Facing Vulnerability in Everyday Ramblings

I overheard one of my students spontaneously tell another last night after class as we were rolling up our mats, “ I like this class.” Man it doesn’t get much better than that. It certainly makes all the work I put in to it worth it.

And I am glad I get to experience a sense of usefulness and accomplishment doing this because I sure am not getting it from work.

Lately I have been a little judgmental of St. Joe and this bothers me and I finally figured out what it is all about. It of course has nothing to do with St. Joe and everything to do with, well, umm, me.

Having this minor surgery, a mole removal above his eyebrow with two layers of a few stitches (he had them out yesterday afternoon) has been really hard on him. He has never experienced anything like this before and it has been an unpleasant struggle. I totally get that. Nobody wants to have something like that done.

But his surgery took about 12 minutes and my recent one took four freaking hours!

It does make me understand a little more why he indulges in such risky behavior such as the regular use of a tanning bed and riding a fast motorcycle, both of which make me cringe because I am a huge fan of his continued well being.

If you haven’t ever experienced difficulty, adversity in any sort of deep way, you only have a bunch of older folks telling you it is not a good idea. If you are resilient and have good energy, (he doesn’t drink much, nor does he eat sugar, he walks and works out), difficulty is not really on his radar…

So knowing all that and adoring him I feel bad that his apparent foray into wuss-dom is bothering me so much.

You have probably figured out what is going on here way before I did.

My surgery was really really difficult, and expensive and I just got a rent increase notice yesterday and I need to talk about this stuff. It has been challenging to cover for him during the time he has been out.

I just got back from the grocery store where I went through the self-service checkout and other than to a couple of customers who called today and a few colleagues about work related things I haven’t spoken to anyone about anything.

I need to.

Clearly I am suffering from a little too much isolation. I need to find a more consistent sense of connection that works both ways. S had canceled our walk on Saturday and I did have a lovely visit with Kes and Most Honorable on Saturday but I need to figure out a way that works for me to have a few people to talk to regularly about oh say the child proof cabinet locks I ordered and the anatomy of the outer upper foot!

And someone I can whine to (discreetly) about my perceived struggles, annoyances, challenges, interests, hopes and concerns.

Diego is sitting right next to my laptop saying, “You can talk to me mom! But I’d prefer it if we played while we were doing it.”

I realize now in retrospect that so many of the problems I was having with the former director at work were because I had a scary cancer diagnosis and multiple and ever more challenging surgeries around that, and two very sick cats and I was being stoic and downplaying the difficulty and powering through.

And while I certainly don’t want to be a wuss I am beginning to believe there is a lot to be said for being vulnerable. As life pummels one into softness I believe it also opens our hearts wider and wider to the suffering of others.

I am sorry St. Joe had this difficult experience. And I am sorry too that so did I.

Oh and can we just please put Donald Trump in the deep freeze for a week, so we can get a break and act like grown ups?

…I took this picture up in the Gorge exactly five years ago hiking with Most Honorable and I think it is just beautiful. :)

Last updated August 03, 2016