seahorse

years ago, i did an enneagram personality test. it pegged me as someone who highly values freedom. which is true. and as the sun sets on my year of freedom from work, i find myself wishing that freedom wasn't so important to me. because the reality is that being an adult is full of experiences, choices, obligation, duties, and it's starting to occur to me that freedom, the way i've valued it, is just not feasible. it's almost a childish notion to believe that one can do whatever they want, whenever they want. not only childish, but perhaps also self-indulgent or just plain selfish.

maybe it's time for me to start re-framing this notion of freedom. instead of "freedom to", i should think about it as "freedom from". freedom from busy. freedom from stress. freedom from debt. freedom from worry.

yesterday, after skeleton park music festival. i bought myself some candy. i like candy, and i gave myself permission to have some. funnily enough, i felt really gross in my body afterwards. another fine example: instead of freedom to eat candy... freedom from feeling gross, heavy, bloated, etc.

i only have three weeks left until this year is just a memory. something i did once. something i remember doing. that's hard. harder than some of the other parts. éamon will be fine at daycare. and i actually think we'll be fine apart (once we adjust). but no longer living as though my time is my own will be a tough one. except, i guess this is a reality i need to start getting used to. éamon is less portable than he once was and i've already started having to miss out on things i was once free to attend. and i suppose, if i really think about it, i don't mind. i like being at home. it's like diving underwater – eventually i'll socially resurface. in the meantime, maybe i'll just learn to enjoy the quiet, more slow paced life-style. maybe freedom is over-rated.

i've been waitin' here for days
tryin' to catch a break
the way I'm livin', it's gonna cause my heart to ache.

refreshing

there's a number of things i'm not looking forward to about returning to work (being away from éamon, early mornings, cramming my personal life into my evenings, having to follow a schedule not of my own design, etc etc). but there are a few things that will be good, and i'm going to focus on those things as much as possible. i especially like thinking of this return to work as an opportunity to start over. after working at BBD for 10 years, i just sort of did things out of habit, and over time, that pattern was pretty tired, worn and ready to be thrown out. so i'm excited about starting fresh.

i want to use my morning commute as a chance to do some oil pulling.

i'm going to pick up a radio that i can plug headphones into so i can listen to the cbc (after having the freedom to listen to talk radio, i don't want to give that up).

on friday, i bought a folding bike that i'll keep in the trunk of my car and take it out at lunch time for off-site bike rides.

i got a new lunch box and new tea thermos so i can enjoy new eating and drinking routines.

i want to make some bunting flags and hang them in my cubicle to decorate the place and make it fun and homey for me.
 
and so on and so forth. i'm actually really excited about this opportunity to re-invent my work life. i want there to be less of a disconnect between my home habits/preferences and my work habits/preferences.

at the very least, i have new things to look forward to, not the same-old same-old of my first working decade.

skeleton bones stand at the sound
of eternity on the lips of the found.

air

i've been thinking a lot since this weekend away about identity. i was really surprised to discover how much and how prominent labels still are nowadays. i kind of assumed that in this modern age, where diversity was valued, that labels were no longer relevant. but i ended up concluding that for people who are struggling to attain and maintain a sense of self, that perhaps such labels are a way for them to take hold of something clear and defined.

i was thinking about my own identity, what parts of my identity would throw me into crisis if suddenly taken from me, and what things are inconsequential.

surprisingly, the first thing that comes to mind is my job. the significance of this really stands out to me, largely because i'm not technically at bbd right now, and i'm not technically working, but i still say "at my work" with regularity. while i wouldn't say it's influenced the way i see the world, it has given me a binocular through which to see the world. i've been able to learn about the world-at-large things i would never know or experience if it wasn't for this job at this company.

another big one is my relationships and community. friends, church, partner. as well as my identity as christian/jesus follower.

i also see how my circumstances have shaped me. things like coming from a broken home, being single for the majority of my 20s, and being a woman. now... when i say being a woman, i don't mean that my identity is shaped by simply being a woman, but rather by the social context in which i'm a woman. because i don't think my job, community, family or faith would be dramatically different if i was not a woman. but it seems that it's how i'm viewed as a woman that has the greater impact on me. interactions with men, interactions with other women, safety at night (or feelings of lack of safety), social norms, etc. for whatever reason, i feel that i'm a strong and capable PERSON (whether this is my natural disposition, or the result of years of having to overcome challenging circumstances), and i think i would've fared equally well/comfortably as a man. and so i think to myself, what is it then, that makes me feel connected to my womanhood? (because i do, and am) and i feel that it's because i embrace my lot in life as a physical female, a social female. it also doesn't define me, but is just one aspect of who i am.

i feel now, like my ramblings are taking me in a different direction then i'd intended. so let me get back to what i was trying to say... that identity is too complex (in my mind) to be boiled down to just one label. i think that "person" or "unique individual" or "lesley" is the only label i need. because circumstances change, and people develop, and i don't want to be limited to just one definition.

foolishness strips the soul of its light.