At the Yankee game the other night, I spotted this young woman with the sign. She was just standing there, a bow in her hair, hoping to help. I wished I needed help, but I didn’t need it then. It was pretty clear to me where the beer line was and that’s where I was headed. Nothing more needed.
Lately I have felt that I need a lot of help, but the kind of help I need is complicated. I need help getting motivated to work out. I need help with the kids’ homework. I need help with my husband’s care. I need help meeting work deadlines. I need help with my dwindling, mixed-up stock portfolio. I need help getting out of bed on cool mornings. I need help getting published.
I don’t know if this Yankee employee can help me with these things. It looks like she can help with directions. Heck, I can do that.
Fella, the beer line is this way! You’re right behind me.
This is not my son, but looks exactly like my son.
In the spring I took away the kids’ privilege of screens and social media from Monday to Thursday nights.
School’s starting the day after Labor Day and I want to remind the kids (and myself) that real life exists beyond the computer, Xbox, Facebook, instant messaging, and texting.
A week ago my youngest brother and I were in a boat on Lake Champlain.
I asked my niece, the driver, to slow down and drop us in the middle of the lake. My brother and I could swim ashore. I love the sink or swim mentality. I’ve never been on an Outward Bound excursion, but sometimes I think my life is an Outward Bound adventure. Before we even took a moment to rethink what we were doing and if we could do it, we dove in. The boat sped away.
I love the urgency and immediacy of putting myself in a pressure cooker and seeing if I can handle it. This is probably why I’m always running late. I love the adrenaline rush of making the train just as it’s about to pull away. (I know, I know, there are many people in my life for whom this style of operating does not work!)
Back on shore, we couldn’t decide how many miles we swam.
Yesterday I signed up for a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) in my office building. I am excited for the fall to start and the kids to get back in school (Kids, how are those summer reading assignments going? Not so good? Get reading!) so I can go back to daily fitness and healthy eating.
Maybe I will actually implement a healthy daily routine and not have to put myself in pressured situations in order to make it to shore.
There are thrill-seekers who chase the storms, but my son and I chase the mist.
Yesterday, we were on the ferrry crossing from New York into Vermont to pick up the girlies from summer camp. It was foggy but the fog seemed always ahead of us.
Then I realized we were in it all along — the mist, which seemed beyond us, actually surrounded us.
“Maybe this is like God’s love,” I said. “It seems in the distant, but we are actually in the middle of it.”
Out the window of the Amtrak train, I just saw an eagle soar above the Hudson.
But I do not see the soaring eagle as a symbol of our country. We are too divided, rancorous, and the eagle is too beautiful, wild.
The bird soars. It is so elegant and at-peace. Yes, I hate when people anthropomorphize animals (especially dogs!) but I can’t help this metaphor. It just came to me and I have to go with it.
This current US political and economic scene is way too vitriolic and fluctuating to be found in nature. While the stock markets jump, the politicians pounce, the eagle soars.
In soaring there are lessons or rules for living. Worried about your portfolio? Retirement? Millionaires getting a free pass? Get out! Get into nature!
Watch a squirrel or a fluffy cloud.
Sit on a park bench.
Drink some cold water.
Smile at a stranger.
Pet a neighbor’s dog (but don’t anthropomorphize it.)
Breathe fresh air.
Find yourself in nature and you will get a breather, a respite, a grounding. It’s why prophets trekked to the desert, corporate execs went on Outward Bound, (although money for corporate bonding has probably dried up.)
Looking for epiphanies? Looking for meaning? Try looking for real life eagles.
the view from my Amtrak seat
Or go somewhere on a train. I just finished writing this and looked out the Amtrak window again.
I saw a hawk up high and a heron down low.
God, nature is amazing! New York State still has a lot of wildlife, and I’m not talkin’ bout City Hall or Wall Street.
I have gone eight days without using my credit card. I’ve blogged about being clueless over family finances. On a regular basis I commit myself to getting over my disinterest in the financial state of the union. https://mbcoudal.wordpress.com/2011/03/03/stocks-and-numbers/
This week I paid cash for all lunches and dinners out. I bought all groceries with cash.
The hardest part was when I stopped at Apthorp Pharmacy to restock my dwindling supply of the usual sunscreen/moisturizer/tint stuff that comes in a small tube. “$38!”
Paying with credit card, I would’ve whipped it out and thought nothing of it, but with cash, hmmmmmm? I hesitated to part with my two twenties. I didn’t buy it. “I’m sure you can find some old sunscreen/moisturizer around the apartment,” I told myself.
Monet's water lilies at the MoMA are so amazing! This image has nothing to do with this post, except that it makes me exceedingly happy to look at Monet's paintings. I took this pic the other night.
It’s always possible to find cheap alternatives.
Coming home from the East Village the other night at 10:30, I would’ve hopped in a cab. I have an unwritten rule not to take the subway after 10 pm. But the $2.25 subway fare seemed much more sensible than a $22.50 cab. And without kids at home (they’re still at camp), why rush?
Watching people on the subway late at night is an entertaining and cheap thrill! The subway ride takes longer. But hey, lose time, save money.
I decided to try 22 days without a credit card because I bought a journal/financial book that promises in 22 days you can change your financial habit. I thought you needed 66 days to change a habit. Whatever.
I had a huge credit card statement the other day — upwards of $5,000 — and there was not much of substance on it — a few orthodontia charges, automatic payments for cable and phone, trip to Chicago, my writer’s class – but no real big ticket items.
Partly I blog to hold myself responsible. So by admitting I have a problem with my cash flow and then blogging about it, I figure I can change it.
Just like when I admitted I wanted to lose 5 to 10 pounds? The pounds didn’t just drop off. Um, still waiting.
Blogging helps me turn my attention to ways I can do better and areas where I need to focus.
Money and weight. I know I’m not wildly out of control, I’m just not where I want to be.
The other night at the theater, I got that sickening feeling. Not again! I was watching the usual depiction of Christian women as hypocritical gossips. Why do Christians and especially Christian women get such a bad rap in movies, plays, TV?
Chris and I were at the play, “Tricks the Devil Taught Me” by Tony Georges at the Minetta Lane Theatre. The play was overall good, but the scene with the church ladies was comically grotesque as the women feasted on another family’s misery, gossiping about town teenagers. They delighted in discussing another couple’s rocky marriage and the potential there for “sin.”
In another scene, one woman who sang for the church choir said she sang only for the money. The church choir was simply a conduit for money, not a spiritual experience.
I know, work with, worship with, sing with (although I wish I was good enough to sing in a choir!) Christian women. (“I knew JFK and you are no JFK.”)
The Christian women I know are anything but mean, shallow and sin-loving. They are thoughtful, hard-working, joyful. They organize peace vigils, letter writing campaigns to end wars. Christian women feed the hungry and wash the feet of the homeless. (Do I exaggerate? Not much.)
Christian women laugh together in bible studies but not at other’s misfortunes; we laugh at our own struggles to be human. We try for transformation, to be more loving. Conversations are about compassion, hope, redemption, grace, struggle, not sin.
My experience with Christianity must be quite different from other writers’ experiences.
I also do not believe that one sect of Christianity is better than another. I was raised Catholic; married in the Lutheran church; baptized one child Episcopalian; baptized the other two Presbyterian; consider myself Methodist.
“Love ‘em all. Let God sort ‘em out.” That is the message on a tee shirt my friend Nancy gave me when she was moving. The gift and the message epitomizes my experience of Christian women — a nonjudgmental, generous and active Christianity.
When I see how Christian women are depicted in popular media, I could cry. And I feel defensive. Hey, I am not conservative, stupid or mean. (Although, occasionally, God help me, I do gossip.)
I wish that I did not get that sickening feeling when I see how Christian women are presented in plays and movies. The way I see myself is far different from the reality that is presented to me. I do not recognize myself; that makes me very sad.
Big metal bumps into big metal. There is a satisfying clink. Almost as good as the dink of cold beer bottles as we toast each other after a hot work day.
Every time I take the train from New York City to Westport, NY, the train stops in Albany to get a new engine. And so I hurry from my seat to the platform with the other train enthusiasts (12-year old boys, pot-bellied men, tourists from Japan) to watch the new engine back in and clink against the train.
Why is this moment of impact such a thrill? Because the engine is small and the train is heavy. Because the elegance and engineering of rail travel still amazes me. Because there is a satisfying clink. Cheers!
I’d seen the walkway across the Hudson at Poughkeepsie every time I took Amtrak upstate. I wanted to walk the longest pedestrian bridge at 1.25 miles, but never thought I’d make it to Poughkeepsie. But I did (the night before, I’d had dinner at the CIA).
On a Friday afternoon in August, I realized my dream: I strolled the promenade.
I always hope for a big epiphany when I walk. But from 300 feet above the Hudson, all I noticed was the beauty of the river that runs both ways. I noticed the fluffiness of the clouds. And I noticed that other people walk at their own pace. Maybe those are epiphanies.
Nice wide walkway. You can bike across too!People of all ages walk across the bridge.
Excited to be leading The Story of Your Life at the Heritage House in Westport, New York this Saturday morning. At this community center, I’ve struck a yoga pose and smiled at the plein air art shows. All in one place, my favorite things: yoga, art, and, now, for the last three Saturdays in August, from 10:30 to noon, creative writing.
This is Dan's book that inspires the workshop, The Story of Your Life.
The Heritage House http://www.westportheritagehouse.com/ was once a federated church, Baptist and Methodist. Now it is a visitor center and home to a community art show, the title of which I love — The Spirit of Place. I want to build the spirit of place into the writing workshop.
The Story of Your Life is inspired from the workshops led by my friend and mentor, Dan Wakefield, who also wrote a book by the same name. http://www.danwakefield.com/ If you’re anywhere in the Adirondack region, please join me in this place.
I sent this blurb to some Adirondack newspapers so I hope we get a few people:
Write about your life — from childhood through the present day –- the small, quiet moments and the large, public events. In this creative, supportive, and fun workshop, you will discover threads of humor and meaning through writing and sharing your writing.
This hour and a half workshop is intended for the experienced, casual, and non-writer. ($10/class)
The workshop is led by Mary Beth Coudal, a writer and teacher, whose essays have appeared in the New York Times, Self magazine, and other newspapers, magazines, and websites. Mary Beth blogs about creative writing at:http://gettingmyessayspublished.wordpress.com (that’s this blog, heh). She also writes about the spirit of New York at: http://mybeautifulnewyork.wordpress.com/ and she writes a lot more than that too.
And now I’m writing this blog in the third person, the first sign of narcissistic tendencies, so I must stop writing and start reading. As the saying goes, enough about me, What do YOU think about me?
of help I need is complicated. I need help getting motivated to work out. I need help with the kids’ homework. I need help with my husband’s care. I need help meeting work deadlines. I need help with my dwindling, mixed-up stock portfolio. I need help getting out of bed on cool mornings. I need help getting published.
100 Days of Poems and Pics 