All of a sudden, One

Everything is slowing down for me. My tattooing speed is getting slow, my ability to just go to a store and pick up a few items, everything. It's because of the people around me. I'm becoming fascinated by everyone and can't stop talking with them. I have these long conversations where I feel so interested in that person, whether they are a stranger, or a friend, or a slight acquaintance. Even if I was just in the middle of something (like a tattoo) if I start talking to someone else on the phone or in the shop to make an appointment all of a sudden they're now the most interesting person and I've lost touch with what I was just doing and now I'm in a deep conversation with this person.

People are glowing, and I see it with my eyes that are not really eyes, and I can see their pain or their excitement or their love shining and I have to talk to them. I'm easily distracted. I can't remember things like names, for people or books I've read many times, even when I can tell you which character I'm thinking of or what they did or that the cover of the book was blue. My mind is full of information, but so much of it I can't access immediately. I'm a fact oriented person as a rule, and yet I seem to be crossing lines out of that realm into the land of colors and feelings, which I'm really starting to see around other people. I want their stories, I want to pull them into me and make them mine, and when I sense pain I want to pull it out with my hands and my words and set it free like circling birds. I sound crazy to myself, because I operate mainly on data as a rule.

I've always seen, or known to a certain extent, but I have never become so lost in my fascination before. Tattooing is a hands on procedure, and art comes from a deep well inside me. When I put those things together it seems like it's taking me a long time to get things done. I'm loving the way my work looks these days, don't get me wrong, I think I'm turning out some of the best art I've ever done, it's not that. I'm just not banging them out one after another the way I used to. With my emotions so close to the surface I cry often, and with my empathy lever stuck on high I can cry just as easily for you as I do for myself. Half the time my tears are not even for sadness, they can be for beauty or connection or, I can't even name the third reason to justify the structure of this sentence. I am having sensory overload.

I don't feel crazy, in the ways I've used the word in the past to describe certain states of being. I feel connected. I feel so much the state of being one with everything and I want to know all my parts, which in turn, sounds crazy. Maybe. I find myself loving people I've formerly hated, and I mean really hated with a daily dedication. Even Dottie, the evil skull and crossed bones on my poison bottle is starting to become someone I'm just trying to have empathy for and I can't even say I hate her, there's only pain left, but the vicious hatred is gone. New people though, I find myself falling in love with, and quickly. Not a "Hey, I want to get romantic with you." kind of love, but a sibling or parental kind of love. Younger people are all bringing out the mother in me. Older people are either my brothers and sisters, or respected elders who make me want to sit at their feet and hear stories of their pasts, which are somehow my pasts as well.

Not every minute of every day mind you, I'm not walking around in this fog of love like a being of light, it's just happening more and more and slowing me down, making it harder to keep a hectic pace that I've run for so many years. Last night I sat and beaded a necklace on the bed while Michael dozed and the music played instead of the television. It was very grounding for me, counting sequences and choosing colors. Being with him, and yet not talking, just being together while all those beautiful songs swirled around me. I'm finding that resisting television and news is good for me, it fills me with fear and anxiety, there is so much conflict and damage going on. The words "Breaking News" never mean anything good has happened, it means I'm giong to be served another dose of fear or tragedy.

Maybe this is all coming from a disease in the gland that controls emotion and mood, energy and metabolism. Maybe it's because for the first time in my entire life I am in a relationship with someone where I am truly risking opening my entire hart and being intimate by taking a giant leap of faith and offering my whole self instead of holding some back for safety's sake. Maybe it's menopause, maybe I've been touched by the hand of God, or it's the meds. Maybe this headache is the price I have to pay for the rest of it, and if it is, would I trade it all away for relief of the pain? Why have I been gifted with all of the questions and none of the answers? Yesterday Shayla said she thinks I'm here to be a healer. Traditionally it's an older woman who fills that role, maybe I'm just coming of age to be who I am meant to be? All I know is that I am slowing down, and becoming more one than one of many.

If you've come to me for work lately and been annoyed at how long it takes to get your artwork I am truly sorry for your distress. All I can promise is that you got the best I have to offer, and that I loved you and cared for you as a person and the artistic outcome of your tattoo and gave you the very best I had to offer in the moment. If you're my real life friend, I hope I need to type no disclaimer at all, that you just know what I say is true. If you've never met me, well, bring me your stories, your pain, your excitement and your love and I will lay my hands on you and see what kind of birds we can set free to fly above your head.