Fire!

The photos of fire streaming in from California seem a far cry from the fire of my Advent candles, but they've been a visceral reminder of the power of nature. Here, fire is a symbol of hope of light in the darkness. There, it's a cry of danger from our planet; a harbinger of fallout in the days to come from our failure to heed the warning signs.

 I have, of course, seen photos of fire and devastation before. But like the difference between hearing other people's cancer stories and hearing someone you love has received a positive test result, the fear strikes closer to home when it's affecting your personal people.

This time, the fire maps show roads I've driven on, beaches where I've found solace listening to the waves. In my mind's eye, I see what was, and try to reconcile it with the ash-filled frames of the photos in the paper. I cry.

This time, it's my daughter and cousin who have evacuated from their homes and are bunking with friends until the fires can be put out. This time, it's my friend Kelly who is reeling from the news that while her condo building is still there, the surrounding neighborhood, the homes of her Covid coven people, have all been turned to ash.

Once again, my heart cries with fear and grief. "How can this be????"

Once again, I am reminded, this time forcefully, today is the only day I have. Tomorrow is not guaranteed. Nothing is guaranteed, except death. Cold comfort, that.

To escape the spiral down, I pivot to what I know is good. My people have evacuated, but they are alive and well. They have friends; are not alone as they cope with this mess. As Mr. Rogers said, "look for the helpers." The firefighters are working around the clock to contain the blaze. Our friends from Mexico and Canada have sent equipment to help in the fight. 

Sometimes, bad stuff happens. No avoiding it. 

But every time, every time, I remember to look for it, I find Good, and the presence of Good makes it easier to stop and breathe for a moment. To figure out one next step, then to take that step.

Sometimes, one step is all I can do. 

Sometimes, that's enough. Because when I take one step, then one more, experience tells me I will eventually come out of the dark times. This, too, shall pass. 

Snow Days!

The forecasts were ominous last weekend, and I will admit I was a bit nervous as I awaited the storm's arrival. A coat of ice, lots of snow, high winds, followed by plummeting temperatures - it sounded like a recipe made for extended power outages. "Please no!" I pleaded with the powers that be. Much to my surprise, so far, they have listened. The power has stayed on. *whew!*

The ice arrived right on schedule around noon on Saturday, but the weather gods heard my prayers, because it was just a light coating - enough to make walking outside treacherous, but not enough to bring down power lines. 

The snow began a few hours later, and flurries continued through the night. I woke up Sunday morning, peered out the window, and thought, "Huh. The storm must have detoured around us." Famous last words.

To the contrary, it was just sleeping in. By noon, I had a nice 5-6" coat of snow, with A LOT more to come in the forecast. 

Hmmm. I know I can easily shovel 6" of snow, but 14"? I was guessing somewhere in there my back would decline to participate in the exercise. But, the driveway wasn't going to shovel itself. 

Hmmm. There's no rule I know of that says one MUST wait until the snowfall has finished to clear the sidewalks. So I bundled up and went out for a nice little 2 1/2 hour core workout. Fortunately for me, the snow was on the lighter, fluffier end of the spectrum, so I finished up the job in good shape. Of course, by the time I finished the round, the first section I'd shoveled had another 2" of snow down, but I ignored that fact and went inside to admire my handiwork from a warm vantage point, steaming cup of hot chocolate in hand. 

I spent the afternoon cuddled up with a book, watching the snow fall. (One of my favorite ways to spend an afternoon. Oh, yeah!)

About an hour before sunset, I figured I'd best get out there again, even though the snow was still coming down strong. This time the snow was even fluffier, which is a good thing, because I was a bit tired from the first round. 

As I headed outside, I thought I was going to be miserable in the cold and dark, but was pleasantly surprised to find myself chugging along without a problem. I had the right clothes on, and was moving quickly enough that I wasn't cold. We haven't had a good snowfall in quite some time, so I was enjoying the beauty of the falling flakes, the evening's hush, interrupted only by the sound of the wind gusts. I stopped now and again to admire the diamond glints covering the ground and sparkling in the light of the street lamps.

As I worked, I was afraid I was pushing my limits, and I was right. By the time I was finishing up, another 2 1/2 hours in, my right hip was using only unpleasant words when it spoke to me, and my lower back had given me a final warning - do much more, and you WILL BE SORRY.

I listened.

I stopped working, went inside, grabbed a quick bite, and settled into a well-earned, long, hot bath. 

Despite the soak, it took quite a while for my muscles to settle down once I crawled into bed, but I'd worked long and hard enough to fall asleep despite the assorted twinges and aches. 

Monday morning's unaccustomed brightness (it snowed!) woke me, and I cautiously rolled over and took inventory. No back twang! Hips, unhappy but moving. Shoulders, tight but ditto. *whew!* I guess I just got paid for all those hours I've spent at the gym these past few years. 

This being Kansas City, it'll still be a few days before the streets will be clear enough for my car to get around, but my driveway is ready to go! (Fortunately, I have friends with practical cars willing to help get me where I need to be; Uber makes a nice backup.)

Happy New Year!

On to the New Year

and, as always happens this time of year, I've blinked and Christmas has come and gone. I didn't have the oomph to get to Minnesota this year, which has been a longstanding tradition, but I celebrated with friends, old and new. It was a good Christmas.

Winter's Solstice has passed, and we are in those weeks where the days are technically getting longer, but only by a few seconds each day. It's almost as if the world pauses for a moment to catch its breath before continuing the cycle of life.

The sun rises late, and sets early; hereabouts the skies are often clouded. I find it hard to get myself moving many mornings. (Leave my warm and cozy bed for the cold darkness, why??) This morning I slept in a bit, figuring it would be another snuggle day - I can't ignore the gray, but I can find the silver linings. I am grateful for good books and my soft fuzzy white blanket. For candlelight and hot tea. For a cozy home and reliable furnace.  

I think Someone thought I needed a reminder that this, too, shall pass. When I finally got out of bed and lifted the shade, I was greeted with a glorious sunrise. The color lasted just a few minutes before fading to familiar gray, but the promise has stuck with me. Beauty Is.

One of the things I've found vexing about retirement is how the days all blur together. Even with exercise to bring structure to my days, I still find myself wondering how I spent my time last week as it flew by.

As I was browsing the news the other day, I found an article from someone with the same issue. As a way to combat it, she pauses for just a minute each night to write down one thing that happened that day. Hmm. I used to journal a lot more than I do now - perhaps this is a key. Perhaps if I can start a discipline of sitting for just a few minutes before I turn out the lights and writing down a few words, it will help.

I'm not usually one for New Year's resolutions, but I'm going to give this one a try. Even if (when) I don't do it every night, if I do it more nights than I don't, perhaps it will give me an anchor. It's worth a shot.

Happy New Year!

Advent IV: Love

Unlike my search last week for vestiges of Joy, I felt Love in the room last night, even before I lit the last candle on my Advent wreath. 

This year, Love has been both the cause of my heartache, and its ease.

The cause, because it is only because I love, because I care deeply, that my heart hurts. If I hadn't loved, I wouldn't hurt. Simple as that. But, had I more closely guarded my heart, I would also have missed out on the best parts of life. The pain is part and parcel of the love. I don't have to like it, I just have to accept it.

The ease, because like the time I found my own cancer, Love has rallied. It has been present as I did my best to help Kate through her cancer's recurrence.

My friends have been there, walking with me as I walk with her. Helping me to figure out the next right step to take.

I am not alone. I don't have words for how deeply the knowledge comforts me.

She is not alone. Her partner, her daughter, her friends, have all stepped up to take care of life's to-do lists, so she can concentrate on healing. 

There is light in the darkness, beauty along the hard paths.

Love Is.

Kate Update: In typical Kate fashion, her body did not react well to the insult of radiation, and her skin became reactive to touch; itchy red lines would appear any and every time something rubbed against her body. Then, for reasons unknown, she developed a bad case of vertigo in reaction to the antihistamines she was taking to control the itching. She spent a week in bed moving as little as possible. But this, too, has passed. She had her last treatment a week ago, and is slowly regaining her feet. Sleeping a lot (no surprise). The dizziness has much improved, and the itches are easing. *whew*

Next: she'll start the series of shots and pills designed to shut down estrogen production in her body. i.e. instant menopause. *sigh* One step at a time.

Treatable. Yes.

Advent III: Joy

Hope sustains me in the darkness.

Peace calms my soul.

It's not so hard for me to claim these gifts; they ground and steady my feet for the journey.

Joy?

It is effervescent, fleeting, airy. It doesn't seek to help me ground and center myself, rather, it irrationally launches my heart into the heights. There, at the apex of the leap, my inner camera takes a quick snapshot of the beauty, which I then store deep within, tucked away with other treasured memories. Stumbling across these moments, even years later, often brings a wistful tear or two to my eye. I suppose it's because I'm greedy - I so would love to stay in the moments; to not let life carry me on past them. 

The pink candle in the wreath symbolizes the joy of anticipation. The end of this season of waiting for the child to be born, waiting for the days to begin to grow longer, waiting for the cycle of the seasons to begin anew, is near. That's a good thing, eh?

I'm not feeling it this year. Which frustrates me.

But I lit the taper anyways and watched it burn for a while, reflecting on the concept of Joy, since the reality was clearly not within my grasp. As I sat, the echoes of Joys past started bubbling up, just in case I had begun to forget how it feels to be joyful, and needed a reminder.

And then, maybe, just maybe, a new, tentative, bubble appeared.

This, too, shall pass.

All shall be well, all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well.

Yes.

Advent II: Peace

"Yeah, uh-huh," says my cynical side. "Peace? In this day and age?"

Hmmm...

As I watched the light of the candle, I decided the Peace of Advent is probably not the kind where one is at Peace because everything is hunky-dory, with smiles all around, at the Happy Unicorn Rainbow Farm up on the hill. 

As I watched the flame flicker, backed by the light of Hope, I figured it's more likely to be the sort of Peace where you are still for a moment; at Peace despite all the things.

It's the kind of Peace I find when I relinquish my efforts to control what's outside of me, and instead turn my attention to controlling my reaction to what's happening in my world. As Viktor Frankl taught me so well, it's the only thing I can control anyways. 

(This is not because of any lack of effort on my part, I assure you. Some part of me is still convinced that if I can just round up all the ducks and get them in the right order, I'll definitely be able to bend the will of the world to my hand. I have not been successful thus far, but there's always tomorrow.)

When I am able to accept those things I cannot change, when I am able to take one more step in the direction of changing those things I can, I, despite all the things, find a measure of Peace.

This is never as easy for me as I think it should be and I've been actively working on it for several decades. I've had to let go of dreams aplenty, say goodbye to too many of the people I love. It's been hard!

Time and again, I find myself focused on clinging, eyes squinched and laser-focused, to my vision of what I want to happen as I travel along life's river. Then, when whatever-it-was I was busy clutching slips from my grasp anyhow, I look up to find I've missed part of my precious journey. There's no going back to claim it.

No, I don't get what I want any more often when I give up my efforts to control the flow of events, but when I let go and allow the water to carry me along, I sure swallow a lot less of it. When I'm not busy fighting the current, I can relax a bit, open my eyes, widen my field of vision, and catch more of the Beauty of my journey. 

I'll keep working on it - if only because those moments of Peace are so comforting.

Advent I: Hope

Poof! It's December!

This year, I knew I would need the Advent Candle tradition to anchor my soul, and so made a point of buying the appropriate tapers ahead of time. (Score one for self-care.)

Last night I tidied up my dining room table (which, despite my best efforts, generally has a collection of whatsit strewn across its surface), dimmed the lights, and put on some quiet music. I brewed myself a cup of tea, lit the first of the Advent candles, and settled in to watch the flame.

Hope. Such a small light. So much darkness.

As I sat and watched, a few tears escaped and trickled down my cheeks. This has been a hard year. Hope feels risky. If I dare to hope, I might hope in vain. And it hurts when a flame of hope gets snuffed out. 

I am afraid. There are so many dark portents whirling in the world's winds - both the larger world, and the world of my life. I was tempted to sink down and let the darkness take over.

But that's the thing about light. Even a small light dispels the dark. Fear wants me to believe the darkness is greater, but it's not. Emily Dickinson's words came to me:

Hope is the thing with feathers 
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all

I took a deep breath. "I can choose," I told myself. 

I can both acknowledge the Fear and know it is not the only Power.

I opened the door to my heart, listened to the song of Hope. 
I watched the darkness wither down, losing much of its power in the light of the candle.

Hope, anyways. 
Yes.

Attitude of Gratitude

 

I once thought the whole "attitude of gratitude" concept was malarkey. But then, in one of my down times, I decided to try noticing things in my day for which I was (or could be, if I was so inclined) grateful. To my surprise, the exercise helped. A lot. 

Noticing the good parts of my day showed the all-of-life-is-black part of me it was wrong. As I kept up the practice, the black lake slowly receded, shrank to where I could easily see it was just a part of life - not all of it; not at all.

I am grateful Kate has been able to apply the lessons she learned in cancer round one to cancer round two. I am grateful she is in a time place of life where she can afford to step back and take care of herself; to help her body to heal as best it can.

She has finished 12 of the 25 scheduled rounds of radiation. (Almost halfway there! Go, Kate!) She tells me she ends each session feeling like someone punched her in the sore spot on her chest; the tissue in the entire area tightens up. She then goes home and spends the next several hours stretching and rolling and repeating until she's regained her range of motion. She then does the whole thing again the next day. (Stretching the scar tissue like this, as it forms, means she will hopefully come out the other end of this wringer still able to breathe freely; able to move her shoulder. Fingers crossed, candles lit.) 

I am grateful morning comes. Every day. So far, at least. Morning comes and I get another chance to have a good day. 

I am grateful Sylvester is here with me. Over the past few years, I've grown to like our 20 minute, morning walk and sniff session. His presence assures I get up and at 'em, then outside to greet the day. Every day. Like it or not. (It's good for me.)

As winter's cold settles in, I am grateful for a reliable furnace. For the delivery of electricity and gas I can (usually) take for granted. I don't have to wonder if today is an electricity-on day, because barring a big storm, all the days are.

I am grateful for you - the You who is reading my words, bringing them to life. Your presence lets me know I'm not alone - not in my struggles, not in my joys. I feel seen. I feel heard. Since Covid, I know how important these things are.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hot Yoga Lesson

When Kate came into town earlier this year, she asked me if I would help her find a place to do hot yoga while she was here - the discipline is one of the best ways she knows to help her troubled back loosen up. I was happy to help, asked around a bit, found her a place to go, and worked with her to sign up for a class or three.

I had tried hot yoga once a decade or two ago and swore I'd never go back, but when she came home from her class with her back clearly feeling better, I decided to give it one more try. I like to do things with Kate when I can, and perhaps I had changed. Perhaps a different style of class would be better.

So, off we went to class together.

I am not a great fan of hot and sweaty; my goal was simply to stay in the hot room for the entire ninety minutes, to do what poses I could do. I made it. I stayed.

At the end, I laid down for savasana and was pleasantly surprised to find every inch of my skin awake with a pleasant tingle. I am alive, it told me. I did a hard thing, it feels good to have done it.

*sigh* Just like that, I was hooked. I started going to class most Saturday mornings.

I took a break from yoga while I was in California. Still, when I came back to class two weeks ago, I expected to pick up where I'd left off.

Wrong. I barely made it through class. I spent over half my time sitting on the floor, trying to convince my lungs they could relax and take in a full breath. SO frustrating! During savasana, I was discouraged, sad, asking myself why I was there putting myself through this torture. If the magic tingle happened, I wasn't in a place to notice it.

This past weekend, class was a hard sell. WHY did I want to do that again?????

I convinced myself to go to class anyways, and as class got moving, was amazed to find I'd brought a whole new me. Yes, I was hot and dripping sweat, but when we got to the spot where my breathing had locked up the week before, nothing happened. I was able to continue moving and breathing, stretching and loosening all the parts. The magic part at the end returned!

??????

I've been pondering these disparate experiences all weekend. How can so much change from one week to the next?

I'm taking this as a lesson in the importance of showing up. A Notice from the Universe to me that life is not static; from week to week, it changes at levels I can't sense. A Reminder to not let failure yesterday stop me from taking a chance on succeeding today.

Take one more step.

Election Blues (Act II)

Man, oh Man!

Turns out over half the voters of this country don't care if their choice for president creeps me out, and has since the moment he stalked Hilary Clinton during their second debate, eight years ago. (Granted, most of those people don't know me from Adam (Eve?), and thus couldn't have meant to upset my apple cart with their choice, but that's not germane to the issue.)

Like the last time he was elected, my gut knew this was going to happen, which is why I intentionally didn't peek at the results Tuesday night. I wanted one more night of peaceful sleep. (Not Yet!)

I've been grappling with depression all week. Good thing I have an impressive array of tools in my coping chest; I've needed every last one of them.

I've looked for, and found, beauty each day as I take the puppy out for his morning stroll.

I've been using my yoga breathing exercises to still my mind when it wakes racing in the night. They help ground me in the here and now, so I can drift back to sleep.

I've been reminding myself I survived, we survived, last time he was elected; we will most likely survive again.

I never did stop giving to my resistance charities of choice - The ACLU, Planned Parenthood, Gabby Giffords' anti-gun group, and Harvesters, my local food bank.

But, since the morning of the election, I can't bring myself to read any news stories touching on politics. This is exactly opposite to my reaction last time, when I began devouring the news, all the news. I'm back to reading just the style section, the advice columns, the comics. The good news part is that I now have an extra hour and more each day to pursue other activities, any other activities. (I've been trying to wean myself from the news-rabbit-hole habit for quite some time - I guess there's a silver lining to this cloud, too.)

I don't know if ignorance is bliss, but for now, I do know a lot less knowledge of what's going on in Washington D.C. will mean a lot less pain in my soul.

So, I am working to focus on the here and the now.

Today, Kate had her first dose of radiation. (So hard!!)

Today, the November sun is shining, the leaves on the trees outside my window are working to outdo one another with their brilliant displays of yellows, reds and oranges.

Today, I went to yoga, and it was warm enough on my way home to drive with the top down.

Today, I'm getting pizza for dinner. (Life is short. Eat pizza.)

Tomorrow, I will work on making it through tomorrow. Today, I just need to make it through today.

One step at a time.