I was thinking of this today, on a drive to take my son to his drivers test (he passed, go Nick!). (For those of you who don’t have kids of this age yet, all I can say, is Stop laughing! YOUR turn will come, too!)

Anyway.

At some point, somewhere in this blog, I think I quoted the therapist that I saw soon after the clipping of the bridge, but I don’t feel like looking it up; suffice it to say, she told me in the fall or winter of 2006-2007, “You will tolerate, until things become intolerable. It’s automatic, then, that when things become intolerable, something will change.”

In the context of trust, and open-ness, and up-front-ness, and all of that; at what point, do I get to say, “I’m tired. I’m too tired, to do this anymore?”

Soon, I fear.

And that is frightening to me. I can lie to myself, and to whomever, as a secondary thing- but really, I’m tired of lying to myself. I’m not very good at it, anymore, and it hurts.

And I find that I just don’t care, and that too is frightening.

Oh well, nobody told me life wouldn’t be scary, even as a nominal grown-up.

Have a great Holiday, for those in the U.S. that celebrate Thanksgiving tomorrow. I hope your day is filled to overflowing with things to be thankful for. Well, I wish the same for anyone, whether you celebrate tomorrow or not, actually.

Funny, how even when things are going so well, I can sometimes feel that old, cold feeling attempting to come back. There’s no rationality to depression, of course- that’s why it’s called an illness, right? If it were sane, why, then I wouldn’t be a cashew, and you wouldn’t be putting me in the category of a nut. Not, of course, that there’s anything wrong with cashews, or nuts in general- except when there is.

I’ve been thinking lately about the true insanity that comes into play, when the only visible logical rational course, is to die. It’s come up a few times in the last month or so, and I need to blather about it, I guess. Some people will run into setback after setback, job loss, business closing, homes burning, whatever, with a mental shrug and a move on. Others can slide into a dark cold place, when home is going along fine, work is great, and the kids are doing wonderfully.

The first time, I was speaking to a group of people at church, and one of the guys there was struggling to understand, and commented along these lines:

What I don’t understand, is how it can get so bad that you think leaving your family, your loved ones, is at all possible. I know that all I have had to do is remember my family, and no matter what it was that I was struggling with, I knew that I had them, and that I had to persevere, just because of them.

My response to Rob, was, “That’s the insanity of it. I didn’t care, because the twisted convoluted distorted thinking, is that they would be better off without me. The complete irrationality of my mindset, then, is what is so deadly, so scary dangerous. Pointing a truck at a bridge, and scraping the abutment at 95+ MPH, is not a sane thing to do; nobody in their right mind would think that it is. The problem, of course, is that when I aimed the truck, I wasn’t in my right mind, and what to me, today, is unthinkable- well, then, that was a perfect solution.”

Later that week, I was on the phone with my oldest friend, and she was sharing some of her concerns and struggles with her husband, and what she believes is his own depression. I was trying to make clear to her that there’s nothing that she has “done”, or “not done”, that caused him to be depressed. As much as we tend to take on this role, it’s vital to remember that this is a disease that can be treated, but not a contagious virus that you gave to someone. It’s not helpful to tell someone “you have it great, look at all the good things you’ve got…”. If we were rational, that might work, but the whole illness is irrational, so all she can do is love him, and encourage him to get help, and if it comes to it, she can call for help herself, on his behalf.

Then, a couple weeks ago, I was talking to another friend who is in a world of hurt right now. She’s attempting to find meds and a therapist she can trust, struggling to survive as best she can, and she asked me “How did you keep from just giving up?”

Those words are terrifying to me.

I don’t know that *I* did keep from giving up.

I wrote here and here, about how I managed to survive, and to get the help I needed to overcome the immediate crisis, and the long-term (longish? 3 years? How long til it’s long-term?) ability to keep on breathing.

If I think back, I can so clearly feel the emptiness, the cold darkness that I lived in. I can still feel the invisibility cloak that draped over me, I can hear that insidious whisper in the background, telling me that there is peace, there is a way to not hurt, to not feel pain, all I have to do is find the blade, turn the wheel, listen and it’s all still and no more struggling…

All I could do, is share with her how I had felt, and what happened, and try to articulate the difference that I feel now; to try to express that I *know* how she’s feeling, I’ve been there too, and that yes, there is a way to feel peace, and not hurt, that doesn’t involve blades and trucks or pills or high places with sudden impacts. That there is help, and she’s already started the hard part of it, which is to know she’s “nuts”, and work to get better.

I hope I was able to articulate that to her, somewhat.

It made me feel completely unprepared and inadequate, though, so today I did a bit of research and found a resource that I’d been toying with for quite a while now. I looked and found a place to offer myself for training, to work on one of the crisis-help lines, to try to help someone that might be hurting the way I was. I’d like to see if I can be there for another as the 1800 ladies were there for me.

So, take that, Black Thing. I’ll not only beat you on my own personal battlegrounds, I’ll train to join in and fight you on someone else’s battleground too. And, I’ll say F-You, while I’m at it, with a smile and a prayer of gratitude for being given the chance.

I feel like Pink-

Am I sweating
Or are these tears on my face?
Should I be hungry?
I can’t remember the last time that I ate
Call someone, I need a friend to talk me down

But one foot wrong and I’m gonna fall
Somebody gets it, somebody gets it
But one foot wrong and I’m gonna fall
Somebody gets it, somebody gets it

All the lights are on but I’m in the dark
Who’s gonna find me? Who’s gonna find me?
Just one foot wrong
You’ll have to love me when I’m gone

Does anyone see this?
Lucky me, I guess I’m the chosen one
Color and madness
First in line I put my money down
Some freedom is the tiniest cell in town

But one foot wrong and I’m gonna fall
Somebody gets it, somebody gets it
But one foot wrong and I’m gonna fall
Somebody gets it, somebody gets it

All the lights are on but I’m in the dark
Who’s gonna find me? Who’s gonna find me?
Just one foot wrong
You’ll have to love me when I’m gone

Some people find the beauty in all of this
I go straight to the dark side near this
If it’s it bad is it always my fault?
Did somebody bring me down?
Did somebody bring me down?
Did somebody bring me down?

One foot wrong, I’m gonna fall
Put one foot wrong and I’m gonna fall
Put one foot wrong and I’m gonna fall
Somebody gets it, somebody gets it
Just one foot wrong and I’m fall
Somebody gets it, somebody gets it

All the lights are on but I’m in the dark
Who’s gonna find me? Who’s gonna find me?
Just one foot wrong
You’ll love me when I’m gone

Have to love me when I’m gone
Love me when I’m gone
You’ll have to love me when I’m gone, yeah
You’ll have to love me when I’m gone

If you have been reading this blog for long, or if you’ve gone back and read the past, you may have noticed that the PostSecret project has a rather special spot in my heart. I wrote in a couple places about this- for sure here:. For those who may not know, PostSecret is a community art project that a man named Frank Warren started. He’s invited people to send him, anonymously, postcards with a secret on them; he then posts some to the PostSecret website; puts some in traveling exhibitions; and puts still others in books.

Anyway… I had enjoyed the website, and knew of the book, and remembered on that bright(dark) hot(freezing) day in 2006, that on the website a person had written to thank Frank, for the 1-800-suicide reference that occurred in the book. On that day, I was so messed up in my head, I didn’t remember the number; but I did remember that it was there and when I made my way to a bookstore, just to look at the book, there it was.

I called that number, that day- and never really said a word. The woman that answered was pleasant, but I couldn’t speak. I do know that I babbled something about needing to go, and called Lynn; from there, I worked along the paths of trying to get my head right, which I sortof kindof maybe think I may have made a little progress toward in the last three years. (3 years, 2 months, 3 weeks, and some odd-hours, if you’re counting, but who’s counting?)

But, I never forgot the fact that Frank Warren had a friend, who committed suicide, and however many years later, he opted to include this number in his book, and on the website; perhaps so some screwed up nut would be able to make use of it?

That memory stayed with me- to the point that when I read that Frank would be visiting a college near my work, one night, I made my plans and made my way to see him. I took a moment then, to meet and thank him, directly, as best I could, for saving my life even though he didn’t know he had.

Later, Frank was speaking in New York, at a big Barnes and Noble bookstore there. I took the opportunity then, too, to head down and hear him speak. This time, Lynn came with me, and when Frank had signed my copies of the new books, she looked at him, and said something about thank you and he’d saved my life, and that she’s grateful for his project, his books, and his whatever. I didn’t hear it all, as I’d gotten a bit emotional during the presentation when people can choose to stand, and share a secret right then and there; and let me tell you, some powerful things can happen, in a roomful of strangers.

So, why is this all in my head?

Because (yes, you got it!) tonight, I went once again to a PostSecret event. This one with my eldest son, who had obtained tickets at his university, and since I was going to be picking him up to come home for the weekend- well, he knows I love PostSecret, that I have the four books currently released in a place of honor on a shelf within easy reach, that I’d been to a couple prior events, that I love perusing the secrets each Sunday on line, so he thought he should see if I wanted to go again.

I did.

We did.

Wow. Again wow. I didn’t speak to Frank this time, I didn’t feel a need to, for I’d expressed my gratitude to him and Hopeline (the 1800 number foundation) before. But, as I listened to him speak, and listened to the brave people that shared a secret or a thought with us, I think I recognized why I felt that I needed to be there once again.

It’s to remember. To remember, in gratitude and with joy and with tears and laughter, to remember that I am not alone, nor are you. We share this journey together, in our common humanity, seeking and trying and stumbling and falling, together we connect with people all over the world. Separately, yet somehow still together, we seek God, we seek Love, we seek a partner, friend, lover, family; we have different secrets, different perspectives, different lives- but, if we choose to, we can reach out in whatever way, and find that we’re not rocks; we’re not islands; and that it’s okay to feel pain, and even to cry once in a while.

So, as we left the school, my boy-that-is-now-a-senior-and-I’m-around-to-see-it, as we left and drove home, we sang at the top of our lungs, together. Badly, I’m sure, but with enthusiasm and silliness and pounding the beat on the dash and the wheel, laughing and dumb jokes, and talking about what we’d heard together, I thought of this.

This time, Frank and PostSecret and umpteen hundred university students taught me to remember this:

We are only as alone as we choose to be.

Go visit Frank and PostSecret sometime. I know you’re as welcome there as I am, and the 270,607,242 others that are sharing on our way.

Thou shalt not use poetry, art or music to get into girls’ pants.
Use it to get into their heads.

I came across a link to this song, and loved this particular line.

To proud to be healthy.

I said that in passing, last night- I was hanging out in a support chat room, for people with mood disorders. We get all kinds there, depressed people, bi-polar people, schizophrenic people- and, I think, a few who aren’t any of these, but perhaps come by out of love, just to try to be a caring presence for those of us that need it.

We were talking about how hard it is, sometimes, for people to ask for help. One of the people there commented that they “can’t do it alone, anymore”… and I reminded them (forgive my vagueness, but we don’t always know from the nicknames whether the person is male or female, and real names are not required) that there is all kinds of help available, if they would but reach out.

And it hit me, how silly stupid I’d been, for so many years. Help was available to me, too, with a phone call, a stop by the church, any number of ways.

But not me. As much as I know intellectually that depression is an illness, that mental illness is an illness like a cold or a squashed disc, or strep throat, the emotional tough-guy response still came to the fore. I can rationalize, or did rationalize, that “it will just go away, it always has” all I want. But the bottom line is that my silly pride was in the way. I can try to put better spins on it, I can try to explain in convoluted thinking that it was this, that or the other- but really, when I look deep in my heart it does come down to that.

Pride.

“Real men don’t need help with … heck, real men don’t even have emotions, right?

So proud, I let my mind and guts get twisted into almost dying.

So proud, I let myself close off from everything I hold dear, from my wife and my kids, from any friends I could claim (not many, but I’m getting better in that area). From my God, completely. From any real life that was at all worth living. From things that I love, from things that challenge and excite- I closed myself off, because of a silly belief that I could do it myself.

Huh.

I wonder sometimes, about myself. I’m not really a stupid person- I’m a college educated, reasonably intelligent person, able to do my job and succeed in things that I try to. I can fly an airplane, sail a boat, program a computer, design a network, listen to friends that need me, all kinds of things. I’ve built a cabin out of logs, and another out of lumber, and wired and plumbed and roofed and all that goes into those things. I’ve maintained houses and repaired cars (back when I couldn’t afford to pay Achmed to do it, thank God for Achmed, because I hate working on cars). Heck, if I really really put my mind to it, I can even take a fairly decent photograph, once in a while.

But, I can’t- or rather, couldn’t- reach out when I needed a hand. Knowing better, deep down, I still was unable to do the simple little things that I could have done to avoid so much pain.

Pride… Too proud to be healthy, I said last night.

Well, ta heck with that.

Misplaced pride nearly destroyed my family; nearly destroyed me, twice. Nearly cost me my marriage, my kids, my hopes and dreams and my life. I think of the things that would have been, had I not felt God’s hands that day, and I shudder.

Hopefully, I’ve learned something. Hopefully, I’ve learned that there is no shame in admitting that I can’t do something alone. I pray daily, that I can put aside pride in self, and be open to what I need to do, however hard that may be. I’ve decided that I also need to add to that: Please give me the strength to be open to ask, should I have too, should I need to accept a helping hand.

Even the title of this blog, I chose in a fit of angry hurt pride. One of Lynn’s boytoys had come across it via some interlinking somehow, and had read a bit of the old blog; and so I moved to this address, a while back. At the time, I had to come up with a name, and I was feeling a bunch of mixed emotions, some of which I didn’t feel all that comfortable with, so I was shoving them down, savagely, viciously. Not a great idea, to try to shove them down, and pretend they don’t exist, but I don’t need anyone, right? I’m an Island, a Rock, and therefore, it won’t cause me any pain. Hence the new address.

Now, today, just over three years, since I mostly missed the bridge… almost three years, since the first time I knew of just how fractured my marriage was… year and a half, since I spent a week in the nut-hut… mixed in all that time, the ups and downs and tears with Lynn, the pride (good kind) in the kids’, the worry about Rob and the joy he brings, I just try to remember, that I can’t afford that kind of pride, not that bad kind.

After all, I had my fall, so doesn’t that mean that the pride went before it, and now I don’t need it? Not that kind of pride anyway.

So now, I guess I can hope that I have enough pride in living my life- to reach out when I need to, and ask for a bit of help when it’s appropriate.

Do you think so? I came across this quote, and thought, “If only I could…”

Have a heart that never hardens, a temper that never tires, a touch that never hurts.
~Charles Dickens

I am a rock. I am an Island.

And a rock feels no pain.
And an island never cries.

Okay, so I haven’t been a very active blogger lately, but I’ve been distracted by other things- like kids, and work, and church, and photography, and such-like-that-there.

That didn’t mean I wasn’t available to be tagged, though, the lovely Lil Bit saw fit to tag me with a meme called “Tagged 8’s”. So, here it is, as best I can

8 Things I’m looking forward to:
1. Going to visit friends and family back in Minnesota!! YAY I leave Tuesday, spend the day and night with an old friend, then over to my dad’s and on up to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, to spend a few days in the log cabin and just “veg”.
2. Summertime! It’s 80+ here today, sunny and bright, and feels wonderful.
3. Sailing! I am so hoping to have the boat in the water this year, for the first time in two years; hopefully the surgeon and physical therapist will agree that I’m in shape to do that.
4. Photos! I’m having so much fun with the processing and filtering in photoshop, and taking, editing and selecting them, so although it’s an ongoing thing I still look forward to it.
5. Fire! (Department). I had the official physical a while ago, and as soon as I’m strong enough, I can start drilling with the department again; perhaps not ready to actively go in, but at least it’s something.
6. Friends! I’m planning a get-together with some wonderful friends in a couple weeks, and I can hardly wait.
7. Time with Lynn! This includes things like a photo-shoot yesterday, with a group of photographers that we hang out with, and going to dinner, hanging out together, cuddles, sex, laughing and whatever. Basically, (I know, I get the ’sap of the year award’), I just like to be with her.
8. Cabin! Summer is also the time to head to the cabin, hang on the beach, be mellow, and just play. Gotta love it!

8 Things I did yesterday:
1. Hot shower to melt muscle knots
2. Took a zillion photos at a lighthouse, with a group of photographers
3. Napped
4. Visited friends
5. Fixed wiring for a network
6. Enjoyed a fine fantasy about photos and calendars
7. Hung out in a hot-tub, with close friends
8. Stayed out way to late

8 Things I wish I could do:
1. Sing
2. Quit my “day job” (but only to do something else)
3. Speak Spanish
4. Travel around meeting certain people, at will and whim
5. See Australia
6. Be a nudist for a month
7. Be able to pay off a bunch of medical bills, all at once, right now
8. Write when I want, whatever I want- without being self-conscious about it

8 TV Shows I watch
*Hmmm, this one is tough- I really don’t watch TV to speak of, and no show that I “Must see”- so I’m going to have to take an incomplete here
1. How It works (Maybe called “How things are made?”)
2. Mythbusters
3. Whatever happens to be on if Lynn’s watching when I go to bed, cuz I have no clue

I don’t know who else is playing or wants to- so I’m going to take the lazy way out, and if you want to play along, you should consider yourself officially tagged.

Today, March 13th, is a terrible-awful-horrible-no-good-very-bad-day.

But not for me, anyway. Today, for me, is a day like any other day. I got up, went to work, did some research, put together some analysis, had lunch- really, just a day.

But I feel great. The only thing I can point to, is simply related to the last few posts.

I’m alive.

I have God.

I have family.

I have friends.

So I’m feeling happy and content and at peace, at the moment.

I hope YOUR Friday, is just as nice in it’s own way, for you.