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Submittance

Yesterday was the first day this December that I truly felt “in the holiday spirit”. I don’t honestly fault myself for this slow start to experiencing the joy of it all. The truth is, I love my everyday life and my routines. I love spontaneity. Sometimes I feel like the holidays hijack all of my time and mindspace, and for that matter, even my living space, with bulky, red and green, glitter and glitz and a miles long to-do list. Sometimes I feel trapped into traditions and experiences that I really don’t want to partake in, but then I feel ashamed for not wanting to do them. And in all fairness, this shame is self inflicted. No one is forcing anything on me.

This year, I have met more people who are the very definition of Christmas elves, than I have encountered in a long time. I gave blood the other day, and the technician was a literally glowing with Christmas cheer. She told me that she sings Christmas carols all year long. She told me every creative position, every single night that she puts the Elf on the Shelf in, for her daughter, with pure unadulterated glee. A bank teller who waited on me the other day, recounted how she first found out the truth about Santa (and then lamented about how many poor children now find out about Santa from the internet which wasn’t around when she was a kid), but she never told her parents, because they all love Christmas more than anything in this world. The teller appeared to be in her thirties now and she was telling me all about the Christmas Hallmark special she couldn’t wait to get home to watch. The most obvious, vocal “Kamala Harris” supporter couple in our local neighborhood, has not let the election results get them down, even one bit. Every inch of their large house (and boat to boot) are covered in bright, cheerful lights.

I’ve been a little grumbly, honestly. I think that there for a little while, I was secretly chanting to myself with a sigh, “Okay, let’s just get this over with.” I never rained on the Christmas elves’ parades whom I have been encountering on a regular basis. That would not be cool. I can fake it ’til I make it with the best of them. But, I felt envious and curious at the same time. What makes someone so completely and utterly enthralled with this time of year? What makes someone wish that Christmas would last all year long?

Nonetheless, yesterday, I think that I quieted my inner protest and rebellion, and I surrendered to it all. My daughter and her boyfriend, hung all of our beloved ornaments on our tree, while listening to carols and my daughter recounted the backstories (trips, and events, and pets that have already crossed the rainbow bridge) that accompany each ornament. They enjoyed a sweet dinner with my husband and I, and we all finished dinner with trying and rating the latest jelly from our 2024 Bon Mamman advent calendar. Earlier in the day, I ran out to the road in my curlers to make sure that our recycling collection crew got their Christmas tips, and their smiles made my day.

That’s the true point of the season, right? Surrender. Surrender to the mystery of the bigger plan. Surrender to your faith. Surrender to the magic. Don’t try to make Christmas happen. Let it happen. Surrender to the season, and enjoy and delight in how it shows you its deepest depths of beauty and hope. Surrender to the whole myriad of feelings that Christmas brings to the table like an overwhelming feast, even the tough feelings. The feelings need to be processed – all of them. This season of the year compels us to slow down and to consider and to contemplate everything that we have experienced throughout the entire past year, and even throughout the past years of our lives. In a sense, this season unabashedly forces joy, and thankfulness, and the spirit of giving, on to us, even in the coldest and darkest time of the year. It is a time of year that cheerfully, yet determinedly reminds us of what means the most to us – the people and pets whom we love, our warm homes, our sustenance, our ancestry, our ability to give to others, our (sometimes cheesy) shared traditions, our faith in something bigger, and the reminder of what all there is to celebrate in our everyday lives. (Ironically, even grumbling about my everyday life being hijacked by Christmas, made me realize just how grateful I am for my daily life, and how I live it.)

I hope that I can spend the rest of this season in the spirit of surrender of what it wants to show me this year. It feels good to let the season happen with the idea that everything is unfolding as it should. If a poor carpenter and his pregnant wife from ancient times, were willing to listen to their higher angels, why shouldn’t I do the same? There is great peace in following the simple, silent guidance of a steady star of light, and waking up to what is being shown in the light.

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

Fluidity

Everything is fluid. Even how you think about things is fluid. Especially how you think about things is fluid. We have started getting Christmas cards and a couple of them have come from people who were from a time when we lived in a whole different state. I have really fond memories of the people there. We were young families, literally raising our kids as a village. The neighborhood we lived in was mammoth. It was so big that it was essentially our neighborhood kids filling the entire elementary school. But yet, the neighborhood felt small, due to the wonderful circle of people we cavorted with there.

Many of our former inner circle there, like us, have left the neighborhood, for different neighborhoods (upsizing and downsizing) and like us, have even left for different states. We had to leave that neighborhood, and that state, back in 2011, for the necessity of greener pastures to support our large family quickly descending upon college age. So, leaving there, was truly bittersweet. We had poured our heart and souls into re-designing and adding on to the home where we lived there, with the faulty assumption that it would be the home that even our grandchildren would come to visit. And then, almost immediately after we finished the totally draining (both emotionally and financially) years long housing project, the Great Recession housing crash happened. We essentially had to give that home away for pennies on the dollar.

For many years, I had bitter feelings about that home. It had become a financial burden and albatross around our necks. It became “the thing” that made it hard to get “a fresh new start” in our new state. It was amazing that a creation that I had once had been so proud of, and had poured so much of my heart and creative vision into, had quickly turned into one of my biggest nightmares. It was a really humbling, shocking, disillusioning time in the lives of our family. And for years, only thoughts of anger and disbelief and frustration and regret, surrounded any ideas of our former home.

Today, out of curiosity, after receiving the cards that reminded me of our “former life”, I looked up our former home. It had been sold again in 2017 and the owners had added on even more beautiful updates. Interestingly, I noticed that all of my feelings of anger and disgust, had dissipated. I am back to feeling proud of “my former creation.” I am back to feeling deeply proud of the fingerprints, and the heartbeats, and the creative vision that we had for that home. I am mostly proud of the happy history and memories that we added to that place which we called home for a time in the life of our family. I am back to feeling only a full fondness for a lovely time in my life, and the lovely nest which we had created for our family at that time. And at the same time, I have no desire to go back. I am truly fulfilled at where I am in my life right now, and I see how all of the dots in my life have been connected and are being connected, as the picture of my life is being lived.

I have noticed this circling around of feelings and perspectives many times, about many people and situations, in my own life. I have also noticed this in the lives of others. Life has a way of softening the edges, after processing the hard stuff. How many people, having gone through vicious divorces, end up deeply hugging each other at their shared children’s major milestones? How many people have been able to find the gifts of lessons and silver linings, and forgiveness of self and others, in even the worst circumstances of their lives? Oprah Winfrey is credited with saying this: “Forgiveness is giving up the hope that the past could have been any different, it’s accepting the past for what it was, and using this moment and this time to help yourself move forward.”

If you are going through a tough time in your life, give yourself the knowing that someday you will likely look at this situation with a different perspective. The worst, sharpest edges causing the gashes, and the bleeding, and the pain, will dull with time. The sharpest edges will stop being able to hurt you anymore. That’s the beauty of true forgiveness. It’s an acceptance of what is, and deciding to only take the “good stuff” from the situation. Forgiveness is finally stopping the continually gashing of yourself with the sharp edges, and allowing yourself to heal the wounds, so that when you come back to viewing the situation, you will see that the now dulled edges, can’t really hurt you anymore. You will find that with time and distance, the healing has created a strong (and sometimes scarred, but often stronger for the scarring) barrier to what was once a truly visceral, seemingly unending pain. Believe this. Stop poking at your pains and let them be. Allow the miracle of the change of perspective to appear when the timing is just right. Believe in impermanence and fluidity because they really are the only constants in life, besides the underlying Love that holds us all afloat.

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

Ingratitude

“Not using your talents is an act of ingratitude.” – Holiday Mathis

My husband was telling me that he read an article that stated that Thanksgiving is quickly becoming America’s favorite holiday. He said that the article suggested this is because Thanksgiving is less commercialized than other holidays, and it is focused on gratitude. It always feels good to feel gratitude. It always feels good to be reminded of all of the plenty and abundance in our lives. When people list what they are grateful for the common lists seem to be: family, friends, home, health, food, pets, savings, etc. That’s why when I read the above quote this morning, it gave me pause. If someone were sitting around the Thanksgiving table and they started spouting how thankful they were for their intelligence, their creativity, their physical prowess, their beautiful singing voice, their gardening skills etc. we might think to ourselves, “How arrogant!”, but yet, we all benefit when people use their talents to the best of their abilities. Our Thanksgiving feasts are delicious because talented cooks came up with the recipes. We are entertained Thanksgiving Day by the talented singers and dancers and musicians and float creators that start with the Macy’s Day parade. We often watch amazing athletes later that day, playing football and other sports. Many of us went to go see Wicked over the weekend (my daughter and I among them) and besides the incredible actors, the talent that went into making that movie from the writers, to the special effects people, to the directors, etc. etc. is a list as long as the credits that are played at the end of each film which we see.

I often would spout to my children, “Actions speak louder than words.” Gratitude is an action. When we are grateful to be alive, our actions reflect this. When we are grateful to be able to do, and to enjoy the things that come naturally to us, we are giving ourselves (and the world) the gift of gratitude in action. When we squander our gifts and talents, that is like throwing a present away in the face of the Bestower. Don’t be humble. Be thankful. Share your gifts with the world. They are singular. No one does anything like you do it, and no one will ever do things exactly like you do them, again. Don’t cheat yourself. Don’t cheat us. The opposite of today’s quote is: “Using your talents, is an act of gratitude.” Today, be your gratitude.

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

Gift Ideas

I think what I have been most jealous about men, throughout my life, is that they don’t seem to worry nearly as much as we women do, about what other people think. I just finished watching a wonderful Oprah Insider video which featured an author and psychotherapist, Lori Gottlieb. She said this: “Guilt is not part of the X chromosome.” The audience of mostly women, laughed knowingly and appreciatively. Gottlieb’s point is that society has conditioned women to believe that other people’s feelings are our responsibility, and so we take on what is called “emotional load/labor” on top of all of the other caretaking duties that often end up disproportionately in our laps.

Interestingly though, because we women often believe that we are responsible for other people’s feelings, we tend to get really controlling about the narrative. We try to control what other people think about us, or about situations, instead of just accepting and allowing other people to think what they think, and to feel what they feel. In this regard, men tend to be better at “Live and let live.” Men don’t seem to get their self-worth from what other people think about them, nearly as much as we women do. Men get their self-worth from what they think about themselves, and my hunch is that they aren’t nearly as hard on themselves, as we women tend to be on ourselves.

I don’t mean to generalize. This is just a theme that has been playing out lately in my life, when talking to friends who are women, and with shows and podcasts I have listened to recently. Perhaps a beautiful holiday gift we could give to ourselves, is to stop worrying so much about what other people think, and put all of that energy back into what we think is best for ourselves. And at the same time, a beautiful holiday gift that we could give to others, is the acceptance that they are free to think what they think, and to feel what they feel, without interference from our desperate need to control the narrative.

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

Exquisitely Beautiful

This has been a deeply cathartic, restorative year for me and my immediate family. It has been what we needed. And I didn’t set out for it to be this kind of a year for us. Of course, everyone hopes that every year will be special, and peaceful, and joyful, and exciting and relieving, but that’s not how life works. We know this. Sometimes “cathartic and restorative” comes from all different circumstances, even if others looking in, might not see what we have been through, in that same comforting way. Life is personal. In hindsight (which is usually the clearest vision), I’m delighted with what me and my family were guided to do and to experience in 2024.

I always tell my family, “Let Life love you.” And what I mean by this is, “Surrender.” Surrender to the belief that there is a beautiful plan in place, even when you start mucking it up with your own worries, and your own need for control, and your resentments, and your mistakes, and your actions and your inactions. Life knows what you really need, and is guiding you along every step of the way. You are just going down the beautiful stream of your life, and while you might be getting caught up with what is going on in your own little, fiery red canoe, rowing against the tide furiously, in the meantime, the current of the stream is still guiding you down to exactly where you need to go. And every once in a while, when you get tired of your own foolishness and you take a beat, and you take some life-affirming breaths, and you remind yourself of this fact, your eyes and your heart will be suddenly clearly opened to the beautiful synchronicities that are happening in your own life, and in the lives of all others. You will fully understand that Life does love you. Life does love all of us. Life is love, and the rest is just the games and the tricks that we play on ourselves in our own fiery little red canoes. And the games are okay. They are creative. They are just part of being alive, and being daring enough to spend some time being human.

There is not a more poignant time in life than during big beginnings and big endings. That is why we have created so many major rituals around births, and deaths, marriages, and graduations. We need these rituals to help us to store and to process the “big feels” that come during these major opening and closing times in life. I don’t think there is a time when you ever feel more alive than during these turning points in life and even when they are hard times, they are so exquisitely beautiful. The stream of life is exquisitely beautiful.

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

Wednesday’s Whimsies

+ Yesterday, I texted my husband that I had written a blog post. He told me that he loved that I had given myself permission to just blog on whim. Kelly Corrigan recently interviewed Christy Turlington Burns (supermodel from the 80s) and also the current creator of a series called The Art of Recuperation, on Kelly’s podcast. Christy said this in their conversation, “When movement feels like freedom and not duty, your feet will carry you further.” Do things because you want to do them, not because you “should” do them. And if there are things that you think that you absolutely have to do/should do, find the “want” behind the should. I will go to my annual physicals, because I want to remain healthy. I will go to work, because I want to feel financially secure. There are a lot more things in life that are self-imposed “shoulds” that you really don’t have to do, if you consciously consider everything. (Everything in life is really just a set of actions/energies and the consequences of those actions/energies) And after coming off of a busy time period that now, allows me to catch up on some truly delicious rest and sleep and recuperation, this quote from the conversation makes a lot of sense, too: “Not all that tires depletes. Some exhaustions feed the soul.” My soul has been fed incredibly delicious experiences all year long and now I am really enjoying some contented, deeply experienced, rest. (long, happy sigh)

+ I read this quote by Eckhart Tolle yesterday: “Boredom, anger, sadness, or fear are not “yours”, not personal. They are conditions of the human mind. They come and go. Nothing that comes and goes is you.” Don’t say, “I’m depressed, or I’m angry, or even, I’m happy.” For you are not those things! You are feeling depressed, or you are feeling angry or you are feeling happy and you probably feel these various feelings and many more feelings, every day, throughout each day. YOU are the peaceful, timeless observer inside of yourself who experiences your bodily sensations, who notices your thoughts, who experiences your everyday escapades, who feels your emotions. YOU are a tiny spark of Source/Creation/Life/God/Spirit experiencing being alive as a human being on Earth at this moment. Live fully in all your powerful glory. Experience it all and know that all is well.

+ We were boating with friends of ours over the weekend and we saw the effects and changes caused by the hurricanes on the beaches and the barrier islands by our town. It was humbling and yes, much of the human created parking lots, and structures and widened beaches have been devastated and need to be repaired, but the natural beauty remains constant. No matter the changes it goes through, nature looks beautiful in every cycle of its life. (as do we – we are part of nature) We saw several dolphins, a pelican decided to fly along beside our boat (similar to that recent car commercial where the bird is flying in unison with the car), and we had the best shelling experience that we have experienced in a long, long time. (The storms sure churned up some beauties!) No experience is ever one-dimensional.

+ I collect potheads and other garden goop. One of my regular readers, Kelly from Cali, recently asked me how Harmonia did through the hurricanes. Harmonia (the muse of my blog, you can read about her on my front blog page) remains solid, still, and beautiful and nonplussed. Here she is today with Celeste, one of my favorite potheads:

This is one of the first potheads that I ever brought home. I never named her. She looks like the masthead of a noble ship:

And here are Bert and Ernie, who are so kind to hold our sunscreen and bug spray. They were discovered in an old barn in my grandfather’s tiny hometown of Windber, Pennsylvania:

And this is Garden Girl. I recently met her maker, a self-proclaimed “yardist”, but that is a story for another day (or check my archives. I have written about him before):

Don’t you just love people who can bring life and whimsy to materials like clay and rock and concrete? They are creators. We are all creators and we are co-creating this world every day. Let’s make it a wonderful one.

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

Tuesday’s Tidbits

+ Hi friends. I’ve missed you. I’ve missed Adulting- Second Half. In many ways, for many years, writing Adulting- Second Half on a daily basis was my second half of myself (the reflective half of myself who was pausing to reflect and to take notes of all of my inner and outer experiences, in this transformative time in my life). Adulting – Second Half is definitely one of my sacred spaces. Joseph Campbell describes our sacred spaces as places “where you can find yourself over and over again.” I’m here today because Life has finally gotten back to an even pace for me lately (which I realize is probably just a small respite, as the holidays are right upon us) but for now, I am enjoying it. Normal steady breathing, equilibrium, steady as she goes – I’m soaking in these feelings before the glitz and chaos of the holidays is upon us.

+ I just finished reading a book in a day and half. Yes, it was one of those books that was Just That Good. The book is called The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride. McBride’s character development is unrivaled. I felt like I was feeling the character’s own feelings. If you want to get lost in a book, and lost in an interesting, thought provoking story, I highly recommend reading it.

+ And also, in the spirit of “Favorite Things Friday” even though it is only Tuesday, I recently purchased The Original Cincha Travel Belt. The Original Cincha Travel Belt is a seatbelt for luggage that you sit up on top your roller bags, when you are cruising through airports, city streets, train stations, etc. In my last travel experience, just last month, the straps were too long on my beautiful hot pink tote bag which I absolutely love, and so the bag would fall off of the sides of my suitcase, causing a great deal of imbalance and stoppage time and embarrassment and frustration. My beautiful, overstuffed bag was taking my roller suitcase, and thus also me, down with it. I haven’t tried my cincha travel belt yet, but when I read about it, it was one of those “Now why didn’t I think of that?” moments. I ordered one on Amazon right after I finished reading the article about it.

+ Every family has their “birthday clumps” in any given year, right? Our family’s birthday clumps are in late spring, and also during the holiday season. In late November throughout December, our family celebrates at least ten birthdays (including my own). For some reason this prompted my curious mind to find out how many people are born on any given day. The United Nations estimates that 385,000 babies are born in the world on any given day. Other interesting facts: September 9, September 19, and September 12 are among the most common birthdays in the United States. (This also tells me that perhaps people are also their horniest during the holiday season) And for obvious reasons, February 29th is the rarest birthday to have in the world. You have a 1 in 1,460 chance of being born on February 29th.

+ I was watching a video where Ben Affleck was being asked about what his thoughts were about AI. Did he think that the entertainment industry is going to be taken over and gobbled up by AI? It is Ben Affleck’s belief, that no, AI is not a real threat to filmmaking. Like all things, AI will change the film industry, but it is his belief, that for a long time coming, AI will still be just a part of making films. Ben Affleck believes that AI will make filmmaking less expensive, thus allowing more creators to come in with less barriers to entry, and thus allowing a proliferation of films like we have not yet seen (much like streaming has done in regards to TV shows). He agrees that AI will perhaps take over much of the human element of special effects, but Ben Affleck compares AI to a craftsman. AI learns its craft and imitates from all that has already been created. We humans are still the vessels of Creative Intelligence which brings thoughts and imagination and emotion into the material world to experience sensorily, and Ben Affleck believes that AI is just another craft or tool to allow us to do this more effectively and efficiently. He said this quote: “Craft is knowing how to work. Art is knowing when to stop.” Ben Affleck believes that AI will have a really hard time with knowing when to stop. On that note, I think that I will stop here for today.

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

Veterans, in Gratitude

In a time period in history, where “service to self” seems to be the common theme, it is an honor to pay our greatest respects to amazing people who give themselves to something bigger than themselves. Is there anything more brave, selfless, honorable than this? Veterans, thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

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

Fill Your Own Damn Cup

As a mother of three sons, early on, I started considering how I would be a good, kind, interesting mother-in-law so that my adult kids would still want to come around. Our youngest child is our daughter and of course, I want to be a good mother-in-law to her spouse, too, but for many reasons, the stereotype of bad mother-in-laws always seems to be related to mother-in-laws and daughter-in-laws.

I read an article that the above Tik Tok went viral recently. And honestly, I believe that the Tik Toker’s advice is good to heed, in order to have excellent relationships with anybody, not just in-laws. “Fill your own damn cup.” If you rely on other people, your relationships, your roles and your “image” for your own happiness, you will be chasing your tail forever, never achieving it. It is our job as humans to fill our own damn cups. And when we fill our own damn cups, we feel happy, and satisfied, and engaged with life. And thus, we are pleasures to be around. We are not eeking dissatisfaction, anger, neediness and resentment that leads to controlling, and guilt-tripping and utilizing aggressive and passive aggressive behavior.

In other words, it is our job in life to be joyful. And joyfulness comes from within. No one else can give us joy, and we should not allow others to steal our joy. We should share our joy, which if we are doing life right, our joy should be bubbling over our filled cups. When we do this, we become delightful, interesting, engaging friends, spouses, parents, in-laws, neighbors, cousins, children, people. Here are some quotes that have struck me in their wisdom for decades and I have shared them on the blog before but they bear repeating:

“No. The most important relationship in life is the one you have with yourself. Once you have that, any other relationship becomes a plus and not a must — and, therefore it becomes luxury, and that is important. The relationship should be a plus, not a must.” – Diane Von Furstenberg

“I don’t think the parent and child should be so intimate that it becomes a jail for the child. I’ve tried to help my children to become themselves.” – Paloma Picasso

     “Your children are not your children.
     They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
     They come through you but not from you,
     And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.” – Kahlil Gibran

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

Kinship

Maybe this is just in my mind, but my experience in going about my daily chores yesterday, is that we women were just a little teeny bit kinder to each other. There was a little more sweetness, a little more understanding and a little more compassion felt for one another. I sensed it. Deeply.

No matter what your politics are, and no matter who you voted for, as women, earlier this week, we were on the brink of something none of us have ever experienced in our lifetimes before – an American woman as president. And I have to believe, that even in the most diehard Republican woman out there, there was at least a teeny, teeny part of her (that teeny part of her that was promised as a little girl that a woman can do anything), who found that idea exciting and hopeful and vindicating. And yet it was not to be . . . .

There is good that comes out of everything. Yesterday, I found a knowing kinship with other women (most of them strangers to me), that I honestly haven’t felt in a long time. And it was good.

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