Suspended

I like these cold, gray winter days. Days like these let you savour a bad mood.

Bill Watterson

(1958)

"It's snowing still," said Eeyore gloomily. "So it is." "And freezing." "Is it?" "Yes," said Eeyore. "However," he said, brightening up a little, "we haven't had an earthquake lately.”

A. A. Milne

(1882-1956)

Year's end is neither an end nor a beginning but a going on, with all the wisdom that experience can instill in us.

Hal Borland
(1900-19780

Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood.

Helen Keller
(1880-1968)

Hold fast to dreams,

For if dreams die,

Life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly,

Hold fast to dreams,

For if dreams go,

Life is a barren field,

Frozen with snow

Langston Hughes

(1902-1967)

I want to unfold,

I don't want to stay folded anywhere,

Because where I am folded,

There I am a lie...

Rainer Maria Rilke

(1875-1926)

In the attitude of silence the soul finds the path in a clearer light, and what is elusive and deceptive resolves itself into crystal clearness. Our life is a long and arduous quest after truth.

Mahatma Gandhi

(1869-1948)

I've spent the past three days in bed, mostly sleeping, sometimes just lying there, staring at the ceiling... I'm not sick. I'm just tired. Really tired, inside and out. And I'm hiding. Avoiding. No denying it.

Normally I love this time of year - it's a time to pause, to reflect on the year that's closing, take stock, count the steps taken and then to look forward to what's to come, dream about it, plan for it, anticipate it... and, usually, I relish that. This year, not so much. I don't really want to look back - nothing there I want or can bear to spend any more time looking at right now. I can't really bring myself to look forward either though. I have no inspiration or vision for that imminent future, even less for the future beyond that. And what I do see waiting out there, know is coming, I don't much care for. It's more hard stuff and I don't know how I'm going to find the energy to tackle or change it. My bouncebackability, usually so reliable, feels decidedly unbouncy.

Not that the here and now is particularly comfortable or interesting to contemplate. It's quiet though. And it's not backwards. Or forwards.

I just want to hold my finger down on the pause button and stay here, in this space in between. Suspended.

But of course, that's not possible. Time moves on and I can't avoid that. I can't avoid what it brings. If I've found anything to be true this past year, it's that the only way through stuff, is through it.

I just don't think I'm ready.

I'm not ready.

I am not ready.

Yet.