From Spring to Summer

 It feels like school is out for the summer. I finished my TMS therapy yesterday and it was bittersweet. I am glad I am finished and that I don't have a break in my day. But, it was a daily therapeutic. I adore the staff, talking to the nurse was like catching up with an old friend daily. Time would run out while chatting. It is interesting the experience. And more interesting, the results. 

I have had my share of drugs, no secrets there. I was coming off meth in a girl's home for unwed pregnant teenagers was the worst of it. Until pharmaceuticals. I also have used plant medicines and still do. I chemically can feel the difference in various drugs. There is a crisper clarity that comes from plant medicines than with synthetic drugs. It is my opinion, synthetics seem to distort in a more negative way.  On occasion, I pop into one of these states of clarity, randomly. The "Why" is irrelevant and dismisses the experience. I say this because I have had these experiences naturally. I had identified with people over the years that shared the experience of coming up above the water and seeing with such clarity and calm, that it was divine. The moments of reprieve during chaos. The way there is many ways, paths, drugs. 

The first time I remember getting high was about five or six. My life came out the gate with experiences coming faster than my body could handle. That feeling and the reversal of that feeling is what led me down this rabbit hole this morning. It was actually in answering a question on FaceBook about my recently finished TMS treatment. It started reflecting on this entire journey to why and how I found myself sitting in a chair, with a little machine, shooting little magnetic pulses through my skull. It was truly like a giant woodpecker, pecking through my skull. It would stir up images of being locked in a high cage, like a bird, but another bird pecking through my scull. I could hear the shattering in my mind. Dreadful. Thankfully the nurse diverts those train wreck thoughts with her laughter. She was so genuine, it was a breath of fresh air. I was therapeutic in so many ways. 

Several times over this last month I have stopped and said, "What a bizarre fucking experience." Last weekend was my last show until the haunt. We aren't having an August show, and that too was bitter sweet. I have been so physically exhausted. That is when the comparisons started making themselves to my brain. Analyzing data, processing. What was different? My design urges. My want and ability to make chaos into order. I went from not being able to open my laptop to creating a new design theme every week on Zazzle. My writing intensity also increased. Mental clarity was happening. That was the feeling. A rise above the waves, a peek behind the curtain, a glimpse into something much greater. 

I was "raised" with drugs, natural drugs that were illegal. I remember sacks of them laying around. I often didn't want to look into some of the buckets. Was it natural or something dead, stewing, like pork feet. The smell. But, the bags of cannabis, was different. Me and my cousin grabbed a handful one day and sat on the stoop and mimicked what we saw in real life. We rolled a joint, sat on the concrete slap in the center of the "white" projects and smoked our first joint. 

I specifically remembered the sky and clouds. The sky was more blue, the clouds, fluffier. That snapshot moment was another sacred moment I held onto in the years to come. Like a parting of the fluffy clouds, revealing the most blue of skies above. Lit by a sun that follows me with love everywhere I go. And when the sun wasn't there, the moonlight was, to reflect the beautiful shiny bits of life to me. Like a plastic bracelet in the tree, shimmering in the moonlight. Spinning like a fairy chandelier. I have tapped into those moments these last weeks while designing. Getting lost in the fairy world. I am excited. I also shame myself for feeling bitter sweet about it. Why? My lack of physical energy is my challenge next. 

Yesterday, driving home from my last TMS appointment, I observed some bicyclist. They are becoming more abundant than cars now it feels. I observed this woman with a freedom on her face. Wind through her hair, she was in her bliss. What was this? A stirring to ride a bike? I haven't felt that in a very long time. Long enough to remember, oh yea, I did have a bike growing up. 

I recently decided to be more active in removing processed sugars from my diet. I also am focusing actually eating my food when I eat it. To savor my food and be more aware of what I am putting in my body. Taking notes of when I am mindlessly eating. My relationship with food and nutrients, and drugs definitely needs addressing. Because my physical body needs addressing. This was one my biggest concerns with the last show. I hadn't gotten on an exercise plan like I had wanted and wasn't as prepared physically as I wanted to be. 

While I have been reprogramming my mind, I have been doing the same with my body. What is this fatigue if it wasn't mental? Some of it was the depression. This lingering fatigue, I think is something else. Because I am having clarity now. Is it toxins in my food? Then the war on food starts along side the war on drugs in my mind. Bottom line, start eating more natural foods. This isn't anything new to you. So, let's cut out this sugar and do some reprogramming there. My relationship to food and nourishment is something I am sorting through now. 

I were a beehive of sorts for the Clementine character last weekend. Someone remarked, "This is the most "you" hairstyle you have worn!" It was quirky and fun, not something I would do everyday, but hey, someone killed a pig and we are have a celebration. It was in that moment, standing in the dressing room, I looked over and saw my reflection in the mirror. Was that me? It is so weird to see myself in the mirror. I even blurted it out in my weird way, "I don't look like what I look like in my head." What do I look like? I have no body in my mind's eye. That awareness of coming into the physical was of a bit of a peek behind the curtain moment. 

In the next moment, we were all backstage, waiting for curtain call music to come dancing out. I stood in the purple halls, decorated with skeletons. Backstage was smaller this year on account of the newly installed elevator for haunt. I thought about it all, looked around at all of us backstage and really absorbed what was happening. I looked at my fellow actors and whispered, "What a bizarre fucking experience right?" They looked at me strangely, as the do and laugh. They knew I was way out on a mind trip. I was so immersed in the moment I felt like I could just become part of all the vibrations around me.

The organ in the back had started randomly playing, adding to the strangeness around us. Yea, it freaks some of us out sometime, and then we remember what we do for a living. Maybe this was our karma. We are entertaining, and the world is entertaining back. The organ starts playing, and we can hear the laughter from the tables out in the grand hall. We are waiting for the music cue. I was nervous, I was jazzed, I was deep in the moment. I was too pumped the first night. Danced out a little strong and seem to horrify people, as I tend to do. What a wild ride right? What a fucking experience. It is almost like a drug, a natural drug. Plus you have the added energy of the crowds. Doing improv along side all this is tricky too. You have to be on your game. On your game and in your game. Part of the game.

Down the rabbit hole I went this morning. What if a mouse in a maze became aware he was in the maze, but couldn't get out. From above, the people over the maze, running the lab think the mouse has no better a life outside the maze. What, is it wanting a home in the field, some cheese and rest? Maybe. I pondered both sides of thinking. The resurgence of being in the matrix has risen. We are all pondering the maze, the simulation, what is real? I can get lost in thinking about all the possibilities. I can get lost in the hierarchy of our evolution, the surrendering of our selves to the collective. All of us moving in cycles, in form. 

When reality starts fading in, and I become aware of my physical body, gravity becomes more apparent. More apparent than it used to. It is harder to move. I hear a voice say, "Well you ARE 50 years old and aren't in great health." Those are facts. And as I begin to ground myself with the reality I am interacting with I become aware of my body and how it is moving through space. It isn't gliding on a bike with the wind in the hair coming out from under the helmet. Am I lazy? What is the issue with the body? 

Maybe I can take the next couple of months and devote myself to my body as much as I have my spirit. Spend some time organizing and cleaning out my physical space and my body. Maybe figure out how to physically relax. Maybe try to truly understand what the chakra system is. Maybe I get off my ass and clean the litter boxes.