Whirlpool

It's been a busy past few weeks, hours spent searching for a new home on-line, setting up appointments, wandering around in the rain & hail trying to find some of these obscure places, peering around other people's homes, wondering how a landlord can realistically expect a tenant to pay $400/week for a so called "fully furnished" apartment that has no functioning kitchen, just a small electric "cooker" and a sink (and the worst thing is that we seriously considered it for at least 2 days, imagining how we could get by without these basic functions - take-outs??!) *sigh*, wandering around lovely, light, spacious apartments that we knew we would not be able to rent because the location was just 'not us', finally finding a suitable pad and now desperately searching for cheap but reliable 2nd hand furniture to fill it.

The new pad is considerable smaller than our current apartment and is only furnished with white-ware, but the location is lovely - in an area much 'more us' - similar to Clapham/Dulwich area in vibe - it's away from the 'city'* centre, with a small beach at one end of road and cool & creative bars/boutiques/shops etc at the other end. I am so looking forward to the move and leaving this apartment behind. Plus I'd quite like the furniture search to be over - it takes up so much time.

I'm feeling mentally or is it emotionally exhausted at the moment. Though my body is up for some exercise and fresh air, my head and heart just aren't in it right now. I don't feel too bad, just a bit numb, full of nothingness. Perhaps I'm putting too much pressure on the move but I'm hoping that it will bring more than a change of scene. I can start to look for part-time paid work, start to meet some new people, and spend less time alone. Don't get me wrong, I love spending time alone, pottering around by myself is more than a favourite hobby, it keeps me alive. But this apartment often feels like a trap, holding me inside and for various reasons that I won’t go into, it’s not exactly conducive to meeting people.

I think I'm mainly lacking sunlight. Here, the balcony looks down on a tree-filled courtyard but the view across is simply the huge apartment block opposite. Thus all the light we get is reflected from it's exterior. If you crane your head round to either side, you can see the sky, but it does not come as easily as it should. We get many bird visitors returning for the breadcrumbs we leave, or just to defecate on our balcony (so sweet to watch the little heads turning slowly from side to side for up to 10 minutes as they strain to release the little packages for us!) and some days they are the only living things I communicate with between BF leaving for work in the morning and returning later in the evening.

The new pad has a substantial deck across the back with both the living space and bedroom opening up to the sky and trees and possibly a sea view when the trees are less leafy. I yearn to look out at this view every day though doubtlessly I will find fault with it in time.

Why am I being so negative? I have strange feelings that things won't go according to plan. I feel fear coursing through my veins. I feel nausea. Perhaps it's just pmt? Perhaps it's not. Sometimes, I think that thinking negative things makes them happen, but maybe that's just a way for me to blame myself when things don't work out the way I wished them to.

Blaming myself for things over which I have no control was almost a religion to me when I was growing up; that and Guilt, the heaviest and darkest of burdens for a young person to carry. I was brought up to believe that thinking ‘bad’ thoughts was just as bad as doing ‘bad’ things. This meant that when things went wrong as they infrequently did, I could blame myself for them even if I merely overheard or was a witness to an incident. I could somehow trace the event back to a time when I’d been ‘naughty’ or ‘cheeky’ or not done something I was told to do, or worse still, I’d done it badly on purpose because I thought it was grossly unfair that I had to do it at all. It’s kind of like the karma concept which I believe in wholeheartedly, but taken to dangerous extremes.

I was such a lost kid. I feel so sorry for the young person I was. And I felt even more sorry for myself at the time. It was an endless spiral of feeling sad for myself and the woeful situation I was in and blaming myself for the things that made my situation so bad. A downward, deep, dark swirling spiral of self-hate. A whirlpool of thoughts endlessly conspiring against me, drowning me in their despair.

How many times did I fantasise about running away? I can remember it so clearly as I used to spend hours thinking about all the difficulties I might encounter, and how I could possibly survive once I’d gotten away. I remember lying in my bed, where I spent as much time as I possibly could, staring out of the window, wondering if I could safely make the jump from the window to the garage and then off down the path and away.

Of course I never even got close to actually doing any of this. I didn’t have the courage or strength to make such a brave move in real life. My constantly worrying head asked: What would I do if I even made it away from the house? Where would I go? What would I do then? What else was there out there for me? I held too much fear to get very far, even in my dreams.

Enough of the reminiscing. I have at least learnt what not to do and for that I am grateful.

* Auckland - 'a thousand suburbs in search of a city'

.......and so on and so on