Devices

Oh bloody hell, it's been another month already. Partly down to the demise of the old laptop, or rather the decision to buy this new one as a pre-emptive strike against the impending demise of the old one... We are grumpy about the change as the old one was much nicer, talked much more politely to the wifi, and was solidly built with a nice metal casing instead of this horrible shiny black plastic. I am unhappy to report that we now have five devices in the house (two smart phones, two laptops and a tablet in a pear tree). I have the most ambivalent relationship with all this technology. I did not want to get a smart phone but somehow a smart phone insisted on becoming mine and now that it is... well, I'm doomed basically, having an addictive strand to my personality which has caused me problems more than once with blogging, email, texts. The last time I had access to my emails on a handset was when I worked for horrible corporate style charity and had a device... not for nothing known by my colleagues as the Crackberry.... and I was forever checking my emails, work and personal. It becomes a sort of nervous tic, and much as I resolve not to allow it to happen, it happens. Bleugh.

Meanwhile I realise that comparing one's life with other people's is a mistake, yet struggle sometimes not to compare my life with other people's. Then other people compare their life with mine, and can't understand why I have so much difficulty, when it all looks so good, and I just feel lousy and ungrateful. My life is one of ease and luxury compared with many, yet I am struggling with the transition back to a 'proper' amount of work, and to squaring up to the demands and rigours of self employment - self-promotion, publicity, networking and the like being considerably less my 'comfort zone' than actually being a therapist, which obviously I rather like and am somewhat competent at. Going back to employment would of course have brought different challenges. Steady income, holiday pay etc, but much more difficulty controlling workload and therefore stress levels.

Sometimes I'm fine, sometimes I'm not. It will be three years in December since G died and two in February since my Mum's death. I still get anxious sometimes, depressed sometimes and struggle with confidence. Less, much less, but still, when these things are happening, they're happening and losing perspective seems to be something to which I am prone. As my latest therapist is wont to point out. No you're not losing your mind, you're just losing perspective.

Meanwhile Autumn is here, the clocks go back at the weekend, my birthday next week, and we had the first fire a couple of nights ago. I think I'll light another tonight to watch the final of Bake Off in front of. Please no spoilers....