Limits

How much can a human being handle?
I mean, in regards to stress.
I decided to blog right in the middle of what feels like an incredibly stressful day to me. I'm at my limit - I feel.
All of the things most important ot me are being either nominally or extremely threatened. That makes me go into fight mode - to want to protect what I'm connected to.
My blood is pounding, I feel very close to tears and ... here is my essential issue, I'm breathing shallowly again.
What is it with life and breathing?
They are so (this seems obvious) interconnected.
Why is the first thing that I'm willing to sacrifice - breathing- the thing that is essential to my "getting through" the struggles.
I wonder if I'm alone in this.
Are there people who, when feeling stressed, immediately begin breathing deeper so as to help them cope better?
I should learn how to do this.
I'll bet it helps with thinking more clearly.

Evidently writing helps too.
I'm starting to calm down.

Jimm

When asked as a teenager, what kind of guy are you attracted to, I said dark.

Dark hair at least with very dark eyes.

I also said that I wanted a man with hair. Not some smooth, boyish type.

I wanted a real man.

My roommate in college told me that I should meet this guy who was on the yearbook staff. She said I'd like him. She said he was blond, blue-eyed, and super nice.

"Not interested" I said, but politely cooperated with her efforts to be nice to me.

He was very blond, very blue-eyed, and was wearing a very creamy yellow sweater.

"Maybe I'm interested" I said to myself and promptly asked him if I could borrow his sweater sometime.

He said yes.

I stained it.

He asked me out anyway.

Our first date was a lovely mess.

He did everything wrong. Not on purpose - just a bad night for him on the suave front.

We were both into theatre. He liked blond women in old movies. Marilyn Monroe and Princess Grace. He tried that night to make me look like Marilyn.

He burnt my forehead with a curling iron.

We reinacted the murder scene from "Dial M for Murder".

He broke my window in the process, with his bum.

Before the night was over, he had broken the knob off the TV, the handle off the fridge door, and we had fallen in love.

In my opinion, love doesn't require perfection. The boldest love feelings that I possess are for the 2 most beautifully imperfect people. My daughter, of whom I've spoken before and my husband, Jimm.

The way we began is the way we live. We stumble and bumble, we laugh, we get frustrated, and we don't take ourselves too seriuosly. We help each other with the breathing and with the being human part.

I still want a real man - the one I have will do very nicely.

Something wonderful

The most human thing I've ever done is give birth.

Actually, when my daughter came into this world it was apparent that she was in no hurry to arrive and my body was not of the mind to give her up so easily. They had to do a c-section and extract her from her safe (albeit snug) place.

There is something so visceral - so primitive about birthing. Even if I would've wanted to control how this birth went, it wasn't possible. Creation takes over.

There is such intensity of physical pain and emotional pleasure all mixed up together - with the goal of producing something wonderful. The funny thing is, what we as humans produce is more humanity! Wonderful?

We sweat and toil and hurt and plead and cry and laugh and when we're finished - there's a smaller version of us- crying and complaining and growing.

It must be wonderful then. Maybe the reason most people love babies so much is that it gives them a chance to hold humanity close. To care for a little one is also caring for ourselves perhaps; touching that very human part of us and saying, "It's ok to be weak and out of control. Somehow - we are ok."

I loved that time - holding my little girl and at the same time holding myself.