writing

Body (of) Work: Craving Pink

I think it was around June or maybe July but there was a night and then a day where I was craving the view of pink. Salmon pink, peach, soft blush pink.

I remember waking from a soft sleep in the middle of the night and needing to see these colors.

It was intense.

Just like the times where I’d have dreams I was drinking water and wake up absolutely dehydrated, it was as if my eyes were desperate for the feeling I just knew being able to rest them on these colors would bring.

Like a soul is described when it absorbs the glory of God or a musician when reaching for an instrument to share an inner feeling that begs for release or expression, that was my late-night need for pink.

I know it sounds crazy, or at the time it did, but in order to survive and calm my brain, for that was what I believe was in pain and what woke me, I opened up Pinterest and started searching for these colors.

“Ahhhhh! Yes!” This was what my body, my whole body seemed to be saying as I gazed on bedding and framed pictures in peaches and pinks.

An itch, scratched. A thirst, slaked. A sigh, exhaled.

I was soothed by gazing on these colors.

I felt like I needed more though and there was a limit to what I could find when searching on Pinterest so I tried Google. I tried a few department stores. I tried a few websites I hoped would be able to help.

The more I looked, the more the sense of calm was replaced with a sense of need.

I needed peach sheets. I needed soft pink bedding.

I needed them in a way I can’t explain other than to say I felt like if I weren’t to find and then purchase these things so that when they came I could take to my bed and have them wrapped around me in the softest of cocoons, I would not be alright mentally or physically.

That was more than five months ago and I have, from time to time, felt that same need pop up; the one in which my eyes needed to see something in order for my brain to not hurt.

I would gaze through Pinterest boards or watch interior decorating shows for glimpses of these colors, these environments, these feelings of colors through visual stimulation like I used to reach for my Headspace app and rely upon mindfulness to ease and calm me.

It always seemed strange to me, how my eyes craved a color.

And then I stumbled upon a Youtube video which led to the discovery of a researcher who I think might know the “why” behind this weirdest of weird things.

And so, I will reach out and ask about it because part of my new “Body (of) Work” involves allowing myself to seek answers to the questions I have about the ways in which body is represented and what lenses I’ll let myself explore and interpret it through.

The Things That Must Be Said

Where do you land on this; the idea that there are some things you simply cannot leave unvoiced. That there are words and phrases and paragraphs of thoughts and feelings that need to be said?

Be it to another, to your God, or to yourself, how do you approach giving voice to what might remain silent?

I Think I Forgot

This morning, scrolling through my emails, I saw that someone had “liked” one of my posts here. That’s when I thought about yesterday and realized I think I forgot to post.

Like, plumb clean forgot.

Like, never once entered my mind.

But, I did remember something else yesterday, or should I say, someone else, and maybe that’s better than posting on a blog every day.

🙂

Inte Idag

Inte idag is Swedish for , “not today”, which is “Leanne” for, I have no desire to say or share anything here.

Not little, not big.

Nothing to place in this daily posting space.

*but I smell apples and a baguette is baking in the oven, soon to be topped with Cambezola. i can share that.

🙂

Rich

Years and years and years ago, when securing enough food to put on the table for my son and myself was a weekly struggle, we happened upon a perfect saying, “Bread rich”.

It came from my son after I had used a coupon, punch card and “daily double” special to buy approximately FIVE bags of bread, bagels, pastry, etc. for only FIVE dollars.

This largess came from a bread outlet about a 45-minute drive from our home.

Pulling into the grass and gravel covered driveway on the side of our tiny rental house in the country as we returned home, my son started carrying the bags inside.

When I had placed all the items from the bags on our worn out Formica counter top, my son said in awe and delight, “Mom, we’re bread rich!”.

🙂

❤

And he was right.

And I loved that he had learned how to see “wealth” in this way and that bags of day-old bread (that would be put into the freezer to save until we needed them) could thrill him as much as I imagine Disneyland thrills kids who haven’t experienced scarcity. 

From then on, whenever poverty came calling and/or I would start to feel lack, I’d look around at all the ways in which I was rich.

About ten days ago, laying on my sofa and knowing I needed more – contact, interaction, help with daily life and the living of it – I reached out to some of my friends both here, in Sweden, and in America via Skype.

The lies that had been circling in my brain about not fitting in, not having worth or value, not being loved or connected, pretty much floated away as soon as my friends and I started talking.

And, I knew I had forgotten what I had already possessed all along. 

I continued reaching out. SMS’s, phone calls, emails. I readily extended and accepted invitations to connect.

Which, oh, thank You, Father God, saved me yet again.

Looking through one of my prayer notebooks, I saw that I had listed FOUR pages of names, just here on the islands alone, of people to pray for. These were people I knew liked me and that I liked, too. People, not all of them yet but a handful, whom I could be honest with and share my heart with.

I realized I was “friend rich”. 

On Saturday, three of them came over just to hang out and brought a plastic shopping bag full of apples and a plastic container full of hand-picked blackberries. ❤

After they left, I placed the apples in a large glass bowl and set them in the middle of my table.

They were so beautiful. Yellow and light green on top of pine wood and against the backdrop of white walls, accented with soft blue curtains and green plants on the window sill looking out against a light-filled sky.

The beauty filled and soothed my soul.

But, there’s more to tell, because that same Saturday, just an hour after my first visitors had left, another friend came by to go on a bike ride with me and she brought another plastic bag full of apples; these, blush red and spring green!

I took out another large glass bowl (I have three of these, making me “bowl rich”, too) and put the apples in them and placed that bowl next to the other on the table.

That’s when it hit me. “I’m apple rich”, I said to myself with a soft, deep, soul-settling smile.

And later on, at Sunday evening prayer service, I spoke up and out (in automatic Swedish! :O ) and told the group of believers what I’m typing just now (except the part about bread rich and the history of the term), how I was struggling, how I reached out, and how I remembered how “rich” I was and how large a part their love and acceptance of me had played a part in my healing.

❤

 

 

 

Sällskap från Gemenskap

Sällskap means “company/association” in Swedish, as in, “the company we keep” or, “thanks for the company”.

Gemenskap means “community/connection”, as in, “a community of people”.

An old friend of mine told me a few years ago that when seeking relationships, especially later in life, we had to start with an outer circle of acquaintances and, over time, grow closer to them so that our friendships became a deeper, inner circle.

So, for me, my growing relationships with others have come as a direct result of the connection to the community I am in.

And that – unbelievable to me looking at it two years into a new home in a new place – has me shaking my head in wonder, praise and thanksgiving because what once felt like a life OUTSIDE the circle has – and is – becoming a world with deeper connections and and the beginnings of an inner circle here on these tiny, tiny islands.

❤

 

Anymore

I’m sitting here on my sofa. There is a windstorm blowing through the islands – so strong that there has been advisories and warnings and such.

(My neighborhood kids told me about it as they came to my door last night to warn me. They were so earnest in their attempts to make sure my pots of cucumbers and tomatoes and flowers didn’t blow away that they each helped to carry them inside where they’d be safe. ❤ )

There’s something surreal, though, about looking at everything blowing like crazy this early afternoon, while the sky is blue, the sun is out and the wind is warm.

It’s a really unique type of storm. One that normally occurs in the winter but has shown up in August. 

Not what I came here to type, of course, but it sets the scene, or, as my mother would say, “I’m painting the walls” for what comes next.

“I don’t think I’m going to fall in love anymore.”  That’s the thought that came up and had me reaching for my laptop to type today’s post.

Triggered by yesterday’s conversation with a new-ish acquaintance about what we hoped God had planned for each of our lives, most of last night and much of this morning was spent with thoughts of “anymore” creating their own storm in my head.

I definitely want companionship, love, a partner, eventually a husband, but the ways and the whys of it aren’t what they used to be. 

A few key things that seem light and easy enough to obtain. Not necessarily ‘low expectations’ as much as simple ones.

Someone to live with. Someone to cook with and for. Someone to do things with. Someone to share life with. Someone to come home to. Someone to talk with, touch, or sit next to in comfortable silence. Someone to love me. Someone to love; enough.

Maybe stronger connections could grow from these light and simple things but if they didn’t, I realized I don’t think I’ll miss the deeper ‘in love’ stuff anymore. I don’t think I can let myself do that anymore.

In fact, I believe I am slightly averse to it. Guarded. Protective. 

How that squares up to Biblical stuff is a bit tough because I am aware that I want what I want but I’m only wanting it at a certain level and of a certain type. The Bible says in order to get that, I have to marry again.

And I’m acutely aware of my secret fear; I can’t guarantee anything.

Telling someone, “I want to be with you for as long as I can.” isn’t the same as vowing, “Till death do us part“. I know this.

But, to find someone who understands that I am so gun shy, so scared of being fenced in and stuck in something that could take a sudden or a long bad turn, and is okay with my aversion to life-long pledges would be a Godsend. 

Of course, I’d be happy to be married again, but until we get there, I need to not feel pressured to ‘get there’, if that makes sense.

“Can’t we just be???” was what I kept asking the last man I spent time with. I didn’t want to game out our future. I didn’t want to try and forecast or predetermine our course. I just wanted to live out our lives as they unfolded, day in and day out – together.

Which, grinning, is so hilarious because I used to be the exact opposite. To quote an old country song, “I wanted to know how the song would end before I started to dance”.

Now, though, things have changed.

I realize I just can’t be bothered to try and fit into someone else’s life or help them understand the ‘who’ of who I am, let alone enter into a relationship with promises of forever.

Now, I just want to have someone here. Low expectations. Low demands. Soft, light, solid, comfortable love. 

I’ve long let go of the idea of ‘soul mates’ and ‘perfect matches’. As 50 fast approaches, I don’t want and am not looking for what I used to just a year ago. That chapter of life has gone and I no longer have a desire to have another chance at getting it back.

I no longer hope someone will meet me in the ways I used to want/need to be met (mentally, emotionally, physically). Instead, all those needs have been shuffled amongst friends and God or walled off completely.

What I look for in a man these days is pretty low key. 

*shrugs*

Anymore, though, when it comes to the thought of love, like this odd and unexpected storm, I no longer even try to anticipate what will blow my way.

 

 

No Big Deal

would the world really come to an end? would someone really die?

(these, the questions that popped up as I left my cozy bed to type today’s/tonight’s post)

no. not really. hardly.

(those, the answers to the first set of parenthetical questions).

but, then again, if it’s “no big deal” then it’s also not that big of a deal to do, yes?