We All Need Soothing (Blog #967)

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Well crap. All day I’ve been worn the eff out. The last few days I’ve slept more than a bear in hibernation, but I just can’t seem to get my rear in gear. Plus, my hips have been hurting. The weather must be changing. Oh no. Is THIS what it’s like to get older? If so, you can have it. Of course, it beats the alternative (dying). Still, I wonder if it wouldn’t help if I were a SMIDGE less cognizant of my body. That is, as a dancer I’m pretty tuned into every square inch of my physical self, and–I don’t know–maybe I wouldn’t make such a big deal about things getting slightly out of whack if I were one of those less self-aware people who, as my dad says, can’t find their ass with both hands. But just imagine how inconvenient that would be.

Especially when going to the bathroom.

But I digress.

I spent this afternoon doing laundry, first my clothes, then my sheets. That’s right, smart alecks, I’ve now washed my sheets twice this quarter. (Miracles never cease.) Anyway, while the washer and dryer were doing their thing, I started reading a book about the importance of the vagus nerve, the longest nerve (that’s actually two nerves) in your body and the one that’s the most responsible for regulating not only your sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems, but also your heart, liver, and lungs. In other words, it’s important. And whereas I haven’t gotten to the part in the book about how to consciously activate your vagus nerve (and thus calm down your body and stimulate healing), I’ve heard before that humming or singing, as well as gentle rocking, help switch your vagus nerve from the “let’s freak out” to the “everything’s gonna be just fine” position. This makes sense to me. Think about how babies respond to humming, singing, and gentle rocking. Well, you and I are no different.

We all need soothing.

This evening I helped a friend update their website. Okay, fine, we technically started over, since their site hasn’t been updated in eight years. And whereas starting over obviously required more work, we had the best time. At least I did. I spent most of my college years engrossed in photography, layout, and design and have spent most of my years since engrossed in writing and communication, so this really was the perfect thing for my friend to ask me to do. I dove right in. That being said, since each website hosting platform is different, much of tonight was a learning curve–how to change font sizes and what not. But hey, I like learning and my friend bought dinner, so Hakuna Matata!

My friend and I worked on their site for–I don’t know–four hours, then I worked on it a few more when I got home. I guess I got hyper-focused on figuring out how to add pictures and link to their social media accounts and couldn’t let it go. (I’m no Elsa.) While I was with my friend I kept futzing around with text alignment–to the left, to the center, to the right. My friend said, “This is why you DON’T want someone who’s OBSESSIVE COMPULSIVE designing your website.” I said, “This is why you DO want someone who’s obsessive compulsive designing your site.” Along these lines, my therapist says there are times when my perfectionism serves me. Because it allows me to attend to ALL THE DETAILS when redecorating a room or redesigning a website or whatever. I just need to be able to turn my perfectionism off so I don’t use it against myself. (Like, my nipples aren’t perfect, and all that.)

JUST ENJOY YOUR NIPPLES, MARCUS.

Now, the fact that I stayed up until two tonight working on my friend’s site when 1) I was already tired and 2) there’s not a deadline–I guess–means I haven’t quite figured out how to turn my perfectionism off. At the same time, it may just mean that I got excited about something, and there’s nothing wrong with that. We creatives (that is, all of us) need to get enthused about new projects now and then. My friend and I tonight were brainstorming ideas and ended up laughing, laughing, laughing. This is huge. Not just having fun, but also bringing LIFE to yourself, to others, and to your work.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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In this moment, we are all okay.

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What More Could One Ask For? (Blog #190)

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Last night I slept for shit and dreamed about a giant wooden statue with a skin condition. I’m still sorting it all out, but the whole thing contributed to my never quite waking up today. When I eventually stumbled into the kitchen, the first thing I noticed was that one of the cats had knocked a drinking glass off the counter. The glass was shattered all over the floor. I thought, First vomit, now this. Of course, neither one of the cats fessed up, so I ended up blaming myself, since I’m the one who left the glass on the counter in the first place. But the vomit is still on them.

At least they’re cute.

This afternoon I worked on a short bio then submitted an essay I wrote last year to a popular website, asking them to consider publishing it. My friend Marla sent me a link earlier this year that said the site was looking for essays on a variety of personal topics, so I finally decided to “give it a whirl,” as my therapist is fond of saying. My armpits were sweating the entire time.

Later I went through my Facebook friends list and began individually inviting everyone to like my Marcus Coker, Writer page. (Click here for a link to the page and click “like” if you want to.) This is something I’ve been meaning to do since starting the blog six months ago, but honestly haven’t felt confident enough to do. Writing is such a vulnerable thing to share in the first place, and most the time it feels like asking someone to like or share my work is an imposition. That being said, everyone on Facebook shares their pages, and people are constantly asking me to play Candy Crush, so I finally convinced myself it wasn’t a big deal. More than that, I’m slowly getting to the point where I believe in what I’m doing here. I don’t pretend it’s for everyone, but I do believe it’s valuable.

Therefore, I’m sending invites, trusting that people are adults and can say yes or no. (Either way, I’m okay.)

Whenever I get to the point that I’m willing to do something like this, I tend to be a bit anal about it, meaning I opened my list of almost 2,000 friends with the intent of inviting each of them. Well, I guess Facebook has a limit on how many requests you can send out at once, and I ended up being temporarily blocked from sending out invitations. Oh well. Still, I’ve been thrilled, as friends immediately responded positively and have continued to do so all evening. In less than twelve hours, I’ve doubled my number of likes. I’m not sure what that means in the grand scheme of things or that any amount is ever “enough,” but the response itself is enough and reminds me that we all have people willing to support us even if we don’t realize it.

Also, I’m reminded that sometimes you have to be willing to be vulnerable and ask for support before someone can give it to you.

This evening I had dinner with my friends Aaron and Kate, their son, Griffin, and our friend Austin. Aaron and Austin are the ones teaching the improv class I’m attending. Also, when Aaron and Kate got married several years ago, I performed the ceremony. Anyway, after eating, we all piled up in Aaron and Kate’s Jeep and took Griffin to the 130th Annual St. Boniface Lawn Social, which is a fundraiser for a local Catholic school. Considering that I’m a total stranger to two-year-old Griffin, I’d say it’s pretty good that he only cried once when I tried interacting with him. I mean, it took a solid two years for my own nephew to stop running away from me. Cats usually throw up or knock shit over.

What can I say? It’s a gift.

I really think the Catholics have fundraising figured out, since they sell beer at their events. The genius part is that rather than selling alcohol for cash, they sell it for tickets, so it feels as if you’re playing a game at Chuck-E-Cheese. Plus, I think we can all agree that anytime you can give up six tickets in exchange for getting turnt, everyone is a winner. (Turnt is the hip term for being highly excited, tipsy, or drunk, Mom.) Anyway, what’s even smarter than selling alcohol at a fundraiser is selling alcohol at a fundraiser then directing people to a silent auction. Suffice it to say, I think Aaron, Kate, Austin, and I are all hoping to NOT win all the items we bid on.

Here’s a picture of Kate and me with some handmade Ninja Turtle beanies. Aren’t they–well–cowabunga? We tried to get Aaron and Austin to try on the purple and red ones, but Aaron said he didn’t want to get in trouble and that people were staring at us. I said, “I don’t think you can sell adults ‘beergaritas’ and reasonably expect them to act responsibly in a room full of toys.”

After the lawn social we all went back to Aaron and Kate’s, and Aaron showed me his shoe collection. Since their wedding, I’ve known that Aaron collects shoes and has several hundred pairs. It’s sort of his thing, and I even wrote a poem about it for their wedding ceremony. (Click here to read “I Have 300 Pairs of Shoes.”) Anyway, seeing the shoes in person was indescribable. I said, “Mariah Carey would be jealous.” There were boxes piled everywhere, and Aaron said he was pretty OCD and knew which shoes were in what box. Personally, I think Aaron should rent his shoes out, especially since our feet are the same size and I know he can’t wear every pair every day.

We spent the rest of the evening visiting, petting Aaron and Kate’s three dogs, and watching Griffin dance to his favorite song, Good Morning, Baltimore. Currently, it’s three in the morning, and I’m wrung out and don’t know how parents do it. That being said, tonight was one of the best evenings I’ve had in a long time, a chance to get away from the cats and this laptop, reconnect with friends, and simply live, not just online but in person. Really, what more could one ask for?

A few pairs of shoes, maybe.

[Lastly, Aaron’s birthday is tomorrow, so Happy Birthday, Aaron. You’re truly one of the most talented, creative, and fun people I know. I wish you all the best and loved kicking off your day with you and your family.]

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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Some things simply take time and often more than one trip to the hardware store.

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everything right where it belongs (blog #41)

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This afternoon I met my roommates (my parents), my aunt, and a family friend at a cafeteria for lunch—like a buffet line, green Jell-O, all-you-can-eat-dessert-section cafeteria. Personally, I think places like this are heaven, but not when you’re on a diet. Somehow I was able to stick to salad and baked chicken, but kept drooling over the tacos, macaroni and cheese, and soft-serve ice cream. It felt like having a spectator pass at an orgy. Like, I wasn’t completely satisfied.

After lunch, I’d intended to go to my office (the public library), but realized that I’d left my laptop at home. Well, when you’re retired (unemployed), you don’t have anything else to do, so I drove home, got my laptop, then drove all the way back to the library.

Recently I discovered how to sync my laptop files to an online account. I realize I’m a little late to that party, but I can’t tell you how good it feels to have everything backed up, especially considering the fact that I lost all the files from my other computer. It feels good to know that something is secure. So today I copied the files from my recent CT scan to my online account, and I kept looking at the file structure, satisfied that everything was both “safe” and “right where it belonged.”

Even now, I keep going back and looking at the files. Yep, they’re still there—organized—exactly where I left them.

It just makes my little heart sing.

A couple of weeks ago I took a metal shelf from my parents’ garage, cleaned it off, and put my collection of Broadway show magnets on it. The project took about an hour because I arranged the magnets first by the city in which I saw the shows and second in the order I saw them. I realize NO ONE ELSE GIVES A SHIT or would even notice, but every time I look at it, it makes me happy and reminds me of a line from a poem I memorized in high school: “God’s in his heaven, all’s right with the world.”

I think my therapist has only used the term Obsessive Compulsive Disorder with me a couple of times in three years, and I think she said, “A little OCD” or “A touch of OCD.” (You think?) But it’s definitely a label that comes to my mind whenever I’m arranging my computer files or magnet collection. Hell, I should probably put it on my business cards:

Marcus Coker, OCD
(Let’s alphabetize!)

My psychologist friend Craig told me the story of a lady he knew who HAD to wash her dishes five times by hand before they could go in the dishwasher. She was afraid her family would get sick from germs. No one ever got sick, so that reinforced her habit. He also told me about a woman who could never see her son because she obsessively thought about killing him. (Whoa.) So Craig said OCD can get really bad; it can seriously alter your life.

Once I read a slightly angry blog that said people like the dish-washing lady and the might-kill-her-own-son lady who have clinically-diagnosed OCD don’t particularly appreciate people like me using the term. Like, YOU don’t have real OCD, I do. You’re just tidy.

I mean, I can appreciate that. And I am tidy. But I guess OCD is a bit like a scale, and Craig says that a little OCD can be functional, so I’m not quite ready to give up the label.

We can hang on and put everything safely in its place, and then at some point, we’re forced to let go.

This evening I went for a two-hour walk. I ended up on Mount Vista, an area of town that was hit by a tornado in 1996. It’s really weird walking in that part of town because I used to ride my bike there, and I have all these memories of the houses and landmarks I’ve seen hundreds of times. Well, there’s this one house on my Mount Vista route that stands out because my sister and I volunteered to clean there after the tornado. And I really don’t remember much about it, but I do recall standing in the kitchen in a puddle of water and going through a cabinet, and there were dozens and DOZENS of Cool Whip containers stacked neatly inside each other, right where they belonged, tidy except for the fact that the house around them was completely ruined.

I’ve thought about those Cool Whip containers a lot over the years. My guess is that the person they belonged to was a little OCD like I am. And I think it’s interesting how we can hang on and put everything safely in its place, and then at some point, we’re forced to let go. A tornado comes into your life, and everything is out of place, and safe no longer exists, if it ever did.

Even though I recently voluntarily let go of a LOT of stuff, I still fight the tendency to start hanging on again, whether it’s with computer files, magnets, whatever. To be clear, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with collecting, and I certainly don’t think there’s anything wrong with putting everything in its place, right where it belongs. I imagine I’ll always be tidy. But whenever I start hanging on and organizing, there’s part of me that feels like I’m reaching for control, as if I’ll somehow be able to avoid a disaster if everything is—in order.

But life doesn’t work that way. Sometimes it’s chaotic and sometimes it’s messy. So going forward, I don’t want to kid myself into believing that having everything just so makes me safe and secure. It doesn’t. Everything, after all, passes way, and it’s not like anything temporary completely satisfies. And that’s more than okay. I don’t need all my things lined up in order for my heart to sing. The heart sings for its own reasons—it doesn’t need a thing.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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In other words, there's always SOMETHING else to improve or work on. Therefore, striving for perfection is not only frustrating, it's also technically impossible.

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