Washington Square Park
Tag: postaday
I Get Social Media
Do you feel like you “get” social media, or do you just use it because that’s where all your friends and family are?
I get social media. But to get it, you have to give it.
I am Facebook, Twitter, Instagram girl, but I put myself out there. I’ve seen studies that show the more engaged a social media user is, the happier she is.
Some people complain about social media, “I don’t want to know what you had for lunch.”
I admit I occasionally report what I’m cooking. When I recently updated my FB status, “Making chili, meat and vegetarian,” several cyber friends in several states were also making chili. Coincidence? I dunno. But it was interesting and fun and I felt less alone in my solo chili-making kitchen.
Sometimes I overshare. That’s me. I overshare IRL too.
As a wife of someone with Parkinson’s Disease, I feel connected to friends and family through social media. Apathy is a side effect of my husband’s disease. On social media, I can’t tell if people are apathetic towards me. I try to notice only the thumbs up, the cheers, the interactions that lead to deeper sharing. I affirm people, just like I like being affirmed.
In the last couple of weeks, I’ve connected in person with two different high school friends who were visiting New York. I wouldn’t have stayed in touch with them without Facebook. When we got together, we talked about deep stuff — how we felt different, theater, how we parent, what’s new with our siblings, how we work.
Of course, it’s scary to put yourself out there and swim in the social media community pool. It’s easier and safer, emotionally, to lurk, dangle your feet in the water.
My social media mania has one downside.
I was reminded of this jealousy factor, when I read: More kids than suitcases’ blog post about torturing yourself on spring break. Because yes, just by the look of some other people’s spring break pics, they’re having a lot of fun out there. I saw in friends’ feeds palm trees and London tea (different people obviously.) That made me wish I was somewhere fabulous.
But I was. I was somewhere fab. Making every day fabulous is one of my life goals. (Thanks to my former colleague, Klay Williams!)
Compare and despair. I try to post awesome pictures of me and the kids having a really good time out in the world. (See below!) Because a picture of one of my kids staring at the phone, laptop, or TV is boring. I post about things, people, and events that I want to remember. I don’t want to remember boredom, bickering, apathy, and negativity.
I want to remember doing cartwheels on the beach. I want to remember bike riding. I want to remember making each other smile and laugh.
This post was inspired by the Daily Prompt – Social Network.
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Daily Prompt: Time Capsule
2012 is drawing to a close (3 weeks left!). What would you put in this year’s time capsule?
I would put:
- My collage art to promote UMCOR (United Methodist Committee on Relief). Am so proud! This was an early version.
- My bike. Oh, my bike. I love my bike. Biking in NYC makes me happy.
seen in a bike shop window in Portland - My first (ever!) unemployment direct deposit check. Definitely mixed feelings, but overall grateful.
- My new business cards.
- Masks that the girls made at Art Students League. We all play roles, wear masks, make art.
- Chris’s SAG movie pass. Going to the movies together has been a great way to connect. Due to Chris’s illness and our busy-ness, I feel we are ships passing in the night. But we’ve sat together at such amazing movies this year! Yesterday we saw Amour. Formidable! (my favorite French word!) Today we are going to see The Guilt Trip.
- A
handful of sand from Siesta Key beach. The kids and I had such a restorative time hanging out at the prettiest beach in the world last spring. Great times, too, with my bro, Nicole, dad, and Marty. - A mosquito from the kids and my ill-fated camping trip to Fire Island.
- Yoga mat. Because my mom still practices yoga and stands on her head.
- Shake Shack fries. After teaching a semester of middle school creative writing, I take my kids to Shake Shack to celebrate.
- School Swimming Pool and Van Cortlandt Park. I watch my kids play basketball, soccer, and baseball, but I spend most of my spectator time on the sidelines of the long benches of the pool or on the edges of the Van Corltandt Park track.
-
all the cousins All of the cousins. Being with my four siblings and their kids for Thanksgiving was definitely the highlight of 2012.
- President Barack Obama’s birth certificate. Just in case anyone, in the future, has any questions. The man is an American, all right already. Forward.
2012 was a very good year.
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Gone Fishing
The boys were fishing and my creative writing students were supposed to be writing. It was a surprisingly gorgeous December Day, balmy.
We were discussing plot. This is tough to teach, especially for me. I like to meander in my writing. For guidance I consulted my trusty NaNoWriMo young writers’ curriculum guide. There, the teacher offered a suggestion to start the discussion of plot with a viewing of the final few minutes of an episode of SpongeBob Square Pants. Apparently, SpongeBob does plot well.
But instead of watching the cartoon, we went for our neighborhood walk to our secret spot in Central Park, a most beautiful little cul de sac where rock meets pond meets beauty.
This is where we met our young fisherman.
They waited.
They waited.
They hooked a big fish.
My eight Middle School writers stood in a circle around the two little fishers. They reeled a fish in. It was a mighty big carp.
I would not have known the kind of fish, but one of the boy’s babysitters told me.
“How old are the boys?”
“Eleven,” she said.
We watched the boys pose for camera phone photo shots with the fish. The fish seemed to be tiring.
One of my writers yelled, “Throw it back!”
“We will,” the boy said.
And he wrestled with the hook in the gaping mouth.
“I’ve never seen anyone fish before,” another of my writers said.
“Hurry! Throw it back!” the girl said.
“We will!” The boy was getting angry. The hook was not coming out of the downcast mouth.
Up to this point, students, you are witnessing, in literary parlance, “Rising Action.”
Now, we have reached the moment of “Climax.”
My creative writing kids yelled, “Throw it back!” I offered to help remove the hook. Thank God, the boys ignored me. But the boys could not ignore the yelling. And one boy, attempting to remove the hook from the carp’s mouth, looked up and spit out a load of curse words at my students, including a line about how my kids were making his life “a living hell.”
Then he went back to work, finally freeing the fish from the hook.
He set it free. The fish wagged itself back into the murky Central Park lake or pond.
The boy asked the nanny for a napkin to clean his dirty hands. She had none. I handed him a tissue from my pocket.
“Thank you,” he said, “And I’m sorry I called your kids so many names. I apologize.”
“It’s okay,” I said. (And I later told my kids that he’d apologized.)
Now, students, this part of my story is, “Falling Action.”
The boy set to baiting another hook.
“He’s very polite,” I told the nanny.
“Yes, he has some anger issues, adopted from Russia and all, but he’s a good kid.”
“Yes,” I said. And I was thinking, he’s a good teacher too. He has taught me and the kids about rising action, climax, and falling action.
And he did it far better than even SpongeBob could.
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Blogs to Follow
I’m humble. I don’t want to brag about our awesome upcoming writing workshops. (Yes, Kelly Wallace and I are leading some workshops on blogging.) But let me brag or blog about my friends’ blogs.
Blogging is about sharing the wealth of your knowledge. I wish more of my friends would blog because it’s fun. I like finding out what my friends are thinking. Here are three recommendations from some of my besties. And these are my friends IRL (in real life!).
Kelly’s blog – check out her recent post on forgiveness. She says, in considering forgiveness and remembering some childhood shit, “Right now things are a little like my morning run: muddy.”
Linda Bloom’s blog – Linda’s an emptynester so check out her take on how Modern Family depicts the college years.
Jolain’s blog – Jolain comments on fashion. She does all the artwork herself. I love her drawings.
My friends are creative geniuses.
They have stories to tell and pictures to share. They have opinions I value.
For a while, my friend Dan posted on a blog about everything he ate. It was interesting because I never realized he ate so many sardines. It got me interested in eating sardines.
Dan discovered one secret to getting readers to check out your blog — mention chocolate (not sardines!). I will try to gain readers by bragging about my friends’ blogs. And I will resort to chocolate if necessary.
History Repeats Itself
Everything is fine. But I am having a slightly depressing day. I don’t want to go into any of the details, but suffice it to say, I have been here before. (My Kids Can Be Mean to Me.)
There are legit reasons why I feel unhappy and unsatisfied in my home life. I remind myself that I am feeling this way today, not every day. Just today.
I think that when I worked full time, I could submerge my difficulties at home into successes at work. I got good at compartmentalizing. That was one of my keys to success.
And, in a way, I’ve had part-time work this week — going to the movies. I have seen three movies and one play in five days. Last night, at the Public, I saw Sorry by Richard Nelson. The story was about four adult siblings on Election Day putting their demented uncle in a home. Really good.
Today, I saw Cloud Atlas. It was a trip. Set in six different time periods, the characters return as descendants from an earlier time or, maybe, as reincarnated souls. They are marked with a shooting star tattoo.
Cloud Atlas, based on the book by David Mitchell, reminded me that our lives are interwoven, past hurts are revisited. The people in power corrupt and exploit those in their care. When consumerism and greed is the value upon which a society is based, take heed. Yet kindness in the extreme can heal the wounded souls and societies.
So going to the movies this week has left me with lofty thoughts. I put my grievances aside. For today. Just today.
I probably should go to therapy instead of the movies. Yet I find my way of coping entertaining.
I heart unemployment!
Sorting Socks
I know it’s Election Day. I woke up feeling confident that I would win. Er, I mean, my man Obama would win. So while I’d like to blog about the 2012 election, I thought I’d post about finding happiness a little closer to home.
Yesterday, I was super excited to declutter. Crazy, right? I sorted more than 50 pairs of socks and it took me hours! These socks had hung around the bottom of the laundry basket for several years, years when my kids’ sock sizes grew from child to adult-sized.
At the bottom of the basket, I found toddler socks. Yes, it’s been a while since I dug down that deep.
My kids are teenagers. So after a momentary fling with nostalgia over those cute little toddler-sized socks, I tossed them away.
I’ve never enjoyed sorting socks. People say, “Do it while sitting in front of the TV at night.” But I don’t watch TV.
I found inspiration for this boring activity from this blog post, 29 Ways to Declutter. It seems Deb Smouse is saying that there’s a spiritual side to decluttering. I like that. Her post begins with this quote:
Clutter is a physical manifestation of fear that cripples our ability to grow. – H.G. Chissell.
When I left my job six weeks ago, I thought, “Great, now I’ll have time to do all those things I’ve always wanted to do, like sort those damn socks in the bottom of the basket.”
Yup, I’m finding satisfaction in getting to the bottom of the barrel and finding my kids’ childhood.
Incidentally, I’m renaming this blog, To Pursue Happiness and I’ve rolled all my blogs home here.
With starting up Boot Camp For Writers and kick starting my freelance blogging career, I just don’t have the time or energy to post on all four of my blogs, so find me here! For the month of November, I’m posting every day.
Getting Quiet and Slowing Down
Honestly, I can speak or write extemporaneously on any given topic. Yes, I’m a know-it-all (and I come from a long line of know-it-alls, of which we are proud!)
For three days in the Adirondacks, I did yoga with Michelle Maron (Lake Champlain Yoga Arts @ Live Well). Now back in the city and with the kids back to school, I’m doing guided meditation in the mornings. I’m finding benefits to being still, keeping quiet.
I LOVE Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass.
“Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,
Missing me one place search another, I stop somewhere waiting for you.”
I first discovered the joys of Walt Whitman and in overstimulation in college when one of my friends liked to study, watch TV, blast the radio at the same time. I tried it back then and found I liked it too. I found it relaxing. I liked cacophony.
I like the adrenaline of rushing, so New York City’s energy is perfect for me. But so is the quiet of the country.
In light of my husband’s gradual slowing from Parkinson’s Disease (he was diagnosed nine years ago), I know I must, regularly, slow and quiet myself and the kids down too. Chris needs to take more time. He stands frozen. He cannot respond quickly to a question.
In those instances, words don’t matter but slowing down does. Stopping to wait matters.
As we walked in the Adirondacks, the other writers and I stopped talking for a little bit. We said nothing.
When I wasn’t talking, I could listen. I could hear our footsteps, our breathing, a bird on the lake. I could hear a breeze through the leaves of grass.
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- Adirondack Writers Workshop
No good reason to write
I hate when I get out of the habit of writing. I feel life’s pointless; I feel I will never catch the momentum of my creative life again.
It’s like the train is idling in the station and I have to run and catch it. This has happened a million times when I drove down from Lake Champlain to Albany-Rensselaer. I had to run to catch the train, back to the city, back to work.
Once I missed the train and I was so pissed. Couldn’t they have radioed down to tell the conductor, “Wait one minute!” I watched the train pull away.
I digress. I was writing about writing. And how hard it is to write.
I have been preoccupied with winding down from my day job; vacating up in the Adirondacks; teaching my first boot camp workshop; caring for kids, spouse, family; trying to get my freelance biz going; and now organizing the Adirondack Memoir Retreat (Oct. 25-28 – Please come).
The point of my life is to make stuff.
Yet all things conspire to get in my way when I sit down to to write. Everything and everyone. And they don’t even mean to. And besides, I tell myself there’s no good reason to write. No one’s asking me, “Can you please blog?” (But kids ask me, “Can you fix some dinner?”)
There’s no good reason to blog because it doesn’t make any money. And why do anything but make a buck? our capitalist society asks.
Yet our souls hunger for art. Our lives need to make things of beauty or else it’s all for nothing. It’s all spent grasping for the stupid gold ring on the merry-go-round. And you can never grasp it. You can never have enough. Money does not satisfy.
Art satisfies. Creativity gives back. Handmade dinners, crafts, and poems thank you. If they don’t, well, then you have something to write about then too. Write about the disappointment and the tragedy of all that lack of return on your investment.
Most of the time, you get the return, you catch the train. The conductor waits.
I have caught the train more times than I have missed it. I hopped on. I watched the cities roll by my window. I opened my laptop. I caught my breath from the run to the train and started writing.
The Muse Will Show
The muse will come when you stop messing around on Facebook or goofing off on Twitter. Reading other people’s stuff sometimes inspires the muse, but the muse can be prickly, even jealous. Ignore your own creativity? The muse runs away. The muse doesn’t like when you spend too long working for other people and not long enough on your own. If you don’t care about your creativity, the muse won’t either.
The muse will show up when you let go of perfectionism. When you stop comparing yourself to all of the successful, rich people you get bombarded with every single day. Those beautiful people get to your muse. Those people are like vampires, making you run into your house and lock your front door.
The muse doesn’t like when you choose safety over the midnight walk in the woods. The muse loves to roam too and wants you to live on the edge of a cliff, not in the cocoon.
The muse will show up when you put fingers on the keyboard and wipe away the blank screen.
The muse will show up when you stop cleaning the kitchen.
When the muse shows up, it’s not work. It’s play. You just have to get out of your own way. Something, some brilliance — seriously! – will flow through you. You will sit back when you are done and go, “Wow! I did that!” But no, you didn’t do that. Not alone any way. You were the conduit. The creative spirit, the muse, flew through you and is now flying away because your ego — such a barking dog — chased it away.
And tried to take all the credit. But that’s okay; that’s the ego’s job.
The muse will be back tomorrow. Or later. But won’t/can’t stay forever, because you have to eat and go to the bathroom and chat with your kids and make dinner and throw a load of laundry in the washer and gossip about the neighbors and, don’t forget, you’ve got to pay the bills.
I know, as an artist and writer, I can visit the muse when I jot my ideas and images in a little notebook, even when I am away from my keyboard or canvas. I use Field Notes, a product. But I get no money (or respect) from Coudal Partners for this endorsement. Although occasionally, I swipe pack of Field Notes when I am at the Coudal household.
As Field Notes saying goes, “I’m not writing it down to remember it later, I’m writing it down to remember it now.”
I want to write more about my prickly, beautiful, sensitive, strong muse. But I have to go for a walk. I have to stretch my body. I have to take my time. I have to let my muse fly.
This post was inspired by the Steven Pressfield’s The War of Art, a book that made me to take my muse seriously.
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