Category Archives: challenges

Just writing is just right

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I knew it wasn’t gone completely.  Lying dormant, somewhere in the back of my brain, was my drive to write.  It happens to me every autumn.  I begin to realize I have more time to write but, because the summer and fall are so much busier at work, I have been out of the habit of sitting down and writing every day.

With the lull of November upon us, I now have time to retrain my brain to generate the phrases that have been trapped in its confines and send them coursing through my fingertips onto my keyboard.  When I say coursing, I mean slow dribbles of words that may string themselves into a sentence, but it’s a start.

I have a writing project ongoing with our local library that I am anxious to rekindle and a second book that is a mere shadow of what it will become.  I still have many query letters to compose with the hope of finding an agent willing to take me on so I can get my first novel published and I have the desire to continue putting words together to string together a meaningful essay to represent my life.

I have taken the first step by promising myself that I will write a blog post every day for the month of November.  Here’s hoping…..

 

 

Grief cannot be fixed, it can only be carried

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I have suffered my share of grief through the loss of many people I held dear.  There was no reason for those losses to occur in the way they did and dealing with those wounds has not made me a stronger person, contrary to popular opinion.

It is tough to find words to say to people after they have suffered the loss of a loved one.  There are no magic phrases to make it all better.  There is no invisible salve to heal the wounds.  There is only comfort in a hug.  There is the ability to hold them when they can’t stop crying.  And there are the moments to share the wonderful memories of the person who has passed.

Loss never becomes easier with time as much as people try to tell you it does.  The only thing that time changes is our ability to live our lives in a new way and deal with the absence of that person on a daily basis.  It is true that some days are better than others.  But it is also true that you can be so overwhelmed by the pain of loss that you cannot leave your house because your tears are uncontrollable.

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There is no right or wrong way to grieve.  Emotion will control you, not the other way around.  The only thing you can do is carry that pain with you and wear it like a badge of honor.  That pain reminds you of the connection you had to the person who has passed.  That grief is the glue that binds you to the soul who has left this lifetime.  And those tears are the reality that make you painfully aware that grief cannot be fixed.  It can only be carried.

 

 

 

 

Finding comfort in the sounds of silence

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points of light

The opulent points of light burn me.

I turn, longing to be swallowed by the shadow,

escaping the realities of my world for just one day.

I yearn for the silence to deafen me,

to make the raucous cacophony of sound abate.

 I let the gentle vibration of my dog’s breathing

wrap me in the comfort of its vague timbre,

knowing that she is my asylum.

The rain falls gently on the tin outside my window.

Its staccato beat lures me into its embrace

and I yield to the power of its trance.

I am powerless to its rhythm.

But the silence beckons

and the sound of the rain fades.

It is only in the silence

that my truths speak the loudest.

Only then can I hear

what my heart is yearning to tell me.

And with no light to distract me,

I have no choice but to listen.

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Unplugging for a while

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It crashed.  It simply crashed and, for a few panic-stricken moments, I didn’t know what to do.  The internet went down at work yesterday afternoon and I felt like a Roombot slowly spinning in circles, bouncing off of walls and random pieces of furniture, lost in a world that was absent of instant communication.

I was moderately frightened for myself when I realized how much I have come to rely on technology.  The increasing ease and speed at which we can sail through mundane tasks makes me forget my humble beginnings of pen-pals and library sessions with encyclopedias and the Dewey decimal system.  I have become a member of a mutated generation that is driven by immediate knowledge and gratification.

I feel somewhat sad that my nephews, who are currently 17 and 14, and like-generations, will never understand what we had to endure to communicate with our friends.  Gone are the days of writing letters in long hand (do kids today even know what that is??), putting those letters in envelopes, dropping them into a giant mail box and waiting weeks, maybe months, for a response.  Making long distance phone calls to a town 15 minutes away is a thing of the past.  And don’t even get me started on the friends who didn’t have answering machines.  I’m sure I still have phone numbers burned into my finger tips from dialing them incessantly on our rotary phone until somebody finally answered.

22-amy

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Our society has gracefully surpassed hand written letters, DOS programming and the annoying pings and beeps of the dial-up connection but throughout that process we seem to have lost a bit of our patience.  If a text message is not responded to immediately, we think we are being ignored.  If an email goes without a response for 24 hours, we question if we have offended the recipient in some way.  And (God forbid) if the internet crashes, our world seems to crumble right alongside of it.

I am certainly not saying that technology and all of its advancements are not wonderful things.  If that were the case, I would not be pontificating my polysyllabic profundities through this medium.  I am simply stating that we are so anxious to feel instantaneously connected to everything and everyone that we forget how to merely connect to ourselves and slow down the pace of our lives, if only for a moment.

As ironic as it is that I am writing this post on my laptop, I feel the need to purposely unplug for at least a few hours. No Kindle, no texting, no television, no surfing the web.  I want to put a touch of history into how I spend the hours of my evening.  I want to write a letter, a real hand-written letter, to a friend I know who will only send letters this way.  I want to hold a paperback novel in my hands and I want to be able to have my brain work the way it was trained to work and not just be distracted by the millions of images on the internet.

The internet may have changed how we communicate, how we learn and how we conduct business, but it should never have the power to change us or the things that make us infinitely human.  Technology is just a tool.  And although it can teach us many things, patience and a capacity for perseverance are not contained in its syllabus.

A Petri dish of hope

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If only we could create a pandemic,

one born of kindness,

grown with empathy

and fed and nourished with humanity.

One cell created with compassion,

a single nucleus of mercy,

could multiply and grow exponentially

changing the face of reality.

But, intermittently,

our Petri dishes have become saturated with darkness,

and the capricious points of light

are crushed under the weight of malignancy.

We must inseminate an embryo of hope into humanity

to give rebirth to decency,

to raise awareness,

to feel confident we have done enough

so we may send benevolence into the world.

Our job is to defend that child of hope,

to stand up for everything good

in a world that is turning on itself.

 Our role as scientists in this laboratory of life

is to keep trying until we succeed,

to never give up hope,

to be ready to alter the science until it works

and to have faith in the results.

 The darkness still threatens

and its critical impact on our study of life

leaves evident reminders of our trepidation.

But we must seek that light,

that place where goodness thrives

and wishes to blossom.

 We must put our faith in the research

of those who have studied kindness before us

and trust that science will prevail,

that the light will quell the darkness

and the child we created

from kindheartedness and charity

will, one day,

make that darkness

withdraw

in

defeat.

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I’m not afraid to cry

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“There is a sacredness in tears – they are not the mark of weakness, but of power.  They are messengers of overwhelming grief, and of unspeakable love.” ~ Washington Irving

~~

Having shed my fair share of tears throughout my life, this quote struck a chord deep within my emotional register.   It has always been easy for me to soak my cheeks with salty tears and I come by it honestly.  My dad wore his heart on his sleeve and many times that same sleeve was used to wipe his tears as he watched movies, TV shows and even commercials.   When my apple fell from the family tree it landed right at his feet and I’m sure that made him cry as well.

My mom was very private about her crying, although she didn’t cry frequently.  She would gracefully leave the room and gently close her bedroom door.  There were never heavy sobs heard from the other side of that door but her swollen, red eyes the next morning are what Crime Scene Investigators refer to as evidence.

Sometimes being able to cry so easily is a gift, a genuine release of emotion that feels much like a cleansing.  But the burden of  not being able to control the moments that those tears appear can also be slightly detrimental and result in swollen red eyes and a need to excuse my appearance after an unexpected cry.

 

tears

 

But, I will never take for granted this ability to show my emotion nor do I wish to change this part of myself.  I love that I can feel so deeply that life, whether it be my life or somebody else’s life, can have such an intense impact on me.  And I can take solace in knowing that the people who understand this about me, the people with whom I choose to share my emotional moments, and my tears, know that this is not a weakness but one of my greatest strengths.

I am me for a reason

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I am a very different person from the young girl I was many years ago.  Some people have the good fortune of knowing who they are from an early age but I was not one of those people.  I lived a life I thought I wanted but I had not been honest with myself.  The path I was following was carved by what others needed from me but not from what I needed for myself.  It wasn’t until many years later that I gave myself permission to be me.

As I shifted through the years, the things I used to tolerate have become intolerable.  Where once I held my tongue, my voice is now louder than ever and I feel confident in my opinion.  I now value my voice and am no longer willing to remain silent.  This part of me always existed but never had the courage to be present.  This strength of character finally gave itself permission to exist and defined the person I always knew I was meant to be.

I recently saw a meme on Facebook and that innocuous comment turned into this blog post.  Life changes.  Sometimes we stick to the original plan, but sometimes we realize that the path we were meant to follow went in a different direction and it just took us a while to catch up.

I spent many years catching up to the person I am today and I am very happy with who I have become.  I have finally embraced the change in myself and recognized it as a strength and not a weakness.  Of all of the dreams I had for myself as a teenager, I could not be more proud of the person I am now and can only hope I have the courage to continue to live by the beliefs that I currently have.   Now, more than ever, I believe I am me for a reason.

 

 

 

Old words with the same message

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I am doing something I don’t usually do by copying and pasting a post I wrote back in February of this year.  The words I wrote then have a hauntingly familiar refrain and I want to share them again because I think they should be read.

 

“It doesn’t take a lot of strength to hang on, it takes a lot of strength to let go.” ~ J.C. Watts

~~

I was born a “fixer” and, until a few years ago, I had spent a great deal of my time taking on other people’s burdens as my own.  But something shifted in the paradigm of my reality when I got divorced in 2012.  I realized I was spending too much of my time trying to change a life that was not mine to change.  I was hanging on to problems that irrevocably had impact on my life but I had no power to solve.  I needed to let go.  But I was so stuck in the pattern of my life that I didn’t know how to let go.  I wanted so desperately for things to work out in my life that I honestly thought that this was the syllabus of my future.

It takes a monumental amount of courage to walk away from a relationship that you have put your heart and soul into, but a relationship has to give you what you need for it to be successful.  By its very definition, a relationship is a form of communication.  Wants and needs are expressed and, in a healthy relationship, are reciprocated without condition.  Such was not the case for me and I knew it.  I felt it deep within myself but it took me a long time to admit it because to do that would have made me feel like I had failed.  But I had only failed myself by not seeing the signs sooner and listening to that nagging inner voice.

I finally found the nerve to put my needs first and, in finally letting go, I gave myself permission to define myself according to my needs and not the needs of anyone else.  The strength to hang on was easy, it was my comfort zone, but finding the strength to let go made me feel eviscerated, vulnerable, and it was not something I was accustomed to.

I wanted to write this post because I have friends now in the situation in which I found myself years ago.  I want them to know that letting go is not always the easy choice, but it may be the right choice, for them.   It may be hard to listen to that petulant voice in your head, but that voice is the most sincerely honest advice you will ever get.

let it go

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Don’t give up easily.  If it is worth the fight, than fight, fight like your life depends on it.  But if you know in your heart that nothing will ever change, let go, let go like your life depends on it.

Just sit back and listen

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Some days are much more poignant than others.  For me, yesterday was one of those days.  I didn’t start the day knowing that my heart would be pummeled by a barrage of emotion but the result of my escapades resulted in a tidal pool of understanding and empathy.

In the rare moments between talk and react lies the innate ability to just listen.  The urge to respond is overwhelming but a silent voice in the deep reaches tells us to remain silent and, for those of us who can harness this wisdom and do nothing but pay attention, we let others feel comfortable to speak their truth.  We give them an asylum to breathe deeply and exhale their reality.  We give them an opportunity to be raw and completely honest.

Sometimes the most important gift we can give is our silence and I was reminded of this yesterday.  If somebody wants your opinion, be honest.  But if that somebody just wants you to listen, be silent.  Really hear what it is that they want to say and wait until they ask for your thoughts.  That gift of quietude can express your support in a way that words will never be able to achieve.

Sometimes the best advice you can give is no advice.  Just be willing to sit back, truly hear what they are saying and let your friends know that they have the freedom to speak without interruption.  Silence speaks louder than words.