A Secret Door

Most nights I can be found sitting by my window lost in the pages of a book. While usually immune to the happenings going on in the street below me, I sometimes find my concentration broken by the flickering on or off of the street light across my way.

In design and color it looks just like all the other lamp-posts who start their glowing nightly guard of Maine street in the early evening hours. But with this one there is a slight difference, it doesn't always stay lit. Once off it stays that way for sometime before once more coming to life. The most likely explanation for this is simply a faulty bit of wiring, something in the mechanics of the post itself that doesn't quite work the way it's supposed to. I however, have come up with another possibility, one that is much less likely, almost definitely impossible, yet infinitely better. Magic.

Growing up I, like millions, was charmed by the story of The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe. The idea of being able to walk into a closet and out into a world so fantastically different from our own, is one I have hoped for ever since I first read those words. What stuck with me in that story, almost as much as the idea of getting into Narnia itself, was what Lucy first saw when she arrived. A lone black lamp-post shining among the snow and the trees. The random on and off of my own lamp-post has sparked in my mind the idea that it isn't just some innocuous piece of metal and electricity, but rather a symbol, a gate to enter some more magical world.

What is if is a sign, to those much more in the know than we, that a different dimension, another universe, is once more open to crossing over. What if the light turns off when the secret entrance is closed and turns back on once more when the magical key has been turned to unlock it's hidden door. Or it could be the opposite, the light turns off when one is about to cross over so that we don't see them disappear into nothing. What if all one had to do was know the exact right spot to look when that light turned back on in the deep hours of midnight, know the secret steps to take, the right way to knock. Just imagine the possibilities, think of all the different things one could see and discover if that one lamp-post was not at all what it appeared. 

An Unexpected Gift

A couple days ago I started reading "The Edible Woman" by Margaret Atwood. It was a book I'd read a very intriguing recommendation on and since I'd devoured "A Handmaids Tale" years ago I immediately put in a request for it at my library. Segue here: for an example of just how much of an issue I have when it comes to my library books, when I got the e-mail notifying me that the book had come I was surprised; I had so many other requests out, and so many other books had been put on my list of books to read, that I had forgotten about this book entirely. Anyway back to my main point. I had picked up the book on Sunday and just read a few pages, so it wasn't until last night that I made my discovery, well two actually.

The first was that there are apparently others like me that like to underline certain passages in the books they read, and at least one person who has no qualms with doing that to a library book as this particular copy is filled with such markings. I only wish I was that brave. I had curled up the in bed and picked up the book to read when the second finding fell onto my lap...

From what I have read so far, this list is probably made in reference to the characters and their story, but isn't it also the perfect list for someone who is fighting to overcome an eating disorder?! I am just so grateful for this serendipitous little gift that literally fell into my hands. 

As far as how I am doing, thinks are OK. I am eating what I need to and have held steady weight wise. I am of course convinced that I have gained 10 pounds in the last week. I realize I say that every week and that so far that has never happened (at least not since Mercy - there I'm not so sure), but it really does feel like it this time. I am finding it next to impossible to feel comfortable in my own skin at all, and other than maybe a few moments right when I wake up or just before falling asleep, self-comfort and acceptance don't really exist in my mind. I do hope that changes, this is not a very fun way to live. Maybe that's why the universe sent me this list, to give me the extra bit of wisdom I need to find my way back to myself again.

The Book of Lost Things

It is not often when reading that genuine shivers of fear race through my veins, not fear for myself, but rather the characters facing known or, to them at least,

unknown dangers. When this does happen it is usually because their is a story, a world, that I have come to believe truly exists somewhere in the universe.

Normally when I read a book, the characters in that story cease to be simple words on a page and instead transform into real, living, breathing individuals who have graciously allowed me into their lives if only for a brief period of time. Usually though, once I have finished reading their story they turn back into words within pages and live only as a memory in my mind. But sometimes, I stumble across a character whose life and world are so incredible that I know that even once I reach that last page and am no longer allowed to follow their footsteps, they are still out there in another world - walking, talking, breathing, existing. I have to believe that, because the alternative is simply to devastating to consider.  Out of all the books I have read, very few have the honor of holding such a special place within my heart. "The Book of Lost Things" by John Connolly has just surpassed the odds and made that list.

Quite some time ago, I had mentioned on this blog the awesome service the Brooklyn Public Library offers readers, that by filling out an online form with books and authors you've loved - and those you haven't - a librarian then creates a reading list of recommendations just for you. Weeks ago, I decided it was high time that I actually use that list for something other than just looking at. It was time to pick a book to read. "The Book of Lost Things" was the one that seemed most intriguing to me so, decision made, I skipped down to my library to get it. Of course, at the time I  was already deep into the pages of a several other books so it sat on my bookshelf for a few weeks before I was free to open the cover and see what excitement it's pages could offer. And, as you may already have guessed, I love it.

The story is captivating, enthralling, and has all the elements of what it takes for me to fall in love with a book. There is magic mixed with reality, there is darkness, the stories of Snowhite, Sleeping Beauty, Rumpilstiltskin and others are peeled back to reveal the sometimes awful truth behind their legends, there is fear destroyed, and love discovered(although in this case not the romantic kind). And of course there are words set together in such a way that my heart grows calm with their truth or my imagination explodes with the possibilities they promise. Needless to say, I highly recommend this book to anyone, but just in case you never get a chance to delve into it's pages - or you just need a little more encouragement - here a few of my favorite passages...


"And David could tell, by looking at her face as she read, whether or not the story contained in the book was living inside her, and she in it, and he would recall again all that she had told him about stories and tales and the power that they wiled over us, and that we in turn wield over them."

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"The window seat was David's favorite place in which to read. The books still whispered and spoke among themselves, but he was now able to hush them with a single word if his mood was right, and anyway they tended to remain quiet while he was reading. It was as if they were happy once he was consuming stories." 

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"And in the dark corners of his dreams, a shadow capered, and it threw its crooked hat in the air with glee."

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" 'We all have our routines,' he said softly. 'But they must have a purpose and provide an outcome that we can see and take some comfort from, or else they have no use at all. Without that, they are like the endless pacings of a caged animal. If they are not madness itself, then they are a prelude to it.' " 

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"How could he explain his sense that the Beast was familiar to him, that there was a corner of his imagination where the creature had found an echo of herself?"

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"She was very cold, colder even than when she had lain in her open coffin, so cold that the touch of her was painful to him. It numbed his lips and stilled his tongue, and his breath turned to crystals of ice that sparkled like tiny diamonds in the still air."

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"Snow sparkled in the eternal dusk, and icicles hung like frozen tears from the bushes and the trees." 

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"And the Crooked Man heard her dreams, because that was where he wandered. His place was the land of the imagination, the world where stories began. The stories were always looking for a way to be told, to be brought to life through books and reading. That was how they crossed over from their world into ours. But with them came the Crooked Man, prowling between his world and ours, looking for stories of his own to create, hunting for children who dreamed bad dreams, who were jealous and angry and proud. And he made kings and queens of them, cursing them with a kind of power, even if the real power lay always in his hands. And in return they betrayed the objects of their jealousy to him, and he took them into is lair deep beneath the castle..."

Disordered Thoughts

When you are in the midst of an eating disorder, the entirety of your thoughts are consumed by it and it's desires. You could spend an hour walking up and down Maine street, pass an afternoon ambling through the woods, or an evening watching your favorite shows, and not really take in a single thing. Instead those seconds, minutes, and hours are lost inside a constant cycle of thoughts about food. What you last ate, what you'll eat next, when you'll eat next, what foods you are allowed to have, and what you sure as hell won't touch. You're thinking about the workouts you'll need to do before and after eating so you can "earn" the calories you consume and then burn them off after. Your body screams with every step that it's hungry, that it's dying, but you're helpless to listen because your mind responds with it's beautiful lies and promises of peace, all you need to do is eat a little less, lose a little bit more.

And when you do get a chance to look outside yourself, all you can really look at are others. You observe what they're eating, if they're exercising, what they look like. You compare yourself with them in each category, a benchmark to measure just how well you are doing. You see the foods they eat and are horrified at the thought of eating something so unhealthy,  disgusted with the idea of polluting your body in such a way. You pride yourself on having so much more self-control than they do. Yet, a part of you - the healthy part - wishes for their freedom. If they exercise you find out how much and then force yourself to do more in order to prove your worth. You secretly chastise them on their days off, or for rests due to injury or illness, because as you and your disorder know - to stop for anything means you're a failure.

In the end, everything you've loved about life gets taken over by a disorder who twists that joy into a warped viewpoint, one where all that matters is how that thing you once loved helps you to succeed in your eating disorder - or threatens that success.

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I recently went out walking. Along the way I saw a man across the street navigating the sidewalks and crowds on a unicycle. I saw a new 'Help Wanted' sign posted in the door a a favorite shop. I saw two squirrels acting much like my two cats when Faelina wants to pounce and play and Synge is having none of it. I saw a single raven walking slowly atop the grass lost in avian thoughts. I saw old leaves skittering across my path on their way to more exciting places. What is so wonderful about this, is that I didn't just see those things, I registered that I did. For so long I went through each day seeing things only through a lens focused on food and exercise. For anything else to penetrate was a rare and special gift. I wonder now just how much I failed to take in during those dark months, how much I didn't see.

These days my thoughts are not all consumed by those of food an exercise, although they are more than I would like. If I could I would erase the necessity of thinking of food from my mind altogether. I eat because I have to, but I almost never enjoy it. This saddens me because I did so used to love food - and eating. This past week I've eaten what I was supposed to and some days weren't too bad, a couple were actually really good. But other days (like today), my self-confidence takes a serious dive, I feel uncomfortable, frumpy and fat; my stomach hurts, my head hurts, and my heart and mind are tired. I wish so badly I could just break free from this physical self and spend the rest of my life floating through the world carefree and shapeless. That will of course never be possible. What is though, are more moments like my walk. More experiences and adventures where I am truly living in this world rather than walking as a mere shadow behind it. I know it is going to take a long time for those days to become the norm rather than the exception, but I also know I can get there. I just have to remember that her promises are lies, while this promise is truth - is life.