DAY 7: THE RISE AND FALL OF ZIGGY STARDUST AND THE SPIDERS FROM MARS

Shadow selfie

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Look, I could have plucked any and all of David Bowie’s albums for this album challenge. In forcing myself to narrow it down, I chose this one because I’m pretty sure this album was my first exposure to David Bowie. At some point while riding around in the back of Randy and Katrina’s van, while staring at the road through the rusted out hole in the floor in the back, Starman, Suffragette City and Lady Stardust floated into my ears. Good Gawd, I miss that raggedy old van and how we’d play a game of Spot and Identify the Road Carcass by sitting around that rusted out hole. Every once in a while, Katrina would look back to check on us and then yell “Scooch back from the hole! You’re too close!” We’d wiggle our little cross legged bodies back and widen our circle around the hole.

I am the kind of music listener who feels like the sound of the music is just as important as the lyrics. In fact, sometimes, the lyrics can be secondary and act as an enhancer to the sound. This is probably because off-key and out of tune notes cause me physical pain. Music makes me feel things inside my body. If the music is good, the feelings are good. I dragged Michael to a Gong Bath once. That’s where you lay on the floor in a dark room while someone plays a series of gongs. You can feel the sound vibrating through the floor. At times, the experience was very relaxing. Michael started snoring at one point. But then the drumming on the gongs grew louder and more intense. I felt my whole body tense up and my breathing became shallow. Tears leaked out my eyes. I was just about to get up and leave when they finally stopped and I breathed a sigh of deep relief. The sound was too much for my body to feel.

David Bowie’s music is enhanced by his lyrics. His music makes me feel, but his lyrics are significant. They are important.

Stone love, she kneels before the grave
A brave son, who gave his life
To save the slogans
That hovers between the headstone and her eyes
For they penetrate her grieving

This country has been involved in war since 2001. Those lyrics from Soul Love are just as relevant today as they were when Bowie recorded this song in 1972. I cannot listen to the beginning of that song without seeing my sister-in-laws face. The other night, Terry practically quoted Rock n Roll Suicide to me.

Oh no, love, you're not alone
You're watching yourself, but you're too unfair
You got your head all tangled up, but if I could only make you care
Oh no, love, you're not alone

David Bowie sang to us songs of self love before we even knew we needed them. He used sound to take us on imaginary journeys into space. Bands like the Flaming Lips and Arcade Fire would not exist as we know them now without the influence of David Bowie. The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders From Mars became the base line for the music I would gravitate to and seek out.

It is the music I want when I just want to lay on the floor and listen to the sounds and feel the vibrations.

YAYA MAGIC PANTS

Light catchers

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We gathered at the Yokalanda Lodge and Camp for Youth. The camp is nestled in the Yokalanda Woods. Established in 1957 by Earl and Rosie Feldstein, the camp has been a summer haven to underprivileged youth from all over the country. There are twenty cabins scattered through the hills and at the center of it all is the main lodge. The lodge is the beating heart of that camp. The main open room of the lodge is where all the campers gathered for meals and inside crafts. Depending on the weather, s’mores and stories were shared around the large fireplace that sat it one end of large room. In 1965, Earl died suddenly and unexpectedly from a heart attack. Finding herself unable to manage the camp, Rosie sold the camp and property to Billy and Ayleen Hershel.

Billy and Ayleen had originally planned to turn the camp into a commune. They had invited fifteen of their closest friends to join them in communal living, raising goats and growing their own vegetables. Ten of those friends agreed. That first year started off with the worst winter the area had ever seen with record snow fall and below freezing temperatures. The goats that didn’t freeze, were taken by wild animals. The hilly landscape proved to be too rocky for planting. The ten people who had agreed to join Billy and Ayleen all agreed now that communal living was not for them. Billy and Ayleen were forced to sell out to Carry and Diane McNabb. Carry and Diane turned the camp back into a summer camp for youth. After all this time, the two women still ran the camp, though in recent times and with less funding, the camp has seen better days. To make ends meet, Carry and Diane have opened up the Yokalanda Lodge in the off seasons to various retreats. Just last month an up and coming tech company rented the retreat for a managers training session. The Pakempsey Shakespearean Company rented out the camp for a whole month while they rehearsed their summer traveling program of King Lear. This weekend the Yokalanda Lodge was hosting a small group of artists for a weekend of workshops built around unlocking creativity.

The weekend consisted of various workshops of various themes such as How to Monetize Your Art, Authenticity and Integrity in Creativity , Conquering Your Fear of Success and Telling Your Story. There were trust falls and roll playing and vision board building. But the real breakthroughs happened outside of those workshops. In the evenings, after their communal vegan dinner, the artists would break off into smaller groups gathering around campfires and on cabin porches. There was always wine and the occasional passing of joint and they told each other their deep fears and they opened their souls to each other. It was in these moments that true cathartic release occurred. Tears flowed. Realizations were made. Plans were formed. Pacts were made. Bonds were formed. By the end of the weekend, as cars were being loaded up and cabins were being swept clean, the artists of that weekend retreat found themselves each quietly trying to process their experience from the past two days. Words were barely spoken until all were loaded up and ready to head out on their separate ways. They gathered to say their goodbyes. This was the moment that proved to be the most difficult of moments. They found themselves unprepared to say their farewells. They held each other tight as tears streamed down their faces. Then they got in their cars and headed out on their separate ways, fortified with their experience of this retreat and knowing that they would always have each others love and support.

That’s probably the best way to put into words what this weekend was like for me. I spent it at the Yokalanda Lodge. I have the bug bites to prove it.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Saturated

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I love you. I am listening

This is how my guided meditation app started as I sat down on my mat after a mediocre practice. I closed my eyes and heard Sarah Blondin’s soothing voice ask me when was the last time I was still and took time to say those words to myself.

I love you. I am listening

Never. I have never said those words to myself.

I don’t think I even know how to listen to myself, let alone tell myself that I love me. I guess I just assume that if I take a moment to listen to myself all I will hear is the chatter of self doubt that continuously plays on loop in my brain. Right now that loop is full of stuff about my photography and the actual contact I have for a place to do a showing. I haven’t even called them yet. The business card is just slowly burning a hole in my wallet. Every time I see it, I get a little electric shock and my heart misses two beats. Sending an email with a portfolio to the name on that card is just like flinging myself off a cliff. I don’t have enough good pieces to fill the space (probably not true). My photos are not good enough to put into the space (again, probably not true). Michael’s not going to like the photos that I want to use for the showing. Instead he’s going to pick the ones that are my least favorite because we have different eyes. I am not ready for this. I am not good enough for this. I am not enough for this. Dr. Mary gave me homework from our session this week where I have to choose eight of my photos for showing. And I’m freaking out over those eight photos. I can’t fling myself off of this cliff. I am not brave. I am not authentically living. I am not able to lean in.

I love you. I am listening

I am closing my eyes. In fact, let’s all take a moment to close our eyes. Place our hands on our hearts. Find the coolness of the breath as it hits the back of the throat on the inhale, following it into the lungs and then out as we exhale. Say the words out loud: “I love you. I am listening.”

Cindy, I love you. I am listening to all of those doubts and fears. I hear them and I am the voice that’s going to tell you that none of those things are true. You have photos that are good enough to hang in a local restaurant. You have enough images. You and Michael will disagree on some of those photos, but you will also agree on others. But you are right. By just standing on the cliff, you are not being brave. You are not living the authentic life that you know you can live. I am listening and I hear you and I’m telling you that you have all that you need to be brave. You are enough for all of this. Now open your eyes, spread your arms out wide and leap. There are safety nets to catch you.

But, if I listen long enough, before that loop can start up again, I can hear the faintest voice saying “I want this”. I want this.

Safety nets. There are safety nets.

DAY 6: NEKO CASE & HER BOYFRIENDS, FURNACE ROOM LULLABY

Cow

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My Dad was a country music listener. When I say ‘country music’, I’m talking about the old time country music. Grand Ole Opry country. Roy Rogers and Dale Evens country. Saturday nights were for Mom’s homemade pizza and Hee-Haw. The day he found the classic country radio station on Sirius XM, he called me to tell me all about it because he was overjoyed that this station existed. Once, well before we knew he was sick, I took Dad to see Riders in the Sky at the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum. You might recognize their voices from Toy Story 2 where they performed “Woody’s Round-up”. Dad was so happy to be at this concert that it leaked out of his eyes. He was the one that gave me my appreciation for good country music. He taught me all about Patsy and Loretta and Johnny and Willie. He introduced me to Minnie Pearl and cowboy campfire songs. I had an appreciation for Dad’s music, but I did not care to listen to it. It just wasn’t my go-to choice of music, particularly in my youth. There’s nothing more embarrassing or annoying than your parents’ music when you are that age.

I came across Furnace Room Lullaby the year Chris died. It’s an album of Neko Case singing twangy country songs, each one resonating in some way with my state of mind. Every word in South Dakota Way could have been written by me in the days after Chris’s passing. I felt all the aching truth of grief in that song. Then I had to have Hooper put down and Set Out Running moved to the top of my anthem list.

And if I knew heartbreak was coming, I would've set out running. Past the city houses
And the ditches on the highway.

This album stuck with me as I entered the crazy world of online dating (Guided by Wire) and into the early days of my relationship with Michael (Twist the Knife). And I am always in the Mood to Burn Bridges.

So if you have moral advice, I suggest you just tuck it all away

This album didn’t just open me up to all things Neko Case, it opened my ears to that music my Dad loved so much. My appreciation for that genre has moved beyond mere appreciation. I now tuck a few songs into a playlist and seek out new artists with that old sound, artists like Margo Price and Yola and even Kacey Musgraves. I listen to this music and I think about my Dad’s western style shirts with the pearl snaps and his bolo ties. I think about how Dad had cowboy boots that he called “work boots” and a fancy pair of cowboy boots that he called his “dress boots”. The same was true for his cowboy hats. He had one for riding his tractor and one for fancy occasions. He had a way of getting as close as he could to things he wanted to do in life. He wanted to be a pilot and when he failed the physical to become one, he became an airplane mechanic. Those cowboy clothes and his music and his red tractor were Dad’s way of being the cowboy.

And I feel like I finally understand that.

RETURN

There's a story here.

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We’d planned to take a bunch of stuff out to Michael’s Mom’s for the neighborhood garage sale on Saturday. The two of us spent the week sorting through the remaining collectables in the basement. Michael sorted through boxes and boxes of baseball cards. But when Friday morning rolled around, the weather report was predicting rain for all of Saturday. Michael called his Mom and cancelled. He went ahead and did the grocery shopping on his way home from work on Friday. So Saturday turned into one of those days where we didn’t really know what to do with ourselves. Saturday was our usual day for errands and now we had no errands to run.

We went and got pedicures.

We headed over to the Westside neighborhood for lunch at a place we’d never been to before. Then we dashed across the street to a little shop selling Kansas City made t-shirts and antique jewelry. From there, we made our way over to the crepe place for dessert and ran into Kelli and her Groove Crew. As we sat, sharing a dessert crepe, we discussed what to do next. I said “why don’t we go down to the River Market Antique?” We hadn’t been down there in ages. In fact, I’m pretty sure I hadn’t been back there since the last time Michael took me there about six years ago. Michael agreed that four stories of antique perusing was a great way to spend a rainy Saturday.

Michael doesn’t remember this, but this is where he took me at the end of our second date. The night before, we had had dinner at nice little farm to table place and then ice cream in Westport. Afterward, Michael took me to the observatory that sits on top of the Physics building at UMKC. He took me to see the stars. Then we laid on a blanket in my backyard, drinking wine and talking until two in the morning. He stayed the night and the next morning, he followed me around on my errands. Then he took me to River Market. That’s where I was when Chad called me to ask how my date with Michael had gone. I remember pulling the phone away from my ear as he laughed after I said “we’re still on the date.” Michael bought a giant wall map that day and I left with two prints, one a map of New York City and the other a map of the U.S. Those prints are framed and hanging in my bedroom. I sometimes look for my favorite spots in New York City and trace the length of Broadway as far up as I can. The map stops before I can get to Talaura’s house.

There is a booth at the antique market filled with bins of things like name patches pulled from uniform shirts and California Raisin figures. One bin is filled with scrabble letters and another filled with random game pieces. For a minute, I got lost going through the bin of name patches. I found a ‘Mike’ and a ‘Randy’ and a ‘Stephanie’. I put them all back in the bin and moved on but not before noticing that someone had taken game pieces and spelled out ‘2nd DATE’ and left it on a shelf in the booth. I smiled and thought briefly that maybe Michael had left that there. I asked him about it later and he confessed to not remembering that we’d gone to the River Market Antique that time. The message had been left by someone else. Someone on their second date. I guess rummaging around through booths of antiques and collectibles is a second date kind of thing to do.

I hope their second date was nice.

DAY 5: BELLY, STAR

Instagram post by Cindy Maddera * May 15, 2019 at 4:32pm UTC

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The truth is, I could write and write about albums that influenced me or that are linked to my memories. Soundtracks to life. Chris and I would spend hours listening to one CD on repeat. A few months would go by before we’d change it and move onto something new and different. I think there was a good solid three months where we listened to the soundtrack to Chess. I sang along with Elaine Page with a dream of maybe, just maybe, getting the chance to play the part of Florence. Chris and I would discuss set designs and lighting. We’d break down the production of this musical as if we were actually going to be a part of putting it all together for the public. Other times, we’d lay spooning while listening to Les Miserables, weeping together at the beautiful sadness of it all.

For a while we were obsessed with Mercury Falling, an album released by Sting our junior year in college. Our copy of In My Tribe by the Ten Thousand Maniacs was the rare copy that included their remake of Cat Stevens’ Peace Train and Chris and I both would ooh-awe-ee with Natalie as we drove down country lanes. We were constantly latching on to musical artists. While Chris was introducing me to artists like Pink Floyd, I was introducing him to the Flaming Lips. I would discover a new artist and write it down on a sticky note for Chris to find. Months later he’d start playing a CD and say “hey, I found this new band I thought you’d like.” I’d punch him the arm and tell him that I pointed that band out to him months ago. Then we’d laugh. Chris was the one to introduce me to Belly. He had their album, Star. I ended up finding every one of their albums in the used CD bin at Hasting’s. But Chris just didn’t give me this band, he gave me a key.

Chris and Traci were best friends. Best. Friends. I came along and I was an outsider. Though Traci never ever treated me like an outsider, I still felt like I was intruding on that relationship. I doubt to this day that Traci had any idea how intimidated I was by her. I thought she was so cool. I still think that. Her relationship with Chris was so important and vital for the two of them. I didn’t want to mess it up. I didn’t want to be the girlfriend that Chris would bring over that would make Traci roll her eyes in annoyance. Knowing and loving all the songs from that band was my in with Traci. I remember one time the four of us, Chris, me, Traci and her boyfriend Chris (now husband), drove to Dallas for a concert. Traci and I were in the backseat and the guys were in the front, flipping through radio stations. The radio tuned into a station that was playing Feed the Tree by Belly. Traci and I screamed from the back seat “LEAVE IT THERE!” and then proceeded to sing along and bounce around in the backseat of the car. Traci would end up being my concert buddy for concerts when Chris wasn’t interested in going. Belly was the band that started that.

At least it was for me.

DAY 4: DORIS DAY AND HOWARD KEEL, CALAMITY JANE

Day four of the album challenge coincided with the passing of Doris Day at the age of 97. I was bound to pick something by Doris Day and Calamity Jane trumped the soundtrack to Please Don’t Eat the Daisies. It was a close call. I went with Calamity Jane because it has one of my favorite actresses playing one of my favorite Historical women in a musical. It’s a trifecta of greatness.

In the summer, you're the winter, In the finger, you're the splinter. In the banquet, you're the stew, Say, I c'n do without you!

I mean, seriously.

My mom was the person to introduce me to the wonderful world of musicals. I don’t know if it was PBS or some other random channel, but Saturday and Sunday afternoons they would play old movies and musicals and I would soak them up. It was not uncommon to hear Mom belt out some random line from a musical or have the dial set in her car radio to the station that played classics. I had a very diverse musical education. This is one of the reasons why you can flip to just about any station and I will be able to sing along to the song. It’s a weird trick. Stephanie, my best friend from high school, said once that I was basically a radio.

I didn’t have access to cable channels until college, unless I was at my brothers. At his house, it was MTV all the time. Once I had my own TV with cable, I flipped between Turner Classics and AMC. Sometimes one channel would do movies with one certain actor all day. There’d be Carrie Grant day or Rock Hudson or Betty Davis movies playing all freaking day. It was awesome. My favorite days were when they played Doris Day movies all day long. I would watch them all from Lullaby of Broadway to April in Paris to The Man Who Knew Too Much to Please Don’t Eat The Daisies. She was simply lovely. She was pretty, but attainable. Serious, yet funny. Doris Day was just a joy to see on screen. I wanted to sing like Doris Day. I wanted to be as charming and graceful as Doris Day. Then you have Doris Day as Calamity Jane. I know the musical is not a true representation of history. It is historical fiction. Calamity Jane doesn’t fit the gender norms of that time. She dresses like a man, drinks and swears like a man. She shoots a gun better than most men. Calamity Jane is a feminist! She’s a woman living her life on her terms. At the same time, she just wants want we all want. She wants to be desired. She wants to be loved. She wants to be loved and desired for who she is. We’re all a little bit Calamity Jane.

To say that Doris Day will be missed is incorrect. The truth is, Mrs. Day has been out of the public eye for quite some time, well before her passing. We’ve been missing Doris Day for a while. Hearing the news of her passing at age 97 just makes me marvel at a life well-lived. She lived her life on her terms. Just like Calamity Jane.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Aphididae

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I’m taking a break from explaining my album choices to talk or think about gratitude. Every week I sit down and write these entries and sometimes it feels like I am on autopilot. I am just going through the motions and churning out words in hopes that it reflects something about being grateful. The practice of gratitude becomes stale. Just like any practice. There are times when I step on my yoga mat because getting on the mat is part of the practice, but once I’m there, I am not always inspired to do anything. That’s why going to yoga classes and reading up on the latest Yoga Journal news is important. It helps me breathe new life into my practice when it feels like it’s gotten stagnant.

What classes do I attend or magazines do I flip through to breathe new life into a gratitude practice?

It is not in the daily news.

My nightly prayers as a child tended to be a long rolling list of all the people and things I was thankful for that day.

Dear God,

Thank you for my mom and dad and our dogs Bitsy and Bulldozer. Thank you for Janel. Thank you for not letting the goldfish die today. Thank you for my teacher, Mrs… and thank you for my best friend Jamie. Thank you for the chocolate chip cookies.

Amen

I remember the lessons taught in Sunday school about asking God for things, so I made a very strong conscious effort to not ask God for anything. Now that I think about it, not asking God for anything came pretty easy. I am and have always been stubborn and unwilling to ask for help. I do not say nightly prayers anymore for reasons I have discussed before, but sometimes reflecting on the simple is a good way to breathe new life into a stale practice. As opposed to the the deep meaning kind of gratitude that I often try to post about here.

This week, a very easy simple thing that I can be grateful for is the sunshine. We have had a whole week of bright blue skies and warmer temperatures. Every day has been a scooter day. Every morning, I have taken a short walk outside before going in for my cup of coffee. I am thankful for this weather that is thawing my soul and bringing joy to my heart. I am thankful for my Mom, my brother and sister-in-law, and my family. I am thankful for Michael and my group of chosen family. I am thankful for Josephine and I am even thankful for that darn cat, Albus. I am thankful for the bounty of eggs from the chickens and the calming presence they bring to our backyard.

I am thankful for fresh strawberries with whipped cream.

DAY 3: STING, FIELDS OF GOLD

I was almost twenty years old when I finally lost my virginity. ‘Lost’ is a funny way to phrase that. Gave away, willingly let go of, out grew, donated. Let’s go with willingly and enthusiastically let go of my virginity. Letting go of my virginity in the back of a car with some high school boy just wasn’t an option for me. I was not desirable to high school boys. Mom brought some of my senior year pictures on her last visit. Michael was looking through them and said “Oh…you’d have been in trouble if we’d gone to the same school. I’d be all over this.” I just quietly nodded my head, but what I wanted to say was “not true.” I knew guys like him in high school and they’d be interested for about two minutes until I opened my mouth and said something truthful and honest. So while all my high school girlfriends were having sex or had had sex, I was reading books about sex.

And promoting condom use.

Then in college, I met Chris. Five years older and experienced. He’d lived a life before committing to college. And he was not enthused about being my first sexual partner. Virgins are work. There’s all these preconceived notions of what that first time will be like. Will it hurt? Will I get pregnant? Should it be super special with roses and candles and a fancy hotel room? Chris was unwilling to cause me any pain. So I willingly gave away my virginity in stages until one day, it just happened. In every one of those stages, Sting’s Fields of Gold was playing in the background. I hear any song from that album and I’m immediately transported to Chris’s dorm room. We’re laying on his twin bed, made up with his original Star Wars sheets The room is dark with just the tiniest amount of light peeking in through the window blinds. Sometimes we’re talking. Sometimes we’re silent. Sometimes we’re even laughing. That album would be playing the first time we said “I love you” to each other.

I remember one evening around the fire pit at Misti’s old house. Losing virginity stories were going around the campfire. When I told my story everyone just sort of shook their heads and Misti said something like “well done, Chris.” I recognize that my first time was not a typical first time experience for most women. I recognize that the relationship I had in general with Chris was not typical. Fortunate. I have been fortunate.

I never made promises lightly and there have been some that I've broken
But I swear in the days still left we'll walk in fields of gold
We'll walk in fields of gold

For a while, not long enough, but for longer than I should hope for, we walked in fields of gold.

DAY 2: NEIL DIAMOND, THE JAZZ SINGER

Prairie flowers

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Erica Mullin was probably one of my best friends when I was in elementary school. Her grandparents were close family friends. I suppose these people were my parents’ version of framily. Rena and Don helped take care of me when I was a super tiny baby. Don worked for Meadow Gold Dairy and brought us milk and ice cream all the time. My Mom likes to tell a story about when she was in the hospital, recovering after my traumatic entry to this world. She received a huge, beautiful bouquet of flowers. All of the nurses oohed and awed. When my mom read the card she laughed and said “it’s from my milk man.” Which every one thought was funny. Rena and Don were like surrogate grandparents. Erica, their granddaughter, was the closest thing to a cousin that I had nearby.

For a while, Rena and Don’s daughter and granddaughter lived in a house on the hill just above Rena and Don. Erica practically lived at our house because my mom would end up taking care of all of us during the day while Erica’s mom was at work. We went every where together. Roller skating, movies, bike rides. Erica had the best toys. She had the Darth Vader case holding all of the Star Wars figures and Hungry Hippo. We traded plastic charms and played dress up with Katrina’s old disco clothes. Our families camped together on what seemed like every weekend. We would take over the RV section of Walnut Grove campground on Keystone Lake with potluck meals and hikes down to the lake to swim. We would spend forever watching a giant ant colony near the playground and hours swinging as high as we possibly could go on the playground swings. That playground had a great big metal swing set. I can still hear Rena warning me that I’d gone high enough and to take it down a notch.

Sometimes we’d all ride to the lake in Erica’s mom’s car. Me, Erica, and Janel, all crammed into the front seat of her mom’s El Camino. At least, I think it was an El Camino. Was there another model of car that looked like an El Camino? I don’t know, but we’d pack ourselves into that car with the windows rolled down because the air conditioning didn’t work and the radio blaring. The air conditioning may have been on the fritz, but the eight track worked just fine. I remember flying down back country roads with the wind blowing our hair all around and all of us singing at the top of our lungs to Neil Diamond’s Coming to America. We were practically glued together from heat and sweat. I can still feel Janel’s prickly leg hairs scratching the side of my right leg. I’ve memorized the motion of pulling hair free from my face as the wind forever twisted my long hair across my cheeks and eyes and mouth. “TODAY!” we’d all shout together.

Erica and her mom moved to Tulsa while I was still in elementary school. Tulsa wasn’t really that far away but the distance and her being a year older changed us from best friends to acquaintances. We drifted apart. Don retired from Meadow Gold and he and Rena upgraded their camper. They spent the rest of his life traveling south during the winter and when Rena settled down in Oklahoma City after Don passed away, the distance changed her relationship with my mom. They sort of drifted apart as well. Any time I hear Neil Diamond singing though, I remember that space in our time line when we were all together, before the great drift.

DAY 1: THE CURE, DISINTEGRATION

Curtsy

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Somewhere around my sophomore/ junior year in high school, I discovered the band The Cure. They released the album in 1989, but it would take two years for any of it to reach my ears. That was the way of small towns. We were always behind. Movies hit the one-screen theater on Main street about a year after release. The latest fashion and trends hit us two or three years later than they did in big city areas. Music was no different. It didn’t help that I lived in a radio void. None of the local stations played the music I wanted to listen too. Late on Saturday nights, if the skies were clear and the wind was blowing at just the right speeds, I could pick up an hour or two of a college station that would play indie/alternative music. In those brief two hours, I learned about punk bands like the Police and the Ramones. I learned about another famous Elvis and the Flaming Lips. The Talking Heads and the Pixies and Echo and Bunnymen were frequently played and I soaked it all up.

A friend introduced me to the Cure. She handed me Disintegration and I took it home and copied it. God, remember coping tapes and CDs? Or recording radio stations? I did all of those things. I played that album over and over and over. I listened to that album so much that I was able to mimic a British accent. That new trick got me an important role in a short play we were doing that year. If you were to ask me now why on earth this was the only album I listened too for months and months, I could not really tell you why. Something about that music just hit a target with my teenage soul. The music alone just felt big to me, meaningful, important. It was that time in my life when I was young and ridiculous and believed I could be just like Molly Ringwald in any John Hughes movie. I wanted to be cool and wise and different, but I wanted to be just like everyone else too. If I’m honest? I still want all of those things. Pictures of You can still feel like tiny needles poking my heart, more so now then in my youth. Funny how the songs we love morph in meaning as we age.

Steven tagged me in a Facebook game to post a top ten album for ten days. When I posted my choice for Day 1, my friend Sarah commented on how she wished these games came with an explanation. Why this album, Cindy? This game isn’t easy for me. I don’t listen to music this way, albums at a time. Usually I listen to an artist, not a particular album. My current addictions are Lizzo, Yola, and Neko Case because we just saw her in concert and it was the best show I’ve seen in ages. I can’t get enough of her music right now. Andrew Bird has been playing frequently in my playlist, along with Father John Misty and Arcade Fire. The National. The soundtrack to Hamilton because I’m resigned to the fact that I will probably never get a chance to see this musical. Morrissey. Courtney Barnett. The First Aid Kit. My music is all over the place. My musical taste is undefinable. So when asked to pick my top ten albums, I struggle. I started choosing albums for their nostalgic value. Specific memories are tied to these albums and this album triggers memories of me driving along back roads to get to this or that. It reminds me of those times I felt lonely and isolated.

It was the album of my teenage angst.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Yellow

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Our scale is broken. I stepped on it Thursday morning and got blank results. I weigh nothing. I haven’t stepped on a scale in some time, but thought it would be a good idea to not be surprised by the scale at the doctor’s office when I go in for my yearly next week. So when the scale reads way more than nothing at the doctor’s office, I will act outraged and insist that their scale needs recalibrating. I like this current feeling of weighing nothing. Truth be told, I’ve been feeling pretty okay in this body. I eat healthy. I exercise daily. I spend about an hour every day on my yoga mat. I drink lots of water. And I’ve been listening to a whole lot of Lizzo.

I am completely and totally inspired by this woman and she is just one on my list of woman to look up too. ‘Look up too’ seems like an odd way to phrase it considering that most of these women on my list are a number of years younger than I am. They all have a similar message of self love and beauty at all sizes. I listen to their message and wonder what kind of woman I’d be today if these women had been there when I was a teen. I grew up looking at the impossible standards for girls on the cover of Seventeen and the chunky girl was always the sidekick for the main actress in the sitcoms. Health did not matter. Feeling fit and healthy was not up for discussion. There was an expectation of perfection without completely relying on a food disorder to achieve that perfection. Really, it was best if you were just born that way. If you could not be born thin and perfect then you would be placed in a lesser human category. Now we’re starting to see all shapes, sizes and colors for our clothing ads and magazine covers and leading ladies. There are discussions on exercise and eating whole and real foods. Diets are a thing of the past. Now we have lifestyle changes with an emphasis on healthy. And all I can do is sit back and think about how fucking empowering it’s got to be for a young girl to see and hear these messages.

But it is not too late for me to embrace this message, to feel empowered by these images and words of self love. I am learning the lesson of standing in front of the mirror and telling that person I see that she is beautiful. She is sexy. She is strong. She makes her own standards and blows them completely away. She is no sidekick. She’s the leading lady, the boss, the leader, the head hancho. I’m still getting used to the idea of telling that person in the mirror that we are the same. She is me.

But I’m getting there.

THAT TIME I GOT REALLY HIGH AND TOLD THE TRUTH

Instagram post by Cindy Maddera * May 8, 2019 at 1:25pm UTC

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My friend Michelle, who is also childless, asked me what it was like to be a step-mom. She posed this question after I’d eaten a quarter of the most potent marijuana laced cookie. That one cookie ruined four adults. I was trying to keep up with our game of Exploding Kittens while trying to focus on the words Michelle was saying to me. I don’t know what I said but I have a sinking suspicion that I told her the truth about my role as a step-mom. I’m not so certain that my truth about my role is all that flattering or positive and I feel a little embarrassed for what may or may not have fallen out of my mouth that evening.

I think there is some illusion that I am doing any actual parenting now that there is a child in my life. I’m sure that this might be true for other step-parents, that they take an active role in parenting, but that is not how it works in this relationship. The term ‘step-mom’ is purely a descriptive term that the Cabbage uses to explain who this woman is that her dad lives with. I do not discipline. I do not shop for. I do not attend PTA meetings. I do not stay home for sick days. I do not make her lunches. She comes over, plays with her toys or watches YouTube and sometimes we all go to Science City or something. I might suggest a book or a piece of fruit but only rarely because 99% of all of my suggestions are met with disdain and skepticism. I am the person to whom the Cabbage asks “where’s my dad?” when she walks out of her room wanting something. Occasionally she will ask me for something, but then she always waits to ask her dad the same question because she never likes the answer I give her. Her dad most of the time will give her the opposite answer to what I gave her. So, yeah, she’s eating candy at 9 PM.

And I don’t care.

When Michael told me that he had a three year old daughter on our first date, I didn’t think “Oh sweet! I finally get a chance to ‘play mommy’!” What I did do was nod my head and say “that’s nice.” without any thought about what that would mean for me or us as a couple. I did not enter the relationship with any idea of being a pretend weekend parent or finally getting a chance at motherhood even if that was a part time opportunity. Outside forces might want to contradict me here and push for that parental connection, but it just does not exist. At least not in this relationship. I know many a blended family where all four parents actually do the parenting. I’m just saying that it does not apply here. Maybe because I never had any delusions of motherhood. In fact, I am almost resentful when I am given a knowing look that comes with a nod followed up with words that refer to some inferred motherly instinct on my part. Particularly when I have just done something that any adult would do for a small child. Like grab that thing down from a tall shelf or open that packet of crackers. I’m never opening packages for others because I can barely open them for myself, but you get the idea.

This Mother’s Day, I will send out cards to the women in my life who raised me. They did actual parenting and chose to be mothers. I am awed by any woman that chooses to be a mother, but I’m impressed by any woman who chooses not to be a mother. Mostly because society just doesn’t understand this choice. We’ve been programmed to think that having babies is the thing we’re supposed to do and stepping away from that programming can be isolating and cruel. Those who are fully devoted to the programming may think that I will regret not having children or experiencing parenthood. Maybe I will; I don’t know. I know that I don’t have any regrets right now. I also know that if I do have regrets later on, that it’s nobody’s problem but my own.

You do you.

GOOD RELATIONSHIPS

Cow

Nine hundred and ninety eight miles. That’s the number of miles to get from Kansas City, MO to Oklahoma City, OK and then to Weatherford, OK and then to Duncan, OK and then to Norman, OK and then back to Kansas City, MO. And it was miles worth traveled. So much of my drive took me down two-lane highways with little signs of civilization for miles and miles. There was very little traffic and often, it seemed like it was just me, the prairie and the cows. If I felt like pulling off the road to take a picture, I just did it. I didn’t let myself worry about the delay it might cause and since I was all alone, I didn’t think about inconveniencing the driver with my request to stop. When I wasn’t stopping to take pictures of the vast landscape of nothing, I was building stories in my head. At one point I even thought up my own stand-up comedy act.

I met Stephanie for breakfast one morning and got all caught up on her life. I got to squeeze Robin’s new grand baby. I soaked in a hot tub. I ate hipster street tacos with Traci, Chris and Quinn (who is more obnoxious now than ever) and we laughed and laughed. I attended a college graduation at a small rural Oklahoma College where I listened to a speech that both surprised me and gave me hope. The young man spoke about his white male privilege and how he intends to use that privilege for social justice. He told his fellow graduates that it was not enough to have conversations on race, but to be active in the fight against racism. No one booed him off the stage, but applauded and cheered and I thought “maybe we’re going to be okay.” Maybe. I sat on the couch in Amy’s library office while she spilled her guts on the last few months of her crazy busy stressful life. I drank too much wine while sitting on Misti’s porch talking about ways to help college graduates prepare for all the possibilities available to them after undergrad. I told Mark something that I have not told anyone. He’s the only person right now who can hold me accountable.

As I made the long drive home on Sunday, I caught the tale end of the TED Radio Hour on NPR. Dr. Robert Waldinger was talking about what makes a meaningful life. Dr. Waldinger is the director of the Harvard Study of Adult Development. His team and his predecessors have been tracking the health and lives of 724 men for 75 years. Actually the study has now moved on to the children of these men. It is the longest running study of its kind. One thing that has been made very clear from this study is the answer to the question of what makes a meaningful life and the answer is simple: “good relationships keep us happy and healthy.” Those relationships are not confined to marital relationships. Just having people in your life who you could count on in times of need, laugh with, cry with, is enough. These relationships keep us happy and healthy. It’s been proven by science that we need each other.

Yet, relationships for me can be difficult. I have always spent so much time alone, as a child, as a teen, in my adult life. I have to push myself to be in the presence of people, but I have never once regretted that push. Mostly because I feel like I’ve nurtured the best relationships with the best people. I am happier and healthier today for the weekend spent listening and laughing and commiserating and just being present in the company of all of them. Maybe Michael’s right about me and his prediction that I’m going to live to well past 100. Those good relationships will hopefully out weigh the bad genes and I’ll be the 90something old lady, doing yoga and zipping around town on a Vespa.

A FEW DAYS EARLY

Casualty

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 The open road calls, for a number of reasons, but in this case it’s for a graduation. I’m disappearing for a few days, so I thought I’d post something on gratitude a little earlier than usual. The other day I ended my yoga practice with a guided meditation. I had never used this feature of my meditation bells app before and I chose something based on the length of time I had. The title was “Practicing Gentle Kindness Toward Ourself” by Sarah Blondin. She starts off by telling us “I know the dark calls to you sometimes, that you turn your face from the light.” and with that first sentence, I knew I was going to hear somethings that would create great emotion within. 

“I know it hurts to live in the disconnect between what you are currently experiencing and what you wish you could be.” 

”I know you work so hard to control the outcome of your life, that you forget to breathe sometimes. That you live in the shallow end, t you forget to go deep, breathe deep.” 

”I know you live there in the tear between these two worlds, between the dark and the light, between trust and distrust, between love and hatred, between acceptance and resistance, between control and faith, between sun soaked mornings and dark forests.” 

I heard these words and thought “Fuck...how does she know?!?”  Well, she knows because so many of us live in the space between. I might as well set up a hammock in that space, I spend so much time there. I am also struck by the balance required to live between worlds. I can accept my body as it is now, but I can still be resistant to it and want for improvement. I can be in complete control of my actions, but I still have to have a little faith that those actions will have good consequences. The thing I am constantly working on is not falling over into the side that is all dark. I don’t want to get stuck there. I don’t want to be trapped there. I fear that if I even allow myself to be present on that side for any amount of time, I will remain there forever in the dark. I have convinced myself that this would be catastrophic.

”You are human my dear one, my dearest love, you are human. You are allowed to be in both ways.” 

The truth is, I enjoy dark forests just as much as I do sun soaked mornings. I am grateful for the reminder that I am human. Flawed, imperfect, beautifully human. 

CRAVINGS

Love

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I woke with a start in the early morning hours to the loud crackling booms of thunder and listened for the rain. I don’t know if I will ever get used to it, the way the thunder crackles, like breaking wooden bats. Thirty something years of hearing the thunder roll in over the prairies and pastures tuned my ears like tuning forks. It became a lullaby even though I knew that thunderstorms could change quickly into a tornado. There were no flashes of light to warn of this cracking thunder. That’s different too. Spring thunderstorms are usually accompanied with fantastical displays of electricity. Here, not so much. The lightening is subtle. I closed my eyes and drifted back to sleep only to jolt awake at the next crack of thunder. This is how I would spend the next few hours before sunrise, sleeping fitfully between breaking baseball bats.

Sometimes I get cravings. Not for food. Though I do think fondly about Indian tacos on occasion. It’s just a very rare moment when I think obsessively about a certain food and think “I HAVE TO HAVE some cheese!” I tend to crave moments and landscapes. I want to be in other places, fully immersed. It could be standing on a thick bed of pine needles in the middle of a forest, surrounded by pine trees so tall that it makes me dizzy to look up. Sometimes I think that if I don’t feel sand squishing between my toes and the crisp damp wind hitting me from the ocean that I will shrivel up and disappear into nothing. Sometimes I am surprised how much I crave open rolling fields with tall prairie grass bent from the wind. I think about all of those times I carved out a shelter in the tall grass and would spend the day huddled there sitting on an old quilt. I would have a stack of books, a jar of water and a kite that I would get going so high up in the sky, I was almost certain it was in danger of colliding with an airplane.

I never expected to crave the landscape of the places where I grew up, where I lived for thirty five years. The monotony of prairie and urban sprawl and trees that lean to the east sounds like something I have seen enough of. Except, there is something to that not quite flat land that sort of slows the beating of my heart. I feel my thoughts roll out and float away on the winds. Traveling down the highway, there will be nothing but the land stretched out for miles and for a moment you can pretend to be the only person on the planet. I crave these moments of isolation and solitude provided by the vastness of this landscape. Right now, I’m craving warmth and sunshine. Dry cracked red dirt. Bare feet on a warm back patio. Tracing lines of condensation running down a cold beer bottle. A thunderstorm I can see coming from miles away.

Right now, I am craving a road trip.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Point

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Not too long ago, I came across a musician that I thought Michael would really like, so I sent him a link to her music. It’s Margo Price if you’re interested. She sounds like a young Loretta Lynn. Any way, I sent him a song or two and Michael was happy. Later, he asked me how I found out about Margo Price. I told him that sometimes, I just scroll through the new release section in Amazon Music and randomly pick a new album to listen to. Michael was shocked and exclaimed “That’s so brave!” I gave him a side eye and completely disagreed. “What if you don’t like it?” he argued. I shrugged and said “then I turn it off.” I think we have different definitions for ‘brave’.’

I recently watched Brene Brown’s Netflix special on bravery and vulnerability. There have been so many times in my life where I have been brave without ever even considering my vulnerability. I’ve thought nothing of the failure or the criticism to follow. I’ve just leaped right out of trees without considering broken bones. I will move quietly and slowely as close as I can to the buffalo for a picture without considering for a minute that I cannot out run him (get in the car, Cindy). I know that you can’t be brave without being vulnerable. I just, so often, ignored that part or avoided acts of bravery that required too much vulnerability.

My True Acts of Bravery

• Graduate school

• Getting back on my yoga mat after Jay died

• Becoming a yoga teacher

• Applying for a job I didn’t think I was smart enough for

• Moving

• Entering the world after Chris died

• Online dating

• My relationship with Michael

• Saying goodbye to Dad in my own way

• Making an appointment to see a therapist

• Any time I let someone see me ugly cry because I’ve been hit hard by a grief wave

I’m sure there are more moments I could add to that list, but the ones listed above are moments that I remember the vulnerable parts more than the act of bravery. They are moments where I’ve truly been terrified of the failure and the criticism. They are moments where I have questioned myself the most. Oh lordy, have there been failures but so many lessons learned. After watching the Brene Brown special, I started thinking about how it’s been a while since I’ve done something truly brave, something that’s required me to lay myself open and exposed. Randomly choosing a new album from an artist I’ve never heard of does not count as something that requires any of those things.

Maybe it’s time to take another leap.

FOR THE ART

Rain drops on tulips

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I stepped out the front door this morning to head to work and noticed that the tulips I had planted were looking particularly lovely all covered in raindrops. I set my yoga mat and my lunch bag down on the porch and swung my backpack around to fish out my phone. Then I walked around to be in front of the house and I started taking pictures. I was in full on photoshoot mode when I noticed that someone’s car alarm was going off. Then I realized that the annoying alarm sound was not a car alarm. It was my house. I had set the house alarm as I was leaving but then I never actually shut the front door. I hadn’t even attempted to shut that door. It was just standing there, wide open. I jumped up and ran inside the house and disarmed the system before someone could call me or the cops or both.

You have a minute after setting the alarm to get out of the house and shut the door. This is usually not a problem for me. In fact, there have been times when I have shut the door and realized I had forgotten something. I have unlocked the door, gotten back inside, grabbed forgotten thing and gotten back out again before my minute was up. This morning, I didn’t even think about it. I just dropped everything and went into photography mode. I guess it was a good thing I wasn’t also carrying a baby or a Faberge egg. I let myself become distracted. The key word is ‘let’. We hear so much about how the average person is always distracted, mostly by their phone. There’s checking emails, catching up on Facebook, reading the latest tweet and scrolling through Instagram. Rinse and repeat to see if anyone’s noticed your post or added something new. One minute, you’re writing up some report for work and then next minute you’re watching kitten videos. These distractions not only keep us from doing the things we are supposed to be doing, but also from the things we are meant to be doing.

Here is what I hear when I think about this story: I was distracted by the beauty of tulips and I had to photograph them. The reality is I was distracted from the beauty of these tulips by the alarm ringing away inside my house. The process of making sure the front door was closed was the distraction that pulled me away from the thing I was meant to be doing. Rewiring the brain to think this way is hard. There are times when I am pausing to take a picture or editing a photo when I have to pull my focus away from someone who demands attention. I try to be polite about it and try to be sneaky while I am doing those things so that it looks like I’m working at paying attention to the person who is talking at me (because usually that’s how it goes). So often I feel bad about this and the result is that I end up not taking the picture I wanted or editing the photo the way I wanted. This is so stupid because this photography thing (and this is really not easy for me to admit) is who I am. Taking photos and all the stuff that goes along with this art is the thing I meant to be doing.

Everything else is the distraction.

NO DOGS WERE HARMED IN THE MAKING OF THIS MOVIE

When you lose your shit at the vet clinic, they hand you the whole box of tissues. Josephine is getting X-Rayed. Waiting on some news.

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When I got home from work on Friday, Josephine was still not better. She’d had diarrhea all over my bed. Michael said that she drank a bunch of water and the puked it back up on the rug. She was still lethargic. So I called the veterinarian’s office and they told me to bring her back in. I explained to the vet how Josephine seemed to get worse after her visit on Thursday. She stopped drinking water and she would bury herself in leaves next to the fence outside. She behaved like a dog that was holing up to die. Even Michael was worried. As I talked to the vet, I had to pause and say “I’m sorry, but I’m barely keeping my shit together right now.” Then I started crying. The veterinarian and the technician did their best to comfort me, but they were concerned too. The medicine they gave Josephine on Thursday was supposed to last twenty four hours and was known to be the best anti-nausea medication on the market. The next step was X-rays and blood work and fluids.

The veterinarian went over Josephine’s X-rays with me. I got to see Josephine’s insides, which looked good except for the empty stomach and her tiny irritated colon. Blood work came back with flying colors. My puppy was really dehydrated and tired from not getting any rest from all the up and down to the backyard to use the bathroom. They gave her fluids and medication for her colon and sent us home. Michael and I forced her meds down and then I made her some chicken and rice. She still was not interested in it, but she did drink some water. At around three the next morning, she woke me up to go outside and walked right over to her food bowl. It was the moment I knew she was going to be okay. We had one more incident of upchucked water all over my bed (I have done so much laundry since Thursday) and that was it. She’s still not 100%, but she’s definitely feeling better and Michael and I have sighed with relief.

Part of me wants to say that I was slightly over reacting to Josephine’s illness, like maybe I was panicking. The more rational side of myself knows that I behaved appropriately in the given situation. Trust me when I say that if you could have seen Josephine, you might have panicked too. The last dog I took to the vet who was behaving as sickly as Josephine, was Hooper. Hooper ended up being full of tumors and had to be put to forever sleep. That was the icing on the shit cake of that year. 2012 was the year I became a true country western song. I lost my husband and my dog. I did my fair share of crying and drowning sorrows in wine. I guess I’m just lucky I didn’t lose my house. That’s usually how those songs go. This scene with Josephine was just way to familiar to a tragic scene I’ve been a part of before. It was stressful and scary and all of that has to leave the body in some shape or form. This time around those wonder twins took on the form of ugly crying in the veterinarian’s office.

We’re starting this week on the upswing. And as long as I can ignore this patch of poison ivy on my wrist, we plan to end the week on a high note. Go Monday!

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Half

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Tuesday evening, I started to feel really anxious about a lot of things. I wasn’t sure if we had enough money to cover Josephine’s vet visit on Thursday. I didn’t know what to do about Easter. Michael’s scooter is in the shop and the repairs have him questioning putting money into this one when he really wants a scooter with a bigger engine. We were sitting on the couch talking about all of these things when I said “I’m feeling extremely anxious.” Michael then asked me if I wanted a Xanex. I told him ‘no’ because I can never get out of bed the day after taking half of one of those things. I wonder if I could just lick a Xanex.

Then Wednesday night, Josephine started vomiting and I was up every other hour with her cleaning up dog puke and letting her outside. The vet appointment for Thursday was for her vaccinations. Instead, she ended up getting a shot of anti-nausea medication and some pills. As of this morning, she was still moping around, drinking very little and not eating. If she’s not any better by the time I get home this evening, I am taking her back to the vet for some intravenous fluids. Her long hair doesn’t help matters because it just makes her look even more sad. She can’t get a haircut until she gets her rabies shot. She can’t get a rabies shot until she’s been off the meds for at least a week. Scheduling for all of these things is making me break out in hives.

And I am still incredibly worried about Josephine.

I have to keep reminding myself that Josephine has done this before. Hemorrhagic gastroenteritis (sounds way worse than it is) is common in miniature schnauzers and usually caused from a bacterial infection of some sort. She ate something gross in the backyard like a dead mouse or dead bird. We just need to be patient and give her a couple of days. I know this, but there’s always that what if part that makes me scared. I have my own fair share of what-if-this-is-worse-then-we-originally-thought moments that turned into not so much a what if as a most definite. Of course my first reaction is to panic, but for some reason, this time around feels worse than usual. I feel like Josephine is more sick this time around, at least she looks and acts more sickly then she ever has before. I feel like I’m more anxious about all of it this time around. I’m on the edge of tears constantly, like the structural integrity of my tear damn is compromised and any minute we are going to witness a catastrophic break.

So where is the silver lining in all of this? Where is the gratitude for this week?

This is definitely a week for digging down deep to find those things. First of all, the vet was not too concerned. She was very relaxed and I felt like she did a thorough exam and took in all of the information that I gave her. Dehydration is an issue, but I can take her in for this if I feel like she needs it. Not every thing has to end in worst case scenario. Let me repeat that. Not everything has to end in worst case scenario. In fact, that statement feels so important to me right now that I might even write on my arm with a sharpie. By the time that sharpie wears off, Josephine will be back to her usual self. That twisting sock feeling in the pit of my stomach will have eased. We can resume our regularly scheduled show.