“Enjoy the little things in life, for one day you’ll look back and realize they were the big things.” Kurt Vonnegut
For most of my life, I’ve found joy and beauty in the little things. A bird on the wing. A wave creeping up the sand, inviting me to play. A bee gathering pollen. My soul is stirred by so many small things at times I think I may burst with joy.
My essence is triggered by my senses. An image may cause my heart to flutter. A scent may envelop me in a blissful calm. A sound may trigger memories. Many times I’m so moved by what I experience it’s hard to contain my emotions. It’s also difficult to find like-minded people. So, I keep it inside and enjoy my own thoughts.
I’ve always been a “thinker,” a dreamer. I was the student always gazing out the window, distracted by anything visual, but always listening. It’s given me powerful insight and honed an almost bottomless depth of emotion. It’s also spurred me to “do” more.
When I was teaching I often told my students that each of us possesses our own set of gifts. We should not compare ourselves to others because each of us is unique. I believed what I told them to be true as each child who sat in my classroom brought something singular to our shared experience. What was missing, in my belief, was me. So easy to recognize in others, but near impossible to discern for myself.
I’m “growing” into my gift(s). I’m learning it’s okay for me to have them and to acknowledge them. I’m tentatively becoming comfortable in sharing them. I’m opening my future to include them.
Remember the little things. A shared glance, companionable silence, the sun poking through the clouds. At any given moment we do not know how we may be impacting others. For twenty five years I tried to stand on my head each day to make connections, to inspire, to matter. And now it’s time to let it ooze in dribs and drabs, in spurts, in torrents. Fear and trepidation aside, it’s time to live with purpose and authenticity.
N.B. – this is a work in progress. My intent will become more apparent in the coming months. I’m looking forward to it. As usual, I sidestepped as I wrote, always willing to follow the tangents in my thoughts. I’d intended to write more about Vonnegut, one of my perennial favorites. Another time. “So it goes.”
“There is nothing to writing. All you have to do is sit down at the typewriter and bleed.” Ernest Hemingway
The title of this post and the photo accompanying this post may seem incongruous to you. Did you read the caption under the photo? It will make the connection though it’s not obvious.
This quotation figured prominently in a colleague’s classroom when I was teaching. I looked at it thousands of times throughout my 25 year career. Now, several years later, I see it. For a quarter of a century, I willed it to speak just to me. Several years have passed since I retired and out of nowhere came a whispered message.
Over the years I’ve read a fair amount of Hemingway. Was it a favorite activity? Not so much for me. On the surface he’s an easy read. It’s while reading between the lines that it becomes challenging. If you know even just a little about Hemingway’s life, you know it was difficult. It was a life of extreme adventure, manly pursuits, failed marriages, endless wandering. Add a serious car accident and two plane crashes to his constant inner turmoil. It adds up to 61. The writing was unable to stem the bleeding. Hemingway took his life.
In my mind, the “bleeding” symbolizes cathartic floodgates. In truth, writing is often a release of emotions that flow through my arm and out of the pen. In that regard, it is representative of blood. Emotion becomes tangible through the mechanism of ink — ribbon ink for Hemingway, pen ink for me. I’m a tactile person and feel a sense of release as I propel a pen across a sheet of paper.
Ok, ok, but what about the trees in the picture? There is so much that draws me to that photo. On the surface the towering spires of the trees are impressive. The trees are long-lived and still reach for the sky. They may be seen as a symbol for strength and endurance. It is up to the viewer to choose what they may mean. The mist and reflection of the sun could mean any variety of things. I choose to see light and hope emerging from troubled thinking.
I did not take the photo. I have used it before and given proper credit and was given permission to use it. Do we sense a story behind this? Of course there is. But it isn’t a story for today. “Dreams/So they say/Are for the fools and they let ‘em drift away…”. Many of my dreams have drifted away. Now is my time to realize some of them.
Lyrics credit: “We May Never Pass This Way Again”. Seals and Crofts
“Say hey” is an expression used as a nickname for the great baseball player Willie Mays. Willie used the word “hey” quite a bit but no one really knows how the nickname came about. Real baseball fans know little facts such as this. Avid baseball fans talk baseball constantly, regardless if it’s baseball season or not.
Baseball is truly an American game created by a brash young country, just as we developed jazz music and tap dancing. Of course, it’s become a bit of a global enterprise but its roots grew throughout the cities and rural areas of the US. Early newspapers paid great attention to baseball regardless of the level of the league. Look up a newspaper from the early 1900s and read the wonderful reporting of the game. You’ll be able to feel the sun on your face, smell the peanuts, and hear the crack of the bat.
It seemed each small town had at least one team. There were loads of different leagues which gave many men the opportunity to play. We all know that not everyone makes it to the big leagues. Many spend entire baseball careers in the minors. I surmise that if one just loves to play, it’s the opportunity to play that matters.
Case in point…a young man, born in New Haven, CT, played organized baseball from 1895-1911. Mostly a third baseman, he also played at second base. Not a stellar hitter, career batting average of .250. He played on many different teams. Here are a few: Augusta Kennebecs, Bristol Bellmakers, Reading Coal Heavers, Schenectady Electricians, Albany Senators. There were a few more. He also had the chance to be a player/coach with the Albany team.
Also due to his association with the game, one of his daughters married a major league player named Johnny Cooney. Johnny played mostly for the Boston Braves and Brooklyn Dodgers. A lifetime immersed in the game of baseball. It’s kind of the stuff of some kid’s dreams. His name was Mike Doherty and he was my great-grand uncle.
As a baseball fan, I would have loved to talk to him but he died a few years before I was born. When I was a kid, the circumstances surrounding baseball were a bit different. Many games were played during the afternoons. If we were lucky we owned a transistor radio with an earplug to listen surreptitiously to a game. Many of us went to sleep at night with the transistor under our bed pillow so we could listen. It was exciting!
Take some time to look at how baseball developed and was supported by small towns as well as big cities. It was accessible to the public and affordable. It could be played wherever there was a field and players. In the early years, players shared equipment. It was more of a pure game until greed took over. Regardless, today was Opening Day and I’m looking forward to the season.
It was thirty six years ago that a devastating event occurred which would change my life drastically…for the better. How is that possible? Sit back and I will share my tale.
Psalm 130 begins with this powerful line, “Out of the depths I cry, O Lord…”. Through these words we gain a glimpse into anguish. All human beings suffer a variety of miseries throughout their lifetimes. As is often the case, how we deal with these challenges may have a great impact.
Long story short, I slipped on black ice. I sustained a torsion fracture to my ankle and tore all of the ligaments. Isn’t that special? Surgery ensued and I then spent two weeks at Mom’s Rehab and Training Camp. Each day was a routine. When I awoke, a breakfast tray was next to the bed. After a bird bath, stuff I’d need for the day was piled into my pillowcase and tossed down the stairs. I followed by bumping my bum on each step.
Once downstairs I crutched to the kitchen and propped my casted leg on a kitchen chair while I washed my hair in the sink. My ankle was so damaged I was never able to have a walking cast because the ankle would not achieve a 90 degree angle bend. I then settled on the couch in the living room, combed my hair and usually had to take a nap by then.
Lunch was in the fridge. Since I couldn’t carry anything, the seltzer bottle went into the pocket of my sweatpants, a piece of fruit in the other pocket, and the sandwich in its baggie hung from my clenched teeth. Lunch lasted all of five minutes which left all afternoon for tedious television, rampant reading, and necessary napping.
After two weeks I had gained enough strength to return to my small apartment. A friend would bring me bags of paperback books weekly that she’d bought at garage sales. My newly-retired dad kept me supplied with seltzer and Lean Cuisine. We listened to many baseball games over the radio.
I was alone a great deal. I’m a thinker. I knew in my heart how much I was not suited for my current “career.” I started making some phone calls. I learned I could get my Master’s degree, do my student teaching, and receive my certification all in two years. Hmmm, not bad. But did I want to teach? Yes, I did. I knew it was hard work as I’d watched the effort my mom put into her teaching.
So, I called a friend to take me over to SUNY Albany to meet with a representative in the School of Education. I arrived late, and was a sweaty mess. I hadn’t factored in all of the walking needed to access the building on campus. Crutching was much more difficult as an adult. But, I apologized and we had a productive meeting. I wouldn’t be able to walk on my leg until a screw was removed but that was taking place at the beginning of May. There was a short summer session beginning mid-May and I signed up for my first course.
Another long story short. I moved back home due to the financial burden of paying for school, worked part-time at my despised job until I finally left to do my student teaching. Was it easy? In some ways, it was. I had set routines. The coursework wasn’t difficult but extremely tedious. Most classes were at night. Student teaching was exhausting but exhilarating. I received my degree in the two year time period, despite working full-time for many months.
So, I’m proof that after having a succession of lemons thrown at you, you can make lemonade. Becoming a teacher was the best thing I ever did. It wasn’t easy, but nothing worthwhile ever is. Teaching was not easy. It required hours and hours of preparation. But again, it was worth it. My life was influenced by so many wonderful adolescents and I learned as much from them as they did from me. I’m thankful I was given the gift of time to think of my future and for the strength to make the necessary changes.
When it all falls down around you, get up and keep moving.
Words are my thing. I live to write. It’s true that I haven’t blogged in a very long time. Mostly it’s due to working on another writing project that makes my head tired. I’ve started a few posts but didn’t follow through on finishing them. Such is life.
There are times when my being is so full, I have to skim a layer or two off the top. My frustration is ample and it’s necessary to release some of this bilious exasperation. I have a great deal of interaction with doctor’s offices due to my medical issues and those of my elderly mom. This past week I experienced an overdose of medical office experiences.
As a frame of reference, a few years back I was consistently feeling unwell. Malaise, lack of energy, overall fatigue, etc. It took almost two months to figure out what was wrong and it was pretty much by accident. However, I am keenly aware of the pervasive assumption once medically-affiliated folks read my chart and spot the depression and anxiety diagnoses. I cease to be a physically ill individual. Yes, this is a generalization but I’ve dealt with this for forty years now.
Since I have a variety of “invisible” chronic illnesses, my stoic appearance belies my daily reality. Look, I’m aware that there are a myriad of folks who deal with very serious and traumatic illness. It isn’t my intent to take away anything from them. On the flip side, it also doesn’t mean that many of us are dealing with day-to-day piddly-diddly stuff. If you can’t see it, it doesn’t really exist, right? And Lord knows, if you have mental health issues everything is all in your head, isn’t it?
I’ve been wanting to get back into the swim. Start slowly with water aerobics and build up to lap swimming. I miss the water. But in the last few months I’ve been having some problems with being short of breath after even minor exertion. Process of elimination for me so I started with the cardiologist. Long story short, I did a treadmill stress testthe other day. I should say I attempted one. I failed. Was shut down after three minutes. Embarrassed and mortified at “failing,” I was at least gratified to see an oxygen saturation of 89. Not in my head this time. My BP also skyrocketed. Nothing is worth doing if not done well, am I right?
Handful of hours later, I received a phone call from my doc. And after almost twenty years, I’m still addressed by the formal form of my first name. “Blah blah, a concern but not really blah, blah adjust these meds blah blah wait a minute blah blah just double your blood pressure med blah blah I’m leaning toward it being pulmonary. I will send in a new scrip for the increased dose. Bye.“
Yes, my life has been reduced to staring at the phone. No mention of a follow up. In my opinion, my resting BP which is slightly elevated doesn’t warrant a doubled increase. However I didn’t go to medical school. I only went to teacher school with just a Masters degree in English, ewwww I hated English class is the usual reaction.
Angry and frustrated, I hoped my thoughts would be clearer the next day. Ironically I saw my primary the next day for a different follow up. I mentioned my recent experience. My blood pressure was still slightly elevated but my primary was shocked to hear my med was to be doubled. I left feeling more undecided.
Here’s the deal. This is a rant on todays current state of affairs regarding our health insurance companies. They’re all about the money and could care less about our health. Hey, that’s similar to our politicians. Never mind. Our doctors are not allowed to spend time with their patients. They are driven by time, a precise amount of contact time allowed by the health insurance companies. It does not give them time to know us, to listen to us, to understand us. No wonder things are missed, mistakes are made, people like me are frustrated.
It won’t keep me from advocating for myself or from asking questions. While I do not like having my questions or thoughts dismissed, it’s really the only option because that’s how it works these days. It leaves too many things swirling through my head. Dylan Thomas, one of my favorite poets, reminds me “Do not go gentle into that good night.” Once a bit of a door mat, I am no longer. I will speak for myself and I will be heard.
As to the state of health care, this feeling comes to mind. “Is that all there is, is that all there is?” I haven’t been able to adopt Peggy Lee’s suggestion “If that’s all there is my friends, then let’s keep dancing/Let’s break out the booze and have a ball/If that’s all there is.” Sadly, dancing would leave me short of breath and drinking would raise my blood pressure!
I will continue to “rage against the dying of the light.” And as the Chairman of the Board used to sing “I’ve been up and down and over and out/And I know one thing/Each time I find myself/Flat on my face/I pick myself up/And get back in the race.” Man, I love words. The next time the impersonal “blah blah” talk starts, I will channel Joe Biden and think, “Will you shut up, man?” Hopefully the words will stay in my head and not exit my mouth.
I’m guessing we all have some specific holiday memories. Mine seem to encompass the entire month of December. Could someone explain why our twelfth month derives from the Latin word for ‘ten’? Ok, yeah, yeah, blah, blah…Roman year to Anglo-French and ta da…December which was once the tenth month but isn’t anymore. Clear as mud.
If you live in the northeastern US, the twelfth month can be wicked. However, it also sports some pretty cool holidays. My birthday in early November was far enough removed from 12/25 so it didn’t impact gifts. Though I like the cold less and less, I do enjoy being out in it as long as I’m dressed properly. Walking during a snowfall is one of my favorite activities. I’m not talking a blizzard, just a nice snowfall. It’s SO quiet and that always amazes me.
There are many things I associate with the month of December. The solstice occurs on the 21st and days begin to get longer. I do not like the prolonged darkness of the winter months. While December may be dark and overcast, the most challenging months of January and February are yet to come.
Back to December. In my youth, December meant the appearance of ribbon candy and the bowl of unshelled nuts in the living room. If it was an especially righteous year, the grandparents showed up with petit fours. Only one of those items remotely appeals to me now and I’m ashamed to admit it’s the bowl of nuts.
While I enjoy some holiday sweets each year, I grow tired of them quickly. Maybe it’s the film on my teeth left from the sugar. Maybe it’s the fact that if I indulge, I have to use more insulin. Maybe it’s just that I’ve eaten my fill. How sad would that be? December used to be a month during which I baked a plethora of holiday sweets and treats. Now I make very little. That said, there’s a pan of fudge cooling in the kitchen.
December makes me think of cold, red faces and runny noses and laughter. As a young child living in Vermont, winter was no big deal. Until our uncle Ro passed away. He was my mother’s uncle, so my great-uncle. I never met him but he’s been talked about enough that I feel I know the essence of him. His name was Roland and I’m thinking my great-grandmother may have read too much Robert Browning.
Uncle Ro passed on December 1, 1964. My mother drove from Burlington, VT to Portland, CT for the funeral, always dicey in the winter months. Sure enough, she ended up driving home through an ice storm. We had several inches of snow in Burlington and were spared the ice. My mother turned into the driveway that late afternoon, her car encased in a few inches of ice. It took a while to get the car door open, just to get her out. My father drove her car to the large indoor service garage (heated) at his business and it took two full days for all of the ice to melt.
Looking back, my mother must have been terrified. She said she was afraid to stop because she thought she wouldn’t be able to get home. We were happy to have her home.
Was washing some pots and pans at the kitchen sink when a flash of memory caused me to smile. And all because I thought of my mom’s old cookie sheets. I had just washed one of mine that I’d used to roast some vegetables the other day. Her cookie sheets could not have been used for that purpose. They were flat with no sides, just a slight rim at either end to grab to pull out of the oven.
They were thin, lightweight and easy to slide cookie from the sheet to a plate. Most cookie sheets I see these days are rimmed all the way around. Yes, it keeps things from falling off and offers greater versatility but I miss those old cookie sheets.
‘Tis the baking season. While most people are thinking about pies, my younger self would be making a cookie baking schedule. During my high school years, I began my tradition of cookie baking. In those days I mostly made spritz cookies. Those are the buttery little morsels that pop easily into the mouth. The dough is pressed through a cylinder which accommodated different designs. One cookie sheet could hold 18-24 cookies depending on the design.
The problem with the older presses is they were built to just turn to the right. Used to living in a non-lefty world, I would struggle year after year to turn to the right utilizing my right non-dominant hand. Or I’d have to use my left hand to turn to the right, very awkward. Regardless of the technique, it resulted in painful blisters on both hands. For that reason those cookies were the last to be made.
And I liked decorating those little cookies using my mother’s old frosting decorator cylinder. It looked like a large aluminum syringe and the plunger was pushed from the top so there was never a worry about hand injury for me. It had lots of different aluminum tips. Buttercream frosting, made from butter and confectioners sugar, could be thinned and tinted to perfection. I can’t tell you how many tiny trees and wreaths I decorated. I must have had a different level of patience then.
One detail I recall is our kitchen table had a leaf that folded down when not needed. When extended up, it didn’t provide a truly flat surface. And those old cookie sheets of my mother’s were far from being perfectly flat. One learned to work with what one had.
Because I’m me, there was a ritual to my baking. It involved an outfit and certain music. In the early days jeans with a dish towel tucked into a front pocket sufficed. This morphed over the years into athletic shorts topped by a chamois shirt or sweatshirt. And always a backwards baseball cap to keep hair out of the eyes. Stacked on the turntable in the adjacent living room were some requisite albums: Jo Stafford’s Ski Trails; the Broadway version of The Sound of Music; and one of The Great Songs of Christmas albums from the record club. For decades, those albums had flour dust on the edges from being flipped between batches of cookies.
Cookies varied from year to year. Spritz cookies were a constant. Some years there were cut sugar cookies or gingerbread men. Many years there were Russian Tea Cakes because they looked like snowballs. Another constant was fudge in addition to a confection known in my house as French Chocolates. Today they’re known as truffles.
I cranked out dozens of cookies using only two cookie sheets. I suppose that’s all one needs with just one oven. I almost forgot the raspberry chocolate chip meringue cookies. Those required the cookie sheets to be lined with brown paper. So it involved using right-handed scissors to cut a grocery bag. More systemic torture for me. It was worth it.
Spritz torture deviceUndecorated Spritz cookies (not mine)Meringues, fudge, Russian tea cakes, French Chocolates (my creations)
I spend a fair amount of time lost in memories. Actually, that isn’t correct. The term “lost in memories” implies one is wandering aimlessly or gazing wistfully. My mind works in images. People, events, scenery trigger images from the past in my head. Much of the time I feel free to wander those paths.
Where I lived as a young kid in Burlington, Vt., was a child’s dream setting. A dead-end street surrounded by woods on two sides created endless possibilities for adventure. Across the street was a large piece of land that everyone on our short block “owned” and maintained. It was a large field that the dads kept mowed.
Clumps of rhubarb and lilacs abounded one side and a dense arborvitae hedge the other side. Woods stood guard on one end and the other opened into a sweeping backyard. It was our ground, our field of battle. And battle we did.
Endless games of kickball and baseball were conducted with the zeal of unfettered childhood. Makeshift items were used as bases, objects like my tiny bicycle which was always second base. We avoided sliding into second as much as possible but sometimes it was merited. The victim could look forward to sporting the badge of bravery, a knee covered with mercurochrome.
Insects are buzzing, the sun is pounding down. All is quiet. Two little kids observe from a sturdy limb in a nearby tree. Their world is hot and dusty, and empty. There is no play in the field on this day. They’re trying to fathom the day’s events. Most of the adults are at a funeral. The image of a young woman, face frozen in anguish, the cords of her neck stretched in grief flutters in my memory. She is the sister of a young playmate. We sit in the tree looking out at our world and try to make sense of what it means that her young husband has died in a car accident.
Our understanding would be years in coming. On that day we knew things would never be the same for some people. We didn’t have the depth to fully comprehend the impact. Our beloved playground held us in its embrace as we puzzled through our thoughts.
Our confusion is still fresh in my memory. As kids do, one of my memories is of endless platters of sandwiches being served that day. It was like I’d gone to sandwich heaven. We kids munched and raced along the street, chasing one another for the mere thrill of the chase. One of the older neighbors spoke to us and we quieted ourselves, still not comprehending the somber tone but respecting our elder’s wishes. Because someone had gone to Heaven, for real.
I enjoyed outings to the woods. There had been woods behind her house and at the end of the dead-end road I lived on as a young child. In those days Westerns were popular on the television. Many an episode of Bonanza and The Big Valley were re-enacted among the trees. Many “forts” were built. Many acorns were ground into “flour.” It was the fantasy realm of a small girl who read voraciously.
Moving to another state resulted in the loss of those beloved woods. However, new settings require exploration. As I made new friends at school, the discovery of a new wooded area wasn’t far behind. My brother and I were active kids. He found the shortcut to the nearby junior high where he attended school and played on the school’s tennis courts.
The next street over from my new residence ended in a dead-end. A large wooded area loomed and a narrow dirt path beckoned to all kids. The path wound its way a short distance before opening up to a clearing where paths branched off in a variety of directions.
To the left was a path through trees that opened up to the back of the school’s tennis courts a playing fields. If one followed a path that went fairly straight, it eventually wound up on some side street at least a half mile or more away. A path to the right branched off to a stream. Beyond the stream, another side street emerged. This sounds straightforward but the woods are seldom simple.
Paths tend to wind their way around objects such as growing trees or fallen trees. There are changes in elevation, tree roots, rocks. Depending on the time of year there may be foliage. Leaves, pine needles, and moss decorated the woods.
One mostly went along the trails on foot, but they were large enough for bicycles. I mostly biked through to take a short cut to the tennis courts. But there were occasions when a few of us would bicycle in, stash our bikes, and explore. A few times we brought picnic lunches. Hey, we were imaginative back in the day. It was so much fun to comb through the woods. We could monitor projects that other kids were building to dam the stream. There were various tree houses and forts in progress. A different type of playground, one with trees, trails, and a stream. Additional skill set? Yes. Additional manner of problem solving? Yes. Additional opportunity to be active and have fun? Yes!
Alas, the path through the woods became obsolete. The property was sold and houses were built. I know there were paths from streets at the far end of the woods but never explored those unfamiliar areas. Paths and trails are useful things. They get us where we want to go. They offer us a look into a different environment. They give us the opportunity to use the imagination. Heed Robert Frost’s advice and take the road “less traveled.” It just could “[make] all the difference.”
“And I’ll make a wish, take a chance, make a change/And breakaway.“ Kelly Clarkson
“So Eden sank to grief/So dawn goes down to day/Nothing gold can stay.” Thought I’d change things up with a poetry snippet from Robert Frost’s poem, “Nothing Gold Can Stay.” I’ve referenced this poem in previous posts, especially in my previous blog thequarryschild.com .
I hold myself to some pretty high standards. It was how I was raised and I’m glad I was raised to have morals, goals, manners, etc. That said, I’m far from being a perfect human being. Perfection is an ideal that will never be achieved. I gave up on that long ago. What you see is what you get with me. Yes, I can be brutally honest. Yes, I can be very sarcastic. Yes, I can be the most loyal friend you’ve ever had.
For some reason I’ve always felt the latter was tremendously important in one’s life. However, life’s journey has shown me it’s a concept many do not embrace. Hey, I get it. The years pass and everyone’s lives become different and diverse. Each of us has a variety of challenges thrown at us. It’s difficult to navigate all of those important shoals of one’s life and keep up with friends.
I had many students in the past who would preface a sentence with, “I’m not gonna lie, Ms. Anderson, but I didn’t __________________ .” Choose from the following to fill in the blank: a) read the book; b) do the assignment; c) get past page 15 of the book.” Always with a smile on my face, my thoughts were any of the following: 1) really? Gee, I wouldn’t have known; 2) yes, it’s painfully apparent; 3) thank you for sharing, but why would you tell that to your teacher?” Of course there were several other choices. Mostly I chose just to say, “thank you for sharing.”
There is a point to this. It pains me to say, “I’m not going to lie, but friendships may be disappointing.” Notice I could not type the word “gonna” in terms of my personal vernacular. That aside, I’ve had a few friends I’ve maintained a relationship with since we were youngsters. I’ve gone out of my way at times to stay in touch. As an adult I’ve also tried to create communication with some from the past only to discover that “talking” through texts and other forms of social media is just so two-dimensional and flat. One’s tone and personality is not conveyed properly and it just leads to disaster. This happened all too recently and, to be honest, I’m tired of ending up on the wrong end of the stick. I’ve practically stood on my head trying to accommodate some individuals but heaven help anyone who misunderstands and isn’t willing to talk things through as adults should.
Therefore, I’ve made a conscious decision to abandon further pursuits on my part. If someone reaches out to me, I’m happy to reciprocate. But gone are the days of me texting, emailing, cajoling, phoning, etc., when often I receive a perfunctory reply or none at all. If you know me, and you’re reading this, you may wonder if you’re one of those people. Truthfully, you should know. If you’re unsure, ask.
My career is in the rear view mirror. It was wonderful and I really enjoyed it. The next chapter is open and I’m working on carving out time for new pursuits, personal care, and elder care duties. If you’d like to share in my thoughts and activities, it’s up to you. I’ve done more than my share over the decades and I’m worn out. I’d love to have you in my life but I just cannot work to maintain it anymore.
“Nothing gold can stay.” Stuff changes, people change, our lives change. While we may look back on the good times, the good times have eclipsed us. They’re memories and while memories are wholly important, they’re intangible. Memories are wisps of life that melt away if we let them but we cannot expect them to repeat themselves.
In terms of personal relationships, I lost someone who was an integral part of my life for a very long time. Truth be told, I have yet to deal with those feelings. I often turn to the words of others for help. Sarah McLachlan has helped me more than once… “So afraid to love you/But more afraid to lose/Clinging to a past that doesn’t let me choose…”. From “I Will Remember You”
In terms of the “good old days,” they’re gone and cannot be recreated. “And I hope when I get old I don’t sit around thinking about it/But I probably will/Yeah, just sitting back trying to recapture/A little of the glory of, we’ll time slips away…”. Bruce Springsteen “Glory Days”
Time to move away from the thoughts that I’m still like I was back in the day. Nope, I’ve evolved and learned to use my words effectively. I matter and it’s time I’m treated that way. Cheers!
Stories Are For Eternity 