I have been neglecting LJ in favor of FB. I figure LJ is for big thoughts, FB is for fun and light thoughts and such. But FB is easier. The UI is set up for quicker easier interaction, It is easier to constrict a big thought into a smaller space than it is to do a good job in a larger space (especially when one has a tendency towards over explaining and being verbose), and there are loads of distractions lurking in FB to grab you and take you away (which happened even as I was looking something up for this session on LJ)?

I am going to try to download my big thoughts here and run FB and LJ at the same time again. We will see how well I do.

A couple of things have come up that in my friend circles that have made me feel like I don’t quite belong or am on the wrong side. Since I am not being social, I sort of feel like I am hiding these things instead of owning them so I get to admit to them here. With LJ, I feel that people know this is only a small slice of life and not to assume what is seen here is the entire story. For some reason, I don’t get the same feeling from FB. Also FB is much more open and LJ has always been more exclusive even though I pretty much limit both to people I know IRL.

#1. I didn’t vote. I take voting seriously and there were many posts reminding people to vote. But I didn’t have a horse in this race so it didn’t feel worthwhile to put the effort in to get the correct info to base decisions on. I figure if I am not going to make an informed decision, I shouldn’t vote. I will only be following the sheep and if I am going that way anyway, the rest of the sheep can do the voting, my vote isn’t needed. I didn’t care one way or the other about the measures on the ballot. I had some leanings but they weren’t based on real reasons, just wanting to go against where the money is being spent, which is pretty much the same as voting because of what commercials are telling you (which I don’t like). This was a primary so it just gets to choose who is going to run in Nov and I will vote then. It is hard to get information on a candidate and have them lose because you get invested in the process. I will do it but will avoid it as much as I can. So I didn’t vote but for very specific reasons as well as I was lazy. I did thing about it all day.

#2. I made no effort to view the transit of Venus. I just don’t care. I was working for NOAA when we had a solar eclipse in CO many years ago. I got involved and went out and watched. In those days we could use floppy discs to view the sun safely. I was bored by it. The most interesting thing to me was when I went back inside, there were little crescents all over the floor from the sun shining through the holes in the blinds. That was neat. I didn’t view the last eclipse and don’t have much interest to view a little black dot crossing in front of the sun. It doesn’t matter. It happens, it doesn’t happen, whatever. I don’t know if this lack luster attitude is from turning my back on space when the shuttle blew up in ’86 or if it is more than that. I do wonder if my head thinks it is boring but my emotions would kick in and I would find it valuable at the time.

#3. I don’t care that Ray Bradbury is dead. It has been coming and expected for a long time. I like some of his stories. The Velt has its hooks into me very deeply. But he just isn’t that big a deal for me. He is like Steven King to me, some of his stuff is my genre but I don’t consider him a genre writer. A factor in this might be the professor of a college class I had called Intro to Science Fiction. It was a lit class and was treated as such. We spend half of once class on Heinlein and half of one on Asimov. These are iconic sci-fi writers to me and I feel they were short changed. We reviewed their pulp work and called it high literature. Oh come on, it was written for the price per word for an audience’s titillation. Yes it had science and it was fiction. It contained novel ideas and an alternative view on issues but that is what science fiction is about. The writing itself was not “high quality” soaked with layers and layers of meaning which is how it seems to be treated in lit classes. If we covered it like it was the pulp/lowest common denominator it was and how this other stuff still came through it, that would be great. It would be like discussing how much character development there is in Sailor Moon with all of the stock footage and monster of the week in a half hour format with commercials. That is rather amazing. But treating Sailor Moon as quality drama is pathetic. Well, this prof was writing a book on Ray Bradbury so we spent two weeks on him. Since I consider him only marginally a science fiction writer it was very aggravating to spend so much more time on him than on those I considered to be architects of the genre. This might have helped put Ray Bradbury into the spot in my head that he has enough people being impressed with him that there is no need for me to join the bandwagon. Not to say he isn’t an important writer and the world has lost someone that has made a difference. Just that I don’t much care beyond it bothering others that are important to me.

So those are the current three areas that seem to be big things to people I like and I care about. I sort of feel like I do when I am a bad fan. The definition of a bad fan is when you aren’t a fan of something that all your fan friends love. It feels sort of like maybe I don’t share as much with these people as I think I do. There, now maybe I can get rid of the feeling that I am hiding these things just so I can fit in.

According to Brene Brown, people deny themselves connection because they feel they don’t deserve connection.

http://www.ted.com/talks/brene_brown_on_vulnerability.html

I keenly feel my lack of connection and I do feel like I am not worthy. Not because I am a bad person but because of many other things.
I don’t feel like I have the oomph to reach out and make the connections.
I don’t think I handle other people initiating connections.
I have gotten really bad when it comes to being dependable.
I don’t think it is fair for others to keep putting energy into me and have me not put energy into them.
This has been going on so long that I imagine that others are tired of it, I know I am.
Connections are hard work and it is so much easier to sleep.

I think I have a lot to offer and am worthy of connection, it is the GUI that is really messed up and I need to fix it. And I don’t know how.

I know a few people that have habits/traits that would drive many people nuts but people like them, a lot. One aspect of it is they seem to own their habits, good and bad, and not make excuses. They appear larger than themselves and don’t seem to worry about people liking them. They are how they are take it or leave it. I find myself enjoying these sorts of people even though I don’t like some of the stuff they do. I don’t know if this is how others feel about them or if they have their own draws. For me it might be because there is a limit with how far a friendship would go. There is a sort of feeling of relief/relaxation when dealing with these “annoying” people, like I don’t have to watch out and be ready for something. I am sure that is my issue that most others wouldn’t share.

When I think about all the things I do that would/could annoy other people and how they couldn’t possibly like me, I think of these individuals with annoying behaviors. If I can feel as drawn to them, even with the things I really don’t like, and others are evidently drawn to them, then I can be like them and my bad habits/behaviors wouldn’t keep people away. (within reason of course). This is something to work on once my ability to connect isn’t a one way drain of energy.

Tonight was an example of why is it a bad idea for me to eat before going grocery shopping (wired backwards). I had a meal from Boston Market and went to Safeway on a full stomach. I was there to get ice cream and whatever else I could that I would eat. The sale I was expecting was over and I wasn’t interested enough to work out what flavor I would want with the other ice cream on sale. After wandering around the store, I found nothing enticing and I didn’t want any of it. I could come up with arguments against everything I know I have bought in the past and liked. I had no interest in any food.

If I shop when I am hungry, then I buy food I will probably eat when I need to eat.

I am so very happy with my President. I was not that impressed with Obama when he was running and I could have been convinced to vote for McCain until Sarah Palin got added. In fact, Obama got my vote more as an anti-Palin vote than any belief I had in him. Now I am tickled pink to have him as my Prez. He has worked hard to follow through on his campaign promises. He has gotten so much done he as scared half the country so I don’t have a problem with him not getting everything. I am disgusted with the GOP and their entire focus to bring him down instead of working towards the betterment of the country. My attitude is whoever is best should run the country. If your party isn’t in power then you should show how you are better, not do everything to drag that other guy down. Rise from the shoulders of eagles rather than pulling people off of pedestals. I smile when I see pictures of him. Every now and then I get reminded that he is the first Black President and I am weirded out for a moment. To me he is a first President. The first one I feel is moving in a direction I approve of, the first one to make me proud to be an American, the first one that has made me interested in politics. He is first in so many things, being Black is very far down the list. I see me and my ideals when I look at him, so much so that it takes me a moment to realize that my skin color isn’t as dark as his.

I liked Clinton and was upset at how the GOP never stopped harping on him after the election. I know he lied but I feel he was put in a position that he never should have been put as an acting President and it makes sense that he lied. I am grateful to him for breaking the attitude about politicians needing to step down because of affairs. But I was never as pleased with him as I am with Obama.

The sad thing I find now is how hard it is to identify with and appreciate other people that don’t like him as president, that are part of the country that is scared or see him as a disgrace. I didn’t like Bush and was sad he was the president for 8 years. But I did respect him as the president of my country. I realized that he was doing the best he felt he could and that his ideas and mine weren’t the same and I was ok with that. (I will admit Chesney scared/scares me and I am so glad he is no longer in power). I get a strong feeling that those that don’t like Obama and don’t agree with the job he is doing don’t respect him as president. So when I run into someone who has a lot of attributes I like or I might disagree with but still admire their difference and then find out they don’t like Obama, it seems to stain everything about them. I know it shouldn’t but I am noticing it does. I try to forget about their political leanings so I can still enjoy the other bits of them. Politics is such an emotional issue that doesn’t seem to have viable ties to the emotions they manipulate.

Sticking this hear so I have a time stamp on it.
I will be upping my meds today. Didn’t take any yesterday, not morning not evening dose.
But something seems to have shifted in me before the meds.
Noticed a pattern about a friend who puts what she does for others as a higher priority than what she does for herself. How she abuses herself to fulfil a commitment to herself, doesn’t give herself room so as not to abuse herself and how I have gotten abused as part of the process because I am willing to show up and help putting me on the same level as herself. No judgement, just the beginning of seeing a pattern that I suspect will show light on similarities in how I have set up my life.

How making changes as an adult doesn’t work because they require demanding your own way and that only works as a child. Trying to grow the tropical plant version of yourself after being planted in a desert for years surrounded by things that work for cactus but not for orchids. Trying to bring in tropical influences and watching them fail because the rest of the support structure isn’t there. How to bring new blossoms into a life without totally transplanting oneself. The value of making space for what you want to arrive in your life instead of collecting it first and making room later. Or collecting it first to get enough that it can support itself when it does arrive. ???

Partial thoughts that need work. But still before the med change. Don’t want one to be credited for the other if that isn’t the case. It might just be time and the thoughts and the meds showed up together to support one another.

I rarely get nightmares and things that should frighten me in dreams rarely do. I woke up and had to work at not going back to sleep and tell myself that zombies and tigers that could float and escape were not real over and over and over. I was really afraid of that the zombie floating tigers were real and what could happen.

Friends betraying me was just a story and no big deal.

The zombie tigers that can float and contaminate dogs and people with a bite escaping the US Capitol building and as a team, the solution might mean going in, sealing all the windows and exits, killing all of them and then ourselves so that nothing can escape into the world to lead to its destruction might have been the closes thing to a nightmare I can remember. I could replay it with different possible solutions and each time it ended up with it being best to seal up everything and destroy ourselves. I woke up and had to work at not going back to sleep and telling myself that zombies and tigers that could float and escape were not real over and over and over. I was really afraid of the zombies and needing to deal with them and being bit.

Being very groggy, I did fall back to sleep very quickly and my next dream was set in the same place but I was a tech in Ops cleaning up problems and trying to stay out of the public eye. The zombies and tigers that could float didn’t exist and the problems included bombs and explosions,treachery and intrigue. We were good at hiding the fact that there were problems and were at risk of being blown up instead of the original targets.

Working ops for the President/US Capital and almost being killed multiple times by attempts to hurt the government and then being betrayed by my partner and having my father and myself rigged with a series of deadly booby traps was dealable. Turns out he was working with a long time family friend and a new friend setting me up for my demise. Each person’s reason was the opposite extreme from their actions and the same for my response. In the end, it even made sense.

I could replay this and watch what happened to me over and over and it happened the same way every time. So my partner who did all the work planting bombs on me but seemed to actually care for me, was killed. Because we were Ops, we face death all the time as that was no big deal for him. It was quick and painless but very dangerous for me to do. The long time family friend who planned and staged it all as well as manipulated everyone into doing the work, was sent on her way with warnings that I knew what she was doing and she should stop. She was angry with me over some imagined slight her lover (which turned out to be my partner) had done because he was busy working with me. We (my father and another friend) brought a law suit against her for some completely unrelated issue. Some land she inherited and how she presented herself. Turns out her heart, her life, and the image she has of herself was really connected to that land and the story she tells herself about her connection. Death would be bad for her but taking this connection away and having her live with that would be devastating. There was little risk to me.

The Bloggess posted a serious post about depression (http://thebloggess.com/2012/01/the-fight-goes-on/). I felt the need to comment and I wanted to keep a copy of what I said.

I have been fighting bouts of depression for almost 30 years. It has defined about a third to half my life. I hide it really well, this is how I handle getting through it. I can seem very upbeat and energetic and enthusiastic in the middle of deep depressions. People don’t have a clue. I have been openly talking about it for at least a decade. I am working hard to learn new ways to cope, to actually not have it define my life. But with learning new things I am not very good at them so I am not escaping my depression as well. My big problem right now is knowing when I am actually depressed and it is a mountain to move so I shouldn’t try to force it because the cost is days of inability to move afterwards or when I am just being lazy and don’t want to get up and if I actually do push past the resistance, the day brightens up and gets better.