Cautious Optimism

When I read my horoscope for the month I was torn between complete elation and woeful disbelief. Being the closet pessimist that I am, I want to celebrate the “good things to come” and “all your dreams will come true” aspect of the forecast – but also being a realist and a bit of a cynic, I will have to settle for the usual cautious optimism.

Now that the alignment of the stars and planets are in my favor and those pesky retrogrades are supposedly a thing of the past – my career, love life and finances are set to hit warp speed by the end of the year or possibly by mid-January or maybe near the end of February. Who cares if I can’t narrow down the timeline - I am going to be successful, in a wonderful relationship and fantastically rich. It’s about damn time!

For those of you who still believe that hard work pays off or love conquers all, a few years with Mercury in non-stop retrograde for a decade or two and Saturn beating you in the head with a large stick, supposedly to teach you some universal lesson that you probably aren’t going to understand anyway, will change your tune.

I’m a fairly logical and straight-forward individual, and if whatever lesson it is that you want me to learn won’t help me put food on the table or get rid of the lines and wrinkles from worrying how to put food on the table, then there’s a good chance I got bored and only heard about half of what you said.

But there is a problem with that. Apparently, if you don’t listen and learn the lesson, you continue to relive the process over and over again (think “Groundhog Day”). I’m not sure I’ve actually figured out the meaning of the all-important, cryptic message, but I’m so beaten down and worn out that I no longer have the strength to fight it.

Mom always had a few horoscope books strewn around the house. She was an intelligent and independent woman, but she was also quite intuitive and sensitive. She was always looking ahead, searching for answers, which likely contributed to my own desire to question and understand the world around me. One trait she possessed that I haven’t been able mimic was her ability to let go of the past – to live in the present. I waste a lot of energy carrying around hurt, anger and regret. To say I have a bit of baggage is an understatement.

I am certain Mom had regrets in her lifetime, but they did not define her. Heaven knows the woman could get angry, often (actually very often) with me. However, once it was over, that was it. If the situation continued to gnaw at her, she never let on. No doubt the fact that such things stay with me virtually forever was sufficient motivation for her to just drop it. There was no reason for both of us to suffer.

Mom has moved on, literally. Her need to see what lies ahead, far beyond the next bend in the road, is no longer relevant. All the twists and turns have straightened out and her view is no longer obstructed.

Next Wednesday will be her birthday. Perhaps that is why she’s on my mind, but I doubt it. Hardly a day goes by that I don’t feel a sudden soft breeze blow past that seems to come out of nowhere. It’s as gentle as a whisper and I can almost make out the words that I expect to be her voice. One of the last things she said to me was that she’d always be around and I have no doubt that she is.

Illumination

Some days it seems the tall buildings you are expected to leap in a single bound have reached impossible heights. And try as you may to see the forest, the trees keep blocking your view.

I’ve been feeling like this a lot lately. But when the darkness starts to creep in, something always happens to reveal the tiniest pinpoint of light. At first it’s just a glimmer, but if you stand in just the right spot, the light grows and brightens.

My dad is that source of illumination for me. When I go to see him, I don’t really notice how much I need his strength to restore my resolve. But after we visit and I’m driving home replaying our conversations and the stories he shared about his life, that level of need becomes quite clear.

As he talks, I’m a little girl again, reaching up to take his hand, struggling to meet his stride and keep up his pace. I look up to watch his face as he speaks and almost lose my balance, like standing on the sidewalk looking up to the tip top of a skyscraper – the ground starts to move and unsteadiness sets in even though your feet are firmly planted on the ground.

To me, he always seemed larger than life - my protector and hero, a status I did not bestow lightly.
Recently, he’s talked a lot about his childhood. I love this not only because it enables me to understand how he came to be the man that so influenced my life and the values I embrace, but more so because I can clearly visualize him as a small boy in the familiar landscape of his youth.

He talks of spending summers with his grandparents on the farm in Chico, Texas and how the things we take for granted today were outside the realm of imagination at that time. That time? Well, this month Dad celebrates his 89th birthday. So cipher back 80 or so years to the mid-1930s before video games, computers, microwave ovens, cell phones or even touch-tone phones. Think party lines. Wringer washing machines with laundry pinned to an outdoor clothesline. Being too busy working for today to aspire for tomorrow.

“When you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?”

“I don’t remember ever thinking about that. Things were different than they are now.”

The conversation moves on, but he circles back.

“I had a hero.”

He goes on to tell me that his hero was “The Duke” (John Wayne).

“But that would have been when you were a bit older and got to go to the movies, right?”

This is not really surprising to me. Much of my childhood was spent watching westerns on television – Maverick, Rawhide, Bat Masterson and Death Valley Days. There aren’t many John Wayne movies we didn’t see at the local drive-in, or downtown at the Majestic or the Palace – always on the big screen and usually in Cinemascope.

“I did want a saddle and a horse to ride,” he said. “I actually made a saddle out of tow sacks, baling wire and corn cobs.”

This intrigues me and I stay silent, waiting for him to continue.

“On the farm there were plow horses but those aren’t the same as riding horses. They just plod along.”

Chico is north of Bridgeport in Wise County. As a boy, he took the train from Fort Worth to visit. And although I have never seen what the farm was like or even the town nearby, I have a pretty clear picture in my mind – like the many tiny towns and farming communities I’ve visited in north and west Texas.

“I raised a calf one year and she always let me come right up to her, even in the pasture. She let me saddle her and get on but she wouldn’t go anywhere.”

I can easily see this scenario play out. This lanky, toothy boy with thick, wavy auburn hair – a head-to-toe mass of freckles, hoisting himself up onto the saddle constructed of found objects. Slipping bare feet into corncob stirrups and likely scratched up from contact with the baling wire, smiling with satisfaction and enjoying the view from his elevated position even on the back of a cow that refuses to move. The dusty earth now well below his feet and overhead, the wispy clouds sweeping across the blue summer sky seem closer and the sun feels warmer on his bare arms.

It is a world of imagination – he is the boy in the saddle on the pony drenched in sunlight - the possibilities are limitless.

Imagination was my salvation growing up and Daddy, more often than not, was my source of inspiration. In the spirit of found or recycled items, he provided the props that transported me to faraway places and exotic occupations. The rotted-out rowboat that became a sand box set the stage for sea-bound adventures. The old black Underwood typewriter hammered out my stories before I could spell. A glass jar filled with thumbtacks provided percussion for my one-girl band. Throw rugs became the stage for my evening performances. And he patiently sat through it all.

There was a second-hand bicycle given a new coat of red and silver paint, upon which my older sister and I got the feel for balancing on a two-wheeler. A few skinned knees and elbows were definitely involved, but with Dad’s encouragement and a hand on the fender to steady our wobbles, we figured it out.

I spent hours watching woodworking in progress. Daddy sliding boards across a screeching table saw and me sitting Indian style on the cool concrete in a cloud of sawdust that settled on me like snow on an early-spring flower. His movements were deliberate and the work meticulous. I was amazed at what he could create out of random pieces of wood.

He said he misses that at this point in his life – just puttering in the shop or pulling up stakes and taking to the open road on another of so many adventures.

“Sometimes I just look through the pictures of all the places we traveled to.”

And travel they did. By the time he retired from the post office, I was grown with a family of my own. So hearing those stories now is like experiencing each step of the journey with him and seeing it all through his eyes. From winding highways and snaking rivers to mountain top vistas, the world he describes is bathed in light and color – and mine looks so much brighter.

Powerless

It’s a very strange day. I realize the word “very” has absolutely no value but in this situation it seems a necessary emphasis.

Presently, every second of my existence is totally outside my control. My electricity goes on and off at will, my smoke alarms are beeping and my battery powered kitchen clock has stopped – the second hand incessantly bumps against the “nine” making a monotonous clicking noise that may, in fact, drive me mad before the day ends. The weather has turned cold (and I have no heat, i.e. electrical issues) and the grey weather has interrupted my usual intuitive sense of time. I’m lost.

This week was/is planned as a time for me to distress and relax. The words relaxed and Rebecca never appear in the same sentence, but the pressures and adrenaline overload of the past two-plus years has reached the point where something truly has to give.

I am the quintessential creature of habit. I cope by controlling my surroundings – maintaining a routine – checking items off to-do lists. I always know where I am and where I am going (at least in the short-term). I exist pretty much in solitude (fine, I isolate myself). But I always instinctively know what time it is, where I need to be, when I need to be there and what is expected of me.

At this moment, all of those things are outside my control. As I sit here, the power continually flashes on and of, on and off. The second hand keeps bumping up against the nine. Perhaps this is the Universe telling me it’s time to shake things up. Forcing me to survive on a different plane.

The good part of all this is that I have a book that I am enjoying (although I don’t believe there are enough sticky-flags in the world to mark all the passages I will need to revisit after the first reading). And, I have one plug in the house that works consistently, so I’m not literally in the dark.

Perhaps all my disorientation is a divine plan. Like traveling on a train, at this moment, I cannot see what I have passed or what lies ahead and am left only with the resources to imagine what the future holds.

There seems to be a sweet spot between 9 a.m. and noon, and from 2-5 p.m. where the power actually holds allowing me to return to my comforting routine. Everything in between is a bit unpredictable and chaotic. It is 9:18 a.m. and I find I am no longer holding my breath, my pulse has slowed and the vents are dispensing warmth.

It is just a lull. I remind myself not to get too comfortable – for, as Lou would say, this too shall pass.

Going Bananas

On Sunday mornings I treat myself to something special – a banana. What I really want is a dozen doughnuts, French toast slathered in melting butter with warm syrup and powdered sugar, bacon – perfectly crisp and slightly greasy so it coats the inside of your mouth and the flavor lingers for hours. And of course the list goes on and on.

But I have a banana – firm and not too ripe, with a little green still at the stem.

I know I shouldn’t, but I deprive myself all week of any culinary delight that might bring me joy, just so I can have that silly banana. And I savor every delectable bite.

I’ve always been a fan of the phallic fruit. The actual thing or anything banana-flavored. 

A personal favorite growing up was banana-flavored moon pies. I could go through an entire box (12 pies) in a matter of hours and still want more. The chocolate ones would never do; it had to be the banana-flavored ones – about 4-inches in diameter, thick, gummy marshmallow filling between soft graham crackers and covered in the waxy, butter-yellow coating that never seemed to melt even on the hottest day. I have no idea what that coating was made of but I am sure it couldn’t have been healthy. Maybe that’s what made it so wonderful.

I still want it. But one would never do. I want the whole box. And not the tiny ones they sell today but the big, thick, sugary ones I had as a kid.

I’m not a kid anymore and I don’t mourn that fact. Actually, life in my childhood is not a place I would really want to go back to even if I had the option. But if I could step back for just one hour, open the pantry and feel the absolute elation of finding an unopened box of banana moon pies, plant myself on the cool linoleum of the kitchen floor and gorge myself in such pure bliss, I would do it without thinking twice.

Weathering the Storm

Today is my father’s birthday. He turns 88 years old. As a child, the idea that someone could be 88 years old was something I simply could not fathom. But as an adult in my 60s, years take on a different perspective.

Like me, Dad tends to be a worrier. We worry about things we have absolutely no control over. But unlike me he is calm. That is an enviable quality I wish I could possess. He has the ability to live in the moment – where as I am always looking ahead, planning for every impending disaster that I am sure will come. My brain is always creating contingency plans for every possible scenario. In doing so, the joy of the present passes me by. But his calmness helps me weather the storms.

Last August, with the scorching Texas heat, the promise of a coming winter seemed so inviting. In Texas we don’t hold out much hope for the changing colors of fall or new beginnings of spring to segue into the harsher seasons. Any inkling of fall or spring disappears in the blink of an eye.

The weather here can change quickly. It’s not surprising to see 80-degrees drop to 50 or lower in a matter of hours. Winter can last for a few days or go on for months on end. Warm spring-like days punctuate the weeks. Like bookends, they frame episodes of snow flurries and ice storms - teasing glimpses of hope that spring has arrived only to be cut short when the frigid north wind pushes south, blowing the warmth away.

For a couple of months it looked like we would have a mild winter escaping the characteristic “blue northers” or ice storms that are commonplace between November and April. But alas, it was not to be, as Mother Nature blessed our parched prairie with some ice and snow just last week.

I admit to enjoying a few “snow days” away from work. If the power stays on, there’s no reason not to just relax and enjoy it. Just don’t get out on the roads. People here don’t get the concept of slowing down when driving on ice. Every red neck in an oversized pickup truck or yuppie in a Hummer presents a “real and present” danger to everyone else on the road.

Weather and its complete unpredictability make me crazy – OK crazier. Things that I can’t control or at least spend weeks preparing for – well, you see where I’m going here. It’s possible that I’m a little bit OCD. I am most comfortable when I can plan ahead, and then make dozens of contingency plans for what might happen if things don’t go the way I expect.

As one might imagine, weather can be particularly challenging for me.

This is where Dad comes in. He knows how I am about the weather. If there is anything at all going on meteorologically, I can count on him to give me a heads up or at the very least check on me. As confidant and self sufficient as I profess to be, I really need him to check on me. It makes me feel like I am not totally alone.

I remember years ago when my oldest daughter was just a baby and there were tornadoes all around Dallas County. I was terrified and absolutely sure both myself and that tiny defenseless creature were going to perish. I wasn’t just afraid – I was certain this was going to happen. So, of course, I called Daddy. He was postmaster at the DeSoto station at the time and I’m sure he had more urgent things to deal with as the tornado sirens blared and people were taking cover, than to talk to talk to me. But he did. In a calm voice he told me where to take cover and reassured me. He made me feel like I could manage the situation. He made me feel safe.

Since that day, I always hear from him when things get dicey. He calls to make sure I’m not stupid enough to go out on icy roads – that nothing, not even work is worth taking a risk with my safety. And usually I’m right where I should be waiting out the storm or lingering conditions. But even so, just hearing his calm, comforting voice and that “I love you” before we hang up makes me feel like he’s right here watching over me – keeping me safe like when I was a terrified scrawny little kid snuggling up next to him during an early summer thunderstorm.

On that afternoon the skies were so black it seemed like nighttime had settled over our house. The hot winds shifted and the air was chilled. We walked through the house together opening windows before settling on the nubby beige sectional sofa in the living room. Then we watched an afternoon baseball game on our black and white Motorola. As I scrunched up next to him, as close as I could get without climbing up in his arms, he narrated the game, explaining the rules and offering details about the teams and which one we were rooting for. I’m not a sports fan by any definition of the term, but that day I hung on every word and focused intently on every swing and foul ball.

Eventually the storm passed and the clouds parted. I’m sure I scampered off to roller skate or ride my bike leaving him to watch the rest of the game like nothing had ever happened. But the event stayed with me. And whenever the winds of change blow through, he is the one I turn to and he never disappoints me.

Faith

This morning I ran head-on into one of my neighbors. I credit that to the time change. Normally I am outdoors when everyone else is fast asleep, wrapped in the warm cocoon of crumpled sheets and down comforters fitting our recent stint of frigid, snowy weather.

Although it is considerably warmer this morning and rainy, there is still a tiny pyramid of snow in the courtyard – the remnant of a small snowman built by someone in the complex.

The woman I encountered is one of only two black people residing in the condos where I live. Both are single females, as am I. The complex is a throwback from the 1950s with a pool in the center surrounded by 30 or so one- and two-bedroom units. It is a charming place – quiet, once you learn to tune out the planes that fly over taking off and landing at Love Field only a few blocks away.

She was dressed in her Sunday best – black dress, heels and matching hat. A handsome suit- and tie-clad gentleman was waiting patiently in the parking lot. They were obviously headed to church.

I see her often, early on weekday mornings as we both head off to work. I assume that she is a doctor, nurse or other medical professional from the scrubs she wears and our close proximity to the hospital district.

She is friendly and always speaks in passing. She smiles. Not the fake smile you put on when speaking to people you don’t really know – but a genuine warm smile. I think she must be kind and compassionate – at least that is what I would like her to be.

She works rotating hours – sometimes days, sometimes nights. Her posture is confident. She seems to know who she is; and I am envious. She radiates optimism.

Seeing her depart this morning to worship, I wonder if that optimism I sense is simply her faith. Because my own faith tends to wax and wane with daily circumstances, I have difficulty imagining or believing in the possibility of a complete and unquestioning devotion.

But I find this woman inspiring. I want to be like her, exhibiting both strength and the softness of femininity. I want to capture that - to embark on the world each day into a total unknown, feeling secure in my abilities to face whatever challenges the day holds and at the end of the day releasing any transgressions or regrets to the universe to be forgiven so that tomorrow, a new day is truly a new beginning.

This woman and I may not share the same beliefs, but that doesn’t matter. Whatever power guides us and gives us the strength to persevere is equal. We don’t have to be the same. But I am fortunate to have encountered her. Perhaps this is the universe encouraging me to set the bar higher, strive to be better and kinder to those around me and to myself - or to just have a little faith.

Daylight Savings Time

It is Sunday morning. A gentle rain makes a tinny sound on the corrugated metal awning of the carport. I’m comfortably sipping my morning coffee and enjoying the early hours before my neighbors step out to start their day.

Last night marked the beginning of daylight savings time. We were instructed to “spring forward” obliterating an hour to stay in sync with the mandated change.

I despise daylight savings time. I hate that I am required to make this change. I pay my taxes. I obey traffic laws. I endure long lines at airport security checks. I drink fluoridated water. I understand that these things are often necessary for public welfare and safety and in some cases even logical (well fluoridation may be questionable), but do “they” really have to mess with time?

I am excessively time oriented. In most cases I know approximately what time it is without looking at a clock. Because I am so obsessive about time and being on time, I have given up wearing a watch and I have to control my need to constantly look at my cell phone to check the time. I can actually look up at the sun and get a reasonable approximation of the hour. But daylight savings time really throws me off my game.

Is daylight savings time really necessary?

DST is supposed to “save energy and make better use of daylight hours” and has been used at various times throughout history according to timeanddate.com. In my lifetime, because the states had the choice of whether or not to adopt the policy, creating much confusion for the transportation industry, Congress passed the Uniform Time Act of 1966 mandating that DST would begin the last Sunday in April and end the last Sunday in October. States still had the authority to refuse compliance.

In 1974-75 DST was extended to save energy because of the 1973 oil embargo, but there were still complaints largely pertaining to public safety.

Now more than 70 countries use DST. In the United States, the Energy Policy Act of 2005 amended the schedule to begin the second Sunday in March and end on the first Sunday in November, approximately seven months. Within the 50 states, only Hawaii and parts of Arizona do not observe the time change.

And so it is. For the next few months, until my body and senses acclimate to the forced time change, instead of arriving at my destination an hour early, I will likely find myself flitting away two hours when I should be doing something more productive. The upside is an extra hour to take a deep breath or get lost in the prose of a good novel and maybe just stop worrying about what’s going to happen in the next minute or hour or day and just live in the moment.