Recovered recovery

I learned something important about recovery this week: I need recovery.

I've managed - by the grace of my Higher Power, the support of my recovery community and my loving friends and family - to accumulate double-digit years of substance free life. Sounds good, right? It is. My sober life is better than any life I ever could have imagined (except maybe for my 9-year-old dream of being Mrs. Bobby Sherman). My job as a recovery support coach allows me to share my experience strength and hope 40 hours each week. Most of my friends are sober folks, as is my partner. It's safe to say that recovery is the centerpiece of my life.

But.

There is a lot more to being sober me than simply talking the talk. I know this, BUT. Sometimes I forget. I lose my spiritual focus. I zone out during meetings. I skip the daily readings that set my mind in a good direction each morning. I make excuses for being short-tempered and snarky. I loll in the warm, sticky ooze of self-pity. I expect my life to roll along without hiccups; how dare the car break down, the sky pour rain, the cat dig her claws into my tender ankle? These are the symptoms of a lack of sobriety self-care. It isn't pretty. It isn't fun. The irony is that although I know the cure, sometimes I prefer to sit in my sickness. That's the weird mental twist of addiction. We hate being miserable, but we can be averse to the cure.

Today I got sick and tired of being sick and tired. I had a little cry, took a last dip in self-loathing, and admitted that what I need is more meetings. Listening to the inside of my head for too long leads me down some dark, tangled paths. I need other voices, the voices of people who have been where I've been and understand my struggles without need for translation. People who are trudging the same road as I am.

Sometimes someone I know who isn't in recovery will ask, incredulously, "You mean you still have to go to those meetings?" Yes. Yes, I do. Because as my life changes, my needs change, and what I need from recovery changes. It's funny that no one ever asks someone, "What, you still go to church every Sunday?" 

I know what I need. I know where to get it. And I know how fortunate I am to know. 

Recovery is a gift that keeps giving. But you have to keep unwrapping the package and using what's inside. 

Vista sky

When I took the dogs outside for their last bathroom break last night, I was mesmerized by the sky. The moon's glow lit the curtain of filmy, silver-blue clouds that arched across the sky. When I brought the dogs in I told Wayne to put on his coat and step outside with me - I promised him it would be worth it. It was. We stood in silence, holding hands, heads tipped upward.

That sky reminded me of the paintings that hung - maybe still hang - up in the high front corners of the Vista Theater in Negaunee. When I was 8, 9, 10, it was still the kind of world where your dad dropped off you and a friend at the movies after dark and picked you up after. I shivered through many a cheap horror movie in the dark of the Vista. And I have a distinct memory of looking up at those night sky paintings. They gave me the same pleasantly spooky, lonely feeling I got when I stared up at the sky last night. I felt as a child - and felt last night - tiny and insignificant in a vast, indifferent universe.

That feeling was - then and now - tempered by the knowledge that I was securely anchored to the earth, close to home, warmth, and safety. It's all right to feel small and spooked when you know that the feeling is momentary, and comfort is close.

That's one of the aspects of fall that I most appreciate. It feels a little sad to feel winter closing in, but that sadness is eased by the warmth and comfort of home. I can appreciate that moment of melancholy, because the cure for it is on the other side of my back door.

"Are you sure you're an alcoholic?"

   "Are you sure you're an alcoholic?"
   I was recently asked this question after mentioning to an acquaintance that I was approaching my 32-year anniversary of sobriety.
   My first response? I laughed. After a moment, I asked, "Was that a serious question?" Turned out, it was.
   When I am surprised by someone's question, or someone's response, I typically swallow my first reaction, my emotional one. It's an almost unconscious response, and is probably a fear-based defense mechanism left over from my past. My first reaction simmers in my unconscious, then bubbles to the surface a few days later, and I assemble the words I wish I'd said.
   So on that day all I said was yes, I am certain that I am an alcoholic. I explained that I had had an immediate, visceral response to alcohol the first time I caught that liberating, loosening feeling of a light buzz. I explained that I always drank to get drunk, and that even when getting drunk stopped equaling a good time and became a series of frightening incidents of self-destruction, I was unable to stop. And if my own experience wasn't evidence enough, I had been evaluated by an addictions counselor.
   I wish I had spoken more strongly. I wish I had asked, "Are you asking me that because you don't believe I would be capable of staying sober if I were truly addicted?" I wish I had asked, "Why do you think you have the right to question my own self-knowledge?" I know who I am. I know what I am. And I know how I got here.
   I drank heavily - alcoholically - for four years. I experienced my first blackout the second time I drank. By the time I attended my first 12 Step meeting, two months before my 22nd birthday, I had humiliated myself in several local bars, experienced countless blackouts, missed I don't know how many hours of college classes because I'd start drinking at lunch and lose the rest of the day, acted out sexually in a manner my sober self would never be capable or desirous of, and was battling suicidal impulses every time I got drunk.
   Those were the drinking years.
   Sobriety has not eliminated the impulse to drink. I have teetered at the edge of relapse several times in the past 32 years. It's a horrible feeling, desperately wanting - needing - to drink, and knowing that doing so will tear your rebuilt life to shreds. What kept me sober in those tormenting moments was my 12 Step practices, music that soothed and buoyed me, my supportive circle of recovering women, and my spiritual life. When those thoughts flit through my mind, which they rarely have in recent years, I am able to brush them aside with an ease achieved only by rigorous practice of my recovery principles.
   Am I sure I'm an alcoholic? Despite all evidence, I have actually asked that question of myself. An insidious voice in my head will whisper, "Come on, you were just a kid out partying! You're an adult now. Maybe you can have a beer or two..."
   I can definitely have a beer or two. The problem is, there will be a third. And a fourth. And so on, until my money is gone and I am a laughing, weeping, vomiting, intoxicated embarrassment. It has always been so and will always be. I cannot separate drinking from drunk. Imagining myself having being satisfied with a social drink or two is like trying to imagine myself leaping from the roof of my house and taking flight. Drinking is not something to do; drinking is the passageway to drunk.
   My sober life today is bigger than anything I could have imagined 32 years ago when I was a timid, desperate newcomer. Alcohol would have killed me; admitting to alcoholism saved my life.
   Am I sure I'm an alcoholic? Dead sure. And grateful beyond measure.
 

The weather outside is frightful....

   As I write this, swathed in sweatshirt, sweatpants, fluffy socks, fuzzy bathrobe, and a knitted afghan over it all, we in the Upper Peninsula are enduring one of the roughest winter days of this season. It's a blizzard out there: 35 mph winds, -35 wind chill. The heavy clouds are sifting a steady falling of dry, floury snow. It's a notable day when the postal service knuckles under and announces there will be no mail delivery in your city today. Events were cancelled; everything from high school sports to church dinners to bingo. Local police are advising people to stay off the roads and the snowmobile trails. Last I heard, the U.P. is currently in a state of civil emergency. Civil emergency! What does that even mean?
   For me, it means stay put, relax, have another cup of coffee and see who's doing what on Facebook. Hardier souls than I are braving the blasting wind and icy temps, venturing out to the events that haven't been cancelled. More power to them. I will stay in my warm, albeit drafty house, with my two-legged best friend/Valentine and the motley four-legged crew. We are all in neutral gear, dozing, eating, reading. Sadie cat has had gotten the most exercise of us all today, chasing a small ball of tinfoil that I rolled down the hall for her. She loves chasing tinfoil balls, but she will not touch them. She galumphed down the hall (she is a rather large cat), cornered the ball, then sat beside it expectantly, waiting for me to come and get it and roll it back again. I call this game Bowling for Sadie.
   A snowstorm produces its own particular kind of silence. There are fewer cars going by, of course, but the sounds of the few that pass are muffled by the snow-covered streets and the high banks. There are no human or animal voices to be heard. Each house is its own island, private, tucked in tight.
   I ventured outdoors twice today, to take the dogs out. They went in the morning and again this early evening. Normally they would have become restless in the mid-afternoon, pacing by the back door, but they seem to understand that today is a day for semi-hibernation. When I took them for their second round, Saira beagle was wild with joy - so much new snow to sniff, to burrow her head in, to dig into for treasure! Indy, my schnauzer, shared my sentiment: Let's just get this over with and get back inside, OK?
   I am not a winter person. I don't skate, ski, snowshoe, or hike along snowy trails. Winter has its beauty and its pleasures, but for the most part, for me it's a season to muscle through on the way to next spring. But I've got to hand it to Mother Nature. Just when you've had about enough of scraping ice off your windshield and putting on a brave face to meet another frosty day, she says, No, you aren't going anywhere today. Settle in. Stay warm. Make popcorn with extra butter. Crack open a good book and relax. For one glorious day, your world is on hold.
   Come to think of it, I may be more of a winter person than I thought.

Good neighbors

    I have good neighbors. No, scratch that. I have outstanding neighbors. I've lived next door to Hank and Perri for almost nine years. We've watched each others' teenagers grow up, move out and, on occasion, ricochet back to the nest. We've weathered blizzards, hailstorms, deep freezes and deep-fry seasons. We've shared sympathies when we've lost beloved dogs. We stop to chat when we're outside at the same time. It's comfortable, and then some. Here's a little tribute to the "then some" of good neighbors.
    When I brought my son and my older daughter to see comedian George Carlin perform at the Island Resort and Casino, a 90-minute drive from home, I asked Perri to keep an eye on the house while my younger daughter was home, alone from early evening until much later that night. Melissa was 15; old enough to be left to her own devices. But my concern wasn't about wild parties or a boyfriend coming over, it was the thought of my daughter alone in the house late at night.
    My daughter told me later that Perri had kept a steady but unintrusive eye out for her that entire night. When my daughter was leaving to run to the store, Perri popped outside to remind her that she was available for any major or minor issue that might arise, from a blown fuse to feeling lonely. My daughter felt the comfort of neighborliness with feeling the smothering of nosy supervision. I felt free to have a good time without worry nibbling at my thoughts.
    When my older daughter needed to get from Marquette back to college in Houghton and her car died, Hank and Perri came out in the bitter winter cold and tried to charge the car's battery with their charger. When that failed, Perri drove me to buy a new battery, and Hank installed it.
    Need I say more? Well, I can. They gave me natural remedies when our beagle, Saira broke out in a fire-red, itcy, painful rash. Just this week, Perri answered my call on Facebook when my Jeep needed a tire removed and my partner was unable to get the lug nuts loosened. He needed a pipe to provide extra torque (or something), and Perri immediately replied that Hank had a pipe he would loan. And by the way, did I want a box of Calvin and Hobbes books? Perri had noticed my posts of the comic strip, was getting rid of the books, and thought I'd appreciate them.
    Did I mention that whenever Hank snowblows his driveway he also does mine? I do what I can to repay their kindness, but every gesture I make feels paltry in the face of this steady, ever-present care.
    Some people love to help because it feeds their ego. They radiate false modesty and lap up "thank you's" like a cat laps warm milk. They make it clear that they are the awesome helpers, and you are the needy "helpee." Getting assistance from these people leaves you feeling less than.
    Good neighbors - good people - help because they can. They don't seek fawning thanks and they aren't in it for anything other than the pleasure of being able to help. I have the inestimable good fortune of living next door to two such people. And I never, ever take my good fortune for granted.
   

Kim Kardashian is not half-assed. Obviously.

   Stepping outside this morning in the aftermath of the blizzardy past couple of days, I thought that the still, innocuous air and benign gray clouds were like the weather's embarrassed hangover after a wild, roaring drunk:
   "Whoa, did I really do that? I dumped all that snow on you guys? Three feet? In, like, November? Dude, I am so, so sorry. That is the last time I mix my warm fronts with my cold fronts."
   But I'm a Yooper, so I'm over it now. It snowed, we shoveled, life goes on. What's claiming my attention at the moment is similar to snowbanks only in shape. What is on my mind is - butt cheeks.
   Kim Kardashian's butt cheeks, to be specific. I mean, have you seen them? If you own a computer and have an Internet connection, seeing those mind-bogglingly enormous globes this week has been next to impossible. Or maybe I'm just surfing the wrong sites.
   At any rate, my naked eyes have seen Kim K.'s naked ass. And woe to all who've so much as peeked; once it's been seen, it cannot be unseen. Ms. Kim, in her noble, ongoing quest to "break" the Internet, posed cheekily for the publication Paper. She appears butt-naked, her back to the camera, on the magazine's cover. She grins naughtily to the camera, her hair up in an elegant twist, and she clings to what could have been a glamorous black evening gown, but is instead used as a sideways parenthesis, a sort of hammock bolstering her rear end. Her naked skin is slick with oil, giving her the hard plastic sheen of an obscene Barbie doll.
   What immediately captures the eye, however, are those two unnaturally round bulbs of solid pink flesh jutting out from the base of her spine. It can't be real. A backside like that does not exist in nature, at least not among humankind. It is, obviously, designed purely for display. It looks incredibly bulky for toting around, and unimaginably uncomfortable for its intended use - sitting. Is Kim's back able to make contact with the back of a chair when she sits? Is she able to sleep on her back without feeling like she's doing a yoga pose? When she goes swimming, does she sink under the weight or get buoyed up to the surface tush-first?
   If the Kim Kardashian buttocks was not a gift from Mother Nature, this was a purchased item, consciously selected, willingly accepted in exchange for a sackful of legal tender. Which begs the question: WHY? Why would a perfectly attractive, slender young woman with more money than the Almighty decide to invest in a derriere expansion? And, being obscenely wealthy, able to afford the finest cosmetic surgeons available, how did she end up with what looks like two beach balls filled with Fix a Flat?
   It's beyond me. Maybe it comes of having more money than I.Q. points. What it looks like from here, from working class, ordinary butt, non-famous land, is a frantic attempt by Kim Kardashian to feed her insatiable "Look at me!" appetite. It's superficial, it's tacky, and it makes me a little ashamed to be a member of the same species. This is what we've come to: young women so desperate for the gaze of the public eye that not only will they peel off their clothing, they'll surgically alter themselves into fashionable Frankensteins. Forget talent, forget hard work. Shove your bare ass out there and fame will follow.
   I feel a twinge of guilt for mocking her. It's too easy, really. Shooting silicone fish in a barrel. But she put it out there. Nothing I, or anyone else, can say or write will do more than Kim Kardashian already has to make a huge ass of herself.
 
 

News fast

       Give yourself a gift: Take a day off from reading or listening to the news. No MSN, NBC, or CNN. No Public Radio, no local headlines, not so much as a whisper of who is campaigning for what office or why the economy is destined to tank. Let your brain dedicate itself to gentler pursuits. Read old Calvin and Hobbes comics, watch a '40's screwball comedy. Or tilt your head back, close your eyes, and don't think about anything at all.
        I have no idea whether the world is going to hell in a handbasket or whether it's business as usual on the global scale. I do know that there has always been poverty, bipartisan rancor, disease, and horrifying crimes committed by soulless individuals. Lately it all feels bigger, louder, and even more irreparable than in eras past. But is that truly the case, or does it only feel that way because of our 24-hour, every single second, multimedia access to it all?
         In my recovery program participants are encouraged to accept the things we cannot change. I cannot accept the rich getting richer on the backs of their workers. I cannot accept the unashamedly bigoted bleatings of racists and homophobes. I cannot accept human beings slaughtering other human beings in the name of... anything. I can accept that there is little I can do to change these unacceptable goings on. 
          I can vote. I can speak out for what I believe in. I can pray. I can try to make my own little corner of this life a warm one for all who cross my path.
          And once in awhile, for the sake of my sanity and peace of mind, I can turn the world off. There will be new headlines tomorrow, some solemn (Ebola), some silly (Kim Kardashian's sisters are more popular than she is!). It's not that I don't care about what's happening in my city, state, country, or world. It's that sometimes caring costs me more than I can afford to give.
           Join me, won't you, in a one-day news fast. We'll play video games, or go for a walk along the lakeshore. We'll give a dog a belly rub, or make silly noises for a toddler and giggle along with him. We'll eat cookies, blow bubbles, sing along with an old song on the radio. We'll appreciate the quiet in our neck of the woods. The world's teeming chaos will be there tomorrow. But just for one day, we can pretend it isn't there at all.
 

So long, sweets

    I almost relapsed tonight - with chocolate.
    I was whipping up a batch of brownies to bring to the office potluck tomorrow. The brownie batter was in the pan, ready for the oven. The mixing spoon wore an enticing coat of sticky, fudgy batter. Unthinkingly, I ran my index finger over the spoon and put my finger in my mouth. Before the batter made contact with my tongue I pulled away my finger and quickly rinsed it under the faucet.
    Close one.
    As of today I have gone three months and one and a half weeks without ingesting any sugar. Well, no gratuitous sugar. No cookies. No cake. No candy. No (heavy sigh) ice cream. Not so much as a sip of my sober-Deb beverage of choice, an ice cold Pepsi.
   Are you impressed? Please be impressed. I need all the positive reinforcement I can get.
   This sugar-free endeavor began by accident. It began at the grocery store, with a decision to not purchase ice cream. My partner's decision, not mine. I've never independently decided to not purchase ice cream in my life.
    I didn't go sugar free that night. Feeling virtuous about resisting the ice cream, I rewarded myself with a Milky Way Midnight. Three days later I realized that I had gone three whole days without a sugary treat. I decided to go for four. When I made a week I began practicing a turn of phrase known in modern parlance as the humblebrag.
    "So yeah, I haven't eaten any sugar for a week now."
    I rarely got the reaction I hoped for - because no one I know carries confetti in their pockets, ready for throwing when a friend does something momentous, such as forgoing Lucky Charms and Trenary Toast for seven long days.
    Mostly, people asked, "Why?", to which I honestly replied, "I dunno. It was an accident."
   Some people asked, "Do you eat fruit? Do you drink juice? There's sugar in ketchup, you know."
    I explained that I wasn't reviewing condiment labels or eschewing blueberries. I was only avoiding extra sugar. The fun kind. The sweet, sweet, delicious, soothing, comforting, satisfying kind.
    What in the hell was I thinking?
    Here's what I was - and am - thinking. I am an addict. And saying I am addicted to sugary treats is no exaggeration. My thinking about ice cream and Oreos is disturbingly similar to the way I used to think about alcohol. And removing these treats from my life has claimed my attention in a manner disturbingly similar to my long ago decision to abstain from drinking alcohol. Giving up sugar has, in fact, been as difficult - and in some ways been more difficult - than giving up drinking.
    I gave up drinking in large part because I was afraid of what happened to me when I drank. I had lost my ability to choose not to drink, and could never have a drink or two and call it enough. Fear spurred me into a recovery program, without which I could never have managed to get sober, or to remain sober for more than half my life.
    Giving up sugar doesn't feel like giving up alcohol. There's no liberating sense of relief at not having to have that all important substance. There's no recovery program for M&M bingers. There are programs for overeaters, sure, but overeating isn't my problem. My problem is, after three months and one and a half weeks, I'd sell my damn soul for a tub of Betty Crocker chocolate fudge frosting. The other night I dreamed I was eating a custard filled chocolate doughnut. It was as vivid and almost as nerve-wracking as any drinking dream I've ever had. I swear I checked under my fingernails for crumbs.
    The cravings are becoming less frequent, and they may be lessening in intensity, but honestly, I can't tell. They no longer come in goading, ceaseless waves after dinner, when my body wants, needs, demands some form of dessert. Now the cravings poke at me when I'm feeling run down at work in the late afternoons, or times when I feel too small and the world feels too big, like the day Robin Williams died.
    Now and then (meaning almost daily), I hear myself whining a woe-is-me about the lusciously frosted cupcake or a gooey slice of warm blueberry pie I can't have, and I have to remind myself: I can have it. I am choosing not to.
    My mind feels clearer. I have more energy. But that isn't what's keeping my away from the white stuff. What's keeping me clean is the fact that I can say/brag I have not eaten any sugar in three months and a week. And a half.
    Anyone have any confetti?

Sober? Check. Mom? Check. Single? Well...

The title of my blog has not been completely accurate for over a year now. I am still (gratefully) sober, still (delightedly) a mom. But I am (surprisingly!) no longer single.
Almost a year and a half ago I made a life-changing acquaintance with a remarkably special man. If I had a list of all the qualities I'd want in a man, he would generate a check mark after every single one. Intelligent, kind, patient, good sense of humor, bookworm. Check, check and check. It is my blessed good fortune that I make all the checks on his list, too.
After a series of brief conversations in public we progressed to exchanging emails, then graduated to Facebook chats. After a couple of cautious months we scheduled our first private face to face meeting at a quiet local restaurant.
We didn't follow the first-date rule of presenting carefully edited histories to each other. Instead, we poured our insides out, laying bare relationship histories, drinking and recovery stories, parenting joys and sorrows, what we loved (animals, books), and what we loathed (right-wing politics and all things Kardashian).
Our conversation extended from mid-afternoon coffee into dinner, concluding only when the restaurant closed at 8 p.m. We parted with a warm handshake and a promise to get together again in the near future.
I hurried to my car, shaking from head to foot - in part due to the sharp, frosty January air, but more because something had just happened to me that I hadn't experienced in a long, long time.
When I got home I stumbled through the kitchen door and froze in the middle of the floor, still shaking, ignoring my dogs' eager greeting. Out loud I repeated, "Oh, my God. Oh, my God." Inside me, a voice calmly repeated, "This is a man you could fall in love with."
I envisioned falling in love as a literal fall. I saw myself standing at the edge of a high bridge, looking down into dark, churning water. Was I willing to risk my safe, peaceful life for another plunge into emotional entanglement? The question answered itself almost as quickly as it was asked. Yes, I was willing to risk it. I was willing to dare to fall in love again.
And, in fact, I did - and he he with me.
Falling madly in love with the partner of your dreams doesn't equal happily ever after, as any grown-up knows. Our togetherness has consisted mostly of joy, laughter, understanding, passion, and the deep appreciation that comes with finding "the one" later in life, when you've learned what matters (honesty, respect) and what doesn't (dirty socks on the floor, hogging the bathroom). But there have been some rocky, tearful interludes, when our present lives collide with past hurts and expectations. What matters, though, isn't that we fight; what matters is we always make up, apologize, and work hard at resolving whatever issue is at hand.
I've had to do a lot of changing to keep this relationship alive; so has he. For my part, I've had to confront the ghosts of a past relationship, acknowledge that these ghosts existed, were haunting my new life, and could potentially destroy it. It was scary work that sent me to a therapist's office. After one excruciating argument, when I was beginning to doubt the relationship was salvageable, a close friend of mine gave me a much needed wake-up call.
I'd spilled every detail of my partner's and my most recent ugly fight. I'd been unable to see past his part in it, focusing only on my hurt. Now, I said, I could see with humbling clarity exactly where my old behaviors had exacerbated the fight.
My friend looked me in the eye and said calmly, "You have a choice. Do you want to continue with your old behaviors and lose the relationship, or do you want to change?"
I wanted to change. And change I have. So has he. Because we want to be together badly enough to work at it. We are old enough to understand the value of what we've found together. What we've found together is priceless.
We laugh hard, every single day. We hug. We kiss. We get each other coffee or an extra blanket. We say "please" and "thank you." We have what I like to call cultural exchanges: I have become a Detroit Tigers fan; he has developed a fondness for Cyndi Lauper's songs.
Most wonderfully, we allow for one another. If I come home from work mentally and emotionally fried, he is fine with me taking my dinner plate to the sofa and reading while I eat, my preferred method of unwinding. If he says he is feeling a tad cranky, I leave him to his laptop and keep conversation to a minimum. We can be completely, comfortably, utterly ourselves with one another That is priceless, miraculous, and irreplaceable. And we are, thankfully old enough and wise enough to appreciate that.
Sober? Yes. Mom? Yes, indeed. Single? Happily, blessedly, and surprisingly, the answer is, not any more.

Laugh, cry, goodbye

Last Sunday I was awakened by the retro phone ringtone of my cell phone. It was a little past 8 in the morning, earlier than I typically want to roll out of bed on a Sunday; but this wasn't a typical Sunday. This Sunday I was hurriedly yanking on my jeans and sweatshirt to go downstairs and give my son Daniel a farewell hug as he departed for his new life, thousands of miles away, in Portland, Oregon.

I already knew how hard this goodbye would be. This wasn't the first time I'd bid farewell to a child of mine. Several years ago I'd hugged my older daughter, Jess, and swallowed tears as she set off for college in Houghton. She felt so far away, although it was less than a two-hour drive. I'd been accustomed to having all three of my kids either under my roof, or at least in my ZIP code. Close enough to stop by for Sunday breakfast or mid-week spaghetti. For a few years my house had a revolving door quality, as the older two left, then bounced back home for a while, then moved out again.

Three years ago I hugged my younger daughter goodbye on a muggy late Saturday afternoon in September. She was beginning her freshman year at a small liberal arts college in Minneapolis. As we ate dinner at a picnic table under a shady tree we grew increasingly quiet, much unlike our usual selves. Words and tears knotted in our throats. When Melissa whispered, "Uh oh, oh no," I looked over and saw tears spilling down her cheeks. We hugged, laughing and insisting we weren't crying, we were fine.

When it was time for students and parents to separate, I gave Melissa one last squeeze and walked away quickly. I swiped tears from my cheeks and snuffled softly until I rounded the corner of a dorm building; then I let loose. My friend Susan, waiting for me on a park bench in the courtyard, began weeping in sympathy along with me.

I sobbed on and off on the drive to our hotel and wept a bit on the drive home the next day. When I got home I went directly up to Melissa's room, picked up a pillow she'd left behind, hugged it close, and wailed. I felt every mile of the distance between us. I felt as if I'd been ripped open at the center, and out of that jagged tear poured sorrow and loss. There was nothing to do but give in to the sorrow and cry it out. 

In my drinking days I maintained that I couldn't stand to feel pain, and had to drink to obliterate it. How very special I was, right? Poor, delicate me. Sobriety taught me that not only could I stand pain, I could endure it, survive it, and  - surprise! - move on from it. All pain, at least all the pain I've experienced, has a shelf life. It eventually dissipates, either disappearing or only aching when reawakened. This same equation applies to happiness - which, when I drank, had a desperate quality to it. Quick, grab it and hold on like grim death! You may never be this happy again. In recovery I learned that life isn't a buffet. You cannot choose only happiness. 

That first week Melissa was gone I kept my tears at bay by reminding myself that she was where she wanted to be. She was happily, excitedly beginning her life as a young adult. 

Three years and five months later I stood in my kitchen, stretched on my tiptoes, hugging my son, blotting tears on the shoulder of his woolly coat. He squeezed me tight, crying a little, too. We laughed as we re-hugged several times, reluctant to let each hug be the final one.

Then he was gone, off to build a new life in Portland with his girlfriend. I cried on and off all day Sunday, thinking about the miles that would separate us. I'd never not seen Dan for more than three weeks at a time. Now I probably wouldn't be seeing him until August. On a frosty February morning, summery August felt light years away.

So I sobbed into my pillow, cried on my dog's neck, wept on my partner's shoulder. Life gave me a little corrective when I went on Facebook that afternoon. I saw a photo of a tree posted by a friend whose son committed suicide several years ago. She planted the tree in his memory, and posts photos of it changing with the seasons. 

My son is a phone call, an email, a Skype away. I know where he is, he is safe and well, and I will see him again. Ditto for my younger daughter. My older daughter now lives in Marquette, with her partner and their adorable baby son. 

Happiness and sadness are part of the same soup. As hard as I tried to strain out the sadness with alcohol, all I did was compound my misery. Today I choose to feel my feelings, knowing that I can survive them, knowing they will pass - both the sorrowful and the joyous ones.

Help! Facebook doesn't depress me!

I am an unapologetic fan of Facebook. I like knowing what my local and far away friends are up to. I enjoy seeing my younger friends post photos of their little ones. I appreciate the pet photos,  the status updates, and the majority of the comical or heart-tugging memes. It's just plain fun. And, like anything just plain fun that gets into the hands of a person with an addictive personality, I indulge in it far too often and for too large bites of time. But until I'm missing work or skipping meals in order to indulge my habit, I am going to assume I haven't crossed into the danger zone of Facebook addiction. Yet.

Facebook is a delightful sounding board for the terminally smart-alecky. I derive a great deal of pleasure out of posting humorously cranky mini-paragraphs about the relentlessly bone-chilling weather, or mock news stories ("Local beagle engages in unauthorized litter box feast; owner recoils in shock and horror"). 

I try to avoid inflicting my opinion on religious or political debates, although I will interject if I feel my comment is on target but not snarky. I am a liberal Democrat and a Christian/Buddhist hybrid, but many people I love and respect lean right and are solidly Christian. I have no desire to hurt anyone's feelings or insist that anyone see things my way (although who are we kidding, I'd love it if I could persuade them to).

I try not to post too much mushy love stuff about my significant other, in part because I do have some understanding of decorum, but also because I don't want to embarrass him. I don't want to embarrass myself, either. Love makes me gushy. And too much shared gush comes across as bragging. I don't want to brag. I have nothing to brag about. The fact that this intelligent, kind, funny, thoughtful, compassionate man came into my life is a cosmic gift, not any achievement of mine. And he is the most... Wait. I feel impending gush. Ahem. Let's move on.

I do not post where I am every time I sit down to lunch or walk in the park, as a lot of people do. If this sounds a tad snobby, let me tell you that one reason I don't is because all of my Facebook activity takes place under my own roof. I don't have a phone smart enough to deliver updates on my every move. And that's a good thing, as I doubt there's a person on this planet who gives a rat's hind end that I am picking up paper towels at ShopKo or scarfing down a fish plate at Big Boy.

According to someone's research - I have no idea whose - Facebook has become associated with incidents of depression in its regular users. Supposedly, reading about other people's family joys, business successes and exotic vacations can lead to envy, low self-esteem and bitterness on the part of the less fortunate Facebookites.

I recently read a story on Huffington Post about a woman who detached herself from social media and realized she is much happier for it. She no longer goes online via her cell phone when she can't sleep, scrolling through the posts of friends who are partying gleefully while she lies alone, pitifully alone, in her big lonely bed. She is getting over the compulsive urge to document her every move, and she is finding other ways to fill those chunks of time previously dominated by posting, tweeting, and Snapchatting. She reads books! She talks to people on the phone, or even face to face! She showers more than twice a month! All right, I made that last one up. The point is, she feels liberated. Not so liberated that she's abandoning her online life forever, but when she rejoins cyberland she'll be armed with a dose of perspective she didn't previously possess.

So I guess I've been doing Facebook all wrong. I don't feel depressed. I am not nauseated with envy. I don't wish I could have Mindy's or Bob's or Susan's or, well, anyone else's life besides my own. When I see photos of friends and relatives lounging on the beach in Hawaii or in their box seats at a Detroit Tigers game I don't think, "Dammit! That should be ME!" I simply note their enjoyment. Clearly, I am not reaping the full benefits of online life exposure. I am sadly lacking in sadness, anger, bitterness and resentment.

The credit for this goes, at least in part, to my recovery program. I have been told not to compare my insides with other people's outsides. Income, new cars, or multiple stamps on a passport do not equal peace of mind or satisfaction. Yes, I would love a new car, a trip to Jamaica, and a triple digit income. But the fact that I have none of those things doesn't eat at me. I am, for the most part, content. I am also sometimes cranky, ungrateful, and just plain miserable. Welcome to human-ness. 

Using Facebook as a barometer for one's personal happiness is a sketchy enterprise. Kind of like comparing your life with that of some happy sitcom family. I want to measure my happiness on my own scale. Bills paid? Check. Employed? Check. Sobriety, family, pets all in place? Check.

Now if you'll excuse me, I just thought of a hilarious status update I want to post. 

Ssh, listen: Mortality's clock is ticking.

I don't know what it is about sitting on my kitchen floor in the morning that lends itself to deep thinking. It's probably the stillness of a house where most of the two- and four-legged occupants are still deeply asleep. And the tentative, soft early morning light. Usually it's just myself and Sadie, my big, fluffy tabby cat, sharing the hardwood floor. Sadie is an unintrusive presence, winding quietly around me, letting me tug gently at her long gray tail. The only sounds are the industrious hum of the refrigerator, the gurgle and sigh of the coffeemaker, and a few damp snores coming from the living room,where my two dogs have collapsed on the sofa to nap after their arduous trek from upstairs to down.

This morning I found myself focusing on another sound in my sleeping house: the sound of the kitchen clock. My kitchen clock is shaped like a coffee pot. On work mornings, when I'm chronically running late, its ticking sounds like the disapproving"tsk" of a cranky old woman's tongue. On lazy Sunday mornings, like this morning, its tick sounds like scissors softly chewing through the fabric of time.

The notion of time has become more and more preoccupying as I grow older. When I hit my 40's - more than 10 years ago now - mortality was no longer an abstract concept. "Everyone will die someday" turned sharply into "One day I will no longer be alive." Each second, each tick of every clock, was carrying me closer to my last day on this planet. This is not a line of thinking you want bouncing around in your head on a long-term basis. Of course, once you have this realization, it's pretty tough to shake. Sometimes I play with this awareness, like a little kid spooking herself. Sometimes this awareness leads me to frantic prayer: Not yet, not yet, oh please, not yet.

On rarer occasions, I find peace in this knowledge. I know that peace comes from acceptance, but acceptance is not my best subject. My addiction recovery program encourages me to "accept the things I cannot change." Naturally, my stubborn alcoholic nature sulks and balks at acceptance. 

I don't want to go! My life is, at this moment, more wonderful, more fulfilling, more happy in every direction than it's ever been. I have a job that allows me to help people. I have three interesting, intelligent, hilarious adult children who are thriving. I have a beautiful baby grandson who unleashes an open-mouthed, lopsided, drool-soaked smile whenever he sees me. I have found a love I thought only existed in my overly romantic imagination. Who in their right mind would be fine and dandy with the idea of leaving all this behind?

Well, as of this moment, no one is asking me to. All I need, acceptance wise, is to understand that this beautiful life is ephemeral. I don't have to love this fact, but I don't have to cower from it, either. What I seek, what I try to live with, is a balance of awareness and gratitude.

Like it or not, fight it or not, one day my name will grace the obituary page. What can I do about that? Not a thing. What can I do with knowing I can't do a thing about that? I can live gratefully. I can appreciate my blessings, learn from my struggles, awaken each day thankful for another crack at navigating the life I've been given. I can be the best woman, mother, grandmother, partner, peer coach, writer, friend, pet owner, and everything else that I can be. I can forgive myself when I inevitably fall short. I can forgive others when they inevitably fall short. I can accept my status as a temporary guest on this enormous planet. And I can be grateful for every ticking second I have been allotted to live here.

Happy birthday to everyone

Birthdays: I'm a fan.

Everyone deserves a day honoring their arrival on the planet. A little congratulations, a little hoopla, a day to make the birthday person aware that their presence is a gift to someone, or many someones. We spare no expense when it comes to funerals, to the mourning of a life's end. Why not expend some energy on celebrating the fact that we've given mortality the slip for another year?

Mortality. There's a heavy word. It's the key in the ignition of midlife crises. It's a word that becomes an actual felt presence as our age creeps higher. When you're young it's "Everyone dies eventually." When you reach middle age it's "I am going to die someday." Me. Solid, living, breathing, laughing, going-to-work, parenting, dog walking me, will someday cease to exist.

But not today! Well, so far so good, as of this moment.

And that is the gift we are given as we accumulate more birthdays. I understand as I never did before that each moment of life is a gift, an ephemeral gift, retractable at any moment. Sometimes it terrifies me; in my more self-indulgent moments, I wallow in that terror. But there are moments - and this is one of those moments - when I am acutely aware of being alive, and I am precisely appreciative of the moment in which I'm present. Sitting at my computer on a near silent Sunday morning, hair cool and damp from the shower. My dog is sleeping on the bed next to my desk, his breath an intermittent whisper; the man I love sleeps peacefully in the bed upstairs, the rest of our combined menagerie nestled around him. At this particular moment all is well. At this moment I want nothing more than this moment. If this is the wisdom of age, bring on the birthdays. A crop of gray hair, a scattering of varicose veins and wrinkles, and the need for an earlier bedtime is a small price to pay.

There are other, earthier perks to this middle age business. I dress for no one's approving eye but my own. I say what's on my mind more often than I keep silent to avoid conflict. I am learning to be less harsh with myself, trying to see my mistakes as human errors rather than unforgivable sins. I'm learning to say no to what I don't want and yes to things I may have not dared try before, when I was younger and less me.

Here's something else. You know when people say, "If you want to know how important you are in this world, put your hand in a bucket of water and pull it out. The space you leave shows how important you are." Bullshit. Each of us fits into this world somewhere, and each of us leaves an empty space when we depart. We count with someone, whether it's a spouse, sibling, parent, or the Starbucks clerk who recognizes us because we're at the drive-through every work morning.

Birthdays celebrate life. Life matters. We matter. Definitely calls for at least a cake and some candles, wouldn't you agree?

The "Shameless" life

So much for not getting hooked on any new T.V. shows.
I stumbled across "Shameless" on Showtime one night when I was too tired to read but not ready to go to bed. I'd read an Associated Press article about the series, and it didn't appeal to me. A dark comedy about a chronic alcoholic trying to raise five children after his wife runs off? No, thanks.
But I gave it five minutes, then ten, trying to sort out who was who in the chaotic, cluttered, somewhat grimy lives of the Gallagher family, headed by Frank Gallagher, played flawlessly by William H. Macy.
Frank Gallagher is an unrepentant addict, a scam artist, a man intelligent enough to be a captain of industry but flummoxed by an ego that insists the world owes him a living and an insatiable appetite for mind-altering chemicals of all kinds.
Older daughter Fiona is a typical oldest child, and a typical adult child of an alcoholic. At 21 she is preternaturally maternal, and ferociously protective of her five younger siblings. Her enormous, dark eyes burn with determination, but also reflect the soul of a girl worn out from bearing grown-up burdens. She's outspoken, street smart, and desperately in need of someone to lean on. But of course, when she does find that someone, a kindhearted car thief named Steve, she can't let herself enjoy it too much; she knows that good times are temporary, and the people you love will eventually drop you on your head.
The younger Gallaghers are intelligent, smart-ass, make-do kids. They stick up for one another and they stick together. And although they treat their father with cynical disregard (in one episode they all raised their hands immediately when Frank asked, "All right, how many of you have, at least once, wished you could see me dead?") they go to extraordinary lengths to protect him when he gets himself in too deep. This is partly because they need Frank around to serve as the ranking adult at parent-teacher conferences and when Social Services comes nosing around, but also because he's their dad. If you find that hard to understand, you must not know any families with active alcoholic in them.
One episode captured the pain of living with an alcoholic so accurately I thought I might have to quit watching the show altogether.
Frank comes to after nearly dying of alcohol poisoning and finds himself in the hospital, surrounded by doctors who are fascinated by his resilience. One of them offers Frank $3,000 if he'll participate in an experiment. The catch is, he has to refrain from drinking for three weeks - and wear an alcohol detection bracelet.
Being the kind of man who would eat glass for far less money than that, Frank agrees. He returns to his family a sober man. He cooks breakfast for everyone, he goes bowling with them, he listens when they talk. He's warm, he's attentive, he's involved. He's a dad.
The older kids watch all this with a jaundiced eye. They have scar tissue where their hearts used to be, courtesy of Frank's previous bouts of sobriety.
One of the older brothers gently warns his younger siblings of how this all will end. "It won't last, you know. Don't get used to it."
In an instant I was 15 years in the past, overhearing my daughter Jess telling her younger brother and sister not to get too excited about the trip their dad had promised to take them on next summer.
"He says stuff like that, but it never happens," she explained.
My husband wanted to be the good dad, the loving husband, the family man who worked 40 hours a week and took his family on fun summer vacations. But, like Frank Gallagher, his addictions drowned his best qualities and turned him into someone we wanted to love but had to back away from.
There's no despair quite like watching someone you love destroy themselves from the inside out. There isn't enough love in the world to change an alcoholic who doesn't want to be sober.
In the Gallagher household, sobriety soon changed Frank into a man with grandiose plans and more energy than common sense. When he launches a remodeling project, taking a sledgehammer to the kitchen wall, the kids know that it's time for sober Frank to go. They immobilize him and pour vodka down his throat.
In the final scene the family is watching T.V. together. Frank slumps in a chair, glowering, bottle in one hand, cigarette in the other. Fiona's boyfriend enters and says a cheery, "Hi, Frank!"
"Fuck off!" Frank growls. The kids grin. Life is back to normal for the Gallaghers. And that's a normal a lot more people than you'd expect are comfortable with.

What to expect when you're expecting... Christmas

Christmas is a time of joy and good cheer, baby Jesus, peace on earth, good will toward... Yes, yes, I know.
But for a lot of us, Christmas means stress. It means shopping, which means ricocheting from store to store, sweating in our winter coats as we wait in too-long lines, smiling weakly when cashiers wish us "Happy holidays," hoping we can manage to accomplish all we've planned for while staying within our budgets.
Christmas is damned hard work.
This year I had a revelation which led to a determination. I realized that my pre-Christmas angst is rooted in expectations - mine, not other people's. I assign imaginary expectations to my family and friends and then try to build a Christmas based on those imaginings. Forget visions of sugarplums, I'm too busy picturing the disappointment on my children's faces if I don't manage to match their (meaning my) expectations of what the holiday should bring.
Mind you, the "children" are 19, 23 and 25, and they are the most undemanding, grateful, enthusiastic gift recipients anyone could hope to wrap a box for. Again, it's my expectations that twist my guts and pull my neck muscles tight. I worry about pleasing them. I fear disappointing them. All based on a foundation of absolutely nothing other than my own insecurity and need to control and create an absolutely perfect Christmas each and every year.
This tail-chasing state of mind usually kicks in right around Thanksgiving, when the world around us becomes steeped in pre-December 25th regalia. Carols on the radio. Ads on TV and in newspapers. Christmas movies, Christmas programs. Did I mention Christmas shopping?
This year, just as I was getting a nice knot of anxiety formed, I had a revelation. What if I approached Christmas the way I try to live my recovery program?
Ba-zing! Talk about a new perspective!
Instead of being overwhelmed, I could keep it simple. Instead of thinking of Christmas as the be all and end all, I could think of it as one day, and I could approach that day with ease, one day at a time. And if I didn't manage to achieve Christmas nirvana for my loved ones, I could forgive myself, knowing I'd done the best I could, and done it all with love.
Christmas is now about two weeks away, and my stomach doesn't ache, and commercials exhorting me to get out there and shop, shop, shop don't make me feel panicky. I am aiming for a Christmas focused on family, love and laughter, which is what always ends up being at the center anyway, no matter what the big box stores say. My kids and I will all be together, alive and well. We'll decorate the tree, hanging the breakable ornaments up high so the cats can't bat them down, we'll keep "A Christmas Story" on throughout its 24-hour run on TBS, we'll exchange gifts and hugs. We'll take a day to stand still and celebrate, pure and simple, accent on simple.
May your days be merry and bright. May you give and receive. And may you give yourself the gift of freedom from self-imposed expectations.

Where I was

Of course I remember where I was.
I was working as a receptionist/office assistant for an architecture and engineering firm. I took a call from Noreen, wife of Bill, our landscape architect.
"I'm watching the Today show, and a plane just crashed into the World Trade Center" she said.
My mind created an image: a single engine private plane, a pilot who was obviously inept or had had a medical emergency. I transferred Noreen to her husband's line and went into the copy room to make duplicate sets of blueprints.
Some of my coworkers had radios on, and within moments music was interrupted by news alerts. This was bigger than one person and one plane.
When a second plane hit the other tower, I ran to a computer to try to find more information online. I couldn't get online. Too many people were doing the same thing as me.
I felt the frozen fear that grips you when you know you're going to be in a car accident and all you can do is watch it happen.
Everyone stopped working and gathered around the office radios. Not being able to see the escalating destruction, only getting a vision of it from the news announcer's hushed, deliberately steady tone, was chilling. He announced the collapse of the first tower without changing his tone. Minutes later he said, "And now the second tower is going down." Then, for a long moment, he said nothing at all.
Two of our coworkers went across the street to the cable office, where there were televisions. They came back quiet and stunned. "It's even worse than it sounds," one said.
I'd been blissfully asleep and didn't know it until I woke up on 9/11. I paid little attention to the news in those days. To me, other countries' hostilities toward the U.S. meant angry, shouting mobs burning American flags in faraway lands. I could never have imagined such hatred manifested against my country, couldn't have conceived of men willing to give their lives in order to punish thousands of their fellow human beings for the crime of being American.
In the days that followed 9/11, as I tried to shape a perspective to fit the incomprehensible, what I kept returning to was how everyone had been having an ordinary Tuesday. Ordinary people arriving at work, saying good morning, filling their coffee cups, settling down at their desks. Like me, like millions of other people that day. Men, women and children settled into their airplane seats, thinking about where they'd been or where they were going. Every last one of them ordinary, unique, irreplaceable. Someone's mother, father, daughter, son, best friend.
Ten years later, I saw footage of the second plane hitting the tower and I burst into tears. I believe most of us, if not all of us, carry a scar from that day that will never quite heal, and a certain memory or image awakens that day for us all over again.
When I mentioned the anniversary to my older daughter, she brought up the fact that other countries suffer incalculable losses as a rule rather than an exception. I've heard and read that from others, too. Who are we to act so wounded when other countries suffer so much more than we do, seems to be the sentiment.
Who we are is ordinary people who were unprepared for violent acts of such magnitude. If we were naive, well, that doesn't make it any less painful. Tell the children growing up without their father that their loss pales in comparison to children in other countries. Tell the sobbing parents and spouses to suck it up and take the larger world view.
You can't. You wouldn't do it to the citizens of the perpetually war-torn countries, either. Loss is loss. Sorrow isn't the exclusive privilege of the long suffering.
I'm no longer oblivious to politics or terrorism. And I'm not oblivious to the suffering of people on foreign soil. But today belongs to ten years ago, the people lost, and the people left behind. They're who I'm thinking of, who I'm praying for, and who I'm crying for.

Tres chic? Non!

I will never be an elegant woman.
I've long suspected as much, but tonight I confirmed it. The epiphany came to me as I was walking Indy, my dog. First, there's no way to elegantly walk an exuberant, leash-tugging, wildly panting schnauzer.
I did a brisk head to toe appraisal: this morning's eyeshadow smeared across my eyelids; layers of hair lofting upward with every gust of wind; nails mostly OK, but darned if I can give up biting my thumbnails.
And my outfit? Well, that sealed the deal. One T-shirt featuring a giant chicken looming over the Capitol building. Two blue socks, one printed with little dog pawprints (cute, yes - but not elegant), the other plain blue. The battered gray sneakers I call my Chuckie Finsters, because one of them squeaks with every step, just like the shoes of the "Rugrats" character.
The entire ensemble was accented nicely by the small orange bag I carried, filled with... Well, I was walking a dog; you figure it out.
Once upon a time I dreamed wistfully of acquiring elegance. I wanted to sweep into a room gracefully, more like a swan, less like Jerry Lewis. I wanted to be as calm as a reflecting pool, lithe as a reed, with a musical speaking voice and manners to fit all occasions, a regular Yooper Meryl Streep.
And therein lies my quandry. I am 100 percent Yooper, zero percent Streep.
Truthfully, I like the idea of elegance more than the practice of it. I don't like wearing high heels, I feel like an imposter when my hair is all done up, and I'm lousy at making charming small talk. I'd rather pull on my Eeyore pajama bottoms and Phil Collins T-shirt and eat ice cream right out of the carton than slip into a too-tight silk gown and pinchy shoes and nibble caviar on crackers.
I'm not less than just because I lack certain ladylike attributes. I may be more crass than class, but what you see is the truest, realest me. I may not be at the top of anyone's invite list for a cocktail party, but if someone's ordering pizza and rustling up a game of dominoes, I'm your girl. Especially if I can come over wearing my Eeyore jammie pants and Phil shirt.

One leaf at a time

I'm nursing a resentment against leaves.
Not the emerald green leaves fluttering above me on the trees; no, it's the quitters I begrudge, the crispy orange-brown defectors already scattered across the sidewalks, crunching under my sneakers as I walk with my dog Indy.
That's August for you, though. August, the hand at your back pushing reluctant you toward September, the end of summer. August has never been my friend. As a child it meant the end of schedule-free days spent reading, playing Barbies and riding my bike, and a return to school, where I was an awkward, uncomfortable misfit.
As an adult it meant folding my own children back into the routine of early to bed, early to rise, juice boxes, clean socks and homework.
This year August will mark my younger daughter's departure for college in Minnesota. I've been trying to imagine what it's going to feel like to hug her goodbye and leave her behind, an eight-hour drive away. I happen to be blessed with an Academy Award-worthy imagination, but I still can't picture how that's going to feel.
But about those leaves. Yesterday I woke for the day at 6:30 a.m., an unprecedented event for a Saturday. I took Indy for a walk down by the lake and saw the pink sun morph into white, felt the cool breeze surrender to warmer, humid air. A perfect summer morning, of not for those accursed leaves.
"Look at this," I grumbled to Indy, who ignored me. He doesn't share my distaste for the premature leaf drop. To him it's just one more interesting thing on the ground to sniff. I looked up, thought I spotted an orange patch on a neighbor's tree, and felt my heart give its familiar pre-autumn sink.
Then, mercifully, my recovery thinking kicked in - specifically, One Day at a Time.
It's still summer, I reminded myself. It's going to be beach day. At this moment in time all is well. You're walking your four-legged best friend on a stellar summer morning. There's a fresh pot of coffee waiting at home, where your three beautiful children lie sleeping, all together under your roof for a little while longer. You're going to hang out with friends today. This day is all you're promised. Don't waste it mourning the chillier, leafier days that haven't arrived yet.
Fall is on the horizon, and winter not far behind it. But today, today I am alive and well, I'm barefoot, and my windows are wide open, with a fine summer breeze wafting in.
Rather than nurse a resentment, I'm going to sit on my porch and nurse an icy glass of lemonade. Just for today, it's summer!

Small town mom, big city daughter

In the past two days I've discovered two things about myself. The first is that I'm not as ready as I thought to say goodbye to my younger daughter and leave her eight hours away, at college in Minneapolis, Minn.
Melissa and I attended student/parent orientation at Augsburg College on Friday and Saturday. Due to the mechanical unreliability of my Jeep (and the woeful lack of big city driving skills of its owner), my friend Kathy was kind enough to get us to Minneapolis. While Melissa and I were oriented, Kathy explored that jungle of excess known as the Mall of America.
As we neared the city I was gripped by a mix of sorrow and distress. How could I let go of my daughter? How would it feel to not see her every day, to face the end of our comfortable girlie rituals of tea and "Desperate Housewives" on Sunday nights and occasional Saturday afternoon strolls through the stores of downtown Marquette?
What I wanted to do was burst into tears. What I did was suck it up. Melissa had worked hard to get accepted to Augsburg. It was her dream school, this was her dream moment, and I had no right to compromise her happiness with my quivering reluctance to face the fact that my baby was all grown up.
So this was actually a twofold discovery. I am a) More bereft than expected at the prospect of Melissa's leaving, and b) A loving enough mom to push my own feelings into the back seat for the sake of my child.
Discovery number two occurred during parent orientation. As I sat in the modern, glass-doored conference room, listening Augsburg staff enumerate the many cultural advantages of living on an insular campus with a major metropolitan city mere footsteps away, a yen to live in the big city myself stirred in my brain.
I could do it, I thought. Imagine packing up and starting fresh in a city with so many opportunities for cultural enrichment. What an adventure it would be!
Later that day, Auggie parents were offered walking tours of the surrounding neighborhoods - abbreviated tours, courtesy of the high temperatures and obscene humidity.
The neighborhood my group toured was tidy and vibrant, a colorful mix of older, well-kept homes and ethnically diverse businesses, shops and theaters. I could easily imagine Melissa eagerly exploring it all, expanding her cultural horizons in a way I never had the opportunity to do.
What I couldn't imagine was me living there. The houses are so close together you could practically reach out and knock on your neighbor's window. The yards were square green handkerchiefs of grass or garden. No lakeshore. No tree lined bike paths. Just lots of concrete, cars and people.
I couldn't do it. I don't want to exchange my slow-paced, small-town life for any advantage the big city can offer. I know Melissa will thrive there. I'm proud of her for her adventurous spirit and intellectual and cultural curiosity. I look forward to hearing all about her new life as it unfolds.
Meanwhile, I'll keep the home fires burning. This trip taught me that I'm destined to be a small town girl. Maybe that's another way of saying timid, or lacking in a spirit of adventure. Or maybe it means I know where I fit - and I know enough to value it.

Farewell, June-tober

And so we bid farewell to June-tober. I know we've had damp, dreary Junes in other years, but I've blanked them out of my mind, which makes this the dampest, dreariest June in my memory.
But give us Yoopers credit: When the calendar says summer, we live summer. Children gallop up and down soccer fields in sweatshirts and mud-caked shoes. Dogs are walked under sullen gray skies, their coats soggy, their owners shivering. Families pile into RVs and pour into campgrounds, parents sticking close to the fire, kids running themselves as sweaty as they'd be if the sun were blazing down. We line up at Frosty Treats, cold-reddened hands wrapped around ice cream cones or waxy milkshake cups. It's the principle of the thing.
That's the true U.P. spirit. But believe me, under that spirit lurked one hell of a lot of disgruntled Yoopers yearning for sunshine.
Resentment is a luxury alcoholics cannot afford. That's a little something I was taught - repeatedly - throughout my 28 years in recovery. Note that I said I learned it; I didn't say I always practice it.
By about mid June-tober my Yooper stoicism had given way to a festering, unreasonable, childish resentment. By God, I waited all freaking winter for June's arrival. I wanted my sunshine! I wanted my beach days! I wanted to pull on a pair of shorts, peel my humidity-curled hair off the back of my damp neck and sip an ice cube-filled glass of lemonade.
The unrelenting 50-something degree days began to feel like a personal insult. I developed an irrational hatred of all meteorologists. I checked The Weather Channel online and on TV several times each day, like a Wall Street trader checking the Dow Jones index.
I'm usually big on gratitude. I tried correcting my sour attitude with thoughts of the violent weather and wildfires tormenting much of the rest of the U.S. At least we're safe, I reminded myself. Cold, wet and deprived of sunshine, but safe. But as you may recall, I did describe this as an unreasonable, childish resentment. Reality tends not to be the cure for the irrational.
What finally cured me was the inevitable: The sun came out and the temperature rose. I pulled on my bathing suit and went to the beach with a couple of my friends. The sand was a patchwork of bright beach towels. Children ran into the water and quickly out again, shrieking at the cold. Adults either basked in the long-awaited warmth or waded into the water themselves for a quick dip.
All this joy, and the temperature never broke 80. The wind was, in fact, a tad cool. When goosebumps rose on my arms I pulled on a T-shirt, then tipped my face upward - grateful for the sunshine and able, finally, to make the best of a less than perfect summer day.