Done for the Past Two Weeks: The Heart of, er, Family

Another week, and in this case two, done.  Another year gone. 

If I were trying to cut a wide swath through life, I might be worried at my lack of "progress."  But since I believe more in being awake for the journey than in racing to its endpoint, I am learning to be content with my small moments.

Here are some recent achievements, as I closed out 2011:

Done for the Past Two Weeks:  Dec. 19, 2011-Jan. 1, 2012

1. Finished Christmas shopping
2. Finished Christmas decorating, minimalist style 
3. Packed for taking Christmas on the road
4. Got our dog settled in his vacation digs
5. Traveled to New Orleans--surviving a hectic departure, which included delaying a plane full of people while my husband ran for the gate
6. Spent time with my sister and her family
7. Celebrated Christmas with my mom, my husband and my two sons 
8. Took my sister and her family out to dinner
9. Watched four basketball games with various family members
10. Held a Polar Express party with my grandson 
11. Celebrated New Year's Eve with my daughter, her husband and two children, my husband, and one of my sons
12. Reunited with our dog after a week away
13. Took my dog to the dog park with my husband, and on two long walks  
14. Watched Kung Fu Panda II, with my son and husband
15. Continued reading Elizabeth George's A Traitor to Memory aloud with my husband--only a couple of hundred pages left
16. Went to dinner with my husband
17. Unpacked
18. Biked once, walked five times
19. Read The Dante Club, by Matthew Pearl;  My Life as a Furry Red Monster: What Being Elmo Has Taught Me About Life, Love, and Laughing Out Loud, by Kevin Clash
20. Continued to work my two part-time jobs
21. Published 1 blog post
22. Continued work on current clients' projects
23. Spent 6 hours working on recall campaign
24. Attended 2 yoga classes
25. Did laundry 
26. Meditated 6 times
27. Began moving our bedroom, exchanging rooms with my son
28. Shopped for new bed
29. Communicated with my mom's investment advisor; used trading authority to make needed adjustments
30. Looked into reverse mortgage for my mom
31. Confirmed my mom's dental insurance coverage
32. Began sorting books, in preparation for offloading a couple of hundred no-longer-needed volumes

As for many people in this most family-oriented of seasons, my time for the last two weeks was focused on family.  The efforts I made, and the experiences we shared were the most important things that were done during the past two weeks.  Our holiday wasn't perfect, but no lives were ruined in its making.  I count myself blessed to have spent these days surrounded by people I love, who love me and each other.  As always for me, the challenge is to come off such intense absorption in family to make room for my separate existence.  I am currently reading May Sarton's A House by the Sea, one of her journaled odes to solitude, which may help in retrieving my inner life.  But then May Sarton didn't share her home with three large male humans in various (and fluctuating) stages of maturity. . .

My focus goal for this period was to make time to exercise at least three times, and to meditate daily.  To be clear, that goal was meant to cover the first of the last two weeks.  Since I didn't get around to blogging last week, by extension the goal targets should be doubled.  

I did manage to get some exercise in, and in the process to baptize my new running shoes.  With the New Year, it is time to kick it up a notch, and to resume, gently, a more strenuous training regimen.  My tri training partner opened 2012 with a lovely e-card, and a separate email detailing all the races she wants to do this year--including one I haven't yet warmed to, a muddy 5K obstacle course slog called the Dirty Girl!  But my injuries are mostly healed, and my excuses used up.  So it's back to the track, and the pool, and the bike trainer this week.  My focus goal?  One session each, running (sort of), biking and swimming. 

As for my meditation goal, well, I did take lots and lots of college math so I know that daily meditating for two weeks would have resulted in a few more than 5 sessions.  The first week, however, was the crucial one, with all its built-in challenges and demands.  I meditated four times that week (twice while squished into an airplane seat that was a tight fit even for my diminutive self), but only two times since returning home the middle of last week.  

My New Year's resolution is still in draft stage (stay tuned), but is going to require regular meditating. 

On Thanksgiving: 10 Things to be Thankful For if You're a Procrastinator

Everything, it seems, is political these days.  The internet is awash with advice on how to avoid political wrangling at our holiday tables; how to eat ethically; and why we should opt out of a politically incorrect celebration of our vanquishing of a native people.  Here in Wisconsin, people are using the occasion of the holiday to recommend the removal of the "biggest turkey of all"--our governor.

But whatever our stance on Thanksgiving, the holiday, it can serve as a reminder to be grateful for all that we have.  So whether we are preparing a feast (with or without meat; organic or not) or a TV dinner; suffering relatives or other fools, or dining alone; eating out or in; or boycotting the whole turkey day thing--we can take a moment to appreciate the good things in our lives.

If we are procrastinators, we may be late (for Thanksgiving, or whatever else we are doing today), but we do have some "gifts" that are all our very own.

Ten Things to be Thankful For If You're a Procrastinator:

1. The long-suffering friends, family and coworkers who love us anyway
2. The "procrastination industry"--all those writers, researchers, bloggers, therapists, coaches and consultants who are hell-bent on improving us
3. All the cool t-shirts, mugs, hats, mouse pads, refrigerator magnets and other paraphernalia that make light of our condition, and allow us to announce it to the world
4. The time we can spend smelling the roses when we're putting off something else
5. Fast food, microwaves, express lines, all night copy shops, and all those other cheats that aid us in our last-minute dashes
6. The luxury we allow ourselves to complete no project before its time
7. The good company we're in
8. Always having something to do, by virtue of never having finished so many things
9. Not having a worse affliction/character flaw
10. Tomorrow

Rather than wishing you a Happy Thanksgiving, my wish is for you to Be Happy, and Give Thanks!

Cheers!

Musings of a Lame Duck Mom

A mother holds her children's hands for a little while. . . their hearts forever.

I was going to post this on Mother's Day, but my husband and children kept me too busy celebrating to finish it.  So here it is, in true procrastinator fashion, five days late.

I never intended to become so wrapped up in mothering.  If the truth be known, in fact, there was a time when I thought I didn't want children.  In the heady rush of my feminist awakening, I made big plans, and they did not include little people.

But what did my head know? 

My three children, when they did come, were all surprises.

And so was the mother they gave birth to.

Turns out, loving and nurturing and enjoying small persons whose care, and upkeep, and upbringing I have been entrusted with is probably my greatest gift.  In every sense of the word.

As I approach the end of the thirty-three plus uninterrupted years I have spent as a mom to minor children--my youngest turns eighteen next month--I find myself somewhat at sea. 

My nest is not yet empty.  Two of my children still live under my roof, and the other is ten blocks away.  I am not finished being a mother.  But I am not nearly so actively engaged in mothering as I was even a year ago.

There are some other things I have to contribute, and meaningful--if not lucrative--work that I am doing.  But I am not sure I will ever again be as good at anything, or that I will derive as much satisfaction, or have as much fun as I have had as a mother.

Then again, having backed into this particular phase of my life, perhaps there is something wonderful ahead that I haven't foreseen. . . .

Happy (belated) Mother's Day, to my mother, who taught me more than I acknowledged; to my daughter, who first made me a mother; and to all of us moms, accidental and otherwise!

Achievements of a Soon-to-be-Rich-and-Famous

Breaking news!

I am elated to announce that I have just sold my novel--Anything But Quiet on the Western Front--to Doubleday.  The deal specifies publication by Christmas, and a $100,000 advance.  I always knew one day my hard work would pay off, but this is beyond belief!

In an unrelated event, I ran my first ever 8-minute mile yesterday.  At this rate, I should cut last year's triathlon finishing time in half for this year's August race.

All this, and the best good-hair day of my life.

Oh, and yeah, finally getting to show off the handsprings I mastered all those years ago, in preparation for just such a confluence of events.

Sometimes, I guess, the gods really do smile down on us.

And sometimes, it's April Fools Day.

Just Say Later

So, I'm still experiencing this lag between me and the world.  The latest thing I missed--to my knowledge--was International Procrastination Day, which was apparently last Friday, March 26.

This morning, I came across a Daily Telegraph article which identifies David d'Equainville as its founder.  What caught my eye was d'Equainville's casting of  procrastination as "a political act."  And not just any political act, but "a crucial act of resistance" in an increasingly overwhelming and speeded up society.  This is right up my alley.

Author of "Manifesto for a Day Put Off," recently released in French and soon to be published in English, d'Equainville says

To procrastinate is to refuse to do what the context -- be it from bosses, administrative obligations or a culture of results -- asks us to do. We must absolutely take the time to think about the tasks we accept to execute, or we will lose all control over our lives.

So I'm not a laggard, I'm a time activist.  

d'Equainville (my new hero) advocates taking time, not just to escape the rat race, but to reflect on decisions and actions, about "the tasks we accept to execute." He gives the example of Shakespeare's Romeo, who could have benefitted from some thinking time.   

If Romeo had put his suicide off a bit on Juliet's tomb, the two lovebirds could have grown old together.

d'Equainville gives his blessing to a delayed celebration of the day he established, so I'm declaring today for my observance of International Procrastination Day.  For the next 24 hours, I will tackle no project before its time.

The Procrastinator's Guide to the Galaxy--Coming Soon to a Theatre Near You

Procrastination has become a household word.  A buzzword.  Ubiquitous.  Trendy, even?

If I needed convincing, I have only to observe that even St. Patrick's Day has a procrastination angle.  As in these two articles I found this morning: 

The procrastinator's guide to St. Patrick's Day: Green beer & Lucky Charms at 7 a.m.?  

and   

Wait Out Procrastination Week the Fun Way While Also Celebrating St. Patrick's Day, What do you guys Do!?, 

the latter of which features this memorable suggestion--

If nothing else, we always have St Patrick’s Day—the day where everyone is Irish and no one is really sure why they’re celebrating. This year it lies dangerously close to National Procrastination Week (the week after!), so it’s up to you, casual procrastinator, to rise above and beyond the call of duty to make St. Patrick’s day your masterpiece. Like Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel, paint the day with absolute zero effort to get things done. Turn your cell phones off and your procrastination potential on to full max.

In the process of learning that we procrastinators have our very own special experience of St. Paddy's Day, I also discovered Procrastinator's Guides to Thanksgiving, Year End Fund-Raising, Oscar Voting, Valentine's Day, Father's Day, Success, PC Maintenance, YouTube, Investing, a Green Halloween, Ocean Acidification. . .

and the list goes on.  

The permutations are seemingly endless.  You name it, we'll screw it up, and thus require post-delay rescue.

Who knew?

And ever the poster child for postponement, I'll be celebrating my Irish heritage tomorrow. . . since I ran out of time today.  I don't even need a guide, I've been doing this so long.

Happy National Procrastination Week--Eventually

 I have been so busy lately, I've hardly had time to procrastinate!  I even let National Procrastination Week slide off my horizon.

As I traipsed through hyperspace this evening, looking for inspiration on the subject, I discovered something curious.  There seems to be some confusion about which week is set aside for recognition of my favorite vice.  Sources are divided on whether this Holiday for Delay is to be celebrated the first or second week in March.  And NPR's Morning Edition, in 2006, confessed confusion about the purpose of the holiday.  

It is National Procrastination Week and we're not sure if that means it's a good time to put things off, or a reminder to get moving.

Dr. Timothy Pychyl's 2010 Don't Delay post for National Procrastination Week expressed the disaffection of the academic procrastination researcher for the observance.  He remarked that, in keeping with its spirit, we might as well also celebrate  

National Over-Eating Week, National Compulsive-Shopping Week, National Addicted-Gamblers Week, and we could even add a week for problem drinkers as well.

Sources are vague on the origin of the practice, though most attribute it, like Jennifer Becker Landsberger, to the 

"Procrastination Club of America", which is apparently putting off getting a real website.

 

Given the latitude afforded by this relatively unstructured event, I suggest that those of us in the procrastination business deal with all this ambiguity and ambivalence by taking matters into our own hands.  Us postponers should decide which week to designate, and whether to mark it by giving free reign to our procrastinating selves, or by reining in our troublesome impulses.  And retaining the ultimate prerogative of the foot-dragger, whichever week we light on for remembering dalliance, we should reserve the right to do it later.

For myself, I have decided to opt for next week.  My National Procrastination Week will be held the second week of March, from the 7th through the 13th.  Part of the reason for choosing next week is that I'm already late for this week.  Given the prominence of the experience of procrastination in my life thus far, I really need a full week to give it its due.

As to whether "to procrastinate or not to procrastinate," to paraphrase a Danish prince, I am coming down on neither pole.  Rather, I will "celebrate" by reflecting on what I've learned about procrastination, in general as well as specific to my experience, over this past year of writing about it.

And I will try not to put it off.

Fast Away the Old Year Passes

Maybe it's a New Jersey thing.  A polling group based in Asbury Park is reporting that nearly 70% of the 1000 Americans they surveyed will be staying in tonight.  But though we won't be staying home in New Jersey, you can add me, my spouse and one of my sons to that list. 


In recent years, I have gotten better at handling the Christmas ballyhoo, the lead-up that begins in late September in some environs, the ambient shopping frenzy, the holiday hype, the relatives, and the post-Christmas let down.  But I still feel guilty and slightly pathetic when the ball drops in Times Square and I'm not there.  And don't want to be.


I guess I feel that my family can pretty much hold a candle to anyone's in the way we celebrate the ultimate family occasion--the first in this annual double feature.  We indulge and lavish just enough, but not too much.  We sing, we deck the halls, we wax nostalgic.  We give to others.  And most of all, we show our love and are happy to be together.  Pretty much the essentials of the Silent Night thing, as I see it.  


But New Years Eve seems more about social engagement, something my troop struggles with a bit.  My husband works in another city.  My teenagers are homeschooled, and currently unemployed.  My social group consists of individual friends, a church and a community organization that are mine and not my family's.  It has been a few years since my husband and I were invited to a New Years Eve party.  And mostly that's okay.  But I feel like it shouldn't be.


I miss dressing up, a little.  I don't really miss yet another opportunity to overeat, or to watch others get sloshier, and ever less witty by the hour.  Somehow the "fun" often failed to materialize at the parties I have attended.  


New Years Eve has taken on a different kind of significance to me, and is most meaningfully passed with people I love--the short list.  So we will lift our glasses right here.  I am making biryani, and attempting cardamom bread.  Midnight will find us feeding scribbled feelings, habits, and mistakes of the past year into our backyard firepit, and taking a phone call from our absent household member.  We can see the city's fireworks from here, and hear the church bells.  


And tomorrow morning I will get up and keep on keeping on, knowing that this demarcation may be all in our minds, but it is not without importance. 

Done for the Week: Up to My Ears in Eggnog

Another Christmas come and gone.  Another solstice/full moon/lunar eclipse, the last of which was 372 years ago, put to bed.  Something about these infrequent events makes us feel the passage of time.  But living our lives intentionally, I think, is the only antidote to the regret that can wash over us as the year comes to a close.  As Marie Beynon Ray says,

We have only this moment, sparkling like a star in our hand ... and melting like a snowflake. Let us use it before it is too late.

Here's how I used my moments last week:

Done for the Week:  Dec. 20-26

1. Continued off-season race training; biked three times 
2. Succeeded in getting husband to gym with me once
3. Finished The Groves of Academe, by Mary McCarthy
4. Continued reading The Zen Path Through Depression, by Philip Martin and continued adding to my library stockpile
5. Took week off from supporting transitioning nonprofit
6. Worked my two part-time jobs, with more hours due to holiday week schedule
7. Published 5 blog posts
8. Wrote 7 Gratitude Journal entries
9. Wrote 3 Morning Pages
10. Meditated 5 times
11. Got electrician back to install re-ordered wall oven
12. Marked the once-in-many-persons'-lifetimes confluence of the solstice, a full moon, and a lunar eclipse by sleeping through the night (It was cloudy here, anyway.)
13. Purchased new bathroom lights,  spoke with electrician about post-Christmas installation
14. Watched our two favorite basketball teams play 4 games, with son and husband
15. Foraged for food at the grocery store several times
16. Attended two yoga classes
17. Survived spouse's return after four-week absence
18. Walked my dog three times, including Christmas Day family trip to the dog park 
19. Gave significant but subtle support to two teenage sons stalled on the "launchpad" 
20. Finished Christmas shopping, and facilitating kids' shopping, by late Christmas Eve
21. Spent happy, peaceful Christmas day with my household members
22. Had enjoyable Christmas dinner and gift exchange at my daughter's
23. Participated in traditional family day-after-Christmas bookstore venture, with gift cards and 20% off!
24. Reconvened my meditation sangha, after two week hiatus

Again last week, my focus goal was to "put first things, if not first, at least earlier in the day. . .  and to figure out what those first things might be, on any given day."   At the present time,  blogging, meditating, exercising and adhering to my novel-writing schedule constitute this category of "first things" on most days.   My related achievements are highlighted in green, and again reflect progress over the previous week.  I made a particular effort to step up my meditation, motivated by the increased stress of the holiday week.  Conspicuously absent from the list, for the third week in a row, is any time spent on writing my novel.  The disruption of schedules which comes with annual celebrations and preparations for same wreaked havoc with my authorial commitment.  

This coming week is another of those non routine times that I find so challenging, to my psyche as well as to my overall productivity.  My step-daughter and her family are in town, my grandson is still off preschool, my professor husband is between semesters, and my teenaged sons are still without jobs, and imposed structure.  For this week, I renew my resolve to post five blogs, exercise four times, meditate six times, and make the time to resume writing the novel--before I forget what it's supposed to be about.

The most important "accomplishment" of the past week was unequivocally the wonderful Christmas Day spent with my family.  Over the years, we have had our share of difficult holidays.  In our large and insufficiently blended family, crises often erupted on or around these emotion-fraught occasions.  We were slow to learn the lesson of lowered expectation amidst the Hallmark hype.  And some of us were not especially mature, as is the way of childhood--and parenthood.  But this year, everyone in our small household stepped up their game, showing love and thoughtfulness and generosity and gratitude and grace under fire.  It was a joy to be the mother and the wife of these men I live with.  With or without the trappings, it is this gift I would wish to keep always.

Stopping for Magic

Turns out Christmas will come anyway, despite whatever balls (and keepsake ornaments) we may have dropped in these days leading up to it.  It won't be perfect.  But it will happen.  And as it so often does in movies and song, the magic we attribute to this time will heighten feelings and experience.


As I write this, my extended family is celebrating a new baby, born yesterday.  A distant friend is posting updates on Facebook from labor and delivery, having survived the last harrowing weeks of an over-40 pregnancy--too much like my own last incubation. 


A friend is mourning her son, not two months dead.  My husband awoke at 5 a.m. this morning, thinking of his father who died on Christmas Eve, decades ago.  And I am missing my dad, more this year than before.


My husband is home.  Our tree is up.  The last late-night online shopping delivery has arrived. My children have graduated from passive holiday audience to fellow makers of the occasion, contributing their outdoor lighting skills, and their thoughtful gift-giving, hatchet-burying and culinary talents.


In true procrastinator fashion, I will join my husband shortly in planning tomorrow's menu and making up one last shopping list, before heading out to the grocery store to join the throngs.  


But in this moment, I want to breathe and to, in my yoga teacher's class-closing words, "fill [myself] up with gratitude for all that [I] have, and all that is yet to come."


Whatever our traditions, and in the most universal sense, 
Merry Christmas!

Done for the Week: Home for Christmas

My husband didn't make it back yesterday, as we had anticipated.  Apparently, Europe got more snow than they knew what to do with--literally.  You know it's not good when the first email you see upon waking Sunday morning displays the subject "Bad News," and goes on to detail chaos, long lines, threatening future forecasts, and no solid idea of when/if its author will ever return.


My sons and I put the unwanted additional separation time to good use, getting our tree up and decorated, and finishing a number of household rearrangements, cleaning and repairs.  But we are ready to be done with holding down this crumbling fort without assistance.  


Below is what I can remember accomplishing during this whirlwind week.

Done for the Week:  Dec. 13-19

1. Continued off-season race training; biked three times 
2. Succeeded in getting one son to gym with me once
3. Finished The Deepest Blue:  How Women Face and Overcome Depression, by Lauren Dockett 
4. Continued reading The Zen Path Through Depression, by Philip Martin, and Undoing Perpetual Stress: The Missing Connection Between Depression, Anxiety, and 21st Century Illness, by Richard O'Connor; and continued adding to my library stockpile
5. Took steps to resolve problem with not-for-profit organization, and to limit and focus my ongoing support
6. Worked my two part-time jobs
7. Published 5 blog posts
8. Wrote 7 Gratitude Journal entries
9. Wrote 5 Morning Pages
10. Meditated twice
11. Saw my therapist
12. Attended Solstice celebration, sans snowbound spouse
13. Attended Jobs Rally
14. Attended Community Meeting on Jobs Emergency
15. Attended Transitional Jobs meeting
16. Attended Board meeting
17. Participated in several transcontinental skype calls with absent spouse
18. Arranged for furnace repair, thereby restoring heat to our frigid home
19. Got electrician here for aborted wall oven install; ordered correct size and arranged return of too small model, and of electrician
20. Ordered replacement bathroom mirror and glass for dining room table  
21. Took my son out for (nonalcoholic) Happy Hour
22. Watched our two favorite basketball teams play 4 games, with son 
23. Foraged for food at the grocery store several times
24. Survived fourth week with absent spouse
25. Survived spouse's return Survived spouse's aborted return, when Europe was snowed in
26. Did lots of laundry
27. Gave significant but subtle support to two teenage sons stalled on the "launchpad" 
28. Made a significant dent in Christmas shopping
29. Got my husband's car's muffler repaired--for less than half the original astronomical estimate
30. Paid monthly bills
31. Got our Christmas tree up and decorated

Last week's focus goal was the same as the previous week-- "put first things, if not first, at least earlier in the day. . .  and to figure out what those first things might be, on any given day."  Last week, I determined that these first things (highlighted in green above) are generally blogging, meditating, exercising and keeping to the routine I've established for making progress on my novel.  This past week was a slight improvement over the previous one.  I maintained my Monday through Friday blogging; I exercised three times--one time more than the previous week; and I managed to meditate twice, even though my sangha did not meet for the second straight week because of site conflicts.  My novel-writing time, however,  fell victim to my grandson's cold, which prevented him from attending preschool, and thus me from observing my writing routine.  

This coming week culminates in Christmas, with all that implies for disruption.  My focus goal for this week?  Same as last week.  And again, I hope to continue to improve.  At this rate, I'll be holding my book party in a nursing home.

Last weeks' most important accomplishment, in my view, was resolving the previous week's crisis/dilemma concerning the nonprofit I have been deeply enmeshed with for the past couple of years.  I have high hopes that my future role(s) in this organization I continue to care about will be more limited, and more appropriate.  


This coming week will begin with a delayed reunion.  I imagine the adjustment will take up its share of these last few days before Christmas--as in the day my husband will "be home for."  

"Let's Be Careful Out There"

As we approach "the holidays" and their communal deadlines, "last minute" advice, warnings, deals, offers, opportunities, tips and strategies are blaring at us through every form of media with increasing frequency and volume.  

For example, this message, couched in dire language:  

It’s getting down to the wire for those of you (or rather, us) who haven’t finished buying holiday gifts. Sony Style is offering some last-minute deals on Vaio PCs with guaranteed delivery by December 24.

Or this, from The Financial Blogger:  

Last Minute Holiday Shopping Tips To Prevent Stress

Or this encouragement to retailers, from Retail Online Integration:

Despite the fact that Black Friday, Cyber Monday and Green Monday are behind us, the holiday shopping season isn't over yet for the millions of Americans known as "last-minute" shoppers. This group represents an opportunity for retailers to drive incremental lift this holiday season, according to an Acxiom report titled, Generate More Jingle This Holiday Season With Last-Minute Shoppers. 

It's nice to know, as I attempt once more to pull this whole annual production out of the fire, that I am a member of such a large and valued group, meriting our very own pricing structure and guidance, and counted on to save the bacon of commercial interests as the year draws to a close.  

Dr. Timothy Pychyl observed, in a 2008 blog post on "Holiday Shopping and Procrastination," that some shoppers purposely wait until the last minute as a strategy for reducing their gift-giving outlay, observing that prices tend to be reduced as the holiday draws nearer.  He does not lump these smart and daring shoppers in with those of us who just put off the ordeal of deciding what to give, feeling guilty about spending too much or too little, trudging to the stores and/or spending hours online in the virtual marketplace, eventually falling over in a financially depleted heap, eyes glazed over, sleigh bells echoing in our pounding heads.  About the first group, he says "not all delay is procrastination;" about the second, "all procrastination is delay."

As I head out this weekend to begin and complete my shopping, I will try to follow some tips, and take advantage of some deals.  And my purchases will be much appreciated, I'm sure, by retailers focused on their bottom lines.  I will fortify myself with the Mexican Spice Latte that has recently become my favorite self-bribe.  I will probably not make it past Chapter One of Elaine St. James' 269-page Simplify Your Christmas:  100 Ways to Reduce the Stress and Recapture the Joy. . .   I picked up this enticing little volume at a used bookstore with a feeling of hope, after a conversation with my daughter.  As a young mother and part-time high school teacher, she is struggling to resist the pull of the Christmas express, that runaway train of  lunacy that hijacks so many of our holidays.  I offered to let her read the book first.  She returned it within a day, having found its simplification approach anything but simple.  Did I mention it has 269 pages?

At this point, I have no option but to wade into the fray, and try to minimize the damage to my psyche and my checking account.  I accept the conditions I have created for the penance they represent.  Perhaps if I pay close attention to my suffering, I could actually learn not to let this happen again.  But after all these years, how likely is that?  

I can also use my time in last-minute shopping hell to practice compassion for myself and my wretched fellow travelers, as we circle the mall in search of deliverance--and a parking space within the same state.  As Hill Street Blues' Sgt. Phil Esterhaus used to admonish his officers at the close of each roll call, "Let's be careful out there."  Only us nuts are out now.

Black Friday: A Procrastinator Opts Out

Black Friday has come and gone.  And again this year, I bought not a single gift, took advantage of not a single bargain.  Just knowing that others are out there in the predawn hours, getting the jump on the holiday shopping game with their lists and their coupons, always makes me feel like a slouch.  And a chicken.  Because the truth is, you couldn't pay me to swim through those crowds and stand in those lines.  

So now that I'm officially behind on my holiday gift acquisition, here are a few of the ways I plan to deal with my late start.

1.  Cut back on the whole deal.  Less shopping, less spending, less store-bought gifts overall.

2.  Loosen up about the deadline.  Luckily, I come from a long line of procrastinators, so my family is used to adjusting the dates of holidays to accommodate lateness.  In our book, a gift is not late as long as it reaches the recipient before the holiday comes around the next year.

3.  Keep in mind what and why we are celebrating in the first place.  And no, despite the dire business page urgings, it is not to rescue retailers and breathe life into our anemic economy.  

4.  Ignore advertising and media messages that holiday shopping is some kind of state of emergency.  Even if there are "only 28 shopping days left," I don't need to cancel all other activities and arrange for a police escort to the nearest mall. 

5.  Don't lose my head; and be strategic.  Keep breathing, don't wander aimlessly, and stay out of stores and off the road on weekends and during peak hours.  

From the preliminary news reports, this particular Friday after Thanksgiving went black without me.  I reaped the benefits of avoiding participation in lower blood pressure and time to hit the gym.  The way I see it, this was a better beginning to the season than if I had knocked off half my list and realized massive savings.  From this inauguration, I am going to make every effort to keep the whole thing low key.  Just because I "procrastinated" on the holiday shopping project does not mean I need to get frantic.  

Some Things I'm Thankful I Didn't Put Off

I have better things to do today than prattle on over the internet.  And for that, I am grateful.  


But because I am also appreciative of the gift that blogging has been to me this past year, I don't want to let the day go by without this brief post.


Here, then, is a short and nonexhaustive list of some things I treasure in my life, all of which came to me as a result of not procrastinating.  In fact, all involved rashness, or foolhardiness, or seizing the day.  (They are not, by the way, enumerated in order of importance, or affection. They are secretly alphabetical.)


1.  My oldest child, conceived inadvertently at the worst possible time, which turned out to be the best possible time, who has grown into my very good friend and the mother of my best, and only, grandchild.
2.  My youngest child, also inopportune, also precious, who turned my world on its ear in ways I can never regret, and whose gifts and struggles are so like my own.
3.  My partner in life, who brings magic, and pain, and friendship, and bad jokes, and intellectual companionship and strife, and a small hole in my heart when he's gone.
4.  My dog and roommate, whom I had no business bringing home to live with us just one week after his much-mourned predecessor died, and who makes me glad every day that I did.
5.  My middle child, who came to me like a lottery winning, in the most unlikely way, who has taught me a large part of what I know, and who continues to surprise me with his generous heart.


Life has blessed me, and in these instances I have managed not to get in its way.  And for that, I am grateful.