Visiting Friend, Reflecting Priorities

I'm visiting my friend who almost died last month in childbirth. I arrived last night (well around 1am) after spending most of the day flying. Jerry was nice enough to drive me to the airport and watch my dog. As a part of my over obsessive self, I couldn't help but be a little worried when he joked as he left me at the airport "I'm free!" I certainly don't want to be making someone feel that - although I think/hope that this was just Jerry's way of being funny.

It is strange being at my friend's place. First, I still have a lot of work to do - grading papers and reading - that I've brought with me. Secondly, I've never been to my friend's home before and haven't seen her for like a year, and all of a sudden I'm jumping into our old friendship and trying to help with her newborn and having to cook for myself here.....I'm feeling a little bored and disconnected right now. She's sleeping in her bedroom with the baby. I can't really concentrate anymore on my grading. Her husband, who I'm not very fond of, is returning to town in a couple of hours. And its overly apparent that she and I have made these VERY different life choices. She never really found herself workwise and is really traditional in a lot of her religious, gender, and political beliefs. And, I can't tell what she thinks about my choices.

I have a lot of friends like this - people that I'm very close with, or at least have been at one time or another in my life, but don't talk with or see on any regular basis; people that I'm very different from in some ways, but have felt very close to in other ways. A lot of things in my life now - and often - feel disconnected. I wrote about this in my thesis actually, how I feel disconnect between my American and Israeli selves. But its not just that. Its also a disconnect between my family self and my independent self, my feminist self and my dating Jerry self, my Jewish self and my Buddhist self. Sometimes, I can feel a unity, but often, I feel like I have these different parts of myself, and there isn't space in any one place in the world to connect with these parts.

But being here makes me feel like I really don't want to get pregnant. I don't necessarily want this experience that she's having. I would love to have children - to adopt. But, I don't want to have to give up everything in my life for it; I don't want to live in the suburbs and give up my career and not be surrounded by diversity and intellectualism. I'm also torn about these things because of my on going fear that what I want isn't possible (aka my father's nagging voice in my head). I go home on Wednesday by the way. And, oh yeah, I've also realized that I desperately need a proper vacation and SOON.

Finding the Middle Road

I haven't been blogging as much, I've noticed. Part of the reason is that I realize that some issues that I want to blog about involve people who might read the blog, and it no longer feels like a safe space in that regard. But, another part of the reason is that my life has seemed to find this middle road, where there seems less of a need to blog. I have Jerry to talk to about the things that happen in my day to day. And I've got so much going on with school, that there's less time to be obsessing about my life or things with my family. Plus, with the way that they treat me, especially Dad lately, it puts me off getting sucked into their stuff, even if it does sometimes involve Mom.

Jerry borrowed my car and went out of town until tomorrow, so now I get to hibernate at home with my thesis and prepare for my defense on Thursday and clean up a little since I'm having friends over tomorrow for "lesbian movie night" and just catch up on everything since I was sick a lot of last week.

Emotionally, I'm struggling with two sets of issues - one revolving around a lack of self-esteem and self-love which makes me not trust others. I think that I attract people who also have these sorts of issues into my life, and that also when someone is there for me over time, I am often looking for the moment when they'll betray me and hurt me. This got reinforced recently with whatever with Kathy, my cousins, and my sister, but is especially a pattern because of the way things are with my father.

The second set of issues deals with when I do get hurt by those who I care about and/or love. It tends to feel like this big betrayal, and maybe I need to come to terms with the fact that part of loving someone is being hurt by them. Maybe this is the nature of human relationships. I know that from a Buddhist perspective, the problem is some how related to attachment. I know though that these two sets of issues are related - lack of self-esteem and the affect of being hurt by others.

Anyway, that's why I am kinda happy to have the day and night to myself.

Link

Thanks to All My Blog Supporters Who Have Made This a Great Year

I'm just noticing that its been a whole year that I've had this blog; I started March 2006. What a trip it has been! And I've had over 5000 hits and am getting many comments to posts. All in all, I think that blogging has been really good for me.

Last night, I was feeling anxious, so I just stopped everything and went to work out. I saw *A* and dropped off my mail on the way to the gym, since he works around the corner, and checked out the bookstore there. I'm getting a book on travel to the Oakland area and will stress about what to do while there for my conference after looking at the book. Merissa can't go with me, and I'm still tempted to like just make it work for Jerry by offering to buy his plane ticket and figuring out all the details. But, if I'm going to buy his ticket, I might as well consider just getting a nicer hotel room in a place where I feel safer and trying to find a way to do this on my own.

I wasn't sure what to do last night with myself. I saw that the Vagina Monologues were being performed at school and emailed some classmates, but no one was interested in going. Jerry had some dinner with his department recruits. Anyway, Jerry ended up meeting me for the show, which was great, and he liked it. I was amazed, especially because I just had a conversation with Sanchi about how her husband wasn't so thrilled about going. Jerry did notice that there weren't many men there, but he seemed to have a good time.

He also told me that he mentioned to his classmates that he's dating a Jewish feminist, aka me. And I feel good that we're settling into a relationship. He asked me to come by his department barbeque this afternoon - a big step in that its an acknowledgement to all of his peers that I'm his girlfriend. I also took him to meet my neighbor who has a dog that is my dog's boyfriend. I've known them since I moved out here, and that was kinda a step too.

Also, I was accepted to teach my OWN class this summer. Its a month and a half - the Sociology of Art and Literature - not my area, but I think that I can make it into a fun class. I'm very excited and was grateful yesterday to have something to focus my work time on.

And, I spoke with Mom today. She asked where I am and what I'm doing. I told her: "I'm going to school." Mom: "Ah right you're in college." Me: "I'm about to get my master's degree. And then I'm going to go to work on my disseratation....to get my doctorate....and then you'll have a daughter who is a dr." Mom said: "Wow, that's so wonderful. I'm really proud of you." I was talking to Mom while walking my dog, but that didn't stop me from crying a bit. What Mom said to me was the only lucid thing that she really got out in the conversation. She was looking forward to lunch at my sister's place when my dad would make hamburgers. She wrongly thought it was tomorrow, but she's still remembering a bit.

Happy New Year!

Well, my life continues to be a whirlwind, or at least feel like it. I've been trying to be kind to myself and give myself lots of time with friends and to rest. Saturday night, I had dinner with some friends, and then we just hung out and drank and played games.

Last night, I had dinner with my parents and Kathy, hung out at Mom's, and then went out with my friend Merissa (Kathy was supposed to come but bailed out). We went to a party that a friend of hers got us invited to downtown. We were the ONLY women at the party (with the brief exception of a 50 year oldish lesbian couple), but it was a lot of fun. Everyone was very laid back, warm, and welcoming. Afterwards, we went over to this drag bar, Missy B's, which was super packed. Despite the fact that I had an argument with Kathy for the last two nights which is unresolved and very painful, I managed to have a really good time. For a couple of hours, I could relate to nice people in a way that didn't involve my thesis, my work, or my family. I also kissed someone at midnight and have a date for this Saturday. It made me feel like a normal person again instead of this tragic case.

I'm now officially into my last week in Kansas City. I have friends to meet up with, work to catch up on, my thesis to work on, my mom to take care of, my dad still kvetching about my aunt. It is still not an easy time by any means, but in the spirit of being kind to myself, when things got wirey with Kathy and another friend Ken (long story which I don't want to get into since Kathy reads the blog), I just let myself lay down for a couple of hours and rest...in part because I was so shocked by everything that's going on in my life.

I feel a little bit releaved about having 2006 behind me. It was a year filled with trouble and strife - the death of my grandmother, the quick decline of my mother, moving my mother into an ALF, the murder of my neighbor, and some serious let downs by people that I thought were good friends. This is the first new year's in a long time where I'm not sure what to expect from the coming year.

But, I have learned a thing or two though about how to approach the year. I expect that there will be more rough times ahead, so I know that I have to take things one step at a time and be diligent about remaining kind to myself and taking care of myself. I need to reach out to other people more, but in a more careful way, ensuring boundaries and that I don't get too emeshed with other people too quickly. I know that my priorities are shifting, and that while I still want to work on my career, I want to do it in a more balanced way. I want more space for relationships with other people (friendship and romantic) and for enjoying life. I also know that I need to create space for just acknowledging what I'm going through, so that I can move out of denial and shock and into feeling the pain of what I've been through, so that I can heal.

Thank you to everyone whose been reading my blog and expressing support over the past year.