First Steps

We  had torrential rains here this weekend, a steady downpour which began last night and didn't let up the entire day.  Yesterday morning I snuggled into my favorite chair, coffee in hand, and watched as the wind tossed my neighbors magnolia tree to and fro, sending a cascade of pink blossoms raining down onto her driveway. We've had a cascade of good fortune in my family lately, for which I'm more than grateful.  In the past few years we've had times when fortune has rained less than blessings upon us, and though we survived it was not without scars.  So although I won't say we "earned" the recent glad tidings, I feel as if  we've paid enough dues to enjoy them without guilt.

While I've written before about my aversion to change, I recently wrote about the positive effect of initiating change rather than having it thrust upon you.  When I made the decision to resign from my job, it was as if I had opened a door which allowed all sorts of new possibilities to enter in.  Within weeks of making that decision, we learned about our impending grandparent-hood.  Then, in another wonderful stroke of good fortune, last Friday my husband was offered full time employment at the company where he once worked, and from where he was laid off in July 2009.

Taking the first step appears key - having the courage to set things in motion with a decision, an action, a forward movement toward the direction of a dream. My son and daughter in law started it all, I think, when they moved to Texas in January.   In their case, that movement toward a new way of life seemed to be the spark that set an actual new life into being. And they inspired me to start thinking about my own situation and how I needed to change it.  I now feel excited about change and for the first time in years I can anticipate it with pleasure instead fear.

Robert Collier, who wrote books on positive thinking and self motivation in the late 19th century, put it this way: "Take the first step, and your mind will mobilize all its forces to your aid. But the first essential is that you begin. Once the battle is started, all that is within and without you will come to your assistance."  

"All that is within and without you will come to your assistance..." It's not difficult to understand that once we make a decision and begin to move in the direction of our desire, we learn to marshal all the forces necessary to help make that desire a reality.  What's fascinating to me is the way "all that is without us" seems to get caught up in the movement as well.

It's as if the universe senses the energy and wants to join the party.  And I say, come on in - you're more than welcome.

How about you? Have you ever taken a first step, made one big change, and then had a series of positive changes occur as a result?

A New Day

There are things you dream about writing, things you hope you'll someday get to tell the world, things that happen in your life that are so amazing and exciting and dream-fulfilling that you can't wait to put them into words. And then they actually happen, and you don't know where to start.

So I'll just say it plain and simple~

I'm going to be a grandmother.

Could there be a better gift than this hope for the future, this new life in a long line of lives, this fulfillment of a dream?

Though this part isn't my story to tell, it has been a difficult road for my son and daughter in law, a road stubbornly filled with stumbling blocks and disappointments.  But now the path has cleared and come November we will welcome this long awaited addition to our family.

When you embark on the task of childbearing and childrearing, you take a huge leap of faith in yourself and the universe.  You hope the world will be a good place for your child to grow and live, you hope you remain alive and strong long enough to raise that child until adulthood, you hope  most fervently that your child is whole and healthy.  You say you don't care whether it's a boy or a girl (and I don't!), whether she loves shooting hoops or dancing ballet.  It doesn't matter if he becomes a doctor, a chef, a carpenter, or a poet, or whether her hair is long and silky black like her mothers or brown and slightly wavy like her fathers.

You just want to share the world with them, be able to watch them learn all the things you know and take for granted - how birds sound in the trees, the feel of the ocean lapping against your ankles when you walk the beach, the freedom in dancing around the room to music.  You want to open the world up and present it to them on a silver platter, invite them to reach out a small, chubby hand and take everything they want.

I'm beginning to realize that all those feelings are actually compounded when you contemplate becoming a grandparent.  Perhaps its because we know so much more than we did in the days we raised our own children.  We know how life can throw you a curve ball one day and hand you roses on the next. We've seen how dangerous the world can be, but also how magnificent.  Most of all, we know how quickly time passes, and how you must savor every precious moment, even when you're sick to death of changing diapers, playing Candyland, or going to soccer games and school plays.

In the twinkle of an eye, it's gone, and they've grown up and away. And you are older than you thought you'd ever be.

But right now I'm feeling young and renewed.  The last few weeks life has been handing me roses, and I'm enjoying that immensely. I'm also hoping this bouquet retains its sweet fragrance for a long, long time.

So I offer this song in honor of Brian and Nantana, and their baby.

A new day indeed.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UxVR-y8419w]

The Stress Factor Diet

Although it's been quite a few years since I had issues with my weight, I will always recall the difficulty involved in losing weight and keeping it off.  Shortly after giving birth I found myself with about 60 pounds to lose, which I managed to do without the assistance of weight loss pills or fad diets of anykind.  Thanks to a combination of youth, being a nursing mother, and having a 15 pound baby to tote around, I dropped the first 40 pretty effortlessly. The last 20 pounds disappeared as a result of one my most reliable diet methods.  No, and I haven't discovered the best weight loss pills in existence.  My diet secret is quite simple.

Stress.

I lost 10 pounds during my parents (horrifying) divorce.

I lost another 10 pounds when I was helping nurse my grandmother during her final illness.

Unlike many people, when I'm emotionally stressed I cannot eat. Literally -the food just simply sticks in my throat.  There's usually one or two foods I can choke down, so I rely on them as my steady diet until the stress period is over. When my grandmother was ill, my meal of choice was scrambled eggs. I ate so many eggs during that six month period that my cholesterol level still hasn't recovered - and that was 20 years ago.

During my parents divorce, the only food I could stomach was tuna fish sandwiches.  It's a tad bit healthier, as long as you don't go for the Subway version, which I love, but which has about 60 grams of fat.

I've dropped about 10 pounds over the past year, when I've been exercising regularly and following my husband's metabolic syndrome eating plan.  Again, no weight loss pills of any kind. However, the majority of that 10 pounds came off during the past three months when I was so stressed out at work and trying to make a decision about my future.

This time my staple food has been spinach and feta cheese omelets -but accompanied by an oat bran muffin to help keep the cholesterol in check.

I won't say it's the most pleasant diet in the world, but the stress factor diet works every time.

Money Matters

Yesterday I attended a memorial service for my friend's mother, who had been living in specialized facility Alzheimer's and dementia patients for the past five years.  Unless you've had a family member in this situation, you might not realize the extreme cost of long term debilitating diseases like this one.  Of course, the emotional price is staggering, but when you add the monetary cost into the equation, it's an astronomical sum. At her memorial service, it was mentioned that she had been interested in investments since the 1960's, and had taken the initiative to learn about investing and stock trading.  It's probably fortuitous that she did, because the cost of her care was about $5000 per month for the last five years.  That's a hefty chunk of change for the average middle classe octogenarian with nothing more than a passbook savings account.

I recall my dad belonging to a stock club in those days, and becoming a very savvy investor.  We all reaped the benefits of his knowledge back in the days when the market was booming and more reliable.  Nowadays, of course, it's all about online trading.  I don't pretend to know anything about investments, and I'm lucky to have a very skilled and reliable broker to help me with my 401K's, my IRA accounts, and my emerging market mutual funds.

But I had to admire the spunk of this woman who took an interest in money matters back in they day when most women weren't encouraged to do anything more challenging with their brains than tally up the bridge scores.

Be My Guest

Last week, Angie Mizzell, one of my favorite bloggers/writers/internet buddies e-mailed me with a very flattering request. "I'm trying to line up guest bloggers to post on my site once a week," she wrote.  "I'm looking for people I admire and who have stories that relate to similar themes in my book and blog.  You were the first person I thought of."

I love Angie's stories and the way she tells them, and I'm super excited to read the book she's writing about her experiences in television and her decision to leave that all behind to fulfill other dreams.  In fact, her story is one that inspired me to make some of the changes I've recently made in my own life.

So I'm extremely honored to have written the  first in a series of guest posts at Angie Mizzell.com.  Visit me over there today, and then go back and visit Angie everyday - you'll be glad you did.