No, I am not speaking of the ominous villain in Doctor Who (I love you if you get that reference), but I am speaking of the strange periods of silence I've recently endured.  Times in life where one desires no company other than a spouse, no conversation other than with beautiful films, and more sleep than most people dream of.

Perhaps this silence is due to my being sick for almost 9 days now.  I've left the house only 3 times in that stint, and just when I thought I was getting better, I woke up this morning with what I can only guess is a different cold.  How festive.

Despite feeling strange, solitary, and rather disabled, I've been enjoying the energy, the Feng Shui, of being in a house that has been lived in so well.  I've cooked several amazing meals, had countless cups of tea, snuggled with Joel any old time I wanted, stewed cider, and baked an apple pie.  I suppose I am saying that I am thankful for being ill in that it has demanded sleep and nourishing food and soul-giving solitude.  I am thankful for a body.

Let me explain.

The Universe and I have been at odds lately.  We've been in discussion about endings.  I am fighting this impossible battle between the biological need to survive and the inevitable truth that we all die, and must.   The human race will most likely be entirely wiped out in the next million years, with nothing to offer the cosmos or other lifeforms elsewhere (except The Voyager, Joel comforts me).   Moreover, I suppose the real struggle is that I cannot control either. I wish I could be obsessed with beginnings, but instead I've been struggling so much with the fact that life ends.  Just when bliss introduces herself to me with a jarring handshake, she slips through my fingers because I think of when it will end. I am trying to accept that this issue has been brought to me to examine and chew on, trying to see its essence instead of its shadow, but I have a distrust of the temporary.

Simply stated, I am trying to reconcile death with life, and it seems everyone has some sort of lovely answer for how they have arrived at their own particular version of peace. I suspect that most deal with it by ignoring it, or praying a lot, or distracting themselves with the busyness of life.  I bring up this comparison to others because I believe our notions of personal happiness are based largely on how we see others living and what they chose to pour their precious lives into.  I am clinically depressed, so it makes sense to me that I would wonder why everyone is so darn happy all the time, expressing how they find certain weather patterns, particular bowls of fruit, or long vacations nothing but entirely rewarding, afraid to express anything negative because of what that might mean, or what others might think.  In the end, when we do not take the time to express all parts of life - the good and the bad, and express both with tact and love - I feel we are performing a great disservice to those in our care, who listen to us and glean inspiration from us.  If we are only expressing good, those who feel badly about life will feel ashamed that they can't just feel good like so and so does all the time.  This is a complete rabbit-trail, I might add.  All of this to say that it often feels as though I am the only one thinking about the inevitable end of the Universe, and balancing the desperate desire to stay alive with the intellectual acceptance of death.  Of course I'm not.

Back to feeling thankful for the human body I have.

Therefore, in the midst of this very confusing mental dialogue, I find it especially rewarding when I am made newly aware of the awe of the human body, decaying and fleeting though it be.

I've not been feeling like myself lately, or so I hear from the ol' brain.  It just occurred to me that  perhaps it doesn't know what myself actually IS and what it's supposed to feel like - and who the hell am I to say what I can and can't do or be?  Perhaps the truest way to see it is that I am changing.  My profile blurs the more I try to see it, the definition of my soul vaporizes through my analytical hands. 

But are there things I can do to recover my old self, if I want to?  My comfortable self? Does Candace have to write to truly be Candace? Or can she take up spelunking and still be Candace...or does the definition of that Candace then change? And what is it Candace has to do to be a new Candace? 

Oh my.  I just had a horrible thought.  What if she starts wearing sports gear OUTSIDE?!  I shudder.  

The question remains, "What makes me, me?"  Is it my interests? Relationships? DNA?  Physical body? Soul (if one exists?) Character traits?  Lifetime on the earth?  Possessions? Big nail beds, fine hair, green eyes?

I am perpetually intrigued with the incongruities between a person's projected self and internal self.  Someone could be the biggest asshole to everyone else, but inside is sweet, sad, and broken.  Another might fancy themselves horrible at hosting when in fact they shine the most when cooking for company.   One person might pride themselves on being proper, another interprets that behavior as stuffy.  Some days I can feel so beautiful, then walk by a mirror and note objectively, "Huh - I'm just me. I'm average."  I don't FEEL average, so which is true?  Last night, on a date by myself, I made a love list.  It's the list of every man with whom I've ever engaged in a reciprocal romantic relationship.  I did this because it's good for me to remember that I am more than my marriage, am attractive to at least 20 guys.  Call it superficial, but what I need of late is the superficial boost.  I can't quite define what's happening, but for one of the first times in my life, I don't really need to.

And that, my friends...that is change.

Thoughts are power.  What are you feeding yours? I had officially gorged on screen time last month, so I made a new goal to read one book per week.  Four books and four weeks later, I'm cruising through my to-read list like a proper bibliophile.  My thoughts are thanking me.