What Once Was, Is Now Gone

{The irony of the title of this piece compared with the title and post of my last entry is not lost on me! Please read the post prior to this one ("Forgotten, But Not Gone" - published earlier today, 4/5/2022) to understand the pertinence of me posting this piece at this time.

This piece was originally written 9/7/2016, revisited 5/32019 and still did not get published until now.}

What once was, is now gone. I am not talking about the hair on my husband’s head, the pint of Ben & Jerry’s Chunky Monkey ice cream in the garage freezer or my excitement to read Harper Lee’s Go Set a Watchman. I am also not talking about 3AM feedings, diaper changes or the struggles to teach a 7-year-old to ride a bike without training wheels. Nor am I referencing the piles of paper on my desk and credenza that need action or filing; the endless loads of dirty laundry; or my enthusiasm for all things Fast & Furious, Star Trek, or Transformers. My husband lost his hair more than a halftime of a life ago; the Ben & Jerry’s only lasts as long as two episodes of The Blacklist and Harper Lee should have left well enough alone with To Kill a Mockingbird. My youngest child is already double-digits and I now have three kids in three separate schools. I feel time slipping away exponentially each day. All of these things that once were, are now gone. On the other hand, the piles on my desk and credenza are like the dirty laundry in my house and my excitement for Vin Diesel, Chris Pine and Optimus Prime:  they are constants in my life and clearly not going anywhere, anytime soon.

However, I am talking about my girlish figure, my youthful glow and the expectations I have of a 47-year-old body that has given birth to three children.

For many years, I put off working out each year well after the New Year’s Resolution phase of the rest of the world because I “knew” my body and I could whip it into shape in a short matter of time. A few sporadic weeks of spring workouts were always enough to bring my body back to an acceptable toned nature in time for my June birthday and the donning of shorts and summer dresses. I never had to work hard at it. Except for pregnancy, I have weighed the same amount, within 3 pounds in either direction, since I weighed in for cheerleading practices in the fall of my junior year of college. Weight and body image have never been an issue for me.

That is not to say that I have a perfect body. I am short and not full-bodied in most feminine-preferred areas, but I have a muscular figure that has maintained most of its presence, at least in my arms and legs. I have never had a flat stomach. (Unless you count the miraculous benefits of breast-feeding for the first 6 months of all three of my children’s lives. Alas, it was fleeting. Stop the breast-feeding and the familiar “pooch” returned.)

I noticed slowly over the years that I felt “squishier” and more weighed down at the end of the winter, regardless of what the scale said. I started backing up my workouts earlier in the year to accommodate a schedule that would still get me “swimsuit ready.” I continued to take the fall and early winter off from working out.

So, imagine my surprise 2 years ago when I was not at all happy with the results of my diligent 5-weeks of a Sean T super-fitness routine. I put in the focus, I got it done, and I looked the same when it was over. A year later, I tried 21 Day Fix…Extreme. I did not need to lose weight, but I wanted to “get shredded!” Year 2 of disappointments. There was a lot of sweating, plenty of grunting, and even a bit of swearing at the TV, but this body did not get shredded. I even (mostly) followed the eating plan. I lost a total of 5 pounds and 3.5 inches, and as soon as I stopped eating her way, I gained it all back.

Last year, a few back-to-back fall/winter business trips with my husband to warm-weather climates predicated the necessity for carrying the workout routine into the fall and winter. Suddenly I realized that I had been working out for nearly a year. A look at my weight and measurements in March showed no real change from the year before. I had more or less continued to work out year-round and yet hadn’t transformed my body back to its 20-something days. Or even my 30-something days. Not even my just-turned-40 days. I was maintaining a figure that I woke up with somewhere around age 45.

Gone are the days of being able to eat whatever I want and not have it affect me. (It’s a whole other article about what food does to my body now!) No longer can I sit around for 9 months out of the year and expect to look great in a tight pair of jeans. My shirts all need to be long enough to partially cover my dropping rear-end. (My husband used to love watching me walk away across a room.) I am saddened and disgusted to know what a muffin-top is. I prefer the banana/cranberry nut kind that The Sturbridge Coffee House sells, rather than the one at my waistline.

We all know and expect that our bodies will change as we get older. We anticipate being winded from doing simpler and simpler activities. We prepare for the aches and pains of first morning light and trying to walk across the floor to the bathroom without reaching out to hold onto something to steady ourselves. We accept that we will find ourselves saying, “What did you say? I didn’t hear you,” and “Can you read that? I can’t see it without my glasses.”

So, it should come as no surprise that a workout regimen changes from a transformative hobby into a maintenance routine. Yet, it does take us by surprise. We refuse to accept it at first, going for a heavier weight, a double-session, dietary changes and more swearing. We do not want to believe that our body will never be the same again. It was hard enough to accept the changes after pregnancy and childbirth.

A mid-life crisis seemed imminent, until I realized that I am actually already past mid-life. Statistically an American woman can expect to live to 78.9 years. I passed the halfway point nearly 8 years ago. When I look at it that way, I guess I should be thankful that I did not notice bigger changes sooner and that in the last half of my life, I am still holding tight to 120 pounds. The second half of my life is sure to be marked by more losses in my physical world:  less mobility and less activity, as well as the loss of loved ones. Age defines who we are at nearly every stage of our life, and yet most times we are unaware of the meaning until we have already passed out of a particular stage and entered into another.

My once pain-free, voluntary, semi-active lifestyle is now a slightly painful required dose of activity that will help to keep my body moving and my mind as tarp as a shack.

Forgotten, But Not Gone

 All too often I frustrate myself by actually making the time to put my "arse in chair" and following an idea out of my head and onto the screen of my laptop, only to leave it sitting in the depths of x's and o's and never publishing it here or doing anything else with it. The idea theoretically and physically is still just an idea if it doesn't get "printed" with the potential for views.

After I have had a hiatus of writing, I usually find myself revisiting pieces that I started and didn't finish, or pieces that I did finish, but I then neglected. As frequently as I think, "That needs work," I also find myself thinking, "That was pretty good! Why didn't I put that on my blog?"

So I am going to give some old pieces the chance to see the light of day and grace the electronic pages of my blog! In the past I have hesitated to do this because certain pieces usually referenced a time of my life that was not only past, they were archaic to where my life was currently. I see it differently now. Although these pieces may not represent my thoughts or lifestyle today, they are still representative of a time in my life and some ideas that were important enough for me to take the time to write a few hundred words about them. Old or new, I believe they deserve to get their chance in the sun.

I always hope that a trip down my own memory lane of writing will inspire me to get back into it and get the ideas still swirling in my head and scratched onto scraps of paper on my desk out into full-blown posts for my blog. Today I have found a piece that was originally written 5.5 years ago. The concept still totally applies today. And yes, it has helped motivate and inspire me to get my fingers tapping and start again addressing my writing. It's a win-win for me and my blog.

Let's Call It What It Is

The other day I saw a Twitter repost on my cousin’s story on Instagram:

“They let Magic Johnson play basketball with FULL BLOWN HIV but won’t let Kyrie Irving play because he won’t get a COVID shot.” – Laverne Spicer

Let’s break this down:

FACT:  You cannot transmit HIV through a cough or a sneeze.

FACT:  HIV is NOT an airborne virus.

FACT:  HIV cannot be passed person to person through breath.

FACT:  COVID-19 is an airborne virus that can be transmitted through air vapors from person to person.

FACT:  A person with COVID-19 can infect someone else through a cough or a sneeze.

This means that there was virtually no way that Magic Johnson was going to infect anyone with HIV on the basketball court. The person most at risk of a health concern was Magic Johnson himself, with his compromised immune system.

Now let’s focus on the real issue here. Although I disagree with his choice, I respect Kyrie Irving’s right to not want to get vaccinated against COVID-19.  But the COVID virus, the vaccine and his rights and or choices are not the issue here. The issue is that once again, Kyrie Irving is not willing to do the job that he is paid millions of dollars to do:  play basketball! This is another season of Kyrie Irving coming out to show us that he really doesn’t want to play basketball anymore. It’s time that Kyrie just stopped playing the one game he does engage in with his team, his coaches, the owners and the fans:  pretending he still wants to play professional basketball.

Last season he behaved like a fifth grader on a new travel team. And that is a clear insult to fifth graders, because both of my daughters played travel basketball in the fifth grade and they were never allowed to just not show up at a game. He chose not to play a game last year, and didn’t even call his coach. He informed his fellow players, but not his coach. I’m sure the “Hey, don’t pass me the ball tonight, ‘cause…I won’t be there,” might have felt like the responsible thing he could do for his teammates at the time, but what grown-ass adult doesn’t tell their boss they’re not showing up for work?

This came after a disappointing season with the Celtics where he was unable to be a team player, both on and off the court. He walked off the court before the game against the Milwaukee Bucks was officially over. Before the season began he declined to be photographed for the cover of Sports Illustrated with Gordon Hayward and Al Horford, citing his indifference to not single out individual players as more important than the total team. Guess what Kyrie, you managed to single yourself out on that one anyway.

So let’s not pretend this latest controversy is about the COVID virus and his right to not get the shot. This is just another Kyrie Irving tactic to draw attention to himself that he wants us to believe is about something else other than what it is about. Even after his Instagram Live video, where he stated that he does want to continue to play basketball, I have my doubts. Outside of injuries – which he has had many, as a lot of players do – Kyrie has still managed to make his time off the court more memorable than his time on the court. We don’t keep talking about the number of points Kyrie can put up, or how many assists he racked up. His skills were once admirable, but his spirit is what has waned. And unfortunately for Kyrie, he is less entertaining and lovable as Kyrie being Kyrie, than Manny was being Manny.

If Kyrie wants to paint, or make music, climb Mount Everest, learn carpentry, volunteer for a food pantry or Habitat for Humanity, or play video games, sleep in late, travel the world, or go work in a mine, coach, teach or anything else, then he should do so. Life is too short to be doing something that doesn’t bring you joy. He should be man enough to stand up and say, “I don’t want to do this anymore.”

I hope that Kyrie finds his way in one direction or the other. I won’t fault him either way. When he was on the court and playing as a team player, he was fun to watch. Now I would much rather say goodbye to Kyrie and wish him well in his next endeavor than continue to be frustrated by his lack of enthusiasm for the game he claims he wants to keep playing. His attitude is disappointing. His refusal to play is irritating.

Learning More About 9/11

Tomorrow is the 20^th anniversary of the September 11^th terrorist attack on the US. I’m sure there will be stories all over the news today and tomorrow, reminding us of what happened in 2001. We will hear over and over again, “We will never forget.” Right now I’m more interested in what we don’t know.

Yesterday I read an email that addressed this very issue. The CEO of a life-coaching school put out her newsletter with two stories from 9/11 that I never heard before. The largest marine evacuation in history took place that day after the US Coast Guard put out an open alert to all water vessels to help move people out of New York City and into New Jersey, to safety. Ferries and personal boats answered the call. For the remainder of the day they transported people out of the city. The estimate is that half a million people were assisted that day after the bridges and tunnels were shut down and the city became locked in panic, fear, and destruction.

In the small town of 10,000 in Gander, Canada, a community came together to host 6,759 strangers. The passengers and crews of 38 jumbo jets and 4 military flights were diverted to Gander to land when the airways into the United States were shut down. For security reasons, most of the people on those planes sat on the aircrafts for 24 hours waiting for information and approval to exit. Then, for the next five days, the residents of Gander put them up in hotels and in their homes, providing shelter, food and clothes for the stranded, before they could re-board their flights and continue on their journeys.

I am positive that there are other stories out there like these. There was s/heroism that day in New York, Washington DC, Virginia and Pennsylvania. Now we know there were acts of selflessness, empathy, and kindness in areas where the tragedy was not actually happening, but people were being affected. It had never occurred to me until yesterday to think about the other ways in which this country and our neighbors came together on that day. You don’t know what you don’t know.

I remember where I was and what I was doing on September 11, 2001. I was scheduled to go in to work later that day at Framingham State (College) University for a training session of my student tour guides. As I enjoyed the morning at home with my one year old son, I was literally doing airplane rides with him on the family room floor as I watched The Today Show. I already knew that the first plane had crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in Manhattan. As Jake’s belly balanced on the soles of my feet, his tiny hands in mine, I turned my head towards the TV just in time to see the second airplane crash into the South Tower. I remember hearing Matt Lauer get flustered as he tried to explain to the viewers what we were all seeing live. It was still being assumed that there was an error or issue with air traffic control. Within the next several minutes the whole country would know that we were indeed, under attack.

I know I will never forget. But this year I am going to do a little research and see if I can find some other stories about 9/11. I know what I know, and I also want to know what I don’t know. And then I want to remember that, too.

Dress Code

Wednesday night is date night with Ed. We started this new tradition in our lives in October 2020. Except for three separate weeks when we rescheduled due to a family situation and then couldn’t keep the date for the week, and one week when Ed was out of town, we have managed to keep our commitment to each other week after week.

I put a lot of effort into my wardrobe for date night. I like to look good for myself, but also for Ed. Maybe even more for Ed. I know there are some feminists out there that would like to call me on that, but I don’t have a problem wanting to be physically attractive for my husband, especially during the times that we have devoted to just the two of us.

Date night for me is a series of events. First we decide where we will go and then I decide on an appropriate outfit. It’s about enjoying the feel of that outfit as it puts me in a psychological frame of mind to focus on my marriage, and it’s about the actual time I spend connecting with my husband. Some people dress for success. I dress for date night.

Last week as we were seated at our table at The Sole Proprietor in Worcester, I lamented to Ed.

“Why doesn’t anyone dress for dinner anymore?” My complaint was met with a swift, “I’m sorry I didn’t put on more than a sweater.”

“Not you,” I acquiesced. “You look nice:  pants, a sweater, and shoes.” Then I discreetly nodded my head in the direction of at least three tables near us.

“I mean the people in jeans, sweats and sneakers. Dirty sneakers,” I sneered.

Ed just looked at me with his “You poor, neurotic soul. I hope you find your way out of this anxiety-inducing situation because it really doesn’t make a difference to me” face.

So I quickly relaxed. I took note of myself. I put myself in check.

“Well, I’m going to continue to dress for dinner,” I stated proudly. “Because it’s what I like to do. I like to get dressed up to go out and I’m going to keep doing it.”

“There you go!” Ed smiled.

So how come other people don’t dress to go out anymore?

When I was growing up we didn’t go out to dinner often. It was a rare outing that was mostly reserved for special occasions. Occasionally there was a random dinner outing, and then it was even more special. I would think, "It’s not Mother’s Day, Father’s Day or someone’s birthday, and we get to order from a menu that isn’t printed in fluorescent lights hung up on the wall above the fry-o-later? Whoo-hoo! Let’s get dressed!"

My parents made us dress for dinner. We never went to a restaurant in jeans, shorts, dirty sneakers or anything that wasn’t considered “dressy” or appropriate to wear to a wedding. Going out to eat with my parents when we were in elementary school meant wearing a dress or a skirt and top, tights, and shoes. In high school we were allowed to wear nice “slacks,” as my mom called them, but still no sneakers. Shoes. Un-scuffed, shoes. Sometimes it meant borrowing something from my sisters, or even my mom, to find an outfit worthy of dining out. But there was never an allowance for an inappropriate outfit.

Similarly, my grandparents impressed upon us the need to dress appropriately when we were out in public. My grandmother believed in dressing “smartly” and the outfit you wore when you left the house made an impression upon others and told people something about you. She believed that you dressed for dinner and for travel. My grandmother made me an outfit specifically for my first flight on an airplane. I was ten years old, flying to California with her and my grandfather to visit family. She made me a denim wrap-around skirt and a buttery-yellow, short sleeve shirt. She bought me brand new sandals and I also picked out my first pocket book. (My mom was cleaning out closets last fall during Covid and found my old purse. It was finally time to put it in the trash.) My grandmother didn’t believe that it was appropriate for people to dress casually on an airplane. She believed that people should take pride in their wardrobe as they headed off to places away from home. She was quick to point out the matching track suits of several couples who boarded our plane out of New York, ensuring that I knew just what she meant when she said some things were not meant to be worn by a respectable traveler.

I love deciding on a fun outfit for a ride on an airplane, especially if I am travelling with Ed. It helps to spur my excitement for long hours seated on a scratchy, germ-infested woolen seat cover. I like knowing that when I disembark from the aircraft that I am ready to go:  to lunch or dinner, to the bar for cocktails, or straight to an event. What I choose to wear on an airplane, or even a car-ride to a fun destination, helps keep my mind focused on the activities ahead.

Studies have shown that work-from-home people are more efficient, focused and productive if they change out of their pajamas before heading to their home-office or kitchen table. At first it may seem really cool to have an extra hour of sleep. Some feel fortunate to roll out of bed and not have to shower and stress about an outfit. But over time, that relaxed frame of mind is a detriment to concentration, motivation, and accomplishment. To “Dress for Success” applies whether you leave the house or not.

Your wardrobe isn’t just about the big events of your life. It isn’t just about the weddings, anniversaries, milestone birthdays, engagements and client-building meetings. Your wardrobe is a reflection of you and it helps spark the frame of mind that you want – or need – in any given situation. What you wear catapults you to your jumping off point of every event in which you engage.

So dress for success. And dinner. And travel. Dress like you mean business, even when your business is all about 100% fun, love and filling your belly.

I fell off of my own wagon...twice

I just arrived here today to post something I wrote the other day. I knew I hadn't been here in a while, so I was surprised to see my last post. I wasn't surprised about the date and that it's been six months since I posted to my blog. I have had several years when I posted multiple pieces and then disappeared for a long time. Instead, I was surprised that my last post was about challenging myself to write shorter posts. Until I had read it all the way through, I didn't even remember writing that or posting it.

The irony here is that as I edited my most recent post, I was a little concerned about its length. I really do struggle to put thoughts out there that are short, sweet and to the point. I really do not do Reader's Digest! 😑

The post that will follow after this one is just over 1,000 words. It would be a good exercise for me to post pieces closer to the 500-750 word count. It would also be beneficial to those that check in now and then to read my words. Shorter pieces would be more blog-friendly.

Wish me luck. For both our sakes.

Word Challenge

I joke a lot that “I don’t do Readers’ Digest” well. If you are not familiar with “Readers’ Digest” then you won’t understand the correlation that I am trying to make. For those of you smitten with the tiny, square magazine filled with quick and easy real-life tales of s/heroism, drama and comedy, as well as the basics of health, nutrition, wellness and finances whittled down into a few pages, scattered with some witty humor and cute cartoons on several pages, you hopefully understand what I am trying to say about myself:  I may be short in stature, but my stories are usually long and detailed, not abridged and edited for quick review. I like words and I like to use a lot of them.

So I am going to challenge myself to put out some quicker, shorter bursts of musings and creativity. My goal is to write something in these next few posts that will challenge my verboseness, confining myself to many fewer words than I normally allow. I’m not even sure what I will be writing about, but we can both be assured that it will be something I know, that moves me to grab a pen in the middle of the night and scribble on the pads of paper on my nightstand, there for that “emergency,” or to tap away at this keyboard. I’m curious if I can feel just as passionate in fewer words.

My first goal was 250 words. Done.