Thankfullness

I have a busy day ahead of me with work, preparing food for a solstice celebration and an evening of sharing the longest night with friends so I'm writing a very quick post.  Tonight marks the longest night and the turning of the year.  In honor of that here are ten things that brought a little light into my world this past year:

1.  My friends who offered love, support, laughter, condolences and celebration.

2.  All of the people who I have worked with creatively particularly all of the members of my performance troupe.

3. My kitties.

4. The green spaces in my city - the cemetery, the waterfront, and the parks.

5. Rice and bean!  A staple food that got me through many a tight month.

6. Good conversation.

7. Books for the knowledge and escape contained in their pages

8. Warm and fuzzy slippers!

9. Dance and rhythm

10. Love.

I am struggling financially right now but, cliche as it may sound, my life is rich in art, music, friends, experiences, joy, and most of all love.  This solstice finds me feeling large amounts of gratitude.

All mixed up and please pass the gravy...

I'm sitting here trying to find the words to explain all the mixed up feelings and jumbles of thoughts that Thanksgiving brings up for me.  It is a holiday that (political statements and dubious origins aside) often leaves me feeling out of sorts and unsure.  It is a day that brings back memories of my Grampy who I will always miss.  My parent's divorce several years ago added another layer of  complication and conflict to the day.  Spending the day with one or the other, regardless of who I am with, always leaves me struggling with a bit of guilt.

The past several years I have spent the day with old friends, a tradition that developed over a decade ago when our families were far away or we couldn't afford to travel.  We kept it going even after  families moved closer or our circumstances had changed.  This year I broke with tradition and I spent the day with my Dad and his family.

Anyway, my thoughts are not forming into any sort of cohesive prose, instead it's coming out in lists:

Things I missed:

...the gathering of my family of choice.  Missed you guys

...waffle, bacon and bloody Mary brunch

...no matter how long it's been I will always miss Grampy

...coffee and dessert in the evening with friends

...my Mom

...turkey leftovers

Things I loved:

...seeing my Gran after too long of an absence

...watching my dad hover and obsess over a turkey

...meeting new people and discussing books

...allowing my dietary restrictions to slide for a whole day (YUM!)

...finding peanut snacks hidden in my backpack when I arrived home

...talking to my brother on the phone

I was left feeling a little sad when I saw many folks at my gran's nursing home had no one picking them up for the holiday.  I was glad to see that where she is living will be much easier for me to get to with public transportation so I can visit her more frequently.   The food was good and everyone contributed something.

So there you have it.  My mixed up little holiday.  Overall it wasn't so bad and I have many things in my life that I am grateful for.   As awkward as it can sometimes be, my family is very high on that list.

Here is wishing you a happy, if belated, Thanksgiving.  I hope you had tasty food, good company and chance to ponder you own personal bits of abundance.

A gratitude post

This morning I am grateful that I have a roof over my head, warmth and peanut butter cookies for breakfast. 

This morning I am grateful that Sandy didn't do as much damage to the city I live in as she could have.  I expect in the years to come we will have larger and more violent storms but other than a loss of power and some downed trees (neither of which I experienced) we came through this one okay.  I am grateful for far aways friend who called or texted to see how Maine was faring in the storm.  I am grateful for those who were out in the storm around the clock helping those who needed it.

This morning I am grateful for that day a week or two ago when I was sure I was getting sick (it turned out be allergies) and so I stocked my cabinet with sudafed and cold medicine so that when I awoke this morning with a sore throat, fever and stuffed up sinuses I was prepared to deal with it.

This morning I am grateful for the 17 years I've had with one member of the spinster pride named Orange.  She is very near the end of her days, frail and fighting cancer.  I think her body is close to giving up and while I wish with all my heart that I could keep her around forever I don't want her to suffer.  I may be saying goodbye as soon as tomorrow.  My heart is heavy with that.  I am grateful for the expressions of care and love sent her and my way. 

This morning I am grateful for the opportunity to create collaboratively with some hugely talented people and the multiple opportunities I have in the coming week to dance and make music with all of them.   

This morning I am grateful that I have a mind that wants to learn and a body that is up to the task of the many hours of work it takes to get ever closer to earning my degree.  I am grateful that what I am learning is useful to me and others.  I am grateful that so much of it I can use now.   I am grateful that so many of my fellow students want to make the world a better place. 

This morning I am grateful to be alive, to have had the experiences that brought me here today and for the amount of love that is present in my life. 

The Year of Susan

When I was in junior high there was this girl, I’m going to call her Susan.  She had perfect hair that never seemed out of place.  Her clothes looked as though she went shopping with a list from Seventeen magazine in hand and a magic fairy with a magic wallet big enough to buy whatever she wanted.  She had a seemingly unending supply of friends who followed her down the hall chatting and giggling about what happened over the weekend.   She was on nearly every sports team at school, basket ball, field hockey, track…and she was, of course, great at all of them.

The teachers loved Susan too since she was also smart and always had the right answer.  When we had a class that required an oral report she would stand before us full of confidence.  She came equipped with just the right props for her subject and people always clapped after she was done.  When asked to do a report on someone she admired she chose Madonna and on the day the report was given she came to class dressed as the pop singer.  She stood before us, a perfect head to toe, twelve year old replica of the material girl. 

I on the other hand, was the shy, quiet, broody girl who had moved to town in the middle of seventh grade.  An extrovert who carried the curse of shyness, I sat in the back of the class scribbling down poems and story ideas in a notebook.  I didn’t giggle with friends about my weekend.  Though I had a few somewhat-more-than-acquaintances I spent time with, my weekends were mostly spent alone in libraries browsing among the stacks, or in the woods with a bagged lunch and my sketch book.  The only sport I took part in was cross country running because I didn’t actually have to interact with the other team members.   I did well in school, but any sort of presentation that I did was pretty much directed at the floor instead of my fellow students. 

In short, we couldn’t have been more opposite.  If Susan was a bonfire, I was just a spark that fell onto the pavement, igniting nothing.   She moved through the halls of our junior high with a natural ease that I was not even close to possessing.  In looking back I know that my twelve year insecure self was putting Susan up on an unreachable pedestal, but at that time I was simply in awe of her.  

To try to become her friend never crossed my mind.  Aside from the fact that it was quite likely she was unaware of my existence, it really it wasn’t her friendship I wanted.  No, what I wanted was to be like her.  Not a replica of her, but instead to find out what it was that made her seem so alive.  I thought if I could figure that out, then maybe I could do it too.  Then perhaps I’d be a little less shy; a little more brave. 

Through all of eighth grade I watched her.   It was not a difficult thing to do.  Our school was small and the entire eighth grade class was only about 60 students.  I tried reading the books and magazines I saw her carrying in her bag thinking maybe they held the secret.   I remember that after saving a bit of allowance money I bought a baggy, pale yellow, v-neck sweater that was similar to one she wore and for a brief moment after putting it on I did indeed feel more confident, at least until on the way to school a young man said hello to me in passing and I quickly realized that it would take more than a sweater to conquer my shyness.  So I kept watching and hoping, convinced that my powers of observation would help me to discover the secret of Susan.

I wish I could say that at some point during that year I learned her secret and that I breezed through high school and the rest of my adult life with a confidence that sprouted from the seed of Susan’s secret, but that didn’t happen.  Instead eighth grade came and went, and I was not any closer to making my discovery.  When my freshman year began she was not there and I heard she’d been enrolled in some elite boarding school for the smart and wealthy.  I stumbled through another move, the rest of high school and into adulthood as full of insecurity as I ever was.   I managed to overcome my shyness in my early twenties, but it would be several years before I learned that seemingly obvious lesson that my inner fire had to be self ignited.   

Susan was just one of many people I met in life who I thought carried some secret to happiness.  It is in our nature to want easy answers to such things and there is indeed wisdom to be gained from those who shine so brightly.  Yet, however we might admire them and whatever lessons we may learn from them, we should not become so blinded by their lights that we lose sight of the flame that burns inside of ourselves.   This is a light that can burn as bright as any other, but it is up to each of us kindle it and to seek out the fuel that will keep its glow steady and strong.   

Coffee and a Cup of Gratitude

Sometimes having everything go right puts me in a bit of an off mood.   I’m happy for all the good in my life but I’m also distracted, sometimes a bit cranky and I’ve had a few moments where I’ve felt close to tears.    These are not the predominant feelings in my life but they are there more than usual.  I think they are connected to the feeling of being overwhelmed with all that is going on.    I am feeling all of the things that people feel when they have a lot to do and limited time resources to do it in; stressed, worried if I’ll get it all done, fear of letting someone down, tired…tired…tired…

Many of the projects I am working on right now are on-going.  While their parts may have completion dates the overall goals for them will take years to achieve.  I might get a really great paper done for a class, but I still have the entire semester and 24 more months to complete.  My troupe might finish a fabulous show at a local theater but there two more shows coming up, a tour schedule to plan for next year, and a media kit to finalize.  And then of course there is just the process of everyday living, eating right, getting enough exercise and sleep, managing my money properly…and taking time for myself.

There are two things that generally get me through times like this:  coffee and gratitude.   The first does not need much explanation.  During busy times coffee is what gets me up from the bed to get things done and it is what fuels those late nights to, well, get things done.  Gratitude however does not come freshly poured from a cup at the touch of a button.  Gratitude is something that takes a little effort. 

This morning while lying in bed thinking of all I have to accomplish this week and mentally running through all of the available hours in each day and allocating them to particular tasks that need doing, I began to feel that wave of, “Oh crap how am I going to do this? I’m going to be exhausted and cranky, I’m never going to get it all done, ugh…what what I thinking?”  As I began to consider that maybe turning off the alarm, pulling the covers over my head and pretending the world was only a figment of my imagination was a really good idea, The Voice of Reason popped into my head and said,

“Quit whining!  Quit whining and be grateful you have a reason to get out of bed in the morning. ”

The Voice of Reason can be abrupt but the point was made.  I am grateful to have so many things I want to accomplish, and in thinking about what I want to do I began to realize how much I’d already done.  I took a moment be thankful for all that has happened to bring me to where I am right now.   I’m thankful for a lot of other things and I plan to spend a bit of time each day this week taking stock of everything I am grateful for.   

Right now the top of that list is coffee.