Don't Mope, Make Something

 I woke up on Sunday morning feeling decidedly blue. It was gray and snowy outside and there didn't seem to be any good reason to jump out of bed. The list of things to feel blue about is long and I won't go into them here. It is the dead of winter after all. There are health challenges aplenty amongst people in my life and my own health feels more fragile than it should. This pandemic has certainly created enormous mood swings for many. But is it possible to go from 0-60 in under an hour? I'm happy to report that it is. Back to my story. 

I stumbled downstairs for coffee and the Sunday paper and then decided to take matters into my own hands, to send my gloom packing. I put on my coat, summoned my trusty companion, Smooch, and headed for the woods. I brought with me some clippers, normally used in the summer and fall, and began to look for interesting bits of flora and fauna. I had a project in mind and was ready to tackle it.

Of course the woods are full of beautiful collectibles, if one only looks for them. I found some of those lovely red branches that people use to decorate their homes for the holidays. I found some pine cones and some different kinds of pine branches. On my way back into the house, I spotted our Christmas wreath still hanging by the door and harvested some bright red berries from it.  

I laid out all of my treasures on the kitchen counter and began to compose a wintry picture. I must give credit at this point to a wonderful company, Tinkergarten, whose mission is helping get children outdoors with fun, educational activities. I had spotted this idea on their website and filed it away for a day when I would be inspired to do it. 

I found two large horizontal trays in my lower oven drawer, each with about a one inch lip. I made my design on each tray and then filled them with water. The trays were then delivered to the table on my screen porch where the temperature was around 10 degrees.  In this kind of weather, it didn't take long for the trays to freeze solid. I must also confess at this point that I don't think of myself as a visual artist. I am a theatre artist and my medium is people, gloriously complex, flawed people who are brave enough to bring themselves to the stage and share who they are. Having a visual eye is certainly essential in the theatre, but I never really studied visual design. I have been lucky to work with wonderful designers who bring their craft to the stage. But here's the point, we can all make things. Am I an artist? Hmm. Maybe not. Maybe I'm a maker. I'm someone who decided to take an idea and do it. Nobody was going to give me a grade. I wasn't going to sell this creation. In fact, one of the things about this project that is kind of special is that it is impermanent. When the temperature goes above freezing, my creation will begin to melt away. Perhaps that's one reason why I am immortalizing it here on this blog. 

Once I had taken the frozen sheets out of the pan, it was time to set them up outside. I have a plant stand that turned out to the perfect vessel for my artic windows. I wired them to it and hung my bird feeders all around the windows. Voila! Joy! Suddenly I was energized and happy! YAASSS! 

There was a lesson in this experience. I went from feeling very glum to feeling extraordinarily happy in a short amount of time. It only took a short walk in the woods and some natural materials. I was thrilled with my creation. I shared pictures of it online and was delighted when people asked how I did it. Even a day later when we got almost a foot of snow, my arctic windows still look fabulous and the birds are loving it as well. 

So my new pro tip to combat the pandemic and the ineveitable shades of blue that winter can bring, is to just simply make something. Maybe it will be an artistic creation. Maybe a loaf of banana bread. Maybe a phone call. But whatever it is, it will make me feel better. I suggest everyone give it a try. 

My brain loves a good nap

In praise of the noble nap.  It turns out that our brain loves a good nap. For those readers who have followed my life over the last several months, you know that my brain was giving me some trouble last summer.  It was kind of letting me down.  It was making me lose my balance and fall down; it was making me feel very fuzzy about a lot! It was creating some other indelicate issues that I won't go into here, but suffice it to say, I had become a "hot mess". So I did what all of us should do when things do not feel right and I went to my Doc. Together, and with help from a range of specialists, we began to figure out what was up. 

In late September, I had brain surgery to relieve the hydrocephalus that was causing my problems. This, by the way, in the midst of a pandemic. I won't go into the gory details here but it was a success and after three weeks in the hospital and subsequently rehab, I was sent home to continue healing and to continue "remembering Perry'.  This last expression was coined by my daughter who chronicled much of the saga and was inspired by our watching  the wonderful Disney movie, "Finding Nemo". 

When people ask me how I'm doing, I tell them that I nap a lot.  If ever there was a good excuse for napping, recovering from brain surgery is surely on the list.  And surviving a pandemic should be on it too. And let's add living in Vermont in winter when the days are cold and night falls early.  We are pretty much locked up at home.  The best I can do to feel like the extrovert that I am is to zoom with friends.  I do get outdoors every day, often walking in the woods with Smooch, my trusty sidekick.  I've been playing brain games on Lumosity.  The rehab doc, who I saw a few weeks ago, told me that the first six months post brain surgery are the time when the most healing happens so we need to "throw everything at it".  So I am exercising my brain and my body.  And I'm napping and dreaming of the day when I'll be able to lounge in my camp tent and after my nap, I'll be able to have dinner with friends. Now those are sweet dreams.

There are so many things you don't know about me

 One of my favorite things in life is revealing to people (particularly people who are much younger than I am) that I have been to Burning Man, not once but several times.  There is always a pause, sometimes a small gasp and ineveitably, some flavor of affirmative comment-  "That's so cool."  "Wow, you?"

And then I smile  knowingly and decide how many stories to share.  And believe you me, there are stories. There's the "critical tits" bike ride when hundreds of women ride topless through the desert. There's the  playa choir that I discovered my very first year and have sung with each year since.  This is the most soulful, spirited choir I have ever sung with.   The year that Michael Jackson died brought a particulary poignant memory.  We sang an arrangement of "Man in the Middle" and many people in the crowd just sobbed.  There were the epic drives in the RV and the sonic blasts from a nearby camp that woke us up in the middle of the night. (night, what night?)

Why is it so much fun to surprise people with your sordid (or savory) past.  Another place where I have loved to share stories of my misspent youth is at my summer camp. I am most definitely one of the senior citizens among the staff.  The young counselor staff range in age from 17 to mid 30's.  There are a few older staff like me who just love the place so much they keep returning whenever they can, but for the most part it is a young crowd.  These young women work hard during the day and many of them party hard at night, staying up into the wee hours of the morning.  Then they wake up the next day and do it all over again.  Ahhh those were the days.  Indeed there were days in my youth when I was right there.  I love to share the story of the night I "fell asleep" down the road at the boys camp and woke up at about 5:00 AM.  In order to return to my tent without getting caught, I drove stealthily down the road, parked my car and stripped down to my underwear and a t-shirt so if someone woke up and saw me I could claim I had just gone to the bathroom.  HA! My young counselor friends find the story hard to believe. 

There is so much of my life that seems hard to believe now.  The days when I was at the pinnacle of my career are in the rear-view mirror. No more flying thousands of miles a year, meeting with high-powered people, solving big thorny business problems.  Gone are the days of speaking at large conferences and enjoying lavish dinners out with clients. Yup.  Now it's pretty much dinner on the porch with my husband, my dog and a few friends.  I can now indulge my passion for music and theatre.  But I don't often share stories of my career with my actor friends.  Who cares, really? For now, this is my life.  This is me.  And there will always be so many things you won't know about me. 

(This post was originally penned on 8/8/20)

Zen and the Howling Hour

I live in a small town in Vermont, atop a hill overlooking the CT River Valley.  There are approximately 2500 residents in our little town and between my husband serving on the planning commission and me directing the 5th and 6th-grade musical, we've met most folks in town.  I also attend the Congregational Church on Thetford Hill which is a lovely community church with a very affirming congregation.  I'm extremely proud of my state of Vermont and my county (Orange) that have both done so well in addressing the current health crisis.  Vermont is one of four states that has been touted as "flattening the curve" as swiftly as almost anywhere else.

Having moved to this town ten years ago from the Boston area and a town ten times the size, I have been slowly acclimating to a different pace of life.  Most people move to Vermont for the beauty of the place, the wide-open space.  I once complained to a friend that I was frustrated that people were so slow to respond to emails.  He reminded me that many people move to Vermont so they won't have to respond to email, at least not in a big hurry.

When we bought our house we knew that we would inherit some challenges. It is a farmhouse built in 1850 on 4 acres, But I fell in love with it. Our home inspector, in his report, noted the age of the furnace, the foundation with some crumbling bits, the roof that would need to be replaced sometime soon and then at the very end of the report, he said this- "despite all of the inevitable problems the house will present- when you're sitting on that screened porch, looking out over the view, sippng a glass of port, life won't get any better than that." It all turned out to be quite true, except for the bit about the port. I'm more of a chardonnay girl.  It is a beautiful place and all the more so now that we are quarantined at home.  There are endless projects to tackle, gardens to tend. I even have a camp tent which goes up in the summer for afternoon naps. Talk about social distancing.

But it is a small town and it's a rare event when we have the opportunity to really feel connected to our neighbors.  This weekend as we sat watching the PBS Newshour, there was a segment about a town in Montana that does a "howling hour" every evening at 8:00.  Residents come out of their houses and essentially howl into the night.  This is all in support of the front line workers who are helping us all stay safe.  It's the healthcare workers and folks manning the grocery stores and pharmacies.  The gratitude that we should be expressing to these folks is boundless. So I thought that we should give it a whirl on our little hill in Thetford.  I sent an email around to some neighbors, many of whom had seen the same news program and suggested we try it.  I wish I could say it was a rousing success.  We did howl on that first night.  My neighbor up the hill had a friend visiting who joined our chorus enthusiastically and I heard some neighbors through the woods let out a howl or two.  I did my part by howing from our porch.  It felt pretty exhilerating, I must admit, but then we all went back to our quiet, peaceful lives.  We didn't do it again and I realized that most people who live here like things to stay quiet and peaceful. We'll let the coyotes do the howling and we'll appreciate our front line workers each night from our own living rooms.

(This post was originally penned on April 26, 2020) 

The struggle is real

One look at the home screen of my iPad reveals my valiant attempts to keep my head above water since the beginning of the pandemic. (see previous post- "What happened to my sunny disposition?)

I wish I could claim that I have found that sunny disposition but that could not be further from the truth. I have slumped into a seething vat of aimlessness, of decrepitude and of gloom. (Too dramatic?) This is so not me.  But there it is.  The collection of newly installed apps on my iPad shows how I have tried to combat the slump.  Here is the list-

Acapella- (surely there must be some way that I can sing with my friends) 

Broadway HD- (or go to the theatre)

DailyOm- (or move my stiff. tired body)  

Simply Piano- (or brush up on my piano skills)

Photoshop-  (or once and for all learn how to use photoshop, you're a marketer for God's sake)

Disney + - (or watch Hamilton obsessively until I know all of the lyrics) 

Breethe (or learn to breathe and meditate and get some sleep!!)

Audible- (if you can't read, surely you can listen to a book)

I wish I could tell you that I am practicing the piano every day, singing with friends, reading fabulous books, moving these tired old bones.  Alas, that would not be the truth.

A quick tour of my house further reveals the struggle.  There are corners of the house that are orderly and resemble the suburban home we once lived in with regular visits from the cleaning lady.  Other areas of the house show the truth of living on a farm. There is chicken shit on the floor of the bathroom, there are fruit flies swirling in the air above the vegetables in the wooden bowl on the kitchen table. The pantry and refrigerator overflow with vestiges of our stockpiling for quarantine. In my office, there are craft projects begun but never finished. In my beloved tent where I while away summer afternoons, there is a pile of books that are unfinished, books about numerology, theatre, about children and dogs.  I chip away at them but without much urgency.  It seems time is fluid now.  There are no deadlines, no guardrails to contain my activity. 

And all the while, I look for the elusive silver linings.  I putter (The fine art of puttering around) and languish and hope for better days.  I know the old me lies in wait ready to re-emerge. To hug her friends and start projects and create things of beauty.  For now, I play in my garden and become mesmerized by my fish pond and nap in my tent and try to remember that I am luckier than most.

And the Children Will Lead the Way

As so many of us are struggling to find our way through the current crisis, we are looking for strategies and ideas.  Where are the silver linings?  What is working to distract us from the horrors of the evening news?

I listened to a fascinating interview yesterday on the podcast Lovett or Leave It from Crooked Media.  A psychologist shared some very tangible strategies for keeping our mental health strong. Strategies include turning off the TV as the images can stay with us long after we want them to disappear, finding things to do that bring us joy (his favorite was watching Tiger King..um okay).  Getting outdoors and moving our bodies is another great tried and true tactic.

But I think the best guides for us in these difficult times are children.  If you have children or grandchildren, you know that they are experts at finding joy and fun in most everything they do. Their secret weapon is their imagination.  They dress up, they make friends from their stuffed animal collection, they play with sticks and rocks.   They lose themselves in books whether they can read them or not.  They run around outdoors in all kinds of weather.  Visit the neighboring elementary school playground during their afterschool program and you will see kids wearing shorts and t-shirts even when there is still snow on the ground.  Weather, what weather?

Kids have an uncanny way of being in the present.  At my beloved summer camp, I watch girls throw themselves into all kinds of fun.  From lying on their belly in the field looking for four-leaf clovers to hooting and hollering in the dining room when a special dessert comes out of the kitchen. Camp provides endless opportunities for boisterous fun and for quiet contemplation which is why it is such a special place for both children and adults.

And at the heart of the simple philosophy of camp is the practice of imagining yourself as the person you want to be.  If I were the person I want to be in this time of being quarantined at home, what would I be doing?  I would be exercising my creativity. I would be trying to be kind and loving to my husband.  I would be reaching out to friends and family.  I would be appreciating the beauty that surrounds us. I would be exercising compassion for myself and others and I would be looking for ways to experience joy.  Many of these practices come quite naturally to children.

My granddaughter Mabel is a bundle of energy and spirit and joy.  She lives every day filled with exuberance and fun.  Would that we could all be so lucky to live that way. Here's to finding your youthful spirit friends and to being the person you want to be, even through the most challenging times.

The Fine Art of Puttering Around

My Dad was a great putterer. My husband is pretty good at it too.  Me?  Not so much.  But I'm working on developing this skill.  Here is how Merriam Webster defines it:

To spend time in a relaxed way doing small jobs and other things that are not very important. 

There is an element of aimlessness in this activity.  That's probably why I've never been very good at it as I don't really do "aimless".  I'm a girl with a plan who likes to get things done. I'm a girl who likes to feel accomplished.  I'm a girl who has spent way too much of my life striving to stay busy. Now there are lots of people who are really busy these days. Of course there are the health care workers who are crushed. There are the teachers who are learning how to teach students remotely.  There are the parents who are working at home all the while trying to home school their children.  These folks are really busy.  But for many of us without the distractions of life and people and purpose, we are learning to putter around.

Here's what puttering looks like in my household.  I have a wonderful office that I love.  I look out the window at a beautiful Vermont landscape, complete with a gorgeous barn. I know.  Lucky, right?

I have lots of pictures and books and projects nearby.  I have a piano in the other room with stacks of music.  I have a ukelele that I have sworn to learn how to play.  I have a collection of percussion instruments from my days as a camp counselor and a music teacher.

I have a craft collection just waiting for me to jump into a project. Bead wind chimes anyone? Beaded handle salad servers? The supplies are there, I just need the will to actually do it.  I have stacks of books and plays just waiting to be read.  There are boxes of photos- a lifetime of photos of moments both precious and every day calling to be organized. The garden calls to me. The asparagus, strawberries, garlic, and raspberries are all doing their thing. I have big plans for a cutting garden this summer. 

Shockingly, it feels that some days I do none of these things.  The kitchen stays empty, the books unread, the photos in their storage box.

I need strategies to putter around?  Lose the to-do list.  Let go of the pressure and deadlines. Add music or not?  Is puttering better when there is smooth jazz or show tunes in the background? Is puttering better with a buddy?  I think not.  It's probably fine to putter alongside someone else but the point it to move slowly doing small jobs that are not important. The buddy system inevitably introduces the "honey do list".  Of course, the expectations from someone else about the things you should be doing aren't exactly in the spirit of puttering around. 

This will be a work in progress for sure. For the expert putterers out there- what are your pro tips? Sharing them will be a great gift to those of us who are GOING INSANE.

But for now, here's the vision I am holding onto.  One day soon It will be warm and sunny.  We'll be singing around the piano, creating fabulous garden art, talking about the wonderful books we have read, eating delicious tomatoes from the garden, scheming about our next theatrical adventure.  And we'll be doing it TOGETHER.  Dear God, I cannot wait.  Who's in?