Therapy Today

I was awakened two hours earlier than scheduled by Ms M, whose room mate makes several noisy trips back and forth on the ancient creaky oak floor from her room to the bathroom, opening and closing the bathroom door, running water for a bath and so on. Usually Ms M sleeps late on her day off, but this morning she came walking into my place at 8:30 straight to the big bowl sized cups for her morning latte, which would have been my latte and I would have been drinking it at 10:30. I said, "Is the pot empty?"
"Yes."
"Make another pot, okay?" Then I asked her what the hell she was doing up, but didn't say, "And walking into my place as if..."

She made moaning noises as she drank that cup of coffee. I thought that was rude. Keep it down with your pleasure over my first cup of coffee.
All of this human interaction got me up and ready to head out into the small portion of the Salt Lake Valley I think of as my neighborhood. From here to The Masters Program at Valley Mental Health, and back with several stops along the way. (There will be photos at a future undisclosed date.)

This is me on the way out the door.








This is me when I got home.


Details later.

I'm The Very Picture of Sloth

Greed:	Very Low
Gluttony:	Medium
Wrath:	Very Low
Sloth:	Very High
Envy:	Very Low
Lust:	Low
Pride:	Very Low

Take the Seven Deadly Sins Quiz

The reason I've posted this is that after nearly a month of avoidance I'm now cleaning my house. Then I'm going to therapy. Pictures later.

Hey, Technorati! Why So Fickle?

I know it's crazy to pay any attention to a little thing like a technorati score, but ever since I installed that damn widget, I can't take my eyes off it. It teases me by changing almost daily--up one point one day, and down one the next. It was only six months ago that I became aware that there was such a thing as a technorati score. The widget lists favorite tags, and I guess if I really wanted to, I could get smarter with my tags. I could pay attention to the momentary fashion of popular tags and label my post with a key word that would jack up my technorati score artificially, but that would be dishonest, and I hate the fact that I give a shit what my technorati score is. I have recently caught myself in so many instances of shallow, foolish, and perhaps hurtful, word flinging, that maybe it's time I put myself in the corner and told myself not to approach the keyboard until I am ready to be smart and witty and write well just for the fun of it, and not give a damn what technorati thought about my tags.

Technorati, you are like the evil stepmother in Snow White with a magic mirror. One of these days, I'm going to take you off that wall, because you've been really pissing me off.

And by the way, Comrade Kevin, my widget really loves you.

A Strong Cup of Coffee

Awarded by
Spadoman
to Utah Savage

Thank you Spadoman. I am touched by this award, as bracing as the coffee I drink every morning. It comes with no strings attached, no chores to do, no obligations. This is an award I can embrace, and it will always give me a jolt of energy to see it here. Blessings like this make life a momentary pleasure that can be repeated whenever the need hits for a cuppa Java.

This is the Bella Award, Coming to Your Blog Soon

Heads up, you know it's coming your way and soon, since this one comes with the responsibility to link it to fifteen, yes, that's 15 deserving bloggers. What makes one a deserving blogger? That I'll leave up to you. I like encouraging new bloggers (yeah like I've been around a long time. I may be old, but I've only been blogging a year and a half. It is now my biggest addiction. It gives me that warm feeling of community that being a recluse prevents in the "real" world.) I feel very close to those of you who visit and comment. I know there are readers who never say anything and I wonder what prevents them. At any rate, if you're new to me I plan to pass this sweet little prize on to you.


If nothing else it makes you pass it to fifteen other bloggers all linked up and friendly like. It came to me from PENolan, of Menopausal Stoner. She and I might be related--if not in the DNA, then in the spirit. She's good people. And here are fifteen others.

Doctor Monkey Von Monkerstein--he's not new, but he knows and has in his hip pocket a great new site posted on his site right now.

StarSpangledHaggis is one of my favorite reads. E writes on a variety of subjects. I'd call her an eclectic writer--always worth the visit.


The Attentive Aphorist otherwise known as TheMom or Moms Nuts. I want her banner. Read That banner or header or whatchacallit for the Attentive Aphorist. Cracks me up every time.

The Lazy Iguana because I was just there and there is a quiz I've got to go back and take.

WeeMousie has a link to a new information site. I'll head back there to pick that link up and bring it home.

Mr. E is the newest smartypants I know. This is going to burden and embarrass him but we'll see if he's got game. He's got nerve and hutzpah to spare, but does he have the chops to link to sixteen bloggers? We'll see.

Spadoman Peace man. Love that photo of the youngest member of the clan. I know this is a girly looking award, but you're secure aren't you.

Shallow Coffee is young and pretty and maybe bipolar too. I think one of the younger bloggers who knows I'm bipolar pointed me in your direction. So far I see lots of spring fashions on your site and god knows I could use a push in the direction of a spring spruce-up, so... I hope this award is welcome at your place.

Telling Secrets is a title I especially like bacause it's what I do. I tell all my secrets. It's a way to exorcise my demons. The problem for me in being a secret teller is that I sometimes tell other people's secrets as well.

Treybald, because I prefer baldness to many of the alternatives men choose when coping with the slow or rapid creeping hair loss that is their lot. You, Treybald have embraced the classic look of the very self confident. Kudos!

Take Your Medicine isn't a new blog, but relatively new to me. Lulu Maude has a lovely voice and a point of view I find simpatico, so that's all it takes to get an award from me. Now take your medicine Lulu Maude.

Mootpoint Neither Here Nor There
Because we have more in common than meets the eye and you are new to me, so this is a way to get to know each other better. I'm not a big stickler for the rules, but the nice thing about doing this linking thing is it brings new people to our attention.

Giggles at Wits and Wiggles who is a great commenter. Thank you for pointing out to me that my therapists terrible taste in clothes and bad hair might be a sign that he is secure with his appearance. But why? is my next question.

Ingrid's Blogger's Roundtable, is not the newest kid on the block but is a wealth of wisdom and good and timely news stories and practical advise and a hell of a twitterer.

LeeAnn's Under The Apple Tree I give you this award for your extraordinary personal generosity and kindness. And because you bake the world's best pumpkin bread.

Details

Stone, a new leaf from the
Chestnut Trees, dirt work
Done on ones bare knees
Stones the color of rust, Color of weathered wood, Color of my Mother's pale Blue eyes but warmer
A cool pink like a sleeping Baby's cheek the leaf
A pale lime green
Stripes in stone, like veins
Pulsing at the throat

Heart Like A Wheel

Alone With Longing

Life left me alone with longing
Pretending I need nothing more
Knowing why I am unloved

At heart an unmet need like hunger
Eats at me and I grow fat on pain
Leaking tears like famished babies

Old, alone, no longer wanting joy
Cracking jokes that no one hears
Waiting for the end of one more

Days of empty longing deaths
Freedom from this rending sorrow
Nothing mends nor ever will

This heart keeps beating without
Meaning why awaken to do nothing
Lasting or redeeming transformation

All the work with time undone
And in the end left to crumble
Alone at last with longing

Peggy Pendleton
5/1/19

What Kind Of Wolf Am I?

I could have answered this question without taking a quiz.

Your result for The What type of wolf are you test...

The Loner

9% Social-ness, 40% Leadership, 9% Morbidity, 82% Lonliness, 40% Inferiority and 20% Beta-ness!

You are the Loner (aka, the Lone Wolf). You don't seem to get along with others, so you prefer to keep to yourself and watch from afar.

Take The What type of wolf are you test at HelloQuizzy

Mint In My Garden

I'm now finally able to drink my favorite beverage--fresh mint tea. This is the patch at the edge of the two steps up to my driveway. This is the time of year I really get my hydrating cleanse on. Mint tea hot, mint tea iced, mint tea mixed with Earl Grey, milky and sweet. I put mint in salads. And when I walk through it as it's everywhere in my garden, it smells great. Dogs come into the house fragrant with the scent of mint. I realize I will never be able to plant a garden where I get a bit of sun because the mint will overtake it in no time at all. I have spearmint, peppermint, and lemon mint.

A Poem In My Pocket

Picked up at Mauigirl's Meanderings this evening. It took my breath away. The post that introduces this poem is also breathtaking.

Assault

I had forgotten how the frogs must sound
After a year of silence, else I think
I should not so have ventured forth alone
At dusk upon this unfrequented road.

I am waylaid by Beauty. Who will walk
Between me and the crying of the frogs?
Oh, savage Beauty, suffer me to pass,
That am a timid woman, on her way
From one house to another!
-Edna St. Vincent Millay

My Therapist, Fred

Fred returned my call yesterday evening just as President Obama was starting his press conference. As you might have guessed, when the phone rang, I checked caller ID and seeing that it was an "unknown caller," I picked up and hung up since it was the hour of day most nuisance calls are made--telemarketers, insurance companies trying to tell me I MUST have insurance coverage to get the most out of my medicare coverage (lying, opportunistic bastards). I wonder why they think calling while most people are sitting down to dinner is a smart idea? If I'm not watching something that's really important to me, I like to tell them what asswipes I think they are. I try to keep them on the phone as long as possible while I tell them the truth about their smarmy business. But last night I was watching the President, so I just hit on and then off so it was obvious that I was not just ignoring the call but actually hanging up. The phone rang again almost instantly, so I thought I was going to have to yell at someone.

Turns out it was Fred calling from The Masters Program where discretion is important, so no caller ID. Since this was a call I really needed to take, I cranked down the volume on the TV and Fred and I talked about my appointment with my internist yesterday. In my conversation with her while she was checking my clotting factor, I told her I'd figured out that what had begun as a mild upper respiratory infection has turned into a mild case of mood disorder heading toward depression. We talked about the specific drugs I'm on for bipolar disorder and she suggested that rather than switch to another antidepressant I might just need an increase in the dosage of my major antidepressant. I like this idea, since the antidepressant I'm on (Doxepin Hydrochloride) doesn't usually interfere with my sleep cycle and allows me to dream. It does add weight. So far it's put 30 pounds on my normally slender frame. If I were still modeling this would be a deal breaker, but now I don't really give a shit about an extra thirty pounds. What I do care about is this volatility, this whipping around of my moods, this creeping downturn into cottony dumbness and drifting off to sleep in the middle of the afternoon. A half hour nap in the mid afternoon would be terrific, but once asleep, I can't wake up. And whether or not I take that three hour "nap," I'm waking up at 4:30 in the morning with a killer headache. For a woman who was never a morning person, this is way out of character for me. I hate being wide awake when it's still dark outside. I hate Morning Joe. I was raised by a person who thought early morning was the best time of the day, and anyone who disagreed with her was an idiot. I guess we already know I'm an idiot. But the dark before dawn is highly overrated in my opinion.

Anyway, I have an appointment next Wednesday early afternoon. Fred is a civilized man. He may have some serious image problems (that I could fix if he'd only listen to me) but even though he looks stupid, he's smart. He used to be my Group leader. I was skeptical at first, because how could anyone with a combover and scraggly shoulder length dingy gray hair, wearing a really ugly Hawaiian shirt, black polyester pants, a belt with a big round buckle (almost covered by a pot belly) and cowboy boots be smart? If this sounds familiar to anyone reading it you know this thread in my relationships with men marks me as shallow in the extreme. Come to think of it, every man I've loved and left got a makeover.

My Garden On The 29th Of April

Spring Garden evidence that I do go outside and enjoy the sun. I took all these photos today.

Riding the Bipolar Roller Coaster

It's been a long time, in bipolar terms, since I experienced a real depressive episode. But I remember, now that I've been going through it again, that depression sometimes presents as organic illness. I start to feel sick. Feeling sick is not my normal state. This feeling sick sends me to my internist. And in the early phase I might have some mild and transient illness that can either be treated or waited out. But I don't bounce back. Feeling ill lingers. Not sick enough to simply stay in bed, but not well enough to want to do much of anything. It's a headache that's hard to get rid of, or a bowel disturbance, or low grade fever, or a slow, creeping stupidity that scares me more than anything. It's the transitions from one pole to the other that are the most dangerous. It's when we, the bipolar, realize depression is bearing down on us and we still have the energy to do something about it, that we know we can't stand it again. That's when we think about suicide. If I were suicidal, I would not be talking about it, so relax. I'm not suicidal. But I have been there, more than once. It's why I don't fear death by cancer or heart disease or a fatal car accident.

In Salt Lake, under the umbrella of medicare, we have Valley Mental Health. And within Valley Mental Health is a group called The Master's Program. You have to be bipolar and over fifty to qualify. I think calling a program for the old bipolar patients The Masters Program is both funny and apt. If you've lived past fifty and you are bipolar, you're damn special. You have survived a very difficult life. And I'm always amazed how many of us there are. We are often treated for substance abuse(self medicating) which might result in a bit of trouble with the law, especially for men. Men are more likely to be incarcerated than women, since men are more likely to be violent against others, where as women are more likely to be self destructive.

We can be extremely charming, and we can be horrid. I would not choose a bipolar friend to hang around with. In my opinion many of us are more trouble than we're worth. And in transition we can be seething with barely suppressed rage. In a manic phase we can seem as if we're taking large doses of amphetamines--motor mouthed and loud. I sure wouldn't chose to spend my time with anyone like me. But for the person experiencing a bit of mania it's damn fun. We all live for the hypomanic phase of the illness. But, like the way down, the way up is also dangerous.

All this to say, I called The Masters Program today, got through the gate keepers to the psychiatrist's nurse. She said she would get back to me tomorrow when she'd had a chance to talk to Dr. Issabela, whose booked two months out. So I was instructed to call Fred, my therapist, set up an appointment on a day Dr. Issabela will be in the office. She will look in on me between appointments, consult with Fred and between them they will decide if I go off Doxepin Hydrochloride and back on Zoloft. I have over the course of my life dealing with this monster illness found that not that many of the drugs to control my illness are tolerable to me. They all have some side effects. And some are worse than others. This drug gives you tremors and this drug makes you fat, this drug makes you stupid and this drug steals your dreams. Go ask Alice. I'm guessing she was bipolar.

I'm Spending the Day At Three Dames With A Clue

Yes, I'm getting out and around today. I'll even spend some time in the sun, Lib. But if anyone cares to make the trip, I'm spending the day at Three Dames With a Clue. It was Katie Schwartz, that very witty and energetic broad, who issued the invitation. So far the other women they've featured in this series of women who have reinvented themselves and write about it are some very accomplished women--with published books and marriages that work. So, I see myself as their one fruitcake without a clue. The questions were pretty simple and straightforward: What's your name, what's your read about, how do you reinvent yourself? My task, as I saw it, was to keep it brief. Ask me a simple question and I'll give you a complicated, convoluted answer that never seems to satisfy. But still, I'd love it if you'll visit me there.

Creeping Depression

Well, this morning I put in a call to my shrink for an appointment. So I wait for a call-back to set up a time. I seem to be slipping into a depression like a warm bath on a cold day. Yes, sometimes sleepiness feels good, especially if you have nothing pressing to do. Taking care of Cyrus is one job I don't neglect, but Cyrus, if he had a shrink, would probably be categorized as a depressed dog. And why not? Cyrus spent his first 9 years in a "shelter" mostly kenneled with a dog run. This would account for his inclination to always pee in one place and poop in one place not far from where he pees. I have never seen this behavior in another dog, so I'm speculating the kennel and dog run were his world. According to what Cyrus' Vet and I can tell from his behavior (completely content to doze beside my bed most of the day) he is happy here. But if this is happy, sad must have been terrible. He is now living on borrowed time, as am I. We seem to be two peas in a pod.

I plan to let myself do what I'm inclined to do--nap. A nap for the depressed could be round the clock sleep, waking only to go to the bathroom. I've had my usual two big mugs of coffee and milk. It has not made the slightest difference in my inclination to go back to sleep. And yard work is out of the question for me today. I just don't care that I have plenty to do. It's plenty to do that will either get done this year or will wait till next year.

When I met Ricardo I wanted to have a birthday party to introduce him to friends. But since Ms M has no interest in getting to know him, other than money, I have nothing to offer him. He doesn't seem to be terribly motivated by money. He seems far more interested in getting to know Ms M. I think it would be hard to find a better man, but romance is a mysterious emotion. You either feel it or you don't.

Now I have no interest in a birthday party. I've decided to pass. I've also decided to go back to bed. I have no appetite. That's nice. No appetite means no effort to come up with something tasty. I ate a banana. I will not starve. I'll take some vitamins and call it good.

And I won't be doing much visiting blogs today, since I hear the sirens call of sleep.

Bea Arthur is Now Singing With Rock Hudson, If There Is A God

Like a thief in the night I've gone creeping about reading. And though I too will miss Bea Arthur I hadn't found just the thing I wanted to post to note her passing. And then I stopped by E's at StarSpangledHaggis, and found this:



And if you know me, you know why this is one of my favorites. And like E says, it's "So Retro"

Cal, I'm Sorry

I have done something so casually cruel and careless that I can barely stand to be in the same room with myself. I have tossed off what I hope will be the last bitch slap of my entire life. I often do this with remarks about rightwing fundamentalists or other political types with whom I disagree. I think of this as snark, but maybe now is the time for me to give up snark as a form of expression. Since I have taken snark from the political to the very personal and in a most shallow and careless way, I have injured a man who did nothing more than attempt to befriend me. In this instance I have become my mother, and the feeling of having been possessed of my mother's lack of sensitivity for the feelings of others is almost too awful to bear. Cal, I'm sorry, and I know it's too late to take anything back. What I have said and done stands out starkly for me. I see the bitch who lives inside of me. It will require some very difficult work for me to exorcise this creature. She is not a woman I wish to be, much less live with. I am embarrassed and ashamed of myself. I need to work very hard at learning the delicate art of friendship before I can trust myself to be kind and considerate enough to offer friendship to anyone. As it is, savage was truer a name for me than I ever realized before.

Seeing With Old Eyes

I have always known that none of us sees things exactly the same way. I'm not speaking of having a different point of view, I'm talking about the literal act of seeing. I discovered this when I was six or seven. My mother had a friend she only saw once or twice a year. I thought this woman was lovely. She had red hair and pink cheeks. She almost always wore green. And warmth was what radiated from her eyes. I told my mother after this woman left our house one day that I thought she was pretty. My mother said, "My god, you've got bad taste. She's gaudy and cheap looking." It was in this moment that I knew my mother and I did not see the world the same way--that what was pretty to me was gaudy to her.

I have since noticed with my friends that what I choose to photograph or paint is not something they usually see as beautiful. I have one friend who works hard to make herself appear invisible. I have another friend who works very hard to make herself seen.

As for point of view, I believe there is nothing that can't be talked about, examined, and therefore "seen." My two friends both think most personal things should remain personal. This means to me that there are things they think should be secret--the dirty laundry of their lives. I think nothing cleans dirty laundry faster than a good airing. So in this metaphorical sense we do not see the world the same way.

I've been thinking about seeing because I've been taking photographs again. Looking at the photos from my past life that I've chosen to frame and put on the wall. They are all photos of small architectural details from places I've lived and loved. But the person I lived with in those places is absent. I have no family photos anywhere in my house except in old dusty albums tucked in the closet. I have so few memories of my family that are free of pain that I have chosen not to look at them anymore. But it was only after years of minute examination of their impact on my life and the truth and validity of my memories and feelings that I was able to put them away.

Nude with Pottery