Humbled

 I spent yesterday scrubbing my house and getting ready for my neighborhood's Civic Association meeting, which I was hosting.  I was expecting between 10-15 people--and who better to talk up my house to everyone they know who is looking than people who already live in the neighborhood?  I prepared as if it was an Open House but with food.  I went grocery shopping and made my own gorgeous antipasti plates, heaped with cheeses and fruits and painstakingly rolled cold cuts and cheeses... I farmed Jane out to a play date (She was blissfully happy but I, naturally, felt very guilty because that's just what I do) and made Ana help me. I cleaned the whole house, did all of the laundry, windexed all surfaces, stashed clutter, etc. When I tell you my Obsessive Compulsiveness was in full bloom, I am, for once, not exaggerating.

My foot was really hurting but I felt like I had to treat this like a marketing event.  We've had no traffic at all since the Open House this past weekend.

Two people showed up. TWO.  One of whom is a neighbor.  The other is the editor of the neighborhood newsletter for which I do the design and layout each month.

We had a good time and I held it together but afterward, when they'd left, I got teary.  All that work, all that expense, all this pain --for nothing. I was embarrassed to have made such a big deal out of something that really wasn't. My husband was so kind to me.  He gave me a big hug and resorted to the Ultimate Measure of Manly Comfort: the fishing metaphor.  "Sometimes you fish all day and never catch anything.  I hope you had at least a little fun fishing."

I went upstairs to bed about 10:00 and could see Ana (12) still awake in her bed.  I went in to kiss her goodnight, still with tears in my eyes. I explained that I was disappointed and embarrassed and felt sort of silly and sad.

She got out of bed and hugged me and looked at me with great concern as she walked me to my bedroom.

"Wait," she said.  "Don't go anywhere."

She disappeared into her room and came running back with a fresh, unused notebook and a blue Flair pen (my favorite writing pen at the moment).

"Here, Mom," she said. "Write about it.  That's what I do to feel better when I'm sad."

And the best part?

She said, "I learned that from you."

Sometimes the gentle butterfly wings of grace and generosity in my life beat such a rush of gratitude and love that it literally topples me over.

I'm living in that today--in the gentle grace of the amazing person I am lucky enough to call my daughter.

Perennials

I have such a good metaphor for today!  I love it when my garden gives me visual aids.

See this?

Those were a total surprise to me this year.

Last year, I planted some lilies after buying one of those foil wrapped little containers of them for my kitchen table.  Once the blooms were spent, I planted them into a pot that was full of annuals and promptly forgot about them.

Until they started poking their little heads out of the dirt in early April this year.

I've been watching them ever since. I've tended them and weeded them and given them a bit of plant food.

Today, they look like this:

It seems to me that Nature herself is reminding me of resilience and renewal. And also? Reminding me that I, too, am a perennial.

Today, I'm going to focus on remembering that I am worth a little care and tending in order to continue to bloom year after year.

Promises Kept

I think my heart may have grown two sizes today.

Somehow-- amidst all that is broken in me, and a world with oil spills, and the inhumanity of people who are often armed with guns-- the fact that my garden is giving me the promise of this tiny green tomato has filled me with hope.

Today, I am going to live inside that hope. I'm going to return to it whenever I feel knocked back. 

Today, I choose hope.

Astonishment

Last night was the first of the sessions in my on-line conference with Geneen Roth, author of Women Food and God.  It was a powerful hour, that's for sure. I am still processing many of the things I heard. I wasn't thrilled with the idea of this conference taking six weeks but now I'm glad I have a week in between sessions to really absorb the information.

One of the action items for this week was to be astonished by what I already have.

This is the perfect action item for me, especially today.  My foot is terribly painful and I had to cancel having coffee with my friend Sherry because I of it. My older daughter had clothing issues this morning, which threw off our schedule and we ended up forgetting her lunch.  I'm mad at my lawn guys, which makes me feel impotent and like I'm not a good manager.

So, deep breath.

By having a little extra time to make my daughter's lunch, I was able to first go to the grocery store and buy things that she might actually, well, EAT. (I KNOW!) I had money to do so and I had the luxury of time to pick the perfect strawberries for her.  I was smiling as I packed her lunch, aware of how blessed I am and also, how blessed she is to have me as her mother. I delivered the lunch to her school and did so with a glad heart.

Sherry and I made plans for her family to come over for dinner on Saturday.  She understands my chronic pain issues and is always unfailingly flexible in accommodating them.  I am so blessed to have her as a friend.

I'm calling the yard guys today, which will make me feel all brave and efficient.

So then I started noticing all of my blessings. I would enumerate them but suffice to say, I am probably the most blessed person on this planet. And you know what else?  I am so unbelievably loved.  It takes my breath away to think of it, really. 

I'm going to spend the rest of my day feeling this amazing feeling of abundance --reveling in it, wearing it like a crown, paying it forward in my every interaction.

Joy

Look what came out of our garden yesterday.

It doesn't matter that it's a little misshapen.  It doesn't have to be perfect to fill my house of aspiring farmers with great joy.

And then I put it in my daughter's lunch today, the ultimate present.

How great is a world where we can grow our own strawberries?

Pain

This post deals with God.  Most of you know I have a very strong belief in God but am not very enamored of organized religion.  I almost never talk about God stuff because, frankly, I don't want to sound like the religious nut jobs that are constantly in the news, pointing to God as definitive rationale for their hatred, ignorance, bigotry and petty mean-spiritedness.  That has NOTHING to do with the God I know. Those people do not speak for me.

I am in a great deal of pain. I have a very messed up foot which gives me a great deal of pain from time to time and this is one of those times. It's excruciating. I can barely hear myself think.

Years ago, I heard a sermon by Tim Cook, who is the minister of the Church of Conscious Harmony in Austin. (I know, I know--the name. But there is nothing implied. It is a church dedicated to conscious living--MINDFUL LIVING. And the minister is simply the best extemporaneous speaker I have ever heard.) In this sermon, Father Cook spoke about how St. Teresa said, "Oh, how I love my suffering for it brings me so much closer to God." He preached an entire sermon about the idea of suffering bringing us so much closer to God.

I didn't "get" it.

I bought a cassette of the sermon and I played it over and over and over again in my car.

And I still didn't get it.

I still don't get it.

Mostly, I connect the most with God through my joy.  I feel the closest to my Creator when I am joyful because I think it's the way we could feel all the time if we had an unbroken awareness of God.  It feels like a taste of heaven. It feels like what I could feel like all the time if I wasn't so broken.

I'm going to think about that today.  And I'm going to think about how I can find my God even in this enormous pain. What am I supposed to be learning? 

Also, I feel like I might do a little crying.  (It really hurts.)

(I am leaving the comments open but this is not the place to debate religion, to point out the error of my ways, nor to demean others for having differing views.)

Struggling

"Despite writing down their self criticisms during the first day of the retreat, despite naming The Voice's presence, almost every student gets reentranced by it over the next day or two.  Since The Voice feels so much like you, and since you are utterly convinced that without it you would romp through your life without restraint or morality, releasing yourself from its grip takes a bit of time; it happens in stages." Geneen Roth, Women Food and God

I'm really struggling with the whole concept of checking in with myself every few minutes.  Checking to see how I'm feeling.  It feels narcissistic and indulgent and I realize that I don't think I am worth it.  I think this is normal back-sliding but I was kind of hoping for  Epiphany=Instantly Whole Barb.  What do you mean there's more work to all this?  I don't have time for this!

Um.

Yesterday, I signed up for an on-line conference with Geneen Roth.  I was absolutely AWASH with anxiety afterward.  But also?  Electrified at the thought of making real progress at regaining my joy. The conference begins Tuesday and will last for six weeks, an hour and a half every Tuesday night.

This morning, I was in a very depressed, tired mood despite the gorgeous weather and all I accomplished yesterday.  So I came home and threw the ball for the dogs for 45 minutes.  By the time they were too tired to bring it back, I was laughing out loud at how happy I'd made them.  I remembered how great it felt to be right in that moment, to laugh with joy.

Oh yeah, it's definitely worth it, this journey.