Make Your Own Kind of Music

I've starting tearing at my cuticles pretty enthusiastically again. There is never much of a reprieve from this, but August is one of my worst months. I really can't stand starting new things. It would be so nice to escape my thoughts for even an hour. Then I could be ok with the knowledge that the school year is starting and give myself permission to enjoy a current moment. But living in the present is just something I chatter at my students to do, maybe even something I'd print for a poster on the wall, all the while experiencing constant inner turmoil that is heavily rooted in a fear of the future. It's very difficult to not make hypocritical statements in my attempts to teach my anxious students coping skills when my own abilities in the area are highly hit or miss.

I had to see my psychiatrist last week. I was listening to the comedy radio station as I drove there because my psychiatrist is the most horrible conversationalist I've ever encountered. But I really need the medication he prescribes so I can achieve what others affectionately call, "falling asleep." My mind won't quiet down for this type of drifting off to happen on its own; hence, I have to talk to this man twice a year so he can take his little notes and file them away while not even pretending to care about how I'm doing. It's important for me to have a laugh on the way to my appointments with him because I have to produce literally all verbal elements of our conversation. Well, all verbal elements other than, "So?" and, "Ah, ok, what else?" Our appointments have an average duration of 4 minutes. This costs me $127, but at least I get to fall asleep at night.

When I was driving there last week, Emily Heller came on the comedy station with this bit from "My Brain," and I had a glorious moment. I understood that I'm not original at all - tons of people feel the same things that I do - and got to laugh my head off by myself in my car:

"I guess, ok, if I did have to change one thing about my body it would definitely be my brain. My brain is like a radio DJ who does not take requests. I'll be like, 'Coming up next, we've got a full hour of just the first verse of 'Mambo Number 5', followed by an imaginary argument with someone you love... The Greatest Hits of Your Mistakes From the 90s, 2000s, and Today... After that, we've got a full hour of just the first verse of 'Mambo Number 5.'" 

As of late, my brain has been playing an eclectic mix of hypothetical parent emails (cc'ing the principal) blasting the various ways I am not meeting their student's needs, a crowded room of 6th graders ignoring any and all of my basic requests, a disastrous first cross country practice with 80 kids running wild in the streets, and a vision of myself hunched over my desk at 6:00 at night while the janitor vacuums the vacant halls. I have glimmers of today's hits as well, however, where I actually get to nod along to the positive counterpart of the first tracks (thank-you emails for my painstaking efforts with students, budding young 6th graders smiling and eager to please, me enjoying an opportunity to coach one of my favorite pastimes after working efficiently all day long and not needing to stay a minute after practice). But then the temporal lobe makes a request for other worries I've been neglecting, such as an accidentally offensive comment I made in a social setting and the awkward silence that followed. "Awkward Silence That Followed" gets played on repeat, followed by the chorus of Cass Eliott's "Make Your Own Kind of Music" and Neil Young's "Sugar Mountain" (just to try to get, "Even if nobody else sings along!" out of my head). And then the tape repeats each track all over again (but sometimes in a mismatched order).

This playlist is not to say that I don't actually enjoy my job. I like talking to kids. There's something so energizing about their raw, visceral nature; it's fascinating how quickly they throw logic out the window as soon as any minor hurdle is placed in their way. Next week, the 6th graders will have to learn how to open their lockers in a crowded hallway, and many of them are going to struggle immensely with this. There will be tears. I try to teach them the logical response to locker issues: If you are unable to get it open before class, it's ok, you can ask a teacher to help you open it; if you forget your combination, you can go to the front office where the secretary has every combination recorded; if it gets jammed, don't worry, that happens all the time - just let a teacher know and they'll get the janitor to come pry it open for you; no matter what, you're going to be ok, even in worst-case-locker-scenarios. Maybe the reason I am drawn to middle school is because my own ability to reason with myself in situations that make me anxious is no better than the tearful 11-year-old whose locker is jammed two minutes before Period 3 Social Studies. I can't deny how deeply I understand her tears, how horribly well I identify with feeling inadequate in front of my peers (peers who always seem to be able to handle things much better than I can). And I certainly can't pretend to forget my own partially insane reaction to my first locker in the 6th grade. I was convinced the verbal commitment of my locker partner would go kaput come first day of school. We had to choose our own locker partners, and if you didn't have one, you had to wait until the teachers determined what other forlorn loser was left partnerless to pair you with. I remember making my mom bike over to my locker partner's house to accost her on a summer afternoon before 6th grade: "Do you still want to be my locker partner, like you said on the phone?" I still recall quite vividly her light laugh and assuring response, "Beth, relax, you have a locker partner!"

Everything turned out fine with my locker, just like it will for the crying girls next week, and just like it will for me once I settle into the grind. The trouble is, the crying 11-year-olds and I don't know that right now. We are stuck with our radio DJ brains that don't take requests. A part of me disagrees with Emily Heller, though, when she says she would change her brain because of this. I suppose it would be nice to be more carefree, but then I wouldn't understand the students who walk through my door, and I wouldn't get the satisfaction of overcoming obstacles. I'm not looking forward to the stress I will undoubtedly experience in the coming months, but I'm thankful for my frantic mind nonetheless. "Make Your Own Kind of Music" never fails to make me smile, and I know at least some middle schoolers will sing along.

"Make Your Own Kind of Music"

Mama Cass

Nobody can tell 'ya

There's only one song worth singing

They may try and sell 'ya

'Cause it hangs them up to see someone like you.

But you've gotta make your own kind of music

Sing your own special song

Make your own kind of music

Even if nobody else sings along.

You're gonna be knowing

The loneliest kind of lonely

It may be rough going'

Just to do your thing's the hardest thing to do.

But you've gotta make your own kind of music

Sing your own special song

Make your own kind of music

Even if nobody else sings along.

So, if you cannot take my hand

And if you must be goin' 

I will understand.

But you've gotta make your own kind of music

Sing your own special song

Make your own kind of music

Even if nobody else sings along.

  

Rock Thoughts

Adam and I attempted another portion of the Colorado Trail at the start of July. I'm not sure why I like "attempted" for the verb there, other than I suppose "attempt" is an action I identify with more strongly with than "complete" or "conquer." This time we were joined by our nervous friend, James, and his likewise nervous dog, Sully. I do enjoy when humans and their dogs resemble one another (often unbeknownst to the human). They were great to have along, and I am certain they toned down the possibility of me having a conniption. Maybe I should always travel with a buffer for Adam's sake. 

On our second day out, we pulled over to a look-out point on Kenosha Pass, to rest a bit and because James wanted to throw out some of his trail mix to reduce weight (I meant to ask him if that really made a difference). I perched up on a rock, Adam climbed below with a roll of toilet paper to, you know, and James was tossing peanuts. I believe Sully wanted to see what Adam was doing, which was making James nervous because the drop off was fairly severe. I should mention my trail name is "Moss," because I enjoy hanging out on rocks. On my large sitting rock were several small rocks, displayed in a cairn of sorts. But they weren't signifying a trail. They were covered with words. It may be assumed that anyone who carves words into rocks and poses them as a cairn wants someone to read their work. I only found two of them to be picture worthy: 

"Expectation of Perfection" 

"Anger"

The rest of them were disturbing but relatable to anyone who's ever tortured themselves with a good dose of self-deprecating internal chatter:

unworthy

self-hate

shame of my family

disappointment to everyone

I thought about the rocks for a long time. I even brought them up to a complete stranger, another thru-hiker who arrived at our resting spot and paused to wait for his wife, who was lagging a bit behind. We made a little small talk: yes, they were doing the full trail, took 6 weeks off from work; no, we're just going to Breckenridge; oh, that's nice, what a beautiful segment you chose to hike. I warned this stranger, "Don't come over here by these sad rocks!" and described what we'd found. We joked a bit, him chiding, "Did you look over the edge to see if anyone's down there?" We all chuckled and when we saw him and his wife again a few hours later later we chuckled again. Adam had forgotten speaking to them before, asking, "Are you doing the whole thing?" The man responded, "Yeah, remember, we talked before? By the negative rocks!" Ha, ha, ha, negative rocks. 

We started walking again and were quiet, keeping our thoughts of discomfort with our packs or even bliss with our simple quest of walking to water and setting up camps and resting and eating...quiet like this, and I think I even forgot about the rocks for a bit until James said, "Are you guys feeling any of the rock thoughts?" Adam didn't understand what he meant at first, the rocks weren't as much a part of his journey down to the wilderness toilet, but I was instantly pleased: "No, I'm not, not at all!" James didn't think he was either, and we were both pleasantly surprised with this state of being. The trail was good for us, and I don't think either of us are strangers to rock thoughts. 

I've always wanted, to some degree, the ability to control my world, and this is the kind of desire that gets people stuck in rock thoughts. But I know that I will always be afraid to not know what's coming. When I don't know what to expect, I go through every comprehensible way for the situation to go horribly in my head until I work myself into a mental paralysis of sorts. Then the thing happens, and I breathe, and do, and reflect, and go home, and run, and all is well with Adam and some dinner and mindless television. It hasn't been until recent years that I've learned I have the ability to cope. I think the most destructive rock carving was the one that said, "Expectation of Perfection." Because if maturity or therapy or common sense don't step in to alter this impossible expectation to fit reality, the world is a pretty torturous place to live in.

I now feel really badly about chuckling. What does it say about the stigma of mental illness when four happy hikers happen upon a collection of stones with suicidal messages and chuckle about it? I'm disturbed by our own flippancy. I hope he or she had a healing walk...I'm drawn to the trail now, because for the first time in my life I found backpacking to be the retreat those other crazy people keep talking about. That must be why the stone carver was out there, right? To heal. It was a pretty serene location for some cathartic rock carving (and pooping, if you ask Adam).