Inching My Way Towards Confidently Failing Upwards

 It's been a while, dear readers. I haven't fallen off the face of the earth, though we almost did. Long story there and I won't have an opportunity to write about it today, but will write about it soon. Still carrying on. Still dancing, and walking. Photo is from a May hike on a gorgeous day in Des Moines. I'm in my fifties now. How did that happen!? I'll celebrate my 54th birthday next month. Hubs is lucky to have celebrated his 70th birthday in April. He had a stroke 3 years ago and was given life saving treatment in less than 10 minutes of his stroke. We are aware of how lucky we are and we are living life to its fullest. I do still blog. I rediscovered my blog over at LiveJournal. I wanted to blog in a smaller sphere for a while as I sorted through the aftermath of telling on my abusive father, but I'm ready to be more public again. I think. I'll continue blogging there, too, as I've met some really cool people on that platform.

We are semi-retired as of January 1st this year! We are still working on a handful of cases and our consulting business from home and I do some work for hubs's former partner (our brother-in-law) from time-to-time at the office, but he is also scaling back and has a part-time assistant helping him. I only get called in for special projects or if she is unavailable. I'm taking a break this afternoon from working on a spreadsheet of federal cases going to trial in the upcoming months. It's nice working from home other than hubs thinks that means I'm available to work 24/7 so I had to set some boundaries. Namely, Wednesdays are my days off and weekends are days off from legal work too, so we can get caught up on home projects.

Wednesdays are art days, mainly. I was invited by my watercolor instructor to Studio time on Wednesday mornings at the Art Guild, so I've been going. It's been wonderful! I've been creating more art than writing, which is okay. I'm creating and that's the important thing. Since I told on the monster, I haven't felt as compelled to write, although I am still writing quite a bit of poetry.

Possibly my best news is that my eyes are lasting about an hour or two longer a day than they were. They still can't last a full day, but I can use them at longer stretches than before. I have to admit, not being able to use my eyes for prolonged periods has shot my focus all to hell though, and if I wasn't certain I had ADD issues before, I'm VERY convinced now. heh

This is my year of shedding my fear of failure, so I am inching my way towards a YouTube channel where I explore things I've always wanted to do but was afraid I'd fart up. One of those things is a fear of being in front of a camera instead of behind it. So...wish me luck. My first baby goal will be to post a couple of teasers before the end of the month. I'm training for a sub 45-minute walking 5k at the end of July (though I'm getting over a head and chest cold that has knocked me out 3 weeks of training, and with lupus, I will just be happy to make it through the race without passing out at this point!!!) and the other teaser will be just for starting the channel. I have another teaser already filmed for Shimmy Mob (belly dance), but we don't have a date set for when we'll perform yet, so I'm not ready to release it yet.

A lot has changed here at good ole Blogger. I need a refresher course on how to find everyone's blogs and how to get mine out and about. I'll share this to my Twitter feed until then. Peace, love & butterflies, y'all! Until next time. xoxo 🦋 

Tripping the Road Fantastic: Where I Found my 3/4 Shimmy

Life. What a weird companion. Hubs and I have been taking road trips all summer long. We've been to Chicago twice, Iowa twice, Indiana, Kentucky and I even took a long trip to Tennessee.

We just got back from what might be the last road trip of the summer. Our second trip to Iowa where we went to Newton to see Grand Funk Railroad (GFR). Back in the 1990s, even before we were married, hubs and I were GFR groupies. I think a lot of why we fell in love has to do with music. When hubs learned that I had GFR in my vinyl collection, despite the fact GFR hadn't had a hit since I was a little girl, I think that set our fate. 

Here we were last night--an old married couple at The Iowa Speedway in Newton. We didn't even know there was a big race with careers and sponsorships in the cross-hairs of our road trip. All we knew was, hell yeah--GFR is still touring! And they are within driving distance!

Because we weren't so much into the race and just wanted to see the last part of it before the rock concert, we arrived an hour late. The ticket booth was closed but the security folks waved us in with the condition they check my purse. Sure! But, what about the concert?

What about it, indeed. No charge to see one of hubs' all-time favorite bands and a band I also love very much (plus we enjoyed the end to an exciting and very loud race). Of course, we knew every song. The energy from the band was more than contagious--I'm impressed that they were so dynamic for such a small show. We were practically front row--maybe 3 rows back and we saw everything, making sure to stand on the side with the keyboards (me) and bass guitar (hubs). The band genuinely looked thrilled to still be out there, doing what they loved, no matter the size of the crowd, and they were fantastic. My gimpy ankle and failing back couldn't help but dance. And...I finally found my 3/4 shimmy. It's a belly dance thing that has taken me two years to figure out. Apparently I am rehearsing to the wrong genre of music and I need some good old early 1970s Detroit rock 'n roll and alt-blues to set me straight. One of my early instructors told me that when I got that 3/4 shimmy, I would wonder how I didn't realize how simple it was to do in the first place. She's right.

I wonder if it is a metaphor for life, too. I think we make life far more complicated than it needs to be. I know I do. Where I need to be right now is writing, dancing, spending time with the people I love, creating, centering, making a peaceful and loving environment for everyone I meet, and being genuine. Pure living. Part of my simplification process began a couple of years ago, but was reinforced very recently, too. I'm spending more time writing (blogging too!) than on social media. I'm spending time with people I love and who love me rather than trying to impress a family that never wanted me in the first place. And, I'm being me. All of me. If I don't overthink all of this, and if I don't live too much in the past, it will serve me well.

I'm still full of weekend bravada on a Saturday night. Remind me that I said and meant all of this on Monday.