Rocks, Thistles, and the Work

A buck fifty for a spackle bucket full of rocks or thistles seemed like big money back in 1986.

Our new home stood on what had once been a field full of feed corn for one of the last herds of cows in our town. The completion of the interstate would open up this rural spot in New Jersey to rapid development and (on the other side of town) McMansions a-plenty. Our home was a 1980s style box, all square and without character to speak of, a mother-daughter sort of house surrounded by rocks and thistles in an unforgiving clay that dyed playclothes a vague sort of orange-y brown.

We felt like homesteaders on the frontier. This town had no sidewalks or community pool. WHAT?

My parents, in an effort to tame some of the front of our acre and a half of property, paid us kids to gather rocks and thistles. It was hard work, but gratifying—and a buck fifty could purchase a soft vanilla cone with rainbow sprinkles at the local ice cream place.  Eventually grass took hold.

By the early 90s we had grass and a tree in our back yard!

My parents planted a vegetable garden and some trees, mostly flowering pears (before we knew that they fall down eventually) and fast growing willows in the swampy back yard. One summer my dad built a retaining wall along the driveway to give the weird slope some structure against the inevitability of erosion.

Dad's wall today

I moved out, went to college, got married, had a kid, and realized that our one bedroom apartment could fit multiple times inside that giant rectangle of the small side of my parents’ house, so we moved in. We never thought it would be permanent, but the real estate market in Jersey in the 90s was insane, so I planted flowers in pots at the base of the deck stairs that led to our door in the rear of the house, and tried to cover some of the gravelly ugh that persisted despite my parents’ years of work.

Eventually we decided to make some improvements to our half of the rectangle, once we decided moving would be financially irresponsible…and then G got sick (literally the day after we started work on turning the garage under our apartment into a playroom/office—we said hello to the contractor as we left on our first trip to Philadelphia).

For several years after G’s diagnosis, I dealt with stress by moving rocks in our yard.  I moved several tons of decorative rocks to cover the ugly construction gravel under our deck. I dug one garden, then another, then another, hacking away at the clay with a pickax, spending all my angst and despair working the earth. We added good dirt to the clay until things would grow. I built a patio (with some digging help from my brother), placing each paver in a tetris-like pattern until I felt it looked right. I planted perennials, then spread the plants once they matured.

All my black-eyed Susans came from 

one original plant.

I dug holes for trees to try and give us some shade against the western exposure’s heat. I worked and worked. The ugly slope in the back of the house I turned into a rock garden, digging out the overgrown weeds and those immortal thistles, lugging rocks to create little burms.

I built a fire pit out of stone, again finding peace in the heavy lifting.

My spouse, too, works the yard. His is more a work of pruning the overgrowth, saving baby trees in the once-field behind our property by clearing out around them so they can grow. He mulches and shapes and plants, too, in a different way than I do, but he will spend hours and hours outside, doing the things. And now we pay our burly firstborn to dig the holes for new trees.

The tidy mulched areas around plantings are Dave's work

We don’t always work together—our style of working/ways of seeing are very different, and it is way less zen to move rocks when someone is saying, “wait, why are you putting that there?”. I move things and then hope he likes where they end up once he notices.

My parents upgraded their garden fence (we have so many hungry deer and bunnies and groundhogs), and put a patio in the front yard surrounded by flowers and shrubs. “Drinks on the veranda” is what we all call the lovely hours we now sit out there.

34 years after our rectangle went up on that barren scrabble of rocks and thistles and some old trees, our yard is gorgeous. It took so much work, some successes and failures, but now, it is gorgeous.

Panoramic of my yard this afternoon--the same space as the first picture. 

We need to do this in America, too.

After the news of the Dayton shooting, so close on the heels of the El Paso shooting, I went and sat on my patio, surrounded by plants and butterflies and hummingbirds. I just needed to sit in the peace of my garden. And I started thinking about the rocks and thistles and ugh of years ago, and how we had to work and work to make it better.

We need to do this in America. We need to work to make things better. Can we fix all the problems? No. Is there a simple solution? No—but there are steps we can take, quickly, buckets of rocks we can fill to prepare the nation’s figurative soil for improvement. We have the angst and pain right now, we MUST USE IT.

I try not to be political here, and I truly don’t mean this to be a political post. It is a human post, a heart post.  We have to look out for each other. Universal background checks seem like a pretty easy bucket of rocks to carry out. Banning weapons that can kill 9 people in under 30 seconds seems like a pretty obvious pile of prickly thistles to rip out. Will this make the nation perfect and peaceful overnight? Of course not—but just like in my yard, we have to start SOMEWHERE.  

Old ladies should be able to go run errands on Saturday morning safely. Soccer teams should be able to fundraise without worrying that their table is in the immediate line of fire for a shooter coming through the door. Parents should not have to die in a freaking Walmart while trying  to protect their infant. Folks out to enjoy a summer night should not have to wear a bullet proof vest just in case.

When I was a kid, we did not worry about these things. When I first started teaching, we did not need to do lockdown drills or active shooter drills. We did NOT.  

I am a historian. This is NOT what America was supposed to be in the minds of those who founded the nation. It's not. We have to work on this garden and get our plantings in order. It hurts my soul to see this happening again and again.

We may need to try some things to see what works. We may find that certain ways of doing things still bug us (I frequently tease my spouse about how he likes to landscape the woods—like, WHY ARE YOU MULCHING IN A SMALL FOREST??? WE HAVE A HUGE YARD? GOD PUT THOSE LEAVES THERE! My poor tidy spouse likes order so much). But we have to do SOMETHING.

We have to stop actively planting or nurturing weeds of horrible rhetoric, or overlooking when elected officials do—words matter, words matter so very much, and like weeds, poisonous words spread. We have to start somewhere.

I believe in the power of prayer, I also believe God wants us to do what we can do.  Thoughts and prayers are a good first step, but if I just think about the rocks in my yard and pray for the weeds to go away, that is not enough. Action on my part is required. Action on all our parts is required to make any kind of substantive change.

If we work together, and work consistently, and vote responsibly, over time things will grow better.  I have to hope that they will. 

I still find thistles in my gardens, and I think I let my Joe Pye weed get a little too out of control (but the butterflies and bumblebees love it, so I feel little regret), but I can deal with smaller problems when they pop up now that we’ve been working this soil for years. Why on earth can we not do that in America? DO SOMETHING!  We can preserve our second amendment rights AND protect our citizenry (which is what the second amendment was originally designed to do—not to facilitate a free for all in terms of weaponry).  We just have to start somewhere and do something.

Ultimately, I can’t hide in my garden forever. I have a responsibility as a human being to move rocks and thistles beyond my own yard. Please, please can’t we do this together? The reward is so, so much greater than a buck fifty.  Let’s plant peace. Let’s plant mutual respect. Let’s plant listening and hearing and helping.  Let’s do the work, one rock or thistle at a time, towards an America where we can all just be in peace.

All are welcome to come sit in my garden with me. Anytime. 

Zen and Memory

“MEMORY! All alone in the mooooooonlight! I can smile at the old days….”

I will take “Oversung Karaoke of the 80s for 200, Alex…”

With all of the sturm und drang of the last few weeks, I have been thinking a lot about zen and memory. I tend to think about memory a lot, for my entire life I have been intrigued by the history of things, the memory I can feel in different places. I know that sounds a bit wooooooo, but I do.  Kind of in a “the rocks cry out” sort of way. Places hold memories as much as people do, and if you know their stories, you can feel those memories of place.  No wonder I became a history teacher. But THAT is another story for another time.

Memory can feed and nurture zen. I remember visiting my great grandparents in Western Kentucky—the smell of Grandma’s house (often a lovely bacon-y smell, she made us bacon every day for breakfast, a rare treat), the heat of the sun in her backyard against the cold water from the hose that we used to fill up an old metal basin to play in, the comfy chair where Grandpa spent his days. Even the ughulous  parts of those trips are not bad memories, even though I joke about them—the epic van breakdowns in New Stanton, PA, Zainesville, OH, Bruceton Mills, WV, the scary hotel situation where mom unleashed her Jersey on the staff while dad was packing the car. ;)

 I remember childhood church-ish picnics where my mom would bring cold chicken and green grapes and we would sit in the sun and have fun activities with other families.  I remember playing elaborate games of time machine in our backyard apple tree. Memories of my childhood home, of Christmas traditions, of love and family feed my zen when I remember to revisit them.

But what if you can’t smile at the old days? What if those memories are BAD?

My son has told me in the past that he does not remember much of his life before he was 10.  He said it sort of nonchalantly one day, and it took my breath away…since those years were full of t-ball and playgroup and homemade Halloween costumes and the Yankees winning an awful lot in the fall—good, zen-feeding things.  But when my son turned 9, his 6 year old sister was diagnosed with brain tumors. Everything fell apart.  He does not remember before that.  The bad memories clouded the good.

Bad memories have a way of sticking around. Not every single detail—but the worst moments are branded into our consciousness somehow.

14 years later, I can now remember and talk about the early days after my G’s diagnosis without weeping. Even THAT took years. Those memories are excruciating, and certain moments are seared into my mind.  The first two years after diagnosis were brutal.  Now my memories can sometimes help people (G failed so many protocols, we have a lot of experiences of different drugs we can share—without the emotional turmoil and terror each failed protocol produced).  The 5 years AFTER the first rounds of treatment were pockmarked with small progressions, scares, and the ever present threat of an immediate resumption of treatment.

Memories are hard sometimes. The “old days” were not always beautiful.

My Rosie asked me yesterday if she used to be super happy when her siblings came home from school. She saw some of our neighbors’ kids running out to greet their siblings, and thought it was so cute. “Did I do that, Mom?” she asked.

I couldn’t remember.  I Could. Not. Remember. I realized…Rosie was 2 when G got sick. G was on treatment during the whole time R would have been the little sibling at home. I don’t remember.

I hate not remembering almost as much as sometimes I hate remembering.

I have no great answer for what to do with difficult memories. Denying them is not healthy, nor is wallowing in them—although honestly, sometimes that just happens, they rise up like a blob and encompass me. This is what happens the day after scan days—I have to dig out of the morass of memory that rises up when we return to the hospital, we look at the brain tumors (which are all still there). 

Often I do that by writing. If I can put those dark thoughts/rememberings into the light, they lose some of their power…not right away, usually, but eventually.  And every time a new ugh memory pops up (that happened this week when a friend shared struggles her child was having in school—struggles that reminded me of some of the cruelty my own child faced in her middle school years), I try to give it light and then keep moving forward---not without the memory, but in control of the memory.  Sometimes I can use those memories to help others. That is empowering, too.

For all those women and men who are publicly dealing with difficult memories right now—stay strong. You are stronger than your memories. Unlocking dark memories and forcing them into the light gives YOU the power, not the memory.  Stand strong in your truth, and your memories become part of your power. Your memories and courage are helping others.

And I truly believe that in truth and power we find healing, and in healing we find zen. Memories are powerful, but they are OURS. We are not theirs. Working through memories is such a hard work – for me, especially with certain things (er, most things) related to my daughter, I still have so much work to do.  But once the memories are out in the sun, they cease to fester and poison my brain.

For all those brave, brave people forcing your memories into the sun…I salute you. And hey, maybe Andrew Lloyd Webber had it right…

Daylight! I must wait for the sunrise!

I must think of a new life…and I mustn’t give in.

When the dawn comes tonight will be a memory too….

LOOK, a new day has begun!

Doing the Work

Zen = Work.

Yes, guest blogger Captain Obvious is in the house today.

Again, I am late. Last week two of our three family cars died ON THE SAME DAY. And not just like, merely a flesh wound—the one is too expensive to repair (ie is now being driven by firstborn with a supply of coolant to keep it from perpetually overheating) and the other is a challenging repair but STILL cheaper than buying two new cars unexpectedly at the same time. But until it is fixed, I am in “borrow a car to get anywhere” mode. I only work part time, so that makes sense.

I am actually kind of surprised, my initial response was not !@((#@&#*& AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH, but more of a “hey, nobody is dead. We can get a new car”.

For me, this is kind of a Zen Gold Star.

That said, the stress of having no car, of trying to help the two afflicted car owners deal with their collective frustration and stress, of dealing with ongoing other painful stuff here, of navigating work and school and schedule drama left me with no oomph to write anything.  For me, anxiety and stress are really contagious. I need some emotional Purell or something so I can be a better support for people in my life who are struggling with things instead of just catching their stress. Can somebody invent that?

On second thought, don’t. Being empathetic /compassionate is not something I want to limit. I just have to do the work to keep myself afloat while helping others stay afloat.

Zen = Work. And at the end of last week, I could only do the work in real life, not on paper (or, more accurately, screen—although I do most of my planning, etc., on paper. I need the physical act of writing to help me get my brain in order).

As I have been trying to help some of my family members with stuff, we keep coming back to this—we have to put in the work to see results, success, etc. Zen is achieved, not really discovered, even though I keep referencing my search for Zen—it is really the work of searching that will hopefully maybe finally achieve some state of peace.

I think the real gift of this time of medical respite is that I can work at using the tools of yoga, writing, bullet journal, prayer, books, podcasts, the little light therapy thing that I have not seen any effect from yet but I am hopeful, exercise, sewing, connecting with friends, practicing gratitude,  etc. to try and get through those moments where I feel skin crawly anxiety. Having the mental space to think “you must work NOW at dealing with this feeling instead of just lying on the floor” is a gift. I am really working at using it.

But gosh, it IS a work.

About 10 minutes ago as I was wandering around my house I actually out loud said to myself “SIT DOWN AND JUST WRITE SOMETHING!’. The dog looked a little perturbed (I know, Coco, you don’t have thumbs, I was talking to me), but today the work was getting my ample backside in this chair and typing something. Lesson plans are done. Test is written. Only one thing left to grade. SIT AND WRITE.

This is part of my work. 

I guess I just encourage everyone today—keep doing the work. Knowing that getting stronger and healthier and more balanced is a work helps me get past my sluggishness sometimes. Just like I keep going to my job, I need to keep working at me, too.  

Do the work. Achieve the Zen. Keep movin’. We can do it.

Movin' Right Along -- Back on the Road

Movin’ Right Along is a Muppet Movie reference. I love the original Muppet Movie so very much. When I first started blogging several years ago, as a way to separate my medical writing from other writing, I bounced around a lot of different titles (most of which were taken already) before I settled on this. Movin’ Right Along pretty much summed up what I was trying to do—in the face of a pretty devastating medical reality, I was trying to create some space and keep moving, while randomly bursting into song or terrible puns (It’s a Myth! A Myth!... Yeth?)

The way my brain works—kind of like a giant catch-all junk drawer-- I kept this blog and my medical writing separate for about 3.2 seconds. Here is where I kvetched about manipulative pseudo-science, medical ethics, and eventually told my second born’s story –an entry a day for a month, in honor of NF and Brain Tumor awareness month. Those entries are still up, if you want to read War and Peace of Medical Smite. Urp. Summing up what was at that point nearly a decade’s worth of trauma in one month completely shut down my writing for a year. 

It has been a slow climb back. 

For a long while, Movin’ Right Along in my life has meant sort of a weary dreadmill workout, or more accurately the old camp swim test where you had to tread water for a certain length of time. You knew you probably wouldn’t drown, but you had trouble just moving your feet and arms enough to keep your head barely above water.

The Whooping Cough-tastrophe of 2016, coupled with some pretty intensely bad school situations for my second born, became the final straw on the proverbial camel’s back.  Within a few months of my daughter finally shaking the 100 day cough (spasms that would leave her blue and choking for air) and graduating from high school, I knew I could not just keep treading water anymore. I had to swim for a dock or an edge of the pool or something, or I would turn into one of those creepy underwater swamp people from Lord of the Rings.

So I did. Swim for an edge, not turn into the swamp people.

I wish I could say I then rose up like Jesus and walked on the water. That would make a great story/blog. That would be a bold-faced lie, but gosh it would be a good story.

 Really I just started looking for floaties or lily pads to cling to as I work my way to the water’s edge.  I made some decisions that have given me the space to try and figure out what I am meant to be doing during this medical respite. I don’t know how long it will last. Our family could be tossed into the middle of the sea at any second, always. I know this is true. But I want to be better equipped for that next tsunami.

So in that vein, Movin’ Right Along is really going to tell THAT story—how I am trying to Move Right Along—the books that have helped in the journey, the podcasts that inspire, the practices that strengthen my lungs and my oh so tired limbs, both figuratively and literally.  I am still on the road (heading to New York to break into public television!...er, something like that. ;) ), but I am determined to reclaim the words that left me during our family’s medical crisis, and maybe help build a little caravan of support along the road…like a convoy of zen , or something.

That would be a good band name, Convoy of Zen.

I will try to keep entries short, and twice a week. EEK, putting that into writing is daunting. But I need a goal, and a deadline. I am the Queen of all Procrastinators because I want things to be perfect and can never get things perfect (life lesson)…so I need a deadline—hoping that deadline will be the next floatie I can grasp.

Please join me on the road. I am not sure exactly where we will end up (Bear left! Bear left!—Right, Frog!), but it will hopefully be a positive kind of road trip.

Movin’ Right Along in search of good times and good news,

With good friends you can’t lose

It could become a habit!

Opportunity knocks once, we’ll reach out and grab it,

Together we’ll nab it,

We’ll hitchhike, bus, or yellow cab-it!

Movin’ Right Along—footloose and fancy free!

Getting there is half the fun, come share it with me!

Movin’ Right Along—together we’ll share the load!

We don’t need a map to get this show on the road!

--The Muppet Movie (original)

Kindness--an Idea Worth Trying

 "Ideas have Consequences"

This hangs in my classroom, this phrase, on cardstock, laminated. Recently, the news in the world and in my own smaller personal sphere shows an awful lot of terrible ideas having consequences that people just don’t think about—or somehow rationalize away. Violence, injustice, selfishness as ideas create suffering, sorrow, and struggle. Aka the evening news.

Here’s a new idea: be kind.

I know. Kind can be hard. We have real issues with people. But the idea of kindness put into action creates brilliant consequences. Kind is brave. Kind is thoughtful. Kind is fruitful.

Kind understands the big picture of things—like maybe no deity wants people killed while enjoying an evening pint, maybe he wants dialogue and work to make the world better, instead of brief acts of horrific violence that scar families and communities forever. Yelling “this is for fill-in-deity-of-choice” (as related in the news) seems like somebody got the idea of what said deity actually wants terribly wrong.

Kind understands that ideas have long term impact – if we treat our planet like it is indestructible, when science tells us otherwise (in small words we should be able to understand), we may end up reaping environmental death while we try to sow economic growth. At what cost prosperity—if indeed any path that ignores Earth’s warning signs can lead to real prosperity? Kind knows that we need to protect the earth for each other, especially for those in the developing world for whom the proffered economic growth is only a distant rumor, and for whom the consequences of environmental disaster are much more immediate and unavoidable.

Kind understands that unjust wages and disrespect of workers (defined many ways) are never truly  “business decisions”— Cutting wages or unjust downsizing impacts families, causes real hardship and pain, and does nothing to benefit the greater good.  Working together to solve problems (even “business” problems) fosters greater long term positive productivity and even more meaningful solidarity.

Kind sees every person as worthy of respect. Every person—not just those who agree with us. Every person. This one is hard. Super Hard. As she who references her imaginary book, “Morons and Their Friends” rather a lot recently—this one is hard for me. Sigh. Kind is hard.  I am grateful for all the people who show me what it is to be kind. I have so much to learn from all of you.

Kind understands that people are legitimately (or irrationally, in my case) afraid of many, many things, and it is easier to be brave when your fears are addressed with kindness, not dismissal. 

Kind isn’t warm and fluffy and snooglyboogly all the time. Kind often requires taking a deep breath and listening…and HEARING what other people have to say. Kind can require a hard word of truth sometimes. Perpetuating cognitive dissonance or untruth is a great unkindness.

Imagine if for one day, everyone tried to be kind.

I know, it’s a stretch, but try.

Imagine one day where CNN and FOX had no bad news to cover (although that might be a full day of angst about what is happening with the news?? We have a panel of experts to discuss…). Where BBC could JUST cover soccer (sorry, football!). Where the local news talked only about “human interest” stories, because everyone took an entire day to be interested in other humans and the benefit of humanity at large. Imagine what that would LOOK LIKE. What that would sound like. What that would taste like. Kindness is prolific and morphs and grows the more it is spread. Imagine that day!

Egads.

That would be The Best Day Ever.             

A day of real kindness—the kind of kindness you see after a disaster, when people go above and beyond to help each other—or states and companies take initiative to protect the planet on their own—or people help workers network and find better jobs where they are respected after unjust “downsizing”—or people of different beliefs and traditions sit and eat a meal together and share their lives—or people reach out to the lonely and afraid and welcome them into conversation or even just smile at a person on the street.

What a day that would be.

I wish for one day, just one day, the world could give this idea a try.

I think the consequences would be amazing.

Me, the Big Rock, and Mount Yikes--Movin' Right Along--Again

She Bloggeth!

Ok, so that is a little melodramatic, but subtlety has never been a strength of mine. My loud face gets me in so much trouble at faculty meetings, I legit have to stare at my notes whenever any person is talking—because even if I say NOTHING, my stupid loud face says all the things that one should never say at any meeting. 

But I digress. I haven’t even started, and I am digressing…this does not bode well.

BUT—I am determined. Words are both powerful on their own, and empowering, and my inability to write ANYTHING after telling our family story two or three years ago alarms me.

Our penchant for falling into statistically improbable bad stuff just finally caught up with me, I guess, and I lost all my words.  For the last twelve and a half years I have been pushing a Big Rock around. Sometimes I can really get it rolling. Sometimes I end up squished under it for a bit (ok, for years at a time,  2004-2006, and then for a couple of months in the summers of 2008,9,10, then 2011-2013, then June 2014, then three months of 2016…*cough).

 Recently, I just got stuck. Kind of like this:

Obviously I did not fill the last few years with art lessons.

And by recently, I mean for like, two or three years. Maybe longer.

Last year my Survivor Kid had whooping cough, technically “pertussis-like syndrome” since she had been vaccinated—hers was a “mild case”.

On a couple of occasions last winter/spring we thought we were going to lose her.  Like, in my kitchen. Mild my fat fanny. I can’t imagine how horrifying the full blown version is…

For whatever reason, that particular pitfall on Mount Yikes really derailed me.  We had made it through brain tumor hell AND high water and a stupid regular illness FOR WHICH SHE HAD BEEN VACCINATED could make my kid choke and turn blue in front of us?  The ER doc who finally gave us a diagnosis was remarkably understanding about why the two psycho onco parents in front of her were in full blown HELL NO mode.

mom note: the whooping cough booster seems to last about 5 years, so...you all might want to check on that. And just because one HAS whooping cough does not mean they are now perpetually immune. Fricka Fracka...
Even a year later, Survivor Kid’s little sister still gets twitchy any time Survivor Kid coughs.

This situation put about 4 tons more on the Big Rock, and added 15k elevation to Mount Yikes.  Mount Yikes was already pretty steep, school was tough, work was tough, life was life. Everyone has tough. That is what life is…we certainly have zero monopoly on Mount Yikes…

….And then we lost some of our long time BT and NF friends in the fall. I still don’t have words for that. So I shall just speak that dark moment, that moment that flattened me for a month, and try to keep pushing up the hill.

Since early fall I have been working through things, really focusing on exercise, and yoga (remarkably helpful, even 20 minute “Yoga for The Ridiculously Inflexible” videos that I do at home, by myself, where only the dog can laugh at me.  I talked to a doctor, and got some help getting my personal chemistry back in place.  I am trying to read things that will help or inspire me—even if I haven’t OPENED Full Catastrophe Living, it’s waiting here to be read.  I am talking to God. I am making an effort to connect more with other people, because I kind of moved into a bit of a cave on Mount Yikes during the last few years.

It is a work.

But I will do it.  And – well here I am. Writing something while both of my girls are at their new schools, doing great. My son—at his school, doing great (no random broken bones in January this year, well, not for him, just for third born. But we managed it.)   I am planning a two day getaway with Dave for the summer, it’s been two years and we need to just have a couple of days near the ocean, just being. 

The work is working. The Big Rock is slowly moving.

I still have trouble reading my words about Survivor Kid and all our family went through. We still live with the late effects of that journey every minute of every day. I read things I wrote years ago, in our life “Before Brain Tumors”, and I almost can’t believe that I wrote them.  Nothing like being at a youth group thing and realize folks are acting out a funny skit you wrote 42,000 years ago.  I used to be really sharp and funny, not just scary.   And you know what, I can work back there again. This is a first step.  Not perfect. I am trying (as always!) not to let the perfect be the enemy of the good.  Let's do this.

Big Rock has gotten mossy from sitting in one place for so long.  So let’s get moving.

Movin' Right Along...again

I would like to say I have blogged reams in the last months and that some mysterious blogosaurus simply consumed the posts, leaving nothing for anyone to read.

I would like to say that I have filled screen after screen with witty commentary and reflections on my fascinating existence.

To quote Groucho Marx, I would like a trip to Europe.

If I had ruby slippers I could tip tap tap them together and voila! these wishes would become reality. I do have a pair of exceptionally cute red shoes (ok, maybe more than one pair. Maybe more than 2…ahem), but none of them seem to possess the key wish-fulfilling properties of ruby slippers.

Alas. But I am resolved, as much as I ever make New Year’s Resolutions—which is never—to actually try to put some words in this blog on a regular basis, even if a roaming blogosaurus threatens to devour them, and even if I have nothing witty or fascinating to say. Red shoes optional.

My one true resolution for this year is to work on being happy so I can be a real support to my children, the ones who have something to truly put happiness in peril. My spouse asked me the other day, in response to me stating a need to avoid an annoying conversation (oh, the holidays!) by going to my “happy place”, “Do you even have a happy place?”

He was kidding, but I, of course, was utterly crushed. (I haven’t made any resolutions about melodrama, so I figure that was an appropriate response.) He’s right. I have to re-locate my missing happy place. As part of that, I need to keep writing. Writing keeps me from hiding under a rock, or the bed, or anything I can manage to fit under. Writing gives me the path to FIND the happy place, because if the words get all glommed up inside me, I can’t navigate a path out of myself. Does that make sense? Silence becomes the rock for me to hide under.

I’m not sure if that’s deep or cheesy, but hey, that’s the vaguely self indulgent perk of a blog, walking the deep/cheese line.

Seriously, I may be brief, or silly, or just meh in this blog, but I am determined to not let 2011 roll over me until at least February. “Movin’ Right Along” was NOT supposed to represent the Steam Roller of Life working its inexorable progress over my formerly 3 dimensional neurotically creative self. I need to reclaim progress, live my life (instead of letting life live me), and WORK at happy.

As inspiration, I am using Gretchen Rubin’s The Happiness Project as a handy reference…I highly recommend this book, it’s a really entertaining and insightful read, and at least for me, I felt like GR was talking out of my head sometimes, which was both unnerving and endearing at the same time. Check out her facebook page for a great community of people who are thinking Happy is a good thing. : )

Carpe 2011!
Peace,
Kristin