Scatterbrained

My mind is all over the place this week...

Americans who tried to take Haitian children across the border to a Dominican orphanage have been charged with abduction.  The whole story is creepy to me, especially that they keep saying they were just trying to do God's work, and that they're looking to God for a positive outcome.

I had weekends off last month and I've been using the time to get caught up with friends, take care of loose ends that have been dangling for months, and just cavorting and sin in general.  There's been a lot of eating, drinking, laughing.  It has felt really good, but as I start to get a little more focused and sober some of the questions I was dealing with before are coming back in even higher relief and with more urgency...
How can I trust my emotions?
How can I trust anybody else?
Where do I want to be?
What do I want to do?
How many rules will my moral compass allow me to break?
How much discreetness before it becomes secrecy, and how much secrecy before it becomes lying?

Oscar nominations were announced, and ever since I was a kid I've been a sucker for the Academy Awards.  I get excited for the nominations, and then I feel all this pressure to see movies before the awards.  I never see all the ones I want, yet I never let myself off the hook.  It's not even fun, yet I do it year after year.  Maybe it's residual Irish/German/Catholic guilt leftover from my parents generation.  The same guilt that gets me when I'm late in Thank-You notes, when I don't call my parents back, when I think about my messy room...

We got ducks last week.  A neighbor winery was diverging of it's assets, and Colleen said we'd take the ducks.  She and I hopped in the Element with some boxes and came back six ducks and a bunch of duck poop heavier.  They are massive - I was worried about them in with the chickens but they're about as big as the rooster so not so worried anymore.  Today's the first day they're waddling around outside the pen.  At first I felt a little emotional about them, they've got such cute quacks, but now I'm totally ok with the foie gras and confit that is to come.

I have learned some intimate things in the past month about myself, and about some others in my life, all whom I consider to be at the very least close friends.  It has been entertaining, and educational, and a little emotional.  (Hey look at that!  Three E's.)   I wish I could share more but I can't until I get it all a little bit more sorted out in my own head.  Lesson - keep yourself open to learning from those that you think you know already.  The universe has surprises for all of us, and some of them are bound to be good.

What Does Bottom Look Like?

Does it look like being drunk in more than one bar with less than 3 other people in each of them in one night?  (I'm not counting the dog.)

Does it look like texting your ex (from memory since you'd deleted his number more times than you can count) and then proceeding to text him meaner and meaner things until you find yourself having to text an apology the next day?  (Even though you had erased all evidence, other than a snapshot of some of the really nice things he was texting back to you.)

Does it look like texting your current very complicated crush at 3am his time that you 'need to talk'?

Does it look like seriously considering making out with a man whose girlfriend you had met not but one hour earlier, because he told his friend he thought your were hot?

Does it look like scolding the friend, who also is your friends boyfriend, for trying to hook you up with him, when in fact it was you who told him to do it?

Does it look like accepting a trip back to the bar to drive by to see if the attractive man that was sitting there when I left to chase taken tail was still sitting there?

Does it look like discovering about forty fuzzy photos on your phone of you trying to get a cute picture holding the puppy, and having no recollection of it?

Or maybe, does it look like all these things combined?


Just wondering.

Cheers

Every once in a while, it feels really good to get really drunk and loud and maybe make some bad decisions and wake up with some bruises.
Not all the time, because then you're just a mess. Just enough to work the kinks out and remember what a hangover feels like, and maybe prove to your rapidly aging self that you can still function relatively well on small amounts of alcohol induced sleep.
Now where the f*$& is the aspirin.

Gratitude and Awe

Warning: What follows is on the mushy mush side, so consider yourself warned...


I've had a rough couple of weeks.

I have been feeling more fragile since I have been since last summer, and everything has been hitting me harder. It really kinda feels like the world is falling apart, got some bad news regarding the murder trial for my brother's death, and to top it off I had some sort of back spasm that resulted in me being in pain for the better part of this week.

Yet there is such undeniable beauty and love around me that it can't help but filter through my clouds - I am so thankful.

I spoke with my mother last weekend on her birthday and I got off the phone choked up because I love her so much, and because I get to have her love me too. We haven't always had the easiest of relationships (basically, 6th through 12th grade had some pretty rough spots) but she is one of the more amazing women that has ever walked this planet. She has survived unimaginable heartbreak, more than one time, and still loves us fiercely and beautifully.

I had talked to my aunt and uncle last night for about an hour about my mental/emotional state, and I am still so in awe of the love and support and advice that they give me so freely, so generously. They have been my soft place to land in some situations that could have been so much more horrible. AND I get to see them every day and learn from these two incredible people.

Today I drove down to the city just to spend the evening with a group of friends at a barbecue at a beautiful house on a hill. This is an incredible group that is made up mostly of people that I grew up with in Wisconsin who have ended up in northern California. Most of us have known each other since 9th grade, if not before, and we've traveled wildly different paths to get here. Some are married, some in grad school, and we are about to add the first baby to the group! We manage to get together every few months or so and it never fails to be damn good time that I never want to end. They are such different and interesting and good people, and I get to be included. I just love that. My stomach always hurts after these gatherings from laughing so much.

I went out last night with two best friends and I just had so much fun. Drinking, laughing, flirting, being a big fishy in a tiny tiny pond. The hangover was so worth it. Krystal told me today that the best part of last night was seeing me laugh and just be Caitlin, having fun. And I just did - after talking to auntie and uncle and being with my girlfriends I was able to shake off some of this weight and feel good. (Even if it was party fueled by booze and the weight comes right back tomorrow, it was so worth it.)



Shortly after Brendan died I told someone that I didn't believe in a god, but if I'd ever seen God, it was in the love and support that carried my family through those first weeks. I'm expanding that. I still see whatever That is in the people I am so unbelievably fortunate to have in my life.