Category Archives: Hip Hip Hooray!

And the seasons they go round and round and the painted ponies go up and down. ~Joni Mitchelle

And the seasons they go round and round and the painted ponies go up and down. ~Joni Mitchelle

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I’ve always love the song “Circle Game” by Joni Mitchell.  As an adolescent when this song first came out, I never truly appreciated the significance of the lyrics.  But at this time in my life, they pulse with meaning.

I’ve noticed an interesting pattern through the years and I wonder if other women my age are seeing it as well.  Our children leave home and go to college.  They acquire degrees and find careers that make them happy.  And life feels somewhat stagnant as a parent with an empty nest.  We take a back seat to many of their adventures and accomplishments.  We brag about them with our closest friends or a stranger in the market, showing pictures on our phones to whomever appears interested and feel blissful when they call home to say hi or I love you.  After a life full of raising sons and taking a back seat to their health, education and well being, I am often at a loss for how to proceed.

We’re captive on the carousel of time, we can’t return.  We can only look behind from where we came.

And then suddenly things begin to happen.  A wedding, a grandchild, another grandchild, another wedding.  Life takes on new challenges and excitement.  A flurry of new activity.

When my sons were growing up, my childrearing “bible” was The Gesell Institute of Human Development.  Anyone remember the books “Your One Year Old”, “Your Two Year Old”, “Your Three Year Old”?  Their research shows that children’s growth is not always an even ride from less to more maturity.  Instead, smooth and calm behavior alternates with unsettled and uneven behavior.  Children go through periods of “disequilibrium”- when they are learning new skills and abilities, growing quickly and experiencing more anxiety and less confidence.  And “equilibrium”- a period of stability and consolidated behavior- when they practice the skills already mastered- when they are easier to live with…

Wowzy..   sounds like my adult life! 😱

2018 was smooth sailing.  A year of equilibrium.  I had the grandmother skills honed and the mother in law persona figured out.  I’d finally settled into my townhome after grieving the sale of my memory-filled yet large and empty house.

2019 will be the year of disequilibrium for me.  A new grandchild.  A wedding.  A new daughter in law.  Growth, challenge, frenzy, a year of learning.  I see the pattern emerging.  What has been lost to the past is being reincarnated in the present-  layered with periods of anxiety and the mastering of new skills.

As they say in Portland, Oregon.. if you don’t like the weather wait an hour or so.  The clouds and rain give way to sunshine and blue skies.  The painted ponies go up and down.  We’re captive on a carousel of time.

And oh what an incredible ride it is.  

 

 

 

 

 

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Do you believe in New Year’s Resolutions?

Do you believe in New Year’s Resolutions?

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One wouldn’t get in a sailboat without a compass or embark on a grueling scenic hike without a map.

Or would they?

Myself? I have a tendency to get lost.  Lost on a trail.  Lost on the freeway.  Lost in my thoughts.  A good plan keeps me focused and on task.  Goals help me to breakthrough inertia.  A map helps me to reach my destination.

So I plan.  And I plan.  And I journal.  And I plan some more.  And I re-read my old journals to see if life has deposited me somewhere close to where X marks the spot.

How about you?  Do you know where you want to go in 2017?  Do you have a hankering for something different?  Are you ready to change things up and see what sticks?  Or are you plodding along the same path.  Waking up to the same job.  Shopping at Target and getting take out from the Chinese restaurant on the corner.

Benjamin Franklin once said “If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail”.  Winston Churchill said this- “Those who fail to learn from the past are doomed to repeat it”.

In either case, some self reflection seems to be in order as we embark on a new year.

Your thoughts?

 

 

 

 

 

Drinking the Kool-Aid..

Drinking the Kool-Aid..

Day 14 of a 14 day detox program and ready to report on better health, better sleep, better outlook on life, better woman, better have a glass of wine soon or I’m going to levitate off the planet.

I’ve drunk the Kool-Aid and I’m detoxed, de-flead, delightful, decompressed, delivered from sin and indecisive about the results, end product, over-all value of the experience and determination to continue some kind of gluten, sugar, dairy, alcohol, caffeine, throw caution to the wind never again kind of life-style.

Did you follow all that?  Perhaps you need a detox so that you can think more clearly and join the ranks of the “free people” who will certainly reach a state of nirvana in this lifetime.

“Let me know how it turns out!” said my friends and co-workers.  It’s like bungee jumping.  If you are alive at the end with no major injuries you might be able to convince other people to do it!  But for the time being, they are content to watch you endure it all.

The crowning event of my 14 day detox was the day 13 Faculty Appreciation Dinner at my place of employment, Presentation High School.  Several weeks ago I signed up to do my duty and bring a dish to the event.  I accidentally signed up for the “free” table.  And I mean gluten, sugar, dairy, peanut, unknown additive free table.  Oh well, I figured what’s the big deal?  I was told that only the “free people” would be eating from this table.  The rest of the group would be consuming the “catered” option.

At the end of the night I took home at least 99/100ths of my homemade arugula, cucumber, green onion, mushroom, tomato, toasted pecan with oil and vinegar (on the side please) salad.  Where were all those free people??  Did they drink the kool-aid of the fried, buttered, glutened and sugared? Glancing at the table as I reclaimed my beautiful salad, I noticed that the food had hardly  been consumed.  Shall we add waste-free to the agenda?  Oh Lordy, the people are starving in Biafra and we are picking at our plentiful food sources!

So the final evaluation?  Drum roll please..

  • I gave up coffee and am switching to green tea in the morning.
  • I have so much energy from this detox that I haven’t really slept in 14 days.

 

Rather anti-climatic isn’t it?

Overall, I’m happy that I joined the ranks of the ”free people” and have had the discipline to do a 14 day detox.  Now I know.  I’ve been redeemed.  I can enter into all those crazy conversations that the “free people” have and sound intelligent and informed.  I can go to Whole Foods and find the chia and flax seeds and know how to use them.  I am dangerous.  I can spot a gluten in a list of ingredients.

I have drunk the kool-aid and lived to tell the story.

 

My Second Act

My Second Act

I just celebrated another birthday.  They seem to be coming faster and faster and as Joni Mitchell says in her song “Circle Game” I want to drag my feet just to slow the circle down.  I’m really not that old.  Just old enough to live in the new “senior” housing in Morgan Hill (if I wanted to).  Just old enough to get a discounted ticket at the movie theater.   Just old enough to be courted and and pursued by AARP.  Just old enough to know better most times…

At least I don’t feel old.

In honor of my recent birthday I’d like to give myself a big round of applause for Act One of my life!  It has not been without struggle and I want to take a bow and acknowledge all the varied and sundry experiences, the provocative and stimulating people, the gut-wrenching turmoil, the unexpected deliriously joyful surprises, the down and dirty hard work and the yin and yang of it all.

I want to shine the spot light on it, acknowledge it, nod respectfully to it and have it exit stage left with its playbill for safe keeping in an archive of sorts.  Curtain closed.  Fade to the second act.

Act Two..

Whereas Act One was filled with calculated planning and career climbing and husband finding and child raising and house cleaning and penny pinching and weed pulling-  it seems only right that Act Two should be something different and unexpected!  The plot should thicken and the tables should turn!  There should be adrenaline pumping suspense and goose bump anticipation!  Why not take risks and do something mischievous and spend so much money on cowboy boots that I’m forced to sell my unnecessarily large house and rent an energy efficient cottage and be able to walk away from it for weeks at a time in order to go on a writers’ retreat or babysit my grandchildren or fly out to spend time with one of my siblings or go to Peet’s and pen that Act Two book?  Maybe I’ll  get a humongous dog and wear tie dye, let my hair go grey and move to Santa Cruz.

I think it’s time to start that girl band.

Sigh…

Did I hear someone yell Bravo?

 

 

You shoot from the hip, Rosemarie! That’s what gets you in trouble!

You shoot from the hip, Rosemarie! That’s what gets you in trouble!

There’s no way to begin except to just do it.  For a woman who is never speechless I seem to be unable to get going on this blog thing.  So here goes nothing!

I am  a straight shooter.  My son, Patrick, likes to remind me to “filter, mom”.  I know.  Sometimes my thoughts sneak out of my mouth without due diligence to my frontal lobes.  My boss at Presentation told me in a recent meeting that I shoot from the hip and that’s what gets me in trouble.  I immediately thought (but held my mouth closed) “Which hip, Mary?  My real one or my ceramic one?”  Had she forgotten that I had my right hip replaced this last summer?  The irony (and the humor!) of her comment was not lost on me.

On that note, people have been asking me “Aren’t you a little young to be getting a new hip?” and “How long will that new hip last?”  My thoughts… how long does anything last?  What warranties do we have on a breast or an eye or a lung?

I’d rather focus on living life and finding some mischief!  I hope you will join me.