Posts tagged lessons

Lessons in Nevers

Brought to you by Mandy Thompson, cause she asked for a blog and one quick like.

I’ve lived a life full of nevers. 

I’m never leaving Irvine.  (I can’t wait to leave and explore and go see new places and some old places and then come back to this safe place.)

I’m not having babies.  I’m too old for that. (I met someone that makes me want to have babies.  I’m doing all those ‘getting ready to have baby’ things like downing Folic Acid and smiling at strollers.  He asked me if I realized I’d have to get up earlier than 10am if we had them.  I’m, gulp, learning that, too.)

I’m never going to love again. (The thing is, the thing to know is.  Even when the heart is breaking into so many pieces they are so small you can’t sweep them up, it repairs.  God recovers you.  He heals you.  It takes time and you get better and then love peeks back around the corner and says hi in that way it does where it takes your breath away and all the nevers turn into maybes and possiblies and then resounding yeses!)

I’m never doing that ‘church stuff’.  Ever again.  Like, with an extra never. (But, I am.  See, it’s not the church as in the building I adore.  It’s the church as in the people I love.  And no, I don’t love the ones all prettied up and perfected.  They are fine and lovely, too.  I love the ones with a little dirt on them.  I love the ones sitting on the side of the road.  I’m drawn to the ones that have a scowl at God from years of disappointment and always and nevers that left them with indents in their brow.  That’s the church I can’t say never to anymore because it’s you and it’s me and it’s that person down the street that needs to know someone gives a damn about them.)

I’m never cooking again. (I did.  Shh.  Don’t tell anyone that one yet!  I’m still not sure if I’m going to keep that never or not cause cooking isn’t my favorite thing.  It came with judgment and rules and disappointment when I was a young wife many years ago.  Now, I’m quietly cooking in the still of my home and trying things out with the judgment of only me and hoping one day to share a meal full of love with only…you, well, and you, too.)

I’m never going to be okay.  (I am.  And so are you.  And there are those moments.  You know, THOSE MOMENTS, when it feels as if the last bit of the earth has finally caved in on you.  The moments when every foot is on your neck and you cannot imagine lifting your head again from the weight of every boot and every shoe saying, “You won’t make it, you.  No, you won’t.”  That’s a lie.  You will.  And you will be okay.  And you are okay even if your darkest moment.  In fact, your darkest moment is really the lightest because that is when God walks in full of love and mercy and takes all your nevers and covers them with promise and hope and expectation.

Rabinna Kabir.  (He is a Big God.)

Much love to you sitting in a coffee shop looking out at cars passing and not stopping.  Hoping you stop and remember your nevers and squash them when the time is absolutely right and not a moment sooner and not a moment later,

Cole

shoes in my fridge.

I phoned Will from outside the car dealership.

Me: It’s a Sunday.  Can you talk?  Just for a minute.

Will: What happened?

Me: She was just sitting there with her extra large sandwich and her cigarettes and threw the car application at me.  What is WRONG  with people?

Will: What are you doing looking at cars?  We just talked about this.  Just last month we talked about how great you are doing, habibi. 

                                    And then the tears came.

Me: I went to the movies last night and saw Another Year and thought it was about an old couple in love but it was about their single lady friend who looks just wretched and wrinkled and old.  And she doesn’t keep food in her fridge….JUST LIKE ME.

Will: Okay.

Me: And she didn’t have a caaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar!  JUST LIKE ME.

Will: Ahh.

Me: *tears and more tears and then sobs and more sobs*  And I don’t want a car but I left the theatre and knew I had to fill up my fridge with food just so people would think I was normal cause doesn’t everyone have more than orange marmalade, soy, one egg and December milk in their fridge? And then I drove by all the closed dealerships looking for a car cause I need a car so people don’t think…so they don’t think…so they don’t think…

Will: So they don’t think you’re almost forty with no car and no food in your fridge, habibi?

Me: *tears*

Will: You are great.  You are doing great.  Remember how you told me movies aren’t real life.  That real life is real life?  Well, real life is real life, Nicolia.  (He calls me Nicolia especially when he wants to make a financial point)  Nicolia, you are the one I tell people about when I talk about someone growing up.  You are paying your debt, you are living on “bread and salt”, you are being a church mouse and within a year you can go back to getting anything you want. 

I almost made a 20K purchase because of a feeling I had in a movie.  Wonder how often we buy on feeling.  Homes, cars, clothes, electronics for you men folk.  I walked away from the dealership to get sound financial advice from a friend and thankfully came to my senses.  Well, then I got a grilled cheese.  Cause that helps, too.

I won’t tell Will about the new navy suede pumps I bought yesterday.  Or the black snake skin ones, either.  They were on sale.  Well, and then an extra 40% off and a coupon on top of that so practically free if you really think about it.

I might put them in my fridge.

Much love,

Cole

What I Wanted to Say.

Brought to you by $3.17 a gallon which I cannot believe seems like a good deal to me.

I was on my way back to take my rental, oh by the way hi…so I was on my way to take the rental back to Enterprise when I realized I needed to fill up the tank so I didn’t pay $1,732.99 per gallon to fill it up. 

I’m learning in my old age.  You men are impressed, aren’t you?  Continuing… 

So, I go to fill up the car, get out, put my debit card in and do the whole waiting at the gas tank thing that we all do when I noticed the “Push To Speak With Attendant” button.  I stared at it.  I wanted to press it.  Badly.  No, I mean not in the way where you want to ask a question for assistance but in a sort of “Hi, how are you today?  I don’t really need help but thought I’d say hi way.”  You know.  Like that way. 

I kept looking at the button and then looking inside to see who might answer my request and then wondering if they would call the Crazy Police on me for pressing it for a non gas emergency reason.  Though not certain if one can be ticketed for pressing the help button I didn’t want to take a chance.  I’m trying to be responsible and all those sort of pre middle age things. 

Still, what I wanted to do was press it and say hi.

And even this evening.  The grandma that hurt herself last week at the corner market stopped by my office and wanted to thank me for sitting with her until the paramedics came.  She has limited english and I have limited faarsi and what she wanted to say she couldn’t.  And what I wanted to say I couldn’t.  What I wanted to say was, “I’m glad you’re alive and I don’t want you out walking around without help and I’m nervous something is going to happen to you and by the way WHERE IS YOUR SWEATER?” 

And my little, taller than me Snarky Brother.  I stopped by his work today and have missed him and felt this really huge need to rush up and hug him even though our family is not much of the hugging sort.  I saw him and he looked Snarky as ever and not in the hugging mood and what I wanted to say was, “I had another seizure last night and I’m so tired of them but just in case one of these is The Big One I want to hug you so that there will be a hug on the record and just deal with it.”  I didn’t.  I smiled and chatted about nonsense and walked away.

I should have pressed the button at the gas station and talked to the attendant.  Who knows if they were in utter turmoil at that very moment and I could have offered a gas station word of encouragement. 

I should have told the grandma to sit down and found her a blanket and loved on her a bit instead of nodding my head and smiling and having pleasantries that don’t amount to much of anything.

And I should have hugged my brother and then called The Elder and told him how very much I love him.  Just because and just in case and just cause that’s what you should do rather than not doing it.

What I wanted to say to you all is that I’m indebted to you for reading my words and for loving on me and caring and finding joy and some understanding from the details of my life.

Much love to you as you find the things you want to say and then say them,
Cole

October Lessons

Brought to you by candy, of the sweet sort.

It’s been an interesting fall, hasn’t it?  Today was warm and yesterday, while setting up for our event, I was shielding my face from the sun in the hopes of adding not one more brown spot to this pre middle age face.  I’m not sure how successful I was.  I might start wearing a bag over it so if you see me and I don’t wave, well, now you know why.

An interesting fall it has been and even a better October full of bits of learnings and lessons and things I didn’t know and now I do.  And I don’t mean know in a BIG way but in that small tucked into your brain way that hopefully gets to the juicy parts and does the right amount of damage.  You know?  Makes change, bit by bit. 

I learned…

1. If a woman comes up to you, in a witch costume, beer in hand and starts yelling at you take it with a grain of witch-beer-infused salt.  She’s probably a little intoxicated and even though all of her meanness comes out in her heightened beer state and that witch costume might just be Business Casual and not for Halloween, chances are she didn’t mean to curse you, your future children or children’s children.

2. Saying sorries a decade later is good.  Saying them in a year is better.  Saying them in a month is really good.  The same week or day? Rather brilliant.  Imagine if you apologized immediately after making an ass out of yourself, you know, the very next moment?  That would be downright emotionally mature.  Plus it feels good to say sorry when you tell your bartender to, “Get this effin bar together.  Now!”  Yes, that was me.  Ugh.

3. Take responsibility.  If you screw up, don’t lay blame elsewhere.  Own it.  Not more than your part and not less than your part, just your part.  Be the exact opposite of every politician you know and forget about putting spin on your story.  Simply, say, “I blew it but I’m going to try not to blow it again.”  How quickly we could move on if we’d take some ownership instead of mastering spin.

4. Share.  Try your absolute hardest to think of someone before yourself.  I saw grown adults maul a candy bar and little kids stand there with empty trick or treat bags.  That’s not right, folks.  If you look around you, see - you there looking to the right and to the left - there are other people besides you.  Notice them and include them and think of them when you are filling your bag to the brim.  I think our bags are filled to the brim in many ways and can be shared with someone else.  Who needs your share?

5. Talk to strangers.  I don’t mean in that sordid pedophile way.  I mean talk to a stranger that is ten feet away from you and you’ve nodded at or waved to or thought of saying more than a hi or bye with for months.  Those strangers.  Have conversations that last longer than a sound bite.  Ask someone about their day or their life or their greatest love.  Imagine what you’d find out if you took the time to meet someone new.

6. Hot chocolate helps.  It helps everything.  Well, when it’s 83 degrees out it’s a little strange but on most October days if you’ll trust me and order it and add whip cream even though that will be so anti-wellness of you, it will help everything.  You’ll feel better and younger and you’ll remember you from back when you were…you.

7. Like your likes.  My niece Kristina just got her license which technically means she could drive when we go to LACMA but I’m not much of the “driving with a brand new driver on the freeway” sort of girl.  I think if you get the blessing of having children then you get the blessing of their freeway firsts, too.  So, Darling Girl wants to Museum Hop with me which makes me ultra happy and as we chatted I realized her tastes in art are very different than mine.  I like that.  I don’t need her to like my likes.  Are you liking your likes?  I hope so.

I ended today at a wake celebrating the life of a dear family friend.  Ninety-six years of life lived by a woman that chose to be full of grace and full of civility and showed love and kindness each time I encountered her.

That’s my goal.  I want that in my life.  Bits of learning and changes and growth and being less like today and more like I want to be tomorrow. Oh, that’s the plan anyway. Sometimes I blow it and sometimes my days are a smashing success. Today, well, today was a good one.


Much love to you as we peak our heads around the corner at November,
Cole

Lessons in Best and Worst

Brought to you by my favorite cream sort of peasant top that I love so much I bought two.

I asked you. I did. I asked you two things.
1. What was the best part of your weekend?
2. What was the worst part of your weekend?

And normally I gear the question to the ladies cause you men tend to hold back your words but you answered too and I love that.Wanna know mine?

The Best
Sitting around a dining room table BS’ing with my brother and sister-in-law. Riding in the car with Baby Brother. Darling Nieces Sweet Sixteen. Setting out platters. Decorating for things other than work. Hearing the high pitched scream only someone in their teens can master. Hot chocolate. The slight mist of rain that almost isn’t rain but puts a glow on traffic lights. Losing weight and not knowing it cause the scale hasn’t been working but you have. The whooshing of wet wheels on wet roads. Getting closer to the finish line of my first race. Street lamps. Front porches. Remembering being Evil Knievel Brave as a child and thinking that might come back. Detailed dreams without endings. Three books, dog-eared. Inspiring a love of museums in you. Air conditioning and windows open…cause I pay the bill.

The Worst
A remembering cry of grief that came from my toes and out of the top of my head. The second row of the theater. An empty tank of gas. Not having a band aid big enough for your wound.

And then it hits me. The Worst are still good even when they are bad.

My cry of grief was healing and brief and beautiful and muffled and I got through it quick because I knew where to go. And the second row of the theater isn’t wretched. I mean it’s not like I didn’t have somewhere to live. It was more an arching of the neck sort of in the middle of entertainment complaint. How bad can that really be? And an empty tank of gas? That means there’s a car to be filled and that’s pretty cool because I can fill it and take a couple adventures! And not having a band aid big enough for your wound - your loss, your hurt, your anger, your frustration, your unknown. I do have one, I do. The only place I know to go is to God. Maybe you have somewhere else and, hey, make it happen if it works for you. But I’ve tried Mint Chip Ice Cream.  It melts.

You all shared some of your best and worst this week with me. I love when you share. It’s sort of like pre-school but for us Pre Middle Agers. Kinda cool, you know?

The Best
Homecoming. Cuddling with Sailor Boy. Discussing Rapture and sex in same bible study. Taking son and daughter to a college expo. Son and friend built me a fence. Sex, diamonds, whisky, loved ones. Dancing at House of Blues while my hub and kids were home sleeping! Did my 10th race.

The Worst
Laryngitis. Sailor Boy puking on fave pair of heels. Sudden migraine on lazy Saturday. Weekend ending. The rain and…it’s cold! A misunderstanding. Not getting enough sleep (baby didn’t care mommy stayed out late!) Suffering from injuries.

Much love to you this quiet night with one car whooshing past every now and then and the occasional rain drop,
Cole

Lessons in Secrets

Brought to you by things my mother told me never to do and the fall, ‘cause I like it.

My mother always said we could never
1. Get a tattoo.  I didn’t and then she died so I never can.
2. Take out gum at church and certainly never in public unless “you have enough to share with everyone”.  Everyone is a lot of damn people.
3. Whisper.  She hated whispering and to this day I do, too.  Whispering oozes of things you want to say to one person and not to many persons.  Whispering is about things that are private.  I’m much more the public sort. 

And to be honest, this past month has been a brainful.  So, until I could gather the thoughts in my pretty, dirty blonde, roots showing head I felt it best to stay on the silent side of things. 

The secret is though….the whisper in your ear though….the thing you know though is that there are things that sit heavy on my heart and for today, I’ll share the ones that comes easily to mind:

I’m embarrassed for complaining about not having a car for two weeks, getting a rental today and then seeing a homeless man riding a bicyle with his belongings.  I’m tearing up now thinking about how ungrateful I sounded this past 14 days.  I have a beautiful, safe home and heat and water and sometimes electricity when I remember to pay the bill.  And there is food to eat and people to check on me.  And seeing a man near 80 years old quietly riding his dilapitated bicycle loaded with the contents of his life made me shudder.  I’m sad tonight about that.  It’s not okay and being unsettled about it is good.

At my very core, I’m brilliantly scatterbrained.  I could start a million companies and, more than likely, at least ten more tonight with a good cup of hot chocolate in hand.  It wouldn’t do you or me or anyone else any good.  I don’t like that about me.  I want to do one thing well and then maybe add a second thing. 

I’m sort of selfish.  Yah.  I’ve been tired of late.  I’ve wanted Me Time and not You Time and finally understand when people have asked the same of me.  Occassionally you just need to put the “Closed For Business” sign up and mine is going up more often than it used to.  For sanity, for business, for the sake of growing a personal life that sometimes bleeds into a very public life, I need to once in awhile put up the sign.  I hope you’ll love me in spite of that.  I hope you’ll trust I’ll come back more energized when I open for business each time next. 

I get frustrated.  I was sitting at Happy Nails getting a pedicure today and a grown daughter and her mom were sitting side by side completely ignoring each other on their mobiles.  On the rare occassion they would say something to each other but it was limited.  Then they would go back to their phones.  I wanted to scream, “Tell each other you love each other!  Say you’re mad.  Say you’re happy.  Say something!”  I wonder sometimes if it’s better if I simply pick up a magazine and disengage but I’m not sure how to once I’ve put my life in Drive.

Those are some of my secrets.  The only time my mom said it was okay to whisper was in libraries or, I guess, at funerals.  Definitely, most definitely it wasn’t okay to whisper to tell a secret.  “What you have to say to her, you can say to everyone.”

So…Everyone…I’m a human being but you already knew that.  And I love that you love me in spite of that.

A couple more lessons for the road, shall we? 
1. Imagine closing every door gently.  Say goodbye to The Slam.
2. Celebrate things like National Peanut Butter Cup Day. 
3. Bake rather than buy.  Your perfect is prettier than their perfection.
4. Read your pissy emails three times before you send them and delete them before you send them.  So, umm, don’t send them.
5. Let people cut in front of you to build your patience.
6. Don’t pick Pre Middle Age fights.  You’re too Pre Middle Age old.
7. Sure, McNuggets are made out of chicken bone and chicken eyelid paste (allegedly) but try to find a better Diet Coke.
8. Men - learn to hold doors for women even if no one taught you to growing up.
9. Women - learn to let men hold doors for you even if no one taught you to growing up.
10. Be nicer.  Not meaner. 

Much love in the loudest non whisper I can muster on this sweet fall night,
Cole

Lessons in Yoga

Brought to you by fake nails. Ten of them.

Reasons to take The Damn Yoga. In no particular order.

Increased energy.
Roman sat down next to me yesterday and when I complained about being so tired thinking I might be pregnant which is impossible since it requires sex he asked, “Maybe it’s that hot flash thing?”

Camaraderie.
I walked up to someone’s desk this week and said, “You didn’t help me pick music so Saturday, you can ZIP IT.” That’s not in most teambuilding books.

Step Relations.
My Stepmother. Even looking at her made me ill this past Sunday. She doesn’t like me and I’m doing my best to love her. I think Yoga would make me adore her. All those endorphins and “I Think My Stepmom Is The Bomb” type feelings will come rushing in when she looks me up and down. I just know it.

Traffic Safety.
I’m certain the practice will center me more and my frequency of hitting cement poles will lesson. And, rather than brake checking close drivers like my niece advises, I will continue to get out of my car and tell drivers to CHILL. Still hoping they are not packin and thus yoga attenders as well.

General Overall Peace, Love and Coleness.
I need this. The sound of someone getting their fake nails filed (who still does that?) makes me want to run into oncoming traffic. That’s when you know you need The Damn Yoga. And when you call it The Damn Yoga instead of Yoga, that’s when you really need The Damn Yoga. I can feel the deep breaths already.

Where’s my mat? I lose it every six months or so. Think it’s under the kitchen sink. Still wish I could spray paint it brown.

Human, full of flaws and moments I wish I was better and not worse,
Cole

Lessons from Toys ‘R’ Us

Brought to you by Play-Doh and the smell of it squishing between your adult fingers.

I was on the hunt for the perfect, huge doll house to hold down 1000 balloons Friday night for an event Saturday which is the way I do things.  I wait until the night before or the moment before and try to make perfection happen. 

Toys ‘R’ Us was all out of perfect, huge doll houses.  They had lots of small, lovely, dainty ones and pretty, delicate, tiny ones that would break if you looked at them wrong.  Those type don’t hold down 1000 balloons.  They cry in the corner at the thought of 1000 balloons.

Still, I learned a couple things during my Toys ‘R’ Us visit.

1.  Middle aged men should probably not roam the store smelling of beer and hovering in the Barbie aisle.  Can you say creepy and cops are on the way?
2. If you are single and childless or have long since entered a toy store of this sort, follow a parent-type in.  They know the entrances from the exits and will help you from looking like a jacka**.
3. Toy stores are not really intimidating.  Simply think of them like giant Targets but with sirens and eternal supplies of batteries.
4. Everybody needs a pink Barbie microphone.  (I’ll be right back.)
5. If you see a stuffed hippo sitting all by himself, yes him, it is your duty to save.  Try not to talk to Jack, yes Jack, in a loud voice for fear of someone taking you out in a straight jacket.
6. Play-Doh helps.  It helps in nearly any situation.  I gave some to a co-worker today that was having a tough go of things.  If you squish it between your hands and smell the Play-Dohness of it all, you’ll begin to feel much better, much sooner than if you don’t.  Promise.
7.  The woman in front of you in line that is melting down because she doesn’t have her Toys ‘R’ Us Rewards card needs: to get a grip and wear denim shorts that cover her fifty year old a**.  (Wait a second while I light your cigarette.  Ugh.)
8. Don’t get mad at the check out guy for asking Would you like batteries with your purchase? even if you don’t need batteries for your stuffed hippo or your Play-Doh.  He’s doing his job and following the sign and if he doesn’t ask he’s going to get written up so go along with it and thank him for asking.  Just play along, won’t you?
9. Look.  Look at the six foot tall man made out of Legos and stop to stare at the new backpacks coming in just in time for Back to School and think about your excitment when you would pick out your backpack and how important that was and then, for a moment, spend some time bouncing a big, red, rubber ball, well, just because it’s in that bin.  You don’t have to pretend to be a child but you can still play.  No one said you can’t.

Much play to you,
Cole

Lessons in Messy, Beachy Love

Lessons in Details and Gratitude

Brought to you by a McDonald’s large, not medium, Diet Coke.

It’s Friday and the end of a very, ultra busy event week.  I have sore everything and things are throbbing that shouldn’t throb.  On top of that, on a morning where I should bask in the glory of my amazingness, which is what I do the mornings after events, I had a press conference to stage.

*cursing under my breath and out of my bed which I did not want to get out of*

It’s post press conference.  I park underground, come inside my apartment, kick off my heels and instantly feel grateful.  I mean grateful in the hugest way someone can feel grateful.  Grateful like empire state building or egyptian pyramid big grateful.  That grateful.  But it’s for the little things.  The detail things.

Here’s a couple I thought I’d share.

Feet free from four inch heels.  Large diet cokes when you normally get medium diet cokes - especially hot days with air conditionless cars.  Service managers that say, “I know others don’t see but I see you - you have your eye on everything, Cole.  I see.”  Sunglasses that shade harsh sun and brief frustrations.  Showing grace when I only want to show ‘strangle’.  Home air conditioning set low and then lower again.  Mixing up all The Godfather movies to make my own synopsis.  Assistants that finish my sentences and understand my different head nods.  Men that remember.  Summers.  Being called a sexy, smart damsel in distress.  Working until my team stops working. Necklaces that turn into bracelets that turn into sometime belts. Tears that last three minutes instead of three days.  Sweaters.  Messy beachy hair.  Almost biting my nail but then not because things really are okay.  Little boys with summer tans that scrunch their noses when they answer you.  Girls that proclaim their favorite color is pink until their favorite color is green.  Oh, and nicknames.  I love a good nickname.

I like details.  I love the little things.  I’m enjoying this summer, this Can’t Decide If I’m Going To Be Hot Or Cold Summer.  It’s fickle.  I understand it.  It’s sort of like a woman that way.  I get that.

Much love to you as you pay attention to the little details of your very big every days,
Cole