Happily Alone, Happily Not

I walked alone, and I didn't have to negotiate conflicts or walk faster or slower. But I had no one with whom to share my thoughts and observations.

I shopped alone, and I didn't have to say "no" or "we'll see" or "I'll think about it" every five minutes. But I talked myself out of things that looked good, and I had to push the heavy cart all by myself.

I ate alone, and there was just one dish to clear and a little leftover to put away. But there was no one to comment on the food or the day.

I spent the day home alone, and there was neither noise to interrupt my concentration, nor distraction to upend my work. But the uninterrupted quiet made me sad and the undistracted focus gave me a headache.

I was briefly responsible for no one but myself, which made me feel free, but made me feel kind of lost at the same time.

I sat alone, which gave me a bit of peace, but made me feel very lonely.

I spoke alone, which allowed me to finish a thought, but meant that no one heard it.

I woke up early alone, which gave me time to work and think, but made me wonder why I wasn't cozy and warm like everyone else.

I enjoyed my moments alone, but was glad when I wasn't alone any more...

Advantage-You

This morning I happened upon a paraphrase of an Eleanor Roosevelt quote--"No one can take advantage of you without your permission." As I made my way through an upside down kind of a day, I thought a lot about the quotation. While I do a lot each day to shape how my life and work will turn out, there are absolutely times when I feel blown along with the circumstances, taken advantage of at every turn. What am I doing on a given day? I'm not sure--someone else is deciding. Will I make progress? I don't know--that's in someone else's hands. While it may be true that certain things are beyond our control, this quotation was a reminder to me that "beyond our control" doesn't have to mean beyond our comfort level. While we may not be able to make every decision about how our days, and our lives, will turn out, we can take some control of how we are treated. We can speak up, both for what we believe in and for what we are worth. We can say "no" when we need to and "yes" when we want to. We can be at least somewhat in charge of the flow of our days, even if we can't always control how they end.
 
Both freelancing and parenthood require a lot of adaptability and daily readjustment. There's nothing wrong with having to roll with change--on the contrary, it may be one of the most important life skills we can have. The key is to re-adjust without giving up, to adapt without losing who we really are and what we really want. To give a little permission to the world, but to hold on to the advantage for ourselves. Because that is something that no one should be able to take.

New Rules

We hopped a bus to a new place, so new, it was a bus we'd never ridden before. We crossed new streets, saw new roads, discovered a new sense of time. We looked for old interests in new destinations. We had new conversations and new impressions of each other. We found some new patterns and discovered some new talents. We took an old kind of day and made some new memories. We followed the old rules, but made some new ones along the way. And in the process, we began to see just a little differently. We allowed ourselves to feel just a little differently. We opened ourselves to just a little more of the world, and found that we were just a little happier.
 
We, whether as workers, or as parents, as students, or as volunteers, tend to live by sets of rules made by others for situations that are sometimes relevant, sometimes not. Rules can give us structure. They can light our path, and give us clarity in what might otherwise become chaos. But sometimes, a few new rules, even just for a very short time, can be just what we need to make a discovery or two. Sometimes, some new rules can make all the difference in the world in how we see, how we feel, and how we play this crazy game of life...

Day Off, Wrong Shoes On

Caught up in all I was doing at home on this (once again) unexpected day off ("day off" isn't for a freelancer always as welcome a surprise as it might be for many), I discovered that I had walked out of my apartment to meet my son's bus wearing the shoes I usually reserve for just in my apartment or building. It was too late to go back--I might miss the bus--and anyway, it wasn't that they'd be ruined. It was simply that they aren't meant for long walks, and, okay, they look a little ridiculous with bright orange patterned socks.
 
So there I was, hoofing it the few blocks to the bus stop, wishing that my feet were more supported and sure that my lower half would be cause for laughter from the hundreds of strangers one passes on a few-block walk in New York City.
 
When I returned with my son a half hour later, I was eager to rest my feet. But I realized that not a single person--those I knew and those I didn't--had even looked at my feet. If anyone did, I certainly didn't know it. And on this not-working afternoon, I learned a few things...
 
1. Most of the time, people are way too wrapped up in their own lives and concerns to be at all aware of your life and concerns, much less the shoes and socks on your feet.
 
2. There is something oddly satisfying about being so consumed with what you are doing that you forget what shoes you are wearing.
 
3. Being around to do the things you don't usually get to do (no matter what shoes you're wearing while doing them) is a good reminder that, even for a freelancer, a day off doesn't have to be a disaster.
 
4. Sometimes, it takes not having enough time for a redo to remind you how adaptable you really are.
 
5. Feet can survive mistakes and people can survive mistakes, a lot more often than you might think.
 
And thus ends the day off with the wrong shoes...

Energy Efficient

Even for people who seem to possess boundless energy, there is a limit. We can dedicate ourselves to a variety of causes and a variety of people, but all of our dedication has to fit into finite periods of time. We can use whatever energy we have, but energy too is finite, making it important to choose wisely about what endeavors we "plug in" to. Just as our dishwasher, which we hardly notice, and our air conditioner, which we often feel we can't live without, take more running energy than just about anything else in our homes, the parts of our lives that sap our energy are varied, and sometimes not entirely clear. When we come home from work, are we exhausted because we worked so hard, or because we spent the day dealing with gossip and baggage and the latest stresses of individuals or the group? When we are dealing with the business of running a family, are we worn out because there is so much to do, or because of the constant negotiation between available opportunities and available funds? Are we tired from being up late with our kids, or are we just tired from handling their drama?
 
Managing our energy isn't necessarily about not doing. Just as we wouldn't just stop using our air conditioner or our dishwasher, we don't have to pull back from everything in order to maintain our energy for the important things. We simply need to be energy efficient. Rather than allowing our energy to go toward drama and gossip and baggage, we can choose to put it toward actual accomplishment. Rather than getting caught up in discussions that go in circles, we can choose to focus elsewhere while waiting for the outcomes of the circles.
 
Being energy efficient isn't just about "buying the right appliances." It's about making the choices that save our energy for the important things. And that is a "purchase" we can decide on each and every day.

Curve Balls

It seems I am always looking for the perfect pitch--the job or situation that will check all the boxes. It will be steady and dependable. It will allow me both to spread my wings as a professional and to be there when needed as a parent. It will give me both sanity and euphoria. It will make me know exactly where to swing to make the biggest hit.
 
What I seem to end up with most of the time are curve balls. Instead of knowing just where the hit will be, I find myself guessing--swinging when I can, but never quite sure where each swing will leave me, when the balls seem to veer off at the last minute every time.
 
I am no baseball expert, but I would presume that curve balls must be among the hardest to hit. They mess with our expectations. They set us up, just to take us down. They leave us wondering what exactly just happened.
 
And so it is that a life filled with curve balls also becomes a tricky one. We expect one thing, and we get another. We prepare for a big swing, only to be left wondering what happened. We find ourselves wishing for just a straight pitch, so that we can really see what our swing is like. We find ourselves searching for the expected, the predictable, so that we have some idea of what the outcome will be.
 
Ultimately, however, it is the curve balls that keep the game, and the game of life, interesting. What will we batters do when the ball doesn't land quite where we expected? What kind of fancy footwork will it take to shift when the world shifts under us? It may seem that we are looking for the perfect pitch, but would we enjoy that every time? Or would we be bored and start looking for more of a challenge? The curve balls often allow--okay, force--us to stretch a little. They force us to think a little faster, to try a little harder, to believe in ourselves a little more. So maybe it's not the perfect pitch we're after after all. Perhaps it's just the set of skills to be able to hit all the pitches, and the vision to see (and not be blindsided by) what's coming at us.
 
Curve balls, fast pitches, change ups? Bring 'em on. I'll just have to make sure I come out swinging.

Nail-Biter

It was a nail-biter--a little league game full of walks and steals and shifting of the leading score. Did the outcome matter tremendously? Not really. While it was the last game of the regular season, it was unlikely to change the standings much, and even if it did, this was little league. And yet, I sat in the stands, feeling every run scored, every error that caused the opposing team to retake the lead, all as if the outcome would matter greatly to our lives.
 
It sounds ridiculous, I know. And yet, as I think about my state of mind in the bleachers, I think about how a while back, baseball wouldn't have mattered. How a while back, I might have been in the bleachers, but not particularly engaged in the game. So, while the stakes here probably did not warrant the biting of nails or a sinking feeling each time the other team scored, I realized that it actually felt good to be invested enough to care. While I might not have been following every play in the game, I sat on the edge of my seat. It mattered to me what happened. I had somehow, along the way, changed from a parent who was there because I had to deliver my kid to a parent who was engaged in the activity itself. Was I one of the screaming ones? No. I sat quietly, biting my nails when necessarily, but watching intently this activity that my son has come to love.
 
Keeping up with the activities of a family is not easy. It puts me on the go most of the time. It takes me, literally and emotionally, all over the map. I was reminded today, however, that keeping up is made a whole lot better by truly investing, by being there, bitten nails and all, not just dropping off and stepping back. And perhaps that's true for all of life. Perhaps it is when we truly invest in our endeavors that we feel a real connection to them.
 
My son's team won the nail biter, through no particular help of mine, but with my eyes watching every minute. And while my nail-bitten hands may never be quite the same, I am happy to see that my connection is new and different too.