Letting Go for Deeper Connection

My 18-year old son is leaving tomorrow night for a gap year in Israel. This is not my first experience with a child of mine going away for a year abroad, so on the one hand, I am acclimated to the idea of him leaving. I have been so okay that I am wondering if it's going to suddenly hit me and I will be overwhelmed with emotion. I am writing today to sort through and make sense of my feelings about my son leaving.

Max and I are very close. We share so much ~ our love of similar music, playing guitar and singing together, art, philosophy, outlook on life and our crazy sense of humor. Okay, now I am beginning to realize how empty and sad the house will feel with Max gone! My older daughter is moving to her first apartment about an hour away, so that will be another big change. And the only child left at home will be my fourteen-year old who will be starting a new high school an hour away, leaving at 7 AM, returning after 6 PM. That means longer days alone to devote to my work and my outside interests, fewer obligations to my family.

As my children grow up, there are many things to adjust to. There are feelings of loss and emptiness as the house empties out. And there are feelings of elation and freedom as I have more time to devote to my own self-growth, my business development, acquiring more knowledge, learning new things that I have always wanted to learn. I will be able to travel and even move in a few years if I find that there is someplace better for me.

As Max gets ready to go, I will be sad and I will miss him. I will also stay in close contact with him through Skype, email and phone. Time will move quickly and the year will pass. Max will have an enriching year, where he will taste his first sense of freedom from his family, a time for him to get connected to his culture and his roots, to enrich his mind and his spirit. I hope that he forms a band, a dream of his. And that he gets into the college of his dreams for the following year.

With all change comes growth and adventure. I look forward to helping my children cultivate their chances for optimum learning and self-growth. And that comes with letting go, one step at a time, one year at a time. The right kind of letting go can lead to the best kind of connection. The bigger the rope, the closer we can feel. Sounds like a paradox, but it really is not.

How good are you at letting go?

My Daughter, My Hero!

I am in awe of my 21-year old daughter. She is bold, tenacious, and gets what she wants in life. She knows what she's passionate about and lives from her heart. I admire her ability to tune in so well to her intuitive wisdom.

Here's what she did last night: She went into Manhattan to meet up with two friends and have dinner. Sounds like a fun evening? Well, my daughter stepped it up quite a few notches. First, she responded yesterday to an email request for an intern position at a fashion house during fashion week in New York. She got an immediate response from the company, and a few hours later went to the interview. Tenacious? Wow! And not only did she get the position, she will be going backstage and meeting with designers and models, a coveted position awarded to her due to her immediate response to the email.

But wait, it gets more interesting. After the interview, she called me, excitedly retelling the details of her upcoming internship, and abruptly stopped as she noticed a big crowd outside Madison Square Garden. She said, "Gotta go, Mom. Taylor Swift is gonna be at MSG and I want to see if I can meet her!"

She called back a few hours later to say that she bought tickets from a scalper, and she wasn't sure if they were legit or not, but she didn't care. The whole experience of being there, jumping at the opportunity to see Taylor Swift, and actually getting tickets was enough for her. If she was out $40, she was prepared to deal with that.

And of course, the tickets were fakes. So, do you think she just left Madison Square Garden? Of course not! I think you're beginning to get the way she works. She and the police tried to catch the scalper who was long gone, so she decided to just hang out with crew members outside MSG and continue to try to get into the concert.

While waiting outside, she became friendly with crew members and managers to convince them to bring her free water, guitar picks imprinted with Taylor's face, and lots of other free things. She has guts, and is not afraid to ask for things. At 9:30, she and her two friends were allowed entry to the concert. Seconds later, she called and let us listen to "Love Story" live!

When I picked her up at the train station at midnight, she was still buzzing with a feeling of empowerment and excitement around her evening's adventures. What could have been a ho-hum night out with friends turned into an exhilarating and fun escapade. I admire a person who grabs life by the horns and creates what she wants.

What have you done lately that got your adrenaline going?

Sad News and Blessings Counted

I just found out that a Coaching colleague of mine passed away yesterday. Natalie Kaye was in her mid-fifties, a kind woman with a big heart who died too young. I was hopeful that her remission from lung cancer would be permanent. I am so sad that she is no longer with us.

The last time I saw her was in the fall at an International Coaches Federation meeting. Her hair had grown back, and her short "do" flattered her newly slimmed down body. She seemed to be thriving. She had left a stressful job and was coaching full time, fulfilling a dream.

Natalie and I first met in our coaching courses at the Coaches Training Institute. Like me, she was very outspoken in class, and we had some great one-on-one practice coaching sessions with each other. Sometime around our third course, I found out that Natalie and I shared more than just a passion for coaching. We realized we were both Jewish, and she grew up amongst mostly Orthodox Jews. She was shocked that I was Orthodox, as her memory of Orthodoxy was all about judgment and superiority. I helped change her view on Orthodox Jews, and Natalie kept promising me a visit to my home for a Friday night Sabbath meal. Unfortunately, we never were able to make that happen.

Another memory I have is of a coaching course that was coming to a close. One of the co-leaders of the course cut Natalie off and did not have patience or understanding about something she was having difficulty wrapping her head around. She was so grateful that I was able to empathize with her, and she wrote me a beautiful email about feeling seen and understood by me. Her acknowledgment touched me deeply.

Natalie will be remembered with love by her many friends and family. Let us take some time today to remember our blessings and focus on what's really important in life. Don't put anything off for another day. You never know what tomorrow may bring. Live today like it counts!

My New Web Presence

I just hired Francisco Rosales to help me brand my web presence for my Life Coach business. I realized that my internet presence was not unified or uniquely identifiable with me and what my business represents, and I value clarity and ease of recognition. I know that I won't stay long on a site that is difficult to navigate or confusing to understand.

I am proud of the fact that I have a web presence. It began with my art website, WonderfullyWhimsical.com, which I have since dismantled and will be relaunching at a later date. I agonized about getting started, placing lots of obstacles in the way of having a website. It was a lot easier than I had imagined, as most things are.

My next step was my coaching site, lifecoachsandy.com, a site that I created almost two years ago with the assistance of the extremely helpful one-on-one trainers at the Apple store. I began my newsletters a year or two earlier, and changed the professional look of them with my new Apple mail program. My blog was launched in April of this year, and 94 posts later, I am loving the discipline of writing almost daily and the clarity it has brought to my vision for my life and work.

Currently, all of my web presence has a different look and a different name. I am about to change all of that with Francisco's help. I have found a new domain name, and I am keeping it a surprise for now. Over the next few weeks, as work progresses on my site and I unify all of it under one umbrella, I will be letting you know my new business name and my new focus.

Until then, stay posted!

Date a Dud

Nice guy, not for me. Maybe for someone I know? The important thing is beginning. As in any process, it takes time to figure out what you want and what works for you.

I see dating in the same way as trying on new clothes, seeing what fits, what works on my body, what looks like I'm trying too hard, what is pretty but not on me. It's hard to know what works without trying things on. If I ponder what clothing will fit well, I may never know what really works. I might be surprised with the perfect match of a color or look that I thought wouldn't be for me. But I would never know if I just sat home thinking about it.

So, I embark on trying on dates, seeing who I am after a 25-year dating hiatus, seeing who men are after marriage, divorce, death of a spouse. Who we all have become after careers, managing or mismanaging our lives, becoming parents, owning homes. None of the same blueprints as 25 years ago. Lots to learn and discover.

What's the most significant way you have changed in the last 25 years?

Dating 101: Addendum

So, on second thought, as I get ready for my date, I will ditch the questionnaire. Too control freak of me. Too intense. I am glad I wrote it up, as it served as a template for what I will be paying attention to tonight, but it is too intense for a first date.

As an old friend of mine pointed out, "Just have fun", so that is what I plan to do. Of course, I may sneak in one flirty fun question, maybe "What was the most exciting or dangerous thing you ever did?" Now that would be interesting to me!

Dating 101: A Questionnaire

Tonight is my first date in 25 years. Two years after my divorce, I met this guy on an online dating site, and he seems like a really good guy, impeccable values, great reflective listening skills, self-aware, willing to take responsibility for what he has created in his life.

When we meet for dinner tonight, I want to have meaningful conversation, which is not a stretch for me. What is a stretch is being more deliberate about what I ask him. I am really curious to know him better, and I find that since we have a limited time to get to know anyone, why not make the best of it?

So, I devised a questionnaire to give me clarity about where I want the conversation to go tonight. I am sure that I will end up not asking some of these questions, and being the flexible and spontaneous person that I am, who knows where the conversation will actually go. I have no clue as to where he will be directing the conversation (after all, there are two of us in the equation), but the questions are basically here for me to set an intention about what I want to create tonight.

Dating Questions:

1) What's a hidden talent or passion that you have?

2) What are you most afraid of?

3) What's holding you back in life?

4) What do you want more of? Less of?

5) Five years from now, where do you see yourself?

6) If you had a magic wand and could

change anything in your life,

what would you change?

7) What's the scariest thing you ever did?

Yes, I am aware that it sounds like I am coaching him, but you can't take the Life Coach out of me. It is really who I am, not a role I play with my clients. Becoming a life coach changed my life and opened my world to better self-awareness and self-expression. I utilize those skills every day. And I think that they will come in handy when navigating the dating world.

What questions would you add to the list?

Home Again, Naturally

Yes, I am home and it feels good to be back. It is ultimately where I belong, with my delicious kids, feeling warm and cozy (or cooled off from the 100 degree heat and cozy), appreciating the quiet and comfort when and where I choose it, reconnecting to my friends and my clients who took a summer hiatus.

Yet, I love that I get to fulfill so many of my less visited passions for two months a year~especially creating and learning many forms of art and teaching kids. Camp is my learning lab, a place I first learned to be a ceramicist, and I used that skill ten years ago to start a ceramics program at my kids' private day school, bartering for tuition. Camp is where I get to leave my parenting responsibilities to some extent while I get to be fed three times a day instead of planning three meals a day for my family.

So, I am back to cooking and cleaning, dealing with the everyday banter of teens, the big and little issues that come up hour to hour. I am already shopping for back-to-school clothes for the kids, helping my son prepare for his gap year abroad, and readying my oldest for the move to her first apartment. I am immersed in bill paying, cleaning, devoting time to my clients and making future plans for my business. And it's all good. I do enjoy the balance, it feels natural to me.

How do I make the transition easier?

1) I have a vision for what I am going towards when I leave the comfort of one thing and transition to the next.

2) I set goals towards making that vision a reality.

3) I set a daily intention to set the tone for the day and make sure I am accountable. Blogging helps me!

As immersed as I was in the crazy pace of the summer, running a really busy art department and overseeing so many wonderful projects, including the dragon for banquet (see below), it is just as easy and fulfilling to do a 180 degree turn and slip back into the life I have created back home.

I feel like a horse entering the race track after the starter gun has been fired. I have hit the ground running and the adrenaline is pumping. I love the excitement that change brings, and I can't wait to see what I create as the week unfolds.

What's one thing that helps you deal with change?

Leaving One World, Entering Another

Last night's banquet was so much fun. There was a homemade dragon held up by about 6 counselors, many people dressed in Asian garb, and food to match the Asian theme. The kitchen worked all day to prepare the delicious food, and the campers were all decked out in their finest dressy clothes. They clean up well!

There was a slide show filled with summer memories. It's hard to believe that camp is over, signifying the end of summer for me. I have learned to love sleep away camp. I get to wear my art teacher hat, connect with kids of all ages, and meet new and old friends whom I see only in the summer. I have learned so much about relationships and how to navigate them more successfully. I created a new art and meditation program for kids. And I was well fed and taken care of by the kitchen staff. I kayaked, walked up mountains, and visited friends at their lake homes in New Hampshire and Maine.

I am sad to leave this summer life and re-enter reality. In times of transition, it helps me to focus on what I am going towards and not what I am leaving behind. So, I am also really looking forward to seeing my two kids whom I miss so much. I miss my home, my bed, the quiet of my dining room. I miss chairs with backs on them. I am looking forward to a mosquito free zone. And to seeing my good friends and extended family.

I got teary this morning watching the kids hug each other goodbye as they left to go on their buses home. And I am finally almost packed and ready to go.

Transitions are easiest when we can see what's possible on the other side. I am fully cognizant of the possibility that awaits me at home. And I look forward to seeing what lies ahead!

What helps you in times of transition?

How Did You Grow?

How did you grow this summer? For the kids here in camp, the answer can be twofold--physically and spiritually. There will definitely be kids here who come home taller or wider. But they will also come home filled with experiences and memories that will last a lifetime.

I am much more interested in the spiritual aspect of their growth as opposed to their physical growth. I am about to step into running my final art and meditation prayer service this morning and I have been contemplating what question to ask them to paint the answer to. I want to sum up the summer and leave them with food for thought, a mantra to take with them back home, to represent something they learned that helped them grow.

I decided to ask them the same question I asked at the bunk party I threw for my daughter: "What did you learn this summer?" After a brief discussion, I will give them time to paint how they will apply that to real life at home.

I can't wait to hear the discussion!

How did you grow this summer? What did you learn about yourself?

Busy Day

I haven't had a minute to sit down and write until now. Today was the last day of color war, and the art room was busy from after breakfast till dinner. I had some wonderful helpers this morning to assist in the massive cleanup and sorting that needs to be done, and I look forward to more help tomorrow. I am exhausted!

This is the second year that I was left alone in the art department to close all three departments; woodshop, ceramics and art. I am responsible for making sure nothing liquid gets frozen, and that all things are covered properly to be best preserved from dust and mice. Last year mice got into the insulation on one of our glass kilns and ate right through...yuck! I am feeling a strong need for support right about now, and luckily, my friend Rachel came back to camp and is willing (and able) to give me that support.

I look forward to finishing up in the art room before the end of the summer banquet, which will be lots of fun. Then on to packing up my living quarters... ay ay ay.

The Hidden Miracle

On Saturday, I had a bunk party for my daughter's bunk. This was our last weekend together, so after morning prayers, they all came to the air-conditioned lobby of the building that I live in. It has been really hot and humid at camp, so the air-conditioning was a real treat in and of itself. Twenty kids and three counselors sat around and did not touch the food I had put out. They waited patiently for almost a half hour while we talked before partaking of the food. To witness twenty 14-year-olds sitting in front of bowls of barbecued chips, Twizzlers, M&M's, Kettle Corn, and Cheeze Its and refrain from eating....a small miracle!

But wait, there's more! I am a big believer in finding meaning in everything, so this had to be a meaningful get-together. My main agenda in having the girls over was to get to know them a bit better. My daughter video chats with these girls all year long, and I barely know any of them. Here was my opportunity to see who she has kept company with for two months a year for the last three years.

I wanted to direct the conversation so that I would quickly learn about each girl. So I asked them to announce their name, where they were from, and one thing they learned in camp this summer.

The answers I got to my question about their summer learning take-aways blew me away. One girl said that she learned to meditate on her food, to really look at it, think about where it came from, and chew it slowly in order to appreciate the food more and elevate her eating. Another said she learned to meditate to alleviate pain. One remarked about her new belief that things will pass, and to be hopeful for a better outcome when she is stressed. I got a few funny answers, such as, "I learned to love milk! I don't know why, but I just love it! I can't get enough of it!"

I shared with them what I learned this summer, many of which I have been blogging about. My biggest learning though, I think, was that change brings good things and small miracles. If I hadn't changed to the art department from the ceramics room, I would never have gotten to know so many wonderful counselors and kids. The relationships I formed this summer are small treasures. I told them that I might never have introduced my art and meditation prayer group had I been in the ceramics room. Many of the girls in this bunk had attended these sessions and they were my most open and deep group of all. They all expressed how meaningful the sessions were for them, too. I told them how polite, kind, and smart they were. I love how they think, and how open they have become. I love seeing their growth from emerging adolescents to young adults in three short years. I told them that I worked in several other camps, but that this camp had the most polite and sweet kids and counselors. They then snarfed down the food in a matter of minutes, thanked me profusely, and left.

So, what began as a way to connect with the girls ended up being much deeper and more meaningful than I could have imagined. I am grateful for the small miracles that happened at this bunk party. And that my daughter has such wonderful friends!

What hidden miracles are you experiencing?

Everything I Need to Know I Learned in Camp

I never went to camp as a child. I always felt that I missed out on something important, mostly a chance to make lifelong friends. I never realized what else I was missing out on until I witnessed it all first hand as an adult.

Ten years ago, I began working in sleep away camps by default. A friend called and said there was an opening as art director for a camp in the Pennsylvania Pocono Mountains. My gut instinct was to say "NO", but I gave it much thought. Another good friend said I should seize the opportunity. She had grown up as a 'staff brat' in sleep away camps her whole life, and it was one of the highlights of her life. So, I accepted the position and learned on the job. I knew very little about leadership in those days, and I felt inadequately prepared, but I soon realized that I was good at art direction, and I loved the crafts I was learning.

I have since brought my camp experience to my kids' schools, introducing a ceramics department to their elementary school, teaching to offset private school tuition for three kids. I now had a marketable skill, an added bonus I hadn't considered when I accepted the camp position.

This is the third sleep away camp experience I have had, and it's surprisingly been my best summer yet.

Here are the next five things I learned in camp:

1) Stay connected to kids. They can be your best teachers, and they keep your spirit alive. I feel that I have been injected with enough joy and lust for life to last me a long time.

2) A little humility goes a long way. Be prepared to be wrong, and especially not to have to prove you are right. It helps mend relationships, especially when you are working in close quarters with the same people you live with for seven weeks!

3) Be open. I have learned so much from the people who are the most unlike me. For example, the woodworking guy who is new this year is not Jewish. He walked into a camp that is not only Jewish but also has a lot of spoken Hebrew. And he jumped right in and learned some key Hebrew words. He even learned how to pronounce the guttural "CH" sound that so many Jews have difficulty with! I love his 'can do' attitude, and with his quiet nature, he observed and connected with so many campers.

4) Be grateful. I am so thankful for the food that the kitchen prepares for me every day. It can be monotonous and tiring to have to think of what to serve my family every day, and I don't love cleaning up and shopping for food. I have a break from all of that for two months every year and I appreciate every bite of food, even when it is not my favorite thing to eat. I am always mindful of the fact that I didn't shop for it, plan it, cook it or clean it up! It tastes so much better that way!!

5) Go outside and be with nature. It is such a gift to go outside and be in the New Hampshire countryside. To take a walk up a mountain every day. To take out a kayak and paddle around the lake whenever I feel like it. To visit a goat. To see the budding fruit trees that were planted just a year or two ago. It is all wonderful and beautiful no matter the weather. We need to be outside more often!

Enjoy your weekend! What life lessons will you share?

Life Lessons Learned in Summer Camp

As I enter the last week of camp, I find myself contemplating what I learned this summer. Here are some of the great lessons I am leaving with:

1) Things don't always turn out like you predicted. I thought this summer would be particularly challenging due to a change in my position in camp. I loved working in ceramics, and was switched to working in the art room. Entering someone else's domain was not smooth and easy at first. However, Jayne and I quickly found our groove and worked beautifully together. I learned a new form of art, precious metal clay, and made some beautiful jewelry. I also rediscovered fabric dying techniques, such as batik and silk painting, and I loved working in this medium again.

2) Change your place, change your luck. When I switched to the art room, I met so many more of the campers and counselors. Ceramics was pretty isolated, but everyone passes through the art room for any activity involving art supplies, which is almost everything. So, I felt more connected and I love being connected.

3) Opportunities for development are yours for the asking. When I volunteered to lead my first art and meditation alternative prayer group, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. When 65 kids showed up for the first class, I knew I was onto something great. Over the 7 weeks of camp, I have tweaked the program and now have a successful product that I can take elsewhere. Yesterday, a girl who had attended a few weeks ago told me how being in my group helped make her day better!

4) Patience is way underrated. Having a teenaged daughter can be quite challenging, and having her here in camp is particularly difficult. Most of the time, she acts as if I don't exist. I know that it is not about me but about her own need to differentiate herself from me. I can be very frustrated and sad nonetheless. So, when she came to my morning art and prayer group this past week and told me that she recruited several of her friends, I was pleasantly surprised. When she said that I led a good group, I almost fell over. My patience has certainly paid off.

I will talk more about life lessons learned in camp in future blogs.

What life lessons have you learned this summer?

On Golden Pond

What a glorious day off I had! I went to Center Harbor, New Hampshire yesterday to spend the day with a neighbor from back home. She lives in a beautiful rustic home on Squam Lake, the very same lake where On Golden Pond was filmed. We set out in a canoe and picked wild blueberries on the way. It's not so easy to pick blueberries when you are not anchored in the water. Careful to protect my eye from being poked, I grabbed onto a branch and shoved berries into a plastic zip top bag as the canoe rocked from side to side. After we rowed to the dock across the lake, Lizzie jumped in for a swim, while I lay out basking in the sun, munching on my fresh picked berries.

The conversation was dynamic as Lizzie and I got to know each other better. Back home, we were always fond of each other, but our busy lives didn't leave time for deep conversation. The lake was conducive to heart to heart talks, and we both had much to say!

When we got back to her house, we made lunch and coffee and ate on her screened-in porch overlooking the mountains and the lake. Breathtaking! Soon, Eloise, her 63 year old organic farmer hippie singer friend came over to jam with Lizzie. Eloise used to be in a blue grass band, and she now sings in her local church. She has a beautiful soprano voice, and accompanied herself with an accordion-like instrument, a tambourine, and a flat bottomed ukulele. Lizzie tuned up her guitar, handed me a bongo drum, and the fun began. I haven't sung like that in years, three part harmony to old Pete Seeger folk songs, Peter Paul and Mary, Cat Stevens, Simon and Garfunkel and more. At first, I was intimidated. While I love to sing, I don't have a strong voice, and I was in the company of two professionals. My saboteur was telling me not to sing too loud just in case I made a mistake. My more loving self told me to just let it rip and have fun. We sang through a thunderstorm that brought us indoors for about an hour, and then back outdoors when the sun shined as if it had never rained.

In real life, Lizzie sings in two bands, Swingset Mamas, her children's band with partner Marlowe Bechmann. She moonlights as a rock guitarist and vocalist in another band that I do not know the name of (sorry...).

Before we knew it, two hours had passed and Lizzie had to hightail it out of there to pick up little Lucy from day camp. Hugging each other goodbye, we made plans to get together when we are back to "real" life.

I love being up in this area of the country, and I made a conscious effort to make my last day off from camp a memorable experience. When I set out with an intention, it really helps me to focus on having that intention come to fruition. Yesterday was a perfect example of that. I turned down many invitations from fellow staff: to go bowling (fun but I can do that at home), to go shopping at an outlet mall (not so much fun and not helpful to my dwindling checking account), having lunch with a friend and her relatives at a beautiful lake (the most appealing of all my invitations, and one I would have accepted had it not been for Lizzie's invite).

What do you do for fun and recreation? Are you making time to really slow down and relax and have fun?

A Little Empathy Goes a Long Way!

I sat across from her at breakfast and we smiled at each other. When would be the right time to resolve the conflict I was feeling with 'S'? Certainly not in the noisy dining room here at camp. I headed over to the art room after breakfast and seized the first private moment we had.

As she stepped outside to check on her batik (that she worked on in my classroom the day before), I asked if I could talk to her about something. Here's how it went:

Me: This is about yesterday when you came into my classroom while I was teaching in the afternoon. I am imagining that when you came in to work on your project, you were trying to alleviate some of the stress you were feeling. Is this true?

S: Yes.

Me: I understand that you were under a lot of stress. When you came into the middle of my class, your actions added stress to my day.

S: I am sorry. I didn't realize that. I was caught up in my own world.

Me: I get that. I don't have an issue with you working on your own work. You just need to do that on your own time. Before or after class is in session, never during. Is that clear?

S: Absolutely.

There were no hard feelings, no accusations, just clear expression of the impact her actions had on me. And what I expected from now on.

What makes a confrontation like this more successful is empathy. I started out empathizing with what might have been going on for her. We are all meeting our various needs all day. Sometimes we don't consider how that might impact another. I have come to realize how important empathy is.

The icing on the cake is that the camp director, a naturally direct and task oriented non-empathic person, expressed empathy to me at breakfast. She said, "You are all alone in the art room now." And then she pouted. How unlike anything I had ever witnessed before from her! I thanked her for the empathy. And she replied, "A little empathy goes a long way!" I answered, "It sure does!"

Will you share one example of when you have used empathy instead of being reactive?

Confront or Avoid?

I believe strongly in confrontation. While it is far from easy to confront, most people I know would rather do nothing than confront someone who hurt their feelings. Of course, there is also a small population of people I know who confront immediately, usually in a reactive, voices raised, all out screaming match. I prefer to not be reactive, mulling over my response for a bit before confronting. But I make it my business to confront.

If we hold back our feelings until the heat has passed, two things can happen.

1) We have a clearer head and can be empathic towards another, guaranteeing that the other person will better receive your message.

2) We "get over it" for a while. In my experience, this method of dealing usually results in the issues just laying dormant like a virus, ready to boil up again with the next similar trigger. At which time, all hell can break loose.

"S" is a woman who arrived two weeks ago to help mornings in the art room and work on the camp yearbook in the afternoons. Yesterday, the ceramics teacher and the woman who co-runs the art room left for the summer, eleven days before camp ends. While I am not happy that no one consulted with me about the impact that would have on my life, the deal was done by administration before camp began, so there was little I could do about it. I had already processed this and was prepared to be alone this week.

I had suggested to "S" that since her schedule is flexible in the afternoons, would she be willing to flip her schedule and help me in the afternoon, when I have full bunks of 15-20 campers, rather than the mornings, where I have a maximum of 8 kids. She said she would think about it and let me know.

So yesterday, when the two other teachers left and I was feeling overwhelmed, I asked again about the likelihood of her switching. She answered with an emphatic no, that her life was so stressed and that she really couldn't even help in the mornings, but would stay for one period. I was surprised at her response, but let it go. Not much I could do.

Okay, here's the trigger: First period in the afternoon, I have a full bunk doing a project that needs a lot of hands on help from me, and "S" shows up to work on her own project on another table! I felt my blood boiling, and a voice in my head said, "How dare she come in here to work on her own thing while I am teaching alone after she told me that she couldn't afford the time to help ME in the afternoons!!!" (Steam coming out of ears...)

Hence the impending confrontation. I have rehearsed what I want to say to her. Here goes:

"S", I need to talk to you about something. Is this a good time to talk? Great. So, yesterday, when you came in to work on your project during my afternoon class, I am imagining that you were there to take a break from your stressful schedule. That you were looking to alleviate some of your stress. Is this true? (wait for response)

Well, when you came in, it added stress to my life and I was angry. I was feeling very overwhelmed with all the changes in the art room and my added responsibilities. I would like to make a request that you work on your art when there is no class in session. Does that work for you?

Wish me luck! How do you deal with confrontation?

Why Don't People Want to Grow Up?

I received many comments on my Facebook page regarding yesterday's blog post question: When did you first realize that you had become a grown-up? Almost everyone said that they are not yet grown-up. Which got me to thinking about this whole growing up business and what it means to different people.

I know that people are partially kidding when they say that they don't want to grow up or that they are not grown ups yet. But I think that you can peel back a few layers to the core truth: aging is not celebrated in this country. We have a huge industry to keep us feeling and looking young.

Is this really an ideal that we want to encourage? The people I know who had plastic surgery in their late thirties and forties to "fix" their aging faces and bodies are still striving for a level of perfection that can be very elusive. It's like chasing your tail. It's hard to know when you are "there" because as soon as you get "there", you notice other "imperfections".

Here's how I feel about the aging process: I love the knowledge and wisdom I have been blessed with as I age. I would not want to go back in time and be any other age. The only challenge I have is that I have to be more careful with my body, exercising more, eating more carefully, and stretching more often. My younger body was very forgiving, while my older body has taught me to be more mindful.

What have you learned from your aging process?

Help, I'm a Grown-Up!

My mom just sent me an email about a writing contest for Real Simple magazine. The topic is "When did you first realize that you had become a grown-up?" and the prize is $3,000, the cost of putting in a new oil tank to replace my rusting one. I sure could use the money, and the contest is sparking the creative juices. Here's what I came up with so far:

1) Age 16, telling my mom to get divorced because they were always fighting, and I thought I understood what was best for the two of them. It took another 12 years, but they finally did listen to my teenage advice.

2) Getting married. Becoming a Mrs. was quite grown-up and carried with it a whole new set of life skills and responsibilities.

3) Giving birth to my first son, Avi, born with a fatal disease, Fanconi Anemia. I learned to advocate for him and became an expert in his disease. It was my first realization that doctors don't know everything.

I felt empowered in the only way I knew, as his caretaker and loving mom.

4) After Avi's death at age 5, I think I grew up even more.

Lots of life experiences to think about. More to explore in future blog entries.

When did you first realize you were a grown-up?