The Real-Life Adventures of A Former Glamour Girl

Taking a breath out of "quiet."

There is a temporary lull in the chaos, clutter and manufacturing of new, tiny bits of paper and legos scattered about the house.  The kids have gone to Manhattan Beach for the day to visit friends and Tom has gone with the Crenshaw girls to walk the dogs in Cold Spring Canyon.  I am alone in the house for the first time in a while.

I have not exercised in two weeks.  I have a little bit of a cold and my ability to focus is limited even on my best days.  I’ve decided to give myself this week off from the gym but beginning next week, I’m back at it and hard!  So far, I am staying mostly true to my no carbs, no sugar diet, with the exception of the little slice of Laura’s home made cheesecake I thoroughly enjoyed on Christmas.  (This is why I do not bake.  I believe it is a mortal sin to not eat home made goodies.)

As I should have expected, that bit of something sweet set off the craving for MORE.  All Christmas night and into the next day, the remaining cheesecake was calling my name.  “Kathy, I’m right here!  You could eat the rest of me and then I’d be gone and you wouldn’t have to worry!”  Yeah, I’ve heard that before.  I practically had to sit on my hands until I could get rid of the last three pieces to visiting guests who are not like me.  In other words, not PIGS!

Today is day three post cheesecake.  The craving is almost gone.  It was a very close call, which reminded me of why I cannot and have not taken even a little sip of alcohol for all of these years.  The disease is still very much alive and waiting.  Other than that close call, I’ve done well with food.  I am so grateful because it was four Christmases ago that I dove off the sugar wagon and into the sugar ditch.  The seductress then was baklava.  It said, “oh this isn’t sugar, this is honey and butter!  This is practically health food!”  Uh, huh!  I’m on to you!

Tom has a nasty sinus infection and has made an appointment to see a new doctor this afternoon.  It is with a concierge doctor like Dr. Dunham but not as expensive.  He doesn’t quite get the concept of preventative medicine and would prefer to only see a doctor on an as-needed- basis, but I reminded him that he is getting on in years and might want to have a doc on staff.  He grumbled, but ultimately agreed.

I need to visit the grocery store today because the eleven hundred dollars worth of groceries I bought last Thursday are gone.  These people and their siblings can mow through the food at a pretty impressive rate.  Hum, they are MY offspring.  I’m going to work in lunch with a friend as incentive.

I know I will miss them all terribly when they go home.  My house will be clean and stay that way but there will not be the energy,the comfort, the joy of having all of my family here.  This is the ebb and flow of life.  It comes in and goes out.  I most likely need a reminder from my friends when I start talking about getting a new puppy or adopting an orphan from another country.  I should rest when I can rest, and restock the pantry and the bank account.  This too shall pass away and with Gods will and Tom’s help, they will all be back in the summertime.  I'd better work in a nap!

My life is so glamorous!  It’s just not fair, lucky for me!!

 

The better deal.

Yesterday my sweet husband scored a new high on the meter that measures perfection.  He wished me a Merry Christmas upon awakening and going to sleep.  He sat by, patiently and supportively, while one by one, our twenty-one kids and grandkids opened and examined their personal pile of gifts, most of which were purchased by ME and will be paid for by HE.

He mingled with every guest, helped our son-in-law Ted install “Tom’s” gift from me of a Wii console. Took out the trash a few times and then, with Ted in the lead and supported by Stacy and Stephanie, finished the dishes from the Christmas feast for 27.  He never complained about anything.  In fact, he complimented me a few times on what a great job I had done on Christmas.  This morning he WOKE UP from whatever spell he was under!

Before eight o’clock he started kvetching about the cost of the twelve mascaras I gave to the various girls.  (Too bad I left the receipt in the bag.)  Like my signature-mashed potatoes, (which are basically three sticks of butter, three bars of cream cheese,  two pints of sour cream with a little milk and salt and pepper, oh, and a three bags of Yukon gold potatoes, skin on, for fiber,) one should NEVER reveal the details of the little touches at Christmas!

For instance, one should tear off the price of the thirty- three pounds of standing prime rib roast from Gelsen’s.  He does not need to know this detail. It could cause a little stress.  He will not need to be made aware of the exact cost of shipping two electric, ride upon Razor scooters which tomorrow I will take to the post office and ship by donkey to Alabama.  He’s not stupid, and the fact that it took two grown men to carry each of them from the closet to the living room, lets him know already, more than he cares to know.

It may not seem like it, but I have reeled in my purchasing of Christmas gifts by miles and miles from years gone by.  For one thing, our living room is smaller by about five times.  The people are bigger and take up more space.  Along with that, their wish lists have the potential for including more expensive things.  Little packages can sometimes cost more than they used to.

Still, I like to get everyone most everything he or she desires or longs to have for Christmas.  Consequentially I was so sad when Morgan was disappointed at the gifts his cousins received that he did not, and which he had clearly placed on his Christmas list.  He says he told me, but I missed it.  His Mother and Santa also missed it.  Morgan was not alone.

I gave one of Brittany’s gifts to Arianna because I had forgotten that I had already wrapped a dress for Ari.  I gave one of Morgan’s gifts to Aidan because of the same memory lapse.  I gave Holland’s mascara to Faith and gave Brittany a  brand of mascara to which she has an allergy.  I gave Ted some ties that I didn’t even like but the dorky salesman talked me into.  I gave him some running shorts that were a size too small because his wife thinks he is smaller than he is.  You get the picture.  Oh and I made Brittany cry when I yelled at her for buying roasting pans that were too small to hold the rib roasts.  She WAS, after all, the only driver who was willing to make a grocery store run for more potatoes, drinks and pans while every one else was eating brie and crackers, spinach dip and playing Wii-dance.  (I’m sorry Britt.  It was entirely my fault since I had already tried to purchase pans at Vons and found they did not have them.)

Personally, I think I did remarkably well!  Congratulations to me!  (Next year’s goal might me to learn about humility.)  I DID shop for twenty family members, 24 friends and got a few little things for myself.  I donated to the food bank, the local women’s recovery home, the world wildlife fund, the red cross and silent unity.   I gave two dinner parties, not counting Christmas, a brunch for twelve, and decorated the house by myself (only on the inside, Jose’ did the outside lights.  Tom hung the wreath on the front door.)  However, my husband is up in his office right now working on the Sunday after Christmas to pay for my good deeds and fun then he is taking five or six kids to the movies to see Tron.  Who do you think has the better deal??  .......  Shh!  Don’t tell!

My life is so glamorous!  It’s just not fair, lucky for me!!

 

 

 

Climax to a season.

It is Christmas Eve in the afternoon and everyone but Tom and Indy are resting.  I’ve had a little nap, which was interrupted by Indy informing me that she was ready to deliver the small gifts I had readied for the neighbors.  I informed her that I needed some coffee before I could finish signing the cards.  She is now out delivering the last box of cookies to our neighbors to the north.

I love this part of Christmas!  The part where most of the work is done and all that is left to do is give, receive, be together and enjoy.  So far it has been a day full of warm, fuzzy feelings with really no prickly parts.  There are more good feelings waiting in the wings when we go to Shelley’s house for dinner and then to the Santa Barbara Mission to look at the Nativity scene with all the kids.  There will most likely be some chaos accompanying the warm fuzzies.

I began this day alone for a few minutes sitting in the light of Christmas tree, watching the sunrise over the oaks as I do most mornings. .  I said my “thank-you” prayers and just felt how sweet my life has become.  I called my dear friends in New York to say merry Christmas, which made me miss more than I do on ordinary days.

Memories are a tricky thing.  They remind us of our history and our loss, the happy and the sad times gone by, the shared love and experience that shape the heart and bind us for life. Memories connect us to our past. We have shared a lot of Christmases and birthdays with Kym and Billy and our families, together in our old house in Los Angeles.  I miss Billy every time we have to carve the turkey or the roast.  I miss him whenever there is a lull in the conversation or the laughter.  I miss the scrabble games at the dining room table where Billy and Tom went head to head and I sat back and watched.  I miss Kym all of the time and especially when I have the perfect cup of coffee or the perfect bite of anything delicious.

For several years Kym and I were YaYas.  We were two of four dear friends who snuck away eight times a year for girl-time.  We celebrated our birthdays and anniversaries with an overnight either at my home or away.  We would usually begin our overnight with a frittata in my dining room and then we’d be off to some big adventure. 

Over the years we went to many spas, had high tea at the best hotels, went to estate sales, to a Buddhist temple to chant and make a donation, we had an astrologer come to the house, went to fire ceremonies, had hot stone massage at home and even made a trip to the hospital, with yours truly in an ambulance with some cute fireman. We went to New York in the springtime and in the dead of winter to see Christophe’s gates in Central Park.  We shopped on Canal Street, and on Fifth Avenue.  We went to Chicago to see Oprah and Burbank to see Ellen.  We had sweet talks late into the night and a few fights in my kitchen.  Our friendships deepened and grew and now span the miles.

Now it is Christmas morning and I am so happy to spend it with my family, all nineteen or twenty of them.  Later some friends will join the cozy chaos and we will share our traditional Christmas dinner.  I think there will be twenty-nine or thirty in my already over-stuffed living room/dining room/kitchen.  Nobody seems to mind the crowding or the dust.  Nobody complains about the lack of formal seating.  There is something magical and comforting about just being together with people we love on Christmas.

I will miss the dear ones who are not here.  Some have passed on, some have moved away, some of these friendships have ended, but there is a place in my heart, in my personal history that will remain forever.  There is a place owned by each of him or her that nothing and no one can erase.

The three grandkids from Alabama have opened their gifts from Santa and the little ones are quietly playing with their toys.  Arianna is getting acquainted with her new Mac book.  We have eaten our first meal of the day and unloaded the dishwasher.  I have fed the birds outside and made the bed. Stacy and her family will be here soon to open some gifts and Shelley and her family will be here a little later.  My life is ordered and fed by these rituals of life, like a heartbeat feeds my body.

There are hundreds of people that have shared and made happy my Christmases past.  Each of you is with me now.  I carry you in my heart.  Merry Christmas all!  May today create another memory of love to carry with you always.  May you enjoy peace in your hearts and all around you. There will be no peace in my kitchen but there will be nearly forty pounds of meat!

 

My life is so glamorous!  It's just not fair, lucky for me!!

 

My favorite Birthday. So far!

Today I am celebrating another birthday.  This one is my favorite because even though I was 64 just two days ago, today I am 36!  Thirty- six years of being truly alive and wonder-of-wonders, sober!!  That, for those of you who do not know, is a very long time without having “a little something to take the edge off.”

This is a down right miracle!  It is a miracle because I have never done anything for thirty- six years in a row, except for motherhood.  I have not stayed married or divorced or fat or skinny or in the same house or the same town or had the same name for thirty- six years.  One can deduce that I did not stay sober by myself.  I have had a lot of help!

I not only have stayed sober for thirty- six years, but I have kept going to “those meetings!”  I cannot say what kind of meetings because that would violate our eleventh tradition, but some will figure it out on their own.

One of my dearest friends asked me today to tell her about my last drink.  I won’t bore you or me by recounting that utterly, uninteresting event.  I can say that sometime on the evening of December 21, 1974, I had a moment of clarity where I saw clearly what I had become and what was in store for me if I did not change my ways and quick.

The next morning I was up before dawn and I made a call to a number I found in the phonebook.  I spoke to a stranger who said the words, “you don’t ever have to feel this way again if your don’t want to.”  I can’t say that I have never again in thirty- six years felt badly about myself, because I have.  There have been mornings after an argument, mornings after an outburst, mornings after I put a bad idea into play but I have never felt hopeless in that same way in the past thirty six years.

Since then many things about my life have changed.  Everything about my life, except maybe my neck and my weight, are better.  My three little girls have grown into three beautiful, accomplished, self-confident women.  They are all wonderful mothers and wives to their original children and husbands.  I myself have become, if not a wonderful wife and mother, at least a decent wife and mother.  These were not easy or speedy accomplishments.  They took years and years and the suggestions and example of many, sober women.  My own mother being the first. 

I have learned something about how to be a friend, how to live and let live, not taking much of anything personally, not criticism, not praise.  I have even come to see that I am not the center of the universe.  (I’m sure my husband and kids would beg to differ, but really, I get it.)  My first sponsor had a saying that I hated but which has come to me on those occasions when I worried about how I looked or what I said.  She said, “Kathy, you are not the star!”  It has helped me so much because I realize that my hair or my message doesn’t really matter, that I don’t really matter.  At least not in the superficial ways I think I should.

I have come to find a higher power that is personal to me.  My concept of that force has changed and evolved as I have.  It is no longer something outside of myself but is instead a power for good; a knowing of how to precede that resides within me.  I always know the right thing to do if I just get quiet and ask.  Before being sober I could not even ask the questions let alone be quiet enough to hear that still, small voice within when it whispered the truth as I became willing to hear it.

One of the best parts about this day and the many thousands leading up to now, is that I know I am capable of change.  I am flawed for sure.  No one will argue that, least of all me, but I have and I can change.  I have not given up on myself.

Today I woke up with a nasty pain in my neck and shoulder.  (I think I’ve been eating too much meat.  That’s a good one!  Too much meat!  Never thought that would be the cause of a headache.)  What was different about this pain was this; I did not owe an apology.  I did not have any messes to clean up.  I hardly had to complain about it or make myself the center of pity.  I simply took a hot shower, got dressed and went about my day.

I had breakfast and lunch with friends, one of my daughters and a granddaughter.  My drinking has never embarrassed my granddaughter.  This is not to say I have never embarrassed her.  I have and I did this morning.  I wore a ski hat pulled over my head and ears to cover my wet head.  They said I looked, odd, but I’m not the star, so I didn’t care!

The best part about the thirty- six years I’ve been sober has been the part where I get to give it away.  It’s one of our “suggestions,” that we help others by sharing our experience, strength and hope with the people coming up behind us.  This has been the most surprising and unexpected of gifts!  I have been touched deeply and forever, by people I otherwise might never have met.

I had no idea, no concept, on that dreadful December night of what lay ahead of me in stores of love, experience and community when I was thinking my life was over! 

This birthday truly is just that; a celebration of re-birth.  For I have been given all that I was seeking in the way of tools for living, love and connection with others.  These riches were given to me  in exchange for simply letting go of the things I thought I could not live without. 

Happy Birthday to me!! Happy Birthday to Us!   

Thank you for the gifts! 

How did you know that I just LOVE surprises?

 

My life is so glamorous!  It is just not fair, lucky for me!!

 

An unexpected gift.

While I have been shopping and decorating to make Christmas magic, one of my sponsees is sitting out the holidays in prison.  Well actually, she has been transferred to Corona’s Institution for Women, in order to participate in fire camp, (This is not to be confused with Camp Fire Girls.  It is a totally different thing.)  Fire camp it seems, is apparently  grueling and does not include marshmallows or singing around the camp fire!  

My sponsee chose to apply for fire camp because it will cut eight months or so off of her six- year sentence.  Eight months may not seem like a long time, but I guess when you are staring at four walls with bars on one of them, eight months could be an eternity.

I have been anxiously awaiting a letter from her.  Yesterday, one arrived in my mailbox.  I was anxious because I could tell from reading her previous letter, that she had not received my two most recent letters.  She was worried that something was wrong, that I had moved away or decided not to work with her.  Yesterday’s letter informed me that she finally did receive a stack of mail that was four months old and included my correspondence.

It is hard not to feel sorry for this girl, whois the same age as my youngest daughter.  There is no doubt in my mind that she did wrong, and plenty wrong at that.  Seven DUI citations is nothing to brush off lightly.  I do not doubt that the punishment fits the crimes.  I think it does.  I just do not know if this punishment will in any way effect her behavior or her life in the future.  Growing up has proved to be a long slow process even for the most humble and willing of us and slower still for some of us.  I wish I could give her shortcuts to make the next lessons easier, but as far as I know there are no shortcuts.

This month, on the 22nd, I will celebrate thirty -six years of sobriety. I have not received a DUI during this time, (although I have been banned recently from a retail establishment due to my arrogant outburst of “don’t you know who I am?”  Humm!!)   I have mercifully been blessed with whatever it took in the way of willingness and grace to go one day at a time without the aide of booze or drugs.  

I’m not stupid either, so I somehow knew that I couldn’t do it by myself and I have stayed very close to the people ahead of me who did and do know how to live without additives.  My sponsee in prison is highly intelligent, probably more so than I am and yet, there she sits and here I sit.  I think pride is the crack in an otherwise brilliant way of seeing the world.

In the book entitled Twelve Steps, and Twelve Traditions, pride is listed as number one of the seven deadly sins.  I’m not surprised because pride alone is a powerful drug.  Pride is the drug that tells me I don’t need you.  It tells me I don’t need God. Pride tells me I’m different. It tells me I do not need to do what you lesser beings have to do, just to get along in the world.  Pride tells me the rules don’t apply to moi!  Pride is out to kill me!

I don’t mean the kind of pride that suggests I wear lipstick and take my time picking out exactly the right shoes.  That kind of pride is a good thing I think.  I’m talking about the kind of pride that tells me I’m unique, that tells me you wouldn’t understand, that tells me I am FINE, that I know what I'm doing!.  This brand of pride wants to take me out!  This brand of pride is deadly!  I am intimately familiar with this nasty deceitful strain of pride.

Funny thing about character defects.  They come all dressed up in different outfits just to keep me guessing. Sort of like a costume party!  For me, pride has worn the dress of arrogance, entitlement, grandiosity and insecurity.  The insecurity dress is really hard to recognize, insecurity being pride in reverse.  Still, even shyness is all about me.

I visited my incarcerated sponsee often, for a year in the county jail, while she waited to receive her sentence.  I went to court with her a total of four times while her lawyer asked for continuances and pleaded for a different outcome.  I was even called to testify as a character witness in her last court appearance.  (I was terrified that I might sway the judge in the wrong way.  That belief in and of itself is pride.  Turns out I am not that convincing.) 

At the end, she received the sentence of six years.  She was bitterly disappointed that rehab instead of prison, was off the table.  In times past, she had been sentenced to rehab.  It seems she came to a point where she forgot about what put her there and decided to use her best ideas for how to manage  her life; drinking and driving while under the influence.  I visited her the day following her sentencing.

I suggested she continue her step work and devote her life to service.  I reminded her that she is in the position of being able to help other women who make the same mistakes.  Her response to me was, “I blame the police!  It’s not my fault!”

Today I am grateful to know some of my faults and defects.  I’m sure I do not know all of them.  I keep taking myself to a place where I can here a message of hope and possibly identify with the defects and solutions I hear others share.  In the meantime, I was up before dawn this morning and watched the sun rise.  I sat outside in the warm breeze and listened to the wind chimes, the birds and the wind in the eucalyptus. 

Today I will shop for groceries, attend a Christmas Tea at Casa Serena, and then prepare a special dinner for some friends.  I’m pretty sure I’ll manage to squeeze in a little nap as well.  My life is simple and sweet, filled with love of family and friends.  I am blessed beyond words, and all I had to do was surrender the exact defects my sponsee still holds so dearly.

I surrendered to the fact that I am powerless over alcohol, drugs, sugar etc., and that I do not know how to manage my life.  I also accepted the idea that, on any given day, I may not know what is best for me or anyone else and that there might just be a power greater than myself that does know.  Who knew?

 

My life is so glamorous!  It’s just not fair, lucky for me!!!

 

Just add this to the list.

I have taken to chewing sugarless gum.  This may not seem newsworthy to some, but to me it is remarkable for a few reasons. 

First of all, my mother pretty much forbade me from chewing gum of any kind, saying I looked like a cow chewing her cud.  Okay, I get that.  A lady doesn’t stand around smacking her lips and chowing down on double mint or Dentyne no matter what.   It’s liable to fall out of her mouth and get on her party shoes.  I hate seeing an attractive girl, smoking or chewing gum. It spoils the illusion of loveliness and it just seems wrong!

Then there is the issue of artificial sweeteners.  They are BAD!!  I’ve told my husband a thousand times that diet Pepsi is the devil’s brew.  So is sorbitaol and aspartame and whatever else they put in that stuff to trick you into thinking you’re having desert.   I protest!  For years if I wanted a coke or a piece of pie or candy, I simply went with the real thing, but now that I’m off sugar, I have no choice.

There are specific times when a carbonated beverage such as coke is called for.  When Mexican food is the fare for example.  I cannot enjoy a taco without a coke to wash it down.  Diet coke has taken its place.  I never drink the whole thing, not even close.  I just need a little sip to swish around with the hot sauce and make me feel festive and dangerous.  Sugarless gum does the same trick.

When I was in Italy this past fall, we stopped at a little auto-mart where they sold jars of sugarless gum that promised to clean my teeth and freshen my breath.  I bought some and found that it not only served those purposes, but also helped me manage the stress of riding with my friend as she drove like a bat out of hell around Italy.  I came home with only a few pieces out of a hundred, which I shared with my granddaughter Holland.

Holland chews gum when she plays volleyball.  It is her secret weapon.   She HAS to have it sort of like some people need their lucky shirt or their lucky thong.  Holland cannot go into a match without her Orbits.  I’m beginning to understand.

I have never smoked.  I thought smoking was absolutely disgusting!  Still do.  I felt similarly about gum chewing.  It just didn’t look nice.  I guess time and a sugar-free diet have changed the way I see things, but no, not completely.  I still think it is not lady like but I agree with Holland that chewing a big wad of gum can get the blood moving and redirect stress.  My mother may have been right about the appearance of a lady,  but for me there are few vices left!

No gum, no candy, no booze, no drugs?   I guess I can just breathe!!  Oh, and have a glass of water.

My life is so glamorous!  It’s just not fair, lucky for me!!

 

Behind the scenes with Santa.

December 1, 2010

My new best friend is my iphone.  She is the one I share my morning coffee and sunrise with.  I scroll down the mail and say good morning to Amazon, Frongate, Endless, Motivation In a Minute and most days, there is  a check in- email from Kym.

Next I check facebook to see what my friends are up to.  Sometimes I comment sometimes I am just a voyeur.  Then I check the weather.  I like to know what the sky is doing in the cities that hold the people I love.  Did you know that today it is colder in Spanish Fort Alabama than it is in New York?  I wonder if Stephanie has a sweater. 

Most of the time I go straight to words with friends and send my wordy friends a word.  Not today.  It seems I have a repetitive stress injury in my right hand, wrist, arm and shoulder from the way I hold my hand and arm when I move those little tiles around.  Very telling about my life don’t you think?  I like to think of words with friends as meditation.  That somehow makes it less pathetic.  I also think of it as exercise for my brain but I think that may be stretching the truth just a little bit.  Most of my words have three letters, sometimes less.  Still, they are letters.

Last night I rode with Stacy down to Ventura to do a little Christmas Shopping.  As much as I love it, Christmas is work!  We wandered aimlessly around H&M trying to put  together outfits for just a couple of our young adult kids and grandkids and may I just say, THAT was exercise for my brain! 

Christmas has always been my favorite time of year.  It is way more than a day or a night.  Christmas is an attitude.  Peace, love, beauty, generosity and being together to celebrate love.  The thing about making it all magical is the behind- the- scenes-part of Christmas.  Right now the behind the scenes bottom of my closet and Tom’s is completely covered with boxes from UPS and shopping bags from Nordstrom, TJ Maxx, Macy’s and H&M, oh and two boxed things that are each the size of a small car! None of this is wrapped! 

I have a ten foot, beautiful Noble Pine standing unadorned at one end of my living room.  I will not ask Tom to bring the umpteen boxes and bins that house the ornaments  and lights down from the attic until Saturday which is the first full day I have without commitments, when I can begin the three-day process of “putting up Christmas.”  In the meantime the Thursday girls are coming for dinner tomorrow and I need to go to the grocery store, shop, put it all away and then cook.

Today I am having lunch with a dear friend.  I plan to exercise first and maybe shop a little more.  My right arm hurts like all get out and I’m wishing I had an assistant. 

Yes Christmas is magical!  But you know the truth about magic don’t you?  It is all done with smoke and mirrors, maybe some elves and Santa back at the North Pole getting it all ready. 

Dear Santa,

 do you have email or a facebook page?  I would like to know your status regarding Christmas.

My life is so glamorous!  It’s just not fair, lucky for me!!