Archive for July, 2011
Today on the MSNBC website there was this headline:
Suicide spikes among middle-aged women
Experts speculate that depression, substance abuse and sleep issues may all play a part
How did this become my home page for my browser? More importantly, here was another story focusing on the negative aspects of aging particularly when it comes to women. Remember in the mid-1980s there was a study which found women who were in their 40s and had never been married had only a 2.6% chance of marrying? Newsweek took it one step further and said women had a better chance of being killed by a terrorist than getting married. Ugh!
Can we please focus on the positive? I know what you’re thinking, how can Michelle say anything? She’s happily married, has three healthy children, a great job, etc. These are all true. I am happily married for almost ten years. I do have three healthy children. I have a job I love. But I’m also middle aged. My skin and breasts are doing things I never thought they were capable of and not in a good way. Wrinkles? Hell, yeah. The only reason I won’t do Botox is because everyone on the planet would know I’m using, Man. My face is the drama/comedy mask all in one. I’ve talked about my sleep issues, depression and how I have to remember to put sunscreen on my face every day. So I know about aging, but I also know about seeing the glass half full instead of half empty.
These have helped put aging in perspective regarding for me:
- What choice do I have?
- Try humor. The saying if you don’t laugh about it, you’ll cry. Seriously (probably not the right word), a sense of humor has gotten people through the worst of times including aging (that’s slightly sarcastic…and funny).
- There are so many people worse off than us. How about going through puberty again? Zits? The boy you’re madly in love with doesn’t feel the same way (a friend of mine told me about this one…kidding. See there’s that sense of humor again). There are people dying of cancer, hunger, lack of clean water. There are people with no one who loves them to support their old and wrinkly bodies. Lots of people.
- There are things to look forward as we age like no menstrual cycles, more money (research shows the older we get the more likely we have money) and saying whatever the hell is on our minds. Who cares? I don’t, at least not in the way I used to. There is freedom in that.
- There is evidence we do become happier as we age, especially after our 40s. There is a U-shaped phenomenon that happens as we age. The magazine, The Economist, reported on a study that found after the age of 50 our well-being improves. You should see how “happy” 82- to 85-year-olds are. Can’t wait.
I’m not minimizing the real stresses we and society put on women when it comes to aging, but the good thing about aging is knowing what we have control over (our attitude) and those things we just need to let go of. I for one am going to stop reading these stories about how most women feel about aging. Instead I’m going to be joyful that I’ve been given another day.
Tell me about the joys you’ve found as you age. Better yet, send me a photo of yourself or a middle aged women expressing their joy!
Take care, my friends. Be gentle with yourselves.
And just cause I love this version of Amy Winehouse’s “Rehab” performed by Rome, I’ve decided to share it here. Plus Amy sadly has joined the 27 club of Jim Morrison, Kurt Cobain, Jimi Hendrix, and Janis Joplin. We’ve made it past 27….YEA!!
Something happened to me on May 27, 1989. I gave birth to a beautiful baby girl named Molly and I grew a heart.
Of course I always had a heart. I was a living, breathing, walking, doing human being. But as soon as I became a mom I started crying at coffee and long distance phone commercials. With each of my children, my heart has enlarged until I fear it will explode and/or I will become a blubbering pool of protoplasm. I now cry when I see a mom and child holding hands, when I hear Kelly or Molly’s voices on the phone or a child crying (or laughing…I don’t discriminate).
“Mom, the commercial is on again,” Jack yells from the other room. I can hear Sarah McLachlan singing her song, “Angel.”
Oh, shit. I HATE that commercial. I’ve only seen about three seconds of it, but it was enough, a three legged dog, a cat with a missing eye, and another dog who needs help standing up. STOP ABUSING ANIMALS. STOP ABUSING CHILDREN, WOMEN AND THE ENVIRONMENT. Tears prick my eyes, my stomach clenches in that space behind my belly button, and I feel sick. I shout to Jack, “Turn it off.”
I think the commercial upsets Jack, too. He’s a sensitive child like all of my kids and he finds it easier to handle the commercial when he can make fun of my tearful reaction to the images.
“Turn it off.”
You know what else upsets me? When people say poor people should get healthy and eat more fruits and vegetables. What if you live in a neighborhood that doesn’t have a grocery store, a farmers’ market, or access to fruits and vegetables? What if the only place to shop is a convenience store? What if an apple is a dollar which is the same price as a bag of chips? Which one would you choose to fill you up? I thought so.
Two days before we were to leave Taos, I looked outside the hotel window to see the most magnificent American Bulldog (Sorry Chewy!) on a leash under a tree by the conference center. I saw Maria, one of the employees, setting down water for her.
“Jack, grab your shoes,” I said already running out the door. He followed me to Taos (the name I gave her) who greeted us by wagging her tail. In fact, she never stopped wagging. She nuzzled my neck. And even though she weighed eighty pounds, she was (is) a gentle soul. I fell in love, hard. Taos’ good eye (she was blind in the other) said she had fallen, too.
“Let’s take her to back to San Diego,” I told David, who became smitten, too. So was Jack.
I’d learned from Maria she had twenty rescue dogs and she couldn’t handle one more.
“Michelle, we can’t take an eighty pound dog with us across the desert,” he said. “What are we going to do with her when we stay in Flagstaff or stop along the way.”
“I don’t know. I just know we have to take her,” I said. “We’ll fly her to San Diego.”
I wasn’t thinking straight, I’ll give you that. Blame it on my heart which had filled up my chest upon meeting this glorious dog.
I went to my class and throughout the workshop I imagined the life Taos would have back at our house in San Diego (with our three other dogs who would all play and frolic together. It’s my fantasy.).
I saw Maria after my class. “We’re still finding ways to get her back to San Diego,” I said.
“Lucy has been adopted,” she said.
“Lucy?”
“That’s her name.”
Tears pricked my eyes.
“You would have been a great mom to her,” Maria said squeezing my arm. “I can see that.”
Taos is gone, but I still imagine her living with me. I imagine finding her on that ranch in Gallup where she’s now living, dognapping her and driving the eleven hours back home.
What makes your heart soar? Break?
Photo: KC Alfred
I found god thirteen years ago.
I hadn’t been looking. The truth was I was too caught up in my anxiety, in my cyclical thinking, in my feelings of depression to look further than my own nose. I’d had the mother-lode of a breakdown in New Orleans on a business trip, and I came back to San Diego to try to put my life, myself, back together again. It wasn’t easy. I’d become a shell of a person. My breakdown had cleaned me out. I felt empty. The only time I felt whole was when I was around Molly and Kelly. I started writing partly because this would save my life, but at the time it meant I could have a career that would keep me close to home, within the safety of my four walls. And then those walls closed in.
“Teach me to surf,” I said to BJ, one of my coworkers who’d grown up in Hawaii, paddling and surfing. I knew I sounded desperate. I was.
“Sure. No problem,” she’d said in a laid back way that I prayed I’d be able to be like soon.
Do you believe in love at first sight? I fell in love with surfing the first afternoon. What wasn’t to love? The big blue sky above me. The smell of the ocean and the feel of the breeze on my bare skin. Surfing is a lot of hard work. But a lot of things worth experiencing are difficult. It makes it that much sweeter.
There I was paddling through the waves, the water enveloping me, honestly sometimes pushing and pulling me. But if you let go, if you don’t try to control the surfboard, if you just go with it, the feeling is magical, peaceful. That peace was something I hadn’t had in a long time. All of a sudden the world felt welcoming, light with the sun beaming down on me.
My favorite part of surfing is being out past the break, straddling the board, my legs dangling over the side, while I waited. It was the only place, out there, that I waited. I just was. The sun and seagulls above, a group of dolphins playing out in the horizon, the feel of the wind and the water keeping me there. Present. The fear I’d been carrying around all of my life was gone. I just was. I was the ocean, the sun, the sand, the seagull, my surfboard, the other surfers, deeply personal but communal, too.
During that time, a reporter wrote an article in the local paper about how surfing (god, mother earth) had saved me. When the article came out, I was embarrassed about how I’d spilled my guts for god and mother earth and people to see. But then something magical happened. I got phone calls and emails from friends and family saying, “Thank you for sharing. You helped me.” I had acquaintances come up to me and hug me. I’d opened up and others had, too.
Photo: KC Alfred
It’s been years since I’ve been on my board. Ever since Jack was born eight years ago I’ve found it hard to load up the board, drive down to the beach, unload the board, wax it, pull and tug on my wetsuit, only to try to catch a wave or two before I have to load the board and drive home to get ready for work, life. I don’t have the time. I haven’t made the time. Molly and Kelly have. But here’s the thing. I can go back to surfing any time I feel like it. Sometimes I do. Sometimes when I’m sitting in my third, fourth meeting of the day behind closed doors and windows that don’t open, I can go back to the beach, my happy place. I can breathe deeply the smell of saltwater and hear the “mine” from other surfers who have called for the wave.
Mine, too.
While herein words I cannot put
Nor in frame may cameras capture
Those hallowed waves through which we slip
And ride this life of rapture.
To be or not
The state of me
Rests on a vexing question.
Were not I dealt this salty deck
“Not to be” leads in which misdirection?
Yet here we are
While lost are thee
If not aboard and riding free
For we may fleeting lines convey
The pulse which guides a surfer’s way.
Dear America the Beautiful–
Can I call you America? We’re on a first name basis, aren’t we? Okay, I know. I know. I’m digressing. This isn’t easy for me. It’s hard for me to apologize, just ask my family. But that’s what I’m doing. I’m sorry. So sorry. Please forgive me. I haven’t been cheating on you. You are my true love, even though I haven’t had a lot of experience with other countries. I do know the greatest country on the earth when I see her. But that’s the thing, I’ve been taking you for granted.
Grand Canyon
Yeah, sure, I can blame the media. We, Americans, have been inundated with stories of Republicans fighting Democrats, conservatives versus liberals, budgets, the obesity pandemic, health care reform (Oh, what are we going to do?), and politicians and celebrities with their pants down. I’ve lost perspective. I’m sorry. I was wrong (something else that’s hard for me to admit). I want you to know you are the best country in the world.
I can see by the way you’re looking at me, you don’t believe me. If you’ll allow me, let me count the ways I love you.
- I could go to my tap right now, wrap my mouth around the nozzle and drink from the end, and I have. How many countries have clean, safe drinking water? Not enough. And yet I’ve taken this for granted by spending money on bottled water (tap water that has been purified) and then filling landfills with my empty bottles. I’m sorry. I have taken for granted I could go to the hose out in my backyard in my garden, and drink from it. I won’t anymore. I promise.
- I can walk into any church (Catholic, Baptist, Lutheran, Unitarian, Methodist, etc., etc.) and pray. I can go to a synagogue, a mosque, a temple. I can honor the earth, sky and moon if I want to. I can dance and beat drums to honor Mother Earth. I can practice Wicca and magic, Buddhism and meditation, and I can write poetry. I can wear a burka, a monk’s robe, or a Hasidic Jew’s payot. How many other countries have this kind of tolerance?
- My children can go to school. In fact, it’s mandatory.
- Do you know what Angola, Afghanistan, Nagir, Mali and Somalia have in common? They all have more than 100 deaths of infants under the age of one per 1000 live births. I’m going to say here, and don’t take this the wrong way, as the greatest country in the world we have a long way to go, especially for Blacks.
- As a woman, I can vote, make my own decisions about who I marry and whether I marry or not, except if I want to marry another woman. I don’t have to worry about female genital mutilation. I can own a car, have a career, and go out dancing with my girlfriends and wear a short skirt.
- I have freedom of speech. I can write whatever I want on this blog. Thank you.
I could go on forever, but I think I’ll stop here. Too much more and I’ll seem desperate. Plus I want you to know that it won’t take another September 11th to understand how much you mean to me. Just know I have a deep love for you. Please believe in that. Also, believe I’m going to work with you to continue to make this the best country in the world. We have some things to work on but don’t even the best relationships have room for improvement?
Happy 4th of July and thank you for listening.
I love you! Michelle
