A Birthday Note to Me and You

Yup, it’s official, I’m 71 today. A little worse for wear, but I’m so grateful I’m still upright with fairly decent posture. Amazingly, the world hasn’t beaten me down, just worn me out a bit. When I look in the mirror, I can see my hair is more frazzled and gray than it has ever been. The crinkles around my eyes are deeper, and I hope they’re from laughing rather than squinting. The wrinkles around my mouth which began to form when I was smoking cigarettes have begun to smooth now that thirty years have passed since I quit the habit. I can also hope it’s because I’m pouting less and not twisting my mouth in disapproval over someone else’s actions.

My most taxing challenge right now is trying to keep up to date with the world of technology. I suppose it might be less of a problem if I wasn’t trying to make something out of myself by creating an author’s platform so I can present my next novel to the world and have more than 75 people interested in it. (That’s how many I personally know of who bought or read my first novel in the Sacred Bundle Series.) I find myself clawing my way up a tremendously steep learning curve to deal with social media and the do’s and don’ts of advertising. Quite a challenge. Thanks goodness I have some ‘go to’ people for help.

Joining the Emandal Chorale was one of the wisest things I ever did. Singing every week for an hour and a half has been a Godsend. At first, I struggled to remember words and tunes and rhythms and put them all together into a convincing performance. If I didn’t remember the words, I was advised to mouth the phrase, “Watermelon Woman” and that it would look like I was singing the words to the song without interrupting the flow of what everyone else was singing. I had to use that trick a few times.

Now I can honestly say there are new pathways in my brain that allow me to learn the words faster while clapping and side-stepping in a coherent rhythm with everyone else. If I don’t, I just giggle, stop, and start again with those around me. Mistakes are ok as long as they aren’t repeated in a performance. My memory improvements are even spilling over into my real life. I can track where I might have left something with greater ease instead of spending an hour searching. Going to the store without the list is easier as I only leave off one or two items and only buy one or two unnecessary things.

Challenges seem mostly to be in the relationship area. My mother has shifted positions with me, as she is now incapable of fulfilling her role as the mother I have known. She’s still the woman who birthed me; it’s just that her mind is elsewhere now, and she just isn’t there for sharing.  It’s OK; I’m learning to let her be while I provide care for her needs and wants. Time spent with my daughter and son and their families has reduced itself to my dropping by on my way between No. California and the Monterey area where my mom lives in her Skilled Nursing Facility. I keep track of my step-son, Steve, and his wife, as well as my grandchildren via Facebook. I suppose they all do the same thing with me. It is a handy tool for that.

Being at the end of a three year relationship with a man-friend has brought a whole lot of processing and re-thinking the idea of a close friendship in the future. Reviewing match.com and plentyoffish.com showed me, by the leaden weight which took up residence in the pit of my stomach, that I wasn’t ready to put myself out there. I seem to be happy writing my novels, working on my web site, sewing my funky pot holders, funky little bags, and crazy lap quilts, in between hanging out with friends and fellow singers. My volunteering has reduced itself too, and I’ve closed my Reiki office and will see clients out of the back office of a local chiropractor. I often do Reiki sessions for friends in my living room. My classes are now down to four a year, but I’m considering doing a couple different and special seminars once a year.

What’s in my future? I hope ball room and swing dancing lessons, more singing, finishing my novel series and other writing projects, traveling, swimming with dolphins, sitting around a camp fire and telling stories, learning to fly fish and maybe golf, going to ceremony with old and new friends, meeting new people, riding a train across country, getting more massages, learning to cook Thai food, walking along the beach, listening to more live concerts, watching more sunrises and sunsets, and any other experiences as they come across my path. I don’t want more things. (I actually want to give some away and keep trying to do just that. Thank goodness for the thrift shops.) I want experiences, and I aim to find them.

If I had any complaints, they would have to include (1) how poundage seems to gather within my skin without my even trying to accumulate it, (2) how exercise has to have a commitment or it falls to the wayside without a whimper, (3) how one seems to need a doctor’s expertise more frequently as we age, and (4) how taxes still have to be done yearly and paid.

All in all, those aren’t that bad. Yup, I’m 71, and, believe it or not, I’m not cranky about it. I’m beginning to believe I will probably make it to 72 and beyond with a sense of adventure and hopefully a sense of humor.

Coping With More Changes

Organize . . .  reorganize . . . then organize the reorganization. That’s one of my procrastination methods. The action seems to connect my mind and body and environment and gives me a sense of accomplishment, whether the last is true or not.

More often than not, my reorganization methods have caused problems. I remember in Germany when I was constantly rearranging the furniture. The habit emerged as a way to handle my anger. When my first husband came home from his work, he constantly accused me of doing nothing all day. I chose then to clean and rearrange one room a day or a shelf or a closet just so he had visual proof I had done something. He had enough of that, when, in the middle of one night, he got up to pee and returned to where he thought the bed was, only it wasn’t. He landed on the floor.

My second husband tolerated any moving and rearranging much less than the first. I tried to explain I was making things easier or more efficient. “Well, you might think you’re improving things, but I can’t find one damned thing in my own home.”

I began writing. This was in the days before home computers. Y bought me an electric typewriter and provided roles of used print-out paper from his work. I typed merrily away, not needing to hit a return bar or add pieces of paper to the platen. Then I would cut and paste my stories together and retype the whole thing again.

One story I rewrote and reorganized twenty-seven times. “For the Love of Roses” was written from every point of view imaginable: first person, second person, third person, then his view, her view, the omnipotent view. The ending became the beginning and then the middle. Description was taken out and put back in, expanded, then I practiced giving everything a color.

The story eventually was the linchpin for my first novel, “An Awakening”, which made the rounds of publishers until it came to live in the lower drawer of one filing cabinet.

In the early years of my living on my own after Y passed away, I found I rearranged stuff when I fretted. Recently I realized I organize and reorganize when I was out of sorts. In fact, very recently I was in such a state, I de-organized. Whatever was going on in me caused me to pull items and files and clothes and oddities from every corner of the closets, house, and garage. I stuck them in empty containers in no specific order and distributed those plastic and cardboard boxes throughout my small bungalow in such disarray I couldn’t walk a clear path from the front door to the bedroom.

I kept to my regular schedule of life, made my meetings, paid my bills. When I realized I couldn’t move about in my garage anymore and I was on the verge of having to park the car in the drive way, I sat down and took stock of my actions.

We live our lives in patterns which build over time. When some part of that pattern becomes thread-bare and dissolves into a hole, we face an emptiness. With effort, we often fill in the hole the best way we can by integrating newer threads to save the pattern. Sometimes the pattern can’t be saved.

Metaphorically, I believe, I was searching through all the paraphernalia I’ve gathered around me for something suitable to recreate the template I’ve used for my entire life. Nothing fit. Nothing could replace the hole or the whole of it. I couldn’t just rearrange things to cover over these changes. I was also procrastinating by creating more circles around myself. The boxes and detritus I stacked were between me and the front door. I was barricading myself in, going outside on my terms, but making it hard for anyone else to come in. It gave me an excuse to be alone because who would ever be able to climb over those boxes, those defenses, to get to me again, to reach into my core, to know me?

Only me.

I finally stopped.

I cleared and cleaned, returning most things to the order I had created when I moved into this space. Some items got donated. Some projects got thrown away. I can now dance in the kitchen and living room, walk around the dining table and bed. I also have a direction and a commitment to promises I’ve made to myself about wishes and dreams.

Who knows how this would have ended if I hadn’t stopped to look at what I was doing? The pain I released when I realized my life had changed again and I needed to change with it could have suffocated me. Organizing and reorganizing served me one more time. Now I am going to call these actions my coping tools. I’m sharing this story for a purpose.

In “An Awakening”, Sue, the main character, was in a similar re-patterning challenge. Her counselor suggested she pick one drawer in her home to reorganize. Just one. Sue found that when she focused entirely on that project, she felt a small spark of hope and one of accomplishment. Have you ever tried this?  I’d love to read about what coping tool you use to help yourself feel OK about yourself and how your life is going.