Cowgirls game, Nikon Coolpix 4500

After my crumbling girl entry, Rachel dared me to do something this weekend that I hadn’t done in a long time. I loved being armed with this challenge as I moved through my days.

Here are the things I did this weekend that made me feel 10 years younger:
1. Woke up early every morning and took long beach walks, collecting seaglass and shells and rocks with holes in them.
2. Had my sister play with my hair and put makeup on me.
3. Ate pot cookies
4. Drank cosmopolitans
5. Did handstands, cartwheels, AND one front walkover in the sand.
6. Played a game called Cowgirls that involves answering personal questions. We discovered that not one, not two, but THREE of us had racy stories involving famous people. My favorite was the one about David Copperfield.
7. Ate chips and dip, gummy bears, ice cream and pretzels.
8. Had a little Soul Train style dance party where I found myself in the middle of the circle popping and locking. (I was a little too good at it. Not enough irony.)
9. Taped a sign, written on a paper towel, to my sister’s back that said, “Kiss me. I’m a bachelorette.”

P.S. I am sworn to secrecy about the David Copperfield thing.

self portrait, Nikon Coolpix 4500

I’ve been feeling older lately.

I’ve actually noticed lines on my face that were never there, that quite literally, appeared a few weeks ago. There are also the occasional grey hairs, which for some reason, I don’t mind. I like to pluck them and examine each silver filament. Maybe I will start to save them, paste these angelic threads into my journal, until there are simply too many too paste.

And then there’s the teeth. Something felt strange in my mouth on Saturday. Upon further examination (me, mouth wide, showing my friends) it was confirmed – part of one of my bottom teeth was missing and a rough edge remained. Only a chip really, but how did it happen? Are parts of my body just falling off now? Am I crumbling slowly but surely?

Is this what aging is?

I am caught in this middle place, where I’m not sure if I’m a kid, a girl, or a woman. When I chat with my mom and refer to my “women friends,” she gets confused about who I’m talking about. She thinks I’m suddenly spending all my time with her contemporaries. It even sounds awkward to me. When did I become a woman?

Lately I’ve been feeling like I’ve lost something, some part of me, some lighthearted, joyful part of me, with all of this adult stuff about getting married and running a business and people getting sick and all that…

I was talking with a dear friend yesterday and I never asked her the question that was on the tip of my tongue, “Where has my joy gone?”

I just couldn’t ask, or explain what I even meant by it. I just know it has something to do with aging and worry and crumbling teeth and being afraid of moving forward into adulthood.

I want to stay being a girl forever.

from the Passmore’s garden, san francisco
I guess life can’t be all that bad when beautiful creatures like this exist in it.

gumballs, nikon coolpix 4500
Spring colors for Superhero Designs are coming soon!

Photo by Dawn Mikulich, I am slowing down

I’ve been using the above photograph by Dawn Mikulich as the background on my desktop all week. These words, “I am slowing down” have brought me enormous comfort these days. I think they saved my life.

I’m a compulsive do-er. Even as I sit and write this, I have squeezed this task into the few minutes between cooking for a birthday party and going to it. I have a hard time not being productive.

Yoga helps. I breathe, stretch, and allow energy to move through me so it doesn’t get all blocked up. But I rarely just stop. I feel guilty, lazy, unmotivated.

Society has a lot of judgment about taking time off and taking care of yourself. (Words that come to mind are “slacker, spoiled, self-indulgent, unproductive.”) This language keeps the dynamic in place…

A few days ago, I was so stressed out that I had what I call the “hospital fantasy.” This happens when you are so overwhelmed with the doing, the worry, the speed and intensity of life that you just want to get off the ride for a while. I create this twisted fantasy of being in the hospital where I don’t have to DO anything anymore, where people will take care of me, where there will be no expectation about what I produce.
(Note: I am clear this is irrational and the fantasy is not to be taken too literally.)

Nevertheless, I think I’ve created illness this way and clearly don’t want to do that. How many times have you gotten a cold and thought, “My body must be run down. I guess I was doing too much.”

Why can’t we give ourselves the gift of stopping, of slowing down, before we get sick?