Trying To Join In

Today I had lunch with six women from town. We ate at a local diner, one of a handful of businesses on Main Street. I had a cup of beef barley soup.

A friend I made last summer first introduced me to this group of retired women by way of a monthly book club. Those meetings have not fit into my schedule since December, and today was the first time I was able to accept an invitation to lunch. I like these women.

Talk inevitably turned to grandchildren, husbands who are retired, mothers in nursing homes, and vacation trips. These are not things we have in common.

Someone commented that she liked my hair, that it was flattering. Someone else mentioned that I looked dressed up. I told her I was practicing for the day I go back to work. She chuckled. She asked me what I wanted to do, and I told her I was interested in policy work. She asked me if I knew a woman in town with the same interest, and I told her that in fact I met that woman in a class I took two years ago.

It was my turn to ask her how the plans were coming for the plant sale, a fund raiser for the library. I went to a planning meeting one evening last week to find that it had been cancelled, but no one told me. It was rescheduled for last night, but no one told me that either. She said that plans are on schedule. I said that I guessed that I would find a group where I could be of help. She said that the same people have been doing the sale for so long that they know what needs to be done.

It would be nice to get to know the "Friends of the Library" because some of those women are working or in the process of changing careers. A few of that group have lived in town for decades, but more are new to town within the last ten years or so. I am looking forward to getting to know them better. There is a general library meeting at the end of April, and I will plan to go because I'm still trying to join in.

At lunch today someone loaned me a book about plants and flowers. My book club friends know a lot about gardening and have offered to help me when I begin work on our yard.

In the meantime we are getting new neighbors next door. Ken is curious - he spied a John Deere tractor in their driveway.

Out Like A Wet Lamb

It looks like the last three days of March will be soggy. More rain today. I just heard thunder. It may reach 40 degrees.

None of my picks made it to the Final Four. I have a total of 70 points, the least of any member of our family in the bracket competition. I enjoy watching the games, regardless of who wins, because the players work so hard. Every team deserves to win. I wonder what it feels like to be able to play basketball that well.

I am scattered today. I got on the treadmill earlier and walked for 15 minutes; then I got impatient and took a break to do something else. I was moving but felt too unsettled to walk a half hour. I did return an hour later, and I picked up the pace to finish my two miles in under 30 minutes.

I have chores to finish here before I go to my daughter's house. I thought it would be fun to shake things up, so I offered to make dinner at her house tonight. She's been traveling for work, and I'd like to hear about her trip.

I am champing at the bit for a change in routine, for something to shift, for something to fall into place. I need to keep moving.

March In Maine Means Mud

Under cloudy skies and with the temperature hovering just above freezing, Ken and I bundled up to venture out this morning. We had two errands to run in the next town, where there are paved streets to walk and interesting sights to see. Before we climbed in the car I asked him to take a picture of me to show hair color and length two weeks into the process. I am surprised at how much more I smile for the camera these days.

The newspaper delivery guy hangs the paper on our mailbox before sunrise every morning. The protective yellow bag does a good job against the elements. Unfortunately, it does nothing about the mud moat in front of the mailbox.

We periodically check this creative way to tally the money collected for a new town library.

This house often has something colorful in the yard, and today it was an egg tree. The bright blue container in the background is a custom-painted dumpster.

Last fall I met the woman who lives in this church, a structure I admired when I first saw it two years ago. She saved it from demolition during the 80's and built a living space in a corner of the interior. There is still a large open space where she has hosted public meetings. I hope to catch her home sometime so she can give me a tour.

The building is even more impressive when you can see the length in relation to the height. I asked Ken if he ever thought of living in a church; he sees how hard it would be to paint and heat. I see the romance of old wood and tall windows.

Career Exploration Workshop #2

Our meeting place for today's workshop was in a different building, and I got lost. I went in the wrong door, walked down the wrong hallway, and asked the wrong person for directions. I was told to go out the front door, walk around the building, and enter through a different door at the back of the building. Fortunately, I ran into a classmate who had figured out where we needed to be.

It felt good to enter a room where the faces were familiar.

Yesterday, in preparation for today's workshop, I completed the interest survey. I was a bit surprised at the results. Of the categories [Skilled] Crafts, Scientific, The Arts, Social, Business, and Office Operations, I felt sure that Social would be my number one category: everything I've done to this point has involved working with people. According to my 120 responses, my highest career interest area is Business, which still involves working with people but with more of an organizational focus. Bingo! This fits with my interest in organizational and community practice within the field of social work. The Social interest area was a close second.

We started this morning's session pretending we were at a party where pretend people were in small groups around the room talking about what interests them. Taped to walls around the room were six lists of what interested the "people" in each group. It was our job to find the list that most interested us; there were no labels or indications of specific careers.

My first choice was a list that included "work with people, influencing, persuading, organizational goals."

We did the exercise two more times. My second-most interesting list included "help, enlighten, develop, and skilled with words." My selection for round three was the list that included "observe, learn, and solve problems."

The first list of words described the Enterprising category, which is equivalent to Business. The second list described the Social category. No surprises so far. Then it gets interesting, no pun intended. The third list described the Scientific category.

Hold the phone, I am not a scientist. However, on a good day I match up with many of the qualities that describe a scientist: original, creative, independent, rational, curious, likes to solve math problems, and does not like rules.

This process is not meant to be an exact science, again no pun intended. It is meant to help me look at what interests me from a variety of angles.

And that is what happened today.

As we talked about what we learned about ourselves I jotted down these notes: stretching view of myself; getting comfortable with who I am, not who I've always tried to be; tension within.

Our facilitator said we may find ourselves moving out of our comfort zone. There are things we know how to do. Then there are things that interest us that are are new to us, and we may need to leave our comfort zone to explore those interests.

I have decided that the comfort zone isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Blog Anniversary

*Note: Last week in a post titled Slips of Paper I mentioned five questions that I found in an article years ago in an "O" magazine. The questions ask about the relationship a job has to a desired way of life. I searched online for the reference for the questions, without luck, so I removed them from the post. Then I thought to email Oprah.com to ask if they knew when the article appeared. Sure enough, they did. The questions have been added to the post and you can read them here.

Today is the first day in my second year of blogging. My daughter helped me start this blog last year on March 23, Easter Sunday. The First Post was titled just that and was all of two sentences long. I had no idea how this blog would develop. I couldn't imagine what I would have to write about.

What a difference a year makes.

Through writing here, and reading the blogs of others, I have met women I never would have known otherwise. My world has expanded to include women of all ages and professions who are willing to share their lives and wisdom.

That has made all the difference in how I feel about this time of my life, still a time of transition but no longer a time where I feel alone, still a time of challenges but no longer a time of despair.

There is no way to know where I will be a year from now. The journey continues....

Dreams Of Travel And Teaching

It's 20 degrees outside, with a wind chill that makes it feels colder despite the sunshine and clear skies. Yeah, not feeling so much like spring.

I am home this week, like every other week. I have meetings to attend and things to do, all within twenty-five miles of my house.

Members of my family are traveling for work this week ~ to New Hampshire, Arkansas, and France.

I dream of travel, literally. In Steering by Starlight: Find Your Right Life No Matter What! Martha Beck advises the reader to pay attention to their dreams. I often dream I am traveling, for work, to talk to groups of people. For years I have fantasized about having a job where I travel, although I'm not sure what the job is that I'm doing. I see myself rushing through the airport on my way to catch a plane. I don't know where I'm going, but I have someplace to be associated with the work I'm doing.

I also dream about teaching. For months I have had dreams about working in situations where I am teaching; sometimes I am working with children and sometimes with adults. I don't remember what I am teaching or where I am working. Sometimes I am sitting at a table with a small group, and sometimes I am standing in front of a large group of people.

I don't think my dreams of travel and teaching are symbols for something else.

I like to travel, but I have never travelled for work. Some of my desire to travel may be in response to all the years I have stayed home while my husband hits the road. I'd like to be the one who goes away for days at a time. I'd like to come home to a clean house and a prepared meal, to hear about what has happened around the house all week, knowing that everything has been taken care of in my absence.

Even though I don't plan to return to classroom teaching, there are many other jobs where teaching is part of the job description. When I got a degree in education, many people told me that the skills would be transferable. It's a matter of finding the right position.

And I am still trying. I received another thank-you-for-your-application-but-we-hired-someone-else email this morning. I have just about exhausted the contacts I made through my internship while working on my MSW.

The career counselor brought to my attention three weeks ago that I mentioned three different entrepreneurial opportunities. My response was that I don't really want to work for myself. I want to work with other people. She said that I could keep the ideas in mind as I move through the career exploration process. Maybe something will come to light with the interest survey.

Everything is in a jumble today.

Career Exploration Workshop #1

Thursday morning I entered a conference room and took a seat at a table. I was one of eight women who showed up for the first in a series of Career Exploration Workshops.

We are an interesting group ~ from a variety of backgrounds, with a wide range of interests, and at ages that span more than thirty years. The one thing we have in common is the transition we are experiencing in our lives.

To begin we briefly introduced ourselves. Then we listed all the things that make looking for a job difficult, so we could set those things aside and focus on the work at hand ~ the exploration of what we value, where our interests lie, and what kind of work we really want to do.

As I prioritized my personal values I thought about: how I've wrestled for months with what matters to me and what I want; books I've read and words I've written; what has stayed the same and what has changed. It turns out that all of that is reflected in how I value integrity, self-realization, inner harmony, purpose, and family.

The results of a work value inventory clearly reinforced how important it is for me to do work that matches my way of life and the kind of person I want to be, that I want to feel a sense of accomplishment, and that creativity in my work is important. My comment to the group was that it's time for me to stop trying to fit myself into someone else's box.

The career counselor I have been working with is the facilitator for the workshops. She asked us if we would be willing to try an experiment in using some type of online forum where we can find information and leave comments between sessions. People in the group have different experiences with technology. I was the one who could explain how a blog works. Me. [You read that right, K.] It was the first time, ever, that I have been the person in a group to explain anything technological. Smile.

Our homework for next week is to complete a survey of interests. Homework. Smile.

Slips Of Paper

Some weeks ago I found three slips of paper in my purse. I put them on the desk, and I found them again today when I was filing paperwork. Appropriate. Timely.

The words on the slips of paper were copied from an "O" magazine more than two years ago. It's odd that I didn't write down the date, or the author, or any other information that would place the five questions I wrote down. *I emailed Oprah.com to ask about the reference for the questions so I could post them here. The Editors responded the next business day:

Those questions appeared in our September 2005 issue. They were part of an article by Suzy Welch called, "Getting Unstuck."The article is available on Oprah.com:
http://www.oprah.com/article/omagazine/omag_200509_unstuck/1

The questions are these:

Does this job allow me to work with "my people" - individuals who share my sensibility about life - or do I have to put on a persona to get through the day?

Does this job challenge, stretch, change, and otherwise make me smarter - or does it have my brain in neutral?

Does this job, because of the company's "brand" or my level of responsibility, open the door to future jobs?

Does this job represent a considerable compromise for the sake of my family, and if so, do I sincerely accept that deal with all its consequences?

Does this job - the stuff I actually do day-to-day - touch my heart and feed my soul in meaningful ways?

I wrote these questions down as I sat at the counter in a Barnes and Noble store. At the time I was thinking about my dream job. I didn't know what the work would be, but I remember thinking that these questions pinpointed how I wanted to feel while I was doing the work.

I want a job that challenges me, touches my heart, feeds my soul, and opens doors while I am able to maintain my integrity. I dream of working with people who share my sensibility about life.

The career counselor I've been working with has asked me to think about the work I want to do. She advised me to sign up for a series of workshops to explore the topic with other women who are also exploring careers and making their way through the job search process.

The first workshop is tomorrow morning. Along with my updated resume and most recent letter of application I will take my slips of paper. The questions are as important as anything else I will consider as my job search continues. Maybe they are the most important thing.

Bracket Time

If it's St. Patrick's Day, it must be time to fill in a bracket for the men's college basketball championship series. The first game is Thursday night, and we have to have our brackets filled in before then.

The "we" is me, Ken, and our three children. Five or six years ago we thought it would be fun for each of us to fill in a bracket. I don't follow college basketball, but that doesn't seem to matter with all the upsets that occur every year. A couple years ago I got the most points, which means I "won" although there is no prize other than the satisfaction of garnering more points than everyone else. Last year my daughter won. We have similar strategies: pick teams because you like the name of the school or know someone who attended there; pick a few upsets but mostly go with the top-seeded teams.

Last night my youngest son T called from Boston, and I asked him if he had filled in his bracket yet. He said no but he planned to. I told him that his dad and I were ready to fill ours in. T asked me if I was going to pick all number 1's to go to the "Final 4." The running joke last year was that my daughter and I both picked all four #1 teams to make the finals - something that had never happened before. Well, last year all four number 1's made it to the "Final 4" and we were kidded mercilessly for weeks. What did we know?

We knew enough to pick the four teams that played in the final three championship games.

Wish me luck. I have a reputation to protect.

Reid State Park in March

Late last week Ken suggested we take a trip to the ocean. We couldn't remember the last time we visited Reid State Park. While Popham has miles of beach to walk, Reid has a shorter beach with enormous outcroppings of rock at each end. It was the perfect destination, less than an hour from home, for a sunny Saturday in mid-March. We arrived before noon and started walking, into the wind, toward a stand of trees about a mile down the beach ~

Once there, I looked back to see Ken checking out driftwood ~

Beyond the rocks, the ocean continued forever ~

I sat on a large piece of driftwood to enjoy the view ~

The waves crashed on the rocks below ~

We walked back down the beach and found that the rocks at the other end had places so well shaded that there were still patches of snow ~

Fresh air, sunshine, the sea, and a walk on the beach with my husband.... What more could I ask for on a late-winter day?

A Sea Change

I'm sending out a big thank you for your wonderful compliments on my new "do." I had no idea this little experiment would be so much fun.

Ken likes it, too. He doesn't read Kate's blog Ahead of the Wave, but about the time she was planning a day away, Ken suggested we needed a day at the ocean. I agreed wholeheartedly. That's what we did today ~ just the two of us, the sunshine, and the sea. We dedicated the day to spending time together. We are full of good ideas.

Photos tomorrow.

My New "Do"

Today was the day. I called my stylist on Tuesday to make an appointment to get my hair colored, thinking I'd have it done next week or the week after. She had an opening today at 12:30, so I told her to sign me up. She said she didn't want to alarm me but that I should count on two hours. Gulp. I'm usually in the chair for less than 20 minutes. Okay, I told her, I'm ready. I also told her that friends told me to have fun with this experience, that it's only hair color. This helped her relax on my behalf, and we wound up having a lot of fun this afternoon. I took two photos before I left the house. My hair looks wild because I washed it and let it air dry. I haven't owned a hair dryer for more than 15 years, and I guess that's another thing that will soon change. First, right profile:

And left profile:

Ta Da! I tried to keep the same expression, but I couldn't stop smiling:

We used old photos to gauge the color; this shade has more red tones. We went lighter rather than darker and can darken next time, depending on how it "wears" over the next few weeks. I told my stylist about all the support I had gotten around this big change. She smiled, joked that she appreciates the business, and is curious to hear what people think. So far, so good - my husband and daughter gave two thumbs up. I am going to experiment with eye liner to see if I can "bring out" my eyes. It's true that one thing leads to another....

Kitchen Art

For the last month I have been helping my daughter with projects. One of the things she wanted was to get artwork put up around her house. I started with a stained glass cat, which is a smaller version of the cat in our kitchen window. Years ago Ken made the smaller cat for my father. When my mother moved, she asked Ken if he would like to have the cat. Its tail was cracked, but Ken was able to replace that piece of glass. For Christmas we gave K the cat, which I hung in a window in her sunny yellow kitchen.

I found a variety of things when I unpacked boxes, bins, and bags at K's house. One of my finds was a wall hanging that we made a few years ago. K had a design in mind and some favorite scraps of material she wanted to use. I helped sew up the background, and then we tacked the tree on top. It looks like it's on fire.

The Promise Of Spring

I noticed the first sign of spring last week. It was not a flower bursting through the snow or buds appearing on a branch. It was the smell of skunk in the air. Yes, spring would return to central Maine this year. The second sign, and much more pleasant to the senses, appeared last evening. I was at the kitchen sink and looked out the window to see a deer in my driveway. By the time I had grabbed the camera, there were two deer ~

And then there were three ~

They moved closer to the house ~

And three more deer came up the driveway ~

There were six deer in my driveway, nosing at the dirt and sniffing dead leaves. I watched for minutes, until the one in front caught sight or scent of something and led the group away from the house. They met in the middle of the road to regroup. I watched as they headed off to grace another yard with their presence and the promise of spring.

Welcome Home

My daughter came home to Maine today. She has been in Colorado for a 4-week pediatric rotation as part of her residency program. She had a good experience, and I enjoyed completing projects at her house while she was gone. We kept in touch through email and phone calls.

But there is no substitution for time together. Today we spent the day catching up.

I missed you, K. I'm glad you're home.

Happy?

Last summer a friend started talking about a book called What Happy People Know by psychologist Dan Baker. Every time I saw her she shared what she was learning and how much she liked the book. After two or three months she asked me if I had bought the book yet. Finally, last fall, I bought the book and started reading.

The subtitle of the book is "How the New Science of Happiness Can Change Your Life for the Better." Baker uses people's personal stories to explain the brain science behind fear and love and how those two things affect happiness.

I decided to make the effort to read the book because my friend was impressed with what it had to say and, at first, my interest was half-hearted. Then on page 29 Baker writes that there are two parts of the brain that send fear messages and one part of the brain that counters the fear because, "It has the amazing ability to say, 'Nothing is wrong - calm down!'" Now he had my attention. Apparently there is a part of my brain that I'm not using or that isn't getting my attention. I kept reading.

My friend asked me how I liked the book. I told her it was okay, but that I was still waiting to read about how to find the secret of happiness. She said, yeah, we all wanted the secret but that it's not that easy.

I liked some of the personal stories, although at first I had a hard time believing that there are rich people who really aren't happy. Then Baker would describe the situation and conversations he had with the client, and it became obvious that the person was miserable despite the appearance of having everything a person could want. Finding happiness is a process that has little to do with what is happening in the material world and everything to do with a person's thinking, feeling, and ability to stay present. This is a theme that runs through many of the books I have read in the past year.

Last night I finished the book. As so often happens, I understood more of what the author was saying as I got further along. Then, if there is something that speaks to me, I plan to re-read the book once I am tuned to hear the message. In this book that something was the last paragraph on the last page: "This is happiness: bittersweet, often broken, a poem sometimes left unspoken - full of longing and opportunity missed, made wise by sorrows that never last, a promise to ourselves, from deep in the past. A future with fears that never arrive: This is happiness - this moment, this now - this being alive." (p. 259)

That message was worth the wait.

Appearances

I am letting my hair grow. It is over my ears and down on my neck for the first time in many years. I figure I will let it grow until I can't stand it. Then I will get it trimmed up so I can tolerate the next growth spurt.

I have decided I want to get my hair colored, soon. The question is what color? A friend last night joked "red," but the thought has crossed my mind. As a young woman, my dark hair had auburn highlights. My eyebrows are still very dark, and I need to consider that as I think about hair color.

This whole process has renewed for me the question of how much appearances matter. I have had conversations with other women whose graying hair has them questioning their appearance. We are worried that some people will not see beyond our gray hair to find out that we are smart, capable women.

At the bridal brunch in Boston on Sunday I was glad to see other women with gray hair. In a room full of women of all ages, I was not the only woman with gray hair, which surprised me. It's not unusual for me to be the only gray-haired head in a group, and until now that was always okay with me.

When my son became engaged I thought I'd color my hair for the wedding. Once the idea was planted, I wondered why I should wait. Maybe coloring my hair would improve my chances in the search for a job. Surprisingly, other women, employed or looking for a job, have echoed the same thought: professional women color their gray.

Three weeks ago I explained to my friend's hair stylist that I was planning to color my hair for my son's wedding. She said, "Well, most women color it all along but you can decide to color it now." Good to know there is not a statute of limitations.

The other comment I hear is that once I color it I have to keep up with it. I have had short hair for fifteen years, so I know all about the issue of maintenance. The recent weeks have been the longest I've gone without a haircut in all those years. Longer hair will ease up on the need for monthly cuts, which will be replaced with monthly visits for coloring.

Last night a commercial for hair color came on while my husband and I were watching television. He asked me if that was a brand I might try. I asked him if he really thought that those models colored their own hair. He said sure they did! Chuckle chuckle. I'm not even sure that the color on the models came out of a box.

I have a feeling this adventure is just beginning.

In Like A Lion

I had high hopes for February when I posted a welcome to the shortest month of the year, and it did start with a well-played Super Bowl game. I was naive to think that the month could deliver on every event and holiday. I have yet to plan a birthday dinner for my son. I missed most of the Oscars because our local ABC affiliate lost its transmission just 45 minutes into the ceremony. I didn't realize that the fuzzy screen was a precursor to losing power during a storm that would drop another foot of wet snow.

I am going to refrain from making any predictions about March. Let's just say that there appears to be no end to the winter weather pattern.

Ken and I decided to tempt fate and made plans to drive to Boston on March 1. Fortunately, the sporadic snow showers did not keep us from getting to Boston on time. I had an event to attend: my future daughter-in-law invited me to go to a bridal brunch hosted by the hotel where she and my son have decided to have their wedding and reception.

It was a wonderful event, and I was delighted to be included. The brunch was held in the rooftop ballroom, which has two long walls of windows that look out over the city of Boston. The room was filled with color and flowers, each table showcasing a unique design option. The gourmet food was delicious, and dessert was a special sample wedding cake for each table to share. The fashion show of wedding gowns provided the perfect ending for the event.

Ken and my sons joined us in the ballroom once the brunch was over. We toured the rooms they will use for their special day. Then we stopped in the lounge for something hot to drink before we headed out in the winter weather. We talked a bit about the guest list and other wedding details. It is pure delight for us to be in on some of the planning. We have plenty of time because the wedding is seventeen months away, not that anyone is counting down.

When I tell people that my son is engaged to be married, the first question I get is, " Do you like her?" I answer with a huge smile and say, "We love her," because we do. The second comment is usually, "You'll have to get something to wear," and I am glad I have time to work on that.

So March is off to a good start, despite the "in like a lion" weather. I'm going to hope for "out like a lamb" weather in four weeks.