A Good Resolution

“Living better doesn’t always mean trying harder. Ease up.”

Whole Living Magazine, December 2011 issue.



I wouldn’t have even seen such a quote thirty years ago; it wouldn’t have registered with me. But on the eve, (well four months to go), of turning fifty, I saw it; I got it; and now I share it.

I became an adult in the heady 1980’s, the Regan years, which were all about hard driving capitalists and prosperity. We all had the opportunity for success providing we got a good education, were competitive, and willing to work long hours. A lot has changed since then, both in our country and in our small towns, and not totally for the worst. One positive that has come from the recession which began in 2008 is that it woke a lot of us up. It changed us. It caused us to choose more carefully how we spend our money and our time. It made us more grateful for what we do have since we saw how precarious everything is – possible of disappearing in an instant for any one of us.

What I’ve learned as I’ve aged is the beauty of an ordinary day. I’ve learned that I love making meals for people close to me. I love setting a beautiful table, sitting quietly each day in my backyard, running my household as a gift to my family to make their lives more calm and smooth. I love books and candles and quiet. Buddhists have told us for years about the importance of quiet and introspection as a way toward finding inner peace.

What did our hard driving society give us? Heart attacks, anxiety, stress and anger? What does rest and easing up give us? It gives us life. And life with those we love.

Here’s to easing up in 2012 - Happy New Year!


Photo: Evergreen Cemetery, Portland

Christmas is......

 a freshly cut Evergreen tree from Maine

 the smell of pine

 sparkling white lights and red ornaments

 the first snowflakes falling on a dark winter night

 children padding down the stairs in footie-pajamas

 steaming hot cocoa in Santa mugs, crowned with whipped cream and
chocolate shavings

 candles

 the soft light of night in a warm home

 stockings hung on the stairs' banister

 the little "o" of a three-year-old's lips when he sees Santa has come

 "O Holy Night" at evening mass

 beautifully wrapped, colorful gifts beneath the tree with big bows

 the smell of cinnamon from baked French toast on Christmas morning

 an orange and a quarter always in the toe of my stocking as a child


Photo: The Old Farm Christmas Place, Cape Elizabeth, ME

Giving

‘Tis the season of giving…and I love it. I love to give. I love to think of what someone would like to have. I love to wrap presents beautifully and have spent oodles over the years on colorful paper, cloth bows, and fancy gift cards. Aesthetics matter to me and I get an oomph of pleasure just looking at beautiful packages under an evergreen Christmas tree.

In this month’s issue of O, The Oprah Magazine, an article asked what my own personal all time favorite gift was. What popped into my mind was so unexpected that I paused and thought deeper. Then I asked Frank his favorite gift of all time, and then I asked others. I love to ask probing questions like this that make people think because oftentimes, I’m amazed at the answers.

My favorite gift of all time came from my friend and next door neighbor, Sheila Sneider. When I gave birth to Ben, as we arrived home from the hospital, Sheila delivered the most beautiful gift basket filled with a hot meal – a delicious chicken/stuffing/swiss cheese casserole, salad, home-made dinner rolls, dessert – the works. Sheila is a wonderful cook and can create and bedazzle for get-togethers like Martha Stewart. The reason this gift meant so much to me is that it was unexpected and exactly what we needed at that time – it was like a loving embrace to two tired parents coming home with anxiety and a new baby boy.

I’ve loved so many gifts I’ve received over the years and have enjoyed them in the year they’re given, but when asked my “favorite gifts of all time,” the few that come to mind surprise me. None are from my childhood, and just think what we parents buy and spend over the years on kids’ gifts. My “ all time favorites” surprise me because they’re not necessarily from the closest people in my life. A couple were material, but it wasn’t the cost that made them special; it was the unexpectedness and the thought and meaning behind the gift.

•

a brilliant gold and pink sapphire necklace sent to me from my Aunt Georgia the Christmas after I spent a weekend with her earlier that year. It was a gift from her first husband and she wanted me to have it. No one had ever given me such an expensive gift. My son, Ben, said when he saw the necklace – “…and you only just met her? And spent one weekend with her? And she gave you that??? It must have been quite a weekend!” It was. I had met her once at 15 and then flew off to meet her again in my mid-forties for a weekend of a lifetime.

• a picture painted in Japanese writing by her second husband which means “less is more” from a phrase she read in my book, Away at a Camp in Maine, a phrase he said to her often and when she read it written by me, she knew I had to have it

• a painting of the Observatory in Portland given to Frank and me as a wedding gift from my boss at that time, Dave Kangas. The Observatory marked the top of the street on the Eastern Promenade where my husband and I began our life together as a married couple. It still hangs proudly in my home and always will – a marker of our beginning and the long road we’ve traveled since.

• The trip to Mexico my husband planned 100% - the best family trip we ever took. I lead and plan and arrange every day, at home and at work. To have someone else choose and lead is the greatest gift to me and I’m so appreciative of it! Everything about that vacation was perfect.

• Forty, white, long stemmed roses delivered to me on my 40th birthday at home from my boss at that time, Brian Noyes. That was the most beautiful flower arrangement I’ve ever seen – breathtaking.

• A few Hallmark cards given to me by my son, Matt, as an adult whose words mean everything to me – they are so touching coming from him. I keep them in my top desk drawer and read them whenever I feel like a perk.

I think of the WalMart guitar my sister Elisa gave my son Matt in the 7th grade – it changed the trajectory of his life and certainly is the most meaningful gift he ever received.

My son, Ben, said his favorite all time gift was the drum kit we bought….when we were supposed to be school shopping for clothes, on a whim, and it became a huge part of who he is. It’s a gift he uses most days. It is fun and shows a talent he never knew he had…and it’s a stress reliever on days when that’s the most pressing need.

What was your favorite all time gift?

What can you give others this holiday season that might mean the world to them….due to unexpectedness and the thought, not ever the cost?

Halloween

A neighbor of mine, who has no children of his own, has described our street as "Mayberry." Watching the neighborhood's kids grow up from his vantage point made it appear they had what neighborhoods used to have -- lots of outdoor play with friends from the street, driveway chalk, jumping rope, tents in yards, baseball, basketball, bikes, lemonade stands. My street isn't unique to this - I see it replicated in neighborhoods all over Portland so for all we hear that's bad in our world, we shouldn't forget that "Mayberry" does still exist in some ways.

For me, nothing stands out like "Mayberry" than what our Halloween's used to be. I will never forget the joy our kids or we adults had when our kids were small, and we all made a party of Halloween every year regardless of whether it was a week night or weekend. It was as big as Christmas.

Our neighborhood attaches to lots of others so there are hundreds of kids. We had years of handing out 120 or more tiny candy bars; it was a constant parade of kids in costume aged one to fifteen. There was running from front porch to front porch, laughter, tripping on costumes, dropping of plastic pumpkins filled with brightly colored candy onto dewy or frozen grass depending on the year. There was "TRICK OR TREAT" yelled in tiny voices and "thank you" when prompted. There was awe by trick-o-treaters at my husband's intricate pumpkin carvings.

Some years, Frankenstein hung from our 2nd floor, the fog machine blew smoke at just the right moment when a child passed, or huge plastic pumpkins on the front lawn. Our neighbors, the Sneider's, are responsible for the majority of the festive atmosphere - their house decorating was fabulous and included a giant light display on their garage with a 'Happy Halloween' logo. A bat flew around the top of their porch making an eery, spooky sound. They made hot spiked cider for the adults and had not just candy bars, but made up bags of candy!

They also played pranks on us. When our son was only 4 or 5, they put steak gristle from dinner into tin foil as his "treat." When we helped go through his candy that year, there was a moment we wondered who would do such an awful trick...but very quickly knew it was them!

I am so grateful to my neighbors for their enthusiastic embracing of this holiday. I'm hopeful my boys will always remember. I know I will.

Happy Halloween!

Fifty

At first earlier in the year, a couple friends hit the big marker quietly and randomly. But with this past weekend's party for one of my best friends, my group of friends has begun sliding down the slippery slope in earnest. Two more friends are hitting fifty in November and three in December. Hold on, folks, we're FRIENDS FACING FIFTY in a big way - we're all in!

My girlfriend, the class clown, the one so much fun to be around, says fifty's not sitting well. She can't quite get her head around it.

On her cake, we wrote "Fit, Fabulous & 50." And she is. She's a do-er; she exercises regularly and has the endurance of a mule - she can ride a bike forever! She is independent and capable of anything. She has a wonderful family and girlfriends who have been at her side since she was a pre-teen. She has worked at her job for over 25 years, no small feat -- again the endurance of a mule! Not everyone is so blessed as they hit the half-century marker, but she's earned it.

And her gift to herself for turning 50 is a trip to France! To France! How cool is that? We couldn't have, or wouldn't have, done that at thirty or thirty-five. But at fifty, if we want to do it, man, we're actually doing it! That in itself is worth the marker.

I'm hearing friends say why hitting fifty is bothering us; it's a lot of things. Mortality seems to be the biggie - we're more than half way through our lives. Maybe we look too old; maybe we feel it. Maybe we're sad the kids are moving out and don't want change or maybe just the opposite - we're anxious for them to go because we're tired and ready for change. Maybe we've not done what we hoped to by fifty; maybe we fear the good years are past. At fifty, forty is sounding OK...when at forty, that was hard, too, but fifty seems to be a whole new ballpark.

Pooey! We've got to let all this go! We have absolutely no control over this and we should be proud of all we've done in our first fifty years because we've sure done a lot! I'm going to try to hold my head up and take the lead of "living the I's" I read in Patti Digh's book, Life is a Verb, for how I should carry myself from here. Being thankful for every day, doing what we want to do, and finding joy in the small things are the way for us to live.

Patti said, "It turned out there were six main ingredients for the fuller, richer life, all starting with the letter I, just as all change starts with I, the individual. For each of the six practices that emerged, simple actions stood out:
Intensity: Say yes
Inclusion: Be generous
Integrity: Speak up
Intimacy: Love more
Intuition: Trust yourself
Intention: Slow down"

*Source: Digh, Patti. Life is a Verb. Guilford, Connecticut: skirt! The Globe Pequot Press, 2008. Print. P. 8
www.lifeisaverb.net
www.pattidigh.com

Photo: Not Mexico, but Rangeley, Maine...finding joy wherever!

Garbage In, Garbage Out

"Fear is a terrible sensation, one we never, ever want to feel. How lucky we are to live in a time and a place where it's so often possible to avoid the things that scare us most: violence, disease, natural disasters, dangerous animals, and, at least until the very end, death. Instead, we get to sit around on our widening behinds watching television shows....about violence, disease, natural disasters, dangerous animals, and death."*


Photo: Botanical Gardens, Boothbay Harbor, ME


*Beck, Martha. "Be afraid....Be Very Afraid." O, The Oprah Magazine October 2011: 67.

Sixteen

I was washing some large pasta pots when, out of the blue, Frank said, " Do you remember when we bathed the kids in the sink?"

Where did that come from?

Yes, I did remember. Like yesterday.

I loved bathing the kids in sinks. They were so wobbly, not yet able to sit up. Their perfect skin was soapy and slippery and perfectly white without a freckle or blemish. They laughed and stared deeply into my eyes. They loved warm water drizzled onto their bellies. They lifted their feet in the air, wiggling their toes. Rubber duckie, bubbles, plastic sail boats floated with them.

Yes, I remembered.

Frank said this the first week of fall when my older son was entering junior year of college, now with some lines of experience on his face, and my younger son was entering junior year of high school, standing over six feet tall.

My younger son is sixteen and this summer, with all its glorious weather and joyfulness, was best for me in just seeing him bloom. I will always remember the summer of 2011 as "his" summer. He got his driver's license, first time out, and I got another gray hair. He got his wisdom teeth out. Last summer marked a lot of questions and changes. This summer marked a lot of becoming who he is. He blossomed. He became comfortable with who he is; he laughs; he is totally "himself" with his friends. From day one, he began driving to school this year, programmed the music stations he wanted, got an iPod adapter. He wrote a first paper on what he thought about walking into high school the first day as a junior. He said he was grown up now. He said, as he walked into high school this year, he was thinking he was half way through high school, of college, life thereafter, and jobs. Wow. Really? I would never have known. Great assignment, English teacher!

With his friends, they discussed how many freshmen there are this year. My God, it's like they're zombies, multiplying. It's like "zombie armageddon!" He mentioned that in high school, the central stair case becomes a mob scene between classes, a "crush." As he was routinely pushing his way through during that first week, he actually heard a freshman shout out, "I'm scared!"

But he's sixteen. Such a pivotal age. He is no longer afraid of the crush at the staircase; onward and upward. I need to get on this ride, buckle my seat belt, and get ready for the roller coaster of this important year in his life!