bextalksaboutstuff

[bextalksaboutstuff]

There is a small brick house on Euclid Avenue in Berwyn, Illinois that has healed a lot of different hearts in a lot of different ways. It is filled with music and laughter, always. It is home base. Something special that you can’t quite name is always in the air and it doesn’t matter if you’ve spent two years or one day there. You feel it either way… that weird, lingering, can’t-put-your-finger-on-it energy. A small corner store whose owner knows everyone’s name supplies all the beer and wine, and a romanticized hole-in-the-wall Mexican joint supplies all the tacos (I do mean ALL the tacos– so many tacos). It’s all so unassuming until you spend an evening out back with the white door and the rose bush and the fire and the people and you laugh and laugh and laugh until your face hurts, and then you understand. About one year ago I was on my way through the sticky Chicago summer heat to play a fest gig with a group of guys from a band called Cardinal Harbor. I remember the joyful warmth and I remember the dull nerves, both buzzing in my stomach, both simmering but never boiling-- the reality of a natural performer who rarely performs. The memory tastes like Solemn Oath beer. I played my music for a small theater and walked offstage into the pack of very tall, baseball-cap-wearing, IPA-drinking Cardinal Harbor boys huddled around a small table. They asked me if I’d ever want to play or record with them and I was flattered, blushing, but cautious. I said I’d talk to them after I heard them play. My dad stood next to me as I watched them play their opening song, “Mirth,” and we both understood immediately that these guys were something special. I’ll never forget the moment over the swell of chatter and applause that filled the room at the song’s end when my dad leaned into my ear and said, “say yes.” I believe I took artistic license and told them, instead, “fuck yeah, dudes.” Fast forward a year, skip the fan girl phase, the charmingly awkward first recording sessions, and my aggressive, persistent insertion into their plans. Today, these people– the band members and their loved ones– are my family. I live in that small brick house on Euclid Avenue two or three days of every week and eat all of their food. I fell in love with one of them. I can't imagine what my life would look like right now if I hadn't said yes. Let me tell you about these people. This group of human beings is extraordinary. Their love for each other and for life is so palpable; you feel their light the very second you enter their atmosphere. Everyone feels it. They are magnetic. They believe in hugging hello and goodbye and in vulnerability and in competition driven drinking events. They believe in meaningful connections and in creating music with integrity. Sometimes it seems like they are the result of a flawlessly executed universal arrangement: Hand-picked souls from all over the cosmos, poked and nudged by an invisible hand in the direction of each other until they all wound up in suburban Illinois to live and love and create together. It's all very strange and difficult to describe. Maybe all I'm trying to say is that something incomprehensibly important happens when certain souls meet in certain lifetimes. One thing I am learning in this lifetime is that people, places, and things manifest themselves in your life when you need them, they stay until you learn their lesson, and then they leave. I felt inclined to write about all of this because the era of Euclid is over soon and it feels sort of strangely like a death. I guess it is the loss of a time and place. I fell in love in one hundred different ways on Euclid Avenue. This house will always be the centerpiece in my head of this odd, joyful, surreal point in time. However, I set out to write about the place and ended up writing mostly about the people. It really is mostly about the people. They are here just the same, they are constant, and they create magic wherever they step. Whatever the next era is will undoubtedly be just as dreamy. I thank these people in my heart very often but I suppose I want to thank them in words for once, plain and clear as the backyard sky radiating orange through a mess of telephone wires: You are all of all of the good things that people tell you are coming when you're hurting. You are the eyes wrinkled with laughter that will flicker in my mind when I am eighty years old and dreaming of being young. You are the matter that makes up the microscopic moments that make you feel infinite. Thank you.

[bextalksaboutstuff]

Advice for a bad day: Crawl into bed and pull the sheets up to your chin. Make a cocoon. Sleep. Shed your skin. Wake up new. Say "thank you." Say "thank you." Say "thank you" again.

[bextalksaboutstuff]

depression can look like:

-wanting to be left completely alone and feeling bad about it -needing a lot of attention and love and support and feeling bad about it -having no appetite, only eating when you absolutely have to, suddenly you’ve lost 10 pounds -eating everything in sight, suddenly you’ve gained 10 pounds -not taking your meds because you know they help -zoning out, not being able to focus, feeling spacey and disconnected -feeling physically incapable of leaving your bed, your room, your house -choosing to stay sad when a situation could easily cheer you up a bit -having no motivation to shower, get dressed, put on makeup, or any other seemingly simple and everyday task -feeling disoriented the whole day after disturbing dreams, having trouble distinguishing reality -making yourself feel bad about being “lazy” -knowing that talking with somebody would help but not having the energy to do it -feeling paralyzed, stuck, unable to speak or move at times -uncontrollable anger, screaming fits, feels like you don’t have control over what you’re saying -almost complete absence of feeling with just a nagging, perpetual, can’t-put-your-finger-on-it sadness sitting in the background -feeling unable or just not wanting to talk to the people that love you -wanting help and love from your friends and family but not knowing how to ask for it -feeling disoriented, confused, scared, and uncomfortable because you can’t seem to connect your mind to your body -guilt, guilt, guilt over anything and everything -being cranky and snapping at people, being extremely irrational and not being able to stop it -knowing exactly what to do to help yourself and physically not being able to do it

Depression can manifest itself in so many different ways and these are just a FEW of them. Don’t brush your mental illness under the rug just because it doesn’t fit the mold of what you’ve been told it should look like… It can be easy to tell yourself that your problems aren’t real. Take care of yourself and your loved ones.

[bextalksaboutstuff]

shade of blue

I was not put on this earth to make you comfortable.  I will not tip toe over your polished floors with muddy feet and fool myself into believing I won't leave behind my shoe prints. I am messy and curious and I want to step in the puddles when it rains. 

I was not put on this earth to please you. I won’t immortalize you in song every time you decide I'm not good enough. I am enough and I always was and those melodies should be saved for something that tastes much sweeter. 

I was not put on this earth to be someone I am not. I have no interest in being an actor in a play that I never wanted to write, even if it means I never hear applause again. I am mine and mine only and I can survive the rest of life without the high of your praise.

I was not put on this earth to pretend that I love any less than I truly do. So many souls have carved in their first name on my heart with make-shift forest knives to break through the bark and it may take a hundred lifetimes to grow back. I am not numb and I won't act like I am and I won't let you shame me for running my fingers over the grooves of the scars every once in a while. I was not put on this earth to give anyone else the power to make me feel small.  I will not paint myself that shade of blue you love just because seeing me in yellow would hurt your eyes. I am vibrant and bright and I never liked that shade of blue anyway.

[bextalksaboutstuff]

“With freedom, books, flowers, and the moon, who could not be happy?”

Treat every single minute of your life as an exquisite moment in time. We are always searching for something better than what we have. We think all we need to feel good is some time away from the noise of our lives but there is peace to be found right now. There is beauty in the way you fold your favorite shirt and joy in the warm, soapy bubbles of your dishwater. The roses on your counter you forgot to notice smell so lovely and the shadow on your kitchen floor is dancing.. You should probably ask if it would like a partner and join right in.

When you tell the Universe that everything in your life is a gift, it will respond by showering you with more beauty than you ever thought possible. 

You don’t “have” to do anything. You “get” to do everything. And there is so, so much to do. 

[bextalksaboutstuff]

I want to be your friend

Your touch turned from honey to venom. 

The softness in your eyes flew south for the winter with the birds; An inevitable and instinctual migration.

I wrapped your wings in bandages when your wounds needed mending and you thanked me in kisses… But the kisses started tasting like blood and the copper on your breath whispered, “Please do not bind me any longer. I want to fly.”

Then I remembered how our souls danced together to a song only we could hear and suddenly the wintery layers of us melted into food for the flowers.

If the trees can trust that barren Januarys always lead to April fruits can’t we do the same?

And so just like the grass learns it must freeze to truly love the sun for what it is, I so unexpectedly understood that you will hold me in a different season.

And your touch turned from venom to honey once again.

[bextalksaboutstuff]

a love letter

Sometimes we set fire to entire forests in order for them to grow again. With more strength. With more dignity. With more ferocity than it ever knew it had.

You are not a fraction of a person without somebody to hold your hand– In fact, you’ve never been more whole. To be alone is to share the beauty of the world with no one but yourself Revel in the delicate grandeur of owning everything you feel.

Become your own companion and let the trees become your friends. Thank the wind for kissing your skin when you miss his touch. Play tag with the children waves that laugh onto your shore. Dance with the birds to the song that they picked out special just for you… They’ve always been singing just for you. But now you’re finally listening.

You are composed of stardust and light and every breath you take is pure magic.

You hold more magnificence in one fingernail than he could have ever given you.

The truth is that love will never give you what you can give yourself. Imagine the tides you could shift if you just believed in your own divinity.

So set fire to your soul. Let yourself burn. And then, Watch yourself grow. With more strength. With more dignity. With more ferocity than you ever knew you had.

[bextalksaboutstuff]

breathing out, i know this will pass

I spent the day tangled up in my bed sheets, staring at the dimmed laptop screen in my dark bedroom. The past few days, anxiety and depression have crept up inside me like they always do; a thick, heavy blanket covering me head to toe, rendering any attempt to escape useless. It has been hard to breathe lately.

Some days are going to be like this. Some days I am going to say to myself, “I cannot get out of bed today” and that is exactly what I will do. I will know exactly what I need to do to help myself and somehow find every reason not to do it. My cat and I will stare mindlessly at a Netflix show that we find no interest in. I will not open the blinds because they are too far away from my bed.

Some days I will struggle through social gatherings, attempting to breathe through my panic with every bit of strength my illness hasn’t stripped away from me. My thoughts will consist purely of worries that run a million miles per hour through my brain, but I will bite my tongue to avoid being labeled the “worry wart” or the “downer” or the “party pooper”.

Some days I will listen to the voice that tells me I am a burden. I will feel guilt in every fiber of my being for the ways I have mistreated loved ones who were only trying to help. I will try to explain that the words I have spoken were not mine.I will say that I am okay. 

Some days I will feel nothing at all and this somehow hurts the most. I’m not sure anyone has been able to find the words to describe a feeling that is so absent. This blankness is paralyzing, debilitating, and all-encompassing.  

I have come to terms with the fact that days like these are going to occur throughout the rest of my life. I have depression, I have anxiety, and these things are a part of my physical makeup. However, I am learning that I can coexist peacefully with these things when I practice mindfulness and acknowledge that my state of sadness is not stagnant. Through years of trial and error, I have learned how to come out of these days without leaving parts of me behind. I used to live my life in this state for days, weeks, months on end. I owe a large portion of my current health to my family and friends’ endless love, but I am willing and proud to acknowledge that I owe most of it to myself. Thankfully, days like today have become fewer and far between.

I’d like to share a short meditation that has helped me through some uncomfortable times in my life:

Breathing in, I know [sadness, anger, anxiety, etc.] is here Breathing out, I know sadness is me

Breathing in, I know sadness is uncomfortable Breathing out, I know this will pass

Breathing in, I calm my body Breathing out, I smile 

Repeat this until you feel less terrible. It’s that easy. Your mind is so powerful.

Meditation is a tool that I believe is absolutely necessary in the path of recovery. This verse in particular focuses on acceptance of whatever state you’re in. Instead of pushing unpleasant feelings away, acknowledge them as what they are, accept it, and slowly allow the intelligence of your breath to ease peace back into your heart and mind. 

Nurture yourself. Forgive yourself. Treat yourself as your friend. It will always pass if you let it.

Love & light.