Category: Humor / Lifestyle

Hairspray

I went to TJ Maxx to buy myself a new yoga top, hoping to avoid the ever popular pose of forward flopping boob. This seemed like a small way to do something kind for myself, and surely my yoga class would thank me, too.

I don’t go shopping much. Mainly because I am trying to live more like a poet so I avoid places where poets aren’t hanging out – which is any place money hangs out. And clearly I am very out of practice. I had just walked in with my empty cart and — ooooooh – purses! Half hour later I snapped out of it just long enough to catch a glimpse of myself in a mirror, with a fringed and brightly colored coral bag over my shoulder – I looked like a tree stump with a tropical bird. A mortician with a parrot. A poet with a purse.

But something about it all – the quiet building frenzy of all the pretty things – I moved from one to the next, deep in focus as if the decision to choose the silk floral blouse over the linen floral blouse would determine the course of all of my days. As if I came for a floral blouse. As if I’d wear a floral blouse.

But removed from context of my own life, I’m pushing forward, aisle by aisle, item by item, size by size, making agonizing decisions and piling them in the cart, barely noticing the people around me, barely recognizing myself as I hold up a lace crop top, a racer back t, a pencil skirt, a ceramic peacock.

An hour in, my cart is full of sherbet colored silk scarves and wispy little tank tops and a million thread count sheets and strappy sandals and stemware and lingerie and hairspray and nautical throw pillows and crisp white slacks and jackets. Who did I think I was? Was I packing for a tropical cruise? Redesigning my carriage house for the summer season?

And hairspray?? Really?

An overflowing cart full of accidental wishes later, I left it all. I just walked out. I was exhausted, and stressed, and sweating. I had just pushed around someone else’s life for an hour, and what did I have to show for it? It took just one hour to forget who I was. To forget all about my flopping boobs, my empty wallet, and the fact that my idea of a hair style is to pile it up in a clump on the top of my head, resenting the 30 seconds it takes to do that.

There’s nothing wrong with shopping, of course. I vaguely remember the “money is no object fun” of it all. But even then, some authentic voice was strangled by spaghetti straps and high heels – by the woman I hardly know, and that I can’t seem to stop looking for.

At least this time, I remembered to leave her behind. And this time, I remembered to laugh.

Dogma

Someone asked me if I go to church and I do not, unless you count the pew that is my dog Gilligan, where several times a day I must show up and be present, even though I’m very busy with my own lofty concerns, and often resent the stinky interruption. He’s no saint, but he’s still one of the best spiritual teachers I’ve ever had. At this very moment he’s curled and farting by my side (teaching me tolerance, I’m sure), but throughout the day, regular as a monks chant, he’ll let me know in no uncertain terms that he requires my full, undivided attention. He’s always reminding me of what exists outside my own head, in the great wide world of birds and love.

And while I often search for places to experience the glory of the world beyond my puny human boundaries, I did not expect to find it in this noisy, snorting animal. I did not expect to find myself expanded, challenged, lifted, humbled and saved by this round-bellied bat-clown of a dog. For that matter, I did not expect a dog.

He arrived as I imagine many of our spiritual gifts do; not by education, donation, tithe, pilgrimage, angel, tradition, or conversion; nor by beseeching the great breeder in the sky on bended knee. He arrived because I invited him. From the very first day I met him he looked me straight in the eye and said “choose, it’s up to you.” And so I did. And so it was.
Now, WHY I chose to let him in my life, I often wonder. As a writer I crave wide, empty swaths of time — massive volumes of uninterrupted, absolute silence. I’m also not particularly “a dog person”. Cats are more my style, as they tend to be happy hanging out with the dirty dishes until the time has come for a nod in their general direction. One can’t help but wonder if there is such a thing as divine intervention, and I suppose you could say there is – as my daughter is the most divine being I know, and she definitely intervened in the arrival of this dog in my life.

But in any event, he’s here. And as all spiritual teachers know, the journey begins with commitment, but must be followed by discipline. If I ignore either, I suffer – along with my carpet, the occasional roll of toilet paper, and my shoes. And like all spiritual relationships, you can’t just phone it in. Gilligan knows exactly when I’m tossing the ball impatiently, just calling myself a member of global church of dog ownership, and when I’m seriously devout in a starting a rousing chorus of catch and come here. He knows when I am walking with intention, and when I’m shuffling absently through the motions. Either way, he does his part. It’s up to me to do mine. And every time I do, our bond strengthens.

What makes him the most terrific spiritual guide is that he is a reflection of the best and worst of my own humanity. When I find myself resenting him, along with all the vet bills, nail clipping, silly interruptions, endless care taking, and inconvenient walking – (and not just on icy Christmas days or muddy Easters, mind you!) — I’ll find his eyes following me, begging for resolution. He quietly demands that we move forward and not get stuck in the gloom. He reminds me to surrender and stop resisting. To open the next few moments to possibility, and drop the surety of self. He forgives instantly, and I learn slowly. But together, we are finding our way.

Of all the things I’ve learned from him, being present is the greatest. Of all the gifts he’s given me, love is the finest. And what we’ve learned together is that showing up and saying yes – choosing – is the start of every holy thing that ever was.

Color wheel

I didn’t take care of my children the way I should have – the way, in retrospect, I could have, if I had been whole and strong and had a better relationship with kale and thought about how chickens spent their days.

If one of the four pillars of motherhood is made of broccoli and breast milk, mine limped on three cheese sticks right from the start. Neither of my kids were breastfed. To be fair, I seriously tried with both kids, and both breasts – but after about 2 weeks I stopped due to dire injury and a low tolerance for snapping turtles. And honestly? Twenty-odd years ago my executive function seemed more critical than my breast milk function. I was a woman running a company and the formula for success seemed better from a bottle than a boob.

And as for broccoli – well, let’s just say tater tots got a lot more plate time at my house. It’s not that nutrition didn’t matter at all, it just seemed “less of a thing” than it does now. It lurked in the back of my mind as “probably a good idea” but not “sit there and eat your organic peas or your brain won’t develop right” essential. So as they grew I apparently continued to live life in a blur, in a fog, in a constant mad dash toward processed food, only aware from the corner of my eye that while my kids were cracking open tiny cans of fruit cocktail and sipping sugar-juice from a foil bag, their preschool counterparts had little sushi containers full of seaweed and soy milk.

Clearly, I was holding on to the 70’s and the box of Devil Dogs a little too tightly, because I actually remember feeling a bit suspicious of those healthy families. I grouped them together with the swear-jar crowd. Life is hard enough on kids – why take away their right to eat a bag of marshmallows and suck yogurt from a plastic tube? And are you seriously telling me little Riley thinks rice cakes are cookies? Put down the fucking rice cake, Riley. Eat a fucking Oreo. And here’s 50 cents for the fucking swear jar. Ok, 75.

As I smoked my cigarettes and served white bread and Lunchables and laughed in a wheezy voice, I know I wasn’t the mom that smelled of sea air and roses. Nor was my kitchen big enough to house entire islands and filled with jars of lemons and copper colanders of just-rinsed arugula. But I could be fun to be around and quite educational; I can name several New Castle kids that came to the house and left with a whole new appreciation of the underground snack world.

I liked the creativity of food, more than the content, and I enjoyed setting a table using the color-wheel, rather than the food pyramid. I’d make “all orange” dinners complete with Kraft mac n cheese, Cheetos, carrots, canned mandarin oranges and Sunny D. (And before you mention a list of healthier orange food options, let me just butternut-squash your good intentions right here – this isn’t the time).

My safety-cone-orange dinners are a fine example of good parenting gone bad. I made them giggle and use their imaginations while pumping them full of life-sucking toxins. (ps. since ranch dressing isn’t orange, no one ate the carrots). And while there are worse mistakes than processed foods (and some of those I’ve made as well), I wonder about the damage done beneath the surface. Like many mothers, my mistakes haunt me as my children transition toward adulthood, carrying the weight of misinformation, mistake and misdirected love.

The hard truth is that there are some parts of parenting where the torch we passed needs to be extinguished completely – leaving our kids standing in the dark trying to find their way. Maybe mine will follow the sound of laughter, and end up at farmers market in front of a color-wheel full of health! I hope so. In the meantime, I hope they’ll relax a little about being perfect, and have a fucking cookie.

FitBit

My new FitBit is bugging the crap out of me. It feels too weighty on my wrist and I think it might be ugly. I’m trying to make friends with it. I’m wearing it this week as a test run for when I get “really serious” about working out. Which of course begins tomorrow.

My FitBit has a lot to say. It tells me I’m very restless at night (no shit. I have judgmental appliance clamped to my arm). It tells me I need to live in a house with stairs. It tells me to shoot for 10,000 steps a day.

Really? 10,000 steps? Apparently my average is around 4,000 something – but I’m a writer! I work from home! There was an ice storm!

I did have one day where I broke 5,000 steps and I’m pretty sure that’s because Gilligan had diarrhea. To mark this momentous occasion, I was awarded my first FitBit Badge. The badge was called the “Boat Shoe Badge” – which I suppose is the laziest shoe, (unless maybe there’s a Slipper Badge).

I wish they had a BitFit. I could do that. Just partially fit. Just some of me is fit. I mean, have you seen my fingers? They are quite tiny and they can fly across the keyboard – 10,000 words a day, easy! Also, I suspect my wrists are quite toned.

At 9:00 am I have 32 steps. At 9:00 am my sister has 3927. Jesus. How far away is her breakfast??

Okay. Time to take a walk….