collaboration

Dearest body of mine,
I would like to extend my most heartfelt apology for under appreciating you all of these years and for being your harshest critic.

It is high time I write this. It is way past time actually–horribly overdue by years, maybe even decades.

I’m sorry. I can be such an ass.

I certainly deserve your indifference and yet you are so endlessly forgiving.
I could learn something from your example.

Anyway, I’m here to say…I’m sorry. And I love you.

I have repeatedly ignored your wishes, judged you and even called you names.
Tiny department store dressing rooms, covered in carnival mirrors and bright, unforgiving fluorescent lights can attest to that fact.

Please accept my sincerest apology.

Over the years, I have deprived you of sleep, rattled you with stress, covered over your anxiety by overworking you and then made up for it at times by smoking and drinking too much, (which I’m sure is exactly what you did NOT need).

Other times, I have marinated you in a melancholy laced dissatisfaction until it affected your health, at which point you knocked me on my ass with anxiety attacks, Mono, a lung infection, strep throat or some other malady long enough to get my attention and give me time to re-group and let you heal.

Thank you and I’m sorry.

I have systematically starved and over fed you; brutally sunburned you summer after teenage summer; changed your natural hair color and texture too many times to count, tweezed, waxed and lasered you beyond all reason and basically treated you like shit since, well– since I was old enough to get away with it.

And don’t get me started on that face.
Every time I look in the mirror I only see the flaws–the thin chicken lips and over-plucked eyebrows, several deep divots due to teenage acne and just when it looked as if I had come to terms with it all–alas, the wrinkles.

But you always cut me slack. Don’t you just want to strike back at me? Like with a giant forehead zit, you know, the kind that hurt like a mutha or a stye in my eye?

You should! What the hell’s wrong with me?

Just the fact that my eyes have sight, my legs still carry me and that I can hear and smell all the wonders of the world around me–is a lottery win! You are sturdy and strong, hearty and healthy — but why hasn’t that ever been good enough?

I’m so sorry.

As a young woman I was naturally thin, (another unappreciated lottery win), so of course, I wanted to be curvy.
I never appreciated your stellar metabolism for one minute. I took it for granted, stuffing my face with junk food knowing you’d save me from myself, when suddenly at around age forty you dialed it back so that now I have to exercise like an Olympian and watch what I eat–every morsel registering on the scale.

Well-played. I know, I deserved it.

I apologize for never knowing you were good enough just as you were.
Listen, I’d like to call a truce. Can we be friends?

I finally realize you are not some cosmic mistake or last minute consolation prize. I wasn’t supposed to be Cindy Crawford or Florence Joyner. I get that now.

God chose you for me, or better yet, it was a collaboration between both of us before we were born, for the life we were meant to lead.

You house my soul for crying-out-loud–my very essence. We are a team, you and me, so you’d think I would have held you in higher regard.

I am so sorry.

So now, having said all of that,
I don’t care what you weigh as long as you’re healthy.

I don’t care if you can’t run five miles like you used to, your legs are still strong enough to hike–hikes are good.

I don’t care if you have wrinkles. Together we have worried and we have laughed–we earned those lines by engaging in a life well lived.

I promise to try to drink less alcohol (you keep telling me it no longer agrees with you).

I promise to get you checked out on a regular basis, you know, for tune-ups –like the high-performance vehicle you are and trust that you can fix yourself most of the time.

I promise to get enough sleep.

I promise to keep us stimulated, body, mind, and spirit, well into old age.

I promise to quit looking around to see how other women are aging and just be happy and make the most with what I’ve been gifted.

I promise to listen to you and to pay closer attention to what you’re telling me.

You, my glorious friend, are a work of art and a freaking miracle and every creak, groan and crack are there to remind me to treat you with respect–After all, we are a team.

Love you,
xox

I was reminded this weekend of a Petition to God that Liz Gilbert wrote as part of her memoir Eat Pray Love.

Her intention was to ask God to intervene in the suffering and dysfunction of her contentious divorce. She finished by signing it and sending it out into the ethers to collect the signatures of other interested parties, living or dead.

She figured that if you can stop the energetic animosity—it serves the world.

That got me to thinking.
I was hanging with a bunch of soulful, heart-filled creatives yesterday, with intriguingly varied projects and books in the works, but they’re no different from all of you guys with your projects and creations, dreams, hopes and wishes. Everybody’s got something in the works.

So I tweaked (okay I totally changed it, but kept the intention) Liz’s Petition To God.

This can apply to any situation you want to hand over to a higher power than yourself.

After you read it, if it feels right to you, “sign it” with your heart. (You can also sign it by putting just your name in the comments) and invite other parties to sign it as well.
They can be people attached to your project, people you know personally, people you’ve never met, people you admire…or in my case Robert Downey Jr. — it doesn’t matter, whoever comes to mind (you’ll, be surprised at who shows up).

Like Liz says in EPL:
“and I became filled with a grand sense of protection, surrounded by the collective goodwill of so many mighty souls.”
Hey, who doesn’t need that?

This is The Petition To Our Muses:

Dearest Muse,
Please intervene and help this project in any way you see fit, and even some ways that would shock and surprise me.
I have done my part. I have shown up, been receptive, chosen your words carefully, sat in the seat and done the work. Now it is your turn.

I recognize that you may be busy with other things like keeping the earth spinning in its orbit around the sun, editing the final drafts of Pulitzer Prize winners, and other various mundane tasks; but it is my understanding that you are focused on each and every one of us and our projects at all times (because times doesn’t matter where you are) and that you can multitask like a mo-fo.

It is also my understanding that when you gift someone with an inspiration, an idea; and that person, with your help, is able to birth that creative endeavor into the world — it uplifts everyone — and isn’t that what we’re all here to do?

Well, that and drink Sangria and eat fried food?

So therefore, it is my most humble request that you help me birth this project into its most splendid and kick-Ass physical manifestation. Whatever that looks like.

You have my utmost cooperation and my endless admiration and love.

I thank you for your kind attention,
Respectfully,
Janet Bertolus