Solid as a Rock

The beaches in Kent are covered with lots of round, smooth stones, worn into their shapes by the wind and the tides along the English Channel.  The tradition there is that the ones with a hole worn completely through are lucky stones, and if you find 14 of them, you thread them onto a string and hang them in your home as a lucky charm.  I think of it as the horseshoe of the British coast.

I was in Kent for a few days, visiting a very dear friend who also used to be my sister-in-law.  One of the days I was there, I took a long walk on the beach while she was working. One of her daughters had a knack for finding lucky stones, and I wanted to see if I could be that observant.  Because here’s the thing:  the stones tumble over and over each other and get handed around by the waves as the tide rolls in and out.  Every single one of them has divots, crevices, or even small partial holes.  But only very few have the small holes worn perfectly through.  (As my friend’s daughter says: “You have to be able to thread a string through it or it’s not a lucky stone.”) 

At first, I must have picked up about 20 stones, only to find the little holes I saw in them didn’t go all the way through.  Gradually, I learned to look at all the layers on the beach, and to walk at the pace of a walking meditation. I started to find lucky stones.  One after the other.  They had a holes formed at an angle or even a series of channels you could only see from a particular corner.  At the end of my walk, I had 10 of them.  Only 4 short for my British horseshoe.

My next days I spent helping out my friend and her husband at a festival booth where they were promoting their business.  My friend and I worked 12 hour days, outdoors under a tent selling their wares. She trusted me with her customers, her money, and even her credit card at one point.  Just like family.

After those long hours, I had neither the time nor the energy to walk on the beach, in search of my last 4 stones.  As I was packing up to leave, I decided to add most of the stones I found to those her daughter was keeping.  I chose two for myself and tucked them into my suitcase.  Because I am mostly a practical person, so I don’t really believe that luck is created by totem objects.  And I wanted to be able to lift my suitcase into the overhead compartment without hurting myself.  

Those two stones, though, remind me of two very lucky things that have opened up in my life:

One — I have learned to slow down and to adapt and in doing so to see opportunity hidden under layers.

Two — More often than not, every time I reach out a hand to someone I care about, I find myself pulled in for a warm embrace.  

  

Angel on My Shoulder

Last November, I signed up for some dance workshops.  At the time, I was practicing regularly, working on specific goals and plans.  I had my choice of Level 1 or Level 2 workshops, and, feeling confident, I chose Level 2.

Time passed, stuff happened, and my dance life fluctuated.  There were always classes or something going on, but my regular practice got jumbled.  I started to lose confidence, fueled by the return of my long habit of body hatred.  In my non-dance life, I was feeling more and more crushed by the essential loneliness of my life.  (That's how I saw it, at least.)  I recognized the gentle settling in of mild depression, so I greeted it and pushed on, feeling more fatigued every day.

In the midst of all this, as I prepared to travel to the workshops, I started to freak out a little bit.  Who did I think I was, signing up for the Level 2 workshops?  I saw some of the names of other participants, and I recognized a few of them as dancers who performed internationally.  How in the hell did I belong in the same room as them? My plan became to go, push through, stand in the back and try not to get in anyone's way.

A couple of days ago, the workshop organizer posted a notice saying that if anyone wanted to level down, there were people in Level 1 who wanted to switch to Level 2.  I sent her a message immediately.  And I breathed a huge sigh of relief.

About a half day later, I got her reply, which started with three simple words: "Are you sure?"

Yes.  Wait -- Was I?

I looked again at the expectations for Level 2 participants and realized that, yes, I met those expectations. I sat for a minute thinking about what I was hoping to get from this whole experience.  I knew that either level would be an excellent opportunity to study with 2 of my favorite teachers, and that I would get a ton of benefit from both.  But I remembered a quote someone posted on their Facebook wall:

If you aren't in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?

― T.S. Eliot

So I sent a message back saying, basically, never mind.  I will stick with what I chose in the first place.  It's not that the self-doubt went away, it's just that I convinced it to come dancing with me.

Thank you again, Hilde, for being the Good Angel on my shoulder, and helping me see the way to jump in feet first.

Nope

You will never know my childhood nickname.  The Ex (with whom I had a 2-decade relationship) never knew it.  What makes you think I would tell you?  Any of you?

I have collected many other nicknames since then.  Mostly short term little things people gave me at various jobs I've had.  Little Amish Girl.  Gretchen.  Science Monkey.  Cute, innocuous things that settled on me with all the weight and seriousness of a glow-stick necklace.

My childhood nickname, though, was created by a particularly clever bully.  One simple syllable that summed up all the ways I could be hurt.  Or all the ways I was repulsive to my peers and therefore forever and always unlovable.

Because it was so clever, people didn't understand that it was also cruel.  Soon, my closest friends and even my family started calling me by this "cute," clever name.  I started using it myself, hoping that maybe it would lose its appeal if I didn't show how bothered I was.  Maybe then I could be my own self again.  But, like many simple clever things, it sunk in and would not go away.  Somewhere in there I lost the chance to get back my own name and it stuck.

I had laughed at it once, thinking that would kill it, and I had to keep on laughing at it lest something worse happen to me.  I smiled when my best friend handed me birthday cards addressed with that nickname.  I answered cheerfully when my mother called me by that name.  I crossed my arms and put on a pretend smile when the person who created that name for me decided that we must be some kind of friends -- so he could sit down next to me and ask me intrusive questions about my body, all in the guise of "being interested."

When I went to high school, I finally found myself in classes mostly with girls who never knew me by that name.  I also found my death glare, and the one time my best friend used that name I stared her down.  I never killed that nickname.  I moved away from it.  And I carried around this hard kernel of hatred for the girl I was -- this physically repulsive creature who earned a clever-cruel nickname and only made it through by taking every hit.  Right in the stomach.

So, no, you will never learn my childhood nickname.  Not from me, at least.  And if I ever hear you use it in reference to me, I can guarantee that I will not trust you again.  I might roll my eyes good-naturedly (old habits die hard), but I will definitely watch what I tell you.  There are some things that just need to stay trapped.

Full Stop

I had a necklace that was an oak leaf with an acorn on the back.  It said "Beginning."  I wore this most days from the time I was first separated up until last October.  It was my ritual.  Remembering every day that the other side of an ending is a beginning.  There were endings and beginnings of all kinds.

In October, I spent some time in California thinking a lot about the self-destructive things I was doing.  Nothing dramatic like binge drinking or driving without a seatbelt.  More subtle things like keeping people in my life out of fear of dying alone and unmourned.  The burden of keeping some people in my life felt heavy, and it started to feel cruel to keep myself available and open to them.

On my last day in California, the necklace broke as I was putting it on.  I was taking a class where we were instructed to think about some kind of ritual to mark our final day.  I hadn't done that yet.  But then, with the strands of the broken necklace wrapped around my fingers, I knew I had a ritual to perform.  On one of our breaks, I walked to a quiet grove built around a prayer tree.  People had come and tied hundreds of prayers, hopes and desperate wishes to its branches.  I read a few of them, struck by how similar they all were -- they could be distilled down to the same few phrases:

Person, love me.
Person, accept my love.
World, be gentle with me.

I found a high branch, as yet unadorned with little prayer papers.  I wrapped the broken necklace around the branch.  Goodbye to these forced beginnings.   Goodbye to cruel continuings.  Time to let some things end.

With the tenderest of regard for my own survival, I let it go.

Decree Day Letter to a Friend

A very dear friend of mine recently got her divorce decree.  I went for a run after she told me and in my head, I wrote her this letter.  Maybe more of you can relate, so I'm posting it here:

My dearest friend,

Because we have always been able to say the hard things to each other, I am going to be truthful with you.  People will hand you metaphors.  Such brightly wrapped, beautiful little metaphors.  The one you will hear most often, I think, is about the phoenix rising from the flames.  I love you, so I am not going to hand you that phoenix rising bullshit.  And maybe you don't even want to hear it because you don't feel like a beautiful bird.

If you don't feel like a beautiful bird, my lovely and amazing friend, it is because you aren't.  You are a wounded creature who just outran a predator and needs a minute to hide and figure out what comes next.  Or -- how about this -- you are a messy, confused, hurting, imperfect and wonderful human.  

You know I've been there, so I can tell you-- that phoenix rising bullshit, it's not like that.  It's more like crawling through a storm pipe full of fetid water.  Or waking up hungover with only 10 minutes to get to work.  Or a factory assembly line.  Or having bratty kids jump in the pool where you were peacefully asleep on a raft.  It is all the metaphors.  

But mostly, it is the reality of your body, mind and spirit fully, officially, publicly removed from the other human you thought was going to be yours for life.  It is an open wound that no one sees.  It is a thing you tried that didn't work out.  Because it is such an important thing (love always is), you feel like other important things are forever beyond your reach.  

I will tell you again what I have told you so many times leading up to this day:  it is survivable.  And even more than survive, you can thrive.  But that is for another day.  Today, let's just live.  

Here's the thing about grief-- you don't "get over it."  You integrate it.  Like a cyborg, you take it in and make it a part of you, and in that process both you and it are changed.  And you are made stronger.  And given superpowers.  (Okay, I'm lying about the superpowers.  Maybe.)  The way you integrate your grief is you accept it and nurture it.  I know you can do this.  I've seen you doing it.  What happens now (and will again at unpredictable times) is that your grief will rise up and try to tear itself away from you.  Don't let it.  You are better together.  Introduce your grief to your fear and the two of them will figure out a way to show you where you need to go.  (Hint:  if you think of doing a thing and both of them start to act up, that is their quirky little way of letting you know it is the right thing.)  

Cry all the crying, and it makes people uncomfortable, fuck 'em.  Do all the inappropriate laughter.  Even allow yourself the gently self-destructive behavior, within reason.  If you forget how to be kind to yourself, ask me how.  I'll guide you until you remember.  And ask me as many times as you need to.  Dog knows, you have done the same for me.  

My dearest friend, you are not being burned to ashes.  You are not a phoenix.  Your heart just got punched, really really hard.  But hearts are tough little motherfuckers -- yours especially.  Isn't it miraculous that something so soft and tender can be so tough?  When you are ready, you will live in love again.  In the meantime, I am here to listen, to rein in self-destructive behavior, and to trade stories of sexual shenanigans.  

In Love and Truth,

Rebecca

P.S. Let's go to Costa Rica and lay around with some sea turtles!

This is Not a Childfree Rant

Recently, at a family gathering, my Dad wondered aloud whether I never wanted to have children because of what happened with him and my Mom.  (They divorced when I was 11.)  I assured him that was not the case.  Just look at how I used to play.

When I was little, I didn't really play with baby dolls the way some girls did.  I had a strong nurturing instinct, to be sure, but not towards the replica baby humans.  I would invent scenarios for my stuffed animals where they needed healing and care -- a clipped ear, a twisted tail, general plushy angst -- and I would provide the care for them.  After they were "all better," they would happily go back on the pile and play with their other animal friends.

I had lots of Barbies, and I would send them on adventures -- traveling, scouting out locations for buildings and movies, hiking in the mountains.  My Barbies didn't really think about taking care of a home and family.  They had strong, supportive friendships with each other and (like child me) often had short hair that I cut myself.

So, no, it wasn't my parents' divorce that made me want to live without my own children.  It was (and is) my nature.  It is my nature to be childfree, much as it is some people's nature to love people of their own gender, or to know that the gender they were assigned at birth is not the one they live in their hearts.

Sometimes this is hard for people (usually men) to understand.  I was born with all the biological parts to grow a human.  Why don't I want to do this?  I am growing weary of explaining it.  I just don't.  It is my nature to love and appreciate children, but to never want one of my own.  This has become a litmus test when I meet men.  The reactions range from "Okay.  Cool.   What are you going to order for dinner?" to (actual quote) "But I think it is in every true woman's nature to want children."

But this is not a childfree rant.  This is a rant about nature.  In dating world, there is a lot of rapid-fire evaluation happening, most of it unconscious.  It centers around the questions of someone's essential nature, and if that could support our own essential nature.  We all walk in with assumptions, and that is where frustration happens.  The assumption that a woman wants (wanted) children.  And that if she doesn't, it is because of some fear or trauma from her past.  No.  Sometimes the answer is as simple as, "It just is."  It is my nature.  It is also in my nature, as revealed in my childhood play, to be nurturing, to want to help others heal, and to keep strong, supportive friendships.  I think this makes me as true as any human, woman or otherwise.

Oblivion

She suffers from anxiety, like many of my favorite people.  She said to me, "I heard that someone had died, and my first thought was, 'Lucky them.'"  She insisted that she had no desire to off herself.  I believed her.

I believed her because I immediately recognized that feeling -- the sweet Siren's call of oblivion.

Probably the same day I saw her, I was walking down the street considering how easy it would be to just . . . not be.  How comfortable to just fall into oblivion.  I pictured a placeless place, through a black hole and a universe away from everything.

Let me assure you, I have no wish to go and seek oblivion.  There are moments, I think, when all that is unsettled in my world speaks with its many-headed voice and gestures with too many hands to count, and the only way I can find a space to breathe is to consider the possibility of Nothing.  Nowhere.

To imagine that emptiness is to clear out just enough room to breathe again.  And to breathe is to take in life itself.  And life trumps oblivion. Every time.

While I was travelling, I heard and thought much about the Buddhist concept of dukkha. (Most simply translated as "suffering.")  Our lives are unsatisfactory at times, this is the nature of existence.  Without dukkha, there can be no happiness, joy or contentment.  Contrast brings focus.  Touching the idea of oblivion illuminates the hunger to live.

So as I continued my walk, thinking of oblivion, I breathed into that space and caught the first whiff of thawed ground and the return of spring.

Greener Grasses

I am walking down a lane in Chiang Mai with some new friends.  We are on our way to our teacher's house.  We are talking about what our plans are when our 3 weeks together are over.  I talk about the dance retreat I am headed to in Costa Rica.

One of them says, "Man, I wish I had your life."

Immediately, I respond, "I wish I had the life everyone thinks I have."

I have been hearing a lot of affirmations and faintly envious well-wishes since I started planning this trip.  This makes me realize, again, how good we are at storytelling.  And how dangerous that can be for us.

We are so good at storytelling that we rarely stop to fact-check.  While this makes us the creative weirdos who change the world, it also makes us seal open doors with nothing more than our stories.

Sure, my life is good.  Much better than it was 2 years ago.  But there are still key things that I am missing, and there are still things in my life that make me the opposite of proud.

****   **** ****

I am at the second part of my trip, tired and sore from a morning absorbed in dancing.  Life is pretty good, as long as I stay in the right now.  But soon I will start storytelling, and see my return to the city I want to leave, the lonely hours at home, the fear that keeps me smaller than I can be.  I'm working on those things -- on having the life that people think I have.

I'm working on telling a different story.

Return to Costa Rica

I came to this retreat two years ago as my "something to look forward to" after the divorce decree.  At the time, it was my first major trip on my own.  Every morning of that trip, I got up early, got coffee, came out to the patio, sat on a comfy chair overlooking the Pacific Ocean and cried.

This time, I arrived directly from 3 life-changing weeks in Thailand.  I am sleeping as late as my body will allow, and I don't drink coffee anymore (for now.)  I feel a lightness which means that I have finally detached from a person who taught me both how to be comfortable in my body and how it feels to be emotionally manipulated.  I am still feeling fragile and unsure of my relationship decision-making skills.  But I am much more sure of my self.  the retreat leader even notices.  She tells me that I look more "in my body" and confident since the last time she saw me.

I am sitting on that same patio, in those same comfy chairs.  The endless ocean still swells in the breezes.  The howler monkeys still call early in the morning and the roosters crow in the afternoon.  I may even be on the exact same cushion, but I am different.  Outwardly, more muscular, wilder red hair, and (I am told) more relaxed in the face.  Inwardly, equipped with a soft, quiet place of infinite strength.

Chaos

I am traveling again.  Much further afield than I ever have before, and I will be gone for longer.  This trip is happening in two parts. The first part is all about exploring my profession, and the second part is about my enduring hobby-that-is-essential: bellydance.  I have barely arrived here in part one of my trip, when I am longing to be at part two.

I have the unique opportunity to spend a couple of weeks learning from a great teacher.  Today was our first day at his school.  I felt unsettled for the better part of the day.  Jet lag.  Lack of sleep.  Too much time in a group.  All of these were true, but the truth came to me at the end of the day.  I think I'm done with my profession.  I love it.  I will always love it.  The thought of leaving it to do something else breaks my heart into a thousand pieces.  But this work does not bring me joy in the same way that it used to or in the way that I need it to.

So I sat in the back of a crowded public transport truck in this foreign country, stuck in traffic for some festival or other, and I sat with the idea of changing professions, to see if it is right for me.  And I realized that I'll never know if it's right for me.  I have to make a decision and prepare to be wrong.

And it occurred to me that this must be how the Ex felt when he finally made the decision to end our marriage.  He loved me.  The thought of leaving me to go and be with someone else broke his heart into a thousand pieces.  But I did not bring him joy in the same way that I used, or the way that he needed me to.

Ah, empathy.

The question now is, am I willing to work on saving my commitment to this profession more than the Ex was willing to work on saving his commitment to me?

And resentment.

Travel is exhausting.