Friday, December 28, 2012

AFTER ALL


I was having tea by a lovely fire in Starbucks this afternoon, and reading a terrific book my friend Lloyd had recommended.  Music played; people chatted.  And I was oddly not reading but silently talking to myself.  The year is almost over.  A tough year.  Dark.  Every blessing a mixed blessing.  As in: I flew out to California at the end of December to be with Alex on January 2nd - his 50th birthday.  I got terribly ill the night after arriving and so did everyone else (except Isobel) within a day later.  Awful 'bug.' Wasn't able to drive out to see Lloyd.  Or visit San Francisco.  Gratefully, we were all almost whole by Alex's birthday - we went to a deli restaurant (gifted by Jamie) where we ate chicken soup.  And thus the year began.

It was not my favorite year.  Useless murders across the world.  Poverty - homelessness - disastrous storms.  I even include too much nastiness in the major election.  And many personal disappointments.  Was laid off from my job in the fall for no credible reason.  Friends appeared and friends disappeared.  My daughter's health a terrible worry.  And things of mine - mainly jewelry - disappeared with troubling regularity.  Nothing of any real monetary value, but stuff I cared about nonetheless.

As for my work - well, I directed a show in January/February at a public school in a North Shore town.  Came off well enough.  Didn't progress much with my writing.  We did have a wonderful though private reading of my play, YELLOW ROSES, in my son's apartment in Manhattan.  Two remarkable Broadway actors; confirmed what we already know: it's a damn good play.  sigh.

Not all terrible.  My eight year old granddaughter and I went to New York City for my birthday.
So amazing to see the world I grew up in through her eyes.  Alex, Patricia and their lovely family came in summer.  And, in the fall, Jamie came to Beverly to perform at North Shore Music Theatre.  No better company than my own kids.  Well, hardly kids; first-rate, brilliant folks in any case.



So that's the litany.  Many people of my generation that I know keep as busy as possible.  Clubs, 'meet-ups,' classes, travel, card parties, etc. etc.  Good for body and mind.  I am on my own more than not.  Maybe too much time to think.  I read my Buddhist books and cool my mind with Zen-like focus:  just being.  It is easier for me to achieve than I would have thought.   At this juncture, I am glad to 'be.'  Charles Aznavour sings a wipe-me-out song: I DIDN'T SEE THE TIME GO BY.  We never do.  Because it's a blink.  A shooting star.  When I'm off balance I begin to miss people long gone and people down the street;  I begin to regret and have to play Edith Piaf recordings.  I kick myself for what I did and didn't do.  So to work it out  I connect with my Zen lessons, and center myself.  If that doesn't do the trick, I pour a glass of Cote de Rhone and bake bread.

Happy New Year my dear friends!