TURNING THE OTHER CHEEK, OR NOT

In the past few months I have again been thinking a lot about the terrible things people are doing to each other in their relationships. Whether a Woman or a Man are involved, I have been told, makes no difference.

Both sexes are unfaithful, both are lonely, both are angry and both are reacting, it seems to me at least, without much thought but with a lot of feeling.

Quite a long time ago, I was writing about ‘road rage’ and how our patience with each other as a society had declined. Road rage was one manifestation that had become tolerated, if not accepted. It was a symptom not the cause, I thought, of deeper problems.

More recently I wrote about The Cheaters and The Liars. What do you do when you are involved and invested with people who betray your trust? Do you quickly forgive and/or forget? Do you give them another chance?

Or, do you just tell them to take a hike, begone, hit the road, quit wasting your time and energy or some variation of giving them their walking papers?

What about that other chance? Is it a ‘first offence’ or just one of many, many wrongs coming one after the other and to no one’s surprise not being able to turn it around and make it right?

Do you just leave at the first sign of what you have come to consider typical signs which past experience has taught you are just the beginning of the end? 

Do you try to push down your fears that you’ve already ‘been there, done that’ or do you try to reassert your optimism that each person is unlike any other and deserves a chance, regardless of what we feel because of a past experience?

All of these are questions that are not unreasonable for us to ask ourselves when faced with a situation which can make or break a relationship.

I regret that I cannot give you (or even myself) an answer without being there or being personally involved myself. 

All I can say is trust yourself and the knowledge you have of what you need and want out of life, and what you know you can live with and want to live with today.

The decision you make may not be the one I would make, or one that anyone else you know would either, but they and I are not you.

You must do one important thing, be true to yourself. As Polonius said to his daughter in Shakespeare’s play The Merchant of Venice – ‘But most of all to thine own self be true, and it will follow as the night the day, thou canst be false to any man’. Good advice, even 400+ years later.

THE NEXT STAGE

One day many years ago, I misspoke. This means I said something without thinking. Happens more often than I’d care to admit.

On this occasion it was my saying, ‘we should try to be honest’. My husband was, I could tell, shocked. What did I mean ‘try to be’, he asked. For him, and for me too actually, you are or you are not. I guess this is being Honestly Honest. 

To me you Smile when you are Happy. Frown when you are Sad. You say what you mean. You mean what you say. You make a promise and you keep it. You do your best. All the rest is dressing and camouflage.

Tonight I couldn’t sleep so I pulled out the Science of Sexy how to dress book.* Maybe a Man dressing movie stars could help bring good wardrobe/outlook changes into my life. Being me, however, I did not suddenly, pull out the How To Flirt book. After 3+ years in my bookcase, maybe I should give it away for Christmas.

My youngest brother today reminded me that I’ve been on my own again for a long time and am likely to just walk away when anyone gives me grief, thinking who needs the problems this one is laying on me. I am perhaps, I admit, not as open to new people as I have normally been for most of my life. This has given me something to think about.

I didn’t think of it this way, but rather that I have a life of total freedom. For those of you looking for this, I can assure you that too much choice can put you under as much as too little can. Perhaps eventually I’ll be able to explain this. In my case, it comes from retiring just as middle age began.

Each of us, regardless of our circumstances however, at various times in our lives, has to make the transition into the next stage of our lives. Right now a lot of people I know are becoming ‘empty nesters’, some even have the ‘boomerang children’ back after having completed their (expensive) educations.

So what do we need to do to adjust and adapt our lives to the changes our age or circumstance is bringing to us?

One of the poor choices, is to behave as many Women do, when afraid or change or overwhelmed, and ‘go into hiding’. Many of us even hide out in plain sight.

For example, as a Woman, at one point in a not great situation, I did the usual, stopped wearing makeup, contact lenses and began (without knowing it) losing my hair. I also went out all the time with my friends and to my club to hear speakers and have many meals out away from home as often as I could. I was not aware until later that my stress level was skyrocketing.

Seriously, there has to be a better way for Women growing older to react than by continuing the lifelong habit of turning our nervousness about change against ourselves, internally and eventually obviously in our external appearance.

Men on the other hand, do Middle Aged Crazy, by buying a Sports Car; at least, ogling younger women (or worse) and in other ways showing that in their own way, they also are wondering where the time went. Since Men aren’t given to navel gazing verbally, like Women are, we see their actions speak louder than words in the changes in their behaviour.

Thankfully, when we are ready to go onto the next stage, common sense normally prevails. We make the changes we need to and stabilize back to a closer version of our normal selves. Among other things, we stop worrying about what is ahead of us and start to rebuild to allow for the new stage.

This can be pretty nice. The greater freedom, which seems so daunting at first, especially when people first retire suddenly is replaced by amazement and wonder how we ever managed to work and have a life as well. Life has taken over and is full of activities and new things.

A lot of energetic people branch out from the corporate world and turn their skills, or interests or hobbies into a second career. Not many people suddenly decide to sleep their days away. For most of us there are lots of things to do. Some, but maybe not all of us, are busier than we ever were.

I think you are and continue to be, who you are as a person, regardless of where you go or what you do. By the time you are thinking about how the empty nest will effect you, you know yourself pretty well.

One added benefit is that the Someday/Bucket List actually can be realized more easily than at any other time since you became an Adult. It will be interesting to see what you actually do with it. Whatever that is, try to incorporate and enjoy it as you go forward into this exciting next stage of your journey. 


*The Science of Sexy - Dress to Fit Your Unique Figure with the Style System That Works for Every Shape and Size by Bradley Bayou.

YOUR ANGER PUNISHES YOU

"Anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. You will not be punished for your anger, you will be punished by your anger."

--Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha

I first saw this quote on one of my blog sites and was fascinated by it. The other day I was thinking about how unreasonable Envy is. Pride is another of the deadly sins and I have often seen the trouble it causes in families, often even between parents and their children, and other people who might have stayed close to you had you not let Pride take over.

Anger however, is diabolical and the most direct way to harm yourself. The quote, of course is a bit humorous, but expressing anger is actually exercising yourself into a frenzy and exploding outward with a lot of the bad energy you have accumulated in order to try and demonstrate to someone else how much they have annoyed you.

When you are angry you say some of the stupidest and also most unforgivable things to other people. A rant can be amusing but most people are not just doing a cathartic little bit of drama, they take their anger and go right for the jugular. There is nothing delicate and careful about an explosion of anger.

I often wonder if the brain is overheated, like the cartoons where steam is coming out of the top of the persons head. The mouth is flapping and usually saying a lot of terrible things.

The closer the person is to you, the greater your capacity to hurt them with your first volley. Since you are out of control, you keep on firing until you have seriously wounded your victim.

Ultimately though, the victim twice over is you. First because you have felt hurt. Then by expressing all of your anger and venom, you upset yourself and everyone else around you, sometimes forever.

Instead of trying to rectify a situation, give the other person a chance to explain (in case something was misunderstood), you build up ‘steam’ and normally carry on to anyone who will listen.

The catalogue of the other persons shortcomings is usually long and detailed. It often consists of even tiny details, that were you feeling friendly might be endearing.

When angry however, every small thing you can think of is used as a sort of mortar to cement the bricks you are piling up for the wall you are building up inside yourself against the other person.

Ultimately, you will make sure that either someone else, or you directly will make contact with the person you are angry at. If it is you, an explosion is sure to follow.

Whoever said ‘be sure your brain is in gear, before putting your mouth into action’, must have been in or seen someone letting their anger get the better of them.

I think by this time, the brain is turned off and only the bile is percolating to the surface. Common Sense and Reason will not prevail.

There is not much chance that cooler heads will succeed in calming you down enough to get you to be reasonable, so the situation has usually escalated to an explosive level.

The explosion is often a big one, and damage, sometimes irreparable, is often done. After the dust settles almost all that is usually left is a destroyed relationship, often a friendship.

Yes, maybe it took two to create the situation but actually once a fuse is lit by either one and a confrontation ensues, either one or both of you are going on the defensive and you may not be able ever to return to where you were before all of this started.

If only we could see the end result of two unhappy former friends when all this starts and shut it down early on, how much better it might have been.

Yes, we are only human, and sometimes humans make a big mess of things, which can’t be fixed or ever made whole again.

REVENGE MOVIES

While in life Living Well is the best revenge, movie makers have other ideas. Because of this we get films such as KILL BILL 1 and 2, THELMA AND LOUISE, PAYBACK, for High Schoolers – TAD HAMILTON MUST DIE; years ago SHE DEVIL, SOMETHING TO TALK ABOUT, LAW ABIDING CITIZEN, and very recently, THE OTHER WOMAN.

Years ago a movie called, ENEMIES: A Love Story showed Anjelica Huston and a couple of other Women ending up caring for the Husband and Boyfriend’s child by another Woman. I think there were 3 Woman involved and they all seemed to be happy in the end and quite calm about it all. No wonder Movies are make believe. In Real Life, this quiet acceptance is doubtful at best amid the hurt and pain that a living, breathing Woman is feeling. Active Revenge seeking is probably also rare.  

The latest of the genre, THE OTHER WOMAN, takes a fairly plain looking guy (obviously not my type) who has a formula down, including asking to meet his Girlfriend’s Father, Flowers at the Office, lots of Romantic Dinners and consideration etc.

The clue should have been the combination of a $300,000 car with a House in Connecticut. Connecticut…really? However, Women generally try to believe and trust a Man they are interested in, so it comes as a big surprise that dropping in on him at home means meeting a Wife, the Girlfriend hadn’t imagined. As if this wasn’t enough and because CHEATERS CHEAT, there is, we soon find out, another current Girlfriend as well.

The Women, realistically join forces but in a Movie Comedy sort of way. The details are therefore not very likely, and ultimately, the guy is exposed as a Crook, as well as, a Cheater on a big scale.

It is not a Men’s Revenge Movie which would be full of explosions, car chases, buildings getting blown up and other loud and gratifying scenes of creative and diabolical destruction, up to and including Murder. For example ones like, LAW ABIDING CITIZEN.

The Women’s version is a group of Women who turn humiliation and their anger into an effort to hit The Cheater where it hurts. Often this is not physical, or only physical, but involves stripping off the things he values in life.

In SHE DEVIL, it is His Home, His Family, His Career and His Freedom. In The Other Woman, it involves discovering that there are more Women, and revealing his fraudulent financial dealings.

It is disappointing to think that today’s Men behave like this one. Maybe THE UGLY TRUTH tells us more about today's male than anyone admits. I know it is possible and even likely for some to carry on this way. Mercifully most of those who want a Single life just stay Single. Either they seem to have never Married or found one marriage was enough.

Perhaps, as in SOMETHING TO TALK ABOUT, someone understands Julia Roberts remark about not getting Married when you are still interested in Dating and decides to play fair. Probably a good idea for the type that thinks of himself as a Player.

However, I actually know at least one socially. He follows the separation of home and social life quite well and totally avoids workplace Hanky Panky. He is however, quite forthcoming about elements of his ‘Game’. As a ‘Woman Friend’ you finally understand that he absolutely does not consider any Woman his equal.

So what is the guy getting out of this? What are the Revenge seekers? I could speculate but… I guess because I think Living Well is the Best Revenge, whatever either gets isn’t much that would bring me happiness.

The Movies are usually still fun. They neglect to show the real pain this behaviour actually brings and the lives that are ruined. For the Revenge Seekers, there is a Victory of sorts and Justice, but only after a lot of time and effort is spent on trying to ruin the hurtful person who used, humiliated and tricked them. The Men’s Revenge version meanwhile, is stimulating and interesting to Crash and Burn enthusiasts such as myself.

Probably both Men and Women into Revenge are best left on the Movie screen, since neither is living a very nice or happy life that they can be proud of. 

WALKING ON SUNSHINE 1 MUSIC

When morning breaks and you awaken you must decide on the day ahead. What kind of day will it be? Will it be a good day to follow the good night? Or will it be a lacklustre day as cloudy in our lives as the dull sky is outside?

I like to think that EVERY LITTLE THING (She Does) IS MAGIC. The song by the Police is with me a lot. When it isn’t, I sometimes like to think about WALKING ON SUNSHINE. 

If all else fails I think about what it would be like to have a great person RIGHT BY YOUR (My) SIDE or how ONE WAY OR ANOTHER I am going to turn TONIGHT around.

Music can be fun and it can give us a lift. Find your own kind of music and sing your own special song. Don’t be HOT then let yourself be COLD. Just go for it. After all, WHAT DOESN’T KILL YOU MAKES YOU STRONGER. 

YOU’VE GOT A FRIEND, who likes you JUST THE WAY YOU ARE and THAT’S WHAT FRIENDS ARE FOR…besides, I don’t let anyone to tell me how to live MY LIFE. 

You are HAPPY that your life doesn’t need A BRIDGE OVER TROUBLED WATER. 

All you ever needed was a little RESPECT and you found that WHATEVER GETS YOU THROUGH THE NIGHT helps us because WE’RE ALL IN THE DANCE.*  

*In CAPITAL letters several SONG TITLES that I like (among one of the many types of music I enjoy and support by attending LIVE performances and listening and a bit of collecting). So many songs and such incredible talent have given us, not only something to sing about, but enrich and enliven our lives. The titles above are just a few of the many that wonderfully creative people have composed the music and lyrics for. Most, probably even all of these can still be found on you tube and on the sites of the singers, song writers and publishers. If you don’t already, consider adding Music to your life.

Some of the singers/groups that sang and/or recorded the above are: The Police, Katrina and the Waves, Eurythmics, Kelly Clarkson, Carole King, Billy Joel, Dionne Warwick, Simon and Garfunkel, Aretha Franklin, John Lennon, Katy Perry, Feist, Pharrel Williams and Queen.

WALKING ON SUNSHINE 2 LIFE

Give me a Sunny Day, and thankfully there are many of those and I say, you just can’t keep a good Woman down. 

As I have been saying we all carry our shells (baggage) around with us. This autumn I realized mine again needed to be lightened.

As we all do, I seem to have picked up a lot of junk recently and was carrying it around with me. No wonder I felt loaded down. 

My thinking is, that it’s always a good idea to drop a bunch of this rubbish off as soon as you can after you realize it is happening.

You’d laugh if you saw my recent forays into Luggage buying. I seemed to be doing something I hadn’t done in a really long time, getting ready to take off at the drop of a hat. However, after (literally) lugging around bags on two trips away this year, nothing seems light enough, so in this area of my life, I am still shopping around.

When I was younger all it took was a good idea for a get away and I was calculating how long it would take me to pack, get to the bank and get ready to go, go, go. At least in my mind, taking off was a prescription for fun. In many ways it still is.

However, like everybody else, schedules and obligations to others, and of course, the costs of things, pulls me back down to earth. This means I end up making a plan for the next available time when I can ‘run off’ and have a bit of time away from my ‘real life’. The Wish List has therefore become a regular fixture in my life. 

The ongoing Wish List is actually kind of nice for Keeping the Dream Alive and makes for always having something to look forward to. In this I am luckier than a lot of people and though I am happy and grateful, I still have many things that I have to do before I try and go away.

I can’t understand how Life, no matter how you try to simplify it, always has periods that are overloaded with activities chock a block and overlapping for the same week or often even the same day. Try as I might, even if I can schedule my time to spread things out a bit, getting together with other people takes me back right away to meet them on their overloaded weekends.

But the Sun is out again and I spend my time humming away and thinking about the (I now realize) old song – Walking on Sunshine* by Katrina and the Waves from 1983. I thought this was known everywhere (and apparently it was reissued in the U.S. and became a hit) but apparently it’s a Canadian light rock/pop thingy. No matter, I found it or it found me.

It gives me something to bounce around to as I walk down the street, enjoying the day even more because I can ignore that the weather is colder when I’m enjoying the sun and the brighter light and another nice day…with a really super busy weekend ahead.

We all need to make our own kind of music, live our own special lives and train ourselves to appreciate the miracle and wonder of it all.

It’s not just what gets you through the night that’s important, it’s how you decide to live your days. Walking on Sunshine sure helps brighten things up.

*Walking on Sunshine - Katrina and the Waves 1983  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walking_on_Sunshine_(Katrina_and_the_Waves_album)

NOT A MINUTE TOO SOON

I came home from a really nice trip to the Mediterranean on September 28^th, had a bit of sleep and immediately started writing. At the time I was sunburnt and happy and thinking about what a great place the world is.

My inbox, especially on the Google sites looked like a bomb had exploded. My personal emails had a joke from two people from my distant past. These 2 have been in the periphery of my life for Decades. They keep in touch, I sometimes reply and it continues. Another guy who should have been gone almost 5 years ago still jumps in and out of my life to feel better about himself and his life, not mine – his.

I suddenly realized that these were not friends or even represented good experiences from the past. I started to think about how UNFINISHED BUSINESS STALKS US. Sure enough, a couple of weeks a problem I have been avoiding came back, intruded twice and continues to darken my present days, because I still refused to deal with it and totally finish this off.

This is what the BAGGAGE we carry around does to us. It puts a cloud of grey into our day, then our week and then our month. This does not dissipate enough that it goes away, it just sits above us and keeps pushing itself forward.

This is the real menace of letting our junk run into the present. The present gets clouded over by the past. All we can do is remind ourselves that it is time to put it away, not tomorrow or next week or next month. The time is now.

To get our sunny days back and keep moving forward into the holiday season happy and brightly ready to celebrate the good things in life, we need to push the past away firmly and for good.

The past has wasted enough of our time recently. It’s not a minute too soon to do whatever it takes to move forward today and every day from now on.

FINALLY FINISH WITH THE PAST

To anyone familiar with the frustrating saga which periodically impinges on the rest of my life, you will already know that the EXCESS BAGGAGE that I was carrying around in my life, this autumn finally got too heavy to carry around any longer.

When I wrote KISS YOUR EX GOODBYE, FRIENDS I THINK NOT, I was thinking about what all of us have been through at one time or another when a dead end relationship seems to drag on and on and never really leaves us free to go on with our lives unhampered.

When you don’t have fits and tantrums or even a good reason to have them, you tend to have a lot of people who are sort of hovering around the margins of your life.

Every once in a while you encounter them again, or they see you at an event or email you or call you. The latter, a phone call is the worst, because you, by picking up the phone, are inviting them into your day. At best, they are saying hello and asking how you are; more often and worse is when they need somebody to discuss and dissect their lives with. Kiss an hour (and sometimes more, if you are polite) goodbye.

You have some sort of a conversation with them. Because you really don’t want to hear from them, they do most of the talking. This is a novelty for you (and probably for them). You are not giving them grief or negative comments or arguing with them. You are actually not saying much at all.

This makes a pleasant change, so they feel all warm and fuzzy that you were there when they needed a shoulder to cry on and/or an ear to talk into. Guess what? You have just become their buddy and are so understanding.

Guess what? Next time, when they have work or relationship problems again, they will pick up and contact you again…and again…and forever, if you let them. Eventually 4½ years after you said, what you hoped was a final, Goodbye to them, they will be calling you again. Any excuse will do.

However, an evening after a holiday is ideal because the call will catch you off your guard, as it was intended to.

When the call FINALLY ENDS, you will find it hard to go back to what you were doing and feel good about the day again, but it is all shot to hell. All you can think of is WHAT I SHOULD HAVE SAID…but did not. You wished you had begun, or certainly ended the unwelcome call with GOODBYE forever.

Now your night and maybe several days after are consumed by anger at yourself that you did not (when this perfect opportunity presented itself) finally put an end to this pathetic non relationship. Now the past baggage is back in the present and in your face, littering up your life again.

This cannot go on, you tell yourself. This should never have happened again. You determine that you will make sure next time, should you get caught off guard again, that you will say Goodbye for good.

Amazingly, the call comes, not on a holiday but in the middle of a week. Again you think it may be a family member and again it is not. Instead it is your long ago ex. Again it is on the phone not by email (which could be ignored and filed away; and usually quickly forgotten).

Finally, after letting him go on about his life and it’s details, you quietly say that ‘It’s time for us to say Goodbye. I wish you all the best in your life’.

You are glad you finally said it, your friends are glad you finally said it, your family is glad you finally said it. Anyone who knows you, and unfortunately also knows about this situation, is glad you finally said it. You are proud of yourself, and you should be. They are proud of you too and tell you so.

Now, what’s left. Yes, ‘fraid so, there is something left. One more phone call is coming your way. I almost guarantee it. I am so sure of this, that I could put a bet down on it and know I will win 99 times out of a 100.

The call, like all the others, will be after a bit of time has passed. This is to catch you off guard and let you resume your life, and give you a false sense of security that you have finally concluded that chapter of your life for good. 

You are very happy you have finally done what you should have done before and are justifiably proud of yourself. You feel you are finally free and clear and moving on…NOT SO FAST.

You must be ready for whenever it comes. It will begin as though nothing in the world is wrong and he is just keeping in touch and wondered how you were. In your mind, you have said a final goodbye. In his, you just had to go and said goodbye to end the phone call. You had to go.

This is when you Cut the Crap. You must stop ‘pussy footing around’ and belatedly take a firm stand. Once and for all you must prepare yourself so that there is no question that this is the end, finis, kaput, done. 

Whatever you remember that you thought was good with this person, was a long time ago. It has not been good for a long time now. If you don’t, this nonsense will go on forever. You will never have your life back or move on to the future unencumbered.

DROP THE BAGGAGE finally, once and for all. This time do not either start a conversation or let him do so. Tell him, in clear and simple English (in your own words) that ‘It is time for us to say Goodbye for good. I wish you the best. I believe I told you this the last time. I have to go now. Please don’t call me again’. Say Goodbye, and hang up.

This is the only way to finish. No more conversations. If he calls again, you must hang up, with or without repeating the above statement. For you hopefully it will be the last time you hear from him. 

Maybe next time you will finish a relationship you need to finish, with someone else, by finishing the relationship.

Experience will have taught you that letting old business drag on is not harmless, not at all. It is instead, HAZARDOUS TO YOUR HEALTH, well being and future to be weighed down by reminders of past failures. 

To go ahead, you need to drop the Baggage and walk on unencumbered. If it takes a second statement to show you were serious, it is a small price to pay to FINALLY FINISH with the past and move on. 

KEEPING OUR DREAMS ALIVE

It took a long time to make life simpler. You almost can’t do it unless you make a conscious effort. Life is always intruding and, as the late Gilda Radner said, “It’s Always Something”. How right she was.

I wrote last month about the people who are Busy Being Busy. Some of them, of course, have a reason to be; they are called Parents. Others make a virtue out of their disorganization. These I know will still be overloaded were I to speak to them next week, next month or even years from now.

Life really is a matter of priorities. You usually do what you want to do the most first, or certainly as soon as you possibly can. This is especially true with Men who tend to be hard wired into goal oriented pursuits which they perform one after another, usually in the order which interests them.

Women, on the other hand, travel through life, with a ‘Wish List’ of Dream places and things that they want and hope to have ‘Someday’.

If you don’t make Someday come sooner rather than later, you may find it has become impossible to realize your dreams. Your clock may just run out or you could become unable to cope physically or mentally.

Let’s face it, some of us are never going to have enough money to feel that going after our dreams today might not leave us short of money for tomorrow.

However, I ask, How much is enough? Will some people ever feel they have enough? More importantly, when do you plan to do some of the things you dream about doing?

While it is true that there are times where there is too much to do and not enough time to do it; there are many other times where we can spend a little extra time thinking about where we can pare down, eliminate and generally reorganize our time and our lives to, sooner rather than later, have a life we like better.

The extra time we have gained can begin to be used to check off a bit of the Wish List and also to add new items and keep our dreams alive and accessible.

ENVY IS A FOUR LETTERED WORD

I have often thought that of the Seven Deadly Sins, ENVY has to be one of the worst.*

I have (too often) heard people use the word ‘worth’ when asking about someone’s income, as in What Is He Worth? I can’t answer such a thing in monetary terms because that only tells me how much money the person has, not what he is like as a human being.

I have watched shameless behavior toward wealthy people. I can assure you that the ‘Yes Man’ is alive and well and still hoping that some wealthy person will pass on the secret of his success, if only the envious one hangs about long enough to discover this secret. Since I was in and around the financial world for a long time, I had occasion to observe some very pathetic self-abasement first hand as well as other shameless groveling & sycophancy**.

What is it that the person hoped to get from the financially successful person? Did they think they would be adopted or mentioned in the financier’s will? Paul Mellon once said, that when he was in the army in World War 2, one person decided to become his best friend. I think Mellon had been really rich long enough to recognize insincerity when he saw it.

Meanwhile, some Envy must be involved. Why else do certain people seem happy to see how ‘the mighty have fallen’? The word Schadenfreude is a German word for ‘the pleasure derived from another’s misfortune'. Nice, there is even a word for this awful enjoyment of another’s suffering.

What do we know of another’s life? What do we know of the hardship and challenges they may be facing? I would say very little. Because I feel that we actually know very little about what anyone we know has experienced and lived through or lived with, we should exercise caution instead of envy.

When Aristotle Onassis had myasthenia gravis, or Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis had Non Hodgkin's Lymphoma and had to have Trepanning done to inject chemotherapy directly into her brain, what good did her jewels or his money do for them.

The world knew of the losses she suffered of many miscarriages and the assassination of her husband and brother in law but what she felt, she said, she would let others describe and that it was not coming directly from her. 

Meanwhile, the loss of his son and heir, we are told caused Aristotle Onassis unbearable anguish and the reward he offered for information as to the cause of his death in an airplane, was not, I believe ever claimed.

Even Onassis daughter ended up dying of a heart attack in a bathtub in South America after several failed marriages and a daughter with a man who she supported. Her estate or her daughter probably still supports him and his wife and their family.

The Tobacco heiress Doris Duke and her cousin Woolworth heiress Barbara Hutton both ended their lives in sad circumstances and isolated and alone. This was also true of Howard Hughes. Robert Maxwell drowned, apparently just before he was going to be vilified and exposed for malfeasance.

The point is, a good life is not guaranteed, just because a person seems to have an enviable lifestyle and money beyond most people’s dreams. It seems people who have studied Happiness recently are finding that all of our assumptions about it are wrong. I need to see what they have found and see if it adds to understanding the phenomena better.

Meanwhile, I urge you to look to your own life and satisfaction because you and I don’t know much about someone else’s life and what kind of life anyone else is living. In fact, we will be lucky to make a success of our own lives, if we don’t mind your own business better and don't stop distorting our own perspective by looking into and after other people’s lives with Envy.

*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_deadly_sins  - Wikipedia  says that these “are known as capital vices or cardinal sins. They are considered a form of Idolatry-of-Self wherein the subjective reigns over the objective.”Today they are usually given as: wrath, greed, sloth, pride, lust, envy, and gluttony.”

**Sychophant www.thesaurus.com/browse/sycophant 

     adj. deferential, groveling. abject · adulatory · bootlicking · bowing · brownnosing · compliant · cowering · crawling · cringing · flattering · humble · ingratiating.

REGRETS I'VE HAD A FEW*

We can be a little smug when we’re in our 20’s. At one point when I was still in my early 20’s and admittedly pretty inexperienced, one of the Men I dated was several years older than me and although a Canadian had been a soldier in the United States Marines and later served with another Commonwealth military organization.  

I was impressed that he had a second degree Black Belt in Karate, had a small tray with sand on it, which I think he used to keep the calluses on the side of his hand firm and generally seemed to be strong and brave and honourable.

One day, however, he told me that he would not like to relive some of the things he had seen. Being in my early 20’s and having been almost totally insulated from the ‘real world’ by my family, my community, my schools (especially a boarding school I lived at for 2 years during High School) and even after; I replied with the confidence that only ignorance and insulation gives you that I had no regrets at all.

We take our own road in life, however, and my particular journey is naturally different than anyone else’s. I know now that I could never have made the statement I did had I been even a bit older and had more experience in life.

I don’t dwell on ‘the road not taken’** much, except occasionally, when like anyone else would, I wonder where I’d be now if I had made some different choices along the way.

I think it is something we probably all do from time to time, before we go back to the familiar path we take to go home.

Song * My Way – words  1967 by Paul Anka unrelated to the music composed by Claude Francois and Jacques Revaux for a French song “Comme d’habitude”.

Poem **The Road Not Taken – Robert Frost, 1915

A USEFUL LESSON

I mentioned once that I was taught a very valuable lesson while I was still in High School by a young guy who knew one of my friends at the school. 

He told me that if I, or anyone else told him they were honest, he believed them and took them at their word. Later however, he would see them with their friends and he would know.

I have used this test myself ever since. When you claim a person is your Friend, one can expect and even assume that you will treat them well. In fact, if there is anyone in your life you would treat well, it would be someone you consider to be close to you and your Friend.

These days actually, some people are even closer to their friends than their families. This makes this small test more important than ever.

Therefore, I will probably always use the little test of observing you with your friends to tell me more about you than you yourself might want to tell me. 

When you tell me you are honest, I will take your word for it, but, I will see how you treat your friends and I will know.

DANCING WITH MYSELF*

I once saw a movie where the Man and Woman agreed to disagree. Obviously a work of Fiction. The chances of this happening in ‘real life’ are slim to none. This is a fact of Nature, Biology, Sociology, Heredity and Genetics.

I did hear a live Woman use the phrase in front of me once, but I thought she was joking. I have never met a Woman who would not try to have the last word in an argument…ever.

The Male of the species on the other hand whether 6 or 96 still thinks himself attractive, a regular powerhouse and dynamo. Every Woman he winks (or leers) at is dying to shower him with affection, to serve his every need and immediately come into his home to feed him, do his laundry and generally be available to meet his every whim.

Real life is much more interesting when it is given a healthy dose of fantasy and imagination. Sometimes however, the Man and Woman both have o realize their limitations and be realistic.

The Woman, even today, can not be fighting every Male she meets because once upon a time, some guy did not fall at her feet. Nor can she realistically expect to never interact with someone of the opposite sex, even if she is extremely timid or angry. I wouldn't want to...BUT...what do I know?

The Male cannot expect that someone working full time is going to be able to work two full time jobs, the second one being, making herself a ‘Domestic Goddess’.

I am fascinated by the dynamics among Couples today. Without warning a Couple seems to have broken up. Without warning a Couple seems to have gotten together. Sometimes it is the same Couple breaking apart and coming together again.

Somewhere along the way, not only did I not know what Friends With Benefits was but also that Women thought Friends with Benefits was a good idea. One Woman told me it saved her time because she was busy, busy, busy. I also became disabled when it came to understand the modern Male. 

I haven’t the slightest idea whether someone is interested in me or not. An (until now) unspoken fear of mine is that I might misread the signals and look a fool. Which is actually the only thing that ever could embarrass me.  

I think perhaps I was a Wife, and/or a Friend to happily married couples for too long to ever interpret any Male speaking to me as more than courtesy and good manners. Kisses on the cheek are how the whole group I am part of greet each other. Also whether it was a male or a female, a handshake in greeting when meeting or departing has long been normal for me.

I guess what it comes down to is that it is time to re watch my DVD of the Mating Habits of the Earthbound Male and try and figure out whether I can ever understand what people do to get together these days.

Maybe I should finally read my book on Flirting (in my bookcase for about 3 years now), throw out all of my clothes (suggestion by my youngest brother) and watch how slutty, provocative, and conversations full of innuendo are just great according to today’s movies. I don’t think however, such films as He’s Just Not That Into You will make me feel any better than it did the first time I saw it a few years ago.

Maybe it’s just NOT LIKELY that I will be a ‘Partner’ (in today’s lexicon) again. Some Widows never are. Either they/we can’t see anyone with the comparable character and qualities we were used to, or sometimes we feel that we understand too well, the black clad old Ladies who seem to take their mourning as a sort of Occupation to live by for the rest of their lives.

In earlier generations, when a Woman was so much younger than her Husband that she survived him, she was either expected to throw herself upon the funeral pyre (India) or remarry either a member of his family or someone else who would look after her and protect her.

I don’t think the past options or the other one of going to a Convent (Nunnery) would work for me either. Chances are, I will be Dancing With Myself*.

What’s a girl to do? Perhaps crack open the Flirting Book, throw out the Wife-like wardrobe, buy some Lingerie and generally feel better as a more feminine Woman again.

Who knows maybe Lightning will strike and make the world of Men and Women comprehensible again. NOT LIKELY but, hopefully not impossible either. 

song* Dancing with Myself - Billy Idol and Tony James 1980

DREAM. DREAM. DREAM.*

All I Have to Do is Dream, was and is, a Romantic Love Ballad that still speaks to Lovers today. This song, is an old one. How old? Well it was issued in 1958 (before any music listening time for me). 

This song is also a Classic and is still known. Best known in The Everly Brothers 1958 version, the song was ranked Number 142 by Rolling Stone magazine among the 500 Greatest Songs of all time.

Meanwhile, relating to Dreams themselves, there are a lot of theories about them and the purpose they may serve in our lives. Anybody with a Psychology course under their belt, knows that Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung both had theories about dreams and how to interpret them and what they meant. Some of these were, quite frankly, pretty weird.

To the rest of us however, many of the Dreams we have when we Sleep seem to be nonsense. Often we wonder why the heck we were dreaming some crazy thing in our sleep the night before.

Possibly the ones that make a bit more sense and/or seem more connected to reality, might be ways we work out things we need to think about and resolve.

The Dreaming in the song however, is the way in which the Singer thinks about his memories about someone he loves. He relives their romance and when he is apart from his love, all he has to do is dream about her.

Of course, the only trouble is that he is dreaming his life away. I know how he feels, because I am a champion day dreamer and secretly (till now) hopeless romantic.

Memories are with us whether we are asleep or awake. Dreams meanwhile can be memories that we actually experienced or our hopes and dreams for the present and future. It might also be a way to consider and plan how we might make our dreams a reality.

I don’t think it does any harm to dream. I hope the Writers and Singers Dreams became a reality. I hope mine do too. Meanwhile, I enjoy my Dreams, and hope you enjoy yours too.


*All I Have to Do is Dream - song issued in 1958 and issued as a 45r.p.m. record sung by the Everly Brothers. Ranked No. 142 on Rolling Stones Magazine's 500 Greatest Hits of All Time. Written by Felice and Boudleaux Bryant.