Spin Cycle: Halloween Past and Present

This is a repost, but Jen said "Halloween then and now" and this fits the bill to the tee.


Circa 1960’s
When I was young and growing up in the San Fernando Valley with my two sisters, Halloween was a huge deal. We COULDN’T WAIT for dinner to be over and dark to descend so we could go trick or treating. My dad had this horrid awful mask that he would drag out, not only for Halloween but also for slumber parties. It came from a movie set and beat the shit out of anything they sell today. It was SO REAL. Not at all rubbery. It was the scariest, creepiest, wrinkled, evil face ever. At least that’s the way I remember and I’m sticking to it. He’d wait until our guard was down, which means sitting on the floor, sorting our candies, and with mask, trench coat, and big ol’ boots, he’d slam open the back screen door and come tearing at us. Clenching hands and BRUUUUUHAHAHA. I’m surprised we never pissed our pants. That’s how much we fell for it every year.

Halloween 1991
Daughter was just over two and we had mostly managed to keep her from chocolate and sweets. Instead of taking her trick or treating, we dressed up and took her to a restaurant/club. You see, my husband and I met working at Bobby McGee’s. I was cocktailing to pay my way through college and my husband was a waiter. EVERYONE wore a costume at this crazy place to work. Even though we had both moved on, we still had a lot of friends there and they did a happy hour thingy on Halloween. So we dressed as the Flintstones. Cave clothes- mine and Daughter’s hair twisted around big, fake bones. It’s a great picture of back in the day when my husband and I used to both work out. Daughter was two and was the most precious Pebbles ever. Not that I’m prejudiced or anything. We went at, like 5 PM, and even after a shitload of fun and frivolity, we were back home by 8. Within 5 minutes of sitting down some kids came trick or treating. There was no hiding from the two year old the fact that I was giving stuff away and that was the end of her not getting candy for Halloween.

Halloween 1993
We had just bought our home that summer and it was Son’s first Halloween. He was 16 months old. He had the CUTEST fucking tiger costume. He toddled along and I swear our block looked like that scene in ET, where swarms of kids come out right at dusk. Being a new neighborhood, it was a beehive of toddler hood. I was holding his hand and waited on the sidewalk as Daughter and our friend’s kids went up to the first house. Son could barely talk, but he sure let it be known that he had observed what went on at the front door. He grunted and grumbled to see inside the kids pumpkin buckets. When he figured out that they were partaking of give-away stuff, he pulled and pulled on my arm until I walked him up to the next door. That was the beginning of his professional status at trick or treating. Everyone thought the baby tiger was too too cute and gave him twice as much as the other kids. But half way around the block he figured out how to unwrap a piece of candy and that was the end. Afterwards, he wanted to sit in the middle of the sidewalk and eat his whole loot. My friend had to take all the kids around so I could haul his little butt home and check his candy before he scarfed down a razor blade or an LSD tab.

Halloween 2006
My children are 17 and 14 and they have made plans to go out with some friends. Son is actually trick or treating in a friendly neighborhood that lets the teens keep up the good work. His professional status is still intact. Daughter is in a play and after rehearsals they are having a party. My husband has to work. I have the night to myself, but I’m being a Halloween Homebody and have decided I don’t want to answer the door and give away candy by myself. So I turn the porch light off and all the downstairs lights too. I go upstairs and treat myself to an aromatherapy bath with candles. As leave the bath I pause to look at myself in the candlelit mirror and contemplate the effects of the last few months. I’m still officially bald, but the first soft down of baby soft fuzz can be felt more than seen. My radiation treatments, finished just two weeks before, have left a thickening of red welts under my left arm. But it’s not as bad as they said it would be. The aloe must have really helped. My scars are still fairly new and jagged and my skin still has the sallowness of all that chemo. But I made it. I’m done with the treatments and have returned to work. I walk to the upstairs window and peek through the blinds to see the families on the sidewalks with their ballerinas and spidermen. I don’t feel the least bit sad to be by myself. I had insisted my kids not stay home for me; I want to make up for all those days and nights they had hung out with me in my room the previous summer. I curl up in bed with a book, grateful that the worst is over. Happy that life is moving forward and back to normal.

Update 2011
In March of this year I made my five year mark as a survivor. Yea. This is huge and I am so grateful to be here.

Looking back at this older post I cannot but help notice how it ended, "happy that life is moving forward and back to normal."

Hm...

After nearly two unbloggable years, with life events I found much more challenging than even cancer itself, I am flabbergasted at my naivete.

I have no idea what I will be doing this year for Halloween. I do know I will dress up as something so my homeroom students get the extra spirit point. Other than that, I am still grateful to be here, more so with each passing day. Taking the good with the bad and one day at a time.

For more spins on Halloween, head on over to Jen at Sprite's Keeper. She puts the list up on Friday.

Halloweens Past

The Spin Cycle this week is Halloween. I'm reposting a Halloween post from last year, those of you who have been coming here for awhile may recognize it...

Circa 1960’s
When I was young and growing up in the San Fernando Valley with my two sisters, Halloween was a huge deal. We COULDN’T WAIT for dinner to be over and dark to descend so we could go trick or treating. My dad had this horrid awful mask that he would drag out, not only for Halloween but also for slumber parties. It came from a movie set and beat the shit out of anything they sell today. It was SO REAL. Not at all rubbery. It was the scariest, creepiest, wrinkled, evil face ever. At least that’s the way I remember and I’m sticking to it. He’d wait until our guard was down, which means sitting on the floor, sorting our candies, and with mask, trench coat, and big ol’ boots, he’d slam open the back screen door and come tearing at us. Clenching hands and BRUUUUUHAHAHA. I’m surprised we never pissed our pants. That’s how much we fell for it every year.

Halloween 1991
Daughter was just over two and we had mostly managed to keep her from chocolate and sweets. Instead of taking her trick or treating, we dressed up and took her to a restaurant/club. You see, my husband and I met working at Bobby McGee’s. I was cocktailing to pay my way through college and my husband was a waiter. EVERYONE wore a costume at this crazy place to work. Even though we had both moved on, we still had a lot of friends there and they did a happy hour thingy on Halloween. So we dressed as the Flintstones. Cave clothes- mine and Daughter’s hair twisted around big, fake bones. It’s a great picture of back in the day when my husband and I used to both work out. Daughter was two and was the most precious Pebbles ever. Not that I’m prejudiced or anything. We went at, like 5 PM, and even after a shitload of fun and frivolity, we were back home by 8. Within 5 minutes of sitting down some kids came trick or treating. There was no hiding from the two year old the fact that I was giving stuff away and that was the end of her not getting candy for Halloween.

Halloween 1993
We had just bought our home that summer and it was Son’s first Halloween. He was 16 months old. He had the CUTEST fucking tiger costume. He toddled along and I swear our block looked like that scene in ET, where swarms of kids come out right at dusk. Being a new neighborhood, it was a beehive of toddlerhood. I was holding his hand and waited on the sidewalk as Daughter and our friend’s kids went up to the first house. Son could barely talk, but he sure let it be known that he had observed what went on at the front door. He grunted and grumbled to see inside the kids pumpkin buckets. When he figured out that they were partaking of give-away stuff, he pulled and pulled on my arm until I walked him up to the next door. That was the beginning of his professional status at trick or treating. Everyone thought the baby tiger was too too cute and gave him twice as much as the other kids. But half way around the block he figured out how to unwrap a piece of candy and that was the end. Afterwards he wanted to sit in the middle of the sidewalk and eat his whole loot. My friend had to take all the kids around so I could haul his little butt home and check his candy before he scarfed down a razor blade or an LSD tab.

Halloween 2006
My children are 17 and 14 and they have made plans to go out with some friends. Son is actually trick or treating in a friendly neighborhood that lets the teens keep up the good work. His professional status is still intact. Daughter is in a play and after rehearsals they are having a party. My husband has to work. I have the night to myself, but I’m being a Halloween Homebody and have decided I don’t want to answer the door and give away candy by myself. So I turn the porch light off and all the downstairs lights too. I go upstairs and treat myself to an aromatherapy bath with candles. As leave the bath I pause to look at myself in the candlelit mirror and contemplate the effects of the last few months. I’m still officially bald, but the first soft down of baby soft fuzz can be felt more than seen. My radiation treatments, finished just two weeks before, have left a thickening of red welts under my left arm. But it’s not as bad as they said it would be. The aloe must have really helped. My scars are still fairly new and jagged and my skin still has the sallowness of all that chemo. But I made it. I’m done with the treatments and have returned to work. I walk to the upstairs window and peek through the blinds to see the families on the sidewalks with their ballerinas and spidermen. I don’t feel the least bit sad to be by myself. I had insisted my kids not stay home for me; I want to make up for all those days and nights they had hung out with me in my room the previous summer. I curl up in bed with a book, grateful that the worst is over. Happy that life is moving forward and back to normal.

For more spins on Halloween, head on over to Jen at Sprite's Keeper. She puts the list up on Friday.

Giveaway Winner and other Stuff....

And the winner of the Hawaii goodie box is...

Kathy from My Space My Blog, My Life

Congratulations Kathy!!

Winner comes courtesy of the random number generator at Psychic Science Website.

Thanks to all of you who commented. Especially thank-you for the spirit of the giveaway, which was for me to show appreciation to those of you who come here, who read what I write, for encouraging me on this journey. Blogging has made writing fun and absorbing for me again. The biggest reason is because people, whether it was those first two readers during my beginning months or a slew of folks on a more popular post, people read what I write. And some comment. There is interaction. I really appreciate the support and camaraderie that comes from blogging.

When I began the blog last year it was a bit of an experiment. To be honest, I thought if it turned out to be something I liked, I would start a new blog using the skills I learned from this experiment. I even have a name for that blog, but have never advanced to make that change. And now I have all these great blog friends and am comfy in my spot. So I am Pseudo. Maybe that other name will get the chance to be a title for a book someday…………………………..

The seed of the idea for a giveaway began in my mind as a way to celebrate my three year anniversary of being a breast cancer survivor. That date is April 10th.

But on April 2nd when I went in for my mammogram the radiologist needed to take a better look. I was called from the waiting area, where I was completely absorbed in the preparations for a vampire war. (Book Four of the Twilight series)

The radiologist just wants to take a couple more images.

While I waited for those images to develop the tech told me to go ahead and just wait in the room.

Bella and Edward kept my mind off any negative projecting.

Mrs. Pseudo a voice called from the hallway.

I came out expecting to be excused to go home. But it was a different tech.

Hi. I’m the ultrasound technician. The radiologist sees something in your mammogram that is a little suspicious. She wants to take some ultrasound images.

Fuuuck me.

A cold wave of air started spreading from the center of my gut like a hollow, expanding pit. I felt detached from my body and as the girl led me to the ultrasound room, used the gel (which is now served warm), and began zeroing in on the suspected blip, I could feel myself floating in a twilight zone.

You know when you are dreaming, and you suddenly realize you are dreaming? How you can manipulate the dream? Seriously, I can do that.

The other night I had a dream that I was driving over an incredibly high bridge with a sapphire blue, incredibly surreal ocean below me. It was definitely Maui, the coastline from Pa’ia to Hana. Suddenly I realized I had been so absorbed in the view that I had driven off the bridge and my car was hanging 1000’s of feet above the ocean in mid air. I drove the car like a plane and suddenly I was on the beach.

Well. Anyways.

While I lay there letting the tech take images of my breast, part of me thought I could will myself from the path that had suddenly reared its ugly head and seemed determined to take me for a detour.

The rest of the ordeal lasted for two weeks. An appointment with my surgeon. An ultrasound guided core biopsy. A bruised breast and a day a rest. Twenty-four hours of not being allowed to shower. Three days of not lifting anything heavy.

The results are in and it was benign.

Life goes back to being a survivor of cancer and not a victim.

For a minute there, I could see each path before me and was suspended between these two realities, prepared for either one.

Either way, life is good. But I have to say, I am very thankful to not have to go down that path again for now.

Yea! Three years.

Red Wagon Philosophies: Part Three (AKA The Final Chapter, I Think...)

Part one is here.

Part two is here.

And here we go...

My own red wagon was what first introduced me to the concept of balance.

Work and play.

Being responsible and letting go.

Practicality and throwing caution to the wind.

One of the problems I find with kids these days is that many of them don’t know how to work through boredom and earn their fun. There are the overscheduled kids of the Type A parents. Between back to back sports schedules, lessons, and whatever else they fit in, they get very little down time. Certainly not enough to push them to their limits of creative imagining. Then there are the kids whose parents are either are at work, or just plain don’t want them out of the house, or just don’t encourage it. These kids watch TV, play video games, or they are on the computer all day.

I’m just finishing up To Kill a Mockingbird with my classes. Did you ever notice how Scout, Jem, and Dill always start their summers out lounging around, bored, and figuring out what to do with their summer surplus of time?

Apparently this topic of not allowing our children to work through boredom and hand feeding them entertainment needs to be left for another post of its own. But you get the idea, yes?

So, moving on.

I introduced the years we lived in a mobile home park on the beach in Malibu before. Across from Big Sycamore State Park. When I was eleven and we moved from the San Fernando Valley to the beach, the red wagon came along with everything else. At eleven, I believe I had mostly outgrown the wagon, which had seen its own wagon train days on our Wonder Years Street years before.

So, one summer day, my friends and I were lazing around in my yard trying to think of something different to do. Hiking? Mmm. Not today. Rock climbing? Swimming? Raft riding? Tree climbing? Fishing off the pier? Been there, done that. Want. New. Entertainment.

I don’t remember who saw the red wagon and decided we should take it tobogganing down the steepest trail on the hill at the front of the State Park, but that’s where we ended up.

Epiphany Number One. The handle of the wagon is not just for pulling. Sitting inside the wagon, you can use it for a steering wheel, a rudder. I remember being blown away at discovering this. It amazed me that this potential had laid latent and pending and waiting to be discovered. That I had almost never uncovered this gem of engineering. (OK. I was a bit slow. My friends acted like I was retarded for not knowing this, so I had to tone down my surprise.)

We selected a trail that zig zagged up the side of a hill and then went straight up along the ridge, perpendicular to the ocean. When we went up the straight edge high enough to get the speed for the turns, and turned to go down, we were facing the ocean. The turn looked like the edge of a cliff. Which it was in a way if you did not make the turn. But contrary to the optical allusion, you would not drop off into the ocean if you did not make the turn, but actually land on the Pacific Coast Highway.

The wagon could only hold three of us and there were four. We took turns being the one to push the toboggan off.

We started off not going too fast and this ended with the wagon anticlimactically sludging to a stop just beyond the first turn.

We gradually worked our starting point further and further up the hill.

By the last rounds, we were careening around the corner on two wheels, our hair blown back by sheer speed, our grins and laughter screaming out from the deepest depths of our souls.

It was the Most. Fun. EVER.

When we realized the rubber was shredding off the wheels we kept going until the wagon could go no more.

My friends asked if we should hide the wagon so I would not get in trouble for trashing it.

We all stood there staring at what remained of the wagon.

It was made of metal and bringing it to the beach had started it rusting. It was old. And now its wheels were gone.

I confidently told my friends the wagon had long been forgotten, was on its last legs anyways, and not only would my parents not be mad we had fast forwarded the wagon’s trail to the dump, but they would surely buy me a new one when I explained I had discovered the most fun activity on the planet.

Epiphany Number Two. Parents don’t always see a child’s perspective of living life to its fullest.

I stood there in shock while my dad stomped and yelled and made a big production of throwing the wagon in the back of the station wagon to take to the dump.

I still could not believe, once I explained EXACTLY how much fun we had, the once in a lifetime thrill, the feeling that we had discovered a true purpose for life itself, that not only did my parents not agree to buy a new wagon…they grounded me. Talk about adding insult to injury.

I remember thinking, and I believe I had about a week to think about it, that if they had a clue what my friends and I had discovered, they would apologize. See the light.

Work and play.

Being responsible and letting go.

Practicality and throwing caution to the wind.

Turns out it was a once in a lifetime experience. I never got another wagon and we found our thrills in new ways. But for months I yearned to experience just one more ride down that trail in a wagon, careening around the corner, smiling and laughing like there was nothing better in the entire world.

As an adult I try to remember to let go of responsibilities once in awhile and take the time to be creative, to relax, to enjoy.

As a parent I try to get my kids to be more responsible.

Ah. The irony of life itself.

Red Wagon Philosophies: Part Two

If you missed yesterday's post, you may want to start here.
When my kids were toddlers, a red wagon was in my top five list of playthings they needed to have. I had fond memories of my own childhood red wagon. When we went to buy a wagon for our kids, I wanted to buy them exactly the same model I had enjoyed, but times had changed and the wagons were made of plastic instead of metal. This was before the heyday of online buying, and we settled for a model the toy store offered.

My children’s wagon lasted many years and served many purposes for them. The activity I remember most was them playing Wagon Train with all the neighbor kids. There is not much that says childhood than ten or more kids lining up the trikes, bikes, scooters, and the infamous wagon to play Wagon Train down the access alley. The first time they got this idea, the wagon had the pristine first position. Our dog, the one we call Old Man now, but back then was a strapping young fellow, always hung outside with the kids when they played. He was never leashed; he was like a babysitter to them. The kids would try and ride him, lead him, order him around. He played as if he went along with it, but there was no getting around that he was in charge more than they were.

The first time the Wagon Train was good to go, the kids had tethered the dog to the lead and wanted him to pull the wagon and lead off the posse. I was sitting outside watching the fiasco, half reading a book.

Giddy up they yelled at him.

He played dumb and just turned his head to look at them. My son, riding a trike further down the line (having given the wagon riding spot to someone’s young sibling who was too little to ride in anything else) got off his trike and tried pulling our dog by the collar to get him started.

I raised an eyebrow.

You might hurt him, I admonished. Take that rope off of him and let him go.

After much argument from my then five year old son (a mere preview to his debating skills as a teenager) he finally unhooked the poor dog. He allowed another kid the spot on first trike and my son went ahead and pulled the wagon with toddler to get the ol’ western styled parade a goin’.

Old Man that was a Young Dog was sitting next to me with his head cocked to the side as he surveyed the action. As the Wagon Train kicked into high gear and all the vehicles were clunking along down the alley with yipees and whoopees singing out, the dog took off at a gallop. He ran alongside the Wagon Train and gracefully propelled himself into the back half of the wagon.

He spent the rest of the day getting pulled by the kids, who had to take turns as Wagon Train Leader (wagon puller). The dog never looked happier.

After that, every time the kids started lining up the trikes, bikes, scooters, and wagon for an afternoon of Wagon Train, the dog would claim his spot INSIDE the wagon. Sometimes lying down so he did not have to share the wagon with undeserving children.

The children came to accept this as the natural order of things.

I have thought about this sometimes over the years when my kids have out maneuvered me. When it seems I am doing more for them than they are doing for the family.

Old Man is now 16.

Red Wagon Philosophies: Part One

The other day when I was walking along the bike path where all the cats live, I met a woman and her preteen daughter moseying along the path pulling a big red wagon. In the wagon was a huge Costco sized bag of dry cat food. And a five gallon jug of water.

We chatted a bit and it turns out that Sunday is “her” day for feeding the cats. She and some other kind-hearted people each take a day. They have really gotten to know the cats well. They have an idea which ones have been born feral cats and which ones were abandoned. Some of the cats have names. The little orange one that always runs up to me, wants to be pet, and isn’t the least afraid of BC – her name is Emma. The woman and her daughter are thinking of adopting her.

These people also trap the cats, especially the kittens, and take them to the humane society to get spayed or neutered. Then they bring them back and let them go where they found them. She told me I can tell by the snip in which ear whether it is a fixed male or female.

I wondered aloud at my measly bag of cat food I carry with me and the kind lady said that anything helps.

I know my healing book that is based on Buddhist philosophies advocated being kind to animals and to help those that are suffering. I started feeding the feral cats on the bike path during my recuperation.

But that woman’s wagon was big; as was the food bag and water jug. She brings them fresh water so they don't drink from the polluted pond. She and her red wagon were like a gigantic heart of giving. Ain’t no power walk when you are dragging that thing behind you.

The fact that I double up on my power walk and cat feeding. Does make me seem a bit more efficient than just a pure giver.

At any rate, the red wagon once again reminded me of all that is good in life.

Tomorrow, part deux

Spin Cycle: Surviving with Gratitude

Just a few months after I had finished breast cancer treatments, a friend of mine who owns a small business was sponsoring an event called “Courage Night” to raise money for breast cancer. She asked me if I would be a keynote speaker at the beginning of the evening. The following is the speech I gave that night. I did little revision to the speech for this week’s Spin Cycle – Survival. But, despite the facts that it’s a tad dated (two years) and reads a bit odd for a blog post, I decided to leave it mostly as it was. My survival spin.

It was March 2006 that I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I found the lump myself in February and my last mammogram had been in October, only four months before. So I wasn’t due for another mammogram for eight months. I am very grateful that I made the appointment to see my doctor when I did, despite my busy schedule as a full time high school teacher, a mother of two teenagers, and a person who just always seemed to be half a step behind on keeping up with her life.

I wasn’t expecting bad news that March. I had lived with the suspicious cloud of breast cancer over my head for many years. In 1977 my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent a mastectomy. The cancer had spread to several of her lymph nodes. She was on rounds of chemotherapy for two years. This June my mother turns eighty. My older sister, my half-sister, and an aunt are all breast cancer survivors. My paternal grandmother became a breast cancer survivor in her seventies and went on to live to the age of 92. I have been carefully watched, palpated, and mammogramed most of my adult life. I had a lumpectomy four years ago in my right breast that was benign. So, when my doctor sent me in for an ultrasound of my left breast, I had lost the nervousness and fear that used to accompany a lump. However, when my doctor called me on the following Saturday morning and asked me to come straight in to her office, even though it was actually closed, I knew what I was in for. Or at least I thought I did.

On April 10, 2006 I had a lumpectomy and was officially diagnosed with breast cancer. The cancer was larger than 1 cm and had broken though the milk duct and was therefore determined to be invasive, even though none of the seven lymph nodes removed were malignant. I was lucky in that they had caught it early, but the doctors all agreed that I should undergo chemotherapy and radiation to help insure that the cancer had not spread and would not come back. Over the next six months my body, my mind and my spirit would be challenged and my body would succumb to the effects of the treatments and weaken in ways that would eventually make me feel as sick as the word cancer implied.

I had a very difficult time with the chemotherapy and this was complicated by the fact that I was uncomfortable with my oncologist. As an educator and life-long learner, I’m not one to submit to extensive medical treatments without doing my best to learn what the doctors are doing to me and why. My oncologist was extremely busy, seemed to overbook herself and never had the time nor the patience to answer my questions to my satisfaction. I had educated myself to cancer protocols and I wanted to know which chemotherapy and accompanying drugs she was prescribing and why. Her unwillingness to compromise in this area, by spending a few minutes of my office visits discussing her plans for me, made my treatments all the more difficult. I had to strengthen my will to stand up for myself and get my questions answered at every visit. As soon as the chemotherapy courses were finished I talked about this problem with my surgeon, who I felt very comfortable with. He is a cancer survivor himself and I think this gives him a kindness and empathy that is not usually associated with surgeons. He agreed with me that although my oncologist was highly regarded medically, it is important that you can have a certain rapport with your oncologist; after all, the oncologist is in charge of your long term care in keeping the cancer from returning. So, he discussed two other oncologists with me, and I selected my new oncologist. I cannot tell you how happy I am with this choice. Although it shouldn’t be scary, “firing” your cancer doctor and hiring a new one seemed weird. But it’s not. My oncologist now is absolutely amazing. She is smart, personable and sees me as an individual. She takes the time to discuss the treatment options she recommends and treats me as a partner in the medical decisions concerning my health. This is especially important right now because I had a somewhat rare and very violent reaction to the tamoxophin. Deciding that the side effects were a lot more dangerous to my health than the benefits, I have chosen to not take the estrogen blockers. So I have to trust that my doctor is very vigilant in making sure the cancer does not reoccur. I encourage anyone who instinctually feels uncomfortable with any medical professional in their health care to speak out and not be afraid to insist on replacing that person if necessary.

So, one thing I would really like to focus on is how my friends and family saw me through the harsh effects of the treatments, how the strength, courage, love, kindness, and prayers of the people in my life supported me and gave me the hope, strength and courage I needed to get through it all.

I work as a high school teacher and I did not have near enough sick days accumulated to get me through the amount of sick leave my doctors were recommending. I was put into a leave share program and within the first day it was approved, my colleagues had donated enough of their own sick days to see me through. I cannot express how grateful my family is for the generosity of the people who donated their days, alleviating some of our financial worries.

There were so many ways that people reached out to show their support. A colleague of mine in the English department sent me an email about her own experience of living through her mother’s breast cancer. Her words were so full of courage and hope and inspired me so much that I printed the email and kept it in my bedside drawer, to take out and read when I got depressed and needed cheering up. One of my closest friends and colleagues gave me a subscription to Entertainment Weekly, which turned out to be my favorite bedside reading. How light and fun and generally distracting it was to get lost in reviews of movies, television, and books. Another friend bought me cool new lounging pajamas and boxer shorts for those days when I wanted to stay in my pj’s all day long. I think she knew how wearing something jazzy and comfortable when you are home and feeling blue can be that extra something that helps you feel OK. My older sister sent me her breast cancer books and literature and was there for me long distance whenever I needed to talk to someone who had recently experienced breast cancer. Another friend, who I had known casually for years, reached out to me and shared her own story of breast cancer recovery, creating a bond that added a new and deeper connection to our friendship. My girlfriend on Maui sent me a book on healing that led me to experience healing on an entirely different level than the one the doctors were working on. Another friend brought over a home cooked meal for my family after every chemo treatment. My mom sent me a card every week for the entire time I was on chemo and radiation, some were loving and thoughtful, some were outrageously funny - my mom always seemed to know exactly what would cheer me up each week. The list of friends and family who reached out to help me through the ordeal is endless, but every phone call checking up on me, every card, every act of kindness, helped.

My husband, my daughter, and my son were there for me 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They are the main reasons I stuck with the chemotherapy. Every single day they reminded me how grateful I am for my life. The tenderness and attentiveness of my husband and my son was amazing. The quiet yet powerful presence of my daughter watching over me strengthened my every day.

I’d like to share with you one of the most memorable moments from my darker days of cancer treatments. One day I went to pick up my son from a friend’s house. My daughter was home making a special meal. She said she wanted to treat me to a home cooked dinner and I have to say I was fairly excited by the idea that at seventeen she was starting to show an interest in cooking. She was planning on making some of the dishes from the food TV network. For some odd reason, when I was too nauseated to eat or even stand the odor of cooking, I would watch the food network and download all the recipes I wanted to try later, when I felt up to eating. I’d had a hard time watching the food network before. It would make me hungry and I couldn’t get through a half hour show without getting up and making something to eat. But while I was on chemo, I could watch it by the hour. I would sometimes watch for an entire day.

This day, my daughter had looked up some of my downloaded recipes and was going to make them for dinner, but she wanted me out of the house because I can be a little bit bossy in the kitchen. When I returned home I got more than a home cooked meal with recipes from the food network. My living room was full of my friends. My daughter had planned a surprise and had secretly invited my friends over for a hat and scarf party to cheer me up. You see, I had recently lost my hair. I wasn’t comfortable with a wig, it didn’t suit me and aggravated the heat and the hot flashes brought on by the sudden menopause the chemo had caused. I guess I had been hiding out a bit while I got used to my new look. But it just took that one day, surrounded by the love and support of my friends, for me to get over myself. We ate the delicious food prepared by my daughter. I opened my gifts and we took pictures of me in each and every hat. My friends tried on the wig that I didn’t like so much and posed for pictures. I had felt uncomfortable taking off my baseball cap to try on that first hat, allowing my friends to see me bald. But after a lot of fun and laughs, love and support, they got me to take a picture without any hat, or scarf or wig. And I am smiling in this picture with my bald head. I am smiling and I am happy and I am truly alive and well. You can see it in my eyes. And I am grateful for that picture and for that day.

On Labor Day weekend I was about halfway through my radiation treatments when my friends planned a ladies only weekend retreat at a beach house on the North Shore. “D” told me we had been talking about doing this for too many years and my bout with breast cancer was a wakeup call that we needed to start doing those things that we talk about doing but don’t get around to. Our husbands and kids would just have to get by without us for three days. Those three days of hanging out on the lanai, relaxing and yakking, of swimming in the ocean, long walks on the beach collecting shells, and yes, especially the evening when “J” put on the pump it up playlist on her I-pod and all the women danced their hearts out in the living room - those three days were amazing. And if I helped inspire through my illness a spark amongst my friends to live life this fully, than I am grateful and fortunate and can see the silver lining.

The courage of those of us who become victims of breast cancer is so intricately linked with the courage of those of you who are there for us, who support us, who live through the fear and the sickness with us and rejoice in our triumphs, who give us hope and remind us, everyday, why we are so grateful to survive.

View from the beach house balcony.

My friends under the umbrella.

That first year I could not go in the sun, so cruised up here reading and relaxing.

A typical dinner on the balcony.

Edit Update: The Laborless Labor Day Ladies only weekend has become something we all look forward to. Last September was our third year of taking the time to enjoy our friendships and take a long breath of the good life.

For more spins or to join the Spin Cycle, head on over to our host, Sprite's Keeper.

There are a couple of contests going you might be interested in. Over at Tiffany's she's giving away two $100 gift certificates to Target.

The Ladies at The Secret is in the Sauce are getting ready for the Spring Fling on March 10th, lots of contests that day.

Mom on a Spin is having a limerick contest and is giving away an autographed first edition copy of her upcoming book that is being published.

Conversation with my daughter last night…

Me (trying to catch up on blog reading).

Daughter comes into the office.

Mom, one of your former students is in my Woman’s Studies class.

Mmm. That’s nice. (Meanwhile I was reading this post of Motherhood in NYC. It you don’t read Marinka you should check her out. She is so, so funny. Great last blog to read before retiring if you need an uplift).

It’s weird running into your old students. Actually, this one is weird.

Yeah, well, at 150 students a year, over the course of many years, there’s bound to be all types.

No, this one is really weird. Kind of irritating.

I’m still only half listening. Daughter continues.

So, I’m sitting with my friend Brian, a few minutes before class starts, and this guy in front of us turns around and says, “Are you Ms Pseudo’s daughter?” And I say, ahh yeah. My friend Brian was in the middle of telling me a story, so we both just sit there awkwardly and your student keeps going.

Your mom was my teacher.

That’s nice.

I was in her class my senior year.

Ah, that’s nice.

She had cancer that year.

Mom, I swear to God, Brian had to cover his mouth and put his head down to keep from laughing. What am I supposed to say to that, “uh, yeah, I think I remember the year my mom had cancer??”

He probably just wanted to know if I was doing alright.

Yeah, well, maybe. But the next thing he says was “Did your mom’s hair grow back? She was bald when she was my teacher.” Brian’s head is down on the desk and his shoulders are shaking he is laughing so hard.

OK. I turn from the glare of the computer monitor. She has my attention and my mirth as well at this point.

Well did you laugh? Cause it is kind of funny when you put it like that.

She IS laughing, finally. Although, I'm pretty sure it is the first time she has laughed at this story.

I might be laughing right now while I’m telling you this. It is funny when I think about it. But I was actually kind of pissed off. I gritted my teeth and told him your hair had grown back and you were doing fine.

Is that it sweetie? Can I go back to reading?

MOM! Brian and I have switched where we sit. But your student keeps following us around and sitting right in front of us!

STAWTTN: Rewind

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Friday Foto: Sacred Places

Before we get started, heads up to this contest. If you are not famliar with SITS (The Secret is in the Sauce - see sidebar for badge), it is a great blog run by the sweetest ladies in the blogoshere. Very supportive. Lots of contests. The latest is a really great one, so check it out.

Now, back to today's post...

My walks keep me healthy. My husband gave me an I-shuffle (which, according to my students is an embarrassingly ghetto version of the coveted contraption) and this addition has added an essential element to my walking that I had not realized was missing. The walks are, in part, to clear my head and center myself. Too much of my focus is in the mental processes. My Chi Kun therapist and my acupuncturist both have told me that my energy needs to be in my “furnace,” (center-just above the belly button). Not in my head. Which can lead to migraines. Stress. Stress can lead to illness. Want to stay in remission. Must. Clear. Head.

HOWEVER, there are times where I find myself mentally preoccupied with less than stellar thoughts while pacing down the trails. Or, some irritating song gets stuck in my head.

Presto bingo, enter the magic I-shuffle. Sets the mood. Blast the thoughts from my brain.

Off we go.

BC Says welcome to the bike path.

First stop, the “feral” kitty cats. Along this bike path, which is one of my walks, there are dozens of “wild” cats. I’m not sure why Hawaii has so many homeless kitties. I have heard that people move and leave their cats. I don’t know anyone who does that. But along this bike path there are a dozen or more places where a pride of cats has claimed their turf. There are ladies who walk with a wagon every evening and feed the kitties. They catch the ones they can, take them to the Humane Society, have them fixed, then bring them back. Most of the cats come out to see if you are going to feed them. One or two like attention and want to be pet.

One of my best friends gave me a book when I was going through chemo called The Ultimate Healing. It is based on Buddhism and has meditation techniques to promote healing through a grave illness. One chapter was about doing good deeds for animals and the tranquility and peace this creates. I got BC that year. And I feed the feral cats. I don’t have a wagon, so I bring a bag that I can carry and feed the little ones that look like they get bullied from the food.

The long and winding road, that leads.....

To the gazebo. A sometimes stretching spot.
Sunrise on the piers.

Deep breath in. Slow breath out. Deep breath in. Slow breath out. There is something about being surrounded by water, standing on the end of the pier, that cannot be duplicated with yoga and breathing exercises in my living room. This is my favorite yoga spot.

A second before you hear it. A second before you see it. You sense it. And there it is. The still surface of the water suddenly erupts as a school of fish changes directions and for a brief moment they simultaneously break through the water’s surface. The orchestra of a coordinated swoosh. A hundred little splashes. BC starts and trembles and for a second thinks about bolting.

Only one time it was not a school of fish. Right there in front of us a baby sting ray came flying out of the still surface of the water. It performed an acrobatic air bank and for a second looked like it was copying one of the planes that flies overhead on its way to the airport for a landing. A black shadow with a long black tail. Held in mid-air for a second not fifteen feet in front of BC and me. Take a picture with your mind, ain’t no time for cameras. A little gift from the sea.

It was gone in another second. We stood for a long time hoping for another show, but it was only meant to happen once. Sometimes, that’s just the way it is.

Then, it is time to turn around and head back.

Thanks for stopping by for a little slice of PseudoLand.

For more Friday Fotos, head on over to Candid Carrie's.

It’s Just Another Hill Baby

In the theme of breast cancer awareness month, please click the pink ribbon in the sidebar.

In October of 2006 I returned to the classroom following a six month leave for breast cancer treatments. My first day back to work presented many obstacles. One, I wasn’t ready to go back. Two, I needed to decide what type of fashion statement I intended to make with my fuzzy bald head. Three, I had to figure out how much I should share with the students about my illness. Four, it was the middle of the second quarter and I didn’t even know my students. Five, I wasn’t ready to go back to work. I’m sorry? Oh, I already listed that? Too bad. Let’s just make I WASN’T READY TO GO BACK TO WORK numbers five through ten.

I wasn’t ready to go back to work because I felt like crap. I was weak. The chemo and radiation treatments had left me anemic, depressed, and with all kinds of digestive system challenges. Seven months before, when the peanut size malignancy had been discovered, I was capable of body boarding five foot waves, not to mention duck diving the same wall of water should it break in front of me while I was paddling out. I could paddle out 150 yards and catch a wave within minutes of lining up. I could power walk for miles with a friend and gab the entire time. I was also capable of waking up at 4 AM, grading and prepping for two hours before work, teaching all day with the necessary energy to face a room full of 25 to 30 teenagers every 70 minutes, and then, at the end of the day, attending meetings after school that usually managed to make me feel like an unfocused and bored ADD wannabe. Then I’d go home to my family and attempt to keep pace with all that is required to run a home with teenagers.

Seven months later, I was not the same person. I needed to sleep eight to nine hours a night, plus a two hour nap every afternoon. My husband was taking me for walks to help me gain my strength back. Even going slowly, I would break out in a cold sweat and sometimes my legs and hands would start trembling. I was just two weeks out of treatments and gaining back my health was requiring my full time attention. But my sick days had run out. My doctors would have preferred I take more time off, but taking off without pay was not an option. I preferred the physical challenge of going back to work over causing even more financial hardship to my family.

I wasn’t looking too pretty and I sure did not want to scare the students. Rumors can run rampant with teens and their dramas and a colleague had already warned me that the kids were saying I was dying. Or dead. Tough as they act, I didn’t want to walk in looking like a tale from the crypt. My students from the year before would remember how I’d been, but the poor kids in my class this year didn’t know me, didn’t know my pale, sallow, mushy, and bald self was not the norm. But I had a problem in that I wasn’t wearing wigs. That’s another story, but for multiple reasons, wigs and I were not a suitable partnership. At home I went sans headwear. Trips to the store – baseball cap. Fancy outing? A scarf.

Our school has a no hat or scarf rule inside the buildings. Well, OK, it’s actually no hats. But it means anything on the head. I realized, of course, that I had a fairly good reason to break the rule. Now I can be a lot of things, including a hypocrite sometimes I suppose, however, I try not to be a hypocrite whenever possible. Like the “no drinking except water rule,” do you have any idea how many mornings I could go for another cup of coffee? But don’t. Since the kids can’t drink juice or soda or coffee or whatever, neither do I. Still, I was thinking that the kids would rather I wear a scarf wrapped around my baldness than deal with the uncomfortable situation of my egg head in their face at the front of the room.

Despite all of these dilemmas, early one morning I found myself getting ready for work. I dressed nicely and brightly, including a floral printed scarf. I carefully applied makeup and used a dark shadow to simulate a hint of eyebrows. I packed lunch and snacks that would keep my energy up. And off I went.

While walking from the administration building, where I had signed in and picked up my mail, to my building I found myself breaking out in a cold sweat. We’re talking all of fifty yards. I shuffled along at the pace of someone moving from breakfast to bingo in a convalescent hospital. One of the VP’s swung by me in a security (golf) cart.

Want a ride to your building?

I glanced with real desire at the other side of his bench seat.

No thanks. Gotta get my exercise to get my strength back.

He smiled and asked if I was sure and sure I was sure and as he drove off the wimpy half of me was screaming inside Come back, come back…….

For my classes that day I suspended work on whatever the substitute teacher had been in the middle of doing. I told my students that since I had missed the first days of school, and since they were all familiar with each other, I wasn’t going to make them all do introductions and bonding activities all over again. Instead, I would let them get to know me. They could ask all the questions that day. A little role reversal. I told them they could ask me anything they wanted. Hesitant at first, the students soon warmed up. My classes flew by and this turned out to be a great ice breaker. Lots of the questions were to be expected:

How long have you been teaching?

Are you married?

Do you have kids? How many? How old are they?

Are you a hard grader? (This is relative to the fact that the long term sub had given A’s to 95% of the class first quarter)

Some got brave:

Is it true you had cancer?

Are you better?

This activity meandered into places I had not intended. Once the kids discovered that I was completely comfortable talking about my illness, they got braver and started asking questions that had been on their minds for quite awhile, long before a teacher’s cancer had entered their lives. Some of them had family members that had gone through or were going through cancer. These students were leery of asking those relatives questions as they were afraid of upsetting a loved one. Me? I had not only given them a green light, I had pushed them into the street.

What is chemotherapy? How is it different than radiation?

Why do people get sick from chemotherapy?

By the last class of the day, I felt right at home again in the classroom. I was sitting in a chair at the front of the room by that point (I had only lasted standing on my feet for half of the first class). This last class was an exceptionally bright group of kids and for the first time that day, one of the students felt brave enough to ask the ten dollar question:

What kind of cancer did you have?

I had mixed feelings about using the breast word with a large group of teenagers. In any other case scenario, the male students would undoubtedly say or do something inappropriate. But I took a deep breath and just went for it.

I had breast cancer.

How did you find out? Was it a mammogram?

Actually no. I found the lump myself five months after my last mammogram. Ladies, that’s an important lesson. Remember to do your monthly self exam.

Out of the corner of my eye, a hand was being raised in the front row, just to my right. When I turned my attention to the student who I thought had a question, a curious sight. The girl did have her hand raised in the air, but her eyes were not meeting mine. They were reflective of the activity she was engaged in. You see, her other hand was busy feeling herself up. Evidently, my mention of self breast exam had reminded her that she had been remiss of late. Spontaneously, apparently without much thought, she had embarked on a little impromptu breast exploration. As she was facing me and her back was to the rest of the class, no one else had noticed. I think I had to shut my mouth which was hanging open.

I didn’t even know her name yet. I definitely didn’t know her well enough to know if she could handle a little gas from me on what she was doing.

I pointed to another hand raised in the back.

Class, and life, went on.

Meditation and Guitar Hero Part 3: The Final Chapter

If you are just just starting the story, you should begin here.

If I could draw a cartoon of myself, this is what it would look like. A gigundus head filled with words and phrases and images, of plans and lists, of retold conversations, of categorical meanderings. The head would be 2/3 of my total self. If you think I’m kidding, I actually had someone tell me that was exactly what my aura looked like. About 15 years ago I used to go to a chi kun massage therapist. An amazing woman who had studied with a master in China. She was the only entity on the planet that could do anything about my migraine headaches before vasodilators were invented. One day, while I waited for my appointment, the master that she had studied with in China and who was staying at her place, he started talking to me in broken English, but mostly Chinese and I couldn’t understand a word he said. The more I looked perplexed, the faster and louder he talked at me. Finally, my massage therapist came out to the waiting area and I looked pleadingly at her for help. She cocked her head to the side, spoke to him in Chinese, and then started laughing.

What’s so funny?

Master Wong says you look like an upside down pear.

At first I thought she got it backwards and this old healer was telling me to take some poundage off of my big fat ass.

She smiled.

No no. Nothing you don’t know already. He says you think too much. All of your chi, all of your energy is in your head. That is why you have headaches.

Well, duh.

My massage therapist moved to Maui ten years ago and my head has been blowing up like a balloon off and on ever since.

Back to last summer, my elephantized metaphorical head, and my inability to get the constant stream of chatter to shut the fuck up so I could find out where I’d put my happy place. I mean, I couldn’t go for two hours walks and exhaust myself every day. Well, I could. It WAS summer. But I was enamored of blogging and wanted a quicker fix for my conundrum.

Blogging equals writing equals a creative outlet.

Blogging came with fringe benefits: Internet friends and blog buds.

Sitting in front of the computer for too long at a time couldn’t be good for my long term health care.

Not meditating and not centering oneself is not conducive to being creative.

A freaking vicious cycle of events was presenting itself.

In June there was Father’s Day as well as Son’s B-Day. They collaborated and together they acquired an X-box and the infamous game – Guitar Hero. Except for Son, we are not a big video game family. Husband, Daughter and myself have never joined Son for long when he’s gone through video game fazes. But we weirdly bonded over Guitar Hero. It started with Son and Husband. Which was fine with me because they weren’t on the computer and I had the office and internet all to myself. Then Daughter got on board. One day they pushed, pressured and cajoled me into trying it out.

I WAS BLOODY FRICKIN AWFUL. Screech scratch. Booed off the stage.

Son gave me some pointers.

I barely made it through “easy” level on Pat Benetar’s Hit Me with Your Best Shot.
But I was transfixed by those descending color notes. I started getting up before everyone (not unusual here –I am the early riser in this family) to practice. A video game. Who’d have thunk?
Before I knew it, an hour or two would go by, where I would tell myself, just one more song.

Was I hooked on the feel of air guitar??? Not exactly. It actually aggravated my carpal tunnel crapola.

The thing that hooked me the most was that in order to follow those descending notes, in order to score the highest for a song (OK. Highest on the easy level. WHATEVER.), I COULD NOT THINK. Incessant conversations were banned from my brain. Needless prattling and list making and planning and all that mind fucking chatter was cleared.

After my Guitar Hero session I would do my 10 minutes of yoga stretches and 15 minutes of “meditating.”

Once school started I stopped my jam sessions. I stopped stretching. I stopped even trying to get back to attempting transcendence. I recently read Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. Now I’m convinced I need to go to an ashram in India and get professional help to find the silence and stillness while sitting cross-legged.

Until I can work that out, I’m heading for the X-box. Or a stretch and a silence. Whichever works.

Meditation and Guitar Hero Part 2

If you didn't read part one, you might want to start here.

Then, in March 2006 I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I was in for six months of treatments. A lumpectomy, followed a month later by surgery to insert a port. Then four months of chemotherapy and two months of radiation. I was both afraid and conflicted. Although I knew these treatments were needed to staff off the chance of the cancer metastasizing, I was also aware of the devastating effects the treatments would have on my healthy body. I needed some proactive tools of my own. I needed to DO SOMETHING. Help the doctors out while they shot poison into my body.

I read everything everybody gave me and stuff I found on my own. I read an article on Melissa Etheridge and another on Sheryl Crow; on how they had both dealt with their breast cancer treatments. Both of them said that mediation practices got them through cancer treatments. One of my closest and dearest friends sent me a book on healing and meditation. It was all about using meditative practices for helping the mind in healing the body. Huh. I could put my busy mind to work for a good cause. Except that it meant meditating.

MUST FIND HAPPY PLACE. MUST FIND WAY TO STAY IN HAPPY PLACE.

So, I read the book and it was very helpful and inspirational. I sat cross-legged everyday and “meditated.” I used the mantras, which also were in English, but very practical and geared towards healing from a devastating or terminal illness. Some of the mantras were too long and I figured it did not help my meditation attempts to stop and read from the book every time I took a breath. I settled on one that I could manage.

Deep Breath. White light in. Visualize the light of heaven streaming towards you and entering with your breath. Focus on this light moving through your body. Let it reach each and every cell. Picture it surrounding any cancer cells.

Exhale. Black smoke out. Visualize the diseased cells being carried by your exhaled breath, through your bloodstream and out through your lungs, being expelled from your body.

I was able to stay in this mode for fifteen minutes, sometimes twenty. I still never got to what I imagined was “transcendence,” but I did manage to keep out other thoughts.

Then I got well. OK. I realize I need to make it to the 5 year mark to truly say that, but once you are fully back in the swing of things at work, once you can physically do everything you did pre-chemo etc, and once your hair is grown back… It’s difficult to remember you are officially still in recovery. I let things slip a little. I stopped meditating. I went back to having a cup of coffee and reading news and whatever on the internet in the early morning instead of meditating. Each day I’d say TOMORROW. I MUST STRETCH AND BE SILENT BEFORE I START MY DAY.

This is about where I was at the beginning of last summer. After a very busy year at work and my new personal project (yep, if you are here you are reading it), my mind was busier than ever. Now, while I tried to meditate, blog ideas clogged my brain, developed in my brain, transformed and morphed and got better or funnier or more poignant until, before I realized what I was doing, I not only did not attempt to shut my mind the fuck up, the next thing I knew I was at the computer. And I’m not even talking about other mindful pursuits. Lesson plans. Research. Assessment. There are a lot of ideas that can float one’s cognitive boat.

What?!? Still no guitar Hero! Shame on me. Tommorrow will be the final chapter.

Don't forget to please click the pink ribbon link in the sidebar.

Meditation and Guitar Hero Part 1

A blog I like to read, Unmitigated, introduced me to the concept of mulit-part postings. I enjoyed it on her blog. So, since this post ended up quite long, I'm posting it in parts.

I have had a long term relationship with the voice in my head. I used to think it was me, but after extensive reading I have learned that is not necessarily true. According to many reads, including my latest read, it is “ego.” I’m not sure how Freudian this latest author intended to be. But there it is.

Juxtapose this with my sincere desire to meditate myself into a state of nirvana. Since my late teen years, which means 30+ years ago, I have been fascinated as well as envious of those who can “transcend.”

However, this is what goes on inside my head while I meditate:

Happy place. Check. Deep breath. Check. Happy place. Deep breath. Happy place. Deep breath.

I should type up and copy one of the better student essays on an overhead and have the whole class discuss and point out what is working.

YES! Maybe a list of common errors for their binders.

Suzie’s was great. Maybe Dana’s. Yeah. Hers was not only good, it was quite unique.

Oh shit. There are thoughts in my head.

Happy place. Check. Deep breath. Check. Happy place. Deep breath. Happy place. Deep breath.

I could go on, but I’m sure you get the picture. I have been blessed cursed with a busy mind. I’m a planner when I’m sitting still. Task orientation takes over. The list of things that I think about while meditating is both endless and exhausting. And that is on a good day. When someone has pissed me off or something is not going right, I ruminate, I relive conversations, I have witty and sarcastic comebacks.

The only way to get away is to GET AWAY. So, instead of meditating, I take long walks. I boogie board. I snorkel. These activities release the preeminence of mind and channel my energy into physicality or nature contemplation. It may not be meditation, but it’s the closest I can get.

Twelve years ago, a friend asked me to go to a meditation workshop with her. It was very cool, very vegan, and the instructor informed us that it is not absolutely necessary to sit cross-legged to meditate. One can lie down. Ahh. We were also given meditation mantras. English versions. I’m not allowed to give them away, but according to this group of meditative instructors, these are actual phrases that have been passed down since the time of Jesus. Someone, somewhere, sometime, tore these meditative practices from the bible for some unscrupulous reason. That’s what they said and I figure it’s plausible if not probable.

So, I lie down, and take the deep breaths and let the phrases attach themselves to my breath. And voila! Not exactly meditation, but, BEST NAP EVER! The instructor told me that was fine. If I fell asleep, that was what my body needed. So, for ten years I practiced meditation by lying down and going to sleep with these invaluable tools.

What?! No Guitar Hero even mentioned? Stay tuned tomorrow for part 2.
Please give a click on the pink ribbbon in the sidebar. Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

BOO!

Insane Mama is having a Halloween contest. I haven’t done a contest yet and I love Halloween, so…why not?

Instead of one great story (I don’t really have a hit-it-out-of-the ballpark Halloween story) I have a few fond memories.

Circa 1960’s
When I was young and growing up in the San Fernando Valley with my two sisters, Halloween was a huge deal. Very similar to Jan, we COULDN’T WAIT for dinner to be over and dark to descend so we could go trick or treating. My dad had this horrid awful mask that he would drag out, not only for Halloween but also for slumber parties. It beat the shit out of anything they sell today. It was MORE REAL. Not so rubbery. It was the scariest, creepiest, wrinkled, evil face ever. At least that’s the way I remember and I’m sticking to it. He’d wait until our guard was down, which means sitting on the floor, sorting our candies, and with mask, trench coat, and big ol’ boots, he’d slam open the back screen door and come tearing at us. Clenching hands and BRUUUUUHAHAHA. I’m surprised we never pissed our pants. That’s how much we fell for it every year.

Halloween 1991
Daughter was just over two and we had mostly managed to keep her from chocolate and sweets. Instead of taking her trick or treating, we all dressed up and took her to a restaurant/club. You see, my husband and I met working at Bobby McGee’s. I was cocktailing to pay my way through college and my husband was a waiter. EVERYONE wore a costume at this crazy place to work. Even though we had both moved on, we still had a lot of friends there and they did a happy hour thingy on Halloween. So we dressed as the Flintstones. Cave clothes- mine and Daughter’s hair twisted around big, fake bones. It’s a great picture of back in the day when my husband and I used to both work out. Daughter was two and was the most precious Pebbles ever. Not that I’m prejudiced or anything. We went at, like 5 PM, and even after a shitload of fun and frivolity, we were back home by 8. Within 5 minutes of sitting down some kids came trick or treating. There was no hiding from the two year old the fact that I was giving stuff away and that was the end of her not getting candy for Halloween.

Halloween 1993
We had just bought our home that summer and it was Son’s first Halloween. He was 16 months old. He had the CUTEST fucking tiger costume. He toddled along and I swear our block looked like that scene in ET, where swarms of kids come out right at dusk. Being a new neighborhood, it was a beehive of toddlerhood. I was holding his hand and waited on the sidewalk as Daughter and our friend’s kids went up to the first house. Son could barely talk, but he sure let it be known that he had observed what went on at the front door. He grunted and grumbled to see inside the kids pumpkin buckets. When he figured out that they were partaking of give-away stuff, he pulled and pulled on my arm until I walked him up to the next door. That was the beginning of his professional status at trick or treating. Everyone thought the baby tiger was too too cute and gave him twice as much as the other kids. But half way around the block he figured out how to unwrap a piece of candy and that was the end. Afterwards he wanted to sit in the middle of the sidewalk and eat his whole loot. My friend had to take all the kids around so I could haul his little butt home and check his candy before he scarfed down a razor blade or an LSD tab.

Halloween 2006
My children are 17 and 14 and they have made plans to go out with some friends. Son is actually trick or treating in a friendly neighborhood that lets the teens keep up the good work. His professional status is still intact. Daughter is in a play and after rehearsals they are having a party. My husband has to work. I have the night to myself, but I’m being a Halloween Homebody and have decided I don’t want to answer the door and give away candy by myself. So I turn the porch light off and all the downstairs lights too. I go upstairs and treat myself to an aromatherapy bath with candles. As leave the bath I look at myself in the candlelit mirror and contemplate the effects of the last few months. I’m still officially bald, but the first soft down of baby soft fuzz can be felt more than seen. My radiation treatments, finished just two weeks before, have left a thickening of red welts under my left arm. But it’s not as bad as they said it would be. The aloe must have really helped. My scars are still fairly new and jagged and my skin still has the sallowness of all that chemo. But I made it. I’m done with the treatments and have returned to work. I walk to the upstairs window and peek through the blinds to see the families on the sidewalks with their ballerinas and spidermen. I don’t feel the least bit sad to be by myself. I had insisted my kids not stay home for me; I want to make up for all those days and nights they had hung out with me in my room the previous summer. I curl up in bed with a book, grateful that the worst is over. Happy that life is moving forward and back to normal.