Turbid

My favorite word is turbid.  Turbidity is usually referred to within geology, specifically when measuring sediment levels of water.  Murky muddy river beds, for example, are considered to be high turbidity.  Turbid.  It can also be used to describe a foggy mental state.  In psychotherapy, the clinical term is "mental clouding".  It can be related to types of dissociation, of checking out.

I love this word, and have been feeling turbid lately.  Overwhelmed, rocky, and a little murky.  Muddy and opaque.  It helps to be able to describe it using a word rooted in the physical world.  I feel like a mucky river bed.

I have been drawn to chasing more and more extreme levels of activity, not just climbing a hill on the trails, but feeling compelled to sprint up them.  To run until I cry or throw up.  I know it will be painful, but I guess I am seeking that pain.  I wonder what it means that the two most prevalent and comfortable mental states are either dissociated murkiness or being painfully frantic.

Maybe I am seeking some sort of catharsis.  Maybe this is my new drug.  Maybe this is my own nutter version of self-flagellation.  On the trails lately I am focused almost entirely on a strange prayer, the origins of which are unknown to me: let the trail beat the angry out of me.  Sometimes "angry" is replaced with "anxiety", "worry", or "sad". I don't know where this came from, but I can't not repeat this to myself silently as I sprint for as long as I can, which unfortunately (and embarrassingly) is not too long.  Maybe I am in need of a container, something to bring me focus and balance, although each time I consider this my head shoos the thought away and I only imagine running or screaming as fast and as loud as I can until I can't anymore.

It's kind of sad, I've found that the end of hikes don't leave me feeling satisfied like they did before.  I've just been a bit more frustrated that my body won't take me further, that I don't sweat as much as I want to, that I don't feel completely drained and beat down.  I don't feel like there's been sufficient release.  I have no idea what the release is that I'm looking for.  I've started re-listening to the frenetic punk of my teenage years, this provides a little of the release I think I want.

I've been dating people and have been simultaneously bored, exhilarated, elated, infatuated, terrified, and heartbroken.  Maybe it's this mixed bag of feeling that begat the muck.  Maybe it's my denial that any of it really means anything, that it is not real.  There was one person that I met recently who has struck me as so hurt and lost and subsequently made me feel hurt and lost.  The brick wall I built between myself and those emotions showed me more than the feelings themselves.

This urge to sprint or fall in love or lose myself in punk again may just be the way I'm moving forward.  It feels like letting go.  It feels like jumping off a cliff.  I suppose I wonder how to do this gracefully.  I wonder if grace has a rightful place here, or if the mucky and ugly and terrifying needs to shine for a bit.