collage of love

One of the most rewarding outcomes of The Big Dig is John's discovery that his wife has a sense of interior design style & pizazz.  He never knew.

The former computer studio, now welcoming sanctuary, looks like what I've had in my head since forever but blocked out.  A place that I can comfortably read or write or the two of us can watch the week's episode of John Oliver or Samantha Bee.  No need to make a fuss about NOT watching more, about skipping Colbert's Late Show intro - that just feel by the wayside of it's own sort of bleah.  It's a room for being, not watching.  

The transition was inspired by love.  By love of a friend - a highly respected artist - who gave us a large collage he'd done of one of his favorite subjects.  Fred Astaire.  We were both blown away when he gave it to us, knowing how much it meant to him.  And we knew it deserved the best setting possible.  Which was in this very room.  All we had to do was prepare it properly.

Still a long way to go.  It's going to be a while before we can get it painted the deep rich color that will be an ideal backdrop for the silver-toned painting, but both John & I can already see it, hanging on the wall behind the computer station.  

Sometimes a person just needs a good kick start to do what was always right & best.  To John, this room looks sharp & zippy & fun.  Most of all, to me, it looks like a collage of love.

 

 

relearning how to BELONG

It didn't seem possible that the wonders rushing into my life could surge any faster, but boy was I wrong!  The past week, selecting short films & video presentations for my older2elder May Film Fest, found them zooming into my life, with astonishing discoveries literally at my elbow.

On Thursday, John & I headed over to Radnor for a TEDx talk, taking a leisurely linger at the Plymouth Meeting Barnes & Noble - terrific way to be fairly close to our destination but letting I-476 rush hour calm down. 

Wonder of wonders - in a B&N Café notorious for its teeny round tables, one of the two large ones seemed to be waiting for us.  I say "seemed" because there was a stack of magazines on it, which could have been a signal someone had already pegged it -or- that they'd left & hadn't taken their mags to the designated spot for returns.  Praise be, it was the latter!  Even greater, louder praises, because that stack of glossy magazines was about to change my life.

It was a stack of wedding magazines.  Except the top one, a cover I'd never seen before & that frankly didn't really capture my interest - BELONG seemed a little too...  not sure what, but it sure did.  Moved the stack to the far edge of the table.  As I pushed it away, something on the cover caught my eye -
"celebrating the art & community of blogging, social media & entrepreneurship."

This magazine had NOTHING to do with weddings.  It had everything to do with ME.

One of the many things learned earlier this month filling out the TEDWomen application was that I have virtually NO social media savvy & that I better get me some if I want CATT & my Values Vision Dream scheme to be given a serious ear.  Here, literally at my elbow, was a magazine on exactly what I need.  Goose bump time!

The articles make me feel O L D, what they discuss are so foreign.  Snapchat, Instagram & something that posts a video for just 24 hours - and that's apparently a good thing! 

I am in for a major education.

Happy RED NOSE DAY!

Now, if only I wasn't horribly creeped out by clowns!   

Yes, I even find Helen Mirren creepy with a red nose.

3:40 a.m.

3:40 a.m. and I've been awake since close to 2:00 a.m. with a massively painful left knee.  First time, but hardly a surprise.

I've had structural problems with my left leg - beginning with my messed up left foot - for close onto fourteen years.  It was, until now, an inconvenience.  But this HURTS.  It was a little painful during the day - that's not so unusual - but it got bad while I was sleeping.

This aging the old-fashioned way has its downers & I've gotten used to people going off on rants about me not taking better care of myself because of not hot footing it to the doctor's.  But this is my 8 months until Medicare, don't qualify for Medicaid (too much money, assets) or the ACA (make too little money) health care reality.  

Will sleep come?

 

Pathways

My wise mother told me, years before I met John, "Be careful who you marry.  He will be responsible for 90% of your happiness, 90% of your unhappiness."  She was spot on.  John is.

Nothing drives me nuttier than experiencing the same core grating behaviors he  first exhibited during our courtship, 26 years ago.  It's not the actions that drive me right up the wall;  it's the fact that they haven't changed over all those years.  I do things that drive John batty, but they're not the same ones that drove him around the bend in the early 1990s.  I worked on those, changed troubling behaviors.  I could see actions that harmed our relationship & take active steps to recognize them as they were happening, then recognize them as they were ABOUT to happen, then feel the triggers that sparked them, then feel their faint origins & stop them, not by suppressing but by SEEING them, letting them know they were seen, and sending them off on a non-destructive way.

That, to me, is what all human relationships are meant to be - healthful spurs to living a more wholesome, less harmful (to others & self) life.  I didn't learn that.  I was born knowing it.  It has brought its own funky cross, because a lot of people don't see what I am getting at.  John certainly doesn't.  To me, he has no curiosity about what makes himself tick, has not interest in going though what are to be the basic steps, the ABCs of breathing on this planet.  He doesn't think that way.  My normal is not his.

I do all I can to have it not matter, but it does.  I know from friends that his way is the more normal way for people to respond to a thoughtless action, with reasons & pledge after pledge after pledge to not do it again, only to do it again because he never got in the first place what had gone wrong, let alone the reason it had.  

Here's the thing, as I see it.  If someone does something that clearly creates a problem for someone, the BEST thing he or she can do, right off the bat, is say something along the lines of, "Oh, I'm sorry!"  Not ten or fifteen minutes later.  Right off the bat.  Just those three words as a response.  Not, "Well, I opened the window next to your seat because I wanted fresh air & it was raining & I would have gotten wet if I'd opened mine."  

When we tell someone, "I am sorry," when we've messed up, it sends the message to the brain, "Oops!  That was  mistake.  Don't do it again."  Of course there was a reason John opened the window next to where I would be sitting - it just wasn't a good one, at least not to me.  But because the first words out his mouth was the WHY rather than a mea culpa, a similar action is bound to happen down the road.

It's hard being married to me.  It's hard having me for a sibling or a child.  It's just always been my expectation that the great value out of being in relationship is that it/they present so many opportunities for self improvement, for getting out of getting in the way of loving, of at least compassion.  Dad got it, but he died when I was in my early twenties.  He would have been button bustin' proud that Mom DID finally get it, in her late 80s.  She got it in her own time, which is when we all get tuned in, if we ever do.  

My expectation - as natural as breathing for me  - of introspection & connecting with chronic dysfunction & trying something to set things better can be massively exasperating to others not so inclined.  And I just don't get people not doing all they can to create new pathways in the brain for better-next-time actions.  

John & I have a remarkable relationship <<<<<<<<>>>>>>>> much of the time.  This one mega fly in our ointment brings about terrible unhappiness on <> much of the time.  But while we're in that tiny space, it darkens our universe, turns the shining orb of our love into a black hole.

I don't get how he can be the way he is & John can't get why I am the way I am.  It's a small thing, but it keeps up apart in very big ways.  John likes to think of  us as together forever.  Me, not so much.  To feel this particular heartbreak to forever?  I think not.  

Am hoping that someday John gets a clue about what he does & makes some effort, even a teensy one, to making things better.  Until that time, I am happy to be on the same pathway with him in our here & now.  For to eternity?  

 
swer - or a variation on same - e

honest, open

As sad as I am for Peter for all he lost when Mim died, there are many ways their baby sister can't fill her shoes.  

He called a few days ago, requesting my chauffeuring services for two or three hours this week (make it three or four, factoring in the 40+ minute ride from our house to his place).  Originally planned on going yesterday, but realized that it's truly best to keep Tuesdays the ONE day John & I have to ourselves.

When I called to reschedule - to Saturday - wasn't a problem.  But then...

Could feel Peter smiling as he started recounting some new triumph of his granddaughter, Campbell.  That would be fine with Mim.  More than fine.  She often knew more about what was happening with Whitney & her family than Peter did!  I am another story.

Years ago, for reasons that grieve me but which I respect, Whitney unfriended me on Facebook & every other way.  My niece, who was my maid of honor, is a remarkable woman & a fiercely fabulous Mom;  whatever she feels needs to be done in the best interest of her family is okay with me.  But it hurts, hearing the rare story about her three delightful daughters, usually about Campbell, the oldest.

Maybe I shouldn't feel that way, maybe I should be thrilled to hear anything whenever it might flit my way.  I don't.  It hurts.  It hurts a lot.

So, was open & honest.  Told Peter, "I am glad that you have a good relationship with Whitney, but it hurts too much to share the little stories about people who're off limits to me."

Bravo for Peter, who accepted that without rebuke.  He's been told before, but the longing to share the accomplishments of his golden girl's golden girl was too much.  He could have told Mim all about it, no problem.

Part of me is horrified, dressing me down with, "How petty of you.  He needs to have someone who knows the family, if only marginally, with whom to share golden moments."  

Am sure he does, but not me.  It hurts too much.  

Imagine how I'd feel if it the cold shoulder had taken me by surprise?  Would have been more than hurt - would have been devastated.  Offering up thanks for having braced myself long ago.  

Mom would be surprised.  Mom would be heartbroken.  And confused.  To her dying day, she believed that once she was gone, the relationship between me & my oldest sibs would be better.  I knew that wasn't to be.  Without Mom, they had no need for my services.  Wish I'd been wrong.

I can be there for Peter when he needs me, to the best of my ability.  Being a listening post for tales of a family I love but loves me not - that, for me, is beyond the beyond.
  

Credits:
allexpress.com
1smartlife.com
123rf.com 
meadowbrookpsychotherapy.com


 

I have to let it go

Of the astonishing number of books I've devoured since November, none bothered me, got under my skin, threw me off my game.  Until reading Carry On, Warrior: embracing your messy, beautiful life, by Glennon Doyle Melton, my current read.  Reading it is brutiful - her word, combining brutal & beautiful.   

Over & over, am reminded in many ways of my sister.  So many times, have started writing a posting about what it brings to mind.  Had one almost finished yesterday, which I deleted.

No idea how it is Glennon's book has brought me to a realization that's as peaceful as it is astonishing.  I have to let Mim go. 

 

Because I can't make right whatever was so terribly wrong in her life.  I can't continue being frustrated, angry, confused by my family's response to her challenges. Their actions - inactions - that are not going to make anymore sense to me now or tomorrow or next year.  It's not likely that either of my brothers will be open about what the hell happened to her that I don't know but that so fiercely ripped open her life & shredded her spirit.  

By writing about it, have been trying to come to terms with something that never made sense, that sure won't now.  Part of me keeps wanting to try, just like part of me always wanted to help Mim feel...  I don't even know what the word is.  Intact?  Whole?  Safe?  They & others fall short.

The fact is that Mim wasn't the only one who was busted up.  The rest of the family was, too.  And they, she did their best to break me.  

Why is it reading Glennon's book brings up all these things I want to speak up about, things about Mim that made me feel so sad & helpless & unable to reach out, to help ~AND~ keeps bringing me to realizing that I'm using time to attempt the impossible.  If my efforts were useless before 07/03/15, they're utterly futile now.  

It's time to release trying to make things better, trying to patch up a family that was smashed up before I entered the picture.   

For what's done, it is done. And what's won, it is won. And what's lost, is lost & gone forever.  

Don't let myself be lost with it.

Let it be, let it go.  

 

 

TED sets my life on its ear

All of my plans, so carefully covered in my just-completed crowdfund request, have to be completely overhauled.  Goodbye, Festival of Positive Education (sob), farewell any hope of getting to Changing the Odds, adios to the Sage-ing International Conference.  

Yes, I'll still get down to D.C. in September for the NCCA Conference & Leadership Exchange, but all other plans have to set aside in order to afford the Big Enchilada - TEDWomen 2016, in San Francisco.

Goodbye Texas & Colorado, swept away by TED's massive price tag - $2500, just to attend.  Air fare, lodging, meals not included.  Gulp.

I have no option - assuming there's space is still available.  Am set on getting input on new pathways for experiencing aging, thoughts on how to restore the respect of the aging aged ancient that's woven into our very dna, insights on approaches to celebrate our elderly in today's hyper-paced reality.  On sharing ideas on what it means & how we're meant to honor them so - as ancient wisdom tells us - OUR days may be happier, more prosperous, more worth living.

Will sweep all the monies I've scrimped & saved for the two Texas conferences, for the Rowe & Omega workshops, transfer it all to my checking account & sign up for late October's TEDWomen 2016.  The NCCA & Sage-ing International Conferences are essential because they are my peeps, the choir in which I am one voice among many, one chirp in a chorus of exception voices. But TEDWomen 2016 - what I can get from being there is beyond my imagination.

NO idea how this will all work out, with no doubts it will.  TEDWomen 2016 - see ya.  This year, the Yerba Buena Center - next year, a TEDx talk at the Mitchell!  Hey, might as well dream BIG!

Substituting Erica Goldblatt Hyatt & Gail Cooper 

in this picture!

TEDWomen: Three days to explore and discuss the issues that matter to you right now, from the frontiers of science and tech and politics to the most deeply personal questions you face in your own life. All wrapped into one vital theme: It’s about time.

https://conferences.ted.com/TEDWomen2015
https://conferences.ted.com/TEDWomen2013
https://conferences.ted.com/TEDWomen2010/program


 

Utterly uncertified, wondrously inspired

It's true.  When it comes to speaking out on the critical importance of living expansively, to fomenting discontent with our current culture's woeful attitudes around aging, to being a ringleader in eldercare anarchy - I am utterly uncertified.  Not so much as a single professional letter designation follows my name.  Not one.  But I am most wondrously inspired to be part of a charge into virtually uncharted territory, turning shirked from & shunned discussions on the power of age & aging into a wildfire of conversations on all that it offers, all that's impossible at any earlier time!   

Those deep-into-the-night conversations aren't based on a researcher's certainty or a geriatrician's data.  They're based on faith that growing old isn't a major goof by nature, but the crowning moment of our very existence.  Plants are created in order to have their blooms admired, but to go to seed & generate a new generation.  This doesn't happen as a seedling, or a flower in bloom, but after the plant appears to break down.  In its apparent falling apart is its greatest power.  As with plants, so to with humans.  Are researchers & academics & other lofty experts likely to get their heads around that image?  Not likely.  

They can't even get their minds straight on the basics of aging!  It could be argued they are possibly the worst people to pull into conversations on aging.  What folks like yours truly considers crucially important, they see as sadly impotent.  As for needing proper credentials to speak about aging - the only common thread I've discovered in scientific studies, journal articles or lofty discussions about aging is some variation on, "Darned if we know."  

Seems to me that the combination of deep experience with a range of awesome elders plus the gift of wondrous inspiration puts me on good or better footing.  

Let's take a look at some of today's experts on aging.  Specifically, Joao Pedro de Magalhaes, in an article for senescence.info,  Why Do We Age?* 


Over the years, many theories have emerged to explain what process or mechanism drives aging (reviewed in Medvedev, 1990; Weinert and Timiras, 2003). In fact, almost every important discovery in molecular or cellular biology has led to a new family of theories of aging. Most theories of aging have old origins, but the inherent difficulties of studying human aging--such as the lack of adequate models--make testing these theories a difficult, lengthy, and expensive process. Moreover, interpreting the results, for example from longevity studies, is frequently controversial; discriminating between causes and effects of aging is often impossible. That is why, at present, no consensus exists over what causes aging, what determines rate of aging across mammals, or what changes occur in humans from age 30 to 70 to increase the chances of dying by over 30-fold.


How does the well-researched, carefully considered, clearly written article end?

Unfortunately, the inevitable conclusion of this section is that the jury is still out regarding mechanisms of aging. Although the search for a pacemaker of age-related changes continues, the bottom line is that all proposed mechanisms can be upregulated by some other--unknown or not--mechanism. The large number of aging theories is proof that our understanding of aging is still far from perfect; to quote David Rollo: "In any field of science, the true degree of understanding is inversely proportional to the number of explanatory theories that prevail." Even so, and since there are more doubts than answers in gerontology, we should not discard these theories easily. Life, and marveling life and death as we do in gerontology, is a game of probabilities. Some theories have gathered more evidence than others and hence may be more promising foci for future research and for developing anti-aging interventions. So please read on the different theories of aging and hopefully you can conjure better theories or determine ways to better test the current theories experimentally. 



Aka, another version of "Darned if I know."  Was not surprised, since the article was introduced with a quote from the ancient wisdom of The Talmud -

"We do not see the world as it is, we see the world as we are."

 
In What is Aging*, another article from the same site, Dr. de Magalhaes notes:

Although everyone is familiar with aging, defining it is not so straightforward. Aging can simply refer to the passage of time and can even have a positive connotation as in "aging wine." In the context of senescence.info, and unless otherwise noted, the term "aging" refers to the biological process of growing older in a deleterious sense, what some authors call "senescence" (Williams, 1957; Comfort, 1964; Finch, 1990). (Personally, I actually prefer the term "senescence." If this were an academic book, I would be tempted to use the term "senescence." Being a website with visitors from various backgrounds, I think the term "aging" is more accessible; "senescence" now also frequently refers to cellular senescence.) Aging is one of the most complex biological processes, whose definition is intrinsically related to its phenotype, as developed below.

Sigh...  What a pity that he finds a positive connotation in "aging wine," but apparently can't conceive of an aging human body having a similar spin.


Two things came out of my extremely brief foray this morning (no more than 15 minutes of online searching "pathology of aging"):

• There's virtually no actually definitive studies on why we age, let alone how.

• There's not going to be, because such studies are "difficult, lengthy & expensive."  Which wouldn't be an obstacle if the pharmaceutical behemoths could make a tidy profit, but they offer no enticing profits.

From what I've discovered, researchers have left the question of "What are the benefits of aging as we were created to grow older?" to those of us without those vaunted professional letters behind our names, the utterly uncertified & wondrously inspired souls who see more, much more behind the whys & wherefores of growing older, elderly, ancient.  

In his 2015 TED Talk, Dr. de Magalhães poses the question, "What is aging & how do we prevent it?"  He has inverted the actual question, which is,"What is the power within aging & how can we honor nurture it?"  

Guess that will be the topic of my 2018 TED Talk!

 

*Copyright © 1997 - 2001, 2004, 2005, 2008, 2010, 2012, 2013 by João Pedro de Magalhães. All rights reserved.