Tuesday’s Tidbits

+ I read a term that I hadn’t heard of before. “Tourons”. It’s a mix between “tourist” and “moron.” It was first coined by park rangers about guests who decide to pet wild animals such as bison and wolves. (spoiler alert: this rarely goes well) It now applies to anyone who acts like a jerk anywhere on vacation. I’ve often thought that the versions that I like least of myself, are on the sidelines of my kids’ games and matches (thankfully this era has passed), and in airports. I think about 80 percent of people (myself included) have a lot of “touronic” moments in airports and during the boarding of airplanes. This summer, let’s all agree, “Don’t be a touron.”

+ My daughter is studying abroad this summer in London. She and her friend who is studying there with her, decided that a black leather motorcycle jacket would be a good thing to have since it gets a little cooler in England than it does in Florida. I told her, “I think I have just the ticket.” After tunneling into the dark recesses of my closet, I pulled out a lovely, hardly worn black leather motorcycle jacket. She tried it on. She is thrilled with it. She texted a picture of it to her friend, and her friend said, “Oh wow! My mom gave me her black leather jacket, too!” My daughter said to me, “Who knew that all moms would have black leather jackets?!” I smiled to myself. There’s a lot about me that remains a mystery to my daughter. “Honey,” I said. “Believe it or not, all of us moms were once adventurous, twenty-something young women, too.”

+ “The difference between perseverance and obstinacy is that one comes from a strong will, and the other from a strong won’t.” – Henry Ward Beecher As a self-admitted “stubborn as they come” old mule, this quote made me think (and even cringe a little). I have often found that my strong will has its positive traits in the ways of going after what I want, but when it veers into “contrarian just to be contrarian”, my obstinateness usually hurts me. All things lie on a spectrum, and self-awareness is the scale that works to balance all things.

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:

2091. Are you the kind of person to step in and try to break up a fight?

The Cord

****Happy Birthday, A! I love you with all of my heart. I’m so proud of you. <3 (No more teenagers in the house.)

When you have children, you want to pour everything that you have into them – your love, your time, your presence, your resources, your hopes, your wisdom, your strength, your intuition . . . . .You want to keep the hardy stream, flowing from the umbilical cord, even though it has long been cut. And then sometimes you get glimpses that your children have incorporated everything that you had to give them into their own selves and yet also they have aspects of themselves that you just can’t help but marvel at, and you know that these added gifts come from a Source so much greater than just you. And then you feel so instantly proud, secure, grateful, and full of awe and amazement. You know that your own cord is just one of the cords that has been, and will forever be, the channel of goodness to your precious children, and your only prayer is that they accept all of the love – all of it, especially the Love which is unfathomably, even greater than your own.

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:

741. What can people count on you for?

Monday – Funday

Good morning. I’ve had the most restful, restorative, balancing weekend. My husband has off of work today, so we both slept in. When we finally woke up, after experiencing a weekend full of rain showers, we looked out of our windows to witness a marvelous, sunny day. The picture above is the top of our screened in porch. The rain drops are sitting on top and they are being kissed by the sunlight and so they are creating the most beautiful, rainbow-y, glittery cover you’d ever want to see. Nature never ceases to amaze me.

Yesterday, I read an interesting article. Sarah Sloat wrote an article for The Atlantic about “eldest-daughter syndrome”. Here are some quotes from the article:

“Women are expected to be nurturers. Firstborns are expected to be exemplars. Trying to be everything for everyone is likely to lead to guilt when some obligations are inevitably unfulfilled.”

“Being an eldest daughter means frequently feeling like you’re not doing enough, like you’re struggling to maintain a veneer of control, like the entire household relies on your diligence.”

At least, that’s what a contingent of oldest sisters has been saying online. Across social-media platforms, they’ve described the stress of feeling accountable for their family’s happinessthe pressure to succeed, and the impression that they aren’t being cared for in the way they care for others. Some are still teens; others have grown up and left home but still feel over-involved and overextended. As one viral tweet put it, “are u happy or are u the oldest sibling and also a girl”? People have even coined a term for this: “eldest-daughter syndrome.”

I’m the eldest daughter and I found the article to be relatable, but I’m not convinced that it is just an “eldest daughter” thing. I think that it is a daughter thing. I think that it is a woman thing. I’ve known many eldest daughters who didn’t fit the definition of “people pleasing kin-keeper.” They set out on their own, striving for adventure and independence much like their brothers. However, unlike their brothers, they were often shamed for their actions, or made to feel selfish or unnatural.

Last month, my daughter brought home some college friends to attend a local festival in our area that is somewhat akin to our city’s own Mardi Gras. She also included some dear high school friends who attend different universities. Her boyfriend, who is also a student at a different university than our daughter, was also in town to celebrate with his friends. And our youngest son lives downtown near to where the festivities would be, and so our daughter wanted to be sure to see him and celebrate with him as well. At the end of the night, when our daughter and her friends, who were staying with us, came home, they all looked exhausted but happily satiated . . . . except our daughter. She looked mostly exhausted. She had been so busy trying to coordinate everyone else’s great times that she felt depleted, frustrated and slightful resentful that no one seemed to notice the efforts that she had gone to for this event. I hugged her hard and I snidely said, “Welcome to womanhood.”

What woman has not felt any of the emotions above? What woman has not felt any guilt for not fulfilling traditional society’s definitions of nurturer, daughter, sister, mother, etc.? What woman has not felt some secret resentment that the men in her life are not subject to these same standards and expectations? What woman has never asked herself, “I’m happy that everyone is having a wonderful time, but who in the hell is taking care of me? Who really cares if I am doing alright?”

When we “give to get” that’s called codependence. When we get all of our self-worth from what we do for others, without keeping what we are doing for ourselves, as an equal part in that equation, that’s called martyrdom, and martyrdom has a way of going down a dark road to a desperate loss of our own individual identities. When we define ourselves only as somebody’s wife/daughter/mother/sister, etc. we find ourselves empty when we ask ourselves, “Yes, but who are you?”

How to heal this? It’s the same as being able to heal anything. It starts with self-awareness. It starts with asking hard questions and being able to feel the uncomfortable feelings that often come with the true answers. It’s being able to define for yourself what your roles mean in your life, and what you are willing to do in these roles, even if others don’t agree with your choices. It’s creating boundaries. It’s defining “self-care”, and what that means for you. It’s developing self-worth that isn’t reliant on other people’s judgments and values, but those of your own. It isn’t easy. Healing is never an easy process, but to live the fullness of life and our own individual purpose, healing is crucial.

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:

1446. What have you done that is out of character for you?

It’s Me, Friday

Happy Friday!! Happy Favorite Things Friday!! I’m not going to be writing much today, because I am going to a matinee with my favorite daughter (yes, she’s my only daughter), doing one of my favorite things (going to the movies), and seeing a movie based on one of my favorite books of all time. (Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret by Judy Blume) I’m so happy that they finally made a movie out of this great book. I love all things book related. Not only are books my favorite, but so are bookstores, and libraries, and those little free libraries that look like bird houses, and bookmarks and book covers . . . . . .

Today’s favorite has nothing to do with books, however. Today, my favorite is a hairspray that the kind, informed clerks recommended to me, when I was at Sally Beauty Supply the other day. (Remember, I live in humid Florida. Humidity is not kind to hairstyles.) When Sally clerks first recommended their best selling hairspray to me with the selling feature of “it works, but you can still comb through it” in my mind, I automatically turned that statement into, “Oh okay, so it doesn’t work.” But I took the professionals’ advice anyway, and it turns out, this hairspray is good stuff. It works! Professional Sebastian Shaper Plus Hairspray is the best that I’ve tried yet in my long life with my fine and stubborn hair.

Now, I’m going to go use a little bit of this liquid gold in a bottle on my hair, as I prepare to see my movie with my best girl. Have a great Friday!! See you tomorrow!!!

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.”

My Advisor

I’m having a little bit of writer’s block. It doesn’t happen to me often, but nothing is stirring me, except perhaps the heat, and the humidity, and feeling a little stuck in my process of trying to move comfortably into the Empty Nest.

As I was writing the above sentences, my daughter texted me (she started her freshman year of college this summer). The text said this:

“Just had the best meeting with my advisor! He is so nice and I got all of my problems fixed lol.”

I found this comforting for many reasons. We all need to have meetings with “My Advisor.” “My Advisor” has a way of making everything seem easier, under control, and reassuring that all of our problems will be fixed. Do you need to schedule an appointment with your own “My Advisor”? Is this meeting a little overdue? Find a way to fit in a meeting in with your “Advisor” today in whatever form that takes for you: prayer, nature walk, meditation, quiet time, etc. It will be the best use of your time today. I promise.

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

Protective Love

30 Best Mother-Daughter Quotes - Sweet Quotes About Moms and Daughters

Our daughter got into her university of choice last night. She will attend the same university that her beloved brothers have attended. Not one of my children has worked harder at this goal of being admitted to this university than my daughter. (and I know that our sons would heartily agree with this statement) We are all so proud of her, excited for her and we are shedding our family’s protective love armor all over her, as she takes these first big steps into the adventure of her fast approaching adulthood. My heart is swelled with pride, love, and awe for the precious gift of my little girl, and her blossoming into a vibrant woman of value and excellence and determination.

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

Way Showers

I went to an “event” yesterday and I actually woke up feeling like I have things to write about. When you actually go and do things, you end up having stories to experience and then, stories to tell. Life felt a little “normal” again, for the first time in a long time, yesterday.

Yesterday the “event” that I attended, was my daughter’s first high school tennis match, of the season. And she won it. But it was a complete nail biter. She was down 3-6, came back 7-6, but then she and her very worthy competitor, ended up tying 8-8. They had to play a tie breaker, which my entirely exhausted daughter ended up winning, 11-9. My nails are bloody nubs. When the match was finally over, I was reminded of the author Glennon Doyle’s most famous quote, “We can do hard things.” I told my daughter what I liked best about her victory, was that she will always have the memory of it, in her back pocket. When she is struggling with any difficult situation in her life, she can think back to this moment, and know for a fact, that she is full of fortitude, perseverance, and calmness under pressure. She can do hard things. She has proven it to herself.

Yesterday’s tennis match wasn’t exactly “normal.” We have good winter weather here in Florida, therefore the matches are held outside. There was no communal snack table, no hugging, no high fives, nor any handshakes after the matches. Each competing duo was handed a fresh can of balls before their games. I was starkly reminded that it was during tennis season last year, when the reality of the coronavirus pandemic was truly setting in for all of us. At the last high school tennis match which I attended (in March of 2020), the coach told the players that the rest of the season had been cancelled. He also told them, that after spring break, they were not likely coming back to school. Unfortunately, he was right.

While I was at the match yesterday, I also partook in one of my other vices – eavesdropping. I have mentioned on the blog before that I like to eavesdrop. I am not proud of that fact, but I own it. As I was watching my daughter play, I overhead a group of high school girls talking. One girl said, “I have this condition called ‘anxiety’.” That statement started a chorus of statements: “Anxiety! Oh yes, I have that! My therapist says I have that, too. I hate anxiety. I can’t sleep! I can’t drive.”

Wow. At that moment I wanted to run over and group hug all of them. But of course, I couldn’t do it, because 1.) Covid and 2.) I was eavesdropping, which is a rude and hurtful thing to do. So, I just sat in my deserved little cloud of sadness, and I reflected a little bit. And I thought about the blog that I was going to write today.

I would like to pretend that these girls’ anxiety issues were all concerning this awful pandemic, which has a lot of us people, all wound up in tight little balls, these days, but I would be lying to myself. Quite honestly, I am sure that I could have overheard that conversation, at any time during all of the years which my children have been in high school, starting around the year 2010. Three of my middle son’s classmates committed suicide in high school. My daughter’s class just lost a classmate to suicide a couple of months ago. I know for a fact that my own children experience anxiety. I’ve witnessed it, first hand.

I believe life is mostly meant to be savored and enjoyed. I truly do. But do I live that? Am I an example of that? Do I model a life that is mostly “peace and joy”? Do I take any responsibility for my own peace and joy, or do I act as if I am a victim of circumstance? These are hard questions. The answers are hard to face sometimes.

Over the years, the women before us have fought hard for the rights which we women have today, such as the right to vote, to serve in the military, and to become vice president of the United States. It is easy to take these gifts for granted. In our “Declaration of Independence”, we were all promised the right to “the pursuit of happiness.” The women before us, worked hard and tirelessly, to make sure that we women had the equal right to “the pursuit of the happiness.” Are we doing our part in that quest?

I believe that happiness is a by-product of what we do. Is what I am doing on a daily basis bringing me happiness? Do my relationships with the others in my life, bring me happiness? Does my relationship with myself bring me happiness? Am I living to my own standards, or am I trying to live to the impossible standards of “fake world” as depicted on social media? Do I have a strong connection with my spirituality, a faith that makes me feel whole, not one that separates me from others with the sense that I am “holier than thou”?

Why are these questions important? They are important because I am a model to my daughter, and I am a model to your daughters and to your granddaughters, and to that beautiful group of girls, discussing, in earnest, their shared condition of anxiety. Kids listen to what we do, not what we say. Kids are excellent at honing in on hypocrites. After raising four almost grown children, and having made many an eloquent lecture (that I myself, was pretty impressed with), I learned that those loquacious words fell mostly on deaf ears, especially if I wasn’t walking my talk.

What are we modeling to the women of the future, friends? If I am honest, that group of girls, could have easily been me, and any one of my group of friends, in any of my various stages of my life. And that’s okay. It’s good to have friends to lean on for support. But it is also good to have friends to savor life with. It is good to have friends to laugh with, and to sit with, in awe of the pure beauty of each other, our friendships, and of the incredible, nature all around us. What are we modeling to the women of the future? “Don’t feel anxiety, girls, but I just changed my outfit fifteen times, because I feel so insecure about how I look. Don’t feel anxiety, girls, but it is important that you look lovely, have a great job, raise amazing kids (because if they aren’t amazing, it is all your fault), and sustain a romantic, exciting, successful marriage through it all. And if any of these areas of life are faltering, I judge myself mercilessly. But please don’t feel anxiety, girls. Seriously, life is fun, once you are doing a perfect job at getting good grades at school, getting into a good college with an athletic scholarship, landing a cute boyfriend who treats you well, and still being able to fit into your skinny jeans. Then, you can be just like “me.” Isn’t life fun? Why do you have anxiety, girls?”

Our daughters, our nieces, our granddaughters, our friends’ daughters will learn to have less anxiety, when we are the way showers of life lived with less anxiety. Our daughters will practice self-care, self-acceptance, and self-love, when we are the way showers of self-care, self-acceptance and self-love. Our daughters, our women of the future, will learn to have meaningful, purposeful, interesting lives of love and wonder and peace and calm, when we show them that this is possible. Our young women of the future will learn to love and to savor themselves, and to savor the very act of just experiencing life, when we teach them that they are lovable just because of who they are, not for what they do. When we show our girls, that life is a wonderful journey to be experienced in awe, in hope, in joy, in peace, and in exhilaration, our example gives them permission to live life the way it was meant to be lived. Will they still experience some anxiety? Of course. We all will. Anxiety is a part of life. But it can be a small footnote. Anxiety can mostly be experienced as a flutter in our stomachs, as a sign of exciting things to come. And let’s remember, when we are living in the fullness of the gift of just experiencing the astonishing miracle of living a human life on Earth, anxiety is easily noticed and then it is just as easily let go, as nothing more than a passing sensation.

Think of a young woman whom you love with all of your heart. Think of how joyful you want this young woman to feel, most days of her life. What does that look like? Do want her to think that she has to have a Louis Vuitton purse, work in a job which she hates, to make the money to purchase that purse, have her stay in toxic relationships that make her feel terrible, just for the sake of having relationships, and to spend hours of her precious life, photo shopping her real life into a fake online picture, to make her life appear “perfect”? Is this what we believe will bring our future young women happiness? What are we modeling to the women of the future, friends? Let’s choose to be the way showers of the wisdom we have obtained. Love and happiness is an inside job. Life is mostly meant to be enjoyed. Savor life. You don’t have to win at it. There is nothing “to win.” Life and love is given to you freely. Happiness is yours, as a by-product of doing and experiencing what uniquely brings you joy. You are an important piece of this tapestry called Life, and so is everyone else. You know this fact. I know this fact. Let’s live it. Let’s be the way showers to our young women. Let’s make the path easier and lighter and brighter for our young women, as it was made easier for us, by the mighty women who came before us. Let’s let anxiety become a barely noticeable footnote, in the otherwise amazing adventure of living Life. It will be good for our future girls. It will be good for us. Let’s be purposeful in our duty. Let’s be Way Showers.

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