Where My Heart Wants to Be

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Okay, okay, so it really is broken. The fibula has a nice diagonal crack in it, and the talus is probably broken, too. (Treatment is the same, no worries the PA said.)

I’m not worried, I just don’t want to wear this dang boot 24/7. I don’t want to keep all weight off the ankle for the next four weeks.

In my roaming across the blogosphere today I came across this video of Steven Pressfield talking with Oprah Winfrey. I am going to take his advice to put my ass where my heart wants to be. I want my ankle to heal. I want to finish this novel and move on to the next. This chair (with this laptop computer, and wearing this extremely uncomfortable boot) is where that’s going to happen.

My daughters are working on final papers for history and English classes. This advice did not really work for them. “My heart is not involved in this paper,” one said. But is her heart set on getting an AA degree and eventually becoming a music teacher? Well, abstractions are hard when you’re 20. I get that.

But, still. Where does your heart want to be? How do you put your a** there?

What do you imagine?

What do you imagine?

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I have been thinking of something my friend Madelon Bolling once shared with me, I think way back in my dissertation days at the UW:

“Try to spend a little time every day imagining the unimaginable.”

I want to imagine taking a trip to the British Isles (including Ireland, where my friend Cherie Langlois snapped this photo)…I want to imagine going there with my husband and having a lovely time.

I want to imagine being fully mobile again! (Stupid ankle!)

I want to imagine finishing this damned novel and starting on the next big thing.

I want to imagine being the full-time writer I’ve dreamed of being almost my entire life.

I want to imagine owning a horse.

I want to stop wanting to imagine and actually imagine. This, in itself, will be a leap. (I’m so glad I noticed it.) 

What do you imagine?

Coming to Birth

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1955A picture of my mother, pregnant with me (seated, just left of center and staring straight into the camera), with 8 of her 10 sisters and a sister-in-law.  (Oh, wait — 7 sisters and one niece.) I don’t know where my older brother is (napping?) but he would be very close in age to the babies sitting nearby.

I had a dream last night in which I was some sort of spy and I went in search of my daughter. When I found her, it seemed that someone had gotten to her, had changed her mind about something essential, and my new task (this is where I woke up) was to find out what had happened to do this. Who had betrayed me?

I know from lots of journal work and reflection, and a recurring set of dreams about daughters, that when I dream about a daughter I am always dreaming about my creative self. Something is about to be born… Often, something wants to be born and I’ve been standing against the door, holding it shut and saying, “No.”

Usually the person who betrays me, is me. What if I got out of my own way? What if I said, “Yes”?

horse2

What if you said, “Yes”?

Happy Birthday to Me

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dr bethanyAfter doing laundry yesterday afternoon (climbing the steps several times) and attending daughter #3’s choir concert in the evening, I spent the night in agony. About two o’clock I finally succumbed to all the pain meds I had taken and fell asleep. This morning, predictably, I feel groggy and not much inclined to work on my manuscript. My husband generously suggests that this will be my most memorable birthday ever.

Honey? I hope not.

Instead of writing I have been obsessively checking my email. And I’ve been reading. Here’s Pema Chodron from Taking the Leap: 

“Of course, neither you nor I know what adversity might or might not be coming — either in our personal or collective experience. Things could get better or they could get worse. We could inherit a fortune, or we or those we love could get an incurable illness. We could move into the house we’ve always wanted, or the house we live in could burn down. We could experience perfect health, or overnight we could become disabled.” (45)

I checked with Louise Hay, You Can Heal Your Life, to see what she thinks about broken bones: “Rebelling against authority.” Hmm.

“Each one of us has a three-year-old child within us, and we often spend most of our time yelling at that kid in ourselves. Then we wonder why our lives don’t work.” (Hay, 28)

mom me eric

No more yelling today. Here’s to you, kid.