Posts from the ‘Open thoughts’ Category

Mar 25

Perspective

I recently went to see the most recent movie from Nicolas “The Notebook” Sparks. I was going with my parents so we settled on Safe Haven with Josh Duhamel and Julianne Hough as a film we could all agree on. I wasn’t expecting much. I like romances but Sparks’ stories are pretty predictable and I find I generally waver between pleasantly entertained and slightly eye rollie. The only exception to this rule so far would be Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams in the aforementioned Notebook. The scene when they’re on the floor of the old plantation house elevates the film well beyond any typical feel good romance. Anyway, Safe Haven was exactly what I was expecting and was enjoying it well enough until I found I was becoming increasingly emotional. By the end of the film I was so overwhelmed I went to the bathroom and bawled my eyes out. The whole experience got me thinking about how our reactions vary so drastically depending on our perspective. The film had a different affect on me than everyone else in the theatre, except maybe my mother who was seeing it through my eyes.

Safe Haven (SPOILER ALERT) is about a young woman who escapes her abusive husband to find herself in a vacation town on the coast of South Carolina where she meets a handsome widower and his two adorable children. It’s relatively straightforward. She’s got trust issues, he’s still dealing with the struggle to move past his beloved wife, they fall for each other, love conquers all and, after her crazy ex-husband gets shot in the chest with his own gun, they live happily ever after.

The thing is, I was supposed to be rooting for the couple. I was meant to see her fill the void left by the children’s mother. I was to hope she’d trust this marvelous man – only alone by a cruel trick of fate – and cheer when she finally let her guard down enough to see that not all men are bad and that she was worthy of love. As I followed the plot however, I became increasingly aware that the character I was most associating with was not the main girl, or the husband or even the children. The character I was projecting onto was the dead mother. For obvious reasons the mother was the character I found myself most connected to. There’s a scene where Josh explains his son “remembers his mother” while the younger daughter just “remembers the idea of her”. It was supposed to make me see that if Julianne could win over the son, the daughter was already hers and everything would just fall into place. I found the entire thing devastating. Loch is younger than the daughter in the film and I know should something happen to me now, he’ll never truly remember me and another woman will easily be able to take my place in his heart. The son in the movie is older, say 11, and he’s angry and confused by his mother being gone but also by his Dad’s interest in a new woman and I found that concept equally unbearable. But, because this film is about two people falling in love and not the story of how people deal with grief, after a few short scenes of minor tween attitude, the boy is equally won over by the successor and ready to move on. Nice for the child. Nice for the Dad. Nice for the new girlfriend. But I’m still sad for the dead mom.

Did I mention the dead mother shows up to befriend and get to know the replacement. Yep, so there's that too.

Did I mention the dead mother shows up to befriend and get to know her replacement. Yep, so there’s that too.

At one point Josh Duhamel looks through a stack of letters in his wife’s old office which has been left like a shrine. It appears the mother wrote a collection of letters to be read by her surviving family members at key moments in their lives, “To My Son on his Graduation” or “To My Daughter on her Wedding Day”. Those letters, all sealed and waiting, are there to make us feel for the husband, for the burden he’s carrying and the job he’s now doing alone, but I was weeping away in my seat for the woman who wrote them and what she had to leave behind. Later in the film when that same building burns to the ground (thanks to the unbalanced ex) and I wasn’t worried for the child who had to jump from the roof or the female lead wrestling her ex with a gun, I was worried for the letters. Those painstakingly written last hopes and dreams. The final thoughts of a mother who had to leave her family but wanted them to know she was still with them. I kept thinking “Save the letters! Save the letters!” and when they didn’t, I was a wreck.

As it is with these kind of books and films however, there was a loophole. The letters, which were stored in a metal desk, were discovered intact when the husband roots through the debris after the fire. At the end of the film Julianne’s character, sitting on a beautiful, old tree swing, is given one of those letters. The letter is simply addressed “To Her”, meaning the woman who comes after, the woman my husband has chosen to love. As Josh and the darling moppets fish in the warm Carolina sun Julianne reads the letter. The dead mom’s voice over wishes her love and joy. She says she’s happy her son will have a mother and her daughter a confident. She says that she knows her husband must really love her because she’s reading this and she’s now able to move on because she knows her family’s taken care of. Julianne looks up, her eyes lock with Josh and they stare lovingly at each other. Their happy ending is all but guaranteed and all I could think of was the poor dying woman who’d been reduced to a disembodied voice.

Life is perspective. We hear in songs what we’re experiencing at the time. We react to words people say with the spin we feel in our soul. Someone having a baby is great news unless you just had a miscarriage or have been trying unsuccessfully for years to get pregnant. Getting an expensive present from your husband is lovely unless you know your family’s struggling with money. Birthdays make some people depressed and other people, like me, super happy. Our take on things is amplified by how we already feel. I was happy for the couple in the film but I didn’t care about them like I did for the woman who had to say goodbye before she was ready. I’m not feeling as noble as she was about being replaced, though for the sake of Sean and Loch I know eventually I might have to adjust.

There was one moment in the film I really appreciated. A second where they took a moment from courting to honor the memory of the person who was gone. The couple are at a particularly romantic location and Julianne asks Josh if he used to bring his wife there. He says yes and admits that for a while he tried to avoid places that reminded him of her because he thought it would be easier. He says he tried to put her from his mind, to not think of her… but he realized that wasn’t fair to her memory. That if he wasn’t remembering her, who would? He says, “She was wonderful and doesn’t deserve to be forgotten.”

Should I go, I would want Sean to find love again. I would want him to be happy. I would want Loch to have someone to love and mother him, to hug and kiss him and tell him everything was going to be ok. I wouldn’t want them to be alone but the thought of someone taking my place kills me. No matter how healthy it would be for them, I’m not ready to be forgotten. Right now I still believe I’ll beat my disease but, should I go down hill, I can see softening to the idea of being replaced. I can imagine a time where I’ll be at peace with the thought of simply being a memory and, with all the letters I write to Loch, perhaps I should take the time to write one to “Her” as well.

Sometimes the right thing to do is also the hardest. It’s all a matter of perspective.

xo leigh

Jan 21

23 Comments

Aging Gracefully?

I was at a holiday party this season speaking to a gentleman who was around sixty years old. We were having a great conversation when he asked me, in a flirtatious manner, if I’d come with a husband. I said, yes and pointed across the room to where Sean was standing his back to us. The man said, “The buff one in the gray? Must be nice.” Then, in a conspiratorial manner he added, “So…you married younger huh?” My wine glass nearly shattered under the pressure of the involuntary death grip. Married younger?! Excuse me?! What was he implying? Ok, truthfully Sean is two years younger than me, but this man was implying an age GAP, like I was some crazed cougar shopping for mates in the nursery. I get it, he’s young and handsome, but suddenly, in contrast, I felt I must look…what…old and tired? Yes, this man was still hitting on me, but it was like he was making a play for a contemporary and not the much younger woman I actually was. The whole experience left me feeling dismal.

Before and after from the botox website. Looks pretty good right?

I’ve flirted with the idea of botox for years. When I moved from New York to LA my incredibly expressive face, the one that could be read from the top balcony, was suddenly a serious detriment. On camera my expressiveness morphed from enthusiastic to garish. Everything was amplified and not in a good way. One on-camera coach informed me I should get botox immediately “to shut that s*#@ down”. I thought I would have done anything to get my career off the ground but I couldn’t get my head around injecting my twenty-seven year old face with a toxin so it was unable to move. Ten years later, seeing the result of that movement etched into my forehead, it’s starting to look like a pretty good idea. Years of conversations and ”feelings” have stolen my fresh face and replaced it with one that looks, well, weathered.

Not ready to bite the bullet, I dance the perimeter of the anti-aging world with things like the new skin care line from Rodin + Fields. Rodin + Fields are the dermatologists who created ProActive Solution, a product I could never use (despite the need) because I was allergic to one of the key ingredients. However, when they introduced their new anti-aging line for both fine lines and brightening, I thought maybe some non-invasive reversing could help. I recognize it’s just a bandaid, but at this time I can’t afford (and am too afraid) of the other options.

Jessica Chastain on the cover of said Marie Claire only further encourages my desire for botox. My forehead hasn't looked like that in ten years.

Jessica Chastain on the cover of said Marie Claire only further encourages my desire for botox. My forehead hasn’t looked like that since I was a teenager.

Aleksandra Crapanzano wrote an essay in December 2012′s Marie Claire called Frozen in Time where she poses the question whether botox and anti-aging treatments are becoming not just the norm, but the unspoken expectation for women in our society. She writes about going to a dinner party and looking around the table at the other women. Despite the fact she was probably the youngest by ten years, she realized that without having undergone any injections or surgeries she probably looked the oldest. She asks, “Have the expectations of a certain stratum of society changed? Was it now uncouth of me to show up at dinner with my fine lines? Was it akin to showing up with mud on my boots and a moth hole in my sweater?” Now I may not be hobnobbing with Manhattan’s social elite but, looking around at the other women in Los Angeles, I can honestly say I understand how she feels.

I was recently doing some random flipping on the TV and came across an episode of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. Having never seen it before I stopped to see what all the hype’s about. What struck me most – aside from the fact that certain women never grow out of junior high behavior – was their faces.

Is this look attractive? Seriously, I’m getting confused. celebitchy.com

What was happening there? It was horrifying. Everything was too tight, too shiny, too exaggerated and frankly, too frozen. I was inspired to tweet something (something I’m making an effort to get on board with) but I couldn’t properly formulate my distaste. What exactly was I thinking? Why did they all look like that? How could they look in the mirror and think they looked good? Were we coming to a place where that was beginning to look normal? In ten years will everyone look like that? God knows I understand the desire to retain a youthful appearance. I’d love to hold onto my jawline and crease free eyes but I couldn’t help thinking I’d rather look like a pile of wrinkles than, to coin a phase, a melted Barbie doll.

It’s brave to age naturally like this…
simpsonswiki.net

My concern is that we’re getting confused. The more we’re absorbed into the business of youth, the more disoriented we get. Is a lineless, frozen face the future’s new normal? Are we looking at a time when we don’t realize how ridiculous we’ve become? It’s obviously what Suzanne Collins was thinking of when she created the people of the Capital in her wildly successful Hunger Games trilogy. In the books the wealthy and elite are surgically altered, dyed and powdered within an inch of their lives with no sense of how absurd and, in many ways, grotesque they actually appear.

Crapanzano’s article references Timothy Greenfield-Sanders HBO film About Face, which interviews former supermodels about aging. In it Isabella Rossellini expresses her inner conflict with this whole new anti-aging industry. “I’m debating in my head. One day I get up and say, “Hey there’s this new technology, why not use it?” But most of the time I wake up and say, “Is this the new feet binding? Is this the new way to tell women, you are ugly deep down, you should be this and this. Is the main problem misogyny?”

…when people expect you to look like this.
nndb.com

Carmen Dell’Orefice, the still stunning supermodel of the 1950′s, offers a different perspective with a candid and casual “Well, if you had the ceiling falling down in your living room, would you not go and have a repair?”

I think there’s something to be said for both points of view. Don’t we all want to retain our face’s “natural” state, the face of our youth? My mom used to say she’s often surprised when she looks in the mirror because she doesn’t feel that old. Crapanzano acknowledges that feeling when she expresses the natural process of aging feels anything but natural because so few of us feel our age. She says, “Out of sight of a mirror, I still think I’m 30, tops. For most women over 40, looking in a mirror is an unpleasant collision with reality, a fissure in our denial. We just don’t feel how we look.” Dr. David Colbert, a Manhattan dermatologist known for keeping his patients looking “naturally” young poses a more probing question, “Does it make your life longer when you look 40 when you’re 60? Maybe. Maybe it’s the interpretation of your life that make it feel longer.” And according to Manhattan psychiatrist Dr. Marianne Gillow, her patients are consistently in better moods after botox, as if looking better makes them feel better, or perhaps the inability to frown simply makes people feel less “frowny”.*

You gotta hand it to her. Carmen Dell'Orefice is 82 and obviously doing something right in the anti-aging battle.herworldplus.com

You gotta hand it to her. Carmen Dell’Orefice is 82 and obviously doing something right in the battle against aging. herworldplus.com

I have to say seeing my face in photographs or a mirror these days has a clear effect on my mood and interpretation of self. I fear turning into one of those women who refuses to be photographed or, like my mother has a habit of ripping (or deleting) herself out of photos. I don’t want to break up with my image, I just want to like it. I don’t think these feeling are uniquely mine or even exclusive to women. There are some amazing before and after pictures of men in Kate Sommerville’s book on skin that would benefit everyone from Sean to my father. Yes, men generally age more attractively. It’s acceptable to see the results of aging on their skin and, in a cruel double standard, their wrinkles often end up improving their looks making them sexy and distinguished, but ultimately, men want to look young and fresh too. Look at poor Kenny Rogers…and he was a cowboy. They’re allowed to be wizened.

Adorable Lindsay vs. post unnecessary plastic surgery Lindsay. So sad.

It’s hard to open a magazine or turn on the TV these days without seeing an onslaught of perfectly smooth faces. Everyone from politicians on the national stage to movie stars on our grocery store news stands are there to show us how we could (should?) look and it’s difficult not to fall pray. I think if you’re going to do it, the key – after finding the right doctor – is to not go overboard (and never touch your lips). Everyone witnessed the destruction of Meg Ryan’s beautiful, quirky, adorable face, because for every Demi Moore there’s a Jocelyn Wildenstein around to freak you out. Crapanzano quotes Harvard-trained plastic surgeon Dr. Haideh Hirmand who says, “People get carried away and think, If a little looks good, a lot will look better and that’s not the case. I’m almost certain you look older if you do too much.” Case in point, previously adorable Lindsay Lohan who looks older than me now.

usmagazine.com

Ultimately, it’s a slippery slope. What is pretty if we can buy it? I remember when Ashley Simpson had her nose done. At first I was annoyed. Just accept what you look like already. But time passes, you forget about the nose job and all you see is the pretty girl the nose job uncovered. I hate myself for thinking it, but she looks better now, and once you’ve allowed yourself to forget she bought that face, you start thinking it was a pretty good idea. At the end of the day I don’t want to look different, I want to look the same. Life’s aged me and I’d like to recognize myself in the mirror again. I want to be the best version of myself, but not so young it becomes creepy. The aforementioned Demi Moore looks fantastic but she reminds me a bit of that old Meryl Streep/Goldie Hawn/Bruce Willis movie Death Becomes Her in which two vain competitive women make a pact with the devil (ironically, played by Isabella Rossolini) for eternal life and youth. As things go drastically and comically awry, they realize life isn’t about how you appear but who you are, and as they shatter to pieces at the end of the film, the audience sees the cautionary tale that is the worship of youth and beauty.

When it comes right down to it -as I said in my post on Birthdays - obviously the key for me is being around to age. I WANT to grow old. But, even with that perspective, I’d prefer the aging part to be a little less obvious. Life is special and sacred but feeling good about yourself is a part of that. Self confidence is akin to self worth and if people start looking at me like I’m expired meat I might start to feel like that. I don’t want to be tightened and pulled within an inch of my life. I always want to look like me, older or no, but if I’m never mistaken for my husband’s sugar mama again, it will be too soon.

I mean really?! Come on!!!

xo leigh

* Aleksandra Crapanzano, Marie Claire December 2012, Frozen in Time

Jan 7

2 Comments

Time To Be A Grown Up

I just returned from Christmas vacation in Toronto with my family and we had an absolutely amazing time. We haven’t been home to Canada in the winter in five years but after having such a lovely time in Oregon last Christmas Sean and I realized there’s something to be said for getting “away” for the holidays. Celebrating in our own home is nice, but the luxury of being able to leave – to go somewhere where we aren’t constantly reminded of things that need to be done or work that should be accomplished, a place where friends are close and family is closer, a space far removed from our “every day” – is a real treat. Our lives have a habit of becoming repetitive, sort of a “same s*^# different day” mentality that a change of scene really shakes up. Turns out it was just what we needed to refill our tanks.

Obviously, being the kind of chummy, togetherness family we are, we filled our days with plenty of family activities encouraged by the season. We walked downtown to see the beautiful Christmas windows decorated for the young and young at heart, we did multiple days of tobogganing (sledding for my south of the border friends) down the snowy white hills in our mismatched ski clothes, we made snow men, angels and igloos on the front lawn and cozied up inside for movies with hot chocolate. Christmas day was thrilling (how can it not be with a little person?) and the spirit of the season filled my childhood home. Two full weeks allowed us to have a real visit with my parents and Loch and his Granny were like peas in a pod. Every morning he’d open the door to my room not to say good morning but to take a shortcut to his beloved Gran. It was both sweet and awesome to be able to roll over and go back to sleep knowing he was happy and I wasn’t in charge.

How great is that snowman? Love my family!

Family time aside, what struck me the most about this holiday was how energized I felt being able to go out and socialize as an adult. Not as a family, but as a couple, or even as an individual. We did have a wonderful Christmas Eve with six of my oldest friends, their spouses/partners and children, but even amidst all the chaos it felt as if the priority remained on the adults. The children ran around and did their thing but I think the grown ups were free to enjoy their evening. I’m willing to accept it might have just felt like that to me because my child is almost 5, comfortable in the space and can feed himself, but for the most part I felt the children, instead of being the focal point they usually are, were able to fall in and let their parents come first. Before everyone went home we even had the energy to do some singing as a group. For me it was the most special Christmas Eve I can remember having. A perfect storm of family, friends and joy for which I was incredibly grateful.

The boys in my life. Good sports every one.

We don’t go out a lot in LA. We sometimes see movies or go to dinner, but between Sean’s insane work schedule, our friend’s busy lives and our baby sitter’s availabilities, we don’t do it that much. I don’t know whether it was the fact that it was the holidays, we had a built-in baby sitter or people were just up for going out, but Sean and I were really social over the break and it was fantastic. We had night of tequila and Mexican food with my Maid of Honor and her new love who, after a decade of living in NYC is finally back in Toronto where I can visit her. We spent an terrific weekend with one of my oldest friends and her family up in ski country where we were outdoorsy all day and spent rosy cheeked nights chatting away while our children played. New Year’s Eve was a riotous evening of old friends, great nibbles and big laughs where even some dancing took place. And finally, and what really solidified this whole thought for me, was a dinner we had with a dear friend of mine from High School and his adorable wife. We connected at a great Italian restaurant, drank a couple bottles of wine and enjoyed four hours of animated, candid conversation. After we’d dropped them off, I turned to Sean and said, “That was an absolutely perfect evening” and it was. Good food, great people, and real grown up interaction. I don’t think any of us noticed the time fly by. There’s a real under appreciation, especially with parents, for taking time to yourselves. I’m not talking about things like spa days, because honestly how many people are actually doing that, but an afternoon or evening here and there that truly belongs to you. Where our conversations shift to subjects other than work or kids. A time where the enjoyment of our peers and ourselves becomes the focus.

The Christmas Eve Gang. Such a wonderful evening.

There was a night a couple of months ago when a group of moms from Loch’s preschool were getting together for dinner. I was exhausted and seriously considering bailing, but I pulled it together, slapped some blush on my cheeks and willed myself out the door. What struck me most, almost instantly after I arrived, was how un-tired I felt. I thought I’d stay for one drink and here I was all perky and laughing. What I realized in that moment was only part of me was tired – the mom part – the other part of me – let’s call it the Leigh part – was really excited to be out. That part of me was thrilled to be among her peers and perfectly happy to order a second martini. I try to remind myself of that feeling every time I think I don’t have the energy to rally at the end of the day. Only part of me is whipped. The other part is just bored.

2 days of skiing with our great friends from the cottage. Fun for kids and grown ups!

I have a close group of friends here in LA. It’s basically three couples with kids and two singles. We used to do a annual dinner out for everyone’s birthday but over time it became increasingly more complicated to organize and we ended up celebrating March birthdays in June or putting two birthday’s together, so we finally let it go. The thing is, now we barely see each other. Sure our dinners only happened five or six times a year but at least they happened. I looked forward to them and now, with all our busy schedules, there’s never any time to see our friends. Without the excuse of the birthday celebration, there never seems to be a reason to make plans.

Some of the New Years crew.

If you’re a parent you understand when I say “embrace the adult part of yourself”. It’s the part that still bothers to do your makeup or craves a couple of hours when no one’s asking you for something. A time when you can stop trying to shape a person and just be a person. But I also think it’s important for people without children to embrace that part too. We aren’t just parents or our jobs. We can’t simply fall into routines and forget to get out. Remember when you used to wait for the weekend? When you’d be excited planning your social life? We shouldn’t stop just because we got busy…or tired.

I’m excited for a fundraiser for Loch’s school in May because it’s a dinner dance where I can plan a costume. I’m eagerly awaiting the summer when my BFF and I will go dancing. I’m psyched for a friend’s birthday party that has yet to be planned because he mentioned he wanted it to be a masked ball. It could be next year but I’m already looking forward to it and that’s slightly depressing. These nights out shouldn’t be so few and far between. If I learned anything this Christmas, other than Mt. Sinai is a far better hospital than Sunnybook, it’s that we need to make more of an effort. That seeing our friends is a spirit lifter. That we require more nights of companionship and conversation and we should remind ourselves more than twice a year that we’re more than a collection of schedules, habits and errands. Connecting with others reminds us of ourselves, not just our given roles.

If I know anything, it’s that life is short and you never know what cards you’re going to be dealt. I realize life’s not a vacation. That we don’t always have the time, finances or inclination to go out. But this holiday reminded me that I should more of an effort. That the simple action of interacting with my peers made me happier. Time with our kids is wonderful. Commitment to our spouse is essential. Devotion to our job is both lucrative and inevitable. But our friendships, our adult based interactions, are vital to our mental health. We need those connections. We need those evenings or lunches or whatever to remind us of who were are at the root of it all. We deserve to be excited. To have fun. To get dressed up, because time for yourself, for the person inside who wants to be more than what they do or who they take care of, is indispensable. So though it might feel like it’s the last thing on your to do list, I believe our lives are better and more full when we live them, not just exist within them.

Happy New Year! Go call a friend.

xo leigh

Dec 17

10 Comments

Tragedy in Newton: What’s wrong with the USA?

The post I had planned for this week seemed frivolous and inappropriate in the wake of the recent tragedy in Connecticut, so I’m going to take this time to briefly express my views, as simplified as they are, on this hideous and sickening event.

First of all, I grew up in Canada where guns are rare and for the most part belong in the hands of the police or terrible criminals. There was no “gun culture” in Canada so even as an American I feel no constitutional pull to “bare arms” in any way. I don’t want a gun. I don’t like guns. I don’t understand, other than hunting (which I’m also not big on) why you would need a gun. I understand the concept of protecting yourself but at what point does your right to “protection” start infringing on the protection of everyone else? Sean and I have decided that we only really want a gun “if the zombies come” because it’s not as if we’d be using it in any other way. Gun in one locked box. Ammo in another. Probably in two completely different places in our house. It’d be useless in a crisis and, frankly, I’m fine with that. Bringing a gun into play changes the game and it’s a game I’m not equipped or interested in playing.

.223 assault rifle, like the one used in the shootings.

Guns were made to kill. That is their purpose. Why regular people in no eminent danger feel the need to have them is foreign to me but I realize it’s a big part of the American culture so I can understand even if I don’t agree. Assault weapons on the other hand – AK-47, semi automatic weapons, fully automatic weapons – I simply can not abide. Assault weapons were created to hold and get out as many bullets as quickly as possible. They are weapons of war that I believe have absolutely no place outside of the military. They don’t belong in the hands of hunters, home owners, collectors or God forbid, mentally ill sociopaths. They are a weapon akin to a bomb as far as destruction, and as far as I know bombs are illegal.

“Guns don’t kill people. People kill people.” I know, love and respect many people who say this but I think it’s a trite phrase touted for years that allows people to pass the buck. Of course people kill people, but the access to guns makes it a hell of a lot easier and destructive. A child who picks up his father’s gun to show a friend and ends up shooting himself can only do that because the gun is there. The angry and disturbed young man who shot 32 people at Virgina Tech could only accomplish that because he was able to get his hands on two semi automatic hand guns. Yes, it is essential we figure out what’s at the bottom of all the anger. Why these young men feel there’s no alternative but mass murder and suicide. We must get to the root of the problem and better respond to the issue of mental illness. We must weed out the cause, but in the meantime, we must also make it harder for disturbed people to follow through with their plans. Even without a “No Guns. Period.” law – which I realize is impossible – limiting the access to weapons can only help. If Adam Lanza only had access to a knife like the mentally ill man in central China that attacked an elementary school on the same day, rather than three semi-automatic weapons with multiple round magazines, the death toll would have been exponentially lessened, as it would have been in the movie theatre in Aurora, CO, the Sikh temple in Wisconsin, or the High School in Columbine, CO.

We have to stop being afraid to talk about this. As Ezra Klein for the Washington Post said in Twelve Facts about Guns and Mass Shootings in the United States, “If roads were collapsing all across the United States, killing dozens of drivers, we would surely see that as a moment to talk about what we could do to keep roads from collapsing. If terrorists were detonating bombs in port after port, you can be sure Congress would be working to upgrade the nation’s security measures. If a plague was ripping through communities, public-health officials would be working feverishly to contain it. Only with gun violence do we respond to repeated tragedies by saying that mourning is acceptable but discussing how to prevent more tragedies is not. “Too soon,” howl supporters of loose gun laws. But as others have observed, talking about how to stop mass shootings in the aftermath of a string of mass shootings isn’t “too soon.” It’s much too late.”

The innocent child victims of Sandy Hook Elementary

We have to stop falling back on old rhetoric and realize the system is broken if our citizens are not safe. Our children are DYING in their classrooms. Whatever you feel your rights are, they can’t possibly trump the safety of our children, or ourselves, as we go about our daily lives. Guns are a serious problem that needs to be addressed in a serious way. It’s not going away, if anything it’s getting worse. Time Magazine has a list of the 25 worst mass shootings in the last 50 years and 15 of them are in the US. The second place goes to Finland who has 2. Of the 11 deadliest shootings in the US, 5 have happened SINCE 2007 and that doesn’t include these Connecticut murders with it’s death toll of 28, now the second-deadliest mass shooting in US history.*

David Remnick from the New Yorker recently wrote an article entitled What Obama Must Do About Guns in which he clearly and adamantly insisted our President stop falling back on empathy following such a tragedy and take some serious and decisive action to deal with the issue of guns. It may be a heated political topic that polarizes the country but what kind of country are we, and what kind of leader is he, if the safety of our citizens isn’t our paramount concern? As Mr. Remnick says, “We have grown accustomed to what will happen next. The President will likely visit a funeral or a memorial service and, at greater length, comfort the families of the victims, the community, and the nation. He will be eloquent. He will give voice to the common grief, the common confusion, the common outrage. But then what? A “conversation”? Let there be a conversation. But also let there be decisive action from a President who is determined not only to feel our pain but, calling on the powers of his office, to feel the urge to prevent more suffering. His reading of the Constitution should no longer be constrained by a sense of what the conventional wisdom is in this precinct or that. Let him begin his campaign for a more secure and less violent America in the wake of what has happened in Connecticut.”

A vigil for the victims outside a church in CT.

Nicolas D. Kristof sites some excellent and plausible suggestions in his Op-Ed piece for the New York Times Sunday Review called Do We Have The Courage To Stop This? After pointing out this “isn’t about one school shooting, but the unceasing toll across our country. More Americans die in gun homicides and suicides in six months (approximately 15,500) than have died in the last 25 years in every terrorist attack and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq combined.” (2000 casualties in Afghanistan as of 09/30/2012, 4,326 in Iraq since 2003, and 2,751 victims in 9/11 Attacks total 9,077) After suggesting such changes as limiting gun purchases to one a month to curb gun traffickers, restricting the sale of high-capacity magazines so a shooter can’t kill as many people without reloading, imposing a universal background check for gun buyers (even with private sales), he directs us to the examples of other countries who have adjusted their gun policies in the wake of similar tragedies. “In 1996, a mass killing of 35 people in Australia galvanized the nation’s conservative prime minister to ban certain rapid-fire long guns. The “National Firearms Agreement” led to the buyback of 650,000 guns and tighter rules for licensing and safe storage of those remaining in public hands. The law did not end gun ownership in Australia but reduced the number of firearms in private hands by one-fifth, and all but eliminating the kinds most likely used in mass shootings.” And it worked. In the 18 years before the law, Australia suffered 13 mass shootings, but not one in the 14 years after the law took full effect. The firearms murder rate also dropped by more than 40 percent with the suicide rate being reduced by more than half (Harvard Injury Control Research Center). Kristof also suggests looking to Canada which “now requires a 28-day waiting period to buy a handgun and it imposes a safeguard where gun buyers must have the support of two people vouching for them before the transaction is able to be complete.” Finally he cleverly suggests we simply look to our own history on auto safety. “As with guns, auto deaths are often caused by people who break laws or behave irresponsibly. But we don’t shrug and say, “Cars don’t kill people, drunks do.” We require seat belts, air bags, child seats and crash safety standards. We have introduced limited licenses for young drivers and are trying to curb the use of mobile phones while at the wheel.” And the policies have worked. With these governmentally implemented auto safety regulations America’s traffic fatality rate per mile driven has been reduced by nearly 90 percent since the 1950s. Kristof rightly points out that if we don’t get as serious about our gun safety as we are about our auto safety, many more will die because of our failure. **

This is no longer a situation that can be blamed on one crazed madman. Yes, one man is responsible but the problem is much further reaching. As John Cassidy said in his New Yorker article America’s Shame: Words and Tears Aren’t Enough, “All societies have deeply troubled and alienated young men, some of whom end up violently lashing out at the world. But in most other advanced countries, such as the United Kingdom, which banned handguns after what happened at Dunblane (in 1996, a former Scout troop leader entered a primary school in Scotland, and shot to death sixteen pupils before killing himself), these misfits don’t have easy access to guns and the gun culture that glorifies them. During recent years, politicians of both parties, President Obama included, have been far too reticent about spelling out this elemental truth. In the immediate aftermath of the massacre at the cinema in Aurora, President Obama refused even to talk about the gun laws, preferring to keep the focus on the victims.” ***

We have to stop making excuses. We have to stop hiding behind an amendment from over 220 years ago and accept that we live in a different world now. A more unkind, angry world with laws that no longer fit the hostility of certain factions of society. Yes, we should also seek the root of the problem, to discover what’s broken in our system causing people to become so desperate they see no other way out or lets mentally ill people fall through the cracks, but in the meantime, we must seriously consider taking the weapons away. As Adam Gopnick, also of the New Yorker, recently said in his article Newtown and the Madness of Guns, “Let’s state the plain facts one more time, so that they can’t be mistaken: Gun massacres have happened many times in many countries, and in every other country, gun laws have been tightened to reflect the tragedy and the tragic knowledge of its citizens afterward. In every other country, gun massacres have subsequently become rare. In America alone, gun massacres, most often of children, happen with hideous regularity, and they happen with hideous regularity because guns are hideously and regularly available.”

I cried my eyes out when I picked Loch up from school on Friday. Hearing his little voice in my backseat, seeing his chirpy face in my mirror. So many parents will never hear that voice or see that face again. That is unacceptable. So many people have been forever devastated by this senseless monstrosity. My heart is broken. My faith in this country is shaken. I’m sick to my stomach. I want to do something to help but how do you make people listen? How do we enact change if even cataclysms like this don’t wake people up?

We can do better. We should be better. If no one stops it, this will go on. As Nicholas Thompson says in America’s Culture of Violence “Voters need to be loud, politicians need to be brave, and the gun lobby needs to be defeated.” There are other issues at hand, but this is the first step and it must be taken.

Let us take this as a call. We must stop sitting in the complacency of our safe, little lives and realize if we don’t step up, that safety could be gone forever. There are rights and there is the greater good. When our kindergarden students aren’t safe in their own classrooms the time has come to stand up and say No More. Every killing is a tragedy. This is a call to arms.

*Ezra Klein Twelve Facts about Guns and Mass Shootings in the United States

** Nicolas D. Kristof Do We Have The Courage To Stop This? New York Times Review, December 15, 2012

*** As of 12/16/2012 Huffington Post and NBC News reports Dianne Feinstein is to introduce an assault weapon ban on the first day of congress. Please don’t turn this into an impotent circular debate of cow towing to your constituents and lobbyists. Pull together for once and do what is best for the country.

Nov 5

3 Comments

Halloween

I am posting a week early because I believe a post on Halloween will feel less relevant next week. With the election tomorrow, I anticipate there will be other things to discuss than goblins and candy corn. To that point, I’d like to encourage everyone to get out and vote tomorrow. This is an incredibly important election and I hope you’ll vote with both your head and your heart. xo leigh

I love Halloween. I love dressing up. My family loves dressing up. We’re those people. We decorated our house with (mostly) home made decorations on September 29th, we bobbed for apples in our backyard, Sean sewed his and Loch’s costume and we throughly enjoyed everything the holiday had to offer from picking out our pumpkins at the local farm, to Monster Mash playing in our house day and night. We love it all. That’s why, when our trick or treating turned out to be kind of disappointing this year I was bummed. It’s like when you love a book so much and then the ending falls flat. You feel kind of like Meh (and yes, I’m talking to you The Historian).

We were really excited to go out. Halloween night is the culmination of an entire month of anticipation and our expectations were high. This year we were kindly invited to join Lochie’s best friend, his family and some of their extended friends in the tony neighbourhood of Tuluca Lake, CA. It’s a beautiful area, filled with houses ranging from lovely medium size homes to humongous, bohemeth estates of the extraordinarly wealthy. The problem is it also seems to have become one of the “it” places to be if you’re on the hunt for candy and a killer Halloween atmosphere. It’s a full size chocolate bar neighbourhood if you get my drift. We were psyched to be included in our group. We love the family and being there seemed legit because we weren’t just driving ourselves to a cool neighborhood to knock on doors. It’s where our friends ACTUALLY live. It’s also an area I can imagine buying a house, because even with it’s obvious 2%ness, it retains it’s old school neighborhood feel. People know each other, talk to the dog walkers, notice when things seem off and generally seem pretty friendly. So, despite the fact that it, like the rest of the residential streets in the valley, has very few street lights, it seemed to be the perfect place for our little costumed babies to experience trick or treating.

We were a small(ish) group of four families with the oldest being six and the youngest being two. We started our evening enjoying pizza and taking pictures of the kids. Sean and I were the only parents dressed up but, that’s us, and pretty soon the people who didn’t know us understood we weren’t so much weird as enthusiastic and accepted us as such. Around 6pm we started walking the neighborhood while it was still light. From a favorite Disney phenom cum rocker’s house where her staff give candy out in front of her closed gate, to the family who’d deliberately taken their gates off the hinges to make their house look haunted, the neighborhood was fantastic. We crisscrossed the street and the kids were having a ball.

As the darkness came so did the big kids. Personally I think there should be a mandatory cut off on trick or treaters. Just as we aren’t supposed to drink in this country till 21, I think trick or treating should be cut off at 13. If there’s a “teen” in your age, you’re too old. I understand that I sound Grincy (or whatever the Halloween equivilent would be) but if you’re out in big groups with your high school friends and your pillowcases pushing ahead of the little kids you’re doing something wrong.

We ended up at a dead end street called the Tuluca Lake Estates which is basically a mecca for entertainment industry big wigs who do it up BIG for Halloween. One lawn had a life size pirate ship, complete with strobe lights, fake wind and sound effects. Another house, which apparently chooses a new theme every year, capitalized on the love of all things Super Hero and had decorated with dozens of skeletons dressed in destroyed superhero costumes, posed in full battle. Aqua Man held a trident to Superman’s neck. Spiderman had reduced Ironman to a helmet and a pile of bones. Another lawn had at least ten life size ghosts playing ring around the rosie. This one street was like a theme park and it was at once both completely fabulous and total bedlam.

The surrounding streets were bumper to bumper parking. No one could drive anywhere. There was a stretch golf cart tooting around a bunch of mouthy early teens yelling “Move!” to anyone who got in their way. Hundreds of people had obviouly heard about this neighborhood and it was as if they were getting dropped off by the bus load. Every house had a line of at least twenty-five people (often double or triple that) clamering for candy. The home owners (or in most cases their nannies and housekeepers) sat in their driveways or on their front porch behind tables. One house even set up a velvet rope to keep the crowds in check. There was no time to interact. No time for the person giving out candy to say “Oh, and what are you?” No time for the generous homeowners (who were easily spending $1000-$2000 on candy) to appreciate the kids in their costumes. No room for the kids to check out the decorations that had been so elaborately set out for their enjoyment. I would have loved to really look around, to take it all in, but it was all I could do to keep my eye on my little jedi and his pirate friend amidst the dark and the crowds. I took to taking them up to every house, clutching their little hands, lest I lose track of them. The candy line was like a convayer belt and, honestly, it was kind of depressing.

This is literally on someone’s front lawn.

As we were pushed aside by bigger and bigger kids (and I’m talking 13-20 – most just in jeans) I felt more and more irritated. I started saying things outloud like, “There’s a line” and “You’re going to knock a four year old over, really?” For every nice teen waiting their turn who had put together a cool costume - big shout out to the Book of Mormon kids who could sing the opening number, the awesome Lisbeth Salander from The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, and my matching Princess Lea who wanted her picture with me, you guys were great – there were ten, burly, shouldn’t be out, little jerks jamming up the streets and elbowing their way past the pre-schoolers. When I was young no self respecting teenager was still going door to door. Or, if they were, it was later, after the little kids were done. You didn’t need a watch back then, as soon as the big kids came out, you knew it was time to go home.

This, however, was chaos and I think the ones who suffered most (aside from the parents who looked strung out and tired) were the kids. The boys never let go of my hands. The pirate kept telling me he was scared and my jedi was seriously put out to wait in a line. Loch was asking to go home by the end of the dead end street. It was no longer fun. It was overwhelming.

What happened to trick or treating in your own neighborhood or like us, the neighborhood of your friends? Driving thirty minutes to get to the “right” neighborhood is weird. It’s like dragging your kids to best fishing spot to “catch the big one” when all they want to do is drop a line off the end of your dock. The houses were amazing but we couldn’t enjoy them. Even the people who owned them, and had gone to all the trouble, weren’t getting much out of it. It was an onslaught and probably why they delegated their candy job to the help.

more purity needed like these images at ziprealty.com

At the end of the day if you asked Loch if he had a good time he’d say yes, he dressed up and hung out with his friends, but as his mother, I know it could have been better. I miss the old days before we started supersizing everything. I missed the purity of watching my kid trip up someone’s walkway to ring their bell. I missed watching from the street as he spoke to the home owner and received his candy. Last year he was a vampire and everyone kept saying, “Oh, look Dracula!” and he’d say, “No, I’m a vampire.” not knowing that Dracula was, in fact, the most famous vampire. I missed him running back to us to show us his goodies and I was sorry not to be able to interact with the other adults in our group without worrying we’d lose track of our children in a mob. Secretly, I even missed my voyaristic love of peeking into other’s people’s homes. We had a lovely time with our friends back at their house but I prefer trick or treating when it’s more wholesome and less commercial. I appreciate the expensive decorations but they come with too many fans. I’m ok with a hand carved jack o’lantern on the front porch and I favor a Halloween that’s more cute superheros and less evil clowns. This year was a perfect example of how bigger is not always better. Sure, Loch came away with a lot of loot, but he was happiest when we got home and he was able to hand out candy and play with his friends. He felt safe there, and in that happiness he could finally relax and just enjoy the holiday he loves so much.

I couldn’t agree with him more.

Oct 29

16 Comments

Deliberate Acts of Kindness

Before I begin, I’d like to say I’ve been asked to become a regular contributor to the online magazine MoveLifeStyle.com. My article about the prevalence of perfection in today’s cyber world is currently published and I’ll have a political piece right before the election. Please feel free to check it out. Move is a fabulous site well worth the bookmark. xo leigh

Sean and I recently received a letter from some dear friends of ours. It was a lovely card that said “Every Single Day, Do Something That Makes Your Heart Sing”. Inside there was a heartfelt note saying they were thinking of us and how very much we meant to them. They had also included a check for a substantial amount of money. They wrote “In thinking of you, God has put it in our hearts to send you something”. These extraordinary people went on to say it was a “GIFT” to use as we saw fit “medical bills, something fun, whatever”. Their one condition was that we never bring it up. They had included it because they felt the “point of us all being here is to take care of one another and help when we can.”

Sean and I were completely floored. We’ve never spoken directly with them about our struggles. Truly only a few family members and an inner circle of close friends are aware of our burdens. Some of our problems might be garnered from this blog but, as a couple, we make a concerted effort to try to outwardly portray the success and solidity we hope to achieve, even when it feels like everything is falling apart. The fact that these incredibly lovely people could sense our distress and felt the need to reach out and help us – in such a meaningful and generous way – was overwhelming.

We are struggling. It’s an uncomfortable time. We’ve never been in such a strong position as far as changing our circumstances – Sean’s producing, my writing – but we’ve also never been in such a tenuous position as far as financial strain. The stress is terrible. I know I should try and relax but I can’t. It can be overwhelming. I feel I have to keep moving. To try harder every day. To just keep all the balls in the air. I know I can’t work any harder, but until my book’s published or I start getting paid to write, I’m not contributing in any tangible way to our situation. I’m simply a super-over-extended-volunteer and the same goes for Sean. He’s back at the bar, which he hates but it puts money into our account, but he spends almost every waking hour working at a job that has yet to garner any financial reward. He’s gifted and driven and devoted to bettering our lives, but everything he does – every audition he works on, every pitch he designs, every layout he creates – he does without a paycheck. I know it’ll be worth it. More than his acting career, which is forever in someone else’s hands, I know producing will work out because how hard you work and how good you are is rewarded in a career where you retain the power. You can be the best actor in the world but never make it. That’s the nature of the beast. However, if you’re the one coming up with the ideas, eventually people will catch on, and then they’ll pay you for it. As far as I’m concerned, the question isn’t whether it’ll all work out, but when, and can we hold on till it does?

ilsebourn.blogspot.com

Back to the card.

Our first reaction was stunned silence. Are people actually that selfless? They’re not zillionaires. They have their own worries, issues and dependents. Why would they do that for us? Our next thought was that we couldn’t possibly accept their generosity. Sean put it well when he said his “pride hurt”. It was as if their kindness made us feel worse about ourselves. Essentially shining a spotlight on our indignity. We discussed returning the check, saying thank you but no, but wondered if that wasn’t going against the spirit in which it was given. Ultimately, after much soul searching, we decided the honorable thing to do was to accept it. To use it as it was intended, alleviate some of our worries, and when circumstances allowed A: Take our friends out to a fantastic dinner and B: Pay it forward.

The giving of an unsolicited (and much needed) gift has changed us. We will never forget this kindness and we eagerly await the day we can bestow it on another. We hope to do it as our friends have, not for recognition or gratitude, but just to know that we could help and to remind us that despite what human nature often shows, we’re all in this together and if we look out for one another, the world can truly be a better place.

Sean and I feel incredibly blessed. Yes, there’s some shame associated with our current situation, but we work every day to rectify it. For every person that does something horrible like attempt to steal our car (which happened last week and left us with a mangled door and no steering wheel) there’s someone who does something exceptionally kind (like our friend who recently gave Sean theatre tickets because he knew we were dying to see a show but couldn’t afford to go). For every low day we’re left to wonder why it has to be so hard, there’s a brilliant night spent among friends that reminds us what’s really important. I know my parents wouldn’t let me die if I couldn’t afford my drugs or allow us to fall to a place where I had to pull Loch out of school, but I’m also not in the position to fall back on them anymore. They’re no longer able to be my safety net and it’s an incredibly scary awakening. Sean and I struggle every day to realize our dreams while still affording our reality. It’s arduous and humbling but we keep telling ourselves we’ll survive. We’ll survive and it’ll be worth it.

zazzle.com

Receiving a check from our friends was a shock, a tremendous blessing of overwhelming kindness, but a shock. Needing or asking for money has always been slightly humiliating and come with a fair amount of strings, but here we were receiving something unsolicited and without stipulation. To return it, simply because it was too kind seemed the wrong thing to do, especially since we can see it as the start of something bigger than ourselves. A chain reaction of compassion that we look forward to continuing.

I don’t often speak about God but I believe he brings people into our lives for a reason and inspires us to do things when we can. He can give us strength and hope and, in this case, he inspired our friends to offer us relief that one day we’ll be able to offer another.

stonebriar.rog

All this reminds me of a story I recently heard about an employee at an Oregon Target. The employee was ringing up a family and when she ran the customer’s credit card it was denied. The man tried another card but it was also rejected. He apologetically moved to the side with his wife and baby to call his bank. The next customer, who had witnessed the transaction, quietly asked to add the man’s bill to her tab. When the employee informed her it was $160, the woman said to do it anyway. She said she knew what it was like to need help. When the man returned to tell the employee he couldn’t pay for the groceries, the employee was pleased to tell him the debt had already been paid. When the family understood what had happened the wife began to cry. They were overwhelmed someone could be so kind. The husband said, “I didn’t have the money to pay my bill but I do have a $20 in my wallet. I’d like to leave it for the next person.” When the next person found their bill had been paid by a stranger they left money to help pay for the next bill, and the kindness continued. The Target employee was so moved by what she witnessed she posted the entire story on Facebook and it went viral. She said the woman would never know the impact she’d made on so many people, and although not everyone is able to pay someone else’s $160 bill, doing what you can can when you can, can impact someone for the rest of their life.

That’s how Sean and I feel. Not only by the shocking generosity of our friends’ gift, but by the compassion so many people have offered us over time. It’s our hope, that we have in the past, and will continue in the future, to fill that role in other’s lives. We hope to take this lesson in generosity and bestow it on others. We will never forget what it’s like to need help, and how very much it means when it’s given.

Love and thanks to ALL our guardian angels. You humble us. We are better for knowing you.

xo Leigh

joinyourhandz.blogspot.com

Oct 15

24 Comments

Anger

There are days that I feel angry. Incredibly angry. Days where I’m not positive or happy or hopeful, but more like cheated, picked on and pissed off. Days when it’s not fair and I can’t convince myself that everything is a blessing. There are days when the world is sucky and mean and I worry I don’t have the strength to handle it any more.

I recognize there are so many people who have it worse than me. People who struggle harder burdened with more. People who have to deal with grief or pain and it’s a effort just to function. Most of the time I’m able to keep that in perspective, but anyone who’s ever dealt with a life changing event/situation will tell you that there are certain days where perspective feels impossible and all you can think about is yourself. I recently had one of those days and as I sat in my doctor’s office beside a woman on oxygen, her tank puffing away as she struggled to take a deep breath, all I could think was “please God, don’t let that be me”.

What I look like on the surface.

The thing about dealing with something like a chronic illness is you have to adjust and learn to live within your new perimeters and still function with some sense of peace. This doesn’t mean you’re less scared or sad, it just means you accept that life goes on and you must too. If you’re able to do that you have the chance of living a relatively “normal” life. You’re able to put the anxiety aside just enough to exist on the same plane as your friends and family. My problems arise when one extra thing goes wrong. It’s like I’ve tamped down my feelings of fear and anger just enough to operate, but if one more thing is added to my bucket it spills over and I find I’m unable to regulate my emotions. All my feelings come pouring out at once, the most prominent one being anger. My recent trip to the doctor was one of those times. As I sat beside that nice woman trying to get her breath, I was in a state of extreme agitation. That morning I’d awoken to a, not insubstantial, indent on the side of my head. As I looked at myself in the mirror it looked as if someone had taken their thumb to the area just above my left temple, pushed it in, and my head hadn’t recovered. It looked as if my skull was caving in and I just lost it. I hold it together every day. I deal with my possible death, our abysmal finances (owed in no short measure to my possible death) and our often ludicrously bad luck. I deal with the up and downs of Sean’s business and the ridiculous strain of Loch’s approaching entrance to kindergarten in the twelfth worst district in the country. I spend every day attempting to push my fears aside so I can play my role of full time mom (and aspiring writer) properly, but seeing that divot in my skull – a possible side effect of a vitamin D/Calcium deficiency due to one of my drugs – was the preverbal straw. I called my doctor and he had me come in immediately. I knew my horror was based more in vanity than mortality, but what I felt was “Give me a f*^#ing break!! On top of everything I’m going to be deformed?! Are you f*^#ing kidding me?!

What I feel like on the inside is more like William Harrington’s painting Sea Venture in the Storm.

I put a lot of weight into holding on to my old life, who I was before I was sick. It grounds me so I don’t feel as if I’m about to float away. The thought that I might end up with a collapsed skull as an outward reminder of my inward deficiencies, just pissed me off. No matter how calm I may appear, I am intensely angry this is happening and occasionally my control tips from restrain to panic. As I sat through my bone density test and my skull x-rays I started thinking about all the other people in the world who are living with anger and how tiring it can be. Someone we know recently lost her son to Cancer. It happened relatively suddenly after years of fighting. Though I have no doubt she’s devastated and heartbroken, my guess is she is also angry. How could you not be? Life isn’t fair. Who gets sick versus who doesn’t seems arbitrary. Good people die and s*^#ty people live. Bad things happen to lovely people while some hideous people live perfectly charmed existences.

Our ship coming in courtesy of mother-mel.blogspot.com

Sean and I work incredibly hard to try and better our lives. We got pushed seriously off track but we’re back fighting every day to make our dreams a reality. So far we’re still waiting for that ship to come in. A while back I broke down and said, “When is it going to be our turn? What are we doing wrong?” If we don’t make it, it won’t be from lack of effort or skill. It won’t be because we were lazy. It’ll just be. I’m just so tired of waiting. So tired of compromising our life and our plans. I realize what’s important. I see it every morning in my bed with my boys for our morning cuddle, but it doesn’t make me any less frustrated. Why does it have to be SO hard?

As it turns out, my skull is not caving in. A number of people saw it, so I can safely say I’m not going insane, but my skull and bones seem to be holding up under the strain of my meds and the wildness of my mind and these days my forehead looks way less like I was just delivered with forceps. So, I’m back to maintaining and as the cliche goes, some days are better than others.

I look forward to the day when all the effort pays off. When I can truly breath a sigh of relief. When my general stasis can return to calm and I can meet my challenges with the energy to rise above the fear. I’m not an angry person. I’m a person who’s circumstances have made her angry. I await the day where I can just let it go. In the meantime, I’ll keep watching the horizon and working to stay afloat.

xo Leigh

profitablesignals.com

Aug 20

6 Comments

Birthdays

My birthday was last week and I did that thing that kids never understand. I couldn’t remember how old I was. I remember asking my mom her age once and she said, “I don’t know. 45 maybe?” I thought she was putting me on. Who doesn’t know how old they are?! As a kid we’re obsessed with age and our next birthday and what will happen when we’re double digits, or 16, 18 or 21. We imagine ourselves “in our 20′s” or what our life will be like at 30 and in most of those imaginings we’re attractive, hyper successful and totally pulled together. When you’re young even a half a year makes a big difference. Loch is four and a half this week and he’s totally different than he was six months ago, but as you truly get older, not only do you no longer count months you can hardly keep track of years.

So, when someone recently asked me how old I was turning I said, “37. No, 38. Wait, shoot…um…no, I’m not 37 now I don’t think. So, no. I’m 36. So, 37. Yeah, 37.” Honestly, it was a struggle for me to figure it out. I was one step away from doing the math from 1975 and that’s saying something as I’m a big avoider of math.

My 2nd Birthday. First real party.

It’s not that I’m one of those people who hates their birthday or wants to be perpetually 29. I don’t. I love my birthday. I always have. Maybe it’s the Leo in me, but I’ve always loved a day about me, a celebration of my life. I’ve always appreciated the successful completion of another year. Long before I got sick I was a fan of the birthday. I’ve always told people who were grumbling they wished it wasn’t happening or talking about “skipping it this year” that they should be happy. There are so many people who would love (or would have loved) to live another year. The time we get on this planet is so fleeting and being granted another whole year is something to be grateful for, and if you’re also someone who’s blessed enough to be around people you love who want to celebrate with you, you should eat that s*^# up with a spoon.

My 6th Birthday with my beloved granny, Mimi.

I realize the “appreciate your birthday” thing might come off a little preachy or high hatted, but it’s not meant to. Yes, I’m in a different position than I was 4 years ago as far as appreciating every year, but this is not a new sentiment for me. Birthdays are an opportunity to slow down for a day and take stock of where you are and where you’d like to be. A day to appreciate your health, your family, your friends, your life. Another year has passed. Are you happy? Could you do something different? Is there a dream you wish you were following? Can you make a goal for next year? Are you healthy? Can you find the gratitude in that? Are you sick? What can you do to help your body take care of itself or better use the time you have left? Look, it’s impossible to be grateful for your life every day. There’s just too much to think about, too many things going on, but on your birthday you get a moment to look around and acknowledge where you are and hopefully find something to be grateful for.

My 8th Birthday. I loved that suit so much!

I’m happy to age. I’ll be thrilled when I reach 40, ecstatic if I reach 50 and grateful beyond belief for every other year after that. Let me tell you, if I make it, I’ll be the happiest 80 year old you’ve ever seen. All that being said however, and no matter how pleased I am to get old, aging isn’t for the weak. Getting old is one thing. Looking and feeling old is totally another. I might be infinitely grateful for my life but I am not particularly pleased with my wrinkles, or spider veins, or sagging upper eye skin (what with that?!). I’m not excited to get a waddle and I like being able to see my jaw line. I seriously considered botox this year as a lifetime of talking with my face has built a grand canyon sized trough above my eyebrows that you could drive a truck through by the end of the day. I hate not being able to eat whatever I want without seeing it on my lower half the next day. I loathe the cracking of my knees and the fact that I groan every time I stand up. I watch my parents with their shortening memories and different physical ailments and I see (if I’m lucky) my future. Getting old is tough. The body you relied on, the mind you took for granted, the memory you had, like any other living thing starts to decay.

My 34th Birthday dinner with my Toronto girlfriends (and our respective spouses).

The question of whether you’d like your mind or your body to go first isn’t a tough one for me. If I could, I’d chose to have my body give out (not any time soon) before my mind. Watching people’s bodies hang on long after their mind has gone is heartbreaking for everyone. I can’t imagine not knowing who I was or recognizing my loved ones. I think it must be perpetually lonely when no one is able to connect with you, and so hard for the loved ones who can see you right in front of them but are unable to break through. I’d rather be alert and cognizant right up to the end. It’s like we should all pick up smoking and high sodium diets somewhere around 85 just to ensure our body doesn’t keep us around after our due date.

My 36th Birthday. Cake made by Sean & Loch. Wonderful day at the cottage!

Like I said, aging is tough. Tough on the ego. Tough on the wallet (saving is something I need to do more of as I age) Tough on the body. It’s not easy or glamourous but, like most things, it’s dependent on your attitude as to how arduous it really is. A positive attitude, one of gratitude and wisdom, can make the unpleasant aspects seem so much less. I went to the movies the other day with a friend I’ve had since we were 10 and at the end of the credits we were the last people in the theatre. Leaving just before us however were five older ladies (say mid 70′s) all busy chatting it up. As they walked out we watched them buzzing about the movie, their plans for the next day, who was going to some event. They walked slowly and carefully but they still seemed spry and light and were clearly having fun. I turned to my friend and said, “You think that’s us in 40 years?” and she nodded. Staying engaged with the world, with your friends, with your life, is a key ingredient to finding the joy in aging. You don’t have to be sick to appreciate each year, you just have to be conscious. Know that it’s all a gift and we should take advantage of it while we still can.

Happy Birthday to you whenever it is. May the next year be your best yet!

xo leigh

My 37th Birthday. 4 of us went out on a Monday night for dinner and ended up seeing an amazing Mariachi band, getting up on stage and then skipping over to an awesome Korean karaoke bar and singing away into the night. Couldn’t have been better!

Aug 7

5 Comments

The Should’s

I considered postponing my blog a week. I’ve been up at my cottage with my family and so much of me wanted to just be on holiday. The problem with working for yourself is you’re never quite sure when you’re off. You don’t have a “work day” or “quitting time”. Your weekends aren’t for recuperating or taking time off and there is no formal vacation. Sure, you can choose not to work whenever it suits you, but if you want to succeed, those times are few and far between. In my personal world of full time mothering and trying to launch a career, any time I have to myself (read: awake with someone else responsible for Loch) I feel I should be working.

This view…

“Should” is sort of a dreaded word in my family. I associate it with my grandmother who used the word often. It implies an outsider’s perception of what you are expected to be accomplishing or an implicit benchmark you are assumed to be striving for. It can be used by my mother (sounding like a mimic of her own mother) regarding my behavior, “You know what you should do…” or most recently Loch’s behavior, “he shouldn’t be doing that” or “he should know that” but it can also just be a voice in my head pressuring me to meet certain life requirements. “Should” is full of innate pressures that can needle you into a unsettled state. “Should” calls attention to your shortcomings and compares you to some unknown flawless person who is clearly making better choices than you. On the flip side however, “should” can also be a catalyst to accomplishment when you would otherwise be too lazy or distracted to complete a task. The spur you need to run that proverbial extra mile.

So, when the thought of enjoying a day with my family instead of sitting down to write reared it’s head, the “should’s” forced me to get cracking. I realize that my blog is hardly life or death. That few will notice if it’s a week late or that this week, even with my best intentions, it will come out a day late due to the fact that I am unable to publish from up north, but even so, I felt unable to relax and just let things go. I have no editor. No deadlines but the ones I impose on myself. No one is looking over my shoulder, but if I become lax about my work ethic, what will I accomplish?

…OR this view?

What occurred to me, while debating working or not, was the concept of living each day as if it’s your last. For obvious reasons I understand this feeling better than others, but for me, the concept itself highlights an interesting quandary. If today is my last day (or my last month or my last year) what am I doing alone in a room working on a computer? If today is my last day why am I concerned with work at all? If I’m supposed to be living as if I’m going to be gone tomorrow, why should I save my money or deny myself anything? If it’s all ending why should I care about my weight or make any effort with my appearance?

How do you live each day like it’s your last, while still planning for a much longer existence? How do those two ideas reconcile into one life plan?

This quote I found on make-me-successful.com makes more sense to me.

I understand the concept of treating others as if it was their last day on earth. To give people the care and compassion you would devote to someone on their way out. If you were interacting with someone who would be gone tomorrow would you brush them off or speed them along? No, you would put yourself aside and truly listen in an attempt to understand their feelings and fears. You would be more indulgent of their shortcomings and not rush the interaction to better suit your timeline. I understand that mindset and I think it would be a wonderful way to live, at the very least a noble goal to strive for. More often than not however, my lack of patience interrupts my quest to be a better, kinder soul and I feel intolerant and frustrated with people’s weaknesses. It’s not my best quality and one I strive to improve, particularly in trying situations.

A story was recently being circulated around Facebook. It’s been around for years but it never fails to affect me:

“A cab driver was waiting outside a brownstone in New York City. It had been a long day and he was ready to go home. He’d taken this last call and was now waiting, endlessly for his fare to come downstairs. He considered driving away but thought better of it and continued to wait. Eventually a tiny, little old lady opened the door with a suitcase in her hand. He stepped out of the taxi and helped her into the waiting car. When he asked for the address she gave it to him but asked if he would mind making a stop on the way. Tired but resolved he agreed and took his fare across town to a little tenement while she told him a story. She’d moved to the city when she was 18 with her new husband. The building she wanted to see was the first place they’d lived as man and wife. He was gone now, as were her children and friends, and she was finally moving out of the city into a home (that was the address she’d given him). With no one left, she knew this was her last opportunity to see her first home. Touched by her words, and turning off the meter, the driver asked if she had any other places she’d like to see again. Over the course of the night the driver and the elderly lady revisited all her old stomping grounds, the hospital where her children were born, the place of her first job, the theatre she’d seen her first play… As the sun started to rise over the horizon, she settled back into her seat and said, “Thank you. I’m ready to go now.” Without another word they left the city where she’d spent her life. As the driver helped the lady out of the car and into her new home, she thanked him again. The gratitude on her face was worth more than any night at home would have offered him. As he drove away he wondered what would have happened if it hadn’t been him that took the call, if someone in a bad mood or a rush had picked her up, or even more close to home, if he’d driven off as he’d considered doing.”

lolsheaven.com

Every time I read that story I like to think I’d behave like the cabbie. It’s what I should do isn’t’ it? We should plan for the future. We should live in the now. We should act like this or behave like that. The should’s have a hold in all aspects of our lives. Yes, we should be kind to little old ladies with no family, but it’s possible we might just drive off after waiting 10 minutes for an unknown passenger.

The concept of treating others as if it’s there last day is poignant and effective and one I feel I can fully understand. What I have trouble with is living my own life with the same consideration. Living life as if it’s your last day is both confusing and depressing, and frankly altogether too close to home.

It’s a question of balance. We can’t live our whole life for this one day, nor can we put all our eggs in the basket of an unknown future. We shouldn’t give all of our energy to our careers so we’re burnt out when we get home to our families and we can’t give everything to our loved ones so we have nothing left for the rest of our lives. We have to find an equilibrium between work and life without failing to remember that people should always outweigh the importance of tasks, and just like the cabbie, if we find ourselves with the opportunity to give a little extra to others, “leave them happier than you found them” as my friend Ashley says, then perhaps we should attempt to do that as well.

Ultimately I think sitting down to write this blog was important not because the world needed to read it so much as I needed to write it. Writing gives me a sense of purpose, and helps balance out my role as mommy/wife/sick person. Does that mean after typing I won’t go back and hang out with my family or sit down and read a book? No, I need that too. I’m just not off the hook because no one is watching. I know better than that.

Or at least I “should”.

Back hanging with my family!

As a final thought I read a quote recently from the Dalai Lama about what surprised him most about humanity. He answered:

“Man. Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And then he’s so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present; the result being that he does not live in the present or the future; he lives as if he is never going to die, and dies having never really lived.”

Jul 22

12 Comments

Summer in Canada

I’m in Canada right now for the summer. Every year Loch and I come for six weeks or so to enjoy the best the Great White North has to offer in terms of weather, and to make sure he knows he is, in part, half Canadian. I want him to know his roots. I want him to know my roots. I want to see my friends, and we both want to go to the cottage. Summers in Canada are a magical time. I thought perhaps living in Los Angeles I would eventually lose the appreciation for the beauty and warmth of the Canadian summer since I no longer have to deal with Canadian winter, but I was wrong. Summer in Canada still holds a special place in my heart that no amount of time in California’s sunshine can replace. Personally I love humidity. My PH isn’t so crazy about it, and I have days that breathing is difficult, but I love a summer where I can tangibly feel the season on my skin. A time when the heat physically hits you in the face. I know most people hate humidity – it’s sticky and gross and uncomfortable – but I’ve always enjoyed it. My grandmother was the same way so maybe it’s just a genetic anomaly, but to me it’s a wonderful and tactile feeling of the summer.

The sunset from the cottage.

Summers north of the 49th parallel also mean going to my cottage. My parents bought it before I was born and I’ve spent every summer of my life on Georgian Bay. When I was younger we used to go for weekends from May 24th through Canadian Thanksgiving and for 3 weeks in July. As I got older I spent almost 3 months at camp but would still go for days off and early and late in the season. From ages 15-21 I hosted an annual girl’s weekend at the bay with my closest friends and now am able to spend 4 or 5 long weekends a summer as well as 10 days straight whenever Sean can join us. The beauty of the place that started as a one room cabin and has since expanded to a lovely family cottage, is that it rarely changes.

The view from the living room. Very old school cottage-y. Not much different than it was 30 years ago.

Sure we add things here and there and talk endlessly about things we “could” do, but the feeling, the essence of the place remains the same. It’s a place of calm, a retreat from the world and it’s ever progressing aggression. It’s quiet and serene in a world full of noise. There’s no TV or internet and loon calls and bull frog croaks still fill the night. Though we aspire to a cool new wakeboard boat or a zippy Whaler runabout, our old boats – aptly, though not creatively, named Red and Blue – suit us just fine. We play games and go swimming, read books and nap. As I age, I’ve come to realize there’s also a heck of lot of work that comes with it, but to me it still seems worth it. My parents running joke is you can always tell the renters and the guests because they’re the ones actually sitting on the dock enjoying themselves. I personally, think my parents could do with more downtime, but they’ve established their routines of puttering around and fixing things or gardening, and I think it makes them happy. I can tell you who the cottage makes the most happy, and that’s Loch. His love for the place feels innate, like he was born with it. I have him in day camp in Toronto right now and although he’s having fun, he’s just counting the days till we go back. It’s truly his favorite place in the world.

Lochie on the Toronto Island at my cousin Cindy’s wedding 2 years ago.

The cottage aside, it’s also just nice coming home. Toronto’s a wonderful city that’s rapidly becoming so cool I sometimes can’t believe I’m from here. There are so many boutique hotels, hip restaurants and stores that it’s truly become a fabulous metropolitan city, not just for Canada, but for anywhere. Between the Distillary district and the cool, young family neighborhoods of the Danforth and the beaches in the East, to the restaurant and gallery row of Ossington in the West and everything in between, Toronto really has become one happening city. It’s also a wonderful place to bring a child. I truly believe the Toronot Zoo is the best there is, and I’ve been to zoo’s everywhere, including the famed San Diego Zoo that doesn’t hold a candle to the nature infused openness of what they have here. We took Loch down to the beautiful Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) and spent hours, after a spectacular meal at their restaurant Frank, in the children’s learning center and exhibits. The Musuem (ROM) is awesome with it’s new interactive dinosaur exhibit. The Science Center has an entire floor devoted to children and so much to see elsewhere. We loved seeing the CN Tower last year but might wait a couple of years till we brave the lines again, and there is an entire amusement park for the under 8 set on the Toronto Island that I’m really hoping we find time to get over too because Loch loves it – and the ferry ride over – so much.

Dinner with some of my oldest friends this summer.

Toronto is just a great place to be, and when you add to it that most of my old friends still live here or have recently moved back, it’s really a treat to be able to come home at this time every year. I love being from Toronto. I love the trees and the neighborhoods. I love the beautiful old houses and how you can be in a gorgeous residential neighborhood (of which there are many) and then be downtown in 5-25 minutes. I love the subway. I love the access to taxis. I LOVE the radio. In LA, I think the radio stations are too specialized musically and too polarized politically. There’s no general pop rock channel, no just the issues or news talk radio. Everything in the States is laser focused to a specific demographic. Canada is more mutually pleasing, more ‘what’s best for everyone’. Personally, I love it. I can listen to the radio all day here. Television is a bit of different story as the commercials are pretty lame, the DVR technology is behind the times and the amount of programming is limited, but I don’t watch a lot of television in the summer so I tend not to notice. What I do notice is the politeness. It’s not a gross generalization to say Canadian’s are crazy polite. Lots of please’s and thank you’s, excuse me’s and the always classic “I’m sorry”. I’m sorry is a big one. There’s a saying that when a Canadian bumps into a door, she apologizes to the door. I’ve totally done that, so the joke always makes me laugh. I had pedicure just after I arrived and the lady beside me must have apologized 10 times in the first 5 minutes she was there. I think it’d be fair to say Canadian’s aren’t as outrightly friendly as American’s, but polite, they have in spades.

My parents and I on the dock at the cottage. No photoshop. The sunset was actually like this.

There are drawbacks to coming home of course, the first being my instant regression to child when I’m in my parent’s house. I think it’d be different if I stayed in a rental or (in my dreams) had my own condo here, but as it stands, I come home and sleep in the same room I had as a child, eat in the same kitchen, drive the same routes, and have the same tiffs with my parents I did as a teenager. They are extremely generous to host us and for the most part we all have an amazing time, but there’s a part of me that always appreciates returning to LA where I’m the adult again. Secondly, the prices here astound me. My pretentious grande non-fat half-caf vanilla latte costs a dollar more here than it does in the States . Every magazine and book is significantly more expensive, and the booze, don’t even get me started on the price of the booze! I can see why that was necessary when our dollar’s value was so far off, but now with the Canadian dollar being just about par with the US, it’s a bit taxing. Speaking of taxing, I find that a bit different now too. Maybe it’s because I’ve had the luxury of visiting my in-laws in Oregon where there’s no sales tax AT ALL, but I think it’s also because I also no longer profit from the uses of Canadian taxes – the health care system, the roads, infrastructure or schools – that makes it harder to swallow. I think it would also be fair to say that Toronto has a significant traffic problem. Yes, the traffic in LA is horrendous, but it’s a town built around cars and driving. The roads are bigger with room for someone to say, pull to the side for a passager to jump out without blocking an entire lane of traffic or highways with multiple carpool lanes. Toronto on the other hand, has pretty much the same roads and highways it did 30 years ago but with a zillion more cars. Add the running joke that Canada has two seasons, Winter and Construction, and you get a serious problem. I feel bad for Torontoians. It’s a struggle to get anywhere.

The only other big difference I notice between the two cities, aside from the obvious like season changes (which I miss), the general attractiveness of the city (I think Toronto is far prettier) and the fact that one place holds all my old memories and the other I’ve chosen to hold my new ones, is the shallow and relatively insignificant detail of how people dress. Overall Toronto is probably one of the most conservative fashion places I’ve lived. Montreal was out there, NYC is clearly a fashion mecca, and LA is, at the same time, super laid back (think flip flops being acceptable almost anywhere), strategically casual ($300 jeans and $200 tank tops paired with $400 sunglasses and $1000 worth of bangles and layered necklaces just too look like you weren’t trying) AND the home of the million dollar movie star red carpet dress. My home town however is very much a pulled together, preppy, moderate place. I’ve always been a jeans kind of girl which seems to work for both locations, but when I read my beloved Hello Canada! or talk to my friends who have moved back here from NYC or see the business “look” of the downtown core, I notice how buttoned up and traditional this country is. Maybe I’ve been spoiled living in LA, land of the high powered stylist but I wonder if Toronto couldn’t afford to have a little more fun…

Happy Canadian Summer baby.

Overall my summers are a wonderful walk down memory lane and an amazing break from my life without family in Los Angeles. I am able to see and catch up with my friends. Hang out with their kids. Go out at night and not worry about getting a sitter. Spend quality time with my parents and let my son do the same. Sit on a dock and watch the sun set into the trees. Have the moon light up my room at the cottage. Drive a boat. Drink on patios with people I wouldn’t otherwise see and enjoy the occasional movie. Yes, I have to work while I’m here. Yes, I miss my husband. Yes, I squabble with my parents. But I am a blessed and lucky girl, grateful for all the happy summer memories I’ve had here, and all the ones I’m still planning to make.

Oh Canada! Thank you for always welcoming me home.

xo Leigh

My parents, Sean & Loch at the cottage

Posts from the ‘Open thoughts’ Category

Aging Gracefully?

Time To Be A Grown Up

Tragedy in Newton: What’s wrong with the USA?

Halloween

Deliberate Acts of Kindness

Anger

Birthdays

The Should’s

Summer in Canada

Search my Blog

If this blog has touched you please subscribe by entering your email address below. It really makes a big difference. Thank you. xo leigh

Twitter

Categories

Recent Posts

Links

Archives

Past Posts

Pages

Categories

Search

Follow “in case i'm gone”