Day 5

Photo by J. Grandbois

"I wouldn't know how to handle serenity if somebody handed it to me on a plate."  - Dusty Springfield

se·ren·i·ty - səˈrenədē/ (noun) -
the state of being calm, peaceful, and untroubled.

I have experienced moments of serenity.  A sunrise over the sea witnessed in solitude.  The quiet of a damp, mossy forest after a rainstorm has passed.  A walk by the river when the fog still hovers above the water.  A moment of waking up and realizing I've nothing to do on a particular day. 

These moments all have two things in common: they were all experienced in solitude and they were all fleeting.  I believe serenity might be a solitary experience.  We can be feeling serenity in the same place and at the same time as another or even many people, but the feeling, while possibly set off by external events, exists solely in the heart of the one experiencing it.  I don't think serenity is infectious in the way laughter or tears can be.  We have have a shared joy or grief, even a shared sense of peace...but serenity is singular.  

Serenity to me is a feeling that I can breathe, that things, while they may not go okay, will fall in whatever way they will and I'll find a way through.  Serenity is an acceptance of the fact that I am not in control of everything.  It is recognition of the connection between myself and all other things in the universe.  The matter and energy that is me occupies this point in space and time. I may not exist for any particular reason but I am here and I'm alive. 

It is a feeling I'd like to have more of in my life.  I'm not sure how one cultivates it.  Perhaps it is created by cultivating other things: peace, self esteem or a sense of gratitude.  Maybe it is easier to feel if one spends more time in nature and quiet places like sunrises and pauses.  I'd like to have enough of it that I could tuck some away in an inside spiritual pocket, so when I find myself in the midst of chaos I can pull it out, unfold it and drape it over my mind.  

Day 4

Miss Pickles -  Perfecting the art
of doing nothing

"In this media-drenched, data-rich, channel-surfing, computer-gaming age, we have lost the art of doing nothing, of shutting out the background noise and distractions, of slowing down and simply being alone with our thoughts."  –Carl Honoré

Today I find I am feeling quite unmotivated to write at all.  Maybe it's the heat, maybe it's my mood (blahhhhhh) but today is the sort of day where I really just want to sit in my room, with the door closed and do...

NOTHING

Despite my best efforts I have accomplished some things today.

• I went for a walk by the river where I sat for a bit and cried, because I was sad and well...crying seemed appropriate. 
• I started baked beans in the crock pot.  They will be done soon and I will be able to accomplish something else, eating them. 
• I took a nap. 
• I ate a sandwich. 
• I ate a slice of quiche. 
• I did my monthly new moon tarot reading (yes..two days late, I know, I know)
• Watched a documentary on South American traditional medicine.  
• Pet the cat. 
• Read a chapter of a book while sitting on the front porch. 
• Watched a Ted Talk on posture and spent about 15 minutes trying to improve mine. 
• I wrote in my journal. 

Apparently I'm not all that good at doing nothing, especially since I can now add writing today's blog post to the list.

Day 3

Today I'm spending the afternoon and evening with one of my oldest friends.  Everyone should have at least one friend who knew you when...

...you had the bad breakup. 

...they had the bad breakup. 

...you doubted everything. 

...you thought you were so sure.

...you finally admitted you knew nothing.

I am grateful that I have such a person in my life.  I hope you do too... 

Day 2

Growing up Saturday nights meant two things at my house: baked beans and A Prairie Home Companion.  There are only a few things that make me nostalgic for my childhood - the scent of holiday balsam, a certain angle of sunlight through autumn leaves, the taste of baked beans and the sound of Garrison Keillor's voice.

I was an anomaly as a teenager  Nearly every one of my friends had parents who where divorced.  That my family sat down to dinner together every night, even on the weekends, was something that was noted and commented on.  My brother and I were home for dinner every night by 6:00pm - except Sundays because Sundays were "every man for himself..." (and it was written as such on the weekly menu my mum posted on the fridge every Sunday night).  This of course really meant, it's the night we eat all of the leftovers from the prior six nights of the week.  Which was okay because, those other six nights - the food was good. 

Each night of the week was a different meal, but Saturday night was always baked beans; sometimes with hot dogs, or cornbread, or brown bread, nearly always coleslaw.  I can remember the sound of the cabbage, carrots and onions being crunched through the hand crank grinder that attached to our counter top.   I remember the light reflecting off the old dented penny that my mother used to brace the screw vice that held the grinder tight to the counter's edge.  

I remember the scent of honey as it was squeezed onto warm cornbread.  I recall the snap of hot dog skin as I cut them up to mix into my beans and the the sweet contrast of brown bread with creamy melted butter.  And always that voice.  That steady, breathy, voice that accompanied the preparation and serving of our Saturday night meal. I remember singing along with the Powder Milk Biscuit song and how when they started taking the show on the road we swore we'd go, and we'd find some creative message to be shared on air during the intermission...

I never did make it to a show.  And my family is now scattered.  My parents joined the statistical numbers of the divorced nearly a decade ago and my brother lives in Alaska.  Try as I might I don't remember the last meal we all had together.  

Tonight, I'm listening to Garrison Keillor's last show with my cat while eating homemade quiche instead of baked beans, and sipping chardonnay.  I keep telling Miss Pickles, she's the cat, how maybe part of the reason I love to tell stories is at least in part due to growing up listening to this man, that I used to write scripts for my own radio shows.

She rolls over and blinks at me...

Day 1

Here's the thing about deciding to do a month of blogging, the first day, it's kind of a freebie.  Why? Because on the first day you get to sit down to write about how you are going to blog for 31 days. You can talk about how you aren't 100% sure you can accomplish the goal of writing every day, but as you are trying to practise self compassion anyway, it will be a good opportunity to not be too hard on yourself.

You might share the theme of your month of blogging, if you have one.  Which you don't, not really.   You do want explore more deeply this thing you have professed to have been doing for five years now. Yep, that's right...five years of blogging, not always regularly, but you have managed to write and publish 449 posts in that time...

Mostly though, you want to figure out whether or not to keep on doing this and if you do, how much of yourself do you want to put out there?  How personal should this blog be?  You've written about a lot of really personal stuff but there are things you've not said; things you keep close.  You know there has to be line somewhere.

And maybe as you are writing this post.  The freebie.  You begin to realize that this isn't about your blog and what you want to do with that, but instead maybe it's about your life and just what do you want to do with the 34 years you statistically have remaining.

You are after all 44 and just got around to finishing your undergraduate degree.  You can only call your self a late bloomer for so long.   You crossed the half way mark nearly seven years ago.  Death is no longer on the far side of the center line.

Like the prior 44 years of your life, you don't really have a plan.
You don't have any blog prompts...  
You just have 31 days of writing.
31 days of trying to figure out the next step.

My Secret...

To be honest I'm not at all sure what it is that keeps me going. What it is that makes me put two feet on the floor every morning. It might be that I have some deeply planted bit of hope and optimism that won't die not matter what life throws my way. I could have a sense of purpose that I don't fully understand. Or it might just be that I really have to pee and the cat needs to be fed, and well, now that I'm up and awake I might as well go on with my day.

I don't really know what got me through the past five years of school/work/create/dance/teach/live. I could say it was my meticulous planning and scheduling, but I'm as much a procrastinator as the next guy and, well maybe I work well under pressure. I had some support, lots of, "Go team!" and "Atta-girl, you can do this." It must have helped - I mean at least no one was saying I was crazy or that I ought to pack it in and go home.

I don't have a secret. There is no special formula or magic plan. Most days I wake up full of self doubt. I face nearly crippling anxiety at least a couple of times a week. I live with depression and a really, really, really not so great self image.

Yes, there are days that I look in the mirror and I manage to smile. I also hate to see things left undone or half finished. I like things neatly completed with the tools tucked away in their proper place after the work is done. There is a need that I have to do right by those that love me, to make them proud of me - maybe it's that I need to feel worthy of the love that I'm given.

Other's might say I'm just terribly driven. That I get something in my head and I have to see it through, even if it exhausts me or makes me, however temporarily, crazy.

The truth is that I wish I knew. I wish I knew because if I did...then when I have those really tough days. The ones where I just want nothing more than to stay in bed, covers over my head, bedroom door shut, curtains drawn, leaving the world for someone else to manage...and can't I please, please, please just stay here for a week in utter silence???
If I knew, if I could name it, then when I had those moments (days, weeks...), I'd have something to draw on. If I knew what it was then I could make it at will and then maybe, those other days...there would be less of them.

But I don't know. I can't name it. And so, I go on. Without answers, without knowing. Accepting that whatever it actually is, that it will always be there simply because it always has been.

Maybe, that's enough...

Was it worth it?

Photo by J. Grandbois

"How does it feel to finally be done?"

This is the question I have been asked with great frequency over the past several weeks.  My answer is generally about the same. I am glad to be done.  I feel less stressed and for the first time in five summers I don't feel pressured to cram as much as possible into the three and half months I had off between semesters.  Yes, there is a lot of good feelings surrounding my completion of earning my degree.

But...(yeah, you saw that coming didn't you?)

There is some cliche out there about how anything worth doing requires sacrifice.  In economics we call this opportunity cost.  It is the value of the the thing we give up in order to do something else.

Being back in school took nearly all of my energy and focus.  I realized very soon after making my return to school that there was no way I could keep up with everything that had been a part of my life.  I knew I'd not be able to dance as much, keep up with my blog (though I did better with that that I thought I would), that my social life would be greatly cut back and that I'd likely have to turn down opportunities that I'd otherwise pursue so that I could have enough time and energy to focus on school.

Knowing I'd not be happy giving up performing all together, I chose to focus on my troupe instead of my solo dance work.  I stopped updating my blog twice a week, which meant I gave up possible ad revenue, writing and review opportunities through the blog group I belonged to.  I tried my best to keep up with my social life, but very soon found I simply did not have the time, and I felt myself drift out of the communities that five years ago were central to my life.  I stopped working full time so I could finish school earlier and took on quite a bit of debt in order to do so.

I stepped out of my life for five and a half years and I've yet to find my stride again now that I've stepped back into it.  I do ask myself often if it was worth the sacrifice, but that is a question I won't likely have the answer to for a number of years.  I am glad I did it.  I love to learn and I derived a huge amount of satisfaction form completing this goal.  I experienced things, such as Semester at Sea, that I never would have done had I not returned to school.

I just a little bit adrift at the moment. I'll find my course soon.