Moving Day

Today is moving day. We will be haphazardly packing up everything in the store into a U-Haul truck to unload it three blocks down the same street. It would seem like we could just walk everything down there to the new store. But we can't. The wardrobes are a nightmare to move ten feet, let alone three blocks. Once you've got a truck, you may as well put everything in it and be done.

Yesterday I read a post in one of the blogs I like to keep up with that provoked me to leave a comment that was not the same supportive, sweet, loving, syncophant response that all the other hundred million women who routinely leave comments on this particular blog feel is their duty to leave. I'm a little afraid to see if the other comment posters have consigned my cold-hearted-ass to an everburning hell. I don't actually care if they do. Sometimes you notice that someone is about to decide to be miserable for the rest of their lives and you can't help but let them know it isn't necessary.

She wrote me back. Which surprised me because the only other two times I commented on her blog, the comments were one of about sixty five and I never heard from her (I didn't expect to). Which is probably because those times I actually merely wished to express moral support. She wrote me back to tell me that I just can't possibly understand what she's going through because I'm not her. And I suppose she feels like if I had a human heart I would feel sad for her even though I'm not having her exact experience.

The funny thing is, I wrote to her just to express that she doesn't have to let her heart stay broken forever. I just wanted to be the one voice that spoke the truth, which-how ever uncomfortable it might be- is that we always have a choice. Always. I know this better than anyone. I have bad days (you all witnessed one the day before yesterday), I have quite a lot of uncomfortable days, I have stumbling blocks, I have challenges...ALL THE TIME. (LIKE EVERY OTHER PERSON ON THE PLANET) But I know that I can get up, dust myself off, and have a good day tomorrow. I know it's possible. Maybe I'll have a bad week, maybe a bad month, but I believe that no matter what life throws you (and I've been thrown some doozies in my time) you can make a good life out of what ever you've been given.

So today, I'm going to embrace the fact that telling the truth rarely secures me a place on the warm fuzzy mantel of womanly friendship, and I'm going to list advice that's worth following. Go ahead and tell me it's different for you in your situation, go ahead and tell me that I just need to stand in your shoes for a day to know how wrong I am, go ahead and tell me how if I truly understood how hard it is to be you I would cry a river of tears and drown in the human sorrow and suffering that is your life, that I would never be able to hold my head up and laugh again. Dudes, I KNOW! LIFE SOMETIMES SUCKS AND IS CRUEL AND I USED TO WANT TO DIE BECAUSE OF IT UNTIL I BITCH-SLAPPED SOME SENSE INTO MYSELF AND REALIZED WE'RE ALL ON THIS BOAT TOGETHER...BALE OUT THE WATER AND KEEP ON ROWING.

• Don't decide that there's only one thing in life that will make you happy. There is no better way to secure yourself a huge heap of lifelong misery. Plus, how horrible to only find your happiness down one road when there's a whole map of happiness to explore in this life.

• Feeling sorrow when you want things you can't have, or losing anything you love is normal. Feel it for a while. But if you're still mourning what life has not seen fit to give you, or has taken away from you for more than a year, it's time to move on. Find something else to want. Find something else to reach for. Love what you still have.

• People die. It's part of this whole life cycle thing those damn hippies keep talking about. Death not only sucks and breaks our hearts and fills us with loss, it's hard to talk about. It touches every last one of us. It's universal. We will all mourn at different points in our lives. And each of us does it differently. But anyone who finds it impossible to let go of the dead and re-focus on the living is out of balance. For every person that dies on this planet, about fifty zillion new people are born. Go meet some of them. Or at least take comfort that this same cycle of life is what allows us all to take part in this fabulous thing we value so much called living. It's not insensitive to let the dead go on to where they need to go and to enjoy the fact that those of us left behind are lucky. Learning to be happy again after losing someone you love is not the same thing as forgetting them. You can honor and remember those who have died while experiencing happiness.

• Don't grow pot in your window. Seriously, this is really sound advice. I've seen what happens when the neighbors find out you're growing suspicious herbacious plants in public view. (For the record: I actually don't like pot and have never grown it. However-everyone else in my family really likes pot)

• Miserable couples who stay together "because of the children" are not doing anyone any favors, least of all their children. When couples are miserable and have basically stopped feeling any love or respect for each other, even if they think they're hiding it well, their children know. I know about fifty kabillion adults who would willingly argue this point with me, but only because they have to believe that kids don't notice little details or they'll have to feel like crap about their decision to stay miserable. I'm all for couples working things out. I say go to therapy. Work hard to repair your relationship. I dislike divorce. But sometimes it's healthier for the kids to not be exposed to the rancour, the lack of respect, and the dissonance between their parents. Think about it: how you and your spouse treat each other is going to inform your child's future relationships. They learn from their parents often when their parents don't think they are being seen. If you have a shitty relationship, the chances are super good your child will have similar shitty relationships.

• Kids see almost everything. So bear that in mind. They aren't going to shout out to you everything they know and see either, because children have their own private world too where they see and hear things and have no desire to tell you about it. Children are extremely sensitive to undercurrents. So the best advice I can think of for all parents is to be aware that children are not simple stupid beings, they are extemely intuitive, instinctual, and can read between the lines. They just don't always have the language yet to express what they've taken in. But they will. And they'll probably tell you about it when they're grown up.

• Be honest with yourself. Even if you can't be honest with anyone else. You can't ever evolve or improve if you can't be honest.

• Have as much compassion and empathy for yourself as you reserve for others. You deserve it. You can be honest about yourself and not hate yourself. Know that all of us are imperfect. My parents have always thought that if I could percieve any faults in them, then I must not be able to love them, because who can love a person with faults? Jesus, people sure are hard on themselves. (Um, myeslf included.)

• Don't pick a spouse based solely on their performance in bed.

• Don't have children because all the celebrities are doing it right now. Having kids (and lots of them) may be all the rage right now, but unless you want them for a better reason than that, please refrain.

• Don't have more than one kid because you believe it's your duty to provide siblings for your first baby. And for god's sake, don't think you're life is ruined if the powers that be have blessed you with just one babe when you wanted more than one. Having no siblings doesn't doom one to a terrible existence any more than having them guaruntees a magical family life. If you got even one baby you're a hell of a lot luckier than all those people out there who got none. I feel much sadder for couples who never get blessed with single child than those who aren't blessed with more. ACK!

• Whether you have a happy or unhappy life is dependent on exactly one thing: YOURSELF. No circumstances, no matter how terrible or sad, can prevent you from having a happy life. So choose to overcome challenges, choose to find your happiness even when it seems impossible. You have that choice. Always. It doesn't mean that when faced with challenges you can always jump up instantly and be joyful. I'm not saying that you need not feel sorrow or anger or desperation. I'm saying that you can get through every one of life's awful surprises and come out the other end, whole, happy, and hopeful. If the boy who lived in a box could do it, then every damn one of us can do it too.

I'm sure I've really done it now. Alienated every person on earth. No one is ever going to believe me now when I say that I feel so deeply for my fellow human beings, that I want every good person to find their happiness, that it makes me overwhelmed with sorrow when I see people drowning in pain and not learning to swim. But it's true. I love people, I just think they sometimes need to be kicked in the ass with a reality check sometimes. Including myself.