Something I love about moving to a new town is getting to discover all of the hidden treasures here. I have never been much of a shopper ~ haven’t been in a mall since something like 2005 ~ but this is not your usual town. There are no chain stores or restaurants within the city limits. I mean, none. And not many at all until you get to Ventura.

What is here is an eclectic and unique mix of art galleries, a couple of natural food stores, a fair share of metaphysical shops (I just discovered my new favorite, Soul Centered), a number of fantastic restaurants and a farmer’s market every Sunday morning. I am in sheer orgasmic bliss over the number of fantastic restaurants, the yoga classes, the spiritual centers, the spas. I cook daily with my sea salts and olive oil and shower with, well, sea salts and olive oil. You can’t get too much of a good thing.

But what really has my heart are the thrift stores, coffee houses and Bart’s Books, the world’s greatest outdoor bookstore. It’s almost like someone designed a town just for me, where I can spend the next few months of my life taste-testing coffee and homemade desserts, searching for new old junk, and cozying up in a bookstore that is as welcoming as your old worn bathrobe and slippers after a long day.

All this without the hassle of traffic and the claustrophobia of a mall. I may just stay awhile.

©2010 the orange chair. All Rights Reserved.

Retirement? Are you kidding me?

I’ve had no less than 43 jobs in my 45 years of life.

I can’t really even begin to think about something as conventional as retirement.

I’ve always felt that a job should be synonymous with life’s purpose.

Only I haven’t figured out that purpose yet.

Figuring Out.

That has been my career.

Researching, excavating, discovering.

What brings me joy? Fulfills my passion? And pays my bills all at the same time?

I’m so much closer to knowing that now than I ever was before.

Which is good, because time is running out.

So maybe retirement is a feasible concept after all.

Irregardless, let’s pretend.

Retirement would be like, job number 45 or 46.

I’ll own a small shop.

Maybe a restaurant, maybe a storefront that sells chocolate and wine and music and coffee.

Something nurturing.

Off the back of the store will be a yoga studio.

On every wall of the shop will be space to hang photography and other creative work by local artists.

Exactly where local is, is yet to be determined.

Just one more thing I’m working to figure out.

©2010 the orange chair. All Rights Reserved.

Exactly two months ago today I landed in LA, and exactly one month ago today, I left LA. Happy anniversary to me.

Before I’d even given notice at work, informed the landlord I was moving, or packed the first box, I told myself that I’d look at this as a sort of experiment, that nothing needs to be taken too seriously and that there are no right or wrong choices here. All I knew then was that I was certain I had to move back to Los Angeles.

Well, right now I can say with certainty that I can’t say a damn thing with certainty. LA was the plan, the obsession, for the past 16 years and now here I am, plopped 80 miles north in a small Southern California town nestled in the mountains at the base of the Los Padres National Forest where I came knowing pretty much exactly no one.

Instead of falling asleep to the sound of helicopters, buses and late night neighbors, I crack the window so I can hear owls, and frogs, and coyotes. Instead of fulfilling an obsession that’s as old as most of my friends’ children, (and just as nurtured through the years I might add) I’ve somehow veered off course toward something that is a little bit more out of my control than I am used to acknowledging.

And you know what? I think I like it. I’ve tried so hard for so long to control things, to keep them in order, to put them where I want them to be, and it really hasn’t worked very well. Because I’m increasingly of the belief that we are spiritual beings here on earth to have a human experience ~ not the other way around, I’ve decided to tweak the experiment  ~ sort of hand the reins over and give in to this natural flow. I’m going to continue to watch as one road leads to another, leads to another, leads to another . . .  and see where it goes.

It’s a bit of a different mindset for me because it’s the first time that my heart and my soul have been a little at odds: my heart misses the ease of meeting people in LA, the feeling that I’m comfortable in my own skin there, the idea that LA is where I belong. At times I want to bolt. My soul, on the other hand, keeps whispering, no. Stay here. You will see. When you know about the history and beliefs of this valley, it’s not hard to believe that in some psychic sense, I’ve come home.

It’s not all been easy, though I am finding it difficult explain. What I can say is this: There is an undercurrent of energy that runs through me like a river, and if I have to name, it, I call it fear. I am fearful. I have felt it for years. And it has held me back. And I have totally screwed up.

I’ve lived in fear’s house, worn its clothes, slept in its bed, and raised its babies. I’ve drunk it, eaten it, bathed in its waters, soaked in its rays, and buried myself in its soil. I realized yesterday just how easy it has been to let it manipulate me. I realized today just how well I’ve been able to use it to protect myself. From what?

From LIFE.

I know full well that you can’t live out loud if you’re scared to live, and I don’t mean moving across country and taking risks and being independent. Those are important too, but what I’m talking about is being courageous enough to stop all the psychic, intellectual and physical movement and really be in the moment with yourself  ~ just yourself . . . no food, no alcohol, no blankie, no exercise, no work. No excuses. Alone. In the moment. Psychically raw, spiritually naked. And like it.

And from there, to be in the moment with someone else.

For me, doing that means giving up some ghosts, so to speak. It means I’ve got to finally quite waiting for the other shoe to drop, I’ve got to allow myself to be vulnerable and unguarded, I’ve got to forget what I learned as a kid over 40 years ago ~ that nothing is permanent ~ and embrace people into my life as though they will be there forever, fate be damned.

Because if I don’t, I’ll keep them just far enough away that I’ll continue to live as though I am alone.

And while I can’t say much right now, I can finally say one thing with certainty.

I no longer want that.

©2010 the orange chair. All Rights Reserved.

Pretty much every conscious effort I have made to draft something funny, silly or lighthearted comes out having some profound meaning (or implied, at least, if I sort of miss the mark).  So here’s another go. And if you don’t think it funny, that’s ok, because you surely won’t think it profound.

Three things you probably don’t know about me:

1. My first waterskiing venture resulted in unplanned public skinny-dipping. Numerous failed attempts to get up on the skis, my legs are tired. Last try, I awkwardly jump out of the boat and graze the metal ladder ~ with my crotch. One piece bathing suit, slices neatly from left side of hoo-hoo to right, puddles around my neck as I, shy 18-year-old that I am, swim over to grab the handle like I think I’m gonna really do this. Stuck between a rope and a wet place, I have no choice but to admit to my boyfriend, his best friend, and his best friend’s girlfriend and parents, that I am, indeed, butt-naked in the water.
2. I missed the Grand Canyon. LA move 1996 started off on the northern route. After stopping to visit my friend in Grand Junction and realizing she wasn’t home (lesson: call first!) we proceeded to detour down through Colorado to new Arizona specifically to see the Grand Canyon. Fires on the North Rim resulted in a long but nightmarishly exciting drive around the Canyon as the flames, visible miles away in the dark wilderness night, seemed to be coming straight from hell. Next morning: Left Cliff Dwellers Lodge, drove to convenience store at intersection of two 2-lane highways, and bought lunch. Left convenience store, turned left. Drove. And drove. And drove. And hit Interstate 40. Are you kidding me? The Grand Canyon is now 50 miles behind us. I’ve never had the best sense of direction, or obviously, distance, either. But it was one of the best laughs of my life.
3. I have peed my pants on the streets of LA. Twice. Take one incredibly weak bladder and place it in a city that does not believe in public restrooms in its parks and it is a no-brain recipe for disaster. 2005. Boot camp class in Mandeville Canyon. Absolutely breathtaking views of the Pacific Ocean and LA. One of the reasons I love this city. But running and kicking ass on hills for over an hour leaves my bladder like an overfilled water balloon, and this is Brentwood and there are no … NO… restrooms or even fast food places located between that canyon and the 10. All the positive mental imagery in the world cannot stop that glass from appearing too full.  And the pain, oh my god, the pain. I almost made it but for that burning, cramping pain. I had a black sweatshirt in the car. One hand on the wheel, one shoving that sweatshirt under my toosh. The handle by then turned so tightly in the off position I thought my bladder had died altogether until . . . oh, thank you, thank you thank you. I cannot believe I am peeing on an LA freeway. Oh thank you thank you, thankyou thankyouhthankyouthankyou. Roommate: How was class? Me, running through to bathroom shower:  It was great! I peed my pants!

You would think I’d learn. But I drink coffee in the morning and water when I hike and flash forward 5 years, neither LA nor I has changed all that much. I do now know that Petco and Trader Joe’s have restrooms. Runyon Canyon, however, does not. Tennis courts, walking trails, water fountains. No porta-potty. I walked the dogs. I walked me. I realized I had done it again and there was no way I was gonna make it to Trader Joe’s or Petco or even The Beanery on Sunset. You cannot pee in the bushes at Runyon ~ the entire trail is comprised of hills and switchbacks so anyone at anytime has a clear 360 view. I mean, you could, but. . . . better to sit in your car and grab the thrift store fleece you bought as a snow coat for your dog on the way out here. Yes. I did. Again. Only this time, I wasn’t about to pee my pants, too, because I had errands to run and a long way to go home. Thankfully I was wearing a long shirt so I could cop a squat, so to speak, on the front seat and still smile pleasantly at the hikers and workmen passing by.

Anybody see a restroom down there?

©2010 the orange chair. All Rights Reserved.

©2010 the orange chair. All Rights Reserved.

Today I am just not feelin’ the love.

Nothing major in the overall scheme of life. Of that I am aware.

Just a lot of little things that add up to a huge desire to bag it and go back to bed.

I shouldn’t be surprised that I found these on my morning walk.

Surely someone is trying to tell me something.

©2010 the orange chair. All Rights Reserved.

Tonight’s full moon is the Gathering Moon.

Time to celebrate all we have accomplished.

Set intentions for the coming spring.

And recognize our own personal achievements and advancements.

This is good for me.

Because I find too often that my own inner guide still bends to the other, my own worst critic.

Time for that to stop.

The bitch needs to go.

Surrounded by mountains and sky and hoot owls and coyotes, I think I know, maybe, why I am here.

I thought the big city landscape was the territory I needed to brave.

Survive that, conquer that, and I am whole.

I thought.

Turns out it is the still uncharted territory inside that calls to be explored.

©2010 the orange chair. All Rights Reserved.

Front Porch of Piney Hill B&B

Way back when, in about 1969 or so, my Cousin Wiley and I went to play in the woods and he got us lost. He was older and he was in charge, so yes, by default, he got us lost. We were missing most of the day and my mom had her friends and the local police out looking for us. Toward the end of the afternoon, we found our own way home and sat on the porch waiting for everyone else to come back from their search. I think it was my younger sister, Janet’s, birthday. I know we had hot dogs for a late lunch, because I’ll never forget how good that pig-face-cow-bowels-lips-butt-and-other-uck tasted on that Wonder Bread bun. Needless to say it was the last time I set out for the wilderness with Cousin Wiley.

Sitting in the wilderness with him is a different story. Wiley and his partner Hank own and manage one of the top B&B’s in Virginia. Piney Hill Bed & Breakfast sits nestled between Skyline Drive and Massanutten. The wraparound porch is the place to sit for spectacular views of both. I could go on and on about their place, but I’d sound biased because he’s family, and there are so many great reviews out there that do a fine job of saying all that.

What matters to me is how being there makes me feel. When I cancelled my 2008 move to LA at the last minute, I made two phone calls, one to the friend I was not coming to work with, and one to Wiley and Hank. I needed to get away from everything that had brought me to making that decision and everyone who knew me and step back to reassess where I would go from there. I arrived at their place in a heap of exhausted tears, and within 10 minutes was sitting around the kitchen table hanging with my innkeepers and a bunch of other guys I’d never met. Wiley got tickled about something he’d said and couldn’t stop giggling and before long the lot of us were swept away into that uncontrollable laughter. That’s just the kind of guy he is ~ down to earth, no pretense, real, and with a sense of humor that reflects his outlook on life. I like to think I’m like him, but I don’t know. He comes by it all so naturally. Hank, as the author of this Sunday’s AssociatedContent.com Travel article says, is a riot. He’s also a fantastic cook and well, just a love. I know the lawnmower story is true as I have seen him on it and have photos as proof.

Real was what I needed when I stepped off my own planned course of reality and flipped it inside itself. Real. Comfortable. Accepting. Safe. Cared for. Yes, this, from the little boy who got us lost in the woods and then threatened to leave me there when I cried. I yearn to be there still when I am feeling lost or lonely or like the world is too big or too mean. To be where laughter sits on the other side of the table and to hear the summer sounds of the country: crickets, cicadas, frogs blending together in the darkness of a land illuminated only by the fireflies that glow throughout the night.

Hank and me and Wiley

Piney Hill Haven

Lazy Susans at Piney Hill B&B

Morning Coffee with the Cows

©2010 the orange chair. All Rights Reserved.

SuziCate, thank you! It has been a huge gift just watching your blog and writing blossom over this past year. Because of you, I’ve been compelled to get out of my own pages and into everyone else’s and it’s opened up a whole new world of fellow writers, bloggers and friends. That’s pretty good for someone who moved to a town where she basically knows – um – nobody – and realized yesterday that the only person she could list on her yoga class emergency contact sheet was her landlord, don’t you think!? (My landlord is awesome, by the way!)

I’ll get into why I write and how it all started at another time. For now, I want to pass along the Best Blog Award to the five writers listed below. I’m just starting to move though the labyrinth of creative, funny, serious, mundane, thoughtful and consistently passionate bunch of writers out there. These are 5 I’ve grown to love.

Becky Blanton at BeckyBlanton.com. This woman rocks. She’s currently living out of her van, traveling across country with her Rottie to interview people for her latest book project. Becky sees a story in every person she meets and she meets every type of person imaginable. Her desire to live free from the constraints of the 4 walls and a desk and her ability to convey the universal oneness that we all share keeps me coming back again and again.

Dlloyd at 20milesfromnowhere. New to the blogging world but oh my GOD what a talented writer and artist. His comment on my blog, Definitely Someday, Just Not Today, in regards to all the tears I was shedding that day, ahh, wow, hand me another tissue. Dude has insight, humor and eloquence. Please write more.

Genie Alisa at . . . in a Bottle. Aside from the fact that if it weren’t for her I probably wouldn’t be blogging at all, GenieAlisa has the ability to write about her crotch mishaps and other bodily experiences while pregnant and not bat an eyelash.  She has served as entertainment, sounding board and encouragement as I get braver at throwing whatever it is out there. The Living Out Loud Project is worthy of an award all its own for the barriers and inhibitions and pigeon-holes it sweeps away on a monthly basis.

Jimmy at Just My Opinion. A writer with true Southern style and a knack for tellin’ it like it is, (at least in his opinion), Jimmy is the breath of Southern sunshine in my new So Cal digs. He’s like a cool glass of lemonade on a hot summer day.

Rachel from Crunchy Turtle describes herself as a “crunchy aka hippy-type individual” and yes, she’s another Southerner. I am not trying to be biased, really. But her blog covers a range of topics and interests, and in particular I enjoy her posts on paganism and her relationship to nature and the universe. It speaks to my hippy-dippy side, which is starting, I happily think, to comfortably overtake the rest of me. I also love her food and travel entries, and guess what? I found her through the aforementioned Living Out Loud project.

©2010 the orange chair. All Rights Reserved.

Back in Virginia Beach, Daisy had a habit of sitting on the her end table and looking out the window.  She’d watch the birds, the squirrels and the neighbors come and go, but mostly she’d sit at her perch and wait for me.

Daisy knows that when I tell her something, I mean it. So when I tell her that I’m leaving, but I’ll be back, she knows I’m true to my word.

She knows she can trust me.

Sure, she’s just a dog, but it’s important to me that my dogs, as well as my friends, know where they stand with me. If I say I’m going to do something, I will do it. If I find I can’t do it, I will tell you.

Why? Because the bottom line is this ~ I’ve learned I have to live in a way that allows me to look in the mirror at myself and like who I see.

Each step I take through life lands me squarely where I place my feet. If my legs are shaky and my footing is weak, then I can’t stand rooted within myself and I surely won’t give much grounding to you.

Better that I tell you I’m slipping than to leave you sitting in the window, waiting. Old dog or old friend, it’s all the same.

So when I hold out my hand to you, or make a promise to you, and I tell you that you can trust me, you can.

The question is, can you trust yourself?

©2010 the orange chair. All Rights Reserved.

Yesterday I felt compelled to spend the better part of a beautiful Saturday washing the hardwood floors and windows, dusting mini blinds, sweeping the deck and doing laundry. Today I think my spirit is doing a bit of cobweb clearing too. I’ve pretty much given in to a silly little crying jag that started in a dream and shows no signs of stopping anytime soon. In the center of my chest is a stabbing feeling ~ like something is gone and is ripping my heart out with it. A couple of times it’s had me doubled over, gut-wrenching, wracked, a good kind of cry. From down deep somewhere, whatever has left or is on its way out is leaving because the time has come for it to go.

A friend asked me over coffee a few days ago what I wanted to do with my photography now that I’m in Southern California. The answer I gave is that I really don’t know. As an artist or creator or whatever, shouldn’t I have an answer for that? It would be sweet to be in a gallery or two, and heck, I’d love to sell more of my prints online, but I’m not sure those two things alone completely fuel the fire. I once didn’t take a job as a photographer’s assistant because the woman told me she wasn’t it in to make “pretty pictures” and did it strictly for the money. Eh, I kinda need more than that.

His simple and honest question haunts me. There is more to my answer than that I just don’t know. The truth is, I’m kinda winging it right now. I mean, I did move to LA, and then Ojai, more on a whim than a plan, right? I’m figuring out stuff all the time. I don’t know exactly where I’m going with this but I do know that I don’t need to beat myself up for not having it all laid out on paper just yet. Something is swirling around and taking shape and building form and in its present stages already is something I could not have come up with on my own. So whatever’s going on inside today, this little bit of cleansing and making space, I’m going to just go with it.

So no big blog today, ok? Just a really cool little ditty that’s my new fav song from the all too awesome Rob Thomas. Now excuse me, because this song today, makes me wanna cry.

©2010 the orange chair. All Rights Reserved.

Girl, I need your help!

I pet a vicious dog . . . and it turned and bit me. I want an apology!

I drove my car through flood waters . . . and it up and sank! I want an apology!

I drank a bottle of wine . . . and I got a HANGOVER! I want an APOLOGY!

I beat my head up against the wall! And it got bruised! I want an apology!

I slept with a married man and he didn’t leave his wife for me  . . .

I want an apology!

I left my good sense at the door and it went home without me. I want an apology.

I played with fire . . . and, uh-huh! I got burned!

I want an apology.

Call me girlfriend ~ we can get on TV!

(For ya’ll that don’t live in LA, you may not understand. Here is something for you!)

©2010 the orange chair. All Rights Reserved.

It’s still very much my goal to be like my dear friend SuziCate and post a blog a day. So far, I’ve not done well with that.

Right now I’m blaming it on the fact that it’s all I can do to keep my head above water while getting settled into a new location. It seems like everything lately has been about navigating my way around town, learning who’s who, working to earn the living, and taking the dogs out for walks and to pee while keeping one vigilant eye on the ever-threatening evil coyotes.

Add to that an hour of yoga and walking a day ~ cuz that’s for the sanity and the gut ~ and you start to get the picture, and even those are rushed. There’s just been no good quality MeTime for sitting down and writing a blog. Because unfortunately I can’t yet pop them out and hit “publish” without at least a couple of hours of time invested. This is my heart and soul here, after all.

I’m trying to be kind to myself and not beat my own head with a stick for all the days I’ve missed and all the great ideas I’ve let slip away, ~ not to mention all the blogs I haven’t taken the time to read ~ but sometimes I feel like I’m running uphill against my own personal stopwatch and I can practically hear the seconds ticking away. Life . tick . Is . tick . Going . tick . By . tick . And .  tick . You . tick . Are . tick .  Missing . tick . It.

What suffers along with my good nature and my attitude tends to be the things I love most. Shooting pictures, writing, reading, meditating. Hell, just sitting on the back deck with a cup of coffee and a breeze. In sort, all the things that feed and fuel my soul. All the things that are creative. You may not think that plopping your butt on the patio is creative, but you’d be surprised at what runs through my head in those moments of downtime.

Creative energy. I need that. Like a fish needs water and a dog needs a bone, I need to have my hands and my being immersed in those creative juices. When they aren’t flowing, this baby withers.

Due to car space, very few books made the trip to LA with me. Most ended up going to friends or donated. So it took me by surprise this morning when my eye fell on a book I’d bought when I came to LA on vacation back in 2004. Jill Murphy Long’s Permission to Play is a beautiful little book full of reminders on why and how to make time for this essential part of any creative and happy life.

Random flipping of pages landed me in the chapter called Creative Expression and a cool little entry called The Top Ten List for Creating. I’m gonna start right now with number one, and see about working my way up. During a particularly whiny bitch episode a couple of days ago, someone pointed out to me that photography is like my therapy. Well, I miss my camera, and I miss my blog, and I am coming back.

The Top Ten List for Creating
10. Learn something new.
9. Perfect a skill.
8. Play in colors.
7. Experiment with textures.
6. Savor the five senses.
5. Be in a happy mood.
4. Alleviate stress.
3. Create with your hands.
2. Develop commitment.
1. Smile more!

*As a footnote, the coyotes honestly haven’t been that bad. I’ve yet to see them, though I’ve made a habit of sitting at the window at dawn and dusk and listening to them come out to hunt. Their howls and yelps are bone-chilling and other worldly, especially at 1am, and I’m afraid I’ve created my own version of the BoogeyMan. So I read about coyote totems, and this is what I found:

If coyote has come into your life perhaps it is time to loosen up and have some fun. While coyote stands for a lot more than just a trickster, sometimes humor and fun are necessary in life when under a great deal of stress. Coyote will teach you how to embrace your inner child and have fun again like you did when you were a child. He will teach you how important it is not to only have fun, but to be able to laugh at yourself in the process. Individuals with coyote as a totem are in for a very fun ride so hold on tight, go with the flow, and enjoy the adventure.

©2010 the orange chair. All Rights Reserved.

I have always called LolliPop my little Mud Puppy. Just like Pearl was my Baked Potato, there’s no rhyme or reason for the name. Until now. Until Ojai.

Thrilled to have a yard again, she can’t just go out in the back and just do her business. Oh no. She’s got to climb up the hill behind the house and investigate every corner of the property, every single time she goes outside.

Dense in vegetation and ripe with the scent of coyote that pass in the early morning hours, there’s lots to entertain her. The dirt on the slope is more clay than dust, and because it’s rained several times in the past couple of weeks, right now it is a thick and slick and sticky paste.

Sometimes she calmly walks along the length of the ramp and plods back to the deck. More likely, though, she’ll take off from the top of the hill, ears and tongue flapping as she comes crashing down at top speed, energized, I like to think, by a sense of adventure. Freedom. Reckless abandon. Probably, she’s just having a damn good time.

She shuffles to the door, mud caked to her feet like sasquatch slippers. The first time she walked in, at 6:30 in the morning, I thought she’d stepped in poo. It took me by surprise and it took me 20 minutes to clean the muck from between her pads. Last night I pulled off the chunky clumps and stuck her little feet in the sink. This afternoon, I just carried a big bowl outside and plunked those paws, one at a time, in the warm water. Complimentary Puppy Paw Scrub and Drying Massage.

With all this trouble, it makes more sense to just take her outside on the leash and stand there with her while she pees, confined to one clean and pristine spot.

Invariably the rains will stop and the mud will dry. It is Southern California, after all.

She’s a country girl, and and she’s happy. She can run, and play. And breathe.

Think about it.

When was the last time you walked barefoot in the rain, jumped with both feet in puddles or bared your naked puppies to the mud?

©2010 the orange chair. All Rights Reserved.

The Living Out Loud project is designed to bring writers out of their box by writing about things that are either new, personal, uncomfortable ~ or all of the above. This month’s topic, way out of my comfort zone, is about my relationship with alcohol. The Living Out Loud project is a monthly writing exercise open to all writers with a willingness and desire to Live Out Loud.

While not quite the same volatile intensity as my past relationship with food, beer and wine and a little Crown Royal have been my teddy bear, my blankie, my pseudo-strength and my downfall at one time or another. I was pretty innocent and sheltered, and except for one can of beer down Party Road before school my senior year, I really wasn’t much of a drinking kid. So I have very few experiences to share.

I really don’t recall the first time I drank. It could have been with four friends on New Years’ Eve 1980, or it may have been the night of my first real “car date” several months later. The guy I was with brought out a bottle of sloe gin, drank enough to make himself sick, looked over at me and said, “I’ve gotta retch” and proceeded to puke his guts out the car door. I was so naive and so self-conscious that I went to school and told my best friend he’d called me names (as in, wretch) and gotten drunk because he didn’t enjoy the date.

I vaguely remember getting drunk at a party and spending the night at my best friend’s house so she could drive me home the next morning (though she can remember that better than me, of course) and I recall quite clearly my first encounter with grain alcohol in the form of Purple Passion the year after graduation: watching the world spin, getting sick, the hangover and headache that lasted for two days.

I’d like to say that never happened again but I’d be lying. During my 30s, the pace picked up a bit. Ironically it centered around my time as a personal trainer in our local gym. We had lots of parties and Margarita Wednesday and because I was in a funky relationship at the time, the gym people became my escape and my extended family. But my tolerance level is low: I’m short and small and there just isn’t much space for a glass or two of wine or a shot or two of liquor. So there isn’t much wiggle room between a few giggles and doing the stupid things. Yes, I’ve drunk and dialed, but that’s harmless enough if you can get past your own embarrasment and humiliation.

What I’m talking about are the judgment calls that have as their basis no judgment. For instance, driving home late at night, plastered on wine, with one hand on the wheel and one over an eye so you can see the road. I almost wiped out some poor guy that I recognized from the gym turning left at an intersection that way. I can’t recall which hand I used to roll down the window, wave and yell, “HEY! I know you!” Maybe funny at the time, but seriously. Seriously. I could have killed someone, if not myself. And I was an adult.

Along with a low tolerance lies the propensity within my family gene pool to turn to something other than our own good sense or innate spiritual perfection as a compass. It’s so easy to turn off the GPS of good sense after the good feeling starts to hit and it’s so easy to navigate the same course over and over and say you’ll learn the lesson next time. But that’s just plain bullshit. Fortunately I didn’t have to physically maim or murder another human being to realize that there needs to be some buffer between the booze and me. I was lucky enough to just lie to and majorly disappointed my best friend about something I’d done when tipsy.

The act itself was silly and innocent enough ~ sending an email to someone I’d professed to put behind me, waking up the next morning knowing that was a stupid thing to do, and throwing on the veil of denial that it ever happened. But while I wore the veil to hide from myself, I was also letting her think I’d passed a milestone, and we had numerous conversations over the next two weeks that, as she rightly pointed out, were based on circumstances that didn’t exist and were a waste of her time, energy, direction and friendship. I merely didn’t want to deal with myself in the mirror but honestly, that’s a pathetic excuse. Bottom line is, my relationships, whether they are with myself or another person, deserve nothing less than to be based on and balanced upon respect and trust and what’s real. If I can’t give that after all the work I like to think I’ve done, well then, I’m an idiot and I’m here to say it out loud.

She was honest and brutal and it was a kick in the gut I deserved and needed and it hit, square on, the target. Bulls eye. I never, ever again want to hear someone I love tell me that I hurt them because I chose to. What I choose is to pretty much consistently keep in touch with me, stay on solid ground, be in at least sober, if not intellectual, control, of my own choices. So while I do like a good glass of wine or a cocktail, I won’t be the life of the party or the one in the corner texting uncontrollably. Nope, I’ll be standing right there, glass in hand, cutting off the refills. I count because I’m accountable to me. And you’ll know right where I stand.

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