Life is a beach...if you are lucky

I had a birthday this weekend. Those numbers are creeping up there and I'm surprised at how little it seems to relate to me. I traveled over the holiday with a friend I've known since we were twelve years old. We've seen each other at our most awkward, at our most beautiful, through the loss of loved ones, through triumph and failure, and all sorts of change. What hasn't changed is that we continue to build a shared story, one that is a near unending source of material for ribbing each other. I tease her about cats, shopping, and her ability to get injured in the most benign of places. I swear she could have an accident in a pillow store. She teases me about the stupid machine in casinos that pushes quarters toward a ledge in gravity defying dance of frustration, my irrational fear of bears, and my weakness for balding men. (I have a theory about extra brain cells crowding out hair follicles and I can't resist a brainy man, especially if he has a sense of humor and appreciates mine.)

Our birthdays are three weeks apart, hers first, then mine, so I get to go on about being younger every May and I do. I'll probably continue until we are ancient because now it's expected, it's tradition. I have no doubt that we will still be friends. Some years, we wait to celebrate our birthdays until we are together, as we did this year. Usually, I go for the smartass card or any that I find about cats. My friend has a wide array of things to tease me about, but this year, she chose sincerity. I've had a difficult year and I'm afraid it shows, like it does when I'm happy or angry or amused. I've never been good at poker.

I am grateful for my friends - all of them. Sometimes you just know instantly that you click and sometimes it creeps up, but I've been fortunate to know some extraordinary people and I am the better for it. I used to be much more cavalier about the people flowing in and out of my life. I was proud of my independence. I worked hard not to get too attached. I actually believed the crap in Cosmopolitan. God help the girls who hope to live life like Sex in the City. The truth is that human connection is all that we have. Even when it doesn't work out like we hope.

I spent the weekend chatting up fellow travelers of all backgrounds, temperaments, economic strata, and cultures and it was invigorating. It was sunny, the water was that exquisite range of turquoise to mallard blues, there were rummy frozen drinks, and food every two hours. I worked on my tan. I wore a bikini and was photographed in it without shame. I read three novels. Still, I caught myself thinking about how much a recent friend would enjoy it, how much fun his daughter would have, how exciting it would be to see a place so different from home, and how much I would have enjoyed being part of that. But I can't fall into the what-if game. And I can't go back, it seems, to my cavalier youth where there was comfort in the superficial. I've been reminded too often lately that every moment must be appreciated, savored, shared. I no longer have the luxury of ignorance or denial.

So, I will engage. I will meet and greet. Without looking for anything, I will chat up strangers again, make connections, make new friends, enrich an already bounteous circle and maybe someday, one of them will choose to follow me to white sands and aqua seas. And maybe I'll be okay with that.

Little Ms Fix-it

I was a project manager even before I was one in any recognized sense. I have always thrived when tackling a large challenge, breaking it down into manageable pieces, setting a sequence, looking for opportunities along the way - you must know people like me. We are the ones who plan vacations, help with weddings, are good in a crisis, whatever.  Our houses are a mess if that's any consolation.

Perhaps you are thinking that this skill must come in handy as a writer - not so much. I can't seem to manage my own things as well, except for my home improvement projects. My novel still has generous amounts of panic, despair, and obscene amounts of caffeine fueling it on its way to haphazard completion.

Anyway, the thoughts that keep me up at night are almost always crazy plans for how I could fix problems. Most of those problems are imagined, by the way - but they might happen and so, I ponder while watching the ceiling fan do laps. These internal conversations start in one of the following ways:

What if I... (called, introduced, emailed, bought, and so on)
Would it be weird if I.... (it only gets stranger)
I guess I could...(for the way-out-there stuff)

In case you are wondering what kind of stuff floats around inside my cranium, here is a doozy from last year. When someone dear to me was concerned about losing his house, I was thinking "not while I have an extra kidney and there is a black market" so you see, it's not always rational.

It's no coincidence that my better ideas often come to me just as I am trying to sleep. My mind really works when I am forced to decide if I should turn on the light (or not) and get the notebook from the nightstand. That notebook has all sorts of random thoughts, some poetry, some story ideas, and some stern admonitions to myself. Their readability often depends on whether I skipped the light. The message from last night:

I have to squelch my problem solving instincts. I can't fix this.

Ahh, the larger problems in life! I have had to continually remind myself that I have to let a few things go - even if they didn't work out like I wanted, even if I was sure that I was right, or if I had a workable plan (probably conceived late a night while watching the ceiling fan spin lazily), and even if I believe for the moment that if I could just (fill in the blank), that my life would be perfect, I would be happy, and maybe Diane Lane would play me in the movie of my life.

I have found that if I can divert my attention to other things (please, let that be my novel!!! Or cleaning my house - that would work too) that life has a way of evening out. Today's crisis is tomorrow's conversation point. Or plot point. Or both. But I can't armchair manage the planet, so I do the best I can.

Until it's time to let go.