks, I felt happy again. It's the big kind of happy, the kind that fills my whole body and makes me want to open, open, open .... After feeling all clenched down with anxiety for so many months, it's pretty wonderful to feel back to my normal self again.

Other things I'm feeling good about lately: Winter is officially over, at least as far as I'm concerned. Around here, it really only lasts about a month – January, specifically – and by the middle of February we've got fruit trees flowering and daffodils and hyacinths and irises and acacias and all kinds of other gorgeous good-smelling things opening up. My parents are coming for a visit next week and I'm excited to show them around at this most beautiful time of year. I'll be driving back to Utah with them when they go, and from there I'll fly to Portland to spend a few days with friends there. Therapy has been helping me a lot; being able to check in every week with someone I trust, who's separate from my everyday life, helps me feel stronger and more grounded, and she's teaching me new ways to calm myself down when I start to freak, as well as encouraging me to acknowledge some very old stuff I'd pretty much given up on ever being able to feel OK about, and work with her toward healing it (is that vague enough for you?). I finished my hospice training and will be starting work there within the next few weeks. I'm working occasionally on the copyediting projects I wrote about last time. Mr. A and I got two new bikes last weekend, and I'm madly in love with the one we got for me – a battered old reddish copper-colored ladies 5-speed Schwinn Suburban from 1975 that is going to be SO fun to decorate, and to ride. Finally, I joined the gym and am looking forward to figuring out how to make that part of my new routine as well.

Some less happy things are happening too. The work I'm doing is not nearly enough to keep me busy, so I'm still going to need to figure out something else to do for money. I'm still spending a lot more time alone than I want to; I'm not bored, and not exactly lonely, but I miss being part of a team, working with other people, seeing friends every day. Also, we're coming up on some stuff with Mr. A's family that I expect is going to be hard; let's just say the timing of my hospice training could not have been better.

And also! It has not escaped my attention that we are now a week and a day into my usual spring practice period (aka Lent), and I haven't yet defined a new practice I want to implement for 2010. I did extend my 2009 practice (not wearing black) indefinitely, and I'm still doing it, so maybe I'll take a break from spring practice this year. Or maybe I'll think of something tomorrow. I haven't decided yet.

My dream life has been super active lately too; I suppose my kind little mind is trying to help me adjust to all of these changes, now that I've sort of stopped digging my heels in to resist them. Yesterday morning I had another new & improved version of a long-running recurring dream, the one in which I am moving back to Utah, and go back to all of the houses I lived in before, hoping to find a place for myself in one of them. Usually I wander around looking at how beautiful and interesting those places are (way more than they ever were when I actually lived in them) and feeling sad, knowing all I'm really doing is looking – I could never really live there again. In this new version, it's sort of reversed. Instead of trying to move back, I'm getting ready to leave. And as I walk through the house, instead of feeling sad that I can't stay, I'm memorizing all the things I like, so I can take them with me when I go. As I look around I realize that while there are a few things I like enough to keep, most of it really doesn't suit my taste anymore.

I keep mulling over something my therapist said this week. We were talking about my work, and what I've liked and not liked about the work I've been doing up until now – basically, writing, editing, designing and project managing various kinds of publications, either print or digital. I've mostly thought of myself as liking my work, so it's been kind of weird to find myself suddenly completely lacking even the tiniest molecule of interest in continuing. She said, "It's like you were a deep sea diver exploring the bottom of the ocean with a wet suit and air tank. You're smart enough and competent enough to survive there with the right tools, but when it comes right down to it, you're not a fish and it's just not possible for you to thrive in that kind of environment. It's just not your nature." There was more to the conversation than that, but basically – she's absolutely right. She pointed out that social work is much more in line with my values than marketing and advertising ... and that once I get into a work environment that honors who I am, I'll feel at home at work in a way I never have in these totally business-oriented, profit-driven places. Not that I expect a career change to change absolutely everything about my life ... but I do think it's going to change a lot.

So yeah. Major metamorphosis right now. I'm trying to just stay open to the possibilities, trust the process, and have as much fun as I can.

Comfort zone, schmomfort zone

So I continue to move forward toward this plan of starting grad school this fall, one grueling, torturous step at a time. It's more work than I thought it would be, and I now realize why most people spend years laying the groundwork for a project like this – rather than just deciding and diving in at the last possible moment, like I'm doing. Not that I haven't been thinking along these lines already for years, and getting myself ready in other ways ... But the actual checklist of things you have to do to get into a program – THAT, I have only been working on for a couple of months at most.

The most daunting item on the to-do list is to complete an approved statistics course with a grade of C or better, and to have it done by the end of May. Setting aside for now the fact that I haven't taken any math at all since about 1981 ... and that it was the only class I've ever failed in my life ... I'm also too late to enroll in anything this spring. So I've been scouring the Internet for an online course and just this morning finally identified an approved class I can take from BYU, of all places (that's where I got my BA, and in fact finished my last few classes through this same independent study program, after I moved to San Francisco). The syllabus starts out by saying, "No, this course is not designed solely for mathematicians, computer geeks, or nerds... This is a statistics course, not a math course—so relax." It's expensive, but I think it will be do-able. I just have to keep things moving, keep things moving. If I can do it now I can still apply for fall 2010; otherwise I'll have to wait another year to start the program – fall 2011. That sounds like a very long time from now.

I don't remember the last time I was this far outside my comfort zone on purpose. There have been times when I've been felt pretty stretched emotionally, physically, financially ... but this is different, because it hasn't been forced on me – it's a choice I'm making to try to do something new. It seems like every single day since I started down this path at least one thing has happened that has made me want to freak out, cry and/or give up. I'm still not at all sure I'm really ready to even apply to this program. But I've decided to do it anyway. Maybe I'll actually get in! And even if I don't, I still think it's worth making the effort, just for practice.

Like yesterday, I had an appointment with the counselor for re-entry students at the junior college in Santa Rosa. I was already discouraged before I even left the house, because I'd had such a horrible experience trying to attend an orientation there last week. I drove 40 minutes to get there, and ended up driving around the parking lots for another 30 before finally realizing I was never going to get a space before the orientation ended. So yesterday I left two hours early, with a bike in the back and a plan to park way off campus and ride in. All the way there I kept thinking of one reason after another to call and cancel the appointment. I hated what I was wearing. I had wicked period cramps and a slight headache. I had missed the orientation, and what if she thinks I'm wasting her time? I don't even know exactly what I need to ask her about. And everyone there is at least 20 years younger than me ... I'm old ... and ugly ... and this outfit sucks ... and oh my head ... and it looks like it might rain – I'll be soaked by the time I get to her office ....

Finally I just gritted my teeth and went anyway. It did not rain. My cramps and headache faded as soon as I got on my bike. The woman was friendly and welcoming, and knew all about the program I'm trying to apply to, and had some very good advice about what I should be doing. The whole thing probably could have been taken care of over the phone, but in the end I was glad I'd made the effort to get up there in person and do something I was really afraid to do.

That's just one example. Every phone call to an unknown person who may or may not think I'm a complete idiot, every ill-defined question I need to ask so I can start figuring out what I need to ask, every new piece of information that suddenly throws the whole enterprise into question all over again ... It's all making me see how avoidant I really have become. A huge, HUGE part of me just wants to forget the whole thing and go back to ... well, what? There's nothing to go back to. Or at least that's how it feels. So for now, it's full steam ahead.

Other things that are happening: I was accepted into the hospice volunteer training program. That starts tomorrow. It's a 30-hour training over three weeks, after which I'll be given my first assignment. I also met with the director of the massage school and decided that is not something I need to be putting my energy into right now. The program they're offering is designed for people who want to do massage as a career, and that is not me. I may still do a weekend workshop sometime, somewhere (Esalen?), just not now.

Work-wise, I'm starting two new projects this week for Mr. A's former boss. One is a fairly large project that could generate a good amount of work for me between now and July. Assuming all goes well I'm expecting this connection really could turn out to be a fairly decent source of income, even if it isn't enough to be my only source of income. Once I finish hospice training I'm also going to register with some more temp services and recruiters, and try to figure out how to get something happening there.

I'm also joining a gym this week. We rode bikes over there for a tour last weekend and I really liked the facilities; I just wish I could be guaranteed a time to go when there would be only strangers there, or better yet, nobody else there at all. The thought of other people seeing me all bulging and sweaty and red in the face makes me want to scream – especially if they're people I know. The more time I spend alone the more it freaks me out to see people ... which is exactly why I need to do this. So ... I'm nervous, but I'm doing it.

Therapy has been a total godsend in the midst of all this. Just knowing there's a place where I can tell the whole truth about everything that's going on, without having to worry about how it might make the other person feel – that has been huge. Even though there are loving and supportive people in my life who will listen when I have things I need to talk about, I don't necessarily want to dump all this emotional chaos into every conversation I have with them. And right now it's all big enough and urgent enough that I do have quite a lot of chaos to process, pretty much every day of the week. I'm still waking up with intense anxiety most days, and blood sugars to match. I'm also dealing with the effects of some major stresses in Mr. A's work and family lately.

I had a totally new version of my "missing my flight" dream last week. This is a dream I've been dreaming in different versions for almost 20 years now, and the basic storyline is that I'm in a strange city getting ready to fly back home, when I realize I'm about to miss my flight. Sometimes I'm running late. Sometimes I miss my exit. Sometimes I don't know how to get to the airport. More recently, the panic has diminished and I've simply decided (in the dream) to stay an extra day and give myself the time to figure it out at a more comfortable pace.

This new dream, though, changes the whole scenario. In this one I'm not trying to catch a plane at all – I'm driving myself, in an electric wheelchair. I'm afraid if I go too fast I'll crash, but every time I slow down the wheels fall off and I have to stop and put them back on. Finally I realize I don't even know exactly where I need to go. I stop at a little store and ask to look at a map, but it doesn't look familiar. "What part of Oregon is this?" I ask. "You're not in Oregon. This is Lompoc." I tell her that can't be right ... so she shows me the map again, and this time she tells me, "We're in Riverside." I take the map from her and find my town and the roads leading to it. Then I look out the window and see that one of those roads is only about a half mile away. I still don't know which direction to take it, but at least I'm a little closer to getting started.

Not much is more boring than other people's dreams, I know. Even my own dreams aren't usually interesting enough to bother recording. This one seems significant, though. What is new in this dream: I'm trying to get there by my own efforts, instead of being flown by someone else. I'm trying to read the map myself. I'm realizing I don't know how to get where I want to be – I don't even know exactly where I am. I'm afraid I'll crash. And I'm looking hard at where I actually am (not where someone said I am) to try to figure out my next step.

The main change seems to be that before, I knew what I wanted to do – catch a plane, then relax and be flown to my destination – but I could never make it to the airport. Now, I'm trying to drive myself the whole way there. I'm still not sure if I'll be able to pull it off, but at least I'm the one in charge. There's no plane taking off without me anymore.

I actually really hate this dream. It always leaves me exhausted. Maybe this new version will be more useful or enlivening in some way. I hope so.

I don't really want to talk about this anymore, I guess. I just wanted to record my location at this moment – approximately ten thousand miles outside my comfort zone, but so far still here to tell the tale.