1. Truth: “my little world shattered / but the big world did not / not only did it have to carry on / it needed me to keep up with it / I was still supposed to care about / the little things that didn’t matter / wrinkled clothing and eye exams / the day of the week and unpaid bills.” Even though people like Oprah glory in the decade of 50 for women, marketing it as a time of freedom and fearlessness, for me it has been one of the most difficult eras of my life. Sure, it was a time when I took lessons and learned to swim, completed my 500 hour yoga teacher training and started teaching regularly, and retired from 20 years at CSU with the hopes of finally fully living as a writer and contemplative practice guide. And yet, it was also a time when I was clinically burnt out, in the thick of menopause, COVID happened and in those first few months one of my dogs and my sister-in-law died, I was hospitalized and had two surgeries, my dad was put on home hospice care and during that process my mom had a stroke and I was one of their primary caretakers during that time, my mother-in-law was hospitalized and died, and my mom’s health (mental and physical) continued to decline until she needed fulltime care and was placed in hospice but she “took too long to die” so recently we had to find another place for her to live while we were in the process of getting her house cleared out and ready to sell. Since the beginning of this year, we’ve been dealing with attempts to steal our credit, I got off my anti-anxiety meds (terrible timing), tried CPAP therapy only to fail and trigger a season of panic attacks and sleep issues, and after a biopsy and ultrasound I started having daily migraines that led to an MRI (“unremarkable”), and Ringo has had his own series of health issues that have required my close attention and effort. It’s been a lot, and not at all what I expected.

2. Truth: “but what about the tender things that did / the hungry bellies and global warming / violent war and finding cures for disease / rescued animals and community gardens / I wanted to carry more but my arms were broken / I wanted to keep helping but my heart was too.” That list above are the issues of “my little world” but there’s also the ways loved ones and those dear to me have struggled, and I don’t have to tell you, kind and gentle reader, of all the suffering and chaos happening in the rest of the world. At times, I am barely standing, can’t sleep or manage to take a shower or feed myself properly, but the desire to ease suffering in others and the world never leaves me. My therapist plays this trick on me where she asks, “if one of your students or a friend were struggling in this same way, what would you say to them?” I respond with such wisdom and compassion, AND I find it so hard to embody the same, to apply and experience what I know in my own life.

3. Truth: “I am now learning to be both / the lighthouse and the sinking ship / the beacon and the wreckage.” It doesn’t have to be perfect. I don’t have to be ready. Just start, just show up, and be honest about the difficulty because maybe that is exactly what someone needs to hear — not just the answer or the fix but also how hard it is, how messy and complicated. It’s hard for me to face it right now, hard for me to take care of myself, AND I’m not giving up. I hope you won’t either.

One wish: Maybe that’s my one wish, that even with our broken hearts and bones, we don’t give up. I was reading a Mark Nepo book this morning, a part where he says, “The instant a bone breaks, the two ends begin to reach for each other” and “The same mysterious force of life animates our hearts. When near the suffering of others, our inborn care will reach for others immediately if we don’t hesitate or block the love” (The Fifth Season: Creativity in the Second Half of Life, page 146). There’s nothing wrong with being broken and it is in our nature to move towards healing, to connect. Stay tender, keep your heart open, don’t give up. We need each other. Keep reaching out, don’t hesitate or block the love, learn to be the lighthouse and the sinking ship, the beacon and the wreckage. 

1. Truth: Two years ago today, my dad died. That grief is heavy, and it is connected to a lineage of other grief that came before and mixed with the ones that came after. These past two years have been especially rough. A long friendship unexpectedly came to an end, Dad was placed on hospice, Mom had a stroke that she only partially recovered from, Dad died, Mom developed dementia and would never live independently again, Eric’s mom died, and we had to move Mom to hospice care. This piggy backs on all the losses that came before that and sometimes it feels like I’m trying to swim while carrying a block of cement or trying to drink from a firehose. 

2. Truth: There is no there, there. My brother sent me a picture the other day of my mom and dad’s bedroom completely empty. The last time I stayed at their house, things were almost exactly the way they’d left them, like they would be coming back any time, like they still lived there. My father-in-law also recently sold the home he’d lived in with his wife, the place we stayed when we visited them, and now that home is not just cleaned out, it belongs to someone else and she is gone. My whole adult life until now, I always knew that no matter what happened, I could always go “home” again, that I could find refuge in either place if I needed it. Those places and some of those people only exist in memory now, and I feel a bit lost without the “home” and family that came before, that had remained intact, where I could return. 

3. Truth: You can make yourself a home. The life you make, the family you chose, the people and things you love, the places you rest and reside — even including your mind, body, and tender broken heart. I love mine — my tiny family, my small house, my little life. It’s everything I ever wanted, wished for, worked toward, and I gave that to myself, I allowed for that, I made it happen. AND, it is still true that I am so sad and being human is hard, and I’m able to make space for that as well. There’s enough room for all of it, the grief and the grace.

One wish: I was watching videos featuring Jane Goodall, who died yesterday, and one thing she said is: 

“I see us at the mouth of a very long, very dark tunnel. And right at the end of that tunnel is a star. That’s hope. But it’s no good sitting at the end of the tunnel and hoping that star will come [to us]. No, we’ve got to roll up our sleeves, climb over, roll under and work around all the obstacles that lie between us and the star.”

So my wish goes something like this: May we stay tender, may we keep our hearts open, and may we continue to look for and move towards the light, together. Don’t give up, kind and gentle reader, and I won’t either.