Retreat

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This is where I am right now. I am on a retreat. Retreat means surrender. And I surrender.

New York City’s winter requires an antidote. How about a warm nurturing room on the third floor of a mansion? Forty-five minutes from the city, the retreat center at Stony Point, New York is totally worth it.

The air smells fresh. The snow is still white. The food is good. I am here for 24 hours.

I am in a house full of women. Some are a part of a Loving Hands knitting and crocheting group. And I am part of a group of nine women from Rutgers Church. In the afternoon, we sat in a circle in the meditation room. In the evening, we sat in front of the fire and laughed.

I love to retreat. I would like to surrender every week. Or every month. Or at least every season. I see the need to get away as restorative and necessary, especially for working mothers. The cost for 3 meals and a single room in the mansion is $115, but the result is sanity. It is not too high a price to pay.

http://www.stonypointcenter.org/

I find I can can thrive on the island of Manhattan so long as every once in a while I can go to Stony Point or Westport, New York or to Manchester, Vermont. Getting away makes going home manageable.

running helps handle my nightmares

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Today at lunch time, I ran with David, my coworker. We ran for 29 minutes, about 2.5 miles. That’s double what I did January 30th, two and a half weeks ago. I love progress.

Yesterday was crazy busy — judging a writing contest, attending a lunch time book club, meeting my daughters’ teachers, watching my son’s swim meet, getting on a conference call, then showing up for my online writing class at 9 pm.

This morning I woke up sweaty. I dreamed I was carrying a baby in one arm and a stack of papers in another. I was crossing from one apartment to another, stepping next to an open elevator shaft. I had that scared-of-heights feeling. I dropped the papers, but not the baby, several stories down. The baby and I watched papers fall slowly, beautifully, like in a movie.

Then I chatted with a friend in my apartment. I left the baby alone in the hallway. I suddenly thought, “I hope the baby girl doesn’t play too close to the air shaft.” Then I thought, “She’ll just have to learn her lesson.”

I think the dream was a way for my unconscious to work out the fact that I carry too much. The dream was a reminder that I need to learn my lesson too. In dreams, we are all the characters and symbols — like, I am the baby, the friend, the air shaft, the sheaf of papers. There are times when my writing, my papers, my parenting, my work, my life gets away from me, falling like the papers down the air shaft. I carry too much.

The only thing I carry when I run is my phone so I can watch my CardioTrainer app and see how far I’ve gone and whether it’s time to go from a run to a walk. See, I’m still doing that 5 minutes of running and then 1 minute of walking routine. It’s good to pace myself.

Now, if I could only figure out how to pace myself in my life outside of running. Is there an app for that?

A Girl and Her Laptop

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This morning I walked to work through Barnard College campus. Here is what I saw and what I thought. It is more than the sun that shines today. Women writers are brilliant. image

Resilience

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My father had a motto, which I think he got from Woody Allen, “Showing up in uniform dressed to play is 99 percent of the game.” Sometimes finding the uniform is tough. But usually, I’m good to go. I show up. And that’s the best I can do. Like showing up to write in one of my blogs every day.

Every new year I vow to get organized, save money, and work out more. And in 2011, I promised myself I’d blog for 66 days and I’m almost there.

I remember a Physics lesson from college (although it was the only class where I got a D). A body in motion stays in motion. And so I stay in motion. I just keep playing, showing up to my life wearing my uniform. I keep going.

For me the tough part of being married to someone with Parkinson’s Disease is that there are times when he is not ready to play. He can’t find his uniform. He’s slow to the game. (I hesitate to ever complain one iota about his disease because yes, I know, it’s tough, yes, worse on him or anyone with a chronic or serious condition. And, hey, what am I complaining about?) But sometimes showing up means telling it like it is. And that’s the way it is tonight.

But tomorrow I’ll get up early. I’ll write in my journal. I’ll get dressed in my work clothes, my uniform. I’ll get ready to play. And I’ll help anyone that needs help. And I’ll try to remember to thank God that I’m on a team.

Huff Po Editor Talks About AOL Merger

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Alana B. Elias Kornfeld, the Living section editor at Huffington Post, told the Religion Communicators Council yesterday she is not sure how the AOL-Huff Po merger will play out.

But she does know that some trends will definitely remain worthy of reportage — like the green movement and our need to unplug.

I find it ironic — and cool — that a plugged-in website advocates unplugging from the web. Don’t get me wrong. I’m a fan of living off the grid. I renamed this blog The Connected Life because I’m trying to connect more to family and friends through face time rather than Facebook time.

On religion, Kornfeld said Huffington Post is not interested in religion — as in the politics of religion — but in religion — as in providing a “Space that gives rise to an inspired experience.”

I’m a fan of share and inspired experiences. And a lot of people are fans of Huffington Post — 56 million unique visitors per month and they’re expecting at least 200 mill more with the AOL merger. Kornfeld said that AOL has a loyal brand following, while Huff Po has substantive content. Nice when big brand marries big content!

I am a fan of Alana’s. And of Arianna’s. I met Arianna a long time ago and kinda knew she was going places.

I love what Arianna’s been saying lately about our need to get more sleep! (my post from last month, inspired by Huffington’s Ted Talk:  http://gettingmyessayspublished.wordpress.com/2011/01/09/get-up-early/ ) I’d like to say more about yesterday’s luncheon, but you guessed it, I’ve got to go to bed!)

Incidentally, yesterday’s RCC was held at the Opus Dei headquarters on 34th and Lexington. Really nice and clubby, reminded me of the Yale Club. Nicer than the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints near Lincoln Center where the RCC met last month.

The RCC is a great group. At the annual gathering this year in Little Rock, Arkansas, Abderrahim Foukara, Head of Al-Jazerra in the US will deliver the keynote address. http://www.religioncommunicators.org/ Should be interesting.

Good Enough

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Perfect is the enemy of Art. Perfect stands like a little vampire on my shoulder, pointy pen and pointy teeth, waiting to pounce.

Perfect plots revenge on Creativity. She gathers her posse – Self Doubt, Superiority, Righteous.

Ah, but Creativity drags her friends from their hang out at the coffee shop. Creativity’s two good pals are Art and Good Enough. Good Enough is tall, although she has a limp. She brings her sister, the one with the lovable shrug. Her name? Whatevs.

Tensions mount.

Perfect squares off against Creativity, like the Sharks and Jets of West Side Story. They are ready to rumble in an abandoned schoolyard. The Righteous goad Perfect. They are going for blood.

But Good Enough and her friends can’t take it any more. They begin to giggle. There is nothing Perfect hates more than giggles. It is like a pail of water on the Wicked Witch. Giggles melt Perfect. Giggles are contagious.

The girls all get silly. They all fall down. They stay out all night, playing hopscotch, jumprope and basketball. They all become friends.

These are the warring factions within me: Perfect, Righteous, Self Doubt and Superiority against Creativity, Good Enough, Whatevs and Art.

Who are your rumbling righteous? Who are your creative conquerors? Whose side are you on?

How does your creative self make your perfectionist side giggle?

Attitude of Gratitude

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What are you grateful for?

Studies show that people who keep a journal every morning or make a gratitude list every night have an improved immune system. (I can’t find the link right now to support this claim, but just trust me!)

I have also heard that a child must hear 10 positive things to overcome one negative thing. The number is probably similar for adults. Today I made a conscious effort to remain positive, adding to other people’s positivity and not depleting them.

Sounds altruistic, but I am doing it for my own health. Remaining positive is good for me. 

I love a neuroscientific excuse to write, be grateful and pursue happiness.

Here are today’s 10 reasons for joy and gratitude — in no particular order.

1. The power of nonviolence and the peaceful overthrow of the dictatorship in Egypt
2. Valentine’s Day chocolates everywhere
3. Handmade Valentines left anonymously on coworkers’ desks
4. Kids’ health, especially my son’s heart, fixed by brilliant doctors
5. Wonderful boss
6. My kids’ singing voices — at this moment, the girls are singing a song from Grease. So fricken’ cute!
7. This warm day nearly melting the icy mounds of snow in NYC
8. My mother’s coming to visit in a week and a half
9. My friends, especially my book club friends
10. My own creativity and sense of humor

While I was watching the Grammy’s last night and making Valentines (see number 3 above), unbeknownst to me, one of my daughters was making one too. If I ever get down, and it is inevitable, I am going to look at this:

Dirty Drifts

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The city snow will disappear this week and I’d like to say a fond farewell.

You hung on too long, my friend, you and your sooty piles, heaped next to the trash.

New York City is beautiful in the Spring and in the Fall. It is beautiful in the Winter right after the snow falls. There are sparkles in the moonlight then. But now, there are cigarette butts and doggy doo. And it’s really time for the snow to go.

I was in Vermont last week. There, the snow stays white.

I don’t want to move to Vermont. Yet I found comfort and beauty in snow that stayed pristine. There was something relaxing about being in a place that is not polluted. (I love that Vermont is just a few hours from NYC.)

I took this picture when cross country skiing at the Lincoln Family Home at Hildene, a grand home, (built on the backs of our immigrant ancestors), by Robert Todd Lincoln, who was president of Pullman Company. Most recently owned by an eccentric descendant of the great president, Ms. Beckwith, it is now a lovely cross country skiing destination with 416 of Lincoln’s 500 acres still intact. Really lovely. http://www.hildene.org/

With every good bye I bid to one season, I have to remember a hello will follow. The daffodils will be the first, their little green sprouts, emerging. And the buds on trees, tightly wound, will emerge. The seasons are a miracle. Just as you can no longer live with one, the next comes waltzing (or skiing) in.

Public School Rules

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Although this blog is dedicated to My Seven Rules for Living, I do have two other non-negotiable rules for my kids:

1. No ball playing in the house.

2. No running with sticks.

You’d think the kids would have internalized these rules, but on a weekly basis I have to remind them not to bounce balls off the walls or whip them at their siblings.

Every school, every family, and every person lives by rules. Even if you have no rules, that’s a rule.

And so it is at the public school where my son plays basketball on Saturday mornings, the rule stands that the innocent ice cream cone is not allowed. She is not welcome. Poor little ice cream cone. She shows up at school ready to learn, wearing her back pack and her sunniest smile, but no, my little friend, you are not allowed.

We have to have rules.

She could come to my house, I could homeschool the little ice cream cone. But someone would eat her. And that would be the end.

The End.

Online Writing Class Part 2

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So my teacher Julia Dahl suggested my story about the New York Times Travel Show might be right for Time Out New York Kids.

An earlier version of the story can be found at: http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mbcoudal/3/1267469654/tpod.html (The Travel Show is Feb. 25th to 27th. I’m going back!)

So I called the magazine and immediately got a live person. I can’t tell you her name. Because, like Valerie Plame, I keep my sources secret.

One of my favorite lines is from the outed CIA agent, Valerie Plame, played by Naomi Watts in the movie Fair Game, who said, “You can’t break me. I have no breaking point.”

Back to my story — I talked very briefly to a lovely editor who accepted my submission, and then within an hour, sent me a wonderful rejection, which basically said, “This isn’t right for us, but feel free to pitch to me in the future.”

So, I feel great! I have a source. I have to continue to make connections, write a lot, learn a lot. I have to gain more insider info. I want to become the Wikileaks of online writing classes. At least for a few more weeks until my Boot Camp for Journalists class is over.

I do want to get some of my millions of essays published. And this boot camp is not going to break me. Because I have no breaking point. And who knows? It might make me.

I am nothing, if not optimistic.