Girl, Interrupted

Well it has been awhile since I've blogged.... Two weeks ago I developed symptoms of what I thought was the standard stomach flu. It kept on even after five days but I didn't get concerned until I started feeling some intense pain in my abdomen area - which after a day of that and no sleep, prompted a visit to the local ER which resulted in a five day admission to Holy Cross Hospital in Taos with a diagnosis of pancreatitis. No particular medicines were needed other than IV fluids to address dehydration. Apparently I am in the 30% of people for whom there is no known cause for the inflammation - typically it's provoked by alcoholism/drug addiction or gallstones in the bile duct around the pancreas. Neither of these two were true for me; the latter was ruled out by an MRI and CAT scan.... What can I say about my stay in the hospital other than it was way too much daytime TV and bland liquids, although I did develop an affinity for the Knox brand instant chicken broth and will have to make sure I have it on hand in emergencies. The morphine was effective in managing the pain for the first two days and since then I've been pain free. Eating is progressing very slowly - I have lost almost 20#'s - and my appetite is minimal.

Needless to say I've been giving myself lots of Reiki as well as receiving energy from scores of others. Affirmations for restored health and wholeness also have become my mantra as well as an openness to receive any "learnings" from the recent episode....

Christmas was way too quiet, me and my daughter's cat, Gunther, and I AM grateful that I was at least home to enjoy the quiet rather than the sterile setting of the hospital. I was well enough to eat a baked potato for Xmas dinner - one of my favorite treats at any time - must be the Irish in me! Last night I felt well enough to work a shift the gym, Northside, and it was a welcome diversion from my own four walls. Being sick sure makes you appreciate your health; something that I must confess that I usually take for granted as I typically don't get sick very often.

So this is the first writing I've done in a few weeks but writing groups start up again the first week of January so I'll be back to it then....

Let It Snow

The local news station was abuzz last night with predictions of snow for New Mexico, especially the northeastern part and the mountains. I chuckled as I listened to their description of 500 plow trucks, possible school closings and an "inch" of snow in Albuquerque! I woke up this morning expecting to see the results of a snow storm only to find about 2 inches on the ground; someone had told me the previous evening that this might be the case, although, they assured me that the mtns would probably get 6 - 12 inches. OMG - they don't know what winter is! I suppose I should reserve this smug statement until at least the end of March '09 - not having lived thru a Taos winter yet. Reliable sources have informed me that it doesn't snow that much in the valley and that if the sun is shining (which it is 300 days/yr) it melts by early afternoon - making the evening commute safe and dry. I enjoyed the brief feeling of being "snowed in" this morning because my skylights and slanted windows were fully covered by snow until the sun caused it to streak and allow patches of light to shine through. One of the things I like about New England winters is that feeling of be buried (as long as it doesn't last too long, or we go without power for no more than 24 hours) - the stillness of a world dumped with a foot or more of snow - no one moving too fast or venturing too far. A perfect excuse for a day off from normal routines, school, work, obligations with the expectations of a day spent in pajamas or sweat shirts, lounging by the fire/woodstove with a good book, a cup of tea and the only duty being the timing of when to shovel your walk - during the storm or after you've gotten it all? My guess is that the power doesn't often shut down here - it hasn't yet in 4 months but it's early yet. Even though I live in the high elevations (5000 feet above sea level)there isn't much wind here, lightening or other forms of weather disturbances.
So no need to listen to the radio/TV for closings/cancellations and although car thermometer says it's 23 degrees out it feels like the low 40's.
I guess it's off to work I go then. Which in my case, since this is a Tuesday, is to the "Wired" Cafe on Felicidad St. behind Albertson's for a cafe au lait and a day of writing.

Holidaze

It's taken me over a week to recover from Thanksgiving. My two daughters, Erin and Jenn came to visit; one for a week and the other for three days. During that time my place was taken over including the computer, TV, kitchen area, bathroom and living space. I even shared my bed with Erin as there is only a pull out futon in the living area. I used to live in a much larger 3 bedroom house with two full bathrooms when they were growing up. Thank God for that. I didn't think I was so territorial until the square footage shrunk and we were all trying to fit into a small one bedroom house. I silently cringed each time I noticed debris piling up on the floor, liquids spilling over on the stove and dishes stacking up uncleaned in the sink. I guess I am a creature of habit, after all, and guess I get more so as time goes on; especially since I have been living solo for the past three years. Don't get me wrong; I was thrilled to see them, our feast except for the overdone roast chicken was delicious and the highlight of our visit was the stop at Ojo Caliente for an afternoon of soaking in awesome outdoor mineral pools followed by dinner in the Artesian Restaurant. And I was secretly not unhappy to see them go - hence my recovery this week of doing laundry, vacuuming, cleaning the bathroom and rewashing certain pots and pans. And of course now that's it's been a week I miss them again. I also overindulgenced, a fine American tradition, and avoided the face off at the gym and the scale. So I have allowed myself a week of being out of sorts, sitting with an ambivalence about sharing my space and staying out of routines that I find nurturing and comforting.
I find it difficult to maintain my patterns: ie: meditation, working out at the gym, writing time, bedtime, etc. when I'm in relationship with others. I too often bend my routine to their preferences - only to discover that unsuspecting resentment creeps in after a time - even though they didn't ask me to change for them.... I know this is my issue and one that I notice when I am in the same living space with others.
Christmas will be easier; I'm visiting Jenn in Durango, CO; she will be working during the day, teaching skiing to those on vacation and we'll spend a few evenings together. I'm hoping that she can manuever us a discounted room at the ski resort where she works so that I can happily pass my time in the indoor pool and hot tub balanced with hot drinks sitting by the fireplace reading or knitting. My goal is to balance our selections of evening activities - allowing her a choice for one night and me the other. I'll let you know how it works out....

Color Me Orange

I'm one of those incredibly annoying people that never like to sit in the same seat in a lecture hall, church pew or conference room table. Just when the person at the head of the room has figured out who is who I screw it up by changing my seat. Blame it on the fact that I'm a Gemini and can/in fact chooses to see things from different points of view and that I'm addicted to change, stimulation and playing devil's advocate. Perhaps that's why I love traveling so much. And debating and analyzing..... At any rate I bring it up because I have since settling in Taos been wearing, decorating and resonanting with different colors than I ever have before. Now I've always done my kitchen in blue tones but now it's sprayed with of all things oranges and reds. I know, I know, anyone who knows me will have a hard time imagining this BUT here's the thing about the Southwest - the landscape is donned with a rainbow of browns and beiges except the flowers and trees. So my theory is that people crave color here - that's why Taos is famous for its cerulean turqoise trim on its adobe buildings, why people dress in vivid colors (often they don't match - but what's that got to do with it?), and decorate in the primary colors.

So my tablecloth is striped reds and oranges, the cloth napkins are yellow and red, the Taos Inn poster in the dining area is full of van Gogh blues/greens/reds and yesterday I just had to buy some new potholders in striped, you guessed it, oranges, yellows and red. (The name of the kitchen store in town by the way is Monet's Kitchen, I kid you not). My washclothes do not match, one in sage, one in organge and one turquoise. And of course I have different color candles throughout the earthship.
The landscape here is much starker than the Northeast; even the mountains stand out more singularly because they are often seen from a panorama of miles beforehand. My house is on the mesa "me·sa (ms)n. A broad, flat-topped elevation with one or more clifflike sides, common in the southwest United States." Spanish for table. It affords an an expansive, uncluttered view of the Sangre de Christos Mtns. to the east - I once wondered why the house was built facing away from the mtns which means you have to go outside to get a view of them. Naively I didn't realize that they build the adobes facing south to take advantage of the huge power of the sun for solar heating.
And I think all these colors are messing with my brain. In a good way. I felt drawn here to write and create. Creativity demands the ability to see things differently, put them in nonordinary combinations to create something new. And I feel that by adopting the color schemes so prevalent here, as well as the frankly quirky nature of the anglo population in Taos - lots of tattoos, I wonder if anyone has ever done a study on the highest number of tatoos per capita?, dreadlocks, odd looking hats (maybe to cover the dreads?)I am by osmosis becoming more creative. At least that's why I like to tell mmyself - so don't spoil the illusion.

Learned Optimism

Yesterday at Unity Service Barbara Jones who has a Ph.D. in Transpersonal Psychology spoke on Martin Seligman's seminal work, "Learned Optimisim". He is the founder of Positive Psychology and has written several additional books, "Character Strengths and Virtues", and "Authentic Happiness". His central theory is that we can learn to be happier even if we have been pessismistic all our lives. He postulates that people who have had trauma in their childhoods are more likely to be pessismistic as they become adults. However, by cultivating certain character strengths and virtues we can retrain ourselves to be optimistic and happier. His research demonstrates that people who score higher on his character strength questionnaire are by far happier than people who don't. Let me see if I can remember the major strengths:
Creativity, Bravery, Temperance, Fairness, Kindness, and Open mindedness, Humor, Curiosity and Persistence. His website: www.authentichappiness.com provides free questionnaires that you can take if you want to find out how you score on happiness and individual character strengths and virtues.

Barbara gave us a homework assignment for the following week - she suggested that we choose one character strength that we score at a lower level than we would like and then think of one thing we could do to improve that score. I partnered with someone who said that forgiveness of herself and others was really difficult for her. She committed to communicating with someone that she has had been holding a resentment against and forgive them. I mentioned that temperance (self control and regulation of appetites/desires) was a biggie for me - especially in the area of consuming sweets (and well, coffee, too, truth be told). So I committed to not eating any sweets for a week. We had a followup chat about a time in her life when she felt she was addicted to sugar and how this caused her to develop severe candida and become quite ill. She posed this question to herself: What sweet things/activities(not food/beverages)have I not been allowing myself to have - ie: then consuming sugary foods as a substitute for that sweetness she was really craving... For her it was time alone, and giving herself the luxury of a walk, hot bath, reading, etc. rather than always caring for others... Get's me to pondering. Not that this a new or necessarily revoluntionary concept. I remember back to reading Susie Orbach's, "Fat is a Feminist Issue" or Denise Lamotte's, "Taming of the Chew". I could write a book on the subject myself. But that will have to wait until the book I'm working on is finished...

Beginner's Mind

There is a Zen saying about the secret to success in any new endeavor is to have a "beginner's mind". To approach new tasks completely open to new information and without preconceived notions based upon past experience. Even though I have been knitting off and on since childhood I frequently find that having a "beginner's mind" when approaching a pattern (either new or one that I have made before)pays off in less unraveling and mistakes. It is a humbling process and yet freeing at the same time.

I am attempting to use this process as I dive into learning how to write. Last night I attended the first in a series of five classes given by a local author on developing character and narrative. There are 10 people in the class, many of them accomplished and published writers.... I was delighted to discover that I didn't feel intimidated by their collective proficiencies. When the time came for us to read what we had written in class I felt eager and exhilarated. And the result was exciting. The teacher, Veronica, had read a poem and a paragraph as a prompt. The theme of the chosen pieces was "what can not be spoken". We were given 10 minutes to write. I wrote about an interaction between spouses demonstrating underlying conflict and tension while they are sitting watching TV. My brief piece was met with enthusiasm and accolades. Initially I just thought that they were being "nice" until I observed that their reaction was not universal to all the other readings.

So this leads me to wonder what would it be like to live your life with "beginner's mind"; to approach each day as completely new - devoid of judgments, beliefs or generalizations from previous days' experiences. I still want to remember all that I have learned (it would be exhausting to have to relearn everything and demoralizing - like recovering from a severe stroke) but free from the sometimes paralyzing effect of preconceived expectations. So instead of assuming that there'll be alot of traffic on the way to work, that my boss will treat me as she/he always has, that my kids won't complete their chores and that there will be alot of bills in the mail I would have the freedom to choose differently. Beliefs are not right or wrong; they are simply attitudes, opinions, and experiences that we hold to be true for ourselves. I could choose to believe that I'll never have enough money to pay my bills, never lose that 50#'s, get a job that I like, create a loving romantic relationship, and so on. Or I could choose to believe that I have more than enough money to pay my bills, I will release the excess weight and keep it off, and that my ideal romantic partner is just around the corner.

A friend of mine once said "what's the difference between denial and an affirmation?"
Good question.... I choose to believe that what we focus on increases - whether positive or negative. If I focus on poor health, bills, relationship disappointments than I am sure to attract more of the same. If I instead focus on what I would like to have more of in my life the universe conspires to produce that
as well.

A Few Words about Writing

I never realized how much work writing is.... It has recently been brought to my attention that my grammar, punctuation, verb usage, composition and style needs some serious overhauling to be accepted by a publisher. My writing teacher, Phaedra Greenwood (author, "Beside the Rio Hondo"), has been editing some of my writing and has recently suggested that I get a copy of the high school familiar classic, "Elements of Style" by Strunk and White. Little did I know that I would be traveling that road again. I have been reviewing the book and becoming educated about passive vs active verbs, avoiding the use of words that end in "ing", when to use apostrophes and the universal sage advice to writers, "show don't tell".

I'm also learning about "fictional techniques", when and how to use dialogue, description and how to avoid the dreaded "purple prose". My usual sequence is to transcribe an interview, type up the notes in outline form, and then transform it into prose. Then rewrite the first draft after letting it sit for awhile. Then I bring it to class and read it outloud to the group while providing a copy to Phaedra. The group gives me constructive feedback about what they like and what needs improvement. Phaedra uses her red pen to correct phrases, highlight areas needing rewriting and recommnend style changes, including punctuation and formatting.
Then it's back to the cafe for more rewriting and the loop begins again.

I've decided to view this a job and keep regular writing hours. I hear that's how writers practice and get better. My general format is to write all day Mon, Tues, & Weds; writer's group is on thursday and then that leaves time of the weekend to do some rewriting. I'm also on the lookout for other classes and recently found out about the winter writing series at S.O.M.O.S.(Society of the Muse of the Southwest) which hosts readings by well know authors, poets, screenwriters, etc. in the region -
Natalie Goldberg of "Writing Down the Bones" fame has been a previous presenter - as well as James Nave, of the Writing Salon, friend and cowriter with Julia Cameron(The Artist Way).

But now I'm off a massage - my first in New Mexico - a benefit of volunteering at the Wellness Clinic by a therapist that lives in Valdez, the valley to the north of Taos and same area that Julia Roberts has a home.

A New President!

Last night with fellow Taosenos and democrats I sat around a big screen TV in the home of Dinah and Seymour(friends of my landlady's, Cindy)and watched Pennsylvania, and then Ohio be announced as projected winners for Barack Obama, the new President elect for the United States. Earlier in the week I had received phone calls from my daughters, 25 and 26, that they had voted (democrat, of course); my younger, daughter, Jenn, admitted that she didn't vote in the last election but was really motivated to do so in this one. I have to say that I was pleased - feeling that I had raised them right - of course, there would have been no less love if they voted for McCain - maybe just a little doubt about their judgment and wisdom. Actually I had been a fan of Hillary in the primaries; she was the one that I really wanted to see elected initially; however, I do now believe that Obama is the right choice at this time both for the nation as well as internationally. Maybe we have a chance of repairing our reputation overseas and propelling the world toward a more peaceful one... It was really inspirational to hear how other countries see us and are inspired by our democracy - especially in those areas where people are imprisoned, kidnapped and often murdered for their opinion.

And it does go without saying that to have the first black president elected in my lifetime is really a thrill; next time maybe it will be a woman. I am old enough to remember the Civil Rights movement, the riots and racial discrimination (still present but progressively weakening). I am also heartened to listen to the post election analysis say that race played a very small factor in the election and that Obama's support was nation wide. I can't say that I would want to be him in the coming months and years - he has inherited an overflowing plateful of issues, crises and challenges.

It is a delight to live in a town that is so heavily democratic and like-minded; not that differences aren't stimulating and necessary but I must say I felt more than a little pride when I learned that both NH and NM had favored Obama in the election. Colorado, too, where Jenn lives - but alas no hope for Wyoming where Erin is (although hopefully at least Jackson Hole voted in favor of Obama)....

Today's another writing day and it's cloudy, yesterday it even rained for about 15 minutes and there is actually a winter storm advisory for the area today. I woke up to 37 degrees but of course it feels more like 50 - 55 for me. There is snow in the mtns surrounding the town but I haven't seen any on the ground yet....