A Bear

 I met a poet once. She was a tiny woman, serious, and sweet with a pixie cut and pretty flowing skirts. I knew right away, I wanted to know her, so I sat near her and we talked each class. I can't remember the class. I remember the teacher, Marianthe Karinikas (that's probably wrong, but I think the name was Greek). The class was either Advanced Nonfiction or Scientific and Technical Literature-I am not sure which. I enjoyed both immensely, as my introductions into the field of technical writing which I absolutely should have completed except I was going through an identity crisis and disdained anything corporate (and Michael Stowe-another instructor-ticked me off when he told 

me, as a thirty something person to put my book away-bite me big boy-actually I think he was smallish, I don't remember. He was definitely balding-and I realized he was more like the type of people I would probably end up working with and simply couldn't bear it). Anyway, we discussed the things we liked, I guessed she was either infp or infj (she confirmed infp). I usually typed intp back then, even though my technical aptitude and  lack of desire to do difficult probably solving, made me unsure about this (and the C's in calc-based university physics-oh the shame). 

We discussed spirit animals, and this is what got me, she said she thought mine was a bear. A bear. Not a wise owl, not a graceful swan, but a big, hairy, lumbering bear. She said something about me being a protective mother or something, but all I could see was a big, clumsy, destructive, flesh-ripping bear. I nodded and smiled and found a way to put a positive spin on it to keep the conversation smoot, but it has always bothered me a little. Since leaving college, I have usually tested infp, but bears are not infp. Compared to her, I am not infp. I am not a sweet, elfin, beauty lover. The only thing infpish about me is that I think about my feelings about things a lot. I am opinionated and piss people off, I don't like to let other people's hypocrisy go, but desire to find a way to bring justice to them (which I know is impossible-the biggest hypocrites amazingly tend to be the best at spin).

 After the topsy turvy upheaval of my life, i find that things are now quite quiet. However, I find I am struggling with a problem I haven't had to face in a long time- acute loneliness. It usually hits sometime after dinner. I am sitting quietly, awaiting bedtime and bam! the aloneless starts to seep under mys skin. It is times like these when I really miss my mom. I miss having another adult to call and to have call me. I even miss my soon-to-be ex hanging around, when he was healthy, he was another person, another mind to connect with. 

The hardest part has been falling asleep. My body is tired, I am perfectly comfortable in bed, fan blowing, and I just can't drift off into dreamland. Last night, I finally got up at around 11, after trying to sleep for over an hour, and took a melatonin and went down to the couch. That seemed to help, and I was alseep within 20 minutes or so. I do hate having to rely on a pill to go to sleep, though, especially when my body is quite tired. I guess, though, taking a melatonin is preferable to that silent, creeping loneliness. It is such an ache, grabbing a slow squeezing control of one's chest. Getting through the evening is the tough part. During the daily hours, something can always been done. There is work, or sitting outside, or entertaining Alec, who "doesn't like being on his own," as he frequently tells me.

Projects around the house have been keeping me somewhat busy. I am trying to pace myself, so what could be done in a day is being completed slowly a little at a time. Mainly this is just to protect my own energy. Laying the floor in the dining room a week and a half ago, completely wiped me out and left me with very sore leg muscles. I don't care to feel that way again soon, so doing things slowly seems to be the trick to not completly exhausting myself.

Social media actually helps a bit, too.Just putting something out there and getting a response helps. Now there are the people who make me cringe every time I see their posts, and that can drag me down a bit (why do I follow them? Well, you know, ,keep your friends close and your enemies closer, they say. While I wouldn't say they are really enemies, they are people who just get my shoulders crunching up and my mouth skewing into an unpleasant angle. I keep them around for soul growth. I figure when their lame-o popular posts stop bugging me, I will have definitive proof of my growth as a human. 

My eyes have been on and off imflammed, and I think I am going to have to face the fact that I just cannot handle contacts anymore. It makes me SO sad, because glasses make my eyes tired and they are inconvenient, especially when dong active things like hiking or wading. I will just have to invest in strudy prescription sunglasses, I guess. Makes me sad. Plus I really like wearing green or hazel contacts to brighten my face a bit. But nope. My eyes are making everything difficult. Photophobia and cringing when the light hits, makes accomplishing ANYTHING very difficult. I left work early because of it yesterday. I just pray my eyes are calmer today. Frozen/cool compresses help ease the pain a bit, but that isn't practical at work with a classroom full of kids. 

By the way, I am working in the library for summer school, and I really just don't like it that much. I like getting to meet all the kids, but I think I prefer actually being in a classroom. My schedule is full, so I am not really bored, so that is a bonus, but it just isn't as satisfying as having one or two groups of students to work with all day. If I do elementary summer school in the future, I think I want a 4/5 classroom to work with.I just love leading classes. It is what I was meant to do. The middle school classes are nice, too. I think that is my frustration with my current job. It isn't that coteaching is bad, or that my coteachers are bad. It is just not where my strength and desire lies. I want to be leading a class independently. While I do also long for my own classroom (that's a huge draw to being a teacher-having that space, it is leading the class itself that I love). I get so frustrated because I can't have that where I am (at least not full time). So I will just keep searching, which sucks, because I want a home-but I want the right home.