you know, it's like a marathon of stuff to be grateful for.
Sad, sad, news. David Carr was brilliant. (Riley just noticed I was sad.)
Here ya go Kanye, it’s a Beckyonce mashup. Now can you just stop talking.
Because it’s going to snow 12-18 inches tomorrow.
It’s a Star Wars funeral. The force was with him.
Good thing I don’t live in Montana, (for many reasons).
I want to look this good at 83. (course, I don’t look this good NOW.)
Last night I trudged through the snow to “Guidance Night.” Since the high school is only three blocks from here, I walked, of course, which meant wearing Yak Traks on my boots. This is not one of the more fashionable looks I’ve ever sported, but a bump or bruise from falling flat on the ice, would have been less fashionable, so I weighed my options. Thing is, I didn’t even take them off when I got there, I just left them on, and thus appeared in public with said Yak Traks on my boots. Yes, things are going to hell in a hand basket here in Brookline. My husband was going to come too, but he got caught in an hour and a half traffic jam, care of the craziness provided by unploughed streets here in Massachusetts (the “Mass” part now standing for inches of snow).
Having gone through the college process with one kid already (and believe me the memory, unlike the way they say childbirth memories fade so you can do it again, is still unfortunately technicolor clear), I didn’t learn all that much that was new. But there was a moment when one of the counselors, talking about the general mood a parent should try and maintain senior year, which took my breath away for nearly a full minute (grateful it didn’t last longer because what if I fainted and an ambulance had to come and take me away in my Yak Traks. Who would even care if my underwear was clean, I would be judged by those ugly things on my boots). She said, “For many of you, next year will be the last time your kids ever live with you, so try and create some good memories.” That statement hit me in the stomach so hard, I thought someone had thrown a basketball at me from the chatty first row, and I’d been looking down at my Yak Traks trying to redesign them in my head, to make them more attractive (shouldn’t there be some way to make them cuter?), and hadn’t caught it.
I did all sorts of emotional work to prepare for Jake’s departure, but Ally will empty the nest. She is the second and last child in the house (unless you count Riley, who is not, I repeat NOT going to college). This is a different type of preparation, and while I’ve done plenty of work on it, I haven’t done as much as I apparently thought, since when those words came out of that earnest red haired counselor’s mouth, I felt each of them stab me like the weather reports of another potential foot of snow on Saturday night.
This is my next project: prepare for Ally’s departure. Jake’s senior year was a festival of last’s, each one that we celebrated and cried over. I had puffy eyes from September 2012-September 2013. I longed for his next steps, while remembering his first steps. I reached for him desperately, at the same time I was pushing him away. It was a challenging year, but when he finally boarded the plane, and after I came home and cried for 24 hours straight, I felt cleansed and ready, excited even, for his awesome adventure (he spent his first semester in Barcelona).
But Ally leaving for college has a different tone. Jake was the first. She is the last. It’s time to start getting my house in order. Again.
If you live in Boston and you’re not a winter person, and you don’t really love having 70 inches of snow outside your house, you’re kind of fucked right now. So, we’re all doing what we have to do to get by. For me, that means BLASTING THIS SONG ALL DAY. AND DANCING AROUND IN EIGHTEEN LAYERS OF CLOTHES. Done.
With all this snow, I’ve been a little house-bound, so I called Mother Nature to see what the hell has been going on (you get crazy during times like these, and yes, I figured she was likely busy, but why not try). Amazingly, she was available.
ME: Mother Nature, thanks so much for speaking with the gratitude-a-thon.
MOTHER NATURE: You’re welcome, and you can call me MN.
ME: So, like, what’s the deal with all this snow? Just have a break up, or something? You seem angry.
MN: Well, you might just look at your water consumption to answer your question, Miss Tude-Athon. Do you realize what all those Smart Water and Poland Spring bottles are doing?
ME: Wait, so this is about me, and my bottled water habit?
MN: Well, climate change is real, or are you too busy reading that raggy Huffpost to have noticed? By the way, what happened to the Huffpost, it used to be real news, now it could practically be mistaken for The National Enquirer.
ME: I know, Arianna has lost her grip. And good God, what about Brian Williams? But back to the snow. So, you’re saying this is due to climate change? That’s why we have like 60 inches of snow out there?
MN: What are you a Kardashian? Um, yes, that’s why.
ME: No wonder it’s started to feel personal. So, no break-up?
MN: I didn’t say that.
ME: Well, if I break up with my bottled water, will you consider wreaking your anger in a healthier way?
MN: I will consider it, but he was from Boston, so I don’t know.
ME: Well, just an FYI, all this white makes you look fat. And you know, looking good is the best revenge.
MN: Fat? (Screams) “Mothers Little Helpers–Call off the snow, it’s not making me look good.”
ME: Well, thanks for taking the time to talk to me. You’ve cleared up a lot. If only you could clear up my driveway, my porch, my walkway, and the icicles threatening lives that are hanging from my house.
You thought I was going to be whining about the snow, didn’t you? Ha! No snow re-cap, when there’s fashion to be bashin’.
The bad, and Jeesh, there was no lack of it.
1. Madonna. This is bullshit.
Ok, her body is banging. The girls are up and at ’em, her legs look strong, and she’s 57, BUT SHE’S 57, and she’s dressed like she’s in the Ferdinand book I used to read my kids. It’s the Grammy’s, not the running of the bulls. (Note to self: buy ass-hoisting garment next time you’re at Bloomingdale’s ass-hoisting garment section.)
2. Jane Fonda, “One, two, three, kick”
I am so all for keeping it young. I don’t think you need to dress like you’re 77, when you’re 77, but you should also not dress like you’re in the Disco show at The Bellagio. Look at that body, it’s still Jane Fonda Workout-worthy, but are you kidding me with this jumpsuit? We could have used a little more plain, Jane.
3. Not Lady Gaga over this dress.
The Lady has fallen off the relevance map, although I love that she’s now making music with Tony Bennett. Seems like she was going for class, but she just came off as crass. Kind of digging the sandals, though. The Egg Dress was better than this.
4. Kim Kardashian. “Really Kanye, do I have to go to the Grammy’s, I just want to get into my pajamas”
Looks like Kim just said screw it, and threw on her jewel encrusted bathrobe. She got home and didn’t even have to change before bed.
5. Katy Perry, Yeah, um, no.
I never expect much from Katy, because half the time she is not going for couture, she’s going for cartoon. The thing is, that she’s really pretty, and I think she was going for really pretty here, but somehow, it just didn’t work out. Part of it is the belt, which has no place on this dress. The other part–the shoes, which she wore with an old bridesmaid’s dress, maybe? And then, of course, there is the hair. If it’s not found in nature, people, it really shouldn’t be on your head.
Jenny Lewis, for Skittles.
Someone got a tye dye kit for Christmas. That is all.
And the best.
1. Rhianna. I am a sucker for tulle.
I know she looks pregnant. I know it’s a big pink ball of cotton candy. I know it is actually the color of Pepto Bismal. I know she might have been hiding some fans who didn’t have tickets and wanted to go to the show, underneath, but somehow it worked, and I fell a little bit in love with this dress.
2. Jenifer Hudson
Ever since she lost weight, this girl has been styled to perfection. ABSO-FUCKING-LUTE PERFECTION. Simple, cool, flawless. This is how you do it at The Grammy’s.
3. Nicki Minaj, Most Improved Award.
Hot damn, Nicki Minaj kind of blew me away last night. That’s a great dress. That’s some appropriate make-up. This was kind of crazy good.
4. Guiliana Rancic. Music to my eyes.
Ok, I know she’s not a musician, but she was on the carpet, so she’s in. To me, this is so Grammy’s. She just looked super cool. And the Grammy’s should be about super cool.
5. Annie Lenox. Because she is a star.
I know it’s simple, but I love that it frames her face, and is so in keeping with who this woman is. It’s not a costume, it’s not outrageous. It’s fucking Annie Lenox. And you don’t get hipper, than fucking Annie Lenox. All hail.
A friend was having a crisis the likes of a mini tsunami a few weeks ago, and asked me to go to an all-day retreat. I didn’t think much before saying yes. Who can say no to someone having a mini-tsunami?
And that’s why, yesterday, I spent the day at Escape, Nourish, Renew, run by Nina Manolson and Lisa Lewtan. It was an all-day, all-girl, all-vegan/gluten free/no sugar/no dairy, small group exploration into the delicate balance between getting what you want and need, doing what you must, and have to, while spinning 5,483,942 plates in the air, and dancing in heels backwards (you know, being a woman in 2015). Everybody walked away with something different from the day. But my take away was simple.
I love women.
I am a girl’s girl. Maybe it was growing up with three sisters, and a mom I adored, or maybe it’s just because I came tumbling down the birth canal that way. Women are intuitive, and smart. They’re doers, and movers and shake-it-off-ers. They show up. They take over. They make a difference. They have super sonic power, or as Marianne Williamson says, in my most favorite quote, “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate, our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.” And put women together in a room, loosen their bodies with yoga, their hearts with hours on end that are all about them, and you have enough energy to solve the world’s most pressing problems (ISIS, climate change, cellulite, WHY THERE CAN’T BE A LIPSTICK THAT STAYS ON).
While I’m lucky to have a lot of amazing friends, really lucky, I get bogged down with work, with kids, with grocery shopping and cooking, and I forget that a girl’s night out is like being exported to an exotic island with warm blue green water, miles of sand, umbrella drinks and nothing on your calendar. It’s fortifying, and emotionally nutritional, and one of the better ways to solve a problem, or make yourself feel important, relevant, happy, or all three. I need to do it more. And yesterday was a big, fat yellow sticky note on my forehead, to do just that.
I’ve always found there’s nothing that compares to the energy that comes from being in a group of women, who are going through what you’re going through. We know how to help each other. We know how to break it down, and get to the core of things. We’re our own best problem solvers. And while we’re all sorts of different, we find, when we get down in there, we’re amazingly the same, all facing similar puzzles, and challenges, and searching for answers that will make our lives work better, give us more time to be happy. We know how to make one another feel seen and understood. I experienced it when I was infertile. I saw it when I had toddlers, I see it now, as the mid-life transition from everyday mommy to empty nester comes to roost.
So, thanks to the women I met yesterday. Each doing there own thing, struggling with their own stories, and putting their best stuff forward everyday to figure out that it’s really ok, and actually necessary, to put on their own oxygen masks first.
In case you haven’t gotten enough of the Super Bowl Half Time Sharks.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kDx3sdA2BY
I have always trusted Brian Williams. The question is, did he intentionally lie, or remember it wrong?
In other news, it’s going to snow for the next three days. And my iPhone says it’s currently 1 degree fahrenheit. yup.
Harper Lee has written a follow up to To Kill a Mockingbird. #bigexpectations.
Lifestyle changes can change your life. Take a listen to Dean Ornish.
Shut the front door, InStyle magazine. Kerry Washington’s a gorgeous black woman, not a gorgeous Starbuck’s latte woman. At least you learned something.
As I read (because I find it too hard to watch) the unimaginable story of Isis putting a Jordanian pilot they were holding hostage, in a cage and burning him alive, and think that the world has gone straight to hell, do-not-pass-go, do-not-collect-$200 HELL, I read the story of James Robertson, who walks 21 miles to work everyday, and hasn’t missed even one day of his job in a factory, in 12 years, and the college student, Even Leedy, who read the same story, and started a Go Fund Me account hoping to raise Mr. Robertson some money for bus fare, but instead raised him enough money to buy a car, or two. And I think, there is such evil and such good. And what we fill ourselves with is our choice.
Already Jordan has retaliated by executing two prisoners. The pattern of violence and killing will continue, and poison us all on our news feeds. I fight with myself about staying informed, and keeping my sanity in check.
But maybe more people will do what Evan Leedy did. Maybe that story will inspire more of us to reach out and help people we don’t even know. This is the kind of human kindness that creates a better world. It’s the sort of thing that even reading about makes me feel hopeful. ISIS fills me with dread and fear. The very stuff that stomps all over the spirit.
James Robertson’s story makes me want to do better, and be better. That’s what I want to breed inside my body, and spread out there in the world, like a happy virus. And gratitude for that.
I don’t like the snow any better today, but I’m over my bad self, and have ceased the whining. Gratitude is back!
So, over the weekend, I went to the emergency room at the Mass Eye & Ear, which I am so damn lucky to live a mere 20 minutes from (less without traffic). I’ve been having weird symptoms in one of my eyes, featuring cloudy vision, and a cornucopia of other oddities, which have been plaguing (and kind of scaring) me for several weeks. So, I called up my eye doctor, Romeo Chang (I have gratitude for this guy’s name every time I call him–HOW CAN YOU NOT LOVE THIS NAME?), but I couldn’t get an appointment for two weeks, which would have been this past Monday. While nobody in my house was taking this second storm seriously, except for me, I woke up on Saturday morning and realized my appointment would get cancelled (which it did), and so decided to put myself in an Uber and go to the emergency room at the Eye & Ear. My husband was like, “You’re going to spend all day there.” to which I responded, “I’m going to spend all day worrying about my eye, if I don’t go.”
Anyway, there were only three people ahead of me. I think I waited a total of 30 minutes, which was kind of extraordinary (I have waited in that same emergency room for like 2-3 hours before). Cutting to the chase, my eye is fine, in fact, the doctor said that “everybody should have eyes that are as good as yours.” But he also said that my symptoms were due to the extreme dryness of the season (just another thing I love about winter) and a teeny, tiny cataract, that was actually so small, I shouldn’t have to do anything about it for 30 years (when I will be 86)! All good, I Uber-ed myself home, and would have continued on my merry way, but my vision was now really blurry from the drops. So, I just gave into it, and laid in my bed listening to the website Onbeing, which my friend/trainer/guru Colleen Quinn told me to check out. It was just what the doctor should have ordered, post eye drops.
Late to the party, I had no idea how cool Onbeing was. (Where have I been? Complaining about the winter, apparently.) Krista Tippett interviews all sorts of interesting people on this site. She has one of those voices that’s smart, soothing, and just a little bit sexy. (Completely the opposite of my nasally, ugly, and completely un-sexy voice, THANK GOD.) I downloaded the Thich Naht Hanh interview, and pretty quickly fell into this beautiful man’s arms. He is a Vietnamese Zen Buddhist monk, teacher, author, poet and peace activist.
Sometimes the world aligns (eye drops and blurry eyes) and you get what you need (this interview). I have been struggling with keeping up my meditation practice, working too hard at settling my restless mind, resisting even the small amount of time it takes to get quiet. Mr. Hanh spoke in a beautiful accent, and talked about mindfulness and suffering in just such a way that I made all sorts of connections that I hadn’t made before. This is something that continually astounds me, how you can hear the same thing over and over and over, and then one day the right person says it and BOOM, you suddenly hear it. He talked a lot about the usefulness that suffering offers us. And what I took away, was that being mindful and going deep into the quiet, prepares you for the inevitable suffering, or rather allows you to find a place in yourself to be when there is too much suffering. This got through my noisy brain, this way of looking at mindfulness.
Gratitude is back and flowing: The Mass. Eye & Ear, Uber, Colleen Quinn, Onbeing, Krista Tippett, Thich Nhat Hanh. Snow shmow. It’s about noticing what is good. (Not what’s piled up OUTSIDE OF YOUR HOUSE, AND WHAT’S COMING AGAIN TOMORROW, oooops, sorry, slipped back into I HATE WINTER mode there for a minute.)
*the gratitude-a-thon 