c'est fini

I just put the cover page on my 118 page thesis - Walking Into the Fire: The Healing of Attachment Wounds. And now I'm going to bed for a very, very long time. (Ok, actually just until 5:45am, when my alarm will go off to go to work, but I'm going to pretend that it is for a very, very long time.)

on the day you were born

"On the day you were born
gravity's strong pull
held you to the Earth
with a promise that you
would never float away…."

-Debra Frasier

If you haven't read this book, you should.

duty in the desert

A couple of months ago I hit the "next blog" link at the top of my blog web page and was directed to Patrick's blog. Patrick writes Duty in the Desert from his duty station in Iraq. I have been checking in on him from time to time and always come away feeling more and more respect for the hard work performed by our military men and women. And, I'm often quite entertained.

Today I laughed my way through his most recent post. I will be thinking of Patrick and his colleagues as I sleep in a warm bed in my own room, with no flashlight being shone randomly in my face.

not just any old pine cone

slow learner

As I was reading a book about the neurobiology of attachment, I came across the following: "Moreover, in order to remain in a state of relative stability, people need to learn to engage in sustained activities without being distracted by irrelevant stimuli. The organism needs to learn from experience and to be able to entertain a range of alternatives without becoming disorganized, or acting upon them" (van der Kolk, 2003, p. 179).

At that very moment, I looked over at Isabelle, who is lying near my desk on my fleece jacket on the futon. She was curled up in a ball, trying to catch her tail and was at it a good ten minutes. She's been doing this for ten years. So much for animal evolution.


*Kolk, B. van der (2003). Posttraumatic stress disorder and the nature of trauma. In M. F. Solomon & D. J. Siegel (Eds.), Healing trauma: Attachment, mind, body, and brain (pp. 168-195). New York: W. W. Norton.

pavlov's dogs

I have always thought it funny that we remember Mr. Pavlov's name so readily, but naught when it comes to the dogs. They did all of the hard work of salivating, after all. I have also always thought it would be funny to name a dog after Pavlov's dog. Complicating matters is the fact that he had sixty dogs! I am particularly amused by the fact that dog number sixty is named John. Pavlov was running out of fresh ideas, so it seems.