Category Archives: The Rules

Emotional Health, Health and Long Life, Spiritual Well Being, The Rules, Uncategorized

Benefits of hiking solo

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While I agree somewhat with the assessment that wanting to take vacations alone is a sign of unhealthy isolation; there are times solitude is desirable. Today, I am thinking of three reasons I love to hike alone:

  1. freedom to pursue my own pace
  2. opportunity for introspection (the examined life is well worth living).
  3. freedom from embarrassment

Recently, one of my co-workers reminded me, “If you wait to hike until you have a hiking buddy, there are lots of places you will never see.”  She is right.  I get the most out of seeing what I want, when I want – often on the spur of the moment. And, I enjoy traveling at my own pace. 

It is amazing the places you can go, the things you can accomplish at your own pace.

Independence Monument from upper Monument Trail
Independence Monument from upper Monument Trail

Last week, I descended 33 switchbacks and a few miles into Monument Canyon. It was steep, slippery, and bruised my toes; but I learned a secret.  If you stop and take off your boot, wiggle your toes and readjust your sock, your foot will get a refreshing second wind. I also learned why I love to hike alone.  No one rushed me. No one twice my size tried to tow me through the canyon like a two-year-old drug through a shopping mall. No one tried to motivate me to move faster with false concern, “Are you sure you’re okay?  Maybe you should have a doctor check out why you don’t have more energy.”

DSCN5899hummingbirdToday, I chose to hike upper No Thoroughfare Canyon.  I contemplated John Denver’s lyric, “you know he’d be a poorer man if he never saw an eagle fly.” I decided I would be poorer if I never saw a turkey vulture fly, or heard a red tailed hawk, or had a humming bird buzz my neon backpack. At the canyon bottom, I stood in the cool of the shade, the sun arrested for the moment east of the rock wall, and breathed the early morning mountain scent of piñon pine and it was healthy, oh so healthy, to be alone.

Further along the unmaintained trail came a true scramble. A 30 to 40 foot putty colored dirt slide, devoid of footholds, made a near perpendicular plane into a wash overgrown with dense vegetation. It was going to be a three points of contact slip and slide, maybe four points – make that a five point contact crab crawl. And the best part?  No one gave me advice. No one chaffed at how long it took me to choose the best route – or to seriously consider if I could manage the return incline once I got down. No one was there to witness my gamble, or my ungainly ascent, grasping and pawing back up the slide.

No Thoroughfare Canyon
No Thoroughfare Canyon

Oh, the places you can go, when you choose your own pace!

Books and other Soul Food, Character, co-dependence, Emotional Health, Fiction is Truth, Spiritual Well Being, The Rules, Uncategorized, Wealth and Fame

I am mildly disappointed in The Hunger Games

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Cherry Odelberg, photo credit Kevin Decker 2010

I have just finished reading The Hunger Games.  It was a great book. I am mildly dissatisfied with the conclusion.  Before I proceed to analyze why, I am sure you have one of two possible reactions which must be dealt with before you can concentrate on what I have to say.

1. Why are you just now getting around to reading this book?

OR

2. What is a 58 year old woman doing reading a YA fiction book?

The simple answer to both questions is: I am a writer, mother, grandmother and I hold down job(s) in the real world.

The Hunger Games (Suzanne Collins, 2008), is more than a dawning of love between vampires or fidelity and character among institutional witches and it is worth a thorough read.

The overall narrative initially and consistently reminded me of Animal Farm or Brave New World, a couple of futuristic stories in the junior great books anthologies, and some ancient myth.  It is a book to entertain, to take you on adventure, to make you think. And thinking is what I did as I turned pages – faster and faster into the wee hours.

My first disappointment came with Peeta. I wanted him to be less passive, more warrior.  But he is only sixteen.  How much can you expect of a 16 year old, a grasp of all the virtues and character traits including Love?  These are issues I yet ponder at my age and I am a voracious reader in part due to my endless search for the ideal. Peeta certainly grasps the essence of unconditional and enduring love. Also, it is hard to find fault with his determined philosophy to not let the competition change who he is.  Why do I have trouble with his inactivity and passivity, do I not truly believe all you need is love?

My lingering disappointment has to do with the ending. She took the fruit and gave some to him – but they didn’t eat it, not really, they only pretended to. They outsmarted the gamekeepers and the Capitol, but, in so doing, did they compromise who they were? What if they had taken the fruit and swallowed it? Might rebellion have broken out  in the districts immediately?

Perhaps a Romeo and Juliet suicide is not the proper death to glamorize as an example to the YA of today. We have been aware of a high suicide rate among the young ever since I was in high school. Publishers, gatekeepers, vocal Christians and psychologists alike would frown on a dual suicide ending. No, besides ending the writer’s opportunity for a Katniss and Peeta sequel, a suicide ending too, would have been disappointing.

So, for the sake of honor.  For the sake of everything good and right and true and heroic.  I would have a true martyr’s ending. It would have been impossible not to cry. As it was, my only tears while reading the book were brought on by the district 11 bread parachute.

In my ending, Peeta flung his knife. Katniss laid down her bow. They were shot instantly for their rebellion and disobedience. Rebellion in districts 12 and 11 broke out and was widely imitated in other districts. Were their families in danger?  Of course. Family is always in danger. It is simply a matter of drawing a line in the sand sooner. In this way, Peeta’s integrity remains intact as does Katniss’s courageous honor. As it was, she took the fruit and gave some also to Adam, I mean Peeta, and the ideal took a step backwards.  But, they were only 16 after all. How could they know that the integrity of their controlled Universe rested on one decision; that all hell would later break loose; that they would live only to fight again?

Addiction, Character, co-dependence, Emotional Health, Fiction is Truth, Health and Long Life, The Rules, Uncategorized

Thoughts on over-responsibility

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There is such a thing as over-responsibility.  I am notoriously over-responsible and it has cost me every relationship I ever lost. It comes as a result of over-compensating for those who are irresponsible, who alter our lives for the worse, or wreck our lives and theirs by being irresponsible.  Sure, when I took up the slack, it made the other person obviously, glaringly in the wrong for being irresponsible; but it left me alone, bereft of my relationships and love, looking righteous and self-righteous; and responsible. Oh, so commendably responsible! Is that what life is all about?

First of all, let me say that over-responsibility is not something you pick up casually by walking into a bar-or even walking into someplace you are supposed to be.  Over-responsibility is a genetic trait and it is also behaviorally conditioned. Not only do I have a genetic predisposition for over responsibility, the people who gave me the genes also polished the grain with legalism and endless praiseworthy expectations.  While I was never good enough, I also knew I was better than everyone else. The only course of action was to keep moving ever forward toward perfection. Just as you can never love too much, you can never be too responsible.

It happens inevitably when I work for others.  There comes a time I find myself saying, “Ooops, pardon me for becoming so invested in your vision that I felt a sense of ownership and began to implement my own great ideas and methods.” I tend to forget that while people recruit you to further their dreams and goals,they also hire you to do it their way, not to edit or improve on their vision.

My counselor once said I needed to forget about being right.  “Quit concentrating on doing the right thing and being right, and do what you want and need.”  That seems so counterintuitive; so irresponsible, so decadent, so selfish. So selfish to do what the God of the universe has called you to do; to quit sacrificing yourself to make up the deficiencies in the responsibilities of others?  Wait a minute. Making up the deficiencies in the responsibilities of others; is that self-sacrifice or meddling and controlling?

Over responsibility keeps me from asking for help. It looks, it appears, so selfish to be irresponsible to the mores of society; to let anyone else shoulder part of my load, to ask for help in something so ridiculous when I can just do the work myself and muscle through. I know the rules; you make your bed, you lie in it. After all, I got myself into this mess, I am responsible for getting myself out. Besides, “if you want something done right, you need to do it yourself.”

I used to cite my greatest strength as, “getting other people where they need to go and having a knack for figuring out just where it is.” Not so anymore. The characters I write in my novels resemble me. I write what I know.  Happily, re-reading and editing a manuscript is often a timely reminder and has the same effect as reading a self-help book.

How about you?  Are you overly responsible?

Addiction, Character, co-dependence, Emotional Health, Fiction is Truth, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Spiritual Well Being, The Rules, Uncategorized

Writing Women’s Fiction

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If I am perfectly groomed; then you will love me.

If I do everything you ask; then you will love me.

If I am a nice enough person; then you will love me.

If I provide for you, because of all I’ve done for you; then you will love me.

If I take care of you, meet your every need; then you will love me.

If I sacrifice for you, lay aside my dreams and desires to help you meet your dreams; then you will love me.

If I do my job and your job too; then you will love me.

I love happily ever after endings.  A happy ending gives me hope. I too, might someday experience fulfillment.  But, the way to achieve that happy ending is not through living women’s fiction.  Living the women’s fictions written above will make you crazy.  That kind of fiction ends on the counselor’s couch, working through resentment, despair and depression.

Character, co-dependence, Emotional Health, Fiction is Truth, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Religion, Spiritual Well Being, The Petty Pace, The Rules

A Parable

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I am resolved not to haul anyone else up the mountain. Not to carry them, not to drag them, just to go up the mountain myself; baggage free. “What do you mean, you will not carry anyone up the mountain?” asked my pastor. “Let me tell you a parable,” I replied.

When I was young I saw a beautiful mountain in the distance. I could tell by the way it was shaped, where its craggy rocks were and where the purples met the greens, that this was my mountain.  This was the mountain I was meant to climb in life. When I was still in the single digits I began to prepare to climb that mountain. My parents chose the proper instructors. I trained diligently.  I received accolades for my progress and criticism to address my weaknesses.  By and by I set out on my journey toward the base of the mountain. When I had gone some distance and was becoming stronger and quite adept at orienteering, I met a tall stranger wandering in a high mountain meadow. I did not know at the time that he was wandering.  It was a busy meadow, profuse with wild flowers and the buzzing of bees. Several trails converged, crossed and separated in the meadow. The stranger was pleased to walk with me for awhile. When we came to the final fork in the road, I bid the young man adieu and headed confidently up my chosen path. “Wait a minute!” called the stranger, “I am coming with you!”

“Oh, have you trained for this mountain, too?” I asked in wonderment. “I haven’t had any specific training for this particular path,“ he replied, “I just have a feeling I should go here, and, as you can see, I am genetically fit to climb this mountain.  I want to climb this mountain.  In this case, desire is the important thing.”  We traveled together for quite some time.  He was an amiable companion   Because he was tall and muscular, he often led and blazed the trail.  Once or twice we disagreed when I took the initiative and started off in a different direction.  “Come back!” he called, “Let’s go this way!”

“The map I received in my training says this is the right way,” said I.

“What does it matter?” he argued.  “You don’t have to stick with the map. Maps are often rigid and tell you only one way.  I can make a short cut through this brush in no time and make a new path for us.”  The second time disagreement arose he just said, “Well, if you will give me the map, then I can lead us the right direction. I’ll give it back by the time you need it.”  A few days later he asked for my compass too, saying, “I’m not sure which way is north.”  I showed him how to read the map and use the compass.

At night we sat around the campfire watching the flickering flames.  “I want to be standing on top the mountain already, waving at people,” he sighed wistfully.  “I wonder if the extra weight of this compass is slowing me down?  The map seems to be taking us the long way around.”

 I woke early, but waited around for him the next morning.  Somehow it just seemed normal that we travel on together.  He was slow waking up and when he rose it was with a limp. “My knee is starting to bother me, will you lend me your walking stick?”  “Good thing I waited,” I thought, passing it over. I hadn’t used it for the past five miles anyway. He wanted to stop walking early that night and when we turned aside to a grassy place he slumped heavily to the ground and fell fast asleep.  Next morning it was hard to wake him. I shook his shoulder. “The sun’s almost up!” I said, “Time to get going.” He groaned.  “I just want to camp here for awhile and rest.”  “The season will end before we reach the top if we don’t move forward!” I said, turning toward the path. “You can’t just go off and leave me!” he cried. I hoisted him to his feet and half dragged, half carried him slowly up the path.  We advanced 200 yards that day and it was rough going because he was twice my size and he kept saying that since I wasn’t strong enough to carry him, I wasn’t really trained to climb that mountain. When it was morning again, I was unsuccessful in arousing him. I knew it was time for me to move on, alone.

That is why I am resolved to climb the mountain myself, without baggage, alone if necessary, and certainly not carrying or dragging someone else.

“But, how can you possibly finish the mountain alone?” asked my pastor. “He has the compass.”

“I will use discernment.  I have years of orienteering training in how to tell direction.  It is a gift.”  

“But, he is a man, he is strong and – he has the map.”

“He used it for toilet paper some days ago.”

“Is that love?”

“Him using my map for toilet paper?”

“No. Is it Love to say you will not stick with him and carry him up the mountain?”

“Yes.  It is love to allow anyone with two good legs to hike the mountain for himself without my doing it for him. “

“What about putting others first?”

“By putting others first, do you mean hiking their mountain for them? Carrying them up instead of hiking my own mountain? Or making sure they get to the top of the mountain ahead of me, even if I have to carry, drag or push them?”

“Well, it just sounded harsh and unloving, kind of selfish when you said you would hike your own mountain,” commented the onlooker.

“If I do not love the God of the Universe enough to obey and climb my mountain as instructed, if I neglect my mountain in the name of putting others first and hoisting them up a random mountain; where does that leave me? That is not love.  That is merely self-sacrifice.  Love, according to C.S. Lewis, is the greater virtue.”

“Yes, but often love demands self-sacrifice,” admonished the chider.

 “Who am I to decide, and control through my aiding and abetting, which mountain is someone else’s mountain to climb?  I asked.

Can I, a mere mortal, outthink God and decide what is best? Is it putting God in first place to say, ‘Oh, sorry I didn’t get done what you asked me to do, God.  Someone else wasn’t able to do their job right, so I went over to help.  That’s okay, isn’t it?  Because, I did get them up a mountain, even if I didn’t go up the one you placed in my heart.’”

The pastor shook his head, a bit perplexed and deep in thought. The chider raised her eyebrows at the passion in my voice. The onlooker rejoiced to learn what sages from other ages have written. Shakespeare penned, “To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.“

One greater than Shakespeare said, “Love your neighbor as yourself. “  If I do not love myself enough to climb the mountain God gave me to climb, how will I ever know what it is to truly love my neighbor?

Addiction, Character, co-dependence, Emotional Health, Family, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Photos, Spiritual Well Being, The Petty Pace, The Rules, Uncategorized

My Answer

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I have decided to throw myself on God’s Mercy and Grace, rather than to stand stubbornly in my own rags of self-righteousness,  weathering the storm on my own strength by declaring that I will keep my word.  What strength do I have?  None.  What strength does God have?  The Universe! 

This is one more application of the 12 Steps to Recovery provided by Alcoholics Anonymous.  The steps I am thinking of today go something like this:  I admit that I am powerless and my life unmanageable. I believe that a Higher Power can restore me to sanity. I am seeking to increase contact with that Higher Power through meditation and meditative walks.

If this sounds interesting to you, check out these links: http://hazelden.org/

http://www.recovery-man.com/coda/codependency.htm and be sure and read some of the books on my favorite books page!

Character, Emotional Health, The Petty Pace, The Rules, Uncategorized

Daylight Savings Time, Your Problem

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Spring Ahead, Fall Back. “There you go!,” they tell me, “it is easy to remember.” But they’re accustomed to their way of thinking, not mine.

A little phrase like ‘Spring ahead, Fall back, can trip my over-analysis switch:  Let me think here. Is that, fall forward and spring back? (After all, when you compete in triple jump it’s important to fall forward-I’ve known that since before daylight savings time began). 

I have the same problem with dessert and desert.  Let’s see, do those Ss stand for too much sand or too much sugar?  I can never remember.  I think I eat dessert and live in the desert.  One thing I have no trouble remembering, however; is how to wield there, their and they’re.  And if you’re thinking that’s a silly thing to pride myself on, that’s your problem.  Not even the media gets that one right.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Emotional Health, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Home and Hearth, Spiritual Well Being, The Rules, Uncategorized

I Feel Welcome Here

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You may know the struggle I had a year and a half ago when I left my beloved mountains of 8,000 feet above sea level and repaired to the high desert.  I did not want to come here.  I loved my rustic cabin, the conifer trees, the open space trails, clear air and perfect weather; and most of all the feisty mountain my blog banner is named for.

I did not want to come here – to the high desert.  It was my plan to take a writing sabbatical in Seattle for 5 months, finish a novel, and then see what new adventures life afforded me; maybe on another mountain.  But here is where I ended up. I finished my novel.  I began another and another.  I did not find a publisher, but I found a job. A good job.  A job tailor made for me. I love what I do and who I am.  The job fits so well that I feel welcome there, welcome to be me and to do what I do well.  I feel welcome when I come home at night and write. I feel welcome here, in the high desert. Walking has provided great spiritual, emotional, mental, and of course, physical health for me over the years. I have walked many of the foot paths, back roads and trails in this high desert community.  No one has shouted at me to get off the trail- that it is dangerous and I don’t belong there. No one has threatened to call the sheriff on me for walking on a public easement to get to a public building.  I have made new friends at work, and at church.  I bought lemonade from the boys next door in my new neighborhood.

 I will not go so far as to say I feel at home here.  Sometimes I wonder if I will ever be truly at home anywhere on earth.  But, I am able to make my home here, because; I feel welcome here. I am at peace.

Character, Family, Health and Long Life, The Petty Pace, The Rules, Uncategorized

Time Honored Baseball

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At the top of the fourth he turned to me and said, “I am really enjoying my father’s day present.” I was too.  Its been 30 years or so since the last time I baked in the sun or got damp and chilled in the rain at a JUCO game. In the space of 3 hours, we did both today- despite being well armed with umbrellas.

We found seats directly above home plate and were free to form our own opinions about the accuracy of the umpire and the strengths and weaknesses of the teams. By the top of the fourth the pace of the game was starting to pick up. He had already had 3 little naps in the stadium seat. I found out that he played baseball in high school. I remember when he coached our small town equivalent of little league summer after summer. I have known all my life that he was a starter on the high school basketball team, but I had never heard about high school baseball.

During the slow beginning innings where the pitcher merely threw strikes and there was little action in the field, I tried to beguile him with conversation, tell him about my seventh grade students who argued just this past week that you can catch a fly with an outstretched baseball cap because it is still attached (all this because I asked them not to be playing baseball in literacy class with detached player equipment- as in, water bottle and pea gravel). I took the counter position that the cap extends further from the hand than the distance allowed in the fingers of a glove.  He did not take the bait, just nodded and said, “Ummm.” Sometime next week he will probably tender his final position on the subject – after he has consulted the online rulebook.

Admittedly, there was more purpose to my invitation than just an early Father’s Day gift (I told him it would take a load off my mind if he would go to the game with me, because then I wouldn’t have to worry about what to get him for Father’s Day). Always the hard worker, my 75 year old dad has been working non-stop the past couple of weeks and exhausting the middle-aged men hired to help.  It was truly time for a holiday.  Baseball fit the bill.

After six innings of reflection I have concluded that baseball is a lot like life.  You spend months and years in training and a good deal of time nonchalantly standing around waiting; as a spectator getting a trifle bored, but you have to keep your head in the game, tensed, alert, and ready at a moment’s notice to make the all important double play-that makes your day or defines your life.

Character, co-dependence, Emotional Health, The Rules

Rule Number 3- Please Everyone

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I have spent half a century trying to please people; how about you?  Yes?

Well, as they say, “You can please some of the people all the time and some of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all the people all the time.” But, hey, it never hurts to try, right?  Maybe I will be the first one to be perfect, get it right all the time, please everybody and the whole world will love me-rise up and call me blessed.

I don’t think there is a thing wrong with pleasing people, with living peaceably with everyone.  I do take issue with peace at any cost – or with pleasing others to manipulate the outcome. At sometime in your life someone has probably said indignantly, “After all I’ve done for you, how could you……”  The words are designed to heap guilt, to convict the hearer to change his ways. If the recipient has stolen, embezzled, cheated or betrayed, perhaps a parent or spouse does have a right to utter this accusation.  But, usually, I think what the offended one means is, “After all I’ve done for you how could you not do what I wanted you to do?”  This is the type of thing Handel’s father spat when George F. decided to be a musician and composer rather than a barber.  When parents say this they often mean, “After all I’ve done for you how could you possibly think of being yourself instead of the person I wanted you to be?”

Recently I was accosted by an acquaintance whose basic communication was, “You are the meanest person in the world!  I knocked myself out for you! I did lots of things for you, whatever I thought was right for you, whether you asked or wanted it or not and now I am angry with you because you did not respond the way I wanted you to respond and do what I wanted you to do.  You didn’t do the job the way I would have done it.  You are not the gregarious personality I wanted you to be. You’re not even trying to be the person I wanted to help you become. I have piped and you have not danced.”  Funny thing, I didn’t even hear the piper.  I was too busy marching to the steady beat of a different drum.  Is this a good thing or a bad thing?