Talking to Myself

At age 16:

May 22, 1977 
For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to write. I guess it all started when I became old enough to read. Books seem to bring something in the imagination alive that didn’t really exist before. Reading used to be my only haven, for a while you can forget everything else and beome a new person. Books have brought so much to my life and mind that if I could write and make my characters live in the minds of the readers, I’d be happy.
 
Today has been a very thoughtful day for me. I’ve been remembering books that I’ve read, like “The Camerons” and just thinking about them again brings a tear to my eye. Then I think that I’d love to be a writer.
 
I saw the movie “Seven Brides for Seven Brothers”. “Jane Eyre” was on too. I loved it. But as I was watching it, I thought that all I wanted from life would be to be loved. Later was a special on Grace Kelly – Princess Grace of Monaco. She was elegant, graceful, and tasteful – not to mention rich enough to support these habits. I thought I’d love to have elegance, beauty and poise – not to mention enough money to support these habits!
 
I suppose, then that this is an outline of what I want my future to be:
  • Slender and graceful – always showing exquisite taste in the clothes that I wear and in everything connected with life.
  • I want to be a rich, well-known novelist and journalist.
  • And I want to love and be loved like in the movies and in books. 
Not necessarily in that order.
Do you think it is too much to ask?
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At age 25

December 27, 1986
The sun is shining down on the woods and streaming through the glass doors. I am sitting at an old wood table, dappled with the sun. I am smoking and drinking whatever they call that concoction of instant tea and Tang and listening to Crosby, Stills and Nash. I have just had a long, hot shower – my hair is wet and I smell like the wonderful carnation-scented lotion Jeff and Marsha brought me from London. It is 1:15 on a Satuday afternoon and at 3:00 my friend Cathann is coming over. I have just finished reading the Prydain Chronicles (the Black Cauldron books) and I really loved them. What more could I ask from any day?
 
And yet, I am not as happy as I feel one should be on a fine day in a fine setting. I am worried about the future and money — all the things that can dampen spirits. Why can’t I put them aside for even a short while? It was easy to forget them back when I could have saved myself from this trouble. Will I ever have control of myself?
 
Also, the books I’ve just finished make me long to be a truly wise and good person. I know I am not – but how does one get there? Or are any as good as characters in novels? Probably not. But why not?
 
So here I am, in my annual year-end anxiety-ridden existential dilemma. Some year I’ll have only hope and eagerness for the future instead of mainly regret for what the past year was not. And on that day, will I have attained wisdom?
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At age 38

December 30, 1999
I remember in grade school being asked to calculate how old I would be in the year 2000. Wow – 38! I didn’t think of it as elderly, I just thought of it as being so old that in Sister Irma Mary’s third grade classroom it was impossible to extend my imagination that far.
 
And yet, here it is. No longer something to imagine – now something to be lived. On the one hand, I know intellectually that the calendar is a human construct with arbitrary origins and therefore has no intrinsic meaning. On the other hand, I’m swayed. We humans have given it meaning through the force of custom, history, even invention. The whole Y2K issue has forced this particular turning of the years to have meaning in a way that even the all-seeing Sister Irma Mary could never have expected…
 
…Despite my self-admonishments, I have felt a prickle of fearful anticipation upon hearing these reports. I can’t forget my recurrent nightmare of panic and holocaust and my attempts to reach my parents…this seems like the time if ever such a horrible vision were to come to pass.
 
And yet, there’s so much more going on – there’s the positive excitement, also. On the winter solstice last week, the moon was the brightest it has been in 133 years, an auspicious sign. And it was so beautiful in the sky that night. I was out for dinner with Joe R. and we drove around a little afterwards. But Joe didn’t seem very interested in the concept, so I cherished the experience quietly in my heart, just as I did with the comet a couple of years ago. The people I know who might also feel the romance and sense of personal significance that I do on such occasions are always far away from me.
 
And in my personal life I have felt myself approaching a new crossroads and know I will be taking a turn from my current path – like the moon I’m at a rare point in my circumambulation of the universe.
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I have kept a journal, off and on, for most of my life. I was inspired to share these excerpts with you upon reading a poem by Pamela Alexander, “Talking to Myself at 34” from her book Navigable Waterways. Reading the poem, I was truly struck by the idea of my journals as a form of talking to myself, of telling myself what it is I know. I grabbed three of the many notebooks that have served as my journals and selected these excerpts randomly. (Well, the December 30, 1999 entry was the first in that notebook and seemed like too good a date to pass up!)

Alexander’s poem speaks of two women, the real one and the imagined one. As I sat in a cozy chair in this house I love, reading bits and pieces of my journals, it came to me that there has been purpose (as well as meaning) in this never-ending conversation I’ve had with myself. The purpose has been to bring these two versions of myself, real and aspirational, closer together inside my skin. I’m not the woman I dream of being – not yet, anyway. But I grow incrementally closer.

The end of Alexander’s poem reads:

Hey, you,

in an old house

with tools that want to be used.

A few cracked windows. Outside them,

cars and radios and shouting people

make a city.

Inside, I discover the door’s duplicity

by looking at wood carefully for the first time

in years. Real wood

made into imagined wood.

.

So the you I’m calling to,

the you that is me,

the one who wants to tell me

everything I know

is both real and invented,

the woman whose name is on the front door

and the imagined person, the one

made with small strokes

on this paper

that used to be trees.

 

Thursday, September 13, 2012

After much consideration, I’ve decided to make a slight change in my posting. As I said last week, I needed to decide if I was still as committed to losing weight as I’ve been saying (despite the fact I’ve been in a holding pattern of some duration.) The answer that comes to me is both yes and no. I am committed to continuing on a healthy path, moving forward in my life on several fronts – my weight being one of them. But I cannot continue on the path where my weight is the one factor that determines success or progress. It is one of the things, not THE thing, that I am doing with my life.

The change in my posting? I will post my weigh-in on the first Thursday of each month, beginning in October. This offers an update to those of you who are secretly hoping I (someday) reach my ideal weight. It also helps me track my own health choices in a concrete and honest way. But it frees us all from relying on a number on the scale to determine how I’m doing. I don’t want to hold myself or you, dear friends, hostage to that any more!

Flashback Friday: Celebrating A New School Year

Here in Iowa, school started in August. But as most communities and states have different calendars, I’ve been seeing “first day of school” posts on my social media feeds for weeks. Now that Labor Day 2012 is history, I think everyone is back at it (just as we are on my university campus).

This can only mean one thing: school pictures are about to happen all over the country!

When my friend Wendy’s oldest child had her first school picture taken, Wendy reported that she was very concerned. “I think I’m going to have her take it again. There’s a mark on her face, and that hair over there is out of place.” My reply, “I think it’s adorable!” was answered with Wendy’s concern that, “I don’t want her to be embarrassed by it when she’s older!”.

What?! Clearly, Wendy did not understand the purpose of grade school pictures – to capture the real child – bumps, scrapes, self-cut bangs and all! Embarrassed? My siblings and I love all of our school photos, especially the bad ones. They so readily capture the zeitgeist of childhood, when living in the moment meant a carefree approach to appearance. There is no place for perfectionism in childhood, nor is our “perfect” look what we celebrate when we think of childhood. So here’s to bad school pictures that capture the heart of childhood!

Exposing the Soft Belly

My friend, Emily, wrote a thoughtful and revealing guest post for Jenion a few months ago titled, “Why I Love Tolkein‘s Writing”. In the process of crafting her post, Emily confided a certain hesitation about revealing too much of herself. She didn’t want to feel too exposed. Too vulnerable.

I’ve had occasion to ponder the idea of vulnerability this week for several reasons.

First, I’ve written about vulnerability before (here, for example). However, earlier in the week my feed brought me this piece, from Kathy over at “Lake Superior Spirit” which speaks more eloquently, and with specificity, about the vulnerability of blogging and the inherent dangers of sharing too much before you are prepared for the consequences: insensitive comments, intemperate judgements and labelling among others. I wish Kathy’s post had been available before I published this gem (especially the “gasbag” part) for example. Or before I sent some notorious emails in which I emoted dramatically and diarrhetically. When we’re roiling with emotion is not the best time to write cogently or thoughtfully – that’s a better time to stop and think about how much, or even whether, we truly wish to share.

The second event which has had me ruminating on the idea of vulnerability took place at the Downtown Farmer’s Market on Saturday. While meandering around Green Square Park, we happened upon a demonstration of belly dancing by a local troupe. The group consisted of seven women ranging in age from (I’m guessing) late teens to 60ish. They were not all equally sure of the specific steps in each dance, and on one occasion all but the troupe leader turned the wrong direction and a chorus of self-deprecating sounds came from six embarrassed mouths.

Each dancer was in full garb and make-up. The costumes, as dictated by tradition, bared the dancers’ midriffs. These were midwestern women in the middle of their lives. They all had bellies. My friends and I commented to one another that it took courage to dress that way in front of so many strangers. I heard more than one person suggest that it didn’t do much to forward belly dancing’s claim of whittling the midsection. And while I heard no comments more cruel than that, had I been one of the dancers I would have been sure they were being made at my expense – whispered behind hands or in private, judgmental thoughts.

In spite of their initial self-consciousness, the women kept dancing. And as they danced, their comfort level increased. So did their enjoyment of the experience, easily evidenced by the expressions on their faces and the loss of timidity in their moves.

That is the gift hidden in the choice to expose our vulnerabilities: the experience of openness.

Some of us will risk vulnerability only in small amounts under tightly controlled conditions – with a loved one, for example. Like a cat, we make an assessment of the other’s trustworthiness, and only when we feel reasonably sure that we’ll be petted and cosseted, do we expose our soft core. This is understandable – we’ve all experienced being hurt at vulnerable moments. Sometimes this kind of risk takes great courage, either because of the depth of past hurts in general or because we haven’t learned yet if this particular person is worthy of our trust.

Stepping into a public arena with our soft bellies exposed is risk on a completely different level. In those moments, it is as if we are saying to the world, “Bring it on! Because the joy of sharing my passion, my art, my suffering – the joy of being authentically and wholly who I am – is greater than the possible exposure to hurt or ridicule.” Artists, musicians and writers know this. So do activists and athletes – anyone, for that matter, who dares to share a piece of themselves with the world. As Gregg Levoy says, “We move toward a kind of divine presence because, through our passions, we are utterly present. We are utterly charged and focused. We are oblivious, we forget ourselves, our troubles, our day-to-day…lives.” (from Callings: Finding and Following an Authentic Life). As we become more present, we experience less discomfort with our vulnerability – it isn’t that it goes away, it’s just less central to the experience than the exhilaration of openness.

It seems fitting to end with some photos of the dancers. I hope you can see, as I do, their progression from hesitancy, in the first shot,  to enjoyment!

Thursday, September 6, 2012

 

Honesty. If there is one thing I’ve learned over the past few years, it is that being honest with oneself is absolutely necessary and absolutely hard. Like all habits, it gets easier with practice and attention, but it doesn’t get easy. I had a pedicure on Labor Day, and the stylist and I ended up in a deep conversation, alone in the spa room of the salon. On the topic of weight loss (with which we have both struggled), she asked me, “Has it been hard to keep the weight off?”

My honest answer was, “Not really.” And that took me by surprise. Behind that answer, though, was another truth waiting for me to pay attention to it. The truth that while I’ve been SAYING I have another 40 pounds to lose, and I’ve been ACTING like I want to lose it, I have actually been in a holding pattern. I haven’t really been working at it.

So this week, I’m taking time to pause and think about where I am and what I want with regard to my weight. Taking some time to get honest with myself. I’ll let you know what I come up with!

In Praise of Weakness (Just kidding! I hate weakness!)

 

If I had a dime for every time someone has told me, “You’re one of the strongest people I know,” or, “You’re so strong, I could never (fill in the blank) like you” I would have enough dimes to buy something really big. Right this minute, though, I just want to munch on something crunchy and salty, so I would use some of my imaginary dimes to buy a couple of boxes of Cheese Nips and call it a day. In my weaker moments, I have been known to down a whole box by myself.

Weaker moments. We all have them, even the strong ones among us. It is in vogue to wax eloquent about how failure and weakness are our great teachers in life – that without them we wouldn’t even understand, much less achieve, success or strength. And this may, in fact, be true.

But here is how weakness feels: Weak.

Powerless. Fearful. Humiliated. Vulnerable. Stupid. I can’t speak for you, but  I don’t like feeling this way. If I can avoid these feelings altogether, I will. Failing that, I will suppress them, push them deep inside to a place they won’t inadvertently be seen or heard. I know they’re there, but when they speak, I am the only one who hears. I can be so heavily invested in the image of myself as strong that the idea anyone else might see my weaknesses and vulnerabilities is untenable.

Problematically, suppression has limits. I can suppress my emotions really well, sometimes for a very long time. Then some event, often insignificant in itself, triggers their escape. That escape is usually unexpected and sometimes directs itself toward another person who is blindsided by my emotional outburst. In thinking of these moments, it turns out, I have been learning some valuable lessons from my weaknesses. But these lessons are not about success or strength in the traditional sense. They are about courage. And they are about love, friendship and forgiveness.

What can these awful, painful moments teach me about courage? They can teach me, first and foremost, that there is a price to be paid for hiding behind silence. Not that everything we feel needs to be blabbed to the world or played on constant repeat. Rather, that our weaknesses – insecurities, fears, vulnerabilities – are part of who we authentically are. We are all generally happy to share our light with others. But when we enter into relationship with another person, the quality and depth of that relationship is determined, to a degree, by how willing we are to share our darkness. No one falls in love with the models in the J.C. Penney catalog – they are good looking but one dimensional. We also don’t develop deep bonds with people who only show us their shiny bits. Just to be clear, this lesson about courage is one I haven’t fully grasped at the emotional level yet, and my practice of it is uneven at best (pitiful at worst).

I am on firmer, and more proven ground, when discussing the lessons my own weaknesses can teach me about love, friendship and forgiveness. After all, these lessons have been demonstrated time and again to be true. Demonstrated when someone on the receiving end of one of my emotional eruptions stays with me in an effort to understand what just happened (as opposed to sensibly, understandably, running away). Demonstrated when evidence of my darkest self results in compassion and the offer of support. Demonstrated in the gift of forgiveness when my inability to hold onto strength results in hurtful actions or words directed at myself or others.

I haven’t learned to celebrate my weaknesses because they are my teachers. I doubt I will ever get to that point. I am just on the upside of accepting that my weaknesses don’t make me an unlovable pariah. They do make me human. They give me the opportunity to practice courage by sharing my authentic self with others – without knowing in advance what the outcome of that will be, but trusting that it is the right path anyway. As I work to change the pattern of suppression followed by emotional outbursts, my weaknesses offer the chance to develop kinder, gentler coping skills (kinder, gentler to self and others). Coping skills that actually help me cope.

And while I can’t manage to actually celebrate my weaker self or weakest moments yet, I can truly celebrate those who offer their love, compassion, and forgiveness to a flawed me. I hope that I am able to return these gifts, with true joy and gratitude, when those I know and love are having their weaker moments. Who knows, I may even be willing to share my Cheese Nips with them!