Category: Life in general

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Life in general Marriage

The Life She Deserves

“Don’t wait,” she says in her soft southern drawl, her cool hand gripping my knee.  “Don’t you wait to live the life you deserve.”
Grandma & Dre

At 16, she met him and fell in love.

At 17, she tried to convince the Justice of the Peace that she was old enough to get married.  He didn’t believe her.

At 18, she married him, against her parents wishes.

At 20, he joined the military, and at 21 she gave birth to their only child, a son.

That same year, living alone in a strange place, she discovered that the kind and loving man she married had a violent and unpredictable dark side.

At 22, her mother told her that she’d made her bed, and now she would have to lie in it.  So she did, for 52 years.

At 40, she became a grandmother.

At 45, she buried her son.

At 74, she buried her husband.

At 76, she went on a date for the first time in nearly 60 years.

At 77, a man brought her breakfast in bed for the first time in her life.

At 78, she travels, she laughs, she goes to concerts, she eats out more than she cooks at home.

At 78, she visits for a week and we sit together, night after night, sipping wine.  She tells me, with a twinkle in her piercing blue eyes, about her adventures and the gentlemen friends she has waiting for her at home.

At 78, she is finally living the life she has deserved all along… one full of happiness.

Categories
Flashback Life in general

Aptitude

Fifteen years ago, I almost became a sailor.  And then I saw the sailor uniform and changed my mind.

Every year, just before my birthday, the U.S. Navy sends me a postcard to commemorate the anniversary of my blatant rejection of their style sense.  They call it a birthday card, but I like to pretend that they’re still pining for my attention.

The Navy recruited me pretty heavily there for awhile, many years ago, because tests indicated that I showed an aptitude for Nuclear Physics and Mechanical Engineering.

They promised me an awful lot of things in exchange for joining their ranks, especially because I’m a woman and those particular fields are fairly well dominated by people with a whole different set of genitalia.  Just before I got ready to sign on the dotted line, however, they decided to try and impress me by having some Naval Officers come over and fill me in on how wonderful my life was going to be. 

That’s when they lost me.

I’m sure those Officers talked up the Navy like there was no tomorrow.  The travel!  The education!  The experience!  Plus, Nuclear Physics = fun stuff! 

All I can remember about that meeting, though, is how ugly and out of date their uniforms were.  I grew up Air Force, and spent time stationed at an Army base, so it’s not that I was unfamiliar with the concept of uniforms.  But I was used to dress blues and fatigues, not all of this white polyester with big dangly ties, bell bottoms and funky hats.  In a word, they looked like Sailors.  From the seventies.

I honestly can’t tell you why I expected them to look like anything else, being that they were in the Navy.  What can I say?

I quietly and humbly turned down the Navy’s incredibly generous offers, all because I didn’t want to look like a sailor.  From the seventies.  And for the record, if I had voiced my displeasure?  They would have informed me that I wouldn’t be dressing like a sailor at all. 

Too little, too late, Navy!  May I suggest a well-placed disclaimer on the sailor hats?

Every year when that postcard arrives, I spend a little time thinking about aptitude, and about how different my life would be if I had signed on that line.  Would I have enjoyed Nuclear Physics?  Mechanical Engineering?  My aptitude and ASVAB scores indicated that I would have. 

As long as I didn’t have to dress like a sailor, of course.

It is so far removed from what I chose to do with my life, that it’s almost impossible to imagine.

Categories
Blogging Business Life in general

Unity

I have a secret.

Come closer and I’ll whisper it, softly, in your ear.

You are amazing. 

Do you know that?  Do you believe it?  You should. 

I just spent 5 days immersed in your teeming masses and I can tell you, my community, my people, that you are nothing short of spectacular.

There are a lot of people out there who believe that because you don’t have a location with precisely mapped borders, you aren’t real, and so they discount you as not being valuable.

But you are.  You are to me.

Look at the way you bring people together. 

Do you realize that without you, some of us would be completely isolated?  We may as well live in Antarctica for all the comfort and support our geographically appointed communities offer.

You make a difference in so many people’s lives, all over the world.

Let me say it again, louder this time.

You are amazing.

Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

————-

A big huge thank you to the BlogHer team for putting on a fabulous conference in New York City this past weekend!  I am filled to the brim.

Categories
Life in general The Style Section

Loyaulte me lie

I’ve designed a handful of tattoos for myself over the years, only one of which I haven’t rejected at some point. 

‘Loyaulte me lie’ in script around my left wrist.

It’s the motto England’s King Richard III claimed to live by, and it means “Loyalty Binds Me”.  Whether he actually lived by that code is something historians have debated for years, but I’m not really that interested in Richard III.  Sorry, dead dude.

I promised myself that if a tattoo design stayed on my list for 5 years, I’d take the leap and get inked. 

It’s been four and a half years.  Loyaulte me lie.  To do it or not to do it?  Eeep.

Tell me:  What binds you?

OR, if you’d rather not go there,

Do you have a tattoo designed for yourself, or if you’re already inked, do you have a favorite?  Share.

Categories
Blogging Business Life in general

Welcome to Life on a Tightrope!

Here I am, in my new home!

Don’t mind the boxes, or the echo you hear as your feet hit the hardwood.

It’s an adjustment, moving. Declaring ‘I’m Home!’ as I walk into unfamiliar territory, all the while feeling inspired, excited, and anxious.

Home. It’s where your heart is, they say. Where you can feel comfortable, with your toilet paper roll hung exactly the way you want.

I hope that’s what Life on a Tightrope becomes for me. I love my old home at The Sweet Life, but I felt stifled there. Like I was a visitor, or better yet, a tenant who owed back rent and who had made more holes in the walls than was allowed.

I know my life is sweet. I know that. There it is on paper: life is good! Appreciate it! Count your blessings!

But I’m darker than that. I don’t wake with the dawn and sing songs along with the birds. And so, writing there made me feel somewhat fraudulent. Like I couldn’t freely say, ‘dammit, life is hard sometimes!’ because is that what you say when you’ve declared to the world that life is vanilla bean sweet?

For the past three years, I’ve tried to write what I think people would want to read at a place called The Sweet Life. I’ve been writing authentically, yes, but what I really want to do, is write what crosses my mind as I let the steaming hot water run rivulets down my spine in the shower. What dwells in the deepest part of my soul when I go through one of my rough patches.

My life is the tightrope – sometimes narrow, sometimes wide, always hanging over a deep chasm promising to swallow me whole if I fall. Here, I will talk about finding my balance.

The wonderfully talented Jenn created this beautiful space, just for me, and she captured me perfectly. Thank you, Jenn, a hundred thousand times, thank you, and it still wouldn’t be enough.

I can’t even put into words how amazing it feels to be here… to be home.

At last.