Reframe.

In a stroke of inspiration, I have produced both disappointment and excitement. Disappointment, as I’m not sure I’ll wear a nude body suit for my Performance Poetry class final performance. Excitement, as I think I know what my piece will be about.

As I’d mentioned, I needed to see if the whole brazen nude body suit thing would be supported by the content of the work – why wear that if you’re going to tell lyrical poems about cherry blossoms? This morning, however, I believe I was struck with the inspiration paddle, and think I know what my piece will be about.

Originally, it was to likely be about a woman’s relationship with her body, how it waffles between ownership by self, and ownership by others, including mainstream media, etc. But, I feel that I’ve covered a lot of that for now in my thesis work, and although, sure, that’s an issue that’s present or “up” in my life, as I began fleshing some of the new idea out in my morning pages this morning, I think I’ve found something riper, funnier, more relatable, and interesting. I’ll keep you posted.

I’ve started using a different morning pages notebook, as I’d finished my last a few days ago. It’s thinner than the last, but much larger pages, which equals much longer writing in the morning. (It’s also made from post-recycled materials, so it’s not new growth trees being cut down so I can write, I wonder what the Harry Potter stars are up to now – which, yes, occurred this morning along with all the else.)

I was a bit intimidated to be writing these 3 long hand pages much longer – would I have enough to “fill” it? What more could I possibly have to say. But I actually think this new length is just right for me. It’s longer than the last, and is giving me the room to get further into stuff before I wrap it up or end. Which is partly why I think my new idea for my performance came about – there’s more room to work it out, and watch it stumble across my page.

On another note. My friend left yesterday, and my little space is my own again. Driving to the airport at 5am will a) make you appreciate a rental car, and b) cause the skipping of my morning blog yesterday, so please forgive. I was a bit pooped and outward energy depleted from the trip.

It was very good practice, though, I believe. To wake up and have a person there. To go to sleep and have a person there. Granted, on the pull out couch, but still. I’ve been a solitary bird here in my apartment for a long time, and having another human here … well, was interesting to notice how I act and react.

Part of me is enormously proud that I got in most of my morning practices, and I stayed within my spending plan for her trip, and brought lots of snacks and meals with me so I didn’t have to eat out very much at all. Part of me is very acutely aware of how other-centered I become in the presence of someone a) so close to me, and b) who's in my space almost 24/7.

But, the good news, is that I noticed it. And I began to do my best to reign back in my codependency. I don’t need to complete your sentence. I don’t need to add in my two cents about your story with my own. I don’t need to be thinking of how to respond or what I’ll say next to keep the conversation interesting and exciting.

It was hard, honestly, in the few times that I consciously thought, I can let this thread lie. I don’t need to pick it up. It wasn’t that I was being cold, or uncommunicative. But when there came moments when I certainly had my opinion, or an alternate opinion, I didn’t have to voice it. I could let my friend state her opinion or share her story without having to add in my own or contradict or augment what had already been said.

Some moments, it felt to me like there was a huge, blatant gap in the space when I was usually "supposed to" say something. And it felt awkward and uncomfortable for a moment – within me. Surely, she didn’t realize anything, and a new thread of conversation would be picked up immediately. But I noticed. I noticed, basically, that I was holding my tongue.

Which, I suppose, leads me back toward my own center. I don’t have to put out every idea or thought in my head. I can let myself rest in the calm of a conversation, or someone else’s story. This isn’t a very frequent habit of mine, usually. Although, I do tend toward the loquacious side, with my friend from New Jersey, we’ve spent so many years as the other’s half, it’s “natural” to want to just chitter chatter away. But, I realized it’s exhausting.

She, again, was not asking me to contribute in a way that was depleting. And it also comes back my former habit of accepting jobs I don’t want, when they’re not asking me to give from my dregs. If I take care of my center, notice that my focus is somewhere in between me and another person, me and a job, and can bring it back to myself, and sit, sometimes in the discomfort of not engaging in a behavior that leaves me feeling depleted, then I get the chance to give from my best, and also, to simply rest in the companionship of another person.