HOPE

     Last night I had a chance to dance.  The first time since I broke my hip.  I can tell my hip still needs to heal more and the surgeon said it would be a year before I am 100%.  While in the hospital back in November, I had some interesting encounters. I could hear one nurse in the hall talking when I first got there and every time she spoke she had a whistle to her voice.  I thought, "How hard that must be and she must have been made fun of sometimes."  After a few days, she was my nurse and she was fantastic.  I think nurses are angels sent from heaven and we don't always get it until we're in the hospital.  Or at least I didn't before I broke my back.  After a few days taking care of me, she talked a little about herself.  She talked about her son dying not too long ago, and I can't remember how but he was an adult.  She didn't cry while telling me the story.  He had the same name as mine.  Then she said that she got cancer around her jaw and so much of her mouth was cut that she had to learn to talk again.  She talked about the physical therapy that she had to endure.  She spoke so honestly about it all, that I couldn't even respond.  She also had such confidence in my recovery.  I was very frightened at that point, and she offered so much hope for me.  I have thought many times that hope isn't real.  It's wanting something to happen in the future, and you're never present.  But this hope, that she offered, gave me a little more peace, knowing I'd be completely healed.  And I will be... So last night I danced for the first time.  Oh, and as beautiful as this nurse was, as generous and open and wonderful as our encounter was, right as she was leaving my room she said, "Oh, and try not to be such a clutz."  Ya gotta laugh...

EASTER SUNDAY

     I am never quite clear on whether I am babying myself or really in as much pain as I think.  Monday and Tuesday of last week, I got a great deal done.  Personal stuff like making sure my meds were being sent to the right address.  Last time, they had the wrong address and I had no meds.  On Tuesday I completed as much as I could regarding getting work.  I then realized I hadn’t done my exercises and did them about 8:30 at night.  After my exercises for my hip, I walked from one end of the house to the other and was so excited.  I love walking outside, but this was much easier and so back and forth I went.  Suddenly I stopped myself.  So many times, I get so excited when I exercise that I overdo, so I stopped.   When I got up the next morning I was in great pain.  My back, nothing else.  I knew I went too far the night before.  The only thing that works in these “overdone” times is sleep.  The exhaustion is overwhelming and I sleep.  So Wednesday, I slept most of the day.  On Thursday I figured all was well, so I did a few things and quickly realized I was still in bad shape… and it went on.  It was maddening and I kept trying to think what I could do besides ice and stretching if possible and rest.  I felt like it was time so wasted and could I at least write.  So I sat at my computer and tried to write.  I found that exhausting and couldn’t concentrate.  I took a short drive, breathed and yes, I prayed.  I asked for some strength and mostly, some courage.  By Saturday, I was much better and took myself to a movie.  And then yesterday, it was gone.  I believe there are reasons for everything.  And there’s a lesson to be learned from the tough stuff in our lives.  I also believe that everybody has trials, not just me.  So, on Easter Sunday it was gone.  I think the gift in all this, is that delightful peaceful gentle feeling when the pain is lifted… That was my wonderful miraculous Easter gift. 

HELL HATH NO FURY.....

      I was in the 6^th grade.  He wasn’t the guy I REALLY liked but I convinced myself this was the man for me.  He sat in front of me and we exchanged notes.  I went too far with my notes.  In the 5^thgrade I wrote a note to Peter Celmer.  On the outside of it I wrote, “Please answer or someone’s heart will break.” It had a lot of hearts on it.  When he asked if I wrote it, I said “No.”  He ripped it up and was incredible relieved.  But this time I think it started with, “Who do you like?”  I believe he asked first.  This went on and on.  “Is there anything you don’t like about me?”, I wrote.. He showed it to Terry in front of him and she turned around and looked at me and said, “Christine!!!” He didn’t answer except with a “No”.  When I finally asked if he liked me, he wrote, “Yes.” all over the paper.  It looked like “Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.”   He pointed out that I needed to stop writing him notes as we were supposed to do our assignment.  I said to myself “This is love and more important than the ASSIGNMENT. " So, it was on.  I told my best friend at the time and I don’t know if it interested her very much.  He said he would call and over the weekend he did.  I told my parents and brothers about my boyfriend.  That was the best.  I got to tell them that this guy “LIKED ME”.   When he called he asked what I wanted to talk about and I said, “Have you read any good books lately?”  After this two minute phone chat, we hung up and I immediately called my friend.  Then the extent of our relationship was writing notes.   One girl who also liked him stood in front of me before we walked in the school one morning.  We had to stand in line until the teachers let us in.  She made fun of me from time to time.  Today she took my purse and went through it.  I didn’t stop her and acted like it didn’t bother me until she got to the compartment where the note was.  Those notes were gold.  We folded them in a way that made them look like a package in the shape of a triangle. It was what I sweated the night before, so I got the purse back before she saw it.She would have read it and showed it to everyone.  Dodged that bullet.  Around that time, the kids in our class changed the seating and the timid teacher let us.  We were in two semi circles.  The teacher could see everything we did with this set up. Almost everything. Everyone sat very close to one another.  My lover was further away.  And then it happened.  One of the real popular girls walked over to me and held up the note he had written her.  “Tell Christine I don’t like her anymore.”  It was over.  And why was everyone calling me, “Christine”? The popular girl seemed so disinterested when she showed me the note.  The bully later said something about us being together and I said I wasn’t.  “Then why did you write him all those notes?”  My father and I saw him walking by our house and I said something to the effect that I didn’t like him anymore.  My father wasn’t buying it.  “Well, you certainly liked him before!!”  My father did not like it that I was brushing my hair more and trying to look as good as I could.  “I know why you’re doing that.  It’s that guy you like.”  My brothers teased me about him and I wished that I hadn’t told my family or friends and could have done this on my own.  But I hadn’t.  I was 11 years old and no man in my life.  I needed revenge.  There was no way I could do anything without the teacher seeing us in our semi circles.  So, I took the spring out of my pen and waited until the teacher didn’t see.  My ex was in front of me and to the right..  Everyone’s head was down working on something.  I couldn’t let them see… BULLSEYE.  I pinched the little spring on both ends and let it go.  It got him in the back.  I kept my head down and I could see out of my peripheral vision that he felt it and turned around and never knew it was me.  I didn’t tell anyone.  There was no drama.  It was over.  Ahh….

IF..........

     If I could meet anyone, it would be Ellen.  It would be so much fun.  First she would dance.  Then, she would talk about her Mama.  Then she would take me to one of her homes and then we’d talk with her wife, then we would play with her animals, then we’d have a few drinks and I would go home.  That’s who I would love to meet.   Ellen Lougenis.  She used to work with my mom at Marble Chair Factory in Bedford Ohio.  Anyone know how I could get a hold of her?

Waaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

   I realize I have been through some tough stuff, so a little self pity is expected.  I am indulging, ya… I am..

I understand that I am lucky to have my hip just about healed.

And lucky that the cancer I had was easily taken care of.

And Lucky to have lived in a beautiful home with a great landlord

And Lucky to have so many friends help me out from driving me to physical therapy, to sending me money, to getting my groceries, etc.

     But I am feeling sorry for me.  And I am ok with that.  I think it bites that I had cancer and bites that I fell and broke my hip despite efforts to keep my bones strong with exercise and yoga.  I think it bites that my buddy/landlord Paul died and not only did I lose a dear friend, but I now have to move out of the most beautiful home I have ever lived in.  And it bites that I cannot be in the women’s chorus that not only brought me great joy to perform in, but it brought me a group of friends that I hadn’t banked on.  I can’t be in it because I am afraid to go anywhere until the weather changes, unless someone hangs onto me for dear life. 

     My life turned around when I got cancer.  Suddenly, I didn’t want to chat on the phone so much unless it was from fun people.  I didn’t want to take the same jobs that the Bureau of Vocational Rehab was getting for me like sales jobs and customer service and they helped me make a great voice over demo and lots of help promoting it.  I didn’t want half of the “stuff” I owned, so I got rid of things.  And then I moved.  And I felt so much better.  I loved my place and living with Paul was so easy.  I had my own suite upstairs but a lot of time was spent with him and we became friends.  When my family came to town and saw where I lived, their mouths dropped.  My brother said he was so impressed and asked why did it take me so long to move?  I told him that I was waiting for the right place.  The truth is I was just scared.  Moving seemed so difficult.  The places I looked at were either in a bad neighborhood, or out of my price range, or I had to climb too many stairs to get in and out. 

     My belief is sometimes life kicks us out of relationships, jobs and homes when life is ready and you’re too much of a weenie to leave on your own.  And there is a small part of me that sort of would like to get out.  Try something, “else”. 

PHILLIP SEYMOUR HOFFMAN

      I am so sad about Phillip Seymour Hoffman.  And I am sad about the statements people are making.  My friend Michael McCarthy wrote, “PSH died of a disease.”  I was glad to see that.  Heroin cannot be easy to just shake off.  Hell, I'm  still working on sugar.  I realize that putting a needle in your arm is not a good move, but I just don’t know what the circumstances were.  My only thought is that you do that because your life isn’t working.  One thing that always strikes me is that fame seems almost like a trauma.  As wonderful as it must be to doing what you love and to be honored for it, there is something very bizarre in our society that we give so much attention to performers and athletes.  Not to mention money.  To me fame is like having children.  Nobody gives you a manual before it happens.  Everybody just wings it.  Michael also wrote, “It's slightly amusing for some people in my line of work to have to fathom the distant, foreign concept that even an Academy award... might not make it all better.” 

      I pretty much loved everything I have seen PSH in.  I loved him in "Boogie Nights".  He was awkward and uncomfortable and perfect in it.   He was as good in small parts as he was in the big ones.  I loved "Capote"and I loved him in "Doubt".  I liked him in "Joey Breaker" as Joey’s assistant.  Joey is a workaholic talent agent in New York.  For some reason, even that small part had me watching him closely and always relating to whatever character he was playing.  Playing them so “human”, for lack of a better word.  I have missed quite a bit of his work lately but will catch up soon. 

       I am sorry for his children and losing their dad.  And frankly, sorry he won’t be performing anymore.