The Last Lesson My Father Taught Me

My father died this week.  The last and perhaps one of the most important lessons he taught me was  to slow down.

Like many people, I lead a very full and busy life.  During my workday I am rushing from meeting to meeting, and outside of work, I am trying to fit in the things I love to do- theater and music and time spent outdoors.  And of course there is time to be spent with family and friends.  All of this adds up to a fast-paced life.  So when my Father lay dying this last weekend, I had to put on the brakes.  This was not easy to do.  It is not easy for me to slow down but it was the only thing to do.  There wasn't anything more important than just being there, being present. The errands could wait, the emails could certainly sit in the inbox for a couple of days or more.  Nobody needed me more than my dear Father and family.

There are other times in my life when I have gotten not-so-subtle signals about the need to slow down.  I once went through a patch of getting three speeding tickets within the space of one month.  This was when I was a busy working Mom, rushing between dropping off the kids, picking them up, getting to work and everything in between.  But there is a cost to all of this rushing.  Of course three speeding tickets signals that I was potentially a hazard to myself and others as I dashed around.  But the cost is more insidious than that.  The cost is that you miss the opportunity to experience the small things, the moments that can mean so much.  Whether these moments are at home, at work or in life.  When we rush, we miss so much.

Most of all, we miss the opportunity to feel deeply.  I have continued struggling over the last few days with the sense that I should be somewhere, that I should rush back to work or to rehearsals or to the endless list of things that wait for me.  But as I have heard from so many friends during this sad time, many of them have said, go slow.  Take the time to grieve.  Do not rush.

So I am not going to rush.  I am going to continue to wander about for a few more days and to feel deeply this terrible loss.  I hope that I can remember this lesson when I jump back into the fray.  I hope that I will slow down when I can to feel and to reflect and mostly to be grateful for what I have.  If we could all live to be 94 years old, with a devoted spouse, a large and loving family and many great adventures to point to, that would indeed be a gift.

The Special Sauce of a Camp Reunion

I have been writing this blog for a year or so and the topic that always seems to fly off my pen (or keyboard) is camp.  Now there are camp people in the world and there are people who have not yet become camp people.  But this story is about a reunion.  This was not just any reunion, mind you, but the 100th anniversary of my summer camp in Vermont.  The camp is Aloha Hive and it is a camp for young girls from age 8 to 12.  There is a sister camp nearby called Aloha Camp for older girls and a boys camp called Lanakila.  My grandmother was a camper in the very early days of these camps and since that time three more generations of our family have come to spend their summers in this beautiful setting, away from the hustle and bustle of their busy lives to learn new skills, to live in a supportive community and to "become their best selves"  I ponder this and reflect on the title of my blog-  Remember What You Know: Musings on Creativity, Generosity and Being Your Best Self. Well imagine that?  I wonder where I got that idea?  That being your best self thing.  Oh right, that was probably at camp.  But back to the reunion.

The reunion this past weekend was such an incredible celebration of friendship and place and community.  It brought together decades of women with their spouses, and children and friends.  There was a great showing from almost every decade, including a new crop of soon-to-be camp parents.  They have their babies in tow now but one certainly hopes that those babies will be lucky enough to spend their summers at this magical place as well.  There was a spirited and energetic staff who stayed after camp, when many counselors go home to collapse for a few days and rest up.  But not  this group.  These counselors brought the same wonderful energy to the activities of the weekend as they no doubt brought to the kids who were in their care this summer.

So I reflect on the power of a place that brings people back over the decades.  Many of us have gone to a high school reunion or a college reunion.  I have had a blast at every reunion I've ever been to.  But high school and college were a 4 year chapter in my life.  I was there and then I wasn't.  Those friendships were special and carry wonderful memories with them but they are not quite the same as the friendships that I have made at camp.  Maybe it's the fact that we really do create our own community in Vermont without all of the trappings and distractions of technology and work and the demands of raising a family.  For young counselors, when they come to camp for the summer, they leave behind their friends and the typical college scene that is mostly about them.  When you come to be a camp counselor during your college years, you find yourself thinking about the children in your care instead of yourself.  You are giving yourself to something much bigger which is surprisingly rewarding for many young adults.

The weekend was a cavalcade of memory-inducing moments.  There was the candle-lit banquet on Friday night with lovely music and great conversation.   There were the activities that we once loved- archery and arts and crafts and swimming across the lake or paddling our canoes.  There was rest hour on Saturday after lunch.  Anyone who knows me or has read this blog knows that I am a big fan of rest hour.  There was a hike up to special spot in the woods and a campfire with stories and songs.  It was so special by that campfire that nobody wanted to leave, despite the growing darkness.  And then there was a fabulous talent show.  One of my favorite stories of the talent show was from the husband of one of the former directors of the camp who was there with her teen-aged children.  From all accounts they were stunned to see their Mom acting in a skit, sporting a sequined gown and acting very silly. This was not the Mom that they knew.  I love that.  Because at camp, we can be as silly as we want to be.  We thrive on that.  We celebrate it and we realize that without even knowing it, we are becoming our best selves.

On Sunday, we gathered once more to reflect, to sing and to hear from former and present camp directors.  We were inspired by their tales of the footprint that this place is creating in the world.  This is not the only camping organization that is turning out fine people but it is certainly one of the ones leading the way.  The women who have lead this camp are all extraordinary in their own unique ways.  There are of course some extraordinary men who are part of the story as well, but this weekend was mostly about the women.  And for me and my daughter and my friends who have experienced this place, that is a gift.  To follow these women and to feel confident and important in the world.  To feel that we are capable and open-hearted and willing to take on new adventures. To know that we will try new things and push ourselves and be part of something much bigger.  That is the gift of this place and that was the gift and the special sauce of this weekend.

So next time you think about going to a camp reunion, just do it.  You'll be happy you did.

Confessions of a Cry Baby

Sometimes the world feels like a really sad place.  This week a dear friend's Mom passed away and I attended her funeral.  She had lived a very long and rich life and was celebrated for that.  I shed lots of tears at the funeral.  Not so much for the extraordinary woman who had passed,  but for her family, her children, the fragile relationships that hold them all together.  I cried because life really is too short.

And then this morning we all awoke to the news of Robin William's passing.  What a loss.  What a tragedy.  I am so so sad that his life ended so abruptly at such a young age.  So I cry for him and for  those of us who will miss his gifts his extraordinary talent.

I cry a lot.  I cry, not because I am falling apart, but I cry because I feel deeply.  Some people don't know what to make of my tears.  There are those who misinterpret them.   There is a classic story that took place when I interviewed at the company where I now work.  When my company hires executives they do a very exhaustive process of vetting the candidate, complete with a set of personality tests and assessment tools.  They want to dig deep and know what they are getting.

This process culminated in an interview with a psychologist who administered the tests.  This interview lasted a full three hours and really delved into a lot of personal information about my successes and stumbles both in work and in life.  You can probably see where this is going.  As we delved into some of these chapters in my life,  I, as I am wont to do, shed a tear or two.  I didn't blubber.  I didn't sob.  I just reconnected with some old wounds that made me cry.  I pulled myself together fairly quickly and explained it away by admitting that I occasionally shed a tear or two, no big deal.  I mean we had been talking for almost three hours.
 The psychologist then asked me how I felt about his sharing what had happened in his reporting of the interview.   He offered to hold back the details of my emotional moment but I said- what the heck.  Open the door.  Share what you want.  This is who I am.

Well here is where the story gets interesting. As the interview process progressed, my tears became "a thing".  They were discussed.  There was concern that I would be discovered in my office in a pool of tears when things did not go according to plan.  There was concern that I would fall apart when they needed me to be strong.  This line of thinking was only exasperated when one of my references, a fabulous former boss, in the course of giving me a glowing reference, shared that he and I had cried together no less than five times.  I'm not actually sure if that was true but what I do know was that he and I had a very close and strong friendship and while we enjoyed working together, we also often talked about life, about things that had nothing to do with the workplace.  This. my friends, is when I cry.  I don't cry about work.  I cry about life.  I cry about dying and suffering.  I cry about babies and puppies.   I pretty reliably cry at weddings. I cry when I feel deep compassion for the people in my life and their joys and their struggles.

There was a time when I apologized for this tendency.  I apologized for making people feel uncomfortable.  But here's what I've learned.  People are usually uncomfortable when you are uncomfortable.  If all I'm doing is experiencing something fully and deeply, then lucky me.  If you are someone who has seen me weep, please don't assume that I am falling apart.  Consider instead that I am  living as fully as I can.  I'll take that any day.

I Believe in Magic- a Story of Camp

One of the most wonderful things about summer for me is that I have a fabulous camp tent tucked away under a large pine tree behind my house in Vermont.  This small oasis brings me untold pleasure.  I have pondered how such a simple thing could be so powerful and yesterday while lolling about, reading a book, I figured it out.  On the tent fly above my head was a drawing and a caption over the drawing.  The caption reads - The Tent of Magic.   This drawing was created on this tent fly during the summer of 2002.  My tent platform was constructed by my very handy husband and son and the tent fly came from the summer camp where I have spent many blissful summers as both a camper and later a counselor.  One theory about the utter joy that my tent brings me is that it recalls for me so many moments of simple happiness and pleasure.  Campers at my camp spend an hour every day during "Rest Hour" relaxing in their tent with their tent family.  This family consists of three campers and one counselor.  Campers are often busy during rest hour, writing letters home or reading a book, maybe playing a quiet game of cards.   The counselor,  often takes the opportunity to actually nap.  I, by the way, in my many summers as a counselor had perfected this.  I would hit the cot and the pillow and be out for a solid hour.  What a fabulous concept.  Rest Hour.

But back to the magic.  Is there something magical about what happens at camp?  I believe there is. There are several stories that back up this claim. After many summers heading the performing arts department, I was asked to be the head of the nature department at camp.  This was certainly going to be a different gig.  No boisterous singing and playmaking but something quite different.  I was affectionately referred to as Mother Nature.   I was, after all, a Mother at that point with both of my kids at camp with me.  It seemed to fit.  There were two things that happened that summer that made me feel that there was truly something magical going on.  The first was when, with a group of kids, we created a small pond in the front of the nature hut.  We found an old white enamel bowl and dug a hole in the ground where we placed the bowl.  Then we got busy planting some plants around the edge of the pond.  We found some small rocks that we put around the edge and even harvested a lily pad or two from the lake to put into our mini pond.  (I'm not sure if you're actually supposed to do that but we were in the making magic business so we figured we were safe).  We filled the bowl with water.  I think we actually got real lake water for our pond, not just out of the faucet.  And then we sat on the ground and admired our handiwork.  

The next morning, before breakfast, I came down from my cabin quite early. This time of day is one of the most magical times at camp as the mist is rising from the lake and there are "fairy handkerchiefs" dotting the green grass of the playing field. These are wispy little webs that cover the field on dewy mornings.   It was very quiet and peaceful as others had not yet come down for breakfast.  Imagine my surprise when I arrived at our newly constructed pond and there, sitting on one of our little rocks on the edge of our pond, was a very happy looking little frog.  I was beside myself.  It was as if we created a spot for him and he just simply moved right in.  You can only imagine the delight we all felt.

The next incident took place not long after my frog arrived.  There is very special place at camp called Rainbow's End which is up on a hillside in the woods.  Every Sunday night throughout the summer, the entire camp hikes up to spend a very peaceful and quiet time in this beautiful spot.  There is singing and there is storytelling. At the end of the evening, all of the campers walk down the hillside to return to their tents.  This particular night I was bringing up the rear with another counselor and we heard the most startling noise in the trees.  It turns out that it was a pair of red-tailed hawks, high up in the trees, doing some kind of a flirtatious, swooping dance together.  It was unlike anything I had ever seen.  My fellow counselor and I felt incredibly lucky to have been there at just the right moment to see it happen.

So several days later, still reveling in what we had seen, I decided that I would take a chance and organize a "hawk walk" and return to the spot where we had seen them before.  It was going to be a different time of day but we were ever hopeful.  So off we went, hiking up the trail to the spot.  There were only 3 or 4 kids who signed up for this activity.  Apparently hawk walking doesn't quite hold up to rehearsing for the play or sailing or arts and crafts.  Nonetheless, my stalwart nature girls and I set off on our adventure. We walked, we stopped and we waited, we walked a bit further and stopped again and we waited.  I might even have tried to imitate the calls that we had heard the night we had seen the two birds.  But I am no expert and there was not a sound from the tree canopy above.  We spent a good 30 minutes out on that trail.  The kids were very disappointed as I had implied from the name of the activity that we were actually going to see a hawk.  So dejected and disappointed, we began to return to camp.  I had clearly lost my cachet as Mother Nature.  Would I ever recover?

As I pondered this question, we rounded the bend on the road through the woods that would take us back to camp and we heard it.  It was the same screech we had heard before.  We stopped dead in our tracks and waited.  Sure enough, the two hawks began their ritual again and we were there to see it.  The kids were thrilled as was I.  I had redeemed myself as Mother Nature and felt that surely there was something truly magical going on.  It was the last time anyone at camp that summer saw or heard from the pair of hawks.  We just happened to be at the right place at the right time- twice!

There is a sign at the end of my driveway now with a wooden cut-out of a camper in her green shorts and white shirt waving.  The sign says "Honk If You're Going To Hive". We put this sign up in June every year to welcome the counselors and the families who are driving by to drop off their kids at camp.  It gives me such pleasure to hear the honks every day as these lucky kids and young adults drive by on their way to this special place.  I am overcome with pangs every summer at this time with the yearning to be there, to be part of the warm and wonderful community, to be outdoors, to make new friends, to sing my heart out.

I don't think the tent in my backyard or the camp down the road have a corner on making magic, but wherever you find your magic,  I recommend you spend as much time there as you possibly can.  And on those lazy days of summer, think of me enjoying my rest hour in the Tent of Magic.

A Love Letter to Jimmy Fallon

Dear Jimmy,

I know you like to write hand-written thank you notes so I thought I might pen one of mine own to you.  But mine is more than a thank you.  It's more of an "I love you".  I have been thinking a lot about you recently.  Not in a creepy (who are you anyway) way but in a person who admires you from afar way. I've been trying to figure out why I love your show.  I've been trying to figure out your secret sauce.

I am not really much of a late night girl.  That is not to say that I don't like to stay up late, which I do, but I never have felt compelled to watch late night television.  Oh wait.. well I did get to enjoy David Letterman when I had newborn babies and was up all hours of the night nursing them.  But for the most part, this is not my thing.  I, along with half of the population got caught up in all the hype and excitement with your debut on the Tonight Show.  I think I was mostly fascinated to see how you would handle such a momentous opportunity.

But I was not just sucked in for the first show or the first week of shows.  I have been pretty much sucked in.  And I keep asking myself what is it about Jimmy that I find so completely captivating.  Is it just that you are a complete goof-ball and seem to have more fun with each guest who comes on the show?  Maybe.  But I actually had a flash of insight yesterday while reading People Magazine.

When the heck did a person ever get flashes of insight while reading People?  Please don't judge but It is my magazine of choice when I am captive somewhere- like a hair salon or a nail salon or worse, waiting for a dentist appointment.  I read People Magazine when there is nothing else to do.  And there you were on the cover.  So I read the story. I must say that it wasn't especially well-written.  It seemed like the writer just kept trying to jam quotes from you into the story.  But who cares. The point is it told a wonderful story about your life and your daughter and how you and your wife are adjusting to so many big changes at one time.

There were two things that jumped out at me.. remember the flashes of insight I was talking about?  The first is that you are a happy man.  You are loving your life right now.  You are happy to go to work on Monday and happy to go home on Friday night.  This has got to be a big part of your secret sauce.  You are truly loving life and it shows.  You are delighted by your family and you are delighted by the shenanigans that you and your team are putting together with your guests each night.

But my other favorite quote in the piece (this is not a direct quote because I never take People Magazine home with me-  Bon Appetit in November maybe, but People never). My other favorite quote in the piece was about how exhausted you and your wife feel so much of the time and that you have both developed "awesome" eye twitches.

Ok so Jimmy.  I know you don't know me but I am going to share something really personal with you.  I have been having an eye twitch lately too.  I do not take to this kindly.  I worry that people will notice and think that I'm somehow falling apart.  I worry that Bell's Palsy is not far behind.  I worry that I look more tired than I feel.  But wait.  You called your eye twitch awesome.  This is your real secret.  You turn everything into something to celebrate.  Instead of fretting about your eye twitching which would be totally understandable since  you have millions of people watching your face on television five nights a week,  you turn it into something awesome. So if you can rise above the millions of people watching your face and not worry about a silly little twitch, well then so can I.

So I thank you for your awesomeness.  I thank you for making me laugh.  I thank you for bringing back something as old school and traditional as a hand-written thank you note.  I love that you are so enamored with your baby girl.  And while I'm having a bit more trouble leaping out of bed in the morning, I thank you for entertaining me so completely.

Happy Fathers Day.

Feedback: At Work, At Home, In the Theatre

I reflect today on the power of feedback.  I am currently in a production of A Funny Thing Happened On The Way to the Forum.  It's a bawdy, zany show with a great cast of talented people.  It is far from perfect but there is great energy, lots of hilarity and generally our audiences have been appreciating the performance.  But last night was a bit different.  We had a wonderful audience on Thursday night with lots of laughter and applause, but last night the audience was different.  Now I am not going to presume that they did not enjoy the performance.  They clapped in all the right places and seemed to be smiling through most of the show.  But they gave us very little in the way of feedback.  I listened and watched my fellow actors come off the stage after their scenes, each puzzling about what was going on.  There were plenty of jokes and as most theater people do, everyone kept their spirits high and brought their best energy to the stage.

I worried a couple of times if there was a risk that we would try too hard to get a reaction.  Could we cross the line?  In this show, I doubt it, but you never know.  I know for myself, as I got ready to go on stage for my one big song in the show, I had a bit of trepidation.  I am always a bit nervous before a show.  I think it's a healthy thing.  If you don't feel some nerves and excitement, then I believe you are not ready to really bring it.  But this was more of a mental challenge.  Without the encouragement from the audience and the sense of anticipation that audiences and actors feel before each scene, the hill seems higher to climb. I went on stage and the scene went just fine.  I just had to work harder to relax and trust myself and my fellow actors that all would be well.

Feedback is such a powerful thing.  I have always worked hard in life and especially at work to bring honest feedback to my colleagues, to the folks that I manage and even to my bosses.  As a career sales and marketing person, I have been in many a meeting with some important people where the stakes felt high.  But no matter who the meeting was with, I have always believed that if I had colleagues with me, we should come out of the meeting and reflect on how it went.  What could we have done better?  What did we do well?  Where do we need to improve?  This has felt a bit tricky over the years when I have been with a boss.  Bosses, in my experience, are not as accustomed to hearing feedback and don't always hear it well.  But I believe that it makes us all better.

And what about parenting?  Isn't that just one big long road of offering feedback and guidance.  Goodness knows it is not always well received but it's kind of the job of the parent.  The trickiest thing is knowing how to offer feedback so it is received as constructive and not as criticism or judgement.  Nobody does well when they feel they are being judged.  I'm not sure what the secret is to getting this right.  I once had a colleague tell me that I managed my team like a Mom.  At first I wasn't sure if it was a compliment or a criticism.  He explained that what he meant was that I gave firm feedback, but signaled that I cared at that same time.  That seems to be a pretty good strategy.

So the next time you are in the audience at a performance or are coming out of a meeting, consider how you can offer feedback in a way that is both constructive and supportive.  We'll all be better for it.

Thank You to All the Teachers on Earth

Today Google posted one small line of text on their home page that was an ode to teachers.  "Thank you to all the teachers on earth".  And it linked off to a video about space and how teachers bring it alive for their students.  It really got me thinking as I have always held teachers in the highest regard.  I appreciate the work they do and I know how dedicated many of them are to their profession and the children in their classrooms every day.

I had a conversation recently with a dear friend who had come to see a play that I was in.  The play was Working, and it is a collection of vignettes based on a series of interviews that Studs Terkel conducted with real working people.  The experience was a joyful one for me for lots of reasons.  The community of actors and behind the scenes folks was wonderful.  There were lots and lots of kids in the show and like many teachers I love being around kids.  I got to make Rainbow Loom bracelets with some new friends who were 9 and 10 respectively.  That's how much fun I had.  And while the show captured so many touching stories about the people who keep our world on track- the fireman, the trucker, the waitress, the mill worker, the mom..  The role that I played was the teacher.  She was a 3rd grade teacher who had been teaching for 40 years and was pretty worn out from the whole thing.  I think her real story was that she had watched the world change and was struggling to keep up.  She wasn't all that endearing as a character.  She opened her monologue talking about what she would do when she really disliked a child.  I had trouble with this.  I had trouble with the whole thing- truth be told.  The monologue was challenging and the song I sang even more challenging.  But I am an actress and accepted the role. Here's the deal about actors- their job is to bring  their characters to life.   I was coached by one of the directors to really own the part, to not be ambivalent about this teacher who believed in the rote method among other things.   Just to be clear- I do not believe in the rote method.   I am way too right-brained for that.  But that was the text and that was the role, so I did my best to own it.

So back to my story.  My friend, the retired teacher, expressed to me how upset she was that Studs Terkel had chosen that story and that character to represent "teachers".  She said that she thought my character was the only "unlikeable" character in the show.  This upset me.  It did not feel good.  It was not that I felt maligned as a performer.  I feel pretty confident that I did the best I could do with the role, but I felt sad that a member of the audience felt that way.  I especially felt sad because I so appreciate teachers.  I remember teachers that I have had along the way and am so thankful for the ways that they have shaped my life.  There was my college writing professor who literally taught me how to write a coherent sentence.  There was my 4th grade teacher, Miss Smith, who was very strict, but who taught me so many of the basics.  There was my English teacher in high school who introduced me to so much great literature.  I remember vividly the day that he introduced our classroom to the Myth of Sisyphus.  That was a shocker.  Seriously, are we all just rolling a rock up a big hill and never getting to the top?

I could go on for pages about the amazing teachers that I have known and not just in the classroom.  What about the extraordinary people who have taught me new skills and amazing things about our world and yes even painful lessons .   I myself have been a teacher in a variety of settings- at a camp, at a children's theater program, in an elementary school music class.  I like to think that I am a teacher in my work life.  That I am sharing what I know and helping people see things in a new way.  This is hard work, folks.  This is not for the faint-hearted.

So today when I saw Google's simple line of text, it made me stop and think and appreciate all of the teachers that I know and have known.  And even if I had to portray a teacher that made my friends uncomfortable and dare I say, unappreciated, well.. I was playing a part.  I was not expressing my personal beliefs.  So thank you Google.  And thank you to all the teachers on earth.