Trumped

Earlier this year there was a change in political hands I was reading the news at every turn. I already was awake suffering from anxiety from everything I had to do for my family (dad's estate, mom's situation, my brother's situation, my kids situation, and wait...I guess MY situation) so what else should I do?

So I would blast Apple music (which is AWESOME btw....) and have the news on in the background, read news on the internet...whatever news "fake or real"...I guess i was getting my dose. I hadn't started this blog so I didn't have an outlet anywhere else after going on Facebook and making myself hungry with the recipe ideas....but I digress.

When I think of the President of the United States I think that is one of the hardest, one of the most amazing, but one of the most thankless jobs in the world. You are privy to political and world secrets that you usually aren't able to share with anyone else except those in power. You are privy to knowing and being briefed on some good but mostly terrible things in the world...and you have to make decisions for everyone else and there is no chance in hell that everyone is going to be happy. And those decisions have financial repercussions and affect the lives of billions of people...domestically and GLOBALLY!!! No pressure right?

But, SOMEONE has to do it. No country can be leaderless.

So when someone steps up to this indescribable plate of responsibility as a citizen I hope and pray that, like a good parent, that they will do their job and do the best they can for everyone in their family. 

We look to our parents for direction in life....we ideally should be able to look up to them as examples of what we'd like to be. When I looked at the Obama family, that is how I felt. You're handed a plate - a mixture of great things and also a mess and agendas from decades and histories past and asked to clean it up. And you do it the best you can and with a smile.

When I think of our current political situation I am baffled. I had hoped that our lives would be better and that we would look to our president as a symbol of who we look up to, who we want to be, who we look to for guidance and hope in a world is failing in so many ways. War, poverty, unnecessary hatred and brutality (to name just a sad few), brainwashing, mutilation of women...a never-ending list.... I don't feel this is the case

I feel that when I look upon my life and my legacy...I would want my actions to be as honorable as possible. Could I and do I have regrets of specific actions...of course.. I am human. But I hope that when I look back on my life, on my decisions and choices that it won't be about being right or wrong. But I hope that I will have acted the best I could with the information I had at the time, with the knowledge and basis of my experiences and ethics, and with not only myself but others in my consideration.

#Home

I was cleaning out one of my dad's homes yesterday and started to think about "HOME". What is your happy place? Is it a physical space? A mental space? Where do you go when you need to rejuvenate your soul and your heart?

Most people think of that place as where you go to at night, sleep everyday, and ultimately where your family is, where they reside...a roof over your head.

But as I think about it, "HOME" is often more of a FEELING, not a physical place. Ideally when I leave work I want to go home. Home is where my girls are, where my husband is, where I have created a space that I love (love/hate depending on how much work there is in it to do sometimes). But its where I feel at ease and happy and relaxed. It's what I work so hard for. It's where I want to curl up with a blanket and relax. Once I experience empty nest (when is this again....hopefully a long time from now)... I want my girls to be able to come - to come "home"...and to them to think of "home" as wherever I am or wherever my husband is.

But the sad part of mortality is that one day I won't be here and neither will my husband and my two daughters (both ages 2 and almost 5) will have to recreate their own "homes". Isn't that the rub?

So where do I go now?  Where is my "Home?" It shifts now and then, from the inside of my four door sedan or our SUV for a few hours at a time when I drive back and forth taking care of the multiple needs of our family...or it shifts to my "work home" where I actually spend more time away from my family than I want but take care of dental needs of others day in and day out. I always come back "home" to my husband and my girls. Home plate...home base...same difference.

I still feel like when I am with my mom I am home. I have sadly had and continue to have a complex relationship with my mom. I have struggled with the relationship with my mom for decades...perhaps it started in infancy. While there are things that I would definitely NOT mimic I have actually adopted many of the things she taught me in how I raise my girls. High standards, a mix of both discipline and love and presence. Where my mom lives and when I visit her I feel at "home"...like I did when I grew up and can easily fall back into the role of a child trying to please her parents.

But as I contemplate mortality again and contemplate HOME I realize that I actually removed myself from my mom's physical space for over 5 years  - a few months before my wedding in 2011 was the last time I spoke to her until my father's death in 2016. In that time I got married (to a man my mother didn't like for God knows what reason), got pregnant, had my first daughter....got pregnant again, and had my second daughter...I realize that my current "home" base and my own life and "home" was created without my mother being present for any of it. 

If I wanted a pity party for myself then I could hear myself even say to me "Damn, that is super sad." and would I want my girls to do this, the answer would be HELL NO. But this is my reality and the pragmatic part of me says...just suck it up and deal with it. As the saying goes "It is, what it is."

I buried my dad today. Now that my dad is gone I ask myself - was dad "home" for me as well. In some ways I realize that knowing that he was always there was a great comfort to me...and therefore a possible "home". But the funny thing about my dad was that he had multiple physical "homes" of his own, but I don't know his "home" was...or where is "heart" really was. The relationship that he had with my my mom was not great...to say the least...and while he loved her in his own way...I wouldn't say that when he was with my mom that was what he considered home.

It is sad to say that I feel that my dad's home was in solitude. That he was happiest when he was alone and doing his own thing. I feel sad because I had hoped that his own children, his son and daughter would provide a "home" for him...seeing his grand-daughter's grow up...having his own home base. But if I reach into my soul and answer truthfully I think being alone was truly his "home". After he lost his own parents perhaps he was lost too. And usually you hope you have a partner in life to go through it, who you have created your own home with, that will prevent you from missing the home your parents hopefully created.

Personally...To me... home shouldn't be lonely...it should be noisy and crazy and have people coming in and out of it...with food flowing and a mixture of silliness and crying and laughing.... a haven of sorts when the entire world has slapped you in the face and you have nowhere else to go...it welcomes you in and you take from it what you need so that you can go back into the world again guns blazing. But I know that for many this isn't the case...hell it isn't the case for me either...but I will try and create this ideal world for my kids as long as I am alive.

"Home is where the heart is."

Survivorism

I decided to start this blog today.

I need an outlet to share myself and gather my thoughts and put things in perspective. Therapy is also extremely expensive and while I am sure I will one day need to reach out and pay someone to listen to me understand my life, this seems a little easier. I am listening to Sheryl Sandburg's "Option B" and it was poignant for me that at one point she said that it is important to write in a journal to help go through any difficult process. I thankfully type faster than I write and by end of day my penmanship looks unrecognizable. So starts my journal.

I am tired of sharing some things with my friends as they have their own lives. I can't share everything with work colleagues or patients - it isn't deemed professional and I hear that you aren't supposed to @#$% where you eat...or in this case...work....and I hardly think that my 2 year old and my almost 5 year old daughter would be interested - let alone what kind of therapy they would need for years to come after. And my thankfully supportive husband doesn't want to hear a broken record day in and day out. So that leaves me here. 

I am burying my father's ashes tomorrow. He passed away earlier last year and it has been hell for me since. He is survived by me and my mother and my brother, neither who wanted his ashes. Personally I think that there is something pretty wrong and shitty about that but I hear that people grieve differently. I have kept him in a box in my garage since receiving his remains, a box of cold meaningless ash that is nothing of the man that I remember in my head and in my heart.

He was a complicated and accomplished man - and like everyone in life...you win some, you lose some. I hope that when he is looking down on me from heaven or wherever he might be in the spiritual world that he feels that his daughter was one of his wins.

Since the loss of my father I have contemplated many things... I have learned a lot and realize that ignorance truly is bliss when it comes to death, taxes, and that the hype of growing up was over-rated. My daughters have it pretty good I have to say. Over the past year of my dad passing I had a few amazing yet fleeting highs but I have had many many emotional lows and I sadly see more in my foreseeable future. I am so grateful to have my own daughters and my supportive husband. And through the shit and the emotional baggage I realize that I practice daily...not yoga...not meditation...but my current motto of "survivorism." At this moment in my life it's the only way I know how to live....survive.