Blogging Out Loud: Pressure Over The Holidays

Deb and Barbara: Now that we're on the other side, be honest, do you succumb to the holiday pressure? If so, any tricks?




Barbara: Okay, I have to add here that I've developed a coping strategy that I almost forgot to share. I make lists on my computer that I update and tweak every year that help me with my grocery shopping, special recipes (with all the specific tweaks for vegans and meat-eaters), and time management. It makes such a difference to my stress levels and efficiency to have a reference list I can call up (or print out; or email myself: ie my shopping lists) at a moment's notice.

Weird Energy––1, Deb––0

Deb: We are in some sort of strange vortex right now, my family and me. So many weird things are going on in our lives. It is a time where emotions and events are stretched wider than Plastic Man (for any comic buffs). The greatest things are happening and the worst things are happening. We have beloved people in our lives fighting for their lives, and the joy of a puppy. We have support and love around us, and hate and bad wishes.

I know that all of us have these things in our lives from time to time, but this––this––is hyper drive, it’s to the max, it’s 3D, it’s life squared. It’s like the world is ending so the universe is trying to give us all things at once. And I don’t just mean stressful things. I have been down that road many times in my life before with the never ending bad news and funeral after funeral and the sad that you thought would never stop being. And even then I could cope. I knew what the beast was. I knew it was bad and sad and that it should bring sadness and so I could handle it.

This is different. It is everything. Absolutely everything. Good bad, sad happy, up down, in out, rich poor, love hate, anger joy, healthy dying, Life is heightened. I am losing things, dropping things, forgetting things, finding things, crying, yelling, laughing, dancing, eating, drinking, and popping Advil.

And worst of all I am panicking. I am losing it. I want to scream. I am feeling trapped and helpless and fed up and powerless. I want to go away from here and I want to stay here. I am employing all of my considerable coping skills and getting nowhere fast. I know this too shall pass, but right now, I am toast. Put jam on me.

Barbara: In classic Deb-style, you still finish with a smile. We can try putting jam on Deb, but my guess is it won’t take. At least not right now.

This post totally resonates with me because (as you could probably tell by my Friday post) I feel it too. And I also feel it’s larger than me and larger than my circle. It does feel to be everywhere, this frenetic incomprehensible vortex that brings madness and mayhem in all its darkness and in all its glory.

Maybe it is like a tornado in more ways than one. Because I do think––as cliché as it sounds––that we are safer in the eye of it. You know, where it’s still and quiet while all hell rages around you.

I don’t know if any of you are experiencing this maelstrom as well, but if you are, I wonder what would happen if we all banded together (in spirit) and decided we would ride the storm in its centre, we would breathe quietly, and we would accept all the whirlwinds around us for whatever they might bring. Because even after that real tornado passes and even after you mourn the destruction in its wake, seedlings of all kinds do push up and grow. And the seedlings can sprout completely unexpected vegetation that may even––after time, mind––bud and bloom the most beautiful flower we’ve ever seen.

Disney World for Luke's 16th birthday

Because—here’s another overworked cliché––apparently we can’t get off the rollercoaster in the middle of the ride. Thank god for the Advil.