I Love Her More Than Zombies

This warm weather and melting snow makes me want to get back out on the trails and head into the woods! I don't care if we would be hiking through two inches of mud and by the end of the day we were covered up to our knees with muck. I want to feel the exhausting weight of the pack on my back after six/eight hours on the move; I want to finish the night with the smoke of a campfire billowing around us and the flames lighting up only a small circle of the black, black night. I want to crawl into our little tent, shimmy into our sleeping bags and barely sleep because there is a rock jabbing me in the small of my back and 'fuck what was that noise' thoughts sending paranoid delusions through my head.

I want to wake up in the small hours of the morning just as the sun is coming up with the birds quietly chirping around us and open the tent to a chill morning and the utter peace and contentment that, that moment brings. Those mornings are amazing. We sit around in silence together, sipping our coffee and just breathe. No one else around, no traffic, no digital distractions; just nature, each other, and that feeling of my soul being revived.

Can we just live out there forever?

Hiking on the Mantario Trail is pretty good, but sadly it just doesn't compare to the trail we were on near Victoria. Looking out over the ocean and hearing the crash of the waves and the call of the seagulls as we pushed forward is just beyond describing. I'm sad we didn't get out there much at all before moving and even after nearly four years here, I am still homesick for Victoria. I want to go back to visit (the place more than the people, is that bad?!) but I'm afraid of how much more I will miss it once we have to leave again. I didn't think I could love a place and miss a place this much.

We moved here for very good reasons though and I would not change that decision now even if I could. To not move here would mean to not meet the incredible people that we have. There are people here that have changed our lives and I can't imagine not knowing them. I can't picture where we would be without having attended MAsT that first time, without putting ourselves out there to co-lead MAsT, and without meeting the people through MAsT that are now friends and family.

I am not the person I was when we moved here (and I don't mean that in the way I did in my last post). Life is different. We are different. I would absolutely love to move back to Victoria someday. We have talked about it many times and our ultimate plan was to always move back. Moving back now though would mean leaving people we love rather than just a place we love. Heartsick versus homesick.

Even if we were to move back, it is many, many years from now. elle will hopefully be starting school in the fall and then there would be a long time from there before moving would make sense. Perhaps by then the homesickness will have been replaced completely by the people that have made such a lasting mark on us...or perhaps they could all move there with us ;)

Our M/s is stronger and our love is stronger due to the challenges and experiences we have faced together since moving here. There can never be regret for this move, only a longing to have all that we have here in the place that we also love.

However, in the middle of the woods, in the beauty of Victoria, in the frigid colds of Winnipeg, with elle at my side I know I am always home. Looking at her asleep beside me, watching her chest rise with each breath and seeing the beat of her heart in the pulse at her throat just puts me in awe of how much I am in love with her and how lucky I am to spend my life with her.

I would miss a new episode of The Walking Dead for you elle, but with you I know I would never have to and that is true love!

The Stranger Inside

I feel like I am becoming a stranger. I used to be pretty laid back, very slow to anger and quick to forgive and move on. I felt fairly stable emotionally and like I could remain strong to support elle. Of course, I had my bad days when I just wanted to hide out in a dark room, let the day pass and probably feel better tomorrow. These days, I want that dark room more and more and I know tomorrow will be more of the same.

Ever have a rough night of sleep where you wake up feeling just as tired as when you went to bed? You drag your ass around all day trying to get through work and life so you can fall into your bed as soon as possible and let the sandman take you. Ever have two nights in a row? What about a few weeks? Couple months? Years? Sleep starts to feel pretty pointless when it does nothing to rejuvenate your mind and body for the next day.

I've been doing this for years now. Trying different medications to see what will work but in the end nothing has helped with my awake hours. Sure pills make me fall asleep, even sleep mostly through the night sometimes, but I still wake up feeling as if I had laid down for only five minutes. I feel physically exhausted all the time. My body feels so heavy. It takes so much effort to put one foot in front of the other, to eat, to coordinate my hands to work. It takes effort to breath because I feel like a weight is on my chest, to keep my head held up, to keep my eyes open.

Mentally, I am not myself. I am often on the verge of tears (and fight them off because I am generally at work); I can not concentrate or focus and I know I am making mistakes; my memory is pretty terrible and I forget words a fair bit. I am quite quick to anger and try really hard not to let it out because I know I am also overreacting. I have lost my patience and get frustrated very easily. I have murderous thoughts of jumping over my cubicle wall and smashing the guy sitting there with his keyboard if he tap, tap, taps it one more time! I think the last month is the worst that this has been so far.

I know this is hard on elle because she wants to help, but can't, and I'm sure she is seeing the stranger than I am feeling. This isn't who she married and this isn't who I want Kahwaii to know.

What if this is me now though?

Getting my Tattoo Done

In less than 48 hours i will be getting my tattoo done of the bruise on my forearm from being waterboarded at Fall From Grace last summer. i have been waiting for this day to come for many months now. i am slightly concerned about how i will explain it to the vanilla folk, especially my parents as i’m sure that at least my mother will ask prying questions and simple vague answers will not suffice. i plan on telling people that it’s my version of the semicolon, i’m bruised but not broken kind of idea. So far the few vanilla people that i told that i’m getting it done and explained why have taken my explanation without question so maybe it will work. If it looks real enough maybe people won’t even think to ask as they will just think that i have a bruise. i have been going back and forth about where exactly on my arm to get it done. If i get it up a bit from where it was actually when it was a real bruise then i will be able to cover it with a ¾ length shirt if/when needed. The whole point of getting it though is to replicate the exact bruise that i received and i don’t know if moving it will change how i feel about it. i think that i will end up getting it in the same place as it was originally and just wear full length shirts when it needs to be covered up.

Short and sweet today, just wanted to quickly touch base and say hi!