I Resolve to Blah Blah Blah

Why is it that we look to the first day of a new calendar year to kick-start actually living our lives? But instead of looking forward to the promise of that new year, why do we spend hours looking back over the year we’re still living in to qualify the things we plan to do in the new year?

Resolutions are supposed to be about making changes while moving forward. Seems pretty impossible to do while facing the other way right?

It’s like we need to see what great times we had, or mistakes we made, and then we resolve to either fix or do more of that shit starting on January 1. But what’s the point right? I mean all we’re doing is looking at what we used to do; thinking about what could have been.

Not what is.

I’m guilty of doing it too. Especially this year.

But I truly think the people who “fail at resolutions” don’t really fail. They just weren’t facing the right direction.

So this upcoming year I’m facing the future, not the past.

I fully intend to take this year by the balls and make it my bitch.

Or something like that.

The definition of resolution in the case of New Year’s is “firmness of purpose or intent.”

But I’m not getting hung up in the meaning of the word, the definition as purported by millions, if not billions, of people worldwide.

Because as far as I’m concerned the calendar year isn’t really a crucial part of the plans I have, other than it being a gentle guide for the things I plan to do.

See, for me this upcoming year isn’t about resolving to do anything.

I will set goals.

Because goals challenge me. They make me try harder. They make me focus, get down to work, and then get down to celebrating when I achieve them.

And I don’t care if I achieve all of them within the tight restrictions of January 1 – December 31. I’m setting my goals and working to achieve them, so if they come to fruition this year then great! If not, that doesn’t mean I give up. It means I keep trying no matter what the date says.

As we all know goals can change mid-stream. They’re fluid, flexible and always evolving in order to get you to the best version of yourself you can dream up and go after.

New Year’s resolutions come with a built in pass/fail mechanism. You either do the thing or you don’t.

Bleh. How limiting is that?

I have four goals I want to tackle this year:

Release new books (yes, multiple).

Learn to cook (meals that aren’t boring).

Read more (books specifically).

Be more active (watching less and doing more).

Yup. That’s it.

Because if I can set out on a course to do all of those things then all the other stuff I might think about in terms of resolutions will just fall into place.

Eating healthy, exercising, getting my career on track, traveling, saving money, or anything else I could dream up that I’d love to change about myself, I’m simply striving to be a better version of me in 2015.

But I’m not going to consider the whole year a failure if I take 3 days off from writing or veg out in front of the television occasionally either.

I’ve always got the next day to get back on track. There’s no point in looking at a little misguided step as a fail. Like I said, facing backwards doesn’t help me achieve my goals.

So as my vacation comes to an end, and a brand new calendar year gets started, I’m looking forward to doing my best to achieve all the goals I’ve got laid out in front of me.

Have a safe and festive New Year everyone!

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Have You Ever Just…

…wanted to scream, laugh, cry, shake, dance, yell, applaud, thank and shout all in the exact same moment?

Well if you have then you’ve got a teeny clue about what the inside of my brain has looked like for the past couple months. I used to come over here and use this space to rant as my personal form of therapy when I felt like my head might just pop off at any second.

But since this summer started my ADD and overwhelmed, overflowing, over capacity mind has been in full-steam overdrive and I couldn’t seem to reign it in enough to even rant.

“I feel like I am spinning…”

Every last word of that song just segues so perfectly into the entire point of all of this stupid bullshit that I couldn’t figure out how to stop from taking over my life. But then it all took over anyway.

This past weekend Matt, my mom & I went to see Jason Mraz perform live here in Phoenix. It was the first time I’d seen him take the stage in over four years and I was looking so forward to the show that I could hardly contain my excitement.

As I predicted, the show was amazing. I soaked in all the positivity he spewed from the stage. I let the whole vibe just wash over me like a big fuzzy blanket of awesome and I felt so great.

Then something really weird happened.

The next day we were invited to go and enjoy an afternoon with some great friends. Nothing fancy. No pressure. Just some pool time, wine, fun in the sun. And I couldn’t get my ass off the couch.

All of the blackness that had been bubbling for so long came flooding up through that blanket of awesome, coated it in sludge, and pulled me into its depths of suckage.

Quicksand inside my head that folds my good thoughts into suck-tion and no matter what I do to try to swim out, I just can’t break free.

I was in such a terrible place in my head that I couldn’t imagine spending one second with anyone. I felt insanely vulnerable. Overly self-conscious. But I know it was for absolutely no reason whatsoever.

Seriously, no reason. I look fine. I don’t have any weird health stuff going on right now (thankfully). I just couldn’t wrap my head around anyone being around me. I disconnected. I was sitting here on my sofa with my mom and Matt but I was so far away from present I wondered if I would ever get back.

My mind was racing at a billion miles a second with way too many horrible things. Stuff that doesn’t matter for shit in the grand scheme of life. But stuff that makes me feel like I’m balancing precariously on the edge of that proverbial razor blade.

But I know it’s just me. Sometimes it happens and I have no choice other than to sink into it and let it happen.

I hate it though, especially when it stops me from having a good time, but I realized this morning that I can’t feel bad about it. Because when it happens I always come out the other side of it understanding more about who I actually am. I have a greater sense of what I want, what I need in my life. And also what I don’t.

A big house. A cool car. Half an acre of underutilized land. Makeup in every shade under the rainbow. Area rugs for every room. 6 colors of the same pair of jeans.

Stuff.

So much fucking stuff.

I should really follow around one of these urban legends I’ve heard about and find out how they do it. You know the people – they only work 25 hours a week, make over $100,000 a year, have a spotless fresh smelling home, totally weed-free front yards at all times, homemade organic non-GMO meals on the table every night, and bath towels that don’t smell because there hasn’t been a moment to wash them in 3 weeks.

Yeah, I know they don’t really exist, but in this world of “everything in my life is fucking great!” internet perfection it’s easy to be convinced that they do.

And it’s just too much for me to deal with anymore.

I’m weeding down.

Starting today I’m fleshing out all the things I don’t need in my life. I don’t need a Pinterest account. I don’t need a twitter account for my old company. I don’t need email addresses of people I never communicate with. I don’t need tax files from 1999.

And I don’t need a house or yard this big.

Another thing we did over this past weekend was watch the short documentary movie Tiny: A StoryAbout Living Small and it finally hit me:

Matt and I are killing ourselves just to keep up with some perceived notion of what we should have and how we should live. And for what? So I have a place to store books I haven’t read since I was 10 years old just so I can say I have them?

I started thinking about Jason being on tour. Sure, he’s got a home base where he can house all the things that mean something sentimental or otherwise, but for months at a time he lives out of a bus, or a suitcase even, but he’s enjoying the things that matter and not needing to be surrounded by copious crap all the time just to feel fulfilled.

At least I think that’s the case. I don’t know the guy or anything but based on his own statements I believe that all to be true.

And I believe it to be the most inspiring thing I’ve ever heard.

Because, why should Matt have to work 50 hours a week, me at least 45, just to make the money to pay for all of this stuff we don’t really need? It’s a pitiful existence and causes stupid shit like this to spew out of my fingers but it doesn’t actually do anything for either of us.

All it seems to do is make me feel like crap because I have too much crap. An avalanche of stuff that doesn’t help me feel any happier.

The time has come to sit down together and figure out how to release all the things that don’t matter so we can embrace more of the stuff that does.

Laughter. Hugs. Family. Friends. Passion for my career. Music. Travel. Love.

Maybe if I do that I’ll be able to make it to the next pool party my friends invite me to. Because instead of feeling chaotic, like I’m nailed to the floor but could tornado across the world at any second, I’ll have a fighting chance for a calmer mind. 

It's time to fight for focus.

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“As Soon as I Settle I Bet I’ll Be Able to Move On”

It probably will come as no shock to anyone who knows me to hear that I’m feeling restless right now. I just bought a house and started my career so of course I’m ready to get a move on and go try my hand at something new. But in the spirit of truth, that’s not even the issue this time. That’s not the real thing I’m struggling with in my head.

The real issue is that I know, this time, I’m not going to change a damn thing. I know that I’ve found a place I can be happy for a long while, as well as a career that I actually enjoy, for the first time in my life. Under former circumstances I’d be ready to bail right about this point because I’d have started to get bored. Disinterested with the predictable nature of everyday life.

When I get to the moment where I’ve taken it all in, absorbed as much as I can from the job/place/lesson at hand, I start feeling antsy. Anxious. Skittish. Ready to flee at a moment’s notice.

But not this time.

The feeling is a leftover; its cold and moldy like that last piece of meatloaf you forgot about, shoved to the back of the fridge. It used to be trapped somewhere in the back of my head convincing me I should stay the scared little girl who never accomplishes anything because she isn’t really worth enough to try. Broke, only moderately attractive, no big show-and-tell story to share with the drama-obsessed world. Kind of a middle of the road nobody if I’m being honest.

I was the one who didn’t finish college and never had a “real” job. The self-proclaimed slacker, lazy, procrastinator type who never seems to get what she wants because she’s too fucking scared to tell anyone what that is.

Always living in fear that I might get exactly what I want out of life if I just pursue it with reckless abandon because then where would I be? I’ve been “chasing the dream” for so long maybe I felt I couldn’t function without a dream. Maybe I felt if I got it then I wouldn’t have a need to continue on. There wouldn’t be any more dreams.

But of course we all know that’s complete bullshit.

So then why am I antsy if I’m comfortable with the discomfort of setting down some roots in these areas of my life?

Because it’s a new feeling. The feeling of knowing I could go back on my heels and haul-ass out of this whole writing life but wanting to stick it out is uncomfortable because of the newness. I’ve never done it before.

After close to forty years of programming myself to believe that I have to keep moving forward – where “forward” used to describe moving on – I’m not entirely sure how to handle moving forward while remaining satisfied with what I’m doing.

Scary? You bet. Necessary? More than I could explain.

The best advice would be to just keep doing it, of course. So I am. Every single day.

Instead of going out and starting in another dead-end job situation, or moving again, I’m doing other things to keep that freshness. Entering writing contests, getting up and speaking at my writer’s group, connecting with new people, giving interviews, asking people to review my book after they’ve read it. Essentially, going after what I want. Boom.

But most of all – asking for what I want, knowing that I deserve to have it, and then going out and getting it. Because life’s too short to stop talking altogether because I sit around worrying if I offended someone with something I said once. It’s too short to sit back and constantly observe what others are doing while never doing anything of any substance myself.

Life’s too short not to make it exactly what I want it to be.

I mean, hell, everyone else is doing it and they don’t give a damn if I approve so I think it’s high time to start living for me. Fuck em if they can’t appreciate that.

I owe it to Indie Authors everywhere to kick ass and take names (of Agents preferably, though with all these adverbs…). I owe it to Matt to do my best to get this thing off the ground after so much support these past couple years.

Most of all I owe it to myself because this twenty-five year dream got clouded with the needs and desires of everyone else coming before my own somewhere along the way. But this is my life and it’s time to clear that fog. Time to open my eyes and see my own life path. Time to take it.

Title of this post is a quote from a Fiona Apple lyric in “The Way things Are”

Obstatunity Comes from Strategery: Part II

Back before we moved out here to Arizona I wrote a post on Matt's working situation which I just went back and re-read as I tried to decide if 'Obstatunity Comes from Strategery' could have a sequel.  As you brilliantly surmised from the title of the post, yes, yes it can.

Only this time it’s my freaking obstatunity.  And I'm planning to run with it.  But first, seeing as though you already know me and know the way it works around these parts, I'll give you the back story.

A year ago I started classes at Ashford University as most if not all of you know.  I Googled the school, read good things, did my research and all that stuff.  But I also did the same for the couple other Universities in question.  I'd been paying back student loans for a couple years from my 2 prior failed attempts at higher ed-u-ma-cation so if I was going to go back it needed to be the right thing.

When it came time to choose I went with a couple factors:
1) School needed full accreditation
2) School needed to have the program I was looking for (BA English)
3) School needed to be fairly well respected

There were 2 out of 3 with my old University that I'd had phenomenal success with - the Art Institute.  Sadly, the one thing it didn't offer was a BA in English.  I narrowed down and chose Ashford. 

For about the first 5 or so classes I was happy with my choice!  Some of the Instructors seemed invested, the course work was recoculously challenging and I actually felt as if my dollars were going to something worthy.  Not to mention Ashford used almost all of my AI classes as transfer credits for all my needed electives so I was already a junior level when I entered.  Right where I'd hoped to be after already investing far too many years in higher learning.

I dove in and studied my fucking ass off, I blew off plans with everyone in order to study, I popped at least 3 veins in my brain while completing the course work to maintain my 4.0 GPA.  And I did.  That accomplishment alone made me proud of myself, and it made me realize I was on the correct path in pursuing a Writing career.

Then suddenly last fall I started to notice that more and more Instructors started to care less and less - as evidenced by their blatant lack of response in class and outright disappearing acts.  I also noticed the course work was snore provoking.  As nice as it was for the first class to go from studying a literal 45 hour week down to 10, by the fourth I was getting frustrated.  But I only had a year to go until that degree was in my hot little hands.  I kept pushing the brick wall.  Kept talking myself into the fact I needed this degree, that I had to have it.

Then all this utter bullshit happened and I really started to question:
1) The need for the degree in the first place
2) The dedication level I'd really have if I stayed
3) The validity of the degree in question.

I was torn not only just on paying the non-existant bill but on staying at the school even if I did.  I had no clue what to do, I was at an impasse in my brain.

Then all of a sudden I realized (with a little help from a friend) that if I keep going to school the only thing I'm going to get is more debt, more popped veins and a degree from a shady University that I won't even really want to tell anyone about.

Instead, it would be far more worth my time to study at the University called the World, read, write, network and publish my fucking book, man.  I'm so far in the hole enough already that I can hardly see how to get out.  But then I feel like I caught sight of the first rung and it feels great.

Do I feel like a failure for withdrawing at the end of this class?  I did before but now I just feel like all the time I'll get back for myself will be better spent creating my own obstatunity - the one where I actually Write for a living, sell my writing, create contacts, network, whatever the hell other Writers do.

Obstatunity - Continuing my education by reading the shit I want to read.
Strategery   - Using that education to further my own career and pay back the exorbitant loan money I already owe without taking on even more debt.

I started getting serious about writing not too long ago and now I'm just looking at all of this as my glowing neon sign to get out and get on with my life.  I'm not getting any younger and a degree from Shady University will do nothing for me in the long run.

It’s not giving up, it’s changing my mind.  Because it’s time to evolve.

Too Bad The Clash Never Answered Their Own Question

I’ve shared in the past some of the issues with our current apartment -- creepy neighbors who seem to follow us from room to room, the fact that there isn’t a real door on our bedroom, the size and layout of the space -- but most recently we had a flood in the basement and after our landlords seemed to not only let it simply drain on its own but to also allow the dampness to fester, it prompted us to ask the age old question ‘should I stay or should I go (now)?’

You all know the next line and if you don’t feel free to check out the lyrics.

So we started looking at apartments with all of the amenities that we really truly would want in a space, mind you, some of which our current place does have but most it doesn’t. Two bedrooms plus a den (or study, loft, enormous extra storage closet, etc.), 2 bathrooms, a functional kitchen with a dishwasher and plenty of storage, decent closet space, a master bedroom sized to fit a king sized bed, a townhouse with no one above or below, parking for 2 cars and access to the T.

It all sounds easy enough, and truthfully it is, but when we started looking the harsh reality of the Boston housing market came to smack us around while it taunted us with dollar signs and 80’s décor.

The first place we looked at was in Norwood. ‘Where the hell is Norwood?’ you might wonder, don’t worry, I asked the same thing. Just south west of the city this fine town is located smack dab in the middle of the country. But we were encouraged to see that the property had everything on our list and then some.

The T isn’t just close, the commuter rail stops right at the community, the property manager told me I could faux every singe surface of the apartment (non-textural) as long as we painted over it when we left, washer/dryer in the unit, hardwood throughout, large private back patio with extra outdoor storage attached, and end units were available.

Those of you who know me know that I would likely spend little time on the patio because country = bugs and I just don’t do bugs. No matter how nice one’s patio furniture is spiders simply kill it for me. I shudder just thinking about it. Of course Matt would love it so that was a half a plus. It was in our price range but on the reaching end so neither of us were sure we wanted to reach quite that far to be quite that far from everyone; on a good day in no traffic it would take our family and friends at least 40 minutes to get there. Boo.

We went back on the hunt to look for communities and came across a newer complex in Southie. Right at the water’s edge and sort of next to UMass, the place consists of two really gorgeous semi high rise buildings. Based on their info online it had pretty much everything we were looking for but was a lot closer to our loved ones.

So we popped in and asked to see their 2+ bedroom unit. She quite literally frowned at us and said her next available appointment was at noon on Sunday. I referenced the ‘Open House’ sign on the front lawn and received no response. OK, thanks, bye.

On the same day we came across the find of all finds. A townhome community that had all the same stuff as the place in Norwood but it was located in Marshfield just a couple miles from Rexhame beach. Matt and I both grew up at the beach, the beach is where it’s at for us, and after spending a considerable number of years at the south shore, we know just where we’d love to land. Marshfield is a close runner up though so for a rental, it sounded perfect.

We saw photos online of the space and it looked great; nice community building, good size living room and bedrooms and their deluxe model even consisted of a front hall storage closet that was about the size of our current bedroom.

When we got there however, I instantly started singing Oh Mickey and was really bummed that I had left my can of Aqua Net and Balloons at home.

The kitchen was the first room on the left, half bath on the right. Both consisted of confetti and paint splatter style (?) rolled vinyl floors in shades of blue and pink plus white melamine cabinetry which could be doable but the rounded rectangle wood pulls really did nothing to make me want to sign a lease. In a final flourish, the countertops were squared off laminate. Oh yeah, and pink. Like, a grandmother’s bathroom, rose colored, pink. I hardly even noticed the deep pile, baby blue carpet everywhere once we got upstairs and saw that both full baths were decked out the same way.

No soundproofing between the units was a big concern of un-cosmetic proportions and although it did have 2 car parking and heat lamps in the bathrooms (score) it just didn’t seem worth the price considering it was only $100 less expensive than the country apartment.

Of course she did say that some units had forest green countertops and that they were just starting to remodel all of the community’s homes. Starting with the one bedrooms. I guessed we’d be almost retired by the time they got around to all of the townhomes considering the model was stuck in a time warp. We thanked her for her generous time and headed out on our merry way, a little dejected but hopeful.

On the way home we talked at great length about what to do. And then we continued to discuss it for the rest of the weekend. There are things about our current place that we just can’t change but one of the major draws of this apartment from the get go was the price. If we were to consider the place in Norwood, we’d be paying about $600 more a month, and I know that comes with a slew of ‘buts’ on the pro side of the page so it is a tough call.

With all that in mind we started talking about just renting a single family instead. Of course that conversation led right into buying a home. Now you all know we filed bankruptcy last year, as I’ve discussed in length before, so it will be a couple years before we’d be able to do anything about obtaining a mortgage.

So herein lies the dilemma -- stay here and save boatloads of money toward buying a home in a couple years but have to live daily with the creepy neighbors and a coin-op washer and dryer in a mold infested basement, or go and save a bit less money in the short term but be more comfortable in the daily flow of life.

As I type the question I am bombarded by what sounds like the people upstairs (the landlord’s son by the way) bowling in their living room. Sigh.

Matt plans to ask our landlord if we can make a few improvements around here (like new flooring in the kitchen, bath and mud room, a new vanity in the bath and permission to paint the stark white walls with the promise that they will be repainted when we go) and if they say yes to all of that we’ll likely just suck it up and stay for the foreseeable future.

I’ll just have to readjust my bathroom schedule so our neighbors don’t pee at the same time as me everyday, all the time, anymore.

I Would like to Think it Was an Innocent Time

When I look back on my junior high experiences gymnastics, academics, clubs, friends and boys seemed to be the priorities of the day. Gymnastics, which I had been doing since second grade, had become a character trait by the summer of 1985. Wendy, Sharon and I all worked out during the Arlington Recreation Department's sponsored gym times and would practice wherever a gym happened to be available. That particular summer we were in the Gibbs Junior High School gym.

It felt somewhat strange being at the Gibbs, like it wasn't my time yet and I was treading on some ground I was not supposed to be familiar with. On one hand I wanted to check out the school so I would know the halls and walls when I got there in a few short months but on the other it was dark outside the gym; my imagination always took over and I never ventured out. I could sense energy in the building of the memories, dreams and thoughts of so many kids before me.

The summer between grammar school and junior high was excruciatingly hot and the gym had no air conditioning just windows that stretched almost the entire way up the wall, but only opened about a half foot. The conditions were oppressive, even to me who has always loved it hot and humid. It was difficult to stay motivated to work out so we mostly just hung out on the mats, stretched and talked.

I had no delusions that I would go to the Olympics or anything but I could spend an entire day from sunrise to sundown in the gym if I was in the mood. Sometimes there was nothing better than getting on the beam with some loud music and just pounding away. I have had dreams about getting on a beam and throwing a routine together and if I think about it, I can still smell chalk.

That summer seemed to fly by, just like most summers when you are young and wish it could last forever. Gymnastics took up a big part of our time but when Wendy and I weren’t working out, we hung in our bedroom with the radio on, or spent our money on goofy teeny bopper magazines. In September, I walked through the doors of the Gibbs Junior High and quickly discovered that the halls were not as frightening as I had made them out to be in the months prior.

The Gibbs had three floors. Sewing, Computers, Cooking, Shop, Music and the lunchroom were on the basement floor. Eighth grade, The Principal's office, Art, the gym, Library and Languages were on the first floor. The top floor was seventh grade and Ms. B's room. During the first year, I spent most of my time in the gym and Ms. B's art room.

Other than Girl Scouts, clubs were a new experience in for me so I joined Art East as soon as I could. Art East was a small group of creative minded students who enjoyed various forms of art, and it was run by Ms. Bichisecchi. With Art East we got to go to cool places like the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and other locations in Boston via subway. We sang out loud on the train and while we should have been singing Van Halen or Pat Benetar, we preferred cheezy pop tunes like Mr. Sandman. When we hung out in Ms. B’s, we could silkscreen, use the light table, draw and anything else creative that came to mind. It was a nice escape from the difficulties of academics now that we were preparing ourselves for high school.

Language was a difficult subject for me but unfortunately a requirement. I wanted to take something cool like Greek, a language I knew I would use in my neighborhood, but we got to choose from Spanish, Latin or French. Spanish it was. I distinctly remember a day in seventh grade when our teacher surprised us with the fact that our oral presentations would be video taped. I had been a ham until Fifth grade, until I started going through my ugly duckling phase, and I was not especially excited to be on camera. Least of all for a subject I struggled with.

On the day of the presentation I wore a fluorescent orange sweatshirt. The color was in but I didn't want to be on camera in it. I hated not having the time to mentally prepare; my face stayed red, palms clammy and I shook the entire time I spoke. The more I struggled with standing in front of my classmates, the hotter my entire body became. It bothered me that I had become so shy in front of crowds and it would take me years to get comfortable with speaking in front of a group again.

The friends I had in junior high were individuals. None of them felt the need to be like anyone but themselves, and it was great to hang out in a group of people that were fun, funny and honest. Our group grew to include more guys and a few of my friends had even started to date. By eighth grade it was cool to let your friends hook you up so, even after my obvious geekishness on Art East trips and total shyness, I found out the guy I liked also thought I was cool.

We started dating and not only went to the year end dance together but we spent the next eight months as a couple. At age fourteen eight months is like forever. Our romance took us right into high school and really capped off such a whirlwind of the two years of fun that junior high was.

I know I am in the minority when I say that despite my awkwardness and overall geek to the core personality, I fall into the rare group of people who enjoyed these years. There was something about meeting new people, making new friends and discovering so many things about myself and the world around me in what I believe to be one of the last of the ‘ages of innocence’ that will forever bring a smile to my face.

Almost Time to Put Away the Flip Flops

As of three days ago, fall officially began but I did not need a calendar to remind me this year. In the past few days I have noticed that the leaves are turning in random pockets and progressively in the past couple weeks the temperatures here in the northeast have started the inevitable downward spiral.

Even though I am a summer baby who is still a firm advocate for the hotter the better, there is something comforting about the early days of fall. Perhaps it is the re-introduction of warm colors, like red, brown, orange and yellow, which provide me a stronger bond to the Earth instead of my usual Water connection. After a summer full of an almost inexplicable need to be in or around water of any sort (but primarily the ocean), there is a peaceful feeling that comes from abandoning my fins for the land. Cooler temperatures allow for light sweaters and hot bowls of chicken soup with stars and even though I am not a big proponent of exercise I love to take off for a woodsy hike or city stroll on a sunny day.

This Sunday morning me, Matt, my Mom and our Fearless Leader my Aunt S are taking part in the Alzheimer’s Association Memory Walk in support of and to honor the many family members and friends we all know who suffer with effects from this terrible disease. This is my fifth walk, sixth year collecting donations and I actually hit my goal this year which was really exciting. Sadly, the forecast for a nice sunny stroll like we have had in most years past is not looking good.

The event of course is rain or shine. The good news is they are doing a big lunch at the end for all the walkers and it is only a short walk from the Cambridgeside Galleria, past the Museum of Science, down part of Storrow Drive, over the MIT Bridge and back down the opposite side of the Charles River to end back at the Galleria. We always manage to have a terrific time walking no matter what it is like outside and this year will be no different regardless of the predicted showers. Maybe that will prompt all of us to walk a little quicker and return home a little faster just in case the Red Sox Yankees game is not rained out.

Luckily the Sox are in the Wild Card spot regardless if we beat the Evil Empire and really luckily the Yankees are all done no matter if we ever play this final series of the season or not. It just makes me happy to think that maybe now Giambi will get rid of the cat on his face that has clearly not helped them garner a spot in the playoffs. I understand that an outfield is slippery when wet but it always aggravates me that rarely ever is baseball played in the rain. Games can always be made up in off days or double headers later because they play roughly 160 games per regular season. Then October arrives and the beginning of fall brings an end to the baseball season and the beginning of football.

Football games are played in rain, snow, sleet, hail, driving winds, 100 degree temperatures or any other element Mother Nature can throw at non-domed stadiums and teams suck it up and play because they have to. With only seventeen weeks of regular season play there is no time for a make up game. They come at you hard and fast and leave just as quickly. Just like fall in New England.

Autumn brings my favorite nationally celebrated holiday Halloween, the perfect excuse to cuddle up on a Saturday morning with a cup of tea, and the death that brings the rebirth of spring. It is the season that is necessary for leaves to fall and blanket the Earth beneath the snow of winter when the trees, and I, hibernate. Fall is the season of change.

In honor of that change and the many others I have personally made lately, I present this brilliant piece of musical prowess to keep everyone entertained while I pack up the summer clothes and pull out the wool cable knit sweaters.

Time to change.

Maybe I will leave one pair of sandals beside the sofa, just in case we have an unexpected heat wave in October.