My Season

Last night at my part-time gig fielding reference questions at a public library a young child saw my name tag and exclaimed “Your name is a SEASON!”  I smiled and kindly corrected, “Close, it’s a month though!”  We both smiled and nodded and they went off on their way.

Still, things have been going rather well Chez April D so perhaps it IS my “season”.

New hair cut! I feel like a wintery woodland nymph!

At my annual obgyn appointment yesterday, while saddened to not have my old doctor who scaled back her practice in order to spend more time with family, I did have a fine exam by another professional at the same facility with no problems.  Not only did weight never come up in my brief time with the doctor, I had perhaps the easiest time of all refusing to get on the scale for the pre-appointment check-in portion of the appointment.  When the nurse was fitting me with a blood pressure cuff she was laying out the steps we’d be taking next.  After “then I’ll get your weight and height and we’ll get you settled into the room” I paused, starting to get worried and finally blurted out “Actually, I don’t do scales”.  The response was a fabulous, “Ok.  That’s fine”.  Simple.  Easy.  Professional.  Talk about a happy moment!  And perhaps this number not being front and foremost on the pages of info the doctor read led to HER not bringing up the subject either.  (While my old doctor was great about keeping the appointment to things *I* actually brought up as concerns, I certainly HAVE been in situations where that WASN’T the case, when the doctor had her fingers all up in that “I’m feeling your ovaries from the INSIDE” position and ranted on at me about the horrors of being fat and, basically, ME.)

So, there’s that.  A good, quick, (healthy report on basic vitals and bits for those interested) doctor’s visit as a “morbidly obese” woman.

I made it through a rather icy storm on Monday and hear that we have another similar chance of icy ick for tomorrow.  Blech!

The ice I chipped off my car on Monday.

I’ve started posting on my blog again after a few month hiatus so that’s also fun.  *waves to the few stalwart readers still popping in or dropping by the front page after finding one of my few crochet patterns*

I’ve been crafting up a bit and finding that I’ve come more strongly to terms with what is important to me in my own life in regards to time-spent and energies expended for the person I’m crafting for.  I’ve also created and sent off my first ever commissioned piece and definitely realized that crafting for monies or *hah* Profit, is not for me.  I’m more a “knit it for the love of it” sort of Witty Knitter/Crocheter!

Wee Peacock is asking you…What?

That’s the update from this lovely fat chick.  What’s going on in your neck of the “woods”?  Is it YOUR season as well?  Are are you still in the winter of another’s season, waiting for yours to finally come around?

Rolling through life!

I keep forgetting how long it has been since my last post. Every time I think of something to place here it turns out that weeks or even months have passed! Yikes! It gets hard wanting to get riled up and ranty for all the many various and sundry ways that the world around me hates my body size and shape and would love nothing more than for me to give in, give up, submit to incessant public demands to hate myself and prostrate myself before the alter of Potentially Getting Thin(ner). So, as I’m rather enjoying being a lovely, confident, currently ranting-on-hold, fat woman, I will instead post some highlights of what I’ve been up to of late

Last weekend, I got to attend a medieval themed wedding in a mountain-esque region New York. There were some awesome statues outside in the gardens at the wedding site and I couldn’t resist a picture!

Prior to that I was dancing for various events in central Mass. One of which was a Pride event that totally ROCKED! The energy of the folks cheering us on was exhilarating. The crowd loved our moves to Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep”.

I also applied for a fun sounding position at a fairly nearby town’s public library…but used the wrong TOWN NAME three times in the coverletter and email.  What’s worse is that it wasn’t a matter of using an old coverletter and forgetting to replace the company/library name.  I introduced the errors manually.  C’est la vie, so it wasn’t meant to be!

I’m crocheting a half-sized Dr. Who scarf for Adam D. so he can wear it more frequently than the full sized 13-foot scarf of uber-awesomeness.

No other fun library interactions of note to report since the “Artist” came by (and for those wondering, I haven’t seen him since…)

I’ve recently read two books with fatness as a theme/major component.

1. The United States of Air was a fabulously funny and, at the same time, horrifyingly chilling satire on the US’s twin obsessions: Fatness (and it’s eradication) and Wars on Things/People/Ideals. Agent Frolick is the Ambassador to France, relating his personal story of how he came to fully believe in the US’s new Prophet’s demands that people subsist only on eating Air.  Caloric intake is Food Terrorism.  The parts I found most frightening were those that, outside of this book’s world, many people would off-the-cuff agree to as a “solution” to all us darned fatties existing in this realm!  (Fat Camps, fatties sent without trial to such places to learn to “eat air”, advancement in any military or government establishment based solely upon waist size, corruption of the highest order…)
2. Butter tells the story of one fat boy’s often sad and all too relate-able attempts to just get through life. He finds himself thrust into popularity when, in the depths of depression and self-loathing, he starts a blog dedicated to the count-down until the night he plans to eat himself to death.  It was a well-written, though certainly trope-y book with a character who is overweight (according to the book) largely because he overeats dramatically.  For that reason it held less appeal than it could have as a touching story about a troubled boy finding his way.

What’s next?  More dancing this weekend, a new hair today that reveals, once more, my neck to the glorious breezes of Autumn. What’s next on YOUR plate?

 

Starting 2012: April D through the (fat) ages (and beyond)

I’m back!  Told you I (was mostly certain I) would be! Anyway; I have been having an absolutely MARVELOUS end of 2011 and start to 2012.  Life is chugging along in a rather calm and peacefully blissful pattern that I hope to continue for as long as possible.  Here are just a few things that have been going on Chez D:

• 

  Adam D sporting the 13-foot-long Tom Baker Dr. Who Scarf

  Adam D and I just celebrated 5 years of married-ness this past December.

• I taught myself to Knit so I could make a Tom Baker Dr. Who scarf in time for our anniversary (I succeeded.  Barely in time though!  That thing is HUGE and it takes a LONG TIME to knit for someone who lives with you and is almost always home from work before you are!  It involved LOTS of being sneaky and knitting when I was sure I was going to get “caught” in the scarf-y act!)
• We visited my folks down in Virginia for Christmas and discovered that taking the train is about as “All Day” as driving or (when you account for all the hassle) taking a plane.  I, for one, enjoyed getting to get up and walk about whenever I wanted.
• Dance-wise I’ve been focusing lately on Tribal/Tribal-Fusion of late and have a few classes to look forward to in February to enhance my sword work!  Also have more performances lined up.  Woot!
• Been rather lax with the trumpet playing lately and focusing on dancing.  I hope to get a bit more playing done though and, even if I’m the only one down there, want to play during the second half of my lunch break more often as I used to do.
• After a really recharging break I’m back to posting and have lots of book reviews, tasty food ideas and general life-posty-ness to catch up on here!

To get to the point of this post though: I thought it might be nice, as I lounge on my last two remaining vacation days for this long and ever-needed holiday, to finally get up a time-line of April D in image form. It should be a fun re-start of the blog for 2012 after my incredibly restful break from blogging.

I’ve gone through many of my old photos recently to organize, purge duplicates and scan those which have no digital form.  There were, however, thoughts that KEPT giving me pause as I looked through images of my own past.  Thoughts I kept coming back to that boiled down to: what was I THINKING back then?  Why wasn’t I happy how I was?  Well, I think I USED to have a time when I was carefree and happy…but those days were quickly outnumbered by the Dieting Days…

I used to wear non-black pants! Look at that awesome pattern! You rock those odd colors young April D!

Look at that sass! What happened to that for so long?

Oh my god I REMEMBER wearing this outfit and thinking I looked awful and unsightly! I remember feeling constrained and sucking in my "gut" But I'm so CUTE here!

Camping in my Youth. Look at those skinned shins! I remember swimming, biking, running around... and being told I didn't exercise enough because I was obviously fat.

Middle School Trumpet: Prepping to do the Memorial Day Parade marching. Which, I obviously only sweated while doing because I was overweight, not because I was marching in a group of other sweaty pre-teens down a hot paved road on a blazing 90 degree day in dark pants while playing a trumpet.

Fruit and Boop: Also likely the first time I rocked a shorter hair style. I used to think I was FAT here?!

Ahhh High School Marching Band. The only indignity not yet evidenced here is the awful hat with the bedraggled canary bird "plume". Oh, and the horror of having to ask for the "plus size" pants to wear.

Dress shopping used to be a nightmare. Always in the "plus" sizes. But, look at that! Why was I always so discontent?! What should a freaking clothing tag's number matter!?!

I used to love those shorts. Remember the size. Remember dieting out of them and back into them and then beyond them forever. Why did I EVER give in to pressures saying I was always desperately in need of a diet????

Look at that incredibly Sassy Hair! What would I look like now if I had NEVER dieted?? If I had just left well-enough alone?!

Honestly, it was a pretty rough couple of nights as I sorted pictures.  I found I had to stop frequently to pick myself up both physically from the cross-legged position I held on the floor and from the rather mental-downer into which I was spiraling.

Happily, I have, with some time and thought, been able to find a calm bit of peace in looking back on these images.  Certainly there remains a tinge of bitter sorrow that I was so incredibly cruel to my own body (and let others be cruel at it “for my own good”) for so long. Likely there will also always be that occasional voice  I indulge for a moment, only now and then, to wonder just how things might have been if I’d been stronger and more self-certain and left myself (and my body) alone. For the larger part, though, I can look back and see the (fat) girl I was, struggling to reconcile the feelings of her own body with the nasty comments received from others and working to fit herself into a paradigm that, if we’re honest, has no place for women who aren’t already naturally thin, culturally beautiful, effortlessly correctly feminine, self-assured yet modest, submissively available yet not overly sexual; aka everything that no one can be all at once.  I can look back and know that these parts of my past have shaped the “me” of now.  I don’t have to have LIKED every moment but I can appreciate each link for the part it plays in who I proudly display now.

Who am I now? April D.  Fat, dancing, trumpet-blowing, husband-loving, nay-sayer-ignoring, life-living woman who has worked rather hard to show that I am a lot more than the sum of the numbers on my health chart.  Here is a rather lively number I just got to perform with a lovely local dance group this past December a Yule Hafla.  My resolution for 2012 (since I’m known to just not make them unless it is something I’m planning to do anyway?): continue being a loud and proud April D.  Fat, Visible and Refusing to Be Silenced.  Yip!

Love Your Body: Start (or Continue) Today!

Big Fat Blog posted a great reminder bit that spurred my own small prod here today.  They’ve listed out a few of the goings-on as well so check them out!  Something I’d point out in addition to the great links listed there is Golda’s offering of a free PDF download (today only!) of her book: Stop Dieting Now.

In celebration of this day here is my suggestion to you: look in the mirror.  Center your gaze on your own eyes. Remind yourself “I am enough.  Just as I am.  I love my body, my self.”  Repeat this mantra as you shift your gaze from your own eyes to each part of your body, then to your reflection as a whole.  It might feel awkward.  It might feel silly.  But, you have to ask yourself, “Why?”  Why should it feel at ALL embarrassing to look upon ourselves and say, out loud, that we ARE amazing?  As is.  Without change.  Without apology. You ARE amazing.  Your body is amazing.  Your body (and you) are deserving of respect and love.  From others but also, and most importantly, from yourself.

So take today (or even a small part of today: an hour… a 5-minute break… 30 seconds) to reflect on this dangerous nugget of an idea: your body is beholden to no one.  It is yours.  To love.  To cherish.  To fuel and to live in.  Enjoy its strengths, respect its weaknesses, and never consider that it is something you need to change in order to feel it is deserving of your love.

Throwing Axes at a Renn Faire last year. Loving my body in action!

Sometimes… it IS just As Simple As That

Today I had a follow-up with my Gastroenterologist just to renew prescriptions and touch base.  Everything she’s been doing to manage my IBS is working well and I feel wonderful most days.  I’ve been reflecting the past week since the reminder about the appointment today that I’ve definitely even solidly stabilized my weight and so that’s not even a concern.  If the weather would warm up for more than one day I could even really get to digging out the shorts from last year, into which I still comfortably fit (for the second summer in a ROW!  Something that has NEVER happened in my dieting roller-coaster years).

This is the second time I went into the office and when told “if you’ll just step over here so I can get your most recent weight” I calmly replied “No thank you.  I don’t do scales.”  The only response was an equally calm and, dare I say, respectful, “Okay.”

How easy!  It was again a simple reminder that taking care of your health by means of doctor visits does not have involve a struggle each time*.  The doctor, who did not note anything about weight last visit, did not even bring the topic up.  Instead we were able to happily discuss what options I had if the hubby and I did decide to try to have children in the near future.  It was a pleasure.  It was simple.  It was what I imagine regular check-ups must be like for people who go to the doctors and fall into the “Normal” BMI range: a routine visit with no lingering issues being dredged up or nutritionist plans being promoted, etc (even though this appointment DID take place down in what is the Nutritionists’ area today).

I love those moments when being Fat is just a component of Being Me, and not a or even THE defining factor.  These are moments I feel like rejoicing, like there is hope that at some point the world will “Get It” and look back and marvel that everyone ever treated people differently simply BECAUSE they were different instead of acknowledging (celebrating even?) diversity for the wonderful and natural trait it is.

*Bearing in mind, of course, that I am very lucky to have some amazing care-providers and that I fully understand that not everyone is so lucky.

Balancing Points: On taking a rest

Balancing Life

There are many things in life that we balance everyday: Checkbooks, jobs and homelife, kids and careers, housework and freetime, classes, love, money, time, life, food… they all take a part of our energy to consider and require finding a balance in order to get through from day-to-day without becoming overloaded.

When do you know when  you gone over your own personal threshold?  When do you feel that sword begin to sway and the point begin to drop?  Can you feel it even?  When life is rushing past is it sometimes just too much to even notice when things are no longer a balance of come and go and have just become go, go, GO?

I know that I often advocate that no matter what you look like or how undeserving society or your own mind might think you are: everyone needs a moment to be calm and un-stressed.

Perhaps that means taking a week away from the pressures of diet ads and fat-phobic messages on TV.  Or maybe you’d rather find something that truly riles you up* and takes your mind off of any of the mundane and/or inane bits of the regular routine by placing it in the realm of a fight for social justices. Maybe being “Stress Free” for you means simply not having to cook one night. Or getting a night away from regular duties with kids or spouses or friends or the job….maybe it means turning up the radio for that one great song and dancing like no one is watching; releasing all that tension with every frantic move of your body to the rhythm pulsing around you.

Whatever it takes I am here to post another reminder that it is never “not quite the right time” to get just a moment to yourself.  It isn’t being lazy to hold up that “STOP” hand on the pulse of what is rushing around you and, in whatever manner works for you, take a mental/physical/spiritual time-out. I feel that a large part of learning to love ourselves and accept who we are, is not only to accept that Yes Virginia, Humans DO have Limitations; but to recognize, acknowledge and work to take the appropriate rest that is required for any and all of the limitations we have.  Not every moment has to be “go”.  There can (and should) also be some down-time moments for “stop”ping.

On my “Go, Go, Go” list right now I have:

• Last class for my MLIS
• Swimming laps Tuesday
• Practice for Belly Recital April 3rd
• Fencing with Adam D Thursday
• This blog (In a related note: I’ll apologize now that there will be no food post tomorrow, I need to cook more and take more pictures now!)
• Trumpet practice for concert this coming weekend in CT (March 13th)
• Full time job
• Part time job

On my “Stop!” list I need to take a few moments of breather to catch up on:

• Sleeping
• Cooking long meals for the joy of creating
• Crochet
• Thoughtful blog posts related more directly to FA (Or is that more on the “go” list??)
• More non-planned weekends with the Hubby to just relax, make love and be together

What falls on your own lists of Busy and Rest?  Do you find yourself neglecting the Rest in order to get more done on that Busy list?  Don’t forget that the body and mind both need time to recoup to function optimally.  It is something I myself often forget and need to be reminded of (hence this post!)

*On the riling up bit: I LOVED the Hunger Game books (well the first was a hit out of the park the second was good and the third a bit disappointing) so I am thrilled at the possibility of seeing this on the big screen. But seriously?? Why post a casting call asking for someone who looks “underfed but strong” to play the female lead? I GET that these kids were all nearly starving.  But that ISN’T what you need to ask for in your damn actresses. If you’re looking for a very lean athlete; SAY THAT!  But to suggest what you’re looking for is the breed of self-starving model that already dominates the acting playing field is really head-shakingly, eye-rollingly ill-considered.  Also?  Katniss was an olive-skinned young girl.  Not a white girl.  Just saying.

Today is an “Unanticipated Orange” kind of day

Extra crispy, zesty bites of orange make for a smile for me!

Today I woke rather refreshed.  We went to bed at 8:30 last night.  Instead of the usual 10 or 11pm!

And this morning I realized that today is the kind of day when you get to work and happily realize that you have two juicy, delicious slices of orange left in your breakfast container that you hadn’t anticipated. A day of hidden surprises!

What sort of hidden surprises have you come across today (or lately) that have made you smile? Has someone complimented you in a way that didn’t make you suspicious or immediately feel that you were being only “mostly” complimented (You know: “Oh!  That sweater makes you look nice today” or “Did you lose weight? You look good today!” sort of back-handed implications that otherwise you look less than appealing).

Today I had those unanticipated wedges of citrus to start my smile.  I also get to play Christmas carols on trumpet this weekend at two different venues, one of which was a last-minute thing.  I got a totally unexpected compliment on my hair, which is about 3 months over-due for a cut and color (its one of my few bodily pamperings: coloring my hair!)

These are the kinds of days I wish I could bank up for the darker, more self-hatred-prone days that usually find me in the grey-moments of deep winter.  A sort of sunny moment to pick-up and get me through.  So here’s to hoping that keeping a mental tab on such small moments WILL be like charging up my unanticipated orange-meter in anticipation of those days where no such moments are forth coming!

What about you?  What small moments have made YOUR day/week/month/year so far as we head into the last month of this year?

Also: happy start of Chanukah tonight to my Chanukah-celebrating friends and readers!

Post-Turkey Post

So how did everyone fare during the Feast of Turkey?  Any horror or happy stories to share?

On my end things went rather well.  Ate a few bites of the “meh” bird, got some tasty pie and good times with Adam D’s family; which is always fun since they’re actually wonderful people.

I finished my NaNoWriMo novel last night (a day early even!) so even though that didn’t end up story-wise where I wanted it to be; I was content to have finished the word count and the storyline.  I believe this will be my last year for it though; it is very stressful to bang out 50,000 words of fiction in one month and I’ve learned after 3 years of this that I far prefer reading and blog-posting to trying to write fiction!

I have lots of culinary adventures to post here and am working on two upcoming musical adventures of the Brass Christmas Ensemble sort that are making me grin.  I love Holiday Tunes on Brass instruments!

On the front of my consciousness that is always sort of aware of new happenings on the dieting arena; I find it interesting that WW is now pushing a 0-point plan for fruits/veggies.  Sounds a lot like they are trying to make WW similar to South Beach: eat lots of green, count the rest.

According to this article on the new plan updated: “The new plan incorporates new strides in scientific research that prove that simply counting calories isn’t enough.”

*shrug*  Meh.  I guess they’ve come a long way since these recipe card of yore. Yet it all comes down to just another wave of rules with no research into the results so people will hopefully be more inclined to spend money on programs that work only to inflate the pockets of those selling them.

And to boot: when will it finally be understood that it isn’t just “counting calories” or “upping exercise” that remains the “problem” with all this rampant fatness?  A LOT of it boils down to:

• genetic diversity,
• a huge change in how fatness is measured,
• a horribly flawed measure of individual fatness which is not intrinsically tied to health but is always pushed as if it is,
• media-inflated panic-mongering, generations of people struggling through yo-yo dieting,
• and a plain old cultural proclivity to eschew everything “Fat”, despite the fact that levels of fatness are NOT rising rampantly and there seems to exist this “Obesity Paradox” whereby the real-life workings of fatness do not measure up to the panic-filled images of what SHOULD be happening.

It’s rage inducing, sigh-provoking and plain old head-shakingly baffling how people can continue to ignore evidence, testimonials and real-life happenings that don’t fit the narrow image of what fatness means so that they can cling to the belief that fatness and all it represents, and all those WITH fat, are lesser-than; abnormal; broken.

At any rate, to get back to my first point, Thanksgiving was pleasant.  No stories to share that don’t come down to noticing that WW keeps trying to re-boot its supposedly fool-proof methods to lose weight and keep it off…with newly tweaked methods.  Does it make you wonder what’s next?

A Fatty’s Sure-fire Advice to get through Thanksgiving

This is the time of year when TV ads and the radio and any form of entertainment that can possibly throw an add across your attention span is clamoring with the dual-edged advice to Buy and Eat This coupled immediately afterwards with tongue-in-cheek follow-up warnings or ads admonishing you for having eaten said thing with a “Here’s How We Can Help you ‘Work off that Food'” logo and a seemingly sympathetic nod of understanding.  You know what I mean, look at a magazine this time of year to see the delectable roasted meats and sugary deserts on the cover, all surrounded by title headlines like “Lose 10 lbs by Christmas!” “Look slim for the Holidays”, etc.

It’s enough that the messages swamping us at this time are so confused “Eat More!  Oh, poor baby, ate too much?  Diet until skinny so you can make it to the next Eat More holiday!”  What’s worse is the roller-coaster conversations with friends, family, co-workers, random strangers in elevators: “Oh I ate so MUCH, I’m so NAUGHTY” going into the following dips “I can’t WAIT to eat such-and-such!….but I know it’s so bad for me!  Goes straight to my hips!”*  “Oh man I DREAD the holidays.  I always overeat and then feel so wrecked for days!” and so on and so forth.

I know I’ve touched on how food is amoral, there is no intrinsically sinful nature to any food; it is all nutrients.  I’ve also touched upon my methods for making holidays less food-stressful.

The addendum of advice I’d like to give today as we ease into the coming weekend celebrations in the US of A (Thanksgiving) is to treat the food-centric holidays, as much as you are able, as just like any other day; only with many more options of food available.

This advice is based upon my own life experiences, your results may vary but perhaps in these tips and reminders to myself you may find a few nuggets of wisdom that will help you through the coming season of Expected Over-Eatery as well.

• Don’t skip breakfast hoping that you’ll be able to cram more tasty goodness in; only to realize that you’re still over-full by the end and feeling both guilty and bloated. Instead, eat normally.  That whole “Saving Room” thing is always a tricky, insidious path to feeling wretched.
• Start with small servings of the things that look the best or tastiest.  Don’t hesitate to speak up and say, “I’d love to try a smaller piece please.  That way I can try more of these wonderful looking things”.
• If the above doesn’t work and you still end up going through a family buffet and getting huge portions from well-meaning food-pushers; don’t fret.  These days almost everything can be saved and re-heated.  Often-times things taste better the second time around.  So DON’T feel you have to eat everything on your plate.  That whole, “Clean your plate; there are children starving in Africa”** meme that wrecked much of your childhood; does not apply.
• If you don’t LIKE something: stop eating it. Don’t feel that the gentle feelings of your great-aunt whoever are more important than making sure your stomach isn’t rolling around in disgusted discomfort.  This holiday is also about taking care of yourself and giving thanks for not having to feel bad. (Or, it should be; so let’s make this a point to head in that direction!)
• You don’t like turkey.  Full stop.  In fact, be honest April D, you would really rather never eat the stuff.  It is, even when brined and soaked and seasoned and cooked in whatever manner possible to make it moist and appealing, still dry and tasteless and ends up sticking in your throat. So, stop eating it!  If you feel you MUST take a few bites for the look of the thing, by all means, as long as you aren’t gagging, but otherwise leave it and focus on those things you DO enjoy!

Remember the holidays, underneath the messages about materialistic avarice uh, I mean thoughtful gift-giving and the confusing blather about “Eat!  No! Don’t Eat!”; this is supposed to be a time to reflect and be thankful for the blessings of the people you love (even if that doesn’t happen to be your family).  Sometimes this means making it through very rocky moments with people (like family) that only seek to hurt you with words or comments on your body or food choices.  Trying to brush off such things is difficult; and in a world where the roller-coaster of conversations about eating and dieting are par-for-the-course and therefore tough to avoid.

So I have very little advice to give for those moments.  Sometimes they can be teachable ones; where explaining a bit of HAES or FA or even just Body Acceptance is possible.  Often-times they are not and biting your tongue or making a quick, “Let’s not talk about diets; this is a time of celebration!” might do the trick to get through the shorter and less abrasive of such moments.  For some of the others, full-on fat hatred moments of body-loathing, the simplest thing is perhaps to walk away.  Smile, make a comment about not believing in such negative body-talk being productive and move on to another group’s conversation.  Remember, there are some times when you have to cut your losses and move on.  If you’re able to do that at a party, all the better.

That’s my “sure-fire” method to make it through the Food Feasting Holidays.  I hope there is something of use in there for others as we get to this weekend of Tasty Treats.

In the spirit of Thanksgiving: I give thanks for this amazing community of Fat and Size acceptance activist; who have really shown me that there are alternatives to constant body hatred and crushing guilt over not fitting some arbitrary model of acceptable personhood.  Truly, you are all amazing.  And I thank all of you for that!

Happy holidays!  Now, to finish that NaNoWriMo and get those holiday cards started!

*As if somehow food goes in your mouth, holds up a map and, if a donut or other typically “fattening” or “sinful” food, nods and says, “Okay boys and girls; it’s off to the hips with us!  No, carrots you go to the digestion system; we’re just going to bypass all that and just slide into the fat reserves on this body’s hips! Now, move out!”  Riiiight.

**I’ve always hated sayings based upon trying to make someone feel guilty for food left on their plates.  As if making your body feel bloated and over-full is a better result than leaving leftovers for another day.  It isn’t as though stuffing those last bites into your already-full belly will benefit these ubiquitous “starving kids”.  How about we do this instead:  Eat what we want, put the rest away, donate goods and money to foundations who help starving people in this country and elsewhere around the world?  Seems better to me than trying to instill guilt over not doing something so oddly forceful as “cleaning your plate” when you’re already full.

Dreaming of Spring, before Winter

I’ve been having some VERY odd dreams lately.  Including my first screaming nightmare the night of my recent 30th birthday!  But, sometimes the combination of positive experiences of a day with a restful mind can manage to make the dream mix into something beautiful.

Yesterday, I went to church again after a 3 month break.  I forgot just how accepting and wonderful my church community is and felt so welcomed.  One woman, who I’ve always thought was incredibly kind and who works with the community in so many ways, approached me after the service to let me know that she loves my uplifting Facebook status.  Just, out of the blue, her letting me know that my words have some kind of positive affect on her daily life just made me almost tear up.  It is the simple things, y’all.

So with that in mind, a reconnect with another kind friend yesterday on-line and a very restful weekend at last, I slept.  I dreamed.

I was walking and met the Goddess of Spring.  She was the friend I had just briefly reconnected with.  We walked and talked of what needed to be done to bring Spring on again.

It was brief in the retelling, but the feelings of cozy familiarity and belonging that surrounded it still leave me in a warm glow right now.  I think it was my mind’s way of reminding me that, now that my favorite parts of Autumn are gone up here in New England, Spring is still planning for next year and will be waiting for me (for all of us) on the other side of Winter.  It was a comforting thought from a comforting dream.

Waking up with my large body enveloped in the happy, lingering vestiges of this dream sure beat waking up trying to scream!

What do you dream of?  Do you remember them?  Are you on medications that enhance your dreams and allow you to remember them clearly or do you pass from dream to waking without a chance to grasp at the slippery, shadowy substance of your nighttime thoughts?