The Time Has Come

"The time has come," she said, "to write."

At what moment do you start being a writer? The moment that you start writing.

At what moment do you stop being a writer? The moment that you stop writing. 

The definition of writer has never been that simple for me. I always thought you needed to get paid or published or maybe even do it full-time for it to really be true. But hey, I was paid. I was published. And although, I never had the pleasure of being able to write full-time, I can now say with confidence that it has nothing to do with all of that. It's really as simple as you either write, or you don't. 

I didn't write for so long. Sure, I had excuses. I was in graduate school. There was a lot going on with my family. Blah, blah, blah. Whatever. Those are just excuses. The fact was that I quit being what I loved. I quit. And then it became harder and harder to become that person I loved again. It seemed that the obstacle I'd created for myself was insurmountable. Sure...another excuse.

I believe in signs. The Universe speaks to us. Whether that be in the form of a higher power, a forest spirit, an electromagnetic field, I don't know, but it speaks to us, and if we choose to listen, if we're BRAVE enough to listen, we can find magic. I ignored all the signs for so long. I excused the signs.

I need to read for school.

I need to vacuum.

I need to buy groceries.


No. No, the Universe screamed. You need to write!

I need to write. I've abandoned it for too long, something simple, something profound that brought me such joy, and I want it back. I want blogging back. I want Chicken Noodle Gravy back.

School is finished. I'm two years older and wiser. I have two whole years of experiences to write about. The material is there. The words are on the tip of my tongue. So. The time has come.

To write.

Tessa Rose

I was gone to Starbucks when the news you were coming arrived. My phone, which had scarcely left my side for the last several weeks as I impatiently waited on news of you, was sitting on my desk; the text message announcing that you were on the way sat unseen and unread on my phone, an eagerly awaited message that would have to wait just a little longer.

When I returned to the office, iced coffee and bacon gouda breakfast sandwich in hand, I absently checked my phone and saw the message I’d been waiting to see for weeks. “Your new niece is on her way!”

The thirty or so minutes after that are largely a blur to me. There was a lot of squealing, a lot of dancing around, a lot of running from office to office to share the exciting news. I called my Mama (your BB) first, as she’s the one that sent the text, and then I called Jennifer, your Mama, to see how everything was.

You were definitely on the way, she said, and before she drove herself to the hospital, she was going to stop at a fast food restaurant to grab some fries, because naturally, she was hungry. Labor’s hard work. This is your Mama. She’s the strongest woman I know. When she went into labor with Garrett, your big brother, she insisted on doing a load of laundry before she left the house. She’s like Super Woman on steroids, and if you’re anything like her at all, you’ll be amazing.

After much celebration at work, your Uncle Jeremy arrived to whisk me away to meet you. We went home, fed the cats (your cousins), grabbed the camera, and away we went. For a good twenty minutes of the hour-long car ride, I squealed intermittently. You can ask Uncle Jeremy. I was pretty excited and pretty annoying. It was about 5:00 by the time we were on the road, and Atlanta traffic can be a nightmare. But not that day. That day everything was perfect.

We made it to the hospital in plenty of time. You were in no real hurry. Your Mama was patient and calm, and for awhile, we just hung out with her and your Daddy in the hospital room. They would only let in two of us at a time, so we took turns. Me, BB, and your Papa. I would say the three of us were equally excited to meet you; we’ll always be your biggest fans.

The waiting room was crowded at first. Families came and went. Babies were happily announced, hugs were shared, even a few tears were shed, and still, we waited.

By 10:00pm, the waiting room was just me, BB, Papa, and Uncle Jeremy. We were ready for you to arrive, and an electric current of anticipation was buzzing in the room, but there was also a strange sense of calm. When your big brother arrived, I don’t think any of us were calm, but with you, things were different. After meeting you, I realized calm was just part of who you were.

We finally did get to meet you at about 1:00am. You were, and still are, beautiful. Your Mama was beautiful, too. When we came in the hospital room to see you and her, she looked amazing. We kept asking how everything went, and she would just shrug. Easy peasy. I know very few women who shrug after labor. I told you your Mama’s pretty amazing.

I’ve held you and kissed you and cuddled you close. Soon, you’ll be a week old, but I loved you before you were even born.

Tessa Rose, I wish you a life of giggles and bare feet, of ponytails and sunshine. I can’t wait to know you even better, to play with you and kiss your boo-boos and be the best aunt in the world. You’re already the best niece.  

  

 

The Empathetic One

When I was agonizing over the decision of killing the spider in my bathtub this morning, despite a deep-seated, nearly paralyzing fear of spiders, I realized that I may be taking this empathy thing a bit too far. I’ve always been empathetic. From my days as child, sleeping with twenty stuffed animals because I was afraid I might hurt the feelings of said stuffed animals (or the giver of said stuffed animals) if I didn’t include them all, to my days as an adult, crying long and hard over a dead goose in the middle of a busy highway.

I can’t help it. I feel, and I feel deeply. Relating to people, to animals, heck, even to things, is a gift, even if it’s also a curse. Let’s start by examining the gift side of things. I care. I care about how the world turns out. I care about people and their fate. I care about how you’re feeling and why you’re feeling that way. It helps me to connect to you and everyone else in this world, and I sincerely love that about myself. It makes me open-minded and inclusive. It helps me “see through another’s eyes” and “walk in another’s shoes” and all of those other tired clichés about connecting and relationships.

On the other hand, empathy hurts. It turns me into mush. It worries me. It’s “tearin’ me apart,” as James Dean might say. As a supervisor, my empathy has proven to be a bit too much to handle. Since January, I’ve been struggling along in my first supervisory role…ever. The fact that I’m now leading a team of 6 to 7 people on a daily basis, that they count on me for things like paychecks and guidance, well, sometimes it’s a little overwhelming.

Their problems become my problems. I spend time agonizing over how best to solve those problems, and most of the time, I just can’t turn off my mind. The same goes with friends and family. If I sense for even a moment (and I’m good at sensing feelings, too) that someone close to me is unhappy, my entire day is thrown off.  I focus on what must be wrong, how I can help, and all of the other things that empathizers focus on when their powers are at work.

Empathizing and worrying seem to kind of go hand-in-hand, although they aren’t mutually exclusive. In recent years, I’ve fine-honed my empathizing to turn off if I start worrying too much. That comes in handy when my mind starts getting carried away with things.

So, yeah, I would say being empathetic is both a blessing and a curse. It’s like I’m a superhero with powers that are both good and bad. Maybe a little like Superman. Run with me here. Superman sometimes hates the fact that he’s got all of these powers, because even though they help him save people, they also alienate him from people and keep him from living a normal life. I sometimes want to live a normal life, with a normal level of emotion and empathy. That’s all I’m saying. When you over-empathize, you end up driving yourself a little crazy.

But if Superman had the chance to give up his powers, would he? It’s the age-old question. If I could give up being so empathetic, would I? The answer always seems to be no. Because in giving up anything that is a part of you, whether it be a super power or a personality trait that happens to be in hyper-drive, you change that fundamental equation that makes you…you. And when the world is full of so many cool people, who are each different and super in their own way, who the heck would want to do that? 

The Best Years of Our Lives

When you come to certain turning points in your life, it’s completely natural, and maybe expected, to reflect on where you’ve been and where you’re going. I’ve been doing a lot of reflection lately. Partially because of an unexpected promotion at work, which has more-or-less changed the trajectory of my career path, and partially because of a little thing called Facebook.

Facebook is largely generational. When I was in college, it was just starting out. At that point, it even required a college email address. It was for college students to connect with fellow college students. A sort of year book and who’s who of your classmates. I can remember sitting in a computer lab at the University of West Georgia and creating my account. I remember scrolling through the profiles of my college classmates, and the joy I felt when I first saw the accounts of old high school friends.

After a couple of years, it became apparent to me that facebook was a lot like high school in a lot of ways. Your online worth was measured by the number of friends you had; the number of times someone wrote on your wall, or liked your status. It was all a popularity contest, and for the longest time, I struggled with the same feelings that overwhelmed me in high school.

Will they like me? Why didn’t so-and-so “friend” me? Why does she have so many friends, and I only have a handful? What am I doing wrong?

The insecurities ate away at me as they had done so many years ago. I suddenly felt like I was sitting alone in the cafeteria or walking to class by myself or fading into the background…again. You hear a lot about the good times people have in high school. I’ve heard people I know say it: “I wish we could back to those good old days. Things were so much easier back then.”

But is high school ever really easy for anybody? Am I the only person who would loathe going back to that awkward, lonely time? I know the answer to both of those questions is probably “no.” I wonder then why things like high school and Facebook come so easy to some and so hard for others?

I’ve long since stopped measuring my worth by the number of friends I possess on some website or even the number of acquaintances I have in real life. I know the people whom I can call genuine friends, and I know I can probably count those people on both hands. To me, that makes me lucky.

Sure, the insecure teenager of my past would look at things differently, but any day of the week, I would rather have a handful of real, authentic friendships than all the Facebook “friends” and “likes” money can buy. I’d rather sit in the cafeteria with my four true-blue friends at the “loser’s table,” all of us knowing full well that our best days are ahead of us, than sit at that popular table where social status is the measure of our worth.

Looking ahead, it’s easy to sometimes look back. I look back on the years I spent in high school and those when I was less secure and less proud of the woman I am with not regret or sadness but with a sense of appreciation. Appreciation of lessons learned and prayers unanswered. Appreciation that I do not look back on the best years of my life but am always able to look ahead to days that grow brighter with each passing year. 

Endings and Beginnings

What better time than the holidays and the new year to start reevaluating where we are in life and where we are going? I’ve had plenty of time and cause to consider these very important questions lately, as I find myself embarking on a new career and a possible new educational pursuit.

I’ve also been asking myself the age-old question that’s been hotly debated and intensely considered by kindergarteners everywhere: what do I want to be when I grow up? Good question, and I’m still not sure that I’ve ever really answered it. If all my dreams were to come true, I’d want to be a writer, but really to be a writer, all you have to do is write, so I’ve already accomplished that in a sense. I guess what I should really say is that I want to make a living writing.

I’ve been so busy in pursuit of my new career that I’ve barely had time lately to focus on writing, and it wasn’t until I received a kind note today from an old, dear friend that I realized how much my lack of focus on that thing that I loved so much was putting it in danger.

When our lives become busy, we tend to start cutting things out. Going to the gym? Nope, no time. Reading a book by my favorite author? Well, there’s always tomorrow for that. Writing fiction and poetry and updating my beloved blog? First, I have to do laundry, then cook dinner, then dishes, and ironing and….

Before you know it, your life has become nothing more than work, work, work, and though you may feel fulfilled by that work and though you may love it, you aren’t giving time to the things that you really love, the things that fulfill you creatively and keep you passionate and excited. Things like family and reading and writing and kitty cats, and all of the things that make me…well, me.

As I try to nail down the program that I want to pursue for my Masters degree, I know that life is about to take another strange and complicated turn. My evenings and weekends now that are already so busy are only about to become busier, as I balance school, even more responsibilities at work that come with a new promotion, family, and myself. Where does writing fall in this future? I’m not sure, and that scares me.

Earlier today I told a friend that I may have to give up writing my column in order to make time for everything. The thought of giving up this column that has now been a part of my life for over three wonderful years is a sad one for sure, but I don’t know how else to make everything fit, and I don’t even have any kids to put in the mix!

To me, life is all about challenge and change. With every new year, every new season for that matter, we are faced with exciting and sometimes scary new adventures, and with those adventures, we have to make choices. I have some big decisions ahead of me in the next couple of weeks. My thanks to that old, dear friend Emily for helping to make sure that writing isn’t lost along the way.