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A colleague was in town with her daughter who is thinking of Tulane and she got Tin a zebra puppet. He has not noticed it even though another friend got him a zebra that he adores (and mommy bought him a zebra menorah that he is yet to see) but suddenly the puppet is his new best friend. He carries the zebra puppet around everywhere as a puppet which is a big jump for him and the zebra talks and eats things (like letters on the alphabet) and sings and dances. Similarly, friends gave Tin a huge bear when he first came home with us and only recently has he decided the bear is also his bff. Ah, I get the joy of rediscovering you – that is why we recycle toys – we put some away and then rotate as he gets bored and then put them back and wala – new discovery.

Our neighbors gave us their kid’s bike seat and so after a few minor adjustments at Le Jouet (New Orleanians if you don’t know this place you are missing: toys galore, bike and bike service that is so far below the service fee at most major bike shops here and excellent) and we were ready to go. We rode through the park and along the bayou on the new bike path to the lakefront and Tin sang the whole way there and halfway back – he fell asleep half way.

The author of the kids books I’m reading, Your Two Year Old: Terrible or Tender speaks about how the child grows up with through these half years, the first half of two is actually tender, it’s the second half that is terrible. The titles are great, Your Three Year Old: Friend or Enemy, Your Four Year Old: Wild and Wonderful, etc. I’m almost convinced that this equilibrium and disequilibrium continues into old age.

The first half of my 50s I was so rocked by how awesome it was to be 50 and the second half was like I was carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders. My book, Your Fifty Year Old: Awesome and Gruesome. The fact of the matter is sometimes I feel whipsawed between equilibrium and disequilibrium and I have learned the pattern, in the midst of extreme joy – STAY AS LONG AS YOU CAN – because this too shall pass. Naturally the same thing happens on the dark side too, it passes.

I was having lunch with a long time friend the other day, at a Greek restaurant in San Francisco, and he recommended the Duckhorn Cabernet – yum! – and I had the lamb kebob and he a squid salad. Delicious. We were talking about too many things to find a common theme but I can tell you both of us have crossed over into the second half of our life whether that is measured in the same number of units or not and so the underlying theme was about the other side even though it wasn’t explicit. He asked if I had seen Cast Away with Tom Hanks, a movie that I thought was one of the finest acting jobs Hanks has done in his career. Of course, I had. He said that he was haunted by that last scene where Hanks is standing in the middle of nowhere, in Texas, at a cross roads and he was looking out in each direction. I said funny he would mention that scene, I remember exactly my frame of mind when I saw it, I was in San Rafael and feeling like my life was not anywhere near the path I had envisioned for myself, and there into the frame of the movie suddenly appeared the mystery woman, the artist whose work Hanks found washed up from the crash. She was working in a large shed, doing her own thing, and driving a pick up truck. Something about her fiercely independent yet warm and welcoming persona made me identify with her and I soon afterwards began shopping for a truck.

The person you meet today is not the one who was here yesterday, I’ve changed. You might not recognize me today if you knew me yesterday. But my spirit is the same if not stronger than it was in days gone by. And the best is yet to come.

A popular male singer who recently went from rags to riches was quoted as saying, “I still don’t understand it. If you don’t have any time for yourself, any time to hunt or fish, that’s success?

After my week long journey and a lot of soul searching and deep dive conversations with trusted friends, I came to the same conclusion, more poignant now in this phase of my life, but really do I want get one more thing done, or enjoy life – the latter came back with a resounding “pick me” – my Russian friend said it’s the American in me that keeps going and going and doing and doing. My Croatian partner says the same. But in the end, we all get caught up in the doing. Remember the New Year’s motto – Just Be It.

I’ve decided that I have to learn DYI. I always plant my own garden but this year, I hired someone because I had Tin and I didn’t have the two days to do the front yard that it takes and so I paid someone to do it. Similarly, these wood columns and their maintenance has been getting me cranky and so I’ve decided when this guy comes to strip, sterilize and finish them that I am going to be his apprentice and learn to do it myself. I used to refinish my entire deck in Marin all by myself, so I don’t know why I couldn’t do these columns. Remember the old proverb, give a man a fish and he will eat for a day, teach him to fish and he will eat for the rest of his life.

The travel home yesterday seem to go on forever and when I finally arrived I was so exhausted, but my energy renewed when it came time to lounge on the sofa and have Tin run back and forth and jump all over me giving me kisses and lots of hugs. I was also greeted with delicious food T had prepared – cauliflower, cabbage and Vietnamese pho. We even managed to stay up and watch last Sunday’s episode of Mad Men. Then this morning after sleeping over nine hours, I woke in my bed, to Loca’s wet nose and Heidi’s big ears and Blekica and Bam Bam meowing for their breakfast. Ah, home at last.

I walked the dogs after Tin and I had our breakfast and the weather outside was marvelous. Heidi wanted to go in the bayou so I let them off leash and another woman’s dog plunged in after them. She asked, “Have you seen anything in the bayou?” and I said, “Like an alligator?” and she said, “Yeah.” I told her about the small gator that my neighbors saw by the Esplanade bridge just last week, but as of late no five footers or larger. She said, “Isn’t it a beautiful day.” And I gave a resounding yes indeed.

And now sitting here on this fall day, I put the skeletons out front and the bones I hung from the wrought iron gate because after all Halloween is around the corner and I’m home.

I was Skyping with a friend and talking about how I’m in a weird place with myself on time. T has her coffee shop time on Monday and works on Tuesday and Wednesdays are supposed to be my time to myself but Wednesdays come and I don’t know what to do – the other night I cleaned out my closet of all my high heeled shoes – two bags full of stilettos – what goes on? – but I’m sort of left there trying to figure out how to have time for myself and so the first thought is to hook up with a friend and have dinner but since I wait till the last minute that’s hard to do. It’s like Jack White’s song I just don’t know what to do with myself only it’s true – I don’t.

So I have to figure out something for Rachel. T always suggests that I go to a coffee shop which the very notion makes me shudder – sit down in a coffee shop? No way, that always reminds me of work. I don’t want to shop. There isn’t enough time to see a movie. I’d like to read my book but where? Weird. I just don’t know what to do with myself.

I walked behind a woman who was wearing a fleece jacket (yes the weather went from 91 degrees to 61 seemingly overnight here in San Francisco) and the back said:

Destroy
Change
Rebuild

I just told a friend to use this as a mantra. To go on an inner journey and not be afraid to tear off a layer or more, and to change, because the more you break through the accumulated layers the closer you get to being for real and the better life gets.

I went to see the Daniel Libeskind‘s Contemporary Jewish Museum – very understated either consciously or budget wise. I headed there late yesterday to see the Black Sabbath exhibit, which was an odd set up of a few bar tables and chairs with headphones and a play list all depicting black musicians singing Jewish songs. I picked up the CD anthology with Nina Simone to Johnny Mathis singing. There was a video projected on the wall with Johnny Mathis speaking about going to a synagogue with friends and hearing Kol Nidre and just loving it so much he wanted to record it – his Jewish friends were there to help him with pronunciation but said 95% of it he was able to do on his own because it was sung from his heart.

The sad thing about this exhibit is that Jews and blacks have a history together, an intertwined cultural journey yet in recent years the strange phenomenon of black anti-Semitism has sprung up, which defies that shared history. I’m adding Johnny Mathis’ Kol Nidre to my Yom Kippur ritual.