A Not-So-Gentle Nudge


Autumn is, by far, my favourite season.  The skies become a crisp blue and it’s distinctly chilly in the mornings and evenings.  The dew on the grass reminds you to enjoy your last few weeks of wearing sandals.  I always feel a sense of anticipation as though something exciting is about to happen.

 

For almost all of my life it has been my own personal “New Year”.  My time for introspection and for weeding out my mind.  Some of my biggest life decisions have been made during Autumn.  Sometimes it creeps up without any warning, but not this year.

 

This year it waited for a Sunday evening and then appeared with pangs reminiscent of childbirth.  It started with a vague sinus headache, heralding the change of season, which slowly developed into a debilitating cramp on the left of my head and down the left side of my face.  Then panic set in.  I had arrived at nearly the end of Sunday and still had too much that had to be accomplished before the new work/school week.  The cramp in my head started to thump ominously, gleefully unresponsive to pain meds.

 

After fitful sleep interspersed with random anxious thoughts shooting through my disorientated head like molten spikes I woke to the new week wondering if anyone had gotten the number of the proverbial bus that had run me over.  The amount of tasks I had to accomplish before I left for work stood ahead of me like an insurmountable wall.  Instead of tackling a single one I took more meds and climbed back into bed.

 

After 30 minutes the pain had subsided to gentle volcanic waves (yes, it incorporated nausea) and I was able to stand up and move around in a fog.  Of the nine things that had to get done before leaving for work (via school) I managed to crawl through four.

 

It was while I was ironing a school skirt that I realised, with a classic light bulb moment, that it was Autumn.  My life was reminding me to take stock.  I need to calm down to a blur and get my priorities into a fluffy little row.  (Spot the irony of while I was ironing?  Geddit? J )  Almost immediately my head stopped pounding as hard as before and I felt peaceful (and a little foolish).

 

So Monday sees me feeling excited, drained, optimistic, a little freaked out, comfortable, positive, exhausted, in control, still a little eina but clear about moving forward with anticipation.  Oh, and when I talk I sound as though I have my head in a fish bowl – but that’s just the swollen sinuses.  I’ve already started my list of what (or who) I hold in high regard and what (or who) could/should be weeded.

 

As to why the universe chose this particular method to remind me to step to one side to breathe and think, I couldn’t say.  Possibly it’s been trying to tell me for weeks but I’ve been to stoopid to notice.  I think next year I'll just set a reminder on my phone.

 

Ah well. Happy New Year.

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