The Friend Who Knew Me
Several weeks ago I found out that my very first childhood friend had suddenly died. Though we hadn’t seen each other since we were thirteen, we’d recently connected on Facebook and the loss struck me deep and hard. She was one of the last friends who knew me as a child, before my brother died.
I met Ellen in nursery school. She had a playhouse fort in her backyard and she liked to play TV tag. We were inseparable.
We both had older brothers. We both had basements. We both had black cleaning ladies who sometimes stayed overnight in their own rooms.
Her mom, Jackie, had a wide, full, white-teeth smile and thick black hair with what seemed like natural curls, but I’d seen her with pink foam rollers in her hair on the morning after a sleepover.
Jackie let me call her by her first name. She never got mad at us. She always answered the phone “yell-o?” She’d hold the receiver in the crook of her neck while she stirred the pot of Spaghettios on the stove. The long curl of the phone cord stretched across the flower-wallpapered kitchen so we’d have to limbo underneath it to get to the table.
Ellen shared her bedroom with her younger sister Nancy, so we mostly played downstairs in the playroom. We gave our Barbies haircuts in the bathroom sink and played dress-up with her father’s suit jackets and Fedora.
The summer that my brother Lenny died, Ellen and her brother Marc and I went to the Young Traveler’s Day Camp together. We did arts and crafts and learned how to swim. I have a photo of us on Silly Hat Day, waiting for the bus in front of their house on Nassau Avenue.
Ellen was smart. Funny. A tomboy to play with. We both had pixie haircuts. We both wore PF Flyers. Her middle name was even Ruth.
She taught me how to ride a two-wheeler. She joined me and my mom on my sixth birthday to see Betsy Palmer in Peter Pan. We sat up in the balcony and we could see the strings that made everyone fly.
Ellen and I went to the same schools, but we were never in the same class. Still, we rode our bikes together and I invited her to all my birthday parties. But by fifth grade she had a different circle of friends. And then I moved to Arizona when I was fourteen and we lost touch completely.
But our moms wrote back and forth, so I knew that Ellen was living in Topanga Canyon and that she had changed how she spelled her name. And later, that she had gotten married, and her new last name was Belinski. My mother gave me her address in Riverside and I wrote her a letter. I was thrilled when she wrote back, a lovely note, how glad she was to hear from me and a bit about her life with Steve and her young daughter.
When the internet came around, she was the first person I searched for. She was now in Santa Barbara and a master gardener. I wrote again, shared about my 10-year relationship with my partner, Marika. And I didn’t hear back.
I couldn’t believe it, but I assumed my being gay was an issue for her. And then, about a year later she wrote me a letter, explaining that no, she was very happy for me, and that she’d been busy with things – that she’d had another baby!
Fast forward to Facebook, and we finally reconnected a few years ago. I loved seeing pictures of her family, her world travels and her paintings. It was fun to post old photos of her for her birthday. And I was glad to be there when she lost her mom to Alzheimer’s, and then her brother to cancer.
During one of our Words with Friends games, I asked Ellyn what she remembered about my own brother’s death. She didn’t remember much, just that he was there, and then he wasn’t. And that everything seemed pretty normal. She felt bad for not being able to tell me more, but I’m sure that her friendship then really did help make me feel pretty normal.
Last year I was going to be near Los Gatos where Ellyn was having an art show. We were both so excited that we were going to see each other after more than 40 years. But my plans changed and we didn’t meet. And we never did make another date.
To be honest, I had some reservations about meeting, I worried that our lives were too different, that we wouldn’t have anything in common. But, after reading everything her friends shared about the Ellyn they knew and loved, I realized that she was the same Ellen who was my best friend when we were five years old. And suddenly my loss was even deeper, because I missed out on having her as a friend in my adult life.
When Ellyn died, I thought I had lost that one-of-a-kind connection to my own childhood. But then I remembered how Ellyn and I had stayed in touch through all those many years of silence and absence. Because as long as I could see her in my mind’s eye and feel the energy of her being, she was with me.
And so, today, when I think I have lost her, I imagine her smiling face, with that wide, full, white-teeth smile, just like her mom. And she is laughing and happy and radiant. Simply radiant.
The Year of the Horse
In Chinese tradition, this is the Year of the Horse, a year of galloping forward, of fast victories, unexpected adventure, and surprising romance. No wonder my new friend is a horse.
He lives on the hill right next to Paradise Park. I watched him all last year from afar, and then he was gone. But a few days ago, on my way to the beach, I saw him and I swear, I squealed, out loud, “The horse is back!”
That night, a little before sunset, he was standing about 30 feet away, on the other side of the old, rusted, falling down, barbed wire fence. I held up a carrot and he trotted over. And I realized that he was actually a she. She ate the carrot and then kept licking my hand. I closed my fingers into a ball and she started to nibble me with her gums. I talked to her, out loud and silently, and we looked each other in the eyes. When I walked away, she followed along the fence until she couldn’t see me anymore.
When I thought she was a male I called him Waldo, because he was always so hard to find on the big hill. Now that I know she is a female, maybe I will call her Jessie, for the stripe of gesso paint on her face. I wondered, what do you call that long slope of the head between the eyes and the mouth?
I found several diagrams online that named the parts of the horse, like coronet, at the top of the hoof, and chestnut, a spot behind the forearm. But there was nothing identifying the area between the forelock and the muzzle.
I have had very little experience with horses. I have a picture of me feeding sugar cubes to the milk man’s horse when I was three. When I was seven I went to Rocking Horse Ranch with my uncle and cousin. They rode horses all weekend and I played in the indoor swimming pool.
None of my friends took riding lessons or dreamed of having a pony. The first time I rode a horse was for a friend’s twenty-fifth birthday. I remember the jerky motion and the saddle and the soreness for days after. Since then, I’ve had no contact, nor have I felt any connection or attraction to a horse.
But in the past three months, I’m suddenly very curious about them. I met some a few weekends ago, waiting in their horse trailer in the parking lot at the beach. There were four sleek, brown horses standing against the open-rails of their trailer and I walked up to them. I looked them in eyes, I talked to them through my heart and they made noises I didn’t understand.
And now, this horse has appeared, right outside my big wide windshield. I saw her several times during the day, grazing up near the water tower, then behind and above the trailer directly across from me. And sometimes I don’t see her at all. I’m guessing she’s behind her feed house or on the other side of the hill.
Yesterday, my neighbor Muriel walked over to the fence with her 12 year old son, Ethan. The horse came right up to them so I joined them. Muriel was raised on a farm and she said the horse is young, maybe three, very friendly, social, alert, interested. And she has good teeth.
She showed Ethan and I how to hold our hands with our palms open, so the horse could check us out. “Hold it like a fist and she thinks it’s an apple. Point your finger and she thinks that a carrot.” No wonder she had started to nibble my closed hand the night before.
Later that morning she talked to our neighbor Mark, who knows everything about everyone in town, and it turns out that this is not Waldo, the horse I watched all those months last year. Waldo was 20 and died about eight months ago. This is a new horse, also owned by Marvin, an old-time cowboy who lives in town.
This morning, Ethan was standing at the fence with binoculars, looking toward the horse’s feed house. I assumed he was watching the horse, but when I followed the line from his binoculars, I saw a hawk perched on a tall, lone pole on the hill, near the house.
I went outside and met Ethan on his way back to his house. “What did you see?” I asked. The hawk was no longer on the pole.
“It was a red-tailed hawk. He’s over there.” Ethan pointed to the grove of trees on the bluff. “See the darker tree? He’s at the very top. On the right.”
I found the bird’s silhouette, a sharp protrusion at the top of the ragged outline of the tree.
“Have you seen the horse?” I asked.
“No, not today.”
I scanned the hill for her among the wisps of dried brush, but she wasn’t around.
“So have you named her yet?”
“Well, according to Elise, (his five year old sister), it’s Lucky.”
“My first dog’s name was Lucky.” I said. I’m sure I smiled.
“I got two bags of carrots at the store today for the horse,” I said. “They were only 37¢ each. So if you get permission, I’d love to have you join me in a carrot feeding.”
Ethan’s mom has taught them not to feed other people’s animals, unless you have permission because you never know if there are special circumstances.
And besides, there was a sign.
“So, here’s a question…” I pointed to the worn wooden sign with faded white letters that said Please Don’t Feed The Horse. The top right corner of the wood, including the E in please, was gone.
“So, do we respect the sign? Or, did it apply to the OTHER horse? Can we feed THIS horse? Because this is a different horse?”
Ethan tilted his head toward his left ear and shrugged. “I don’t know.” And I didn’t know either. But I knew that I wanted to.
Later in the afternoon, I was sitting at my picnic table writing and scanning the hill to see if the horse was grazing nearby. Julie, another neighbor, walked by and she knows Marvin, the horse’s owner. She said the reason he doesn’t want people feeding the horse, is so that she doesn’t lean over the fence.
“But she leans over even if I just go up to her,” I said. “And I’m not going to stop doing THAT.”
Julie smiled and said, “Oh, just do it. I won’t tell.”
“Well, still, maybe you can ask him for permission to feed her carrots?” I said. “And can you find out what her name is, too?”
That evening, as the sun disappeared behind Horse Hill, I watched and waited. I had cleaned the RV windshield so I’d have a clear wide view. I felt like a kid, waiting for my new friend to come over and play.
The red-tail was back on the post. And the horse was grazing in a flat patch across from me, about twenty feet away. I ran out with my carrots and called to her from the fence. But her head was down, facing away from me, and she didn’t even notice I was there. I waved my hands. I whistled. I took a bite of the carrot. It was crunchy and sweet.
A Simple Game of Questions
There was a fun game going around on Facebook a while back. A friend chose the age for you and you had to reflect back and answer the questions as they related to you at that age, and then also at your current age.
Like most quizzes, the important thing was not to spend too much time thinking of perfect or clever answers, but to simply respond with whatever came up in the moment.
A friend gave me the age of 26:
I was: 26
I lived in: a semi-furnished one bedroom apartment over a garage in Tempe, AZ
I was married to: being single, independent, the best
I drove: a Plymouth Horizon
I feared: nothing
I worked at: Computer Pro, preferring to demo the Apple IIGS and Macs than IBMs and Compaqs
I wanted to be: top salesperson every month and I was
Then, when it came to my current age, I wrote:
I am: 54
I live in: my RV across the street from the ocean in Cayucos, CA
I am married to: my technology
I drive: a blue RAV4 with white flower stickers (it makes people smile and it helped my mom see my car)
I work at: staying present, enjoying what is, keeping my heart open to love, light and compassion
I want to be: in a wonderfully exciting, loving, intimate, heart-sparking relationship
After I hit the POST button, I reread my responses and noticed that my answer about being in a relationship didn’t say if this relationship is with a person, my work, my art, my writing…or what. And that I had somehow omitted what I am afraid of now.
I found both of these things very curious and revealing. And it’s had me thinking about it ever since.
So I invite you to answer these same questions for yourself. Don’t work too hard at the answers. Go with whatever comes up first. See if anything surprises you, reveals something in a new way, gets you thinking about who you are and how you show up in the world.
I was: 26
I lived in:
I was married to:
I drove:
I feared:
I worked at:
I wanted to be:
Then, answer them again, using your current age:
I am:
I live in:
I am married to:
I drive:
I fear:
I work at:
I want to be:
If you’d like, I’d love for you to share your answers by clicking on the Comments below.
Whale Watching: Is There a Metaphor Here?
photo courtesy of subseatours.com
The last time Marika and I went whale watching, we both got seasick. But it was more than twenty years ago. And we both wanted to try. And this time we would take some pharmacist-recommended bonine pills before we went out.
She took two pills with her tortillas and cheese breakfast. I decided I didn’t want to feel spacey, so I put my no-more-nausea- seasickness bands on the pressure-points on my wrists and we headed out.
It was a clear, crisp, blue-sky morning. I bundled up in layers: an under-camisole, brown turtleneck shirt, mid-weight fern green sweatshirt. My top layer, my over-sized blue Morro Bay hoodie that I bought in 1995 was on the seat next to me. I had my knitted hat on and I regretted not bringing gloves.
The boat was a catamaran, like an oversized pontoon, but with two tubular hulls to float the boat instead of one. And it had a motor. The sides of the boat were about four feet high and the deck was open to the sky with five rows of white, wooden benches to sit on. I took the end seat on the left in the second row. Marika sat next to me, on my right.
The water in the bay was smooth and easy as we made our way past the raft of harbor seals toward the harbor. Captain Kevin stopped the boat and the Naturalist, my friend Ruvi from the bird festival, pointed out where to look for the peregrine falcon.
“Three quarters of the way up the rock, do you see the waterfall of guana? Look to the right of that, in the shadow of a rock that looks like a fist.” I borrowed Marika’s binoculars and found him, tall and still, perched in the small crevice.
But looking through the binoculars as the boat rocked was making me immediately uneasy, so I handed them back to Marika and refocused my attention on connecting my body with the rhythm of the water.
Morro Bay Harbor is one of the more dangerous harbors on the Pacific coast. The entrance is narrow, bounded on both sides by high, dark rocks, and big swells can create dangerous conditions in the bowl of the bay.
Last week we joined the other tourists and locals who came to the harbor to watch nine and ten foot waves break over the jetty. Hard-core surfers took their boards out into the swirling surf and people perched themselves on the most inland of the rocks to watch the show.
In fact, the surf was so high that they cancelled the whale watching tour we were supposed to go on last weekend and rescheduled it for today.
I’d been watching the water the past few days on my morning beach walks. The ocean was still more active than usual, but the waves were smaller and slower and there was much less wave action on the horizon.
From my seat on the boat, the waves looked calm and easy. Ruvi came up to me and pointed far out, past Morro Rock. “There are some whitecaps out there, so it may get a little choppy. “Uh oh,” I said. “Why?” he asked. “Do you get seasick?” Marika and I both nodded. “But I’ve got my meds on board, so I’ll be fine,” she said. I turned to her. “OK, can I have one too?” I took two, chewed them as directed, and had a sip of water.
The boat followed a curving route away from the marina, around the corner of the sand spit, between the red and green buoys toward the open ocean. Just past the jetty, the waves became a roller coaster of five foot swells, raising the front of the boat up, then dropping it. I WOOHOOed loudly with the kids in the front row, thinking that being one with the movement would ward off getting seasick.
I screamed and smiled, feeling the water rise and lift us, then fall out from under us. My torso rolled forward, my hips settled back with each swell. The cold wind felt good on my face as we rode the waves toward the horizon.
The boat turned right, cutting across the water, parallel to the coast. The engine at the back of the boat roared over the water sounds as we headed north. The wind kicked up and I pulled my hoodie on with the hood.
“The gray whales are migrating south, from Alaska to Baja in Mexico and pass through the open waters just beyond Morro Bay.” Ruvi stood on the storage box labeled “Adult M Life jackets” and pointed out over the water.
“Watch for spouts,” he said. “ It’ll be like a spray from a garden hose in the air.” We all scanned the endless waters on all sides of the boat. The water was getting choppy and there were small whitecaps where we were headed.
The swells were only a foot or two high, mostly slow, gentle rolls. But they were constant, and coming from all sides now. I took off my hoodie. Even though the wind was blowing cold, I was suddenly feeling warm and flushed.
Ruvi squatted next to me and asked if I was OK. “There’s less movement further back,” he said, pointing to the row of seats behind me. He was right, I felt less of the swaying. But it was too late. I hurried to the back corner of the boat, hung my head over and puked.
He brought me a bottle of water and encouraged me to splash some on my face. It did help. For a while. Until I had to puke again.
I sat back down next to the droning engine. I turned my head into the breeze. I tucked my face down so I couldn’t see everything moving. I tried chanting but couldn’t get past the first line. I looked up to catch glimpses of what everyone was seeing. But mostly I just sat in that back corner and waited for it to be over.
But, we did see gray whales! Three of them traveling together. And there were displays of mating behavior and fluking and we were close enough to see the barnacles on their skin.
It was an unsteady walk back to the car and I was shivering. Marika gave me dry socks when we got home, turned the heat on and I got in bed and slept for three hours.
I was hungry for pretzels when I woke up. Marika and I talked a little about my whole ordeal. “I knew the minute I saw you take your hoodie off that you were in trouble,” she said.
“Thanks for coming back to check on me.” She had spent the last hour of the trip at the back of the boat with me, but still watching all of the whale activity that was happening in the water.
I asked her to tell me what she saw, what it felt like to scan the waters, watching and waiting.
“There were three whales and they were moving so erratically in the water, not swimming in a straight line, so the boat kept moving to find them.” I remembered hearing Ruvi shout out the different positions on the face of a clock. “First they were in front of the boat, then off the right side at 4 o’clock, then they spouted again behind the boat.”
“Males or females?” I asked. “One female and two males. The second male holds the female in position for mating.”
“What did Ruvi say about them swimming with their fin on it’s side?” “That was the mating behavior.”
“WOW!” I’m glad everyone got to see it!” And I was. I didn’t regret the day at all. “Now I know that I don’t do boats,” I said. “And now I know that I can,” Marika said.
I tucked into bed early that night with a hot cup of ginger tea and a check in on Facebook. I had no pictures of whales to share but it was still a very good day.
Showing Up On the Page
I am writing.
Not just blog posts and my Mac tips, but real writing with sturdy nouns and persuasive adjectives, full delicious sentences that appear on the page as if by magic.
Writing that isn’t about making a point or sharing information or already knowing what I want to say.
I’m writing from a deeper, more creative place. And yes, I have a book in the back of my mind, but I’m not writing for it to be a book or published article in a magazine. I’m just writing.
I’ve been making excuses for months, years, really, about why I don’t have the time or the energy for this kind of writing.
But really, WHEN I AM WRITING LIKE THIS I GET ENERGIZED!
Writing is one of my very favorite things to do. I get lost in it. Time has no meaning when I am following a sentence on the page, finding the absolutely perfect way to describe the bending shadows of a tree or how it feels the day after you meet a favorite author.
Some days the sentences come right away and I write several pages. Sometimes it is a slow kindergarten start, and I just rhyme words to oil the machine.
That’s what Maya Angelou does.
She says, “I write until the muse is convinced that I’m serious and says, Okay. Okay. I’ll come.”
You see, you have to be willing to show up and be serious. You have to be willing to not know where the story is going. You have to give yourself up to your muse, your guide, your creative spirit. With no expectations of the outcome.
Not knowing. Not needing. Just giving voice to that which needs to speak.
And the words are coming because I’m showing up at a regular time every day, my fingers on the keyboard, open, ready, wanting.
Hanging out with other people who understand this process is great inspiration. Being in the presence of other passionate people is uplifting. Motivating. It truly raises your vibration and calls the words to the page.
I used to think that I had to stop reading when I was writing so that I wouldn’t be distracted, so that my energy wouldn’t get diffused. But really, reading other people’s writing fuels my own love of language. It reminds me even more why I write. And so, for the very first time ever, I am part of a reading group. And it’s true, reading and talking about other people’s writing sparks my own craft.
So what are you ready to show up for?
What do you absolutely love to do?
What is the thing that takes you out of time and space, that energizes you, that you wish you could do for hours without interruption?
What is the thing that sparks your heart and gives you life?
And how are you going to begin?
I’d love to hear your comments. Please share them with me and my readers by clicking on the Comments below.
Sitting In Stillness Opens a Heart
“Beautifully Balanced” by Deborah South-McEvoy
Life is funny sometimes.
We tend to avoid what we need and want the most.
And then circumstances happen and we are suddenly faced with exactly what we weren’t able to give to ourselves.
Leaning into it, accepting it, can be a challenge.
But when we are able to be grateful for the experience, magic can happen.
Several weeks ago I tweaked my back (again) and spent five days resting, moving slowly, doing virtually nothing.
I couldn’t walk the dogs or do the laundry or run errands. I couldn’t sit at my computer for very long. I couldn’t do any of the things that I usually do to distract me from my heart work.
But it was such a gift, really, to have my body step in for me and give me what I most needed–time to let go and do nothing.
Because it is in this quiet space of stillness that we can choose to release the struggle and begin to ask, what do we really want.
The weeks leading up to my tweaked back had been very stressful, emotional, and challenging and I was feeling especially agitated, restless, uncertain. I had big choices to make and I had no clarity about anything.
I knew that what I most needed was to let go of all of the struggle and just step away from myself and create some space.
But I was too caught up in it all to do that.
And then I tweaked my back and had all the space in the world.
Now, when I’m not overly stressed, I do have a habit of creating quiet time in my life on a regular basis. And so, when faced with this sudden stillness, I was able to relax into it, grateful, even, for the opportunity, even though it was physically painful.
And in the stillness of not working, not housekeeping, not care taking, I could feel myself letting go of the struggle.
I was taking deeper breaths. I journaled. And I got very clear that I wanted to manifest more opportunities for community creativity in 2011.
Not surprisingly, as soon as I named and claimed this, emails appeared in my Inbox with opportunities to do just that. (Really!)
And I was standing straight again, walking my regular pace. I felt a lightness in my body and so much excitement in my heart for these new possibilities.
Struggle is hard. Stillness can be uncomfortable. But, for me, leaning into that quiet space is the only way to let go and discover what my heart really wants.
So how can you create some quiet stillness in your life?
Here are just a few suggestions. I’d love to hear your ideas.
· practice yoga
· take a long walk in nature
· listen to music without words
· color, doodle, draw without expectation
· take a nap in the middle of the day
· massage your dog or cat
· play an instrument
· lie in the grass and watch the clouds
• go on a weekend retreat
New Year’s Un-Resolutions
Do you begin the year with a list of New Year’s Resolutions? Things you swear you are going to do or not do that will make this year different than all the rest?
And then, just a few weeks into the year, you realize you’ve abandoned your list, slacked off on all of the things you swore would be different this time?
And you feel pretty down on yourself?
Face it, resolutions are a great concept, but they’re usually goal oriented and don’t address HOW to achieve what we want.
Here are some simple suggestions to help you focus more on the HOW of the changes you want to make in your life.
1. Take some time to discover what you really want
2. Be brave and say it out loud
3.Join an online coaching circle
4. Be open to opportunities that may not look like your original vision
5. Do more of what you love
6. Hang out with people you admire
7. Find more balance between your body, mind and spirituality
8. Say NO more often to the things that don’t make your heart sing
9. Say YES more often to what tickles your fancy
10. Imagine yourself already being, doing, having what you desire
Another tactic is to rephrase your resolution.
Instead of lose 20 lbs, how about, make healthier snack choices. This gives you a concrete action step that you can take, a HOW TO for losing weight. It gives you something tangible and real that you can choose to do that supports the results you want.
Every day is a new opportunity to say YES to what we want, what we really want. Every day offers us a chance to choose HOW we can make that possible.
So what do you want to to make happen in your life?
What do you want to manifest in 2013?
I’d love to hear what you’d like to manifest in your life this year. Post your dreams here in the comments and you’ll be doing step #2!
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Postcards from Paradise
I am back in California and I am so grateful for this freedom that I have created for myself to be able to move between places and appreciate the joys of each of them.
As I drove back with the strong intention of focusing these next three months on writing my book, I realized that I have long dreamed of spending a winter at the beach and writing. For years I thought it would be in Cape Cod. I even had a friend who invited me to stay in her cottage in Wellfleet and I would just have to pay for the heat. But winter can be brutally cold there and most of the stores and restaurants close for the season. And there are no fresh fruits and vegetables in the winter.
But here, in Paradise Park, there is a lovely balance of solitude and community. It is my perfect sweatshirt weather, and I have the time and space to walk and notice and write. And there are farmers markets all year round.
So I’m taking my time to re-acclimate, settle in and WRITE!
Thank you again, so much, for sharing this journey with me!
I’ve been posting on Facebook and have copied some of them here as snapshots of my first week back. Enjoy!
I am home. With my other love, the ocean. Remembering why I am here and so feeling blessed that I can be. I’ll be taking the next few days to re-acclimate, unpack and settle in.
I’m in a new spot in Paradise Park. I was surprised at first, but now glad because I’m not so obviously reminded of my life with Laddy when I was here before.
Of course I think about him and miss him, but there is less sadness and loss and more about simply noticing his absence and remembering what a great dog he was and how much I loved him.
My new spot is on the back row, facing the trailers in storage and Horse Hill. When I move my chair to the edge of the grass, I have a spectacular view of the ocean. I walked on the beach (ahhhhh), and for a long time I was the only one around.
I said hello to people and dogs and watched the sun go down, then I took myself to Duckie’s for Caesar salad with fried fish on it. YUM! And enough for lunch tomorrow. Welcome Home…
heater and hat are on. enjoying hot ginger tea and an oatmeal raisin cookie, deciding what to do next….
It is a cold, cold morning here at Paradise Park. Turned the space heater on at 4:30 but didn’t get out of bed until 7:45. Now the water heater is readying for my shower and I need to clean the coffee machine after this first horrid morning cup. But I am HERE and a morning beach walk is definitely on the horizon. Happy Friday, y’all!
Great morning beach walk. I could have been wearing shorts, even though the folks I passed were bundled in hoodies and sweatpants. Clear, crisp air, low rolling waves, fast-romping dogs….then visited with the park owner in the office, catching up on the news. now home with a list of possibilities for the day.
The sun is lower than Horse Hill. Time for an evening stroll. First I have to change clothes again, back to long sleeves and a sweatshirt. I am re-learning the weather here.
Happy weekend. It’s been windy here all night which means the RV has been rocking all night. Once I knew it wasn’t an earthquake, I was fine with it. Now enjoying coffee from a cleaned pot. So much better.
Sitting at the dinette with my lunch and I just noticed a peekaboo view of the ocean between the eucalyptus trees. Wow!
Eyes closed: Salty sour sea air, rolling waves, the clack clack of a skateboard in the parking lot.
I met a white lab on the beach, Bodie, and he dropped his tennis ball for me. We played many rounds of kick the ball, and the whole time I was thanking Mabel for all of the practice.
It would be very easy to just turn the heat on, enjoy some hot tea and tv and tuck in for the night. But I am choosing instead, to bundle up and walk down the hill into town for tonight’s annual Christmas event. There will be carolers, and cookies and refreshments and cider and wine tasting and even free carriage rides. I can see the lights of the cars arriving… so off I go….
It was a fun outing. Talked with a young couple from Australia traveling the west in a rented RV, saw some of my neighbors, and spent a good amount of time talking with the woman who owns Happy Go Smile, who lost her job and ended up opening this fun and successful shop. And I brought home a handful of sweet treat samples: a mini pumpkin pie, peppermint gelato! three different cookies. Now I can enjoy that hot cup of tea with TV. And slippers.
https://www.facebook.com/HappyGoBarb
I read the flyer for the yoga class. Twice. I swore it was going to be a restorative class, a lovely re-entry for my body back on my mat. But it was a flow class. My first ever. I modified to my abilities and kept up pretty well until those last 15 minutes before Shavasana – man – I was tired… And so I honored my body and slowed down. Now that I’m home and resting, I’m so proud of myself!
This afternoon I walked down to the beach and just sat on a big flat rock, noticing. My neighbor makes his dog Lola sit each time before he tosses her ball into the waves. Dachshunds don’t run like big dogs–it’s more like they rock their weight from their front legs to their back legs in a forward motion. The sky was filled with pink and blue like baby shower colors.
Winter sunsets at the beach are living paintings that fill the entire sky. Last night everyone was out with their cameras, walking a few feet, then stopping to shoot a new composition.
The RV is washed, propane filled. I’ll do the windows later. I checked out the “more desirable” spot available around the corner. The view wasn’t that much nicer, it was in a big social hub and the space was on too much of an incline for easy leveling.
So I am happy to be back in #59 across from the trailer storage and Horse Hill where it is level and quiet and I can see the town and Morro Rock and a peek-a-boo of the ocean. I am so grateful that I had the choice!
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The Story of Our Stories
We love stories. We enjoy the telling of a person’s life, the happenings in a dream, great descriptions of people and places. But often, we begin to believe that the stories we know and tell ourselves are the only truths.
We convince ourselves that, because, in the past, when we did this, the result was that, therefore, it will always be that way.
That because the last time you went to a party where you didn’t know anyone, you were ignored and uncomfortable, so anytime you go somewhere where you don’t know anyone, the same thing will happen.
Or that because every time you’ve submitted a piece of writing, it was rejected, you’ll never submit anything again for fear of another rejection.
We all have these repeating stories. And, because they are based in truth, we believe them. We hold them up and say, see, I’m not making this up. When I do that, this happens.
But, if we are truly writing our own life stories, then isn’t it possible to write a new ending, even a brand new story?
I have worn eyeglasses since I was four years old and I have a lot of stories about how getting new glasses is hard, traumatic and always difficult.
There’s the story about the octagonal tortoise shells in fifth grade that had such an improved prescription that I was nauseous for days.
Or the wire framed aviators in high school that were too snug behind my ears, so I bent them and re-bent them until the metal temple broke, but I still wore them, even though they created an open sore on the side of my head.
Or, more recently, the very expensive, digitally-made lenses that I had to tilt my head to the left to find the sweet spot and I had them re-made and they still weren’t right but they wouldn’t give me a full refund.
In fact, in the last three years, I have paid for two different pairs of glasses that have ended up in the bottom of my drawer. So, even though I strain to read 12 point type, and my lenses are scratched and foggy, I’d rather wear a pair that has a five year old prescription than go through the whole New Glasses thing.
And, while, on some level I knew that this was a story that I didn’t have to keep repeating, it wasn’t until a friend said, “But it’s just a STORY!!”
Until she pointed it out, I knew it but I didn’t KNOW it. Or realize that I could write a NEW one…
So while I was in Phoenix, Marika made an appointment to get her eyes examined for a new prescription, so I made one too. And the exam was easy. And we went shopping together for frames.
We looked in several stores and we both found some we liked at an independent optician in the neighborhood, an older man who really knows about glasses and fitting. I took a deep breathe and ordered the frames and he said they’d be ready in a week.
But they weren’t. And then it was Thanksgiving and the store was closed for the holiday weekend and I had to extend my stay in Arizona another week to wait for them.
I could feel my anxiety building and I noticed that I was beginning to sabotage the situation with my thoughts. “They’re not going to be here in time.” “I’m not going to like them.” “This is going to be like all the other times.”
I worked myself into quite a tizzy – should I cancel the order and just stick with what I have. After all, there was probably going to be something wrong with them.
And this is where the story changed.
Because I heard myself telling the old story.
And I realized that I really WANTED these new glasses. I wanted to see better.
So I told myself that it might take some time to get used to the new prescription, but that it would be worth it if I could see clearer.
I took out a big piece of paper and wrote:
I will adjust to these wonderful glasses with patience and willingness, grace and ease.
I will be so appreciative of the better vision.
They’re going to feel good and fit right.
I’m going to love seeing myself in the mirror wearing them.
Folks will notice and like them.
And my neck and shoulder pain will be gone.
I read and re-read these words all weekend, envisioning myself trying the new glasses on in the store and being happy.
The day I picked them up, I closed my eyes before I put the new glasses on and repeated that first line of my mantra, to remind myself to be patient and willing to get used to them.
With a few tweaks behind the ear and on the nose pieces, they were wonderful. I could read the smallest print on the bifocal card and the details on the sign across the street. And I didn’t have a fish-bowl effect when I glanced sideways.
The fact that he took $50.00 off the bill for the delays didn’t hurt either.
It was amazing. Marika and I went to the grocery store and I was reading EVERYTHING out loud, from the big signs at the far end of the aisles to the fine print on the cereal box. No squinting, no straining, no tilting my head every which way to find the sweet spot.
I couldn’t believe how easy it was!
The first time I saw myself in the bathroom mirror, I did a double-take. With a big grin. Yes, they’re big and bold and fashion forward, but not eccentric. And I love having so much lens depth to see near, far and everything in between.
The next morning, Marika and I were sitting outside having our coffee and she said, “I still can’t believe how easily you’ve adjusted to your glasses.” “I know,” I said. “It really is all about the story we tell ourselves.”
But there was a red tenderness on the left side of my nose and the back of the right earpiece was pressing too hard on the top of my ear.
The optician was closed for the weekend so I postponed my departure, scheduled two clients and went back to see him on Monday. I was surprised that he called me by my name. I sat down and explained what hurt and he made some adjustments. The nose piece immediately felt better and the pressure on my ear was gone.
But after I got home I felt a new pressure along the side of my temple. And I started crying. Bawling. Because it was no longer easy. Because I hated this part about too tight, too loose.
Marika encouraged me to go back for another adjustment. She reminded me that they’re just adjustments. That I already know that I can see with them, now it’s about getting more comfortable. I cried some more, then asked her to go back with me. She even drove.
Sherwin, the optician, was just as happy to see me as the first time. He adjusted the right earpiece so it was no longer pressing, tweaked the nose piece to recenter the frame and we left.
Marika asked, “Are you sure you don’t want to walk around and try this for a while?”
“No, it’s good. Let’s just go home.” But as we walked to the car, I wasn’t sure. “Can we just sit in the car for a minute?” We did, and after some more crying, I went back.
Sherwin and I did several rounds of too-tight-too-loose, and when I started to get frustrated, he said, ”Just relax. Take your time.” And in between each adjustment, he shared a story about his son, or the house he is building or he asked me a question about my Mac training.
And then I couldn’t tell anymore, so we stopped. I thanked Sherwin and joined Marika who was waiting in the car. By the evening I realized that, with all of the tweaking, the glasses were slightly crooked and the prescription was no longer in the right place.
But instead of freaking out and crying, I reminded myself that they were perfect before and they could be perfect again. That it wasn’t a problem with the lenses, I just needed to get things adjusted again. And hey, maybe now that I had sharper distance vision, I’d start seeing what I want for my future.
So I chose to delay my departure one more day, and I saw Sherwin again in the morning. He tweaked, he bent, he told me he’s adjusted more than 10,000 glasses since he’s been in business, and that sometimes, you have to go through Texas to get to Florida.
Now they’re pretty close to perfect. And I love seeing so much better. When my eyes are tired from the day, I remember that this is a transition, a process. That I just need to keep breathing and moving through.
And I’m still saying my affirmations, but this time, they’re in the present tense.
I am adjusting to these wonderful glasses with patience and willingness, grace and ease.
I am so appreciative of the better vision.
They feel good and fit right.
I love seeing myself in the mirror wearing them.
Folks notice and like them.
My neck and shoulder pain is gone.
What stories do you keep repeating, reliving? What if you re-wrote it? Please share your comments here.
Blessing the Openings: Clearing the Clutter Part 2
Native Americans have a tradition called The Sacred Smoke Bowl Blessing, often called “smudging,” which is a powerful cleansing ritual. Herbs and incense are burned with the idea that smoke attaches to negative energy and, as the smoke clears, it takes the negative energy with it.
Smudging is not the process of eliminating or killing anything, but is simply the shifting of energies so that there is a balance of positive and negative.
Here is an opportunity for you to bless and balance this space you have created in yourself and in your life.
What you will need:
some incense (sage, cedar and sweet grass are most commonly used in traditional smudging)
two pieces of paper
matches or a lighter
a big glass of water (just in case)
a well ventilated room or a place outdoors
a metal baking dish or non-flammable bowl
Light the incense and slowly take a few breaths to relax yourself and come to the present moment. Feel the space inside of you that you have created. Notice what it feels like, if any emotions are still attached to that space of letting go.
On the first piece of paper, write what you are releasing. It can be a single word, or a paragraph that sums up what the clutter in your life symbolized.
Crumple the paper into a loose ball, place it in your burning bowl and carefully light it with a match.
Watch the smoke and flames rise up, carrying that which you have released up into the atmosphere. Follow your breath, inhaling and exhaling with awareness.
As the smoke clears and the paper disintegrates, consider what new things, ideas, traits, inspirations you’d like to come into your life.
Hold this vision in your heart as you write it on the second piece of paper. Again, it can be a single word or a paragraph. Be clear. Be concise. Be sure.
Crumple this paper into a loose ball, place it in your burning bowl and carefully light it with a match.
Breathe deeply, inhaling and exhaling as you watch the smoke and flames rise up, carrying your new visions into the atmosphere. Feel the space you have created, inside and outside.
Breathe into this space. Make it holy. Make it yours.
Please share your experiences in the Comments below.
DID YOU KNOW??
In addition to writing this blog, I also lead workshops, retreats, and small coaching circles for women over 50 who are in transition–in their relationships, jobs, living situations, roles in life, or just in an in-between place in life.
Would you like to join us??
