muddleddreamer

Who are the synchrobloggers? A group of friends and acquaintances sharing an experiment in the blogosphere. Every other week, we agree on a topic, and reveal our separate takes simultaneously on Friday morning, 9AM.

This week’s topic: Food.

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Ok, I admit it. The fact that a size “Zero” exists in women’s clothing is absurd. Really, there are people out there who are so skinny that they actually can be quantified as a null? And we’re all supposed to strive for that, to literally become a nothing?

That said, if the existence of size zero means that my size gets to drop down the scale a few numbers accordingly, well…let’s just say that I’m not exactly opposed to the idea.

Having grown accustomed to being a certain number on this scale (certainly not a zero, but still, something in the single digits, at least), I didn’t quite believe it when I saw the number that my bridal consultant at the dress boutique had written on the little piece of paper that she was holding under my nose.

“You think I need a what?”

“Based on your measurements, this is the size I recommend,” she responded, adding, not unkindly, “I’m afraid they don’t have vanity sizing in wedding dresses.”

Well, damn, why not? I wanted to quip back. While my mom sat close by, silently suffering sticker shock (and most probably regretting her generous offer to buy her only daughter the dress of her dreams), I went silently into tag shock, thinking about the size that would be listed on the label of my dress when the order came in.

“Keep in mind, of course, we can always take it in,” said my consultant.

Ah ha! “Yes, of course, well in that case…” I murmured, and accepted the number on that horrid little piece of paper as my own.

Temporarily.

And so it is that the topic “food” brings nothing to mind for me at the moment but the diet I’ve started, and my plan to lose twenty pounds before my wedding next year.

I hate to be a cliche, but, there you have it. I’m shedding for the wedding, and so far I’ve lost five pounds in just over a week.

If you want a super simple (and super dorky, since I made it in Excel) calorie tracker, you can steal mine.

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The Synchroblogs this week:

The Meat of the Hunt

Fish Food

Food (art post)

The Bad Bag of Cuties

Feed Me, Seymour!

Eat, Bake, Love

Who are the synchrobloggers? A group of friends and acquaintances sharing an experiment in the blogosphere. Every other week, we agree on a topic, and reveal our separate takes simultaneously on Saturday morning, 10AM.

This week’s topic: Darkness.

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The darkness almost never meant rest.  When the lights went out, I lay in my bed and tried to sleep, but I could never get the knack of it. I could make my body be still, but my mind was restless, out of control. In the quiet space of night, it would kick into high gear, free from distractions.  I thought of the day that had just passed – the things I did right, the things I screwed up, the things I wanted to remember or wished I could erase.  I thought about my future, making plans for the next day, the next week, the next year. I thought about my past. I thought about books I had read or movies I had watched. I thought about everything. Maybe some of it was useful, productive in some way. Most of it was just running mental laps through my interior landscape – running and running and certainly not getting any sleep.

It was almost impossible to lure my mind away from its nightly exercise, down into the dark hollow of sleep where it should be snugly tucked and resting. Over time, I developed a routine to try and force it. Once I was exhausted and ready to plead on my knees with my mind for it to settle down and let me get some rest, I began. I started with my toes, relaxing the little muscles there, then the arches of my feet, then my heels, my ankles… Focusing on each little part, I rolled the wave slowly up my body, until even my eyebrows were relaxed. I focused on my breathing next, making sure it was deep and slow. Then I began to try and retreat into the unconscious part of my mind – not an easy thing to pull off consciously. I would get lucky, sometimes. Sometimes, the green crawling shapes that moved over my walls in the dark, like the colored shadows that bright lights leave behind in your eyes, could turn into dreams if I watched them long enough. Sometimes, I could hook on the edge of a runaway train of thought and be pulled along as it became a story, and then the story might run farther and farther into nonsense until it slipped straight off into dreamland. More often, I resorted to trying to force this slip into sleep to happen with various visualization techniques, as my mother had suggested when I complained about my insomnia.

You are climbing into a dark well. The stone is rough and cool under your palms as you go over the edge. The rope moves and you are being lowered, slowly. Sinkng down, and down, deeper, into the dark, cool space of the earth…

Or maybe it was a mine. Maybe it was water I was sinking through, my whole body floating weightless, encased in dark liquid. As long as I didn’t start to think about whether I would feel scared or cramped or claustrophobic down there in the well or the mine, or how I would breathe while encased in dark water, these tricks would help.

But the only thing that has ever consistently worked for me, I didn’t find until about three years ago. How simple it is, and yet, how impossible it has been until now, when we are no longer living in our parents’ houses, separated by curfews and our individual beds. In our bed, I lay down, and tuck myself in close around his body. Happy hormones rush through me – the basic human response to skin-on-skin contact.  Safe, they tell me, peace. My mind is quiet, doped and distracted, and I drift right off, encased in Ray’s arms.

The Synchroblogs:

Dark City

How Are You? I Am Fine.

From Darkness, Light

Into the Darkness

The Senior Scramble

Further