My Old Kentucky Home

When I was wandering around my hometown on a recent visit, I chanced upon folk artist Marvin Finn's crazy, colorful chicken sculptures in the waterfront park. They remind me so vividly of my long-dead grandmother and her ongoing battle with her hens. She had a cantankerous relationship with them, because they were usually ornery and unmanageable and hid their eggs in the highest bales of hay stored in the barn. My grandmother was a devout and gentle Methodist, but she waged a lifelong war for her flock's eggs and souls, all the while reproaching them for being a stubborn bunch of heathens and hussies. I hated reaching under an old biddy for an egg and getting pecked on the arms and hands, but even more I dreaded watching my grandmother chop off their heads for Sunday dinner. I still find it difficult to eat chicken without remembering the real blood and guts involved in getting it to the table. But these cheery sculptures also brought back the memories of fragile chicks keeping warm in a box by the kitchen stove, of the comforting cluck and shuffle of the hens as they went about their daily business, and of the ordinary beauty of their color and shapes. Returning "home" is always a similar mixture of warring elements for me--the blood and guts of the painful episodes in my life that took place there mixed in with the beauty of the landscape and the memories of people I once loved. I've finally given up trying to reconcile those two feuding family ties that bind. Like the chicken and the egg, the sweetness and the sadness are all part of the same dish.

Things to do on Frida's Birthday

1. Wear my earrings with Frida Kahlo's eyes on them.

2. Feel beautiful.

3. Write 300 words on any topic whether I feel like it or not.

4. Listen to Latin music on Pandora.com.

5. Say "gracias" all day long.

6. Be brave about the things on my Secret Fears List.

7. Give the world a wink.

Word Drought

A long weekend at my family reunion in Kentucky left me at a loss for words. The video word wall in my hotel was tantalizing -- letters falling like rain, but my well was dry. I'm still trying to refill my creative reservoir, wondering if I'll ever be able to put into words the craziness my family stirs up in me. Or if I even should. My usual reaction is to talk my dramas into the ground, beat the meaning out of them, analyze them so thoroughly that I could create a spreadsheet on every aspect of the experience. But I wonder if there are times when you just have to be speechless in order to hear your deepest feelings.

MInd Trips

Where would you go on this magical old bike? I'd visit a couple of places in the past:

- The bench under the magnolia tree in full bloom on the American University campus where I fell in love with my history professor. I could have done without the 7 years of angst, drama and drivel that followed, but I'll never forget that silent lightning strike of two people colliding in space and time and having their molecules rearranged.

- I'd go to the beach with my kids and watch my young son come up the beach dragging an enormous dead sea turtle he'd found behind him with a rope. Because he was so purely happy and later that became a rarity for him and our relationship, I'd love to go back to that moment and appreciate it more.

- I'd follow the Pacific Coast Highway toward Mendocino again, the great ocean swelling and heaving and changing colors on one side of the road, the swell and curve of the tawny California hills on the other, a surge of Vivaldi leading me on, uniting sea and land, heaven and earth.

Aging Boomer Smiles Bravely

Whenever I read about "aging boomers" lately, the subtext is "old person who is using up all our resources and should be abandoned on an ice floe." Suddenly my age is anathema. I am a drag on progress, a parasite on society. Forget that I'm still working fulltime, taking spinning classes, using a computer, iPhone and Nintendo DS (okay, that one is stupid), trying to do my bit to fight global warming and mountain top removal and never holding up the security line at airports trying to figure out what's legal to take in my carryon. I even have a Power Monkey! No, evidently that's not enough to justify my continued existence ("What, you're STILL alive?!). Evidently, I also need to admit that the '60s were stupid, that I was a compulsive shopper, that I was too ambitious and feministy for my own good and that I'm sucking the lifeblood of future generations by having a longer life expectancy. Was I so dismissive of The Greatest Generation, the one that came before mine? If so, it's probably payback to be the enemy now. Karma sucks, and I can hear my mother laughing about it. No longer hip, only waiting for that inevitable hip replacement that will take up a valuable hospital bed that could be put to better use by a 35-year-old. All I can say to young writers who are blaming boomers for the current economy is this is what 65 looks like, and good luck when you get there because someone younger than you will inevitably be bitching about how your generation fucked up the world. I just wish I could be around to enjoy it. Maybe if I eat more yogurt and do more pushups...

People Who Say Yes

I should be used to Mean Girls by now after 15 years of publishing a magazine for women. I've had my fair share of nasty letters from women who think I deserve a comeuppance. Letters accusing me of being an elitist (hey, I want to respond, my toilet was outdoors the first 12 years of my life!), a man hater (yikes, my list of lovers says I have the opposite problem--I might be a slut!), a fake feminist (is there a secret handshake and password?), a plastic surgery pusher (I'd probably do it too if I weren't so afraid of pain and anesthesia), an abortion loving liberal (yep, I'm pro choice forever). At first, I used to cry whenever I got a critical letter. Then I got mad. Now I try to shake it off and not give my energy away to strangers. But every letter like that makes me realize how judgmental I've been at times of women I don't even know, and how that shames and teaches me. But it also makes me realize how much time all of us spend getting angry about the wrong things. I want to save my anger for men who beat up women, for rapists who walk free, for girls who aren't allowed to go to school. And I want to celebrate people who are creating something, making art out of their lives, throwing a party for no reason other than being alive. I want to be one of those people, but I have a long way to go.

Celestial Tomato

On the way to my car this morning, I picked one of my new homegrown tomatoes and put it on the seat next to me. When I got to work, I decided to let it ripen a bit more on the dashboard, but when I locked the car I noticed the sky was reflected in the car window and the tomato seemed to be floating in midair. Of course I think this tomato is a miracle, lacking only the face of Jesus or the Virgin of Guadalupe to warrant crowds of worshippers, but beyond that, it reminded me yet again to look for beauty everywhere. Today, my dental hygienist asked me if I was going to be doing anything fun this summer, and I almost said "not really," but caught myself in mid-naysay and answered, "Every day is fun." We both laughed at the novelty of that thought. Not that I remember to live by that often enough, but I'm going to try to look for more celestial tomatoes every day.