Fencing Bear at Prayer

I've figured out why I am so upset.  You were my friend.  I trusted you.  I believed in you.  I respected you and your work. And then you turned away from me toward the bright lights and forgot how much I had meant to you. Or maybe you never noticed. But I did.

All of my friends got medals this weekend.  My roommate (the one closest to me in the picture) even got two.  And I was back on the ground taking photos for everyone. Yes, I feel a little bit sad.  Who wouldn't?  I've been up there twice (although not in this particular event, Vet Combined as opposed to Vet 40s), and, yes, I liked it.  The question is, why?  Why does it make so much difference whether one gets on the medals podium or not? I used to think that it was because being up there on the podium would prove something about my fencing, that I was good enough.  But, again, good enough for what?  To fence?  I'm already that.  Even the fencer who comes dead last in the event is good enough to fence.  Nobody has to earn the right to compete, at least not as such. Sure, getting up on the medals podium usually means that you got to fence more on that particular day, but, again, it isn't like all those of us standing round tak...

It came to me all in a flash on Saturday. My husband had asked me to tell him a story, "something good about your childhood."  I tried, but all I could think of, other than the food , was how hard it had been making friends.  "It sounds," he said, "like you're blaming everybody else."  "No," I screamed (yes, it got to screaming), "I didn't say that.  It was just hard, and everybody was so mean to me." Which they were.  The kids on the playground when I was in second grade, who confidently told me that I would fail when the grown-ups decided to promote me to third grade after the first month.  The girls in the neighborhood who beat up on me when we moved .  My best friend(s) who dumped me for another girl or who refused to acknowledge me on the bus after we had been hanging out all summer.  The popular girls who never quite let me into their clique.  My friends in high school who spent the summer after we graduated going out ...

It's ironic because it is what I actually wanted: for her to leave me alone, to stop criticizing and correcting every word that came out of my mouth and thus making me feel like there was nothing I could do to (as Nutt puts it in Terry Pratchett's most recent Discworld romp ) "accumulate worth." But when I finally told her how I just couldn't take it anymore, trying all the while to explain what was so upsetting me, she responded by insisting that we not talk for a month--although with the confusing stipulation that we should still be polite to each other in public. Confusing, because as I learned yesterday, this means pretending in front of everybody else that nothing is going on and so, therefore, effectively lying; saying, "Yes," when asked if she wants to do something with me, only to turn around once we are alone and insist that she meant, "No." Fine. Whatever. Just get out of my head! It's embarrassing. Here I am, mid-life, embr...

Some years ago, I was playing with one of my decks of Tarot cards and asked the question, "What is the meaning of life?" The deck that I was using was Alexandra Genetti's beautiful " Wheel of Change ," and the card that I picked was the Eight of Disks: "Spiders Weave Their Webs in the Branches of a Weathered Tree." Spiders, webs, trees: how, I wondered, was this the answer to my question? Something about Fate and threads? Something about creation and death? I don't get it. Ah, here it is: "The web represents strong connections. It symbolizes any network of people and things working together to build something. Each person pulls the thread along and, in his or her interactions, knots it together with the threads of others, building the interpersonal web that makes up a life. The web of your life is made up of all the people, places and things you interact with."* At which point, if I remember correctly, I started to sob. Not out ...

Overheard at the NAC ... (click to enlarge) It's interesting how carrying a stuffed toy bear around all day makes it easier to behave like a grown-up. Thanks, Bear!--RLF

I was on Facebook all morning today, looking for long-lost cousins, former students, colleagues and friends whom I hadn't been in touch with for years. It's an interesting--and absorbing--exercise. Some of my "friends" are easier to find than others; old classmates, for example. But for those who do not group so neatly by institution and year, it's challenging, a real effort of memory and associative thinking. I've known how many people in how many different contexts over the course of my life (nearly 44 years)? It's as much as I can do to recall the names of all of the students who have done senior theses with me, never mind friends whom I knew in high school. I'm just thankful some of them have thought to look for me! I have vaguely known about Facebook for a few years now, but only joined this past summer. If anyone wanted to find me, I argued, they could just Google my homepage. But then my sister posted some photos that she wanted me...

click to enlarge