MISSED CONNECTIONS

Saturday morning, I pulled myself out of bed to do my usual hunting and gathering routine. I’m going to confess that this is kind of a big deal. The usual Saturday morning routine has been disrupted in some way ever since the beginning of the new year. Some of the disruption has been entirely out of my control. Weather/illness/refrigerator delivery snafus are out of my control, but me just being too sleepy and tired on a Saturday morning is entirely within my power of control. This time, I got myself out of bed and out the door before 7:30 AM. I had a nice little breakfast and resumed my writing relationship with my Fortune Cookie journal, abandoning my other story for now until I know more about France, Germany and Nazis. Then I headed out for hunting and gathering.

I was in the produce section of Trader Joe’s and was reaching up to grab a bag of mixed greens, when the woman standing next to me said “Oh! You have a list! That’s so smart. I’ve already put three things in my cart that I didn’t even come in here for.” I laughed and said “I’m not so sure how smart it is or just crazy that I have a list.” Then I explained the meal planning food control situation I had going on with that list. We laughed and then parted ways. Except, we kept bumping into each other in different sections of the store. Each time, we’d have a brief conversation before moving on. At one point, our conversation went on long enough to cause a traffic jam in the freezer section. We both ended up returning our shopping carts at the same time and the woman laughed and said “we even finished at the same time!” The two of us laughed and said our goodbyes as we moved off to our own vehicles. I watched her car pull out of it’s parking spot and for a minute, I thought about running over to her car to properly introduce myself and maybe even exchange numbers.

Now, I have serious regrets about not getting her name and number.

It’s just that she was so fun and personable and likeable. I thought “This is a woman that I could be friends with! We could meet for coffee and or drinks.” I bet she’d be really into going to Camp Wildling. I feel like she’d fit right in with all of us. I feel like every Saturday morning from now on, I’ll be distractedly shopping in Trader Joe’s while searching for this woman. Then I have to find a way to approach her without being creepy or stalkery. Someone recently posted a romantic missed connection thing in Twitter and the people in Twitterverse found out who the missing parties were and got that couple together. I need something like this, but less romantic and more ‘let’s be friends’. So…I’m looking for a woman with light brown skin who was in the Kansas City, MO Trader Joe’s on Saturday morning January 29th around 8:30 AM. She was wearing a beautiful white, red floral print, head scarf. She mentioned her five year old, so I know she has at least one kid. She drove a white toyota four door thing, like maybe a Camry(?).

Lady, if you read this, I swear I am not a psychopath. I just want to be friends.

THE PRINCESS AND THE PEA

Except instead of mattresses, picture couches. Yes…the couch saga continues. After a month of sitting on the new couch, one of the cushions started to sag and pill. It took a month to get someone from Macy’s to come out to ‘inspect’ the couch. Two months of sitting on the couch has made the couch look like it has been part of our living room for a year or more. The inspector showed up this week, took some pictures and wrote up a report. I immediately received an email from the customer service department at Macy’s telling us that “the merchandise was found to be up to manufacturing standards with no evidence of defects.”

The manufacturer has low standards and I am paying a lot of money for a couch that we’re going to have to replace in a year.

When I got the third email about a delay in delivery, I emailed to complain and hinted at cancelling the order. The next week, Macy’s suddenly found my couch. When I complained about the couch, they scheduled an in home visit and said that someone would contact me about what time they would arrive. The day before the home visit, I emailed customer service as well as sent in pictures of my own of the couch. An hour later someone was calling me about my upcoming visit. The inspector was supposed to call me thirty minutes before arriving, but that didn’t happen. He showed up without any notice. I am so not a confrontational person. Michael and Heather got me this far. If it wasn’t for the two of them I never would have filed a complaint, but I filed a complaint. That complaint was met with an industry version of sorry not sorry and I don’t know where to go from here.

Here is what I want to do. I don’t want to make any other payments on this piece of furniture. I want to tell everyone I know (and I don’t know) never to buy a piece of furniture from Macy’s or anything manufactured by Bauhaus Furniture. The only time I ever blog about anything product wise, it is because I like it and think others might like it. Now I find myself in a position of blogging about something because they have made mad. Really, it’s not just that I’m mad. I feel stupid. I wanted a nice couch and I purchased something from a company who I thought sold nice things. Macy’s is saying to me that I can’t have nice things.

We should have just gone to IKEA and put our own couch together.

THESE DAYS

I took a series of nude photos of myself over the weekend. I had been thinking about it for a while, how I had done this many years ago, but never revisited those photos or thought about retaking them. It was a birthday thing. I did it during a time of creative struggle and insecurity. I would have thought that I would have revisited the nude photography after losing weight, but I just never really wanted to take the time to do it. I wrote a whole blog post about the pros and cons of nude photos. Then I deleted the whole thing. I think really, I didn’t want to write a whole entry about honesty in photography and then not post the picture. Because I was not about to publicly post a nude photo of myself.

I am a professional.

The story itself is one you’ve all heard before. It was the kind of post that reeks of the navel gazing that comes with turning a year older. It’s a story I didn’t really feel like telling again, but the one that I came up with because right now, I’m feeling a little bit like a dumpster fire. Michael tested positive for COVID on Friday and has been quarantined in the basement for the last five days. He’s fine; it was like having a bad cold. The weather turned gross and coated everything with a layer of ice and snow. This kept me from wanting to leave the house to even go grocery shopping. Work is real weird and politically dramatic right now. I’m doing my best to keep my head down and focused on the work, which isn’t hard because there’s a lot of microscopy related science happening right now. My yoga practice has gotten sketchy because anytime I am forced to be still with my thoughts, I start crying.

Every day, when I start to berate myself for not walking enough or skipping a workout or eating a cookie, I pause. Then I gently close my eyes and whisper “Be kind to yourself.” In those moments when I am alone with my own memories and tears start to leak out, I gently close my eyes and whisper “Be kind to yourself.” On those days when I fail to be inspired to take any pictures or write any words, I gently close my eyes and whisper “Be kind to yourself.” On the days where I feel like I am only putting in about 50% of effort, I gently close my eyes and whisper “Be kind to yourself.”

Tomorrow, I turn a year older. I gently close my eyes and whisper “Be kind to yourself.”

A DOOR TO ANOTHER DIMENSION

The kitchen in my house has been in need of a major upgrade and remodel since the day I moved in, but I have ignored this need. Major remodeling projects stress me out. I mean, like irrationally stressed out. Hair falling out in clumps and mysterious itchy rashes kind of stressed out. The bathroom remodel wasn’t too bad because we overpaid someone else to do it with the guaranteed time frame. The kitchen is another story. First of all, a kitchen remodel is not cheap and if you are paying someone to do it, it is really not cheap. Secondly, I feel that the chaos of a kitchen remodel would be my undoing.

Sometime recently, a mysterious puddle of water would just show up next to the fridge. Michael did some research and read something about a drain in the freezer. So while I spent last Thursday cleaning the house, Michael spent the day taking our refrigerator apart. The results of his labor is that we ended up refrigerator shopping on Sunday. I don’t want to tell you which refrigerator we ended up purchasing, mostly because I am embarrassed. It’s not that it is crazy expensive or anything like that. We stayed within our budget and it will be wonderful. There’s a TV screen in the door. That’s the embarrassing part, but Michael really pushed for it because of my obsessive menu planning. The problem is that the refrigerator is wider than the old one. Actually, we were very very limited in choices based on width and we bought this fridge knowing that it was not going to fit. A cabinet will have to be removed. I had to resist the urge to lay down on the floor of the appliance section of the store we were in during this whole discussion on refrigerator width.

Michael got a snow day on Monday and he spent the day assembling a set of shelves for the basement so that I could organize rarely used kitchen items. Then he removed the cabinet to make space for the new refrigerator that is arriving on Saturday. He sent me a picture of the space and I sighed with relief. It really isn’t so bad back there. Michael asked me what I had expected to see behind the cabinet and I sent him a gif of the fridge scene from Ghostbusters. I truly expected a doorway to Hell, because that’s what I do. Remember when I was convinced that the bathroom floor was going to collapse into the basement when Michael replaced the toilet? Or that time Michael replaced an outlet in the living room and I was convinced that if he removed the old one there would be nothing there at all? I’m not sure I have the right constitution for home ownership, but I was so encouraged by the shape of the wall behind the removed cabinet that we have decided to remodel one side of the kitchen. The south wall of the kitchen will require a complete demo and some electrical work, but the north wall, the one with the fridge and stove requires nothing more than a coat of paint and some new cabinets. We’re ignoring the floor for now.

All of this is dependent on if and when IKEA gets the cabinets in that I want, but I feel pretty confident that we could get the walls painted and new cabinets up in two weekends, without too much disruption. No one is more surprised than I am about how calmly I’m walking into this remodeling project. Hair is still intact and I haven’t even scratched and clawed at my skin once. I’m even excited about the whole thing.

OH...HELLO...NEW YEAR

I didn’t check my email accounts for seven days. I didn’t eat fruit. I didn’t even really eat vegetables. I did eat a lot of cheese. I also finished the last season of Gossip Girl and OH MY GOD, CAN YOU BELIEVE WHO GOSSIP GIRL TURNED OUT TO BE?!?! I won’t spoil it; I was surprised, but not surprised. Also, Blair wore the most fabulous Tiffany’s earrings when she finally married Chuck. I read a little. I slept in a little. I allowed myself to be on vacation even though we didn’t really travel far. On New Year’s Eve, I ate even more cheese and I drank too much and when the clock struck twelve I ate twelve grapes, choking a little on grape number nine.

On New Year’s Day, I pulled myself out of bed to feed the animals and walked across my sleet covered backyard to let the chickens out. I made myself a bowl of oatmeal and topped it with strawberries and a banana. I cleaned off my dry-erase calendar. Then I created our January calendar. Vacation time is over. Let’s get this new year rolling. There are words to write. There are MasterClasses to watch. There’s healthy life choices to make. There are roads to be traveled and a life to be lived. I know that sounds a bit optimistic considering the whole pandemic situation, but I am more optimistic about this year than I was for 2021. I’m vaccinated and soon to be boosted. I continue to do the things I need to do to keep myself and those around me safe. Sure, I’ll probably at some point contract Omicron, but because I’m vaccinated, it won’t be a big deal.

Many of us entered 2021 with an expectation that it would be so much better than 2019 and it was better. 204M Americans have been fully vaccinated. People went back to work. The whole life/work balance thing was reevaluated and mental health became a priority. We took some hits for sure, but we got up and kept going. Because that’s how we roll. I may not be entering 2022 with any greater expectations than what I have when entering any other new year, but I am entering this year with the optimism that 2022 can be a great year. The possibilities of goodness are endless and this is my year for putting in the work to make that goodness happen.

I hope that all of you have had a wonderful and safe holiday and that this New Year brings you endless amounts of goodness.

OUR YEAR IN PICTURES

Sometime around midnight on Wednesday (or Thursday…who knows what day it is anymore?) I realized I had not done anything about creating my usual end of the year slideshow. So, I cobbled something together and you know what? 2021 wasn’t so bad. We went places and saw some faces. We found Harry Styles the Caterpillar and kept him alive until he became Harry Styles the Moth. It was not a completely shit year. So here it is. Our year in Pictures.

OMENS

Every morning, just before seven, a murder of crows fly south over my house. I know this because this is what time I am out opening the chicken coop for the day and feeding the chickens. How very Little House on the Prairie this makes me sound, even though I am far from the prairie. Right around dusk, that same murder of crows fly back over my house in the direction they came from. I have no idea where they settle for the night or how they spend their day. I only know of their comings and goings. Back and forth. I only know their daily commute, but I wonder about them and where they go.

I have a friend I met through camp who is almost intimidating in her coolness. I feel every bit of my nerdy geek girl self when I am standing in her presence. I might as well be wearing broken glasses, taped together between the eyes and orthopedic shoes and my arms filled with all of my science textbooks that I’ve kept since college. She’s just badass and cool and she’s constantly driving off into sunsets on solo car/camping trips. She posts beautiful pictures of her surroundings and every time I see them, I feel a pang of jealousy. I find myself jealous of the position she puts herself in to be able to acquire those photos. I am jealous of the mindset that allows her to pack up the car and go. I’m not sure I have ever been in a pack up and go mental state. Not even in that brief period when I was single. Oh man, talk about missed opportunities. If there was any time in my life to run off on my own for a weekend, that would be it.

I think about where I was in my head at that time and realize that I did not have room in there for those kinds of thoughts. I am not the person I was then. I don’t feel like I’m the person I was this time last year. I sort of feel like I’ve become a person I don’t want to be. This is not an unusual feeling for me at this time of year; this is old self doubt. All the things I should be more of and less like. This feeling happens this time year because I leave so very little time for myself or I realize just how little time I have left for myself. Michael and the Cabbage will sleep until noon if left undisturbed. I move around the house extra quietly on Sundays to maximize my alone time. Every time I think I might get a day to myself, I always get shanghaied into something else and the things I had put on the top of my todo list get booted to the footnotes. But now I’m thinking of that murder of crows and how it would be nice to fly off somewhere for a day or two. Move those todo things out of the footnotes and back to the top of the list. Move myself from the footnotes to the top of the list.

Here is what my magic crystal eight ball predicts for the future. I will scoop up the dog, throw a change of clothes and toothbrush into a bag, grab my camera and jump into the car. I will choose a random spot on the map and go. Not just once. This is will be a regularly scheduled event. I have plans for myself in 2022.

INCOMPLETE

Lately, on Saturday mornings when I’m sitting at the coffee shop before heading out to do the weekly grocery run, I’ve been writing on a story. This sounds normal to you, like yes Cindy, we know you write those fortune cookie stories. This is different because I’m not writing in the Fortune Cookie journal. In fact, and I feel bad about this, I have not written in the Fortune Cookie Journal in ages. Instead, I’ve been writing in a regular no prompting notebook and it’s one long story arc. This all started when I took those mushrooms on a camping trip in July. I started writing a story based on a very real dream I had had. It was one of those past life kind of dreams that played in cinemanic format through my brain. Every weekend since, I’ve spent time just adding to that story. A paragraph here. A couple of pages there. I don’t know where this is going or what my intentions are with this writing. I mean, I’m writing it out in pen and ink on paper. It’s not like it’s going to be an easy thing to polish up for an editor or publisher. The thing is, I am writing it.

This Saturday morning, I went to the coffee shop but I didn’t take that journal. I didn’t write. Instead, I worked on a Thanksgiving menu list. That journal sits on my desk under the grocery list because I pick up both of those things when I leave the house on Saturday mornings. I looked right at that journal as I set the grocery list back down when I got home and unloaded all of the groceries and I heard the tiniest of naggy voices in the back of my head, but I shrugged those voices aside. They were not very loud and easy to ignore. By Monday, the naggy voices had gotten louder and I was starting to feel a bit twitchy. It is almost like the feeling I get when I’ve been away from my yoga mat for too long. My hands and my brain are all “where’s my weekly exercise?!?!”, but also the action has a cleansing quality. It clears some words from my brain and allows for better word traffic and it wasn’t until Monday afternoon when I realized how important that weekly word dump really is.

I shouldn’t call it a word dump. There’s a real story here. It might not be a good story. It might be a far fetched story, but it is a story. It is more story than I’ve ever written before which is why I believe it might be a past life story. It’s real to me, even if I’m still on the fence about past lives. I can see my characters’ faces. I can smell the air where they live. At times, it feels more like me just writing in my diary than it feels like plunking out a tale. I’m not working and if I started taking it more seriously, it would probably turn into work. I think that’s how I’m going to finish something, by not working. Though it does require attention at least once a week because I’m more scattered today than I have been since starting this new ritual. I am surprised by this. I had no idea that the twenty minutes I spent writing on this story one day week would turn out to be such an important part of my mental wellbeing.

Maybe I should have signed up for NANOWRIMO….

UNPACKING

I’m the type of person that comes home from a trip and immediately unpacks. Dirty clothes are sorted and laundry is started. Toiletries are put back in the medicine cabinet. Bags are placed back into storage. Any souvenirs that were purchased, find a home. Then I sit down and process photos and I might write a blog entry about my travels. I do all of these things as soon as I am home because I know that if I don’t, my life will fall into chaos and the planet will stop spinning. Basically, I just need everything to be in its proper place so that I can sleep better at night. I have always been this way. I unpack physically and emotionally in a timely and efficient manner.

With an exception.

I feel like I have not unpacked my emotions from Camp Wildling, June or October. We do camp mail bags and I’ve only glanced at the contents of either of them. In fact, I put June’s bag into my cedar chest. Out of sight out of mind. People have asked me about camp. What’s it like? How was it? All questions to which I have replied “Great. I had a great time.” and just left it at that. There is like a complete mental block when ever I go to describe my camp experience in any real detail. At first I thought it was just because I let too much time pass before giving it any thought and attention. I got back from June camp and we immediately headed off to Arizona, which brought its own emotional weirdness. We got back from October camp and then immediately left for a weekend trip to a lake house with Robin and Summer. It’s almost as if I intentionally stay busy so that I don’t have to time for processing. Then I convince myself that I really don’t have anything to ‘unpack’.

I slept through all of the profound experience opportunities.

I had a massage scheduled for the first day of October camp, just before all the campers arrived. Nadah, our camp massage therapist, is this beautiful wise older woman. In fact, I have a picture of her sitting at the fire pit. She is wrapped in a blanket and holding a walking staff. She looks like the woman you would expect to find after a long epic journey to search for answers to age old questions like the meaning of life. Her massage therapy also involved some energy work and at one point, she had her fist in my back under my left shoulder while holding her other hand over my heart and she just stayed there. It felt like minutes passed and then out of nowhere a bubble of a sob worked its way out of my throat and the next thing I knew, I was ugly crying on the table. This went on for longer than I care to think of, with Nadah the whole time murmuring encouraging words.

To tell you the honest truth, I was kind of mad about the whole thing. This was not the experience I want from a massage. Except it was the experience I needed and that idea makes me even more angry because I’m stubborn and obstinate. I am compartmentalized and I knew that letting go of whatever that was in the back of my heart was going to leave an empty space. Then what? I can’t have empty spaces. Everything has a place; see the whole unpacking ritual at the beginning of this entry. I’m not good with empty spaces, but creating this space right at the beginning of camp was actually a really good thing to do because I filled that space with laughter. There was one moment when Amani and I were sitting next to each other around the campfire and someone was telling a ghost story. I don’t know what was said, but something set the two of us off into a fit of giggles so severe that I truly expected my mother to appear between us to angry whisper “Do I need to separate you two?!?” I pulled my blanket over my head and tears streamed down my face because I was laughing so hard. I don’t think I’ve laughed so hard and so much since Chris was alive.

I don’t think I’ve laughed so hard and so much since Chris was alive.

That sentence was worth repeating because it will be ten years in February since Chris’s passing. On one hand, ten years feels like a blink. On the other hand, ten years is a fucking long time to go without that kind of laughter. I’m not saying that my life has been void of laughter all this time. I just went from daily bouts of it to scattered moments of laughter. That’s a little hard to admit. I don’t laugh like I used to and that’s a shame. Now that I’ve unpacked that bit of emotional baggage, I’ve got to find a place for the contents of that knowledge. I don’t want to fill my empty spaces with trash. I want to fill those spaces up with ridiculous giggles and the kind of laughter that leaves you gasping for air. I’m working on some goals. Goals for, hopefully, a healthier me and part of that healthier me includes daily bouts of laughter.

COUCH WARS

I feel like the most adult thing we did this weekend was not dropping $5,000 on a new couch. In fact, I am so proud of ourselves for coming to the conclusion so quickly that we probably deserve a trophy. I mean, we told the sales clerk that we needed to go home and remeasure the space and that we’d be back the next day and at the time of saying that, I truly meant every word. Then once we were back in the truck, we both realized at the same time that we did not need a $5,000 couch. But we do need a couch. It is this desperation of need that drove us to even considering a $5,000 couch in the first place.

At the end of July, when our estimated delivery date for the new couch was pushed back to November 30th, I thought “Okay…we can move the futon up from the basement and sit on that until November.” It’s been 1997 in our living room ever since and it did not take long for the two of us to realize that we no longer have 1997 bodies for sitting on 1997 cheap furniture. Once you’ve experienced a couch with armrests, there’s no going back to seating options without armrests. No one is comfortable. Josephine and the cat are the most comfortable with this seating arrangement but that is only because they are laying on me. I could handle all of this if the couch was truly going to arrive on the 30th, but oh no. Friday, I received a new notice of estimated delivery. This one’s for February of 2022 and I feel like this is unacceptable. At this point I don’t even remember what the new couch looks like or feels like. Did we consider all of the things when we sat on this couch in the showroom back in March. BACK IN MARCH! I don’t remember what I ate for dinner on Friday. How am I supposed to remember how comfortable a piece of furniture that I sat on eight months ago is or isn’t?

Wait…I had Thai fried rice for dinner on Friday.

I’m not senile. I’m an adult. I am an adult that has acquired a certain level of standards. That might not mean a $5,000 couch, but it does mean a comfortable affordable couch. So, Michael and I are preparing to play the field with all of the furniture stores. Next weekend, I will medicate myself and then we will drive out to the big furniture mart and sit on all of the couches. It must be comfortable for both us. It must be made of durable, pet friendly materials. And this part? This next bit? It must be in stock or a guaranteed delivery date of two weeks. No more of that estimated delivery bullshit. Because I deserve nice furniture. This is the most important realization from the whole couch experience. I am no longer a poor college student or recent graduate. My student loans have been paid in full. I have automotive insurance that I have been paying on for years and have been so responsible that I did not have to meet a deductible when I filed the loss of V. I have always been (mostly) responsible, but now I have become more financially responsible in ways that I most definitely was not when Chris was alive. My furniture no longer has to be found on the curb or handed down from a family member and my furniture can come pre-assembled.

Because I am a grown up, dammit!

Anyway…that’s what I keep telling myself. Eventually it is going to stick and I might actually believe it. Right now, it’s become a mantra for why I deserve a good couch.

HOUSEKEEPING

Yesterday, Michael and I rode our bicycles over to Kelly’s for some camp prep stuff. Then we rode our bicycles to a new ice cream place that just opened on Troost because bicycle rides equals ice cream time. On our way home, we were pedaling up a fairly steep incline and normally I would not be having a good time, but because I now have pedal assist the incline was easy. I just pedaled up the hill. Then I passed Michael and I said “Okay….I like my bicycle now.” The E-bike was not an immediate sell for me. The sudden increase in speed when you pedal took a whole lot of getting used to and I felt wobbly on previous rides. Sunday’s ride was different. I finally felt comfortable. Maybe this will be my two wheel ride to work vehicle while I wait on the next scooter. See? Things are already looking up. I’ve received some very important text reminders that joy is not a thing; it’s a feeling. I have all of the things that V taught me.

Last night I had terrible dreams. They were all versions of Chris’s last few weeks with us and in each one, I would start sobbing. My sobs would wake me up. I would change positions, fall back to sleep and start all over again. I finally crawled out of bed Monday morning with a stuffed up nose and puffy eyes. I looked at my swollen face in the bathroom mirror and said to my reflection “Enough.” I’ve had enough of this moping about. Camp Wildling starts for me on Wednesday and even though the weather forecast predicts rain for most of the time and the temperatures are going to be down right chilly, I am ready for all of it. I want to be in the woods with my camp friends no matter how soggy it might get. Laughter and joy will keep us warm.

What I learned from June camp was that accessing the internet or getting any kind of cell signal required standing at the top of the hill, near the entrance and holding the phone above your head. So, I am not even going to try to post while I am away. I’ve backed my new journal, my new pen (both of these gifts are from Karen as part of the Lightmaker’s Team) and The Lightmaker’s Manifesto. I’m going to bundle up and snuggle in close to a fire pit and do some thinking about the whisper I hear every time I pick up this book and what that whisper means in regards to activism. My goal is to return from camp a little bit wiser, little bit rested, and a little bit more joyful.

Have a great week everyone!

THE HARDEST YOGA POSE

In 2008, Chris and I had tickets to see Feist in concert, a concert playing at the Starlight Theater in Kansas City. This was well before we knew that we would eventually be moving to that area. We decided to go to Tulsa the day before the concert and spend the night at my parents. Tulsa had recently opened a new Whole Foods and since Chris and I were all into grocery stores, we wanted to go check it out. As we drove down Peoria, we passed a scooter shop and sitting out front were two scooters, an orange one and a blue one. Chris and I looked at each other and did an illegal u-turn and parked in front of the shop. It was like they had parked us out in front. Chris and Cindy. Orange and blue. My credit was so bad that my Dad had to drive down to sign the loan papers. Before signing, Dad looked at me and said “Is this what you really want?” I replied with my whole heart “Yes. Yes, this is what I want.” He laughed and signed the papers.

There are so many things about that day that stands out in my memory. The perfection of that moment. Chris and I had been eyeing scooters for some time and here we had stumbled upon the most perfect scooters. They were Vespas in our colors. Dad, who I would never in a million years thought he would approve and agree, signed the paperwork to make it happen. There was only one moment of hesitation for me and that was when they delivered our scooters and I realized that I had no idea how to ride. I immediately almost ran into a parked car, but I knew without a doubt that I was meant to ride a scooter. I studied the motorcycle licensing book that tells you all the ways you’re going to die on a motorcycle. I went to a parking lot in the neighborhood every day and practiced turns and stops and driving in a straight line. I passed the motorcycle driving test with flying colors.

My scooter is more than a fancy Italian name with an engine and two wheels. It has been a source of joy since the moment I laid eyes on it. It taught me perseverance. It made me more observant to my surroundings. It has been a comfort in real shit times and it has become an extension of who I am. And on Friday afternoon, two men drove into the parking garage at work and loaded my joy into the back of a van and drove away. Just like that. My V is gone and I have no hope of ever seeing her again. I filed a police report with a very apathetic and robotic woman holding down the front desk of the local police department who couldn’t find my vehicle in the MO registration because she kept typing it up as a Vesta. I never spoke to a police officer. So, I feel certain that V is gone forever. I’ve had a whole weekend of moping about and leaky eyes over the whole thing.

I’m sad.

I’m broken hearted and defeated.

At dinner that night, our conversation turned to yoga and I told the Cabbage that the hardest pose in yoga is savasana. What makes it so difficult for most people is that it requires you to be still with your own thoughts. The true practice of this pose is really hard because the true pose is practicing the art of dying. It is saying goodbye to everything in your life. There are times when I think that I’ve got this pose mastered. It has gotten easy to say goodbye, or so I thought. This current goodbye was so unexpected, such a shock to the system, that it is going to take some time and practice to settle back into stillness. Michael is already talking about my next scooter and of course, when the time’s right, I will get a new one. But for now, I need to spend some time saying goodbye to all of the things that this scooter, my very first scooter, represented in my life. The emotional value of this scooter far exceeds the monetary value of the scooter.

And there’s no replacing something like that so quickly.

JUMP AROUND, JUMP AROUND, JUMP UP, JUMP UP AND GET DOWN

The Cabbage is officially eleven. They had their birthday party at a trampoline place on Saturday and had originally invited about ten “friends”. Only five of those friends showed up, the ones they hang out with the most and who they consider to be close friends. This meant that her grandfather, Max and I were able to get on the jump for free list. And oh my goodness, did I jump. I jumped on a trampolines. I jumped off a high-dive into a pool of foam blocks. I jumped around in a game of dodgeball. I jumped and jumped and jumped and then I felt something pop on the outside of my right knee and I stopped jumping. Now I’m kind of limping and my knee feels mushy. I have an appointment on Wednesday for the bone and joint clinic. I think their grandpa fared worse than I did. He left with a visibly swollen ankle. Despite my possible broken body, I had the most fun. I might have even had more fun than the kids. It was the kind of fun that made me think “Why don’t we have one of these things in the backyard?!”

BECAUSE TRAMPOLINES ARE DANGEROUS!

I don’t know if you’ve noticed my use of pronouns when talking about the Cabbage. In June, I received a text from them saying that they were changing their name and that their pronouns are they/them. I replied back positively, but also with a plea for patience. Not only am I retraining my brain to remember to call them by a different name, I am also retraining my brain on pronouns. It is not easy but I feel like I’m getting better and I’m working really hard to get it right. I am also surrounded by grownups who understand all of this and they themselves to their best to use appropriate pronouns for The Cabbage. From the few conversations I have had with the Cabbage, there have been some resistance by some to even try. Heather was talking to them on Friday and at one point used the wrong pronoun, but apologized and fixed it immediately. The Cabbage responded with “That’s okay. You’re doing better than school.” This was the first time The Cabbage has even met Heather. So I hoped the encounter sparked some good things for the kid.

Someone asked me recently if I thought this was just some phase that The Cabbage was going through. My response was “I don’t know and I don’t care." So what if this is all just a phase. This is their truth in this moment right now and I choose to respect that truth. Here’s why. I am a firm believer in teaching through actions. One way to teach a child respect, is to show them respect. In respecting the Cabbage’s wishes, I am not only teaching them what respect looks like but what trust looks like. They know that there are people in their life that they can trust with being their authentic self without ridicule or judgment. I do this because it is what I would have wanted from the adults in my life when I was their age. I think about the generations that come before this one, in particular, my own generation. The concept of sharing your truth and being the person you wanted to be seemed absolutely impossible unless your truth fell into the heteronormative. Being any different brought on the wrath of bullies and discipline from adults. It was dangerous.

I don’t want any child to feel that kind of fear and I’m banking on this generation to eradicate the heteronormative. They are going to be the most comfortable in their own skin and I can’t wait to see the great things they do with the kind of support and respect they have been given.

JAIL TIME

On Sunday, I started feeling congested and achy. Then chills set in and there might have been a low grade fever going on. I panicked and freaked out. All I could think was that I somehow had gotten COVID. I mean all of my symptoms were on the list. By Monday morning, I was still feeling achy. So I called in sick and scheduled an appointment for a COVID test. Now I am officially in COVID jail. I am not allowed back to work until I have a negative COVID test and symptom free for twenty four hours.

I feel much better today, though a bit silly.

No…I feel a lot silly. The thing is, we’ve had a rash of COVID exposures recently and I feel like I have narrowly avoided COVID jail up until now. I know I have made the right and responsible choices, but responsible choices are hard. Now, I’m sitting on the couch and watching bad TV and thinking about the things around the house I should be doing. I have little motivation to do more than that. I did have grand delusions of mowing the front yard today, but the weather had other plans for me. Josephine seems more than content to lay here next to me while I type. It is all too easy to stay put.

I can spend this time reading the manual for my new camera. On Saturday, I very confidently (and masked) walked into a store expecting to walk out with a new Canon, but instead walked out with a new Nikon. It seems that I am addicted to Apple products and Nikons. Though, I had done my research before walking into that shop and the sales person knew they were dealing with a knowledgable person, I have to admit that once I had the camera out of the box, a wave of insecurity hit me hard. What am I even doing? Who do I think I am? The voices of self doubt are harsh.

Months ago, I completed the Wholehearted Inventory in preparation for a book club. I set my results aside and even forgot about them. Book club finally got it together and we had our first Zoom meeting this week, where I discovered that I had been reading the wrong book. I had been reading Daring Greatly all this time and wondering what the heck the Wholehearted Inventory had to do with this book. What I was supposed to be reading was The Gifts of Imperfection. Apparently that book is all about the Wholehearted Inventory. At one moment during the book club meeting, we got way off topic and were talking about random things. Then Pam, our book club leader, said “wait..how did we get so off topic?” I replied “Avoidance.” Then we laughed because it was probably true.

The section on the Wholehearted Inventory that I need the most work just happens to be the section on perfectionism and self compassion. The new camera may be a Nikon and that does mean that there are some similarities. Buttons are in the same places, but that is about it. I have a whole lot of learning to do and I expect to take a whole lot of crappy pictures. I am not going to start out taking perfect pictures and I am intimidated. And I lack self compassion for my feelings of intimidation. I started thinking about getting a new camera because I felt it was time to challenge myself more. So I’ve done it. I’ve given myself the gift of a challenge, of learning something new. But I have also given myself the gift of working on self compassion.

WHERE WE ARE

This is very simple and almost too on the nose to share, but I’ve been struggling with writing for this space and my brain is trying to process all the things that I have schedule for the month of September. So when I saw this quote from Calvin and Hobbes posted in my timeline, I sat back in my chair with my cup of lukewarm coffee and said to myself “shut up, Universe. I don’t have time for your intervention.”

We’re so busy watching out for what’s just ahead of us that we don’t take time to enjoy where we are. - Bill Watterson

Last weekend, Kelly hosted an August edition of Camp Wildling. I did not attend this one, but I’m still a part of the Facebook group so I’ve been seeing the posts from August camp rolling in with pictures and expressions of joy and gratitude. I had a moment of straight up jealousy and disappointment for not being there. Then I reminded myself that the October edition of Camp Wildling will be here before we know it and I am going to be at that one. Michael has even taken time off to go so we can take the camper and I have visions of our little pop-up set up in the RV section of camp, our camp chairs set up under the awning and my little camper lights decorating the outside. I was also looking at everyone’s pictures from camp and thinking about what that space is going to look like in October. I cannot wait to teach my photography class because I know we will be in a spectacular setting. Oh, the dreamy sunlight of Fall, plus the golds and reds of the leaves. Swoon.

But September sits between me and Camp Wildling and September is booked.

This week has been slow and hot. It’s been so uncomfortable here that I finally broke down and made myself an iced latte. I despise cold coffee, but I thought maybe I’d give it another try. Nope. Still despise cold coffee. It’s like drinking a glass of cigarette flavored milk with ice in it. It’s just not for me. I am currently in the waiting part of the hurry up and wait that is science, but instead of really taking advantage of the quiet stillness, I’m feeling bad for sitting still. Instead of basking in the stillness of right now, I’m thinking that something is wrong with me for just sitting around. I should be enjoying this moment before all of the activities of September and October start rolling in.

My new friend Rose taught us all June campers the term JOMO. Instead of fear of missing out, you experience the joy of missing out. Today I am embracing the idea of JOMO.

June and August editions of Camp Wildling sold out fast. I expect the same thing to happen for the October camp. October camp will be the 14th through the 17th and tickets can be purchased here at Camp Wildling website. The Ozarks in the Fall is beautiful. Camp Wildling is magical.

MY MIND ON PLANTS

A few months back, when we were still getting ready for the June edition of Camp Wildling, Kelly sent out a request for tapestries and decorative blankets. She said “You know, the kinds of blankets you used to hang in your parents’ basement while smoking pot.” She was so surprised when she found out that I had never had such a teenage experience. First of all, no one in Oklahoma has a basement. You might have a basement, but it’s the kind of basement that is barely tall enough to stand up in. [Side rant: Yes, I understand that it makes zero sense for an area known as “Tornado Alley” to have homes without basements. There’s some sort of geological reasoning behind not digging a basement into the foundation. I just don’t really know the details of it.]

Secondly, I was raised by very devout Southern Baptists. There was zero alcohol in that house. I will still hesitate to order any kind of alcoholic beverage in front of my mother and have been known to decline just to avoid her judgmental stare. There was only one time my Dad ever brought home alcohol. I was a teenager and the last one left in the house with my parents. Dad came home with a six pack of beer and I was shocked. He told me that he found it in the parking lot at the grocery store and that he was going to make beer biscuits. I was forty five years old (yeah, this year) before it occurred to me that Dad had not ‘found’ that beer. He had purchased that beer. He had purchased that beer because he had wanted a cold brewsky, not a goddamn biscuit.

It’s not that I am completely naive when it comes to alcohol and marijuana. It’s just that I never really had that young ‘adult’ time of experimentation that many people got to have. My vision was tunneled in to school and a future career. I’m not upset by this. Not even remotely. It’s just that I am pretty much middlish aged and there are a few things that I realize that I would like to experience at least just once. I’m not talking about anything hard core. I’m not going to take up heroin or crack (are those the same thing? I don’t even know). I’m just a little interested in psilocybin and a few months ago I was gifted some in mushroom form. I did not take them the minute they were gifted to me because I wasn’t ready. I had research to do first and planning. It was all very scientific. I interviewed experienced people about how much to take and what to expect. Everyone I asked told me to be in nature for this experience. Really…that is all anyone could really say. “Take it on an empty stomach, maybe with orange juice and be in nature.” As for what to expect, I could not get a straight answer from anyone. This is probably because everyone’s experiences are different and when I did finally take my first dose, I took notes like I would for my scientific notebook.

The effects that I experienced where very subtle. It turns out that my first dose would be considered a microdose. I did sit for what felt like hours just writing down a story that is building inside my brain. That night when I went to bed, I slept so soundly that I did not hear the boisterous group of young men playing some sort of game in the their tent in the campsite next to us. I slept until after eight the next morning and only got up when I did because Josephine was standing on me, looking down into my face as if to say “it is time to get up now.” In the week that followed though, I felt a noticeable difference. It was is if a switch in my brain had been flipped from negative to positive. There was a day last week when I was interrupted while in the middle of my yoga practice. Not only was I okay with pulling my shoes on and fixing the problem, but I went back to my mat and finished my practice.

Michael Pollan, in This is Your Mind on Plants, has this to say about psilocybin:

Human consciousness is always at risk of getting stuck, sending the mind around and around in loops of rumination; mushroom chemicals like psilocybin can nudge us out of those grooves, loosening stuck brains and making possible fresh patterns of thought.

It is no secret that I have been feeling creatively stuck for some time. I just keep cranking out photos and words out of habit, while hoping that at least one photo or written thing will be something I am proud to have created. I have been in a loop of rumination. Maybe I was hoping that taking mushrooms would get me out of that loop. Maybe I was hoping that I would have some profound vision or experience that would nudge me out of a lot of different grooves. I was talking to a friend about all of this recently and our conversation turned to ayahuasca. Ayahuasca is an intense hallucinogenic experience. It involves a Shaman to guide you through your visions and it is very popular among celebrities. People who have experienced it rave about the life changing visions they experienced, only barely mentioning the intense vomiting that comes with taking ayahuasca. There is a part of me that kind of wants to have this experience, but there is a bigger part of me that knows that I don’t need this kind of experience. I can only imagine having visions of letting go of things I am unwilling to release. Also, I avoid anything that involves mild vomiting. Forget intense vomiting. No thank you.

I have more scientific experiments to do, but for now this is my mind on plant.

ICE CREAM STORIES

I wrote this post over a week ago. It has just been sitting in my drafts waiting for me to do something with it. I’m posting it now for a number of reasons. One reason is that it is something new to read while I finish compiling some thoughts from the weekend. Not too long ago, Atlas Obscura was offering a four part writing workshop on telling stories through ice cream. They have been advertising in the daily newsletter that I get in my email and the first add asked “Can you tell stories with ice cream?” I did not sign up for the workshop. I am sure I could have benefitted from it but I already knew without a doubt that of course you can tell stories with ice cream. My whole life is linked to that creamy sweet wonderful dessert. It is genetically encoded in my DNA to love ice cream. It is also genetically encoded into my DNA for my gut to not love it so much, but I don’t care. I will eat the ice cream and suffer the consequences later. I’m talking about ice cream. Not custard. Midwest is all about custard, which is good, but it is not ice cream. Look. It’s just better to not get me started, but I will say that Michael was almost forty years old before ever eating at a Braum’s and that is a goddamn travesty.

“You mean I can get any flavor ice cream as a shake instead of a drink with my hamburger meal?!?!”

Mom told me a story once about my Pepaw, her dad. She said that Pepaw would make ice cream every evening. It always contained whatever fruit was in season and growing around them, but his favorite was peach. She told me about how they would all eat a bowl of ice cream after dinner. Then they might go to the movies or church or some family activity. When they got back, Pepaw would eat another bowl of ice cream. She said “Your Pepaw loved his ice cream.” Pepaw rarely made the drive from Mississippi to Oklahoma to visit. We most always went there, but I vividly remember the times that he did come and stay. One visit in particular was right around my high school graduation. I still had school activities every day, but when I would get home, my Pepaw would say “Let’s go get ice cream.” I would then drive us in my 1980 Chevy Cavalier into Owasso for ice cream. That car was the car that replaced my first hunk of junk and it was so nice, except the air conditioning didn’t work. Still it seemed like quite the upgrade from what I had been driving. At least this car had whole, working seatbelts. Pepaw was the only person I would allow to smoke in my car. The truth is, I would never have denied him anything. I got so little time with my Pepaw and of that little time I did get, only a bit of that was alone time. During that visit, it was just the two of us driving into town, sitting at a plastic table outside Braum’s and eating ice cream. Our conversations varied, but he told me his regrets. He told me that he loved me and that he was very proud of me. This meant more to me than the ice cream because I didn’t think Pepaw really knew me. We only ever saw each other once or twice a year.

Pepaw could be the first chapter of my ice cream stories, with several chapters to follow that. Ice cream is a link to every man in my life. That boy I had a I huge crush on my freshman year of college and how the two of us would always make the ice cream run for whoever was hanging out in the dorm lobby . Chris and how he always used “let’s go get ice cream” to trick me into going to Best Buy. Michael seeing me mad, cranky or sad saying “Do we need ice cream?” and then driving me to my favorite ice cream place. Dad and vanilla ice cream. I could go on and on because there are many ice scream stories to be told.

While I was wrapped up in a yoga silk the other night, I started thinking about physical pain and how that pain gets stored in our bodies. The facia is that membrane that surrounds the muscles. Think of it as cellophane. Each moment of pain twists, wrinkles and knots that facia. Some knots are bigger than others and those are the ones we tend to remember most clearly. I can still vividly recall the pain of getting my tonsils removed at age seven and the pain from doctors attempting to reset my broken right arm when I was ten or eleven. Strangely enough I do not remember the pain of breaking my other arm two years earlier. I guess breaking both bones in two doesn’t hurt as much as cracking a bone? Once, while riding Katrina’s bicycle, I turned a corner while going too fast and I laid the bicycle down, sliding the right side of my body down the road. The memory of that moment is more vivid due to my calm reaction as I stood up. The neighbor had watched the whole thing and asked me if I was okay. I leaned over, picked the bike up and shrugged while saying “I’m fine.” It wasn’t until I had the bike parked safely and was inside the house that I allowed that pain to flood over me and cry. All of those moments are stored in giant knots of facia in my body. It only takes a nudge to bring the memory of that pain to the surface.

I have zero memories of the pain of brain freeze from eating ice cream. Oh, I know I have had it happen to me as a child and even as an adult, but the memory of that pain is not held someplace in my body for later recall. I suppose that is why I repeat the action that causes this pain over and over again. It’s why we all do. The reason that brain freeze pain doesn’t stick itself into the fascia is because the action comes with sweetness and joy. There is usually some giggling involved. Brain freeze is a physical pain of joy and that joy tends to overrun the pain. It’s like love. We love even though we know at some point we are going to end up broken hearted because the sweetness and joy outweighs the pain aspect of loving.

WHAT WE ENDED UP NOT DOING

We went into IKEA looking for two things: something to replace the old hutch in the dining room and some sort of storage unit with a trash can for the bathroom. We found the thing we want to replace the hutch. It’s name is Billy, but they were all out of Billys (Billies?). The storage unit for the bathroom turned into a whole moment of “we’re completely remodeling the bathroom”. New sink. New sink cabinet. New medicine cabinets. We were going to strip the bathroom down and repaint and then put in all of these new things. Except when we got the area to load up all the pieces, IKEA did not have the sink. So, we bought new cushions for the dining benches, a new light fixture for the hallway, and three boxes for our Billy that we will eventually get.

We got home and unloaded all of the things and then I said “Wait. How are we supposed to turn the light on with this new fixture.” Michael said “I don’t know what you mean. You just turn the light on.” Then I said “But you need a light switch. There’s not a light switch in the hallway.” The current light is a pull a string light comes on system. Michael was still confused, so I had to physically show him the differences between having a light switch and not having a light switch. Then his light switch turned on and he said “Oh no.” The next morning while watching CBS Sunday Morning, I put together my three boxes that are intended for Billy and realized very quickly that those boxes were not going to fit in Billy. They are made to fit the Kallax. The only correct purchases that we made at IKEA were the new cushions on the dining table benches and more kitchen sponges.

It’s fine. We’ve decide to put the new light fixture in the kitchen and I did some reorganizing to use the boxes in our Kallax.

I did a lot of reorganizing this weekend. By the time I decided to stop, I had filled three and half garbage bags with clothes, shoes, bags and some other useless items. Michael joked with the Cabbage that he didn’t know what was going on but that he was just happy he wasn’t in one of those bags. Then I heard Michael say something like “Cindy’s going crazy.” and I cringed while trying not to take it personally. He just thinks that he’s being funny, but what he doesn’t know is that there have been so many moments where I am decluttering because my brain has gone a little crazy. Clearing out useless stuff is an action I can fall back on in the moments I am feeling anxious or out of control. My decluttering moments do seem to put him on edge even though it is my own stuff I’m cleaning out and he’s regularly complaining about not having room his things. He doesn’t see it when I am decluttering to make more space for him or that I hear his complaints about not having a place to put his books and things and I am trying to remedy this for him. His failure to see that I am trying to make space for him makes me feel as if I will never be able to clear out enough space for him. It is a never enough situation.

I did not allow that to happen this weekend. I ignored every little joke or comment on my sanity and I cleared space in my house for me. Not because I was feeling anxious or that I need to feel in control. I cleared it because I want to be able to easily access things in my closet and in my dresser. There were a lot of failures this weekend. Some of those failures were beyond my control. We still do not have a couch and probably won’t for another two weeks. I was unable to make any headway with the dining room furniture. Those three and half garbage bags of no longer useful stuff is a win.

Maybe even a bronze medal level of win.

A HOUSE ON A LAKE

Last week, I sat down and made of list of things I wanted/needed to do. It is time to make some updates to the blog, maybe put in a page for Yoga in a Tiny Space and freshen up some images. I finally decided to renew my Yoga Alliance membership and I am looking into teacher insurance with the idea that I might be doing more teaching. Don’t hold your breath on that one. I love teaching, but I’ve gotten very comfortable in my home practice. Teaching changes how I practice and I’m not ready for that kind of change. I am ready to get my name on some sub lists and have plans to bring back my online class sometime near the end of August. I made the list and have even crossed things off of the list because I did the thing. Then we spent the weekend at a lake house with friends and if I’d made the list on actual paper, I would be setting it on fire right now because nothing on the list matters anymore.

All I want to do now is live on a lake and eat tomatoes with mozzarella.

I have written many versions of various entries over the past few weeks. One was devoted to the amount of sleeping I did during the month of June. I miss June. I fell asleep during a massage while sitting in one of those weird face down massage chairs. I fell asleep in the middle of a side stretch during a yoga class. I took at least three long naps during our camping trip in the West. I did so much sleeping that I thought it was post worthy. Then I let that post sit in the unpublished list and after a week or so of not ever hitting 'save & publish’, I hit ‘delete’ instead. According to the Astrology report in my latest Yoga Journal, we entered July with plantes across from one another and the energy bodies of those planets are at odds.

This opposition will fuel a drive to pursue your heart’s desires, while also calling for discipline and restraint. Strive to stay present during this challenging period.

It might be the discipline and restraint part that I am having trouble focusing on and this is a fairly normal feature(?) of my mental state during the summer. I used to blame my malaise on the heat, but it hasn’t even really been all that hot this year. It’s Wednesday and so far this week has been the most focused, task accomplishing week I have had in over a month. I have peeled my body out of bed every morning at 5:15 AM for X-tend Barre or rowing and walking the dog. I have made it onto my yoga mat and I am drinking water. Now if I could just stretch this discipline into some other areas of my life, I might write some stuff that I feel worth publishing. I mean…I’m probably going to publish this one, but only because I went to the trouble of quoting an article.

If astrology is your thing, it’s looking like August is going to be more suited for wrangling scattered thoughts. For now I’m going to just strive for staying present with these scattered thoughts.

COUNTDOWN

I woke up this morning and the first though in my head was what if I can’t get my laptop to connect to the projector or the wifi at camp. How am I going to get a slideshow to work? What about music? What if I have a tech failure? I have no idea what I’m doing. I’m a liar. A fake. A fraud. I’m a gosh dang imposter, but I have a tent and a whole carton of eggs and some snacks. So maybe no one will notice the whole fraudulent part. They’ll all be too dazzled by the pretty multicolored eggs from my chickens.

I am about to step into something that is a little (okay… a lot) outside my comfort zone and make myself vulnerable on purpose. Last night, Kelly (the camp director) asked me how I was doing and my response was “antsy”. I am not packed but I have neat stacks of things I plan on taking scattered around the house. While, I’m gathering stuff into piles, I am also thinking about the Grand Canyon and how unprepared I feel for that trip. Instead of focusing on right now, I am thinking about what I need to get done in the two days that I am home before we head out for Arizona. I feel like I’m standing in a doorway with one foot in the room that leads to summer camp and the other foot in the room that goes west. I know I need to step into the summer camp room but I am just sort of stuck with indecision. One minute I feel like I have everything together and the next minute I’m breathing in bag.

I don’t even know where I’m going. I have yet to download a map. This realization has me tilting my head like a curious puppy because it does not sound like me. I am a planner. I mean my weekly meal-plan/grocery lists are legendary. My daily life is organized. Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays are X-tend Barre class and smoothie days. Tuesdays and Thursdays are rowing and avocado toast days. Tuesday evenings are declutter and dust days, while every Wednesday I clean the bathroom. Laundry starts on Friday evening and is finished by Saturday evening. When I attend a science conference, I start reading abstracts and talk lists weeks before I leave and I have made a list of talks that I specifically want to attend. This is why I am really surprised that I have only taken glances at the camp schedule or only have a basic idea of where I am driving to on Wednesday.

The space between my brain and forehead feels tight. I am sure that if someone held a crystal pendulum over my head, my crown chakra would cause it to spin wildly out of control. There is a whole lot happening inside my head and it isn’t really all summer camp. It’s mostly all the thoughts on the rest of my life. In fact, summer camp might be the best place for me to be this week. I’m so mentally distracted that last week I failed to secure anything in my scooter crate and lost a sweater (Michael found it for me) and my work badge (lost forever). Four days in the woods with sketchy cell phone signal and a group of campers to keep track of (I’m a camp counselor too….I’ll be channeling those 4-H days) might just be the thing I need to settle my head space. I just need to throw everything I can think of into my car and drive far far away. The only downside is that I can’t take Josephine with me.

I just want to be there already with my tent set up, and all settled in. Once that happens, everything will fall into place. The doubts will float down the river and I will have some space to breath proper without the need of a bag.