Summer at Last!

Summer officially begins.  Memorial Day weekend arrived and, as if that was the cue the weather was waiting for, it brought summer with it.  After a disappointing spring peppered with 40 degree days, it appears we've landed, plop, right in the sweaty, windy heart of another Oklahoma summer.  And summer in Oklahoma, despite its blast-furnace temperatures, is always my favorite season.  The university students go home to wherever they are from, and Norman slows down and grows up.

I look forward to lazy evenings with a cocktail on the patio, enjoying the smell of cut grass.  I'm ready to get out and find ways to get wet and beat the heat.  In heat like this, summer entetainment means Water.  We set up a pool in our yard every summer, and even though there's something really White Trash about it, I love getting out there and drifting, just looking at the blue summer sky and not thinking about anything.  Grayson and I sometimes go to Pelican Bay, a water park in Edmond, or we go find a lake, river or stream to get wet in.  And this year... this year we're going to the beach!

It occurred to me a few months ago that my boy is growing up, and I may have only a few more years in which he'll be completely happy to go on vacation with his mother.  So I decided that every summer from now on, we'll take a trip together.  I don't know how I'll pay for it.  I'll worry about that later.  I'm making memories for both of us, and holding his childhood as close to my heart as I can while it's still within reach.  So we're off to Galveston in August.  I know it's not the most glamorous beach, but it's the one I can afford to get to this year.  Next year maybe I'll be able to save up more money in advance.  I'm putting us up in the Gila Monster Hilton or some equally shabby hotel, so we can afford to spend five glorious days basking on the sunny shores of the mighty (if somewhat compromised) Gulf of Mexico. 

Planning to take a trip every summer also gives us the incentive to do a little research:  explore all the possible places we could visit.  Grayson says he wants to see Old Faithful, but he also wants to visit the Smithsonian, so there are decisions to be made in the year ahead.

There's a downside to summer for me, as well.  In the summer Grayson's dad and I trade off weeks with him, and between that and the weeks he spends at camp and visiting various grandparents, I sometimes lose him for two or three weeks at a time.  In June, for example, I have him at home for only one full week.  It frees up my social calendar to go do Grownup Things at will, but I miss my boy when I'm at home alone.  The house is too quiet, and I have too much time on my hands.

This summer presents fresh challenges, as well.  This summer Grayson is meeting his dad's girlfriend, preparatory to her moving here from Chicago.  This is a big step, and will mean big changes for all of us, but probably mostly for me.  In the nearly-three years since the divorce, The X has not previously had a "real," meaningful girlfriend. He was always dating this girl or that girl, but none of them lasted long.  A few months, half a year, and they were gone. And though it shames me to admit it,  there was a small, probably quite vile part of me that took some satisfaction in that.  Now I'm brought face to ugly face with that part, and it's not a comfortable feeling.  The Authentic Me is not, perhaps, 100% sure of her self worth, and has been, perhaps, propping it up a bit on the failure of The X to find anyone As Good As Me.

And now, of course, he has.  And she's coming here.  And meeting my son.  And because he's a terrific kid, I'm sure she'll love him.  And because he's got a loving nature and she's doubtless a very nice person, I'm sure he'll love her.  And I know that, no matter who else enters his heart and his world, he will always love his mother best.  I know that. My head knows that. But that little squinched-up vile bit inside my heart is scared that Grayson might ... just might... love her best. 

Remember that list of nice things people said about me back here?  Well, I need to remind myself of those things -- remind myself that even good, nice, wonderful people sometimes enter marriages that fail.  Those failures don't negate all the good things about those people, and it doesn't negate the good things about me. The fact that orange juice tastes terrible with toothpaste doesn't mean that the orange juice tastes bad.    It just doesn't work with toothpaste.  Learn from it. But don't give up on brushing your teeth.

There's plenty of joy in the world:  there's enough love and happiness, good fortune, good times, excitement, fun and success to go around, and someone else's good fortune does not diminish my chances of achieving any of it.  It's not the lottery.  It's Life, and we all have to make our own way and seek out our own happiness. 

And so I am trying to kick that nasty little bit out of my heart and make way for what's next.  It's feeding on my future. It's getting in the way of my Quest.  It's as stubborn as a tick, but I'm determined to dislodge it, because I have a job to do here. 

Chaos Theory

Since my divorce, I've made a surprising discovery about myself:  I have a high tolerance for environmental chaos.

When I was married and keeping house for "a family," I spent up to 5 hours every weekend dusting and scrubbing, vacuuming, doing laundry and  on and on and on.  It was often a point of contention in the marriage, as no doubt it is in many marriages, how much time I spent on these drudge jobs vs. how much time my ex spent on them, and the relative value weight of yardwork vs. housework.

Since I've become single again, with no one but myself and my son to please... I've degenerated into a complete and utter slob.

Sadly, I think this must be Authentic.

My car is full of gum wrappers, empty soda bottles, crumpled receipts and crumbs. My kitchen sink is always piled with dishes. My coffee table is a jungle of random objects and sticky substances.  Lets not even talk about my carpet.

My response to this?

"Wow, someone should really clean this mess up." And then I go out and putter in the garden, or put my feet up and read a book or something else that doesn't help the situation at all.  Often I'm not even really aware of the disastrous nature of my housekeeping until I'm going to have visitors and I suddenly am able to see the place through their eyes.  Good God, is that really my bra on top of the TV? 

I wasn't always this way. I vaguely remember once keeping a fairly tidy office and working hard to keep dust bunnies from achieving sentience on the stairs, but something has changed.  I now have no one to blame but myself. And as it is my own mess and my own decision not to tidy it, I'm not angry about it.  Something about removing that third person - the one who is NOT doing the scrubbing and sweeping - has freed me from the whole cycle and removed the source of resentment.  I don't mind things not getting done, I only mind when there's only one person not doing them.

By the way, I do all the yard work, too and no, it's not equal to housekeeping.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I never clean, or even that I don't wish I was tidier, I'm just observing the phenomenon. Authentic Me is not concerned about a messy house, and can live in congenial peace and harmony with a certain amount of chaos. 

Chaos.  The source of all creation.  Over my computer, on my desk at work, I have pinned a copy of the Chinese (or is it Japanese?) symbol for Chaos.  To me, it looks like a little swordsman riding a wave, and sort of sums up the way I do things. Woo Hoooo!  Here we go!

I read somewhere that creative people thrive on chaos, and that chaos is essential to the dynamic creative process.  The universe itself was formed from the chaos of the Big Bang and the random collision of materials that ensued.  Chaos Theory has to do with discovering the order that underlies huge and seemingly random patterns... which is kind of what I'm trying to do with my life.  A tiny change at the outset can cause completely and wildly different outcomes:  the flapping of a butterfly's wings in North Dakota resulting in typhoons in Thailand.

In more concrete terms, it means that – at least for now – for this stage of my life - I'm not completely in control.   Cosmic butterflies are flapping their wings.  I like to tell myself that means I'm "Open to the Universe," inviting creativity, opportunity and abundance.   Or I'm just a slob.  Who knows?

Sticky-Note Self

Since embarking upon this Search for the Authentic Me thing, I find that, ironically, it has sort of driven me to a certain level of inauthenticity.  I want to find some STUFF that defines me, but rather than let that grow organically out of myself, I'm trying to stick things on like post-it notes.  I find myself wanting to go out and do stuff so I can say I did it, so I can be actively seeking this Me of which I speak.

I keep getting distracted from Who I AM by Who I Want to Be.  So now I have a touchstone for what's authentic:  if I'm doing it just so I can take a picture and post it on Facebook.... it's probably not authentic.

I'm like a crow, distracted by shiny stuff.  Or maybe a bowerbird or pack-rat is more appropriate.  "Ooo!  That's shiny!  That's admirable or desirable or cool, I'll just stick it on, add it to my collection, post it on my blog." Then it's mine, and since we all know that you are what you acquire, those qualities will be transferred to Me, thereby instantly making me admirable, desirable, cool, etc.

On the other hand, maybe you don't know what fits until you try it on.

Like volunteering at Wildcare.  For the past three weeks, I've gone once a week to volunteer for this wildlife rehabilitation center in Noble.  I've been meaning to do it for a long time, and so finally now I'm making the time to do it.  I'm trying it on.  I've never volunteered anywhere before (of my own free will. Doing things because your job or your position on the board doesn't count).  Does that make Me a Volunteer?  Maybe not, but I think that volunteering as a means of interacting with and caring for wild animals IS Me.  So I guess that passes the Facebook test.

Me with a lorikeet.  Narcissistically FB ready.

Bungee jumping... probably wouldn't. Not that I'm tempted, frankly.

This week I took my son to the zoo to see the new baby elephant.  I did it for a couple of reasons.  One, because I'd been feeling low and nobody can feel low in the presence of a baby elephant. Two, I want to share experiences like that with my son while he's still young enough to be interested in going to the zoo with his mother and I fear my window is closing there. Three, I wanted to post pictures of us doing something fun together on Facebook and Flickr.  This proves I'm a good mom who is engaged in her son's life and wants to offer him enriching experiences.

My son with a lorikeet, having an awesome time.

Pass the FB test?  Sure, I think so, because I had genuine reasons as well as self-serving reasons.  And truly I enjoy the zoo, as long as I don't go too often or when it's too hot or too crowded.  There are two things I love about it (besides the obvious one of gaping at exotic animals).  I love to watch my kid enjoy the experience and (see above), I like to interact with animals.  My favorite is the lorikeet experience.  You get a cup of nectar and you're ushered into the aviary full of beautiful, brightly colored birds who have been conditioned to expect sweet deliciousness from humans.  They land on your shoulders, your hands, arms, head. They crowd each other around the cup, they can even take the plastic lid off with their beaks, I was told, in their eagerness to satisfy their need for the sweet stuff.

I love these silly, shallow birds. They're utterly self serving and unapologetic.  Besides that, they have cool dinosaur feet and they are colored like plush toys.

There's something about birds that is truly wonderful.  I love the feel of bird feet curling around my finger.  I love their bright eyes and the way they turn their heads to inspect you first from this eye and then from that. At Wildcare there are some mostly fledged starlings that hover around the outdoor "Play yard,"  begging shamelessly for a handout from every human that passes through.  They land on your head and shoulders and practically have to be nudged out of the way in order for you to walk through.  Interacting with them makes me feel somehow privileged.  Most people don't get to interact with wild birds in this way.  It makes me glad I volunteer there, and keeps me coming back, as do the baby opossums, no matter how smelly their cages.

So I don't know.  Maybe I'm just sticking sticky notes all over myself, but maybe it's okay during this process to try on a few labels and see if they fit. I don't think I can come up with any better plan, so that's what I'll have to go with for now.

Worms and Bugs

I was in Okie City yesterday to do some radio interviews, and dropped by my favorite nursery and garden center, Horn Seed Co.  This place is awesome.  There are plenty of bigger garden centers, but none that have the old-time feel of the serious gardener that Horn does.  They have this wonderful old bar that's backed with a wall of drawers full of bulk seeds. You can order your seeds by the pound, and they'll pour them up onto a scale with a big silver scoop on top, and then package your seeds for you in a brown paper bag tied with twine.  You can get about 20 different kinds of beans there, and seed potatoes, strawberry or onion sets, peanuts... it's a gardener's heaven.  And the greenhouse has the best selection of herbs and veggies.  You can choose from about nine types of basil and six or seven types of sage alone.  It makes me happy just to go in there, even if I don't buy anything.

I went in, ostensibly, to buy a replacement zucchini for the one the cutworms got.  But I got to browsing, and ended up with six packets of flower seeds, two bedding plants, a plastic container of live ladybugs and an icecream carton full of worms.  Now that's shopping.

Live ladybugs and worms!  Awesome!  How could I resist??

Grayson and I released the ladybugs into the garden at dusk last night, giggling as they climbed up our hands and arms. What's ticklier than  ladybug on your arm?  Well, how about six ladybugs?  It's fun to see so many of them in one place:  little red spots of voracious predatory cuteness, unleashed on the unsuspecting pests plaguing my broccoli and potato plants.

The weather has been peculiar this spring:  cold and windy. And my garden has a cringing air to it:  like it's crouching down, waiting for the next blow.  Everything seems like it's holding off on growing until it sees what the weather is going to be like. All except the broccoli, which is loving the cool temperatures. Unfortunately, the broccoli worms love it too. You gotta hand it to evolution where those guys are concerned.  You couldn't make a critter colored more exactly like broccoli leaves. I hope ladybugs like them.

The worms are for my worm composting bin.  Red wigglers are tiny little scrap-devouring demons!  And they poop out the world's finest fertilizer. Plus, frankly, it's just cool to have worms eating your garbage. Grayson loves to go "feed the worms" with our salad scraps.

I'm telling you all of this because the worms and bugs really speak to some important part of me.  I know it's essential in some way to the Real Me. Gardening is in my genes. My great grandmother kept a huge garden and worked it herself into her 90s.  All spring and summer you could find her in the garden, leaning on her hoe handle, wearing the old-timey sun bonnet and bib apron my mother made for her every year, pulling onions or digging potatoes, or sitting on the back porch in the glider of a summer evening, shelling purple hulls or snapping beans. Those were some of the best memories I have from my childhood: time spent in the garden with her. I would go handle the butterflies that were drunk on apricot nectar from the fallen fruit by the back door, or eat fresh-pulled green onions with bread and butter, or stand on a low brick wall at the back of the garden, picking and eating handfuls of black currants.

I'm not a quarter of the gardener she was. But I aspire to be. Heck, I'm just 44, I've got a good 50 years yet to practice. 

So bring on the bugs!  Bring on the dirt, the seeds, weeds, worms and compost. When I'm with them, I know I'm home. 

A Not Very Scientific Experiment

In the spirit of the search for the self... in the past two days I have done two things to help me define myself.  Here they are:

1)  I returned to my maiden name.  It's been two years since my divorce, and my son is old enough to be okay with not having the same name as his mother.  Besides, it occurred to me that there might be another Mrs. X in the offing before long, and I didn't want to be the Other Mrs. X.  So I decided to finally jettison the name, thus freeing me (in theory) from one more bit of emotional flotsam. Changing your name is a surprisingly simple process that involves several pieces of paper, two trips to the County Courthouse, and $118 in court fees, (plus $22 to publish an announcement of the impending change in the newspaper's legal notices) but it was well worth it, in my opinion.  After about 15 minutes at the courthouse yesterday afternoon, I am, once again, who I was. So, whether or not I know who that is, at least I can name her accurately.

2)  I conducted a quick and very informal poll on Facebook to ask friends to give me a couple of words that described me.  This is cheesy and narcissistic in the extreme, but it's all done for a good cause.  Here's the list of words offered up by my friends and acquaintances :

Comical
Creative
Brazen
Revelatory
Inspiring
Lovely
Hardworking
Hilarious (2)
Independent (2)
Fullofsurprises (this was a cheat to get three words counted as one)
Dedicated
Funny
Beautiful
Tall
Short
Creative
Fun
Gorgeous (special thanks for that one)
Ebulient
Iconoclastic (Those two are about $10 each, I think)
Quirky
Earnest
Caring
Friendly
Talented
Loving
Unforgettable


So, it looks like Funny wins at 4 mentions.
The runner up is in the Pretty category, with 3,which was a surprise. 
Then there's hardworking, dedicated and earnest, which sort of go into the same category.  So I'll call that a second runner-up.

So, based on my completely un-scientific, untested and hiiiiiiiighly dubious poll, The Real Me could safely be described as Funny... and might be considered Attractive and Dedicated/hardworking/earnest. 

I tried to group some others together, but it got complicated.  Quirky... is that sort of like fullofsurprises?  Or more like Creative?  Can Iconoclastic and Revelatory go together just because they're big words??

It's too bad there's no such thing as a Facebook for People Who Dislike You.  It would be even more interesting to see what their list would look like.

I do try to make people laugh. Often at my own expense. It makes the social give and take easier for me, and keeps things nice and light so you don't have to talk about anything too real, and it's better than small talk.

Over the past year, however, I've noticed in myself an increased ability and willingness to have real conversations with people. I don't skim the surface like I once did, and though sometimes I wish I'd stuck with skimming, more often than not I find out some really interesting things about people. 

Mostly what you find out about people is that they're not anywhere near as (fill in the blank)  as you imagined them to be. For example, the electrician with a soft Okie accent who came to fix my air conditioner. In conversation with him I discovered that he practiced yoga, was raised by a lesbian couple, and hated being an electrician.

Today I gave a radio interview to a woman who told me God had spoken to her 18 years ago and told her to build him a radio station. She also told me she could tell something was different about me when she saw me today and she knows that good changes are coming for me soon. And she said a prayer for my strength and happiness.

I'm not a religious person, but I figure it can never hurt to have someone with a radio station to God say a prayer on your behalf. And if she says something good is coming my way, well, I'll believe her.

What's a Bandicoot?

My son and I were browsing through the Smithsonian's fabulous Natural History book – or, as we call it, the Great Big Book of Everything – trolling for bizarre animals. (This is is a thoroughly awesome book, both for browsing and for braining intruders, as it weighs about 15 pounds) .... and we ran across the bandicoot.

The bandicoot is an Australian animal that looks something like an aardvaark and something like an opossum.  But its real claim to fame is that it is called a bandicoot.  You've got to love the Aussies, who truly excel at animal naming.  These are the people who brought us the platypus, the kookaburra, and the wallaby.  I wish Australians could name more things.  

Today I launch Blue Bandicoot as the public offshoot of a private blog I have kept for years known as Scrawlspace... but without all the incriminating names and personal details of people whose lives intersect mine who might not wish to be splattered over the blogosphere. It's a combination journal, essay collection and rumination spot, with one primary objective:  the search for the Authentic Me.  It's named Blue Bandicoot because "bandicoot" is a helluva good word, and I'm not as creative at naming things as the Aussies.  And also because as I was trolling the web for bandicoot pictures, I ran across this interesting explanation of the significance of having a bandicoot as your Spirit Animal:  "Bandicoot is a great guide for those who are currently in a dark part of their lives who need some respite from what might seem an endless, shadowy, tumult."

This is a bandicoot. A cute bandicoot.

Well, so there you go. Natural History and Aboriginal mythology agree. Bandicoot it is.


Okay, if you're still reading after that, I'm amazed. Why do you or anyone else care who the Authentic Me is?  You don't, of course.  But I'm probably not the only one wrestling with this issue.  Dante started the Inferno with it:

Midway upon the journey of our life
I found myself within a forest dark,
For the straightforward pathway had been lost.

I'm 44, and two years ago I found myself divorcing my husband of ten years, whom I thought had been my dream husband; selling the house I thought had been my dream house, and moving into a rented house in my hometown of Norman, Oklahoma. Of all the possible pathways I believed my life might take, this was not one of them, and in just a few short months my entire future – or what I could reasonably see of it – was swept away. 

I went through all the stages of grief:  denial, anger, tears, wine, Match.com, sex with inappropriate people, wine, tears again... etc, and emerged into a new world.  My world.  Here, many of the old expectations no longer apply. Here there are new adventures like dating and mowing my own lawn.  There are new opportunities, like hanging up pictures I actually like and blowing off all but the most absolutely essential housekeeping. There are also new hazards, like my ex husband's new girlfriend and predatory colleagues who turn into Mr. Hyde when they learn of my divorce.

The upshot is that everything on this side of that period we shall refer to as The Crazy Time is different. Even the stuff that is the same is slightly different. I still work as the PR director for a natural history museum, for example. But now, working at the same job I worked at before The Crazy Time feels oddly anomalous.  As if it should have changed, too.

So recently I realized that I felt Stuck. That I feel ready for my life to Go On... but I have no idea where it's going.  I have no idea where I want it to go, only that the old direction is no longer an option and the old me is no longer driving.

So who is?

Over the course of the last few months I've tried on some new Mes.  Pretty Me is nice, but expensive and unsustainable.  Being Pretty all the time is just too much work. I've got to relax sometimes, and though I love the look of the acrylic nails, I can't really afford them on my single mom's budget. Community Service Me is just too exhausting and I can't maintain the necessary level of Concern and Commitment. Healthy Me (a sister to Pretty Me) needs a drink and gets bored on the eliptical machine every single morning.

So it appears I'm not going to be able to just choose a Me off the rack.  I'm going to have to go a la carte.  And that means figuring out a few things.  Hopefully the parts will add up to a whole. I'm starting with the very basics, here.  So far, here's what I have:

Me is not a morning person. 
Me prefers red wine.
Me does not care for sushi.

Riveting, I know.  Stay tuned, I'll keep you posted.