I just want someone to know

… It’s not the Sunday scaries. I hate my job. I love teaching art. I love a lot of my students. I love seeing them create. But we have bad leadership. Lack of communication, no support, no system. No tolls to help with behaviors… Unless you count the three text books I’ve been given to deal with classroom management. Like I have time to read. We’re not listened to. We’re belittled. Asked to work extra hours. This week was told I would be sharing my room with music. We would take turns weekly alternating between the classroom and doing our classes from a cart traveling to home rooms. They need a room for in school suspension. Then we were told if we didn’t like it to come up with a different plan. Not a different space. Nevermind the three unused classrooms that are being used for storage…a different disciplinary plan.

That’s not my job. That’s yours principal. I don’t get paid to do your job.

I’m not sad the weekend is over. I’m angry that tomorrow I have to go back to this shit show.

The stress of it is costing years off my life. My body hurts with the rage.

I’m so tired of this place.

I want out. I want to know God hears me. Cares about me. I want a new chapter. And I can’t make it happen fast enough.

Gross.

I am so tired of this. I don’t want to go back to the toxic place that is my work. It’s suffocating. Heavy. Unfair. I want to get out, out of my apartment, out of this job, out of town…I want to run away. Never look back. I feel gross knowing I’ll step through those doors tomorrow and it will be okay. But I’m not. Not there. Not here. This is all so yucky.

Put me where I belong.

Today’s Hauntings

The apartment I no longer live in that I will still have to pay for, the city I miss, the unrequited love. The years behind me and the ones left. I am halfway through life, if not more. My years left are short. It won’t be long. Still I do not know what I want to be when I grow up, I do not know you. I have not loved with all my love. I have no legacy. No savings. I will leave, and if nothing changes significantly I will leave nothing behind but cat hair dusty books and trinkets and unfinished artworks. Over half my life without you, even if I find you- how will we make up for lost time, lost fertility, lost beauty? How will our love stand against the backdrop of our lives lived without each other? I have not done enough. Now I don’t feel like I have enough time. This is not how I wanted my story to go. My cats have no idea that they are the best of me, and they will be so short a mark on me. Deep. Forever held. But even by them I could do better. This life…tolerated. Mediocre. Hardly a whisper. What good was finding beauty in the rubble all these years? In the hodpodge, in the surviving? What did hope amount to? What use is the passport in the firesafe box? Why must I feel so deeply? Why must I feel I’m missing so much? Why must the years grow shorter? How do I stop this rushing towards the end when so little has begun? The candles are poision. The work is little. The plants are dying. How do I pull back from the edge this time? All the books I have not read, the dances left untread, the paths not taken, the songs unheard, the colors not yet seen, the love not yet lived, the meals not shared…How has it come to this? So much void ahead, such a short path from here to the end? Castles of braille written in sand. Blind to the maze, lost in the lotus, naive and sold for parts. Unheard, unseen, unknown. How do I render this glorious unto Him? How can He redeem these ashes of nothing, empty handed brokeness? I will arise to love. I will live my little life. I thought I was made for more. I thought the beauty, depth, and sensitivity mattered. I don’t know another way. I don’t know how to put down hope or dreams. But I am tired of this half life. Of this not mattering. Not winning hearts, not shining, not showing the way, not thriving. Like somehow everything I know to be true, the blood, sweat, tears, wilderness, olive grove…some how none of it reaches here. This is lonely, not untouched by grace, but the tenacity required to continue to trust grace unfelt…is wearing me thin. I am weak and don’t know how to be held or hold on.
I will clean the dishes, put away the towels, dust, sweep… I will do what I can. I will try again. I will keep keeping. But I want a better story. These last chapters…I want them to make sense, to be worth the wandering before.

Not a Teacher here.

I am tired. I do not want to be here any more. Teaching should not feel like pounding angry words coming at you every moment telling you you don’t matter. But that is what it feels like here. This is blind leading the blind chaos. We educate children different from the systems we’ve constructed. The system is broken. The rules are out dated. The support is lacking. It’s an untrained, untamed circus. Have them juggle while spinning, and flying through the air. A lead trapeze artist. It hollows you out, working within a system that isn’t functional, pretending everything is fine. This is just the way it is. It leaves you empty. No sparks of joy. No victories small or consistent. Communication breaks down under the strain of professionalism and politeness. There is no sense in this.

Lord, I need a different job, I need to get out of this. I need life breathed into my bones.

The last day of Christmas

Yesterday was the last day of Christmas. Today my Christmas decorations are up past Christmas and I need to change the chalk numbers written on my door. I need to clean and water the plants, should put away my decorations. I need to do laundry, shower, finish my application for that one school, send the legal documents to the lawyer. Yesterday I made the lawyer trying to take my money over an eviction case that took place after I moved, blush. He’s doing his job really well. But he is also the most helpful lawyer I’ve talked to in weeks of talking to lawyers trying to get someone to explain if I should take the settlement deal. I didn’t get grades in for 2nd quarter. I will have to endure more of third quarter than I want. I wish I was called to endure this school…but it just feels like a trial I was dropped into. I do not hear or see God much these days. Honestly I’m not sure I’m seeking Him either. Because I’m hurt and mad and so very tired.

1. What are standout moments from 2023?
Moving. Starting an art teaching job. Cockroaches. Sitting in Pastor Kirk’s office and being told I have value. Being invited for Halloween at the Hannah’s. Starting therapy, getting 5months in, and being told I am worthy of receiving love, feeling that wash over me and at the same time some piece of me trying to reject it. Feeling at home in Chicago when I visited. Visiting Texas. Being suspended from school for something I didn’t do, twice. Having 30k withdrawn from my account, getting it restored. Realizing the worst roommate ever isn’t done haunting me. Giving two new paintings away to Audrey and Seth.

2. What would I do differently?
Drink less. Clean more. Exercise. Print every legal document. Shop online less. Explore more.

3. Who did I have the most meaningful interactions with?
Family, Fustins, Pastors, Jenny perspectives. Lance and Melissa. Brianna and her Family. Sarah Cooney. Ms Ventus, Mr L. Audrey.

4. Where did I spend most of my time?
School, Home, Trader Joes. In self-pity, dissonance.

5. What is something I’m proud of?
Showing up for work and therapy. Finishing two paintings. Not giving up. Despite mental and emotional burnout/anxiety- not going to dark places – being stronger mentally then I have been in the past. Still holding onto hope. Not loosing faith. Asking for help.

6. Which books, shows, movies and music will stay with you?
Harry Potter, Eras tour.

7. What is the biggest lesson I have learned?
Vulnerability is worth it. Risk can feel like both a set back and a growth. Print every legal document. Being financially stable is life giving. I can do anything for a year.

8. What era am I in?
Overcoming anxiety era? The Era I was alone? Getting to the bottom of myself Era? Discovery Era? Era of grief and confusion? Lost Era? Displaced Era? Era of missing home? Era of being strong even if I don’t feel like it? Era of figuring it all out on my own?

9. What are you willing to change to get closer to the life you really want?
Drinking less, more people and exercise. New job.

10. What is my wildest dream for 2024?
Move back to Chicago, get married, plan the trip for Ireland, make lots of art.

11. What habits do I want to develop or change this year?
More exercise, art making, hosting, people. Less drinking, smoking.

12. What am I most hopeful about this year?
A new job, a different apartment, less drama.

13. Which personal strengths do I want to utilize more this year?
Loving, tenacity, taking risks.

14. What will guide my choices this year?
Life-giving, safe risk taking, peace.

15. How can I step out of my comfort zone this year?
By pursuing people more, building a comfort zone, doing things I really want even if they are scary (like moving back to Chicago.)

I am discontent. I am growing. I am trying. I am figuring it out. I am hanging in there. I won’t give up.
Writing this all out did not make me feel better, or accomplished, or hopeful. But least it is recorded. Today I will think about packing up Christmas decorations. I will see old friends (Brenda and Elissa). I will shower. I will try to get through my to do list. I will act in hope. I will try to find better reflection questions. Or sit with these ones a little longer.

I am not ready to end Christmas. I need Advent. I need Christ to come into my world into these experiences. I need Him. His presence. That’s what I want most this year.

Hope for 2024

Lord Jesus, I want a new job, a safer job, a job where I feel supported and valued. With great bosses and an awesome staff. Doing something I am really good at and really love doing, and have room to grow in. I want to be in a place I love, to love myself well, not just accept myself and not hate myself. I want to be curious, and make others feel loved. I want to love well. I want to be safe. I want to be safe. I want to be safe. I want to feel safe and make others feel safe as well. I want to know and experience your love, and revel in your love revealing it to others. I want to be married and to build a home and life with a partner who will make me laugh, and lighten my load as I lighten his. But mostly I just want to know I’m in the center of your plan for me. That’s my hope for 2024.

An Irish love song .

You loved me once. Like the changing tide, like the seasons stride. In a breath then gone. In the longest light. It was a short night that took you away. Oh you loved me once.

A sad ghost sings through the moore and over the waves. She knows a love lost before time. But the tides and seasons wane.

heart break. Reality.

Guttural. Deep. I don’t want Your affection anymore. I just need Your intervention. I was nothing before You came along. Now I’m broken. I don’t want Your love. I just want a different life. I’m so tired of this walk. The straight and narrow was never said to be so dark.

Bitter blue

She said it was so impossible to create depth with the color blue.

So I went to a museum to prove my thoughts true.

Shadows in midnight hues. Browns with just a hint a blue jean. Skies broke open the corners deep in velvet hues of…blue.

She was wrong. The color of shadows eluding her.

Vindictive, twisted satisfaction.

My favorite color proving true.

Music holding me.

Skies and lakes, ice, and cold bright nights, your suit, the movement of it across the room. The boy on the plane with specked eyes in an warm shade. The greens only yellow without.

Sing to the mountains and moon wild one.

But don’t forget to paint.

uncharted waters

“He did this. The one who must not be named. You know, don’t you?” -Prisoner of Azkaban.

This current season has been blamed on witchcraft coming against me, grief, a renegade thyroid, failure to thrive, not adjusting, the wrong city, the wrong school, singleness, lost hopes, dying dreams, a million other things.

I’ve taken it further and asked what I have I done to bring this on? My temper lost too many times, the whiskey bottles I could count, but rather not, giving up, trusting fate too much, silencing the voices…but not having them to blame and rebel against. The poor diet and lack of movement. The endless scrolling. The failure to complete tasks.

Dirty dishes everywhere, an unmade bed, the half watched shows even…the tree only half decorated, but does it matter if it gives light to the night otherwise so dark no one knows? The crooked star, the paint without a pallet, the failing to start. The trouble to breath. The book I can’t start. Reading or writing. The un-watered plants. The empty classroom. The asthma attack, the first in 20 years. The lingering cough that is salty. The broken glass. The rotting fridge. The owl that will never come. The cats that always do. My daemons. My angels. The solace I keep. The house plants I suffer.
FUUUUUUCCCK.
Is this anxiety? At least depression I know. I get. But this mess… this is disgusting. Distasteful. So miserable and unbearable and unbecoming. This…some dark giant slug suffocating me, making my heart race, and my body congested, the temperature all wrong, too weary to do the things that need done, and too annoyed to forget them. Too uncomfortable to sleep. Too slow to move.

This…I cannot bear. This scares me unlike bouts of grief or depression-as grief sometimes manifests as…this is scarier. This could do me in. I don’t know how to fight, how to balance, how to stand. I must go on. I have to. I just can’t choose not to. I can’t. But damn. I just want to breath. To feel fully without fear, like I’m meant too. To know what it is to hold a pen to paper and reveal your heart, to put hand to clay, and feel your whole self, to paint and know you’re laying bear the inner world. Just to breath. Just to breath clear. To hope. To feel. To know. Why is anxiety so numbing, so dissociating, delusional, draining?

Just burry me. Take me home. Let me breath.