March 2021 - Adulting: Second- Half

Me, Myself and I

So, I’ve been banished from my house today. I am writing this from a coffee spot. We are having some drywall work done in my home today, and I suppose I am somewhat of a pistol on days when my house is crawling with strangers. My husband and my daughter have been doing work/school from home since this time last year, and more than a few times I have cried from my victim chair that I don’t get any “alone time” anymore. Well, today they kicked me out. Okay, it was more like an insistent coax or a persistent, strong nudge, but clearly, together they decided that things would be more peaceful at the house today, without me whirling around like a stressball, sighing and complaining, wringing my hands, huffing and puffing, and working up my sensitive trio of dogs, like a frenzied entourage, behind me. I own my eccentricities. I get it. I’m getting what I asked for; I get alone time all day today. And honestly, it’s kind of delicious. I’ve missed me. It’s kind of nice to get reacquainted with me. And I hope to bring the refreshed, grateful, more centered and peaceful version of me, back home to my loving family. Sometimes my family knows what is best for me, even before I realize what I truly need. That’s called love.

Keep taking time for yourself until you're you again. - Lalah Delia | Words quotes, Self love quotes, Quotes to live by

Spend time for yourself quotes Top 86 spend time with yourself quotes sayings | Dogtrainingobedienceschool.com

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Tuesday Tidbits

+ I have seen “Not all those who wander are lost” before, but I had never seen the whole verse, nor did I realize that it was written by J.R.R. Tolkien. I love it. I love all of it. I am a bit of a wanderer. I get bored easily. All this being shut in, is starting to make me want to burst. I sat next to the most colorful character at the nail salon the other day. We were all wearing masks of course, but this woman was also wearing a big, elaborate, flamboyant orange hat and her loyal, chubby little dachshund sat at her side, as still as a statue. Apparently, she had ties to Hollywood and whether true or not, her stories were entertaining and enthralling. I have often dubbed myself, “freak magnet,” which is not very nice of me at all. Honestly, I love the “freaks” in the world. I’m probably kind of freaky. I think we all have some “freak” in us, and the freer ones among us, let it fly. People tend to open up to me and tell me their fascinating, intimate stories, and I love it. The other day at the salon, I realized how much I miss that element of my life. Like the flowers starting to bloom, my fascinating encounters with interesting strangers are soon coming back into play as more and more of us get vaccinated, this I hope. Hope springs eternal.

+My word of the day from Word Genius was “amuse-gueule” which means, “a small savory item of food served as an appetizer before a meal.” It struck me that this is the first time I have seen “savory” used in a positive way, in a long, long time. Usually it’s used in an emphasized negative form – “He’s such an unsavory character,” or “That’s not a savory place to go.” It must really suck to be a positive word, always used in a negative way. Savory is going, “Geesh, I’m supposed to mean delicious, and scrumptious. Let’s keep it positive, guys!” (See, I told you that I’m kind of freaky. Words don’t really talk.)

+I took a little Ted talk lesson this morning on “The Dunning-Krueger effect”. That’ll bring you down to earth, real fast. The Dunning-Krueger effect speaks to the idea that most of us think we are better at most things, than any of us really are, at doing anything. In short, all of us think that we are above average humans, which is statistically impossible. Apparently, we are all amazing drivers on the road. HA! The supposed remedy to this damn humbling rule of humanity is 1.) Keep learning and 2.) Be willing to ask for, and to consider constructive criticism. Oh, fun. HA! On this note, I have a new favorite phone game which I will tell you about on Favorite Things Friday. It is called Redecor. I love the game, in an obsessive, stalky way, but like a friend full of brutal candor, Redecor has helped me to discover that “The Dunning-Krueger effect”, is indeed a real thing. A couple of 9th places out of 10, will do that to you.

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Monday Fun-Day

(credit: Rex Masters, Twitter)

These are called Pup-Cakes. They are almost too cute to eat. But on a Monday, these wouldn’t last until my second cup of morning coffee.

Speaking of food, I saw this on a sign the other day:

“Be soul food, not eye candy.”

I think it is okay to be both, but soul food is the preference. Soul food is much more nourishing. I’m wishing for all of us, the best Monday that we have ever had in our lives. (I’m setting the bar low.) See you tomorrow!

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Soul Sunday

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Good morning soulmates! Yesterday, I spent the afternoon at the beach with my husband and my daughter and our two male dogs, who are both natural water dogs. It was a wonderful day for all of us, and my husband pointed out that it is noticeably calmer and more quiet here this morning, than it is most mornings. There was a lot of energy expended at the beach yesterday, which tired us all out, but I also think that being at the beach works like a “reset button”, to balance us back to our own natural rhythms, in sync with the nature all around us.

My regular readers know that Sundays are devoted to poetry here at Adulting – Second Half. On Sundays, I write a poem or I share a poem written by another writer. I strongly encourage you to write a poem today. Share your poem here if you like, or just share with yourself. Poetry is a form of writing which is typically more connected with your emotional side and being. It is hard to write or to read poetry, without getting your heart involved, and we all know that it is good to stretch your heart muscles. Here is my poem for today:

Yesterday was different this time.

The waters were calm. The winds were even.

I looked out into the horizon and I understood,

That it was okay for me to be on my ship,

And for you to be on yours,

Perhaps never to sail together again.

Despite our different journeys,

Despite our different vessels,

Once formed out of the same timber, from the same tree.

As I looked up into the even, placid sky,

And I gazed at the early, brave, bright moon,

It occurred to me that we all share the same starry navigator,

As we take our individual journeys, throughout the waters,

Sometimes rough and stormy,

Other times smooth and clear and calm,

Until it is time to return to the safe port of our heavenly home,

Where only Love resides, and where the Tree of All,

Still stands tall at the endless shore,

Where the planks and the boards all melt back into the Tree,

As if they were never separated from her graceful form,

Holding all of the stories from all of the ships’ adventures,

Soundly and effortlessly, in the wide, sturdy trunk of All That Is.

The Definition of Beauty

I watched a snippet of an interview Oprah Winfrey was having with Sharon Stone. Sharon Stone has written a recently released memoir. In the snippet, Sharon Stone was saying that after having a stroke, and being told that she was pretty much “over” in Hollywood, she realized that she had lost her “beauty.” Oprah asked her to clarify this, “What do you mean you lost your “beauty”? Sharon Stone told Oprah that it was not so much that she had lost her physical beauty, as she had lost her “radiance”, her “magnetism”, her “presence” and her “vibrancy.” Both women concluded that it is these attributes which really make a person attractive. And they both agreed that radiance, magnetism, presence and vibrancy all come from health, well-being and confidence from within.

Yesterday, I had a good day. I saw a glimmer of confidence and hope and excitement, everywhere I went. People are really starting to believe that there is an end in sight to all of the limits that have come with the pandemic. I could feel it. Nothing in my physical world was different. Everyone was still wearing masks, but the energy had subtle changes. There was a lightness, an optimism in the air. Maybe I was feeling this way, and so this is how my outside world appeared to me. I’m not sure, but for whatever reason, yesterday, the world seemed more beautiful to me, than it had seemed in a long, long while. And when I say beautiful, what I really mean is radiant and magnetic and vibrant. Life is coming back to life. I feel it inside of me, and I feel it outside of me. We are well on the way to healing from this past unfathomable year, my friends. And this healing is radiating, and vibrating, and bringing all of our lives out into full, mesmerizing color, once again.

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Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Emotional Support Candy

Good morning, friends! Friday is here!! Whoop! Whoop! On Fridays, we don’t discuss anything deep or serious here at Adulting – Second Half. On Fridays, we keep the spirit light and airy and on the surface. On Fridays, I typically list three favorite things, or songs, or books, or TV shows, or movies, etc. and I ask you to add your favorites to my Comments section. Here are my favorites for today:

Favorite Idea: One of my aunts buys a couple of colorful bags of Easter grass and puts clumps of it, in her yard. The birds then take it and make their nests out of it and she ends up with pretty pastel birds’ nests, all around her yard. Just call her Auntie Snow White! Along these lines, I hang little lawn ornaments and such at the bottom of my magnolia tree, and one of the ornaments is an angel made out of sheep’s wool. I noticed lately that the angel’s flaming red hair is all wild and yet, thinning, at the same time. I tame it down and the next day, it’s a mess again. I was blaming the rain and wind for her bad hair days, until I noticed a little bird plucking away at the angel’s hair, probably to make a soft nest. My angel will be bald soon, but I don’t mind and I don’t think that she does either. It’s for a good cause.

Favorite Pickles: Grillo’s Pickles. We get a big tub of them at Costco, every time we go. These are the most fresh, crisp, delicious pickles that you will ever eat! And the great thing about pickles is, that you expend more calories chewing on them, than they cost you, in your daily calorie count. The tub looks huge, but you will go through it quickly, believe me.

Favorite New Magic from M & M’s: M & M’s messages. I love all things M & M’s and I love that they always, always are offering up new ways to be M & Ms. They don’t sit on their laurels, even as good as those laurels are, in the delicious world of candy. Look at these:

Some of them even have Spotify play lists that you can scan, like this one:

M&M'S Peanut Butter Candy Messages Sharing Size, 9.6 oz Bag | M&M'S - mms.com

Okay friends, you have some stuff to add to your shopping list: Easter grass, Grillo’s pickles and M & M messages! Enjoy your weekend!

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

It Just Blooms

On my to-do list for today, is to get a birthday card in the mail for my cousin’s little girl who is soon to turn two. Imagine being two these days. Everything is so completely different than when I was two, or even when my children were two years old. Technology is moving at such a rapid rate. It’s only in the last twenty years that inventions like smartphones, Google, Facebook, electric cars and Bluetooth have become part of mainstream society. Who knows what’s next? I have never had a scientific type of mind, but I am eager to see what is coming up for all of us, around the corner, most likely in rapid succession.

It’s when I consider all of these rapid changes in the world, that I get really annoyed at myself, and at others, when we start saying disparaging things about younger generations. Who are we to judge? Who are we to say what we would have been like, if the internet, Facebook, Instagram and digital cameras were part of our growing up experience? When you start comparing generations, you are never doing an apples to apples comparison. A truly scientific experiment would require that all of the outside variables be exactly the same, and that’s not possible with human beings, not even for identical twins in the same family.

Why do we humans have such a need to make comparisons? If we are honest with ourselves, it is either to make up for insecurities in ourselves (feeling better than), or to validate our own poor opinions of ourselves (feeling less than). Neither comparison does anything productive for us, or for anybody else. Comparison is only helpful when it is inspiring and inclusive. That kind of positive comparison is just an act of witnessing and discerning whether you say, “Gee, I want some of that. How do I get something like that for myself?” or “Wow, that’s interesting. It’s not for me, but variety is the spice of life.”

There is such an emphasis today on “likes” and “claps” and “followers”, but in our frenzy for approval, do we ever really stop and ask ourselves why? Is something only good for us, and interesting to us, and exciting for us, if other people say that it is? How much time are we spending talking to others about our lives, posting “stuff” about our lives, always justifying our opinions about things, versus actually just living our lives? If we are making a living from our “likes”, “claps” and “followers” then it follows that the court of public opinion, should sway our choices, I suppose. But then that just turns our own life into a commodity, being shaped by forces that aren’t really authentic to our truest selves. When we are so focused on the “likes”, “claps” and “followers” of any life decision that we make, we are no longer living our true life, but more of an empty image, that changes with the wind. And also, when the people who are making their own lives/selves, their “product”, and are then, exposed to be something different than what they are portraying, everyone feels disappointed and deceived. We see this happen time and time again.

When someone I love asks me to help them with a dilemma they are experiencing, I offer my opinion (sometimes too quickly and boisterously and annoyingly – I own this about myself. Thank you for still loving me, my peeps) but I also like to remind the person that if they put their question “out there”, they are likely to get half the world agreeing with their actions, and half the world disagreeing with their actions. Even if a majority vote leans one way or another, what does that really matter? The only thing that really matters when making a decision about your life, is what deeply resonates with yourself, at your very core. If you put the focus back on what resonates with yourself, versus what generates a bunch of “approval”, you will experience your deepest, most sacred connection to your own self and your own life. Authenticity never requires approval. It just is.

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Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

A Slight Yellow Haze

This couldn’t be more apropos to where I live right now. My neighbors drove by the other day and I thought they got a new car. I was wrong; the pollen made their black car look grey.

When I first moved to Florida and I ended up at the doctor’s office every two months for sinus infections, my doctor told me that I live in one of the two worst states for allergies. Hawaii and Florida are the worst states for allergies because something is blooming, all of the time, all year long. She also mentioned that by driving a convertible, it was like I was driving in a giant vacuum cleaner, sucking up all the pollen as I drive along. (I decided that the inconvenience of sneezing and wheezing was worth the freedom of toplessness.)

There are few things more embarrassing than having an allergy attack during this pandemic. I feel like wearing a sign saying, “Chill. It’s allergies!” I watched this poor woman struggling in the grocery store the other day. She was sneezing and sneezing and sneezing, right into her mask. Blech! Poor thing.

It's bad-------- | Allergies funny, Ecards funny, Someecards

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Take A Moment

Happy Birthday to my brilliant, beautiful, confident, talented, loving, level-headed, dream of a daughter come true!!! I love you with all of my heart. You are incredible.

***** On a more somber note, my heart is with all of those who have been traumatized by the horrible mass shootings that have happened in rapid succession these last few weeks. While so many of us are craving getting back to “normal”, I don’t think any of us are wanting mass shootings and violence to come back on to the regular scenery of our lives. My fervent prayer is for guidance on how to stop these senseless tragedies. But sometimes I think that we may already know the answer to that prayer. On an individual level, it is our own responsibility to create peace and happiness for ourselves. When we each have a core of peace and happiness, that is the energy that emanates from us, that is the energy that is given from us, and that is the energy which heals and uplifts the world, when it is felt in totality, and generated by the masses. That is what my 2021 tagline is meant to communicate:

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

We are all sharing this beautiful world. Therefore we must each take individual responsibility for our own unique part, in this co-creation of our collected lives. It’s easy to say, “Well, I didn’t shoot anybody.” And most of us don’t stoop to that horrifying level of pain and aggression, but how many times are we sarcastic with our spouses? How many times are we dismissive of our children or short-tempered with people we work with? How many times are we passive aggressive with our friends, or perhaps, on social media posts? How many times do we treat the person who is waiting on us at the store as a machine, as we chat on our phones through the whole transaction? How many times do we mindlessly fill our own bodies with empty, unhealthy calories, instead of tall glasses of water? We have so many choices in our individual days, to take a pause, and to decide whether our next action is one coming from love, or one coming from pain. We are quick to judge other people’s actions. But if we stayed in our own lanes for one day, and really consciously and detachedly looked at each action that we decide to take throughout the day, we might be a bit aghast at how much pain we have a tendency to leak out into the world. And all of that pain adds up. All of those little drips of unhealed pain that we are unwittingly putting “out there” can lead to the crescendos of chilling pain that we witness in society today. At the same token, love works the same way. When we read stories about heroic acts, and kindnesses shown to strangers, we get inspired. We want to be part of that loving experience. We are quick to volunteer our time and our resources to a worthy cause because we are inspired by others’ loving actions. How many times a day do we say encouraging, thoughtful things to our families and friends? How many times a day do we take moments to rest our bodies, or to stretch our bodies, or to drink that tall glass of water? How many times do we make eye contact and offer a compliment to the kind person waiting on us at the store, or to the homeless person sitting outside of the store? Those loving actions all add up, too, and the energy of that Love flows out into the energy of Life, which we are all co-creating. And Love is infinitely more powerful than any hate. Pain waits for us to be unconscious and lazy in our thoughts and then in our actions, so that it can creep out a little bit more and a little bit more, sometimes leading to destructive acts like what happened in Colorado last night. And then pain and hate laughs, devilishly, at our shock and our dismay about the utter awfulness. But the thing about these eruptions of pain and destruction, is that they tend to be smothered by Love. The people of Boulder will hold each other, and they will help each other, and they will heal each other, and prayers will abound. We prove it to ourselves again and again and again. Love always conquers fear and pain. Love reigns supreme. Love becomes even more powerful when it is shared and multiplied. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to reach a point in history, where we no longer have to prove that Love destroys pain? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we didn’t even have statements that say that Love dominates? “Love dominates” – That sounds like a silly oxymoron. Love Is. Love Is. Love Is.

I mentioned the song “Shameika” by Fiona Apple, recently in my blog. In the music video, the first couple of minutes the real Shameika, firmly, calmly, peacefully says, “Take a moment.” This really stuck with me. Lately, before I say something to someone, or before I send a text, or before I put something in my mouth, or before I put something in my shopping cart, I breathe and I hear Shameika’s voice saying, “Take a moment.” And then, in that lucid moment which I am taking, I try to reflect, in a detached way, whether my next action is one of pain, or is one of Love. It is my responsibility to heal my own pain, so that I can be a clear vessel for Love. I can’t heal anyone else’s pain, but I can work towards making sure that my own pain, isn’t adding to another person’s pile of pain. If I determine that I was about to act out of my pain, that means that I have to take a look at my thoughts to see where that pain is coming from. It is a reminder for me to try to work through that pain with acts of Love, towards myself and towards others. This takes a lot of consciousness and honest effort. It’s so much easier to focus on other people’s “stuff”, and what I think that they should do and should be, but that it is pointless and fruitless. We’ve each been given one life, one vessel for Love. That’s a huge responsibility, in itself. But if we each did our part, the light flowing through all of us would expose all the darkness as nothing, just nothing. Light shines the dark away. Love Is. Love Is. Love Is.

Hear Shameika’s “Take a moment” in the first minute of this video. It will stick with you. It’s the most important message I have gotten all year.

Monday Fun-Day

Who says that men age better than we do? Cher is about as ageless as they come. I remember watching the “Sonny & Cher” variety show with rapt attention, when I was a kid. Just typing that sentence, made me feel really, really old. But hey, Cher makes “old” look pretty damn good!

TOP 25 QUOTES BY CHER (of 137) | A-Z Quotes

Make up your mind to believe in yourself for the rest of this year, friends! Over this past weekend, we experienced the first day of spring. Astrologers believe that this is the true start of the year. Aries is the first sign of the zodiac. I love all of the redos and retakes we get at the beginning of the year. If you were a little foggy on January 1st, that’s okay because you could reset your intentions for the new year on February 12th, which marked the Chinese new year. And if you were particularly unfocused through the first couple months of the year, that’s not a problem because March 20th marked the first day of spring and the start of the astrological new year. Three times is the charm! Trying to pretend anything after this date, is the beginning of the new year, could be perceived as a stretch, but at the same token, it is never too late to start anything. It makes sense for spring to start the new year, I think. There’s so much hope, promise, and freshness in springtime. Miracles abound in spring. Happy New Year, friends! This is what I think this beautiful spirit of Spring of 2021 is confidently saying to us: “I got you, babe!! . . . . . I. Got. YOU. Babe!”

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.