Baby, I Got Back

Thank you to those of you who wrote in, or commented as to where the hell I've been. It truly means a lot to me.

My apologies that I haven't blogged sooner. I have LOTS to tell you and am just trying to figure out where to begin.

Okay, look...I have been up to something really, REALLY IMPORTANT.

SOMETHING REALLY, REALLY IMPORTANT and thus, have not been able to blog.

I can't tell you what that something is, but...

Does anyone have a power shop-vac that I can borrow? I don't think that prunes are going to do the trick. Speaking of "tricks", this is a mean one. I mean really, WHO PUT THAT THERE???

Okay, but seriously folks...I DON'T think that prunes are going to take care of that problem.

Actually, I have to be honest with you. I haven't blogged, because I've been dealing with a lot of depression lately. And if I truly had that soda bottle up me bum-bum, I'd be dealing with a lot more depression than I am right now...or maybe not.

But, in any case, I'm sorry that I haven't been blogging. I've felt rather immobilized since our return from our trip. There are many reasons for it...

The first two weeks of the New Year were packed with some really awful news that left me deeply saddened. Everything from that poor, poor hiker in Georgia, to a couple of deranged fathers demonstrating the most devastating kind of betrayal upon their families that one can do...let alone two. I won't mention the specific incidents, for most of you, I probably don't have to... But, the tragedies left be numb and shell-shocked.

So, there are some other reasons for the depression, but for the last two weeks, it's been all I can do to go to work. I've retreated into a shell of sleeping intermittently, eating, watching movies with Will and reading.

When I get like this, which this amount of depression to last for this long is rare for me, I try to be patient with myself. I know that it will pass...

This morning while pouring my coffee and lining up rows of Ajax to snort off the kitchen counter, I looked up on to our kitchen wall and gazed at a painting that often blends into the background of routine.

It's Sir Edward Burne-Jones', "The Wheel of Fortune".

When I bought the reproduction quite a few years ago, I felt foolish for paying so much for a copy, although, it is a well-done reproduction.

The painting consists of the Goddess Fortune spinning her wheel. And upon the wheel is a slave, a king and a poet. And with the wheel's every turn a fallen may rise back again, while those on the peak of glory and happiness may fall down.

I felt like it was an appropriate message for much of life; the ebbs and flows of not just fortune, but emotion. The whole "you win some, you lose some" thing...

Everything is temporary.

Here I am with the stunning original at the Musee d'Orsay in Paris last spring.

She's amazing in person. The folds of her garment, the melancholy on her face as she turns the wheel, the hot dudes tied down stepping on each other...

So, this morning as I gazed at our little painting, I wiped the Ajax off my face and tried to embrace the perspective of it. I lamented the loss of the last two weeks, but through my darkest days I tried to treat anyone I came in contact with, with some type of kindness, even if it was a wave to a neighbor, or at least a smile, even though it was often feeble.

After all, it wasn't their fault I was depressed.

I tried to not let the darkness rule my light. And I tried to not listen to anger or despair that was welling up inside of me, but to know that love still resides somewhere there...And to take deep breaths and think over-flowing thoughts of peace...And to know that this too shall pass.

And to remember that as old as it is, it still rings true to me, it's not whether I win or lose, in fortune or emotion, but how I play the game. And how I love my life. And how I'm grateful for it.