Embracing the Chaos...
3/31/2021
I sharpened this image too much...
It seems that this time of year is when I reawaken, along with the plants and trees outside, the insects, the returning of the migrating birds. I've been questioning my habits of sharing writing and photographs, of ideas and heartbreaks. I ceased the act for several months, and deleted all semblances of social media as a gift to myself, near the end of January. I've written more about it (see below). Why? Why do I feel the need to share these things? Living a life without constant documentation. If a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to photograph it, did it really fall? Did it make a sound? Did it even exist?
Following these months of introspection, going inside, into the darkness of the year, the darkness of the mind and heart, I've once again reemerged into the sunlight. Neither place is 'better' than the other, or more or less powerful, they just are. Without light, there are only shadows, or nothingness. They need each other to exist.
I've been reading When Women Were Birds by Terry Tempest Williams, and so much of the book speaks to me, speaks to what I'm struggling with right now. "To write requires an ego, a belief that what you say matters," writes Williams, and it leads me back to my questioning of myself, of these outpourings of words and images. Do these matter? I ask myself, and yet, almost immediately, my heart answers, yes. They are important to me, and that is what matters. To me. However, they may not matter to anyone else. That is also fine. These are the scraps from which I piece together my life - they are important to me, but one person's treasure is another person's trash.
"What's in those diaries then?"
"They aren't diaries."
"Whatever they are."
"Chaos, that's the point."
-Doris Lessing, The Golden Notebook
This I wrote in the middle of February, and held with the question of what to do with it until now. And now it's here:
It’s been a tumultuous start to the year. I vacillate between content and contempt. I try to slow down, to appreciate what I have, to know that I have enough, that I’m doing enough, and then the thoughts creep in. Unfinished (unstarted…) projects, built up daily tasks and chores, rushing around to and from school. Plotting the garden. Trying to figure out what exactly it is that I’m aiming for right now, what direction I want to guide my existence gently toward, and then feeling like I’ve fallen sideways onto a path that I didn’t want to be on, and wondering how to get back on track.
At the beginning of the year, I set out a list of focal points for the new year. Not ‘goals,’ necessarily, and not ‘resolutions,’ but an easy-to-follow list of areas I want to expend my energy on. If presented with an opportunity to add something – a new project, a job, a trip, etc. – I look at my list and decide which, if any, of the categories the addition would fall under. If I can’t find a suitable category, then I’m not undertaking the new project. My list is: Family + self-care; Garden – being outside; Photography and creative outlets; Education – including schooling for the boys and learning new things; and Giving Back. Despite being limited in the number of items, the list is quite comprehensive and broad. It is also already very full of the things that I am already doing, so new additions have to be very important, and fit a particular niche that was not already filled by something else. Because my time is limited, taking on something else is probably going to mean giving up something that I’m already working on, so it’s important that I make a thoughtful decision around what to include, or continue to devote energy to, in my life.
I gave myself the gift of giving up social media at the beginning of the year. I hadn’t been on Instagram since the beginning of October last year. Ironically, my last image that I posted was a ghostly self-portrait that I’d taken, the mood of moving into the dark part of the year. Our new water barrel had come packed in a giant plastic bag, and I decided to wear it, ghost apparel. In a few senses, it is an apt choice for that last, final post – I gave no notice to anyone that I was leaving the platform. Indeed, I wasn’t sure at the time, but was feeling more and more stress surrounding the ‘need’ to find things to post, and also comparing myself unfavorably with other people and their achievements. Despite having plenty of images and writings to put up, I would second guess myself constantly, questioning my motives and worth and would eventually end up posting nothing. Ironically, I ended up ‘ghosting’ everyone – no longer posting or viewing posts, leaving messages unanswered. I finally deleted my two accounts in January. I had a residual Facebook account, which was inactive, and I was not able to use it due to conflicts with verifying my identity. (Facebook wanted me to upload my birth certificate to ‘prove’ it was me, and I decided they already had enough of my data, so I refused.) I was able to log in and finally delete that account this year, as well.
The last ‘social media’ sort-of site I had been using was Gurushots, and I deleted my account there in December. I don’t remember when I started my account with them. Not long enough ago to have the ‘Pioneer’ badge for accounts created when the site was in its infancy, but long enough ago to have worked my way up to the second to highest tier of ‘achievement’ and then take a four year hiatus. I returned to quite a different platform (if at all interested, you can read about it here). Honestly, it was primarily the Teams addition that made me lose interest. That and I achieved the ‘Guru’ status within the first month of returning. From there it was sort of a lack of excitement or drive I’d felt up to that point. I didn’t really care once I’d gotten it. There are so many ‘gurus’ on there now anyway, there’s not much prestige in it. I was momentarily excited about running my own challenge – thinking I could pick an interesting theme – but now the themes are pre-selected, and it’s basically another photo challenge, where gurus submit cover photos for the theme, and then they are selected to run the challenge if their photo is selected. The team I had joined was interesting at first. Consisting of a group of us from all around the world, I learned new tactics and had some interesting conversations. It grew tedious, however, due to the time differences and language translation. Sometimes half the members would converse in French, because it was a common language between them (countries of origin: Belgium, Serbia, and Tunisia). I didn’t mind, and would translate and thought I might pick up some French in the meantime, but it grew to be a contentious thing among some of the other members, not using English, in the chat, and eventually some people left due to funny complaints or disagreements. The changes to the site felt mostly like ways to keep people active on the site. You know, your team is counting on you! (So buy more swaps, or whatever. I never did buy anything from the site, playing only on what I’d win in challenges.) I left the team and for a while thought I’d keep my account and play, without a team, but in explaining myself to the team, talking about why I was leaving, I realized I had a rather unhealthy view of the game and was spending quite a bit of time on there, when I should be doing other things. Also, it had started to affect my photography, and not necessarily in a good way. Since horizontal photos are favored in the contests, I began shooting only horizontally, even when a vertical composition would have been a better choice. I decided I’d quit the game and not have that influence over my photos. I didn’t feel like the game was helping me grow as a photographer, anyway, just taking up a lot of my time because I’d go through my old photos over and over to find ones that would fit the contest theme rather than go out and make new images.
After all that, having been without any extraneous ‘social media’ for a few months now, I feel fine. I don’t feel like I’m missing out on things. If someone wants to share something with me, they send me a text, or an email, or a letter in the mail (!). I don’t have to doom scroll through random posts from acquaintances, or worse, strangers, and wonder if I should alter my life in some way to better compete with whatever it is they were showcasing at the moment. I feel better about myself, actually feeling beautiful and able to look at myself in the mirror with acceptance, and appreciating the things I have.
That time that I would have spent on those platforms has been gifted back to me, and instead I’m using it to read more books and take online courses. I just learned about pruning our trees properly yesterday, thanks to an online class.
It’s interesting how certain books can find you at just the right time, to teach you something you needed to know, or make you aware of some connection that’s been there the whole time, but you needed to read it from someone else to realize it. I’ve been reading Louise Erdrich lately. I started with The Night Watchman, and loved it, so I tried to find more of her work. I’m currently in the middle of The Blue Jay’s Dance. I got it because it was touted as a book about the early years of motherhood, and it is, but it is really a very personal volume depicting her struggles with relationships at that time in her life. I can identify with her feelings of frustration, of feeling trapped at times. The description of planning a garden, one that in reality never quite materializes as closely to the one in my mind, was particularly funny to me, as it’s exactly where I’m at with my garden right now. The planning of the theoretical garden, with the overzealous ordering of seeds, the mapping, the marking of the calendar what will be planted when. Like Erdrich, I will always retreat to that perfect mind garden in times of distress, and it looks nothing like my little plot of land that we’ve been working since we moved into this house, almost 11 years ago. I still have the hope, each late winter, that some of the additions of the upcoming summer will withstand the struggle of survival and begin to thrive and multiply in my yard. I know that at some point, far in the future, my yard will begin to resemble that ideal mind garden I’ve sown over the years.
The slowing down happens easily, sometimes. I was sick for a week, and had no choice but to slow down. I slept for a whole Saturday, while my husband took the kids out to let me rest. Over winter break, I had an entire list in my head of all these wonderful things I’d get done (because having two kids home all day would definitely provide more opportunities to do those things that I’d not had the chance to get around to over the previous months with school work and such). I got, literally, nothing on the list done. I did give myself the freedom to watch two movies by myself, alone, in the bedroom with headphones. It was enjoyable. I tried not to be distracted by ideas of things I ‘should’ be doing instead. As school started back up, we began walking to the school in the mornings again. We still had been walking mostly every afternoon, but the mornings had been taken over by driving, falling into the idea that there was a slight advantage of having 15 more minutes if we take the car instead. I’d scrape the ice off the windows and we’d go. It was very harried, despite the thought it would be time saving. Walking again in the mornings, even in the very cold mornings, like this one, where the snow was blowing, and I had to brush it off my child before sending him through the entry doors, are much more peaceful and relaxed. I see the birds out and about. Enjoy the assault on my senses. The cigarette, still smoking, thrown out of a car that passed by before us, the tendrils of whitish smoke contrasting with the dark shadows of the asphalt. The grackles, sending screechy songs out into the chilly morning, sitting at the tops of the giant pecan trees at the end of our street, stretching out their tails in the morning sun as it hits the treetops.
Following these months of introspection, going inside, into the darkness of the year, the darkness of the mind and heart, I've once again reemerged into the sunlight. Neither place is 'better' than the other, or more or less powerful, they just are. Without light, there are only shadows, or nothingness. They need each other to exist.
I've been reading When Women Were Birds by Terry Tempest Williams, and so much of the book speaks to me, speaks to what I'm struggling with right now. "To write requires an ego, a belief that what you say matters," writes Williams, and it leads me back to my questioning of myself, of these outpourings of words and images. Do these matter? I ask myself, and yet, almost immediately, my heart answers, yes. They are important to me, and that is what matters. To me. However, they may not matter to anyone else. That is also fine. These are the scraps from which I piece together my life - they are important to me, but one person's treasure is another person's trash.
"What's in those diaries then?"
"They aren't diaries."
"Whatever they are."
"Chaos, that's the point."
-Doris Lessing, The Golden Notebook
This I wrote in the middle of February, and held with the question of what to do with it until now. And now it's here:
It’s been a tumultuous start to the year. I vacillate between content and contempt. I try to slow down, to appreciate what I have, to know that I have enough, that I’m doing enough, and then the thoughts creep in. Unfinished (unstarted…) projects, built up daily tasks and chores, rushing around to and from school. Plotting the garden. Trying to figure out what exactly it is that I’m aiming for right now, what direction I want to guide my existence gently toward, and then feeling like I’ve fallen sideways onto a path that I didn’t want to be on, and wondering how to get back on track.
At the beginning of the year, I set out a list of focal points for the new year. Not ‘goals,’ necessarily, and not ‘resolutions,’ but an easy-to-follow list of areas I want to expend my energy on. If presented with an opportunity to add something – a new project, a job, a trip, etc. – I look at my list and decide which, if any, of the categories the addition would fall under. If I can’t find a suitable category, then I’m not undertaking the new project. My list is: Family + self-care; Garden – being outside; Photography and creative outlets; Education – including schooling for the boys and learning new things; and Giving Back. Despite being limited in the number of items, the list is quite comprehensive and broad. It is also already very full of the things that I am already doing, so new additions have to be very important, and fit a particular niche that was not already filled by something else. Because my time is limited, taking on something else is probably going to mean giving up something that I’m already working on, so it’s important that I make a thoughtful decision around what to include, or continue to devote energy to, in my life.
I gave myself the gift of giving up social media at the beginning of the year. I hadn’t been on Instagram since the beginning of October last year. Ironically, my last image that I posted was a ghostly self-portrait that I’d taken, the mood of moving into the dark part of the year. Our new water barrel had come packed in a giant plastic bag, and I decided to wear it, ghost apparel. In a few senses, it is an apt choice for that last, final post – I gave no notice to anyone that I was leaving the platform. Indeed, I wasn’t sure at the time, but was feeling more and more stress surrounding the ‘need’ to find things to post, and also comparing myself unfavorably with other people and their achievements. Despite having plenty of images and writings to put up, I would second guess myself constantly, questioning my motives and worth and would eventually end up posting nothing. Ironically, I ended up ‘ghosting’ everyone – no longer posting or viewing posts, leaving messages unanswered. I finally deleted my two accounts in January. I had a residual Facebook account, which was inactive, and I was not able to use it due to conflicts with verifying my identity. (Facebook wanted me to upload my birth certificate to ‘prove’ it was me, and I decided they already had enough of my data, so I refused.) I was able to log in and finally delete that account this year, as well.
The last ‘social media’ sort-of site I had been using was Gurushots, and I deleted my account there in December. I don’t remember when I started my account with them. Not long enough ago to have the ‘Pioneer’ badge for accounts created when the site was in its infancy, but long enough ago to have worked my way up to the second to highest tier of ‘achievement’ and then take a four year hiatus. I returned to quite a different platform (if at all interested, you can read about it here). Honestly, it was primarily the Teams addition that made me lose interest. That and I achieved the ‘Guru’ status within the first month of returning. From there it was sort of a lack of excitement or drive I’d felt up to that point. I didn’t really care once I’d gotten it. There are so many ‘gurus’ on there now anyway, there’s not much prestige in it. I was momentarily excited about running my own challenge – thinking I could pick an interesting theme – but now the themes are pre-selected, and it’s basically another photo challenge, where gurus submit cover photos for the theme, and then they are selected to run the challenge if their photo is selected. The team I had joined was interesting at first. Consisting of a group of us from all around the world, I learned new tactics and had some interesting conversations. It grew tedious, however, due to the time differences and language translation. Sometimes half the members would converse in French, because it was a common language between them (countries of origin: Belgium, Serbia, and Tunisia). I didn’t mind, and would translate and thought I might pick up some French in the meantime, but it grew to be a contentious thing among some of the other members, not using English, in the chat, and eventually some people left due to funny complaints or disagreements. The changes to the site felt mostly like ways to keep people active on the site. You know, your team is counting on you! (So buy more swaps, or whatever. I never did buy anything from the site, playing only on what I’d win in challenges.) I left the team and for a while thought I’d keep my account and play, without a team, but in explaining myself to the team, talking about why I was leaving, I realized I had a rather unhealthy view of the game and was spending quite a bit of time on there, when I should be doing other things. Also, it had started to affect my photography, and not necessarily in a good way. Since horizontal photos are favored in the contests, I began shooting only horizontally, even when a vertical composition would have been a better choice. I decided I’d quit the game and not have that influence over my photos. I didn’t feel like the game was helping me grow as a photographer, anyway, just taking up a lot of my time because I’d go through my old photos over and over to find ones that would fit the contest theme rather than go out and make new images.
After all that, having been without any extraneous ‘social media’ for a few months now, I feel fine. I don’t feel like I’m missing out on things. If someone wants to share something with me, they send me a text, or an email, or a letter in the mail (!). I don’t have to doom scroll through random posts from acquaintances, or worse, strangers, and wonder if I should alter my life in some way to better compete with whatever it is they were showcasing at the moment. I feel better about myself, actually feeling beautiful and able to look at myself in the mirror with acceptance, and appreciating the things I have.
That time that I would have spent on those platforms has been gifted back to me, and instead I’m using it to read more books and take online courses. I just learned about pruning our trees properly yesterday, thanks to an online class.
It’s interesting how certain books can find you at just the right time, to teach you something you needed to know, or make you aware of some connection that’s been there the whole time, but you needed to read it from someone else to realize it. I’ve been reading Louise Erdrich lately. I started with The Night Watchman, and loved it, so I tried to find more of her work. I’m currently in the middle of The Blue Jay’s Dance. I got it because it was touted as a book about the early years of motherhood, and it is, but it is really a very personal volume depicting her struggles with relationships at that time in her life. I can identify with her feelings of frustration, of feeling trapped at times. The description of planning a garden, one that in reality never quite materializes as closely to the one in my mind, was particularly funny to me, as it’s exactly where I’m at with my garden right now. The planning of the theoretical garden, with the overzealous ordering of seeds, the mapping, the marking of the calendar what will be planted when. Like Erdrich, I will always retreat to that perfect mind garden in times of distress, and it looks nothing like my little plot of land that we’ve been working since we moved into this house, almost 11 years ago. I still have the hope, each late winter, that some of the additions of the upcoming summer will withstand the struggle of survival and begin to thrive and multiply in my yard. I know that at some point, far in the future, my yard will begin to resemble that ideal mind garden I’ve sown over the years.
The slowing down happens easily, sometimes. I was sick for a week, and had no choice but to slow down. I slept for a whole Saturday, while my husband took the kids out to let me rest. Over winter break, I had an entire list in my head of all these wonderful things I’d get done (because having two kids home all day would definitely provide more opportunities to do those things that I’d not had the chance to get around to over the previous months with school work and such). I got, literally, nothing on the list done. I did give myself the freedom to watch two movies by myself, alone, in the bedroom with headphones. It was enjoyable. I tried not to be distracted by ideas of things I ‘should’ be doing instead. As school started back up, we began walking to the school in the mornings again. We still had been walking mostly every afternoon, but the mornings had been taken over by driving, falling into the idea that there was a slight advantage of having 15 more minutes if we take the car instead. I’d scrape the ice off the windows and we’d go. It was very harried, despite the thought it would be time saving. Walking again in the mornings, even in the very cold mornings, like this one, where the snow was blowing, and I had to brush it off my child before sending him through the entry doors, are much more peaceful and relaxed. I see the birds out and about. Enjoy the assault on my senses. The cigarette, still smoking, thrown out of a car that passed by before us, the tendrils of whitish smoke contrasting with the dark shadows of the asphalt. The grackles, sending screechy songs out into the chilly morning, sitting at the tops of the giant pecan trees at the end of our street, stretching out their tails in the morning sun as it hits the treetops.
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