Seattle – Love is all we need…

fullsizeoutput_e406

Two Cups is my metaphor for life. One cup overflows with gratitude for all the blessings I’ve come upon as I’ve walked the path only I could walk—infinite, really. The other cup, only filled partway right now, are heartaches I’ve collected along my almost fifty years of living in this crazy world. It feels like a healthy balance to have so much goodness and a few hardships too. Perfectly imperfect. It’s kept me shooting for the stars while remaining grounded in real life too.

I’m extra grateful this year as I’m still here, sitting on my couch with a book about Christmas, Paris, love, and the heartache of loss. My cat is curled next to me whistling in her sleep, the fire crackles below four Christmas stockings my grandmother made for me and my three girls. The darkening sky above the bay is a soft grey, one that whispers words of serenity and peace.

This summer while on a vacation in Peru, my girls and I were in an accident where I was directly hit by a boat while we were motoring back to our cabin in the middle of the Amazon at night. I blacked out but heard the sound of a fishing boat hitting ours and then me. It took another two to four days before I realized I had bruises on my arm, dislocated ribs, and a head injury that has a 60-90 percent mortality rate. After the accident, my girls and I were taken by a different boat to the third-world-strip-mall, urgent care to have my lip sewn back together. Novocain was injected, but I wasn’t numb to the needle and thread pulled in and out of my gums in a hallway surrounded by the soundtrack of devastation. Nine stitches, mostly on the inside, answered my prayer that it would be “better than I think it will be.”

The next morning I drank more coffee than I usually do because I had a Seattle-sized tumbler with a lid for my swollen lip covered in a bandage. And, perhaps, I was in shock and kept sipping, reliving the events of the previous night. “What the hell? It’s a family vacation!” What was happening inside my head was the bleeding veins between my skull and brain on my left side were being constricted by the extra caffeine. It only took a half hour for the bleeding to stop before my body encapsulated the blood like a blood blister and pushed my brain over just enough to give me a freight-train headache through the center of my being. This headache was enough to get us out of the jungle and back to civilization where there is migraine medicine, a real hospital, and people who could help me and my three kids get out of the country. We got our two weeks worth of clothes and souvenirs packed and back on the long, narrow boat for the 45 minute ride to the tiny airport and then to Cuzco at 12,000 feet where we spent the afternoon waiting for our flight to Lima. It just so happens that altitude is also a blood vessel constrictor. Lucky for me.

But for the Starbucks mug I got in Lima at the beginning of the trip, drinking too much coffee, and having lunch at 12,000 feet, I might not be here this Christmas. I would have stayed for another day and a half in the humid jungle where blood vessels remain in full dilation. I would have thought my headache was a regular migraine with the added benefit of being hit in the mouth and this would have caused me to continue to bleed until it was too late. I may have been on the airplane with my three kids heading back the next day. I may have had to have surgery in Peru to relieve the pressure of two days of bleeding inside my skull. If I would have made it through, only 30 percent make a full recovery after surgery when bleeding is undetected for too long. This is what makes subdural hematomas the most severe of head injuries—you don’t know it’s serious until it’s almost too late.

Angels were in the Amazon. There were so many things that could have gone wrong. The first being, our group of eleven didn’t get thrown into the murky water where caiman (alligator family) and other terrifying creatures live. There were five kids on board… Just the trauma of being thrown into that water in the dark… I believe my angels were my four grandparents I’ve lost in the last handful of years – Elwyn and Shirley, and Alice and John. I was protected in the Amazon until we were able to get all the way back to Seattle where I realized I might have a severe concussion. Yep, and then some. And, I was protected at home when I sent a prayer request because the hematomas got bigger and surgery was a real possibility. Hundreds of Facebook friends responded. I was sent to a different doctor at the last minute and he said we would wait despite the CT scan. After two weeks of excruciating headaches, they stopped completely with the prayer, thoughts, and love that were sent my way—the very next day. Gone.

***

Four months later, I’m doing so much better. Christmas is busy always, but it’s seemed like a little extra overload this year. Cookies didn’t get baked and not enough holiday movies watched from the couch all together. We had to get two Christmas trees because the first one was picked out in haste during a homework break at dusk. It was too small, “just not right.” Not to mention two sets of cards because there was a typo on the first set. Once again, life moving too fast.

The moments though… We had the best time shopping for each other in Seattle. We saw Annie: The Musical at the 5^thAvenue Theater. We watched a couple movies and got to sleep in a few days. My family, aunts, uncles, and cousins came over for Christmas Eve. It was magical. Our morning was lovely too – matching pajamas, Christmas music, the fire flickering, twinkling lights on the tree and mantel, presents opened, and pumpkin pie and homemade whipping cream for breakfast. Around noon I helped my girls put all their things in Ellie’s car and off they went to celebrate the holidays with their dad and his family.

The house is peacefully silent now. I’m still in my pajamas and the filtered sun won’t shine again until tomorrow. It’s not picture-perfect, but it’s been a beautiful day. I’m surrounded by love and grace. My girls gave me the softest blanket I’ve ever touched (ever), photographs of my girls with Santa through the years sit on the table behind the couch, a nativity scene on the piano, a “perfect” (second) Christmas tree with ornaments I’ve collected since I was young, art, flowers, and even my cat and dog, surround me as a reflect on where I’ve been, how blessed I am to get to live this life of mine, and what’s ahead in the new year.

We all have moments of absolute magic and moments of deep grief for what was lost or what will never come to be. Me, too. I’ve decided I’m going to live for the magic, the connections to others whether minutes or a lifetime, and, most importantly, for the love I can give to those in my circle and their love given right back.

This is life. It’s two cups at the same time. Sometimes one cup is overflowing like a Starbucks cup from Peru. It’s easy to keep refilling until you have to get out of the jungle—right now. The cups are not always marked clearly. The cup of heartache just might turn into the cup that saves you, but patience is required. It’s happened over and over for me.

The only thing I need to remember is to accept whatever comes, have faith I will be okay no matter what, and hold onto the hope that is infused in both cups. I’ve learned that everything in this beautiful, messy life is meant for me. I get to decide the narrative, even when it’s as crazy as a rogue fishing boat hitting me in the middle of Peru on our family vacation.

There is always, always something to be thankful for… Today, I am thankful for every single thing because I almost lost this life. This Christmas I was given perspective and that grace surrounds me like the softest blanket I’ve ever been wrapped in.

May you also know for sure that no matter what, life is so, so good. Love and grace are protecting you too. xo

It is all so clear to me, as I look at these three different places. Can you feel the energy of the cold, arid mountain range of Idaho, the fiery precision of Times Square in New York City or the sultry warmth of the Hawaiian Islands where the water hangs over the Pacific Ocean, not a rain cloud in sight? The energy of a place infiltrates all 75 trillion cells in our body. The energy of a place has the power to alter what we accomplish, how we sense the world, how we feel about ourselves, understand others; it has the power to change who we are.

My family has been living in Ketchum, Idaho at 5,853 feet above sea level for almost a year. The annual rain/snow fall of 18 inches compared to our hometown, Seattle, which has an average of 65 inches of rain, has had a bigger impact on our family of five than the daily vitamin D surge. The sun shines seventy percent of the time, but most months of the year it is either cold or icy cold without a droplet of water to spare – the pouring rain will bring the humidity to seventy-five percent on a relatively warm day. The winter months are dry and frigid, the air thin and constantly moving. The punishing climate causes people, plants and animals to draw inward to their core. We huddle together in our home with the fire radiating the warmth we crave, but it is never enough. Even writing is letting go of too much. Maybe that is why Ernest Hemingway fled to the Florida Keys when the temperatures and moisture in the air plummeted.

When I think of New York, my home for four years, it is the sultry, hot summers and the fire in those that thrive there that I envision. The people of the Northeast are not drawn into themselves; instead they seize the opportunity life presents with sharp focused achievement. There is no time for contemplation or second guesses. Relationships are strong and loyal but there is an identified reason for the attachment – family, work, customer, neighbor, friend – and all others are suspect. The fire within you generates the warmth you feel. Of course, the danger is in the excess. The bright, strong, action-oriented leader thriving in NYC can step over the line into aggressive, critical, inflamed, and angry. The village they lead might get scorched. In balance, the energy of New York City is invigorating.

Kauai is the oldest of the Islands. Life moves slower and the warm air surrounds you like a whisper. Nothing is too important. You are surrounded by the waves lapping the smooth sand and the breeze lulls you with utter contentment. Mt. Waialeale in the center of the Kauai rainforest is the “wettest spot on Earth” with 450 inches of rainfall per year. My family explored Kauai for Spring Break this year. As we drove around the Island we passed one of the most beautiful beaches we had seen. Across the street was a dilapidated hotel with trees and weeds growing through the windows, the roof weathered and caved, and in complete disrepair to which a bulldozer is the only option. My husband remembered going to that hotel as a kid on vacation. It is the Coco Palms Resort, where Elvis Presley filmed the movie, Blue Hawaii and famous stars from Rita Hayworth and Frank Sinatra to the von Trapp Family Singers vacationed.

On September 11, 1992, Hurricane Iniki ravaged the beautiful hotel and it was closed with no plans to rebuild. This happened twenty-one years ago, on one of the most famous beaches in the State and everyone said, “Oh, well,” and walked away. There it sits, home to plants and critters, as well as a tour company that will walk you through the jungle that has grown inside this famous hotel. The picturesque cove, on one of the most beautiful islands in the Pacific Ocean, is as pristine as if it were deserted. Although, there is the possibility of an Elvis sighting on the tour.

The difference in place is striking – Idaho, New York, Hawaii. We feel different in each of these places; the people have a different collective energy. In our transient society we often find ourselves in places that are worlds apart from our origins. When on vacation we marvel at the differences and it feels good to balance out our own natural energies, but what happens when a person from Kauai moves to New York; a New Yorker moves to the Rockies?

I have experienced my own energy shift when I moved from Seattle to New York and back again. My Northeast life was fast and focused. I worked sixty-hour weeks, went to business school at night, traveled for work and pleasure and planned our wedding. When we moved back to the rain, it was with a baby and without a job. That fire within, which kept life humming along in New York, began to smolder and build like a bonfire on a Northwest beach. The outlets that kept me balanced disappeared into the gray clouds and fog. It took awhile, but slowly I came back to steady, balanced contentment that I experienced growing up in the soggy Northwest.

Living in Idaho has caused another shift that seems more light and breezy. I don’t feel as rigid or stuck in situations that in Seattle felt like quicksand. Here, moods move with the wind, routines are not as important, and ideas – not actions – are fast and furious. The future is more interesting than analyzing the past or sticking to the schedule of the present. I hike in these gorgeous mountains and I am alive with energy.

Too much of the energy from this arid, mountainous region, however, causes some to have sleepless nights, get dehydrated and anxious about the future. They don’t thrive because the energy of place filters through our cells like the water fish swim. When we stay in one place we can no longer see that energy and might assume that our very happiness or unhappiness is either ‘just how we are’ or, worse that there is something wrong with the people in this particular place – depending on our own mixture of elements.

Only through living in three distinct places have the differences revealed the impact on myself, on my family. My oldest daughter and I share similar energies and have loved the dry climate of the Rockies. In Kauai, we felt like a ship stuck on the beach as the tide recedes, but my husband and middle daughter could not have been happier surrounded by the warm, thick air where the moisture hangs like a hummingbird lapping sugar water. In New York, I would get wrapped up in dramas, wore them like a cloak. The details and schedule seemed ever so important. The question was, “What am I doing right now?” In Seattle, damp like Kauai, the question was, “What happened in the past that causes me to feel like I do today?” And finally, in Sun Valley, Idaho, I ask, “What is my purpose in this life, how can I help?”

These questions are my questions, which have been revealed by immersion into a place. They also come because of my unique makeup of natural energies – comprised of ether, wind, fire, water and earth – and how that place stirs us in it’s own energy.

Tag: Seattle

Coffee, Angels, & Hope

Can a Place Change Us?