The String Around My Finger

Lifestyle blog about emotions during Mercury Retrograde

Farewell mercury retrograde.

See you next in June, when we will again lay our heads on your dense pillow of introspection and runny emotions. Looking inside is good but hard work, and I’ve been writing a lot as I move through some big feelings. This poetic reflection was penned during our most recent ebb and flow amid the cosmic juices of Mercury, the planet that is said to hold the reigns of communication.

He called, by the way, and we spoke about our respective vulnerabilities and he encouraged me to speak my fears. To talk in safety is truly a gift, that I am writing to remember.

One of his hairs just tumbled from my head into the sink, sexy. But where is he?

Mean ideas about myself, not him, begin to circulate inside my hopeful heart. Such is the cyclical, painfully slow passage of growth. I meditate and bask in the reassuring glow offered by citrine, rose quartz, and other gemstones. I shed grateful tears when my oracle cards reveal what I need to be reminded of and yet, the stomach-tightening tension creeps back.

I heart the healing posts and say, “Thank you-praying hands,” to the ones that speak to me. I am charmed by old enemies that slither around in my amygdalae and throw shade on the brightness I’m trying to live. It’s hard to find the right words to string together the stories we need to hear to loosen the rusty hinges of passed down patterns, and to let ourselves be.

This is the grit of wellness.

At times I resent it because I didn’t ask for this hard fucking journey. But then again, what else could I expect? Being incomplete seems to be one of the most natural and difficult states for humans to embody. I speak this to myself while recalling the radiating warmth of his, “I love yous” and those huge, long hugs.

Still no text.

Writing reminds myself that it’s real; I’m real. I am a woman who exists outside of my feelings for him – REMEMBER THAT! Writing also helps quiet those unhelpful things I sometimes allow myself to hear, about being less than, about being a fool. It is a lot of work, but it’s the only way to move forward or inside ourselves where the best secrets reside.

In his song ‘You Know Who I Am’, Leonard Cohen writes about himself as the distance his lover puts between all of the moments they will be. It’s a slow, heavy song I cherish. Love transforms us because of the new spaces we step into with another and the new words we create in the process.

Words tell of our experience and we can feel them.

Just like Leonard sings, in love we are naked, wild, and in disrepair, always.