The Phoenix: Epicuriousmothering Rising

My great grandmother, her granddaughter and a beloved friend. Here's my confession:  Man, it's hard to be a woman. Really, those TED talks I listened to yesterday, two of them were a call to women to stand up and be strong leaders, executives, and scientists.  Be AMAZING!  Be everything.  You can do it! Only, even listening to those talks, I feel so tired.  It's so hard to do everything.  When I try, I mostly do a really crappy job at everything.   I remember so clearly my senior year having our two MALE teachers giving all these lectures to us women trying to empower us (bless their hearts) about how we can be anything we want and how we need to be more and better and BE SOMETHING!  You can be doctors, lawyers, mathematicians, and scientists! A girl next to me muttered, Ug, I hate science.  Why is it always science? That got me thinking . . .  I, of course, had to share my thoughts so I raised my hand a...

Sunlight through the trees lining the road to my beach . . . I did not, in fact, start to write anything today.  I woke up groggy and disorientated (why does this happen?) and was slow to start my day which involved some very lazy yoga and a lot of sweating (89 with 91% humidity on the porch).  Then late breakfast/lunch.  While I was sitting at the table on the porch reading Night Circus, the humidity and heat made me super dozy and I found myself literally nodding off.  I quickly napped before I had the 5 1/2 hour round trip to pick up my Papa from Orlando. I made it there and back safe and sound and honestly, driving on 95 from Stuart to Orlando is a smooth straight ride.  Heaven bless controversial TED talks (they get me going) for keeping me awake!  Not to mention a great visit hearing all about my dads travels in Panama on the way back.  So proud of him and that team for building literally a life saving bridge for those beautiful peop...

My beach . . . and that cloud . . . isn't it amazing? Half way through . . . and I feel like I am actually getting somewhere. I know that I don't want to be a yoga instructor (right now). I don't want to go back to school to teach high school (yet). I would love to teach college creative writing classes, but I haven't done anything about it (yet). I do feel like the Universe has something in store for me . . . I just need to be open and patient and willing and it will happen. And I 'm glad I haven't found a job or been obligated to too much because I could be here for ten days with my mama. And . . . I have a new novel hatching in my mind.  I am day dreaming it, sleeping it, eating it, and biking and running it.  I've decided that I will ask you all to help (if you want) and create another blog or something like it where you can read it and give feed back.  Even if no one reads it, at least I'll be creating it or feeling a wee bit of p...

Oh man, I'm tired. I want to tell you I slept well, but I didn't.  I was a wee bit worried about my mama and so sleep did not come until the wee hours of the morning and even then, it was far from restful.  I tried to do yoga but somehow always ended up in shavasana (corpse pose . . . flat on your back with your arms and legs relaxed) after every sun salutation (I only did two).  So I bowed to my body and just stayed there.  It felt wonderful. I went on my nightly bike ride but I seriously could barely peddle.  I just tooted along slow and steady and watched this huge bomb like cloud grow bigger and bigger in the east. It looks like a mushroom cloud doesn't it?  Maybe a little? I let my mind wonder and go where it would and over and over again, I thought back on my days at the beach and at the pool here.  Everywhere I go, people are mostly naked; old and young, fit and flabby, and they all seem, without a doubt, to me all gloriously beaut...

Pay no mind to the rusted handle bars . . . everything rusts here and plus, I'm pretty sure my dad found this bike on the side of the road . . . and yet, it's the bike everyone fights over.  Oy.  My mama is feeling sick and sad. It turns out, I feel very sad when my mama is sad.  Especially when she's feeling bad.  Today was literally 900 hours long.  I didn't want to leave her alone, so my errands to grab stuff to finish a lot of organizing didn't happen, but even so . . . I got a lot accomplished. Her linen closet got an overhaul (good bye old towels and rags and aprons and everything frayed) and organized.  My dad has taken over the dining room table as his study (which as I'm decluttering I've discovered is also a repository for my mothers stuff as well) so I'm working on that and the big credenza in her living room that's filled with old dishes and odds and ends.  Honestly, I think she won't recognize her house when I'm done.  ...

After posting last night, I pulled myself out of bed to actually take a shower (my feet were literally black and my hair was stringy), I wondered out and turned on the shower in the bathroom.  I was about to hop into the shower when I realized I'd left my towel in the bedroom.  I stumbled along the hallway when I noticed a strange looking little lumpy thing on the floor. It literally was not there three minutes before when I went to the bathroom.  I assumed it was . . . wait . . . I had just swept the floor.  There was NOTHING on the floor.  Nothing! What the heck  . . . I crouched down and looked closer only to have a long leggy thing stick out . . . What?! Then . . . I realized this sleeping lizard thing was one of those tree frogs.  I do not do well with any amphibians, but frogs scare the heck out of me (it's from our summer work gardening . . . there was this pond and the bull frogs--huge bull frogs--would leap at you and leap at each o...

I have spent the day decluttering, organizing, moving, and rearranging my mama's (and dad) house after 19 years of living in it.  I'm not sure my mother understood what it meant when I said I'd organize . . . because I've gone a bit crazy. But the result is beginning to show and I feel so happy about everything. One example . . . the pantry . . . tomorrow I will show the bedrooms and living room and closets . . .  Only, I still haven't showered and I was nasty sticky gross at 9am this morning . . . for reals, these Floridians are AMAZING. I was drenched!  And had to snap a selfie . .  This is me after . . . I look better than I felt (ick) How they can run, let alone walk, let alone breath in this weather is beyond me.  I was a soggy, nasty, sweaty, tomato face, ugly girl when I came back from my 5 mile run (ok, walk).  I thought I was going to DIE.  Literally.  I looked like I had just stepped out of shower . . . water was run...

Was I just writing about how sleep was not my friend? Well, it's my obsessed lover right now.  I seriously CAN'T stay awake.  I slept for eight hours straight (like drugged sleep) and seriously dragged myself out of bed after laying there for 30 minutes so I could wake up enough to drive my sister to the airport.  I was awake to drive her . . . but as soon as we got to church, my head was bobbing all over the place.  I just sunk down in the pew and let myself just drift off because there was no fighting it.  When we got home, we ate lunch and then my mother went off to take a nap and I thought . . . there's no way I could sleep more, so I went outside in the 89 degree humid porch and read on a blanket . . ..  Only, I dreamed I read because I was fast asleep.   I went to the bed and slept another three hours. Am I narcoleptic? Possibly.  It feels wonderful.  I just came back from a night walk around the neighborhood in the full mo...

Holy Hannah. Yesterday . . . a beautiful blur.  Got up at 4:50am after not sleeping, tried again to arrange it so that I could get to the reception, but no luck.  At all.  Took a deep breath and decided to accept that I couldn't change this situation. I ran 5.6 miles with John and our friend Sarah and talked about how INSANE this situation makes me, but how, in the long run, this is small.  There are much more things in the universe to worry about.  I can't tell you how comforting I found that run and conversation.  I felt like I could breath again. I threw my clothes, computer and a few other odds and ends in a bag and head off to the wedding . . . which was beautiful in every way.  Love was everywhere.  And joy.  And laughter . . . Me, the mama of the bride, and my dear friend Lynsie Pretty much everyone here is GORGEOUS! And then for an hour and a half, I got to help with the reception prep . . . oh, my heavens!  Th...