My Accidental Maxim

I was journaling the other day and meant to write “I am the happiest I’ve been in my life.” But I caught myself writing “I am the happiness.” As I hastened to cross it out, I stopped and realized, no, that’s actually what I mean, isn’t it?

It explains, at least a little bit, why haven’t been contributing to my blog since September. I’ve been so busy being “the happiness” that I didn’t have time to write.

Or perhaps this is the cause. At the beginning of the school year, my principal gave each member of her faculty The Journal of Awesome. It was created buy a guy named Neil Pasricha. A few years back and Neil, like many of us, had hit some bumps in the road of life. Broken marriage, death of a close friend, ensuing depression… you know the drill.

So Neil decided to crawl his way out of the dark hole of despair by writing one awesome thing every day.

(Go ahead. Twist your skeptical mouth or roll your eyes at the hokiness. I certainly did. Just another take on Norman Vincent Peale’s old “power of positive thinking.”)

It was working so well for Neil that he started a website called “1,000 Awesome Things." (Enter superior eye roll here.) His blog turned into the bestsellers The Book of Awesome and then later The Book of (Even More) Awesome, translated into dozens of languages around the world.

I know my dear principal, whom I genuinely like and respect, intended the journal to be a much needed morale-booster. So I sighed to myself and committed to my pretty turquoise colored awesome journal.

As I focused on finding my awesome each day, it got easier. It became this daily, if old school pen-and-paper way to reflect on my Sunny Side of Life. I’d been writing all year on the positive side of aging and being single, but now I was noticing the abundance of awesome things in this world, extraordinary in their simplicity.

My blog went by the wayside as the observations went into The Journal of Awesome. As 2013 winds down, I’d like to list, for the sake of closure, just a few of my awesomes captured over the last four months.

• The crossing guard saying, "Hey girl!" and flashing me the peace sign every time I ride my motorcycle to work
• The taste of a Peppermint Patty I didn't have to pay for
• When I come back from lunch and my students have hidden under my desk to jump out to surprise me
• The way the coffee smells at Drip on Mind Gravy poetry nights
• Being texted by a man I like "ur the one with bright eyes"
• The way frost sparkles on the brown grass when the sun hits it on a 24-degree morning
• Waking up on Saturday thinking it's Sunday but it's really truly Saturday!
• Patient acceptance of things being the way they are
• When a 3rd grader, on a particularly humid morning, says to me, "Miz McQueen, why you hair look like a hot mess?"

And last, but certainly not least, my accidental maxim. I am the happiness.

Deal With It

Why do people in their twenties seem to think that people in their thirties are just a spoonful of Metamucil away from ordering off the senior menu at Denny’s? They talk about their impending “Big 3 – 0” like it’s a long-range missile trained on their personal GPS coordinates. When that weapon strikes, the 29-year-old will apparently have the instant and overwhelming compulsion to buy a packet of Tums, a pair of powder blue polyester stretch pants and some $4.99 reading glasses at the Walmart. Oh, no, my first gray hair! Life might as well be over!

Young People – and by that I mean – well – you know who you are – I’m here to offer my services. In my educational DVD entitled “Suck it up and deal – how to start a new decade without the whining” you can glimpse what could be in store for you upon finally reaching your- gasp! – next birthday with a zero at the end of it! In this sixty-minute program, I’ll reveal some basic techniques which hinge upon the principles that (1) life is precious and worth living to its fullest and (2) to go on living means ya gotta age.

You need to bite the gray-headed bullet and bite down hard. Once I teach you how, you can ingest all of that power you’ve been giving to the idea of aging badly and turn it into something I like to call self-esteem. Not that know-it-all, blustery bravado you’ve pretended was self-esteem, either, but the bonafide, genuine, real deal.

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will show you how.

But that’s not all!  Included in this low-priced offer is a special kit that will reveal to you with near x-ray vision all those social leeches who suck the very oxygen out of a room. It’s backed up by a support system that’ll daily reassure you – sometimes, it’s okay to judge a book by its cover. Why waste what precious little time you got left on emotional parasites?

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Born to Die

The guy at the shop –

The one who looks like

An extra from Sons of Anarchy –

All long hair and ratty beard –

Enlarged ear lobes

And perplexing tattoos –

The only legible one reading

“Born to Die” on his forearm –

Asks as he rings up my helmet

So – do you – uh – ride – or drive?

I think it’s a trick question –

I’d been led to believe

By people who look like him

Only a kook says he drives a motorcycle –

And in the long moment

I pause to consider how to respond

He clarifies sheepishly –

Well – I mean –

Are you like – the passenger?

Me?

I straddle my Vulcan

Like rich white ladies ride horses –

Swap their smells of hay

Wool saddle blankets and mink oil

For leather and gasoline –

For the smoke which oozes

from an Impala in the next lane –

A gold-ringed hand dangling

Out the open window –

Camel Light loosely gripped

between an index and middle finger –

I take all of that in

In the steamy hot

Cicada singing south

Before I head out of my city –

Urban smells giving way

To the land of Oz

Where Poppy chomps at the bit

Like Secretariat at Churchill Downs

I call her Poppy

Because she’s the color

Of the California state flower

Where I’m from

And because

We hit 80 together

And it’s better than opium –

Poppy’s my opiate of choice –

All five senses engaged

At warp speed on a 2-lane –

We’re intimate with

A canopy of Virginia oaks –

Green tangled kudzu –

Breathing the unnamed scents

Along with the wisteria and lavender –

The wet earthy river stones –

Hear the rumble beneath –

Feel the roar of the odd semi –

The way its aftermath

of heat and speed buffets around –

Sucks us in and rattles our bones

 

This is what life tastes like

But I don’t say that to the guy

Who was born to die –

I tell him – I ride –

But I’m no passenger –

Evolutionary Telephonics

The best telephone I ever had was the Snoopy phone my parents gave me for Christmas when I was a kid. I long had a thing for Snoopy, Charlie Brown's imaginative, intelligent pet. I collected Snoopy stuffed animals. I had a Snoopy lunchbox. I owned Snoopy folders and posters and stickers and stationery and the only thing missing until that blissful, perfect Christmas was a Snoopy telephone.

I recently tried to count how many telephones I've had since, but it was impossible. I moved around a lot. I lived in something like 33 different places by the time I turned 33, got married, and moved onto a sailboat. Most of those temporary residences came with Princess phones belonging to roommates who'd arrived before me (and stayed on after I left). A mobile phone didn't enter my atmosphere until 2005. I'd barely switched from a wall phone with a tangled cord to the wireless remote contraption that gave one the surprising freedom of walking around the house - even sometimes as far as the porch! (Those years on the sailboat, during which our only oral communication was through a Ham radio or VHF, delayed my telephonic evolution considerably.)

In fact, I still owned - and more astonishingly, was still using - the Snoopy telephone in 1999. It may be hard to picture a 30-something woman talking on a toy, but there you have it. I only sold it at a garage sale because I was moving onto the marital boat. I almost burst into tears when I took the limp five dollar bill from the early bird shopper who scooped Snoop away from me. I still sometimes wonder why I didn't put that old relic in a box to store in my parents' attic, to cling to that piece of my childhood with the same ardor I now associate only with hoarders. But where would I put it today? And furthermore - where is the telephone jack in my house?

Much like the rest of the world, I now have a cellular phone that slips into a pants pocket or purse or slides carelessly down the crack between the car seat and console. It's my fourth since 2005 and my "everything" phone. It's embarrassing to pull out. It seemed so hip and modern when I got it, but it's already obsolete. It's not Smart. It's not 3G. Its camera is pitiful, there's no swipey feature, you can't talk to it and create a text. I try never to pull it out in the company of iPhone users. I doubt I'd be openly ridiculed, but I fear they'd think less of me.

I wonder what Snoopy would think of all this. His cartoon represented something to me, sitting on top of his little red dog house banging away on a manual typewriter. "It was a dark and stormy night..." He was an author whose walls were lined with rejection letters, like me. Snoopy lived in a dream world of his own invention, the same way I do whenever I can get away with it. He didn't even know he was a dog. He was Joe Cool in sunglasses and the Flying Ace in goggles; he was a shortstop, an attorney, a grocer, an Olympic figure skater... the sky was the limit for that little dog.

Sigh. I miss my Snoopy phone. But I'm becoming someone who only looks forward, not back. Eventually, I'll get a Smartphone. Perhaps, in quiet tribute, I'll find a cover for it that bears Snoopy's image, for old time's sake.

Three Wishes

Mt. Helgafell

In western Iceland, near the village of Stykkisholmur, there's a small mountain called Helgafell. Icelanders of the Viking Age worshipped at its altar, believing the god Thor resided inside.

Helgafell features prominently in an Icelandic saga - one of the many historic tales that vividly describe the challenges early settlers faced. This one is the only saga believed to have been written by a woman. It's the kind of murder and vengeance story Shakespeare would have written - had he been Icelandic and lived in the 11th century.

A woman named Gudrun Osvifrsdottir is declared the most beautiful in all of Iceland. She keeps getting married, and the marriages keep ending badly. When Gudrun's on her third husband, Bolli, she persuades him to kill Kjartan, the guy she really wanted. Then she gets Bolli killed by Kjartan's vengeful brothers.  Finally, she marries Porkell, and he drowns.

Somewhere in there, Icelanders convert to Christianity, and the Viking altar turns into a church. Gudrun converts, too, and immediately acquires enough guilt to admit, "To him I was worst whom I loved most." Then she becomes the first nun in Iceland, a recluse when she dies. This, despite all previous mayhem, makes Gudrun a heroine, and they bury her at the foot of Helgafell.

That's 1008 - as in, the year 1008.

Like almost anywhere you go in Iceland, Helgafell is a mystical, magical place. Here, you have the opportunity to stand at Gudrun Osvifrsdottir's grave with a pure heart.  Then you climb Helgafell (which is easy - it's only 73 meters high), but you can't talk, look back, or even turn your gaze side to side. (Think: Orpheus getting the hell out of Hades.) At the top, stand inside the ruins of the Viking altar/Christian church, face east, and make three wishes. After that, talk as much as you want, dance around, turn cartwheels, whatever strikes your fancy. Just don't tell anyone what you wished.

If I'd known Gudrun made what amounted to a deathbed conversion, that that was what made her a heroine, I doubt I would have bothered with the ritual. As it was, blissfully ignorant on my last day in Iceland with my friend Wendy, I urged her to participate with me on our way to the airport. And I thought hard about my wishes as we looked for the grave. I knew exactly what I would've wished when I was 27: May I be a wildly successful author with a bestseller. May I live in Santa Barbara with an ocean view. May I marry Tom Cruise before he converts to Scientology.

Wendy made her wishes outside the altar -
will they still come true?

As I began to climb, I laughed at the younger me, her grandiose and selfish desires. What would I wish for today? I couldn't think of anything I particularly wanted, other than to actually hike for ten minutes without speaking or looking back. I'm infamously voluble and I dwell in the past, so arriving at the ruins both silent and looking forward felt like aspirations already achieved.

Of course, I can't talk about what I actually wished, but I can give three hints. I don't want for anything at this point in my life. I like where I live. And L. Ron Hubbard can have Tom Cruise.

Road Trip Back

Should you ever desire to feel like a kid again, you don't need to have a midlife crisis and bungie jump or skydive or climb all the 14,000 foot mountains in Colorado. You just need to take an 1,800 mile road trip with your parents.

I was 4 days into my 6-day journey across the nation with Mom and Dad before it occurred to me that I wasn't cursing. If you know me, you know I have a potty mouth. I swear like a sailor. I have tried many strategies to break this filthy habit - or at least, cut back to half a pack a day - to no avail. The best I could do was not swear in front of my students, their parents, or the principal at my school.  It's disturbing how significant an accomplishment this is.

My parents are not prudes. They cuss sometimes, they do. I just don't think I've heard either one of them say sh%# or f*+k or a#%*=le. My top three, if the truth be told.

One thousand miles and I hadn't said the f-word in four days. Even when I was behind the wheel. Not only that, my speech was peppered with words like dangit and shoot. I was no longer a crusty old foul-mouthed codger! I was sweet and prim and - dare I say - girlish in my manner!

This is how she looks at me.

Then my mom insisted on paying for everything. It didn't matter that, of the three of us, I'm the only one gainfully employed. "I don't want you to spend your hard-earned money," my sweet mother said every time I whipped out my credit card. I'm pretty sure her money was hard-earned, too. Still. I'll never not be her little girl.

Finally, there's this: I'm pretty sure it's not just my folks who believe, no matter how many years their child has been driving, said child just left the DMV with her learner's permit.  Mine appear to have forgotten that I lived in San Francisco for seven years, where I became an expert parallel parker. Passengers actually admire my work, like an art form.

Never have I felt more vigorously youthful than on Beale Street in Memphis, where I spotted a slightly cozy space in which to squeeze my parents' new Kia Sorento. They both advised me -

I'm the 47-year-old teenager on the right.

simultaneously - how to get into the spot. Since I was unresponsive to their harmonizing (because it took all the will power I had to refrain from cursing), my dad got out of the car to direct me with complicated hand signals.

Thirty-two years shaved off, just that easily. I felt 15 again. Right back where the troublesome fledgling adulthood began. Hmmmm... Does anyone know where I can buy a pack of clove cigarettes and get my hair dyed pink and green? Because I am ready to bust out the curse words and

PAR-Tay!

The Hate and the Love of Swimming

The summer between my junior and senior years of high school, I joined a neighborhood league swim team with my friend Laurie. The coach was evil. We had to compete in all the events, regardless of our, say, slow, incompetent, ziggy zaggy backstroke. I hated our coach as much as I hated my Algebra II teacher. Why couldn't I just specialize in the Australian crawl, an elegant, four-stroke-breathe, four-stroke-breathe I'd learned from my Mamaw?

Swimming in a sea of rock and roll.

I remember three things about being on this team. I remember the chlorine-stinky-green tint to my then very blonde hair. I remember being the dork who lost my team's impressive lead in a relay when I swam my clumsy, awkward butterfly. And I remember failing to show up for the NBA Playoffs of Summer Swim League because Laurie and I had tickets to a Day on the Green music festival. Journey! Eddie Money! Bryan Adams! NIGHT RANGER! A teenage girl has priorities, you see.

I loved Steve Perry. I mean LOVED.

After that, I avoided swimming pools for 30 years, making my forays into water the lake, river, and ocean variety. I developed a preference for boats and skis and boards, fins and tanks and snorkels, over actually swimming.

And then, last fall, in chronic pain from my neck to my feet, I visited an arthritis specialist for a thorough exam. Diagnosis: osteoarthritis and fibromyalgia. Reduce the high impact exercises I was doing five times a week down to once. Medication was offered. Me: "I don't want to go that route." Doctor: "I respect that. You'll find relief from regular massages, eating lots of leafy green vegetables, and soaking in Epsom salts. For exercise, try some gentle yoga. Oh. You've got to keep up your cardio. How about swimming?"

Swimming? Are you kidding me? Sure, I'll do yoga and stretch out on a massage table listening to new age ocean sounds. I'll sit in the bathtub sipping a kale smoothie. But I'll call myself an arthritic, fibromyalgic wussy girl and quit cardio altogether before I'll get in a chlorine-stinking swimming pool again.

When a smart friend suggested that I quit identifying myself as my syndromes, and I remembered that I'm an insane lunatic stressed out freakazoid if I don't get regular cardio, I joined a gym and reluctantly took up swimming. At first, I could manage six heart-thumping lengths, gasping for breath at the end of each one like I'd just run up the side of Kilimanjaro. Wait - haven't I been doing aerobic exercise vigilantly for the last five years? It sure didn't feel like it.

Sanctuary.

Now I swim 24 to 30 (and even, one time, 50) lengths with gusto. My hair, the white blonde having evolved into that odd array of 17 shades, hides the green. I enjoy the chlorine smell left on my skin for hours afterwards - it reminds me of how I feel when I'm swimming. Graceful. Elegant. Swimming is a meditation. There's the counting and the quiet, no sound except the drumbeat rhythm of my kicking feet, the bubbling of my exhalations, the welcome intake of breath.

I am not arthritic and fibromyalgic. I am a swimmer. I am an athlete. I am glad Coach made us learn all the strokes 30 years ago. While there will never be a butterfly in my routine, I do swim all the others. I can even backstroke in a straight line by staying present, in tune with my surroundings.

Don't Stop It

I’ve wondered for a long time why I feel so genetically programmed to persist in taking on physical challenges with each passing decade.

My original personal trainer.

My father is entirely to blame.

He took my training wheels off before I was ready. I failed swim class and was made to re-take lessons until I passed. Then learn to water-ski - slalom - by age 9. In the garage, with a punching bag, he taught me how to box. Not to be a fighter, but to “hit once, make it count, and run like hell.”

As a teen, I had to ride my ten-speed to the tops of mountains with him. (His mantra: “Don’t stop till you get to the top.”) He took me down double diamond runs at Squaw Valley and Heavenly, my skis attacking moguls in awkward, ungraceful bounces marked by tears and gnashing of teeth.

Game for a single ski. Not really.

You’d think, wouldn’t you, that once I graduated high school I’d rebel like a normal person? Oppose my father’s oppressive ways – lead a sedentary life, become a pear-shaped computer programmer or the slacker star of a Richard Linklater film? 

But no: the avid, near rabid quest to mountain bike, snowboard, surf, and sail offshore marked my 20s and 30s like permanent tattoos. When the going got tough, I'd catch myself inadvertently singing, Don't stop till you get to the top to the beat of Michael Jackson's Don't Stop Till You Get Enough.

My early 40s involved an uphill battle to complete a marathon. As I neared the finish line, a 75-year-old man sprinted past me. Then a woman with prosthetic legs flew by. I won’t tell you my finish time, but the volunteers were disassembling barriers as I hobbled along muttering my father's hymn.

(Side note about the 40s: You finally have the stamina and attention span to do tackle endurance activities while your body screams, "Why didn't you do this when you were 20?")

My late 40s are lately consumed with motorcycling, which I never thought could ever be as difficult as single track mountain biking. Now I know. I have a lot to learn. And it's harder than I thought it would be. On the other hand, it's just another mountain to climb. Dad's voice is in there saying, Don’t stop till you get to the top. The man is 80, still lifting weights and running - half of his three-mile route uphill. Don’t stop till you get to the top. 

I can’t actually see this mythical land of finales he's been referring to my whole life. All I know is that stopping before I get there won't ever be an option.

Take It Off, Take It All Off

Belly fat? What's that?

Here's something I haven't done in more than 40 years: stripped off my clothes and run through the sprinkler in my backyard.

And why not? When I was about 3, I loved to go out in my one-piece bathing suit, where I'd turn on a hose to fill a bucket, get a drop or two of water on my suit, and then strip it off like it was on fire. I can't remember much about my third year of life, but I do recall how great it felt to pull that swimsuit off and scamper freely, all alone.

The other day it was 90 degrees and as I rode my motorcycle home from work, I got stuck for an agonizing three minutes at a stoplight. (A couple of weeks ago, foregoing the leather, I  purchased a textile jacket I believed to be perfect for summer riding. It might be - for summer riding in northern Alaska.)

At home I ripped the jacket off in the driveway, removing my helmet as I stomped into the house, gasping. I let the dog out and hopped after him, one-legged, as I tugged off first one boot, then the other. Removing my socks only made the rest of me jealous of my feet. So blue jeans, t-shirt, even bra soaked from that stint at the stoplight all fell to the grass like leaves from a tree in the breeze.

Yet something was missing... Ah, yes. The water feature. So I stretched out the hose, attached the sprinkler, aimed it at the neediest of plants, and then pranced, nymphlike, through the spray.

Returning to my roots?

It occurred to me later that it takes a certain amount of comfort with one's body to be naked outside. Most of us lose that around age 3 or 4.  I've been to a couple of nude beaches and clothing optional hot springs where I marveled at the exceptions to this rule. The people with the least perfect bodies appeared to be the most comfortable. How did they gain this acceptance of themselves when the bulk of us feels awkward wrapped in a towel in the locker room at Gold's Gym?

Even living alone, I haven't spent much time unclothed. If I did, it was after a shower, standing in the mirror looking for flaws. But on this day in my backyard I felt extraordinary. Maybe it's because I've traded in the filthy obsession with the outer me to concentrate on healthy eating, cardiovascular health, and balance. Since I've quit worrying about how my body looks, it's like it has a mind of its own, and it doesn't need anyone else around to make it feel good about itself.

Robert Frost once wrote, "Good fences make good neighbors." Since the house next door has been vacant a year, and the only way to see into my backyard is through its second story window, I hereby paraphrase the poet laureate to claim: "No neighbors and a good fence make awesome nakedness."

Sell It

My neighborhood held a community yard sale last weekend. This involved a sign in front of the Villages at Lakeshore entrance, a lot of confusing emails to and from homeowners, and piles of junk in people's driveways. Twenty years ago, I thought of yard sales as inevitably frustrating opportunities to make as much money as possible on a Saturday morning. Now I view them as a chance to psychoanalyze my fellow humans while getting rid of shit I no longer want. My method was "Make me an offer - everything must go." If I hadn't used it in a year (or four), it was out on the driveway.

Who wouldn't get out of the car for this?

I applied my merchandising background from high school department store jobs to organize neatly with curb appeal. Shoppers here prefer to drive by and roll down their windows, gaze at wares from the climate controlled comfort of Trailblazers and sedans. Yet I didn't get nearly as many shoppers as my neighbors two doors down, whose stuff was in messy stacks and piles in huge plastic Rubbermaid bins. Maybe the mystery of those untidy tubs of junk is what lured customers out of their vehicles. They couldn't resist a peek into the unknown, whereas my naked display gave away too much at first glance.

The few shoppers who braved my yard were uncomfortable if I didn't name a price. When I said, "Make me an offer" they averted their eyes, shrugging awkwardly. If I caved in and stated a ridiculously low number, they of course offered half, to which I responded, "Great! I'll take it."

In this unorthodox way, I made 30 bucks in less than two hours and got rid of half of my junk. The rest was headed for Goodwill, as soon as humanly possible.  

Just as I started packing up, the passenger of a maroon minivan rolled down her window halfway to ask "How much for the picture?" She referred to a huge, ugly print I'd picked up off the street - free - about two years before, thinking I might someday use the heavy black frame for something. I said, "Name a price." She looked distressed, then faintly disinterested, and shook her head. I feared she'd wave the driver on. "I'll give it to you free," I said, my voice a tad overeager. Could she see the thought bubble over my head? Please! I beg you! Take this hideous behemoth off my hands!

Then she smiled. "I can't do that. But I'll give you $2.00 for it." 

Sold.

Curves

The elegant tree.

Motorcycling is like yoga for speed freaks – a lot about balance. Learners topple the way we do in tree pose in beginner sessions. My first bike weighed 311 pounds, had an engine that sounded like a lawnmower, shuddered at 55 miles per hour, and gave even non-bikers the opportunity to smirk over her paltry 250 CCs. But at least she could be picked up when I dropped her - which I did, frequently, just like I drop myself in raven pose on my yoga mat. 

When I do this, I land on my head.

When the insurance check arrived after Rebel's destruction, I decided that my six weeks of experience and a mild concussion rendered me ready for a 471-pound, 500 CC Kawasaki Vulcan. At stoplights, this baby chomps at the bit like Secretariat at Churchill Downs. We take off like jockey and race horse, and we feel real cool doing it.

But there’s this concept called a learning curve. I'm not even talking about trying to figure out where to lock my helmet or why there's no gas gauge - let alone, reverse gear. The night I bought her, I tried to back the Vulcan across the grass into my backyard. 160 pounds makes a big difference. This stubborn new mule wouldn't budge, and neither would I. I gnashed my teeth and yanked those handlebars, grunting like an Olympic weightlifter until my arms gave out and I dropped the thing. Attempting to lift it was like dragging a 500-pound man out of quicksand. I couldn't do it without help. I felt foolish and stupid. I can't lift my own bike? Just give up, McQueen. It's over. 

Not fully recovered from that humiliation, I rode to work the next day. The bike sputtered and died at every stop. I thought amateur things like, “Pull out the choke, rev harder, is the battery failing, did I buy a lemon?” Ultimately, it quit with the permanence of an obstinate child, so I got off and pushed - discovering that I am strong enough to propel the beast forward over pavement. At least there's that.

Determined to stay upright.

Just as a cute cop pulled over to help, I remembered something important. I bent over the seat, flipped the fuel valve to the reserve tank, and the bike started on the first try. I shrugged goofily at the officer and sped away, thinking What kind of damn fool novice nearly runs out of gas?

The thing about learning new things is that curve. And the thing about learning curves is they get a whole lot steeper the more years that pass. Negative thoughts much more easily creep in, like I don't need to do this. Why even try when it's so hard?

I don't have the answer yet. All I know is that as the curves get tighter and steeper, I am ever more determined to get around and over them - upright and forward, with plenty of momentum.

Crash it!

Now that I finally worked up the nerve to tell my parents, I can reveal all in the blogosphere. (News flash: even middle-aged people fear telling their parents some stuff.)

There I was on my birthday, cruising along in the cool spring air, smiling and watching traffic in the defensive way I'd been trained. I entered the roundabout with its big, fancy fountain; I saw the SUV, which appeared to be yielding the right of way; I headed on toward my exit.

What I remember of the next few seconds is thinking "No no no!" and "Stop stop stop!" as the sparkle of her giant side view mirror rapidly approached my head. There was an awful grinding sound. I was flat on the pavement, and my sweet Honda Rebel was skidding away from me. Then I closed my eyes.

When I opened them again, a big-eyed band of concerned looking white people surrounded me. "Don't move!" yelled a man who resembled Tom Selleck. "Don't move!"

I sat up and shook my head, then shouted back, "Let's get out of the street. People need to get to work." I inched my way to the curb, sat on the perfectly manicured lawn by the fountain, and took off my helmet. I blinked a few times and thought, Okay, no big deal. Park my bike somewhere, and I can walk to work from here.

"Do you know what day it is?" said Magnum P.I., still feeling the need to shout. I thought for a second. "Yeah," I yelled. "It's my birthday!"

"Call 911!" he bellowed. "Call an ambulance!"

"Don't call a fucking ambulance! It's my birthday, for real - great birthday, huh?"

Two sweet women crouched beside me. They spoke in the soft tones of professional soothers. One turned out to be my would-be executioner. "I'm so sorry, I didn't see you, you were in my blind spot, are you okay, I'm so, so sorry..."

"It's okay," I said. It's like that for me - always important to assuage the guilt of the hurter. "Don't feel bad."

The other woman conferred with Magnum. "I'm a nurse at Richland Memorial. I'll drive her to the ER."

From there, things got hazy. There were police cars. Strangers pushed my bike out of the roundabout. A wave of panic... "Who hit me?" I said. "Who hit me?" Insurance information was exchanged, but I didn't seem to have any of it. My heart thumped in my chest. Things were happening fast, outside of my locus of control. I'm forgetting something. What am I forgetting?

"Is there anyone we can call?" Magnum P.I. again, up in my face. "A family member?" There I was stumped. Family. Hmmm. 1,800 miles away. No husband. I'm single. Ah. Work. Call work! "I need to call work."

I panicked again when I couldn't remember the number. Something's really wrong with my head! I pulled out my cellphone and started dialing at random, one dead end after another. Finally it occurred to me that not just the brain-injured can't remember phone numbers.We don't store them in our brains anymore, thanks to the nifty little cellular address books in our tiny mobile phones.

In the nurse's van, stuck in dense Commuterville on our way to a hospital I couldn't remember the name of, I called the closest thing to family I've got: my ex-fiance. "Hey," I tried to sound casual. "I was hit by an SUV and I'm going to the ER. Do you think you could meet me there?"

A short pause and then: "Debra, you called me five minutes ago. I'm already on my way."

So this is what a concussion is like!

All that's left of my sweet Honda Rebel.

A pop song ended on the car radio, followed by one of those annoying updates I always tune out. Chitter chatter, blah blah blah, crash on I-77, southbound lane of I-20, but then this: "Traffic delayed in Lake Carolina due to a collision involving a motorcycle..."

"Hey! That's me!" I was elated. "They're talking about me!"

The bike was totaled, but I was released from the ER in under an hour with nothing more than an Advil and a wheelchair ride for legal purposes. The refrain of the day? "It's a good thing you were wearing your helmet." Yeah, yeah, yeah. Why is it that people who don't ride love to say that so much?

Now the search for the next motorcycle begins. Let it be bigger, with a more powerful engine. Everyone says you dodge SUVs faster that way.

Flying Solo

Call it what you will: partner, fiancé, boyfriend, husband, long-term, monogamous, committed situation...

I have been without one of those for more than six months now. This is an all-time record for me. I turned 47 two weeks ago and I haven't been without one of those for more than a month in the past 25 years.

I've adjusted - pretty well, some might say - finding my way back into the family of creatives, reading "fresh ink" (what we call the stuff we've just written) at open mics, keeping up with my blog, my letter-writing, my exercise routine. I bought a freakin' motorcycle. I ride it as often as I can and feel the wind in my face and experience this great and joyful sense of loving my life. (I'm fairly certain, for a reason that eludes me, I never would have bought a motorcycle had I been in one of those.)

A friend said recently, "We need to fix you up with someone. You need to go on a date." I shuddered visibly - maybe even audibly. A date? Sitting across the table from a stranger asking inane questions like, "Where do you work?" and "What are your hobbies?"

It is as inconceivable as finding myself on a rocket bound for the moon.

Some friends have had luck in the online dating world. See above reference to rocket bound for moon.


As I get on with my life I sometimes wonder, will it always be like this? I have so little experience not being in a relationship that it actually feels like - how do I explain? - like my only way to ensure being in a relationship was to run them back to back for a quarter century.  Not doing that makes me believe - quite deeply - that I'll never find my way into another one. I just don't know how.

This might actually be okay. I've had more than my fair share, and I may have even proven I'm not exactly cut out for it. Would it be so bad to carry on, riding my motorcycle to poetry gigs, meeting my friends for book talks and meals in swanky restaurants, and devoting myself to the unconditional love of a little dog named Bill, whose only daily expectations of me are two scoops of Purina One Smartblend Lamb and Rice Formula, throwing the tennis ball in the backyard approximately 20 times, and cuddling up at bedtime for 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep?

If you ask Bill, he'll tell you: I'm great at this.

You're Soaking In It

Now where do I get that hair-do?

When I turned 40 - an astonishingly brief seven years ago - I took the day off and spent it with my friend Winnie. Win was a woman who knew how to take care of herself, and was ready to show me the way. "First, we're going to get mani-pedis. Then we're going to have Thai food for lunch. And then you're going to buy a bra at Victoria's Secret."

I scoffed at everything but lunch. I do love me some Pad Thai.

But ... mani-pedis? I hadn't let anyone clip my toenails since I was a baby. And scrub my feet?  Soak my hands in ... mystery liquid? Remember the ads with Madge the aesthetician (I'm sure she didn't have such a fancy title back then) plunking her clients' digits into Palmolive dishwashing liquid?

Don't even get me started on Victoria's Secret. Me, pay $42 for a bra? I had long believed I wasn't sufficiently endowed to warrant such an expense, and thus resigned myself to uncomfortable and ill-fitting over-the-shoulder-pebble-holders for $12.50 on sale at Ross Dress for Less.

"Debra," Win said authoritatively, "You're 40 years old. It's time."

So we got all dressed up and went for our mani-pedis.  Since I abuse my hands with an abundance of clicking and finger-picking and dishwashing in non-Palmolive liquid, the mani was sort of an indulgent waste.

The pedi, however... well, what's not to love about immersing your tired toes in a hot bath, getting your calves massaged, having some pepperminty exfoliating mixture rubbed all over them and then never having to bend over to awkwardly trim your own toenails ever again as long as you live? 

Oh. Yes. I am forever and always all-in for the pedi.

And definitely go for stripes and leopard prints!

Lastly, the $42 bra from Victoria's Secret forever holds a special place in my heart (located conveniently close to my bosom). It only took one, but I've never gone back. It's not all sexy pushups and lace. There's wireless relief to be found there, too. After 27 years of bra-agony, to suddenly discover there exists a contraption that actually fits and is so comfortable you forget it's even there? And comes in a wide array of fun colors and patterns?

For my 47th, I splurged on four all at once. It helped that they were on sale, but really, I would've done it at full price. It's my birthday, and Win taught me it's okay to go big on your birthday (even if "going big" is a 34A).

Tomorrow I'll be soaking my feet in a hot whirling bath having someone else make my toes look pretty. And may I recommend this to all the ladies in the house? If you walk upright, you deserve a pedicure. And if you wear a brassiere most days of the year, you damn sure deserve to have it feel FANTASTIC! So go out there and treat yourself to (at least) one, wherever it may be and at whatever cost. You are worth it. We are all, every one of us, worth, at the very least, a decent, if outlandishly expensive, bra!

And some pampered feet.

Bring it On

I always thought these were for old people at the beach.

My birthday is tomorrow, and I just got a really original gift. The news that I am officially in menopause!

The change of life! The Big M! Or if you really want to be euphemistic, simply ... The change... My cute little 67-year-old doctor tapped me on the knee and said, "Now, you can call yourself a grown-up!" Everyone knows I love new experiences, so really, this is cool with me. Actually, it's hot with me, but you get the idea.

Instead of throwing myself a birthday party, I've decided to throw myself a menopause party. No one is invited, of course - who'd want to be subjected to the unpredictable mood swings? But I do have a wish list of birthday presents, and until I find a shop called "Menopause 'R' Us" at which to register, this will have to suffice:

* A deluxe hand held personal battery operated misting fan ($16.95 on Amazon.com)
* Bedsheets made out of that same kind of high-tech moisture-wicking material that mountaineers use (try Patagonia or the North Face)
* Pajamas made of same
* Oh, heck, just a spare, dry bed to move into in the middle of one of those sweat-soaked nights

That's what I'm talking about!

* Plenty (I mean PLENTY) of Xanax
* A five-year supply of Replens
* If Natural News is to be believed, then I'll need a supply of Black Cohosh, Wild Yam, and Ginseng. And flax seeds. All organic, if possible.
* Last but not least, in the increasingly unlikely event I ever have sex again, an extra large bottle of Astroglide. (Oh wait. I already have that. I'm such an optimist!)

I have wondered about this for several years now. It's nice that the limbo is over. The Big M is on. Just another in a long line of life adventures, as far as I'm concerned.

Turn It Around

See me? I'm the soaking wet one.

I was all set for motorcycle safety class at the technical college in Columbia. I'd been told to expect a roomful of young guys and an instructor in leather chaps who sauntered around asking each person why he was taking the class. Almost all of them would answer "To meet girls."

I was so excited by this prospect. I was going to position myself in such a way as to be the last one asked, so that I could shock them all by answering, "To meet girls." Oh! I was going to be so funny, the class clown!

Imagine then, my disappointment when, not only was the instructor not wearing leather chaps, but out of eleven students, nine of us were women. Actually, I wasn't disappointed at all. Female Power! When it was my turn to answer why I was taking the class, I said, "I'm tired of riding bitch." Which was, in fact, the truth.

We spent precious few hours in the dry warmth of the classroom. We bitchen biker babes (and two unremarkable guys) spent twelve hours in the pouring rain "on the range." The high both Saturday and Sunday was 44 degrees. I'm not whining. Okay. I'm whining. Where was that hot March weather that caused my impulse purchase of a motorcycle last weekend? The only thing that kept it from being utter misery was this thought: I'm learning to ride a motorcycle!

Notice Grumpy's big black and yellow umbrella. Grrr.

There were two teachers. One (let's call him Friendly) was nice when we screwed things up, couldn't navigate the tightly-spaced cones, dropped bikes. Friendly would gently correct and then, when we got it right, he'd smile broadly and clap and say, "Yeah! There you go! Good job!" The other one, Grumpy, yelled a lot, and groaned, and yelled some more. "No, no, NO!" He'd scream. On the off chance we did something right, the best we could hope for was a grunt.

When it came time for the road test, I am sure I'm not alone when I say how much I dreaded putting my cold, wet crotch back on that cold, wet seat for another round of Grumpy's yelling. Two of us were hypothermic to the point of teeth chattering. We sat on our wet bikes in our wet clothes waiting our turns to complete seven impossible exercises, like make two consecutive U-turns in a blue box the size of my living room without going outside the lines. Then get the bike up to 18 miles per hour and come to a sudden stop in an orange box the size of a laptop. The colors were impossible to distinguish on the wet pavement in the gray light of the late, rainy afternoon.

We did it!

Discouraged and discontent, hungry, and shivering, I was sure I was failing.  I completed only one U-turn and it was well outside the lines. When I stalled in the little orange box, Grumpy said "Arrgh." His pen seemed to move independently as it checked boxes on his clipboard in a very negative way.

In the end, we sat in the classroom watching an extremely boring video on DOT Snell motorcycle helmets while casting surreptitious glances as Grumpy scored our tests. That might have actually been worse than riding in the rain. But when he did the first nice thing he'd done all weekend and handed out bright orange envelopes to every last one of us, we celebrated with stale Krispy Kremes and took turns drying our crotches with the Xlerator hand dryer in the women's bathroom.

We were ready to ride.

Bought It

One thing is certain - I am methodical. I make lists. I plan ahead. I avoid crowds and stick to a budget and am responsible with money. I grocery shop on Sunday mornings when everyone is at church.

I am also impulsive, bipolar, given to flights of ideas, and I-Swear-To-God-Unwanted Drama. These things define me as much as methodical does. Some might say I'm balanced. Others would stick the prefix un before it.

One warm - which is to say HOT - March Saturday, I went motorcycle shopping with a friend. I wasn't yet ready to buy a bike - I'd carefully planned to complete my rider's safety course first. This would be window shopping, and I thought my friend was a safe bet. He's the one with the 900 pound VMax who, a mere two weeks earlier, was in a near fatal accident on his bike. Confined to bedrest with most of his ribs broken and his clavicle mashed, he repeatedly said that me getting a bike was an extremely bad idea.

Bedrest bores a person, I guess. He became my secretary from his sedentary position. He made all the Craigslist contacts, set up the appointments, and picked me up at 9:00 am on the appointed Saturday. Then he chauffered me from one location to another. Somehow, despite being cautious, especially when something costs more than $50, I managed to write a check for 38 times that amount and bought myself a bike.

Then my broken-ribbed friend with the mangled clavicle rode my new bike on the Interstate back to my house - in a short-sleeved shirt and no helmet.


AND I THOUGHT HE WAS THE REASONABLE ONE!

Back at my house, he put 'er in neutral in the driveway and told me to ride across the threshold into my backyard. Excitedly, I took the helm and half rode half walked my little Rebel into the garden. A couple of days later, I got a wild hair and decided to ride her around the garden. This proved difficult in weeds and grass and mud from a recent rain. Also, not knowing how to ride a motorcycle added to the drama. I almost crashed into the fence, then kept stalling as I tried to back the bike up. Where is reverse on this thing? Oh. Right. Better leave her parked till that class next weekend.

Act On It

I was really peeved last fall when my ex-boyfriend went out and bought a motorcycle about five minutes after I said I was thinking about getting one. After all, I'm the one who watches "Sons of Anarchy" with near religious zeal. I'm the one whose 80-year-old dad just bought his second Harley. I'm the one with disposable income, a free spirit, a love of the open road, and a rebellious streak about ten kilometers wide. I've been saying I'm going to get a motorcycle some day for the past twenty years. How dare he beat me to it?

After fuming about it for an unbecoming amount of time, I came to my senses. (A) This is neither a reality TV show nor a competitive sport - though wouldn't it be funny if it was? The crazy middle-aged person who can demonstrate the depth and breadth of a midlife crisis the fastest wins an all expenses paid first class trip in a Humvee limo to the Emergency Room - deluxe private suite included! And (B) I've been all talk and no action for more than two decades. I was jealous of his spontaneity, his confident follow-through - and right at the onset of winter, no less.

This is what my drop looked like - inside my head.

It was pretty friendly of him to let me take his bike for a spin on the Richland Mall's rooftop parking lot four months later. It'd been more than a decade since my dad gave me that crash course on his first hallowed Harley, so I was a tad unsteady and nervous. Nevertheless, I tooled around on my ex-turned-boy-pal's Vulcan and got it up to a whopping 15 miles an hour. Then I braked to a stop and dropped it. He was a really good sport about the dented mirror and the fuel leaking everywhere. As he pulled the bike upright and waded through the gas puddle, he was actually grinning. "What did you think? You want one now, don't you?"

What I wanted was to cave to the fear that I didn't know what I was doing, that I'm too small and weak to hold a motorcycle upright, and that I should forget about this ridiculous fantasy of mine once and forever. But that would mean going down in history as She-Who-Was-All-Talk-And-No-Action - by far the least appealing choice. Thus, the intoxicating mixture of his enthusiasm and my fear inspired me to sign up for a weekend long beginner's course that very night. Then I got myself a learner's permit and googled "Top Ten Motorcycles for Short Women."

There would be action, by god, and slightly less talk.