Martini Rescue Squad

"The Laughter Cure" by Rachele Kanigel

Link:  http://www.yogajournal.com/health/2533

Excerpt:   'When you start laughing, your chemistry changes, your physiology changes, your chances to experience happiness are much greater'

“Dealing with a Change? Ask Yourself This One Question...” by Brynn Harrington

Link: http://wellfesto.com/2014/01/22/dealing-with-a-change-ask-yourself-this-one-question/

Excerpt: "This sounds so basic, right?  But it’s easy to fall into the trap of changing in order to run from something, with no future destination in sight."  

"Who Killed the Romantic Comedy?" by Amy Nicholson

In homage to the Oscars...

Link:    http://www.laweekly.com/los-angeles/who-killed-the-romantic-comedy/Content?oid=4464884

Excerpts:     "Men and women are still falling in love, of course. They're just not doing it on screen — and if they do, it's no laughing matter.... Titans of the genre such as Julia Roberts, Sandra Bullock and Matthew McConaughey dashed back to dramas...'More movies are puncturing the fantasy...so you're getting more of a sense of people working through things, as opposed to fate swooping in and making everything happen.'"

 

Same Time, Same Place...

Guess which groggy, 5 x 4.5-inch fluorescent-painted turtle wandered back to my yard again this year?

Baby Max is alive and well. His colors have waned over the last three years, but his spunk and uncanny timing have not.  

 

(For a reminder:  http://www.martinirescuesquad.com/my-blog/2011/03/it-takes-a-turtle-part-i-of-ii.html)

 

New, Part II of II

Whatever we made of New Year’s Eve in our own minds and what it implied for the year ahead, we’ve probably forgotten.  On January 1 or 2, we hit the ground running.

A month and change into the new year and many of our heads are already in April 2014.  Most of us have not yet made sense of last year and probably won’t start mentally scrapbooking it for another few months.  That’s premature, premature, premature...

Unless we had a catalyzing event that crystallized the year in real time, we need a few months to let 2013 settle in between 2012 and this year before we know what to make of it.  That’s how it feels now.

In school, it was pretty easy to characterize each year in context with its customary events and hurdles; driver’s licenses, the college application process, first-year core courses in college or grad school...

For a handful of years after school, we had a few rites of passage that also provided some consistency for many of us in both our expectations and our collective experience; our first apartment in the city, our first “real” job, our first adult relationship...

By December 31, the year that was about to close already had shape and character.  You did not need to think too much about it.  New Year’s Eve could thus be the most romantic, exciting, anxiety-stirring idea in the year.

Even if you were nearly certain nothing incredible would happen, there was always the possibility.  That alone gave the night its own magic.

It gave December 31 the right to expect we would find something special to wear and somewhere special to go all in homage to the possibility it portends.  And many of us complied because we were hopeful that fickle night would smile on us.

Most years, that expectation was exhausting and nothing occurred to justify the drama.  By mid-February, we may have felt a little foolish for yet again having appeasing the night’s demands.

That’s why a gentle smirk cheated across my face with my cousin’s words, “We’ve just had such full lives, it’s OK to relax now.”

A few years ago, while still bowing to that impetuous date, I definitely did not expect to be at the grocery market at 8:30 p.m. on New Year’s Eve, still wearing my exercise outfit.

A few years ago, I definitely did not expect to be 100-percent certain nothing incredible would happen that night and happy about it.

This year all I wanted was a ho-hum night.  A safe night when I did not expect anything and did not put myself out there too vulnerably...when I prevented that New Year’s emotional indulgence by ardently, at the market in exercise clothes at 8:30 p.m.-committed refusing to give into it...a second consecutive year of homemade pasta and shrimp...a night when I could not be disappointed.

When I could refocus from the night to a quiet hopefulness in the year ahead.

And that’s what I was sure to have.  That certainty provided a comfortable elective deafness to December 31.

My cousin and a few other friends with whom I chatted at the market felt the same.  New Year’s Eve was not going to be anything big.

However a couple of my neighbors had a different plan.  Sitting at my desk an hour or two later, appeasing my meticulousness by completing a few year-end tasks, the music from their large party bounced off all sides in our little canyon.

I don’t know who these neighbors are, but we have the same taste in music.  That night, I heard their party’s laughter and chatting bubble along with a few popular songs.  One song ended just as I was about to push away from my computer for the night.

“Perfect timing.”

But curiosity kept me at my desk a second or two longer to hear the next song.  I could not identify it until “Just a small town boy, born and raised in South Detroit...Took the midnight train going anywhere...”[1]

Don’t stop believing.[2] 

“Ha!  True,” I agreed.

Again the gentle smirk tugged my face into a smile.  Emotional indulgence found me, like it or not.  It seems to know just when to find most of us.  Perfect timing.

Compare all of the fanfare we may or may not have made of the night and how inconsequential that is now, just a handful of weeks into the year... Compare all of the expectation and build-up to New Year’s many of us considered a given in years prior with the indifference we may generally feel, or pretend to feel to it now...

Whether it is nostalgic or forward-looking, anxiety-inducing or hopeful, big or ho-hum, one thing is constant about the year that follows. It’s new.

And right about now is when that newness starts to have some definition, to become something we can work with. Something exciting. We have 10.5 months left to fulfill everything we may not want to admit we hope for. To make this a Happy New Year.    

 

---

[1] Cain, J., Perry, S. and Schon, N. (1981).  Don’t stop believin’.  On Escape [7” vinyl].  New York, NY: Columbia Records.

[2] Ibid.

New, Part I of II

“Happy New Year!,” said a familiar voice when I picked up the phone at around 10 a.m. January 1.  “What did you do last night?”

“Oh, God, I stayed in last night!,” I answered.  “I ran errands all day yesterday and finished exchanging my Christmas gifts.”

“OK,” said the voice with an expectant upturn.  With an upturn that implied, “And then what?”

“And then I got a mani-pedi, picked up some fresh ingredients and made organic pasta with shrimp at home.”

“Oh...OK.,” the voice answered, not sure if he should feel sorry for me or if I was content with this situation.

“It was perfect,” I added.  “What did you do?”

“Oh, wow, Honey, we had a great dinner with some friends up here and stopped by a couple of the hottest night clubs...We were out past 2:30!,” he answered.

“Dad, that’s great!,” I replied.  And he razzed me a little.

Yup, my father, stepmother and their friends at the ski resort went clubbing for New Year's and I stayed home.

More specifically, I tinkered at my desk a little while, took a hot shower, got into my thick and comfy robe, applied a charcoal facial mask and enjoyed my homemade dinner by candlelight at my kitchen table.   It was perfect.

December 31 had been a full and very satisfying closing day in a full and very odd year.  As the last week in the year narrowed down to hours, I became more and more excited about going to the market, picking up a few wholesome ingredients and making myself a healthy dinner.

Pulling into the market, I joked on the phone with my cousin in the Midwest who also decided to stay home and unpack boxes at her and her husband’s new place, “When did we get so old?”

“It’s not that,” she asserted.  “We’ve just had such full lives, it’s OK to relax now.”

“Ha! True,” I replied.

I laughed because it is true.  We’re in our thirties now and we don’t need to have crazy New Year's Eves anymore, if we ever did.

The next morning I laughed again.  The call from my father made my cousin’s comment that much funnier.

New Year’s can mean completely different things to people who otherwise usually agree.  Is it nostalgic or forward-looking?  Does it rally your anxieties or your hopefulness?  Does it have any oracular qualities or is it just another day?

(To be continued next week...)

Your Ownership Moment, Part II of II

That was the moment when each of us first recognized we can triumph or we can fail.  We can feel angry and hateful or we can feel empowered and loving.  We can feel scared by how completely open is that space we’ve cleared in front of us or we can get out from under that openness’ gravity and move forward to fill it.

Those are extremes but for most of us, that moment when we took ownership of our own lives emerged in extreme circumstances.

For many of us, that revelation bloomed in the middle of a hardship.  A loss, probably tragic, or some unforeseen dysfunctionality or disappointment.

The extreme circumstances bifurcated our choices.  Made them that stark and simple.

Mine was about 10 p.m. one weeknight in September 1993.  I was 16.

My parents divorced when I was about three years old.  They continued bickering over child custody continued until I was nearly 17.  My brother Pat and I were caught in the middle.

In July that year, we entered a new set of custody hearings.  I think the fourth or fifth.  I was old enough to be aware of what was going on, but too young to have any decision-making capability.

I could say what I wanted, but it did not matter.   Everyone tried to invalidate everyone else.  Everyone only heard what fit through their very finite filter and tried to construct a concrete reality from that silt.

Legally, I was invalid, mute and powerless.  And scared.  Everything I understood about stability in my life could change and I could not do anything to stop it until I was 18.

That night in September following a rather intense conversation, I did not have any idea what to do.  I was crying so hard, I could not breathe.  I dropped to my knees to pray.

I prayed until my gasps evened out, until my eyes dried to manageable moisture, until I felt a warmth drape itself around my whole body.

Take or leave the religious undercurrent, that was the moment I knew everything was going to be OK.  That I could wallow, rebel, implode...do any number of things to hinder my success – outward, exhibitionistic things to evoke a reaction from others – or I could decide right then that this is my life.

That I could own this life and steer it in a good direction.  That I could have faith in myself and develop my own useful, loving discipline.  Or destroy myself.

Or stop every passerby for the rest of my life to ask if they thought I was going the right way, never getting any further than the next doubt would set me back.

For a good number of us, our moment was equally dark and frightening.  Thinking about your own may make you cold and scared.  Even hearing a song you often heard on the radio back then can make you feel eerily sad.

You want to rush home to something that will affirm you of how far you have come.  That you are now safe and untouchable by all of that darkness. 

Overhearing ownership moment narratives like that gentleman’s in the dinner group, the one’s whose private manifesto first surged through them on a safe and ordinary day, can make us a bit jealous.  It can make us a bit sad our story was not as easy.

Until the next time it seems our world is going to hell.  The next time we’re so close to a huge decision, our breath fogs the glass between where we are and the other side of that decision.  The next time we realize we need a course correction.  The next time that revelation blossoms that our life is ours.

“Hey, I remember you.”

Until that next time we quiet the world just long enough to feel that declaration grow stronger and clearer.  Until we recommit to move forward with our own loving discipline.  With faith in our decisions.  With that wordless conviction we are going to be fine.

Right then, we push the way we understand everyone else’s first ownership moment off the page and continue writing where we left off after our last.  We let that silent triumph call the darkness, sadness, earnestness, comedy and conflict out of hiding and into to order, and move forward to fill that space we’ve just cleared in front of us.

That seems to be true for most people. 

Your Ownership Moment, Part I of II

Some of our most resonant triumphs are silent.  That seems to be true for most people.  Think back to yours.

A few weeks ago at a restaurant, I ran into a table of gentlemen I know socially.  Through my brothers, family friends, community organizations, etc.  They were ages 40 to 80-something and had met for a holiday dinner.  What a grand dinner it had been!  They have it every year.

They invited me to sit with them while they had after-dinner drinks and let their conversation lazily wander into the margins where their philosophy hides.  Their invisible philosophy that shapes their text.

Most in that group are originally from Los Angeles and a couple of them had fought in the Korean War or in Vietnam.

“I remember the day, it was my freshman year in college, when I went down to the post office,” one of them said, “and enlisted in the Marine Corps.”  He shipped off to war soon thereafter.

But he did not intend to talk about the war.  No, he sharpened that memory down to the one moment when he realized, from then on, his life was his.

He realized he was 18 and he could stay at school or he could decide on something as far removed from that safety as he could imagine.  Something in which he believed.

Again though, patriotism, dogma and duty were not his take-aways from that revelation.

He said that was the moment he first realized his choice and every other choice from then forward, that liberty and all of its consequences, were his.

Most people, whether our autobiographical memory is keen or pretty blurry, can remember that moment when we took ownership of our lives.  The moment we knew this life is not our parents’, our grandparents’ or our halograms’ of speculative outcomes.

It’s not subject to propriety, obligation or expectation.

And even if those factors are very real for us, for that moment they are suspended in midair, invalid, mute and powerless.

Most of us can remember that moment when everything stopped and a wordless conviction resonated from our core that our life is our own.  Think back to yours.

 

(To be continued next week...)

"The Heart's Intention" by Phillip Moffit

http://www.yogajournal.com/wisdom/926

Excerpt:  "Goals help you make your place in the world and be an effective person. But being grounded in intention is what provides integrity and unity in your life...You are connecting to your own sense of kindness and innate dignity. Standing on this ground of intention, you are then able to participate as you choose in life's contests, until you outgrow them."

"Don’t Be Pretty – Be Beautiful in 2014" by Glennon Doyle Melton

Happy New Year, Everyone! 

http://momastery.com/blog/2013/12/31/6676/

Excerpt:  "Women who are concerned with being pretty think about what they look like, but women who are concerned with being beautiful think about what they are looking at. They are taking it all in. They are taking in the whole beautiful world and making all that beauty theirs to give away to others."

New Normal, Part III of III

For a couple months, summer into the fall, I had thought we were in the clear.  In our own ways, we had all processed Big Nance’s loss.  It had been seven or eight months.

We were still grieving, but all seemed to be moving on and healing.  Until October.

“Paigey, Honey, what am I going to do about your grandmother’s party?,” my mother Little Nance asked.  “How am I going to be able to recreate that?”

“You mean her Christmas party?,” I exclaimed.  I.e. the open house she threw for almost everyone in the greater metropolitan area in her Midwestern town?

“Mother, you are the ascendant matriarch in our family, but no one expects you to be your mother.  No one expects you to be Big Nance,” I answered, surprised by my own momentary wisdom.

And throwing that party this year would have been impractical anyway.  My mother does not live anywhere near the Midwest.

But knowing how that party was my grandmother’s biggest and most important event in the year, it made sense to consider recreating it.

This year, we agreed to let go of that party.

“Yes, and I have to stay in Los Angeles for Christmas this year,” my brother said in November.

In years past, he and most of our family would do whatever we could to be in Ohio for part of Christmas.  For the party, the Christmas Eve Day brunch or Christmas Day itself.  We did whatever we could.  That’s what we had to do.

The nuclear families who lived in Ohio had their own private celebrations, but even they would usually come by the Queen Mum’s home for part of Christmas Day.  One or two of them would.  Total absence during Christmas week was grounds for holy war in her mind.

This meant Patrick typically flew back to California very early on Christmas morning for his obligations on the West Coast, but at least he was there for some of the week.

And making that trip this year would have been impossible anyway.

But knowing how Christmas Week was the one time each year we could all see each other, it made sense he’d consider making it.

This year, we agreed to stay in our respective home towns.

“Oh, my God, my stocking!,” I thought in early December.  There it was, still on my bench in my breakfast nook.

It had arrived a few weeks after Christmas, a few weeks after the Queen Mum took ill.  A few weeks before she passed away.

When it arrived, I did not have the patience to open it and chase the runaway lip balm sticks.  So I set it on top of the other things on my bench.

When she passed away, I did not have the courage to open it and picture her stuffing the lip balm sticks in with the scented lotion sample pack.  So I kept it on top of the other things on my bench.

As the months rolled into each other, I did not have any desire to open it and let go of the last stocking she would ever give us.  So it stayed where it had been since mid-January.  On top of the other things on my bench.

It stayed there until my friend Trevor came by in early December and inquired about the collection of things on that bench.  My miscellany in purgatory.

“What’s that stocking?!,” he asked, laughing.

“Oh...God.  That...Yeah, it’s my Christmas stocking from last year.  I still have to open it,” I said with a laugh in reply.

“I still have to open it,” I thought.

Fortunately necessity intervened.  The next week, I was on my way to a holiday event – one to which you have to bring an unwrapped gift for a child that costs $10 or less.  I had forgotten to pick up something when I quickly remembered my stocking.

“There has to be something in there a child would enjoy! A Beanie Baby, a yo-yo, a deck of Uno cards...something.  And the Queen Mum would love to know her toys will go to good use,” I rationalized.

I ran to my bulging, year-old stocking, inhaled deeply and cut into the fabric.  Plenty of baggie clips, a pack of scrub sponges, and yes, a meat thermometer... but nothing really appropriate for a child.  So I ran to the store and left the stocking on the bench.

When I returned home, it sat there waiting for me to complete emptying it.  To release all of tchotchkes and mini-toiletries...all of the creativity, usefulness, abundant generosity and perseverant kindness my grandmother had used in assembling it.

All of us, in our own ways, are trying to let go of our expectation she will still be there.  That there has to be something on which we can rely to continue holding us passively together.

But when we let go of that, we inherit the obligation to be active in holding our family together.  Will we accept that?  That is the bigger question that has kept my stocking on top of the other things on my bench.

Christmas Day this year, my first Christmas spent completely in California, I did a double-take when I saw my parent’s mantle.  One of my aunts had stuffed and sent four Big Nancy-style stockings.

Stockings bulging with tic tac boxes, lint rollers and many other things the Queen Mum would have stuffed in there.  My aunt nailed it.

Other than the stocking, this Christmas was not normal.  Not within our family’s range from unusual to normal. Not yet.  But we’re getting there.

Among everyone who has lost their base line family member, that’s the best and most hopeful thing any of us can say.

Happy New Year.

New Normal, Part II of III

That quest for normalcy is one of the latent surprises I noticed to our collective grieving process.  Many of us who have lost their family mascot may have already known to expect it, but I had not.  Instead I was concerned about Christmas.

“How are we going to handle that?,” I wondered.

Christmas in our family has always been big.  Big Nance big.  And every year, it was in Ohio.

Cousins, aunts, uncles, second and third cousins, great aunts and great uncles would fly in from California, Florida, Oregon and West Virginia for 72-76 hours of blitzing from party to party with the same unspoken prerogative to be, in a word, Christmassy.

Happy, healthy, lively and together.  You could not find a better single frame of that than my grandmother’s Christmas stockings hanging from her mantle on December 25.

The mantle over the dainty hearth in her pink living room is white wood and I don’t think it is wider than four or five inches.  Every year, I was surprised the stockings did not dislodge it from the wall.

Every year, my grandmother would slice her panty hose down the middle, leaving two independent stocking legs.  She sliced enough pair to have one stocking leg for almost each person in our family who would be in Ohio for Christmas.

Although I never saw “her” acquire the items she would put into the stockings, I could picture her in the supermarket a week or so before Christmas.  She would start at the head of the aisle with all of the tchotchkes and mini-toiletries, extend her hand so her dainty fingertips reached into the first few inches of the shelf and start walking forward, letting everything her fingers could reach tumble whimsically into her cart.

In our stockings every year, we would find a small box of bandages, a plastic envelope of make-up remover towelettes for travel, a deck of cards, pair of scissors, meat thermometer, variety pack of fluorescent post-its, bottle of nail polish remover, mini-calculator...one of almost everything for everyone, jammed so tightly together the stocking fabric bulged in odd directions.

If there was anything in someone else's stocking that you wanted and did not have in yours, you could probably trade an item or two with your cousin to get the item you coveted.

Once the Queen Mum had stuffed the stockings with all kinds of useful oddities for intrafamily bartering, she would knot each one at the top and dangle the misshapen stockings from a multipurpose rope strung around that poor dainty mantle. 

The last few years, as grandchildren married and had their own children, we would have 12 or more heavy pantyhose legs bulging with arbitrary but useful “stuff” dangling from that rope strung around the mantle.

Those stockings were a blessing and an albatross.  There was so much nonsense in them you would not usually buy for yourself but once you see the items, you agree you need them.  However if you tore through the stocking to explore your loot, you would have to find a way to transport it home without accidentally leaking Scope or jasmine bath gel all over your suitcase contents.

We eventually evolved to realize it’s best to keep the stocking in-tact until you reach your home.  Then you can liberate the goodies.

But even that can be challenging; even if you put a shopping bag under your stocking before you slice it open, the contents still pop out in all directions.  You still may find a tiny dental floss container under your sofa six months from when you released it.

That’s why, for the past few years, my stocking has remained on my bench in my breakfast nook for weeks, if not months after it arrives at my place. That bench has become my purgatory for almost all of my miscellany.  For everything I’m not yet sure what to do with.

For the past few years, it has been the perfect place for my Big Nance Christmas stocking.  I get to see it lying there for a while, calm and contained, and enjoy everything it means to me – the creativity, usefulness, abundant generosity and perseverant kindness that marked every Christmas with Big Nance.   That she infused into every Christmas.

“What are we going to do without her?...How are we going to handle that?,” I’ve wondered this last year.  Many of us have.

 

(To be continued next week...)

 

New Normal, Part I of III

My family life has never been normal.  Many of us can say that.

Has it been stable?  Yes.

Has it been normal, as in Beaver Cleaver normal?  No-ho-ho.

Has it been normal compared to most of my peers’ normal?  Eh.

It’s more useful to measure our normalcy within context.  Within our family’s range from unusual to normal.  By that measure, we have been more normal than not.  Normalish.

My grandmother Big Nance/the Queen Mum was our reigning monarch and our normalizer.   Her whole package - her drama, occasional volatility, grandeur, contradictions, affirming verbal legends, generosity, faithfulness and all-weather love - was our normal.

She passed away almost 11 months ago.  Since then, across the country our family has tried many different ways to cope with life without her.

Some of us have tried to hold onto whatever it was that we understood about life with BN, whether or not it was optimal, sustainable or even enjoyable.

Some of us have ventured out to find our own comfort zone.  Or we are more comfortably open about our own and each other’s deviations from tradition.

And some of us are trying really to let go of our unspoken expectation that the loud, adoring, strong and consistent rhythm she brought to all of our lives will continue.

Our expectation that there has to be something on which we can rely to continue holding us passively together.  Like it or not.  Something unifying for which we can all be grateful.

All of us are trying to find our new normal.

Among everyone who has lost their base line family member, many of us can say that.

 

(To be continued next week...)

Mmm...

...Yup. Family dinner.

Happy Holidays to you and yours.

Another gem from Mazi Robinson:

"Don’t give into the pressure of 'timeline living.' Meaning, if your adult life does not unfold according to the socially acceptable timeline, it’s okay.  You are not behind." -  Mazi Robinson

From:  http://voicelessonsfortoday.com/2013/12/09/ever-heard-younger-self/

Thank you for this, Mazi!

"Why Gratitude Makes You Happier and Wealthier" - Christine Kane

To complement "Ungrateful"...

From: http://christinekane.com/why-gratitude-makes-you-happier-and-wealthier/

(In Honor of Thanksgiving.)

Gratitude is about so much more than being thankful. Gratitude is a practice. For some, it is a way of life. Why do some people swear by this practice? Why do those people live happier and more abundant lives than everyone else?

- Because gratitude is about presence.

Gratitude is about waking up in this moment and being here – really being here – and noticing what’s around you. Most people are so busy thinking about the next thing, or their horrid past, that they don’t wake up and look around at their present moment — the only moment there is.

- Because gratitude is about honoring your life.

Do you ever compare your life with someone else’s? Do you ever wish your life were better and more like another’s? Sometimes we can lose ourselves in wondering how we “measure up” to some standard set by someone else or by the media or by our parents. My belief is this: Comparison is the mind killer. And the antidote is gratitude.

Gratitude requires you to validate your own life. (And you really don’t have any other life, do you?) It forces you say YES to the gift that is you. The choices you’ve made, the changes you’ve gone through, the track you’re on — all of those have brought you here. Even if here is a place that needs a little adjustment, that’s okay. There are always gifts in any present moment.

- Because gratitude is about attracting.

It’s difficult to attract abundance and joy if you are saying “no” to what IS. You say no each time you focus too much on the future or past, or when you criticize something that is in your present moment. When you say yes, you shift. Attraction is about “yes.”

Gratitude says, “Yes, I love this!” And then more of this is attracted, because the this is what you’re focusing on.

- Because gratitude is about choice.

How you translate any situation is the situation. What you choose to see is the truth (for you). This isn’t proposing that you live in denial or phoniness. It’s reminding you that your translation of any life situation is your own choice. Over and over we’ve all heard stories of people who have ignored others’ translations of their talent, their projects, their art, their looks, their lives. These people chose their own translations and succeeded. You always have a choice when it comes to how you look at things. Choose to choose gratitude.

- Because gratitude is about wisdom.

I think people believe they’re being smart if they criticize, complain, and focus on the problems of the world around them. Smart? Maybe. Clever? Sure. But not wise. It is wise to look for and find the knowing place in your heart. It is wise to choose joy. It is wise to honor your riches. It is wise to focus on and grow the blessings of your life.

- Because gratitude is about recognition.

Use your power of focus to hone in on the beauty and on what makes your heart smile or sing. Recognize the spirit in your life. It’s all around you waiting to be noticed. In the words of Franz Kafka, “It will roll in ecstasy at your feet.”

- Because gratitude is about receptivity.

Gratitude makes you receptive. It makes you concave. It makes you a vessel, waiting to be filled.

I carry a small notebook with me everywhere I go. In it, I write down song ideas as I hear them. I write down quotes I hear. I write down ideas for stage stories. As I do that, I become more receptive, and more ideas and songs come to me. It’s a tool that says to my subconscious, “Send more my way!” And the subconscious always responds.

Gratitude is the same way. It says, “I am receptive! Send more!” And more arrives.

- Because gratitude is about creativity.

Creativity is really all about attention. When I write a song, I build a relationship with that song. I spend time with it. I get to know it. I pay attention to it. Artists do the same thing with drawings. They spend time in rapt attention and the drawing is born.

Gratitude is the same way. It is a creative act to notice and pay attention to the moments of your life. Some days it’s an enormous act of creativity to even find things for which to be thankful.

Be creative. Be present. Be receptive. Be wise. Be wealthy. Be grateful.

"Ungrateful" by Mazi Moore Robinson

Enjoy this powerful post by another wonderful college friend who is now a therapist and popular public speaker:

http://voicelessonsfortoday.com/2013/12/02/ungrateful/

 

Excerpt:  "Gratitude is the pathway to joy, indeed.  But comparative suffering and self shaming are not the pathways to gratitude.  Shaming yourself into gratitude is not healing.  Using gratitude to silence and bypass your sincere grief and pain is not helpful.  Sometimes- often times- the healthiest thing we can do is to admit I’m unthankful for this.  I don’t want this." 

Frosting

This last month of the year, December, is the frosting.  Some years it spreads thinly.  Just enough to add some sweetness and to remind you how much you have to be grateful for.  To remind you how vital and important your aspirations must remain.

Other years it has enough to spare and you can scoop a generous fingerhookful right into your mouth.  As you slowly breakdown that richness, you partially regret overdoing it.  And are quietly sure in due time, the thinner layer years will emulsify that excess for you.

This last part of the year, we can all forget ourselves in the Dickensian morality messaging, overwhelming gaiety, complicated holiday travel logistics and lurking anxiety we haven’t done “enough.”  We can forget in a handful of weeks, we will start over.

January begins with all of the ingredients in the bowl; residual concerns, refreshed aspirations and everything from our to-do list last year that followed us into this one.

It’s a lot to take in and it all seems especially unfriendly at that moment.  We stand there bleary-eyed and hung-over from the holiday season’s conflicting intensity, not sure how to address ourselves to this new mix.

Grudgingly we approach the bowl, grab our coarse wooden spoon against our dry winter skin and start stirring everything together; all of our goals, plans, obligations, timing and constraints.  It can take extra effort, but by mid-February, we’ve started blending it into a batter.

If we’re lucky, that batter is already smooth.  All of the elements look like they will combine well.

If we’re being a bit too ambitious or hard on ourselves, the year still looks lumpy.  Maybe we shouldn’t have committed to this, or maybe we won’t exactly be able to fulfill that...

In either case it still requires extra elbow strength, ambition and humility to finalize the blending.  But between early to mid-March, the year usually looks like a proper batter, thick and even enough to work with.

By April, we’ve visualized how the year will most likely take shape and we are ready to continue forward with confidence.  We’re ready to pour the batter into a mold and turn up the heat.

In May and June, we’re cooking.  By July, the batter has risen to fill out the mold.  It may be a little crooked on top, but we have to remember no one will see that when we empty it from the mold onto the plate.

August reminds us to stick a toothpick in our year and see if it comes out clean.  If we’re on track for a year done well, or if maybe we need to turn up the heat and cook a little while longer.

In September or October, like it or not, the year starts cooling and solidifies into its final form.  At the right time in November, we know when to turn the year onto the plate to free it from its mold and complete the cool down.

We may have to use our blunt common sense to scrape it loose from the regrets that won’t let go.  Or it may fall onto our plate with ease, affirming how right we were to have been so diligent with that extra elbow grease during the blending phase.  How clever we were to have lubricated the mold for easier removal.

How lucky we are we don’t have those clinging regrets that sometimes hold on even when we worked as hard as we could to prevent them.

In late November we close our eyes for one minute, hoping to open them to see the nearly finished year as we’d wished and it’s already December.  It’s time to complete the year as sweetly as we can, whether delicately or indulgently.

It’s time to remind ourselves how grateful we are for our persistent aspirations and sometimes under-acknowledged good fortune.  December is the frosting. 

 Happy Holidays.

For Thanksgiving laughs...

This is a social network post by my college friend and fellow Angeleno while visiting Iowa with his wife for the holiday:

...Thank you for green-lighting this repost, Bryan.  Cheers!

Happy Thanksgiving, Martini Rescue Squad!

Wishing peace, love, joy and good health for you and yours.  Thank you for reading this blog.

 

Selfies, Part II of II

At least one, because some selfies are hybrids; they combine the best elements from a couple of styles.

The following are some of the most popular some friends and I have noticed during our due diligence.  Your comments and additions are welcome:

 

Multiple Chin Selfie

 

These photographers have tried to maximize the distance between their camera phone and their face.  Thus they extended the arm holding their camera as long as they could and retracted their face backward, producing two, three, or four chins.

Their facial expressions tend to be expressionless, an awkward smile or an “Ooh, Baby” look.  Often, you can see their upper arm in the photo as well.

You have to acknowledge these are kind of sweet.  These photographers are probably new to selfies.  They haven’t honed the skill.

 

Supermodel/Duck Face Selfie

 

They think they look like a supermodel. Everyone else thinks they look like a duck.

Remember those photographs in the fashion magazines we admired as a tweens?  The ones in which the models puckered their lips in stylish disgust, blatant indifference or seductive volatility?

That look is probably what these photographers were attempting.  It’s probably not what they produced.

 

Body Art Selfie

 

These photographs may not include a face.  The emphasis is on the tattoo(s) or flexed muscles, or the tattoos on the flexed muscles.

*(Most of these also fall under the Mirror Selfie category below and may include some Duck Face elements).

Tattoo shots straight down the photographer’s arm, leg or chest can be quite effective.  Incorporating a mirror allows consumers to appreciate the tattoo in context with the rest of the photographer’s body.  Especially if that body is quite muscular.

With or without the tattoo(s), flexed muscle shots are pretty self-explanatory; the photographer is proud of their artful physique and intends to attract mates who appreciate it as well.  Makes sense.

 

Timer Selfie

 

For these shots, the photographer has cleverly set a timer on their camera to allow themselves adequate time to strike their intended pose; across the room – i.e. nowhere near their camera, at their desk at work looking very official, or most often in their own closet or bathroom.

You can consider many of these “selfies in denial.”

If you want to give the photographer the benefit of the doubt, assume someone else was there with them.  That’s possible.  However for many of those shots, you would think that someone else would have advised against that pose.

And would have had to smoosh themselves into a corner in that office, closet or bathroom to allow for the distance between the camera and the subject.  Which would have been very accommodating on their part.

 

Drivers Seat Selfie

 

These fall under either the Multiple Chin or Timer category, but they are so prevalent, they deserve their own designation.  These photographers want to show themselves sitting in their driver’s seat in their car.  By themselves.

Dressed in work attire, recreational activity clothing or no clothing...Tattoo(s) and flexed muscles...Sitting upright and alert and/or slouched to one side and making peace signs....Sometimes still wearing a seatbelt...The stylistic options are limitless, all from this one little seat.

If the subject has multiple chins, it’s sensible to assume the photograph is a selfie.

Alternately, many Drivers Seat Selfies show the subject with their arms relaxed, as if their hands are down by their sides or in their lap.

As if they photographer set the timer and put their camera on their dashboard.

As if the photograph is not a selfie.

If these are not selfies, the someone else who took them must have been lying across the subject’s dash board, wedged into the windshield.  Also very accommodating on their part.

 

Mirror Selfie

 

These are straight-up selfies.  You can see the camera in the photographer’s hand as reflected in the mirror, usually with a small glare from the flash.  These selfies are honest, which is admirable.

Unless the photographer is also making a duck face.  Or an “Oh, my God, I feel so uncomfortable, I’m going to make my surprise fourteenth birthday party face.”

Or unless the photographer is looking away from the mirror at 45 or 90-degree angle even though, again, you can see the camera in their hand.

 

 

“Wow,” said Tucker as we elaborated on the selfie concept.  A few minutes later, he proudly incorporated his new word into a sentence.

“You get it!”

Although he has not ventured onto any dating websites just yet, he understands.  We all understand.

We all want to love and be loved for the things that make us as unique as our fingerprints.  We all want to represent those things to our suitable takers.  We all should get a second opinion on our merchandising.

And the Oxford English Dictionary should consult a few of us about adding some nuance to its selfie definition.   That is, if it intends to continue as a fortress defending the English language's embattled propriety.

Selfies, Part I of II

Selfie /ˈselfē/ - a photograph that one has taken of oneself, typically one taken with a smartphone or webcam and uploaded to a social media website.[1]

 

“What?!,” my friend Tucker said, cautiously panning our immediate happy hour neighbors to see if anyone had heard me and to prepare himself for damage control.

“Selfie!  Selfie is the Oxford English Dictionary’s Word of the Year.  Isn’t that ridiculous?,” I laughed.

“What is that?,” he more stated than asked, still partially afraid of this new word.

“Oh my God, Tuck...Hey, Guys,” I said to the coworker foursome sharing the high top table next to ours.  “What’s a selfie?”

The quick consensus answer: a self portrait with your camera phone.

“No-ho-ho, I’ve never heard of that,” Tucker resolutely laughed and gently shook his head.  Social media are not really his thing – he does not need them.

Selfie might be the verbal General Santa Anna to the Alamo of English language propriety, but the idea is nothing new to those of us who have studiously inventoried a dating website or two.  For us, the word “selfie” is simply a name for a creature that has multiplied and thrived for many years.

Group selfies do not count for this entry.  Those are a product of necessity; you and your friend after you hiked to the top of the mountain or you and the ladies in the limo for your friend’s bachelorette.

These are situations in which you have to take your own picture.  You want everyone with you at that moment to be in the photo.

Selfies produced by that unstoppable/unadvised duo, you and your camera phone, are the species that inspired this entry.  They are as unique as the people who take them; they are our digital fingerprints.

But still, we would all likely agree that most fall into at least one of few familiar categories.

 

(To be continued next week...)

---

[1] Retrieved from: http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/american_english/selfie?q=selfie

 

"Getting to the Next 'There'" by Alicia Robbins

Check out this useful post from an incredible woman and great friend:

http://www.icontact-archive.com/-eBE1BTTRFaO2qOO9GvWSN0zPrgHHtPh?w=1

Thank you, Alicia!

 

Biography: Alicia Robbins, SOC, is a union camera operator and freelance DP. She graduated with a MFA in cinematography from AFI in 2003. Since then, she has shot and operated on several award winning features, commercials, documentaries, and music videos. She is also involved with 3D filmmaking working as a rig tech and engineer for films such as Step Up Revolution and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes...(http://www.aliciarobbins.com/)

*Her photo on her home page shows everything you want to know about her.  

 

Wise Wielding, Part II of II

How many would convey too much eagerness – about your company, your product, your title...?

How many would convey naiveté – about your company, your product, your title...?

How many would seem awkward, inexperienced, pompous, shifty or reckless?

As if you would wind through a cocktail party, interrupting every conversation to hand a card to absolutely everyone without braking to make eye contact with a single person.

And how few would convey doubt - about your company, your product, your title...?

How few would convey embarrassment - about your company, your product, your title...?

How few would seem ill-prepared, sloppy, pure-intentioned, popular or stealth?

As if you are confident everyone you would want to contact you already knows how.

God, those people are cool!

They are in the ideal position – they are the brand.  They are the logo, company and name that would be on their tiny piece of paper.

Either you recognize them or you don’t and if you don’t, it’s no one’s loss but yours.  If they want to talk to you, they will.  They don’t need a card.

So cool!

At the furthest opposite end on that achievement spectrum, back about 13 or 14 years, we TV news interns thought we had the best of all of the perceptions above working for us.

Very few of us had cards. And if we had them, we would have felt like schmucks for giving them to people.  “Oh...they make cards for those positions these days?”

The correspondent for whom I interned may have offered – can’t recall for certain – but if she did, I definitely declined.

At the political conventions, there were hundreds of us, which means A> None of us was very important.

And B> There were so many of us, we formed dozens of mini-cliques that would gather in our makeshift break areas.  Our salons.

We would commiserate and conspire.

“Oh my God, that cameraman with WTH TV up on the mezzanine is such a (not good word)!”

“The one with the beard and the John Lennon glasses?”

“Shyeah!  I fully tripped on his cord this morning and when I said, ‘Hey, you should pick up that cord so no one hurts themselves,’ he told me to #%^+ off shoved me out of his way.”

“Thanks!”

Or...“If you want to talk to Senator A, don’t wait for her in that tunnel across from the jumbotron.  Her press officer knows we’re onto her.  I saw her go out another way this morning.”

“Thanks?”

We had to take each other’s advice with gratitude and suspicion.  We interns were in it together and in competition with each other.

We couldn’t take it personally if we had to body check each other to intercept Senator A as she disappeared into the tunnel opposite the jumbotron.  But we all secretly knew we thought we had considerable influence.  We respected that.

We did not have any status to the rest of the world and most of us preserved a precious status immunity in our minds.

These days, most of us don’t have that luxury.  We have to get the job, which is definitely hard, and then we have to do well at that job.  Great.   And at the same time, we have to represent that job and ourselves as best we can.

Without seeming too eager, naïve, pompous, shifty, reckless, doubtful, embarrassed, popular...

We have to take on the corporate world, protect, defend and nurture our company and ourselves to render our truest benefit to our shareholders, stakeholders and all the people we serve.

And part of doing that is deciding this one thing – how many business cards, how many tiny paper shields should others see that we keep with us?

Wise Wielding, Part I of II

It might be self-evident that we should be careful about our job’s infallibility by our own measurement – that none are completely perfect and we’re stronger, smarter people for acknowledging it.

That wisdom’s younger sibling is our eagerness with giving out our business cards - how many should we carry with us?

How many are too many and how many are not enough?

This is a lot more nuanced and yet, almost as obviously important when you think about it.

Ah, getting the job is a triumph.  One that could go unnoticed by almost anyone who didn’t see your job status update on your favorite social network.

But getting the business cards – that’s the real deal.  You are official.

Your name and the company’s name are on the same tiny piece of paper and they are there intentionally, declaring to the whole world in 12-point type that you and this company, you’re together.

You may not have a title yet, but you are part of that larger symbiotic whole.

You are ready to take on the corporate world, protecting, defending and nurturing that company to render its truest benefit to its shareholders, stakeholders and all the people it serves.

And you will wage that battle armed with nothing more than that tiny card bearing the company logo.  Your tiny paper shield bearing the domain’s crest.

Wow.

Before you line up in your starched phalanx or go renegade, e.g. venture out by yourself to get a latte at the café down the block, you need to decide this one thing – how many business cards should you keep with you?

Not for conventions, the corporate world’s speed-dating ritual, where it’s normal to have in your hand a stack of 100 cards held together by rubber band you had to knot together after it snapped,  Where 150 cards in the same bundle are too many. Even the rubber band knows that.

Not for drinks after work with your friends who work in the same complex, where it’s assumed you've probably all given away most of the cards in your card case by that time.  Where it's assumed at least one of you will have a left-over card or you can reach each other through your mutual friends.

But for your normal, day-to-day.

How many tiny paper shields do we need to protect our company – our domain - or ourselves? And how many would imply a weakness?

(To be continued next week...)

A funny from my mother:

Today's Short Reading from the Bible...

From Genesis: "And God promised men that good and obedient wives would be found in all corners of the earth."

Then He made the earth round...and He laughed and laughed and laughed!

Having a blessed moment

Have a great week and Happy Halloween!

 

Too Easy, Part III of III

About 10 minutes after pulling into my ideal parking space, I had purchased the three or four things on my list and was on my way back out of the market to my car.

Just beyond those automatic sliding glass doors, as I bobbed and pardoned through my fellow shoppers, I paused for one deep inhale to behold my automobile in that perfect parking space. The space I had coveted for so many years. Beautiful.

And vigorously walked to my car to deposit my groceries in the passenger foot space and glide my car out of the space just as easily as my good parking luck had allowed me to glide into it.

“Click” the seatbelt, look both ways, “kathunk” my gear shift into reverse and...”Ooh, nope! Not yet. There’s a car coming into the lot at the traffic’s speed and...

“Oop – yikes! No, not now either. That person walking behind my car isn’t paying any attention and...

“Go, go, you other two cars waiting just behind that person and...

“Seriously? Now there are other four cars queued up in the thoroughfare, waiting to get into the lot...Where did they come from? And...

“Ack! Thanks for letting me back out, but sorry, Guys. I can’t pull forward into the lane any faster. See? Those three cars that came in while I first tried to back out have stopped completely to allow the person in the last space to back out and I can’t move either direction.”

This shimmying back and forth, edging in and edging out, waiting and then hurrying...getting so far, only to have to pull back in entirely and start all over...this must have lasted five minutes.

Felt like 10, but let’s be conservative and go with five.

Five minutes of feeling completely stuck. Stuck in my parking space that for years I had thought I either won’t get or don’t deserve, that I had thought would definitely make life easier, more enjoyable or more rewarding.

That would make it just a little more possible to get everything I’ve wanted and have worked hard for.

That depended on many things coming together, from the grandiose to the mundane. Like my and probably many of our erstwhile dream job.

“Shyeah,” I smirked to myself, “I’ve been here before.” We all have.

We’ve all been in that place where our conditional reality, our one “My life would be so easy if...” isn’t anything like we expected.

That one thing we held out for, compromised and bent ourselves to get...may make life a lot more difficult. We may find ourselves stuck there.

“Well, at least now we know,” we say. True. We don’t have to burn any more emotional energy to fuel that candle we carried for that opportunity.

The logical conclusion that may follow from then on is to drive past our ideals to take the first opening that seems available and safe, but that doesn’t necessarily work either.

That safe spot may make our distance to our ultimate objectives that much farther, which would cancel that spot’s convenience. That’s a practical concern.

The much larger implication is that we may make it a habit to submit ourselves to living in our conditional reality paradox, “My life would be so easy if...” and it’s conjoined twin “Nah, that would be too easy, wouldn’t it?”

But what do we gain that way? We’re still setting ourselves up for an ultimate expectation of complete happiness with our most coveted goals, which we’ve already decided is too risky to try for due to the complete disappointment that is likely to follow, or we settle for a safe not-quiteness.

What if a better plan is to try to be a little more balanced? To continue working hard for our goals that will facilitate many other things we’ve worked so hard for, but to always remember nothing is probably as ideal as we think.

That we may always have to compromise and bend ourselves, no matter how perfect the opportunity in every other way, and that may make life a lot more difficult - as long as the things we may have to compromise and bend are not deal-breakers – And that no opening, job or place to park, is completely perfect.

What if, when we look at it that way, the consequences of not getting that spot soften and other opportunities we hadn’t considered before, the ones that will still get us where we want to go, become visible to us.

Our lives would be so much easier if...

Too Easy, Part II of III

That is a natural follow-up to our conditional reality construct.  To think that we either won’t get or  - for some subconscious or hyperconscious reason - don’t believe we deserve the things that we think will definitely make life easier, more enjoyable or more rewarding.

The things that will make it just a little more possible to get everything we’ve wanted and have worked hard for.

That’s one thing about being a single woman most of whose peers are married; most of my friends and I have the same goals and plans, but many of them comfortably expect they will have two incomes to help facilitate theirs.

I would like to get married to the right man, as may many of us.  However, I doubt any of us are willing to put our lives on hold until that happens.  Are willing to postpone everything we want for our futures.  Because guess what?  Our futures are now.

And if we know what we want in life, we have to tape our subconsciousness and hyperconsciousness’s mouths shut at their first peep of “Nah, that would be...”

We have to get after it now.

God, that’s so empowering!  Frightening, but empowering.  Of course, realizing our goals depends on many things coming together, from the grandiose to the mundane.  Like that first parking space at the market.

I usually go to this market at the same time everyone else goes there; at lunch, at dinner or just before the market closes to pick up that one last thing we need.

We are all usually there at the same time.  We are all usually in a rush or very, very tired.  Scoring that parking space?  That would be too easy, wouldn’t it?

Last week around lunch, I turned into the lot and felt my eyes widen in awe.  The parking space was open.  I stared in disbelief.

“No!  That’s not really avail...Oh, gosh, how did I get so lucky?,” I thought.

Then in my rear view, I saw the other cars behind me waiting to get into the lot.  I collected myself and pulled straight forward into the space.  Straight forward into the space.  Beautiful.

And that’s exactly how I felt about my dream job a few years ago.  I idealized this job, coveted it and worked hard over a handful of years to earn the qualifications, as we all do in our careers.

We probably all thought that position for which we aimed would be the way, or at least a way to achieve our aspirations.

I thought my career move would enable me to do something fascinating, challenging and ultimately quantifiable.   Something that depended on developing and maintaining long-term relationships that would be mutually beneficial to everyone involved.

A way I could provide for myself and perhaps someday coprovide for my family.  And I could do it for the rest of my career.  Ah...

Have you ever watched the scene in “Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason”[1] when Bridget and Mark run to each other over the grassy hill, wearing simple clothes and carrying a picnic basket?

They are wholesome, healthy and fulfilled.

Right.  That’s how I thought life would be if only I got that one job.  Again, ah...

After that handful of years working toward that ideal, my dream job opportunity opened.

“No!  That’s not really avail...Oh, gosh, how did I get so lucky?,” I thought.

I collected myself, thankfully made an adequate impression in my interviews and got the go-ahead to pull straight forward into that opportunity.  Straight forward into that opportunity. Beautiful.

This position seemed nearly impossible to come by and would not ever be easy, but if I could get the hang of it, I thought would make the rest of life much easier.  Like that first parking space at the market.

Like that one thing we think we either won’t get or don’t believe we deserve, that we think will definitely make life easier, more enjoyable or more rewarding.

(To be continued next week...)

---

[1]Hayward, D. et al (Producer), &  Kidron, B. (Director).  2004.  Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason (Motion Picture).  United Kingdom:  Studio Canal.

 

 

"Ah, Malibu"

Too Easy, Part I of III

“My life would be so easy if...” fill in the blank for yourself.  Grandiose or mundane, I think most of us have constructed those conditional realities in our heads.

My favorite is pretty simple.  A parking space at the grocery store.

“If I could get that first space in the lot, the one right in front of the market’s door, life would be so easy.”

For 13 years now, I have gone to the same grocery store almost every day.  Or most days in the week.  It’s very convenient for my typical life flow and it’s a pretty entertaining place.

And parking is usually available, but never up front.

You pull into the parking lot from the main thoroughfare, drive to the very end of the lot and make a hard u-turn around the median strip.  Well done.

But don’t take the first spot available.  You’d have to walk the whole length of the lot to get to the market, which would cancel that spot’s convenience.

No, continue driving back toward the parking lot’s exit onto that main thoroughfare.  About 70-percent of the time you will find one of the last few slots, either to the left or the right, is open and waiting for you.

By parking in one of those, your commute from your car to the store’s entry is not more than a handful of yards longer that it would be if you got that first parking space in the lot.  The space I don’t think I had ever gotten before last week.

“Nah, that would be too easy, wouldn’t it?”

(To be continued next week...)

Amen

“Come on, stay with me…keep going...keep going…look deep into that part of yourself where you’re scared to look,” said the panting man from his platform at the front of the room.

Most of my fellow congregants had their faces down, toiling to do as he urged.  As if fire and brimstone would rain down upon them if they didn’t.

“Only then can you find the truth…Only then can know what drives you!”

People all around me groaned.  Some shook their heads in shameful recognition.  Some wept.

“Whew!,” the man exclaimed, “just one more push and it’ll be time for the cool down.”

Yes, this had been a very gratifying spin class.

If you keep your eyes closed for a minute, you realize fitness instructors and evangelical ministers must be cut from the same cloth.

Even if their bike or altar is on the same level as the rest of the assemblage, they have an implied elevation above the group.  An authority.

Even if they have the audacity to loudly challenge us to look into the dark, private parts of our souls and don’t get any more specific than that, we know exactly what they mean.  We feel like they know exactly what is in there.

Even if they shout at us, grunt at us or clench their jaw while talking to us, while looking directly into our eye when we haven’t done anything to deserve that tone, we enjoy it.  We expect it as part of the cleansing effect.

Nowhere else in civilized interactions is any of that acceptable, but if a more evangelical minister, spin instructor or yogi doesn’t treat us that way, we leave the congregation.

If they don’t make us perspire, make us groan or make us cry, it’s just not worth it to us get out of bed that early.  If they don’t give us something to think about, we’d rather worship from our pillow.

But here is the difference...One must wear his pious ceremonial robes and necklace with a devotional symbol…The other must have some serious tattoos on his bare, glistening arms - not just an om for om’s sake, but something green, red, yellow and black that consumes his whole shoulder and bicep – or they aren’t credible.

One must consistently choose the right moment to evoke higher powers and that holy three-letter word...The other must occasionally evoke our baser energies and let fly with a careless four-letter word, or they aren’t impactful.

One must pace among your fellow parishioners and gently reach into your heart…The other must pace among your fellow yogis and gently tweak your asana, or they aren’t engaging.

One must have graduated from an esteemed seminary and must have left his demons behind…The other must have led fitness retreats to exclusive tropical resorts and must often indulge in divine “meditations,” or they aren’t qualified.

Both must lead you on a journey through all of the virtue and torment in your soul where words are useless, or they just aren’t serving their higher purpose.

And this is what you see if you keep your eyes closed...for a minute.     

 

Boom.

There are impressively subtle and clearly final ways to phrase things.  They are not verbal exclamation points, verbal commas or verbal ellipses.  They are verbal periods.  Boom.

It appears the art to using them is in recognizing the appropriate nuanced context.   Those contexts can pop out of nowhere.

But if a clever speaker capitalizes on the precise moment and you’re listening at that moment, you know what their words mean.

“Conversation closed.”

No conditions, additions or exceptions.  Even if they phrase their comment as a question.

You could implore further, but you know you probably shouldn’t. To what end?

While you may be somewhat insulted if the speaker intended the comment for you, you are also a bit impressed with their swiftness and how their response wasn’t necessarily rude.  Not on its surface.  But it was effective.

This kind of snarkiness is irrefutably elegant.

“Ouch,” you think, “but man, I need to study this art!”

A week or so ago, I overheard two professional associates in conversation with each other at an event.  Each of them chose the perfect verbal gem for the perfect moment.  Their own perfect “Boom.”

They inspired this entry.  Thank you to them.

The following are the top 10 terminal phrases that come to my mind.  Please comment if you feel compelled or wish to suggest any additions:

1. “I know enough to be dangerous.”
2. “God bless you.”
3. “I wouldn’t put it that way.”
4. “I’m glad you think so.”
5. “Well...what do you want to do about it?”
6. “I’m sorry that’s how you feel.”
7. “That’s interesting”/“That’s nice”
8. “I’m not sure what gave you that idea.”
9. “No, I heard you.”
10. “Don’t worry about it.”

And a bonus for good measure...”So what else is new?”

Here’s to those who have a knack for this art, and to those of us who have had the occasion to hear them.  May we all cultivate that skill to render the greatest good.

“Subject: FWD: Social Networking Romance”

From: Mom
Sent: Monday, Sep 23, 2013 at 9:52 PM
To: Paige
Subject: FWD: Social Networking Romance

From: DadBob [mailto:Mom]
From: NeighborCarl [mailto: DadBob]

 

"Yes, my dear, I live in a gated community..."

Social Networking Romance

 

From: Paige
Sent: Monday, September 23, 2013 9:55 PM
To: Mom
Subject: FWD: Social Networking Romance

 

And he's an actor who may be gay...

 

From: Mom
Sent: Monday, Mon, Sep 23, 2013 at 9:55 PM
To: Paige 
Subject: FWD: Social Networking Romance

 

When he is employed

 

From: Paige
Sent: Monday, Sep 23, 2013 at 9:56 PM
To: Mom
Subject: FWD: Social Networking Romance

 

True. 

 

~~~

When You Know..., Part II of II

What happens when we were absolutely positive we knew and did not have a single doubt in our judgment and still, we were wrong? What are our options?

We can comfort ourselves by weighing our decision’s consequences with the consequences from having chosen the alternative; the lasagna was not as good as the chicken cacciatore, but now we know better.  Next time, we’ll order the chicken.

Fine. No big deal. Compared to picking the wrong spouse or life partner.

Yup, that’s a biggie. And there may not be a next time. The chicken cacciatore may now be happily married with three adorable chicklets.

Another coping mechanism is to dismiss our fallacious choice as a function of the times. “I never would have picked that prom dress today, but that was hip at the time.” (See photo insert).

Or “I never would have gone into consulting in this kind of job market, but that was a hot job in the late 1990’s.”

Look back at our prospective career pursuits over the years and, at the time we wished to pursue them, they were probably really good choices.

Similarly, we can take the easy out, the “that was the right option for me at the time.”

This excuse is the sloppy catch-all; it can get us off the hook for almost anything. And better yet, very few people but our inner, inner circle can refute it.

That is why this is so dangerous. We won’t ever have to do that much introspection to plead this one.

All we have to do is write off our decision as being a function of time, place and absolute subjectivity – thus we have total impunity. Conversation closed.

OK, so we can get off the hook for not really “knowing” when we knew, but what if that’s not good enough?

What if we can verbally wrap our heartbreak in at least a few circumstance-specific explanations with a tidy bow on top, but it still doesn’t add up? When being wrong isn’t the problem, it’s that the consequences of being wrong nearly crushed our soul and possibly someone else’s?

When we had faith that we’d found the one thing in this finite life that would remain true for all time eternal and we were catastrophically incorrect?

How do we get out of that one?

It can compromise our faith in our own judgment such that we never want to make an important decision again. That’s healthy.

Or we continue making the same wrong decision over and over again, because at least we know we are strong enough to handle those inevitable repercussions.

Ooh-hoo-hoo, that’s even better!

“Sometimes, your heart is supposed to be broken,” one of my closest friends Trevor said.

What?

“That’s just the way life works,” my Dad Bob agreed.

You post mortem whatever went wrong, write it in a little note to yourself, send it out into the ether and move on, he added. Trust that you have internalized the important take-aways.

“But you can’t keep replaying the tape to see why you were wrong or what went wrong...save the analysis for the next time you’re ready to make a big decision.”

Otherwise, he explained, you halt any progress in your life.

“You get gun shy and you might talk yourself out of a viable option, because you’re afraid to make that same mistake.”

Or worse, he extended, you obsess over your fear so much, you nearly lock it in as a self-fulfilling prophecy.

You can’t stop eating just because you might not like the lasagna. You can’t stay home from prom just because your dress might look like Versailles via Vegas. You can’t stop working just because your job may not be the right fit. You can’t stop loving just because your heart might break.

You make note, you let go and you press on. And the next time you know, you might just know.

Prom Dress 1994

When You Know..., Part I of II

Indecision is human.  So, it appears, is the assumption that we have superhuman clairvoyance when we find “the one.”

Even the most stylishly jaded and suspicious people I know have come to the point where they believe it and will attest to it regarding something that is important to them.

Funnier yet, most people seem to apply that belief in our clairvoyance to everything we seek, no matter how mundane or important.

We can attribute that to another human characteristic, subjectivity.  But not really.

“I’m not sure what I want on this menu, but when I see it, I’ll know.”

How many times have you or someone with you said those same words?  Right.  And I am sure none of us would consider that choice very important.

So this clairvoyance seems to kick in for decisions of every magnitude.

During spring break my junior year in high school, my mother had a very extravagant idea – she and I would take a girls day to find the perfect prom dress for me.  For my first prom.

Thanks, Mom.

“Oh, yes, Honey, it will be wonderful...We’ll fly up to San Francisco, go to a few special stores, maybe take in a show and have a dinner.”

Huh?

This seemed a bit extreme to me, especially since you could find most of the same stores at home in Los Angeles as you could in San Francisco - and they would likely carry the same dresses. 

But this was our first spring without my grandfather Papa, whom we visited most spring breaks.  This trip probably had more to do with that for both of us than it did with my dress.  And a big night up there sounded like fun.

Incredulously still, I asked her on the way to the airport, “Mom, what makes you so sure we’ll find the dress up there?  How will I know those dresses are any better than the ones down here?”

“When you know, you know,” she answered.

Huh.

She was correct.  I did.  It was one-piece dress with a bone-colored silk brocade vest that tapered in at the waist, attached to a huge, glorious, floor-length gold lamé skirt.  Ah, 1994.

During fall semester my fourth year in college, some friends and I had a very practical idea – we would bring our freshly printed, gratuitously bullet-pointed resumes to the career fair in the huge event space above Memorial Gym and find the perfect job.  For our post-college “real jobs.”

Most of us knew what kind of job we wanted.  This would be a focused search.  But there were many companies representing many industries – almost every industry but mine, which was at the time TV news production.

How would any of us know which opportunity we wanted?

“When you know, you know,” one of my friends answered.

“I know, right?!,” I agreed.

They were correct.  They did.  And most of them went into consulting.  Ah, 1999.

During the early 2000’s, some of my friends had a very natural idea – they had met the one!  Their it!  Their perfect other half!  For the rest of their lives.

This caught on quickly and over the next several years, many had the same idea.  By 2010, most of my friends were married.

Their stories are all different – they met in college..., they met at work...,  they met at that dinner party the week they were both in Dallas..., they had always know each other, but they saw each other at that dating website and...

“When you know, you know,” they all answer.

Most of them were correct.  They did.  And they are still married.  Ah, married people.

During summer 2006, I had a very practical idea – trade in my car while it would still fetch a good trade-in value and get something that did not have so many harmless but expensive quirks.  The perfect car for me.  For the next several years.

I did my due diligence on models and prices, compared the most credible safety test results, discussed it with my Dad Pat and...waited a year.  That was the appropriate choice.

A year later it was go-time.  Dad Pat and I had revisited our discussion, I had confirmed the previous year’s test results still held and I knew the car I wanted.

“Sure, I will suspend commitment until after the test drive, but I’m confident about this one,” I told my brother.

“When you know, you know,” I added.

My research-born intuition was correct.  I did.  And I will continue to drive that car for the foreseeable.  Ah, Japanese engineering.

So we humans, when we know, we know.  About everything from our lasagna to our life partner.  But what happens when we’re wrong?

Right.  Uh-oh.

(To be continued next week...)

Tearproof Mascara, Part II of II

The next morning, I dressed and applied my make-up – everything but my mascara, the final touch.  I looked at my new purchase in its floral yellow box with suspicion, eyeing it untrustingly before applying it to my lashes.

This was a day when I needed all of the hyperbolic gimmickry to hold true.  A Tammy Faye-style mascara meltdown would have been messy, distracting and annoying.  It would not have honored my grandmother.

We had to get to the church.  I had to give this new mascara its fair shot.

The drive to the church – the same church where we’d had my grandfather Papa’s memorial 20 years ago – did not set me off.

Through greeting family and friends who had traveled from every part of the country, our family’s gathering in the private room off of the entry to the church and the grandchildren’s remembrances during the service, I shed only some minor tears.  Most mascaras can withstand those.

You couldn’t measure any of those tears with the same metric as the emotion that overwhelmed me as our family filed out of the church after the service.  As the bagpipes started playing “Amazing Grace.”

Oh, my God!  My eyes gushed like the Fountains of Bellagio.  But not for long.

And yet again, my mascara was fine.  Freakishly fine, considering.

At the reception at a town club, the family dinner later that evening and the grandchildren’s drinks in that pub in the old town area – the same pub where everyone’s grandchildren meet for annual rituals – the two of us remained more or less in-tact.

Neither the mascara nor I completely liquefied that day.

That day, the new magic goo in its iridescent aqua bottle became my secret shield.  The world could fall apart, but damn it, my face will not be an inky mess.

Sure, lofty and inspiring, but that proclamation presupposes I would have the opportunity to jump into that huge, viscous grief I knew awaited me.  As far as I was concerned, I’d only stood in it up to my knees thus far.

“You know what?,” I asked myself, “The day all of us get home from this memorial, I’m going to the market to buy enough provisions so I can get into bed for a few days and cry it out.”

Dive head first into that grief and not even swim against it.  Just let it surround me until I float back up to the surface for air.  Lie down beside it and let my fingertips dangle just beneath the surface in case I need to dive back in.

A week later, I joked with a friend I’d eaten most meals at home since I’d returned to Los Angeles, because I had stocked enough soup, rice and turkey meatballs marinara to sustain me through that grief swim.  The one I hadn’t yet had.

Over the last seven months, it had gotten easier to admit I’d not fully mourned Big Nance just yet.  Other than a few brief tears a couple of times in yoga, or in the market when one of her and Papa’s songs played on the sound system, or when I called her home in the Midwest to reach a family member and heard her voicemail greeting that still melodically assures she will return your call.

I hadn’t taken that grief dive.

However, that new waterproof mascara had continued to impress me.  Most days, I have worn the enchanted product from New York.  The plumping, lengthening one that stays on for hours…

But if I knew I’d be yoga that day, or would see an old friend I hadn’t seen in ages or would have an emotion-charged conversation, I wore that secret shield.  Every day I had a quirky premonition something would finally push me into that deep grief, I wore it.

I’d worn it often enough to rub away most of its brand logo.  It had held up well.

This mascara had a new true believer and I’d started wondering, almost doubting if I would ever have that mournful swim I’d expected.

“Maybe this grief will be smaller and more protracted, like those occasional tears in the market or when I call her home in the Midwest expecting to find a relative and hear her ‘Hell-oh.’  Maybe that will continue a really long time, but I won’t have a big cryfest.”

That possibility passed through my mind last week.  It became more credible, more soothing, as the week progressed.

Sunday morning, my heart felt heavier.  Church that day would be a good thing.

The last several years, I’ve resolved to go about twice a month.  It has never panned out that way.

“I’ll worship from my pillow,” I’ve joked.  This year, I’m making a more committed effort.

That morning, I dressed for church and applied my make-up – everything but my mascara.

I looked down at my make-up bag to find the glossy black, silver-trimmed bottle from New York, but something guided my hand to its iridescent aqua bagmate.

“You might need this one today,” I thought, and did not think anything of it again until I was in church.

I cannot cite anything specific the minister said during the sermon, but the tears came out of nowhere.  As if the minister had flipped a switch and I could not stop crying.  Not for long.

After the service, I hurried to the restroom to splash cool water on my face and blot my eyes.  Pulling the paper towel from my face, I looked down to see black smudges.  Waterproof, but not tearproof.  At last I saw this is true.

All day I cried on and off.  Most were long grief swims.  After each, I blotted away some more black.

For the last week, I’ve not been far from that grief.  I’ve rolled into it a few times by surprise.  Others, I’ve jumped in willingly.  This will probably continue until it doesn’t.

My flawed secret shield has done its best to keep me together, but a few times I’ve given grief its due and left my shield in its bag.  It would not have helped.

Planning or predicting when grief surrounds us and huge, syrupy tearproof mascara – both would be great and neither is possible.  With time, after a few good soaks in our mourning, it seems each becomes less necessary.  

 

Tearproof Mascara, Part I of II

Waterproof mascara and smudgeproof mascara are not the same thing.  Each meets a different set of needs for ladies with different sets of concerns.

I learned this very important lesson the day before my grandmother, the Queen Mum’s memorial in February.

This is the wisdom the sales representative so proudly imparted across her cosmetics counter in the department store as the incandescence from the display racks behind her illuminated her like an angel.

It was 25 degrees Fahrenheit outside the charming Victorian-inspired shopping center, our family had just lost our matriarch and those of us who had not packed something bright red to wear to her memorial had to find something ASAP.

That and I needed a mascara that could withstand the meltdown I anticipated having during or preferably after the memorial.  The one I’d anticipated for the last few days, but hadn’t had yet.  If only we could plan when grief hits us.

“Thank you, but which mascara is tearproof?,” I inquired.

I’d marveled endlessly the prior few months over the mascara I had purchased when visiting my friend Rebecca and her boyfriend in New York last autumn.  When we had to go to the high-end make-up emporium just down the street.

Ooh, yes, I agreed.

The enchanted black goo she wanted to show me can plump and lengthen your lashes beyond your imagination and will stay on for hours!

Oooooohhhhh...and it had.

But will it stay on while you’re crying huge, syrupy tears and feel like your heart is smashed to powder?  That is what I wanted to know from the perfectly styled 60-watt angel across the counter.

That’s not how I phrased it, but I’m pretty sure she understood what I meant.

“No, probably not,” she answered sympathetically.

I.e. yes, I should consider purchasing a different mascara for the occasion.

Smudgeproof mascaras are for long days at the office and will help you prevent flakes and, well, smudges, she explained.  Waterproof mascaras will withstand rain and yes, tears, but she could not guarantee they are “tear-proof” per se.

That’s fair.  But she did point me to a new, waterproof product in an iridescent aqua bottle.  One that she said would have the best chance of staying on, given the somewhat unspecified circumstances as she understood them.

That seemed to be the most substantial thing anyone could assure, given the circumstances as I understood them.   In addition to the certain grief that I knew would imminently over come me.  The same one that necessitated this gluey, brush-on insurance policy.

(To be continued next week...)

 

Keep the Change

Many luminaries have agreed simplicity is elegance.  But some things are so subtly perfect and simple just as they are, we find ourselves trying to complicate them.

We think it makes them more relatable.  Easier to understand.

That sounds counterintuitive, but many of us do it.  That, or we take that elegance for granted and skip over how whole and ideal that one simple thing can be.  How radically that one simple thing can change our day, or us.

Hearing an old favorite song on the radio at just that right moment, spotting a wrapping paper pattern on the rack in the grocery store that we recognize from childhood, or driving past a lemonade stand in the neighborhood.

The latter can be more annoying than not.  Usually, you only see them on those beautiful, clear days when you don’t have the time to stop long enough to breathe...much less to purchase a cup of lemonade.

“Really?  These kids are in my way,” you think when you first see the stand ahead of you.

As you drive closer to them, you start to question their motives.

“Shyeah...they’re probably just bored kids,” or “they’re probably trying to make some money to buy a new bike or iPod, or “they’re probably trying to get some experience starting a little business.”

...Like I did when I was their age,” you acknowledge as appropriate for you.  And you start to feel like you’re a big, fat jerk if you don’t stop.

“The lemonade is going to be warm and bitter,” you scowl.  “And those wax-coated cups have been sitting in the sun who knows how long...I’m going to get mushy, melty wax all over my fingers and lips and...”

“Oh, my God, shhh!,” you interrupt yourself.  “Quit your griping and buy a cup.”

So you stop your car.  Your more neighborly conscience won this victory by manipulation.

Not to be defeated without a little exhibitionistic flare, you arch your chin to the sky in homage to idealism before letting it drop in disgust as you exhale and refocus your eyes on the eager entrepreneurs.

And you usually see the most alarming thing – you see the joy or excitement that comes over their face that they have a customer.  Authentic joy and authentic excitement.  It’s a little unnerving at first.

“Uh...how much for a cup of lemonade?,” you ask, if it’s not already written on the brightly colored poster board or paper plates the children have somehow adhered to the folding card table.

Sure, 50 cents is a fair price, you agree.

Then you look up to see the concerned expression creeping over the parents’ or housekeeper’s face as their child pours the cupful and walks toward your car.

You try to read their look.  Is it, “Oh, my God, will Becky spill?,” or  “Will this person be a jerk?,” or  “Will they have too big a bill for Alex to make change...?”

These are all assumptions, but the visuals support them; you look at Becky or Alex walking toward your car holding your cup with both hands, staring at it with complete commitment, biting their lower lip to offset their anxiety...About what?  About spilling?  About tripping and falling?

Oh, my God.

Then you look back up at the supervising adult biting their lower lip as well....and then back to Becky or Alex...and touchdown.

“Here you go,” he or she says as they hand you your cup without spilling.  The minitycoon stands back, letting their pride straighten their spine.

You look up once more at their supervising adult, feeling your shoulders relax in sympathy with theirs.

Well done, you think as you had them your dollar bill.

“Hmm...and this lemonade is delicious,” you say.  “Keep the change.”

As you merge back onto the street, you start to appreciate Becky’s or Alex’s business model’s brilliance.

They considered the weather and recognized a need among their target consumers.  To fill that need, they prepared a product that requires minimal ingredients and supplies – one they could easily manufacture per market demand.

For their retail location, they require nothing more than a table-like surface and a street corner.  They handle their own marketing and sales.  Thus they have very little overhead.

They set up shop on a great corner for cross-neighborhood traffic, easy three-point turns and short-term stops.

Their price is very fair and these children probably chose that number anticipating most consumers would let them keep the change, which would double their revenue from each single-cup sale.

Brilliant!

Or perhaps they are simply some neighborhood kids who wanted to open a lemonade stand on their block for the day.  That idea makes you smile.

Even if hours later you drive by that corner again and notice the supervising adult is not paying any attention...

The children have become complacent with their monopoly power on that corner and have let their commitment slacken...

They have sold/consumed all of their merchandise and are chasing each other up and down the block on a sugar high...

Even if your brief stop hours earlier is the only time you see those children...

You realize their simple lemonade stand’s discrete elegance – so discrete you probably would have missed it most days – and how silently and decisively that elegance chased away the complication you tried to project on it...

You realize that one sale probably benefitted you more than it did the children.  Keep the change.

 

Evolutionary

Memories are usually something we try so hard to retain for our school, our work, our relationships; we diligently studied - or crammed - in school to remember everything for the exams...We take terrific mental or written notes to recall the ins and outs at work...We do everything we can to avoid that heartbreaking moment when our relative gently reminds us we forgot their birthday.  Again.

We don’t want to wash that blanket from our departed or absent loved one's bed in fear we’ll forget what it was like to be close to them.

We work so hard to hold onto memories while sometimes forgetfulness, might be more helpful and healthier than anything we remember.

“That's a no-brainer!,” you might think.  “How could you go on through each day with a smile if you’re constantly aware of the heavy things in your reality?”

Or “How could you interact with the negative people in your life if you always remember how horrible they can make you feel?”

Or “How can you have any peace within yourself until you fix A, B and C...?”

All good questions, I think.

Forgetfulness as mental revisionism is a somewhat infuriating, somewhat appealing idea.  Especially if your long-term retrospective vision has a rose-colored lens.

Forgetfulness as a means of distillation, of boiling your memories down to the most important nugget in each is slightly less alarming, slightly more assuring.

But it isn’t it also equally packed with subjectivity?  That idea could be equally infuriating and/or equally appealing.

An interview on NPR earlier this week brought all of this to mind.

The guest was a neuroscientist who discussed her new book about sleep and memory.  “People might think that memories, once they're formed, remain static," she said, "and it's just, you know, kept like a library book on a shelf, and then you can pull it out when you want to...”[1].

Sounds good.

“...But actually that's not the case. Memories evolve constantly. They change, and a lot of that evolution seems to happen while you're asleep.”[2]

For me, as for probably most of us for our own reasons, this is a bizarrely personal issue.  After the horrible car accident I’ve referenced over the last few weeks, I had absolutely zero memory.  For weeks and weeks and weeks...

That is a hidden blessing from some forms of neurotrauma – I’ll never remember the accident or my time in the hospital.

However in those weeks and weeks and weeks... I could tell you the same joke in the same five minutes without recalling.

Or I could tell you the same joke in the same five minutes without recalling.

Haha...TBI humor.  Sorry.

Thanks to all higher powers for the friends who kindly worked with me and laughed.  Repeatedly.  At the same jokes.  For weeks and weeks and weeks...

Taking on my memory loss was very difficult for me at the time – I’ve always remembered peculiar, sometimes arbitrary but often personally loaded things;  my sixth grade crush’s 12^th birthday party calendar date,  my primary school best friends’ phone numbers, a song that played on the car radio that night in high school when some friends and I drove to the farthest end of the next county  over for the boys’ school volleyball championships....Specific things that don’t mean anything to anyone else.

And I was afraid I’d never remember them again.

Remembering the facts, the specifics, has always been very important to me.  Ideally, for people like me, our ability to preserve those details hold us accountable for preserving the events as they actually transpired.

But then sometimes we forget how we felt in those moments and thus make the same decisions, repeat the same mistakes.

For others, remembering their emotions is very important.  Ideally their ability to be fully present in their momentary reality holds them accountable for preserving their emotional recall and letting that guide their decisions.

But then sometimes their emotional recall can vary in intensity based on their life’s content at any given moment and they have not retained any specific information to ground their recall in fact.

“...It doesn't necessarily always help us remember exactly what happened,” the neuroscientist said.  “Sometimes it helps us to recombine information, kind of extract out the gist, the main points, from, you know, lots of different experiences.”[3]

It helps us to let go of the facts and the emotion, and reduce it all to the most important take-away.

Which is itself subjective and, yup, evolutionary.

It's somewhat infuriating and somewhat appealing that might be the one thing we can hold onto.

---

[1] Gross, T.  (2013, August 15).  Of Neurons And Memories: Inside The 'Secret World Of Sleep' [Interview].  Retrieved from: http://www.npr.org/2013/08/15/212276021/of-neurons-and-memories-inside-the-secret-world-of-sleep?sc=tw.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Ibid.

 

 

Scars, Part II of II

Our stories about our scars never start on a light-hearted note.  We may have processed them over many years and reiterations so they now have a heroic, comedic, self-deprecating or endearing tone, but that was not how we related to our scars at their genesis.

At first when we underestimated that razor’s sharpness, it scared us to have those unsightly warnings on our gentle flesh...despite any cool points we felt we scored by shaving our legs so early compared to our peers.  That was so unnecessary.

At first when we did not notice the pothole in front of us on the bike trail until we had tumbled over our handlebars and scraped our arm impressively raw, it was embarrassing to have such a large tell-tale indicator.  That was so stupid.

At first when we woke up from our medicated fog after our surgery, we were mutedly alarmed when noticed an incision that had not been there before.  That was so unfair.

After my serious car accident – the one I mentioned two weeks ago – I did not have many visible injuries except for my left hand.  It was covered in painful, conspicuous and disgusting-looking glass lacerations and I was ashamed.

“What man is ever going to want to put a ring on this hand?,” I thought.  Yup, I was 18.  Marriage was nowhere near relevant.

When I arrived at college a few months later, I had to allow a few extra minutes every morning to cut custom-sized pieces of adhesive silicone scar sheets to fit over each of my lacerations on my left hand and a couple of other spots.  The sheets were colorless, but still pretty obvious.

Oh, and fun factoid to my new reality – the doctors told me they could not remove all of the glass from that hand after the accident without compromising its viability.  Therefore I could expect glass to “pop” out of my hand from time to time for the next few years.

Huh?!

That was so absurd.

Great.  So my hand was freakishly mangled and nifty little glass shards could spontaneously emerge from my flesh at any time as if to illumine secrets from centuries past, as in those fantasy adventure films from the 1980’s...Or as if to remind me of an accident I will never remember.

Too much, too much, too much.

All of those things we have endured in life were too much to handle at first.  Or too much to explain. Compound that with any other emotion that flavored our injuring incident.

Once we accepted those scars, vitamin E oil, special lotions or scar revision procedures may have been options we’ve considered or attempted.  Whichever we decided was appropriate.

If the option we chose was effective, that may have tempered our distress, embarrassment or anger.  But our scars are still there, if only faintly.

In a still moment during yoga class last week, I looked down at my left hand, pressed flat against my mat and looked at my scars.  Not each one individually, but at all of them together.

They have mostly self-corrected these last 18 years, having thinned and blended so they now nearly match the rest of my skin.  I often forget they are there.

My left hand’s got nothing compared to the markings you can see on many of your half-clothed classmates in that studio, or any other place where it’s customary to be no more than half-clothed, and the stories you’re tempted to imagine to explain those markings.

But if you watch some of those individuals, your narratives about them fade to silence.  There is something sacredly affirming about these people.  As if their scar does not exist.  That is the story you want to hear.

We all have hurts, emotional scars, but those are easy to minimize if we want to.  In fact, we think we’ve healed or invalidated them if we can reduce them so small that we can barely feel them.

We can flat-out deny we ever had those scars, if we think that suits us.

Scars on our skin don’t afford us that illusion.  They are visible and tangible, even if we are the only one who can see or feel them.  Even if we’ve reframed them with heroism, humor or any other tone.

They are irreplicable. They are ours.

They are a blessing and an onus; they are our very own and forever reminder of how strong and how fragile we are.  Our scars tell us our stories.

 

Scars, Part I of II

Hide them as we will, scars tell stories.  Funny stories, frightening stories, sad stories, inspirational stories...The richest tales they tell are the stories composed by people who don’t yet know you.   And those stories tell more about those people than they tell about you.

Scars are visible reminders that something hurt you and has never completely healed.  That something may still hurt you.

Spots on your clothing are easy devices to leverage as conversation pieces, but scars are not something most people feel comfortable discussing in conversation – neither the scarred person nor the person who notices one really wants to bring it up.

“Whoa, Dude, where’d you get that?”

Yikes.  Few people seem to ask that unless they know each other really well.  In most cases, we probably don’t want them to.

Moreover, the answer could be quite graphic – which would make everyone uncomfortable.

“Dude...I’m sorry I asked.”

Yup.  Makes two of us.   Even if we didn’t completely answer them.

Everyone has at least a few scars.  Those reminders from that surgery, that biking accident, or that very, very premature enchantment we had with shaving our legs.  Well before we had any hair growth to shave or any idea how to handle a razor.

Reminders from any combination of poor timing, poor choices or the catch-all - poor luck.

Our scars may not ever change much, but the way we relate to them is dynamic.  Our scars are our trademark, our constant ownership claim to the person we have become and will be.

Following that change – that is the real story.

(To be continued next week...)

“The Other Paige,” i.e. the Kindness of Strangers

Is kindness a policy for you?  Is it a conscious decision, a strategy?  Or is it natural for you?

Whichever applies, doesn’t it astonish you to consider the wonderful things that may have happened in your life due to someone else’s kindness?  Even if – especially if – you did not know that person?

It’s a strange idea and it’s intimidating.  How do we return the favor?  Do we hold out, watching for a tit-for-tat opportunity, or do we resign ourselves to hoping we can reciprocate that energy to the universe as a whole?

Or do we hope that someday, we will have a moment to meet those strangers again and say “thank you?”  Circumstances aligned perfectly for one of those recently.

“I’m sorry,” I said to the striking, tall blonde woman in the flowing pink dress at the party on Cape Cod.  “You look familiar.  Where did you go to college?”

This was my first night on the trip I mentioned the last two weeks – the night my jet lag from the red-eye flight compounded my fatigue from a handful of days with little sleep.

The night the inn where my parents love to stay had a “007”-themed party for which my parents dressed in costume...and entreated their appalled 35 year-old daughter to pose with them in front of the themed picture backdrop... which she, i.e. I, repeatedly refused to do until it became less embarrassing to pose with them and get on with it than to resist any longer.

Party Pic Lady did not like me.

The night when I wanted to enjoy a party, see some family friends and make some new ones in my peer group.  All of whom I quickly discovered are married, have children and can’t wait to catch up on every progression in each other’s lives since this time last year.  As they do every year.

Awkward, awkward, awkward.

But the blonde in the flowing pink dress did honestly look familiar.

“Vanderbilt University,” she answered, looking at me inquisitively.

“Oh my God,” I exclaimed, “so did I!  Are you one of the Singardt twins?”

“No,” she answered.  “I know them though.  I live in Atlanta too, but I’m Paige O”Kenney.”

“I’m Paige as well,” I added...

Paige O’Kenney, Paige O’Kenney, Paige O’Kenney...Nope.  I did not remember her name.

...“I’m Paige Nesbitt.”

“Oh my God,” she said, “I’m Paige Esposa O’Kenney.  You’re the other Paige!”

In our freshman class at Vanderbilt, we had five Paiges.  I know.  During my first term in school when I wanted to do almost anything but study, I went through our “Newcomer” picture book and counted.  Productive, huh?

We had five Paiges in our freshman class, but Paige Esposa and I were the only two who went by Paige.  The others went by a different name.

“That’s right!,” I laughed loudly.   “The other Paige.  I love it!”

Paige O. and I had not spoken in 13 or 14 years before that party.  We were not friends on any social networking sites, we’d not been to any of the same weddings or reunions.  Nothing.  And not for any reason, we just hadn’t connected.

She is married now with three beautiful sons and terrific husband.  Their family comes to Cape Cod each year.

As I listened to her updates about life since college, some vivid images flipped through my mind and warm gratitude unfurled in my chest.  Paige O. is a very kind woman.

January 1996, half my life ago, I transitioned into college after spending the first semester at home recovering from a very serious car accident.  Neurotrauma.  Good times.

When I committed to going to Vandy, I was a confident, socially well-adjusted high school senior with incredible friends, a great boyfriend and a loving family.

Fast forward a few months and I was a rapidly-expanding freshman who woke up one morning trapped in a latent awkward phase that made braces and perm hangovers from junior high feel like a beauty pageant.

I always had smile on my face that first term in college, but constantly heard the internal ticker counting down to that unspecified but inevitable moment when I would blessedly crumble, introvert, grieve and start to reconstruct my me-ness.  I prayed for that deliverance daily, but ooh-hoo-hoo...I knew it wouldn’t be pretty.

Until that moment, my only strategy was to try to act “normal.”  My college friends will unanimously tell you I was not successful.  “Freakishly chipper” is one description that resonates with my recall as well.

Yup.  And my first week at school, sorority rush began.

I had to wait to rush until I had at least one full semester of college on my transcript, which was a good thing.  If those were not the school's rules, you could safely say rush would not have been a good experience.

No one...spell that out: N-O O-N-E had the bandwidth to help that freakishly chipper, socially awkward new girl adjust to college life.  No one except for a very, very finite group of students and faculty for whom I will always be grateful.

Among that group is Miss Paige O.  The first Paige.

We’ve both evolved a good bit since college, but her kindness seems to have held constant, as it has with the others in that finite group from my first term.  I gladly took the opportunity to say “thank you” to one of them.  This entry is my thanks to all of them.

Whether it’s a conscious decision or a natural gesture, a  stranger's kindness can start a life-long friendship.

 

20 Years Later, Part II of II

“Let that be so” was my first reaction.

Followed quickly with an “Um...yeah.  My eyes have been open...for more or less 20 years...or maybe my whole life.  This is old news.”

...Which I quickly hushed with a judgmental statement scorning myself.  Sound familiar?

But I left that shop certain it had to mean more than that.  More than apparitions from magical poofs of smoke.

More than angels, Crystal Cathedral-style angels who swoosh over the crowd in Orange County North with flowing hair extensions so covetable you almost don't notice the camel dung stench from the real camels the magi actors ride down the aisle...More than anything grandiose or so clearly, indisputably miraculous.

I left that shop determined to keep my eyes open.  Every one of us has an event like that – one that puts us on-guard for something extraordinary.  One that fills us with expectation for something extraordinary.

Our first instinct may be to feel our eyes moisten with the sweetness from that expectation.  Or our first instinct may be to whip that naïve heart back in line. To “wise up to reality.”

In one order or the other, we likely hear both voices.

For the next few days, I went back and forth between the two; I took long, meditative walks by myself to the edge of town at least a few times.  I meditated quietly.  I prayed silently.  I felt the corners of my mouth rise in a wry smile, lovingly telling the universe, “Oh yeah?  Bring it.”

I opened my eyes and waited.

On my last day, I repeated that walk to the edge of town.  No miracles really.

In the cab back to the city to catch my plane, the cab driver mentioned something unusually coincidental, so I texted an “old friend.”  He and I exchanged a few messages about how funny that was.  And...no miracles.

At the airport, I met a few prophetically familiar people whose plane departure backed into mine.  Who were uncannily stuck at the same gate and had been for hours, on a different airline, but heading for the northern hemisphere in the same state as I.  And absolutely no miracles.

On the plane home, I settled into my seat and breathed deeply – until turbulence rattled our tiny plane like a maraca during a Miami Sound Machine tribute at two giants’ wedding.

The passenger two seats away, much younger and much surer of her grasp on the universe, sympathetically grabbed my hand.  “It’s OK!,” she assured.  She leads the tours on rides at Disneyland for a living.  That’s where my biological parents first met. It’s a small world after all.

And no miracles.  I comfortably drifted off after the first in-flight film.  Comfortably full from my fresh dinner-in-a-box that had originated that same morning back in my home state, some 2700 miles to the west.  Comfortably full of ambiguity as to what that painted sign on Cape Cod meant.

The same Cape Cod I’d last visited 20 years ago, when miracles seemed to abound by necessity.  Until I wakened – calmly and peacefully.

“Miracles can only happen before your eyes once you open them.” [1]

Noted, thank you.  Or sometimes, what if the miracle we need is the reminder to keep our eyes open?

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[1] White, R.  Miracles [Giclee print].

 

Price list at a Cape Cod ice cream parlor...

Wonderful.

20 Years Later, Part I of II

“Paigey, Honey, you promised you’d come to Cape Cod this year,” my mother pleaded on the phone a few weeks ago.

“No, mother, I specifically did not promise,” I clarified.  “I told you if my work schedule did not change I would…Oh. OK.  My work schedule hasn’t changed...You’re right, I sort of said I would come.  Thank you for inviting me.”

“We’ve been coming here for 20 years and not once have you come with us,” she added, having already won this topic.

“You’ve only been going there for 5-10 years,” I replied in disbelief.

“No-ho-ho, we haven’t,” she refuted.  “I looked it up and the first summer we came here was 1993.”

“Oh,” I said aloud.

“Summer 1993.  That was the last time I was there,” I thought silently.

Summer of 1993.  My coming-of-age summer.

"How was it 20 years ago?!,” I asked myself as a wind rushed through my chest.

Summer 1993.  The summer I studied at Amherst College with two close friends from high school in Los Angeles. 

The summer my heart broke repeatedly over family issues that persisted from my biological parents’ divorce 12 years prior.  The summer I started to get strong enough on my own to move past those issues.

The summer before my license, my first love, my…

"Whoa…,” I reacted as I catalogued the things life has unfolded for my family, friends and me since then.  “How has it been only 20 years?”

Those two questions – my dual incredulity about 20 years’ passage - repeated in my mind at least a handful of times in the last few days before this trip.  It swirled through my brain the whole drive from the airport in Boston.  It continues as a subtle state of wonderment.

My last time on Cape Cod was a one-night excursion from Amherst.  We students took a huge motor coach from the school, I think out to Provincetown, on farthest tip of the Cape.

We spent at least a couple of hours on a touring ferry, but the high point to our trip was a dance mixer for the students in our program at our motor lodge.  A motor lodge that had lots of “character.”

The next morning, we stuffed our backpacks into the luggage compartment in the bus and drove back to campus.  That was my last time on Cape Cod.

“So what’s with all this wonderment?,” I asked myself somewhat critically as the car turned into the drive to the inn where my parents stay.

“Huh.  It’s a pretty convenient distraction from a few other things on my mind, isn’t it?”

Some biggies.  We’ve all got them.

“And you need sleep.”

I shook my head gently in exhaustion from both the wonderment and the cynicism, banishing each back into their own corner of my mind for silent time.  But the wonderment did not stay still for long.

It’s very crafty about continuing to squeeze your heart without making a sound; it doesn't break any rules as you’ve stated them, nor does it relax its hold.

After my parents and I finished breakfast, we drove into the center of the village to see the artist’s studio, the shops, the “adorableness.”  I took it all in with the sharpest acuity I could muster.

“Mom and Dad, I want to go into this shop,” I said, pointing to an artisan’s gift boutique.  I’m looking for something specific.”

“No, I don’t have exactly what you’re looking for,” the shopkeeper said kindly as we finished looking through her merchandise a few minutes later.  “You might try Village Emporium across street.”

“Thank you very much,” I said as I turned to leave.  And just outside the door, I saw this:

 

“Miracles can only happen before your eyes once you open them.”[1]  Huh.

(To be continued next week…)

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[1] White, R.  Miracles [Giclee print].

Conspiracy Theory, Part II of II

“And why is it so hard to leave?”

By this point, you’ve let your fear of making the wrong decision erect a scarecrow just outside either exit from your depot – a fear of making any decision at all.

You’re no longer worried about the uncertain topography and climate once you choose a direction to move.  Straw by straw, fear by fear and self-doubt by self-doubt – no matter how erroneous – your bigger picture fears have built a decoy; it’s hard to see past your fear of moving from your safe place.

Your fat, slothful moment is getting away with murder and you can't blame it – it didn’t gorge itself without your consent.  You've never disciplined it to expect otherwise.

All it has to do is lie there, watching you pace back and forth, and listen contentedly as that lucky coin you flipped falls deeper and deeper into your bottomless stomach.  Head or tails…you’ll never know which the coin divined.

Sometimes you convince yourself that you have to be stripped that bare, uncovered by distractions or excuses, before sharp madness hoists you to your feet.

With each step it takes for you, you hush your internal hysteria with a tempting conviction that something truer thank you has taken over.  That the universe, as Emerson put it, has conspired to put firm ground under your feet as you take that first step outside your depot.

With each successive step, a pathway materializes until the madness has settled into purpose.  The path ahead is clear.  You conviction has anthropomorphized into a rucksack with everything you will need.  When you stop to adjust its mildly chafing straps against your perspiration-soaked back and shoulders, you look behind you to see your scarecrow in flames.

You can barely see your selfish moment any more, but imagine its conniving little eyes staring right at you from the window sill as your depot disappears with distance.  Someone else will arrive there soon.

Sometimes you convince yourself it has to get that dramatic, you have be reduced that far before all elements in life will coalesce to ensure your safe travels.

But what if that assumption is nothing more than toxic fatalism?  What if making things that difficult for ourselves does not make us any more worthy of our optimal outcome?

What if that indecision depot, that ever-fattening moment and certainly those scarecrows are nothing more than paper stencils through which we project all of our fears?

We all know them well.  We can cut them from memory.

What if we keep that rucksack closer with each journey?  Let each skinny, nimble little moment circle our legs and meow harmlessly as we stand on our empty depot platform to briefly study our map and pick our next direction.

As we go, knowing it will be OK.  Knowing even if we have to turn around or change course, it will be OK.

What a shame it would be to spend more of our lives in safe indecision than exploring the universe’s conspiracy.

 

Conspiracy Theory, Part I of II

"Once you make a decision, the universe conspires to make it happen.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson 

A friend posted that quote on her social network page a few months ago and it resonated - as it may with many of us.  And it resonated, because I was caught between some pretty big decisions – as may be many of us.

Initially that in-between space is a blank platform, a depot between at least two directions you could go.  Each may have a significantly different climate and topography as far as you can see and both may be very rewarding in their own way.  Both could be interesting, educational, but the uncertainty beyond your sight gives you pause.

“Yes, thank you, I think I’ll wait right here,” you say as you look from side to side and confirm there isn’t any imminent danger on that elevated indecision platform.  You set down your things for a moment to clear your mind.

That greedy moment quickly fattens into days, weeks or months and curls around your feet, snoring contemptuously.  Ignoring that taunting vibration, the depot has started to feel like home.  You’ve even hung curtains and covered the walls with a soundproof padding that protects you from any of the urgency outside.  It’s so warm and safe in indecision, you’d like to pretend you can stay there forever.

By this time, the decision is no longer between Direction A or Direction B, it’s now a decision between deciding or staying right where you are.  In indecision.

“How did I get here again?,” you ask in disbelief.

(To be continued next week…)

I Don't Know, Part II of II

When you think about saying it, do your shoulders and neck tighten and the corners of your mouth dip slightly, as if they’re all strung along your throat chakra like an internal pulley? Is it a shameful “I don’t know,” as in “I’m weak, defeated, uninformed, stupid…hide me.”

Or do your cheeks pull in as your chin raises and tugs your chest up to support it in preparation for confrontation? Is it an affronting “I don’t know,” as in “I’m so freaking mad at you, I don’t want to talk about it anymore. Conversation closed. Boom.”

Or do you exhale deeply and feel like you’ve just sidestepped a conversation landmine? Is it the failsafe escape hatch “I don’t know,” as in “Ooh-we!...I’m not touching that one!”

Or do you pause for instantaneous introspection and confidently, undetectably nod with yourself in agreement? Is it the “Hmm…Nope. I don’t have that information in my mental database.”

I.e. the “Eh. I know something about it, but not enough to have an informed opinion.”

I.e. the “I’m going to take a backseat on this one and see what the others have to say.”

That “I don’t know” feels really good.

A simple, honest kind of good. Let’s say you chose that one. Then look at the impressively elaborate calculus your brain did right before making that clean statement.

You could have avoided that fateful trifecta, “I don’t know,” however you would say it, and taken the easy out - the “Well, this is a sensitive topic. I’d rather not offend anyone who has a different opinion” – thus both saving face and seeming very aware, sensitive.

Sure, but what if that’s completely inconsistent with how you usually handle yourself? Or the opposite - what if the implied consensus on the topic is so resolute, that answer doesn’t work? You look like a positionless jerk?

You could have faked it and thrown out any of the words you’ve heard mentioned in conversations on the topic so people would at least know you were aware of it - so you get partial points for watching the news once a week. Sure, but what if you used those words completely out of context and gave yourself away as an absolute fraud – and a careless one at that?

You could have winged it, boldly attempting to reconstruct the New York Times photo caption you remember reading on the train that morning.

Sure, but what if someone asked you to elaborate?

Uh-oh.

Disasterdisasterdisaster. 

And my favorite – you could have referenced some higher consciousness seminar you yoga instructor led where you learned that fourteenth-century Sufi poets used to believe that the vapors from their tea were like the feathers on a chicken…

Sure, but what if everyone internally said, “Uh…right, freaking weirdo,” and came to unspoken consensus they would continue the conversation around you from that point forward?

You could have done any of those things, and some of us have a ahem reasonably sizable experiential catalogue on which to base our projections of the most likely results. Right, not so good.

Damn. Those are some very detailed and probably accurate calculations. Our brains are fast like that.

Instead we avoided all of that and said “I don’t know.” A cognitively amputated and insubstantial, or aggressive and confrontational, or crafty and untouchable, or concise and immaculate “I don’t know.” How we wield that verbal Excalibur is our call.

We left it open interpretation – ours and anyone’s who heard us. In that, there’s utility, wisdom and, yes, elegance.

I Don't Know, Part I of II

Say this - out loud or in your head, doesn’t matter: “I don’t know.”

Hmm…

Say it one more time.

Does it feel vulnerable? Does it slice through your thoughts mid-course, leaving them bleeding and flailing helplessly until the very question that gave them life in your mind has run dry?

Or does it make you angry? Does it imply an imminent, silent battle? Or does it absolve you, get you off the hook? Whew...narrow miss! Or is it good and solid? Does it strengthen you?

Those words can evoke some pretty complicated feelings, both for the person who speaks them and for anyone who would hear them. Or they can be the most elegant, informed answer you could choose. Your secret weapon. Roll that around for a sec, but stick with me…

I have noticed that phrase, those same words, have a more adaptable, varied meaning than most. The great thing is no matter the topic, that answer is not incorrect. It’s not correct either. It’s open to interpretation, but that’s what can be so scary.

We all want to have enough formal education or experience-taught savvy to keep up, or to have those whose opinion matters to us think we keep up, right?

Sure.

So we order the book, listen to the webcast from that think tank’s conference or carry around the same dog-eared geopolitical quarterly hoping for the chance that random circumstances will detain us somewhere long enough to read it…all to achieve sufficient – or passable – understanding. So we can pass our own test for knowing “enough.”

We want to avoid being caught with our knowledge knickers down, revealing our bare unsophistication.

Of course.

But all of that effort and evasion muddies those three little words. It obscures their utility - their wisdom. And, yes, their elegance.

Going with gross simplifications, that phrase falls into one of four families of meanings we could express. The one that rings truest with any of us, that is most familiar or most evocative – speaking only those three words – says more about the things we don’t verbalize than the things those words convey.

(To be continued next week…)