28th

I wanted to sit and write about a specific topic. But my mind keeps jumping around and can’t settle down.

It’s June 28th. Dirk’s birthday, oddly enough I still remember that. And then all the 28ths go right down in a line: Grandpa Gene dying on Jan 28th, Danny dying on April 28th, J’s Dad Randy dying on May 28th.

I could probably find more.

But I wanted to write about Disney to put in my vacation file. But I’m not quite there yet.

And I wanted to muse about best friends, in so many ways, and I’m not quite there yet.

And I wanted to sigh over trusts, and wills, and drama, and angst, but that’s not much to even write other than all the silly details.

And I wanted to write about life, and tears, and heaviness, and joy, and disassociating, and opening to stay present. But that seems hard to write about and I’m not quite there yet either.

So I will be in this moment right here. Sitting in my messy office, with 3 pairs of glasses surrounding me, my Blood Orange Spindrift still sitting unopened and collecting condensation, my half glass of water in my pink cup, and all my cluttered jewelry sitting under my laptop stand.

I need to clean my office. But I’m not quite there yet.

I want to talk about the upcoming surgery but I have an element of hope that everything will be okay and it won’t take that long, and recovery will be easy, and why did I block my whole summer for this in my head?

But I just don’t quite feel like it yet.

Today, I’m grateful for the emotions that overwhelm me like they did just now. Collapsing my body in, and on itself, my face crinkling with grief, and tears coming to my eyes. The quote comes to mind that I’ve seen lately…

“Grief, I’ve learned, is really just love. It’s all the love you want to give, but cannot. All that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go.” 

And then it subsides, and I remind myself that I control my thoughts, and this won’t last forever, and to appreciate the other moments of the day.

My best friend is in town right now. I guess I will talk a little about best friends. Each best friend has such a different part in my life. I appreciate them all and laugh at the differences.

Some need some time to settle in, others I sink into trust immediately.

Sometimes it’s just me and I need to learn my lesson of letting it go.

When N gets here, it’s the N show. It’s her vacation and she has places she wants to visit, eat at, and submerse herself in. She said, “Come pick me up!” so I did and we just got in the car and kept changing the direction of where to go.

But I was pretty chill at that point! Except I hadn’t eaten yet and I could feel my blood sugar low. Or just the hangryness.

We drove around, found a parking spot at Laguna, and she wanted to walk a specific place. She grabbed a coffee, I ate half of my yogurt while waiting, and felt a little better. We walked down to the sand even though it was cloudy and gray.

We took a few photos, including the one above. We sat in silence. We talked about a few things. She texted Ang and kept it open for where we wanted to go to next and Ang said directly… and OMG, I opened up my text chain and the sheer amount of craziness I just saw made me laugh. Hormone blockers, wet vaginas, kinder bday party invites… that was a trip.

BUT… going back to yesterday, Ang said “I’ll just handle a couple things here until you decide where you want to go next and I can meet you there.”

Which immediately made me start quizzing Nicole and asking in about 6 different ways to try and get something concrete so I could have Ang leave her house, so I could eat lunch sooner.

This continued over 10 minutes. At one point, N walked down to grab her shoes she forgot – I was going to climb down all those steps with her but honestly I was a little light-headed and hungry – so I called Ang to just say GET in the car, and I’ll have an address for you in 20 minutes! It would take her 60 minutes to drive down to us anyway!

So N and I walked, and walked a bit more. I was throwing out ideas, lightly. Trying not to push.

But then N said something like, “I know it would make you really happy for me to make a decision right now.”

The memory I have in my head was her basically saying she wasn’t ready to make a decision, and I just had to wait. I don’t remember the exact words said. But I remember we were standing outside Las Brisas and the path overlooked the beach.

This isn’t what we were looking at but it was about 5 minutes before.

And I just had to sigh and smile. Did it matter? No. If she wanted to wander around more then I could just let her, and enjoy it. I was enjoying my time with her. I was hungry but I was still enjoying it. And I wanted Ang to come enjoy it with us.

But at that moment, I was ready for a glass of champagne to help me chill the fuck out.

Two things can be true in one moment. And it was definitely a moment of staying in the present.

We went shopping right after that and I bought myself an emotional support rock (Sodalite). It is satisfyingly flat and I can soothe myself by rubbing it when I’m fidgety.

I bought Ang the same one, got Nicole one for energy, and Krysta one for “what do we buy our friend when she’s overwhelmed, can’t make a decision, and needs peace?” Well, I got her a Ruby Fuchsite.

And now that I’ve typed for 20’ish minutes, I’m off to get my bathing suit on and will wander over to Cota de Caza for a summer pool party.

Stay in the present. Find some joy. Appreciate the good moments.

I’m inhaling good energy, and exhaling what doesn’t serve me. With a hand on my heart.