Now I’m sharing all my secrets

I have spent my adult life being prepared, rarely, if ever, missing a deadline. Our son was born two days early.

Over the years, whenever we've invited people for dinner, I'd like to sit quietly in a chair for a half hour or so before our guests arrived and simply blink my eyes. This made me feel powerful.

At work, when I had to make a presentation, I'd go to the conference room well in advance and clean the whiteboards, line up the markers and erasers in the slim, silver tray, wipe off the table with wet paper towels from the ladies room, and rearrange the furniture.

Like a girl scout, I was always prepared.

But lately I’ve been messing up.

Here's a picture of my jeans drawer. Note the total lack of clean jeans.

My sister, Kit, had to come over to my house yesterday morning at 6 a.m. and help me get ready for a First Friday event at our local Art Center. We worked for four hours and ten minutes making product labels and putting price tags on the stuff I made to sell.

I was a whole day late.

Here's a photo of my messy craft room. Seven incomplete projects!

Being retired has taken the "mo" out of my mojo.

I’m not "golden."

Not “good to go.”

I’m neither "locked nor loaded."

I’m not ready for anything, especially for retirement.

Comments

Therese said…

Haha! This post is great, Holly! Don't feel bad. All's a sign you're relaxing and letting your hair down. You deserve it. Have fun! So nice to not have to worry about schedules and due dates!

December 3, 2011 at 1:50 AM

Genealogy: it’s about connection

Each one of us has two parents, four grandparents, and eight great-grandparents. For every generation you go back, the number of people who procreated, to eventually make you, doubles. When I first started out on my genealogy journey, these numbers astounded me, and still do. I love to think about my DNA stew. It feeds my soul. Playing with numbers Let’s assume each generation makes a baby at age thirty. Perhaps the age should be 16, 18, 20, or 25, but whatever, I picked 30 for this exercise. After all, in the past, people started having children earlier than today, but they also bore many more children and did so over a period of 10, or even 20, years. Stick with me for this simplified and fictional example: For a child born in 1960, there were two parents who were born about 1930. The baby’s four grandparents were born about 1900. The baby’s eight great-grandparents were born in 1870. (You see, I'm doubling the number of grandparents and going back 30 years at the same time....

Lost Spirits ~ Found Souls

I’ve been hanging around with artists lately. This is not something new. I’ve always enjoyed the company of creative people -- writers, crafters, gardeners, painters ... They’re not exactly normal, which is how I like it. One thing an artist does is write an “artist statement.” It’s a proclamation, really, and it takes considerable thought. It’s kind of sickening to be so self-focused. But you know what? Without pausing to think through these questions, there is no clear artist behind the artwork. If I don’t know what I’m trying to express, who does? And so, I ponder... What’s my purpose? Why do I make my art? What does it represent? What is special about how I make it? What does it mean to me? Here’s my first-ever artist’s statement; see what you think. Artist Statement Creativity has always been very highly valued in our family. When it came to play, my brother, sister, and I were allowed to go anywhere and do whatever we wanted. So we danced outside in the pou...

Adrian and Russell -- Story Cards

This is the first post of a series of Story Cards that I will be creating for our three-year-old twin grandchildren. The stories will be written in two chapters and mailed a few weeks apart. I know that children enjoy stories featuring their own names, but I have decided to use given names selected from the family tree that I created for the twins when they were born. The stories will be "flash fiction," a storytelling genre in which the characters, storyline, and setting are captured in just a few words. They are very short stories. Given the economy of words, the stories will likely all begin in "medias res," that is, in the middle of the action. Each card will contain little inserts to be held while the stories are read to them and will feature a tree. So, here is the January Story Card. Adrian and Russell Chapter One With the glow of the moon, the two boys saw the spiky seed pods strewn across the sidewalk. So many were on the ground! So many were still on ...

Holly Cusumano

Search This Blog