Mmmmm......welcome back. Been a bumpy patch. Details don't matter- I won't add more chapters to the book. It's time to start clearing the bookshelf. More about that later.

The past 6 months. Lessons. Pain. Nose against the window. Sharpness of reality. The box closing in tighter and tighter. Alot of fear. The whys, hows, wheres and whens fell away and I was left with OUCH. And I cannot seem to shake that ouchiness. Too pokey. Too deep. So tools I didn't want to turn to became the only choice I could see- which seemed like another failure because I couldn't beat the darkness.
Each time I muster up enough momentum to try to scale my perceived wall, I end up in my puddle again.

Today...a bit of a ray. A different view. An alternate perspective that I hope to use as a key.
Picture, if you will, an old library. The sort you'd see in a stately British estate. Wood bookshelves, carved woodwork, rows of books with ornate bindings. Dark colors- stuffy and boring, if you ask me.
At a closer glance, each book has a title.
Each title is one of my stories. By stories I don't mean a tale. By story I mean a memory line. An identity, a 'hat', a pair of glasses I wear or have wore at different points in my life that defined me.
See, for me....there is no ME. I'm just which book I pick that day. Am I the little girl who couldn't open her apple juice can, or am I the bubbly cheerleader. Am I the victim Mommy or the frustrated artist....the PTO mom or the girl who loves to dance on tables. So many books, so many stories whose chapters keep growing for the mere fact that survival has meant the morning must begin with choosing a book.
The books don't fit, the titles don't work, but if I don't pick one in the morning, I am invisible.

But today. Today, one of my special angels, D, ( because she would kill me for using her name :), showed me something interesting. The books feel like leashes to me. But the books are just that...paper made from bark. Bark that disintegrates. So each book comes off the shelf and one by one, the pages fray, the words fade, the binding split and the books slowly melt away....leaving empty spots on a bookshelf.
But wait.....what's this??
If you push on that heavy, wood stuffy bookcase- the bookcase wall opens and spins!!
And behind----is my lost imagination. My world of whimsy I locked away so long ago. The little girl's world where all was available and each day held endless possiblity. Yesterday's disappointments or sadness was just that...yesterdays. No stories built upon them. There is always today and now. And there is space and air. So which way do I choose to turn today? What will I try? What can I be? Each moment doesn't have to be built on another...they are just free standing because they come from an "I".
I see colors and polka dots. I see Alice in Wonderland, Willy Wonka, Mackenzie Childs- patterns, shapes, sizes, textures.
And now I finally understand where my inspiration for my work comes from...even where it takes me days to eek out one piece from the depth of my darkness.

Pretty cool, eh?