The human mess

I was rather shocked recently to discover that I have become one of those people who have a lot of things wrong with them.  Shocked because I have always been (or thought of myself as) extraordinarily healthy and strong.

I've had well-behaved bunions on both feet for ever so long, but recently one of them has swelled to the point that it looks as though there is a marble under my skin.  It's pushing my toes out of alignment, causing painful calluses and corns to develop.  This is a problem because of how much I love to walk, which is now more challenging on some days.  I've got an appointment with a podiatrist in my calendar and am hoping for some relief, although I'm pretty certain I want to avoid surgery if at all possible.

A few weeks ago I discovered a hard, rough little bump on my forearm.  It didn't itch or hurt and was annoying mostly because of just being there.  Recently it began to look infected and to be painful whenever I would accidently bump against something.  Last week I went to my dermatologist to have it removed so now I have a big old divot in my arm.

On the same day as that derm. visit, a sore place on my gums developed into an abscess, which grew until it burst.  Fortunately my dentist was able to see me the next day.  The swelling is mostly gone and there doesn't seem to be anything to be concerned about, although he couldn't say what had caused it.

It didn't help that these second two issues occurred at the same time Sweet Hubby and I were going through a 3 day power outage, so moving from our cold dark house into a motel room.  I also had an acting audition for a role in a feature film, which had to be recorded and submitted by the end of that very bad day.  It all felt like a lot at once.

I promise this will be my only organ recital in this blog (although if we have lunch together you might hear about some of it again).  I'm mostly writing about all of this because of how it has affected my spirit.  I feel more vulnerable now, less assured of my health and strength.  These issues have all been, or soon will be (I hope) successfully resolved and my energy is restored, with a few adjustments for my aching feet, but I am keenly aware now that there will be more issues to come.  I don't know what they will look like, when they will show themselves, how bad they might become.  I just know that they are waiting for me.

Okay.  I'm human and mortal and it's messy.  Okay.   Bring it on.

 

Time to talk about it

Here are some random thoughts that have been floating through my mind since the election:

It's time for me to give up the idea that I can change anybody's mind.  I've known that for a long time, but now I really get it on a deeper level of insight.  People have to change their own minds.  Because of that, I'm hoping the country goes to shit right away.  That will be bad for everyone, but maybe - only maybe - it will wake up the people who have become entranced by what they believe Trump to be, or what they believe he will do.

Although I will certainly take part in symbolic actions, such as marches, I am going to be vigilant in searching for concrete actions I can take.  Action is the great antidote to depression and feelings of powerlessness.  Very important for me/all of us to remember that we are not powerless and voiceless.

Things are going to go very badly for Ukraine, with probable withdrawal of U.S. military support, so one of those actions I'm going to take is to write to NATO to urge that body to accept Ukraine as a member.  If Russia takes over Ukraine, especially after its almost uncontested Crimean grab, Putin will no doubt be emboldened to take over other countries/territories as well.    https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/198183.htm  

At my best, I've very, very curious to see how these next couple of years unfold.  At my worst, I'm full of despair.  But my despair doesn't help anything and hurts me.  My rage only adds darkness to the world.  That's not who I want to be.  So I'm working on curiosity.

I'm currently reading "Killers of the Flower Moon", an excellent nonfiction account of the investigation into the murders of Osage Indians, which were orchestrated mostly by one man who wanted the rights to their oil-rich land.  This book has reminded me that throughout all of human history there have been men (maybe some women, too, but mostly men) greedy for power and money.  This era is not an anomaly.  It just happens to be the era I/we are living through, so it feels more real and urgent, disgraceful and wrong.  Corruption in business and government is nothing new.

I believe, and my experience is, that most people are good and kind and friendly and honest.  But kindness is quiet; anger and bullying are noisy.  Noise makes the news, which is why it's so easy to have a skewed perspective on what's going on in the world.  I need to continue to approach people with an eye to their humanity, to reach across whatever divide there might be between us.

"A defeat doesn't mean you're defeated."  Joe Biden  

The patient died

 A friend shared this a few days before the election:

HOLDING VIGIL

 My cousin asks if I can describe this moment,

the heaviness of it, like sitting outside

the operating room while someone you love

is in surgery and you’re on those awful plastic chairs

eating flaming Doritos from the vending machine

which is the only thing that seems appealing to you, dinner-wise,

waiting for the moment when the doctor will come out

in her scrubs and face-mask, which she’ll pull down

to tell you whether your beloved will live or not. That’s how it feels

as the hours tick by, and everyone I care about

is texting me with the same cold lump of dread in their throat

asking if I’m okay, telling me how scared they are.

I suppose in that way this is a moment of unity,

the fact that we are all waiting in the same

hospital corridor, for the same patient, who is on life support,

and we’re asking each other, Will he wake up?

Will she be herself? And we’re taking turns holding vigil,

as families do, and bringing each other coffee

from the cafeteria, and some of us think she’s gonna make it

while others are already planning what they’ll wear to the funeral,

which is also what happens at times like these,

and I tell my cousin I don’t think I can describe this moment,

heavier than plutonium, but on the other hand,

in the grand scheme of things, I mean the whole sweep

of human history, a soap bubble, because empires

are always rising and falling, and whole civilizations

die, they do, they get wiped out, this happens

all the time, it’s just a shock when it happens to your civilization,

your country, when it’s someone from your family on the respirator,

and I don’t ask her how she’s sleeping, or what she thinks about

when she wakes at three in the morning,

cause she’s got two daughters, and that’s the thing,

it’s not just us older people, forget about us, we had our day

and we burned right through it, gasoline, fast food,

cheap clothing, but right now I’m talking about the babies,

and not just the human ones, but also the turtles and owls

and white tigers, the Redwoods, the ozone layer,

the icebergs for the love of God—every single

blessed being on the face of this earth

is holding its breath in this moment,

and if you’re asking, can I describe that, Cousin,

then I’ve gotta say no, no one could describe it

we all just have to live through it,

holding each other’s hands.

 

—from Poets Respond.   Rattle Magazine Alison Luterman

Trying to understand

Every election year Sweet Hubby and I re-watch "The West Wing".  Last night we were watching an episode in the final season, which is about the campaign for a new President.  Both the Democratic and Republican candidates were men of intelligence and integrity.  When the Rep. lost the race, his staff urged him to contest the vote, but he refused, even though he had possible cause (the sudden death of the Dem. VP candidate). 

Watching this, I was suddenly overcome by an anguish which has been simmering below the surface of my soul since 2015, when it felt to me that half the country had gone insane and embraced a vile, lying, ignorant, narcissistic, mean-spirited bully as their hero and President.  Sometimes this anguish boils over, as it did last night.  "How is this possible?  How is this possible?  How is this possible?" I sobbed.  "I don't understand."

When I went to the back of the house to compose my mind, I found myself thinking of a minor incident from earlier that day.  During a workout class, I had mentioned to the instructor that my thigh muscles were cramping during one exercise.  She said "That's because they're working.  You're just not used to exercise."

I instantly felt insulted and defensive.  How dare she?  I workout 5-7 times every week.  I'm extremely fit for someone my age.  She's young, she doesn't understand that muscle cramps are a fact of elder life.  I didn't say any of that, of course, because that first reaction was followed almost at once by  some clearer thinking.  I knew she meant no harm, was responding to my comment in the way she knows to.  That first reaction was purely visceral; then my brain kicked in and smoothed my ruffled feathers with perspective and understanding.

I realized that every one of us is subject to those instant visceral reactions of fear and anger.  And I thought: maybe some people simply get stuck in those reactions, aren't able to move past them by examining them, thinking more critically, more wisely and clearly.

And so I began to have some understanding of how it is that a massive portion of the population can get excited about shallow, inflammatory  rhetoric full of dog whistles and triggers and simple answers.  That understanding  really helped me.  I could see that the main source of my anguish isn't because of how these Trump fanatics are behaving (however egregious that might be).  It's because of how hard it is for me to understand their behavior.  Once I can understand something, I can deal with it.  It's the not understanding that makes me feel so loony.

Adoring the Rainbow

Randy Rainbow is so amazingly talented.  Also clever, funny, insouciant, sarcastic, witty, charming, snarky, sly ,iconoclastic, and cute as a sack of gay kittens.  He is also deeply committed to liberal politics.

Every parody song he creates is an attempt to wake up the rest of us.  He shines a spotlight on what has gone so terribly wrong in politics since the rise of Trump and MAGA.  He points out the hypocrisy, the cruelty, the ignorance, the bullying behaviors, the noise and anger, the lying lying lying of the far right wing of the Republican party.  And he does it in the most delicious, fun, and flippant way possible, without scolding, without dark drama and dire predictions.  He is really trying to get through to us all, while making sure we still love him and want to be in his company.  Amazing.

If you haven't seen his latest, Blank Slate, I highly recommend you watch it.  The tune is Taylor Swift's (bouncy and memorable); the lyrics are pure Rainbow.   (Be warned that Randy does have a sponsor now, so there is an endorsement in the middle of the video, but it doesn't interrupt the song). 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CzYt-WuCCA 

Closing up

The last few months of my dad's life, after he had been moved into a very nice senior living place where someone from the family visited almost every day, he settled into watching, over and over, the same old Universal Studio black and white horror films.  King Kong.  Frankenstein. The Bride of Frankenstein.  The Mummy.  Dracula.  He had memorized these films long before I was even born, and they never ceased to delight him.  

Quite recently, I became aware of a feeling, or maybe an insight, which allowed me to understand why he loved to disappear into these movies.  I think I understand now what it will be to want to withdraw from the world, a world that I don't feel I quite belong to any more; a world that is no longer mine.  I can foresee wanting to be quiet, to be surrounded by things that comfort me with their familiarity.  Things that I understand.  I can feel what it might be like to sort of shrug and let the world take care of itself.  I can tell that in the future there could well be a time when I will want just to close up, much more slowly than a sea anemone, but gradually and steadily.  I will want to be surrounded by what I know and am comfortable with. 

I'm certainly not ready for that yet.  I am always on the prowl for new experiences: new restaurants and foods, new music, new theater, new people, new places to explore.  I still have plays to write.  I still have friends I love, and my family, and my darling kitties and Sweet Hubby.  I'm still willing to make the effort to travel, to have get togethers, to exercise, to write birthday and holiday cards, to dance my ass off, to do something new.  But someday...

Oh well.  I will let the world take care of itself.  I guess whatever happens will happen naturally, so why fight it?  

I fall down

This morning I was coming down the stairs from the living room to the front door, a case of seven treads I've gone up and down several times a day for fourteen years.  And on the second to last tread, for some reason, I stepped into midair and fell right down onto the tile floor, sort of on my side, with my head leaning on the door.

In the movies and on TV, falls like this are usually shown in slow motion, and one can see the many ways the falling person might save herself.  Not so in real life.  This happened so fast.  

Sweet Hubby was right there, and I think this was terrifying for him, because for an instant he didn't know if this fall would be fatal.  I knew in an instant that it wasn't, and after a quick self-assessment, I laughed and assured him over and over that I was all right.  It took some time but eventually we were both smiling and laughing, with me making a joke about how I don't want SH to come up with some plan to assure that this never happens again, and SH joking back that the plan already exists, as he pointed to the handrails.  

Now, hours later, I have a slightly abraded bruise on my left forearm and absolutely no other damage.  I'm glad I didn't hit my head on the floor, and I'm glad I exercise as often as I do, because my bones are still strong.  So it all turned out just fine, and now it's just another story.

Someday something is going to happen.  It might be as fast as today's fall, and it might be slow and take a long time.  Personally, I'd prefer slow and long.  However unpleasant it might get at the end, I do like the idea of being able to say my good-byes.  I won't know until I get there, of course, how it's going to go.  But someday something is going to happen.  I'm just glad that today wasn't the day and this was not the thing. 

Weight

 I have thought about my weight every single day since I was about 10 years old, usually many times a day.  I've thought about it when I was thin.  I've thought about it when I was heavy.  I thought about it when I was in Hollywood pursuing an acting career.  I thought about it when I was office manager for a Beverly Hills real estate office. I thought about it when I moved to Seattle as single woman and was looking for love.  I think about it now that I am married to a man who acts as though I'm beautiful no matter how I look.

I think about it and fret about it and make private promises about it.  But I don't ever actually go on a diet.

Here's the thing about diets.  Going on a diet means choosing something uncomfortable (kale) over something comfortable and comforting (chocolate).  And making that choice every day, supposedly for the rest of one's life.  No wonder it's so hard.

The times I've been thin have been either because I was very active (3 hours of contra dancing 3 times a week, for example), or sick (pneumonia, or a 2 week sore throat, or when my thyroid when into hyper-drive).  So I've just never gotten into the habit or discipline of dieting.  And now, even though I'm still fairly active, I don't do that rigorous dancing, don't have the metabolism of youth, and am hardly ever sick and never for long.

A few nights ago, I lay on the living room floor for a while listening to music.  During that peaceful time, I put my hands on my belly and let them rest there, and for just a moment I had a glimpse of what it might feel like to leave myself alone; to accept that I eat what I eat; I look like what I look like; people see me how they see me.  I saw what it might be like not to think about my weight but just to live unselfconsciously.

It was very nice.  For that moment.

Unearned blessings

There are many blessings in my life for which I can take no credit.  To have been born at all, for example, is downright miraculous, given the odds.  To have been born with a healthy body and good mind, into a family where I was loved and educated, in a country which offers so many possible paths, in a time of modern medicine, dentistry, and indoor plumbing is good fortune not shared by everybody, in fact not shared by many.  I did nothing to deserve such luck, any more than a Saudi or Iranian woman deserves the restrictions and oppression she is born into.

A friend was recently talking to me about the unearned blessings which fill his life, especially the good friends he has gathered around him.  "But you know, " I said, "an awful lot of how good your life is is a result of who you are, how you've lived, the choices you've made."  That got me thinking about my own life, and that maybe I actually can take credit for some of what seems simply like astounding and random good fortune.

I, too, have so many, many good friends, people I cherish.  They bless me by choosing to be my friends.  But I work at friendships.  I send birthday greetings every year - yes, actual cards in the actual mail with actual stamps.  I get together regularly with local friends for walking, movies, meals, conversation, games.  I stay in contact with more distant friends and visit them when I'm able.

I have two callings which thrill me: acting and writing.  And I've had enough successes in both to call myself a professional (although never enough to support me).  The paths to those successes have been incredibly bumpy and long.  Certainly there is an element of luck in having any success at all as any kind of artist. Not every actor with talent, skill, and passion gets to see her face onscreen.  Not every playwright with talent, skill, and passion gets to see her plays performed and published.  But I've worked at these, too, living on almost nothing for decades in order to stay true to what I wanted to do with my life, defying my parents' advice to get a full time job.

Meeting Sweet Hubby, the perfect man for me, is probably the biggest miracle in my life, especially coming as it did so late (I was 54).  Only magic, only angels could have brought us together.  But it is all the work I did on myself - years of transformational seminars and therapy, plus a lifelong habit of reading voraciously - that made me someone who could catch SH's eye, made me interesting and desirable to him.  I can also take credit for the fact that no matter how many romantic relationships didn't work out for me (A LOT), and no matter how many heartaches I had to recover from (ditto), and how much self-doubt I had (ditto x5), I never gave up on wanting to be happily coupled, never closed my heart or became cynical and bitter.

I guess it is so in all our lives, that a lot happens to us, both good and bad, which we can't possibly have earned and don't deserve per se.  And there is also a lot that happens, good and bad, because of how we live our lives, how we treat others, what choices we make.  It does seem to me that good fortune and bad aren't really evenly distributed.  I have no way of understanding how that works.  I'm just as grateful as heck for how much good has come my way.  Whether I deserve it or not.

Mad at Joe and Ruth

Watching the Presidential debate on Thursday was absolutely excruciating.  It's always hard to listen to Trump's bloviating hyperbole, but when Biden had a brain freeze in the first few minutes, I just couldn't watch any longer.

I admire and respect President Biden.  I think he's done a good job against staggering odds, and I will vote for him again this year.  Even at his worst he's better than Trump, and I know he'll surround himself with smart, skilled, experienced people.  But right now I am really mad at him that he didn't step down and allow a rising Democratic star come forward.  I'm thinking Hakeem Jeffries, Katie Porter, Adam Schiff, Pete  Buttigieg, and there are probably others I don't know about.  After all, I'd never heard of Barak Obama before he came forward in 2008.

Can't Joe recognize that he is failing both physically and mentally?  Weren't there people advising him to step down?  I don't know, maybe he plans to step down during his tenure (oh please let him have a tenure) so that his VP can take the reins.  Maybe there aren't any Democrats who want to be President during this time of upheaval, division, discord, and rancor.  I have no idea what goes on behind political doors.  I just know that I wish, fiercely, that Biden had stepped aside.  He just doesn't seem up to the job.

I'm mad at RBG, too, despite being a huge fan of hers.  Why oh why oh why didn't she step down during Obama's term so that he could appoint someone to the Supreme Court?  She knew she was sick and old.  What was she hanging on for?  I understand that even with another liberal on the bench, the Court would still have a conservative majority, but it would be a heck of a lot more balanced that it is right now.

The two big issues I'd like to see addressed are term limits for the Supreme Court and the end of the Electoral College.  I guess if I'm going to complain, I should take action, huh?

PapaWeese

This morning I woke up thinking about my paternal grandmother, PapaWeese. I don't know why she would be on my mind.  I haven't thought about her in a long time.  She died when I was 15, almost 60 years ago.  I hadn't matured enough by then to be able to see her as anything but my old-fashioned granny PapaWeese.

 (How that name came about, by the way: We called my grandfather PapaFrank, but my sister, the first grandchild, fumbled MamaLouise, which turned into PapaWeese, and it stuck.)  

I can still call to mind the smell of their apartment on Sawtelle Blvd., a fragrant combination of mothballs, face powder, PapaFrank's cigarettes, and whatever PapaWeese was cooking.  I remember her playing the piano while we sang.  She was a professional piano player, used to play at the USO and for silent films.  She was so skilled, she could change keys without blinking in the middle of a song.  She wrote poems, some of which were published in the local newspaper.  She always pretended to take an interest in whatever my siblings and I prattled about.  I know she belonged to a lively bridge club.  This morning, though, I found myself wondering about her as a person.  She was certainly always cheerful when my family came visiting, but was she happy?  Did she enjoy her life?  Did she have dreams she wasn't able to fulfill?

PapaFrank was nice to us kids, but had a stern visage, and was very private behind his eyes.  I believe he was not successful in any kind of business.  In fact, my dad didn't seem to know what his father did for a living.  I remember him saying something about PapaFrank selling gloves door to door at one point.  They lived through the Depression, with creditors banging on the door.  They were probably poor even into their old age.  

I really don't know why I'm thinking about this now, but for some reason, I am wishing I could talk to PapaWeese woman to woman and ask her how she felt about her life and her marriage and how her children turned out.

And I realize that I'm part of the last generation that will remember her and PapaFrank.  My nieces and nephews didn't know them, and have probably only heard of them as distant figures who used to be part of the family.  And so it goes, and so it must go.  I know that.  I just wish I had known her better.  I hope she was happy. 

How would I defend my life?

This morning I woke up thinking about the movie Defending Your Life.  The premise of this movie is that when a person dies, she goes to Judgment City where scenes from her life are played before a panel of judges.  If the judges determine that she (or he) has evolved beyond a fear-based life, she is allowed to move on to the next level (whatever that is).  If she is still driven by fear, she must return to Earth for another opportunity to evolve. 

This got me wondering what scenes from my own life might reveal.  Outwardly I'm committed to being fearless (although I realize that's not really possible; it's not about living without fear so much as not letting fear make the decisions about how one acts).  I even have a sticker on my bedroom dresser that says "Not Afraid".  But is that how I actually live my life?  Am I courageous?  How much do I allow fear to limit me?

I have occasionally made daring leaps in my life where I may have looked fearless but really wasn't.  For example, dropping out of college and moving to Los Angeles when I was 22 seemed bold, but I have always known that my family is there to catch me if I start to fall, so I wasn't taking much of a chance.  A lot of people said I was brave to leave Los Angeles after 26 years and move to Seattle without knowing anyone, or knowing the city, or having much idea of what I would find here.  But that move took no bravery because I was moving toward an exciting new possibility, an opportunity to make new choices, to reinvent or rediscover myself.  Sweet Hubby and I got married after a long-distance courtship and didn't really know one another much at all.  But that also took no courage because somehow I knew that this was going to be a long and happy partnership.  I don't know how I knew, but I did, with a certainty that precluded doubt and fear.

And then there are those moments that have fully demonstrated my cowardice.  When I was flown to Incheon, South Korea several years ago to see a festival of performances of my short plays, friends suggested that I use the opportunity to rent a car and explore the country, which I was most likely never going to visit again.  I absolutely didn't want to do that.  The idea of driving alone through a country where I can't speak the language or read the road signs and don't know the rules and laws quite intimidated me.  I have girlfriends who have gone camping alone in the wild.  That doesn't sound at all enjoyable nor safe to me.  I have said 'yes' to a whole lot of stuff I wanted to say 'no' to because I was afraid someone would think less of me.  Looking at these scenes, I see myself as terribly fearful.

So when have I ever been truly brave enough not to let fear stop me?  In this moment, the only time I can think of was shortly after I moved to Seattle, which was just before the war in Iraq was declared.  I went to a resistance training to prepare for a protest event at city hall, and volunteered to be one of the people to take a position that could possibly lead to arrest.  I wasn't arrested, but I didn't know I wouldn't be when I volunteered.  So that's one time, one moment when I can claim fear didn't stop me.

I suppose, like most people, I'm a mix of courage and cowardice.  But thinking about all this has got me thinking that I need to be more aware of those times when I have a chance to choose between the safe action and the bold action, even in those small moments that don't seem to matter much, such as saying 'no' when 'no' is my answer.  I'm going to have to think about this some more.

In which I have a glimpse of myself

 I was dancing my ass off recently, as I love to do in the evenings, having a grand time, rockin' out to Robert Palmer's "Addicted to Love".  And I suddenly got a glimpse of the possibility that all I have to do in order to give the world whatever gift I have to give is simply to be fully and fiercely myself.  I think maybe that's all any of us needs to do and be.  

Beethoven and Shakespeare, of course, had other gifts to offer, but for most of us humans, who we are, how we treat other people, what we say, whether we smile or growl, laugh or holler, give or withhold, reach out or clam up, all of that is our legacy.  All of that informs the kind of mark we make, and what we leave behind.

So in that moment I saw that my gift is just my very me-ness.  And it occurred to me to wonder why I struggle so much with lack of self-confidence.  Because in that moment, I also saw that I am fucking amazing.

As are we all.

A weekend in Bend

Last week I drove to Bend, OR to see my newest short play in a festival.  A friend surprised me by offering to join me.  It's about a 6+ hour drive, so it was lovely to have the company, as well as someone to share driving and meals.  Also, she had lived in Bend for a few months years ago, so she was able to show me around the town.

The first night there we went to the theater where the festival was playing.  This is the second time a play of mine has been accepted by this theater, but my first time to see the performances for myself.  Well...

The acting in the plays I saw was community theater level at its worst.  Both the acting and direction were awkward and amateur.  And the actors in my play dropped literally half the text, so a 12 minute play was 5 minutes long and didn't make sense.  I did not stay to see the second half of the festival.

I learned later that the director of my play had had to step into that role at the very last minute, so she was not solid with the lines.  She sent me a video of the second night's performance, in which all the lines were spoken, but the acting was still pretty bad.

It was also weird that there were no printed program for the show.  All in all, this was a pretty poor evening of theater.  And what makes me really angry is that this theater asks that only unproduced plays be submitted.  This is becoming a common practice among theaters, and one I fight back against with letters and emails when I come across it.  These theaters don't seem to recognize that a play can only be unproduced once, and after that become ineligible for any other theater which accepts only unproduced plays.  So the first-production rights are incredibly precious to a playwright.

Too often, absolutely nothing is offered in return for those rights: no honorarium, no reviews, not much audience, no development opportunity, nothing.  The theater in Bend didn't even mention in its press materials that the plays were world premieres, so why the heck do they have the gall to ask for only world premieres?  Grrrrrrrrr.

Still, I'm really glad I went.  I got some nice time with a friend, which took our friendship to a deeper level, got to explore a darling town, and have several really terrific meals.  I did come down with either an annoying sinus infection or a bad allergy attack, because my nose ran the whole time I was in Bend.  (3  COVID tests reassured me that at least I didn't have the dreaded C.)  That bothered me almost more than the awful performance of my play, which I had been so eager to see fully performed for the first time.  But one of my latest mottos is "What doesn't kill you makes for a good story afterward."  So there you have it, the story of my adventures in Bend, OR.

A women's world

Last night I saw a photo of a cityscape at night, full of tall, tall buildings with spires reaching into the sky.  It reminded me of a story I'd read about someone, either the architect or the owner, adding an antenna to the top of a new building so that this would be the tallest in the world by a couple of inches.  And I thought "I don't think female architects would be so bent on a building having to be the tallest" - for the obvious reason.

That got me thinking about what else would be different if women were in charge of the world.  I don't think there would be wars, for one thing.  Women are the mothers of the sons (and now daughters) who fight the battles in a war, and I just don't think women would be so cavalier about sending their children out to face tanks and bazookas and bombs and such.  I know all of this is a generalization, but it's founded in experience and science.  Women simply aren't as aggressive as men because we're not run by testosterone.  Women are more cooperative.

Sure we have our murderers and bitches.  But so often the women who can be pointed to as making it in a man's world are women who act more like men, have adopted men's language, posture, and shows of strength.   So it's still male energy running everything.

All of this is moot, of course, because women will never be running everything for the very reason I'm talking about; we just aren't subject to that kind of aggression.  Maybe don't even want to run the world.  Long ago when my grandfather asked me what I would do first if I were made Queen of the Universe, I replied immediately "Abdicate".

When I look at a war scene, at the tanks and cannons and drones and uniforms and rifles and dead bodies, I get terribly sad.  It all seems so unnecessary.  We all know already that we share this fragile, magnificent, miraculous planet and that we are made of exactly the same organs and blood and brains, despite the differences in language, history, skin color, customs. Why on this good green Earth can't we get along?  But I guess if one country acts like a bully, other countries have to act like bigger bullies in order to win, which makes the bully act like a bigger bully which makes......

I once saw Jordan Klepper interview a MAGA follower at a Trump rally.  When he asked if she would vote for a woman for President, she was quite firm that No no no, a woman might be emotional, might be on her period and start a war.  So he asked "Haven't all wars so far been started by men?"  It actually gave her pause, but of course I have no idea if that moment actually got her to think a little more deeply about the rhetoric she parrots.

I could be way off base in my assumptions about how much more peaceful the world will be if it were run by women, but since it will never happen, I guess I'll never know.

Double jackpot

One night recently Sweet Hubby and I saw red lights flashing on the street outside our house.  We looked out the window to see the wife of the couple across the street being carried into an ambulance.  (She's home again and doing all right, in case you're concerned, although she has a bad case of long COVID.)

Something like that always brings to mind the fact that one day SH and I will have to deal with one of us being carried away for good.  Those thoughts make my heart clench up and my stomach drop in anticipation of how awful, how unbearable, how ghastly it's going to be to say good-bye to SH.  I don't know how I could ever recover from the loss if I were the one left behind.

But for some reason, this night another thought came close on the heels of the "Oh no, oh no!"  I remembered that I have, astoundingly, been loved every day of my entire life.  First it was my mom, whose affection, support, and warmth could always, and I mean always be counted on.  No matter how neglectful or dismissive or absent or cranky I was, she loved me unwaveringly and I knew it.

Since SH and I joined our lives almost 18 years ago, I have also been loved by him, every day, without fail, no matter what mood I'm in, whether my insecurities are rampant or I'm pouting about something or we've just had an argument.  He loves me and he tells me so many times a day and shows it in a hundred ways. 

I do realize that it is the loss of all that constant, faithful, dependable love that is going to be part of the heartache if SH dies before me.  It certainly was true that when my sweet Mom died, it left a gaping hole in my world, but by then I had SH to lean on and be comforted by, so love was uninterrupted.  If he dies first, I can only imagine with a shudder how bereft I will be.  I hope I will still have my darling siblings, of course.  We three love each other dearly.  But they and I are busy with out own lives, and are a bit more judge-y in our shared love.  It's wonderful, but it's just not the same.

So what I hope is that if (I say 'if' rather than 'when' because SH has promised I get to die first) that terrible day arrives that I lose my SH, I hope I remember to be grateful grateful grateful to have been loved so well, and will allow that remembrance to be a balm, to add some gratitude and sweetness to the bitter sorrow.  Maybe remembering and cherishing those lifelong gifts of love will be what allows me to recover and continue to live my life.  That's what I hope.

My youngold body

I'm pretty crabby these days.  I've got shingles on my back.  Shingles!  And it's darned uncomfortable and painful.  I'm usually a minimalist about medications, but I've been slugging down Tylenols as often as the directions allow.  I've had the most recent vaccination so it's probably not as bad as it might have been otherwise; just a small patch about the size of a 50¢ piece, pink and red and blistery.  But it has made my whole lower back ache and the skin around it feels tender and bruised.  (Plus it doesn't help that I also seem to have injured my right shoulder, unrelated but also painful.)  

What the hell???  Shingles?  That's an old person's problem, and you have to understand, I'm only 37, lithe and strong and flexible and healthy, full of energy, a force of Nature.

I know that I'm 72, or at least my body is.  I don't deny it, never lie about it, am not embarrassed by it, don't even mind it.  I just don't feel it.

I wonder if everyone in the world is like me, being one age by the calendar and a different age in spirit.  When something like this happens, something like shingles shows up to slow me down and slump my shoulders, there is a dissonance between how I think I ought to feel at the young, healthy age of my spirit and how I actually feel at my calendar age.  It makes this old folks' condition seen like a mistake, an outrage, something I might have to deal with decades down the road, but not now, not yet.  

Yet here I am, more aware than ever that I must expect health difficulties to show up now and then, and perhaps less then and increasingly now.  Oh well, another day above ground, which offers the possibility of experiencing more of life.  Including goddamn shingles.  

Going to hell and other miscellanea

"The country is going to hell," say Trump and his followers.  "This administration is a disaster.  The Democrats are ruining the country."  They're right that the country is going to hell, but it's because of the ignorance and malice of the very people who are saying it is.  If there are problems - and there certainly are - I'm not hearing any offer of any solution by the people who are complaining, angrily, threateningly, mindlessly, gleefully complaining

To anyone in the future who tells me she (or he) can't cook, I plan to reply, "Can you read?"  Because that's all cooking is: following a recipe.  Of course as one gains confidence and interest, a lot more is possible in the realm of cooking: baking! for instance.  But even without confidence and interest, one can turn out a decent homecooked meal just by following a recipe.  

Sweet Hubby and I had mac and cheese out of a box this afternoon (it had been part of a holiday gift box and I didn't want it to sit around forever).  It was just awful.  I guess it's possible to become used to that kind of food; lots of people no doubt have and are.  But homecooked mac and cheese is like first class flight: once you've experienced it, it's hard to go back.  I think the people who say, "I can't cook" really just don't want to.  It is a lot of trouble, after all.  Thinking of what to make, seeing if the ingredients are at hand; grocery shopping if they are not; putting the groceries away; the prep, usually comprised of chopping, mincing, boiling, saute-ing, stirring, etc; then the actual cooking itself, trying throughout the process to time the dishes so they are ready at somewhat the same moment.  I'm almost talking myself into a box - of mac and cheese. 
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Easy to be stupid

 I was ordering lunch at a counter recently.  I like to thank service folks by name, and when I looked at the name tag of the young woman helping me, wasn't sure how to pronounce Anahi.  So I asked.

"Is it pronounced Anna-hee or Onna-hee?"

She replied, "Onna-ee, no h sound."

I rolled my eyes self-deprecatingly and said, "Americans", as in "We American are so hopeless around things that are foreign to us."  But then I realized that just because she had an unusual name, olive skin, and a slight accent didn't mean she isn't American.  So I sort of fumbled my way through an apology/explanation and slipped away.

In that moment, I realized how very easy it is to do or say something stupid, with no ill intent whatsoever.  And lately, it feels as though it is easier than it has ever been to hurt someone's feelings, or to sound anti-this or phobic-that.  Imagine the pressure on celebrities and politicians, whose every word and gesture are recorded and widely shared, to try to navigate the world of other people's feelings.  (I'm not speaking, of course, about those politicians who are actually making a career out of insulting and debasing others.)

It also got me thinking: "For how long should someone be held accountable and punished for past mistakes?"

There's no one answer to that question, of course, because there are so many variables.  How egregious was the mistake?  Was it intended to be hurtful or was it just careless and stupid?  Has the person matured beyond that behavior, even to the point of being chagrined about it?

When Brett Kavanaugh was grilled prior to being awarded his seat on the Supreme Court (I still haven't quite gotten over that he's one of the Supremes), it was clear he hadn't matured beyond his college bad boy behavior.  He was flustered and defensive and acted victimized by the questions.  So in my mind, he is still accountable for his past transgressions.  He has not earned the pass of forgiveness.

The best examples I can think of of someone taking full responsibility for causing harm are, sadly, fictional, although I'm sure many real life examples abound.  I'm thinking of an early episode of "The West Wing" in which Jed Bartlet, who is running for office, not yet President, is holding a town hall meeting with some disgruntled farmers.  One of them calls him out for a decision he made which affected the farmer poorly.  Bartlet takes a short moment to consider, then acknowledges "Yes, I hosed you with that one."  In that moment, he immediately rises in the estimation of another character, Josh Lyman, who goes on to be his Deputy Chief of Staff.

And I guess that's the point.  We so often act as though we are covering our asses when we refuse to admit mistakes, or try to defend them, when in truth we are so much more admirable to the world when we acknowledge them and especially when we do our best to atone in whatever way might be possible.  I hope I remember that the next time I do something I need to apologize for.  Which will probably be later today, because it's so gosh darned easy to be stupid.

Reflections on the year that was and the year that will be

The beginning of a new year, I always like to take some time to reflect on the past and visualize the future.  I ask myself and pretty much anyone I converse with:

What was hardest about 2023?  What was best?  What did you accomplish?  What did you overcome?  And what are your hopes/vision for 2024?

For me 2023 had a lot of wonderful moments and not too many difficulties.  Some of the hardest parts of the year were about our kitties Bandy and Angel.  When we first adopted them at the end of 2022, they were 5 months old, so full of play and affection, climbing all over us with freedom and trust.  Both of them would visit me for a cuddle at all hours of the night and early morning, which was heaven, despite the loss of sleep.

But as they matured, their dynamics changed.  Bandy became the alpha, and Angel began to shrink away, always hyper-aware of where Bandy was.  Angel stopped getting in our laps and stopped visiting me at night or getting onto the bed at all, while Bandy still gets in my lap almost every evening and still comes to sit on my chest almost every early morning.  Angel became sensitive, timid, while Bandy is absolutely unabashable and confident.  I was so sad to feel a widening gap between us and Angel.

Happily, Angel has started to become more available for affection again.  Several times recently she has crept onto the bed and curled up on my pillow for a purr fest, and has even gotten into my lap once or twice while Sweet Hubby and I watched a movie.  I need to remind myself that there is more to come, and not to take any one moment as representative of all moments.

The worst crisis of the year has ended up being almost all silver lining.  The downstairs level of our house was flooded in November, which felt disastrous for a few days.  But that disaster has led to SH starting at last to clear away a lifetime's accumulation of stuff stuff stuff.  Since we had to clear out his downstairs office in order to take out the carpet, he has decided that besides putting in a new floor, he's going to put in new insulation and wiring and paint the room, so although the house is topsy turvy right now, in the long run, it and we are going to be much better off.  I'm thinking this flood was one of the best things that ever happened to us.

Most of the best of last year consisted of travels: to Alaska for a wedding (where I got my first case of COVID); a cruise to Hawaii with a great friend (where I got my second case); to Idaho to visit best girlfriends; to upstate NY to visit SH's dad and family; to CA for a big family gathering.

It wasn't a great year for me as a playwright.  There were 13 productions of my plays around the world, plus one short play published in a literary magazine.  I did write a couple of new short plays and made some progress on a full length.  As an actress, I had a great time shooting a new series of commercials with my faux 'family' for an Idaho credit union.  I always seem to have just enough artistic accomplishments to feel hopeful, never quite enough to feel successful.

My vision for the new year is to travel more and to finish at least one of my full length plays-in-progress.  And that's a bit of a rundown for me.  I'd love to hear what the kind of year it has been for you.