A breeze off the river sent chilly fingers through my thin shirt. I’d walked to the first stop of my morning stroll, the Charity Thrift Shop, bought a book, then hurried back to the house for another layer. Now amply fortified, I set out to find the one fabric shop in Ferragudo. At least, I hoped it had fabric.
As soon as I turned away from the river, the incline veered steeply up, and my pace slowed proportionally.
A sewing machine on a sign suggested that might be the place I was looking for.
Stop #2.
I stepped into a hive of whirring needles and saw a note: Alterations, posted by the cash register. A young woman slid from behind her machine and hurried toward me. For the next few minutes, we earnestly and unintelligibly burbled at each other until she whipped out her phone and typed in, Please tell me what you want, and handed it to me.
Do you have small piecesof fabric for sale? I typed back.
Come and speak to the manager at noon, she replied,
Thank you. I said, and left. Dead end.
I continued my uphill climb, craning my neck to gaze at the whitewashed walls of The Palms, streaching heavenward. Later, I googled and learned that The Palms – Ferragudo is a private “closed condominium” providing peace, tranquility, and security to its privileged owners.
As I read the description, it was abundantly clear that my privilege was of some lesser variety than what was required to live there. I moved on.
The Palms was the summit. It was all downhill from there. And yet, there remained no shortage of charming gateways, stairways, and pavered roadways to delight the eye.
Destination #3
Club Nau on the beach. A sign at the roundabout directed me up another hill. This one offered views of a different nature.
And suddenly, I was at the top with sand, sea, and sky arrayed in splendor below.
Down the steps and left on the boardwalk brought me to the beachy vibe of Club Nau.
For a blissful hour, the ocean whispered secrets, sailboats, like giant white birds, skimmed the surface, and cranes circled, cawing and mewling overhead.
The panorama of peace played out while I sipped my blackberry SPARKLING CIDER! That’s the name I couldn’t remember in the video! Sparkling cider.
The slow meander home showed me the back side of the castle and weather-and water-sculpted rock formations.
A row of fisherman’s huts huddled against the cliff.
And I soaked it all in like a giant, starving sponge.
Getting old is worth it to have these magical days of falling wider, higher, and ever more deeply in love.
Icy dervishes whirl across the field outside the window. My weather app describes today as dreary. Seriously? How about cloudy? Knowing there will be an absence of light is enough information. Cloudy states a fact. Dreary assumes a negative emotional response. Not everyone finds an overcast day dull, bleak, lifeless, and depressing. Maybe I welcome this sunless day to curl up with a book or chop and sauté in a brightly lit kitchen, filling the house with the nurturing aromas of a hearty soup. Just stick to the facts, AI. Don’t tell me how I should feel.
The first time dreary popped up on my app, I chuckled. I was used to seeing cloudy, mostly cloudy,intermittent clouds, and snow. Clear days here in the far north aren’t designated sunny, they’re just called cold. The new word felt like a whimsical departure from the norm and made me smile. But today’s dreary followed a long string of overcast and cloudy days. My first reaction was, “Go away!” (Like the nursery rhyme: Rain, rain, go away, come again another day, little Sherry wants to play…) My light-deprived inner child was annoyed.
So, I was already in a pissy mood even before getting out of bed.
After journaling in front of my cozy fireplace and pivoting to a more positive mindset, I decided to spend the day cooking.
Mom used to make Italian Wedding Soup. I’d found a recipe online and skimmed it for my shopping list and purchased the ingredients. But true to form, I’d neglected to read the details.
Remembering how delicious it was, I decided to make a double batch and set to it, mixing Italian sausage and ground beef, egg, breadcrumbs, parmesan cheese, and onion. When it was the desired consistency, I glanced at the instructions and did a double-take.
Form the mixture into about 40 – 1/2-inch wide – meatballs.
One-half inch wide? The size of marbles? Forty?You’ve got to be kidding! For the next hour, I sat rolling sticky blobs into teeny-weeny balls that more accurately approached 3/4 of an inch wide. I filled a 15 x 20 cookie sheet with 108 meaty marbles.
All that effort and half the mixture still remained in the bowl. I shoved the pan in the oven and made an executive decision. The rest would be four times the size of those wee nuggets.
The minis were done in minutes. I left them to cool while I prepared their jumbo siblings. That went much more quickly. But, when I tried to turn the oven back on to bake them, nothing happened. After two years of cooking, my forty-pound propane tank had run out of gas. The line from a Seinfeld episode screamed in my head: No soup for you!
I put the sheet of large raw meatballs in the freezer and went outside to unhook the propane tank and load it in my trunk for the next trip to town. The not-so-dreary day got worse. The tank was frozen fast in place. It wouldn’t budge. I wrapped my arms around it and tugged. I wedged myself between it and the house and pushed. I cursed it in Spanish, Indonesian, and English and kicked it forgetting I had metal ice cleats on my boots. No damage was done, they only marred it a bit cosmetically. In the end, the tank won and I quit.
After the frustrations of the morning, a warm blanket and a good book sounded like heaven. I cuddled in and fell instantly to sleep.
Today was to be mostly cloudy but warmer, according to my app. Mid-afternoon, armed with a bag of Ice Melt Salt and a quart of boiling water, I once again went on the offensive with the tank. I tucked salt around the base and doused it with hot water. At first, it didn’t appear to be working. But then… there was a slight jiggle when I tugged. With renewed vigor I grabbed it. Back and forth, back and forth, I rocked that baby loose. Success!
Tomorrowis predicted to be above freezing followed by four days of cold. I’ve positioned a cement block over the frozen spot and the freshly filled tank will sit atop that from now on. Problem solved.
In the midst of all this, I had a Human Design reading. It was a birthday gift from my daughters. Among other things, I discovered that I am an Experiential Learner. Is that a polite way of saying I have to f*** it up first before I get it right? That would explain a lot!
I hope you’re keeping warm and there are no drearies on your weather app.
You blew me away with your responses! What great suggestions you all made! I’ve taken your advice and have been busy rewriting and expanding to the next few chapters. Once again, critics have at it! Please!
I do have a few specific questions.
1) I’ve written in a very informal style, incorporating comments from my everyday life. Is that working?
2) The information isn’t new, but my goal is to present it in an engaging way. Is that working?
If you could respond to those and then freely voice all other thoughts, criticisms, and advice, I’d be thrilled! Here goes round two!
Don’t Hold On To What You Can’t Have
CHAPTER 1
Grasping, clinging, and telling myself lies compromised my happiness long past the use-by date. So where do I get off asking you not to hold on to what you can’t have? How do I dare offer advice when I personally screwed up so brilliantly?
If I had an imposter syndrome, that would shut me down. But impostering isn’t one of my issues. How do you measure what has been learned over decades? Here I am, a seventy-something who fudging knows a bit from living it. I’ve laughed, loved, failed, and yet come out on the other side vigorous and vim-full of…well…you decide.
I want to talk about letting go because it’s sticky, and tricky, and one of the most important keys to happiness. There are times when it’s necessary to sever all bonds, and other times when subtly loosening the grip does the job.
But it’s knowing, isn’t it? Knowing who we are, what we need, what we want. Knowing when enough is enough and too little is too painful.
Socrates, one of the great philosophers of all time, is credited with saying, Know thyself. He also said that self-knowledge is a philosophical commandment that can help people avoid mistakes in their relationships and careers.
Philosophical commandment! Holy ravioli! What does that even mean?
Ravioli – I’m starving. Time for lunch. More later.
CHAPTER 2
Okay, I’ve given it some thought. Let’s reduce philosophical commandment, to a less lofty-sounding but equally valid expression. Let’s call it the guiding rule. Self-knowledge is the guiding rule that helps people avoid mistakes in their relationships and careers. When it’s spelled out that way…so logical…right?
Until I read the iconic book by Kathleen A. Brehony, Awakening at Midlife, I had not devoted one iota of bandwidth to pondering those essential questions about myself. I was living on autopilot, numb, checked out.
Sadly, we can’t flick a button to light up our awareness. Learning who we are is a process; if it hasn’t been part of the daily regimen to date, there’ll be some catching up to do.
I was in my fifties with four failed marriages and a felony conviction to my credit (or debit) when I began to ask Who am I? Fortunately, the conviction was overturned on appeal, but I’m just saying, I was a late bloomer at the awareness table. And, I hate to admit this, but even after I began the process of self-discovery, I married and divorced one more time. Breaking old patterns is a bitch.
On the flip side, my transformation is a testimony to the fact that it’s never too late. Are you listening? It is never ever too late.
Uncovering who we are is an exciting journey. I didn’t know I was a writer. Didn’t know I loved solitude. Didn’t know how much I needed adventures, challenges, experiences, and an out-of-the-box reality. It gives me goosebumps to write this, to remember how lost to myself I was.
When we don’t know ourselves, we’re vulnerable. Instead of choosing what will feed and nurture us in healthy ways, we run the risk of falling prey to opposite energies. That’s what I meant when I said I was on autopilot. I let life happen to me rather than making informed choices to determine my fate. Self-knowledge = informed choices = a higher potential for happiness and success.
What does all this have to do with holding on or letting go? Everything. Yup. Absolutely everything.
Okay, it’s 32 degrees Fahrenheit, as warm as it’s going to get today, and it’s already closing in on 2 p.m. I need to get my walk in before dark. In the frozen tundra of northern Minnesota, winter brings nighttime virtually on the heels of sunrise. I need to catch while catch can – back soon!
CHAPTER 3
It’s a quarter to eight in the morning and still dark. In honor of all that’s true and holy, I’m letting go of my need for sunlight and embracing the gloom. To my point – I’m choosing not to hold onto what I can’t have right now. I’ll practice patience. That’s a good place to start. I’ll loosen my vise-like grip on the desire for a bright and beautiful day knowing that if I’m patient, that day will come. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, and if I check my weather app, maybe not for a week. But it will come. So, Sherry, give up your infantile whining already!
Patience isn’t always a virtue. It’s good to have patience for something over which you have no control. Like the weather, for instance. But in circumstances where your needs aren’t getting met…. Here’s where you have to know yourself. If you don’t know what you need, you don’t know when you’re not getting it. To be a healthy human, you must know when action is required to make a change for your well-being.
So let’s help you get to know you.
After I read that life-changing Awakening book, I set out on my journey of self-knowing. I made a list of things I love. Not people. Not pets. Things. One of them was sunlight through French doors. Really! That’s random. But it’s something I love. My list went on for pages and pages. I found myself returning to it throughout the days as another ‘love’ popped to mind.
What a simple task, right? But, by becoming aware of the things I loved, I was able to give myself more of that. I immediately weeded out of my life the things I didn’t love. Itchy clothing, stinky candles, lumpy pillows…. You get the drift!
#1 – Make a list of the things you love
When I well and truly couldn’t think of another thing I loved, I asked myself, What do you want that you don’t have? I quickly realized I’d opened Pandora’s Box – a real can of worms. My day-to-day was a shallow shell of shoulds. I was trying to fit into a mold of imagined expectations – what I thought others wanted of me – that had no resemblance to the life I desired. I remember thinking, I’m just marking time, waiting to die.
I panicked. I’m not kidding. The hairs on the back of my neck prickled. My breath came fast and shallow. The room faded in and out of focus. I was cemented into a job, a house, a marriage, a community, an entire life that belonged to someone else.
We stuff this information so deep…we tell ourselves stories to support the lies…we deny, deny, deny, that anything’s wrong and put on a show of the perfect family, the perfect marriage, the perfect employee, the perfect wife, when all the while we are perfectly miserable.
If our reality is dreadfully out of alignment with our heart, it will require great courage to take the steps necessary to shift it. As I viewed my list of woes, my first thought was, no way. There is no way out. My second thought was, But this is unsustainable. I’m just marking time. I have to find a way.
According to the Constitution of the United States, the pursuit of happiness is our inalienable right. Deep down I felt that. I hated what I had to do yet I knew I deserved better than a robotic, disengaged existence. But, Oh! My! Where to begin?
And there are times, like now, when my heart says, Keep writing, and my body says, It’s noon! For god’s love, stop and eat breakfast!
‐———-
After breakfast, I did a new vision board.
After lunch, I walked with my sister in a marshmallow world.
After the walk, I worked on chapter 4! Now I await your feedback!
It’s the day after Christmas and I’m blown away! Your responses to my request for partners in my ONE BIG IDEA was unprecedented. Wow! Thank you!
Momentum is with us, so…moving right along…
The votes are in and there was a tie: Journaling the Subconscious and Don’t Hold On To What You Can’t Have are the clear winners. So, I’ve decided to combine them. It’s easily done, I think. Anyway, you’ll let me know if it’s working as we go.
Now, according to the advice from my mentor, Matt R., I’ve jotted down the first few paragraphs – a sloppy stab at what I think this book might feel like – and I’m once again looking for specific feedback. You’ll find those questions at the end. So here goes…don’t judge me…actually…DO JUDGE ME! We’re in this together – doing something old in a new way.
Title: Yet To Be Determined…
Chapter I (These are just a few intro paragraphs to get your feedback)
A reader called me out recently saying, How dare you offer advice without the proper education to back it up? If I had an imposter syndrome, that would have shut me down. SLAM! BAM! THANK YOU MA’AM! But impostering isn’t one of my issues. How do you measure what has been learned over many decades against a college degree and zero experience? Who do you want to listen to? A twenty-something who just scored their MA in counseling or a seventy-something who f****** knows sh** from living it? No contest, folks. Hands down, the one who’s lived, laughed, loved, failed, and yet come out on the other side vigorous and vim-full of wisdom…I’ll take that any day over a book-taught newbie.
So, let’s get to the task at hand. When I talk about journaling from the subconscious, it’s because I’ve been doing it for twenty years, and the revelations gleaned from that practice have transformed my life. And when I tell you not to hold on to something you can’t have…don’t get me started. Well, actually, yes! Set me loose on that one. Grasping and clinging, telling myself lies, compromised my happiness long past the deadline when most intelligent people would have figured it out.
——————————————-
Okay, it’s your turn!
Did I successfully get your attention? If not, why?
Are you convinced that I may have valuable things to say about the subject? If not, why?
Have I engaged you enough to continue reading? If not, what should I do differently?
Can you relate to the ‘voice’ – the somewhat cheeky writing style? (Remember, Matt says this should be brief, punchy, passionate, and above all, interesting.)
This is SO MUCH FUN! But…remember…be honest with your critiques. I was in the Ubud Writers’ Group and they were relentlessly brutal! I can handle anything!
There’s a section of the vision board I haven’t dealt with. Upper left quadrant. There it is. I can’t move on to create a new board until this one has fulfilled its mission, until I’ve done the deep dive into the subconscious messages represented here that are running my show. This is the last one. It’s daunting and I’ve avoided it, especially the part about the inner goblin. Who wants to face that?
Here’s the magic. As I sat down to write, I had no clue what my inner goblin might be. But as soon as I isolated the image posted at the top of this page, I laughed out loud. In my face was the reality that, at this point in my life, I’m experiencing resistance to New Possibilities and New Ideas – new anything for that matter.
That isn’t who I’ve always been. I’m adventurous, up for anything, raring to go, right? Suggesting that might have changed makes me think I’m getting old. Please don’t laugh and say, “You ARE OLD!” Age is a state of mind. You’re as old as you believe you are, and I believe myself to be approximately forty-ish, at least in measurable energy if not in looks…that ship has sailed. I just took a selfie to see how many wrinkles I could make. Unfit for publication. Too much truth.
To suggest I’m satisfied with the status quo is an understatement. To imply I’m stuck there might be true. But when you’ve got it so good that you can hardly believe you’re that fortunate, why wish for anything else? I’m close to family yet independent. I have a vibrant community. My house is everything I ever wanted. I look out my windows at peaceful fields and magnificent trees.
I could go on and bore you to tears, so I won’t, but the message is clear. I’m happy.
The catch, then, is OPEN-NESS. Despite deep contentment, am I willing to fall into something new? Do I need to be? The goblin would suggest that, yes, I do. But, if I’m perfectly honest, I don’t even want to be presented with the possibility of something new. There’s been so much change in my life. I’m ready to settle, ready for stability, ready to plant myself in this safe place and just be.
So perhaps the inner goblin is the feeling that I SHOULDN’T be content with that. I never have been before. I’ve needed adventure, challenge, change. Distractions. From what? Probably, from knowing that life is finite. There’s an end and let’s not get there with regrets, things left undone, sights unseen, adventures unexplored.
Well, that end is in sight. Not imminent, but clearly on the horizon. I’ve gone where I wanted to go, seen what I’ve wanted to see, had adventures enough for two lifetimes. The itches have been scratched. So, inner goblin, wither and die you bothersome fiend! I am where I am, what I am, who I am, and until I say otherwise, I’m unrepentantly delighted.
I’ve been thinking a lot about life lately. None of us asked for it, but after nine months, give or take, we’re thrust naked into this world, helpless. Absolutely and utterly helpless. We would not survive without someone to tend to our every need. What is that, a parasite? No, a parasite feeds on its host. I looked it up. It’s a word I’d never heard. Human babies or any infants that cannot care for themselves right out of the gate are called altricialyoung. Those that pop out already self-sufficient are precocial young. (Is that where precocious comes from?)
Those were the second and third new words I learned today. The first was Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar. That’s a mouthful.
Not that any of that matters, but I do love words, especially when they’re strung together poetically. Those brilliant writers who construct sentences in unique ways to make me feel like I’m right there are heroes to me. It’s the difference between writing, He was angry, as a statement, or, His face turned a shade redder, his fists clenched, and every word that spewed out was laced with venom. The first rendition is boring. In the second, I can see this mad soul and feel his fury.
See how easily I squirrel down a rabbit hole? I was talking about life, right?
For two years, mine has been synonymous with hard, physical work. I hadn’t realized until now how desperately I needed that distraction. Back-breaking labor brought healing magic as the trauma-angst of Covid slowly seeped out of my nervous system.
Building a house required skills I didn’t have. Designing it was easy. Second nature. But making the vision become reality with lumber and screws? Way beyond my pay grade! But I had help, patient teachers, and a few not-so-patient ones. I learned a lot. The end product is far from perfect, but it’s mine. And the sense of accomplishment? Off the charts.
As of this week, the inside is finished and fully furnished. It’s a home that so completely reflects me that a mini-explosion of joy hits me every time I walk through the door. I made every choice. The main living area is neutral with bursts of color in the rugs and accessories. Windows face east, south, and west with sweeping views of meadows and marshlands. Light and bright, it vibrates happy energy.
This past year, I added a garage, deck, entryway, and a 14’ x 22’ loft room with a moody vibe. Browns and grays provide a backdrop for warm bronze, terra cotta, and gold. It’s a private place where reading, writing, and solid, eight-hour sleeping, flourish.
I need both spaces, the upbeat and the shadows. In my loft I feel grounded, nurtured, safe. In the livingroom/kitchen I’m bouyant, lighter-than-air.
And now, I suddenly have free time. There are no undone tasks looming like goblins in my psyche. I’m free to live.
It’s no wonder, then, that I’ve been thinking about life – where it’s taken me, what I’ve learned, and how I want to spend the years I have left. I say years, but there are no guarantees. That knowledge drives my thoughts as well. It’s almost as though building the house was a brief detour from my trajectory. I put writing on hold. Travel on hold. Even thinking was suspended.
And now, I’m feeling my way back. The only thing I’m sure of is my delight in this place. My sense of well-being here. The scent of fresh-cut hay. The sounds of my cousin’s tractor pulling the baler leaving giant tootsie-roll mounds in the field. Raucous honking of Canadian geese flying south.
I’m in no rush to do anything. Maybe it’s time to rest, to revel in this peace, to enjoy my surroundings with no pressing urge to explore beyond my front yard. How unlike me. Could I have achieved contentment? Maybe this is Nirvana – neither suffering nor desire, just peace, tranquility, joy, enlightenment…hmmm…enlightenment… Okay, not quite there yet, but I can see it from here!
When I imagined moving to remote northern Minnesota, I wondered if I’d feel isolated, deprived of friends, even lonely.
I knew my house would be mere steps from my sister’s home, but she has her husband and her dog to keep her company. From emailing faithfully back and forth every day through the covid years, it was clear that she was happy with her routines and content with her life. But as we mused together about my move here she seemed eager and excited. She told me about her vision for a community on the farm and said my coming would be the first step in manifesting it.
In many ways, Gwen and I are as different as peas are from turnips, yet we share similar interests. We both love to read and write poetry and enjoy sewing projects, although she’s a true artist while I’m an impatient, just-get-it-done-and-get-on-with-life imposter. She bakes the tried and true recipes we grew up with. I like flavors of Asia, India, the Middle East, and Italy (who doesn’t like Italian food) and I experiment with those dishes. She’s addicted to chocolate. I can’t stop eating salty popcorn. She hates to travel. I crave it. In a nutshell, our differences keep us interested and curious about each other.
The combination of Gwen, work on my house, and writing, would have been enough. But…
My sister and W have been established in the community for decades. Gwen worked in school administration until she retired and W is the township supervisor (has been for years) and makes it his business to know everyone. They host coffee for various friends or family members at least once a week and folks in these parts are quick to reciprocate so they also get invited for coffee about once a week. The thing is, we’re considered a unit: Gwen, W, and I, so I’m included in all of it. As a result, I feel the need to pull my weight and serve up something delectable with steaming cups of joe for those same people on a regular basis.
Then there are my children and grandchildren…
family weddings, graduations, funerals…
people who are curious about my tiny house and the addition I’m putting on…
old school friends…
and friends from my years in Minneapolis that I haven’t seen since I moved to Bali in 2012.
Suddenly, I find myself on the opposite side of loneliness, adjusting to more socializing than I’ve ever in my life experienced before.
What I didn’t know about this chapter could fill a library.
Take, for instance, the garden. Gwen and W have a spreadsheet laying out the location and number of rows for each vegetable. They order seeds in December and plant them in flats that sit under grow lights by a bank of southern windows until it’s warm enough to move them to the greenhouse. As soon as the earth is dry enough, W tills the plot and rakes it smooth. Planting begins when the snow melts and the threat of frost is over.
I was lulled into thinking gardening was easy this spring when the planting went fast and felt effortless. Then, I was gone for several weeks babysitting for grandchildren so I missed most of the weeding, watering, and tending. But the garden grew without me, and now it’s harvest time.
There’s no keeping up with it! Beans – experts recommend picking them twice a day. How many beans can three people eat? The raspberries are just as prolific.
And cucumbers – Gwen’s been pickling and jars line up like a platoon of soldiers. Tomatoes are ripening, and so is the corn. Carrots will soon be big enough to pick and preserve. There are a hundred garlic bulbs drying on a wire rack in the garage.
I’m so far out of my league with the garden. I want to help, but my questions must annoy the heck out of my patient sister and brother-in-law.
“Is that a weed?”
“Is this ripe?”
I really am that clueless.
Nonetheless, gardening is a communal effort in many respects and adds to the social-ness of life here.
Bear’s arrival brought a new dimension to the group dynamic. He was a history major and there’s nothing he doesn’t know about the rise and fall of empires, wars, the dates of plagues, the migration of people over the face of the earth…and music. He has thousands of vinyl records and remembers all the heavy metal groups from the sixties onward. He’s witty, inquisitive, and a willing participant in our nightly deep philosophical discussions.
Yes, nightly.
The four of us gather at 5 p.m. every evening to replay the events of the day, philosophize, plan what needs to be accomplished on the morrow, and enjoy our beverages of choice. Bear likes flavored sparkling water. The Klarbrunn brand is his current favorite. Gwen and W drink pinot grigio. I’m hooked on Smirnoff’s Spicy Tamarind Vodka over ice.
If you want to try it, fill a glass to the brim with ice cubes, then pour a shot over them. Let it sit for 15 minutes so some of the ice melts diluting the vodka just a bit. If you don’t, you’ll wish you had. It’s an acquired taste, one that I developed in Mexico. I was fortunate enough to find a liquor store in Grand Rapids that sells it. They had one bottle. Now, they stock at least five or more at all times. I think I started something.
A year ago, on August 19th, I left Mexico and landed in Minnesota to stay. I love my view over fields unobstructed by anything manmade. Before, I valued the fact that I could walk wherever I needed to go. Now, groceries, building supplies, toilet paper, and everything else, require a forty-five-minute trip one way. I’ve grown to appreciate the zen-ness of that drive on the Great River Road, snaking along the Mississippi,
navigating ninety-degree corners around fields of corn, rye, and alfalfa. I have to go slow to avoid deer popping out of the woods in front of me, or wild turkeys clustered around something dead on the pavement.
As much as I’m physically here, my mind still swirls in the surreal elsewhere of multiple realities. I messaged Ketut, in Bali, to wish him a happy birthday. Selamat ulang tahun, Bapak Ketut. Sudah potong kuenya? He answered that he did not have a birthday cake because his birthday fell on the celebration of Kuningan, and there were already many offerings of sweets. My mind’s eye saw graceful penjors arching over the streets, and women in their see-through lace tops and satin sashes, carrying towering offerings on their heads.
The bold, macabre design on the vodka bottle transports me to San Miguel de Allende. Once again I’m on Elaine’s rooftop with my friends watching men, women, and children, in frightening Day-of-the-Dead costumes, dancing as they parade along the street below.
A steaming bowl of pasta, and I’m back in Praiano, the village on a cliff where you climb a thousand stairsteps to go anywhere.
I remember my hosts, Nicola and fabulous Felicia with deep fondness. How I miss them. And Signore Piccoletto, serving his tiramisu at Saghir Restaurant, will forever remain in my heart.
There’s no loneliness here on the farm, only the sadly-sweet memory of friends I’ve left behind. Helen Keller is credited with saying, Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all. I signed up for the daring adventure, and, oh! baby! What a ride.
When I began writingforselfdiscovery.com I was doing just that – writing to figure out who I was. I still journal every morning, and sometimes I’m surprised by revelations. But self-discovery is no longer the focus, and writing has taken a back seat to manual labor…The Projects.
After leaving Bali, in Indonesia, then San Miguel de Allende, in Mexico, I needed a place to live. Transforming a dilapidated hunting shack into my home sweet home took hundreds of backbreaking hours. Even though I may have actually worked only five out of twenty-four each day, there was no way I had energy left to write. Whoever I was, or whatever I was becoming, had to happen without me pestering and probing it with words.
Even after I moved into my new home on Valentine’s Day, there were a thousand and one finishing details: butcherblock countertops to sand, seal, and stain, shelves to hang, curtains to make, and towel bars to install.
Then there was the matter of the antique rocking chair disintegrating in my sister’s garage.
I needed a chair and she suggested I take that one. Neither of us could remember where it came from, but she knew it had been in the old farmhouse here when we were kids and had come with us in 1955 when we moved to Grand Rapids.
Gwen offered to help me ‘fix it up’ and found spongy foam for the seat and back in her sewing supplies. I screwed and glued, tightening the wiggly arms and legs, then painted the frame black.
While we worked together, I was motivated. But spring was upon us, and gardening is Gwen’s priority. Her attention was instantly and permanently diverted away from the chair. I draped a scarf over it and used it in its half-baked state while I procrastinated.
A rocking chair alone does not fulfill my definition of comfort. Something to elevate the feet is essential. I scoured the internet for a pouf or an ottoman spending hours scanning every conceivable option, but nothing grabbed me.
One day, wandering through outbuildings on the property, I happened to stumble over a wooden box with a hinged lid and dragged it home. A piece of paper inside said, Libby Township, in faded black ink. Some sharp-toothed critter had gnawed through a bottom corner and a network of webs cluttered with the carcasses of dead insects, crisscrossed each other inside. A mysterious ragged opening punctured the lid. Nonetheless, I knew it was perfect. That evening, after I’d scoured it clean, sanded off the tooth marks, and prepped it for paint, I showed it to my brother-in-law. “Oh! You found the old Libby Township ballot box. That’s government property, you know…” I reminded him that possession is 9/10ths of the law and it was mine now.
Transforming that eyesore into a functional footstool was far less daunting than trying to figure out how to upholster the rocking chair. I turned my attention toward restoring it. Within a day or so, it was finished.
Around that time, Bear joined our community.
He arrived with a motor home that would be his temporary quarters while he turned the old dairy barn into a primary residence.
Perhaps you’re sensing a theme here…hunting shack, dairy barn…
He swore he wanted to do it himself, W swore he wouldn’t help him, and I swore I wouldn’t lift a finger if anyone so much as mentioned sheetrock. Of course, it was all bluster and bluff. Now Bear’s domicile is underway, and we’re all committed to seeing it materialize.
After a morning of leveling his floor on my hands and knees, I came home to that naked rocking chair, mocking me. Suddenly, I couldn’t tolerate it. The rest of my house was finished and every single decision I’d made thrilled me. Feverishly, I set to work. By that evening, the seat was done and I’d cut a pattern for the back.
At sunrise the following day, I was once again leveling the milk house floor on my knees, covered in sand.
When my body couldn’t take another minute, I hurried home to the chair and finished the back.
Day three was a repeat of one and two, but that afternoon I made a detachable seat cushion and the chair was done. All it needed was an accent pillow. I remembered an Ecuadorian weaving on a bag I’d harvested from a friend’s Goodwill castoffs. The colorful, somewhat abstract design would make the perfect accessory. I found the bag and repurposed the woven panel.
Could it be any cuter? What a transformation.
Meanwhile, I was busy scheming with my drafting pencils. Winter had beaten my little car to near death and I wanted a shelter for it. But not just a garage. I also needed an entryway for my house, a deck, and a 14 x 20-foot loft space over the garage. A girl can dream.
As I write, Lofty and Gene are outside, sawing and pounding. The foundation is in, and my vision is taking shape.
Sometimes, I think I should start a writers’ group like the one I loved in Bali. Then my aunt texts and invites me for coffee. Or I should join the local book club. My daughter calls, and I fly to South Carolina to babysit. Another daughter calls, and I drive to Minneapolis to mind their house and the cat while they vacation in Croatia. I ask myself, Were the writers’ group and the bookclub of the past simply a way to fill the void I’d created by being far from family? Do I want or need those diversions now?
The questions are moot. I chose family and a community where we pitch in and help each other. I still love to write, and some future day I may entertain a writers’ group or a book club. But right now, it’s time to pull on my work clothes and make myself available for The Project next door.
The wooden sign hung on the wall in the bathroom hallway and ingrained its message into the fiber of my being from the time I could read until I left home at eighteen.
Standing with legs crossed and butt cheeks clenched, waiting for a sibling to flush and unlock the door, I committed its words to memory:
On every visit home over the years the little plaque was still there to remind me.
When had that message been more pertinent?
My seventieth birthday brought with it a paradigm shift of proportions not seen before in many lifetimes – perhaps ever. Foundations were rattled. Belief systems challenged. Trust in the order of things was upended.
For me, it felt like being stuck in the center of a bowl of lime jello. I could move a little and see fuzzy shapes through the green haze. But my hands had nothing to grasp. I couldn’t get out. I was forced to be with myself.
In the pressure cooker of Covid, the flames intensified under anything left on the back burner to deal with later. Later, was at hand. Emotions, the closeted things I hadn’t wanted to look at, were storming the gates.
Grant me the serenity…
Stoic Capricorn knows how to stuff it, move on, and don’t look back. That can work for a long time and it did. It took me on a glorious Bali adventure. It allowed me to compartmentalize the trade-offs – seeing family perhaps only once a year for a few weeks and living the dream in paradise the rest of the time.
But plague ravaged the earth and everything changed. All at once, I was restricted. I couldn’t just hop a plane back to the States. Vaccinations wouldn’t be available to ex-pats for many months and to fly I needed proof that I’d had them.
Life, as I’d known it in the village of Ubud, disappeared overnight. Locked down without the distractions of friends and fun, the walls of defense cracked. Feelings tumbled out, messy, tangled, unruly, demanding attention.
Accept the things I cannot change…
Weeks and months dragged on. I wrote, meditated, did yoga, journaled. “What’s next?” I asked the Universe and the All-Knowing said, Take time to reflect. Having nothing but time, I did as directed. Slowly, like waiting for a Minnesota winter to end, I dug through my psyche, dusted shadows off neglected data, deleted old stuff, and upgraded the system.
I Zoomed with family. As soon as we finished and the screen went dark, so did I. I’d cook something. Take a solitary walk. Bury my nose in a book. And sob.
I learned a long time ago that nothing changes until I know what I want. It was easier to know what I didn’t want. I didn’t want the coronavirus. I didn’t want isolation. I didn’t want to live with fear. I didn’t want to miss my family. But the Universe doesn’t respond to negatives so I remained stuck in the jello.
What I needed was a want big enough to dream about, to energize me, to propel me toward a goal.
Courage to change the things I can…
What could I change? What did my heart long for? I sank onto my meditation pillow, raised my hands to offer gratitude for the many blessings I still had in my life when a voice resounded in my ear so loud and clear it made me jump. What are you doing here?
In Minneapolis, 2009, bored and miserable, I’d asked myself that same question. My answer had been immediate and shocking: “Just marking time waiting to die.”
I’d come full circle. If I was honest with myself, I’d felt the rumblings of impending transition for the past two years. But a new dream hadn’t taken shape and there was nothing to do but wait for it. There is no forcing the door to the future.
The shift in energy, however, was undeniable, and the tug toward children and grandchildren grew to an overwhelming ache.
The vaccine was eventually offered to foreigners. I got my first dose and was given a date for the second. There was, as yet, no big dream, but I knew I had to connect with my family and I hoped if I took that step forward, light would shine on the path ahead.
I made the circuit from California, to Minnesota, to Pennsylvania, basking, wallowing, and delighting in joyous reunions. I’d booked a round-trip ticket when I left Bali. Now it was time to catch my return flight. I’d left everything there, a beautiful home, dear friends, a life. But the closer the time came to leave, dread filled my heart. I couldn’t go back. At the last minute, I detoured to Mexico.
It had been forty-six years since I’d been in that country, but I knew people there. I quickly acclimated and yet the big dream, the overarching want eluded me. Until I realized…
…and wisdom to know…
Family was the force tugging at me. Roots. Familiarity. A foundation that wasn’t continuously shifting. I wanted accessibility to loved ones without crossing an ocean or needing a passport. Mexico was still too far away. There was only one place that checked all the boxes: the family farm.
I arrived in northern Minnesota in late August to begin the rest of my life. It was an idyllic autumn. The weather was perfect. Leaves changed and held their colors as tamaracks turned golden. Work on my 400-square-foot tiny house progressed.
And then…
It snowed.
As I stare out the window at a landscape gone white and gray, I’m once again flooded with emotions hooked into memories that sent me fleeing the north country years ago. Tangled up with those feelings are others that speak to my soul. I am winter’s child grown old. I’ve come home to embrace what I rejected in my youth, peace, stillness, mortality, and the cold, dark nights between November and June. Unwritten stories whirl in my head. Plots twist through my dreams. I’m excited about the future. I’m excited about the present. My heart and mind are primed to plug into the resilience of my Norse ancestors. My body will adjust!
Meanwhile, I want to paint a plaque to hang outside my bathroom door. It will go something like this: Grant me the serenity…
Am I stuck in a season of Game of Thrones? Since moving to northern Minnesota, I’ve heard the ominous phrase, Winter’s coming, more times than I can count. It sends an anticipatory chill down my spine. Leaves are turning and the next thing we know there’ll be white drifts waist-high.
I loved GOT, but I don’t dare start the sequel, House of the Dragon, before my own house is winterized and liveable. I’d be hooked, binge-watching, and worthless, like I was when I finally tuned into the blockbusting House Targaryan/House Stark series and swooned over Jon Snow’s woeful appeal. In spite of violence, torture, and relentless bloodshed, I couldn’t stop watching. That’s what happens when the plot is irresistible.
What does any of that have to do with my little house on Fantasy Bay?
Plenty! After hiring Leighton Movers to bring an abandoned, half-finished cabin to a prime spot on the family farm, my sister, brother-in-law, and I have been working our senior bods to the point of extinction, skirting the crawl space, putting in new windows, insulating the floor, and digging a trench from the electrical pedestal to the house. It’s a scramble to meet the encroaching cold. Every morning the thermometer reads a degree or two chillier as we brew coffee and shiver under our layers.
Sometimes it seems like an impossible dream. Then we complete another day’s work and I drag myself to bed, hopeful again.
This was the cabin when I first saw it about a quarter mile from where it is now.
The idea of installing new windows across the entire front of the house was daunting. I hired local handymen to remove the front wall and build frames for six. “Six?” Lofty, my main guy, repeated the number. “Yes, six. And I want them six inches apart.” I showed him my drawing. He scratched his ear and nodded.
I would have loved a full wall of glass, but…winter’s coming. In the far north, windows aren’t the best insulators. I compromised, couldn’t afford all that glass anyway, and I still have a to-die-for view. Eventually, two more windows will wrap the corner on the right.
I want it all now, of course. Finished – like it is in my head. Patience was never my forte.
After Lofty and Dante had been at it for four days, the framing was ready and the exterior was sheathed. Gwen, W, and I cut holes in the Tyvek, installed the windows, and applied flashing tape. Ahhhh! The view!
Then we turned our attention to the floor.
I’ve never seen such a thorough job of screwing as demonstrated in the sheets of plywood we had to remove to install insulation. There must have been fifty rusted screws in each piece and they didn’t want to let go. With bruised knees and slivers in our butts from scooching along the floor, we were able to get about one-third of the sheets up the first day. I removed old insulation from the walls to reuse between the floor joists. It took us three days total to complete that job.
After each phase of this project, I’ve thought, Whew! The toughest part is over. Then something even more physically challenging comes along.
Thirty feet long and two feet deep, that’s the length and depth of the trench required by code to bring electricity from the pedestal to the house. I filled out the form on the State of Minnesota website, paid the fee, and within seconds the electrical permit landed in my email box.
Digging the trench would have killed us all if we didn’t have the auger. With that beast of a machine, W punched eight holes in the ground, each one of them four feet deep. Then we shoveled out the solid-packed dirt between each hole connecting them and removed the excess that had fallen back in when the auger came out. We persisted until we had our two-foot depth.
When I say dirt, that’s a euphemism. This soil is clay. When it isn’t sticky-wet slime, it’s a dense, rock-solid wall. Salty sweat burned my eyes. My heart pounded. My shoulders and back ached. I was so tempted to throw down that shovel and walk away. But there was Gwen, sweating and scooping the earth like a maniac, and W the same. Gratitude, guilt, and willpower kept me going.
By the way, what do you think of my fashion-statement designer overalls? They’re Gwen’s. She sews her own and guessed my wardrobe might not be up to the tasks we were about to undertake. So she gave them to me along with the pretty peach workshirt. I accepted, delighted, knowing she had three more of the same pattern. She wears them for gardening. The others are in sensible colors: green, brown, dark blue. I have the serviceable-but-pretty floral ones. I’ve never worn anything as comfortable!
But I digress.
What’s next?
We’ll bring the wiring to the electrical box inside the house and install outlets, switches, and lights. Then the inspector will come to point out everything we did wrong. When he leaves, we’ll correct any mistakes. Once again we’ll call him for another look and he’ll give the final thumbs-up. That’s a best-case scenario. Fingers crossed.
Right now, it’s fifty-two degrees and raining at ten-thirty in the morning. We’re still drinking coffee and procrastinating. That’s a luxury that doesn’t happen often because that phrase beats in our heads with every tick of the clock and drives us forward.
writing for self-discovery 
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