Month: January 2023

Better Than the Queen of Monaco

“I thought I was going to be queen of Monaco even though someone else did it. [Laughter] But I had these giant ideas. And then you get older and, oh, s*** is going to happen. And, Mike White, you have given me hope. You’ve given me a new beginning. . . .

“This is something all of you, if you don’t know Mike White, this is what you should know: He is worried about the world, he’s worried about people, he’s worried about friends of his that aren’t doing well, he’s always worried about people, you’re worried about animals, and he really is one of the greatest people I’ve ever … He gives me so much excitement to be—you make people want to live longer, and I didn’t.” – from last night’s speech from 61-year-old actress Jennifer Coolidge, who won a Golden Globe for The White Lotus last night, about the creator of the show, Mike White

“. . . .you make people want to live longer and I didn’t.” Wow. Have you ever heard a better compliment? And this is about a Hollywood guy! When has that ever happened before?! My regular readers know that I’m a huge fan of The White Lotus series and I have previously written about Jennifer Coolidge’s ‘big break’ coming to her later in life, which is a rare thing, particularly for women in Hollywood.

From Jennifer Coolidge’s Golden Globe acceptance speech, it is my belief that these accolades and appreciation couldn’t have happened to two more deserving people. Jennifer, for slogging along, continuing to work feverishly at her passion, even if she thought that her days of a “big break” were over, and to Mike, for being that guy who cares – Mike cares about people, his friends, animals. . . . Jennifer’s whole speech was about what a wonderful, loving person and being Mike White is, without even beginning to mention his incredible talent as a writer and director.

My favorite trainer at my Local Stretchlab has experienced more than her fair share of difficulties in life. Raised in Guam, she had to drop out of medical school to take care of her mother and grandmother, who both had cancer and when they passed, her father became ill and so she cared for him, while still trying to manage the family business. It is only in the last five years or so that my trainer has been able to focus on herself and her own adult life. She is married to a marine, and yesterday they were celebrating their three-year wedding anniversary. She told me that she was taking the entire weekend off to celebrate with him. My trainer told me that for most of her life, she never dreamed that she would marry, and she is so utterly thrilled and grateful to be married to the man of her dreams. We both agreed that the beauty of difficult times, is that the harder that they were, the more they make you appreciate and savor the wonderful times in life. When you know just how low and difficult life can get, the gratitude which you feel for the smooth, amazing times is almost overwhelming.

If you are in a point in your life when you feel like your ship has sailed, be like Jennifer, and just hang on. Keep doing what is meaningful to you. It ain’t over ’til it’s over. You really have no idea where this journey is taking you. The most meaningful, exciting times of your life could easily be right around the corner. And while you’re at it, be like Mike, care. Care about people, and friends, and animals. Be like Mike and be the kind of person who makes people want to live longer. And when you get to a point in your life when you finally (and maybe even surprisingly) get something that you always wanted but started to lose hope of ever getting, be like my Stretchlab trainer and take a long weekend off to simmer in the joy and gratitude of it all! Because of slogging through the tough times, you get the equal and opposite feeling of utter bliss!

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

Tuesday’s Tidbits

+ I’m relatively new to the iPhone and the thing that I could do without is Siri’s attitude. When I say, “Hey Siri”, she says “Um-hmm” in a tone that I read as slightly condescending, distracted, “fake” cheerful and annoyed. It’s almost as if “uh-hmm” is short for “What do you want now? I’m kinda busy out here in the ethersphere. ” I think that I would prefer something like, “Hi, beautiful! How can I help you?”, in a delighted, enthusiastic, tail-wagging, eager tone. I find Siri’s “um-hmm” almost as annoying as women who are at least 35 years younger than me, calling me “honey.”

+ In the beginning of the year, I found myself chomping at the bit to get back to “normal.” Our four adult children, overlapping their holiday visits, between them all, kind of like a Venn diagram, were here at home, for a total of about four weeks, in various counts and measures. Towards the end of the holidays, my adult children said that I started repeating the same questions which I supposedly have always asked during every school break since they were little ones, “When do you go back now? Is it almost time for you to go back?” (Our kids do an interesting mocking impression of me asking these questions. They find it quite amusing.) So yesterday, was my first full day entirely by myself. And the house was soooo quiet. And my grocery cart looked pitifully empty with just the groceries for the two of us. And I only had to do one load of laundry. And so, when I got home, I texted to the family chat, with a myriad of cry-face emojis, a question which I also often ask of my kids, “I miss you. When are you coming home again?”

+ As I write this, I am wearing a V-Line Double Chin Reducer face mask, which I saw on Amazon, as the hopeful side of me focused only in on the positive reviews. It fits over my ears and under my chin and I have hopes that my jowls will magically disappear after only a few wearings. Ha. My dogs find this unique mask quite disturbing looking. I know and I understand on a logical level, that this is yet another gimmick which I have fallen for that most likely will not work with any great noticeable measure, and all of the while, it cost me time and money, and it makes me look ridiculous, and vain, and pathetic, and also frightening to my fur babies. And you can laugh at silly old me, but I know that there are a few of you out there, just like me, who while reading this are perhaps wearing a gold flake mask, or trying out a teensy-weensy dollop of that new anti-aging cream from that teeny, tiny $453 jar of “The Emperor’s New Cream” that you insisted on getting for Christmas. The global anti-aging market is now said to be worth almost 60 billion dollars. Sigh.

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

Monday – Funday

credit: @jennrants44, Twitter

I have a couple of these types of friends in my life – dangerously fun. I also learned early on to never, ever seat our eldest son and our youngest son next to one another anywhere, at any time. It’s a recipe for hilarity and disaster. I think it is a really special thing to have some people in your life whom you can anticipate the fun and mischievousness which comes with them and who brings it out in you.

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

Soul Sunday

“We live on a blue planet that circles around a ball of fire next to a moon that moves the sea, and you don’t believe in miracles?” – Unknown

Sundays are devoted to poetry on the blog. Poetry often speaks to the parts of you that you keep hidden, even from yourself. I recently discovered a young, modern poet who is taking the poetry world by storm. Her poems are stirring, moving, sometimes disturbing and uncomfortable, and at the very least, make you think. Here are a couple of poems by Kate Baer seen below. If you are like me, you will find her words intriguing enough to seek out more.

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

Slow Your Mojo

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

I was part of a discussion yesterday, at one of our local adorable boutique stores. We were having a conversation about the start of the new year and yesterday’s gorgeous, illuminating full moon. Everyone was talking about how this year feels like more of a slow, yet steady start out of the gate. We’re definitely in a forward motion, but not at a frenetic pace.

Interestingly, a young turtle appeared in front of our house, by our garage door yesterday afternoon. He was easy for my daughter and I to pick up, and to move into our backyard, closer to the lake. The turtle’s self protection was to clam up into his hard shell. The turtle knew that he would never be able to outrun us. He knows that his own pace is slow, deliberate and steady, with a hard armour of protection surrounding him. The turtle played to his strengths, and so he stayed closed up into his shell, until he realized that he could trust us to help him to get to a better place.

Perhaps this is a good allegory for this upcoming year, or at least the start of this year? One woman in the discussion said that she does not like to say “low energy” or “low frequency”, because unfortunately we have given “low” a negative connotation in our society. Instead, she uses the terms “slow energy” or “slow frequency”, because sometimes it is important to slow down, and to pay attention to the road ahead and to the direction which you are taking. Another woman chimed in with this thought: “You can only go as fast as the slowest part of you.” This made me think: What is slowing you down? What is holding you back from marching forward? Do you have heavy baggage that needs to be let go? Are there cords that need to be cut? Are there parts of your bodily and mental health that need to be healed, and to be nurtured, before you move on down the road?

The moderator of the discussion suggested this journal prompt written below. I am taking my slow, sweet time meditating on my own answer to this prompt. The answer hasn’t become apparent to me yet, and that’s okay. Stews and soups that have simmered for a long time, tend to make for the best melding of ingredients, resulting in the tastiest of concoctions. Here is the prompt (and we all giggled a little bit, because although this was a groupshare event, this prompt does not necessarily encourage ‘sharing”):

What is something this year, that you will keep to yourself for yourself?

My daughter went “to town” furiously writing her answer right after the prompt was announced. I mentioned to my daughter that I noticed this fact, and she was immediately forthcoming with sharing her response to the prompt with me. My daughter told me that she likes her evenings to be completely “chill.” She doesn’t like when most of her evenings are filled with activities and stimulation. My daughter likes to ease into nighttime. As a freshman in college, she recently came to the realization that she had lost her boundaries around this fact, and she plans to go back to school with a firmer, protective shell around her personal needs. Wow. I love my girl. It is times like these in parenthood when you see the blossoming of your children turning into adults, and you open up your mind to all that you can learn from them, too. It also makes me realize that just like how baby sea turtles inherently know to follow the light to make their path to the sea, so do our baby children inherently know to follow the light of their own souls to find their path to the vast adventures of life that lie ahead of them.

And I would add to this, “and at ease with your own pace.”

Mysterious Friday

“Their hotel-worker guide explains to them that it’s called a Testa di Moro. He explains, ‘The story is a Moor came here a long time ago and seduced a local girl. But then she found out that he had a wife and children back home. So because he lied to her, she cut his head off.’

Rocco doesn’t tell them the rest of the legend, or the other interpretations of the Testa di Moro’s origins. According to Visit Sicily, after the girl removed the man’s head, she used it as a vase to grow basil. The scent attracted her neighbors, who loved the vase and had copies of it commissioned.

But Visit Sicily also gives another backstory for the statues. In a different version of the legend, the girl and the Moor fell in love. When her parents found out, they beheaded both of them and hung their heads as a warning. That’s why the heads are usually shown in pairs, though “White Lotus” mostly shows the man’s head alone, referencing the other version of the story.” – Pop Sugar, describing the meaning behind a statue of a man’s head in an episode of The White Lotus, Season 2

Happy Friday!! Happy Best Day of the Week!! I don’t mean to make this a macabre Friday post, but I got absolutely entranced with this interesting pottery after watching The White Lotus, Season 2 this fall. My regular readers know that Fridays on the blog are devoted to my favorite things. I get out of my head and I fully engage with my consumer side on Fridays. Things that I love to consume are just a product of other people’s incredible creativity. Think about it. Everything that you use in your life arrived first from someone’s creativity and imagination before it landed on your back, in your house, in your mouth, sparked your interest, or touched your heart. This is how we are all connected.

Back to today’s favorite: I love pottery. I love keeping my plants in interesting containers. I often love the containers almost as much as I love my plants. Italian pottery is wonderful. So, I started on a quest to find a Testa di Moro of my own. However, reality is, the last thing that I need to take care of, is more plants. Ask my gardener. (also known as my husband) So instead, I found a website that sells wonderful Testa di Moros that I can wear. (which if I am being painfully truthful with myself, I even need more jewelry, less than I need more plants). But c’est la vie, it’s Friday and I LOVE plants and jewelry!

This Etsy website called EtnaBijoux, based in Sicily, Italy, has the most divine Testa di Moro earrings. I purchased two pairs and I adore them. They arrived surprisingly fast from Italy and they are even prettier than their pictures. I can feel the maker’s passion for them, by looking at their intricate quality. Go here for a little piece of Sicily to wear whenever you want to feel exotic and divine and you want to keep life interesting and mysterious: https://www.etsy.com/shop/EtnaBijoux?ref=yr_purchases

Salute!!! The weekend is almost here!

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

Ring Ring

In Indonesia, the words for “thank you” are “terima kasih,” which, if you translate them literally, mean “accept love for what it is.”
– Tamalia Alisjahbana 

Thank you, readers, for being here to witness my writing. Accept my love for what it is. I appreciate you.

Yesterday, I did a tiny, easy thing for myself and for the people in my household which will make a major difference for all of us, for the rest of this year and beyond. I figured out how to turn off the ringers on our landline phones. For years now, we have been annoyed and pestered by the loud ringing, often at ungodly times, of the landline phones (one that sits right next to me on my desk as I write).

Now, I already know what you are thinking right at this moment. I’m kind of psychic. You won’t be the first to have this thought. My husband and my kids and my friends have pointedly asked me the same thing, many, many times. Why do we still have landline phones? The long answer is this: I have a very stubborn, obstinate, old-fashioned part of myself whom everyone I care about abhors. However, I adore her. Her reasoning for the landline is this: it’s cheap, it’s a good second option for people to be able to reach you without having to give them your cell phone number, and it’s a great second option for “911” calls. (In case Freddy Krueger shows up at my house, I want backup.) And (consider yourself warned) the more people in her life who ask her, “Why do we still have landline phones?”, the more she digs in her heels.

So, for now and for the unforeseen future, the landline stays. But since the landline’s phone number has been in circulation for a few years now, the telemarketers have it on their primetime lists, and the landline calls at our home have become more frequent, annoying and untimely as time has gone on. So yesterday, instead of yelling, rolling my eyes, picking up the phone and slamming it down on someone’s poor ears or running over to the phone, in a panic, wondering if there was some emergency/catastrophe that I needed to attend to, I actually took the time to figure out how to turn off the ringers on the phones. And it wasn’t hard. It didn’t take much time at all. And I already have been breathing easier, just a day into the peace and quiet which this action has brought to me.

I often talk about self-awareness on this blog. It occurred to me yesterday, that when I feel annoyed and irked by anything, I should use this as a signal to pause and to question whether there is any action that I can take that would change this annoyance in my life, which I have grown to just accept. It’s amazing how many little irritations we just accept in our lives, without questioning if there might be simple solutions to the problem, in order to ease the pain. Are those cute, but pinchy, painful shoes really worth achy feet? Pitch them. Is it possible to easily and inexpensively change out that sticky door handle? Do it. Are you constantly annoyed by someone’s tardiness or rudeness? Know your personnel. Take steps to avert and change any situation that you foresee will annoy you. You are worth it!

I am so happy to have my uninterrupted peace and quiet this morning. I am a little miffed at myself that I didn’t take action to figure out the phone ringers sooner. Still, the past is in the past, and I am now sitting in the peaceful, quiet present, quite pleased with myself. And it’s delicious. And I still have my back-up plan in case Freddy Krueger stops by.

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

Take Off Your Socks

Over the holidays, I was talking to a woman whom I went to college with, who works as a lawyer in her father’s law practice. Her father is in his eighties. She said to me that she questions this all of the time. My college friend told me that she enjoys practicing law, but at the same time, she fully plans to retire. She can’t decide whether her father is much more fulfilled by being a lawyer than she is, or if her father is afraid because he doesn’t know how to do, or to be anything else.

Also over the holidays, my husband and I pulled out our traditional “wish lists” for 2022. We make these lists of what we desire to happen in the new year, on New Year’s Eve every single year, and we also make a separate list of things that we no longer want – things that had their lessons, but no longer serve us. We burn the “do not want” lists away in a fire and we keep the wish lists in an envelope in a cabinet. While both my husband and I had some things on our respective wish lists that we wanted for ourselves, it was interesting to notice just how many things on both of our wish lists had to do with what we wanted for our children, such as our daughter getting into her desired college, and our youngest son, who has epilepsy, to be seizure free. In fact as we were announcing how many of the things on our wish lists had come true in 2022, even our daughter remarked that too much of our own wish lists had to do with our children, and not with ourselves. We were clearly wrapped up into our roles as parents when we made our lists.

As I am embarking on this empty nest stage of my life, it is becoming apparent to me how much I, and others, attach our whole identities to our roles – mother, father, husband, wife, partner, businessperson, writer, daughter, friend, consumer, head of household, manager, provider, volunteer, athlete, activist etc. etc. Last night, before I went to sleep, I was doing a guided meditation, in which I was instructed to take off my roles for the day, as if they were layers of socks on my feet. It was eye-opening to see how many roles we take on every single day. My feet were quite hot and puffy from the proverbial layers of socks I had worn all day. The question lies, Who is there without the roles, and the identities, and the functions? Who is there when all of the socks are removed? And finally, do I truly understand this sockless being’s intrinsic worth, or I am afraid to take all of the socks off, fearfully believing that nothing will be there?

After all of the socks (roles) are taken off at the end of the day, who we truly are, are beings of pure awareness encased in human bodies. That’s all any of us truly are, and the rest of it is just socks (roles) which we put on/try on/keep on/take off. Our truest identity, for all of us, is just the peaceful being of awareness who experiences our lives, in our bodies, as we put on and we take off our chosen socks (roles). Some people believe that this universal awareness which we all have in us, is God/Life/Universe, or our souls/spirit. What has more worth to us than this? Isn’t God/Life/Universe intrinsically valuable for just being? Without this universal awareness which we all experience, none of anything even consciously exists.

It’s a deep concept, but if we can wrap our heads around it, and identify with being the pure, peaceful awareness that is experiencing life as we know it, the rest of it is just socks! And they can be wonderful, comfy, favorite socks that we love to wear on a daily basis, but the socks aren’t us. The socks aren’t our identities. The socks are just roles that we play in our lives. The socks can be removed and layered and changed and cherished and their holes can be darned, but when the socks are taken off, what is left is the most meaningful, peaceful, being of awareness, who is in every single one of us, just taking it all in, and experiencing the joy, and the awe, and the sensuality, and the wonderment of it all. If we identify with our timeless, eternal “being”, and not with the socks which we wear on a daily basis, we get a true perspective of the eternal, indestructible characteristic of Life. And it is in that true identity, where we find peace.

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

Scars and Wounds

gentle reminder from my elders this morning, “Remember to speak from the scar, not the wound” -@DrBlackDeer, Twitter

As an emotional fire sign, who can turn into a fire-breathing dragon in seconds flat, I needed to read this tweet this morning. We’ve all experienced so much emotional lashing out in the last few years, haven’t we? And there are a lot of people and institutions that have some terribly bloody wounds right now. These wounds need to be healed and to be integrated and to be understood before any healthy lessons can be gleaned from the experiences that created the wounds.

The best lessons come from the places and the people who have done the work and taken the time to heal. The best lessons come from people who have had the wisdom to do a lot of self-awareness, introspection, and self-care to heal the wounds, before assuming they have anything to truly teach about a particular situation. The most sound wisdom comes from a calm, serene, compassionate, peaceful part of others and of ourselves, and not from a brash, emotional, reactive state. Asking ourselves the question, “Am I reacting or am I responding?” gives us real clarity in any situation that has any kind of emotional charge.

In an emergency room, it’s much easier to talk about how I got a certain scar that is now mostly healed over, than to explain how I got a throbbing, full of pain, bleeding gash. In fact, in that situation of a fresh wound, talking about it is relatively pointless. The immediate action is to take pertinent steps to heal the wound and stop the bleeding. There will be plenty of time to talk about it later.

I keep hoping that 2023 will be that restful, reflective, “healing the wounds” kind of a year that it seems that we collectively need, in order to move on with clarity and purpose. Scars can be quite beautiful when they serve as reminders of healed wounds and wise lessons obtained from those wounds. The only thing that a fresh, throbbing, bleeding, gash needs is immediate, personal attention, and a quiet, clean, safe place to start the healing process.

In the beginning of this year, it seems to be a fine time to take a pause to lick our wounds. Healing is a timely, personal process that must happen, before that healing can be shared as wisdom which will be truly helpful to others. When we give our wounds the chance (and we don’t keep picking at the scabs), and the space, and the time to heal, they quickly become the healed over scars of our experiences. And then it follows: “Speak from the scar, not from the wound.”

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

Monday-Funday

credit: @MastersRex

This is the first year in a long while that I don’t have any “major biggies” right outside of my starting gate. Last year was our daughter’s senior year in high school. Our daughter is the youngest child of four kids. My mantra was “Finish Strong” and as I gazed at my 2022 calendar there were already dates filled with prom, tennis tournaments, college acceptance dates, graduation, a mother/daughter trip, etc. I started 2022 with a stomach full of dizzy, erratic butterflies and a planned up schedule with no time to think. The only plan was to execute “the plan” and to “Finish Strong.”

The first part of 2022 was focused on getting our daughter settled at her own starting gate of adulthood. The second part of 2022 was supposed to be about getting settled into our own empty nest, but a lot of happenings started occurring, right around June that took up most of our time and attention: my mother-in-law became quite ill before she passed a couple of weeks ago, our youngest son decided to graduate early from college, and so, as I ponder things, I realize that I ended up finishing this past year still feeling a little bit “unfinished.” The dizzy, erratic butterflies decided to stay with me all year long and those little buggers can be quite distracting.

I could be wrong, but it feels like the butterflies have flown on for now. Maybe they are just sleeping, but right now, I think I am where I thought I would be this past June. I am only now at the true starting gate of our empty nest. I did “Finish Strong” last year. And it finally feels like I am where I thought I would be in the middle of last year: at the starting gate of Part III of the book of my life. I have a wide open slate and it feels daunting and exciting all at the same time. I wanted to end this post with a play on the mantra “Finish Strong” so I looked up synonyms for “strong” so that I could write “Start Strong” as my mantra, but with more cache. “Start Forceful”? “Start Tough”? “Start Solid”? Interestingly, “in fine feather” was listed as one of the synonyms. “Start in fine feather.” This resonated with me. The angsty little butterflies who were with me all of last year have finally flown on, and now I too can follow into this next stage of my life, “in fine feather.” To me, “in fine feather” is not too bold, but instead sounds confident, excited, quirky, fun and anticipatory. Today truly feels like the first day of this next stage of my life. Today, I start this next leg of my journey in fine feather.

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