Category: The Voices in My Head

Where were you a year ago?

On By MezzoSherriIn Life-Long Learning, Memoir, Pop Goes the Culture, The Voices in My Head1 Comment

A couple posts ago, I mentioned my theory about humans being wired for anniversaries. I still haven’t taken the time to consult with Professor Google to see if there is any science bearing out that theory—for tonight’s sake, I’ve decided that whether or not I’m right about humans in general being wired this way, I know from my own lived experience that I sure as shit am wired that way.

I think it started with all the moving around we did when I was growing up. A lot of my memories of growing up are organized on the internal string of beads I keep in my head tracking what town and house we lived in for what years, what school I was at, and what my classroom looked like at different ages.

The internal recollection of where I was when such-and-such a memory took place is one of my most vivid ways of being able to place when something happened and how that memory exists in the sequence of events that have made up my life.

A picture of several beaded bracelets in different shades of red and maroon.

So I expect I’ll be spending the next month or so being a little bit haunted by the recollection of “where I was a year ago.”

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I hate to move it move it

On By MezzoSherriIn Be Your Own Beautiful, Don't you want to be thin?, Fat is Just an Adjective, Health at Every Size, Memoir, The Pressure to Fix Myself, The Voices in My Head1 Comment

So I mentioned that I had a less-than-wonderful endocrinologist appointment near the end of January. Basically, my A1C level is elevated after however-long of being stable.

And it could be a post-2020 dumpster fire kind of anomaly. After all, my stress has been through the roof since last fall, what with a very COVID Christmas, the presidential transition (and insurrection) and coming up on the first anniversary of this COVID life.* And to be honest, I paid just about ZERO attention to monitoring my carbs or sugar intake during the latter months of the year. Plus the fact that I’ve been sedentary as fuck since this COVID thing started. Most of my activity in recent years has been of the “functional fitness” variety: walking from the parking garage to the office building, being on my feet at work, airport and city walking during my almost-monthly business trips, plus the recreational activities of play rehearsals and dance choreography. And none of that has been happening for the last 11 months.

Two potatoes with cartoon faces drawn on them, sitting side by side on a dollhouse-sized couch.

So, the spike in my A1C level could be temporary. Or it could be a progression in whatever level of pre-diabetes/insulin resistance/whatever ethical doctors really call it I currently have.

Jury’s still out on that—more observation and follow-up testing over the next few months to see what’s what.

But regardless of what the diagnostic outcome is, feels like a good time to get my butt off the couch.

Which, alas, isn’t anywhere near as easy a task as that sounds.

Because this past week, I’ve come face to face with the depths of how diet culture has completely destroyed my relationship with healthful bodily movement.**

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Bearing witness

On By MezzoSherriIn Life-Long Learning, Memoir, Politics and Policy, Pop Goes the Culture, The Voices in My HeadLeave a comment

[CN: the Holocaust, genocide]

There’s one more other thing that had me sufficiently preoccupied that it delayed my return to JALC by 4 or 5 days. It was a new project (or obsession), but it’s one that deserves a much more thoughtful exploration than last night’s joking reference to “shiny new objects.”

It started last Wednesday, on International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Someone on one of the lefty/liberal FB groups I belong to posted a link to the Arolsen Archives‘ #EveryNameCounts campaign, making the observation that the need to support this work is more pressing than it’s ever been, especially given the photos of those Capitol insurrectionists wearing anti-Semitic shirts with slogans like “Camp Auschwitz” and “6 Million was Not Enough.” (Also see this video from the US Holocaust Memorial Museum at around the 9 minute mark. Watch the whole thing if you can.)

A concentration camp prisoner intake card, slightly out of focus. Superimposed over are the words "#EveryNameCounts: An Initiative of the Arolsen Archives."
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Permission to fail

On By MezzoSherriIn Make Epic Shit, Memoir, Practicing in the Heart, Self-Acceptance, The Voices in My HeadLeave a comment

With the weekend down-time, I’m probably gonna start my next puzzle tomorrow. It was a Christmas gift from my niece, and it ended up having a bit of a joke attached to it. You see, she’d also brought a puzzle to her parent’s house as a traditional Christmas project—yet another one of those shared traditions I’m looking forward to ALL of us enjoying together for Christmas 2021!*

Only the wintry scene on the puzzle itself was not a match for the wintry scene she’d chosen, as represented by the picture on the box.

A completed puzzle sitting in front of the puzzle box it was packaged in. The puzzle box shows a wintry scene with a gazebo among tress, with a single red cardinal ion the foreground. The completed puzzle shows a wintry scene of a snowman standing in front of a wooden fence, surrounded by more than a dozen birds.
It was the multiplicity of birds that gave it away

(I will pause for a quick sidebar to give mad props to anyone able to do a 1,000 piece puzzle without a guide photo…)

So, I was warned that the photo on the outside of my new Springbok puzzle box might or might not end up matching the puzzle inside.

A box for a 1,000-piece Springbok puzzle, showing a picture of a red-and-white striped lighthouse on a grassy bluff, in front of a pink and peach colored sunset sky.

It’s like a bonus mystery with my gift. Fun!

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Shine on, you crazy diamond

On By MezzoSherriIn Be Your Own Beautiful, Memoir, Practicing in the Heart, Self-Acceptance, The Pressure to Fix Myself, The Voices in My Head1 Comment

I’m gonna be a little bit emotionally honest tonight.

One of the main reasons I posted my reading challenge list last night is ‘cos I was still too embarrassed to share my word for 2021.

[Quick catch-up for anyone who needs it: I’ve chosen focus words for a few years now, which is something a number of folks in the self-development world do. And, as I mentioned in the run-up to New Year’s Eve, my word organically came to me somewhere early-to-mid-December.]

Now, that unbidden emergence is the way all my successful word-of-the-year experiments happened,* so odds are that unbidden word is the right choice for me in 2021. And I have enough trust in my intuition that I haven’t been actively seeking a different option. But, alas, I also have enough self-judgement that I’ve not been willing to share this word with anyone.

And what is this super-embarrassing term that has me in such a tizzy?

Shine.

A close-up picture of a sparkler.

(Kinda silly, right?)

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Laying some groundwork

On By MezzoSherriIn Life-Long Learning, Memoir, Stuff about Stuff, The Pressure to Fix Myself, The Voices in My Head1 Comment

It’s been a long time since I did “New Year’s Resolutions” (I wrote about that last year and the year before). Nonetheless, in these waning days of 2020, I find myself in a reflective state of mind, drawn towards the notion (fantasy?) of getting myself more centered/grounded/organized before 2021 rings itself in.

Part of it is that odometer-turning energy that gets me every turn of the calendar. Part of it is the positive side effect of allowing myself to really-and-truly check out of work—-something I’d not done since COVID started.

But let me be clear: NONE of this is irrational exuberance about 2020 turning into 2021. As far as that cosmic detail is concerned, I agree with this wisdom I’ve seen going around Twitter and FB:

Nobody claim 2021 as “your year.” We’re all going to walk in real slow. Be good. Be quiet. Don’t. Touch. Anything.

Solid advice, as far as I’m concerned.

Still, I find myself doing some preparatory things for this quiet walk into 2021.

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Surge on surge on surge

On By MezzoSherriIn Memoir, Pop Goes the Culture, Spirituality, The Voices in My Head4 Comments

I was gonna write an entirely different post tonight. I finished another “just for fun” read over the weekend, and was gonna do that one last fluffy book review before coming back to more serious topics.

But then I saw this tweet from NBC news:

So I guess it’s back to seriousness sooner rather than later.

Although, in all honestly, I’m not sure what more I have to say aside from.

What the fuck, America?

A picture of the red Angry Bird wearing a medical mask.
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Going back to go forward

On By MezzoSherriIn Life-Long Learning, Memoir, The Voices in My Head2 Comments

In other news, I’m wondering about going back to school.

Assorted art supplies (colored pencils, scissors, brushes, rulers, markers) in stainless steel buckets.
Just an elaborate ruse to feed my addiction to school supplies

Now, I’ve been in the education NPO business for a long darn time, so you could totally say that I don’t need more coursework or another degree to be successful.

And yet, I’ve been feeling more of a pull towards getting an Ed.D. during these last few months. As the policy piece of my work portfolio and my direct involvement in research & TA projects have all increased, I’ve been wondering about whether there’s benefit to me in having a stronger—or at least more organized—level of background knowledge about the education field.

There would certainly be some benefit to me, job-wise. And I wouldn’t have worked in this field so long if I didn’t care about it as much as I do. And I legitimately enjoy learning new things.

But still I wonder: what’s the gain for me here? What are my motivations? Can I trust myself?

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Raindrops on acid

On By MezzoSherriIn Meta-Blogging, Pop Goes the Culture, The Voices in My HeadLeave a comment

I’m taking a frivolity break tonight: my political posts take an embarrassingly long time to write, so I need to get something quick and low-effort up now so I can use tonight and tomorrow’s writing time crafting something that is more substantial and better researched.

Early in COVID, when everyone was opening up the vaults to various cultural programming in order to lift our collective spirits, I watched part of a Live from Lincoln Center broadcast with Annaleigh Ashford. Now I’ve had a bit of a girl-crush on Ashford since I first noticed her in Masters of Sex. After that, I learned what an incredible musical theater talent she is, from being the absolute best part of that TV remake of Rocky Horror, to Kinky Boots, to her revelatory interpretation of Dot in Sunday in the Park with George.

I didn’t watch the whole concert (episode. whatever-you-call-it.) during the spring. I’d been kicking myself over that carelessness, but preparing this quick post has brought me the happy discovery that the whole thing is still online—and not behind a subscriber paywall!

Celebrate good times!
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