I’m in my thirties

And now it’s all happening, the doubt, the uncertainty, the years of work that lie before me….is this all there is?  Maybe I should just do more meditation, but these issues have been churning around inside me in the last week.

So we have decided not to have children, for a variety of reasons.  But as two accomplished professionals, that leaves work the entree in the meal of our lives, and we aren’t really challenged or fulfilled by our work.  It just seems like the school cafeteria where we’ve eaten for years and know every chicken-steak and tater tot special that’s going to be served.  Sorry for the metaphor.  (And I’m actually paid very well for it, so I feel triply-vexed by my problem.)

And I’m really starting to notice that maybe work is unfulfilling because people just want to raise their families, work their eight hours, and be done with it.

Now, I’m not at all reconsidering my no-children decision, but I guess I’m afraid.  That I don’t know what to do with my life.  Now that I see those words, I feel a little silly.  Why, there’s tons of things I want to do, and yet I can’t seem to find the time/space to do them.  (And of course I see it for the excuse that it is).

Creating a good life is work, isn’t it?  Jeff Loves Coffee.  Yep, the capitalization was necessary.  And so he lovingly grinds the coffee beans every morning before making a cup of coffee every morning by hand, using our Aeropress coffee syringe thing.  And now he’s considering roasting our own beans.  The coffee he makes is certainly delicious, but I’m unsure about the time this endeavor will require.  And buying a giant sack of “green” beans, and storage, and other considerations.  So look at all that effort for just a good cup of coffee.

I used to volunteer, tutoring someone in math to pass the GED (not that easy for someone who dropped out of high school, and wasn’t a high-achiever at the time).  But then she moved away to San Diego.

I signed up to be a volunteer dog walker at the local humane society, but I stopped going because it was too difficult for me to do.  And I didn’t feel any fulfillment from it.

My therapist pointed out that I needed to stop searching for things outside myself, and look inward instead.  Well, I’ve done it, and I feel pretty good these days, except when I’m worried like I am now.

We’re thinking about starting a business.  Something.  But it’s so scary and huge and off-script for me, the girl who knew she was going to go to college when she was 5 years old.

I have done very well for myself, actually, and I’ve been working part-time since 2001, which I think is pretty cool.

A crop of people about five years younger than I at work got married about two years ago, then last year they took fabulous vacations to Europe, and this year they’re all having babies.  Again, I’m not envious of their baby plans, but what I am is envious of their seemingly-set life plan.

I’m an Energizer Bunny who wants to have some place to go!  A new plan to embark upon.

My goal had been to write, but I wasn’t doing much of that.  So that’s why I started the blog.  Certainly I get tremendous satisfaction from it, especially because I become despondent when my fave bloggers aren’t writing.

So maybe I’ll eat a light breakfast and then hit the gym.  Things can only get better from there!

Monday Morning

I am fortunate and find myself frequently with Mondays off.

This has led to the Monday Morning Syndrome, a general feeling of malaise and self-attack from all the things I should have done earlier in the week but kept pushing off, with bouts of anger and lack of activation energy to get started on a task. It is truly an effective form of suffering, one which I have perfected.

This Monday morning, however, I find myself well-accomplished at this early hour of 10:41. I have already washed and hung outside on the line (bonus points!) a load of laundry, done the fortnightly Trader Joe’s grocery shopping, and refurbished our supply of Nature’s Miracle —Just for Cats!

And used said product on two innocent victims from an overnight attack.

And buried the compost.

Now I am debating whether or not to take the car in to get new tires or just tackle the remainder of tasks, then hit the gym around 1300. I’m betting on the latter, which includes: sorting through assorted mail and paperwork that have been clogging up the kitchen table, vacuuming my office, and decluttering the bedroom. You know, it’s really not so bad!

Maybe I’ll stop by the tire place in the afternoon, see what’s on their plate.

Back from the Big Island

Sigh….I have the post-vacation blues.  However, I am fortunate enough (and grateful) to have a day of transition before it’s back to work for me.  We saw everything that I’d hoped to see, except for rainbows.  That was because of the haziness caused by the volcanic activity that was going on right then.  In fact, the day we arrived, the rental car shuttle driver announced that residents of a subdivision in the path of the lava flow had been evacuated.

I vacated…my body & mind from home.  I was immersed in Hawaii and transported via my senses: the bright-yellow birds we encountered before we even left the rental car lot,  the sound of the palms swaying in the breeze on our lanai, feeling the searing heat of the lava as it flowed six feet away (and what a difference it made, just stepping back a foo or two!), the neon-turquoise beauty of the shallow water contrasted against the deep blue of the deep water.

I like that the Hawaiians refer to lava flow as the goddess Pele, and the metaphor continues as they describe the viscous flow as fingers, reaching out.  Standing next to Pele and seeing the bright-orange lava with its quickly-cooled black crust on top, I felt her slash away at my beauty, drying up my lips with her searing heat; she is one hottie.

Waking up the songs of rainforest birds when we stayed in Volcano Village, I didn’t know where I was, they were so unlike anything I’d ever heard before.  They seemed particularly beautiful and especially trilling, but it may have simply been my state of mind.

I had worried that my husband would be swept away by the beauty of Hawaii (and consequently ignore me) but I realize now that I was the one who was transported.

After eight focused weeks of weight loss through exercise (swim, bike, yoga) and sensible eating (no sweets except for fruit and Valentine’s Day truffles and many meals of beans& rice  broken only by homemade and vegetable-laden homemade soup) I arranged my storming of the Kona coast carefully the night before through Google maps: arrive at airport, proceed to Costco for bulk water supplies & bulk macadamia nuts and then quickly in succession — Kailua Candy Company and onward to Mrs Barry’s Kona Cookies!

The only disappointing thing about going to Kailua Candy was that it was our first day on an 8-day vacation, one that would include lots of driving around in a car; there was just no way that anything we bought would survive the trip.  We bought a low-priced sample box and vowed to return before we went off-island.

And Mrs Barry — oh, she did not disappoint.  Crisp cookies that were perfectly browned, butter-licious coconut shortbread (oh, I still regret not buying more when we had the chance), and new-on-me coffee cookies with chocolate chips. We were the only people in the store at the time and liberally sampled from the Free! dish.  I still can’t believe we only bought a dozen.

We sat in the car to munch on cookies while we planned our next move…and in that time a guy (obviously a local) had parked & had made his multiple-bag purchase (a dozen per bag) who joked on his way past, “Are you two going to sit in your car and eat all your cookies?” and we responded in unison, “Yup.”  It made him chuckle.

Poor Jeff was in his jeans (I hadn’t thought to tell him to wear one of the pairs of SPF pants with zip-off legs that we had bought expressly for this trip) and was quite uncomfortable in the sun’s mind-staggering heat.  He was ready for a shower, so we decided to hightail it to the B&B.

I had been a bit unsure about the quality of this B&B, because its price had been so low.  I still don’t know why they charge so little, but for three wonderful nights we had a gorgeous, extremely spacious, well-appointed one-bedroom apartment with a giant picture window and lanai facing the ocean.  Though I didn’t notice, Jeff realized the only thing missing in the kitchen was a stove/oven, but they had helpfully given us use of an enormous gas barbecue, complete with a side burner.

The funny thing is that while trying to decide which “suite” to book, I had read that the one we stayed in was suitable for four people, so I had dismissed it as too large for our needs.  [Passable for four, as two would have to sleep on a full-sized futon in the living room, but fantastic for two].

Fortunately for us, the other two suites were already reserved, so we had to take the larger one.  I couldn’t be any happier about it.  The next-largest didn’t have a private lanai and the smallest didn’t have an ocean view at all (it was the apartment below ours).

We had freshly-ground Kona coffee and a freshly-baked loaf of bread placed into a basket with assorted breakfast stuff delivered to our place every evening.  But later in our trip, we’d have Kona coffee beans to grind every morning in our coffee maker!

On our three breakfasts there, we had one loaf of banana bread & two of pineapple-coconut — just heavenly.  And Jeff ate his first-ever papaya and mango while there, too.

We caught every sunset except for the two while we were on the other side of the island in Volcano Village.  Our first night in Volcano, it was gently misting, and the second, it was overcast.

Though I remembered from my last trip to the Big Island the necessity of changing from my NoCal clothes stat at the airport, I couldn’t imagine how much I wanted my clothes off.  It was like my feet were suffocating in my sox & shoes (I knew better than to fly with flip flops & Hawaii wear — it just gets too darn cold at 35k feet) and it felt so good to take off my long-sleeved t-shirt layered over my black tank top.  Phew!

As Jeff remarked after I peeled the layer off, “You already look more Hawaiian.”  We had only disembarked and walked down the stairs to the tarmac at that point — another 50’s style relic that lives on in Hawaii, like the entire city of Hilo.

By the time we arrived at our B&B we were stuffed with cookies, which meant that it was time for macadamias.  Oh, I go through this every time I go to Hawaii…I consume so many macadamias in my first 24 hours that I simply don’t want to eat any more for the remainder of my trip.  This time was no different.

Our B&B hostess must have laughed when she saw our two enormous boxes of six-pack Mauna Loa macadamia nuts, because they were the exact brand that she left in our breakfast basket.  I guess we’re lucky she even left them, since she knew we had them.

Jeff read the nutrition label on the side of the nut can tut-tutting over the fat content.  “Don’t be a killjoy,” I pleaded, “I only eat them in Hawaii.”

So we showered with the coconut-mango shower gel and shampoo, and  moisturized with the coconut-mango lotion.  Everything associated with body products smelled like dessert.  I warned Jeff that he might be awakened by me licking his arm.

Then we just rested in that beautiful bedroom, listening to the birds flirt and luxuriating in a king-sized bed.  Then our thoughts turned to sex.

Then we went to Hapuna Beach for the sunset, one of the prettiest beaches on all of the Big Island, and turned in for the night.

The flight over had been interminable, so when we finally touched down, it felt like we had time-traveled when we landed around 12 noon.

Up All Night (practically)

Went to a concert at ye olde Great American Music Hall Friday night.  [I had never been there, and when I walked through the main door and into the hall, I felt like I'd time traveled to the Moulin Rouge.  No kidding!  I was on the main floor, there were balcony seats, huge columns supporting the balcony, and baroque beginning-of-the-20th century flourishes all over.  Straight out of a Degas oil.]

Thought the show started at 8, but it was really 9.  Thankfully the weekend’s rains had not yet begun, so waiting outside for more than an hour wasn’t really awful.  What the problem was, was that we missed the last train out of the City when the show finally ended after midnight.

I had been getting sleepy, but the drama forced me awake.  Now it was getting interesting!  There was another hapless commuter who asked the station agent what to do now, and he mentioned the transbay bus depot as Plan B.  We quickly consulted a map in a bus shelter where one man was explaining the virtues of bus #800 to another, and then went off in search of the bus terminal.  As we were leaving, the bus maven turned to us to ask if we needed help with “the 800 schedule.”  “Nope, we’re fine,” we said as we walked away.  So off we went.

We arrived there at 12:50, which was pretty good for twenty minutes’ walking, only to discover that the last bus left at 12:38.  Doh!  But there was a bulletin board that said, “Did you miss the last bus?  Try the 800!” Double doh!

Again, luck was on our side, as the rains continued to stay away, and the transbay bus ran every half-hour through the night.  We were only fifteen minutes away from the next bus.

There was a meandering ride through Oakland, but eventually we arrived very very close to where we’d parked the car (and we had had an alternate plan to park not very close at all) and finally arrived home shortly after 2am.  It was the latest I’d been up in years, and we slept in until noon yesterday.

I’m still suffering sleepy after-effects.

I’m very pleased that I didn’t panic or get carried away worrying about what was going to happen to us.  I chalk it up to the meditation.

{And the concert was very good, but I much preferred the opening band, Paul & Storm. }