has it really been that bad? oh, well, i thought it a witty, if stolen title, from daniel defoe, who of course wrote 'robinson crusoe', the hero stranded alone on an island. true, lots of ups, and an awful lot of low moments. getting hit by a car didn't help, though i enjoyed the contact with medical people and friends. and of course, i realized long ago withdrawal the rock-bottom component of suicide. living alone on a mountain-top doesn't always seem wise.
sunday morning i woke thinking of all the times i'd lost confidence in myself. not a good beginning for the day! i'm always asking, why? and it gets me in trouble. with these memories came the actual loss of nerve into my body. in solitude i seem able to re-create any state in myself i happen to meditate on.
once i remember feeling like a complete failure. i'd been choreographing a dance for a class concert. one girl complained to everybody about my improvisational process, dancers used to doing what their told. trouble is, most choreography done by the numbers, and i simply can't count in the dancer's way. the teacher jumped all over me about the girl's complaints, saying she couldn't have this undermining everyone.
wow, what a terrible reaction i had to the criticism. i couldn't really function in rehearsal and had to invite the teacher in to put a hold on it. ironically, she came in and said about the piece everything i'd been saying all along. i did recover, the piece appreciated by the cognoscenti, and the complaining girl radiant with success, having done something she'd never done before.
alas, in the immediate moment i tend to lose sight of the long-term goal. and mulling these things over i realized my failure to use my anger instead of bottling it up undermines many an endeavour, including walking away from promising romances. i once read in a marriage counseling book: a woman will test you, she wants a man and not a little boy. in those situations measured angry responses necessary. even my grandfather would put his foot down every once in awhile, his spouse a powerhouse.
on may 10, 2014, here at mt. hough i began making notes in a fat spiral notebook. and today, september 1, 2015, i'm on the last page. at first i thought of calling it 'little epiphanies'. too pretentious, i thought, and renamed it 'journal of a plague year'. i haven't re-read most of it. i almost never do. this time i'm tempted to see what i find.
The most important thing: having a poetic view of life.
Keep in touch with your own mythology.
The landscape is full of stories.
and so on. i'll keep looking and report back. i think it important to have some record of my own life, if only for myself.
