Aging

My 4 year old granddaughter and I recently ran to the store for veggies to grill. On the way back to the car a young man offered to take my cart and handed me the gallon of milk still in the front of the carriage. He was on his way to bring the carts back into the store. Once in the car my granddaughter asked, "Did that man help you because you are old?" "No," I quickly answered. "I don't have any problems doing it all by myself. He was just being nice." After a pause my loving granddaughter informs me, "Well your face and neck look old."

You cream, exercise, eat well, try to live positively, you meditate, fill your life with art and friends and family and do your best to deal with the normal stresses of life.  But, we all get old.  And through the eyes of a 4 year old how old I must look as I near 60.  I don't feel old but....2 years away from 60!  When did that happen?  

Ms. Pope

I wish I would read before bed but instead I turn on the TV.  Just a bad habit.  Maybe it's the fact that we have a giant 6 foot TV right at the foot of our bed? Honestly, most of TV bores the crap out of me.  One show that grabs my attention, as I lay half awake in bed, is Pregnant in Heels.  It's a somewhat sappy show about the privileged soon-to-be mothers of Manhattan.  Ms. Rosie Pope, a British ex patriot,  consults on all sorts of maternal issues from breast feeding (who knew wet nurses were outlawed in NY these days) to sex while pregnant.  What intrigued me last night was an episode about her unpreparedness for her own upcoming birth of her daughter.  Her staff intervened with her much as she would with her "clients."  Her husband told the camera that when mothers drag their feet, i.e., don't get the nursery ready or buy anything pink for their baby girl who will be born in 5 days, there is something going on.  That is the whole premise, in fact, of the show.

What interested me was that the rich and famous consultant to mothers of NY has a troubled relationship with her own mother which causes her to fear the birth of her own daughter.  Reminds me of Martha Stewart.  She is Suzy Homemaker of the year.  Yet, she works 20 hours a day (and you know she is not the one cleaning her 16 houses despite all her tips on organic cleanser), has no husband and lives alone.  She published her Martha Stuart Wedding issue, if I recall this correctly, on the day she either got divorced or her daughter got married in a small ceremony.

I guess the point is that people do what they need to know or sometimes are in professions where they are playing out old relationships, without even knowing it.  My mother, a nurse, used to say that all urologists had issues with their manhood and surgeons were control freaks.  Who doesn't know a police officer with authority issues?  My mother, herself, could be mean and insensitive to me, much like her schizophrenic mother was to her, yet kind, loving, and so nurturing to her patients.  I think about my work with troubled kids.  I was so ignored as a child that everything I did as a little girl and young adult was geared toward getting recognition, being seen.  And, I hate this!  I was funny, cute, creative, smart as a means to an end (being seen), not because I was internally motivated to find humor in life, learn about my world, express my inner being in a piece of art.  My primary goal in my work with troubled kids has always been to make sure they feel "seen"  and understood.  Big surprise. 

All of this makes me wonder.  If we were all psychologically healthy and resolved our deep and old issues, what would we do professionally?   I know for me, as I understand myself better I have a deeper interest in other things that are unrelated to the care taking of the emotional well-being of children.  I have a passion for self-expression through art and writing; I want to experience the world through travel; and I love working on my health through cooking and exercise.   I wonder what kind of architect I would have been, had I grown up with a different set of parents and chosen this career path?  My work with kids is still a passion but it changes as I change.  At this point it is all about them and less about me because I can step aside, having addressed my need to be seen.  It doesn't matter to me what others think of my work or even if the kids see what I am doing to help them.  The work, now, is all about them.  And so I guess I am better at my work, having worked through the reasons I was drawn to it. Well, let's be honest here, this is all a work-in-progress :P

If Rosie Pope has a bad mother-daughter relationship she can try to repair that with her own daughter...but, then, will she be so motivated to be the famous maternal expert?  Perhaps she will be, maybe that's her karma in life.  But, maybe she will be even better at it because she can truly focus on her clients vs her own needs as she helps them deal with their issues around becoming a mother, not hers.

Hey, Who's in Charge, Anyway?

This is our crazy ass dog, Olivia.  I love this dog even tho she is headstrong and a tad nervous.  This summer I am on a mission to train her.  I want her to learn some very simple commands (that's the easy part) and then get her to follow those commands (the challenge) everywhere.  What I want her to NOT do is charge at dogs and people who enter our space with her hair spiked up all along her spine like a blond Mohawk, growling and looking like Cugo.   I want her to say, with tail wagging as she saunters up to a new dog or person, "Hey, hi.  Watsup?"  I want a little more namaste and a lot less "bring it on."

I have watched enough episodes of the Dog Whisperer to know how important a daily walk is for some dogs.  I know Olivia has to give in to me being in charge and I can give her the chance to do that on a walk.  I pick about 10:00am for our training walk because most other dogs and owners have already been out for their morning tour round the neighborhood.   When I first started walking her, I was excited that this might be an opportunity for both of us to get our daily exercise in.  This has not turned out to be the case.  I am very busy on our walks.  First, I have to hold the leash across my body so that I can easily yank on it with the strength of two arms,  if she charges a random person or strains to run over to a barking dog way across the street. Throughout the walk, I find myself also pulling her along as she buries her nose into every blade of grass we pass by, commanding her to, "Leave it.  I think I need to leave the smell fest to before and after the walks from now on.  When we walk, that's probably all we should do, walk at a comfortable pace.  When we walk across the bridge where there is no vegetation soaked in mesmerizing dog urine, I reinforce her with a "Heal" as she trots along in style.  All the while, I grope around in the little red bag that hangs from my belt loop, for treats. The walk, at least for now, is all about Ms. O and I leave my exercising to the gym.  

We are making progress, tho.  Last night when my husband came home and Olivia heard the "ding" of the elevator, she charged forth barking, hair on high alert, as usual.  I yelled, "Leave it," and she actually stopped, turned around and looked right at me.  Her hair was smooth and no longer at attention.  Not expecting her to actually listen to me, I was momentarily stunned.  OK I have her attention, I thought to myself, now what do I want her to do?   "Come," I commanded her, and she came to me!  Once in front of me I gave her a tiny piece of cheese and said, "Relax" which she did by laying down with her hips to one side, tail still.  Cool, I thought to myself.  But, what I really wanted her to NOT do was charge my husband barking away with tail wagging, skidding across our hardwood floors, so I told her to "Stay."  With eyes focused intently on me, she did.  Success.  I can feel the success.  Leave it, come, relax, stay.  I got it and so does she! 

I remember a dog trainer once saying that Olivia was the second smartest dog she had ever seen.  So, learning the commands is easy.  Getting her to follow the commands is the whole problem.  With a strong-willed dog it's just easier to not go walking, to put her in a back room when somebody comes over.  But I worry that she may accidentally charge somebody, sometime and hurt them.  I can hear Ceasar Milan, "You got yourself a red zone dog, lady."  Plus I get tired of the high anxiety everytime she hears the ding of the elevator, a knock on the door or the buzz of somebody ringing from downstairs.  And, I would really like us to both get our exercise by taking a daily walk together.

I get it now that Olivia needs to feel that I am in charge. I need to set up her world so that she listens to me.   Ms. O needs a pack leader and I need to step up.  Got it :)

I See Me

 

Jake: “I see you.”
Neytiri: “I see you.”
These AVATAR movie quotes actually appear in several places throughout the film. The last time they are used, however, is during a particularly poignant part of the movie where Neytiri saves Jake and really “sees” him for the first time, which refers to the deeper meaning of the world “see” held by the Na'vi.


I don't have a high powered job where I run the whole show, a best selling book on children's yoga or educational psychology, or craft the hottest handmade earrings flying off the jewelry counters in Soho, New York.  I used to think that those were the ultimate goals in my life and I felt like a failure because I only had a Ph.D.   But, I was wrong. 

My goal in my work with children is to embrace the parts I love and deal matter-of-factly with the parts that are total nonsense and boring.    I know I am doing what I should be doing, career-wise, which is working with kids in trouble.  Professionally, for better and worse, I am right where I need to be. 

And, regarding what I write, I don't even care who reads what I write any more.  I just need to write and so I do. When somebody asks, "Who is the audience?" I reply, "I don't care!"  When I get an offer to write a book on a topic I am marginally interested in I feel good about deciding to not do that.  I want to write because I have something to say that is of interest to me.  Period. 

The pleasure I get out of gazing at the lime green and peacock blue enamel earrings glowing red-hot as I carefully remove them from a 1,500 degrees kiln is one reason I hammer, quench, solder and enamel once a week at the art studio.  The other reason is that I love wearing a pair of completely unique, handmade earrings that only I designed and made.  Falling in love with the swirls and lines I am painting all over that crazy butterfly chair that was meant for the dumpster, I know I am doing what I love to do.  When somebody says, "Hey, you could sell those,"  or "I can see your new jewelry line, Just Joy",  I laugh to myself and carry on with the kind of visual art that I want to create with no interest whatsoever in what others might think or what might sell.  I have learned at long last and honestly, continue to learn, that when I care too much about what others think, all inspiration to lead my life like I want to, vanishes. 

If more than my joy of it all happens in life and I write that book or sell that jewelry line or am highly regarded because of my work with kids in the eye's of others, so be it.  But these are not the goals for me any more. The fact that I feel passionate, excited, happy about what I do in my life is all I need.  This is not to say that other opinions are not of interest to me, they just don't mean as much to me anymore. 

And in this change of heart is freedom, peace and excitement! 

Angry Workouts?

I took off my pink weight training gloves and went to wash my hands.  "Are you angry?" a woman with a serious face asked as I washed my hands next to her in the locker room.   It was late on Sunday.  Some people shut down the bar, I was shutting down the gym.  I had been dragging my feet about my upper body workout so when I finally got to the gym at 5:30 on Friday night, I pumped like a crazy woman for 75 minutes, full upper body workout.   Generally you do this in 2 sessions, back/arms and then shoulders/chest.  But, I wanted to do my homework on Sunday because I was training with Stacie on Tuesday and muscles need to rest at least a day in between workouts.  Angry?  That was such an off-the-wall question.  I felt, strong, pumped, in a great mood.  "Why do you ask?" I frowned, completely puzzled, at this random woman, who had obviously been watching me, the only woman pumping iron, the only person pumping iron on that early Friday evening.  What was I, the entertainment?  "You looked so angry when you were working out, throwing the weights around." Angry, I thought?  Is that how women view other women who pump iron in the right way.  "No, I feel great!" I smiled, dried my hands and went back out to the gym floor to stretch. 

My personal training sessions with Ms. Stacie have taught me how to pump iron.  You lift weight that is heavy on the 9th or 10th repetition and impossible to lift on the 12th rep.  And then you do this 3 times before you move onto another exercise.  You lift until you cannot lift any more.  You exhaust the muscle which causes it to "rip" and then rebuild, thus literally building muscle and getting stronger.  I am a good student.  During my last training session at the gym where the big boys really pump iron, I was sweating, red in the face, grimacing, and pushing my muscles with all my strength as I stepped up, squatted down, lunged across the gym floor.  Ms. Stacie smiled as she drank her protein drink and ate her rice cereal sprinkled with wheat germ and hemp seed. "Now that's how you weight train," she told me.  After that particular workout, I could not walk without wincing for 3 days after.  I had to make my dog, Olivia, stop and wait on the top step of our hallway until I could gently ease my way down to the bottom step (vs. skip down the steps like we usually do) to let her out to pee. 

As I drove away from the gym I wondered about this woman's thinking.  Would she have asked a man who was sweating, red in the face and grimacing as he used all his strength to get that 25 pound weight (OK, he might be lifting 75 pounds) up over his head, if he was angry?  I know she wouldn't.  Few women in the gym lift weights.  Generally I am alone with a bunch of guys, who kindly, treat me like just another person in the gym. 

I used to frenetically spin as though I was peddling for my life 3 times a week, only stopping those early morning sweat fests when I found out that I was actually burning muscle (anaerobic workout) which contributed to my spare tire because I was burning muscle, calories, for sure, but I was also burning muscle.  Problem with burning that muscle is that my metabolism, which normally slows down as you age, needs all the help it can get and the help it gets is from muscle.  For me, I have learned that moderate aerobics (like walking the dog at a fast pace daily) and focused weight lifting 3 times a week are the only way to get strong, ward off osteoporosis, and bid farewell to my muffin top.  Well, I am working on all of that.  True, I have changed my eating, as well (6 small meals, always pair a carbohydrate with a protein, and lots of water), but it's the fact that I pump iron like I do that has been the most meaningful change.  Angry?  No.  Happy?  Yes!  I feel like I have finally learned how to exercise.  Now we will wait to see how my body changes in the next few months.....

Arrhythmia

Periodically I get a heart sonogram, blood test, and wear a halter monitor for 24 hours. These tests let me know how my heart is functioning. I don't really have a serious heart ailment, per se, rather I have 2 irregular heart beats that can look like I am having a heart attack, which is what the primary care physician thought when I went in for a check-up 7 years ago and promptly called the ambulance to race me to the ER. "No, I don't think I am having a heart attack," I told the frantic physician with a frown, "I have noticed this weird beating for about a month," as she laid me on the gurney and asked if I was light headed. I am happy they act in such a frantic manner but the whole scene was a little too dramatic for me. Anyway, I recently went to a new and very young doctor (my favorite doctor has moved on). She listens to my heart and her face flushes. "Get the EKG," she tells her nurse. Despite what I tell her, she is now freaking out telling me that medicine is the only answer. I have worked hard to not be on heart medication. She tells me I have hyper tension. I tell her I am way nervous at the doctor's office, "You know, white coat syndrome?" I leave her office vowing to visit my cardiologist and find a new physician.  

Sandy Feet

We spent a week on Sandy Feet, a 50-foot 1/2 a million dollar yacht, tied to the dock at the Marriott Marina on Hutchinson Island in Florida this February vacation. Ken, my wonderful and adventurous husband, went down a week before me. When he called mid-week and told me he fell on board and cut both of his big toes on the bottom of the little refrigerator doors (loosing one toe nail in the process), I should have known this would be a memorable trip.

Although the boat had 2 bathrooms, the waste tanks they were connected to were small. There was a set of lights right next to the flush button for each toilet. Green (which I only saw once for a short time) means, empty. Yellow means we're filling up; orange means you got a little room left and red means, don't flush. When I arrived, a week after my husband had been there with his friend, one bathroom flush light was orange and the other yellow. This was Saturday and the boat waste is pumped out on Wednesday. Oy was all I said to my husband...so, we follow the rule, "If it's yellow let it mellow?." I had forgotten what it was like to live on a boat.

The day I arrived my husband also decided to do laundry. For some reason I wasn't in favor of using the tiny washer/dryer combo but taking no heed, my husband put in laundry soap, a full load of shorts, shirts, and socks, and shut the door to the DEMON. Twenty-eight hours later we scooped the laundry out, wet, and hung it around the cabin. "Try the reset button," we were told. Nope, that didn't work. "Turn it to off," we were advised. Sorry, that didn't work either. "Let it run through another cycle" we thought. Let's check the manual I thought so I downloaded it and read through each step. Yea, that was ineffective. The only thing that finally worked was for me to call the company that makes the DEMON, in Portland, Oregon. Their advice worked, "Turn off the fuse and wait 14 minutes." Weird.

The second night I was there I laughed out loud as my husband asked me, "Are you eating crackers?" I was scratching the bottoms of my feet. I had 30 bug bites from the soles of my feat to my neck. Bed bugs? Well, that did run through my mind but I assumed something more boring....and as the pharmacist said, "Noseems." A little bug spray and I was no longer host to invisible little bugs that seemed to find me tasty.

Otherwise, we had a fabulous trip!