THE THINGS WE DO NOT KNOW

I spent the weekend in Oklahoma not seeing everyone I wanted to see, but spending quality time with those I needed to see. I was able to see for myself that Talaura’s Sarge was alive and well. I was able to squeeze Talaura and hopefully give her a tiny break and an empathetic ear. Most of the rest of my time was spent with Robin, Traci and Chris. I dragged them all to the First Americans Museum, a museum Chris and I watched being built but never got to see its completion. The front of the building looks like the sun and for years, we watched as this sun rose because we passed the construction site on our daily commute to work. It was lovely to finally step inside this sun and see the tragic beauty of our first Americans.

Then Traci, Robin and I spent the rest of the day floating in Traci’s pool. As we floated about, rotating with the shade, we talked about all things and no things. This was the first time Traci and Robin had really gotten a chance to talk to each other and I watched a friendship begin as they learned the stories of each other. At one point, when our fingers were pruney from our time in the water, I told Traci about the hand written note I had found in Chris’s office while cleaning it out. The note contained half a date, a date I couldn’t account for and the thought of it has haunted me all this time. I asked Traci “Is it possible he knew he was sick before we moved?” and without blinking an eye she said “I would not be surprised.” She told me that he would have done anything for my happiness.

This is when I learned something about Chris that I didn’t know.

Traci told me that Chris had not always been the kind, empathetically generous person that most of us knew. She told me about him telling her he had met a girl and all his fears that this girl wouldn’t love him. She told me how I had changed him. I rolled my eyes at this thinking that it couldn’t possibly be true. All the years. All the time. My core belief is, has been, that Chris was the one who made me a better person. Definitely not the other way around. He’s the one who built a place for me to write, to put the camera in my hand, to put my career first. This is how I learned that support is not words but actions and I have spent lifetimes worried that I didn’t act enough in return. Turns out that was not necessarily true.

We made each other better.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

I have this asparagus fern that I bought two years ago. Every year, I buy some kind of hanging plant for the front stoop that ends up dying from neglect, but I thought I’d try something different when I bought this fern. I thought I would try to keep it alive, like bring it inside during the winter. The problem is that inside my house equals instant death for any house plant except for the ivy I’ve had in a pot on top of the fridge for thirteen years. I just don’t have the window lighting space for inside plants. My olive tree is barely surviving and I moved it outside for the summer. I predict that it will not take kindly to being brought back inside in the Fall. So I decided to take my fern to work.

There are large east facing windows on one whole side of my work cubical. I already had two plants that were thriving in that space, plus an inherited aloe that should absolutely not be thriving because it has basically outgrown it’s container and that was before it was ‘gifted’ to me. As we all learned from Jurassic Park, life finds a way. I named my asparagus fern Sideshow Bob, loaded him up along with the thousands of roly-polies that had taken up inhabitance in the few days I had allowed the pot to sit on the ground, and I took him to work. During the first month, I swept up a lot of roly-polies, but now we are poly free and thriving. Sideshow Bob is a mess. Every time I pick him up to carry him to the sink for watering, he sheds needle like leaves in a trail. Every six months or so, half of him turns brown and brittle. I think he’s dying and pluck out as much of the brown parts as I can. Then he sprouts new limbs and everything is okay.

Sideshow Bob needs parts of himself to die before growing.

Humans do this too. We shed dead skins cells and intestinal cells every day. I mean, women basically build nests in their wombs every month that are torn down and removed from the body. Parts of our bodies die off and get replaced with new cells. Of course our ability to do this gets less and less the older we get and it doesn’t look as visually dramatic as Sideshow Bob, but we still do it. Life, finding it’s way again. All of this started me thinking about how parts of our not physical selves need to die before we can begin to start something new. I know I have a habit of clinging to a routine even when it no longer serves me. I just keep doing the same thing over and over with the idea that it will reset itself into a routine that is useful and healthy again. Then I eventually reach a point were I wonder why nothing is working or feels right and I remember that I never actually made any changes that would lead to useful and healthy.

It’s time to start cutting off some brown crunchy dead parts, in this case an old way of thinking and doing, but not in an attempt to just rush forward into something new. I think I’d like to clear out some of those dead thoughts and ideas and just sit with that cleared space for a minute or two. Maybe take some time to grieve those thoughts and ideas and then wait for new thoughts and ideas to grow flourish. And I get that personal growth can happen on top of old thoughts and ideas. New growth happens like this in the wild all the time. Mushrooms can sprout on living trees. Every year my hostas come up out of the ground with extra hostas. But I have also driven through the Flint Hills after a controlled burn and have seen the softest greenest layer of grass as the prairie replenishes.

When there’s nothing left to burn, you have to set yourself on fire. -Douglas Campbell, father to Torquil Campbell, lead singer of the band Stars.

Burn off the dead and no longer useful parts and then sit back and watch the new growth come in.

THE STATE OF THE BODY

Right now, the ads in my Instagram feed are either for needle work kits or curing plantar fasciatus. Occasionally the algorithm throws in an ad for somatic yoga for women over fifty because the internet thinks I’m eighty. I’m cool with that. I’ve stopped getting the ads for magic elixirs that cure perimenopause, though that may change after today’s post. I stopped taking the progesterone/DHEA stuff that I had ordered from the internet about a month and a half ago. It was time to renew my three-month supply and I put a big pause on that order for some reasons. The biggest reason was because of cost and I could not get my insurance to cover any of it. So I figured I would pause treatment, make notes on how I was feeling, and then take all of this to my doctor.

And I did that today.

I am going to start by saying that I really like my gynecologist. She is the same age as I am and doesn’t think I’m crazy. She walked into the room with a smile and a “Welcome to Perimenopause!” because the nurse had already given her a briefing on my erratic periods and my weight gain. To be fair, I did step onto the scale with my keys and wallet in my pockets, plus my Nikes. I’d like to think that added about five pounds to the number, but really I have no idea. The only time I step on a scale is at the doctors office because if I start doing this at home, I start obsessing and stressing out about numbers which leads me down a very unhealthy rabbit hole. My doctor only barely mentioned the weight and I said that I think I’ve reached a place where I’m okay with it and this is just my body. She nodded her head in agreement and said “Yes! I completely agree with you!” Then she told me that her favorite lubricant is olive oil and we swapped friendship bracelets. We didn’t really swap friendship bracelets, but olive oil is her favorite lube choice second to coconut oil.

I explained to my doctor how I felt taking the online stuff and how I was feeling now that I’m not, which isn’t great. I’m back to not sleeping for more than two hours at a time and my body has gone back to barrel shaped. My right foot hurts all the dang time, but I’m still doing all of the things. 10,000 or more steps a day. Yoga. I’ve added weights to my yoga practice. Standing all day at my desk. I’ve swapped out my tofu scramble with plain greek yogurt to get more protein. I told her that I basically have one of two stages: rage or sobbing. I’m either going to punch someone in the throat or melt into tears. Then she said “I’m here to support you and let’s talk about ways to do that.” So of course, I burst into tears. We talked about options in relation to the current state of my ovaries, which are still doing something even if they’re only spitting out low quality eggs. Then she prescribed a very low dose birth control pill with instructions to give this a good three month try. The idea is that this will even out and regulate things.

We’ll see.

It is turning out that three truly is the magic number. I was on the other stuff for three months. Now I am to give the new stuff a three month chance. At least this treatment is fully covered by my insurance and familiar. I took a birth control pill every day for twenty five year. I am excellent at remembering to take this pill. I have hopes that this will work but not high hopes. Just like my weight, I think I’ve finally started to come to terms with this is just how my body is right now. I make sure to not walk around carrying knives and always have a package of Kleenex in my pocket, which is probably just a good habit for any stage of life. Sort of like Hitchhiker’s Guide To the Galaxy and always carrying a towel. Except a woman would most likely never hitchhike because bears don’t drive cars or if they do, don’t pick up hitchhikers.

This is more of The Transportationally Responsible’s Guide to Perimenopause.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

I almost skipped this today. I have plenty to be grateful for this week. This morning, I locked my house from the inside. Then I stepped out into the now very clean garage, pushed a button and watched the garage door open. Then I got on my scooter, rolled it outside and pressed another button, closing the garage behind me. Then I just rode away. And I know that seems like a normal everyday thing to be able to do if you live in a house with a garage, but this is the first time in my life that I have had an automatic garage door opener. This feels like getting an A++ in adulting. It is also the reason that while I may be forty eight years old, I still feel like I’m in my early twenties trying to figure out life. Which is probably why some of my adulting tasks this week made me cry big fat stupid tears.

But I’ve talked enough about my new garage door.

The Cabbage asked to go see the musical Come From Away and if the kid is going to ask to see any form of a stage production, I think it is important to make it happen. So we took them to the Starlight Theater last night and sat outside watching the North American Tour of Come From Away. The musical is based on the true story of when 42 planes were ordered to land at the Gander International Airport in Newfoundland during the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon on September 11, 2001. The tiny town of Gander rallied to take in about 7,000 stranded people. It is a beautiful example of the human capacity for caring and kindness during times of great tragedies, but I found the beginning of the musical to be pretty hard to sit through. It starts with how we all started on that day, how we all got up and started doing our normal daily routines until the news interrupted everything. There was a moment when the performers’ reactions to the horror was so familiar and heavy that I almost got up and left.

Later, when we were on our way back home, the Cabbage asked us what our favorite parts were and when it was my turn, I said “That’s going to be a hard moment for me to pin down.” Then I confessed to finding the beginning to be very difficult for me to watch. Michael piped up and agreed. He told the Cabbage that they needed to understand the opening put us in a very different headspace than them. Chris and I used to joke about how that day changed everything, but it truly did. That day in, some ways, brought out the worst in people with lasting consequences for our Muslim Americans (or any brown skinned person). But that day also brought out the best in us. We can really pull together and do good things for one another in times of crisis. This is great and all and there are some beautiful stories out there from those sorts of good deeds, but what about those times when we are not in a crisis?

In the years since then, I have become more apt to notice the good we can do for one another when there is not a crisis. I’m talking about those times we give money to a GoFundMe need or buy something on an Amazon wishlist to help a teacher. Maybe it is just the simple act of saying ‘good morning’ and pausing for short chat with that old man waiting at the bus stop you pass on your morning dog walks. There is joy in being kind to others and I am grateful for those moments when I experience that kind of joy. So my answer to the Cabbage’s question about my favorite part of this musical is this. My favorite part of this musical is the global overall message of kindness.

The practice of daily kindness is what makes us ready for those often bigger acts of kindness required during a crisis.

FAIR

Last minute and on a whim, Michael and I decided to check out the Leavenworth County Fair on Saturday. We didn’t really have much going on that day to begin with. We’re still in limbo with the garage clean out while we wait for the new garage door. That’s happening on Wednesday this week and I’m still trying to muster excitement and happiness over this purchase. I’m sure once I have a remote in my hand and a functional door, I will be thrilled and wondering why I hadn’t pushed for a new garage door sooner. Maybe it will be part of Friday’s gratitude post. Any way, Saturday seemed like an ideal time to visit a county fair.

When Michael pulled into the pasture parking lot, I looked over at the small fairgrounds and for a minute thought that we had traveled to my hometown county fair. I guess I was expecting something bigger for some reason, but this county fair was just like the county fair I attended every year while growing up in Collinsville. We walked into the one building of the fairgrounds that had been divided into a handful of exhibitor booths. The other half was filled up with fair entries and I found myself having to explain to Michael why there were tables of jams and pickles and ziplock baggies of half eaten cookies. He was floored by the whole process, that people enter baked goods or crafts and receive ribbon prizes. I was floored that I had to explain it all. Had he never been to a fair before?!? When we got to the photography entries, Michael paused and then said “Wait. Why don’t you ever enter anything?” I just shrugged. Eventually we made it to a display of participants in the 4-H dog show. Among all the smiling faces there was a picture of a girl with her beagle. I smiled and pointed it out saying “look! It me!”

And in a way, it was.

The first time we cleaned out my childhood home, I came across two large boxes filled with ribbons and trophies all from entering crafts and sewing projects into the fairs. The trophies and plaques were from the years I showed my beagle, Odie. We were good, grand champion good. It may be a surprise to some that I trained a beagle in obedience considering how little obedience training I’ve done with Josephine. I taught Josephine the bare minimum of manners and a number of tricks. Her down stays are pretty good, but she leads when we’re on walks. I threw those boxes of ribbons and trophies into the dumpster with no regrets. It’s not that I am not proud of those accomplishments. On our first day in obedience training classes, the teacher told me that I would never be able to train a beagle for obedience shows. Turns out I am as stubborn as a beagle and will never let anyone tell me what I can’t do. Odie was off lead by the time we won our third grand championship. Odie was the best dog and my first broken heart. I went years without a dog after he passed, just unable to open my life to another dog.

That’s not why I threw those ribbons and trophies away though. I tossed them because they reminded me of how hard I worked to contort myself into the kind of shape that would win medals. I didn’t make anything without asking myself “how would someone judge this? Is this good enough for a blue ribbon?” And it wasn’t even really about winning a blue ribbon. It was about winning many blue ribbons. The more ribbons, the bigger the potential scholarship. See? It wasn’t even for fun. My 4-H career was a long game for a bigger payout, college tuition. But it was also years of scrutiny and judging and aiming for an impossible perfection. So when Michael asks me why I don’t enter things in the fair now, I can only shrug because the actual answer is too complicated. It is hard enough putting my words and art out there knowing that there are some who judge the content. The only thing that makes it easy is that I don’t ever receive a written score card attached to ‘place’ ribbon. My art gets out there because I say it’s worthy of notice, I think the picture is good, I think the words fit together nicely. The big payout now is the joy I feel at seeing my stuff out there.

I sighed with relief as we left that building. I looked at Michael and said “let’s go see the pigs!” Then we wandered through the barns and Michael finally understands why we should get a goat. Michael ate a corndog while I ate a caramel apple and contemplated how much skin I would burn if I went down the giant slide. Michael asked if I wanted to ride the slide, but I looked at the sun reflecting off it and turned back to him and said “I’m good.” That was that. The county fairs in Kansas are about the same as the ones in Oklahoma and they haven’t changed much.

But I have.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

I don’t consider myself to be a true sports fan. I own one KC Royals T-shirt that ended up as a pj top because it’s really soft. There is not a single red item in my wardrobe for representing the Chiefs. I do have a KC Current sticker on my scooter. I know nothing about the sport of soccer, but I am one hundred percent supportive of this team and what it means to have the first women’s soccer arena in the country. I will listen to updates of the games on our local Bridge radio station. Other than that, most everything is grouped together as ‘sports ball’. That being said, I do get into watching the Summer Olympics.

Most evenings since the opening ceremony of this year’s Summer Olympics, we have just had the TV on with the games playing as background. Sometimes we’re paying attention. The surfing competition has been riveting and watching Snoop-dog and Flavor Flav interacting with the US athletes has been a thoroughly joyful thing to watch. I have always watched the gymnastics. Many many years ago when I was tiny, I was in gymnastics and even competed. I was terrible at the uneven bars, okay with the floor routine, and pretty good on the vault, but the balance beam was my jam. That is the place where I excelled and I really enjoyed it until I got taller. The taller you are, the harder it is to flip yourself off the end of a balance beam. Once scary fall was all it took for me to move on from gymnastics. But it didn’t stop me from watching the sport and watching the US Women’s gymnastic team gives me all of the feels.

My experience with coaches and work-out instructors have all included a ‘no pain, no gain’ mindset. My gymnastic coach was one of the nicest people, but even he had his moments. One of the reasons why I was so terrible at the uneven bars was because I could not pull myself up and often, my coach would leave me hanging on the top bar until I would eventually lose my grip and fall. I learned to hang for a really long time. After gymnastics, came dance coaches who would force a dancer to bend in ways the joints should not bend. There were aerobic coaches that yelled at you to keep moving. I have even been in a yoga class where the instructor encouraged a student to keep forcing their handstand despite the obvious shoulder pain this person was in. Many of us were taught that pain comes with fitness, that in order for you to have a fit and trim body, you must hurt. Muscle tears. Joint pain. Just the price you pay.

Pain is weakness leaving the body.

Tokyo, Summer Olympics 2020, Simone Biles had a wobbly twist as she came off the vault. If you were watching and are not a gymnast you probably didn’t think anything was off. She had flipped around in the air and landed mostly on her feet, not her face, something you or and I could not do. But to a trained gymnasts and Simone Biles, that wobbly twist was evidence that something was off with Simone. Then Simone Biles did something that shocked the country. She quit the olympic trials, taking herself completely out of the competition. She cited mental health concerns as her reason. Her head wasn’t in it or in the right place and that disconnect can lead to serious injuries. Simone Biles made her mental health, as well as her physical health, more important than medals and it was something many people had never seen happen before. Many thought that this was it for her, that she would never again compete in gymnastics.

Now, if you’ve been watching this year’s olympics, you know that we had not seen the last of what Simone Biles has to offer. She came back and showed the world that she’s better than ever, but she also showed the world the benefits of making your own health a priority. Simone Biles is an athlete that little girls across this nation have looked up to for years. She is an inspiration, but in that moment she decided to step out of the 2020 Olympics, she became an advocate and an inspiration. I’ve been following Simone Biles for years and I am grateful to see her return to the mat. The joy on her face as she has expertly completed her routines is blinding and beautiful. I am grateful that she has been able to compete with a safe and healthy mindset. But more than anything, I am grateful for the reminder that it is more than possible to step away from something you love in order to heal your mind and or body so that you can come back and be better at that thing you love.

This summer, I have stepped away from doing some things that I love. My personal yoga practice has been garbage. I’ve rarely made it on to my mat for anything other than teaching in well over a month. The same is true for my photography practice. My camera has not left the camera bag since we left Minnesota back in June. These things that I love to do have hit a lull or more likely, I’ve been experience some burnout. I finally made it back to my mat this week for me and I have felt stronger on my mat this week then I have felt in a long time. Breaks are necessary for healing, but also for missing the act of doing. I’ve missed my yoga time and grateful to have it back. Today, I realized that I miss my photography practice too. I miss taking the time to look around me to find beauty in the simplest things. It’s back to school time for many next week. Maybe back to school for me means getting back to my photography practice.

Sometimes I need a break and reminder to ask myself “Why do I do those things that I love?” So far, I have always been able come up with solid answers for why. I am thankful for those reasons of why.

WHEN YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT TO SAY

Yes. I still have a cough and it is just part of who I am now. So let us all just accept the way we are in this moment and move on with our lives. That’s really all I have to say. My brain is on a creativity strike and quite possibly all of the creative brain cells are forming a list of concerns and needs to be negotiated with management as we speak (figuratively). I’ve been doing work stuff. I’ve been doing stuff around the house. Yesterday, I spent the whole morning working in the garage, throwing way stuff and organizing some other things. I made sure to leave a giant pile of tools for Michael to deal with. I told him ages ago that if he cleaned out the garage, I would get him a bike stand for working on the bicycles. So far, I am the one earning the bike stand.

I guess I should add ‘learn to fix bicycles’ to my list of things to do.

I have been doing a little bit of learning these days. Maybe that’s why the creativity brain cells aren’t working. They’re not on strike; they’re just taking a vacation so I can learn some stuff while they sip cocktails from pineapples or coconuts. Michael and I started our Duolingo accounts back up and have been learning Spanish. We discussed a number of languages, but felt Spanish was the was most practical. When our new washer was delivered, the guy doing the actual install did not speak much English. He had to call in his helper to translate some issues with the connections. This happened many months ago, but I still feel embarrassed by the whole thing, because I felt like I should know more Spanish than I actually do. Okay, maybe it’s been twenty years since I took Spanish 101 and I never really used what I learned. I still felt inadequate in the moment. At least now I can say “Yo hablo Spanish, un poquito. Ve despacio, por favor.”

I also spent some time looking over the primaries ballot for Kansas City, which is happening next Tuesday. Because the ballot contains a list of a bunch of different people running for a bunch of different things, I needed know who was who and what was what. I have sort of been hyper fixated on getting rid of our current Attorney General because he is garbage. He refuses to let innocent people out of prison, but instead spends his time filing frivolous lawsuits against Planned Parenthood. I’ve emailed him so many times that the staff has just put me on their mailing list. I constantly get a newsletter detailing his weekly activities to which I usually respond “Stop waisting my tax dollars on lawsuits and free Christopher Dunn!” Anyhoo…I spent a good amount of time reading about who is on my primary ballot and deciding who and how I was voting. I even printed out a ballot and circled things.

Yes. I am that person who studies for voting.

So…that’s some stuff I’ve been doing in between work and illness and watching way too much TV. I’m learning stuff, but mostly I’m learning to lower my own expectations for myself. This is always the lesson. I will never be the valedictorian of self kindness and I will always be taking You’re Doing Enough 101.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

I’ve been struggling with today’s gratitude post, something I tend to do when I’ve been sick. I’ve spent the week dealing with an upper respiratory infection. There were two days where I barely left my bed and one day of not moving far from the couch. As per usual, I still have a cough that is not dainty and discreet. It very much sounds like demons are trying to make their way out of my body even though I feel loads better. Which is the thing I should be grateful for this week.

Feeling better.

It’s rather an easy one.

I spent a lot of time away from the internet this week. I didn’t read the news or watch the news on TV. I didn’t post or take any pictures. I tuned the noise of the world out and I’ve been thinking a lot about division. How many times in a day do we hear the phrase “deeply divided country”? It has to be in the hundreds, this constant reminder that we should be at odds with one another. On one hand I see it clearly. During Trump’s presidency, he stacked the Supreme Court to his favor. The results of this has been to take away women’s rights to body autonomy and take away our rights to a clean environment. The list of the removal of rights is even larger if Trump is re-elected. He has plans to remove civil rights such as the same-sex marriage act, reduce the disabilities act and reduce federal employees like my friend Sarah who works for affordable housing. He plans to unfund basic scientific research that leads to life saving medicine. Technically, my job could be in danger. His list of removal of basic human rights is a long one. Those things are scary enough, but it is his ability to rile and incite hate and violence in his followers that truly terrifies me. He has found a way to, without addressing the specific needs of this mostly white group of people, turn their frustrations from being disenfranchised into rage. In a sense, he has created a new batch of terrorists. This rage has blinded these people from questioning his rhetoric and any possibility of civil discourse. [Side note: when’s the last time you checked on how your senators and representatives are voting? You can do that here: https://www.senate.gov/ I like to read the Daily Digest, like a newsletter of the day’s activities.]

They have fully drunk the Kool-Aid flavor of Us vs Them.

Yet, I can’t shake the idea of ‘deeply divided’ as being anything but a social construct, a 1984 tactic to keep all of us at odds with one another so we don’t ever question the rhetoric (or read that Daily Digest), nor do we make an attempt to work together. For a while now, all of that noise of constructed division has had me depressed. A week of isolation from the diatribe has me feeling less depressed and quite hopeful. I still believe that things can be better, but I also know that I do not have to engage with anyone so blinded with rage. It is a waste of my time to point out that allowing others to have those civil rights takes nothing away from them. My time is better spent reading that Daily Digest and staying in communication with my representatives and senators. My money is better spent supporting candidates who support equal rights and legislation that supports affordable health care and housing, and legislation that supports a cyclic economy for its benefits to the environment. My time is better spent breaking down the construct of ‘deeply divided’ with basic acts of kindness within my own community.

All that being said, I’m really grateful that Kamala Harris is going to be our first Black female President of the United States.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

We’ve made it to the middle of summer and Michael pointed out that he has about three weeks of summer vacation before it is time to go back to the classroom. Every time we see something about back-to-school reminders, the Cabbage groans. They are not ready to start their last year of middle school, particularly since a number of their friends are starting high school in the Fall. Michael and the Cabbage have managed to fill their summer vacation up with equal portions of summer time fun and chores.

It’s the chores part that I am grateful for.

The two of them spent two days last week, moving furniture and rugs to clean baseboards and the floor. The rug in the dining area even got washed. Then they turned their focus to the vehicles, washing the inside and out of Michael’s truck and my car. Michael re-caulked the bathtub and it looks like a professional did the job. This week, while the Cabbage is on vacation with their mom, Michael started cleaning out trash in the basement and took our sparky defunct microwave to a recycling center. All of those things were chores that I did not ask them to do and are not specifically on my list. I have dusting on my usual chore list and that includes baseboards, but Michael doesn’t know that. The only thing I asked of the Cabbage this summer was for them to clean out their clothes, getting rid of things they can no longer wear and their ‘toy’ bins. They completed this early in the summer because they were motivated with the prospect of new clothes.

The two of them did all those extra things along with the general day to day chore list. They made dinner and cleaned the kitchen. The cleaned the bathroom once a week and did the grocery shopping. They started the laundry. They took time each day to pick up their daily clutter. And I’ve pretty much done nothing except finish up the laundry and make sure a weekly meal plan gets made. Well…mostly. I still clean out Rosie (vacuum robot) four times a week and do a round with the broom and vacuum on Sundays. I’m not great at doing nothing. I need to keep some chores of my own. Me having no chores during the summer months has been Michael’s plan for a few years now, but this feels like the first summer the two of them have accomplished so much more than the usual chores.

I am truly grateful for all of the hard work they’ve put in this summer.

Next week the two of them are taking the train to St.Louis. They’ll stay two nights before taking the train home. I’m excited for them. I’m always talking about how I’d love to take the train some place. I could have tagged along, but I thought it was more important for them to do this one without me. Some of my favorite memories come from the times Dad and I traveled together, just the two of us. I desperately miss my dad’s enthusiasm for adventures great and small. Where ever we went, I was just as much in charge as he was. He allowed me to have freedom and to make choices for the both of us. But also it was an opportunity to spend time with my dad when he was at his most relaxed. I believe in those moments I saw his true self and he was goofy but thoughtful. I am a better traveler simple because of Dad.

I’d like that for Michael and the Cabbage, but I also hope they enjoy their well deserved trip.

THE ESCAPE INTO ROOM

Or the reason I’m not getting a new driveway. There’s a number of titles here. Getting into my garage from the outside is very much like an escape room situation. It’s probably why I avoid invitations to go to an actual escape room. My whole day is solving puzzles. My life is an escape room. First, I have to unlock two different locks on the front door. Once inside, the next thing to do is turn the alarm system off. If I delay on this or just tune out the beeping, the alarm company calls me. I’ve done it twice. Once the alarm is off, I have to unlock the two locks on the door from the kitchen into the garage. Then I slide my homemade bar lock aside and lift the garage door. I do all of this so that my scooter can be safely stored inside the garage and if I’m lucky, Michael gets home before me and has the door open when I get home.

I was not lucky on Monday.

Except this time, when I lifted up on the garage door handle, nothing happened. The door refused to move. I stood for a moment in my sweltering garage, studying the contraptions that aids in lifting a garage door. I couldn’t see anything missing or wrong, so I attempted to lift the door with more force this time. Nothing. I went inside and got Michael. He replaced one of the springy pulley things years ago. He still remembers it as his worst case of handyman’s Tourettes ever. He inspected all the things involved with lifting the garage door and noticed that one wheel of one of the pulley thingies (the newer one) refused to move. It did not take him long to declare that this was beyond his expertise. Which is fine. I’d rather he throw in the towel before seriously injuring himself. Also it was probably 110 degrees in the garage. The problem was that my scooter was still on the wrong side of that garage door.

We managed to wrestled my scooter in through the backdoor, finally using the ramp we bought eight years ago. It wasn’t easy and I nearly amputated one of Michael’s arms by smashing it between my scooter and the door jam, but we did it. My scooter is now safe inside the garage. And stuck there. While I made dinner, Michael got on the phone with a company and the end result is that we will be replacing the garage door with a brand new one. Really, this is the smartest option. I’ve lived in this house for thirteen years. The garage door was janky as F when Chris and I moved into the house. It is honestly a testament to my stubbornness that it has survived so long. The new door will not be janky at all. It will have a real locking system and an automatic door opener.

I should be over the moon about all of it.

It will be at least three weeks before anyone can come out for the installation of the new garage door. My scooter is now safe, but also trapped in the garage. And this is honestly not how I wanted to be spending money this year. It feels like we’re starting to hemorrhage and barely have everything under control. I was hoping to be in a tightening the budget mode by the end of this month so we could start socking money away for a new driveway. I totally heard sad trombones while typing that last sentence. Why would anyone want to sock money away for a new driveway?!?! One might sock away money for a new car or a vacation to Italy. Not for a concrete road that leads from the garage to the actual road. It is a sad, boring and very expensive purchase.

Home ownership is an albatross.

The list of wants that I have for my house just keeps growing, like an upgraded electrical system so we can install solar panels and a charging station for the EV will we own one day. I’d really like to gut my kitchen, add some outlets (I have two and if they are all in use at the same time, the circuit blows), and make it a more efficient tiny house space. While we’re at it, it would be nice to turn the current pantry into a staircase to the basement, maybe replace the giant dining room window with French doors that lead out to a back patio and possibly add a porch to the front of the house with an easier entrance. Once that’s all done, we could see about really getting the basement leak proof and converted it into a proper living space. And then….

The list is never ending.

And I guess…the garage door is also on that list. In three weeks, I can take it off the list of wants for the house and I will no longer have to escape room my way into my garage.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Niki de Saint Phalle

A week ago, we had a family movie night and the three of us went to the theater for Inside Out 2. This was the same day I broke my necklace and was already experiencing some feelings. So I made sure to stash a brand new pack of travel tissues into my pocket. It’s Pixar. I knew there would be tears, but I also knew that there might also be sobs given the day I was having. It turned out to not be that bad. I mean, the movie is great. The puns are hilarious. The storyline is well thought out and maybe a little too relatable for the Cabbage right now, but we all enjoyed it. When I say it wasn’t that bad, I mean that it wasn’t the usual stabby stab of a Pixar movie. There was even a moment when I thought “Oh my gosh! I might make it through without crying!”

I don't know how to stop Anxiety. Maybe we can't. Maybe this is what happens when you grow up. You feel less joy. -Joy, Inside Out 2

And then I started crying.

This takes me back to thoughts and ideas I heard recently on Hidden Brain and which I talked about here before. Neuroscientists know that forming new synaptic connections is a link to feeling joy. Think about firsts. Your first taste of ice cream made your little head explode, but over time that feeling lessened. With that first bite we formed a neural connection that said ice cream equals joy. As we age, that connection we made becomes a known thing. So eventually, ice cream goes from “OH MY GOD THIS IS AMAZING!!!!!!” to “This is nice.” This example doesn’t have anything to do with anxiety, but more to do with habituation. Unless you’re lactose intolerant and then anxiety plays a part in your ability to enjoy ice cream. We feel less joy not just because we are growing older, but because the things that bring us joy have become habits.

The other day, I Mission Impossible moved myself from the front passenger seat of my car (while in motion) to the very back of my car where I grabbed a small block of cheese. Then made my way back to my seat with said cheese so that Michael and I could have a snack while we were out running errands. I ended up doing it again to grab a Coke that had been mistakingly placed in the bag (and not in Michael’s hand). I did this with ease and was pretty impressed with my curent state of agility. In that moment, I felt a large amount of joy. You see, like most women, I am often frustrated with this body. If I sit for more than five minutes, my body hurts when I get up. All of my fat cells have migrated from all other parts of my body to set up camp in my midsection. But I still have the ability to climb around in my car like a toddler who figured how to escape from their carseat.

So what made this a joyful moment?

My actions were new. I had never attempted such a thing in this car before. I’ve done something similar in Michael’s truck. I’ve also stood on the center console and through the sunroof of his truck (sometimes while moving) to take pictures. His truck is bigger than my little Kia. There was a slight danger factor (adrenaline rush) in the moment, but I moved with ease, leaving me with a sense of accomplishment. I even took a moment to verbally acknowledge my awesomeness. I am sure that when I was seven, if I had done such a thing, I would not have put the event into any category of feelings, yet it is probably something I did easily (probably often) at that age. What made this situation a joyful experience was the ability to reclaim actions taken for granted of my youth. In this case, I rerouted a joy pathway. So while it is true that as we grow older we might experience less joy, we don’t have to experience less joy. We just need to reroute the old pathways.

I don’t plan on living a life where I experience less joy. If anything, I expect to experience even more joy. Or maybe it’s that the joy I do experience now is more meaningful? There are things that have never lost their wow factor for me. Fireflies and hummingbirds. Seeing wildlife like deer in my neighborhood. Nature still wows me, but there are many other things outside of nature that can still fill me with joy. Just by making that observation, I have rerouted dozens of joy pathways. It is as simple as flipping a switch.

Here’s to flipping switches.

HEAVY

It happened last week. I was lying face down on the chiropractor table and heard a snap that did not come from body. It wasn’t until I was sitting up and about to leave that the source of the not-human snap was discovered. Dr. Fran collected Chris’s ring, my scooter charm and my now broken chain from the table and said “Oh no! I know how much this means to you.” She poured the chain and other items into the palm of my hand and at first I couldn’t register what she was talking about. I exclaimed an “Oh no!” right back at her and then I shrugged as if it was no big deal. I think I even said “no biggie.” My insides did not reflect my outsides. That feeling of cutting open a palm or finger and watching the blood pool up and then that lightheadedness that comes just before passing out, those were the feelings that washed over me. I walked out to my car with shaky legs but with a smile plastered onto my face.

I pulled myself together and then felt silly for having a gut wrenching reaction to a broken chain. This is fixable. I didn’t lose Chris’s ring or my scooter charm. It’s a good excuse to walk into the Tiffany’s store (I thought had closed) and on Friday, after subbing a yoga class, I scooted right on over. My Elsa Peretti olive leaf ring has been sitting in my jewelry box for ages. I caught the ring on my car door and seriously bent it out of shape, lucky to have not ripped my finger off in the process. I plonked the ring down along with my chain so that both could be repaired and polished. While a sales rep filled out all the necessary paperwork to ship my things to the New York store, I thought for a moment about just buying a new chain. I said something about this out loud and the sales rep stopped me. She said “Tiffany’s is no longer making that style of chain. The new chains are much thinner. You’re going to want to keep this thicker chain for it’s sturdiness.” I leaned back in my chair, slightly disappointed but remembering clearly the day I purchased that chain. The sales rep then had been equally attentive, making sure the chain was sturdy, yet elegant.

That happened almost twelve years ago to the day.

Exactly twelve years ago, Talaura and I, along with Kizz and Amber, took the very first boat out to the Statue of Liberty. We were the first people on the island on the 4th of July and our mission was to leave some of Chris’s ashes somewhere. We found our spot, a rock on the other side of the fence that surrounds the island. If I’d taken a picture from the water, it would look like Lady Liberty was looking down at a little pile of Chris. I didn’t get that picture. In fact the picture I did take just looks like some ashes on a rock. There is nothing in that picture to clue you in on the location. The Statue of Liberty was the first pancake of ash dispersals. A few days later, I walked into Tiffany’s and bought the chain that has been holding Chris’s wedding ring ever since.

Now it’s broken and Chris’s ring is sitting on my jewelry box and not resting on my sternum.

I had a fleeting thought that maybe the broken chain was a sign that it was time to stop wearing Chris’s ring. It is a heavy ring, chunky and sometimes painful if it hits me in the face during yoga. I do feel lighter. I picked up the coffee can that holds Chris’s ashes so that I could clean there recently and I noticed that this can feels lighter. It doesn’t have the heft it had at the beginning of all this and I might be able to fit Chris into a smaller coffee can. I took an empty 15 oz Cafe Du Monde can to pick up Chris’s ashes and was kindly told that I’d need a bigger can. Amy and Chad went on a scavenger hunt for a larger coffee can to put Chris in for his Celebration of Life service. I think Chris would now fit in that Cafe Du Monde can. So…things do get lighter and I bet Michael would be thrilled if I stopped wearing Chris’s wedding ring. It is something we do not talk about, but something mentioned years ago leads me to believe he wouldn’t mind the absence.

Except…

I don’t like the way this particular lightness feels. It has been six and half days without the weight and comfort of the ring resting near my heart. I don’t want to get used to the feeling of being without it. There is no relief in this weightlessness. I am a helium balloon that needs that metal ring tied on the end of my string to keep me from simply floating away. And I will be floating for another two to three weeks. What I am realizing is that while some parts of my loss feels heavy, it is a heaviness that feels like a weighted blanket. It is obviously not a struggle to be carting it around with me. I’m more than strong enough. The weight of it all brings me comfort.

So when you see me standing with my hand on my chest, positioned with my palm pressed against my sternum, know that I am just holding this space. This is the temporary metal ring at the end of my string, a very poor place holder for the next weeks.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

I was sitting at a bar with a drink when a fairly attractive gentleman sat down beside me. We started up a conversation about this and that. He had a smooth voice with an accent. He was charming. Then he said “Photography is irrelevant.” I gasped and replied “You are absolutely wrong. Photography is evidence of life, the beautiful gut wrenching painful parts of living. All of and everything to do with living.”

Then I woke up.

Later this week, I found myself at a high school graduation taking place at my old high school. I was tasked with photographing the new graduates. I had to fight my way through parents and family to get pictures of smiling nervous faces. Many of those parents happened to be people I had gone to high school with, their children now the ones to repeat history. The whole time I was balancing taking pictures with being polite to some of the people who still look down their noses at me. It was awkward and hard work and I longed for an ultra zoom lens so I could take pictures from the back of the room.

Thank the gods, I woke up.

I rarely remember the exact words spoken while I am in dream land, but I very clearly remember my response to Mr. NotSoCharmer. I also very clearly remember the feelings of inadequacy brought up from that second dream. I’ve been in a photography funk ever since taking my prints down from Westside Local months ago. I cart my camera around to places, but have no umph to pull it out of the bag. I’m just lugging around a heavy backpack. Last weekend, my sister and I took our mother to the Edith Head exhibit at the Oklahoma Museum of Art. I lugged my heavy backpack with us and took a few snapshots of the city. Later on, while I was processing the shots I started cropping the image so that only a bit of the structure was visible in bottom left corner. The rest of the image was open sky. I found the empty space appealing.

It was also expressing a feeling that I might have been feeling.

Now I have a new dream: my dream exhibit. It’s one that takes place in a real gallery and includes extra large prints of empty space. Right now, the idea of it feels just as hazy as regular sleepy time dreams. The only difference is that it has started gears in my head that feel rusted and stiff from sitting still for so long. It makes me want to just sit with this idea while those gears loosen up and form some kind of plan for possibilities. Dreams can come true. The big dreams just take some time and more work than the small dreams, but I’m ready to start rolling up my sleeves.

Today I am thankful for dreams.

SQUIRRELS IN THE ATTIC

I just bought a beginners embroidery kit because I saw an ad for it in my Insta Reels. I watched the whole ad, mesmerized as I watched a needle and thread travel through fabric to form a perfect little bee and something inside of me said “Cindy…this is a need.” Normally I skip right over those ads without blinking an eye. I don’t know, man. This ad just spoke to something in my soul. I listened to a lot of NPR as I traveled between home and Mom’s. I got the beginning of this episode of Hidden Brain and the episode started with stories from listeners talking about their time during the COVID lock down. Every single story was sad and mostly all centered around the isolation. When the lockdown lifted, the consensus was that people were happy to gather with friends and family. That first get together after months of isolation brought excitement and joy, but over time the same kind of gatherings started to lose that initial sparkle. On my way home, I caught the next part of this story where Tali Sharot, a neuroscientist, explained what was going on inside the brain as we habituate our daily lives and how to find that sparkle of day to day life.

Maybe that embroidery kit is an attempt to reintroduce some sparkle.

While the lockdown introduced a level of anxiety I had not experienced since Chris’s illness inside of me, I’m looking back on some parts of it and feeling a longing for the good old days of isolation. [Side note: Did I mention that moment when lockdown became official and I drove my car over a retaining wall and got stuck? Three large fellas happened to be across the street and they lifted (yes, lifted) my car off the wall, declared that everything looked okay and I drove off. I only told Michael about it months (possibly a year) later when we drove by the now broken retaining wall.] If I set aside those moments where I was panicking about losing my job and trying to climb out of my skin from feeling like a caged animal, the lockdown wasn’t really all that bad. My house was the cleanest it has ever been and I spent at least two hours every day on my yoga mat. We experimented with challenging Bon Appetite recipes and murdered our first two lobsters. I kept a sourdough starter alive, something that I need to restart because suddenly people in my house remember the pizza dough I used to make with it and want pizza.

The summer months are meant to be the time when I do what ever I want and forget about the daily chores. I have not transitioned into this idea very well. To be fair, we did hit the summer running. Between theater camps, kid camp, moose hunt and another theater camp our calendar’s have been full. Earlier this week, I opened my Google calendar on my iPad and it was sitting there open when Michael walked by. He said “Your calendar looks like Donkey Kong.” I think he was referring to all the color coded boxes arranged in each day of the week. I was in the process of re-doing our dry erase calendar for the month of July. Wait. I’m about to confess something that is going to make everyone’s eye twitch. I have my Google Calendar. Then a work calendar through my work email. Then I have a dry-erase calendar for everyone in the house. At one point in time, I had my Google calendar connected to the TV screen on our refrigerator as reference in case I missed something for the dry erase calendar. Our TV did an update and I never reconnected my calendar. Look, just forget the part about my fridge having a TV because TVs in fridges are dumb and unnecessary. Trust me. I see the crazy as I write this.

While my calendar might remind Michael of a video game, I will say that the month of July is the most open, unscheduled month I’ve had in ages. I finally see some space for doing whatever I want. Museum date with Melissa on a Thursday evening? Yes please. Yoga on Saturday mornings? My mat is already in the car. I’m going to turn my focus to the daily feeding of a sourdough starter. I am scraping out more time for yoga and while Michael and the Cabbage take their train trip to Saint Louis, I’m going to clean behind all the furniture. Okay…that’s a chore, but I want to do it and I’m doing whatever I want.

I’m going to poke a needle and thread into bits of fabric, making flower and bee shapes.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

This week, I was contacted by an old friend who wanted to honor Chris in a very specific way. We haven’t spoken or seen each other in years, only keeping up with each other’s lives through social media. We spent some time catching up on his now grown children and my life as a step parent. Then he told me about his plan and asked me if I would be okay with him using Chris's name as an author in something he was writing for academic publication. I gave my permission without hesitation but with the stipulation that I can read it before he submits.

First of all, it was really nice talking with this friend. It has been far too long since our last encounter. He is so gentle and kind and understanding, just a great person to communicate with, but he also tells me nice things. Like how I am the one who is kind and understanding. He told me that Chris and I were still his standard and example of how relationships should be and work as a true partnership. That’s very sweet and equally painful to hear for a number of reasons, but it was good to hear this person’s voice and appraisal.

Chris and I were not an island. I have always known that Chris does not solely belong to me. I am sure the same would be true of Chris if roles were reversed. The two of us have always believed in the collective of humanity. We created a family for ourselves with people who believed in the power of support and community. To have such a family and community requires love and respect, but mostly love. Love is the foundation and we all know what happens to houses built on poor foundations. Our house was made to endure the tests of time and loss. It was built to hold an unimaginable weight of love.

Not just for me.

This week was difficult and my first instinct for today’s post was to write about all the hard stuff and how busy our summer has been so far. I have yet to transition into a do nothing phase of summer. I’m tired and my feet hurt. The brain fog is thick and yesterday I discovered a long black hair sticking out of my chin. Lord knows how long that’s been there, pointing at people. That phone call with an old friend was a balm. I am grateful to have been partnered with someone who inspires others, even years after he is gone, to think of him so fondly. I look forward to reading this academic paper and seeing Chris’s name honored in this way.

THE TIME I COULD HAVE BEEN OUTLANDERED

There’s a hiking trail head on the Gunflint Trail road that leads out to Magnetic Rock. Magnetic Rock is a 60ft natural monolith with magnetic properties. Any thing you read online about the rock suggests that you take a compass with you to hold up to the rock to witness the magnetic properties. The evening we drove the length of the Gunflint Trail, we stopped at this trail head with the intent of making the hike out to the rock. My head started hurting the closer we got to the trail head and by the time Michael parked the truck and we were dousing ourselves with bug spray, my head was throbbing. I said nothing about my discomfort. This was not just about seeing a magnetic rock. This was also an opportunity for a moose sighting. But ten steps into the woods, we quickly realized that this was not the hike for us. The trail path ahead was either slippery with thick mud or underwater. We turned around and hopped back into the truck, taking a cloud of mosquitos with us. We spent the next ten minutes smashing mosquitoes on the windows and the dashboard. I trapped two of them in the sun roof. As Micheal drove us away from the trail head, my headache started to decrease in intensity and was down to a dull ache by the time we reached our cabin.

Michael was not surprised by my headache. I am a walking compass, a super power that makes for a great party trick. Michael likes to joke that there’s a magnet in my brain. Maybe it has something to do with the iron in my blood. A doctor’s never told me that I have too much iron. They usually only say anything if you don’t have enough. It’s most likely genetic. My dad could do the same trick…until things went wrong inside his brain. So, for my future caregivers, if I suddenly can’t point you in the direction of North, you’ll know that there’s something terribly wrong with me. How ever I came about this superpower doesn’t really matter. I don’t know if magnets are a kryptonite. I’ve never tested this by rubbing magnets on my head. I did have a thought that this superpower makes me susceptible to things and that my headache saved me from being Outlandered.

Mom, my sister and sister-in-law and I have all been reading the Outlander series probably since the first book came out. What usually happens is that one of us will buy the book and then just pass it around. The four of us are all pretty vested in this story of a woman who has been transported back in time and the love affair that ensues. Each book contains anywhere from 850 to over 1,000 pages and it is the very reason why I switched over to eReaders. I’m not normally into romance novels (not since my teens), but these books are a less romance and more historical fictional SciFy. Though the sex scenes are decently steamy and it is nice that the leading heroine is open and bold about her sexuality. She is also not the typical romance heroine who sits back and waits for the man to save her. I am curious about the physics of her time travel, like what she can and can’t take with her. Here’s what I was wearing on this hike: hiking boots, overalls, tank, long sleeved shirt, rain jacket and the usual underwear. I had a water bottle in the long pocket of my overalls and my camera looped over my shoulder. I’m pretty sure my wallet was in one pocket and my cell phone in another. I was holding Josephine’s leash. Would all of those things travel with me, including Josephine? Would Josephine survive time travel or would I get to the past holding a leash with an empty harness?

I don’t think I want to know the answer to that last one.

While I find the stories entertaining, the very idea of being whisked back in time to before women’s right to just about anything does not sound remotely appealing or attractive. Life in general was pretty difficult and filthy in the 1700s but life for a woman in the 1700s feels more than difficult. It was fucking dangerous. I am sure that within my first two hours of being transported to that time, I would indeed be burned on a stake. I would probably beg for it because I would have no idea how to proceed in that timeline. Can I build a fire? Sure, if I have matches and newspapers and oil soaked dryer lint. I might be able to prop some sticks and limbs up against a tree to make some sort of structure for sleeping. I could forage some. I know what a wild onion looks like and dandelions are edible. I wouldn’t poison myself, but I am not ashamed to say that I am material girl, living in a material world. I should rephrase that. I am a modern girl, living in a modern world. Maybe I could endure the never ending labor of day to day living in the wilderness and the immediate danger of rape and or murder if there were was hot and cold running water and I could be clean.

That’s really the only difference between now and then, right?

THE ELUSIVE MOOSE

I had this idea that I would be posting a picture of my hand holding a fifty cent piece. I could clearly see it and the words that I would write as a caption. It would say something sweet and a bit sappy, a tribute to Dad. As we prepared for our trip, Michael and I confessed to squirreling away a fifty cent piece. He said he had called all the banks looking for one, but finally ended up digging through an old change jar to find one. I told him that mine came from the stash I’d saved from the tooth fairy. We were ready. I was ready.

But we never saw a moose.

Our first day in Grand Marais, we were out the door by 6:00 AM and traveling along the Gunflint Trail. This is the road we were told to take. We didn’t take the road to the end, but instead turned off onto a gravel loop section of the trail. The map kept throwing out warnings of possible flooding and washed out roads. We had arrived in Grand Marais during a torrential downpour. It was still sprinkling that morning. At least two vehicles passed us going in the opposite direction and after stopping to drag a tree out of the road, we understood why. I ended up dragging two trees out of our path that day. We stopped by a pond to watch and eat our breakfast sandwiches, expecting a moose to step out into the waters at any moment. We moved on after finishing our breakfast, continuing our trek and spotting a black bear.

But never a moose.

We eventually made the loop on around to the main road back to town. We parked at our cabin and then walked into town and out to the Grand Marais lighthouse. We visited the Welcome Center where we were handed various maps and advice on moose spotting. We ate lunch in town before walking back to the cabin for naps where we both slept for hours. Then we made ourselves dinner. We had purchased groceries once we made it to town the night before, planning our meals but not our flavors. The two of us discussed what flavors to put on our lake trout fillets. We had candied pecans and half a bag of Michael’s spicy nacho Funyans. We chose the Funyans and it wasn’t a bad choice.

After our dinner, we headed back out to the Gunflint Trail. This time we stayed on the trail, driving it all the way to it’s end up in the Boundary Waters. I didn’t know about the Boundary Waters until the day before. We had stopped in for a stamp at the Superior National Forest station. There we were greeted by a sullen twenty something year old who told us about the Boundary Waters and basically told us that our moose hunt might as well be a hunt for unicorns. The Boundary Waters are 1.1 million acres of wilderness accessible mostly by canoe with some foot trails. It is wet, boggy and wild. You must have a permit to enter and the trails are not marked. This is of course a prime moose environment. We were not prepared to go into the Boundary Waters. So we drove as far as we could into the wilderness, constantly scanning the landscape in search of moose.

But we did not see a moose.

We saw a fox and deer. We saw a lone turtle attempting to cross the road and falcon soaring across the cloudy skies. We did not see a moose. It seemed that sullen twenty something year old was correct and then we made a decision. We were not going to let a moose hunt define our trip north. The next morning, we rose at a reasonable hour and lingered over breakfast. Then we loaded up the truck and drove north to the Canadian boarder. We hiked out to see Pigeon Falls, the tallest falls in Minnesota. We stopped for pie before making our way back south and to the Devil’s Kettle Falls. The hike to the falls was more than we expected. The trail had us climbing up rugged steps, down 193 steps and through mud just to get to the falls. I left Chris there and then we had to make our way out. I was sure we’d have to carry Josephine up those 193 steps, but she practically ran up them. Once we made it out, I made Michael stop in the campground there so I could rinse the mud out of Josephine’s paws. After stopping for lunch, we collapsed in our cabin pleased with how we’d spent our last day in Grand Marais.

So, we didn’t see a moose.

We saw beautiful falls and wilderness. The wildflowers were breathtaking, every road lined with colorful blooms. We spent days without radio signal or internet. We saw a black bear! Which apparently is more rare of a sighting than moose. We soaked up the chilly weather knowing that Kansas City was sweltering in summer temps. We fought off swarms of mosquitoes, swarms like we’d never seen before. We saw Canada. Passport snafus kept us from going into Canada, but we saw it from a distance. It’s surprising how close we are to the Canadian boarder. We learned a lot about looking for moose and boundary waters. We discovered the charm of Duluth and Minneapolis and made plans to visit again. Friday morning, we packed up and headed south. We left the Superior National Forest and we were finally able to pick up some radio stations. U2’s I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For started playing through the truck speakers. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. I chose to laugh.

Then I pulled out my phone and started planning our next moose hunt.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

The weekend before last, Michael and I spent almost the whole day on our bicycles. We cycled up to Brookside to our favorite nail salon for pedis. Then we walked the bikes across the street (so we wouldn’t mess up our new toe paint) to a sushi place that we always forget about until summer time because they have nice patio and reasonably priced lunch bento boxes. After lunch, we rode over to an art festival that was happening in Prairie Village where I convinced myself I wanted a new driveway more than I wanted a new piece of art for the walls. We got ice cream and bought some weird canned fish meats from the cheese shop. Then we rode the bicycles to the grocery store to pick up some salad fixings for our dinner, before finally making our way back to the house.

There was a moment during our bicycle ride when we were leisurely riding down a neighborhood street lined with tall trees. The weather was perfect. We were not baking in the hot sun and I wasn’t struggling up a hill. I said loud enough for Michael to hear me “I really like riding my bike!” Which is the truth. At first I felt a little bit of shame because it is an electric bike, but I’m way over that. It’s about intention and I was never one of those hardcore bicyclists. I don’t care about the exercise. Well…I kind of care about the exercise. I don’t care about that sort of Pelaton style of bicycle exercise. I just like riding a bicycle for the joy of riding a bicycle. My electric bike makes it easier for me to do that. I’m still moving my legs. I’m still feeling the burn. I’m just not giving up halfway up a hill and wanting to die and then hating myself for not being fit enough to get up the hill.

I want to be the kind of person that rides their bicycle regularly to work. There are a few things working against me in this venture. One is uncontrollable and that’s the weather. It’s been risky to ride the scooter lately with all the storms and popup showers. I am not fast enough on the bicycles to ride between raindrops like I can on Valerie. Morning temps have been chilly. There is no joy in having to bundle up to ride my bicycle only to end up sweating inside a coat because I’ve built up some heat through peddling. The other thing keeping me from eagerly riding my bicycle is totally controllable and that is my brain. My brain starts to worry about time and if I have enough of it. This creates anxiety and when it is time to open the garage and get a two wheeled vehicle out, I hesitate.

On Monday, I fought through that anxiety and rode my bicycle and I learned that time was not the only thing contributing to my anxiety.

Going to work on the bicycle is great. It is an easy carefree ride. There is little to no traffic at that time of the morning and I take the recommended bike route which means I should have a bicycle lane. Unfortunately the section of the Paseo I use does not have a designated lane, but the right lane is wide enough for both a car and bike. Unless someone is parked on the street. Which happens all the time. Still, at seven fifteen in the morning, this is not a problem for me because I’m the only one on the street. Coming home is a different story. There’s a lot more people on the rode at 5:00PM and they are all very anxious to be home from a long day of work. Many do not care that you are a bicycle on a designated bicycle route. It doesn’t feel safe and this stresses me out.

The first thing that Michael asked me when I got home on Monday was “how was your bicycle ride?” So I told him about the good parts. Then I told him about riding home on Paseo and how it stresses me out. His advice was for me to just take the Trolley Trail home. Remember that whole brain-time anxiety thing? That’s why I don’t normally use the trail. The Trolley Trail is out of my way. I have to go about one mile west to connect to the trail. Then when I exit the trail, I have to go almost two miles east to get home, whereas the Paseo is a straight shot. I live a block west of that street. Here’s the thing, and I just looked at the map, it truly is not all that far out of my way, but for some reason my brain has decided differently. So when Michael suggests I just ride the trail home, I get whiney and roll my eyes over how much longer it is going to take me to get home.

Wednesday, I rode my bike to work and at the end of my work day, I got on my bike. Instead of turning left to get on Paseo, I took a left and cut through the UMKC campus to the Trolley Trail. Then I proceeded to have the most delightful ride home from work. I stopped to wait for stoplight at an intersection with a family of three also on bicycles. The child was young, maybe six or seven, and the mom was explaining the stoplight and the crosswalk rules for when the light changes. When the light for the opposing traffic turned to yellow, I heard the mom say “Okay, the lights are about to change. Get your body ready. Get your bike ready.” I took off ahead of them, but I thought about that mom’s lesson to the child. It’s a pretty good lesson, but might need one more thing.

Get your MIND ready. Get your body ready. Get your bike ready.

This should be the first thing I tell myself when I get out bed each morning, no matter what vehicle I end up driving that day, especially if it is my own brain keeping me from doing the thing(s) I want to do. So there’s a few points of gratitude here. I am grateful for Michael’s suggestion to use the trail for my bicycle rides home from work. If I had ignored his advice, I would not have had the opportunity to hear that mom giving her kid the lesson of being prepared to cross the street. I am grateful to have overheard that exchange of words. Finally, I am grateful for joyful bicycle riding experiences.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

I started working on a writing project in October of last year. It has become one of my UFPs (unfinished projects) sitting in my Google docs, but I tend to visit this one more often than any of the others. It is a writing project that will not be able to see the light of day for (hopefully) a few years and maybe this is why it has become so easy for me to sporadically add to the story. I’ve tried writing a story centered around Chris and being a widow and I probably have five different UFP versions of this story blinking at me whenever I open Google docs. I just get to a spot where there’s nothing to write. I don’t know how to end it or it just feels emotionally better to leave it as it is. Sort of like vague plans or booking the hotel reservation but not doing any research on what you should see and do in that area. This thing I’ve been working on off and on since October feels like something I’ll eventually finish, like I know how to end it when the time comes.

That being said, my writing style is very undisciplined. It seems that I can commit to coming up with content for this space at least twice a week, but any thing with multiple pages and chapters is a really big commitment. I am an ebb and flow kind of artist. When I’m really inspired to be out and about with my camera and working on photography projects, I have little inspiration for writing. The writing flows in when I’m in a photography lull. I thought maybe the practice of combining the two things would lead to more finished projects, but that hasn’t happened. Right now, I am writing. That’s where I am in this ebb and flow. I wrote about a particular time and some events and as I wrote it all down, I found myself crying at my desk. I was surprised because I thought I had worked through my feelings about those events. I thought I had already done the work to release that pain and that there would be nothing to bring up in the writing of this story. But apparently I still had some feelings tucked away that needed to be addressed.

There was a brief section of time when I was seeing a therapist. I didn’t do too much to seek out this therapist, no interview process. I just went with someone my insurance would accept and walked in not really knowing what to expect. Once a week I’d sit in a cushy chair in an office with my therapist and I would just talk. I needed very little prompting and received no more prompting than “how are we feeling today?”, but this was all I needed to spill the bean can of complaints I had filled up since my last visit. At the end of each session, my therapist would say something along the lines of ‘thank you for sharing’ and that would be it until the next week. After about year of this I felt like I had talked all of my complaints out of my system and didn’t feel like I had anything else to contribute to my therapist. And that was it. I never received homework or any kind of “what if you tried…” My therapist was just a listener. I stopped going to therapy and never made an effort to find a new therapist.

The truth is, my writing practice has been the most helpful tool for sorting and dealing with my emotions.

I am by no means discounting therapy. My one time therapist expedition is not a remotely fair measure of the benefits of therapy. I benefited from time with my therapist. I had overachieved in the no complaining department, not speaking up when things annoyed or bothered me. Even on the blog, I avoided complaints. So for a year, I spilled them all out in a safe space to someone who was basically a stranger. I learned to find ways to communicate about the things that annoyed me without whining. I’ve just had a better experience moving through the really hard deeper emotions by writing about them. This makes me very grateful for my writing practice even when there are times I’m not doing much of it. My creative endeavors are part of my therapy and while I have invested money and time into one creative endeavor like new a new camera and a new lens, I realized that I haven’t invested in my writing. So this week I purchased a gratitude gift for myself, a book on writing titled 1,000 Words: A Writer’s Guide to Staying Creative, Focused, and Productive All Year Round.

I don’t know if this means I will be writing a thousand words every day. Maybe this is one way to replace my Fortune Cookie Journal. Who knows? But also, maybe instead of asking the question “will I ever write a book?” I can start asking the question “will my book get published?”

EVENTS

It started with a series of events. First, my dad’s sister passed away. Then my dad’s dog, Annie passed away and when that happened, Dad’s health took a fast and sloping decline. For years, Dad had been telling us the same old stories over and over. That was Dad. There was nothing that didn’t feel normal about this. But when Annie died, Dad lost his sense of direction. That was not normal and things progressed very quickly after that. Sudden. My dad’s death drug out over a year, but still felt sudden at the ending of it all. I knew it was coming and told myself I was prepared for it.

I’m a terrible liar.

I awoke to a text from my sister: “Button passed away in the night.” Button is my mother’s cat. Mom has always been a cat person. She’s the reason we always had at least one cat roaming around the house. I think about this now and realize my parents had their own familiars, Dad with his dog and Mom with her cat. Button has been around since before we moved Mom into the house she lives in now. When I called Mom with my condolences, my mother broke down into tears and said “She was my constant and only companion.” It was, and now is, my turn to be the comforter. While my mother has comforted me often, most of my tears were from scraped knees and broken bones. Mom being (hopefully) past those stages of scraped knees, I am left to comfort broken hearts.

Her job was easier.

Sometime last year, my mom started telling me “This or next year is probably my last.” She’d say these things whenever I called her to check in. I have never protested her declaration, but instead replying with a simple “Well…okay.” I have learned in the years since my dad passed to not object or try to correct my mother in the things she says. I’ve gotten good at redirecting her stories of ‘whoa is me’ to something from happier times. I’ve slipped up once and lost my patience with her and that was when she said no one would miss her when she’s gone. I realize now that it was a bait, one I fell for. I’ve been asked “Doesn’t it bother you or make you mad when she says she only has a couple of years left?” That doesn’t bother me. We should all get to chose our time, but the idea of not missing her….that was a terrible and hateful thing for her to say. I miss her while she is still living. I miss the mother she was in my toddler memories and in all the times it was just her and me. I miss the mother she was before J died. I miss the mother I took to Ireland and pointed at a large penis someone had drawn into the sand on the beach and asked if it was a picture of a cow.

And when I redirect her from her stories that come from someplace negative, that version of her is still there, but barely.

My mother’s brother passed away a couple of years ago and now her cat. I can’t help but think about Dad and the events leading to his decline. I’m worried that I will disappoint my mother and not spend enough time with her. I’m worried about the mistakes I will inevitably make. I’ve notice that I have a tendency to shut off emotions during a given time frame and proceed as if everything is okay. I wait until I’m completely alone to break down and let the masks fall. I am well aware that from the outside it will look like I’m not even sad for her to go. Even though I have been warned, I will still be surprised by the suddenness of her departure. I’ve heard people say that part of the joys of parenthood is watching your children age into grownups, but not much is said about grownups watching their parents age into decline.

Frankly, it is not a joy for me to witness but it is turning into lessons on patience and kindness, lessons on caring for my own body and how to prepare for my own age into decline.