Dreams to Remember

An extra blanket, that's what I need to get out of bed in the morning. As counterintuitive as this seems, the extra warmth will make the harsh morning air seem less awful and I'll have an easier time making it to my coffee pot for reinforcements. This theory was proven last night when I stayed at a friends' house - catsitting while she's out of town. She has a down comforter on her bed, something I've not slept with in a long time. It didn't hurt matters that I had a very friendly cat named Pixel curled up with me for a good part of the night, once he'd settled down enough to stop headbutting me in the nose repeatedly. He just got out of the hospital after an operation, and apparently was very glad indeed to be home. I attempted to do a bit of journaling in bed, only to have the page bonked every few seconds, smearing my handwriting all over the place.
Never have I met such a persistent cat. Bonk. Bonk. Bonk.
When I awoke this morning I had little trouble getting myself out of bed. It must be the heat (or lack thereof, in the case of my own bedroom), that keeps me stuck in bed. So here I sit, an extra blanket draped over my knees as I type away.
This past week, excuse me, these past few weeks have been both pleasantly productive, and full of wasted time and counterproductive energy. It's been an albatross around my neck to sit down and make time to write in here, let alone anywhere else. But I have pulled off my first ever Christmas wherein I've made all my presents by hand. It's endlessly more satisfying than finding something out in the shops; even if it is something cool and perhaps even useful to the person you're getting it for, it doesn't compare to something made by hand. At least that's how I feel about presents. I can only hope that others will share this view come Monday.
As I write I'm wrapping up the last details of the presents, and trying to keep my head on straight with a bit of severe scheduling. I don't know about you, but I rarely find myself needing to pull out my calendar and plan out my activities and obligations for the next several days. But it's the only way I'll get it all done. I have endless details to attend to, packing, mailing, letters and bills to address before venturing home to the California warmth on Sunday. I can't even bring all of it to mind right now. And that doesn't include all the things I intend to get done once I'm there.
I've been stuck, lately, on the question of proper perspective. I've been through a few emotional rough spots lately (Honestly, who hasn't? Synchronicity is real), and there were moments when I lost my head completely. Despaired. You know the drill. One little thing, played back again and again through your mind, each time a little more distorted, a little further removed from what actually happened, until the real cause of your pain is buried under a mountain of props and perfumes. It's only when you step back and look at things with perspective that you realized it's not as bad as all that, and if anything you've orchestrated this whole nasty business yourself.
Well.
I have, with a little help from my friends, pulled myself from the wreckage by trying to keep proper perspective. My tendency toward self-destruction/sabotage (is this what Freud would call my Death Wish?) notwithstanding, I've been flashing on this more and more lately, always to calming effect. Look at it another way, one just as if not more valid than the way you're thinking now that keeps you so crazy and depressed. Take a step back from yourself and see things on a grander timeline. Or look at all the things that are going right, rather than wrong. The list goes on and on.
Yet we human-types seem to have the damnedest time keeping perspective. There's not much I know now that I didn't know at some time or another in the past, which, had I remembered it, could have saved me considerable pain and wasted effort. But isn't that just part of living and forgetting? And is anything ever wasted? Well, yes. Not learning from your mistakes (or learning from them, and promptly forgetting about it) seems to be the textbook definition of a wasted experience. But if I keep perspective I know that this is pretty normal, all things considered.
But what I'm coming out with from all this is that when people deviate from reason and coolheadedness, it's almost always on the side of things that are going to make them miserable and self-destructive. If you hold us up to the model of the 'ideal philosopher' (in whom reason is absolute), we err on the side of totally fucking crazy every time. I'm no different.
Alas. We're going to carry on anyway. It may be part of our nature to self-destruct at every opportunity, but so too is it our nature to fight tooth-and-nail against anything trying to put us back in the dirt.
The extra blanket is in place. The pieces are falling where they need to fall.