My dear little one..

I wish you two things...to give you roots, to give you wings.  The first time I heard that was on an episode of Designing Women. I don't remember the specifics, but Suzanne, a childless woman, had to let go of a little girl who had been in her care for a short period of time. She was so broken hearted, she loved that child so dearly, that she struggled to release the little one she adored. 

I remember watching that episode and that quote buried itself in my heart and my mind. It's been there for a very long time. Right now seems a most appropriate time to dust it off and talk about it, because my social media and my own heart is full of parents letting go of their little ones, be it kindergarten or college. The releasing looks simultaneously beautiful and excruciating. Bitter and Sweet. Roots and Wings.

Of course, never having children, I'm somewhat of an expert on having children. (Sarcasm font, folks.) But I do have kids that I feel my soul has deep and abiding ties to, so I'm going to dive in to this. Feel free to tell me what I get wrong.

Deep breath... having children is an incredibly selfish act. Now hear me out. There is no truly, entirely altruistic reason to have a child. You can hope they make the world a better place, but that's not a reason to have a baby. The way I see it, the entire reason boils down to leaving a piece of you here when you go and making a person you love and who loves you with a depth and breadth one cannot put into words. Having children is about loving and being loved, ultimately.

Now raising children, that's an entirely selfless act. It's a sacrifice from the jump (pardon the pun). From the very beginning they literally take a piece of you and keep it for themselves. Then there is the woman sacrificing her body. Then when the little bitty arrives, it's giving up sleep and time and bits of yourself , your goals, your snacks and your money, and on and on and on. Little by little, it's less of some and more of others - less giving up sleep, more giving up money. Less wiping noses and bottoms and more ferrying them around and re-learning fractions. The entire time you are doing this, the truly selfless thing is, you are teaching them to leave you. You are making them more independent by the day. All the reminders you give them and all the lessons you teach them when they are young turn into the knowing how to as they grow up. You are giving them to the world every single minute, a drop at a time.

Then one day, there they go, and you have to encourage and cheerlead and make the lists of the things they need to do and know and the things they need to have, and then you begin to check those things off. One thing at a time, you get closer to letting them go. How counter-intuitive that must feel. You've spent days and nights for years keeping them safe, making sure they are where they are supposed to be and then one day, you don't have to do that, you don't need to do it, you're no longer allowed to do it, because you've done your job well and now you have to trust what you've created to start making their own way out in the world.

Of course, you're never really, entirely done. I still ask my mom how to cook certain things, how to navigate new experiences. I still ask; I still need from her. But, I mostly move through the life I've created, filling her in and sending her pictures of the little family we've created. She's a supporting role, sometimes a guest star in the life of a person she made entirely out of nothing.

The selflessness of the act of raising a child, born out of the selfishness of wanting one is in a word...miraculous.

My niece, Sydnee, is moving into her dorm today. Nine hundred twenty-eight miles away from the world she knows, from the life her parents made for her. Her parents are there with her right now, preparing for the 30 minute window of time they are allowed to carry her things, put them down, hold her close and then let her go. The weight of that, to me as simply her aunt, is almost crushing. The pride is equally so. I cannot imagine how her mom and dad and brothers feel. They are the ones who will miss the physical presence of her; the everyday sounds and smells and sights. The shoes and the laughter and the door slamming. The piles of laundry and dance uniforms. The space she takes up in their home will be vacant, and the space in their hearts will ache for her.

But, they'll live new experience through her texts and calls and facetimes. They'll visit and see the life she's making, the life they sacrificed for her to begin. They'll watch as their grown up baby grows even more as a person, and they are the ones who started it all. 

We should have known when she was a baby, when she didn't want to be rocked to sleep, when she would fling her arms wide as you put her in her crib that she was already dreaming of spreading those wings.

Today, at 2 p.m., perhaps as you are reading this, they'll begin to open, entirely, with uncertainty, with some reservations, with definite fear... but they will stretch wide and her feet will leave the ground, will leave the familiar. She'll look back over her shoulder and see her parents proud and sad faces and feel those incredibly strong roots giving her all she needs to begin to learn to soar on her own. She'll know the wings are strong but so are the roots. She'll know that both will always show her where home is. One will carry her there and the other will hold her place for her as she flies. And at 2 p.m. CST, her mom and dad will let her go. They will sacrifice again. Willingly, gratefully with hearts that are full yet slightly broken. Bitter and sweet. Roots and wings.

To all the moms and dads going through this, whether it's kindergarten, high school or college, the military, or moving out...well done. I hope they squeeze you a little longer before you let them go.

And to Sydnee... I love you mosterest. Bigger than the ocean.

The new year...

is but a newborn. It's brand new. We don't know its personality, its patterns, neither its woes and worries nor it's joys and adventures. We won't know what 2023 is or isn't until this time next year. We're all hoping for some calm. My goodness, we deserve calm. We'd like some healing and unexpected loveliness, of course, but after what the decade so far has served up, I believe we'd all just take a neutral year for this one. Please, please don't give us any fresh hell 2023, we're still digging out of the past hell.

I've been thinking about resolutions and what they really are. A recipe for failure? Little lies we tell ourselves? A joke? I think I've landed on them being a promise we make ourselves to change. Change is often scary, so generally the changes we want to make are those that benefit us directly. Get fit, eat better, spend more time with friends and family, stay off social media, stop comparing ourselves to other, look at our phones less and our loved ones more. Those are all good things. They are all noble and honorable. But what about the kind of change that makes us have to make amends? Change in how we behave towards others requires so much sacrifices and so many apologizes and admitting our wrong-doings, I often think it would be easier for me to stop eating bread entirely than for someone to attain a true change of heart.

I think about a resolution I've made basically every year since I was 27... this is the year I make my body better. Sometimes, I've used words like thin, skinny, small. It never works, because I'm likely shooting for the wrong star. I should be thinking strong and healthy. DON'T WORRY, THIS BLOG ISN'T ABOUT THAT RESOLUTION, I'm just using is at the example to build a picture in your mind before I dive in. Let's say that I resolve this year to get strong and healthy. I will not wake up tomorrow strong and healthy. Just saying I'm making that change doesn't make it happen. I have to work and sacrifice time and pay attention to how and why I'm eating what I'm eating. I have to exercise consistently and all the other things to make it happen. So, basically, I have to DO something to make the actual change. Saying it means nothing if I don't put my back into it.

Let me preface this by saying, if you think I am talking about you, that's on you. I'm not. Check your ego or your behavior if you think this is about you directly. If you see it as a finger pointed at you, well then, you should likely get really honest with yourself about your behaviors and deal with them. Come at me, and I will push back. I'm not responsible for your guilty conscious. Sort yourself out.

That being said, let's have a chat. 

I've heard many times in my life about how this person or that person has "changed". I'm talking specifically this time about someone who had hurt people in the past, been a bully, lied about people, just been downright mean in their lives. You hear someone say, "oh he used to be a douche, but now he's a nice guy" or "she really was a mean girl in high school, but she's so sweet now". And what I've come to realize lately is that those sentences often should be followed by the words "to me". He's a nice guy to me. She's so sweet now to me. Because here's the thing, to truly, truly be changed, in my opinion, one has to do the work and make it right. It's not enough, I feel (and this is my blog so I can only speak from my thoughts and feelings) to start being nice, you gotta go back to the not nice time in your life and fix it. In other words, you have to do the workouts to lose the weight.

The thought process is often for us to just forgive and forget, because not doing that creates bitterness in one's own life. Bitterness clouds your judgment, it shifts your focus from the present good to the past bad. Like they say, it's like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. And I absolutely agree that shaking off the dust of hurts others have caused you will certainly restore you power and keep you from wasting your valuable emotions and time on someone else's behavior, (which you can't change and you aren't responsible for), but forgiving someone who isn't sorry is an immense challenge to say the least. Forgiving someone who continues to inflict the same harm over and over again can be nigh on impossible.

With the advent of social media and even texting, criticism of others, bullying, and even downright lying about others has become as easy as a few taps of the keys. Not having to see the pain you inflict, some believe, makes it easier to do. You don't have to see their face when you say the mean thing, so the internal "feel bad" part of you doesn't get switched on. I will say that there are people who simply have killed the "feel bad" part of themselves by years and years of saying the mean thing or telling the lie so frequently, they could say it to your face and not only would they not feel badly, they'd enjoy it. I also believe social media and even texting has also made the apology so much shallower. It's so easy to bang out a quick, "I'm so sorry..." that apologies have lost some of their weight. 

Apologies for big things should be difficult, I believe. There should be a lump in your throat, you should feel some sense of shame, and you should make yourself recognize the pain you've caused. I think social media has made it so not only do we not have to apologize in person, we don't even really take ownership for what we've done. Apologies now say things like, "I'm sorry if you were hurt by what I've said." or "I'm sorry for whatever I did to hurt you." A blanket, easy I'm sorry makes us wonder if they are even sorry at all. Social media has also made it easy to extend an olive branch. We do things such as liking the status of someone we've hurt to see how they are feeling about us, or we say "Merry Christmas" on their holiday post hoping they'll like our comment and we'll feel better about how they feel about us, or to be able to tell people "I was nice to them and they didn't respond. It's not my fault they can't get over it!"

Ultimately, when we take someone's temperature about us in this way, on social media, what we are hoping is for the kissing and making up without having to do the work to make things right. We are hoping we won't have to apologize for real, and that person will just move on like nothing happened, and we can stop feeling like that bad guy, or if it's someone who enjoys being the bad guy, but has had relationships suffer because of their wrong doing, they hope everyone will let them off the hook because they are trying to make things right, when all they are really doing is trying to give the appearance of fixing it so the consequences stop. People like that will even get angry if their insincerity is met with genuine distain. They've apologized, so they feel they are owed an it's okay.

To me, the only real olive branch is a full out, sincere apology. Don't tiptoe into someone's feed hoping for a warm response. Don't just flippantly say sorry followed by the word if. Do the work. An apology to me has to involve the words I'm sorry followed by the word for. Then there needs to be an acknowledgement of how their actions negatively impacted their victim.  We shouldn't be saying "It was never my intention...", because, let's all get real, when you do something knowing it will cause hurt, your intention is always to hurt. That's what you were going for, hurt. Next, explain the steps you are taking to fix the problem and then do those things, no matter how hard it is for you.  

I've been watching the Harry and Megan series on Netflix. Full disclosure, I'm team H & M. So, let me just use their situation as an example of what I believe a real apology looks like, shall we?

"I am so deeply sorry for intentionally spreading lies and unfounded rumors about you. I know that by doing that, I damaged your character and made people who know you as well as many who don't think poorly of you, even hate you. I did that to hurt you, in fact, my entire reason for doing that was to hurt you. I am doing my best to make sure those I've lied to know the truth. I will have your name in my mouth telling the truth about what I've intentionally done to you with the same energy and to the same people I lied about you to. I owe you that, even though it's hard, because what I did to you had to be so incredibly hard on you."

Can you imagine getting that sort of apology? Can you imagine giving it? Whew. Just writing it made my palms sweat. That's the sort of thing we need. If you did harm and are sorry for the harm, FIX IT. If you've done harm and only want to make it better for yourself, make the discomfort you feel stop, then just save it. Your little thumbs up on their beach picture is lame and embarrassing and downright gross. Either you're sorry or not. Decide and act accordingly. Righting a wrong should be uncomfortable and hard, because the harm we've caused likely caused them discomfort and hardship.

So then what? After you've sincerely, correctly (in my opinion) apologized, what do you do next? You wait. You give your victim (harsh words perhaps, but I'm not for sugarcoating this) time to process what you've said and decide if they forgive you. Perhaps they will and things will be wonderful. Perhaps they won't. They get to decide that. Remember, you were the one who did wrong, not them. Not accepting an apology isn't wrong. If you wouldn't have caused harm in the first place, they wouldn't have to decide how they feel about an I'm sorry. And frankly, sometimes we've inflicted too much damage for someone to care about whether we're sorry or not. Sorry doesn't take back the emotional toll that's been taken. Sorry doesn't erase anything, and sorry means nothing if you continue the harmful behavior or don't make amends. Even if the person doesn't forgive you, if you are truly sorry, if you have honestly changed, you'll keep doing what you should to put things right again. That person to whom you've said you are sorry also can forgive and forget you. They can accept an apology but choose to keep you out of their lives. Once bitten, twice shy. If your actions are part of a bigger pattern you have with others, they may chose to ignore you entirely. They may not trust your apology. You have to let them. Most people don't touch a hot stove twice.

If they don't accept your apology, or they do and choose to continue living without you as part of their lives, respect their decision. Don't keep apologizing. Don't keep trying to get them to be part of your life. You lost the right to that when you did the harm, because when you hurt someone, in that moment, you have all the control. When you apologize, sincerely, you've rightly given that control back to them. Accept that with grace and humility and leave them be.

I've said all that to say this, don't say you've changed if you haven't, and don't expect others to pretend you have if you haven't. Don't try to convince others someone has changed, because it's possible that person has just changed to you. Conversely, if someone has changed, is putting in the work, don't keep dragging up their past behavior. It's unjust to keep pushing them back down when they are trying to rise. Call them on it if they revert, obviously, but don't beat them with a stick about their past. They and you can't change what's been done, we can only be honest about it and do better. Resolving to change isn't enough, even on the first day of a new year, one must actually do the work to change and live that change daily. We also must work to repair the damage we've done. Change, I don't believe, can be permanent until we've cleaned up the mess we've made in our past. You can't be given a clean slate, you must clean it yourself, so that even if you're dealing with hell, at least it's the fresh kind.

P.S.  I've read where folks are choosing a word for the year instead of making a resolution. It might be a more realistic thing to do. To decide on what you want 2023 to look like, sum it up in one word, and carry that with you during your year. Ugh. Just one word to someone like me who loves almost all the words is a big ask. So, as I sit here on my proverbial porch as the time slips into the second day of 2023, I'm searching for my word. Peace? Joy? Health? Change? Fresh?

No.  My word for this year is ASK. I'm going to ASK folks for what I need. I'm going to start, upfront, kindly but firmly asking for what I need to move through my life. I'm going to ask for peace or attention or space or time or <gulp> help. I'm going to ask the people in my life to help me be honest with them by allowing me to be honest with myself about what I may want or need from them or me to make living this life more fulfilling. The amazing thing is, the people who are in my life fully, are more than willing and even happy to help me get what I ask for. Most people are. You'll notice the word isn't TELL. Tell does seem stronger and more powerful, but folks have the right to not do what I want because I've told them to, and some people are built to always do what they are told to do, so that seems like an abuse of power. I'd rather ask and give them the opportunity to decide if my request is fair to them. 

I'm 51. The odds are that I'm well past halfway through. That's a startling revelation. I want to look back at it when I am at the end and not see things I've missed because I simply failed to ask for them. So here I am, asking you to tell me your word. To inspire me with what you want your year to look like. I'd wager that not one of you will pick the word HELL.

Happy New Year.   

51 Christmases...

I'll have celebrated this year. Fifty-one. I don't, of course, remember the first one, (I was six weeks old after all), nor do I remember the second. That's the one where my mom went to the hospital and came home with the very best gift, my brother. At this point, many of them run together. I know they weren't always Joy to the World, but neither were they all hell. Perhaps that's part of the magic of Christmas... as time passes, the hell fades and you're left with the merry.

What I remember most is the feeling. I daresay that's what most of us remember. Sitting on my couch tonight watching Christmas movies with my dogs and my husband, I can feel it. I can feel the merry and bright. Every year is different, the food, the people you are with come and go, the gifts, but the heart knows it's Christmas and even when our heads aren't exactly clear enough to see it, the tiny spark of the Christmas spirit remains. Even when it's bad, we can close our eyes and remember how it felt to really feel Christmas time. 

I do remember particular gifts, the square green box of beaded necklaces that my friend SLT helped my mom pick out, the boom box, the underpants and turtlenecks. We got a lot of necessities, because there wasn't a lot of budget for luxuries in our house, but somehow my parents made those gifts magical. My mom would put numbers on the gifts, so we couldn't snoop. Living in a mobile home gave them few places to hide the presents before they were wrapped (my sister somehow seemed to find them!), and there weren't stacks and stack of them, so my mom always wrapped them beautifully and made it an adventure to figure out whose package was whose. My mom did a beautiful job of balancing Santa and the birth of Christ. We always knew what was important to our family. We marveled at how a man in a sleigh could deliver gifts in one night as well as the miracle of a baby born in a stable.

The year we three Huber kids began to doubt Santa, he stopped by our house. There was a knock on the door, and the jolly, bearded guy himself was standing on our little porch. He asked us what we wanted; told us he knew we'd been mostly good...we should keep our room cleaner (TRUE!), and I shouldn't talk back (how did he know?!), Stacie shouldn't be so bossy (no comment) and Randy should put Dad's tools back after him used them. That Santa knew because he was real.

Later that night, my parents left us "supposedly" asleep in our beds and went to visit my Uncle Don and Auntie Pam down the street. We had been told to stay in our beds no matter what, and if a kid was ever going to do what their parents told them to, Christmas Eve was the night. It was the seventies, we lived in a very small village and there is no doubt in my mind our neighbor, Gary, was always watching out for us, so we were perfectly safe. Not long after the folks left, we head rustling in the living room. Magically, of course, we didn't hear the front or back door open, so it absolutely couldn't have been Mom and Dad. It had to be SANTA. We three were all too scared of forfeiting whatever Santa brought to even peek into the living room. We were vibrating with excitement waiting for our parents to come home. When they did, they were as surprised as we were by the packages under the tree. They had been gone! Ask Uncle Don and Auntie Pam...they had been with them the entire time.

That Christmas, I do not remember what I got. I can't tell you what was in a single one of the boxes. I can tell you about the smell of wood smoke from the stove in the living room. I can tell you how my dad smelled of coffee and tobacco. How my mom smelled of Jergens lotion, the cherry and almond kind. How the homemade hot chocolate was the exact right temperature. I can tell you how my little heart pounded in my chest as I felt my belief in something wonderful grow. I remember how it felt to snuggle up with my sister and fall asleep. How everything seems lit by firelight in my memory. How beautiful and treasured that memory is.

There was the year we got ten-speed bikes when we never in a million years expected anything that grand. There were the lean years when we knew how hard our parents worked, but that sometimes things are just hard to make happen. There was the year my mom gave us blankets on Christmas Eve and told us, again, the story of the Christ child being wrapped in swaddling clothes. We didn't know at the time that the blankets were necessary because heating fuel was so expensive, we'd need them to keep warm.

We never, ever felt like we received less (even when that teacher made us write a report telling everything we received for Christmas and made us read it in front of the class -- if you're a teacher, please don't do this) but even then, we knew Christmas was about the feeling not the things. If you read what I've written so far, you maybe think that it was about the gifts for us. You'd be mistaken. You see, out of 51 Christmases, I've described four times I remember gifts, because Christmas really wasn't about Santa or gifts for us. It was about the spirit of it all. It was about the feels.

I don't know about you, but when I was little it never occurred to me that Christmas wasn't on the weekend. Christmas break made every day a Saturday, it seemed. I just assumed Christmas fell on the weekend. We'd go to my Grandma Huber's on the Sunday for lunch. There was turkey and my grandma's perfect mashed potatoes and my mom's noodles and homemade rolls. We'd have to wait until the dishes were done to open the gift our grandparents (or more likely my Aunt Ethel) got for us. There were so many of us there, the house would feel like the middle of summer. We'd go in the breezeway just to cool off. We'd sit at the kids' table and use the broken crayons that were kept in an old cigar box to color page after page in the big coloring books Grandma always had. We'd eat that old fashioned hard candy and no matter how many of us there were (literally dozens) my sweet, tiny grandma would let us sit on her lap and feel the soft skin on her arms as that wrapped around us so tightly.

My Grandma Elsie made candy. I mean all kinds of candy. Not cookies... fudge and things covered in melted chocolate or almond bark. Peanut brittle that stuck to your teeth. She made so much candy that one year we found a pan of fudge she'd put in a spare closet to cool in July. She had one of those ceramic Christmas trees she'd painted herself and later a fiber optic tree that sat next to her red lava lamp. We'd go over Christmas day and eat candy and tell her what Santa brought us while my grandpa snoozed in his recliner. When we were older they would be traveling to Florida or Texas in their motorhome, but Elsie would always call with a Merry Christmas and "what did that old Santy bring you this year?"

We always had real tree. Dad put it in a bucket of rocks, and it invariably fell over at least once after we decorated it. My mom always, always said the tree looked better after it fell. She'd tell us to squint our eyes and look at the lights, how they all ran together and looked so warm. We had a cardboard fireplace that was the centerpiece of our holiday decor. She'd put "angel hair" that was made of spun glass on the top and little things she found here and there that told a Christmas story. A little wooden nativity. A green glass stocking that once held Avon perfume. A green Christmas tree that was an air freshener. Little ornaments that she put in the corner cabinet in the kitchen that she made look like different floors of a house. In her mind, as she decorated it, she created a story about the different levels and then would tell it to us, and we'd add to what she started with using our own imaginationss, sometimes arguing with each other, because someone else's story didn't fit ours. Mom always found a way to mix them all together and make them all fit.

My dad always was the last to get up on Christmas morning. The man never slept past dawn on any other day of the year, but he seemed to stay in bed FOREVER. FOREVER probably being 5 a.m. He'd get his cup of coffee and sit on the couch by my mom while we opened gifts. My mom would make waffles for breakfast. She hates the smell of pancakes and waffles lingering in a house, so it was a labor of love on her part to make them. I remember seeing my parents sitting on the couch together and having just a small realization that they were people outside of being our parents. They were a couple, and on Christmas Day, their love seemed a little brighter.

As I got older, of course, Christmas changed. It always does. We become the givers and not the getters. The year my dad died, my mom and I didn't put up a tree or cook anything special. We sat on her bed and watched movies all day. I remember how quiet is was. No smell of coffee and tobacco. Not waiting for him to stagger down the hall, wiping the sleep from his eyes. That's one I'd like to remember a little less. But such is life. The hard days living in the memories, too.

I remember years of wrapping gifts for my nieces and nephews. I remember wrapping presents with my sister-in-law and brother until we were slap happy and doing more playing with the toys then putting ribbons on. I remember the year the kids and I made ornaments with their hand prints on them. Tiny little fingers wrapped around the bottom of a glass ball. My mom found them this year, the ones we made her. Gavin's, Sydnee's and Delaney's And she can trace her fingers across the ridges of paint their little hands made and feel that Christmas.

I remember helping my brother with his light show in his yard and Sydnee talking to the lighted reindeer, because she imagined they were real. She was making her own Christmas story, just like her Moo Grandma did years and years before. Landon jumping up and down and squeezing my face because SANTA DID COME! Gavin getting Christmas pajamas and being less than thrilled. Delaney saying "you cannot be this dumb" when I was trying to help her put the lights up for the big tree in their front yard. She was wrong. I could be that dumb.

When I married, my husband and I wanted to have our own Christmas traditions. We started by getting a real tree. The first one we could barely get through the front door and it gave my poison ivy. The next one had very few needles a week before Christmas even arrived. I remember how awkward the first Christmas with my husband and his girls felt, but by the second one, they felt like Christmas  to me. Candlelight and cocoa and the scent of pine. Their laughter and their voices quoting lines from The Grinch and Elf.  Driving around looking at Christmas lights and ooooing and awwwwing. Creating our own Christmas magic.

All of these things... the cardboard fireplace, Elsie's fudge, Evelyn's soft skin, Randy waking us at 4 a.m. and falling asleep on our floor waiting until Mom said it was okay to get up, Stacie passing out the presents, the smell of waffles and coffee and tobacco and pine, how my heart skips a beat when my husband's fingers brush mine as he hands me the coffee mug that says "Mrs. Santa", how awkward MPG is while opening gifts, the way Michaela always loves anything we give her. Sitting on the couch with Gavin and Sydnee and Landon and Delaney eating Christmas cookies they had baked. The sound of the Christmas bells from the church down the street. The messages that say "Merry Christmas, I love you" from Mandy and Danny and Addie and Alison... all of those things are the real Christmas to me.

While family and friends added their own magic to my Christmases and I'm so grateful for that, my mom is where my Christmas spirit was born, in that little house with that wood stove and very little else. I can't imagine the sacrifices my parents made to create those memories, that magic. I'll never be able to fully express my gratitude for it. I just hope I've created even a small measure of that magic for those I love. Not by the gifts, but by the spirit.  

This year, we have a tiny little girl who won't even remember this Christmas, but it will be the one all the others are built on. Every year we'll add memories and magic. And hopefully on the Eve of the Eve of her fifty-first Christmas, all is calm and all is bright, because when she looks back on them all, she remembers the spirit of it, the love, the feeling. I hope she is reminded of the shiny parts and the harder ones, because there will be hard ones, fade in the glow of Christmas lights. No hell. Just magic.

Have yourself a merry little Christmas. May your heart be light.

There are certain...

times in our lives where we are expected to "rise to the occasion*". We are expected to perform feats of superhuman strength be it mentally, physically or emotionally, because the circumstances call for it. These can range from remaining level headed in the face of a medical crisis to doing 12 hours of work in an 8 hour day, to running on very few hours of sleep over many, many days while caring for a tiny human, to conducting oneself with dignity in the face of the loss of a loved one, to making a magical Christmas while also trying to run your daily life. The expectation is that we will do what has to be done and are stronger for it and proud of what we made happen under sometimes extraordinary circumstances. That's a lot of pressure.

Who in the fresh hell decided we have to always rise?

Google inspirational quotes about perseverance or not giving up. Wait, don't. You'll throw your back out rolling your eyes. Or worse, you'll feel a demand to perform under duress in an unhealthy way. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger! What? Those are the options? Death or strength? Humans are more nuanced than that. Our coping abilities are so incredibly varied and subject to external and internal forces, that it's not always as simple as "do or die".

When I think about people "rising to the occasion", I have immediate images and memories of situations where I've witnessed just that. My friend at the hospital when her then husband was in a horrible car accident that killed his cousin... I can vividly hear her wailing when she was told the cousin hadn't survived and then her pulling herself together to go see her critically injured husband, who was too injured to be told about the profound loss.

I remember another friend writing the words "Please come. I need you." to a friend when her son was having a life threatening medical crisis. "Please pray." came another message. "I'm scared." Then her taking the lead in finding the best care for her child and receiving her miracle.

When my SIL called to tell me about my niece... "Lisa. It's Delaney. She's not going to be okay." through tears. Her voice breaking while she knew what she was telling me was breaking my heart. Crying with me on the phone. Then calmly explaining the information she had while continually offering me support and then carrying our family through the next several days and weeks.

Let's visit about this, I said the three memories I shared with you above were examples of people I know "rising to the occasion". When you read them you likely admired the part where they performed as expected in the face of adversity. They carried their burden and made things happen and took care of what needed to be taken care of. But what if the real beauty is in the reaction not the action? The wailing and the admission of fear and the breaking voice, because those are some of the realest moments I've ever experienced.

Yes, they all had to get on with it. Things needed to be done. Incredibly important things. But before that, before the doing, somewhere in the pause, in the sharp inhale because it hurts so incredibly much, in the moment before the cry when our brains have processed what our hearts can't quite yet hold, is the real rising. It's where we are so raw and wrong side out that we are being almost involuntarily honest. Perhaps the motion forward after that is all acting. It's doing what I'm supposed to do and what's expected. It's suspending the reality to do the work. For me, the getting things done isn't nearly as courageous as the hurt and fear being laid bare. The stronger isn't in the surviving necessarily, it's in the moments after we find out and the moments before we start to act, it's the part where we're living it not surviving it.

Those are extreme examples, but most of us experience the pressure to push through regularly under less intense circumstances. That daily pressure adds up. Day after day living with the expectation that we will always do what needs to be done and what needs to be done right this very second. We're expected to make things happen while making it all look so easy. We get a "well done!" with an undercurrent of "we'll do this all again tomorrow".

What if I don't want to? What if I'm tired of rising and performing and carrying and having pressure applied? What if I don't want to choose between death and strength? What if I don't want to always become a diamond?

I saw a post by a lovely friend MRR that, in essence, said people are telling us they are struggling, hurting, frustrated or in desperate need of help and oftentimes our response is "you've got this", when they've just told us they don't. It's reflexive to tell someone "you can do it" when they've said they can't. We want to cheerlead, and we truly believe they can and likely they will, but what we've really done is tell them they aren't feeling what they say they are. Bigger than that, we've let them know that they aren't safe asking us for help, because all we'll offer is an inspirational quote. What we should be telling them is it's okay to not be able to handle everything that we've been given. It's more than okay to ask someone to hold something for us. It's okay to do what you can and leave the rest. 

Somewhere along the way, we've decided it's a virtue to spread oneself so thin we almost disappear. We're expected to figure things out and stay on top of things and handle things and not complain. We've all become professional jugglers and more and more things get thrown at us and we're expected to keep them all in the air. Make the appointments, do the shopping, over-perform at work, cook, clean, fold the laundry, run the errands, care for the kids, visit family, make time for friends, wrap the presents, practice self-care, quality time with partner, cheer at the ballgames, put the damn laundry away, keep up with current events, voice your opinions, make informed decisions, be informed, floss, let the dogs out and in and out and in...and don't forget to breath and grieve and move on and never forget.

We're expecting ourselves into a nice little breakdown, and we're putting expectations on other that are driving them in the same direction. We cannot just say, "It'll be okay." because one day it might not be.

What's the answer? No seriously, I'm asking what is the answer? There are things we simply must do and things we have to get through. But maybe right now, in the most wonderful time of the year when we are all feeling the pressure to make it magical, we give ourselves permission to just simply NOT. We take one thing off our list every day. I mean obviously feed those kids and yourself and pay those bills so you keep warm, but maybe don't curl the ribbon on the presents. Or maybe you put your 8 hours in at work and close the door behind you and let it go, because it will be there tomorrow. Maybe don't fold the underpants, just throw them in the drawer. Don't make the bed. Say no to an invitation you're not thrilled to get, don't bake the cookies...don't and don't and don't. 

It could be like a good kind of peer pressure if we all agree to do less. Now, by all means, if you can't relate to what I'm writing then keep doing exactly what you are doing. If it works for you, I'm cheering for you! But if you are like me and you're feeling overwhelmed and then feeling like a failure because you're feeling overwhelmed, we could decide we've risen enough for now. We could decide we are exactly what the occasion needs just as we are. We don't need to be or do more. Perhaps if we all start doing a little less of what's giving us hell, we could do more of what is truly wonderful. Sometimes, the beauty and strength really is in the pause.

Of course, I realize the privilege in all of this. There are people who wish they had what I'm complaining about, but that doesn't make what I struggle with invalid; it just makes it mine. 

* Is it just me or does this phrase make you picture a loaf of unbaked bread in a tuxedo? Just me, huh? Cool.

We're apparently...

in the season of gratitude. That sounds charming, doesn't it? Gratitude. It has a great flow, lots of vowels and consonants with a funny word in the middle. It looks great on signs hanging in one's dining room. Grateful, thankful, blessed...we're all supposed to be feeling that all the time but especially over the next few days. I mean the holiday has the word THANKS right at the very beginning of it. If you can't find something to be thankful for on Thanksgiving when the fresh hell can you?

   We've all seen that part in movies where the family gathers around the table for a beautiful feast. The turkey all golden brown like it just returned from a week at the beach. The table beautifully set with mounds of sides (the BEST part of the meal is the sides). The family dressed casually yet beautifully (no stretchy pants is unrealistic), smiling at each other, folding their hands and saying grace. Then they go around the table and say what they are most grateful for that year. What a beautiful scene. No pressure, right? I mean the people they love the most are sitting right there and they have to say what they are most thankful for that year. How could that go wrong? 

    Yet they all manage to do it. They all come up with a sweet and heartwarming yet concise statement of what has been their biggest blessing that year. No one repeats each other; everyone's seems similar enough to cover the big ones (family, health and love) yet enough different to keep us from scrolling through TikTok. Then, inevitably, someone stands up and raises their glass and gives the absolute perfect toast summing up everyone else's but of course more eloquently and with an added punch of sentimentality that makes everyone say HERE! HERE! Just precious.

    Here's how that goes in most houses, gathered around the table, you have the ones with social anxiety (yes, you can have that even with people you are familiar and close with) who start to squirm and are unable to focus on what other's are saying because they are so stressed about having to speak up and out and get it right...the ones who are just phoning it in because this part is so cringe...the ones who are hangry because dinner is an hour and a half later than expected due to the underestimation of the time it takes to peel 20 pounds of potatoes and because Aunt Becky was an hour late, as usual...the ones who did ALL the work to make this a special day and it's ruined because it's not living up to the expectations they had in their head...and the ones who always go last and pontificate and preach and otherwise go on and on and on trying to reproduce the HERE!HERE! part of the movie while the rest of us are starving and everything is getting cold. I mean COME ON...just say "my family" so we can all dig into those potatoes!

    And who carves a turkey at the table? Too messy and time consuming when there's butter rolls to gobble! (See what I did there? Turkey...gobble)

    Okay, it is lovely to take a few moments to sit with those we love and be grateful for them and everything we have. It's important really in some ways so that we realize the great privilege we have and generally take for granted in our day-to-day lives. Recognizing that we are blessed is necessary if for no other reason but to encourage us to help where we can and give what we're able to others.

    But, because of course there's a but, what if it's been a hard year and we just can't see it? What if in this season we just can't see the sweet in our lives because we're living something incredibly bitter? When one's life is a pile of rubble, how do we pick through it and find the shiny bit that we hold up for others to see? How do we say we're grateful for THIS when THAT is so broken?

    Maybe we don't. Maybe we shouldn't have to. Maybe it's unfair to expect ourselves and others to find the good when our burdens are so heavy that finding the good seems like another stone to carry. 

    Sit with me on the porch and let's talk about the sadness and the hardships this season can also bring, because they are numerous and overwhelming. They create a circle of shame...I'm supposed to feel X because it's the holidays but I'm so frozen in Y and Z, I can't, so I probably deserve X, because everyone has something be grateful for, but my X is so big I can't see anything else. My X is so devastating that it's taking up all the space, so perhaps I deserve X because I'm not counting my blessings.

    Or those of us who have had something wonderful happen (say...the birth of a child or grandchild) and yet we still feel the heaviness of something else in our lives. A loss, a life change, a lack of serotonin (not a joke, it's a real thing especially this time of year). We know we should be living in bliss...over the moon...happy as a lark, but we're still struggling, because something really amazing doesn't erase something hard.

    The added pressure this time of year exacerbates the bruises and breaks we've experienced. Those wounds can be brand new or old ones that have never or can never heal. We miss people in a different way during the holidays, don't you feel? We count how many Christmases we've not been able to spend with them. A friend who has a son in the military can tell you exactly how many and which Christmases her son has been home for in the past decade. Not many. We count how many years since our last Thanksgiving with a loved one. Or we ache to our bones because this is the first one without them or the second or the whatever number, because no matter how many it's been, they can all still be so hard. We feel their losses more deeply right now, because the empty seat is enormously empty...it's a visceral reminder of a pain so profound we can't verbalize it.

    Grateful isn't always easy, and sometimes when it is, it's only able to be felt on a superficial level. Let's imagine the scene around the table in our real lives, shall we? Sister says "family and health", brother says "same", Aunt Betty says, "my children and family and that my bursitis in my hip isn't acting up today", Mom says, "being here together, good food and a healthy family" and Dad says, "You guys and jobs to pay for all this grub, now let's eat it!" I mean, which is more realistic, mine or Hallmarks? And you know what? Both are okay. Both are valid and right.

    What's also right and valid is the one who sits staring at their hands with tears rolling down their face because they are heartbroken for whatever reason. The one who is so concerned about the daughter who isn't here with her feet under the table because she's out there somewhere doing things that are causing destruction to herself and her family. The one who misses him so much because it's the first holiday without him but also feels guilty because they can see a glimmer of hope that they won't always carry the intense loss in this way. The one who thought they'd have a baby to shush and hold and feed this holiday. The one who does have a new little stocking to hang, but also carries the fear that because they received something so wonderful, the universe will take something else.

    Here's the thing...all of those things exist around almost any table. Just like the foods we eat at that table...bitter and sweet...our hearts can hold both. Our hearts can also at any given moment only have space for one of them.

    So here we are, finally, at my point. If you feel bursting to the seams with gratitude this holiday, that's incredible and beautiful and valid and equally important as those who don't. You shouldn't have to dim your joy because other's can't find there's in this moment. Be reasonable, of course. Don't make us all sit there starving while you list all your recent acquisitions or every "atta boy" email you received this year, but do feel the depth of thankfulness as fully as you need to. To be fair, we have to allow those who feel intensely grateful this year to be just that, because life can be hard, yo, and we should celebrate when we feel we can.

    Also, equally importantly, we need to allow space for those of us who simply cannot name something. We shouldn't expect them to or force them to mumble a platitude when their hearts are barely holding together. We should let them sit quietly at the table or in their own homes without badgering or pressuring them to BE THANKFUL DARN IT...COUNT YOUR BLESSINGS...FIND THE SILVER LINING! Because some things are just too big and dark to see through or around. Sometimes what we are so deeply ungrateful for is so immense, we simply cannot carry another thing. And that has to be welcomed at our tables too.

    So maybe this year, during this season, we allow grief or loss or fear or heartache or the sadness we can't name to have a seat. Perhaps we at least try to put it at the table with the weird cousin who eats with his hands and puts ketchup on mashed potatoes. We allow it to be there; we acknowledge it as a guest, unwelcomed and persistent, who is simply part and parcel of the human experience. Just like we can be grateful any day of the year but especially on Thanksgiving, we can also be bereft on any day of the year but especially on Thanksgiving. There's room at the table for all of us and all of that. If we can fit both the delicious sage dressing and the gross sweet potatoes, we certainly have room for all the emotions the holiday brings with it.

    Let's be gentle with each other now and always, but especially now. As for me, I'm grateful for a new little person who will in a couple of years sit at our kid's table, and I'm missing my Delaney and my dad ever so much this year. Maybe in part because of that new little one, my heart feels heavy for my dad who never truly got to experience Grandparenthood and my niece who didn't get to mom nearly long enough.

    See, I can do both at once. My heart is overflowing with joy and love and gratitude...but the space that's always full of Dee and Dad and my Grandparents still comes uninvited. And that's okay...it's because I loved them so big and hard, I wish they were here to see me count this new blessing. Bitter and sweet, they both exist often simultaneously and either can consume any moment including a holiday. Let them come, whether you bring them or someone else does. Because pretending they both don't exist doesn't erase them, it makes them louder. Don't hide your gratitude or your sorrow this year. Make room for the heaven and the hell...just don't make room for that cranberry jelly stuff...no body is grateful for that. 

MLG 11/17/22 my heart is fuller because of you.

Hurt people...

hurt people. That's one of those things people say to make us feel better when we've been wronged or to make us feel better when we're the one doing the wrong. I do believe it tends to be true. Of course, not everyone who has been hurt, hurts and not everyone who hurts us has been hurt. But we've all been hurt and, frankly, we've all done some hurting of others. The second part of that sentence tends to make us uncomfortable, but it's still true. We are all part villain and part victim. I'm the bad guy in other people's story* and maybe you are the antagonist in mine. We've all done and said things that have done harm. I mean, we can't all be the victim all the time, right? Someone has to be doing the hurting. Someone has to be the one giving the hell.

When someone has done something to me that has created a wound, I do (usually) try to understand why. Is it me? Am I the one who caused the initial hurt that's now being reflected back to me? Is this person simply lashing out at me, because I'm the closest or easiest target? Do they feel safe expressing their anger or sadness or hurt with me, because they trust me to understand and forgive? Or are they just plain mean? Usually, it's not mean, it really is a bad seed someone else planted in them and for whatever reason, they are reaping it all over me or you. Or maybe I am the drama.

When I was in fifth grade, we had a new principal. He was a younger man and, in hindsight, I can easily say he was earnest, serious and desperately wanting to be taken seriously. He was a bit more than necessary. I remember distinctly on a warm day at the beginning of the school year he was giving what I truly believe he thought was a profound and inspiring speech to our class. He walked up and down the rows the entire time he was addressing the students of whom he was now in charge. I remember feeling very snoozy and overly warm and bored out of my mind. I was fighting to keep my eyes open and sweating like, well, a kid in an un-airconditioned class room during late summer. My glasses began to slide down my nose. As the principal walked by, he took his middle finger and pushed my glasses up my nose, the tip of his finger ever-so-slightly tapped against my forehead between my eyebrows.

And something inside me exploded in white hot rage.

It was embarrassing, of course. Girls shouldn't sweat (keep in mind it was the early eighties). It's likely only the classmates sitting to my left and my right saw, if they even did. It wasn't the embarrassment as much as the tap of his finger on the spot of skin at the top of my nose. This man touched me. Now let me be clear, it wasn't something nefarious, it was a simple gesture meant, likely, to be helpful and at worst to assert his authority and make sure I was paying attention to his dutiful droning. But to a little girl like me who was terrified of men, who had been touched in terrible ways, who couldn't tell anyone what was hurting, it was a match dropped in gasoline.

I sat in that chair hearing nothing but the sound of my pulse pounding in my ears, the rest of his bloviation lost on me. All I could think about, all I could feel was that hot, angry, shameful spot at the top of my nose. It felt on fire. And that fire began to spread and grow and it started consuming the part of me that could control my reactions to men. It burned through my desperate need to be nice and liked and made me a heat-seeking missile toward men. 

Interesting isn't? I had endured horrible touching and suffered in silence without so much as a tear. I didn't make a sound at that, but this...this fingertip to my forehead caused me to get very loud, very quickly. A few minutes later, our class went to P.E. and that is where 10 year old hurt Lisa, hurt someone. 

Our P.E. teacher was a man. He was actually an incredibly kind and encouraging man. He had a wife and children. He was doing his job and working with kids who were of varying athletic ability and interest. Yet he showed up week after week to teach. And I was there, week after week, putting him through hell. Now, I realize I was a kid, and, because I'm pretty ashamed of that behavior now, perhaps it wasn't as bad for him as I feel it was. But perhaps it was. Maybe, I did hurt him. The incredibly harsh things that came out of my mouth, the attempts to undermine his authority, the blatant disrespect...I feel almost sick thinking about it now. If I were he, I would have hated me, even though I was a kid.

But if he felt that way, he never let me know. He ignored it for the most part, and when he did address it, he didn't yell, he just told me to go sit down and be quiet. Sometimes, he'd send me in to wash my face and calm down. He never sent me to the Principal. He just kept showing up and doing his job. I'd like to think that maybe I wasn't that bad, but I know I was. It's a big regret of mine. I can tell myself that I was a kid who was betrayed and broken, but I still can't excuse my behavior to myself. 

I was a hurt person who hurt a person, right? No. It's not right. It's really, really not. And yes, I was a kid and he was an adult and yada yada, but it's still wrong. Just because you were hurt doesn't make it excusable to hurt someone else. We still have to be held accountable for our actions. We can't excuse it or ignore it or explain it away, because if everyone who is hurt goes around hurting people, then everyone will keep being hurt and keep hurting and the ride won't ever stop. Hurt people who hurt people are still absolutely wrong for doing so. Full stop.

Adults now use that little saying to allow them to perpetrate all sorts of emotional damage on others. Don't get me wrong, I fully believe in triggers...see above with the finger to the glasses, BUT I believe my triggers are my responsibility to address and monitor and regulate. Grown Lisa knows that the fire that was lit by the simple, innocuous touch was about something deep and terrible. It was about ME not him, but it also wasn't about the teacher who bore the brunt of my rage. 

Let me be clear here, kids who have been harmed are not to blame for the way they process and deal with what happened to them, again, full stop. I do believe we have to start teaching personal responsibility and accountability for behavior at some point, so that the hurt doesn't perpetuate hurt. We have to start somewhere, yes? We cannot dismiss transgressions against others simply because we've been transgressed against. (Forgiveness without boundaries is also unhealthy, but that's for another day.) 

We need to start listening to what people aren't saying out loud, but their behavior is screaming. We need to ask what was created in them that is now creating damage to others. We need to help them find and then heal their villain origin story before they become someone else's. As importantly, we need to not allow them to go unchecked. They can't go around causing explosions without so much as a look back. Hurt people don't get to hurt people without repercussions. They can't or everything and everyone will go up in flames.

I've thought about that teacher a lot lately. He didn't know I was hurting. I'm absolutely positive that if he did, he would have helped. He didn't know, because I couldn't say. All I could do was be mean. All I could do was hurt, because I was hurting. But I'm so very sorry. Adult Lisa is so incredibly sorry for what 10 year old Lisa did and said. So, yes, we should try to understand why someone is lashing out, acting out, and hurting others. We need to gently walk back with them until they find that point where someone caused the hurt that creates more hurt and help them put that fire out before it consumes them and those around them. Even when we are burning, we must choose not burn others, because lighting someone else on fire won't put out the flames of our own hell.

*This is a different story for another blog. If you think you know, you probably don't know the truth.

You've heard said...

comparison is the thief of joy, I'm sure. I wish I'd heard that when I was younger. My lands, the amount of time I spent comparing my hair, clothes, skin, body, accomplishments (or lack thereof), grades, inability to shoot a lay-up or actually do pretty much anything athletic to my peers and my siblings probably, embarrassingly, adds up to years of my life. Now, don't get all weird and start with the "not all comparisons...". You understand what I mean, and if you don't, you're either choosing not to, or this particular porch visit isn't for you. And that's cool. Maybe the next one will be. Because you see, I'm okay with not being everyone's cup of tea, because, to be fair, not everyone is mine.  

I think about what I could have been doing during that time instead of stealing my own joy and I almost roll my eyes out of my own head at myself. I still compare myself to others, but on a much smaller scale than I used to. I do believe with age comes maybe not necessarily wisdom but at least some clarity. I'm not racing anyone except the mean Lisa in my head who wants me to live in a constant state of "you're not enough" or "you're too much". Mean Lisa's voice seems much quieter now. She tends to only cage rattle when someone outside of my own little brain says or does (or doesn't say or doesn't do) something intentional or not that makes me question myself.

Those questions, at their core, are about the validity of my life choices or the space I'm currently occupying. Should I be doing more? Should I have more? But ultimately the question ends up being "Should I be more?" Since Mean Lisa is pretty freaking abusive, she wants to isolate me with these thoughts. She compares even the fact that I'm having those thoughts with others. "I'm sure SHE doesn't toss and turn at night about THAT." "I'm sure they don't second guess things the way YOU do." 

I'd like to be noble and say, "I hope I'm the only one." but, truthfully, I hope I'm not. If comparison is the thief of joy, then companionship is the bearer of hope. I know I'm not in this alone. People I love have talked to me about their own self-doubt, about the Meanie who lives within them. If we're all in the same boat with this, we need a bigger one.

Remember being a teenager and having your entire life ahead of you, and being in some kind of all fired hurry to have it all planned out? My wedding colors were going to be pink and yellow (Egads!), I'd have three kids, write speeches for the President, and have a sunken living room with a sectional (we called them pit groups in the eighties). With the exception of the pit group, none of that happened. Seventeen year old me would have been so disappointed in myself. Now that I think about it, Mean Lisa is 17 year old me. She's also an echo of every mean girl who made fun of my clothes, hair, body, etc. The good news is, those voices are less intrusive now. I can tell them to shut the fresh hell up, and they do. Because we are in control of what we think about ourselves, if we chose to exercise that control.

Now that we know who the thief is and who the bringer of hope is, there's one more meme we need to create. Expectation is the death of contentment. Okay, so I'm of course not talking about expectation of behavior (i.e. don't be a jerk, obvi) or expectation of performance at your job, or expectations of behavior within a relationship or honoring your commitments. I'm talking about the expectations we put on ourselves to have, be and do. "I should have more..." "I should be more..." "I should do more to have more and be more." 

Round and Round it goes, where it stops nobody knows. WHAT it stops is contentment. It's the capacity to stand in the middle of your life and feel peace. It can make us take for granted the things we do have, what we are and what we've done, because we're expecting the next thing. Man is that lesson hard to learn, especially now when all we see is MORE than we are. Cleaner and bigger houses, wide smiles, adorable children, well-trained pets, magazine-worthy decor, perfect marriages...perfect lives. We certainly know all of that is curated for public consumption. I can't count the number of times I've taken a picture of my dogs doing cute things immediately after cleaning up a puddle of pee in my dining room. (MOOSE!) We know it's not the entire picture, yet we try to recreate it just the same.

My older step-daughter knew from a young age that her passion is teaching, and she has worked her cute booty off to make that happen. She's brilliant at it. The kids in her class are incredibly fortunate to have someone so dedicated. Her path wasn't always easy, but it always had a direction. She is thriving. It's a beautiful thing to watch. Just because someone's life seems to be a "natural progression" doesn't mean that it hasn't been hard-fought and without struggles. MPG has consistently persevered and created that progression. I'm constantly amazed by her tenacity. 

My younger step-daughter's path has been a bit less of a straight line. The girl has been all over the place. (Disclaimer: my younger step-daughter knows I'm writing this and whole-heartedly approves of this message. She's looking to encourage with this, just like I am. So for real leave the porch if you can't understand that.) She has tried on several hats while searching for her passion. Let's see... nurse, respiratory therapist, math professor, business major, insurance sales, cosmetologist, and now she's majoring in kinesiology. DID I MISS ANY MAB?

As people who are fully invested in her success, we sometimes want to say (yell?) "DECIDE ALREADY!" My goodness kiddo, pick something and do that. Have, be, do and have, be, do it right now. And I know she's felt that from us. I know she's felt the frustration and displeasure, but what it really is on our part is fear. What if she doesn't ever have what she needs? What if she's never what she is supposed to be? What if she never does what we all expect her to do, which is settle down and ease our worries? Because while we all want joy and contentment for those we love, what we also selfishly want is for them to be sorted out so we don't have to fret about them.

It's not just our expectations of ourselves that can destroy our contentment; it's our expectations of others that can not only kill their contentment but our own. Right? I mean if I'm constantly expecting people to fit into the boxes I've assigned them arbitrarily and even selfishly, how am I ever going to be at peace? If folks aren't being and doing and having what I think they should, how can I know contentment? And how can they when they feel us pressing in on them to settle down and follow the path? We steal our peace and theirs. We are not only our own Meanies but, terribly, theirs as well.

Ugh.

It's so hard to not think that our route on the map is always the best one. We came up with it, so it must be. But our route is ours and someone else won't have the same experience following it. Perhaps there's more traffic for them, or they hit every single red light. Perhaps they enjoy a more scenic route. Or maybe they see the value in taking a more direct way in order to get where they are going because they are ready to be there. Saying "the joy is in the journey" isn't always fair or accurate. For some people it is a joy and they find their haves, bes, and dos along the way, and for others it's being at their destination so they can have, be and do in the place they've been moving toward their whole lives that brings their joy. Neither is wrong. Neither is better. Both are valid. Expecting others to use our map ruins the journey for them because where we are going isn't ever where they are. Each life path is unique and fresh. Realizing that for ourselves and for others actually translates to our being able to see the part of others' journeys that hold joy and helping them when they breakdown or hit traffic.

As usual, all of that has been headed here. The midlife crisis thing is a real deal for some of us. Maybe crisis is a misnomer. Perhaps we should reframe it as a midlife refreshing. This summer I struggled with it. While I am absolutely content in my very joyful marriage (no comparing/no expecting), I found myself wondering if this is all there is professionally. I have several wonderful people in my life who are experiencing this same thing. Empty nest, loss of partners to divorce or death, loss of careers, direction, motivation and on and on. Lots of loss and empty. And man, that is some scary hell. The question, "Now what?" plays on repeat. So does, "It's probably too late for me to do... or be... or have..."

Again, ugh. There are times I've wondered if perhaps I had taken the long and winding road to get to my destination, I wouldn't feel so lost where I'm at. I didn't know what my passion was, so I picked a job. That's a very hard thing to come to terms with. Writing it is weird, because it doesn't feel entirely honest. The truth is, I think I did know what it was, but I was too scared to do it. Or maybe I was so busy expecting to have everything figured out that I didn't take my time to find out what would give me fulfillment and contentment, in other words, to actually figure it out. I think maybe I'm taking baby steps to get and be and have what I've always wanted. It's scary and exciting and refreshing, even if I did wait until mid-life-ish to change course.

Folks like my older step-daughter KNEW her passion and moved heaven and earth to make it happen. My younger step-daughter hasn't always known. Maybe she still doesn't, but she isn't settling. She's still seeking. She's still driving us mad with her twists and turns, but it isn't about us in either case. It's about their individual journeys. It's about them cutting a path, climbing over and under and through to find where they belong. And it's our jobs to worry and care, of course, about those we love but also to encourage and cheer and help them change a tire when they need it. We can point out the obstacles, but we shouldn't be removing them or forcing them to re-route because it's what we want. That obstacle may be steering them in a better, truer direction. Recalculating, make a u-turn, recalculating...I hate when my mapping systems says it, so I shouldn't be saying it about anyone's life.

Here's the fresh in all of this, I am excited about where I am going and what comes next, but let me be clear, I am so incredibly content with where I am. Which is, once again, sitting in my bed in the middle of the night*, dogs and husband snoring softly, hand on my leg, talking a little fresh hell with you.

*DU if you are up reading this, I hope you are content with your cereal choice and it brings you joy. You deserve it.