August 9, 2016August 10, 2016 My True North

White bread

I am the captain of my ship–as well as the author of today’s note from 1979 or 1980. And, as you’ll see, in 9th grade I was already on my way to becoming a master of race relations and cultural sensitivity. (My former boss and friend, Kirk Koepsel, once told me, “Sarcasm doesn’t translate into writing.” I have always hoped this isn’t true, but if it is, please know I was just now being sarcastic.)

I grew up on the east coast–elementary school in the Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, area and intermediate and high school in a D.C. suburb–so, consequently, my formative years were blessed with a fair amount of racial and cultural diversity. I had White friends, Black friends, and every shade of brown in between. There were plenty of Latino, Indian, Southeast Asian and Middle Eastern kids at Herndon Intermediate and Herndon High School. In 9th grade, I had an Iranian friend whom I asked to teach me some Persian (Farsi) words and phrases. Sadly, all I can remember today is halet chetore, which means “How are you?”

However, my closest friends were White, and, if I think about it, I can only remember being at their homes, knowing their families and spending most of my one-on-one time with them. Time spent with friends of color was always in school, or at school-related social events–rarely individually, and never at home.

What many of my peers probably don’t remember is that I attended our senior prom with my friend K., a Black football player whose family had moved to Herndon from Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo). I am ashamed to confess that I told my parents I was going with a different (read “White”) friend because I didn’t think they would approve. K. and I wore matching tuxedos, and double-dated with the mutual friend and his girlfriend, who deigned to join the three of us in our dapper finery and wore a dress instead.

It’s particularly fascinating to reflect on the scenario briefly referred to in my note–of which I have absolutely no recollection–at age 51, when I spend half of each workday in a community college diversity center. I’m far from being the most culturally fluent person in the room, but in the past couple years, my horizons have expanded enormously thanks to my job. My Latino boss–with whom I have almost daily conversations about some aspect of cultural competency–has brought both Tim Wise and Robin DiAngelo to our school to speak on White privilege. I’ve read several of their books, I participated in a year-long Inclusion & Cultural Fluency leadership training series, and I’m learning to speak Spanish because my inability to communicate with so many folks has been driving me crazy for a long time.

In other words, I’ve made a personal choice to improve my cultural competency and increase my understanding of White privilege. This is a priority I will work on throughout the rest of my life, whether or not I continue to pursue a career in higher ed. I may not remember why the Korean boy made me nervous, nor why I thought I needed to “feel sorry for him,” but from the perspective of more than thirty years later, I now know to challenge myself when I have thoughts like these.

hey chic!

How’s life? mine’s just boreamundo. actually it’s pretty gross. my life is in a rut. it’s been there for the longest time. but i’m planning on having a heap o’ fun this weekend. Friday night I’m going to a party, Saturday night I’m going skating, now I have to find sompin’ to do sunday.

i told C. about ya not being allowed to go to Roanoke. She’s really upset. I think we could try and talk your parents back into letting you go.

I sit with this ~~Vietnamese~~ Korean guy in Bio & M. isn’t here. He carries a Korean-American dictionary around with him. I feel sorry for him but he makes me nervous.

This class is sorry. I wish I could’ve gotten into Mr. S. 2nd period, because I’m pretty sure that’s where A. is now.

Mr. S. sez they need pitchers on the softball teams ‘round here.

Later!

Love moi

December 19, 2015December 19, 2015 My True North

Sputnik 2.0

Let me be perfectly clear about this: I believe my cat, Chai, is the reincarnation of my former cat, Sputnik.

I am completely serious. I believe in the recycling of souls, also known as reincarnation. Of course, billions of other people also believe this, but I suspect a significant number of these folks are Hindu or Buddhist. I, on the other hand, was raised in a church-going Lutheran family. I started questioning things pretty early on, however, and have not been a Lutheran–or even a Christian–for the majority of my life. Though I believe very firmly in a higher power, I choose not to refer to it as “god,” since I associate this word with Christianity. And pretty much everything about Christianity makes me intensely uncomfortable. Instead, I think of it as Source, or Source Energy, the term used by the teachings of Abraham-Hicks.

The biggest shift in my worldview began in 2003 when I began attending classes at Creative Living Institute at the recommendation of a friend. Mary Graham’s lessons opened up a whole new world for me that made more sense than anything I’d ever been exposed to before. I learned about numerology, tarot cards, astrology, auras, chakras and meditation, among other things. I knew what reincarnation was, of course, but Mary talked about it in a way I hadn’t considered before: that souls travel together through time and have “contracts” with each other, and that everything comes from the same source energy and is thus connected.

With this abbreviated background in place, let me tell you about The Man.

Sputnik was my soulmate, my familiar. We found each other at the Dumb Friends League in Denver, Colorado, in February 1991 when he was about six months old. He was the first cat I adopted on my own, and for whom I was the sole caregiver. I loved him with every fiber of my being.

photo of kitten in a window — Sputty in our Denver apartment, 1991

From the first moment I saw him in his kennel, I knew. An adoption counselor placed him on my lap in a visiting room, and he immediately rolled over on his back, waving his paws in the air. I named him Sputnik because I liked the sound of it, and because I liked the band Sigue Sigue Sputnik.

My friend David almost immediately dubbed him “Little Man,” and that nickname–along with several variations like “Little B” or “The Man”–stuck till the end of his life in 2010. He was extremely naughty, with a penchant for blueberry muffins left out overnight on the stovetop. He tipped the trashcan over and dug through the contents almost every day until I wised up and bungeed it shut. One day I returned from work to find every piece of jewellry I owned strewn from one end of the apartment to the other. Oh yes, he was naughty. And I adored him. He particularly loved playing stalk and chase, and being held above my head to be “flown” around the house, complete with airplane sounds. David tied a rubber cockroach to a long piece of dental floss, creating a cat toy for Sput second only to “Mr. Purse Strap,” which we finally just threw out a few years ago.

photo of two cats curled up together — The Boys in 2008, age 17 and 18

I adopted a brown tabby kitten from the Dumb Friends League in 1993 and named him Biscuit. “The Boys,” as they were known, provided my husband and I with many years of love and entertainment. They left this world within a year of each other at the ripe old age of 19.

photo of two cats laying on blue carpeted stairs — Nemo & Sidra, 2012

We moved from South Dakota to Oregon in early 2012, and, though we had Sidra and Nemo, two female cats we’d adopted in Rapid City, I knew I had to find another male Himalayan mix like Sputnik. In May 2013, I found him on Petfinder.com. Actually, I found a brother-sister pair who had been rescued from the shoulder of Interstate 5 near Springfield, their mother having been killed on the highway. I made a phone call, loaded a pet carrier in the car, and off we went.

photo of a kitten in a cat carrier — Chai, 5/26/2013

Though we were prepared to adopt both kittens, the rescue assured us that, based on their young age and personalities, they wouldn’t be the least bit traumatized by being separated. So Chai came home with us on May 26, 2013.

Chai is very self-entertaining, as are many cats. One day I noticed him playing alone in our guest room, and watched as he pawed at the rug (like he was digging a hole), then put his head down and did a front roll into the spot where he’d been “digging.” Sputnik used to do the exact same thing. I’ve never seen either of our girl cats do it.

Last week, I was in the bathroom flossing my teeth, and Chai joined me on the counter. Then he did something he’d never done before: he got into the sink and began pawing at the sides, curling himself up in the round space and looking up at me. Nemo will sometimes get on the bathroom counter, but she has never once gotten into the sink.

I took an almost identical photo of Spunik in our apartment sink in 1992. I spent a lot more time in front of the mirror in those days, and he was right there with me, most of the time. I think he even supervised the night I tried to pierce my own nose with a sewing needle. (That didn’t end well. I had to have it done professionally.)

If it’s true that souls can choose to travel through time together, it’s entirely plausible that the Little Man bided his time out there in the Nonphysical from 2010-2013, saw an opportunity to come back to me and took it. This probably sounds pretty crazy to someone who doesn’t subscribe to this particular worldview, but that’s OK. I don’t really care, because the truth of it resonates within my higher self.

It was only within the past five years or so I actually looked up the word “Sputnik” and discovered its literal meaning is “fellow traveller” or “travelling companion,” depending on which website you use.

There are so many reasons to feel connected to Source.

Aside August 26, 2013October 10, 2013 My True North

So many thoughts, so little time

Life is seemingly boring after the events of Blog Week 1. However, I remind myself (and you) that I didn’t start MyTrueNorth2013 with the intention of a Bill Bryson-esque romp through Europe or a Stephen King-esque novel about a killer bat that invades peoples’ homes and flies off with their pets. I started it to write about things that make me think–which, with any luck, lead to big ah-hah moments (at best) or opportunities to enjoy feeling another small piece of the puzzle click into place (at the very least).

Which is why, despite an action-packed weekend into which my husband and I tried to fit a few too many events, including

• dinner, wine and two-fifths of the Brian Copeland Band at Emerson Vineyards (another perfect Willamette Valley evening)
• a dawn hot air balloon launch (sounds corny, but watching thirty or so hot air balloons launch makes my heart soar)
• more dinner, wine, live music and camping at Airlie Winery (it’s definitely not about the sleep)
• a three-hour nap (is three hours still considered a “nap?”) while husband worked Sunday afternoon

I’m choosing to write today about a guided meditation practice I attended at Love Yoga last night.

Meditation is one of those “talk the talk” things I mentioned last week, as in “How was your meditation, honey?” “Ooooh, I felt so centered. I think I really had a breakthrough.” I love the idea of meditation, and I love the insights it can and does bring when I do practice it. But I don’t do it nearly enough.

I have come to believe that meditation is one of the most valuable tools –if not the most valuable–we can have in our self-work toolbox. Though I can count the number of times I’ve done it on my fingers and toes, I can also say that I’ve had a pretty good-sized ah-hah moment just about every single time.

If this is truly the case, then, the next logical question would have to be, “Why in god’s name don’t you meditate every single day? Or three or five or ten times a day, for that matter?”

In a word, laziness. Also, admittedly, a sense of entitlement–by which I mean I think I should just have an amazing, joyful, happy, peaceful, prosperous, healthy life without working at it. In fact, I think we all should. I think every single person deserves to have a wonderful, happy, prosperous life, and it makes me sad that so few do.

Anyway, last night Melissa led us through four 15-minute meditations, during which we were free to be comfortable on our mats any way we chose. Guided meditation works much better for me, as I’m one of those people whose completely undisciplined mind needs that gentle direction and constant redirection from the never-ending hodgepodge of thoughts that I just can’t seem to stop.

Less than 24 hours later, I can’t remember exactly what she said, or how she led us through the meditations. However, more importantly, I do remember the ah-hah moment that resulted.

Louise Hay tells us in You Can Heal Your Life (Hay House, 1984) that

“We create every so-called illness in our body.”

Now, this may be hard to swallow. I know I find it hard to swallow. The personal responsibility placed on us by people like Louise Hay (not to mention non-physical entities like Abraham) seems patently unfair to me ~~sometimes~~. OK, most of the time. But I guess I don’t have to like it for it to be true.

Hay’s book Heal Your Body (Hay House, 1984) contains a pretty comprehensive list of dis-eases and physical and emotional complaints along with their corresponding probable causes. I use this list frequently to try and figure out what the hell’s going on with me. The weird thing is, every single probable cause she lists for my physical or mental gripes is spot on.

During last night’s meditation, I found myself–as I very often do–thinking about the past and being saddened by my thoughts. (See last week’s post Will Someone Please Invent Time Travel, Already?) On the way home, I started wondering–as I also very often do–why my thoughts always seem to be so overwhelmingly focused on what has been, instead of on righthererightnow or what’s yet to come. And then I started thinking about what Louise Hay says about foot problems.

Without going into too much detail, I can tell you that one of the several physical ailments I suffer from (read “cause myself to suffer from”) is plantar fasciitis. I also have osteoarthritis in one of my big toes. Guess what Hay’s probably cause of foot problems is?

. . . . .

(I’m giving you time to guess.)

. . . . .

(Did you guess it?)

. . . . .

(Drum roll)

. . . . .

“Fear of the future and of not stepping forward in life.”

Didn’t I say she was spot on?

So I kept my train of thought chugging along its proverbial track and asked myself, “Couldn’t my obsession with the past and how I seem to miss the Good Old Days and all the houses I’ve lived in and and things I’ve done and enjoying time with my family and all my dead relatives and friends and pets and vacations I’ve been on and being a kid and riding my bike around the neighborhood and not having any of these hateful adult responsibilities more than I enjoy being righthererightnow and anticipating all the wonderful times still to come be construed as ‘fear of the future and of not stepping forward in life?'”

I think it could.

(You may want to go back and reread that paragraph. It actually does make sense, as well as seeming to be mostly grammatically correct.)

Louise tells us that new thought patterns–or positive affirmations–can heal and relax our body. For foot problems, her recommended affirmation goes like this:

“I move forward in life with joy and with ease. I stand in truth. I have spiritual understanding.”

Her step-by-step method to allow and encourage change is pretty straightforward:

1. Look up the mental cause. See if this could be true for you. If not, sit quietly and ask yourself, “What could be the thoughts in me that created this?”

2. Repeat to yourself, “I am willing to release the pattern in my consciousness that has created this condition.”

3. Repeat the new thought pattern to yourself several times.

4. Assume that you are already in the process of healing.

Whenever you think of the condition, repeat the steps.

Easy, right? It should be. But this is where Laziness rears its ugly head: it’s easier to be a mess and wallow in the past and be unhappy and complain and cry than it is to do the hard self-work. You really, reeeally have to want to change yourself and feel better and know that it’s worthwhile to do the work, or you’re just going to be stuck in that same rut forever.

I vacillate between desperately wanting to change and thinking, “Why bother?” After all, these patterns of thought have worked for me (more or less) for almost a half-century. Why should I bother now?

I’ll tell you why: because I’ve had glimpses of how good it can be. I know now how it feels to be in what Abraham-Hicks refers to as “the Vortex.” I recognize when I’m in there–and when I’m not, I want to be.

The most beautiful (and ironic) thing of all is that I love knowing I’m the only one responsible for all of it: how I feel, the good and bad things that happen to me–all the love, joy, fun, health, wealth, peace and serenity, or lack thereof, that I experience in my life. There’s no one and nothing else to blame when things go wrong, and only myself to celebrate when things go right. That’s not to say that I don’t feel immensely grateful: the Universe is a kind and generous place that works in concert with me and my thoughts. My parents have done more for me than I could ever express in words. And my Non-Physical Posse always has my back.

Today I choose to enjoy the Here and Now.

Namaste.

Procession photo courtesy Institute for Great Lakes Research, Bowling Green State University
Vortex photo courtesy Crestock.com

August 20, 2013March 21, 2014 My True North

Another day, another … whatever.

It occurred to me yesterday morning that it may appear to some that I overreacted to last week’s yogurt scarcity.

Recall, however, that I did identify the event as “another one of those Final Straws,” and that this sort of thing happens to me with “disturbing and irritating frequency.” Also please note that I am fully aware my favorite yogurt has not been discontinued altogether; it’s just that our local Safeway no longer stocks it, either temporarily or permanently. Just wanted to get that straight.

To illustrate this disturbing trend, following is an abbreviated list of products upon which I–and, to a lesser extent, my husband–had become very dependent, only to experience the repeated pain of their disappearance from the marketplace one by one:

• Aziza eyeliner pencils (the earliest product discontinuation trauma I can remember)
• Simply Organic Grilling Seasons marinade mix (the best marinades we’ve ever tasted–what the hell happened, Simply Organic?)
• Trader Joe’s unsweetened powdered chai mix (some people like to control the amount of sugar in their beverages)
• Burt’s Bees Bay Rum After Shave Balm (made hubby smell delicious and gave him a soft face–what’s so wrong about that?)
• Lily of the Desert Aloe 80 Clarifying Facial Scrub (are we the only ones who like scrubby facial cleansers?)
• Safeway’s O brand organic peach/mango fruit-on-the-bottom yogurt (seriously, am I the only person in the country that thought this was the best flavor ever?)
• Patagonia stainless steel travel mug (husband temporarily “lost” his [read “left at friend’s house in Seattle”], so loving wife tried in vain to find him a new one online)
• Star fruit (I haven’t seen one in the produce section in years–have they gone extinct?)
• OXO Good Grips Soap-Dispensing Stemware and Glass Wand threaded refills (who knew our dish wand would far outlast the availability of the exact sponge refills needed to make it work?)
Look–here are refills available for purchase online:

Don’t be fooled: these refills are NOT THREADED. They snap in to an OXO Good Grips Soap-Dispensing Stemware and Glass Wand identical to ours in every way but one.

And don’t even get me started on my favorite TV series that have gone by the wayside in (relatively) recent years:

• Seinfeld
• Queer Eye For the Straight Guy
• Most Haunted
• UFO Hunters
• 30 Rock

At least The Simpsons is still going strong after 24 seasons. Yaaaaaaay Matt Groening! Yaay … uh … FOX? … Er, never mind.

Anyway, you may be wondering what kind of profound truths I have gleaned over the years from these recurring disappointments. I’m one of those people who reads meaning into literally every seemingly coincidental object or event with which I come into contact. For example, puppy and I were walking this morning, and I saw a squirrel use a crosswalk. Really. It was absolutely extraordinary, and I had to stop and take a moment to ponder the meaning of our timing such that we were privy to this singular phenomenon.

I interpret all these seemingly random product discontinuations as a message to be more

See how I made the word look like what it means? I don’t care what those snooty graphic designers say: it’s amazing what you can do with Microsoft Publisher.

The sad (and odd) thing is that the older I get, the less flexible I feel. Yoga definitely helps with the physical flexibility, but I need to do some real work on the other kind. A former yoga instructor used to say, “Flexible spine, flexible mind.” Does physical flexibility, then, lead to mental flexibility? Not necessarily.

What does it mean to be flexible? I find that I sometimes learn more about the meaning of a word if I take a look at its antonyms. So, what’s the opposite of flexible?

• rigid
• obstinate
• unaccommodating
• unadaptable
• unbendable
• stern

Ew. That was easy. I don’t want to be any of those words. These words sound much nicer:

• soft
• springy
• stretchy
• adjustable
• limber
• willowy

I’ve been sitting here trying to come up with a nice, neat conclusion to wrap up this post, but I just realized that through the process of writing it, I’ve come to understand another small part of my life–which is the whole point of this blog anyway–and I don’t really feel like I need to provide a nice, neat conclusion to wrap it up. I hope you’re okay with that.

This blog is like my online mat space and yoga practice: it’s by, for and about me. If, by chance, there are others of you who spend an enormous amount of mental and spiritual energy questioning
E V E R Y T H I N G ,
maybe you’ll identify with these posts. I hope so, anyway.

[Afterword: I just Googled “starfruit” in an attempt to find out why I haven’t seen them in the produce section for quite some time. Look what Snopes.com has to say about a 2008 e-mail warning about the fruit:

The item quoted above, typically titled “Star Fruit Can Kill,” has been circulating on the Internet since at least May 2008. The original author is unknown to us, but the piece draws its information from April 2008 news reports surrounding the death of Tang Gon Sean, a 66-year-old Malaysian man Star fruit who on 29 March 2008 passed out after eating star fruits, was taken to Shenzhen General Hospital, and subsequently expired there after falling into a coma. Ten other patients at that same hospital experienced symptoms similar to his, and two died, said Tan Si-Yen, the doctor quoted in those news reports. All had eaten star fruit.

Relatively little known in North America, star fruit is popular in China, Taiwan, India, Philippines, Australia, Central America, Africa, and Brazil. While this foodstuff’s proper name is carambola, it is more commonly called “star fruit” because of its shape, which causes slices taken from it to resemble stars. It has a sweet, mild taste somewhat akin to a cross between apple and lime, and is rich in antioxidants and vitamin C. It also has the potential to harm kidney patients.

Star fruit contains a neurotoxin that affects the brain and nerves but which people with healthy kidneys are able to filter out; it therefore poses no danger to those whose kidneys function normally. However, those with renal problems lack protection from that neurotoxin and thus risk “star fruit intoxication,” a condition that manifests with insomnia, hiccups, vomiting, numbness of limbs, decreased muscle power, twitching of muscles, confusion, and convulsions, with the time between ingestion and onset of symptoms varying from thirty minutes to fourteen hours. Intractable hiccups are often the first symptom to present itself.

While the majority of those hospitalized for star fruit intoxication do recover, some deaths have been associated with this condition. Star fruit-exacerbated complications in kidney patients are rare, but they are potentially fatal, and thus this fruit is best avoided by those with kidney problems, including those on dialysis. Indeed, dialysis is the only treatment known to be effective in treating this illness, yet it must be both daily and intensive to have the desired effect, and continuous dialysis has been recommended for severe cases.

The National Kidney Foundation (NKF) advises in its Dietary Guidelines for Adults Starting on Hemodialysis: “Always AVOID star fruit (carambola).”

Information about the interaction of renal patients and star fruit did not first surface in April 2008; medical literature has been documenting reports of and studies about the star fruit’s effect on kidney patients at least since 2000, with such findings subsequently reported by the general media.

Barbara “star report” Mikkelson
Last updated: 11 June 2009

WTF? Intractable hiccups? Convulsions? DEATH???!!! I’ve never been so thankful to have a perfectly-functioning set of kidneys in my life.

August 18, 2013December 13, 2015 My True North

Will someone please invent time travel, already?

Is it a bad thing that I’ve started to watch the clock and wonder what time is too early to start drinking? I’m pretty strict about waiting till my husband gets home in the evening so I’m at least not drinking alone. But lately I find myself wondering if 3:00 is too early? Maybe a glass of wine or two with my salad at lunch? That sounds pretty sophisticated–although not as sophisticated as when I’d go for lunch at T.G.I.Friday’s with work colleagues and order a Long Island iced tea. (Really, that only happened once. Or twice.)

~~Sometimes~~ Okay, frequently I find myself wallowing in retrospection and regret. And if that doesn’t sound unhealthy, I don’t know what does. It’s like if I just focus long and hard enough on whatever aspect of the past I happen to be obsessing about, I can magically transport myself back there and do things differently. And then when it doesn’t happen, I get even more regretful and depressed.

Then I have to try and pick myself back up by repeating all the mantras I’ve accumulated over the years, starting with the most recent:

Then I move on to:
You are loved. All is well. (Abraham)
This too shall pass. (Unknown)
Leap, and the net will appear. (John Burroughs)
It’s all a journey. (????????)
Rub some dirt on it. (husband’s Little League coach)
There’s no crying in baseball. (A League of Their Own)
Ball up. (tactful, loving brother)

Then maybe I’ll listen to my Abraham-Hicks CDs, or, alternately, Rush or Pink Floyd, and things either continue to deteriorate or husband comes home from work and we watch 30 Rock.

I think the real problem is that I’m simply not very good at at being Present. Oh, I like to talk the talk. (“How was yoga, honey?” “Oooh, transcendent. I was really in the zone tonight.”) But when it comes to walking the walk, I’m just not There. And I’ve been aware of There and studying There and trying to be There for almost ten years.

[At this point, I need to overwhelmingly, enthusiastically and lovingly thank my friend Shelly for introducing me to Mary Graham and the Creative Living Institute.

Shelly, Mary and CLI expanded my world and became a turning point in my life.]

Maybe this is all okay. Maybe working towards There is what life’s all about. Maybe I won’t ever get There. Maybe I will. But I do know this: beating myself up about every decision I can’t change isn’t going to help. Maybe if there’s one small gift I could give myself, it would be to love myself as much as or more than hummingbirds, flowers, sparkles on the water, moonlight, shooting stars, butterflies, autumn leaves and Carolina wrens.

August 14, 2013December 13, 2015 My True North

“Comparison is …

“Comparison is the thief of joy.”
–Theodore Roosevelt

My friend Emily posted this on her Facebook page recently.

It was a timely message I desperately needed to hear, and now I find myself thinking of it during the day when I’m reminiscing about the past, or noticing how different (not different in a good way, either) our current house is from houses we’ve owned before, or looking at newer, fancier cars than mine . . . etc. etc. etc. ad nauseam.

How can I be joyful if I’m constantly reminding myself of what I don’t have, instead of being grateful for what I do have? For many years, I’ve kept a gratitude journal. But sometimes I’ll go for months without writing in it. I’m in one of those phases right now. Maybe it’s time to rectify that.