It’s hard when we are younger… anything younger than 50… to imagine actually being 50. And yet, after much anticipation, here I am. I don’t feel a day older than, let’s say, 25. Some would say I don’t look any older than that either, although the wrinkles around my eyes might suggest otherwise. I don’t mind one way or the other. I do appreciate that while I can’t for the life of me see anything up close, I feel the same physically as I did in my youth. I am grateful for that.
Luckily for me (one would never put it this way when one is 16), I have had a bum knee since I was 15 and it is no different today than it was back then. That means that when we traipse all over New York City for three days to celebrate my turning, the dang thing hurts. Yet because it’s nothing even remotely new and I got used to it a long time ago, I don’t in any way associate it with aging. Same thing with the physical challenges that come with PCOS. It’s nothing new. It has ebbed and flowed and manifested differently throughout time, but it just is what it is and I know now that the phase will change. It always does. One of the biggest benefits of age is being able to recognize that nothing lasts forever, just as one of the benefits of being young is believing that it does.
Another benefit of age, and I think particularly for women, is that we finally begin to step out of the bullshit and into our true selves… with authority! That’s good, because as I’ve mentioned before, we need a whole lot of feminine boss energy in the world right now. I got to catch up with four of my best female friends in NYC, all of whom are roughly the same age, and it made me happy to no end to experience the bossed-up women that they have grown into. Need a definition? Here goes from the urban dictionary:
 Boss-Up. Take ownership of ones life, by directing the full capacity of their time, resources, and attention toward a specific direction, goal, or intent.
Simply put, each shows up as who she authentically is. Each in her own way is flourishing, guiding, loving, and leading with uncompromised authority… because she’s been there, done that. Chausey, my oldest friend dating back to age 5, is a powerhouse of love and wisdom who is a master at nurturing the little self while reflecting the higher Self back to each and every person she meets. Mary, my best friend and partner in crime from college, is an unwavering creative genius who can’t help but manifest more laughter and love into the world. I perpetually can’t wait to see what she will put out there next. Krista, my best friend from graduate school, is rocking her life as an architect in NYC with no need for apologies or affirmation. She’s got it. Elise, my freshman year roommate in college, continues to live into her sheer genius as a writer of both words and now numbers (coding), all while mentoring youth into their potential. Not only that, but each one is a nurturing matriarch in her own right, be it to her own children, her nephews and nieces, or her aging mother. I’m lucky to have had each one, and so many others, as a friend for such a long time now. It’s my privilege and joy to be a witness to your lives.
That’s what 50 looks like. We laughed, and laughed, and laughed… particularly about our newfound impatience for disrespect and waiting and drama given that we could now keel over at any second! No time for that shit! I’m not so secretly excited to have reached this threshold, because now I can say “Don’t mess with me! I’m fifty!!” Oh and I have been. It makes people stop and actually listen. I’m gonna use this age thing for all it’s worth. Don’t look at me and treat me like some young thing with long, blonde hair. In the first place, I’m probably older than you, and in the second, I’m likely wiser. So move over. The Age of the Woman is here.
Now that we have established that, please allow me to utilize this momentous occasion to share a little feminine wisdom with you. I bring this to you via The Beautiful Project, which we were fortunate enough to see on it’s opening day at the Met. Shannon found out about it and we practically ran across Central Park, bum knee and all, before having to run back across Central Park to meet Elise for dinner… because we had to see this one exhibit. Here is the description of the project:
“At The Beautiful Project we train and support a collective of Black girls and women photographers, writers, scholars and artists in activist image making using photography and writing while centering our own care and advocating for the care of our sisters. Together, we engage our community, providing opportunities for further learning, gathering and sharing.”
It was well worth the run. The images and stories were powerful in and of their own right, but then their creed spoke to me at my very core. I had to take a picture so that I can keep it as a constant reminder. Sisters of all ages and colors, I share this gem with you care of our Black Sisters who are wise and beautiful like no other. I am so grateful to have experienced that wisdom and beauty first hand in my five years at Prairie View A&M. Thank you, Sisters, for the gift that you are to all of us. Power on. It’s your time. May we all follow your lead:
No, really, thanks. Thank you for spending this past year with me and my blog. My very first post and leap into this adventure was on Thanksgiving weekend one year ago. My experience of it has been all over the place, just like life I suppose. I have found it helpful, terrifying, surprising, comical, joyful, real, and often just plain fun to write out loud how I am processing life. It’s a funny thing writing something and then sending it out into the universe with no idea who might end up reading it. While I know that I know some of you quite well, I know there are others who I do not know at all. Either way, I have no idea who has read my meanderings unless you happen to comment on it. And that’s fine. I trust that what I share and whoever it is shared with serves us both in mysterious ways, and I love that about it. At the same time I have received quite a few deeply heartfelt reflections back to me, both through virtual and real world comments, and those reflections have without a doubt kept me going and believing in working on connection in this way. So again, whoever and wherever you are, thank you for being here with me. I am happy that we are all in this thing called life together.
Speaking of thanks, here are a few other things I am thankful for. First off I have to say life in general. I honestly do love it. It’s not only the happy stuff I love either. I mean happy is great, but so too are sad, frustrated, angry, fired up, crushed, and beaten. True joy is found in those places every bit as much as it is found in happy, silly, carefree, light, laughing, and triumphant. My bitter is almost always served up with some sweets. I also tend to prefer my sweets be a little less sugary and a whole lot of authentic, deep flavor (think dark instead of milk chocolate). That’s life. It’s a wonderful adventure no matter what happens to be happening.
The next thing that I am thankful for, as if that last one didn’t cover the whole shindig, is people. As in humans, yourself included. We don’t suck, contrary to popular opinion. We are really quite beautiful things, lost as we may be. There is something in that lostness, in our vulnerability, that is endearing. I can hear the entire Universe sighing for us. It’s not because the All That Is feels sorry for us, it’s because the All That Is is particularly fond of us, to borrow a line out of the movie “The Shack” (which is a great one in case you have never seen it or read the book. And to be clear without giving too much away, the All That Is is particularly fond of absolutely everything in existence). I share that fondness, which is why I am pulling so hard for us. We are worth it. I believe there isn’t a thing in the Universe which wouldn’t prefer for us to stick around at least long enough to realize our full Selves.
Now for one last big thing that I am thankful for- Gaia. Mother Earth. Thank God she is so damn smart! More than smart, she is wise. More than wise, she is pure love. Make no mistake, she loves us. She wants us to stick around too. She enjoys our company. More to the point, we are an expression of her. In so many ways, what this moment is calling for is simply for us to realize that the world is not a hostile place after all. Gaia, and all that she entails, is not our enemy. To think so is akin to thinking that our body is our enemy. Of course many of us do think that. It’s not true. Our bodies are as wise and loving as the Mother Earth who birthed us, who nurtures us, of whom we are a part. If only we would lay down our swords so that we might see, and more than see- experience. We are here to be at home in the world. To be at home is to belong in the deepest sense. It is to be connected, integral, relevant, loved.
Now I would be remiss if I didn’t list a few specific things that I am grateful for, so here goes in short order. Shannon: for her bravery, persistence, willingness to do crazy things with me, authenticity, entertainment of most of my whims (while somewhat keeping me in check when I am overextending), sensitivity, dedication, depth, eagerness, and true love for all things (myself included, which she expresses by supporting me in becoming more of who I truly am in the world). Family: for perfectly delivering not only myself, but also the lessons I came to learn so that I might evolve. Houston: for the story we have been writing together… may it end, or not end, well. Vermont: for inviting me into your story… let’s make it a good one. Finnegan and Greta: for keeping me grounded in what matters… like when it’s time to eat, or give butt rubs, or get outside, or howl, or snuggle. Friends both old and new: for the laughter, the support, the sharing, the caring, the keeping it real, the pushing each other along, the pulling each other up, the honoring of connection. For anyone and everyone who has crossed my path: for the reflection… thanks for showing up.
Now for a couple of gifts to help you along your way. I just finished reading a new book called Spirit Hacking by Shaman Durek. I first came across Shaman Durek on a podcast somewhere, somehow this past spring. I found what he had to say to be spot on in a deeply insightful and frank sort of way that I appreciated. What I am talking about is a rare depth that comes from somebody who has been given behind the scenes (veil) access. The guy knows what he is talking about. So I was curious to see what he would say in book form. I was not disappointed. I would have everyone read it if I could. That said, know that it will likely challenge how you see the world. If you are sensitive to profanity, be warned that he speaks in a way meant to relate at a ground level and to a primarily younger generation. It’s worth putting up with if it bothers you. Again, his understanding of the situation is spot on. What’s really awesome is that he gives many “spirit hacks” to help each one of us show up to the situation at hand. I have already incorporated some of those hacks into my daily routine and plan to do more so.
One of the hacks that he gave reminded me of one that I shared with you all earlier this summer. I originally got this hack from Thich Nhat Hahn’s book Reconciliation: Healing the Inner Child. In Thich Nhat Hahn’s version of this “hack,” we greet any tough emotion that shows up by name: “Hello, Anger. You are welcome here.” Then we invite wisdom (the higher Self) into the room: “Wisdom, please join us.” Then the three of us talk out the situation to better understand what it is really about and what it is showing up to help us with. Shaman Durek’s version of this hack is called “Responding with Love,” and he gives a slightly different version of essentially the same hack with some specifics about how to incorporate your body into the hack as well. The two versions together have given me a fuller picture of what the hack is about and how to best utilize it.
You might be wondering why it is called a “hack.” That doesn’t sound very gentle, does it? I assure that it is, in both cases. It’s called a hack because it is aimed at breaking us free from old, entrenched patterns that no longer serve us. Until we face these patterns and do the work required to shift gears (which takes many repetitions), they rule us. There is no way around this if healing is what we are after. There is furthermore no way to heal the planet until we heal ourselves. That is why I wholeheartedly recommend both books. Well, that, and I also happen to care about your own wellbeing. I want to see both you and me live into our full potential. That would be fun. Being stuck in survival mode is no fun. That is the equivalent of playing small, when we are much, much bigger than that. I would have us all experience our bigness.
Now for one last thanks. You may not be aware that Thich Nhat Hahn has retreated to Vietnam, his home country which he was exiled from, to transition out of this life. He is 93. Very soon he will move on from within the monastery where he first took his vows. There are so few elders in the world, at least relative to the number that we could use right about now. Thich Nhat Hahn has been one of those for a very long time now. He non-fought alongside Martin Luther King Jr. during the Civil Rights Movement as well as in opposition to the Vietnam War. He changed the way we understood Buddhism in this country by bringing it down to earth and into our everyday lives. If you have any sense about mindfulness in your life, that understanding can probably be traced back to Thich Nhat Hahn whether you realize it or not. So to Thich Nhat Hahn, thank you for your service. Thank you for being our teacher and for showing us the way. Thank you for leaving behind so many great resources to guide us through humanity’s great transition. What a blessing you have been. Thank you for showing us that each and every one of us is a blessing as well.
Hello, world! As you may have noticed, I have been a bit absent here this past month. Sometimes we just need a break. I didn’t actually plan to take this one, it just kind of happened as one week slipped into the next without writing my blog. As I think about it, some of it was just taking time and space for myself to reflect and reset. Some of it was a process of welcoming in and adjusting to winter, which came early here in Vermont this year. In part it is because I am working intensely on my book at the moment as well, and that means a whole lot of researching and writing. On the book front, after enjoying a flowing start to that process, I ran into a big swamp of quick sand (difficult topics and complexities) that I have been patiently wading through and doing my best not to fight.
Actually, life in general has felt a bit like that this month as I have been largely drawn inward and snuggled up at home. Every project that I am working on felt difficult in some way, like it needed a pause. That’s more than a little disconcerting for somebody like me who tends to be pushing, pushing, pushing all the time. I also haven’t had a whole lot of interaction with anyone other than Shannon. As an introvert, I easily get comfortable in that mode… and then I don’t want to go out or interact with anyone. More on this in a minute.
But rather than simply gloss over the last month, I’ll share one aspect of it. For a long time now I have been wanting to take control of my retirement investments. Now here is what you need to know about me. My retirement plan has always been to “live naked on a mountaintop.” I have literally said this anytime anyone has asked about it since I reached adulthood. My attitude on this is partly because architects don’t make a lot of money, and I certainly haven’t for most of my career. Yet it isn’t just that. The bigger picture is that something about the whole saving for and working for retirement thing doesn’t resonate with me. This thinking and strategy is part of a system that I have never fully bought into. It’s like waiting until we are practically dead to start living. That’s ridiculous. More generally, I’ve just never been that into money (if I were I would never have chosen architecture as a profession in the first place because we were warned profusely in school that we would not be getting rich.) Yet in spite of my not overly caring about my retirement funds, I have accrued some nonetheless.
The other thing to know about me is that I happen to be a pretty powerful manifestor. Perhaps you see where this is going. That mountain… we already own it. We even have a tiny house on it. We have more work to do on it and would have to make some adjustments to be able to live there during winter, but it could be done. It wouldn’t exactly be easy living during winter, but it could be done. So if I am not careful, I am going to end up naked on that mountaintop!! Let me just say for the record, Universe, clothes would be nice… and some shoes. Maybe a warm coat.
Now back to those retirement funds. I don’t have anything near what somebody my age is supposed to have. What I do have has been sitting there neglected, by me at least, for all these years. It would be one thing if I had entrusted them to somebody who I trust- somebody who understands my values. That has not been the case. Some of my funds have been in a Vanguard fund through my SEP-IRA, some have been in my old employer’s 401k, and some are now in the Texas Teacher Retirement System. That last one is like a black hole of retirement funds- I have no idea how those funds are invested and there is no possibility of me moving them out. But the first two I could do something about, and I had procrastinated doing something about it for way too long. This past spring I started what has been a long, arduous process of moving and taking control of my retirement savings. Remember I have never cared about any of this stuff, so I have never taken the time to learn about investing, stocks, etc. and so on. I couldn’t be bothered… until I was.
What really started bothering me is the fact that money that I had earned was being used to support companies that don’t align with my values. I couldn’t ignore it any longer, so I have taken the past six months to get up to speed so that I could responsibly take over management of my own funds. I can now happily say that I have consolidated what I could into my own individual 401k, and that I have carefully chosen every single mutual fund, ETS, REIT, bond, and stock that now makes up a diversified portfolio that reflects my values. That means that I am divested from fossil fuels. It also means that I am invested in renewable energy, in technology that we will need to transition to a more sustainable world, and in more sustainable building materials, just to name a few sectors. I’m not going to lie, it took a ton of reading and research. I wouldn’t necessarily recommend that everyone take this on themselves.
I would, however, encourage everyone to check that their investments are in alignment with their values and with the world that they hope to manifest. There are tools to help you do this. For starters, if you want to see where you stand relative to fossil fuels, go to this website: https://fossilfreefunds.org. You can enter the name of any fund or ETS you own to see how it scores. If you aren’t happy with it and if you have control over your retirement account investments, change it. That part isn’t that hard if you are just wanting to invest in a fund or an ETS. If your retirement savings are in a company-managed fund, then that website will also guide you on how to advocate for a change. There are other similar websites that score funds on social equity issues and the like. As for me, my retirement funds are now in alignment with what I hope to manifest. That’s important, lest I end up living out my life in a world that I didn’t actually intend.
I try to make sure that everything that I do is aimed at the world that I hope to manifest. Writing this blog is aimed at that. My book is aimed at that. My work as an architect is aimed at that. My work as a teacher is aimed at that. My personal work is aimed at that. It’s not always easy. Sometimes I get bogged down like I have been this past month. Sometimes I want to retreat and give up. Yet with age and experience I have learned not to fight so hard through these lulls. Better to just sit with it, feel it, acknowledge it, and give it a big old hug. So that’s what I have largely been up to this past month.
The other thing that I have learned is to remain conscious that I am in no way stuck in the lull. It will shift in its own good time. Zooming out to remember that and to see the broader sweep of my life helps. The final piece is adding or saying yes to a prompt that might begin to shift the energy. In this case, the prompt(s) have surrounded engagements with organizations and people who are part of the work and projects that I am shifting into. After speaking at the Tiny House Fest Vermont last month, the head of the semester long design-build class at Yestermorrow, Andrew Keller, asked me to come speak to his class. I gladly accepted as I love Yestermorrow, I appreciate how Andrew approaches his work, and it was a chance to help the next generation… which I practically never pass up on. That encounter was scheduled for yesterday morning. In the meantime, my colleague John McCleod at Middlebury asked me to come give desk crits to his introductory studio in the afternoon. I of course gladly said yes to that too.
I was actually looking forward to both. I absolutely love engaging in deeply meaningful ways with people, especially young people, who so want to manifest the world that they hope for, as all people who are attracted to designing or building do. Then yesterday came. I. Did. Not. Want. To. Come. Out. Of. My. Cocoon. Sorry, that was way too long of a use of that newfangled literary device! Anyway, I had my heels digging in the ground as I forced myself to walk out the door- running late of course. Fortunately, I also know from experience that this is typical for me and the trick is to just get myself out the door and then I’m fine.
I managed to do that, started the car (now equipped with snow tires!), and set off on my way. I knew I had a beautiful, wintery drive over the mountain ahead of me. But I didn’t have to wait for the mountains. Just a few hundred feet down my street, the snow covered trees in front of me and the vista across the lake to the side of me was so overwhelmingly beautiful that it brought me to tears. Literally. I have never had a more powerful experience of just being completely overwhelmed by the beauty of our world. It continued for my entire drive through the valley, through Brandon, over the mountain (by that mountain that I hope not be naked on unless it happens to be summer and I just took an outdoor shower), through Rochester (where I stopped at Sandy’s- my favorite coffee shop- and got to chat with one of my favorite baristas), then up scenic 100 to Yestermorrow. Breathtaking. The second it first hit me, it completely dispelled any reservations that I may have had about the day in front of me. The only thing that was in front of me was pure perfection.
When I arrived at Yestermorrow, I felt completely at home. Of course I always do there. I have spent much time at YM over the years in multiple ways: lecturing, taking classes, attending festivals, being a teaching assistant, etc. Oh, and making friends! This particular lecture was for a group of college-agish students in their semester long design-build class. The idea was to talk about what I do in the world, which for me always involves relaying the frameworks through which I do that work. Since I haven’t been teaching this semester for the first time in five and a half years, I felt a little bit out of practice going in. It didn’t matter. After giving them my overview (which in and of itself always goes deep), the students pushed me and pushed me for more. We went really deep. I got to watch their faces come to life as new possibilities for life opened up in front of them. There is nothing more awe-inspiring to witness than that, except maybe a wintery Vermont wonderland.
Now remember how I said that the last few weeks have been a bit difficult with my book writing process? It’s just that the way my mind works, the way my whole presence works, is to synthesize a whole lot of complexity into a to-the-point-at-hand clarity. To outsiders it looks like this process is easy for me. Often it is at this point, but only because I have wrestled with so much for so long. Yet still, this moment is complicated and I want to show up to it in a way that is commiserate to it. That means I have been wading through a lot of difficult territory across multiple disciplines, all while having to figure out how to distill it into something that will be meaningful, insightful, and most importantly useful to a wide audience. I am hoping to cast the widest of nets. I want to meet anyone and everyone where they are at and give them a window to their full potential, primarily by opening up a window into me. It’s delicate work. There are many tangents tugging at me. There is much that we have to face and clear out of our way that is no longer serving us in the process of figuring out a path forward.
Cut back to my talk at Yestermorrow. The final question, by a young woman who is studying at Smith, was this: “Do you have anything that you have written that we could read?” I almost fell out of my chair. Nobody has ever asked me that before. Many have told me that I should write over the course of my life, but here is somebody asking if I had completed that assignment yet. Eureka. Thank you, Universe. I told her that I’m on it. Of course they then wanted to know what my book is about, which led to a whole other round of discussion! We talked so long that I was now running late for my departure to head back over the mountain to Middlebury. No matter. In the words of an elder who I have referred to before in these pages, “there is nothing more important than this right now.”
I finally broke away from what now felt like a sea of students truly grateful for what I had shared with them. As I always try to do these days, I left them with the thought that nobody is extraneous. Every single one of us has our own unique role to play in our evolution. As I have shared with you all before, I have a bit of a save-the-world complex. I shared that with them too, letting them know I have long come to a place where I understand that I won’t save the world alone- we will only arrive collectively or not at all. Yet I also understand that the world won’t be saved without me. That is to say that we won’t evolve without me contributing what I uniquely have to contribute. The same for you. That’s all you have to do- whatever you feel called to do.
Back in my car for another drive over the enchanted Green Mountains, I took in the awe of it all. I didn’t get to Middlebury in time to go to a lecture in the Environmental Studies department that I wanted to go to. No matter. I took my time to gather myself at lunch instead. It was then that I got a text from John asking me if I would mind introducing myself to all of the students in the architecture department at the start of studios. Of course. Of course that was what the Universe had in store for me next.
Take my morning session and repeat with three times the students. Same reactions. Same lights coming on. Same gratitude. Same reflection. Thank you, Universe. Thank you for the much needed reminder. I got to spend the rest of the afternoon in one-on-one student desk crits. I always love those interactions the most in my teaching. It gives me the opportunity to really dial it in specifically for each student based on where they are coming from and what they are searching for. It gives me the opportunity to call forth and validate the potential of each and every one of them. I so adore that experience. Yesterday reminded me in a very powerful way of how much so. It also reminded me that teaching in the way that I do is central to my own calling. I am so, so happy that I get to continue to do so at Middlebury and no doubt in various ways at Yestermorrow. In the meantime, I think I have a book to write!
I hate baseball. No, no, that’s not accurate. I don’t hate it, I’m just not particularly fond of it. Actually, I’m really not overly fond of any team sport other than the greatest sport of all time- ice hockey. There, I said it. I’m just speaking my truth here, folks. Well, o.k., I do enjoy watching some other sports on occasion. Soccer would be an example. And…. hold on…. I’m thinking… well, soccer. Let’s just leave it at soccer. But here’s another thing I notice about my inclinations as a sport fan (or not). I am not, I repeat NOT, a fan of professional sports. No, wait, wait… that’s not true either. It would be more accurate to say that I’m not a fan of professional sports of the male variety… not even when it comes to hockey! Wait a minute, did I just say that??? Well, yes, yes, I did and it is mostly true, but then again not 100% true. On a rare occasion I will even get into the NHL if and when some really great story is unfolding.
Now drop down to the college ranks and all sports instantly become more interesting to me. It has something to do with an increase in purity the more the money drops out of it. I still don’t choose to watch, say, college football, but I might on occasion in the post season. And, yes, I’ll even occasionally watch the Texans in the post season, mostly because I appreciate J.J. Watt not just as a player, but as a person. As for basketball, sorry, not much dice there. That’s just how it is with me folks. I’m not making a political statement here, I’m just telling you what it is like to be me. Oh, hell, everything is political isn’t it? I suppose truth be told I don’t enjoy watching (male) professional sports for the same reason that I don’t like watching TV. I don’t like the way that it distracts, taking away time and energy from the things that matter to me. Well, that, and I don’t appreciate some of the antics that it breeds in some people some of the time. I’m being careful not to over-generalize here. Some professional athletes are truly phenomenal people whom I admire, such as J.J.
Side note, that wish I wish would stop being a side note. When it comes to professional sports that involve women, that’s an entirely different story. I tend to love those no matter what the sport, but especially when it involves playing hockey. What can I say, I’m biased. I would just much rather watch women playing sports than men. I’m sure this in part has to do with the aforementioned dropping out of way too much money and partially to do with I just like watching people who are more like me. I can relate to women playing sports at all levels and therefore it is just a million times more interesting to me. End of side note.
Back to athletes whom I admire. When we were preparing to leave Houston, I realized that I had really nothing in my wardrobe that would signal to anybody that I was a Houstonian (other than a desperate lack of winter attire!). I wanted people to know where I was from up here in Vermont. So I thought about it. I thought about what is something that has touched me and made me feel pride for this place. The answer was crystal clear. Astros. Jose Altuve, specifically. I’m just going to be honest here, folks. I love, love, love… love, love, love!…. Jose Altuve. Love him. I fell in love with him when the Astros won the World Series in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey. Remember that thing about loving watching women play because I can relate to them? Yes, I am just going to come out and say it. Altuve is my honorary female athlete. That is the greatest compliment that I can give the guy in case you are thinking otherwise. He is in touch with his feminine side, his sensitive side, and he’s not afraid to show it. There is a reason that everybody but everybody loves Altuve. Oh, and, of course I can relate to him because he is only 4 inches taller than I am! Shorties unite!!!!
So my Houston pride purchase was an Astros World Series Champions shirt with Altuve 27 on the back. Yes, I wear it proudly up here in Red Sox country. For me to wear any athlete’s name and number is HUGE. I just don’t idolize athletes that way. Let that be a testament to all that Altuve represents. For me, he is everything that I hope for professional sports and for professional athletes to be about. Did I mention I love him? I do. I love him so much that I will even watch baseball just to get to see him play. And as for his teammates, I think they are pretty awesome too. When they won the World Series in 2017, Houston was reeling from Harvey. Altuve and his teammates knew how much the city needed a picker upper and they got the job done. This is sports at its finest hour. This is sports bringing people together and giving a sense of hope for what is possible in the world. I can get behind that.
All I ask is that in the midst of such endeavors, we not forget what we are truly fighting for. Is it a title? Is it bragging rights? Is it more money? Or is it a community that we believe in and that represents the best of our potential as human beings? I’m going to go with the latter, and I’ll appreciate any athlete or any team that keeps that intent front and center. I believe the Astros are such a team. Let their accomplishments inspire us to face the adversities that Houston (and the entire world) now faces with the perseverance, creativity, compassion, and determination that we need to bring forth a world that we are all proud to live in and that we would all like to call home. Go ‘Stros!
It is a really strange thing if you think about it. Fall is my thing, the time of year that I love the most. Specifically, October has always been my favorite month. Even down in color deprived Houston, there is something great about the month of October (usually). The sky is different, more vibrant, more whole. The slight cool in the air, or not so slight as the case may be, is a welcome relief. But mostly, things just feel more vibrant to me.
Here in Vermont this is true tenfold with the changing of the leaves. This entire week I have felt so incredibly at home in the world. It is difficult to even describe the depths to which I am speaking. All I can really do is talk around it. It’s a feeling of complete calm, a settledness. It’s a feeling of unfettered aliveness, with nothing getting in the way. It’s a vibration that is resonating perfectly, no discord whatsoever, with the world around me. And it occurs to me in the moment that what I am experiencing is life as it is meant to be experienced, as pure joy.
Another way of saying the above is that fall is when I feel most alive. So what is so strange about all of this? Well, fall is when the rest of life begins winding down for the winter. It actually represents a preparation for death, or so we have fashioned. For a deciduous tree, it is the time of pulling in. The vibrant colors that we love so much are the result. And we do love our fall colors. This weekend Vermont was overrun with leaf peepers, and Shannon and I were right there among them. I wonder what the trees think. Do they love all of the sudden attention or are they mumbling to themselves, “Look, I’m trying to go to sleep here!” I’m going to go with the former. I’m going to guess that their process of winding down is a pleasant relief for them as well after a summer full of frantic production. Maybe, just maybe, they actually feel the same way I do- at peace and humming along with a deep sense of oneness.
It seems everyone and everything feels that way up here right about now. Our week included meeting a group of friends for dinner on Thursday night in Middlebury. We brought together two couples that had never met each other, on a spontaneous whim, yet it became quickly apparent that we were all one big, happy family. In part this was because five out of the six of us were women hockey players (which our one token, non-hockey playing male delighted in). Hockey is a small world! In part it was because of Vermont, in which everyone seems to know everyone in one way or another. The evening was an entirely enjoyable communion with people that we love. In plain English… so much fun! This is how friendships are supposed to feel, camradarie at its finest. We count ourselves lucky for the wealth of friendships that we have accumulated along the way.
On Friday, Shannon came home early from work and we spontaneously decided to drive over the mountain via Brandon Gap to our favorite coffee shop (as mentioned last week), Sandy’s Books and Bakery. First of all, the colors along our drive over the mountains were nothing short of spectacular. I just can’t imagine this ever getting old or one iota less jaw dropping. As for Sandy’s, we hadn’t managed to get over there all summer, for which we have been feeling the void because we consider Sandy not just a friend but a trusted elder. Fortunately she was in the coffee shop when we got there (she is often found next door in her sister store, the Bookary). When she saw us she stepped around the counter to give us the biggest, warmest hugs ever. So much love between us. This is how human relationships are supposed to be. We hung out there and simply read the lazy afternoon away. On our way home the tree colors were in a whole new light… the light of a stunning sunset. It nearly stopped us in our tracks, but we kept going… each of us secretly wishing we were watching that sunset from the Brandon Gap Great Cliff along the Long Trail.
Yesterday we decided to go touring around again. Neither one of us had shook that feeling from the night before. So we packed our day hiking gear, head lamps included, and set out on our way. First stop was my cousin-in-law Ben’s new farmstead up in Lincoln to check out and talk through his latest building projects. We just popped in. He had no idea we were coming and didn’t need to. Then we continued over the mountain again, this time via Lincoln Gap, which was packed to the hilt with day hiking leaf peepers. We kept going as we were aiming for a less crowded hiking adventure a little later. On the other side of the mountain we took a pit stop at the Warren Store where we picked up a quick bite to eat. The place was packed. From there we headed up the road a bit to the Bundy Modern to check out their latest art exhibit and take in the fall colors in their extraordinary setting. This off the beaten path museum is well worth finding. The place is just crazy beautiful:
From there we headed back south toward our final destination. South meant a drive along the Scenic Route 100 Byway. The scene along 100 never disappoints no matter the season, and is part of why we love our little town of Rochester, home to our mountain retreat as well as Sandy’s, so much. On our way we took another pit stop at Hubbard’s Country Store in Hancock to pick up some food for our hike. There are so many cool general/country stores in Vermont, including the ones mentioned here. They had exactly what we were looking for even though we had no idea what we were looking for when we walked in: Vermont cheese, summer sausage, olives and get this… wine in a can! Don’t judge! It was yummy!
We arrived at the Long Trail parking lot around 5pm, enough time to hike up to the cliff and get settled for the show. Remember how I said that Lincoln Gap was packed to the hilt? There were only a few cars in the parking lot at Brandon Gap. Now don’t go telling too many people, because it is kind of nice to keep it that way! The hike up to the cliff is steep, providing a nice bit of exercise with a huge reward at the end. On our way up, one nice caring elderly gentleman made mention that it gets dark quickly, darker than you might expect. Normally such paternal instincts would annoy me, but I just thanked him and assured him that we had headlamps and he seemed relieved to hear that. When we got to the cliff we had it all. to. our. selves. It was nothing short of magical. We set up our spread and settled in.
Then we took a million and one pictures all while applauding nature with every twist and turn of the plot. O.K., well, the wine might have been talking, just a little. Photos never do the real thing justice, but here are some teasers nonetheless:
The whole time everything that I described above about vibrating with it all was in full force. Then, it occurred to me that the moon was almost full and should also be rising around the same time. Sure enough, right on cue, the moon peaked out as the sun waived goodbye. I can’t help but think that they talk to each other every chance they get. On this occasion, I imagine they were nodding at each other with the hugest smiles on their faces knowing full well the glorious scene that they were orchestrating, seemingly just for two lone hikers on a cliff way past when we should have been. This is our proper place in the world. This is what it is to be fully at home in the world.
We finished off our wine at the last possible second as the sun was disappearing in the distance. With headlamps on, we started our descent. But you know what? We never turned them on. It was dark, yes, but our eyes adjusted enough to be able to see the trail and watch our step. What could be more perfect than a night hike in the witching month?? It turned out not to be the least bit scary though. I had not anticipated this, but I was reminded of something that I haven’t experienced nearly enough of lately. I actually feel completely comfortable in the darkness. In fact, I love it. It reminded me of my days at Princeton when I would wander the campus late at night, often ending up running across and then laying in the middle of a field and looking up at the stars. It was magical to be in the forest, on a mountain, in the darkness, and to feel every bit as much at home as I did in the light. It reminded me that our fears are often unfounded. Yes, shit happens in life, but more than often than not it doesn’t. It’s worth wondering what gets missed when we spend so much time worrying about shit-aversion. Hell, even when it does happen, it gives us a great story!
As for stories, we have come to the end of this little non-haunted, yet enchanted, story in honor of my favorite month for all time. I love you, October. Thank you for bringing us all together. I am not done with you yet. We just decided to go touring again today. See you out there, fellow October lovers!
This was a momentous week. But first things first. It’s October!!! My favorite month of the year has arrived! And it is everything you would expect… in Vermont, that is. The leaves are turning and, yes, it really is stunning. So for you less fortunate souls who live in, say, Texas, allow me to take you on a vicarious leaf peeping trip through Vermont.
To ring in my favorite month- because I couldn’t quite wait until last Tuesday- we went on an all day excursion the Saturday before last. Our day started with coffee, of course, at one of our favorite new coffee shops, the Kinder Way Coffeehouse in Castleton. We now have a favorite coffee shop on both sides of the Green Mountains (east side is Sandy’s Books and Bakery for inquiring minds)! What we love about Kinder Way, besides the excellent coffee, is the spirit of the place. The owners, Mark and Erika Gutel, run this place on love. With gentle reminders from Erika, Mark says “I don’t have to save the world, I just have to give them a place to rest for a bit.” After a bit of prodding, we discovered that they also run a nonprofit farm, Kinder Way Farm Sanctuary, which serves as a refuge for rescued farm animals. On this particular visit, Mark tells me “I’m so glad you two are in Vermont permanently now. You are in the right place. We are likeminded and we need to work together. We don’t have much time.” He is right. We have found kindred folk in the Gutels and we are looking forward to all that might lead to.
From there it was onto our main mission for the day: apple picking. Now let me just say that if you have only ever gotten an apple from a store, that’s a tragedy. Please put apple picking on you bucket list and get to it! We chose to try Boyers Orchard & Cider Mill, a family owned orchard in Monkton. The apple picking greeter (for lack of a better title) was the sister of the owner, an elderly Pre-K teacher who works there on the weekends during apple picking season. She oriented us as to what and where the multiple apple varieties were, making sure that we understood we were to taste test apples from any and every tree before we made our selections. Oh and we did! With a bag full of apples in hand we added their homemade apple cider and apple cider donuts to our spoils as the owner, sister of the aforementioned greeter, checked us out. Then we went over to their tasting room to try out the alcoholic versions of their apple cider as well as the red and white wines that they make from their on site vineyard. Yum! We made another friend in the taste testing lady (for lack of a better title) in the process. While she wasn’t related to the owner, you still got the sense that it was one big happy, messy family operation.
Apple mission accomplished, we followed the suggestion of the taste testing lady and headed over the mountains, leaf-peeping along the way, to continue our taste testing at Mad River Taste Place in Waitsfield. The purpose of this place is to help small, local food and drink producers get their products to market. We sampled way too many Vermont artisan cheeses and then washed it down – so to speak – with samplings of Mad River Distillers rum and whiskey. Realizing we had yet to eat anything resembling a meal (and having consumed one too many alcoholic samples), we crossed the parking lot toward Worthy Burger Too to share a locally, responsibly sourced craft burger. So good.
En route we couldn’t help getting drawn into a local clothing shop called Product Think Tank. With a name like that, we were instantly intrigued. The owner, Annemarie Furey, beckoned us in as we started peppering her with questions. It turns out that she left the fashion industry because frankly she just couldn’t stomach it anymore. She started her own company to replicate the “farm to table” concept in the clothing industry. For one, her clothes are made with only natural fibers to model the elimination of petrochemical-based synthetic fibers (think polyester, nylon, acrylic, spandex, etc.) from our clothes. If you don’t know this already, petrochemical-based synthetic fibers contain not only toxic chemicals, but they are also non-biodegradable. In our fast fashion culture in which we turn over our (relatively cheap) wardrobe at breathtaking speeds, toxic landfills and environmental degradation are the result, nevermind whatever it is doing to you. Annemarie further utilizes family owned farms in democratic countries to grow and produce her clothing, which is made to last for life. Shannon and I picked up a few sweaters, because guess what folks… sweater weather has arrived in Vermont!
We spent the following day up at our mountain retreat, which we unfortunately neglected all summer. I have missed this place! I am happy to report that everything was in good shape. Shannon, Finny, Greta and I hiked “our” 40 acre forest to enjoy the fall colors while continuing the process of getting to know the place. Ultimately we will co-create a thriving ecology, humans included, alongside the genius of the mountain, the forest and all of the living forms that make up the community (ecosystem) of this place. On a related topic, I am currently reading The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben (link to our local Northshire Bookstore, not Amazon). This is a must read if we are to understand (and save) the world in which we live.
So that rounded out our celebration of the arrival of October. Of course we have celebrated with fall foods galore all week: apple cider, apple cider donuts, homemade apple compote, apple crumble with vanilla ice cream, homemade pumpkin muffins, butternut squash ravioli, and acorn squash soup- all from locally sourced ingredients. There is something about fall, yes, but you aren’t really experiencing it if your culinary connection is coming through a pumpkin spiced latte collected at the Starbucks drive-thru. This is why we moved home to Vermont:
1/2 natural ecology + 1/2 real community = 1 place that has a snowball’s chance in hell of not just surviving, but thriving
I am not advocating that everyone move to Vermont. What I am advocating is that, first of all, you discover the natural ecology of the place in which you live and then find the people who are doing such amazing things as I described above. Form a community with these fearless people who are putting themselves out there, daring to change the course of humanity. If you have an amazing idea of your own, do it. Go for it now. Don’t wait. There is no time for that. Find what, where and who you love and support it with everything you got. You will never, ever regret such a decision.
All that said, I started by saying that this was a momentous week for us. It was. We sold our house in Houston. As I have mentioned in a previous post back in the spring, we had painstakingly poured love into the renovation of what had been my home for twenty years, where I had raised my kids, and had been Shannon’s home for ten years. We put way more money into it than was advisable, knowing that we would be selling and moving to Vermont in the not too distant future. We had completely transformed the energy of the place from where it was when I first purchased it. I had always envisioned this as a gift to the next resident(s) of our beloved home, that had cared for us all so well, rollercoaster ride as it was. I didn’t get the sense that the first potential buyer was the right guy. Fortunately (in retrospect), he backed out. The next buyer made me so incredibly happy. While I haven’t met her, what I do know is that she is a nurse and a caregiver. I knew instantly that she was the one… the one who we had done it all for. I’ll never know her story, but I trust that she will be well cared for herself, at least by this house, from here on out.
As for us, I am going to say words that I never imaged I would be able to say. We are debt free. No car debt. No student loan debt. No mortgage. Nothing. At least not for the moment. We will enjoy just a small respite. Then we will be right back at it… renovating Shannon’s childhood home that has cared for her family so well and brought so much joy over the years. We will overhaul it, while saving everything we can, in order to bring it into alignment with the lake ecology and world that we love so much. That means net zero energy performance. That means longterm durability. That means responsibly sourced and local materials to the degree possible. That means a new septic system, drainage curtain, and raingardens to keep our human wastes from polluting the lake. And, yes, it means a super comfortable and cool home to host our wide community of friends and family. It’s coming, folks. Just give us this winter to rest and then probably a few years of sweat, love, help from our friends, and no doubt some tears! It will be an expensive endeavor, yes. We will go back into debt to accomplish it. However, it is not nearly as expensive or as soul crushing as the alternative of watching the planet, humans, and other species laid to waste. We can do this, one house, one community at a time, if we all work together. The cost is worth it. We are worth it. Every human and every species is worth it.
We live in Neverland, or so we have convinced ourselves. This could never happen. That could never happen. I could never do that. We will never do that. And on and on. But is it true? Who decides what is possible and what is not? We so often point to the “system” these days and throw our hands up in the air. Everyone knows that the system is the problem. Although we don’t agree on the nature of that problem, we do agree that it simply cannot be changed. The course of history is set in stone. All I’m asking is… are we sure?
So many “I could never do that’s,” so little time. It seems to me that I am not wasting any! This past week I have been on a, let’s call it hectic, adventure running here and there. It wasn’t meant to be quite as hectic as it has turned out, but then again- that’s life! Sometimes. I was supposed to head down to Houston to celebrate my parents’ birthdays, squeeze in a few business meetings, and catch up with friends. Then I would hop a plane to Colorado for some business with the U.S. Department of Energy before returning home to Vermont. That was the plan.
Let’s start with the fact that I was very nervous about this plan. My nervousness wasn’t based on my itinerary, per se, it was based on one simple fact- I still have a goatee. If you need a recap as to why, revisit my post “Hairy.” When I wrote that post I was early into growing out my goatee and still had a long list of things I could never do with it ahead of me. I wasn’t sure if I was going to face those fears or not, and I gave myself full permission not to. Here is a partial list of things I could never do:
I could never interview for a job with a goatee.
I could never get on an airplane with a goatee.
I could never go to Houston with a goatee.
I could never face my parents with a goatee.
I could never go to an important business meeting with a goatee.
I’m sure I could list a million things, because the truth is that just about every other thing gives me some form of angst. The thing is that I just didn’t know how deeply ingrained this effort to hide myself has been, nor how successful it’s been. So you can see that this trip invoked a whole slew of my deepest fears. I honestly wasn’t sure if or how I would face them. True to course, I had a complete panic attack the day before I was supposed to leave. Understand that my goatee is now quite prevalent. It’s unavoidable. It makes me highly visible in the exact way that I don’t like to be. People notice me. Ugh.
Mostly what happens is that at first people see my hair hair (the hair growing from my head rather than my face & chin) which is blonde and quite long at this point. Due to that and my stature they immediately register “woman.” Then they catch sight of my goatee and there is this visible moment of complete disconnect. It’s simple cognitive dissonance. They naturally go to their memory banks for an image that they can utilize to make sense of what they are seeing… and there is none. Nope, no images of women with goatees in there for most folks. I get it. It’s interesting to watch it. I am learning not to be bothered by it. It’s nothing personal. Uncomfortable, yes. Personal, no. It gives me an opportunity to work on holding an empathetic space for an expanded sense of possibilities. It gives others, of course, an expanded sense of possibilities for their memory banks. All of that is interesting and doable.
But then there are the wounded parts of myself. The parts of myself that have faced judgement and rejection are not quite so empathetic. That part of myself wants to crawl under a rock, or perhaps kill you. That part of myself feels the sting if that look of confusion turns into any sort of judgy stare or even glare… which on occasion it has. One might ask why in the hell I would subject myself to this. Those were, in fact, the first and only words out of my father’s mouth, “Why are you doing this?” Sometimes, I wonder that too! Yet I know why. So here is your answer. I am doing this to allow the wounded parts of myself space to be felt, expressed, seen, and healed. I am lucky that I have such a tangible means through which to invoke all of the small ideas about the world (and therefore me) that oppressed me in the first place.
Why on earth we humans decided that women are not beautiful as they naturally occur is beyond me. I don’t understand this. Growing up in Houston, Texas and the South in general comes with certain expectations if not demands when it comes to how females are supposed to appear. I never felt comfortable filling that image. This is mostly because I find it to be unnatural, when in fact I appreciate the beauty of raw nature. I think women are beautiful – more beautiful- without all of the masks. I was trained to wear makeup at age 13. I won’t even get into hairstyling. Then there are the clothes, the mannerisms, the not being too assertive or too smart, and on and on and on. Yuck. I found it oppressive, and confusing.
Yet by the time I arrived on the East Coast to start college I would never even think of walking out of my dorm room without a full face of makeup on. That is, until I noticed that for the first time in my life, most of the other women on campus were not wearing makeup. Hallelujah!!! Let freedom ring!!! I stopped it all immediately… the makeup, the hairstyling, all of it. By my junior year I had cut my hair boyishly short. Returning to Houston in this condition was, well, nerve racking to say the least. This is to say that I have dealt with this anxiety before. While nobody had a problem identifying me as a woman on the East Coast, I was routinely asked if I was in the wrong bathroom back in Houston. Ugh. Why can’t you see me??? Do you understand that the messaging is that women are not beautiful just as they are? This is to say that we are not good enough. While I think we have made progress on this front over the last 25 years, we are not there yet. So, yes, I am growing out my goatee as a declaration. Here it is: “I am beautiful just as I am.” Well, that, and… “I don’t give a damn if you don’t agree with me!” Mind you, I have to muster a lot of gumption day in and day out to hold this messaging in my mind. The world has done quite a good job of convincing me otherwise.
Now for that list of never coulds. I have chosen one by one, step by step, to keep facing them. Two weeks ago I went to a job interview with goatee a flowing. This wasn’t just any job interview either. This was THE interview… you know, the one for the perfect job that I have been jockeying for for three years now- a teaching job in the Architecture Department at Middlebury College. Granted, the interview was just for a short, temporary gig for Winter Term. But still. If I didn’t pass this test then I would’t be considered for a permanent position later on. My every last nerve went berserk- complete panic attack. There is some part of me though that is ready and willing to fight for me, to stand up for me, to take back complete control over my own narrative. This part of me said, “You are doing it.” So I did. Although I do have to admit to crying en route to my interview. But you know what, in spite of that initial awkward moment of cognitive dissonance, the interview went great. And… I got the job!
Next stop, Houston. Passing the job interview test helped some, but it didn’t stop me from having a panic attack all over again. In these moments I just stare at myself in the mirror trying to be o.k. with it all and wondering if I can. Then I remind myself that the point is to be uncomfortable, to get the very reflections from others that I am trying to move past. This helps me to invite those reflections rather than trying to hide from them. After some serious deliberations I psyched myself up to move ahead with it. Then the storm came. Tropical Storm Imelda that is. The night before I was supposed to leave, the storm was predicted to make landfall and flood Houston. It is impossible to play dice with the weather. No matter what you do, you loose. I ended up changing my flight to a day later in hopes that the worst of it would be over by then. Of course that didn’t happen. Instead the storm stalled out and arrived a day late and the very thing that I was trying to avoid- getting stranded in Newark- happened. Nature will have her way.
At first my flight was only delayed, or so they thought. I took my extra time at the airport to pull out my computer and start something that I have been meaning to start for some time now, to the point that it had been nagging me like a pesky five year old for days. Sitting there with the Manhattan skyline in full view, I started to write my book. Yes, you heard it here first, folks. Book is in progress. Then they cancelled my flight.
Fortunately, I have friends in Jersey- Mary, my best friend from college, to be specific. She lives in Princeton so I texted her to ask what our plans were for the evening. It turns out that we were heading to Philly for a screening of her husband Jim’s trailer for the movie he is working on. Take that, Imelda! Actually, here is what I really think. I really think that nature takes very good care of us and this was a case in point. Not only did I get to see one of my best friends, but I also got to see Jim’s family who I hadn’t seen since they got married, well, let’s just say some time ago! It was so great. They were all so, so happy to see me and we had a marvelous time together. And it was all so damn comforting, which is exactly what I needed in that moment. The following day I was supposed to be attending the climate strike in Houston with one of my close friends there. I instead went to the one in Princeton. No harm, no foul. And for the record, go, Greta!
As I walked through the Princeton campus to catch the Dinky (train) back to Newark, something dawned on me. Just the day before I had sat looking out at the Manhattan skyline recalling how much I love NYC and have felt at home there since my days at Princeton, even though I have never lived there. Then I ended up at Princeton, which most definitely has been and feels like home to me. Now I was heading back to Houston, the home where I grew up and have spent the majority of my life. From there I would be heading back to Denver, Colorado, which is my family’s home and where my grandparents had always lived during my life. This trip was quite literally walking me back through my entire history, step by step. Such a strange turn of events. Yet it mirrored exactly what I have been doing, walking myself back step by step by step.
When I landed in Houston, what can I say, there it was right out of the gate…. the glare. The glare of a white middle aged male as I walked past him to get to the rental car shuttle. He turned his head a full 180 degrees keeping his eyes on me as I walked past just to make sure that he maximized his full glaring opportunity. I paid no mind. Look, Houston, I know it isn’t everybody, but the truth is that you have some work to do still. You have some work to do on multiple fronts, in fact- social, economic, and ecological to name a few. I get to say this and call attention to it because I am a native. I have earned that right having called Houston home for the last 50 years. It’s true that I have more to say to you than to most places, but that is because I know you best. We are family. I see you for who you are, as you are, in your naked truth. Yes, you are naturally beautiful and full of potential, but as I shared with my greenie friends at brunch on Sunday, it is way past time for you to face your shadows so that your true beauty can shine through. I am not convinced that you will, but I’ll keep cheering for you- from a safe distance.
Most people don’t know what to say about my goatee, so they choose to say nothing. That is how most people, and my friends in particular, show their support. They choose not to make a big deal about it. I am still trying to figure out how to open up conversation about it myself. For the time being, I also choose not to say anything and proceed as I normally would. But you know what has been the best reaction so far, besides the complete loving support that I have received from Shannon, that is? My very good friend Amanda leaned over to me during brunch amidst a whole table of friends and whispered “I love your scruffy.” I just had to say that. Thank you, Amanda! That put a huge smile in my heart.
Finally the last leg of this little adventure landed me in Colorado where I have been doing some important work with the U.S. Department of Energy. I am still in Colorado as I write. All I can say is that I was so tired by the time that I got here that I couldn’t even begin to care anymore… at least not about my goatee! I care deeply about the work that we are doing and feel so grateful that I am able to make a meaningful contribution and that I am trusted to do so. I have many friends in the DOE and you know what, not a single one of them seemed to care one iota about my goatee. They cared quite a lot, however, about what I had to say. They also care quite a lot about me personally and how things are going in my life. The feeling and respect is mutual. And it is this way because we all show up with authenticity and genuine care for each other and for the planet.
Nature is as it is. I am as I am. You are as you are. All three statements are related. I noticed something as I walked through Princeton, then Houston, then a short hike this afternoon in Colorado. I noticed the air. The air is distinct and familiar to me in each place. In each place it has a particular feel, a particular buoyancy, a particular smell. Each one was familiar to me and each one felt like home to me in its own way. That is because the air of each place is embodied in me. It is embodied in me in the way that my body has adapted to it. It is embodied in me in the fact that it has delivered breath and life to me. It is embodied in me in the way that it has delivered molecules that have literally been incorporated into my own body. There is no escaping that we are one with this place and with each other.
Now to end this little story with my original line of questioning. Are we sure that everything is set in stone? I notice that I am evolving, even though I am fundamentally the same person that I have always been and even though I am interdependent on the places and the people who have informed my life. I notice that Houston is evolving, even if not as quickly as I think it must. I notice that humanity is evolving, even if it looks like we are moving backwards these days. More than anything, I notice that we have written the rules that guide what we call “the system.” Nobody outside of ourselves decided that women should wear makeup and should not have goatees. We did that. If you still think that women should not have goatees, all I can say to you is that I have one- quite naturally- and I am a woman. Guess what? We have full power to rewrite ourselves, to rewrite the rules that we have written, to drop what no longer serves us, and to write a new ending/beginning. How do we do so? Step one: face our shadows. Do whatever it takes. Grow out that goatee (metaphorically speaking) if necessary!
Our stories are so important. They tell us who we are. Shannon and I are all about the stories these days. We have just initiated a Story of Place project with our community on Lake Hortonia. More about that in the future. For the moment it means that we are out there making connections in and around our community as well as with the storytelling experts, such as those at the Vermont Folklife Center. On Wednesday we went to see their exhibit, Ice Shanties, and ended up getting a tour of their archives in the process. Then yesterday we went to an event/workshop that they were co-hosting in Burlington. It included a “story booth”, where everyday common folk could go in to tell a bit of their own personal story. We decided to take it for a short test spin just to get the feel for it. Shannon (very quickly I might add) took the role of interviewer, which meant I had to be the interviewee. Sample questions were posted around the booth and I pointed to my favorite. It was simple: “What time period of your life would you like to talk about?”
I quickly realized that just because I liked the question didn’t mean I had an immediate answer for it! Or to be more precise, I knew, but I wasn’t ready to go there in that moment. There are some things that are easy to talk about and others not so much. I went with something easy. We were just practicing after all. One of the main points of yesterday’s event was to share research that shows that the better we know our family stories, the healthier we are. Yes, that is what the research shows. The organizers of this event were interested in extending the same thinking to the community at large. If we better know the stories of our community, does the community become healthier? I suspect that it does. It’s pretty simple really. The more we know our stories, the more connected we are. The more connected we are, the more whole we are. The more whole we are, the healthier we are. Simple. All we have to do is open our mouths and start sharing.
It should at least be easy to share the nuts and bolts stuff, the joyful stuff, the fun stuff. Yet now would be a good time to ponder how much you really know about your parents and their parents and so on. How much of their stories have/did your parents and grandparents actually share with you? How much did you listen?! There are a ton of questions that get at your parents’ stories such as “what jobs did your parents work when they were younger?” I know that my father pumped gas and changed oil at his father’s gas station growing up. But as it turns out, I don’t know what jobs my mother may have had growing up or up through college until she became a Registered Nurse. In addition, I know my paternal grandfather’s work history, but not my maternal grandfather’s. This could well be because I wasn’t paying enough attention, but it’s also true that my father happens to be a talker (I mean storyteller!) whereas my mom is not quite so much. Well, Mom, you now have your assignment. You have three days to get your story straight! I am looking forward to seeing you both for your birthdays on Wednesday.
So it is interesting to discover where the holes are in what we know of our family story, and it is important to fill them. It should be relatively easy to share and to discover the easy stuff. Just volunteer the info or ask the questions. That is a great start. Yet if health is what we are after, then we can’t just stop with the easy stuff. We have to keep delving. All the way down into the hard stuff. The messy stuff. The stuff we don’t talk about. The taboo stuff. The off-limits stuff. The family secrets. All those things that we lock down in the basement never to be seen or heard. I’ve explained why before. In short, because those are the things that in large part are subconsciously controlling the story that we are writing right now. That is how unhealthy patterns are replicated through families, communities, cultures.
This is delicate work. It requires every empathetic bone in our body and then some. Starting with the easy stuff really is the best way to start. That helps to build our empathetic muscles. I would say go slow and tread consciously. That and be gentle with yourself and with others. It’s scary work. This isn’t sprint work. This is training for the marathon work. Best not to plow through it. Let me give you a case in point.
I’ve mentioned something once or twice in passing throughout this blog, but unless you are personally in the know about the previous chapter of my life, you are likely to have missed it. If you are somebody who got to know me only in my most recent chapter, you are likely to not know this about me (as I discovered from a recent reflection from somebody who had no earthly idea). Actually, there are even people from the particular chapter of my life that I am referring to who don’t know this about me! Here goes, because apparently I failed to make the announcement: I am a parent. I have two daughters, Madison and Kristen. Those two beautiful people in the photo above are them. There are a million and one reasons why not everybody knows this. As Madi said to me two days ago, “Out of sight, out of mind.” I see I have some storytelling to do.
Why has this been out of sight, you ask? Let me start by explaining that Madi and Kristen are technically my step daughters. My first partner is their biological mother from her previous marriage to their biological father. The kids were 4 and 6 when we partnered, and 16 and 18 when we split. So technically, yes, we are “step” to each other. The step never really mattered to me though. As far as I have ever been concerned, we are family.
But if step isn’t hard enough as it is, we were a gay couple on top of that. In the first place, we were not allowed to be legally married either in Texas or federally at the time. This is to say that we had no legal protections. On top of that, while things were changing in this country, they had not changed yet. My partner was deeply afraid that our kids would be taken away from her/us. This in spite of the fact that their father always knew the truth of our relationship and was supportive. So out of her fear, we remained closeted for most of our kids’ childhoods. And when I say closeted, I mean closeted… even to our kids. How we managed this, I cannot even begin to wrap my head around these days nor would I try to justify it. It was never my preference. But I was the step, so it wasn’t my decision to make. At least that is what I thought at the time. If I had to do it over again, I would choose not to participate in what was essentially a lie. In other words, I would force the issue. I would bring it to the surface. In retrospect, every single one of us would agree that being honest would have been much healthier for all of us.
But that’s not what we did. There were two schools of thought at the time. The first was tell them as early as possible such that all forms of love between two consenting adults are included in their worldview. The second is wait until they figure it out on their own because that means that they are ready to know. We went with the latter. It. Was. Crap. When Madi finally did pop the question at age 16, she was pissed. And rightfully so. In one fell swoop, the entire story of her life was upended. She no longer knew what was what, if she ever even did. Her response: “Why didn’t you just tell me??!!” Indeed. Why? And further, “If you had just told me from the get-go then it all would have felt so normal.” Right. Kristen, too, had her own processes, revelations, and breakdowns. The whole thing just sucked.
And that, to be honest, is just the tip of the iceberg. There are many things that I won’t share here, not because I don’t think that all things should be brought to the surface, owned, and released to the world for all to see. I do. But remember that this is delicate work, and it is a marathon not a sprint. Our family is still very much in the process of processing our story for ourselves and with each other. It is slow work. So slow. Painfully slow. I have been sitting here waiting, watching, holding space (at a painful distance) for my kids while the second hand ticks for over twelve years now. Madi is now 30 and Kristen 28. In that time there have been glimpses of progress, of readiness, of hope, and then… silence. Nothingness. Emptiness. Most of the time. I won’t even try to describe that pain or the sense of hopelessness that goes with it.
Let’s just say that both of my kids had, in Madi’s words, “volatile childhoods.” Yup. Very. My role in that was to be the behind-the-scenes stabilizing force. Nobody knew what was really going on or how I was handling it save my best friend Micki, probably my parents, and maybe anybody else who was observant enough to surmise what was not readily visible. Our lives were a mess. Yet as Micki likes to remind me, without me there in it, it wouldn’t have just been a mess… it would have been a disaster area. My every move was aimed at stabilizing the ship, at keeping us afloat. And I did, until I couldn’t any longer. I exhausted myself in the process. Over the years I was slowly disintegrating from the inside out. By the end I was one step away from comatose having completely forgotten who I even was anymore.
Yet even then, if I could have taken one more step for my kids’ sake, I would have. God didn’t let me. God, in her infinite wisdom, pulled the plug. That’s not the story that has generally been told about how that chapter of my life came to a crashing end, but it’s my truth. My Instructions were to model a healthy decision for my kids. Not that I really had a choice in the matter, because I didn’t have the capacity to take one more step anyway. I’m stubborn and the Universe knows it, so when push comes to shove It knows to force me to my knees in order to force my hand. I had no choice left but to trust the Universe. In that, I had to trust that the Universe was going to take over the care for my kids. I had to, because not only did I have no legal rights, I could never expect them to choose me over their biological parents. Not to mention they were young adults with minds and lives of their own by that time. I knew exactly what was going to happen next, it terrified me, it broke my heart into a million pieces, and all I could do was… watch. The aftermath was in fact all that and a bag of chips. If my kids’ childhoods had been volatile, their early adulthood was hell.
I won’t even try to describe to you how painful it was to be utterly helpless to be of any help. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I didn’t want to be there for them. Boy did I. Actually, truth be told, what I wanted to do was rip them right out of that set of circumstances. But I couldn’t. I was effectively cut out. All I could do was gently make my continued presence known to them without forcing them into a choice between parents that I never wanted them to have to make. For the most part, they couldn’t (quite) hear me. Not yet. But maybe now. Part of that has to do with the fact that I have my own wounds to heal, my own protective walls to tear down. Part of it has to do with their wounds, their walls, their own healing process. I have been doing my work, and they have been doing theirs. Perhaps we are ready now.
These days I am much better equipped to be a parent than I ever was when I needed to be. But in spite of that, I don’t regret any of it. You see I had to go down that path. I needed to be completely dismantled in all of the ways that it dismantled me. By the same token, I know in my heart of hearts that this was all part of my kids’ paths too. It made them into the beautiful people who they are today. The ways in which they have each been able to show up to their lives, to face their shadows, and to step into their authentic, loving, brave selves astonishes me. It takes my breath away. It gives me hope for the world, who we are as a species, and our ability to turn things around. We can do this by sharing our stories- even and especially the painful ones.
Madi told me a couple of days ago that her memories of childhood are foggy. I was there. I was conscious. I was an adult. I remember. I know things that shaped her life that she had no container for at the time. Same for Kristen. Sometimes when we choose a pattern- wait until they are ready to ask- we get stuck with it for awhile, until it fully plays itself out. But if we are patient enough, every choice and every path will lead us home. In the (ultimate) end, every story has the same ending- Oneness, Love. In the meantime, we each get to tell our own story as a continuation of the stories that came before us. The better we know the stories we come from, the better story we get to tell.
I love, love, love this photo of me and my brother. It makes me laugh every time I look at it. It now hangs in a corner of our living room that we designated for our favorite kid photos, so I get to laugh a lot! I thank God every day that I have a sense of humor. Well, God and also my dad who passed along the Pottorf sense of humor to me. If I didn’t have one, the complete disgruntledness with life that I have perfectly expressed in this photo might be my predominant experience. But it isn’t. Right below that photo is one that expresses perfectly what I really think about life. Here it is:
This photo makes me laugh out loud too. That’s the patriarch of the Pottorf sense of humor, my grandfather, on the right. While he looks stern in the picture (and often was), I like to think that he is secretly approving of my laughter. That’s my grandmother in the middle. She was always my ally, and you can tell here. The juxtaposition of these two photos completely cracks me up. Anybody who knows me well knows these two sides of me. They also know that I routinely crack myself up. If you catch me laughing for seemingly no particular reason, you can be sure that something like the scene portrayed in these two photos is going down in my head. My sense of humor is just laughing at the false seriousness of it all (and sometimes, yes, quite inappropriately).
That gives you a little background as to why I laughed out loud and felt like I won the jackpot when Vermont issued me my new license plates. Yes, it’s official. I’m a Vermonter! Not. I’ll never be a Vermonter, these people will never let me be. That’s o.k., because truth be told I’ll always be a Texan. Bless their hearts. If you don’t know this yet, that’s Southern code for something like “Don’t mess with Texas.” Which is to say I think Vermonters will find they’ve met their match. At least one did! Oh, but before I go further into this, here is my new license plate:
Ha! “Hmph” is one of my favorite responses to life. That’s the side of me in that first photo. So you can imagine that I laughed very out loud when the nice DMV lady pulled out my new plates. For the first time in my life, I won’t have any trouble remembering my license plate number! The other thing that has made both Shannon and I laugh out loud recently is this realization that while I will never be a Vermonter, I have officially achieved Vermonter-in-Training status. I am a V.I.T.! Trust me, that’s way better than being a masshole. Mind you, for reasons mentioned above, I will never graduate from this status, but still. How did I achieve this momentous feat you ask?
Let me start by saying that when Shannon and I started dating I was civilized. Yes, I’m going to completely blame this all on her. For example, I have always been very shy about my body. I would never change in a car for instance, nor go to the bathroom in the woods. These days we often find ourselves in a situation where we are going for a hike and then to do something else afterward which requires a modicum of civilization (hygiene). A few weeks ago we got back to the car and right there in the parking lot I stripped down and changed in front of God and everyone. Shannon just looked at me like “Who are you????” Then last week when we were on our way to Lake Placid, we stopped to take a hike in the Adirondacks. The hike was next to a stream with a few good swimming holes. Shannon was scoping out which one she was going to dip into on the way down. When we got to it, she’s like “you coming?” Yes, yes, I am. We stripped down, waded in, and dunked. Stark naked. Mountain streams are always freezing in case you were wondering. Yes, there were other hikers on this trail and somebody could have come along at any time. Oh well. Shannon just laughed out loud and noted that she could not believe how different I am from 12 years ago. That’s when she gave me my official V.I.T. designation. I then laughed when I noted that that’s what I could tell people about my goatee- it’s part of my V.I.T. initiation! Not really, but it’s funny anyway.
So quick goatee update. It is still growing strong! I have to say that my discomfort level is too. I’ve been out in public more with it as well, and I am noticing my reaction is to try to shrink myself down and hide it (and myself). That’s what I’ve most always done in life. If I had a super power it would be invisibility. I’m an expert at rendering myself invisible. Case in point. When I was in elementary school the most popular kid in school always had a massive slumber party for her birthday. I couldn’t hang with the all night revelry (such things are absolutely exhausting for an introvert), so I was usually the first person to crash in my sleeping bag. Nobody would notice. They didn’t notice so much that often as the other girls were still running around, they would step right on me… without even noticing. Rather than making myself known, I just kept hiding in my sleeping bag as if nothing had happened… even though it hurt.
Of course life is full of every which kind of experience, so here is a different one. I was also a complete tomboy growing up. I promised in my last post that I would talk about why I align with being a woman at this moment in human history, so let’s go there. In fact, let’s talk sports. Sports is as good a vehicle as any to have this discussion. I was that girl. The only one who the boys on the block would allow to play no matter what they were playing- kickball, baseball, street hockey, basketball, tackle football. When I was in third grade, one day I found myself playing flag football with the guys during recess. We were in the huddle and the quarterback tells me to go long. My best guess is that boy was Brett. Here is a photo of him from our senior year just to give you a visual:
Brett tells me to just run like the dickens. He says nobody will follow me and that he is going to throw it to me for the touchdown. So when the ball was hiked, I did. I ran like the dickens. Brett was right. Nobody paid any attention to me. I felt a little silly running like mad away from everyone, but then true to his word, Brett threw the ball. To me. It was a Hail Mary. It was a perfect throw and I made a perfect catch before breezing into the end zone to dance the funky chicken. Sometimes invisibility is a powerful thing. Sometimes not. Saturday night- stepped on. Monday at recess- end zone hero. Go figure. Here’s another go figure. Brett and I both went on to become cheerleaders together our senior year of high school. I know you won’t get this unless you are a Southerner, but being a cheerleader was actually a macho, popular thing for guys to be back then. At my high school our squad was always half male, half female. What’s more shocking isn’t that Brett was a cheerleader, but that I was!
To recap, I was ever the athlete. Hockey was my first love, but I wasn’t allowed to play growing up because I was a girl. I didn’t like figure skating (my mom’s sport), so she made it her mission to find a suitable sport for me. Gymnastics ended up winning and I spent my childhood as a competitive gymnast (ages 5-16). When my gymnastics career was brought to an end by a knee injury, I took up tennis and played varsity at my high school and then JV my first year in college. But hockey was still my first love, so I finagled my way onto the Princeton women’s varsity team my freshman year, proceeded to become a starting goalie by my sophomore year, won an Ivy League Championship by my senior year, and was invited to national team tryouts the following year. Then there is the coaching. I started coaching gymnastics after my knee injury at age 15 and coached for the next 4 years. I was good at it. Similarly, when I retired from my competitive hockey career to focus on my architecture career, I took up coaching hockey and did so for the next 15 years. I was one of the earliest women to receive a master level coaching certification from USA Hockey. This is all just background information to say that when it comes to sports, I have some experience.
Rewinding back to my senior year of high school, my boyfriend was the class genius. Literally, he is a genius. His name is John. Photo timeout. This is John:
See what I mean? He’s a little nerdy, right? But a cutie, for sure. You might need a little more of a breather before I keep going (that was your warning), so here is another photo for you:
These are all from my high school yearbook incidentally. The caption for this one read “Shelly and John get dressed up to go to the library on their first date.” Hysterical! Now, yes, I was a complete nerd too, but also simultaneously a jock. John and I spent most of our time together deep in conversation. For the most part I can’t remember what we talked about (God only knows). But I do remember this one conversation. It was about sports. And it got heated, just a little. John was not an athlete. His perspective on sports was that by stressing competition and winning, it was essentially training us all to be war mongers. Can you say triggered? I was.
I utterly refuted his position. I’ll come back to that. But first I want to tell you that when I was reading about highly evolved beings in Conversations With God a couple of weeks ago, I was reminded of this conversation with John. I was reminded because, in essence, God says the same thing in CWG. Highly evolved beings, he says, don’t participate in sports or competition, and for all of the reasons that John had pointed out. I am hereby going to say that they make a very good point. Let’s be honest, if it wasn’t a very good point it would not have triggered me all those years ago. Yet I am going to continue to respectfully say that there is another way to look at it. If you are a sports lover, don’t panic. But do get cozy, because we are going to have to cross some terrain to get there.
In fact in order for me to make my case, I am going to have to talk about God, specifically what I mean when I use that name. I am not- I repeat NOT- talking about a white bearded old white guy. I am going to have to back way up to throw this Hail Mary though. So hang on to your hats and start running like the dickens. Did you know that bacteria lives in my gut? Your’s too. We call this our gut flora. These microbiota are living beings in and of their own right. I am, quite literally, the environment that supports these life forms. You may be thinking “yuck.” We don’t tend to think very fondly of bacteria, after all. We might in fact be inclined to want to rid ourselves of such bacteria. We might want to cleanse our gut until it’s squeaky clean. You want to know what would happen then? We would die. That’s because our gut microbiota – the living beings that live in our gut- actually do all of our digestion for us. I don’t digest my food. They do. They are metabolizing on my behalf, and by them doing so they also get to live.
What on earth does this have to do with God? Hang on. One more step. I have spoken quite a lot lately about how in my worldview everything is sentient. This is true across all scales. My gut microbiota are sentient as distinct, if interdependent, beings. I am sentient as a distinct and interdependent being. You know what else is sentient? The environment that plays host to me. And just like my gut microbiota metabolize for me, I am also metabolizing for my environment. I’m going to leap out across a few scales to talk about my host environment as a whole- planet earth. Planet earth, in my worldview (and this is scientifically supported) is sentient. We have even given this sentient being a name.
Her name is Gaia. She is as conscious as I am, even though from our current world paradigm I may have a hard time relating to her as such. As you have seen from previous posts, I am working to build my communication skills on this front. But let’s not stop there. Gaia also exists within an environment. Her environment is the universe. The universe, too, has an environment. At each and every scale, life is conscious, distinct, identifiable, and… interdependent. Life itself is a living being. At the grandest scale possible, when talking about all that exists, I give that living being a name. Her name is God. So now you know who I am talking about when I use that name. I am talking about the All That Is. If you want to take one step further here, realize that just as my gut microbiota are a fully integrated part of me, so it is between me and God.
Now we are ready to go. I want to focus now on two characteristics that we have ascribed to God. God is all-powerful on the one hand and all-loving on the other. In our current collective worldview, we relate the all-powerful side to the masculine, and the all-loving side to the feminine. Now let me just say right here that there are biological (natural) reasons to tend toward these associations. Yet let me also say right here that we do our very best to fit males and females into the appropriate boxes. That is to say that how we show up is both a function of nature and of nurture. It’s not just one or the other. I would say that we need to stop forcing either characteristic onto a male or a female independent of the other. I would instead argue that we need to cultivate both within each and every human at the same time, and regardless of gender. I would say that both characteristics are in fact invariably present in each and every human, regardless of gender.
I would finally argue that our survival as a species is dependent upon our ability to balance these two characteristics of God within each and every human, which will then balance them within our species as a whole. The reason I say this is because we have been way, way, way out of balance for way, way too long. This is to say that we have been fixated on developing the all-powerful side, and intent on suppressing the all-loving side which we consider vulnerable. This is manifest in every attempt that we make to control things. Most fundamentally, we have sought to control nature and each other. This is what we envision power is, and we call the society that has resulted “patriarchal.” Well, guess what folks. God is not a male. God is neither masculine or feminine, but the perfect balance of these two natures.
Now to bring it down to earth via something as American as apple pie- sports. John was right. The way we have been doing sports has also been to emphasize, train, and develop the masculine side of the equation. Competing and winning are about power. And a focus on power in this way is in full alignment with a war mongering mentality. We have applied this equation to males and females alike, so it isn’t even a gender issue. It is no accident that females who participate in sports are much more likely to be successful in the world according to males. Of course they are! They have been trained to compete. They have developed the muscles, so to speak, of their own all-powerful natures. Now please hear me when I say that the rise of women’s sports has been extremely useful and necessary in the process of our evolution, because we can’t even begin to elevate this conversation to the next level until we have women in the room. We just can’t. But it is now time to step it up a notch.
So let me start that process by sharing what I said to John all those years ago. I objected vehemently, because frankly, that wasn’t my primary experience of sports. If it had been all about competing and winning, I would have never survived as a gymnast because frankly I stunk at that part of it. I knew, based on my experience, that there was something inherently missing in this masculine framing of sports. What my experience told me was that the value of my participation in sports wasn’t so much about conquering the world as it was about conquering me. The way I expressed that to John was to say that sports challenged me to overcome my own boundaries. It wasn’t about me besting somebody else, it was about me becoming my best self. I have since come to understand a great deal more about what I intuitively understood then. I was right too. Transcending boundaries is where it is at. That is what we need to be focusing on. Sports, like any other human endeavor, is a vehicle to work on those muscles. At least it is when we use it for its highest purpose.
Want proof? Ask any athlete (or musician, or artist, or mathematician, etc.) when they are at their best and they will describe being in “the zone.” What is being in the zone? It is having transcended our self-defining and self-limiting boundaries to enter into a state of, you guessed it, Interbeing. Being in the zone is becoming one with our environment. In the case of sports, that environment is a game played on a field of some sort. My best moments in sports were not the moments in which I won. My best moments in sports were when I was playing in the zone. The outcome of that in some cases was winning and in some cases not. Yet it didn’t matter either way because the experience of the zone was so much more than the experience of either winning or losing. In fact, there is no winning or losing in the zone. Win against what? Lose to who? There is no winning or losing when there is only one thing present.
It’s time to talk about our all-loving nature. What is love? Connection. That is what it is. To love is to be one with. Yes, I just did. I just made the case for the true feminization of sports. I also just explained to you why I align with being a woman at this point in human history. Admittedly, this work is easier for women than it is for men both because of our naturing and because of our nurturing. Yet we all must engage in it, regardless of gender. That is the only way we are going to stop ourselves from burning down the house, and you all know what I am talking about.
If you are an athlete, I dare you to give up on winning and instead focus on connecting, on being in the zone as much as you can possibly muster. See what happens. If you are a coach, I implore you to change your definition of success from winning to how much time your athletes spend in the zone. See what happens. If you are the parent of an athlete, well, I have way too much to say to you so I am just going to say leave it to the athletes and their coaches for now! Settle down!!
Here’s the thing, everyone. Life is just a game. And this is what the game is all about. It’s about forgetting that we are One so that we may rediscover our own all-powerful natures. Then it is about remembering that we were One all along via our all-loving nature. But you want to know a secret? True power is found not in flexing the muscles of our separate selves. True power is found in Oneness. This is to say that it is found in love, in connection, in being in the zone. The irony of all ironies is that when we play out our all-loving nature to its full extent to enter into Oneness, what we discover there is that we were all-powerful all along. We will never fully achieve our all-powerful nature by focusing solely on being powerful. We will only get there from the other side.
You are probably exhausted, so feel free to stop here. If you can push yourself one step further, this will be a bonus insight. One of my favorite books is The Peaceful Warrior, by Dan Millman. I relate to it, of course, because he is a gymnast. If you have never read it, I won’t spoil it for you. I’ll just say it is based on Dan’s own life and in particular his training by an enlightened master, Socrates. At one point during Dan’s college gymnastics career, Socrates comes to watch him during practice. Dan puts chalk on his hands and then mounts the rings to execute an absolutely perfect ring routine. He was in the zone. If it had been a competition and there had been judges present, he would have scored a perfect 10 and won.
He was quite proud of himself as he walked over to Socrates afterward. But Socrates was shaking his head in disapproval. Dan couldn’t believe it. What???!!!! That was perfect! But Socrates just told Dan that he was completely sloppy when applying the chalk to his hands. Here’s the thing. Learning to be in the zone only becomes truly useful when we learn to do it “off the mats,” as they say in yoga. It’s relatively easy to work on and learn to inhabit the zone during an athletic or creative endeavor. But can you do it when performing the most mundane activities of your life? Can you do it when you are washing the dishes?
I can’t. Not yet. I keep trying to be mindful when washing the dishes, but you know mostly I am still irritated that there are dishes in the first place! Damn dishes. Just go away. Socrates would seriously be shaking his head at me. So there you have it. The ultimate challenge is to inhabit the zone all the time. That is what a state of Interbeing would feel like. Until we are ready for that, any old vehicle to practice being in the zone will do. Sports happens to be a great vehicle for this. I- a woman, mind you- just saved sports (even though I am not supposed to be saving anything these days!). You are welcome, sports fans. Have fun with it and feel free to laugh out loud any ole time.
O.K., look people, let’s just cut right to the chase- I’m hairy. I just am. Always have been, always will be. And I won’t keep you in suspense for one second. Yes, that is a photo of me above. That is how I look right this very second. So, so much to say about this, so here we go!
First things first, because this is the first thing that enters my mind when I wonder what people are going to think when they see me: no, I am not transitioning. I love, love, love being a woman. If God came to me today and said it is time for you to transition to another embodiment, what’s it going to be male or female?… I wouldn’t hesitate for one second before emphatically choosing the latter. That’s how much I align with being a woman at this stage of human history. More on this some other time. But with that out of the way, let’s get to the bottom of this hair thing.
A little background is in order. Nobody who knows me has ever seen me like this. What’s more, I have never seen myself like this. Yet that isn’t because facial hair is a new thing for me. It’s not a result of changing hormones as I age. Nope. I’ve been like this since, well, puberty… which frankly didn’t go so well for me. Abnormalities with my period landed me in a gynecologist’s office, who quickly deferred me to an endocrinologist. A lot of blood over multiple tests revealed that my testosterone levels are higher than what is considered normal for a woman. Yup, I was diagnosed “abnormal” as just a teenager. Abnormal, of course, isn’t o.k. in our culture, so something had to be done. I was started on hormone therapy via pharmaceuticals right away. I stayed on those for several years, before finally one day in college I had had enough. I didn’t like how my body was responding. I didn’t like how I felt. I didn’t feel suddenly “right,” but quite the opposite. Nor is there any curing this abnormality. There is only overriding it with drugs. So I just stopped, and I’ve never gone back on that decision.
Now I need to take a quick time out here to say a little something more about this condition and my decision. Back in 1935 this hormone condition was labelled Polycystic Ovary Syndrome, or PCOS, which is an absolutely horrible name for it because it incorrectly labels the condition for one possible symptom (cysts on the ovaries) rather than the cause (higher than normal androgen levels). So now you can read more about it if you are curious. While day in and day out I stand by my decision to not treat it, that decision is in fact risky. It puts me at a higher risk for endometrial cancer for one. So I am not advocating here what anybody else’s decision should be should they discover that they have PCOS. My decision was based on listening to my own body. I decided to let it do what it naturally wants to do, while doing whatever I can to help it to be happy and healthy. Primarily that means closely watching my weight and exercising regularly.
Now to get back to the hair. My non-traditional hair growth started in my teen years. Yes, I tried all the things that women do to deal with pesky, unwanted hair. I waxed, although that didn’t last long- OUCH! I plucked, and still do, but that became the equivalent of trying to mow the lawn with scissors, so other utensils had to be added. I gave in and began shaving my chin sometime during college. A personal trimmer was added later to keep the blonde hairs above my jaw line short. I tried laser treatments in my thirties (and had to due to a skin tag that developed on my chin), but frankly that only briefly minimized all the other things that I do to deal with it. It didn’t eliminate the hair and it certainly never will. That’s because as long as my hormones remain as they are, I will remain hairy. It is what it is. So here’s the routine: pluck dark hairs above my jaw line at bedtime, shave below my jaw line and trim above my jaw line in the morning. This. Takes. Time. Ugh.
In the meantime, I’ve always been curious. Would I actually have a beard if I let it all go? Well, maybe not a beard, but perhaps a goatee?? I happen to like goatees! When Shannon and I picked out our dogs, she picked Greta because she has an affinity for Rottweilers and we thought she was a Rottweiler mix. Greta turned out to look more like a German Shepherd, but we love her nonetheless! I picked out Finnegan, because I wanted a scruffy scruff with… a goatee! Look at our two cuties:
Isn’t that a great goatee on Finny?! O.K., granted, it’s a bit exaggerated in this photo, but I digress. I wonder, if people actually do start to look like their dogs, maybe I might look like Finny! Well, there is only one way to find out. I have at most only gone a few days without shaving. But three weeks ago, I started a game of chicken with myself. I stopped plucking, trimming and shaving to see how long I could stand it. I didn’t really know how this was going to go or what I might get out of it, other than satisfied curiosity. It turned out to be much, much bigger than that.
It’s one thing to be rough around the edges in the confines of your own home. But the second you have to step out into the world, the whole show changes. In this case, I wasn’t at home alone with Shannon in the first place. My sister-in-law and nephew were here with us all summer. So I instantly had to confront my self-consciousness. That turned out to be a good little warmup for next steps. Other nearby family members and friends were then invariably added into the mix. Uncomfortable! But doable, and I did it. Then the first real test of my resolve- we went out to eat. I had to go out in public. And we went to the Wheel where everyone who works there knows me, no less. Yikes. Plus we had more friends from out of town meeting us there and coming to stay with us afterward. Really, really uncomfortable!! By this point I was a week and a half in and the hair on my chin was easily visible. I was so uncomfortable that I made sure that we sat at a table in the corner so that I could face the wall!!! Yet I survived. The next night we all went out AGAIN. Good grief. This time we sat outside and there was no corner to hide in. I just had to be with it. I made it though, and nobody seemed to look at me funny. Not yet anyway.
That emboldened me a bit and so after all of our visitors left, I suggested that Shannon and I go on an outing. We drove around visiting various general stores throughout Vermont. By this point my hair was unavoidable, and I did get some double takes. Nobody said anything rude. They just looked at me with curiosity. Each time, I just stood into it, doing my best not to shy away. By this point in my adventure, the meaning of it became much clearer to me. It reminded me of a similar adventure that Shannon took ten years ago when she went through a major life transition in which she changed careers and moved down to Texas. She utilized the transitional space to attend yoga teacher training at Kripalu. Before she went, she decided to shave her head. That decision, like mine, was in part just curiosity. What was it like to be bald? But it was really about so much more than that. It was a direct confrontation to her very identity. It was a direct confrontation to her ego. It begged the question, who am I without my hair? Who am I when I don’t look the way people expect me to look? Who am I when people look at me funny? Who am I when I step entirely out of my comfort zone?
For Shannon, it was shaving off all of her hair. For me, it’s growing it all out. There’s no way to anticipate what stepping into these questions brings. Shannon did so knowing exactly what she was doing. I didn’t. All I knew is that I felt compelled, finally, to do it. I have had to build the resolve to stick with it each and every step along the way. With each heightened challenge I think, “Oh there is no way I can do that.” And then I do it anyway. Yesterday Shannon and I went to watch the U.S. and Canadian U-18 and U-22 teams face off in Lake Placid. I knew that I would run into people that I knew. This is the world that Shannon and I come from. It was our whole world at one time. I am now three weeks in and the goatee is way more than just peach fuzz. What doesn’t show up in the photo so well is my mustache and above the chin line hair because it is mostly blonde, or grey as the case may be, horror of all horrors!
Time for a funny story time out. It took me about two weeks to realize it, but once my mustache hairs were long enough, I did in fact realize that some of them were grey, not blonde. I immediately went to Shannon and said, “Shannon.” She said, “What?” Me: “These hairs.” Shannon: “Uh-huh. What about them, Shelly?” Me: “They’re not blonde!” Shannon: “What color are they, Shelly?” Me: “Grey!!!!!!!” Shannon: dying of laughter. It’s not that I mind grey hairs. It’s just that I have a head full of blonde hair still with only a grey hair or two sneaking in there. So it was just a bit, shocking.
And the age thing is part of it. As noted, I will be turning 50 this year. As I settled into this little adventure, I came up with three reasons for it. First, I think it would be nice to actually know what I really look like before I turn 50. Second, I hear we are supposed to stop giving a shit what people think when we turn 50, so I thought I better really get on that. Third, and most importantly, I wanted to face whatever hurt, fear, reservations, shame, vulnerabilities, etc. that have been hiding in this place where I hide my facial hair.
So now back to yesterday’s hockey outing. This one was a huge road block in my head leading up to it. Right up until the day before, I couldn’t imagine going without shaving. But by this point I understood what I was up to and how important it was that I face my fear. I spent the night before giving myself and my inner 5 year old a pep talk. I sat with that 5 year old and told her emphatically, “You are stunning in every way. It doesn’t matter if anyone else can see that or not. I see it.” And then the whole way to the rink I just keep repeating this mantra, “you are stunning, gentle, kind, and loving.” Of course the other thought that crossed my mind is that the Lake Placid 1980 Rink is large enough that we could potentially hide in the corner where nobody would see us. That turned out to be a ridiculous thought. We were spotted in about two seconds flat, but at least that was by somebody who knew Shannon more so than me.
I wasn’t there to hide though, so I made sure to reach out to one person who I knew would be there ahead of time in order to force myself to face her. That person was Cara Gardner Morey, the current Head Coach of Princeton Women’s Ice Hockey, who is serving as an Assistant Coach on the Canadian U-22 team. She got back to me right away and told me to be sure to say hi if I saw her. Well played, Cara. Well played.. even if you were an unsuspecting hero in this story. I thought, well, that doesn’t mean that I am going to see her. She is going to be busy coaching after all. No dice. One period into the U-18 game I saw her talking to her players in the stands just to the left of us. Then I thought, well, I am not going to go disturb her. She’s working. But then her players left and she went and sat a little higher up in the stands- by herself. Dang it! That’s it. I’m going. I turned to Shannon and told her I was going to go just quickly say hi. She smiled, knowingly, and encouraged me along, “O.K., go ahead.”
I was surprisingly calm as I approached. There is something about surrender that frees us. This thing was happening and there was nothing that I was going to do to stop it now. No point fighting anymore. And when that moment came the interesting thing is that I returned to me. I was no longer conscious of what I looked like. I was just me the way that I am when I am around people that I am deeply comfortable with. I sat down beside Cara and told her I came to say hi. She turned to look at me and with the biggest smile said “hi, it’s so good to see you!” and then gave me a big hug. Rather than just that quick hi that I had planned, we sat there chatting, sharing, and laughing for the entire third period. It was amazing. It was fun. It was connecting. It was comforting. Whatever Cara may have noticed or thought about my facial hair (she was literally inches away from my face), she didn’t skip a beat. And I thank you for that, Cara.
So I sit here still with goatee. I don’t know where the adventure will end, as I intend to just keep putting one foot in front of the other. There are, of course, a thousand more “I could never do that’s” in front of me. We’ll see. No matter what I decide to do in the future, I will have in a very real, scary, and tangible way faced this place in me that has been kept under lock and key. The thing about locking a part of us away is that it is impossible to do it. That is to say that it is impossible to only lock a part of us away while letting the rest run free. Life is more of an all or nothing affair. To truly be free, to truly be ourselves, we have to let the parts of ourselves that we have locked up out of jail. Sometimes we have done so to protect ourselves, sometimes to disown ourselves, sometimes both. Whatever the case, it’s a no go. Eventually, we each have to come back to ourselves and choose differently. It doesn’t mean that I have to wear a goatee for the rest of my life. It’s about making it o.k. either way. Who knows, I might end up loving it when it’s fully grown out, and so might you! In the meantime, it’s still scary. Case in point: posting the picture above in a public way scares the shit out of me. But guess what- I just did it!
