Run to the Roundhouse, Nellie

You'll find all the deliciousness Susan T. Landry and Melissa Shook have put together here.  It's an online literary journal of memoir. Lives examined. A short vignette of mine is in The Roundhouse too, writing to the prompt "Hometown." And here, you'll find an explanation of the concept or maybe it's really a call. There's so much to chew on, savor, delight in, learn. I'm thrilled to be in such company and can't wait to see what's ahead. Self portraits, such as this one by artist Alexa Grace, are also featured because surely the way we present ourselves visually is a rich memoir, too.

In this life together

"Piglet sidled up to Pooh from behind. "Pooh?" he whispered. "Yes, Piglet?"
"Nothing," said Piglet, taking Pooh's hand. "I just wanted to be sure of you.” 

 

―A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh

The Men

I love watching the relationship between my husband and my son. They have such an easy and loving camaraderie, at this point, a friendship, yet my son has great respect for his dad and my husband has great respect for his son. I am so glad my son had his dad growing up. I think if it had been just me parenting him, I might have gone all kinds of wrong, the two of us pushing each others buttons and jockeying to be right all day long. My husband had the ability to step in and say, "You two, cut it out." Just that, but it was enough. It helped us come back to ourselves. Sometimes in the teen years my husband would intervene to tell our son, "Don't speak to your mother in that tone." Other times he would take me aside and quietly explain how a thing looked from where our son stood. Last night, my husband and now grown son were side by side absorbed in reading on their Kindle Fires. I raised my phone and snapped a photo and they didn't even stir.

Once

That was me, once. And in twenty more years, I will run a photo of myself taken today and I will say, That was me, once. Why does it take twenty years to appreciate the way we once were? Why can't we see ourselves with those future eyes, tender and forgiving, today? I look like my mother as a young woman in this photo. Now, when I look in the mirror the visage I see is my father's. Funny how we change through the years and how long it takes to grow comfortable with each new face we wear. Some of us manage better than others, I presume, or is this struggle fairly universal?

Cubby's Emotional Bank

Many years ago a woman who was doing a communication workshop at a retreat held by the magazine I worked for, posed this question: "Ever notice how one coworker will mess something up and instead of getting upset or exasperated, you're calm and generous, helping them clean up the mess? But then another coworker will mess up in a similar way and suddenly you're extremely annoyed? What's going on?"

What's going on, she went on to explain, is that coworker number one has been making regular deposits into your emotional bank account and so when coworker number one has to make a withdrawal, there is already a cushion of goodwill to drawn on. Coworker number two, on the other hand, has made no deposits, she never steps up to help with anything, never talks companionably or offers a kindness, doesn't honor her commitments or appreciate your efforts or otherwise engage in a positive relationship with you. So when she draws down on your emotional bank account she's immediately overdrawn and you're pissed!

I never forgot this woman's analogy. It was based on the insights of Steven R. Covey, author of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, a book I have never actually read. This woman had dubbed her version of the bank "Cubby's Emotional Bank" to make it more idiosyncratic and relatable. It made so much sense to me. And even though she was giving us this little metaphor in a workplace context, I was struck by how well it applies in every sphere of human interaction. When my children were growing up, I consciously tried to teach them the concept of Cubby's Emotional Bank, to encourage them to always be looking for ways to make deposits in other people's accounts, acting with empathy and integrity in all their relationships. I tried to explain there will always be days when we need to make a withdrawal and we want to do our best day in day out to make sure we're not overdrawn. There is never any guarantee about the other person's response, of course, but the idea of emotional bank accounts is still a pretty good guide.

I was thinking about this last night when a cousin told me how ticked off she was to have to clean up after her son's girlfriend. She told me this right after telling me how little interaction she had with this young lady, how she could find no avenue to getting to know her better despite the fact that her son had been seeing her for some years. She was feeling as if this young woman had willfully shut her out. So when she complained about the mess this young woman had left in her kitchen, I reflected, "It wouldn't be such a big deal if she'd been making regular deposits into your emotional bank." My cousin, who is a therapist, knew at once what I meant. But it got me thinking.

Here in this place, this virtual table we sit companionably around, we are making deposits all the time, in comments, in posts, in reaching across the table simply to say, I'm here, or maybe even, I have walked this walk and I will bear witness with you. How powerful that is, to have a place where we can go and write our truth as closely as we can manage it and have a community of souls who do their best to understand. And when I need to make withdrawals, when I get too cranky or moody or opinionated, too busy or distracted or life-confused to post or comment, they mostly hold on till I can get it together and find my way back. No wonder I cannot stop coming here! So thank you, dear friends who read here. I have been thinking about each one of you today, and I am so very grateful you are here.

Winter Break

My son is away for the weekend. He comes back on Tuesday for an overnight turnaround, then drives up on Wednesday with two of his housemates for his final semester of college. My girl, who has spent the day re-reading Harry Potter and becoming one with the couch, will join a gathering of high school friends tomorrow evening, and the next day she will hang with her other crew, the soul cluster she started this whole peer-relationships journey with when she was four. Truthfully, I could sit and gaze at these two all day long. I never grow tired of it. These days, I just stalk them with my camera and watch them creepily while they're sleeping.

This was the sweet sibling goodbye yesterday.

Loose ends

Found that photo on Facebook. I don't know who drew the face or where, though it looks like the work of an artist in the island where I was born. Very clever, that artist. I am at loose ends today. There are so many things I need to do, so many more things I could do, and I am inspired to do none of them. The mistake was in getting dressed. I should have lounged in my sleep clothes all afternoon, with the effort of a shower between me and the outdoors, and then I would have been content to curl up and watch a movie or read, and let the day float aimlessly by. Instead I am now freshly laundered and itching to do something useful with my day before it turns to evening. What an extravagance, a whole afternoon all mine to do with as I please, and I cannot quite decide what pleases me. My son left this morning, all shaved and trimmed and GQ'ed, to spend the weekend in another town with a young woman. And her family. Talk about blowing up his privacy. As long as I am torpedoing people's privacy, my daughter and her boyfriend have built a tent out of old comforters in the middle of the living room. Giggling like four year olds they lined it with cushions and are now reclined within, watching a movie. Now that's a good use of a Saturday.

The not knowing

I am sad this morning. I know the feeling so intimately, it comes in cycles, rising to make itself felt, dipping away again, hiding out for a while. It is gray outside. A gray outside Friday morning, dark inside my house, my children still asleep, my husband already gone to work, and I sit here trying to touch the sadness, to hold it close and make it my friend. I am tired of fighting the sadness, tired of trying to make it a stranger who arrives uninvited. This sadness lives in me. It is mine to embrace when to rises into view, mine to welcome as a guest who comes to tell me that there are things that matter deeply, and of course you will be sad when you have to say goodbye to your children yet again. This is your life now. They come and then they go again. You wrap them in your arms while they are near and you wrap them in your petitions when they go. My son is here for one more day. He leaves tomorrow to spend the weekend with a friend. Then he is back for less than a day before he leaves again for his final semester of college. After that, who knows? We will see.

And that is another thing I will no longer do battle with: the not knowing. I am endeavoring to become comfortable with not knowing what comes next, with letting events unfold and trusting I will be able to manage, not fearing the blindside. Trusting my husband and my children to manage too. Trusting them not to be broken by sadness or made fearful by change or unmoored by joy, trusting myself and trusting them to hold nothing back and not resist the unforeseen. When in my life did I decide that the unforeseen was dangerous? Such goodness and possibility comes around that corner, too.

This year, no matter the rise and fall of the wheel, no matter the sad days and the welcome and unwelcome surprises and the incessant whir of my brain, I am going to dare to let down my guard, knowing that there is nothing one can fully prepare for ahead of time, you just do your best and keep on living. I am so exhausted from bracing all the time for the worst I can imagine. The worst never comes. Because whatever comes, we don't spend time evaluating whether this is the worst of it, or even whether this is the best of it. Instead, we square our feet and get busy living it. There is no other way.

Alicia the Beautiful

“There is no exquisite beauty…without 

some strangeness in the proportion.” 

—Edgar Allen Poe

Still Here

First day back at work. My defenses must be shot because the things I am usually fairly inured to are strumming my last nerve. Pet peeve:

Coworkers who complain about all they have to do when in fact almost everyone around them has as much to get done, and one who can't let go of how the writer of a story in the last issue acted like such a prima donna and wanted to re-edit the edit of her story and she's still so pissed about that and she's going to talk to someone up high about how that went down. I just want to scream get over it. Some writers are prima donnas. Some editors are too.

Well, don't I sound put upon today? Compounding matters is the fact that I am in denial that I am back at work on the second day of the year 2013 and how on earth did we get to 2013 already?

Had a nice little break though. And yesterday, twenty seven of us sat shoulder to shoulder around three tables joined end to end for a New Year's day meal. At one end were the young people, at the other end were the older folks, and it felt like a communion of souls, all of us happy to be welcomed at that table among generations of old and new friends.

Happy New Year, my friends. Or as Ms. Moon might say, Happy Wednesday.