An Invincible Summer - A Woman's Journey

Grief has no time table.  I feel it lifting, allowing the breath to come easier. Still, my inner teenager is hesitant to let go of it. Grief can easily be cannibalized by victimhood and victimhood is one of the tools she uses to get what she needs or wants. She wants to use it even as I am writing this. I write but she tries to override my thoughts, cogitating on how we can still change the situation using the right words, formulating a plan. She would like to tear me from this moment and pull me back into the scary past where we sat rather low on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Where, often times, there was not nearly enough.   “How will we keep the house, afford to repair the car, take care of our medical needs?”, she whispers in my ear.  Those thoughts have nothing to do with the start of another beautiful day. The Great Mystery is LOVE. If I am operating out of love the past are just echoes, the future is nebulous at best and the present is here, right now.  The past does help me popu

The Boy Scout never ceases to amaze me.  At school, he is the teachers pet. Well, most of the teachers. One of them only tolerates him and his big presence, over confidence and ready opinion, the rest seem to adore him. He shows up early, ready to connect, putting himself confidently out there in a way that makes me envious. He advocates for himself with the professors and the staff. He wants to have them all over for dinner. They have standing invitations as soon as they are no longer his professors.  His super power has worked in his favor, getting him on-campus work that has covered his tuition, specialty work studies and now, and best of all, an internship with an aged (so about our age) master garden who, in the past, was the director of the Portland Japanese Garden.  Boy Scout wants to specialize in ornamental pruning. There is a good demand for qualified pruners here in town and they can make a really decent hourly wage. The more experienced of them can bring in $150 to $200 per

Went to an ACA speaker meeting Saturday night. I couldn’t hear so no idea whether it was good or not. In the long church pew ahead of me was a single occupant. A woman about 30ish. She was inexpertly dressed, and her hair was a home dye job and her makeup could use a little help from a pro and, truthfully, all I wanted to do was go sit with her and tell her how beautiful she looked. She was beautiful because she was being her own true self. I didn’t sit with her. I don’t know if I could have done it without making her uncomfortable about the big feelings I was having. You see, my trans daughter is trying to be her very best womanly self too. She is putting herself out there day after day, being vulnerable and hoping for, in not complete and unabashed acceptance, then at least decency in return. She is a good human, kind, thoughtful and caring but that is not always what she gets in return. The other day she went to a women’s only yoga class. She checked it out carefully. It did not say

It's my birthday!!! Well, not my birth birthday but my ACA birthday. I's been 6 years since I first set foot in an ACA meeting room.  Most meetings end with a reading of The Promises which is a list of ways your life will improve if you are willing to do the work. They are as follows: 1.  We will discover our real identities by loving and accepting ourselves. 2.  Our self-esteem will increase as we give ourselves approval on a daily basis. 3.  Fear of authority figures and the need to “people-please” will leave us. 4.  Our ability to share intimacy will grow inside us. 5.  As we face our abandonment issues, we will be attracted by strengths and become more tolerant of weaknesses. 6.  We will enjoy feeling stable, peaceful, and financially secure. 7.  We will learn how to play and have fun in our lives. 8.  We will choose to love people who can love and be responsible for themselves. 9.  Healthy boundaries and limits will become easier for us to set. 10.  Fears of failures and

Coffee with a new friend today. For the most part, it was enjoyable. She’s warm and personable, tells a good story and I just like her. I now know her upbringing, her troubles, her spiritual bent. We talked a bit about our relocation to PNW and my job search. I was a little vulnerable sharing my disappointment and concern about the future. Told her I was trying to stay present, live in the moment, but not always succeeding. Then she says, “Well, you know what to do about it.”, with a smug look on her face. I was confused. Do I? Do I know what I can DO about it? I waited…….”Make a change”, she says. Make a change? Exactly what change did she mean?  She made assumptions about me. She assumed I’ve been sitting at my little ole desk crying woe is me. She assumed I haven’t sent out more than a hundred resumes, or taken a job I had to quit because I could not hear because of the warehouse noise, or been quickly eliminated by every head hunter when they cleverly managed to coerce my approxima

As I practice my gratitude this morning it’s easy to find the beauty around me. The snow covered graves do not hinder the wildlife from foraging. A mama and her fawn, keeping one cautious eye on me, are finding food. Rabbits are everywhere. A murder of crows, staying close together, are making me wish I had brought some seeds with me but they are not going hungry. The sky is indecisive about how it is feeling, first lightly weeping and then deciding a dusting of fluttering flakes is more appropriate. Gorgeous. Boy Scout is on my mind. That man, in constant pain from sports injuries and a bad car accident in his early 20’s, never ceases to amaze me in his ability to find joy, humor and a deep connection to his inner child. His car accident severed the tendons that lift the front of his foot so his gait is a step and a sort of slap, step slap step slap. I love when we walk and I know he is near without even seeing him. He also has benign tremors in his hands. It doesn’t seem to trouble h