Adrift

As much as we’d like to think we are in full control of our lives. We’re not.

There is a world around us that lives, breathes and grows at a constant pace,

our reactions defining who we are.

Things change.

Without warning.

Without our permission.

Our house was broken into last week.

And I’ve been struggling with how and when to start using social media again.

I can’t shake the feeling that I’m being watched. Every time I leave the house,

I take bags of stuff with me, afraid to leave too much behind.

I wake up in the middle of the night wondering if there’s a password I didn’t change soon enough, some trace of myself left in a folder, a door to my life left open, like the one they broke through.

People told me I needed a dog. So I tried fostering one, to see if I was ready to adopt. I wasn’t.

I was looking for something I needed to find in myself. Something I’m still searching for. Something that is going to take time to rebuild.

The new security measures will help. But getting back to my regular life ~ my art ~ is how I’m going to get to the other side of this. I feel like I lost a week of my life. A week that should’ve been spent making art for my upcoming shows but, instead, was filled with account changes and trips to the hardware store.

But sometimes we need that time, to process, to recover, to breathe.

So I am trying to simplify. To pare down my goals to what I can do right now. I need to become the message I’m always trying to relay in my work. It’s okay if I need to cry in the door aisle at Lowes or check the locks three times before I leave the house.

But it’s not okay to stop doing the things I love, like making art and reaching out to the people close to me.

So this how I move on. Feel safe again. One day at a time. By posting a blog I’ve been working on for a week. Not being afraid to share my story. Being grateful that we are all safe. And that the things we lost were just things.