Wanderlust

Lately I've had a yearning for Africa. Do we all yearn for Africa?

I stare at the map on my wall, on which there are no red dots stuck to the African continent. Truth be told, there's a few continents without red dots. There used to be green, blue, and yellow dots on the map as well, but everyone always asked what the different colors represent, so I wanted to stick with red. My dot stickers are old now and don't stick very well. I just superglued red dots on top of all the yellows, greens, and blues. My fingers are covered in superglue. Boston? How did I miss Boston? Boston got its red dot- I ran the Boston marathon in 2014.

Staring at Africa, my eyes graze over the different colored countries. Where could I go in Africa? Morocco? Yes, maybe some day. But that's not what I'm yearning for. Egypt. Yes. That's what my heart wants right now.

"Right now?" Mike asks when I tell him.

"Well no. Right now I'm going to go for a run. Then eat breakfast." I wonder about the current state of Egypt and decide that at least for the next few months, I don't have time for Africa. I'll spend a week in Hawaii a month from now, I'm spending another summer in San Diego, one more trip with Emily before school is back in session. Then I've got to work on graduating.

Last night I dreamed I was in India, making curried lentils.

City Life

Jen made a comment a couple months ago that I'm living a glamorous life. I think spending most of your life in a small town can skew your image of city life. I think it was the mention of taking the train to the airport. Trains seem adventurous... although I may have been talking about the light rail, which is a bit less adventurous.

I know what she's saying though, and it's probably why I like living in a city more than in the country (and I've done both). I teach today, so I'm sitting in my 8th floor office (with 8th floor roof access) downtown, dressed up in a teal blouse, open front black sweater, and black slacks. Slip on black shoes. Dangly earrings. Beside my laptop sits my cell phone and coffee.

I did  not take the light rail here today. The light rail takes 2-3 times longer than just driving, so I'm contributing to city's air pollution.

My sinuses are so inflamed that my teeth hurt. My doctor just upped my dosage of Nasacort to twice daily (it's a 24 hour dosage), and order that I get back on Zyrtec. I was going to drive to the pharmacy to drop off my prescription for a steroid inhaler, but I would lose my fantastic parking space. I have to pee and I'm two floors up from the restroom... with no elevator.

I'm wedged tightly between glamour and misery.

Wish You Were Here

Why is it that "absence makes the heart grow fonder"? Is it the lack of our partner's snoring or the way he leaves the sponge full of water in the kitchen sink, that allows us to focus only on our favorite parts? The way his eyes smile, the way he smells, the sweetness of his words and touch? 

I woke to the sound of waves crashing on the beach and peered out my window beyond the lit sand path and into the darkness. I laid back in bed and listened to the waves, just audible over the whir of the air conditioning unit, and felt a sense of having dreamed this moment and place before. 

I prepared a cup of coffee as light started to filter onto the water and the cicadas began to overpower all other sounds. I sprayed myself down with citronella and walked barefoot onto the wooden porch with my coffee cup and saucer, and sat listening to the cicadas and the waves in the warm, damp air. I took my second cup down to the water's edge, just steps from my bungalow, and took photos as the sun struggled to peek out from behind storm clouds. Stray dogs and people sauntered by while several swimmers played in the water in front of anchored fishing boats.

It's something to have someone back home that makes you excited to leave paradise and return to his waiting arms. 

I dropped off my empty cup in my bungalow and walked along the beach looking for a better vantage point for my photos. I stepped off the sandy beach and onto the rocky shoreline that looped around the island. A crab scurried across a rock and reminded me of the book "Beachcombing at Miramar". A young man with a fishing pole joined me on the rocks. 

It started to rain, so I slowly made my way back to my private bungalow where my brightly colored swimsuit stood out on the wood decking, drying from yesterday's snorkel. The cool air felt soothing as I stepped into my room and sat on my bed, looking out the sliding doors to the ocean. My phone displayed 22 new messages and I responded to the only one that mattered. 

"It would be awesome if you were here."

"As long as I was with you."

2 am and beyond...

2 am is no friend of mine, but we've been seeing a lot of each other lately. My neighbor's ceiling fan has finally stopped sending pulsed humming noises into my bedroom, which I've been laying awake listening to for days. It has also stopped raining, which I laid awake listening to for two days. I don't remember if the rain coincided with the ceiling fan.

I'm pretty sure my neighbor has tuberculosis. His cough is terrible and it's been going on at least since he moved in a couple months ago. My mind drifts to any and all circulation vents in my apartment. I decide I'm closed off from his apartment, and let it go. Him and his wife also have a child. A small baby. One with high pitched shrieks that they endlessly coo to in an effort to silence it.

My neighbor snores. I'm jealous that's he's asleep.

A friend said "Text me if you're awake at 2 am, I probably will be too." But I don't. I don't because as I lay in bed awake at 2 am, I think about whether or not I could make it to the gym, and still get cleaned up in time for my doctor's appointment that would precede the class I'm teaching, which I don't have the homework graded for.... or actually the quizzes either, and all of that needs to be done before noon, and holy shit I need to get stuff done for my internship as my performance has been drastically sliding. I have to study for my oral quiz tomorrow in Japanese class, and I start doing calculations... and I start panicking, and I start crying. And I could text him and ask if he's awake and I could tell him that my stress level is so high that I'm crying and I don't know if I'm going to make it, and I picture his response "Don't worry, it's going to be ok."

And that is exactly what I cannot bear to hear right now. Telling someone who feels like things are definitely not ok, that things are going to be ok, is like telling a burning person that their feet are not on fire.

Well I don't know if it's exactly like that.

People with "real" anxiety tell me not to stress about it. It's not worth it. "Just let it go". And I wonder where in my life I went wrong that people assume that I should always be ok. That I can just decide to turn off my stress and anxiety.

My advisor is returning tomorrow night and I've done exactly zero with my thesis since he left. I'm editing a paper for a visiting foreign professor and I'm a page and a half into eight pages, and hoping two of those pages are references.

I think about going for a swim, but it's cold here and the pools are outdoor. The indoor pool a block from my apartment doesn't open until 8 am. I think about the indoor pool at 24 Hour Fitness in San Diego and how I could roll out of bed right now, step onto the warm pool deck in my bare feet, air thick with chlorine and high humidity, let my body be wrapped in the tepid water, and listen to the sloshing in my ears. Stroke, stroke, stroke, breathe, flip at the wall, brief silence, stroke, stroke, stroke, breathe.....

Ok, so then can you make it to the gym? But I don't want to go to the gym and it doesn't open until 5 am. You can clean the bathroom, that'll give you a dose of chlorine and check one more thing off your massive list.

I refuse to clean my bathroom at 3 am. I get up and take two Tylenol.

I could continue grading. I could work on my code for my internship. Maybe I could even do something wild and crazy like work on my thesis.

I roll over and put my arms over my face. What I really want is to sleep. I am exhausted. I am annoyed by the people who suggest that I just turn off my stress, my panic, my anxiety.

What are you going to do with that spinach you bought? You were going to scramble it with eggs, but you boiled the eggs, and you didn't get any other vegetables for salad. It's just going to sit in the refrigerator and go bad. Really. I'm stressing about spinach now. Please just go to sleep.

It's now approaching 4 am. At 4:45, my coffee pot will click on and start gurgling and dripping. Coffee aroma will drift into my room and I will consider getting up. I will instead doze off. My alarm will go off at 5:30 am and I will be jolted into blurry confusion.

I consider telling my doctor I can't sleep. The last time I saw my doctor she suggested I cut back on, and possibly completely stop, caffeine. For a not very good reason that I won't get in to. I can only imagine her stance on the topic if I told her I'm not sleeping between 2 and 5 am. How do you tell an insomniac not to drink coffee in the morning? I generally do not drink caffeine after 3 pm and I'm at about 3 cups a day, so I don't think coffee is the problem.

I stare up at the ceiling in the darkness and brainstorm about what makes me feel sleepy. All of this. Feeling sleepy is not the problem. I'm sleepy, I'm tired, I'm exhausted. My rapid heart rate, racing thoughts, and overall feeling of distress, is the problem. Just let it go. It's going to be ok. My agitation is the problem. My brain is the problem.

And now I'm staring at a computer screen (with computer glasses on, thank you) at 4 am on a Tuesday, and this week is just going to have its way with me.

Trail of tears

Last year, a fellow grad student suggested I print out a one year calendar (all on one page) and cross off each day I worked on my thesis. She got the idea from a website on accomplishing goals. So over the summer, I did just that. I did fairly well over the summer. When school started back up again, I was too overwhelmed with classes and work to get anything done on my thesis.

I printed out a new 2017 calendar. January was sporadic. There are no X's in February. 

After a merciless week, I have finally sat down at my desk on campus to work on my thesis (after hearing for the last couple weeks from my advisor that I'm lagging behind). 

I think I'm going to go ahead and mark on my calendar the days that I have sat down in front of my data, cried, and put it away. I think shedding tears over your thesis should count as productive days. 

I started out on Elle King Radio on Pandora. After having far too much bitter coffee from Peet's downstairs, the upbeat, sassy nature of the station was too much to handle. I switched to Ray LaMontagne Radio. Shawn Mendes was whining for mercy. Thumbs down. The rain pattered against the window and all 173 issues with my thesis came crashing down on me.

"As I'm Leaving" (David Grey) came on. If anyone has seen Ladder 49, that's where they're having the funeral for John Travolta's character and it's raining, his wife is grieving, it's just really sad. But the song is actually beautiful. 

I grieved for John Travolta for a couple minutes until my advisor showed up and took the rest of my scotch for his meeting with the dean. 

Zero progress on my thesis. But plenty of tears shed. 

My notes are spread out across my desk. I have no idea what to focus on. 

Sacramento is not showing northeast wind events. I can hardly remember why it is I'm supposed to care. I don't even know how to Google what it is I'm supposed to do to fix my plots that a visiting professor said were "meaningless". You have to rotate the axis into the winds... 

Maybe I shall make a flow chart of how to progress with my thesis. A road map if you will.

Or Google a new scotch to try.

If Something Should Ever Happen...

I just got back from Japan... and came home to chaos. Chaos that I knew was coming. Maybe I'll post more on Japan later. I got so busy trying to see so much in such little time, that I didn't have time to write about it.

I went to Japan because I felt the US plummeting. I needed to see the temples that gave birth to the Buddhist temples here. My temple.

I went to Hiroshima, to pay my respects and to learn. I have literally hundreds of pictures from Japan, but for this post, I'm going to only share a couple, because it's what's on my mind.

This photo:

With this explanation:

On September 11th, of 2001, I drove my dad to work in his jeep because my vehicle was in the shop. We listened to KGB on the radio, and heard the reports of the attacks. I asked my dad if it was for real. "Shh... let me hear this".

Campus let us out early that morning. America was under attack. It was a scary time. People left notes in New York trying to find each other... for days, weeks.

My dad and I discussed what we would do if something ever happened and we were separated. Phones wouldn't work and we'd have no way of getting in touch, no way of letting each other know we were alive.

We made a pact to meet at Bud Kearns, where I swam. Or to leave a note on the building.

As I stared at the photo of the Japanese writing in Hiroshima, I immediately thought of my dad and our promise to each other. To find each other.

I watch our country crumble now and think about what my dad would say.

When I was young... less than 10 years old I would guess, we sat in line at the Mexican border and I saw a couple guys scaling the border fence. Having only heard my mother's take on the issue, I said "Dad, do you see that?"

"They're just trying to make a better life for themselves, Carrie".

I am so thankful for the influence my dad had on me. How he chased out some of the ugliness my mother taught me. How he softened my heart a little. My dad, the science lover, the feminist (a topic for another post, maybe tomorrow), the humanist.

And as I travel the world and get ready to set out on another adventure, I know I am forever trying to find my dad. And I know I will never find him. Maybe that's not true. When I let go. When I stop trying and stop thinking and stop fighting, I realize he's right with me. In my heart, my thoughts, my mannerisms. He is the mold that made me.

Wild Creatures

Lucky for me, they cut one of my ribs out... just below the collar bone. And every once in awhile, my heart can squeeze out in the newly created space, like jail bars pried apart.

Sometimes at night, when I can't sleep, I lay on my left side and place my right hand under my left armpit. I can feel my heart quiver in its cage, and the first time I felt that, I thought there was something wrong with me. It's not a heartbeat I'm feeling, it's the actual contraction of the ventricles, then the atria, and somehow I can feel the whole thing. I guess it's normal. I place my hand under my ribs and feel it flutter as if it's living a life of its own. And maybe it is. Like a stranger living in my own body.

Maybe I should introduce myself. We could become friends.

That wild thing with wild ideas.