Category Archives: friendship

May17

waving truce against the moon

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“Let the beauty you love be what you do. There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.” – Rumi

It’s time for some true confessions. The less I see of others sharing their vulnerabilities, the more I wanna. Because I’m also seeing some others who are sharing and it looks en-lighten-ing. I want that. I want to be lighter. I will always be a moth to the flame of freedom. All freedom – physical, financial, emotional, spiritual. I’m in my 70’s, and let’s just be frank here – I’m on the approach toward my death. I don’t feel like I’m going to die anytime soon, but the truth is we never know. Yes, I’ve lost much younger loved ones suddenly. But the recent shock of losing my former husband is a different kind of lesson.

He died unexpectedly last month at the age of 88. That sounds reasonably old. But there were things to be considered: firstly, he was the youngest of 5 children. His mother died of complications from an auto accident. But his father and four siblings all lived well into their 90’s. He lost his brother last October at the age of 97. They still golfed and played bridge twice a week with friends. They were active. He fully expected to live into his 90’s. And his death was “unexpected” because he died as the result of a fall, not of old age or natural causes. I had spoken to him a few days prior about getting together for lunch soon. I fully expected that to happen.

But this is really about the fear it triggered. We had been together for over 30 years when we were younger. He was not ever willing to discuss any arrangements for his death, natural or otherwise. He simply refused to consider it. When we were first married, I used to goad him that he thought he was the first immortal human. We had teenage children. His income was 10 times mine. There was no life insurance or any kind of financial arrangement in the event of his death. He was the most stubborn person I have ever known, and believe me, that is saying something in an Irish family.

So when he died in April he left nothing. His retirement pension stopped, which means so did my alimony. The State of Michigan is richer now; they won’t be paying him any longer. His new car has been repossessed by the bank. His 4 daughters inherited a savings account just large enough to cater his memorial service luncheon. Gratefully, I will receive his social security survivor benefits (but no longer receive mine. Social security pays whichever is greater, not both.) My life has just gotten exponentially harder. I’m 72 now and scrambling to figure out how I’ll support myself. It didn’t need to be this way, and of course, it’s absolutely perfect. It must be. I just don’t get to know why.

Yes, I had tried again and again to reason with him, even recently; to put some kind of a plan in place. He refused. In fact he laughed at me. He wasn’t going to die anytime soon. I thought he was unreasonable. He thought I was ridiculous. I guess we deserved each other. I miss him anyway.

If you’ve been here long, you know I’ve been grieving the loss of my beloved cat since October 20th. Just a couple days later my brother-in-law died, and a friend’s sweet dog whom I also loved. Three deaths all at once. And you also know that Chewy, my cat, was coming to me in my dreams and meditations. Twice he said very clearly, “do not make any decisions before spring.” When I heard this the second time, I asked what he meant by spring and he replied, “March 30th.” So…March 30th came, and while I did not feel any better, I was watching and listening for a change. Dick died 2 days later.

Since about the age of 65 I have worked at overcoming one of my biggest fears. It had incapacitated my creativity all of my life. My big, fat, ugly fear that people (especially loved ones) would think I am crazy. Insane type crazy. If you’ve read past blog posts, you know that I have truly healed these fears. All of my life my family and my two husbands had told me I was crazy. So I hid. It was blatant manipulation, what we now call gaslighting. It worked brilliantly. Kept me right where they wanted me – at their service.

Only today am I remembering that decades ago I went for a psych evaluation with a leading psychiatrist at U of M. I had asked my primary care physician to refer me because the antidepressants weren’t working. I thought maybe I needed something stronger. During that hour the psychiatrist said to me, “Well, you are not crazy, if that’s what you’re worried about.” He recommended that I not take stronger medication, but work toward improving my “circumstances.” In other words, pull your head out of your ass, Susan, and stop letting yourself be manipulated. Maybe stop living with addicts. My “over-developed sense of responsibility,” also professionally diagnosed, would get the better of me for a few more decades. Speaking of being stubborn…

So today I find myself back in survival mode, plagued by fears. And I wish to be free of them. I will begin with what I know – I will speak them. Name them. Expose them to the light. When Siddhartha Gautama (the Buddha) met evil on the road to enlightenment, he named it Architect. The Architect who would design his demise. The Architect of self doubt. He turned to face anything or anyone he felt this threat from. He would address them, and he would say, “I see you, Architect.”

Architect, I am scared of dying – not of death itself, but of suffering. Of lingering, being a burden to my only child. Let me be clear, I’m not afraid of pain. I know how to remain whole inside myself when my body is paralyzed with pain. When the morphine isn’t working and you can’t cry out for out for help. No one wants to learn that, but I have. I have walked trembling and yet confidently through hell and smelled the breath of huge, huge demons. Hoping their chains held; knowing that if not, at least my death would happen swiftly.

I’m afraid of losing the loved ones I have still, but that comes with aging. That’s just the way this works. I’m afraid of poverty. Of not having any control over where I live. Of becoming less and less free as I age. I’m afraid of this grief…of never finding joy again. That scares me most of all. I don’t know how to do grief. I guess I’m learning.

As I’ve said here before, my small group of friends have been patient with me. I went to lunch last week with one friend. It was a make up date because I had messed up our previous plans; I put them in my calendar wrong. Patience…while I am obviously being reset by life. Or as I say, “I’ll be with you in a moment” – my own euphemism for “I am not functioning.” Anyway, after a lovely meal we sat in her living room while I cried, consumed in self pity as I am these days. She reassured me as sweetly as I hope I would do for her. “There’s comfort in melancholy when there’s no need to explain…”

Suddenly she noticed a blue bunting on the bird feeder outside the window. Next thing we knew a spectacular oriole flew in. Brilliant orange, like it was lit up. Then a red cardinal. A bright yellow finch. It was surreal. Surreal is my default notification that God is hangin’ close. The veil is thin, and I am being blessed. I might have dismissed the significance of that if I were afraid you’d think me crazy. If that is crazy, sign me up for more.

“So now I am returning to myself these things that you and I suppressed.”

Apr21

with every mistake…

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“If you’re not living on the edge, you’re taking up too much space.” -unknown

My dear friend (who we affectionately refer to as Ramda) came to visit. My son nicknamed her that because we revere her wisdom. We live about an hours’ drive apart, on a good weather day. Since we are located in the NW region of Michigans’ lower peninsula, good weather days are random. In the winter months – November through April – the roads are going to be treacherous many days and impassible some. But it is spring now, so better. Unfortunately, this entire northern half of the lower peninsula has been experiencing record flooding. My friend got tired of me putting off a visit. I’m grieving and having panic attacks lately. Long distance driving is a daunting obstacle.

So she decided to come here. And then all hell broke loose in the form of thunderstorms and high winds. Many roads were washed away. The people who live in Traverse City have been told that the repairs will likely take six months or more. The damage is widespread, and given the weather this time of year, could potentially get worse. Ramda had to set a long, circuitous route and go north into the Leelanau peninsula and then come south to me. But she insisted, and I am grateful for her wisdom and her company.

As it happened, the sun was shining that day. We bundled ourselves against the forty degree temperatures and ventured to the nearby lighthouse for a beach walk. I pocketed only a few stones. As with most everything in my current life, I have refined my collecting habits. Now I only collect rocks shaped like hearts, or pink granite with a green line running through it. They grace my windowsills and sinks. These are the same beach stones that caught my eye as a child along these beaches. I’d tell you I’m in my second childhood, but anyone who has known me long will tell you – I never left my first. And it’s never too late to have a happy childhood.

She and I sat on the bench and had our usual deep, loving conversation…and some good ol’ belly laughs. Somehow we got on the subject of language itself, one of my favorite topics. We started talking about recent buzzwords that have entered the cultural vernacular. Words like envisage. And conversate. Soon we were cracking ourselves up using those in sentences…you kinda had to be there. But really, why? I see; I visualize. Feel free to envisage yourself right along…I talk. I don’t conversate. Whatever.

Anyway (which does not, nor has ever had, an S on the end, people) we had a lovely visit. These early spring days are glorious here. Exactly what I need for healing. I am more and more acutely aware of the collateral beauty. You know what that is, right? It’s the inherent beauty in all life, in being alive on the planet earth exactly where you are now. For reasons beyond me, it is far more noticeable when you are in a state of grief. I want to learn to be aware of it always. I want to learn to live with heightened senses, from inside a state of grace and compassion. To miss my lost beloveds and to see and hear them in the earth as it comes alive again.

My son and I have decided that we love living here near the water. Our little village has everything we need. When I was looking for a place to move I wanted to be off the beaten track (not in the drop-by zone) but with the most important amenities: a library, a post office, and a grocery store. I also got a wonderful local bookstore and several restaurants, and a six-bed hospital with world class medical care. But we do live on, as we call it, “the edge of the world.”

This is a destination, not a pass-through place. It is our own thin place. And it is just right for us.

Apr16

“Seal the blast doors!”

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When my son was little I used to say, “you can fool some of the people all of the time, or all of the people some of the time…but you can’t fool me.” It was straight-up manipulative programming. I’m not proud. Not only was I living in survival mode myself, but I had noooooo clue how to parent a child, let alone a sensitive genius. I set out to convince him that he had best not try to pull the wool over my eyes. I would not be fooled. Maybe not the best way to build trust.

In truth I had pulled just about every trick in the book with my own parents. I’m not sure they were actually fooled, but they allowed me to get away with anything and everything. They subconsciously taught me to think that I was really smart…hahhahaa. I was certainly creative getting myself into all manner of sticky situations. God, my guardian angels, always had my back. Like the night of my 18th birthday when I drove to the tattoo parlor to get a tattoo – and the building was literally on fire! As it happened, I got my first tattoo for my 40th birthday, and I’m glad I waited for a number of reasons. Never mind in the year 1972 that industry wasn’t regulated, so…eewww.

Fast forward decades and I am no more savvy than I was at 18…or, am I? No smarter, perhaps, except to know what I don’t know. But oh…way, way more trusting. Exponentially more faith. Faith in my intuition, imagination, God. Those are all the same things, just by the by…and somewhere after midnight, in my wildest fantasies…

The original Star Wars came out in 1977, the year before my son was born. There were no streaming services then. I insisted my husband take me to the theater, and I remember that it was only showing at one theater in the northern Detroit suburbs, in Southfield. The next day I made him take me back with my teenage sister in tow this time. My heart knew something truthful was happening and I was going to glean every drop of inspiration I could while it was available. It was life-changing, like watching The Beatles on Ed Sullivan as a kid. A bold new world of possibilities was opening up.

When my son was old enough – 7 or 8, maybe – we watched Star Wars together. And I told him something I believed to be true then, and still now: “you must become a Jedi to survive in the world of your future.” He is, indeed, a Jedi for his time. I encouraged his intuition despite not understanding how it worked.

Recently I lost one of my heroes, my former husband. I say that with a whole clusterfuck of mixed emotions. He needed to be my hero to feel worthy as a man – and thus, he needed me to remain in the role of damsel-in-distress. It took years for me to become cognizant of that unhealthy dynamic; more years to extricate myself once I had tried and failed to change it. But I never did overcome the need for him in my corner when I was truly in trouble. And he never abandoned me. He might not have had any emotional intelligence (he was an addict, after all), but he was always at the end of the phone in an actual emergency. That was his love language. For example, when my son was diagnosed with lymphoma, he showed up at the door unannounced, dropping off bags of groceries. He did his best with what he knew, also a product of his own dysfunctional upbringing. I’m learning to forgive him. And me.

And so here I am, grieving again and still. I’ve had another hero step in since his death, a dear friend. She’s the rare kind of friend who doesn’t wait to be asked if you need help. She knew what I needed and she just showed up. And it wasn’t the first time she’s done that. Somehow she has always believed in me. There are no words to describe my gratitude.

We all need heroes from time to time. All of a sudden they are everywhere I look. Fear shall not prevail. One of them is my aforementioned friend. Four of them just circled the moon in Artemis II. My son is my hero, just not in a way I expected. He never fails to inspire me, nor to make me laugh and feel safe and loved. He tells me emphatically that I am magic when I least believe it.

One of the women friends I admire most just bought us tickets to see the story of Mary Oliver at the City Opera House next month, a wonderful evening to look forward to. Mary Oliver is one of my heroes, as is Anne LaMott, who wrote:

“I was reminded of the Four Immutable Laws of Spirit: Whoever is present are the right people. Whenever it begins is the right time. Whatever happened is the only thing that could have happened. When it’s over, it’s over.”

Help shows up in many ways. Having faith is recognizing that you are, and always have been, blessed and highly favored. God, the angels, show up in many forms. Sometimes they are the loved ones who have always got your back. Sometimes they frustrate the ever-loving bejesus out of you. This dawn it was simply birds singing me awake. So I mean this, and I say it to you with all my heart: May the force be with you.

Mar31

Monday moanin’

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Unlike most, I love Mondays. I always have. Mondays are the beginning of a new week, and I like beginnings. I’ve always been a morning person. Mornings are the beginning of a new day, and I like beginnings. So Monday mornings? The best. This seems to have been true since I was a young girl, old enough to notice that I liked some things better than others, so I’m calling it “my nature.” I am a morning person by nature. I have always preferred sunrises to sunsets, eastern light best of all in a house. It feels like renewal, somehow regenerative.

Only in retrospect am I realizing that I also liked Monday mornings throughout my life because I preferred school to home with family, and work to home with husband. Monday morning provided someplace to go, away from the chaos. It’s sad to see that in retrospect, to not have been aware enough to have seen it at the time I was living it. Big-ass learning curve I’m on this incarnation…phew!

As it happens, this morning I feel at peace. I have not felt at peace in a very long time. My dear long-suffering friends have put up with some very bad behavior coming from me. I’m tiresome. Unreliable. All I have done is cry, swear, and moan. I have even discovered that when you get a solicitation text on your phone – the kind you respond STOP to unsubscribe from – you will also be unsubscribed if you respond FUCK OFF. It works the same but is so much more satisfying. I’m just ornery.

My depression – no, despondency – has been limitless. Since October, so, all fucking winter. This winter has been particularly severe. Dark, extremely cold, historic amounts of snow, power outages. I don’t remember a winter this ugly in decades. It matched my state of mind perfectly. Cart meet horse…never mind…the sun is out this morning. The temperature will soar over 40 degrees today…woohoo. The snow is melting. I can get out of the house. There is hope.

The truth is, of course, this state has been grief. It seems to be bottomless. I’m sure everyone is tired of hearing about it. Losing my beloved familiar broke something open in me. Something that had been festering for a long, long time. Perhaps more than one lifetime. That’s how it feels. I am inconsolably angry – for both of us, you might be glad to know. If I can survive this I’d like to think it will benefit more than just me. But who knows…the longer I live, the less I seem to understand about how things work. I’m new here.

So, now what? From moments of screaming in the shower to resigned meditation, I have repeatedly heard, “wait until spring,” “don’t make any decisions until spring,” “rest until spring.” I yelled and sniped and cajoled back, “be more specific,” “give me a date.” I am so entirely done trying to interpret spirit’s wisdom, or my intuition. Give it to me straight or shut up. And I did – I did – hear back: end of March. March 30th to be precise. And here we are.

Now it is time to discover the entirety of my nature. To learn the language of my soul. To find out how life works if I don’t make compromises. To face east and let the sunrise light me up, now that I am free to be myself.

Mar15

always eat from the garden

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Sweetness and light I am not. I’m a surly old broad. I fail to understand why I am not treated like royalty everywhere I go…do they not know who I am…???

I’m much like Francis in this wonderful short film. A grouchy old fuss-budget-know-it-all. Able to be plied with sweets. But I want to be like Bella – self-assured, friendly and inquisitive.

A few days ago I met a dear friend for lunch, and then had the treat of accompanying her to a house showing. Who doesn’t love to nosey around a house for sale?! The old cottage itself was a bit of a fixer-upper, increasingly less common in this area. And often the victim of vampire flippers looking to make a quick profit. This cottage had been shared by three sisters who were either deceased now, or too elderly to travel here. A pencil portrait of one of them hung above the bookcase in the living room, as if they had always intended to return. This had never been a year-round home, but a getaway. It was a little gem waiting to be loved again.

The realtor made a comment about the potential here if someone had the vision. My first thought was that my friend has vision! She is a remarkable person, and one of my favorite artists. But I didn’t say that – instead I started espousing what I would do with the place. I have vision, too, you know. I guess I was having a sudden fit of jealousy, and I must have sounded like a right ass.

I loved the acre of woods hiding the house so protectively, the long two-track dirt drive we had to back up and search for…the fir floors, white bead board walls, the mullioned windows. A fairy tale cottage in the woods if ever I’d seen one.

Oh, I do so hope my friend comes to live in the cottage. She would be closer to me. I want her closer, in hopes she will be patient with me, like Bella is patient with Francis. Of course she will. She always is. And being with her is healing in so many ways. Patience is healing. Being seen is healing. Being vulnerable is healing. I want to be vulnerable with my hopelessly romantic little life.

Mar13

hopeless romantic

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It has been almost a month since I have written here. Remember when I used to write almost daily?! That hasn’t happened in a very long time.

It has been a very long winter. I wasn’t sure if I’d ever write here again, to be honest. In fact, I’m not sure about much of anything anymore. My life has been a “watch this space” kinda life…I’m taking it one day at a time. You might think that wise in my old age, but that isn’t really new for me. I’ve pretty much always lived by the seat of my pants.

Now I just live more in retrospect – and I am paying particular attention to the healing. That is one of the many beautiful things about growing old: self-awareness grows, too. Often in spite of ourselves, although I shall only speak for my stubborn self here.

And you notice different things that you never noticed when you were young. How could you have, scrambling to keep up with the impositions of the world? Trying to work and love and think and feel and survive the constant barrage of needs and expectations…trying to survive…

Now I look back and realize that I completely and utterly lost any semblance of romantic inclination decades ago. I had no desire for romance in my life. In fact, I found the notion of romantic love repulsive. Deliver me. Go away. “I vant to be left alone,” as Greta Garbo actually said. I only wanted to enjoy my own company. It didn’t happen right away. In fact it took decades (and several therapists) to extricate myself from the addiction of people pleasing. But, in retrospect, I see now that it was a healing that had occurred. A great big – HUGE huge huge!!! healing: I stopped needing to be accepted. I stopped killing myself trying to prove my worth. I stopped needing to be anything other than who I am so that you wouldn’t leave me. I stopped needing to be needed.

And everything changed. Everything. Halle-fucking-lujah…

Although, I cannot tell you how many friends have told me that living without romance in your life is sad. Sad?! I’ve never been happier. Sad? Because I’m alone? Sure, I experience waves of loneliness. They last about 3 minutes before the delight of something else grabs my attention and I am free to blissfully dive down that rabbit hole.

And this morning something wonderful occurred to me – that I might be living the most romantic life of anyone I know. I am a hopeless romantic.

I romance everything in my life. The trees! Oh, my…the trees. Aren’t they magnificent?! They are not just shade from the hot sun – no. They are my cathedral; my sanctuary. I do not merely walk through the woods; I am on a pilgrimage of spirit. I sit at the beach, watch the water pulling diamonds to the shore, listen to the inland sea rolling onto the sand, and I am transported to heaven. I hear God whispering sweet nothings in my ear. Yep, I’m a hopeless romantic, having a mad love affair with life. Watch this space.

Almost a decade ago I discovered a weird little television series, and I am currently watching it again…as romantics tend to do. It’s so much better this time through. Do you know why? Because I’m so much better this time through. Detectorists is a very quirky little slow moving story about two misfits who become friends over a common hobby – metal detecting. I could not BE LESS interested in metal detecting. But I am a nerd. And my nerd of a son likes to go metal detecting, especially on the nearby beaches after a storm…and it gave us something to watch together.

My hard-ass, hard-hearted unromantic stupid self thought I’d indulge him. But I fell in love. I fell in love with the characters and the writing and the scenery and the music and the spectacular talent and the oh-so-unpredictable surprise delight of it all! What a masterpiece.

Jump down this rabbit hole. Written, directed, and acted by Mackenzie Crook. You’ll never look at a nerd the same way again. Music by Johnny Flynn…and if you don’t know who he is, pull yer head out. Most recently I watched him in Goodbye June. And Rachael Stirling, so talented in her own right, even if she is the daughter of Dame Diana Rigg – who petitioned for a part in the series herself when she learned about it. If you don’t know who Diana Rigg is, well…we really can’t be friends. Go wake up your inner romantic and join us among the living.

Will you search through the lonely earth for me? Climb through the briar and bramble? I’ll be your treasure…I’m waiting for you.

Sep28

in restless dreams I walked alone

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Oh my goodness, it is the perfect fall morning. The sun is just beginning to dissipate the fog and whiffs of smoke-like dew slide across the valley to my east. Everything glistens. I love this time of year. I’ve taken a little break from writing because I’ve had a friend visiting from out of town. She usually spends much of the summer here, just a mile down the road from me, in her little cottage on the lake. But this year she has not been able to come all summer. Because life has been hard. We are at a certain age. We lose our parents and their siblings, the aunts and uncles of our childhood. We lose siblings. We lose friends. We have health challenges.

I myself am going through another health challenge – physical and mental. As part of a routine check-up my doctor noticed I was a little out of breath. Well, I flunked the pulmonary function test she ordered. Now I will go through pulmonary rehab, which is a good thing. I will gladly work for any improvement in lung capacity I can get.

Louise Hay, who wrote You Can Heal Your Body decades ago and provided a list of all the emotional causes behind common physical symptoms, tells me that lung issues are grief. Yeah yeah yeah…I’ve had asthma and lung problems much of my life, almost as long as I’ve lived with my invisible friend Grief.

And for a combination of reasons, I am conscious of the grief I am feeling now, again. It isn’t new; we’re familiar. We know how to be sad. In fact, I welcome sadness these days. It seems an appropriate response to much of what is going on around and within me. And it means that I am feeling (and not repressing) the truth I am acutely aware of. I don’t want to live with any denial if I can help it; that leads to depression. And depression is harder to manage in winter. The light of summer is fading fast. Hello darkness, my old friend…

…I’ve come to talk with you again. I told my friend that I look forward to winter, and I do, increasingly as I age. I love the quiet. The complete and enveloping quiet you can only know in the middle of a dark, snowy afternoon. With my friend I have talked and cried and laughed and cried some more this week. We have covered a lot of ground. She will leave in a few days. Hopefully life will be a bit kinder to her and we can meet again next summer. It triggers a lot of fear – will life be kinder again? Is that realistic as we get older?

The summer residents and tourists crowd my area – the trails, the beaches, the roads, from May through October. They come from all around the world. We will wait in line at every restaurant and at the post office, the library and the gas station. Life is less convenient six months of the year, but I won’t complain. They’re the reason we have our choice of good restaurants in a rural village. Strangers often share a table in a restaurant during the crowded months, and that is how I met my friend. She and her daughter, visiting from their home in Kansas, were waiting in line in a tiny restaurant.

I was out for breakfast that morning with a family member, and invited the two women to sit with us. We briefly introduced ourselves and slightly scooted away, not wanting to be intrusive. But these friendly people started a conversation. They had flown in the night before and come to the little obscure restaurant for coffee and warmth, as they hadn’t time to grocery shop yet and were quite cold. I asked them if they needed anything (blankets? hats and gloves?) and my new acquaintance, obviously around my age, answered, “just emotional support.” Instant new best friend! Upon leaving I handed her a piece of scrap paper with my phone number, address, and an invitation to lunch at my home the next day, quipping, “and here’s hoping none of us are ax murderers!” Her daughter shot back, “we’re about to find out.” Invitation accepted.

This morning she and I went back to that little restaurant. Meandering across the narrows we saw a pair of great blue herons wading. Two sandhill cranes flew overhead and called out to let us know…to let us know…we are here…we are alive. We see you. I sent them silent prayers for a safe journey . After breakfast we went to a gorgeous show of local art and photographs at Oliver Art Center. I needed that little shot of inspiration to remind me to make some art. Lack of creativity is surely part of why I’m sad….maybe a big part. Could my lack of inspire-ation have something to do with pulmonary stress? Breathe out…breathe in…

“Some people don’t get to live soft lives. We get handed chaos, grief, betrayal, and we have to learn how to bloom anyway. We become the ones who know how to carry others when their world falls apart because we remember what it was like when no one showed up for us. We’re not here because it was easy. We’re here because we didn’t give up.” – unknown

Aug21

bugger

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“People without a sense of humor will never forgive you for being funny.” – Joyce, The Thursday Murder Club

In my fantasy life I host a writer’s group once a month. Or maybe we pretend to be a book group or a writer’s group but we really solve murders. We gather around my gorgeous little antique dining table in the upholstered rattan chairs and talk and ponder all afternoon. We have tea, coffee, perhaps a sip of prosecco. We open little party gifts we’ve made or collected for each other, and we eat cucumber sandwiches and scones with lots of cream…someone falls asleep out on the veranda in the chaise lounge. It’s just a little nap. Some drooling might occur, but no one will hold it against you.

They love coming to my home, because, well, let’s face it – I know how to entertain. And put together a list of suspects. No one leaves hungry, and everyone leaves excited and hopeful and full of new ideas. It will be hard to sleep tonight.

In my actual life, a dear friend is moving into a new apartment in a retirement community, as did another friend not long ago. I’m experiencing pangs of jealousy. First of all, I love being old. Helen Mirren said “the best part of being over 70 is being over 70.” So hanging out with peers is ever so appealing. Young people just don’t get it. I want no-holds-barred brutally honest communication – and I also want to be home in my pajamas by 8.

All of my adult life I’ve wanted for nothing more than a big, raucous house full of family and friends. Kids and grandkids, constant coming and going. Music playing and spontaneous dancing and laughter and laughter and laughter. And a private office off my bedroom with a door that locks when “I vant to be left alone.“

That was my childhood home, and I spent the last 50 years of my life trying to recreate it. But it wasn’t real. It was a sham. My childhood home was also hiding terrible neglect and abuse and dysfunction. The big loud happy home was just for show. My parents wanted the happy home, too; they also didn’t know how to make it happen. They didn’t know how to face the addiction demons. Neither was I going to be able to create the life I wanted; I had not a clue how to go about it. And so shame tends to creep into my dreams and cloud my sleep. When I wake I feel entirely like a failure. Where did I go wrong?

That’s where the deep sense of failure stems from: I’m smart…but not smart enough to have figured this out when I was younger. To have stopped trying to please everyone else and keep everyone else safe; to have known that survival mode will never get you where you want to go. I was slow to understand that love is not transactional, nor negotiable. I wasn’t just quite smart enough to know that we really cannot earn our way to health and happiness…to know, beyond a shadow of a doubt that I AM already everything I could possibly dream. My loyalty and devotion were misplaced outside myself.

And now I have lived long enough to know the privilege of looking myself in the mirror and asking, “IS that what you really wanted? Or perhaps, is there something far more valuable to be gleaned here?” And now I can let myself fall apart at the seems. I grieve the life I spent trying to fulfill a fantasy that, in fact, I would not choose now. Now that I belong to myself.

“Hope is a renewable option: If you run out of it, at the end of the day, you get to start over in the morning.” – Barbara Kingsolver

Aug5

“I mean…where do I start?”

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Rabbit Hole Alert. Ohhhh….boy. If you’ve been here at the blog for long, you may remember how obsessed I was a few years ago with the BBC series called The Detectorists. I’ll still aver that it was one of the all-time best ever television series. Then, just yesterday I discovered The Lost Words. Low and behold, the artists of both have worked together. No surprises there. Remember, ultimately it will be the artists who save us.

This beautiful series explores the tender world of the autistic genius, of how sweet friendships are, and how difficult romance (or any form of emotional intimacy) for those who hang by a thread on society’s hem…it’s about paying attention and persistence and most of all it’s about dreaming.

Renowned actor Rachel Stirling apparently petitioned her friend Mackenzie Crook for the role of his wife as she wanted to participate in the series. And when her mother, Dame Diana Rigg, heard about the series she asked to be in it. So she plays the part of Rachel Stirling’s (Becky’s) mother. Between the 2nd and 3rd seasons Dame Diana Rigg sadly died. So Mackenzie Crook re-wrote Season 3 to include her character’s death. The talent that gathered to participate in this series brings so much for our enjoyment, not the least of which was Johnny Flynn writing the musical score. You’ll laugh and cry, but you’ll never feel the same about these goofy characters or the nerdy brainiacs they represent. My own autistic genius child went right out and bought himself a metal detector after watching this! It reminds us that the ordinary and invisible in our culture are precious beyond measure. It is a gem.

Jul11

the world is made of spider webs

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“When I’m an old lady I want to be one of those women that has a house full of plants, weird rocks and crystals. That just looks after her animals, paints and minds her own business with her crazy hair.” – unk

Well I don’t know who said that, but I am that woman now! It’s the second week of July already. I’m getting around to spring cleaning. Better late than never I suppose. For starters, it’s been a little-shop-of-horrors-like around here for a couple of years now. I seem to have a green thumb (I am an old witch, after all.)
I take home little forlorn plants from the grocery store clearance for $3. and two years later there is nowhere to sit in the same room. One small monstera I brought home (it had tipped over and lost half it’s dirt) is now eight feet wide and ten feet high. Seven years ago I bought a foot-high Norfolk Island Pine (indoor only in my climate) to use as a tiny Christmas tree and it’s almost hitting the ceiling now. My son helped me move the plants out to the back deck the other day. They aren’t coming back in. I need to find homes for them. Removing them has opened up every room and it feels so spacious in here I could dance. No really – I could actually dance in here.

This is a small house. Originally built as a summer cottage by a University of Michigan professor, the idiot I bought it from tore out most of it’s original features and knocked out walls to create an open floor plan. If you don’t know how I feel about that you might read some of my older posts. Suffice it to say that open floor plans are an abomination of the human spirit. They suck the dignity out of relationships by unnaturally forcing everyone in the household to share the same noises and smells. It feels like living inside a shoe box. Open floors plans are for worms…just sayin’…

But I live in an open floor plan, because, well, it was the right house in the right place. The plants apparently like this arrangement. They have taken over, spreading from the studio to the kitchen and the living area to the dining area. And down the stairs and across the ceiling. This ends now. I’m taking back my home! I love nature, and I will always have a few plants. But this has become ridiculous. I’m ducking and penguin-ing myself around them.

For my next trick, I’m deep cleaning all those creepy corners I haven’t been able to reach or crawl into. Getting all the spider webs and tumbleweeds of cat hair out. Eeeeewwwwww…and I have taken down the curtains and washed them. Everything has sticky dust. And I wonder why I’m so sick all the time?! Twelve loads of laundry later and the place is looking like new.

So here’s the thing. I’ve read a bazillion books on decluttering and feng shui-ing your space back into order. Psychology journals about how decluttering helps your mental health. And I’ve always done it throughout the years…in little increments. It has never felt like this. Maybe because I’ve been ill? It’s true that I’ve never let my home get this dirty and cluttered before. But something about this is coinciding with a huge shift in awareness.

A few months ago I participated in a Beta test group for a program designed to help older women traversing life changes. I’ve mentioned it here briefly, and I will provide a link for you at the bottom of this post. It’s called the Wayfinding Road. I don’t know what any of us were expecting, but this process with this group of remarkable women has been beyond helpful. The small group I was working with included a recent widow, a woman retiring and moving across the country, a woman whose husband was ill, one who had left the country and relocated to Europe, one who is a political refugee in exile. All manner of circumstances – one uncompromising commitment: a life of continued growth. We quickly realized we had much in common despite a wide variety of life experiences. Soon after the 6 week program began I started having dreams with these women in them. And my dreams were fantastic, adventurous and profoundly healing. I was wealthy beyond measure. Something supernatural was happening. We discovered we were all having experiences we could not explain. We started calling it “magic” for lack of a better explanation.

I have never met any one of these women in person. I have interacted with them only online and via email. If one of them called tomorrow and said “I need your help,” I’d be on a plane. They taught me how to love myself. I’m done with depression and shame and guilt. They taught me how to stop performing my life and begin to live it, deeply. They are well educated, articulate. Some of them speak more than one or two languages. They are all extraordinary. The 2nd time we met I confessed to feeling unworthy of their friendship – but I knew I had 2 choices: drop out or show up. I showed up and they lifted me higher.

I hear them talking to me in meditation, telling me precisely what action to take to heal myself. This morning’s meditation told me that my chronic pain and illness serves only to remind me that I took on the responsibility for my family, and that it is long past time to let them go. Not only can I not be responsible for them, but this addiction to saving them is not helping anyone. I gave it up today and got out of bed pain free.

My life has begun to change now in the last few months. Not in any way I had planned. It’s still going on; it’s a process. I don’t know what this means or where it will lead me. Watch this space. But wow…change is afoot.

Lynnelle Wilson is the creator of Wayfinding Road. Contact her through YouTube or Substack: