Reclamation

How do we reclaim spaces and moments that we used to exist in and define ourselves by? Loss takes with it pieces of our daily lives---pieces that sustained us and brought joy to our lives---whether we lost a home, a community, a relationship, or a person. I’ve experienced moments of mild unease or anxiety in returning to places that used to be “home,” or meeting up with people who used to feel like “home,” re-doing activities I used to do in relationships that felt like “home.” However, there is power in reclaiming these as my own; there is power in actively creating my own home. During this chilly winter season, I have been reminded of how reclamation is a powerful part of my own healing process.

Nearly seven years ago, on a typical sunny day in Colorado, my father was killed in an avalanche. He was skiing inbounds at a resort, following the rules. Without much conscious thought, I put my love of skiing (and winter outdoorsy-ness in general) in a metaphorical closet, nervous to tempt fate and to unsettle my own emotional healing.

My most recent story of reclamation happened this past weekend, among friends, high spirits, and blistery icy slopes in Maine. Leading up to the trip, I approached downhill skiing as something “I used to love” or that “I can still do moderately well.” Since my father’s death, it ceased to be a defining factor in my life. I had skied a few times in the years between that day and this past weekend, the most significant being a visit to the run he died on. The blue and white sign at the top of the run now reads “David’s run.” But, that experience, was more a sense of visiting---visiting the place he died, visiting his world---it wasn’t mine.

In Maine, I chased guy friends, who will always ski faster than me but are willing to pause to let me catch up, down the icy slopes. In some moments I felt transferred back into childhood, peacefully enjoying my skis gliding over powdery snow. In other moments I struggled, silently cursing the ice and shrubs sticking out of the snow. A sense of bliss followed the entire experience, aided by the surprise of still knowing how to ski and the forging of new friendships---where we share values related to being outside. Values that represent “home” for me. I am not sure what exact transformation took place or on which ski run, but skiing felt comfortable and peaceful. I can welcome the world of skiing and the community it encompasses back into my life.

Central to the outdoorsy world I grew up in, my family spent holidays at a YMCA camp tucked away in the Rocky Mountains. The camp is set between downhill ski resorts and hundreds of miles of cross country skiing. It is a gorgeous winter heaven. The year after my father died, we retreated to one of these cabins for a painful and lonely Christmas. We passed the holiday estranged from each other, engulfed in our individual grief. The camp felt haunted by childhood memories and impossible images of the future without my father.

It was six years before we plotted our return this past December. Together, we visited a sign the camp constructed in memory of my father. This year, the same space felt peaceful and healing. I felt my family take a collective deep breath and embrace this space, which was once ours and now is ours again. Reclaimed.

Curled up by the wood fire, I smiled as my mom and sister took out old card games, which contained records of highest and lowest scores throughout the history of our family playing the game. They lightheartedly reminisced about my dad’s competitiveness and my grandmother’s love of dominos with joyful memories of past holidays. As the pain withdrew from the memories over the years, we stepped back into our relationships with each other and again became a family that visits the places where it grew together over and over again to make new memories.

You should sell that

I’ve been reading Etsy’s “Quit Your Day Job” series since my senior year of college. Although I didn’t have a full-time job, something about the mystery of the “alternative” career path held my attention. I graduated in 2009 with the inaugural class of recession babies, and like many in my cohort, I went to grad school with the hope of staying out of the tanking job market for just a few more years. I wasn’t exactly sure where my studies would take me, or how I’d make a living after another round of coursework, but I was fascinated, albeit terrified, by the upheaval that seemed to be taking place in the hierarchy of professions. While many were devastated by layoffs and cutbacks, it seemed that every corner of the internet was highlighting another creative entrepreneur who had left her “safe” day job to make a living through her art.

As jobs that had once been considered stable became obsolete, creative professions and other more “risky” pursuits were being thrust into the spotlight. What once seemed risky came to be viewed as self-sufficient, as less traditional paths began to redefine success and professional freedom.

Part of why I’m obsessed with reading all of those quit-your-day-job stories and interviews with full-time bloggers and creative professionals, is not that I want to do what they do, necessarily, but rather that their trailblazing inspires a bit of confidence in my own choices as I find my way in a new professional landscape.

One of the downsides of the greater visibility of creative professions, however, is the “You should sell that” mentality, otherwise known as the death of the hobby. It’s the idea that every handmade gift or creative passion is the seed for a money-making venture. It’s the sense that your art is not legitimate if you’re not selling it, or that you’re not a real writer if you don’t make a living through your writing.

For my own part, I admire those who make a living through their art, as well as those who are creating beyond business hours. There are as many ways to practice creativity as there are creators, and I think it’s so important to honor them all. As I juggle multiple roles, all under the umbrella of words-on-paper and words-on-screen, I am especially inspired by those whose creative integrity infuses all of their work, whether it takes place in an office or a studio, whether for love, leisure, or livelihood.

The Same but Not Equal

I’m a big believer in asking questions.  Lots of them. Ask until you understand or until the person you’re talking to runs out of explanations, then ask some more. There’s a question I’ve been asking myself for a few years now. What’s the difference between marriages and civil unions and why is it important.  From the outside looking in, I just didn’t understand, not really.  Was it a name thing, like you say potato I say potahto? Was it an injustice, a matter of civil liberties? Was it black and white or shades of grey? Was there a right answer? I just didn’t know. And I didn’t ask enough questions.  I didn’t push for answers or ask the folks who would know, and I had opportunities to. I accepted that it was different, that it was less than, and that was a bad thing. But I didn’t really get it.

Sometimes you experience something and it strikes you to your core.  Maybe you read it, maybe you saw it, maybe you heard it, but all of a sudden there is a wealth of knowledge and emotion that wasn’t there before.  That’s how I felt this week when I read This.

I have a cousin who lives in Illinois.  She’s quite simply amazing, and when Illinois passed legislation allowing civil unions she and her equally awesome girlfriend joined thousands of other couples and got unionized (no, that’s not a real word). They’ve been a couple for longer than my husband and I, so as I was reading the article I couldn’t help compare, my relationship to hers.

For example, I’m married everywhere I go.  Alaska, Hawaii, Texas, Mount Rushmore and Disney World.  Always Married.  My cousin is legally committed only in the state of Illinois.  Only.  If she so much as crosses the border into Indiana, poof, she’s single.  Her legally recognized partner is now her girlfriend.  And those rights she has in Illinois, don’t apply in Indiana.  She has no legal claim, no legal responsibility, no legal anything with a woman she has committed to.

If my husband and I are (god forbid) in a car crash in Tennessee, I have rights. I can talk to the doctors, I can make decisions for him and about his health if he were unable to do so himself.  My cousin and her girlfriend might as well be college roommates for the legal rights they would have in such a situation.  I cannot imagine the pain and helplessness of such a situation.  I think of my husband. I think of the unthinkable, if something happened to him, and I was told I had no say, no rights, no voice. I don’t know how I wouldn’t live in fear of that every day.  I don’t know how that wouldn’t break me, the mere thought of it.

I hesitated before writing this.  I hardly ever talk politics, even with my closest friends and family, for several reasons---one of them being I believe people have the right to make choices, and just because someone makes a different choice doesn’t mean that they’re wrong and I’m right, it just means we made different choices.  Did I really want to get political on the Equals Record?  Then I realized two things: one, just because this has been made to be a political issue, does not mean that is all it is. And two---this is the Equals Record.  So maybe it’s a good place to talk about equality.

I believe my cousin is equal to me in every way but those she surpasses me.  I believe her heart and her brain are roughly equal to mine as are her abilities to reason, to make decisions, and to love.  She and I are both the same in that we love another.  But that is where the similarities end, at least for now. One of us is married, and one is not.  I don’t have the words to express how wrong that is. To express the injustice. To express the pain and the fight.  I just don’t have them. I hope someone else does.

Drinking Deep

I love fresh starts: springtime, birthdays, the turning of a new year. January always gives me a feeling of limitless possibility, as well as a craving for inward-turning, reflection, the chance to take stock of where I’ve been and where I want to go. I rang in the New Year this year with a grateful heart, filled to bursting with amazement at everything that has come into my life in the last twelve months: A new home, a true medical miracle, a tiny life kicking and growing inside me. This time last year, I could not have imagined the wealth of happinesses that 2012 would bring. Now, in retrospect, I am awed.

As the weeks of December ticked by, I found myself thinking about my hopes and dreams for the new year. I am a lover of goals and a maker of resolutions; I love having things to bring structure and order to my life, and ideals to strive for. Since high school, I’ve faithfully set resolutions and chosen themes to focus on for each new year, and many times I’ve seen my life change in profound ways as a result.

Still, as I pondered on 2013, I felt stumped. What could I resolve to do in a year that would bring so much change, so many unknowns? While this year is still young, my husband and I will be welcoming a newborn into our lives, adding a completely new element into our otherwise familiar existence. Could I really make resolutions when I had no idea what this year would bring?

Could I ask anything more of myself than simply to be there, living and breathing the new adventures that 2013 brings?

I just want this to be a year of drinking deep, I found myself thinking. I don’t want to miss a second; I don’t want to get to the end and regret the times I wasn’t present for the moments that counted.

And that, in the end, sums up my sole resolution for this new year:

Drink deep. 

Be there, wherever “there” may be.

Give myself a little grace when I inevitably fall short.

Let go of a few of those things on my to-do list.

Cherish these last weeks of pregnancy, and cherish the hectic newborn weeks to come afterward.

Let myself be filled with love for my new little daughter—this soul that stands on the cusp of this world—and let go of less important things.

I don’t know, here on the threshold of the coming year, what 2013 will bring. Like most years, I imagine it will carry its share of pain along with the joys, and I’m sure that keeping my temper and equilibrium after one too many nights spent soothing a newborn will be a challenge. There will probably be moments of exhaustion, of bleary-eyed apathy, of downright frustration.

But there will be so many moments of beauty, too.

And I don’t want to miss a single one.

Looking Forward: Storytellers.

Over dinner this week, my sister-in-law (Calla’s mother, and a fellow writer) and I discovered that we share a common fear: the bedtime story. “Tell me a story,” Calla will say on nights when I babysit. She’ll look at me imploringly, tucked in her bed alongside her stuffed warthog and plush pygmy lemur.

This is when the cold sweat begins. “Will you help me tell it?” is my response, every time.

“Yes.”

“Okay. Great. Once there was. . . a banana,” I’ll start, choosing my words haltingly. “A banana named Jim."

Usually, at this point, Calla is staring at me, eagerly awaiting what spellbinding fate might befall an anthropomorphized fruit. “And then what?”

“Hmm. And then. . . and then. . .” I’ll stammer, before inevitably admitting defeat. “You know what? That’s a great question. Why don’t you tell me?”

***

In the tenth grade, I wrote a short story for my English class that was told from the point of view of a man on death row. The same year, I wrote another piece from the perspective of a little boy who heard voices. I followed that with yet another, about an inner city teenager who’d been kicked out of school. (Clearly, at fifteen, I was interested in exploring the darker side of the human experience.)

I received good marks on these stories at the time; still, they’re pieces that embarrass me now---full of vague details and street slang I didn’t know how to use.

These were stories I didn’t know how to tell.

Today, as a writer, I still doubt my story-telling abilities. Essays, I can handle. Interviews are no problem. But a story is a different animal.

I once overheard a college classmate of mine wonder aloud, “do you have to live like a rock star in order to be a good writer?”

At the time, I understood exactly what he meant. We were being told in our workshops to write what we knew. But in order to tell good stories, did this mean we had to live them first?

***

There came a time last summer when, in the midst of a sort of quarter-life crisis, I decided to prioritize adventure above (almost) all other things. Whenever I was invited out---or presented with a new experience, big or small---I resolved to say yes.

As I’ve shared with you at times here, the results of that decision have often come at the expense of comfort. I can’t think of a more tumultuous time in my life, but then again, I can’t think of a period more exhilarating, either.

My friend Megan sent me a quote yesterday morning from Barbara Kingsolver’s The Poisonwood Bible, which reads, in part: “to live. . . is to acquire the words to a story.”

Yes. At the very least, what I’m doing now is collecting stories. “Sometimes,” I told Megan,” I’m so interested in certain emotions that I’ll put myself in situations---even if they’re uncomfortable---just so I’ll know what they feel like.”

If I live them, I’ll be able to write about them. Share them. Use them.

Whether or not this will improve the quality of my bedtime stories remains to be seen.

Labor Pains

I’ve noticed a strange phenomenon among mothers, myself included. It seems that as soon as they have finished labor, they completely forget it. I ask my other mom friends for advice, and their eyes glaze over, they tilt their heads. ‘Hmmm, did I have an epidural? I can’t remember if my water broke.’ The same often goes for developmental stages. I look for sympathy among women my mother’s age and it seems they don’t recall the specific struggles of a toddler, or the pains of pregnancy. I can remember trying to recall my labor pains directly afterwards and them slipping from my memory like so much water in my hands. Speaking of water, the other evening I had quite a scare. I still have five more weeks until my due date, but I was convinced in the middle of the night that my water was leaking. It was the strangest feeling and I called my husband down from his office upstairs so that we could freak out together on the bathroom floor, frantically googling until I had scared myself enough not to sleep a wink. There’s so much emotion with childbirth. I didn’t have as many crying fits during this pregnancy, but that night I was laughing and sobbing all at the same time again. I don’t think it was leaking, nothing more came out and I had no contractions. The whole experience scared me enough that I went into extreme nesting mode. We spent the weekend at Ikea and I washed miniature baby clothes. It reminded me that there are many different ways to deliver a baby, no less valid than another. I had stupidly assumed, being a second time mother, that my labor would be the same. Charley came one day early, I had felt prepared and ready. But there’s no guarantee this one will come the same way. He could be early, he could be small, he could even be a C-section, and I have to be okay with that.

I had fallen into the trap of thinking everything would go just like with my first, both the good and the bad. That in many ways this kid would just be Charley 2.0, and I have to remind myself that might not be the case. Every kid is different, sometimes especially siblings. I used to look forward to the differences. ‘I can’t wait till I have a smaller baby that isn’t so active’, I would tout. Or ‘Maybe the next one will color with me?’ But instead, the closer I get to labor, the more fearful I become of things being different. It feels like the great unknown all over again, stumbling into the great void of parenthood. Just when you think you know something, you realize you have no idea.

Whole worlds

Two volumes, four books, 2724 pages, hundreds of high-quality illustrations. These are the stats for The History of Cartography, an encyclopedic tome published by The University of Chicago Press between 1987 and 1998. The volumes are still available for purchase, but they are now also available for download as a series of PDFs, because, as the publisher’s site explains, much has changed since this work began:

“In 1987 the worldwide web did not exist, and since 1998 book publishing has gone through a revolution in the production and dissemination of work. Although the large format and high quality image reproduction of the printed books are still well-suited to the requirements for the publishing of maps, the online availability of material is a boon to scholars and map enthusiasts.”

Things like this rarely happen these days, as we have generally given up on trying to contain the whole world between two covers. And this is certainly for the best, since a conversation about the history of anything can only benefit from more voices than one book, or one series of books, can contain.

But what struck me most when I came upon this work, which was published between the time I was born and the time I went to middle school, is the sort of sustained attention it must have required. Although it includes the work of multiple contributors and editors, it’s hard for me to imagine the kind of commitment and hard work that brings such a project to life over the course of more than a decade.

Since offering up my New Year’s resolution to finish what I’ve started, several friends have asked me why and wondered what I really meant. Does it mean I have to finish every book I start, even if it turns out I really don’t like it? Does it mean I have to finish a faltering project, even if it seems doomed? Of course not.

What I really meant is that I’d like to move beyond the wonder of beginnings. I love beginnings. I love the excitement of brainstorming ideas and the hope and optimism that comes with getting started. But after the thrill of beginning wears off, the middle is much less glamorous. It requires simply showing up and doing the work, or “being boring,” as Austin Kleon says in Steal Like an Artist.

Endings, too, can be a challenge. Whether it’s finishing Moby Dick or sending a long-term project out into the world, endings require a sort of reckoning between what you’d hoped for and what really came to be. Sometimes things turn out better than expected, sometimes worse, but an ending is almost always different from what you imagined when you began.

As I set out to finish what I’ve started, in small and perhaps increasingly bigger ways, my intention is simply to embrace all of the middles and ends that are required, just like beginnings, to make things happen.

Blowing in the Wind

Dear Sibyl, I was recently left by a guy that I thought was going to be a long-term boyfriend with a future.  We had only been together for five months but we had been chasing each other for half a year before then and I know he had been interested but thinking he had no chance for way more than that. When we finally got together, we were the dream couple to all our friends and the times we spent were most often in mutual genuine bliss.

Then one day, he invited friends over on a Friday at 1.30 am when I had said that I was tired from a long week. So I was a bit pissed off and went home. He broke up at 4 am with a text and confirmed that in a conversation the next day saying: 'We have nothing in common, he can't see his friends (far from true), I'm reactive--he's proactive, it won't work out so he'd rather end it and it's better for me as well.'

I was devastated. Most friends said it's just gonna be a few days. So I took it with dignity, kept my public appearance, including Facebook, happy and optimistic and left him alone for about 5 weeks. But believe me, I was devastated. I had no idea what was going on and friends told me he wasn't being himself either. So I had hope he'd come to his senses.

Then I saw him at a festival. Snorting mountains of cocaine. Everything became a bit clearer to me. Throughout the weekend I learned that he had re-started cocaine the night before he broke up, been doing loads of drugs since then and that he had lost his job. He did continue to want this breakup but deliberately stood next to me very often and started crying during songs. I have told him now that I don't want any contact for a few months. That included that I didn't want a 'Happy New Year' email either. I thanked him but told him again no-contact.

But now I don't know what I will do after that. I can't avoid him forever. Will he come to his senses? Would it be a good thing if he came to his senses? Should I try and stay friends? Should I avoid him in my life---tricky because we have zillions of mutual friends that I don't want to lose. I think that it's not a lack of love but a fear of failure and of commitment that he's suffering from. I know the cocaine phase is temporary. So is the unemployment. Part of me wants him back after that. Another part thinks that he can't be trusted ever again.

What do you think?

Yours,

Brokenhearted in the U.S.A.

Dearest Brokenhearted,

There are so many ways to cheat on one's partner.  You can disengage emotionally and start up an internet friendship with a long lost fling.  You can sleep with a member of their family, their best friend, or a random person you meet out dancing.  In your case, Brokenhearted, the cheating wasn't sexual at all.  His mistress was cocaine.

When I was a teenager, my best friend lost his mother to cancer, and I, to my great surprise, lost them both.  I adored his mother, and had fully believed that my fervent prayers to save her would turn her illness around, right up to the very end.  By the time she died, however, I was not surprised, having visited her several times in her final days.  But I was completely shocked how my friend reverted into himself, eschewing my friendship for people who never knew his mother, and would not bring up his pain.

I wouldn't take no for an answer.  I wrote him long letters, parked outside his house and waited for him to come home from school, and, when he did let me in, sat with him for hours in silence while we inexplicably watched tennis on his tiny television.  It was all he wanted to do.  Or so I thought---I slowly learned that all the times I couldn't find him, he was off with his new friends, consuming as many drugs as was humanly possible in the provincial area we lived in.

Since that experience, I've learned to look for the presence of mind-and-mood altering substances any time a person has suddenly disengaged in a primary relationship, especially when there is a precipitating loss of some kind.  For whatever reason, your boyfriend's unemployment was more than a temporary career setback---it was a huge loss to his sense of self.  Instead of being able to let you in to that pain, he turned to something to shut it off, in this case, cocaine.

The only bright side is that he broke it off with you the moment he chose drugs over connection with you, even if he wasn't truthful about what he was doing.  This is actually sort of admirable, because most people in the throes of an addiction just take down whoever is closest along with them.  You dodged a bullet, and when you realized the kind of dangerous behavior he was engaged in, you wisely instituted a no-contact policy.

The piece I have to gently warn you about, Brokenhearted, is your assertion that his cocaine use is a "phase".   Drug use is not like body piercing or thinking you're an evangelical Christian.  It's not a phase, it's an addiction, especially if it's been caused by depression because of his unemployment, caused him to do something so drastic as break off a healthy relationship, and if he is truly snorting "mountains" of it at festivals.

I know that in your pain of losing him, you wish he could come back to you, untouched by your time apart.  But he will not be the same person then, even if he does.  He has started down a long road that will take him a good while to return from, and in fact, he should be a different person, if he really digs in to the recovery process.

So, my suggestion to you is to only invite him back into your life if he is a) in some kind of recovery program, and/or therapy, b) willing to discuss why he sought out drugs instead of connection at that time in his life, and c) interested and able to hear from you how it hurt you to lose him in such a way, and what boundaries you need going forward.  Finally, he should agree to never break up with anyone ever again via text message.

In the meantime, tend to your own broken heart.  Think less about him and his choices, and mend your own wounds, sewing them up with the support of your friends, with new experiences that bring you joy, and comforting practices like staying in to intricately braid your hair and read your favorite book over again.

Your boyfriend made a sad mistake, choosing cocaine over you.  Don't follow him down the rabbit hole.  I have seen many people throw away their dignity for the lure of the seductive drug user.  There's something desperate in those hollowed-out eyes, and we are sure that if we can just harness that desperation, we can turn it into passion---for us, rather than the substances.  Instead of chasing that dragon, stay close to yourself, on your own side, in the realm of human, rather than chemical, connection.

Soberly,

Sibyl

Resisting Autopilot

The other day, I heard an interview on NPR with David Esterly, a master woodcarver who just came out with a book, The Lost Carving: A Journey to the Heart of Making. He talked about what he believes are the two halves of creativity: one half consists of coming up with ideas and planning things out; the other half exists within the making itself. This second half (his favorite), is a spontaneous, intuitive relationship with the process—responding to the materials and adapting mistakes into solutions. I had the radio on while I worked on a cut-out for an animation I am making. I usually have something on for background noise, except when I’m drawing, because I always think of drawing as the hard part. Once the drawing is done, the pressure is off and the radio (or podcast) comes on.

I draw on yellow tracing paper, which I flip over and transfer onto a piece of medium-weight black paper. I used to draw directly onto the back of the black paper (and occasionally still do), but the cut-outs always come out messier that way, and when I’m using multiple colors, it becomes hard to line them up correctly without a master drawing. The trade-off is that the immediacy of the line is lost with all the tracing that goes on. As I sat, cutting out along my prescribed, traced lines, listening to Esterly talk, I wondered, am I really doing anything creative right now?

The weird thing about getting good at something and developing a neat little personalized system is that it makes it easy to go on autopilot.

As part of me listened to the radio, another part of me started thinking more about what I was doing. Though the drawing is there as a guide, there are numerous subtle decisions to make as I cut. Most of the time, I don’t really make these decisions, but let them happen automatically. The cut-outs come out just fine. But this time, I really thought about what I was doing—How thick should this line be? Should this small gap be left black or cut away? Shouldn’t these lines be more parallel?

I think that the sum of all these tiny nuanced decisions shows in the finished product. There is a tension in the lines that makes it feel more alive. And focusing my attention that way made me feel more alive, too.

In her book Long Quiet Highway, Natalie Goldberg talks about how creative acts can be a form of meditation. Sometimes when I am making a cut-out I am impatient, just wanting to get it done and see what it looks like. But sometimes, like this time, I go deep into it. Time passes differently, the way it does when I play with an animal, or really listen to music. I really experience what I am doing; I experience the uncertainty of being alive.

To listen to the David Esterly interview, go here: http://www.npr.org/2013/01/06/168632372/re-creating-the-lost-carving-of-an-english-genius

You can see more of my work here: http://mollymcintyre.com/

Looking Forward: Growth.

A couple of months after my niece, Calla, was born, my brother and sister-in-law sent a photo of her on a sheepskin rug, staring straight into the lens with wild, wide green eyes. I was still in New Zealand, living in my front-yard trailer, when the photograph arrived in my email inbox. “She’s switched on,” said my WWOOF host, admiring the shot on my computer screen.

As Calla grew, more photos came. There she was, bundled in sky-blue snow gear. Strapped in a swing at the playground. Setting foot in the ocean for the first time, wobbling on tiny, tubby legs. One video showed her demonstrating a newfound ability to operate the bedroom humidifier with just a touch of her fuzz-covered head.

When I moved to New York in 2009, Calla turned one. As her aunt, babysitter, and---as my sister-in-law once kindly referred to me---her real-life fairy godmother, I’ve had the pleasure and privilege of witnessing the numberless spectacular and bewildering transformations that occur in the first few years of life.

“Can you imagine one day we’ll have a real conversation with her?” I remember asking my brother.

Today, three years later, we not only have conversations, but discussions. The baby who once did little more than babble can now ride a scooter, sit through chapter books, make correct use of the word confidant, and identify several obscure varieties of pasta. (Anyone familiar with strozzapreti? She is.)

Calla's a new person every day.

A few weeks ago, she took my hand and pulled me onto her bed, yanking a blanket over our heads. She held a glowing egg-shaped nightlight in her hand. “The grown-ups will never find us here,” she said.

“Am I a grown-up?” I asked her. “How old do you think I am?”

She squinted, lost in thought, and guessed. “Eight?”

---

I ran a Google search recently using the question, “can a person remember being born?”

Apparently, and not surprisingly, the answer in most cases is no. In fact, what I gathered from my search was that for the majority of us, first memories extend no earlier than the age of three---and can occur as late as the age of seven.

It’s unlikely, then, that Calla will remember her first time in the ocean, her penchant for the Milly Molly Mandy book series, our egg-lit conversation in her bed.

She’ll have no recollection of the many drastic metamorphoses that have occurred in the past four years.

I will, though, and I look forward to telling her about them.

I’ll also remember this as a time of significant change for me, as well. The difference is, I can recognize it. And feel it. And think about it. It’s mind-blowing, for lack of a better term, to be conscious of major changes as they’re happening, to feel yourself growing---having new experiences, learning, experimenting, being uncomfortable. I---like my much-younger niece---feel like a new person every day.

It’s kind of like being a child again. I imagine, in wild, stunning ways, it’s a little like being born.

The Passing of Time

We lost my childhood golden retriever this week. He was almost fourteen years old, a very long and full life for that breed. I say lost, but my parents had to make the decision to put him to sleep. He had a large tumor and was in pain and very sick towards the end, not the dog we remembered and loved at all. Making the decision seemed far more difficult than just letting him go. I think we all hoped he would just pass in his sleep. Their house is quiet now. No nails scratching on the wood floors, no doggy gruffs and barks. But I think what we are mourning even more than Lucky himself is the passing of time. We are reminded in an instant how quickly 14 years can pass. He spent 5 years living near the beach in Indiana, 5 years in an apartment near a lake in Florida and 4 years at their house with the nice fenced in backyard. When you subdivide time like that, it makes it go by even more quickly.

It’s been almost 4 years now since I moved to Florida, and got married. And even though I have my own house with my own dog, I am crying over the good times. The years spent in Long Beach with Lucky, just five short ones, when I was a teenager and took him for walks everyday. I needed that dog, we all did. I am mourning the memories, and at the same time wondering, where are my memories of Florida? Is it because there are no seasons, no markers in the passage of time? So many of my great memories from growing up involve the seasons. Or perhaps it’s because I am only just starting my own family. Maybe all those memories were really about the four of us, my parents, brother and I, and of course, Lucky. In many ways his death ranks right up there with my grandfather’s in terms of importance.

I think we are all grieving and scared. Scared that in many ways this is just the start of deaths to come. We are all aging in a way that is much more noticeable now. And in the middle of it all is Charley, so young and oblivious, wondering, “Are you otay mama?”

Non-negotiables

We watched a couple of documentaries last weekend that are still tugging away at me as the week floats by. The first was Happy, and the second was Bill Cunningham New York. In the first, intimate portraits of happy people in surprising situations—from a rickshaw driver in India to an American woman who has recovered from a severe accident—were interspersed with researchers discussing what they had found to be the building blocks of happiness: novelty, close relationships, and acts of kindness.

In the second, shots of the revered street fashion photographer Bill Cunningham biking all over Manhattan with his camera contrasted with glimpses of his tiny apartment, where he sleeps on a board among file cabinets. For him, sleeping and eating seem to be afterthoughts. And the idea of a work/life balance? Well, he’d probably just laugh and say that work is life.

In a surprising moment, he responds to the invisible interviewer that, yes, of course, he goes to church on Sunday. It seemed that while everything else came second to his work behind the camera, church was a given. The otherwise opinionated and articulate subject paused for a long stretch and struggled to explain why.

More than anything else, these two films challenged my assumptions about non-negotiables. Each of us is constantly making tiny choices, arranging and rearranging priorities, which eventually add up to the more public aspects of our lives. Sometimes it’s impossible to really explain the whys and hows of our own lives and the lives of others. We can only grasp at threads among the complex bundle of will, experience, nature, and circumstances. I suppose all of this is obvious, but perhaps I needed a reminder.

Grief: Mapping Your Online Community

I learned the phrase “Community mapping” at age sixteen while volunteering in a small community in rural Paraguay. At the time, the notion of mapping the resources in a community seemed clear. Quickly drawn on a piece of paper---the community school, church, homes, the dirt roads connecting the dots, and the fields that spread in the spaces between houses. The stick-figure buildings my host family drew to mark the previously listed sites represented the physical locations of where community manifests. They leapt off the page as a visible sign of the strength and resources held within this community.  At sixteen, I transferred this model to my life in Colorado---my school, my home, my family’s cabin, and the places where I spent time with my friends.  My map made sense, I didn’t question my places of support and where my community came together. The intervening twelve years of moving and creating new communities---including online---threw a wrench in my map. It no longer fits on one page or within a single community. I access much of the pieces of different communities in online spaces, including gchats from friends who still inhabit past homes on other continents, Facebook messages from childhood friends, and following twitter feeds of friends-I-haven’t-actually-met, who share a common journey.

Grief and loss often throw the individual into an unknown emotional space, where the “community map” becomes increasingly important. It creates a sense of one’s resources and places of support; showing the individual the strength of their community(ies). For many, the communities of support blend between in-person, phone, and online communication.

Admittedly, the online space trends towards the more positive aspects of life, as Jenna Wortham notes in her article, Talking about Death Online, “This is more than trying to decide how carefully polished you want your online image to be. . . . It’s about the way social software is slyly engineered to get us to participate---we are encouraged to brag about our lives, and present ourselves as living our best lives each day and year.” Between updates about babies, engagements, jobs, and school---loss becomes just another post that slides by not really resonating.

Engaging with more difficult, heart-wrenching topics, such as grief and loss via social media opens the individual up to vulnerability. For many, loss creates moments of intense need to reach out to one’s community. The online platform is not necessarily designed for in depth sharing or support, as posts and tweets have character limits. The feeds stream by, not allowing the adequate time or ability to respond to a friend’s post. As Jena Wortham writes, “However, when it comes to talking about death and grief in a non-abstract way---that is, when dealing with the loss of a family member, a partner or close friend---it gets much, much trickier. It doesn’t have an appropriate reaction face, a photo that you can reblog, a hashtag.” I often wonder as I see friends hesitantly posting memories of their lost parent how our ability to comfort each other spills into this medium?  How much of our ability to empathize in person actively translates with each “like” we give to their posts?

As a firm believer in allowing each individual to chart their own path for grieving and healing, online spaces may become mechanisms for both. In my own process, I try to push the boundaries of what feels comfortable to share on Facebook, twitter, etc. I don’t shy away from posting pictures of my father, marking what would-have-been his sixtieth birthday, the sixth year since his death, or my travels to places he would have loved. However, the accompanying text is often positive, such as “missing your adventures” rather than engaging with the harder, empty feelings of loss. While I can’t express my “full self” in this online space, I trend towards sharing what I can with this online world. As my community is spread throughout many places, online becomes the place that I receive (and provide) support from so many communities at once. Online, I am reminded of the people beyond the Facebook photos who love and care about me---through likes, comments, and quick emails after they see the post.

Beyond our individual experiences with grief and healing---Facebook has become a community in itself, creating a way to memorialize those who have died. Two of my “current” Facebook friends are people who have passed away. Their profiles remain places where friends and family leave notes---sharing life updates, memories, or simply typing “I miss you.” In a world where visiting gravesites may not be practical, the online memorial space may bring us closer together.  In her blog post, Online Mourning and The Unexpected Refuge of Facebook, Cheri Lucas (another Equals Record writer) discusses her experience with a friend’s death;

“A few hours after receiving the news, I wrote something and shared it as a Facebook note. I posted scanned photos from college—precious moments of youth, debauchery, and experiences I had never shared publicly—from nearly 15 years ago: onto his profile, our friends’ profiles, and my timeline. I sat in front of my computer, clicking on photos people tagged of him: images that conjured memories, that stunned and confused me, that made me feel grateful for knowing him, that devastated me because I realized I didn’t know the man he had become.

Alone, I sobbed. Yet I sobbed with Facebook open—his life revealed and exposed in bits on my screen, his friends spilling tears on his profile. I sobbed at home, by myself, but also with everyone else. I had never given in to the community of Facebook until that moment. For the first time, its communal space had comforted me.”

The possibilities of online spaces to bring us together are endless, we can share memories of those who have died, sharing our own healing processes, and of course, share our joys. Yet, as Wortham also notes, we don’t yet know the outcomes of creating online communities that don’t support the whole breadth of human emotions. However, we should trend towards sharing our authentic selves, our whole journeys---and in return, we should support others who do just that---comment on posts people share about those they have lost, about their difficult moments---engaging with the full spectrum of emotions, will only make the blissful moments stronger.

Much of my community is online, thus my grieving and healing cannot be completely separate. However, as with all pieces of grieving, this is personal---and we will each have to carve out how we interact with our online spaces. Yet, striving to make these spaces open to deeper human interaction, will only bring us closer to each other, and as a community---closer to healing.

Just Somebody That I Used To Know

Dear Sibyl, One of my best friends who I have known since kindergarten is slipping away from me.  I'm in my mid-30s and we've have a pretty distant relationship for at least the past 10 years.  I see her several times a year and love her very much.  We have so much past behind us and obviously care about each other but it seems that she puts no effort to be my friend.  When I reach out to her by phone or email, she does not respond.  And when we see each other in person I feel like she doesn't seem that pumped to be with me.  

We both have kids now and I thought that this would bring us closer.  Both of our dads died in the same month and still we can't seem to find a way to communicate like best friends.  It's strange and sad for me.  I don't feel that there is a way of talking about this with her.  It just doesn't really work to ask someone if they don't like you anymore.  

I want her to be a close friend but I don't know how to do it, our friendship seems so empty and what feels like one-sided.  I am certain that we will always know each other since we are basically family.  I think we have a lot less in common now than we did when we were kids but I still love her very much.  What can I do to make it less awkward and more friendly?

Sincerely,

Long Lost Best Friend

Dear LLBF,

When my teenage best friend slept with my first love boyfriend, I not only forgave her, I put her in my wedding as a bridesmaid seven years later.  At the time, I thought I was being so very magnanimous, but now, seeing how that friendship fizzled out over the years as I struggled to keep the connection with letters, emails, and phone calls that went basically unanswered, I think I had a lot to learn about boundaries and letting go.

For so long, I considered myself a pitbull in relationships---intimidating at first, but once you got in, I'd hang on by my eye teeth forever.  I believed that that was what it meant to love someone---to hold on no matter what happened, but over time I found that what I had sunk my teeth into was simply a hungry ghost.  She floated away from me, and in her wake I found that she was actually a pretty terrible friend.  I had been afraid of letting go of our intimacy because I feared I'd lose a part of myself in the process.  What I realized is that I'd always be the young girl who loved her, trusted her, forgave her, and kept reaching for her, but she had moved on, and I needed to as well.

Luckily, as an adult I have worked hard to create a few incredibly honest friendships, the kind where if we have a phone conversation and the other person seems distant one of us calls back pretty soon after to say "That was so weird.  What is really going on?  I think it's me, I'm in a strange place today.  Sorry I made fun of your boyfriend's hair.  He's Sassoon fabulous."

The juxtaposition of these two friendships, one in which I was striving to make something work even though all I was getting was indifference at best and poor treatment at worst, and the others, in which we are so concerned with keeping short accounts with each other that we go the extra mile to check in about the smallest bit of disengagement growing between us, is what I keep thinking about with your question, Long Lost Best Friend.  What you have found yourself in, all these years later, is a non-reciprocal relationship, in which you are doing all the pursuing, and she is distancing as fast as her legs will take her.

The simple fact that you don’t feel like you can share that you feel disconnected from her is a huge red flag to me.  In order to find the friendliness you seek, you actually have to dive further into the awkwardness.  What have you got to lose?  At this point, you don’t have a real friendship, and it’s leaving you with grief and, I imagine, a growing resentment of some kind.  So, my suggestion is that you plan a date with her, sans kids, to sit down and say, “I’ve noticed we’re growing apart, and it’s sad to me.  Do you think it is just an inevitable part of growing up, or has something gone wrong?  I’d really like to work on this with you.  Either way, you are always in my heart and will be in my life.  But I’d like us to be close like we used to be, when we’d be so excited to talk to one another that we could barely wait for the next chance.  Have you felt this too?”

Hopefully, she’ll say, “Yes!  I’m so glad you brought this up.  It pains me too.  How can we make it better?”  And you’ll have a chance to ask her to respond to your emails and phone calls more frequently.  Or, she’ll tell you what she’s been holding on to, some place that the relationship broke down, and the two of you can work it out.

However, she may claim that she doesn’t know what you’re talking about.  This is the time that you stand firm in your reality, and say, “Well, I miss you.  I’d love it if you called more often.  If you can’t do that, I understand, but we’ll lose a connection that we’ve forged over many years, and I’ll be grieving that loss.”  She’ll think you’re brave for stating your truth, and will be flattered that you hold her so highly.  Then you can relegate her to someone who walked alongside you for awhile, hand in hand, but is now on an adjoining path, still moving in the same direction, but with distance between you.  It could free you up to form a closeness with a new best friend, who has the capacity to give you the intimate friendship you crave.

With Love,

Sibyl

Let go of time.

It’s official---we have a legitimate walker in our house.  Our 1-year-old is suddenly, out-of-thin-air toddling around like the tiniest Charlie Chaplin.  She has that hilarious stance: butt jutted out, feet duck-splayed and little arms curled up by her sides.  Sometimes she flaps them just for good measure, as if flying might be next on her list.  Her forward motion is augmented with a side-to-side wobble that threatens to send her scooting to the floor in either direction. I so desperately want to fashion a miniature bowler, cane and moustache and perpetrate it on her.  Occasionally, she revs up the engines a little too high, which can result in face-planting that ranges from controlled to . . . less so. Watching this process, I can feel the anxiety welling to the surface.  I have visions of gluing packing peanuts all over her entire person.  After all, I didn’t spend ten months eating algae-based DHA and another twelve torturing my breasts (THEY USED TO BE AMAZING.  AMAZING.) so that she could crack open her fragile melon with one ambitious step over the dog.  Incidentally, she has negotiated some kind of détente with the Ruby thus far, which seems to involve using her for a taxi, a way station, a pillow, a jungle gym---you name it---in exchange for the dog gaining unfettered access to her head, hands and feet for incessant licking.  It is, all at once, achingly adorable and also disgusting.  But here we are one year into her life and she has six teeth, can eat an entire avocado in one sitting, has finely honed comedic timing and ambulates.

I have spent a good portion of the past three years worrying.  I worried I wouldn’t get pregnant.  I worried she wouldn’t be healthy.  I worried she wouldn’t develop appropriately.  I worried she wasn’t getting enough milk.  I worried I was working too much or too little or some combination of both.  These days I worry she is growing at lightning speed and I am not appropriately savoring every moment.  Having said all that, I would like to take this opportunity, at the start of a new year, this second year of my daughter’s life to stop worrying so much.

Today I was driving through Brooklyn, rushing from working in one location to another.  As is typical, I was contemplating about 1400 tasks and projects while simultaneously replaying Isadora, elated, walking across our living room in my mind.  In this particular scene, she scurried toward the front door, plopped down on her tush and hastily gave herself an enthusiastic round of applause.  This memory prompted an audible laugh.  But my next thought carried the sheen of sadness, “It’s all going by so quickly.”  At that moment, the light turned green, and I noticed the side of the building next to me as I passed.  In large, block letters, someone had stenciled onto the brick, “LET GO OF TIME.”

In 2013, I intend to release my tight clutch on each moment with my daughter while not wasting any more of them at sea with concerns.  This is what parents do.  I am not terribly unique in this.  We claw after the days that slip away and busy ourselves with anxiety over things we can’t control.  But perhaps if I keep reminding myself to loosen the grip now, at the beginning of all her beginnings, I can open up space for even more delighting.

Looking Forward: Solitude.

I landed on the North Island of New Zealand in November 2008. I was alone, except for a mammoth North Face backpack, stuffed to capacity with Dr. Bronner’s peppermint soap and two dozen chocolate-chip Clif Bars. I planned to spend the next four weeks by myself, farm-hopping, if you will, as a participant in an organization called WWOOF (“Worldwide Opportunities on Organic Farms”).

For seven nights, I slept in a trailer on the lawn of a couple in their sixties, who sold produce at local farmers’ markets and ate only raw food. Bedtime came early at this particular household, and I spent hours each night reading by flashlight in my bunk, a hot water bottle nestled at my feet. I felt fragile---emotionally, because the quiet made me nervous, and physically, because I was too unsettled in my new surroundings to stomach the mountains of raw vegetables that were served for dinner each evening.

The next ten days were spent on a small family farm so implausibly lush, I was certain I’d found Tolkien’s Shire. There, I met Jo, a single mother who---on a daily basis---baked bread, practiced yoga, milked goats, trimmed roses, tended an unwieldy flock of chickens, and kept a vegetable garden. She taught me to make pavlova and strawberry jam, clean chicken coops, care for the animals. And at the end of each day, I retired to a cozy cabin in the backyard. I was alone, but exhausted. My body ached in a way that felt satisfying, even pleasurable. I slept soundly.

I ended my trip on Great Barrier Island, where I washed dishes at a local fishing lodge in exchange for a bed and free meals, many of which happened to include lobster. The people there were patient, generous, relaxed. The fishermen---who wore rain slickers and thick white beards, just as I expected fishermen would---took me to sea and taught me to properly cast a line, never batting an eye when I ultimately chose to eat gingersnaps on the boat’s deck rather than participate in the unsavory task of gutting the day’s catch.

One morning before I left, the lodge owners allowed me to take their station wagon to the beach (a terrifying experience, as I’d had no prior experience driving on the left-hand side of the road). When I finally arrived, nauseous and a little shaky, I found the sands deserted, with not a single other beachgoer in sight. And so I spent that afternoon alone, with a book and a sandwich and a sweater to guard against the wind.

I might, at one time, have found this solitude frightening. But on that day I felt adventurous. Like a daring traveler. A wanderer. A pioneer.

Today, as a writer, I spend an inordinate amount of time alone. Depending on my mood and the rhythm of the day, I find this both liberating and lonesome---there are times when I can’t stand the quiet; there are others when it’s nothing short of sublime.

Solitude, I’ve found, is its own kind of wilderness. Becoming familiar with the terrain requires a certain amount of exploration, and a bravery I can’t always find.

But what a pleasure it can be to surrender sometimes---to wander, to get lost, to accept the challenge.

On Flying

Over the holidays we took a short trip up to Pennsylvania to visit my husband’s family. We decided against moving after all and it would be our last trip for awhile with the baby coming in just 7 (!) short weeks. It was a quick weekend trip, but the timing was perfect to see some snow, only Charley’s second time seeing it. He was thrilled; watching it float down through the air was just as magical as I remember. I was glad that at the last minute Charley and I decided to accompany Matt on the trip. Originally I was going to stay home, I’m just getting too big and am exhausted all the time. But seeing his face in the snow made it all worth it. He and Matt spent all day Saturday before New Year’s sledding and building a snow fort as close to six inches blanketed central P.A. I sat by the big picture window in my sister-in-law’s house and watched them from afar, it was almost as much fun. Charley is getting so big, and everyday I have to let him go a little bit more. I read Catherine Newman’s “Bringing up Birdy” on the flight and it was the perfect companion to the trip. In the memoir she is expecting her second just as her son is about to turn three, almost my exact situation. She writes first about the pregnancy and then towards the end about juggling two kids. I was taking notes for that part! After February feels like this scary unknown, but one that I’ve maybe navigated before. Much like driving a well-traveled road through the snowfall. You know the road is there and you know where you are going, but the journey is still frightening.

We had a layover with our flight both ways, and since we booked so last minute (the morning of) our seats were all over the place. The first leg of the trip I managed to sit across the aisle from Matt and Charley. I could kind of lean over and see Charley, but mostly Matt entertained him. The second leg the plane was very small and we switched so that I could sit with Charley on one side and Matt was across the aisle squished next to a larger gentleman. It felt comforting to be near my baby again. I’ve noticed I’m a more nervous flier now as a mom. I grip the seat tightly and for the first time in my life, I watch my son instead of the runway during takeoff and landing. I want to make sure he’s okay, and he always is.

On the way home I ended up several rows behind Matt and Charley and it was nerve-wracking. I wanted to see my little guy and know what he was doing. I had to trust that he was ok with daddy. The very last leg of the trip Matt gave me his first class ticket (he had been bumped before we booked our tickets) and they sat some twenty rows back in coach. At first I was a wreck! It was fun to be in first class, but I kept thinking how much Charley would like the mini water bottle they gave me and the cookies and blanket. I worried about him and it struck me, this is what being a mom of two will be. I have to let go of my firstborn just a little bit and focus on the baby. I have to trust that I’ve taught him well in three years and let dad take over a bit. It was hard, and as soon as the plane landed and people were departing, my eyes scanned the crowd for them. And there was Matt with a sound asleep Charley in his little yellow striped leggings thrown over his shoulder. He told me that he had slept the whole flight.

On finishing what you've started

I started thinking about resolutions early in December, and I finally settled on something specific just in time for the New Year. I knew I wanted to dig deeper and put down roots. I wanted to focus on paying attention and following things through. I had a sense of what my intentions would be for 2013, but I knew I needed something a little more tangible to measure my progress and keep myself on track. Our little dining area is crammed with shelves and shelves of books, a combination of the two libraries and reading histories we brought into our relationship. Over the course of a meal, it’s not unlikely that we’ll pull out one or two, a bilingual dictionary or a novel or a theoretical tome, and mull over its past or flip to a familiar passage. I love our little library, but I’m always aware that it’s laced with a funny little secret.

The truth is, there aren’t so many books on those shelves that I’ve actually finished. Sure, I’ve read zillions and zillions of pages, if you consider them all together, but finishing one whole book is another thing entirely. If you pull out any of the books that are my own, you’re likely to find a bookmark stuck halfway through, or a worn first few chapters followed by crisp, untouched pages through the end. In some cases, I even stopped just a few pages before the end.

It’s not that didn’t love those unfinished books—in fact, I’ve claimed many of them as my favorites. Mostly I’ve just been drowning in reading assignments for the past few years and never felt like I could give my full attention to one whole book before sailing into the next. And maybe, in some cases, I liked those books so much that I didn’t want them to end.

Whatever the reasons may be, those unfinished pages are calling to me, especially now that I’ve got a little more time to attend to them lovingly, rather than whizzing through their pages in a race to some imaginary finish line. I think I set each book aside with a pang of guilt, but also with a glimmer of hope that I’d come back to it sometime in the future and finally do it justice.

A change in my reading habits is just one small example of the attention and depth I hope to cultivate this year, but I think it’s a good place to start. I’ve left plenty of loose ends dangling over the past few years, and I think it’ll feel just right to return to those characters and stories and ideas, one by one, and find out how things turned out.

How to See in the Dark

Sibyl, In the past few months, my family has suffered two major tragedies, and a few minor ones.  Now every time my husband leaves the house and doesn't answer his cell phone I think he's dead.  Most of me knows this is irrational, but until he gets home or contacts me, I'm a bit of a mess.  I can't afford the $170/hr to see a shrink, but sometimes I don't know how I'll move through the world without feeling at any moment someone I love could die or be hurt.  How can I move past this?

Sincerely,

Irrational

Dearest Irrational,

I have good news and bad news.  Since I know it would calm your anxiety to get it out of the way, let's start with the bad news.

You are not going to get past this.  It is going to become part of who you are.  These traumas, whatever they are, are changing and shaping you.  Who you become in the face of them is up to you.

We'll get to that.  Before you can worry about who you're going to be, you have to survive these first traumatized months.  First of all, explain to your husband that for right now, you need him to answer the phone every time you call.  He doesn't have to talk, he can answer with a text that just says "I'm here".  But for right now, that is what you need -- to know that he is alive.

It is perfectly okay to be Irrational right now, when life makes so little sense.  It’s okay to be a mess.  It’s okay to put your hands on his face every time he returns to you, and say, “I thought I lost you.  You’re back.  We’re home.”

If he really objects to this imposition, put a time limit on it, "I just need this for the next 2-4 weeks.  Then we can reassess."  Trauma is a huge relationship litmus test, so if he can be there for you in this, you will only get closer.

Now for some good news: you don’t have to go it alone.   Of course you can't afford $170/hour for a therapist.  Who can?  That fee is absurd.  I don't know where you live, but I bet there's a clinic or a graduate school nearby that has therapy interns that could see you for as little as $25/session.  If you live in California, and any of your recent tragedies are from violent crimes, you can get therapy through a program called Victims of Crime.

So, with a little bit of research about clinics, schools, and resources in your area, you can see a therapist that you can afford to help you through this time.  You'll have to go through this dark period of your life no matter what, but you shouldn't have to go through it without a guide.  Therapists are trained to walk alongside folks who have experienced tragedies while holding the lantern to help them see the way.

So, with your supports in place, you'll be able to dive in to the crux of the matter.  These recent tragedies have pulled the veil off of your life and you are seeing humans for what we really are: ephemeral.  Our lives, no matter how bright and beautiful, will one day pass away.  It is a horrible panic attack-inducing truth.  But it is also what makes our lives have a sense of urgency, what propels us to ever do anything of consequence, what gives us something worth fighting for.

When my beloved father died, I spent a grief-stricken winter laying face up on my bed, immobile, staring at the one lonely snowflake I had hung from my ceiling, reciting my favorite poems and feeling the chill of a world in which my anchor had been pulled up.  I was adrift.  And terrified.

So, when it came time to register for classes at my university, I signed up for an intense course in Death and Dying, in which we read 12 books about death; theological, philosophical, and personal texts.  The professor's father was dying as he taught the class.  He and I spent several afternoons in his office, laughing at the absurdity of death and sitting in silence at the horror of it.  It was insane to immerse myself so fully in my grief, but I had a therapist I trusted and my fiancee by my side, so I dove in.  I needed to make sense of the world before I could commit myself fully to living in it.

Perhaps you are not about to take such an undeniably intellectual pursuit.  However, do something to make sense of your world, or you will find yourself trying to control it in odd ways.  Pulling out bits of your hair and lining them up in straight rows, restricting certain foods to cheat death's knocking, calling your loved ones obsessively -- I've been there, I know this behavior.  But how you face these tragedies will direct a good portion of your life.  Don't judge yourself for however you experience grief, but strive to get the better of it.  Just the fact that you wrote in to this column shows you are ready to face these fears.

Finally, do something that makes you feel really alive.  Take up boxing, write a poem every day, hike the hills behind your house, sing at a monthly open mic night.  Whatever it is, choose something that brings you close to the core of life, but does not throw you over.  Grind your feet into the earth, finding your shoring beneath you.

Remind yourself why you want to remain a citizen of this world.  Give yourself visceral experiences of the beauty of this life, despite the pain we inevitably incur.  Love so fiercely that death has no lasting sting, just a dull ache that reminds you that what you’ve lost lives on in you, propelling you to further bravery in loving.

Love,

Sibyl

A List of Resolutions

I’m not normally very good about New Year’s Resolutions.  In fact, I typically skip them altogether.  It seems when January 1^st rolls around, my life is already in a state of chaos and/or change or I have already adopted any ‘resolutions’ I might make.  But this year is different.  This year I find my life in a near constant state, I’m not planning any moves, I already have a job (or two) that I like, things are stable. So the door is open for resolutions.  After listening to the goals and commitments of my friends and family for years, I finally have my own resolutions.

• Be a grown up: Put away money for a rainy day, update important things like health insurance and retirement plans, get a handle on my taxes and generally be a responsible adult.
• Be a great friend: make the phone calls first, send long emails, write letters. I treasure my relationships, especially those with my friends---its important to act like it.
• Take care of me: develop healthy eating and exercise habits.  My sister once told me that she exercised because she feels (and I agree) that she’s pretty awesome and “that much awesomeness deserves to last as long as possible and be as healthy as possible”.
• Read to expand my horizons:  Books about science, religion, and interesting biographies are on my list, as well as dipping into poetry and essays.
• Set goals: I’m kind of a float-through-life gal; setting goals on a monthly basis will help me stay on top of my resolutions and give me a rush when I cross things off.
• Direction, dreams, and discovery:  These are my keywords for 2013.  I’m not one for corporate dreams or following a set path, but there are still things I want to accomplish and places I want to focus my energies. I want to see where projects or ideas might lead me; it’s thrilling and exhilarating to think about all the new things I might do, learn, and create.

May your 2013 be everything you could hope for and more!