Oh, This Is Going to Be GOOD!

All ready for the 21 Day Yoga Challenge

"Whatever you're meant to do, do it now. The conditions are always impossible. People don't realize how quickly they're going to be old. Time goes very fast." ~ Doris Lessing

I'm all set to go. Not tomorrow, I've got to give a lecture at Georgia Tech and I'm not exactly done preparing, and I have to launch the new Article 31 (child's right to play) website, too, and it's not exactly done. But, come Wednesday, I'm going to start a yoga beginner's series from Yoga Journal - a 21 day challenge.  I've got my yoga mat, yoga blocks, weight ball (for later).

No time like the...day after tomorrow.

Getting My Body Back

Then and now

There is an ebb and flow to a big huge effort to change your life. You know how about 3 days after New Year's Eve's big promises you, well, ebb.  This go round I'm going with the flow - even if I crash into a rock or two and get hung up on the shore for a day or two. I'm just going to keep diving back in until the change is no longer a change, but is me.

Today I have been busy at work on a website for a non-profit for which I am a volunteer board member. Hours had passed when I stood up to get my power cord in the other room. Yeah, well, I tried to get up. It wasn't pretty. By the time I had righted myself, my husband walked in with the mail and on top of the stack was my monthly issue of Yoga Journal. Unlike most months in the past I immediately opened the issue and began reading. 

Thirty years ago I did yoga all the time and loved it even though, back then, people thought it was pretty weird. I'd stop for a while but always come back to it. Eventually I got to the point of practicing 90 minutes a day. It was so invigorating and, at the same time, calming. I'm not a church-type so for me yoga was my prayer and meditation - prayer and meditation with my whole body. If I missed a day or two of practice everything felt out of kilter. 

Slowly, jerkingly coming to a full stand today reminded me how I have totally and purposefully lost connection with my body. Just like one stops listening to someone who nags or irritates, I try to shut out the aches, pains, stabs, tightness and weakness of my body by ignoring it as best I could. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the overeating was a form of self-medication to ease the pain or at least distract from it.

The plan in my head since I begin this blog/journey has been to return to yoga, but it has never quite moved out of its comfortable territory in the back of my mind. Today it "slapped me up side the head with a two by four" (a lovely Southern phrase). As I look at this magazine I am thrilled that I have kept so many of the back issues. I wonder if they have a column on yoga for those like me who are trying to do aging differently. I don't want to fight aging and I don't want to pretend I'm young. I want to savor all the good things that come with time - perspective, experience, forgiveness, a dash of wisdom. Part of the deal is that the body starts to, well, you know. But, the problem is that today I felt like I was 83 instead of 58, and I felt like an 83 who hadn't worked out in 50 years if ever. 

Just this very minute I had a flashback to 1965 (no, not that kind). I took piano lessons from a woman who lived next door to a boy in my class. She was elderly, clearly in her 80s, but there was something different about her. I seem to remember purple, which was pretty odd in our very chi-chi, not hip, part of town. One day I arrived for my lesson to find her standing on her head. Standing on her head! I want to be in my 80s and standing on my head!

So, let's see where I go with this. Maybe I'll even get to the point where I'm comfortable using pictures of me instead of pictures of strangers I found on the Internet. Maybe I'll get to the point where I'm comfortable in by body again. I will if I just do it. 

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Some links:

Yoga Journal

Advice on Practicing Yoga in Middle Age, Part 1 (New York Times)

Advice on Practicing Yoga in Middle Age, Part 2 (New York Times)

Advice on Practicing Yoga in Middle Age, Part 3 (New York Times)

How Not To Be An Awful Mother-in-Law (I think)

My son is one lucky fellow.

All in one day - a Monday no less - we suffered through the one year mark since the death of my 16-year-old stepdaughter and my son was accepted to graduate school. The extreme gulf between the emotions of those two events is all the more vast when you consider the fact that it is a miracle my son lived beyond his teens. Monday was an exhausting day. Roller coasters can wear you out even though you're not doing anything but sitting there going along for the ride. 

Adding to the stress/tiredness is the fact that I've got myself in over my head with obligations for my time and that adds to making the dips deeper on that roller coaster. I've gotten good at saying "No" to things I don't want to do, but when it comes to things I'd love to do....oy, I suck at saying "No." Any progress I've made in my life has come from the "Yeses" so I try to cram them all in forgetting that all-nighters are a thing of the past and I am a terrible judge of what I can accomplish in any given period of time.

And, then there's the frustration of suffering from American extremism - the kind where you feel like you have to be the -est of anything and everything in order to count at all. You have to be the richest, prettiest, smartest, thinnest or innovativest. Yeah, I don't think that's a word at all, but, you get it, right? I mean you can't even just be the wonderfulest by doing non-profit work anymore. You've got to have a dashboard that shows how miraculous the work is. Try measuring the value of play in an infographic!

Done venting yet?

There is one thing that I really, really love being and hope that I'm more than ok at, and that is being a not-awful mother-in-law. I feel a little creepy writing this because it smacks a little of manipulation, so let me dance around it a bit until I figure out what I'm trying to say.

One of the dearest things to me is my son. For decades it was just the two of us. I left his father (he calls him "the sperm donor") with a black eye and an 18-month-old on my hip when I snuck out of the house and hopped a plane from Richmond to Atlanta. No child support. No rich uncle. Just us. And it was great. I loved being a mom to this kid (still do). He was all boy - sports, stitches galore, climbing too high, falling, but he was a sweetheart, too. One Mother's Day when he was four or five, and outdoors in the neighborhood was still a safe place to play, he saw a neighbor preparing to throw away a 2/3-dead flower arrangement. My son asked if he could have it and brought the flowers to me, his Mom. They were the most beautiful flowers I've ever seen in my life. Can you imagine?

Eventually, the little boy who was like no other in his wonderfulness got overrun by hormones, a typhoon of anger at the long-absent father or S.D., peer pressure and a wild streak. We entered into the dark years. I'll spare you those details, but let me just say that  eventually that hellion became an inspiration as he dug himself out of the hole he had dug himself into. One foot in front of the other, occasionally two steps back, and now he is graduating from college next month and starting graduate school right after that.

When I get caught in those circuitous ruts in my brain and can't climb out I think about my son and the force of will and character he used to turn his life around.

Which brings me back to my daughter-in-law and how not to be an awful mother-in-law. And, that is largely by focusing on my ever-increasing love for her and for the gratitude I feel for her having come into my son's life, and thus, mine. This woman is not only drop-dead gorgeous and smart (a PhD, no less), but she loves my son, has helped him learn how to learn, I am betting she stands up to him in a fight, and she has given him two sons who are without a doubt the best, amazingest, funniest, adorablest, most remarkablest children you have ever seen in your life.

And, that's no American extremism. In this case, it is just the way it is.

Life. Is This Somebody's Idea of a Joke?

(1) My brother Richard,  and (2+3) Step-daughter Summer holding my first grandson

One of the more difficult things to come with the passage of time is that it becomes more and more common to face something people really can't stand thinking about - death. Do you remember as a kid not really believing that those bones and bloody things that you saw in your text book were really inside of YOU? I felt that way. Still do sometimes. But, I didn't get to remain a stranger to the inevitable truth and limits of having a body for very long.

Over the years I have experienced more loss than I care to think about. Both parents - are you still an "orphan" if you are a grown-up? I lost my 3-year-old sister when I was 7, my 36 (or was he 37?) -year-old brother when I was 46 (or 47). Shortly after losing my brother his widow and my two nieces were blocked from my life. It was like multiple deaths all at once. My own sister moved out of my life. But, at around the same time I met the man who was to become my new husband. Life sure has some pretty extreme ebbs and flows.

With my new husband came new children to love. His grown son and his twins - then 7 or 8 - a boy and a girl. People actually asked me was I sure I was doing the right thing marrying someone with children who were going to become t.e.e.n.a.g.e.r.s. one day soon. Completely blocking out the memories of my own son's teen years I said, "How bad could it be? They're great kids!" And I loved them, although when she was 12 and when he was around 14 I did wonder from time to time what I had been thinking. On some levels it helped soften the blow of the loss of my nieces, but I valued the twins totally and completely for the unique individuals that they were.

My husband and I have been married almost 7 years now and meeting him was one of the luckiest things to ever come my way. But, tomorrow... tomorrow marks the one year anniversary of the death of his beloved daughter Summer. She would be a senior in high school now, driving cars and driving us crazy. Instead, just over two years ago she was diagnosed with a rare sarcoma. On the evening of November 11, 2012 we were all around her as she took her last breath. Summer was a piece of work. Beautiful, funny (in a very sharp and smart kind of way), maddening, charming, sneaky, empathetic. She was not easy. She was one of the most complicated people I have ever met,  but she could be magnificent. And, now she is gone.

After my mother and brother both died unexpectedly and in an instant, and I managed to get through it, I actually thought, "I've got this death thing down pat. I've experienced the worst. I can handle this." The thing I am realizing now, with Summer, is that instead of handling it I shut down. Now, I am letting the reality of her loss flow over me. I'll tell you it sucks.

But, life is life. It can be good and bad. It can be yin and yang. Since Summer was diagnosed, in this short little span of time, my husband and I went from 0 to 4 grandchildren! My son and his wife had a boy, followed by my older stepson and his wife having twins (a boy and a girl!), and then another boy for my son's family. I found it was possible to experience the greatest joys and the greatest agony virtually simultaneously, although I often wondered if this was some cosmic somebody's idea of a joke or of a gift? I think both, but mostly the latter.

There is a saying in AA, "You must accept life on life's terms." I had absolutely no idea what that meant until my brother died. Now I get it. Life pulls no punches. It hits hard. But, oh my, if you stay open - just keep your heart from hardening - life also brings you the greatest gifts it has to offer. And, then, damnit, sometimes it yanks those gifts right back out of your hand. No punches held, remember?

So, from all of this I get something to which I used to pay lip service, but am now actively focusing on... holding life loosely. Accepting what it is and how it is at any given moment. Actually BEING in the moment. Love what is there in front of you to love today. Let go of the rest. It's taken me a while to believe this stuff, but I do. It only makes sense and it makes each day a pretty darn decent one.

And, that is my sermon for this fine Sunday as I sit and ponder my beautiful step-daughter, and cry, and laugh a bit. She is missed more than you can imagine, even if I am "only" the step-mother. And so we mourn, and then in a few hours, we are going to have dinner with my son and his family. The 2-year-old will call out "Nana! Poppis!"as I scoop him up in my arms. The 10-month-old will give his little Elvis smile as his beloved grandfather picks him up and tickles his tummy. What a day it is today.

Slight Backtrack

This is something I wrote a couple of weeks ago. Yes, it still applies.

Actress Jennifer Lawrence looking very tough.

In front of me are a few things that are always on my desk. The first is a card my husband gave me. It says, "Have the fearless attitude of a hero and the loving heart of a child." (Author unknown). I love that he would give that to me.

To my right is something I printed out a while back entitled "Are you mentally tough enough?" (Of course not...ADD, Pisces...YOU be tough with those labels - but, secretly, I do believe I am tough. I used to feel I was really tough, back when I was living in my head instead of the world.) So the five points of being mentally tough that they listed are:

1.) They don't feel sorry for themselves

2.) They don't give people power over them

3.) They don't avoid change

4.) They don't play small

5.) They don't focus on things they can't control

There was a third thing, but I can't remember, oh, yeah, Seth Godin wrote a piece recently on being FORMIDABLE, not being, but CHOOSING to be formidable. The opposite of being formidable is being an accident waiting to happen. Ha. I resemble that remark. 

I'm not sure about you, but here in my world (aka brain), I am fast approaching 60. To tell you the truth I'm excited as hell about it. 60. I remember my Auntie Dayle inviting my husband and me to visit her in Cape Cod. I (pathetically) said, "Are you sure?" She (beautifully) said, "I'm in my 80's. I don't have time to surround myself with people I don't care to be around." Choice made. You can do that? In the past I was one of those people who stood there in front of someone toxic and said, "Oh, I'm so sorry. I am wrong. Please hit me again." It has been hell getting that ship out of port, but I think she has sailed. Good riddance. 

Well, part of the dealing with ADD thing is not only getting organized, but being disciplined. I'm going to have to build in time for this writing, but for now, I'm supposed to be doing some studying. I'm in graduate school and loving (and being overwhelmed by) it. Wait. Cut that out. No, I'm fine. I'm loving it. 

So...approaching 60...wanting to dive into the "third act" with arms wide open in wild abandon (disciplined abandon?) and joy. And love. I want whatever time I have left to be filled with love, acceptance, peace of mind, and a good, strong, healthy, albeit aging, body. That's it for now. 

Keeping My Head In Line

I'm going to start worrying about being self-indulgent next week, for now I'm just going to write away and see where it goes. Maybe by next week the apologies and/or self-justifications will stop, too. Why do that? Who makes me feel that it is necessary and that I am even being self-indulgent? Oh, I know. The voices. Those who make me feel "less than." They know who they are.

Where was I? I've been at this new-way-of-living thing for a week now.  I am not radically different from last week, but I stopped looking for instant gratification, miracles and a magic pill long ago so that is ok. As they say in Alcoholics Anonymous, "Progress not perfection." I am in this to live a healthier life for the rest of my life. Today I will focus on today. Well, in a minute anyway.

I started out the week on fire, slipped into old patterns, but then snapped to attention when I realized the voices going through my head were those mentioned in the first paragraph. I was startled when I realized what was happening. I  focused and scanned my brain to come up with the fully-and-truly-me image I am painting in my head. The stark difference between the two versions is astounding. I feel like a completely different person when I am a completely different person. Ha. The thing I have to remember is that what other people think of me is none of my damn business and it is idiotic to look at myself through their lenses. Me? I just want to be a healthier me so that I can do the things I want to do with the rest of my life...and, look good in this coat and pants.

Discovered on HabituallyChic ~ Photo and clothes: Emerson Fry 

Well, enough of that. This blog is helping me to remember and stay on target. If it helps me, maybe it will help somebody else. 

Briefly, I did pretty darn good with the no sugar thing. I'm getting used to non-sweetened coffee and cutting out desserts. I'm noticing that if I do succumb to a sugary delight it is never enough. I had a low-fat cinnamon something or other at Starbucks the other day and it was as if someone turned on the post-Halloween sugar jonesing switch. It's easier if I just don't have the first bite. 

I didn't do much on the work out front. My husband and I took our 10-month-old grandson on a walk yesterday, but my foot is really hurting from the surgery. I did a little research on the Internet (who needs med school?) and discovered I have metararsalgia - basically the pad of my foot under where I had the surgery is ticked off at me. Turns out maybe it wasn't too bright to walk around barefoot so soon after surgery. So today is staying put, icing and resting the foot. Maybe I'll throw in a little stretching for good measure. Oh, I know. I'll spend some time revitalizing the image of the wonderfully aging me in my brain..and doing my homework...and learning how to write shorter blogs.

When Is It Too Late?

Louise Nevelson would not have become "Louise Nevelson" if she had not simply begun to work. 

Long, long ago I received a catalogue for evening art classes at the High Museum in Atlanta. The cover of the catalogue was a simple quote on a newsprint background. It read:

“It is never too late to be what you might have been.”

– George Eliot

The quote captivated me and rocked my world. I found it overwhelming because I believed –  though only in my early 30s – that my life was set and that I would be relegated to the misery of an office job for the rest of my life. There was no way out that I could see. I understood the term “rat race” because I felt like little more than a worthless rodent dutifully running the same course each and every day. Unlike the rat, thinking for myself only made me more miserable.

In my defense, this was still the era when people stayed in one or two jobs for their entire lives. There was no Internet, there was no social entrepreneurism, and breaking free was truly terrifying and somewhat akin to climbing Everest.

The catalogue cover stayed on my bulletin board for years before it took. But take it did. Dreams of being Walt Disney and opening my own animation studio languished as I had no money, had never animated anything, had never run a business… The “you can’t do that” list ran long.

One day, a dear friend said simply, “Start where you are.” That had never occurred to me. Without that admonition I would have researched, planned and plotted my life away without actually stepping outside of my brain. Instead, I searched for what I could do right here and now. I called the then-rundown Hughes Spalding Children’s Hospital on the fringes of downtown and asked if they would like a free mural painted. They said, “Yes” and I was on my way.

Fortunately they never asked if I had actually painted a mural before, as I had not. But, I could draw. So eventually I found myself standing in the middle of the playroom imagining my scene on the walls. I opened my first can of paint and promptly spilled most of it on the floor. At least I laughed as I rushed to clean it up before I was discovered. I had my hands dirty. I had begun.

One day, several weeks into the project I heard a rustling behind me and turned to see a little 5-year-old girl in her drab hospital nightgown (with a second gown worn backwards as a robe). She stood holding onto her IV pump, her eyes wide open with wonder. On the walls n front of her she saw what I saw in my mind. Her eyes and my friend’s simple instructions had launched the trajectory of my life up and off the chart into the stars.

I was 40. It wasn’t too late then. It isn’t too late now.

Today I Begin Again

Since nobody is looking yet I'm just going to let it rip. What could go wrong by being too self-revealing in public? (I will spare you the insertion of a smiley face here, but I did consider it.)

There is so much more I want to do with this life. Over the past couple of years I've had a number of physical (and emotional) setbacks. My son, who is studying strength and conditioning pretty much said, "You better do something about yourself NOW or it is going to be too late."

Now, I don't really want to believe in "too late", but I tell you one thing, I am miserable in my body right now. It's not so much from a vanity point of view (although there is no denying that I cannot wear the clothes I want to wear with bulges where I have them), but it is from a health perspective. I am weak. I am prone to tearing ligaments. I have zero endurance after basically not being able to walk for the past 4 or 5 months. The muscle tone I had is a distant memory. I ache, have arthritis, am recovering from surgery on a broken foot, two D&Cs in the last 6 months...there's more, but I forget... and, I think you get the picture... I'm back at the starting gate at 58 1/2.

You want to hear my goal? Sensational at 60! Why not? I've already given up smoking (38 years ago), drinking (20 years ago), meat (1 1/2 years ago). Now, it's sugar and processed foods. Wait, wait...this is not what works for me. Going TOWARDS something works for me.  So, here is the embodiment of my goal. And, I start today.

My goal

Some of My Favorite Things

I remember tracking down Atlanta artist Heather Haase years ago when I ran the Virginia-Highland Artist Market. As I recall I had to talk her into showing.

Her work is extraordinary. She combs the world for the extraordinary trinkets and beads that she incorporates into her pieces. Absolutely amazing.

I can't help but think that our first Blythe Bouvier icon would have gone as wild over Ms. Haase's pieces as I do. I was fortunate to wear one for a very special evening and giving it back was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do . I think I'll get in touch with her again and do an online exhibit of her work if she's interested. This is the kind of thing that gets me so excited about living. We've each got to find the things that keep the spark of enthusiasm alive. 

What ignites your enthusiasm?

Our First Icon

Beatrice Wood
Photo by William Gray Harris

Beatrice Wood, aka the "Mama of Dada," lived and practiced her art until a few days after her 105th birthday.  At a young age her independent spirit had her standing up to her aristocratic parents and dashing off to Paris. It wasn't until decades later that she stumbled upon the craft that would bring her such claim - ceramics and pottery (hmmm, are they different?). The story is that she had some tea cups and tried in vain to find a pot to match the set. She came to the conclusion that the only thing she could do to get her way was to make the pot herself. And I am guessing it was a success - or if not, it stoked her curiosity about this new medium.

Ms. Wood was also renowned for her wit and style. I wonder if you can have style without wit. Those who have style but take it too seriously totally blow it. That's when the "clothes wear the person".

Here's a sample of the artist's quotes that float around the internet. I like her perspective a lot.

"My life is full of mistakes. They're like the pebbles that make a good road."

For more about Ms. Wood and her work, please visit http://wwww.beatricewood.com/index.html

Aging in Full View

Id love to write about aging with grace, strength, and splendor. No, not splendor, vibrance. That's more of what I'm looking for myself. I want to write about those extraordinary women who, although well into their sixties or seventies, still have a lust for life, an appropriate amount of subtle sensuality (what's with the apologetic tone?), are physically and mentally flexible, are still passionate and curious about life and learning, are engaged with all kinds of wonderful people of all ages, and just make you feel better about yourself every time you are with them. I figure that perhaps if I write about people like that I might just figure out how to actually...be...that.

My friend Morgan. This is what the new 60 looks like!

What I'm not so into are the women who have been nipped, tucked and injected into creatures not quite natural. It's just not my thing (well, maybe a little bit around the eyes). And, frankly, you don't have to be sartorially extraordinary or a freak of nature who still looks 32 to catch my attention. It's not about being young or rich or bejeweled. It is about the twinkle in the eye and everything that fuels that twinkle. 

This project is partly for me and partly for you. The me part is because somedays I have twinkle, some days there are aches and pains that dull the spark. There are a lot of simple things I can do today to change the spark/dull ratio favorably. I need to make some massive changes that I must make before I get one day closer to 60 in 16 months. I'll get into that later when I have my bearings a bit.

The you part is that there are so many fabulous women (and men) out there who aren't completely bummed out by aging. They love the things about getting older that are incredible (there really are a lot of those - trust me) and they do what is necessary to stay in optimum health. I love collecting pictures and information about these people and I'll share them with you. Maybe together we can all leap and twirl and laugh into old age and completely and totally change the way we look at age.

So, I won't begin writing today. I'm just pulling the ideas together as well as the Pinterest page and the Twitter page and the Facebook page (I'll figure out later if we really need all of these forums.) For now, hello. I can't wait to see photographs and interviews and so on from you about making the most of every day. 

See you tomorrow.