From Blue to Smooth by Music Soothed

iz gonna haz a boo kwissmus wifowt U

It was about a week ago that Ed stopped reassuring me that 'we'll work it out' or 'I'll figure it out' or 'I'll make it happen' when I pressed about plans for me to come down to have Christmas with him and his family in the Rogue Valley, and instead said 'I can't see it happening'.

I was devastated.  It's now been 7 months since we were last in arm's reach.  One by one I pinned my hopes on certain dates--by his birthday in late September,  by my birthday in mid November, by Thanksgiving, by our anniversary December 2nd--and they all approached and passed like big trucks on slushy streets, splashing me with cold sadness for days or weeks.

This time instead of wallowing, I got busy.  I eschewed my soggy pillow for busywork: Organizing Gmail and my Master Task List, browser bookmarks, crafts, clothes, files; reading tree books, ebooks, email, blogs, web sites; crocheting; wishlist shopping.  I avoided my pillow and the bed where I could not keep at bay the thoughts that tapped into the tear well.

No Christmas.  That's essentially what it meant.  My family doesn't celebrate Christmas. As I did not before I married Ed.  For several years I'd fought feelings of guilt for joining in and enjoying it.  But soon it had become the highlight of every year.

The weekend after Thanksgiving my sister-in-law dropped off my Christmas gift (she was my Secret Santa this year as I was her's last year and still owe her this) as she and Ed's brother were on their way to the Seattle Seahawks game.  That should have clued me to what they were gathering from Ed or his Mom.

When she asked me what I would be doing for Christmas with my Mom and sister I blithely said that I was still hoping to make it down, that we just hadn't figured out the transportation yet.  I thought maybe I'd seen doubt flicker across her face but she was standing in the dark garage with the light from the kitchen casting a chiaroscuro over her and anyway my eyes aren't trustworthy and besides I didn't want to go there.

Relaxing ambient and chillout music

This music makes you smarter...

(calmer, energized, happier, healthier, creative, rejuvenated, connected, grounded, efficient...)

I might have given the cold shoulder to the wallow this time but that doesn't mean I avoided the emotional tail-spin.  In the last week I pulled several all-nighters two of them exceeding 36 hours, sleeping 5-7 hours before doing it again.  That couldn't last as sleep deprivation has consequences--anxiety, mental fog, stupid mistakes (putting cold cereal bowl in microwave, turning on wrong burner, using conditioner instead of body wash and versa visa) forgetting (why I'd opened the fridge door; where I'd set down my evening pill cup; to include the pertinent info in an email before sending; to feed Merlin; to eat; to take Rx, to breathe) slow responses, headaches, poor focus, dizziness, continuously finding myself staring into the vanishing point whether that might be the back wall of the fridge, the wall behind me as I stood at the mirror, the neighbor's roof, the laptop's hinge as fingers lay idle on the keyboard, the bottom of the bread drawer, the floor at my feet...

Yeah, there is a law of diminishing returns when it comes to sacrificing sleep in the name of 'making time'.

Well, in the course of browsing for ad copy in the areas of my interest (a project for my AWAI copywriting course) I'd signed onto a number of mailing lists primarily to harvest their copy for examples but I didn't say no to any of the thank-you gifts (many were newsletters or ebooks that amounted to the same thing--copy) so I'd collected quite a few.

Among the gifts tho, were a single track and a full album from Mind Power MP3.  I had not gone looking for the site or their product.  Their gifts were part of the thank-you gifts for signing up for the newsletter of another site.  So I hadn't yet been exposed to the claims for the BWE system they use and thus wasn't primed to expect anything more than the normal enjoyment of the ambient and classical music I love.

With a single listen I was drawn in and for the next three days I kept one or the other and then a third playing in the background as I worked.  Eventually, I again found myself staring into the vanishing point while listening only now it didn't feel wrong or weird.  My thoughts had calmed.  My anxiety was muffled.  The blue carried shades of purple and silver.

Tho not exactly happy, I was no longer heartbroken.  I noticed I was sitting up straighter, felt an increase (slight but noticeable) in the long elusive physical and mental energy, and was taking deeper breaths without thinking about it--a defiance of my habit when stressed or depressed to breathe shallow and stop altogether for 10 to 20 seconds at a time once or twice per minute.

That was Sunday.

When I got up this morning I decided that I was going to make it purposeful for the entire day.  I would take frequent breaks from my busy work and listen while focusing on my breath as my counselor is encouraging me to do.  I would combine it with sessions with my light therapy lamp.  I would listen while meditating.  I would listen while daydreaming, while crocheting, while doing isometric exercises sitting in my desk chair.  And while reading, surfing, writing, posting, organizing....

And so I did.

As the day wore on the evidence that something real was shifting in me accumulated. This was before I took the time to actually read the copy where they explained the Brainwave Entrainment technology behind their albums and the science behind it.  It's all about triggering the brain's transition between vibrational frequencies with rhythm and pulses of sound, encouraging it to settle into therapeutic frequencies that facilitate healing, creativity, mental acuity, relaxation, sleep, appetite control, immune system support, bliss, serenity, compassion and love, memory, focus and concentration and on and on.  By themselves these odd sounds are irritating or boring to listen to but when mixed with music they become part of the ambiance of the piece and we have a case of 1+1 > 2.

You can see their brief description in a short vid by clicking the second linking under the vid above.

After a few times through each of the three free gifts I needed some variety so I found their YouTube channel.  It'll be awhile before I've gotten through them all.  Especially if I keep replaying favorites.  The embedded video is one of their playlists which I'm listening to as I work on this.

I meant to be in bed on time (by 9) but I've spent three five hours longer than I meant to on this and the morning vid chat with Ed is only 5 3 hours away.  Sigh.  I guess I'll be going back to bed after again.  But I can't be sleeping til noon as I'm on duty with Mom from mid morning to midnight while my sister is on a job out of town.

So I'll leave you with the link I found in their email today to a page where you can access 20 free gifts from Mind Power MP3.com.  Some are ebooks, some are music videos, some are music downloads from single tracks to full albums and some are free listens online that time out 24hrs after you load the page.  And they mean 24 hours exactly.  There is a countdown clock and the player shuts down in the middle of the track when it reaches 0:0:0:0.  Be sure to ration these ones and open the links at least 24 hours apart so you don't have to split your 24 hours between more than one.

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Are We There Yet?

Are we there yet?
2 cheezeburger.com

You know?  I'm not sure yet.  Still feeling the vibration in my bones and glutimas maximas.  The sound of the traffic going by outside is not much different.  My ears feel full of jello from the sudden changes in altitude.

But we arrived in Longview about 8:30 so I'm told.

I got here in time to visit with Mom for nearly an hour standing beside her bed.  She said she had just gotten settled and not been asleep yet.

Then my sister and I visited for hours.  Until 11:30.

My netbook is on battery as there are no grounded plugs in the living room and I don't want to disturb Mom by rooting around beside the bed for the plug I usually use while here.  Wish I'd thought of that while we were visiting and got it set up then before she went to sleep.

Well, I've been awake since 6 something this morning and on the go from the get go.  So it is time to stop going.  I'd like to crawl into bed with the netbook and read an ebook until either the netbook's or my batteries give out.  I've already used 50% of the netbook battery checking email and fb and tracking down that LOLcat pic I remembered seeing once.  That leaves me at the most a little over an hour.  Should be plenty of time. I just need a chance to relax and let my mind and body go to that place it goes when it lets go.

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Under the Weather

Not feeling good today.  My thinker is discombobulated.

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Got My Face In the Books

see more Lolcats and funny pictures,
and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

I've got books out of three libraries on my sister's cards.  With my leaving date closing in (possibly next weekend) I'm frantically trying to get what I need/want out of as many of them as I can.

From the Longview library I've got a mixture of fiction and non-fiction.  Some of them I've been checking out every time I come to town for the last several years, some I grabbed off the new book shelves on my visit there a couple of weeks ago, some I found in catalog searches on certain themes and a few I last checked out when I still lived in Longview and are books not in our Rogue Valley System:

Shardik by Richard Adams
Solstice by Joyce Carol Oates
The Swan Maiden by Jules Watson
The Venetian's wife : a strangely sensual tale of a Renaissance explorer, a computer, and a metamorphosis / by Nick Bantock.
Reading on the Brain by Stanislas Dehaene
Connectome by   Sebastian Seung
How to Fix Copyright by William Patry
Aladdin's lamp : how Greek science came to Europe through the Islamic world by Freely, John.
Banquet at Delmonico's : great minds, the Gilded Age, and the triumph of evolution in America  by Werth, Barry.
Q, the earliest Gospel : an introduction to the original stories and sayings of Jesus by Kloppenborg, John S., 1951-
White Protestant nation : the rise of the American conservative movement by Lichtman, Allan J.
Literature suppressed on religious grounds.
Literature suppressed on sexual grounds
Literature suppressed on political grounds
Literature suppressed on social grounds 

And there are four fiber art books not listed on crochet and embroidery and selling handcrafted items.

The books from the Vancouver WA county system all happen to be on the craft of writing or the writing life::

VAN  And so it goes : Kurt Vonnegut, a life   / Shields, Charles J., 1951-  
VAN   Revision : a creative approach to writing and rewriting fiction   / Kaplan, David Michael
VAN   The half-known world : on writing fiction   / Boswell, Robert, 1953-  
VAN  Description   / Wood, Monica  
VAN   Alone with all that could happen : rethinking conventional wisdom about the craft of fiction writing   / Jauss, David.

These last two I don't have in hand yet.  They are waiting for pickup but my sister may not be going north again in time so I may not get them at all. :(


VAN  Shouts and whispers : twenty-one writers speak about their writing and their faith
VAN   Proust and the squid : the story and science of the reading brain



And from the Lower Columbia Community College the theme seemed to be psychology and comparative mythology--both with the flavor of gender studies.  These are research for my FOS storyworld:


LCC Women, androgynes, and other mythical beasts by Doniger, Wendy.
LCC Boundaries of the Soul by June Singer
LCC  The power of love to transform our lives and our world / June Singer.
LCC  Twice upon a time : women writers and the history of the fairy tale by Elizabeth Wanning Harries
LCC  The implied spider : politics and theology in myth   by Doniger, Wendy


Turned out there is a limit of five books for non-students so I have to send two back before I can get these.  So am trying to finish with the two just above this weekend so I can trade them out.  At just 200 pages each they are the two shortest of the five my sister brought home.


LCC Androgyny : toward a new theory of sexuality / June Singer

LCC  The witch in history : early modern and twentieth-century representations / Diane Purkiss.  

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Library Lurrrrrve -- 13 Quotes & an LOLcat

"The closest thing we will ever come to an orderly universe is a good library."   ~Ashleigh Brilliant

We may sit in our library and yet be in all quarters of the earth. ~John Lubbock

I love the place; the magnificent books; I require books as I require air. ~Sholem Asch

"When I got my library card, that's when my life began."   ~Rita Mae Brown

I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.  ~Jorge Luis Borges

There is not such a cradle of democracy upon the earth as the Free Public Library, this republic of letters, where neither rank, office, nor wealth receives the slightest consideration. ~Andrew Carnegie

A truly great library contains something in it to offend everyone.  ~Jo Godwin

Libraries are reservoirs of strength, grace and wit, reminders of order, calm and continuity, lakes of mental energy, neither warm nor cold, light nor dark.... In any library in the world, I am at home, unselfconscious, still and absorbed.  ~Germaine Greer

The library connects us with the insight and knowledge, painfully extracted from Nature, of the greatest minds that ever were, with the best teachers, drawn from the entire planet and from all our history, to instruct us without tiring, and to inspire us to make our own contribution to the collective knowledge of the human species. I think the health of our civilization, the depth of our awareness about the underpinnings of our culture and our concern for the future can all be tested by how well we support our libraries. ~Carl Sagan,Cosmos

"Had it not been for the public library's collection - my love for writing, and my interest in crime fiction, might never have developed."   ~Sara Paretsky

"Libraries are absolutely at the center of my life. Since I couldn't afford to go to college, I attended the library three or four days a week from the age of eighteen on, and graduated from the library when I was twenty-eight."    ~Ray Bradbury

"Libraries are places where the imagination begins."    ~Heather Barbieri

"A library is not simply a repository of books, it is the symbol and center of our culture - a door and a window for those who might not otherwise have such doors and windows."   ~Amy Tan

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No Intervention Needed--Just Invention

No one understands us Wrimos

This is the time during every NaNo when I am feeling like a fraud.

Still at 555 words from first 5 hours.  

Something happened to the story I spent most of October daydreaming about.  In Mid October I was straining at the reins to write THAT story.  Now I'm feeling like an alien exploring a strange new world, an anthropologist digging up dusty dreams.

The story I've set up, A Trick of Light, needs another month of prep work.  It went off an several tangents.

Something has to GIVE.

Can I go back to the original daydream?  Should I?  Would it even help?

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Reading

For the first time in many months I actually fell asleep over a book this morning. After reading over 250 pages in nearly one sitting. Almost like having my own mini read-a-thon.

And it was completely unplanned. My intent late Monday evening was to get back to work on the baby afghan fringe and the silk shawl, alternating through the night while watching videos on my netbook. But after dinner I spent time perusing the items Ed had brought home from the library that afternoon and checking my library account for the next due date. Which is when I discovered that I now have only one more week with that big stack of large print novels I checked out on my last physical visit to the library in January. To my great chagrin and frustration I had not yet begun a single one of the six.

Not only had I not started any of them after eight weeks with them, I had finished only one of the books whose due dates took precedence over them and that wasn't a novel and was only 100 pages. To compound the frustration, three of the library novels I had started since Christmas had had to go back with their bookmarks still some ways from the end. I hate that!

Now with only one week to go it seemed risky to even start one and all that built up anticipation every time I caught a glimpse of that stack of novels waiting their turn deflated like a popped balloon. I might as well just send them back now, I thought. In fact I might as well just send every one of the 30 odd library books back this week. Who am I kidding?

Well, except for the crochet books. They're actually getting serious use.

Yet before I was done on the library catalog I had ordered five more books. All screenplay writing manuals. Because an email coming in from Script Frenzy while I was checking my library account reminded me that there was less than half a month until kick off and I hadn't begun prep work for my script yet.

Shortly after that I discovered that I was going to have to do a restart before I could stream a video or download an update to my video player before I could play a DVD. My netbook had been pestering me to do other updates for several days so I decided it was a good time to do all these maintenance chores. So while I was waiting on downloads I brought that stack of large print novels onto my lap and began browsing in them trying to decide if it was worth starting even one with only a week to go.

Then before I realized what was happening I had turned more than ten pages in one of them and by the time I had competed all the downloads and restarts I had turned over fifty. By then I found I preferred to keep on turning the pages than to pick up my crochet hook or start a video.

Except for an hour or so hiatus to rest my eyes while playing around with the new features on my freshly downloaded update to Whizfolders Deluxe I kept on turning pages until my eyes began to cross and when I was forced to put it down around 8 AM my bookmark was on page 257. This evening I've turned another hundred pages and have reached the halfway mark. And I do believe I'm gong to keep on turning them.

The book? The Templar Legacy by Steve Berry. A mystery/thriller in the same genre as The Da Vinci Code. Complete escapist reading.

I'm not sure whether it is the light, escapism aspect or the large print that has made the difference. I just may find out though as I'm probably going to finish this one in time to have a good chance of finishing one of the other five and they all have significant literary qualities.

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Caterday LOLing

The bug is finally letting go. Four days in a row of feeling a bit better than the day before.

Am now on row 151 of the bamboo baby afghan. 4 to go including the one I just started. Will probably finish the row work before dawn.

Am now reading for 15 to 30 minutes at a time which is triple what I could do a week ago. So the stacks of library books are starting to look appealing again. Just in time to say goodbye to half a dozen of them this coming week tho.


Have begun to look about and notice the many neglected tasks and feel optimistic about tackling them soon.


I made these three LOLs. Go vote for them or favorite them or some of the 200 plus others on cheezeburger.com and help me get on the front page with one.

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