Gina

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So, I wrote a post called “we’re all we’ve got” on Xmas Eve, and I put it up here. It’s personal, vulnerable, and still fairly rough. I talk a lot about relationships, break-ups, building family, disability, and what we call community. I was a little scared to put it out into the world, but I’m also proud of it.

And I want to add this addendum: I especially want to say a humbled, happy Thank You to all of the beloved friends who have been my rocks through what has been one of my hardest years to date. But I also want to say thank you to those of you who are not as close to me, but who have still stepped up for me in amazing ways. Everyone who contributed to my health fundraiser over the summer, whether financially or just by spreading the word. Everyone who comes to Girl Talk and Sex Workers’ Writing Workshop. The extended St. James Infirmary and Center for Sex & Culture families. My amazing students in Writing On The Body this semester. Dodie Bellamy & Donna de la Perriere for being amazing professors & mentors in  my graduate program. Everyone who’s offered up support and connections and laughs and, yes, love in the hardest times. You matter. It matters. I’m so humbled, and so grateful.

Also? I ended up having the best Xmas I have ever had as an adult this year, even as I spent much of it home alone and sick. I rested up enough to get to have some lovely, low-key, and downright magical times with old friends. I’ve spent the past few days in general feeling held, buoyed up, beloved, and cherished. Like I’m building up reserve and energy for The Next Big Awesome Thing. It is a great way to feel at the end of this year and the beginning of a new one. And it couldn’t have happened without all the people I hold dear.

Grazie mille, beloveds. You really do mean the world to me.

♥

October is always a reflective time for me. This year is no exception. Between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur (I’m not Jewish, but both the New Year and the day of reflection/atonement elements of those holidays are meaningful to me) and Samhain and Halloween and All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day/Day of the Dead/Dia de los Muertos, well… There’s a lot that gets stirred up just from all that, let alone from looking back at where I was a year ago.

I’m feeling bittersweet, wistful. This afternoon I looked through all my journals from this time last year. And it was, as I remembered, hardly a picnic for me: I was dealing with money & school stress, my landlords were being douchebags and stalling about making urgent repairs on my apartment, I was dealing with a lot of nasty health stuff, and I ended up getting diagnosed with fibromyalgia. Not everything I was dealing with was Hella Awesome, by any means. I have no desire to look back on This Time Last Year with rose-colored glasses.

But? I was falling in love with a sweet, beautiful boy, a guy who made me feel like I’d won The Boyfriend Lottery. I was having lots of fun amazing Love Adventures & the best sex of my life. I was with someone who made me feel like The Cherished Pink Cupcake Princess. Who reassured me, over and over, that he was steady and solid and in love with me and not going anywhere. All of that made even my worst days feel sweet & good. There was a soft place to land. After years of being unpartnered, opening myself up to A. and trusting that he wasn’t just gonna disappear was a huge shift for me.

And, well… Then he eventually did leave. I’m really only now starting to recover from the huge & brutal shock of having my steadiest person vanish. And of course there were reasons, very legitimate reasons, for him to leave. And as sad and wistful as I might be right now, I’m uninterested in demonizing him for leaving. People do what they have to do. I get it. But it doesn’t mean that it doesn’t hurt, and it doesn’t mean I don’t wish it was different.

All I can say right now is that I miss him, and that shit feels hard. Not insurmountable, and not in crisis. But hard. And wishing it could all be different while simultaneously knowing that it can’t be different is a profoundly uncomfortable way to feel.

I know that time is really the only thing that heals feelings like this. And I have books to read, papers to grade, a motherfucking novel to write, and, most importantly — a big & interesting & exciting life to tend to. I know that I’ll get through this with time. I just wish I could press a fast-forward button right now.

Onward & upward. This too shall pass.

So, I’m ostensibly in Portland on Writing Retreat. I’ve been here since last Tuesday night. For the first days I was here, especially considering how hard the heartbreak was hitting me in SF and how badly I thumped the weekend before I left due to a fibro flare, I was willing to just let myself settle in and rest. And a lot of my sad around the break-up actually alleviated. A change of scenery has done me really good in a lot of ways.

But now it is the start of a new week, and it is really time to Get The Hell To Work. And the grief is starting to come back in waves (as grief does, I suppose). I’m feeling pretty flooded with emotions — which I guess is actually normal? But honestly, a large part of me is just like AAUGH I DO NOT HAVE TIME FOR THIS HEARTBROKEN SHIT, I HAVE A FUCKING BOOK TO WRITE! I am ON DEADLINE, and time is of the utmost essence here. I can’t actually afford to just fuck around moping while I’m in the Pacific Northwest, as much as my hurt heart might really WANT to.

This is also complicated by the fact that I am a perfectionist, and I have a tendency to put work before things like sleeping and eating. I know that I usually hold myself to hella unreasonable standards. But I also need some standards here, you know? I’m trying to strike a balance between being kind to myself but also not sliding so deep into The Intense Emo McDoomyface Sadness that I don’t actually get anything done.

Anyway. Have any of you ever had to deal with intense heartbreak plus A MAJOR FUCKING DEADLINE plus a tendency to be perfectionistic and overwork yourself? Dudes, how do you deal? Advice is very much appreciated here.

One idea I had is to set myself a goal of getting out X number of words/day of the novel, just for this week. So that even if I don’t write a whole chapter or story or whatnot this week, I’m at least getting little chunks written bit by bit. And then maybe as I feel more able to work on stuff, I can step my goals up.

Anyway. Thank you for listening, tumblrverse. <3