A Glamour DON'T

"Hey, that is me!"  I squeal, surprised to see myself in the pages of a magazine.  The photo is of me at a street fair in my long skirt covered with batik prints from Indonesia.  It is patchwork, but sophisticatedly pieced. The earrings I am wearing are the antique Afghanistan ones and my necklace sports a Tuareg medallion I had found in a store in Woodstock.  My black cami contrasts nicely with my Mexican embroidered scarf and jean jacket.  My 'Goddess figure' is exceptionally flattered by the photographer's choice of angle.  The only thing amiss is the black rectangle box over my eyes; not kinky, just added in some version of photoshop to save the magazine from getting my consent.

Then I saw the caption: "DON'T.  The sixties  wants their stuff back"

Noooooooooooooo........

For those of you who do not peruse Glamour magazine, the end page is typically a series of photos of women wearing a particular kind of style. Half the women and their garb are dubbed 'Do''; the other half are dubbed 'Don't'.  A page might show how women are wearing animal prints or pencil skirts or fur.  Celebrities tend to be the 'Dos' .  Unsuspecting women on the street are 'Don'ts', with only their eyes photoshopped out to 'protect' their identity.  After all, the Glamour editors need to sleep at night without any guilt.

I wasn't really on the Glamour end page, but I certainly could be.  I dress 'different '.  I live in long skirts and treasure the intricacy of ethnic handiwork; embroidery, batik,  Thai and Indonesia silver.  I appreciate the beauty of the 'not so polished, not so perfect'.  Perhaps I find comfort in garbing myself in something that reflects my nature. Or maybe I just want attention (as I have been accused); but looking different is a way I stay true to myself.  I do not follow a trend. I do not blend in.  I will not be what some magazine editor has the audacity to dictate.

Do I occasionally  hear giggles as I walk by? Sure.  Do I also receive compliments? Absolutely.  Do they matter?  No. I dress for me. I dress for me alone.

The sixties want their stuff back?  No way. This stuff is mine now.

Imperfection: The Full Harvest Moon

I am imperfect. I've discussed this in the last two blogs.  I am imperfect inside and outside.  Like most of us, I fall prey to negativity. I cling.  The Buddhist likes to point this out when he sees it.  I sometimes find it annoying because he clings too, just to different things; but overall, I appreciate that he and I can constructively suggest improvement.  I want to improve, I truly do.

The key to this always seems to circle around self love. I have made huge strides here, but I am still holding back, ready to find the imperfection.  The trap is that I will always be imperfect.  That is the nature of being human.  The real challenge, the real work is to learn to love imperfection.  And when I succeed and find joy in the mirror, in my heart, I will find joy in your imperfection too.

And the world will suddenly be brilliant in its beauty...
like the Harvest Moon...
bathing me in light...

Mirror Mirror: The Full Harvest Moon

"Mirror mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?" I ask.

I stand before the mirror; it's rather plain, no gilding or fancy frame like the fairy tale.  No magic entity appears, no portal to a beautiful step daughter.  Instead a fifty one year old woman stares back. She blinks.  She turns her head from side to side.  She moves in close.  She retreats. She sighs.

"I look my age" I say dejectedly to the mirror. Mirror woman sighs in response.

Why is this such a failure?  Why has it come to this clinging to youth?  Why is looking the age my body has lived perceived as a fault? And what a small window this age reflection requests.  Definitely can't look over your age. So, the best you hope for is a few years younger.  I am fifty one.  Can I really expect to look forty? Forty five? Forty seven?

And as we all strive and cling to the glimmer of youth, are we not just resetting the bar higher and higher with each passing decade?  Just by dental hygiene advances alone, we look much younger than our equal aged grandparents, many of whom had dentures.  Not to mention the advances in skin care and hair restoration. We are younger than ever before at age fifty one. 

NO! we are STILL FIFTY ONE.  Not younger...just packaged to look fresher from the outside. Like adding blood to aged meat at the butcher counter to give it a fresh red appearance, we equally deceive our eyes and tell our souls lies.  Yet, no matter the exterior, we remain our age.  Is that what is so frightening? That we are in fact aging?

We buy organic foods, demand natural ingredients, but disallow ourselves the natural process of aging. It isn't a disease, it is a process. Would we tell the autumn leaves not to color? Not to fall?  Isn't there beauty in those crinkly orange leaves?

The mirror woman stares back at me then breaks into a smile.

A Call for Redemption: The Full Harvest Moon

I know a woman. She lives too much in her own head. She hears slights and condemnations where none exist.  She feels maligned and misunderstood.  She tries to speak, but her words fall short of her intentions. She tries to hear, but her ears only allow the negative to resonate.  Her eyes could see the stars, but too often, she stares at the dull bare ground.  She suffers.

She counts the misfortunes of her life as a testament to why she is the way she is.  She defends her action. She defends her inaction.  It isn't her, you see, it is the past that made her this way.  It is what happened. 

I tell her that although she cannot change what happened, she can change how she reacts to it. I tell her that she can manifest a new beginning where she is her best self. I implore her to look up at the stars.  

Instead, she mires herself in jealousy; coveting what others have.  She clings to what could be, what might be. She wants her moment. Her Disney Moment. Her pina colada and lei from Ricardo Montalban on Fantasy Island. The fifteen minutes of fame Andy Warhol insisted would be hers. Glory and Redemption. Her GLORY. Hers. Hers. Hers.

So, she spends her hours daydreaming about how it could be. How it might be. But action is so hard. So scary. Out of her reach...easier to not try.  Safer to stay still.

I implore her to change; because frankly being around her is a bore.  She forgets how fortunate she is. She complains and she whines...and so, she pushes me away.  How can I love her?  She is so pathetic.

But her redemption matters to me.  And to my last dying breath I will be striving to change her, because this woman is me.

Let Them Eat Cake! The New Harvest Moon

I surfed the internet this morning, looking for whether Marie Antoinette actually declared those title words ever so long ago.  The general scholarly gist was no, she did not.  The words were propaganda used against her and other nobles of the time. Rabble rousing rubbish.  If the poor have no bread, then let them eat cake!

When I was a child, I heard those words and thought Marie Antoinette to be rather generous. I pictured a Disney princess with a beehive hairdo handing out pretty pink pieces of birthday cake to all her subjects.  I took it literally; let them eat cake.  As my life was thrift stores and Salvation Army cast offs, I rarely got cake or ice cream.  A big treat in the house was strawberries and milk or a spoonful of honey.  So, my Grimm Brothers and Hans Christian Andersen fueled imagination had a cliche story plot involving my transformation into an elegant princess just as I was handed my pretty pink slice of cake. But just me. Not my sister. No. She stayed poor. Everyone knows that the older sister always gets what she deserves for cutting your Barbie's hair off.

Now, forty four years later, I am slightly less ready to pass judgement; but I am still waiting for cake. When is it my turn to have the tasty treat? 

Oddly, it hadn't occurred to me that I am now the noble. I don't feel like a princess. I certainly don't look like a princess. Yet, if I was honest, my loving Buddhist treats me like one.  Maybe he sees an elegance that I don't. Yet, the fact remains that I am fortunate. I have a nice life in a nice house in a nice town.  Fortunate. Lucky.  Yes, we worked hard and did smart things; but we also did incredibly stupid things. I'm sticking with Lucky.

Today is the new Harvest Moon, a moon that I am always fond of as it conjures the image of Thanksgiving with a large cornucopia of beautiful firm vegetables. Bounty. Abundance. And like dominoes in my mind, I eventually find myself feeling gratitude.  But gratitude is a hollow comfort for those without bread.

May this moon, move me to generosity.  Let them eat. Period. Let them eat.

Dust and Keepsakes; Home

The Buddhist isn't driving like one.  He is cutting in and out of lanes at a speed that keeps my jaw clenched shut.  I asked him once if he would define himself as an aggressive driver; his answer surprised me for its honesty.  "Yes", he said, "but defensive too..."

We are on the Henry Hudson Parkway, headed south bound, headed home.  The George Washington Bridge reflects in the Hudson like a crystal palace and The Buddhist and I discuss why the towers are illuminated as neither of us has seen this before.  The open steel work is impressive and stunning in the floodlight and I am wide eyed as we enter the bridge.  

The Hudson crossed, we both relax ever so slightly.  The Henry Hudson Parkway is a four lane roller coaster of a highway with high speed and sudden stops.  While The Buddhist is correct that this route is faster, I prefer the Tappan Zee Bridge and the relative predictability of Route 287.  The Buddhist knows that if I am driving this leg of the trip, we are taking the long way home; hence, I am never driving in this leg of the trip.  The Buddhist loves peace...and efficiency.  In truth, I am just as thankful;  I just want to get home.

Home.  Not where the heart is, because my heart is splintered and fragmented; many people carry it around with them, unseen and unburdening. It resides with the Buddhist, and with my daughter too. But home nonetheless.

An hour or so later, the cats are greeting us with curt meows while the house greets us with a quiet indifference.  There is a stale smell to the air and the place feels hollow. The furniture is arranged ever just so and all my precious bric a brac remain fashionably displayed.  Home.

I open the fridge to see what I can conjure for us to nibble and find jalapenos covered in mold, but one is unscathed. I find a few scallions and begin chopping to add to half a bag of shredded cheddar and taco chips. Impromptu nachos. The Buddhist begins squeezing limes. Impromptu margaritas. We mill around, fidgety, unpacking suitcases,  staging our life to begin again tomorrow.  Eventually, we sit, sip and chew.  We are quiet. Too quiet. We have already said what we care to in that wheeled cube we inhabited for too many hours.

Why are we always driving North to the places we love?  Why is this oasis that I call home not enough?  If my heart is where my people are, then what is the magic of this place? If I always crave to be near mountains, why live in New Jersey?  If my body finds peace in a rock strewn stream, why reside in a subdivision?  If my soul seeks nature to hear it own thoughts, why live under Liberty International flight patterns?

I look around the familiar, unsure of what answer I hope to find...