It’s All So Beautiful
A child of the 70s has arrived in StarDate “twenty-fifteen”! I remember when 20anything sounded far away and futuristic. And now we have arrived. While recently watching an episode of Star Trek TOS I enjoyed seeing how many things we have that good old Gene Roddenberry “saw” in the 60s. Flip phones, Siri, translators and stun guns have all been in use in some form or other. And yet it is a very different world from the one we watched from the bridge of the Enterprise. From my perch on the bridge of a ziplining course, we are still here on earth and will be in the foreseeable future. You would think that would make us live more purposefully as a species. And maybe, this time of year, we do. For a short time, the year is new and we dive into it full of Great Resolutions to do Great Things. Usually by March, magazines stop featuring new diets and even paying for the gym membership wont get us off the sofa. Weekly date nights with spouses fall by the wayside and we have indeed screamed at our kids. More than once.
I have an idea. How about we stop making Great Plans excepting this: Be grateful, be forgiving and live purposefully. That’s it. Wake up, be thankful and remember that each moment is a gift. Hey, even the lousy ones are preferable to the alternative. So just be the best you you can be, each day. Some moments will be stellar. Many will have you crying for do-overs. But forgiveness starts with self. There are no do-overs. So just simply, do your best, as bestest as it can be in any given moment. That’s my plan. And I am finding, moment by purposeful moment, life can be Oh. So. Beautiful!
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I remember being 8. I never thought my birthday and Christmas would “never come”. I never thought about them at all. Time would creep by without my knowing. The year was always full with friends, family, school, performances, summer vacation and days of playing outside till the street lights came on. Suddenly, Thanksgiving would come and with it the first appearances of the Signs Of Christmas. (For my younger readers, there was a time when Halloween did not ring in the Christmas Season.) From that moment on I could not WAIT for My Birthday. Not a lot has changed. I still love My Birthday and wait anxiously for it. This has been a great year after a few really rough ones. Seasons really do change and feeling the warmth of Springtime after a long, hard winter has been amazing! I celebrated my birthday at a ladies’ tea with women who have provided immeasurable support throughout this incredible journey we call life. While my Swissters couldn’t get here and a few key players were missing, the women there reminded me of my connectedness. They reminded me that the only child with neither mother nor father is not alone but a part of a larger circle of love. My birthday was a celebration of life, survival, love and the wonderful thing that happens when friendships blossom and deepen! Those connections affirm that he who walks in the light of love is truly forever young. Happy Springtime, Happy Birthday, Hedreich!
Amazing how time really does fly when you’re having fun. Except for a moment or two, this was just the greatest summer! I saw Elsa and Anna and Olaf at Disney, hit water park slides, amusement park coasters, rode trails, swam lakes, saw knights and medieval instruments of torture, had friends and family visit and visited with friends and family. All this fun I had in the company of the world’s most wonderful 10 year old. And then, almost without warning, Summer was over and there were a host of new starts. A pair of Harry Potter-esque glasses and a new school for my 5th grader. Fitting an ‘upright’ into the car for the school orchestra’s newest bassist. The search for a Boy Scout troop as he earns his Arrow of Light. For me, finding a single-mom-student-budget car to replace my wheezing mom-mobile before she leaves us stranded on the road. Getting rid of the post-divorce trauma poundage. Training for my first 5k ever. Oh and starting the last semester before getting on the licensure train to graduation and certification. Talk about the dog days of summer being over!
…and the living is easy! I love this time of year. Even though I am never short on lesson plans to write, music to arrange, homework to finish and a never ending barrage of kid stuff to play host/chauffeur for, it still feels like the living is easy. Maybe because without the daily school run, all the other stuff seems less jumbled up and squished in. Maybe it’s because the warmth gives a special glow to my son’s skin and eyes. Or maybe it’s because I am finally starting to realize that relationships mean more than a completed to-do list. A day of studying will have to be recouped no doubt. But spending a day with my multi-generational sister-friends nourishes the soul. And taking time to ooh and ahh over the summer camp war wounds proudly earned in a game of Capture the Flag cements mother-son camaraderie for the years to come. The living is easy when we allow it to be. Even the most difficult moments can be simplified with faith, friendship and a healthy dose of fun and shared laughter. July 4th fireworks remind me that the days are already getting shorter whether we’ve noticed or not. Be sure to relish the sunshine and warmth of summer. It does a body–a soul– good.
I’m sure that when Lionel Ritchie wrote that tune he was not thinking of late night statistics and laundry sharing space with arranging and choreography. But having recently celebrated my son’s 10th birthday as well as my 5th Mother’s Day as a mom on my own, I realize more than ever that time waits for no one. Five years is a kind of landmark, a time to reflect but mostly a great hallelujah time of “How I Got Over”. It’s like the official beginning of a new chapter. Life is a wonderful whirlwind of performances, little league, field trips, instrument acquisition, hunger relief events, band practice, new music, friends, family and well, laundry and permutations. And even when it takes me all night long, I am overjoyed to be able to…well, I’m just joyful. The dryer buzzer just went off so I gotta go. But the pic will let you know what else is going on. Stop on by. We’ll leave a light on fer ya!
Every four years, the Olympic spirit always infuses me with a special kind of inspiration. I inevitably end up skiing or ice-skating, undaunted by my–ahem–very marginal talent on any slippery surface. Watching this year’s Olympics with my own progeny, I am somehow transported to my grandmother’s living room. Listening as my great-grandmother, born in 1893, scoffed at the briefness of the ladies’ costumes, we watched the ‘thrill of victory, the agony of defeat’ –and some really inspiring commercials. Now, while listening to the fatherly voice of Morgan Freeman, I reflect on victory, defeat and “my everywhere”. Not only did this month find me on the ice NOT falling on my keester, it finds me going for my personal best. Back in school, singing, teaching and nurturing an active, always-hungry male tween, I am at the top of my game. I have to be. The investment thus far leaves me with only one option: WIN! Yes, sometimes there is incredible pressure and there are of course setbacks. But KNOWING that I’m going for a win keeps me focused and on track. Much better than being #everywhere, I am right here, right now, in the moment, with a path as clearly marked as the downhill run. Best part is, I know that getting there is not half the fun, it isthe fun. So at the end of each day am thankful for my victories, wiser for my setbacks and overjoyed to know that I don’t have to wait 4 years to go for gold all over again.
Hello 2014!
While December makes us all want to see the world through Christmas colored glasses, the downside is that we get our knickers in a bunch when something happens to make our family-friend diorama look less than Currier and Ives perfect. Given, perfidy hurts, especially when it’s an inside job.
Life happens. One minute it’s blue skies and smooth sailing, the next minute a squall hits and you’re paddling furiously just to stay afloat. It’s kind of like the andante movement of the symphony bleeding into the allegro molto except there’s no sheet music to follow and no preemptory pause before the next movement begins. Life happens suddenly, leaving you there, in this boat, terrified, wondering which way to shore. Hopefully you recognize it. The only way not to succumb to the overwhelming sense of fear, dread, loneliness or whatever it is that your storm brings, is to find your happy place. For the God folks, it’s “think about whatever is good, pure, lovely”.