•Have been in Salina for a few days just spending alone time with my parents. Everyone should try it (with their own parents…or mine…cause they are cool.) It is really wonderful.
•Tomorrow begins the next adventure.
•Saturday night, will be in St. Lou to see a few old friends and a show at Webster. Time warp.
•Sunday- arrival at New Zoar for our second annual Lovewell Theatre Project= writing a professional show with totally awesome people. I am little kid happy about this.
•In order to prepare for the busiest time of the Lovewell year, I have been working nonstop. The next 2 weeks (at New Zoar) will make that worth it.
•Spring in the Midwest is priceless.
•I still have not purchased a new camera. That is so stupid. Maybe I should just go for it tomorrow.
•Having to replace the latch on the hood of your car (that you never drive) and spending a small fortune on it? Dumb.
Things like this make my heart feel like it will jump out of my chest and then that is followed by the uncontrollable welling of tears. It is the coming together, the collaboration of strangers, the on lookers, the music of that show that is still so alive and relevant, the human connection, the creativity, the leaping.
The gang spent 3 days together and maybe slept for 10 hours. This is why it is not necessarily a bad thing that we all no longer live in the same place. If we did live in the same place, maybe not all of us would be living.
Why do I look like a T-rex?
When Tim calls…
Mocking bird?
Remember the time when Ryan tried to kill Crazy Dave?
Scott broke it up, thank goodness.
Dress up?
Doesn’t Nathan look like a happy cat?
On Tuesday morning, I woke up at 7a.m. stumbled into the shower, threw my stuff in a bag, walked to the train station in the rain, made it to Midway 40 minutes before my flight took off, flew to Ft. Lauderdale, prepared info for a board meeting, went to said board meeting, had a very late dinner with Rick and Peter and talked about the upcoming LTP workshop at New Zoar, went back to FLL apt and packed up the rest of my ‘home’ (my suitcases), slept for 4 hours, woke up and went to the printer to get everything ready for Thespian conference, drove 4 hours to Tampa (with my pal Shelly,) worked some more aaaand went to sleep in a giant, wonderful hotel bed. Ahhh. Tonight I will have dinner with my Aunt Janett and Phil, will sit at the Lovewell booth for the next 2 days and will then fly to KS on Saturday to see my parents for the first time since the holidays. Such good times.
I landed in Chicago last night. Came here for just a few days to catch up with everyone. Haven’t been here since Thanksgiving. Every time I come here I think about how part of me still lives here. There is a smell in the air that is just…home. Ahh, Midwestern air has an undefinable quality about it that is something I wish I could bottle and carry in my pocket.
Had dinner with my dear brother and sister-in-law. We sat on the couch, eating, chatting, watching parts of Star Wars.
Went to Dave and Amanda’s place and met up with some of the rest of the gang. There is truly nothing like old friends. Two minutes tick by and erase the time in between meetings and there you are- who you were, who you are and who you want to be.
I am awake now at 7 in the morning. Ridiculous. Excited for Jamie and Ryan to arrive and end the 4 month McJohnson dry spell.
It has been two years today and I still think about this orange face on a very regular basis.
His passing was the end of an era. I guess that is what pets are. Eras. A smaller (than people) marking of time.
I have spent my life trying my very best not to worry about the outcome of situations that I have no control over. For a while, I was not successful at all and it started to destroy me from the inside out. Basically, I listened to everyone else’s worries (about themselves, about me and my choices, about the state of the world and what a normal life should be) and I took them all inside and let them have a hay day in my guts. It took ‘me’ over. In the past two years, I have become better at banishing those worries from my mind and in turn everything in my world has become a little brighter.
Today, I read the following at dailyom.com and it just hit home:
“If prayer is an intention that we announce to the universe in order to create a desired outcome, then our every thought is a prayer. This includes thoughts of worry as well as of hope. All thoughts are subtle creative energy. Some thoughts are more focused or repeated more often, gathering strength. Some are written down or spoken, giving them even greater power. Every thought we have is part of a process whereby we cocreate our experience and our reality with the universe. When we use our creative energy unconsciously, we create what is commonly known as self-fulfilling prophecy. In essence, when we worry, we are repeatedly praying and lending our energy to the creation of something we don’t want.
The good news is that we can retrain our minds and thoughts to focus our energy on what we do desire to bring into our lives. Since most worry is repetitive, it will take more than one positive thought to counteract the energy we’ve created. The simplest antidote to worry is affirmations. When we hold these positive thoughts, repeat them often, speak them and write them and refer to them throughout our day, we are using focused energy to create positive results.
A lot of times we have concerned loved ones that worry about us. When this happens they are also sending out a worry prayer to the world. A loving conversation letting them know what is happening is the easiest solution. Also, ask them to send you positive affirmations rather than worry about you. After all, worry doesn’t do them any good either. Explain to them that worry can actually be energetically harmful to you and that wishing good things for you is much more beneficial.”
Please don’t worry about me…and I will do the same for you.
Knee Update:
At 6:30 at night last Thursday, I had an awesome MRI at the hospital. They blasted country music into my ears. In South Florida, that is super strange. I did not complain.
I was out of there by 8 o’clock and on my way to Vero Beach to spend a couple of days with some friends at their beach house. At 11:30p.m. I get a text message from one of the Lovewell students (D-Rob) saying that his dad just looked at my MRI and I should call because they are all still awake having some sort of party. Umm, okay? (His dad is a radiologist, for those of you wondering what the H is going on.) I call, sure that he has bad news. I mean, the Orthopedic surgeon did tell me that I had an 85% chance of having to have surgery. The first thing the radiologist says is “so tell me exactly where it hurts on your knee and how.” I proceed to explain the pain (great song lyrics if anyone wants to steal them) and he listens. When I am done, he says “I see nothing here that constitutes surgery. “Nothing” I sqqqqqqqqqqquuuuuuuuuuuueeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaal
in happiness. I really had no idea how I could make that surgery happen. Yeah, yeah, I would have just done it and it was not a huge deal, but it meant really changing around some big plans (that would have then effected a lot of other people…which is the part I was freaking about.) So he keeps talking and I only hear parts of what he is saying because I am so happy: “Blah, blah…deep bone bruise…blah, blah….fracture at the end of the bone…blah, blah….torn ACL that is inflamed….blah, blah.” That is what I hear, but basically I have only heard “NO SURGERY.”
So, I will be a gimp for another couple months while the bone heals, but did you hear? No surgery!
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I leave you with this headline from the Salina Journal this weekend:
“Kansas helps restore prairie chickens in Missouri”
Just thought I should share that.
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Yesterday, pulling up in the driveway of the Spangler house, I hear strange music playing. Upon opening the car door, it gets much louder and I realize that it is live music and it is coming from somewhere near by. Walking up to the house, I see something set back in the bushes. A few more steps and what is actually going on comes into view. There, by the door of the house is Mats, Margie, Dorie, Sherie and two random children I have never seen before, completely decked out in ‘foreign’ attire, playing weird instruments.
(Does a weird old man mask count in the ‘foreign’ category?) The crazy song they were singing was a welcome song for me. So now, I must ask myself, how could someone not feel welcomed by this?
Listen, I kid you not, I have seen R.I.P. 3 more times this week (on FB posts and once in an e-mail.) Two of these people are from Kansas and one from Chicago. I hate to narrow this down to a Midwestern thing (as I am pro-Midwest) but this has got to stop. Saying R.I.P. about someone you knew who died (and all of these cases were recent deaths) is so uncouth. Okay, I’m stepping down off of the soap box now.
