I Guess I'm Not a Killer Queen

For some reason, I've had songs from Queen running through my mind for the last week or so. One line in particular, from Killer Queen: "To avoid complications, she never kept the same address..." There was a time when I might have understood the logic, but these days, I find it very complicated to use different addresses.

Ever since I took up the nomadic lifestyle in 2004, I've been juggling addresses. I was rarely in one place for more than six months, so it didn't make sense to keep an apartment. But I had to have an address. Over the years, I've used three addresses in Ohio, two in Arizona, and one in New Mexico. I could have used a mailing service, but I get so little mail it wasn't worth paying for it.

In my travels I've learned that you can't get a post office box unless you have a local physical address (if you have a physical address, why would you need a P.O. box?). And you can't even get a library card without proof of residency, such as a rent receipt or a utility bill (I never had any kind of proof like that). So it has been frustrating.

I bumped up against the complications the other day when I prepared my tax return. In the last couple of years, I've tried to consolidate everything to one address -- Mom's. But as I gathered my forms, I realized I'd missed something. One of my W-2s still had my sister's address, and that's the address I used to file last year. What address do I use to file this year? Here's the thing: the school district where Mom lives has a school income tax. I don't want to pay it, but that address is on most of my accounts and such. I don't actually live either of those places! And I can't use the address where I'm currently staying.

Now, looking ahead. This spring I'll be going to stay with my daughter in California. Yes, another address. Except that it would cost several hundred dollars to transfer car registration and get plates and a new driver's license. So I don't want to become a resident. I'll have to keep an Ohio address and just be in California temporarily.

I like being able to move around when I feel like it, but I'm really getting tired of this aspect. For me, not keeping the same address has certainly NOT avoided complications.

How Blogging Can Help Cancer Patients Clarify Goals

Today, a guest post by Melanie Bowen:

How Blogging Can Help Cancer Patients Clarify Goals

When most people think of a cancer center, they think about surgery, chemotherapy and radiation treatments. The University of Pennsylvania's Abramson Cancer Center and Pennsylvania Hospital in Center City offer all of those things, plus they offer workshops on writing. These cancer centers cite a 2007 study in “The Oncologist” showing that patients who write for 20 minutes per day feel measurably better.

A public/private journal in the form of a blog can help provide a support group, enabling family and friends to participate in the patients journey. A blog can also help patients to clarify goals or even write down and maintain a bucket list that they want to accomplish in life. Quality of life is a very important aspect and its never to late to start doing what you’ve always wanted to do little by little.

Psychologists warn patients to be careful about how they approach their goals, desires and lists. One type of goal-setting, known as conditional goal-setting (CGS), can actually contribute to depression, especially in someone diagnosed with a serious illness. With CGS, one’s happiness is conditional upon attaining certain goals. Sharon set high goals early in life, and by age 50, she had a lucrative career, a successful husband, a beautiful daughter and a large, luxurious home. Then it all fell apart. First, her daughter became addicted to drugs, which led to an expensive rehabilitation center. Then her husband’s business began to fail. As the final blow, she was diagnosed with stage IV bladder cancer, which had metastasized to her lungs, and given a doubtful prognosis. She was eventually forced to retire. Money was tight, and the family began looking at smaller houses. Had she been a conditional goal-setter, she would have become seriously depressed.

Instead, she looked at what was right with her life: a close-knit family, supportive friends and her faith. She began writing about her insights in a patient-support blog. In doing so, she discovered a new goal when people began telling her how her blog had changed their lives. She began taking speaking engagements to share her story and soon realized that writing a book was the top dream on her bucket list. She began being proactive about her life, kept up with regular treatments, did things on her own to improve her treatments and sought out advice from others in similar situations to her own. Life has it’s obstacles, but that doesn’t suggest we stop--it only suggest we push harder and keep going!

A bucket list can also involve fitness and nutrition as well which can serve as motivation for wellness. However, to keep it from becoming just another broken resolution, patients should think about what activities bring them joy--how to turn fitness from being a task to fitness being fun. Take a walk and enjoy the scenery close to home, meet new neighbors and also write about your experiences. A small jog can lead you gradually working up to longer distances--and that analogy stand for any goals you set.

Do the things that really matter in life, and then catalog them as achievements! Inspire yourself.

Exercising For Emotional, As Well As Physical, Fitness

One of the areas where I've needed to get unstuck is physical fitness. The frustration, depression, and apathy of the past six months or so have immobilized me. As a result, I've put on enough weight to make all of my clothes uncomfortable, and my joints hurt. This is not who I am! I've always been fairly active and athletic, and being sedentary like I've been depresses me even more.


My first step in getting back in shape was to read (again) Younger Next Year For Women. It's a fun book to read, and it inspires me. Along with all the physical, anti-aging reasons for being active, they say, "Exercise and mood share the same chemistry." So if I exercise, I can get fit both physically and emotionally. I'm ready. Starting now, I'm committed to regular exercise.

I actually started last week. It's winter, and I hate the cold, so I decided I could just go up and down the back stairs. There's 20 steps, and it's a good workout. Of course, I forgot I'm 52 years old, and I overdid it. My knees didn't like me the next day. So I took the rest of the week off to regroup. I'm so out of shape that I'll have to work out to get ready to start working out.

This week I started over. I'm making myself go outside and walk so I can build up some muscle and joint strength before I do anything more strenuous. One of my excuses (besides the cold) was that I don't have time. But I realized that I leave work around 4 or 4:30, and it'a only a five-minute walk home. That means I get home too early to start dinner, but with not enough time to start into anything else. Why not take the long route home? I did that a couple days and it worked fine.

The weekends are harder, because I don't have to go outside to go to work. I want to stay in where it's warm. But I went out. Today was the first really cold day, and the first day of walking on snowy sidewalks. It was cold, and there was some wind that blew right through my coat. So what?! Embrace the cold! Put on a hat and gloves, for heaven's sake! I did, pretending I was out hiking on the Appalachian Trail, remembering how it was out there, where no cold would deter me from my goal.

It was a little hard to keep up a good pace with the slippery snow on the sidewalks. Having been reminded that I'm over 50 and not as resilient as I once was, I felt vulnerable. I know that I'm at an age when osteoporosis begins to be a concern and when wrenched joints and pulled muscles don't heal very fast. I'm more afraid of falling than I've ever been.

I don't like having to be so cautious -- it makes me feel old -- but I believe it will actually be to my advantage. Normally, when I'm out to walk for exercise, I really stretch out, and my back tends to arch. In that position, it seems to me that a slip or fall would be more likely to damage my back or hips. Today in the snow, I took special care to keep my pelvis lined up below my spine, keeping slight muscle tension throughout the entire walk. Somewhat of a Pilates approach, I guess. As a result, I felt more secure, and I could even feel my thigh and butt muscles engaging and working. It's got to help the abs, too.

I'm going to keep at this routine for now. Maybe in a few weeks I'll add the stair climbing. By summer I should be ready to get back on that bicycle. I can't wait!

The Obligatory New Year's Blog Entry

Everyone seems to do a New Year's blog entry. I hadn't thought specifically about it, but today I felt like writing, so here's mine.

Overall, 2011 wasn't the best year for me. Without going into details, I'll just say that I suffered some setbacks emotionally, spiritually, physically, and financially. The end of the year found me battling depression and anxiety, lacking in confidence and at a loss as to what to do next. I had one definite plan for a relocation in the spring of the new year, but even that was fraught with anxiety. I knew what I was going to do, but the how had me running in circles. That wasn't like me at all; the confidence in my own ability to handle any situation that arose had evaporated. That fed my depression and anxiety, leading into a downward spiral.

I was like an old vinyl record with a flaw in one of the grooves. You know how the needle would sometimes get stuck in a spot, just repeating the same rotation over and over...vvvt-bp, vvvt-bp, vvvt-bp...until you gave it a little nudge? That was me. I kept going over and over the same questions, thinking about the same obstacles, not liking any of the answers, and not advancing.

Finally, in the last week of the year, I gave up. I chose one of the answers, decided it would just have to be that way, and allowed myself to feel the resulting sadness. Next day I visited with an "out-of-the-box-thinking" friend who listened to my concerns and suggested various solutions. As I resisted every suggestion, I realized that my lack of confidence had resulted in a need to control every aspect of my situation, which led to anxiety and a lack of adaptability...which fed the lack of confidence.

It didn't happen right away -- just like if you were engrossed in something, you didn't recognize right away that your vinyl record was stuck -- but that realization was like the nudge I needed to unstick my needle. Over the next day or so, I found myself letting go of my need for the "perfect" solution and remembering that whatever happened, I'd handle it. The trick was to make a decision, to nudge that needle out of the flawed groove by doing something.

So I am starting the new year in a better frame of mind. I still have a long way to go to recover the inner peace I enjoyed a year ago, but I know if I just keep going in circles, I'll never hear the end of the song. All I have to do is put my needle in the groove and play one track at a time...and if it gets stuck, give it a nudge.

Photo: Thomas

Of Past Cats

I wrote this essay in 2001, but it was recently brought to mind once again and I decided it needed to come out of the mothballs:

As night thins into morning, I feel the familiar warmth of Lenny beside me. With my eyes still shut, I roll onto my side to curl my body around his, slipping my arm over him and pulling him close to me.

Lenny was the cat I hadn't wanted, but who had come into my life anyway and stolen my heart. My daughter already had a cat, and one cat in the house was enough. But despite my wishes, my son brought a kitten home from the dairy farm where he worked. What could I do? I couldn't send him back where I knew survival would be a struggle for him. So he stayed. He was a slight kitten with oversized ears and yellow eyes. His gray tabby coat was silky, with a furry undercoat of buff. His kitten ways soon won me over, and he became one of the family.

Lenny became the family clown, and he brought such joy and laughter to our home with his crazy antics. He chased a ping-pong ball around the house, bouncing it down the basement stairs and then carrying it back up in his mouth. He stalked and attacked his stuffed animal toy, standing on it with his front feet while his back feet stomped it into submission. He loved catnip, and would leap high off the floor to grab the box from someone's hand. Often he would stretch out on his side and pull himself across the floor by hooking his claws in the carpet.

The older cat did not appreciate this rambunctious young interloper. With a look of disdain, he ran whenever Lenny came near. If contact couldn’t be avoided, he knocked the youngster down with a swipe of his paw. Undaunted by a cat three times his size, Lenny continued to torment the older cat until Smucker, too, became young again and agreed to play. The two of them would race through the house, sounding like a thundering herd of horses. The mad dash would end in a tumbling ball of fur, from which they each emerged to stare at each other in mock hate. Ears flattened and tails twitching, they bared teeth and exchanged glares. Then one would attack the other, rolling and wrestling on the floor until one made a break, and they raced through the house once more.

When my son left for the army, Lenny became my constant companion. He slept on my lap while I worked at the computer, sometimes waking to reach for the keyboard. He had a special spot on the kitchen stool, where he would sit and watch while I cooked or washed dishes. He followed me from room to room, from basement to attic, never underfoot but always nearby. I could always count on him to race past me on the way down the steps, leaping onto the post at the bottom and taking a swipe at me as I walked by. If I left the room while he was sleeping, he would awaken and meow plaintively until he found me. At night he slept curled in the hollow of my side. Often I would open my eyes in the morning to find him stretched out beside me, gazing at me with love in his golden eyes. When he saw that I was awake, he'd stretch out his paw and gently touch my cheek.

I missed Lenny terribly when I was away on an extended trip this summer, just as I missed my children. And it was while I was away that Lenny became ill and died. The heartache, combined with the homesickness that I already battled, was almost more than I could bear. My little Lenny was gone. Never again would I hear his plaintive meow or feel his silky fur against my face. Never again would his warm little body snuggle next to mine on a cold winter night. He was gone, and for the last few months of his life I'd been away.

I didn't want to get another cat. None could replace Lenny. But once again, against my wishes, a kitten came to live in my house. This time it was a calico stray rescued by my daughter. Noodle was firmly entrenched in the household routine before I even returned home from my trip.

As the first tentative rays of the morning sun slip past my bedroom curtains, I blink the sleep from my eyes and reach to give Lenny a good morning scratch. But, of course, it isn't Lenny. It's Noodle's sweet kitten face that gazes adoringly at me with pumpkin-colored eyes. No, she'll never replace Lenny, but as the new day comes alive, I look deep into Noodle's eyes, and she stretches out a paw to gently touch my cheek.

(All My Cats)

I'm Somebody!

Yes, I'm somebody. I know it's true because of something I did yesterday. You know how you'll hear people say, "Somebody should fix that." "Somebody should clean that up." "Somebody should make some changes." "Somebody should DO something." Perhaps you've even said or thought it yourself. I know I have.

Well, yesterday I was out bicycling when I came upon a broken branch lying halfway across the road. It wasn't a busy road. Anyone could stop and move it with little worry of getting hit. It wasn't in my way. I could easily avoid it on my bike. I rarely even drive that way. That branch in the road would never affect me at all. I started musing, "Somebody's going to have to move that." And then I stopped. And I moved it.

It was a lot easier for me to step off my bicycle to move that branch than it would have been for someone to stop a car and climb out to do it. There's no way to know what may have happened if I hadn't stopped. Maybe someone would have hit the branch and broken something under their car. Maybe a piece of branch would have flown into the nearby yard and hit a kid upside the head. Maybe nothing would have happened at all.

Someone else would have eventually cleared the road. It wasn't my responsibility. Or was it? In What Color Is Your Parachute? Richard Bolles writes:

The Spectacle Which Makes Angels Laugh: So many times you will see people wringing their hands, and saying, "I want to know what my Mission in life is," all the while they are cutting people off on the highway, refusing to give time to people, punishing their mate for having hurt their feelings, and lying about what they did. And it will seem to you that the angels must laugh to see this spectacle. For these people wringing their hands, their Mission was right there, on the freeway, in the interruption, in the hurt, and at the confrontation.

It is our responsibility -- all of us -- to look beyond ourselves and consider the greater good. It is our mission to do whatever we see needs done, whenever we see it. Right away, before we forget and before it's too late. If each of us made the effort to take care of the little things as we go about our daily lives, the whole world would run much smoother.

If you think you just can't spare the few minutes it might take to make something right, never mind. Somebody will do it. But later when you look in the mirror, remember that YOU are somebody. Just like me.

Why Slow Travel?

I like to travel slow. To some people, that means going by car or bus instead of flying. But I prefer to go even slower. My favorite ways to travel are by bicycle or on foot (horseback would be good, too). Some would guess the reasons I enjoy those means of travel have something to do with physical activity, or challenge, or just being outdoors, and they'd be right. But there's something more -- something you don't necessarily recognize if you only ever travel in a vehicle. Robert Pirsig describes it in Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance:

"In a car you're always in a compartment, and because you're used to it you don't realize that through that car window everything you see is just more TV. You're a passive observer and it is all moving by you boringly in a frame."

Given my druthers, I don't even like to watch TV much, so it's no surprise that I'd prefer to remove that frame in my travels. Pirsig goes on to say that when you travel without the protective shell of a vehicle around you, "You're completely in contact with it all. You're in the scene, not just watching it anymore, and the sense of presence is overwhelming."

I can remember times during my hiking and bicycling when I looked around and consciously thought,"I'm not just looking at the scenery, I'm part of it." Most often it happens when I'm halfway up a mountain and see nothing but mountains all around me. Or in the middle of flat, treeless Montana where there's nothing between me and the horizon to break up the miles. In the face of such vastness I feel a humbling insignificance.

Perhaps we all need more of that perspective, to get out of the box and back in touch with what's real. Let's get over our own sense of self-importance. Slow travel helps us remember just how small we are here on our earth. And when you realize you're a mere speck in a much larger environment, you tend to give that environment its due respect.