I saw a client today, the first one in a while. I’ve been “on sabbatical,” meaning taking a break from client work and trying to recover from the considerable burn-out that comes from dealing with anxious, sad, stressed and fearful people and animals every day. To help is wonderful; to see how much can’t be helped, or won’t be, well, that’s hard, and it seems to get harder as the eyes of each new wary, shut down, freaked out dog find a glimmer of communication in our work together, and then recede back into themselves when old habits and intolerable situations shroud hope and progress. How can we sleep on a bed with something, love something so deeply, but forget to understand it, fail to learn what it needs? And we can’t solve everything anyway, no matter how hard we might try.
Since taking time off from hands-on work I’ve been spending most of my time in my office at home, where I’m taking on-line courses, doing paid organizational work and staring at this computer like some combination wifi crystal ball and compass, getting and sending clues about where I might be headed next. Class, work, friends (real ones -a clear sign of depression is when I find myself interacting with Facebook more than once or twice a day), and surrounded by other old friends in the form of guitars, dogs, rugs and a beat up, deep green and red holly tree right outside my window. I realize this is where I’m happiest right now. This is where I feel grounded.
I think it’s the guitars most of all. At a time when I feel everything changing, when I’m unsure of even where I’ve been, these oldest, steadfast friends are my timeline, surrounding me in the solidness of wood, the magic carpet of sound. On the back of the Guild and the Larrivée are the faint indentations of lyrics I’ve written as far back as 35 years ago, guitar flipped over on my lap as I scribbled a thought, flipped back as I searched for a chord to accompany the words. 
Feeling lost? Take a look at your desk, says I. Computer, cup of tea, phone. Spanish books. Bills. A robo skunk and rat just used for proofing stays on my poor dog. Behind me my guitars, a fan purchased in Spain as a child, my grandfather’s drum, his old easy chair in front. To my right the creepy fish I bought in an attempt to understand another species, which I’ve (Goddammit) now grown sort of fond of, resulting in a weird aversion/guilt thing whenever I look at him. He’s always looking at me. A dog to my right, another in front of me watching out the window for squirrels in the holly. My father’s classical guitar hangs to my left, made the same year I was born, and to my right the silver Gretsch shimmers, her smoky, dark voice a beautiful contrast to the high-strung beside her. I know them all so well, and to stop and look at them reminds me that it’s all been connected, all been mine, is all as tangible as those guitars and so, blanketed in old friends, it all makes some sense in this strange, tippy winter.
