The Good and the Bad this Week

With my nomad lifestyle the past year, I have not yet created my deck garden. Not long enough in one place is my excuse. But, my dear friend, Joan Howard, poet, brought me these lovely peonies in this precious vase. Aren't they beautiful?

My kind helper, Anne, bought geraniums for my deck before I got back home to Hayesville, and she potted a few more flowers. 

I am so happy I have these bright spots in my life because the past week, my first week back home in the mountains has been extremely stressful.

I came home to find that my well water smelled like sulfur. When I turned on the hot water faucet, black dirty water rushed out. I turned on the hot water in my shower and it filled my tub with awful dirty water. 

I was dismayed, to say the least. I called my friend, John who helps me out of jams when I don't know what to do. He suggested I call the company that drilled my well when the old one dried up. He also said, don't drink the water. I was not about to do that. My brother-in-law told me the same thing, Don't drink the water!  Well, I am not as dumb as I look, fellows.

To make a long story shorter, I have been without drinkable water for five days. I boiled water on the stove to wash dishes and to use for cooking. When I finally found someone, a plumber, to come and see my dilemma, he said I needed a top-of-the-line chlorinating system to kill what was in my pipes and my hot water heater. He could not put it in until Friday and it would take him all day. I would be without any water for several hours. The price of this system is outrageous, but I pray that it solves my water problems. Joe, the plumber is a very caring man and is determined to get everything working right. The system is from Chem Free. 

Another stressor was the loss of my cell phone. 

I had lunch on Sunday with two dear friends at a fine restaurant in Hiawassee. On Monday I realized my phone was missing. My first thought was that it fell out of my handbag when I put it on the floor beside my chair. I called but could not get anyone at the restaurant. My friend called and could not talk to anyone. I knew they had strange hours there but I went over to see if I could find my phone. The doors were locked and I could not find anyone to ask.

Today an angel of a young man called me from my cell phone. His name is Zachery and he works at the restaurant. He said, "I found your phone Sunday after we closed and put it in the Lost and Found drawer. Today I just happened to open that drawer and saw it was still there. It was still charged so I called the number you had listed under Home. I'm sorry I didn't do this sooner but thought you might have picked it up."

I wanted to give that nice young man a big hug. I hope I can find out the name of his boss and write a note to him. 

So, all is well that ends well. 

A plumber and a caring young man made my day on Friday. I will sleep much better tonight even though Joe said I shouldn't drink water from my well for two weeks. It will take that long for the system to clean all the pipes. 

I am looking for a calm and peaceful weekend.

Readers, have you ever had to live without safe water for five days or longer? Have you ever lost your phone for days before it surfaced? 

Getting off the fast track this year

For years now, society has been compelled to stay busy, working constantly, at home and at the office.

We hear ourselves reciting a litany of what we accomplished today or this week. We go, go, go all the time as if we are on a treadmill and must keep going faster and faster, doing more and more.

On Social Media, we see our peers posting about all they do. I was caught up on that track myself. I didn't realize what I was doing to my health. After all, I only did what I wanted to do. But I will not be given a crown in glory for what I accomplished today. My reward was the feeling of pride in myself for having done something. However, my life doesn't need to be measured by the items completed on my to-do list.

Although I like to write the end to a long-planned task and I enjoy my work for NCWN-West,  I have planned my life with three days each week set aside just for me to do only what pleases me. If I want to read or watch a movie or talk for an hour on the phone, I will not feel guilty or pressured. On some of these days I plan to spend time with friends and family.

I will never complete all that I need to do in my house. I accept that. I can be happy with my stuff scattered about on my dining table, my upstairs office and downstairs in my studio. I accept that my unique manner of disorganization is mine, and I can work with it. 

All weekend I have been home alone, with Lexie to keep me company. 
I enjoyed the peace and quiet, the free and easy lifestyle now becoming mine. Monday is a holiday here in the USA, so my weekend is extended. I might not dress to go out at all. I can eat whenever I want and sleep when I want with nothing to interrupt me.

I watched two Sunday TV shows. I am caught up in a series on a streaming channel and I watch some of that every day.

I can't seem to make my new Lenova laptop work the way I need. With so many new "options" in every program, I hope to turn off those I will never use. Part of my free time is spent educating myself on new technology. I love to learn, but this is more than I bargained for.

I no longer have cable TV.
 My local television shows are now coming into my house on the Internet. Sad to say, Internet does not work well here in the mountains. I have had to buy enhancers to help bring a signal for my television sets. I had to purchase an Amazon Fire Stick for my Roku TV, and then I had to install it. Although I have worked with it for several hours, it is not working as it should. I will figure out what to do sooner or later.  (Oh, how I miss Barry. He would have had it working with no problem at all.)

It looks like it will take more of my time to get the hang of this new system. I can only work on it for short periods of time before I get stressed. My goal is to stay as calm and stress-free as possible. With my newfound lifestyle, I am sleeping better and longer each night. I am cleaning out my Inbox and throwing away most of the paper that comes in my mailbox each day. For a long time, I have been drowning in paper. Political, charities, and retail envelopes. Now it goes into the trash before I open it. What a waste of money and paper!

This week I plan to work on genealogy and family history. I will also meet old friends one day for a long lunch. It will be fun to catch up. Life is good.

Most important, probably, is my determinination to move more.
Just moving around during the day instead of sitting too long is essential to my good health.

In the book, The Blue Zones, the author tells about why the people in these zones live longer than we do and they are healthier. They move all day long in their daily lives. They live much as my parents lived on the farm in the twentieth century. 

Blue Zone inhabitants are social people.
The author says we should have at least seven people in our lives we can call on at any given time. Everyone who knows me will tell you I love people and being with people is uplifting for me. Social interaction increases endorphins, I guess. 

The people in the Blue Zones don't try to live to be 100 years old. They don't go on diets, or go to the gym. In their daily lives, they walk almost everywhere. They eat simply and burn calories. We can climb stairs, walk to work or ride a bike instead of driving everywhere, and that could help us live longer. 

I can do what is best for me in my own environment. That is my plan for 2020 and beyond. I made my Vision Board for this year. I found that is a great way to accomplish goals. But, I will work some, play some and relax more. No more should do, needs to, and must do now. No more pushing myself and blaming myself when I don't make deadlines. Unless it is a matter of life and death, I will do my best, but if I am late, it is not the end of the world.

Time is our most important commodity. We can't buy it, borrow it, or bring it back once it is gone. I hope to make the most of every minute I have. I want to spend time with my loved ones, friends and family. I will call them and see them on my open days if they are available. I don't want to say, as I have often done in the past, "I wish I had called her, or gone to see her" when I am sending flowers for her funeral. 

How is your stress level? Do you feel you need to slow down, take more Me Time and enjoy a simpler life? 

See you next week and thanks for stopping by.

Millennials? Where did they get that name?

How did the young generation become known as Millennials?

Who gave a generation that title? Lately all we see or hear is what the Millennials think, how they plan to vote, how they are changing the country.

Millennials are also known as Generation Y, the demographic that directly follows Generation X. Those who reached adulthood around the turn of the 21st century are considered Millennials.

This is the generation that was raised to believe they should follow their dreams and they could accomplish anything they wanted to do in life. Many of them were made to believe they were special. I hear grandparents say, “Just ask my grandson. He knows everything about computers and the Internet. Kids are so much smarter today than we were.”

Computer or device savvy?

I have not met anyone among my family or friends who can help me when I have a computer problem.  Most of the young adults I know can tell you how to use a smart phone to take a selfie, to research on their tablet, or how to bring up You Tube videos that make me laugh.  But very few of them know about using a computer for writing, for blogging, for setting up a website, marketing or building a readership for an author. 

A college student recently told me she never uses a computer and doesn’t know much about them. She uses her smart phone and thinks she knows all she needs to know.

While Millennials grew up in the electronics-filled world and they seem to be online constantly with their devices, research has shown they are the most stressed-out generation.

A quote from an Arianna Huffington post said, “According to Stress in America, a study commissioned by the American Psychological Association, Millennials are the most stressed demographic….

The study asked participants to rank their stress level on a scale of 1 ("little or no stress") to 10 ("a great deal of stress"). Millennials led the stress parade, with a 5.4 average. Boomers registered 4.7, and the group the study labeled the "Matures" gave themselves a 3.7.

The Millennials are more tolerant of differences and is the most diverse generation, ethnically. They have extreme confidence in themselves. I can’t imagine having such confidence at such a young age.

In spite of coming out of college unable to find jobs in their fields and burdened with huge debt, they are optimistic about the future of America. I hope their optimism proves true and they can make the enormous changes we need to get our economy back on track for the middle class that is the backbone of the United States. 

I am sure that parents who hovered over their children, sending them to the best schools, and gave them every advantage possible, worry that these young adults will never have the good life their parents enjoyed.

I see it happening. 
Parents lived in fine houses, drove the nicest, newest cars, belonged to the country club, and their kids grew up privileged, expecting to always have everything they ever wanted.

When the silver spoon tarnishes, the expectations are too high, and the adult child feels thrown to the wolves. Without financial support from parents, no job, no income, the stress can take a person down into addiction or depression or both. It is no wonder the Millennial generation faces more stress than anyone today. 

Whether they are working or unable to find work, stress becomes a health issue.

"Stress is a huge factor when we look at medical problems such as obesity, hypertension, diabetes, cardiac disease," says Dr. Nancy Snyderman, NBC's chief medical editor.

I heard of a few Millennials who surprised and disappointed their parents when, after earning a degree, they announced they were going to be organic farmers or were going to work for a non-profit that they believed could change the world for the better.

Now that I understand the stress these young people are dealing with, it is easier to see why they have weight problems and suffer chronic illness. Stress leads to heart disease, high blood pressure and autoimmune disorders.

I am in the Mature Generation, and I have had diabetes for 13 years. When I have too much stress in my life, my blood sugar goes up. When life is calm and I sleep well, my levels are good. I imagine how  difficult it is for young women who work and care for a family.

Anxiety is a precursor for depression. Too many young women today take sleeping medicines, anti-depressants, and anti-anxiety medicines to help them get through their busy days.

I sympathize with the Millennials who face uncertain futures in today’s world. We all want to pursue our dreams, work only at jobs that we enjoy, and we all want to earn a decent living. But my generation didn’t always have that opportunity. People I know worked at jobs for forty years that were boring or unfulfilling but paid the bills. Now they are retired and are excited to have the chance to pursue those dreams.  Perhaps that is why the Mature generation feels less stressed.

What is your stress level these days? How do you manage to keep the stress under control, or do you?

I Just Can't Multi-Task Anymore

When there is too much on my plate I get a bit unfocused. I never plan on that happening, but this past week I proved to myself --

I am not superwoman. I am not even related to superwoman.

For several days I prepared for this week. Some of the things on my schedule were hosting Coffee with the Poets on Wednesday morning where my dear friends, Mary Mike Keller and Estelle Rice, were reading.

Another thing was completing a photo presentation with over 100 pictures to scan into my computer, enhance and caption each one. I wanted to make sure that the families of each of my siblings were represented in the presentation and include some of my cousins who planned to be at the gathering of nieces, siblings, nephews, their children and grandchildren. 

During this preparation and learning to use Power Point and a borrowed projector, I also regularly talked with my brother's caregiver and tried to bolster his confidence in taking care of his father, deal with the weird medical world, and keep his sick mother calm. I couldn't sleep at night as I tossed and turned with "monkey mind" raging until the wee hours of the morning. 

Would my brother still be with us, or able to come to the reunion? Were his needs being met at home or would he have to be readmitted to the hospital? I was torn between wanting to be there with him and all the other things in my life such as Writers Circle, my business. 

At the same time, I learned that my dear niece, Lyn, had emergency surgery for a torn retina on Monday. She was terrified she might lose her sight. She had faced this trauma before and the outcome was not good. When I couldn't sleep at night, I prayed that she wouldn't lose her sight. But the worry did not go away.

Worry negated all my positive promises to myself. I work diligently  to be a positive person and so far it has worked fine. But this week I also wore my Interim Program Coordinator hat. The Netwest News should have gone out on May 1. The editor said she had to go out of town last weekend and asked me to complete it and mail it to our members. I agreed.

But, I had to go out of town last weekend to see my brother. I worked on the newsletter on my old antiquated, but well loved, laptop. It would not send the newsletter with all the graphics in place. When I arrived home on Sunday night, I sent the editor a note and said, I can't do this now. When it is complete, I will mail it.

It was Wednesday before we managed to get the newsy letter out to our members. That was one chore off my back.

But my PC hat was well in place, and I spent one hour or more on the phone discussing Netwest business. As I tried to multi-task, including doing laundry and pack, I made errors of judgement, I made errors in the reunion project which I am hosting, I forgot to pack some important photos, but I didn't forget to get a cat sitter.

Trying to be superwoman resulted in my stress level shooting higher and higher. I missed the writing event I was supposed to host. I let myself become fearful, become the woman I was a few years ago when I didn't have confidence in myself. I questioned whether I should have begun the reunion project all by myself.

But I did something right. I asked for help. I asked a writer friend to take over Coffee with the Poets for a few months. I let my sister come to my rescue and help me with the reunion duties. 

I realized I could not function on four hours of sleep each night so I am taking a sleep aid for a few more days until I get back on schedule. Lack of sleep knocks me off kilter. When I don't sleep I hurt from fibromyalgia which I've dealt with for about 15 years.

My regret is that I hurt the feelings of others. I raised my voice to those I love and cut them off on the phone. I lost track of my priorities for a while, but tonight I've regained my equilibrium.

By writing about this, I see what I need to do to be healthy again.

By writing to you, my readers, I have learned what has been happening in my life and how I must fix what I can. To anyone I have hurt this week, I'm sorry. I'll do better next week, I hope.

But that will be a full week as well. I begin teaching a new course on Healing through Writing and I will be reading at the John C. Campbell Folk School on May 16. I hope my brother will improve when he gets his pacemaker next week. My niece will be at the reunion because the doctor says she can go. I hope that means that her eye is healing and she will have full vision again.

For now this superwoman needs some sleep.

Find your blessings where you may.

I found it hard, at first, to be appreciative after being stopped by the State Patrol officer. He gave me a warning instead of a citation for speeding, but --- he did write me up for having an expired tag.

When I realized I had left my handbag in the buggy at Wal-Mart at 10:30 p.m. I hurried back dreading to hear the worst. After all, I had left the buggy in the outer area of the store and I remembered four young men standing there. I could imagine them eyeing the purse as I turned back to my car. All the way back to the store I beat up on myself for being so dumb, for not paying attention to what I was doing. I could even hear Barry's voice, "Glenda, why don't you keep your mind on what you're doing?"
Later as I drove home with my bag safely beside me and everything intact, including cash and credit cards, I practiced my new attitude about life.

The cop could have given me a ticket for speeding instead of just for the tag offense. I could have found that no one had seen my purse, or I could have found it empty, but I did not.

A "buggy boy" had found the black bag while doing his job. An honest young mman who probably needed the cash although it was not a large amount, turned it in to the store authority. My negative mindset slowly changed course.

I am thankful that I live where thieves are not the norm; where respect for others is not dead;where young men still open doors for women and the bag boys turn down a tip for loading my car at the grocery store.

A kind officer had decided not to send me to court with a speeding ticket. I would surely have paid a large fine.

So, I found some blessings in my stressful evening. I am lucky and happy that I came out so well.
I have learned to look for the good even in the worst situations.
Life is not always pretty, nor perfect, but deep
in the dirt we sometimes find small gems.

I probably should not be posting this time of night when I'm half asleep and bone tired, but forgive me if I ramble.
My class last Tuesday was excellent with about ten delightful students of all ages. Our oldest is 85 and writes with the confidence of a seasoned writer. All of us are looking forward to his sharing his memories from as far back as World War II. We discussed organizing our stories in folders and writing down the turning points or milestones in our lives. One man couldn't wait to begin heading his folders. I have a good, good, feeling about this class. The trust is already there. I must confess I just love writers and being with writers, beginners or professional.

All of my life I have dealt with stressful situations by writing. Writing is therapy for me and I'm grateful I enjoy it. A few weeks ago as I waited in a room filled with people young and old starring into space, encircled by arms of loved ones, hands griped in hands, the tension and fear was thick enough to choke a person. I pounded on my Neo, a little keyboard I can use anywhere. I would later download my writing to my computer. Like a reporter at the scene of an accident I keyed in all the characters, described faces, body shapes, expressions and actions. I learned this from Darnell Arnoult an excellent writer who says she keeps a notebook with her and gets some of her best characters from watching people in waiting rooms.
I don't plan to use these people in a fiction piece, but it helped me through my waiting time to write about them and imagine what they were facing.
Do you study and examine people you see and wonder about them? Do you write about them? Most writers are observant of the people around them in restaurants, standing in lines and anywhere they can watch people. Try it the next time you have to wait in a doctor's office. Just make notes on what you see in the faces of those who are there in the room. Describe their physical attributes. Notice the difference in noses and describe them. It is fun and a good way to get your mind occupied if you happen to have a troublesome situation you'd rather not think about.
I'd love to hear from anyone who has ever done that or who thinks it might be a good thing to do.