Run, MJ! Run!

How well are you running the race?

That was the subject line on the first email in my inbox  ... the day after ... I came clean ... about my hamster wheel ... habit.

Honest. I don't make this stuff up.  And even though I had 8 viewers ... and 2 watchers ... my hamster wheel ... received 0 bids ... on ebay this week ... again.

Maybe I should just give it away ...

I think I'm doing ok ... in the race running ... that is.  De-cluttering.  That's my goal.  It has been for more than a few weeks ... this time.  Ever since I got that direct message:

You're holding on to too many things, MJ.

When my best friend speaks that plainly & directly, I always listen!  No.  It's not

E.F. Hutton ... it's God, Creator of the Universe.  And, granted, He isn't just talking about things in my garage ... in my house ... in the little room off the sunporch.

Starting to clear out my house ... is just easier ... than clearing out my heart.

You see it's not the fact that I am holding on to ... too many things .. that's the problem.  It's the ... holding on ... to too many things.

Letting go is very hard for me.  Maybe that's because I have spent my entire adult life trying to make someplace feel like home.  So I gather up things that I think should be important ... and meaningful ... and I keep carrying 'em along with me.  Whereever I go. 

Thinking surely ... those things ... will make this place ... or that place ... feel like ... home. 

From time to time ... it's almost worked ... for a year or so ... then reality sets in.  You'd think I would have figured it out ... long before now ... 

Things don't make a home. 

And even though I am totally committed to cleaning out ... de-cluttering ... ridding myself of things that are no longer necessary to me ... I falter.

I pick it up.  Spend a little too long remembering where it came from .. why I have it ... & analyzing why I thought it needed to be brought along ... this time ...

Determined & cynical in my old age ... I am getting pretty good at cutting the cord ...

to a lot of things.  There is always that moment of hesitation, though, when I realize that there is still some life left in it ... it's just hard to give up something ... that still has

a little bit of life.

So this go round ... I am striving to be more practical.  Telling myself that, yes, the object in question still has value & purpose ... it has something to offer ... to someone ...  

just not to me ... not anymore.

Hanging on to things ... that may ... or may not ... have a little life left ... has been sucking the life ... right out of me ... for a very long time.

Thinking about things ... always leads to thinking about people.

I tend to hang on ... a little too long ... to friendships that have run their course ... too.

And ... to be perfectly honest ... at times it's the idea of a relationship ... that never actually unfolds ... the way I think it might ... the way I want it to ... that I allow to occupy a little too much space in my heart.

Imaginary relationships ... with real live people ... hopefully building my house of cards on whims ... silly, silly me.

It's a game I play with myself ... it seems safer ... than playing for real ... playing games with my head ... to guard my heart ... and MJ loses ... every single time.

Pretty sure those make-believes are part of the "too many" things I am holding on to ....

Seriously ... you'd think those would be the easiest to put out on the curb ... cuz there's no life in pipe dreams & "what ifs" ...

But they're not.

And after months of silence, the little bear has suddenly become Chatty Cathy.  Cheering me along the race course, maybe. 

I have written about the talking little bear ... a couple of times before.  He's special. 

Unpredictable ... unexplainable ...

The possibility of it being a battery that's running down has long been put to rest.  If it takes over a year & a half for those batteries to ... lose their charge ... then I am thinking I want some more batteries from where those came from ...

Some days ... it's simply a random outburst ... maybe 2 or 3 times in a 24 hour span.  Other times, it's a frenzy of chatter ... clusters of messages ... running together ... separated by pauses of varying lengths ... conversation-like.

It seems that the little bear talks to me more at night.  Sometimes it's constant ... all through the night.  There's meaning to the rhythm and timing of the messages.

I am sure of it.

The little bear only knows one sentence.

I love you THIS much !

Powerful ... important words.

For now, I am choosing to believe ... each time the little bear speaks ... it's because someone important to me ... is thinking about me ... maybe even allowing a little

MJ make-believe to come alive in their own hearts ...

You see, I'm pretty sure that I am not the only one who plays that mind-tricking-the-heart game ... especially in the still of the night ...

The little bear does occasionally speak to me during the day ... like first thing in the morning ... or when I am working from the house ... or when I return from the

busyness of my day.

Just more often ... in the dark ... in the wee hours ...

And I wonder ... does the little bear speak ... when no one's around to hear ?!? 

Triggered magically by someone's heartfelt thought ... words hanging in the air of an empty house ... waiting for me to hear them ... in my own heart ... upon my return.

The whole thing reminds me of a Twilight Zone episode.  Little bear proclaims ... outloud ... the desire of MaryJane's heart.  A baby-monitor ... of sorts ... channeling messages from a real live person in an imaginary relationship ... a fairy tale she is about to put

out-on-the-curb ... letting go ... before it's time ...

... ok, so maybe there's a little bit of life left in that one ... 

It's a great story.  And I will tell it ... when I am sure

what it all means ...

Home is where your heart is ... open your heart ...

find your home ...

Run, MJ! Run!

www.lifelessons-mj.blogspot.com

(c)september 2011

Doors Wide Open

Sitting on the porch ... drinking coffee ... and I realize that I am tired ...
all-the-way-to-the-bone exhausted.  It's not really surprising, I guess ... with all of the busyness of the last few months ... still, somehow, it snuck up on me ...

So here I sit ... staring at the four sliding screen doors ... that are either stuck in their runners ... or have fallen completely off-track ... propped up or laying on the ground.  A couple of them have been that way since the end of last summer.

And I am thinking ... what is it that I have been doing ... that's so much more important than taking care of these things ... at my house ?!?!

Seriously.  Yesterday the front storm door's flapping finally unhinged me!  Three minutes ... and a phillips head screw driver ... and I had that puppy handled.  No big deal.  So why did it take so long for me to take the three minutes ... to put an end to the annoyance ?!?

It's like all that carpet I ripped out last fall ...    the upstairs ...  has bare naked floors ... plain wood ...

... and I think ... one of these days .. I will get back to that.

And I know I will.  When I am ready.

So what's up with that?!?!  Why aren't I ready?!? 

Maybe it's because this house ... really doesn't feel like home to me.  I wish it did ... but it doesn't. 

And that's really sad, because the spaces of the house are ideally suited to me... big kitchen ... fireplace ... porch ... living room large enough for the piano ... plenty of room for Jessi ... plenty of room for whoever I want to make plenty of room for ...

It was a fixer-up-er when we bought it ... that was the plan ... fix it up, make it our own ... it was going to be home.  That never happened.  And now, I know that I need to get on with the fixin' it up so that I can get on with the moving on ...

... with finding my home

It's time ... I know.  Still I stall.  Out of fear?  Uncertainty?  I'm not really sure ... I know that as long as I put off doing what needs to be done ... it's impossible for me to make a move ...

This morning, I am thinking ... that maybe I should get those doors back on their tracks ... start focusing on getting ready ... so that whenever what's coming next ... finally reveals itself ... I am not held back ...

Maybe what's coming next is actually being held up ... because of my lack of preparedness ...

Maybe I am impatiently waiting patiently ... for something to happen ... and the only thing standing in the way of me ... and the life I want to be living ... is ME.

My heart knows that change is coming.  Actually, change has been banging on the doors for quite some time.  Maybe that's how they have all found themselves offtrack ... unhinged ... demanding that I pay attention to the absence ... of doors. 

Damaged doors ... forced open ... by the demands of change.

Doors open.  People come in.  Doors open.  People go out.

A fat robin hops through the damp grass ... with big ole worm dangling from it's beak.  And my rabbit is frisking about ... I smile.

It occurs to me ... again ... that all of my doors are ... well ... wide open.

www.lifelessons-mj.blogspot.com
(c) May 2011

There's No Place Like Home ...

Imagine my surprise ... last week ... on my last run-through before Thanksgiving at the local, family-owned grocery store near my house. I rounded the corner of the produce aisle &  found a display of peanuts.
Not just ANY peanuts ... Jimbo's Jumbos peanuts !!!

Yes, indeed.  I bought some.  Just because .... yeah ... just because.

Those peanuts were the catalyst for a lot of soul-searching ... and scab picking ... throughout the rest of the week. You know sometimes, you just rip the band-aid off ... flake the crusty scab ... and realize that that wound you've been worrying over for so long has actually healed ... on it's own ... without you even knowing it ...

... and THAT's something to be thankful for ...

Jimbo's Jumbos.  Finding those peanuts whisked me back to a Thanksgiving a long, long time ago ... in a far away land ...  when I was a young, idealistic woman ... with goals & dreams ... learning to be bold ... confident ... independent ... determined ...

... to take on the world ... to make a difference ... with my smiles ...

Yes.  That was me.  I found it written exactly that way ... on a To Do list  ... stuck in an old journal that I ran across recently while turning my house upside down.

It caught me off-guard ... stunned that I didn't remember ... something as important as that.

"Success" & all its trappings were all over that list,  I must admit ...

Success was defined differently by me then ... much different from how I see it today...

That Thanksgiving was the very first one I ever spent away from home.  I had moved to Edenton, North Carolina earlier in the year.  It was a long way from Edenton to Little Rock.  So I had decided to make the trip home at Christmas ... not Thanksgiving.

Even though I had been on my own for a few holiday seasons before that Thanksgiving ... living in Dallas ... getting home really hadn't ever been a problem ...

This was my first taste of REAL LIFE interferring with my being where I wanted to be  ... when I wanted to be there.  It was killing me.

Oh yeah.  About the peanuts.  Jimbo's Jumbos come from Edenton, NC.  It is one of the primary businesses in that sleepy little town ... full of history ... colonial history, peanut history & MY history ...

I wasn't the only one having a problem with the whole Thanksgiving thing.  My mom & my grandmother, Mimi, weren't too happy about the thought of an MJless turkey  day either.  So they loaded up the truck and headed to ... well, actually they flew into Raleigh ... but you get the picture.

... funny, I am sure that I knew at the time ... but I honestly don't remember what the rest of the family did for Thanksgiving that year ...

So that's how it happened ... that I learned how to cook a turkey & all of the fixins'  in my very own kitchen ... the way Mimi always did it ... on that first grown-up Thanksgiving ...

Edenton, North Carolina.  Home of the Jimbo's Jumbos.  Changed. My. Life.

A couple of years later ... there was that Christmas ... in Virginia Beach.  One of the most miserable Christmas' ever.  No real family.  No real friends. 

Lonely.  Lonely. 

And again, I couldn't go home.  It was just too far.  Twice that fall I had traveled back .. to say farewell to my father ... in real life ... in after life.

We were a struggling young couple ... with jobs that required a lot of time & didn't pay so much ... with a child on the way ...

Money was tight.  It simply wasn't possible.

Bottomline ... it wasn't going to be Christmas for me ... since I couldn't be at home ... with my Mimi ... and my Mom ... and my family ...

I was 20-something ... all grown up ... with a husband ... and the little girl in me was longing to go home ... for Christmas ... life was pretty lousy ... at 20-something.

Home.  Where I was safe & secure.  Always welcome.  And loved unconditionally.  That place that I could always run back to ... to tag up ... to regroup ... recharge ... before heading out again ... to search for those really important things in life ...

So I clicked my ruby slippers ... over and over again. 

"There's no place like home.  There's no place like home.  There's no place like home. There's no place like home."

Then early in December, the phone rang.  It was Mimi.

"Little darling ... do you want to come home for Christmas? "  "Yes, Mimi.  I do.  More than anything."  "I will make it happen."

And she did.  A small check in the mail ... that gave me the gift that money couldn't buy ... long before "priceless" became the buzz word for such things.

I can still hear her voice.  Today.  Nobody ever called me "Little Darling" ... nobody except for her.

There's no place like home.

The years went by.  No matter where I was Mimi always came to see me.  My Mom did, too.  And no matter what ... I always came back ... here  ... from whereever I was living ... because in my mind ... it was this place ... that was home.

It was just the way we loved ... each other .. in my family. 

Later, after Mimi left us ... things changed.  I still came back ... year after year ... even when the road ran one way ... because it was ... home ...

Except that it no longer felt that way ... at least not the way I remembered it.

I miss Mimi.  She always made me feel like it was all about me ... of course, I think I knew all along that it was really all about her ... either way ... it doesn't matter ... it felt good  ... plain & simple ... she loved me ... no matter what ...

There's no place like home.

So maybe it really wasn't the way we loved ... each other ... in my family.

Maybe it was simply the way SHE loved ... me.

I don't know.

It's going to be Christmas soon.  And my daughter will be coming to my house ... a place that will never feel like home to her.  Home ... to Abbi ... will always have an ocean view.

That's ok.  I get it. Honest.  I do.  It's all good.

And we will all go to my mother's house ... and we will enjoy being there ... with her ... at her house ... still it won't be the same ... as it was ... when it was home.

It's sad ... really.  How things change.  How they stay the same.

There's no place like home.

It's a special kind of love that transcends families ... where fresh starts abound ... and even though forgiveness isn't always easy it wins out in the end every time ... where nothing is ever more important than the relationships ... all the wrongs ... all the hurts ... while not forgotten are somehow gotten past ... because there's nothing more important ... than HOME.

Somehow home got lost along the way.  Or maybe it just wasn't as important to anyone else ... as it was to me. 

I have always tried to recapture that feeling  ... of home ... to serve it up ... at my house ... whereever that house was.  To open my heart ... to offer that unconditional love  ... To my family.  To my friends.

Somehow I thought if they could feel it ... than so would I ... yeah ... than so would I.

I have always wanted Abbi & Jessi to be wrapped up in that same kind of love that gave me the confidence ... to boldly go ... over the rainbow ... out-of-bounds ... to follow my dreams ... even when they turned out to be something less than I imagined.

And season-after-season ... I traveled back ... trying desperately to find ... my way ... home ...

You know ... right where I left it ... in a place where we had phone numbers ... not digits ... or contact lists ... phone numbers that started with prefixes like "FRanklin" and "MOhawk" ...

There's no place like home.

And there I was ... on Thanksgiving ... in a house ... in another place ... that always takes me back ...

Just me ... good friends  ... and that silly bag of  Jimbo's Jumbos.

And it came to me ... early one morning ... as the fog rolled across the lake ...

Maybe it's not really the way we loved ... each other ...  in my family.  And maybe it really wasn't simply the way Mimi loved ... me.  Either.

Maybe it's been ME all along.  Loving others the way I wanted to be loved.

I don't know. 

All I know is that going home is the journey I have been on ... for all of my adult life ... trying to find my way ... to that cozy, comfy place.  And all the roads that seem to have led me to nowhere ... are bringing me closer ... to where I want to be ... I am almost there ... I can feel it ...

Follow the yellow brick road ... FOLLOW the yellow brick road ... follow the yellow brick ROAD ...

Jessi gets it.  Home is whereever she feels safe ... accepted ... and loved.

It's as simple as that. 

So, yeah ... I ripped off that band-aid ... to find a wound that had healed ... all on it's own.  There's a still a little scar ... and that's ok ... cuz it really doesn't hurt .. not anymore.

Home doesn't always have an ocean view.  And it isn't always found in Little Rock ... even though that's where I thought I left it. 

And Jimbo's Jumbos still taste great ... we didn't find a bad nut in the bag.

And on Christmas morning ... we will all go to my mother's house ... the house that I used to think was home ... and maybe ... Santa will have a little extra Christmas magic ... there in his bag ... when he stops by ...

And as we share the traditional pound cake & coffee ..

Maybe ... just maybe ... we will ALL feel it ...

... the way we used to love ... each other .. in my family ...

Home.  It's that place where you find that all that really matters ... is what is found right there.  Home is ... plain & simply ... where the love is.

Now THAT would be a very Merry Christmas ... at least it would be ... for me.

There's no place like home.

http://www.lifelessons-mj.blogspot.com/
(c) November 2010

Homeward Bound ...

For a variety of reasons, my real family did things for Thanksgiving ... that weren't all together.  We're all grown-ups ... and have expanded families now.  And that's ok.

In a conversation with some of them earlier in the week, I had to explain to them what Thanksgiving was really all about for me. It's not necessarily the same for them. You see we are all wired differently ... and different things mean .. well, different things ... to each of us.

It's a common belief ... in my family ... that since my divorce ... and Abbi's marriage ... and all that's happened over the last few years ... that I don't really have a family of my own .... or a home ... or traditions.

Funny, how everyone else always thinks they know who you are ... and what you are thinking ... better than you know yourself. 

Sometime or other this weekend,  Alice In Wonderland was on in the background. The Tim Burton version. And Alice is being asked over and over and over ... "Who are you?"

Questioned ... challenged ... frustrated ... she replies, "From the moment I fell down that rabbit hole I’ve been told what I must do and who I must be. I’ve been shrunk, stretched, scratched, and stuffed into a teapot. I’ve been accused of being Alice and not having to be Alice, but this is MY dream. I’ll decide where it will go from here."

I know exactly how she feels.

The truth is I do know who I am ... and have been finding my way back to a Mary Jane that I really, really like ... one with traditions ... and family ... life ... and a strong desire to be "home".

Yes, it has been different these last few years ... and there were a couple of years that I wouldn't have been able to pull off a frozen t.v. dinner ... without melting down completely.  And it's nice that an extra effort was made to let me know that I did have somewhere to go ... so that I didn't have to be at my house ... alone ... at those times.

Cooking Thanksgiving dinner is one of my very favorite family things to do. And it has been a let-down each year since my divorce to simply bring along a dish or two rather than busying about for days making all of my favorites and sharing my home & my heart with the people I love.

That's what I do.  That's who I am. 

It was my choice to spend the long weekend at the home of someone that I consider family. It's a long story ... how we are sorta-cousins. .. three generations from then - until now.

There's been a lot of hurt & betrayal & distance woven through the course of our friendship. It's nice to be at a place in time where the forgiveness & fondness overshadow the disappointments & let-downs.

It's a special kind of love that transcends families ... where fresh starts abound ... and even though forgiveness isn't always easy it wins out in the end every time ... where nothing is ever more important than the relationships ... all the wrongs ... all the hurts ... while not forgotten are somehow gotten past ... because there's nothing more important ... than "home".

It was comfortable. Familiar. Fun. It was good. And right. 

... and it was there ... this week ... that I realized where I want to be ...

... home ...

Home is place that's safe. Filled with love & acceptance. It's where you get to simply be you ... no pretense. And it's ok. No matter what. You're always wanted & welcome there. And if you're lucky, there's one someone special there who shares life with you. Home it's where you find that nothing else matters except for what is found there.

I was reminded of that this morning ... when Simon & Garfunkel's Homeward Bound was played ... at church ... and that's when it hit me  ... that's the journey I am on ...

... the road that appears to keep leading to nowhere ... it's really leading me HOME ...

So back to Thanksgiving ...

... there were turkey games galore ... turkey games are much like reindeer games ... just not talked about as much.

Gobble. Gobble.

The festivities started with the "making of the dressing" game. It's a long standing family tradition. It's a game I am pretty sure that I "won" based on the rules set forth by Aunt Julia ... not 100% positive, though ... lots of fuzzy places towards the end of the game ... and no one's shared the score with me ... at least not yet.

One thing I do know is that I let a couple of boomerangs fly ... a little too soon. I hate it when that happens. Cuz success in boomeranging is always in the timing & the toss. Oh, well. It is what it is. And who knows?!?! Maybe I blundered into the "right" time ... accidently ... that would definitely be a first for me ...

Time will tell.  It always does.

Card-playin' was on the agenda as well.  A lot of card playin'. Somehow that didn't really happen. There were some friendly hands of spades & Texas hold 'em that were lively & fun, though ... with two young but very strategic players. If we would have had the chips out, I am pretty sure the poker playing would have been extremely competitive and challenging!


Thanksgiving night was full of games, too.  First there was the "silent" game.  That wasn't any fun ... so I was really glad that Yahtzee prevailed.  There was a first time Yahtzee thrower in our midst so, of course, HE was graced with beginner's luck.

Seriously.  Every single time he rolled the dice, he came up with a Full House or a Straight.  Unbelievable.  Vegas, Baby! 

I, on the other hand, had not so much luck ... rolling the dice.  Still I kept in mind that the goal of the game was to Yahtzee!  Roll after lame roll ... I marked my less-than-mediocre numbers on the score sheet.  Then amidst the laughter & chatter ... I rolled three 2's ... lousy cuz I already had my 2s and an equally depressing 3-of-a-Kind.

On the second roll, I got another 2.  Wow!  I was actually going to make 4-of-a-Kind without having to scratch it off ... for a possible total of 14 pts.  Sheesh!

Than ... just like that ... I rolled the last 2 ... YAHTZEE! 

It was the only one of the game.  So I won. In the end.

Interesting.

Moved on to Apples to Apples.  First we were going to play until someone had 3 cards.  Than it was 5 cards.  Than it was until 9 p.m. And in the end we played 4 1/2 hours ...

It was a special time filled with love, laughter ... and healing.

For the record, there wasn't a HOMEless card ... or I would have have had it.  Still I had some interesting cards in my mix :

Cranky, generous, intelligent, kind, hopeless, cute, inspirational, distinguished (which I liked better than the companion card "dignified") ...

... and then there was that "create-your-own-card" that was thrown in for good measure ..."humpless" ... gotta feel the love when it comes from those who love ya ... I'm just saying.

Funny.  There wasn't a "happy" card in the box ... at least not that turned up in the hours that we played.

Again, Mr. I'm-New-To-The-Game was on a hot streak.  And I think everyone assumed he was going to be the winner when we totaled up the cards accumulated at the end. 

Nope.  It was me.  By one card.  Apparently it was the highly coveted "juicy" card that brought me the win.

... homeward bound ...

Of course, the entire week had been building up to the Razorback game on Saturday.  A game where the play was elevated by the possible outcome ... the Sugar Bowl.  And what a game it was.  Full of blunders & errors ... time clock issues ... still in the end, the Hogs won the game ... in spite of themselves ... in spite of the "lost" time ... they never lost sight of what was on the other side of the goal line ... the Sugar Bowl.

Somehow, the Razorback game is a complete and accurate analogy of my week of turkey games:  fumbles, overthrown passes, dropped balls, missteps on every drive ... and that whole "timing" thing ... yet they didn't let the unexpected ... or the obvious mistakes ... or miscalculated choices ... defeat them ...

Neither will I.

The action in football takes place in a set amount of game time ... so the end of the game is clearly defined ...

Not so much in life.

One of the similarities of football & boomeranging is the importance of  "timing" and the "toss".  Both the Hogs & I struggled with those things ... this time ...

Of course, the difference between football ... and boomeranging ... is the predictability of the outcome ... you know, where the thing's going to land or how long it's going to take to come back around .

Today, I am feeling pretty great.  I know what I want.  I know where I am heading.  It's ok that I am not like everyone else.

A lot of time was spent talking ... my sorta-cousin and I ... sharing things.  Things like the difference between satisfaction and happy.  Existing and living.  And why some people approach it all one way ... and others go about it completely different ... and all of us ... are looking for the same things ... and none of us are seeming to find it ...

Intellectual conversation.  Much like Apples-to-Apples.

I watch as so many people I care about rush about filling up their time and the emptiness in their lives with casual encounters ... meaningless flirtations ... friendships that are already ending before they even start ... wondering at the end of the day why they are still lonely ... even though they aren't alone.

... and gradually, over time, they are giving away the special things ... sharing pieces of their hearts randomly ... losing themselves along the way ... because ... well, just because ...

... it would be like playing Apples-to-Oranges ... and expecting to win.

I tried to explain what it was that I wanted and really didn't come up with it at the time.  This morning Del said in his message that one of the telltale signs that a couple is in trouble relationally is when they stop "enjoying" each other.

Yahtzee!  That's it!  I want to be be sharing my life with someone ... I want to ENJOY life with someone who fits me perfectly.

... and in our conversations, I finally said outloud somethings that I haven't really wanted to admit ... because once I said them ... I was going to have accept the truth.  Not so much bad things ... things that explain my confusion and frustration at times ... about the not-so-perfect man who fits me perfectly ...

It's affirmation that I AM different.  What I have to offer is rare & unique ... as long as I don't allow myself to give it away ... in little pieces ... in places that don't really matter ... except to fill time.

I don't have time ... to be wasting my time ... by spending my time ...myself ... tangled up in nothing.

For me that means hanging on to the pieces of my heart ... the treasures of ME ... and not wasting them in places that I know from the start aren't ever going to feel like home ...

Want to know what "home" feels like?  At least to me ... take a look at one of the BEST Thanksgiving movies ever ...
 

So I am rolling the dice ... taking a chance ... laying all of my cards on the table ... waiting on the what comes around from the unexpected boomerang release ...

... impatiently waiting patiently ...

What if I can't wait?!?

TURKEY!  ...turkey .. turkey .. turkey ...

http://www.lifelessons-mj.blogspot.com/
(c) Novemeber 2010