Retirement: Month Four

Last sunset of 2010, Texas Hill Country.

December--four months, one-third of a year into retirement and I still don't know what I want to do when I grow up. Beginning to wonder if I'll ever grow up.

Slow but steady progress towards making sense of things. And the Best. Christmas. Present. Ever. My daughter surprised me with a visit and the news that she will relocate in Austin within the next year.

That's huge. For the last fifteen years we have been separated by so many miles and so little money to visit I despaired we'd ever see each other again. To keep hope alive, I'd look forward to the next time we could be together. I've never insisted on adhering to traditional holidays, especially since she felt the need (and I concurred) that those special times were more important for her to be with her dad and his new family than with me. I can make a holiday out of any day of the year. Her presence is what makes it special for me.

To be sure, I have my own family to celebrate those occasions with, and that's been wonderful. It's just more wonderfuller now.

Reconnection: 2010 was full of surprise calls and e-mails from old friends who found me via Facebook, Twitter, the Showco listserv, and plain old Google. One friend UPS'ed me an antique Blue Willow mug that she had been carrying around for 35 years to return to me. Green (the band) reunions at James Neel House of Music were great fun, interesting to see where dynamics have changed, where they haven't.

Trying to reconnect with myself. Dealing with depression in a new way (shit happens--you won't be stuck forever) and peeling back resistance to commitment. Learning how to care for an aging body. Accepting good things as well as bad.

New Year's Investigations (as opposed to New Year's Resolutions): The word "resolutions" has several connotations. I associate NYRs with grim determination, mindless exercises in habituation, failure, and general dissatisfaction. For 2011 I am looking deeper. Redefining "resolution" to mean "problem solving," "arrival," "completion." Bringing curiosity into the mix. Jumping off cliffs. Cracking facades. Opening doors.


1. Music: spring concert season begins soon! AVAE is doing a piece (Poulenc Figure Humaine 1943) that I've wanted to perform for a very long time with a group that has the talent to execute. Thanks, Ryan!

Knocking the rust off the old flute chops. Wonder of wonders, one of the few things that was pre-organized before the move. All my flute music is safely stored in a clear bin, so was easily retrieved from the unlabelled boxes. There are a few items I keep close: my flute, passport, and a palm-sized turquoise bear fetish. Piano as well, all in a bin.

2. De-clutter: The unprepared move knocked me for a loop. I miss my old tree house, but my new place is definitely more conducive to fashioning a physical environment that is safe, healthy, and wildly creative. Several sub-categories: prioritizing what needs to go, what can stay; acquiring items that will enhance the above (computer chair, clothes dryer, slide/neg converter). Photographing items that I might sell on Ebay or Etsy. Accepting that I will probably NEVER mend clothing, replace buttons, etc. Aggressively dealing the unaccustomed onslaught of paper mail triggered by retirement (enough, already!)


3. 52 Weeks to Awesome: This is one of those serendipity things that showed up at the right place, time, and price. Already reaping the benefits from the bonus goodies alone--a lovely, hand-drawn watercolor Goddess calendar to brighten up the workshop wall as well as keeping me on track. Homies Pace and Kyeli from the Connection Revolution don't know me yet, but I'm looking to blow their collective minds and find myself in the process. Or vice versa. Scrumptious, either way. Evolution.


4. Rehab: Next purchase? A pair of supportive walking shoes. Austin has two awesome feet stores--Caravel and Run-Tex. I'll be searching for the ones that make walking more enjoyable. Especially now that it's as cold as it's going to get for the year--can't walk outside in hot weather, too many unhealthy heat/UV reactions. Psyche--look for ways to share PTSD recovery with those still inside the horror.

5. Simplify, simplify, simplify: Simply, make room for wonderments, good deeds, insane creativity.

6. Milestone birthday: The ol' Six-Five. Or as I like to say, "eighteen with forty-seven years of experience." Because that's what it feels like. Really.

From the Crone's Nest

Wherein transcendancing and paradigm shifts abound. Well, maybe not the bouncing sort of bounding, rather more the comfy old chair way of boundmenting.

Aunt Lura passed away last Wednesday. A cousin called to let us know, and we made plans to drive up to Waco for the service on Friday. As a result, we got to say goodbye to her and spend some time with other family members. We agreed to plan to get together for a happier visit soon.

After the service, I whispered to my sister, "I asked Aunt Lura to say hi to Daddy."

"Me, too," she whispered back.

A few hours after my cousin's call Wednesday evening, a friend called to tell me she was in labor. I had helped deliver her previous babies, and she honored me by asking if I would be there for this one as well. She called at 10 p.m. I got to the hospital around 10:45. The baby was born at 1:01 a.m. As a result of this wondrous event, I got to meet some super cool young women in a mommies co-op who are in to natural childbirth and got me all jazzed up. The next generation of forward-thinking women's health care providers.

I must put in a plug for St. David's Hospital staff and admin for making noticeable progress toward offering the mother choices. Having the opportunity to see their show on three different occasions, I witnessed staff having to delay delivery until a doctor's arrival, to seeing a nurse respectfully ask the mother wanted to have this or that done to her baby...or not. Appropriately timed, of course. They take control when it's necessary.

We absolutely MUST empower the mother to fully engage with her delivery, and health care providers must recognize the mother as an essential partner in her own care. The more choices we have, the more we know, the less we fear the unknown. Fear causes us to tighten up which in turn causes pain. Breathing techniques, relaxation to alpha state and working with the rhythms can help make delivery much more comfortable and enjoyable. It's  just   natural...

The same could be said for the end of life. The more power we have over how to die with dignity, the more society progresses. It's all nature.

Even the part about a full Friday funeral, the sisters and a cousin driving to Waco, joining in the abundant lunch prepared by church members. A sweet service, a gorgeous sunset at the cemetary, and the drive home. Or the bit about catching a bite to eat, going up to the hospital to hold a newborn on my bosom for a couple of hours, in total peace, total calm. Mom, baby, mommy friend, the spirits of all my female family and ancestors, and me. Totally in the moment, auras blending, connecting the earth and the sky like a giant, 300-year old live-oak tree.A sufficiency of time, advent, completion.

Which leads me to the last realization. If I'm not living on an ocean, I usually manage to live by or under an ancient tree. I must have been a druid in a former life.

Lecturette on Change, Vacation-Head, and the Universe

Everyone's having trouble getting back into production. Whatever that maybe for you. I left a blissful environment, free of care, surrounded by beautiful people and lovely hospitality, and all the crap is still right here where I left it. What, you may or may not ask? Dishes, dirt, only a little mouse until it got so cold that Linus deigned to sleep inside and scared him away. And a pile of clothing that measures roughly 7 feet by feet by 3 feet--I say roughly, because there are dozens of smaller items that have sloughed off, effectively mulching the floor between bed and bath.

It occurred to me that this construction is about the size of a grave, except not so deep. A shallow grave. Then I read communicatrix on change, and I saw my body lying in that shallow grave of fabric. With an aggregate of shoe, book, a used cotton swab or two, a United boarding pass, old computer printer and keyboard, and as I squinted deeper into the layers, a confetti of various and sundry dropped pills and nostrums for the average Austin allergy season.

After I laughed myself silly, a vision hopped into my mind of hundreds of thousands of clever women all over the world coming to a simultaneous epipany about change, vacation-head, and the universe. This is the part that makes the leap from physical to intellectual to paradigm shift. And you know how I love paradigm shifts.

What we're experiencing here is the effects of the Winter Solstice, or however you prefer to name the cyclical phenomena of life on this planet. And this particular solstice is fraught with an extra scoop of socio-politico-astrological-astronometrical nutty goodness. The universe is a whole, and we each get to describe the size of that universe for ourselves.

We mystical Capricorn INFPs get downright visionary. We are billowing in dreamscapes. We take an eternal exposure of the world and instantly project our own future on the path ahead. We swim in Jungian protoplasm.

We are awash in analogies. The goat. The seed. The darkest night. The coldest stone. The basement of our dreams. And then we put one foot in front of the other and climb toward the light, singing, or writing, or chatting, or drawing, or otherwise sharing the journey with other travelers.

Which brings me to another point I don't want to forget. Multi-tasking is a made-up word by some smartass youngster with ADD. I know that because I recognize it as serial-tasking at light speed, which is what I do 24/7 unless I consciously focus on finishing one activity. Multi-tasking gives the IMPRESSION of being incredibly good at all those things, but is in fact an excuse for not properly completing projects or losing things through the cracks in the road.

Most of us are responsible for churning out some grist for our daily bread. Don't get me started on work stuff. But in my real life, I know deep down that I do my best work when I de-stress to alpha level and let all that I've experienced and absorbed ferment and coalesce into some creation that magnifies my soul.

So I observe the earth's changes, my skin feels the traverse of the sun day to day and year to year, the lover's pull of the moon at perigee. I cherish the winter (in the US--an Aussie friend says she's sweltering) as much as I do the summer solstice, for it is a time of new beginnings, growing things, and this is the optimum time to examine flows and inclinations and nudge them toward the light.

Not particularly earth-shattering, but according to the I-Ching, perseverance furthers...

Tip of the hat to Communicatrix Colleen Wainwright, one of my new favorite writers. You go, Colleen!

Meme tagged by Kay's Thinking Cap

My pal Kay, over at Kay's Thinking Cap, tagged me with a thought-provoking meme. Here's what she asked:

Name five things in your life now that you never dreamed would be in your future when you were 25 years old.

Well, Kay made such a dynamite list she inspired me to do some digging.

1. When I was twenty-five, I never dreamed that age- and appearance-bias and discrimination was so prevalent, even among my friends and lovers--that anyone could reject me just because my body changed shape--after all, it was my mind that I considered my most important asset.

2. When I was twenty-five, I never dreamed I could ever commit to an addictive relationship that would eventually strip me of my soul, my spirit, my self-worth, and ultimately endanger my mental and physical health, or that it would take twenty-five more years to extricate myself, and another ten to recover.

3. When I was twenty-five, I never dreamed that even though I scorned chauvinism and male domination, it would be years before I finally learned how to break the shackles and become my own woman-self.

4. When I was twenty-five, I never dreamed I would travel the world and sing in wonderful venues, or have so many fascinating adventures abroad.

5. When I was twenty-five, I never dreamed that I would have a natural childbirth at home--a daughter who would grow up to be such a fabulously wonderful woman.

I have to add a sixth: When I was twenty-five, I never dreamed that I would encounter so many paradigm shifts in my life, and question so many basic beliefs--justice, fairness, sense of self-worth, ad infinitum...

Thanks, Kay, I'm going to check out the other women you tagged now!

I'm tagging Cowtown Patty at Texas Trifles, Rhea at the Boomer Chronicles, Pam at Mind Trips, Wintersong, and Dorothy at Boomer Chick: Musings of an Over the Hill Chick.