Gedenkrad

I guess I have Canadian YA literature on the brain, because the phrase "She was more of a knitter than a doer" has been living rent-free in my head lately. I remember reading it in one of the Anne books (the one where she went to college, I think?) and wondering what tf it meant. I had a vision of one of the middle-aged ladies they (Anne and her roommates) lived with curled up next to the fire knitting. Evidently it means you're all plans no action. Now imagine someone from The Maritimes saying "She was more of a knitter than a doer." Thank you for coming on this full-circle journey with me.

I tried searching these entries to see if I've already talked about this, and it doesn't look like it. Sorry if this is repetitious, but if so, here we go again: when I was moving out of The Fairy House O, understandably, needed to find someone to take my place. That rent don't pay itself, k'nawmean? So O did find someone - Bri. They were quiet and nice, worked some number of weeks on and some number of weeks off on the slope and came to tour the room while I was in the midst of packing up to move out. I moved out and to a beautiful place in Government Hill with my on-again-off-again roommate, A and didn't really think about Bri again, honestly. You may have noticed that I'm using Bri's given name instead of a first-initial. Why? Hang tight. A year and some change later things had gotten serious enough with S that we decided to move in together and found an apartment in a part of Anchorage called Valley of the Moon. It was close to the place that S's best friend was planning on living and a truly beautiful part of the city (well, except for the hypodermic needles). We moved in in August and so I decided to throw a small birthday party in the new apartment - on this particular year on my actual birthday. I was turning thirty and did it up pretty big (well, for me). I heard a couple of gunshots in the distance in the night, but that's truly nothing too out of the ordinary for Anchorage. It turned out the very same night in a park about four blocks away from my apartment, Bri was shot while biking through Valley of the Moon park. There was a somewhat high-profile serial killer in Anchorage that summer and they chose Bri. There was a ghost bike in the park for a while thereafter; I'm not sure if it's still there. Following Bri's death, O had something of a breakdown. He moved to Chicago - which is not in and of itself a red flag, but when I got together with him for dinner he was wan and sad and said, "It turned out that nobody really knew Bri." Maybe they had a hard time connecting with others. Maybe they were on the spectrum. Maybe there was a swimming pool of human experience between them and others. And then they were gone. I wonder how many lives are like that.

There's a blog I've read for over 20 years in which the blogger at one point wrote about some days when they wake up and saw every person in a "Russian mystic" fashion*. Every person was once a baby who was loved by their parents. Everyone. I suppose that's not technically true. But...life is so strange. How can we ever really know each other? We cannot Vulcan mind meld. And even if we could, I suppose that might be considered emotional abuse.

I think I've mentioned my appointments about meds in passing. My NP was surprisingly receptive to my descriptions of why escitalopram wasn't working for me. I was expecting to fight a little more for my right to...uh...try a different med. She referred me to a psychiatric NP and long story short despite some weird miscommunication about washout periods (I shouldn't have to ask about that, right? This is covered in PA programs, no?), and long story short I'm on day 7 of bupropion and that seems to be going much better. I feel like I need to distribute a questionnaire to my daughter because I'm not so sure my husband perceives me accurately all the time. Which, to be fair, who does? What a lot to ask! Etc. But I think L might be able to tell me the things that are the most raw and important.

Likert-scale-like does mommy:
Forget things
Remind you of the character Anxiety from Inside Out 2; how often?
"Yell" at you?
Listen to you?
Play with you?
Take care of you?

...and then, of course, I would have to get S's opinion on certain things b/c what 6-year-old gives a fuck about safety and self-care? Not that many. Anyway. Of the two meds I've tried so far this one seems to much better support function if not sleep. I am still sleeping an adequate amount, but the first couple of night I would have a thought while drifting off to sleep that triggered a dump of dopamine or norepinephrine and that woke me up a bit until I calmed myself down again. But this seems to be resolving and I tend to manage my sleep through magnesium and melatonin anyway.

Hey, guess what? No, not that! I got a haunted mirror! Well, I thought it might be haunted-ish when I dropped it in the parking lot document. Since then it's behaved itself, but after a playdate with her 10-year-old friend, L said she was scared of the mirror and thought it was saying, "Run!" to her. I said we'd keep an eye on that and cleaned it off with Windex. So far so good since then. But! It was returned to the thrift shop from whence I got it as per sequencing of dates on stickers. Hopefully if haunted, it's benign? I'll let you know. I have sage! So much sage. We'll be fine!

There are fun facts I just can't seem to forget. And here are two: Nastya of Youtube empire fame (or maybe not, I don't know how your family manages its screen time; if you don't know who she is I'm happy for you) was mistakenly diagnosed with cerebral palsy when she was <2 years old. W.C. Fields seemed to have a type of dermatillomania as related in one of his biographies. One of the people interview for the book said he would obsessively pick his face. I'm sure that's useful information to someone. Don't know who though.

The Ataris came to Anchorage and I didn't go because I went to that burlesque show with most of my cohort. I guess I could have gone afterwards, but I just...can't make myself do things past 10:00 PM. Or maybe I can now with the new meds? Uncertain. And the lead singer from Illuminati Hotties came to Anchorage too for Parlour In the Round. I did consider going to that, but things got complicated that day, S was out of town, L and I got separated on the way home from the park and she scared the hell out of me and I scared the hell out of her and we cried and decided to stay the hell home that night. But maybe next time! *sigh*

I finished Dordogne and as a result now really want to go to there. It's not super likely I'll be able to, but if you do, here's a handy-dandy guide. 

*She also has an entry I think about every once in awhile about days where "someone left the cap off the sexy" and everyone is weirdly sexy on days like that. I have days like that too, but it seems less societally allowed the longer I'm alive.