learn to be still: reflecting on the 49th parallel

Last Friday I turned 49. That’s a big number. All around the world, there are monuments on or near the 49^th parallel.  Including Paris. 49 is a big deal.

Although, to me, my birthday is always a big deal. 

I was groomed to be a complete Birthday Diva. Birthdays are the only time in my life when I consider myself high maintenance. I can remember years when my birthday ran not for one day, but for a week or more. As a child I always cried while my family sang “Happy Birthday” to me. Not sure why. If I ever decide to go back into therapy, maybe I’ll see what we can dig up on that one.

This year I wanted no tears, and no regrets. Since 49 is a big deal – like “one year from the Mid-Century mark” big - I wanted this year to be special in a deep sense. I wanted to do some planning.  Build some monuments of my own.

honesty is such a lonely word: authentic living

We live in the Age of the Fraud. Look at just three recent headlines:

• A lauded athlete who is admired by many and recognized for his athletic prowess, for successfully fighting cancer, and for creating an influential nonprofit that benefits millions, finally admits all his wins were due to his use of performance enhancing drugs.
• Another athlete’s tear-inducing story of tenacious perseverance through the death of his grandmother and girlfriend loses respect when the public learns neither the grandmother’s death nor the existence of the girlfriend can be validated.
• An author writes a best-selling memoir about her traumatic upbringing in a Los Angeles foster home and subsequent decline into the drug gang life, only to later admit she grew up in a privileged home with her biological parents, attended private parochial schools, and has never been in a gang.

This is a small sample of people in the recent news who have proven to be frauds.

"do you know where you're going to?" - making goals

I’m a little late making New Year’s resolutions. I had them in my head at the end of 2012, but figured if I made them too early they would suffer the typical premature death by now. I thought I’d just hold off until the rush had passed in hopes they’d have more staying power.

Am I the only one who waited?

This year I’m writing down my resolutions. AKA, “goals”.

Why does that word freak me out so much?

My daddy always told me to make goals. Goals for next month, 3 months, 6 months, a year, 5 years, 10 years, etc. 

But making them wasn’t enough. He said I needed to write them down.

“If you don’t set any goals, you won’t go anywhere. But you have to write ‘em down, set some sign posts. Otherwise you won’t remember where you started or whether you ended up where you wanted. Set ‘em, write ‘em down, change ‘em if you need to – but don’t spend your life going nowhere.”

Wise words.

Too bad I didn’t heed them.

happy (goo) year

I’m back.

Thanks to those of you who missed my blog and asked if I was ok. I am. Better than ok.

My Christmas was amazingly wonderful. As full of magic and family and home time as I had hoped.

However, the New Year came in not with a bang but with a sniffle.  Nothing life-threatening, just the hacking sneezing coughing achy sore throat junk everyone else I know has been dealing with that I had hoped to avoid.

Between the busyness of an amazingly wonderful holiday, traveling, keeping up with my real job, and hacking through the winter nasties, my time and energy have been at a premium. And that was enough to put me on writing hiatus.

You’d think lying a-bed like Camille (minus the TB) would have given me a lot of time to postulate and blog and journal.

You’d be wrong.