Slipping.

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I have been doing extremely well. I haven't missed an appointment, without intention and usually calling in, for months? Many months? I think I have all of my bills tended. There might be one out there I need to wrangle, but... Most of them are exactly on track, up to date, and on time. My lawn has been tended and is being maintained. Laundry is caught up and kept up. Dishes... shut up. Most of my life, down to food and medicine is working like clockwork. But... I feel that sliding, slipping, loss of traction, confusion, and uncertainty about direction creeping in. That scares me as much as serious pain. More so, in a way, in that I often can't feel pain. With Pain, it's mostly the thought that counts.

I have appointments coming up. But, I've lost track. I need to call Monday and check on those. I have an appointment for Sam and Sassy coming up. I know when but I need to call and rearrange the Sassy part of it, putting that off until August or September, with money being just a wee worrying, birth-month bills coming up, and the visit from my mother to expense. There are other things, but... those are the immediate worries. And they have been on my mind for a bit, only coming to a head on... a Sunday? What can I do on a Sunday? I can only hope to remember on Monday. But I have known, I have just not been... tending my fears, worries, concerns. Have I been unable... or unwilling... or... what?

But more, it's a general feeling of loss of... control... will... strength or actionability of will? When I left my foster home, I did so for a number of reasons. One of the most potent was this same feeling. I had taken my grades from a 2.0ish in junior high to a 3.57 as a junior in high school (when grades actually, you know, were grades). I just missed AP classes, though I think it was as political and social as it was grades, or more. Between snobbishness and the liberal mindset of teachers even back then (always?), I didn't make the cut. While no longer liberal by that time, I was morphing between libertarian (before it was named) and conservative. I was certainly not a fit. I played football, basketball, and track, and successfully for my level (if not outstanding in anything). I was involved with advanced projects at school, as well, in spite of not being AP. But... it was slipping. I feared disappointing my foster parents more than I feared leaving. How was I to know my foster father would have a final heart attack a few months later. Life is too much sometimes. In any case, I ran and hid, I had... nothing with which to hold onto my successes. I had no words to express my horror, or even tell them what was happening.

I have had good times before, times of health, and reasoning, and being on schedule, as an adult. They have all slipped. No amount of grip or hold or push or pull could keep control. I think it is different this time. Maybe. At least I do believe I have far more tools available at this time, and experience. Whatever strength I lacked, whatever insights I didn't have, and certainly the experience of going through this, I may have more of those things this time. But more, I think what was holding me down, randomly, invisibly, mechanically... my heart... is being treated. But is it enough? Is anything enough against what is pulling me down? Am I still very crippled? Is the heart all of it? Oh I hate this feeling, this uncertainty. I will merely, to be honest, focus on my goals, try no harder or more lightly, and keep busy with those things I should, want, and need to do. Much like driving over a patch of ice, the best thing to do is to keep your wheels as they were (or maybe try to straighten them gingerly), don't accelerate or break, but don't freeze, yourself, as you may actually need to do the seemingly unwise in order to actually maintain control or do the right thing and steer into a swerve, keep the vehicle on the road, keep the wheels down. Yes, I am sweating. Literally when I realize how far I have climbed in the elevation of success, how steep the descent, how icy the road I travel.

Bah. I will make it. If not I will make it back up and climb higher. I am sure of it. It would just hurt on the way down. My ego, too, is fragile for all the armor and weapons I wear and maintain. Maybe that is WHY I carry such terrible things? :p A shower, grooming, and a call to see if my friend is around, and then a drive to pick up a bike and maybe check on a friend. Later.