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I was just speaking to someone who said she remembered me from ten years ago – very interesting – a decade ago I was doing the same type of calls and looking to have the same interviews. Some things don’t change.

Meanwhile, another person called and was saying that I should write down all the cute things that Tin does because I’ll forget when we’re older – so okay, list of cute:

Yesterday, butt naked after having been out on the bayou playing with his neighbor and great love Mignon/Minnie/Minnow – he danced around the living room with a blade of grass playing it like a trumpet.

The other night he called me into his room because the moon on his twilight turtle had gotten obscured by the ceiling fan.

He is the big boy at nursery now and he takes care of the littlest one there – Victoria – and is always concerned about her.

I got a new wireless keyboard and he asked if he could have my old one and so he sits on the bed and types away using the tape measure as a mouse and says, “Look, I’m working!”

He has asked for Heidi to sleep in his room with him. He really has a bond with her.

He is obsessed with trains, planes and all vehicles and every night when I tell him a bedtime story in bed he dictates who the character will be but mostly the vehicle is a train they are on. Last night he rode a grey pony to the West Coast and hopped on a train back to New Orleans and we met him at the train station with balloons.

He wants to share everything that is ours and nothing that his. “You’re not sharing,” he tells me when I won’t let him backwash into my water.

I was lighting the candle for my mom this morning when I looked outside and saw that the crepe myrtles are leafing up. Foolish trees, don’t they know it’s fall? Meanwhile, back at the ranch, last night friends came over and we talked seriously about New Orleans and our attachment to this place.

But my friend asks, “Could I be evacuating all the time when I’m 70 years old?”

New Orleans has almost become a metaphor for the brave new world, it was destroyed, it resurrected, and now the threat of destruction hangs in the balance. And we its denizens are supposed to go about our normal life with this as a our backdrop. But what’s interesting is most people live in New Orleans because they have roots that go deep there, but now this generation is getting used to the idea of a rootless New Orleans, one where a Category One hurricane blows through and knocks down the palms first because they have the most shallow roots, and then starts attacking the mighty oaks. And that’s just a #1.

The nature of all things is ephemeral. Can we get used to the fact that if you buy a DVD you are not sure there will be a DVD player in a year, or if we buy a phone that it won’t be obsolete in six months or everything you bought to go with it like the iPhone 5 where none of the accessories now work with the new phone, or how about a computer, will we be using computers or tablets, and will we need to even buy a camera at all? Take a house, if you build it carefully and make sure everything is just so, but then the elements start attacking it from day one, do you try to hold onto the house or get used to temporary shelters.

The nature of all relationships are in flux. A family member can tell a lie and start a domino effect that lasts years. A friend can take offense at a tease and never speak to you again. A husband can become a stranger overnight. What about love? What about friends? What about family?

What/who on earth could we possibly commit to?

I went for a brief run in City Park this morning because my bike ride is being squished into the need to get some items for a school meeting tonight plus work. So be it. But as I was running I ran into a fellow park walker and he called me Red, as he always has, but then he stopped himself.

As I ran past him I realized that I have spent 2012 grieving the someone I used to be. It made me think of Streisand’s Someone I used to love. Or rather a more updated version by Gotye, Someone that I used to know. I twisted each of these lyrics in my mind as someone I “am” used to loving, someone I “am” used to knowing. And there’s the rub.

My friend support me by saying I can start over – go ahead. My life coach asked me what is it about who I used to be that I miss, that I want to bring back? Dunno. When I look hard at who Rachel was the coach tells me that I was always trying to please everyone and do what’s right. My friends just know that I was hyper and was always doing something, never relaxing. Is this someone you want to bring back?

So I grieve. It’s hard to lose a friend especially when it’s you. As I ran through the park I just grieved over the loss of who I was and thought, okay, this is cool, grieve, and then make room for who you are becoming. I am unwritten.

Everyone needs to find a chant to meditate on, to help clear the mind of all the nonsense coming in and out. So I picked RAM because I had been listening to a lot of Ram Dass and that is what he uses to calm his mind and enter meditation. Ram means god.

But last night, as I tried to sleep through coughing, wheezing and general aches and pain, not to mention the security alarm going off at 3:30am I was saying Ram and my racing mind was thinking Ram – ney as in Romney and that is something that is not soothing to my mind. So I stopped.

Then I started thinking about renting out the house and my mind started doing somersaults and so I stopped thinking about that.

Then I began thinking about work and then I fell asleep thinking of Mark Zuckerberg and mobile advertising and then I became wired all over again.

So I did what I do for Tin, I began to count backwards and the next thing I knew it was morning.

Now I need to find a new chant.

So Tin’s virus turned into my virus on perhaps the busiest work week of my career – Murphy’s Law – you decide.

For me, I’m trying to power through the urge to run and throw up with the overarching need to get my interviews typed up and my calls locked and loaded.

I tried one call this morning but as I hacked and hacked into the receiver I quickly realized that it wasn’t going to happen today. If I ever wanted to speak to these people again.

SO I went to yoga for the first time in about five months and now my body is saying – where have you been?

TwosDay – two-for-one virus day, two reasons to take a pill and call me in the morning.

Today was as challenging as any Monday as Tin woke with his fever still raging and so all efforts to get through what was to be a productive and busy Monday were morphed into a Cat in the Hat juggling on a ball scenario. Here try some dominos, here look at a video of Louis Armstrong, here do ABC’s on Mommy’s phone. Sigh.

No matter – the day was productive. My swimming became a quick bike ride after my last call. My paperwork – well a dent and now pushed to tomorrow’s to do list.

All of my life’s training has gone into making me a much more flexible person than I ever thought I could be. And now for the victory crawl.

Ever notice that while you busy your mind with outlining what you lack, the universe keeps heaping stuff at you that you never knew you needed? That’s right, it’s time to wake up and smell the coffee, even if it is decaf, it’s going to be good.

A fellow blogger sent me a note with lines from a song. What’s interesting is that everyone thinks when they see a bald woman that a) she has cancer, b) she had breast cancer, OR c) she cut her hair for cancer patients. However, I’m thankful I do not have cancer and at times I feel almost guilty about not being 100% able to deal with being bald (24/7) considering I don’t have cancer, and sometimes I forget that having a blank slate is a great place for a woman of my age to be. The lyrics my friend sent are from Katyna Ranieri singing Oh My Love:

And from nature we should learn
that all can start again.
As the stars must fade away
to give a bright new day.

And while I’m at it, I keep forgetting to think about the positive things in my life, for example, that my son has opened up a new world for me in many ways – meeting his friends’ parents and finding new friendships there, engaging with Waldorf Schools and finding intellectual stimulation there, and let’s not get started on the fact that a brown child warms up relations with others of the same skin hue, and let’s not forget what Tin brings to the equation – always on, always entertaining, always adorable (even when he’s not).

So while I’m listing people for whom I am grateful – remember one of my favorite songs when I was young was, “You Always Hurt The One You Love,” which I would actually rephrase as you always neglect the one you love – so shout out to my partner who tells me every day I look good bald, that I shouldn’t stress about anything business-wise, and who is never short on compliments for anything I do and always has a positive attitude even when our dial is tilted to heavy load. Remember it all comes out in the wash.

To top off the whole thing with a cherry, there’s my niece who just Facebooked me that she wants to do a Sprint Triathlon with me in the near future (so nice to know three of my nieces are out there running today), and that has me pumped to get myself in shape if I’m going to be doing anything with the likes of hipster youngsters.

So, who has your back? Well, who doesn’t (and if you could name them, permission granted to delete them).

Last night, we watched War Horse, don’t ask me why. Somewhere I read a good review of it and added it to our Netflix list and there it came right after the storm and we were wanting to watch a movie and so next thing you know, we’re watching War Horse.

Tear jerker from beginning to end and afterwards, when the credits rolled, and Steven Spielberg’s name came up as Director, we both simultaneously said, “Spielberg, of course.”

The story was a deliberate sob fest from beginning to end, manipulated by the endearment of that horse that was independent, loyal and beautiful. Of course.

But what later haunted my sushi dreams was war, and men who conceive, launch, fight and dream about war. I watched the images of men marching in formation heading off to kill other men and for the life of me, I could not replace them with women. I cannot fathom women conceiving, launching, fighting or dreaming of war.

I can see them marching in formation to the gym, to the mall, to the green market, but war? Come on.

1) You feel the sun warm your head and you sit on the stairs a moment to enjoy it.
2) You suddenly can’t walk without sunglasses because the light is coming straight at you.
3) Cormorants, pelicans, and other snowbirds return to the bayou.
4) You turn the water down on the irrigation system.
5) The inflatable pool sits deflated.
6) Your psycho dog has even more energy.
7) You start wanting soup.
8) Before you leave Zumba it is dark outside and it’s not even 8:00.
9) People start sending in email requests for your VRBO after not hearing from anyone all summer.
10) You want to be outside during the day.

Okay so I have spent the last few days squinting at the computer and not leaving my chair and my right back is killing me. Tatjana asks me everyday, “Did you do something for yourself today?” Uh, no. But I’ve been busy.

I took Tin to a kid’s birthday party the other day and just went bald – to hell with it, it’s hot – my friend’s father, who is kind of a hottie, said to me, “You look beautiful!” and I said, “Coming from you, that made me day.”

I have given up on scarves and hats and wigs for right now because it’s too damn hot to even consider it. I was at La Boulangerie today and a little girl came in that had pretty much lost all her hair. I know it’s easier for me at 53 to deal with this than her at 6 or 7. So I hope she knows she is beautiful, or that someone is telling her this every day, because it helps to hear it.

At the same time, the guy came to fix the alarm today that hasn’t been working and he was a little surprised to see me bald – he then told me about his wife whose fingers and toes are peeling like a banana. She took an expensive pill to fix it and her hair started falling out. So now her fingers and toes are wrapped. On the scale of what would be worse – peeling fingers would make me INSANE.

You have to count your blessings as much as possible.

My horoscope was all over it this morning:
September 07, 2012
Taurus (4/20-5/20)
This morning, take a good long look in the mirror and remind yourself that you definitely have your fair share of sex appeal! Having a healthy level of confidence is more attractive than wearing a certain size, having a certain hair style or driving a certain car. So strut your stuff. The magnetic energy you create when you believe in yourself is undeniable to other people. Admit you’re hot, and act like it! You’ll start reeling in the cuties.