Life

Hi loves,
This is a couple of years old but seems just as relevant as ever!
Happy weekend all you self-sacrificing mommies. I’ll be at the pool with a cocktail.
I know, I’d better pray I don’t choke on an olive because I’m going straight to hell.
Carry on,
xox

Being that I’m in my fifties most of my friends have grown kids.
But since age is just a number and I’m  just immature enough, I have several younger  friends with very small children, kids under the age of ten.

I was talking to one of these younger moms and she asked my advice.

Not about mothering of course, since I forgot to have children and she doesn’t want to go to jail, but about the level of commitment she and her girlfriends have to their kids and their spouses, and about how epidemic it is—this crazy, twenty-first century level of parenting and wife-ing.

Oh, and about how they don’t have the same level of commitment to themselves.

Seems she was chatting with a friend of hers, a fellow mom, and they were joking about how clueless their sons and husbands were. They mused that without their loving guidance these males would be feral, running in packs, eating garbage and living under bridges with trolls.

They commiserated that it was an all-consuming job with no time off  for good behavior and no fancy vacations.

We laughed of course, but it all sounded very familiar to me because that has been a recurring theme for most of the moms I have known.

“If it weren’t for me they wouldn’t eat, or they would live on Cheetos and Dr. Pepper. Their growth would be stunted, they would be spindly and stupid from lack of proper nutrition.”

“If it weren’t for me they would wear the same filthy clothes, brush their teeth once a month when they showered (or fell into some water and called that a bath), and their ears, fingernails, and feet would be caked black with dirt. Even their lice would have lice.”

“If it weren’t for me they wouldn’t have one lick of manners, as a matter of fact, they probably wouldn’t have much of a grasp of proper English or any social graces whatsoever. They would scratch their balls, grunt, and   never look up from their phone, iPad or computer. They would be complete social misfits.”

In a nutshell, if it weren’t for the tireless sacrifices, commitment and love to these guys (and girls) they would be just shells of their current magnificent selves. They would have NEVER made the team, passed fourth grade, gotten that big job, done a speck of homework, learned music, gotten braces, written that speech, etc., ect., ect.

It’s okay if it’s a two-way street – but let’s get real here – it can be very one-sided.

So I listened, and laughed and then got tough with her – because I love her – and she asked.

“That’s all ego talking. You have to justify all that time and energy so you tell yourself basically, they’d be nothing without you.”

Is any of that true? Probably not. As a gross generalization, woman DO tend to bring out the best in men. And children. And small animals. And other women too.

I explained to her the oxygen mask theory. It’s amazing actually.
The airlines have to tell you that in the case of cabin depressurization, it is imperative to put the oxygen mask on yourself FIRST and then your child (hopefully your husband can put on his own or you have bigger problems than you think.)
They give you permission to go first; which seems completely counterintuitive to mothers –– so they have to be reminded.

“You and your girlfriend have to put your oxygen masks on first, otherwise you’re no good to anyone.”

Then a thought entered my mind like a lightening bolt. I got chills it was so profound. It was Divine Guidance. I certainly didn’t come up with it, it was too good.

“Oh Jeez, hey, I just got this.
If you really believe what you’re saying, who would YOU be if you had devoted the same time, energy, commitment, sacrifice and LOVE to yourself that you have put into your family all these years?”

Then we both teared up.
Holy shit that’s big.

If you’re devoted to making everyone around you great, when is it your turn?

A ton of woman do it when they become empty nesters, but why wait?

This doesn’t apply to only kids and family.
I did it with my boss and my job, until I wised up, woke up, and set boundaries.
We make their lives easier, smoother, more fun and better, while we lose sleep at night.

I think it’s time for the oxygen mask first thinking to prevail, and taking the time to figure out how to make our own lives become great too.

Are you with me?

Can you relate to this kind of sacrifice and commitment to family? Have you found a balance? Let’s hear it in the comments.

Big love to the moms out there,
Xox

This is a post from two years ago and I’m sorry to report that I’m still an under-reacting bitch when it comes to diagnosing pain. Please, if you get hurt, NEVER listen to anything I say.
Carry on,
xox

We need to carry this chart around with us at all times, because
most of us have a hard time articulating our level of pain.

My husband goes to the head of the class.
Here’s a classic story that makes us laugh when we’re drunk.

It was back a few years ago, when he discovered (on Web MD in the middle of the night) that he had appendicitis.
I scoffed at his self-diagnosis. Of course, I did. I suggested he had gas and told him to buck up and take a couple of Motrin.
Wife of the Year, I know.

Since he was due to leave on a motorcycle trip to the Sierra’s the next day, unbeknownst to me, he went to the doctor.
THAT should have told me something right there because he’s someone who can have a chainsaw sticking out of his neck and he will sidestep a visit to the doctor.

“Oh, that? Nah, I don’t need a doctor, I’m just going to observe it.”

He called me at work from St John’s, where he had been sent immediately by his doctor for an MRI.

Jeez, I thought. I can’t believe how much they’re overreacting. It’s gas. I’m tellin’ ya.

He got the results while I was on the phone with him. He was told to go directly downstairs to the Emergency Room, where real doctors would admit him for surgery; seems his appendix had a slow leak and I was going to have to give back my medical diploma.

Gas it was not.

I drove like a maniac, in a thunderstorm, in drought-stricken California (in the movie version of this story I’m played by the supremely talented Kate Winslet and this is all VERY, VERY dramatic), to make it across town, at rush hour, to see him before they took him in to operate.

When I got there (late) he was in Emergency, hooked up to antibiotics and pain meds, waiting for his turn in surgery; doing his Sudoku and entertaining the nurses.

“What’s your pain level on a scale of one to ten?” the friendly nurse asked while I was hugging him hello.

“Three or four,” he said, without even a cringe. I’m thinking—gas. It’s a three because the MRI was wrong and he ate a burrito with extra hot sauce.

“Really? What’s a ten to you?” The nurse was curious, since appendicitis is up there on the pain scale—for most mere mortals.

“Being skinned alive or boiled in oil” he responded, completely serious.

“Huh… ” The nurse seemed stunned. “Okay Braveheart, have you felt that? How would you know? I’m asking you as a point of reference.”

Think about it. That’s a great question!
What is a five or an eight or even a ten?

I wondered; have I ever felt a ten? 

We all know those individuals to whom a paper cut is a ten. Are most of us even aware of our pain tolerance scale?

Minutes later his appendix burst. I saw it register on his face like shock. He was fine one moment with his paper-cut three, and then, BAM! It was as if someone had stabbed him and started to skin him alive. He looked very much like #10.

The crazy thing was that if he’d been riding the back country of the Sierra’s—he’d have died.
He hadn’t been accurately portraying his pain because he didn’t know how.
“It’s a ten, it’s a ten, maybe even eleven!” he yelled as she injected morphine straight into his IV, his whole body relaxing, his eyes rolling back into his head.

They rushed him into surgery and he is now happily appendix free.

It appears to me that this list could apply to emotional pain as well.
Will we tolerate three’s and four’s as we “observe” the situation?
What constitutes a ten? The equivalent of emotional stigmata or boiling oil?

Food for thought.

Copy this list and keep it with you – in case someone asks.
I especially love the faces.

Love,
Xox

This is the cake my tribe gets almost every time we get together because we have SO much to be grateful for that if we listed everything there wouldn’t be enough room for frosting!

*”The running commentary that dominates my field of consciousness is kind of an asshole.”
~ Dan Harris ABC News Nightline Co-Anchor

Who hasn’t felt like that about those saboteurs that dominate your brain-chatter? Listen, did you know that you can banish them for good? Well, you can, so let me tell ya how!

I’m in the middle of Pam Grout’s new book Thank and Grow Rich which is about the unimaginable power of gratitude.

Although the title insinuates it is about accumulating money—it is so much more than that. It is THE gratitude handbook. A  manual on how you can start thanking your way toward a “rich” life in every damn way you can imagine.

Love, relationships, creativity, peace of mind, and FUN!

Yes, life can be fun.

*”Life is a ticket to the greatest show on earth.”
~ Martin H. Fischer Physician and Author

Here’s the rub. *“Quit thinking, start thanking.”

I could blah, blah, blah, all over this page giving you a synopsis of what the book is about but I think I’ll let Pam, the author, do that instead because she says it way better than I ever could, as a matter of fact, she did! Here is a quote from page 72.

*AMASSING ALCHEMIC CAPITOL

“The bliss, the wisdom, the creativity, the laughter, the friendships, the joy, the serenity and peace that have been, for the most part, seen as an impossible dream will become your most ordinary state of being.”
~ The Way of Mastery

More than another book on counting blessings, this is a book about climate change. Changing the climate of your energy field, upgrading the resonance with which you perceive the world.
Practicing gratitude, more than penciling a written list, is to practice alchemy.
Looking for the good in life literally changes things. Physically changes things.
Financially changes things.
Mentally and emotionally changes things.
It literally changes atoms and rearranges molecules.

Cynics like to discount gratitude, downgrade it as sweet, nice, something for naive Pollyannas.

What I’ve discovered is that living on the frequency of joy and gratitude causes cataclysmic reverberations.”

So I, for one, am getting my Thank You on. What do you think? Are you with me?

Carry on,
xox

*Taken directly from the book Thank and Grow Rich
https://www.amazon.com/Thank-Grow-Rich-Experiment-Shameless/dp/1401949843/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1474414863&sr=1-1&keywords=thank+and+grow+rich

I am not proud of what I’m about to reveal—but it’s the truth.

Once upon a time, I had the world by the balls. Or the tits. Both are equally painful if you think about it.

Anyhow, I had a job I loved, lots of friends and foreign travel. I ate and drank and slept well and had enough sex (although, do you really ever have enough sex? — Asking for a friend). Only one thing stuck in my craw and I was an A-number-one brat about it.

Thinking back on this chapter of my life, I can’t believe what a spoiled jerk I was. A serious boil on the ass of humanity.

Nevertheless, I still think the cause was a good one—I just went about it all wrong.

I was nearing my forties, terminally single, and childless by choice.

One night, tipsy on wine and inadequacy after attending yet another friend’s baby shower directly on the heels of Mother’s Day, I decided that there needed to be a National holiday to celebrate women like…well, me…who am I kidding? Just me.

I picked a day in September, because of where it sits on the calendar (I wasn’t a total asshole), directly after summer and just prior to the run-up to the holidays. I think it was today, September the 20th.

After careful consideration, filled with equal parts entitlement and hubris, I gathered together my family and friends to decree that September 20th would heretofore be known as Spinster Auntie Day!

I wanted cake. Cupcakes to be exact. I wanted decorations. And gifts. I think I even registered somewhere. God help me.

Why my sister didn’t gag and tie me up until I decided to behave myself is beyond me. Anyway…

My feeling was this: I celebrated everyone — all the time.
Weddings and their showers, babies and their showers and birthdays. I went to so many I’ve lost count. In your thirties, matrimony and childbirth essentially take up most of your Saturdays and many of your Sundays. Society at large celebrates mommies and motherhood. And families. As fun as that can be—and it was fun—after a decade I felt like an outsider.

It was a club of which I was not a member.

There was no day for me and all of the many women like me. (Insert hands on hips, whining and foot stomps here.)

The unmarried, childless women that all the other women turn to in times of joy and crisis.
The Auntie. In my case, The Spinster Auntie.

The diaper changing, stroller pushing, tote lugging, binkie washing, baby wranglers.

The ones who take worried midnight phone calls, do 6 am pharmacy runs and read Goodnight Moon over and over tens of thousands of times. We sit covered in drool or some unidentified sticky substance to watch Frozen or Toy Story or Cars until we want to gouge our eyes out while their mommies grab a quick shower, run an errand, or God forbid, catch a nap.

We were regularly available because we were a part of that village, you know, the one that it takes to raise a kid.
And besides that, we had no real life.

At the time I knew the parents were heroic. But I couldn’t help feeling like we were the unsung heroes.
No one meant to overlook us. They were sleep deprived and just so fucking busy being full-time parents. Overlooking is never intentional.

Now before you go and totally hate me (If you don’t already), don’t get me wrong. I loved my auntie duties. My time spent with my actual niece and nephew and the children of all of my friends. Every boo-boo kiss, hand-hold, “I wuv you”, and baby belly-laugh was pure joy to me and I wouldn’t have missed it. I felt lucky to be a member of the inside circle.

I just wanted a day. And cake. Don’t forget about the cake.

I don’t remember if we ever celebrated Spinster Auntie Day more than once. Probably not. I’m certain I went on with my life, too ashamed to bring it up again. I think if asked my sister, with a shudder, could remember.

Come to find out I was not alone in my unadulterated shamelessness. In 2009, someone actually got a National Aunt and Uncle Day added to the calendar (I like my title better), but I never heard about it because by that time I was married and had, at long last, finally gotten over myself.

Listen, loves, the point here (if there is one), is this: Is there an unsung hero, an Auntie or Uncle either by birth or just their proximity, around you now? Please, please, will you say thank you and buy them a cupcake? From me?

Carry on,
xox

“We have perfected the attitude of worry. If we don’t have something to worry about, that worries us.”

—Michele Longo O’Donnell

Stress is a thug and a thief. It’s a thug because it has such little regard for our well-being, and a thief because it absconds with BIG chunks our time. It adds up. Stress, that jerk, has looted months, if not years, of accumulated hours from my life. So, I have no problem giving stress the finger, whenever I can. I take great glee in pissing it off.
Here are the Top Ten things that piss stress off. Practice them wisely—and often.

1) Rest. Stress HATES when we’re well rested. We make better decisions, we’re on our game and less likely to muck things up. Naps, long weekends and vacations are its Kryptonite.

2) A Sense of Humor/Laughing. Have you ever tried to laugh while completely stressed out? A real, deep belly laugh? It’s almost impossible. It’s akin to keeping your eyes open when you sneeze. The two CANNOT coexist.

3) Asking for help. Stress can’t stand it when we realize our limitations, delegate and ask for help. It needs a frazzled, overextended, perfectionist, control freak as a host. Calling in the Cavalry BEFORE you’ve reached your wit’s end sends stress the silent Jedi signal: This is not the droid you’re looking for.

4) Believing you have enough. If you believe you have enough time, money, resources, help and happiness, you will be invisible to stress. It will pass your house and go torment your neighbors.

5) Exercise. Yes, it is possible to outrun stress. You can outrun it on the treadmill, or with the dogs at the park. Once that heart rate goes up and those endorphins kick in, stress will NOT be able to keep up. Stress carb loads, always goes for seconds, eats peanut butter out of the jar with a serving spoon, and parks illegally in the handicapped space, so it never has to walk far. Stress hates a fit body and a clear head.

6) Organization. When you’re well organized, meaning, you know where everything is, and can easily find it, stress has a shit fit. How can it fuck with you and mess with your head, if you can immediately come up with your passport, keys, glasses, insurance papers, rent check, stamps, cat nail clipper and both of the same black sandals?

7) Behaving like a grown up. Stress despises adult behavior. Stress is counting on us to NEVER grow up. It adores a good temper tantrum and will do everything in its power to keep us from getting our ducks in a row. As a matter of fact, it is heavily invested in the prospect of us not saving for retirement, avoiding responsibility, making uninformed decisions and never planning for the future.

8) Self-care. THIS pisses off stress almost more than anything. Getting a massage, doing yoga and meditating. Those are three of its mortal enemies. It throws its hands up, shakes its head and walks away in defeat. It can’t take hold of a peaceful mind.

9) Not caring what other people think. Once you drop that bad habit, stress will have to go find another victim. Don’t feel bad for a second. There are millions.

10) Awareness. Stress has a full-on hissy-fit when you call it out. It can’t stand when you know its name or what it looks like. It would rather stay anonymous, in one of its many disguises. As a headache, an ulcer, colitis, hives, over eating, over spending, depression, and anxiety.

I told you, it’s a thug.
It knows, that once you know why it’s there, it’s days are numbered.

Can you think of more ways to piss off stress? Tell me what you do, I’d LOVE to hear some comments!

Carry on,
Xox

“I don’t know.”

Probably the scariest words this side of “It doesn’t look good” and “We have to talk.”

And why is that?

Maybe because from the earliest age we are asked, no, make that we are expected to know EVERYTHING.

What do I want to be when I grow up?

Who invented Velcro?

What do I want for lunch every day?

Where should I go to college?

What’s my major?

Do I want coleslaw or fries with that?

What is love?

Is there a God?

Where do I want to work?

Who do I want to marry?

Do I want children? How many? Boys or girls?

What state do I want to live in and which neighborhood?

Am I going to work or be a stay-at-home parent?

Do these jeans make my butt look big?

Should I stay or should I go?

How will I know when to leave?

Should I buy or rent?

How much do I need for retirement?

When are you too old to wear a bikini?

Donut or green juice?

Burial or cremation?

Holy crap! The sheer volume of questions we’re supposed to know the answer to is mind-boggling! And the fact that we come to a decision on most is commendable. We were taught well.

Consider my life. I’m no different from you. Not knowing what I wanted had NEVER occurred to me. I learned that saying I don’t know was unacceptable. It wasn’t one of the choices. There was no plan C. No other box to check. When I didn’t know the answer, I winged it. I made shit up. I turned at the fork in the road. I didn’t stand there with a map or spend time consulting my GPS. I had a five-year plan. I made a decision and dealt with the consequences because acting like I didn’t know which way to go, which most of the time I didn’t, seemed like the bigger risk.

But as I’ve gotten older and presumably wiser, I’ve discovered:
1. Not having children was the right decision for me (whew!)
2. The only woman who can get away with wearing a bikini after sixty is Helen Mirren.
3. It’s okay to say “I don’t know”.

Thinking I had to have all the answers started to feel like prison to me. It left no room for chance, spontaneity or dare I say—magic.
I slowly discovered that saying I don’t know opened the door a crack allowing a myriad of possibilities to flood in.
I don’t know went from feeling shameful to liberating. It became my Get Out Of Jail Free Card.

I throw “I don’t know” around like confetti. I aim to live a more inspired life. I no longer feel the need to know the end-game. I’ve pretty much taken my hands off the wheel and let a force that is much more daring, interesting and magical take control of my life and I’ve got to warn you IF you decide to go this route—buckle up—you’re in for one hell of a ride!

Carry on,
xox

You know those things you do in your life that seem like a good idea at the time?

How when you’re young you feel as if you have all the time in the world to change them if they turn out to be nothing more than a bad habit?

Like jaywalking, talking with your mouth full, or unprotected sex?

I smoked cigarettes. Not all the time. Just socially. At parties mostly, and clubs, or with my roommate at the Formica dining table we had in the kitchen of the little rental we shared with my sister, who did not partake in this most unhealthy of habits. We kept a pack of Virginia Slims in the freezer with booze and a little bit of ice. Two liberated young women, beating the odds in a man’s world — Baby, we’d come a long way! Sexy, right?

Meh…now I keep coffee in my freezer. And an unopened bottle of Vodka. And a non-GMO corn crust pizza.
That’s almost-sixty-sexy.
I know. Meh…anyway…

Gossip was served in that shitty little kitchen most mornings and evenings and nothing goes better with gossip than a cigarette. They are the Batman and Robin of vices. In my opinion, you cannot have one without the other. Even now, when I smell cigarette smoke I want to divulge something dishy.

I want to speculate on Tom Cruises’ sexuality or get the dirt on Melania Trump. Is she really a fembot?

I suppose I should also designate gossiping as a bad habit. I thought I did that several decades ago but this talk of cigarettes and vices has opened Pandora’s Box—or a time machine—and inside is a Star Magazine and a pack of Virginia Slims.

This all changed for me the minute a guy told me I smelled like an ashtray. I’m lying. No man ever said that to me. They weren’t stupid, they wanted to get laid.

In my twenties, at parties, and in clubs the smoke was so thick that everybody smelled like an ashtray. Looking back I’m convinced most ashtrays actually smelled better than my thick, curly hair which absorbed all the bad breath, BO, eighties music, and smoke within a ten block radius. That transferred to my clothes, then my car and finally to my pillow. After awhile (several years), when I’d wake up and all of those smells would hit my nose in the first few seconds of consciousness—I’d want to ask—are Angelina Jolie’s lips real?— no, seriously, I’d want to puke.

There comes a time, (thirty) when you ask yourself: Is this the woman I thought I’d become? At least I did that. And I came up short.

I was letting a man emotionally get the better of me. How was that okay?
I was dabbling. I wasn’t serious about much of anything.
I was jaywalking, talking with my mouth full, and smoking, gossiping and apparently lying.
I was having protected sex. So, one point for Janet.

All of that seemed like a good idea at the time. Because I was completely unconscious. I had no idea who I was or who I wanted to become.

When, on the five-millionth smelly pillow morning, it finally dawned on me. I need to get my shit together. I need to figure out where I’m headed, who I want to be, and how that person behaves. And good lord, I need a shower.

I’d love to say it all happened overnight, easy-peasy-Parchesi, but I’d be lying (and that’s prohibited), it was progressive. And messy. It took focus, intention, and tons of introspection. In other words, it took decades to craft the ADULT woman I wanted to be and for starters, she wasn’t a smoker.

A Small Confession: I still miss smoking.

The reason this came up for me was the fact that now, at almost sixty, I’ve begun to craft what kind of “older” woman I want to portray. Do I continue to eat whatever I want and put elastic in all of my pants? Do I forgo red lipstick because it spreads all over my face like Heath Ledger’s Joker? Do I succumb to sensible shoes?

Luckily, because I’ve done this before I know the work that lies ahead of me—and I’m exhausted already!

I’ll let you know how it goes.

Carry on,
xox

This is a shit story. It broke me. It shattered me into a thousand little pieces. But it was the catalyst for my complete reinvention—so… thank you.

This is the best part of the story. The part I love to tell. The “miracle in the mess” so to speak. And it happened seven years ago today!

I’d love to say I stayed in the energy of that miracle and was able to ride the wave of hope, but I didn’t. I fell apart. It was ugly.
This was a sign. But I couldn’t see my way clear of the disaster.
Oh, well, lesson learned. Lessons learned. Many, many, lessons and I’m so much the better for them. Actually, I’m a completely different person. Ask my husband.
Anyhow, enjoy this flashback and appreciate all of the miracles that show up in your darkest hours. I do. Now.
Carry on,
xox

The second miracle occurred during cleanup.
We were about four days in.
The mud had been cleaned up, but the floors, walls, windows and merchandise were still covered with a layer of toxic, smelly slime.

We covered our faces with those cloth masks and plugged on.
Oh yeah, did I mention it was over 100 degrees!

This was the day I was told that the walls of the building had to be cut open up to 5 feet in order to air them out and avoid the dreaded black mold. I don’t know why that hit me so hard, but it did. I walked outside, sat on some steps across the parking lot, and cried while a Sawzall proceeded to systematically carve up my beautiful little store.

This felt serious…and profoundly sad.

Gary (my insurance advocate), came outside and put his arm around me as we sat silently watching the carnage. When he finally spoke, he asked me if I wanted to go in and box things up, the things that hadn’t gotten wet in the bathroom storage closets. Since the walls would be wide open, someone could potentially get inside and help themselves to whatever was left behind, so he gently suggested I go take a look.

I declined. He insisted. (I think about this all the time, you’ll see why in a minute.)

I think he also just wanted to keep me busy so he didn’t have to look at my big, sad and soggy face.

Since the electricity had been turned off, the bathroom was pitch dark as I poked around in the back closets with a garbage bag, waiting for my eyes to adjust. A generator and the Sawzall wailed away.  It felt weird to me to be salvaging Windex, paper towels, and toilet cleaner.

It occurred to me I could just leave it for the salvage crew. What difference did any of this stuff make now?
I was numb, just going through the motions, trying not to feel too much.

Tucked in the back of a shelf was a box of Tampons with the top torn off. All my good customers knew it was there. Periodically, I would bring a handful from home to refill it. (All you women reading this know what I’m talking about.)
There were several left in the box, so I tucked them into my pocket tossing the empty box in the large, green garbage bag.
But as it flew on its way into the bag, I could HEAR that it wasn’t empty.

There was something heavy sliding around the bottom of the box as it hurtled toward the trash.

Blindly, I reached inside, felt something cool and smooth, and pulled out the expensive diamond watch my husband had given me for our 5th anniversary! Was this some kind of a joke?

The hair stood up on the back of my neck as I stared at my missing watch, there alone in the dark. I started to shake. Violently. Then I started to scream. Loudly!

“Myyyyyy Waaaaaatch!” I screamed as I scrambled towards daylight.  All the workers stopped and stared at the screaming woman. “Ohhhh myyyy gawwwwwd! Are you fucking kidding me?!” I was screaming at the top of my lungs, sweating profusely in the heat. My hair was flying out of its rubber band and I had a mask over my face which muffled my words. The entire get-up morphed me into some kind of crazed, incoherent germaphobe. Gary looked at me, horrified.

Here’s the thing you guys. That watch had been “missing” for over 2 years. My husband had just recently mentioned how disappointed he was that I hadn’t found it yet. I felt terrible. We both knew I wasn’t someone who lost my jewelry. In my previous life as a jeweler, I had worn the watch a lot but since opening the store, it seemed too fancy, and I only took it out of the safe for special occasions.

I NEVER wore it to the store. EVER.
One day I had gone into the safe to get it…and it was gone.

Okay. Did I mention I found the watch on September 9th?
Our anniversary is September 9th.

The missing watch had mysteriously appeared after 2 years on a sad but significant day—in the MOST impossible place imaginable.
It was a sign.
Don’t lose hope.
Miracles occur.

I finally stopped screaming long enough to dial my phone. I couldn’t call my husband fast enough.

XoxJanet

Oh, for crying out loud! Why do we do it?

Why do we choose to live so small?

When I was a little kid, I was HUGE. A great, big, unedited, unabashed, force to be reckoned with and I’m guessing you were too.

The other day I was a quivering bag-of-doubt when someone really wise asked me, “Who did this to you? Who made you think life was setting you up to fail?”

Well, good question. I have absolutely NO idea!
Was there one person, a family member or a teacher who caused me to feel like a quivering-bag-of-doubt? No. Not really. My dad wasn’t a huge fan, but that was motivation to me. Besides, I’m not into the blame game anymore, but— it did make me think about how ridiculous I can be.

I think it’s society at large that makes us dial ourselves down. Don’t you? We’re taught appropriate behavior and since we want to fit in—we follow the crowd.

Well, guess what? I don’t wanna follow the crowd anymore. Do you?

I want to write my own story and make it GREAT! I want to blaze my own trail and as of late, I want to swing for the fences!

Swing For The Fucking Fences! (Okay, I may have had too much coffee).

But why the hell not?

Who’s with me?

Hey batter, batter!
xox

“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is.” ~ Albert Einstein

So, you guys, this is a video that I saw on my Facebook homepage ONCE. One time, (if you can believe that, because when does THAT ever happen?), a few months back and it moved me so much I wanted to tell you guys about it.

I wanted to tell you the story of Chloe, but, and I’m embarrassed to admit this, when I looked at my notes I couldn’t make out the name I had scribbled while I watched. I tried everything. But it didn’t look like Chloe AT ALL! Curtis, Caitlin, Cody, none of those were right and without the name, well, I was screwed because the name plays such a huge role in this story. So, not only was I unable to write about this amazing story, I couldn’t find the video either!

BECAUSE IT’S CALLED CHLOE!

Then lo and behold, this past Sunday, Oprah ran it on Super Soul Sunday because it’s that good. Hallelujah! Mystery solved and here it is.

I’m showing you this on the weekend so you’ll have plenty of time to watch it. Really, you must watch it.

Okay, maybe not.
But…how about this? Maybe if, and only if, you’ve gotten tired of waiting for something you wanted with your whole heart.

Or, if you’ve questioned or even cursed God/Universe/The Lord/Bob, whoever, because it was looking like the thing you desired most in the world was being withheld from you.

Or, have you ever felt that horrible feeling that washes over you on those days when you lose your faith and you think “Yeah, this thing ain’t gonna happen. Never in a million years. What a complete and total FOOL I’ve been!”

Have you felt any of these? I have. All of them.  You need to watch this.

Carry on,
xox