Monthly Archives: May 2019

Purple Hair

29 Wednesday May 2019

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Dateline: Santa Fe,  July 2018, on one of the best summer vacations this girl has ever had. Not counting Italy. But that was fall, not summer. Anyway….

The Night at the Plaza

The music was heard two blocks away as we walked toward the Plaza, so that gives you an idea of the volume once we got closer. We found a small patch of unoccupied ground, unfolded our lawn chairs, and sat down. The flyer classified the sound as Americana/Indie, and the people dancing were enjoying it as much as those of us who were just people-watching. The relentless heat had finally abated…or was it the ice cream the cooled us down? New Mexico’s Largest Free Music Festival seemed to draw a mostly local crowd enjoying a local band on an outdoor stage in a park. I was glad we came.plaza

It was plenty loud, so my friends Patti, Josie, and Evelyn and I were not trying to make conversation but were communicating with our own kind of language: raised eyebrows, smiles, thumbs up or down, nods, and turns of the head as one character or another caught our attention. Like the chicken on a leash who had  her toenails painted to match her human’s toenails. Or the lady in the shiny pink stiletto heels that were sinking at every step, making her stumble as walked across the grass. Or the kid climbing the tree next to the sign that read “Do Not Climb The Tree.”

Or the blonde woman in the long-sleeved black sweater (oh yes, and did I mention how warm it was?) and khaki pants. She walked across the Plaza directly to where I was sitting; I had no doubt that I was her target.  I had no idea who she was or if I might recognize her from when I lived there a lifetime ago. Yeah… no clue.

“Do you … (something) …  ?” she asked me.

Eyebrows up in response. “Excuse me?” I half shouted.

“Do you live here?” she repeated. “I hope so.” (Wait-what?? Did I hear that right?)SFe Patti Evelyn

“No, sorry, I don’t.  But can we help you with something?” I thought if I didn’t know where whatever she wanted was, my friends who were all locals could help.

How to Get Perspective, Maybe

Her next statement took me by surprise. “I hoped you did, because my husband I are thinking of moving here, and with your purple hair – which I love, by the way – I thought you must not be a conservative and we are trying to get away from them and so if you lived here, there must be other liberals here, too, and we might like it here.”

Wow. It was a loaded statement, to be sure; I gave her points for taking a risk. My next thought was, I don’t really have purple hair. I have a few streaks of colored hairspray, which happened to be pink that day, but … whatever. I wondered if she had too much to drink. I looked around for the invisible husband and caught Patti’s questioning look. I shrugged just enough that my new friend saw it.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “You probably think I’m weird, and I’m not, but really, you just gave me so much hope.” She actually looked let down.

Hope? From (not) purple hair?!? I tried to encourage her with a smile, and she responded in kind.

In the next few minutes, she told me that she is 65 and her husband is 75. She just recently had a birthday and realized that if she divided her life into 5 year blocks, she has lived 13 blocks of time, and given her education, self-care, access to medical care, and current lifestyle, she expects she will live another 3 blocks, but her husband may only have 1 block of time left. So it’s important that they make some decisions before time runs out. Whew! And there was more.

They live in Arizona, have sold their places in Mexico and on Cape Cod, and are looking for the last place they will live. She is concerned that Scottsdale has become too conservative and she is fearful she no longer belongs there. (Ooh, belonging. I can relate!) She likes Santa Fe but wants to make sure that there are people like her here because she will undoubtedly end up alone when her husband dies. So he told her to go talk to some locals and find out what it was really like behind the glossy pages of the magazines. My purple (or pink) hair caught her attention.

I can’t fault the logic of talking to someone who might have a different perspective on the quality of life to be had there, but to pick someone in a park listening to a band because she has color in her hair, which must make her a liberal, seemed somewhat random (and maybe a bit desperate?)  to me. I took her at her word, though, and engaged in the conversation. She seemed harmless enough. I’m glad I did; she turned out to be a fun person to talk with, albeit a little intense.

It wasn’t just about her. She again expressed genuine fear about not belonging wherever she was. I couldn’t be sure but I had the feeling she thought she might find herself alone sooner rather than later in regards to the husband. I shared that I was solowingnow and had been for over 3 years, and that I had moved around some in my career so I could relate to the right fit of a particular community.  I told her that I just recently had a conversation of a similar vein with my daughter about my choice to stay living in Virginia after Kevin died. Renae was concerned that I was isolating myself and not being connected enough to her or my other kids and their families.

Belonging

To the contrary, I stayed in part because I did feel like I was accepted there and belonged. My neighbors had made sure to include me, to seek me out, to check on me.  In fact, I felt/feel more connected there in the short time I had been there than I had in the last five years I had lived in South Dakota. Plus, I needed time to just be me for once; not be someone’s mother or wife or any anything. To figure out who I am now and what I want out of the rest of my life. She gave me a hug and said she just knew I was the right person for her to talk with.

An interesting side note: I had also just started reading Brene Brown’s book Braving the Wilderness, The Quest for True Belonging and the Courage to Stand Alone. I highly recommend it. (Update: check her out on Netflix also.) Brown is a social scientist who has researched and written on experiences that bring meaning to our lives and how we need to belong to ourselves even when we want to be part of something else.  She says early on in this book that “you will always belong anywhere you show up as yourself and talk about yourself and your work in a real way.” I recommended the book to her. And that night, I felt like I belonged there and that talking with this woman was a very natural thing to do. Of course, I didn’t have to defend myself to her; she was looking for a like-minded person, and she found one. Thanks to my purple (pink) hair, apparently.

We carried on our conversation above the music and somehow we heard each other. Probably because we were both curious about the other and were really listening hard. I felt like I made a difference to her, and that felt really good to me. I remembered also the good times in Santa Fe, not the disillusionment that ultimately led to my leaving…23 years ago. I found myself thinking that if I moved back here and if she moved here, we could be friends. Her name is Jean Marie, and maybe someday I’ll see her on the Plaza again. I’ll have to put more purple (or pink, as it really was last night) in my hair so she’ll recognize me.

Reflecting on Who I Am .. Was … Am …

I hadn’t thought much about the fact that my hair could say so much about me.  Then again, I suppose the natural silver color alone is a statement about me; the purple color is just another dimension. I’m sure I send all kinds of messages by the way I dress, the people I hang with, the tattoo on my wrist, the smiles I give, the venues I show up at; why not the color of my hair? or skin? or height, or weight, or the accent in my voice? I wonder what she told her husband about me that I didn’t tell her. I think I had a tendency to dismiss all those factoids most of the time, but since this night, I have started to pay more attention. As Neale Donald Walsch has said in Conversations With God, “The only reason to do anything is as an expression of who you are.”  

The story could stop here, but no. Ever since that night, I have had a running conversation with myself about living in Santa Fe again.

I went to a few open houses, talked with a realtor and saw a few more houses, and started actively considering a move. I mentally went into room in my house in Virginia to select what I would keep and what I would let go of. I wondered who would miss me if I left. That was the upside.

Questions

There was, though, a big downside. Never mind the money aspect; there is the ex-husband, and the marriage and the divorce, the leaving. Been there, done that, including a failed attempt at a reconciliation almost a year after the divorce. Could I go back? Could I make myself believe that the 23-year journey I’ve been on since then was all necessary for growth and pruning necessary for more growth? Could I dispose of, dispense with, dump, and discard my material possessions and convince myself that things don’t matter? Would I stay in a place of forgiveness or would I have to reopen and reexamine old wounds? Would I be able to accept a new standard of living? Would I like and accept the new person I am sure to become? Do I have it in me to dream big one more time, or will past unfulfilled dreams get in the way? Is this a true do-over, a chance … for what?

Fast Forward Almost a Year

Well…….I wrote that first part of this post last year when I spent seven weeks in Santa Fe. As you may know, I chose not to make the move then, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t had to still answer those same questions. And some new ones. A trip around the sun doesn’t guarantee all the answers.

For example, I am going to visit family in Minnesota for a high school graduation and a wedding celebration next month. It’s “home,” kinda, but it’s also not my home anymore. It’s a place to remind me of my roots but more and more when I go back, I need my own space. So I am taking my camper, which is another expression of who I am now, collageand instead of hanging out with at the homes of my sibs, I will have my own campsite at a lake, and they can come visit me if they want. They have jobs, and houses to maintain, and their own families and friends. I don’t want them to feel obligated to entertain me for weeks on end, and I don’t want to feel I have to be the gracious guest for weeks on end.

I want to see my old home through different eyes this time. Not because I am considering moving back (have you heard about the winters??); moreso because I am gratefully arriving at a place in my life where I can appreciate my past more, appreciate the environment and the people and the quirks, appreciate my own history, without clinging to it.  I can enjoy the process of that reflection. I will have my own home, which is a kind of security in itself, a grounding that keeps me connected to who I am now, so I don’t fall unaware into who I maybe used to be when I was there.

I don’t necessarily mind that the old labels defined me, because there is a  sense of belonging can’t be replicated any other way. But I also want to be the expression of who I am now. I used to be the girl who shared a blah blue bedroom with two beds and three younger sisters. Now I drove 2000 miles to get there, have pink polka-dotted curtains with fringe on the bottom that I made myself, in a camper I named Saffianna with a beaded chandelier and an antique quilt, and an ironing board repurposed as a table. I have a tattoo, drive a pickup truck, walk three dogs (one of which is blind and deaf), and I have purple or pink or silver hair, depending on my mood that day. You could say that someone who likes antiques, drives a pickup truck, has a dog, and knows what an ironing board is could be a conservative traditionalist. I say it’s kinda hard to be accurate about who I am if you don’t really know me.

Free at Last!

It’s only been in the last year that I even experimented with purple or pink hair spray. That is one of the facets among the multitude of changes I have made since I found myself a widow. I might have gotten here eventually anyway, but widowhood has gifted me time to discover a sense of freedom and a confidence simply from having survived it.

At best, you can say I am still evolving. Gingerly. Happily. Curiously. 

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Does Action Precede Motivation?

02 Thursday May 2019

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The dogs were overly excited at the prospect of going for a walk among the crowds. I wasn’t. just getting them leashed up was increasing my blood pressure. What happened is that I wanted to go support my friend Amy who was having a book launch event for her first novel. I thought I could “swing by,” not realizing there was a local festival of sorts going on at the park she was at. My parking preference was in the shaded parking garage across the street from the park, and that was full. I went to the upper deck level, also full. The road was closed at the next street, and we ended up about 6 blocks away, requiring walking downhill about 2 blocks and then along the beach the rest of the way. I had no idea where I might actually find Amy in this crowd. It was a very warm day, and I couldn’t leave the dogs in the car in the sun. Usually I would have left them at home, but I thought this was a quickie thing, after I had run other errands.

So…dogs happy, me not so much.

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We go where you go, Mom!

You might remember that Harley is blind and deaf, and he’s a 5# Yorkie. Easily trampled if you’re not watching closely. Bo is a senior beagle who acts like a curious hunter when walking in crowds, and he loves to bay Hello to anyone within ear shot. Sasha, the circus dog, is a toddler and acts like a neglected one in desperate need of attention to anyone within licking distance. My hand is still sore four days later from the strangling it took to hold onto their leashes. All’s well that ends well, though. We all survived, and I got to see Amy. Later, the dogs were exhausted, and we all took naps when we got home.

I have known Amy for about 4 years. We have had a friendly acquaintanceship, and I was proud of the fact that she called on me to advise and coach her through the publishing of  Front Coverher first book. As it happens, though, my expertise is more along the lines of assessing readiness and supporting the writer through the writing process. She had already written her book and needed editing and publishing guidance. I referred her to another friend, and they created magic. Check out her book here. It’s for young adults about a girl who is raised by her grandparents when her mom becomes a drug addict. I was enthralled, and moved.

My own book idea about the grieving process, or how I changed as a result of grief, or inspiration for living through grief, or something (you see part of my problem, right?), has been languishing for two years and counting. I don’t remember how long it took Amy to write hers, but from the time she first contacted me about it until publication was barely a few months. I was extremely happy for her, and yet I felt that sinking feeling of failure that I had not even finished my first draft.

Amy’s brother John was assisting at her table at the park. She was busy autographing books and talking to customers, and so John and I chatted. I said something about her great beginning and my slow meandering in Neverland, and he said, “Action precedes motivation.” Light bulb!! Yes! I remember that, needed to hear it, and immediately resonated with the expression. I had heard this before, and in fact, have been known to use a version of this old saying myself. John Maxwell includes his version of this in his 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership: The Law of the Big Mo. It’s all about Momentum. (Disclosure: I am certified to teach Maxwell’s 21 Laws, so no surprise that I connected to it right away.)

The gist, of course, is that it’s important to prime the pump first to get some momentum going.  But…it’s easier to steer than to start, right? The paradox is that motivation is key in developing momentum. I think of it like riding my motorcycle: it’s easier to stay upright if you ride faster instead of slower, but you still have to turn on the bike and start in first gear just to get going.  Arghh! Which is where the action part comes in. Putting my butt in the chair in front of the computer and working on it, not waiting for Inspiration to tap me on the shoulder and whisper “Now.” Once I do this, the inaction gene is deactivated, making room for more action. Momentum can spread and generate more enthusiasm. Bottom line: I need to make it happen; I can’t just wait around hoping it will happen by itself.

The book writing isn’t the only place I find myself languishing. This semi-retirement phase I’m in is an incubator for doing a lot of nothing, a breeding ground for inaction. I was reminded of this when  another friend of mine, Christine, came to visit this past weekend. We used to work together, and we were able to get a few things checked off the Work Bucket List when we collaborated. She was in town to celebrate a professional accomplishment, her achievement as a Fellow of the Institute for Court Management. I myself had completed that designation about 15 years ago. Christine included me in the Acknowledgements section of her final research paper, noting that I had been “an inspiring force” in her career in the court management world. We talked a lot of about who else is doing what these days, and I felt a dullness about not seeming to do anything productive, noteworthy, or innovative any longer. Which isn’t true, but it felt like at the time we were talking.

For a bit I felt out of touch, irrelevant, and like I had aged out of the system, so to speak. It’s been 3-1/2 years since I left my last full-time paid employment, and sometimes I still miss the everyday buzz of being on the go. (I sometimes live vicariously be binge-watching The Newsroom or West Wing.)  I wondered if I had finally exhausted my Personal Sabbatical that was supposed to be only one year and speculated that maybe I should consider re-entering the World of Work. When I quit my job, I thought I needed time to grieve and to evaluate my purpose and place. I was offered a leave of absence (two to three weeks,  ha!), but I turned it down because I didn’t know how long it would take to find myself, reinvent myself, or ignite the fire that had burned out. Starting my Duggan Difference consulting business a few months later had the effect of short-circuiting my plans, and it’s only been in the last few months now that I have finally felt the release of the old me and my former life as a wife and court administrator, and accepted the changes in myself and my life that have come about. With probably 25 more years left on my personal calendar, though, you can see that I might need to find a few things to do yet, things that make a difference. Do you ever feel that way? I haven’t actually known too many people who have retired; most of them get another job or else they died prematurely.  And when you are solo, it’s harder to keep the batteries charged. There must be more; there is always Something More…for me, at least. I just need to know what it is.

Maybe that means that I am now in a better place, to do better work…better writing… about all these changes. I haven’t just crossed some line in the sand where before I was that, and now I am this.  Rather, I have been straddling the fence between this and that, and now I have chosen a side to jump to. As I’ve said before, it’s not like I haven’t been doing anything except eating bonbons and watching soaps all day for the past 3+ years. I have continued to contribute to the world by fostering and rescuing dogs, by creating beauty in the form of an updated house and yard and glamper, by teaching classes and generating new court leaders and gardeners and writers, by reaching out to support other widows or  others who have had some setbacks, by adding positive and productive energy into my neighborhood by serving on the Homeowners Association board, etc., etc., etc.  Hmmmn, just reminding myself of these things is slightly motivating. Obviously, I’m not done with my life yet.

When it comes down to it, my motivation for living despite the uncomfortable, sad, sometimes lonely vacuum that comes about during the grief process is the result of the actions I have taken to not fall victim to feeling sorry for myself or wallowing in self pity or isolating myself from a world that doesn’t make sense any longer. So John was right; action precedes motivation. And if it works for living, it surely must work for working. So today I am sitting at my desk, even though it’s going to be a pleasant 90 outside, the sun is shining, and the spring weather beckons me to laze away the morning. Already I feel energized from cleaning my desk, organizing my thoughts, and writing this blog. I am primed to do more writing, so off I go!

I hope you, too, will consider that taking the first step for anything is a huge step. I’m not an advocate for The Grind, always working, always pushing and grasping and digging in. I have learned a lot about peace of mind, relaxation, and appreciation. That is worth knowing about! But there is a time when either working or playing, just doing something can yield enough spin to set that flywheel in motion, creating more momentum. Before you know it, you’re on your way to a better … whatever, or another whatever, or a new whatever. Live, laugh, love. Action precedes motivation. True dat!