Wedding Pix

Rehearsal Dinner

Vietnamese tradition - the groom's family gives the bride's family a pig.  Here it is - ready to be eaten!

Dad and groom

Rebecca, groom's sister, bride's mom and sister plus groom's grandad and wife in the background.

Bride's sister and boyfriend with bride's mom in the background taking a picture.

Rebecca and Jeremy

Groom, bride's mom and bride.

Groom's brother and date

Groom's brother looking sad because it's sparkling cider and not champagne

Pig after dinner.

Lynn, Uncle Sam and Anita waiting for the ceremony.  Uncle Mike looking at the door waiting for the wedding party to come out.

And here they come - Aaron, best man, Steve, Liz (groom's mom) escorting the groom.

Bridesmaids looking for the bride

Groom and chaplain waiting for the bride.

And the bride made it!

Moms

 

Jeremy and Bec

Bride and groom eating the fabuloous food.

And a good time was had by everyone!!!

Pix

First picture - playground at the park nearest my house.  If you're older than six you can't get on this playground equipment.  Bummer.
Above - picture of the podium and stage at the Springtime in the Ozarks conference.  Very dramatic and suited for the dramatic story that followed.

Along the street in Eureka.

View from the balcony outside our room in Eureka.

My friend Cynthia's back yard of her office.  The pigeons are always happy there because they are so liberally fed.

I took this picture out the window of my car and it appears I was holding the camera crooked.  But it's still a terrific looking tree!

My friend, Phyllis, had a coupon for this Jamaican restaurant.

My hydrangea bush is blooming.

Stew with ground chicken.  Never made this stew with ground chicken before, but it's pretty good.

Anniversaries

April, May and June of each year are full of anniversaries of some of the worst tragedies I've experienced.  Some years I do better than others with those times.  I've worked through the feelings, done the grief work and still sometimes my body remembers anyway.  This has been one of those years for remembering things I don't usually have occasion to think about. 

In April of 1976 my grandmother and mother were killed in a tornado.  For some reason, this year the memories that came to me were of how my youngest son and daughter, who are very severely disabled, reacted to being left with strangers while we went to my dad after the tornado.  Both of them came to me through the foster care system and never really left.  I knew that when they arrived at my house.  The placement was supposed to be temporary but due to their disabilities, I knew they weren't going anywhere.  By the time of the tornado, they had been with me most of their lives.  My daughter stayed with friends and my son had to go to Children's Medical Center.  Both of them were unbelievabley difficult to care for so we were lucky to have had any options for them.  Both of them were about four years old at the time.

While we were gone, one of our friends who also had a child with severe disabilities, called to tell us that our daughter had laid down in her bed with her eyes closed and would not respond, not even to eat.  She said that she had been that way for three days and thought we should come back.  So my husband jumped in the car and went back.  When he got there, he just picked her up.  She immediately opened her eyes.  He fed her and held her and when she was back to herself, he returned to my dad's.  Apparently, she did fine after that.  She just needed the reassurance that we had not left her forever.

When we returned from being with my dad, I picked our son up from Children's Medical Center.  He was very quiet on the way home.  I carried him into the house and set him down on the kitchen floor just inside the back door.  He immediately lay down on the floor and began to cry softly.  He just lay there for almost an hour, crying softly - I think with relief because he was finally home.  He too probably thought he had been deserted forever.

Both of these two are now 40 years old and I am always aware of my responsibility for them.  for the past 20 years they have lived with roommates in homes in the community with 24 hour staff assistance.  Their disabilities make them vulnerable in the world and the only consistent person they have in their lives to look out for their safely and well being is me.  Sometimes that responsibility is heavy and I would rather skip some of the things that need to be done.  But I always remember that my daughter tried to die when she thought we had deserted her and my son could not stop crying with relief for an hour after he came home.

Rules

It occurred to me the other day that I should write a book called, "Rules I'm Never Going to Follow Again."  At age 70 I'm pretty sure I'm done with a lot of them.  Of course, I'm still going to stop at stoplights, use my turn signal (follow traffic laws).  I'm still going to follow most of the laws of courtesy - basically they're just about caring about other people - not a bad thing at all.  However  I no longer think I have to wear make up when going out in public.  I no longer comb my hair more than once a day.  I don't have summer and winter clothes - I wear the same stuff year round.  I buy very comfortable clothes so that they can double as pajamas.  (I know.  That's really terrible.  That means I sometimes am too lazy to put on pajamas.  OMG!)  I don't like traditional breakfast foods so I often eat spagetti, pizza, salad, hamburgers, hot dogs and other lunch type stuff for breakfast.  What's the big deal?  My sleeping patterns have been messed up for years so I sleep at odd times.  Whatever. 

I hate business meetings so I never go to them anymore.  I've been boycotting funerals unless I think they're going to be the kind I like where they just talk about the person or I need to be there for support for the person's family.  Otherwise I generally don't like funerals so I don't go.  On the other hand I go to every wedding I'm invited to - I might even start crashing them.  They're usually fun.  I feel that way even though I've decided that no one should get married unles they're prepared to accept the other person exactly as they are. 

Well, that's just a few of the rules I'm not following anymore.  When the book is published, I'll post where it can be purchased.

Fun

Just came back from the Eureka Springs, Springtime in the Ozarks conference.  The weather was lovely and the speakers were entertaining and very helpful.  I laughed and laughed at the speaker on Saturday night.  He said that meditation was not "extra credit" in working the program - it's in the steps so we're supposed to do it.  He said meditation had taught him that he was not his thoughts.  He said that people sometimes believed that their thoughts were enemies since acting on their thoughts often got them in trouble.  No, he said, it's not that our thoughts are enemies - they're trying to help us but they're just stupid is all.  Boy has that ever been true for me.

This was the first time I'd been to the conference since the wreck.  For several years I didn't want to go because I thought going would trigger grief.  Ron and I were married there in 1986 and went to the conference every year but one after that until his death.  We thought Eureka was our town - just made for us and we went there a whole lot in between conferences.  We shopped, ate and walked.  My whole house is decorated with stuff we got in Eureka Springs.  I got my beloved bubble machine there.  This year when I thought about going to the conference I didn't have the feeling that I would grieve there and I didn't.  It was like coming home to a place that has always been filled with joy for me. 

Thanks to my friend and roommate for making the drive and helping me get around and thanks to one of Ron's friends who gave me a ride on his motorcycle up the hill from the conference.  I know my truma surgeon would have a fit, but it also felt good to be back on a bike!

The Precious Gift of Serenity

Two weeks before the end of February I had my two week detox from the prison of the to do list I've lived in all my life.  I didn't kick it out of my life forever; I just quit making one for two weeks.  That eliminated the anxiety of trying to figure out what to do first and thinking that I had to do everything on it all at once or I was a failure.  Of course, I didn't rationally believe any of that, but some part of me kept on trying to make me believe it.  It was a weird two weeks.  I was just trying to get in touch with my intuition so as to be able to use that as my guide rather than my ego.  I was more peaceful but certainly more discombobulated.

Then I immediately went into the inner ear mess where I was completely disfunctional for over a month.  Boy oh boy did things ever get piled up.  So now I'm digging out.  Had to get an extension on my taxes.  My bookkeeping was two months behind.  Plus I hadn't written a word in I don't know when.  I had started on a major cleanout of closets, cabinets and drawers and was right in the beginning stages of that.  Without the detox from the to do list I would have been in a quandry at this point.  But I'm not.  I just do two or three things a day and then rest.  If I feel like more I do more.  If I don't, I don't.

Several months ago I started re-reading The Artist's Way as a way of breaking out of the writing slump I was in.  One of the major things it recommends is something called "morning pages" which is three pages written every morning in long hand just as quickly as possible.  The idea is to empty out all the thoughts that are in the way of the right brain which is the creative side of the brain.  I started the writing back at the end of December and have been fairly diligent since.  I've missed some days but the majority of the time I write.  I have been amazed at the crap that spills out of my head.  The longer I do the writing, the more quickly I get to the right side of my brain that's the part that tells me what I really want to do with the precious moments of each day.

Pix

Karly is singing to the theme of Two and a Half Men.  (Visiting dogs)

Kooper is playing with his toy.

Caryn did my spring pedicure!!!!

Judy did my spring haircut.

A birdfeeder the squirrels can't figure out.

A very weird tree.

The wildflower garden is growing!  Thank you, Aaron and Tammy (Tammy made a fence for it so the dogs wouldn't dig it up.).

Addiction to Being Right

It's election time again which means the media is going crazy looking for stuff to report on that makes somebody look stupid and wrong - either side will do.  I don't blame the media because it the way politics works these days which in turn in a reflection of how the whole culture functions.

I talk to enough people on a daily basis that are trying hard to correct their thinking so that they can have some peace of mind and peace with other people to notice how pervasively we all seem to work at "being right."  Most of the stuff they talk about is how somebody else is wrong and how pissed off they are about it.  I'm almost always completely amazed by how ridiculous their stories are.  They guess at what other people's motives are and get mad at what they guessed.  The behavior they report is usually neutral unless the motive for it is part of it.  Plus they are not actually impacted by the behavior at all.  They're just mad because the person is "wrong."  Totally goofy.  The whole thing deserved no attention whatever. 

I'm just guessing, but it seems likely to me that when we're feeling bad about ourselves, we look around for someone who's "wrong" and that makes us feel better - eventually leading to a deep seated addiction to taking offense at things that are completely unimportant because it makes us feel "right."

What I'm doing about my own tendency to do this is to use the 10th Step to root out anything I'm kicking myself for and doing what I can to correct it with the help of God.  Then I try to turn my attention to enjoyable and wonderful things.  Right now I am reading a poem every day and reading about poetry.  I used to write poetry all the time and I'm going to start writing in a few days.  This is a lot more entertaining than wondering if I should get mad at somebody for something.

FLOW

In order to have an enjoyable life, the author of FLOW believes (based on research), we need to discipline our minds to focus on the present and on the activities we've chosen.  The author says that left to itself, our mind will just wander around and eventually focus on thoughts that carry the biggest charge of energy - which in almost all cases is whatever randomly shows up that's negative.  Our minds have evolved to protect us from danger so naturally run to the negative.  Unfortunately since we are not living with saber toothed tigers, this negative thinking is mostly not helpful - in fact, it's very UNhelpful.

According to the author, most of our addictive type activities:  drugs, alcohol, work, tv watching, etc. are designed to stop our minds from running to the negative.  Of course, there are big downsides to these efforts.  A much better way is to systematically train ourselves to think about - for the lack of a better word - our goals.  The author isn't very happy with the word,  "goal" because it's associated with the extrinsic rather than intrinsic.  He means activities and goals we have chosen strictly for ourselves rather than the objectives the culture determines for us.  The structure of goals we chose for ourselves decides what our lives will be about and how much we will enjoy our lives.  The research shows that when people are focused on the activities that will move them toward the goals they have for their lives, they are happy.  In the beginning, of course, these goals will usually be focused on the material as we establish ourselves as adults in the world, then many people will focus on the larger framework of the community and finally, the happiest people will work toward developing their talents.

The author is really unhappy about the direction our culture has taken in downgrading "amateur" hobbies.  He says that it's a shame that one's "hobby" is not considered important unless one makes money from it (which entitles one to be called, professional).  It's his contention that it used to be more common than it is now, that people sang in "amateur" choirs and choruses, played musical instruments in local bands and orchestras, painted, sculpted, wrote poetry, studied history for their own interest, etc.  Now, he says, people look down on those who do so.  In his opinion, if you have talents, you should develop them.  If you have interests, you should study.  What matters is that by developing yourself as a human being, you will have optimal experiences, which even if those experiences give joy only to you, the world will still have one more joyful person in it.

FLOW

After reading the books on shame, I started reading a book called, "FLOW:  The Psychology of Optimal Experience."  It seems to me that it's about how to be happy.  No airy, fairy philosophy stuff - evidence-based (research) on what makes people happy. 

One of the ways they researched was, they had all kinds of people carry pagers around, and the researchers paged them at random times.  Then the folks filled out forms on what they were doing and how they were feeling.  From that information they extrapolated what seemed to be consistently useful in making people happy.  It turned out that pleasure and leisure were not the answer to happiness.  What was the answer is a lot more complicated and harder to describe.

The psychology consistently showed that people start out in life working on getting their basic needs met - food, shelter, health, relationships, work, etc.  Lots and lots of people stay in the framework for their whole lives and lots of those folks are quite happy there.  Others are not satisfied in that framework and move on to a larger framework - that of religion or some other spiritual practice that guides their decisions and their lives or some other framework that connects them to a larger community such as community service, politics, etc.  Last but not least, there are some people who move on to a much larger framework - that of self-actualization - meaning that they develop their talents and capabilities.  The happiest of all the folks studied were those that were living in all three frameworks simultaneously.  There was almost no "leisure" or "pleasure" type activities in those folks lives because their joy came from their spiritual and creative activities. 

Interesting.  More on this later.  Haven't finished the book yet.

Shame

I just finished reading a couple of books on shame - what it is, what causes it, and how it affects us.  It's a subject I used to give a good deal of thought but haven't in a long time.  But it occurs to me after reading these books that shame is a plague on our individual lives, our culture, our country and our world.  Secrets become our middle names.  We are terrified that someone will find out about all the ways we are not perfect and perfection is defined totally arbitrarily by our culture - what we weigh, what we wear, what we do all day, how we look, how our children behave, how much money we have, what we think about. 

Women are ashamed because their husbands cheat (how is that possible since she's not the one that's cheating.  I guess it's because if she were better, he wouldn't want someone else.  The thing is all those gorgeous, perfect movie star women are being cheated on all the time.)  People are ashamed because they are getting older.  We're ashamed because we don't know how to do some stuff.  We're ashamed that our houses and cars aren't fancy enough.  We're ashamed because our parents aren't the way we think they should be.  Our kids needs to be beautiful, smart and successful and never make mistakes or we are ashamed.  People are especially ashamed if they have someone in their family with addiction.  (People don't really believe addiction is a disease because addicts behave so badly.  Then people believe the disease idea is an excuse.)

We are especially ashamed if we make mistakes of any kind; big or small - which, of course, we do every single day.  So we are ashamed all the time.  The only way to make us feel better is for us to shame someone else.  Which we do a lot.  Good grief!  I don't believe in this crap any more.  Being ashamed is not helpful.

Pix

Flower shopping with Aaron

Flower shopping with Aaron

P.F. Chang's

Kristin at P.F. Chang's

Full moon.

Grrrr

Huge doses of steroids have put me back on my feet after a whole month of vertigo severe enough to keep me lying down with my eyes closed 98% of the time.  Apparently, this is caused by some kind of an inner ear problem (probably allergies), and a lot of other people have had it.  I tried ignoring it and getting around anyway, but I got so dizzy I fell.  That's not good since I've got a rather fragile body and don't need any injuries.  So, I gave in and did what worked -  lying pefectly still with my eyes closed.  Enforced meditation.  I told everyone I was pregnant since the dizziness made me feel like I had morning sickness.  (Amazing how you never forget the fun of morning sickness.  I read somewhere that if men got morning sickness, there would be a whole building full of a cadre of scientists looking for a cure.)  I ate a lot of soda crackers.  I wish I could say that I gained something from the experience - that it increased my spiritual growth or something.  But I guess the thing I mostly gained, was great gratitude for not being sick!

Spritual Awakenings in General

I guess most of my spiritual awakenings could be classified as waking up to the truth about myself.  In the past if I had "come to" and seen those things I would have been in despair.  There's a reason why the first three steps of the 12 Steps are the first three steps.  Waking up to reality has the foundation of the realization of powerlessness and unmanageability, followed by the belief (hope/suspicion) that there is a force for good in the universe that can and will restore sanity, followed by the decision to let that power care for us and change us.  At first my spiritual awakenings were definitely rude awakenings and were painful.  But not so much any more.  I am completely dependent on a higher power for my life and any changes that happen in my personality and attitudes.  My awareness of other people and how to treat them comes to me from a higher power also.  To sum up - no spiritual awakening has happened to me except as I was surrendered to the care of that force for good in the universe.

Welcome Memories

At a meeting a few days ago, the speaker mentioned Ron and how much help he was in getting sober.  I remember how Ron spent a lot of time helping people who were stuck and really didn't want to do anything but meetings, so he would take off his counselor hat and put on his AA hat and try to take them through the steps.  From what the speaker said, I'm guessing he was one of those.  Then after the meeting, a gal came up to me and said that Ron had helped her mother do an intervention that eventually got her into treatment and she said how grateful she was.  She said that the intervention itself didn't go that well.  As soon as she realized what was happening, she ran out of the room and went up on the roof where they couldn't talk to her.  But she eventually got sober.  I'll bet Ron was entertained by that.  Going up on the roof was a bit unusual, but stuff like that happened all the time.  People hate being called on their addictions!  It's been over six years since Ron died, but people I don't know still tell me about how he saved their lives.

Spiritual Awakening #7

This was a gradual one.  I don't remember there being a moment in time when I had a flash of light and woke up, although there was one flash a few years ago when the whole concept solidified and I totally got it.  I heard things in meetings like, "My mind is dangerous territory, and I shouldn't go there alone."  Or the "stinkin thinkin" phrase.  The upshot was that I should not believe my thoughts.

I always thought that my thoughts were me and that they were true.  I've come to believe that for whatever reason my thoughts are often - nearly all the time - not in my best interests at all.  They almost always are either judgments of myself or others or worries about the future.  They urge me to do things that are destructive.  I've also learned that being aware of what I'm thinking as continuously as is humanly possible and questioning the truth of my thoughts and then changing them, is a huge key to serenity and peace and love.

Learning that my negative thinking was very likely the cause of the majority of my emotional upsets was a huge turn around for me.  Recently I've been practicing the "morning pages" recommended by The Artist's Way.  The idea is to empty your mind of whatever you're thinking about in order to fill it up with the good stuff. 

I've actually been journaling daily since 1991, or thereabout, for that purpose, and it's been my experience that although I don't have control of my first thoughts, I do have a choice about whether I entertain and believe them or not.  These "morning pages" take the process a lot deeper in that they're three pages of longhand every single day.  All the stuff that's buried under the usual blah, blah, blah of my thoughts usually comes to the surface by the end of that third page.

Questioning my thoughts is a challenge because I have unconsciously come to believe a lot of things that are not true.  Recently I realized that some of it probably comes from the fairy tales I learned in childhood.  For example, I learned from fairy tales that some people are evil and some are good (the wicked step sisters and stepmother of Cinderella) and that when people do things that hurt me, it means that they are just bad people and want to hurt me for no reason.  Of course, I always saw myself as the good person.

Well, the actual truth is that all of us are hurt emotionally - seriously wounded - by the crazy world we live in, the crazy way we bring up children, and we pass that woundedness to each other all the time.  That's the reason there are "bad" people.  I'm not one of those brainless do-gooders that wants to let everyone off the hook because of their woundedness - that doesn't help at all.  Being accountable for our behavior is always the right thing to do.  But having compassion for myself and all other humans means not living with fear caused by my thinking. 

Spiritual Awakening #6

Early in my recovery I read a lot of books trying to find a way to connect with a Higher Power.  One of them was "Love is Letting Go of Fear."  There was a story in the book about a guy on the subway who was very, very disturbed by some children who were more or less running amok.  He got angrier and angrier because their father was sitting right there doing nothing about the situation.  Finally he got so mad that he confronted the father.  The father apologized and got the children to sit down.  He said that he guessed the kids were just letting off steam because they had just come from the hospital where their mother had died and he, himself, was just not quite present since he was in deep grief.

Of course, the moral of the story is that I don't know whether my harsh judgments of other people are true or not.  There may be a good reason for what I've judged as their bad behavior.  In fact, instead of assuming that they are bad people, lazy, uncaring or just have bad motives, it might work better if I assumed the best instead of the worst.

This has helped me immensely in that I no longer wear myself out so much with judgments of other people or myself.  If I assume good reasons, I can just adjust to what is, instead of using my time and energy blaming and complaining and keeping myself in emotional turmoil.

Spiritual Awakening #5

Oh how I hated this one.  I was complaining and blaming to my sponsor about how awful my boyfriend was behaving.  She suggested I take his inventory - write down all the bad things he was doing and what character defects he exhibited.  When I finished, she asked me to come to her house and tell her all about it.  As soon as I finished, she said for me to sign my name at the bottom of the list.  Of course, I was horrified and greatly insulted.  Then she explained that it's actually impossible to see someone else's character defects unless we have some form of them ourselves.  We might be going in a different direction with them than the person we're judging or we might just wish we could get away with the same behavior, but there's something we're secretly judging ourselves for that we're covering up by judging someone else.  If I call someone a miser, for example, I might be feeling guilty about overspending or being "tight" myself.  If I'm not judging myself, I might just see the person as thrifty. 

Oh how hard this one was to swallow.  On the other hand, it's an absolutely perfect way to see my own character defects that I'm blind to.  Very handy.  After enough personal examination, I'm not so shocked at my character defects, and my ego doesn't try so hard to defend me.  None of this has a purpose of trying to make me feel bad or guilty, but just to help me see how I'm getting in my own way and keeping me unhappy.  By continuing to work the steps on whatever I find, I'm able to forgive myself which helps me be a lot more accepting of other people.  Unfortunately, it's a process, not an event.

Pix

Poinsettias last way past Christmas.  This one is a little bedraggled though.

Below is the sweet potato vine is started months ago.  Just as I was giving up and going to throw the potato away, I saw a tiny bit of green, so I put it back in the water.  By spring I'm going to have a huge plant - I think I'll start another one!

Cisco loves the heating pad.  He's such a skinny baby that I feel sorry for him and keep turning it on all day.

Spiritual Awakening #4

This one absolutely amazed me.  I had someone in my life that walked into my house without knocking and another person who took any money I left anywhere in my house.  Of course, I had thrown my usual fits about being victimized, so they both knew how I felt but kept going.  I felt like a helpless victim.  My dear sponsor was not impressed with my victimhood and kept asking me 1) why I didn't lock the door and 2) why I didn't lock up my money.  I thought this was bad advice since the obvious solution was for them to behave. 

Eventually I got it, though, and did what I needed to do.  I realized that I just expected people to do what I wanted and was horrified when they didn't.  She told me that everyone has different rules and different motives for doing what they do and that my expectations were what was making me miserable.

It turns out that those principles are applicable to a lot of things in life.  She suggested that I quit taking other people's words and behaviors personally, bless them and live the way I thought God wanted me to.  I forget about this from time to time, but life always gives me a reason to remember it.

Spiritual Awakening #3

When I had been in recovery about 9 months I realized that I had consistently done something for 9 whole months - I hadn't taken a drink, I had gone to several meetings a week, I talked to my sponsor almost every day, almost every day I had read some of the literature and had asked God to help me pretty much every day.  That alone was a huge awakening - I knew that I had never ever before in my life, done that many things consistently for that length of time.  I knew it was a miracle.  I wasn't a believer in God, but now I was suspecting that there must be a force for good in the universe that had given me the power to do those things.

Then at about that same time I realized that I was happy and had some peace of mind.  Happiness and peace were new things for me.  AND I had none of the things I thought I must have to be happy - my finances were a mess, I had lost my job, my daughter who was still at home was going through a terribly difficult adolescence, plus I hadn't even had a date with a guy in several  months.  That was a miracle too.  The only thing that had changed was my willingness to do some simple things.

A few pix from Christmas

The gorgeous jewelry box from Adam and Thien in its place of honor.

The "check" from Aaron that promises me help with my wildflower garden.

This year's collage.

Spiritual Awakening #2

After the awakening that the only place to live was in the present, I had another amazing realization, thanks to the same counselor that told me about the book, Your Erroneous Zones.  I called her, having a huge fit because my husband had left our youngest two children in the house alone while I was at the grocery store.  Both of them were very severely disabled, and when I got back there were windows broken out and various other disasters had occurred.  He was in the backyard working in the garden.  I was completely beside myself. 

She asked me what I thought needed to happen, and I said that he needed to change!  She asked me how long I had known him (15 years), and what he had changed during that period of time.  I said he now ate vegetables.  She said that many people would have self-examined during that period of time with as many life changing experiences that he'd had during that period, and that they would have made some changes.  Since he had not, she said, how likely was it that anything she or I could say or do would get him to change.  A flash of light went on - he wasn't going to change!  She said that we were now getting somewhere.  So, if he's not going to change, she said, what will you do to fix this problem.  Of course, the obvious answer was that I need to get a babysitter if I left the kids at home while I went somewhere else.

It was another wake up call to stop waiting for other people to see things my way and do what I wantedno matter how right I thought I was.  From then on I either asked someone else to watch the kids when I went some where or I went when they were in school. 

Spiritual Awakenings I Have Had - #1

I heard a speaker say one time that all the spiritual awakenings she had were immediately preceded by rude awakenings.  Very perceptive.  I do have to add in all honesty that her perceptiveness and articulativeness didn't save her.  She relapsed and died a few years ago.  Just goes to show that being articulate and perceptive does not keep you sober.  She stopped working a daily program and that's what happened.

Anyway, the thing about rude awakenings is true for me too.  The very first awakening - both rude and spiritual - was when the very first counselor I ever saw told me to get the book, Your Erroneous Zones."  She said to read it and do what it said and I wouldn't need to see her any more.  Since I was completely at my wits end and was completely physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausted from trying but failing to meet my overwhelming responsibilities, I immediately set out to read it as fast as I could from beginning to end.

It was, in my opinion, a very badly written book.  It also challenged my belief system.  As I read it, I occasionally threw it against the wall.  Finally the lights went on when I got nearly to the end of the book.  Contrary to what I had believed, the author said that I wasn't responsible for absolutely everything - that I could ask for help.  He also said that complaining did absolutely no good whatsoever.  Instead, he said, I should take responsibility for myself and start trying to solve whatever problems I was having.  Most importantly of all, he said, worrying about the future and feeling bad about the past was a complete waste of time.  Life is only happening in the present and that's where I should be living.

I felt like a weight had lifted off my shoulders and I felt as if I was capable of solving my problems.  I wish I could tell you that everything went well from that moment.  But it did not.  Unfortunately, I did not have a mentor to talk to to help me put the principles into practice.  The only thing I was able to do on my own was learn to center myself in the present by focusing on what I felt, saw and heard around me instead of focusing on my thoughts.  I was able to be "present" most of the time which felt absolutely lovely.  However, that didn't help me solve my problems.

 I did ask for help - in fact, I demanded it.  That didn't work at all and I was still left with the problems and now the people I demanded help from were pissed.  Even so I had periods of absolute joy being present, which is definitely at the heart of spiritual awakening.  I still have the skill of centering myself in the present no matter what is happening.  I think that the present is where God is and the present is the only place I can get in contact.

Sabbatical

Right after the first of the year I decided to take a short sabbatical from doing a whole bunch of things I don't want to do.  I had three volunteer jobs that I kind of took out of either guilt or people-pleasing and then noticed that they were taking up the time I wanted to do other things that were really important to me.  It turns out that it's a lot harder to quit than I ever imagined.  One of the people has emailed me at least once and sometimes twice a day to ask if I would "at least" do this or that.  I've said, "no."  It's not getting through.  The other person cried.  Dear God.  How do I get myself into these things! 

So...today, in between continuing to say, "no."  I sent a story off to one of my favorite magazines - the first time I've ever put any of my writing out in the hope it would be published.  If I had kept saying yes, I would never have done it.

Unsolved Problems

I puzzle a lot over why we human beings keep doing the same thing over and over expecting different results.  It's the definition of insanity and yet we don't seem to notice it - in ourselves or even in other people.  I also call it "victim thinking" because we see the source of our problems being other people and/or our situations.  Yesterday's reading in one of my meditation books addressed this and reminded me that learning a new perspective on myself and my life was so miraculous.  I think I'm still hard wired to see my problems as originating outside of me but because I still talk to people in recovery, read the literature and go to meetings, I have these constant reminders of a much more helpful way of dealing with life.

"Once is a fluke, twice is a coincidence, three times is a pattern."  The writer of the meditation page was referring to the behavior of other people.  He/she suggests that we ask ourselves when we are upset (one more time) with the behavior of someone else, how many times this has happened before.  If it's three or more, it's time to quit hoping it will change and change ourselves instead.  I used to think, "But it's him/her that's wrong; so he/she should change.  What can I possibly do to help myself if the other person keeps on doing things that upset me?" 

Well, there are a lot of pretty simple, but difficult answers:  Like changing my expectations and accepting that this person, for whatever reason, is probably going to keep doing what he/she is doing.  That alone can increase my peace of mind, because I won't be continually surprised that he/she hasn't seen the error of his/her ways and changed.  I may need to distance myself temporarily from that person, or stop talking about a particular subject.  A lot depends on what the actual behavior is, but I can always figure out what I need to change by talking to other people in recovery.  It is never necessary for me to suffer because of someone else's behavior!

It's Okay Darling...

Cheryl Richardson who has written several books on improving your life sends a weekly email to anyone who signs up, and of course, I signed up!  This week's email had to do with New Year's resolutions.  She doesn't like them either, but still the beginning of a new year is a good time to think about making changes that would improve your life.  She said that research shows that all change comes about in fits and starts so we should be patient with ourselves.  She recommends that when we get off track we should put a hand over our hearts and say to ourselves, "It's okay, darling.  Just get back on track quickly."  I like that.  I'll be doing that a lot, I'm sure.

Non resolutions

January of each year is just an arbitrary time for change.  Change can happen any time.  Hope can happen anytime.  What I want to know, what I wish research would focus on, is what are the most effective ways to make personal change.  The universal problem is that people make resolutions (me included) and then....well, you know....All that actually happens is that we feel discouraged and bad about ourselves.  I have read that the problem is that we are hardwired for short term pleasure rather than long term success and that overcoming the drive for short term pleasure is extremely difficult to overcome.  At the very least someone surely has interviewed people like me who always say, "this is the year I lose 20 lbs"  but who still weigh the same at the end of the year and then finally actually did it.  Okay, National Institues of Health - where are you spending my tax dollars?  All that research into heart conditions, diabetes, etc. would not be needed if we had the answer to the qeustion of how to get ourselves to hang in for the long term.  There are lots of opinions and lots of ads on T.V. but where's the research that proves what will work?

Grief

"There are many forms of loss - divorce, incarceration, illness, death, even emotional change.  When I lost the person I loved more than anyone in the world, I was more than devastated, and in my grief, I pushed everyone away...With the help of so many wonderful {program}members who held me and let me grieve in my own way and time...I learned to live with loss with pain, with despair, until eventually I began to feel alive again."  Courage to Change.

This is the seventh Christmas after the wreck when I lost the love of my life.  I am so grateful that I could mostly enjoy this Christmas season without having to pretend to be myself like I have had to in years past.  I have learned that the world in general finds it difficult to put up with people who are in grief.  We are irrational, irritable, morose, and generally no fun.  They want us to act like ourselves and quit being so self-centered.  I am incredibly grateful for all the program people who expected me to grieve and let me cry as much as I needed to, who expected nothing from me because they knew I had nothing to give.  Because of them, I arrived at a Christmas season with a real smile instead of pretend one.

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas

Sunday morning meeting by the pond at the park.  This one white duck looks like he feels like I used to feel - out of place.

Went to The Nutcracker ballet with friend, Mary.  Another friend couldn't make it so gave us the tickets!  Kids were getting their pictures taken with characters in the lobby.

My "for awhile" roommate had a bad case of tummy trouble so we went to the minor emergency center.  This is a picture of the room we were in - someone decorated for a soothing effect.

I have a roommate for awhile.  She's figuring out her next step in life.  My silver Christmas tree that stays up all year wasn't quite the Christmas mood she was looking for so she got this little one.  I like it!

Pix

Bob and Mary Ann with their brand new Christmas tree, hanging the ornaments they got from some of the NHS class of '59.

These pix are of the rebuilding of Mary Ann and Bob's neighbors houses after the tornado in Joplin.

Bob is taking a pic while I take one of him and friends

Mary Ann is opening the ornaments classmembers have given her and Bob to replace the ones they lost in the tornado.

Went to see the Muppets.  The Muppets live in the same world as the Star Trek folks.  Good always wins.

Babies

I kind of envision us humans as babies about a year old or less, standing in our cribs, screaming at the top of our lungs, faces red, tears dripping off our cheeks, snot running over our upper lips.  We have poopy diapers and diaper rash.  We are hungry.  It has been a very, very long time since anyone kissed and hugged us and rocked us.  We are wailing with all our might but no one is coming.  Somehow we missed it when we grew into adults and were in charge of ourselves.  Sure enough no one is coming because who we have to rescue us is us. All the blaming and complaining we are doing will never solve our problems. 

So here's what I think...

I think that a whole bunch of people in recovery plus a whole lot of other folks (I'm including myself in this) are just stuck in the emotional development of a one-year old child.  We complain and complain and judge other people and somehow miss it that there are a lot of things we could be doing to solve our own problems.  I had a counselor/therapist tell me a long time ago that when you complain and complain about the same on-going problem over and over and over, it's like a little baby crying and crying and crying so that someone will come and fix the problem.  Babies can't help it.  It's the only thing they're capable of doing.  If someone doesn't come and fix it, they just keep crying louder and louder until they exhaust themselves and then fall asleep. 

From time to time I realize I'm doing this - sometimes it takes me years to see it.  Recently I decided that if I complained about something for more than 24 hours (even just inside my head), I was going to talk to somebody and decide on what action I could take to solve the problem.  I say this a lot, but it's true:  I'm old and I don't have time to waste on fruitless whining.  Since I'm not a baby anymore I can just ask somebody for help if I don't know what to do myself.  Sometimes the solution is to accept what I can't change and turn my attention to something else - preferably something positive.

I see this one-year old behavior everywhere - especially in politics.  It's just sad.  Blaming and complaining don't solve problems.  We're stuck in our grown up bassinets.

Holidays

I've got my work cut out for me - it's that time of year.  For many years now I've worked at enjoying the holidays.  For a variety of reasons, it's not automatic.  Left to myself, I would probably pretend that holidays were just ordinary days and go about my business.  But after I got into recovery I decided that those days were there to be enjoyed and if I had to work at it, I would do it.  Luckily, the love of my life was a holiday lover and that was a big help.  We had some truly lovely times.  We went to the zoo when they had it lit up with Christmas lights, we went to musicals and plays about Christmas, we had parties, we went to parties.  Sometimes we went off by ourselves and just enjoyed each other.  Since he's been gone, it's more work but I still believe it's worth it.

Pix

Kristin and teammates at soccer match.

Kitchen table

Above:  Sharon's studio that they built on their house.  She is such a wonderful artist.

Neighborhood tree

Kristin making math problems on the refrigerator with magnetic numbers.

Thanksgiving table

Oh look !  My Christmas tree and Christmas lights are already up. Wait - they're up all year.

Wounds

I'm reading Geneen Roth's Breaking Free of Emotional Eating and she's giving me a lot to think about.  At the time of the year when there's a special day set aside for being grateful, I am grateful for the people who write books and the publishers who publish them so that I can learn about myself and the world.  I am reading a part of the book where she discusses the effect of "stuffing" our negative emotions (phrase borrowed from the program).  "None of us lacks for wounds," she says.  "Born of imperfect parents, sheathed in bodies that get ill and grow old, we are always subject to the aggressions and torment of others.  We all have our stories."  Instead of paying attention to our wounds and facing them, we try to run away by numbing ourselves with chemicals, food, gambling, sex, and/or self-righteousness.  The running away process causes us to project our pain outward causing us to hate and hurt others who are already hurting from their own wounds.  Profound. 

"Everyone gets abandoned, everyone... We all have to live through the feeling of having nothing left when people we love walk out, or move away or die."  So, what's the answer?  Live through it.  Love through it.  Learn through it.  Grow from it.  Understand that we can be transformed from it.

The Changing of the Guard

Saturday was my oldest daughter's 50th birthday, and I was honored to be invited to the party.  A long time ago I decided I was the "queen" of the family because I was the oldest (and by definition, the most wise).  Of course, that's actually a joke - getting older doesn't really make you wise.  But it occurred to me that when you turn 50 someone should crown you the queen, so I passed on the tiara I got at a women's retreat - it was child size so it just perches on the top of your head and falls off if you move in any way that isn't "queenly."  (Stiff neck, chin up, back straight, slow graceful walk, etc.)  Now she is the "wise" one and everyone should listen with humility to her advice - so now I'm off the hook.  Not that anyone actually thought I knew what I was talking about!

Sitting Still

I read the same meditation books over and over.  I think I may be on the third year of reading the two I'm on now.  I was thinking about changing them out, or at least one of them out on January 1, but I read something this morning that has changed my mind.  It's a weird thing that happens - and I hear this from other people in the program all the time - when I read the same thing over and over:  I find stuff that seems to have just been put in the book.  I couldn't possibly have read it before.  But I must have.  Since I saw something brand new this morning, I may just stay with these two books for another year.

The gist of it was that many of us have a hard time "sitting still" for recovery because our lives have been full of "fight or flight."  Those are the two things we know how to do and neither one of them helps in recovery at all.  It's hard to get in a fight in the program - although it is definitely possible.  Mostly, though, people are working hard to learn NOT to fight.  Depending on how far their recovery has come, they might just smile at you and hug you and tell you to keep coming back if you try to start a fight.  Certainly people run away from the program all the time.  There's a saying, "If you don't like the program, we will cheerfully refund your misery."  So, people leave - running from truth, hard work, self-examination, ego-puncturing, etc.  Lots and lots of us come back when we have hurt bad enough.

That "sitting still" explanation is very helpful to me.  I've certainly been in that "flight or flight" mode for most of my life, and it still is hard for me to sit still.   The people I work with have big trouble sitting still and working out solutions to problems.  I'm thinking that they might be like me and just very used to either fighting or running.  But problem solving requires sitting still and thinking and taking responsibility instead of running away or picking a fight -both of which make the cause of the problem other people! 

Meditation Practice

I only took an interest in meditation when I saw it was in the 12th Step, which is coming up on 30 years ago.  Before that I thought it sounded stupid and boring.  I had friends who had a serious meditation practice that really irritated me.  Nothing could start in the morning until they had sat still and in silence for 20 minutes and everything had to stop in the evening while they did the same thing.  We were on vacation in Europe at the time, and I had other priorities.  I just saw no point in it.  They weren't any different after meditating than they were before.  They weren't getting along and just went right back to fighting after their meditations. 

My first sponsor gave me a little booklet on meditation.  It wasn't program material but had been used by a lot of people in the program.  It basically said to write down all the thoughts you needed to get out of your head (the to-do list, etc.) so that you had room to listen for God.  Then it said to spend some time asking God for direction for the day and write down any thoughts you had.  Then you should definitely check with someone before you carried out any instructions because it might be God or your wishful thinking.  I loved this meditation and still do it a lot.  Recently, though, I thought I would try a kind of Zen meditation and I find I am loving it too.  I'm still not really sure what the point of it all is, but since it's in the steps...

Also I found a book I got at a used bookstore a hundred years ago.  (How to Meditate by Lawrence LeShan) It talks about the point of meditation, which is to get the benefits serious meditators have received since history began to be recorded - a sense of being part of everything in the universe and a felt peace that stays 24 hours a day.  I could use those benefits so...

Serenity Prayer

God,
Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change...
I might not like this person/situation one bit, but I am willing to accept it with Your help.  I will (with Your help) stop blaming and complaining and think and talk about something else.  If there are things I can do to improve the situation without even thinking about changing someone else, please show me what they are.  Maybe the change I want to see can begin with me.  Maybe I could start treating him/her with the same kindness, courtesy and respect I want.  I need Your help to trust that I am in Your care and have nothing to fear.

The courage to change the things I can...
Based on my past experience, I think there's a good chance the changing I need to do is my own thinking and behavior.  I certainly am going to need your help with this too.  This business of treating other people the way I want to be treated (even if they are not treating me that way), is really hard.  My ego tells me that I need to straighten them out and show them what's what.  My ego tells me that when I don't fight back, I'm a doormat.  So it takes a lot of courage for me to not attack people.  I need Your help to trust that I am in Your care.  I need Your help to change my thinking so that I don't tell myself "victim" stories about how I am a feeble, helpless victim of other people and unpleasant situations.  That's the only way I can have the courage to change myself.

And the wisdom to know the difference...
Well, it seems that it's not all that hard, rationally, to know the difference.  I can, with Your help, change myself.  I can't change other people and situations.  The confusion comes from my ego that wants to tell me all problems come from other people and that I am always right.  So, please help me not believe those lies and know that changing my own thinking and behavior can solve most problems.  Even when changing myself is not enough to solve problems, behaving like a kind, respectful, rational adult (with Your help) in difficult situations can have a positive influence on difficult situations.

Oklahoma

When I worked in the non-profit field I had the opportunity to go to a lot of national conferences.  I learned a lot, met some fascinating people.  At one conference in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, I met a guy from California who said he had a football scholarship to Tulsa University but decided not to go.  When I asked why, he said, "tornadoes." I said they had earthquakes in California, and he said he was used to that.  Well, now we're having earthquakes in Oklahoma to go with the tornadoes.  I also haven't forgotten the 115 degree weather that went for days and days this summer, and the 115 degrees below zero we had last winter plus the two and three feet of snow.  Hmmm.  I'm starting to be one of those old people that says, "It wasn't like this in the olden days!" 

However, when I was sitting here checking my email last night and it sounded like a freight train was coming and then the whole house shook for a good period of time, I was suddenly grateful for all the fears that have left me.  I wasn't afraid; I was just a little entertained.  It didn't look like the house was going to fall down so I was safe.  After it was over I looked for cracks but didn't see any so I went to bed and slept like a baby.  The rest of the natural disasters like ice and snow storms and heat and cold, etc. are mostly just mild irritations and some entertainment.  I don't know if I'm just old so don't fear death and/or injury or if it's spiritual growth.  Either way I'm grateful.