light progress 2
methinks i have already written umpteen books covering my light phobia. alas, the art of writing is in the rewrite and attempts to read through that disorganized verbal vomit still trigger more trauma flashbacks than i care to work through this week. methinks i would need to have a stronger therapy support network cued and standing by before i begin. i wonder how many psych pros stephen king has on his staff. just wondering as i respect the man's privacy.
anyhooo.......... continuing on with my experiments of bringing journal topics together. . .
============begin copy===========
arfie10/04/2012
Back from 5 weeks in the field and away from the internet. I see allot of new faces here.
Herstorically, I have always made my base camps as far as possible from artificial lights. Of course that has been increasingly difficult to do.
After last year's light horrors, I have been working to build immunities against the light phobia. During this field tour I deliberately set my camps within view of at least one country glare. These days country folks are out shining the big cities, so it was a "natural" progression.
I am back to my suburban base for a week now and thinking I have, indeed, progressed with the light phobia. The early dawn inventories of the coming day's work have been pain free. The neighboring lights have been reduced to the level of traffic noise and AC compressors.
Either that or the phobia is gathering forces for another attack...
Prayers welcome.
Herstorically, I have always made my base camps as far as possible from artificial lights. Of course that has been increasingly difficult to do.
After last year's light horrors, I have been working to build immunities against the light phobia. During this field tour I deliberately set my camps within view of at least one country glare. These days country folks are out shining the big cities, so it was a "natural" progression.
I am back to my suburban base for a week now and thinking I have, indeed, progressed with the light phobia. The early dawn inventories of the coming day's work have been pain free. The neighboring lights have been reduced to the level of traffic noise and AC compressors.
Either that or the phobia is gathering forces for another attack...
Prayers welcome.
=========end copy=========
a new wave of lights has been errupting in the farm compound. my light phobia has been escalating with every new eye-grabbing twinkle. our farm assistant (fa) is a light lover and quite creative her selection and placement of lights. she has suggested the brighter security lighting. i donae believe i bothered to tell her i had removed the very lighting she was suggesting. i donae remember well, but methinks i responded with my complete sentence, "no." subject over. door slammed.
when fa (alone) first moved into a single room of the old farm house around end of august, 2020, the arrangement was temporary housing in exchange for cleaning out the mess we left behind when we moved from there to here in december, 2019. the farm restoration had been put on hold during the domestic shit storms and covidic delays which created our poorly defined family, but plans were still in place to complete the farm restoration. 3 years later, the restoration project is still on covidic delay, complicated by the fact that fa has come to be an essential player in the farm operations. we don't want to lose her, or her family, but the old farm house needs to be empty in order to complete the level of restoration we are planning. we value her place in this operation enough that it feels appropriate to build a new house outside the farm compound. should she move on to another job, i see us filling her position with a new player. the house is part of the pay package. alas, contractors are still over-worked, under-staffed and working with unpredictable supply lines. it is not a good time to begin a project of this magnitude.
3 years with no end in sight is a long time to call a place home without leaving your own mark. the new wave of lights is only one of the domestic touches that stake out the homey touches and we are mostly glad for the feeling that she is here to stay. my regrets are that she is living in sub-standard housing which is located in the middle of my work space.
sorting. . .
stepping small and praying big. . .
Replies
perhaps the meanest of the light phobia symptoms are my reactions to light/dark metaphors. when i am stable and accepting, it is no big to substitute synonyms for the cliched metaphors to replace the images of physical hands reaching for physical light switches. i can hear what the speaker means in place of what they say. no, those physical light stains on the night horizon are not generated by packs of mystics creating peace on earth on their roads to heaven. just a collection of humans trembling in fear of both literal and metaphorical darkness. healing hopes for all. no exceptions.
in my therapy support network, i have resumed the therapy tool of dumping out of threads/convos at the first flash of literal eye aches from the light/dark metaphors. there is no shortage of light disciples who can support the metaphors with cultural ease.
i do wonder if light/dark metaphors have any spiritual content for light lovers the content seems even more shallow than the duality of good/bad, etc. just judge ^it^ and be done with ^it^. no need for clarity on what ^it^ is. for sure, if there is any spiritual content, the context varies so widely that ^it^ is far from standardized, even within a single congregation. within the anonymous congregations shouting into the digital void, the meanings are incomprehensibly varied. one soul's light is another soul's dark but as long as they keep ^it^ vague, they all have the power of electrical switches in common.