Author Archives: Sherri

It’s OK to Cry

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I distinctly remember the day that I discovered the existence of the Bassner Third Tear Duct (members of our family seem to have an extra tear duct and cry at the drop of a hat). It was the day of my sister’s wedding. The three of us (me who was a bridesmaid, my next older sister who was the bride, and my oldest sister who was Maid of Honor) were standing in the hallway outside of the Rabbi’s office. The Ketuba had been signed and so it was time for the ceremony. Wendy was fixing Beth’s dress; I was poking at Beth trying to make her laugh. Our Dad rounded the corner to tell us it was time to gather, saw the three of us, burst into tears, and ran the other way. He cried the whole way down the aisle; he cried through the whole ceremony; he cried walking back up the aisle until someone put a scotch into his hand just outside the sanctuary door. It was the first time I’d seen my Dad cry. And it seemed like that opened the flood gates. He never stopped! Every emotional event, every sentimental second, started the watery eyes. It was a beautiful thing!

I, of course, am my father’s daughter. I am very emotional and sentimental. I cry at AT&T commercials. I cry at predictable sappy endings to movies and TV shows. I cry at the end-of-the-news-happy-story segments. I’ve realized, though, that it’s more than sentiment. I also cry when I am angry or frustrated or tired or “hangry” or if I don’t feel well. Crying is the way I express almost ANY intense emotion. It’s a good thing but it can also be a problem. So, this essay is a Public Service Announcement for all those who share the extra tear duct: It’s OK to Cry.

Just as I remembered the moment I learned the existence of the familial extra tear duct, I also remember the exact moment my career advancement ended at my first employer. Return with me to the stressful days of the fall of 2001. All you have to say is “9/11” and everyone knows exactly what day you are referencing. I was less than a year back on US soil after my expat assignment in Mexico, marinating in a role that was very exciting yet was a bit much for me to bite into at that early stage. The economy had fallen off a cliff after 9/11 and I was in a meeting discussing who I was going to fire from my organization. I had only had to fire a couple of random people in my career to this point but this was going to be a big one. And everyone I was firing were friends of mine! The stress level was enormous. I had never been through an economic downturn as a senior leader and was privy to information I had never had access to before. It was mind-blowing! The casualness that my fellow managers were taking toward upending the lives of dozens of people was distressing. And I won’t even get into some of the personal issues I was juggling. Halfway through the meeting, I burst into tears. The stress got to be too much and that’s how my body released the tension. I remember a co-worker exclaiming, with pity in her voice, “Oh, Sherri!” That was it. I KNEW in that moment that I would not advance further in my career in that company.

Crying, particularly in a business setting, is the ultimate sign of weakness. Or, it’s interpreted that way. For me, though, it is simply how I blow steam. Once I let some tears out, I get ahold of myself and think clearly and effectively again. Even in that fateful meeting, once I hit that pressure relief valve, I was able to focus and get the job done. But that’s not how others see it. I often wonder what would have happened if, instead of releasing stress by crying, I had gotten angry and started pounding the table. Would I have been seen as someone fighting for my organization? As a “truth teller”? Or what if I had just gone silent? Bottled up all that stress and went home and punched a wall? For better or worse, people who get angry (often men) are seen as strong; as fighters. And people who cry (often women) are seen as weak. It pisses me off! And THAT can make me cry! Dammit!

What can piss me off even more is that when men cry publicly, it is often seen as expression of strength! As in, “he’s so strong he can allow himself to cry in public!” Give me a break! If I could control when I cry, I’d do it. But I can’t. It’s simply my body’s way of saying, “You want to burst an artery or do you want to relieve this stress by crying? (Pause) I thought so.”

Crying can even be helpful in getting what you want. If I say I don’t feel well and that is accompanied by tears, Trish knows immediately it’s time to go get Won Ton soup. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gotten onto a flight that should have been closed or into a hotel room that should have gone to someone else. I don’t do this on purpose. The tears are sincere. Everyone can tell a fake cry. They just happen to be extremely effective, at least with anyone who has a heart.

I get it, though. We have been socialized for ages to see crying as a sign of weakness. I admit that I find myself judging those who publicly display that extra tear duct as well. I catch myself in that judgement and walk it back, but it’s an instinctive response. I’m lucky. At this point in my life, I can pretty much cry whenever the mood strikes. I don’t fight it because I don’t fear judgement anymore nor does someone else’s judgement affect me much. OK, so I get a little annoyed when I’m crying at a TV commercial and Trish catches me (“are you crying at that puppy?!”), but she’s allowed. I’m proud to share my father’s softer side. And if someone else starts to cry, I will cry with them. In fact, there are two things I can never let someone do alone: cry and throw up. So, it’s never a good idea to get sick in my presence.  Anyway, if showing my emotion helps someone else to embrace theirs, and not bottle it up and express that intensity in less productive ways, then I feel I’ve done a public service.

So, go ahead, criers! Cry at weddings and funerals! And birthday parties! And movies and TV shows and stories about pets that were just adopted. And when you are angry, or frustrated, or happy, or any intense emotion, just let it out! Because you know that irrespective of the judgement of others, that’s how you manage strong emotion most effectively.

I did just fine in my career even after that crying stint. Later in my career, I dealt with extreme frustration through yelling at my boss and it got me fired. Probably should have cried.

The Holiness of Barbie Redux

Prologue

I mentioned last time that A LOT has been going on during my sabbatical from writing. One of those things is a reconnection and reaffiliation with my Jewish faith. Expect more writing to come on Jewish themes, but in the meantime, I wanted to post something I wrote about 15 years ago. It is an essay inspired by an experience at a Shabbat morning service and it was published in the quarterly magazine of the US Conservative Judaism movement. It is by far my most read piece since that magazine went out to about a quarter of a million homes. Since it is no longer available on the USCJ’s website, I wanted to repost here (and a few of you have asked me to do so over the years). Without further ado, then, the essay exactly as written, with a short epilogue:

The Holiness of Barbie

I have a confession. I sometimes feel as if I am faking it as a Jew.

Born into a Jewish family, I feel inferior to converted Jews. They know so much more about being Jewish than I do! Why didn’t I study more? Why don’t I study more now? Have I questioned enough? Am I just going through the motions and habits from childhood? These questions have been dogging me for the last three years. Then, one Shabbat morning a few months ago, a little girl and her Barbie doll taught me a lesson I’ll never forget about what it really means to be born and raised Jewish.

To understand my uncertainty, you need to understand my personal Jewish history. I was raised in a traditional Jewish home (somewhere between Conservative and Orthodox) and had a bat mitzvah at 13. Along with most of my classmates, I drifted slowly away from my formal Jewish upbringing when I went off to college. I never stopped identifying as Jewish but my observance of the traditions faded as I moved away from home and started my life as an independent adult. In another entirely unremarkable twist, I began drifting back toward religious observance in my mid-40s when I began to attend open high holiday services with the local Reconstructionist congregation. It accelerated when I broke up with my longtime Christian partner. I like to think that I suddenly felt free to explore my spirituality, but that’s not fair. The reality was that as I struck out on my own again, I needed a sense of community.

I rationalize my lack of Jewish knowledge by looking at chronology. Coming of age in a traditional shul as a girl in the late 1960s/early 1970s, I wasn’t given the same training as my male counterparts. At least, that’s what I tell myself. My bat mitzvah was a Friday night service and my role was limited to a few key prayers, a lot of responsive English reading, and chanting the haftarah. I remember the boys studying and studying for their bar mitzvahs. Their Shabbat morning event involved a lot more than just chanting the haftarah. They led every aspect of the service, including reading from the Torah. I remember that mixture of relief (that I didn’t have to learn so much) mixed with a bit of jealousy (that I didn’t get to learn so much). I have a distinct memory of one of my male friends whispering every word of the Amidah as he prayed next to me one Shabbat morning. I only pretended to read while I waited for everyone to start sitting down so I could sit, too. What I really wanted, though, was to know every word like he did.

My return to shul began when a colleague from work died and I attended the memorial service. Something just felt right about the place. A few years later, when the congregation moved to a beautiful new building on my side of the valley, I took that as a sign. “If Beth El was the right place for my friend, it just might be the right place for me.” I started going to Shabbat services at the beginning of the summer and paid up my membership in time to get a ticket for the high holidays. I soaked in the sense of community from day one. The feel of the sanctuary was overwhelming. I felt hugged and loved by the familiarity of the ritual of the service. It was probably a year before I could get through a service without crying at some point. Most of the time it was the Shema that got me. (It still does.) Often, it’s Etz Hayim, particularly when I’m up at the ark, standing so close to the Torah and surrounded by the congregation’s voice echoing in prayer.

I found, though, that it had been so long since I had prayed at Shabbat services that I had forgotten the flow of the service. As I began to attend services regularly, I realized that I never had known what the service really meant. Oh, the prayers were familiar. The tunes were pretty much the same. I remembered the basic sections of the service. But I didn’t understand it. When I was a kid, I didn’t really care, but as an adult, it didn’t feel right to just be there.

I began to question how I was able to identify so strongly as a Jew if I never lived in or kept a kosher home, never was shomer shabbos, and didn’t even know the prayers! How could I consider myself a real Jew when all I did was follow along, sing familiar tunes, and know when to stand up and when to sit down? I was embarrassed at my lack of scholarship and understanding; I felt like a fraud. Even now, do I mimic more than I understand? I began to read the commentary and translations; I began to think about the flow of the service; I began to understand what the prayers meant and why we said them. But as I learned more, my discomfort grew. Did I learn this as a child and just forget it? Or was I just never taught this?

Enter that little girl and her Barbie doll. I’ve been a member of the synagogue for almost three years now and I am a regular on Shabbat. Services were in the chapel that morning. Services were a little more crowded than usual as the winter weather was giving way to early spring and the prospect of getting up and out to services became more palatable. I was asked to carry the Torah that morning, my favorite honor. I can’t help but hug the Torah while I sing the Shema. I always walk slowly through the congregation, making sure everyone has the chance to approach the Torah, to honor and bless it. I had rounded the corner at the back of the chapel, carrying the Torah back to the ark, and was slowly running the gantlet down the center aisle. With the full house, the pathway quickly narrowed as people crowded into the aisle. The smiling faces closed in. I turned to the left, turned to the right. I waited as the outstretched hands, shielded by tallitot and prayer books, reached out to connect with the Torah.

About halfway down the aisle, I saw her. She was no more than three years old and had been coming to services ever since she was an infant. She stood slightly behind her father’s leg, one hand clutching his pants behind the knee, the other clutching Barbie. As her father stepped into the aisle to make room for others to reach the Torah, she stepped with him and was almost directly in front of me. There were people all around us, so many that it felt like it was just the two of us. I looked down at her from around the Torah’s mantle. She looked up at me, clear blue eyes through brown curls. She first looked back and forth between me and the Torah. We were surrounded by song as the cantor and congregation chanted. Then she looked up at her father, then at the others all leaning in around us before she caught my eyes again. They were all reaching to the Torah’s mantle. She wasn’t wearing a tallis. She wasn’t carrying a prayer book. So she reached up with her doll, touched Barbie to the Torah’s mantle, and then kissed Barbie’s head. Everyone smiled.

And right then, right at that very moment, as we laughed and my heart just flooded with that absolute joy I felt with the Torah in my arms and surrounded by this community. Right then, I understood the incredible blessings of my Jewish childhood. This little child understood something very simple: That beautiful object that woman is carrying, it is holy and special. I shouldn’t touch it directly. But I have to bless it. I’ll use Barbie. That was all she knew, yet that is all we ever need to know. The purity of holiness, the safety of community, the blessed nature of the Shabbat service. The scholarship will come later, just as it has for me. I look forward the day a decade from now when I will watch that little girl be called to the Torah as a bat mitzvah. I will follow her as she leads the service and listen as she reads from the Torah and chants the haftarah. But she learned what she really needed to know those Shabbat mornings, clinging to her father’s leg and blessing the Torah with Barbie.

I learned those lessons, too, even though I don’t remember them. They are within the tears that well up still when I close my eyes and recite the Shema. They are there when I walk into the shul on Shabbat, take a deep breath, and feel peace. What a gift, those lessons from my Jewish childhood! What a gift, the holiness of Barbie.

Epilogue

I did, indeed, attend this young girl’s Bat Mitzvah. I had long since moved to the Philly suburbs and the Rabbi reached out, asking if he could use the essay in his comments to her that day. I decided to drive up and attend. Imagine my surprise when the Rabbi read almost the entire essay to her as the majority of his remarks! I listened through tears as he read the essay exactly as I heard it in my head as I was writing—same emphasis, same intonation. I have never felt so heard nor so validated. I am still extremely proud of this piece of work. This “little girl” is now spending a gap year in Israel before she matriculates to college. Tempus fugit.

What I Did on My Summer Vacation

I’m back! Some of you are thinking, “I wondered if you were ever going to post again!” Others are thinking, “Gee, I guess I haven’t seen a post from you in a while!” A not-insignificant-number are thinking, “Am I still subscribed to this site?” Regardless, I am going to assume that you all are thrilled to get a blog post from me again, just as I am thrilled to be writing again, and Trish is (sort of) thrilled to be editing again. My last post was way back in January of this year on my Five Year Blogiversary. In it, I hinted that I might be taking a break from posting since I had felt my writing had become…stale. I needed to rethink what I wanted to accomplish. Then life happened. SO MUCH has happened over the last nine months! Over time, I will fill you in, but we’ll start small.

Let’s start with the message from the Universe that got me to sit down at the keyboard again. I was in the airport almost two weeks ago, heading down to Atlanta (more on that in a bit). I was in that scrum of people that forms around the gate when they make the preboard announcements and I had just maneuvered myself into position to be first in line for Group 4. I heard a familiar voice and turned around to see one of my all-time favorite co-workers from my Air Products days behind me, talking on his phone. I leaned over, smiling, and caught his eye. Between waiting to board and then wandering down to baggage claim in Atlanta, Ron and I had a few minutes to catch up. It was so wonderful to see him! We hadn’t crossed paths in at least 10 years. Ron is one of those people who was always a joy to be around. We caught up on work (he is actually retiring and was on his “farewell tour” to see key customers). We caught up on his kids (he now has an adorable toddler granddaughter). And I was treated to a classic Ron “Dad joke” (“Two of my sons are actuaries! What are the odds?!”). Then he said something to me that I was not expecting: “I haven’t seen a blog post from you in ages! Why aren’t you writing? I looked forward to those posts. It’s how I stayed connected with you.”

There are so many reasons why I write. I write to get thoughts organized in my head and then out of my head. I simply find the process enjoyable. When I read something I’ve written and pronounce it “good,” that is very satisfying. I started the blog to capture the myriad coaching lessons I had absorbed over my professional years and that I imparted to those younger who might benefit from that experience. As I finished capturing those thoughts in a range of posts, the blog evolved to more broad thinking about life, although almost every “life lesson” can be applied in a work environment and vice-versa. And, I realize, I write to connect. I write to share a bit of myself with others; to receive a bit from others as they share thoughts and comments back with me; and, in some little way, to stay connected with a bunch of people with whom I’ve crossed paths over the years. I have found that connection of all sorts becomes more and more important as you get older, so whatever I can do to maintain and build community and connection has increasingly become a focus in my life. So, I’m writing again because I want that connection. I will write when I have something to say and post when I believe the writing is solid enough to share. I resolve to be a little lighter in presentation, since laughing (or at least chuckling) makes anything more enjoyable.

What do I have to say today? Well, I want to share with you what the last six weeks of my life have been like. More specifically, I want to share some thoughts on what I’ve learned from that time. From July 21 (when I left home for a trip to Atlanta) to August 31 (when I finally put my suitcase away), I have spent only six days at home. That time period included:

  • An initial one week trip to Atlanta
  • An 18 day journey from Vancouver to a cruise in and around Alaska
  • A second, 10 day trip to Atlanta to be there for my Mom’s major surgery (she is, thankfully, doing great!)
  • A head cold
  • My first bout with COVID
  • And a sinus infection (bonus visit to Urgent Care in Atlanta)

What have I learned?

  • Obvious observation: I can no longer travel as well as I used to travel. I caught the head cold on the way back from that first trip to Atlanta. I was not over it when I came down with COVID on the cruise. I was barely functional on my second trip to Atlanta, staying masked 12 hours a day which probably led to the sinus infection.
  • Everyone around me has learned The Second Rule of Sherri: If Sherri is miserable, everyone is miserable. I am not proud of this behavior. When I finally stopped feeling like I was swallowing shards of glass and apologized to my travel mates in Anchorage, no one argued with me that I’d been a pain the ass. My dear sister had to not only deal with the stress of Mom’s surgery, but take me to CVS four times, Urgent Care once, and then deal with me complaining, coughing, and snorting 24/7. She deserves a medal. Trish’s suffering was further compounded by getting COVID from me. (The First Rule of Sherri, by the way, is: Feed Sherri on time and at regular intervals. That’s for another essay.)
  • The bears in Alaska must be a myth because we saw no bears, save for one humongous one in a wildlife reserve. Ditto for moose.
  • These challenges are always sent to you for a reason. I believe the reason for this trial was to push me out of my comfort zone and back into action. I had gotten too consumed by completing my Daily Challenges in on-line solitaire, Spider solitaire, Sudoku, and a tile matching game. I think I need a little more out of life.

Checking in on line for the final flight home, American offered me an upgrade to First Class for $69. Was there a question in there? As I settled into my seat, I thought about breaking my “no drinking” rule while flying, then I remembered I’m on antibiotics for the sinusitis and shouldn’t drink. As I sipped my vodka/cranberry, I noticed that I had slipped into a kind of numbness. I was physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausted, yet I was feeling good about Mom’s recovery and allowed myself to remember all the GOOD parts of the vacation (of which there were many). These last six weeks were surely a test—as well as a kick in the pants to get moving again. I have so much to tell you about! This essay is a good start. More to come.

On My Five Year Blogiversary

On January 25, 2019, I took a big breath and hit “Publish” on sherribassner.com.  In preparation for writing this essay, I decided to reread all I’ve written over these five years: about 130 essays, and around 156,000 words.  It took me a while.  My first thought was, “Wow—I’ve written a book.  Maybe two books.”  I guess I can say that’s one life goal met.

My second thought was, “Just goes to show—when you really have passion for something and make it a priority, you can do big things.”  To get to this point, I had to first figure out HOW to create a blog.  I started, cleverly, by Googling, “How to create a blog.”  Oftentimes, for me, just that first step is an impassable barrier.  But I found a tutorial on how to create a website and set up a basic blog (the creator got a commission from my hosting site) and got going.  Putting my writing out there was really scary.  I am not known for having a thick skin but if I was going to do this, I had to accept the vulnerability.  I oscillated between just wanting to keep this among my friends and family and, of course, wanting to be a viral sensation and Oprah or Brené Brown getting me a book deal.  I’m pretty happy with where things have landed. I have somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 subscribers, which means that in addition to my close friends and family, there are a bunch of acquaintances and even people I don’t know at all who felt compelled enough by something I wrote to go through the process of subscribing.  In addition to the subscribers, each post gets somewhere around an additional 50-100 hits.  While this doesn’t really sound like a lot of people, I am still amazed that that many people occasionally read something I wrote!  Know that I am so honored each time one of you chooses to read an essay.

As I read through the body of work, I noticed a few things.  First, that the initial year was pretty strong!  I credit both Trish’s editing skill (who knew I mixed tenses so frequently?) and the fact that most of those first essays were thoughts that had been clogging my brain for years.  If you are new-ish to the blog and are looking for those essays focused more on career coaching, you’ll find most of them in those first two years.  Those lessons still resonate.  As time went on and I began to write more about “life lessons,” the pull-through of those topics I coached on was pretty clear.  It’s a reminder to all of us that there is not a big difference between effective behavior in the workplace and effective behavior in life—as well as the importance of being your authentic self in both arenas.

My favorite pieces tend to be the “theme arcs.”  Early on there was the three part-er on Transitioning to Retirement.  A bit later was a deep series on creating sustainable change in yourself, anchored by the example of the weight loss journey that Trish and I went on during the pandemic.  I have written many times in these essays that I know I am not breaking new philosophical ground with what I write.  I hope, though, that I am finding ways of expressing thoughts that help you better internalize and then act on the lessons.  I know when I read on personal growth, I am rarely confronted with brand new thinking.  However, I am often exposed to ways of thinking about a topic that make me say, “I never thought about it that way” which helps me internalize and use a thought more effectively.  I hope I’ve been able to occasionally do that for some of you.

I also hope I’ve made you laugh a bit.  My all-time favorite essay has to be A Day in the Life, the story of when Trish and I got new cell phones.  I can be a very serious person, especially in my writing, yet I try to inject humor when I can.  Laughing, particularly laughing at yourself, is one of the healthiest things you can do.  This is a crazy world we live in and it can be easy to get caught up in all the drama.  One of my themes continues to be taking a deep breath and recognizing that you can only control so much.  Giving yourself the grace to laugh and release a little of that external stress gives you the fortitude and energy to then work to effect change outward.

Speaking of external stressors, 2020 provided a lot of food for thought and writing.  What a year that was!  A global pandemic, a contentious election, and a lot of social unrest.  It was fascinating to live through that.  My writing during that time captured the angst, yet I was glad to see I didn’t totally dwell on it.  My journal is another story!  And, when I was going through my hard drive printing out essays, I found several drafts that I had written during that time that I just couldn’t publish.  There was a lot of rage that I wasn’t comfortable sharing.

Things have settled down a bit for now, yet I know there will still be much to write about going forward.  I do feel, though, that I am at a bit of an inflection point.  To me, the Abecedarium started to become a bit derivative toward the end.  While I was gratified to see that I hadn’t repeated myself too much in the bulk of my writing, over these last few months I kept circling around the same thoughts.  Maybe it was the pressure of my self-imposed biweekly publishing deadline.  Maybe I just need to take a little time to reset.

I’m going to close this reflective essay with a request.  Over these last five years, I’ve gotten amazing feedback and encouragement from so many of you.  If you have some thoughts to share with me on what kinds of essays you’ve enjoyed the most or found most useful, I would appreciate hearing that.  Is there anything in particular you’d like me to write about more (or less)?  I know I’m going to keep this blog going for at least a little while longer (I just re-upped the hosting fees for another year) but I am going to back off the biweekly posting goal.  I want to make sure when I post something, it is on a topic I have felt strongly about.  My frequency will be more unpredictable.  (Don’t worry—there are at least three topics going on in my head right now.)

Thank you for joining me on this very personal journey.  As noted above, I am humbled that you have taken the time to read some of my writing and have found it enjoyable/useful.  While I started writing for me, I keep writing for you.  Oh, and if anyone has any thoughts on how I might get a book deal, I’m all ears!  Apparently, I’m going to need the income since Trish says she’s going to start charging me editing.

“Z” is for Zoo

Happy New Year, my loyal readers, and welcome to the final installment of our year-long Abecedarium!  I’ve thought long and hard about the best way to wrap up this journey.  I could have written some sort of “best of” list, which seems too common at the end of a year.  I could have written some deep thoughts about this journey we’ve been on together.  But, since the year-end is usually a Zoo for us all, I thought humor might be the best way to go.  Herewith, a slightly fictionalized recap of these last two weeks, presented in four parts, since while the truth has its funny moments, making some stuff up is way more fun.  I’ll leave it up to you to determine what is fact and what is fiction!

Part One:  The Great Eating (and Drinking)

The week leading up to Christmas is a time of social gatherings, eating, drinking, and general merry making.  As a Jew, I did not really participate in much of this most of my life.  Hannukah has its latkes and brisket, but it doesn’t hold a candle (pun intended) to what I’ve stepped into since I slid into Trish’s social circle.  All I want to do during this week is sleep, eat beans, and feel normal.  Instead, I never know what day it is, I have heartburn every night along with alcohol-induced insomnia, and a daily 5:00 am wake-up call from Baxter.  OK, so the Baxter wake-up call happens every day but it’s more annoying to have a kitten wail one inch from your face when you are uncomfortable and haven’t slept.

Our engagements included: 

  • Three “light” dinners at friends’ houses, involving delicious but constipating appetizers, wine, lots of red meat, wine, heavy desserts, wine, and cookies.  Always cookies.  And wine.
  • A Christmas cookie bake sale to support a cat rescue (more cookies).
  • A traditional Christmas Eve Eve neighborhood party (more wine, “signature” cocktails, constipating appetizers, heavy desserts, along with conversations for hours amidst so much background noise that my aging hearing only picked up half of what was said).
  • Christmas Eve with part of the family that involved (all together now) wine, constipating appetizers, and cookies.

By the time Christmas morning broke, I was exhausted.

Part Two: Presents

Trish and I live by a certain Fairness Doctrine.  We split household chores and are constantly afraid the other one is doing “more” so we fight to scoop the cat litter or take out the trash.  Gift-giving is no different.  My birthday falls a week before hers, so if I feel she has “outdone” me in the gift-buying, I have a week to fill in gaps.  But Christmas morning means we open gifts at the same time, so there is always a little panic.  Plus, since I have a really hard time keeping gifts until the appointed day, I tend to wrap them as soon as I buy them and put them away.  This means I forget what I’ve bought her.  The bad part of this characteristic is that I over buy.  The good part is that her gift-opening is just as exciting for me as it is for her!  I can’t wait to see what I got her!

This Christmas morning was wonderful.  Baxter let me sleep until almost 6:00 am.  We put the Yule Log channel on the TV.  We made decadent breakfasts, partly to hold us until the family gathering and partly because, well, why not?  We ate a few cookies.  Here are the winners of the 2023 Gift Awards:

  • Best Gift I Asked For:  A T-shirt from the Drunk Phils Fans Facebook page.  We are big fans of our Phillies (baseball team) and, as such, complain about them all the time.  This Facebook page is a riot—and they have merch.  Proceeds (supposedly) go to local charities.  Their motto:  Our Bases are Always Loaded.  I will wear that T-shirt with pride!
  • Best Gift I didn’t Ask For:  The book What an Owl Knows.  I’m sure it was on my wishlist.  A non-fiction book about owls.  Nothing could be better!  I tend not to buy myself books anymore because I still have SO MANY that need to be read.  However, I can’t wait to dig into this one!
  • Riskiest Gift: An Instant Pot.  I told Trish I did NOT want an Instant Pot because I get skittish about pressure cookers.  I have no idea why.  I must have had an accident with one in a previous life.  However, I have been intrigued and three of my favorite people have one.  Over the last week or so, I’ve been watching videos, joining Facebook groups, and perusing recipe websites.  I’m getting excited!  I know I’m going to love it.  I think today is going to be the day that I will boil water and hope I don’t blow the house up.

Part Three:  Family

Trish’s brother and his wife have been hosting the Family Christmas for years now and it is always an amazing day.  This year began with Trish volunteering me to make an appetizer that a foodie friend of ours had made during the Week of Eating festivities.  I had never made it before.  Now I was going to be making it for my in-laws who, I admit, I am still trying to impress nine years in.  This appetizer was a two-day prep affair and had to be served warm.  They weren’t pretty, but they tasted decent.  I butlered them around the house and since every time I turned around, her brother was there to grab another one, I think I did good.

Besides the wine, constipating appetizers (not mine), wine, red meat, wine, heavy desserts, and cookies (and wine), the best part of Christmas Day is the Reindeer Games.  Trish has a big family and almost everyone participates which makes this loads of fun.  There are always abusive gag gifts.  The only one I will share in this G-rated blog was the coaster we were given with a picture of a cat saying, “Let’s sit down and discuss what happened to my testicles.”  This, I assume, was for Baxter. The highlight this year was the Ball o’ Prizes:  a bunch of small prizes (candy, airplane-size bottles of booze, gift cards) wrapped in layers of saran wrap that you need to unroll while wearing oven mitts.  You have until the next person in line rolls doubles on a pair of dice. Since there had already been much wine, hilarity ensued and was captured on video.  And posted to Facebook, where it will live forever.

After Christmas, Trish and I boarded a plane to Atlanta to visit my family and celebrate my Mom’s 90th birthday.  By now, we were both exhausted, hadn’t slept, and our systems are totally out of whack.  But, hey!  Time for more wine, appies, foods we’re not used to eating, wine, a little Fireball, and more social interaction than my worn-out psyche had absorbed in a long time.  Yet we loved every minute!  Mom’s birthday lunch is the first time the whole family had been together in ages since my California Girl niece and I are rarely in Atlanta at the same time.  We sat around a big round table at Mom’s favorite Chinese restaurant and fêted our matriarch.  I could feel my Dad’s presence.

Part Four:  The Re-entry

We headed home the day of New Years Eve.  I, of course, woke up at 3:00 and couldn’t get back to sleep.  The Uber picked us up at 6:00 for a 9:00 am flight because the Atlanta airport is so busy.  Except for THAT day.  No traffic.  No line at security.  We were at the gate before 7:00.  We treated ourselves to one more large meal (served at a restaurant) and boarded on time.  Then we sat on the plane for three hours in a queue to get de-iced.  I think they need to de-ice planes maybe once every three years in Atlanta.  Lucky us!  We rolled in the door some time mid-afternoon, just in time to watch the Eagles lose yet another game they should have won.  We slept 10 hours that night.  I made a big pot of 16 bean soup the next day.

We were tired and cranky and yet happy.  It was an outstanding holiday season.  We all feel pressured to have a Hallmark Holiday, but real life is messy.  People fight and get sick and misbehave, but they also show up and laugh and love.  So much social interaction does drain this introvert but it also fills me up.  In the end, all we have is each other.  Let’s have a little wine, some cookies, and enjoy that.

“Y” is for Yesterday

Can you believe that we are at the penultimate essay of our year-long Abecedarium?  This process has been a blast.  I admit that I have mostly forced a title starting with the appropriate letter of the alphabet based upon whatever was streaming through my head at the time.  However, that has made me appraise my ponderings more deeply, as well as more frequently, between essays.  I hope you have enjoyed this journey as much as I have.  These last couple of weeks, I’ve been ruminating on Yesterdays.

This past week I had an MRI (annual screening test).  The scan takes about a half hour, so while I’m lying prone on the sled inside that tube listening to the banging of whatever bangs inside the MRI, I have a lot of time to think.  And I often think about my mortality.  This year, I asked them to play ‘70s music.  So, in addition to thinking about my life looking forward, with the music of my youth blaring in my ears I was also thinking about the years past.

I’ve noted often that I have struggled my entire adult life with living in the present.  Listening to those songs from my youth, I marveled at how easily I lived in the moment back then.  Those songs made me think of warm spring days, lying on the pole vault mats after track practice listening to music and talking.  They made me think of long summer days, which I mostly spent in the high school gym working on my jump shot.  They made me think of the first day of school in the fall, full of hope and anxiety.  And everyone always looked so different when we came back together to start the school year!  Time passed slowly back then.  Four years in high school felt like an eternity.  Four years in college went by so much faster.  Four years in grad school passed so quickly!  Well, individual days seemed slow, but the entire process seemed fast.  Now, four years of just “life” passes in the blink of an eye.  I want it to slow down.  I want to savor each day more because I appreciate each day more now.

Earlier this month, my bestie had a milestone birthday and a few of us jetted off to New Orleans to celebrate.  At one point, I started giving her some good natured grief about getting older.  Asking her how she felt about this birthday, she didn’t miss a beat.  She said, “It’s a privilege.”  I absolutely loved that response.  She’s right.  Many people don’t get the privilege of reaching our age.  When I was in my 20s and 30s, “60” seemed really old.  With life expectancies at that time barely in the 70s, I guess that thinking wasn’t too far off the mark.  It also seemed very far away for me.  I barely gave a thought to what my life might be like in my 60s or what I should be doing in my 20s and 30s to prepare for that stage in my life.  (Except for saving money.  Thank you, Mom and Dad, for teaching me basic fiscal literacy!)  My thoughts were filled with building my career, building my social life, always focused on “getting through” the current stressor.  It wasn’t until I retired that I started realizing that what came next was less important than living fully today.

I don’t, of course, live mindfully every day.  I have my routines.  There is the class-of-the-day at the Y.  All the daily challenges on my iPad games.  All the email newsletters that need to be read.  Then it’s lunchtime already.  Then I go into a food coma and read more or play more games.  Maybe there is an errand or two.  Maybe a phone call or two.  Before I know it, it’s time for my daily check in with Mom and then time to make dinner. 

Every year, as we move into the latter half of December, media outlets start looking back over the past twelve months to remind us of the good, the bad, and the ugly.  What always strikes me are the lists of famous people who have passed over the year.  That list used to be populated by people with whom I mostly had a passing awareness.  Now those lists include a number of my contemporaries, or those not much older but who have been fixtures in my life.

To emphasize this feeling of mortality, I found out I lost a friend earlier this week.  Not a close friend, just someone in whose orbit I circulated for a few years and someone I respected immensely.  I ruined that friendship through a hurtful selfish act.  I owned up to it; apologized; did not make excuses nor throw anyone else under the bus.  She graciously heard me out.  I determined the best way I could respect her was by exiting her orbit.  Most definitely my loss.  The indiscretions of youth have a cost.  I have worked to learn from that experience by, first, trying not to make stupid selfish decisions.  Since no human is capable of avoiding that completely, I then work to own my actions.  There is a reason personal accountability is a hot button for me.  Since I have embraced the pain and embarrassment of owning my actions and words, I expect the same from others.  Unfortunately, taking ownership does not grant you forgiveness.  That’s up to the other party.  But part of living mindfully is doing the right thing because it’s the right thing—not to get a certain outcome.

I am not breaking new philosophical ground with these thoughts.  We all know we need to slow down and live with more intention.  This time of year, we get lots of reminders of that, which is something I appreciate.  Simultaneously looking forward and backward has the paradoxical effect of helping me live in the present.  Life can change in an instant, as I also was reminded this week.  A relative on Trish’s side had a bad accident at work.  He is badly hurt and we are praying for his recovery.  As of this writing, we still do not know the full extent of his injuries, nor his long term prognosis.  I am doing what I do:  cooking for his family.  One instant, one phone call and your life changes.  We don’t think about that all the time because we’d be paralyzed with anxiety if we did.  It’s a good idea to think about it every now and then, though.  It reminds us to live mindfully; to treat people with kindness; to own your issues; to forgive others theirs.  I didn’t know any of this in those long ago yesterdays.  I just lived each day as it came.  Now, as Beth says, I know each day is a privilege.  I don’t want to forget that.

“X” is for Xena

For years now I’ve been wanting to pen an essay entitled “Everything I Need to Know in Life I Learned from Xena: Warrior Princess.”  This Abecedarium has finally given me my chance!

“Xena: Warrior Princess” is a TV show that aired for seven years, spanning the late 1990’s into the early 2000’s.  It followed the exploits and adventures of a warrior woman and her trusty “sidekick” Gabrielle as they fought injustice, Greek Gods, and an anachronistic list of historical figures (she fought both Julius Ceasar and Alexander the Great, among many others).  The show aired at a pivotal time in my life and became an important touchstone for me.  It began shortly after I got dumped from a relationship and found myself living alone for the first time since grad school.  It aired from the transition to my expat assignment in Mexico all the way through my transition back to the US.  At a time when my life seemed upended in almost every way imaginable, it was a constant.  And, thanks to email listserves in those early years of the commercial internet, provided a community that I could take with me from place to place.

The show, which on the surface seemed really cheesy, was brilliantly written and quickly became a cult success.  I happened upon it by accident (it ran on a second tier network) and was hooked immediately.  There was strong lesbian subtext between Xena and Gabrielle at a time when there were vanishingly few positive gay roles on TV, and the writers played that up as they realized the show caught on quickly with the gay community.  But more than that, Xena was a deeply developed character with conflicting strengths and flaws who served up a number of life lessons.  Herewith, what Xena has taught me:

Stay focused on winning the war, not each and every battle.  Xena always had clarity on her goals and recognized when she needed to walk away from one battle to be able to win the war.  She did have an uncanny way of being able to clean up those loose ends by the end of each episode, but the point was that you had to stay focused on the bigger goal.  Many of us have the tendency to want to win every single battle we are faced with and end up expending so much energy that we never achieve the big goals we were really after.  This is important in your work life as well as relationships.  We’ve all heard the maxim “Pick your battles.”  Xena knew which ones were important.

Never, ever, lose your moral compass.  Xena didn’t just keep in mind what the bigger goals were, she also stayed loyal to WHY those were the bigger goals.  It may have seemed like she was selling out her morals at times, but she knew what she was doing and always came back to the “right” side.  It is easy in life to be seduced into compromising your principles to achieve a goal that you think is important.  Often, though, the money or the job or the “prize” was never as satisfying as you thought—or the brightness was dimmed by what you gave up to achieve it.  Deep down, WHO we are is much more important than WHAT we have accomplished.  Some people have stuffed that realization down so deeply that they never reconcile their actions with their negative impact.  Most of us do have that better angel on our shoulder, though.   Listen to it.

When you have that clarity of purpose, don’t give up.  Time and time again, it would seem like Xena was defeated yet she’d find some way to prevail.  Once she knew what she had to do, she was unstoppable.  I will admit to not having that degree of intestinal fortitude.  I have rarely been able to attain that kind of clarity.  I have always harbored too much doubt.  That’s why I could never be a successful entrepreneur.  I need too much validation and support to be able to persist in front of a mountain of obstacles.  However, I have learned to persist in small ways, and it always comes back to reminding myself what is truly important.

Stay loyal to those who stay loyal to you.  This may sound like a mob creed (and maybe it is), but you know who you truly love and care about and who returns that commitment to you.  Keep those people close and do whatever you have to do to support them.  These are, in turn, the people you can count on.  Certainly, Xena would do anything to get Gabrielle out of jam, but she also put herself on the line more than once to get Joxer out of trouble.  He was the annoying comedic foil in the show but he had a heart of gold and Xena knew it.  The people you need to pay attention to in your life are not always the loudest and most insistent.  Often, they are the quietest and most unassuming.  Treasure and protect them.

Don’t take yourself too seriously.  My favorite episodes are mostly the funny ones.  By your comments, it seems your favorite essays of mine are usually the lighthearted ones!  We all like to laugh and find the humor in daily life.  That doesn’t mean that you can’t learn important lessons at the same time.  We are all works in progress and full of contradictions.  That’s what makes us human.  Learning to look at ourselves clearly and find the humor in our flaws is a form of grace and a way to learn to love yourself for just who you are.  It’s also the best way to learn to love those around us for just who THEY are.  No one is flawless.  Learn to laugh at those imperfections while you work to change the ones in yourself, and mitigate the impact of those you don’t.

In the end, Xena and Gabrielle did not sail off into the sunset together.  Initially, I was pissed, as was most of the broader fan community.  Over time, I saw that it was the most fitting ending to the series and consistent with the character the writers had built.  Xena sacrificed herself for the greater good, even though she had the chance to come back from the dead and be with Gabrielle.  (She had reanimated several times during the series.)  She stayed true to her moral compass until the very end and that’s a goal we should all embrace.

“W” is for Welcoming

We are on the home stretch of our year-long Abecedarium, patient readers!  I must admit, I’m a bit amazed at how I’ve been able to pull this off thus far.  I was a bit worried about letters, like Q and V, that seem to have limited use, but finding words to support a theme has been surprisingly easy.  In fact, most of the time I am noodling over several words that start with the letter of the day.  Bring it on, X, Y, and Z!

Finding the right word that begins with W has been an interesting challenge over these last two weeks.  I began pondering about the power of Words in general and Writing in particular, but that’s not the theme.  (I have a feeling that will drive my essay on my five-year blog-iversary, which we’ll reach right after this Abecedarium is complete.)  Nor is Wisdom, although I always try to sprinkle in a little bit about that as well.  No, today’s essay is going to focus on thoughts around Welcoming.

Part of what had me thinking about this theme is the on-going journey of socializing our new kitten, Baxter, with his reluctant older “sister” Bridget.  We’ve had Baxter almost a month now, and we’ve come a long way.  The day we brought him home, Bridget reacted with a “What fresh hell is THIS?!” look followed by a hiss and growl and running away.  Baxter, for his part, dove under a couch, not to be seen again for 12 hours.  I, of course, had had visions of Bridget falling in love with this adorable little kitten, letting her maternal instincts allow her to welcome him.  Instead, she has reacted to every stage of this socialization process with confusion/anger/standoffishness complete with strange growls that should not come out of any earthly creature and bared teeth that give me nightmares.  Little by little, her stance has softened.  She has begun to come running (well, slinking) to play along with Baxter with the feather-on-a-stick toy that she’s ignored up until now.  Bridget has consented to being in the same room with him, including somewhat relaxing on one lap while Baxter does the same on another.  (This is why you never should have more pets than available laps.)  Then, this morning, there was an amazing breakthrough.

We have discussed Bridget’s deep-seated food insecurity issues before.  Because of this, I have been really careful around feeding time.  I was afraid that if Baxter dared to come over to her food bowl that she would rip him to shreds.  He, of course, snuck over to her bowl and dug into her food, which apparently tastes way better than kitten food.  So, over the last couple of days, he has steadfastly REFUSED to eat his canned kitten food.  (I, as the paranoid hypochondriac, immediately decided that there is something fatally wrong with him.)  This morning, he again refused to eat his food and before I could react (I hadn’t had any coffee yet), he went over and stuck his head into her bowl WHILE SHE WAS EATING.  My heart caught in my throat, waiting for the attack.  But she LET him!  She actually backed away and let him eat her food.  No growl nor hiss.  I was stunned.  In her own way, she HAS accepted him and, in fact, I think she understands that he’s a kitten and needs to eat.  Her hissing and growling had clearly become just performative and that act clinched it.  She has finally welcomed him, although I expect her to continue to play the annoyed big sister for a while.  She does have an image to maintain after all.

I have also been thinking about Welcoming in the context of putting oneself in a new social situation.  My Mom made the decision last February to move to a different senior living facility.  She knew no one at this new place and even with a newcomer “buddy system,” she was often left to fend for herself at meal times.  Do you remember the stress of the cafeteria in grade school or high school?  It’s not a whole lot different as adults.  I am so proud of how my Mom handled this situation!  She opened herself up to the kind of rejection and discomfort we all dread, irrespective of how uncomfortable she herself was in the situation.  Over the months, she has developed a circle of friends and tells me stories regularly of how she welcomes new people who are looking for a place to sit.  People were kind and welcoming to her; she has been paying it forward.  

With everything going on in Israel these days, I have felt myself pulled back to more active participation in Judaism—particularly the need for a Jewish community.  The activation barrier, though, to attending a new shul for the first time has been prohibitive.  Religious institutions can be clic-y places and finding one in which you feel comfortable can be a difficult trial-and-error.  I had pushed through the discomfort when I lived in the Lehigh Valley and found a wonderful home at Temple Beth El.  I needed to push through that discomfort again, here. 

Trish went with me to Friday night services at Temple Sinai a couple of weeks ago.  The attendance on Friday nights is generally lower than Saturday morning and I paradoxically find that easier.  Trish, of course, made friends quickly and easily with the people there.  It’s one of the aspects of her personality that I admire most.  She is an easy conversationalist whereas I am not.  She connects with people extraordinarily well.  Yesterday, I went alone to Shabbat morning services.  A few of the people we had met before were there and recognized me.  (Of course, they asked where Trish was and looked a bit disappointed that she wasn’t with me.  I tried not to take it personally.)  Striking up new conversations is hard for me.  It was always a struggle at work events, too.  Once I got to know people, conversation would flow more easily but those first encounters were difficult.  However, this first time went well enough that I’m encouraged to go back again and work at recreating the community that I miss so much.

This was also a lesson to me on the importance of being welcoming myself.  The essence of being welcoming is being non-judgmental and “people curious”.  Bonnie and Mike made me feel part of the Temple Sinai community right away.  Cheryl patiently asked me questions about myself during the Kiddush and shared a lot about herself even though I was too uncomfortable to ask good questions of her.  Everyone knew I was “new” and they were kind.  I have a hard time being welcoming to others because I have a hard time striking up conversation with people I don’t know.  (Well, even with people I DO know.  Writing is not really a problem.  Talking can be.)  I am trying to embody some of the lessons I’ve written about and the best way to do that is to remember what it’s like to be on the receiving end of needing to be “seen”.  These days, with all the division and dehumanizing going on in our polarized society, making the effort to be welcoming and seeing those around you as unique humans is more important than ever.  This week was another good reminder of that for me.

“V” is for Vampire

My last few essays have been a bit heavy, so I thought I’d lighten things up a bit today.  Those of you who are cat owners will appreciate this essay.  Those of you who are not cat owners will probably be convinced to never own a cat.  This is the story of bringing a new cat into the house.

Losing our not-quite-six-year-old Maine Coon mix, Beau, was dramatic, as you know.  He was an awesome cat and replacing him would be impossible.  However.  Little Miss Bridget was quickly showing signs that she would not be a good “only” cat.  Bridget had a hard start in life.  She was abandoned, as a kitten, on the Platt Bridge in South Philly and somehow hit the lottery and found herself adopted by us.  She still carries scars (we believe) from that rough beginning.  Girl has an attitude (see this essay for more on that).  But without her chill big brother Beau, Bridget was quickly becoming excessively clingy and showing signs of separation anxiety when we would leave the house.  We knew we had to get her a playmate—or, at least, another cat to torture.

Socializing cats versus dogs is a very different exercise.  Dogs are pack animals and quickly (so I’m told) develop a dominance order and everyone learns their role in the pack.  Cats are solitary by nature and tolerate other cats only if they bring something useful to the table.  Female cats that are established in a household are particularly territorial.  Blood sacrifice is required from all beings (human and feline) when a new entrant arrives.  Bridget, as a torty (tortoise shell coloring), has attitude to spare.  We knew our best chance to introduce another cat was to get a kitten, preferably male, and preferably very soon.

I will admit that I wasn’t ready.  I was still in mourning.  I will also admit to saying Kaddish for Beau for the requisite 30 days of Shloshim.  But Trish saw a picture of a little fluff ball on Facebook and the die was cast.  (Spoiler alert:  I am totally smitten by him.)  We picked him up about a week and a half ago, and the adventure began.  He was so good on the hour-long ride home!  He is a six-month-old domestic long hair male, whom we named Baxter in a nod to Beau.  I am convinced Beau sent him to us.

It has been a long time since either of us has had a real kitten.  We had to be reminded of a lot of things, such as how their claws are like needles.  And how they can be very skittish.  And how much energy they have.  We had set up our sunroom for him since we could close it off yet Bridget could keep an eye on him through the French doors.  I set him down when we got home around 2:30 in the afternoon and he immediately ran under the couch.  He did not emerge for 12 hours.  I made the first of many panicked phone calls to my bestie, who works at a cat rescue.  She has been my Voice of Reason.  “What have we done?!” I exclaimed.  “This kitten is never going to come out from under this couch and Bridget will hate us forever!”  “Give it time,” she soothed.  “It’s going to take time.”

I took the first night on the couch.  Sometime after midnight, I woke up to the sounds of a kitten exploring.  I spent the rest of the night coaxing him over, trying to soothe him between runs back under the couch, and getting him to eat and (thankfully) use the litter box.  Dawn found me totally exhausted but with Baxter lying between my knees and shredding the skin on my fingers.  Trish came downstairs looking annoyingly rested and he immediately dove under the couch again.

He did not come out all day.  All day!  We were watching TV in the evening and noticed he had just ventured out under cover of darkness.  He would come to the French doors to look into the family room, but if we dared to go into the sunroom, back under the sofa he would go.  Trish’s night with him went something like mine had gone the night before.  I came down, annoyingly rested, to an exhausted Trish who was lying on the sofa with Baxter between her knees and shredding her fingers.  She had been up all night.  As soon dawn broke, under the couch he went.  “We appear to have adopted a Vampire cat,” I said.  “We should have named him Vlad.”

Over the next few days, we moved him up into our bedroom (since the temperature dropped and the sunroom was just too cold) and made slow but steady progress.  I made hourly panicked calls to Beth, who patiently reinforced that we were doing all the right things and reminded me this process take time.  Little by little, he came out of his shell.  He has proven to be a real snuggler and an amazingly good-natured cat.  We have got ourselves a winner.

At this point, you must be wondering how Bridget is adapting to this new entrant.  Well, when we first brought him into the house, I leaned down close to Bridget (but not too close!) and introduced her new little brother.  She back up sideways a step or two and gave me a wide-eyed look that can only be described as “What fresh HELL is this?!”  Over the next week, we did a couple of supervised introductions.  Baxter’s ears would flatten as she let loose a growl from deep in her gut and finished off with a first-class hiss.

The most unnerving part of socializing new animals is that at some point you need to just let them work it out.  We started letting Baxter wander and explore with one of us following him.  When Bridget would encounter him, little Miss Bitchy McBitch Face would give him a few solid hisses and back away.  We feel fairly confident, though, that she’s not going to hurt him.  This is why you get a kitten.  As I edit this essay for publication, we have him in free roam.  We’ll hear the occasional hiss and growl, but aren’t worried.  Baxter has stopped flattening his ears and just gets down in a submissive pose.  Bridget gives him “what for” and walks away.  I suspect this will continue at some level for a couple of months.  Cats.  So much fun!

Bringing Baxter in the house was ill-timed in the sense that I felt that our lives were finally getting back to some sense of normal after a crazy couple of months and suddenly we were tossed back into total disruption.  Baxter will never replace Beau.  He is bringing his own love to us.  As a wise person once told me, “True healing begins when you realize that hole in your heart is really an opening.” 

“U” is for Uncharted

This essay is posting a few days late for a number of reasons.  First, my editor has a head cold and I refuse to put a piece of writing in front of her when she can’t edit clearly (or fairly).  Yes, that is a lame excuse.  Second, we had house guests this weekend, which is when I usually write polish my essays.  This is also a lame excuse since I could have written during the week or after they left midday Sunday.  So, the REAL reason this essay is late is that I’ve just felt very “un” lately.  Unsettled.  Unmoored.  Out of my routine.  Not in control.  Then I watched a TV show that titled that particular episode Uncharted and I knew I had my title.  I felt like I’ve been navigating uncharted waters, as it were.  And I just couldn’t write.  I’ll admit that I’m only marginally comfortable with this essay as it is.  I’ve just been all over the place.

I’m sure you got a hint of the disruption I was navigating in the previous essay entitled Time.  Let me tell you what else was wrapped around losing our beloved Beau.  First, I had traveled to Atlanta for my Dad’s yahrzeit (the anniversary of his passing).  I do not travel “well” anymore so that trip alone left me out of sorts.  My sister came back with me for a visit and we all had to deal with our trauma over Beau’s illness and decision to let him go.  Then we drove to Rhode Island for the family wedding that was beautiful and joyous and exhausting.  (We don’t handle six hour drives like we used to, either.)  After that emotionally draining visit (I hope Wendy will come back), my sister went home on Tuesday and I promptly came down with a wicked head cold.  Trish nursed me for the next, oh, five days (which basically involves getting me won ton soup, listening to me complain, and generally leaving me alone).  For good measure, I bit my tongue, so I had a huge painful ulcer, AND badly burned the roof of my mouth on hot soup.  I was a pleasure. Our house guests came the following weekend and we had a blast!  We hosted a Happy Hour on Friday that included two of Trish’s siblings and their spouses; we ate and drank and watched football and baseball with our friends; and, had a final group brunch on Sunday before they headed home.  As they drove away, Trish surrendered to the head cold and here we are.  It has been several weeks of ups and downs to the extreme.  I have emotional whiplash that has left me both drained and disoriented.

What I’m also struggling mightily with right now is Hamas’ indiscriminate, brutal, violent slaying of over 1400 Israelis.  I will say right up front that I am not balanced on this one.  No, I do not revel in the fate of civilians caught up in this mess and I will not defend every single action of Israel but nothing can compare to the brutality of those murders.  This is not a new conflict, of course.  If you want a good primer on the history of conquest of the land we call Israel, read Michener’s The Source.  But you don’t need a historical novel to know that Jews have been hated and hunted for millennia.  As a Jew, I have been educated since I was a young child on one very sad fact:  every few generations, Jews face an existential threat.  It’s happened like clockwork for thousands of years.  Those old enough to have experienced the horrors of the Holocaust, or who have direct connection to those who did, know this well.  Those young enough to be removed from that history see only what fits into their current experience.  But these are still uncharted waters.  Things are different this time.  We have real time information, much of it highly graphic, that shows the inhumanity of war.  We are also subject to enormous amounts of mis- and disinformation.  The weapons available are frightening and the ability to coordinate across different factions could lead to devastating outcomes.  I don’t know what is going to happen.  This very much feels like an existential crisis for Israel and I’m frightened.  This is all keeping me off balance.

Over the course of pontificating in these essays over the last almost five years, I’ve waxed philosophical about my ability to finally live in the present.  I apparently was a little too proud of that, because reality smacked me in the face over the last few weeks.  I was right back to living for the next opportunity to exhale, just like I had almost my entire adult life.  I couldn’t control what was happening around me and I had precious little ability (Strength? Focus? Desire?) to control my own reactions and outlook.  I stopped working out.  I stopped writing.  I stopped meditating.  I feel like I stopped breathing.  It was a humbling reminder that it’s easy to talk about calmly living in the present when everything is going smoothly yet a different exercise all together when you are lurching from one unexpected blow to another.

As I was thinking about this essay, I kept coming back to this theme of being in uncharted waters.  Mostly, that concept carries negative connotations—thoughts of dangers known and unknown; thoughts of lack of control; fears of what might happen next.  It got me thinking about my work years, particularly the last decade, which was one long uncharted journey.  When I started my career, I thought the world was run by competent, mature people and I found that intimidating.  As I gained experience, I realized that the world was run by people just like me, and I got scared!  Did I have the mental clarity to lead well?  Now, I realize that the world is run by people generally less capable than I am and it just pisses me off.

Like most people, I learned to develop mental and emotional shortcuts to navigate stressors:  a situation would arise that had elements that were familiar to me and I would apply a solution that had worked in the past.  Sometimes this worked brilliantly; sometimes it failed spectacularly.  Over time, I realized that while shortcuts had their value, EVERY situation is unique.  The trick, when you have a shortcut you want to apply, is to ask yourself, “What is different this time?”  I will admit that I did not embrace this thinking until very late in my career.  In fact, I believe it is what got me fired since the people above me did not want to think about what might be different.  They just wanted to do the same thing they’d done in the past and assume the same outcome.  I wanted to do something different but couldn’t find the right way to convince others to follow that pathway.

I’ve written before about my obsession with assumptions.  Assuming that the same solution will work in a different situation—or that a solution that previously failed will not work now—can get you in trouble fast.  Most people are not sufficient students of history to know what’s different this time around.  It gets you in trouble in relationships, in business, and most certainly in global politics.  No matter how confident you are that you’ve “been there, done that,” know that you must take a moment to ask “what’s different now?”  It may bring you clarity or it may take you in a totally different direction.  I can’t tell you what will happen in Israel or what the “right” path forward is.  All I can see is that it’s different this time and we can’t jump to conclusions.  Similarly, while I know I have certainly been through my share of trying times, I need to take a breath and move through these times intentionally.

So, finding myself in uncharted waters again, I’m asking myself, “What is different this time?”  I’m not so much embracing the chaos as challenging myself to not give into it.  I’m starting by going to back to what I control and what I don’t.  I’m letting myself feel but trying hard not to just react.  I’m taking more deep breaths.  I’m not allowing myself to let the days slip by while I wait for things to get better.  And I’m writing again.  We’ll see what comes next.