Recommencing

Your sense of hearing can be the strongest altered mood trigger. Listening to music, specifically.

Unplugged versions of messed up punk rock songs can be quite effective plunging one into a crying fit. If it's got a piano and a violin in it, if the lyrics hint at mental illness, if the singer has a plaintive voice, I am screwed.

This is what I choose to write about after a long sojourn in the non-blogging world. Middle-aged female depression. I couldn't help it. I happened to catch the tune as I was re-watching an episode of my favorite dystopian TV show today. It made me tear up.

Not true. I have been listening to it for days. This mood has been brewing. I downloaded four different versions of it, all covers. The original just never did it for me. I even made a playlist for my iPod click wheel. Wow, does that sound retro or what?

The rate at which things evolve, change, become obsolete is increasing exponentially right as I march inexorably into an age where it takes longer to find my bearings. Make no mistake, though, I always find them. I have so far escaped every culling unscathed. But as I see the world I know change to the point of discomfort, as a new generation takes over, all of a sudden I find myself in a mentor position, a walking encyclopedia, a benevolent veteran. I'm not sure I want to accept this role I am being cast for.

This is what I choose to write about after a long hiatus. Me, myself and I. Depression is selfish by force. When you are trapped in your own mind it is difficult to step outside the navel-gazing.

There is so much more I could be writing about. The economy of my native island is falling apart, thousands of my compatriots are leaving the place every month, jumping the puddle into the mainland, looking for jobs and the dream of a better life. Texas, my adopted land, is becoming a popular destination, growing at a faster rate than the top two favorite destinations of the diaspora. Of course, when your volumes are small to begin with, growth rates can look impressive, but we got nothing on Florida or New York yet.

If you happen to stumble upon this blog because you googled boricua in texas, I am sorry that I am not more informative. Or relevant. Search the many groups on Facebook that have sprung up to facilitate a sense of community in this state. It is a big state. Get ready to do a hell of a lot of driving.

I am not THE Boricua in Texas. I am just one of many.

Sometimes I dream of going back, when I'm old, when the kids are grown. I think all of us do at one time or another. Nostalgia is a powerful trap. If I go back I will feel out of place. My slang is hopelessly outdated; I have no clue what a yal is. People were not being propped against the wall, dressed up as boxers, or staged at the domino table for their wakes when I lived on the island. There was no tren urbano. Filiberto had not been killed yet. A woman had never been governor.

I have been here for quite a long time. The experience of living here has changed me. Being a single mom, getting married again, having another child, all that life lived has changed me. My job trajectory has certainly changed me, in ways that surprise me sometimes. I used to love a clever turn of phrase; but living in the land of elevator pitches and corporate buzzwords, I often grow impatient with languid prose.

I would have changed just as much if I was still on the island. Make no mistake. But I would have become a different person than who I am now. We like to think we are a singular consciousness drifting through life, but this is an illusion. We all change, every single day, no matter where we are. However, on the island I would have had the fantasy of a continuity of self, a shared national experience with my fellow boricuas.

So I choose to maintain a tenuous connection to my past life by filling my Facebook friends roster with high school classmates; even the mean girl who spread rumors about me having lice in middle school is my Facebook friend. But these people don't know anything about me. How could they? It has been so long since we were classmates. Many of them have also left the island, and may have nostalgia issues of their own to deal with. And that's OK. We are all trying to come to grips with our evolving lives. Sometimes all it takes to find our bearings is to write.

Tuesday Night

Tonight I have been obsessively listening to "November", by Max Richter. Beautiful, haunting.
If I could have anything in the world, I would ask for my daughter and her school orchestra to play this.

Needless to say, if you have read my blog in the past, when I start with the excessive replaying of intense music it's quite possible I may be struggling with depression again.

So, this blog still exists. Not long ago a friend of mine asked me to blog again. She missed me. Over the last couple of years I have thought a lot about what it used to be. When I started blogging back in 2006 it was exciting to have a personal space for whatever I wanted to say. Personal blogging was all the rage back then. Things have changed since then. It's all about Facebook now for my generation, and Instagram (and Snapchat, Kik and who knows what else) for our kids. There are still lots of blogs out there, but for many of us, posting on Facebook has largely replaced blogging as the way to connect to others, to express ourselves.

I'd like to use this space again.

I guess now you know where I stand on this whole Komen/Planned Parenthood issue.

I will never do the race again.

Blogging

It has been entirely too long since I have played with my blog.  I am sorry, whoever is left out there that still follows me in some way.

Anyway, all kidding aside, I miss my blog friends.  I miss Selma, and Meleah, and Paisley, Ixia and Josie, and everybody else whom I interacted with when I started blogging.  Some of them are Facebook friends, but I have totally lost track of others.  It's hard; sometimes I did not even know their real names, so I have no idea what became of them.

Rainy Morning

The last few days it's been rainy and gloomy where I live. This morning, on the way back from dropping off my kid at school, I was listening to "The Suburbs" by Arcade Fire. The song felt especially fitting, knowing it was inspired by The Woodlands, quite close to where I live.

I wished I had a camcorder with me on that short drive through my neighborhood. Everything felt dreary, from the overflowing trash bins sitting on the edge of every driveway (it's trash pickup day) to the line of cars in front of the school; the bike riders getting wet in the drizzle; a lone jogger in purple sweats, a black cat crouching in front of its house, a broken down Jeep Cherokee with a sticker advocating impeachment for Obama, the car that ran the stop sign in my street corner and almost hit me. I would have taken footage of all that and put it together with the song, its whiny melody the perfect soundtrack to a depressing morning.

Maybe I have SAD.

A commenter on a forum I am prone to frequent commiserated.  They sent hugs and said: On days like that, it's difficult to remind yourself that the real joy is in the journey.  And that is true.  On a different day the same things would not drive into a pit of emptiness and despair. There are days when I would see signs that life's quirks are all around us, even in what would appear to be the most common and mundane places. I would get reassurance that no matter what, life goes on and we are all in the same boat. My heart would warm at the sight of siblings walking together to school, or I would chuckle at the notion that a possum visits my neighbor's porch at night to munch on food she leaves there for the couple of street cats that roam our street. But I can't enjoy the journey today. Today I am too wrapped up in my own private dance with the Beast. 

 

 

Best wishes

Happy Winter Solstice, Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, Seasons Tidings, Happy Chanukah, Happy Kwanzaa, or whatever floats your boat!

Fire Station Visit

Isabel's Daisy troop visited a fire station this week, Klein Ladder 36, in Tomball.

Kindergarten Holiday Party

Isabel and her friends.

World Diabetes Day

Today is World Diabetes Day.  I am thinking of my dad today, who passed away due to complications from diabetes almost 21 years ago.  I am thinking of my mom, who is struggling with this now, seemingly triggered by other medicines sue needs to take to keep healthy.

I am also thinking of myself.  I had been living with a prediabetes diagnosis for two years, and early this year my doctor said it was time to do away with the "pre" and consider that I am a diabetic.   I am on Metformin to control my blood sugar, and for the most part it works.  But I still have some work to do to optimize my eating and physical activity habits.  For example, I need to try to get back to the daily exercise routine I had during the summer.  It is said that 30 minutes of walking every day can help keep type 2 diabetes under control.

The Big Blue Test (see video below) in an initiative to create awareness of the importance of physical activity to control blood sugar levels.  The test itself is fairly simple:

1- If you are a diabetic, test your blood sugar
2- Do some kind of physical activity for 14 minutes
3- Test your blood sugar again
4- Post your results here: http://bigbluetest.org/

I did it right this morning.  My initial value (30 minutes after breakfast) was 155.  After exercise, it was 131.




http://bigbluetest.org/
http://www.diabetes.org/
http://stopdiabetes.diabetes.org

New haircut for the tween