One thing that the Wellbutrin seems to have done is take away my ability to cry. It’s actually really frustrating, because the FEELING is still there, I just have no mechanism for letting it out. I can even feel the emotional welling that would signal the usual burning feeling I get before the tears flow… but no tears.

I came close today, though. I caught Noodle kitten with the pantry door, and she cried out… and I was so afraid that I’d hurt her, I started shaking. But no tears.

She’s fine, by the way. I think I scared her more than anything. She has a bad habit of jumping, as quick as can be, into any open cabinet, the fridge, a closet, the dryer. I live in fear of her trying that with the oven. She’s small and SO fast!

In better news, it seems that the reissue of my beloved Undone by The Lucy Show is now out. Finally, some people realized how good they were – especially THAT album. The title of this post is from “The White Space” but there isn’t a video for that, so I’ll give you a more well-known song, “A Million Things.”

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

Tags: fear, lucy show

How can people be so heartless
How can people be so cruel
Easy to be hard, easy to be cold

How can people have no feelings
How can they ignore their friends
Easy to be proud, easy to say no

Especially people who care about strangers
Who care about evil and social injustice
Do you only care about bleeding crowd
How about a needing friend, I need a friend

How can people be so heartless
You know I’m hung up on you
Easy to be proud, easy to say no

Especially people who care about strangers
Who care about evil and social injustice
Do you only care about bleeding crowd
How about a needing friend, we all need a friend

How can people be so heartless
How can people be so cruel
Easy to be proud, easy to say no
Easy to be cold, easy to say no
Come, on, easy to give in, easy to say no
Easy to be cold, easy to say no
Much too easy to say no

The results of yesterday’s elections made me sad. I’ve had an overall feeling of frustration with the world and the need of people to push their limited world view on others, but this is almost too much to take. I see my friends, hurting because they are denied the basic rights to openly love who they choose, and I hurt for them. This diminishes us all.

edited to add: Well, there’s this, at least – Chapel Hill, NC elects gay mayor. Something to celebrate, anyway.

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

Tags: disappointment, lgbt, maine, same-sex marriage

Did I have fun, back then? I think I did from time to time, although I was consumed with trying to establish who I truly was. I did stupid things, things that I’m lucky to have lived through. I spent too much time in dirty alleys, decrepit houses, squats… I was reckless because that’s when I felt most alive. I didn’t know then what I know now about me [and the world] – I knew I was depressed, but not to the extent. I spent weeks lying in a room, listening to Bauhaus over and over, before I started getting really reckless, taking ridiculous risks… what finally got me up and moving was the challenge to find ways to kickstart life into an “exciting” place.

Sometimes I feel a million years’ worth of distance between the girl that I was, and the woman that I am now. I can look at the photos and see the me that was, but it’s as if I’m looking through a curtain of fog. Then again, there are so many nights that I can’t remember from that time, that it’s hardly surprising that I feel that way!

People who didn’t know me then usually can’t believe that the stories that I tell have anything to do with the me that they know now. People who knew me then often express surprise that I’m where I am. Xiane the enigma, whoop-dee-doo.

I have no idea what I’m trying to say here. I’ve just been lost in thought after stumbling on the above photo in my photos folder. It is always insightful for me to think about how far I’ve come.

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

Tags: this is who we are

Lyrics from Split Enz [poor boy]

In much more pleasant posts…

Several updates are needed to be made! The Wellbutrin seems to be doing its job in keeping me level and energized. I haven’t done much talking to my therapist about the things that won’t keep swirling through my mind, but that will come with time. And of course, I have this space to spill the bits that just need to get the hell out of my brain.

We have a new kitten! She quite literally climbed into our laps and our lives, and has stolen our hearts. She’s a long haired grey and rumpled looking thing, with a sweet face and a spunky attitude – she was very sick and skinny when she came to us, but she got better with liberal application of love and care, and she’s emerged with the best attitude. [and also a great need to chew on my fingers.] We’ve named her Noodle, and the biggest task has been integrating her into our life with the Squeegee Cat. He wants to chase her, she freaks out and hisses and runs, and things escalate from there. She’s growing rapidly, so soon enough she’ll be able to demonstrate how she feels about being chased!

Otherwise, it’s all XianeTime as normal. I keep spinning yarn and teaching classes, talking endlessly about fiber arts, and rolling stray wool off my clothes. I need to take more photos, and I need to get out and get some hiking in now that Autumn is truly here. This time of year is always good to me, so I’m glad that it is here.

Tell me about your favourite thing to do during Autumn! I want to live vicariously through you, my friends.

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

Boo hoo. Your golden boy is such an artistic treasure, he made so many wonderful movies! Well, whoop-dee-doo. Those cinematic masterpieces or whatever you’d like to name them aren’t enough EVER to excuse the fact that he RAPED – yes, RAPED – a 13 year old girl. Nothing will ever excuse that. Nothing can mitigate it. He never even served time; instead, he ran from the country and had relative freedom for 30 years. His victim has had to live with the fact that he was able to do this, and now she must live with having all those wounds reopened and dragged back out into the public’s eye.

Please, please, for the love of whatever you hold most dear… put yourself in her place, if only for a moment. What a blow it must be to hear that Roman Polanski should get a free pass because he made some Great Movies… especially when you must go to bed every night knowing that everything changed for you one day in your thirteenth year, and you’ll never be able to completely forget it.

I could just vomit when I read some of the reactions to this news, I really could. In what world should this EVER make sense?

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

Tags: lack of sense, rape, roman polanski

I was supposed to catch y’all up on my status, arg.

This is what happens to me even with the best of intentions – I get sidetracked so easily. This time… well, wait, I’ll tell you the story. It’s a good one. First though, the therapist visit!

I’d scoped out the therapist’s office ahead of time, so I wouldn’t panic about knowing where it was. [always smart] It’s in a quaint part of town, with some older houses, some in disrepair. The actual offices were a bunch of trailers cobbled together to make a building; needless to say, I was a bit worried how that would reflect on the treatment that I would get. O_O

I shouldn’t have worried. The patients there ran the gamut, and there was an office dog, which made me smile… and best of all, my therapist, Anne, was female – something I’d really wanted but hadn’t voiced. I didn’t want to have to tell my story to a man. I didn’t want to feel ashamed or just hope that he really, truly “got” it.

After the basic introductions and a run-down of my medical history, I went ahead a spilled the whole sordid thing. Trigger warnings galore, folks.

Read the rest of this entry »

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

Tags: catching up, depression, kitties, noodle, rebuilding the girl

lyric from In The Wake Of Adversity, Dead Can Dance

How does one find a therapist? That’s my question of late, since I’ve never had need of one. I’m going to see Dr. Naz in the morning, and I’ll be asking her, but really… I’m at a loss. Obviously something more needs to be done, because my issues, my little stupid annoying debilitating isolating painful problem, isn’t getting better.

I’ll report back what I find out from the Good Doc, and elaborate more afterward.

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

Tags: rebuilding the girl, this is who we are

You’ll hang the hearts black
And dull as the night
You hanged your past and start being
As you in ecstasy

Still being cried and laughed at before
Should I be sewn and hugged?
I can by not saying
Still being cried and laughed at
From light to blue

And should I be hugged and tugged down
Through this tiger’s masque?
- Cocteau Twins

I unravel. I sew myself back up. I find a string, dangling, and accidentally [or not] pull at it and find the process renewed. Strings dangle and threads are pulled with needle and patience and old wrinkles in the fabric of me are softened by tears and age and use.

The process, to me, is familiar… but I keep it close when I can, because I am embarrassed to show the repetitive rends and mends to the outside world – both for fear of being judged, and from my own pride. Admitting that something’s wrong acknowledges the issue. Of course, not addressing the problem will never be helpful, because those on the outside have no way to know that behind my smile, I’m hiding pain. Yet admitting the pain is potentially giving away a weakness. Catch-22, around and around, just like my emotions and my thoughts.

The worst of all is conceding that I can’t do as much as I used to do, that my attention and my determination and my concentration and all my other -tions are undermined… by my depression. Too bad that I can’t shun that one. Dun dun.

Sometimes I want to start bashing my head into the wall. It isn’t from frustration [look, another -tion] but more from a desire to control SOME of the pain myself. At least if I smack myself around, I’ll have overrode the annoying phantom ache in my chest/heart/brain. That ache is the hardest thing to explain to people – that it just feels like someone is squeezing my chest, but not in a physical way, exactly. And my heart physically feels heavy. So do my hands, legs, even head sometimes. When I hang my head, it’s because I literally just can’t bear to hold it up anymore, it’s too hard. When it gets that bad, sometimes I just go to sleep for as long as I can stand. [That is, when the insomnia isn't in control.]

But I don’t want to sound complainy, because honestly? I’m working on trying to find solutions, and as hard as it can be sometimes, I still consider myself lucky, and happier than many people probably are. These blog posts serve as explanation of my inner workings, as a history of my struggle, as an update, as an education. I could talk about the joy that the local feral kittens that I’m working to tame brings me, and maybe I will in the next post… but getting this update out first was MOST important, because these things need to be said.

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

Tags: catching up with xiane, finding the girl, here i am, music

And she is not good or bad
Oh, but she wants all she could have
Your soul’s familiar call
This is it… I am and
It’s not like me
[Claire Voyant - not like me]

My silence is equal to my lack of passion. I am adrift in a sea of “I don’t care” and “I’m too tired” and “It doesn’t matter” - but it does matter and I do care, I’m just too tired and pained to admit it or do anything about it.

Depression is embarrassing. It’s humiliating to admit that I don’t have the drive to finish anything, that all I do seems to be sit around on my ass and think of nothing, or dream wistfully about the things I’d like to be accomplishing, if only I had the passion, the energy, the stamina, the will.

And people look at me and see a “healthy” person, which I can’t blame them for - and they wonder why I can’t just shake this off and get to doing… obviously it should be that easy. Just make yourself motivate, Xi.

It isn’t. I wish it was.

I went to NYC recently. For most of the time I was there, I was energized, more than I have been in ages. I came home full of hope, ideas, thoughts.
I know that living here takes away some of that zest for life… no sidewalks, no bustling creative energies, no ever-changing wall of humanity to observe. I barely even have friends here. And of course, I’ve been becoming more isolated again, but that’s a side effect of the depression, too, that need to cut myself off from everything. It hurts me to be open like that - physically hurts. That stupid Cymbalta commercial about depression hurting? I really wish it wasn’t true. I get an ache inside, like someone was slowly squeezing my heart and lungs. My bones ache. I feel weak and ineffective.

What’s worse is that I hate hate hate talking about it, admitting it, telling people just what’s going on and how I feel. Like I said, it’s embarrassing… and I know that so many people discount these feelings. I understand it, and I wish I didn’t sound so whiny and weak. But I guess the only other options would be to either fake that everything is fine, or stop talking again. And I am tired of not communicating. I know that hurts my friends and family, too… and there’s enough hurt going on already without that.

And you might tell me the truth
And I might be reminded of you
In everything I see and that I feel
You might be…

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

Tags: depression, mental health, this is who we are

It’s my life, don’t you forget… *

It was a day out. [A day in!] Rob and I decided that we needed an adventure, so we wandered to NoDa and wandered around for a while… we had a quick and light meal at Cabo’s Fish Tacos [they have lots of other stuff too, and a great atmosphere!] and then went to the Boulevard Gallery for a quick gander… then of course wound up at Amelie’s French Bakery. I’m writing this entry from there while sipping on some excellent coffee and recovering from the chocolate mousse cup pictured above. Seriously… a 24/7 bakery? Sign me up. I love this place.

We also managed to just miss a TORNADO that hit Cleveland County on our way out… wow. Hopefully our apartment will still be there on our return. *meep*
The weather’s been steady-on rainy, Springtime-a-riffic lately, and my freshly seeded balcony garden seems appreciative. I already have some mesclun mix seeds a-sproutin’ and my small herb plants look healthy and happy. I love being a gardener, and I’m really hoping that I do well this year, so that we can add the veggies of my labour into our meals.

To add a little depth to this post, I have been both riddled with Deep Thoughts about my direction in life, and driven with the desire to fine tune some slacker aspects of day to day existence. I will elaborate more as I firm up plans, but let’s just say that there will be more cooking at home and Xiane care-taking to come. It’s something that I’ve been neglecting severely, and I deserve better! I’m the only Xiane that I’ve got, after all.

Have you made new plans for your future lately? Anything that you’ve been wanting to improve in your life? I’d love to hear all about it!
*thank you, Talk Talk!

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

Tags: amelie's, coffee, gardens, this is who we are

NOT SAFE FOR WORK. DELIRIOUSLY FUN. HELL YEAH. [okay, I'll stop yelling now]

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

Tags: love, music, rainbowrama, video

Weather: hot. Damn hot for April.
Mood: a bit worn but overall upbeat.
Location: on the deck at Broad River Coffeeshop, under an umbrella.
Music: Morrissey, of course.

So hello there… radio silence broken at Chez Xiane, and no worries - things have been as up and down as anyone can expect in this life, but I’m doing well nonetheless.

Update-like things:

• increased Cymbalta dosage. This seems to be effective for now, and my moodiness has been muchly decreased.
• one thing I notice when I’m depressed: I don’t listen to music as much. Lately, I’ve been consuming new music at an alarming rate.
• I’m sick to death of a lot of my clothes and I want some changes.
• I’ve been working very hard on my business, spinning MANY yarns this month. I really do love spinning… so relaxing.
• My hair is long as hell. Seriously.
• My dreams have been amazingly vivid and bizarre lately. I suspect it has to do with the allergy medication that I take, Singulair. Another friend of mine mentioned recently that it gives her nightmares… for me, the dreams are just epic and memorable. So weird.

So there you go. I’m quiet all this time, and I have nothing substantive to give you in exchange for my silence. That’s so like me.

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

Tags: cymbalta, morrissey, music, useless updates, you tube

We all need the security that belonging brings…*

This weekend, I went back to a place that I wasn’t sure that I’d ever visit again. Not a specific place, exactly - but a kind of conceptual one.
I had a lovely weekend visit from Kristyne and Jay, with our goal being - besides enjoying our time together - to go revisit dear ol’ blighty… I mean, check out the monthly goth/industrial night in Charlotte, Return Of The Bats. Just in case you don’t know, I haven’t been out to *any* club/bar since… Cirque Macabre in Raleigh, 2007.

There’s a couple of reasons for this. One, and most important - my respiratory system has been b0rken for quite some time. It was a serious problem back when I was doing The Dawning, but I sucked it up and just felt terrible for the following Sunday and Monday every week, for much too long. During Cryptkicker, it was getting pretty bad, to the point that I knew that I really needed to keep myself out of those environments for my own good. But it took having to stay in a smoking-allowed hotel room for a weekend when I was already suffering from bronchitis to pretty much smack sense into my head. After that came the failed attempt at the “methacholine challenge” - basically, my lungs were so weak that they couldn’t risk giving me the the methacholine. Eeek! Obviously, after that, sacrificing going out into smoky environments seemed for the best.

Another reason for not going out to the clubs is… well, burnout. I mean, when you DJ every weekend, plus go to other clubs for fun and socializing, eventually you just get kinda… blase. It’s the same songs, the same clothes, the same lights and smells and everything. Even if the crowds are different and the nights vary in satisfaction, eventually it all blurs. How sad is that? I knew it was time for me to step away until I could re-appreciate something that used to bring me a lot of joy.

ROTB was definitely a lot of fun. I met some new folks who were quite lovely, got to see some Charlotte people that I never see enough of, and had a smashing time with K & J, the most wonderful friends in the world. I didn’t get to dance enough, because of the smoke, and I would have liked that. I probably would benefit from showing early and leaving earlier - both because I usually like the more obscure tunes [I could go another long stretch w/o hearing Headhunter again] and because the smoke is less prevalent in the early part of the evening. I don’t need alcohol to fuel my dancing, which is good, since I don’t drink anymore! I just don’t know if I can go every month, because my lungs might not agree.

Of course, I could always buy a cheap disco light, make my own playlist, and have an impromptu dance night in my apartment when I can’t make it out. Ha! There wouldn’t be fun people to talk to, but at least I could dance and breathe.

Anyway… You can’t go home again, but sometimes you can visit. I had some other points here that I wanted to make, but I’ll be damned if I can remember them right now. Ha!

* Joy Division [novelty]

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

Tags: breathing is good, charlotte north carolina, everything old is new again, i like tags, night clubs, return of the bats

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

So the Christians and the Pagans sat together at the table
Finding faith and common ground the best that they were able
And where does magic come from, I think magic’s in the learning
Cause now when Christians sit with Pagans only pumpkin pies are burning

- Dar Williams [The Christians and the Pagans]

No matter what you believe
No matter where you are
No matter if you think that you’ve been good or bad
No matter if you hate the holidays, or embrace them happily:

I wish for you Peace
Happiness
Love.

Mirrored from ...what's a xiane?.

Tags: holidays, wishes

Just a test to see if my cross-platform posting is working. Feel free to comment at http://www.xiane.org if this works!

Bo, Melissa, Xiane at the Charlotte Roller Derby
Originally uploaded by xiane threeravens.

Look at us, in the VIP section! Wooo!

This was the first time that any of us had been to the Roller Derby, and it was a blast! The Charlotte team kicked butt, although they were narrowly defeated at the end of the bout. The best part, though?

MY MONKEYSIS was a guest referee! WOOOOOOO!

It was a damn good time and we will definitely be going back. Bonus points for running into Petzilla there, too. We actually saw quite a few people we knew in one way or another, particularly from vending at Snug Harbor. It was great!

"
The cold light of day
Pours out of me
Leaving me black
And so healthy"

( food trackin' and stuff )

Tags: gettin' healthy

http://producten.hema.nl/

totally safe for work, but it does have sound.
you need flash to view.
don't click on anything, it'll go all by itself. :D

Tags: funny!

Snowy night!
Originally uploaded by xiane threeravens.

SNOW! Snow snow snow snow snow.

... Well, now it's "Wintry Mix." But!

S N O W!!!