Ahhhh, up before dawn again. But it’s ok today, I slept well last night, for 7 ½ hours. I am good to go. And, I have a lot to do today, so that’s a good thing.

I’m trying to find a used highback booster seat for my son’s girlfriend’s daughter, who I will just call his step-daughter. I went to see one yesterday but it was for up to 40 lbs, and she’s 50. She legally doesn’t need one here in FL, but my son said her mother is the car seat nazi, so she does. I think I’ve found one though. Going this morning to look at it. New ones are expensive and I am not gonna spend $60 on a car seat that will be used for a week. Without the high back they are about $20. But this used one I found on FB market, for $20. So I’ll take it. If he doesn’t sell it before I get there.

Yesterday my hot water heater pilot light went out twice. Luckily, the last time it did this, I watched the guy re-light it and wrote the instructions in my phone. So, while I called Duke Energy who I pay $5 a month for insurance for the hot water heater, I got it started both times by myself. And it’s still going this morning. But I asked to have someone come look at it anyway because I don’t want it going out when I have company.

I’ve also been working on the sound healing reconfiguration, and I was able to get to a run-through yesterday. Today my friend who plays the Tibetan bowls at the sound healing is coming over and we will go through it together to see how we do. I’m feeling pretty confident that I can perform it by myself though, with minimal help from my friend. That’s a good thing. She loves doing it, but has trouble with the length of time, an hour, sitting.

I spent the afternoon on my deck. It was a wonderful FL day, 80°, sunny, a little tropical. I went out to read, and did some reading, but then the phone, lol. Besides friends FB messaging me, texts, messages from the guy with the car seat, I had a long convo with my sister who just came back from a 5-day cruise. It was the first I’d talked to her about the break-up. I was concerned that her hubby would be sad, because he got along with Dan and seemed to like him, but really, all is well. He is good with it, probably mostly because I am. But whatever.

It’s difficult when you break up with someone who has been in your life every day, every minute for a long time. People don’t know how to treat you when you’re in the same place separately, because we have the same friends. Dan said something to me about so-and-so was “your friend first.” What does that have to do with anything? They are friends, they will stay friends unless they don’t, but I won’t be involved. I mean, seriously, every friend he has here is someone he met through me. He brought nothing in the way of people to that relationship. I am glad though that he does have friends because isolation doesn’t lead to a good place. Last I heard he’s still going to the play/dinner theater this weekend that my BFF down here is in. I am fine with it, as long as I don’t have to sit at his table, and since the tables are 8 people, and we have about 15, we will have 2 tables. He can sit at one, I’ll sit at the other with my high school girlfriend who’s visiting and my friends here.

Then the next day, Monday, 2 more girls from high school are coming, and apparently want to have a “slumber party” at my house. It will be fun, but exhausting. We did this once before, and my one bathroom with 4 people staying in it will be a challenge. I think they’ll be leaving the next day to go to one of their sister’s place a couple hours from here. They are making the rounds. I think I’ll put a firelog in the firepit if it’s nice enough to sit outside.

I am moving along nicely. I miss him a little less each day, and also am a little less angry with him, and more feeling sorry for him. I know why he can’t give of himself. But knowing doesn’t excuse it. If I am ever going to have someone in my life again, which at this point I’m thinking not, they will be able to communicate with me, hear me, acknowledge me, and not argue with me.  I can do that I think. I like to have intimate conversations about who a person is. I’m sick of dealing with someone else’s defensive posture when all I want is to be heard. I’m pretty positive that no one will ever live with me again. I am not inclined to deal with someone else and all their idiosyncracies full time.  I need my space.  Alone but not lonely.

Whatever. It is what it is. I’m going for my 2^nd cup of coffee, and watch the sunrise, which it will be doing in about 20 min. Love and light to all.

This morning’s “death” set me back. For about an hour. Not bad. I was angry not hurt, but I managed to get through it without adding to the garbage that was out there already.

I’ve been trying to take the old gong stand apart and down for about a week now.  I guess it was my adrenalin, but I went at it like a bear an hour after I threw him out of the house and got it into pieces small enough to stash under my bed for the time being. I was then able to put my living room back into the shape it was in before I had to rearrange it to accommodate 2 gongs. Then I set up the table that some of the other instruments sit on when performing. I sat down and began playing, first the bowls, then the gong came in low and I did that for a while. A long while. Then I realized I could play the ocean drum, and the gong flumies. Those are little rubber mallets, really superballs on a stick, that make the most amazing sounds. The smaller the diameter of the ball, the higher pitch sound. Most people think of them as the whale sounds, because they really do sound like whales keening. I have 5 different sized ones, and they sounded amazing with the ocean drum going at the same time. It was so soothing for me. Healing myself while I played.

When I decided I needed to eat, since I’d eaten an apple since coffee in the morning, I put it all down, let the vibrations fade and most of the intense anger was gone. I realized what a sad. solitary and broken life he had lived, and that his attacks were really about himself. Every time I wanted to tell him off, I started writing it out and then deleted it. So, I got it out of me, but didn’t add to the self-loathing than I’m pretty sure he already is deep into. Because in the end he will hear in his head the voices from his youth that told him he was always at fault for everything. Even though he is, lol, in this case.

No, not really. I believe that people do the best they can according to their level of consciousness at the time. I feel sorry for him, in the end, because, well, just because.  I don’t need to list the reasons. But the point is, the gongs not only heal those meditating while I play, but they heal me, to play them. It was a lovely thing. I feel blessed to have that gong in my house, and the bowls and the rest of those wonderful instruments.

Because I managed to get through that, I was able to make myself a good dinner. I’ve walked a mile and a half for two days in a row. I’m determined to get back to the way I was when I moved down here. I’ve had a rough go of it for the last many months. Wrecked my back, which seems ok now. Went on the cruise from hell, came back and was sick for 3 weeks. My health finally seems stable. The negative influence, which grew and grew until I was weighed down by has been eliminated. My knees crumbled under it. I’m straightening back up. Making new friends. Really working at reconfiguring my sound healing so I can do it with less. We all know less can be more. Maybe it was all in the grand design. I think it might come off better without him. Not to be mean. Honestly. But he never bought into the healing, and I think without that vibe from someone who is not all in, completely, it just might be more effective.

Yesterday when I was out walking, I stopped into a little shop full of handmade goods. It’s new, and I’d heard good things about it. I was the only customer in the store, and the owner was at the counter with her laptop. I asked her about the jewelry, was it local, handmade. I asked if maybe I could show her some of my work sometime. She said, sure bring it in. Then I asked her if she had ever heard sound healing at the beach. She looked at me for a moment and then said, “OMG! That was YOU!” I smiled and asked if she’d been there. She went on about how amazing it had been, and how it changed her, the experience was so intense. I knew she was speaking from her heart. She asked if she could tell me her story, and when she was done, I asked her if I could hug her.

Because that’s why I do it. To give people a venue to do what she did. To facilitate that kind of healing. I don’t do anything, I want to make that clear. I mean I take no credit for what happens there. I just offer the space, support and the vibrations, and energy so that people can heal themselves. I remembered this woman, because when she was leaving, she put her hands together in a prayer gesture, and thanked me so sincerely. She said I said to her, “welcome back.” I don’t remember saying that, but it’s likely, I say it often when the event is over. She said that when I said that she was thinking, OMG, she knew I was on a journey.

Well of course, I’ve taken that journey probably 300 times. I am so happy to share the experience. So without Dan, it will be different. But I think his absence will allow me to fly on my own, and who knows where that will lead.

Now I’m watching TV and thinking of making some kettle corn. Mmmmm.

Feeling very free tonight. Love and light everyone.

Meeting lasted less than 10 minutes. Went exactly the way I thought it would. When I forced him to stay on topic he told me I was a fucking bitch. My, have I fallen from the most loving, forgiving, low maintenance person he’s ever met

At any rate, after that comment I threw him out of the house, and it’s over over over. Done.

I think Dan is coming over here to talk today, although he has not confirmed or given me a time. I have no expectations.  Since I told him my door was open if he could ever talk to me about the things that separate us, I feel like I should allow this. So, we’ll see what happens.

For the most part, I have found myself happier alone. I have periods where I miss him, but more where I am relieved that I can once again focus on the things important to me, without his judgment or demands. Like writing.

He has started coming out to the music venues where our friends play, and congregate. While I am very happy he’s not withdrawing into himself, which I was truly afraid of, it is uncomfortable for me, because I’m so angry that he treated our relationship so badly, and walked out on it rather than talk to me. So when I see him, I can barely look at him, for the pain and anger I feel. He can act….and pretend. I cannot. I will not. What you see is what you get. He wants to come to a dinner theater that my BFF here is starring in this Sunday. It’s bad enough when he’s sitting at a distance from me at another table. Having dinner with him (and a dozen at least other people) is not something I am looking forward to. He’s always at the center of things, because he’s funny, and quick, and loud. Thank God my high school girlfriend will be here to distract me, as well as other of my good friends. At the moment I just wish he wasn’t.

Anyway these are reasons we need to put this relationship on solid footing, either walking away, or walking together, but not standing still looking at each other, wondering what’s going on.

Well we will see what comes of talking today. If, in fact, it happens. Or if anything at all comes from it. It will be what it will be. I do know, for sure, that everything will be fine, in the end.

Love and light.

WordPress tells me I am on a 7-day streak, which gives me pleasure to know. I am back to my writing, it seems. I try not to be too specific in talking about my emotions any longer when I am writing here. I still write the details out, as I know of no more effective way to work things out than to write them down and see the patterns as they are.

Kind of like interpreting a dream, by utilizing a site that can assist. My personal favorite is dreammoods.com. I had a dream a couple weeks ago, vivid, remembered in detail but seemingly non-sensical. After looking up the main components of the dream, it made perfect sense. It aligned with what I believed, what had happened to me, and really confirmed what I already knew. It was very personal, so I won’t write about it here. But I did write about it, to put it all in order.

I list the main components and then look them each up for the meaning of that particular thing. In this dream, I was sleeping in a hallway at the beginning, and woke to a few inches of calm clear water on the floor. (This was only a portion of the dream.) So I looked up sleeping, hallway, flooding, water, windows (because they lined the hallway), and ceiling. I copy and paste them onto a description of the dream, and after I am all done, am able to make sense of it. Then I summarize it, and what it was telling me. I find it very helpful. I just wish I remembered more of my dreams.

I am determined to go for a walk today. I finally got a good night’s sleep, am not coughing, and have plans for a fun evening. I guess that means I should go get dressed. Besides, one of the neighbors just came out on their deck to smoke…so the peaceful tranquility of silence is broken. My coffee cup is empty anyway.

Love and light to all

The silence of a Sunday morning
Wraps around me soft and oddly cool
Sitting outside in the hazy warm sunshine
My trusted coffee cup beside me
My peace lily in front of me.

The wind has died down for the moment,
Amplifying the stillness
And I feel a spark of happiness
Trying to re-light the fire that usually resides in my heart.

It’s returning.
Maybe not for the day
But for now.
And knowing that this moment is all that matters
It is enough.

By Deborah E. Dayen

Here I am, once again waiting for sunrise. I woke at 4 AM on the dot. I tried to get back to sleep but to no avail. I finally got up about 5:30, knowing if I wrote out my feelings, I might be able to sort them out. I was thinking about how Dan stopped by yesterday afternoon with some more of my stuff he found. While he was here, and didn’t even come in the house, I asked him for a folding table I knew was in his truck that we use for sound healing to put the bowls and drums on. It apparently upset him, and he started an argument with me when I told him I’d bought it, and I can use it. So, long story short, I am apparently supposed to be happy with all the stuff he bought me, and while I appreciate his gifts, I wasn’t bought, he can’t pay for me, or my love. He buys without any conversation about it, often stuff for my house that I’m not even given an opportunity to give input on, or have expressly asked him not to spend the money on. But I decided long ago, after repeatedly telling him that it makes me uncomfortable, that it’s his money to spend as he sees fit, he’s a grown man and I assume he can manage his own money.

Anyway, it was not a happy conversation.

Immediately after one of my BFF’s from CT Facetimed me, and we talked for about an hour for the first time in a very long time. It felt so good to reconnect with her. She has been there with me through my marriage, divorce, a boyfriend who broke my heart. She was so happy when Dan and I got together, because she and everyone liked him, I was not the only one who fell for his acting ability. But she supported me yesterday, but she told me how proud she was of me, to be accepting of what is, to let go, to set boundaries.

I had to hang up after an hour because I’d made arrangements to meet a couple very close friends at a restaurant to listen to my two more very good friends sing. (We are all part of the same tribe, as we say.) As I was getting ready to go, the woman singing sent me a text to tell me Dan was there. I was happy, and not happy. Because it still hurts me, that he shut me out, but I was happy he was getting out, and not locked in his condo. But as he left, he walked over to the table, came up behind me and apologized for over-reacting. I thanked him, because it was good that he could acknowledge that he’d been such an ass….but really it was so minor in comparison to the reason we are split. I wish he could apologize for that, and at least try to repair that damage. But that’s wishful thinking, and it’s not going to happen. This morning the poignancy of that dichotomy, what he says and what he does, woke me up and is hitting me a little hard.

One of my spirit girls and I had a conversation this week, on FB around a meme about how relationships are not designed to make you happy, but to help you grow. Because I keep saying that I thought I’d learned this lesson, but apparently not. Immediately after that conversation I found an article by a page called “Fractal Enlightenment” which suggested that we keep coming back to the same lessons because our path is not linear but a spiral, and each time we encounter the lesson it’s from a different perspective. Which, I’m pretty much in agreement with. An understanding of this makes the frustration of having yet another failed love affair much easier to take.

If you’d like to read it, here’s the link:

https://fractalenlightenment.com/40308/self-development/keep-coming-back-lessons?fbclid=IwAR2xqfwcdqIODHYSnIdu2cGUc78ehhXOES-m7sNmOfYGBx-HQf13m2NscE4

Obviously, I am in a serious place this morning. There are emotions running around in my heart from missing Dan, yet knowing that it would only get worse if I didn’t set boundaries. There is only one way to open a path through them. He knows what it is, he chooses not to take it. I refuse to go back to where we were. As I told another old friend yesterday, I can’t go backward, even though sometimes it’s tempting.

I am ok this morning, just working out this stuff. Hope everyone has a good day. Love and light.

I got the rat poison. I opted not to get the kind you throw in the attic, because it kills them instantly and then, you know, you have a dead rat in the attic. I have used them before, but always had Dan’s house to escape to when one died, and ripened. Upon close investigation, I saw no sign that they were ravaging my pantry or anywhere else. No droppings, no chewed through bags of rice or cereal. I’m taking a guess that the one I saw might have snuck in when I left my back door open for a minute. I’ve not seen hide nor hair of him since. So I set one more bait station, refilled the one I had and will just continue to monitor them. Usually, they think they’ve found the food when they find the bait station, eat some, and leave. They are small, about twice the size of a mouse, but nowhere near the size of the river rats we used to see as a kid when the Mississippi overflowed its banks, or even in CT, when the Connecticut River flooded and they would come up the sewer lines into our car wash. I’m grateful these are only about 4” long, not 18” or so. Ugh. Rats.

I have been beating up Dan’s old gong stand to try to get it apart so I can put it away. I sprayed all the nuts and bolts that were stuck with WD-40 as well as the joints that just slid together but won’t unslide. I’ve been banking on the crossbars with a hammer, but don’t wish to dent it. I guess I will have to either ask Dan to come and take it apart, which I am loathe to do, or ask one of my friends (male) to help me. I guess the 2^nd choice is the best one. Dan might take it as a sign I needed him, for other than taking it apart. But I’ll try again for a few days, and then decide if it doesn’t come apart.

I sat out on my deck reading yesterday. The temp is coming back up, and it was a perfectly beautiful afternoon, in the 70’s, though it got quite windy. Today is reaching for 80 and I’m so excited that I can put shorts and flip-flops back on. It is such a shame that we won’t be doing a sound healing tonight on the beach, such a perfect night it will be. Although it is still breezy, and that makes it difficult. The gongs catch the wind and have blown over. Still, the wind usually dies at sunset, so I think it would have been doable.

I went to open mic last night. I almost didn’t go, because I was tired by nighttime, but I needed the camaraderie there. It is there that I met my Gulfport tribe. It’s a perfect place, a seafood joint with really good food, really good staff, very casual, wonderful talent. The sound leaves a little to be desired, and used to drive Dan crazy. There are a few people for whom that’s enough not to want to go. But most of us go not only for the music, but to see each other, and catch up, and support those who perform. Last night two people had celebrated their birthday in the last week, so, as is our custom, someone brought cakes and we all sang happy birthday. I knew there would be cake there, so I ate a tiny dinner, and when I saw two cakes (I’d only expected one) I turned to my friends and said, “Oooh, I’m going to be Marie Antoinette! Having cake for dinner….” It was good. And fun.

Everyone has been asking me where was Dan. I have not wanted to tell people we’d split, because they all loved him too. Dan the actor, not Dan the man. They didn’t really know the man. But they all enjoyed his company. However, last week, I just lied, I said probably watching football, until I was advised that Thursday night football is over. Damn, it never pays to lie. I just wasn’t ready to verbalize it, still hoping we could resolve the issues. This week I just said that we’d split up. And while they were all appropriately sad, I felt relief that now all my close friends, my tribe, all know, and I have nothing to hide. Plus I find I can talk about it now without too much emotion. It is wonderful to have the warm cloak of good friends wrap around me. I am blessed.

Love and light, everyone.

Yesterday I met with my Spirit Girls for the first time in 2 months, really I guess since Thanksgiving.  Between the cruise from hell, and all the trips some of them were making to visit family, we just couldn’t get together.   Again, I was, am reminded what a wonderful circle of friends I have here. I also went to my friend’s (who brought me into Spirit Girls) Tibetan Bowl meditation in the morning. On the short drive over (about a mile) I was thinking a lot about the sound healing which will now have to reorganize and regroup. How much I would miss doing it, and how I have to figure out how I can do it by myself.

I had started out to go, realized I had no water bottle with me, went back to my house, and headed over. I was right on time, but the last one in the door. As I walked in the friend who facilitates this meditation was sitting, ready to play, but said as I walked in, “Oh Deb! These guys have been asking me about the full moon sound healing (which should be this weekend).” She had told them that we would miss January’s full moon, without going into detail as to why. But she said, “They want you to do it by yourself, with just the one gong.” And they all (about 8 or 10) nodded their heads vehemently. One couple in particular, who I did not know, said, “I’m a newbie to this kind of thing. But we went to the December healing at the beach and just LOVED it. Please do it again.” It was a sign to me….that my exact thoughts driving there were verbalized as soon as I got there.

This delighted me. I mean really. When people get it, I always feel that is enough reward, to have people love it like I always did, and to facilitate that, at that venue. So I basically promised them I would try to figure it out for February’s full moon, and my friend promised to help me. She already plays her Tibetan bowls with us, so I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch for her to add my crystal bowls to them, and do all the bowls. Then I can do the gong, walk through the crowd with the rainstick and ocean drum, and still have the bowls playing while I do.

So, I put up a post on my Good Vibrations FB page saying that I’m sorry about January, but will be back in February. I put up a 2^nd post, offering private sound healings at my home. So things change, and we adjust, right? I refuse to give up things I love just because I have to change the way I do them.

I used to be terrified at the thought of performing. But this….it terrifies me to think of not being able to do it. It’s always been my thing anyway. So, I’ll do it alone. Even someone with stage fright like me can do this, mostly because no one is even looking at me. They are all laying down, deep in meditation by 5 or 10 min. into it.

In other news, I have fruit rats again. UGH. They come in out of the cold, and it’s been dipping below 50 at night for a while now. So my job for today is to go to a place in town for do-it-yourself pest control and get whatever I need to get rid of them. Then I have to find someone who will fix my ductwork in the attic, which the rats chewed through, for less than $3000 (my first quote). They have chewed holes in the metal ducts…they eat anything. Dan fixed the biggest one, but it’s a temporary fix. That estimate of $3K seems absurd for a tiny house (912 sq. feet) and maybe 40 or 50 ft of ductwork if I replace them all. I need to deal with that before anything else I do. The joys of owning a 93 year-old house in Florida.

Well off I go. It looks like I just made a list of stuff I need to do today, lol. Tonight I’ll go to open mic and hang out with my friends. So very lucky to have so many good friends in this town.

Love and light, everyone.