High / Low

High / Low is a game that John and I play at dinner sometimes, and we were sure to play it each night while his (our) niece was staying with us for two weeks, as part of our Christmas gift - which was sending her to her first summer camp.

The day she arrived, August 1st, I had the highest high and the lowest low that occurred on the same day, in the same incident, that I had had in a long time.

That morning, despite having read a story precisely about this happening, I walked Reno with the retractable leash. I know it's not a good idea, but he likes it a lot since it gives him a little more range than the normal 6' leash, and it gives me a welcome break on the occasional walk - I don't have to pay as much attention wary of tangling since the leash takes care of it for me.

But you see where this is going. In quick succession, on a route we never walk, I walked into a spider web. I gave a little "eep!" and tried to wave the threads from off my face. While doing this, I loosened my grip on the leash, so it was lightly secured in my hand.

However, the "eep" and scuffle of my foot scared Reno. And he darted away (as he does to every crushed leaf, cracked branch, scuffed foot, garbage truck, siren, car door, shouting kid, bouncing basketball… and so on…). Usually, no big deal. But you, of course, recall the loosened grip.

Yup. Down went the leash handle, BANG, on the sidewalk. And then it zipped up toward Reno, retracting as retractable leashes are wont to do.

And off he went.

Like a freaking shot. I've never seen him run so fast. If he even could hear me over the clatter clatter clatter of the leash bouncing behind him, he was out of ear shot in under eight seconds. This was a moment that it would have been really nice to be a runner. But as it was, I reached VO2 max in about sixteen seconds, long after I'd seen the last corner Reno rounded and had no idea where he was headed next. I stopped shouting and started texting John in desperation.

He asked if he should come home, and I said no. He said I should go home, get the car, and drive slowly around the area I last saw him, and call his name.

Low point.

So I walked, jogged, ran, walked again, huffed and puffed my way home. As I walked, I sent a crazy email to my boss that read, "Not sure when I will be in today; dog ran off and I have to look for him."

I started to sniffle and cry. How could I have done that? How could I have dropped the leash? I kept seeing him, flattened out and running full tilt, tail between his legs, glancing back in terror at the horrible clattering monster that wouldn't stop chasing him. Was that the last time I'd see him? Oh god. I remembered that he had on his citronella collar but not his real collar with his tag. Not that he would let anyone get near him, and sure, he is microchipped, but it feels like a long shot.

With a stitch in my side and a hitch in my step, I rounded the corner onto our lawn and for less than a split second - for less than even a full thought - I couldn't believe the insult of a god damn cat on the front porch.

But no!

Not a cat!

A little red dog! A panting, ears folded back, nails-scraped, tail wagging, waiting patiently, leaning against the front door little red dog!

I couldn't believe it. I kissed him on the face, let him inside, and took off one beat-to-hell retractable leash.

High point.

I'm a massage (groupon) whore.

(Using the word whore in a blog title might be inviting weird Google searches, but there's just no good substitute for it!)

I admit it. I am a massage whore. I scour Groupon, Yipit, Amazon Local Deals and LivingSocial for massages. I'll drive to Tigard on a Saturday morning. I'll figure out how to sneak out of work early on a weeknight. I'll go to a basement studio, a studio connected to your house, I've been to two studios in little converted sheds that felt like kids' playhouses with a massage table, hippie music, and a waterfall machine in the corner. For when I win the lottery, like my friend Bill, I've started keeping a list of who I'm going to share it with (because you don't want to make that decision in the heat of the moment of winning; you want a list that you've thought about in calm, considerate moments to refer to). And along with the folks who I'm going to buy a car, or give a down payment for a house to, or just write a nice check, I have a list of the things I will begin to do.

And getting 2 to 3 massages a week is very high on that list. It is an item on that list that could start immediately. Others will require some weeks or months of planning. And sure, I'd like one everyday, but my newfound lotto-winning life isn't going to be longer than 24 hours in a day, so capping it at 1 to 3 per week seems logical.

In the meantime, until this lottery-winning happens, I content myself with online massage deals and enjoy the experience of new masseuses, new styles, new studios, new music, new fragrances. Oddly, the weirdest massage I've had this year was in Honduras… where I had three… because apparently it is common there to slather on baby oil, to assist the masseuse. And I mean slather. For each massage, during the whole hour, I experienced seemingly endless drizzling. It took more than one shower and one dip in the ocean to feel like it was really gone. (I'm sure this killed coral and I will do karmic penance for it.)

But recently, I had my first myofascial release massage. If you haven't had one, try it! It was not exactly enjoyable during the massage, I won't lie - it is intense - but afterward, for a couple days, my back felt more neutral than it has in months. Perfectly relaxed with no areas of tension, and a true difference in my posture and muscles. What's the lesson? I guess that it pays to be a whore sometimes, when you try something new.

Comin' up on the Jesus Year...

I've generally been the youngest in the group, whatever the group may have been… playground, locker room, homeroom class, new job or office, new tribe of friends. And as many of near-peers turn 33 in the year before I do, I get to look ahead this summer to my coming Jesus Year.

You're familiar, right? Even Urban Dictionary has an entry. And it's perfectly succinct: it's the year to get things done.

Over the last couple weeks, between a relaxing vacation, the new dog's ongoing antics, increasing work responsibilities, SIBO diet living, and the wonder of these long pre-summer days and evenings, my personal philosophy has (suddenly) expanded.

Please allow me one bit of back story first. Every family has it's lore and legends; in my family, there's a piece of lore that places me at about age 8 or 9, when my mother was having some normal-for-her, low-level, anxiety-filled, long verbal run-on about life, and challenges, and what does it all mean. When she turned the question to me, I said, "Don't ask me, Mom. I'm just a kid." Everyone laughed. And in a similar episode a few months later (as noted, this sort of out-loud rumination was the usual at home), I quipped back, "God, Mom. The point of life is that you make mistakes, and then you learn." (I do not remember the former exchange; I do remember the latter. We were at Murphy Lake and I wanted to touch the antlers of the stuffed elk in velvet on the wall but knew I was not allowed to.)

So this may have been my own self-stated guiding philosophy about life - from age 9, until very recently.

And suddenly… it feels sudden, having bubbled up in the past few weeks… I've decided that life is now about two other things entirely. It's about losing judgement, and it's about not being first.

I am a very judgmental person; I know how you should live your life, AND why. And I will happily tell you. Or if I don't know you, or you won't listen, I'll happily tell one of my friends. And now that I'm walking a little red dog around the block in a damn raincoat, a sweet little red dog that goes ballistic at the sight of another dog, I'm thinking, "Well, fuck." I didn't teach the dog to bark like that; he's not reactive because of me. But it sure as shit looks that way. And I don't love putting a raincoat on a dog, but he reacts to it a lot like he reacts to the Thundershirt and any way to take the edge off his anxiety is a good way to go. So I mosey along with our raincoats, and realize that I would normally look at me and judge the hell out of me. Uh-oh. Jesus Year. That means I have to start understanding people better. Give them more slack. Really, deeply believe they're doing the best they can with the tools they have - and not just say it.

And secondly (ha ha!), it's time to no longer be first. Who is not first in their own lives? Well - parents, for one. And spiritual leaders. And people dedicated to their jobs as deep vocations and true callings. In other words: the good eggs. The good eggs don't think about being first, and don't think about putting their own desires, satisfactions, whims, needs, moods, recognition and preferences first. The good eggs do make certain their own needs are met - sure, of course they do. But they do so mostly because it makes them better people who can turn around and better be able to serve and love the world. And you know what? For the first time in my selfish little life, that sounds really delightful. I get it. I paid lip service to not being first, but all along, I knew this was my movie, my soundtrack, and you were all supporting players. But this new philosophy - boy, does it take a huge load off. I don't have to be the center of my own universe. I can cook, read, play, love, work and write - like I do, and enjoy, of course - but it all doesn't have to be So God Damn Important. What a relief. To loosen my grip.

I mean - a bit. I'm not letting go, just letting up. I still think you're a huge fucking asshole if you take the outside seat on a bus. Just move goddamn over, dude.

Sexist and Classist

If you don't ride public transit - and preferably the bus - there are parts of yourself that remain hidden. Parts of yourself you might not even know exist. But start riding it, on the regular, and you'll discover those parts. Oh, they will come out, like it or not.

So I may have already know that I am a bit sexist and a bit classist, but this week on the bus, I realized both anew in two moments where my thoughts bubbled over before I could control them, subvert them into something kinder, spin them into something reasonable. I saw my own truth and there's nothing to do with it but share.

The first was a packed bus; not quite standing room only but almost. All seats taken and some folks standing. Standing on the MAX light rail train is one thing; standing on a bus is another. It is significantly more uncomfortable. The first 7 seats on the bus, 4 on one side and 3 on the other, are reserved for Honored Citizens - seniors and those with disabilities. The seats flip up for wheelchairs, or are intended for those with limitations.

As we get fuller, at a stop, the bus driver says, "I have an Honored Citizen here, if you are not an Honored Citizen, please give up your seat." And what happens?

The three seats on the left: a dude, healthy, fit, age 32 or 33, and his girlfriend, similarly healthy. Next to them, an older man with a cane.

The four seats on the right: a very heavyset older man with probably developmental delays and three women, between 30 and 40, healthy and fit.

What happens?

Two women on the right start to stand up; one is clearly a fake-out stand up - she is waiting to see if anyone else will go for it. The other woman really was going for it, and she stands, takes hold of a strap, and the Honored Citizen has a seat. And my mind EXPLODES.

The youngish guy? Didn't even flinch. Didn't even think to get up. Chivalry, I've decided, is dead. I glared at his girlfriend with a mix of pity and rage as I left the bus a few stops later and I think my message was received.

The second was a very young mother, she couldn't be a day over 20, climbing onto the bus in the pouring rain with a whining toddler. They got the last two seats, near me, and upon settling it, she pulled out a soda bottle and opened it, then opened his baby bottle, filled it, gave it to him, and his quieted right now. I was horrified. I don't even let myself drink soda, diet or regular anymore; I know it's a chemical and sugar poison for the delicate human body - much less a toddler's! I was also most horrified that it was a Mountain Dew. What trashy parenting, I thought. Mountain Dew! Might as well be cocaine.

Then I saw that it was a Sprite, and I immediately on the heels of my Mountain Dew judgement was the thought, "Oh, well, maybe the little guy is sick. You have to have Sprite when you're sick."

As if my experiences are universal, as if my having Sprite as a kid on the couch with a cold means anything, and as if I know a damn thing about being a mother at that young age, riding the bus in the rain.

Try it: ride the bus for a month. It's a forced mile in both someone else's shoes, and in your most ill-fitting ones. Not bad to see, once in a while.

July 29, A Pommern Monday. Part 3.

Not written in my journal, but a couple quick stories. First, stool samples. Meggie and I did not witness one. We saw the slides, and we saw the specimens. They keep a couple formaldehyde jars of examples, either to impress visitors or to illustrate to parents the importance of treatment - or both.

Also, when urinalysis was ordered by the doctor, the man or woman had to give a sample. And what are you given to collect your urine in? A now-empty insulin jar. As pictured above (small ones on the left) with worms in it. Think of the size of the opening on those little jars. Have fun peeing in that! Oh and I'm sure hands get washed...

Also during our day, one of our cases negative for malaria, negative for typhoid fever, was an old woman - oh, probably about 300 years old. To my eyes. Her grandson was with her and he was in his late teens, so that would make her in her 70s at the oldest - if he were the youngest child of her youngest child.

The woman was asked to give a stool sample and when she left, Patricia engaged in a long conversation with her grandson. As an observer with no language, I relied on body language and tone of voice. It appeared like she was lecturing him. He didn't want to argue with her, he maybe even knew she was right, and he felt ashamed, but stuck. She showed him a Bible passage. Once he left the room, she explained to me. "He has completed his secondary school and it is time for him to go teach. To go away to a new place and to have a job. But every time he has made plans and found somewhere to work, she gets very sick. But no tests come back. Sick with what? Sick to keep him home? I tell him he needs to go; he cannot cancel again his plans and his life. Again and again."

Nurse Patricia:

The rules:

July 28: Back in Pommern.

(As written in my journal that day; grammar and minor edits only. Italicized portions are additions written after the trip.)

How can you give a gift when the balance of power is so badly weighted as to basically be a straight vertical line? For we Americans, we wealthy and confused (are we generous, guilty, or desiring of sharing the things we love and put so much meaning into?) little Americans, with our language taken from us - we want to give. But we want to give the things we treasure - to show gratitude for allowing us to come into the community and for being so patient with our cameras, our energy. But how CAN we give? We're so far from the first to bring boxes of school supplies - and yet, there are none in any of the classrooms. But if you got a pen, and were hungry, wouldn't you sell the pen for crackers? So how can our gifts make sense?

Edward asked me what I was sorting, when I was inventorying medical supplies before Zumba class the other day, and it was a pile of dental floss (many small packages, a few yards each). When I explained, he asked me to put it in the clinic pile because if given directly to the people, they'll use it as fishing line. The things I don't about about this kind of generational poverty - and the things I don't even know that I don't know! - make me useless. As a giver of any kind. People say, "Oh, I learned so much from 'them'" in reference to a poorer or less powerful society and I've always - and still do - take that to mean that any people with less than us will teach lessons about what is really important - love, family, laughter, connection to the community. And I've thought that was total crap. And to be honest - I still do. 

But my head is figuratively spinning tonight as I come to grips with low little - how nothing - I'll contribute here. I'm stunned and embarrassed to realize that what will be learned here will ONLY be learned by me. But not the sweet things in life, not at all a reminder of the simple profound pleasures. Instead I'm learning the profound depth of sameness the third world endures. The pain of meeting daily needs with nothing leftover at the very best, or a debt as the sun falls, at the very worst. But never two pennies to rub together - never enough to have one task done for a week or a month. Every day is exactly the same and you're lucky to just catch up every 24 hours. My human desire to communicate with the person in front of me, but the overwhelming reality of a boggingly large group of individuals in front of me.

By way of hard details, the flickering generator light tonight makes me laugh - it's terrible illumination that gives me a headache, and it is still more than all the people here have. 

Most of the women volunteers swapped clothing stories tonight - yup, most of us are heavier than we were a week ago. And in our Rose & Thorn sharing tonight, my rose was the baobab trees and their evocative emotions. My thorn was reaching wifi for the first time in almost eight days only to have it be down today. I really want to hear from John - about his backpacking trips and plans, that he is OK, that all is well at home. It's 9 PM here, 11 AM Sunday there - and he is so close to me right now. I can't feel if it's because of nerves or a problem, or if he just wants to hear from me, too.

Finally tonight, I am burdened with a good bit of despair. I feel so much like I'm letting you all down. I've put on music for the first time since arriving in Africa - Sigur Ros - in order to let these intense feelings of disappointing you flow through. 

Don't get me wrong - enough of you warned me. 

"I hope you don't think you're going to help/save/affect anyone." 

"You know you're not going to make a difference, right?" 

"What can you do in two weeks?" 

"It's arrogant to do this." 

"Just go to any town and you'll find someone who needs help. Why go with an organization, that costs money?" 

Oh, I came with much caution and pessimism - those are all direct quotes from professed friends. I haven't thought I would save anyone. But now I feel I owe you - you who sent me and Meggie off with contributions, and so much excitement and love. How can I come home with nothing tangible to show you? How can I come home broken? 

There's the septic tank, thanks be, and the joy of Zumba. And that very well might be it. So if it is - I have to let go as this second week starts. If that is all there is show for it, by way of successes, then that is the truth. Or all there is for others. The soul lessons have been great, as I can even understand them so far. And the affirmation of intuition as a guiding force has been deep. Within ten minutes of meeting all the volunteers, I was immediately drawn to Leslie - the world is full of soul connections and one here is a sweet surprise, a little reminder that life as it was ticks on and on, and I'll rejoin it - but the Tanzanians won't. 

I was asked by Emmanuel if all us Americans - can we all afford most of the things in most of the stores? How to explain a platinum ring, a vacation house, owning two cars for two adults? WalMart versus Saks? How do I talk about disposable diapers and throwing away food? Or closets of clothes so big we probably could not make an accurate list of every tee, every pair of panties, every coat, sock, shoe and baseball cap that we own? I actually didn't recognize Moses tonight, when he came to stoke the fire, for he was in a new jersey! After I got back John said, when I was explaining how I struggled to explain poverty in America to Emmanuel, "Oh, I get it! It's like, how do you explain the difference between flying ON a plane and flying on your OWN plane? How do you explain the difference a Bentley and a Ford Focus?"

If the choice had to be made right now, I wouldn't come back to Tanzania. It is so broken, and I am so small, that my little dollars to the deaf women who make crafts, or to Mamamorrie for doing my laundry, just seem to make it worse. Dangling the prize in front of Wile E Coyote but never, not once, letting him win. And we are the roadrunners - moving too fast. Someone said to us, during one of our evening lectures, "You need to slow down, America, or we really will never catch up." 

So I guess I want to apologize for how little - or negatively - I might effect Pommern, when you sent me with such enthusiastic support. I want to apologize for possibly bringing back more pain, a deeper understanding of grinding poverty, dirt, smell, anger from those who watch us zip by in a private vehicle. 

I'm groundless again tonight and so I took in a little Pema Chodron reading... she's right about one thing... how can I be both so big and so small? How can I stay right where I am without resolution; how I need resolution! Ah, but how Pema wags her finger at me lovingly - no, no, no; you don't. Resolution is bad for you; better always to sit in it. And get softened because of it. 

July 21: Dar Es Salaam to Iringa, Part 1.

(As written in my journal that day; grammar and minor edits only. Italicized portions are additions written after the trip.)

6 AM. Alarm. I've decided this morning that every single thing that happens is part of my spiritual journey - even feeling rundown, like I do, and having flare-ups of some of my normal digestive and skin issues. All I want is to feel 100% healthy, but I don't. I admit to myself and Meggie that I'm in a vulnerable state. I feel fragile, whether I like it or not - so I think of Pema and decide to make a choice: to start where I am, here and now.

Breakfast at 7. I'm anxious about the seating arrangements for the car ride. It turns out we are too many for just one van, so the family is put in a Jeep and the rest of us are in the Global Volunteers van - and we each get a window, no one is relegated to a middle seat! Sweet, self-centered, Western relief. It won't be 10 hours of misery on tap.

If I were Peggy on Mad Men, I'd be writing a commercial for Bonine by the day's end, as I journal this. It IS as advertised! Non-drowsy and not a moment of car sickness all day. And this was a test of all possible car sickness causes - no AC, windows open with hot and dusty air blowing in, ripe with smells and endless cooking fires, swaying and swerving of a many-passenger van, inconsistent road quality and unskilled drivers in a developing country, plus driving on the left! I felt I could almost read; that's how powerful the Bonine was. But poor Meggie, who felt much more rundown than I did this morning, pale and sweaty and nearly threw up her breakfast at one point this morning before piling in the car, took her first Dramamine instead - and promptly slept for almost 4 hours. It knocked her out and she missed the few hours of tin-roof slums as we crawled out of Dar.

We drove first to pick up the solar water heater repairman (whose task in the village we're all very interested in, needless to say, as we are on tenterhooks to know what our living situation will be!), who will join us for the long drive - but he's not there (and really - how did we not expect that?). So we arrange to meet him by the side of the road at some place that Mohammed, Global Volunteers driver and employee, know about and then we drive to the airport.

Leslie, one of the women from Denver, still does not have her luggage. She has handled it with so much grace - an inspiring grace. Meggie and I told her we'd be in tears without our luggage but Leslie, probably around 60, is all calmness and resignation. After all, what else CAN she be? I get a sense she's lost more than her luggage before and while she is not happy, and jokes about how tired of her red plaid shirt we'll all be in another two weeks, she amazingly does not take it out on anyone. As Nick Hornby would write, now that's character.

We bump along, driving alongside the dala-dala public buses, fully and unsafely crammed with people, and I remember Edward saying last night that one's name, in his world, morphs over time into "Father (or Mother) Of". So in our group, Joe would be Papakathy, as she is his firstborn. I laugh out loud when he says it and try to hide it. Would I be nameless? And also because as the "simple forest people" my father is fond of calling the Scandinavian side of our ancestry, we are known by our father's name, not our child's (we're the sons of Anders, the Anderssons, and we're the sons of Lars, the Larssons)*. I don't want to belabor the point but how incredible is this difference? As a society, do we owe our fathers or do we serve our children?


More hot, dusty, windy, smelly slum. They get worse - packed tighter, faces more somber. As first I am intensely curious and almost want to stop to watch the activity in one place for a full cycle - open fires, cooking, laundry, babies. Then, as the kilometers pass, I become overwhelmingly weary. Weary for the women whose work looks boring, repetitive, full of drudgery. How dirty to cook over an open fire. How hard to control the heat. And how to keep caring about the baby getting dust in his eyes or in the spittled corners of his mouth? The bags of charcoal for sale by the side of the road are enormous - and how long do they last when you're cooking nearly all day? Life must be an endless stretch of predictability - or is that just my own fear?

Before seeing this poverty with my own eyes, I thought feeling small and helpless and powerless to fix/change/help/cure such problems (which I absolutely feel) would send me home wanting to turn in and BE small - to take good care of my small world and house, and maybe even want to have children and just stay home with them. To be mistress of one small domain as a reaction to the global scale of suffering that I can't impact.

But watching the endless basics of cook, clean up, cook, clean up, stoke the fire, change the baby, cook, clean up, sleep, do it again - I feel the opposite. Let's be realistic here - these women are going to live and die in this life and they're not going to get educated and discover themselves, change their community, and become self-actualized. This is their actual. And it's all it will be. So my intense interior reaction, as I sit calmly and appear unmoved in my seat, is that when I get home, I can't pull back into the small world of my self and family. I think, holy fuck. I owe the world. I owe it the biggest presence I can give - I owe the extension of my energy and skill to as many people as I can possibly reach.

And in this moment, that means not having to save the world - not having to be Lincoln or Marie Curie or MLK, as it feels at home. Back there, it's an overwhelming shame and guilt that I didn't become a lawyer and fix all of immigration law, both U.S. and global. Or that I didn't become a professor of feminist studies whose fine work resulted in universal day care, two years PTO to share when new babies arrive, and a fundamental shift that perfects male-female understanding and balance in the home and on the job. Oh? I'm sorry? Too high a bar, you say? Then you must not be a perfectionist, or you must not have the Baron for a father, or you must not have grandiose mental tendencies. I know that all sounds crazy - but the mind is a bit crazy, no? It looks crazy all written out, but it feels perfectly normal on the filmstrip inside my head.

That's not what is happening right now, though. Instead I am thinking that any reach is good reach - any reach is still more than the reach these women can have - and what if they want to have more, how awful,  but can't? So I owe it - but not resentfully or as a burden. I owe it to be in balance with the world, like Edward and I laughed about last night.

The slums thin out, we pass the main public bus transfer station - waiting areas labeled "Dar" or "Upcountry" - and I think for the hundredth time of my brother and his fiancee. They wouldn't be in a private van! They'd be on that public bus. It's hard to admit to myself that that isn't for me. Could I do it? Sure. But I'm not willing to. And that's what is hard to admit; I don't, some of the time. But I have to be OK with that because I'm here, living the choice and plans I made - so! Ha! I better be OK with it! I laugh as I write this.

After a while, the slums don't shock me anymore. The thing that takes my breath away is - Masai! Real Masai - in flip flops! Carrying a stick, herding cows. Later - more Masai! This time on a bicycle... and using a cell phone. Ahhh. It's too much.

Skinny cows everywhere, swinging their giant, hungry heads and their clear eyes are peeled for anything to eat.

* I know that I would be Andersdotter or Nilsdotter, not Andersson or Nilsson. But the Ellis Island employees made -son much more popular than -dotter, so I use it incorrectly to make the point simple.

Taking the Advice

I've been trying to figure out the best way to wear a bike helmet and not be annoyed about sweaty, matted, swinging-into-the-eyes hair. I looked at bike helmets with a ponytail cut-out. I looked at bike helmet airbags that you wear around your neck like a scarf, and they sense unusual/extreme motion like a car's airbag (or your MacBook's internal drive-saving-device) and pop out when needed. I read Bike Portland's advice for new riders forum, their women's forum, and various cycling fashion forums.

And in the end, I just took the overriding advice, and went for what people kept saying will work every single time, no rider excepted, for beating helmet hair, helmet sweat and helmet crankiness:

That said, there were honestly more reasons, bigger ones, that I decided to go for The Chop. But with each passing day (it's been a week now!) I love it more, and on the warm bike ride to work this morning, I was rewarded with a perfect coif at 8 AM and no need to carry brush/gel/pins/elastic bands. No matter how cliche it is, this is liberation.

Too Busy

Not to join the chorus of "I'm so important that's why I am so busy" jerkwads that we all know... but look, pals, I'm busy. I'm overwhelmed these days in a way I never have been. But too busy to write? What is too busy to write - really?

My friend Kelly said to me last month, "Ten minutes is still ten minutes. And ten minutes usually turns into more than that." I'll admit that it does sometimes - and sometimes that ten minutes is an absolute grind. The plank workout move of creative output. Every second a burn.

But. She's right. Ten minutes is indeed ten minutes. And that's over an hour a week even when it's ground out one painful second at a time, which is more than I can say for the last three months. So here's to a week back in the saddle again; the saddle I'll fall out of again of course, (I'm no optimistic fool) - but a saddle happy to find a little, teeny, tiny groove in once more.

Quit slouching! Part Two.

A few days after the eye-opening video experience (below), I attended two work events, in rooms full of tall men.

That is to say... I read once there is a high correlation between very financially successful men and height. At both these events, filled to the brim with lawyers, bankers, financial planners, CEOs turned consultants, some who's who of Portland (including those that actually live in Vancouver because it is cheaper), there were A Lot of Tall Men.

And the truth is, no one like to schmooze. No likes small talk. No likes, as we say back in politics, to work the room. (If you really do love it, well, ok: I believe you; you're just not of the race that knows Joseph, and alas, I am).

But there can be a little thrill, a little fun, in playing the game of Schmooze. It's like acting in a play, and there's a little fun (and a little terror) in that!

So in this room of Very Tall Men, and then again a couple nights later in another room of Very Tall Men, I chuckled to myself quite a bit. Playing the part, working the room, pretending not to be shy - it is so much easier when A, you stand up straight, and B, you have tall people to look in the eye and project confidence to. Score a second lesson for the week - it is time to quit the slouching.

And will lesson three be about The Chop? (As in - the hair. Chop. Is it? Isn't it? Being cut off to a tiny, tiny, boy-like length? I'm undecided. Still.)

Be Careful!

If you're a knuckle-cracker that is.

Because, as it turns out, while science has shown time and again that it does not cause arthritis, it CAN sprain a joint - like any other ligament sprain. And it really sucks if you are, perhaps, an aggressive knuckle-cracker and find yourself in just this predicament.

Prescription? Ibuprofen. And rest; lots of it. For example - wrap it up so you remember not to use it, thus letting it rest. Sheesh. 

True Story

Here I am, downtown, headed back to my car, on a recent Sunday - a famous Portland "sunbreak" in progress - and so the rays are reflecting energetically off the wet pavement, the people are smiling from their Sunday benedictions. It's only mid-morning so we have the day ahead of us to be useful, productive, goal-oriented. I wait patiently for the crosswalk signal. There's a man about my age on the other side, also waiting patiently. He's Indian-American, perfectly normal and well-groomed*, and he smiles at me, and looks away. I smile and look away. We wait for the walk signal. (*I point this out because hey, downtown Portland on a Sunday morning? There are plenty of unstable or homeless or still-drunk or plain ol' crazy people out and about. This is just a neighborly-seeming, regular dude.)

Just as we pass each other in the crosswalk he flings his arms wide and gestures loosely from my head to my toes, and says, "Beautiful! Such a beautiful woman!" and keeps walking, and doesn't look back. It burst forth from him; he says it in a way that he just HAD to tell me he thought I was beautiful. It couldn't remain unsaid, and he wanted nothing for it - nothing but to say it and move along with his day.

Do I think I'm particularly beautiful, especially worth such a joyous outburst? No, that's not why I'm sharing this with you, of course. I'm sharing it because I wonder what could happen this week if I'm compelled to share a loud, brash, big, silly compliment with someone - especially someone I don't know well, or at all - and what if I go ahead and do it? Will you do it with me, and tell me about it? Maybe it'll motivate me out of my straight-laced box and I'll be ready when I see someone do something nice, dance something beautifully, wear something crazy-unique, say something really funny in a public place. I'll be ready to shout out to them that they are wonderful! And then I'll share about it here, too.

That settles it.

When you're wearing something you're not really sure about, style-wise, and then someone whose style you abhor sees you and immediately blurts out, "Cute skirt!!" you know it's time for it to go to the clothes swap. Decision: made.

(im)Maturity

Is it a sign of maturity or immaturity when in the middle of making a mistake or acting in a way you know you will regret, you recognize it - immediately?

It doesn't happen later... it happens exactly as the words are coming out of your mouth. Precisely when you're standing there quietly, and failing to ask for what you want and is completely reasonable.

This little, tiny, tinny, scratchy voice inside whispers, "It's OK to stop talking about this and abruptly change the subject. Couldn't be more awkward than it already is!" Or, "It's OK to ask for one of those to yourself - it wasn't assumed you would even share in the first place, so don't be forced to. Just ask."

Maybe someday, when I'm all growed up like a big kid, I'll recognize these mistakes the split-second before they happen? Instead of during? Or after?

But, ah, perhaps that right there is the height of immaturity.

Before? So you can be what, Emily; perfect? Serene all the time, and never ever unprepared, never stepping into muck or talking faster than your mind can think?

So the same quiet voice may in fact be saying to me right now, as I try to let the last week or so go and fall asleep, "Be grateful to recognize the mistake at all, much less in the bungling middle of it. That's an improvement! And don't cling to the notion you'll stop making mistakes. You only do that when you're dead. These mistakes are going to keep coming. The grace is in refusing to let them clobber you. And in going to sleep without feeding them."

But I'm NOT Sorry!

In the last month, I've noticed an uptick in saying sorry. Someone bumps into me; I say sorry. Someone emails me incorrect information; I reply, "Sorry, can I clarify, you meant the 19th not the 18th, since that is Friday, right?" Someone paid to provide a service arrives with a smile; I begin the interaction by apologizing for needing their service at all.

I don't think, typically, I'm a very apologetic woman. (Ask my husband.)

Whence does this uptick come?

Perhaps it is that as I embrace the start of middle age, I find everything greying out... not in emotion; far from it. Rather, I see things are more complicated - I am less sure of the black and white in life - I can understand another point of view even if I don't, or won't ever, share it. With this grey, is this apologizing some sort of uncertainty in my own authority creeping in, too?

Or perhaps it is sheer laziness. Plain ol' backsliding into the fierce cultural habits we're raised with as girls, all sugar and spice and everything nice. I'm certainly more tired than I've ever been - because it's true! It takes longer to recover from injuries, illnesses, nights out partying in middle age - and so maybe I'm putting my energy elsewhere and just forgetting to Stop Saying Sorry.

When was the last time you apologized? Were you really sorry? Was the error one of your making?

What's New?

Is it weird to answer, when asked what is new in life, to say, "I have really been flossing a lot more in the last month and I hope that at my next dentist visit in two weeks they will notice - and compliment me on it."

Hmmm.

It's Bleak Out There

So I was out this past weekend and I was the wingman. Being happily married means you can't give one speck of advice about how to approach a cute guy at the bar - heck, you can't even give advice about how to tell if he is cute enough to approach, but not so cute he's going to be a douche. This wingman business, clearly, is not my area of expertise. In fact, I prefer the "be dead honest" approach, be it with a lot of charm and humor and snappy, broad jokes... but I now am seeing that's not exactly how this flirt-at-a-bar thing goes, at least not typically. Being married means you get to be fearless... and I don't think that's the hallmark of a successful interaction at 12:30 AM for the wingee (or whatever you call the woman on the prowl who has a wingman in tow).

And after talking to exactly three guys - only three! - I came home exhausted. This is a lot of work.

So three things kept running through my head as I made my way home.

First, the guy who said he works in financial services and only when pressed with numerous questions finally told me he manages an emerging markets mutual fund, requiring odd hours to do business in different time zones... hey plaid shirt dude, why say financial services? Why make me dig? Why not just say what you do instead of talking down to a dumb girl? And what's with the resume keywords?

Second, when your name is typical, easy to pronounce and probably familiar to people, as mine is, you never, ever, ever, not one time, think about awkward it can be to start an interaction (not to mention all three) like this:

"Hi, I'm Josh, what's your name?"

"Jenae."

"Renee?"

"No, Jenae."

"Like Renee?"

"Sure. With a J though."

"OH! JUH-nay?"

Sigh. The name is accented on the second syllable, so actually, it is more like Juh-NAY... but the point is that it shone a light on how when it is loud, and dark, and late, if your name isn't Megan or Jennifer or Elizabeth, it can be tough to start the witty, funny, flirty fun part of the night, full of the banter you're seeking, when instead it skids and stutters over name pronunciation at the start.

And finally - third - perhaps answering Point #1, is when Mr. Financial Services, with too-close a shave and too-popped a collar, walked away and said, "I'm a registered Republican," I laughed and said, "I know, I could tell." But I SHOULD have said, "I'll forgive you."

If I'm gonna be a wingman, I have sharpen my claws wit.

On the other hand...

Alongside the cherry bullets, I now have a half-flat of blueberries, perfect little BBs of frozen Oregon sunshine. (Incidentally, I read somewhere recently that 'Oregon Blueberry' is one of those things that can command two or three times the price in China as any other kind of blueberry, American or not. Good taste, across the Pacific.)

But I wonder, as I happily fill up the new freezer that resides in the garage, and feel a sense of making good use of a long summer night, I stop. I wonder. Am I being 100% an ant - working hard, thinking about and planning for bad weather, studiously saving up - but failing to have any of the grasshopper in me - playing music, enjoying berries now, savoring the short NW summer?

A good friend recently pointed out that one of my "triggers" is listmaking. (A good "trigger", of course, is something that sets us into a spiral of patterned, unconscious and unhealthy behavior.) A very good observation, and reminder that I have to be careful to not put too much effort into the list, to sticking to the list, to prioritizing the list instead of the truly important people, needs, and moments around me. So today, I am happy to have a gallon of frozen blueberries.

And rather than think about getting more to wash, freeze and bag up this week, I'm turning back to my current book (My Antonia) and finishing off the last bit of Chardonnay (Rock Horse Ranch). A little ant. A little grasshopper.

Rainy Skies in Summer

When you're married, and you own a home (or make a mortgage payment to the bank that owns your home), and then you cross into your 30s, you will get asked how many kids and pets you have... and if you're me, you have neither.

But I grew up with dogs, both hunting dogs and family dogs, and I do love them. I just also happen to work 40 hours a week or more outside the house, plus commuting, gym, and grocery shopping time, so it has felt, for a long time, that having a dog would be unfair to the pup. But I think off and on about getting a dog, and funnily enough, the last 4 or 5 people I have floated this idea to have had the exact same reaction:

"Oh, dogs are great. They are. But if you haven't had one, or had one recently, you might have forgotten that they just can break your heart. They don't live long enough for us humans, and it can be so, so tough to lose your dog. It's just something to think about, something to not forget about."

Good, Better, Best.

Oh yeah, I'm going to tell you another Anne of Green Gables tidbit.

In book 3 (my personal favorite) the incorrigible Philippa Gordon says somberly to her new beau, whom she is head over heels for and is a pastor, "You couldn't be anything but a minister," after she hears him deliver a wonderful sermon.

He replies that no, he couldn't be. He tried for a long time but it didn't work.

So sometimes I get pretty down on acting, and film, and television, and the mass-produced woman-hating bullshit that comes out of Hollywood.

But then sometimes I watch something so good, so fucking good, that I want to meet Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams not because they are celebrities and probably fascinating and probably glamorous and definitely interesting and likely wonderful dinner party guests... but to purely, simply and tenderly thank them for not trying to be anything other than actors - and for bringing the world Blue Valentine.

One: run out and see it. Two: don't expect to be uplifted after you see it. Three: do expect to be amazed at their talent. Four: comfort yourself with the knowledge that Michelle Williams is like 32 years old, and we have decades of great art coming from her - she is the next Meryl Streep.

And five: feel in your bones that you have a calling as intense and true as the one these fine actors have been listening to... and start listening, too.