After coming home on Monday night from a long road trip to Boston, I haven’t felt quite settled in yet. It’s an odd feeling, almost like a dream—as if I need to be somewhere, but I’m not sure where it is. I’ve been reminding myself that I simply need to be all there, wherever it may be; and the rest can take care of itself.
Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to encourage self-nurturing and to “give the planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.”
In October, I’m traveling often with my husband, rowing in regattas. It is a great way to keep in shape, but it can be tiring and can leave me feeling rushed. When I get those feelings of always being in too much of a hurry, I remind myself to just breathe and be in the moment, rather than overthinking the schedule. It’s really not as hard as I sometimes make it out to be.
Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to encourage self-nurturing and to “give the planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.”
I got overly stressed last week after rowing the mixed double at the Head of the Ohio regatta in Pittsburgh, which for me was the start of the 5K fall racing season. The weather was great—sunny, with moderate temperatures and little wind. My husband and I, who were older than most of the crews, had a good start as several other boats got “satisfyingly small,” as my husband put it, behind our stern. We had plenty of energy and kept up the pace well.
But then, about two-thirds of the way down the course, my hands began sweating profusely. I couldn’t keep a firm grip on the oars and flubbed a few strokes. It didn’t matter in terms of where we finished; two crews were significantly faster, and we’d gotten well ahead of the others, so we had third place regardless. I worried about it afterward, though. My mind went into a gloomy negative spiral as I thought it was likely to be a midlife issue, and maybe it would last for years, and rowing wouldn’t be much fun anymore.
My husband offered the practical suggestion of putting Stickum on my hands when rowing. There isn’t really a product called Stickum anymore, although there used to be about 50 years ago, before professional sports banned it. Companies still make similar products for amateur athletes, though. It’s just a rag with a tacky chemical to wipe on the hands to improve grip.
The problem with using a Stickum-like product is that it starts to wear off after about 15 minutes, and a 5K rowing race takes longer than that in a double or single. So, although it did improve my grip, I was still stressed when we practiced on our home river last week. Because I was busy with work and with afternoon rowing practice, I didn’t have enough time to relax and get my mind in a better place before we left for another regatta in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. We had great weather there also, and we rowed well for a second-place finish. Although I never lost my grip on an oar, I still had unhappy thoughts, feeling that I didn’t even know if I could trust my own body.
After we got home and I’d had some time to rest and recover with a Monday vacation day, I finally did the sensible thing and read some articles online about how to deal with the problem of excessive sweating during exercise. As I suspected, it can be a midlife issue for women, caused by temperature regulation being less efficient. One simple recommendation was to drink ice water with electrolyte mix before exercise, rather than just drinking plain water (as I often had done). I tried that before getting on the rowing machine Monday evening, and my hands were fine, with minimal sweating.
We’re on the road again this week, rowing at the legendary Head of the Charles in Boston. I’ll keep in mind that in modern times, there is generally a solution for most issues and no need to sweat the small stuff.
It was still dark when I woke up this morning, but it was late enough that trying to go back to sleep wouldn’t have been productive, so I got up and started my workday earlier than usual. At first, I was a bit grumpy because my sleep hadn’t been as refreshing as I would have liked and because I had been rushing too much this week. A cup of coffee helped me to feel more awake, though, and the quiet house was peaceful. There really wasn’t anything to complain about, after all.
Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to encourage self-nurturing and to “give the planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.”
Shortly after my daughter’s marriage in 2018, I developed a weird “phantom ring” issue where I sometimes felt that the ring finger of my right hand either had a ring on it, when it didn’t really have one, or was missing a ring that should have been there. I normally wear three left-hand rings—wedding and engagement, with a 20-year anniversary ring in the middle.
Where the phantom ring might have come from was totally baffling. There was never a time when I regularly wore a ring on the right-hand ring finger. I have one for it, with a small rose-quartz stone, which my husband bought for me long ago; but I’ve only worn that ring occasionally, and whether I wore it more or less often didn’t seem to make any difference with the phantom ring issue.
This year, it occurred to me that if I had a 40-year anniversary ring, it probably would go on my right hand because four rings would be a bit much for my left hand. I visualized the new ring as having the same design as the 20-year ring, with a row of small stones, but they would be rubies because that is the traditional gemstone for the 40th anniversary.
After that, I never felt that my right hand was missing a ring. I presume that’s because the phantom ring has now been “found,” in that it belongs to my future self, who is keeping it safe. Perhaps the message from my subconscious mind is that I need to take care that my marriage doesn’t get misplaced!
On Tuesday, my manager sent an email reminding my workgroup to do the employee survey because the last day to respond was Wednesday. She added this image to get people’s attention:
I replied that my first thought was that I might want to repost the image on my blog, and that I knew I was procrastinating because I was composing a blog entry in the back of my mind instead of doing the employee survey, but that I would make sure to do the survey.
Then I was going to compose this post yesterday and have it ready to go bright and early this morning; but of course, I procrastinated, and instead I’m sitting here at the desk writing it late in the day. I’m not really sure how many layers of procrastination that makes, but it’s definitely recursive. Oh, well… that’s life!
Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to encourage self-nurturing and to “give the planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.”
Since last year’s unfortunate demise of my digital art display, which was no longer supported after the manufacturer went out of business, I sometimes feel as if part of my creative energy went with it. In particular, I haven’t felt motivated to blog about my assortment of future selves and younger selves, who made a lively menagerie in previous years. Back when I changed the picture on the art display every morning, its imaginary “window” gave me inspiration by showing a fresh view of the world.
Getting my real windows replaced last month made my house brighter and more cheerful, but unfortunately there’s not much to see in my backyard at present. Climate change has mostly killed the willow hedge along the back property line. In the spring, I’m going to have a landscaping company remove what’s left of it and plant a long strip of native wildflowers, including milkweed to support the monarch butterfly migration. I’m also visualizing some taller shrubs in the corner that faces my home office window, with a path leading into them. Although the path would go nowhere, the neighbors have tall and healthy trees behind that area, and I want to create an impression that I could step outside and go for a walk in the woods.
Browsing through images of butterfly gardens online, I saw a photo of a natural prairie area on the grounds of an elementary school. It wouldn’t have been suitable for a suburban backyard, but it gave me pleasant memories of long rambles through flowering meadows as a child.
(Creative Commons image via flickr)
The piano music from the “Peanuts” television cartoons floated into the scene in my thoughts. I didn’t see Snoopy dancing, but a glance to my left revealed Lucy’s psychiatric help booth on a sidewalk next to the children’s butterfly garden. “The Doctor Is In,” the sign proclaimed, with the usual price of five cents. Charlie Brown wasn’t the patient this time, however. Inside the booth, my 76-year-old future self Kass, who had arranged her hair to look like Lucy, was cheerfully waving me over.
Apropos of the setting, I could only mutter “Good grief!” as I stepped onto the imaginary sidewalk.
Kass opened her hands wide and smiled up at me from the wooden crate she sat on. “Well, you were saying that you had lost motivation to write about your future selves, and I thought you might appreciate a little help with that problem.”
Another crate, longer and narrower, had been set up on the sidewalk to serve as the patient’s couch. A large black ant was making its way slowly across one of the slats on top.
I looked up at Kass again. “Okay, I guess I did say something like that. I wouldn’t have thought of it as asking for psychiatric help, though. I just want to replace the art display so I can feel more creative.”
“You didn’t have the art display until 2015,” Kass pointed out, “and you didn’t travel as much in real life before then, either. Still, you wrote plenty of stories and blog posts. Now you’re older and can afford to travel and see more of the country, but you’re feeling low on creativity despite visiting new places, and you wonder why. Would you say that’s a fair assessment?”
Brushing off the ant, I arranged myself on the narrow crate, using a denim jacket for a pillow. The clouds above the butterfly garden formed a vaguely castle-like shape.
“I kind of know why. The past few years have been emotionally draining, with so much weird stuff going on—the pandemic, and all the craziness going on in politics and the world. My workout plan is much more demanding than any exercise I ever did before, and although it has made me healthier, it often leaves me feeling tired. And then, of course, there’s everything that has been lost—from simple things like the art display and the willow hedge, to pleasantly cool summer evenings that don’t often happen anymore, to people in my life who have grown old and died.”
“In other words,” Kass summed up, resting her chin in her hand like Lucy trying to look serious, “good grief!”
The castle in the sky began to crumble, its ramparts falling away as one gray cloud drifted to the east.
“Well, yeah. Something like that.”
“Or, maybe, not-so-good grief,” Kass suggested. “You have to give yourself time and space for grief, you know. That is why people all over the world have rituals. Anything can help; it doesn’t have to be a fancy ceremony. You could, for instance, go into the backyard and say a few words of gratitude as a memorial service for the willows on the day before the landscapers come to replace them. If you did more to acknowledge your feelings of loss, you might not feel as overwhelmed. That, my dear, is my professional advice. Five cents, please.”
I visualized a dusty old buffalo nickel from the metal coin drawer in my mom’s antique slot machine. Sitting up, I gave it to Kass.
“That might actually make some sense, I have to admit. Thanks for your help, Doctor Kass.”
“My pleasure.”
I had another blog entry written out by hand on a notepad, which I meant to post a few days ago, but this has been a disruption-filled week, and I never did get around to typing and posting it. First, the old printer in the home office went bad. My husband ordered another one right away, but then he noticed that the router, which also was “long in tooth,” was having some issues too, and he replaced it.
Of course, that meant all kinds of things needed to have settings updated, and he has been working to get it all properly configured. I am glad he has the expertise to take care of our computers and devices, but this week I’ve had to remind myself not to worry about the small things. This too shall pass…
Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to encourage self-nurturing and to “give the planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.”
The change of seasons in late September often feels too sudden to me. Even though the hot days still feel like summer, it gets dark so much earlier that I find myself wondering where the daylight went.
The moon is bright and full this evening, though. I heard an owl hooting when I was outside earlier, and I’ll take it as a timely reminder that there is always something to appreciate in the longer nights.
Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to encourage self-nurturing and to “give the planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.”
I felt pretty good after Sunday’s marathon row. There were no blisters on my hands, I didn’t have to crawl out of the boat, and I had no aches or pains sitting in the car during the trip home. Although my hips felt a bit stiff the next morning when I bent down to unload the dishwasher, that went away after I’d been walking around for a little while. Overall, it was much better than I had expected.
So, when my husband mentioned that it was about time to get our flu and Covid vaccines, I thought it would be just fine taking a midday break from work and going to the pharmacy on Wednesday. That turned out to be overly optimistic. Fatigue hit me like the proverbial ton of bricks by the end of the workday. I felt way more exhausted than when I’d gotten vaccines in the past. Although I went to bed at a reasonable hour, my Garmin tracker informed me that my sleep was very poor and not restorative.
I’m feeling better now, getting ready to go to bed, and reminding myself that everything changes all the time and there’s no reason to worry about it.
Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to encourage self-nurturing and to “give the planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.”
