"Anything alligator swallows becomes alligator"

Abundance has a work thing this week, so he's been largely absent from the internet and it definitely gives the days a different flavor, less words, less text pettings (there's a cartoon I saw recently that had person A saying to person B "I'm warning you, I'm an animal in bed" in the first panel and person A under the covers in bed telling person B "Pet me and bring me food!" in the second panel.)

He's told me that most of the time, my insecurities prompt fond indulgence, rather than the annoyance I assume my needs provoke.  (I probably used this image before, but I tend to think of my feelings as emotional hairballs.  Like owning a cat, I provide many benefits but occasionally I'm going to hork up some feelings at your feet and all that can be done is getting out some paper towels and pretending the whole thing never happened.)

But still, I try to put things on back burners and under beds, and spin myself increasingly alarming stories, picking apart offhand comments and awkward moments.  And the solutions I find to whatever imagined misbehaviors/missed cues I find is to become smaller, less messy, less emotional, less needy.  (I feel like a gaping chasm of desire for attention most of the time).

And Abudance is totally teaching me to use my words, and almost every time it works out well for me, and we even have found a signal for when I'm feeling especially insecure, one that doesn't put him on the spot as much as when I demand "Say something nice"  (I seem to pick partners who freeze like deer in headlights upon hearing those words).

But I'm feeling disoriented, disconnected from everything at the moment.  I've wrenched my back and lost my fitbit, which seems to have sucked what little interest I have in exercising away.  I feel avoidant of any convention work, reluctantly attracted to Arisia, even though I keep not being able to figure out how to enjoy conventions.  I want to cook, but my kitchen is cold and I'm tired and my relationship with food ranges from awkward to hostile and back again.  

The details are good, the overall picture is good.  I have lots of interesting plans in the month of December, and a whole union week between Christmas and New Years to either sit on my ass or have grand adventures.  We're buying a tree this weekend and I predict it will freak Tanning the fuck out.  There's the Illuminations tour, and Revels, and Gather Here classes, and buying all my family books they probably won't read.   I'll go back to Hands and Hips and bake in front of their fireplace, I'll make my dog wear a holiday sweater, I'll finally start reading the new Mira Grant.  

Good things, omnia.  Good things behind you, good things in front of you.   This is just December hitting, you can totally hit back.