I disconnect in a lot of ways. Sometimes to feel safe, sometimes to distance myself because I don’t enjoy the company, and sometimes in the moment because I need to breathe alone. My sons split the unloading of the dishwasher into two “equal” parts as a routine and daily chore. Today I did the unloading as we had three tests to complete for school, yup, I am their teacher…comment below if you know a good therapist, for all of us. Anyway, as I was unloading the dishwasher I disconnected, and I started getting really into the pattern on some small serving bowls that I cut and placed strawberries into for the boys. The blue and white sucked me in and it was perfectly placed next to a white bowl which only made me lose myself more and more because well, they went together nicely. I have always designed the perfect placement of dishes in the dishwasher. To understand the extent of my insanity, I also strive to serve on specific dishes which has enabled me throughout the years to take photos of the hand-washed dishes on the drying rack that pleases some sick part of me I feel others struggle to relate to. Odd I can connect to these dishes sometimes more than I can to people. For instance, one may say I have too much time on my hands in response to this, where I would say perhaps you should make the time to appreciate the things we do daily and sadly tend to overlook the opportunities in them.

I have disconnected from people who have asked me to, this was painful. To be honest, it still is. I have disconnected through a divorce. I have disconnected from society when my anxiety grabs my throat and throws me into bed ensuring me it is not safe out there and I will lose everything if I exit my home. I have also disconnected from myself and felt peace in fantasizing about leaving this world to continue without me. Luckily I managed to still be connected enough to ask for help and then get reconnected via Ketamine Therapy which saved my life and gave me new eyes in the most amazing exploration of my brain in which I traveled through tangled thoughts that bound me and found places I have never been, in periods I have not lived, very familiar. During these treatments at the clinic, I was unable to speak, I could not form words, I could not make my mouth move, I was the weight of all my thoughts and it kept my body bound to the recliner and my mouth sealed leaving me only to process in solitude while others could only infer what I was feeling by the rise and fall of my heart rate and blood pressure, and sometimes by the silent tears. There was so much to take away from this that was beautiful and poetic. But also I learned to just shut the hell up sometimes and think, breathe, and process. I have been lost in my thoughts for as long as I can consciously remember, which is why I always took to writing and music. Which is also why I am here now. When I zone out I am writing in my head. I used to grab whatever I could to jot down my thoughts. One time in my dye my hair very red phase, I was checking out at Target and the cashier was telling me how I reminded her so much of Lindsay Lohan and I was like ok, shut up about this no one you speak of, I am in the middle of a thought! Hand me your pen and print some receipt paper out for me, please. I didn’t say “shut up” but I did say “please.” I actually did do this and I sat there and wrote down my thoughts while she continued to count my freckles (I made that part up but pretty sure it’s a solid bet). Three things to be said here: One, I have no interest in celebrities the way we have been taught to, they are people at best…Two, as life went on I stopped feeling this need to write down my thoughts constantly and started just writing in my head, literal children’s books have been written in this noggin and tossed away as I drift off to sleep…I suppose I write bedtime stories to myself in my head and now I understand why I ended up in Ketamine Therapy. Three, when I disconnect, I am the most connected. ….Four! There has to be a fourth!

Four would be how much power there is in silent tears. When I was a child, I was with both of my grandpas when they passed. My maternal grandfather…Papa was the most iconic man in my image. He was always red in the face, had the laughter that you always knew he loved you and everything you were saying, and had a gold scorpion stud earring. Only a true stud could pull off that kind of stud. When he passed we all took turns in groups to say our goodbyes. What do you say? You say you love them and that’s about it. Funny they call it “saying your goodbyes” when those words are never spoken in the process. Instead, you do your best to say how you love them in a hurried mess as you race with time that seems to have stopped but is slipping away faster than it ever has and leaves no room to say what you want or are trying to. But visually, oh you get locked in and it stays with you forever. This goodbye was no different. My mouth did not work well but my eyes were this device that captured a forever moment. Something nothing could destroy, burn, or trash. The image created fears nothing, for even in being lost, it will be there with me somewhere in my tangled brain and perhaps only to be found during my silent tears when trying to save myself as I have before. These are the thoughts that came to mind when in ketamine. Flashes of life like a slideshow, some in color, some in black and white, some from a life I never knew I lived. So the day will come when someone is saying their goodbyes to me and as they do, inside of me I will have the untouchable images of the goodbyes I too have said. The silent tear I saw running down my Papa’s cheek as he scanned the room with his watercolored eyes looking at each of his grandchildren as we did our best to express our love. Nothing had to be said. He was dying and we were there unable to say goodbye but somehow in the silence and the disconnect we connected in an indestructible moment that made saying goodbye unnecessary. Moments like this, moments of disconnect make me realize that through disconnecting we create layers of eternity in everything we do.