Month: September 2018

You So Funny

My daughter loves the TV show America’s Got Talent.  Thankfully she has much more wholesome and uplifting tastes in TV shows than her parents who stayed up past their bedtime to finish The Sinner last night and recently binge-watched the entire second season of Ozark in two days.  Occasionally, I would sit down with my daughter and watch AGT when there wasn’t anything dark and disturbing to watch instead.  This season I was utterly rooting for the comedian Vicki Barbolak to win.  I think that she is hilarious.  Vicki is warm, self-deprecating and has great natural timing.  She didn’t win, but she got far enough to guarantee a bright future in all sorts of comedic opportunities, in my opinion.  When I looked up Vicki on the internet, it turns out that she took her first comedy class when she was 38 years old.  What an inspiration for us Second Halfers!!

During AGT, one of the judges, Mel B who is a former Spice Girl band member, dressed as a unicorn and read from a joke book.  That brought me back to the days when my kids still had book fairs at school.   I gave my kids money for their book fairs with the insistence that they only buy books with that money.  They had better not come home with stuffed animals, 4-foot pencils or whoopie cushions . . . only books.  Invariably, at least one of them would come home with a joke book. (Retrospectively, I should have put joke books on the “DO NOT spend my money on this at the book fair” list.)  Now, I don’t know if the teachers still do this, or if kids can just read to Alexa or Siri now, but back then, their teachers required their students to read to a parent for at least 30 minutes every night.  So usually one of my kids would start reading their joke book to me.  That is when I would don my noise cancelling earplugs.  Okay, not really, but after 18 knock-knock jokes in a row, when I was ready to knock-knock my head into the wall, I would decide that this particular child was an excellent reader and really didn’t need anymore practice reading.  Looking back, I am wondering if the whole “read the joke book to Mom” was a well-thought-out scam to get out of reading.  My kids are clever like that.

Jokes are a funny thing. (no pun intended, seriously, I just reread that line and I had to laugh that I even wrote it.)  We have a love/hate relationship to jokes.  And humor is a very personal thing.  What I think is hysterical could easily fall flat to you.  Spontaneous humor is great, but it often never fails that in social circles, a joke telling session starts up and my palms start getting sweaty.  Everyone should have a few good jokes in their pockets for times like these.  I have a couple jokes that I have worn out so much that anyone who has ever met me, stood behind me in line or glanced at me funny, probably has heard me tell it.  I don’t like long jokes, because I always get so nervous telling them that my mind freezes and the punch line disappears into the thin air.  My friend once taught me a really short, corny easy joke that is so short that it’s impossible to forget the punchline and even though it’s a groaner, you get your joke-telling turn over fast.  I’m going to share it with you, because I love you guys and I want to give you something.  It goes like this:  “Two men walk into a bar.  Don’t worry, they have bumps on their heads, but they’re okay.”

Thank you, guys!  You’ve been great!  Give it up for Adulting – Second Half!! Woo-hoo!!!  See you tomorrow for what you’ve been waiting for all week, Favorite Things Friday!!!

Oh Just to Be With You . . . Thank You

When I was little girl there was a kids’ show that I watched called Romper Room.  The teacher, who was sort of the show’s director would hold up a magnifying glass and peer through it.  She would say directly to the TV screen, “I see Billy.  I see Susie.  I see Rachel and I see you!  I see you!”  When I was very little, I bought it: hook, line and sinker.  Then I started getting “in the know” and my cynical self thought, “Oh really?  How the hell can she see me?”  Well, maybe I didn’t swear, but I was a little annoyed at myself for getting duped.

Earlier this year when I attended the Taylor Swift concert, Taylor talked more than a couple of times about having a very personal relationship with her fans and audience.  I felt a little skeptical when she said it, but she did seem so emotionally sincere.  I had just recently started blogging and everything was so new that I didn’t quite understand this connection.  But now I do.

First of all, I need to say thank you.  I started this blog on an emotional whim.  My eldest child had just left the nest and I had so many words, emotions, questions, doubts, fears, etc. swirling around in my head.  Writing has always been the best outlet for me to really organize the swirl in my head and try to make sense of it all.  I felt like a blog would be a great personal tool for me to heal and grow.  It has definitely been that for me, but also so much more.

I thought writing a blog would better help me to connect with myself and it does help me with that, but I had no idea how connected it would make me feel with others.  I have good IRL (in real life) family and friends who support my blog and read it regularly.  I can’t thank you enough for all of your love, and support, and the kindness you have given to me throughout my life.  I treasure you all.  But readers out there, who I have never met in person, I thank you, as well.  I treasure you.  I never knew I needed you, but I did.  You make me feel like I have a voice worth listening to; you make me feel heard and understood.  I appreciate you more than you know.

I feel a personal connection to this blog, of course, but also to everyone who reads it.  Your time is precious.  You choose what is a worthwhile way to spend your time and when you read my blog you are giving me a gift of your precious time. Thank you.  Thank you.  Thank you.  I sincerely honor that and respect that offering.  What used to be looked at as just a personal release (my blog), has now become a responsibility to those who entrust their time to it.  I don’t take that lightly.  I get up every morning excited to write, excited to release, but mostly excited to connect to you all, my readers.  As an entity, my readers, you have become another part of my life whom I love, treasure and feel responsible to be accountable and there for you.  I want our daily connection to be that “comfortable old pair of slippers” that will always be there for both of us.  I promise you to be as reliable and as honest and as “real” as I can be.  I see you all as my friends and I am grateful for you.  I see you. Thank you.

Green-Eyed Monster

I once read that if you feel envious of something that someone else has, instead of wallowing in those feelings, you should use the envy as a springboard to either change up things in your own life or to change your thoughts.  Napoleon said that “Envy is a declaration of inferiority,” but I don’t believe that.  I think all of our feelings are part of our natural navigation system, so when our feelings are negative ones, we have to pay attention to what thoughts and circumstances are creating that negativity.  That, in turn, empowers us to make changes.

Many years ago, a friend in my neighborhood who was a few years ahead of me on the parenting chain wheeled happily down our road in her brand new convertible, with the top down and her hair flying.  I was still stuck in the minivan/SUV/station wagon stage of parenting and taxiing my four kids around town in that mode of travel, and admittedly, my envy meter went way up.  I felt sorry for myself for about a week, every time I hauled my brood around in our giant, french-fry garden, multiple mileage miracle, ton-sized Ford SUV.  Ironically, I now look back at that car with such fondness remembering the very many family road trips it reliably got us to and then safely back home, all in one piece.  However, my current ride is a convertible and I adore it!  I decided to turn my envy into future inspiration and it has worked out great in the long run.

Friends of ours are continually busy doing things.  They take trips and adventures and outings as often as the rest of us drink coffee.  Their three kids are younger than ours and I started to feel inferior, lazy and martyr-like compared to them.  I started to feel that ugly little ripple we call envy.  Now reality is that I like down time.  I like alone time and a lot of it.  I like to be spontaneous, calm and peaceful.  So, as exciting as planned outings and trips can be, a little bit of them goes a long way for me.  However, in noticing my ugly feelings, I realized that perhaps our family life had gotten a tad too predictable and banal and so we added a few more weekend outings and we made a better point of planning more interesting family vacations.  I don’t fit into my friends’ frenetic lifestyle but I am grateful for the inspiration it gave to me to spice mine up a little bit and to make changes that were inspiring to me.

Theodore Roosevelt said that “comparison is the the thief of joy.”  I have repeated that quote often to my children when reminding them to be only the best of their own abilities and circumstances.  However, I only believe that Theodore Roosevelt’s statement is true in the long run.  In the short run, if I feel a little prick of the green monster, I ask myself where is that prick coming from and what do I need to do, as an empowered woman, to make that prick go away?  In that sense, a very ugly negative emotion can be turned around to be a beautiful flash of inspiration or a change of focus to strong thoughts of gratitude for all of the amazing good in my own life.  As we all know and have experienced, the grass is greenest where you water it.

The Earth Has Stopped

Yesterday, I read this quote in my meditation:

“It was one of those days so clear, so silent, so still, you almost feel the earth itself has stopped in astonishment of its own beauty.” – Katherine Mansfield

I think that is one of the most poignant, beautiful lines I have ever read.  I had never heard of the author, so thanks to the wonders of the internet I was able to find out everything I could possibly want to know about Katherine Mansfield.  She was a short story writer, from New Zealand. She was friends with D.H. Lawrence and Virginia Woolf.  She passed on in 1923 due to tuberculosis at the young age of 34.

I think that quotes like the one above are why I love the written word.  When someone can help encapsulate what I am experiencing, thinking, feeling in one short statement, I think that it is nothing short of a miracle.  I think this is also why I love nature.  The author passed in 1923, but yesterday when I was walking a trail in a nature preserve with my husband and my dogs, I experienced exactly what she wrote.  The awe that I felt for the still nature around me almost took my breath away.  Nature is not timeless, but for our lifespans, it might as well be.

I don’t really have anything else to say about this.  Katherine Mansfield’s statement says it all and I am in awe of that.  And I look forward to experiencing that “earth has stopped” moment again and again for the rest of my life.

 

It’s A Sign

A good decade ago, I belonged to a book club and the book that we were reading and discussing one month was Still Alice, which was focused on the subject of Early Onset Alzheimer’s disease.  We were all still in our thirties, but instead of discussing the book, someone had gotten a hold of psychological tests we could all take to make sure that we none of us were in the early stages of Alzheimer’s.  We all nervously scrambled, taking the test quickly and anxiously.  It’s a shame that we all wasted our time worrying, instead of enjoying the discussion about a really good book.  We all came out “normal.”

I laugh at my foolishness then, but as I approach 50, I find myself questioning whether I need to take that test again.  I read once that most people are as forgetful as they were in their 20s as they are in their 50s, its just that when you are in your 20s you don’t even question it.  In your 50s, you notice everything that you forget.  Lately, everything gets questioned as a sign of aging for me.

My right arm has been sore for a while.  Now, keep in mind that I type more than I ever have, I walk around with an 82 pound labrador who is mediocre at best, on a leash and my purse has so much stuff in it, I might as well be carrying around a bowling ball.  That being said, on a day that my arm was particularly sore, I started out believing that I might have a debilitating case of arthritis and because I had time to stoke my imagination, I soon started hyperventilating believing that I was having a heart attack.  Dr. Google is not my friend.

My body can’t do the things that it did in my 20s and 30s.  I have come to terms with that.  It’s just that with the self awareness that comes with aging, it’s less easy to brush things off.  A bad mood is all of the sudden a concerning menopausal hormonal imbalance or a desire for a new car becomes a midlife crisis.  Other people are forgiving of the foibles of aging people.  Maybe I should just take advantage of that fact and enjoy some forgiven kookiness that comes with the second half.  If I can let go of some of the anxiety, it could be quite freeing.

Hurricane Hell

I am sending my most heartfelt prayers and love and concern for the people being affected by Hurricane Florence.  We live in Florida and experienced Hurricane Irma last year.  It is such a terrifying experience.

When we were in the Florida Keys one time, we took a picture of a billboard.  This is what it said:

Life is like a camera.  Just focus on what is important.  Capture the good times.  Develop from the negatives and if things don’t work out, just take another shot.

The Florida Keys are no strangers to hurricanes.  You are going to be okay, dear Carolinas/Virginia friends.  Everything’s going to be okay.

Hello Friday!

Happy Friday!  “Sassy, classy, and still kickin’ assy!” – Maxine

“I know every day is a gift, but where’s the receipt for Mondays? I want to exchange it for another Friday.” -Anonymous  

So, my daughter has been telling me for weeks about an item that she thinks that I should add to my Favorite Things Friday blogpost. (New readers, I show my ultimate superficial side on Fridays, by pimping retail stuff that I like and I encourage you to share about the stuff you like, too, in the Comments section.)  So, I was going to add her item today until I saw that it has been discontinued. (Please see my previous blog post Where Did You Go? for a rant on how terrible it is when our favorite things get relegated to the Discontinued box.)  As per my rant, I saw that this previous cheap drugstore item, now retails on ebay for around $32 and my daughter saw one on Amazon for over $700 this morning.  If you have “funny money” to burn, the item is called Band-aid Friction Block stick.  My daughter claims that this has been a lifesaver protecting her from the painful blisters that all of her new school shoes have been causing on her pretty little feet.  I hope that she uses this block sparingly, because this is the last one that we’re going to spring for, at those prices.

Let’s go for some more realistic recommendations on Favorite Things Friday:

Natural Life Toothbrush Cover – I love the entire line of stuff from Natural Life  It is such a cute, upbeat, wholesome company.  Natural Life is like the Chick-fil-A of cute, girly stuff, in my mind.  I’m sure I’ll feature other items from Natural Life down the line, but I had to start with their wonderful toothbrush covers.  They are like adorable hair clips for the top of your toothbrush.  The plastic cover clips over your toothbrush, protecting it from germs, broken blush, and exploded face cream, when you travel.  I have two of them.  One says, “No More Cooties!” and it has flowers and rhinestones and the other says “Llive Happy” and it features an adorable llama.  It’s things like these that make being a female so much fun!

Avalanche Travel Dog Bowl –  In case you haven’t noticed in previous blogs, we have two dogs.  We are slaves to our dogs.  My friend has dubbed our lab, “Prince Ralphie.”  This collapsible silicone dog bowl, is perfect for when we take our dogs on hikes, the beach and other adventures, like escaping from hurricanes.  (Thoughts and prayers go out to all of our dear friends in the Carolinas and Virginia and all other areas being affected by Florence!  Hurricanes are horrible.)  Anyway, these bowls are silicone and collapsible, so they are light, easy to carry and easy to store.  They are perfectly easy to set up and fill with water and food for your furry princes and princesses!  Then, when the fur babies are finished, the bowls are very easy to clean.

La Croix Sparkling Water – After being a Diet Coke addict for years and burning a couple of holes in my stomach, I decided I needed to change some of my habits.  I drank a lot of water, but then I got bored.  I missed my fizz fix.  I tried all of the sparkling waters on the market, but this is “the one”.  I keep coming back to La Croix and it totally satisfies me.  My husband feels the same way.  No calories, no salt, no artificial anything, and yet it still satisfies.  It’s an acquired taste if you are used to a lot of sugar and flavor in your drinks, but once you accept the change, there’s no going back.  La Croix is the bomb!  It’s got that perfect amount of “sparkiness” that I like in my healthy drinks.

Okay, one more Friday funny and then let’s all go have a really nice weekend!

“Every Friday I feel like I deserve a new addition to my closet for all of my hard work during the week.”

Funny, but true.  Go get yourself a cutesy toothbrush cover, at least.

 

 

True Apologies

Earlier this summer, our family had gone to a local water park for the entire day.  We hired our long-time pet sitters to come to our home to take our dogs out a few times that day and to walk them.  Our pet sitters are a lovely mother and daughter team who have watched our dogs when we have been away on vacation many times, sometimes even out of the country.  They have always been reliable and responsible.  It has always been a great comfort to us that they look after our sweet pets and even check up on our home when we are gone.  Their service is truly good peace of mind for us.

Unfortunately, on this particular day, our pet sitters made a mistake and did not have us on the calendar for the right day.  Later that afternoon, I realized I had not left a check out for them and I called them to let them know that I would send the check in the mail.  It was then that we all figured out that a date mix-up had happened and that they had not been to the house to look after our dogs.  We were all upset and they quickly got into their car and headed over to our house.  The pups were good and everything ended up being just fine.  Honestly, at that point I wasn’t upset about the situation any longer.  Mistakes happen and all was well.

However, the best part of this story comes after that little fiasco.  The part that really made me ponder my own actions in life, was how well our pet sitters handled the aftermath of their mistake.  In my email, I received the most genuine apology I have received (or frankly, given) in a long time from anyone or any entity.  Our pet sitters completely owned their mistake, making no excuses.  This was no “Sorry But . . . ” apology.  They were not defensive.  This was no “Sorry That You Are Upset . . . ” apology.  Our pet sitters apologized profusely for their mistake with full understanding of why this experience would have upset us, let us know the thought-out changes that they had implemented in their scheduling system to ensure that this type of mistake wouldn’t happen again in the future and asked us kindly to trust them again for future business.  My family understands that mistakes happen and we had no intention of “firing” them after this one episode, but the way that the mistake was handled was a lesson to me that I won’t soon forget.

Why is it so hard to earnestly apologize?  Why do we think others expect perfection from us?  None of us are perfect.  We all make mistakes.  I think when we are wronged, all that we are looking for is true remorse from the offender, a feeling of being understood and heard as to why we are upset, and evidence that the offender has fully and earnestly considered changes to ensure that they won’t hurt us again. In that way, they are showing us that they value us and that they value our relationship to us. In my experience, these types of true apologies are rare in today’s world.  True apologies are rare enough that I felt the urge to blog about them.

We have had our pet sitters come to our home and take care of our pets several times since this experience and they always provide a great service.  I’m grateful to know them, not just as people who help take care of our family, but also, as teachers and way-showers, who have been good examples to me that showing humility and taking full responsibility for our actions are true markers of confidence and character.  I actually have even more respect for our pet sitters now, after the mistake, than I did before.  It’s been a valuable lesson for all parties involved and the dogs’ tails are still wagging.

 

Family Hashtag

I started a new family tradition a few weeks ago.  Admittedly, it was created by that little control freak in me who wants to feel that my family is always safe and secure.  It comes from the worrier in me who likes to “keep tabs.”  I want to know what the temperature and pulse of my family and its individual members are, on a regular basis.  Now my immediate family has a majority male contingent.  There is my husband and three sons and then there is me and my daughter.  I had to come up with a tradition that was going to be easily doable and interesting enough to keep the attention of an intense middle-aged executive, a young twenty-something on his own, a college fraternity man, two busy teenagers and me, their fearless leader.  The one thing that we all have in common is a streak of competitiveness.  So, I came up with Family Hashtag.

Every single day, we have agreed to text to a family chat, a # and then at least one word that describes our individual day.  The competitive part comes in with the idea of how long can we keep the streak going?  Admittedly, I’m usually the first one to post on a daily basis.  I guess I serve as a reminder that this tradition isn’t going away anytime soon.

It is amazing what one word to a few words after a hashtag, can convey.  Believe it or not, you can almost tell someone’s mood or “state of being” from just one little 3-second text.  Examples:  #ihatemath, #coffeeingallons, #relief  Sometimes my family members are feeling tricky and mysterious and will post something quizzical that makes us all want to know more.  Then, the chat gets a little more involved and interesting.  At the very least, what I definitely know from my little daily game is that all of my family members are alive and breathing and still interested in keeping a connection with our little family unit.  I highly recommend this game to all of my readers’ families, especially families run by sly Momagers like me.

Boys are People Too

I was required to open a Twitter account when my daughter was on a softball team many years ago.  That is how the coach reached out to us parents. She was way ahead of Donald Trump.  I didn’t even look at Twitter for many years after that, but recently I started following a few people and groups on Twitter because I find them to be so insightful and interesting.  Think Smarter on Twitter is something that I try to check out almost daily.  Here is one of their recent tweets:

I have four children.  My first three children are boys.  Honestly, since my youngest son is almost 18, I should say that they are men.  I’ll never forget when my children were little, one of my sons asked why is it that in Disney movies, the boys tend to be big dopes and the girls are champions?  The other boys chimed in, too, wondering why that was the way of Disney movies.

In the media lately, we have been exposed to the worst men’s behavior.  And this is good.  Men need to be held accountable for their actions.  So, do women.  People need to pay their consequences when they do wrong.  Unfortunately though, it sometimes seems like men as a whole are being lumped into a group of jerks that the vast majority of men have nothing in common with. Men are being dehumanized and I think that they have a right to question this.  I would not want to be judged by the behavior of a few evil women.

I like men.  Most of the men that I have encountered in my life have been wonderful influences.  Most of the men whom I know are nice, kind, loving, respectful people.  They love their families, they provide for and protect their families and they serve their places of employment, their communities and their country.   They are good people, just like most of the women I have encountered in my life.  Men are not the enemy.

When I was in college, I attended a feminist speaker forum.  One of the speakers showed some film footage of women’s rights rallies that had occurred in the 1960s.  In these rallies, scores of angry women were yelling, “Take the power!  Take the power!”  Now, I realize that the women who came before me have made it so that my daughter and I do not have to feel nearly as discriminated against than the women of earlier generations.  I am so grateful that these strong women stood up for what is right.  Sometimes change requires extreme emotion.  I understand that. I also know that further change is needed.  However, I am hoping that we have come to a point in our history where that chant can be more of, “Share the power!  Share the power!”  An inclusive energy going in the same direction, can go so much faster and take us so much further than a constant battle.  I believe that most reasonable people, men and women, would like for this direction to be the way of the future.  It is what I hope for, for my daughter and for my sons.

******

I debated about whether to write about 9/11 or not. Why after 17 years does it feel so fresh? There are no words. Just a heartfelt thank you to the heroes and heartfelt prayers sent to the families who will never be the same due to this senseless tragedy.