overflowing toilets.

something that's really annoying about life is that toilets sometimes overflow.

something that's really really annoying about life is that toilets sometimes overflow in the middle of the night, soaking the carpet all way from the bathroom into the surrounding bedrooms. it's really nice to step into first thing in the morning.

so i called maintenance more times than i care to remember and thankfully, by the time i returned from class the carpet had been shampooed and there was a big green fan making loud noises and blowing bits of fabric about my floor, indicating that it will eventually make the carpet dry.

to say that i'm thankful that maintenance took care of the situation would be the understatement of the century. However, it would also be an understatement to say that my carpet is still just a little bit damp.

i'm not trying to be a complainer, but i can't say i'm incredibly fond of having to stand on my tiptoes to walk across my room and then dry my feet whenever i get where i'm going. and as of last night, the pile of wet towels and bathmats that the overflow had taken by storm were still festering in the bathroom corner where maintenance had left them earlier in the afternoon.

i came in late from the library, talking on the phone to my mother who had foolishly hyped herself up on coffee a couple of hours before and was unable to sleep. i intentionally left my boots on until i'd plopped onto my bed so my feet would stay safe and dry.

by the time i hung up with my mom, my eyelids were heavy and burning. i needed to venture across the marshlands and into the bathroom to get ready for bed, but putting my shoes on and half-squishing my way to the bathroom and then not feeling like i could go to bed until i carried the filthy, wet towels to the washer just wasn't something i was up for, and so i stayed in the safety of my island-bed and fell asleep in my clothes and my mascara.

i woke up to the early winter sun peeping through my window. i smiled because i love it when that happens. i felt surprisingly rested, considering i'd fallen asleep in my clothes. this was probably due to the 30 extra minutes of sleep i'd gotten because i'd failed to set an alarm.

usually i take my mornings as they come- sitting, listening to music, reading things on the internet, eating my breakfast, drinking my coffee, and not getting myself together for the day until i feel completely satisfied with my moments of waking stillness .

but being that i was short on time this morning, i woke and immeadiately began a mental list of things i needed to accomplish in the 45 minutes to follow. a jolt of hurried energy started to pull me from my bed until i remembered that the floor was wet, and that the bathroom was filled with soaked matts and towels, and that i was going to have to walk through all of it and take off my mascara from the night before and move the towels to the washer and suddenly it just didn't seem worth it. the prospect of sitting in my bed with my computer for the rest of the day grew increasingly attractive.

i started to imagine ways that i could avoid the wet carpet and the soaked towels and my bathroom floor that needed to be scrubbed and still make it to class in a half-hygenic manner. but i was a prisoner in my own bed, and the only way i was going to get anywhere i needed to go was to scrunch my nose and place my toes on the cold, wet floor and walk across it and move the mildewing towels that were blocking the shower and just accept that it was all really gross and unpleasant but that i had no choice other than to do it.

i knew that no matter how long i waited, the dirty tasks would always lie between me and the rest of my life and that as long as that was the truth, i may as well just get them over sooner rather than later.

my recovery was the same way. I knew that it was going to be excruciatingly unpleasant. (much more so than moving wet towels or walking on overflowed toilet water) but i also knew that the excruciation of gaining weight and eating a meal plan and buying new clothes and looking "healthy" was standing directly between me and my life and that it would always be standing there until i chose to bear the pain and walk through it.

the only thing that putting off something like recovery will ever change is how much of your life you're wasting. i've wasted a lot of time sitting, paralyzed by my unwillingness to step into the difficulty of relinquishing my eating disorder. but the time that i haven't wasted- the time on the other side of the pain- stepping out the door and letting the endless blue sky and the sun fill my field of vision instead of just a sliver through my bedroom window- that time has been more beautiful than i know how to say.

and if i were still sitting with dry feet and hands in safety of the middle of my bed, i might be clean and and i might not be grossed out, but the extent of what i would have experienced in my supposed place of safety would reach no farther than the dimensions of a double bed. in other words, i would be alone and empty.

recovery {from anything} will always be between you and your day {and the rest of your life} and recovery {from anything} will always be hard.

why not get it over with and start living?

Love,

EA