YEAR-END REVIEW - OUT OF THE STORM, A RAINBOW

I'm seeing all the year-end, and decade-end, retrospectives coming out this week. As a documentarian and a sentimentalist, I love that stuff.  It's why I keep decades worth of old journals, both handwritten and electronic, and bins and files of photographs and a file drawer of basically old documents from various groups I've been involved with and greeting cards I've received.  I love seeing all those things that were (and many that remain) important to me, that formed my life, and contributed to who I am today.  So, in that spirit, let's run through the old-school hand-noted Day Planner for 2019, as I did last year, and choose some highlights:

January:  Hard.  Hard conversations with Hub.  Home alone for two weeks while he was away on the first of three annual monthly winter snowboard trips.  Started yoga teacher training and wondered if I had what it takes to keep going.  Came home from my first intensive training weekend exhausted, overwhelmed, in tears, unsure.  2019 did not start out so great.

February:  Snowpacalypse!  Record-setting snowfall in the lowlands while I was home alone again for a week during yoga teacher training weekend.  Big anxiety about ongoing relationship issues, driving in the slippery snow up hills, and the challenges of the training resulted in massive multi-day migraines.  Still, the kindness of one of our Yoga instructors saved me and others with an offer to spend the weekend at her amazingly artistic and nurturing home instead of braving the elements and barely passable roadways.  I survived!  And felt a growing connection to my sister yoginis.  A community was forming, born of hardship.

March:  Hub's last snowboard trip and finally feeling settled and excited about the Yoga Teacher Training.  Learning so much!  Then off to our annual Kauai vacation, where depression and exhilaration danced together in an odd off-kilter jig.  At least it was warm.

April:  Another week of migraines and from the looks of my calendar, a too-busy month with something scheduled every day.  But the end of the month took us to the Southeast to see friends near Charleston, South Carolina (where we lived for two years on a barrier island) and to Savannah, Georgia to see family.  Fun trip full of memories of times past.

May:  Hub's total knee replacement and difficulties navigating the caregiver/patient dynamics.  Glad for modern medicine, amazing technology, and Hub's ahead-of-schedule and better-than-most progress, likely at least partially due to his "I'll do it myself" insistence on independence during recovery.  I had to learn not to hover.

June:  A Girls Getaway to the ocean beach with friends.  Days of talk, laughter, ritual-making, and important insights.  The respite I needed under sunny skies and starlit nights, embraced in loving friendship.

July:  Migraines, GI issues, sadness.  I felt lousy a lot of the time early in the month.  I worried something was majorly wrong with me.  (Relieved to find there wasn't).  The end of yoga teacher training came late in the month with a 5-day learning retreat in the North Cascade mountains before a big graduation celebration.   The close bond we'd formed as a group left us all amazed and grateful.  After spending 200 hours together over 6 months of intensive learning and practice, it was both a relief and a bit sad to say goodbye to the experience...and to each other.

August:  We were off to Minneapolis for Al Gore's Climate Reality Leadership Team training. Discovered an unexpected fondness for Minneapolis (in the summer!)  and had fun exploring the city when not in sessions in a freezing hotel ballroom.  The majority of the month was very, very, very difficult.  Hub was gone for bit on an annual camping trip and then home to lots of very hard conversations that shook me to the core.  I didn't know I was capable of rage, but I am and it was cleansing.  Big learning in hard times.  Life-changing, actually.  I know myself and my limits and boundaries and strength in ways unknown before.  The tremors I'd been feeling between us for, well, quite a long while, finally shook my foundation.  It was no fun.

September:  Rebuilding.  Hub was away again to a favorite camping site for several days, then home to more relationship work, big epiphanies, intentional recommitment and reason for hope.  Forty-seven years into our marriage and this felt like a new beginning; a second honeymoon.  Gratitude and Grace abound.  Also a family trip to my great-niece's wedding in Scottsdale and late in the month a perfect trip for Hub and me to NYC.  Did I mention honeymoon? 😉

October:  Hub left with an adventurer friend for 3 weeks in Nepal, on a trip planned for months, to sightsee and also to visit the two students whose educations we have been sponsoring for 5 years.  Big Adventure!  Instead listening to me whine about staying home alone, my friends invited me to join them in Maui for 10 days where I soaked up all the warmth, sun, and silky warm waters I could before returning to the 'wet months' in the Pacific Northwest.

November:  Hub got home mid-month and we shifted into a very low gear, reconnecting and resting up for the holidays to come.

December:  And here we are.  (I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that the current president was impeached and that was awesome, but of course, not the end of his reign, yet.)

This has been the most mellow holiday season I can ever recall.  Family, friends, our annual seaside getaway, a couple of holiday outings....and all of it felt manageable and easy. 

The absolute highlight was shopping together for a modest, understated, but very lovely diamond wedding band -- a tangible reminder of what we'd come through this year resulting in a recommitment to our long marriage, promising to go forward with renewed intention, honesty, love, respect, and care.  When I look down at my hand and see that sparkle, I feel blessed beyond words.

It wasn't the easiest year, but a necessary one.  Into 2020 I take a revitalized marriage, my devotion to family, my treasured friends, memories of, and plans for more travels, a deep and joyful spiritual practice, and a determination to right the upside-down world of our national political landscape.  Into 2020 I take happiness, contentment, and optimism, which is such an unexpected blessing that I feel like I've had a personality transplant.  Well, I'll take it.

At least, that's the view from here...©

AND THAT'S A WRAP...

I've been reading year-end lists and "year in review" articles all day.  I realize that so much happens, from the ridiculous to the sublime, to the tragic and the mundane, that for me it all often melds into an "I don't quite recall" mishmash of memory fragments.

So, I decided to go through my old-school Day Planner (I refuse to give those up!) where I can see a Month-At-A-Glance notes and entries, picking out those events that most impacted my 2018.  I wonder if anyone else does the same.  Do any of these resonate with you?

(Most of these highlights ended up in blog posts so look back in the archives for more detail.)

January:  Women's March 2.0 -- A disappointment for me.  There will never, ever, be another day like the first Women's March in 2017; life highlight.

February:  Sitting at Dairy Queen scarfing down a self-celebratory hot fudge sundae on Valentine's Day when the restaurant TV suddenly showed "Breaking News" and the Parkland shooting and it's aftermath was released upon us.  Unfortunately I've been as emotionally devastated with each mass shooting; that wasn't new.  But those Parkland teens and how they rose up in activism inspiring a nation (or at least a part of it) to action still gives me the most hope I've had for the future.  I hope I live long enough to vote for one of those 'kids'.

March:  Hamilton!  Lin-Manuel Miranda,  you are a god.  Gratitude to Son Two and his fiancé for the tix so I could be "in the room where it happened."
Also the "March for our Lives" national event on TV and marching in the local event -- see Parkland above.

April:  Annual trip to Kauai.  Surf, sun, aloha.

May:  Wellness.  Started Weight Watchers and committed to a vigorous and varied schedule of physical fitness activities.  Made progress.

June:  Dove into working on I-1631, the Washington State Clean Air/Clean Energy initiative and working with Common Purpose to register voters with an eye to the mid-terms.  Challenging, inspiring, exhausting.

July:  Stunning health diagnosis and scare for Hub.  Threw us both off kilter and focused us on what needed to be done; all else seemed superfluous.  As usual his calm kept me from completely losing it. (Also I hold the image of our family gathered at the hospital on the day of a procedure Hub had to have, love and support palpable.)  Incredibly grateful for modern medicine, sophisticated testing, smart, skilled doctors, and a diagnosis we can deal with.
Also July --  a Jackson Browne concert; also meeting and attending a workshop with John Pavlovitz, Resistance Hero and true Christian.

August/Sept/October:  Staring August 30 and continuing until October 4 our big trip to Great Britain -- our first to Europe -- on back to back Rick Steves tours.  We were gone for 5 weeks, but the pre-trip prep and post-trip recovery seemed to make for about a 3-month commitment! Amazing, frustrating, awesome, exhausting.
Also October -- Son Two and his gal officially got engaged!

November:  The long-anticipated mid-term elections.  Blue Tsunami in the House of Representatives!  A win for Progressives, diversity, women.  Finally we will have some oversight into all of the crazy, illegal, immoral shenanigans of the current president and administration.

December:  Here we are -- a month of festivities with family and friends; another birthday for me; and deep, deep gratitude for my health, my home, my life, and everyone in it.  My family is the through-line in all of this, the reason for most of what I choose to do.

I am grateful to end this year with a feeling of anticipation and optimism, curious to see where this blog goes in 2019, and hoping you'll be along for the ride.

At least, that's the view from here... ©

LESSON NOT YET LEARNED?

I've overextended myself.  My September calendar is chock full of commitments I've made to social engagements, political activities, classes, fundraisers, social justice events, volunteer gigs, grandkid sleepovers, family birthday celebrations, a rock concert, a garden going to seed...plus the Seahawks season has begun and Outlander Season 3 is on TV.

I learned this lesson years ago...not to schedule my life every waking moment.  But something went awry this month and I slipped back into "Sure, I can do that!" mode.  Almost every empty space on my "old school" paper Day Minder calendar has something written in.  I'm reminded of my post from last month where I talked about not being able to answer sufficiently when someone asked me what I do to "keep busy".  I need to send her a photo of my September calendar.

I love having a full, abundant life with lots of friend and family time (grandkids, childcare, family dinners, birthdays, gallery outings, coffees, breakfasts, lunches, craft days, Tribe gathering of we 12 who sit in circle together monthly, facilitated by Hub and me, so some prep work goes into it.)

I love being involved in social justice issues -- re-joining and attending a Physicians for Social Responsibility event (climate justice) and a Housing Hope dinner (homelessness/affordable housing).

I love political activities -- candidates' nights, hosting a house party for a city council candidate, and the usual Resistance work of contacting members of Congress over the latest policy outrage, attending "Together", A Womens' Empowerment Event with my SisteResistors.

I love my yoga classes, including the series of five one-on-one classes I'm taking with a Yoga Therapist who is helping me with my alignment and core strength to address some back pain from my mild case of scoliosis.

I am following doctor's orders to get moving more often on the treadmill or aerobics class.

I'm starting a Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction class (8 week series, plus full day retreat next month) to address my Demon Anxiety.   It's something I've wanted to do for years and finally it's offered here in my own community.

I'm still volunteering for my old foster care agency and wondering if I should contact the second grade teacher for my granddaughter and see if she can use a grandparent classroom volunteer.  I so loved that last year.

I love it all....and realize I'm barely keeping up.  The first 10 days of October look similarly booked, until we head to Chicago for a week.  After that, things clear out and I mean to keep it that way!

I've heard we keep repeating ourselves until the lesson we need to learn is truly learned.  Mine has to do with finding so many varied aspects of my life worth pursuing to the point of barely being present to any of it as I prepare for the next thing.  Here I am again, in an old familiar place.

The good news is, I've caught myself in time. I've at least learned to breathe through it all and find moments of calm and quiet in the midst of "too much to do".  I'm flipping the pages on my calendar seeing mid-October through the end of the year with lots of white space.  I'm in charge of keeping it that way.  I'll keep you posted.

At least that's the view from here...©

SCHEDULING SANITY

I use "old school" month-at-a-glance calendars; have for years.  And I keep the old ones in a file drawer.  They are a "diary" of sorts of the "busyness" of my life.  (The only one I've lost track of in the 25 years I've kept them is the one which documented the milestones of Son-Two's first year of life...I was sleep-deprived, a bit depressed part of the time, and completely overwhelmed by a 2 year old and a newborn...so losing that calendar, while a little tragic in terms of documentation, is also understandable). 

What I notice, when I glance through them on occasion, is that for most of those years I scheduled myself crazy.  Literally, perhaps, since in 1996 there were weekly "therapist" entries for several months.  I remember the depression, the overwhelming feelings of worthlessness, the near constant crying. Well, not constant exactly, because I apparently still led workshops, volunteered in my kids' classrooms, sat on committees all over town, helped oversee a major remodel on our home, helped my mother move from Illinois to Washington after my dad died...little things interspersed between counseling sessions.

Just over a year ago, shortly after the new year of 2011,  I sat in front of the fireplace during a meeting of my women's group and burned a replica of my calendar.  I had just had a very significant "wake up call".

(**NOTE: My women's group meets twice a month to focus on "personal work" -- meaning we meet to offer support and challenge to each other on our life's paths.  What makes us think, feel, and do what we think, feel, and do?  Does it serve us to stay stuck in a certain pattern?  If not, how can we break free?  How can we help shift the paradigm that no longer serves us?)

I had just been facilitated by one of the Sue's in a process of looking at my absolutely crazy-making pattern of over-committing and over-scheduling my life.  At one point, I was challenged to let go of some of the things I was involved in.  I agreed wholeheartedly, then when further challenged to name which things would go, I  began to negotiate and rationalize why I had to hang onto most of the things on my "to do" list of commitments.   Suddenly it struck me....I was like an addict; powerless over my calendar and my inner need to be needed, feel important, feel productive, and like my life had meaning beyond just "being".  I was all about "doing" to be of worth.

Why?  Maybe because when I was a child, children were to be "seen and not heard".  I felt invisible and ignored when I was "good" and I was never "bad"...that was a job for my brothers, who were perhaps braver than I in rebelling at the age appropriate time.  So as an adult, I lived my "goodness" to the extreme -- maybe for the notice and recognition and respect I'd always craved.  (There...that's what "personal work" looks like -- although it takes longer and is much messier.)

I realized in a sudden flash of recognition that I had to "burn my calendar", clear the dates, and start over.  Nothing scheduled.  Blank space.  How did that feel?  Was I of less worth?  Did my life have less meaning?  Could I still be seen, accepted, and appreciated if I didn't fill my time with do-gooder duties?  Scary stuff.  

Since then, and now retired from my job, I've completely reorganized my time and how I "spend" it.  Instead of retirement freeing me up to do more, I've decided to do even less.  I have a handful of activities and commitments that are meaningful to me.  And I have a lot of blank dates on my calendar.   I occasionally have a concern that this new slower pace falls stereotypically into the "getting older", "less energy" category.  But it really doesn't feel that way to me at all.  It just feels like I am finally taking responsibility for pacing my life in a way that feels full, satisfying, and not crazy-making busy.  It feels like I'm living now how I wish I had ALWAYS lived, regardless of age.  I'm finally just happy being...even if I'm not always doing.

At least, that's the view from here...©

**Interested in more info on "personal work" and a life-changing experience?  Check this out: http://www.ww-wc.org/woman-within-weekend