Beyond Broken

Self Exploration

Invisibility

When we get older we often suffer from a kind of invisibility.  Heads do not turn when we walk in a room, even though we may be wearing our new spring clothes.  Sometimes in the locker room at the gym young women have conversations around me as if I am not there at all.

This all seems to come with the territory of getting older and although I have noticed, it has not troubled me much.

Then came a new set of experiences that brought on a whole new level of invisibility.

We decided to sell our large, long-time home and downsize to the condo of our dreams.  Yes, we had to act fast, and fortunately a family member had told us for years “If you ever decide to sell your house I would really like to buy it.”  So we asked her how serious she was and within a month’s time our house was sold and our condo bought.  We arranged to rent the house back for four months while we reasonably prepared to move and renovated the condo.  Four months sounded like a long enough time for the transition but it was not enough physically or psychologically.  We built our home forty years ago and it was an embodiment of us. We underestimated the whole process. We felt overwhelmed and numb.

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Grandpa was a boxer

 With my grandparents in 1968

My grandfather was a professional boxer and a Featherweight Champion in Washington D.C. in the 1920’s when boxing was illegal.

“BOXING IN WASHINGTON WAS ILLEGAL UNTIL THE LATE 1930s, but it was conducted nevertheless on a floating crap-game basis, with arenas popping up here and there” writes Shirley Povich the famous sports writer for The Washington Post at the time. It is in this backdrop of thugs and gambling and organized crime that my grandmother married my grandfather in 1926, making him promise to leave the ring. My mother was born two years later.

My grandparents were Jewish, and Jews at that time experienced a lot of discrimination. This was true in boxing as in all sports, so my grandfather changed his name from Isadore Goldstein to Goldie Ahearn. This new persona identified him as Irish — a more acceptable minority in sports. As the story goes, one of the first times he stepped into a ring paired with another ‘Irishman’, it did not take long for them to discover they were both Jewish and had both garnered Irish names.

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I Was Watching the Clouds – Reflections for Mother’s Day

I was watching the clouds this morning lying on a dock hearing the gentle waves wash over the rocks below.  Occasionally, the dock would rock, creek or moan from the motion.  The clouds were not moving as I watched them but if I looked away and then back they had moved apart and reconfigured.  This happened over and over again.  This apparent non-movement which is actually very dynamic.

I think about this as I begin to unwind from the huge project I undertook to recreate a Wellness Weekend for women here on the shore.  The configurations of so many moving parts that came together and then dissipated into what will be next.  A new configuration like the clouds.

I know I won’t be a leader of this again.  I am not sure if I will have a role in it at all.  I am a cloud looking for my next cluster yet also not moving and in continuous motion all at once.

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Relationships Can Be So Puzzling


How many of us have come away from an interaction with a friend or relative and thought – wow that was unsatisfying!

It is often puzzling as this drawing suggests — what did I bring to the interaction — what did they bring?  What happened?

I had such an experience last week with a dear friend and colleague.  It was so inspiring to unravel what happened and feel the regret for my part.

Brene Brown defines connection from her research as:

“Connection is the energy that exists between people when they feel seen, heard and valued; when they can give and receive without judgement; and when they derive sustenance and strength from the relationship.”

I retraced my steps with my friend.  I am deep into the study of ‘near enemies’ of connection and compassion.  They are these tricky/masquerading moments when we make a comment or add something to the conversation that looks like a kind, responsive contribution but actually stops the connection cold.

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When the weather moves

I get very excited when I watch a weather system move in across the sky.  Here on the Bay I watched one the other day.  It was bright and sunny on one end of the beach and ominous black clouds build up on the other end, moving across the sky towards me.  I felt energized and excited.  I remember a time sitting at a winery with my then five-year-old grandson. He is drinking “the best lemonade he ever had,” and I am drinking a glass of Chardonnay and we are both equally excited watching the weather move in across the mountains.  It looks dramatic and in minutes we are forced inside by the gale.

Why does this simple movement of weather invigorate me so?  I sit with this question as I watch the storm begin to scatter rain around me.  And the answer is simple.  It is a rare and wonderful privilege to witness cause and effect.  So often we wake up in the morning and experience the weather we are having.  We are ‘in’ the weather but we did not see the weather in the making….

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