Eyes Wide Open

I have been talking to a dear person, (I’m keeping it simple to keep them anonymous - god I love the norm of flexible pronouns) about their long relationship and separate lives they and their partner live. They confessed to me that they’ve realized their partner is narcissistic. It shook me but I’ve known and loved these dear people for many years and with this revelation, what we always said was just quirks, fell into that “Ahhhh, now it all makes sense” revelation. 

So what do you do when partnered with a narcissist? You create your own parallel life. Their are times of interaction, but you are not the most important thing. It may appear that you are, because partner (hmmm, “Not Partner”, is a more appropriate label) knows that attending to your needs keeps their world the way they want it. But really Not Partner is just spinning within your world in their own orbit around themselves. 

As usual, my instinct is to try and help, to offer advice, to try to “fix” my dear one’s problem. But  this is my dear one’s life, their choice to stay or go, to fix or fight. And Dear One has come to the conclusion that Not Partner has been this way for so long that it is too late for Not Partner to change. 

Their lives, I tell myself, as I hear NP talking, working into the evening and on Saturday morning and in all the moments I’m visiting this lovely home that Dear One has created, are theirs to live the way they choose. And so my mind goes to a story (or is it a poem?) called Welcome to Holland. It was referenced in the book that I’m listening to when the author realized the way it spoke to her particular situation. It was originally written for parents who plan for a typical child and then find they have a neuro diverse or physically diverse child and the plans they made and dreams they have don’t fit the needs or potential future of their child and their lives change dramatically, but there is still beauty and joy in this unexpected life. Look it up. It’s a lovely allegory. 

So, I woke thinking that my Dear One is in Holland. They’ve always wanted to live in Italy, and has even attempted to move there. They’ve pleaded and cajoled Not Partner to go with them. But Dear One is in Holland, and can be miserable in Holland, choose to see the beauty, or move to Italy alone. 

Is it ever too late to change and become True Partners and move to Italy together? Do you live with frustration or enjoy the tulips and buy Italian wine for yourself to drink alone? 

So I Decided Not to Leave

Decisions, decisions. And at this stage of my life they all feel so final. Do we remodel the kitchen in this house? Will we live here long enough to enjoy it? Should my husband retire this year or next? Why do they keep giving him promotions? Should I keep trying for a different job or stay with my fabulous students and colleagues? 

One of our main tactics in answering these questions involves procrastination. The kitchen did get remodeled this summer and it is the best thing we've done in a long time. Still, it was a conversation for about five years before we both took the leap. Then the answer to question two is that we'd damn well better stay here forever because that kitchen was a lot of work! As for question three, retirement keeps eluding my husband, mainly because he says he may as well stay as long as he loves doing what he's doing and they keep paying him well enough for it. The final question is really rhetorical and was answered as I wrote it. I have hit so many walls to moving in the direction that I thought I should be taking that I think the universe is telling me to choose another path. Last week I realized (okay, okay, my husband told me) that part of my path must include writing. I talk about writing. I talk to myself about writing and I write in my head almost constantly. So I decided, for the fiftieth time in my life, that if I don't include writing in my life, I will go crazy. Crazy will be the next blog. 

Some things that have changed about my writing since I last wrote include the font size. Why does "normal" look like "tiny" now and I have to use the "large" font size choice on this stupid Blogger site? Well, I'm past thinking too much about comfort and am just going to go with it. Like shoes. My feet need comfy, clog-like shoes in order not to hurt. I have looked for three years in vain for an administrative-looking pump that I can wear all day comfortably. I have now added my fruitless efforts to the long list of ways the universe is telling me I am not meant for the administrative path. If I were going to be a school administrator full time then supportive but intimidating pumps would be required and they don't exist, so there's that. I choose comfy and am not ashamed of it, or of the large font.

I tried Xanax the other day in preparation for an MRI and it made me realize that I live with a constant level of anxiety that wasn't there ten years ago. At least I don't think it was. Two of those magical pills made a layer of anxious just evaporate like mist in the warm sunlight. I was calm and clear. I was able to get through what had caused a panic attack two weeks prior with a clear head and slow, steady breathing. Unfortunately, I could remember very little of what happened after that, and what conversations I had, so those magic little pills must be reserved for extreme circumstances only. Writing is a safer kind of Xanax for me. I feel calm when I write. The world makes more sense and I am not as anxious about the future, or about the decisions I have to make every day, big and small. Finding those shoes and deciding when to retire don't seem such large, looming problems anymore. 

So I've decided to write. More often. For me. If you enjoy my ramblings and want to join me for the ride, come along. I sincerely hope you find your own Xanax, but I'm more than willing to share mine. 

Clarity

I've decided to set an alarm on Sunday evenings. Well, maybe Saturday mornings. No, hmmm. Well, I've decided to set a weekly alarm so that I blog weekly. I came back to this blog six months ago and promised myself to wiggle a little. I did, then stopped. So let's try this again. 

I write because if I don't, I'll explode. The words go around in my head and I have conversations with myself (which I found out today, via FaceBook, means I'm a genius) and with others who are not here. It makes me feel saner to write the words on a page. To see them crisp and dark (and a font size larger since the last time I wrote, sigh) on the computer page. It gives me clarity.

Clarity is something I desperately need right now. I feel the need surrounding me, I see it swirling throughout the internet, the news, the streets and shops and neighborhoods. Clarity is stability, it gives us a vision of what the future might bring. Even if the clarity brings a vision of awful, hateful, bitter battles and difficult journeys, at least I know what plans to make, to brace myself for what's coming, I know what to pack for the trip.

This week I thought I had clarity, and on Tuesday night that was wiped away and swirls of uncertainty replaced it. My beautiful, ever hopeful, immigrant husband tries to see the best outcome, but all I feel is fear and sadness for him and for my family and neighbors and friends. Not immediate-danger kind of fear, because fortunately I live in California, a state that saw the hate and said NO very clearly. I fear for friends in pockets of communities where hate was bubbling under the surface and only needed permission to be let loose. I fear for larger communities in red states that feel permission to let the hate flow. I fear the flow of hate and the battle that will result to stem the tide. 

In order to keep clarity, I have to say over and over, LOVE TRUMPS HATE. I hope that an alarm has gone off for you and you stay very diligent. I hope that clarity comes for our leaders. I hope that those who think this win gives them permission to be hateful are given a clear message that LOVE AND RESPECT IS THE ANSWER, and it's NOT OKAY to hate.  

I hope for Clarity. I hope. I hope. I hope.

Love,

Janice

I'm Still Here

A friend who was set in my path last year challenged me a few weeks ago to wiggle. Just a little bit. To wiggle meant to write. If I want something enough, but fear, weariness, or time were the sticky mud that slowed me down, I should just set my mind to moving at a wiggle pace. Just a little every day and eventually I would get there. She is a champion of my writing, she takes risks and pushes herself and puts herself out there. She jumps out of that airplane daily, weekly, risking and flying at the same time. I believe she was put in my path for a number of reasons, and one was to hold my hand and lead me onto that plane, buckle my parachute, and cheer as I jump out into the clear blue sky.

Because writing is like that for me. It's a rush. It's adrenaline and anxiety and joy and tears and everything all at once. It's cathartic and cleansing and I feel stronger and clearer once I see my words on the page.

Today I went back. I opened this blog and I read entries from the past and thought, "Who is this woman? How did she get so insightful and eloquent?" I truly didn't recognize myself, my writing, in the mirror. And I loved them, the entries, the fears, the thinking and language and I felt them all over again, and she started to look familiar, came into focus. Me. That's me. I can do that. I can write. How could I have forgotten her, this writer? Did she get lost in the grief of slowly losing her two parents over the past three and a half years? 

Time's up. My wiggle is done for today. I'm promising myself at least a few days a week of writing time by setting my alarm 30 minutes earlier than I actually need to get ready for the day. So now I will go and dress for Pilates, have breakfast on this cloudy Saturday, correct some papers, run errands.

Thank you, my friend. 

My Background Music is Books

Many people hear music as they remember a particular place and time in their own personal history. I realized today that although music often takes me back to a specific place in the timeline of my life, books are actually the true score to my life.  

The past couple of weekends we painted the upstairs hallway (well, my husband painted while I helped prep and then told him the spots he missed), which meant moving furniture, the most daunting piece being The Bookcase. It isn't that huge, but it contains books that range from a 1929 Alice Through the Looking Glass that belonged to my mother, to Number the Stars bought for my own children, plus various Nicholas Sparks (mine and my oldest daughter's) and My Body My Self (I won't embarrass the proud owner of that one). That bookcase contains the complete Tolkien series, one baby book (I have three kids, so I wonder why only one? And where are the others?), CS Lewis, The Brothers Grimm, many Beatrix Potter mini books, and dozens of other treasures. These treasures represent periods of my life that are particularly poignant.  I was changed forever by Fahrenheit 451 and the high school teacher who assigned it.  As a teacher and mother I read and cried through Bridge to Tarabithia.  Again as teacher and mother I marveled at my youngest daughter's fascination with dark tragedies, but remember how challenging it was to get her to read at all.  I remember being delighted in my son's development as a reader when hooked on Watership Down (finally hooked on reading!) and proudly watching him as an independent thinker choose  Michael Moore's various takes on the political world as we know it.  

I hesitated, cleaning out the shelf of the "fluff" my mom lent me to read, and making a pile of my own children's books to add to my classroom library. Which of these may have been instrumental in my oldest daughter's development of world view or a writer's eye and mind? Did some of these have remnants of my mother's life philosophy or enjoyment of historical fiction (a passion we share)? My father had the habit of ordering books and copying magazine articles that reflected his philosophy, one for each of his daughters, and sometimes his grandchildren. I have a copy of the last of those thoughtful purchases with a note clipped to it in his handwriting that says "Janice". It's a gift from him, probably his last. I haven't read it yet, but it went into the pile of "to read".

Yes, books are the score that plays in the background through the stages of my life. The children's party planning books are alongside the master's degree books, each equally important, telling the tales of my many lives.  I clean away some space on the shelves and wonder what books I will add. I'm looking forward to carving out time for the "to read" books that are on the shelf, easily within reach, and wonder what my children will think when they go through those shelves of my life.

Never Apparent, Always A Parent

It's not always clear to me at what moments I am parenting, and when I'm just a parent. Is every conversation, every interaction with my kids an act of parenting? Friendly conversation or banter, an outing for yogurt or a simple car ride always seem to turn into something more. If our kids have become adults, are we still parenting them? My children are adults, according to the law of the land, because their birth dates fall more than eighteen years ago. If you are a parent you know that this means nothing to clarify the definition of their being 'adult'.

Our oldest child is completely financially independent. Child Number 2 is well on her way - we provide food and shelter, but she is saving towards getting her own shelter soon. The third is still a tax write-off, a full-time student, and completely reliant on us for food and shelter. Aside from those cold assessments of our assets, our kids are still our kids. They need advice and, asked for or not, we provide it. They need reminders that family time is important, so we dribble on the guilt. They need to hear that they are on the right path, are making good choices, are loved and smart and wonderful, so we praise and hug and encourage. We bribe them with promises of food, we buy them gifts of new tennis shoes, golf clubs, and clothes. We help them set up their new apartments. We provide gas and cars and muscles when they move. And all of that is the easy stuff. 

When they come to us with a proposition, or a decision, or a philosophical/political position, we have to stop and take a few breaths, or even give them an "I'll have to get back to you after I think about it." Encouraging independence and helping them get on their feet or on their way to achieving a goal or taking a stand is a path strewn with obstacles and potholes. Every hesitation can be interpreted as disapproval, every compromise a failed promise or dashed hope. Even encouragement can be misread as consent. Recently one of my children asked for help paying a couple of months rent (as a loan) in order to move into an apartment with friends who would be ready sooner than my child was ready with enough savings. Hmmm. We were asked carefully and seriously, and our progeny knew the amount was not a monetary hardship on us. In spite of the careful and difficult request, we paused. We want to instill responsibility and the ethic of paying cash not credit. How to do that without sounding selfish and stingy? Impossible; and apparently we achieved the double coup of appearing to be unsupportive as well.

We have three kids, and in a good week only one of three is mad at us. Usually it's two, and on rare occasions all three. And sometimes it's not both of us; two are mad at me and their dad, the third is only mad at dad. Or one is mad at both and two are mad at me, etc.  I'm going to take the position that anger and frustration is a sign that we are doing something right. Or not. Who knows? All I know is that I am always a parent.

When My Smartphone Dove into the Pool

There I was, sitting by the pool, just picking up my towel. Suddenly, (but slowly) it was like everything went into slow motion mode - the dark rectangle splashhhhhhhed into the aqua water, then slowly sank, twirling through the sparkling water like a leaf falling from a tree in the gentle autumn breeze. HOLY SHIT, MY PHONE!!!! I jumped in and scooped it up and wrapped it in the towel quick as a blink (slow motion mode stopped at "HOLY..."). Fortunately I had my bathing suit on so nothing else got wet that shouldn't. A friend was quick to suggest the rice drying method (I'd used this one successfully for my daughter's phone) so I got out a baggie and scooped the rice in, dried my phone as best I could, and popped it into the bag and prayed.

Meanwhile, I had to get on about the day's events without the assistance of my smart phone. I felt a little lost at first, then I began to problem solve, because that's just who I am, a problem solver.

First, I picked up my daughter's phone and texted her father to let him know I was phoneless for the rest of the day. He never checks messages so had no idea until much later. When she called him to gloat to, I mean inform, him that his 'girlfriend' (his pet name for me, still, 30 years after the wedding) had dropped her phone in the pool (insert hysterical, throaty laughter a la Demi Moore - my girls inherited their father's raspy voice), he thought she was the one who did it and refused to believe it, bless him. 

On to the list of How We Got To the New Dentist in the Other Valley Without My Smart Phone. Step 1, etc: Try to remember the name of the dentist that is typed into my calendar. Then realize that thanks to the magical Cloud, my calendar information from my phone (sometimes) transfers to my laptop. Fire up the Laptop. Look up the address online, then Mapquest (haven't used that in a while) it. Memorize the directions (and email them to Demi-laughter daughter just in case). Repeat this address to yourself over and over so your daughter doesn't think you've totally gone over the hill and are now sliding down it into dementia. Get in the car and pray the traffic isn't bad, because you certainly can't check it on your smart phone. Find the New Dentist on your own and feel totally, well, SMART. All on your own. Sit in the waiting room reading the TV Guide because you have no games to play, status to update, or online reading to do. BECAUSE YOUR SMARTPHONE is at home, sitting in a bag of rice. Find your way home (after a three hour visit - I almost said tour), with only one wrong turn. Try your best not to turn on the cell phone that still needs to sit in rice. Fold clothes. Wait.

I tried the rice, then the blow dryer, thinking two solutions are better than one. Over six hours after the swimming incident, I was tired of reading (actually turning pages. Of paper.) my book and trying to figure out what to put in the pasta salad (oh, yah, check the laptop edition of recipe finder) and I just couldn't wait any longer. It worked! My phone was working! How did I lever live without you?! I mean, ahem, no problem, could have gone a whole day no  problem....