i finished a book yesterday and today i'm in a bit of a funk.  trevor once told me he could tell when i was in a funk.  i didn't even think i was in a funk at the time and funk was not in my feeling vocab at the time but since he said those words to me i've adopted them.  so yeah back to the book.  extremely loud and incredibly close.  i bought it last tuesday when i was with mom at shoppers.  i had watched the movie with heather a week or so before.  the movie was touching, sad and powerful.  i knew the book would be better and it was.  the book was intense.  i'd say a major theme of the book is loss and grieving and it doesn't soften it at all.  that part is powerful.  the lonliness of loss.  the boy in the book would describe his feelings as "that made my boots feel heavy".  i like that.  but it was also about chosing to live after loss and the healing power of connecting with other people.  "sometimes living is scarier than death."  the boy in the book didn't believe in God, and i do, but that didn't stop me from feeling his experience.  it was a good book. powerful and solemn and sad and funny and innocent and quirky, lonely and comforting.

as i was reading nearing the end i was laying on my bed crying and wiping away tears and mascara and my cats were curled up at the foot of my bed.  something about the way they were both there, the way they were curled up in the softest balls of fur, in the cutest positions made me feel less alone.  does that make me a crazy cat lady?  maybe.

i'm going to invent a spinster burger and sell it to a & w.  it's not going to be what you think.  it's going to be good.  i never would have chosen to be a spinster but that doesn't mean it has to be bad.  it can be good.  making it good can make me good and that's where the burger comes in.  just kidding.  not really.  it's going to be vegetarian.  maybe black bean.  maybe that mushroom and rice one i used to make.  then i'm going to wrap it in bacon.  ha ha ha.  i love bacon on burgers.  it's also going to have a special sauce because spinsters are saucy.  don't pretend you don't know that.

one time when i was driving home from surrey in the dark and the rain i was thinking about my move and about how the actual moving of boxes and furniture doesn't daunt me.  that's the easiest part.  then i thought "i'm strong.  i can do hard things."  i am strong.  i.am.strong.  i've always been strong, not to say i'm not weak and doughy in lots of places but one of my core things is i am strong and i've always been proud of it and i've often been ashamed of it.  i've wanted at different times to hide it, to flaunt it, to hide behind it, to prove it, but lately as i'm coming into my middle agedness, i just accept it and enjoy it as part of who i am.  i am strong.  i am strong and sassy, sarcastic, silly, weird, thoughtful, generous, accepting, stubborn, messy, creative, intelligent, sharp, witty, funny, kind, literal, cheerful, spiritual and many other things good and bad sometimes more and sometimes less.  ebb and flow.

i want to make a difference.  i want to do good.  i want to have mattered, to have contributed, to be understood and to understand.  i want to see and be seen.  i want to overcome and to become.  i have big ideas and dreams and am challenged by my own mortality in real time. i'm challenged by many things, fears, desires, self-mastery... how to end this odd declarative post...