“Poetry is not a turning loose of emotion, but an escape from emotion; it is not the expression of personality, but an escape from personality. But, of course, only those who have personality and emotions know what it means to want to escape from these things.” – T. S. Eliot
Welcome to poetry day on the blog. I believe that my readers here probably have bold, intriguing personalities and strong emotions. This is wonderful for living and being the fullness of life, but it is also a lot to encapsulate. Escape from yourself a little bit today, dear readers. Write a poem. Here is my poem for today:
I absorbed it all in this season,
The love, the laughter, the familiar sounds,
Of our family’s giddy banter.
I soaked it all in until I was satiated,
And sopping, and barely able to take in much more.
And now that you have all scattered back to your places,
I realize that I absorbed a new molecule of fond memories,
Into every one of my cells.
This is how an infinite love grows.
It just continually expands itself,
Into every direction that life takes you, my loves.
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:
The last of the mohicans left today. Our eldest son, his girlfriend and our daughter took to the road at 6 a.m. this morning, back to their own adult lives. My husband and I gave them huge hugs goodbye and then went straight back to bed. It’s a miracle that I am still not in bed right now. Our holiday season was really good. My daughter said last night that it was one of the best ones ever. And I agree. But I am pooped. Sometimes I marvel at the fact that we lived, for most of our married lives, in the constant, frenetic activity that comes with raising four kids, because when everyone’s home I find it to be wonderful, joyous and fun, but also exhausting. It’s amazing to me how quickly my husband and I have gotten used to the new normal of our quiet, orderly, empty nest, because for almost 28 years of our marriage, we had always lived with at least one extra kid. (By our tenth anniversary, we had all four kids) The brilliant writer Jane Austen once wrote that she hated tiny parties because they force you to be in “constant exertion”. I think that’s where the tiredness comes from all of the communing that many of us do over the holidays. You are in constant exertion of relating, sensing everyone else’s energy, catching up on each other’s lives, making meals, making plans, making and reliving memories . . . . I tried to really just savor it all. I made it my mission to savor my family’s laugher and expressions and relaying old memories and making new ones. (Our son’s girlfriend found a tree ornament last night on clearance that we bought because it perfectly depicted a crazy, inside, “you had to be there” spontaneous experience we all had around a fire pit one of the nights. These moments are priceless.) Overall, it was sort of a Venn Diagram Christmas experience this year. Some kids came early and left earlier and some kids came later and left later. They brought along friends and stories and new experiences throughout the course of it all. (Our youngest son even bought his first “adult” car in the middle of everything). This Christmas was its own entity, as all holidays end up being. We bring the framework of the aged decorations, standard traditions, and long standing recipes, but there is always room for the new activities and surprises that pop up at Christmas every year. There was a lot of exertion, but it was lovely. Life loved us this Christmas. “Love” was the theme this Christmas, for sure. And I feel that wonderful, satiated, “job well done” feeling that is also screaming at me to kick up my feet and to deeply rest in some quiet and solitude.
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
Here is the question of the day from 3000 Questions About Me:
Hello! Happy Friday!! Happy First Friday of 2024!! Welcome to the best day of the week during the best year of your life!! (don’t doubt it, make it so) On Fridays, I discuss my favorite stuff which helps to make life more fun. Today’s favorite is a last minute extra Christmas gift that I purchased for each of our four kids who all moved into new apartments last year. These portable Acacia Wood sofa arm tables make a stable place to put a drink or a small meal or the remotes and they include a holder for your phone or your iPad. They are made of hardy acacia wood and are movable to any kind of arm, on any kind of chair, due to the spring action of their holders. This is the modern day version of TV trays. You can purchase one of these handy tables on Amazon for $30. Here is a link:
I’m sorry for the late post today. We were at a major amusement park all day yesterday. I’m out of practice with amusement parks. The last time I was at this particular park I was a chaperone for a school trip – middle schoolers. Ugh. It was quite stressful back then, trying to keep track of hormone-filled tweens with all different interests (and/or lack of interests) in rides, and who also had especially keen abilities to disappear. I remember being on the bus on the way home from that trip, smiling to myself, as 12 Rod’s “Glad That It’s Over” played loudly in my headphones.
Yesterday was truly wonderful though. My husband and I smiled at each other, thrilled that we were still able to handle some of the major rides (without getting sick), but also able to be the human coat racks for our kids who were going on some of the major, major rides. My husband commented that the marvelous thing about theme parks is that they make it so that many generations can be together, and still have great fun together. There is usually something there for everyone in theme parks, even if it is just to vicariously see, and to feel the joy that occurs in a day of “escape” for everyone together in the park. We left the park (at closing time), exhausted but in a good way. I looked at all of the other people leaving the park with us, and everyone looked weary, but also utterly satiated. All of our muscles were clearly rubbery and spent from walking all day, and from holding tenseness on the rides, but our smile muscles couldn’t stop working for all of us, as we peacefully made our way to our cars, knowing that we were all headed to a good night’s sleep.
Question for the Day from 3000 Questions About Me:
1119. What keeps you optimistic?
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
I was shopping with my daughter and my son’s girlfriend earlier this week. Neither of them have sisters, so it is fun to vicariously watch a sister-like relationship forming between the two of them. They both have been saying “Girlboss” and “boss lady” a lot to each other when talking about their lives and what they want for themselves in the new year. I told them that I would like to be part of the “Girlboss” club, too. (You’re never too old to keep honing your Girlboss skills.) Armoire.style says this about boss ladies: “our definition of boss lady is a woman who gets life done, whether that be at work, at home, in an office, with their coworkers, family, dog, cat, friends, etc. Boss ladies are those who enthusiastically embrace new opportunities and lift each other up.” When I read this definition, I thought to myself, this defines practically every single woman I have ever known in my life, from family members of all ages, to my sorority sisters, to my closest friends, to my various doctors and practitioners, and women whom I have worked for over the years. The funny thing is, we see boss lady attributes in all of the women in our lives, and they probably see these attributes in us, and yet, we don’t always give our own selves credit for being Girlbosses. This lack of recognition is what makes us have to come up with these labels and definitions in the first place. We women often don’t take credit for everything that we are, and everything that we do. When we “boss” ourselves, we are often terrible, nitpicky critics and stingy with appreciation. We shame ourselves for not doing, and being more, more, more . . . . We can be terrible, cruel bosses of ourselves.
The truth is, I am also the mother of three young men in their twenties who are just starting out their adult lives and their careers, and I see that they put tremendous pressure on themselves, too. If only I could gift all of my children (male and female) the amazing gift of hindsight – hindsight being that realization that nothing was as big, or as bad, or as insurmountable, as I had built it up to be, as I have lived through several decades of the experience of being an adult. If I could, I would wrap the wisdom and the comfort which comes from hindsight, up for them, in an instant, and it would be the best present that I could ever give to them. But as we all know, the best presents are the ones that long last in our deepest cores indefinitely. These invaluable gifts in life come only from our own experiences and our own reflections of these experiences.
I have written in the blog before that the most important job we have in our lives is to be our own best life manager. How’s your life manager doing? How would you rate your boss (you being the boss of your life?) Is your life manager kind? Appreciative? Supportive? Encouraging? Inspiring? If you have a great boss, it tends to lead to a wonderful work/life environment around you. How you treat yourself, is often how you end up treating others. Are you giving yourself enough appreciation, support, and vision, if for no other reason than for the ability to give these things back to others? Boss up this year. As Winnie the Pooh, one of the greatest bosses that ever existed has to say:
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
Today’s random question/prompt from 3000 Questions About Me:
246. If you started a business tomorrow, what would it be?
What’s your theme of 2024? Yesterday a friend texted a Washington Post article to a lot of us that had a little tool in it, to find “your nudge word.” The article can be found here:
Do you have a nudge word that makes sense to you? Since our family is still visiting here all week, I haven’t had enough quiet, by-myself reflection time to figure out my “nudge word” for 2024 just yet, but I do love the concept. Interestingly, at this time last year, I had chosen the word “Resipiscence” to be my word for 2023. (I didn’t know it as a “nudge word” back then. The word “resipiscence” is a word that came to me at a workshop that I had attended early last year.) The dictionary describes resipiscence as this: “areturn to a sane, sound, or correct view or position“. After experiencing the pandemic in 2020, the absolute worst year of seizures for our epileptic son in 2021, and the long, painful, drawn-out illness and eventual death of my mother-in-law of 2022, I wanted a word that I could repeat like a mantra, which represented to me, the getting back on track to a certain level of “normalcy” and peace and calm and stability in my life, and in the experience of our family. Despite a few unfortunate blips here and there, thankfully, 2023 proved to be a year of resipiscence for both me and my immediate family. I think that the idea of picking a nudge word or a theme for your year (or maybe even for individual experiences/vacations/pursuits, etc.) has great merit and can be quite powerful. It is the uncomplicated reminder of what you really want for yourself, and for the moments in life that you experience this year and beyond. So, nudge, nudge . . . . and if you are so inclined, please tell us about your own nudge word that you chose for 2024, and also why you chose it.
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
OOOOPS! Much like trying to remember to date things “2024”, I already forgot my new feature. The Question Prompt of the Day from 3000 Questions About Me:
Happy New Year!! Happy 2024!! I have really good feelings about this upcoming year. It’s going to be a good one! (We even get an extra day – leap year!) May all of your dreams come true for this year. And remember to dream BIG!
I already have our lucky New Year’s Day meal simmering in the kitchen. Pork, kielbasa, brats, sauerkraut, collards, black-eyed peas. It smells good in here!
I’m going to add a new daily addition to the blog. One of our sons got me a book for Christmas, called 3000 Questions About Me. He thought that they would make great writing prompts. I think that I will share a question each day that might work as a good writing prompt to any of my readers who also like to write and/or like to keep journals. Keeping with the theme of luck, here is today’s question from the book:
704. What have you been very lucky at?
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
Welcome to the last day of 2023. I like that this year ends on a Sunday. Perfection! Sunday is poetry day on the blog. What kind of poetry did you write and live in 2023? What kind of poetry do you hope to write, and to make in 2024? Here’s my last poem I will write this year. (Now it is time for you to go write yours . . . ):
“NEW YEAR”
Every ending is a new beginning
Every year has losing and winning
I find myself sitting here, widely grinning
Knowing that the earth still keeps spinning
As the veil we call time is quickly thinning,
Into a new precious year of our lives.
What will we make of this gift?
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
When our four kids were little and I would start to complain about everything that had to be done, especially around busy times like the holidays, my husband would say to me, “I’m happy to help. Just give me a to-do list.” My husband was always extremely helpful. His generation was the beginning of the generations of dads who are “all in” – changing diapers, carrying around the diaper bag, taking turns waking up with the kids in the middle of the night. Still, it was me who was the one dedicated to coming up with “the plan/to-do list/what needs to be done”. My exhaustion was never from doing the tasks of raising kids. It was more of a mental exhaustion. “How’s this all going to work?” “How are we going to get everyone to where they need to be and then pick them up on time?” “What should we make for dinner (every single night)?” “How do we handle each child’s individual crises, triumphs and challenges?”
This holiday season is so delightful because we have several “adult heads” taking the wheel. These young adult brains are great, not only at executing plans, but strategically thinking the plans up, too. They have energy, foresight and enough experience now, to know what will work, and what won’t work for our big clan. Sometimes I have even been handed “to do” tasks and this suits me just fine. It is really relaxing to not always have to be the lead dog. Every stage of raising a family is different. But each stage is absolutely wonderful in its own way. Raising a family is the most interesting, challenging, satisfying, humbling, self-discovering experience of my lifetime.
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
I am not going to write a lot today and maybe not a lot in the days following. We finally have all four adult kids in one spot for the holidays. We are having Christmas morning Part Deux and I’m loving every minute of it. The Wise Connector on X posted the meme above. December is a beautiful door that opens to 2024 and closes on 2023. Open doors can be welcoming and exciting, and yet when closed, doors also keep us safe and protected. I love December. I hope that it has been a good one for all of you. See you tomorrow.
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
