Until my father returned to school to finish his education for the ministry,
I lived in the distant rural, from which I learned many lessons of living. These
lessons came easily to a sensitive mind, the point I wish to discuss as an early
memory of knowing I was “different,” before “bipolar “ was even a contsruct
to me.

I was very subject to press at criticism, attention, whether positive or negative, 
and truisms that blossom and baugh brought to me, These qualities are part 
of the Bipolar complextion as surely as flight of ideas, and colorful behavior.
Intensity, the condition’s cardinal trait, is already woven into the fabric of these
minds, and so, as I grew and learned of life from my parents and family, I also 
learned from nature, for it was an abundance, rare, to us, beautiful and true.

I learned of the blossom which had appeared in the night, but beside, its lifeless 
sister lying nearby; the concept of death, of impermanence, married early with
my sensibilities, and has been a circumstance with which I have struggled all of 
my life. I remember one incident, which really was several, occurring from about
age five until age nine or ten – each spring. A Little friend and I would hasten to 
the woodlands, to gather creekside violets, as soon as the weather was warm; we
would gather and play, and each spring, I would look up to the lovely green canopy
and become so touched with the beauty, new and full of emerald, chartreuse, lime ,
jade – all the colors green can be – and with the beauty, I would weep, intensely, if 
briefly. My little friend would move apart, say nothing, and we would resume our 
play. She did not know that I knew the beauty was passing.

Thusly, as a first-time blogger regarding Bipolar illness, I could say that it is not just
about speaking rapidly, being promiscuous, spending money, and all such commonly
know symptoms, but also, carrying the weight of sensitivity, a tenderness for life, express-
ing intense knowing, including the feelings of others. These qualities make for creative
activities, but all bipolars are as different as they are alike, and such is not an easy 
identity to “try on” since we live in a poor culture which enjoys the different, almost to
the perverse.

Remembering these beginnings brings the reality of sensitivity with all of the positive
and the negative features. – ah, that there was such as innocence, a blush, a self-
awareness unto weeping.