What's Next?

Anyone who watches "West Wing" knows that one.... what's the next thing to be tackled?  Who needs to be taken on?  How do we claim triumph over the next set of obstacles?

These are the questions I ask myself in a hospital room in Concord, MA.  By now, I figure I've lost at least half my reading audience.  I figure this mostly because I write about THE SAME SHIT OVER AND OVER AGAIN.  But I can't help it.  This is the stuff of life that eludes me, and I will continue to write about it until it makes sense. I swear, I'm not trying to bore anyone.  But this is the course of my life.  If you're bored with the monotony of hospitalization after hospitalization, can you imagine how I feel?????

I ask "What's next?" because I (and a team of highly-trained specialists) have come to a conclusion: Laura is very good at being bipolar.  Laura is also very good at singing & acting in high-pressure, high-level musical productions.  What Laura is NOT very good at is doing both at the same time.  Since kicking bipolar disorder to the curb doesn't seem to be in the cards right now, I am taking a hiatus from performance.

The thought of this makes me nauseous. This is not "ok, go do this difficult thing without a net".  This is "you've been doing this difficult thing without a net since you were three years old, now just fucking stop". The idea of it brings on waves of depression, devastation, confusion.  I feel like someone just pulled a rug out from under me and told me there was a floor to walk on, so just go do it.  But the floor is covered in tacks & nails.  How the FUCK am I supposed to walk across this new floor?  I don't need a net, I don't need a map; I need feet of steel.

I know that there's nothing telling me not to sing EVER.  I'm allowed.  My throat works.  I remember the notes and words and rhythms.  I just can't do it in front of anybody for the foreseeable future.

AND I AM PISSED.

I have some thoughts.  I won't stay away from music.  I'll continue to take voice lessons.  I'll continue to work on my piano playing (when the titanium screws in my right hand don't give me too much trouble), and I am hell-bent on learning to play the guitar.

But this feeling of not singing feels like someone is trying to pull my heart out of my chest... through my right eye socket.  It's a ripping and tearing that I can't even get my brain to comprehend.  I need some steel plates in my head and heart to go with those feet.  I need to walk across that floor.  How the hell am I going to get across that floor?

What's next?

May Is Mental Health Awareness Month

"I feel like I can fly.  I feel like I could write until the end of time.  I feel like I am worth nothing.  I feel like cutting my skin is the only way to stay in the moment.  I feel like I am the best, worst, and only person on the face of the earth.  I feel like I do too much.  I feel like I will never do enough.  I feel like I am a role model to all those who seek the truth.  I feel like if you listen to me, you will only hear lies.  Don't listen.  Don't look at me.  Don't pay me any mind.  Please see the hurt.  Please see how I am lying.  Please see what I cannot tell you...ever.........."

The preceding is what goes through my mind in about 15 seconds on any given day.  This is the thought process of one person with Bipolar Disorder.  It usually happens about 100 times a day, a few times every hour.

Now add guilt.  Now add anxiety, nausea, sweating, shaking.  Now add the voices of 10 other people, all shouting at the same time. Now add visual hallucinations.  Now add screaming parents, spouses, siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins, friends, enemies.

Now try to work a job "just like everyone else".  Now try to clean your house, cook your meals, do your laundry, tend to your children, socialize with your friends. Now try to accomplish your dreams.

Seems a little difficult, doesn't it?

The next time someone says they're anxious about something, or they don't know if they can make it out to meet you for dinner, or they just don't know how they're going to get through the day, don't get angry or annoyed.  Don't sigh and think about what a drama queen they are.  Don't try to tell them that "it's all in their head", because IT IS ALL IN THEIR HEAD AT THE SAME TIME.....and it's not going anywhere. Just read this post.  Read it again and again until you start to see what it might be like for them.

And just love them. The only thing people with an illness want is a little love and support.  Just give them that much....and know you make all the difference.

Decisions, decisions....

Here it is, folks. That obligatory end-of-the-year blog post. That moment when you, gentle reader, put up with a hefty helping of musing in the hopes that we will all learn something by the end of it, even if that lesson is simply to avoid Laura at the end of the year. 

2013 blew big honkin' chunks for me. My husband had heart surgery and, thank God, is doing well since that procedure. After 3 years of relatively good mental health, I was thrown a big helping of madness. I had no control over my brain for large periods of time. Every time I tried a new remedy, that bitch Medicine threw her head back and laughed heartily. My relationships were strained, sometimes to their limits. I drove myself to many hospitals and outpatient programs. My husband and other family members drove me when I was too out of my mind to drive a car safely. I discovered a naturopathic nurse practitioner who is trying to sort out my body and mind on the cellular level. So far, so good. The last few months have been better than the first nine, and we'll leave it at that for now. 

So now comes the end of the year, when we try to make our lives better. Wipe the slate clean and start anew. We make decisions every day. What am I going to wear? How much cream should I put in my coffee? What are we having for dinner?

I've made a lot of them in the last 365 days. I decided to stop teaching for now. I decided to continue working at the library. I decide to keep living, even when suicide truly felt like the only feasible option. I recently decided to stop shoving my emotions to some dark corner of my brain, and have started a dialogue with other rape survivors online. I want to make a go of being honest with myself and take a road previously left alone. I avoided it at all costs, praying that my mind would somehow fix itself, even after admitting what had happened to myself and the world. I'm now starting to see that talking about this with other people who have had the same experience is the right way to go. There is so much pain out there, but there are so many strong people who are healing themselves as they heal each other. I am lucky to know them.

I am making decisions now. I have decided that a writing life is one I must choose. My thoughts explode from me so often, in the form of prose, poetry, lyrics, and blog posts. There's no turning from them now; they are a crucial part of my psyche, and I am giving myself permission to explore them at full force. Of course, right now I'm sitting in a pool of my own AAAHHHHH. I can't seem to do anything long enough to make headway. I want to be that careless, messy girl who looks around at her cluttered living room and sees the result of hours of good reading and writing, of SOMETHING DONE. Instead, I've been in the same position on the couch for the last 3 hours, reading Doctor Who fanfiction on an iPad, and none of the laundry is done. My creativity sits stagnant while the crumbs of gluten-free crackers I've just eaten look up at me with disdain.  As the year closes, I shall nudge them under my couch with renewed fervor, and continue to pile books next to me, writing at every chance I get.

I have decided that I will not let my anxiety in life rule my consciousness. I will live outside of my brain and body, continuing to speak my mind in an honest way, while taking leaps of faith and courage. (I can just see my husband cringing at this thought: "Oh God, what's she going to do NOW?") There may be an MFA in Writing in my future. I may take up teaching again in the new year. I may go to the moon. Who knows? All I can say for now is that I am trying to take 2013 by its throat, throw it over my head into the dumpster, and start living again.

Here goes nothin.

Vignettes Part I

Hello again, gentle readers.  The following is the first of a few vignettes I wrote whilst at Emerson Hospital for another bout of med changes and "staying safe" this month.  All names have been changed to protect the innocent/guilty.

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Carl throws a stress ball across the common room, hitting Blake in the shin.  They're talking about all the ways you can make alcohol and drugs from household items.  They have a case of what Bob would call "the spin drys".  Guys come in for 3-5 days because their wives, bosses or families beg them to get clean.  They dry out enough for the physical effects of their substance of choice to wear off, claim Jesus as their guide, and go right back out and use.  They have no intention of quitting, they just want to make their families happy, or keep the money coming in.  Blake has already managed to ingest Purell to try to stop his tremors and hallucinations.  In his mind, the ethanol in a hand sanitizer would be better than sobriety; all hand sanitizer has been confiscated from the unit.

Carl has taken to Blake and a few others who are all trying to dry out.  They laugh a little too loudly, proclaim their love of the Patriots, Red Sox, and Bruins a little too vehemently, and know everything.  All exclamations have at least one "fahhk" in some part of speech.  They are frightened little boys, wearing their fathers' jerseys and expressions, trying to be just as brave.  When their knowledgeable statements and information are questioned, they are almost always wrong, and they bluster through all the reasons why.  Their glasses weren't on, they thought you said the '77 Sox lineup, not '87, and that bitch nurse gave them the wrong med at the window this morning.  These are the guys who tell you who REALLY killed Kennedy, but can't remember their son's birth date.  Their tales come forth through gravelly, smoke-filled cords.   

I ask one of these gentlemen why he's so angry.  He says "I'm not angry at nothin'. Nothin' bothahs me anymoah." This is the same gentleman who thought Purell would make a good mixer.

It seems to me that I sometimes see these sober men for the last time on earth.  They are walking and talking ghosts, who won't ever be in this corporeal and sensitized state again.  Alcohol and opiates will numb their pain, desensitize the body, until they sleep forever.

"And now, the end is near...

And so I face the final curtain"

My Pa Rocky was a huge Sinatra fan.  He was such a big fan that we played "My Way" at his graveside on the day of his funeral. That song wasn't just one of his favorites; it was a mantra by which he lived his life.

Pa's life was not an easy one.  He came from a small town in Calabria, Italy. When he was 12, he and his father came to the United States, to work and raise enough money to bring his mother and two brothers over.  They lived in an apartment building in Boston, working hard, eventually bringing the rest of the family to America.  When Pa was 15, his father died.  Now he was the head of the family, supporting his mother and two young brothers.  School had been out of the question for a long time; now his life was about family and work.  Childhood was out of the question as well.

The years that followed were not easy either.  There was joy in his marriage and birth of his three children, but heartache in his divorce and strained family relationships.  He continued on his own path, not worrying about consequences, but being true to himself.  Even if no one liked his answers, they were his own truth, and he would not give up.

I find myself thinking about Pa a lot these days, these days that are shaky at best.  He did his utmost to make his own decisions on his own journey.  He was strong and stubborn (some would say to a fault).

I am making my own decisions now.  I have thought about giving up music.  Last night, I was scheduled to sing the Verdi "Requiem" at Tanglewood.  About an hour before the performance, I began to sob uncontrollably.  A dear friend and my manager both rubbed my back and comforted me and told me not to worry about singing, just to take care of myself.  My husband and mother said "Put tonight behind you.  It's one Verdi performance." But how many nights like these must I put behind me?  How many times can I start to lose my mind and let everyone pick me up off the ground, sobbing and wondering why I can't just get swallowed up by it?  How many people must I disappoint?  How many times will I prepare for a concert and then go through such a roller coaster in my brain that I question my own perception of reality?  In the span of one hour, I went from urges to cut myself, to determination to do the concert anyway (sobbing during silence be damned), to a simple and utter despair.  I don't know if I'm manic, hypomanic, anxious, depressed or psychotic.  I keep taking the pills, and taking the pills, and coping and coping and coping.

I want to try to slow the creeping unrest in my heart.  I can't stand to be around more than two or three people at a time.  Going out in public makes me fearful.  I worry that people I don't know will be angry, talk out of turn, or won't be quiet in a movie theater or at Mass.  These things make me feel actual fear!

And so I feel an end is near, and I face a final curtain of sorts. Is this the end of a music career? As I rehearsed the "Requiem" this week, I could not help but weep while I sang.  I am mourning the career that might have been.

I have had regrets, but I will have to do this my way.

But What If I Can't?

I am many things, one of which is a singer. I've sung for as long as I can remember, which for me is 2 or 3 years old.

My first musical memory is of my father standing me next to the piano and teaching me the song "Dites Moi" from South Pacific. Dad played, I sang, and an obsession was born. I can still hear the 4 bar piano intro in my head, V to I, in staccato chords. Dad would play the first note of the melody at the end of the 4th bar, so I knew where to start. But I didn't need the help. I couldn't HELP but know where the song started. It just made sense. It couldn't be anything else.

My love of music grew and grew, from a tiny spot in the center of my little body to the ends of the earth. Momma and I would sing songs from Disney movies and Broadway shows. I knew the words and melodies to every rock song Dad played with his band (I can still feel the foam microphone cover on my cheek as I sat at his keyboard during rehearsal breaks). My Fisher Price record player played everything from John Denver and the Muppets to the soundtrack of "Pollyanna" to Michael Jackson's "Thriller"-- a 4th birthday present from Dad. 

My family likes to joke that I started my "stage life" when I was negative 6 months old. Momma was pregnant with me during a run of "Trial by Jury", a G&S operetta. How could I help but love the theatre? I knew it before almost anything else!

Then when I was 6, I began piano lessons. I had been sitting at the piano "pretending to play" for so long that Momma and Dad knew this was the next logical step. My piano teacher was a little Italian nun with whom I had a love-hate relationship for the next 12 years. She was a part of the Irl Allison Guild; this is an organization for which you must play an "audition" every year in front of a judge, and receive an annual award commensurate with the material you present.  (Translation: If you don't screw up your songs too badly, you get a medal.) I loved these auditions because it was an adrenaline rush like no other.  You sat precariously on the edge of a piano bench, willing your hands to do what you'd worked so hard at all school year, in front of an audience. Then you got to do it AGAIN for a family recital in June..... now my obsession for music included the thrill of live performance.

And so it continued, with piano recitals, stage shows, choral concerts, band concerts, musicals, Pops concerts, Tanglewood concerts, Symphony concerts, more stage shows, TV tapings, movie soundtrack recordings, and on and on and on.

Last year, I came to a violent curve in my musical road.  I was onstage, and suddenly the feeling that I always cherished, that sense of "right" that music and performance gave me, was slipping away.  It turned to panic and rage.  My blood pressure skyrocketed, I broke out in a sweat, and I had to sit down in the middle of a performance.  My wonderful flying feeling from music was crashing and burning in front of my eyes. I tried to brush it off, as a simple flexing of the nerves, or a hypomanic episode.  But it keeps happening, and happening, and happening....

Since then, I have had a few other close calls and cancelled performances.  Two weeks ago, I was singing for a Marvin Hamlisch Tribute at Symphony Hall; we were doing all numbers from "A Chorus Line" with the original Cassie..... holy shit!  This is what young Broadway fans dream of!  How exciting!  But for me, it turned sour again.  I couldn't enjoy it.  I was so bogged down in sadness and anxiety that I had to actually keep myself from sobbing whilst another soloist sang "Sunshine, Lollipops, and Rainbows".  I COULDN'T SING FUCKING SHOWTUNES WITHOUT CRYING. As the 2nd evening of performance progressed, I made a decision.  That night, I would go home, get settled in for the night, and kill myself.  This was it.  Music held no beauty for me anymore.  I sang and felt nothing. What was the point? What will happen to me now?  My sublime comfort in all the chaos had been music, and standing on a stage singing as though the devil were chasing me. It was gone. And soon I would be.

I managed to remember my promise to Paulie and cling to life until the next morning when I got help from my therapist... into another hospital. Now, I can get through the day without wanting to die, most of the time.  I tried hard not to cry for that week in hospital, and the week thereafter when I thought about the fact that I may never be able to perform again. I can't find my fire. I can't find my love of this precious gift that was given to me when I was 2 years old, standing next to Dad at the spinet in the living room, right along the stairs.

I listen to music and sing along softly to the radio. I sing jazz as fiercely as I want while doing the dishes.  I can't practice.  I'm trying hard to keep my chin up, knowing I do have some musical obligations.  My conductor at the Hall is being gracious and wonderful and letting me try a few weekends of Tanglewood this summer. I am determined to find my sublime comfort again, in the memories of a toddler singing in French with her father......

.....but what if I can't?...........

The Descent...

On Monday, I went to my bi-weekly voice lesson.  I had a great time working on lots of musical theatre repertoire, and my teacher is a gem of a human being.  The lesson began with him taking one look at me as I approached his front door and saying, "Honey, talk to me..."

How do I respond to this invitation?  "Oh, I'm fine, just deep in thought!" "Oh, don't worry about me, I'm just trying to remember the lyrics we have to work on today!"

No. I looked him square in the face and said, "I think I'm losing my mind."

I haven't been using social media very much in the last few days.  I haven't been working, singing, reading, eating, sleeping, or anything really in the past few days.  I have been too busy trying to keep my brain inside my head.

I am manic.

Now, gentle reader, when I say manic, I do not mean the little hypomanic "blips" I've had in the past.  I mean that I am completely off-my-rocker.  I am not quite hallucinating yet, but every bit of my concentration is going toward not hurting myself/anyone else, as well as anyTHING else.  Last night I actually had to physically stop myself from getting out of bed at 11pm to smash every inanimate object in my living and dining rooms.  I had never felt so strongly that I NEEDED to destroy everything there.  Why?  Sure beats the shit out of me.

I have spent entire afternoons this week sitting on a chair and NOT cutting my arms to ribbons.  It takes all of my energy to finish sentences.  I have never been this manic in my life.  I have been anxious, or depressed to the point of self-harm, but this is brand shiny-new.  Paulie sat with me on Monday as I hung onto his sweatshirt in the living room and sobbed over and over again "What's happening to me; WHAT IS HAPPENING?!?!"

Possibly the biggest KICKER to this entire shitty ball of wax is that I had my husband drive me to an Emergency Room on Monday night.... and they sent me home. I'm not crazy enough.  I had no "confirmed plan" of suicide that night, so "Medicare won't pay for any kind of inpatient treatment.  And don't bother telling me now that you're suicidal.  It won't work."  It was then explained to me that there were people waiting 3-5 days in the same emergency room who had not gotten a bed in a substance abuse facility yet.  There were waiting lists for every hospital and program in the area.  I wasn't getting in anywhere.  They told me to go home and talk to my therapist the next day; that she would have MORE luck of getting me into a facility THAN A HOSPITAL WOULD.

So now I sit at home and wait.  There is a facility in my hometown that is able to "talk to me" on Tuesday.  A psych hospital that is quite popular and rhymes with "LeClane" has a 5-week wait to just TALK to me for an intake, never mind get me into a program.

Paulie is being so good; he sits and tries to keep the demons at bay.  I speak in half-sentences and bewildering metaphors, and rail at anyone who will listen to my tale of woe.

Now begins my spiraling descent into uncertainty and insanity.....Hello, old friend.

The Little Dolly

The past weeks have been a little dicey, as my last post indicates.  My husband has not been well, and to make matters more difficult, I have not been well.  The flu came at me twice, and I swatted it like an annoying insect twice.  A few days of rest and fabulous chicken soup (made by said husband) seemed to do the trick in both cases. Paulie needed a trip to the ER on Saturday, and so flu symptoms were quickly forgotten as we headed over to LGH and took the time to get the thing diagnosed (a post-surgical kidney infection... GAH!) and treated.

Now, the past few days have been restful without any effort on my part; a rehearsal here, a few lessons to teach there have been the extent of them.  There are probably a million long-term projects I could be working on, but for now I can't think of a single bloody one.  There is a new novel on my coffee table, a bag of junk food newly procured from the convenience store, and a few scratch tickets (purchased from the winnings of my Christmas stocking tickets).

This is a new experiment.  I will attempt now, with great trepidation, to not do anything simply because I have the time.  I will not do anything on PURPOSE!

Ah.... there it is...The Voice of Reason: "Laura, you have so many things to get done.  You don't work a full-time job.  You don't have a house full of people to take care of.  Get out there and do something!!!" The voice of reason usually sounds like my father, which is inherently unfair, given that my father is NOT the kind of person to push anyone else.  He's simply the hardest-working person I've ever met, and so when I don't think I can work, his voice sounds.

My father is the person who worked 3 jobs while attending college full-time, and then continued to work at least 2 part-time jobs while working full-time once he graduated.  He married, had 4 children, and made us all feel like the most special people in the world, all the while teaching a full school day, gigging at night, and oh, yeah, getting a Masters Degree as well.  In the summers when he wasn't teaching, he added another job to the docket.  He painted houses, worked in offices, taught private lessons... he did whatever it took to make sure that we were provided for, both physically and emotionally. He's a bit of a demi-god in my book, and one whose shoes will not be filled.... EVER.

So, of course, here comes my guilt.  As people in the biz might ask: "How do you follow that?"

I dunno.  I guess I'll stop trying.

The more important thing about my father that I truly wish to be, much more than a hard worker, is a supremely kind and generous person.  My father finds a way to make every person in a room feel special, for whatever their strengths are. He remembers names of spouses, children, family, and friends.  He asks about jobs and accomplishments. He sometimes touches their arm when he talks to them, so they know that they are his sole focus.  When someone cries he hugs them, rubs their back, asks what he can do.  He passes a guy asking for money on the street and always has a one or a five on him to give. Sometimes they want to talk.  He does that too.  He's the guy who makes sure that people have what they need, and always DEMANDS that no one know about it; therefore I'm not going to tell you about any of those things either, just that they happen.

When I have been at some of my very lowest points, my father has been there.  I remember being rushed to the hospital for a suicide attempt, and my father wasn't home at the time.  When I came to in the room I'd been assigned, it was to my father's arms around me.  I immediately started to cry and ask forgiveness.  Dad just sat there on the side of the bed, holding me and telling me it was ok.  That I was his Little Dolly, and I would be fine.  He told me to "take it easy" (his favorite phrase), to take my time feeling better, and not to worry about a thing. While I still have moments where I'm sure that I'm disappointing him to the point of pure frustration, I also know that he loves me more.  It's awe-inspiring and scary and comforting all at the same time.

So now, 13 years later, I'm choosing to take another page from Dad's book.  I'm going to try my very best to be as good as I can to people (a life-long pursuit, especially for one as snarky as I am!!!), and at least for tonight, I'm going to take it easy.

Ending a cycle of silence

This day feels like it was a long time in coming.  It's an impossible thing to write; I almost don't want to look at the words as I type them.  I may even be looking down and typing by feel right now because I can't believe that I'm doing this, but I am ashamed.  I am ashamed that it has taken this long for me to publicly admit something that should not be shaming.

I am a rape survivor.

Good Christ, I actually looked at the screen while I typed that, and now I'm nauseous.

For some of you, this post is over.  You'll click away now, with a comment about how needy that poor Laura is; she had to write about "that kind of thing" on her blog.  What a terrible thing, and what a messed-up girl she must be for admitting something so publicly.  Maybe you're right.

But I'm pissed at myself because it took me so long to talk about this.  I am ashamed of the fact that I could not, until now, say those few words above without feeling like I was going to vomit, and that everyone I knew and loved would hate and abandon me.  So I just never said them.... but the time has come for this cycle of silence to END.

The truth is I WAS raped.  And then I did something completely STUPID.... I blamed myself.  I was the idiot who went to that place.  I was the moron who dressed in a "cute" way that night, in hopes of meeting a nice guy.  I was the absolute cretin who didn't fight.  I was the shamed individual who said "No one will believe me; it's my own cross to bear."  What a Catholic!!!!  I was raped and then I FELT GUILTY ABOUT IT.  I went ahead and did every single thing one is told NOT to do in a situation of violence.  I kept my mouth shut.

It took me almost 4 years to admit to anyone that it had even happened.  At one of my ER visits, a nurse asked if I had a history of sexual violence, and I found myself saying "Yes."  She looked up from her clipboard, her eyes asking for more information.  I then blurted out "I was raped when I was 20."  I couldn't believe my own ears.  I had kept it a secret for so long, it didn't even feel like I was the one speaking.  A tailspin of self-doubt and loathing promptly began.  I must have been wrong.  Maybe I made it up?  I'll just keep it to myself; I'm imagining things.  And then I found myself telling Paulie... and my parents... and a few other family members.  Whoa.... that shit really happened.  But I wasn't going ANY further than that.  Because people don't talk about that stuff.  It's off-putting and makes one look like they just want sympathy, right?

Now, 12 years after the incident (the rape, Laura, call things for what they are!!!), I find myself more sensitive to blatant justifications, jokes, or a generally flippant attitude toward rape and sexual abuse.  The past few months have been particularly painful, with no real reason in sight.... and last Sunday night, I lost it.

Audra MacDonald won a Tony award for her role as Bess in "The Gerschwins' Porgy & Bess".  She took the stage, and began to give a lovely heart-felt speech about how grateful she was to the world of theater.  She thanked her leading man, Norm Lewis....and then said that she enjoyed being raped every night by her "Crown", Philip Boykin.

Did she truly mean that she enjoyed even a pantomimed sexual assault?  Absolutely not.  Did she make a bit of a mistake in putting things quite that way?  Yes.  Was it her fault?  No, it was a whacky way to say "thank you" to a fellow cast member because she won a huge award and was excited. But I was livid, and everyone in the room with me knew it.  I ranted and raved about her behavior, and blathered furiously on Facebook.

I calmed down and asked myself "Why does this particular transgression bother me so much?"  Later that night, I started to get my answer: "This will continue to bother you until you get serious about it.  You need to take a stand, Laura.  Be an adult and do the right thing."

And so I think it's time.  I think it's time that I join the ranks of those who don't "take it" or "hush it up" anymore.  It's time that I do the right thing by every person who has been sexually assaulted, and speak my mind when I don't like something I hear, become publicly involved in sexual injustice and abuse.  In short, I will use my big mouth for something good.

If even one person comes across this odd, disjointed blog post, and decides to report a rape or assault, it's all worth it.

I'm through with silence.