If you haven’t read the first or second post of this series, scroll down and read those in order beforehand so this one will make sense to you.

***

I woke up on the fourth morning of my little “me retreat” feeling very refreshed. I showered, then made my way down to breakfast where I shared a table with some new-found friends from my painting workshop. After we ate, we walked together across the property, over the bridge, and into the dome tent once again.

I made my way over to my station, stopping in front of that blank piece of paper I had put up the evening before. I was feeling safe, happy, and protected, so that was going to be what fueled my new painting. I started with mountains, then created a stream which carved through the base of those mountains with no plan of it having a real ending. I changed my mind and decided to have it end as a pond down alongside a cabin. As I started to add the cabin, I thought “This is the house that Anne built.” Odd thought, but okay. I filled the mountains and areas around it with redwood trees, then stood back to get a good view of what I had just made. The mountains felt like my protection and all the trees represented the people in my life who are there with me, and for me. The “house that Anne built” really felt like it was the life I had created for myself and what I put around it felt very satisfying. I added cattails and flowers in and around the pond, with green grass and pink, purple, yellow, and orange wildflowers carefully filling in the vacant space throughout the rest of the painting. I finished it off with a walking path up to the door; a door I could open and invite people in if I chose to do so. I completed the finishing touches later that afternoon, taking it off the wall to set with my other paintings after it had dried.

We weren’t going to be painting that evening and on Friday, we only had the morning  session and then our weeklong workshop would be over. Since it was my last night there, I grabbed a cup of tea after dinner and made my way down to watch the sunset in the same spot I viewed it from on my first night in this place. I thought back on my week there and the emotional journey I had taken myself on and was really proud I’d chosen to make the most of it, even when it wasn’t always easy. As the sun dipped further into the ocean, I noticed a baby whale jump in the water while its mother swam alongside it. (The jumping happened several times which I tried to capture in a photo, but never did. I did capture a really pretty sunset though, so I made it the header photo at the top of my blog). Several guests had also spotted the whales so we stood together, watching them as they made their way up the coastline toward the setting sun.

Friday morning after breakfast, I packed up my belongings and put them in my car so I could head home as soon as our final painting session was done. I knew the drive would be long because I’d be approaching Los Angeles during rush hour, so I wanted to get on the road without delay. I turned my room key in to the office, then walked alone across the property and through the garden, going over that bridge one final time. As I made my way into the dome tent and up to the blank paper at my station for one last painting, I felt happy and at peace, so I painted this tiny island in the Caribbean Wil and I have been to a few times. It’s simple and beautiful, and on every visit, I’d cannonball off the side of the little boat we’d chartered to get there, swim to shore, and do cartwheels on the beach. The sky and the water are both a blue like nothing I’ve seen anywhere else. I added palm trees on the island, and a single wooden boat, anchored in the water near the shore, which turned out really well because I had finally figured out perspective.

At the end of the workshop, I collected my paintings and walked alone to my car. I set them down carefully in back then hopped in front to drive off the property, and down the winding highway toward home. I spent a lot of time on that drive thinking about the relationships in my past that had negatively affected me so much, most of them causing sadness and resentment that I’d held onto long after those relationships had come to an end. Looking back, they were all with people who had many of their own issues that had nothing to do with me at all. I felt, in a way, that I had stepped into their emotional splash zone and absorbed the aftermath. I had never dried off, allowing myself to leave their burden behind me. Over time, that’s a lot to carry, and I didn’t need to do that anymore.

In the years since removing those toxic relationships from my life, I have chosen to focus my energy in people who are positive and uplifting, who constantly make me want to be a better person, and not allow myself to get close to anyone who brings me down or affects me in any negative way. I have always had a lot of empathy for humans (almost to a fault) for as long as I can remember, so this wasn’t easy. We can’t always cut out people we would otherwise not have in our lives. Sometimes we’re exposed to these types of people in the workplace, in our own extended family, and for some, in public social media platforms we choose to be on. But when I think of these people having their own issues that have nothing to do with me, I feel a lot better knowing I can choose not to absorb what they may throw my way. I am not responsible for their feelings, only for my own. Doing this workshop gave me a way to express myself and provided inspiration for other ways I can do this at home in my daily life. I no longer feel like I’m on lockdown or trapped by those feelings. I finally feel free.

If you haven’t read the first post about this, scroll down to that post and read it first so this one will make sense to you.

***

Monday morning, I woke to the sounds of birds chirping in the bushes outside my room and the dull roar of waves crashing along the cliffside below. I looked at the schedule for this painting workshop I signed up for and it was 10am to noon, 4pm to 6pm and 8 to 10pm every day. “Yipes” I thought. This was going to be more intense than I expected but I guess they need that much time if they’re teaching two dozen people how to paint. I showered and made my way down to breakfast, choosing to sit back at the wooden countertop and bench that looked over the ocean to avoid potential awkward conversation with others.

As I walked through the property and up to a bridge that goes over a stream to connect the two sides of land, it felt, I don’t know, kind of symbolic to cross a bridge to a side where you get to experience a new part of you. I immediately shook my head and planned to never say that out loud because it sounded like “hippie talk” and that wasn’t me. I joined the others in a large dome tent near the cliffside where we were protected from the cold and damp, but could hear the waves crashing outside. I was excited and a little nervous as I walked in, grabbed a stool, and sat in a circle with the others who were also here to learn this skill.

As one of our instructors started talking, I realized this wasn’t a class where we were going to learn techniques on how to paint. “WHAT did I get myself into?” I said to myself again, trying not to giggle. The instruction was to paint what you feel. “Wait. How do I paint what I feel when I don’t know how to paint?” I thought. There were several tubs of water color on tables behind our painting area, which were individual spots with poster-sized paper taped up to the inside walls of the dome tent. We each had several size paint brushes at our station but the paint was on the tables behind it so you could walk away from your painting and think about what you were doing. Seeing it from afar may change how you feel and physically removing yourself from standing right in front of it helps with those feelings.

Let me get this straight. No instruction, paint what you feel. Uh…got it.

I decided to paint my favorite tropical vacation spot Wil and I go to every year because it makes me really happy. Happy is good! I started with the water, blending colors together that I could see in my mind of that warm ocean I love to swim in and watch sunsets over. Blue is my favorite color so it made me really happy to start with that. I then (awkwardly) added some beach, some rocks, and some palm trees, laughing at my inability to draw or paint any perspective whatsoever. I decided to fill the sky with one of the beautiful, colorful sunsets I would see every evening when we are there. And that’s when I started to figure out why we were doing this the way we were doing it.

In my 17 years as a hairdresser, I only told a handful of my clients that I’m colorblind. I’m sure that’s a scary thing for your hairdresser who’s about to color your hair to say to you, but I only told those people because our conversation had somehow led to it. I was great at doing shades of blonde because I didn’t have a problem seeing that. But shades of red were very scary to me, so I stuck completely to the numbers on the color tubes and a chart from the manufacturer I was trained on in school. I could trust myself to do those colors correctly on paper but never by what I saw. Same with cool tone browns. They just looked green to me but that’s not what the client saw, and they were always very happy when I finished, so it was fine. Here, I’m about to paint a sunset, which has multiple colors and shades, by choosing base colors and mixing them together without a label. Scary.

I walked up to the table of paints and asked an instructor what one color was because it was a weird one I couldn’t see well. She said it was a burnt brick red. Awesome. I dipped my brush in it, and walked over and brushed it across my skyline. I stopped, horrified. It looked pink to me. Like, magenta pink. I asked the girl painting next to me what color it was and she said a dark brownish red. WHAT?! I stood there for several minutes, angry that I asked someone else to tell me what the color looked like. Then it hit me like a ton of (magenta) bricks that this was about trusting myself. Trusting that the colors I choose to make the beautiful sunset I see every time I’m there to be what I SEE, not what I think others see. Hello, first lesson in trust. I see what you did there. The finished result was a perfect sunset (in my eyes) and perfect blues in the ocean, silly looking palm trees, rocks, and a beach that kind of looked like something a fourth grader would paint, but that’s okay. The completed painting made me very happy because for the first time ever, I trusted myself to do what I wanted with color, and that felt pretty great.

We had a long break between our afternoon sessions, with lunch happening in the middle of it. I decided to take a detour and go on a little hike up the canyon along the stream the bridge crosses over. It was really pretty but I felt nervous being there alone with all the places you could lose your footing and fall. I cautiously made my way through for about 20 minutes and decided to go back for lunch. Not feeling very social, I ended up taking my meal to my room. I ate, napped, and went back to the painting workshop. This became my routine for three days. But each time I went back to paint, I was painting what began as some sort of landscape scenery that I would start without thinking, take a step back, and realize the things I was creating were symbols of things in my life. Water was always in the painting because it felt calm to me, and huge redwood trees would symbolize me and others I cared about; strong, solid, and able to withstand the fires that could and would sweep in. I stood back from one particular painting and just stared at it for several minutes. What I wanted to add was a volcano but it didn’t seem right surrounded by all the pretty trees and wildflowers I’d just created along a river. One instructor came over and stood next to me, both of us looking at my painting. She asked what I felt like adding to it and I said a volcano but it didn’t seem right. She said a volcano is a very powerful thing and I should add it if I feel like it. And then I became a crying mess. There have been relationships in my life that felt like a volcano; volatile, unpredictable, unsafe. Over time, I would physically be removed from them, thinking I was protecting myself. But standing there afraid to paint an angry, erupting mountain that I didn’t want anywhere near me and all that felt calm, I understood how being physically away from these people did not help me get past the feelings of fear, anger, sadness, and mistrust of those past relationships. I painted my volcano and everything around it became symbols of my feelings. UGH. I was an emotional mess as I finished this painting. I ate a very small lunch in my room, and then took a long nap. After that though, I began to feel a lot better than I had in days.

Since I was feeling better emotionally, I took more chances and parked myself in different areas during mealtimes. At each meal, I’d end up talking with someone new. Well, new to me anyway. Pretty much everyone I had encountered had been to Esalen before so I was the newbie. I heard really wonderful stories from men and women, most of them older than me and of course, more experienced at this place than me. I was beginning to see what I thought were a bunch of “hippies” were actually people a lot like me. People who wanted a break, wanted to learn something new about themselves which, it turns out, is what all of their workshops are about. They were all just people who had found a place where they could express themselves. It was like therapy but in nature, which was exactly why I had this strong sense of wanting to go there in the first place.

That afternoon and all the next day, I ended up painting a large sunflower. Again, I hadn’t set out to make this but when I stood in front of that blank piece of paper, that’s what I started to paint. I grabbed a wooden stool (and a palette of the paints I was using with my tiny brush) and spent hours working on it. It felt very meditative to me. When I was done, I stood back and looked at it. The whole thing looked very happy and peaceful to me. It felt really good that I created this thing that taught me about patience, about putting thought and care into something just for me and not worrying about perfection.

I looked back through all the paintings I had done over the week and saw it as a story of things in my life that made me the person I am today. Clearly, the person who hadn’t faced a lot of feelings I thought I had moved past, and that’s why I had been feeling unhappy and trapped for the past several months.

I cleaned up my supplies, walked out of the tent and over that bridge, and headed back to my room for one the most restful nights of sleep I’d had in months.

DISCLAIMER: The posts I make this week are about my own experience. There have been a couple of times in my life where I have had a temporary bout of depression which has stemmed from a specific situation, and once I figured out a solution to why I’d been feeling the way I was feeling, I’ve been okay. If you have felt depressed for a long period of time and don’t know why, please talk to a doctor about it immediately.

***

Over the past eight months or so, I’ve had waves of feeling really good for weeks at a time and then a few days where I felt, I don’t know, kind of down on myself and unmotivated. Those days usually happened after having a day or two of feeling really anxious for no reason. It’s weird. Things are good in my life so what the hell was my problem? When I was feeling really good, I would go to my twice weekly Pilates sessions and come out feeling invigorated, and I would take walks alone or with friends a few mornings a week and feel energized for the rest of the day. And as recently as ten weeks ago, I was on a cruise in the Caribbean with friends and feeling happier than ever. But in the ten or so weeks since coming home from that cruise, the times where I felt down or unmotivated were for longer stretches than it had been in the months prior, and that really bothered me.

I’ve always been very in-tune with my body. I’ve known for a while now that my approach to middle-age has brought a fluctuation in my estrogen levels which can affect mood, and I can definitely tell when it dips and I feel off in the brain department, so I try to help it by getting regular exercise and being careful with what I eat so I don’t feel worse. But there was something more to this than just hormones. I knew I was feeling out of balance in doing something for myself, something that was inspiring or creative, but I wasn’t sure how, and honestly didn’t feel the motivation to get myself going on something just for me. There were so many other things in my life that needed my attention so doing anything significant for myself had stayed on the back burner for far too long. My son, Nolan, moved to Arizona in January and was home for a visit about six weeks ago, and we talked about how I’d been feeling. We both agreed it would be nice if I flew out to Phoenix so we could drive up to Sedona for the weekend since neither of us had been there. I thought a weekend of hiking in beautiful scenery would be a step in the right direction at getting me out of my funk and maybe inspiring me to figure out something creative I’d like to do for myself once I got home.

I scheduled my visit with him to be the same weekend Wil was going to speak at the Science and Engineering Fair in Washington D.C. since I would have just been home alone anyway. Two days before both of us were supposed to leave for our respective weekends away, our dog, Marlowe, tore her cruciate ligament and half her meniscus in her knee and required surgery. She would be at the vet two nights and then come home and require 24 hour care and supervision for the next eight weeks. EIGHT WEEKS. I texted Nolan from the vet office to tell him I couldn’t come to Arizona because of Marlowe’s situation, and then went to the store to load up on everything Marlowe and I would need for the next few days while Wil was out of town. I boarded our other dog, Seamus, because I knew I couldn’t manage caring for both of them on my own while Wil was away. I was about to be on lockdown in every sense of the word.

When Wil came home from D.C. and Seamus came home from boarding, it was really difficult to juggle taking care of all the animals. Marlowe was in pain and felt vulnerable so she did not want Seamus or any of the cats near her. We would rotate them from room to room so Marlowe could rest and feel safe, and I would sleep (and am still doing this) in our guest bedroom with Marlowe next to me on the bed with her leash around my arm so she doesn’t try to jump off during the night. After his D.C. trip, Wil had to immediately go into three weeks of TableTop production, so the pet juggle was on me at home. I love my pets to death but I was feeling more and more like I was trapped and unable to do a single thing for myself, especially since I had that Sedona trip to look forward to and had to cancel it. I ate the same things every day, had the pets needs handled, took care of things around the house, and was exhausted all the time. I did make sure to still do Pilates because I knew if I didn’t have at least one thing for myself, I would lose my mind, but even when I did that, it didn’t help me feel better mentally. Wil knew how hard it was for me to take care of all of this alone during the day and would try to help me in the evening but we weren’t spending any quality time together, really. We were both so tired at the end of the day that we would just watch TV and go to sleep early. The same thing happened every day for two weeks while he was in production and one evening, I completely lost it.

I knew how tough it was on Wil to have these long days prior to and during the filming of TableTop, so I hadn’t said anything to him about how I’d been feeling over the last two weeks and really, over the last few months where I’d been having these waves of feeling off. Doing another season of TableTop was a tough thing for him emotionally and I guess I felt like my own moments of unhappiness seemed trivial, so I hadn’t brought it up. Looking back on it now, I know that wasn’t a wise decision on my part because when he told me he had a day off and just wanted to have friends over to play board games all day for fun, I had a total meltdown. A complete, ugly cry meltdown as I was putting a load of laundry in the washer while he was telling me of his weekend plans, and he had no idea it was coming.

I mean, wow, was I a mess.

We ended up spending the next two hours talking about how I’d been feeling because he had no idea this was going on with me, which was completely my fault for deciding my feelings were a burden when he had his own stuff going on. I felt like I didn’t know what I was doing with my life and had no idea how to feel any better about that. We both agreed I should talk to the therapist that has helped our family over the years and fortunately, I was able to get in to see her the following afternoon.

One thing I’d been thinking about for weeks was taking myself on a road trip and for whatever reason, I really wanted it to be along the coast in Northern California up to Big Sur. I’d been there once before and it’s beautiful. I have always felt a sense of calm and happiness when I’m near the ocean and I know that was a big part of why I felt so good when we were on that Caribbean cruise recently, but something about being along this rugged coastline with all the huge trees surrounding it felt, I don’t know, peaceful and healing to me. The therapist talked with me about this thing that happens with women around my age whose kids are out living their own lives. As a mom, it’s very common to put our own creative ways of expression on hold so we can care for our kids, and then after a while when they’re out on their own (in addition to this hormonal change that happens in our bodies) we feel this need to have something for ourselves, something creative and inspiring, and after all those years of either barely doing that for ourselves or not at all, it’s like we don’t know how to get that started again. Since I’d been feeling like I wanted or needed to be up in Big Sur, she suggested this place called Esalen for some quality “me” time.

I had no idea what Esalen was, but I did think it was unusual that this was the second time in a week someone I knew who I’d talked to about how I’d been feeling had suggested I go there. I was really worried it was some sort of religious thing because I’m not interested in that, but I went home and looked it up and it wasn’t a religious place at all. It was just this beautiful place that you can stay at to relax, take in the view, go on a hike, eat healthy food, take yoga or meditation classes if you want, or sit in the natural hot springs. And if you were feeling so inspired, there’s different workshops happening on weekends as well as during the week that you can participate in. I felt like I needed this time for myself as soon as possible and a weekend didn’t feel like enough time. I wanted a whole week, and I was surprised I was able to book it just six days before I wanted to go. I’d heard from both people who suggested this place to me that it books up so to schedule my stay a couple of months in advance, but I just figured I got lucky that space was available.

Since Wil was still working on TableTop for the week I wanted to go, I decided to board Marlowe at the doggie day care/boarding place we always take them to when we travel. They have experienced staff there who can provide for a dog requiring extra care and a quiet place to rest without other dogs around to disrupt. I felt sad at first for taking her there but I knew it was in my best interest to take a week for myself and she would be in good hands while I was away, so it would be okay. I packed a bag and headed out on Mother’s Day for my five and a half hour road trip, sunroof open and singing along with the radio the whole drive up. I’d never taken what was essentially a “me retreat” so I was excited and relieved knowing I had this time to just relax.

When I pulled into the driveway at Esalen, I was blown away by the breathtaking view. The trees on the cliffs overlooking the ocean below, an enormous garden full of vegetables and flowers, and quaint little buildings along the perimeter of the property that served as rooms for the guests. I pulled into the parking lot and walked up to the office to check in. I noticed a flyer on the counter about a painting workshop happening the whole week I was there so I asked if there was still room in it if I signed up. Again, a thing you usually have to book way in advance, but for whatever reason, there was a spot available if I wanted it. I’d always wanted to learn to paint, so I took the workshop schedule with me back to my room so I could think about it while I unpacked. After I put all of my things away, I grabbed the map of the property they gave me upon check-in and headed out to explore so I could familiarize myself with the surroundings. I checked it all out and then decided I had nothing but time while I was there, so I stopped back in the office and signed up for the painting workshop.

An hour and a half after I arrived, it was dinner time. All of the guests could get their buffet-style meal and sit anywhere they felt like, indoors or out. I decided to sit alone at what was basically a wooden countertop and bench that looked out over the ocean and I ate my food while being entertained by sea otters playing in the water below. But as other guests started filling in the seating around and behind me, I could hear their unusual conversations so I looked around to see who I’d be spending my week with. I felt oddly out of place as I realized I was surrounded by what appeared to be dozens and dozens of “hippies.” I felt so out of place that I quickly finished my meal, grabbed a cup of hot tea, and decided to stroll over to the edge of the property to watch the sunset. As I sat down on a rustic wooden lawn chair and looked out at the setting sun, there was something very familiar about this view, and that’s when I realized where I was. It’s the same place they filmed the final episode of Mad Men when Don Draper has a life meltdown and gets in his car and drives, eventually ending up at the edge of a cliff watching a sunset. The final scene shows him sitting cross-legged on a lawn surrounded by “hippies” as he meditates along with them.

After the sun went down and darkness filled the air around me, I headed back to my room. I felt a bit panicked at the idea of having committed to being there all week, but I decided I just needed to focus on myself and make the most of my experience there. I got up to my room, walked inside, shut the door, set the key down on the desk, and started laughing as I said out loud “WHAT did I just get myself into?!”

***

As women, we seem to have this unique gift of a multi-tasking brain. We can juggle our job, our family, and our home needs like nobody’s business. But the one thing so many of us put on the back burner is our own health. We power through when we have a cold or the flu, and we tend to ignore something that hurts or just doesn’t feel right because we feel like there isn’t time to slow down to take care of ourselves. What’s even worse is remembering annual wellness check-ups because if we’re feeling fine, we don’t think to do those things.

About 15 years ago, when I was in the thick of raising two very active kids and working long hours at my job, I decided to make May “me month” so I would remember to take care of myself, even if I was feeling healthy. I knew staying healthy was important for my family so making my health a priority became important to me. I would take the time to schedule an annual physical and a gynecologist visit, and eventually added getting a mammogram, as well as seeing a dermatologist for a full body mole check. As careful as I was about sunscreen by the time I was 30 years old, I wasn’t as careful as a teen or in my 20s, so those mole checks have been a necessary part of my adulthood to monitor anything new or suspicious on my skin.

It’s an unfortunate reality that not everyone has health insurance and for some, they do have health insurance but the deductible is so high they just avoid going to the doctor. I was in that same situation for a very long time so I can completely relate. If this is a concern for you, there are so many low-cost or free clinics you can go to for these wellness exams. I took advantage of these services as a single mom who couldn’t afford anything extra in life, and I’m really glad I did. And if you’re feeling like you need to talk to someone about your mental health and your health insurance doesn’t cover it, there are some wonderful free services available to assist you with that as well. A healthy brain is just as important as the rest of your body so if you’ve been putting off talking to a professional about it, now is the perfect time to do something about it.

If you haven’t already scheduled your annual wellness exams, please take the time to do so. This week, May 8-14, is National Women’s Health Week. It’s a reminder to take care of you because you are worth it. By making good choices with your diet, getting regular exercise and adding those annual exams to your routine, you are on the right path to a long and healthy life!

It was an unusually warm, spring day. The smell of orange blossoms filled the air as I made my way over. For weeks, as I approached this certain spot, I would smell something else though. It wasn’t flowers, it wasn’t freshly cut grass, it was the smell of something rotting. Not quite the smell of death, but close. I couldn’t take it any longer. I walked up, bent down and blindly reached my hand in, fingers spread wide as if to feel something, anything, as my hand surveyed the space. And that’s when I hit it. Warm, encapsulated, about to burst. I yanked my hand away and screamed.

Hold on. I should go back a little further on this. Let’s start from the beginning.

It was Spring of 1992. My junky old car had died, so my dad gave me their old 4-speed Datsun B210 that I had learned to drive on back in high school. It was in great condition but my mom hated to drive it, mostly because she wasn’t comfortable driving a stick shift. Although recently, her car had been in the shop so she drove the Datsun the week before it was handed off to me permanently. For some reason when I got the car from her, it had a bit of a funky smell, but I didn’t care. I had a car to drive and that was all that mattered. I took it to the car wash and got it looking sparkly, and they even threw in a couple extra blasts of air freshener because they noticed the smell too.

This little car got me to and from work no problem. A week into driving this car, I was very aware of that smell still being in it. I would search the car but never find anything, so I’d just drive to work with the windows down and the smell would go away. I didn’t smell this every day, though. I started to realize I only really smelled it when the car was hot inside. At least 5 times over the next two weeks,  I would move the seats around and search inside the car and in the trunk to find where that smell was coming from. Nothing. It must be in my head, I thought.

It was now the third week of owning this car. I was in a bit of a hurry because I was running late for work. It was really warm outside and I had parked pretty far from my apartment so it was a haul to get to my car. As I approached the car, I was hit in the face by THAT SMELL. I hadn’t even opened the doors yet. I was a good 8 feet from the car and I could smell it. “That’s it!” I thought. “I am going to FIND WHAT’S CAUSING THIS RIGHT NOW.” I looked around to make sure none of my neighbors heard me talking out loud to myself, but also to make sure no one was around if I did find something in my car. Would I be mortified? Terrified? Embarrassed? No one needed to witness what I was about to discover.

I walked up to the driver’s side door, unlocked it, and set my keys and my purse on the roof of the car. I bent down, grabbed the lever adjuster and pushed the seat back as far as it would go, leaning my head down by the pedals to look under the seat. Nothing. I got up, grabbed the lever again and pushed the seat on its track all the way up toward the steering wheel as far as it would go. I crouched down on my knees, braced myself with my right hand on the floor of the car, and reached my left hand all the way up under the driver’s seat, my fingers spread wide, blindly surveying the space, and that’s when I hit it. Warm, encapsulated, about to burst. It felt like it was the size of a softball. OR A HEART. OH GOD!! I screamed as I simultaneously yanked my hand out and stood at the same time, immediately feeling something rip the top of my hand open. I stood up next to the car, gasping for breath as I looked down at my hand, which now had a two inch slice straight down my middle finger. The cut happened so quickly and was so deep it took a minute for it to start bleeding but then blood was everywhere. I grabbed a kleenex from my purse and wrapped it tightly around the cut, then looked down to see what I had touched under the seat that cut me the way it did.

When I yanked my hand away, this thing had dislodged itself from its position, which apparently was wedged directly up under my seat. The cut from my hand was not from this object, however. It was from the upholstery tack under the edge of the seat, and when I stood and yanked my hand, the razor sharp tip of this tack caught my skin. I could see the edge of this…THING that had come part way out from under the seat, so I took off my shoe (of course I did) and cautiously leaned over, using the end of my shoe to pull the object the rest of the way out from under the seat. There it was, on the floor of the back seat. The smell was at a level I’d never experienced before. I stood there, trying to process exactly what I was looking at. And then it started, my uncontrollable laughter.

In its package, which was now about to rupture from the gasses it had created, partially liquified, was the culprit. A rotting ball of Provolone cheese.

I grabbed the corner of the package and carried it to the nearby dumpster, laughing and dry-heaving along the way. Afraid it would burst if I dropped it in while I was next to it, I decided to toss it into the dumpster from about six feet away. The package hit the inside wall of the dumpster and EXPLODED liquidy cheese everywhere (except on me THANK GODS). I ran up to my apartment to clean my finger (which really needed stitches but I was already late for work, so I tried to butterfly bandage it closed but then spent the day replacing bloody band-aids on it because it didn’t stop bleeding for hours) and I called my mom.

“Mom?’

“Yes?”

“Are you missing a ball of Provolone cheese?”

“Oh, I was wondering where that went. I made a quick run to the grocery store before we gave you that car. It must have rolled out of the bag. Just bring it with you the next time you come over.”

She changed her mind when I explained what happened. She couldn’t understand why I went THREE WEEKS with that smell in my car. I mean, how hard is it to find a ball of cheese?  I am the genius who found out the hard way that sometimes your nose can find things easier than your eyes can.

I’ve noticed an interesting thing that happens every time Wil posts a really happy picture online of the two of us together. There’s always handful of people who want to try to criticize Wil, sometimes by his own appearance (it’s crazy how people seem surprised at another human being not having perfectly straight teeth) but mainly by attempting to “insult” Wil for being with me because I’m older than him. And since it happens so often, I figured now would be a good time to set the record straight, since he posted a picture of the two of us at the hockey game last night on Instagram and these comments appeared again.

First of all, yes, I am older than him. When we first started dating twenty years ago, it actually really bothered me for the first six months of our relationship. I had always assumed older meant more responsible for some odd reason. Boy, was I wrong about that. Wil was one of the most responsible people I’d ever met. After six months into this relationship, I talked with my grandma about me dating someone new but it was weird because I was older than him. My grandma, who outlived three husbands in her 94 years on this earth, (one to a tragic accident, one to cancer, one to old age) very sweetly said “Oh, honey. I was older than ALL of my husbands. We just know a good thing when we see it. If you love him and he loves you and is good to the kids, that’s all that matters.” And that’s when I stopped caring about our age difference and focused more on the man who unconditionally loved me and the two little kids I brought into this relationship.

About 10 years ago, Wil and I went to visit my grandma in the nursing home in Oregon. She had dementia, but she wasn’t an angry, frustrated dementia person. She was more like “Meh, I can’t remember that detail in life.” But there were things she did remember and one of them was that conversation I had with her about Wil when I had started dating him. While Wil and I were talking with her, she paused for a moment, took Wil’s hand into her own, pat the top of it with her other hand, then looked up at him and said “You need to take really good care of yourself because we women in this family live a very long time.” She looked over at me and winked, and let go of Wil’s hand. Wil, laughing, enthusiastically responded “Oh, I know!” My grandma smiled back, relieved in the thought of the very long life Wil and I would continue to share together.

So, for those concerned about Wil being in a relationship with me, an older woman, I have some words to ease your mind so you don’t have to worry yourselves about it anymore. As you can see by the photos you comment on, we are extremely happy together and the age difference doesn’t matter to us. We may both be in our 40s now but rest assured, we enjoy traveling together, we share our life with amazing friends and family, and we continue to love our home and all of our rescue pets. And when you see those smiles on our faces with the natural aging lines and the occasional gray hairs? Don’t worry about that either. Aging happens to everyone. Someday it will happen to you too! And if you’re lucky and find the love of your life, who may or may not be older than you, I hope you experience the strong passion for each other that Wil and I continue to enjoy several times a week.  As the experts say, sex keeps you young! (and happy, and fit, and flexible, obviously). So don’t worry about Wil anymore. He seems to be doing just fine with his older wife and of course,  I am thrilled with my younger husband.

In mid-January, after several months of feeling like it just wasn’t fun anymore, I had decided I was done with Twitter. Having a public account allowed some truly reprehensible people to show up in my mentions and spew their misery and I was tired of providing the platform which gave them access to me. The bad was starting to outweigh the good, and so I finally deleted my account, and it felt wonderful. The next day I wrote a post about why I left and it turned out someone who works in the Trust and Safety Department at Twitter read that post and emailed me about it. After a few email exchanges, we decided to talk about it further over the phone. I had a great conversation with this person, who then invited me to attend a private symposium Twitter was having for 30 representatives and leaders of organizations which assist a wide variety of communities online that deal with an absurd amount of abuse and harassment. I agreed to attend and three weeks later, I flew up to San Francisco to participate in this all day event at their headquarters.

I had mixed feelings about being part of this symposium. I felt frustrated at what seemed like a lack of support from Twitter for their users when they know all of this horrible abuse is happening on their platform. I felt sad that they didn’t provide easier ways for users to protect themselves from the attacks that constantly happen and as a result of that, I felt the only thing I could do to protect myself was to just leave it. I also felt scared and REALLY out of place once I arrived there. At the beginning of the symposium, each person attending stood up, introduced themselves, and talked about these incredible organizations they were there to represent. And then there was me. I stood up, said my name, followed by “I’m just a woman on the internet. I didn’t have a verified Twitter account, I’m not a celebrity, I’m just a woman who is passionate about rescue animals and human equality who somehow has a voice people like to listen to.” As soon as I said that out loud, I understood why I was there. There are so many people just like me who liked Twitter for the social part of it but who end up dealing with the dregs of humanity who show up in their mentions. I was there to offer my point of view, just like all the other representatives there, on how Twitter can make their platform a more user friendly and safer place to be.

I won’t bother going into all the details of the entire day but I will say I felt really good about the things we talked about. We had discussions together as well as splitting up into groups to discuss tools that would be incredibly useful to users to manage their timeline, since we all know the horrible people online are always going to be there. Everyone came up with great ideas on how Twitter could expand their own software instead of users needing other third party software companies to make our personal Twitter experience more enjoyable. I’ve known about these third party software tools for a while but for me, I felt if it ever got so bad that I needed a third party to help me manage what I see, it just wasn’t worth it anymore. If Twitter just provided this themselves, it would make the platform a simple and pleasant experience again.

One of the things suggested to me by the person I spoke with at Twitter was to just lock my account to protect my user name from being released for anyone else to use in the future. Apparently, there were some online articles written about my Twitter departure and some asshats are waiting for my user name to become available so they could pretend to be me. People sure are neat. Anyway, I did what Twitter suggested and locked my account (and deleted tons of my old tweets because who knows who follows me. Now all anyone gets to see is basically my pet pictures.) After a few weeks following my departure, I had friends suggest I also auto-link my blog and Instagram posts to Twitter since people who follow me there may not know I am still online, just on a different platform, so I did. I don’t look at Twitter, I don’t read any mentions or comments to me, and I don’t read my timeline. I know. I’m putting the “anti” in social media. How boring.

This past week, Wil and I went on the annual JoCo cruise along with 1100 super awesome nerds. This is the sixth one, and I was really excited to see new faces as well as all the old, familiar ones. But an unexpected thing happened for me. I ended up having dozens of conversations with people I’ve only interacted with on the cruise, at conventions, and on Twitter, who all came up to tell me how happy they were that I was back on Twitter. Woops. I hadn’t considered my auto-link posts would appear that I was back to actively participating in anything there, so I had to explain that I wasn’t reading anything there and I wasn’t engaging in any tweets to me. That’s when I realized I should probably write this post.

At the end of the symposium day at Twitter, I did feel that if the company could create this software to give the tools to users to make our Twitter experience what we wanted, I would probably go back to it. Once on land yesterday at the end of our cruise, I decided to look at my Twitter account to see what others see on my profile page. First, I saw that I had several follower requests. Woops. Apparently, making my account private means the only way to follow me is if I approve these requests and honestly, the only way I’d be okay with that is if I looked at each profile to make sure the person isn’t an asshole, and that isn’t something I feel like investing any time in right now. For months, the abusive attacks at me were so massive that I would make the effort to report the truly awful ones but just mute the accounts of all the others in a quick way to not see them in my mentions. I looked at that mute list (which is thousands of user names long. So long that as much as I scroll through, I still haven’t seen the end of the list) and there were dozens and dozens of those awful and abusive users actually following me. I’m assuming they’re waiting for me to post something they can run with, which is why I will continue to keep my account locked, not read any of it, and not engage with anyone in my mentions. Enjoy those pet pics, people.

I am reluctantly optimistic that Twitter will eventually create the software so many of us would love to use to have control over our Twitter experience. It may take a few months and hopefully it’ll happen before it’s too late. In the meantime, I don’t blame you for unfollowing me now that you know I’m not really there and won’t be reading what you say to me. And maybe someday I will be back on there for real when there’s a way to make it the experience it used to be for me before all of this crap started. I know there are so many wonderful people I used to interact with on Twitter and I do miss that, and I appreciate your understanding of why I’m doing this the way I’m doing it. Any of my life I choose to share online is so much better now that it’s on my own terms, and that makes all of this worth it.

In elementary school, I had no idea what Valentine’s Day meant. As I got older, I found out it was actually a day that a massacre occurred, so that sucks. All I knew as a kid was it was the really awkward and forced celebration of choosing the box of Valentine cards that didn’t sound too sappy that I was to give to each student in my class. Snoopy was usually my go-to of choice because a dog is pretty neutral in the love department. I’d always get a bag of Conversation Hearts and carefully choose the candies which couldn’t be read into too much (listen, I was VERY concerned about this in 2nd grade) and stuff them into the tiny envelope each Valentine came with. I’d go through my whole class list to make sure I had a Valentine for every student (required) and double check my list to envelope count multiple times before heading to school that day.

Every year, we would decorate a large envelope (two pieces of construction paper stapled together around three sides, lots of glitter and doily cut-outs) and would tape it to the front of our desk on the morning of Valentine’s Day. Then, just before the first recess, the teacher would call out the names of five students at a time to go around the room and distribute their Valentine’s into each hand-crafted recipients envelope. Even as a seven year old, I felt like this holiday was pushed on people, and it always made me REALLY uncomfortable to sit there as we took turns passing out Valentine’s from a class list our teacher gave us. Sure, from the teacher’s point of view, she wanted everyone to receive one, but to me it was weird.

From second grade until I moved away from Oregon to California in eighth grade, I would get a special gift from one boy. One of his parents worked for the Chapstick company, so on Valentine’s Day each year, he would give me a new flavor of Chapstick, and at Christmas, he would always give me the Lifesaver Storybook AND a new flavor of Chapstick. At the time, I thought he was just being nice, and I always thanked him for the gift before heading off to play with my friends on the playground. It wasn’t until that first Valentine’s Day when I moved that I realized he was probably doing all of that because he liked me. He didn’t give Chapstick or Lifesaver Storybooks to anyone else, only me. And I was clueless to his admirations. Bravo, Anne.

Once I was in high school, Valentine’s Day wasn’t forced upon us by teachers. It had now become a stressful day of “Should I send a Candy-gram to someone? Is someone going to send a Candy-gram to me?” That was the worst. I did read a story this week about a high school senior boy who bought something like 900 carnations and had people help him pass them out to every girl at school because he wanted each girl to feel special. I thought that was so sweet and it totally makes me cry just typing this out.

As an adult, I decided I wasn’t going to celebrate Valentine’s Day with anyone because seriously, this stupid “holiday” is made up for the card, flower, and candy industry. Thankfully, I married someone who feels the same way. However, I did cave a couple of years ago and got Wil something (full story about that here). He loved that gift so much he ended up getting it tattooed on the inside of his left forearm. But we have gone back to the tradition of NOT getting each other anything because we don’t need some silly holiday to profess our love for each other.

Whether  you’re in a relationship with someone or enjoying life on your own, remember that this “holiday” does not mark any sort of achievement or failure in love. We all have friends and family in our lives that we love and who love us every day and that’s what’s important. And if you’re feeling like you want something special to celebrate the day, go get a flavored Chapstick for yourself and someone you care about. I bet that would make little Vincent from my class very happy.

About three months ago, I called to schedule my annual appointment with my otolaryngologist. If you’re like me the first time you see that word,  you’re probably like,  “The hell is that?” It’s a head and neck specialist. I see this doctor to monitor the multiple benign nodules I have on my thyroid through ultrasound and biopsy, and he does blood tests to make sure my thyroid is still functioning properly. I do have an endocrinologist I see in between the visits with this specialist just to continue to monitor them, but a second opinion from a specialist eases my mind.

I wasn’t able to get in with this doctor until yesterday because he had taken his own medical leave of absence and once he returned, he didn’t have an appointment available for six weeks. I wasn’t thrilled to have to wait so long when I was overdue for this check-up anyway, but I made my appointment and made sure nothing would stand in the way of me getting to see him. I allowed myself plenty of time to get to the facility so I wouldn’t feel panicked about traffic, but just as I was about to turn to go up the driveway to the parking structure, a train came and the arm of a gate came down, and a “no right turn” sign lit up.

“It’s ok”, I thought. I had gotten there with nearly 15 minutes to spare so I should still make it on time.  But the train went SO SLOW that I ended up calling my doctor’s office to tell them I was still coming to my appointment, but I was stuck behind this train for who knows how long. The nurse said not to worry, it happens all the time, and the doctor was running behind anyway so just get there when I get there. I relaxed, and waited TWENTY FIVE MINUTES for this train to finally go through. I parked, got up to my doctor’s office, checked in, and took a seat.

As soon as I sat down to wait, I realized I’d left my book at home. ARGH! I had my phone so I decided I’d just check my email and play a game on it while I waited. As I pulled my phone from my purse, an old man in a seat just to my right started talking. He was very soft spoken so I didn’t hear what he said at first, and didn’t realize he was actually talking to me until I looked up. He repeated what he’d said the first time. “What did you eat when you were a kid to get you to be so tall?” I laughed. At 5’8″ I never thought of myself as particularly tall, but I was wearing 2 inch heeled boots so I probably did look taller than usual. “I was a garden grazer when I lived in Oregon as a kid” I said with a smile, and started to go back to checking my email on my phone. But the old man, who was there alone, started talking again. I put my phone away because he seemed to want someone to chat with while he was waiting in the lobby, so I happily obliged.

The old man told me he was born and raised in Glendale, California, and has lived there his whole life. When he was 17, he went to Chicago alone to attend a football game. “Can you believe I went there alone? At 17?!” he said, clearly thrilled at how adventurous he was at such a young age. I agreed that it was pretty remarkable. He had met some kids at the game and then after, they all piled into the car of one of the boys. “There were no seatbelt laws back then, so we’d just get as many people into the car as possible” he explained. “There was one girl left to get in the car and there was no more room so I offered for her to sit on my lap” he shared, with a big smile on his face before continuing. “The young girl climbed into the car, got on my lap and said ‘And what is your name?’ “I’m Don Anderson of Glendale, California” he said to me, sheepishly. ‘Nice to meet you, Don Anderson of Glendale, California’ she said to me with a smile, and shook my hand.” The old man paused for a moment, looking down at his hands, and then said “We got married when I was 21 and 55 years later, we’re still married.” The old man beamed with so much pride and love in his eyes, I felt like I was going to cry.

This man went on to tell me all about his three kids and his nine grandchildren, pausing each time the nurse came out to call in a new patient. Concerned, I asked him if he was there to see the doctor. He told me no, his wife was there because she had something going on with her thyroid gland. He said she had seen the doctor and then they sent her to the building across the way for a blood test and an ultrasound, and that he’d been waiting for two hours for her to come back. He seemed nervous now, so I said reassuringly “This is a very good medical facility but every time I come here, there’s always a long wait. I’m sure she’ll be back very soon.” He nodded in agreement.

Over the next 30 minutes, we took turns sharing stories of ridiculous things we had done as kids. He told me he and a friend once put a fiberglass fishing boat in their pool so they could start the motor and ride around in the water when the UPS man, who had been ringing their front door to drop off a package, heard all the noise and came back to see what it was about. He said the UPS man just stood there, stunned at what he saw, which he and his friend thought was hilarious.  I told him about the time I was in fourth grade and my friend and I made cookies at her house and got flour EVERYWHERE so we decided the way to clean the floor was to cover it in dish soap and water and then run and slide across the sudsy floor, but then her mom came in and was FURIOUS at the disaster we made and sent me home. We both laughed at each other’s stories when suddenly his eyes lit up at the sight of his wife returning to the lobby.

The old man stood up, adjusted his coat and smoothed down his hair with his left hand. He stayed near me, waving his hand for his wife to come over. “I want to introduce you to my wife” he turned to me and said with a big smile on his face. She made her way over, saying “Did you make another new friend, Don?” while smiling because obviously, chatting with strangers was a regular thing for him. He leaned over asked me my name and then stood back toward his wife to make the introduction. I stood, shook her hand, and told her I got to hear wonderful stories and it was lovely to chat with her husband. She smiled and thanked me, then looked back at him, took his hand, and told him she needed to schedule surgery. They walked away together, holding hands, and he turned back around to wave to me. I smiled and waved back as they disappeared around the corner.

A few minutes later, I was called in for my appointment. The nurse was very apologetic for the wait. I told her it was fine because it gave me the opportunity to have a very nice conversation with a very sweet, old man. I knew they were behind because there are people coming here for an appointment that can result in a life-changing diagnosis, and I’m pretty sure that was the case for Don’s wife. I thought of Don sitting next to his beloved wife, holding her hand, as they discussed her upcoming surgery, and how terrified he must feel. But my thoughts quickly drifted to the image of these two people as teenagers meeting for the first time, having no idea they were about to share decades of life and love together, and that made me really, really happy for them.

After nine months of dating, Wil and I knew we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together, so my two boys and I moved in with him. It was a weird transition for me going from having a whole closet and a whole bed to myself for the past three years to sharing it with someone. It was also REALLY difficult to transition from being the only adult in the house responsible for my two kids to learning to share that responsibility. As a kid myself, I could literally sleep through anything, anywhere. But once I became a single parent, my mom ears kicked into overdrive and I could hear, see, and smell anything and everything in my sleep. This was a good skill to have when my tiny children needed me, but I never unlearned this mom ear skill. Even to this day, with my kids having moved out years ago, I have to sleep with an eye mask on and silicone earplugs in and have a white noise machine going or I can hear my cat walk across the floor on the other side of my house. It’s crazy.

After several months of us living together, I decided I wanted to go back to cosmetology school to finish the program and get my state board license. I had started school right after my divorce from my kids’ biological father, but trying to waitress during the day, go to school at night, and take care of two tiny kids on my own finally had become too much when my mom passed away when I had only completed a third of the school program. I stopped school and just focused on taking care of my kids and paying my bills by being a waitress. I knew I would finish school someday, and since the state allows you to keep the hours you’ve already completed (state requires 1600 hours for completion), I would just go back when I was ready. I enrolled to go full-time during the day and just work part-time at night so I could finish school faster and get started on the career I’d always wanted. It was exciting and exhausting. There were many nights I was so exhausted but couldn’t sleep because every little thing would still wake me up. One night in particular will always stand out in my mind.

By this time, Wil was 24 and I was 27. Wil had been living on his own since he was 18, so he knew how to cook some basic stuff. One unfortunate meal he used to make for himself way too often was this thing he called “Chili Mac.” He would take leftover chili he’d made and mix it in with Kraft macaroni and cheese from a box. Now, I get what you’re thinking. “Hey, this sounds like the best bachelor chow EVER.” You’d be right. Except for the part where this Chili Mac would give Wil the most toxic farts in the HISTORY OF ANYTHING HORRIBLE YOU HAVE EVER EXPERIENCED IN YOUR ENTIRE LIFE. Sometimes he would make this for lunch, so the toxic levels would have already left him by the time I’d gotten home. I would always know this was a meal he had chosen to eat while I was away for the day when I’d come home to see the pile of used matches on the coffee table.

A few times when I had to work late, Wil would eat his Chili Mac for dinner and the aftermath was still an issue when I got home. I would ask him to please not eat that late in the day so I didn’t have to endure it when I got home and he would respond “But it tastes so good!” and give me a sad face like my request was depriving him of one of the greatest joys in his life. One night, after an exhausting day at school followed by a really long and stressful shift at work, I crawled into bed and just wanted a peaceful night of sleep. Wil came to bed shortly after I did so he could read a book and fall asleep with me.

Around 1am, I woke up because Wil had shifted to his side in bed and when he adjusted the covers to go up around his shoulder, he poofed the silent aftermath of his Chili Mac right into my face. I immediately woke up and sat STRAIGHT UP in bed, ready to tell him to please leave the room if he had to fart. He was sound asleep, so I laid back down, angrily turning away from him and shoving my pillow into my face to try and filter the air that was punching me in the nostrils. I was dozing off when it happened again, and again, AND AGAIN. I was delirious from exhaustion and kept tossing and turning trying to find fresh air in the room without much success.

I had to get up at 6am for school. After who knows how many times Wil had woken me with his Chili Mac ass, I was PISSED when I was woken up at 4am to his choke cloud AGAIN while he laid there on his side, peacefully sleeping. In a sleep and room fog haze, I yelled at the top of my voice “LIGHT A FUCKING MATCH!!!” Now, to Wil, who slept through all of his nuclear level releases, he had no idea what was going on but clearly, when he woke to my scream, he knew exactly what had happened. He said nothing. All I heard was the fumbling for the matches on his nightstand followed by a strike on the matchbox, as a flame lit up the room and was blown out. Our Lady of Sulphur had released me from the evil confines of Wil’s wasteland grasp, and I was able to sleep for two hours.

When my alarm went off, I was so tired I felt hungover. I was angry at Wil for how tired I was as I got myself off to school, but by the time I got on the freeway, realizing I felt like shit because my boyfriend kept me awake farting all night became hilarious to me. My yell followed by silence and that match lighting up the room and being blown out replayed in my head all day. I’m sure it was the exhaustion but my god, I laughed harder and harder at that as the day went on. When I came home from school, Wil greeted me at the door and apologized profusely for keeping me awake that night. I accepted his apology on one condition; he never eats Chili Mac again. He gave me the sad face but he agreed. As we climbed into bed that night, I glanced over at his nightstand and saw the book of matches and that one used match. I laughed as I fell asleep with his arms around me.