Doing It Alone

Hi, Boomers,

Sometimes blogging is downright difficult. You'd think that someone with my verbal acuity would never be at a loss for words or for ideas. But lately, I've been mentally preoccupied with my new book. Shamelessly, I mention again: Sixty, Sex, & Tango, Confessions of a Beatnik Boomer.

When I began to write my book about turning 60 and all that it entailed, it seemed a way to keep my creative juices going. During the day, I grabbed and hour here and there to write something, and at night, I was a maniac writing way past my bedtime. My computer was my friend; my words were comforting and cathartic. Writing became my pacifier - a way to self-sooth my wounds and losses and to use my humor for good and not for evil.

The process of writing reminds me of rehearsing a play. I loved rehearsals because it was the creative engine that drove the creation of a character that was someone else, not like me, but possessed bits and pieces of me. Everything had to be real on stage, had to be believable. The rehearsal process was the most truthful way of creating a character. The subsequent performances on stage were pre-determined and set and they weren't as much fun as rehearsals.

Writing is like that but more so because writing is solitary. There is no community of writers or actors around. The "aloneness" factor creeps in to the process and quite literally engulfs the writer. I love it. I love that the silence is only broken by the sound of my fingers on the computer keys.

Writing my book encompassed about two years in my life. After the first year, Sixty, Sex, & Tango was at an literary agency. I signed with the agent for six months, but she was unable to find a publisher. I had no illusions that a publisher was going to snap up my book. I was an unknown entity; I was writing a memoir. I had no national or local platform. I spent another two months deciding what I was going to do with the book after my contract expired.

Those two months were a revelation. I stood outside myself and took a long look into my soul. Why did I write the book? What did I want from the book? What would happen if I just put the manuscript in the closet with all my other screenplays that were getting moldy? What would happen to me if I did publish the book? Scared of success? Scared of failure? Those are fairly universal fears.

I sat with the situation and didn't do anything. I didn't judge the situation. It was what it was at the time: I had a manuscript that maybe or maybe not wanted to be a book. It needed editing, more organizing, more honesty, less anger. How deeply did I want to explore? From today's vantage point, those two months of isolating thoughts seem a dream. As December ended and the second month turned into the beginning of a third month, I got more detached from the book and wouldn't even pick it up.

Then right after Hanukkah, without any thought or reasoning, I found myself looking for self-publishing houses. I remembered that a friend of mind used a particular self- publisher for her book and I liked the way her book was produced. So out of the blue one day, without thought or emotion, I went rummaging for her book to find the publisher and I called iUniverse. I spoke to a wonderful, honest man who was so kind he disarmed me. He was supposed to be a salesman and he was more like a shrink. We had a long conversation about my book and what I wanted to do with it. He didn't try to sell me on any package or push me. He just listened as I talked. And when I was finished, he said, "So what do you want to do?"

It felt so right to finally say, "I want to publish the book." It was a relief because I realized that I had finally allowed myself to take responsibility for publishing the book. I was hiding from making a decision because I was refusing to draw inside myself to engage my feelings. During that time of contemplation, I had spoken to no one about what I was feeling or how deeply I resented having to make a decision regarding the final outcome of the book.

My decision to publish happened just before the Christmas holiday. The new year was ahead and it felt good to have made a new year's decision prematurely. On new year's eve day, I got into my car and drove to San Diego to a tango festival and felt gratitude to be able to think with a clear head for the first time in months. Life was good and I was going to dance tango for the next three days. The new year started splendidly.

Namaste

Joan

I Took A Trip To The Moon

Hi, Boomers,

I've been busy it seems. I started a new writing project. Not a book but a monologue on a theme that is to be part of the Jewish Women's Theater group salon readings for this coming year. This particular theme is: "Jewish Women Do Men." I've got plenty of material, but I have been wrestling with the format. I'm used to writing in a book format. I have to think "monologue." I'm under a seven to ten minute time limit - mostly like five minutes but I'm trying to stretch it. The fun part is that I will be doing it as a reading. But for some reason I'm stalling now. It's not that I have writer's block because I can yenta with the best of them. I think I keep getting interrupted by the clatter in my brain. I need to go away and write.

And I will tomorrow. I'm going to Las Vegas to be with my family over the Jewish new year. L'Shana Tova. Happy New Year to all my Jewish peeps. I think I've really been excited about being together with my family, having dinner and seeing the grandkids run around and play and take care of the new babies - Jude and Penelope. Bliss for me.

And last weekend over Labor Day I attended the Denver Tango Festival. There are two in Denver - Memorial Day and Labor Day. I'm still breathless about it all. The dancing was sublime. I had a wonderful experience. And yes, I was selling some copies of my book, Sixty, Sex, & Tango, Confessions of a Beatnik Boomer, and every last one was sold by the second day. I also brought a bunch of advertising 4x6 cards and they were quickly gone. What really astounded me was that most of the people who bought my book were men, even men much younger than 60! I'm wondering if I got the demographic wrong. Men scooped the book up and asked lots of questions and laughed out loud at my chapter headings and were full of enthusiasm about the project. Husbands were trying to entice their wives to look at the book but they weren't exactly that interested. Although I must say that the young girls who are my friends gave the book to their mothers and those women loved it. Anyway, it was all so much fun and exciting and I'm still a little on the moon about it.

Speaking of being on the moon, my beloved Jungian therapist retired at the end of August. I put a call in to him a week ago and wished him well. Mike, my therapist, changed my life. He had a profound influence on my psyche and on my spiritual journey. He's all over my book. In fact, he gave me the courage to write it, but he didn't know that because I didn't even know it until I began to write my memoir and Mike came pouring out.

Mike called me today to officially say good-bye even though I hadn't seen him in 2 years. We were kindred spirits - the same age, the same sensibilities, the same humor and wit and love for all kinds of things we found in common.

"What's in store for your retirement?" I asked Mike.

"I'm going to explore my two million year old man inside of me and then maybe go to the moon," he responded with a lilt in his voice. "Then I might get a place in Washington in the middle of nowhere and contemplate."

I knew Mike was deadly serious about his plan. There really is a two million year old man inside of Mike. I wish I could stick around to get to know him better.

"I want to find a place, too, to go to contemplate," I said.

"It can be inside or it can be outside, Joan."

"I know that, Mike, because you taught me that I would always carried my sense of Self with me wherever I decided to venture."

"That's right, Joan. You carry yourself and that inner pony that sometimes acts up. Don't ever lose that pony."

I promised Mike I wouldn't perfectly tame my inner pony because then life wouldn't have as much joy and be as much fun.

Maybe I'll get to go to the moon some day, too. And maybe Mike will be a fellow traveler.

Namaste

Joan

The Dog Days Are Over

Hi, Boomers,

It's the eve of August 31st, 2010. It's technically the beginning of the end of the dog days of summer. The end of the week marks Labor Day and the beginning of a fall cycle - back to school, back from vacation, back to work, back to back responsibilities.

In the days when I taught drama in high school, I loved this time of year. I loved going back to a crop of new students, mostly dysfunctional, pop smoking, LDS taking strangers living in the alternative universe of Las Vegas. It was Clark High School, Las Vegas, Nevada, an outpost of mostly dispossessed kids, with one parent, maybe two but they worked shifts on the Strip - some graveyard, some early morning, some split shifts. But they loved coming into my class because they knew I truly thought they were special. Our dog days were times of experimenting with improvisation and reading and acting in the new and exciting scripts from Off Broadway's golden years in the late 60's and early 70's. The weather didn't quit snap into fall mode because it was still hot as hell in Vegas until October. Yet, we sweat through that first month getting to know each other and allowing the senior thespians show the way to the newbies, the wanna-bes who took drama/theater to find a refuge against their adolescent angst.

Dog Days were days of optimism and hope in my life and they still are. Now my grandsons go back to school and I still get a thrill of hearing about their teachers and books and friends.

I love the fall weather. It's my favorite time of year. Los Angeles can provide that fall weather snap, cooler nights and less warm days in the shade. Sometimes there is a bout of heat around Labor Day, but I can still smell football season and see the band practice outside my yoga room at the John Wooden Center on the UCLA campus and sometimes catch a glimpse of the football team warming up on the field as I walk to my car.

As the feeling of renewal comes over me, I am cognizant of old memories from grammar school and high school when I was part of campus excitement and new classes and old friends returning to our familiar posts.

I'm feeing nostalgic for my parents, particularly my father because he drove me to St. Raphael's grammar school for so many years. I was so very happy growing up, and I loved sitting next to my dad in the car as we listened to Don McNeill's Breakfast Club on the radio. We would sit in the car and watch the Dominican nuns get out their taxis on the side of the school while my dad and I continued to listen to the radio. I wouldn't get out of the car until the nuns entered the building.

Every end of August and beginning of September memories come back with a vengeance and take me back deep into my past - a past that gave me my values, my sense of direction, my loyalties, and my sense of self.

Namaste

Joan

Expect the Unexpected

Hi, Boomers,

I'm excited today. In fact, I've been excited all week. I feel like I'm high all the time because adrenalin has been surging through my body with more than its usual speed. It was a good work week, teaching yoga every day - getting back to what I love doing. After experiencing the spiritual connection to Bali, it was a great feeling to connect my mind and body and breath in movement and intention. I also worked daily on marketing plans for my book, which was like another full time job. I even made time to dance tango on Wednesday night at one of my favorite venues - El Floridita on Vine and Fountain.

I was only away about 9 days but it felt like I was away a month. I guess that's a good sign that my vacation was terrific. And I'm still carrying Bali around in my heart, in my head, and in my future.

Okay, I won't beat around the bush. I'm having my first book signing tonight at my Saturday night milonga - the place where I regularly dance tango. It's actually called The Tango Room and we just celebrated our ninth anniversary at that particular studio.

I don't know what to expect from a book signing. But I'm just going with the flow and having a good time. Invitations were sent out and plans have been made to celebrate all 60 year old women in our tango community. It's free to all of us who have reached the 60th decade. A milestone for sure, and yet, we are all really very young at 60 it seems to me.

My book, Sixty, Sex, & Tango, Confessions of a Beatnik Boomer (still shamlessly plugging, aren't I), deals with turning 60. One day, right in the middle of being 60, I startled myself by consciously recognizing that I had turned 64. It was just a number to me. Nothing more than a number. I felt like I was 19; I acted like I was 19, and I moved like I was 19. In fact, I didn't move as good at 19. I like to think that living with joy, with yoga, with dancing tango has lead me into surrender and acceptance of living gracefully in my 60's. I'm now two years older than when I started writing the book and I feel younger. I feel like Benjamin Button decreasing in age. Maybe I'll die looking like a baby.

So tonight I celebrate many gifts I have been given: my family - sons and daughters in law and brother and sister in law and adorable nephew, my grandchildren - all five of them - my wonderful, loving friends, the tango and the pleasure and happiness that the dance has brought into my life, the ability to actually write a memoir about living joyously with gratitude and love.

I reflected today that I never had a vision about a book signing in my future. I just wrote daily for a year and a half joyfully. Sometimes I got so high on life that I wanted to scream. And sometimes I did just that. I screamed. Strange to me that I didn't have a vision of an outcome sometime in the future. It was just about the process, the journey that was a kick. So today I am surprised and I am grateful. And I wanted to share that with you.

Namaste

Joan

Notes From the Hindu Underground

Hi, Boomers,

I'm home and the emersion back to reality has not taken place yet. Hey, the day is almost over and maybe I won't be jarred back into the daily news. A weariness is beginning to creep into my bones and my mind is fuzzier than at noon when I wandered through Ralph's trying to come up with a week's worth of food. Not Whole Foods? Okay, so I had a bunch of Ralph's coupons that needed to be used up.

While my body is shopping and organizing bills and juggling next week's marketing activity and classes, my mind is still back in Bali. I'm still flush with the warmth and generosity of spirit and daily offerings of gratitude that encompasses this most unique Hindu society. Despite the hundreds of motorbikes and taxis flooding the streets at all hours, the rhythm of Bali resides in the beats of one's heart. Care, kindness, and gratitude is the mantra chain. Karma determines your way into life and your way out of life.

One of the most unique experiences I had was attending a cremation ceremony. The funeral was held in a small village about 10 miles outside of Ubud - the city where I stayed - and it began in the home of the deceased. We were served water and cake before the ceremony began. There were relatives and villagers milling around or sitting. Music was playing; children were happily wandering around; the ladies were gossiping and the men were organizing and erecting the very tall edifice where the deceased body was to be placed.

When it was time to gather on the center road in the village, we all moved into the street and watched the finishing preparations. On the very top of the funeral edifice, a beautiful young woman, dressed in Balinese ceremonial clothes, sat perfectly still. She was a member of the deceased family. Below her was a life-size black cow made out of wood; upon that cow road an important person from the village. He looked like a cowboy in a western movie. He was happily showing off to the villagers how much fun he was having atop that cow.

In this particular funeral ceremony, only one man was going to be cremated. The deceased was considered to have some wealth in the village and so he was allowed to have his own separate cremation. Sometimes many people are cremated at the same time if they do not have the means for an individual funeral. This was an unusual event.

My friends and I hung out with two adorable Italian men who spoke English very well and so we all walked together down the pothole filled street, wind blowing dust around our bodies as the oppressive heat made our throats dry. I thought we should be sad at this moment, but no one around us was sad. Everyone was joyfully talking and laughing and it all seemed so, well, perplexingly not like a funeral.

We walked into a large field and the villagers stood back as those who prepared for the cremation did their work.. The black cow was situation on its own platform and was separated from the edifice where the body was held. Actually, the body was wrapped much like a mummy in ancient Egypt and placed in what looked like a casket. Then men lifted the casket and carried it to the cow where it slowly slide into the body into a carved out cavity inside the cow. Evidently, the cow had movable parts and functioned somewhat like a crematorium. In the ensuing half hour, piles of wood and straw were placed around the cow. Still, the crowd talked and continued to carry on as if they were standing around at a market place.

The family approached the funeral pyre to pay their last respects. The wood and straw were beginning to burn. When the cow was sufficiently burning, I walked up to the sacred cow which housed the burning body and paid my last respects. I knew from my yoga and study of Buddhism that this was a moment of transition for the deceased. His soul was moving on into the spiritual world and he would, of course, come back into another form. If he had lived life with good karma, he would return a happy man. If not, his life would be full of struggle.

I asked our driver, Wayan, why there were no tears. Why there was no sadness. Why were the villagers were totally relaxed and peaceful. The sense of balance in the crowd was pervasive. There were no high or lows; the energy of the villagers was uniquely tranquil for just having seen their beloved relative die.

Wayan told us about the Hindu philosophy of death and dying; it is much like the Tibetan philosophy of living and dying. For Hindus and Buddhists, death is a transition after life. That transition has meaning because the energy of the soul does not evaporate. The soul lives, it resonates in the universe at the moment of death. Death is a happy time in these unique cultures. It is a time to assess karma and give gratitude for life on earth. For those who are close relatives of the deceased, a wife or a daughter or son, then there may be tears shed but not in public. No one mourns or long.

I am still feeling the vibe of peace and non-violence at the core of the Balinese society. I sensed no anger; I sensed no impatience; I sensed no judgment. There is little crime and not much drug use. There seems to be a lack of coveting of things or fighting over the spoils of events or situation. The island of Bali and its people are embracing and loving and the the richness and textures of this most magnificent and lush environment and its spiritual people will have a long lasting influence on my soul.

I didn't do any yoga while I was away. My friends asked me if I missed the practice. But I told them that my practice was more meditative and not so physical because we were hiking most of the days and the physical exertion was vigorous. So my thoughts turned inward many times a day as I let my mind wander and absorb the purity of the air and the stillness in my environment. Can you imagine meditating in a rice field? It's heaven. And Bali is surely as close to paradise on earth as it gets.

Namaste

Joan

Up in the Air

Hi, Boomers,

A few thoughts on travel before I leave for Bali. Bali. It sounds romantic and so "eat, pray, lovish." Let's set the record straight. I'm not going to Bali because of Ms Gilbert's book. While I found her journey somewhat interesting and a bit whiney, I truly believe there are more interesting anecdotes about sappy transformation. She ain't Carl Jung. To those of you who worship her journey, you can all throw rotten tomatoes at me when you meet me.

And while I am on the subject of eat, pray, love, Julia Roberts and Javier Bardem? Please. The guy Ms. Gilbert fell in love with on Bali was much older than she and fully Brazilian. Even though the movie comes out on Friday the thirteenth, it will be a great hit because most females between the ages of 20 and 75 have read her book - except two of my friends and my step-daugher, Camille, and these are ladies whose taste in literature would put book critics out of business. I hope Bali isn't over-run with over-wrought females looking for redemption with that shaman she chased and a Brazilian hunk she fell in love with. I understand from my traveling companion's friend - who just came back from Bali - that her shaman is not a celebrity who says the same thing to everyone who pays him gobs of money to release the evil spirits from their souls. "You will always find happiness." He should work for Hallmark.

I'm laying in bed and beginning to grasp the amount of time I am spending in the air to get to Bali. Probably around 22 hours with a layover in Taipei. My legs are already buckling under me. I lose a whole day crossing the international time line. And I'm leaving at the hideous time of 2 am Thursday morning. I'll sleepwalk into the cabin of the plane, try to get settled in my seat, realize that I have never been so uncomfortable in my life and ask myself why, oh why, I decided to vacation halfway around the world. Answer; it seemed like a good idea at the time - when my friend, Carol, told me on the stairwell of the Math and Engineering building on the UCLA campus after my yoga class that she and Adrienne were thinking about going to Bali for their vacation. I just jumped right in and invited myself. I wasn't even going to take a vacation this year. I was going to wait out 2010 without leaving the U.S

Impulse can be a good thing sometimes. It can be creative and engaging and even exciting. I've been impulsive many times in my life. But as I look around my bedroom with piles of clothes spread out everywhere and a bathroom that looks like tweens have been playing movie star with all my cosmetics and makeup, I'm having more than second doubts about leaving beautiful Santa Monica and the Pacific Ocean. Of course, one cannot swim in the Pacific, so what good is it except to gaze lovingly at its tepid shores.

The energy it took to prepare for this trip, the work I had to finish on marketing my book, getting substitutes for class and giving them detailed instructions about where I teach on campus (min-boggling), engaging my neighbor to water my plants and pick up my mail, excessing about all the details have thrown a damper on my travel excitement. Will it be worth it in the end? All will be revealed when I step off the plane at Denpasar in Bali. Wayan, our driver (almost everyone in Bali is named Wayan), will meet us inside the airport with our names on a sign and I hope I will begin to feel that I am ready for my adventure. After all, my traveling companions and I have outlined in detail all the places we want to go, all the restaurants we want to eat in, all the events we want to attend.

So this once in a lifetime trip is going to be great, right? I am hoping that tonight as I fall asleep, I will begin to surrender to the inevitable.

One more thing. I'm leaving my computer behind. I have not been without my computer for over a year. It has literally become my brain and that's pretty sad. It's time that my MacBook and I separate. It's not a divorce, mind you; it's just a 10 day separation and I can handle that. I'll blog when I return. I'll tell you all about my wanderings. And I swear I will not fall in love with a Brazilian.

PS My new granddaughter, Penelope Sweet, is doing very well. She is eating well and is even gaining back some of her weight. I will miss my daily updates on her progress.

Namaste

Joan

Penelope Sweet

Hi, Boomers,

I never even gave being a grandmother a thought until one day five and a half years ago, I became a grandmother to Jordan Mac. And then two years later, Luc Daniel was born. Okay, two grandsons. That's great, really great. But the moniker "grandmother" was still kind of a foreign concept. After all, I was still living la vida loca, and my mostly monthly visits to my family in Las Vegas were keeping me connected but not especially engrossed.

Oh, but I had another son and he and my daughter-in-law were about to have Greyson Ambrose. And now, this little ball of energy a little over two years ago and making a deeper impression on my psyche. Okay, three grandsons. Doable.

I continued on with my yoga/tango life and buried myself in writing my book, Sixty, Sex, & Tango, Confessions of a Beatnik Boomer, continued my visits, divided my time between homes in Las Vegas, and never gave the grandma game another thought. Until...

Here comes Jude Love entering the world in January of this year. Happy new year, Jude Love and welcome to a growing family. Jude is the most chill of the grandchildren. He smiles all the time and loves the action in the house. He's straight out of central casting. Big, beautiful and bold.

I'm trying to keep this grandma scenario straight. I love them all equally. I love their energy and unconditional love and it's kind of fun being a quasi parent again - that is, when my sons aren't around to parent me parenting my grandsons.

"Mom, we talked about this...leave him alone." But it's about the filthy dirty Linus blanket dragging along the floor filled with dog hairs and ground in food and the thumb ever-present hanging from Luc's mouth so he can't speak let alone answer a question. Okay, I'll shut up.

This week I have another grandchild. A girl - my first girl - Penelope Sweet. She was 34 weeks at birth, 5 pounds 6 ounces of the most beautiful tinniness I have ever seen. Not bad for a premie - a fighting, feisty Leo premie who let's everyone know in the NicU that she is hungry and wants her dropper of milk.

I lovingly watched my sweet pea sleep in her plastic bubble attached to so many lines and monitors that I lost count. I can still feel the emotional connection to her lightness, to her divine being.

A girl. A real live girl. I had boys; my brother had boys. We missed the experience of having a girl. Suddenly, and without provocation, we have righted the confluences of the universe in our family.

I wonder at the miracle of birth, of a mother's love and her unconditional, immediate devotion to her offspring. I saw my daughter-in -law lovingly connect to Penelope with such finality that I was moved to tears. There are still miracles in the world to experience. I wouldn't have missed this grandma thing for anything.

Namaste

Joan