Keep Falling

Two Monday’s ago, I woke up at 5 am and took the bag I had packed for a weekend in the Hamptons full of shoes and once worn dresses and re-zipped it.  I grabbed the nearest big blue Ikea bag and tipped my laundry basket into it, watching as the clothes cascaded out of it, like a cotton avalanche. I kissed my boyfriend good-bye as he sleepily slid toward my side of the bed.  I heaved this monstrosity of dirty clothes over my shoulder and lifted my rolling luggage out the front door to the 2011 Subaru Impreza that I share with my little brother.

This little silver bullet of a car has almost 150,000 miles on it, smells like my little brothers dirty gym clothes, and in that moment opening up  the car door made me happier than I can even express. I needed a break from Brooklyn, and this sweet little four wheeled wonder was my ticket out. I didn’t worry about the wonky back bumper, or that the check engine light has been on basically since we got it a few months ago.  I just saw the E ZPass was in place, and that Google maps told me it was blue all the way from Brooklyn to Vermont – I turned the ignition and pulled out of the parallel parking spot that had taken me at least 5 tries to get into.

I needed a breath because I have been feeling unsteady lately.  This unsteadiness is partially of my own doing. When I consciously uncoupled from my job, I saw it as a real opportunity for me to figure out what I wanted for my life to look like, and to try to build the fuck out of  it.  Which in theory is BRILLIANT! I’m following my dreams, going with my gut, being brave – thinking about what I want to do with my wild and precious life! I am doing the things that I promised myself I would do! I almost died, don’t I deserve to give myself the opportunity to find happiness.  YES all of these things are SO TRUE.  

But, what they don’t always put at the bottom of these quotes in the prettiest calligraphy I’ve ever seen, is that while investing in yourself, and listening to your heart is incredible – it is also really, really scary.

I’d been doing what I normally do in the face of things that terrify me: I work super hard, I don’t take care of myself and most charmingly I try to control everything I possibly can.  This includes myself, my relationships, my social interactions, money, food and breathing.  For the last few months I’ve been dancing on the razor’s edge of this control. Trying, trying, trying to keep myself balanced – praying that I won’t fall, knowing that eventually, I will.

My brother had called me a few days before I left for Vermont and asked me how I was, I took a breath and before I could speak he said – ‘You’re not doing well.  You know it, I know it, and listen that’s ok.  Stop struggling against it.  Lean into kid.  Don’t make any decisions, except to get the fuck out of town.’  

I called my parents right afterwards and asked if I could come up for a visit. I needed to fall apart, and apparently, I needed to do it on a pile the dirty laundry that was currently sitting in the backseat.  

Owning a car in New York City is a bit of a luxury, and it was still pretty new to me. We had only owned it since March, and most of the trips in it had been to see family, or friends and I was rarely by myself.  

The joy of being in charge of the playlist, and being able to stop whenever I wanted to was not lost on me. I sped up the New York Thruway the same way that I would have when I was 19.  Windows wide open, drinking gulps of milky sweet iced coffee, singing to songs as loudly as I wanted – feeling free, totally ridiculous  and like I could stop and pee at every rest stop because I have a small bladder, I love beverages and goddammit I was in charge.

For the last few months, I have been searching for something to make me feel steady.  For that one thing that I can lean back on and say – “Alright Katie, see this thing happened and that means that everything is going to be ok.” But that thing hasn’t come.  As I drove past service stations and farm towns that smelled like fresh cut grass, I realized that it probably never would.

Not because steadiness isn’t in my future, but because I have a tendency to move the goal post whenever I get close to that feeling – to say it still isn’t enough. That I need to work harder and smarter to be worthy of a concrete feeling.  Which is exhausting and shitty, because it makes it pretty impossible to ever score a point.

I rolled up to my parents house, still buzzing from all of the coffee and the number of indie-pop songs I belted out, hugged the crap out of my mom and sat down to start working.  My dad walked in looked and me and said

‘Katie, you should go and lie down.’

No, Dad I’ve got some stuff to do, I should really take care of it now.

‘Do you have a deadline? Or is there someone who is waiting on it right now?’

No, not exactly.

‘Then I think that you should go upstairs and rest.  That’s why this house is here, that’s why you’re here – so you can relax and rest.  You need to rest Katie.

I looked at both of my parents, and in their eyes I saw love (and more than a little concern) so I walked up the stairs and did what the told me. I laid down, and I slept.  I woke up hours later from the nap that I didn’t think that I needed, feeling unwound.  I had a cocktail and a chat with a my dad, and dinner and a tearful heart to heart with my mom before tucking myself in tightly to my bed for the second time that day.

My alarm went off at 5:15 and I padded down to my parents front porch with my journal in my hand.  I wrote as the sun came up over the Green Mountains, thoughts and feeling and nonsense poured out – nothing particularly life shattering, but it was honest and it was real and I meant every word.  Which felt fucking awesome.

I closed the journal entry with these thoughts:

You’ve got this, I promise.

Keep falling.

Go through it. 

Show up.

I love you.

In the off chance that you’re reading this, and maybe feeling like everything is so stinking out of control –  I want you to say all of the things above to yourself. Because it made me feel so much better, and I hope that it will help you too! Oh, and also, I think that you should lie down for a little bit.  You deserve it, I promise. 

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