A Beginning and an Ending

A Welcome, An Obituary, and A Lesson in Not Sneaking

Me at Everest Base Camp in March of 2020 as COVID snuck in.

“Don’t sneak or you’ll ruin your immortal soul.”

This quote QUOTATION (Stephen, your yell is in my head every time I incorrectly use this word still, 15 years later) is from Patrick Haggerty of Lavender Country. I first heard it this weekend at a mind and body writing retreat that led me to finally put these words on the internet.

I’ve been sneaking.

I’ve been writing and sometimes even (rarely) calling myself a writer. But not showing anyone what I’ve written.

I’ve started and sneakily published the first post on six different websites and blogs over the last twelve years, I’ve tucked pages of music and poetry and half-baked novels into my closet right beside the journals I’ve been filling since I was eight.

I’ve shared the occasional word dense caption on Instagram and every time I have fallen a little more in love with myself while also being terrified someone might think I’m so silly.

I believe in the deepest core of my soul that our experiences help other people. And yet, unless you’re one of probably ten people you’ve never read any of the billions of words I’ve written, for me, but also for you.

And it’s been crushing my immortal soul.

The sneaking manager

My therapist/coach has said it in another way. She tells me that a part of me is a manager of secrets. Writing is only one of them, but we’ll stick with that one for now. This cute little manager is constantly determining who gets to know what so she can control how people perceive me.

I so vehemently disagreed with my therapist the first time she said this. I am so open! And vulnerable! I have no secrets!

But I think the manager has been keeping secrets from me too. She has been the stagehand in all black, thrilled at the fact that she’s running the show completely unseen, making the audience cry without really knowing why. Giggling when they think it’s the obvious thing in front of them, when it’s really the perfectly timed lighting shift.

Well, I see you little stagehand Stephanie. So sneaky.

And I see that you’re tired. Thank you for your work. For keeping me safe.

Now maybe we can sneak a little less.

So what will this be? and why should you read it?

I don’t know.

It will probably be messy and sometimes maybe brilliant. It will be my very best attempt at vulnerability every time. And it will be full of drafts with thoughts and phrasing that is always subject to change. I’ve found that perfection is part of what keeps me from publishing so proofreading will be present… but limited. If you’d appreciate a more concrete answer, check out this list on the about page.

I’m going to show up.

You are invited to show up too. Comments will always be open.

Why now?

Because it’s time.

And because I have never been so in love with myself as I am today.

I’ve definitely pretended to be before. I remember one of the first times I met my sister’s now husband (and my now brother!) We were playing with a basketball (not playing actual basketball - that is beyond me) with my dad and I was complaining about some work dynamic and I said “you know, Dad, I think the problem really is that I’m just better than everyone else.” Part of me was trying to be cool, and part was just trying to make my Dad laugh (which I did), and part of me maybe thought it was actually true.

But more parts of me truly hated me. I was so full of anxiety, depression, insecurity, jealousness, pride, fear, immobility. And I hated it.

At the beginning of this year, I lost my job, a long term on-again-off-again whirlwind of a relationship ended, and I moved cities (again).

It was a cleansing. An opportunity. A cosmic convergence as some might say.

Since then I’ve gone through a transformative (ongoing, life long) journey of meeting the parts of me and falling in so much fucking love with them.

(I thought about taking the word fuck out of that sentence, but if fuck isn’t a word you can sit with, you might not like it here very much anyway since it is one of my most favorite words.)

My eyes welled up seven hundred times yesterday because of how beautiful it feels. I burst into spontaneously laughter at least three times because my smile couldn’t hold enough joy. I look visibly different to myself in the mirror. Have you ever seen someone you dated years after breaking up and had NO IDEA how you found them physically attractive? It’s like the opposite of that.

It’s a love I’ve craved and sought outside myself for my entire thirty five years of life. And finally finding it feels nuts.

And all I want to do is share it. And help others find it.

Loving myself has made me brave.

Who is this space for?

It’s for me. But I also hope it’s for you.

If you like a well-crafted sentences paired with typos and spurting streams of consciousness. If you like people’s gooey bits and human stories or are curious about the things I’ve learned in therapy. Or if you’re searching for a friend on the path of your own healing journey, I’d love to have you here.

I will post at least once a week, but I imagine I will post more often than that as we get started. There may be an initial bombardment.

My Obituary

An exercise we did as part of last weekend’s writing retreat that helped me finally start this space was writing our own obituary. I think mine tells you more about why I’m here than all of the rest of these more practical words did.

Stephanie was a dreamer, a big dreamer, but not just in a head in the clouds (she’d hate that I just used that cliche) kind of way, she made her dreams real. She spent years, decades actually, dreaming, manifestoing, therapying, planning, healing, listening, and putting tools she didn’t know she’d need in her toolbelt. She desperately wanted to make the world more loving, more communal, more human. She wanted to use her own experiences to change the world.

Her favorite thing in the world from birth to her final exhale from this body was people’s gooey soft bits, their stories, their kids teetering under the adult trench coat, their fears, their loves, their humanity, and the way it just spilled out on barstools or in the middle seat on a cross country flight. A little vulnerability vampire - she collected these moments and pieces of people’s hearts until her hands and heart were so full she didn’t know what to do to keep them all safe. But she was a creator. So she built a home for them. A church. The church she had always wanted and started bringing hearts home. All her dreams and tools somehow pieces together finally and perfectly into this place, where we all gather now.

Stephanie was incredibly fierce, always, but her gooey human bits were my favorite. And when she started letting them drive every once in awhile, her car became a bus, became a plane.

Stephanie created the life she dreamed of. She was my rock and I can’t wait to carry on what she started. Love, Macey.

I hope you’ll join me in this.

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