I feel like pineapple sage in bloom.

The favorite thing about my herb garden at this time of year is the color of the pineapple sage blooms. That vibrant red touches my heart and makes me feel alive. The color is a beautiful shade of red unmatched, in my opinion, by any Crayola crayon or colored pencil humankind can manufacture.

I am on a new path in life. A little over two weeks ago, I looked in the mirror and saw the fat woman I had become and denied existed. I never saw her in the mirror. This day, I did. During my sojourn to New York City, I saw her every time I looked in a mirror. I cannot relate to her. She is not who I am. I decided to join Weight Watchers (WW) as a result of my introduction to her, and after only two short plus weeks, I already see her melting like the Wicked Witch of the West.

I bought all the WW toys, and my newest motivator is The Activelink. This is a USB card that is house is a clip that I wear attached to my bra and my pajama top. I put it on when I get up and take it off when I go to bed. It monitors my activity all day. I just completed my first activity assessment and learned that I am adding one to two activity points to my plan each day. Activity in the "Points Plus" WW plan allows me to exchange them for food points each day if I want. It plugs those activity points directly into my eTools WW account and the program keeps a tally of my daily points while producing reports that track my progress. The Activelink challenged me this morning to a twelve-week program to increase my activity points to three per day. Bring it on!

I feel so motivated by this program for the first time. I tried the WW Points Program many years ago through work, but just could not wrap my mind around counting points. I find now that the toys I bought really make it fun to track points and motivate me to stay on track. I log everything I put in my mouth and check my progress each day. In just a short time, that thing changing my stomach so severely has disappeared. I've lots over seven pounds and I like the changes I see. I have more energy and I am highly motivated to meet the "other" me trapped inside this body. I haven't seen her in too many years. She is like that beautiful red bloom; bursting at the seems to come out.

My New York City Adventure

In my seat at Wicked with my new friend, Ariana.

After bidding my husband and puppies goodbye at 11:30 a.m. on October 12th, I sat behind the wheel of my Toyota Solara and said a prayer, "Please keep me safe on this drive and in the city. Please protect me from anything or anyone who would harm me. Please help me to keep my heart and mind open to whatever lessons I am meant to learn on this trip, and please let me have fun. Amen" Then, I let go of all the fear and apprehension I had been feeling leading up to driving to New York City alone for a long weekend, and turned the ignition.

I started Weight Watchers (WW) the Tuesday before I left, so I packed some WW snacks, fruit, baby carrots and several bottles of water in an insulated bag I bought from "Thirty One". I had my pocket point calculator in my purse as well as my paper tracker to log all the food I ate, as well as my walking activity in the city. And, I finally broke the seal on a new pedometer I had for years and never opened to log how far I walked over the weekend. My laptop got included with the latest version of my book on a thumb-drive to do some writing at night in my hotel room because I was attending a writing seminar after all. And lastly, I packed my wool coat, light gloves, a scarf and a hat with some warm clothes because NOAA told me it may be a bit chilly over the weekend. I would do the "New England layer thing", and I was so ready for an adventure.

My life has become a little complacent; a little too routine. I am happy and grateful for all my blessings, but I felt in my core that I needed a "shake up". So when I got the email about the writing conference in NYC, I knew I had to go. I invited my cousin to join me, and when she declined, I was not surprised. I wasn't sure she was ready for something like this, and I was afraid to go alone. I had been to "the Big Apple" several times, but never by myself. No, I would do this alone. It'll be good for me, I thought.

With traffic delays, I arrived at the entrance to the New York Inn on 8th and 46th Street at 4:45 p.m. I decided to drive because the train would have cost me almost $300. With the conference being about $600 and hotels as expensive as they are in this city, I wanted to save a little money and have flexibility on Sunday night after the conference ended to enjoy dinner with any new friend(s) I would meet. The Pennsylvania Hotel where the conference was held was about $300 per night, so I did some web research and found this Inn for $194 per night, including taxes. Everyone I met said it was cheap, and got a worried look on their faces. The hotel was a couple of blocks' walk from Times Square and only a fifteen minute walk to the Pennsylvania Hotel, across from Madison Square Garden.

I pulled up out front and laughed a little to myself. It was kind of "seedy" looking and was next door to a Subway. The narrow steps up to the entrance led to an equally narrow fourier with a handsome (India) Indian man behind the desk with a lovely smile who greeted me warmly. I instantly relaxed. I had called ahead several weeks before to ask about parking and storing my bags on the final day of the conference. I was told they had valet parking for $45 per day and a luggage room where I could leave my bags for $4 per bag. I thought this acceptable, and when I asked the nice man about the valet parking, he looked at me quizzically. "We don't have valet parking," he said. I said, "Oh, I was told over the phone that you did. Where do I park my car then?" He told me that the Central Parking garage was three blocks up and on the left.. I found it easily and the cost was $25 per day with a hotel discount as long as I got them to stamp my ticket. There was no elevator, and that first climb up five flights of steep, narrow stairs to my third-floor room was exhilarating to say the least. I thought my heart would pound out of m chest and I broke a sweat.

After I closed the door and thanked the man (I didn't tip him), I looked around and burst out laughing to myself. The room was the smallest hotel room I had ever stayed in. It had to be eight-foot square. The bathroom was made for "little people". I honestly did not believe I could even fit in the 12" x 13" shower stall. I'm not exaggerating! An air conditioner was still in the window and there were metal gym lockers for my clothes. But I had as big a flat-screen TV as we have at home! I called Larry and laughed my ass of with him over the phone. I thought it was hilarious, and felt like it was Jane Fonda's new apartment in New York City with Robert Redford in the movie, "Barefoot In The Park". I decided I would be getting a real "grassroots" New York experience, and was ready for anything. I put my suitcase on the luggage rack and walked to Times Square in search of a discount ticket to Wicked.

I found the kiosk, but Wicked was not listed. There was a young man outside helping people find what they wanted, and told me Wicked did not discount with them. "Do you think I could get one ticket from the theater then?", I asked. He told me to walk up to 50th and turn left, so I did. Along the way there were a group of hip-hop artists dancing to great music, so I stopped to wiggle along and snap some pictures.

They attracted a nice crowd and it made me smile. I found theater and there were hundreds of people standing outside in a perfectly straight line across from the front entrance. I asked some young people closest to me if this was the ticket line or if they already had tickets. A young woman said, "Oh no. This is the lottery line." I asked what that was and she told me I should go up to a window she pointed to and leave my name for the drawing to win a discounted ticket. I said thanks and headed to the window. "I don't know how this works," I told the nice man at the window. He told me to put my name on the 3x5" card he placed in front of me with the number of tickets I wanted. I could have two or three. I did as I was bid and put "1" in a circle under my name. "You can have two," he said. I told him I was alone and only needed one. He said, "Oh, ok," and took my card. "I'll be drawing in sixty seconds," he told me. I said, "Awesome!" in my head, "Just in time." I backed away to join the crowd.

Very shortly afterwards, that same man came outside to address the crowd with all the cards he had drawn in his hand. He began to read names. People crowded around me, pushing me further back. The fourth name drawn was, "Kathy Gardner". I yelled, "Oh my God!", and rushed forward to take my place in the winner's line to huge applause from the crowd. "I never win anything!" I gushed. I immediately turned five years old. I was so excited, I couldn't stop talking. Everyone around me was excited for me too. After the crowd of "losers" was disbursed, I was handed my card to collect the front-row-seat ticket for $30 cash, and a lime-green, metal button to wear on my coat that read, "I won the Wicked Lottery." I knew this was a very good omen for the rest of my weekend. I had no fears at all, and was already having a blast by myself in New York City. I am so happy I went and so thrilled I did it alone. I highly recommend it.

Getting Un-Stuck

Writing is hard work. Reliving choices I'm not so proud of in my past by writing a memoir is much harder. Walking down memory lane is like climbing this tree. Once I get to the first branch, the climbing is easy. But as I reach the top-most branches, my climb becomes precarious at best. I am stuck there, high above my Self; looking down. In looking down, I become afraid of falling. Falling into the dark places I am too afraid to venture. They are gone. Why go there again?

My past contributed to making me who I am today. I am a product of my choices: Some were healthy, and some were not. But the unhealthy ones offered lessons I could not have learned otherwise. Those lessons were useful and provided knowledge to maneuver through the maze of Life.

A Sage I met in the mid-1970's said that "knowledge is the key to understanding". I have made a Life's journey out of acquiring knowledge. But the knowing I seek is of my inner-most Self. The journey to Self is life-long, and well worth the effort. But, like climbing the tree, it does not come without some scratches, cuts  and bruises. Bandaids and antibiotics were made for healing those wounds.

Love is the healer. If a cut leaves a scar, the scar becomes a reminder of "the good fight". It is a symbol of reaching an even higher limb; a greater level of knowledge. Learning to love my Self; even my dark side, is healing and is required to achieve happiness. Happiness is floating down a lazy river in the sunshine while birds sing and fish make splashes around me. Learning to go with the flow of life by turning "upstream thoughts" into "downstream thoughts" is challenging, but very doable with practice. Practicing every moment of every day is my Life process.

I will find my prize at the end of this double rainbow when I reach the other side of this Life. But as I travel on my journey, I continue to notice every-day prizes like that tree, the river and the rainbow; the bird song and the fish jumps.

Making time to quiet my mind, especially "the squirrels in my head", as my sister would say, is one of my greatest challenges. Those critters keep me stuck. But they are smaller than me, and cannot keep me down. They are in the past, and the past is over. I am here in the Now. I take a deep breath and blow out the pain. I realize my past cannot hurt me, it enriches me. I become like the rainbow: full of beautiful color and light.

Writing this blog post is my first step back to that memoir and those memories. They are now in perspective and I can move forward once more.

Honoring a life form.

On the last day of our wonderful vacation on North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, my sister-in-law and I took our last hour-long beach walk after eating a 6:30 a.m. breakfast with our husbands and sending them off to their last day of golf in the heat and high humidity. We love these walks. With Hurricane Leslie far out in the Atlantic Ocean, dark clouds hung over the horizon keeping us cool, and the early morning temperature today was cooler than it has been over the last three days. We were more tired this morning than usual, but as we walked, watching the little terns and sandpipers pecking their long bills into the sand hunting for snails and who knows what else while playing tag with the waves (they seem to hate to get their little feet wet), we picked up the pace and chatted. The roaring waves were as loud today as they have been, so I had trouble hearing her soft voice next to me. I always feel a little badly having to say a little too often, "What?"

About half-way down on the first leg of our walk we saw a surf-caster with his rod bent a little too far. "He has something," I said. "We have to stay and watch what he caught," Karan echoed my thoughts. "The only thing I've seen anybody catch, " I said, "is a little brim-size fish about the side of a sunfish." We stopped with several men on the beach, some who seemed to be friends or comrades of the fisherman and watched his technique. He held his rod straight up as the tip bent far forward and walked backwards on the beach. He kept walking and we side-stepped as he went to give him plenty of room and to get out of the way of his taught line. He walked pretty far back, slowly and steadily, giving the line plenty of rest in between not to rush whatever was on his hook, and allow it to get away or to break the line. Then he reeled the line in quickly walking toward the shore again before stopping and repeating his walk backwards.

An older woman with her plastic rain hood tied around her chin and her head down marched along the beach straight towards the taught fishing line. It was clear to all of us that she didn't even see the line, the fisherman or the rest of us all standing around. One of the men yelled, "Ma'am! Watch out, Ma'am!" But she didn't even react to his voice, and the poor fisherman had to lift up his taught rod to avoid cutting into her neck or forehead. We thought he had lost the fish, but sure enough, the line was still taught and he still had something on it. I wondered if that woman went though life that way: walking towards who knows what with her head down instead of looking where she was going or at what was around her: one of the walking unconscious, as I like to refer to them.

We kept looking at the line and tried to follow its trajectory into the surf looking for a splash or some sign of what he had caught. "I hope it's not a clump of seaweed working against the surf," I said. I kept looking back and forth, and soon, all the men rushed towards the surf's edge. There was something flapping on the shore. It was a stingray. It's wingspan had to be at least two feet wide. It's tail was about as long or maybe just a bit longer. An older man, not the fisherman, grabbed the stingray like a bowling ball with his thumbs in its eye sockets to carry it up the beach. The hook was caught in its wing close to the edge. I was very surprised the hook didn't tear out. That tissue had to be really tough. The fisherman couldn't even pull his hook out. He had to cut it out, notching the wing leaving a hook-like tear in its edge.

"Flip it over", the fisherman yelled over the roar of the surf, "it's easier to deal with it that way". So the old guy flipped it over after a couple of tries, again using the eye sockets for leverage. Once flipped, we could see its gaping mouth open gasping for air. Its chest heaved up and down and I walked around toward the top of its overturned head to see in its wide mouth. There were sharp, pointy teeth in there! We were all fascinated.

"Cut the tail off," the fisherman said. "Step on the top of it to hold it down," the old guy told one of the male bystanders. While his foot held down the fish, the old guy used his pocket knife to cut the tail off a couple of inches from the fish's body. "Why are you cutting his tail off," I asked. "To get rid of the stinger,"the old man said. He picked up the detached tail to put his knife blade into the socket where the stinger met the tail. The stinger was farther up the tail and located under it, close to the body. We all expected the tip to be the stinger. It was not like that at all.The stinger was hard and very pointy. The old man tossed the cut-off tail with stinger into the surf. Karan took note that it would probably wash back to shore or lay on the bottom where some unsuspecting swimmer could step on it. She wondered if someone did step on that stinger, if it would poison them as well as hurt them.

"What will you do with it (the fish)," I asked, "Will you eat it?" A young man standing with the group with a Spanish-sounding accent said, "Yes". He was not the fisherman. "What do you eat?" I asked again. "The wings," he said. "How do you cook it?" I asked again. I was fascinated now. He ran his fingers along the contour of the stingray's body to indicate the wings would be cut off along this line. "You don't eat the body?" I continued. "No," he said. "The wings have a lot of meat and no bone." "Is the texture like swordfish or tough?" I continued. "No, it's different." "Does it have its own flavor?" I asked again. "No," he obliged.

"Well, congratulations," I said both to him and the fisherman, "I'm glad you're going to eat it." My heart melted in that moment as I watched the struggling fish trying to breath with is bleeding cut off tail. It must have been in pain and not killing it outright, but letting it suffer in this manner seemed cruel to me. I appreciate killing for food. I do not like killing just for sport. But, I also respect life enough to not let the creature suffer. These men didn't care about that part at all. In my mind's eye, I put my finger tips between the stingray's eyes on its "third eye" and blessed it. I thanked it for it's sacrifice and it's life. I asked it to provide a tasty meal for this young man, and then I had to walk away. I thought I would cry, but I didn't. It's food, I thought again.

Witnessing this catch was very exciting. I learned lots of knew things about catching, eating and cooking stingray. A woman and her friend walking by expressed her revulsion at eating such a thing. She would never even consider it. "Where's your sense of adventure," I posed to her. She just laughed me off and kept walking. Once again, I missed the opportunity to capture this event on digital film. I have not once remembered to bring my camera on our walks. But I am still praying for the life of that stingray, hoping God will kill it quickly and not let it suffer too much

As we walked back by to finish our walk, we saw the young man had not taken the fish away. I didn't see him anywhere. The old man left it on the wet sand and had pulled his cart over it. Was he hiding it or protecting it from dogs being walked on the beach. I heard the fisherman tell him the law was to catch and release it right away. The stingray was the same color as the wet sand, so I imagined if the beach police rode by, they would not see anything obvious. We also noticed that they were present while the fisherman was reeling in his catch, but left the scene before seeing what he had caught. Maybe they don't monitor licenses or catches on beaches that survive through tourism. I really don't know. It just upsets me that those men had no respect for that poor fish and let it die slowly instead of finishing the job on the spot. When we walked back by, the stingray was not moving. Again, I had to tell myself, "It's food," and try to let it go.

Just love her.

"Just love her and let her follow her own path." These are the words that just came to me. I prayed this morning after reading about 'Not Withholding Love' in "Love Without Conditions" by Paul Ferrini. for guidance. I need to figure out how to love and stop judging my niece, Susan. I need help in learning how to live with her in love and understanding; compassion and forgiveness. I must stop trying to rescue her, save her or protect her. I must love her, just as she is. I must stop trying to change her or improve her lot in life.

She is on her own path. I am on mine. Our paths are not the same. That's ok. She has a right to her choices and her path. I must not try to save her with mine, as if mine is better than hers. Hers is to her as mine is to me. We are on our paths to learn our own lessons. Who am I to judge her lessons? Just love her and don't worry about saving, rescuing or helping her. Just give her the love she needs, and don't worry about the rest. "Look at the birds in the sky. They don't plant or harvest or gather food into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. You are more valuable than they are, aren't you?" Matthew 6: International Standard Version.

God will take care of her. I have tried enough. We all have. If she doesn't want to take care of herself or even help her life's condition in any way, who am I to interfere? She is an adult now. She has the right to make her own choices. She is choosing hardship. I must let her reap what she sows in life and love her anyway. We all must do this. In this way, we help her and ourselves. By giving her the love she needs, I bring love to myself. The Law of Attraction says we attract what we put out into the Universe. If I focus on putting Love out there, I will attract Love back to my Self. It feels like a revelation I am seeing with new eyes.

Denial

"De-nial is not just a river in Egypt", is what we say a lot in our family. We called our mother the Queen of Denial. Now  I think I am. I have suspected it for a some time, but today I am certain.

I announced to my friends on Facebook that I am going to finish my memoir and submit it in a contest for a publishing contract. I registered for a New York City conference in October to get information about the process for submission and all the "how-to's". Most recently I received another email from the same publisher to submit my memoir by September 27th for a $5,000 advance and a different contract opportunity.

I just realized this morning I've been writing the wrong memoir! Now I have to start over. Can I get it done on time?

I'm sure I am not the only writer to ask, "Who would read a book about MY life? What makes my story unique?" Well, I certainly have lived a very interesting life, but I have not been able to come up with a tag to make marketing my memoir unique. In all my research about what memoirs are being published, there is always a life-defining moment the authors are relaying: overcoming abuse, disease or something else. The story I have been writing is all over the map; the entirety of my life. While I can certainly relay some very interesting moments, and very likely will some day, my first memoir requires a challenge I have met and grown from to attract a publisher.

I have been in complete denial about the most important, socially relevant part of it: I was an unwed mother in 1969-70! I just realized I have been discounting just how big a deal that is. This fact alone will make my memoir marketable and interesting, even though single parenting is now a pretty common-place life event, especially since Hollywood jumped on board. But, it also means I have to go back to "square one".

Wish me luck. I now have to wrestle the demons I have been denying all these years. My son was a Gift, it's "the squirrels in my head" that now have to come out. Oh boy.

Here is the song I sang to Chris during his infancy. It made me cry every time.

Happiness

Happiness is a perfect bloom.

Happiness is a great cup of coffee.
Happiness is a warm dog on my lap.

Happiness is the love of my husband, children, family and good friends.

Sunrise at Lake Murray.

Sunset over the Sakonnet

Happiness is a beautiful day.
Happiness is the sweet sound of birdsong.

Happiness is a cloudless sky, except at sunset.
Happiness is a full moon shining down and lighting the world.



Happiness is feeling good about myself when I look into my own eyes.
Happiness is feeling accomplished and successful.

Happiness is the sound of laughter.
Happiness is the feel and smell of a baby's silky-soft skin.
Happiness is a big, warm hug.

Happiness is hearing waves lap on the shore and rippling over rocks.
Happiness is the warm feeling of sun on my skin.

Happiness is a lovely afternoon nap.
Happiness is discovering something new.
Happiness is rediscovering an old kinship.

Happiness is a song well sung or played.
Happiness is working or playing hard and a good hot shower after.
Happiness is being naked outside without shame.

Happiness is a delicious meal.

Happiness can be anything you want.
Happiness just requires a shift in perception; a change of thought.
Happiness is...