Are we aging... backward?

My best friend and I have discovered something really odd at this stage of our lives. We love all the things we loved when we were kids. She started it ( I'm telling....mom!!!)

We went roller skating at Oaks Park last weekend. It was so much fun - I didn't fall down once (thank GOD, how humiliating) and I really loved flirting with the guy playing the organ. I wanted to special request the hokie pokie or something but I'm too chicken.

So, I spent the week thinking about how much fun it had been and looking forward to doing it again. We'd had a busy week and she told me she was going Saturday so I didn't get to join her. But something interesting happened... she bought a hula hoop. Saw it in a store window an impulse bought that dang thing on sight. A hula hoop?

See, all the things we loved when we were kids give us this feeling. For me, it's a bicycle with a banana seat, banana Popsicles... even bananas, as long as they have a butterscotch to go with 'em (thanks, grampa!) I wouldn't exactly compare it to being in love, but it's like being in heavy like (not to be confused with heavy petting - completely different!!)

Rollerskating made me feel giddy. Making new friends all over the place makes me feel giddy, too. Seems the more of a good thing I have, though, the more I want. For the first time in forever, I feel free to taste the adventures that life has in store. Banana Popsicle, anyone?

Where did you come from?

I love the idea that we've been here before. If there were any surprises in this life for me, it would probably be those rare times that someone crossed my path and instantly I felt history, connection, joy. My heart would say hello again, knowing we had somehow reconnected after a very long time.

I have many friends. Few of them know everyting about me (what fun would that be?) and fewer still know a lot of the bad stuff I went through when I was in my teens and twenties. But I came out the other side, became a respectable member of society, despite the bumps in the road that could have stopped a lot of people cold. But it didn't stop me. Because I had those ghosts I so love to talk about to guide me toward more people that share my world, the experiences I would need to become who I'm supposed to be.

I have a best friend that is also a new friend. We'll call her RK. She takes care of me like none of my other friends and better than anyone in my family ever has. If I needed a place to sleep, she'd make a bed. She's offered food while I struggle to find a job, everything you could possibly want or imagine - there is nothing she wouldn't do for me. How could you ever ask for a better friend? Safe harbor is so rare in this big, cold world and I have it with her. I have it other places, too, but with her it feels completely unconditional. She admires my parenting and the love and care of my children - which is not always easy. She makes me laugh with her witty, opinionated spirit. She calls me when I'm in need - almost like she has a second sense about me. All this from someone I haven't even know for a year. She has to have known me before. She has to know that once I'm through this horrible 2008, I will be the person I used to be and it'll be her turn to be pampered, cared for, spoiled. But she doesn't know that and she takes care of me still. Amazing.

I used to be this strong, determined, always "on" person. Nothing would keep me down for long, I could handle anything, always dealt with people strongly and fairly, never let my personal issues interfere with my business life or my friendships. I spoiled my friends with time, attention, surprises. And then that changed. The tough, strong, always put together me went out the window in one very quick second and I've had to rediscover how to get up in the morning, take care of kids and dogs and household, and allow myself the opportunity to be - are you ready..... - NEEDY. And just in time, RK is there.

Yeah, mushy I know, but this RK, the person I adore as a friend, falls into that category. We instantly hit it off (pedicures we love, politics we agree, life we cherish) and I think it's because I knew her before. Who were we to each other? Her amazingly strong sense of self makes me know we were family, not just friends. Sisters, maybe. And I got lucky enough to meander into her office one day and find her again. Thanks, universe. You're always looking out for me.

You don't temper perfect

I'm an intense person. Let's not pretend. I don't believe in pussy footing around, playing games or being anything but 100% Rachel. And that's about 100% more than most people can stomach.

So what do I do? I guess I could temper the passion I feel for life, the world and the people I care about. I could wear a big sign that says "Danger - radiation - keep your distance". Or, maybe I could just become a hermit and live in my hovel, allowing the poor, innocent general public the ability to stay behind the glass.

BUT I REFUSE. I am, as one friend puts it, "the be all, end all, how the hell did I get so lucky to meet you, perfect friend". I'm there at 2am when someone broke your heart. I bring you soup in bed when you're sick. I call when you're down - and I call when I'm blue, too. I give and I take. If I feel something, I tell you. You'll never wonder what's up with me. Heart is openly displayed on sleeve.

I took a major break from this type of behavior for years. I was unhappy, struggling and pulled away from everyone. But I found out quickly that hiding from your problems just makes them bigger. So now, I'm facing them and becoming the old "march through cemeteries, stomp in puddles, love with wild abandon" Rachel.

So when someone says too fast, slow down... can't handle it, I think I'm going to act fast. "Really? Then you'd better stay away" and off with their head. Talk about the ultimate red flag.

Because, damn it, when was the last time that you felt the most important, dynamic and exhilarating feeling - of being alive, toes in the earth, perfectly in tune with the world? - to only be told you're TOO alive and to knock it off? What kind of tool says "I love your intensity, I love your fire" and then immediately wants you to not be that way. Oh, wait - that's a man for you. My bad.

Here's my promise to myself today - people, you take me as I am, all 100% Rachel, or fuck you. You don't temper perfect.

When everything falls apart

Today has not been a good day. It started out nicely - a massage is a good way to begin things. But it's has quickly spiraled to the point where I'm in that place - you know, from that movie? "The pit of despair". That's the ticket.

When you're friends are all right - and they don't even have the nerve to say "Told you so" because they know you'll shatter into a million pieces

When the best thing you can possibly do for yourself throws everyone else into actual, physical turmoil

When your to do list is so long and so full of bad stuff that it's no longer a list but the line you stand in on the way to the executioner

When the people who are supposed to pick you up when you fall apart are too selfish and worried about their own shit that they ignore your very quiet cries for help as you wash out to sea

At the other side of this, there had better damn well be a fucking golden ticket.

MISSING: Some stuff and some other stuff

One in a while, it's nice to have your world turned upside down. Life is full of missed opportunities, chance meetings and random chaos. I've become an expert in the first and last of late. But amidst all the craziness, fear and occasional self-loathing, something completely amazing has happened.

I found happy.

I found it in an open space, by a fountain, overlooking some train tracks. I'd love to say I found a million dollars (maybe the car payment people would leave me alone then). Or maybe that I discovered, completely by accident, a cure for some dreaded disease. But this is oh so much better to me, selfish girl that I am. I'm laughing again - a lot. The bad moments are so much more palatable. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel - and it's not even an oncoming train. Bliss surrounds me, and I deserve it. This joy I plan to keep to myself for a while, savoring it and cherishing it as it should be savored and cherished. Because happiness has been so rare.

Happy was lost one summer day a number of year ago. I thought about tacking "Missing" posters around the city, but didn't have a current photo to add. Who would know happy when they saw it? How would people know what to look out for when all I could describe was "random giggles, puddle stomping and dragonflies". People can find all of those things, but the happy was lost to me.

I've taken life WAY too seriously of late. The whole parenthood, responsibility, independence thing has become problematic. I've spent too much time trying to do what I feel I should, too little doing what feels good. So, now that I've rediscovered happy, I'm hoping some of the more recent additions to my life can get lost: gloom; loneliness; disappointment. I figure they'll visit once in a while, but I'm ready to kick them out, make them get their own space, limit their visa to a short visit when necessary. Kind of like a couple of my uncles.

I found happy again. It's giggly and giddy and dragonflies, stomping in puddles, traipsing through cemeteries, saying I love you to all who matter and those who'll listen. Whoever sent it this way, I'm forever in your debt. I don't intend to ever let you go.

Wanted: A big, burly, 70 pound pitbull that doesn't shrink from the rain!

Summer's almost over. The weather has started it's change from heat wave to rainy days. My yard looks like I have trees on every square foot (not true - but my next door neighbor does and he's happy to share leaves. Joy.) And my dog refuses to walk in the rain.

Yes, Ezmond has been with me since July. Summer was great - we walked so much he's mostly perfect on a leash, as long as I remind him who is boss. But today, he showed me a different side of himself. Looking up at the rain with eyes narrowed, backpack on but still hunched over. A minute's coaxing got him off the porch and into the drizzle. A minute later, he was standing firmly at the base of the driveway, completely unwilling to move. He had his feet buried in the pavement as I tried to pull him. You know, "once I get him in motion he'll stay in motion"? But not exactly...

So, our walk lasted all of 45 seconds. I brought him in and took off his gear, headed for the coffee. And I laughed at him. He seemed rather indignant and walked quickly to the pillow at the foot of my bed where he sleeps. I think his nose is buried firmly in his butt and I bet he won't come out until spring.

What was the question?

I grew up with a dad that is not very lovey or very nice. He's bipolar and wasn't on medication. He was SO much fun when he was on a manic high - we'd do crazy stuff like load into the car and blow off school to be at the coast for a couple days, camping in the middle of November at the mountains. Or, we'd make frequent trips to Winchell's donuts on 72nd and Sandy at 2am for crullers. Those were fun times. And his name is Tom.

However, with manic behavior, the good comes with the bad. He is never allowed alone with my kids. He scares me enough that I have nightmares about him. As I see him, in his 70s and ailing, I wonder how much longer he'll be here. And how I'll feel - if I feel anything - when he leaves us.

So, when I was little, I thought all dads were like this - basically cool and nutty and crazy. Then, when I was a toddler, I spent most of a summer with my great-grandfather, Jabez Shovel-Babb (born in 1884, died in 1985). Dad called him Jay-who. He had so many stories to tell - his older sister and their mother had tickets to take the titanic to the states, didn't go because my great aunt had the chickenpox. I may not have been born but for that because he wasn't born yet. He talked about his life as a trolly conductor in Portland, watching the city grow from the 20s when he moved here. Remembering neighborhoods like Lents, Sellwood and Madison as stops on his trolley. Forever, I will think of the Portlan transit system as his. It doesn't beling to us, but to those who came before.

He had an affinity for bananas and lived to be 101 - he swore that 2 bananas a day and all the butterscotch candies you could eat lead him to a long and GOOD life. He smiled a lot and had the most infectious laugh when you heard it - which was rare. He was softspoken and demure, slow to talk and slower to raise his voice.

I was smitten with him - he let me crawl on his lap (Dad never so much as hugged me) and told me stories of England and the coal mines and how difficult life was when my great aunt and my grandfather were growing up. He gave me coins from his pocket that were so foreign to the US coins I would find on the street. We were very, very poor (pancakes and jello for dinner, free cheese... food stamps was too embarrassing for mom so we'd go hungry and she wouldn't have to stand in line and be embarrassed.) I adored every minute I spent with him. When we had the ice storms in the 70s, hed sleep on a makeshift bed in our living room, next to the fire, and I would sleep on the floor in a sleeping bag, piled in with brothers and cousins and the odd neighbor. Nothing felt better than those nights, watchig the transformers blow up, having cocoa that mom cooked on a campstove on the front porch. I never wanted it to end, never wanted to go back to a life of grade school where I excellend and felt mired in the mud, all at once.

My beloved Grampa died when I was 12. His funeral was one of the saddest days of my life. First of all, they put all this icky makeup on him - he looked like a clown. He would have hated that! Then, they dressed him in a fancy, satin suit and slicked his hair back. My great aunt asked me to kiss him (eeew - dead man cooties!) The way I remember him was very thin grey hair blowing around his head as he got off Tri-Met #12 on his way to tea with mom. Pale as a ghost - the man had that parchment skin that older people get. He was 101 for goodness sakes!

And his suits were tailored in England (he was born in Cornwall), with a special inner pocket, silk lining, and every detail done to the nines. I loved his style. The man was classier than anyone I could possibly imagine. I wanted his suit coats so bad that, when I got them from my aunt as a rememberance, I wore one EVERY DAY throughout high school. Got a nickname from that. Not repeating it here - it still haunts me in some circles. It was the 80s, after all...

So, my grampa died. But at home that day, after the bad organ music and me asking everyone to sign the guestbook - and all the comments of "You're becoming such a nice young lady" and getting super-hugged by one to many slightly creepy, distant male relative, I found something. I found a half penny from 1902. It was in my room, tucked safely in a shoe where nobody would find it. He hadn't been by in a while - had he left it there and I just didn't wear them? Had my mom or my dad done it to make me feel better? My heart died a little bit that day, it was the last time a man put arms around me and loved me without expectations. And I kept the coin to remember the cool things he'd taught me (how to make your tea, how to eat a scone, what bus gets you where in the city - he never drove, what really makes a man into a man.)

For obvious reason, he stayed dead. Any alternative coould be weird. Only, the coins kept coming. A couple people who are very important to me died one day in 1990, only I didn't know it for a few days. Two coins showed up in my shower - clogging the drain. Had to have the plumber out to fix it. He yelled at me for throwing British money down the drain, like I was nuts. I just smiled - until later, when I realized the exact moment they showed up would have been the exact moment of unfathomable loss.

When both my children were born, I had coins in my hospital room. For every big event in my life, there was a reminder of him. I'd think of what it would feel like to get a soft and getle hug at a sad moment, to have someone pat me on the head and say "No bother, girlie, no bother at all" and I'd wonder where we go when we're not here anymore. And yet, he was there.

Last time, it was when Jessie, my dog, died pretty suddenly in the spring. With all the other chaos in my life, I wasn't sure I could keep up the front of everything being OK. I came home to an 1898 ha'penny and a butterscotch candy on my computer keyboard. Really. A fresh one, not musty and old and smelling like dead guy. Glad there were no bananas, though... that could have been weird.