Author Archives: joe bielawa

W. T. F.

There is a certain cyclical looping to my life. It used to be more drastic dramatic then it is now…whether age or a drug free existence has mellowed it, who knows. I still get bitchy-itchy feisty during certain months.

Since my late teens, late May was always been a time of flight for me, with September coming in second as a month of shift.

Moving, running, cutting ties, changing scenery. Usually across country or across town, mostly fueled by my abandonment issue: me fleeing because of a broken relationship/situation from heartache or me giving the ole “FUCK YOU” to an employment situation or friendship. After a time the geographical shifts stopped, but the minor change of jobs or housing always occurred in May.

As I maintain clean time and sobriety, and developed a “normal” routine…certain upheavals of my younger days have subsided. That is not to say that I don’t still get severely geeked out at various times of the year. Maybe it’s my quarterly period.

Oddly, at other times of the year when the gibbous moon is waxing I am in turmoil, yet in May the approaching full moon brings me peace.

This has been a rough one, this May 2013.

Heap it onto an already depressive sort of mood and the bottom just seems to fall out.

I have been neglecting the gym and not getting my usual endorphin surge. So that may be the key…or a reason to my angst. I know exercise is my antidepressant. So I have to return. I have been doing weekly workouts, but not the every other day intensity that I had been doing for the last few years.

There are situations in life and on the horizon that need to be dealt with, yet I know I must ride through this rough right now and new days will dawn and all this turmoil will be in the past.

I dreamt of him again last night. Not in anger, sadness or conflict…but like it was years ago when the innocence of our love had yet to be spoken. His face was bright with a smile as I looked at him. There was laughter, warmth and happiness. We were as one as we were then. It was bliss. I felt connected to him again.

I woke up to reality and the yearning. I miss him. I want to share these things again. With him. Yet I know that will never be.

…may blow around you. But that will always be so.”

Winds of change are in the air again or for always? It used to be for me that May was always a time of tremendous change… major geographic changes, friendships dissolving, employment extinguished.

Seems I have become too comfortable with my status quo.  It’s not really that the status is unacceptable, it just seems I have become complacent. Accepting of the mundane when I know I am capable of greater heights. And so, facing my fear and insecurity head on, it’s time to shake things up…toss it all in air…see where it all lands. 

“But now’s the time to look and look again at what you see,
Is that the way it ought to stay?”

ya, ok. I got the Led in my head.

“Then as it was, then again it shall be. And although their course may change sometimes…rivers always reach the sea.”

TRAIN IN VAIN ~ Strummer/Jones

Say you stand by your man 

Tell me something I don’t understand 
You said you love me and that’s a fact 
Then you left me, said you felt trapped 

Well some things you can explain away 
But my heartache’s in me till this day 

Did you stand by me 
No, not at all 
Did you stand by me 
No way 

All the times 
When we were close 
I’ll remember these things the most 
I see all my dreams come tumbling down 
I won’t be happy without you around 

So all alone I keep the wolves at bay 
There is only one thing that I can say 

Did you stand by me 
No, not at all 
Did you stand by me 
No way 

You must explain why this must be 

Did you lie when you spoke to me 

Did you stand by me 
No, not at all 

Now I got a job 
But it don’t pay 
I need new clothes 
I need somewhere to stay 
But without all these things I can do 
But without your love I won’t make it through 

But you don’t understand my point of view 
I suppose there’s nothing I can do 

Did you stand by me 
No, not at all 
Did you stand by me 
No way 

You must explain why this must be 
Did you lie when you spoke to me? 

Did you stand by me 
Did you stand by me 
No, not at all 
Did you stand by me 
No way 

And the play list continues.  Music as therapy. Always has been. Probably always will

HOW DO I LET GO — Dennis Ferrer

I will heed the call, when I’m ready I’ll give my all

Disturbia ~

What’s wrong with me?
Why do I feel like this?
I’m going crazy now.

Out my life, out my head
Don’t wanna think about it
Feels like I’m going insane
Yeah

It’s a thief in the night
To come and grab you
It can creep up inside you
And consume you
A disease of the mind
It can control you
It’s too close for comfort

I have heard “Enjoy the moment you’re in…it will be over shortly”   Um, ya, ok.  Peculiar how joyous moments seem to fade fleetingly while  moments of anguish toil for days (years?)

Some sayings in recovery just piss me off, probably because they ring so true.

Peeling the layers of onion…

My delusional, dsyfucntional thinking. I have always said my drinking and drugging weren’t the issues. They were the by products of my ill thinking resulting in consequences.

Life.

Two days after celebrating my ninth year free of narcotics and my 50th birthday the next day, I  faced  a truth I have known for a while, but have just not been dealing with or admitting too. Such is denial.

It really wasn’t an AHA! moment. It is all wrapped around and rooted in my core issue.

Like those first days of making the decision to stop using drugs, I am uncomfortable, overwhelmed,  feel awkward. I am depressed, sad, angry, humiliated, feel defeated…but then at the same time I am feeling rushes of excitement  as new energy begin to fill the dark recess with a new light and thought process.

I guess in a way this will be easy…HA!  ya, ok. I have been through all of this before, just not dealing with this particular issue. There will be times when I feel like I want to go back and hold on to this old thinking…but I have to keep focused that no matter how difficult the pain of change may seem it’s far better than the pain of staying in this dysfunctional mind set.

Maybe in six months after I get past all this discomfort, I will elaborate more about this particular issue.

Until then I’ll just keep peeling at the layers of this onion.

Yesterday was my 50th Birthday. And it feels GREAT! Still seems kind of freaky in a way…50 years old. I don’t feel it…but what is 50 “supposed to”  feel like. Also odd: I almost extinguished my life in the middle of my 34th year when the whirlwind of my life in active addiction just seemed too much… right before I made the decision to try rehab because nothing else seemed to work and suicide seemed like the best option.

Looking back:

At 20, I was high on weed, hash, hallucinations and Jack Daniels. Uncomfortable with myself and didn’t even know why, let alone who I was. Surrounded only by people who got high and I thought would be my friends for life.

At 30,  just a drunk with a extreme fondness for Manhattans or beer with Jager chasers. Surrounded by friends who were barflies like myself and would have had for life if they had not meet their end.

At 40, strung out on crystal meth, weed and cigarettes; wishing I was the Hindu god Shiv with multiple arms and hands, so I could keep a steady flow of inhalants at my mouth. I was in complete isolation and my only “friend” was the meth purveyor.

Of course the common thread through those decades was my dysfunctional thinking fueled by my fear.

Now at 50, and nine years of clean time under my belt, I have a better insight into self and who I am. I am surrounded by a wide range of friends, from those who are rooted in recovery, to “normies” (people who drink, but aren’t ruled by it) to people still struggling with use. But we share honest friendship. I don’t hold an expectation that any of these people will be in my life for long, but some are showing up in my life with more frequence than anyone has in my past.

Obsessions, ya I still have a few..some I  am working to let go of, others I still let rule, like sushi/sashimi…  I lose myself at a sushi bar.

So maybe it is getting older or maintaining clean time, whatever it is, I am finding my self more at peace, and embrace who I am and where I am at. For all those years of self-induced turmoil, I find myself in a very good spot.

Nine years ago tonight I quit using crystal methamphetamine. Sometimes I feel like I wasted nine good years. HAHA. No, not really

I was at the Rollerdome skating tonight as the clock turned 8:34 pm, the exact minute I put the pipe down nine years ago, and the surge of energy that came over me was intense. Really, thou, all day long I had a sly smirk on me face and was kind of giddy. When I think back to the days of my use and the anxiety, fear, uncertainly, emptiness, loneliness that use to occupy my mind was such utter desperation…the very force that kept me using to try and mask all I felt. Now being clean and sober, none of those destructive thought processes dwell on my mind. Oh, sure they may cross it occasionally. But I am not consumed by them any longer. More importantly, I am able to feel my emotions as they arise, not chemical induced delusions.

The last 12 months have been incredible for me. All areas of my life continue to improve, some areas still need vast improvement..but it’s a forward motion.

For me, the reconnection to and the re-emergance of my art and my talent brings me the greatest joy. I have done more photography in the last 12 months than I have in the last 12 years.

I have reconnected to some old friends, made some new ones and some distance is occurring with others. All I am at peace with.

“More will be revealed…”

This morning, early, I was awoken by the voice of my dead friend, saying very clearly, in his  distinct tone and accent: “JOEY!” It startled me so that I sat right up and said “Freddie?” It wasn’t a dream..I can tell those. It was, without any doubt, his voice.

I can’t say these sort of things happen regularly or even occasionally. But they do happen with frequence.

I just can’t always tell who they are. More than I few times I have been brought firmly out of sleep by someone declaring my name.

And then there is the bed thumper. I get brought out of sleep by something or whatever thumping with a solid JOLT to my bed.  And when I look at the clock it is 3:19 am, everytime. So it’s 3:19…what? I was born on 3/19. whatever.

When I lived in Southern California, I endured three early morning earthquakes in the 7 years there. It was kind like that. I was awoken by what felt like something hitting the bed, I would wake up and then everything would start shaking.

These things don’t really bother me all that much, it would just be nice that after they call me awake, the would say something else.

No, seriously I am still clean and sober and sleeping quite soundly. That is until I hear my name called.

So much occurring, events unfolding, situations revealing.

What to share? How to expound?

I think I’ll  begin with…..