The Year of Living Shamelessly

Why shamelessly?

So, I was thinking earlier this month about the start of a new year, 2013.  And I was thinking about how I'm still not making resolutions, because resolutions never really work out, and yet I still wanted to set some goals for myself this year.  I wanted, in some ways, to make this year different and the start of maybe even the second half of my adult life.  I started running this year, despite what my good sense told me, and I thought, "maybe I should call this my year of living dangerously."  But, then, I'm not a dangerous kind of girl.  So, I thought of shamelessly, and that fits for me.

I've lived so much of my life based on what was shameful.  With the idea that being shameless was a bad thing.  But, see, if we're not ashamed of who we are, then we can shamelessly enjoy ourselves and our lives.  That's the year that I want - a year to enjoy life, friends, good wine, good books, movies, moments with my children, moments - good ones - with my job.  A year to shamelessly stand up and say, "yup, I'm a big old nerd with a quirky sense of humor, and you know what?  none of you would love me quite as much if I were anything else."  Or something like that.  Maybe I won't broadcast that just yet - needs some work.

So I'm shamelessly embracing the fact that I am a gigantic, card-carrying dork.  I speak Latin.  I force my children to learn Latin.  I shove it down the throats of those in the near vicinity.  I listen to music from the 1980's - the best decade so far.  I dance, in public, shamelessly.  My children have shame for that last one, I'm sorry to say.  But it's my job to embarrass them just a little bit.  I love science, and often ponder things that no one else cares about.  It's the little things in life - why are there hairs on raspberries, anyway?  They're delicious, but seriously, shave.    I love Star Wars, and can quote it line and verse.  At least the original Star Wars - yeah, I'm that kind of Star Wars dork.  Still not ashamed.  I can quote the Breakfast Club and Pretty in Pink.  I wear bunny slippers.  I am a certified, mom-please-don't-talk-to-my-friends-about-that, geek.  It's OK...I'm not ashamed of that.  Nor of the fact  that, at this moment, I'm wearing DNA double helix earrings.  They're awesome - nothing to feel shameful about there.

I'm an awkward geek, too.  I can dance, I mean seriously, I can salsa, waltz, and swing.  But I can't walk across a floor without falling flat on my nose.  I'm that kind of awkward dork.  I run awkwardly - like a wounded badger.  It's why I started to run at night.  Now, I've decided I have nothing to be ashamed of.  Certainly those well toned men and women jogging past me with ease were once puffing along like me, though they probably looked a little more graceful.  I jog at night now, because I like it.  I like the peace.  I like the stars and the moon, and the quiet of my shoes hitting the trail.  I'm shameless about it now, and about the fact that I mostly like it.  Maybe not the feeling like I might throw up sometimes - I mean, I hate to throw up.  I'm going to be shameless.

I'm shameless now about my four decade old body.  I've had two children, fed them both, and put a lot of wear and tear on this body.  It's mine.  Scars, saggy parts, and all.  I still hear the voice in my head telling me "you're too old to wear that."  "No one should wear dresses like that unless they have a modeling worthy backside."  But this year I'm telling the voice to shut up.  My body has taken me a lot of places.  My beat up hands, with the unpainted nails, have held a lot of babies, dried a lot of tears, played music, written poems, done some hitting and some hugging.  My beat up feet with the deformed toe nails?  They've taken me all over the world.  I'm rather fond of the callused things.  I'm not ashamed of those either - I earned the calluses.  The lady who does a pedicure for me once every decade or so would disagree about the calluses - they're bad enough she calls other beauticians over to "tsk, tsk" over the state of my feet and talk bad about me in Korean.  That's OK...I'm not ashamed of  my feet.  They take me where I want to go.

I'm being shameless in what I eat, and in what I feed my families.  It's unlikely I'll impact an industry, but the way that animals are treated in the farming industry in our country is wrong.  I don't eat those animals, and now I don't eat their unhatched babies or the milk for their young either.  I'm shamelessly crunching my way through fruits and vegetables and rediscovering how awesome the perfectly ripe tomatoes can be, or a perfectly steamed spear of asparagus, or even some crunch lettuce.  So, I am shameless as I sit and eat my huge pile of greens and fruit every day at lunch, despite jokes from family and friends.  And I'm marching forward with feeding my family this way.  Maybe someday they'll thank me.  Or not.  But they'll live through the experience anyway.  No one ever died from eating fresh produce.  At least, not as long as e coli wasn't involved.

The goal I'm still working on is shamelessly telling people "no."  I have always felt that maybe people won't like me if I don't help them out.  Or maybe I'm only being worthwhile if I do everything I can to make their lives easier.  I spend my whole life in service to others, and it's not a bad thing to be.  Except the one person I have never served is myself.  So, this year I will shamelessly tell people no, I won't run their errands, drive them on pointless skirmishes, write their reports under a ridiculous deadline, or make last minute shopping trips for them.  I'll tell them no, without remorse, because I will want that time to read a book, take a run, play with my kids, or talk to a friend.  I will not feel guilty, or at least I'll ignore that guilt, at letting my kids fend for themselves, or telling their dad to feed them dinner, so I can fit in some exercise.  I'll be shameless in my need to have a few days a year to myself, and I will tell those who attempt to throw monkeys my way, "no," in a loud clear voice.  Shamelessly.

So, this one is harder.  It's easy to write on a blog, where a few friends and a lot of anonymous strangers might read my words.  I write, have always written, all the time.  I have written novels.  I have written a lot of novels.  Novels that virtually no one  has read, that I have done nothing with, because I was convinced that no one wants to read what I write or is interested in what I say.  I will be shameless this year, throw caution to the wind, and clean up one of these novels and submit it for publishing.  I don't care if it's rejected with great laughter or disdain, I will do it.  Shamelessly.  And if someone doesn't like what I write, then don't read it.  I promise, I won't be hurt.

I will, this year, and perhaps from now on, shamelessly do as I like, not as I should do - barring that it might hurt someone, including myself.  I will take those chances and not worry what it looks like, sounds like, might look like to someone else.   I will learn those things I want to learn, and I will enjoy it.  Without shame, and without worry.  I will tell those I care about that I do, despite a lifetime of being taught that it's wrong to be that openly affectionate.  It's not vulgar, it's not tacky.  It's what people do.  Shamelessly, for hundreds of thousands of years.  Our lives are short, often much too short, and we should tell people we care about them, without shame.  What could be wrong in having affection for another person?  I love my friends.  I love my kids. I love some of my family members.

And I will shamelessly accept that I have failed in some areas of my life.  I have failed with my birth family.  Fear and shame have kept me from admitting that.  I can't fix what was broken before I was born, and I will not allow shame any longer keep me from closing that door.  My birth family is a train wreck.  I am shameless in saying,  I didn't cause it.  I can't fix it.  I won't be responsible for it any longer.  I will shamelessly say how badly I have screwed up some parts of my life, and I can't undo or fix those either.  I can move forward and try not to repeat all my old mistakes.  And I can be shameless about saying I will screw up again.  It's who I am.

I am shameless in saying I'm not the world's best housekeeper.  I will have friends and family over and not apologize for books lying about, a basket of laundry waiting to be put away, or dishes drying on my counter.  If they are my friends, they will not care about those things. And I will be shameless about taking the time and effort that could be put into rectifying those things and enjoy time with people instead.  "Pardon my home, but you know, people LIVE here."  I will say it shamelessly. 

I am a woman in my early 40's, with the scars and the bags under my eyes to say I've had a lot of living.  I'm a workaholic, neurotic, sometimes psychotically energetic, dorky kind of woman.  I sometimes am sarcastic, and even occasionally witty.  Sometimes I hurt peoples feelings without meaning to, because I went for the easy joke.  I am sometimes serious, and occasionally moody, or even maudlin.  I am an insomniac who loves the quiet of the night and hears the call of adventure in a book.  I'm the most impulsive organizational control freak you'll ever meet. I'm sometimes out of control, and often hyped on caffeine.  I'm awkward and geeky and on a rare day sentimental (but don't tell anyone).  I like music and laughter and a good drink.  Sometimes I drink more than I might think I should, if I were acknowledging shame.  But I'm not.   I am passionate about music and stories and words.  I am passionate about my job and doing it well. I'm shameless about all of it too.  Just as I should be.

It's the year of living shamelessly.  What will you do when you let go of your shame too?

And So Life Goes On

As 2012 drew to a close, and everyone waited to see if the world might really end, I just wanted to know where a new year might be going.  My daughter decided that there wasn't a high enough probability that they were right and she studied for her finals anyway.  Good decisions, since her high school was still standing on December the 21st.  And so life goes on.

There's always a prediction that the world is going to end.  There's always someone who believes that they know the exact moment we are all going to cease to exist.  What I know is that someday I will cease to exist, and I don't really care to know the how or when.  Life goes on.

2012 was a weird kind of year.  I don't believe in karma per se, but I started 2012 so angry, so confused, so fed up with life in general, it's little wonder I had the start to the year I did.  In January, I got hit by a car.  That sounds so momentous, but really, it was just a car backing up in a parking lot - they didn't see me, the bumper clipped me, and I got knocked onto the sidewalk.  Once I regained my bearings I even thought, "that was it?  I thought being hit by a car would be more serious than that."  I walked around sore for a couple of days.  And then life went on.

And on, and on, and on.  And I didn't enjoy a single moment of it.  I was racing around preparing for Katie to graduate from middle school and move into high school.  I moved out of my house and brought my girls to a townhouse across town.  I lightened my life.  A lot.  I threw away, gave away, stored away all of the stuff that has been weighing us down.   We spent so many years accumulating stuff.  We don't need it - it just makes it too hard to clean the house anyway.  I got rid of cable and made our television a "for DVD only" zone.  We cleared out computers and extra furniture.  I bought a new bed - first piece of furniture that I really bought on my own, for myself.  I learned how to do things for myself.  Some nights last spring I was so tired, I felt half dead.  But I didn't die, and life went on.

I watched Katie graduate, and not being a person to bawl in public much, I still teared up a little bit quietly.  Life does, indeed, move on - faster and faster every year.  It doesn't seem all that long ago that I brought her to St. Francis for the first day of school.  She was 18 months old.  So cute.  So tiny.  I watched her grow up on that campus, and watched her learn and change and make friends - and lose them.  I watched her learn some painful lessons.  And suddenly, that phase in her life was over, and I have a student in high school.  I used to roll my eyes when my grandmother warned me it would happen this way - time going faster and faster.  But it does.  And I felt like somehow my 30's had gone by without my even noticing.

I'm not one to be hung up on age.  It's just a number, after all, and some of my best friends are 20 years older than I am, or ten years younger.  And I don't think a thing about it.  But what did really hit me was the way that number snuck up, and the feeling that I hadn't had enough joy or experiences or...anything...to show for it.  Life goes on.  And we should enjoy it.

So, I started some new things.  I took a road trip by myself across country.  I allowed myself a few hours to really cry, and then told myself that I was done with that.  I saw some things I had always wanted to see, and some things I hadn't planned on seeing.  I met people and talked with strangers.  Danced with an elderly Zuni man in a convenience store in New Mexico.  I walked in the rain and nearly drove my car off a mountain in a wild summer storm.  But I didn't, and as frightening as the twenty minutes or so of driving through that storm were, there was a feeling of great satisfaction in having safely negotiated my way through it and seeing that dark mass of clouds in my rearview mirror as I pulled through Santa Rosa.  I spray painted a car in the middle of a cow field, watched fireworks over the Amarillo sky, and watched the sun come up over a desert.  And I could have cried because I have wasted some time over the last decade.  Oh, not on the important things I do - like my kids, or my job - but on worrying, or choosing easy over adventure, or choosing staying in over friends sometimes.  Anything worthwhile generally takes some effort.  I am not much one for resolutions, but I resolved to make some effort.  To do the things I've always said I wanted to do, but never get around to doing.  To let go of some fear, and to try new things in life.

I started with one thing I have always wanted, but never had the nerve to do.  I got a tattoo.  Now, I'm still me and I did some research on where was the best place to go, didn't get a tattoo I couldn't cover when I want (or need) to, and followed all the care tips carefully.  But I decided fear was not a reason to not go through with it.  All of that, to find that it really doesn't hurt so much after all - as the artist said, "you wouldn't see all these big tough guys walking around with them if it really hurt that much.  women are tougher than men about pain."  I think he's right.  We have to be, afterall, to bear and care for children.  So, cliche aside, I got the tattoo I had always wanted - a dragon - on my back.  It's not huge, but I know it's there.  Sometimes now when I get nervous, I think of that, and remember I can do anything I want or need to do, as in "heck with that, I've got a dragon on MY side."  Life moves on.

Katie started high school.  I started putting together another phase of my life.  I've thrown caution to the wind a few times in 2012, and I've had some wonderful experiences.  I've made new friends.  I've had some moments of which I am less proud, but I value the experiences just the same. Sometimes because they taught me something about myself, sometimes because they helped me get closer to another person, and sometimes because it was fun as hell - even if I should have had my head examined.  2012 was weird.   But it was a good start to a new decade in my life.

I don't make New Year's Resolutions.  But I did resolve to start 2013 in the spirit of my life going on - in the best, most fun and still safe and responsible (because I'm still me) way as possible.  Life doesn't end because you get hurt, lose a friend, fall out of love, have someone you love die, or just become unhappy.  Life moves on.  You can move with it, or be carried by it.  I started 2013 by getting another tattoo (and no, most of you will never see this one either).  This one is a compass - to remind me to always know which direction I'm headed and make good choices along the way.   But to keep moving.  Life goes on - go with it.

The Path Less Traveled

My visit to the Petrified Forest National Park was certainly the highlight of my road trip, but not the only high point.  After Puerco Pueblo, I continued through the park, winding through the strange and foreign landscape.  Much as when I visited Yellowstone Park, I was struck by how many unusual geological anomalies could occur in such a small area.  Coming down in altitude from the Painted Desert Canyon, the road winds under I-40, past the old Route 66, marked by a car from years gone by and telephone poles with wires leading to nowhere.  Despite the age of those items, they are modern compared to the history they sit among.  The Pueblo is modern in comparison to the other places I saw that day.  I passed by fields of blackened ash, rock formations known as the TeePees - conical shaped rocks formed in layers of sediment, from when the desert was once a flood basin.  Those conical formations were striped in blues, greys, reds and whites.  Rounding a corner, I came to the Crystal Forest, an area rich in colorful petrified logs.  The logs lay haphazardly around the hillside, undisturbed by time, and now undisturbed by humanity, as enforced by vehicle searches at each exit.  The petrified logs lie about where the ancient flood waters left them lying, back in the Triassic.

Hiking a mile at 7400 feet is more than my lungs are used to these days.  I had to sit down and rest.  Apparently the park rangers don't mind if you rest on the petrified trees, as long as you don't try to take one.  Considering they weigh somewhere around 200 pounds per cubic foot, I don't think there was any danger.  Sitting there, it was a little like seeing what that area of the country would have been like a few million years ago.  Everything looked strange and foreign to me.  I was waiting for a dinosaur to come around one of the hills.

Leaving the park, I felt lighter and better than I had in a while, finally feeling the vacation kicking in.  I had driven 1200 miles all by myself, visited places I'd wanted to see for ages, and in the Arizona desert, my allergies were a thing of memory.  I sat in my car contemplating at the turn off for Interstate 40 - only 170 more miles to the Grand Canyon.  I decided to save that trip for another day, and instead take my time heading back to Texas, thinking  I might wind my way down the Turquoise Trail and into Las Cruces for the night.  Well...best laid plans and all of that.  At Gallup, I headed south on a small local highway, seeing by the map that there was a short cut that would take me through some great trading post areas.  It was the Fourth of July, but I figured not everything would be closed.  Hmmm....never assume.

I wandered through the hills of New Mexico, along this small highway, enjoying the scenery, but becoming increasingly concerned due to lack of traffic, lack of habitation, and lack of gas stations.  My gas tank was down to nearly a quarter of a tank, and no civilization in sight.  I had driven onto the Zuni Reservation and was mentally calculating gas mileage and whether or not I could make it back to Gallup.  I found a small business looming in the distance, which turned out to be a convenience store/restaurant/bar/hang out because it's a rainy fourth of July place.  I walked in to find all of four people leaning on the counter.  A very nice young man put down his beer and picked up a napkin to draw a map for me when I owned up to being lost.  The lady stocking shelves offered me a bottle of water.  And a somewhat elderly gentleman with long white hair and the fanciest cowboy boots I've ever seen asked me to dance.  Well, I could barely hear the music on the radio, but when an elderly gentleman anywhere asks you politely to dance, you dance with him.  It's just the right thing to do.

So, if I felt like I was on another planet and that things were a little surreal while I was in the Crystal Forest, dancing in that convenience store/restaurant/bar/place to hang out on a rainy Fourth of July, well, that was in another universe.  The song ended, the gentleman said thank you with quite a good laugh, and I collected my map.  I offered to pay for my bottle of water, but was waved off, so I left some money in the tip jar on the counter instead.  Indeed, I had been wandering parallel to a much better populated highway, and their directions led me directly to a Phillips 66 station.  So, I didn't run out of gas on the reservation, just before a thunderstorm, and I managed to find my way back go Grants, New Mexico.  I would say I had wasted a good part of my afternoon in the process, but I don't think that anything was wasted.  Life is certainly more interesting off the highway.

It turns out that life is also safer off the highway.  I had already lost a fender on I-40, so it wasn't my favorite road.  That afternoon, just outside Moriarity, the thunderstorm that had been chasing me caught up, and I found out what happens when winds sheer in off the mountains.  I also found out that the fender on a car does serve some aerodynamic function of sorts - my car shuddered with every gust of wind.  The rain came slamming in while I was on a mountain, with large trucks to the left, fore, and rear of me.  I rediscovered the fact that you are never too scared to pray.  I drove on for several miles while gripping the steering wheel as tightly as possible, because, of course, my brain thought THAT would keep my car on the road.  Must have worked, as I drove out of the rain and sailed on through Tucumcari again, getting off the interstate long enough to enjoy that stretch of Route 66 one more time.  I had hoped the neon signs would be on, as the sky was so dark, but alas, they must have been set to a timer.

I spent the night near the New Mexico/Texas border and woke up ready to ride.  Knowing I was nearly home, I popped in some good CD's, and sang off-key all the way back to Houston.  It was a long drive, but I knew that home, a shower, and my kitty were waiting for me.  With apologies to those who live in and love Fort Worth, who the hell designed those freeways?  Traffic jam at 3:00 in the afternoon, had to quickly cross three lanes of traffic to get to my very steep, very curved overpass, only to find that at the top the road split in three directions.  Really?  Felt no small sense of accomplishment at making it through Fort Worth and gliding into Corsicana, to turn south.  I-45 might as well be home, I've driven it so many times.  I cranked up the Madonna I was rocking at the time and the time flew by.

2400 miles, several wrong turns, walked in on a drug sale, spray painted a Cadillac, ate breakfast with some German bikers, danced with a very nice gentleman in a very strange store/bar/restaurant, hiked through the painted desert, sat on a petrified tree that saw the birth of baby dinosaurs, followed the Mother Road through parts of American history, and safely back home.  So much of that trip was dependent on leaving the interstate.  The interstates of America are safe.  They are well constructed, so you hardly feel a bump or know that you're traveling through mountains or canyons, in deserts or swamps.  Every interstate feels very much the same to me.  But without leaving them, you never get any variety, you never get a feel for what our country feels like.  If I had stayed on the interstate, I would have saved a lot of time.  I certainly could have flown straight on down to the Grand Canyon and back, but I would have missed all the milestones along the way.  It would have felt like just a trip and not a journey, and certainly not a vacation.  Vacations are meant to be times to leave our daily lives behind.  That's what I did when I left the interstate, and instead decided to explore without agenda, without preconceptions, and often without a map.  To find yourself, you have to embrace the journey as well.

Leaving a Mark

When we leave home for a trip of any kind, we find often that it is more that the trip takes us, and changes who we are.  I left home a week ago, hoping to find some peace and quiet.  With both children away for the week, I knew that staying home would mean reverting to my habits of work, sleep and work some more.  It was time to break the cycle.  Who would have thought that I'd find the trip would bring answers in a place so lonely as a cow pasture, or in a form so simple as graffiti?  And who would imagine that I'd be less lonely on my own than I am in daily busy life?

With no particular plan in mind, I packed a duffle bag and headed north up interstate 45, my main goal being to cross Route 66, and to get out of this Southern Texas heat and humidity for a couple of days.  Hopping on State Hwy. 287 at Ennis, Texas, I followed the highway through small towns in the Panhandle, spotting old time drive-ins, Texas vineyards, and lots and lots of cows.  Oh, lots of cows.  I found Route 66 late that afternoon, with a little thrill of excitement.  I've heard my whole life about this infamous road across America - the Mother Road.  I felt the ghost of Steinbeck sitting to my right, nodding his head in approval.  Get off the highway and find the real America, he seemed to be saying.  Getting on and off the interstate to follow this winding, often badly kept stretch of road got tedious at times.  I loved the forgotten towns that survive only on the memory of a time when 66 ran through their midst, bringing travelers.  Many of those towns are all but ghost towns now, with a few key tourist spots to bring in revenue and keep the town alive for the farmers and ranchers living in the vicinity.  Perhaps that IS the real America, the spirit to survive and adapt in the face of change.

Route 66 and Interstate 40 both cross through the heart of Amarillo, which is where I found myself stopping for the first night.  Being nothing if not adventurous, I stayed in a well-advertised, inexpensive motel.  I found my mistake the first time when I went back to my car to get a forgotten book.  There was a drug deal going down in the parking lot.  Returned to my room without the book, and locked my flimsy door.  I didn't sleep very well that night, what with the party in the room next door and the funky smell coming from across the hall.  On the plus side, lesson learned, and I know what crack smells like when it's being burned now.  Adventure aside, I was glad to see the dawn and pack my car back up.  It was early that morning when I gassed up and trekked the seven or eight miles to the Cadillac Ranch, just on the west side of Amarillo.

The Cadillac Ranch is an interactive art installation - in a cow pasture.  Driving East on Route 66, after leaving Amarillo, you'll find ten Cadillacs, from various model years, planted in a row, in a cow pasture.  Parking on the side of the road, I entered through an old gate, to the smell of cow patties in the early morning air.  The wind was blowing wildly off the flatlands, and I could hear the sounds of the nearby interstate in the background.  Humans are odd, that's all I can say.  Spray cans littered the field, discarded from their gleeful artistic debauchery.  Here and there, people were spraying "I heart so and so" or "Bob was here" on the sides, undercarriages, and wheels of these upright cars.  I was walking around for the third time when someone handed me a can of spray paint they didn't need anymore.  I hadn't planned on adding to the insanity, but when a moment presents itself, you take it.  I started with just a few test sprays, and then found myself wondering what I should paint, how I would leave my mark.  From what I had observed, anything written would be covered over in a matter of hours.  So I found myself spraying something I wouldn't say out loud.  Everyone has something they carry around, something that is a secret, or embarrassing, or whiney, or just plain silly.  I spray painted mine on the side of a Cadillac, in a cow pasture outside of Amarillo.  No one who knows me will ever see that confession, and no one who sees it will know me or care.  It was freeing.  I was pretty gleeful in decorating my words with outlines and curlicues.  A group of bikers had approached the installation at that point and one of them laughed watching me, said "looks like you're having fun" in a German accent.  I realized I was, having fun.  I said I was enjoying the beautiful morning and one of them asked if I'd like a short ride.  Well, tempting as that was, I didn't know the guy and wasn't dressed for a motorcycle ride, even on a vintage Harley like this one.  I declined, but it was nice to be asked.

Driving westward again on Route 66, I passed through Adrian, Texas, the last town in Texas on the old road.  It was an impulsive move that had me stopping at the Mid-Point Diner for a late breakfast.  The Midpoint is an historic spot, built originally in the 1940's, rebuilt twenty years later, and added onto over the years.  The furniture is mismatched, the building old, and the waitress and cook were cheerful and colorful.  I was the only person there the first few minutes, then some area regulars dropped in.  They didn't even have to order - just said, "breakfast as usual."  A few minutes later, the group of German bikers came in and pretty much took over the diner.  There were enough of them that they were at every table, taking up space in every booth.  A couple sat across from me.  The lady in my booth said that they were all visiting with her brother who lives outside of Abilene, and taking a tour across the country on their bikes.  Turns out her brother was the one who had offered to give me a ride on his bike - and watching them all together, I could see that they were just enjoying life and a beautiful summer morning together.  It was evident as they bought silly items from the Route 66 gift shop, ordered their meals and shared menu items with one another with laughter.  I was rather glad to be included in their midst of joyful conversation.  Ana's English was good, but her accent made it different to understand.  I never did catch her brother's name, as the accent could have made it Ari, Ottie or several other variations.  Didn't matter - their company was pleasant just the same.

I left after enjoying an omlette full of vegetables and probably dripping in butter.  So good.  Such a good start to the day.  I was still full of that same gleeful spirit about thirty minutes later when I crossed into New Mexico on old Route 66.  Land of Enchantment, as their signs all say.  New Mexico was a mixed wonder to me, the whole time I was there.  Mountains and desert, small towns and larger cities.  I drove through Tucumcari on the old Mother Road, and found it to be the best preserved of all the towns along the route.  I wish I'd been able to go through there at night time, as all the neon signs from the past are still maintained in that town, and I bet it's a  sight worth seeing.  Passed the TeePee Trading post, a historic shop.  Also the Blue Swallow Motel, another fun place I've seen in pictures over the years.  Just outside Tucumcari (and I'll say that a lot, because it's fun to say...just like the old song says, "Tucumcari Tonite"), I was forced back on Interstate 40 for a bit.  It was at this point that my trip turned a little bit sour, as I lost a piece of my car.  Two days before leaving town, I had hit a pole, and thinking the only real damage was to my bumper, figured I'd fix it later.  Ummm...well...apparently my fender was not so firmly fixed in place, and it flew off going down he interstate.  I looked in the rearview mirror just in time to see a semi run it over.  To say I was miffed might be an understatement.  I was pissed.  All the way to Albuquerque.  By then, I was running out of steam, and the city of Albuquerque is too beautiful to stay mad for long.  Whoever planned that city even had the thought to make the freeways symmetrical and attractive.  Overpasses are colored Terra Cotta and accented with turquoise, reminding all those who pass that they are in the Southwest. 

The turnoff to Chaco Canyon was badly marked, and I spent a lot of time wandering in the ancient hills, looking for the park.  Rain drove me back down to the freeway again, and on toward Gallup.  Gallup is another Route 66 town not much marked by time.  I spent my night at the El Rancho Hotel.  I love their sign, "Charm of Yesterday; Convenience of Tomorrow."  Of course, the hotel reached it's heyday in the late 40's and early 50's, so that convenience of tomorrow is about fifty years behind.  But that's OK, the charm was all there.  The El Rancho was the place where the movie stars of the 40's and 50's stayed while filming westerns.  I walked up the curving staircase, knowing I was treading in the path of Katherine Hepburn, John Wayne, and Ronald Reagan.  It was a 1950's vision of what the wild west should be, with curving stairs leading to a second floor gallery, a player piano in the lobby, and lots of wagon wheels and bull horns.  My headboard was a wagon wheel, located nicely in the Errol Flynn room.  Now, I had a very small single room, so I highly doubt Flynn ever graced it with his presence.  Still, best sleep I had on the whole trip.  I dined that night in the hotel's restaurant, with its kitschy decor and dubiously "authentic" Mexican menu.  I settled on a grilled cheese and salad, as being from Houston makes me skeptical of Mexican food in other states.

I drove into Arizona the next day, singing along to Fleetwood Mac and enjoying the irony that the desert weather was cooler and more pleasant than that at home.  I pulled into the Petrified Forest national park around 7:30 a.m., and was one of the first in the park.  I can't begin to describe how incredible the Painted Desert canyon is.  None of the pictures I took could do justice to the colors and variety of rock formations.  I stopped to tour the Painted Desert Inn, perched above the canyon.  It's no longer open for overnight stays, but I can only imagine that those who honeymooned there had a very hard time living up to the start to that marriage - how could anything else compare with that kind of setting?

I stopped at the Puerco Pueblo, a 900 year old shared living space, on a high mesa, within the park.  I was the only one on that particular trail that early in the morning, and I might have been a little bit of a rule breaker, as I wandered off the path to stand inside the kiva that morning.  Those who know me well know that I am a huge history geek, and there is nothing more thrilling to me than standing where others have stood and lived, and imagining their lives.  I am always fascinated by how they are different from those I know in my time, and how we are all the same as human beings.  Looking over the cliff, there was a rock sectioned off, and on it, there were petroglyphs.  Ancient graffiti.  I was looking at those etched images of dancers, lizards, people, and I was struck by the similarity between those marks and the spray painted artwork on the Cadillacs the day before.  900 years before, someone made those marks on the rocks.  They had the same dreams of raising their children and living good lives with someone they love as the people at the Cadillac Ranch, and they had the same goal.  To make a mark.  To say "I was here."  To say they loved someone.  It's what we all do, every single day.  We try to leave an impression of our brief and tiny lives on this planet.  To leave our mark on the world, and on those we love.  I'm not sure how long I stood there, impressed with these ancient artists, but I felt how real they were, and how they certainly had left a mark that stood through time.  I thought about those whose marks were washed away by time and rain, and animals.  But their spirits remained in the desert as well, telling a story if we care to listen, to how their lives weren't so different from ours.  In this time, we overcomplicate our lives, load up with too much we don't need.  Worry too much about things that don't matter, and forget about those that do.  But at the heart of it all, we hope to leave something that commemorates our time on Earth.  My spray painted words at the Cadillac Ranch have long since been covered up, so I'll have to leave my mark in other ways.  On my friends, my family, my work and those things I love.

To be continued....(because it's just getting too darn long).

Fifty Shades of Something

I am always on the look-out for a good read.  When a good friend - a librarian no less - recommended a quick summer read, I jumped at the chance.  I'd never heard of the book, because apparently I live in a bubble.  Yeah, a work-kids-home-work again kind of bubble.  So imagine my surprise when I mentioned it to a coworker and he said, "oh, you're reading that book."  Wow...what literary hornet's nest have I uncovered this time?

The book, Fifty Shades of Gray,  was one I had never heard of a week ago.  As of today, I have heard countless others discuss it, and am baffled by the sheer excitement and whispers of guilty pleasure resounding around campus.  Another co-worker practically beat me down to get the book when I was done.

To back up for a moment, I should preface this with the disclaimer from my librarian friend, who says she started skipping the sex scenes after a while.  Since reading this book, I think she must have read a total of three pages, as the rest were all sex related.  That's OK, I'm not opposed to a well-written sex scene if it furthers the plot.  I suppose in this case, it could be said to be furthering the plot, but well written it was not.  The entire book was a teenager's pulse racing inner dialogue, coupled with a consenting adult's best kept desires.  Did I finish the book?  Yes.  Despite being put off by the writing style.  Despite wondering where the author came up with the idea that a man at ANY age would be capable of those acrobatics.  I finished the book . As stereotypical and badly painted as her characters were at times, there was a very real relationship between two people at the heart of the book.  The interactions between two or more human beings are the very reasons any of us read any piece of fiction.  Their e-mails, within the story, were  the most compelling parts of the book.  Because they were real, self-doubting, sometimes sexy and sometimes angry.  Fifty shades of gray.  Are any of us any less?

When I was younger, I used to wonder who I was.  Am I the scholar or the clown?  Am I adventurous or studious?  Which path am I following in life?  I spent a lot of time trying to figure that out, and I've spent some time lately reviewing those answers.  In short, I am all of those things.  I am more than just fifty shades of gray.  I am all of those things, and none of those things.  The sum of the parts is less than the whole.  I've spent a lifetime wondering who I am, and am just now accepting that who I am in the moment is not necessarily who I was yesterday or who I will be tomorrow.  I can be serious mom.  Or silly best friend.  Or efficient employee.  Or moody person who just wants to be alone.  All still me.  More than fifty shades of me.

So, fifty shades of complicated in each of my friends.  Our friendships are different from day to day - depending on who each of us is on that particular day and in that particular place.  My relationships are mercurial and endlessly changing.

Fifty shades of curious where my path will take me tomorrow, and who I will be in that moment.  Fifty shades of irritated that I am spending this long thinking about it.

I suppose I can say that Fifty Shades of Gray wasn't such a bad book, as it made me think.  That's what a good novel does.  I'll give it points for that.

Now, fifty shades of tired.  I'm going to bed.

Spring Cleaning

So, if nothing hammered home to me how different my life is as I've gotten older, it would be that the meaning of Spring Break has changed. Spring Break, once upon a time, meant I could stay up as late as I wanted and have a few drinks without the worry of getting up early for school or for work. Spring Break was about some adventure and some fun.

I'm in a different place in my life. Not that adventure and fun are behind me, it's just that I let them come more naturally these days. I figure enough opportunities come my way, and I won't turn those away when they knock. However, in the mean time, a break should be a break and I can use the time in myriad different ways. Today I am fluctuating between reading a book and cleaning my house.

It's Spring - and that always means a little bit of Spring cleaning. Time to sweep out the accumulation of winter's debris and make way for new life and new plans. I'm literally cleaning my house, getting rid of things that I don't need, donating items I can't use, and sweeping out the cobwebs and cat hair. At the same time, I'm spring cleaning other parts of my life.

It's been a hard winter for me. In short, I am coming up on the middle of my life, and I have finally accepted that I am not superhuman and cannot solve everyone's problems, be everything to everyone in my life, and say yes to every request. I will, ultimately, fail. I've been failing quietly the last several months - mostly failing myself, but occasionally my children and my work. By taking on too much, and by refusing to accept that there are human limitations, I have become exhausted, irritable, cranky, forgetful and slow. I've allowed relationships to lie half-dead and done nothing to either revive them nor put them out of their misery. And I have forgotten how much joy there can be in some of the smallest parts of the human experience.

Spring cleaning. I've cleaned out my kitchen. The refrigerator is sparkling, the pantry is organized, and the counters are decluttered. Gone are any products full of things not found in nature. My kitchen is a living place now, with food that is still at least partially alive. More than just no dead animals. No more products supporting the death of animals. And I will not apologize for feeling that way, or for feeding my family this way. Anyone who wants to live with me will have to accept that, just as I will accept if they choose to make a different decision when it's not my kitchen doing the cooking. We all have our own conscience...just not in my kitchen.

I will scrub my floors and begin sorting items for a garage sale. We're moving in the next month, and I want to start fresh with less clutter and less baggage. Growing up, we moved a lot. I never got to get comfortable in any one place, which was bad. But I had a lot of fresh starts and I dumped my baggage quite frequently. That was pretty good. I haven't had a chance in a while to reinvent myself or my life. It takes momentum to make change, and staying in the same place, surrounded by my own clutter and that of those who live with me, it's hard to find that momentum. Even the thought of moving makes me groan - it's hard to get out of a groove you've worn in over twelve years. I hate to think I'm stuck in a rut, but I am.

Once, many years ago, I babysat for a little girl. We were watching her dog in the back yard. Every day, he flipped his water dish three or four times, and every day I'd have to slog back out in the wet grass and refill it three or four times. I told him he was stuck in a rut and find something new to do for entertainment. So, when we were getting ready for her nap time and she chose her book, the little girl picked a new book. I was surprised, as she always wanted the same book before nap. She told me she didn't want to "suck a rat anymore." After I figured out that she was breaking out of her own rut, I laughed for a bit and complimented her on her decision to stop sucking that rat.

I need to stop sucking the rats.

So, it's time for some serious spring cleaning. Time to reinvent myself a little bit. Not change, just spiff up a little bit. It's the season of new life, after all.

January: BookFest 2012

It's been a rough start to a new year. All the signs might have been there, if I'd looked a little closer. Plague. Pestilence. I can't understand a single lyric from a Top 40 song. If that's not a signs of Armageddon, it should be. I've been plagued by birds, crazy people, hit by a car, and can't find my bank card. All of that could lead me to have a major hissy fit. Instead, I have chosen to wallow in fiction (and a little bit of non-fiction) instead. And this year, just for fun, I'm tracking what I read. Some are re-reads, some are guilty pleasures, and some will actually challenge me to think. When I'm not too tired for brain function, that is.

So, with January at a close, here were my reads for the first month of 2012, or at least some of them, since I didn't start keeping track until around the 20th of the month....

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green - recommended by a co-worker, and much enjoyed. Katie is reading this one now. I do love a good young adult book. I read most of this one in one evening, realized it was 1:30 a.m., put it down, turned off the light, and couldn't sleep. 2:00 a.m., I had to finish the book, because it was haunting me. It haunted me after I was through as well. I'll reread this one.

Looking for Alaska also by John Green - recommended by me, because I loved the first one I read of his so much. It was well written, and I liked the characters. Not as much as the first, but still a good read.

Paper Towns - yeah, also by John Green. Sue me - my kids were sick, and I was on a roll. I liked this one almost as much as Fault in Our Stars. The characters were quirky, and I love a good road trip story.

This Beautiful Life by Helen Schulman. This one was based on a true story. Not terribly great writing, but a compelling story. Not so much about the well-known case that was in the papers, but about what happened to a family as a result of one bad decision. I have kids - it scared me a little to see how quickly a life could be ruined. Or a whole family and all of their lives. One bad decision. Ouch.

Punished by Vanessa Steel. Disappointing. It was a rushed telling of a story of abuse. Nothing more to say.

Always to Remember by Lorraine Heath. Nome de Plume of a friend of mine; we used to be in the same writer's group many, many years ago. I read this when she first published it in the early 90's, and recently noticed that it was available for Kindle. So, I indulged myself. While basically a romance, it was so much more than that. I love the idea that courage isn't necessarily about a big, loud show of action. Sometimes true courage walks in silence. In the faces of women sending their men to war. In the actions of a man doing what he believes is right, even in the face of violence. Good re-read.

Speaking of good re-reads. I picked up Good Omens by Neil Gaimon and re-read it one day last weekend. Fabulous. Simply a fun, good read. Who would have thought the end of the world could be so entertaining. The Antichrist and his buddies off to saves the world, and they didn't even know it. From chattering nuns to hell hounds named Dog. Awesome clever.

Collapse by Jared Diamond. How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed is the subtitle. Like with his previous book, Guns, Germs and Steel, Diamond gets to the heart of the matter - human nature doesn't change. We can change locations, times, weather..all manner of details. Essentially, people are still people. None of his ideas were startling or new, but it was well-told, with several well-made points about civilization now and in the past. Took me a while to get through this one.

On Chesil Beach by Ian Mcewan. Like always, his attention to character development and motivation was incredibly detailed. But there was something about this tale that irritated me. I know, the very point of "if only" was integral to the plot. But I wanted to shake both of them. If only they had been born a few years later. If only they had felt free to say what each was thinking. If only he'd followed her sooner. If only. They were immature, and their story ultimately ends in unhappiness, because they couldn't communicate with one another. I did enjoy the attention to the time period's details though. This was the era in which my parents married. Gave me some insights there.

A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare. I don't really need to explain this one, right? Katie's reading it for a class assignment. Her comments made me want to re-read a favorite.

Songs for the Missing by Stewart O'Nan. This was also recommended by a co-worker. (Note to self: congratulate self on acquiring a co-worker with good literary taste.) This story was well-told, though perhaps not what I expected when I first began reading. Despite a missing girl and a possibility of foul play, the real story centers on her family. As in This Beautiful Life, the theme is really about how lives affect one another and what happens to those connected to tragedy. The human triumph is in our ability to keep going and keep living. I saw a dance performance this month also based around this theme - the human endurance and capacity for love after loss. Amazing. O'Nan's deceptively simple writing was amazing as well.

Weetzy Bat by Francesca Lia Block. This one looked so promising and the reviews were so nice. It seemed like a quirky coming of age story. I like those. This was quirky. And weird. And poorly written. And full of strange sequences of events, and names that don't make sense. When I was done reading it, I had the realization that reading this book must be a written rendition of what it is like to trip on acid. Now I am even less inclined to drop acid. I wasn't inclined before, but I'm less inclined now.

Jerusalem Maiden by Talia Carner. Recommended by a parent at school. I enjoyed this story thoroughly. I like putting myself outside of my own cultural constructs. It's hard enough for any child to break free of parent expectations and culturally accepted ideas. For the protagonist in this story, living in early 20th century Jerusalem, the idea of choosing a life as a single artist is unheard of. It was a well-told tale of someone living the life they choose, no matter what, and the difficult choices along the way. Good read.

And that brings me to the books queued in my Kindle. The Cobra Event by Richard Preston. The Coming Plague by Laurie Garrett. I figured with the world ending this year and all, I ought to get a leg up on what could happen. Figured I'd start with the plague. I'll look for some good books on earthquakes next.