Our dear departed Lucy

Last week,I lost my grandmother. It doesn’t feel like I “lost” her, though, which implies some panic or confusion about her whereabouts. I guess it’s better described as we let her go. Or she let us go. Or she let go of us. In any case, she’s gone. And I miss her.

She was a few days shy of her 97^th birthday. Many have asked, “Was she ill for a long time?” Not really, she was just old for a long time. It’s clear to me now that old will eventually get all of us.

“Were you two close?” others have asked. Yes, I think we were, but she was close to a lot of people. I’m certainly not the only one missing her today. One of my friends texted me, “She was such a big part of your life!” Indeed she was, especially in my adult years. Over the last twenty years we’d hit a rhythm of my visiting her throughout the year as often as I could – a meal here, an overnight there – but for sure, come mid-July, I’d bring my children and we’d stay overnight for a few days in her home. Until her late 80s, she’d visit me in California during the winter as well.

I was with her the day before she passed away. I wish I’d known it would be our last time together, though I don’t know if I’d have done anything differently. I’d visited her many times in the nursing home where she lived out her last eight months – sometimes she was alert and knew exactly who I was and we laughed about old times and caught up about new times. During other visits, she was in her own world and I did my best to enter into it. On that last visit, she appeared to be lost in her own thoughts, though she’d politely respond to me. “Lucy, this is Joy, your granddaughter. I am in town from Singapore and I came here to tell you I love you.”   “Oh, well, thank you very much,” she answered, as if a staff member had given her the time – and then she would drift off to sleep again. Just before I departed, though, she piped up and said, “Well, I have one surprise for you. The weather changed; that’s my surprise for you.” Somehow this makes me think she pieced together who I was, after all. We’d spent hours last summer comparing her weather to the weather in Singapore.

Of course, I knew she was going to die. In fact, during the last year of her life, she’d told me many times she was ready. “Why do I have to go on like this?” she’d say, after a particularly tough day. Getting old isn’t pretty or dignified, I now know. The process is full of frustration, compliance, coping and loss. I’m a little more prepared for it after watching Lucy do it with such grace. I’ll never make the assumption again that losing an “old person” is somehow easier or more expected than losing any other loved one. Though she was ready to go – and I thought I was ready to let go – I didn’t understand that the grieving and mourning wouldn’t begin until she left. It’s painful no matter when or how a loved one goes. I didn’t know that before.

I’m sad today and I miss her so much. The day after she died, I was at a work conference in San Diego and some of my beloved colleagues who’d heard about Lucy’s passing sat me down and gave me a gift. They said, “Tell us about your grandmother.”

Without thinking, I replied, “My grandmothah was a nuhse in the Ahhhhmee.” I wish this blog had an audio format, because I’d imitate my grandmother’s voice like I did for my colleagues. I had to channel her for a moment because I wanted them to know an important part of her – her voice.  It’s impossible for me to think about Lucy and not hear her speaking.  Her accent, her clear articulation and how strong she spoke was so much a part of how I knew and understood her.  No one else in my life spoke quite the same (well, except her sister, Betsy, with whom I often confused her when I was young.) To know Lucy was to love her voice.

Indeed, she was a nurse in the army. She enlisted after she graduated from nursing school at Duke and was immediately sent to the South Pacific. She witnessed horrors and difficulties I’ll never know that made her into the pillar of strength she was for the rest of her life. Today, I am lucky to have one best-friend-grandmother still with me, but I’ve had three WWII veteran grandparents pass on. Three times now, I’ve gone to the same little chapel at the veterans’ burial grounds near Annapolis, MD and listened to the soldiers play taps and watched them fold and present the flag to the family with gratitude for the veteran’s service. I remember when Lucy sat in the front row and received the flag from our country in gratitude for her husband’s service. Last Friday, my father received it for his mother’s service. If you are invited to a funeral, go. If you are invited to a veteran’s funeral, run and get a front-row seat.

Her service was held in the Methodist church she attended. I’m a preacher’s daughter, so I know how to estimate a crowded church. I’d guess there were almost 300 people in attendance. At 97, Lucy had probably already buried that same number of friends. What a testament to her life to see so many people still around who knew and loved her.

I learned so much from Lucy, but mostly she showed me how to laugh and have fun.  When I was twelve she taught me the joy and freedom of skinny-dipping.  Thankfully, she was on hand to rescue me with a towel when my bathing suit sunk to the bottom of the lake and other swimmers arrived!  About twenty-five years later, she took my children down to the little beach on her property and right there for all the world to see, she taught them the same thing. She laughed herself silly when the crabbing boats came in and waved to us.

She loved “a pahhhdee.”  It didn’t matter if she had 2-3 people over for soup or a crab feed for thirty of us, she would call me on the phone and say “Oh, Joy did we ever have a party!”

Her life showed me the value of making and keeping friends.  More people than I will ever know loved my grandmother.  She collected friends daily and never shied away from approaching strangers and turning them into friends.  Her sweet, life-long friendship with Eleanor is one I admire and try to emulate. (In fact, I recently wrote about it here.) How did Lucy find friendship so easy, when in fact we all know that making and keeping friends can be a challenge for many of us?  I think it had to do Lucy’s way of showing a focused, steady and unwavering interest in the life details of whomever she was with.  To be in her presence was to know she was “all there” for you.  Holding space for the other to shine was one of her gifts.  Whenever I arrived for a visit, she’d have two lists ready.  The first one was a list of questions about my family, my business and my life.  Before I’d arrived, she’d thought long and hard about me.  She loved friendships that spanned generations.  After an afternoon out with a woman in her thirties. Lucy called me to say, “Joy, surround yourself with young people. They will keep you young!”

She also taught me to stay current.  Lucy’s love/hate relationship with her computer was something to observe with awe.  She embraced technology in a way I can only hope to do as I age.  Her emails were funny and filled with mistakes and sometimes I’d get multiple emails in a day with no content or that were meant for other people.  She struggled her way up the learning curve when the internet exploded, but she basically kept up.  I remember multiple July visits in a row teaching her how to copy and paste and later finding the instructions in her own handwriting taped to the side of her computer.  One time I called and she said, “Joy, I cannot speak right now.  My friend is here fixing the computer.”  I later found out her friend was a 15-year-old boy from down the street she’d call about once a week for help.

As fiercely independent as she was, Lucy modeled something very important for me: asking for help.  She was not afraid to show vulnerability when she needed something.  Many of the people who gathered for her service were answers to her calls for help, and I loved all the big and small ways her community assisted her as she aged. She was able to live a long time on her own and in her home because of them.  Neighbors, church members, and friends across the creek constantly checked in on her and helped her with rides and things around the house.  When I would come visit, Lucy would get out her second list, which was full of things she needed my help with. After we’d talked and visited for a while she’d say, “Ok, Joy, here’s my list, get the step ladder.”

Finally, she taught me the pure joy of eating ice cream.  Lucy watched her figure her whole life. But after a day of eating celery for breakfast, cantaloupe for lunch and a spoon full of cottage cheese for dinner, at nightfall the ice cream would come out of the freezer and the fun would begin.  When she stopped driving in her early 90s, I thought the Highs convenience store up the street from her house might go out of business because that little old lady wouldn’t come in for pints of ice cream any more.

During the last year of her life, she had very little interest in food. She’d force herself to eat though she wasn’t very hungry. I’d cajole her and try to make it easy by focusing on the most delicious thing on her plate. “Oh Joy, I really couldn’t eat another bite!”  Just then, an aide would walk by with a tray of ice cream cups and ask if she wanted any. “Why yes, I’ll have one now and I’ll take another one to my room for later, ” she’d say. There was always room for ice cream.

After Lucy’s funeral service and the moving veteran’s graveside service, many of her friends and family gathered at her house to visit and remember her. My daughter walked down to the crabbing pier to see the skinny-dipping beach and breathe in that Chesapeake Bay atmosphere one last time. Together we looked at pictures on the walls and introduced ourselves to the neighbors who’d heard all our stories over the years. After a few hours, the crowd dwindled and the only ones who remained were her children, grandchildren and the spouses she’d long accepted as family. We’d eaten a hearty lunch provided by our closest family friend, Chris, Eleanor’s daughter, and we’d talked ourselves out, but we didn’t want to separate. Who knew when or if any of us would be in her home again? Who knew when we’d even see each other again?

Just then, my Uncle Randy and his son-in-law Ryan darted up to the Highs and loaded up on ice cream. Together we filled heaping bowls and toasted our dear departed Lucy one more time. We did just what she’d tell us to do: We Enjoyed. Every. Last. Bite.

Thank you for indulging me and listening to my memory of my grandmother. My friends, Betsy and Rebecca, gave me such a gift when they asked me to tell them about Lucy.  I’d love to hear about your loved one – still with you or departed. If you’d like to share, leave a comment here. I’ll treasure your story.

I once was blind

Six years ago, during a dinner party of adults, I excused my 12-year-old son to go to my room to watch a movie. Much later, after the dishes had been cleared and the last of the guests departed, I climbed the stairs to check on him. He’d dragged my armchair across the room to sit comfortably, three feet from the screen. “This is the only way I can see,” he explained. “I have to do this in math class too, in order to see the board. Didn’t the teacher call you? She said she would.” Off to the eye doctor we drove and sure enough, the boy was near-sighted. His chatter filled the first car ride after picking up his frames. “Can you see that over there? Look at those houses way over there! I can see their rooftops!” On and off went his glasses as he tested before and after versions of his sight. The most remarkable thing, he shared, was seeing individual leaves on the trees as we drove past.

A few weeks ago, my 20-year-old daughter returned home for winter break. In our taxi to see the new Star Wars movie (a Christmas tradition three years running), my son exclaimed, “Oh no! I forgot my glasses!” The driver pulled a quick u-turn and he hurriedly ran up to his room to get them.   After the (thrilling!) movie, he handed his glasses to his sister to hold while he removed his sweatshirt and she jokingly put them on. And then she stopped dead in her tracks. Her mouth fell open in awe and her head made a slow circle, taking in the hubbub of the mall – all the glory of Christmas – the rushing shoppers, twinkling lights and bright decorations. She almost couldn’t believe what she was seeing.  Apparently, she is also near-sighted, but we didn’t know it.

The following morning, we landed in Bangkok as planned and made our way to a shop where she had her eyes tested and picked out frames. Just like that, she got a new look – and a new outlook. It’s been a week now and she hasn’t stopped marveling at what she can see. She’s doing exactly what her brother did six years ago. On the top of a high rise admiring the view, she pointed to the distance. “Can you see that red building?” she asked. “How about that sign – can you read that sign?” The glasses went up and down over her forehead as she compared her naked vision to her improved vision. Nature is the biggest shock, she agrees with her brother. When we arrived at the Thailand coast to a little town called Hua Hin, she stared at the ocean. “Guys, I’ve never seen the ocean look like this, you know.” We all razzed her, “How could you not know? How could you not realize you couldn’t see?” Here’s the best way she’s been able to articulate it: everyone’s vision ends somewhere. The horizon, the distance, the skyline, whatever you name it, is as far as the eye can see. She just assumed that spot was a lot closer for everybody than it really is. Her reality was short-sighted.

The New Testament records a story of Saul (later known as the Apostle Paul) who God intentionally struck blind in order to stop the evil persecution of new Christians. Saul was a pretty awful character, honestly. After three days of blindness and misery, a minister nervously approached him to offer prayer and Saul, at the end of his rope, I imagine, accepted the offer. Saul repented of his wicked ways and the Scripture says, “something like scales fell from his eyes,” and his sight returned. He changed his name to Paul and became the greatest Christian evangelist of all time. He wrote much of the New Testament and his is a story of utter and complete transformation – a life lived one way and in a single moment that life was changed and made 100% new. A true conversion. He was blind – blind to his own evil ways, blind to the power of God’s love and the welcome of His embrace and physically too blind to continue to murder and imprison Christians – but then… then he could see. He could see the grace of God that welcomed (even) him. He could see his own sin and failings and he could see a way of escape from the dark life he’d been living.  He could see so clearly that he reordered his entire life. It’s as if even his heart (or mind or soul) received vision after the scales fell.

I’m pretty sure I stumble my way through life mostly blind. Full of uncertainty and insecurity, I do my best with the vision I’ve got. It probably stops long before the horizon and much before I can take in all the beauty around me.  It reaches only as far as my trust in my marriage, my security in my friendships, my hope placed in God and my handle on anxiety. On a given day, (sometimes depending on my struggle with insomnia), those can be fairly short distances. My vision is blurred and distorted by my numbing, my self-doubt, my self-sabotaging ways and my utter lack of sleep. Sometimes, I see myself bigger than I really am, the hero of a story where I am a bit player at best, and other times I view myself as weak and small­ – the victim of a story – where I am meant to shine. My vision isn’t trustworthy all the time. It doesn’t always provide me the truth.

I know what it’s like to have moments of clarity, though. Those watershed moments where suddenly I think, “I see it all clearly now.” Recently, I had a moment like this within my marriage, where by a small miracle I could actually see my contribution to a problem and I was able to own it rather than lay blame. Those were heavy scales that tumbled down that day. I remember a day long ago spent with two friends and the nagging feeling of being excluded and ignored. “I never need to feel like this again. I don’t need these friends in my life,” I realized. And it was done. As an entrepreneur I probably have had most of my clear thinking moments in my business. My own actions and efforts are the biggest predictors of my success. As simple as that sounds, that’s rare clear thinking for me. I’d rather factors beyond my control be in charge.

A casual friend told me about the moment she knew in her gut she must leave her marriage. She was on a couples date and her husband was openly flirting with the other woman.   Then she overheard the woman quietly ask her husband what the secret to a long happy marriage was. Her husband of twenty years whispered, “I don’t know. I hate her.” Was this the first time he’d disgraced her in public? Probably not. And it wasn’t the first evening out that ended with hot tears of humiliation and shame, but it was the moment “something like scales” fell away for her.

As I age, my vision of my parents is becoming sharper and more in focus. I see their tender hearts and how well they’ve loved me. It’s clear now that they are humans who did their very best and though at times I may have needed more, or different, they gave me everything they had. This clarity brings a flood of gratitude. My wasted and limited vision in my teens, 20s and even into my 30s didn’t always allow this. I was in a blurry zone, but it’s clear now.

I’m compassionate to that younger self, though, the one stumbling around with her scales in place, doing the very best she can. She’s still with me now much of the time. My best friend tells me to try to do just the next very best thing and when that is done, go on to do it again. When I embrace that advice even though I can’t see the horizon or barely even the path beneath my feet, somehow I know not to step into the ravine. I know to avoid the potholes and to duck if a branch is hanging too low in front of me. Just the next very best thing is what I do.

With everything in me, I hope that 2018 is a year where clear thinking and more importantly, clear seeing reigns. Dear Lord, may I really see the woman standing in my mirror and understand her potential. May I see the women I meet and know them as three-dimensional humans, full of their unique hopes, stories and abilities. May I see my husband and children as people in process, like all of us. May the scales fall off in every role and every relationship. May I experience the beauty of the individual leaves and the rhythm of the waves in a new and more detailed way.

But if my year turns out to be muddled, confusing and clouded like many of them that have come before, may I trust myself to do just the next very best thing.  May I work with what I can see in front of me, through my thick and heavy scales, and still enjoy 2018 one hesitant, nervous step at a time and somehow, through God’s grace, make my way down the path that rises up to meet me.

Blessings to all of you in the New Year. With your scales, your half-scales or your brand new glasses, I’m in it with you.

Much Love,

Singapore Joy

P.S. But seriously, how cute does she look in those glasses?

Girlfriends

Girlfriends,

This is my grandmother Lucy and her best friend Eleanor. They met as neighboring young brides with growing families when they both lived for a short time in Rockville, Maryland. More kids arrived, jobs changed and they both moved away. Jobs continued to change and children grew up. About fifteen years later, they found themselves living as neighbors again – and this is where they’d each remain – in Annapolis, Maryland. Over the years, they shared crab feasts, backyard BBQs, family birthday parties, boat trips on the Chesapeake Bay, bridge games, books and conversation…lots and lots of conversation. They held each other as each of their husbands passed away and when their own bodies began to fail in different ways, they supported and cheered each other on through medical scares and adjustments. This year, they separately moved into the same retirement home so they could get extra care and that meant they got to see each other at meals, Bingo and sometimes just for a quiet afternoon chat. Turned out, though, that my grandmother Lucy, the younger of the two, needed a little more care than that home provided so she recently moved into a skilled nursing home an hour’s drive away. They are both in their late 90s; this picture is their goodbye hug before Lucy moved out – likely their last goodbye.

Oh, that I should be so lucky to keep my girlfriends as close as Lucy and Eleanor were able to keep each other. I’m only 44 and I’ve all but finished raising my kids. The days of meeting other moms on the Saturday morning soccer sideline are done. Those long sunny Friday afternoons playing in the street that rolled into two families heating up all the week’s leftovers we had in the fridge, laying them on a shared table and calling it “Picka-Picka,” are finished. No more, You take the kids after school today and I will take them tomorrow exchanges, or Can you take my kids out for ice cream tonight because I have to work and am worried about leaving them on their own. Now, girlfriend time is just that – time I can spend alone with my girlfriends.

I’ve started listening to a new podcast series by one of my favorite writers, Jen Hatmaker. Her podcast, “For the Love,” began with a series called, “For the Love of Girlfriends.” As I walked my dog in the rain this morning, I heard Jen say into my ear buds, “I invest heavily in my girlfriends.”

I felt tears spring up as her words landed somewhere tender in me. Because, I. Love. My. Girlfriends. That same tender spot was activated a few weeks ago when my business coach ventured a little more into life coaching. She asked me to think of this upcoming work season and consider all I wanted to achieve and receive and try to boil it down to one word that could serve as an intention. “Friendship,” I answered. “I want to lean into my gift of friendship.” “Joy,” she replied, “You are friendship – it’s what you do naturally. What you are saying is you want to be more of your true self this season.” YES! It turns out, my Girlfriends, we are linked in my heart. To be a better me, I need to be a better friend to you.

Life, though, with its supersonic speedy ride, throws so much in the path of “investing heavily.” I need more sleep than ever before and the older I get, the more time I seem to need to regroup alone. The extroverted me is asking, who is this new introvert moving in? I need more time to spend with my parents and my almost-adult children, and my marriage – like all the other ones – is an organic force that needs care and tending as well. Plus, I work, like, all the time and run out of hours and energy every day. How can I slice a fatter pie piece called friendship?

I’ve learned from moving abroad, and by traveling constantly, that it’s real work to maintain friendships and that work has to be taken seriously. Similar to the work of marriage, it’s best and most successfully done when both parties believe it’s 100% their job to do the reaching-out and initiating. Anybody waiting around for a text, or thinking, “You know, I am always the one to call. Let’s see how long it takes her to call me this time,” is sunk. Memories are too faulty for us to play those tit-for-tat games. I am “here two weeks and gone for two months” in most of the friendships I currently have, and those are with the friends I am lucky enough to live near or visit regularly. My Lucy- and Eleanor-style friends – the ones I’ve nurtured for many years – I see once in a blue moon as I’m passing through a city nearby, or we schedule a long Face Time catch-up when we can. One of my besties and I trade lengthy emails often, and when we reply, we interrupt each other’s paragraphs with different colored fonts so that it reads like we are interjecting into a live conversation. Another friend takes me grocery shopping or does it for me if I cannot tag along. While I was typing this, she dropped off two bags and we stood outside my gate laughing so hard at random things that we had tears streaming. Just after she pulled away she sent a message, “That was just what I needed today,” and of course it was soul-lifting for me too. Another friend leaves me voicemails regularly and asks “How can I best pray for you today?” Another lives five hours from where my eldest is experiencing a hurricane from her college dorm room and texted last night to say, “Can I go scoop her up?” When I was in labor with that child I passed that friend’s apartment and my husband stopped and beeped during a contraction. Our connections runs deep.  Another makes eyebrow-threading appointments for me whenever I am in her town – even if we are off schedule from each other. She just comes to sit with me while I do the upkeep because she recognizes how busy I am and what a gift the hour of conversation is to me. Recently a friend moved into my home for a few weeks as she transitions to a new life and she makes me laugh every single day, usually through bitmogi. She’s a bitmogi ninja. Three other friends book a lunch reservation together whenever I can come. I know they cancel plans and move things around and always go to my favorite places because I don’t live in their town anymore and they know I miss the food and their company so much. I can’t begin to list the friends who have opened their guestrooms or kicked their kids out of bedrooms to host me overnight or overweek during the last four years – it’s too many to number. Investing heavily can look a lot of different ways, and I am a lucky gal.

I don’t have high standards for friendship, honestly. At least not in the beginning – I’ll give almost any woman a chance to see if we have the spark. This has been a useful mindset through an international move for sure, but it’s enhanced my entire life. Obviously it doesn’t work out with everyone, but it has afforded me a *very* diverse set of friends. Random ages, with/without kids, married and single girlfriends, various or no religions, working and non-working, American and everything else. It stays interesting.

Here’s what I look for in a friendship that will stand the test of time:

The Best of You. I don’t need you to be my Best Friend; I’ll find the best in you and I’ll offer you the best of me. We don’t need to align on everything and you don’t need to be my end all to all end alls.  Maybe you are my writing buddy or the one who holds my whispered marriage stories or the one who will get me through the years of caring for elderly parents. Maybe I can be your shopping or lunching friend or I can sit in the hospital with you while your baby is getting diagnosed, or help you house-hunt. Don’t feel the need to meet all my needs, just bring your best self and know I’ll bring mine.

The Real Stuff. I’ve been told I’m a tad more comfortable sharing the tough stuff and getting vulnerable than the average gal and I try to keep that in mind and go slowly. It’s hard because the times I’ve chosen to dive in deep with someone new have mostly paid off and I see no reason to wait. I don’t need you to bare your soul, but I do need to be real myself. And I need to know you can handle it. You may not be a God person, but you gotta know I’ll share my faith journey with you. You may hold your parenting fears close like cards, but you’ll hear a lot of my worries about my kids.

We’ve gotta be on the same team. There are enough people in the world transacting, posing, one-upping, competing and manipulating. I’ve got no time for that in a friendship and I don’t think you do either. If something about me brings up an insecurity in you, or something in your past has taught you that women are meant to be jockeying with each other, we can either talk about it frankly or move on from each other.

I can do the group friendships, but I love the one-on-ones more. I really love parties. I’ve built my whole career around them, for goodness’ sake. And I love to throw my own birthday party as many years as I can. I fill the room and introduce my friends to each other. The connector in me comes to life in groups. Those long tables filled with laughing women make great memories, and they are the perfect place to include newcomers, but know that I’ll look for time to be alone with you too. Alone we can discover together what we can share and what we can be to each other. And groups can bring out a different dynamic sometimes… one that doesn’t foster the kind of friendships I want. A few times I’ve learned I could be an individual friend with a particular woman, but I needed to avoid her in groups.

Laughter. You don’t need to be my personal comedian, but we’ve got to find a way to laugh together. Laughter heals me and hits the reset button. I can get through almost any stressful thing if I can find someone to laugh along the way with me.

Grace given easily. I’ll freely give it and I’ll need it too. I can’t have grudges in a friendship and I need to know no one is keeping score. I’m certainly not. If I’ve hosted you for dinner more than you’ve hosted me, know I am not tracking it and I’m likely finding that you are giving to me in some other way. Remember that part of my giving you my best? It doesn’t always appear as Even Stevens. There’s no tally pad in my heart. And I’ll likely come up short if there is one in yours.

Listening, especially to the hard things. I like to hear the whole thing. The whole story. All your feelings and thoughts. I’ve worked hard to become a good listener and I am cued up, waiting for you. I went through a rough patch a long time ago and I just couldn’t seem to move past it. I needed to reiterate and revisit the hurt and each time I verbally went through it, I learned something new about myself. As time went on, that experience provided much-needed personal growth. But while it was happening, it was hard and miserable. A close friend offered to be my listener. “You never have to apologize for repeating yourself with me. I’ll listen to the story as many times as you need to tell it.” Ever since, I’ve tried to be to others what she was to me.

Recently, I was sitting in church next to a new-ish friend and she leaned over and whispered, “Hey, do you think sometime we could just, like, talk?” I looked up and saw some brimming tears. “Now,” I replied. I grabbed her hand and exited the pew immediately. You know what I felt? Honored. Hopeful. Ready. When a woman leans into me and makes a bid for a deeper friendship, I know I’m one step closer to a Lucy and Eleanor relationship.

We women have so much to offer each other in this little lifetime and no time to waste. We’ll be 90 and hugging goodbye over our wheelchairs soon enough. Can we get started today?

What do you look for in a friendship that will stand the test of time? Would love to hear your thoughts in the comments section.

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The Fearless Pursuit

I was speaking with my friend, Kim, yesterday about the theme of the recent cabi sales conference, Fearless Pursuit. She said, “You are always so fearless, Joy!”  Ha!  If only she knew!  I am fearful of so much — what people will think of or say about me, that I will fall short of my own expectations or ones others have of me, that I will bite off more than I can chew, or that I will fail to see the larger context and play out my life in small little ways.  I am a recovering pleaser and fear has been a friend/foe for as long as I can remember. (A few years ago I even wrote a rare blog piece about my relationship with fear) No, I am certainly not fearless, but I am learning to be courageous.  I am learning to feel the fear and do it anyway.

Please, please tell me you saw the Wonder Woman movie this summer!  I took my grandmother and the two of us have been texting each other ever since to point out themes of female empowerment, courage, risky grit and leadership.  My biggest take away is swirling around the idea of “calling” and how Wonder Woman was “called” to her mission, and that mission didn’t look like everyone around her thought it should. And if you’ve seen the movie, do you remember that moment when she entered no man’s land simply to rescue a village — a small blip on her quest to end WWI? When her team hesitated and said, “This is not what we came here to do,” and she replied, “No, but it’s what I am going to do,” donned her crown and climbed the ladder, I seriously thought my heart was going to explode.  It was like she was saying, “This is all there is right now,” and that’s the line that keeps coming back to me as I do the little things to open and build my business this season, settle my family into the new school year, connect with far flung friends and touch base with my parents even when I feel too busy to call.  “This is all there is right now,” is what is guiding me forward at the moment. It’s what my inner Wonder Woman is whispering to me so that I don’t get overwhelmed trying to eat the whole pie of my life — dreams, achievements, ambitions and all. This Wonder Woman will stick with me as I enter the big noisy cabi shows this fall and see that one shy gal standing in the corner needing some personal attention, the days when my inbox reaches 300 unopened messages, but a friend in needs wants to go for coffee, or when my kids ask for some extra help and love even though they really could do it on their own.  It’s what has kept me traveling so much this past year.

Speaking of which, I’ve been living out of a suitcase for 15 weeks and tomorrow, I go home!  I cannot tell you how eager I am to unpack, sleep in my own bed, walk my dogs and make toast in my own kitchen.  This last stretch of travel has been wonderful and I’ve seen so many great friends and had fabulous cabi fashion experiences, but it’s time for a little rest and recovery as I enter this fearless fall fashion season and begin again.   Stay tuned for lots of information as I dive into the collection and begin having shows, but for today, listen for your own sweet Wonder Woman’s voice and ask, “What is this thing in front of me that is requiring me to be fearless?”   What fear are you feeling, but doing the hard work of courage anyhow? What is your no man’s land moment?  What did you certainly not sign up for, but you now realize has become everything that you need to do? Well, I can’t tell you how you will get through it, but I can tell you — with certainty — you are not alone. I am cheering you on and I’d love to hear what you are fearlessly pursuing.  You can just hit reply to this email and you’ll land in my inbox.

From one strong Wonder Woman to another — Much Love,

Your Singapore Joy

P.S. Truth time: This is a re-post. This morning, I emailed this to my Cabi fashion clients in my typical newsletter form. I usually receive 2-3 responses to a newsletter update.  After just a few hours, my inbox had over 30 responses with women sharing their intimate and closely held fears, inspiration and triumphs with me.  So… I’m not the only one who is familiar with fear and who is trying to overcome it, huh? Thought I’d share it with my patient readers as well.  I promise, you guys, I will start writing again. I think about it, and you, all the time. Thanks for hanging in there with me during this quiet phase.

P.P.S. I know a movie scene outside of the context of the movie just isn’t that moving. But here’s my Wonder Woman Moment. Click Here