Last week, I got an email from a lady who finished writing a book about dance with a picture of me dancing in a wheelchair.  Two years ago, she asked me to submit any writings I had that she could put with the picture.…  She liked what I wrote. If it went into this book, it would be the first time I was ever published.  So she wanted me to see the finished product and we met last week.  The picture was lovely, and so is the book.  Meeting this writer was exciting.  She was very kind, but that writing I did was not in it.  It made sense as the writings in this book were more poetry than the kind of stuff I write but still, I was disappointed. So that was Monday. 

  I was certain I was destined for this next gig… Karen McCrocklin, hosts her own radio show on Hay House Radio… she is incredibly alive and funny and has great guests…She celebrates being gay and helps others come out…. She held a contest for a listener to interview her for an hour.  I couldn’t wait to enter.  She said she wasn’t sure how it would be done, but you get extra bonus points for calling in her show, so I called and got on.   She explains it would be random and her assistant would be handling it.  She said to send three questions that you will ask her.  I pondered this for a long time.  I asked what really moved her… what does she know for sure, and how did she learn to have such an open heart to everyone, not just the gay community…. After watching her on you tube and reading articles and interviews, she seemed like she was advocating for us all.  Not just the LGBT community.  I thought it would be an honor to talk with her.  I knew I could do this.  I get stage fright alot, but voice overs, radio, has been much easier for me. 

   There were over 200 entries and she announced the winners last week.  She decided last minute it would be two people.  It wasn’t me.  That was Wednesday.

   I feel like this is how life goes.  We can’t always get what we want but I was still bummed.  Then a facebook friend posts a video of Oprah talking about surrender and The Color Purple.  I heard this story a few times but this was more detailed.  It was great.  She said she had to let go of getting in that movie, even though it was all she wanted.  And she wanted to be happy for the person who got the role she auditioned for…When she finally got that, the moment she understood that concept, she got a phone call from Steven Spielberg to come into his office the next day and he heard she was on a fat farm.."If you lose a pound, you could lose this part."  Of course, she got the part...                     

     About 30 years ago, a friend was moving to Los Angeles to become an actor.   Many of my friends are actors.  I see them in movies or television, but this one got me.  I was happy for her but sad I wasn’t going.  I prayed long and hard about this.  The answer I got was to be as happy for her as if it were me, if not more so.  This wasn’t the answer that I wanted.  I swear, God answers all my prayers, and the answer is usually “NO.”  One thing I noticed was I wrote more last week.  Posted a couple of pieces on this blog.  “What do you want me to do?”  is usually the question I ask God…. Still working on that one..

  

  

 

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.....................................................

   About 32 years ago I was living in Athens Ohio and lying and saying I had already graduated from college.  I hadn’t.  But I was in town and working with a professor, writing comedy and making a demo reel to take to auditions when I left.  I was also working.  It was one of the most magical times in my life.  I decided since I was not in any classes to relax as much as I could.  I worked but it didn’t feel like work.  I was 23 and waitressing.  The restaurant was tiny and called “The Hobbit House.”  I loved it.  Once I got how to do things, it was very easy.  I had a table with 2 women at it.  It was a slow time in the day and they were the only ones in this restaurant.  I wondered how I could make this the most fun I could possibly have.  I don’t remember what I did or how I served, I just enjoyed it a lot.  The one woman smiled and said “Thank you, it was lovely.”, when she left.  Then the manager came up to me and he said, “What did you do?  They were so happy with the service.” 

  When we were making this demo reel in the spring, we were taping sketches that I and this professor had written featuring me.  We were working with the radio and television dept. and the graduate students in the theatre dept.  Things were not going well with the radio and television dept.  I did the same thing as when I waitressed.  I asked myself one evening as we were taping, how I could make it fun for myself.  I didn’t think about anything but that.  We did this sketch over and over and it was just me and one other actor.  I enjoyed it thoroughly.  After it was over, we went to a bar to discuss things.  One director sat down and immediately commented on my incredible patience.  She said she couldn’t believe how I kept the energy up with each take.  This was a woman who could not remember my name for 2 years.  It’s comical that anyone could think I had such patience.  I don’t consider myself patient. 

  In both of these instances, I didn’t worry about others, or care too much what anyone thought of me.  I simply took care of myself and the rest got done.

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

     When I was a kid, I walked to my elementary school very happy… I loved the rain… I loved the crossing guard… I loved new pencils… I loved my friends… I loved the teachers… They were sweet and smart and kind… I loved learning something new… I loved playing dodge ball… I loved the last day where the teachers surprised us with a trip to the Big and Little store for ice cream cones… I loved our principal…He even knew my name.  I loved his secretary.  She was bright and smart and called my mother at work once, to tell her my skirt ripped and I needed to go home to change clothes.  I loved lunch and the women that worked there.  I loved standing in line.   Then I got a little bit older and just got scared…. I could not figure out how to act with the other kids.  I wasn’t as popular…I didn’t have the right clothes… I did poorly in school and the teachers weren’t so nice anymore.  The librarians at the junior high seemed angrier than the amazing librarian I knew in elementary school…  that seemed unreal, she was so kind.  I remember her eyes lighting up when I brought  her daffodils from our garden.  I managed to graduate high school by the skin of my teeth.  Almost 40 years have gone by…

     I still live near my elementary school, and I love the rain… I love new pencils… I love my friends… I love learning something new.  I still go to the Big and Little store… only I buy a V-8 instead of ice cream.   I love lunch, especially with a friend or two.  I love the librarians that greet me kindly every time I walk in at our local library.  I love the lady at the grocery store who makes it her mission to tease me every time I walk in.  I love to sing.  I love to dance.  I love when my kitchen is clean…  Once you pass the “needing to impress” years, you love life again… You start to appreciate the same stuff from your childhood. You take less for granted because you know your days on this earth are numbered.  You set up better boundaries so the critical folk you thought you should put up with are out of your life.  You giggle at other’s imperfections because you know you have the same issues in one form or another… You have fun as a child doing everything….You get mad at your friends, then two minutes later, you walk hand in hand. 

TRUTH

    When I first broke my back in 1980, I thought all would be well… It took some time to realize that I had damaged the spinal cord and was paralyzed.  I could bend my legs in bed, but I wasn’t getting the picture.  I had a bag attached to me to urinate… but I still didn’t get it.  I had surgery about 6 days after it happened.  Then it took a few days to heal, and then they put me on a tilt table in therapy to sit up because I had been laying down for so many days.  Gradually they sat me up and would check my blood pressure in case I was about to pass out.  Then they gave me weights for my arms and exercises to strengthen my upper body.  Then finally, they stood me up in between parallel bars and I couldn’t feel the floor or move my legs at all.  I flipped out.. I cried for a few days.  I was so angry at the world.  Then slowly, I started to feel better.  They may have given me drugs for the depression, I don’t remember, but I realized that I would walk again.  Not only walk, but be a hundred percent healed.  I got very happy.  Just peaceful.  Everything was beautiful.  The walls in the hospital.  The wonderful people taking care of me.  Life was perfect.  After 10 weeks, my parents brought me home.  The 3 hour ride felt wonderful after being in the hospital so long.  It was November and the leaves on the trees were changing.  I told myself to remember this anytime I was sad.  It was an adjustment moving back in with my parents but still the peace I felt was great.  This feeling lasted about a year.  I was trying to figure out what changed.  Was it the rods in my back moving and sticking out of my back causing great pain?  I don’t mean, sticking out of my back through the skin, but two bumps in my back.  Was it my father’s anger that was constant?  I really don’t know but I wasn’t as happy.  I saw Martha Beck talking to Oprah last week about this bliss she felt after surgery and realized she could feel it all the time if she told the truth.  She wasn’t cheating on her taxes, it was more the small things like saying she was fine when she wasn’t.    Or just being honest with herself.  She said sometimes she didn’t want to work out at the gym, but really enjoyed roller blading and would do that instead.  I saw a friend yesterday.  I could tell she wasn’t doing great.  She said she was not that good and we chatted briefly.  I have no problem with this.  It makes her very human and approachable so why am I so fake sometimes?  I was at church about a year ago and said hi to someone and he said, “Can you smile?” I did but it was weird.  I went to visit people I used to work with and we all were giggling and I walked up to one supervisor and said “Hello.”, and asked how she was doing and she said, “Can you smile?”  All I wanted to say was, “Why is that so important to you?” Instead I smiled.   

  Maybe I was so peaceful in the hospital because I spent some time feeling all my feelings of hopelessness and despair with the thought of never walking again and the bliss "feeling" was just underneath.  I remember not caring what anyone thought of me as I had my "breakdown".  How freeing.