Forty Years Later

A New Week. A New Outlook!

Katy (on the right) and her two best friends partying

Nothing like a little time and fun to wash away the blues....or should I say the reds.  If anger were a color it would surely be red.  Oh, it's still lurking around but it's laying low and that's good. 

Not a thing in my life has changed this past week except my attitude.  Isn't it wonderful that we have the individual power to do that for ourselves? Everything we need for a happy life is right here in our little brains and hearts. And any of us can access those attitude altering tools but we've gotta believe that we have total access to them.  Luckily I found mine a few days ago.

I have to tell all of you that left me comments last week how much they meant to me.  You have no idea how those comments lift me up.  No. That's not true, of course you know because you feel the same way when you find that same good support on your own blogs.

You're right, Pam, the anger is just a part of the process and I'm pretty sure that it is a process of me establishing a new and better life.  Well, I'm not pretty sure, I'm positive I have a better life now, even with the occasional flare up of anger, and an infrequent taste of fear in the back of my throat.  

But life goes on.....

I had one of those big fat dates that I've enjoyed having once a month with Sam.  I went up to his town and stayed for three days.  We had a lot of fun doing not much of anything:  taking drives, assembling little antipasti dinners (there's a great grocery store there) and devouring them, watching the first season of Weeds, playing with his dog, and watching Nuggets basketball of all things.

I am the most anti-tv sports person in the world.  Or at least I have been up until meeting Sam.  He's not.  Sigh.  Do you remember a long time ago in a post I mentioned I'd made a list of the qualities in my perfect man?  I figured that according to the law of attraction if I wrote a very detailed list then tucked it away,  putting the clear intention out into the universe, this guy, this perfect guy would show up. Well one of the features of this perfect man was he doesn't watch sports on television.  Hmmm.  Clearly Sam isn't that perfect guy.  Not only does he watch sports on television but he convinced me to watch a basketball game with him.  I curled up in the corner of the couch with a pillow fully planning to snooze, but I'll be darned if it wasn't so exciting I was totally entranced...entrapped?...in it.  Didn't sleep a wink.  He was impressed.  I made a lot of points on that one.  He said for a rookie watcher I really got it. Ha.  That cracks me up. The strange thing is though, I did get it! First hockey, now basketball.  I'm worried there's a latent sports babe masquerading as me.

On Sunday I drove down to Denver to see Fleetwood Mac with my sister and her husband.  They had an extra ticket, and invited me along as their guest.  We took a taxi to and from the venue, and enjoyed the concert greatly with the help of several vodka martinis.  I love to see old rockers still rockin'. (I'm referring to both Fleetwood Mac and myself.) 

There's a lot going on here on my front and I'm feeling kind of slammed.  I wouldn't feel so anxious if I had even begun  packing Katy's things for the trip to her new home.  As it turns out Max is coming out to get her much earlier than we had originally talked about.  He's coming on the thirteenth of June! So soon! 

That wouldn't be a big deal, but two months ago I booked a little B&B in Hill City, South Dakota for a week for Katy and I.  We're leaving next week. I wanted us to have a trip together before she leaves. I would have loved to have gone to Oregon again, but that trip is expensive.  This one is a fraction of the cost, and there are so many cool things for families to do in this area:  Mount Rushmore, the Wild Mustang Rescue Ranch, Jewel Cave, Wind Cave, an old train right out of the cowboy days, the Crazy Horse memorial, Custer state park and all the wild animals that live there, a kangaroo rescue ranch (isn't that weird?), plus creeks and lakes for swimming.  

I've come around to the point that I'm just plain excited at the prospects that are awaiting me in a new ALONE life. My calendar is beginning to look very interesting for this summer.  I'm building in plenty of fun:  several concerts (I'm blessed that Max is in the music business and gets me free concert tickets); some visits from friends; a few little trips for myself, mostly to Sam's part of the country; and plenty of day trips that end with late dinners with my girlfriends.

But the first thing I'm going to do is to establish a new daily rhythm of waking up and going to bed....no more alarm clocks!  Living by my personal body rhythms rather than a clock is the thing I've missed most these three years that Katy has been here.  Once I do that, I'm going to get my house ready to sell, write, do more art, learn my photoshop elements program, teach myself to take better photos.  I think it's going to be a good new life.  

Still gotta figure out the money thing, but I'm up for that too now.  Resigned might be a better word, but it doesn't matter if I'm up or just resigned, I'm going to figure something out that works for me. I'm lucky I have no debt. Not a penny. That's important security.  I can always pay for propane and my property taxes and eat peanut butter.  Ha.  Just kidding.  (I hope!)

That photo at the top of the page is of Katy today at the pizza place.  She was eleven years old yesterday and we had a party in town today.  I brought four of the girls home for a sleepover and have been hauling food to the den ever since we got home. They eat so much yet they're so thin!

Tomorrow we'll all go to town for an early memorial day parade.  There are already flags all over town.  We're getting a fly over by some air force jets, and the weather is supposed to be wonderful.  There'll be live music in two different places, interesting exhibits, and I hope those Amish ladies will be on the street selling their world's best doughnuts (risen and fried...yum).  Folks will be driving up from the flat lands in cars and on Harleys, filling the town and spending money at last, and the ice cream shop reopens.  It's summer in the mountains.  Just the best time here.

Aspen at the back of the house...GREEN at last!

This week marks another event.  It is one year since FH left.  The divorce wasn't final until July of last year, but I start the clock on the day he left. Looking back I've got to say, it's been a good year for the most part.  Oh, there were some frustrations, some hurt, and that anger thing, but they didn't rule the year or even come close!  I'm pretty proud of myself.  I've managed to figure out a way to handle most of what has come up if not always with aplomb at least with some efficiency.  It feels good.  I feel strong. 

My friend Paula came over last night and we talked till one.  She said you've handled it all remarkably well, and she's right. I have.

Now I'm ready for the next year, my next incarnation.  

I love having something to look forward to.

That Anger Thing...Awful!

Sometimes having a blog is having pressure.  I began this blog with the intention of writing about how I, a seasoned woman, handles a divorce after a 40 year marriage.  I don't think any divorced women or women who are contemplating divorce read this blog, but I had the idea that my experiences would somehow help another who finds herself going through the same thing. And, like therapy, it gives me a mental cleansing to write about my feelings and experiences. It often actually seems to center me.  So when some things have come up that are especially unpleasant, and about which I feel reluctant to write, I have ignored my beloved blog.  

But I love my blog.  I love my readers (who might have skipped the country by now, I've been so negligent).

So, here's the deal:  I have been just eaten up with anger these last weeks.  I don't think there is anything else that erodes peace of mind and well being more than anger does. It has destabilized me. 

A couple of weeks ago I was told casually that FH and she (they) were moving here to Colorado to a bustling little mountain town to manage a group of radio stations for a man we did business with in the days when we had our company. I was swamped with anger upon hearing that news, and it has only grown more toxic as the days have passed.  I'm actively trying to get through it and banish it from my life because I'm a relentlessly positive person and I need to get this crippling anger off my back.

Do not get the idea that I'm sorry for myself. That isn't the emotion I feel. No it isn't. FH (former husband) left our life of 40 years. For me, an entire adult lifetime.  He took nothing but his guitars and his clothes. He simply left it all behind. Every thing.  And he moved to the southern town where his long term lover lived (my home town!), and acted like I was getting a great deal by getting all that he left. 

 But here I am with a very expensive house I can not sell (the realtors here are not even opening their doors right now), a house that requires a few thousand more dollars to be spent on it before it's actually ready to sell.  I have a half mile gravel driveway to maintain, pastures to be dragged and mowed, a $20,000 tractor that no one wants to buy, art treasures that aren't very marketable now, stocks that are at rock bottom, and the list goes on and on. I have immense baggage.  And I can't just walk away from it like he did. It's my money.  I have to have it.  And frankly, I don't have the same skills as he to go out and just walk into a new career.  I was the back bone.  The detail gal.  The Virgo of our company.  He was the spark.  The electricity.  The smoke in the mirror.  The Aquarian.

I'm angry that he just walked away from everything, a completely free man. Free to begin a new life, free to start a new career. Free. And I have no hope of that until I sell this house of mine.  And I have to figure out how to stay afloat for the years it will probably take to sell this house!  I must think of a way to make money when no one wants to spend money that doesn't actually require me to live in a town, because as you know I live in the fabulous but limiting middle of nowhere, seventeen miles from a tiny town of two thousand people where every third business has gone out of business, unable to make it through this past winter.

Like Scarlet O'Hara I've gotta pull down some velvet drapes and make myself a plan.

It's hard to write about money or rather the lack thereof.   Here's what I think: people who have had to struggle most of their lives or even a portion of their lives seem to have inner resources that those who did not have to struggle lack.  Their spunky, creative, resourcefulness and ability to make it in spite of the odds is a badge of honor really, that only they have a right to wear proudly.  But for those who never had much of a struggle, it is somehow embarrassing to admit they are now flapping in the wind of the economic downturn.  Their self worth is somehow ridiculously entwined with their "wealth". Now, you guys don't worry too much, I'm not going under anytime really soon, but without a plan it would happen.  I'm not going to go forward without a plan.

In many ways this stupid economic disaster that our government has carelessly plunged us all into has, in my case anyway, allowed some of us to wipe out that wayward line of reasoning.  Hell. We're all broke now.  Admit it.  Deal with it.  And, to tell you the truth, I think it's going to make me a better person all in all, with a more serene, a more conscious life once I get the hang of it.  I do. I've just gotta get the hang of it.

Yesterday I took my usual hike up the mountain behind the house.  Usually it clears my head, and in fact frequently fills me with a euphoric enthusiasm that makes me feel like I can take on anything.  Strangely, it's kind of like that misleading feeling I often get in bed in the dark just before falling asleep. I'm sure you know that feeling...

Every thing's possible! What's that all about? Why can't we maintain that spirited, confident, energy in the bright light of our active time?

But after two miles or so I realized that emotionally, I was going the other way. Before long, I was weeping.  I turned off my ipod and just stood there amongst the trees boo hooing big time.  And then I was screaming, cursing (and I'm a great curser, or cusser as we said in the south), and throwing rocks at the trees.  It was a magnificent tantrum!   FH's ears must have been burning like a dry forest fire. But I'll tell ya, the freedom to be able to do that, thanks to the isolation of the mountain, was just exquisite. After awhile I continued to stumble up the rocky trail, wiping tears away when they impeded my progress, stubbornly determined to reach the top. 

Once I did reach the top, and it was difficult...my legs had become so very heavy...I sought out a little stone bluff I love overlooking the box canyon below, and sat there a long while.  The tears finally dried up.  My heart stopped pounding.  My mind quietened.  And while I can't say my anger evaporated, it did greatly soften and I was able to put it into a little self enclosed room of my mind where it will burn itself out and not be able to harm me.  There's nothing like the release of an uninhibited tantrum and the calming hand of mother nature.

Eventually, with a deep sigh and the understanding at my core that I simply can not allow this anger or any other negative emotion or challenge to change my positive course (to where and what I have no idea) I found the road home and headed downhill.  

After a couple of miles I plugged the earphones into my ears, found John Mellencamp's  "Wild Nights" on the ipod, turned it up full blast and stepped up the pace down the hill feeling decidedly lighter on my feet.  

And I still feel better today so I'm pretty sure the worst is behind me.  I'm just looking ahead now.  I'm going to be just fine.  

A Dating Saga

I never thought I'd be dating again, unless of course I became a premature widow. But I didn't become one of those; instead I became a ripe on the vine divorcee.  And I'm not complaining about that.  I'm a bazillion times happier than I have been for....oh, at least the last 8 years.

 When FH left, a year ago this May, men were the last thing I thought I'd be interested in thinking about for at least a few years. Maybe longer.  Hell, maybe forever. I felt pretty jaded.  But that must have been a smoke screen in my brain because as you know the minute my friends urged me to join the on- line dating sites, I was enthusiastically off and running.

I think the reason for that was because my heart remembered that before the 5 pretty lousy years and the 3 dreadful years I had a loving, fun and happy relationship with a man.  And this might sound weird to you, not having lived my life, but the fact that FH was unfaithful to me from the very, very beginning in no way actually changes how I remember I felt at the time.  I'm not sure I ever mentioned that particular betrayal, but he dropped that info in my lap just before he left. It didn't mean anything.  We had a great life, you know it didn't mean anything. And of course at the time it was happening, since I didn't know it, it didn't mean anything.  It means something now. This was in addition to the two years of the serious affair, with the person he's with now. But, really, that's not the topic I want to write about, though it may explain why I got into another relationship so quickly. (Though I'm still not sure how it got so monogamous.)

Just out of the gate I met Sam through e-harmony and we connected in many ways.  There are some pretty big differences in our backgrounds and our thinking, but for now this is a fun relationship and I want to keep it healthy and fun, and affectionate.  But I got it in my mind that his overt affection was waning.  I mean, we've only had one big weekend long date a month since December and frankly in my opinion, that isn't much time, and I think the fires ought to burn just as strongly after four months perhaps even stronger than they did the first three months.  I'm going to have to say that after my last bland 8 years, the fires are going to have to burn a long, long time in any meaningful relationship in my future! I may have said something to that effect over spring break.

So when a man right here in my little town contacted me through another dating site for the second time (the first time he contacted me I told him I was involved with someone and wasn't interested), and said would I like to go out for a no strings attached friendly steak dinner with me and my brother and his wife,  I thought, well....no strings....sure, why not? A male friend right here in town could be handy.  My friend Linda knows of his sister in law, so I felt safe in inviting him to my house for a pre dinner drink and chat.  I didn't particularly want to walk into a restaurant and face three strangers cold. And no I didn't mention this to Sam.  Of course I didn't because though I knew it was just a friendly dinner, somehow I figured he wouldn't see it quite the same way.  

Right off the bat as I covertly peeked out a window and watched him walk up to the door, bottle of wine in hand, I was disappointed.  His photo on the net must have been taken at least 8 or 9 years earlier. (Why do on-line daters do that?) I was fairly sure he had added a few inches to his height too.  And, nothing personal if you wear them all the time, but the man had on tennis shoes and I didn't like that so much either. We were going to a nice restaurant for dinner.  Sure it's casual here, but.....well, ok. It's just a personal thing.  I think I have some kind of shoe fetish or something because men's shoes matter inordinately to me.  FH wore cowboy boots all the time and that got on my nerves too.  I like men's shoes to fit the occasion or activity. (Weird? Maybe.)

As we chatted, politics intruded into the conversation. That certainly wasn't my doing, but he rattled on about wanting to nuke half the world for almost our entire "get to know you" time. He was quite radical. By now I'm thinking Oh, dear. Thirty minute drive to town, hour and a half dinner at least, thirty minute drive home. Yikes.  A more seasoned dater might have faked a heart attack or something, but I just felt resignation. And I got all dolled up for this? And, this is strange, he told me he has no real food in his house.  Each week he goes to Safeway and buys frozen dinners for the week to come and that is what he eats every single night. (I'm kind of a fresh food nut.) Well, what about veggies I asked.  Oh, I look for dinners with vegetables in them.  

I'm sure I've mentioned before that I'm still a rock and roller though that includes rock from the 70's through today now rather than just classic rock, and I don't believe that two people can actually be happy together for long if they like greatly divergent music from one another.  Really.  I believe that. When he started the car and turned the cd on, Barbara Streisand was crooning. Sigh. And following that the song "Feelings". Yes, a long night.

At the restaurant for some odd reason, the man who had been ranting expansively about the coming revolution became nearly silent.  Upon stating that he was going to get the steak, his sister in law began her needling, I can't believe you're going to get that. It's too expensive. You won't eat it all. It's too large. etc.  It's always a slow restaurant, and by the time we finally returned to the car for the thirty minute drive to my house, soothed by easy listening music, my cheeks were exhausted from smiling.  On the way home I'm trying to remember what I have recorded on Tivo. It wasn't even eight yet and dinner was at 6.  I'm thinking about three episodes of Amazing Grace and the remainder of that wine he brought, and my p.j.'s. 

The shuffling around on the front stoop by the daters who know the date wasn't stimulating or repeatable, no one's coming in for a night cap, and even a polite hug is out of the question has got to be one of life's most awkward moments.  

By the time I closed the front door, I'm thinking Sam is looking mighty good. Mighty good.  I was feeling sentimental about him, and dialed him up on the phone only to get his answer machine.  So, I got on those p.j.'s. But before settling in front of the telly, I checked my mail.  Sam's not much of an emailer so it wasn't a message from him I was looking for, but there one was.  When I opened it, after telling me he'd left his phone at work, he continued with absolutely the most romantic message he has ever sent me.  After my dry evening, I fairly swooned. What? Has the man got radar? Just what I needed, when I needed it.  

So, I've decided I'll have an extraneous dating hiatus. For the moment.  Just enjoy and bring along Sam.  Certainly until Katy leaves for Nashville.  Really, it takes a lot of energy to date and I don't have all that much extra to spread around just now.

I've got the kid, I've got the one big fat date a month, I've got the house to get ready to sell,  I've got the physical activity to keep up (I have to do that, I gave all my larger clothes away.), I've got my friends to maintain.

Whew!  

 

Gettin' My Head Straight

I just want to tell you all how wonderful the comments were on my last post.  They were meaty and well thought out, and they truly inspired me and helped me get my head in the right place.  As Lavonne, my gf here, and several of you reminded me, This is what I want.  This is what I have wanted.  Dad for Katy. Freedom for Anya.

So this week I've focused on two things: being softer with Katy and having more fun together; and thinking of all the things I'm going to do when I have my freedom.   You know I'll miss Katy like mad. I will.  In fact it's difficult to think of becoming just a part time feature in her life.  But, big but, I won't miss being a full time, surrogate mother.  At least I won't miss a lot of the responsibilities and life style changes that have gone along with it.  

Like having to wake up at 6 in the morning (dreadful) and immediately having to do something, like cook breakfast and drive to the bus stop, and therefore having to go to bed and hope to be asleep by 10 (also not good). 

 Like having to think of something healthy to feed someone every day. (Though I'll admit to failing on this one on many Friday and Saturday nights.)  

Like HOMEWORK.  I hate, hate, hate math homework.  See, math ignorance apparently runs in the family.  Is that a gene?  Max was just hopeless in math.  Me?  I was a total dunce, and in most ways I still am (in math! I'm quite brilliant in other areas! ha) Poor Katy didn't have a chance.  I told her teacher early on that I am a dunce in math and she laughed.  I'm sure she now knows I wasn't exaggerating because I have actually had to send her frequent notes saying that I'm sorry, Leah, but I can't help Katy with this.  Would you help her figure it out?  She's pretty cool. About 10 years younger than me and we share the same musical taste so I made her a cd of the Subdudes and the Wallflowers recently.  Trying to kiss up you know.

I could say like running around and driving to town so much (a 35 mile round trip), but that's probably good for me and I've actually grown to enjoy more activity.  That could just be a result of divorce.  It's so interesting to me...a constant source of wonder...just how many things I do, say, and think differently now that are an outcome of divorce and becoming single.  Even my politics are evolving rapidly.  Where was this woman all that time? How much of who we are is an effect of who we are with? That's fascinating to me. Do you think that's the normal way with all couples? 

Here's a thing I wouldn't have done when married: Linda came over Friday night and didn't go home till 2!  We drank 2 bottles of wine, played music and talked, talked and talked.  If we ever had any secrets, we don't now.  I loved that.  Thank goodness for girlfriends.  And just before she came my best friend from high school, who I connected with after FH left, and I talked for 2 hours on the phone!  2 was my lucky number that day!

And finally, I am looking forward to the ability to just pick up and go somewhere.  To be spontaneous.  To go to the neighboring town for shopping and lunch with the girls and not be on pins and needles worrying about getting home in time for the bus.  To just go.....

I'll miss that little girl though.  She really knows how to fill up a life. And what if I lose my youthful outlook?  She's really kept me on top of youthful popular culture.  Just ask me about Miley Cyrus, Rocket Dogs, and the latest pop music.  

Good grief. Last week when the Ting Tings came on the radio I didn't even switch channels.  And I was alone! 

Yeah. Life with Katy is good.  But we'll just have to invent a new kind of life, apart/together. It'll be good. Katy'll have her dad...

 And I'm gonna have some adventures. 

Separation Anxiety Is Creeping In

I just got home today from picking Katy up at the airport in Denver.  She spent the week of spring break with her dad, Max.  It was a turning point in the effort to make her completely comfortable with and accepting of going back to Nashville to live with her dad after living here in Colorado for almost three years.  The trip was a roaring success. She didn't want to come home.  He said she began crying early last night, leaving furtive little notes when his back was turned trying to show him the logic of her staying there.

How great is this?  Really, it's great! Just great!

So why am I feeling so shitty?  When she got off the plane she didn't rush to hug me. Actually, she never did. I hugged her finally.  Her tone with me was impatient and a little edgy.  On the three hour drive home she informed me that she loves Nashville better than Colorado, loves the brand of car that her dad drives better than the brand that I drive, likes rain better than snow...is just sick of snow.  She doesn't want me to touch anything she got on the trip.  When she complained that her fingernails were trimmed too much, I said something like a little too short, huh?  Her dad had no way of knowing how she likes her nails and trimmed them too short. But No! they aren't too short at all, in fact it's better; I just have to get used to them.

You see what I mean?  But that is all to be expected I imagine.  I'll bet Byrd (who knows about these things) would say it's natural for her to begin switching her alliances now. She's preparing herself to leave me and Colorado and go to her dad. She's beginning her separation process.  I know all that intellectually.  But emotionally?  It smarts.  It's just ridiculous but throughout the drive I was secretly harboring hurt feelings.  At one point I thought I would CRY for heaven's sake. Thank goodness that was outside of the car at the gas pump.  I became snappy.  Ugh!  I was petulant, and I just hate it when I'm petulant. 

Here's what I worry about and have to guard against with all my inner strength:  I can't let my separation process take a negative direction. You know what I mean...so that by the time she goes we are so argumentative I'm just thrilled that she is leaving. I want her to go. I want the natural order of things to return to our three lives.  I do. Max is ready. Katy is ready and I surely thought I was ready.  Most of me is.  I long for the freedom it will bring me even as I'm worrying that I will have a sinking spell when it happens, and be so bereft and lonely I'll do something stupid like move to the wrong place; become a hermit, eat everything in sight and get really fat; or latch on to some man who is absolutely not right for me just to have something to fill the new emptiness. 

 I'm a little scared that I'll get all grouchy and reserved as these months progress.  Hold back. When the way I really want this to go is with love and patience.  I want these last two or three months to be some of our best...not our worst.  And I  have to make this happen.  She's just a little kid. I'm the grown up here.  My e-harmony guy reminded me of that on the phone tonight.

You're going to have to do a lot of hard swallowing for the next two months.

Any advice will be greatly appreciated.  Xanax?  

Oh well. Enough of that...

My computer was in the repair shop for a week and three days.  I discovered I spend entirely too much time on it throughout the day and that is the big time waster I've been sleuthing for.  I'm going to establish my personal  Computer Usage Policy and then dredge up all the self control I can to stick to it. 

I spent the week of spring break with the e-harmony guy (I guess I need to give him a name.  Ok. From now on I'll call him Sam, a fake name of course to protect the innocent.)Part of that time was spent here in the wilderness with Sam.  I cooked for the first time, exposing a domestic side I'd kept under wraps until I whipped up perfectly cooked salmon, roasted asparagus and my very famous in these parts spinach salad with my own roasted tomatoes, caramelized-the- long-way onions and feta cheese.  I make the vinaigrette for that also. I made all the components before he came so the entire production would look almost effortless.  I like for my guests to believe I think enough of them to go to some trouble....but I don't want them to think I slaved over a hot stove all day.  There is a fine line between making dinner guests feel coddled and making them feel like they are impositions.  Anyway, I have no experience of this but I'll bet a dating woman has to be careful not to look too domestic or men will expect her to start doing domestic things for them.  Like cleaning their houses or doing their laundry.  Luckily I'm an outspoken sort of  person so it's doubtful I'd fall into that little trap!

After that I went to his town and we skied.  Altogether a lovely spring break.  Now it's a long dry spell with no school holidays till the end of school in May, though I do have a very cool babysitter that Katy loves for long weekends.  (Just one a month.)  She takes Katy horseback riding and lets her break all the rules when they play Scrabble. 

I'm back home with a new computer keyboard and a fire in my belly to get some things done that actually contribute to my goal of putting my house on the market.  

I am still in total darkness about where I'll go and what the heck I'll do when I do sell the house.  I've had moments of a panicky stomach just trying to work this all out.  

But I'll save that tale for another post. 

And About My Friends....

Change.

Seems it's on a lot of minds these days.  I'm not the only one.  Reading many of my favorite blogs this week I see that many of my blog friends are regarding change, embracing it, suspicious of it, planning it, wanting it, or resisting it.  All with varying degrees of enthusiasm and dread.

Susan at 29 Black Street is planning it.  A move out of her big old brick house. She'll make a brand new home in a new location near a beloved friend.  And, thinking of more little veins to send out into the world from her richly creative heart. 

J is seeming to finally be embracing change even if it isn't a permanent change (and really, what change is).  Who wouldn't look forward to a summer in the awesome landscape of Alaska growing raspberries and looking for peace.

Mmm is "facing great change...potentially...and not sure I want to face any of it", resisting it for the moment, seeming to dread it a bit. 

Judy did make a big change.  Moving to a new town, leaving behind so much that she loved and now not convinced at all that "change is good".  But as always happens in the course of a life another crossroads looms ahead and this time she's determined to put a positive slant on change.

Emily is contemplating a changed body: svelte, strong, supple, and submitting meekly to a hard driving trainer in order to accomplish the change.

Mim has gone through the trauma of unemployment...one of so many families stricken by the cruel economic crisis, but now is hopeful for change. As the season changes and is brighter, so she and her husband hope will their prospects also be brighter.

Paris plans a reinvention, a master change as her intrepid resilience carries her into a new life, a new world populated by new, loving people.

fire byrd is counting the minutes till her big change, a move to the sea that she's dreamed of for a long time.  She's relishing the idea of change, and already creating her base of support in her new home town well before she even moves there. 

Pherenike is receiving signs from the universe of an approaching change.  She's not exactly resisting, but she's wary.  Does she really want it?  Does she have a choice?

Robin is considering the idea of a change that reaches backward, not forward: to detatch significantly from the internet or not.  Whatever her decision she'll abide by it with an awareness and acceptance that the consideration of change will have given her.

I write encouraging comments to my friends urging them to take change by the horns and wrestle it into their lives.  And I mean it.  I'm a cheerleader for change.

But in the back of my head a little voice is laying on the sarcasm.....yeah, so when are you gonna wrestle your way into your garage?  The barn?  Except for the huge change of Katy leaving, all the rest of my potential changes rely upon my selling my house. But I can't show it until I tackle several areas of disrepute, particularly my big old garage and bigger damned old barn, both full of remnants of the past:  collectibles, tools, furniture, photos, books, rugs,...oh, so much stuff.

I am overwhelmed at the prospect of banishing it all, but I wonder if I'm truly overwhelmed or is it a disguised resistance to change?  A panic driven clinging to the known and comfortable.  A trepidation of the unknown.  I don't want to believe that.  I fancy myself an enthusiastic acceptor of change. An adventuress into the unexplored.  A traveler into virgin territory. 

That's what I want to be.  

So, you know what?

If I find that I'm something less....

well I'll just....

change!

Change on the Horizon

Certainly that was the longest hiatus taken yet!  And no really good reason.  A person can always find a little time to write...can't she? Life just got in the way and got me awfully preoccupied.....

our drama continues

A lot has been going on here with my little family caught up in a soap opera drama again. In this case more of a crime drama.  I won't elaborate; that one's not my story to tell.  It's Max's story.  I have to shake my head, though, at all the sordidness my ex-daughter in law has brought into our lives in the 10 years I've known her, and now she's crossed a line from which there is no return.

What I can talk about though is that the woman has fled to Canada and in the long run that will affect all three of our lives for the better.  I may not have mentioned before that she is not a citizen here. (Actually I'm not sure I've ever mentioned her.)  She's Canadian from Nova Scotia.  And the girl has gotten herself into a lot of trouble.

katy's big adventure

Katy had time off from school last week and she had two big firsts.  She went back to the city, Nashville, that she left three years ago, and she took her first unaccompanied airline trip.  Big deals both.  Three years ago when she left Nashville she swore, and has continued to pledge that she would never go back there.  She hated it.  It's surely a sign of Max and Katy's strong bonding since my divorce that she wanted to go stay with him in that town.  She kind of emotionally transferred all the nastiness of her parent's divorce to the city, so that Nashville became a huge negative symbol in her mind.   

In the dark car driving home from the airport confidences were shared as they often are under the cover of darkness, and she told me she believes she could go back and live with him in Nashville.  She's always been adamant that he move to Colorado so they could live together here. And she's still ambivalent about Nashville, though not about living with her dad. She was worried her remarks would hurt my feelings, but they didn't.  It was never the plan that Katy would live here with us and then me forever.  My dream was always that Max would fight for and get custody, and that eventually he and Katy would reunite and live as a dad and beloved daughter should live, together. And time's passing at warp speed. She goes into middle school in September.  Just a little more time and he'll miss her big, little girl life altogether.

Well, he did fight long and hard, and won custody. But he and I didn't want Katy to be in the same town as her mother.  So, and this is where these two stories tie together, with her mother on the lam in Canada, Nashville becomes a real possibility.  I won't deny that my dream had the two of them living in Colorado, but Max has a good job there, with a good income and a contract.  During these harsh times that is an asset greater than gold.  And I can not move there.  I will never move back to the south. I left there 30 years ago to come to Colorado, and my soul homesteaded here. I simply can not live in the heat and I would die if I had to leave Colorado.  I believe Max thinks I'm being a bit of a drama queen about that...Mom, you wouldn't die!  

Stranger things have happened.

He and I are talking this summer...possibly...no probably.

 

Living in the mountainous middle of nowhere.

so what about me?

Yeah...what about me?  I've been pondering this. I haven't actually been alone yet.  I've been without a husband, but I've had a lively, life filling person with me since the divorce. My life revolves around Katy and her needs.  Technically I'm a single mom living in the mountainous middle of nowhere with a 10 year old girl. It's my life and has been since the divorce, and in fact I think it is a large part of the reason I handled the divorce with such equanimity.  I had to really.  For Katy.  So I anxiously wonder what it will be like when Katy goes with her dad?  Will I dance with glee at my freedom? Or will I sink into the gloom of loneliness?  I honestly don't believe that I'll sink, I'm not a sinking kind of woman, but I do know I'll have to watch myself. Be careful.  Make interesting changes. Tackle it head on. Make still another new life.

Max said something that really made me begin thinking about this.  After she had left him, he told me that it was so difficult to let her go.  Every night I go home to a quiet, empty house. I cook alone, eat alone and then try to kill some time so I can go to sleep and wake up in the morning and leave this empty feeling house. I'm lonely.  But with Katy here, we do home work together, eat together, laugh and talk, talk, talk....she's such a presence.

And right now she's my presence.

It's kind of scary.

 

I Was In Love Once.....

I've been thinking about love lately.

I don't know what got me started thinking about that. Perhaps the fact that every visible surface is plastered with hearts, xo's, sweet sentiments and all the rest of the symbols of love as Valentines day draws near.  But aside from that a wonderfully entertaining new reader of my blog, lilly, has been writing of love this month.  It was her post on February 2, "What Is Love", that probably kicked off my love musings, then the next day or two after I read that  I was walking up the mountain behind the house and the song "Addicted To Love" by Robert Palmer came on my i-pod.  I laughed aloud at the lyrics. Oh yes. That's what it feels like alright.

Your lights are on, but you're not home

Your mind is not your own

Your heart sweats, your body shakes

You can't sleep, you can't eat

Your throat is tight, you can't breathe

Trudging up the hill I remembered.......

I fell in love once. I fell in love with FH (former husband for any new readers).  I was 19, he was 24. The first time I saw him was at my very first job interview ever.  He was on his knees flipping through a filing cabinet as I was shown in to my interviewer.  My skirt was as mini as they came....it was 1967.

When he turned to look up at me, his heavy lidded eyes glided from my ankles slowly up that long expanse of leg and finally our eyes met...no locked. I was burning with the certainty that he could see right up my skirt. Well if it wasn't love at first sight, it was definitely lust at first site!  What a job interview that was. He fiddled around with those damned files the entire time and I was so flushed and nervous I haven't the slightest idea what I said to my interviewer. The only thing I was aware of was that I had to know more about this man. I remember thinking, If I am not hired I will die. But I  was hired and that set off the events that formed the next 40 years of my life. 

He walked like a man who had been places and seen things, and actually he had. He had returned from Viet Nam recently. A lock of thick black hair flopped onto his forehead at the slightest movement; he was tanned and muscled, slim and hard as a rock.  He was devastatingly handsome and he was as edgy as a razor blade. I liked that. He seemed dangerous. A bad boy, for sure. He had been a green beret on an A-team in the army and he knew everything about survival and getting along and getting what you want.  And he wanted me.  He was also at the bad end of a six month marriage.  I eventually met him for stolen hours deep in the woods and brief, steamy encounters in the coffee room.

He was still married for three months after I met him, and though I knew I shouldn't that didn't stop me.  Now do you see a case here of the karma train exacting its due? Yes, I've thought about that one.

Those were the most exhilarating months of my life. I was eaten up with being in love. It was so mentally and physically taxing I don't know how I survived. I was engulfed.

Mmm said recently in a comment that being in love is so exhausting. How true.  A lovely exhaustion to be sure, though. 

I don't really expect to ever feel that again. Surely there was a youth quotient to the heat that can never be replicated at my riper age, even when I meet the man who can set a fire in me. When I do meet him, will it be a bonfire he sets? A wildfire? Or will it be a low simmering bed of coals that will warm me in a more extended, sustaining manner deep into my soft old age.

Hmmmm. Sweet thoughts, but at the moment I'm just as happy living in the moment. I am  wide opened to love, which is a good thing because love can only enter through an opened door.

Yes, I do believe I will fall in love again one day.  I didn't believe that at all for months after the divorce. But I know now I have way too much love percolating inside me not to spread it around a little. Certainly no hurry though.

Love can take its time.

Stepping Out Of The Cloak

I just got home last night from a date weekend with the man I've been seeing.  The e-harmony guy.  This has got to be the best way to see and be with a man: for idyllic three day weekends once every 3 to 5 weeks.  What I'm noticing is that every time we're together it's fresh, fun, and friction free (honestly, I didn't plan that alliteration).  And we are never together long enough at one time for it to become mundane or even predictable.   Once a month we learn a few new things about one another, carefully doling out selected bits of information that we each believe enhances our characters,  inserts mystery into our images, or illustrates our fetching senses of humor.  And there is still a bottomless well of juicy facts to learn about each of us. It's a clean slate.  How lovely to be with someone who is seeing me with untarnished eyes, someone who doesn't know every single thing about me that there is to know. The days and nights are balanced with fun activities and just being cozy.  Affection underscores even the slightest touch and glance. Consideration for the other motivates all actions.  Every arrival is highly anticipated; every departure is poignant and romantic.

Is that perfect or what?  As Max pointed out to me recently, You're not going to advance the relationship very far with that kind of schedule, Mom, it's a fantasy world.  To which I answered that I don't necessarily want to advance anything.  It's fine the way it is, and sometimes a nice fantasy world is exactly what the doctor ordered.

Just look as this line-up of the major things we did this weekend:  Went to a hockey game at the local rink in which he was a player. He plays in kind of an old guy league. Went to a fun pizza place/bar with lots of the players and some spouses and girlfriends.  Next day....went out for lunch, went to a movie (Grand Torino), went to a neighborhood bar where many couple friends of his were and I hit it off with everyone including two great women both of whom were artists.  Saturday, drove the hour to Denver to see a professional hockey game with his 22 year old daughter. After that we met his 24 year old son and had a delicious dinner out. Any holes in that schedule (none of which, except for the game in Denver was really preplanned) were nicely filled with that "cozy" time I mentioned.

Seriously, even on a vacation with FH we never, ever did that many fun things in that short length of time.  Like Max said, a fantasy world.

I'm glad I made the decision to get on e-harmony.  I didn't think of it myself and I would not have done it had it not been for my friends putting the idea in my head.  It's added a fun, adult facet to my life that's all mine, not a part of my grand motherly/mother surrogate roll.  The roll that is fairly all encompassing except for this one little getaway a month.  I hug this time possessively to my heart because on that weekend each month I step out of the grand motherly cloak and slip into my other incarnation....Anya, the energetic, single woman that loves a lemon drop martini and can stay up till two in the morning talking, laughing, dancing and loving without a pause.  The bold doer of new things, thinker of new thoughts, and speaker of clever remarks.  Then after just a short while I drive the three hours home or send him home feeling like I've been to the spring of renewal.  I slip back into that sweet, grandmotherly cloak and I feel content there. It just fits a little better when I can step out of it for a time.

My Non-Milestone!

Pinon pine cones looking just like little flowers.

Every life, every marriage has milestones, "a significant point of development", according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary that I keep by the computer.  And every divorce has milestones and I've gone through several:  the signing of the papers, taking a 3,000 mile driving trip alone, my birthday, getting through Christmas, going out with a man for the first time, are some that come to mind.  And this week there was a big one:  date of the wedding anniversary. 

Our wedding anniversary would have been on Monday the nineteenth.  But here's the most delightful part, and the most self revealing....I didn't even realize it.  And yes, I knew it was the nineteenth.

Katy and I met my sister Lissa in Denver this past weekend for GNO as Katy calls it (Girls Night Out), though it was more of a GWO (Girls Weekend Out).  The Stock Show is going on in Denver and in conjunction with it each year there is a "Super Dogs" show so I bought tickets, and we invited Lissa to join us.  We had a blast cruising the stock show, staying in a hotel together, and going to the dog show. "Super Dogs" originates out of Canada, but the dogs and their owners are from all over Canada and the U.S., and many are from the city in which the show is playing. It's run by these two old drama guys in gold lame suits that do a fabulous job of revving up the audience.  The dogs do all the fun things working dogs do in field and agility trials but in a more theatrical setting and accompanied by very loud music, and each section of the audience is assigned their "dog team". Boy did we scream and holler for our team! It's an hour and a half of fun and dog love from all. So many happy dogs.  They clearly love doing it.

Anyway, yesterday I got an email from Lissa though I didn't open it till today, and she said she saw on her calendar that it was FH's (former husband's) birthday. For forty years January was  a BIG month because of the anniversary and the birthday.

I just wanted to write and remind you how wonderful it is to see you happy and excited about each day, her note said.

I was shocked! It hadn't dawned on me that it was his birthday.  But then, I was doubly shocked when I remembered that Monday would have been our 41st wedding anniversary, and it never crossed my mind either. Good grief! I would have figured that at the beginning of this month I would have thought Oh, it's January. The month we got married. But that didn't happen. I just grinned to myself this morning at the wonder of it all.  Hooray for movin' on! Hooray for a new life! Hooray for peace of mind!

The thing I did realize this morning though was that I should have Katy call her grand dad and wish him happy birthday belatedly. (I do things like that for her, not for him!) So she did.  And this day just got better. I don't actively eavesdrop on her conversations with him.  In fact if she's walking around in the same room as I am I motion her to go talk in another room.  Still, often I can't help but hear her side of the chat.  Today she told him that she didn't call him yesterday because we went to Colorado Springs, and only today did Aunt Lissa remind her it was his birthday.  (That was the first fun thing Katy said which indicated that I had not  remembered.)  He apparently asked what we did in Colorado Springs and Katy said, We had to go get Gran some jeans.  She keeps going down in sizes because she's working out.  Ha, ha, ha, ha.  Good girl!  Oh yeah. I got a good laugh out of that. 

Possibly someone might be thinking that if I'm doing so darned well then why do I care if he knows I'm looking good, doing good and not remembering his birthday or our anniversary.  But I'll bet there isn't a divorced woman alive who doesn't want the old ex to know she's doin' fine....on her own...without him! Just human nature I think.

Needless to say, that made my day. Plus, got another milestone under my belt.  I wonder how many milestones there are anyway.  Does filing my first tax return as a single person qualify?  And what the hell do you do when you were married part of the tax year and single for the other part? 

That's the next thing I've got to figure out.

 

View of my house from the top of the hill today.

Oh, It's Not Just A Name

 

Look at this background.  Another reason why people ski.

I've decided to take back my maiden name.  This might sound like a light weight issue and I know....generally speaking and compared to the issues some of you are facing it is, but not so much to me.  Honestly I've grappled with it for months now. I mean I've had my current name for forty years! Most of my life.   

There is a point in a divorce when the lawyer asks if you want to take back your maiden name.  When I was asked, I didn't even take ten seconds to think about it.  I just said No!  I was sitting there beside FH who went with me to two out of the three visits I made to the lawyer. Three visits, ninety days and $2,500; that's all it took.   As I said months ago it was an "amicable" divorce.  He didn't even get a lawyer. The lawyer was mine. (The man just wanted to go.)   FH looked at me surprised and said Really?  You aren't going to do that?  I looked at him surprised that he was surprised and said I didn't want to because all my financial and every other kind of history was known under my married name.

I wish badly that I'd known I would be offered the option at that time because if I had had time to consider it then and make the decision I've made now it would have happened automatically with the stroke of a pen and wouldn't have cost me a bit of extra money and time.  Now I'll have to petition the court, pay a lawyer, and god knows what other fees will be required.  But I'm going to do it. 

I'm already using this new/old name when I meet someone new.  I'm using it with you guys.  It's the name you see when you email me.  Even this new fellow I've met knows me as she. 

I know it'll be one hell of a hassle.  That's why I've dragged my feet.  Credit cards, records, all kinds of people have to be notified and I'll bet most of them will want paper work.  But the main reason I've been nervous about it is because I worry that one very important entity will screw it up...the government.  In particular, the social security people.  I'll have to change the name attached to my social security number and in this country, that number validates your entire existence to the government. In fact, I think that now everyone gets one at birth or soon thereafter so it is in effect our birth number. They probably wish they could tattoo it to the bottom of our feet the minute we take our first breath. Can I trust the government to get anything this important to me right?  Scary thought!

Over the holidays it came to me as clear as the Colorado sky on an cold winter's day that this married name means absolutely nothing emotionally to me.  I think a name should mean something emotionally. I remember when I got the name.  It meant something emotionally then.  I had just turned twenty years old and in spite of the free love "movement" and "womens lib", I  rushed to the bank and ordered my first checks with the name "Mrs. FH" printed on them.  Didn't even use my own first name. I would gaze at them, awed.  I was like a high school girl with stars in her eyes writing "Mrs. FH" in romantic script all over her notebooks day dreaming about owning that name too.  Actually, I wasn't too far beyond high school!  Two years! Thank goodness eventually I came to my senses and at least used my first name on the checks.  The "Mrs. FH" moniker is the way the generation before mine would have chosen.  Many of those women would have referred to themselves as "Mrs. FH" till they died.  My step mom did it. Later, during my involvement with NOW and trying to get the Equal Rights Amendment passed (I was a bit of a rebel in my small town then.) I took my maiden name, West, as my middle name and have used it that way ever since.

I feel like a new woman has emerged from this divorce.  She's thinking differently, she's doing things differently, she's almost unrecognizable to me...she doesn't even look the same. Yesterday, Katy, her friend, and I went skiing.  The ski mountain is two hours from here.  As I was riding the lift...alone, because the girls were at a different level...I was thinking about this; well, actually I was talking out loud about it. I've discovered that the ski lift is a wonderful place to think, talk to myself, laugh aloud, and ponder.  I'm in the most beautiful place in the world, wrapped in the muffled silence of a snow covered landscape,  weightlessly gliding through the treetops feeling small and insignificant yet at the same time feeling like the most important person in the whole Universe. There's an enormous comfort in that dichotomy.

There's a lot of distance between the chairs and unless the people ahead look back at me, I know I'm in the clear and I keep on talking. Telling myself how wonderful I am.  How strong.  This "self uptalk" is actually how I gave birth to this new woman.  I was saying to myself Look at you, Anya. Here you are skiing alone. (You have no idea how strange that is.) Driving up an icy mountain pass to get here.  Grinning and talking to everyone. Sitting in the lodge alone having a Starbucks and loving it.  Feeling just so competent. So full.

Later a storm, a real blizzard,  moved in and the drive home took four hours rather than two. I just turned up the radio, relaxed, and poked along.  When we finally turned off the paved road onto our seven miles of gravel county road, the snow was so deep, I started laughing.  I can not believe I'm out driving at night in a damned blizzard! And I'm not even freaked!  The girls asked What are you laughing at, Gran?  I said I was just laughing at all the snow. It's so pretty.

So you see.  I've got to get the new name.  It's just the cherry on top of the sundae.  And I'm going to keep that identity.  I don't care what happens in the future. If the king of England sweeps me away to become his queen, I'm keepin' it.  It's going to be all mine. Forever.

I was born with it.

I'll die with it.

No Resolutions Here!

I'm thinking about the "R" word today.  To me it's almost as negative as the "F" word (though sometimes the "F" word is the only word that works and well...actually it isn't always negative).  So, you know the "F" word; I don't need to explain that one.   A lot of you use the "R" word so comfortably, but I just don't. Or can't.  So I'll say it just once...RESOLUTION.  Whew! Way too much pressure in that word.

What I prefer to say is something pleasant and fun sounding like Things I'd Like To Do This Year,  or Possibilities This Year (I love the word possibilities; such a promising word) or Ideas For This Year.  I don't usually include the date when I write these "ideas" down because that way I can just carry them over from year to year if they don't get done the first year I write them down. 

I have a few brand new things this year:

Figure out exactly how much a year it is costing me to live here (it's shocking that I have not done this. I've been drifting along. Bad, bad, girl!)                                                 

Decide how long I can live here without being stressed

SELL MY OVERFLOW STUFF

Start my Amazon "bookstore"

Write something in addition to my blog

Make a website on my house (incidentally, I have a $10,000 finder's fee if someone brings me a buyer before I go with a real estate agent which isn't going to be anytime soon.  Know anyone who is longing for a rocky Mountain hideaway?)

Learn how to TAKE BETTER PHOTOS!

And if I look back at the ideas and possibilities I wrote...I believe it must have been 2007, there are still plenty of things there to add to this year's list.  Looking through my journals I can't seem to find what I wrote last year.  I'd love to find that because last year was a really, really, bad year and I'm curious to see how my mind set translated into New Year's ideas. But here are a few from 2007 that are still waiting for my attention:

Start learning my Photo Shop Elements Program (good grief, I can't believe I've had this program installed in my computer this long and have not even looked at it)

Do art every day (probably not going to happen this year either. if I do all this other stuff I won't have the time!)

Meditate more  (getting better but still room for improvement)

Make more of my own cards for my friends (might can pull this off)

Practice visualization

Don't wait till the last minute to do everything (Oh. Well.)

Don't you always feel like you can do anything and everything when you're at the starting gate of a brand new year?  It becomes a little more difficult to sustain that enthusiasm and sureness as the year progresses, and that's why I think it's important to seize the list of ideas really quickly and knock out some accomplishments.  The momentum should then carry us forward and more will get done.  I'm sure this is the way it works, though I have yet to actually prove it.

Anyway, this is what I'm thinking about and I fully plan to do more than just think about it.

I really do.

I would love to see what you're putting on your lists, mental or literal....I check your blogs nearly daily...why don't you write about it there, or in the comment area here. Share you guys!

I might get some new ideas.

Cheers!!!

The Deer Messenger

The Deer

Gentleness and Innocence

Deer teaches us to use the power of gentleness
to touch the hearts and minds of
wounded beings who are in our lives.

Don't push towards change in others,
rather gently nudge them in the right direction
with the love that comes from a Deer totem.

When a Deer totem shows up in your life,
a new innocence and freshness is about to be awakened.
There is going to be a gentle lure of new adventures.
There will  be an opportunity to express the gentle love
that will open new doors for you.

On New Year's Eve, I went snowshoeing on the mountain behind my house.  This time I reached every landmark that on earlier walks had been a goal accomplished and just kept going.  I got to the locked gate that marks the national forest boundary and with big duck feet clumsily climbed through it and just kept going.  I had the i-pod in my pocket, earphones in my ears, and I was in the zone.

 

The forest side of the gate.

But there is a certain place on my trail when I turn the i-pod off, take out the earphones and soak up the sounds of the forest: wind blowing through the stately blue spruces in their broad needle skirts; ravens squawking, apparently at nothing more than the joy of lazily riding the thermals; the crunch of my snowshoes moving in and out of the snow...and the padded silence of deep, snow covered forest. This place where I separate myself from the music is near the top end of my usual trek, my side of the forest gate.  But on New Year's Eve I climbed through that gate and just kept going. I'd say I'll go to the top of that hill then I'll turn around.  Then I'd do that and I'd say Well, I'm almost at the u-turn in the box canyon so I'll go till it makes the turn.  or Oh, man, I can tell by the sky I can see through those trees I'm nearly at the top, I've gotta keep goin'. And that is how I make the goals.  Just a little by little. From one landmark to another.  Is this a life lesson for me? For anyone? If so, I'm just learning it. I have never made and met athletic goals in my life. And very few other goals for that matter.

Looking back I believe I was inspired by a comment made the night before by my friend Lucy at our girlfriend Christmas party (a little late this year).  Lucy is around 70, ten years or more older than I. I was telling the girls of my snowshoe adventures and how I was delighted and amazed that I was walking all the way to the forest gate.  Then Lucy said, Yeah, I walked that road last summer all the way to the top of the mountain. 

Hmmmm.  I'm thinking, the top of the mountain. Much farther than the forest gate. And suddenly the top of the mountain became a very alluring destination.

Up past the gate the snow was very deep and there was no previous snowshoe path to make the going easier. I could really feel those butt cheeks firming up every time I lifted a snowshoe out of the heavy snow to take another step.  I felt quite clever when I noticed that all the animal footprints were stacked upon one another along the edge of the road while I was walking in the middle of the road. I made my way to the edge and realized that the animals knew that that part of the road was less deep in the first place, and if they all kept to the same path, eventually it would become slightly packed down and the going would become easier for all. Those little critters are smart.  I followed suit and then kept to their path. I'll bet they appreciated my packing down their path even more.

I so wish I could convey the sheer isolation up there.  I've taken a lot of pictures trying to capture it to show you guys, but they always fall short of the reality.  When I'm up there it's like I'm the only human in the world. It is exhilarating. Often I think I will cry from it. Occasionally I do.

  

On this day as I rounded a bend in the road I came face to face with a magnificent buck deer.  I carefully came to a stop and we regarded each other for a few moments. Then I began to move toward him slowly displaying no threatening behavior,  but not avoiding his eyes either. In fact, I held them unwaveringly with mine.  I was a little surprised that he didn't bolt. That's the common action of a buck being approached by a human.  They are much more skittish than the does who are not hunted. But at the same time, I had a gut feeling that he wasn't going to flee, and so I edged closer and closer to him.

I said quietly Are you a messenger?  and he simply stood there not frightened by my voice at all,  holding my eyes with his big, knowing, brown eyes. The deer almost always hasten away when I speak to them. Oh, at that moment his deep liquid eyes seemed to hold the wisdom of the Universe to me. I was mesmerized.  I spoke to him a little more though I don't recall what I said. Only when I decided to take a photo and reached for and fiddled with my camera did he turn unhurriedly, look over his shoulder at me once, then gracefully disappear down the steep, snowy, cliff and into the trees edging that side of the road. I let my body relax, and I knew he was a messenger.

I continued the walk and eventually I did reach the top, a place where I could look over the other side of the mountain and see a sweeping valley below.  I wanted to mark this special accomplishment, but every rock and stick was either buried under several feet of snow or frozen in place. So I just I whooped and hollered a little bit. I felt so deeply touched by the moment (it was just so beautiful) and by my messenger that I paused and voiced a reverent "thank you" to the Universe. I threw kisses to the Universe.  Honestly, I rejoiced. (have I ever used that word?) As I've told you before, you can do that up here in the middle of nowhere.  Certainly one of the joys of living in the boonies. Max and I charted that walk on google earth later.  It was a five mile round trip...1000 foot gain in elevation.  In snowshoes.  Ha, ha, ha, ha...who is that woman?

The first thing I did when I got home was to go to the computer and enter the site that my dear friend Susan told me about that explores the meanings of animal totems.  (I have decided to not call my blog friends "blog friends" anymore.  They are just friends.  Don't you feel that way too?) Here is the link: animal totems.  And I looked up "deer", and above at the beginning of this post, under the photo of the deer is what the deer totem means.

You know, I don't think that every time a fox runs across the road in front of your car or you spot a coyote in the meadow that that is a "visit" or a "message" from an animal totem. In my world, those are regular occurrences. No. I believe it has to be a special encounter with an animal. Or an encounter with a special animal like the albino raven my ski instructor watched for a half hour the day before New Year's Eve. (I'll tell you about this guy later. Yum)  Something out of the ordinary.  In the case of the buck, it was just that. He did not run at my approach, but instead stood there regally and silently conveying to me that our meeting was meaningful. Is this just my vivid imagination?  Does it matter? Not one bit.  If you believe you are receiving a message from the Universe then it is effective whether it is a reality or a figment.  Is that just wonderful or what?!!

Well....that was an important message, so apropos to the conversations, musings, conclusions and decisions of my little family during this season.  Those I'll explore later with you, and hopefully benefit from your insights and comments. 

There were many stellar moments in this holiday season...the very best I've experienced in many years.  But that deer and the gift of his message to me must certainly set the theme for my highly anticipated new year ahead. I just know I will discover my true way this year.

Happy New Year my dear friends!

Snowshoe tracks leading to home.

A Pretty Nice Day

Katy and me throwing out reindeer food on C.Eve.

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!!

...although I imagine most people with more extended families aren't going to be reading blogs on Christmas Day. I'm waiting on the prime rib to cook and the potatoes to boil, etc. so it seemed like a very good idea to write a quick little post (if that is possible for me). 

It's been a lovely day: a reasonable wake-up time, great Santa bounty for Katy, good gifts for Max and me, Dean Martin crooning out Christmas songs all morning.  Max bought Dean last night.  All the Christmas music left with FH and his computer (we all use i-tunes and the computer rather than cd's though we listen to it through the big speakers). We've always listened to Christmas music by country singers, but it was clear this year that Max wanted to begin a new tradition and heck, I was up for it.  After several decades the same music had gotten a little stale and it was too FH.

I think Max has had a few sad and bittersweet moments.  On the one hand, as I've said before there is just NO anxiety, crankiness, and negativity in the house like when FH was here, but on the other hand, the family structure must seem to be missing one important person to him after all those years.  His dad hasn't called him or emailed him and it hurts even though he acts like it doesn't.  With the exception of contacting Katy occasionally, FH has pretty much emotionally deserted the family.  How does a man do that?  Especially when he has almost a whole entire life invested with that family.  I haven't spoken to him in over four months and it is the same for Max.  sigh   Well, that's negative stuff to think about right there and that just isn't how I'm feeling now.  

Last night was different but pleasant. After Katy went to bed wired and couldn't get to sleep for hours, and was crying because Santa won't come if I'm not asleep but I CAN'T GO TO SLEEP!!!  Max and I listened to music and burned CD's for each other so we could share and later I wrote some comments on blogs that I hadn't visited this week to say Merry Merry! But, around 12:15 pm (she's still not asleep) I received a wrong number call...three times.  On the third time I joked around with the woman calling.

Well, that set off an amazing and interestsing hour of conversation.  She was in northern Colorado visiting her kids.  She is 70 years old.  Janet was trying to call her boyfriend here in my town but she kept dialing my number instead, which by the way isn't even similar to his.  So we got to talking and of course we were talking men because that's what she had on her mind.  She said her psychologist out in Pennsylvania has told her she's obsessed with this guy who won't ask her to marry him, nor will he ask her to live with him after eight years of dating.  The doctor wants her to move on, but there she was furtively calling him at midnight and feeling guilty as hell. To me it seems that romance at 70  might should  be revered whatever its nature but as she talked more I realized that from her doctor's point of view it is a matter of self respect.  She said sex with this man is FABULOUS, hence some of the obsession.  (Isn't that wonderful though?  Fabulous sex at 70! It's something to look forward to, for sure.)  Anyway, after 1:20 when we decided to get off the phone, we exchanged only first names and phone numbers.  I would have done emails because I could tell she liked getting things off her chest with me, but she doesn't do email.  I said Well, it's after one, are you going to call John now? and she said she wasn't.  It's too late.  I think I was meant to call you instead so I would talk too long and not call him.  I'm leaving tomorrow.  I won't call now. We agreed it was all destiny and hung up.  It was just fascinating to me.

Well....gotta go make those decadent mashed potatoes...Linda's recipe of course.  She's got all the best recipes.

So, if anyone is reading this, Merry! 

 Can you believe it is finally over!

My Big Adventure

Squirt

I've been quite remiss in writing my blog!  That's not a good way to run a blog; all the blog advice you read tells you that.  I thought I'd better get to it, though, because I don't want anyone to think I haven't written because I'm blue.  I'm not blue.  Thank goodness!  And, I have to worry now about whether any of my beloved readers still remember me!  While I have been relatively busy, my not writing is mainly because my writing brain has been having a fallow period.  Too much Christmas spirit.

I have done a fun thing or two lately, though.  Remember when I wrote that I signed up on e-harmony, the dating web site?  Well, there was one awfully nice man whose emails stood out from the rest and eventually we began talking on the phone.  Gosh, I guess we talked almost every day for a month. Some of the conversations lasted two hours and more! That was such a revelation to me because I had no idea I could do that: talk on the phone for hours to a man.  I would have never believed I would have anything to say and I figured anxiety and shyness would sabotage my efforts.  I used to talk endlessly on the phone to clients when I worked, but when I quit, it seemed like I developed an aversion akin to a phone phobia...a mild one.  Not only that, but it was a man and I just couldn't imagine how that would be.  Well clearly it went well and I couldn't find a trace of anxiety and shyness anywhere after the first ten minutes.  What a delight to discover that! Who is this woman?

In the natural course of things like that, we decided to meet and see if the attraction would hold up off the phone. In person.   Geeze.  If I thought the phone was scary I was petrified about a face to face. But that's why I signed up on the darned site, so I just swallowed the fear. Thing is, he lives three hours away in a ski town in an area I've always loved.  My family used to go skiing there all the time.  So, since I seldom do anything half way, I decided that rather than planning an innocuous one hour meeting at a Starbucks somewhere between our towns, I would give myself a little Christmas gift and just go there and rent a tiny condo in the village. I've needed to have some alone time desperately.  I  haven't had any since FH left back in May.  I arranged something pleasant for Katy and just went for it.   I thought that if we continued to like each other, I'd have a nice escort for the weekend.  If not, well....it's a great place to just hang out and be alone too. 

I'm happy to report that it went very well.  When he came over the first time, he brought flowers, candy and the sweetest note.  Really!  He must have paid attention to my e-harmony profile where I wrote that I was hoping to find a romantic man. We had a ball.  We went to a movie ("Australia". It was wonderful.), dancing, driving, shopping, eating, talking, and threw in a little bit of kissing just for good measure.  And yes...that was also scary.  Imagine my not having kissed anyone for at least two years, and for the thirty-eight before that, it was just one man. And, after twenty years or so we didn't kiss that much anyway.  I wonder if that is the norm with long married people or if it was just us. Hmmm. Perhaps more kissing would have changed the course.  Well that's doubtful and anyway, I'm getting pretty happy with the course I'm on now.  I won't deny that I've felt a little starved in that area: hugs, kisses, and just simple affection. You know. The good stuff.  Thankfully I was able to maintain some composure and not come off like a needy little puppy, though I admit that at times throughout the last few years I have felt that way.

Oh, and he has a wonderful dog. Roxy. A big plus.

Like I said on this blog long ago, I'm not looking for a husband, a soul mate, or a live in boyfriend, although I suppose a soul mate would always be a good thing to find, though I can't say I believe in those anymore.  But an interesting man to go places with occasionally would be nice, and living three hours apart certainly supports the "occasionally" part.  My friend Paula says my plan won't fly because most men our age are looking for someone to take care of them and they aren't going to be game for having a date once every four or five weeks like I am envisioning. We'll see. 

I do know that I need more of an adult life.  I'm doing several things to try and create one.  I joined that health club and I'm going to volunteer there a few hours a week after the holidays just so I can be around more adults and meet some new people.  I'm going to go back to book club, or at least consider doing that.  I joined when I first moved here, but I just hated most of the books they chose.  My reading time is too treasured by me to read something I don't want to read. Lavonne says they are selecting much more interesting books now.  Frankly, I like entertaining books for my nightly reading in bed. I may just be an occasional visitor.  And I did the e-harmony thing, a very adult thing.

So, what's next? Another nice visit from him, this time here on my turf.  Katy and Max, my son, are going on their own little trip for a few days after Christmas and that is when he'll come.  I'm not up for family introductions just yet.  I don't want to introduce Katy to anyone unless I'm fairly confident he'll be in my life for a decent amount of time.  Not that I'm keeping the facts from her. I'm not. 

So....that's one thing I have been preoccupied with.  I was going to write about how I've begun snow shoeing on the mountain behind the house but I had more to say tonight than I expected so I'll tell you about that fun pastime later. 

It's a great holiday this year.  It really is. Max is here. The atmosphere is void of anxiety. We are going skiing twice while he's here...Katy for her first time, and me for the first time since the 80's.  The weather is gorgeous. We've got fabulous food to cook for Christmas day, and Santa has some fun surprises in store for Katy. 

Right now...life is good.

And, just in case I go fallow again, let me say right here and now...

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!!!  YOU'RE ALL GREAT!!!!!!!

Rite of Passage

Surely decorating the Christmas tree is an important milestone to get through the first Christmas after a divorce.  I got through that one last night.  I can't say it was jolly.

I wasn't even disappointed that I had to get such a little tree.  THE TREE has always been my thing.  I love decorating the tree.....I always go with the same approach: the collection of ornaments I've built over 40 years the majority of them representing a time, an event, a person in our lives(and a couple of really ugly balls I made in home ec when I was in junior high). I've always had a tree as big as the house would handle.  In this mountain home with the mountain lodge type architecture, the ceilings in the living room are way up there...and so has the tree been, 14 to 17 feet. Clearly, this year that kind of tree was out of the question for a barely five foot tall woman alone.  So I ordered a 6 foot tree, figuring I could handle it but when I picked it up it was a five and a half foot tree and I could carry it with one hand. Hmmmm. This is different.

Getting it set up was simple once I finally managed to saw off a little sliver at the bottom of the trunk so the trunk could absorb water.  That only took 45 minutes and a ton of yelling and banging about of that dull old saw.  Looking up at the tower of Christmas boxes that had to be loaded into the car, hauled up to the house, then later hauled back down to the barn was a bit daunting. Katy and I could just manage these impossibly big and unwieldy boxes by each taking a side and it was a struggle.  I decided to take just the ones that said "Main Ornaments". There were five of those.  Loading the boxes, I'm thinking, this is not the proper set up for a woman alone. 

Katy and I named the tree Squirt.  It's cute. Though it was weird being able to stand flat footed and put the white dove of peace, on the tip top of the tree. 

But opening those boxes of 40 years of ornaments was like letting the wicked Genie out of her lamp.  I  wanted to find my very favorites since the tree was so small. I had collected these Christopher Radko hand blown glass, old world ornaments for many, many years. But as I looked for them, I realized how few were left after last year....

Last year, the tree was huge.  FH put the lights on but after that it was clear he had disengaged wishing to be anywhere but there.  But I put on the Christmas music and Katy and I decorated that big tree.  As soon as  he could escape, he headed for bed, but I was troubled that the tree seemed to move around too much at the slightest touch.  I would place an ornament upon it with the greatest of care and it would sway.  I knew that wasn't the norm. Anxiety gnawed at me, but I continued.  As he headed to bed, I asked him to check it. I know it's listing! Something's not right. He refused to walk across the room and look at it.  I did the best I could. It's fine.  I begged.  Please! I'm worried.  But he just went on up to bed.  So with the most delicate touch I finished up and Katy went to bed. 

I sat in my chair, all the lights off except for the tree and my reading lamp and read awhile bathed in the glow from the hundreds of lights on the most glorious tree ever. Shortly, I sensed a movement from the corner of my eye, and turning my head, I watched in horror as that enormous tree tipped, and moving as if in slow motion, crashed to the floor.  The sound was deafening.  I have never before and never afterward heard a sound like that, the sound of dozens and dozens of beloved Christmas ornaments shattering into a million fragments.  I screamed as if I had witnessed a murder, and indeed, I felt I had.  Katy rushed out from her room and screamed in shock. We began to weep.  Naturally, the crash awakened FH. He raced down the stairs, looked wide eyed at the carnage and he also wept.  As he rushed to see what could be saved, he cut his bare feet in a dozen places. My.  I'll stop there.  It didn't get any better.  It was awful.

Eventually he went back to bed, and I stayed up sitting in my chair hollow hearted, the broken tree still stretching across the room amidst gleaming shards of hand blown glass. That night I knew my marriage would not survive.  And besides, who wants a marriage that merely "survives".  "Survive" is the most beautiful word in the world if you are talking about cancer or a life threatening illness, but a marriage?  I wanted something more than just survival.  The tree became a giant metaphor of my marriage.  The fragments of shattered ornaments, reflecting forty years of memories shattered now as well, because even sweet memories can't remain intact in the harsh light of deception and loss of love.

The sad memories of that dreadful night a year ago threatened to engulf me for the entire time of decorating Squirt.  I could only go on, because well....if you have a kid, at Christmas the show must go on. And Katy seemed ok, only occasionally murmuring about a special loss she felt, or caressing an ornament she loves and remarking that I'm so glad my horse didn't break.

I stayed up late and finished. And today I hauled those boxes back down to the barn.  Now I'm sitting here at my desk, writing this and admiring our little tree.  I feel like I've made it through some rite of passage for divorced people and let me tell you, I'm glad it's done.  I don't know what I'll do next year.  Perhaps I'll gently pack away family memory ornaments for Katy to have on her own tree someday and then I may keep my very favorites, the ones that don't represent a loss or make me sad and then....I'll just go shopping for some new ones.  I do love to shop.

Rocky Mountain Christmas

The only darned photo I took that is recognizable!

Our town has one big day/night that kicks off Christmas. Many organizations and all the stores put a lot of effort into that day and if the locals were lacking in Christmas spirit before, the Big Night turns them around for sure. Only a real bah humbug! Scrooge kind of person could resist the magic of our town, sparkling with lighted trees and buildings on a dark Christmas season night. That night was last night.

  I haven't missed one of these Christmas events since I've lived here. This was my fifth one. There is a craft show, festival of trees, a big dance, chili suppers and home made cookies and cider at every corner and in every store. The culminating event of the evening is the Christmas parade. Some years are so frigidly, miserably cold, lots of people watch the parade from their cars. But I don't care if a gale force wind was blowing a blizzard right down the middle of Main street, I wouldn't watch the parade from a car! This year, however the temperature was a balmy 35 degrees and the good weather brought out a much larger crowd for the Christmas parade than in past years.

 Crowding into both sides of the street making just enough room for the parade to pass, onlookers of this small town parade are active participants.  We reverently place our hands on our hearts when the mounted color guard passes carrying the American and Colorado flags, Christmas lights adorning their beautiful horses, because our patriotism rises at the sight and we all feel just lucky as heck to be exactly where we are at that moment.

And when the search and rescue team passes in force, lights shining on their helmets, we lean toward them, saying things like Thanks guys!  and We sure appreciate your work! because these are the men and women who will save our lives if we ever get lost in these wild mountains.

Dozens of soccer kids (Katy included) walked jauntily in the parade this year, each little head sprouting reindeer antlers outlined in red blinking lights, their voices raised in laughter and singing. 

Plenty of friendly dogs were walking their owners, dogs prancing and barking happily, pulling towards the crowd for pets and admiration. One thing I've realized since living here is that dogs love parades.  A big flat bed trailer was loaded with hay, and riding on it, as calmly as if they were in their home pastures, two of the tiniest miniature horses I've ever seen, their owners sitting beside them stroking their tiny necks.

Then various little floats, often being not much more than gaily lit pick-up trucks, some full of carolers. And finally, several impressive contributions from our wonderful and exuberant volunteer fire department, including of course, Santa on one firetruck. It was the largest and best Christmas parade ever.

When the crowd reluctantly broke up, most people were hoarse from yelling Merry Christmas! a hundred times, and my eyes were misty as always.  Our parades do it to me every time.  My throat tightens, my eyes fill with barely contained tears, and I feel so very happy knowing that what ever happens to me in the future...where ever I go and whatever I do, I was once able to live in this small town where the people are opened and giving, and though there are hundreds here who are moving in from other areas of the country, each and every one of them wants to retain the best of the American spirit in this little American town in the Rocky Mountains.

I am feeling very blessed this year!

Pizza Recipe Correction!

My good friend Linda, whose cousin Vinnie gave her the Winter Pizza recipe called and said, Hey, girlfriend, I read your blog and you left out the mozzarella!

Yikes! Well, I left it out because I didn't know it was in there.  Linda had mixed up the gorgonzola with the mozzarella before she came over. My ears must have been plugged when she talked about the cheese. So, here's the correction:  add a bunch of mozzarella with the big quantity of gorgonzola and you'll have it right!

My Way

The cerulean Colorado sky today.

It's lovely to get home.  Even this small thing,  coming home and getting home,  is so different in this new single life I have.

Max's flight out of Denver did not leave until seven Saturday night so we didn't have to drop him off till six.  That would never have happened with FH (former husband) in the picture.  No. Either Max would have been told to get a very early flight, and we all would have left Fort Collins at the crack of dawn to get him to the airport; or he would have been dropped off at the airport ten hours early.  On the day of departure from anywhere, FH adopted a no nonsense, no fun approach to the day.

 My "single" Saturday, on the other hand, was quite leisurely.  Mid morning my sister and I drove to this mountain trail and hiked it, following up the rather strenuous walk with a double, wet, vanilla cap at Starbucks. Back at my sister's we all lounged around talking, and finally Max, Katy and I moseyed out to the car.  But we still weren't finished having a nice day.  Nope. We stopped and had a relaxing lunch before leaving town. It was just so darned pleasant and  completely opposite to travel-home days in the past.  This was my agenda. 

A light, wet, snow was spitting from the sky as I left the airport making the freeway slippery and the glare from the headlights on the wet pavement more irritating than usual.  Within a half hour my eyes burned, and I knew I'd better have a stout shot of caffeine. But no old gas station cup of coffee for me.  Oh no.  I would have another of those vanilla caps.  Yikes! Two in one day. But who's counting?  I mentally studied the location of the freeway exits in relation to the Starbucks in Colorado Springs and made a plan.  Once off the exit, I decided to pop into the grocery store for a roasted chicken and salad ingredients (the best food for restoring ones waistline after the big feast). Right there next door to the grocery was this little wine shop where I remembered buying a wine I love on sale (7 Deadly Zins).  Heck. I'd just run in there and see if it was still on sale.  It was.  Finally, I rounded the Starbucks building, bought the cappuccino and a chocolate for Katy, drove back onto the freeway, and headed into the mountains and home. I might add that the radio was playing continuously and of course it was my favorite stations I listened to.

It was all that spur-of-the-minute activity that was a novelty for me.
A  pure...unadulterated....novelty. 

You don't realize how much you compromise within a marriage. Sometimes the compromise is quite disproportionate to the disadvantage of one of the partners, the one who would rather just go along with whatever it is rather than argue. As everyone does in life, you pick your fights. But at some point some people, like me, look at their lives and realize they aren't fighting for anything anymore. Not even a nice lunch on the way home from a vacation. That's how you lose the joy. Resignation is a killer.

Once home, I unpacked the car because it was about 29 degrees and I couldn't let makeup or food freeze overnight.  After that I was so wired from the vanilla caps I poured a glass of the new, excellent wine and went to the den with a roasted chicken and baby lettuce sandwich and watched "The Jane Austen Book Club" for the third time. I crawled into bed around one.  

Such a nice day.

And as I suspected it would be, a nice holiday too.

The Cheer Is All In The Details!

 

Winter Pizza...my little gift to you!

I have to say one thing.  I'm cruising into the holiday season feeling much better than I ever thought possible.  I mean, wouldn't you think that the first Thanksgiving and Christmas after the divorce would be awful?  Weepy, sad, full of anger, lethargy, depression:  all those emotions and feelings encompass my expectations for the holidays. But, as things have turned out (thank you very much Universe) I believe it's going to be a stellar year. 

This isn't all mental, however. Physically I'm having a bit of an up tick.  In fact, I am feeling rather in top form.  I can't point my finger at just one thing; I think it's a combination of a few things.  I am five or six weeks into working out at the club, and three weeks ago I added in the mountain hikes.  I am now into the third week of taking some new vitamins that I'm beginning to think are just dynamite.  Then right after Halloween I gave up Jiffy Creamy Peanut Butter and Dove Promises (this one is a temporary hardship) and I've lost six or seven pounds.  Whew!  This is a good run. I imagine it is a normal sort of chain of events for a recovering divorcee (such a gay sounding little word).  It's like I'm feeling well on the road of recovery from the mental part of getting a divorce; now I'm getting some physical strength and self confidence under my belt to face the next phase.

Tomorrow Katy and I will pick up Max at the airport in Denver and head up to Northern Colorado to spend four nights with my sister and brother-in-law. We are going to Fort Collins, the town I expect to eventually move to when I ever sell my house (please Universe, just this one more little thing). We are leaving very early so I can go to a mall and buy some makeup I've run out of.  We don't have to get Max until five.  I want some extra time at the mall, because guess what is right next door to the store where I buy the makeup?  Anthropologie. Ahhhh. Shrine to whimsical decor and dress.  I must remember my mantra in this lousy economy:  hoard your liquidity, Anya!  I mean it!

I need to get packing, but I'll leave you with a little Thanksgiving gift.  Linda and her dog Chief and his friend Scout came over Saturday night and didn't leave till after midnight.  Among many fun things we did, fueled by a bottle of Plungerhead zinfandel, was to make a pizza for our dinner,  the recipe being one she had just received from her cousin. You must try it.  The juxtaposition of the hot tangy gorgonzola and the cold baby arugula and sweet caramelized acorn squash can only be described as sensational.  The squash of course, could stand alone as a side dish served hot or at room temp. The recipe is written rather loosely as there are no measurements and actually, no written recipe.  This is so easy yet so impressive; you could build a reputation on this pizza.

Winter Pizza

Pizza dough from a pizza restaurant (Linda got hers at Whole Foods)

Large amount of crumbled gorgonzola

1 acorn squash

1 package baby arugula

maple syrup

red pepper flakes, salt, pepper

white truffle oil

olive oil

some flour for dusting the pizza board

A pizza stone  and even a paddle make a lot of difference in ease and in the case of the stone, the quality of the crust.  But of course you can use a pan.  As for the truffle oil. Don't stress not having it. You could eliminate it, but if you live near a Whole Foods or other gourmet food store, you don't have to.

Slice the squash in inch wide slices. Put into a bowl and toss with olive oil, red pepper flakes, salt and pepper; then drizzle with maple syrup.  Spread on a baking sheet and bake in a 350 degree oven till soft. Carefully use the sharp point of a knife and remove the skin from the meat; cut into 1" chunks. Scrape up the caramelized maple syrup crunchies from the pan.  Let cool.  This step can be done a day in advance at least.  Just refrigerate and let the squash come to room temp before using. 

That's all the prep there is.

Heat oven to 500 degrees, and put pizza stone into oven. A hot stone makes a better crust. Get it good and hot. Then, lightly flour a working surface and work the dough into a rustic, round shape the size (or less) of the stone.  I like to do this part on a floured pizza paddle.  This just makes it easier to put the pizza onto the very hot stone in the oven.  Lacking one, two people can gently lift the pizza and lay it upon the stone. 

Brush the pie dough with olive oil, then drizzle white truffle oil over all to taste. Sprinkle on the gorgonzola and be very generous.  Cover the pizza thoroughly.  Turn the oven down to 400 or 450 and put the pizza onto the stone.  Watch this beautiful concoction like a hawk, lifting up the edge occasionally to make sure the bottom isn't getting dark. The crust shouldn't get very dark: very light brown with little areas of a darker brown will be just right.  You have to watch it because the time will vary in every oven. I think we cooked ours 10 or 13 minutes or so.  Yours might take more or less time; close observation is your best tool here.

Remove pie from the oven.  Completely smother the hot pizza with the baby arugula.  Use lots of it.  Then cover with the chunks of squash.  Finally, sprinkle the maple syrup crunchies over all.  Admire greatly, then eat while hot so you can groan at the hot/cold, sweet/tart magnificence of it.  (It's still delicious when it cools off.)

One tip from Linda's cousin Vinnie (honest to god, that's his name), an Italian and a cook extraordinaire:  when you shape pizza dough, the trick is to use just enough flour to keep the dough moving around easily on the board or your prep surface.  Too little and it sticks there and perhaps on the stone too.  Too much and...well, you know. It would taste all dry and floury. 

So, my dear friends...I may find time this week for another post, but if not.....

Bon Appetit and Happy Thanksgiving !