Gratefulness

by

Attitude of Gratitude

My Granny B told me, “Gratitude is your best attitude each day because there is calmness and quiet JOY to living gratefully each day.”  Her Granny B’isms, as I’ve come to call them, were her small pondering pearls of wisdom imparted during the important work we did in her kitchen.  I spent a great deal of time with my maternal grandparents during my formative years and there was a great deal of conversation and wisdom imparted!

Granny loved being in the kitchen.  She planned elaborate baking opportunities for us on Saturdays (in between watching Julia Child on PBS each week) as she told me stories about her life while quietly dispensing her B’isms.  Ironically (although never formally diagnosed), she was manic depressive.  Before there were self-help books, talk shows, and the medications used today, she created her own form of self-help and hope.  She believed strongly in her faith journey and in the power of gratitude as her personal prescription toward a deeper gratefulness for life. Somehow, celebrating daily gratitude became her habit, her attitude, and her unspoken effort.  I know she struggled during many dark days, but she kept giving her personal best, consistently applying some element of cheerfulness. Expressing gratefulness was a powerful way to positively connect with those around her.  Besides, who doesn’t like being around a person who’s genuinely grateful?  I asked her one day what motivated her:  “First thing each morning, reflect on your day ahead and aspire to be grateful with an open heart and mind. At the end of the day, think over what you have done, if you fulfilled or rejected your aspiration.  Either way, gratefully rejoice that you are able to see and go forward, no matter the outcome, with renewed clarity, confidence, and compassion in the days ahead…”  Whew…lots to ponder indeed!

So today, think back over your formative years.  Who first demonstrated the power of gratefulness with an attitude of gratitude?  If given the opportunity, what would you say to this person today?

In our complex world and challenging society, it is my sincerest hope we continue to seek and find an attitude of gratitude daily, and as always, gratefully choose to lead with hope and always in the greatest of these…love.  🙂

by

Deep breaths…Day #12

“Breathe it all in, Love it all out…”  ~ Mary Oliver

Living through uncertainty and change is a constant challenge in life, especially in 2020! Everyone is navigating a culmination of both in this moment, especially this past week, all while dealing with a new wave of the pandemic. I won’t mediate a conversation on politics, but whether your election weight was lifted or burdened by the results, the uncertainties of what comes next during transition exists, leading us down unknown and ever-changing pathways.

When you’re a recovering control freak like me, worrying about every little thing outside my control is also a constant struggle.  This phenomenon is a direct gene-pool mutation from my  mom, who coined the phrase, “preventative worry.”  Guilt and preventative worry are food groups in our family.  Thankfully, I’ve learned to better identify and accept my response, embrace my reaction, and appreciate how uncertainty is part of my self-care journey each day (even when it’s uncomfortable).  A caveat:  accepting the uncertainty doesn’t mean I’m okay with it or with the situation tied to it, but it allows me space to better explore what it might mean while I check my attitude and effort–the only two things in my control.

Gratefully, my attitude and effort allow me to remember these critical points:

  1. I have the power to care for myself and others during challenging times and during the best of times…
  2. I have the power to pay attention and make space for my feelings and also show up for others as they do the same…
  3. I have the power to speak my truth and then listen when others are sharing their truths…
  4. I have the power to let go when needed even though holding on is often easier…
  5. I have the power to explore outcomes even though being wedded to the outcome is not essential…

Gratefully, you have all these powers too!  Simply breath in and breathe out as best you can.  Dig deep into your well of reserves and ask yourself:

In what ways will I gratefully ‘breathe it all in and love it all out’ today? 

Keep breathing in and out, my friends, and please know I’m sending masked-covered smiles and so much love! 🙂

by

Buck up, buttercup!

A very personal Thanksgiving came today about three weeks early and a little over 13 years later.  My urology-oncologist used words I never anticipated hearing:  “Your most recent lab tests, scans, and the procedural scope this morning indicate your bladder cancer is completely gone, and unless you need us, we don’t plan to see your smiling face this time next year.”  It took a few seconds to grasp his meaning while sitting on the table in a wrapped-up sheet.  “I need you to say it again, please,” I whispered.  He glanced up from the scanning screen to look me directly in the eye:  “No more bladder cancer, no more maintenance meds, and no more annual followup required. You have defied odds, beaten this foe with your bladder intact, and this medical chapter is closed. I wouldn’t expect anything less of you because you always do what you have to do.” 

I can’t remember my thank-yous to the medical team, ringing the bell of victory, or the long walk back to my car in the massive hospital parking garage. I do remember bursting into broken sobs of relief and pure JOY as St. M answered his phone to hear me repeat this unexpected news.

In the formative years, my momma often reminded me:  “We do what we have to do until we can do what we want to do, so buck up, my little buttercup.”  I never truly grasped the significant depth of this until recently.  I’ve always done what needed to be done.  I am not, however, always certain what it is I really want to do, but I intend to gratefully ponder and explore many options.

So today:  Gratefully think about something in your life you have to do versus something you really want to do.  What will you do to “buck up” in your own way? 

In the meantime, I am grateful to my extraordinary family, friends, medical team, colleagues, students, church family, and others for your hope, faith, JOY, assistance, meals, jokes, stories, prayers, smiles, hugs, reassurances, and unconditional love shared no matter the day, time, or status in my ongoing medical journey.  Your gentleness and grace, especially on the darkest days, allowed my hope to grow and blossom into endless possibilities, and special thanks for reminding and helping me to show up and “buck up” every step of the way. 🙂

by

Sprinkle it everywhere…

“Be kind. Be kind. Be kind. Be kind.”  I heard this daily as a child and have done my personal best to remind my own children as well as those in my daily charge.  A student even painted a little sign for our classroom I keep close even today:  “Kindness is free; sprinkle that stuff everywhere, please!”

There is great power in kindness because kindness is a personal choice.  Kindness is a simple gift each one of us can easily afford to give daily.

So, as we get ready to “button up” the most divisive, costly election in American history in an overwhelming year when every human you see could use it…

What will you do to gratefully spread some kindness today?

Here’s hoping we create clever ways to simply overwhelm others and, in turn, help ourselves, in the two things never wasted in this lifetime…love and KINDNESS!  Stay safe, stay strong, and be well, kind friends!  🙂

by

Calling all saints…

All Saints’ Day…All Souls’ Day…All Hallows’ Day…Sabbath Soul…Dia de Muertos. From my perspective, this particular day has always provoked a powerful response.  Within our worship service, this day is marked with responsive readings, special hymns, remembrances, lit candles, the presentation of a white rose to a surviving family member, and clergy reading aloud the names of those saints from the congregation who have passed during the previous year.  Most disheartening, the list was long this morning.  It’s a marked day of remembrance for all who have gone before, not just this year, and, as my Granny B. would often observe, “to open and honor the ‘thin space’ where all the saints meet.”  

Thanksgiving, 1996.  My mom in her kitchen holding court while preparing the feast in her authentic holiday attire, festive jewelry, coiffed “Steel Magnolia” hair, completely spotless makeup, and brilliant eyes sparkling intelligence and southern sass.  I would quietly sneak up to her with my camera, especially on holidays, because she NEVER liked having her picture made; she always took stunning pictures though.  She passed in 2016 and I miss her every single day, especially on certain days each year like today.

In a strange way, I find myself deeply nostalgic and profoundly grateful every year on this day…grateful for all who came before me, whose shoulders I continue to stand upon…grateful for the treasured stories, the powerful memories, and the lasting legacies of these saints…grateful for the opportunity to reflect on the transformational stages of my life journey…grateful for the blessings of each day and the chance to clear away the broken parts while exploring new paths to grow in hope and grace.  So today, reflect on the saints in your life.  Who are you particularly grateful for and why?

Here’s hoping we never lose sight of the gifts gratefully given to us by those who go come and go before us…for when one is missing, the whole is somehow less.  “For all the saints who from their labors rest…”      

by

Showing up once again…

As I’ve shared before, when you’re traveling the path of Alzheimer’s with a parent 24/7, you can expect daily kinks in the routine.  Some days are relatively smooth and we roll along, while others, well, I can’t say it very nicely so I’ll leave it to your imagination.  Most mornings dad pops up in bed as I present him with a hot cup of coffee, a smile, and a cheerful greeting.  I remind him to shower, help lay out his clothes, and leave him to his personal rituals. Once he presents himself in the main part of our home, he grins and announces, “I’m here; let the day begin” (even though it may be pushing noon).  He chooses to “show up” and we do too.

Dad requires more and more assistance with specific daily tasks, especially those involving medications, reminders to carry his cane, wash his hands, cover that cough, and such.  He easily confuses things or chooses to just skip them.  Some days while gently reminding or assisting him through a specific task, he looks at me as though I’m bossing him into submission.  (even though I realize I’m a red-headed benevolent overlord at times).  To dad though, I’m his little girl again and by golly, no daughter of his will tell him what to do.  But the instant St. M opens his mouth to repeat exactly what I just asked, dad immediately complies.  WHAT?!?

It’s the power of what I call “show up.”  You see, St. M carries compassion in abundance and uses his super power of show up to his advantage with dad.  In his calm voice, he coaxes dad to do what’s in dad’s best interest.  I’ve learned to also appreciate this additional assistance when my patience well runs low.  In reality, it’s a grateful outcome because someone other than me took the time to show up in a needed moment.

What’s a super power of yours you use to help another?

Some dear friends frequently remind me on this journey of these powerful words:  “show up…pay attention…let go…speak your truth…don’t be wedded to the outcome…”  This is my morning mantra as I show up in gratefulness for the opportunity to start another day with dad. And here’s hoping your super power(s) offers you the opportunity to start another day in gratefulness too! 🙂

Restoration…
by

Restoration…

Yes, it’s been a few weeks since the last post. So much life…soooo much 2020!  While we all know everything will work again if it’s unplugged for just a bit, even that is not a complete guarantee this particular year, huh?!

Today, however, marks exactly 30 days until Thanksgiving, my personal favorite.  In an effort to jump start myself and find ways to focus on this important season of thanks and giving in the midst of an ongoing Pandemic, these next 30 days are once again about GRATEFULNESS.  As a way to express appreciation, share a word or two of kindness, and reflectively narrate on the grace of simple gratitude, there will once again be a question posted each day.  Here’s hoping this helps us pause briefly from the anxiety, stress, and frequent-overwhelmingness of this unique time in our lives.

Personally, being grateful is a feeling of appreciation for a kindness, a welcome experience of gratitude and of thankfulness.  Being authentically grateful brings pleasure and contentment on a level everyone could genuinely use in daily life.  The word itself comes from the Latin derivative, gratus, “showing grace, blessing, and JOY…” Just like daily physical exercise, we must create and cultivate mindful ways to powerfully practice daily gratitude in an effort to recharge and reboot mind, body, spirit, and soul.  As always, we start with a simple question on Day One: 

What is ONE thing you are grateful for today, only today?

Me?  RESTORATION.  Waking up to a beautifully crisp fall morning following lots of fog the past week (literally and figuratively) with regained energy.  The woods have regenerated with leaves swirling, and it’s Pumpkin Carving Day around here to boot!  My personal battery is restored from  yesterday because the blank page in the journal of life at this moment on this day is clean, crisp, and ready to unfold a fresh story!  Hopefully, restoration brings more patience, forgiveness, kindness, understanding, and generosity.  Perhaps we work to right wrongs, learn from yesterday’s mistakes, listen more, talk less, or simply put down our phones.  Hope is not lost and mercies are abundant, if only we seek them. 

Gratefully, restoration brings another day and offers renewed energy as many times as we need it!  And as my favorite Transcendentalist, Henry David Thoreau observed, “I am grateful for what I am and have…my Thanksgiving is perpetual.”   So, in this moment, take a deep cleansing breath, and gratefully name aloud your ONE thing today.  🙂

by

AHHtumn at last…

The temperature today, light rustic shades just beginning to emerge among the foilage, the lack of 95% humidity (whew!), and an overall lighter feel in the air… Autumn is making her first appearance a little earlier during this most unusual year.  Waiting patiently through the LONG hot summer of this pandemic with the consistent uncertainty, anxiety, and worry, it is ever-so-refreshing to simply breathe softer, cooler air literally on the day of the Autumnal Equinox. Pop hasn’t left the screened porch since awakening; meals, naps, snacks, and conversations ensue in his outside “office” today.  He takes a moment to look at me and to thank me “for living in a place with four distinct seasons and trees.”  We are grateful in our own ways for the blessings and gratitude of this first day of Autumn, the time when change is in the air, when everything bursts into the last boldest color, and nature saves up a grand finale of fabulousness.

Winter pencils into the etching… Spring shimmers in pastels… Summer glows in soft watercolors… Autumn, well Autumn explodes into the final mosaic of all the seasons together, simply reminding us again how lovely it can be to simply let things go.

Happy Fall, y’all! 🙂

by

My momma always said, “the best sermon is a great example;” thus she and daddy (for better, or worse sometimes) taught us daily by their living example.  My sister and I know we “chose our parents wisely,” because in the midst of everyday life, there were daily lessons through their poignant example.

As I watch moms today in the grocery store, on a hiking trail in the park, and everywhere else in the community, it stuns me how moms must be as wise as Solomon, as smart as Socrates, as unconditionally loving as Mother Teresa, and as disciplined as an Olympic Athlete.  Momma was the same over half a century ago…she wasn’t our friend (until much later in life); she was our parent. “You didn’t come with instructions, so rule #1:  I’m never wrong, and rule #2, if I am wrong, then refer back to rule #1.”  🙂  Funny how those rules changed drastically when she became a grandmother. 🙂

Yes, my mom demonstrated daily who she was and lived by the legacy she created with witty southern sass, grit, humor, and backbone.  Even though she was a young mother who literally grew up with us, she firmly shaped our character with integrity while encouraging us to dream big for the future.  And because we also grew up in a progressive household where we were expected to “take care of ourselves in the real world,” finding our passion to help us independently support ourselves was non-negotiable.  “Get a grip and buck up” were heard daily in our household.  “You’re not lost and don’t need to go find yourself; I know right where you are.”  We also learned to control our attitude and effort because “those two things are in our constant control.”  And just like her classroom and school settings as a teacher and principal, mom set the bar extremely high, but she also provided a loving cushion when we stumbled along the way.  Our mom was our first and most important teacher, advocate, and disciplinarian; she set the rules and we followed them, well, mostly (except for riding the laundry basket down the stairs, dropping each other into the laundry hamper, that whole chandelier disaster…).

While mom’s physical voice is now silent, the echos of her lessons and expectations ring clearly inside my soul.  I’m humbly grateful and thankful for the example of my mom.  I was so busy growing up and then raising two little women of my own, I often forgot she was growing older.  Even in her final hours with us, Mom was showing us how  to hold on and then to bravely let go on her journey.  If she were with us during this most extraordinary life in the time of COVID-19, I have no doubt she would have much to contribute to the conversation.

Thanks, Momma, for demonstrating the courage, hope, JOY, and unconditional love so I could one day be a mom to the two extraordinary miracles who shower my world and Momma-soul in JOY!  I miss you so…

Happy Mother’s Day to all you moms!

by

Limes

Yesterday, I cried over limes.  Limes.

After putting on my mask, my special pair of “outside-shoes-during-quarantine,” my gloves, and what’s left of my sanity, I ventured beyond our house.  Since pushing Day #60 of at-home quarantine around our house, heading into the community for necessary provisions was a considerable leap of faith.  I spoke sternly to myself on my way to the grocery store to retrieve our online order.  After last week’s verbal altercation inside the store with the creepy stalker guy who followed me with no mask, no gloves, and less than six-feet of distance from my personal space, ordering groceries online for pickup seemed the best choice this week.  Securing a time slot was an added bonus since home delivery is evidently not option where we live.  Choosing items online while giving up purchasing decisions was another step in tempering my control-freak-benevolent-overlord issue, but yes, I can and will be flexible too.  So, over the lake and through the woods to the grocery drive-up lane I went.

While loading everything into the back of my car, the very kind assistant shared the list of items missing from the order.  Mind you, I’m all about substitutions; after all, we must be bendable but not breakable in these challenging times (and will gladly accept ANY roll of toilet paper available).  As she rapidly ran through the substitution list, one item caught my attention…“No limes or lime juice available, but you do have extra lemons in the bag.”  No big deal.  Oh…wait.  No limes?  At all?  Lemons, again?  Who’s hoarding all the limes and do they have all the toilet paper as well?

There was one particular activity left on my agenda this week specifically involving limes.  You see, we were scheduled to leave with friends on a special vacation today, May 1, to explore Key West…the first non-working trip for St. M in a long time.  In the planning stages for the last three years, this trip was finally happening.  All our schedules coincided, reservations and tickets were purchased in advance, and everything came together beautifully…and then, a pandemic.  In a snap, the entire adventure evaporated.  My whole mantra of “plan your work, work your plan, and autograph your work with excellence” was out the window.  No vacation.  Stay home.  Be safe and well.  Adjust.  “No limes, but you do have extra lemons in the bag.”

All the way home I pondered.  Once home, I removed my shoes, washed my hands, and M helped unload the bags to the designated drop area while I wiped down and put everything away.  The tears started quietly flowing when the first lemon emerged, then quickly turned into my ugly, snot-sobbing meltdown (if you know me at all, this is rare, but when it occurs, brace yourself).  While limes are not a necessary staple of life, especially in a pandemic, this one time, when I had a specific purpose planned as a surprise treat, “no limes, but you do have extra lemons in the bag.”

Limes weren’t the real reason for my outburst.  I was crying about the overwhelming weight of this entire reality for ALL of us.  I was mourning our complete lack of control over this unbelievable situation.  I was snot-sobbing because I can’t physically be with my little women, my sister, my family, and my friends.  I was grieving for the crushing number of individual lives lost in this pandemic, the families losing these loved ones, the heroes serving daily on the relentless front lines, the essential workers who are exhausted and scared, the scientists and researchers desperate for answers and a plan, the insane loss of millions of jobs and financial stability, the school children missing their teachers and friends, the parents doing their personal best to educate their children while maintaining daily life and keeping food on the table, the high school and college students missing milestone activities and graduation ceremonies, the individuals living in complete isolation with no assistance, people experiencing food and housing insecurities, the persons who are dying completely alone, the stress, hurt, worry, and despair we are ALL experiencing at varying and alarming degrees…and so much more.  I was naming and working to process the powerful thoughts and feelings within this uncharted territory.  But limes?  Limes simply became the tipping point.

When calm prevailed, the words of Washington Irving once shared again resonated new meaning:  “There is a sacredness in tears…they are messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition, and of unspeakable love…”

So today, I’m grateful and relieved St. M had a soft flannel shirt and loving arms securing me as I released all on my highest speed.  I’m grateful for a working washing machine and detergent to wash his beloved shirt.  I’m grateful for fresh hope to move forward in the most graceful way possible, finding small ways everyday to make some type of difference.  I’m grateful to acknowledge and express my anxiety, fears, uncertainty, and longing.  I’m grateful for our kind neighbor who left three limes and more of her home-grown lettuce on our front porch table.  I’m grateful there are little lime pies now waiting on the front porch of our travel friends to remind them we will head south some day to the land of endless beaches, six-toed cats, spectacular sunsets, and authentic key lime pie.  And specifically today, I’m grateful we’ll make some fresh lemonade to sip on our porch (with all these extra lemons) as we continue to stay put, stay safe, and create new ways to be gentle and kind to ourselves and others.  🙂