I need to sleep more

I must've been asleep at some point.  I was suddenly aware of the sound of bird song, a robin, loudest, singing (which I realize I haven't heard in ages, the ones I've heard recently were chirping) and a quieter bird that has stopped.  The dog was staring at my face.

Outside it was still dark, quiet, aside from the bird.  The full moon dropping down over a pair of cedar trees to the west, in a clear sky.  A light drifting silently southward, an airplane.  The communication towers blinking red in the distance, and street lamps sending light toward the ground below from where I am looking.

The cat is sitting staring at me from the end of the bed.  I have a brief dashed hope that it is a weekend, but somehow that doesn't jibe, and I decide it must be Tuesday (?)  I really haven't been getting much sleep...it is actually Saturday.  I want to sleep more now that the dog is no longer shoving me over the edge of the bed.  The cat smacks my arm: they are ready to be up.

I follow them downstairs, let the dog out.  Let him in, go back upstairs to try to sleep a little more and I close the door on them (I can hear them on the other side) and establish only my second boundary in over a week.  (My first was last night, when I kenneled the dog so that I could actually cook and eat something.)  When I'm here, they are both pretty much joined at the hip to me.  The only time alone I've had is in the bathroom.

I enjoy their company.  But I might as well learn to have some boundaries.  Funny that it took a dog to teach me that.

I hope they don't tear up the house.

Tuesday

For the record, I'm not mad.  Just learning to value myself more than someone else, or the approval of someone else.  Trying to figure out who I want to be right now, and where I want my life to go.  What makes me myself, not anyone else.

Through no one else's fault, I've found that I tend to put everyone else first, and have been holding my breath so often on my own life, waiting for the right time, for something (relationship, job, weight to get carried by those responsible for it, ???) to happen before I live.  And I want to stop doing that, it never arrives, I always find I'm waiting, and years pass by.  (I'm not waiting for happiness, I already have that, I'm waiting for purpose, and what I contribute to the world. Where I fit in in the greater scheme of life.)  It's not all the time, but it's too much of the time.  A message buried so deep and ingrained in everything I do, that it's almost imperceptible, yet driving everything, every choice I make.  I'm just suddenly very aware of it.  I'm more aware of the time passing, that there are fewer years of life ahead of me than behind me, and what do I do with them?

Yeah, that's where I'm at.

Only twelve hours left

I'm not quite sure who my clown is yet. We only have 12 more hours of class, I hope I figure it out a bit more. If you are a relative of mine, you should probably stop reading now, the following is not an image I want in your brain.

In addition to the dancing and singing on the spot, I tend to be getting the suggesting/direction: "be sad (or some other emotion), orgasmically (at a high energy level-standing up)." In another class I had a while ago, I got (interact with scene partner with this knowledge), "You're not wearing underwear." "You just had sex." Um okay. I'll do it, but why??? (And don't freak out, I don't think it's sexual harrassment, it's part of life. I think I've had a tendency to maybe be a little prudish, and so it's sorta' funny for me to get this.) The irony is that when I did the Vagina Monologues a few years back, the entire cast had to fake orgasms on stage for one scene.  It's in the script, and usually one person does all of them herself, but in the production I was in, the director decided everyone in the cast would do one as they were called out. It freaked me out at the time, I didn't want to, nor even know how to do it (I had never faked an orgasm before, and I was embarrassed to do it), and granted it was to a much larger audience, and I didn't know most of them. I've only had to do it in this class in front of seven people. 

Making myself do all of this is good for me, it definitely pushes (far) beyond the boundaries of my comfort zone...which is interesting. It's like a little voice is whispering in his ear..."she's terrified of this, make her do it." It's not just faking an orgasm, it's the singing and dancing as well (not the three together-I'll admit it, I don't have the singing voice I would have chosen, but after the earlier part of the year, I am thrilled to be able to sing in any voice with any volume, in relative tune and without pain, and I'm not a graceful dancer, which is not to say I'm not an interesting dancer.  And I'm getting more comfortable with sharing both of those. And you know, you DON'T have to be freakin' "perfect" first, for anything. It's probably more engaging for the average audience if you're not. They get an in, they can relate.) Those came up again tonight. This is all bubbling up out of somewhere. Maybe it will improve my choir singing, and I hope it improves my acting (the access to all of this.) My throat's a bit raw from singing loud, but it doesn't "hurt" like it did in the winter and spring. I have a teeth cleaning next week, hopefully that won't set off the pain again. It was probably coincidence, but it makes me wary. (The pain originally developed after a dental appointment.)

My energy was super low today (0-6, it was probably at 1/2.) It might be because I didn't do much earlier in the day, I went for a walk to the grocery store, and that was about the extent of it. I tried to listen to dance music, but it didn't help. Went outside and sat on the steps and Spot flew over to a wire above and in front of me, faced me, and started making a series of the low clucking noises they make by pulling the sound out from deep in the back of their heads, with their beaks held down and ajar. I think he was singing to me. I think he was trying to cheer me up, it was kinda' sweet. He did that for a few minutes and then flew away and I went back inside and watched a Rowan Atkinson sketch about "how to date" on youtube, which cheered me up some, but didn't get my energy level much higher. He certainly has moments of physical genius. These are separate from Mr. Bean, they were live skits. I'm trying to find old (physical humor) sketches, but mostly I find "roasting" bits, or impersonations, which are great, but I'm looking for body and facial stuff. Maybe I should just watch old cartoons...it's what I think of when I think "clown" now.

I think having my boundaries of "what is acceptable" stretched, is great. I said I wanted access to all of me for this work (theatre) and that's what I'm getting. Still safe to do it (even if a long series of cuss words continually fall out with my breath each time I hear what's next.) Can't believe I'm publishing this.

Crap! I'm hungry and these crackers are stale. (Word of the day would probably be "think.")