More insight

I have let this blog become something that causes me anxiety.  I have decided that it is something I "should" do and that I "should" write specific thing.  It is no longer enjoyable when I put limits and expectations into the content.
So, in order for maintenance of my mental health, I am gong to write in a more spontaneous, here's- what-I'm-thinking-today kind of way. Here goes.

I have the old phone that I used in my first apartment.  It is a princess style push-button, colored that hideous 1970's burnt orange.  It weighs as much as a small Subaru.  I'm pretty sure that it was rented from the phone company, which is what they did in the olden days.  You eventually owned the phone, apparently.  Either that, or I just never returned it!  I threw that phone against the wall once after breaking up with one of my boyfriends.  I used it in at least three apartments, maybe even after grad school.  I don't know how it ended up still being a thing in my life or how it migrated to my office to become a play therapy toy. All I know is, it's still with me.  The kids love it.

My sister has something similar that she uses as a prop with teenage theater students.  Her phone is even older than mine.  It is a standard black rotary model.  Although my touch tone push buttons are fodder for ridicule, her rotary dial poses an epic challenge.  Her students are unsure of how to make the dial turn, doing things like just punching the hole over the number or tying to open the phone like a combination lock.

My sister and I may seem to be in highly disparate professions.  (Psychotherapist vs actor and acting instructor/coach), but we are always surprised at how many similarities there are in how we go about reaching our goals.  (That particular situation will likely end up in future blogs.)  But today, I want to share my favorite phone story.

This is a sad,  nostalgic story, in that current and future generations will never have the opportunity to experience the joy and satisfaction of slamming the receiver into the the cradle after an angry conversation with your mother.  Caller ID has rendered the ability to crank call your arch enemy, asking him things like  if he has Prince Albert in a can (better go let him out) or if his refrigerator is running (better go catch it), or my personal fave, "This is the Jefferson City sewage company, and we've had just about enough outta you!"

And this story, concerning old fashioned phones, would never have occurred in the modern days of cell phones and text messages.

My sister had a job as a tour guide at the Missouri state Capitol building.  Most days she provided guided tours, pointing out the rotunda whisper gallery acoustics and the beautiful Thomas Hart Benton paintings.  Or she was assigned to the Governor's mansion where she could point out interesting architectural details.  But on this particular day, she was assigned to Loman's landing.   It was an infrequently visited tourist sight with two building's.  I guess it was pretty boring
I also guess that's why she called me.  She had too much time to think about stuff.

Our house had two phones.  One on the kitchen wall, and one on my Dad's desk, in his office upstairs. If you picked up the receiver of one phone, you could listen in to the conversation occurring on the other.  My brother went through a period where he liked to try to listen in to our private talks.  If you didn't hear him picking up the other phone, you would be able to hear him breathing.  If you quietly said,"Paul, get off the other line.",he would yell down, I'm not on the other line". There was almost never anything interesting for him to hear, anyway

This was the days before portable phones.  The receiver was tethered to the "call box" with a curly cord that got shorter as it tangled.  Every once in a while, you had to let the receiver dangle on the cord so it could unwind itself.  But even at it longest, you only had about five feet to move before you were rudely stopped like a dog on a leash.

I was too young for a real job, but old enough to be home alone during the day.  The phone rang, and I ran to answer.  This was also the days before answering machines, so we all jumped at the sound, just like a caveman being tapped on the shoulder. The tap could just be a neighbor inviting you to his cave for dinner, or it could be a saber tooth tiger testing out the tenderness of his possible prey. You never knew who could be calling.

The phone ringing interrupted whatever very important thing I was doing; probably watching TV or eating a whole rasher of bacon or singing along to a show tune as I banged out the melody on the piano (I did this A LOT).
I answered "Hello?"
"Amy, you gotta clean out my fish bowl for me!"  She was almost out of breath in her panicked state.  "I didn't have time to do it this morning, and now Fred and Ginger are both gonna DIE if you don't!"
Did I mention she is a little dramatic.
"No"  i answered.  I was loving having the power to thwart her desires.
"Please!!!"She was begging now, with a little sob in her voice.  "Think of poor Fred and Ginger!"
"No.  I'm not cleaning your fish bowl.  Your fish will be fine if you do it when you get home".
"I don't have time tonight!  I'm going out, right after work!!!"
"Oh well, you'll have to get new fish, cause I'm not doing it"
"Fine!  Be that way!"  Slam!
I got to hear the loud clunk as she hung up on me.  Oh well> I got back to whatever very important thing I was doing.  But just as I started whatever it was, the phone rang again.  I was pretty sure it was her calling back.  Ring ring ring ring....ten, eleven, twelve times.  No answering machines in those days, remember?  What if it wasn't her?  What if it was my mom checking in?  She'll be furious.  What if it was someone trying to reach my Dad? What if it was an emergency?

I answered,  "Hello?"

"Bitch!"

Somethings never change

More theology

I am veering from my reminiscing today because I had a little epiphany last night.

If you have read past blogs, you will know about my brand of theology.  I am sure that there are people who would say I am an atheist because I don't subscribe to the conventional idea of a God we have to come to though religion and faith.  I am not a-theist;without an idea of God or a faith.  It's just an evolving idea, informed by religious traditions and cemented in science.

Here is my epiphany,  This my seem as if it is just a re-hash of my older thought, but it was not.  Do you know how,when Eliza Doolittle finally understood what Professor Higgins was trying to teach her in My Fair Lady?  It was the proverbial light bulb going off in her head moment when she was finally able to say, The rain in Spain is falling on the Plain" without a Cockney accent.  I was finally able to FEEL what I have always believed in my head.

I have always said that God is everything and everywhere; responsible for all life and all creation of all that exists in the universe.  But last nigh I finally understood that at a cellular level.  The full meaning of the force that we call God simply being the surrounding everything like soup that is capable of permeating into you very bones and that IS your consciousness.

We mess things up when we give God a personality.  Whether it an old man with a beard (who likes an awful lot like Santa Claus, living on a cloud in heaven and sending out gifts to the faithful with angels instead of eves!), or Morgan Freeman passing on the title to Jim Carrey.  We do a grave injustice to the vastness og this thing we call God.  We ell ourselves short by denying that we cannot be separate from that vast creative force.

We are also being arrogant and misguided  in the thought that, somehow, if we just live correctly and say the right thing, that we will be any more worthy of God's love than anyone or anything else.  It is the epitome of arrogance to believe that some personality of God just decided to throw some people onto a planet to see if they could sink or swim.  I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but we are the result of an accident in nature.

In no way do I think this makes humanity less worthy of love and respect.I think everyone should be in awe that the force that creates everything was able to create this remarkable world and this remarkable universe.  I just think that in a universe this vast, expansive and varied, we think that we are any more marvelous than anything else in said universe. I  think it is a very big mistake to limit ourselves to a narrow way of thinking about anything.

I also think we are ridiculous in our idea that "God" is responsible for suffering.  That, somehow, God would knowingly allow a child to be abused or people to starve or a hurricane to wipe out an entire city, He didn't reach down and say "I think I'll give that one Multiple Sclerosis because she was mean to her sister, or just because I like to see how people deal with stuff.   God doesn't do this.  Nature,which is way much bigger of a force than humanity, does this without any idea that this is a good or bad thing. It just is because it is.

Here was the other part of my epiphany.  I have always believed that "God is Love".  But the reverse of that statement is the real truth.   Love is God.  I think that, if we are truly understanding of that force that creates all, it would feel like love. Not because it decided to, but because that is the feeling that that energy gives us.  It like fire is hot and ice is cold.  That just its property.  The property and essence of that God force feels like the most profound and amazing love. People confuse that with a personality that has to choose to bestow love somehow. That energy has no choice in the matter.  It just is what it is.

Next time I will write about smaller.less complicated thing again!

















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Journey onward

Have I mentioned that I didn't start in college as a Psychology major?  I went to The University of Missouri in Kansas City to go to the Conservatory of Music.  I actually (this is bragging) got a full ride scholarship to play the cello in the orchestra. I was supposed to play in The civic orchestra of Kansas City, too, but I conveniently forgot that part.  Several of us had the same scholarship, and when they would go to Civic rehearsals, I would wonder why my scholarship didn't stipulate attendance.  Years later I was looking through the scrap book my friend Carole gave me as a graduation gift after high school. Lo and behold, the letter did mention something about membership in the /civic orchestra being one of the requirement.  Oops!  Can they take back my degree?

Just like everyone else in their first venture away from home full-time, I discovered a lot of things about myself that year.  I discovered that my endless pursuit of popularity in high school, held very little panache or prestige in college.  I wish  I could say that these things were profound and included a lovely coming-of-age moment.  It was really things like:  It is really nice to sleep in on Sunday morning;  I was a lot cuter than I ever thought I was; I was better at a lot of things than some of the other kids; I was worse at a lot of things than some of the other kids; it could be much cooler and more fun to hang out with the kids I would have considered "hoods" (that's what we called the bad kids at my high school) than with the kids I usually hung with.  And the most important thing was that I had no desire to spend 4-6 hours a day in a practice room in the basement of the Performing Arts Center.

I have come to understand that, just like real writers enjoying the process of committing words to a page, real musicians enjoy the process of perfecting the musical phrase exiting their instrument.  I liked the process of rehearsing with the whole orchestra, and I enjoyed playing concerts.  But I was more enamored with dressing up to look fancy and being on stage than I was with knowing that I was contributing to the glorious whole of creating a musical experience.  I really do like classical music and I love those sound of a well-played cello,  But I am not committed enough to making myself create that sound.  Plus, I never really had the chops. I was competent, but not inspired.

So, I discovered, that I was a lot more interested in the people playing the instruments than how rthey played their instruments.  So I switched to a psychology major after my freshmen year and breathed a sigh of relief.  In order to keep my scholarship, I had to continue to play in the orchestra and take some music classes, so I actually ended up with a double major.

Here are some of the thing I learned during the course of my undergraduate education.  some of the things were in class, and a lot of it was just during life.

1,  Most of college is about showing up and being able to stay the course.  You have to be competent enough to complete reports and take tests at an expected level, using correct grammar and punctuation, and knowing how to format correctly.  I'm not trivializing how hard it can be, it's just that much more of success in higher education is about committing to it.  Question:What do you call the guy who ranked last in his medical school graduating class? Answer : Doctor.

2.  It is okay to not be perfect (see above joke)  But, it does not punish your professor to do poorly in his or her class class just because you think he or she is an ass.  You're the one who gets the bad grade.

Which leads to
3.  There are some crappy teachers and there are phenomenal teachers.  Find the ones who are great and get as many credit hours as you can from them.

I think that enough for now.  But as I write I am having some actual insight (imagine that) about things I discovered during my education that I will explore next time.  For now, peace out, baby!

How on earth did I get to this place anyway?

There is a concept called internal or external locust of control.  If you are a word collector, a more psychoanalytic way of saying this is alleplastic or autoplastic.  The both mean the same.  Do you feel a sense of control over your life and destiny (Internal locus of control or autoplastic) or do you feel as if life happens around you and are just a victim of your circumstances (external locus of control or alleplastic).

I think I have always felt that I pretty much get to decide what happens to me.  At least I did until I got diagnosed with MS.  Now I realize that the only thing I really and truly get to control is my response to given situations.  Of course, you can and absolutely should plan things.  Do what you can with what you have from where you're at every moment.  Then sit back and hope that all your ducks are in the right row and that the  best possible outcome will happen.  But also, expect that some of your ducks will wander into a different row and that something unexpected will change everything.  Hey!  It happens!

But this is supposed to be a blog about my journey up to now.  So make with the wavy Scooby doo backward-in-time-lines, and here we go again.

My first job in the "field"  was as a summer relief worker a Day Care Center.  The day Care was a part of the children's home run by my Dad.  He really struggled with having me work there (nepotism and all that), but I applied, and, Bob's your uncle, (Look it up, its a real expression), I was hired.  I got to be the  summer relief for the teachers and the cook while they were on their vacations.
 I started as an aid, then cooked for a month, and finally had my own classroom.  I think I was 20. The best things about that job were that I got to go to the pool everyday, so my hair was platinum blonde and I was so tan.  I have funny skin.  I am pretty white.  (Shockingly Caucasian.  I glow in the dark.)  But, I get a pretty good tan.  I guess I shoulda been born in California.  Here is me at my sister's wedding that summer.

Me and my sister,  She is the gorgeous one and I am the short one with the platinum hair and killer tan

  I also really liked being the cook, because I got first dibs on everything.  The real cook had planned the menu before hand and had super easy stuff for me to make.  We also got donations for afternoon snack.  It was usually stuff like peanut butter cracker or applesauce, but once we got boatloads of Twix Bars.  That was a little dangerous for me. I really like sweets!

The kids were the real best part of that job.  They were all cute.  I had a few favorites,  There were two sets of twins.  Both sets were boys.  One set were named T-Wani and D-Wani. We called them T and D and they were ALWAYS in some kind of trouble.  The little girls were no angels.  Once they were told not to put water in the sand tray, but the sand mysteriously got wetter and wetter.  The girls were taking big swigs of water in their mouths and spitting on the sand to get it wet.  EWW! But very resourceful!.  I have pages of pics of those kids.  they were all great kids.  I still remember their names even!  In hind site, I can see which kids were probably being neglected and which were potentially victims of abuse  It warmed my 20 year old heart when the kids asked to go home with me, but now I would see it as a pretty significant warning sign that maybe there was a reason they didn't want to go home.

It's funny to think of them now.  That was 32 years ago!  They are all grown up with kids of their own....  maybe even grand kids!
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Overall, I think the Day Care was a pretty tame intro into the world of direct service.  It gets a lot hairier when you see the big picture and become a little less naive about people's intentions
But that will have to wait til next time!

So til next time, farewell to social services until after graduation from UMKC.

A  life worthwhile

I struggle with the question of what makes a life worthwhile.  Or, more specifically, what makes my life worthwhile.

In college, my friends and I would buy The National Enquirer just to look for the most outrageous stories, (Years before the internet and Stumble Upon!).  I ran across a story about how much the human body is worth,  As in: how many precious metal and  minerals are in there or what could you get for selling all you internal organs.  Stuff like that.  And I know that car companies have a dollar amount designated for each human life so they can get a ratio of how worthwhile it is to recall a part on a car versus getting sued and paying settlements. And,  if you are Betty Grable, you can say that just your legs alone are worth a cool million!

So I guess, if nothing else, you can say that every life has a dollar value.But I am more concerned about what makes our conscious life worthwhile.  I absolutely believe that an alive person is worth more than a prematurely dead person.  I absolutely believe that everyone breathing the same air and having the same energy burning in their bodies is connected and contributing just because of those things.  I would tell my clients that very thing  I would tell the parents of a special needs child that very thing.  I have told people that had a son is killed in a gang shooting or who's sister is dying of MS because she has no insurance those very things as well.

So why am I different?  Who do feel the need to validate my existence with achievement and impact?
Sometimes, that is even what keeps me from writing! I rail against feeling that I "have to" in order to feel worthwhile!

So I have decided that I will stop trying to fight the the need to validate myself by reviewing small ways that I may have impacted on the world.

When I wrote my essay for grad school, I got all dramatic and soppy and wrote something about only needing to impact on one person to make the hard work of getting a degree worth the effort.  I'm surprised they let me in!  However, if I really felt that way, I have to see if I have made an impact n that one person, and if it was truly worth the effort.

So in future posts,  (to keep you in suspense,)  I am gonig tp review my life's work and identify interesting cases.

Have a writing goal gives me the motivation to keep it up, as well!

mid life crisis part 36

When I am not in front of the computer, the ideas are ready to be thought and placed on the page.  When the page is available, I can think of 25 (non-productive) thing I would rather do.

Today, I am just going to put words down in a free form way, and hope for the best.

I am completely aware that my weird sort of mid-life crisis is well underway and shows no sign of dissipating any time soon.  I am ambivalent about my practice, and I don't trust myself to become a writer.  I have to quit thinking that I can override the MS fatigue, the inability to walk, my numb hands,...my depression and become something or someone else.  I am not reinventing myself in the game.  I am prematurely exiting the game.  I am calling what is happening, an early retirement, but it is really, a physical and emotional inability to keep on keeping on.

So I am probably going to let the practice, as it exists now, die a lingering death.  So now what?  That the question and I am allowing the confusion and not-knowing-ness to be my current reality.

I am aware that a big chunk of the failure to thrive of my practice has everything to do with this attitude.  If I am not putting the intention and effort in making something happen, it won't happen.  The problem is, that I don't believe it will happen for me.  I believe that even if I put in a lot of effort to make it happen, that somehow, it wouldn't happen anyway.  I hear about therapist's who run into a perfect deal with a referral source, by chance, or they get recruited to a group practice or a dream job because they are so out there and so good at what they do.  That kind of thing doesn't happen to me.  Or maybe it does, but I'm not able to see it, because, maybe I'm really not the therapist I always hoped I was.


So who I am I without that role?  I have been attached to the role of "Therapist" for so long, that I am not sure who this new person is!  Maybe, I can reframe for myself and see this as an exciting new adventure into the unknown.  Or I could quit being sappy and just decide that I am tired and am just moving into a lazy ass resting mode.

I'm always going to wonder about a whole plethora of what ifs, missteps and wrong decisions along the way.  But the bottom line is, this is where I have landed.  It is not so bad.  Dana is successful enough that I no longer have to worry about how we will pay the bills.  Any fear or anxiety is all ego feeling as if I am not leaving my mark on the world. Or , at least, not a big enough mark,

I am going to quit with lingering doubt and anxiety and let thing play out.  You know, things have always been playing out.  Things are always beyond our control.

I like those quizzes on Face book.  You know, What state should you live in?  Which famous dictator were you in a past life?  and my fave Which Harry Potter Character are you?  I always get Luna Lovegood, even if I try not to!.  I stumbled upon  quiz on Stumble Upon that was a little different.  You were supposed to answer questions regarding how you would feel in a variety of situation.  The last question was "You are lost in a deep fog in the woods.  What would you  do?"  My response was, to move forward slowly and enjoy the mystery.  The question said your answer indicates how you feel about death.  I love my answer.  I am going to choose to use that answer , not just abut death, but about ythe rest of my life.

I am going to move forward slowly and enjoy the mystery of what comes next

Here are some pictures from DC, just as I promised!

Botanical gardens.  Ellen (who looks just thrilled to be there!), me and my Mom in full 70"s regalia

Me and the Capitol.  I am the one in red

Me, my Dad (My skinny dad,), and my brother ready to boogie board!

Me, my brother and Ellen in front of The White House

The Washington Hilton and pool

Just a word about these pics.  No doubt about it, I was thin and almost athletic looking, although I never was, and never will be that.  That red tee shirt, worn with gym shorts, (which were a stylish thing at the time!  I swear!), was from The Pooh Company which you may remember from earlier posts.  My hair was not always that blonde, but it got pretty bleached out every summer