Dear Reader:

I am home again, home again.   What crazy travels the kids and I have had this summer.   What interesting togetherness.  What perfect imperfection I have been experiencing.  Overall, it has been good for our various relationships (I am currently constructing a Venn Diagram with circles for L, L, and C in my head.  Because that's who I am...).    This is now one of my all-time favorite family pictures:

It was taken at the Korean War Memorial in DC where I explained to them the facts of their Grandfather's service in that conflict and enjoyed watching them splash their hands in a soothing water sculpture there in a little grove of trees.   And, it capped off a day of monumental monument sight-seeing.   Every time I walk into that Lincoln Memorial, I tell you, I feel an overwhelming sense of reverence for that man's greatness and humanity.   His ability to hold complex, divisive, and tragic circumstances in his head and heart and find a way, painfully and thoughtfully, forward is a true inspiration.   In fact, it reminded me that I have just got to read this soon - it's on my shelf:

http://www.amazon.com/Lincolns-Melancholy-Depression-Challenged-President/dp/0618773444

The inscription at the beginning:

"The inclination to exchange thoughts with one another is probably an original impulse of our nature.  If I be in pain I wish to let you know it, and to ask your sympathy and assistance; and my pleasurable emotions also, I wish to communicate to, and share with you."

Abraham Lincoln - February 11, 1859 (not a spurious internet quote, dear reader, this one is well-researched and documented!)

So, thank you, dear reader, for allowing me to share my pain and pleasurable emotions here with you.  I think it does me a world of good.   I have recently been thinking a lot about how we construct the psychological narratives of our own lives.   Our lives are not just a random series of things happening to us - well, in their raw form they may or may not be, depending on whether or not one believes there is a master designer.   However, I think we ascribe meaning to events that happen to us and, thus, construct the narrative of our lives as we move along through them.   I was fascinated to read this recent article on the topic:

http://www.quietrev.com/how-to-tell-your-own-life-story/?utm_source=sc_fb&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=life-story

"Our stories are everything.  They are the heart of love and of meaning."

And, that last Joseph Campbell quote:   "Where you stumble is where your treasure lies."  That reminds me so vividly of this great poem by Wendell Berry:

The Real Work

It may be that when we no longer know what to do
we have come to our real work

and that when we no longer know which way to go
we have come to our real journey

The mind that is not baffled is not employed.

The impeded stream is the one that sings.

************

My stream, dear reader, has been impeded for a while.   My mind has been baffled.   It's probably no surprise, after reading some of my recent posts, to learn that I have been suffering from depression.   I am starting to feel a bit of hope and self compassion flow back into me, and although that gives me some pleasure, I am also cautious about extrapolating full recovery from that.   I am taking it a day at a time.   The fact that I can write about it here is a good sign.   One of my symptoms is a perception of gradual disconnection from friends and family (I try not to assume that my experience of this is typical or atypical, mild or severe.   I don't want to compare my pain to any others.   It is just my own.).    It's like a piano string that is never played or, more accurately, a piano hammer that is misaligned and unable to strike the string in question.   I keep hitting the correct keys on the keyboard but they misfire and hit the air between the strings.   The only way for that string to come to life is for the hammer to hit it straight on.   Then it vibrates with resonant sound.   But, I've probably taken this analogy way too far.

Anyway, the circumstances of my life remain completely vibration worthy.   I have joyous children who love me.    I have friends and family that care about me, and probably have no idea that I've felt galaxies of distance between us.    I have work that is meaningful.   But, there it is.   The hammers are not hitting the strings.

I do, however, find solace in poetry and words and music.  They tend to align the mechanism briefly with the sound.   I find it overwhelmingly touching that I can feel connected to another human who might be completely different from me, but who writes or talks of this experience of darkness.   A recent article by Parker Palmer really touched me:

http://www.couragerenewal.org/welcome-to-the-human-race-an-interview-with-parker-j-palmer-on-the-topic-of-depression/

And, I do have at least one friend of which he writes - one that can be present with me in this place.   And, I have the hope of finding meaning like Palmer describes - an opening to compassion and courage.  

Anyway, this is my first halting attempt to describe and write my story about this with, perhaps, a little bit of humor:

About 15 months ago,  I was pretty sure that my life was like that of Deborah Kerr in "An Affair to Remember" - all that romance, all of that drama, all of those chiffon dresses and cosmopolitan dinners on cruise ships, all of the potential for a lovely new directions.    Then, about, 14 months ago, I saw a disappointment on the horizon, put my rose-colored sunglasses and scarf on - a la Audrey Hepburn in "Roman Holiday" or Grace Kelly in "To Catch a Thief," and ignored it.  About 8 months ago, the disappointment arrived and settled in on my shoulders.   I realized that I was actually not in a classic movie.   I was in a B-level flick with Ben Affleck and Jennifer Aniston - "He's Just Not That Into You" (did you know that when you google "Mediocre Films with Ben Affleck and Jennifer Aniston," that's what comes up? Ha.).   Anyway, I was a little miffed, because I had been led to believe that my biopic would be a very sophisticated film - maybe with Juliette Binoche as the lead, eh?  How did I allow myself to be in some sad, pathetic Keanu Reeves vehicle?   I was better than that, right?

Anyway, what's helping me right now is to have realized that Deborah Kerr and Cary Grant were cursed from the start and that kind of fantasy was not really ever a great place for my life to land.    I mean it's patently obvious that a) Grant is not that great a painter,  b) a cruise ship is not any kind of place to make decisions, c) Kerr is foolish to not think of her own personal safety on the streets of New York, and d) how about that guy that is ACTUALLY PRESENT with you in the hospital room, Deborah?   Come on.   He has the benefit of being ACTUALLY THERE.

If any of you are unfamiliar with "An Affair to Remember," I'm sorry for that digression.   But, suffice it to say, I am now changing directions with regard to my life narrative.   I am thinking to myself, what would Leslie Knope (Parks and Recreation) do?   She would look ruefully at the past, forgive herself, and move on to make plans to become the director of a new inspiring documentary rather than resigning herself to becoming a second rate actor in someone else's drama.

I am embracing presence with myself and with others.   Presence is the key to connection.   Let me say that again.   If I have learned anything over the past year and some change, it is that PRESENCE IS THE KEY TO CONNECTION.    AND, CONNECTION IS THE KEY TO LOVE AND BELONGING.

These past few days with the kids have been qualitatively better for me because I spent 70% of my time away from technological devices and with them.   That's remarkable for me right now because Food and FaceBook are my primary escapes.    I plan to continue working on that so that I eventually get to 90% human interaction/10% virtual interaction.   I will be patient and compassionate with myself about this.

I have also read more books in the last two weeks than I have in the last 6 months combined.   Books that were compelling like "All the Light We Cannot See" which I just finished and cannot rave positively enough about....Never have 500+ pages gone by so quickly.

All day camps for the kids start tomorrow.   I have lots of work to do this week.   But, I will try to do it with PRESENCE.   And, take my highly sensitive, introverted heart off into some quiet corner by myself to continue trying to make those piano hammers strike those strings more accurately, both metaphorically and literally.   :)  

Thanks for reading.