Remember One Thing

Monday afternoon, I was manning the flower shop by myself when I received a phone call that was a wrong number. This isn't unusual, as our shop seems to have a phone number close to that of some sort of licensing office. The man on the other end of the line ignored my initial greeting and went directly into a rant about what happened the last time he attempted to call this office. In my usual kind tone, I explained "I'm sorry, you must have the wrong number, this is a flower shop," while snipping the thorns from some roses. Instead of apologizing, as most folks do when they realize they've misdialed, this particular caller responded with an angry exclamation that included The N Word, then immediately hung up on me.

I'm a fan of expletives in general. There's an episode of SpongeBob Squarepants where he and Patrick find cuss words written on a dumpster and begin using them, calling them "sentence enhancers," and I love that description. I'm a writer, I love words and language and I don't think there should be "bad" words. There's a time and place for everything, even The F Word. However, I also believe words can be misused and that hate speech is a serious issue that exists in our society.

I'm not easily offended, and I believe everyone has a right to their opinion. It takes a lot to shock me but with all that being said, this man shocked me. I mean, mouth hanging open, dumb founded, flabbergasted. I stood there holding the phone listening to the dial tone in absolute awe. I could not believe what I'd just heard.

After I hung up the phone and regained my composure, I considered using Caller ID to call the man back. If it had been my personal phone and not my work place, I probably would have. (Although the next day my boss said "You can call him back right now if you want to, I don't care. That's not acceptable.") I didn't want to scold the man or insult him, I simply wanted to ask Why? Or more accurately, I wanted to say "Seriously? Five days after the Charleston shooting, and during an especially racially charged climate in our country, you want to use that word with a stranger? What exactly do you think you're contributing to society by talking this way?"

I've been thinking about that man all week, my faith in humanity a bit bruised. With all the horrific devastation in the news lately, I like to think that people are carrying on their day to day lives taking particular care to practice kindness and gratitude. I know I sure am. But I bet that guy hasn't thought about me for one second. He was just pissed that he was told to press 7 and when he did, he got disconnected.

This morning when I heard the news that the Supreme Court had legalized gay marriage, I turned to my husband and said "Well, I'm glad to see that this can happen in our country, even if people are still using The N Word, " and we both laughed because really, you have to.

I still can't believe that in the year 2015, in The United States of America, anyone has to fight to be considered equal. We are all the same. I don't care what color your skin is or who you like to have sex with. I simply cannot understand why anyone who wants to get married should be denied that. I don't want to go into a political rant here, that's not my style. In fact,  I'm not a political person at all. I'm not a religious person at all. I'm a person who believes in fairness and love. It doesn't seem complicated.

Over the years, a few people in my life have tried to encourage me to change my blog title. More than a few people in my life are not exactly fans of following the rules. "Break some rules," they plead. And yes, I suppose we all do it from time to time. But I won't change the title of my blog because those are two huge fundamental parts of who I am.

Dave Matthews Band has an album called "Remember Two Things," and while I don't know what exactly that title refers to, I like to think it is along the same lines as what I find important in life. I guess it actually can be boiled down to one thing, which is simply: Be Kind. If you do that and you follow the general guidelines of being a considerate human being (even if you occasionally break a rule,) you should be okay.

K is for Kindness

As I began to embrace a gratitude practice, I noticed a shift taking place in my life. From that point forward, my sharp edges began to soften. The protective shell I'd built around myself my entire life began to fade. This process has taken years, and is still happening but it started when I began to face the world each day with gratitude and kindness.

It turns out that if you're miserable in your life and a bitch to be around, you tend to attract other miserables bitches and you all wallow together in your wretchedness. I am grateful for the friends I have who supported and tolerated me when I was at my lowest and helped to guide me out of my distress. Receiving kindness and choosing to separate myself from people whose energy I didn't want to share any longer (or having The Universe force that separation,) allowed me to start from the ground up, so to speak. I was able to rebuild my life with a foundation of my own choosing.

My life lesson here is that kindness is a cycle; you dole it out, it makes the receiver feel good, they dole more out and so on until you are the receiver and the circle continues.

I've spent the majority of my adult life working with the public, mostly in the field of veterinary medicine. If you've ever worked with the public, you know some days just suck, no matter what you do. And when there's a full moon? Forget about normal. Crazy stuff happens then! Over the years, I came to realize that people tend to act out when they are upset. A client who is rude to me about their bill is most likely distraught about their beloved pet, facing financial hardships or any combination of the emotions and challenges in life. I've witnessed first hand how being kind to a rude person will disarm him. He'll tilt his head or take a step back as if he's thinking "Oh, I'm not going to get a fight here so I guess I'll be nice!" I do believe that some people simply like to complain. They call or come in looking for an argument. When they don't get one, they don't know what to do so they retreat. Although occasionally a person will continue to lash out and there's nothing I can do to help. I just smile and say "Thank you, have a nice day!" These situations are challenging. I cannot say I'm always able to keep my cool. Every once in a while there's a person who is just down right out of line.

Plato said "Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle." I can't think of a better way to advocate for kindness. You never know the stories of the people you pass each day. Think about your worst struggle and imagine a stranger facing it, then give that person the treatment you would have wanted when you were struggling.

My boyfriend taking a photo for strangers in NYC Aug. 2010

It's That Easy

On my second day at my new job, I was monitoring anesthesia during a surgery when the receptionist slid into the room to tell me that a client had just hit my car in the parking lot. I closed my eyes and exhaled "How bad is it?" but she didn't know. My boss immediately vouched for the client, letting me know he was a nice honest guy who would surely take cake of things but my heart had already sank.

To my relief, I got outside to find my car in tact with the exception of one tail light but I will admit all that shattered colored plastic and glass made quite a mess in the snowy parking lot. Now here's an interesting thing about me; I suffer from anxiety issues and will often torture myself over seemingly minor issues such as what is appropriate to wear to a specific event or keep myself awake at night stressing about whether I'll be able to afford the gift I want to buy my other half for his birthday. But when it comes to major issues, ones that deal with others and my impact on The Universe, I'm often the one under control. Understandably, the driver was upset and embarrassed but I assured him that "Seriously, this is no big deal. We'll get it taken care of." It only took two days to get my car into the shop, fixed and back home. The gentleman was apologetic and friendly through the entire process. He repeatedly thanked me for being understanding and nice but I was also grateful for his honesty. If I'd finished my shift to find the damage without someone having come forward, I would have been crushed.

Car camping at The Gorge 2008

My car is 13 years old and has over 192,000 miles on it. I love this car. To say I'm emotionally attached to it is an understatement. It's not in great condition but it's fine. I'm used to all the dings it has and the noises it makes. There's a crack in the windshield, the back windows don't go down and in order to pop the hood you have to reach way up under the pedals for the handle and turn it a certain way but it runs fine and I don't have a car payment! This car is one of the last things I have left that links my current life to the one I left in North Carolina seven years ago. The day it leaves my life is going to be a sad one. If I had gone out to the parking lot and found my little Focus all crumpled, my heart would have broken.

I was grateful the damage was easily repaired and that the experience was positive and I went on about my business. A week later, I was busy at work when the receptionist brought me a greeting card that had been dropped off by the guy who'd hit my car. I was pleasantly surprised and quite curious. It contained a gift card to a local restaurant and a beautiful handwritten message. This kind human felt compelled to go out of his way to thank me again for being understanding and reasonable! He wrote "What a breath of fresh air to meet someone who is respectful and pleasant. It gives me hope for our society." As I put the card back into the envelope I was full of a sense of gratitude and pride in myself. I thought Well, I might be a lot of things but at least I'm not an asshole! The fact that a person was truly appreciative of me not being a jerk was pretty impressive. The whole thing was straight forward as far as I'm concerned! Someone made a mistake, apologized and made it right. In return I was understanding and kind. That isn't complicated. I don't think a person should be surprised to receive that treatment from a stranger in a situation like this.

Since that situation was easy for me to handle, it seems like there are other places in my life where I could be using this approach to make things easier, mainly with myself! What if I screwed up and instead of lying awake at night beating myself up about it, I said It's okay self, you're intelligent and kind and you made a mistake, so what? Make it right and then don't do the same thing again? I feel like I should challenge myself to try this. I find it interesting that the behaviors and personal philosophy that I believe in and show to the world is most difficult to show to myself. I wonder why that is?

My car seats 2 co-pilots

Be Nice (to yourself)!

Yesterday marked one month since my sweet dog passed away. It wasn't as traumatic of a milestone as I feared, but I was still feeling a bit low. While I was picking up some groceries I decided to buy a bouquet of flowers, in honor of Ritz and to add some bright color to my kitchen. My cashier was a girl in her late teens. I hadn't seen her before at that store. As she scanned the plastic wrapped bunch, she asked who the flowers were for. I smiled and said "They're for me". Her face fell a little and she let out a pitiful "Awww" sound, as if it were a sad thing and she felt sorry for me. I opened my mouth to respond but quickly closed it. I know there's nothing I can say to an 18 year old girl to make her understand why a 34 year old woman buying herself flowers on a Monday afternoon is not a sad event. I think at that age, I still thought men bought women flowers to woo them, instead of to apologize and that surely an adult woman buying herself flowers must be an old maid.

I believe part of the reason it seems like a strange gesture is because we don't really do a lot of things for our selves in our society, especially women. When I started seeing my life coach, one of the first observations she made was that it didn't seem like I was being kind to myself in my life. I thought that was absurd until we did more work together. It was the proverbial lightbulb going off above my head: I  had been living my life to please others. I was worried about cleaning the house, getting a raise, visiting my mother, not because I wanted to but because that's what others expected of me or that's what I thought they wanted from me. Now don't get me wrong, it's not like I just said "Okay, I'll stop doing that" and things changed. It's still a struggle for me. I often have to check in with myself to make sure my motivations are true and not just for someone else. But I wasn't raised that way, and I don't think many of us are. We learn to do what we're told and what's expected of us from an early age. I think it's even hard to see how that can be a negative at times. I think of course I want my partner/mother/boss to be happy and to do what they want. Now, it's easy for me to see that this isn't always true to myself and I'm actually doing the boss/friend/mother a disservice. In the end, I'm not happy and therefore not much fun to be around so the other person doesn't end up having a good time either.

When struggling with a choice, such as should I go white water rafting with my boyfriend and his siblings, I ask myself "What would serve me best?" and I lay out the options and listen to myself. Yes, I want to spend time with my boyfriend but I don't like rafting, in fact it scares me a lot. I'm going to be afraid and he's going to be worried about me and no one's going to have a great time so I think I'll stay home and weed the garden and have dinner with him when he gets home. It wasn't easy to do at first but it's extremely helpful. Once I got the hang of it, I saw that decisions became a bit easier and I spend less time putting up with situations I don't enjoy. I challenge you to give it a try. Should I really spend $8 on flowers while I'm unemployed? Absolutely. And I don't have to justify it to the cashier or to anyone else!

Resolutions

            We’re now five days into the New Year and I’m happy to say I’ve been sticking to my resolutions with relative ease. I made three resolutions for 2013:

1)    Write daily

2)    Meditate regularly

3)    Be kind to myself

These are personal goals I’ve had for a while but have had trouble sticking with for one reason or another. I figured a brand new year was a perfect time to change my habits. I spent the last couple weeks of December thinking about my goals and ways to go about meeting them and I feel The Universe has given me some hints that I’m headed in the right direction.

On New Year’s Day, I was in the mall (working on #3) when I came across a video game for my Xbox Kinect called “Deepak Chopra’s LEELA: mind, body, spirit, play”. At first glance it seemed cheesy (a meditation game? How is that even a thing?) but it was cheap and I decided to give it a try. I’ve played it a little each day and so far it seems neat. I haven’t had a change to unlock all the features but it provides me with time and space to settle my mind and that’s what I needed most.

Later that same afternoon I was  browsing in a bookstore. I wasn’t even looking for a writing book when I saw A Writer’s Book of Days by Judy Reeves and knew I had stumbled across something big. I’ve been looking for something similar for a long time and had even bought a couple other writing books but hadn’t found one that felt like the right fit. The book is a writing coach of sorts, providing advice, information and suggestions on how to make writing a priority in your life. What I thought was so great is that it is designed to give a year’s worth of guidance with one chapter for each month, breaking the information down into catergories and most important to me, it gives daily writing prompts that already have me writing about things outside of my normal comfort zone.

My third resolution is the hardest. The first two are straight forward, physical actions but being kind to yourself? Most people probably think they already do that. I know I thought I was. About half way through 2012, I started seeing a life coach and so far this one of the biggest realizations I’ve had during our work together. It’s interesting because I consider myself a kind person. I’m thoughtful and compassionate when it comes to other people and to animals but it seems I’m also pretty good at beating myself up. I’m starting to see how much time I’ve wasted “shoulding myself”, as I like to call it. I should keep my house clear, I should work out more, weigh less, be better at roller skating. I can’t even imagine how much time I’ve spent dwelling on just those issues alone, then add in my worries about my job, relationships, finances, etc.  I’m never doing exactly what I think I should be and it’s exhausting- no wonder I’m so tired all the time! Becoming aware of this has been a huge breakthrough for me and becoming aware is a first step to initiating change but after spending thirty-some years in a specific pattern, it’s though to know where to start to be different.

So I guess maybe that’s the sum of all my resolutions for this year: to work on being different, changing my patterns. I’ve already started and noticing change is the biggest motivator for making more. Because it’s really a big process and I’m proud of the fact that I’m even doing it.