Easy for You, Hard for Me

How easy it is to place this line in the sand, the air; in our lives. Easy for you, but don’t you know it’s so hard for me. A bit like a child trying to keep up with grown-up stride, but always unable. Unable to walk side by side, unable to keep pace. For a long time I’d felt like this, but unable to tell anyone, just thinking that I somehow felt like a teenager, to everyone else’s grown-up. Stuck, I didn’t want to grow up to be like anyone I’d known, and yet, still looking for someone to look up to. 

This can sometimes be the plight of us who grow up in this culture where intellectual pursuits are rewarded and if you are bright, even the most difficult task, is actually, easy. So, when we as children are told, this is difficult, and we find it’s not, it creates a sense that the person who told us this would be hard, is well, either lying or perhaps, not so bright themselves, and so we are in a way, left to our own devices. 

This also creates the weird paradox that being smart is the be all and end all and that if you just apply yourself, you will be successful. And what we ask, is this success? To be like you? Step one on the quest for self. So now, I know, that much of what was missing for me was not just a role-model, but a sense of being whole, a sense of integrating my emotions into my intellectual self. A sense of having an open heart chakra, a sense of not competing with others, but of just being. I had to deconstruct all the roles that people play to make themselves the adult, understanding now, that I was not the only one feeling like a child inside, but I was one of the few willing to admit, to naming this. 

I had to understand how people hide behind titles like rev, like president, and vp, and professor, and dr and how these labels only represent a passing through of levels of learning or assessment and do not in any way measure a person’s wholeness, a person’s ability to care or to respond appropriately, or even in their own, or others’ best interests. I don’t feel like a teenager anymore, I feel like a person. I have ages within me, but alongside I have compassion and a much bigger scope of understanding how we come to choose how much of ourselves to share and how much to hide. 

Once I so often thought, easy for you, hard for me, now I know, life is hard, life is easy, life is a beautiful mess, in a random ordered world. I don’t have to hold onto being the outsider, I don’t have to be afraid to step into the often stupidness of our systems, of our ineptness, of our humanness, there is no Santa, no one in the sky with a big book, we have each other, we are enough. 

blue screen

living in computer generated space

becomes an exercise in disappointment

of being alone

of missing out

of waiting for that next email

or text

that will connect us 

to that which makes us feel

so much smaller

than we really are

i want to escape from behind the desk

with the computer

with the glowing screen

with the constant ping

of letters from the rev mrs isaiah watson

whose husband just died

but in the lord

who wants my social security number

to deposit millions from an overseas account

and the ads from the merchant where 

i just shopped over the weekend

reducing me to an object 

to be used

manipulated

and I smile

too smart for that

deleting the email

but not turning off the 

screen

not leaving the office

afraid of what real life might 

have to offer  

Let Rise

I am, in some ways, a month behind in my life. I’ve been struggling with a horrible cold, and then the mind numbing effects of cold medication, and once again, I’ve missed paying bills on time, something that at one time I would be mortified to even say aloud, let alone write for the world to see. And so, yet, even in my writing, I feel like there’s so much I want to write about, so many projects and again, it seems like not enough time. My mother often accused me of cleaning with “a lick and a promise.” I don’t want to live my whole life this way, but sometimes, it seems the only way to get through, is to just get on with it. Right? I mean, who really wants to dust? 

So, to make some sense, to not fall too far behind, and then so, to stave off giving up; I’m trying to recap. I don’t think I ever quite took the time to write about the process of becoming a writer, at least not in the same way I’ve been trying to mark the process of becoming a therapist. Part of this I think, is this awful fear I carry with me, that if you talk about something you jinx it, and especially being a writer comes with all this baggage of how hard it is, how you never get paid for it, and how confusing, even, the whole process is now. I can’t tell you how many times people have asked why don’t I just self-publish. The process isn’t like becoming a therapist. As much as I struggle with the details of the whole getting licensed part of my therapist career, it is a clear path, as opposed to writing.  

As much as I’m juggling writing and therapy, when I try to put my writing on the ‘back burner’ it just won’t stay there. My writing is such an integral part of my life, it won’t take a back burner or a back seat, it wants to drive. So, unexpectedly this past year, a short piece that I wrote was published in an anthology, The People’s Apocalypse, and finally, my writing was in an actual book. One of the editors, Ariel Gore, coached me with the re-writes of my memoir. It still makes me smile. And just last month, I connected with the writer Melissa J. Haynes, her book, Learning to Play With a Lion’s Testicles: Unexpected Gifts From the Animals of Africa had caught my attention (after being one of Jimmy Fallon’s top ten do not read books). 

The book is a beautiful adventure memoir, as Melissa travels externally to Africa, and also journeys inward, on a quest for reconciliation. I was impressed with her risk-taking on more than one level, and as we connected, she was impressed with my writing, and she offered me a guest blog on her site (melissajhaynes.com). Her generous sharing of her blog space and of her support for my writing has ushered in a more fearlessness in myself in making connections with others. Trust, yes, trust has been a big theme for me this year. Trusting myself, trusting others, trusting in the universe; this seems to be the antidote for risk, and it’s companion fear. I need to move into the next year letting go of fear, entering into the warmth of trust, and all that it might foment. I want to come in out of the drafty back porch and exist in the warm kitchen of life. Mix, knead, let rise, punch down, let rise, bake. 

What's Your Holiday Emotional Temp?

This is the time of year that my youngest daughter lives for. She loves the snow, doesn’t mind the cold, has no problem wearing long underwear under her jeans and as of today has changed both her and my phone to have Christmas backgrounds and ring-tones. I am coming off of a most disappointing Thanksgiving, which I spent alone in bed, sick, while my family feasted on Megan’s amazing cooking. I had no clue she was using the expensive organic, US based apple juice for brining the turkey, but I did have a clue the dinner was going to be spectacular. She has a gift for the holidays. Her love for this time of year is infectious, and to be blunt, in complete contrast to my, “Oh where has summer and daylight gone, and damn it’s cold, attitude.” 

In trying to defend myself, I said to her a couple of weeks ago, “But hey, I gave you guys great Christmases, a nice tree, presents even when I was strapped for cash.” Her reply, “But mom, you didn’t enjoy it, you weren’t happy or excited, it’s not about the things, it’s about the feelings, and the magic of Christmas.” And you know what, she was right. I could again, become defensive, and say something like, “For Pete’s sake, I was a struggling single mom, I had every reason to be overwhelmed and tired and sad.” But I didn’t, I simply remembered back to my own childhood Christmases, where my mom was stressed out, and it wasn’t really fun or nice, even though we had ‘everything.’ One of my best holiday time memories, was actually on Christmas eve day, going ice skating with my older brothers, when my mom was exasperated and chased us out of the house. 

And so, I share this with you on the day after Thanksgiving, in order to ask you, what are you feeling and expressing around this time of year? Because, you know, we don’t just pass down traditions and stuff, but we pass down our feelings, too. We pass down how we react, what we believe about life in general, and even rules around how happy we think it’s ok to be. This year, I’m shifting, from sweet Pete, it’s cold, to wow, how lovely are the stars in the long night sky. I’m shifting to smelling hot cider, to being grateful for the simple things, and the most important things, like a daughter who in spite of my harried feelings was able to hang onto her simple delight in this most wonderful time of the year. 

P.S. Megan brought me home a plate, and Kathleen posted pictures and so I was able to see what a beautiful job my daughters did without me in creating a fabulous Thanksgiving for their dad, their grandmother, and their aunt (and their children). Kathleen hosted and her place looked beautiful. Erin & Andy picked up Megan, and then came back for the forgotten bacon (for the greens). Max made his cheesy garlic french bread. I missed the smell of turkey roasting, but was so warmed by the thought of my kids taking care of themselves and each other. Bravo. 

Sky Talk

we can talk in the language of the sky

you and I

when each day begins 

we can look to see 

if there are clouds

low or high

far or nearby

and in the afternoon

we can look to see where the sun is

if dark will come later or soon

we can look to see

if the night will be cool

rain or dry

you and I 

in the twilight

we can muse about

how the trees look different

in this different light

how shadows play

on the streets

on our faces turning lovers into strangers

in the night time when the lights are low

and in the heavens orbs and stars glow

we can wonder we are still together

smile at the thought

as the moon emerges high

what will the sky bring tomorrow for 

you and I  

Lantern Walk

Lantern Walk: Keeping the spark alive within when it is cold outside. 

A couple of weeks ago now (the time is really flying by way too quickly), I took a night off of seeing clients, and went to a lantern walk for my granddaughter’s preschool. We joke about it being a hippie preschool (more connective than competitive) and it is in a little house where they sing and bake and create community with 3 and 4 year olds. Audrey likes going, and for Erin it is a break from mostly full-time mothering. 

For this particular twilight activity; the children had made their own decoupage and tissue paper (and lined with non-flammable tape) lanterns. They were beautiful. The lake where we were gathering was not far from Erin and Andy and Audrey’s house, and so we (Megan and I) all drove there together. It was sweet to see the parents and children pile out of cars, hats and gloves on, and walk toward the edge of the lake. It was a chilly night, in between warm autumn days and cold fall nights. One of the preschool teachers was giving out pumpkin muffins (delicious), and the other was preparing to tell a story with a backdrop of sunset and reeds. 

As the story began, I was taken in by the simplicity of the story, (of the sun giving fire to man to keep warm with through the dark winter) and by the beauty of this woman’s voice in the still of the evening. The children were enraptured by the storytelling and I felt connected to all the people who ever listened to stories with the sky overhead and the wind on my face. Such a simple reminder, to keep the spark alive when it is cold outside. How to do this? 

After the story, the lanterns were lit with votive candles inside. They sang their lovely lantern song and we began to walk the walking path. When the wind would blow out a child’s lantern, someone nearby had a lighter to light it again. There we were, walking with our children, for me, walking with my daughters, my soon to be son-in-law, and my precious granddaughter, this keeps me warm inside. This keeps my lantern lit, knowing that I am a part of a family, knowing that there is safety and warmth and love and support. Having someone come up on the walk and offer you more muffins made it enchanting. Keeping rituals keeps us grounded. 

I get cold easily, and so towards the end, I was the first to leave the walk for the warmth of my car, and to sit in the quiet. I want to remember this all, I want to have more time for stories told outside, for walks outside, for a slower pace. Winter is coming, and I need to make sure to keep my lantern lit until May.  

Real Riches

Our Real Riches are Our Ability to Feel 

Seriously, it is true, our abundance lies in our ability to feel our feelings and to know that we are connected to all of the world, if we are connected, we then have access to everything. We are made of stardust and ocean and all the other things that grow and thrive and continually become stronger until we rejoin the earth in a different form. So, I am going to make the intention to be grateful not just for the things in my life, but for the ability to feel, and for each different, nuanced feeling that I experience. To be grateful for each second that my body is alive, feeling, and connected to everything else in this amazing web of life. To see things as related, not separate, to see things as a whole, not parts, to feel awe, to feel supported, to feel belonging, not because I conform, but because I exist. 

Punished

There have been many lessons I have learned as a parent, and one of the most valuable lessons that fortunately I learned early on-- is that punishment does not work. Does not work, I repeat this, because we are so marinated in this construct that we can hardly remove it from our lives. But seriously, it does not work, and not only does it not work, what it does is destroy trust and relationship. If we believe, really believe that we will be punished for doing certain things, it only tells us that what we are doing is wrong, it does not open  up possibilities for what is right. 

Punishment makes people feel so unsafe, it boxes them into a corner, where their creativity which is needed to see possibilities is shut down. I found a wonderful explanation of this, this morning, reading through a clinical book called Trancework by Michael Yapko, this is how he puts it; “In simply punishing someone for doing something wrong, there is nothing provided to tell the person what the right thing is to do. The person merely learns what not to do; receiving repeated punishment with no alternatives provided leads to frustration, anger, and finally a point where punishment is no longer effective” (p. 286). 

For me, it was as simple as spanking my child and realizing that they would do the same thing that I spanked them for over again, so I could spank them again and again and again and they would still do the same thing. As explained above, the spanking produced no change in the behavior, but what did change, was the relationship. I felt horrible, my child felt betrayed and then I somehow had to repair all that on top of finding alternatives to the behavior which started the whole thing. What I also had to do, was examine why it felt so awful to even want to punish someone. What thoughts, beliefs, did I actually hold about people, to imagine they needed to be punished, and that I was the one to do it? 

Finally, reading this, and put so succinctly, validates how I came to view how people grow and change, how people create loving relationships. In safety, with encouragement, with alternatives, not punishment. Although I don’t consider myself a Christian, there are still Bible verses that bounce around in my head, and this one comes to mind, perfect love casts out all fear. 

There is no fear where love exists. Rather, perfect love banishes fear, for fear involves punishment, and the person who lives in fear has not been perfected in love. 1 John 4:18. 

As I raised my daughters, I read the Bible regularly, I held onto the verses that made sense to me, that made me feel like I could trust myself, especially as a parent. There were some verses that when I internalized them, and acted on them; made my life and my relationships better. This I believe is wisdom, finding and accepting words that most affirm our best selves, the selves we strive to be, that create the relationships we want to have, that build the places of safety and growth in our lives. So, whether it is a clinical book, or a book a wisdom, words help to affirm and to guide us to articulate and share where we are most loved and most human. 

Road by Walking

There are times when I forget that I need to write for me. Sometimes, it seems I can write and the words flow, and it all makes sense (at least to me), and then there are times that come and I am worried that putting words to whatever is going on will just make it too real. Or, how do I in linear fashion put down on paper all the whirling, swirling thoughts and emotions that I am capable of experiencing? This is where the poets excel, right? 

A metaphor, like the wind through the top of a full, leafy tree comes close to the feelings. Slivers of sun, glimmer on the shiny side of the leaves, while the strong wind carries the branches up and down and the leaves shimmer and shake. I too shimmer and shake, and feel the current take my limbs  up and down and yet I am firmly rooted in the ground all the while. It feels like a storm inside me, and yet, all anyone might see is a glimmer in my eye; all they might hear is a long sigh. 

Nobody told me that the changes that come about when we grow from child to adult just keep coming about, year to year, as the seasons change, we too change. From naive to learned, from free to committed, from childless to grandparent, from in love to mourning, and then back again to free and in love. We ride the currents of life in a small or large boat, with many, with few, alone. What remains for us except the orb we stand on, the sky above. I thought I would grow from child to adult, and have all that I would need on my journey. 

I was told to go to college and make my way in a church and find a good enough man. After I’d done all those things, I sat still and found pieces of myself that I would need to take with me for the next stretch of road, and that still is all I can do. I can’t see the journey’s end, I can’t see the future, but I can tentatively step by step, make the road, and night by night, make my peace and make my bed, rest and start over. 

More Wild

Taking care of myself becomes something elusive sometimes, I can feel that I need to be taken care of, I deeply feel that ragged sense that I am not at ease, not whole, not holy any more, and this seems to turn in on itself, to feed on itself as I grapple to get back to just a sense of everyday OK-ness. I tell myself of course you feel out of sorts, you have spent weeks of having your daughter move, then your mother move, and in the course of moving my mom, sorting through memories that I’d forgotten for good reason. And now, now I am behind in my own housekeeping, bill paying and general life upkeep. I am behind and I am left with this residual feeling of growing up in a home that was chaotic and thrived on fear and mistrust. I have worked really really hard to create a home that is filled with love and trust, and yet I still haven’t gotten the chaotic part totally in check. And I hate it. And it shows me exactly that my life is too busy and where I need to change. 

And so, to take care of myself in the midst of this chaos, I bought myself a book that I’ve been wanting to read, Cheryl Strayed’s Wild. Once I got past wondering if it would be as good as all the hype (it is), and being jealous that she is published and awesome (she is), I let myself sink into her story, her adventure, her own hero’s quest, and it dawned on me, how un-wild I have become. How fear has crept into corners of my life where I’d never want to admit it to anyone. How when I decided to make myself take a walk yesterday morning, I told Megan this story that I’d kept to myself for a really long time, before I left. Well, Megan, there is a part of me that is afraid to walk around the lakes, it sounds silly, I know. The lake I walk is always full of people, it is daylight, it is Minneapolis, for Pete’s sake. But a long time ago, when I was 12 or 13, and I walked around a city lake in the evening, I was in a bad mood, a defiant mood, mad at my family. And so when a man in a car called out, hey, do you want to go for a ride, instead of walking quickly away, I approached this man in a car. 

And when he said, get in. I did. Once in, I knew I’d made a mistake. He was not young and cute, but older and disheveled looking. We chatted, he drove down Hennepin Avenue and by the corner of Hennepin and Lake he had his hand tangled in my long brown hair in a way that made me feel sick. He turned down a side street lined in mansions and parked by Lake of the Isles. It was starting to be sundown, and I was starting to be afraid, and I was definitely afraid when he locked the car doors and grinned at me. I told him I needed to get home, and he wouldn’t listen. He started to undo his belt and I was trapped. As he talked about how he’d love to have a girlfriend like me, I went along with it. I told him I’d like to be his girlfriend, but we’d have to date for a while before anything happened. He told me he wanted to take me on a picnic and I agreed. I agreed to be his girlfriend, but he’d have to be nice to me, and he had to take me home, now. He softened, and agreed. 

I stupidly let him drop me off near my home. He knew my neighborhood, and I said I’d meet him at the lake the next day. When I never did, he started stalking me in the neighborhood, yelling things at me from his car. This went on for months. Of course I never told my parents, as they would (as they always did) have blamed me. And I blamed myself. And so, I told Megan this story, feeling a little like maybe she would think less of me. I have a few of these horrible men stories, tucked away, untold, unwritten, because as a young girl growing up, there were only two kinds of girls, good girls and bad girls, any evil men perpetrated on girls would then become internalized in the girl, the man remaining, well, only a man. If folks knew about the evil you were a bad girl, if you could hide it, pretend, store it away, you could fool folks into believing you were still good. I always wanted to be good, to be careful, not to be wild. 

After I told Megan this story I headed out to walk around the lake on a beautiful, sunny, Saturday morning. The walking path was crazy full of people. I walked a long time behind a couple of women talking loudly,  and so, I decided to walk away from the path, to walk on the sand, on the water’s edge. At first I thought, I will get my shoes wet and sandy, and then I realized that I’d become too careful, too worried, too unwild with myself. I thought of Cheryl Strayed, walking the Pacific Crest Trail, and I pushed myself to be more wild, and realized that what I thought was taking care of myself, was really, too often, living in fear. Fear still, of what people would think if they knew, fear still of someone lurking, fear still of not having the information I’ll need to keep myself safe. Fear that I’ll never figure out how to take really good care of myself and others, to be safe. Fear that the stories I tell should not be told. So, I just kept walking on the water’s edge, not caring if my shoes got wet and sandy. Instead of chatter and cell phones and the sound of shoes on paved path, I heard the water hitting the sand, I heard the wind in the trees, I felt the ground underneath me both soft and solid, unmovable and moving. I whispered to myself, become a little more wild, wild is not the undoing of us, it is us. 

Only Love Lasts

little plastic pink colored babies, one with wings
mom what are these?
oh those are pro-life things
hmm, really, little one inch plastic babies
thrown in a drawer with old receipts, recipes, faded photos
can i thrown them away?
ok

after years of being clutter in a drawer 
we can finally throw them away
as my mom is down-sizing
really down sizing this time
to move from a large condo
to a small apartment
in a senior building

the things we save 
we think we’ll need
the power invested in palm fronds
that cannot be thrown away
because they are holy
and plastic babies saved
because they are not

an old photo of cub scouts in blackface
which turns into an ugly family fight
over whether or not minstrel shows are racist
about white privilege that my brothers have always had
passed on to them by my parents and my culture
when we are all old and should know better
as we struggle with the changes that life brings upon us
i know now that this privilege brings with it a price 

i never wanted to inherit this mess of stuff
along with the inability to throw things away
a horrible curse a spell that only my daughters have 
been able to break for me
to step into the living 
to care about the experience
to feel my feelings
to throw or give it away
throw it or give it away
only the love lasts

long time passing

Usually when I write it feels like a good thing, like if I’m not even really sure what I’m talking about at least I’m admitting that hey, I’m not sure here, but I’m writing it out. The past couple of months I’ve felt too unsure to write much, too unsure to open the pages and to put anything down, and this has somehow not made things better. I wouldn’t call it a writer’s block, I’ve never liked that term, because it makes it seem that all there is to writing is, well, the writing and it’s more than that. But what I have come across lately, that makes some sort of sense of all this, is that researchers studying creativity have found that people need to feel safe to be creative. 

Much of this research is being applied to the workplace, this of course, being the dominant place for most people’s lives (sarcasm). I shouldn’t go off on a tangent here about home not being a safe place for way too many people, women, especially, because, my brain is too tired for tangents lately, and this, this is partly why I’ve been not writing. I’ve been too tired from trying to shake off my past, trying to dart in and out of my family of origin, like time travel, like portals, like something sci-fi where your whole head is just not wrapping around the information that is coming in.  

This past week we moved my mom from her three bedroom condo in Edina into a one bedroom senior apartment in Northern, Minnesota. To a town just at the Canadian border, this I know, I drove the one hour into Winnipeg years ago with my two youngest. My oldest sister and her husband live there, and they are happy to be able to spend more time with my mom. This is actually a wonderful thing, a good thing for my mom, as her days in her condo this past year were getting increasingly difficult. It just has been a lot of me interacting with family members I don’t see very much, and realizing that family often just doesn’t not only not feel like family, they often feel like enemies. They feel like the ones you have to suit up for to protect yourself, and even feeling like this feels really awful, but then you have to admit it to  yourself, admit it and know it is true. 

It is also that I have been very close to my mom, for my whole life. For my whole life we have never lived more than an hour’s drive away from each other. For my whole life, I have somehow been the one my mom felt she could rely on. Being a daughter has been a large part of my life. Now I know this part of my life is not over, but it is changed dramatically. Between the managing this change, and going through the things my mother didn’t take with her, I find myself inserted into my past, like I have abruptly fallen through a portal to the past, remembering things and feelings that I’d just as soon forgotten. 

Suddenly remembering how unsafe I felt most of my growing up years, and then realizing how it’s taken me a long, long time to feel safe more often than unsafe. And so as I shake this feeling of sadness, grief and not-safe, I realize that to write out our feelings, to write out our pain, requires a modicum of safety. If I can step back into that safety, I can make sense, I can create, and in this circle of safety create my way either to, or back to a life that makes sense. I am retrieving that child that I was, carrying her out of the debris that was my life, and I don’t have time for the making sense of it yet. 

Chasing

Summer has run off from me, like some wild and unruly child, and all I can do is stand by the back door, staring off at them as they are too far down the block to chase after. I am tired, the summer was too full, my phone rang too many times. I drove too many miles back and forth across the city. Picking people off, dropping them off, going to St. Paul for Izzy's ice cream, barely able to savor it, before it melted. Then getting on the freeway again, time like dew, evaporating.

the bargain

i come to the table
not to make a bargain 
with the devil
but to renegotiate
the bargain 
made with 
my life
in front of the alter
of shame
and unworthiness
i am pleading
that the angel
see
that really that bargain
was not made by me

i am laying out all
my trashy stuff
all the things 
that make me scared
and unaware
of how deserving 
i treally truly am
let’s make this deal
let’s make this done and sweet
let’s trade in any and all
thoughts constructs
that self defeat
nothing shady
nothing untrue
let’s even take away the bargaining table
between me and you 



some days are just sad

early morning
waking up
i wonder where i am heading
i hear the sound of the bus
down the street
wet from rain
a strange comfort
the buses always run
september weather in august
gray 
damp
like school should be 
starting soon
like i am still in grade school
when i am middle aged
i can smell new crayons
the soft feel of light blue lined paper
all the songs on my 
playlist come up
sad
violins weep
voices steeped in 
melancholy
then Fred Astaire
comes up
singing
“let’s face the music and dance”
and i smile 

The Neediness Experiment

Lonely

Dictionary: lonely |ˈlōnlē|

adjective ( -lier , -liest )

sad because one has no friends or company: lonely old people whose families do not care for them.

• without companions; solitary : passing long lonely hours looking onto the street.

• (of a place) unfrequented and remote : a lonely stretch of country lane. 

Wikipedia: Loneliness, the state of "feeling lonely," describes a human state or feeling involving isolation, or the feeling of disconnection with others, etc. Often accompanied by a sense of yearning for connection. Usually manifests through hopes of romantic redemption in the arms of another. 

As a single person, I am loathe to admit to feeling lonely. And the first definition I looked up in the dictionary seemed to be untrue as in I’m not actually alone, nor friendless. I have great friends and family, and I’m actually surround by people more than I’d like, truth be told. But I am lonely, and in this culture, to be single and lonely is sort of to be a pariah, you know, desperate. But what I like about the wikipedia definition is that it is more about the feeling, rather than the state of being lonely. And not only am I feeling lonely, but I am always curious to know more about our feeling states. I believe our feelings (emotions) have important information for us that we often overlook, or bury or otherwise somehow try to keep at bay. So I want to sit with it, listen to it, learn from it. 

Now that I’ve admitted that I’m lonely, I can sit with it. As I sort through my particular loneliness, I’m thinking that a part of this is that I’m lonely for myself. I haven’t had enough alone time lately and that takes a toll. I also will admit that I am hoping for redemption in the arms of another, whew, now I’ve said it. Actually I was relieved to see that part, I thought I was the only lonely person who thought I could be saved from this sense of isolation by another. I get hung up on this piece, probably because I’ve so valued my freedom and autonomy and the connection I long for seems so out of my control. Like how do you get someone to redeem you or even just take you into their arms when you’re not even dating anyone? I’ve had that sense of relief, though, when someone does take you into their arms, and it is a lovely feeling. 

I’m also struggling lately with the whole dating piece in my head, trying to figure out, am I believing something that is keeping me from being in relationship? Like, is it me? And what is it about me, then? We all go through this; this, this, I know. I think that our culture has so mythologized love and romance and even commodified it to the point where we think it is our right to have a wonderful and fabulous romance, and you know what I want to go to the court of love and demand my pay out, but really there is no such thing. And maybe, sometimes, loneliness really is more about us being lonely for our self, and not lonely for another. Maybe we get lonely when things change, too. Lonely for other times and places. 

In this past weeks, my oldest daughter has been packing up to move away from the house she bought from me 7 years ago, the house that I moved into more than 25 years ago, with Kathleen ready for kindergarten, and Erin just a baby. This house held all of our family memories, the stairs the girls slid down on sleeping bags, the lilac tree that Erin and Megan would climb up into, the living room where Kathleen would choreograph dance moves for Erin and Megan to learn. After next week, the house and home will have to move from being the place that kept our secrets to entering into all our memories as the house the girls (and my grandsons) grew up in. 

Also, in the past weeks, the decision has been made to move my mom up North to Roseau, Minnesota. My mom has always been near to me; after my dad died, I moved her to Owatonna, and then to Waconia, to be closer to my brother, and then, again, a couple of years ago to Edina. But now she will be farther from me than ever; but close to my oldest sister who lives in Roseau. This is a good move for my mom, but still a change for me. And, one of my brothers who lives not too far from me, even though I don’t see him and his wife often, is moving down South, as in down south to another state, not Southern Minnesota. So, the memories contained in their home as well, will now be again, simply memories. The fact that my siblings are retiring is another whole story, too. Am I really getting this old?  

So, lots of changes, lots of people in my life moving around. And honestly, I am ready for a relationship, ready to give up freedom and autonomy for a new kind of freedom, freedom to move around in the place that love creates. Freedom to sit around on a Saturday (or Monday, or Tuesday) night and just listen to music or watch movies with someone. For a long, long time my children have been my life traveling companions, and now they are going down their own roads and I’d like to have someone whose road will connect with mine and meander down into the future. Someone with whom I am not the parent of or the daughter of, hmm, what could that be like? 

I feel a little guilty, too. I feel guilty and ashamed that I want someone to help and support me. Yes, to need someone. When I was young, the sense that I got from my parents was such disdain for needing anything, being one of eight, there really was never enough, that I grew to believe that to need someone, or anything, was not just bad, but disgusting. And so, I guess I’ve  had to split off from the part of myself that does indeed actually need others. I now invite that part of myself in. Why hello little needy girl, take a seat, with all your neediness and just relax. It is so alright to be needy, it is so alright to want to be held, to be cared for and to be wanted. And as I accept this needy part of myself, I believe that I can be accepted in my entirety by someone with open arms. This is the work, really. This is the part that requires constance, to stay with the parts of ourselves that we think make us vulnerable, but which in fact, make us whole. 

The neediness experiment: well, I don’t think I’ve ever shared this before, but this was an internal neediness experiment that I conducted when I was only 19. It was at this age that I took a few weeks and traveled by bus through Europe with a bunch of other college students. At the time I was newly engaged to Steve. I had a beautiful diamond ring that I wore on the trip. I was unsure, truly, about getting married and with my internalized sensibility regarding neediness, I believed this trip assured me the perfect way to test my own neediness. I believed that if I could be on this trip and not need Steve, it would be ok to marry him. If I thought that if I actually needed him, this would be the antithesis to love, which I believed was a choice, an intellectual decision. I smile now, I knew so little about life, about love, about how brain hemispheres and internalized concepts of love and life inform how we create relationships, that I can only look fondly on my young self. I also feel sad, that there was so little that I knew about my emotional self, and how to feel, understand, and trust my own feelings. So, there you have it, from a long time past, I’ve disdained neediness, only now, to find myself in the throes of it. 

I came back from Europe, convinced that I did not need Steve, but that I loved him. I would never deny my love for him, or for anyone else that I’ve ever loved, and I know now, that I too, needed him, just like we all need each other. Just like any other ordinary person, I need others. I am lonely, I need love. 

Ordinary World

What seems like a lifetime go, in a galaxy far away, in the little town of Owatonna; all I wanted to do was to get back to my ordinary world, regular life, where things, generally were OK. What seemed (and was) a horrible ton of things happened to me in a rather short period of time. I felt like I barely made it through, and if I think of it all at once, there’s still pain there. So much pain, sometimes, that I hesitate to write about it. But I believe that writing heals, and I think that enough time has passed that I can write about it. 

When we go through really, really difficult things, in some ways it truly is the making of us. So, things were pretty OK most of the time I was married, but then my then husband more or less just quit coming home to Owatonna; then one day, what seemed out of the blue, a “dancer” from Deja Vu nightclub called me to tell me that my husband loved her, not me. I can smile now at this; this young girl, calling to set me right on this point. It seemed that she wanted my life, my big house in Owatonna with a garden and little bikes and trikes in the driveway. My enchanted, married, stay-at-home mom life. I had all this and a husband with an exciting job as a stagehand, who toured the world with Prince. And well, look at what a great husband he was! 

Of course, when I told my husband, he dropped her and found a more covert friend. This was the beginning of the end of my marriage. Then when all that was done, and I was divorced, I became engaged to a man in Alaska, fortunately that didn’t work, but at the time it was one more heartache when my heart was already bruised. It was also around this time that something very wrong was happening with my youngest daughter Megan.While on a vacation in Wisconsin, she had a headache so bad, all she could do was lie on the bathroom floor and cry. Then, theses headaches, migraines, began to happen more and more often. I took her to specialist after specialist, and no one knew what was wrong. The best I could do was take her to the emergency room for a shot of pain medication. She was 7. It would be nearly 10 years later, and years of her being suicidal that we found that she has hypothyroid disease. 

Then, my oldest daughter Kathleen, at age 14, became pregnant, she was just beginning her freshman year in high school. My middle daughter Erin, was often left out in the hectic day to day life of caring for one daughter who was unexplainably often very ill, and a pregnant and then young mom teen. After my divorce, when I no longer had the luxury of staying at home, I had to work a full-time job, and then come home and care for children aged infant to teen. At a temp job, before I landed a full-time job, I met a man that I dated for a while. 

A pretty nice, regular guy, who at one point, shared the Duran Duran song, Ordinary World with me. It’s a beautiful song that has stuck with me ever since. Mark told me that the song reminded him of my life. The song, and the fact that this kind man could see my longing for life to just be OK again, consoled me. I was not alone in my just wanting life to be ordinary. I think I can share this now, because, well, my life is pretty OK now. Kathleen and her sons are doing fine, she’s a college instructor and more than that a sweet daughter and a kind mom. Erin is also a mom, with a three year old and a kind fiance. She put herself through the U of M, studying psychology. And Megan, well, she is doing well now on thyroid medication, recovering nearly 10 lost years of her life. She is a jazz vocal student, with more and more interests in life appearing all the time. I made my way back to the very beautiful and amazing ordinary. The song is a beautiful backdrop that wraps around my mind. 

Free From Fear

As I meditated this morning on the words of becoming free from fear; it became more clear how often I am in fear. Fear of judgement, fear of saying the wrong thing, fear of breaking yet one more unspoken rule in a culture that has currents of hierarchy, patriarchy and a bloody history of racism flowing just below the surface. Fear of loss. Fear of being found less than, less than the personas that we hide behind. We fear we are less, when actually, in our vulnerability, we are always more, much more. 

As a child I felt bewildered at times of having to give respect to those who clearly were not worthy of respect; but because they were older and/or had a title, respect was due. This early training carries over into our work lives, our school lives and every other place we show up where there is rank. We are under the threat to show deference to those who may or may not have our best interests at heart, who may or may not know how to treat people with respect and compassion themselves. I have held on to this bewilderment, and in this, often I find myself teetering on the edge of contempt. I don’t want to hold anyone in contempt, this is a challenge then, to turn from fear and contempt to compassion. 

Hopefully we get to choose what and who we respect as we get older, and I respect those who can hold others in compassion, not in fear. There is another kind of respect, also, that I hope to hold others in; this is in respect of their fear. This is more challenging to me,as I tend to get stuck onto or into others’ fear. I think this is where I am tempted to contempt. In my fear, I want to fight fear with fear. Instead I need to allow other’s to have their fear, and not enter into it. I need to respect their fear. 

In respecting other people’s fear, this means I allow them space around their fear, not judging them for their fear, as I tend to do. Fear manifests itself in so many ways, it can be tricky to track, but eventually it shows itself in making walls, creating ways in which we cannot connect, for fear of connection is so underlying most people’s fear. If we allow ourselves to be connected, we become vulnerable, which for many, instead of inviting closeness, is terrifying. 

A long, long time ago in the liner notes of a record album (LP); I found this quote and it has stuck in my head, “Across my heart I put a sign there is no thoroughfare, but love came laughing by and said, I enter everywhere.”  This comforts me, that there is no barrier to love, really. Not even fear. As the singing bowl sound enters into my body, let it reverberate away all fear, leaving more room for love.  

For Heaven's Sake

or how the concept of heaven corrupts

think about it

you will give up today

for an unknown tomorrow

and when tomorrow comes

you will once again

give it all up

until you die

or until you realize

the price is too high

the construct too 

nebulous

to give the whole 

rest of your life to

what if

there is no 

heaven

no god

no retribution

only today

what if you 

could have no regret

because you never

let tomorrow

make you give up

today 

Flower Power

I had a fantasy a couple of weeks ago as I left my house. As I ran down my back stairs (now that there’s no snow, I can run) I looked at my nearly empty deck and thought, what if I could buy lots of flowers for the deck this year, and just turn it into an oasis of rest? That would be so lovely, so wonderful.  Of course my next thought was that flowers are frivolous and expensive and so maybe one day. One day, where all my best hopes and dreams live. 

The past couple of weeks the weather has finally been warm enough and so I thought if I can’t buy lots of flowers, I could buy one or two flowering plants. It started with the potted dahlia Erin & Andy & Audrey gave me for mother’s day; I repotted it, and it looks so lovely outside. Also, the past couple of weeks has been so stressful that I felt like I needed flowers, a trip to Bachman’s, anything to make me remember that I can have and do some things I want. Being frivolous, not frugal, is important to me. So, yesterday Megan and I went to Bachman’s, twice. And bought beautiful flowering plants, twice. 

This is what happened. The first time we went to Bachman’s we became enchanted looking at all the flowers and picking flowers that would go with each other, like planning a potted garden. What about this one, ooh, pretty but too pink. This one maybe, yes, the yellow with the purple, we can put it in the green planter, then. How about the little fairy gardens? Maybe we’ll plant violets in the little rock planter?  I told Megan about the Buddha statue I’d seen at Marshall’s earlier in the week, maybe it was still there? So, we went there too, before we went home. The Buddha statue was gone, but there were lots of big planting pots. Hmmm. 

Once home, we became even more passionate about the project. Who knew this could be so much fun? Then we had to go back to Bachman’s to get more dirt, and then maybe another flower or two? It was getting late in the day, and it was Sunday, when stores close early. So we made it to buy more flowers, more dirt, and even a little gnome  to put in one of the pots, before Bachman’s closed. And then we decided we should go back to Marshall’s to get the pots we’d seen earlier, since they were quite a bit less money than the pots at Bachman’s. It was a bit after 6 when we got to Southdale, it was looking good, there were still cars in the lot. Macy’s was open until 7, we were still good, until we got to Marshall’s and the security gate was halfway down the door. 

Megan and I looked at each other and ducked under. We headed straight for the pots, we grabbed two quickly and headed towards the checkout. Both of us nervous and sheepish. We are not the pushy shopper types, we are reluctant shoppers most of the time. Megan has to remind me to say excuse me rather than wait for people to move. We looked at each other in shock when we heard the  security gate being closed all the way. So there we were after closing, trying to purchase pots, the high of planting flowers still coursing through our veins. Fortunately, at the checkout, the clerks (and manager) were all quite kind, saying, oh we didn’t know anyone was still in the store, and yes, one cashier is still not closed out yet. And then, when I asked which way out? No worries, we’ll open the gate and let you out. 

We were relieved and giddy and surprised at ourselves. We were in sync on this mission. Proud of our dedication to the project, stopping at nothing to complete our plant potting. We noted how if either of us had hesitated at the halfway closed gate, we could never have pulled it off. We carried our big pots out to the car. Excited to get the plants potted. We stopped at the co op for hamburger and buns for dinner, and then finished planting our plants when we got home.  We have one pot left over, Megan reminded me the lovely hibiscus that we didn’t buy would be perfect for it. We’ll have to go to Bachman’s again soon. It was a lovely day, and I now have a lovely deck, now; not some day. What was that Goethe said? “Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.” 

Marketing & Manipulation

The last tomato I bought was not just a tomato. It was an heirloom tomato, purchased at a high price at the co-op, of all places. It may or may not have been locally grown (which is relative to say, Minnesota, the US, or the globe). What I do know, is that I never, ever would have imagined that a grocery staple, like a tomato, would be priced at what I would consider, a luxury item price. I did not buy it because it was pricey, or heirloom. I bought it because it looked like the freshest produce. 

My bag of coffee is not just a bag for coffee anymore, it’s not just a ‘container.’ It is a place for marketing. It tells me, “Light or Dark, it’s all green.” And I’m thinking, yeah, right. Green. Unless there is something less than savory going on in food production, why would I need to be assured that my coffee is green? In the wisdom of Shakespeare, I think, “Thou dost protest too much.” I want to pick my coffee on taste, not politics. Especially not corporate politics. I worked at a major chain coffee shop, and I saw just how green it was. For the corporate folks, of  course. They may have no guilt, for they have spread it all around to the rest of us, subtly, of course, by assuring us that we should have no guilt, in buying their products. 

I don’t know for how long it’s been going on, but marketing attempts to manipulate our emotions are rampant. Maybe you know that, maybe you don’t. I think about it when I see green, as in; our products, store, manufacturing, etc. are green. I know enough about manufacturing and the world in general to know how very little control we have about each step that goes into harvesting, making, and shipping goods. This doesn’t mean that some companies might not take more care, be more in control, and offer products that might be more sustainable than others, but I would ask, what does exactly green mean? Are there standards attached to this new color word for political and social beliefs? 

And in the case of something like say, new construction, might re-using an older building actually be the most green? But we often don’t like to do our homework, to look into what green actually means in advertising, in the industry and in this organization, precisely. We take people at their word, and if green means sustainable, we buy, even if it means that rain forests are destroyed, and the trucks moving the product are using up petrol and emitting pollution. After all, they’ve covered the bases for us, haven’t they? Isn’t that what their brochures say? (While actually, all this paper, printing, and advertising, are too, using up more resources.)

Green isn’t the only place that we are manipulated by advertising; how about the strange concept that you are saving money when you are actually, (yes, really) spending your money? How can you both save and spend, at the same time. And I will admit, I get ‘tricked’ into this, because, sometimes, I forget, that money is nothing unless I spend it. Sometimes I still believe that I can (and will) only make a set amount of money, and so I better be careful, instead of believing that I do have enough and can keep making more. 

So, what does this have to do with me (or us) in general? Well, sometimes I just wonder if all this marketing aimed at manipulating our emotions has made us wary of having emotions? If it is so easy for someone else to take advantage of me because I have emotions, why do I have them? Maybe I should hide them away, behind defense mechanisms, maybe? And if everywhere I go on the street, I get conflicting emotions and people might just try to see me as vulnerable, how do I navigate? 

First, I think we have to remember that our lives, including our emotions, including our cold hard cash, are our own. We don’t have to live our lives, or feel our feelings, or spend (or save) our money for anything except ourselves. I’ll say it again, our feelings are our own, for us. Our emotions are fantastical ways that we figure out what we like, and what we don’t like, they help us become who we are. There are no bad and good feelings in terms of ethics or morals, just feelings. What we do with our feelings may have consequences, how we manage how we feel may have lesser or greater social (and personal) consequences, but that is separate from how we feel. 

I’m watching an older British TV show lately, Reggie Perrin, (with Martin Clunes, who is adorable) and on the show, when Reggie’s mom makes him crazy, he ‘hallucinates’ as he calls it, that a wrecking ball mows her down. (This might actually be more representative of how Reggie feels inside, that his mom is oblivious to him and doesn’t see it.) We all laugh, though, because we know that we have not evolved to the place where Reggie can articulate his feelings and act on them in a way to protect himself; and so he imagines a horrible way to get rid of his mother, and most likely, the wrecked feeling inside of himself. 

Maybe we don’t want to see the many ways in which we are manipulated, are not exactly who we want to be, and our helplessness at times, in living in such a complicated world. Maybe. But also, just maybe, we can learn to accept our feelings, and integrate them into our lives, and so then, we can address our shadow selves, personally and communally, knowing that we share responsibility for letting ourselves be manipulated, by marketing, by politics, by ourselves, and each other. So that when you buy that cup of coffee, you know, that many coffee growing communities don’t enjoy the same quality of life that you do, when you buy green, huge corporations are still stripping forests, and when you spend money, that’s simply what you are doing. 

But, it is also maybe OK that people in another part of the world live differently, what you have in that car you are driving (convenience, esteem, mobility), they may have in higher levels of endorphins, because they live with family members (happiness, community, acceptance). And maybe, corporations that are motivated by greed, won’t succeed in the long run, maybe they will, and this shows us that we still accept colonialism and makes us think, What do we need to do about this? And spending your money, you could save it, yes, you get to do what you want with your money. Really, you get to do with your money what you will, and you know what? You get to do with your life what you will also. Your emotions will kick in in regards to your internalized belief system, but just remember, you will most likely be always wanting to feel accepted, and also to have some autonomy. 

And maybe, when we learn to understand our own emotions better, and give ourselves a vocabulary around them, we will no longer need to resort to defense mechanisms to protect ourselves or our self-concept. We won’t have to hallucinate graphically our inner world. Instead, we could become more solid in who we are, how things are, and be accepting of it all.