family

Hello Tribe,
I don’t know if you saw this the other day but when I read it I knew I had to share. It’s by Maria Shriver, one of those women who strike me as having it alllllll together. i’s dotted. t’s crossed. All of her ducks nicely in a row.

And while I’m pretty sure that is true most of the time, I was surprised to read what similar paths our thoughts were taking these days. Me and Maria.
Maria and me.
Two peas in a pod.
Bff’s forever.

Anyway…check it out and see if you’re feelin’ it too.

I bet you are.
Carry on,
xox

Maria’s Sunday Paper: The Power of Re-evaluating Your Beliefs ~ by MARIA SHRIVER | Oct 29, 2017 |

I’ve Been Thinking, The Sunday Paper.

The news of the week, as it always does, got me thinking. It got me thinking about politics.
Thinking about addiction.
Thinking about success.
Thinking about how to live one’s life.

Every new year, I usually do some kind of inventory of my own life.
But I can’t wait until then. I just can’t. (Plus, my birthday is around the corner, so now is as good a time as any.)
And the truth is, it’s not just the news that has got me re-evaluating. My body has also been speaking to me to pay attention.

My heart has been calling me out. My mind is telling me not to get caught up in the noise, but to instead step back and think about the effect that the noise has on my life, and on all of our lives. Plus, it’s all been giving me a complex migraine, complete with vertigo and vestibular damage (don’t ask).

As you can you see, it’s not just one thing that brought me to this moment again.
It’s been a series of whispers and then a few 2x4s.
If I’ve learned anything in life, it’s to pay attention to the whispers and the 2x4s because they usually precede a knockout. (Speaking of knockouts, the voices of the Architects of Change featured in today’s Sunday Paper just blow me away. I love being in community with them and so many others that we have featured. They help me rise above the noise and inspire me to have hope and move forward.)

What also gives me hope is knowing that at any point in my life, I can change things that aren’t working.
So here are a few things that the week’s headlines made me think about. I share them with you in hopes that they may give you something to think about in your own life as you move forward.

Success
I’ve made big misjudgments here. I used to think that if I were the anchor of a network news show that I would feel successful. Same with publishing a best-selling book. I was wrong. Success, I’ve learned, is an inside job. I didn’t grow up with that message, but I now know it to be true. The people who I now think are the most successful are the ones who have beautiful, loving families. The ones who love and are loved. They are the ones who toil quietly and patiently on the frontlines of life, serving those who they love without seeking attention or notoriety in return. They are the ones who recognize that a modest life is just as meaningful as one lived in the spotlight. (Boy, was I reminded of that this week when Albert Einstein’s notes on living a modest life sold for $1.6M. Check it out in the section below my essay.)

Politics
I used to think the Democratic Party had all of the answers. I was wrong. Both parties contribute to divisiveness, as we see each and every day in the news. Both parties have brought us to this mean-spirited, divided place. I left the Democratic Party a few years ago to register as an Independent. There lies my hope.

Work
I used to be so judgmental about people who weren’t working like maniacs. I was wrong. Working like a maniac makes you sick and it’s an addiction. Put work in its proper place. Find balance. Your happiness depends on all parts of your life working together.

Rest (Mental and Physical)
In my home growing up, rest was a big no-no. My parents never rested, so neither did my brothers or I. Today, I know better. Rest is critical to your mental and physical well-being, so make time for it. No one else is going to give it to you.

Health
I used to think that I could eat whatever I wanted, for however long I wanted. I was wrong. Bad choices catch up to you. Before you know it, you could be that one that cancer decides to knockout. You could be the person that Alzheimer’s decides to take hold of. Make your health (especially your brain health) a priority. And, while you are at it, get to the bottom of your relationship with food. Cookies are not a substitute for real love. They don’t love you back.
Trust me. Candy, cake and Swedish fish don’t either.

Fear
I used to view myself as fearless because I skied black diamond runs and jumped off cliffs. I spoke up and spoke out. But then I came face to face with how much fear I actually had deep down. Today, I work hard at pushing through the things that scare me emotionally, like sharing this list with you. Sometimes, I feel like I’m alone when I’m vulnerable or admitting that I’m scared. But, I now know that I’m not. (Speaking of fear, as I watched Sen. Jeff Flake give his speech this week on the Senate floor, I couldn’t help but wonder if he was feeling fear or afraid as he stood there so boldly making his public statement.)

Solitude
Speaking of fear, very few things scare me more than being in solitude. In order to not be alone, I often pack my life and my house full of people (I mean, lots of people). Because the truth is, I’m happiest when my house is filled with the people. But, I know that I’ve also done this because I’ve been afraid to be alone, look like I was alone, or feel like I was along. I’ve noticed, though, that the universe has a way of doing for you what you can’t or won’t do for yourself. Today, I spend quite a bit of time alone. (My son and niece who have been living with me for the last year are now both moving out.) I’m not saying I love being alone, but I’ve realized that I’ve learned most of the truths that I’m sharing today because I’ve spent time alone. I’ve spent time in silence. At the end, my takeaway is that we should try and spend more time in solitude so that we’re comfortable with it when we have to be.

Loyalty
I grew up in a family where loyalty was king. I heard about it all the time.
Loyalty to family.
Loyalty to friends.
Loyalty to a particular faith, political party, or person.
But, what I never heard about was loyalty to one’s self. It didn’t dawn on me that one could crush the other. Today, loyalty to myself is more important than my loyalty to anyone or anything else. I’ve learned it’s not selfish to put yourself at the center of your own life. I’ve learned that you must honor that person looking back at you in the mirror because the cost of not doing so is high.

Celebrating Life
Life is short. I grew up knowing this to be true, but now it seems like I’m reminded of it all the time. Healthy friends call and tell me they have stage 4 cancer. Someone else whispers to me that they have early-onset Alzheimer’s. Another person tells me about a crippling depression that makes life unlivable. And then, of course, there is the news. We don’t celebrate life enough. We don’t tell our loved ones what they mean to us enough. I’m not writing this because of my age (and because my birthday is on the horizon). I’m writing this because of my first-hand experiences.

Honor your life. Celebrate your life. Enjoy your life. Do it now.

Re-evaluating—whether it’s on your birthday, New Year’s, or any other day—can be painful. But, it can also be incredibly liberating.

Every time I take inventory, I discover things I’m wrong about. But, I also discover that I’ve been right about more than I realize. I’ve been right about certain friends. Right about the importance of family. Right about my faith in a God larger than me or any one building. And, I’ve been right that there was something in me—as there is in you—that’s always worth fighting for.

That’s something none of us should ever have to re-evaluate.

P.S. I’ll be sharing more thoughts like the above in my upcoming book that’s inspired by these essays. “I’ve Been Thinking: Reflections, Prayers and Meditations” comes out February 27, 2018, and is available for pre-order now. I can’t wait for you to see it!

On beating yourself up

Almost everyone does it. I’m not sure why.

After the fact (or even during it) all the blame, second-guessing and paralysis. We say things to ourselves that we’d never permit anyone else to say. Why?
1. It leaves us bruised and battered, unlikely to do our best work while you’re recovering.
2. It hurts our knuckles.
3. It distracts us from the work at hand.

Perhaps there’s a more humane and productive way to instill positive forward motion. I’m sure there is.
At the very least, this is a dumb hobby.
~ Seth Godin

Once, back in the nineties, I took a boxing class.
I figured that with the boss I had and all of the sex I wasn’t having—I must have a lot of hostility to work out. And besides, I had read in Vogue that you could burn 1200 calories an hour boxing!

Sign . Me. Up.

The instructor, a tall, Mandingo Warrior named Frejah (pronounced Free-Jay) who trained professional fighters at a famous gym in Venice, would have us carefully bind our fists with tape, lace up our gloves, and stand in front of a six-foot tall dark blue leather punching bag that was suspended by a heavy black chain from the ceiling. Every class he’d stand behind us, kicking our legs into a wider stance as he ghetto-yelled “encouragement” which could have easily been mistaken for harassment—all in the name of motivation.

“Come on you little pussy” He’d holler at Kenneth, a guy who came in wearing a white shirt with a pocket protector, “You couldn’t hurt your grandmother, who by-the-way, said to say hello to you this morning.”

Some of us may have giggled.

“Oh, you think that’s funny?!” he swooped in beside me and bellowed in my ear like a drill sergeant, “Do ya?!” I shook my head no emphatically as I pawed at the bag like a baby kitten. “Is that how you hit a fucking bag?!”

He went and stood in front of all of us as we tried in vain just to make the heavy bag swing on the chain.
We all sucked. And this was like week four.

“Hit the fucking bag!” he screamed, foam escaping the sides of his snarled lips. “Hit it like you mean it!”

There was a timid girl next to me, Tina, wearing glasses and a ponytail. Her face was filled with determination but every time she hit the bag her glove would just slide off and she’d almost do a face-plant on the behemoth. Frejah became silent as he watched her punch and lose her balance, punch and lose her balance.

His silence was not a good thing. It meant that the pressure was building—and he was about to blow!

I couldn’t watch.

As I sent a flurry of kitten punches into the body of my bag, Frejah got into Tina’s face. Inches away he started sneering insults. “What the hell do you think you’re doing you little mamby pamby?”

I had no idea what that meant, it just sounded bad. Weak and lame. Frejah was right. We were a bunch of mamby pambys.

He grabbed the glasses off her face and tossed them over to the side. Oh, fuck, I thought, How do I watch what’s about to happen and still look like I’m hitting the bag? My talented right eye traveled over somewhere around my ear to get a good view. (It never happened before—and it has never happened since.)

Frejah was yelling obscenities at Tina while pushing her in the chest with his glove.
Goading her to hit him.
“Your daddy an asshole?” he sneered, “I bet he’s a reeeeeal piece a work. You hate him dontcha?” He pushed Tina a little harder with just one gloved fist.

“Hit me. I’m your shitty daddy. Hit me! You know you want to!”

But that bitch stood her ground. She didn’t budge. Until she did.
Without so much as blinking Tina landed a solid left hook squarely on Frejah’s right jaw. Then she walked out. I found out later that she drove all the way home (without her glasses!) with her hands still bound in the bright red boxing gloves.

We all froze in place like life-size, mamby pamby ice sculptures. Frejah barely flinched. His glove went up to his face and he nodded. I think I saw..admiration?

After waiting the appropriate three minutes to thaw,  I found my nerve, grabbed Tina’s glasses off the floor, unlaced my gloves, and never went back to class. Boxing had started to seem like a really dumb hobby, dangerous in more ways than one. I decided to take up running. Getting run over by a car seemed like a gentler way to go than boxing with Frejah.

One of the guys who stayed, told me later that Frejah only got more abusive as the months went on (it was a twelve-week class) but that in his defense everyone who stayed (one heavily tattooed girl who was more masculine than Vin Diesel, and looked like she could kick the shit out of Frejah if given the chance—and five guys) —they all got REALLY good.

I guess that form of abuse “motivates” some people.

I met Tina that Saturday for coffee at Borders to give her back her glasses and basically say, “What the fuck, girl?!” I told her I wasn’t going back. Tina nodded, “Frejah sounds like all the voices in my head,” she said, “I don’t need to pay someone to talk to me like that!”

“I know. What a dick,” I agreed.

“But I can’t tell you how silent the voices have been since that night. I think I scared the shit out of them!” Tina laughed.
So did I.
Then she leaned in, “And for the first time in over three years I called my horrible father” she whispered like he might hear her. “How did Frejah know?” She looked at me with an odd combination of wisdom and naiveté.

“It’s his job. I think guys like that can smell it,” I said and went to order a giant slab of pumpkin bread so I didn’t have to think about how much I wanted to slug my shitty dad.

Maybe I should have kept boxing?

Carry on,
xox

When I was a kid, around middle school age, I had a best friend named Ellice. Her last name was something long and German sounding, virtually unpronounceable if you weren’t wearing lederhosen or didn’t have sauerkraut running through your veins.

Ellice had a father with perpetual dirt under his fingernails, which always struck me as odd because my dad never did.
In his filthy drab green coveralls, all greasy haired and grizzled, he was some kind of super-duper airplane mechanic. Her mother, on the other hand, was the executive assistant for some highfalutin businessman downtown. I never saw her without her high heels, red lipstick, and a really fake looking black wig with tufts of gray hair peeking out from the sides.

A more unlikely couple you could NOT imagine. If you saw her parents standing side by side you couldn’t picture them sharing a cab—let alone making babies.

Nevertheless, they had three. Ellice had a kid sister and a baby brother who were looked after by an au pair, which I learned was an exotic word for nanny, which was just another word for babysitter/maid—or in other words, Alice on the Brady Bunch. This entire concept was as foreign to me as the au pair, Kirsten’s, British accent.

Since we were tweens and obviously waaaay past the nanny stage, Ellice made it clear to Kirsten that “she was not the boss of her” which I’m sure came as a relief to the poor young woman seeing that every time I saw her she was braiding the toddler’s hair with one hand while holding the infant whose diaper had exploded ochre colored baby poo-poo all over her powder blue uniform with the other.

I can trace my earliest memories of “Yeah, that baby stuff—that’s not for me”, back to those exact moments.

That time in history, the 1960’s, was fraught with social conflict, burgeoning women’s rights, hippies and the English Invasion. All which mirrored my own internal, pre-teen, hormone fueled, identity crisis. But what may have imprinted on me the most was a fondness for foreign accents and my appreciation for the way they made the dumbest diatribes sound like freaking Shakespeare.

So, for three months one summer my “precocious friend“ (my mother christened her with that title) and I walked around our little slice of suburbia wearing Kirsten’s Mary Quant white lipstick (which we “borrowed” off of her nightstand)—and took to speaking with British accents. Now, when you’re faking a British accent it’s really only fun if you go around acting clueless and asking strangers a ton of questions in the most non-American way possible like “Where is the loo?” and “Can you please direct us to the lift?”

We explained our general stupidity and unbridled curiosity by saying we were exchange students from Bristol (I wanted London, but she picked Bristol.) We peppered our conversations with lots of “brilliants” and “cheerios” and as we walked away we flipped our hair and yelled “Tah!” over our shoulders.

We acted out this charade for so long that after a while I started to believe I was British.

That is, until our neighbor, Judy, busted me at the drug store in front of a man and his wife who went from being absolutely charmed and beguiled by us—to being thoroughly disgusted.

“Corkie, is that you?” Judy asked in her thick Brooklyn accent swinging me around by my shoulders. “Why are you talking like that? Don’t be an idiot. Stop embarrassing yourself!”

My face still gets hot with humiliation just thinking about it.

Which leads me to the present day and eyelash extensions. Have you seen them? They are spectacular!

I was late to the party on this trend, but after my sister convinced me to get them for the sake of “convenience” I have to admit—I fell truly, madly and deeply in love. They became my Holy Grail. My own black-fringed version of the Fountain of Youth. My Be All and End All.

You see, my natural eyelashes are so blonde they are invisible so I have always had to dye my them black to even know they exist. These days, my body suddenly has the ability to produce jet-black chin hair but my eyelashes have remained the color of straw—so I’ve taken to wearing false eyelashes, which I LOVE.

But, come on! Eyelash extensions were MADE for me! I mean, the fact that you WAKE UP—IN THE MORNING— with lush, dark black eyelashes made me feel… beautiful. I tried to stay blasé but I couldn’t help myself! Every time I caught my reflection in the mirror I did a double-take. I didn’t recognize myself. Those eyelashes transformed me into one of those women who wakes up gorgeous, like a Kardashian, or a soap opera star.

Strangers even commented on how pretty my eyes looked. I just batted those long, voluminous, black lashes so furiously, they repositioned the jet stream.

As the weeks passed I started to believe that I had been born with long, thick black eyelashes. And that they looked natural. Both which were lies.

Sadly, and I mean break my heart, dead puppy kind of sad, this time the part of my neighbor, Judy, was played by my own body. I was double-crossed by a severe allergic reaction which caused me to have to “give up the jig” after a brief six weeks.

I’m ashamed to say, they were the best six weeks of my life.

Nevermind. It has been my experience that throughout my life I’ve tried on a lot of affectations on my way to deciding who I really am.

And I’m betting you have too.

Some are ridiculous, like fake British accents, and we discard them after a couple of weeks. Some are impulsive but they grow on us and we weave them into the fabric of who we are like I did back-in-the-day with my red hair and more recently with a tiny gold nose ring.

I will not be deterred! Age hasn’t stopped me from morphing and changing and trying new things and I don’t believe that it should! Listen, I think that if I stop doing this you’d better hold a mirror under my nose to make sure I’m not dead.

Carry on,
xox

The great 11 pm. eyelash extension self-removal debacle of 2017. Which I can barely speak of without crying. Now I look like I have alopecia (not that there’s anything wrong with that.).

Mondays are interesting around here. They can be mundane or they can make you wish you had a time machine and could transport yourself back to Friday so you could re-live the weekend. Yesterday was a doozy of a Monday by any estimation. Here’s a recap:

In case you were wondering how our skunk-a-thon was going I posted this over the weekend on social media.

Filed under the headings: In case you were wondering AND Count your blessings you’re not us-

Over here at the wildlife refuge the count so far (as of this morning) in “catch and release” is (drum roll)
4 skunks
1 raccoon 
And two house cats (who we released immediately in order to avoid messy feline litigation).

Not to mention the party platter of poison that’s starting to make a dent in our Bombay-esq rat population.
So, yeah.
#lifeintheburbs

The good news is, Ruby hasn’t been skunked in a while (knocking wood) although the odiferous smell of Pepe Le Pew wafted thought the bedroom recently at three am waking us both up and I had to race her to the doggie door (I am not fast on my feet at 3 am but thankfully, neither is she) so I could block her exit and save us (and her) another middle of the night Silkwood Skunk Shower.

The bad news is, the latest skunk was trapped sometime around dawn on Sunday (Ruby actually alerted me in a very Lassie Come Home kind of way, going out back and then sheepishly poking her head in the den, repeatedly interrupting my coffee with “Mom, Uh…I think you need to see this…”) so I finally did, and there it was, and the sad part is the exterminator doesn’t pick up critters on Sundays. (No worries, it has food and every time we checked on it, it was sleeping.)

“Monday,” they said when we called them at seven. “Just don’t agitate him and he’ll be fine. Nick will pick him up on Monday.”

Nick. Nick…how do I explain Nick?

“Hey, How would you describe Nick? I asked my husband last night. “He feels a little like a cross between Forrest Gump and Rain Man. I’m not sure if he’s daft…or a savant.”

“He’s Carl Spackler (Bill Murray) in CaddyShack,” he replied without looking up from his Sudoku.

I just about peed my pants. “Oh, my, gawd! That is so accurate it’s scary!” I screamed with glee.

Nick IS Spackler. A know-it-all expert on all things extermination related. Same hat, same pants tucked into his boots, he carries on hour-long mumbly monologues if you dare ask him a question. Not only can you NOT get a word in edgewise, you can even step away to go to the bathroom or make yourself a sandwich and he’ll still be talking when you get back.

All of this to say: He is the perfect exterminator for me. My husband runs when he sees him—I follow him around like a gray haired, middle-aged puppy dog.

I’ve even caught him talking to the trapped critters! When I mentioned it he explained to me that he has to gain their trust so he can transport them to their release up in the hills above Mulholland with a minimum of fuss, anxiety, and pee-ew.

Now I know what you’re thinking (that he doesn’t release them—he kills them) and I did too at first, that is until he showed me the movies.

That’s right, Nick has made movies on his smart phone (with Bill Murray like narration, “She’s a little timid to come out of her cage, so we’ll just wait until Princess feels more comfortable.”) of each and every release he’s done. It’s freaking incredible (and a little bit scary) but I love him for it.

So, yeah, Nick is the Spackler of exterminators.

While I was waiting for Nick to come and pick up our latest “guest”, I went out front to cut and paint a few more of my magic wands. That’s when I noticed a card inside the container and it made my day (or at least my hour). I took a picture of it and texted it to Raphael. He sent back a nice reply.

What a lovely Monday you’re thinking. Right? Not so fast.

Little did I know that he and Ruby had just averted certain death.

Saturday, my husband took his work van to get the tires rotated.
I know that’s a thing, but it’s so inconsequential to me that I erased it from my internal hard drive in order to save bandwidth for more important things—like every phone number I’ve ever had—and song lyrics. Anyway, YOU need to remember this because it comes into play later. Ok, well, now.

Monday morning while he and Ruby were speeding their way to work (they were lucky if they were going 40 mph) the van started to shake. Badly. He looked down out of his driver’s side window and saw the left front tire wobbling wildly. After he unclenched his sphincter muscle and his balls came back down from up around his ears, he pulled over and checked the tire. It seems that the lug nut, thingamabobs were stripped so badly they became loose and the tire was literally about to fall off. ON the freeway. With my dog inside the car. Wasn’t that an episode of Sanford and Sons?

Well, I just about lost my shit!

He told me this after he limped the thing home, stopping several times along the way to tighten the metal thingies that keep the wheel on the car. In other words, he MacGyver’d it. With no help from the little brown dog, by the way.

“I was in the middle of texting you when you sent me the picture of the card about the magic wands”, he said. “So I thought, no, I’d better not tell her now, she’ll just lose her shit.”

I just stood there, gobsmacked. (BTW: The W, T and F keys are worn bare on my computer because of stuff like this!)
That’s one of those moments you realize that your life could change in an instant and that skunks would become the least of your problems. Maybe it was the magic wands that saved them?

Do you have emotional whiplash yet? I do!

Carry on,
xox

Magic wands(with help from Sue and Maddee)

Remember this old Huffington Post piece? I didn’t either. Ha! Here it is again on this Throwback Thursday.
Carry on,

So, we’re at a family wedding.

Not immediate family. Extended family.  The worst kind. The judgiest ones in the bunch. The one’s who keep inviting you as an afterthought, because, well, you never come anyway, so when your husband convinces you that it’s an afternoon of cake and dancing, you RSVP Yes + 1—and blow their judgy little minds.

I’m the black sheep of our family, one of several, and so they’ve seated us at the “loser’s” table. I actually overheard someone at the wedding call it that.

It really is the loser’s table.
It’s the absolute worst table in the room. It’s all the way in the back next to the kitchen, so far away from the action that the music takes a minute or two to reach us. It’s so bad that the band’s lips are out of sync, like an old Charlie Chan movie. They run out of food by the time it’s our turn to hit the buffet. And cake. My hubby and I share the last sliver of cake.

We are seated with two non-recovered alcoholics who are shit-faced and speaking what sounds like pig-latin to each other, what looks to be someone’s fourteen-year-old pregnant niece, an old hippie who took way too much LSD in the’60’s—and a convicted felon.

In stark contrast, the horrible bitch-faced woman who was married to my dad and quite literally drove him to his grave, is smiling sweetly at my husband from the bride and groom’s table (I can see her with my binoculars)—because she knows how to write epic thank you notes—and she plays the game.

I can remember looking at pictures of myself as a baby and wondering if I’d been a stowaway on a ship from some far-off galaxy that was looking for signs of intelligent life and when they realized this was an okay place to leave me—they did just that—in Santa Monica California—so, not too shabby.

With my thick white hair and tanned skin, I didn’t resemble my pale, dark haired, freckle-faced siblings in the least.

I also arrived with the most vivid imagination, a song in my heart and a skip in my step. And it saved me.

Rickets skinny with large buck teeth, I forged my way through childhood wondering if my people were ever going to swing back by this way and pick me up. That had never been their promise but still, I held out hope.

I’ve always been different. I can’t explain how or why and at times it caused me a world of hurt.
As much as I loved Catholic school, (especially the uniform. See, I told you, weirdo), the dogma never made sense to me.

The wrath of God? A punishing God?
Whose God were they referring to anyway? Mine told me knock-knock jokes and led me to the fields with the most lady bugs to catch. Mine wasn’t hanging over my head bleeding on a cross, mine lived happily, laughing and loving in my heart.

This caused me to question things. Mostly authority. I could never do or believe something just because someone older told me to. And I just could NOT bring myself to “play the game.”

That spells trouble for a kid. Trouble, with a capital T.
And not the obvious punky trouble. Rather, the kind that challenges parents and teachers with all of its “Why’s”.

I will ALWAYS pledge allegiance to the wild side, and by wild I mean overgrown. The unbeaten path.

I remember asking my fifth-grade teacher what I was actually promising by pledging my allegiance to the flag. It opened an hour- long conversation about Patriotism and love of country and she seemed genuinely happy to be asked something she’d ‘never before given any thought to.’

I broke some of our unspoken family rules as a teen by addressing the elephants that had taken up residence in pretty much every corner of our house. It sounded like sass, back-talking, and disrespecting authority and it was resoundingly underappreciated. But because I kept my 4.0 GPA and honor roll status, it saved me from long weekends grounded in my room.

I was an anomaly at the time. Not a paint-by-numbers slacker and not your typical hippie-druggie—just a high performing, insufferable, pain-in-the-ass.

Black sheep.

I think my dad first labeled me. He could never figure me out. That day it had something to do with the fact that I got an A in Science Class without ever buying a book, yet, I wanted the teacher fired for being a dumb-ass.

Black sheep. I’m guessing most of you were black sheep too.

I quit college to act.
I retired from Catholicism.
I prefer the cookie dough to the baked cookies. Always have.
I didn’t want to work the “family business”.
I believe in energy and the power of thought.
I was divorced by twenty-six.
I decided NOT to have kids.
I’m unafraid of confrontation.
Until I went gray, I couldn’t have told you what color my hair REALLY was I dyed it so many different colors.
I don’t like ambrosia salad.
I hate green jello, bridal showers and babies breath in flower arraignments.
I love to sing and dance. Anytime, anywhere.

And that vivid imagination that led me to believe that there was something greater out there for me. I know many of you feel the pull as well.

I’m back at the wedding, with all of its criticisms hidden in polite discourse.
“So, I guess no children for you, Janet?”
“No Aunt Barbara, You do realize I’m over fifty now.”
“Huh. And you’ve finally married. A Frenchman. American men aren’t good enough for you?”

I decided right then and there, in the midst of this family of strangers, to declare my status.

“I guess not. You know, I’m a black sheep.”

The old woman looked up at me with something…recognition?…as I gently guided her back to the “winners table”.

Carry on,
xox

Got any good “black sheep” stories?

At breakfast this morning, my BFF Steph and I were marveling at how kind and thoughtful the folks are here in the south, specifically Nashville and Huntsville since that is where my butt has sat for the past few days. I’m sure the rest of the south is equally kind. For instance, I know for a fact that the folks in my brother’s home state of Arkansas are top-notch, slap your mama, over-the-top nice.

Especially Billy. Billy is in a league all his own—but that is a story for another day. Suffice it to say, Billy has gotten me out of so many jams—technologically speaking, (and let’s be honest, are there any jams that are worse than a computer staring back at you with the black screen of death?) that I bought Billy a pony—on Amazon.

Anyway…Steph was relaying the story of her seat mate on the flight into Huntsville yesterday.

He was your standard issue, middle-aged guy, who’s been commuting from the state where he’d been transferred, back and forth to Alabama where his wife and daughter have stayed put until she finishes her senior year of high school.

In my tribe, we’ve been talking a lot lately about mindfulness—conscious living.

Why we want the things we want.
What are our expectations?
What do we hope to gain?
Will this decision add to my quality of life—or detract from it?

You know, all of those questions that make us formerly impulsive Bohemian types cringy and squirmy.

We have entered the phase of life where the opening line when you talk to God has changed from “Dear Lord, please give me what I want—to, Dear Wise One, please show me what I need.”

The man on Steph’s flight was coming back to be present at his daughter’s senior prom. The decision was easy for him as he explained, “You know those dates on headstones and the top of obituaries? The date of birth, then a dash and the date they died?” Steph nodded.

“In my family, we’ve decided to ”live the dash. To figure out what makes us happy between those two dates—and just go for it!”

I sat back in my chair for a minute taking that all in.

Don’t you fucking love that?

I never thought about mindful living quite that way before, but he’s right! There are a finite amount of years that fit inside the dash. How we fill that space is our choice. We can live unconsciously, (which to most of us means fearfully, cautiously), reacting to circumstances that seem beyond our control.
OR
We can take the reins and live the dash. Filling the space between those dates with love and happiness.

I choose the latter, don’t you?

Carry on,
xox

Hello my tribe,
Well now.
I wish I had all the answers. I wish I knew what to say to lift all of our heavy hearts.
All I can do is share what I believe and how that’s helping ME make sense of all of this madness.

I believe in energy. That everything is energy. Love, hate, optimism, fear.
It’s all energy and that energy has power.
And after a while, if you focus on one thing long enough it gains momentum.
We just saw the proof of that with this election. Lots and lots of folks whose fear and anger morphed into a blind rage. I say blind because everyone wants to be heard, right? We all want to think our needs are being served. So, in their own self-interest they blindly (and deafly (is that a word?)), followed someone who said, “I hear you.”

I believe he took the momentum of their fear used it against them.

That being said, I’ve alway remembered what someone wise once told me “Don’t be against something Janet, be FOR something else. Don’t be anti-war, be pro-peace.”
They explained how, from an energetic standpoint (yes, we’re still talking energy), it’s cleaner. It’s clearer.

Because, when you rail against something by yelling and waving your fist at it—you give that very thing MOMENTUM. That’s what causes rioting and violence in the name of peaceful resistance.

Besides, if and when the shit does hit the fan, if my hair is on fire, I can’t be a part of any solution. I believe fear is disempowering. Because I know fear won’t lead me anywhere near the solution.

Plus, it feels like shit to hate. Doesn’t it you guys? The pettiness? The cattiness?
It feels like shit to think that fifty percent of the country is nuts. It feels like shit to be so freaking far away from love. Because you and I, we’re all lovers.
We’re the unifiers.
We like to think we’re spiritual, evolved, and open-hearted.

But look how conditional that has become.
It’s turned into “us” and “them.” And we’re behaving no better than “they” are!
“Think like me and I can love you/be your friend. Look like me, talk like me and vote like I do and only then can I love you.”

Yikes.

Don’t get me wrong. We must be vigilant. We must march our asses off, write letters, organize, protect, defend and sign petitions. And vote. For. Sure. We MUST Vote.

I’m just asking that you check-in with yourself. You’re intentions and the energy you’re giving momentum to.

It’s abundantly clear what you’re against, but what are you FOR?

I believe in civil discourse.
I believe it’s a small world and that we’re all connected.
I believe in using our voices.
I believe that the majority of the American people are decent, loving people.
I believe change can be a good thing.
I believe that our country needed a wake-up call. Many of us had NO idea how many “-isms” were alive and well and living under the rug.

I believe in us and that love wins. I really do.

Carry on,
xox

A classic, Janet, Holiday rant.
I’m guessing you can relate.
Live long and prosper.
xox

We are now entering the second week of December. That triggers a hot mess of mixed emotions inside of me.
Every. Single. Year.

Listen, don’t get me wrong, I love all things Christmas, but can we please move it to May?

When I see THAT date—December 1st—I can’t help it—my butt puckers.

As the month progresses I secretly want to strangle December. I want to take it around back and teach it a lesson.

Show of hands, who’s with me? Who here in readerville secretly hates December?

Who thought that thirty consecutive days of extreme holiday stress was a good idea? Target? Santa? The devil?

By the end of week one, I’m consumed by that sinking feeling that lets me know—I’m already behind schedule.

I’m already late with my shipping.
Once I navigate the Post Office parking lot, or as I like to call it, December Demolition Derby (I once backed up and ONTO an Audi, a brand new one—my trailer hitch opening up the front hood of that car like a can opener), I have to stand in line and wait for the TWO postal clerks behind the counter to wade their way through all the other holiday shippers.

There is yelling. There are lies, bribes and cutting in line. There are tears. And that’s just me.

Once I work up the stamina (facilitated by devouring all of the fudge I made the previous night) to take on the Christmas tree shopping—usually reserving December 10th for my tree excursion—all of the good ones are gone.

By the second week of December! That is just criminal.

Last year they had a Charlie Brown section for people like me. Dried up weak and feeble trees that were already dead—pitifully begging for a home. Those are what’s left for us mid-December stragglers. The ones who wait so they don’t have to fight the crowds and crying kids the first two weeks.

Get this: I drove past a lot the other day where they were flocking trees. Remember flocking? Crispy, fake snow? I thought I’d passed through a time warp except for the crowd. There was a crowd of bearded hipsters with man-buns all milling around the tent inhaling crispy snow and sipping artisan hot chocolate.

Are hipsters bringing flocking back? Is that a thing again?

Are you freaking kidding me? If those hipsters had lived through the sixties like I had, they would NEVER in a million years have the slightest inclination to re-create it. I still have rotating color-wheel flashbacks.

Once I got my Christmas investment (they are well over ten bucks a foot) home, it took me three tries to get the white twinkle lights to do the one thing they were designed to do—light up. We sent men to the moon and wtf?… If you so much as look at a strand cross-eyed HALF of it will go dark.

But only half.

Which leaves me filled with hope, because December marks a season of hope, right? Hope that I can find the rat bastard loose bulb, tap it gently, twist it, or God willing, replace it with the extra one taped to the cord, and have the freaking tree lit by New Years.

THAT has never happened. In all of my years lighting a tree I’ve yet to twist a loose bulb and have the thing light back up.

That is an urban myth. Worse yet, it’s a fairy tale told to unsuspecting Christmas revelers in order to fill them with false hope.
That’s not playing fair. Jesus would frown on that.

In search of lights that worked I was forced to do what you’re never supposed to do the entire month of December if you have a brain in your head and one ounce of common sense left in your body——I went to Target yesterday and they were already out of white lights AND wrapping paper. It’s the first week of December people. Seriously?

In the parking lot, I nearly got sideswiped by an SUV wearing blinking antlers. Am I insured for that?

Baking. Let’s talk holiday baking. I love to bake.
I love it so much I only do it once a year in December, otherwise, I would be HUGE.
Like, walk me down Central Park West in the Thanksgiving Day Parade huge.
Because my love for baking is only exceeded by my love of eating what I bake.

What? You don’t do that? I call bullshit. Sure you do! Because it’s only logical. Artists love art. Singers love music. Bakers love all things warm and gooey. They love it so much they make it themselves—for themselves. Between eating the raw cookie dough and “quality testing” the finished products my friends are lucky to get a bite in edgewise.

December is also a month of wonder.
I wonder every year which of my favorite childhood ornaments will fall prey to the floor-gods. They are insatiable and unrelenting in their search for a sacrifice. I’m aware of this, so in order to keep the emotional carnage to a minimum I put the ones I don’t care as much about near the floor, as an offering. A token of respect. Then I padlock my favorite treasures safely inside the middle branches. But the floor gods always prevail. Last night the ice-skater I received when I was eleven mysteriously appeared on the hardwood floor under the tree. She wasn’t broken broken. Just her left ankle and skate are missing.

But her career is over. There go her hopes of a medal.

I had a good cry. SHE took it with grace and dignity so I re-hung her in the front of the tree as an example of Christmas courage.

Listen, how about those Christmas cards?
All year long I’m lulled into complacency, thinking I have several great shots for the front of a card. Then it comes time to send them in to get printed. Either I’m late for the “print by” date because for some reason I’m unable to fathom why on earth that date is August 31st, and I’m too busy eating watermelon BECAUSE IT’S SUMMER—or I can’t find the pictures.

They’re missing. Gone. Non-existent. A figment of my overactive imagination.

I could make do with the one from last year. The one where he’s squinting, my smile is jinky and the dog has wild eyes and a grin like Cujo. Oh, fuck it. Just never mind. It’ll just have to wait until next year. Again.

I do love receiving all the cards from friends and family. I really do. I adore being able to see how much the kids have grown every year but can I ask you a favor? Please don’t send me the three-page newsletters. That’s okay. I’m all caught up. That’s what Facebook is for. Besides, they’re primarily filled with bad news. The death of a pet, Uncle Frank’s broken hip, the baby that can’t say please. Are you kidding? Has no one any good news to share?

The last one I read was like a Charles Dickens novel. It was filled with so much tragedy I had to read it with a box of Kleenex (and Sees candy) and a glass of scotch. Honestly! I know nothing says Christmas like death and job loss, but can we all agree to just cut-it-out?

December. What is it with you?
You drive me nuts! You are like the bat-shit crazy relative everyone hates that keeps showing up drunk every year!

As much as I vow that this year will be different,
I eat too much.
I spend too much.
I drink too much.
I argue way too much.
I don’t get enough rest.
I over commit.
I cry.
And I lose my patience.

Which brings me to the realization—December, you are a little bit like childbirth. You are miserable and painful in the moment but after some time has passed (like 365 days) I forget and repeat all the madness because when I look back on the holidays you brought me miracles and filled me with wonder and THAT my friend,makes you impossible to hate.

Happy Holidays Y’all!
xox

This is reprise from last year that my friends still quote back to me. Ha!
Carry on,
xox

Hey guys,
Here’s a holiday favorite that this year I’ve been able to put on the Huffington Post.
Take a look. If you know him you’re going to smile and if you don’t, well, I think you’ll want to.

The big French guy who stole my heart — and then hijacked my favorite meal!
Cheers!
PS. REAL men use pink rubber oven mitts! Bam!
xox

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/janet-bertolus/how-my-french-husband-hij_b_8547286.html

Now that we’re living in an alternate reality…I think we may need this this more than last year. I know I do.
Thanks Adele.

Happy Thanksgiving!
xox