Merry Christmas To All And To All A Good Night

You Slipped Away Before I Ever Got To Hold You

There’s a little something that pulls at my heart this time of year.

I don’t talk about this stuff very much any more. I talked and talked and talked about it a lot for awhile. I even mentioned it a few straggling times once I’d mostly grown quiet about it. A lot of friends and strangers questioned my resistance to healing. I don’t know if this is just something about me, an excessive emotionality that disallows me from ever really letting go of the deepest pains.

Maybe everyone is like this. Maybe you are. Maybe you aren’t.

It still hurts me at this time of year when I think about the babies who are not here, the one who was due on Christmas Eve, the one who quietly died in my womb in December and then had to be removed. Two of my kids won’t get presents from Santa this month, nothing to do with being naughty. They just didn’t make it. They never had a chance to be naughty. They slipped away before I ever had a chance to hold either of them.

I’ve always loved Christmas. I still do. But this little something pulls at my heart now too. It’s a melancholy kind of joy I feel nowadays during the holidays.

I choose to feel the happiness of the season, because most of the time, I do have a choice.

But when the tears come, I let them take over for awhile. That’s a choice, too. A mostly healthy one, I think, regardless of what anyone else might believe. When they dry up again, I hold onto all the joy I can find, and while I let the pain visit, the joy is where I remind myself to dwell.

May you all find the greatest joys and dwell in them for the rest of this year and into the New Year. xo

once upon a time (there was a douchebag)

Okay, so maybe I got a leetle bit pissed off when I saw this image on Pinterest tonight.

And maybe I went a leetle bit overboard on the “description” when I repinned it.

and the princess didn’t have her heart broken by a man who couldn’t keep his dick to himself for more than five seconds because she was smart enough to say no to the pretty face that was hiding the vile creature behind it. And she had all the time in the world to then pursue her own interests and be the person she was meant to be, reveling in her identity and fulfilling her aspirations fully. She spent as much time as she wanted with the best girlfriends who always built her up and cared about what she was saying rather than pretending to listen and hoping she was soon done. And she hand selected the finest young men to keep her company (and then sent them on their way when she was bored with them) and she read books and made beautiful art and sun bathed and nobody ever left the fucking toilet seat up or made her have to drag their feelings out of them like driving nails into brick because they were such poor communicators that she just wanted to scream into infinity in those miserable moments of complete relationship hell when she would rather be twirling through the living room, singing her favorite song at top volume. She didn’t have to share the remote or watch any sports she didn’t want to, and she only got foot rubs with her pedicures and nobody expected her to have sex with them just for doing it. She smiled every day because she wanted to, not because she was pretending she was happy, and nobody needed her to fetch them a beer or make their food first so that by the time she ate hers it was cold. She played with lady bugs and stopped to smell the flowers every day. Her friends and family thought she was fucking awesome because she was able to live her life to her full potential instead of for some loser who resented her for not wanting him to drink jack daniels every fucking night. And she never had to sleep in the goddamned wet spot. THE END.

Yeah, maybe a little too far.

Maybe.

(Who am I kidding?! That shit had it coming.)

Taking the heart road.

Sometimes Braden (now age 4.5) asks me how to say things in Spanish. I go to this website and we enter words and then we learn now to say them together. He especially enjoys the feature where you can actually listen to a pronunciation of the word. Unfortunately, however, he gets really frustrated when we encounter a Spanish word with an “r” in it, and he can’t say it exactly the same way. I’ve tried to help him learn how to roll his r’s, but he hasn’t been successful yet.

Today he asked how to say “tree” in Spanish. The answer is “arbol.” He became very frustrated about the sound of his r’s again. I began encouraging him to keep trying, but he just kept telling me, “NO, because I CAN’T do it.” This prompted me to launch into a long discussion with him about how you have to keep trying when you can’t do something the first time, rather than giving up, if you really want to learn it. I even gave him examples from my childhood.

(I totally went through torturous and seemingly endless trials in front of the bathroom mirror to learn how to roll my tongue. I was going to be damned if my brother could do that and I could not, and refused to believe the BS idea everyone was feeding me that it’s a genetic trait and you can’t do it unless you inherit that. IN YO FACE, FALSE POP SCIENCE.)

Braden indicated he didn’t agree with my sage advice about trying and learning. So I told him that he can take a slightly easier path and trust my advice, or he can be stubborn and take the hard road through life. He considered this for a few moments, and replied, “I think that instead, I am going to take the heart road, Mommy.”

Me: “What?”
Braden: “I’m going to take the heart road instead.”
Me: “Oh? What is that road like?”
Braden: “It has lots of heart patterns on it. Red ones and pink ones too, and I like them. And lots of heart rocks. And heart shaped trees.”
Me: “How does that make you feel?”
Braden: “It makes me feel so happy.”
Me: “And where does this road lead?”
Braden: “It leads to everywhere you want to go. And there are stars racing in the sky.”

My friends, the heart road is paved with red and pink heart patterns, strewn with heart rocks, and lined with heart shaped trees. It will make you feel happy, stars will race in the sky overhead as you travel, and it leads to “everywhere you want to go.”

I guess being happy on “the heart road” is better than being miserable while struggling to learn rolling your r’s in the long run, huh? This kid kind of totally disarms me every damn day. And he really has no idea how brilliant these things he says really are.

I’m still a firm believer in trying for the things you desire, but I’m glad to have someone in my life who reminds me it’s not always a bad idea to voluntarily take the heart road.

so much to look forward to

those grey skies just can’t have me anymore
it’s been so long since I
ran in the sun -
thinking I was trapped in the storm,
no chance to be warm.

but suddenly I’ve realized
there’s nothing holding me there
no chains, no ropes, no cage I’m in -
the door wide, I’ll cross the threshold,
out of the cold.

those grey skies just can’t have me anymore
for years they’ve tortured me -
held me close, whispered dark lies,
covered my eyes.

now they’re open and I see
a sun shining just for me -
no thunder here, no whipping rain
just warmth for miles,
waiting smiles.

warmth for miles

it’s for the taking
and I’m game.

I’m game.

Sharing my joy.

Every single time I look at these, I feel pure joy. Thought I’d share that with all of you.
You don’t mind a little joy in your life today, do you? *wink*

Happy Saturday!

Me is {more than} enough.

I wrote this post over 4 months ago. It is the culmination of a tangled, emotional struggling and growth, something of a metamorphosis, that I’ve undergone in the past few years. When I wrote it, I was standing on the edge of a precipice looking into a great divide, and I was ready to step off, not knowing if I was going to fly or fall. For awhile, I didn’t care which. As it turns out, I found I was carrying a bridge to the next peak in my own back pocket, and in unfurling it, what “fell” was this post, out of my heart and soul, onto the digital page. Something in me cranked, turned, and locked into place. I was absolutely sure I was going to publish the piece; I often publish my ugly stuff, my emotional wailings, and then… I didn’t. 

At the Blissdom Conference, Brené Brown was the Opening Keynote Speaker. I sat there in awe as she started talking about shame, about vulnerability and fear, and hot tears pricked the corners of my eyes. My mouth fell open when I heard her saying things I had written in this post. I had written that I was enough, that I accepted myself, and then I didn’t publish. Somewhere in there, I was telling myself “I am enough… but not quite enough to publish to the world that I am enough.” Kind of ironic, no?

Brené reminded me that when I allow myself to be vulnerable and truly open with the world, I am the happiest me that can exist. Yes, it can be frightening, but there is no more real way to live. And so I pull this out of drafts, I hit publish, and I affirm that I mean what it says. I hope it speaks to someone. It’s a truth from my heart.

~

I am {learning to be} comfortable with who I am. I know I am a being in process, unrefined, unsure, and, in many ways, different from others, different than you.

I accept me for who I am.

This has not always been the truth. Far from it, in fact.

For most of my life I have badly wanted to be accepted by others and worried that I would not be liked because I am not who or what others expect/desire me to be. My family taught me it is okay to be different. Society screamed at me {in whispers, with looks, in rumors, on television, in magazines, and at lunch break during school} that it was a lie! Different is bad, the world at large wanted me to be sure.

During grade school, my hair was dorky, my clothes weren’t “cool enough”, my ears poked out too far, and I was a nerd for genuinely liking to read and learn. I lived in the South, and most of my peers went to church and believed in God – I didn’t. I liked popular music, but also classical and old rock, preferred dorky to preppy, and laughed with a hitch. (#snort)

Most of the time I was okay with all of that.

Except for the times when I wasn’t. You know the times; the moments when others, intentionally or not, make you doubt yourself for your differences. Those moments shaped me in an ugly way. Those were the moments when I wished I was anything but me, anywhere but inside my own skin. I learned to put on a tough act, pretend I didn’t care. But I did, I cared so much it hurt.

I don’t think any of us are inherently comfortable with being put down, cast aside. I sure am not. It’s a painful thing. If you can accept that pain and move on, you’re golden.

I’ve begun to learn to accept Pain as the Dark Valley lying far below the Peak of Joy.

I’d never understand how high that summit was if I hadn’t climbed there from the foothills.

The disparity lends meaning to each extreme. I wish for it to make us focus on the blessings of our joys more greatly. Unfortunately, many of us (myself included, during a great many times in my life) dwell in that pain instead, and refuse to let it go, even when we’re at the peak.  Somehow, we take it with us, wrapped like a shroud.

That’s a negativity that can color as much of your life as you give it room to roam over.

So, for much of my life I have said and done things here and there, again and again, to try to gain acceptance from others. This is not to say that I haven’t also been true to myself in many ways and embraced many of my differences but there has always been an undercurrent of intense need that has made me strive to be what others want from me.

What a foolish waste of time. What an endless recipe for misery.

The acceptance that follows from such a practice is false. It may feel good briefly, or on the surface, but it is acceptance under pretense and deception.

It is an illusion.

As an adult, and increasingly in the past several years, I have grown tired of trying to please others to gain approval, to appear to be someone I am not in order to receive {perceived} acceptance and {false} fellowship.

I am not interested in relationships built around the idea that I should change, am not what I should be, think/feel/believe the wrong things, need help to be better, am broken, or need to be or do more *whatever* to be good enough.

And while I’d like to say I don’t need others, I will fully admit that I do. This is also something new for me; this is part of shedding the “tough act.” I DO need friends. I DO need support. I DO need people who care about me.

However: I do not need you to solve my problems. I do not need you to guide me. I need you to care about me, have an interest in my well-being, want to laugh with me, and be willing to listen when I need or want to talk. I need you to accept me for who I am, what I am comfortable with, and what I am not. I need for you to like me for who I am, or leave me alone.

I need you to like me, to even love me, for who I am right now, in this very moment.

And I will do the same for you.

If we are different, I am happy to find our similarities and celebrate them. I am happy to accept our differences and move forward. It *is* okay to be different, that really is true. What I have come to feel very deeply is that when you can accept someone, despite their differences, without trying to change them, that is true acceptance.
That is the basis for real friendship, humanity, and love.

[I am also okay with not needing to be friends with everyone. Tolerance and acceptance are the most important when there are differences that drive us apart.]

When I was a little girl, I loved Popeye, and I delighted in him saying, in his scruffy, twisty voice, “Iyam what Iyam, and that’s all that Iyam!” And I guess that’s what I’m saying. I am what I am, and that’s all that I am. And it’s enough.

I am Me.

I am {learning, growing, adjusting to being} comfortable with who I am. I know I am a being in process, unrefined, unsure, and, in many ways, different than others, different than you. I accept me for who I am.

I accept you for who you are, too.

On processing my Blissdom Conference experience.

There is so much. So very much, and there is no way I can touch it all in one post. I’m going to break this up into posts on different days (non-consecutive, of course, wouldn’t want to ruin my lazy douche reputation by posting two whole days in a row with words and stuff) as I speak specifically, and share photos (mine and others’) and videos with you as I go along.

photo by Mishelle Lane

And even then, I won’t be able to get it all across to you. The excitement, the freedom, the friendship, the FLASHMOB (oh yeah!), the chance to speak and share, the Community, the panels, the musical performances, the food and drinks, the fun, the laughter. The LOVE.

photo by Mishelle Lane

I’m going to try very hard, but there just seems so much and some parts of it seem so deep, that I fear I have not the skill, the time, the energy… to really make you see, hear, and feel it the way you should, the way I wish for you to, the way I did.

I’m going to tell you now, before I start the posts by day, that I truly love this community of persons I’ve become connected to these last several years. Some of you I am only connected to by the wisp of a thread, and we float into and out of one another’s lives only occasionally. Others of you spend time with me every now and again, us keeping up in bouts and starts and stops, flowing here and there; you make my life your here sometimes and your there at other times. Still others of you are tied to me like a lifeline, and I think of or hear from you every day; we’ve been with one another through happy times and hard ones, and everything in between.

photo by Mishelle Lane & Lotus Carroll

All of you amaze me, inspire me, and collectively form a thing I am constantly in awe of and drawn to endlessly.

Each of you should attend this conference next year, or the first time you have the chance to do so. I’m rooted in the heritage of BD and have been a part of this Blissdom Community since it began in a crazy, cowhide-covered-walls hotel with a pink crayon brazier in the lobby (no really), and I’ll be a part of it for the rest of its fabulous ride down the road. I can tell you that with absolute surety, and I will also tell you now that what keeps me coming back is not just my ties to its past, or my deep and abiding love for the woman whose heart dreamed this dream so fiercely that she made it come true, but for the HUGE sense of love, friendship, and community I feel while I’m at this conference.

There isn’t any substantial amount of time that you will spend alone while at Blissdom (unless you really want to be alone, and I’m right there with you on that one, we all need to decompress, and for me that’s hiding in my hotel room every now and then in the dark because I will be a complete hag to someone in that moment if I don’t, and also because I get REALLY GASSY when I’m traveling/nervous and you gotta excuse yourself every little while and let that out, but I digress) and you won’t find one minute when there isn’t something amazing right at your fingertips.

My word for this conference is LOVE.

Call me cheesy (I really don’t mind, cheese is one of my favorite things in the world), but that is the truth. And Love, when it is truly felt and shared and spread around, is basically the most wonderful thing that exists. Some pretty popular and talented Liverpoolers once said that it’s all you need.  I think they were pretty much right.

I’m looking forward to sharing these next several posts with you. I hope you enjoy them.

Oh, and one more thing: All you women out there, the ones I know well and hold dearly in my heart, the ones who have been with me for the past few years, and those who only check in once in a great while, as well as any woman who just happens to stumble through here for whatever reason, and even those who never read these words themselves at all or know me in the least (can you tell them for me?)…

~You are beautiful.