Category: Life

New York Is

Posted on by Kathryn Atkins
high st brooklyn bridge signage mounted on blue steel post
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New York is:

A state

A city

A harbor

A county

A cheesecake

A cut of steak

A baseball team

A football team

A hockey team

A basketball team

A stadium

A newspaper

A daily

A magazine

A book

A song

A historical novel

A film

A ship

A typeface

A TV star

A pinball machine

A state of mind

But for me, New York is . . .

The

place

where

I

was

conceived

 but

not

born.

Loved perhaps, but not kept.

Transported from in utero

To the left coast

To await my fate.

What happened???

I was lucky.

I was adopted.

*

For more thoughts around the subject, please see my May 2018 post: Life’s a Crapshoot.

 

 

 

 

Leave Room in Your Suitcase

Posted on by Kathryn Atkins
apple book break color
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So, did you think this post was going to be about travel? Great. It is. But, it’s not.

Hopefully, we are all going somewhere. However, we are not always going on vacation. Or going out of town. Or going on a safari, per se. We are, however, traveling through life. We need to have our suitcase packed, our selves ready, open, and available to step, fly, jump, and fall forward into the next place. Our metaphorical bags should always be packed, as in why slow down to throw in a toothbrush when the next adventure may have toothbrushes waiting for you at the other end? Or better yet, we won’t need toothbrushes there at all. Our teeth will automatically be cleaned by busy nanobots grinning as they scrub, singing happy tunes, and making you happy to boot.

So while the suitcase should be ready to go, it should have room to add stuff. We want to leave space in the suitcase of our minds to put in cool new ideas, experience an image in a way we’ve never done so before, or taste a new aroma, or savor a different apple with a cool name like “Jazz” or “Envy.”

We save a spot for experimentation.  We can pause in the quietness to read an author we wouldn’t have tried without the clarity that white space in a suitcase brings. We can “hear” a not-my-usual color; “wear” a not-my-kind of music. (Not typos: Hear a color and wear music were on purpose.)

I invite you on your next journey to leave room in your suitcase. In fact, I will leave room in mine, too, and maybe we can meet in the middle.

 Always keep a bag packed!

Life’s a Crapshoot

Posted on by Kathryn Atkins

Did you watch it? The storybook Royal Wedding? What did you take from it? That there’s no predicting life. No one would have thought a Hollywood starlet would marry an honest-to-goodness prince. Well, not in real life. In stories. In movies. On TV. But not for real. But it was. Real.

Rolling the Dice

crapshoot2Back in 2006, I was becoming increasingly aware of egg donors facilities. Yes. I was pretty amazed that people were picking characteristics they wanted for their children and were buying eggs that they thought would make little people with those traits. What’s cool is that it doesn’t work that way. At least not yet. Thank goodness. For instance, neither of our children plays the piano by ear, but I do. On the other hand, I can’t draw my way out of a paper bag, but our younger son is crazy-good at drawing, painting, sketching, shading, faces (for gosh sakes), and composition. How nice a surprise. Right? 

Is life a game of chance? I think it is deliciously so. In fact, I say throw all the eggs and sperm in a piñata and do a free-for-all blindfolded party burst. Then grab the gametes and zygotes that lie on the ground, smash them together and you’ll have a kid — any old kid, and the future means nothing, the past means nothing, and lineage has no meaning whatsoever. Birthrights mean doodly squat. The Kennedy clan has had more than its share of problems, right? 

You can be born and given up for adoption. You can be born into squalor. You can come into the world with an affliction. You can start your life in a palace. And sometimes that, too, can be bad luck! What. Dee. Heck?

People that are born of two parents bring recessive and dominant genes to the party. The randomness of the different permutations produces hugely disparate kids of the same two parents, no matter how many kids they have. It’s the scary-wonderful, elegant and inelegant magic of it all. We keep doing it through the centuries, and sometimes we make a mess of it, and sometimes, it’s a beautiful thing, this life.

Life’s a crapshoot right from the beginning, and that’s all there is to it. There should be more, somehow, but there isn’t.

Purpose

Posted on by Kathryn Atkins

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Someone in the audience asked, “How do you know you’re living your life’s purpose?” Good question!  How DO we know? Here were the answers from others in the room:

“No other place I’d rather be.”

“I’m happy.”

“I’m in a state of flow.”

“It feels like I’m being me.”

The women’s group in our neighborhood met to share business ideas and to talk about ourselves. Our SELVES. What do we fear? What do we seek? What do we need to feel like we are living our life’s purpose? How do we say “no”? As in NO. How do we protect our obliging, pleasing selves (many women fall into this category because of our role model moms) so we can live our life’s purpose on purpose?

Mark Twain said, “The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.”

Sometimes the way we can be our best selves and find our purpose is to set boundaries. So sometimes we have to say “No.” Or say a qualified, controlled yes. “Tuesday after 3PM for thirty minutes.” We want to give our gifts to the people who will grow from our knowledge, our skillsets, and our experiences. This is another quote:

The meaning of life is to discover your gift. The purpose of life is to give it away. ~ Pablo Picasso.

We are here to do unto others. But not at the expense of our selves. Or we will have nothing to give. We must find out why we are here, per Mark Twain. Then we need to give our gift — perhaps it is our purpose  — to the rest of humanity. One at a time, or in a group, or through blogs. Like this one.

The same woman asked, “Can you have more than one purpose?”

I believe we can have more than one purpose. What do you believe?

Temporary

Posted on by Kathryn Atkins

Dandelion_20windWe just dropped off our twenty-year-old son at the airport. He is so, well, twenty. After raising two boys to manhood, I know that Kahlil Gibran was probably right: Our children are only on loan to us.

I had heard it, but I didn’t have a clue of what that meant. When they were little, I fooled myself into thinking they were mine. But now I’m not so sure they ever were. Yes, they pretty much did what they were told—most of the time— because they didn’t know any better. However, those times didn’t last. And the boys often made their own decisions and mistakes, because that’s how they grew up. Childhood is temporary, as are many other things. The speed of our children’s progression to adulthood from the womb makes my head spin. Why is this?

 If our children are on loan and temporary, then so are marriage (‘til death or divorce do us part), our age, our highs, and lows. The seasons come and go. Winter fades to spring, which yields to summer and on to fall. There is no constancy in life except the fluidity of movement of one moment to the next. There is never a time when everything comes to a screeching halt. Never. The idea of it is so unfathomable to humankind, that most religions have an afterlife. Good or bad, heaven or hell, it’s a continuation of now into the future. We are almost never here and now, because now is like a freight train with “then” before it and “someday” after it, and “here” lasts only until that freight train leaves the station.

That means that there is no real past when you’re in the present. We cannot retrieve our children as they once were. We cannot ever again feel them inside our bodies, in our arms, or on our backs. That was temporary—a phase that is no more. I am convinced of the temporary nature of the past. Why, then, can I not see that the future is a fleeting, unattainable bundle? How insane am I that I do not see this? We project forward as if there were a way to control the future. There is none. We prepare for the future, we save, we worry; we think we can control outcomes, but alas, the future has no bearing on the present. It will be what it will be. That does not mean we don’t try to achieve our goals. No, rather, it means we try to plan our lives so that we must live only in the present knowing that any other form of living must negate the thing of life itself. It is so rudimentary but almost impossible: many people spend more time outside of now than in, and it is no wonder that the passage of time blurs on its way through life’s train station.

If there is no “present thread” (maybe because it is invisible) holding this day together, then it pulls apart, like a sweater unraveling, and the fabric we think we’re wearing is naught but a tangle of yarn on our mind’s floor.

Because life is temporary, my kids are on loan, my mom, brother, and spouse are fleeting, and everything is but a smearing of consciousness. I must stop. I should grab the hands on the life’s clock, hold onto them like the devil, and slow them way down as if my life depended on it. Why? Because it does. It just does.

Kathryn Atkins 2006

Flip

Posted on by Kathryn Atkins

Death Calendar ImageThe calendar doesn’t care.

Its pages flip. The new day comes into view. If it’s a plain daily calendar, it’s not much fun. The best calendars are those big monthly calendars with images that take your breath away. The ones that make you smile, even sigh at how beautiful they are. Some are sweeping vistas of romantic places. Some are such unique animals that you question if they really exist. Calendars do this on purpose, so you don’t have to suffer as much with your life’s passing.

I have a favorite calendar. It’s from Paper Source, and I buy one every year. Without looking at the summary of images on the back, I carefully hang the calendar on the wall directly across from my work desk. Like a little kid, I wait to the first day of the new month before turning the page. Never do I look ahead. In fact, it’s like peeking at Christmas presents before it’s Christmas. As in,”Mom, tell me where the Christmas presents are hidden, so I don’t find them by mistake.”

This tiny ritual aims to keep me from the frustration I feel with the swift passage of time. “The days are long, but the years are short,” says Gretchen Rubin, author of The Happiness Project. It’s crazy how right she is.

But alas, I am feeding my own angst. I look forward to flipping the page so I can see the new image. As I view the same image every day for three weeks, and then four, I almost will the month to be over. But then when I flip the page, I see what has transpired.

Time is slipping through the continuum.

The calendar looks me in the eye and starts asking the hard questions, “What did you accomplish last month?” or  “What do you have to show for the first three months of this year, not that it is one-fourth (!) over?” Or “This time last year you said you would have ____________ (fill in the blank) done. Did you do it?”

The calendar doesn’t care.

I told you that already. But it certainly has a gift for asking the profound questions — the questions that drive you nuts.

So as you flip the page of your calendar, pause to see what you have accomplished. Keep your fingers crossed. Maybe next month, you will have some good news for her. If not, there will be a pretty picture to greet you, and you can smile, sigh, carry on, and either gird yourself for self-recrimination or prepare yourself for joy when you reach to do next month’s flip.

Piano Hands

Posted on by Kathryn Atkins

Looking down, my hands are young.

Little nails. Little fingers.

Skipping on the keys.

Smooth, dainty skin.

I am six.

From farther up I’m looking down at my hands upon the keys.

Bigger reach, longer nails. A little polish

Dancing on the keys.

Taut, youthful skin.

I am sixteen.

Looking down, my hands are shopworn.

They play the music that comes through me.

My fingers waltz on the keys now.

Drying, aging skin.

I am fifty.

My gaze descends to my hands resting on the keys.

As I lift and lower, music emerges,

But alas, my fingers lumber on the keys.

Misshapen knuckles; veins popping blue.

I am seventy.

I look down upon my hands.

My fingers hover and shake,

Taking dry aim at the keys.

Gnarled, twisted, useless hands

I am too old.

They wheel me over. I bend toward the piano.

I hit a few notes with tentative strokes, and

I cry out in frustration. Then I remember.

I remember and I weep for the lovely melodies

That still skip in my heart.

* * * * * *

 I am pushing toward the seventies decade, and I have this lovely video of my son and me playing a duet! This is one melody that will skip in my heart for a long time. 

Note: The poem appeared in the California Writers Club 100th Anniversary Anthology called West Winds Centennial, published in 2010. The California Writers Club is a 501 (c)3 organization that was founded in 1909(!) by honorary members Jack London, George Sterling, Joaquin Miller and Ina Coolbrith.

 

I Wish You Enough

Posted on by Kathryn Atkins

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I wish you enough sun to keep your attitude bright no matter how gray the day may appear.


I wish you enough rain to appreciate the sun even more.


I wish you enough happiness to keep your spirit alive and everlasting.

I wish you enough pain so even the smallest of joys in life may appear bigger.


I wish you enough gain to satisfy your wanting.

I wish you enough loss to appreciate all that you possess.


I wish you enough hellos to get you through the final good-bye.

Note: this poem and others can be found  in my book on Amazon Giving My Self to the Wind.

Also from the publisher Outskirts Press if you’re not an Amazon fan. Goodreads, too!

Give Your Self to the Wind

Posted on by Kathryn Atkins

. . . AND RECEIVE THE GIFT OF LOVE

How do you give your self (it’s two words, on purpose) to the wind? Finish your stuff, I tell yoDandelion_20windu. And be willing to be vulnerable! When you finish, though, you are very likely to fail. In fact, you can really suck! Your art, your book, your music, your crocheted or knitted piece, or even your book report for school, if you’re still in school — can really be awful. But, finishing it is important. We could fail. We can get an “F” or we can have no one buy our art, our book or our music. That’s okay.

We hate to fail!

No one likes to fail. We don’t want to be failures. People like winners. True. No one wants to be the last one in the race. Few people want to come in fourth at the Olympics. They don’t get a medal. But what they did get was experiencing the Olympics! How good must they be to make it through all the competitions and trials to get to the Olympics in the first place?

Failing and being a failure are two different things, however. Failing is a temporary thing. In fact, failing a bunch of times is how you eventually get better.

Failing is learning. “Oh! How interesting! That didn’t work. I’ll try something else.”

Failing is helping other people learn. “Wow. Look what they tried! Let’s see if we can do it better or differently.”

Failing is winning the game of perseverance. Gaining strength. Experiencing grit. Knowing how golly gosh darn badly you want something.

Failing is a gift.

Unfortunately, failing multiple times can keep some of us from finishing. We grow tired of the skinned knees, the broken airplanes (Wright Brothers), the cotton gin that breaks (Eli Whitney) and the telephone that doesn’t ring (Alexander Graham Bell). We give up. We will not finish that book. We will never hear the musical piece. We leave our sculpture in a heap of rocks and rubble, and we will punch a hole in the painting. No one will ever experience your novel, your Mona Lisa, your Nutcracker Suite, your David statue, or maybe your computer application.

So you are not John Steinbeck or Leonardo da Vinci? You are not Tchaikovsky or Michelangelo? Did they think they were when they created their works? How would they know in the beginning if they did not finish anything?

Every one of the artists you know didn’t know they were any good when they started. John Steinbeck was rejected dozens of times. Starving artists starve for a reason. Are they failures?

Here’s the deal. These creatives are failures if they measure success by money and fame. Many of the famous artists never saw fame or fortune while they were alive, so they did not think they were any good!

Fail. Fail often. Keep writing, painting, making music, sculpting, and inventing. Give your self your work and your you-ness to the wind… and receive the gift of love.