Category Archives: Choices

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It’s Curtains For The New Look – Repurposing A Dream

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My great aunt Wylly was always full of surprises. In addition to being a talented children’s book author and writer, her gift giving, present wrapping skills made every gift she gave a magical experience. Her packages were never wrapped in tidy boxes or perfectly shaped bundles and the ribbon didn’t always match the color of the paper, but inside could be anything. My sister Margaret and I treasured every gift she ever gave us even when we received things we were not sure we would ever use.

Forty years ago when I was nine, I received the pin cushion you see above. Aunt Wylly had taken the time to make it special by embroidering my name on it and adding it to a sewing box stocked with some of the things a young girl just learning to sew might need.

I never became the world’s best seamstress. In fact, it’s generally touch and go as to whether a pattern I’m “trying” to follow will come out as it’s supposed to, but I must say, with a few pins and a bit of imagination I can sometimes surprise myself.

It’s raining here as I work on repurposing some drapes, a duvet, and a bed valance that all were a part of my past life. Along with an old bed frame of John’s, and a few other pieces, I’m creating a dreamy new look for the guest room. John has taken to calling it the oldie worldie room and I think that fits it fairly well except the real oldie bits are being repurposed into a new look that mixes my world with his in a way that I just know is going to be a warm and welcoming place for our guests.

I’m stretching my skills a bit to do some things I’ve never done before and I hope to have it finished before I leave for Georgia in about a week. That said, I need to get back to work now. My new sewing machine has just been plugged in for the first time and I’m ready to give it a go…after I read the directions of course. Do you remember when I wrote about something big that happened because I didn’t read the directions?  Go here to find out.

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You’ll Call It A Procedure, But…Questions About FAI Treatment

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I don’t know how many of you saw Billy Crystal’s talk to his son’s classroom in the movie, City Slickers, it’s the one where he tells them what they can expect from life, decade by miserable decade…

Stop a minute and go here to see it …I’ll be here waiting when you get back.

Okay…I think now you can see where this post is heading. That’s right, straight to the OR (operating room) do not pass go or try convince yourself you don’t need it. Pain is real and when it’s constant, it is a pretty clear sign. I tend just to take some over the counter pain meds and drive on. Call it stubbornness or a left over ” Can do” attitude from my army days, but I like to act as if I just put my head down and stay focused, I ‘ll be able to out run whatever twinge, or in this case, stabbing leg and butt pain that won’t go away.

As an example of my former crazy-super-woman belief in mind-over-body madness, I once ran miles and miles every day for three months with a really bad break in my foot. I didn’t know it was broken, I thought I had bruised it wearing high heels at a business conference. So for three months, I got up early every morning, swallowed 800 mg of Motrin, laced up my Nikes, and went out the door.

By the time I saw a Podiatrist, he  took one look at my x-rays, laughingly said it was a really bad break and asked if I minded if he used my films ( x-rays ) in his next talk. I thought great …this guy is going to share my stupidity with a roomful of people at his next presentation.  After I said okay to being someone else’s life lesson for the day, I asked him what were we going to do about my foot, to which he responded, ” Nothing, it’s already healed. ” Let me say now…my left foot has never been right since. I should have listened to my body when it was sending me such loud messages back then. Maybe that foot would always have been a bit more prone to pain after the break, but maybe not if I hadn’t ignored the pain.

As it turns out, I’m getting another chance to decide what to do now about a pain I’ve had for years, but has become increasing worse over the last few months. I’ve lived with it for such a long time and gone through a fair amount of physical therapy and other non invasive treatments (a little chiropractic), that I just assumed I had a hinky hip and there was nothing to be done about it. I went to a doctor here recently for the first time since moving to England ( my first NHS experience ) to chat about HRT and aging (hey I’m 49…it’s time for those talks) and my hip pain came up in conversation, before you could say boo, my new GP had me scheduled with a surgeon for an evaluation.

After a meeting with the surgeon, I had x-rays followed by an MRA (MRI with contrast) and yesterday I received a letter from the from the bone cutter confirming my GP’s initial suggested diagnosis of FAI along with his recommendation of open hip debridement surgery.

It’s nice to know there’s a reason for all that pain, but I really wish there were more options than the suggested surgery. I’m actually kind of old I think for this solution based on things I’ve read and other sources. I think most of the time you are told to adjust your lifestyle as in swim, don’t run and just wait until you’re old enough for a hip replacement. Given that I’ve lead such an active physical life, this would be a real hardship for me. I’d be looking at no yoga, no running, no rock climbing, no skiing, … would no coast path walking be next ….. the English may call it walking, but sometimes the hills are so steep, you almost feel as if you need a harness and someone on belay so it’s not always pain free either.

I DO NOT want to give up all my fun physical activity at 49!

I’ve had a wonderful response from a dear friend who happens to be a very knowledgeable medical professional with years of experience in oncology and other areas along with some more recent skills in the area of chiropractic medicine. Steven works out of Atlanta most of the time, but his gentle and supportive email to me today made me feel as if he was sitting in the same room discussing the possible options for my treatment and recovery. I really appreciated his thoughts and suggestions and this takes me to the reason for exposing my weak side ( hip) to the world.

If you’re still reading this lengthy medical drama, I’d like to impose upon you to please send this out to anyone you know who has gone though the surgery for a hip impingement…mine would be open as opposed to arthroscopic so that is what I would be most interested in hearing more about, their surgical experience along with their recovery, follow up…and hopefully, their successful outcome.

My actual diagnosis is an ovoid/cam femoral head shape with an associated tear of the labrum.

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You Say – We Say

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England and America are two countries separated by a common language.

~ George Bernard Shaw

I’m sure everyone has heard the expression, ” You say to-may-to, we say ta-mah-to.” Here in the UK, it is still almost a daily event for me to have a bit of word wrangling with John over how different words may be pronounced. It’s interesting how we can be referring to the same thing, but saying it in different ways leaving room for confusion at times.

We just work it out generally, but there are times when it’s too funny not to share. One example that still makes me smile was when John and I were watching his granddaughter, Jersey Girl (JG) while her parents were away for a few days in Spain. Right before they were expected home from their trip, I called out to JG from the kitchen and asked her to please pick up the living room as her parents would be home soon. What I heard back was, “Pardon?” a word that had become a frequent refrain over the previous days whenever she was having trouble with my accent, pronunciation or phrase usage. A moment passed and then I heard her say, ” Do you want me to tidy up my toys? ” and I was reminded once again of all the ways we may speak the same language, but say things that have very different meanings.

Another example occurred when John came to see me in America. We went to Home Depot, a DIY store in midtown Atlanta because we were working on a few home repair projects while he was in town. The midtown Home Depot has a large customer base in the gay community and is generally pretty busy with lots of people around to help you if you need assistance. After searching on our own for what we needed, I began to look around for a salesperson to help us. Having absolutely no success with this I muttered something along the lines of…” not being able to find someone when you need them, ” to which John said in frustrated voice,” That’s because they’re all outside having a fag! ” My immediate response besides my eyebrows arching to the ceiling was to say very quickly, ” Shhh, you cannot say that here!” Of course, he meant that all the sales people were outside having a cigarette, but still….

Another adjustment was one that I had to work out over the phone during the early stages of our initially long distance relationship when John spoke about his granddaughter pulling faces.  I remember thinking, pulling faces… and visualizing what this might look like. It took a bit more conversation to discern that he meant making faces as in silly, funny ones. JG is a champion face puller having done so since before she could speak so that now if you even point a camera in her direction you may get a series of photographs that look like the ones below.

These were taken from a distance in low light and then enlarged so the quality is not the best, but you’ll get a good sense of what I’m talking about when you see them. Also, you should know that I had no idea that she was creating a different look for each shot as my completely unaware expression indicates.

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The last two faces are my favorite funny ones that she “pulls.”  In case you’re wondering how JG learned to make such interesting looks for photographs, the one below is her mother practicing for the day when she’d need to teach her own daughter how to get a laugh with just a look.

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Ample Make This Bed

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Ample make this bed.
Make this bed with awe;
In it wait till judgment break
Excellent and fair.

Be its mattress straight,
Be its pillow round;
Let no sunrise’ yellow noise
Interrupt this ground.

~Emily Dickinson

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After much deliberation, John and I chose a new bed for our resized and redecorated bedroom. Even though our new mattress will not be delivered for a few days, we were too impatient to wait so we shifted the old mattress from the guest bed and tucked in for the night. I am loving the redesign although it was a bit disconcerting in the middle of the night. The whole orientation of the room has shifted including the addition of a new window on a different wall while losing the original larger window.

There is still a good bit to do before I have the big unveiling, but we did hang three pieces of original art yesterday that all work amazing well together. I usually have something other than white walls around me, but John wanted to keep it light and white so the color for me must come in through the artwork and fabric choices. We did choose a dark wood floor which works well with the light wood of the bed and the stark white of the walls.

When I moved to Cornwall, the only piece of furniture I shipped is the chair you see below. This was taken on moving day at my step-mom’s house. I worried that it might not fit in here, but I put it in the new bedroom and John and I think it’s a perfect fit for our new space.

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We also decided that the living room could use a new sofa so this one is being delivered next week.  I’ll be back with another decorating post soon. I have a few decisions to make and I would be interested in hearing your thoughts. I am about to go batty trying to decide between a variety of things with for my new studio space and bathroom such as paint colors, bathroom tile, light fixtures, bathroom mirrors, rugs and curtains.

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Turning Over A New Leaf – Seeing The Other Side

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For many, the phrase turning over a new leaf means making a big change in some way, but if you are anything like me it may mean something different. In the picture above, most people might notice the way the petals have lost their deep color and have taken on the look of old lace. At a glance, I can easily see the obvious fragility in the beautiful decay, but what really draws me in is the tiny sliver of the underside of the leaf in the top right corner.

The desire to see more of what is hidden in the shadow distracts me and one story becomes two as my mind digs deeper into the well charted mental landscape I refer to as,” What if ? ”  If you read my last post, then you know what a struggle it can be for me to keep things organized and focused especially with the never ending stream of ideas circling in my head.

I know it would be a stretch to think there might be a magic solution to help keep me on track, but I did want to share a link I received from Jennifer McGuiggan of The Word Cellar. Jennifer is a professional freelance writer and editor and she very kindly left me a link to a guest post she did over at Magpie Girl.  In it she talks about an idea known as The Wheel of Work and how having an understanding of the eight phases of a project can help when it comes to working with your individual strengths and weaknesses as you move a project from conception through post-production.

I also wanted to thank you all for your comments and suggestions on my Ground Control post. You were all so kind regarding my photographs and I can’t begin to tell you how much fun it is to share what I see here and have someone else enjoy it as well.

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Ground Control – We Have A Problem

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Sometimes life offers you so many choices you may have trouble deciding which one thing is the very best. I wanted to use one of my images from the other day for a blog post, but in trying to decide…well, I couldn’t. So went to John and asked him which one he preferred and he quickly pointed out the first one you see above. Still not completely satisfied, I then considered what was it exactly that I wanted to say this morning and which image might best suit the direction of my thoughts. This didn’t help either because each photograph has something about it that makes me think of how it might illustrate a variety of topics and even though the images seem very similar, I see a different image to topic “match”  for each one of them.

So that’s when I decided that the real topic for today is not about which photograph to use, but rather how my indecision and desire to do everything ” just right” creates an ugly scenario where little gets done. People talk a lot about having writer’s block which I always thought of as a problem grounded in a lack of words or ideas, but perhaps indecision can be a blockage of sorts too.

It’s days like this when I feel as if I need an air traffic controller to help me keep my ideas organized and moving forward in an on time manner so that while one project is say, taxiing to Concourse A and arriving at Gate 10, projects 2 and 3 can be circling and landing in an orderly fashion. To illustrate my indecision, what you get today is all the images. If you have any tips I can pass on to ground control, please leave them in the comment section.

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A Room Of One’s Own – Week 11 – Update

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Can you believe we have been living with dust and disruption for 11 weeks? So far no one’s gotten snappish, grouchy, or stroppy as John would say. Stroppy and cross are popular expressions here and might be used in this way,

” Don’t get cross with me….”  Or  ” Someone’s being a bit stroppy…”  which might translate to ” Boy are you a grouch!”

All remains peaceful here despite my tendency to be messy one day and tidy the next. I’m generally a bit scattered with my stuff, but in fairness I don’t have a study to tuck it away into like John although his study has some of my things that arrived on this day stored in there too. My boxes are everywhere and so are our clothes, which are currently scattered throughout the study, guest room and the attic (loft) since we’ve vacated our bedroom during the renovation. Enough of this housekeeping chatter…here are the pictures from this week.

You can see a change in the pictures for today in that the wardrobe (closet) that John built last week is no longer there. We decided it didn’t look right once the bedroom lost a few feet to the corridor (hallway) so he shifted it back to the original space before the work began. It’s about the same length only now it’s slightly more narrow. It’s plenty deep enough and will be able to hold his chest of drawers, but it will run the length of the wall now.

This closet repositioning means we have had to change in the style of the new bed we had picked out because the closet takes up a bit of the bedside table space. We found a perfect remedy for this online this morning and I love the new bed frame we picked out.

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Look to the left of John’s elbow (sorry for the bad picture) to see the closet he put in and then ripped out.

It’s one mirrored door and one solid one off to the left.

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Here’s another view. (Sorry about the post being in the way)

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This is the corridor (hallway) that took some of the bedroom width with it.

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John putting up the plasterboard (sheetrock)

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Rebuilding the wardrobe (closet)

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Looking down the corridor (door to bedroom on left)

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Just so you don’t think all I do is sit at my computer…that’s me giving the house a coat of paint last Saturday

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John caught me with painting with my tongue sticking out (necessary for concentration)

Stop by on Sunday to see a little birthday blog I have planned for John if you get a minute. I’ll be baking his cake tomorrow. Thanks to everyone who sent me a carrot cake recipe, I’ll post the results after his birthday on Sunday.

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A Room Of One’s Own – Week 9 & 10 – Update

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I skipped last week’s update so I wanted to post a few pictures or “piccies” as they are frequently called here. Brits seem to have fondness for adding “ies” to words I wouldn’t normally consider changing in this way, such as rellies for relatives and wellies for Wellingtons the rubber boots we sometimes wear on our walks. Putting the language lesson aside for now, let me show you what John has been working on over the last two weeks.

When I posted the last update the new master bath still looked like this.

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The pictures below show the most recent developments and how close it is to completion.

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John tiled everything including the window ledge and all around.

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Thankfully, this shower is larger than the current one in the family bathroom which has a shower and a separate tub.

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These are typical shower fixtures for here where you can control the temperature independently from the water pressure. I still haven’t mastered this very well yet and ouch can be frequently heard when I’m washing up. I will not have this kind in my tub/shower combination.

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The wall is tiled even into the exit where the door will be into the master bedroom.

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Testing the toilet and sink placement… (not permanent yet) the hardwood floor will go down first.

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View of the layout from the shower (No wasted space)

In addition to all of this work, John painted part of the outside of the house (The master bedroom and ceiling multiple times to get a good coat of white.) and began knocking out parts of the fireplace so he can install a small woodburning stove. The one below is the one we’ll have in a few weeks. These are cute little mini ones compared to the ones I’m used to in America. I’m still deciding on paint colors and what I’ll need in the way of furniture. I’ve made some decicions, but this post is running a bit long so I’ll share that with you later.

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Calling All Master Bakers

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I have a funny story to tell you about the photograph above, but first I have a request. My husband John has a birthday coming up in a few weeks and I need the very best carrot cake recipe you have. If  you’ve got one that others rave about then I want a chance to bake for him. So please send me your favorite and let me give it a try.

Now about that story…. A few months ago, John and I had been out for a little walk and decided to stop by the pub before walking home. As is my way, I had my camera with me and although I don’t usually take pictures that aim quite so directly  into someone’s home, I’m afraid I did that day. Walking by a charming 200 year old cottage that I frequently pass on my runs and walks, I saw the carrots in the picture above hanging in the kitchen window. No one was around and it wasn’t like I was peeping in or anything plus the road is very close to the cottage. Because it’s so close, I was walking only a couple of feet from the window making it easy to snap two discreet pictures very quickly. I didn’t see anyone and I thought no one saw me. Remember now, we live in a village with about 500 people and sometimes I bump into people at the pub who might recognize me. Usually it’s because they know me now since I’ve been here off and on for the last 19 months and I’m pretty friendly and not at all shy. Well, a few weeks go by and John and I are in the pub on a Saturday afternoon and I go up to the bar to get a refill for John and to say hello to my favorite bartender Roger who you see below.

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While I’m at the bar, a man who is buying drinks for his daughter and wife turns to me and says something along the line of, ” You’re not  from here are you?”  Okay, I can’t remember exactly what he said, but in the course of our conversation I find out where he’s from because I can tell he’s not a local. It turns out he and his wife are staying temporarily with his daughter and her partner in that sweet little cottage I think of as Carrot Cottage even though it’s really named after a flower not a vegetable. His daughter was new to the village so I had not had a chance to meet her yet. Going over to the table I introduced myself and asked her about the carrots I saw hanging in the window a few weeks earlier. Since I’m living in a country with different customs as well as expressions that can get you into trouble such as, ” Stop being such a pain in my fanny ” because words may have a totally different meaning, I assume this hanging your carrots thing must be unique to the UK.

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As I’m describing what I saw that day she said, ” Did you have a camera with you?”  ” Well…yes,” I say thinking, ” uh oh.” She said I thought I saw someone out there taking pictures and told my partner Colin, (not his real name)  “I think there’s a woman out there taking pictures of your carrots!” As she said this, I felt kind of silly, but only for a moment. I mean, I think I managed to get a really nice picture of a bunch of carrots. Thank goodness their windows were so clean. It turns out the carrots on a string had no meaning other than he’d just washed them and was giving them a chance to air dry.  I haven’t seen them since, but I always do a quick glance at the window whenever I go by now. I thought I might print out the photograph so that it is in a greeting card form and leave it behind for them with a personal note and maybe a little carrot cake for two.

Remember….John’s birthday is fast approaching so please send me those carrot cake recipes. If you leave your recipe in the comment section we can all have a chance to sample some versions different from the ones we normally use. Everyone except me…I don’t have a carrot cake recipe of my own yet.

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My Last 24 Hours (of 48)

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I have always been a bit intrigued with numbers noticing the ways in which one might imbue meaning into a particular one or even a series of numbers such as the 09-09-09 of today’s date. It’s kind of funny in a way since I’ve struggled with math for a fair amount of my life especially in middle school when numbers on a chalkboard could inspire fear faster than almost anything else.

As a child we moved so frequently and sometimes from coast to coast, that many things were lost in the back and forth of change. My math education was one of them. Looking back, I can see how little math I learned in my first 12 years in the classroom, 13 if you want to toss Kindergarten into the mix. So while I’ll could read before many of my fellow Kindergarten classmates, (okay, it was mostly rhyming Dr. Seuss) I never ever felt like I had a secure grasp on numbers during the long years of my public education.

As you can see by my title, change is coming and it’s bearing down rather quickly. In less than 24 hours I will leave 48 behind and slip quietly over in my sleep into the last year left before my 6th decade begins. I have big plans for this year. I have always treated birthdays in the  same way that many do New Year’s Eve, as a time for reflection and goal setting. I like to make a plan around my birthday and write down my dreams and goals for the next year.

It’s easy for me to look back and think about all I haven’t managed to do yet. I’ve had a list of Things To Do Before I Die since 1987 and while I’ve been crossing things off as I complete them, there are a few that I’ve changed my mind about that no longer matter anymore. I’ve been able to do a good many things on my list, but I am not entirely satisfied with where I am in several areas of my life. I enjoy so many good things while others struggle that it seems a bit greedy to want more than I have right now.

Many of the blogs I read on a regular basis have their own lists that they call a variety of names, such these found here: Mondo Beyondo, Life Lists, as in the case of one I read just this morning where Karen Walrond simply refers to her list as her Truest Goals.

After reading Karen’s post this morning, I felt inspired to do something I never do which is to share at least three things from my list for this year. I’m calling mine my Big Bag of Dreams. The title is based on a quote by Benjamin Franklin:

It is hard for an empty Bag to stand up-right.

This year I’m writing down my goals for the last year of my 5th decade on a brown paper bag with the top three on one side and an extended list on the other. I intend to put bits of the things I do to accomplish my goals into the bag so this time next year when 49 rolls over to 50, my bag will be so full it can stand upright. I want a tangible 3D image of what I am doing to fulfill my dreams during year 49 with me everyday.

Here are the big three for next year:

Complete the book I’m writing now and actively look for an agent and publisher.

Finish designing the game I’m developing with my sister Margaret and begin production and marketing.

Research, design and set up a Big Bag Of Dreams week long workshop/playgroup/dreambuilders gathering for a group of women interested in filling up their own bag of dreams to be held during 2011, the summer of my 50th year here in Cornwall, England.

At a glance that list looks a bit scary even to me, especially if you knew what other things are in the planning stages right now regarding big travel and more home renovations. When I feel as if it may all be too big a dream or doubt starts to creep in as doubt often does, I will remind myself of some of the other things I have done that at different points in my life I would have considered impossible.

It’s easy to overlook areas of success when they occur on a smaller level than say publishing a book or winning an Oscar, but when I need an example of a goal I’ve accomplished, I can remember of my first semester of University work where I learned 12 years of math in three months earning a B in a class I had been terrified to take. If I can do that with all my issues around math and numbers than who’s to say I can’t do exactly what I want with the three main goals for my Big Bag Of Dreams project.

Tomorrow as you may have worked out is my birthday. I’ll turn 49 at 2:02 am and John, sweetheart that he is, has something planned that involves packing an overnight bag and is a total surprise for me. I will probably have limited access to my computer for most of the day Thursday and I’m not sure if I’ll post again before the weekend, but I would love for you to consider leaving three special projects, dreams, or goals you have for your life in the comment section below.