Trees, Like Frozen Fireworks… Belated

Perhaps in order to exculpate myself for the rather heavy-handed melodrama of “Free Fall,” I felt required to write a joyous and triumphant account of November in all its glory. I started one but it ended up fizzling into a rambling discourse on winter hibernation and the joys of simplicity. Feeling redundant and aimless I didn’t post it.

But I have been thinking recently about how enjoying the journey is more important than the destination. It’s something Dan has to remind me of all the time. Sometimes it is better to just do something than to achieve perfection, or get stalled along the way because perfection is So Much Work.

So I share this belated slice of my experience:

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Truly the first week of November was exultant: the fall colors that I had worried would not come finally peaked, the world watched the exciting outcome of the presidential election, and I passed the national certification examination, the final hurdle left before I could send in my state massage therapy license application.

Taking the exam was quite a dramatic experience in and of itself: the crying people I passed going into the testing site, the security (I was photographed and electronically fingerprinted repeatedly and could not even bring my own Kleenex into the testing room), the panic when I didn’t know a question, the constant chanting under my breath of, “I just have to pass. I just have to pass,” the adrenaline rush when I electronically submitted my test for scoring, and finally the relief of seeing my passing score and knowing it was all over…

Afterwards, the trees seemed like fireworks frozen at the height of their glory. It was as if the whole world was celebrating with me! And I was jubilant…

But the excitement was as bright and short lived as the fall foliage. With bad economic news pouring in every day, and the unavoidable wait for my application to be processed, it happiness was not to be found in grand, triumphant gestures but in little comforts and domestic projects. In peace and quiet and the first somewhat relaxed holiday season since… Well, I don’t remember the last one actually! It’s probably been since grade school.

There are tradeoffs financially to be sure, but it really is such a joy to put in a few hours at work then work out and still be able to make it home in time for dinner with Dan. After he leaves to teach or perform I have time to adventure in the kitchen, or read a book, or nap, or clean, or talk with friends… There is such a wonderful feeling of luxury, of indulgence, in having time to do just what I want to do. And I find that what I want to do these days is be a bit of a homebody.

I haven’t really described our new house because it’s not quite unpacked enough to post photos yet. It is small and homey. A bedroom filled almost completely by the queen-sized bed. A tiny bathroom. An odd shaped living room with only enough room around the furniture for one person to squeeze by. An office overfull with two desks, two chairs and a futon. A bright little kitchen and a reading nook that is currently full of stuff we are still unpacking. Because of its small scale it feels like an elaborate play house for two big children and I’ve come to think of it as our “fort.” A place where we can retreat from the slings and arrows of the world, snuggle under a blanket on the couch, and enjoy all the glories of the season.

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Since the holidays have passed, I’ve turned my attention from cookie baking to bread baking and have returned to my work getting my massage practice off of the ground. I received my license on December 3rd and am now completely official! Website design and marketing takes up a lot of my time but so do working out, and yoga, and reading, and catching up with friends, and spending time with my better half. We even had a snow day on inauguration day so we all could stay home and watch. It's been at least 5 years since that much snow fell here so it was something like an inauguration day miracle.

So far I’m enjoying the journey of 2009 quite a lot.

Southern Hospitality

There is one thing that I've done in Durham that is undeniably, hands down, no doubt about it better than the same activity in Chicago, and that is the simple act of Voting. I've been twice now and it's just so lovely. The early voting option means that I can vote after work (or even on Saturday or Sunday!!!) instead of getting up Really early to vote and then standing in a long line of annoyed, sleepy, Freezing people that snakes down a depressing back hall in an elementary school and then out into the cold.

It's not just the convenient hours though, or the lack of lines. It's the people and the spirit that is shared there that makes it really special. Even two weeks before the election proper, there are copious volunteers and staff. They smile and usher you from place to place, assist with parking, make any changes necessary to your personal information, answer questions politely and really seem to appreciate you being there. There was even "curbside voting" available this time for people who couldn't get out of their cars easily or navigate the tight quarters between booths.

While I was actually in the voting booth someone loudly announced the presence of a New Voter and everyone in the room applauded! People are more than just polite and happy, they are bubbling over with optimism, and with the sense of being in this together. I come away feeling uplifted and hopeful and proud. Citizenship at its finest, Southern style.

Free Fall

It’s fall. Neither summer, nor winter. Neither completely moved in, nor completely moved out. Neither student, nor professional. A time of change, of reflection, of transition, of being between, of liminality…

The liminal state is characterized by ambiguity, openness, and indeterminacy. One's sense of identity dissolves to some extent, bringing about disorientation. Liminality is a period of transition where normal limits to thought, self-understanding, and behavior are relaxed - a situation which can lead to new perspectives. (Taken from the Wikipedia article on “Liminality.”)

I do indeed feel a bit dissolved and disoriented. And it’s no wonder either: first graduation, then moving, and now trying to start a new career while the economy spins out of control… In the midst of this time of upheaval, I find both comfort and unease in the old adage, “The more things change, the more they stay the same.” (Exhibit A: The Cubbies. Exhibit B: The sadly familiar, Chicago-apartmenty way I am currently sitting in my new home, listening to every word of my upstairs neighbor’s TV show and smelling her smoke wafting down the stairs.)

The ability of the universe to maintain equilibrium in the face of change seems to be especially powerful when it comes to unpacked boxes. No matter how many I unpack and break down there always seems to be a constant number impeding my progress around the apartment. As one yields to my efforts to find places to tuck its contents away, another sneaks up from the garage or out of a closet to take its place. I believe they have evolved the ability to reproduce...

What I’ve been tackling most recently are actually acquisitions from my parents’ attic. Boxes and boxes of college texts and class binders have appeared as if by magic and I find that I must finally cull them most dramatically. Reading these documents I hear ghosts from the past whispering to me of the meagerness of my successes and profundity of my failures. After skimming just a few of them, I already feel an overwhelming need to fall on my knees and say Mea Culpa! for all my grammatical sins. I want to plead forgiveness for never mastering the hyphen and for the hubris of such embarrassing essays from High School as “Malapropisms Happen (Even to Me!).”

Ridiculously bad as the High School writing samples are (and I’m pretty sure that they were kept as examples of the cream of the crop, which makes it worse), I find myself really ashamed as I read over the comments of dear Dr. Poole on my college music history papers and exams. The disappointment drips from notes chastising me over and over again for my inability to make my own analysis and take intellectual risks. “…Do you learn only what I tell you to?” (Well, I was carrying a 21 credit class load… so the answer probably was, “Yes?”)

I’m sure I bridled at such comments at the time, but now I know that she was only trying to give me the tools to be a scholar, tools I never mastered. I want to apologize for not living up to my potential, for playing it safe, for lacking the intellectual curiosity, capacity and fortitude she thought she could manifest in me. I recall her telling me just before I graduated that I had done something in my own “inimitable way.” In hindsight, her tone was a touch sardonic instead of complimentary.

And, oh yes, the more things change… Here I am again, brought as far by my excellent teachers as they could take me, and once again having to take the next steps on my own. Once again facing my inadequacies of courage and imagination. Seeing where I want to be, knowing how far from that I am, and simply unable to envision how I will ever get there. In this liminal place between school and licensure I am afraid. Afraid that even with all of the knowledge I worked so hard to obtain this past year I will be unable to find the spark of insight to apply it. That once again I will fall far short of expectation.

That must not happen! I can choose not to repeat my past mistakes, to be free of my self-imposed limitations. This time I must not fail to cross the threshold, to run the race to the end. This time I must see the stars below me and leap into the abyss anyway, knowing that there is not so much difference between flying and falling, that both will take me to new adventures, new perspectives.

This time I simply must not fail… to become.

In my own inimitable way.

Moving Surprises

I loathe moving! But then so does almost everyone else, making what Dan and I are going through not particularly noteworthy.

I think, however, that reaching over my head last night while packing, grabbing a ceramic serving bowl stored on the kitchen cabinets and finding a Dead Bat inside might be a bit more unusual. And I believe I deserve a Congressional Medal of Honor for not dropping said bowl and smashing it in the process.

I didn't have the nerves required to get a picture though. You will simply have to imagine the poor little furry thing lying there.

The movers come early tomorrow morning!

Pomp and Circumstances

And now it is September 1st and not even my dear sainted mummy is checking this blog for new posts anymore...

But I beg you to believe me when I say that the posts that I have Failed to post since March have been great works of art. The epics of wit and pathos that I have drafted in my mind while driving to and fro between work and school and externship and practice clients would have brought tears of joy and sorrow to the eyes of those with even the hardest of hearts. It's just that I have been a wee bit too swamped to um... actually write them down.

If you've been in contact with me since this last semester began you will probably already be aware of all the papers and tests and externships-Oh my!-that I have been complaining of most heartily for the last several months. About the middle of May I made a list of just the Big deadlines between then and August 2nd. It had 18 things on it! I immediately began to hyperventilate and only began to breath again when they handed me my diploma last Sunday.

Oh yes, I have Gradumatated!!! And although they did fail at graduation to blow trumpets when they called my name, or shower me with accolades, or fall at my feet lauding my surpassing brilliance and general studential excellence the likes of which they have never before seen and can not hope to see again... they did give me a diploma and a transcript with all "P's" (for Pass) on it... Sigh. I think my classmates who whipped off answers to homework assignments 15 minutes before class might have had the right idea after all!

Still, despite a general lack of recognition of my brilliance :) , graduation was a wonderful, bittersweet celebration of the last year and the closing of that chapter of our class's life. There was a lot of heartfelt sobbing involved... My class was very close and it was sad for us to leave as we had been through so much together (births and deaths and Anatomy exams!) and school was a life changing experience for all of us. I learned an enormous amount both about massage but also about myself.

Now (after a couple of tearful days recovering emotionally from being ripped untimely from the womb... so to speak) I am working diligently on the next steps to launching my career. I have a new business e-mail address and have ordered temporary business cards for marketing purposes. I'm mulling over questions about websites and financial software. I have sent off my application for the national certification examination and once I pass that I will be able to apply for state licensure. Once licensed I can actually begin to work professionally (i.e. take money!). Maybe as soon as November!

I promise, Promise to keep you posted this time. Really.

Surprising Lee

I have finally been able to rescue this blog entry from my old computer. I wrote it way back in February just before the poor old thing died so I’m afraid it’s a bit dated... but what the heck:

North Carolina keeps on surprising me in ways that range from the tiny details of flora reproduction to major socioeconomic trends. I'm learning that some things just can’t truly be understood until you’ve been here for a while and experienced them firsthand.

• Magnolias produce pinecone like things with bright scarlet seeds inside and the leaves stay green all winter.


• A dead tobacco factory can completely dominate a whole downtown area.


• There really are people here who won’t vote for Obama because they believe that the “races should be kept separate.”


• It doesn’t really matter anyway because our primary is in MAY! Will there be any candidates left to vote for in May?! (I guess it’s possible at this rate.)


• Nothing can rival the extreme decibel level achieved by a family of Tarheel fans watching a Duke/UNC game. (The stomping, the screaming, the throwing of the hats and the leaving of the room in disgust, the depths of despair and the heights of rapture… It’s a very loud and complicated cathartic ritual.)


• The complete lack of winter...

Chicago folk simply would not believe it. “Balmy” and “February” have come into bizarre juxtaposition in my vocabulary. It feels a little wrong, a little like cheating. I’m Supposed to be more miserable at this time of year. Instead I can count on one hand the number of times that the full length “down comforter” winter coat has come out of the closet. It’s pretty amazing really and a bit scary, although I’ve been assured that this does Not necessarily mean we are headed for the hottest summer ever.

Yesterday (February 18, 2008), I took advantage of the sun and the warmth to go for a trek around the school fields while listening to Barbara Kingsolver’s book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. I’ve been enjoying this book very much for the past month or so as I work out. It’s part tragedy, part comedy, part drama, part self-help and part inspiration. The premise is this: huge, fossil fuel guzzling, environmentally unsound food production and consumption = BAD! Local, environmentally and socially responsible food production = GOOD!

The book is in turns infuriating and hopeful, challenging and exciting. It’s about remembering that creating healthy and sustainable food really should be at the top of our list of priorities, not at the bottom. A few of the things it’s gotten me excited about are: Making your own cheese, canning, freezing local produce (my kingdom for a chest freezer!), baking our own bread (I just pulled a loaf from the oven in fact), and starting a garden. In short, returning to my roots. My family used to do all of these things and brewed our own root beer to boot!

Of course, Dan and I already do some of this. We never purchase off-season tomatoes or ears of corn and we certainly heavily frequent our farmer’s markets in the summer. Last summer we even picked and froze an enormous number of strawberries from a local farm. But there are ways we could do more to take fossil fuels out of our food equation and I am inspired to try a few. Every little bit helps.

So as I was tramping around this beautiful school farm with news of a Huge beef recall ringing in my ears, I finally got to the portion of the book that deals with corporate farming of animals, feed lots and the like. The timing could not have been more appropriate. I was listening to words of warning about the need for inspections and better treatment of animals, for our own protection, just as the crisis was actually at hand.

And this leads me to yet another surprise that North Carolina has to offer: Part of the problem with mass produced livestock is that as farmers trend towards designer breeds we are losing varieties of livestock breeds in alarming numbers, and all the wonderful genetic diversity that goes with them. Many of these new breeds (turkeys for instance) are literally incapable of reproducing naturally. Imagine! Yet there is an organization that is working to preserve heritage breeds of livestock so that we will have access to them should the need arise. It is called The American Livestock Breeds Conservancy and lo and behold… It’s practically in my backyard. It’s located in the little town of Pittsboro North Carolina, just south a bit from Chapel Hill.

Since reading this book it seems that everywhere I look I see references to local foods. A friend of ours was interviewed about the subject recently for a local paper. The universities are bringing local foods into their dining halls in a major way and restaurants are proudly promoting their use of local meat and produce. There is a Durham Food Coop and a farmers market in every nearby town.

I guess it’s time I stop being so surprised about these things and just Enjoy them. It's a gorgeous day. I think I'll walk over to the farmer's market and get me some lovely local greens...

Bare to the Bone

Last weekend was a momentous occasion for Class 51 at BTI.

Not only was it our class's first clinic working with a paying public (clients pay the school a token amount to cover costs), but it also was the first ever such event held at the school. We were breaking new ground, steaming into uncharted territory full speed ahead. I think each and every one of my classmates had at least one minor cardiac infarction at some point during our sessions but we all also really stepped up and it was a very successful event.

My five clients range from the "I'm not so sure about this getting undressed and being touched business" to the "I dare you to try to give me enough pressure... More! More, You Wuss!"

My biggest challenge though came with my second client who was perfectly comfortable and lovely and not demanding at all, BUT... To respect client therapist confidentiality I won't list all of the medical issues on their health history. Suffice it to say that I was under the impression that I was required to have serious advanced training before I would be able to work with at least a Couple of the things I saw there. I freaked... My teacher was totally cool about it. The client was totally cool about it. But I was thinking, "Are you Crazy? You are going to let me touch this person?! I'm not ready for this!!!" They couldn't lie on their stomach so I had to drape them in a side lying position, which I hadn't worked in before, and then completely improvise work on their back as our normal techniques were kind of out the window at that point.

I did my best to be calm and nurturing but I'm pretty sure my voice being two octaves higher and the way I started thrusting pillows here there and everywhere gave me away. I did my best and hoped it was a generally good, or at least not Terrible, experience.

And, of course, after doing the session and sending the client on their way, I thought, "That wasn't So bad..." And thus ends Part One of this story.

Part Two: That very same evening Dan and I got to see a concert by one of my favorite folk singers of all time: Carrie Newcomer. She just happened to be touring for a new album and had a small concert in the area. So exciting! What a perfect way to relax after a hard, though successful, day. So there I was, standing in line, waiting for the concert to start when a playbill was thrust into my hand and I looked up to see... my client from that afternoon. Clearly harried, things not going quite as expected with this concert they had arranged, they were too busy to recognize me but it was quite a moment for me nonetheless.

My day's work was that person's relaxation and vice versa. I had never imagined in that tense, stressful hour working with that client that they could possibly be giving something back to me of equal import. Certainly not that very same day! It was a tremendous lesson about respecting my clients and treating them as people first and foremost, not just seeing the conditions they might have.

I want to do that but I am not always the best at connecting with people. It's work. It's scary. And there is often rejection involved. What a gift then to be in a vocation that is at its very essence about connecting with people, about touching them with openness and kindness and meeting them where they are instead of where we think they should be. I don't have the luxury of hiding. My work challenges me to be the person I want to be.

After all of that internal drama it was still a lovely concert and the last song was one of my favorites. It's about the singer/songwriter life, but sitting there listening to it again, with my new insight about myself and this work that we are doing fresh in my mind, it brought tears to my eyes.

Here I am without a message
Here I stand with empty hands
Just a spirit tired of wandering
Like a stranger in this land

Walking wide eyed through this world
Is the only way I've known
Wrapped in hope and good intentions and
Bare to the bone


There is nothing I won't show you
There is nothing I can hide
I have risked it all and dreamt it all
And seldom questioned why.
You took me in when I was hungry
When my spirit ached and groaned
Laid wide open and defenseless
And bare to the bone


So when I rise I rise in glory
If I do I do by grace
Time will wash away these footprints
And we'll leave without a trace
Between here and now and forever
Is such precious little time
What we do in love and kindness
Is all we'll ever leave behind


When my eyes are slowly fading
When the light is softly waning
When the evening sun is setting
And the world is barely breathing
It is then your voice can call me
And your hand will lead me home
Like a newborn awed and naked
And bare to the bone


When I rise I rise in glory
If I do I do by grace
Time will wash away these footprints
And we'll leave without a trace
Between here, now and forever
Is such precious little time
And what we do in love and kindness
Is all we ever leave behind


Here I stand without a message
Here I am with empty hands
Just a spirit tired of wandering
Like a stranger in this land
Walking wide eyed through this world
Is the only way I've known
Wrapped in hope and good intentions and
Bare to the Bone