Dangermond.org

Last year about this time one of my longtime sources was hanging out his hat as a life coach and wanted to take me on. It was successful, but little did he (or I) know that fate would have a hand in intervening and moving me to a new plan. Oh well, must be flexible, right? Now an old friend who has been a counselor for decades wrote to say she has gone through life coach training and would like to take me on as a practice case. I’m beginning to feel like my life is a petri dish just begging to be studied.

And suddenly as I am divesting myself of all things that are not adding to my life, I am suddenly being asked if I want to do this, or that, or how about my future – as if anyone knows about my future, even me.

So I thought about this whole grand experiment as I dragged my sick self to Jazz Fest (I caught a cold yesterday) just to hear Hurray for Riff Raff (a local band that I like) and Mia Borders (another local) and I sat on the grass speaking to a friend about “the situation” as we are wont to call it. The situation being over 50 and just not caring about a lot of things we used to care about, about being disenchanted with some things, and curious about others that were not even glimmers earlier in our life, about losing some faculties and gaining others, about friends who come and go from your life, about family that remains stuck in second gear, about losing love, about losing your mom, about the economy, the malaise, and so forth, and I must say that midday, I walked home, to get Tin who was going to be returning from school, who of course, on Tatjana’s first day gone on her two week trip, decides not to nap AT ALL, and I just decided that I would only vow to deal with what was in front of me at the moment and all big thoughts, goal setting, deeper digs would be put off indefinitely.

There is no question the universe is playing cat and mouse with me. The welts on my bald head are proof in the pudding.

Maybe Loca just represents the dark side of me. She woke me up again, but maybe I woke her up, it’s hard to say, about 3am my head started itching as if someone had thrown fire ants on me. I got up and looked in the mirror and had welts all over my lumpy head. Not a good look to say the least.

I went back to bed and looked outside and the thoughts that stormed my brain are cliches like the universe only gives you what you can handle and so not cancer, not disability, not death – just annoying. Isn’t it fitting that what would plague me is simply annoying. I ran into my doctor yesterday on the bayou as I was at my neighbor’s crawfish party celebrating my birthday and she said, how are you? And I said, varies by the minute. Tachycardia, out and out lethargy, unmotivated, and little did I know lumps were coming next. She said it takes time to get adjusted.

Time, it’s funny how everyone kicks that around all the time. It takes time to get over ______. Well, yesterday on my birthday I received copious amount of cards and one was missing. The one I got every year from my grandmother with the five dollar bill in it. I miss that card. I received numerous text messages wishing me well, but it was the call I didn’t get that I hung my head and cried about on the back stairs. The one from my mother. I miss her. Wretched mothers – they plague you to no end when they are alive and then they die and leave you bereft of their company. What sort of universe creates this dynamic?

Loca inched up to my bed and stared at me with her black shiny eyes. I couldn’t see them because it was dark. But I could feel them boring a hole into me. WHAT? I wanted to scream or maybe I did scream at her. WHAT is the question I want to howl at the universe right now. I get it – I get that all of this is a sign to step back and take stock of my life. But my insides are crawling and teeming with deep profound questions.

Yesterday, for my birthday celebration, friends gave me a card that said, on your birthday while you go in search of deeper meaning and universal truths and then you open it and it said, we will be at the bar. Is it fair to say that even though I laughed, I just really wanted to scream – could be the drugs, someone said. Yes, could be the drugs.

Two babies, kids, champagne, crawfish, cards, friends, loved ones, houses, grass, water, sky, clouds – I observed them carefully yesterday while out on the bayou and only one thought came to mind, and it was Joni Mitchell speaking:

I’ve looked at clouds from both sides now,
From up and down, and still somehow
It’s cloud illusions i recall.
I really don’t know clouds at all.

This morning I turned 53 and I woke feeling like 73 because Loca had diarrhea all night and kept waking me up. But let’s forget about that detail and talk about how last night went. A friend called with a babysitting option and we hopped on that train, Evan called and said he was going to be jamming with international musicians down the street at Clever and we suddenly had a destination, the Puerto Rican girls arrived and were armed and ready for some great jazz and so they hopped on board.

Next stop, the Jazz Train.

It was nutty – musicians coming and going on the stage, singing, trumpet, trombone, clarinets, drums, bass, banjo – you name it – they were from Europe, Canada, the U.S., and they were having a damn good time.

We waltzed home from Clever and stopped on a friend’s porch with the girls to dance a little and sing a little as they played the guitar and congas. Now that’s what I call kicking off May.

Happy Birthday to me!

A very long time ago when I was leaving home and running as far away from my family as I could possibly run, someone, when I told her “I don’t need them!” said, “That might be true, but they need you.”

And so if you get up every morning and put a frown on your face, you’re sad, but you also make everyone else miserable so what if your sole purpose in life is to a) be happy and b) spread joy. Okay, I’ll sign up.

Today – May 1 – marks the beginning of May and at the beginning of May we

ta da

hang in there with me, because I’ve just decided this

every beginning of May we dance and we dance every day of May. I started with Valerie by Amy Winehouse this morning, which is appropriate for the first day because once you’ve danced to Valerie, you are ready to dance. But then later in the day, wanted to see Vanessa and so I stopped on the way to the vet where I was picking up the dogs and went to Ingrid Lucia’s Backyard Bash.

First there was Vanessa, channeling Angelina Jolie with some sumptuous red lips alongside Handsome Dave:

Ingrid’s yard was so down home homey I just wanted to move in, and the hen was really helping the groove:

But it was the mule and Gal’s voice that made me think that May had begun in earnest, the celebration of life deserves a soundtrack and I can think of no sweeter sound that her singing, “Let the Mystery Be.”

May has sprung and stolen moments moving to music amongst farm animals is where I want to be.

The gals renting the place are all nurses in some capacity and just informed me that hypothyroidism makes you gain weight, but taking thyroid replacement pills don’t make you lose weight – the ignominy of this disease!

So a friend’s daughter is in town and was wanting to babysit so we’re having an impromptu date night and just so happens, as these things are want to do, that Evan is jamming down at Clever so where to go is resolved in a clarinet second. For those who missed Evan’s show at Jazz Fest, you missed it. Whoa. Fabulous.

Here are a couple reviews:

Times Picayune

NOLA.com blog

2011 was supposed to be my year – it totals 4 which is my lucky number and yet, just two days ago I was discussing with a friend who is an architect about how I feel sometimes as if I broke a mirror seven years ago and this is the final year of dealing with the fall out. He said, Amen, as he lit his cigarette. He said, “I thought my situation was temporary but I’ve been away from home for three years now [he had to take a job out of town], I keep thinking it will be over soon. Sigh.”

So after a few days of more eating than usual and more cocktails than typical, I now have more weight to bear. I look at this all as not like oh the wrinkles on my face are from smiling all the time, but more like blech. I want to enter my 53rd birthday that begins tomorrow on the sunny side of the street, but right now I am dodging shadows. I spent the better part of yesterday listening to another’s issues and thinking to myself that my own life holds relatively less drama, but does it?

I read about this guy who was on Wall Street, who was fired and got 22 months severance and now is a barista and rather than sympathy all I could think is 22 months severance – the guy is young, did he help build that company, uh no. I was offered but declined four months severance – 4 is my lucky number. Right?

Then I read a post from a friend of mine who is an eternal optimist and it said he was blown away when he realized that OK turned sideways is a person. A friend sent me a note saying she came across this email that I sent her: “… so good seeing you today and I just feel this incredibly positive energy from you every time I am around you – I really think you are destined for greatness and so I am going to suggest that you don’t let anything into that picture that doesn’t let you live to your full potential…”

Ever wonder who you are at any given moment?

And that indeed made me realize yet again all of this, every bit of it, is perspective. Is 53 old? What if 53 totals 8 and half of that is 4, which is my lucky number? How lucky is that? So you have to keep flipping the coin – the lack of energy, the lack of hair, the nausea every morning – wake up calls. The dog diarrhea in the yard, the cat torn screen, the kid fingerprints on the wall – life.

Life spelled backwards is efil.

If one is lucky, a solitary fantasy can totally transform one million realities.
Maya Angelou