packing lightly

going back to work yesterday was hard, ya'll.

i think it was the comparison between the wild, fresh, red-tan and evergreen of colorado and the confined, stale, neutral pinky-lavender of the hospital. i mean, i didn't even know it had rained yesterday until i drove out of the parking garage, saw the wet pavement and felt the damp come through my air vents. last week i knew it started raining because i felt it on my skin. it gave me goosebumps sitting on the dock up on pike's peak, you know?

but i've developed coping skill #3 for work. although numbering them is a little arbitrary, because they're all really the same thing:

RUN AWAY!

whenever possible and appropriate, of course.

anyway, i've taken to going down to my car in the parking garage for lunch, sitting for a hour and half in the dull light and eating while i blast my ear drums into nonexistence with country music.

did i mention letting my brain circle until it has partially processed everything? and then i can think through one thing at a time. hence the hour and a half everyday.

yes, i said country. i know - i haven't listened to country since middle school. but i think i like it because they (they being country artists), for the most part, present the kind of idealism that i totally feed off of and need to hear, half-way through the day. there is realism in there, too, and sometimes i just need to know that some man somewhere really means it when he sings about how lost he got in his wife's eyes when they got married. and that has implications on the fifth floor, not just in my heart. i hope that makes sense. i don't feel like explaining myself right now - it would be very long and very philosophical and i'm too tired for all that.

so. country it is. except i'm all about guster right now. actually, the wailin' jennys. actually augustana. mm, yeah. augustana.

it's been a radio kind of week. i haven't had one of those in awhile, either.

i feel like such a borderline-er. but i suppose that foggy sense of self has to do with the peacemaker in me. i'm getting better, really i am. i actually am starting to know what i need.

i need wind.
i need rain.
i need fresh air.
i need green.
i need nature-grime.
i need to go a few days without a shower.
i need time to talk.
i need time to listen.
i need water. big bodies of it in which i can play.
i need people. centered people, anyway.
i need conversation.
i need to be able to be quiet.
i need time to be understood.
i need time to understand.
i need bare feet. real bad.
i need sunlight.
i need hooded sweatshirts. and all that they stand for.
i need campfires.
i need to move.
i need to be loved. in the way that i've only ever been at home, i think.

i'm so ready to go to england. i'm so scared, but i am so ready to get out and away from "the smallness of my own life" as brandi carlile said once. i'm kind of sad that her new video is on vh1. she was kind of jenn's and my little secret, and now she's not anymore. and the song that got her there is really different from the stuff i know. much more rock-y, less folky, which just doesn't feel right.

but. that's not really important.

maybe i will move to colorado, my dear lady : )

sorry, i'm bouncing all over the place. i just really want to run away from any form of responsibility right now. vacation always kind of screws with me that way. but i got a lot done today - i checked my e-mail and figured out some fusab stuff that needed to be figured out and i called people that i needed to call and set up some coffee dates that i needed to set up.

so i feel better about life now.

and my favorite song comes on just in time for me to stop typing nonsense and go to bed.

and she's already out the door
she's already out of here

[augustana]

well. merry tuesday : )