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averygoodun42And my garden rather overfloweth. Especially with kale and salad greens. However, the chard I picked for dinner tonight was truly outstanding, so much yayness there. And the 2 pound zucchini I picked ain't bad, either. Doesn't compare with the five pound zucchini I picked up at the CSA today, but then, I wasn't around to nurture it, was I?
It was kinda nice making dinner only from things that were super fresh. Even the beef was freshly ground.
It's also neat to notice the difference regions have on produce. Like my chard, for instance. I had fresh, fresh chard in BC while I was there - one night it was picked right before cooking. But it wasn't as good as my chard. Their strawberries, however, beat ours hands down. Their butternut squash is almost to die for, while ours is meh, but our acorn squash is da bomb.
Granted, this year it's unfair to compare produce because they haven't had summer yet. God, that was wonderful... (Did Igloat about mention I missed that horrible heat wave? Yeah. It was 60 degrees and raining where I was. Fabulous!)
But it's good to be home.
While I was there, I underwent two very long EMDR sessions. I am still processing a bunch of what came up, so I can't say how useful it was just yet. However, as I was driving somewhere with my mum the other day, we were going down a big hill with an amazing view, and I realized one of the reasons why I don't feel the urge to move there now as I did last year: I'm not dying.
I'm sure I've mentioned before that the Pacific Northwest is my soul's home. It is a place were I can, for lack of a better description, feel my spirit moving within me, and still feel at peace. I feel grounded there in a way I don't anywhere else. It is not comfortable, but it is rejuvenating.
This trip was as rejuvenating as previous trips. The scenery was as beautiful (or more) as I remembered. The animals more welcoming (I saw my first pod of porpoises. Ever!). There was magic in the air, sea, ground and light. Creativity swirled around me, and it was only the lack of time and supplies that kept me from painting up a storm.
It was perfect.
And yet, I felt a slight revulsion at the thought of moving there. There was no impulse to search out a head-hunter for Geoff, or even look at the help wanted ads. Any time the thought of trying to move there came up, I couldn't take the visible pros into account.
I also didn't feel the Guardians' presence this trip. Well, only once, anyway, and I had to concentrate for that to happen. The last trip they were there, front and center, the entire time. They were almost frightening in their power. And their call.
I don't know if I mentioned how, for a year or two prior to the meningitis, I felt like I was dying. It wasn't just depression either, although I doubt it would have shown up in any medical test they could have thought of. I could feel life seeping out of me. Out of my body. It was kinda discomfiting. Stressful, even.
But there was nothing technically wrong. Yeah, I was more tired, and a little achier at times, a bit more prone to colds, but it wasn't even enough to go to my rheumatologist to get blood-work done. All it would have shown was a slightly elevated SED rate, though not a flare, and the advice would have been to exercise more. Which is good advice, granted, but I don't think it would have helped.
And last year, when I went to BC, I felt so strongly that I needed to be there. It was where I belonged. And Right Then!
And it wasn't disappointing when Geoff stalled and hemmed and hawed about looking into the job possibilities that were there, it was almost devastating.
I needed to be there.
And I think, looking back on it, it was because I needed to go home to die. (Not that I would have died, necessarily. They have excellent healthcare up there, no matter what the US media reports.) My soul was reaching out for home and peace.
Now, of course there are other ways of looking at that. It could be that the sense of dying really was all in my mind and I just opened the physical levee gates with all the levels of stress I put myself through last year. Unhappiness has been proven to be bad for the health.
But that would discount the sense of myself that I have learned through the years. Because I do know myself. Quite well, actually. And I especially know my body. That's one of the reasons I survived the meningitis - I knew that the pain in my head was going to kill me, and that I needed treatment immediately.
*shrug* Or maybe I just have a better sense of my mortality than some.
Anyway, I am glad to be home. I don't know how long we will be here in New England, though it's likely to be for the next couple of years at least, but it is nice to finally feel free to make this my home, fully and completely.
It was kinda nice making dinner only from things that were super fresh. Even the beef was freshly ground.
It's also neat to notice the difference regions have on produce. Like my chard, for instance. I had fresh, fresh chard in BC while I was there - one night it was picked right before cooking. But it wasn't as good as my chard. Their strawberries, however, beat ours hands down. Their butternut squash is almost to die for, while ours is meh, but our acorn squash is da bomb.
Granted, this year it's unfair to compare produce because they haven't had summer yet. God, that was wonderful... (Did I
But it's good to be home.
While I was there, I underwent two very long EMDR sessions. I am still processing a bunch of what came up, so I can't say how useful it was just yet. However, as I was driving somewhere with my mum the other day, we were going down a big hill with an amazing view, and I realized one of the reasons why I don't feel the urge to move there now as I did last year: I'm not dying.
I'm sure I've mentioned before that the Pacific Northwest is my soul's home. It is a place were I can, for lack of a better description, feel my spirit moving within me, and still feel at peace. I feel grounded there in a way I don't anywhere else. It is not comfortable, but it is rejuvenating.
This trip was as rejuvenating as previous trips. The scenery was as beautiful (or more) as I remembered. The animals more welcoming (I saw my first pod of porpoises. Ever!). There was magic in the air, sea, ground and light. Creativity swirled around me, and it was only the lack of time and supplies that kept me from painting up a storm.
It was perfect.
And yet, I felt a slight revulsion at the thought of moving there. There was no impulse to search out a head-hunter for Geoff, or even look at the help wanted ads. Any time the thought of trying to move there came up, I couldn't take the visible pros into account.
I also didn't feel the Guardians' presence this trip. Well, only once, anyway, and I had to concentrate for that to happen. The last trip they were there, front and center, the entire time. They were almost frightening in their power. And their call.
I don't know if I mentioned how, for a year or two prior to the meningitis, I felt like I was dying. It wasn't just depression either, although I doubt it would have shown up in any medical test they could have thought of. I could feel life seeping out of me. Out of my body. It was kinda discomfiting. Stressful, even.
But there was nothing technically wrong. Yeah, I was more tired, and a little achier at times, a bit more prone to colds, but it wasn't even enough to go to my rheumatologist to get blood-work done. All it would have shown was a slightly elevated SED rate, though not a flare, and the advice would have been to exercise more. Which is good advice, granted, but I don't think it would have helped.
And last year, when I went to BC, I felt so strongly that I needed to be there. It was where I belonged. And Right Then!
And it wasn't disappointing when Geoff stalled and hemmed and hawed about looking into the job possibilities that were there, it was almost devastating.
I needed to be there.
And I think, looking back on it, it was because I needed to go home to die. (Not that I would have died, necessarily. They have excellent healthcare up there, no matter what the US media reports.) My soul was reaching out for home and peace.
Now, of course there are other ways of looking at that. It could be that the sense of dying really was all in my mind and I just opened the physical levee gates with all the levels of stress I put myself through last year. Unhappiness has been proven to be bad for the health.
But that would discount the sense of myself that I have learned through the years. Because I do know myself. Quite well, actually. And I especially know my body. That's one of the reasons I survived the meningitis - I knew that the pain in my head was going to kill me, and that I needed treatment immediately.
*shrug* Or maybe I just have a better sense of my mortality than some.
Anyway, I am glad to be home. I don't know how long we will be here in New England, though it's likely to be for the next couple of years at least, but it is nice to finally feel free to make this my home, fully and completely.
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no subject
Date: 2011-08-03 03:01 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-03 03:57 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-03 04:30 am (UTC)I'm so glad your trip helped you to make those realisations, and that you seem to be energised now that you're home. :)