Posted by : Sherri Cornelius Tuesday, February 3, 2009


I've had a feeling lately. An underlying vibration. A hum, if you will. That hum is telling me it's time to move on.



(Calm down! I'm not leaving. Hear me out before you start freakin.)

It's time to move on, but I can't tell from what. I'm fairly happy with how my life is right now, the friends I have, the direction of my writing, the blog, etc. I mean, life is full of disappointments, and any problems I have now are just the garden-variety problems of living.

Maybe I'm restless exactly because I have nothing to rail against. No overwhelming worries to occupy my mind. I'm looking back over the arc of about the last year and a half, and great googlie-mooglie, have I gone through some changes.

Picture yourself climbing an icy mountain. Imagine that you put your foot down wrong, lose your balance and start to slide. At first you try desperately to find purchase on the ice, but after a bit you realize there's none to be found. You let go and slide down knowing you'll fetch up somewhere, and you focus all your attention on slowing your descent and avoiding obstacles. Of course, you can't avoid them all. You come to a stop at the bottom, get up and brush the snow off your ass, and look back at the mountain. You might sit a while and ponder how far you slid, tending to your scrapes and bruises and back spasms, and trying to decide whether or not to try that hill again or go around.

I think where I put my foot wrong on that hill was at the end of 2007 with a major marital blow-up. We're all right now, and you'll notice I'm assigning no blame, but at that time I questioned everything I thought I knew, not only about my husband but myself. I leaned heavily on the online community I'd built for myself, but very soon my faith in that community was shaken with another event. (Some of you remember the crazy bitch who shares my name. She would probably describe me the same way.)

That's when I still thought I had a chance to find purchase on the hill. I grabbed onto anything I could find, except nothing took. In fact, my grappling went on way too long. I didn't think I was doing anything different, but suddenly it was as if I spoke a different language than everyone I knew. I couldn't make anyone understand me. Everything I said came out wrong, and it seemed I was alienating folks right and left. The more I tried to make myself understood, the worse I made it. The more I grabbed onto sanity, the more elusive it became.

So finally, I gave up and slid to the bottom of the hill. I let people leave me, and I left some who made me doubt myself. I decluttered my life of toxic people and erroneous ideas and unused possessions. It was a long, slow slide, but I'm going to be naive here and say I've finally reached the bottom. I may have been stationary for a couple of months now. Maybe this restlessness I feel is that change in momentum. I've rested, regained my strength, patched up my wounds and am ready to start again.

And the decision of whether to travel the flats or tackle the mountain again? I have to say, I don't remember why I was climbing that damn mountain in the first place.

{ 5 comments... read them below or Comment }

  1. What do you mean? I don't understand. Can you be more clear on this?

    j/k

    I had a recent event that reminded me how small I am, and and how large things around me can be. I have to say, I'm glad you didn't dump everything when you slid.

    And I hate forgetting why we're climbing. I especially hate it when you're about three quarters of the way up.

    Yeah, I can relate.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm just glad you didn't leave everybody behind on that slippery slope. I'm glad you feel things are turning positive, and it's nice to see that happening from my perspective above you on the crumbling, rocky outcropping...

    ReplyDelete
  3. Man I miss you. I feel like I'm tumbling head over heals down my slope...actually it feels more like I've stumbled off a cliff.
    I think I'm coming over Friday. I have some stuff I need to tell you, and I'm warning you: you're not going proud...at all.
    And, I am very very mad at Aunt Rhonda.
    Love you. <3

    ReplyDelete
  4. How weird. I mean, it's weird you mention that underlying vibration, because I've been feeling it too, just for different reasons.

    Sometimes - well most times I guess - all you can do is dust off your backside and keep going, even if it's in another direction.

    I'm just glad I'm one of the ones who's still with you on the journey. :) *hugs*

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  5. Many people climb because the mountain is there. That may or may not be enough. But the other choices seem to be staying where you are or going around the mountain. Well, you could dig through it but I'd rather slide down a mountain than have it fall in on me.

    Stay on the journey.

    ReplyDelete

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