can’t take that away from me

Today I’m 52. I woke up stiff as hell; I walked about 10 miles yesterday without really planning to (or preparing for it) – a little more than 6 of it all at once at the end of a hot day. No regrets and no bitching, I’m just a tad stiff and sore. At 52 that seems a reasonable price to pay for youthful shenanigans. Next time I will plan my route more attentively, and ensure my calories and fluid intake leading up to the excursion are more appropriately managed to support the demand, as a proper grown up might. 🙂

A lovely day for a journey.

I’m sipping my morning coffee and smiling. I smile a lot lately. I feel content, generally, and comfortable with myself and the woman I have become over time…eager to celebrate the small successes with my traveling partner, and a little self-conscious that at least for now, he is my only partner, and my only lover. It’s not an entirely comfortable experience for me, but wonderful for learning to treat one person truly well – me – and leveraging the power of that knowledge to treat my partner(s), and lover(s) well in the future. I need this time exploring who I am, and what matters about that – and what does not. My highs and lows are entirely my own. I feel sexy, beautiful, and comfortable in my skin. I love, and I am loved in return.

“You Always Have My Heart” 8″ x 10″ acrylic on canvas with glow.

Some past relationships have ended leaving me feeling damaged, cheated, betrayed, and robbed – less of goods than of emotional experiences I really enjoy, and invested in heavily, only to find that the circumstances, or actions taken within the relationship took from me some moment of pleasure or joy, in some cases things I miss even to this day. I am surprised to find that I have come to terms with something I didn’t understand when I was less experienced, or less worldly, or less wise, or less… old. 🙂 Life has a pretty firm non-compete clause. Oh, I don’t mean that people don’t try to out do each other through one-upmanship, childish game playing, or frank actual theft, but Life itself is having none of it. Consider this thing that seems [to me] to be unavoidably true: you can’t have who I am. You could cut your hair the way I cut mine, color it precisely the same shade, learn my turns of phrase exactly, repeat my anecdotes to others as if they were your own, and attempt to duplicate my aesthetic, my issues, my timing… you would not be me. If we were twins, we would be individuals nonetheless. If we love the same movies – or the same people, we remain distinctly limited to being who we are, ourselves, whatever lies are told and whatever truths are hidden. It does not matter at all what we say about who we are. We simply are the being we are, with our choices and actions standing front and center and shouting the truths of it. “The truth will out.” Oh, hell yes it will. Put all the effort you may care to into some charade; all is revealed through choices, and actions.

“Contemplation” 12″ x 16″ acrylic and iron oxide. August 2011

I am reminded of a jazz standard I love that is apropos. “They can’t take that away from me” We don’t lose the things we love – they become part of who we are. I am this woman, this being of light and love, and I am unapologetically original – there just aren’t any copies that pass for the real thing. Just like a jazz standard, each singer’s song is different. Life being what it is, which is to say filled with change, experiences do come and go – there will be points in my life when leisurely contented conversation over morning coffee between passionate lovers may not be an everyday thing. I may not always have the leisure time (or the lover) to share lazy hours naked in the arms of love. Will I miss the things I enjoy when I am not able to enjoy them? Well, sure. Can anyone truly rob me of them? Not so much, no. Even when someone takes actions that seem to tear apart the fabric of my experience for their own gain…at no point, and in no way, will they ever be able to experience what I experience. I belong to me. My joys are mine. My challenges are mine. My growth and my triumphs – all mine. There is no ‘competition’ actually possible – even with love. We’re all beings of free will – my lovers will choose me, because I am who I am, and I meet some need at that point in their life. We share some measure of our journey together, for a time, but each remains individual. Our shared experience – still our own. The Art of Being is an art, because unlike science it can’t be truly duplicated, repeated, or taken over one from another; we are each having our own experience. I like my coffee the way I like it, and it tastes the way it does – to me. Your results may vary. Will vary. You are undeniably you. I have no power to take that from you (and no desire to have your experience), and you can’t have mine.

“Communion” 24″ x 36″ 2011 acrylic on canvas w/ceramic details & glow

I am smiling over my coffee because there is no ‘win’ or ‘lose’ – just love, and human beings – a handful of whom are probably the sort who would take what isn’t theirs rather than put in the work to be the person they so desperately want to be. In the taking, they gain little, destroy much, and in the end – touch nothing about me, myself, unless I allow myself to be down trodden by their malice or ignorance – and they can’t have what they attempt to take in the first place, because they can’t have my experience of self. I’m not at all sure when this realization solidified in my understanding – recently. Wednesday? Earlier? Weeks ago, perhaps, but I didn’t have words for the growing sense of peace and utter self-assurance it filled me up with. It’s a lovely birthday gift to myself to have the feeling, and find the words.

Somewhere across the distance of life’s journey, I am connecting with myself.

I was on a journey elsewhere…and I found my way home. 🙂

I woke with some difficulty this morning, so stiff that rolling over to shut off the alarm took effort, and the seeming ceaseless beeping until I got to the clock didn’t seem to do as much to wake me, for real, than I might have expected had I been sufficiently awake to have expectations beyond expecting to be able to turn off the alarm sooner, with greater ease. I’m still groggy.

I’ve been sitting here, gazing vacantly at my aquarium, and listening to a jazz standard that doesn’t sound quite right…even though I feel sure that the version I am listening to it the one I favor most. It’s an odd sensation, that finds me searching YouTube for other versions, by other artists I have listened to singing this song… none of them sound the way I remember. the arrangement is somewhat different in all of them. Then…as I hum the version I expected, quietly, it hits me; I’m hearing the version of the song that is most representative of me singing it, myself. Yep. I sing jazz standards, mostly a capella, mostly in the shower, in the car, or out walking…and I rarely do so when anyone can hear me because my singing is actually pretty dreadful. lol I love the feeling that goes with whatever moves me to sing, and alone I feel no hint of self-consciousness about delighting myself in this fashion. I find it unexpected that my favorite version of any of these songs I love would be my own.

I suspect being hung up on this song this morning is a kindness my brain is offering me to distract from both pain, and the worrisome appointment later. It is convenient that the biopsy falls on the same day as therapy – however emotionally challenging the biopsy procedure may turn out to be, I’ll be getting pro-level support later. By the end of the work day yesterday, I was feeling pretty pragmatic about the appointment – and the procedure. I’m still tense about it, still a bit worried about the outcome, but it’s no surprise to me that I’m mortal, that I’m 52 this year, that aging is, or that uncomfortable medical procedures are sometimes necessary. I’m fortunate to have ‘procedures’ available that may save me from an early demise. Fear subsided by day’s end, and this morning I am…tense, yes, but unafraid. That’s an improvement.

The worst case scenarios my brain devised, of course, are dreadful – and seemingly reasonable, or at least potentially possible, but that’s sort of a requirement for a really terrifying worst case scenario, I think. I didn’t get past the fear until I allowed myself to consider these ‘worsts’ to their apparent likely conclusions, and took a moment to consider those proposed outcomes with an open heart, self-compassion, and acceptance. “What if…” It added some things to the disappointingly long list of shit I think I need to work on, and served to reinforce an eagerness for life that is pretty positive, generally. My next step – and this one needed real will, and commitment to action, was to take some moments to consider that these worst case scenarios are just my brain running simulations – “what if” analysis – and they have no more reality at all than any other work of fiction. They are merely words, images, and projections of potential moments that are not yet, and may never be. They have no power over me that I do not give them, myself.

Perspective

Having reached a point of emotional equilibrium about this appointment, it’s disappointing to wake up this morning in this much pain, and this stiff. My spine feels like my vertebrae are super-glued in place and lack any flexibility at all…but, hey… great day to see a doctor, even on an unrelated issue. (Are there really any ‘unrelated issues’, ever?)

So here’s a question… If you had to check out today – and I do mean end your mortal experience here in this plane of existence, no planning, no preparation, no last great experiences, just wrap things up and call it good – if you had to check out today, are you content with what you got done for yourself, and for the world? Have you left a lasting positive legacy of some kind, even if it’s only the lovely memories of having loved you that remain? Was it ‘worth it’? If the answer is ‘no’ – what will you do differently tomorrow? It was this question in mind, last night, as I arrived home that gave me insight I needed to communicate, at long last, something that had been throwing my heart’s song off-key and I was finally able to express it as a question without accusation, or grief, or baggage, and that was a wonderful moment.

Well…here it is, today, and no more stalling. Today is a good day to take care of me. Today is a good day to recognize the sometimes hurtful fictions in my thoughts are not the experience I live, unless I choose that experience, myself. Today is a good day to let events unfold gently. Today is just one day of many, and I am just one person, each of us having our own experience of the world.

Life’s Unbreakable CNC

Real – Really?

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Life’s Unbreakable CNC

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Real – Really?

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