I was very happy with how helpful the programming heads, and the head organisers, and Emilia the work force executive, were, and that made everything a little easier (sometimes more than a little!). There were other little glitches, but I could not praise their encouragement and friendliness enough. And Heli's choreography and production deserve lots of praise: she had a lovely, unique vision of something that was new in these parts, and she had the energy and the patience to make it happen, and the end result was very much worth it, with its own personal style and sensual magic. Heli was heartbreakingly beautiful - lyrical, feminine, radiant - and Spider was strikingly, overwhelmingly charismatic (not that we ever expected her to be anything else, but she rose to all parts of the challenge fantastically, and was worth every single word of the praise we gave her - hopefully strongly and repeatedly enough that she believed it). And the other Heli, my wondrous little sister of the soul, was - once again - such a true pro at the head of the corps de ballet, after such a short practice, that it was another grateful delight. And I owe a world of thanks to the people who wore my gowns in the Rotan vuosi and Yövartio costume shows, and another world and possibly a couple of moons to the people who helped me into my Kätketyt kasvot costume after the dance performance (when I had made the mistake of not lacing the back half-shut beforehand, and it turned out that the lacing cord was too thick). And to Terhi, who helped me into my dance costume, and then helped me back into it for the pictures, and helped me pack everything up and carry it down - and to Gini and Mirjam for saving my makeup near-catastrophe.

So many people were so helpful and supportive and patient that it more than makes up for any misunderstandings with others. None of my post-low was due to anyone but myself and my own miscalculation in the amount of work I promised to do. Considering that I really do have the experience not to make any more mistakes of such a magnitude, I have only myself to blame.

And good heavens, the level of costuming at our larps is high! Incredibly so, I should say. Since game budgets are still so small, it's the costumes that really create the atmosphere, and at their best - boy do they create atmosphere!

There's some other stuff, but of that, later. It's not a big thing, anyway.

(Oh well) Even so, about that other, not even big, stuff... Mostly it was just social embarrassment, and I hate social embarrassment - even when it's private, and not huge, and probably just misunderstandings because of insecurity. Anyway, in essence: the champagne Heli so graciously provided us later in the evening was not enough to get me drunk as such, but it did have the effect on me that it loosened my tongue. These days, I'm very good at not saying anything interpersonal (to friends or enemies, either) without considering it very, very carefully, but yesterday night my tongue ran faster than me. So I ended up saying some stuff to some people I definitely would not have said otherwise.

Don't get me wrong: I meant every word I said that night, and now, sober, I still stand behind them. They were said in complete honesty, the good, the bad and the moderate and sensible as well. It's just that as things go, I had No Right to say some of the stuff at all, so I had a huge moral hangover. Furthermore, I was surprised and hugely flattered at what the other person said, but now, afterwards, when we're both sober, I have a hard time believing they meant it. They were probably just trying to be nice. I mean, this is me we're talking about. I'm not attractive.

And so, today, I was embarrassed about my own forwardness, and worried that the other person was embarrassed about saying stuff they didn't mean in their attempt to be kind to me. And so I avoided them, and avoided talking about the subject. Which is cowardly, really.

Too tired. Can't form letters. Will go to sleep now. More later.

This other person is in the position of strength now. I hope they realise it.

09 Aug 07: Slightly Less Rush, No Less Pain

Some of the worst panic lessened a little today: some of the preparatory stuff is done; and my lecture was moved to Sunday at 15-16. Due to other things, I'm feeling even lower about myself: everyone else is beautiful, attractive and knows what to say to old friends - I don't, I just get tongue-tied and scared.

At least I have new dancing shoes, and that's always a nice feeling, as if new shoes had extra lift packed into them that then slowly rubs away. And my dancing skirt is done, though lots of other things that needed repair are still in pieces.

Something else that happened today made me consider my blind spots, the ones that I don't consider connected to the depression, just to my nature. I have a really, really hard time dealing with two things: deceiving others by abusing their compassion; and fairness. They drive me besides myself and into fields of rage that I find awfully strange. The first, I suppose, is self-evident, but the second means many things. It means, for example, that one does not change face to suit this person and that - and even more so, to suit one's need of this person and less need of that person. It means not stealing other people's efforts and claiming them for one's own, either for one's own glory or one's own use (without appropriate thanks and/or compensation). No, not even if one thinks one was involved with some other parts of the effort (that one thinks were more important, maybe). And it also means not stealing other people's spotlight: if someone has come up with something wonderful and interesting, one lets that person have all the glory of the creating or the finding. It's their moment: it's impolite to try and lessen it.

I suppose these seem like basic politeness to others, and so they are, of course. I don't know why the push such a honking big button in me, but they do. Fairness is important.

08 Aug 07: ...Bloody Never!

I went back and glanced through my feelings at this time last year. Should not have. I was in a better shape; I was not nearly as half-done with everything, and not nearly as busy. Am I'm not even responsible for anything this year!!

How come I'm worse now?? It's not fair, dammit. Not fair, hear??

Fuck it, why didn't I just skip everything and run to Visby? I don't want to be yet another fat dance diva, like almost every other year (but then, I could always excuse myself because I was choreographer and producer, and that was more important than my own dancing). I lack discipline, and with that, practically everything. And I don't even want to start on my presentation on the gradu, because none of it is done. And I have too much sewing to do, just to buck up my black tulle skirt and to repair the costumes I promised for the costume show.

Next year, could I finally say no?

But if I had discipline, I wouldn't need to say no. I could do all this.

Next year, could I finally be somewhere else? Like Paris? Or South America?

Fat chance.

(Night)

Elokuu:
minähän sanoin

veitsen viilto tässä vieraan ylellisessä sametissa:
talvihovi on käynyt laittamassa omenat tuoksumaan

älkää väittäkö etteivät omenat ole niiden:
minä näin ne, olen nähnyt ne joka yö
ennen turvallisten aukeiden laitamilla

joiden keskihorisonteista minä hupsu luulin nähneeni
uusia portteja
minua varten
verhoitta jätettyjä, niin kuin postikortit jostain
jonne itsellä ei ole varaa matkustaa:

elokuu se vain leviää ja ajelehtii ja jättää kuplia

(...ja kuka yleensä voi kestää kivutta näiden öiden
vierasta pehmeyttä? kun kuu katsoo pois,
sileiden hiusten kypärä
ja posken ja kulman kaari hienompi,
kirkkaampi kuin kenenkään kateus voi nielaista

miten voi kestää sen, ettei ole yksi
noista kirkkaista joita tämä elokuu katsoo kasvoihin?

kun seuraa sivusta tuota kuun posken kaarta
ja tietää lopullisesti ettei ole tarinoissa sisällä:
miten sen voi kestää?)

(It is never any easier to admit to character weakness, but I'll try, in the name of that elusive honesty. Today, I had to pass on something absolutely marvellous and thrilling, because I knew I would not be as suitable for it as some other people I could reasonably reach. And... it hurts. Hard and sharp and bitter, and like nettle rash or a cramping muscle, it just won't stop until one forgets it - and not well even then - and since it hurts, forgetting is not that easy.) (I wish I didn't mind. Didn't I just swear in a Potter sorting test that I'd rather go to Azkaban than be thought of as superficial? I should not mind. But it hurts; it hurts so.)

05 Aug 07: ...Never Gets Easier

These have been... difficult days. I should have expected it, after baring the unexpected sores in the old innards again. I always crash afterwards, just wanting someone to hold me and shush me and say it's okay, even though nothing's really wrong, quite on the contrary. It's just that... knowing - and even when the knowing's improved - that one is not as bad and worthless and broken as the sores would try to claim is not enough. One still needs to hear it from someone else.

And so, yesterday: migraine. The pain was moderate this time - no worse than ordinary headache - but the nausea made moving impossible, as usual, and so I had to miss on a potentially very interesting LARP experience. There's not much one can do about nausea, unfortunately. By late evening, I had recovered enough to drop in at a friends' (four of them) birthday party, like I'd planned to do after the larp, anyway. But even those couple of hours of being social at the party's wind-down were a little too much, because today I was no good for anything. Couldn't get up, couldn't communicate, couldn't exercise (which, by now, is really really not good for any plans). I had some really nice plans for today, but I just couldn't face the world at all.

I hope tomorrow will be back to normal. I don't know. I have so much to do I may just despair and give up on them totally and run off to Visby at the last second. Oh, how I'd love to be able to do that!

But I suppose I'll still keep trying to manage. Tomorrow. We'll see.

03 Aug 07: Blunt Exposure

Avoided writing about this for a night and a day. Because these psychological revelations were supposed to be done already. Because I don't want to write about this stuff anymore. Because it seems like making excuses, always. Because now that I'm trying to act as a functional human being, it no longer feels irrelevant what others think of me in general, and who might read this in particular. Because this is deep and raw and so feels almost indecent. I guess it always did, but then I just didn't care. Now - now the return to such reckless honesty feels terribly hard. But as long as the name of this diary stands, it still is a description of a recovery, and therefore all stages of said recovery matter.

See, I found one more. One more sudden, frightening piece of understanding - perhaps small to others, perhaps even self-evident, but it was not so to me. And, like all the other pieces when they came, almost impossible to write about, no matter how much reason says there's nothing to be ashamed of; nothing to fear. Therefore: very probably true.

After visiting P&P&H yesterday afternoon, I dropped by at Lissu's place, and we somehow wound up talking about my continued impatience with how slowly I improve in anything, even now (weight, studies, love life, anything). And she said, like so many times before, that I was so harsh on myself, so unforgiving - more unforgiving than anyone. I don't think I ask too much of myself - and said so, again, like so many times before - but it certainly is true that, ultimately, I expect to fail anyway. In any attempt that matters, big or small. That the disappointment is a foregone conclusion. And somehow, through something she said, I realised why this is so.

Not because our parents' demands for us were impossibly hard (though hard they were - the unspoken ones). Not only because I got the impression that I was not as worthy as my brother. Not only because I was shy and oversensitive and therefore naturally took badly to criticism. Not only because my mother herself was shy and awkward and overreacted to my perceived steps out of the well-trodden path (or I perceived the reactions as overly big). Not only because our parents both, at certain times, threatened to leave. All of these are factors, and we all, or most, have some of these, or other such, factors to hinder us... but even after winding my way through the understanding of all these, I've been slightly better, but the deep sense of never being enough was still there. Why?

Because there was an even deeper and more insidious sense of disappointment that I didn't even know to face, because reasonably, one simply could not come to think of it. But these things are not about reason. They are about basic need and self - unformed, undifferentiated self. What happened was that as the oversensitive child that I was, I absorbed my parents' disappointment in each other and subconsciously took it upon myself. And particularly my father's deep, surely painful, unspoken but strongly projected, disappointment in my mother - with whom, as we may remember, I was in a very deep emotional symbiosis; father always being the distant one whose approval or disapproval was the thing that mattered. Because of that mutual disappointment, the five-year-old me learned that anything she could ever do would not be enough; would always be a disappointment.

And it was not even about me at all.

Not about me at all. Never was, so is not, will not be. I am not fated for disappointment. It was not about me.

And again, I am not blaming my parents. They certainly did their best: they loved us, unquestionably, they never directed such disappointment at us, and they tried their best not to even show any; tried their best to work through. And did get through the hardest times, and many things were easier after that. But I was four, five, during those hardest times, and it is then that I absorbed the disappointment, taking it on myself like children do, not knowing I did and so not knowing it wasn't even about me at all.

Not about me at all.

...I really hope there will be no more of this stuff, because this was hard. And embarrassing. But I guess one still owes this for the story of the depression.