Not Chaotic … Simply Versatile!

I am delighted to thank Ms. Cat von Hassel Davies at http://www.catrambles.com/ for graciously honoring me with the Versatile Blogger award!



I really appreciate her kind words about my blog. I've always been concerned about my lack of focus. I've considered trying to separate my blog out into various topics such as literature and writing, education or health but it would just be too time-intensive, considering all the other things I have going on in my life right now.

So from now on I will think of myself as a "versatile" blogger. It gives me a sense of freedom. I'm a woman with a lot on my mind and my blog gives me a place to share it. The first rule of the Versatile Blogger award is to thank the person who gave it to you. Please go and take a ramble with Ms. Cat ... she's a fantastically entertaining blogger.

The second rule is to post seven random things about yourself. It's difficult for me to dredge up seven things I haven't already shared about myself in this blog, but here goes:

1. I was born in the "new town" of Glenrothes in Fife Scotland. I have big plans to blog all about it and the link between sculpture and creativity in childhood.

2. I dislike team sports but I love watching gymnastics and competitive ice-skating.

3. I love trashy pop music. My current favorite is "We R Who We R" by Kesha". It makes me dance like a wild woman.

4. I'm obsessed with buying blank journals. Even if I have ten in the house I'll still buy another.

5. I'm very vain about wearing my glasses in public. If I see you at the store and I'm wearing my glasses, I will be tempted to hide from you.

6. Before I wanted to be a writer it was my childhood dream to become an actress. I'm a bit of a ham, really.

7. I've picked out a pretty girl's name for my second child but I'm not sure I want another!

The last part of accepting the award is to pay it forward to five bloggers who you think are deserving of such an honor. I plan to unveil my selection very soon!

I'm happy to have positive feedback on my blog. I've now moved my platform back to its original home at Blogspot, where I can widgetize and monetize to my heart's content for free. In my next blog I'm planning to write about the connection between versatility and crowded teeth ... there really is a link but that's a post for another time ... to be continued!

New Frontiers

The drive to my doctor’s office isn’t long. It starts getting prettier heading west on I-70. I drove over the Veteran’s Memorial Bridge and the beautiful Missouri river at St. Charles. I’m supposed to teach a unit on the Lewis and Clark expedition this semester, if I get that far given these insomniac nights. I wondered what Meriwether Lewis would think if he was here today. I imagined him standing on the banks of the river with Seaman by his side, watching these huge hunks of metal flying by at furious speeds on an impossibly complicated piece of architecture. Lewis was from a slow world. It took the expedition two years to find the Pacific ocean and make it back to St. Charles for a hero’s welcome.

Some people in the U.K. and even some Americans have told me that this country has no history, but on this late September day before the leaves have started turning, I feel my heart overflow with a rich sense of history and amazement at the sacrifices made by others before us who gave us the life we know today.

I feel good on the drive. I feel like my meds are working. I listen to Better than Ezra and Jack’s Mannequin and think it’s time I found some new music. I sing loudly. These nights are another matter. I sleep fitfully. I wake up feeling dizzy and twitchy. At night my mind kicks into overdrive, making small problems into insurmountable obstacles. How long to get well? How expensive? Will I ever really shake this thing? What will I do if this doctor quits or retires on me?

Lewis and Clark and all the members of the expedition were driven to distraction by gnats, mosquitoes and the dreaded tick. I feel their pain. I’m on my own journey in a new medical frontier of emerging ecological illnesses that our technology is yet unable to detect and that our medicines struggle to treat.

Lewis could probably sketch the Veteran’s Memorial Bridge to scale. The explorers of that time recorded and categorized everything. It was their way of exerting some control over a dangerous and unpredictable environment. It’s now 3:23AM. Meriwether Lewis mapped half a continent by his own hand. I write only to exert some control over a dangerous and unpredictable interior; my own body and mind.

A *Normal* Life

One of the yoga teachers at the Bally’s gym near my house loves to talk about the philosophy behind each yoga pose. We’ll be stretched out some pretzel-like twist for ages while she talks in a gentle voice about what each movement is doing for us spiritually.

A few weeks ago, it must have been before my Lyme relapse, I remember her saying that in yoga philosophy, life isn’t a single straight line from point A to B with times of total joy followed by times of total sadness. She said to think of it as two parallel lines, like train tracks. One of the track lines represents our joys and the other our sadness. Even as we have joys in life, there are still moments of difficulty. Even as we have difficulties, the joy is still there alongside us, waiting for us to become aware of it.

Even after ten years of learning yoga as meditation and kind of looking down on hatha yoga, her words still struck a chord with me. I’m sure there’s a complicated Sanskrit term that sums up the concept she was trying to teach. If anyone knows they can share it with me. Our joys are deepened by our sorrows. Our sorrows are lightened by our joys. If there was anything to convince me of the existence of God and life after death, it would be this beautiful symmetry of life; the way the universe seems to be continually supporting us through tough times as we learn and grow. Maybe it’s just the way I see it.

I’ve focused a lot lately on lamenting my sorrows in this blog. I’ve learned that I can’t get too caught up in disappointment and anger. I have to try to think about normal things and try to have a normal life as much as possible. I have to focus on my joy. Which is a long-winded way of saying that I finally got around to figuring out the new camera Jeremy got me for my birthday and excusing myself for posting some photos of my kid.

Pretty self-indulgent, right? But hey, it’s my blog, and there’s just so much joy in these photos.   Namaste, y’all.

“Life is so generous a giver, but we, judging it's gifts by it's covering, cast them away as ugly or heavy or hard. Remove the covering and you will find beneath it a living splendor, woven of love, by wisdom, with power.”