Filed under: Art, Bipolar, Book Conservation, Fireworks, General Musings, Health, Predictions, Preparedness, Publishing, Science Fiction
Well, it is for me, since yesterday was my birthday.
And it’s a bit odd, but I do feel as though something is different this time around. Usually, birthdays don’t mean that much to me. And I don’t tend to put a lot of emphasis on just numerical age – mine, or anyone else’s. Besides, 51 isn’t a significant milestone in any way – it’s not a big round number, it isn’t some threshold like 18 or 21, it isn’t even a prime number. It’s just 51.
And yet . . .
. . . something does feel different. Perhaps it is due to the fact that last Thursday I finally got the long-delayed physical exam I initially went to see my doctor for in September and the results were actually pretty good. In spite of all that I have done to myself over the years, I’m in decent physical condition. Surprise, surprise.
So maybe that’s it. Or maybe it’s because I have so much good work waiting for me to do – important work, worth doing well. Not just the conservation work, though there is a *lot* of that. But also work on the care giving book. That’s important, and will be a help to others. I’ve also been recently asked to join the board of a significant arts organization here in the state, as well as to apply for an important local government (volunteer) position – more on that when everything shakes out. There’s even a publisher who has shown some interest in Communion of Dreams, though I’ve been down that path enough times to not expect a pot of gold at the end. All of these things tend to bolster one’s mood.
So last night, as we watched a bit of the City’s fireworks display from our front porch, I felt happy. Productive. Strong. With a certain . . . resolve. I feel as though I have recovered a lot over the last year, found that parts of me have been hammer-hardened and honed properly.
It is a good feeling.
Whether it will last long, or not, time will tell. But I feel more complete, more prepared to move on and do the work before me, than I have in a very long time.
Happy New Year.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Alzheimer's, Bipolar, Depression, Gardening, General Musings, Habanero, Health, Preparedness, Survival
My special-order plants arrived yesterday. Bhut Jolokia, Fatalii, and Red Savina chile peppers (man, you gotta love a pepper with the name Fatalii). Ivory Egg and Opalka heirloom tomatoes. These will be supplemented with other peppers and tomatoes I can get locally.
So, since we’d gone several days without rain, I was finally able to get into the garden and do the tilling that has needed to be done for the last couple of years. And since it had been a couple of years since I had done it, the ground was hard, compacted, uncooperative. I basically spent six hours wrestling with the rototiller. Six hours being jarred, hands going numb, shoulders aching. But also six hours thinking.
Not serious thinking. Not most of the time. Not when I was in a life or death struggle with the machine. Mostly it was random free association, going over this or that neglected chore, replaying a conversation I’d had at a city meeting the day before. But there was also some time for real contemplation. Real introspection beyond consideration of how sore my back was.
And somewhere in there I discovered something. Strength. Not physical strength – at 50 I don’t really expect to reclaim the physical strength I had at 30. Rather, a kind of strength of personality. A sense of my own potency. A realization that this had come back to me.
Oh, it hadn’t been a complete stranger. It takes a kind of personal strength to close a beloved business, and to care for a beloved family member until their death. Instead of glimpses and flashes of the thing that kept me going the exhaustion of those years, this was more . . . whole? Unified? Tempered?
I dunno. But it was – is – there. A sense that I can do more now. That I am more capable. More secure in my abilities.
I have always felt as though this life were a thing caught just at the edge of full consciousness, in the mildly euphoric hypnogogic state as you emerge from a dream into morning. And so there is often the sense that one is only now coming to full wakefullness, full integration of your faculties. And so it is again, with this renewed sense of personal power, the upward arc of my bipolar cycle.
And soon, I’ll be planting tomatoes and peppers. That always makes me feel good.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Alzheimer's, Art, Bipolar, Book Conservation, Depression, Health, Survival, Travel
“Say, while you’re here, maybe you can take a look at this piece of artwork I have. It was given to me by the artist, a friend, but it seems to be coming away from the frame.”
This is part of the price of having owned an art gallery and having done framing. Friends and family ask these questions. But it could be worse – I could be a doctor.
“Sure, be glad to.”
* * * * * * *
Email from a friend, following my post about depression:
I hope you’ve turned the corner on the inertia and are getting back into it. Got meds?
My reply:
Lets see – yeah, a couple of different ones for my bp. For the depression? Nope – the state of treatment there is still less than a crap shoot, in terms of finding something that works. And since I am not paralyzed by it, and know how to work my way out of it over time, I’d rather spend the time doing that than mucking around with random chemicals on a “try this for six weeks” basis.
* * * * * * *
I sat in the recliner, just enjoying the picture created by the fair-sized window on the wall across from me. All I could see were trees – no sky, no landscape beyond – just trees.
But what trees!
Coastal redwoods. And only three or four of them. About 25 feet outside the window, so I was only getting a partial view, mostly of that rough, somewhat shabby but oversized bark. With a couple of horizontal branches to make the composition more interesting visually.
“Nice view out this window.”
“Yeah, we sited the house to do that.”
My wife designed this house. It was good to be staying there.
* * * * * * *
On the flight out I sat and thought. For a long time. Listening to music, eyes closed. The Southwest jet was only about 2/3 full, so my wife and I had plenty of room in our three-seat row. I could just relax, spread out a bit, and think.
I don’t do that often enough. Usually, I am reading, blogging, watching something, having conversation. Or I am working – whether at my conservation bench, or playing house elf, or doing something else. But I seldom sit and just think.
Or listen to music. I got out of the habit while caring for Martha Sr. It was difficult to do, since so often I had to be listening to the baby monitor we used to make sure she was OK.
I used to really enjoy listening to music. Just listening, thinking.
* * * * * * *
“See, it’s pulled away from the frame.”
I looked at the piece. We’d hung it off an open door so that I could examine it easily while it was suspended. Abstract, large pieces of torn paper, colored in pastel tones of blues and greens and beiges. The pieces had been heavily gessoed then painted with a thinned-down acrylic. To add some surface effects, the mounted pieces of paper were rolled and folded such that they created a high relief of some five or six inches. All this tied onto the base sheet (also gessoed and painted), which was adhered to a piece of foamcore. This was then mounted by construction adhesive to a strong boxed-”H” wooden frame which you couldn’t see from the front. The whole effect was pretty good, if you like abstract art. Overall, the piece was about 3′ wide by 5′ tall.
“Yeah, I see what you mean. The top part has curled away from the frame, peeling away.”
“You can do whatever you need to. I’ve got some Gorilla Glue – maybe that’s strong enough. Or, if you want to screw the piece back onto the frame, I can get some paint to blend in and mask the screws. Whatever you think it needs.”
I looked at the piece again, hanging there. Pulled a bit, knocked off a chunk of the bead of adhesive. “Let me think about it.”
* * * * * * *
They tell you to expect it to take a year to recover. You don’t believe them.
But they’re right.
Oh, that doesn’t relieve you of the duty to try and get your shit together more quickly. To try and get past the soul-aching exhaustion that comes with having fought the good fight for so very, very long. You have to do that. It is absolutely necessary.
But it isn’t sufficient. It will still take a year. Or longer.
* * * * * * *
I sat in the chair, looking out the window. I had changed my position ever so slightly – now, on the extreme right, I could see about half of the large birdfeeder. We had filled it and hoisted it up that morning. Now maybe a dozen Steller’s Jays were mobbing, taking turns at the feeder, flicking in and out of my picture.
If you know Bluejays, you know these guys. Smart. Stubborn. Survivors.
Sometimes, being a little stubborn is what’s needed. Stubborn in a smart way. While several of their number kept some larger crows away, the others would eat. Then they’d swap. Smart.
* * * * * * *
“We’ll get what we need when we’re out. Is there an art supply store in Ft. Bragg?”
“Yeah, Racine’s. Downtown.” My sister-in-law looked at me, a little quizzical. “I’ll be happy to talk with the artist and get some paints and do the touch-up, if you just want to remount the piece with screws or something. There’s no reason you have to try and match what she used.”
“I won’t need any paints. Nor any screws.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Well, the problem isn’t the adhesive. The problem is the lamination.”
“Sorry?”
“See,” I pointed at the back of the piece. “There’s just this piece of foamcore. There’s nothing to balance the force of the paper mounted to the other side. Rather than trying to force the whole thing back, which will probably result in snapping the foamcore backing, we’re going to dismount it entirely. Then I will put a layer of stiff cloth on the back, using an adhesive similar to the gesso on the front. I want to go to the art supply store, since they’ll either have the PVA I want, or I can get some gesso and use that.”
“Will that work?”
“Yup. It’s a basic process from book conservation, just applied on a larger scale than I usually do it. Same thing as getting the balance right on the cover of a book – cloth on the outside, paper on the inside. It stops the bookboard from warping.”
* * * * * * *
It’s been a year. Or it will have been next week, when I’m on the east coast.
On the day I’ll meet my co-author for the care-giving book, as it happens. Talk about serendipity.
Nothing magical about that. But anniversaries have meaning.
* * * * * * *
I can’t quite explain how it changed. But somewhere along the way out to California I found something. Whether it was in the music, or the thinking, or just the quiet place in my head that resulted from an enforced relaxation for several hours, it was there.
Stubbornness.
Not the stubbornness which saw me through the long years of care-giving. That was different. Defiance in the face of the disease ravaging Martha Sr.
No, this was less about simple survival, and more about . . . well, joy, I guess.
I wasn’t swept away with feelings of overwhelming happiness or anything. But there was a sense that joy could once again be mine. Not just satisfaction in work. Not just enjoyment of life. But joy in being able to create. Maybe not yet. But the possibility was there for the future.
A smart kind of stubbornness.
* * * * * * *
We turned the dining room table into a workbench. I laid down newspapers, then we positioned large jars to support the artwork from the front without damaging the high-relief rolls and folds of paper. I needed access to the back of the piece, and this was the only way to do it.
First, I cut away the frame. Some of the facing of the foamcore came off with the frame, but not much. Then I removed all the remaining old adhesive from both the foamcore and the frame itself. I set the frame aside.
Then I mixed up the straight PVA I’d found at the art supply store with water, 50-50. Set that aside.
I took the piece of light cotton duckcloth I’d gotten, and cut it into three strips, each about 2′ tall and as wide as the foamcore. I laid out more newspaper on the floor. I laid a strip of cloth on the newspaper. And using a 4″ plastic putty knife, I poured/spread the PVA across the cloth. It was necessary for it to be completely saturated, the fibers completely relaxed. I waited for a minute for this to happen. Then I picked up the cloth by one edge, and took it to the table. I draped it across the foamcore, and spread it out smoothly, making sure to have good adhesion.
I repeated the process with the other two strips of cloth, overlapping them a few inches.
“Now we wait,” I told my SIL.
“For what?”
“For it to dry overnight. If the cloth shrinks the right amount as the PVA dries, it will cause a balancing force to the gessoed paper on the other side, and the foamcore will flatten out. If it is not enough, another application of PVA in the morning will help get the balance right. If it is too much, I can spray it with water and let the adhesive relax. It’s just a matter of finding the right balance.”
She looked at the contraption sitting on the table. She said nothing, but it was clear she was skeptical.
* * * * * * *
I had been waiting around for something to happen.
Well, no, I had been trying to figure out how to force something to happen. And being very depressed that I couldn’t do it.
I was being stupid stubborn. Forcing myself to work. To write. To try and find some happiness in this or that.
It was, perhaps, a necessary stage. Just to show myself that I had the stubbornness I needed, even if it was applied ineptly.
But there was a better path. A smarter path. Just relax, and start walking.
* * * * * * *
I poured myself a cup of coffee, walked over to the table.
The foamcore was almost perfectly flat. A slight rise on one corner where the cloth was stronger than the minimal amount of paper on the other side, but that would flatten out just fine.
I sipped my coffee, glanced out the window. From that vantage point I could see the whole bird feeder. There were crows there now, arguing with one another.
Sometimes you just need to understand your way out of problems.
Jim Downey
Off in the morning, to northern California. Visit family, relax. Walk in the redwoods, and on the beaches.
Not a cure for the depression which dogs me. It wouldn’t be depression if it could be resolved so easily. I don’t think people who have never experienced it can quite understand that.
But it should help. Help, as today’s quiet observation of an age passing helped.
Passing. Like light on the water.*
I have scheduled several new items to show up here while I’m gone. So don’t be a stranger.
Chat with you when I get back next week.
Jim Downey
As usual, it’s only in hindsight that you recognize it. The typical seasonal downturn is something more. Oh, you’re aware of the symptoms. The intense introspection. Desire to sleep more. Lower level of creativity. Difficulty in finding the motivation to do anything. Lack of enthusiasm for the usual things you enjoy. Tendency to drink more, without getting the slightest buzz from it. You’re aware of the symptoms, but until you’ve been dealing with them for a while they don’t all add up to something that you can see.
The ‘black dog‘.
I’ve written about my bipolar tendencies before. It’s mild, but there. I try and keep an eye on it. Sometimes it is hard to discern, amidst the clutter of life. This period of mild depression could have been just the usual seasonal blahs I have, plus some tiredness and stress about my health and desire to get the house ready for visitors, plus the upcoming first anniversary of Martha Sr’s death. That was what I was attributing my feelings to. But this morning, a quiet walk in the brilliant cold, I recognized it for what it was. Depression. Mild, but more than the sum of the various factors I had been noticing.
Recognition of the problem is important. I can take steps to deal with it, and most importantly keep track of where I am in the downward arc. If it looks to be severe, then I’ll see someone about it. But I don’t expect that – my personal mountains and valleys tend to be modest. Mostly it is just a matter of riding it out, putting one foot in front of the other, playing ball on running water.
Jim Downey
. . . that this is post #501, I thought I would do something about genes:
Experts ponder link between creativity, mood disorders
There have been more than 20 studies that suggest an increased rate of bipolar and depressive illnesses in highly creative people, says Kay Redfield Jamison, professor of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University and author of the “An Unquiet Mind,” a memoir of living with bipolar disorder.
Experts say mental illness does not necessarily cause creativity, nor does creativity necessarily contribute to mental illness, but a certain ruminating personality type may contribute to both mental health issues and art.
* * *
Creative people in the arts must develop a deep sensitivity to their surroundings — colors, sounds, and emotions, says Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, professor of psychology and management at Claremont Graduate University in Claremont, California. Such hypersensitivity can lead people to worry about things that other people don’t worry about as much, he said, and can lead to depression.
“The arts are more dangerous [than other professions] because they require sensitivity to a large extent,” he said. “If you go too far you can pay a price — you can be too sensitive to live in this world.”
Tell me about it.
OK, so it’s not exactly about genes. But I couldn’t resist the joke.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Alzheimer's, Bipolar, Blade Runner, Book Conservation, Daily Kos, Depression, Hospice, Weather, movies
Seems a bit ridiculous for someone 6′2″ and pushing 250 pounds to be “feeling small”, but that’s about the best characterization of my emotional state today. Bit of a headache, some intestinal issues – not ’sick’ exactly, but just under the weather.
And what weather. What was mostly sunny and near 70 yesterday and Saturday is cold, grey, wet and very unpleasant today. 35 for the high, sleet/freezing rain this afternoon and snow scheduled for tonight and tomorrow. The kind of day that makes the cats curl up on the radiators and refuse to budge.
Both my good lady wife and I are feeling this. I think it is just part of the natural let-down, the ebb & flow of recovery from being care providers for so long, of grieving. I cross posted this diary (with some additional explanatory material) to Daily Kos yesterday, and it generated some really good discussion. But I think it left me feeling a bit wrung-out. For the longest time I have been able to attribute any mild depression or exhaustion to the stress and demands of care-giving, but the fact remains that I do have a mild bipolar condition. I suspect that for a while things are just going to oscillate before reaching some kind of equilibrium once again.
So, take it a bit easy today. Maybe go watch Blade Runner or something this morning, then see if I can accomplish some more conservation work this afternoon. One step at a time.
Jim Downey
Whoa – this is *such* an improvement!
Who would have guessed that when you remove Garfield from the Garfield comic strips, the result is an even better comic about schizophrenia, bipolor disorder, and the empty desperation of modern life? Friends, meet Jon Arbuckle. Let’s laugh and learn with him on a journey deep into the tortured mind of an isolated young everyman as he fights a losing battle against lonliness and methamphetamine addiction in a quiet American suburb.
Jim Downey
Hat tip to Tim! Cross posted to UTI.
Filed under: Bipolar, Civil Rights, Depression, Flu, Google, Health, Society
I was going to title this “I’m sick and tired . . . of being sick and tired.” After yet another night of coughing jags, tossing and turning, getting up to take OTC meds every couple of hours, and generally being miserable in this tenth day of this flu.
But then I popped that phrase into Google, to see why it echoed so from my childhood. And a couple of clicks later I found this, and was humbled.
My tendency to feel sorry for myself is not one of my most attractive traits. I can only say that it usually is a sign that I am bottoming out, and before long I will be climbing back out of my own personal pit of despair (whether it is caused by health problems, my mild bi-polar condition, or some other source). It’s that Emerson quote, again.
So, sorry about that, Fanny Lou. Didn’t mean no offense.
Jim Downey
I suffer from a mild form of bipolar disorder, as I have written about previously. Looking back, it started in adolescence, though I didn’t understand what was going on until my mid-20s. It is mild, though, and I have never suffered either a hypomanic or major depressive episode (though I have had some very dark periods), and have been able to control the disorder with minimal impact on my life. In this sense, I guess you can say that I am a little bit crazy – nothing major, nothing which requires hospitalization or heavy pharmaceuticals, nothing which puts my life at risk. I’m just a little bit crazy.
Being a ‘little bit crazy’ isn’t like being a ‘little bit pregnant’ – there is a range of severity with any mental health issue, just as there is with almost any other kind of health issue. You can have a mild case of the flu, which can be annoying, but doesn’t require much in the way of treatment – or you can have the kind of flu which can kill you if you don’t have medical intervention (and perhaps even then). You can have, say, a rotator cuff problem which requires nothing more than regular light exercise, or you can have such significant shoulder problems that surgery is required. I think that this is the thing which most people don’t really consider when it comes to mental health, because of the stigma attached to mental “illness”.
And make no mistake – there is still a huge stigma attached to any mental health ‘problem’. While I’ve known for about 25 years that I’ve suffered from this mild bipolar condition, I’ve largely kept that to myself, for this very reason. Attitudes are changing somewhat, but still . . .
One good example that I have seen played out countless times in discussions about religion: atheists see belief in God as essentially irrational, in that there is no demonstrable “proof” that such an entity exists. That’s why religious belief is called “faith”. Yet if you say this, in almost any form or phraseology that I have seen over the decades, people will instantly assume that you’re saying that all believers are “delusional” and basically “insane”. And it’s not just the people of faith who will think this – I’ve seen plenty of atheists jump to the same conclusion.
But that’s silly. There is clearly a difference between types of religious faith, as well as degree, just as there is in the range and severity of mental health ‘problems’. I dare say that most people who don’t really spend a lot of time thinking about it have what can be characterized as only a nominal religiosity – ask them, and they’ll say that they believe that there’s a God, but they don’t really spend a lot of time dwelling on Him/It/Them. Even among the devout there is a wide range of manifestation of religious fervor – the little old lady who goes to her local church every Sunday and prays for relief from her arthritis pain is significantly different from the kook who straps on a bomb and goes off to blow up unbelievers. The couple who pray for the intervention of the Virgin to save the life of their child are different from, say, the guy who taps his bat three times against his left shoe before stepping up to the plate. Et cetera, et cetera.
I’ll be honest – I see all of this as ‘magical thinking’, and not grounded in reality. But it is not all the same. Much of it is harmless, just amusing and not truly toxic either to the believers or to the world. Just as my mild bipolar condition is not the same as severe bipolar disorder, let alone true depression or schizophrenia. I’ll be even more honest – most such ‘magical thinking’ is of very little real concern to me. I see the bulk of it as just adding some richness to society. And I wouldn’t even necessarily say that people should get rid of it. Hell, I can’t say that I really want to be rid of my mild bipolar condition – it is manageable, and there are benefits to it, and I’m used to it. Yeah, sure, in some ideal world I wouldn’t suffer the periodic bouts of mild depression, just as in some ideal world everyone was rational and grounded in reality.
But we don’t live in that ideal world. I’d settle for having a little superstition and magical thinking, acceptance of the fact that we all have our quirks and small problems, in exchange for getting rid of the toxic manifestations of religion as well as true mental illness. How about you?
Jim Downey
(Cross posted to UTI.)
