Beginning to love the distance

Yesterday we ate lunch at the Northern Lights Roadhouse in Beaver Bay.  They consistently have the best unusual and tasty food above Two Harbors second only to the Angry Trout in Grand Marais.  Then I went to the North Shore Merchantile and did email and web work.  Back at the cabin, Jim and Larry cooked a magnificent meal of steak and califlower and potatoes.  Last night was truely a dark and stormy night.  The waves were wonderful. The lightening and thunder magnificent.  I got to bed early since I am going to Grand Marais today for the Arts Festival and then a Log Cabin Concert with Mike Monroe.  I got lots of correspondence via texting from folks at home.  I wonder how much the roaming text will be costing me.  One man was lamenting that he could not do the, in my mind, dangerous work because he had the restriction of a halfway house.  What can I say when he is not listening to me.

Then this morning I awoke and Jim had preopared a wonderful breakfast and I ate and then left the guys at the cabin, they headed for Minneapolis and I headed for Grand Marais and the Arts Festival.

Mike Monroe sang in the waterfront park and it is he and Deb, his partner and soon to be wife that I came up here to see and hear.

He was marvelous and she is always a trip.  She is a healer and gave me some good direction to cope with my excema.  In the evening I will go over to their home for what they call the Log Cabin Concert.

Thinking

Steven and Cassidy are busy cleaning up a mess at the Yarn Garage.  There was a major water leak there.  Some times I think that Steven and Cassidy were made for each other.  They are two wonderful and unusual men and they both have unique gifts.  So they are at home in the Cities and very busy.  I told Steven that I would come down there however he refused the offer.

The Monroes are a fantastic influence in my life.  Michael's music and Deb's wholeistic  coaching are just what the doctor ordered for me.  More about this later.  This trip is proving to be just what I needed to get over my physical and emotional ills.  I am so blessed.

Beginning to love the distance Gratitude

Funky Dreams 

But the evidence is there and unless I find other evidence that contraverts that, I will have to just lose the illusion that either of them ever authentically cared for and about me.

...So with all the issues of questioning whether some of these men care for me or not and thinking all the while I am unwanted, why do I ignore the people who I have no question actually care for me....  Also without me to either care for or manipulate, my questionable friends may show their true colors and lead to their own outing in my questions of their actual concern and love.  I fear also that they will go back to use and up here I can do nothing about their personal choices, no matter how damaging it may be for them.

Yesterday I slept a lot.  I took and afternoon nap and then went to bed about 9 PM.  I am bothered by the excema on my hands and hopefully it will go away.  Yesterday after a wonderful breakfast, we went to Beaver Bay and I answered emails and made phone calls.  I have set up an appointment with the Duluth Super Eight to work with the manager, Jody, on a website for them.  I like the folks at the North Shore Merchantile, Barry and his wife.  Somehow I think I may be doing some business with them. There is heavier and stormy weather coming in and that is the North Shore I love.  

Thinking

I ain't well yet but I am getting there.  When I am involved with the shore and the guys I can forget my fears and worries about the men at home.  I am beginning to think that I have been thinking more and more that I am just an old man mark for a couple of men I thought were friends back at home.  That hurts.  But the evidence is there and unless I find other evidence that contraverts that, I will have to just lose the illusion that either of them ever authentically cared for and about me.  In the meantime, Jim and Larry, Steven, Don, Tony, Ellen, Damien, Aaron, Christian, Glade, my brother, and many other contemporaries do care for me.  I know God is a real force in my life and sustains and upholds me.  I guess I am just a sucker for these attractive and hurting men.  And they are masters at maniupulation.  In the past week, I noted that one of them, came up and sat in my lap and tickled me.  That was fun but then another old and somewhat gin soaked man came up and he did roughly the same thing.  Suddenly it became obvious to me that for that moment, I was just another person to be toyed with and manipulated.  I was just another mark.  Is that his full interest in me or does he really care?  Can I be a cared for friend or am I just a meal and housing ticket and transportation?  I fear the answer is yes but there are some issues coming up that will give me a firmer handle on that.

I know that I do care for them and it is sad and unfortunate that they do not care for me.  It is just my loss, not theirs.  I will care no less for them knowing that it is not reciprocal.  I can get over the sadness at the loss.

God's wilderness up here keeps me occupied and centered.  I am praying a lot more and meditation is a joy.  

Now, I had a doozy of a dream last night.  In it my mom, dead since 1998, denied that I was being shorted on my bed which I discovered was only 3/4 there.  I said, "You really don't want me here."  She said, "No we really want you here."  I somehow knew she was lieing.  So I am sitting around with this internal "I am an unwanted person. " Jim asks if perhaps it is just lust and not codependence.  I don't know.  So with all the issues of questioning whether some of these men care for me or not and thinking all the while I am unwanted, why do I ignore the people who I have no question actually care for me.  Perhaps the solitude of the final days of this vacation will help me sort that out.  Also without me to either care for or manipulate, my questionable friends may show their true colors and lead to their own outing in my questions of their actual concern and love.  I fear also that they will go back to use and up here I can do nothing about their personal choices, no matter how damaging it may be for them.  God sets up all things in his wisdom and glory and he has done a magnificent job on my current disease.  I am so blessed.

Funky Dreams Gratitude

The Healing on the North Shore

Since it is so cold up there we need to have winter clothes with us. We then visited the North Shore Merchantile in Beaver Bay where they have free Wifi and I caught up on various messages from home.

...First, really stay in the now, this wonderful place is so impressive and beautiful that it is hard to burden myself with people and places far away, it takes much too much work.

Yesterday we went hiking through Gooseberry Falls State Park.  We saw Rita, the old naturalist, who has been promoted to a regional naturalist, and the two current naturalists for the park.  That was a blessing.  There are numerous hot men wandering the trails and byways of the park and now I am thinking that my "alone time" up here I will just be hiking away at Gooseberry.  

 Whew!  

We also stopped at the Beaver Bay Library where Jim discovered our idea of visiting Isle Royale was a bit off.  Since it is so cold up there we need to have winter clothes with us.  We then visited the North Shore Merchantile in Beaver Bay where they have free Wifi and I caught up on various messages from home.

 Steven is NOT coming up.  I kind of knew that but I tried to convince him yesterday.  There is no convincing him.  Camping for him is a three star hotel rather than a five star.  I will miss him but that is OK.  

Yesterday, in the midst of seeing the haunts of Gooseberry I have seen for over sixty years, the codependency did not even exist.  It was "healed".  I also got calls and texts from lots of folks back home that cooled me off and reassured me.  I think I have found some tools once again to combat my codependency.  First, really stay in the now, this wonderful place is so impressive and beautiful that it is hard to burden myself with people and places far away, it takes much too much work. Secondly, being with great people and communicating with great people, even about the illness, and particularly about the illness really opens you to feedback and support that really helps.  Third, and perhaps the most important, I am praying a lot more here and that helps the most of all.  Turning things over in prayer.  Now I have been told that for my sixty four years and yet, here on the shore, the power and beauty of that reality comes home, bigtime.  I am so blessed.

The Healing on the North Shore Gratitude

Can it be that I am again having a problem with my codependency.

He will be saying hello to the guys who were just at the Tuesday Meeting I go to and of course was not at today.

This afternoon I was gripped with more of the sad morose feelings I have been having.  I am thinking about my friend and the high possibility that he is using again and I can do nothing about it.  I am having a hell of a time turning this over.  He did not look that well when I left the cities and he was hanging with his friend at a bar.  I am just standing in God's way.  I am allowing him to think that somehow I will worry about his using himself.  He probably has been using alcohol and drugs and is using now.  It seemed that way when I stopped in and saw him just before I left.  He has been using me and I know that but I think he is a friend and cares for me too.  Now I am questioning that also.  

I just got a call from Glade in Minneapoiis.  He is a friend of Bill W and he was calling out of concern.  It was wonderful.  He will be saying hello to the guys who were just at the Tuesday Meeting I go to and of course was not at today.  He is aware that some things have been going on with me.  It is so wonderful that he is concerned.  

It was last August 11th that I saw this fine man bloody and broken on the street.  I have gotten closer and closer to him over the year.  He has spent a lot of time at my condo and he is the best guy cleaning up the condo of any of the many of my friends and acquaintances.  He is very intelligent and he has helped me lose the weight from 252 to 238 with regular workouts in the condo excercise room.  He is an awesome man.  

So many folks are being out there for me.  I am so embarrassed that I am so gripped by this or rather that I am allowing myself to be so gripped by this.  I am so blessed.

North Shore Day One Gratitude

I drove up yesterday after spending some time catching up on some web things and then seeing Timmy and Cassidy and Cassidy's boyfriend, Jake.

...Traditionally I have invited friends to spend the time with me and Jim and Larry are the only takers this time.

This is a blessing.  I am up here as I am every year at Castle Haven Cabins. 

 I drove up yesterday after spending some time catching up on some web things and then seeing Timmy and Cassidy and Cassidy's boyfriend, Jake.  (Man, Cass and Jake are a stunning couple.)

The agenda up here is no agenda.  Traditionally I have invited friends to spend the time with me and Jim and Larry are the only takers this time.  They will leave on the 12th and I will be alone here through the 17th when I will be returning home.

Thinking

Well, this is a unique opportunity.  Generally my life is filled with people or I fill it with people.  God has seen fit for me to be up here by myself for the end of the time.  In a very strange way, it is like when I was in jail, separated from everyone and just needing to be on my own.  I have all kinds of concerns and cares for folks in the cities.  Yet here I will be.  I am so blessed.

North Shore Day One Gratitude

Freedom Saturday

The first poem in the book talks about the fact that people can say they love you and like you and spend time with you however they will go home.

I was up and centering at 7  AM.  I am still in the grips of my codependent jag over my friend.  So I have been spending more and more time at meetings and talking to friends about what is up with my life.  I drove Timmy to work at 10 AM and then BJ Andrade-Ward, a photographer friend, came over and we put up his website, www.isabobphotography.com.  I then played on more websites.  In the evening I went to my favorite Saturday 12 Step meeting.  I was handed the collected poems of Maya Angelou. I then after the meeting went to the meeting after the meeting and met with a new sponsee.  Then it was home and to bed at midnight.

Thinking

I am finally "over" my funk of the last two weeks.  I have been attempting to protect a dear friend who has been making decisions which could end his sobriety.  I finally got it with the gift of the Maya Angelou book.   The first poem in the book talks about the fact that people can say they love you and like you and spend time with you however they will go home.  If you try to get validation from anywhere outside of God and yourself, you will fail.  They will all "go home."  I realized that eventually, perhaps not right away, my good friend will realize the emptiness of what he is doing and whom he is attempting to get validation from and then will come back to God and his family.  My efforts to alter his perceptions were totally futile and eventually reality will do that for me.  I need to get out of the way of God and just love him.  I can do that.  

At the meeting after the meeting, one sponsee told me, "Hmmmm, whenever I am taking someone else's inventory, it generally means I am not taking care of my own inventory.  I definately have let my own inventory go.   If I just keep and open and willing mind, God sure can get a lot accross to me.  I am so blessed.

Freedom Saturday Gratitude

There is Never Enough Gratitude

Intellectually I know that it is totally out of my control and is not my business but I then think, is it good support for me not to voice my opinion and support of his original goals?

Today was full but not with anything really organized.  I was up and centering at 5:30 AM.  I am pooped from yesterday, the final day of the Pride Festival.  I had the wonderful gift of working in the Downtown Churches booth.  I had a meeting with a new sponsee at 8 AM and then played on the web work until the evening.  I went to my 12 Step meeting and spoke on the fourth step.  I then went to the condo and was in bed at 11 PM.

Thinking

I have been so tied up with a friend's decisions recently that are directly opposed to the original goals he set for himself in sobriety.  Intellectually I know that it is totally out of my control and is not my business but I then think, is it good support for me not to voice my opinion and support of his original goals?  I am having a struggle with this one.  I am blessed.

I say that because the morning attitude of gratitude I do is one of the only sources of healing to these self imposed wounds I have.   He may be setting himself up to use, but I am blessed.  I have the experience and strength and hope to be sober for today.  I am so very blessed.

There is Never Enough Gratitude

Big Brown poops out

I have been very sad and codependent the last few days with my sponsee using, lying to me and getting thrown in jail.  This was just what the doctor ordered, a very good time with good and healthy friends. 

Mrs. Howard, Ellen Lewis, and Aaron Jackson and I went to the races today at Canterbury Park.  

It was my first visit to a Horserace and I did wager on a number of races spending about $30 and I won $4.10.  Oh well, the companionship and the food and the fun was great.  Big Brown just pooped out.

Thinking

I have been very sad and codependent the last few days with my sponsee using, lying to me and getting thrown in jail.  This was just what the doctor ordered, a very good time with good and healthy friends.  When you are Hungry, angry, lonely and tired,  HALT and take care of yourself.   I am so blessed.

Big Brown poops out Gratitude