finding my own rhythm

Walking on the other side, Aragon April 2013

Finding a manageable pace doesn’t come naturally to me. When we're out walking in the mountains, if I don't consciously keep a check on myself, I’m the one bursting off at the start of the trail, only to be later gasping for breath whilst everyone else overtakes.

In daily life, the same situation often occurs, much to the detriment of my health. I easily get swept up in the excitement of new projects or carried along by the enthusiasm of others, until my body just can't take it any more.
 

After a busy, and therefore exhilarating Autumn, I intended 2014 to get off to a steady and slow start. Instead, I found myself once again overloading myself to breaking point. So many unimaginable possibilities have been opening up for me work-wise since last October, that it's almost impossible to say non. Hours teaching English and French or translating are thrilling and exciting. Hardly a day went by in January and February when I didn't come back from an afternoon of classes buzzing with the excitement that comes finally doing a job I've worked so hard for and waited so long to do.

But with that buzz and with those hours comes exhaustion, real over-whelming, anxiety educing exhaustion.

The last few weeks of February were a real struggle, as I could feel the busy working days finally stacking up and taking their toll. Doing my accounts at the end of the month, I realised that I have unintentionally been teaching between 15 to 20 hour weeks. That, in addition to the translation projects I was working on at the start of the month mean that my bank balance is looking healthy for the first time since I received my last payment of student loan. My energy reserves were are however well and truly overdrawn.

Something inevitably had to give. In the end it boiled down to a toss up between doing the job that I love...and my health.

Out in the hills, I've found the key to being able to sustain greater distances is to take my time, to pace. But that inevitably means an acceptance to not only take things a little slower, but also be willing to do a little less each day. I'd love to be able to translate that same principle into my daily life, to feel it were possible to "walk" even greater distances, rather than find my steps petering out and grinding to a holt.

 

Ever since I stopped working back at the start of March, I've been searching for that seemingly elusive rhythm between race and standstill, where my legs get into a manageable rhythm and my feet feel they could keep going for ever. I'm keeping eyes on the summit, standing straight and breathing deeply as I take each step...no matter how small or slow those steps may be. 

letting go

If my eyes follow the lines of my arm as it extends beyond my body, they arrive at my hands. Both closed tightly.

If I were to peek into one of the hands, inside I would see everyone and everything I hold dear; my family, my beloved, my friends. But also my personal successes, big and small, my precious memories. 

Now if I were to examine the other hand, I'd see the fingers are clenched so tightly over into the palm, the knuckles are almost white. In this hand sit my life-long and more recent dreams. My secret longings, my most bitter jealousies. My joys but also my sadnesses. My hopes for the future but also my present despair.

With my fingers of both hands wrapped so tightly around these, I can open neither my hands nor my heart to anything else. As if I'd somehow loose myself if I dared to offer them up.

All that I hold in both these hands are part of me. I guard them jealously, unwilling to let them go. And yet.

No one is asking me to let go of my loved ones. No one can take away all that I have achieved. But perhaps I am hanging on too tightly to the other stuff?

If only somehow I could have the courage to loosen my grip, to let go of one handful? Then one day I would wake to find an open palm resting by my side, free to be filled with other possibilities. 

busy hands

We're now back in our valley home, after a few weeks away. Lately, fatigue has been becoming more and more a heavy weight around my neck. Not the everyday tiredness that comes from leading a hectic life. Nor the Sunday morning sluggishness and lethargy be-known to students brought on by one too many sugary cups of coffee, frequent late nights or not enough fresh vegetables. Rather an exhaustion that greets you when you wake in the morning, that a good night sleep won't lift. A tiredness so consuming it seeps into your bones, that could drain away all happiness if you let it do so.

Just a few short months ago, I was a teacher and translator. Working for myself from home. Weaving together words and untangling muddled syntax. It feels like another life ago. I've been off work since March, too ill to work. And as this current rough seems to be showing no sign of abating, looks like I'll be taking the rest of the summer off too.

As we try to navigate our way back to that path of wellness, my days have been stripped back to the essential. Eating wholesome food. Fresh air. Long sleeps. Deep breaths.

Foraging in the woods helps. Picnics in the sunshine helps. Spending time with friends helps. And above all, keeping my hands busy helps.

sleepless

My nights have been restless of late; dark shapes clouding my otherwise blue sky dreams.

My calls through the thick ink of night snap him to attention and without recollection of space or time he is tangled in her damp hair. He wraps me in his arms and whispers in my ear until he feels my heart return to its natural rhythm.

His breath graces my neck and my body softens. Sleep beckons me once more and he gently returns to his half of the bed, my warmth still on his chest. These are the ways he knows how to soothe my nightmares. Treading slowly with me. Holding tight. Making new dreams.

I hope that these dreams, this fog, will not haunt me for long. We hope they are merely a product of this rocky patch now; a mind leaping ahead whilst its accompanying body lags behind out of breath from the exhaustion of being.

managing tension

 

The early morning scent of brewing coffee. The first rays of golden light out on the balcony. The fleece in my hand is bouncy, soft. Like a tiny fluffy cloud. It feels exactly like it belongs there. My head starts spinning with a hundred million billion willion thoughts. Now is the time to bring them out. Let them breath. With each turn of the treadle, they tumble out. Thoughts only. Dreams. Little sadnesses. As I draft the wool, the wheel twists the fibres together. My thoughts twist into the thread, wind onto the bobbin and are held in place by the tension between my hand and the wheel. It is time to let go, to put tension and stress to better use. It is time to make yarn.  

in these green mountains

“If you asked me why I live in these green mountains

I would laugh at myself. My soul is at rest.”

Li Po (701-762)

Mountains get into your blood. After almost five years of living in the Pyrenees, I miss their familiar contours when I go away. I am used to their monumental presence, the way they seem so fixed and eternal, and yet offer a visage that seems to be constantly changing. 

These mountains are indeed green, but they are also sometimes white, golden, grey or blue...

Every day the first thing I do is look up at the mountains, the unfolding peaks that tower over our little valley village to the east and to the west. Nothing else seems quite so satisfying.  

fatigue

Lately, fatigue has once more been a heavy weight around my neck. Not the everyday tiredness that comes from leading a hectic life. Nor the Sunday morning sluggishness and lethargy be-known to students brought on by one too many sugary cups of coffee, frequent late nights and not enough fresh vegetables. Rather an exhaustion that greets you when you wake in the morning, that a good night sleep won't lift. A tiredness so consuming it seeps into your bones, that could drain away all happiness if you let it do so.

flotsam and jetsom

 

We've been walking in woodlands, across meadows and through salt marshes. But today I am in my favourite place, beside the sea. I walk along the shore at a snail's pace. I take baby steps. It's frustratingly slow and I seem to tire very easily at the moment. But this will have to do for now.

The sea  invigorates me. I feel the breath rush out of my lungs and the sharp intake of new air. The tang of salt spray, the sound of surf, the call of the sea birds.

Spindle in hand, I walk slowly and carefully, just at that place where the waters and the sand overlap.

I walk slowly because I am tired today. But also to keep the yarn that I am slowly creating from breaking and loosing the whole thing to the sea...

As I walk, as I spin, I find other fibres twisted together by man but also spun by Mother Nature herself, thrown up from the depths of the sea's belly to rest here a while on the sand.

the things that keep us up at night

It's not the ache behind the eyes,

the loss of appetite or

the painful limbs.

The pallid skin or the freezing hands.

Neither is it the lost years.

The exams left untaken,

The high heels left unworn,

or the broken dreams. 

Rather, it is the perception of others,

their lazy comments or ignorant

judgements. Their unwillingness

to understand. To accept.

Their incessant questions and their hurtful words

muttered under their breath, which we

broach without comment.

These, not the fatigue nor the pain, are the things that

eat away at our lives, that mark us out

that keep us up at night.