Hiding and Patience

I think Maigh guest posted on one of my regular blogs, that has to be how I found it. But either way I read this and I loved it.

Sunday morning when The Mc went to the rubbish bin he found a bird trapped
in a skylight in our mailroom, and we spent the next 45 minutes (with the help
of a neighbor with a ladder) helping the little guy back to the real
world.

He didn’t mean to get himself trapped, but he was curious and wound up
somewhere he shouldn’t have been. Sticking to his instincts, he flew up and kept
flapping his wings against the plastic bubble thinking there had to be a way
through it and to the light – if he just flew harder and faster and with more
resolve.

We laid bread crumbs down in hopes he was hungry and would come down to
eat. He didn’t. We threw them up, in hopes he would embrace the Hansel and
Gretel-ness of it all. He didn’t. So we did what we had to with a long pole
broom and a ladder, shepherding him out by way of what may have felt like
violent means.

I need the universe to come after me with a broom.

For the past three weekends, I’ve been in hiding. I’ve been a little
worn out and burned out and used up and feeling generally deflated and selfish
and a lot like that bird in the skylight.

Flashing back to a 5 year old me who hid in a round rack in the middle of
Sears while my mother picked out clothes for my brother and the upcoming school
year. You can guess what happened.

I feel like that.

While I didn’t exactly want to be found, I didn’t exactly want to stay
lost, either. I didn’t know where I was, I didn’t know how to get home, and in
retrospect – I doubt I knew where home was.

There used to be a piece of paper tacked to a corkboard in my kitchen
with a list of goals. It was weathered by sunlight and the heat and humidity of
a kitchen, with faded print declaring short term, mid term, long term goals
spanning finances, health and spirit. Some have been met, some have been
replaced, and many have been abandoned in light of life changes…like moving to
Ireland by 40.

I’m trying to find my way out of the skylight, out of the rack and back
to a path that feels intentional and purposeful, that feels like I’m
contributing and moving in the right direction. I’ve written about this and
mused about this and bored all of you as well as myself nearly to tears but the
fact remains that I. Am. Lost.

This naturally presents an entirely different series of emotions into
the mix: guilt (“don’t be so effing selfish, you’re ALIVE”) and annoyance
(“would you stop WHINING already”) and confusion (“ummmm where was I supposed to
be?”) and that doesn’t help a smidge.

Earlier this week I had a hold of my mojo for about an hour, and I lost it
again…squirrely little bitch.

So during this in-between time of loosing and finding again, I’ll stay
in the safety of my jammies and the condo with the kitties and the TV and poor
Mc trying to be as supportive as he can with me in a funk and cleaning
compulsively as though a pristine home where there’s a place for everything and
everything in it’s place (my mothers ghost) will provide just the right
environment for the mojo to find me again when it’s ready.

Maybe this is supposed to be teaching me patience?