In Which We Declare a Holiday

[mrissa]

It is, however, a holiday with homework.

Here's the thing: this stupid vertigo crap has been going on for quite some time now. And February 13 will be the one-year anniversary of my visit to the current clinic to get test results and make a plan for PT and like that. I am having some difficulty with the length of time this has gone on, but frankly I don't feel able to talk about that very much here right now.

So what I'm doing instead is declaring February 13 the holiday of One Year Closer to Balance. We don't know yet how long this will take or what exactly the end state will be, but we know we're one year closer than we used to be. Think of it like it's my birthday! Only without cake or presents or funny hats. And instead of observing something fun like an arrival on the planet, observing something unpleasant continuing to go on for at least the near-term future! Um. Perhaps I will rethink this lack of cake and funny hats.

Anyway. Homework. What I would like you all to do--and any of your friends and family who want to, the more the merrier--is think about balance in your lives. It applies in all sorts of places. So I would really, really appreciate it if you could do something to bring about a little more balance in your own life, and then come over to my lj to comment or write me an e-mail to tell me about it. It could be very literal, doing a few yoga poses or balancing your checkbook. Or it could be a lot more abstract than that. Leave work on time that Friday to give non-work activities more of their place in your life. Read hard SF if you've mostly been reading high fantasy. Spend more time by yourself if you've been feeling pushed into more extroversion than you have available. Call your grandmother if you feel like you haven't had enough time with family and are lucky enough to still have one. Balance, balance, balance.

Please? This is frankly pretty hard for me, and I would kind of like to put it in a larger context rather than feeling alone with it.

(I will bring this up again, so you don't have to remember all this time by yourselves.)

Comments

[rosefox]

A most excellent idea. I shall definitely go contemplate, and contribute a balancey thing.

EDIT: It occurs to me that deciding not to go to Boskone is definitely a life-balancing of sorts: while some of that decision was financial, a lot of it was also realizing that I was planning three weekends away from home in February, and that seemed thoroughly excessive. In general, I'm trying to explicitly schedule more home weekends, and to enjoy them when I have them.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

That is a very good kind of life balancing to think about. Trust me, I know. Although away from home is not as much of an option these days.

[reveritas.livejournal.com]

You definitely need cake in this situation.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

The problem is that 1) I like baking cake better than eating cake, but 2) baking cake involves boiling things. (Yes it does. Baking cake that is not Our Cake is functionally equivalent to not baking cake.) So I will definitely aim for cake, but it will depend on whether I am having a good day or a bad day for handling hot objects that day.

I could ask my mom to bake the cake and she would do it in a heartbeat; in fact, if we hadn't talked about my preferences for doing this sort of thing, she might do it without my asking, if she thought it might make me feel better even a little bit, because that's the kind of mom she is. But point #1 is relevant here. So. We'll see.

[themagdalen.livejournal.com]

I regret the source of the inspiration. On the other hand, I like this holiday very much.

Will try to have some balances to report by then. :)

[txanne.livejournal.com]

Yes, exactly.

I have quite a few imbalances to think about. Two weeks of pondering will be useful!

[redbird]

That seems like good homework. (You know about my usual little bit of yoga, so I'll assume I should do something additional.)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I do know about your usual little bit of yoga, but while you can do something additional, I wouldn't want to knock your day out of balance by demanding it if it just didn't fit. Making that judgment may be part of the balancing.

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

This is a thing I can do.

I will be at CupcakeCon that weekend, but I am sure I can do my homework in advance.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Balance the chocolate cupcakes with the red velvet cupcakes! Do not neglect the balance of cupcake and milk or other pleasant beverage!

Lo, I am a cruel taskmaster.

[aliseadae]

I love this idea. I will think about things I can do and get back to you. I might possibly try to balance the time I spend with different groups of people in BSFFA (Beloit SFF association) but I might think of something else.

[aliseadae]

I might post and tell others about the existence of the holiday. May I?

[rezendi.livejournal.com]

Hmm. I will be in Brazil, but maybe I can see if balance works differently on the other side of the equator.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

You fall clockwise instead of counterclockwise! Or is it the other way? I can't remember.

[aedifica]

I think I can celebrate that holiday along with another at the same time, yes. (I'll either be celebrating Nate's 30th birthday, which will have been the day before, or my ex-boss Leah's 30th birthday, which will be that very day.)

[ckd]

The date is very appropriate for me because Boskone is very much my balance-con[1]. Vericon is basically a weekend of boardgaming (as will be made obvious once I finish logging my plays to BGG), Arisia is gaming with a side order of seeing folks (when I can find them in the maelstrom), and Readercon is probably the con at which I spend the most time attending programming.

At Boskone I will go to panels. I will play a game or three. I will spend time sitting on couches chatting with people. I will wander through the dealers' room and the art show. (For that matter, I'll help set up and tear down said art show. It's fun work and serves as an extension of the con.) I'll eat a meal in, and a meal out; a meal with people I've known for years, and a meal with folks I just met. I'll be happy to see the people who could make it this year, and sad to miss the ones who couldn't (including you and rosefox).

I will also try not to slip on the ice walking to the Westin from the T station. That's really going to require balance!

[1] Upon some reflection, this is even more true than I thought when writing the main part of this comment. When Boskone returned to Boston in 2003, I returned to regular congoing. From 1992 through 2002, I made it to something like 4-5 cons in total; now, that's a bit more than an average year's worth. That's been a big part of my life balance over the past few years.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yah, I'm sorry I couldn't make it out there; on the other hand, I'm not sure whether Boskone or Readercon would be my con of choice if I was trying to do a Boston con. I would be amenable to persuasion either way.

[prettymuchpeggy.livejournal.com]

Funny, I have been thinking a lot about balance lately. Very interesting. As for balance breathing exercises/meditation has reappeared in my life. I have also started reorganizing/culling my "stuff" and saving for furniture (no more "make do" for me) so when the time comes I am ready to move into an apartment again. I have been feeling imbalanced since having to move in a rush to parents house after another disastrous roommate situation. My stuff has reflected this - finding order again makes me feel good.

With that said if anyone wants a natural colored table top, a utility cart or two - three drawer brown circa 1960ish night tables. They are up for grabs.

[rmnilsson.livejournal.com]

I've been trying to figure out how to balance my need for actual night tables in my bedroom with my lack of funds. Maybe we can help each other out?

[thorintatge.livejournal.com]

Excellent idea! I'll mark my calendar.

[buymeaclue.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure it's actually possible for me to spend more time talking/thinking about balance than I already do in my horse posts.

We shall see!

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yah, you get a free pass for Every Day Is Balance Day In Hannahland if you want one.

[sam-t.livejournal.com]

I am tempted to try keeping something on top of my nose, for pure frivolity. My next-doordesk colleague has three juggling balls on his desk. But perhaps it is not fitting in a responsible software professional to imitate a sea-lion in the office. Oh well.

More seriously, I'm working on trying to get the proper proportion of solo hobbies (like crochet, or (when I'm feeling better) working on the allotment) with time spent with other people. I haven't really felt up to a lot of company for a while, and I like being on my own, so it would be easy for me to get into the habit of not seeing people much.

I also need to give my wardrobe a bit of an overhaul. I have impractical (or at least, less practical) things for particular occasions and practical clothes for sitting around the house or exercising in, and I need to work out some combinations that end up being practical but not too scruffy.

I will report back when I have done some more thinking.

[redbird]

Do you have friends who would enjoy helping on the allotment sometimes? (I have enjoyed helping other people with gardens, including allotments, when geography allowed. Even weeding is less annoying if you do it once rather than every n days.)

[matociquala.livejournal.com]

Good holiday.

qigong and yoga and climbing, it seems, remind me every time I attempt them that my balance is not all that good. I tip over! I am tippy! Like a cow.

But I keep doing the qigong and yoga and climbing, on the theory that eventually this will improve.

<3

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

It is a good theory.

[caoilfhionn.livejournal.com]

Last year I finished grad school, and toward the end writing and researching eclipsed everything. This year I need to rebalance my life and remember how to come out of my head. I started by going back to making things with my hands, beginning to end. And I am setting times to meet up with people without having to leave by a certain time. It feels rather wasteful, but it's not.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Uff da, yah, life after grad school is hard to figure out on an emotional level.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

You know I can't ignore direct requests! But I will need to take advantage of the reminder(s).

[pieslut.livejournal.com]

It turns out I was thinking something along these lines in terms of relationships recently. New Year's Resolutions and all that. For the last few years I have had one central relationship in my life, with my spouse, and all the others have sorta fallen by the wayside, because 1) I am naturally introverted and 2) I like spending time with him more than I like spending time with anyone else. If it were just me I would feel no need to make any changes here, but I know that the closeness of our relationship has cost him connection with his family. So tomorrow, to help balance things we're going to see his mother and stepfather, to hold their hands through a potentially scary medical procedure. This is ordinarily the type of thing I would just send my sweetie to do alone, but he will feel better if I am there, and his family is in need of support, even if it can only be grumpy german support.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

That sounds like a very good thing you're doing.

[stillnotbored.livejournal.com]

We all need more balance in our lives.

I think about balance all the time, balancing work with goofing off, doing needful things with things I want to do, which often overlap but don't always. I know there are days I list to the left when I'd really and truly rather be leaning right.

There are so many things in my life that are not under my control right now. That makes me think of balance in whole new ways, because I'd like at least an illusion of control. Balance is easier to maintain, I suspect, when you have someone to lean on if you lose yours.

I also suspect I should stop thinking about this right now. But like Scarlett, I will think about this tomorrow and come up with some homework suitable for sharing and that doesn't depress the hell out of me.

Promise. :)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Oh trust me, I understand about not having things under your control that really, truly feel like they ought to be.

But we can only do what we can do, y'know?

[fidelioscabinet.livejournal.com]

I have such a long list of little things that needs to be hacked through that would Make Life Better--none of them big things, one by one, but all together, a very long list, so what I need for balance is to chip away at the list, little thing by little thing, until life looks less like the Oxyrhynchos Papyri have been deposited in my dwelling, or like Borobudur buried in jungle vegetation.

Alas that you should have this anniversary; my aunt has wrestled with the balance thing for a very long time, and my cousins can recall cooking dinner under her direction while she lay on the floor, because the vertigo had got the upper hand and she didn't trust herself to make it to the couch. They had very little idea what to do for her in the 1960s and I'm glad they know a little more now, even though getting better has been so slow and grim. It is Not Good when you need to fall back on the Battle of Maldon for inspiration just to get through daily life, but it takes what it takes, and isn't that a thing?

Coué's (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coue) concepts can be overly optimistic, and certainly there are those who abuse them by claiming that if you aren't getting better it's because you don't really want to*, but I do believe we are better off when we try to keep in mind that it is possible for things to get better, even if it's very slow and we don't notice the progress very much at times. Despair is a greater mind-killer than fear.


*@##%&)&%&)#&#%(&^$&#*& them. Seriously.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

It is a good thing that we've got better resources now. Yes. And I'm not sure whether this type of clinic (mine is very specialized: National Dizzy and Balance Center) is available in the average other city of this size, so that may be a piece of luck for me as well. I never cease to be aware of the ways in which this could be so, so, so much worse.

I have what I call bloody-minded optimism. I don't pretend that I am guaranteed that this will ever get to the point of all the way well (although I am certainly not at the point of deciding that it won't!), but I do think things like, "Probably I will get well and do x, and if not I will do y instead, and y will be good anyway."

I think this reached its peak when I was plotting Dwarf's Blood Mead and said, "Well, and sometimes your brother lops your arm off with an ax, but if he does, sometimes the gods make you a better arm out of metal, and then all that's wrong is that you owe the gods a better arm sized favor!" In the most cheerful and perky voice imaginable, so my friend's girlfriend at the time kept giggling throughout the rest of that evening and saying, "Your brother lops off your arm with an ax! The gods make you a better arm! Yay!"

[marydell.livejournal.com]

I love this idea. I've been thinking a lot about balance lately--work/life, mom/wife/individual, artist/writer, other stuff. I lack life balance in a big way at the moment, and it's a problem.

I'll move some of the thinking & planning onto the front burner and see what happens.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Great! Glad that it dovetails nicely with your own thinking.

[rushthatspeaks.livejournal.com]

This is a brilliant idea for a holiday. I will be celebrating it in April this year, for reasons I do not wish to go into in public, but I'll let you know.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Great, thanks!

It's possible that I may be well again by April. I'm not relying on it, but it's possible in ways that "I may be well again on February 13" just isn't.

[hypatia-j.livejournal.com]

I'd already decided that this was my year to work on balance. The last two were about order and that was somewhat successful. It is useful to add a holiday to my plans. Thanks!

[voidmonster.livejournal.com]

I am, alas, a day late to this. However!

I hadn't realized I was working on balance until I saw your post because I'd been doing it behind my own back. Writing's just been a struggle for me lately, and I've gotten into that place where I won't let myself have the cookie I want because I haven't finished eating my greens. Ya know, metaphorical-like. Screw that. I'm a big person now, I can eat my cookie.

Especially when that means making progress on my novel, which helps me stop feeling like I can't finish anything which goes a long way toward ameliorating the creeping feeling that it's all just Not Okay.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

You aren't a day late to it--it's not yet February 13!

Already on it.

[careswen.livejournal.com]

Last year, we declared February 13th to be Valentine's Eve, which helps keep a valuable balance.

[orbitalmechanic.livejournal.com]

That is the day when Sarah Connor Chronicles begins again! So things will already be better in my house. Hopefully something really big will blow up. Further considerations to follow.