life

I am genetically predisposed to be one of the idle rich.

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Yes, that’s me as rendered by AI. I’m still against AI, and I didn’t ask for this picture, but I can’t resist.

Until exactly five years ago this month, I had always been able to say that every problem plaguing me could be quickly solved with a large influx of cold, hard cash.  And I said that with reverence as I knew how fortunate that made me.  My health was good, I loved where I lived, my relationships and friendships were rewarding, and I loved where I worked, even if the nuts and bolts of what I did weren’t rewarding. When I let my Inner Writer free, life really got good.

Except for money.  I am not good with money.  I have never been good with money.  And I’ve never had enough money for this weakness to be that big of a factor. 

But after the almost five-year bout of COVID and Long COVID and back problems, I have a new appreciation for health.  For a while, the situation seemed dire, and I mourned everything I wasn’t going to be able to do if physically disabled by these problems.  The good stuff would still be there – my relationships, my writing. But I might lose the financial security of my job, and I would be plunged into abject poverty without the means to ease it.

Oh, how I mourned the life I had envisioned for these closing years. 

Well.  The Long COVID seems to be gone (hallelujah!), and we are handling the back problems. I am physically and mentally much better and still able to work. Hope ruled my psyche once again. But I am still hamstrung by financial matters.

I’ve read countless accounts and statistics about big lottery winners. It’s almost a universal experience that they end up broke and miserable.  I always read this with interest, trying to glean the why.  It always boiled down to greed combined with philanthropy.  They invested in risky projects, spent uncontrollably, and bailed friends and family out of their financial hells. 

I developed a plan.  Never mind that you have to actually buy a lottery ticket to win the lottery; I had a plan in place.  I had chosen the investment advisor I would use.  I had chosen the person I would hire to handle mundane matters like paying the bills, hiring the housecleaning staff, and dealing with pleas for money.

Me?  I was going to live a blissful life of the arts and travel.  I was going to see it all.  They say if you go to Paris, you need a month to see all the Louvre has to offer. Rome requires even more time.

My life of poverty has left me always short of time.  A lottery win’s gift of time would be the greatest blessing. Time to write, time to travel, time to garden, time to cook, and time to nurture my loved ones. 

Oh, I have it all planned. All of it. 

At a very young age, I first quipped: I was genetically predisposed to be one of the idle rich. I’ve repeated that line like a mantra my whole life in tandem with more time, more time, more time.

I’m in the last twenty years of my life.  To be given every minute to do as I choose would be a luxury I can barely even process.  And to spend that time with family and friends with lots of travel, art, and fine food thrown in would be so so so… something. I’m at a loss for superlatives. 

So, the trick now is to figure out how to do most of this in tandem with the daily problems and responsibilities of my normal life.  I’m working on it.

Platitudes

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Young Lady Reading a Red Book
by Amalia Suruceanu

Where did you find this card?  It is scrumptious — hand-made paper and a soft watercolor image that I think might have been an original.  You didn’t make this, did you?  Was this all your handiwork?

If so, I’ve never had a handmade card deliver an I’m breaking up with you message before. 

Your card arrived in the mail today.  I noticed the pink envelope first, and then my heart beat faster when I saw it was your handwriting. 

You’ve always been an original. 

My heart stopped for a minute after I read the first line. Although those opening words were innocuous, I knew what was coming.  I knew as soon as I saw your writing on the envelope. 

I knew. 

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The End Days

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I have perhaps twenty more years of life left in me. Maybe less. Maybe a lot less.

The years have been kind. The years have been brutal. I have experienced great joy as well as great sorrow. Through it all, I hoped for a tranquil journey. Through it all, tranquility has been elusive. Fleeting glimpses here and there. Moments of contentment were rare.

But I had hope. I believed in someday. If I were organized enough, if I worked hard, if I was a good person, if… if…if… all would be well. Life would be like boating on a placid sea with a colorful sail rippling in the gentle breeze of deep summer.

I handled the chaos. The stress. The upheaval.

I was often overwhelmed, but I continued moving forward. I tended to my child, who was and is the love of my life. I tended to my house. I tended the garden that brought me glimpses of tranquility when hummingbirds fed at the trumpet vine. I tended to my job.  I was not so good at tending to my spouse. We divorced just shy of our twentieth anniversary.

These past twenty years as a divorced, perimenopausal woman have been chaotic and heartbreaking. I often quip that my New Year’s resolution is to be bored. I have been accused of being dramatic, but the drama invaded my life uninvited. I did not conjure it, nor did I encourage the spectacle.

When sent home to quarantine during the pandemic, I hoped for three weeks. Three weeks to hole up in my house and find my equanimity. Three weeks to figure out my life. Three weeks to decompress, regroup, and emerge again fortified and ready to take on the world.

The previous year had been eventful — much of it in not a good way. Still, there were things to celebrate. I turned 60, and my only child had a small destination wedding in Spain. I was the only person on my son’s guest list able to attend. His father had health issues, his grandmothers were too old to make the trip, and so on.

With some trepidation, I planned my first solo international vacation. I raided my 401K and gifted myself an epic two weeks on the island of Ibiza. It was my 60th birthday present to me. The expense was considerable. It was also my only child’s wedding. It was an escape from the stressfest that was my life, and I pulled out all the stops. Sixty! Who would have believed such a state was possible?

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The uterus is not a homing device.

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Photo by Mika Ruusunen on Unsplash

“The uterus is not a homing device,” Rosanne Barr screeched.  I was channel surfing and happened upon her eponymous sitcom just as she uttered that line.  I had never heard the saying before. It turns out that it is an old feminist slogan that is considered overused. 

I laughed out loud.  I did. I sat back and enjoyed the rest of the show.

I’m not much of a television watcher, but that one line hooked me.  Barr was blazingly funny and insightful until she wasn’t. I was a faithful viewer until she, and the show, went off the rails.

Neither my now-ex-husband nor my son can find their own asses with two hands and a flashlight.  I was the designated Finder of Lost Things. By the time I heard Rosanne say, “The uterus is not a homing device,” I was weary of always and forever spending my free time trying to find their lost stuff.

Something snapped, and one time, I quietly responded, “I don’t know where your jockstrap is. I put it away the last time I used it.” And that was my standard response unless the missing item was something important to me.

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