Everything Is All Right (Blog #123)

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Currently I’m in Springfield, Missouri, at the Savoy Ballroom, where for the last two days I’ve been eating and sleeping upstairs and dancing downstairs. This afternoon I took a nap. (Please alert the media.) Y’all, naps should be a required activity for adults in America. What a shot in the arm. I feel like a kid again. My brain is working. What a great life. Honestly, the only thing that could make this place any more magical would be a fire pole. Just imagine–wake up from a nap, slide downstairs, dance.

Perfection.

Last night my friend Matt (who’s teaching dance now and in the photo above) and I rearranged furniture and decorated the dance studio in the upstairs apartment. The challenges were 1) the room has a lot of weird angles, and 2) the room is really four rooms in one–a dance studio, a guest room, an exercise room, and a “the rest of our crap goes here” room, and 3) we couldn’t put any furniture in the middle of the room because people have to dance there. So Matt and I scratched our heads for about an hour (no, THAT won’t work EITHER), and finally decided to “do something even if it’s wrong.”

It took a few hours, but we finally figured it out. I don’t have any “before” pictures, but here’s what we ended up with. This is the view when you walk in the room. The “dance/music section” is on the left (partially pictured here) and extends to the middle of the room. The “exercise section” is in the back right corner. My most favorite part is the Apple poster with Pablo Picasso that says, “Think different.” Notice how his shirt matches the piano keys beneath it. Because the wall behind the piano is concrete, we decided to hang the poster by fishing wire from the exposed pipe behind the air duct. It was our way to “think different.” I said, “We’re just following directions.”

This is the view from the back of the room. On the left (on your right as you walk in) is the “guest room section.” The screen on the far right is by the doorway. To the right of the TV is an old wooden music stand with a book on it called From the Ball-room to Hell, which is no-kidding about the evils of dancing. Maybe it could be subtitled Dancing Your Way to Damnation (And What a Way to Go). I’m reminded of Mark Twain’s quote, “Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company.”

As Billy Joel said, “The sinners are much more fun.”

Here’s a close up of the “dance section,” to your left as you walk in, straight across from the couch. (You can see it in the mirror in the picture above.) Isn’t that the cutest thing you ever saw? The dress is the one Anne wore for the opening night of the Savoy.

This afternoon after my nap, Anne and Andy and I went next door to eat Peruvian food (yum). Next door! In the course of conversation, we talked about what it was like living with my parents. I said, “You know, Mom and Dad are pretty cool. Of course, sometimes they (and by they I mean Dad) know how to push my buttons.” Then Anne said the best thing ever.

“Well sure they know how to push your buttons–THEY MADE THEM.”

Seriously. Is she right or is she right?

Now there’s a flash mob class in progress. I met one of the couples (Della and Dusty) before when I was here for a sock hop. They recognized me by my name because they used to live in Van Buren in the eighties. I guess when our house burned down, it was a pretty big deal. (It was a pretty big deal.) Anyway, Della told me tonight that her husband had gone downtown (where the car accident and subsequent fire happened) that evening, but he hadn’t called to say he was okay. She said she was sure he’d been hurt. Then she said, “It’s really amazing you weren’t home that evening.” I said, “My parents went to dinner and had planned to get a babysitter for me and my sister, but they couldn’t find one. Several years ago a lady who used to take care of us told me my parents called her that evening. She said she lied and said she was busy so that she could hang out with her friends.”

Let’s hear it for liars (sometimes).

Today I’m fascinated by how one life touches another, how a tragedy that happened in a small town over thirty years ago can create a point of connection for two people, and then how those same people can be brought back together in a beautiful ballroom long after the deep sigh of relief that comes with surviving a near-miss has been breathed. Still I’m fascinated how part of me remembers the fear like it was yesterday, how even writing about it now makes my eyes water up. I look around at all the people dancing and it’s still such a relief–everything is all right.

Earlier tonight I watched Matt teach two of his students how to do the frog jump, which is an aerial I taught Matt a few months ago. I watched him talk about how to take time to prep, how the girl’s hand needs to stay under her belly button for support, how they need to do a rock step when it’s all over. And whereas I’m not Matt’s only instructor, I feel like it’s fair to say that most of that came from me. Watching Matt, I felt like a proud dance parent. Watching his students, I felt like a proud grandparent. Naturally, everything I know came from someone else, so I think that just as one life touches another, we can never really say how far our influence goes. Truly, our story goes on and on in both directions. Truly, we are infinite.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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Your story isn’t about your physical challenges.

"

The Magic of Tom Collins (Blog #105)

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Not to be a stereotypical homosexual, but I love (LOVE) a good musical, and rarely a week goes by that I don’t listen to at least one Broadway show tune. All that being said–and I hope I don’t offend anyone here–and by that I mean I don’t care if I offend anyone here–but I’m not IN LOVE with the musical Rent. I mean, I adore parts of it, but I have a difficult time with the soundtrack because of all the “voicemail” numbers and all the BEEPING. Maybe it feels too much like real life to me. Anyway, a few weeks ago–for no apparent reason–I put on the Rent soundtrack for the first time “in a month of Sundays” while driving to Fayetteville.

As I’m wont to do, I eventually settled on a single, solitary song called “Santa Fe” that I kept on repeat for nearly a week. I can’t tell you why, but I must have listened to it fifty times or more. It’s this snappy little tune about a guy and his boyfriend who are dreaming about getting out of New York City and running away to open up a restaurant in–you guessed it–Santa Fe. Maybe my fascination had something to do with dreaming and thinking about what’s possible.

Within a week of listening to “Santa Fe” for the first time (recently), I got the ever-living shit knocked out of me and my car when I was rear-ended in the worst possible way. Within three days of the accident, I knew my car (a Honda Civic) was totaled and that I’d need a new one. So I made one phone call to a dear friend who almost always knows what to do (and if he doesn’t at least sounds like he does). He said, “Go see Johnny Jack in Van Buren. Tell him what’s going on. He’ll treat you right, and if he says it’s a good car, it’s a good car.”

So that’s what I did. On Monday, July 3rd, about closing time, I stopped by Jack’s Motor Company and met Johnny. Initially he steered me toward a Ford Focus, which met all my requirements in terms of price. But I didn’t like it. (I still don’t like it. You can’t make me like it.) But Johnny said I should come back the next day and test drive it. “I’d really like an SUV,” I said. “How much is that Nissan Murano?”

“Too much,” Johnny said. (I’m paraphrasing.)

But then Johnny continued, “In a couple of days I should have another SUV in. It might be just the thing.” And then he quoted me a price that actually seemed doable, probably thanks to the person who sent me over. So the next day, July 4th, I went back to Johnny’s with the intention of test driving the Focus, just to give it a chance. (Everyone deserves a chance.) But when I got there Johnny said, “You’re in luck. That SUV I was telling you about got delivered early.” And there it was, a beautiful 2007 Hyundai Santa Fe, freshly cleaned with the stereo blasting one of my favorite tunes, “Africa” by Toto.

Did you catch that the car was a Santa Fe–like the song?

Well, I took the car for a spin and fell in love within five minutes. I picked up Mom and Dad, and Dad said, “Bite the bullet. You’re not going to be happy with anything else.” When I got back to the lot, I told Johnny that I wanted it, and he said, “I’ll put a sold sign on it. Whenever you settle the insurance claim, it’s yours.”

It was that easy. I really only had to look at one car.

A little over a week later, the insurance check finally cleared. Today was the day! I guess I thought buying a new car would be a hassle, but it wasn’t. Johnny was awesome. Is awesome. As one friend who knows him said, “He’s the man.”

I’m calling the car Tom Collins, since that’s the character who sings the song about Santa Fe in Rent. And I don’t mind saying he’s pretty sweet. It’s the first time I’ve ever owned a daily driver with leather interior, heated seats, powered everything, tinted windows, and a moon roof. Plus, it’s pretty spacious, the perfect size to host an intimate wedding reception. But seriously, I couldn’t be more excited. I mean, if you have to get slammed in the ass while minding your own business and are forced to buy a new set of wheels, a car like Tom Collins is the way to go. As my aunt Carla said, “There’s a difference between living and living well.”

You may already know this, but Tom Collins isn’t just a character from a musical about being broke and infected with HIV. It’s also a drink–made with gin, lemons, sugar, and carbonated water–that’s been around for over a century. And whereas I’ve lived my entire adult life and never had a Tom Collins, I figured today was a good time to change that. So this evening I celebrated the Santa Fe by going to El Zarape with my friend Justin and ordering (and drinking) the adult beverage that shares the name of my new car.

Well, sort of. My friend Jimmy was our waiter and bartender, and he’d never heard of a Tom Collins. So we Googled it, and he said, “Sure, I can do that.” But when he talked to the other bartenders about it, they said, “The carbonated water will ruin the alcohol. So leave that out, add a splash of Triple Sec, and use another orange liqueur instead of an actual orange for garnish.”

OMG, y’all. These are the kinds of friends you need in your life. Jimmy’s Modified Tom Collins was UH-MAZING. It was basically like lemonade on steroids.

GRRRR.

When Justin and I got back to his house, his wife, Ashley, and her friend Schuyler wanted to go out for Taco Bell, so I said, “I’ll drive!” (I’ve never had a car I’ve been proud to pile a bunch of people in for a fast food run. God. It really is the little things.) Anyway, at Taco Bell when it was our turn at the Drive-Thru, the voice on the other end said, “Just a moment please,” and without thinking I blurted out, “Take your time. Order when you’re ready.”

And then everyone inside Tom Collins exploded with laughter, which I thought was the perfect way to start our new life together.

I’ve spent most of today in awe at the way the universe works, the fact that something that initially seemed awful (my car wreck) turned out so well. Before me, the Santa Fe was owned by only one person, a little old lady whom I spoke with on the phone and told me the only reason she was getting rid of it was because she’d backed into a trashcan and wanted a car with a backup camera. Now that I’ve spent a day with Tom Collins, I kind of want to call her back and tell her how grateful I am she didn’t see that trashcan. And I could just hug my friend who sent me to Johnny, and I’d dance at Johnny’s wedding, except for the fact that he’s already married.

I guess a lot of people would say that my randomly listening to a song called “Santa Fe” a week before my car accident and an old lady hitting a trashcan with her Santa Fe vehicle and then trading it in at the same time I started car shopping were simply coincidences. But at this point in my life, I know better. Joseph Campbell said, “When we follow our bliss, we are met by a thousand unseen helping hands.” Personally, I love this. It’s like I’ve spent so much of my life waiting for something magical to happen, and then one day I realized magic has been happening all around me this entire time, gently waiting for me to notice, to start dreaming again, to believe that anything and everything is possible because–it is.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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Life is better when we're not in control. When we mentally leave room for anything to happen, anything can.

"

On Being a Broken Record (On Being a Broken Record) (Blog #91)

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This afternoon I swam laps. Mostly I kept getting pissed off that my new goggles were leaking, but I managed to swim thirteen hundred meters, which is three hundred more than a few days ago. As I was getting ready to leave, in the locker room, there was a kid running around, maybe waiting on his friends. I’m guessing he was about seven, but hell, he could have been twelve or thirteen. I mean, everyone’s getting Botox these days, and it’s really hard to guess someone’s age. Anyway, this kid kept singing, “Singing in the shower,” a line from a song by Becky G. Just that one line, stuck on repeat. Over and over again.

Singing in the shower.

Singing in the shower.

Singing in the shower.

I wanted to scream. Geez, kid, learn the rest of the freaking song!

This morning when I woke up I felt skinnier. I’m guessing you know how it goes when you’re on a diet, exercising. You get up one day, and things feel a little tighter, a little lighter. Maybe the scale doesn’t agree with your assessment, but you know–something’s different. Well, the first thing I thought was, There you are, Peter, which is actually a line from the movie Hook starring Robin Williams and references Peter Pan, and not my personal Peter–thank you very much. Anyway, in the movie, Peter Pan has grown up, and he returns to Neverland a middle-aged, overweight lawyer. Of course, none of the Lost Boys recognize him, until one day when one of the boys takes off Peter’s glasses, looks deep into his eyes and says, “Oh, there you are, Peter.”

So I guess it’s a good thing that the line popped into my head this morning. Eating better, exercising, and down several pounds, I’m starting to feel like my physical self again. Also, I feel like I should mention–my armpits don’t smell like bleach anymore. (This is something I blogged about several times over the course of many weeks, some funky body odor that showed up and wouldn’t go away.) The problem has been better for a week or so, but I’ve been cautious to “speak too soon.” But for whatever reason–better diet, Gold Bond Powder, Holy Water–it seems I’ve been healed. Thank you, Jesus. I smell like myself again.

There you are, Marcus.

This evening my friend Marla and I attended a book signing for our friend Anita Paddock at Chapters on Main (a local bookstore) in Van Buren. (Anita’s second book, Closing Time, was recently released.) I told Marla that when our house burned down when I was four, my parents gave our kitchen cabinets and some bathroom fixtures to a family friend who, at the time, lived and worked in the building where Chapters is now. The cool part? The cabinets are still in use, in the coffee shop section of the bookstore. Even better, the baristas handwrite fun and encouraging notes on every cup of coffee. Pictured above, my cup tonight said, “Love Yourself.” I joked with Marla, “Not a problem!”

Tonight I went for a walk, something a friend recently referred to as a “midnight ramble.” On my way back, several blocks from home, I patted my stomach and actually said out loud, “There you are, Peter.” Of course, even though it was after midnight, there were two ladies sitting on a front porch right beside me. Geez. Of all things to say when talking to yourself. There you are, Peter.

Since I got home tonight, I’ve been thinking that I’m a lot like that kid at the pool this afternoon. I’ve got this phrase on repeat. There you are, Peter. Singing in the shower. Whatever. Once I heard the mind referred to as “an idiot box,” meaning that it just repeats itself over and over again. I guess it’s harmless, albeit annoying, when it happens with a song lyric or a movie quote. But of course, it can happen with anything, so a little phrase like–I’m just gonna shoot from the hip here–“you’re fat” or “you’ll never get a date as long as your armpits smell like cleaning chemicals,” can do a lot of damage when it goes on–and on–and on.

There’s a technique my therapist talks about called Broken Record. It’s basically used to enforce a boundary with someone you care about who simply isn’t “getting it.” You boil your boundary down to a one-liner and keep repeating it. I won’t talk to you when you raise your voice. And no matter what they say–ifs, ands, or buts–if they scream or yell, your answer is (calmly) always the same. I won’t talk to you when you raise your voice. And if you have to–I’m leaving/hanging up now.

We teach people how to treat us.

I think the idea behind Broken Record is twofold. First, we teach people how to treat us, what’s acceptable and what’s not. Second, people learn by repetition, and it can take a while to re-train someone, to let them know your rules of engagement have changed–for real this time.

Sometimes my therapist and I talk about positive affirmations, which are pretty big in the self-help/new age world. If you don’t know, positive affirmations are simply positive statements you write down or say to yourself that you want to be true in your life. For example (as mentioned in a previous post), I, Marcus, and a brilliant and prolific writer. Or as my coffee cup suggested tonight, I love myself. So you just say that over and over again, letting it sink into your subconscious, which apparently is a slow learner. In essence, you have to Broken Record–yourself.

Personally, I have a love/hate relationship with positive affirmations. Sometimes I think they’re wonderful, and sometimes I think they’re a bunch of shit. But as evidenced by the phrase I’ve had on repeat today–There you are, Peter–it’s obvious that I’m already talking to myself, my mind already has a record on repeat. So the question is, would I rather be playing the record that says, “I’m fat, I’m fat, I’m fat,” or the one that says, “My God! I’m stunning, I’m stunning, I’m stunning”?

I vote for “I’m stunning.”

The way I see it, everything you tell yourself is an affirmation. It’s just that somethings are a hell of a lot more positive than others. And if you’ve been telling yourself one thing–something negative–most of your life, it’s going to take a minute to turn that truck around.

Sometimes I marvel at people like Anita who actually get a book written. It seems like such a daunting task. But just like this blog, it’s simply a matter of sitting down and writing like a broken record–over and over again. At first it’s just a word, a sentence, a paragraph. And then before you know it, it’s a thousand words. Two months later, it’s a book. Honestly, I wish it were easier. I wish I could wake up tomorrow and have a six-pack. (I mean, I could have a six-pack of beer tomorrow, but not a six-pack OF ABS.) And I wish I could write a book in a day, and learn the Argentine Tango in a day, and learn everything I’ve learned in therapy in three years–in a day.

But that’s simply not the way it works. Rather, it’s like swimming, one action on repeat. (Hopefully with a decent set of goggles.) It’s a balanced meal, a good habit, lots of positive self-talk–done over and over (and over) again.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

"Things that shine do better when they're scattered about."

Results in the Distance (Blog #69)

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Today was my first full day of clean eating, and I don’t mind saying that it sucked. I drank so much water that taking a leak is now my most time-consuming hobby. I’m surprised the toilet didn’t look at me and say, “You again?” The meals themselves were fine–they just didn’t last long. This seems to be the case whenever I cut out carbs, at least for a couple of weeks. It’s like my body’s saying, “Hey, where’d all the bread go? SEND MORE BREAD!”

This afternoon I ate a salad bigger than Minnie Pearl’s hat. It was so big and there were so many vegetables to chew that it took me an hour to get the damn thing down. Midway through, I was stuffed and honestly didn’t think I’d be able to finish it, but I did. (No carrot’s gonna get the best of me.) Thirty minutes later, I was hungry again. All day I’ve been hungry. It’s like I’m just throwing eggs and artichokes into my stomach the way a seven-year-old throws pebbles into the Grand Canyon. There’s just a faint “chink” as they hit the bottom of my guts. It feels like trying to satisfy a pet dragon with a stalk of celery.

The upside to being hungry all day long has been that I already feel skinnier. I had a friend tell me once that when he quit smoking and his arms trembled from cravings, he just told himself it was his body’s reaction to getting so much oxygen. In terms of cigarettes, that logic never worked for me, but I like the fact that my friend could blow smoke up his own ass to help him over a hump. So today I’ve been telling myself that feeling hungry is my stomach’s positive reaction to my good decisions, as if all that noise down there were a bunch of cheerleaders at a ballgame rooting me on. I said a-boom-chicka-boom! 

Honestly, I’m not buying it for a second.

I really hoped that by the time I finished I’d no longer be able to feel my butt bouncing up and down.

This evening I walked to the park in Van Buren and jogged around the pond/lake/whatever when I got there. Jogging is hard enough as it is, but the trail tonight was covered in goose poop, so it was like running an obstacle course. There were feathers and shit–everywhere. It looked like a bunch of birds were in the middle of lunch and got massacred by a crocodile, shitting themselves just before they died. I kept darting left and right–it was more crap than concrete–imagining that if I stepped on a wet turd, I’d end up first in the pond and then in the chiropractor’s office.

So I only did one lap, then headed back to the house.

A firm butt isn’t built in a day.

Before I got home, I stopped at the high school track and jogged a mile (for a total of about three), alternating each lap between jogging and walking. I really hoped that by the time I finished I’d no longer be able to feel my butt bouncing up and down like one of those big punch balloons with the long rubber bands that children play with. Alas, that was not the case. I kept reminding myself that Rome wasn’t built in a day. A firm butt isn’t built in a day. When it comes to losing weight and healthy living, it’s about being able “to seek distant rather than immediate results.” (Someone famous said that.)

A few days ago a Facebook memory popped up with a picture from the summer camp where I used to work. The picture (below) is almost twenty years old, and it shows me and several of my dear friends dressed up in camouflage and war paint. (We used to do a lot of shit like that in order to entertain and scare the campers. The young ones sometimes wet their pants in appreciation.) Normally I get nostalgic for summer camp and my friends when I see a picture like this one, but as I jogged tonight, the only thing I could think about about was how fucking fantastic my waistline looked back then and the fact that I didn’t even appreciate it at the time.

Now that I think about, I didn’t appreciate beer back then either. I’m sure the two facts are unrelated. In college when I gained weight for the first time, my sister said, “Is it food weight or beer weight?” Well, I hadn’t even thought about it. I said, “Beer has weight?” (This is something they didn’t teach us in science class at Fort Smith Christian.)

This afternoon I watched The People’s Court, thought that everyone on the show could use a good therapist, and put contact paper on some of my favorite paperback books. I can’t tell you how happy it made me, everything so neat and tidy. This evening I soaked in the tub and took extra time to groom and shave, so now I’m neat and tidy too. I’ve been thinking all day that it’s important to have little rituals like this whenever embarking on new adventures like dieting and exercising because it signals that we’re willing to take care of ourselves (just like putting contact paper on your paperback books signals that you’re willing to take care of your things). It’s why we break champagne bottles on new ships–it’s like a baptism, a beginning.

So that’s how I’m looking at today, as a beginning. After all, the journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step. And whereas it’s just a single step, it’s a really important one. So today is my single step, and as I strike out with hunger–both for carbohydrates and for what is to come–I seek results in the distance.

[Thanks to my friend April , whom I’ve known almost my entire life, for posting the picture from camp. She’s fourth from the left in the photo, and if it weren’t for her, I probably never would’ve worked there, and that would’ve sucked more than this diet.]

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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You've got to believe that things can turn around, that even difficult situations--perhaps only difficult situations--can turn you into something magnificent.

"

An Enchanted Slumber (Blog #67)

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This morning I woke up in Nashville, but now I’m back in Van Buren. Whenever I return from an out-of-state trip, I always feel a bit unsettled. I know the technology to travel long distances in short amounts of time has been around since before I was born, but I still feel odd whenever it happens to me. Maybe it’s not traveling the physical distance that bothers me, but traveling the emotional distance.

Last night before I blogged, Bonnie and I sat in the kitchen and ate cold pizza and did shots of whiskey. At least I think it was whiskey. It could have been rum. I’m not an expert. Anyway, somehow we got on the topic of fairy tales, which fascinate me. As the conversation went on, I brought up Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz and talked about the fact that she goes on this amazing journey, but when she gets back, her family thinks it was a dream. Like everyone I’ve ever dated, they don’t get it. (In their defense, of course they don’t get it–they didn’t go on the journey and they weren’t the ones transformed by it.)

So that’s what I mean by the emotional distance, the transformation. I think any journey, even a week in Nashville, can change a person. Personally I had a week that was full of excitement, inspiration, and contemplation. That’s a lot to digest, and it’s hard to bring it all back to the place you came from, since it often feels like the people there don’t get it either. But again, why should they? They’ve been living their own lives, their own adventures.

I guess it just takes time to adjust after a big trip. On the drive back today, Todd and Bonnie and I didn’t talk much. I think all of us were tired, each looking back and looking forward, trying to figure out where to put the last eight days, maybe disappointed there weren’t more of them.

While Todd drove, I sat in the back and read one of the books I bought yesterday, Be Your Own Fairy Tale by Alison Davies. There’s a section in the book about Enchanted Slumber, the type of sleep that came over both Sleeping Beauty and Snow White. (And will come over me as soon as this blog is over.) The author explains that sleep represents not only periods of rest in our lives, but also periods of transformation. In the case of Sleeping Beauty, she fell asleep a girl, but woke up a woman.

For lunch this afternoon I had a burger, fries, and a chocolate shake from Dairy Queen, so this evening I went for an incredibly long walk/jog. (Since I started the hour before midnight, my stupid fitness app split my results into two days, so it looks like I barely met my goal, when the truth is that I FAR exceeded it.) Anyway, God willing and the creek don’t rise, I’m about to enter a period of transformation myself. Exercise is about to become a regular thing around here, and that means no more beer and tacos for a while. (Don’t worry, beer and tacos, I’ll come back for you, I just really need my pants to fit right now.)

Rest gives us time to dream.

As I walked/jogged tonight, I thought a lot about the fairy tale book, about how this time in my life is a lot like an Enchanted Slumber. (Obviously, I sleep past noon. Plus, I’m waiting for Prince Charming.) But really, it’s a big time of rest, a time of waiting, a time of transforming not only my waistline, but almost everything about me. Granted, I’m not exactly sure what things will look when it’s all over, but Sleeping Beauty didn’t either, and it worked out nicely for her.

As the book suggested, looking at things this way is already helping. I know that a lot of times I get frustrated because I’m not over there–now–but thinking of Sleeping Beauty reminds me that rest (and patience) is necessary for all of us. Rest gives us the energy for the adventure to come. What’s more, rest gives us time to dream.

So I’m reminded to give myself time to rest, whether it’s coming off closing a business of eleven years and selling most my possessions, or coming back from a weeklong trip to Nashville. After all, a lot of emotional ground has been covered, and it takes time to assimilate. Of course, when you’re resting, there’s no hurry. (Ask any Sleeping Beauty.) One day, for certain, you’ll wake up. And you’ll be grateful for the time you rested, and you’ll be just as grateful that you’re different, far from the person who fell asleep.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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If another's perspective, another's story about you is kinder than the one you're telling yourself, surely that's a story worth listening to.

"

small beginnings (blog #36)

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Last night I slept for a grand total of two hours. When the alarm went off at 7:45 this morning, I stumbled into the kitchen and stood in a daze with the freezer door open for five minutes while I stared at one frozen waffle and wished it were two frozen waffles. (Unfortunately, the waffle never multiplied, so don’t ask me to feed the five thousand.)

I spent the day attending Leadercast at the Van Buren Performing Art Center. Leadercast is an annual, national event where several prominent leaders from various fields come together to discuss leadership. This year’s theme was “purpose,” and the event took place in Atlanta, but was broadcast to cities around the world, including Van Buren. Two of the speakers today were local, and one of them was my friend Marla, and she had an extra ticket, and that’s why I dragged my ass out of bed so early.

When I got to the event, the third speech was already in progress, so I sneaked in the back and thought, Apparently some leaders get out of bed REALLY early. The guy speaking was Jim McKelvey, the creator of the credit card processing software called Square. Well, anytime I attend events like these, I always take notes because my inner straight-A student simply will not quit, even when he’s sleep deprived. So the first thing I wrote in my “lowing my expectations has succeeded beyond my wildest dreams” notebook was “An artist is someone who makes something that nobody needs,” but what I thought was “An artist is someone in his mid-thirties who lives with his parents and stays up until five-thirty in the morning blogging about it,” which just made my ego soar. I’m an artist.

After Jim’s speech, there was a break and I found Marla. We walked upstairs where several sponsors were giving away free pens, magnets, squeezy balls to help reduce stress, and coffee. Ya’ll, I’ve never been so glad to see a cup of coffee in all my life. It tasted like a miracle, better than two frozen waffles ever could have. But the most notable part of the entire break was that there was a jazz combo playing, right there in the middle of the room (in Van Buren, Arkansas). I looked at Marla and said, “Who has a jazz combo at nine-thirty in the morning?” Talk about something that nobody needs. Still, I couldn’t help do a little Bob Fosse number as we walked down the stairs, the whole time thinking, I should get up before noon more often.

After the break, there were more speakers, and then we had lunch. And then there were even more speakers. One guy, a psychologist named Dr. Henry Cloud, told the story of a woman with an eating disorder who used to come to group therapy “dressed to the nines.” And it became this point of discussion, like, why do you have to look so perfect? But she said she just had to.

So one day he’s in a suit and tie, about to leave the group and go straight to give a big presentation, and he looks at this lady and takes his cup of coffee and pours it down the front of his dress shirt and says, “You don’t have to be perfect.”

As he told the story today, he did it again. He just poured his coffee down the front of his white dress shirt, made a couple jokes about not having a six-pack (but having a keg), and kept going with his speech. So I got out my notebook and wrote, “You don’t have to be perfect,” and I centered it perfectly in the middle of the page, and then I went back and added a smart-looking exclamation point. (And that, my friends, is called irony.)

The last speaker in Atlanta was Tyler Perry, the creator of the character Madea. Back to the theme of purpose, Tyler said that he found his purpose on the other side of his pain. Tyler also said that when he was first getting started, he wrote a play that took six years to really get off the ground, that he lived in his car for part of that time. “Scripture reminds us to never despise small beginnings.”

After Tyler, Marla spoke. She talked about how much she loved this area, how her roots were planted deep, and how she wanted local leaders to know what a difference they make, that people notice. Her speech was so beautiful that it almost made me not want to move.

Almost. (But maybe that means that when I do move, I’ll move with more appreciation for my roots.)

This evening I took a nap for a few hours. When I woke up and told my brain that I needed to write, my brain took one look at me and said, “You’ve got to be fucking kidding.”

So here we are. It’s two-thirty in the morning, and I wish I could tell you where I’m going with all this. Usually I try to pick one event or emotion and stick to it, figure it out, find a lesson in it. But on days like today, it’s harder to do that. I heard so many wonderful, inspiring things today. Hell, I heard a jazz combo at nine-thirty this morning. All day I kept thinking about the blog and about writing, about being an artist and how I struggle with perfection. I thought about how therapy and even this blog have helped me to work through my pain and how it feels like I’m getting closer to my purpose. I thought about small beginnings, how I often despise them, wishing for something better rather than appreciating them for what they are—actual beginnings.

And how beautiful it is to begin!

And how beautiful it is to begin, however imperfectly.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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Love  is all around us.

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