The Principle of Impermanance

I have never been a lover of clichés and expressions, which every writer knows to use sparingly or not at all. Yet, there’s one born every minute (as they say), and I cringe anew every time I hear the newest saying. Don’t sweat the small stuff, and it’s all small stuff was a particularly wordy one from a while back. Then, there are the old, dependables (some of which are passé): Don’t go there … at the end of the day … back in the day … it’s all good … my bad … talk to the hand … and my personal favorite, whatever.

The one I hear most often lately, whenever some nasty event is gong on in my life, is it is what it is. This is meant to convey wisdom, I suppose. It’s a fact. It’s happening. There’s nothing you can do about it. I love the definition I found online in The Urban Dictionary: “This incredibly versatile phrase can be literally translated as "f___ it." Ah, yes.

When I complain or lament about some aspect of my life to someone, and he (it’s usually a he) responds with it is what it is, there is simply no comeback. It’s a showstopper. I can’t argue, no it isn’t! Or it’s not fair. I would sound like a three-year-old.

I’ve given far too much thought to this stupid phrase, which will go its way like all such pieces of pseudo wisdom eventually do. But like so many real clichés, as opposed to stupid expressions, it is what it is actually does mean something: here's this thing that’s happening. It’s a single event in a single moment.

So, what are my options? Well, I can rail and scream about it, I can ignore it, or I can step back and observe it dispassionately. That’s hard to do when I'm in the middle of a mess, but it’s possible with practice. It even has a name: mindfulness.

I’ve probably read a dozen books on mindfulness, but basically it means paying attention, on purpose—not doing anything—just observing. Then, the most amazing thing happens: whatever I am observing changes in some way. It is one thing for a moment; then, it’s something else. If it is what it is means this is what’s happening right now, if I wait a while, something else will be happening. Nothing stays exactly the way for very long. Everything is constantly changing. Wait a minute, and what is will become what was.

When life is a mess, this is a very comforting thought.

The Return of Perspective

Viktor Frankl wrote that problems are like molecules of gas confined in a container. If the container is small, the molecules huddle together; if the container is large, they put enough space between them to fill the whole thing. Frankl said it much more eloquently, of course, but the lesson is clear. Problems, like molecules of gas, expand to fill one’s life, taking up whatever room is available. What’s not so clear, though, is which of those problems deserve attention and which aren’t worth our energy. In other words, of all the annoyances, disappointments, and stressors that assail us each day, which ones really matter?

Sometimes, it’s hard to tell. Everything takes on the same appearance of importance. Someone steals the parking space you were about to pull into; your boss makes a ridiculous request; you lose an account; you misplace your debit card; you feel like you’re coming down with a cold; traffic is at a standstill, and you have an appointment. In all, your molecules are spread out all all over the place, and they are fighting for your attention.

Then, you get a call from the school. Your daughter has fallen off the top of a pyramid at cheerleading practice and broken her arm. The school nurse is taking her to the emergency room.

In the space of a single sentence, you know what matters. It isn’t your stuffy head or lost account or unreasonable boss. It’s your daughter and her broken arm. The other problems shrink in size or simply disappear. You wonder why you let them get to you, as you focus on driving to the emergency room to comfort your daughter and assess the seriousness of her fracture.

We all encounter problems every day, ranging from minor annoyances to major catastrophes. I hear them from friends and strangers. They assail me on the news and the Internet. I obsess over my own. And then something big happens (big being a relative term) that pulls me up short and screams in my ear: Get a grip. The rest of this stuff is nothing more than mere molecules.

And for a while, anyway, my perspective returns.

A Little Help From My Friends

Most of us would rather be givers than takers. We prefer do a favor or buy a gift for someone else than accept one. We shudder at the idea that we might ever be dependent on our children for financial or physical assistance. We do not want to be a burden.

I was in a discussion group a while ago where this subject came up. One couple had lived in China and Africa for several years and described the tradition and, in fact, the law that mandates the care of aging parents by their children. “It’s accepted. In fact, it’s expected,” they said. “This is the only society we know of where this is not the case.”

Those of us over 60 were intrigued but not convinced. No way will that happen, we said, though not all of us really knew how we would make it to 90 in our present financial circumstances.

Sometimes, we just need help, and there is no way around it. We are sick or broke or have an accident or surgery and simply can’t get through this particular crisis alone. We either have to ask for help or accept it when it’s offered. I had such an experience today. I had to have a minor medical procedure, and the doctor insisted that I have someone drive me home when it was over. I considered taking a cab, but, in terms of getting home, this was not acceptable.

I mentioned this to my workout partner, who said, “No problem. I’ll drive you there,” settling the matter in five seconds. I thought I had the ride home taken care of when it fell through this morning. I didn’t want to do it, but I called another friend and said I needed a favor. “Of course,” she responded. “Do you have a ride there? I’ll be happy to pick you up, stay with you, and bring you home.” I was very touched but assured her I had the first one covered and would be fine alone. She and her husband picked me up in a dismal rain, walked me to my door, and kissed me goodbye.

I’m doing as the doctor ordered: taking it easy for the rest of the day. I’m also contemplating the value of good friends who graciously came through when I needed them. Sometimes, despite our stubbornness on this issue, it really is better to receive than to give.

B.F.F. (Best Friends Forever)

I talked to my oldest friend today—I don’t mean in age; I mean in years of friendship. We met in 1949 in seventh grade on the south side of Chicago. We were twelve. Being a mathematical wizard, I just figured out we have been friends for 60 years. No matter how you look at it, that’s pretty amazing.

If someone had told me then that we would be on the phone, in our seventies, living 2000 miles apart, but still sharing confidences and comparing notes, I’d have rolled my eyes in disbelief. Yeah, right. (Of course, in those days we neither rolled our eyes nor said, yeah, right.)

Seventh grade was before either of us had been out on a first date, put on lipstick, or understood the concept of being “popular.” We fought with her big brother, baby sat for my little sister, and lamented that our mothers didn’t understand us. She sang and danced; I drew and painted. We stormed through adolescence, doubled dated in high school, and lived different lives at college.

She got married and had a baby when we ourselves were still babies. She lived on a kibbutz, while I went to fraternity parties on campus. She was unconventional and free spirited; I moved through the stages of my life as if I were following an invisible plan. We both learned about divorce the hard way. She got a master’s degree and remarried. I built a life as a writer. Her life looked exciting to me; I’m not sure how mine seemed to her. Now, she is retired, and I have reinvented myself, yet again.

Years passed, always finding us in different cities but somehow keeping the ties of our friendship firmly knotted. We saw each other infrequently, always swearing we would celebrate our next milestone birthday or anniversary together but never quite pulling it off.

Now, suddenly, six decades have passed, and we realize we can’t always assume we’ll get together sometime soon. What if there is no sometime soon? What if there is only now, and we are blowing it by thinking we have forever? No one has forever. Few people have friendships that remain intact and intimate for so long. Life is unpredictable, uncertain.

That’s why we are making definite plans for Christmas 2009 to celebrate our extraordinary friendship.

Life: The Endlessly Passing Show

I used to have a beautiful hand painted-sign that read: This too shall pass away. It meant the difficult times I was going through wouldn’t last, which I found hard to believe as I stood in the eye of my personal storm. Eventually, though, the storm did pass, and I moved on with my life. That was my first lesson in the Buddhist concept of impermanence, though I was far from grasping the idea at the time.

It is almost 40 years later. The sign is long gone, but its wisdom remains. Here’s what I have learned: Things change. Life is dynamic, like a river. It just keeps flowing, taking with it experiences we are glad to be rid of and those we had hoped to keep. Nothing is more dramatic proof of that than the recession that is not quite over.

People who were busy living their lives—going to work, enjoying their homes, buying things, watching their kids play soccer—suddenly felt as if they had been hit by a tsunami. Businesses, jobs, homes, income, security, gone—not only here in the U.S., but worldwide. That’s impermanence with a capital I.

A recession, a hurricane, a flood, death or divorce, bankruptcy, and illness are all pretty dramatic ways to learn that things change when we least expect them to. On the flip side, they can change in wonderful ways: a wedding, a new baby, a windfall, a best seller. These are the changes we welcome.

In 1970, a guy named Richard Alpert, who became Ram Dass, wrote a book called Be Here Now. He was trying to tell westerners what Eastern religions have been teaching for centuries: Enjoy now because now is all we have. He was right, of course. Joseph Goldstein, one of the earliest teachers of mindfulness meditation in this country and the author of One Dharma, was more poetic when he wrote: “All experience is part of an endlessly passing show.”

Now, that is a thought to meditate on.

A Celebration of Women

I went to the library, in a big hurry and desperate for a good mystery. Bad combination. All the current, best-selling mysteries were gory (what with that?), and I found myself standing at the new nonfiction section. I’ve always felt that the right book falls into my hands at the exact moment I need to read it, and once again, that’s what happened. Suddenly, I was holding Cokie Roberts’ 10^th anniversary edition of We Are Our Mothers’ Daughters. I left the library with that single little book … well, little, fat, 319-page book.

I'm a big Cokie Roberts fan. I love her voice, her incisive comments, and the breadth of her knowledge about what’s happening on the hill when she appears on NPR. Actually, I'm also a fan of her husband, Steve Roberts, who often subs for Dianne Rehm on NPR. Nobody manages a discussion better than he does. Recently, I have discovered Rebecca Roberts who does the greatest interviews on (you guessed it) NPR. She, too, has a warm, distinctive style. This is one incredible family.

We Are Our Mothers’ Daughters encompasses the personal, the political, and the profound. It is part memoir, part history, but mostly a celebration of women. It weaves intimate stories of Roberts’ own life with those of her amazing family, today’s headliners, and more obscure heroines. Equally comfortable with present day political celebrities and women we may never had heard of, Roberts made them all come alive for me.

I read this book as if it were a revelation, and in many ways, it was. I’ve always known that women are remarkable, but Cokie Roberts brought that home to me in ways I never thought about. We Are Our Mothers Daughters should be required reading in every women’s studies program.

As I reached the last page, I felt renewed pride in being a woman and in the special sisterhood we share with women who came before us and who are making a difference in the world right today. Thank you Cokie!

Freedom From the Should Monster

About 30 years ago, someone lent me a book that changed my life. Books can do that if they show up at exactly the right moment with exactly the right message. This book was called The Path of Least Resistance. It was written by Robert Fritz in 1943. Fifty-six years later, I still find its message relevant and compelling. I’ve taken seminars and read other books that have taught the same concepts as if they were new. In fact, I have even taught them in my own classes. I don’t even know if Robert Fritz made them up or if he, too, adapted them from someone else’s teachings. It really doesn’t matter. What matters is that these ideas still provoke thought, create change, and work.

I’ve been thinking about this book a lot lately. I’ve read it many times and highlighted it until the pages are almost solid yellow. To review it all at one would take much too much space or give short shrift to its complexity. But what I’ve been pondering these last few days is the subject of “fundamental choices”— which Fritz doesn’t even mention until page 103—and particularly one of those choices: to be free.

First, let me explain that “a fundamental choice,” in Fritz’s words, “is a choice in which you commit yourself to a basic life orientation … a state of being.” Fundamental choices are unaffected by changes in internal or external circumstances. Once you make such a choice, convenience and comfort are irrelevant. Once you make such a choice, you begin to deal with reality in an entirely new way.

Fundamental choices are not always conscious, though it’s best if they are. The ones people tend to make are to be free, to be healthy, and to be true to oneself. They all sound so simple and straightforward; yet, I have spent a great deal of time over the years contemplating what they really mean. For example, what does it mean to be free? Of course, being a writer, I looked it up. Here are a few of its meanings:

• not under the control or in the power of another; able to act or do as one wishes : a free choice.
• subject neither to foreign domination nor to despotic government : a free press.
• not or no longer confined or imprisoned : set free.
• not a slave
• able or permitted to take a specified action : free to leave.

In this country, supposedly, we have many of these freedoms, at least in a big-picture way. We are not subject to foreign domination or a despotic government, and when we think we are at risk of either one, we take action through demonstrations or at the polls. Most of us are not confined or imprisoned, and those who are long to be set free. We are not slaves, since slavery has been banned, and we are free to do anything that falls within the law. All of these points can be argued, I know, but on the surface, they are true.

So, as I contemplate the fundamental choice of being free, what else could I possibly want? I live in America, the land of the free. I am free come and go as I please. I work at a job I love. So where does this choice come into my life? Well, to tell the truth I want to be free of “shoulds,” the invisible controlling little voices that keep popping up in my mind.

What is a should? (back to the dictionary)

• A should is an obligation, a duty, a correct behavior, typically when criticizing someone else's or our own actions : You should call your mother every day; you should finish this assignment before you take a break; you should take the job because it pays well.
• A should is a desirable or expected state : You should know what you want to be by now; you should be financially stable; you should be married.
• A should gives advice or suggestions, usually unsolicited : You should lose some weight; you should tell him what you really think; you should discipline your children.

Shoulds are tyrants, very persistent, relentless little tyrants who never seem to shut up. Sometimes, they are other people—your mother, your boss, a friend, even a total stranger. But more often, they are you, talking to yourself. You may call it your conscience or your critical parent; I call it the should monster. I have recently become more aware of its ubiquitous presence in my life. You should do this; you shouldn’t do that, and on and on. What’s worse is the running dialogue I engage in with my personal little monster. I know. I know, I tell it. I should exercise, but I am so tired right now. I’ll do it later. OK?

OK? Did I really say OK? Did I ask an imaginary voice for permission to forgo exercising? Am I truly a slave to the instructions of some formless, non-thing that thinks it’s knows what I should be doing? This is embarrassing, but apparently so. I am eternally grateful to Robert Fritz for offering me a choice in the matter—a fundamental choice. So, here and now, I choose to be free of the should monster.

I feel better already.

Happy 5770

I’m not ordinarily an observer of holidays—religious or secular. There are so many of them, and most seem irrelevant or inappropriate to my life. So, they come and they go and, at best, they may tack an extra day onto the weekend, giving me more time to work. But there is one holiday that matters to me, one that seems worthy of celebrating, albeit in my own unconventional manner.

The holiday is Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year and the start of the High Holy Days. If one is Jewish, this day holds enormous meaning. I was trying to find an official explanation of that meaning and came across this opening line of an editorial in a weekly newspaper, the St. Louis Jewish light.

“As the shofar sounds on Rosh Hashana to open the Gates to Heaven, we have a duty on earth, to open our hearts and minds to the great potential of working together in lovingkindness.”

What struck me about this sentence was the word lovingkindness, which is fundamental to the teachings of Buddhism. There are many books on that word (my favorite is by Sharon Salzberg), and people spend days at meditation retreats just focusing on the practice of lovingkindness, or Meta. It suddenly occurred to me that, if we reduced the basic teachings of all of the great religions of the world to one idea, it would surely be lovingkindness.

Believe it or not, making that connection was epiphany for me, a simple explanation for the meaning behind this ancient holiday. This is an idea I can embrace, contemplate, and, yes, even celebrate.

Today, which happens to be Rosh Hashana—the start of year 5770—seems an appropriate time begin.

A cure for just about everything

I just returned from visiting my grand-dog. We spent a glorious 10 days together, playing, walking, chatting, going in, going out, rolling on the floor, and just hanging out. If you want to calm your jangled nerves, pet a dog. If you want to feel needed, get down on the rug, and let him curl up next to you with his head on your leg. If you think you’re not important, walk out of the room and watch him follow you. Nothing like it, I swear.

The thing is I don’t own a dog. I am just in love with my daughter’s little guy. He looks like a puppy, but in truth, he is anything but. Still, to watch him prance on his hind legs when he wants a treat or gallop across the lawn to be let in or set too fast a pace when I walk him, one would swear he was just a kid.

All of this begs the question: WHY don’t I have a dog? Why don't I go to the rescue shelter and save a little life? (It would have to be little because we have condo association rules about size). Or, if I want something fluffy and cuddly, why don’t I go online and look up fluffy, cuddly breeds or go to Pet Smart and just pick out a puppy?

I have a gazillion reasons, including bad weather, unexpected expenses, and arthritis; but they really don’t hold up. After all, I’ve made an utter fool of myself by creating a website for my favorite furry friend, put his picture on my computer screen, and considered getting Skype so I can see him up close and personal.

I feel a little silly writing this, as if I’m hoping someone will talk me into running out and actually finding the dog of my dreams. The problem is I have already found him, and he lives 900 miles away.

Words! Words! Words! I’m so sick of words!

I’ve been an NPR junkie for years. I thought I was hooked forever on all that “in-depth news and intelligent talk” (my local station’s slogan). Then, one day I realized how sick and tired I was of the same repetitive news all day long and the incessant babbling on the topic de jour hour after hour.

How can they stand it? I wondered. Don’t Carl Kassel and Korva Coleman get tired of rearranging the words of the same headlines 50 times a day? Don’t Diane Rehm and Neal Conan and Robert Siegel get bored with  the endless interviewees and callers after a while? And, most of all, don’t they wonder if the only things worth talking about are bleak, depressing, and enough to make one think the world is going to hell in a hand basket?

Suddenly, I thought, if I have to listen to one more commentary on the things people have been commenting since five o’clock this morning, I will lose my mind. And if I never again hear the words, “critics say,” it will be fine with me. Why do these people feel duty bound to tell us what critics say on every subject? Why must there be an equal and opposite side to every single issue? Why can’t they just report on one side for once and talk about the other side some other time? Perhaps this is their stab at balanced reporting, but, if so, it isn’t working. Most of the time I would be just as happy not knowing what critics are saying. Let the critics have their own stories. Why do they have to hitch a ride on someone else’s?

Why do we have to hear polarized opinions in every debate and why, for that matter, does it have to be a debate at all? This is not an original question. Author and sociolinguist Deborah Tannen, Ph.D., posed it in her 1998 book The Argument Culture: Moving from Debate to Dialogue.

“The argument culture urges us to approach the world—and the people in it—in an adversarial frame of mind,” Tannen wrote. “Our determination to pursue truth by setting up a fight between two sides leads us to believe that every issue has two sides—no more, no less … But opposition does not lead to truth when an issue is not composed of two opposing sides but is a crystal of many sides. Often the truth is in the complex middle, not the   extremes.”

In other words, life is not a tidy, black-and-white photograph. It is many shades and textures of gray. I would love to buy several copies of The Argument Culture and send them to every newscaster and commentator on NPR with instructions to absorb its wisdom. Would it revolutionize talk radio if they actually put these principles in action? Or would they all simply be out of a job for not being fair and impartial?

If NPR did dramatically change its program strategy and begin to provide real in-depth news and intelligent talk; if every issue didn’t devolve into a war of words; and if the purpose was to promote full understanding of issues, rather than crowning the winner in each discussion, how much more knowledgeable and tolerant might we all become?

I can’t answer that question, but I know one thing for sure: I would turn my radio on and once again become a devoted NPR listener.

 

Minding Our Moments

I do a lot of reading about the Buddhist philosophy, the heart of which is the concept of mindfulness. It’s all about paying attention to what’s going on right this minute. This is hard from me since I tend to romanticize the past, which I remember as perfect (it wasn’t) or stressing out over the future, which seems scary (it probably won’t be).

This is not a new concept of course, though it is back in fashion with a vengeance. Way back in 1970, a guy named Richard Alpert, or Baba Ram Das, as he preferred to be called, wrote a book called Be Here Now. He was high on LSD when he wrote it, but the title and the idea had staying power.

I have a complete shelf filled with books on this and many other Buddhist teachings; but, as one of those teachings famously observes, “a finger pointing at the moon is not the moon.” Similarly, reading about living in the moment is not actually doing it; it’s just reading about it.

Jon Kabat-Zinn, the modern day mindfulness guru, keeps pointing out that this moment is the only moment we have, and, if we don’t live it, it’s gone. Then one day we wake up and find that we are out of moments.

Believe it or not, I just got that. I was talking to my oldest friend, who was telling me a story about a father and daughter who had not spoken for 15 years. The daughter wasn’t ready to break the silence … yet. She may never be. "So sad,” my friend said. “She’ll never get those years back. They’re gone. Wasted. Life not lived.”

After all those years of reading, all those books, all those words — just like that, I understood. Fifteen years doesn’t sound like a big number; 473,040,000 does. That’s how many moments of her life that girl lost. How many have I not lived, ignored, wasted? How many do I have left? I don’t know. Nobody knows.

I guess that’s the point.

Tower of Babel

Sometimes, when I overhear people speaking in a language other than English, I am struck with the desire to understand what they are saying. It’s as if they are in another place, and I want to enter their world, even if only for a moment. Language separates us, it seems, and I find it frustrating.

I have two clients who immigrated to the U.S. many years ago. They speak English very well and, in fact, have both written books in English. Yet, behind the words are other cultures, other ways of looking at the world. I learned this lesson back in college a lifetime ago when I dated a student from South America. His worldview was Brazilian, and though we were using English words in our conversations, often we didn’t seem to be getting through to each other. He spoke from his culture, and I listened from mine.

I’ve been pondering this lately because I realize that the same miscommunication occurs between people who speak the same language — people who are related, who have grown up together, or who know each other well. In families, sometimes, it seems that like one person is speaking Greek and another Chinese. Consider two siblings who are engaged in a heated discussion. They report the argument to their mother. Ironically, both recall exactly the same words. “She said this; I said that.” But the interpretation of those words is wildly different. Whom does mom believe? Both children are reporting the conversation the way they heard it, but apparently, what they heard is poles apart.

It wasn’t always that way according to the Old Testament. Once upon a time, everyone spoke the same language. After the great flood (the one where Noah built the ark), supposedly, they all moved east and ended up in the city of Babel There, they built a huge tower that would reach all the way to heaven. They dedicated their tower not to God, but to the glory of man. As the story goes, God was not happy about that and expressed His displeasure by scattering the people all over the earth and making them speak different languages. That was the biblical origin of miscommunication and misunderstanding.

However it began, we’ve had thousands of years and about as many books to help us fix the problem. I’ve actually written one or two of those books. Yet, frankly, I don’t think my communication skills are any better than anyone else’s. My books and most of the others I’ve read are about communication skills: how to ask questions, summarize what you’ve heard, keep the conversation on track, etc. But I’m not at all sure that skills alone will do the trick. If I say “Why are you doing that?” and you hear, “Don’t do that!” we’re off the bad start.

We hear and interpret words based on our individual perception, which filters what comes in through our senses (what we hear and see and touch) and all of our life experience (what we recognize from our store of memory). No two people hear or see things the same way; no two people have the same life experience. Thus, no two people interpret a spoken message the same way.

So, what we still have in our sophisticated, educated, enlightened society is a modern version of the Tower of Babel. 

Family Matters

What better way is there to spend a gloomy weekend than by cleaning out a storage closet? I do this often, and one would think mine would be nearly empty by now. But, alas, the file boxes seem to be breeding and having new, little file boxes between purgings. As I moved things around, this time, I came upon a bright, red cardboard carton labeled “Family.” I knew it had file folders in it because my entire life is in file folders, but I didn’t remember what I had filed or why. So, I hauled it out and began to revisit the past.

There was a folder for each member of my immediate family: my mother, my father, my sister, and each of my daughters. We were all great letter writers before the advent of hastily tossed-off e-mails. There were letters to and from all of us — some hand written, others, typed. The letters conveyed apologies, confidences, congratulations, condolences, explanations, and the latest news from camp. Nothing went on in our family that did not make its way into a letter.

There were cards for every occasion and no occasion that eloquently said happy birthday, happy Mothers’ Day, I’m sorry, thank you, and I love you. There were report cards, college grades, and papers written for school. There were resumes and detailed applications for jobs. There was specially designed stationery with logos. (Who but my daughters would have their first resumes printed on designer letterhead?) There were photographs, though not many, because I filed them in different folders.

There were two-line notes my father used to send with money and many renderings of the “Good Ship Lollipop,” which I think was the only thing he ever drew. There were articles I wrote that I didn’t remember writing, my sister’s very funny “saga” about her daughter’s first year away at college, and the eulogies she and I wrote when our parents died.

We think we’ll never forget these things, but we are wrong. That’s why we keep scrapbooks and photo albums — so we will remember the moments of our lives. Maybe it’s my age that caused me look through that box to see what others might find someday. My younger daughter recalls when we were cleaning out my mother’s apartment and she came across a fancy gift ribbon. “Why would grandma have kept this? she asked. No one knew. Since then, she has been busy putting everything she owns in cute little containers with labels on them so there will be no such mysteries in her life.

Maybe that’s why I’m reexamining the contents of all my file boxes. I want people to know what mattered most to me and why.

Unconditional Love

In 1987 a new Stephen Sondheim play opened on Broadway, and I wanted to see it. This was not an idle whim; it was an obsession. It was also highly unlikely that it would ever happen. I couldn’t really afford to go or to stay in a hotel. I had used all my vacation time. My company wouldn’t pay for me to join a professional association let alone to send me to New York. Talk about dreaming the impossible dream. Yet, in October of that year, I watched the curtain rise on Into the Woods from what was surely the best seat in the house. What followed was magical.

Into the Woods is a morality play about fairy tale characters who all inhabit the same story. Their lives intersect as they seek the one thing they think will make them happy — a handsome prince, boundless treasure, adventure, freedom, lost beauty, and a baby. And when they get what they yearn for, they live happily ever after. And that’s the end of Act I.

How could a 50-year-old woman be obsessed with seeing a bunch of make-believe characters, including a frustrated witch, two womanizing princes, and a cowardly baker, sing and dance their hearts out for hours? And what does this have to do with my father? Well, that’s the real story.

Stephen Sondheim didn’t know my father, but he captured his essence when it came to make believe. My father was a gentle man with a beautiful, deep voice and a vivid imagination. He thought it quite natural to have characters show up in each other’s stories, where some of my friends insisted they didn’t belong. The original versions paled in comparison to his.

Into the Woods opened the same year my father died. The play was, in my mind, a kind of memorial. They say people we love hang around a while after they die just to be sure we are OK. He surely did, at least until I saw that play. In a theater full of people, I watched it alone, except for the very real presence of my father, who stayed just long enough to watch it with me.
My father never considered himself a successful man, and I was always puzzled by that.

Perhaps he felt he should have made more money, but I can't imagine what he could have provided that we didn't already have. He always had a generosity of spirit and of self that I have found in no other human being. His whole life gave testimony to the philosophy that the more love you give away, the more you have to give. And give it he did — consistently, constantly, endlessly.

Most of all, he gave it to my mother, for fifty years, in small ways and, occasionally, with extravagant gestures. No woman, I think, has ever been more loved by a man than she. He gave it to my sister and me and then to our daughters, three more additions to what we always called "Frank's harem.” But, he gave it, as well, to everyone he met on his journey through life — to his parents and brothers and sisters to those he worked with on the Long Island Railroad; to friends and to total strangers; and to every child he ever met who wanted to sit on his lap and hear his wonderful, slightly rearranged fairy tales.

I could list the things he did, his accomplishments, the specific acts of kindness I remember or others told me about. But, in truth, I would prefer to gather and share my own special memories of this man, who held my hand as we walked through the park and swept me into a magic world of make-believe with his wondrous stories and fanciful pipe dreams.

The things I remember may seem inconsequential — not the stuff of which a man's life can be defined. But, they are significant to me and help, somehow, to explain what made my father so special.

He could fix anything with his wonderful hands, no matter how mangled or hopeless the damage might seem. He could take himself and any child who wanted to accompany him into a world of fairies and princesses and wonder. He was a marvelous dancer, effortless and smooth, somehow trapping the music in his every movement and transmitting it to his partner. He was a helper, always rushing to do something for my mother or for us. He woke me in the morning with a hot cup of coffee; he was always first to do the unpleasant chores he wanted to spare us; but he is best remembered, I think, for removing the saucers from beneath our cups so he could beat all of us to cleaning off the dinner table.

He was a collector — of everything — especially memories. His dresser drawers and closets bulged with wonderful things he had saved for his children and grandchildren, and his mind was equally full of recalled treasures from the past. He loved history and baseball and things made of wood, but most of all, he loved the railroad. All his life, no matter how far from trains he may have strayed, Frank Levay was a railroad man.

I grew up on the railroad, riding back and forth between New York and Chicago. I slept in upper and lower births, in tiny compartments, and in spacious bedrooms. I ate meals in dining cars with white tablecloths and heavy silver coffee pots. I was watched over by tall, dignified porters who had promised to keep and eye on me during the trip. This was my father’s world and so it was mine.

I was an only child for the first eight-and-a-half years of my life and spent much of that time with him. My memories are like slides flashing on a screen: flying through the air on a swing until all I could see were thick green leaves dotted with patches of blue … watching beautiful ladies, whom my father called debutants, sweeping though fancy hotel lobbies … eating chicken chow mien in New York’s China Town … walking on top of a wall made of rocks and holding tight to his hand … and riding with the engineer in the cab of a brand new diesel engine.

We built a life together during my early years, and we rediscovered each other when I was a grown woman who reached out to my father and found that he was reaching out to me. He went blind, very suddenly, in his 70s, and never really adjusted to the loss of his sight. He was 79 when he died, leaving an unfillable void for the six of us who loved him.

All my life, he gave me one priceless gift — unconditional love. No strings, no living up to expectations, just being me was all I had to do to receive it. Few parents have the wisdom and strength to give that to their children. My father had both.

Doing Things the Hard Way

When one is directionally challenged, as I am, getting places can turn into my worst nightmare. Take today, for example. I wanted to get a printout of my lifetime earnings (Don’t ask why. It’s a long story). Being Internet savvy, I went to socialsecurity.org, filled out the requisite form, and hit submit. Flashing red messages told me I had made a mistake. My address was wrong. I rechecked it; it was right. In a standoff with a website, one never wins. After a frustrating 20 minutes of trying to convince unseen forces that I really do live at this address, I gave up and decided to drive to the nearest Social Security office.

But first, I had to find out where it was. I Googled Social Security in St. Louis and found two offices in the general vicinity of my neighborhood. So, off I went, trying to beat the “heavy rains” that were predicted for St. Louis,

Of course, I forgot my GPS, without which I’m helpless. I finally found the address, but it was not a Social Security office. It was a law firm with one attorney who specialized in Social Security matters. “Try calling Social Security,” the helpful receptionist suggested and offered me her phone. I called the 800 number and was informed that the options had changed and I should listen carefully to the new menu. I’ll spare you the never-ending “if you want this, press one; if you want that, press two” and all the questions that required verbal responses, which the frustrated voice recognition system didn’t recognize. I gave up and hung up.

“How about a phone book?” the receptionist asked, handing me the old, reliable white pages. (Key word here is old.) I looked up Social Security in the government section, found an address, and set off once again. Supposedly, the office was in a bank building not far from my house. For some reason, though, it wasn’t listed on the bank directory. The reason turned out to be that it had moved to another location — this time, far, far away from where I live. The rain had started as I dashed to my car.

Of course, I had no idea where the street was located (despite trying to decipher a street guide printed in two-point type), passed it by miles, and, in desperation, dashed through the rain to a storefront medical clinic to beg for help. With explicit directions, I finally found the street and the building and the office. My purse was searched, I was given a number, and I sat down to wait. When it was my turn, I went to the window and commented on my problems trying to find this particular office.

“Did you Google us?” the women behind the counter asked. I nodded. “Well, honey, that’s your problem,” she said. “The information on Google is wrong.” Wrong? Yes, wrong. I had spent hours trying to find the place, time waiting for my turn, and more time driving back through the rain in rush hour traffic. I was exhausted and had wasted the whole afternoon going somewhere I didn’t need to go, all because a website, Google, automated telephone technology, and the phone book had conspired to complicated my already complicate life.

Later, I mentioned my travails to my daughter, who said, “Mom, I think Social Security automatically sends that printout every year. Are you sure you didn’t get one in the mail?” I don’t even want to look!

Looking Back on "Women's Lib"

In the beginning, there was a book. It was called The Feminine Mystique, and it started a revolution. The year was 1963. The thing about revolutions, though, is that they don’t happen all at once. It takes a long time for those at the back of the parade to get in step with those in the front, all of whom are marching to music only they can hear. Women like Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem and Bella Abzug were leading this parade, and they were light years ahead of the rest of us.

The whole concept of “women’s lib” was uncharted territory to those of us who were still waxing our floors in shirtwaist dresses and Mary Jane shoes, driving nursery school carpool in our shiny, new station wagons, and putting dinner on the table every night at 6:00, just as our mothers did.

Let me tell you how I finally got in step. I was tricked into it by a soft-spoken, white gloved, closet feminist. Ever so gently, she convinced me to invite a group of my friends to meet once a week to watch a program on Channel 9 and talk about it. That was all we had to do: watch and talk. She never said the words women’s liberation or consciousness raising. She never suggested that we would be in the forefront of a powerful movement. She just said it might be interesting.

The program, which originated in California (probably at Berkeley), was called “Choice, Challenge For American Women.” It had one simple but compelling message: Ladies, you have choices. How you live your life is up to you.

Week after week, we watched that program and talked, and talked. Week after week, we began to awaken to a new reality. Can you imagine the sound of a room full of young wives and mothers having a palpable aha moment, all at the same time? Our sudden sense of freedom left us breathless. It was 1970, seven years after The Feminine Mystique was published.

I went home and told my husband I wanted to get a job. He thought I was kidding … or crazy. He didn’t think I could possibly mean it. In fact, all over the country, there were husbands in a collective state of shock. We had obviously lost our minds. To prove it, we went back to school, to work, to our typewriters and easels and pianos, and forward to long-delayed careers and single motherhood, if necessary.

To have choices was intoxicating. Understand, it’s not that we didn’t have them before; it’s that we didn’t know we had them. Can you fathom that fewer than 40 years ago we were oblivious to something as fundamental as having the right to choose?

Little by little, of course, we got used to idea. We stretched ourselves and reached out to other women. We encouraged our daughters to ask for what they wanted and refuse to take no for an answer. We even invented a new word (well, Gloria Steinem did) “Ms.” Most of us didn’t chant slogans, or burn our underwear (that’s a myth, by the way), or get all bent out of shape when a man held a door open for us.

We just kept doing whatever it was we had chosen to do, as well as we could possibly do it. And those of who really understood what women’s liberation was all about learned to respect those among us who made different choices from ours.

This revolution, which began 46 years ago, embraced different causes, different colors, and different ages. It was never exclusive, and it was never about being right. Rather, it was about having the right to hear a different drummer … and step to the music we heard, however measured or far away.

Dispelling the Worry Demon

I have a close personal relationship with worry, and apparently we have been together for a long time. I don’t remember how old I was when my mother bought me a copy of Dale Carnegie’s How to Stop Worrying and Start Living. It had a lot of good ideas but no real, long-term effect.

I’ve been worrying a lot lately. I have list of topics to worry about. After 9/11, I worried about how life as we know it can change on a dime. Then, I worried about the war in Iraq and the thousands of servicemen and woman who were killed or wounded beyond repair. I worried about politics nonstop. Of course, my current worry is the economy, which is helped along by an unending flow of news and commentary on how bad it is and how the world is slip sliding away into a depression. I worry about my family a lot. When something is bothering one of my daughters, I ruminate on her problem until I find myself skipping meals and waking up at night.

Of course, I know worry is as useless an emotion as guilt. It gets me nowhere and certainly doesn’t lead to doing anything constructive that might dispel it. According to Wikipedia (yes, I really did look it up):

“Worry is an emotion in which a person feels anxious or concerned about a real or imagined issue, ranging from personal issues such as health or finances to broader issues such as environmental pollution and social or technological change.” Well at least I'm worrying about the same things other people are.

“About one in four people, have chronic worry … which can cause heart attacks, high blood pressure, ulcers, gastrointestinal problems, muscular aches and pains, skin rashes, eczema, respiratory problems and asthma.” That is very scary.

So, what to do? Being a modern, savvy traveler in cyberspace, I Googled my topic and found Dr. Edward Hallowell, psychiatrist and author of Worry. He suggests the following:

• Don’t worry alone; talk to a friend.
• Find out more about the issue; check your facts.
• Make a plan and take action.
• Take "care of your brain" (sleep, exercise, eat healthy).
• Seek human contact (hugs are good).
• Let go of the problem.

I’m sure this is all good advice, but it is nothing I haven’t heard before. Actually, it seems a bit simplistic. When I was worried about the war in Iraq and talked to my friends, they were all equally worried, and we just reinforced each other’s anxiety. The same is true of the present state of the economy. The only thing on that list that makes any real sense is “let go of the problem.” That’s tough but doable. It will take an act of sheer will to put my pet demons out of my mind.

As I wrote that line, I could just imagine myself shoving a little demon out the door, turning the key, and stacking tables and furniture against it to prevent him from getting back in. I’ll bet neither Dale Carnegie or Edward Howell ever thought of that.

Memories of my Mother

I am feeling quite philosophical. For one thing, my mother died 10 years ago today. For another, tomorrow is my birthday (not great timing). While it sometimes seems that time is dragging, when I realize that it has been a decade since I last spoke to my mother, I am stunned. I have often felt that, in some inexplicable way, she is more present now than when she was alive. Today, as I think of her, I am rereading what I wrote 10 years ago. Every word still resonates.

First and foremost, my mother was her own person — a liberated woman long before anyone ever heard that phrase. She spoke her mind; she did her own thing; and she exhibited a strength few women I know can equal.

She lived every minute of her 91-1/2 years. She was bright, funny, engaging, and fully engaged in life. She celebrated every birthday as a gift and didn’t seem to notice her age until this past year. But even as she began to slow down a bit, she still managed to read a book a day.

She was intelligent, multi-talented, and capable. It always seemed to me that anything I could do, she could do just a little bit better — from knitting and sewing to finding mistakes in something I had just proofread.

She knew the value of education and went back to work twice to help send both of us to college. Her own education was a result of voracious reading and constant honing of her abundant skills.

She had a direct, personal relationship with God and talked to Him every day. She lived her Judaism in spirit and in deed and honored her own mother by keeping the Sabbath holy.

She had a razor sharp wit, an indomitable sense of humor, and a will of iron. Her face and gestures were eloquently expressive; her love of books was contagious; and her pride in everything we achieved propelled us through life.

She forged and sustained a tightly knit family and instilled in us a strong value system that we, in turn, have tried to keep alive for our daughters.

Most of all, she loved us — all of us — her husband, her daughters, her sons-in-law, and her three beautiful granddaughters. She loved completely, as she lived life, with spontaneous affection, generosity, and zest.

Of all the things she gave us over the years, the gift we will treasure most is her love.

The Reality of This Recession

Sometimes, I think I live in a cave. Its not that I don’t know we’re in a recession. It’s not that I don’t hear about it 10 times a day on NPR, which is the only news that squeaks through my blockade. It’s not that I am unaware of the thousands upon thousands of people who are laid off each week, or the stores that are closing all around me, or the 75 percent off sales everywhere I look. But after eight years of orange alerts and dire warnings and fear, I have become somewhat inured to bad news. It was so bad for so long, and I felt so helpless, that I stopped reading, watching, or listening to the news.

What finally brought the reality of this recession home to me were two conversations about education. One was with the St. Louis Community College, where I teach writing. Registration for my non-credit class is down this semester, as it was last semester. And it’s not just my class; it’s all classes, on all campuses of the community college. People are cutting back, and one of the ways they’re doing it is by not taking classes they don’t need. How many people really need to learn how to write a nonfiction book?

The community college discontinued the separate catalogs for each campus, which people were used to receiving. That probably confused a lot of would-be students. They seem to have discontinued the person who interacted with the instructors, as well. That definitely confused me. I have no idea whom to call when I have a question. So, I call the continuing ed office, where I am told they are in the midst of reorganization. What does that mean? I ask. "It means we may not even be offering the program in the future," I am told. What program? "The continuing education program." I hang up in a daze.

This morning, I was telling a friend about this development. “My daughter is on the strategic planning committee for one of the branches of the university,” she says, "and she just heard they might be closing." Closing? Closing what? I ask. “That branch of the university,” she replies. “I don’t know how she will get her degree if they close the whole campus.”

Suddenly, I am hit with the enormity of this recession — how widespread and deep it is, how it reaches into ever crevice of our society, how many lives it is touching and in many cases ruining. There is no response to my friend’s dismal observation. What can one say?

A Very Bad Day ... or Two or Three

Ever have one of those days? You know, the kind where everything goes wrong from the minute the alarm goes off until you finally escape your little black cloud by diving into bed and burying your head under a pillow. Today was definitely a day for the books, or the blogs, as the case may be. It actually began the a couple of days ago when I left my cell phone and Bluetooth earpiece in the pocket of my workout pants and then dumped them into the washing machine. They emerged from their dunking clean but useless.

The phone was insured; the Bluetooth was not. I had a choice between a replacement phone or upgrading the whole soggy mess for $200 and walking out of the Sprint store fully functional. I opted for the replacement, which was promised by overnight mail. The only proof that it had arrived was the UPS sticky note on the ground half way down my stairs. I was home all day, waiting for the UPS guy, who apparently knocked on my door with a feather. He didn’t return on Friday or Saturday or Sunday, so I still have no phone.

People couldn’t call me, and I couldn’t call them if I was out and about. Friday evening, I used my landline phone to confirm my dinner date with a friend. “OMG,” she said, “I completely forgot and have made other plans for the evening. I’m so sorry.” This was not really a tragedy because it was too cold outside to want to go anywhere. She felt terrible; I said, “Don’t worry about it. I’ve done that more than a few times in my life.” We rescheduled.

Saturday disappeared in a flurry of activity — working out, looking at my daughter’s new choice of wedding ring (it looks nothing like the Jared ring, by the way), pursuing our search for the perfect dress, grabbing a bite to eat, grocery shopping, and finally collapsing. It would have been a lovely day except for one little thing: I completely forgot that I had plans to meet another friend for dinner.

I woke up Sunday morning with a sinking feeling that something was amiss. I checked my calendar and there it was — the missed dinner date. I called my friend, overcome with remorse. “What happened to you?” she asked. “OMG,” I said, “I completely forgot. I got all tied up with wedding stuff and just spaced out. I’m so sorry. I feel absolutely terrible.” “Well you should,” she replied. I was devastated.

Still in a cloud of amnesia, I went off to fulfill my greeting duties of the Ethical Society, only to find I was there on the wrong week. I’m a greeter next Sunday, not this one. Eventually, the day ended. Thinking myself safe from further catastrophe, I pulled down the bedspread, and there was an open pen, sitting in the middle of a spreading blue circle of ink. The bedspread, of course, is white. I did a lot of screaming — “Out, out damn spot!” — but to no avail. All attempts to purge it made it ten times worse. I think this is the end of my beautiful bedspread. The ink, of course, soaked through to the duvet cover and the comforter. I went to bed with the washing machine chugging fitfully and the bathtub full of water and bleach.

When I was a little girl, I read all the Mary Poppins books. In every book there was a chapter called Bad Tuesday or Bad Wednesday, in which Jane or Michael had a very bad day where things went wrong left and right. In the end, of course, everything worked out fine, thanks to magical Mary Poppins. Some never-to-be-forgotten lesson was learned by the remorseful culprit, and Mary Poppins put everyone to bed. End of chapter.

Well, this was my bad Sunday — or more accurately Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. As it finally came to a close, I couldn’t help wishing I had a Mary Poppins to set things right, put me to bed, and end this particular chapter.

“He got it at Jared.” A Cautionary Tale

My daughter (T) became engaged over Thanksgiving. She and her fiancé found the perfect ring at Jared, the Galleria of Jewelry. There it was, right in the case, just waiting for them. It was kismet. Rather than purchase a center diamond, they wanted to have their own “sentimental” diamond mounted in the ring. (A little side note: this diamond was guaranteed and upgradable) “Of course, no problem,” said the store manager, who kept the ring to set the diamond.

That’s when the problems started. It is l-o-n-g story, especially if you are the bride to be, but I will try to give you the abbreviated version.

• The Jared technician cracked the diamond while setting it.
• The store manager offered to replace the cracked stone with a “perfect Jared diamond.”
• The ring was sent to headquarters to search for that perfect diamond; the search took weeks.
• In the meantime, T made many phone calls and trips to the store to check on the status of her ring.
• No calls were returned; no one had any information.
• T began to express impatience. Where was her ring?
• Finally, after many behind-the-scenes phone calls, the ring and the perfect diamond arrived, separately. The stone would have to be mounted at the store.
• T finally received her ring the day before Christmas.
• Meanwhile, back in the manager’s office, the news was not good. The diamond, though perfect, was neither guaranteed nor upgradable. ,
• Why? Because it was a “replacement diamond,” and that was Jared’s policy.
• T tried logic, reminding them that she wouldn’t have a replacement diamond if they hadn’t cracked her original one.
• Logic did not prevail; policy was sacrosanct.

T is what we call a “consumer vigilante” (a phrase coined by Faith Popcorn in The Popcorn Report, 1991). She swung into action.
• She wrote to the president of Jared and the district manager, explaining the sequence of events and the problem. No one responded.
• She called the president, who apparently does not speak to customers, and the head of customer service, who apparently doesn’t either.
• By this time, it was mid-January.
• In the meantime, T made many phone calls and trips to the store to check on the status of her request.
• No calls were returned; no one had any information.
• Meanwhile, back in the manger’s office, the news was not good. The manager had a copy of the letter to the president, but no decision. She would have to call her district manager to resolve this matter.
• Finally, after many behind-the-scenes phone calls, Jared issued its verdict: it declined to guarantee its own diamond but agreed to upgrade it.
• T said no thank you; she wanted to return the ring. That, unfortunately, was no longer an option.
• Why? Because it had been purchased more than 30 days ago, and that was Jared’s policy.
• T tried logic, reminding them that the ring had not been in her possession for 30 days because Jared had sent it back to headquarters; that when she tried to resolve the issue through letters, phone calls, and visits to the store, no calls were returned, and no one had any information; that these delay tactics had effectively “run out the clock.”
• Once again, logic did not prevail; policy was sacrosanct.

It is a maxim of customer service that when a person has a bad experience, he or she will tell at least 11 people, who in turn may each tell 11 other people, and so on. In today’s world, telling only 11 people is a pretty obsolete approach. As the mother of the now-distraught bride to be; a blogger; and member of Facebook, twitter, and several other widely read social networking sites, I thought it would be more effective to tell 11 million people.

So the next time someone tells you he’s going to Jared, you might want to share this story.

Addendum to story: After all of the above, Jared agreed to take the ring back. Lots of bad PR for no good reason. That's why corporations should not have "personhood" status. They don't behave like people.

Closing Out the Year

This is my least favorite time of the year because it is time to get my finances in order to send to my accountant. While I am under the impression I have worked hard all year to keep track of income and expenses, file receipts in the right folders, and regularly add the figures to my Excel spreadsheet, I have been kidding myself. What should be a fairly straightforward task turns into an annual nightmare as I realize I have done none of the above.

First, let me say I am not a numbers person. I don’t particularly like numbers, and anything with dollar signs and decimal points gives me a stomachache. This doesn’t augur well for the task at hand. Where to start is always a problem. I guess the best place is with the pile of paid but still unfiled bills, scattered receipts, and check stubs that seem to have no discernible organization.

Then, there is trying to figure out to whom I paid what during each month of the year, so I can put the figures in the right cells of my empty spreadsheet. It’s not pretty. This year, in desperation, I called my bank and begged for a listing of 2008’s online business payments, all the time thinking, Right. Like that’s going to happen. Miracle of miracles, the lovely woman on the phone said, “Sure. I can do that. I’ll print it out and put it in the mail today.” And she did.

My income is divided into three parts: writing fees, book sales, and social security. That doesn’t sound too complicated, but fighting my way through PayPal and Amazon to see how many books I sold and how much I actually made, after the fees and humongous discounts have been deducted, almost drives me to tears.

Of course, there are the mountains of forms I get every month from Medicare, Blue cross/Blue Shield, and my Medicare Part D insurer. I guess I never look at them before I stuff them into file folders, but now I must. It’s pretty scary reading material. Insurance is it’s own private hell. When you’re self-employed, there seem to be 50 kinds, all out of pocket or deducted from something. And taxes. I never realized how many kinds of taxes there are, none of which are deducted from anything, so they are all out of pocket.

Finally, it is time to add up all these numbers (I swear I’ll eat out less, cut down on hair cuts, and find a cheaper grocery store), attach W9s (or whatever they’re called), and bundle up last year's proof of what is going on my tax return … just in case.

I do this every year, but, somehow, it never gets any easier. This is when I swear once again to hire a virtual assistant (VA). But if she’s virtual, as in — simulated, artificial, imitation, make-believe, computer-generated, online — will she come here and do all of this for me next year?