Searching for the Silver Lining

I suppose that you can find silver linings anywhere if you look hard enough. I've been writing more in the last week than I have in a year. Actually, I've been doing more organizing with bits and pieces of writing amid the shuffling of scenes. At least, until this past week. The past week has been a kind of hell that I thought ... I hoped never to see again.

Some of my readers may know that in 2009 my husband Jerry died suddenly of a heart attack. I won't go into it now as there are plenty of posts on Life on the Ledge where you can get the visceral experience. This summer, my granddaughter Sarah left because she had to go live with her Dad. Her mother decided she wanted to move away and take Sarah with her. When Sarah didn't want to leave with her, it forced Sarah to choose between her mother or her Dad. She's been with me for virtually all her life, and for the last 7 years she's lived with me full time. Her dad is my son, and he adores Sarah, so I know she's in a good place. But this has been a new grief on top of an old grief. And it is Christmas.

I've lived in dark places where the darkness seemed physical and felt as if it would never be light again. For weeks it has grown darker in my head and the real world appears in league with it. The single light in the dark place is that my pain levels have improved a lot in the last six months. The gym trips have produced a positive physical change by improving my strength. So, while the holidays are my private hell, at least they are less painful.

Mama said the road to hell was paved with good intentions. I keep trying to write, but there are days when I actively avoid it. I think about it and I can feel the aversion at the thought of sitting down and fighting my fatigue and mental stagnation to get words on the screen. 

And then there is the diet. I started it a few months ago and coupled with my gym work, I've lost 16 pounds. But I've hit a stalemate, and it is very frustrating. Honestly, if I could workout every day, I'd probably lose it with no problem but I can't. I'm still bound by RA and fibro. They rule with an iron fist. The ever present fatigue overwhelms me and leaving the house becomes this enormous effort of will. I'm doing well to make it two to three times a week. Some of those days I can't do the full routine. The beasts don't stop me completely me but they hobble me.

Mama also told me that hindsight is 20/20. If you are young, start now to get in shape and don't stop. I did some kind of workout most of my life and was slim and normal weight. Once I went to work, I did less and then I got sick and stopped. Only now, 20 years and 100 pounds later have I started back and although it is helping, I know if I'd kept it up life would be easier. 

I still see the silver lining, that bit of writing, but I crave to dive into the flow. I miss that most of all. The sense of falling into a rapidly flowing river that drags you out of the real world and into your creation. Everything falls away. I think it is why I used to love writing late at night with the lights off. Time seemed to stop, and the world shrank to a small pool of light. Everything disappeared: sounds, sights, and smells of reality faded away. The craving for that sensation never goes away once you have been in it. That's my drug of choice.

Until then, I just look for that silver lining.