Tradition!

It was an interesting weekend. For many years now XDO and I have had a tradition of getting together at some point after Christmas for a holiday celebration with two close friends. It began when we still lived in the Big City, and continued when we moved to Little Town on the Prairie. This year of course, being the First Christmas Apart there was a bit of a conundrum about how this would be done. Initially we had decided that the most comfortable thing would be to have two gatherings, one with XDO and the friends and one with me and the friends. But schedules being what they are, that just did not prove feasible, so this weekend the two of us found ourselves spending the weekend in two separate guest rooms at my sweet friend J's house.

To say there was some tension would be an understatement. For the most part I think XDO and I have done pretty well with civility and even beyond to a level of understanding and friendship that allows us to interact pretty well most of the time. But to expect that we could maintain that in close quarters in a setting that brought back memories of an earlier time when one of us has so clearly moved on and the other has not....well, perhaps that was pushing the envelope. My friend J and I had talked earlier in the week about trying not to say too much about that "moved on" part of my life. In short, I was going to try really really hard to stifle myself all weekend and not act like the really happy, contented, joyfully grateful, totally blessed, newly in love woman that I am. Yeah. Especially in the presence of two of my oldest and dearest and friends who just might want to know something about this new person in my life. But I gave it my best shot. I was pretty quiet when we were all together. I answered the questions about R in generalities. I showed them his picture discreetly and tried not to gush about him and how great he is. Fortunately there were some respites. There were times in the car on our shopping jaunts when I could talk to J. And on Saturday night I drank too much wine and took the dog for a long walk and called R and kvetched. And on Sunday morning, the weather was looking dicey, so I begged out early and headed off for home earlier than planned.

I think it was hard on XDO as well. I noted I was not the only one who was doing disappearing acts. I was not the only one who was snappish at times. Clearly we need a new plan for the post-Christmas gathering for next year. We have moved on and times really have changed. I can remember many years ago knowing some folks who broke up who were determined to stay friends. I wondered at their motivation. I wondered at their ability to do this difficult thing. I wondered at their sanity. As with any decision we make in life there are pros and cons. There are some unique things about our situation that makes me fall on the side of still thinking that the pros do outweigh the cons for us to continue to struggle with this. But what shape it takes, how it evolves, especially now that I am clearly "with" someone else and not just casually dating changes things. Particularly since I am not sure how clearly XDO has or wants to apprehend that fact quite yet. Saying you are happy for someone and living with the reality of seeing them live into a new life can be two quite different things. I don't want to be insensitive, to flaunt my happiness. But on the other hand, I don't want to have to keep censoring and stifling either. I have worked too hard and fought too long to stop people pleasing to take it up again. Somewhere here there is a balance. There always is. And if I can be quiet, and wait patiently in the now, curiously compassionate, listening to my heart, trusting myself to know....it will come.

NaBloPo...More or Less

Trying again for consistency at the halfway point. I must say that I am glad that January is half over in some ways. It is anywhere from 20 to 28 below zero this morning depending on whose thermometer you believe. Just having the car start is a miracle. Ever since moving to Minnesota way long ago, I have always been sort of amazed by the fact that life even goes on when it gets like this. But it does. Oh, some things are adjusted. School is starting two hours late this morning so the kids don't turn into little Popsicles waiting for their buses, and many of the pre-schools and kindergartens are not meeting at all. Some of the senior programs cancel or delay starts to make it easier on folks, but for the most part it is business as usual and the expectation is that you show up for it.

There is a part of me that has always rankled a bit at that. It feels kind of like a fist-waving "I'll show you who's boss" stupidity that can only lose in the end. I mean when it comes to minus 64 wind chills and white outs versus the human body....duh....it's kind of no contest who wins here. But if you say, "well I think perhaps we should cancel such and such" or "perhaps I will skip this or that" or "I'm not coming in to work today due to the weather" there is a sort of looking askance, sometimes concealed, sometimes not, an attitude that you must not truly be one of us, not tough enough to live here, to play among the real folk of the great North country. I have gone back and forth over the years with how much I give in to that. It was a whole new adjustment again when I moved to the prairie. Driving in my first white-out was sobering. It was, also I hope, my last experience of being able to look up and see perfectly blue sky but not being able to see the end of my hood in front of me. Yeah. I have adopted the position of "just say no" pretty much. If anything that looks even remotely inclement is predicted, I simply don't leave town.

Getting around in town is enough adventure for this chick. I managed to get stuck at the end of the driveway last week. It was another one of those days when it had snowed another three or four....my snow guy hadn't come, the town plow had, I thought I could make the mogul, I was wrong. Fortunately three very nice men, and C who was picking me up to run an errand came to my rescue and we dug a little, pushed a little, rocked a little and spun a little and out I popped. I hope that is my one for the year. Last year's was much worse. It involved a tree, two guys and a winch. The year before I had an off-road incident simply coming back from a church meeting on the other side of town. Life, you see is not dull here in my little world of white.

NaBlo....Wha?

I seem to be heading in the completely wrong direction on this daily posting business. Now it's been two days, and if it hadn't been for a Friday Five, it probably would have been three. *sigh*

I once had a professor who said, "While it is true that the unexamined life is not worth living, I also believe that the unlived life is not worth examining." I seem to be living in a tension between those two extremes these days. I find myself thinking at times, "Oh, I want to stop and take time to remember this moment, this feeling....to reflect on all the wonderment of this absolutely amazing gift that has come so unexpectedly to decorate my life." But at the same time....I want to be in that moment, fully completely alive and present. And I want many such moments...truth be told I want as many of them as my busy life allows. But then, still being an introvert, even an introvert in love....I still need to withdraw... from the business, even from the moments to recharge, regroup. It is a dance I do with myself, and now with another. And blessedly, he too is an introvert, so he gets the need to go away and recharge....but also the pull to "be with." It's a funny little two step we are doing these days.

Thinking about the pros and cons.....I think I there is the possibility that I may become boring to others, as I seem to have kind of a one-track mind. I seem to have less of an interest in the affairs of the world than perhaps I should right now. I think my dog is feeling a little neglected. I seem a tad distracted at times. My need for post-it notes is even greater than before. My bloglife is seriously suffering. But on the good side, I am more generous of spirit. I feel more compassion for my fellow creatures. I am more apt to say yes to just about anything within reason that is asked of me. Despite the fact that it is January and it has just snowed for what seems like the hundredth time, I am remarkably cheerful. My house is cleaner than it usually is.

I have been at the beginning before....and yes I know that some of this is transitory....but there are forces at work here that go deeper. The soulwork that has allowed me to open myself to the possibility of being loved obviously makes a difference. Being able to relax into receiving care and nurturing obviously changes things. Feeling for the first time that I am with someone who could be my safety net too, and that I might even allow myself to fall now and again....well, that's kind of transformational.

So this is about change...this post, this time....these gaps in my blogging. Do it, write about it, find the balance. Live life, examine it.....it all makes it worth living in the end, really I guess.

Oops...Tripping on Change

This NaBloPoMo thing is not going so well. I missed posting again yesterday. This time is was not so much forgetting as a combination of not having time and really having nothing to say. Apparently writing about change isn't any easier than doing it!

The shower is less random than the posting. I'm not quite sure what happened. If the tech was being more dire than he needed to be and just turning it up did the trick, or if something put the fear of the Almighty into the heater....but we are running at 100% hot showers and (gratefully) counting.

Most of the time being part of people's change process is a really splendid thing. It is, in fact, one of things I love best about my day job. This week though for some reason there has been a fair amount of frustration involved. I am kind of between "gigs" here. With the closing of CH, ten hours of my week freed up, and I am getting a new contract position which will begin in February. Because of that, I can't be assigned a lot of new clients who would then not be able to get back in to see me. But I need to stay productive (translated: produce some revenue for the center) so I am seeing people who need a crisis counselor, or who just need a quick assessment for something. In short, not the most satisfying kinds of situations for someone whose greatest love in therapy is the relational connections! In addition to that, it seems that a fair number of my own folks are in hard or stuck places right now and I'm feeling the pain with them.

There are also some who are bringing some of that pain on themselves. I feel different things for them. While I understand that sometimes we really do stand helpless before ourselves, victims of our still unhealed pasts, or our neurotransmitters run amok, or by being overwhelmed by too much life and not enough coping skills ...sometimes we don't and are making bad choices with some pretty clear sight....and then want pity, solace and rescue when those choices have consequences. "Duh!" I want to say at those points, "And you were expecting exactly what when you did the exact same thing for the fifty-sixth time?" But of course I do not...well not in those exact words anyway....because those folks could not hear me if I did. No. I take a deep breath, and ask God for patience, and say, as gently as I can..."So what were you expecting to happen when....." There has been a fair amount of that this week. The holidays bring it on. January in Minnesota brings it on. It's cold. It's dark. And this year it's been snowing approximately forever. My own fatigue level factors into how I feel, too. Even happy and in love I feel the drag of January. It is never my favorite month and I am always glad to see it pass.

So I can have empathy for those who are not blessed with love and friendship and coping skills. Even the ones who are heading down the same path with their eyes kind of open. I get that they do what they do because they simply have done it for so long they don't remember that there is another way. That when they get scared/stressed/anxious/depressed the system crashes and reboots to all the old defaults and we have to go back and slowly, patiently once again add all the pretty and useful upgrades. I remember how long it took me, and how blessed I was (and still am) with wonderful patient people to reboot and reconfigure my crashed self. So I remember and breathe and pray and say, "It's a process, change is slow, it will come, you will get there....let's just take that first baby step, shall we?' Some days....in the bleak midwinter.....it's just a little harder to get there than others.

When Good Appliances Go Bad

It was one of those good news, bad news things. The water heater itself is fine. It's just the thermostat that's shot. That was the good news. The bad news. The water heater is seventeen years old and there are no thermostats to be had. The temporary solution for now is to crank it up manually to "scald" and sometimes, on a very random, intermittent basis, sort of whenever the water heater feels like it, I'll have hot showers. And other times, well, I won't. A new one? Of course that is the real solution. When I asked the technician, "How much?" he said, "Well, as long as you're sitting down.....and he told me. Oh. My. Kind of the same reaction I had when I went looking at washing machines last summer. Clearly I have not replaced appliances in a very long time. In this century perhaps. There is good news there, too. My utility company will finance the new one. Just pop it on my bill, interest free for ten months. I think I will try to tough it out until after the heating season when the bill drops back out of a range that makes me gasp every time I see it anyway.

The way I see this, it adds an element of interest to my life....what will today's shower hold? Or perhaps I can use it as a way to remind me to be grateful. I have a shower, and sometimes it will be a hot one. And at some point there will be the means to make it consistent again. Good news on many fronts. Choosing my attitude, changing my focus. It's easier to change that than the water temperature, it seems.

Anticipating Epiphany.....To End and Begin

Only five days in to NabLoPoMo and I have missed a day of blogging already. I have no good excuses to offer. I simply forgot. Instead of writing about change yesterday, I was doing it. I'm afraid I anticipated Epiphany a bit and took down Christmas. I felt the worst about the creche. The kings had not even gotten a chance to really settle in and adore when the box came out and they got packed away till next year. But Christmas, as I have been reminded in ever so many ways this year is not about a season, or things or decor. The Love that we celebrate arriving in incarnate form came and stayed. It doesn't get packed up with the lights and the garland to wait in silent darkness for another season.

As much as I love having my house decorated, there is a kind of calm serenity after it all comes down that I also enjoy. It seems more spacious. Especially this year as I really claimed the process for myself. I purged a lot of old holiday junk and got it down to a manageable amount. As I packed it away I organized it in totes and labeled them so decorating next year should be a snap.

Though all of this did include a fair amount of work, it seemed like a good thing to do on the Sabbath. It was reflective and restful in that it got me thinking about Christmasas past and how different this one was and why. Perhaps it is this new birthed and steadily growing love in my life, but the whole Incarnational aspect of Christmas has been striking me anew. Especially as I preached John's Gospel on Christmas I, that from the beginning this was in the mind of God...to be among us, to be us so that we could know God and become more like God. It really does boggle the mind to be loved that much by the Creator of the universe. Sometimes I can only think about such things while doing mundane things like sweeping tree needles and picking up stray ornament hooks.

And tomorrow it is officially Epiphany. If I had to pick a day for my spiritual anniversary, this would be it. Epiphany Sunday was the day that I finally said yes to God and meant it as I wrote about last year in this post . Anniversaries for me are always a time to take stock of the last year. What has changed, what needs attention, where do we seem to be going. So that is the intention for the next twenty-four hours. To find some space for quiet. To focus on this relationship, to reaffirm this commitment, to once again say yes to whatever God has in store for me knowing this year at an even deeper and profound level that I am loved and God truly is holding my life.

Thoughts on Change

Just about when I think I'm figuring it out, it changes. That used to make me all anxious and uptight. Now it just makes me sort of smile at myself in a kind of tolerant amusement. Like take sleep for instance. I had this pattern going. Little spurts of a couple hours through the night with little wake-ups, then a longer chunk before morning. It probably wasn't the best for getting that really good REM stuff, but it was working. I seemed to be functioning, and I was used to it. I was almost always awake and ready to go before the alarm at six and often by five no matter what time I went to bed. Lately I seem to be downshifting. Last night I slept six hours without a break, and I slept until after 9 this morning when the phone woke me! That's just one example. There are certainly far more profound ones in my life that demonstrate clearly the possibility of change. Ask those who know me best! Old dogs may or may not be able to learn new tricks, but middling humans....I am here to say that amazing things can and do happen!

Ch-ch-changes...Post 1

My basic belief about change is that we finally do it when the pain of our current situation overtakes the fear of what it will be like when we finally take the steps necessary to do whatever it is that is needed to make the change. Because I do think it is fear that is the greatest obstacle to change. All those scary messages we give ourselves (based on perfectly reasonable -- to us anyway -- beliefs about the "things that could happen" if we take this step out into the unknown). Because that's where change takes us....out there into some new place where we have not been before. And for most of us it takes a lot to get us to go there. And whether we like to admit it or not, pain or at least a fair amount of discomfort with our current status is the best motivation for that movement. And the funny thing is, that when we get there, to the new place....we often find it's really not half so bad after all.

Something Good

I'm feeling a little like Cinderella today. I did get to go to the ball...well at least the New Year's Eve dance....and it was everything I'd hoped it would be. It has been kind of a long-term fantasy of mine to do that on New Years...get dressed up and go to a dance with someone special...and for a whole host of reasons, it has just never happened. Bless R, when this event was advertised and I shared my dream with him, he never hesitated for a moment. And unlike many things that having been dreamed of for so long, do not deliver in real life, last night was wonderful and almost perfect. The music was great, we had fun dancing and just being together. It was interesting seeing who else was there and fun to talk with our friends. We toasted the New Year at midnight and I uttered a prayer of deep gratitude for this wonderful gift of dreams that really do come true.

One of my favorite songs has always been Something Good from the Sound of Music. I find myself humming it lately. "Nothing comes from nothing, nothing ever could....I must have done something good." I feel like I must have done something to deserve this. Not just the dream come true of the dance, but finding love at this time in my life, finding someone who fits, who accepts all the complexities and baggage that come with me. And that there is an ease, a lightness, a distinct lack of drama that I find very refreshing at this point. But I also know that I must account for grace, and that perhaps I did nothing and that he, like all the blessings of my life is simply another gift and my appropriate response is simply gratitude and cherishing.

NaBloPoMo for January is about change....it sounded interesting, and since my life and many people around me seem to be about that, I thought it might be fun to take on the challenge of trying to write something every day on that theme...so off we go.