Building Up

Special thanks to Jamie for his comment. I appreciate you offering your story and reminding me of mine, it really doesn't seem real to read that and know it was me, even though I typed it from this very seat. It got me thinking...

You know when you watch the waves lapping at the sand, how there is the ebb and flow of the water against the earth, and at some point you realize the tide is coming in and the water is continuing the routine of back and forth but the overall gain over the earth is measureable in just a few minutes??

OK, now, it does the same thing when the tide is going out... the regular back and forth, but the noticeable retreat back into itself after its gobbled up your sand castle and footprints and left its trail of seaweed as the marker of its most outward stretch.

Here is the trick - there is a time when you can watch the sea as the tide is going out when the ebb and flow of the rhythmic roll seems to plateau. Like it is relaxed. Like it is glad that the turmoil of reaching toward the mountains is over and it can just be, just rock a little, maybe lick its wounds, and breathe a minute before it gets back to it. The waves are low and slow, doing nothing but what they do, not trying, not achieving, not racing back to the mass of water, just lapping softly. Its like watching a baby sleep to see how comfortable this part of the cycle is.

Somehow, when I witness this, I picture Mother Earth taking her moment alone to focus and ready herself for tomorrow's rolling of the tide, tomorrow's struggle to go farther than she did today, tomorrow's new challenges. I see her building her reserves of strength, getting her affirmations ready, remembering how to stand up straight and telling herself that there is no other way to be but proactive so just understand this is how it works and you will do it all again, but not til tomorrow.

I'm taking notice that I operate in a similar fashion - very consistently doing the same back and forth, but with ever increasingly gains over where I haven't been, followed by the curling into myself to ready for the next round of accomplishments.

I've been in the reach out and retreat cycle for many many years now, thinking the work I do on myself is for the purpose of getting people in my world... and as soon as ONE PERSON shows up I stop thinking of myself and get distracted by them. If lots of people get drawn into my world, I have even more reason to focus elsewhere. And then, I fall back onto myself, letting them all go, and wait patiently for the self nurturing moment of pause to return, and know that I must understand that struggles are part of how life goes and hope that the next time I put myself out there, that I fiercely proactively put myself into the world, I remember that I don't have to neglect myself to do it.

Well, I'm pulling back. I've left my mark, I'm satisfied with these efforts, I've embarassed myself and am ashamed that I continue to repeat these same follies on every attempt to take on the world and have a whole new handful of things I will take with me to my comfort zone to polish up for my return to the big bad world.

I start my new job January 8th, after one week of training my replacement starting January 1st.
Sister and Spaz are both of the idea that a roomie change January first is a bit soon, so that is penciled in for February.
I'm sending my check to pay off the car today. The pink slip might make it to me by Christmas.
I'm wasting some TV time zoned out with Lamer's of various degrees, finding out how to sit politely through dinner and not reach for my wallet, remembering how to get a guy begging for my number in 15 minutes, learning how to gently remove his tongue from my mouth and request that we learn each others names before he tries it again, and overall getting over my rebound guy.
I'm enjoying every second of having an old dog, letting her lead the way to new blocks in our neighborhood, dancing to the iPod tunes on the sidewalk as she meanders on people's lawns.
Once the benifits kick in, I'll make an appointment day to get me checked up on - teeth cleaned, vagina probed, moles checked, spine aligned, psyche scrambled.

In the mean time, I take a moment each morning to listen for the ocean waves. I remember that some things are just bigger than me, that its always happening no matter how I feel about it or what I do to try to gain control of it. Then I jump into the shower and prepare to use my natural ebb and flo to work my way just one more inch of difference over yesterday's mark on the world.