Menu Close

Letter from S (2008)

2008

i’ve been looking through old words from the past year – perusing through my life, so to speak, since i document most everything that happens – sometimes pseudo-publically in forums such as this, but always in my own space.

it’s interesting to look through the changes that have occurred in the past year. i have always known since childhood that my 32nd year would be monumental even if i didn’t understand why. even now, i’m putting the pieces together as i creep up on 33.

i have yet to publish a book, although i write all the time… i haven’t done anything ‘outrageous’ in the art-world that would cause me fame , i’m not married (haha), i don’t have children, i haven’t left the country or run off to join the circus (although i’ve thought of that one before).

nothing has really HAPPENED that seems huge – yet i feel different. i know things are different.

making the move back to gainesville was sudden yet completely spawned by a feeling in my gut that i needed to do this.
i struggled tremendously when i moved back yet i knew that i had done the right thing.

and now, here i am, a little over a year later and i am more stable than i’ve been in years. i am still extreme – but my extremes are quieted by the stillness inside of me that has always existed even when i didn’t fully trust it.

in a way, i’ve caught up to myself.

last december i wasn’t sure if i’d live to see thirty three. i started to think that maybe my death would have been the monumental thing that happened at 32 and it scared me.

hooked up to a heart monitor and being told by doctors that i would die if i didn’t stop the high functioning dance of my eating disorder truly shocked me into reality.

although, i felt the pressure to keep Funtioning after this, gradually i found some sort of balance as the months after the stint in the hospital passed by.

i still struggle with this, as i probably always will – but i am more sober about it than i ever have been.

i recognize that although i have gained the weight and look ‘healthy’ now, it is still a daily choice. one that i have to make every day. it’s as simple as that. and i don’t always do it right – but i realize that each day is a moment for change.
it used to be, ‘fuck it all,’ and i’d just split off from that part of myself and pretend that it didn’t exist. well, i may have pretended – but it didn’t matter.

i woke up. i have a body. and i am learning to love it.

that feels freeing to write. it’s kind of overwhelming.

sometimes i get caught up in the complexities in my mind – the whys and hows and philosophical reasons for a wish to depart from the world via self destruction. self destruction as a means of freedom from the human complexities of this world… Contradictions. i’m not the only one…

i can sit and contemplate forever – but unless i actually take action, it won’t matter.

i guess 32 was the first time in all of my years inside of the mirror that i realized truly that i do not just possess a body – but i actually Am a body.

this is the idea that the shrinks try to get you to own in the beginning of treatment – yet, as per usual, i do most things backwards or out of ‘order.’ (what is order, anyway? we’re all on our own timeline).

mentally speaking, i understand my disease very well – yet this intellectual awareness can keep a person trapped as she spins outside of herself finding the Reasons and spouting off wisdom to others while she exits stage left and nobody even notices.

i don’t want to do this anymore.

32 may not have been my year of breaking into the public eye of the art world or the year i moved to Paris or some such thing.

it was the year that i took ownership of the vehicle that will keep me walking these roads for years to come so i can Do all of those things that i want to do. it’s been a year of firsts, a year of playing catch-up, a year of raw look-yourself-in-the-face types of moments that remind me to continue on.

a year of true awakening and connecting. of decisions. a year of cleansing my soul of illusions and toxicity —

it’s been a year of dimension that gets stronger all the time if i choose to stay in my body.

it’s sort of been a tie-up of the last 10 years of my life when i first made the decision to exist as my self outside of the identity that i used to find in a number on a piece of metal.

i chose life at 22 and did not look back. have i done things perfectly? hell, no. i lived in state of duality for a long time and occasionally still do.

but just as i knew then (at 22), something had changed.

during the fires of 1998, i was driving home on the smoky highway from orlando and i had a revelation. i knew that i could never give up on my own spirit.

i started to love it. slowly at first – but in time, i have learned to truly accept myself.

now it is my body…

this, to me, is worth far more than any other lesson i have learned thus far in life.

it will preserve the spirit that i have fought so hard to strengthen and keep me ticking on this huge ball called earth that i love so very much.

i am grateful for 32.

by S.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *