Birthing a New Me

There’s a change a brewin’ in me, folks.

And… it’s felt about as fluid and graceful as when Jim Carey of Ace Ventura fame was birthed from a large, plastic rhinoceros arse. My facial expressions and utterances are the same.

I’m on the lookout for something different; something big. I’m waiting to embrace change as enthusiastically as I’d embrace the return of the buoyancy of my breasts.

Trade Winds

You see, I haven’t felt very connected as of late. Hell, I haven’t felt connected for a good seven plus years. It’s more like I’ve been sort of floating around, willy-nilly, on a trade wind from the Caribbean. But, you know that feeling I’m talking about, right? When you feel that indescribable joy, feeling of connection, and clarity of purpose and path in every bone in your body; when you just know you’re onto something big and it swells you, you feel lighter, and you physically see more clearly?

I was talking with a friend about this feeling of connectedness recently. I told him that I haven’t felt that feeling since I moved to Cleveland. I was trying to noodle out with him what that was about. I think it started with an emergency surgery I had for my Stage IV Endometriosis. I was married to a wonderful man but we just had nothing to work toward together. We didn’t have much in common, we were just sort of going through the motions of existence, neither happy, nor sad, but simply content and comfortable. I hadn’t been happy for the last six years of my marriage. I think that surgery and subsequent recovery awoke something within me – a will to live; a will for more than just existence and comfort. I left my ten year marriage, I left my family and friends, I left my home and traipsed across the country with 30 boxes of books, a twin mattress, and a couple of bookshelves. I had never felt more alive. It’s as if my vision, normally 20/40 had returned to 20/20. I’d never felt more clearly set upon my path nor more full of joy.

Blowin’ About

It lasted for a good three years too. During that time I traveled to Europe, New York City, South Beach, Folly Beach, Ottawa, Chicago, Detroit, Toronto, Pennsylvania and a few places I can’t even remember. I dove out of a plane. I learned to snowboard. I got up on a surf board. I went to hundreds of concerts and met thousands of people. Literally.

What my friend and I decided was that when you’re taking risks, when you’re stepping out of your comfort zone, you’re naturally more connected. When you’re shaking things up in your life you’re truly living in the NOW. You’re not focusing on the past or the future. I challenge you to take your first dive out of an airplane while retaining thoughts of Aunt Hester smacking you as a child with her bejeweled ruby handbag. It’s not possible.

It’s the same for travel. When you’re in a wholly new environment you’re bombarded with new senses and sensations; things you’ve never seen, heard, or felt. It’s difficult to focus on the mundane or worry the past or future when you’re in a new setting. I think this may be why folks are addicted to extreme sports. Who has time to worry about the state of their stocks and the market when they’re barreling down a mountain on a piece of wood?

There are other ways to stay in the NOW but my meditation pillow is musty and I’m no Deepak Chopra. Yet.

Turning the Fan on Low

For now, I’m making baby steps. I’m not just sitting around waiting to be blown about by that nor’easter. I may not be moving 2,000 miles away, jumping out of a tiny plane at 11,000 feet, or traveling to Bali, but I’m doing what I can.

For example, since I was fifteen years old I’ve had long hair. Why fifteen? Because that’s how long it took to grow back after my mom decided I would look adorable with a Dorothy Hamill haircut for my entire childhood. I loathed it. It was like a bowl cut, only with a gargantuan bowl. Detest is probably a better word, in fact. Every time I sat in that stylist’s chair I cried big, fat tears and my tiny heart would break thinking about Julie Wood and her long yellow tresses. I swore that I would never have short hair again. And now, at 41, I’m seriously thinking about chopping off my hair. No, not a Dorothy Hamill. Something funky and chic and different. I’ve oft wondered if hair holds memory and toxins. If it does mine is full o’ guilt, shame, Jaeger and Beam. I want to lighten my load. I want to shock myself. I just hope I don’t cry while I’m in the chair with visions of Dorothy skating through my head.

Next up are three tattoos. Big ones.  Not like the little heart with a ball and chain that I got on my ankle when I was 19 and couldn’t commit. My second, back in 2002, was a piece of art I fell in love by a Japanese artist. Since that time I’ve fallen in love with various pieces of art, some of which I’ve gotten tattoos of, but until 3 years ago they were in more inconspicuous places. Now I have a large upper arm piece but I want more. So I’ve searched high and low to find the right artist here in Utah and these three super meaningful pieces of artwork will soon be on my chest and arms. It struck me the other day that I’m going to miss this body when I pass on because of all this gorgeous artwork by some of the most amazing tattoo artists around.

I’m also searching for a Yoga retreat that I can steal away to calm my monkey brain, get a tad of Zen, try to stretch my unused muscles and pat the must out of my meditation pillow.

Is this stuff superficial? Outer reflection? Surface?  Yup… but it’s the only place I can think of to begin to express what’s brewin’ within. I can’t seem to crack the inner. The deep. The buried. Yet. But I can feel it in there. Waiting. Biding its time to become. Birthing a new me, head first, from that proverbial plastic rhinoceros ass.