NEW YEAR

Zen project

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Monday morning, I set in on the far side of the kitchen and started cleaning. I pulled out drawers. I threw away packets of soy sauce from 2013. I removed items that we no longer use (anyone want a programable rice cooker?). I wiped down every surface with disinfecting cleaner. When the kitchen was done, I moved on to the rest of the house, moving from room to room armed with a dust rag and a trash can. When I finished with the house, I moved on to myself. I coated my face with a charcoal mask, took a steamy shower and shaved my legs. Then I rubbed coconut oil all over my body because my skin is so dry that I am turning to dust. I’m like the ending of Avengers: Infinity War. Michael and I rang in the New Year watching Bird Box while working on a puzzle. I was in bed by 12:10.

Tuesday morning, I got Michael up and dragged him to a yoga class that my friend Kelly was teaching for New Year’s Day. Kelly gave us some intentions for the new year and I wish I’d written them down. Dr. Mary was there and she hugged me tight and told me I looked rested. Then Michael and I walked across the street so I could take my final picture of my Flickr 365 Day project. It was 18 degrees with snow flurries and I did not smile. Even though our New Year’s traditional Indian food place was just a few blocks down the street, we drove to the restaurant. It was closed. So Michael took the most convoluted way to the Indian place in Westport where we struggled to find a parking place. There was a woman sitting in her car and we pulled up next to her. I asked if she was leaving. She rolled her eyes at me and said “One minute.” But we got her parking space. We ate too much Indian food and then walked it off at the local health food store before driving over to pick up the Cabbage. Then Michael and I finished our puzzle and I went to bed.

I am entering 2019 seriously unmotivated.

The psychologist and author of the Willpower Instinct, Kelly McGonigal said in a New York Times article about crushing your habits that you should focus on changes that would make you the happiest and pick a theme for the year. Most often we tend to make resolutions about our health based on things that we’ve heard would be good for us. Running. Meditation. Eating a daily kale salad. It does me no good to make a resolution to run a marathon in 2019 if I hate running, but eating a daily kale salad is reasonable because I do love kale. I understand the brain science of creating reasonable resolutions. It is the focus on changes that would make me happy part that I am having a hard time with. I have yet to spend any time reflecting about what I want for myself this year let alone reflecting on changes that would make me happy. I don’t know what changes would make me happy. Skipping January, February and even parts of March would make me happy, but that doesn’t ever seem to be an option. Maybe skipping those months wouldn’t necessarily make me happy as much as it would make it easier for me to reflect on things that would make me happy.

I can say that yesterday afternoon, when Michael and I were finishing up our puzzle, that I was pretty content and at peace. We moved the puzzle to the kitchen table to have more space to work. Then we sat in the dining room, with Andrew Bird playing on Alexa, piecing together the Periodic Table. It was nice to be sitting at the table doing an activity other than watching TV. I feel like a change that would make me happier would be to step away from the TV. I read in the evenings, but I’m usually sitting on my end of the couch with Michael on the other end and the TV playing some stupid crime show. I’m going to get up and leave the TV area. Maybe to read; maybe to do some writing; maybe to work on another puzzle. I don’t know, but the TV is not bringing me joy or good health. Another thing that I know for sure is that I am happiest when I am on my mat. I have myself booked up with yoga workshops through March and I’m eyeing a women’s yoga retreat in April. I might even buy a membership to a studio for the summer.

One of the intentions for the New Year that Kelly gave us in class yesterday was to get rid of all the bullshit. I recently was made aware that I put in a lot more thought than some into my actions towards things and people around me. I put a lot of effort into making someone else’s life easier, while making my life harder and it’s really kind of exhausting. Especially when it’s one sided. It’s bullshit. So, I think I’ll dump it and do more to make my life easier. Take more initiatives for myself instead of waiting for someone else to take the initiative. Do a better job of tuning out the grumbles and whines. I don’t understand why it is so hard for some women to put themselves first, but I am one of those women who has a hard time doing just that.

That’s some bullshit I can do without.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

This is my last Thankful Friday post for this year and a good time to reflect and be grateful for the life lived in 2018. Really, it was pretty good. There was lots of travel and sight seeing. There were opportunities to squeeze some people that I don’t get to see very often. We ate some really good food and we finally cleaned out our basement. I haven’t spent any time really seriously considering what I might want next year to look like. There’s an adult beginners fiddle class starting up at the end of January that I am considering. I need a violin. I want to eat fresh snails. Not frozen or canned. Fresh ones. I want to do more yoga related things and I want to use my camera more often. I want to write something.

But for right now, I just want to sit back and enjoy the memories of this year.

I TOOK EVERYTHING DOWN

Christmas Eve at Terry's

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I’ve been quiet around here lately, I know, but there’s been Christmas time activities and sloth practice. We went to Tulsa to visit with my family over the weekend, where I gave my mother an Ancestry DNA kit. Then we forced my mom to fill a tube with her spit all in the name of science. We had Christmas Eve morning at home with just the three of us. The Cabbage opened her presents and played with Legos. I made enchiladas to take over to Terry’s where we spent the evening drinking margaritas and reading each other’s tarot cards. My self doubt is keeping me from accomplishing shit. At least that’s what my cards said and I was all like “well, duh.” Christmas morning was spent baking pie crust and making pies. Then we spent Christmas evening with Michael’s moms. On Boxing Day, I took down all of the Christmas, swept and vacuumed, and watched some dumb movie that I don’t even really remember now. I taught my yoga class that night and then tried to go to bed at a reasonable hour so I would be able to get up for work today.

Here’s what I have learned in the past five days: The Cabbage sounds like a stampeding rhino when she walks through the house. One day, she’s going to live in a second floor apartment and her neighbors are going to hate her.

I did not use the past five days to the best of an educational example.

Though I am learning to play some form of poker (I don’t really know which one) for a poker tournament on Friday night. My new phrase is “I fold.” I’m really good at saying that. We’ve been using an old deck of cards that I took from my parents’ house when we were cleaning out things. It’s an old Braniff Airlines promotional deck of cards. That deck of cards was always in the camper. None of us were poker players, but we played many a game of Go Fish with that deck of cards. The cards also contain travel phrases in Spanish and Portuguese. ¿Dónde puedo comprar un rollo de película en blanco y negro o color? This does not translate to “I need a black pelican” or “May I see a list of your white and black wines?” It’s asking about buying film for a camera. There’s also one about about buying a flash bulb. This is an old deck of cards. I think I have had more fun memorizing travel phrases in Spanish than I have learning to say “I fold.” Michael says that the first one to be out of the tournament gets to drink. I have goals.

I spent some time today compiling our year in pictures. With any luck and some incense burning for the Gods of Tech, I will have that posted for you tomorrow.

FOLLOW UP

Sun catcher

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I wrote yesterday’s post without realizing that it was a meaningful date. My nephew, Donnie, the second child born to my brother and sister-in-law died from complications at birth. It was 1983, which would make me seven. J was three. You’d ask him what he was hoping for while Katrina was pregnant; a baby brother or a baby sister? He’d answer every time with “a baby monkey”. Katrina and I were talking about this yesterday. I told her that I remember getting in trouble for playing Jingle Bells on the piano. It was after the funeral and everyone had left the house. I started playing and Mom yelled at me to stop, said it was inappropriate. Katrina said she didn’t know that had happened. I explained that she hadn’t been there. Mom didn’t mean anything by it, she just didn’t know how to talk to a little kid about death.

Katrina responded with something I had never considered. She said “Yeah, I don’t think any of us did. You, J and Janell were the actual casualties of Donnie’s death.” It was a really weird time. I can’t speak for Janell or J, but I know that I was so confused. But here’s the thing. I wasn’t confused about the death part. Maybe that was one thing about being raised in a Baptist church. There was a lot of talk of people dying in the bible. I was confused by how I was supposed to feel. It was Christmas time. I knew I was supposed to be sad but I was also happy about Christmas, except now I wasn’t supposed to be. A generally happy child was being told to be appropriately sad. My feelings were being dictated to me. No wonder I was confused, but now I realize how often we are told how to feel. Be happy. Be calm. Don’t be sad. Don’t be angry. Okay, be sad right now, but don’t be sad three days from now. There is a limit to how long you should feel a certain way.

When we remember things, we remember them with a mix of feelings. Is it too far fetched to believe that we experience things with a mix of feelings? The line for what is or is not appropriate became completely erased when Chris got sick and died. We joked often about death and we laughed even when our throats were tight with emotion. This did not change after he died. We are irreverent and inappropriate in our jokes around Chris’s death. Because death is not just sad. At times, it can even be a relief. It is the knowing that person is not going to be around any more to hear those jokes and respond to those jokes that makes death sad. I know that whenever one of my tribe makes a hilarious commentary on the death of Chris, that Chris is somewhere laughing with us.

The authentic part of living this life is allowing ourselves to feel all the emotions with out limiting ourselves to who ever is dictating what is or is not appropriate. The Cabbage has asked me about my Dad. She’s asked me about the man in the picture on the bookcase. I told her that Dad and Chris are dead. I told her that yes, it is sad and I miss them, but I have buckets of joyful memories that make me happy. I want her to understand that it’s okay to be happy and sad at the same time. I want her to understand that no one is allowed to dictate how she feels about something; that it is her choice. You don’t need any one’s permission for your feelings.

This is a lesson I wish I learned a long time ago.

CHRISTMAS MEMORIES

Puppy

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The best Christmas I can remember as a child was the year I got Odie. Odie was the most perfect beagle. In 2015, a beagle named Miss P won the Westminster Dog Show. Odie was almost identical in color to Miss P. His head might have been a little bit smaller and he did not have Miss P’s expression of bored indifference, but he could have run circles around her in the judges ring. For months leading up to that Christmas, the only thing I asked for was a beagle puppy. “What do you want for Christmas, Cindy?” someone would ask. My answer every time was “A beagle puppy.” I don’t remember what year this was or how old I was. It was sometime between broken arms and my sister was still young enough to get excited about the surprises we would find under the tree. The two of us, like most children, tiptoed carefully down the stairs at two o’clock in the morning to take a peek at what may have been left for us under the tree.

The two of us were about half way down the staircase when I heard a whimper. I forgot all about being stealthy and quiet, instead I ran down the stairs with the heavy un-lady like footsteps of a troll. An open box sat under the tree with the tiniest saddest little puppy, begging for company and love. I scooped him into my arms and took him back to my room. When we cleaned out the family house and started sorting through the multiple containers of pictures, we found hundreds of pictures of Odie as a puppy sleeping on someone’s lap, curled up on a boot, tucked into a cushion at someone’s feet. He was impossible to potty train and ended up leaving a big stain on my mom’s hardwood floors. But his worse offense was chewing up the rungs of Mom’s dining room table. That banished him to the outside for good. He was still the best dog, to me anyway and he lived a really long and happy life. Odie set the bar for any future dog that would come into my life.

That was the best Christmas not just because of Odie, but because I think that’s the last Christmas I can remember where I still felt that spark and excitement of Christmas. Maybe I knew that Santa was not real, but I believed in him any way. In fact, I still believed in all things magical and mystical, but it was an age where I still got excited over the whole gift thing. Not just the surprise of what I was going to get, but seeing the faces of joy as others opened their surprises. It is the last Christmas I can remember that didn’t include a layer of sadness or an awareness of the sadness of others. That is not to say that Christmases since then have been bad. It’s just that Christmases have an underlying layer of sadness in general. It is a time when memories, good and bad, swirl around our heads and we can’t help but miss the ones no longer with us to share in those memories.

Do you know how many times my Mom told us all the story about the time my sister woke up before everyone on Christmas morning and then opened ALL of the presents? It is a story of legend. My Dad would laugh every time. One year we all decided to change the Christmas tradition of ham or turkey for our Christmas meal and instead have what we all loved to eat, fried oysters. We would all end up in the kitchen at some point. Dad was always our unofficially designated food taster. J would make the cocktail sauce, stirring in horseradish to a bowl of ketchup like a science experiment. Remember that year Randy caught a shark? Katrina brought a fondue set and we all stood around it dunking bits of shark and then everything into hot oil. Fondue became known as fundue. There was the Christmas when Chris surprised me with a pair of earrings that I had been coveting. It wasn’t the earrings that made the surprise so special. It was how he had to sneak over to Eureka Springs with out me knowing it to get the earrings. Which he managed to do in glorious Chris fashion.

Whenever those memories get too overwhelming, I grab Josephine and cradle her like a baby while scratch her belly. I put my face to her face and tell her what a sweet puppy she is and how much I love her. She’ll lick my cheek and then every thing’s alright. Because just like at that Christmas when I got Odie, puppies make everything better.

WE MADE DONUTS

Donuts

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There’s a guy I work with who has been experimenting with making sourdough bread at home. I have always loved the idea of baking sourdough. It has something to do with my background in microbiology and keeping a living culture of wild yeast growing on my kitchen counter. So I asked the guy at work if I could have some of his starter the next time he had to split his. A week before Thanksgiving, he handed me a recycled jelly jar of sourdough starter. I fed the starter and stuck it in the fridge and then we left for California. When we returned from California, I decided to make my first loaf of sourdough bread. I planned our whole Sunday night diner around this loaf of bread and I was going to bake that bread in my enamel Dutch oven and it was going to be the best loaf of bread I’ve ever made.

It was the worst loaf of bread I’ve ever made.

That loaf of bread came out as a heavy round brick of sourdough. It would have made an excellent bowling ball if it had been perfectly spherical. It didn’t taste bad, but it didn’t taste like anything special either. I know what went wrong, or at least I think I know. We have a kitchen scale that is not very reliable and I had weighed out my ingredients. There was probably too much flour, my starter was not wet enough (sounds gross) and I was impatient. I didn’t give the dough enough time to rise properly. I rushed it so we could have it for dinner that night when I should have made the dough the day before so it would have plenty of rise time. You cannot rush sourdough. Sourdough is a practice of patience.

I continued to feed my starter once week and bought a new container with a breathable lid to store it in. I’d feed it and then shove it back into the far corner of the fridge, uncertain of when or what my next sourdough experiment would be. Then a recipe for sourdough donuts floated into my email. Then I pulled the starter from the fridge and started feeding it. That was Thursday. I fed the starter for two days, leaving it out on the counter until using it on Saturday when I made up the donut dough. The recipe I used said to leave the dough out at room temperature for four to five hours and every hour or so, go in and stretch and punch the dough before placing it in the fridge overnight. In between dinner and wrapping Christmas presents and sips of gin and tonic, I would go and stretch and punch the dough.

The next day, I rolled out the dough and Michael helped me cut out donuts. We placed them on sheet pans to rise for another hour and a half before frying them in hot canola oil. Michael and I tag teamed the frying and sugar coating. He manned the fryer while I dusted finished donuts with confectioners sugar. And it was the most fun we’ve had in the kitchen in a really long time. We were amazed that we were making donuts. Michael kept saying “We’re making donuts!” and then he’d start running through lists of names for our future donut shop. We were both mesmerized by the dough floating in the hot oil. They would puff up with a bubble of air stretching the dough, like making bubbles out of bubblegum. The best part? They were delicious! Crispy on the outside and soft and fluffy on the inside.

We made a complete mess of the kitchen. The dog had spots of confectioners sugar all over the top of her head and back (she stood under us the entire time). Michael got inspired by all the frying to slice up and batter zucchini to dunk in the hot oil when we had finished with the donuts. The whole house smelled like hot grease and donuts. It was worth it. I can easily ignore the fact that it took two days to make these donuts and that there’s powdered sugar everywhere simply because we had such a fun time making them.

And no one was burned with hot grease.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

To the moon

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I wrote and completed a whole Thankful Friday post about self care and spontaneous chair massages. All that was left was to add a picture and post it. I opened it up this morning, selected the whole thing and then hit ‘delete’. The post felt whiney and negative even though it was about gratitude and taking care of myself. There was a tone to it that at the end of the day, I didn’t feel like sharing. So, I’m not. I am going to take todays post to truly talk about some things that I am grateful for.

My dear friend Robin became a grandma this week. Her first born, Nikki, had her very own first born early Wednesday morning. A beautiful healthy baby girl who looks just like Nikki did at birth, with a full head of dark hair. Robin flooded my phone with pictures and I responded with jokes about her being a grandma. Then I thought about Robin holding that baby, who she immediately unswaddled to count all toes and fingers, and I got really teary about the sweetness of all of it. Wednesday evenings, when Erin comes to pick up the Cabbage, she brings in her newest little one, The Pea. She sets The Pea down in her carseat on the floor and while she and Michael discuss Cabbage things and get the Cabbage ready to leave, I sit in front of The Pea. I poke her and tickle her and make her grin and we have a lovely five or ten minutes together before Erin scoops them all out the door. It is the most ideal baby zen practice. The act of holding a baby softens us, melts away tension and makes us quieter. I wonder what would happen if they made Trump hold a sleeping baby before he could use his Twitter account. I am thankful for this new addition to Robin’s family and I am thankful that everyone is happy and healthy.

Which leads me to happy and healthy and births in general. He’s probably not going to like me saying it, but today is my good friend Terry’s birthday. Knowing this man and having him in my life makes me a better human being. Terry is the hardest person to do something nice for mostly because he’s too busy doing things for everyone else. He is irreverently hilarious and crazy wise. He is a talented artist and craftsman. And he throws a mean party. Terry is that person in my life who gets it, gets me. He pulls me out of my homebody shell to do silly things and I am grateful for him. Also, Josephine loves him. LOVES him. Most dogs love Terry. That’s how you know he’s so special. He can win over the hearts of all creatures, great and small.

I guess, to sum up this week, I am grateful for births.

YOGAVERSARY

Taking on this week like a warrior.

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I went to a yoga class at work on Tuesday. Usually I just go on Wednesdays, but I was feeling the need for some discipline. I snuck into Amie’s yoga flow class knowing that I could easily disappear into a corner. The previous week, she had been teaching the class the basics of Ashtanga yoga and for today’s class she wanted to continue with that theme but incorporate more of the seated postures. If you are not familiar with an Ashtanga practice, you will hear the words “seated postures” and feel some comfort in knowing that you will be just sitting around on your mat. ‘Seated’ sounds easy and yes, once your butt is on the mat, the pose that follows is simple. It’s the getting there and getting out parts that are hard. It starts in down dog and involves bringing the weight into your hands and shoulders as you hop up and swing your legs through. Then you do all of this in reverse to get out.

Give me the fundamental standing asanas any day. The sweep through thing has never been my strong suit.

From the grumblings of some of the other students in the class, I take it it is not their favorite thing either. But the occasional Ashtanga practice is good for you. It’s simple, yet challenging and for certain personalities (or doshas) it is a practice that can take you out of a comfort zone. The full Ashtanga practice is not my yoga practice though. I prefer a more body balanced practice then what Ashtanga provides, but often modify an Ashtanga series to my own needs. I was thinking about my yoga needs while trying to fling my body forward into a seated position and doing some math in Tuesday’s class and I figured out that 2019 is my 20 year yoga anniversary. It will be twenty years since I walked in and attended my very first yoga class, which happened to be an Ashtanga class.

I hated it.

I’m not kidding.

I hated that first class, but I went back for more because I am prideful and refuse to accept failure. I recognize that hating my first yoga class is not a failure. It just seemed like a failure to me at the time because I thought (had set myself up for it) I would love yoga. And I do love yoga. Just not Ashtanga yoga. Twenty years later and I don’t hate Ashtanga any more either. That one class opened me up to the giant world of yoga and a yoga practice that brings me joy and comfort. It also gave me something that I have not found in any other format and that is body confidence. Being on my mat is the one place where I am not just comfortable in my skin, but where I truly feel like this body is beautiful. Yoga has also given me a community of women who are all strong, beautiful and so ridiculously supportive. Karen, my yoga teacher, continues to be a source of reference and knowledge in all things yoga and life. Then there’s Shannon, who talked me into teaching again. She set me up with Kelli Austin at Sunshine Yoga who promoted my strap workshop without really even knowing me. Now I have Kelly, who’s joy of life radiates out of her like an atom bomb.

Kelly made me realize something today. She teaches the Wednesday lunch time class that I normally attend and today I was her only student. I had stepped back to plank and suddenly I hear her exclaim “Oh my gosh! Look at how you’re on the tips of your toes! I’ve never seen anybody do that. It’s like you’re floating!” First, I had no idea that I was doing this in plank pose. Secondly, it makes me laugh because if she only knew how much I struggled with plank in those early years of yoga. Now I was making it look effortless, like I was floating. For my next trick, Rocky, watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat. No really, what is my next trick? I’ve been thinking a lot about what I want for 2019 and one of those things is to celebrate my yoga anniversary. I’ve already signed up for an anatomy of yoga workshop in February, but I’d like to speckle the year with attending yoga workshops. Maybe this is the year I finally take a Kundalini yoga class or I find a teaching gig at one of the studios near me.

I do know that I want to spend more time in the vicinity of the kind of women who constantly cheer each other on.

DIVISION

I think it's his teeth that bother me

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I noticed last week that there was a lot of outrage and debate happening over whether or not we should still be playing the Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer cartoon. The Huffington Post did an article about the jokes posted on twitter during the Tuesday evening airing of Rudolph. Turns out that some people took what started out as a joke about this 1964 Christmas classic, a little bit too seriously. Other news outlets picked up the story and turned it into the telephone game. It went from ‘we’re just making hilarious observations’ to ‘this cartoon should be banned!’ The next thing I noticed was my Facebook timeline filling up with Rudolph images and outrage. I just shook my head at all of it because now even Rudolph the Reindeer, a cartoon about acceptance and inclusivity, has become a weapon of division.

STOP FALLING FOR IT!

It’s not just Rudolph. The idea of banning the song “Baby it’s Cold Outside” has got some people riled up and shouting about taking the #MeToo movement too far. I’m not one to go around saying ban the music and books…because Nazis, but I’d rather listen to other holiday songs than one where a guy is pressuring a girl to do something she’s not so sure she wants to do. For me that’s called freshman year of college and my brief foray into online dating. I don’t need to hear a song about that. But to each their own. I think the meme that really tops it for me are the ones that are intentionally incendiary. “I celebrate CHRISTmas. Sorry if that offends you!” Honestly I don’t care what you celebrate; what offends me is the obvious attempt to start an argument.

This is a time of year when there is supposed to be joy and good will. According to Charity Navigator, 31% of annual donations for 2014 happened in December. It is a holy month for some religions, many of which encourage acts of charity and kindness towards those less fortunate. If there’s one month out of the year that should bring us all together in love and peace, it should be the month of December. Yet we have managed to find ways to incite hatefulness and arguments even during ‘the most wonderful time of the year’. What is wrong with us? Is it just easier to incite hatefulness and arguments than it is to be kind? Maybe for some, kindness only happens on a face-to-face level, that it doesn’t transcend to online and social media. Maybe it’s easy to forget that the things we post are a reflection of who we are as a person.

It makes me ask myself: What kind of human being do I want to be?

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Oh, don't mind me.

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One night this week, I dreamed that I was being attacked by a swarm of mosquitoes. I was walking on a beach that was dirty and littered with drift wood. There was a man walking a few paces behind me and we both started running when the swarm hit us. I ran while hitting my arms and legs and waving my hands around my head. The mosquitoes were thick and everywhere. I could hear them inside my ears. I heard the man behind my yell out “here! take my towel!” and he draped the towel over my shoulders as we both ran. I could see my car up ahead and knew that I just had to make it to the car. I woke up suddenly, gasping and scratching at imaginary mosquito bites. I talked about this dream with Dr. Mary. We discussed the meaning of it all, how the mosquitos represented little annoyances I had had and the comfort of the towel and knowing that I was close to safety. Then I told Dr. Mary that I didn’t think I needed her every week.

I was surprised to hear myself say it. I hadn’t planned it. I had been thinking about it recently, but I didn’t realize that I was ready to do more than just think about it. Dr. Mary was not bothered by this, but did ask what prompted this decision. I told her that for the first time in a really long time, I was entering this holiday season without feeling the need to constantly breathe into a paper bag. I told her that I feel like I’ve taken bags and bags of guilt to the garbage dump. I’ve been holding onto guilt about Chris. I say out loud all the time how Chris would be okay with how I’m living my life, but I never really truly believed the words I was saying. Instead I felt guilty about this life I’ve forged without Chris, but my guilt wasn’t all Chris related. There was guilt about Dad. There was guilt over not being all the things I could be for all people. There was guilt for my grief, for being sad, for missing Chris even though I’m with Micheal. At times my guilt over everything was crippling.

I don’t feel that guilt any more.

I have discovered that it’s one thing to treat others the way you wish to be treated and quite another to treat yourself the way you wish to be treated. Actually, it seems to be more difficult to treat myself with patience, kindness and respect. It’s work, but I’m doing it. A year ago, there was no way I would have allowed myself to book a holiday trip that did not include my family. A year ago, I would not consider making a trip to Oklahoma at Christmas time that did not include driving all over the state in attempt to see every single person. I would already be berating myself over not being or doing enough. I’m not saying I’m cured or that I still don’t need to spill my guts to Dr. Mary. I just don’t need to spill them every week. It has been almost two years since I thought about jumping out of a moving car into busy traffic. Progress.

I am thankful for progress.

VERSIONS OF US

Michael and Cindy 2018

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Michael and I choose a new ornament for the tree every year. The ornament is supposed to reflect something about us and the year. Our first year ornament makes absolutely no sense. Santa is riding a giant trout and there’s a fishing pole dangling out of Santa’s hand. It’s ridiculous and confusing. And completely appropriate for the time. This was probably six months after we first met; four months after he had officially moved in. We were ridiculous and confusing. The second year we bought a record player ornament. It was the year Michael had set up his record player and I bought a bunch of Doris Day albums. Later ornaments would be a camper (of course) and something Star Wars. Then we stumbled upon two ornaments that carried an odd resemblance to us. The guy had a curled mustache and wore an orange sweater. The girl sported a stocking cap on her cropped brown hair. They were ornament versions of us.

This would become a recurring thing. We now have two small doll like ornaments. One doll is wearing a plaid shirt with hiking boots. He’s sporting a medium length beard and holding a small Christmas tree. The girl version is bundled up in a coat and scarf. She’s holding ski poles even though there are no skis on her feet. The resemblance is uncanny. The two ornaments look so much like us that we even considered using them in our Christmas card. Maybe I did. I vaguely remember taking a crappy picture of the Cabbage holding the two dolls. Michael and I were looking around Target on Saturday for this year’s ornament and I heard him say “Hey look! It’s us!” I turned around to see him holding up a gnome with a long beard and girl doll wearing a cap and scarf. I guess a cap and scarf are my go to winter looks, but I busted out laughing at the idea of these two being the ornament versions of us. They are by far the most hilarious versions we’ve come across. We bought them along with a seal ornament because this year we saw a lot of seals.

Earlier in the day we had been talking about Christmas cards and pictures for the cards. I always start out with an intention to take or have someone take a nice festive picture of the three of us, but it is so hard to coordinate. It doesn’t help that the Cabbage is in that poser stage where it is more reasonable to believe that one can collect marshmallow poop from unicorns then it is to get a genuine smile from her. For this year’s card, I didn’t even try. I just used some random pictures I’ve taken this year and I’m perfectly happy with this. As we talked about the cards, Michael mentioned the idea of us wearing ugly Christmas sweaters. I winced slightly and replied that Chris and I had already done that. Chris and I used to plan out elaborate Christmas cards. We took joy in the whole process. It was like preparing for our very own Christmas pageant and we would start making our plans for the photo shoot in October, gathering costume materials and backdrops. People looked forward to what we’d do for the next year. I’m not going to lie. That first Christmas after Chris died and I had to put Hooper down, I considered photographing their coffee cans of ashes wearing Christmas hats for my card. I didn’t because I figured there was less than a handful of people who would see the dark humor in this. Everyone else would just see it as the the sad country song that it really was.

I don’t even attempt the elaborate Christmas card with Michael and the Cabbage for a number of reasons, but mostly because I’m not trying to recreate a life I had. The things that made sense for me to do in my relationship with Chris doesn’t make sense to do in my relationship with Michael. Because it is not the same relationship. Chris and I had our own thing. We made silly Christmas cards. Michael and I have our own thing. We find versions of ourselves in Christmas ornaments.

I DON'T OFTEN CRAFT, BUT WHEN I DO I USE A GLUE GUN

Crafty

17 Likes, 4 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Crafty"

Early last week, I started noticing a trend on social media. People were posting pictures of their Christmas trees with captions that read “we finally got the tree up!” It was the word ‘finally’ that started to put me into a panic. I hadn’t even started to consider decorating for the Holidays. I’ve had stuff sitting in my closet to make a new Christmas wreath for ages, but I put it far enough back in the closet to not really pay attention to it whenever I open the closet (every single day). I’ve had more important things to do. Like sitting on the couch with all the animals piled on top of me. The most pressing thing on my list of things to do was to reorganize our linen closet and bathroom cabinets. We had a big basket on one shelf of the linen closet that was filled with various medications and toiletries. What I should really say is, we had a big basket of garbage sitting in our linen closet. My main goal for this weekend was to fix that basket and by fix, I mean get rid of that basket.

It just didn’t seem possible to get the linen closet organized, a new wreath made, and put up all the other Christmas decorations in one weekend. So I cheated and started cleaning out the closet and bathroom cabinets on Thursday. I also started working on the wreath that night and when I got home Friday night, I drank a couple of cocktails and got out the glue gun to finish it. I’m thinking of starting my own YouTube channel called “Drunk Crafting with Cindy”. I can sell my crafts on Etsy. I think my new wreath turned out really nice. Wreath accomplished, I made a plan for Saturday that included a trip to the Container Store (the most loveliest place on earth, I’m not kidding) and bringing up all the Christmas boxes. At the very least I had to get our menorah out because the first day of Hanukkah starts tonight. But when I opened the Christmas boxes, I couldn’t find our menorah. I have no idea what happened to our menorah or why it was not put back into the Christmas boxes (I blame everything that goes missing on the basement flood). So on top of the trip to the wonderful Container Store, we had to go hunt up a new menorah.

Then a Christmas miracle happened and I learned to bend time to my will. Grocery shopping happened, stocking stuffers were purchased, the tree was set up and decorated, stockings were hung, Christmas cards were ordered, gifts were bought, linen closet got organized (lazy susans are not just for kitchens), the house got cleaned, laundry was completed. People, I made a loaf of sourdough bread. I wrote this blog entry! I just high fived myself. I went from feeling really behind on all things to overachiever. The problem was that I let myself fall victim to the trap of allowing social media to measure and gauge my success. This living life and doing stuff thing is not a competition. I am not behind on anything (except maybe the gas bill…did I pay that?). No one is marking my name down on a failure list for not putting my tree up the day after Thanksgiving.

But I’m hanging on to my new found super power to bend time.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Chickens

11 Likes, 0 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Chickens"

I stood looking out the kitchen window as I washed our breakfast dishes. It was that time of morning when the sun is just about come up. Every thing was tinted dark and cast in shadows, like looking through sunglasses. I noticed one of the chickens poke her head out of the coop. She tentatively stepped out onto the ramp. It was Marguerite. I watched her as she pecked at the snow that rested on the ramp to the coop. A few seconds later, Foghorn peaked her head out the coop door and looked around. She carefully stepped forward to stand behind Marguerite. Neither of them ventured further than the first few rungs of the ramp and did not stay out long. The two of them carefully turned around and made their way back inside the coop. I assume they are nestled on their perch inside the coop. The four of them packed in there on the perch puts off enough warmth to keep them comfortable.

We’ve had the chickens for almost three years now. Technically, this might be our last year of eggs. They haven’t laid an egg since late September I think. That’s the time of year they all molt and lose their feathers. The chicken run and coop become littered with an array of colored feathers and the chickens take on a patchy Kramer-esc look. Bed head. They roll out of the coop in the mornings with bed head. Michael and I talk about what to do with one of the chickens when they die. We can’t bury them in the back yard. We might be able to put in a chicken graveyard in the front yard. Michael’s afraid he’s going to just have to put the dead chicken in a bag and put it in the dumpster, the same thing we do with the dead things Albus brings home. (Most common sentence in our house starts with “There’s a dead squirrel…”)

We also talk a lot about a new chicken coop. This chicken coop, along with the chickens, has been sort of like our first pancake for chicken raising. Our coop is difficult to access, making it hard to give them water. They recently decided to start laying their eggs inside the coop, but away from the nesting box. I cannot reach eggs that they lay outside of the nesting box. Michael has to reach his long arm into the coop and retrieve the eggs. There’s not a door to the run section and so it has to be lifted up to change out their water. I finally figured out a way to do this on my own, but all the chickens escape when this happens and I’m left with trying to figure out how to get them back in the coop. Josephine does a fairly decent job of herding, but it also looks like she’s attacking more than herding. The chickens end up fleeing to the safety of their coop. We talk about leaving the door open to the coop during the day and just letting the chickens roam free during the day, outside the safety of their chicken run. This has just been talk because secretly we both fear that something bad will happen to them.

Our original plan was to get three chickens. At the last minute, I picked up a chick and cradled her in my hands and said “Maybe we should get four in case one dies.” We took four chicks home and they have all survived. Each one has their own personality. They are not lovey dovey chickens. They barely tolerate being held and they have to be chased. They don’t come up to willingly. Matilda will bite you. But we love them. We love them enough to talk about doing it all over again when we lose these four.

CRASHING TO AN END

Camouflaged snail

7 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Camouflaged snail"

I realize that it is not even December. I mean, it will be December by the end of this week, but right now it is still November. We have a whole month left in this year and I shouldn’t be rushing ahead. Except my brain is totally rushing ahead and I keep thinking about what I want to accomplish next year. I had only one thing that I wanted for this year and that was to complete a project. Any project. I’m thirty something days away from completing my 365 Day photo project that I have been posting daily on Flickr. I am going to complete a project this year. Also, I’ve been saying for years how I need to clean out the basement and pair down. I’ve just stopped putting this down as a resolution because every year I fail miserably at this. I might get one corner cleaned out only to fill it up with crap again. Sure, it took a major basement flood to get this goal accomplished, but by golly, that basement is clean and we have way less stuff.

These accomplishments have inspired me to start thinking about doing stuff. I’m not quite sure what stuff I want to do, but I want to do some stuff.

I think that on the top of my list of things to do next year is to expand my photography skills and build up a portfolio. Maybe even take a class or two. Someone in the office said to me in regards to our California trip that I must have taken a lot of pictures. Really, after sitting down to upload and edit, I did not end up taking very many pictures. I had even debated before the trip whether I should even bother bringing my Nikon with me. In the end, I decided to pack it and then I did make an effort to use it. That first morning at the cabin, I was awake before everyone. I snuck out of the cabin with my camera and went for a walk. The sun was just coming up and the air was crisp. I thought I might try to make my way to Tamales Bay, but it was further away than it looked. I walked the winding road far enough to reach a place where I could at least see the bay and was rewarded with light from the sun peaking up over the hills and filtering through the clouds.

Later on, we all hiked out to Kehoe Beach. I took some pictures there that I am really happy with and that evening I captured a picture of the moon that I’m pretty proud of. The camera stayed in my bag for the rest of the trip because it ended up raining on us for most of Friday. We spent the day in the cabin, playing games and telling stories. I knew that I wanted to stop on the north side of the Golden Gate Bridge on our way back to the airport. So I just let the photography slide to the way side in order to just be present in the moment. When Michael pulled our car off the highway and up to a parking space that overlooked the bridge, there was already a line of photographers set up at the look out. Serious photographers. They all had big fancy lenses and tripods. I got out of the car with my dinky Nikon and thought “what the Hell am I doing?” I was a joke. I closed my eyes and took a breath. When I opened them, I looked out at the Golden Gate Bridge, fog rolling in and the sunlight filtering down. We were high enough to be above the fog and the sunlight filtering through that fog made the water sparkle. It was blindingly beautiful.

And I captured it all on my dinky little Nikon.

I want more of this for 2019. I want to feel less intimidated and I want to feel more confident in my own abilities to capture beautiful moments. I want to accept that part of me that is an artist.

SOMETIMES YOU'VE GOT TO GO

Little cabin in the woods

17 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Little cabin in the woods"

A few months back, my friend Heather sent me a text mentioning that she had her company cabin for Thanksgiving. Some of you might remember the last time I went to the cabin with Heather. I might have mentioned it here, but the cabin is in the tiny town of Inverness, CA. It sits high up on a hill surrounded by trees and the windows face Tomales Bay. I told Heather that if we weren’t tightening our belts and paying off debts, I’d invite us to tag along. Her reply was “it’s not until November.” She had a point. I cashed in some frequent flyer miles and we sold some stuff on Craig’s List. We bought plane tickets and rented a car and crashed her Thanksgiving.

And I’m so glad we did.

Michelle, who you might remember from that time I was a bearded lady and she was one half of the first ever interracially conjoined twins, flew up from San Diego. Heather’s friends, Maria and Mateo, flew in from Arizona. We’d never met, but I had heard some stories. Maria and Mateo ended up riding in the backseat of our rental car every where we went. I got so used to the two of them sitting behind us that I felt like we’d forgotten something when we left the cabin early Saturday morning. Instead of a turkey dinner on Thanksgiving, we ate Dungeness crab. In fact, we ate Dungeness crab for almost all meals. Turns out that six pounds of already picked crab meat feeds a party of six for two days. Just an fyi if you ever find yourself needing to place an order for picked crab meat and you order a pound per person, the person taking your order is going to scoff at you. You will ignore the scoffing and order that amount any way. Be prepared for the leftovers.

Instead of spending the holiday with family, we spent it with people we didn’t really know. I felt a bit of guilt over this. I claimed Michelle as part of our tribe the moment I met her three years ago. After spending five minutes with Maria and Mateo, I felt the same way about them. I even feel a little sad that they live so far away and are unavailable for random rides in the backseat of my car. So that guilt quickly dissipated when I realized that I was spending time with family. I was spending time with the family I have made for myself. We ate. We drank. We hiked to a beach. We played games and told stories. Mostly we laughed. Good lord, we laughed so dang much. I am very very fortunate.

Sometimes the best thing you can do for yourself is to go to a little cabin in the wood with no TV and very spotty cell signal. Make sure the cabin is filled with good people and a nice roaring fire. Be sure to spend some of that time on long walks and part of that time watching the rain. Laugh and memorize every silly ridiculous moment.

This is self care.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Blanket and snuggle weather

8 Likes, 2 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Blanket and snuggle weather"

Every morning this week, my alarm has gone off at 4:50 AM and I have crawled out from under my heated blankets. I have pulled on my thermal leggings and long-sleeved T. I have unrolled my yoga mat and I have spent an hour in practice. I do not adjust the thermostat and the house is chilly, but I move my body through rounds of sun salutations to warm myself up. Often, Josephine comes back in from doing her thing outside and climbs back under the covers of my bed. She has a new haircut and she probably needs a sweater. She rolls herself up in my comforter like a burrito. It is only near the end of my practice, when I am settling down into a ten minute meditation, when I hear her jump from the bed and run into the living room to find me. Then she climbs into my lap and curls up like a ball. Instead of counting through a mantra, I scratch the dog.

I call it puppy meditation and I think I’m on to something. Like, move over goat yoga. Puppy meditation is taking a seat.

There have been plenty of scientific studies describing the health benefits of caring for and owning a pet. One study gave a group of people a rabbit or a turtle or a stuffed toy that matched one of those two things and then measured anxiety levels. Anxiety levels were lower for people who were petting the live animal. Even if it was a turtle. A review paper submitted to BMC Psychiatry found the current pile of scientific papers out there regarding pet ownership and mental health to be accurate in showing that:

‘pets provide benefits to those with mental health conditions through the intensity of connectivity with their owners and the contribution they make to emotional support in times of crises together with their ability to help manage symptoms when they arise.’

Even if it is a turtle.

There are lots of meditation techniques. Walking. Candle gazing. Chanting. Mindfully petting a dog fits right in. It’s a really nice way to start out the day. Every one is happier. Me. Josephine. Albus not so much. He curls up on the bathroom floor and gives us the side eye. But I bet if you had a nicer cat, you could have kitty meditation. Even turtle meditation.

I am thankful for puppy meditation. I am thankful for my puppy.

P.S. I bought Josephine an advent calendar. Michael incredulously said “You bought the dog an advent calendar?!” Then I told him why I bought the dog an advent calendar. Every time I get us one, the candy is terrible and there’s lots of complaining about who has to open it and eat it. Josephine’s little nubby tail is going to wag so hard that it’s going to make her whole body wiggle with excitement every time we open a day on the advent. We could be opening garbage and she would do all of her tricks. If anybody is going to gain joy out of a daily advent calendar, it’s going to be Josephine.

MODERN LOVE

Instagram post by Cindy Maddera * Nov 9, 2018 at 5:50pm UTC

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My music selection has been all over the place lately. I go from a Kesha station in the mornings to Morrissey in the afternoons. Some times I toss in some Pomplamoose or broadway show tunes. Last week, it was David Bowie. Hours and hours of everything Bowie. Modern Love started playing and for the first time I noticed that David Bowie speaks at the beginning of that song. His speaking voice caught me off guard. I was suddenly struck by the sound of it and immediately regretted not having a chance to have a intimate conversation with David Bowie.

David Bowie died from the same thing Chris died from. Cancer of the liver. I know what Mr. Bowie’s last few days looked like. I think of his wife who had to witness his last few days. I think of a few other women who have had to witness those last few days of their own spouses. I want to squeeze all of them tight and just whisper “I know. I get it.” The image of how they looked in the last few days are never going to leave your brain. It will float to the surface of your memories at random. Michael’s drunk face does it for me. I guess, at least I know what he’s going to look like in his final days. Also the smell of Jason’s Organic henna shampoo does it. It’s a shame because I really liked that shampoo.

The scientist in me finds it fascinating how the soul of a person sort fills the organic spaces like balloons. As the soul shrinks, the body doesn’t get smaller. It gets more hollow. Sunken. The body gets more and more unrecognizable as the person you knew. There are machines that photograph the entire insides of the human body, but there’s yet to be an image of what one could interpret as a soul. Everything has a name and (mostly) a function. The large intestine, small intestine. Heart. Liver. Kidneys. I would be tempted to say the appendix could be the organ that holds the thing that makes you, you. I’ve never known a person who has had that removed to know if they’re different afterwards, but considering that the removal of an appendix is pretty standard procedure would have me ruling out particular organ. I don’t have my tonsils and I’m pretty sure I still have my soul.

Pretty sure.

There’s something there that doctors haven’t seen that keeps us inflated and whole. Something more than air. It is the thing that makes you who you are. I know exactly the moment when Chris was no longer Chris. The same thing with Dad. There’s a part of me that wishes I didn’t witness those moments when the balloons filling up the their organic spaces, started popping. Those popping balloons didn’t even make a sound. No warning, yet I knew it was coming.

I know when to go out and when to stay in. Get things done.

Is that what’s holding our souls steady and in place? Knowing when to stay in so we can get things done?

It’s time to change the station.

VETERANS DAY

The World War I Memorial and Museum starts their celebrations at least a week in advance. This year the building is lit with images of poppies. I’ve yet had an evening free where I could go and see it. It hits me every Veterans Day; every time I see social media fill up with photos and thank you notes. Veterans Day arrives and at first I view all of it from a distance. I don’t really remember Veterans Day being a big thing. The pastor during Sunday service might have given a sermon on soldiers and faith and then request that all military veterans stand for recognition. I don’t remember parades or fan fair though. Veterans Day was one of those holidays celebrated quietly with only a moment of gratitude taken before moving on with our day. Then I remember.

My Dad was a veteran.

It’s an easy thing to forget. My Dad’s time in the U.S. Air Force ended long before I came along. Randy is the only one of Dad’s children who was around during Dad’s service and I don’t know how much of that time he remembers. Dad never really mentioned his time in the military. He could go on and on about the camping and beauty of Michigan where he was stationed and how much he enjoyed living there. But he never mentioned anything about his actual time on base. The few things I know came from my mother. She talked only once about the tensions between the US and Russia during the Cuban missile crisis and how Dad was on call at the base. Russia was entering US airs space daily. It was a very tense time. Dad never spoke a word about it.

That was his way.

Dad would on very rare occasions impart snippets of the serious moments of his life. Years after doing so, Dad told me about riding on a charter bus with his fellow Union members to the Oklahoma State Capitol to protest the Right To Work amendment. I was so surprised by this story. I knew my Dad was proud of his Union and attended all of the meetings, but I had no idea of his actions. Dad would tell us stories of fishing and camping. He would talk about the mischief he would get into with my Uncle Russell. Yet he never talked about the serious moments. Not even towards the end. And when I think about it, Dad was not the only service member in our family to not really mention their time in service. Pepaw, a veteran of the second World War, would tell you a few details about his time spent in the South Pacific and only when prompted.

I overheard a story on the news of a veteran’s reaction to someone thanking him for his service. This man was gracious in his response but then gave some advice. He said instead of saying “thank you”, tell a veteran “I remember". It is more meaningful to be remembered. I am grateful for those who have the fortitude to serve this country in the military, but I also want to remember and never forget those who served. We forget that our veterans serve for only a certain amount of time before moving on and living ordinary lives. They move on, have careers and raise families. They retire and grow old. Instead of thanking a veteran, maybe we need to prompt a veteran to share their story.

To remember.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Instagram post by Cindy Maddera * Nov 9, 2018 at 5:50pm UTC

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I’m sitting in the library, typing this and it is currently snowing. It started yesterday around lunch time. I don’t know when it finally stopped last night, but we woke up to everything coated in a layer of frozen slush. The sun came out just enough today to melt that layer away and now it’s started snowing again. It is almost a fitting ending to this week. It is as if someone decided to throw everything at me this week just to see what I was made of. Well…I’m not made of fluff and sugar or things that are brittle. Je suis forte.

I stopped at a cemetery on the way to work this morning. It is one of our historic cemeteries that offer two for one plots on the same grounds as baseball legends Buck O’Neil and Satchel Page. It seems like a morbid thing to enjoy, but I love old historic cemeteries and this one has the most beautiful trees in the Fall. Sometimes a fog rolls in and lingers along the tombstones like a 1950s black and white horror flick. There’s a cathedral style crypt built into the side of a hill near the back that is hauntingly beautiful. Despite how I feel about cold weather, I can’t help but notice how beautiful the snow can be and I knew that the cemetery would be a perfect place to capture that beauty. The only regret I have is that I didn’t have my Nikon on me. The decision to stop was a spur of the moment choice and I hadn’t thought to pack that camera. In the end, though, it didn’t really matter what camera I had in my hand. Something sparked as I stepped out of my warm car into the cold cemetery. I thought “Oh…hey! I remember this feeling!” traipsing through the snow and taking pictures. As I left the cemetery, I noticed another car had followed me in. That person was now standing outside their vehicle with their camera maybe feeling that same spark.

I’m going to be just fine.

PEEK-A-BOO

Same but different

11 Likes, 0 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Same but different"

I’ve been reduced to tears of anger, frustration and fear three times this week and it’s only Wednesday. Part of it’s been the election. Part of it has to do with work stuff (the first rule of blog club is to never blog about work). Some of it has to do with holding onto things I need to say but I’m afraid to say because I’m a big chicken. A tiny bit of it is me just feeling sorry for myself. An even smaller bit of that is my disappointment over the ending of the most recent episode of the Walking Dead (WHY DO WE STILL WATCH THIS?!?!). There’s an 80% chance that it is going to snow here tomorrow and I’ve just about got a hole dug out for me to be burry my head in it.

I feel like all the good parts of me have dropped off the planet. My writing is sparse and full of complaints and gripes. My photos are forced and unimagined. My yoga classes are uninspired and meh. I feel like shutting down here until the end of the year. We saw our first Christmas themed advertisement last night and Michael and I both booed the TV. Michael has already started asking me about what I want to do for my birthday in January and I almost told him to just fuck off. I can’t plan that far ahead. I can’t really plan ten minutes ahead right now. We’re lucky that I make up the menu for the week on Thursdays. It’s the reason we have food for this week and meals I don’t have to think about. We’re spending Thanksgiving with friends at a cabin in the woods in California. In my head, I’m already eating an Ike’s sandwich and taking long walks in woods of tall trees. I’m photographing the fog that rolls into Tomales Bay and looking for giant slugs.

Maybe this is where I’ll find those missing good parts of myself.

I’m not giving up completely for the rest of the year. I’ll be around only because I know that writing here keeps me somewhat sane.