Who Is My Neighbor?

 My word for the year is Expand. 

Like most turtles, when I get nervous, I pull in. I bite when I get cornered. I've been very nervous in the last decade. This is the year I try again to be social, even though it rarely lasts and rarely provides whatever it is I think I'm supposed to be getting. Maybe that's the sociopath thing getting in the way. 

I was told of a young person who got a third job and needed a dog sitter while she rearranged her schedules. I was reluctant. My Turtle brain saw all the ways it could go wrong. I remembered Expand and offered to help. 

Yes, it turned into a compost storm. After the fifth change of plans in two days, I quit. I wasn't being paid. I rearranged my own schedule four times to accommodate. I even spent 30 minutes convincing her I could do it. Read: I became temporarily insane. No one should have to convince someone to accept help that is obviously needed to everyone except the person who needs it. 

Am I wrong? I don't care. I'm an emotional wreck. This is exactly why I left foster care case management. I am constitutionally incapable of enduring chaotic people. 

So who is my neighbor? What is my God-given responsibility to help others? We have The Good Samaritan but how far does that story go? If the robbed man was permanently crippled, was the Samaritan responsible for him the rest of his life? Or just until he was healed enough to beg? 

When is helping enabling? This young person, in my formerly professional opinion, needs help I am trained but not licensed to provide. There's a reason AA waits for moments of clarity, even when they don't come. There's no helping someone who cannot recognize help. 

I will add her to my prayer walk, a thing I intend to write about next because it has been an amazing addition to my life both physically and spiritually. My heart breaks for her and her family. But I cannot be the kind of neighbor I thought she needed. 

It has been one hour since I walked away and my heart rate has dropped, my innards have settled and my matcha tea with honey tastes good again. The weekend plans I completely suspended two days ago are back on. 

I'm sorry, Lord, if I failed the test. It's not the first time and it won't be the last. 

Keep the faith. 

Hatred

 On one of my recent better days, I asked God to show me any hatred I still harbored against another human so I could forgive. I've become very concerned about that "I will forgive you as you forgive others" stuff Jesus says. 

Couldn't think of anyone at the time, but I've come up with a few since. 

I hate people who can sew. 

Specifically, doll customizing youtubers who throw out a casual "So I sound like I'm 12 and I made this oversized hoodie with a working pocket that a 54 year old can't make" or "This is my Ken doll's lined parka with a zipper and hood and pockets and look at all the little details I added and I'm only 17!" or "I just sewed a zigzag stitch around the edge to keep the fabric from fraying. You can, too, if you're not a mechanically challenged post-menopausal loser." 

I hate you all. 

People who can sew lockstitches without a bird's nest tangle on the bottom side. People who can sew zigzag stitches and 1/8 inch seams without the fabric getting sucked into the foot feeder and requiring scissors to get out. People who don't consider their sewing machine a device straight from Hell designed to make them curse God and die. 

Which means I've got some things to work on. Especially learning how to sew. 

Keep the faith. 

Killjoy

 Sometime after college, I Grew Up. Before then, I could draw, read fiction, write for fun, build dollhouses - all the things that made me happy. All the things children do before they realize time is money and nothing is fun anymore. 

After I Grew Up, the only thing I did for fun was D&D with my friends. The Divorce happened and all the fun people went with him and I kept her and life got incredibly dull. I wrote for a bit, until I got published and realized that what I thought was fun was actually Work, and it wasn't fun anymore. 

Then The Dark Time happened and there was No Fun for more than 10 years. 

Killjoy showed up in The Dark Time. She'd lurked before then, but she really took center stage when I lost all friends and all faith and all hope. 

She's the Adult in the Room. The one who asks "What use is that?" "Where are you going to put it?" "All that time spent and that's all you have to show for it?" "Unless you sell it, it's worthless." "You spent how much?" "A child could do that better." 

Killjoy doesn't know how to play. She knows how to criticize and demotivate. She's an energy suck. She's not happy unless I'm constantly weighing my life against worthy (work) and worthless (anything that isn't work). 

All mammals play. It's a way to relax the brain, lower cortisol and inflammation, and make time move faster. My life is a long slog through molasses because I can't play and I can't sleep. 

I've enjoyed dolls from before Dad made my first dollhouse, and I've played with them on and off my whole life. July 2025 I started playing with dolls again. For almost a full year, I had fun. Then Killjoy popped up and asked, "Just how much are you spending on this hobby?" It was the beginning of the end. I ran a report, and all the fun bled away into the balance sheet, just like she wanted it to. 

Now I look around at what made me happy a few short months ago, and I feel ashamed and stupid and tired. Just like she wanted me to. She wants me to waste my life feeling miserable. She wants me to hate myself and end the day unhappy. Another Demon that moved in long ago and made herself comfortable and me miserable. 

I want her out. I'm thinking I'll make a doll of her and hang her from the catwalk. 

Keep the faith. 

Forty More Years

 What do you want? For more than a decade, my reflexive answer has been "to die." I want off the ride. I want out of the Dark City. Hey, Jane, stop this crazy thing. 

Trying to change my brain to a more positive track, I can no longer allow this answer. What do I want? 

I want energy. 

If I wasn't tired all the time, maybe I would do something. Write another book. Sew a dress. Draw a picture. Volunteer. Even thinking about doing any of those things exhausts me. The absolute certainty that I have at least 40 more years on this planet is the worst punishment I can imagine because it's 40 years of being tired without ever finding rest. 

My glory days of almost 7 hours a night are gone. I lie down. I close my eyes. I may manage four uninterrupted hours from 8 to midnight, but it's a crap shoot from there. It's not racing thoughts. It's anti-gravity eyelids. I can close my eyes but they don't feel closed. They hurt most of the time. Eye spikes. 

I know I've slept when I can remember a dream. I also know that's bad. Remembering a dream means I wake up at the wrong time. I have nightmares, too. Guessing that's another side effect of menopause and estrogen deprivation. Very realistic nightmares. 

I have the mutation for Alzheimer's and I wonder if that impedes my sleep. All the doctors say sleep is very important for brain health, but none of them, not even Stasha Golmanik, have been able to help me sleep more. Covid taught me doctors don't know jack. Once again, I'm on my own. Lone Turtle against the world. What else is new. 

I opened a financial prediction from my advisor today. I have a 64% chance of meeting my retirement goals. I should be happy. If that was a cancer prediction, I'd assume I'm getting cancer. So I should assume I'll be OK at 100 years old. Turtle Brain doesn't work like that. Not currently, anyway. I have 40 years to change it. Doesn't look like it's happening today, though. 

Keep the faith.  

First Thing

 I am a depressive person. Show me any lovely thing, and my brain doesn't stop with "how lovely." It keeps going, playing out whatever it is until lovely turns to death and decay. I can't tell you when this started. I can say it's been true for at least 30 years. 

According to Arthur Brooks, and Daniel Amen, I can change this. 

Well begun is half-done, says Mary Poppins. When I wake up now, I immediately focus on God, on scripture and on thankfulness. I don't want to. My waking brain goes to dark places when left on its own. That's where the Worm lives. The Worm doesn't run my life anymore. 

Blessed are You, Lord our God, king of the universe, who will bring me through. Great is Your faithfulness. Today is Your gift to me. Today I will focus on how good You are. That is what matters. 

It's hard. I don't feel that way, but I want to feel that way. Feelings are liars. They are fickle and cheap. Focus determines reality. Whatever my chemical predisposition is, I can altar my mental state into the Light by turning my eyes toward the Light the moment they open, physically or metaphorically. 

Any new skill is awkward and fumbling to start. I've spent 25 years doing it wrong. It takes time and effort to learn a new way to be more positive. What I accepted in December 2019 was I am better off fumbling toward the light than tumbling further into darkness. However long I have left in this world, I want to keep reaching for the light. 

I am the Way, the Truth and the Light. No one comes to the Father except by Me. Amen, Lord. 

Keep the faith.