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A couple weeks ago – maybe last week? – I was lucky enough to go on a yoga retreat. … Well, it *was* yoga, and yoga *was* practiced, but also, it wasn’t yoga. It was a life retreat.
Considering that my life has been in a free fall for going on two years, I might say that while it was a privilege to go, I also *needed* it. Despite having at least three legitimate panic attacks prior to leaving and while driving to the retreat. Sometimes panic sneaks in through the tiniest of kinks in one’s armor, and a person finds herself at a turnpike rest area completely convinced she will be murdered in broad daylight.
Like I mentioned, I kind of *needed* the retreat.
When John & I made the decision to come back to Chester County, there were a million reasons. But at the top of my list was my yoga studio. I understand that this idea – of a place I pay to go to practice something I could easily practice anywhere on my own – might not fully make sense to everyone. But John had several concerns before our big move nearly two years ago – and sadly/ironically/hilariously he was right about all of them. I’d said that we could be happy anywhere (this based on the fact that I’d moved every few years my entire life and was still alive and well … failing to remember that the moves had been difficult, painful, dark, hard, sometimes terrible and rarely -if ever – happy). I think, in retrospect, I didn’t fully understand how to stay put. How to just live and be happy in one place. I had itchiness for change under my fingernails, tickling my brain, and because I’d never known anything different, I thought moving was what had to happen.
I was wrong. This was not the first time, it certainly won’t be the last time. But hopefully I will continue to learn and grow and get uncomfortable and grow some more. Only time will tell.
Anyway. What dawned on me the longer we lived in central PA was that I’d willingly walked away from a life that John and I had painstakingly built. For no real reason. Just because we thought we needed a change. Everything came into focus the longer we were up there, the unhappiness growing like a plague. I missed my studio, I missed my doctors, I missed the city, I missed Birds’ fans and the Schuylkill Expressway. I missed Amtrak trains to NYC. I began to understand that I missed home. And I’d never really known where that was before (see above re: moving every few years). But I knew in my bones that it wasn’t Bellefonte.
I don’t remember the exact moment when we knew we were moving. But it happened fast. And so many other things – really hard, grown up, life-is-effing-hard things – were happening simultaneously that my memories are foggy. But all of a sudden we were buying a new house and we’d sold the one we’d just built and we were packing and loading and preparing for the hardest move of our lives.
It was brutal.
Right before our current house was due to be finished it flooded. Our timeline got kicked back several weeks. I spiraled, not really sure how to keep on keeping on. When we finally signed papers, we drove directly from the closing to see “Deadpool & Wolverine” because I’d bought tickets the day they went on sale and we hadn’t anticipated the delay. It was a comedy of errors. When we began our move-in the next day, my body seemingly collapsed, giving out after months of running on adrenaline and cortisol.
The dates of the retreat hadn’t seemed that close when I’d signed up (something I’d vowed to do having missed several retreats the studio had done while I was gone). But then all of a sudden it was upon me, and John had to be in Pittsburgh for work so we’d hired a sitter to stay with Eli for the first time in his little life. And I hit the road minus all my meds (which came back to haunt me – WOOF!)
Anyway.
All of that to say that the retreat was scary for me initially. I didn’t really know anyone going and as I drove I wondered if I’d made a huge mistake. I worried about Eli being alone with a stranger and if he’d behave. I knew that I forgave him anything but that’s because he’s mine. I worried about John getting out to the Burgh on time. I definitely got a migraine that I still can’t fully kick.
But also. The retreat was a gift. It was beauty and open souls and nature and sharing and yoga and hikes. And it confirmed to me that my yoga studio – one of the three things John had been most concerned about leaving – was as important and special as he’d believed it to be. I just hadn’t realized. That when I’d gone to my first class back on April 2, 2018, that I’d also found a home. A place full of like-minded humans who fill up my soul each and every class. Each and every day.
I learned these past two years and even more concretely these past few months being home again, what a gift and privilege and frankly, a luxury community is. I spent four days connecting with incredible people and confronting truths within myself. It was gorgeous and sacred.
It confirmed to me – if I hadn’t known before – that I’d come home. That I was back in my community.
That this place – these people – were my home.
Xoxo, g
and so it is
My internal dialogue is tired. But like all internal dialogues, it also never stops. My day time thoughts slip into night time dreams and back again, over and over, days and weeks slipping by. It’s the middle of September already. The middle of September last year feels a world away. We lived in a different house, a different town, a different place. We prioritized different things. We had people in our lives that are now gone.
It was a different life.
I keep waiting to feel relief … from something? anything? everything? … but relief never comes. Hours seemingly disappear and suddenly it’s dinner time. I haven’t showered. Or done half the things that were on my To Do list. I’m exhausted. A migraine is lurking. I can’t catch up.
I think maybe this feeling will never stop. I will always be pushing to feel caught up, to catch a breath. I forget that two years ago things *also* felt hard. I forget that my rose-colored glasses and nostalgia don’t serve me. I feel sad. I miss my mother.
We moved home because we missed home. Because we didn’t know for sure it was home until we weren’t there anymore. And now we are back. And I am racing to make up for lost time. I am continually surprised – nay, shocked – at the changes that happened in 18 months. It simultaneously feels like we never left and also like we’ve been gone for decades. Time is trippy, weird.
I talk about writing. I fleetingly think about reading. But I can’t keep up with life, so no writing happens. No reading happens. My fatigue governs my days, as my clothing piles up in my cluttered “I’ll get to it this week” closet of horrors. Haha. Things that used to feel easy or routine are a heavy lift. I talk to myself out loud ~ “You’re okay,” I say repeatedly. I say it, but do I believe it? My knees buckle underneath me, I stumble and reach for anything to steady my steps. I am defeated, my inner dialogue says. I have lost. I look at my reflection in the mirror and fail to see anything positive. I see the fatigue, the pain, the weight gained. The creases around my eyes and forehead. The evidence that no matter what my inner monologue says, time keeps marching forward. I am forty-four. I look it.
I look tired.
I am happy to be home. I am happy in this little life that husby and I have carved out for ourselves. Me, him, our Tiny Terrorist dog Eli. I know these things. I reach for them when everything else feels overwhelming.
Xoxo, g
3 octobre 2023
I’m really stubborn. Often to my detriment. I mean – just, stuck in my ways, fighting every inch against change stubborn. I have to really marinate in new ideas, chew them up in my brain, twist them inside out.
And then, when I begrudgingly accept change, I feel better for it. Because I came to my conclusion the old-fashioned, hard won way. I accept that maybe, it’s not the easiest way. But I need to see things from all angles. Make sure I believe what I believe because I chose it knowingly and with understanding.
I’m not a great debater. I ask a lot of questions but I’m not looking for a painful argument. Just like I don’t shop to shop, I don’t argue for arguments sake. I have friends who love a good debate for no reason (“let me just play devils advocate for a minute” is never my favorite sentence) but me? I’m out.
I want to discuss ideas. I want to hear different points of view. But I am gathering information, not trying to convince anyone or sway anyone. That’s not my jam. Some years ago I read a sentence (or heard, I can’t remember) – Everything you believe is because someone said it to someone somewhere sometime. And since then, I’ve questioned everything I believe.
Some things are harder to let go than others. We are raised with baked-in ideas and morals and values. Everything that forms our worldview was taught to us – either deliberately or by example. We are observant as children, collecting data to understand our surroundings, different things making different impressions.
I was raised by a mother who told me – explicitly and tacitly – to never have children. She said to live my own life, have my own adventures. Having children did not need to be a part of that. I did not need children to be complete. In fact, having children would forever render me second and she didn’t want that for me.
Which, honestly, is still kind of a radical point of view – even in 2023. Society tells a much different story, and so many women, my elders, my contemporaries, probably think I’m “less” for not being a mother.
But does that matter? Should it matter?
Or does it only matter if that is what I think of myself.
It’s an interesting thought to ponder. Does what anyone thinks of me matter – in regards to anything – if I don’t buy in?
I saw a social media post by a friend recently and in it, she self-identified in a way I have NEVER seen her. Like, kind of blew my mind a little bit that she saw herself that way. But it made me think – does my opinion even matter if that is how she sees herself? And my answer to that is – no. My thoughts and opinions don’t matter. In *my* world, she is different than how she described herself, but my world shouldn’t matter to her. Just like, in reverse, her views of me shouldn’t affect who I believe I am and how I choose to exist in the world.
I’m not sure what this blog post was about, but maybe stream of conscious writing.
Xox, g
2 octobre 2023
Sometimes I feel as though life gets distilled down to very clear delineations between YES and NO. Not in a basic kind of way but rather a life-affirming kind of way. YES, this is important. NO, this is not. YES, I should care about this and put the time in or NO, this isn’t helping. I’ve had a few of these moments of clarity in my life – disease being one, death another. Everything, for just a moment, comes into focus and it’s abundantly clear what’s worth it and what isn’t.
Last Thursday I had my second colonoscopy/endoscopy. The first one was brutal. So going into the second I wasn’t just skeptical, I was scared. And scared little me gets defensive, bullish and all around not fun. When it was all over with, and I drifted up out of my anesthesia haze, gripping John’s hand as though a lifeline, my first thought was confusion. How did I get into a different room surrounded by different people? But my second thought was of relief. Yes, of course the clock starts again at that point, counting down to the next colonoscopy, but it’s a very very long timer. It’s a five year timer. Possibly seven. Because the colonoscopy was good. Even better than the one four years ago. So thats a good thing. And in that moment, I was through it.
But now here I am. Wondering about that clarity. Wondering what my next steps are. Wondering.
I think I’ll finally finish my 200 hour teacher training. Perhaps also finish the philosophy course. Consider doing the 300 hour. I’ll keep writing. I’ll keep working every day to eat better food. Drink more water. And get quality sleep. I’ll probably still binge TV shows, and buy tickets for Marvel releases at 9 in the morning the day the tickets go on sale. I’ll continue to drink chai lattes. And I hope travel and smile and be grateful for this little life I lead.
But what does that look like? This I don’t know. This, I have to build from the ground up. All on my own.
Xox, g
19 septembre 2023
I woke this morning to cool air, soft blankets and the sounds of construction. I didn’t mind. Someone (Eli) had slept mostly quietly through the night. And woken with his Dad earlier than me. This is a small (perhaps medium-sized?) miracle as we are working on crate training and we are all (John + I included!) terrible at it. Eli – for all his manic energy, pouncing and jumping – is an excellent snuggle bug and fits perfectly between John + I most nights for at least a few hours before retiring to his own bed for the majority of his resting time. It works well for all of us, as we have crafted our lives this way – hubs and me and puppy. The dynamic shifted – in some ways dramatically – from Lucy to Eli but both have moments and traditions that fill our hearts (& memories) with untold joy.
In a few moments I’ll hop in my Volvo crossover (which we almost traded in this weekend but that’s another story for another day) and drive down to our local coffee shop and get John a brew and me a chai. I will smile driving past Talleyrand Park because its beauty is untold and just grows from season to season and I will have a moment of true contentment. Because the road to here has been awful, very bad, painfully hard – and sometimes it’s hard to remember and appreciate all the good.
Like open windows and birdsong. Crickets and peepers to drift to sleep to. And a beautiful house that fulfilled so many dreams.
A year ago John was away at NIH. I was home alone, with no obligations because my Dad & Lenny were enjoying themselves with friends on HHI. I got Covid. It was pretty awful for a full 48 hours. By the time John got home he’d decided that waiting a year from Lucy’s death to consider another dog no longer worked for him. Eli came home with us that Saturday.
He was eight weeks old so all his quirks and challenging issues now are pretty much completely our fault. But I was still sick. And we had already been feeling fidgety in life. Little Eli Emerson was just along for the ride. When we decided to sell our house in Chester County (a place, may I remind you, we thought we’d retire to eventually before making it happen much sooner than anticipated, so we loved it there) and move permanently to Centre County … well, because, there were myriad things we didn’t anticipate. Honestly we had reasons to do it. A lot of them. Mostly valid. All still more or less true. We just didn’t anticipate everything that would fall out from underneath us as the journey progressed.
Anyway, we did all the things that go along with moving. We cleaned (sometimes things that might never before have been cleaned – like the baseboards in our stairwells), we de-cluttered and staged. We left for weekends and Open Houses happened,. Two weeks, and a lot of blood, sweat and tears later, we had a cash offer and a close date. We’d done it.
Sort of.
After the selling came the moving and the storage units and the logistics of John working from home in our tiny Penn State house. It became about taking care of Eli while we spent Christmas in France with my brother and his wife (a trip we booked after Lucy, but obviously before Eli). It became about figuring out how to survive, endure. And sometimes, it became about making biscuits.
We put a (substantial) deposit down on new construction in December and we waited. And waited. The building process didn’t start until the second week in March (more on that another time because it elevates my blood pressure in unhealthy ways). By which time I was fairly certain we’d made a colossal mistake. I was miserable, trapped, sick. Eli was insane. Life felt impossible.
When closing finally arrived (construction was not complete yet … WTF) I was still on the fence. I knew that time – life – everything only moved in one direction. And that direction was forward. So I had to just get on with it – movers again and painters and contractors for various projects we felt we wanted to do straight away. But I spent most of my free time (which, to be fair, wasn’t much) wondering what hellscape I’d landed in. And couldn’t escape.
Everything – and I mean everything – felt hard.
Sometimes, it still feels hard. John’s company, and in turn his job, completely changed direction and focus and in their mess, John found himself in a completely new job, new duties, new products … the list goes on and on. We are still in that and it has been incredibly difficult. But here’s the silver lining for all those Pollyanna types – unlike at the start of Covid when John lost his job – right now, he still has one. With benefits and retirement contributions. Everything else has been flipped on its head, but that’s still true. And for that we are grateful.
I took a vicious fall a few weeks ago. That’s been challenging. For my ego, for my health, for my happiness. My yoga studio up here isn’t what my studio used to be. I miss that. More than I ever thought possible. I miss my friends, I miss my flow. I miss the community. That is a wound that is not currently healing well.
Eli is still a maniac. Jumping and chewing and just generally being more enthusiastic than I can always handle. He leaves for boot camp in a few weeks (hence the crate training) and John and I are both hopeful and terrified. I hate the idea of him being away from us but I *love* the idea of him learning some very helpful skills (like not jumping on people and knocking them over… to start).
But this past weekend we had no guests. We had no home football. We just had us and our house and coffee dates and movies and NFL. We slept in. We opened windows. We cooked dinner. It was -in a word – blissful. Everything we hoped moving here would be it was. Even if only for a few days. Just a whisper in the chaos that is currently life.
The Giants had a miraculous comeback. The Steelers won because their defense was rock solid (or at least T.J. Watt was). Penn State won away. We fell asleep with open windows, votive candles flickering their last flame. For a brief moment, it felt as though we’d come out the other side.
Xox, g
17 janvier 2023
I blinked and fifteen days passed.
We spent over two days journeying home to America from France. First to Geneva, then Philadelphia via Madrid, then a night at Dad’s and then, finally … thankfully, we got home. Sleep in my own bed is like liquid gold. The soft snurfle of Eli curled up contentedly between us, the rhythm of our night time routine, the food we love in the fridge. So much cold water. Delicious.
And then more travel, doctors appointments, Eli’s little boy surgery to prevent any more little Elis.
I think I have a stomach bug but who knows anymore. My neurologist seems to be indifferent to the ebbs and flows of my health – as long as the MRI scans look solid, as long as my organs are functioning – all the other bi-products of MS are insignificant. Except, they aren’t insignificant to me. To my life. To the exhaustion and the fuzzy-headedness. The inability to function in a society that insists we be producing every moment of every day.
I’m so tired. I’m tired of being tired, I’m tired of explaining (with a smile and self-flagellation) the basics of my version of MS over and over and over again. I’m tired of feigning ‘okay-ness’. I’m tired of dreams slipping out of my fingers, of watching the time tick by slowly, unable to do anything except survive. I feel as though I’m drowning, slowly, sipping air every few minutes so that the agony never quite ends.
I’m tired of feeling alone.
I always wave it away, assuming I miss my mother and by default the loneliness cannot ever be assuaged. But I think I’ve always been alone. A little American girl overshadowed by a British family who never talked about anything, a family who shunned illness as though it was the worst of all deformities. A little American girl whose father loved her but didn’t quite understand her. Why isn’t she more British like her mother, his beloved wife? Why is she so … contrary?
Change is uncomfortable. I know this. I spent my life changing. Changing schools, changing houses, changing after-school activities, changing lives. It’s always uncomfortable because the unknown is uncomfortable. The devil you know is better than the devil you don’t. But why? Because the devil you don’t could be ANYTHING and at least the devil you know is a known quantity. Knowing is infinitely less scary than not knowing.
Walking away from a life – even one I consciously built – is what I do. It’s what I’ve always done. When things get too familiar, too comfortable, I get antsy.
This blog post is about nothing. It’s about this moment in time. Home from five days at my Dad’s house, finally back in a safe space – a space I can live and exist without having to justify or explain. That having MS is hard. And it’s unpredictable. And I can’t promise anything. Ever. That sometimes I don’t have the patience or bandwidth to be pleasant and nice and accommodating. That sometimes the bigotry and bias and lack of perspective is suffocating for me and I don’t have the forethought or inclination to sit silently by.
Did I mention I’m tired?
I’m so fucking tired.
xox, g
7sept22
Today was another doozy. For completely different reasons and I *did* make it to yoga (thankfully). But yowza. My left shoulder is screaming, my whole body feels heavy and my legs are a mess. Thanks, MS.
Family is a weird, tricky thing. You realize, when you’re forty-something (in my case forty-two) that everyone is always winging it all the time, even if they proclaim authority on a matter. Everything is an opinion, a perspective, and you’re just kind of bobbing around trying to make sense of it.
But family is family. They are the people who are still around after all the shit has hit the fan. They are the ones who want to be miserable with you on holidays because that’s what is done. It’s exhausting and irritating and also, strangely comforting.
People love you but show it in strange, incomprehensible ways. They assume you understand but you absolutely do not. At all.
I’ve cried too much today. And I’m woefully behind on my to-do list (like f*cking always). I’m tired and hungry but I wonder if I’ll sleep tonight.
Oof. I miss Lucy.
xox, g
6sept22
I read something recently that equated Labor Day Weekend with New Year. A time when we all collectively re-start. I like that. Today was a shite re-start for me, but I’ll take it. My Dad once said that I stumble and fall often, but I always get back up. I hope that remains true for the remainder of my days. I didn’t want to go to yoga this morning – it was satisfyingly gray and rainy. Bed was wonderfully comfortable. But I dragged myself up, did the requisite getting ready and morning chores (which includes washing all the towels in the house for Towel Tuesday) and managed to get into Husby’s truck just in time to make it to class.
Which I did not do.
I messaged the instructor, I hydro-planed (not related to the message), nearly rear-ended a sedan, got to the studio, grabbed all required accessories (still damp from getting into the truck) and trudged through the rain. It was three minutes past start time, and even though I knocked and waved and tried valiantly to get someone’s attention, I was left outside.
Huge bummer. Because I certainly needed some yoga after a hellish drive.
Got home. Successfully backed the truck into the driveway (not something I either do frequently or enjoy) and got even more soaked as I shlepped my yoga gear back inside with the groceries I’d picked up and two hot drinks from Starbucks.
I was pretty sure I could use the day before me to get things done, but I am an expert at wasting time and getting side-tracked (perhaps my best skill is procrastination haha!). I forced myself onto the bike, lifted (who am I?!?) and went for a walk. And here I am, about an hour from when I want to start making dinner, having accomplished all of NONE of the things I need to get done. I can’t even get a photo to upload properly to this blog. Which is driving me batty.
When I was younger I had a very interesting interaction/communication exchange with my mother’s oldest sister. Thoughts were exchanged. I was shamed. For existing, I believe. If I can recall. I don’t remember all the details (I’m sure she still has the emails so if I truly wanted to know, I guess I could ask … but why I would do that, I certainly don’t know). Anyway. One of the things I do remember was a bit about how I hadn’t earned anything in my life and didn’t understand hard work. I’m not sure how she knew because I’d grown up across an ocean in a country she’d never lived in, but hey ho, at eighteen I didn’t think that rationally. What I heard, and remembered, was that my suffering was not nearly worth giving any time to or recognition of. My suffering was dismissed because of apparent privilege (being American I guess?). Anyway. I never forgot that, that there was a scale of hardship and my life and struggles didn’t rank on it. I bring this up because I am sensitive about ever complaining about how hard things are because in the grand scheme of life, my troubles are not nearly comparable to many, many people in this country and around the world. So being snarky about not understanding website formatting shouldn’t even be mentioned.
On the flip side, does that mean that anything and everything that is hard for me, within the parameters of my life, should be discounted as difficult? I’m not sure. I am certain that my problems are first world, white upper middle class problems — which aren’t usually life-threatening. But sometimes my problems are very real, and very difficult because within the framework of my existence, I am struggling.
MS taught me that.
But this isn’t about MS (despite essentially my entire life being about MS in one way or another). Today was a challenge for me even though that might not actually equate to being hard. And I find myself frustrated, exhausted and overwhelmed with sadness as the minutes slowly click by on this random first Tuesday of September.
I also have to remember that I’m that girl – you know the one. The one in her early forties without kids, in a happy marriage with three cars, two houses and a travel problem. The girl who spends her weekends going on coffeeshop dates in a zippy red sports car convertible and doing home renovations (because she can). It doesn’t really matter that I worked hard to get here; I learned some hard life lessons along the way as well as the painful struggle of an incurable autoimmune disease. The point, I guess, is that even though today was a tough one (for me, which -I think we’ve established- is relative) I still have a husband who loves me, food in the fridge, clothes in the closet, a roof over my head, air-conditioning, heat and health insurance that covers my catheters and my infusions and my migraine meds and my plethora of doctor appts. Sure, I lost my mother and my grandmother (the women who most specifically made me me) and my baby girl earlier this year. But I can still walk. I can buy shoes and jeans and skincare and get my hair done.
I don’t know. I think comparison IS the thief of joy. But how do we stop comparing? How does the cycle end?
A question for another day.
xox, g
3sept22
I should have been in Ireland today, celebrating twenty-five years of my cousin’s marriage. But life didn’t work out that way and we had to cancel flights and rearrange our schedule … and then rearrange it again … and again. And now, I’m spending today alone, sitting on my back deck, reading yoga texts and contemplating taking a shower soon (because I dragged myself to yoga this morning – worth it, always!- and I’m gross and stinky and really need to clean up).
When I left Zavino all those years ago – more than five, whew! – I had no idea what I was going to do. I knew I wanted out of that job and that company, I knew I wanted out of the commute and the stress of restaurants, but I had no idea what else I was qualified to do. That debate quickly took a back seat to spending time with my mother as she battled cancer and eventually succumbed followed by two years of surviving the ever-changing landscape of a global pandemic that metamorphosed into a country massively divided.
But I’m young and I can’t ‘do nothing’ forever. In fact, my body and my brain massively object to doing nothing indefinitely. So earlier this year I endeavored to finish my yoga teacher training. And I’m hoping to be able to teach plus incorporate my life practicing yoga into my new endeavor with Danielle. My brain feels happy – challenged and overwhelmed and blissfully content. It’s funny what direction and purpose can do for a person.
I had this strange moment yesterday while John and I enjoyed a coffee date on our back patio. I thought about how we’re all racing to accomplish something – become someone – make our mark … but to what end? I thought about all the joys of my life, the hard work J+I have put in to crafting this little slice of happiness together, and I thought to myself – I’m ready to just sit back and enjoy it for a bit. Enjoy our homes and our decks and our patios and our cars. Enjoy where we live – Longwood and Marsh Creek and West Chester and State College and Beaver Stadium – and all the trappings that come with this life built in rural pockets of Pennsylvania. I want to just … be. And not feel like I’m racing or completing or rushing or reaching. Because here – where I am – is more than enough.
My younger brother lives in the French Alps. He travels nearly constantly – he summits mountains and ice-climbs and skiis and surfs and white-water rafts and reads loads of books and writes screen-plays and has a million friends who love him. He visits the sets of Scorsese films and hosts epic Halloween parties. He lives life extremely well. And I have moments (more than I’d like to admit but – I believe – understandably so) when I wonder how he lives such a rockstar life, and I sip chai teas in Chester County and shlep into Philadelphia routinely for medicine infusions. How is my life so … boring … compared to his?
It always takes me a beat to remember that my life is actually exactly what I want. Just as his life is exactly what he wants. I don’t want to sleep on a mattress in a van – no matter how cool & adventurous it sounds! – because I like sleeping in my nice bed (or any bed for that matter) and being able to shuffle to the bathroom without getting dressed and putting shoes on. It’s really hard to remember that when the romanticism of his existence tugs so constantly on my soul. I have to begrudgingly remind myself that I am a creature of habit, that I enjoy seeing my baristas at my Starbucks and my yoga friends and teachers and my dad on a regular basis. I like having roots and routine. Those things feed me.
But I was raised by parents who travelled everywhere, and to whom travel and adventure defined success. I know – am more sure than anything – that my Dad loves me, but is he as proud of me and my life as he is of my brother? Maybe. I don’t know. My American father married my British mother. My American brother married his French wife. I married an American man whose young life kept him in a small town in north central Pennsylvania. He didn’t have a passport until after we met (and not because of me – because his job sent him to Costa Rica for long stretches). I think about these things more than I want to because I think being human means being afflicted with some kind of insecurity. Mine is not living up to potential. Not taking advantage of opportunities. Not having purpose.
Heavy. I know.
Anyway! The breeze changed directions and I got a whiff of my stinky self so I am off to shower and do wildly exciting things like balance our check book and rearrange our cleaning supplies and the laundry room. I bet my brother is doing something epic – like watching a famous race or attending a crazy celebration. That’s okay. It’s better than okay. That’s life. And I am grateful for every day.
Xoxo, g
01sept22
It always feels like a relief when September arrives. Even though it’s still blazingly hot and humid. Even though nothing has changed much from August (if you aren’t a parent, which I am not). But it’s the hint of change, the promise of cooler days. The dream.
Yesterday J+I drove up to Mortgage #2 (an affectionate nickname) to receive a refrigerator for the garage. Every part of that sentence is bougie and I know it. I’m pretty bougie (daily yoga at the studio and chai teas and online shopping habits and designer blankets etc etc). But having a second house and now a fourth refrigerator? I’m externally (& internally) rolling my eyes. My biggest frustration today has been trying to scale my photography so this damn blog will upload the files … and yes, I hear myself.
Recently I’ve been thinking a lot about change. Partially because it’s kind of inevitable as the seasons begin to shift. But also because I have been working on this blog and whew – I have changed a lot since I wrote some of my early stuff. I just updated my ‘Curiosity About Me’ page because when I read it, I didn’t even recognize it as myself. Which made my brain begin to whir and spin, contemplating how we all change and evolve (or not!) over time and it isn’t just our hair or our waistline. It’s our values and our day-to-day existence. I changed out the picture of John and I because we look completely different. But I also changed all but one ‘fun fact’ on my list, because I’m not the same person who started this blog in 2011. And I never will be again.
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Fun fact — all the cells in our body change over every seven years. So every seven years, we are – theoretically but also biologically – completely different people. It’s crazy and wild that we stay in relationships and friendships and jobs and lifestyles for so long – as though longevity and loyalty trump all. Shouldn’t we always be evolving and adjusting our lives to reflect who we are in a given moment? I think so. I mean, I still adore my husband but he’s changed remarkably since we met all those years ago. We’ve just changed and evolved together – as a partnership. We haven’t stayed the same, and neither has our relationship. Which is both the best parts of us and sometimes, some of the worst parts.
I always vow to never become as close-minded or grumpy about new-ness as older generations are and have been toward my generation and the ones that have followed. But perhaps it’s inevitable that there will come a point when I look around and don’t recognize or understand the society ebbing and flowing around me. (Let’s hope not, but I can’t guarantee anything).
About a month ago, one of my closest friends (dare I say best? … I dare) approached me about an idea she’s been working on developing. I’ve shied away from working with her in the past because I don’t want our relationship to become about work and nothing else. I don’t know why but I was skittish that it could irrevocably (& negatively) change our friendship. But then I started thinking about all the people in my life who I love ridiculously and who I met through work. It’s a lot of people. Stretched out over a lot of years. So why wouldn’t I give this fledgling idea a chance – because it’s a really, really good one.
Anyway. That brings me to today – tapping away at this blog and trying to refresh it as best I can in anticipation of what Danielle is cooking up. We’ll see what happens. But I plan on enjoying the ride.
xox, g
D5 Creation