Tag: Energy

Categories
Politics

Day 543 and Complicated Country

America has always been a complicated country. We’ve perpetrated some of history’s great evils. And at the same time we’ve achieved the greatest set of freedom ever known. Dickins didn’t fucking know best and worst of times. That’s always been the great American novel’s thing. The remix is better sometimes.

And I am feeling this tension in my body this week. To have always believed in the forward progress of this nation. Even when one grew up, perhaps most uniquely among generations, aware of the sins. We had Adbuster’s and Zinn’s People’s History and every politically aware piece of Hollywood awards bait.

You know how weird it feels to be optimistic about capitalism and the mess of democracy when you know it’s fucking blood magic that bought its riches? Everything has a cost. But who am I to know the cost. And would I bear it myself if I thought I could enjoy it’s fruits only? I doubt it. Everyone loves a fucking deal. And white people love the meritocracy. Because it means we’ve got merit by being winners. Whatever your ego needs.

It’s no wonder we love horror movies in America. We like a nightmare on Elm Street. And we love our monsters. What if racism was the monster all along we laugh. Our art has always recognized the victims in the system. It was only very occasionally that our laws did anything to protect anyone though. Amendments were hard fought and fiercely opposed. Reconstruction of what exactly? Did we even try?

So I’m not surprised that my body is on the line. Because someone in my lineage knew the cost. They came to America willingly. The freedoms we bought for ourselves as immigrants. We knew they weren’t free. But maybe we misunderstood the cost. Didn’t pay the bill in full.

But if the promise isn’t worth it. If the dream cannot be attained? Then what happens. Who pulls back from contributing our best. Who gives up a little on working harder. And how do we slowly decay just a little bit over time. Slowly at first. And how does that compound. What little failures add up to the final cynical calculation that anyone who has lived under an authoritarian can smell.

It dawns on me that we should have been fighting my entire lifetime to secure every inch of freedoms we could. That every single instance would matter because we’d be losing ground the moment we stopped. Because shame is unrelenting. And we must hold our ground against it every day. Ever vigilant.

Categories
Chronic Disease Emotional Work

Day 542 and Energy Budgets

I’m not much for active time off. Or being active at all really. I have a limited energy budget so I watch my energy expenditure carefully. Other people budget their money. I budget my energy.

I’ll often find myself jealous of other people who enjoy active hobbies. My husband plays tennis and shoots competitively. Every weekend he is off doing fun shit outside. He could easily play a sport, socialize afterwards and still have the energy to go out for dinner.

Meanwhile I’m probably in bed. I have plenty of fun, lower energy usage hobbies. I read a ton of fiction. I play games. I am working on my foreign language skills (be my friend in Duolingo), and of course I’m a notoriously active Twitter shitposter. All things that can be done while laying down!

And while I love all of those activities I wish that I didn’t have to run the math on how much a coffee with friends would set back my energy budget. I long for the opportunity to simply throw on clothing and head out the door without fear of how that might impact the rest of my day or even my week. But I run on the spoon theory just like your average disabled person.

My fear is that my energy poverty is isolating me. I struggle to explain that I’d love to spend more time with people but I need them to commit to cheaper energy expenditure options. But even the energy required to explain how friends and family can accommodate me is a challenge. It embarrasses me there I need everyone to work around my needs. And I’m often too scared to be demanding about what would work for me. So instead I just spend my time and energy alone.

If you are interested in learning how to make the effort to spend time with someone with energy poverty I hope this post helps. For instance instead of playing a round of tennis, perhaps you could come visit me at home and we could quietly chat on the couch. Instead of going out to dinner we could order in takeout. And no I don’t mean cook at home because then I’d need to plan, shop, cook and clean up afterwards. I very much mean order food on disposable plates so it’s minimal energy outlay. Disability accommodations are not very eco-friendly. It’s a different calculus of resources.

You may have to do a lot more work to be friends with someone managing a disability or a medical condition. If they don’t respond it’s not because they don’t want to see you necessarily. It could just be that you messaged on a bad day and it slipped through the cracks. We need you to actively work to be present for us. It’s a big ask but it is appreciated.

Categories
Chronic Disease

Day 540 and No Pain

I’ve come to accept an ambient level of pain as part of my daily existence. I’ve logged over fourteen hundred discrete pain measurements over a three year period. It’s likely one been in pain for a bit longer but those are the documented years since I had a diagnosis and began working to overcome it.

I’ve only had a handful of days where I’ve logged below a three. The pain scale most of the medial industry uses is from 1-10 with 4-6 being moderate pain and 10 being unbearable give me the opioids pain.

I typically log somewhere between four on a good day and seven by it’s end. I’ll usually have an eight or a nine a few times a month. Those knock me flat and I won’t be able to get out of bed. I can work and do basics when I’m at a five or six but it’s very tiring. And frankly it took a lot of mindfulness work to learn to work through pain.

Pain is actually exhausting. It’s hard to even begin to describe how much it reduces your total capacity. Articulating pain has eluded much finer writers than I. Just because one can live through it doesn’t mean one should.

To have had a morning of relief felt truly miraculous. It was sadly short lived. Some stresses hit my day and my pain is back up to a four. I can live with a four. I have been for sometime. But to finally have seen the light of having a pain free day after years of struggling will sustain me for a while. To know that it’s possible. It felt like a miracle.

Categories
Travel

Day 539 and Hurry Up and Wait

As summer travel is turning into a source of horror stories and tears, I decided the best way to handle transiting across various borders is to pad every flight with extra time. To hurry up and wait as a strategy.

This has naturally lead to some significant mind numbing waiting issues. Two hours in an airport lounge isn’t as fun as I imagined or even remember. Lounges seemed nicer in the past. Sitting in the liminal with lots of other bored, stressed, and otherwise disengaged humans gives you plenty to watch but little of interest.

My lounge experience went as you’d expect. People giving each other a wide berth while they sip mediocre white wine. Teenagers trying to not to look at their parents in case someone cool passes by. All forms of athleisure and sweat pants swaddling the asses of women just hoping for a comfortable flight. The occasional child demanding a cookie from the two poorly stocked snack sections

When it’s time to board everyone simply mobs the doors. No one care about any system. It’s just a throng of desperation yearning to get on and claim overhead baggage space. I’d like to be irritated as I paid for business class but status is funny that way.

I can’t even find anyone to Karen at to say I’m supposed to be up front. So I wait at the back of the line. No one is following orders because no one is giving them. I packed compact & sensibly but everyone else is testing the limits. No wonder everyone wants to get on as fast as they can. Overpacking must be a stress response.

The entire experience is a war of all against all. If everyone is priority boarding than no one is a priority. It’s just pushing and shoving and giving no fucks. Sadly I give fucks about decorum and politeness so I didn’t have the balls to try to make a run around. I just said and wait and wait. Hurry up and wait.

Categories
Emotional Work Preparedness

Day 532 and Mortgage

I signed the mortgage paperwork for my first house today. We are moving to Montana. I don’t know how I made it well into my thirties without every owning real estate but I’m going to guess it involves the Great Recession.

Hell if you go further back it probably involves the bankruptcy my parents endured when Web 1.0 crashed. Point is that millennials haven’t had the best hand when it comes to home ownership. We were either totally broke or housing was so expensive it was comical to consider purchasing anything.

I was quite opposed to it for a long time. Why would you tie up your precious capital? Why would you lock yourself into one place? Why would you cut off optionality? And then the crumbles began. The pandemic hit and we were no longer constrained by geography. We could actually assess long term priorities and ambitions for how we’d live our life.

Which ironically made it even harder to decide. Do we want to live in a city? Do we want a suburb? What states will we consider? How does climate change factor into a purchase. How about resilience issues related to power and water? What about sociopolitical risks? We invested nearly two years into working through these questions.

Montana ended up topping the list even though we considered Washington, Oregon, Colorado, Michigan, New Hampshire, New York and Connecticut. Our goal was a colder climate with a bit of remove from the world with minimal invasive politics. We also wanted some yuppie amenities like decent grocery stores and a good airport. My husband doesn’t like New England and I don’t like heat. But we do love mountains. Montana just kept coming up to the top of the list.

I feel relieved that after all of this effort we were finally able to buy a house. Would I prefer buying without the almost certain knowledge the house will be under water during a recession? Maybe. It’s not optimal. I don’t love the idea of having a mortgage at all.

But the idea of having a home I can rely on for years to come fills me with relief. I’ve quite literally never experienced it. But I think it’s going to be good. My body sure seems happy about it. I felt like I could actually plan. The second we were done with the notary I felt a weight lift. My mind cleared. I felt optimistic. I wanted to plan. I wanted to build.

Categories
Aesthetics Emotional Work Travel

Day 531 and Overpacking

I used to be an expert packer. If you do some deep Googling on me you will find lots of travel tips as at one point I was the co-founder of a travel cosmetics company called Stowaway. I was on the road a lot and became quite practiced at getting my entire life in a carry-on.

I can’t seem to pull it off anymore. At first I thought it was because I didn’t travel during the pandemic. Then I blamed it on being modest disabled from all my various health nonsense. But I’ve just stumbled onto the real reason

I’ve got fantasies of having a life where I still do things.

By packing high heels and nice dresses and several colors of lipstick I am telling my disability “not today Satan!” Except then of course I don’t use any of it. Because I am in fact still disabled.

I packed an outfit for a black tie gala when I went down to Austin. Because you never know when you might appreciate having a gown on hand and it didn’t take up much space. Now mind you I still attended an actual gala, but I ended up wearing a tank top and camouflage pants. Crypto is low key that way.

While I am introverted, and not terribly keen on socializing, I haven’t quite given up on a world where I go out if I want to. I want to feel like I’ve got the option to say yes to a nice dinner or to a meeting up at a cocktail bar. Leaving behind my favorite pair of Gucci heels is cutting off some part of my life in my mind.

If I only pack comfortable clothing and sensible skincare I feel as if I’ve conceded something to my disability. If I don’t pack a nice dress, even if my entire trip is planned around being casually at home in an Airbnb, I feel I’ve somehow given in to the pain and fatigue.

I’m not entirely sure if this is something I can work through. Or even if I want to work through it. I hate having to make room for medication and supplements and knowing it means there is no room for a hair dryer or a second pair of heels. I’d rather overpack. I’d rather have some sense of optimism and ambition.

But then I’ve got to get through customs at Heathrow and I’ve got no intention of checking any of my luggage during a chaotic summer for travel. So it might be time to try getting back to traveling light. And that means fewer cosmetics and clothing.

Categories
Emotional Work Travel

Day 530 and Social Burnout

The week or two before I attended Consensus in Austin I could barely talk about anything else I was so excited. But I’ve barely said anything about the actual experience after the fact I feel so burnt out from the social exertion.

A friend of mine was a little hurt I didn’t tell them anything about my experience. They pointed out that it was a bit like watching a movie as it built up to the narrative climatic scenes and having it cut straight to credits. They were invested in my trip and then I didn’t do anything to tie up the story.

And boy did I have a negative reaction to that. I felt like absolute shit. How dare they feel like they were entitled to hearing about my life on a timeline that would make sense to them. I waffled between anger and shame. I apologized. I thought I’d made them feel shitty by not sharing. Maybe I did owe them a narrative as it was happening.

I went into some of my core childhood fears. Was I actually being withholding and deliberately creating distance because I felt I had violated my boundaries by over socializing? Probably! But also my friend kindly realized I was freaking out said “chill bitch I’m kidding tell me when you are up to it.” And then the relief flooded my body. I could just say no and my loved ones would understand.

I am feeling so burnt out being being around people I spent the morning debating if I should use my energy on a shower or save it up for a doctors appointment. Which is clearly a stupid and chaotic other/or agenda I shouldn’t engage in. If driving to an appointment that is supposed to be restorative for my health is so overwhelming energetically that I am not showering I probably should go.

I suspect I’m going to need a few days with substantially lower social engagement to recover. If I’m ignoring you it’s because I quite simply can’t be productive in a conversation with you without compromising my own boundaries. I appreciate everyone’s understanding.

Categories
Emotional Work Travel

Day 523 and Logistics of Appearing Professional As A Woman

I’ve never liked packing. It brings back childhood memories of moving which I did once every two years until college. And even then it was only a three year reprieve. I’ve moved thirty eight times in my life and I’m about to do my thirty-ninth to Montana soon.

I’m headed to Texas for Coindesk’s Consensus conference. I’m giving a talk called InDAOstrial Revolution about the history of corporate governance and recent large scale macroeconomic innovation cycles. I swear it will have some memes and it’s a pretty degen talk overall (why how do you do my fellow kids). But no seriously one of the arguments I make is that American government arose out of fascism so it’s pretty lit.

Unfortunately Austin is literally pretty lit. The predicted high for the entire week is over 100 with a couple days over 105. I’m moving from Colorado to Montana as I find the weather to be too hot in Colorado with global warming. So that gives you some idea of how I tolerate heat. I really don’t have a wardrobe for this kind of shit. I have a couple items I bought for Miami for the last crypto conference I went too but it feels a bit flashy for Austin.

I spent a couple hours in my closet trying to figure out what the fuck might be tolerable and basically ended up with exactly what I packed for Miami. I brought a more professional navy wrap dress for my talk as I figured I should look the part. Though I did seriously just consider wearing an Obi gown just for fun. If my body cooperates maybe I’ll wear it out to a party.

Then I had to contend with what kind of skincare and makeup was going to work on the surface of the fucking sun. I rummaged through quite a bit of sunscreens. Then I pulled out all my favorite skin oils and replaced them water creams and essences. Because I’ll be on a stage I also had to find my power foundations. I rarely used powder anything on my face. I’m totally a cream woman. But being under lights meant I needed to consider some melt-proof polished options. I typically wear very little makeup these days as I’ve got great skin so I may as well show it off. But that reads poorly on a stage and on camera so it requires a bit of planning.

Honestly the logistics of being a professional woman in public are extensive and it’s a set of obligations no formal education ever covers. It’s not like there is a class in 10th grade about applying professional looking makeup. But there should be! I say bring back home economics and add in the feminine arts. I want manners and grooming and styling so everyone has the chance to do the right social signaling that puts you on a track for upward mobility. It’s every bit as a crucial a skill as being numerate. If I ran a school I’d include it in my curriculum and I’d be sure to pass it in to my daughters. If only because you need to know the rules to break them well.

Categories
Internet Culture

Day 521 and Lots of Words

Today is the second day in #1000WordsofSummer. If you haven’t heard of it, it’s a program run by Jami Attenberg. I am not using my daily writing exercise to “count” for it as they are separate experiences in my mind. So now I suppose I’ve really opted myself into a very prolific two weeks of writing.

I wanted to begin on my story when I first woke up. I had ideas for plot points and details running through my head. But I had some other work that is due on Monday so I put my head down and pushed through everything else so I could get to my science fiction.

I considered writing the thousand words first but I don’t like the idea of using writing to procrastinate for some reason. I’d prefer to get the main tasks down and out of the way. Then my fun writing gets it be a treat and serve as a carrot to get other deliverables done.

So I got my power point done and then I went straight into my short story. I did an edit pass and that somehow added in an additional 700 or so words as different parts got more fully realized. I sketched out some plot points and areas I wanted to explore. That was another 300. It was much easier going for second try than the first. W

hich is a very good argument for just doing something and not judging it. By the time you come round for the second try, you will have learned some tiny sliver of something. And that little something slowly over time makes it all easier. The struggle is the work.

Categories
Emotional Work

Day 519 and Dogged

I am a obsessive. I latch onto shit. If I’ve got a problem in front of me I will absolutely fixate until the every blocker to solving said problem is removed. If a blocker cannot be removed, say it’s 11pm and shit is closed, then I hope you want to hear about it all night. It’s absolutely one of my most annoying personality traits. I just do not let up.

I had a bulldog as a kid. Her name was Maybelline. If she was playing tug you better believe you were going to lose. Bulldogs were bred to latch onto a bull’s nose and not let go till they had brought it down. An 80lb dog could corkscrew and thrash its body till it brought down a thousand pound bull. Don’t play tug of way with a bulldog. They just don’t fucking let go.

You are actually discouraged from playing tugging games with a bulldog because it will only excite them. And you don’t want to encourage a dog that can fuck you up to engage in behaviors that will fuck you up.

Equally if you see me latching onto something you should not engage. I will not let it go. I was looking at Airbnbs today as I’ve got some travel coming up. I knew I wasn’t going to book anything as I needed to get answers from a few hosts on basics like air conditioning. I had a few criteria I knew I wanted met so I just kept scrolling.

Suddenly I’d gone through several hundred properties and several hours has gone by. Sure I’d narrowed it down but I hadn’t actually picked a place. I couldn’t till I heard back. And so I just kept scrolling. Maybe if I kept at it I’d find something matching every single one of my criteria.

Eventually I had to be pried away. The bull wasn’t going down. I wasn’t going to be able to book as it was past midnight in Europe anyway. I’m pretty sure I’ll have the perfect place to book when I wake up. I did the work. I have lots of chalices. But fuck I cannot let it go. And it’s getting in the way of me thinking about other productive shit. Which is a metaphor for how something I’m sure. Being dogged is good. Until it’s not.