As winds begin gusting under a setting sun, tornado watches and warnings are appearing in black and red shades dotting the state map. The gloomiest of meteorologists begin talking about taking motorcycle helmets to closets. I sit under a cozy blanket by the fire wondering if I should take a shower and get dressed. I’m well prepared for disaster. Candles, matches, batteries, water, and weather radios – I have it all.
But how prepared are we for disasters that don’t come with sirens and notice? And what are the definitions for disasters? We stare at life and it stares back watching as jobs are lost, relationships fail and children disappoint. People don’t meet expectations and pets die. Sometimes, disaster happens in a second of time and the hours of life are changed forever. Disasters are self-defined. From a cake that doesn’t rise to a death in the family, each one of us may use the same terms for catastrophe of minor or major consequence.
I’m tired of planning for might be. I’m tired of catastrophizing. I’m just plain tired. And so my emergency plan is now to move forward secure with life lessons rather than armed with cases of green beans. I will focus on skills instead of purchases of beef jerky, vegetable seeds and solar powered showers.
My new preparedness tools begin with kindness to people - - they will be there for me in times of need. Non-judgmental attitude to others –- they may not judge me so harshly. Empathy for the downtrodden –-they may find me in their company when I need a helping hand. Compassion for the circumstances others find terrifying – -for surely, each definition belongs to the owner and is not mine to change.
Acceptance, openness, honesty. These are among the skills that will take us through life when it slaps us down because these are the ways in which friends are made and family is redefined. Life may find us opening a can of beanie weenies in the dark or crying under the sheets; but it’s only people who pick us up when we’re down and surround us with that which cannot be bought at the last minute-–Love.
Sunday, February 27, 2011
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Redefinitions
I asked someone once if he were happy. “I’m not unhappy,” he responded. At that time, I thought his answer was sad. Where was joy, elatedness, contentment? If you weren’t unhappy, weren’t you happy? What kind of scale did he use to measure his life?
Lately, I’ve been thinking about happiness and how to define it. It seems that I’ve given a lot of power to other people when it comes to how I feel. Give me a little praise and I’m like a lap dog panting for more. Say I look like I’ve lost weight, and I’m your friend for life. Sadly, I’ve given even more power to the nasty ones--the wicked, rude, mean human replicas that sabotage good feelings and who were the authors of my life’s chapter and paragraph. They defined if I were happy or not or if my day was good or bad. But, I’m not going to let them write my book any more.
Once if you asked if I were happy, I might say yes if it was day lived in the absence of destruction and terror and gloom. Or if I successfully turned my back and shunned the people who did not evoke joy, then I also would be happy. After all, happy is the opposite of sad. Good the opposite of bad. Right the opposite of wrong.
Life doesn’t work that way though. I’ve learned that manipulative people, by nature, will manipulate. Liars will lie. The corrupt will find ways to burrow like chiggers into the skin of the innocent. Not to me. Not anymore. I’ve taken the power back and use it to stand in the same room with the wretched and understand their evil and not let it touch me. I let their falsehoods bounce off me and reabsorb in their heartless body shells. I've accepted the reality that these people exist and live on the planet.
Somewhere in regaining power, I’ve redefined happiness. Somewhere in this game we call life, emotions live in the grey between black and white. Happiness is not the joyous height of euphoria that comes from surviving a life altering event or the mere absence of those who cause heartburn. Sadness is not the blank feelings of those pondering suicide. In between the extremes, there is not an abyss. In the space where the pendulum swings, it stills in a place that one person defines as not unhappy, another; peace and another; simply good.
I’ve believed that life was about swinging from trees on vines that never break jumping away from bad and into good. I’ve spent decades climbing from threat and into a peaceful canopy. I now realize that sometimes the vine breaks and I land smack in the middle of life. This event is not a catastrophe plunging me into the depths of dispair and misery. It doesn’t have to be defined or categorized. It doesn’t have to fit someone else’s definition. It’s enough to simply be alive. Every once in a while, I may find myself staring down someone whose weak vine dropped them into my world at the same time, but I have the power to walk away. They are not going to change my day or define my life. They are not going to control my emotions. Each day is an adventure and I don’t know if I will be unhappy, happy or perhaps feel something different, but it’s mine to define…mine to feel…mine to own.
In the distant past, after encountering the wicked, I would run home crying and be miserable. In the recent past, I might run away screaming over my back, “Adios, sucker. Sayonara, Satan’s seed. Au Revoir, insipid idiot.” Today, I might just say Goodbye as I slowly walk away and breathe in all the emotions that life offers which cannot be weighed and measured on a scale.
Lately, I’ve been thinking about happiness and how to define it. It seems that I’ve given a lot of power to other people when it comes to how I feel. Give me a little praise and I’m like a lap dog panting for more. Say I look like I’ve lost weight, and I’m your friend for life. Sadly, I’ve given even more power to the nasty ones--the wicked, rude, mean human replicas that sabotage good feelings and who were the authors of my life’s chapter and paragraph. They defined if I were happy or not or if my day was good or bad. But, I’m not going to let them write my book any more.
Once if you asked if I were happy, I might say yes if it was day lived in the absence of destruction and terror and gloom. Or if I successfully turned my back and shunned the people who did not evoke joy, then I also would be happy. After all, happy is the opposite of sad. Good the opposite of bad. Right the opposite of wrong.
Life doesn’t work that way though. I’ve learned that manipulative people, by nature, will manipulate. Liars will lie. The corrupt will find ways to burrow like chiggers into the skin of the innocent. Not to me. Not anymore. I’ve taken the power back and use it to stand in the same room with the wretched and understand their evil and not let it touch me. I let their falsehoods bounce off me and reabsorb in their heartless body shells. I've accepted the reality that these people exist and live on the planet.
Somewhere in regaining power, I’ve redefined happiness. Somewhere in this game we call life, emotions live in the grey between black and white. Happiness is not the joyous height of euphoria that comes from surviving a life altering event or the mere absence of those who cause heartburn. Sadness is not the blank feelings of those pondering suicide. In between the extremes, there is not an abyss. In the space where the pendulum swings, it stills in a place that one person defines as not unhappy, another; peace and another; simply good.
I’ve believed that life was about swinging from trees on vines that never break jumping away from bad and into good. I’ve spent decades climbing from threat and into a peaceful canopy. I now realize that sometimes the vine breaks and I land smack in the middle of life. This event is not a catastrophe plunging me into the depths of dispair and misery. It doesn’t have to be defined or categorized. It doesn’t have to fit someone else’s definition. It’s enough to simply be alive. Every once in a while, I may find myself staring down someone whose weak vine dropped them into my world at the same time, but I have the power to walk away. They are not going to change my day or define my life. They are not going to control my emotions. Each day is an adventure and I don’t know if I will be unhappy, happy or perhaps feel something different, but it’s mine to define…mine to feel…mine to own.
In the distant past, after encountering the wicked, I would run home crying and be miserable. In the recent past, I might run away screaming over my back, “Adios, sucker. Sayonara, Satan’s seed. Au Revoir, insipid idiot.” Today, I might just say Goodbye as I slowly walk away and breathe in all the emotions that life offers which cannot be weighed and measured on a scale.
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Change
Anyone who has ever walked into a dressing room only to discover that sizes which fit come in larger numbers understands exactly how I feel about change. Staring at the mirror in disbelief that life has altered is difficult, no matter how hard I try to shove my body into it. For those who can’t understand this feeling, consider pulling on a wet, cold bathing suit - - drunk. In other words, I don’t do well with change.
Big change is considering brown as the new neutral. It’s toning down big hair (just a little) and wearing sunscreen. It’s ordering tater tots instead of fries. Some of my friends thrive on change. Only a few weeks ago, I went to a hockey game with a friend who has been looking for a job. A few days later, I received an email inviting me to her going away dinner before she moves this SATURDAY to CHINA. I can’t even comprehend moving to another neighborhood, much less a foreign country, alone, and within the span of about 10 days.
Change is unsettling to me. When routines are altered, I feel like I’m flying on trapeze bars without safety nets. After the adrenaline ebbs, I fall in bed safe under flannel sheets pulled high around my neck well into the warmer days of spring.
Over the last few weeks, my routine altered plunging me into the chaos of change. During this same time, familiar people re-entered my life bringing along their human containers of bile and evil. I saw lying faces, that I still wanted to slap, hiding wicked hearts. I thought they could no longer touch me with their cold, wretched claws. I thought wrong.
But then again, I thought wrong. The time is different. I am different. Mahatma Gandhi said, “Be the change you want to see in the world.” I understand now that change doesn’t happen to me. I am slowly becoming the change I want to see. Regardless of leprous forms slinking towards me, I am not a bystander allowing random targets to invade a porous spirit. The mean ones have power only in their heads and while they are in there, they need to think again. They need to reconsider their places in this world, and it’s not anywhere near me.
While I may not choose to move to China in a heartbeat, my heart beats true, and I am fortified through the strength of others. I have friends encircling me and extending open arms as I learn to walk. I have the one who believes in me more than I believe in myself whispering soft words. Through his eyes, I can sometimes imagine wearing new brown shoes until night falls and then slipping under cool, crisp cotton sheets.
Big change is considering brown as the new neutral. It’s toning down big hair (just a little) and wearing sunscreen. It’s ordering tater tots instead of fries. Some of my friends thrive on change. Only a few weeks ago, I went to a hockey game with a friend who has been looking for a job. A few days later, I received an email inviting me to her going away dinner before she moves this SATURDAY to CHINA. I can’t even comprehend moving to another neighborhood, much less a foreign country, alone, and within the span of about 10 days.
Change is unsettling to me. When routines are altered, I feel like I’m flying on trapeze bars without safety nets. After the adrenaline ebbs, I fall in bed safe under flannel sheets pulled high around my neck well into the warmer days of spring.
Over the last few weeks, my routine altered plunging me into the chaos of change. During this same time, familiar people re-entered my life bringing along their human containers of bile and evil. I saw lying faces, that I still wanted to slap, hiding wicked hearts. I thought they could no longer touch me with their cold, wretched claws. I thought wrong.
But then again, I thought wrong. The time is different. I am different. Mahatma Gandhi said, “Be the change you want to see in the world.” I understand now that change doesn’t happen to me. I am slowly becoming the change I want to see. Regardless of leprous forms slinking towards me, I am not a bystander allowing random targets to invade a porous spirit. The mean ones have power only in their heads and while they are in there, they need to think again. They need to reconsider their places in this world, and it’s not anywhere near me.
While I may not choose to move to China in a heartbeat, my heart beats true, and I am fortified through the strength of others. I have friends encircling me and extending open arms as I learn to walk. I have the one who believes in me more than I believe in myself whispering soft words. Through his eyes, I can sometimes imagine wearing new brown shoes until night falls and then slipping under cool, crisp cotton sheets.
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