Hudson: Tea

There is a lot of tea in Hudson. 

Wonderful Tea Vat

I was happy

Verdigris Tea Library

There were some really lovely tea sets on display, at the tea shop and throughout the various shops.

I love tea.

Hudson: Drusilla

My main (and best!) reason for going up to Hudson was, of course, to see Drusilla.  I have been friends with Dru for a long time.  Amazingly, she still likes me after all this time!  Dru is my Ratly Art friend.  She was a Manhattanite for a really long time and now she is in Hudson.

Aside from her ability to draw better than God (as the late great Dave Passalacqua would say), she is a supremely wonderful human being.  She has great stories and a wacky perspective. And her hair was purple this past weekend.

Also, her apartment is full of Really Cool Stuff!!

Dru's bathroom has black walls and a really fun color-changing night light.

The night light

I don't know what this thing is but I LOVE it.

Dru has paint and a brush farm.

 And many stacks of papers.  It truly feels just like home.

Dru has a naked mole rat stuffed animal.  Seriously, how freaking COOL is that??

Naked Mole Rat

If you want to see the rainbow night light against a white background, no problem.
Just head to the kitchen.

There is a cat gargoyle on the steps outside.

It watches the glass rats.

Best New Yorker cover EVER.

Just like me, Dru loves her tea.  She guards her tea collection very effectively.

 Here are some tiny rats in tiny bottles.

There are some assorted beasties who live with Dru, but they deserve their own post.

Hudson: Meow-Meow

This past weekend I went up to Hudson to visit my amazing friend Drusilla.  I have tons and tons of great Blog Fodder from the trip.  But since it is Sunday night and I am very tired, I will start with Meow-Meow, simply because this is the shortest and fastest post to write.

Meow-Meow lives upstairs.  His real name is Clapton but that doesn't suit him.  So Dru calls him Meow-Meow.  He is a rescue with a vague history.  His owners attempt to keep him indoors but he always breaks out.  Meow-Meow hates being indoors.  Dru made a little cat-spot for him on her porch with a cave, food, and blankets.  Meow-Meow loves it in there.  (That's how awesome Dru is.  Meow-Meow drives her nuts yet she still looks out for him and makes sure he is comfy.  Even though he technically lives upstairs.)

Meow-Meow lounging in his man-cat cave

Meow-Meow talks.  A lot.  Loudly.  ALL THE TIME.  Seriously, you have to hear this cat to believe it. As cats are wont to be assholes rebellious, I had trouble getting Meow-Meow to talk for a video. It's likely I am the first and only person ever to have 1) actually wanted him to talk and 2) not been able to.

Daya adores Meow-Meow.  She wanted to take him home. He even got to be Cat of the Day.  (The Cat of the Day is Meow-Meow, Hey!)  Although he is neither feral nor a stray, if someone wants him they could probably have him.

I do not want Meow-Meow. NO.

Easter

I love Easter.  It's a great holiday.  Of course in the Christian religion it is the celebration of the resurrection of Christ.  And it is a resurrection time- Spring resurrecting the world from the death of Winter.  It's nature.

Easter was not originally a Christian holiday at all- it was converted, so to speak. It was a pagan holiday of celebrating Spring.

Also, Easter has the BEST candy.

So what do eggs, chicks, bunnies and all the fun Easter things have to do with Christ?  Nothing whatsoever. But they have everything to do with  the goddess Eostre.  The holiday bears her name, still, even today. The ancient customs are still celebrated.

Enjoy your Peeps and Cadbury eggs and egg hunts and egg dyeing and baskets!

Perfection

My Tax Guy

I love my tax guy. LOVE.  My taxes aren't particularly complicated, but I refuse to do them.  They are just one of those things that it is worth paying someone else to do.  And he does such a great job.  For the last 13 years. He knows me, he has all my info, and he is fast.  Every year, someone tells me how I can do my taxes for free--but I'm not interested.  I don't want anything to do with it  Besides, it is a small family operated business and I like to support local business.

My tax guy's father used to do my taxes.  His mom runs the front desk.  She is a tiny Asian lady in her mid-seventies, and I swear she doesn't look a day over 40.  When  I grow up, I want to be just like her.

When I had my first apartment, my tax guy was on the same block.  Even when I moved, I still made the trip back to my old neighborhood because my tax guy was that awesome. Then I moved again and he moved and for the past several years we have been down-the-road-neighbors again!

I dropped my tax papers off and was walking home.  A thought went through my mind that I didn't give him my W2...which of course I did.  Not two minutes later, he called and told me I hasn't given him my W2.  I'm such a superstar.  I ended up emailing him my paper and all was well.

I refuse to do my own taxes.

Sudama's Wisdom

I absolutely love my yoga Tuesdays. The teacher is named Sudama.  He is a lovely Russian man, with great energy.  He knows a lot and he shares a lot.  He is funny, too.

Here is a paraphrased quote from our last class, in talking about meditation:

When you quiet the chatter in your mind, 

your inner teacher comes out. 

We all have an inner teacher. 

It wont pay the rent, but it will teach you.

-Sudama 

Om shanti

Traumatized

Yesterday Daya asked me if I could take a look at her kindle because it was low on space and she couldn't find anything else to delete.

I took it to work and had a look around.  I went into her internet search history.  As I scrolled through, I saw all the events and people she had been reading about, on her own, on Wikipedia.  I felt so proud of her.  And THEN.....there were several links of very explicit and very nasty content of the "adult" kind.  I felt sick.  I felt like a complete and total parenting failure.

Now, I have had the sex talk with Daya.  We did that at the beginning of this school year.  I gave her three age-appropriate books, which she does look at.  And I am available for questions, which she does ask. Mostly, she just thinks the whole thing is gross. She has seen nude pictures and she has been to art museums.  I have an entire library of art books with nudes.  I have a nicely illustrated dictionary of the human body, which she has always had free access to.  The point is that she has access to appropriate information.  She should not need to go looking for it.

Her internets were on lockdown for a while, but I recently relaxed it because of a very sensible request to do research for homework, which is valid. We have had many talks about internet safety and trust.  She wanted so badly for me to trust her, and I wanted to trust her.

When she called me from dance, I told her we needed to talk.  About her internet history on her kindle.  She had no idea what I was talking about.  Based on her initial reaction, I believed her because she didn't act "found out".  When I spoke to her later in person, it turned out that she tapped on the wrong thing and this nasty stuff presented itself to her.  She didn't watch it.  She closed it.  I believe her.  She showed every sign of honesty. I know my child.  She was telling the truth. She said it has happened before but she closes the pages and doesn't look at them- she thinks they are weird and gross.  It has only happened on her (Android) kindle.  I checked our iOS devices, they are all clean.  So now she is not allowed to use the web browser on her kindle.  I did set her up with the parental guard profile, but all her game data is reset.  We are both happy with the rule of no internet browsing on the kindle.

I was so relieved I felt sick,. Again.  This was a very traumatic experience for me.

It is so disgusting how this awful nasty stuff can present itself and invade with no invitation whatsoever.

Carey sent this to me, and it is very comforting.  She was so supportive and wonderful, for which I am deeply grateful.

I do pray a lot, and I generally accept that prayers are heard, but it is so, so nice to have this confirmation.  Sometimes I really do need to hear it.

******

SIDE NOTE

I am going to get some very interesting traffic to my site now because I have another post with the word porn in it. Oh, and sex. And nude! Going by numbers, my top hit of all time is this post.  

What can I say, my blog promises to disappoint.  

If you came here for some nudity you can go look at my copy of Twilight.

Chartreuse

My friend Cathy shared a post from Growing Bolder.

Our entire childhood, adolescence, and early adulthood is spent 

doing things for the first time. 

At some point that stops for many adults. 

That's when time start going faster and your body and brain begin to slow down. 

One key to reaming youthful is never stop trying new things

This is so true.  It is one of the things I love about living in NYC- there are always new things to try and see. I love trying new things and learning new things.

Well, I told Cathy she is next in line for chartreuse eyeshadow. I can't tell her to do that if I'm not willing to do it myself. So if you want to rock chartreuse eyeshadow, here is how to do it!

I use all Urban Decay, but of course you can substitute.

10-15 mins!

1. Prime

2. Neutrals (matte) in crease and top highlight

3. White pencil (UD Yeyo) cover eyelid as a base

4. Outer corner- UD Loaded (dark green)

5. Center lid- UD Thrash (from ELECTRIC palette)

6. Inner corner- your skin tone matte neutral

7. White pencil inner corner highlight

8. Lower lid- UD Mushroom pencil (taupe)

9. Top liner- black or dark green (UD Junkie pencil)

10. Mascara (UD Perversion)

Live life and have fun.  Be ELECTRIC.

Collective Hate

Human nature loves to vilify and condemn.  Take, for example (one of countless examples), Germanwings co-pilot Andreas Lubitz who crashed the plane killing himself and 149 others.  It's an awful, horrible act.  But I send love to and prayers for him as well as those who were killed and their loved ones.

There is immense negativity and hatred towards this man from the masses.  It is a form of Collective Hate, which I also term as Group Hate.  It is poison.

I refuse to participate in most forms of collective energetic focus- including politics, church, and any collective social groups with a unified belief system and/or agenda- these are all Tribes.  I do not join Tribes. I'm not necessarily opposed to them; some of them are helpful and beneficial and have their place- but I will not participate in them.  

My energy is mine to control and direct- adding it into a group collective with someone or something else controlling and directing that energy is, IMHO, a very bad idea.  It is the energetic equivalent to what happens with our tax dollars.  I have to pay taxes and can't really control where it goes, but I can choose where my thoughts and energy go.

Collective Hate is a very, very dangerous thing. It is invoked by the media and leaders of Tribes. It spreads rapidly and infects many, many people.  One of the worst things you can do to yourself is engage and contribute energetically to Group Hate.  It weakens and damages your energy and makes you very vulnerable in many ways.

I see people asking a lot in Reiki groups (and other places) how to protect themselves from negative energy. Shielding is important, however the best way to protect yourself is to radiate love and compassion.  When you make a choice to disengage from Group Hate and send love instead, it is not because you are saying the act is ok, rather you are protecting yourself and your energy.  It's the same concept as forgiveness.  When you do not participate in and generate negativity and hate, these negative energies cannot latch onto you.  You are not inviting them in.  They cannot become part of you.  They cannot poison you.

If you want to be Light, that's how to do it.  It starts in your thoughts, in the intentions of your thoughts towards others (and yourself!).  It continues in the words you speak and write. Then in your actions.  Be careful.  Go away from the mainstream collective. Guard your energy.

Own your energy. 

Spread love, not hate- even in the most challenging of situations.

This is what the practice of loving-kindness meditation is all about.

Just Plain Mean

I was taking close-up pictures of Isis and Furball came along.  So I took her picture too.

Isis got mad at this for some reason and smacked me right in the eye.  I have 2 claw marks.  :(
Maybe she was mad because not only was Furball more cooperative, but her pictures came out better.

The Zombie Maze

It is Saturday night.  We got home a little while ago and I am exhausted.  Daya is already fast asleep. I do not have a blog post lined up for Sunday.

So here are some pictures from the birthday party today.  It was a blast.  We got to shoot each other in a very cool zombie maze.  I got the special Rick Grimes gun and vest, and I won the most shoots in the secret unofficial adult game.

That maze was cool.  We need to go back...without kids.

It;s good to have friends to be zombies with

Green Team

I am so stinking ridiculously proud of Daya- she was invited to join the All Stars dance team! There are sub-teams, and she is on the Green Team.  She has been wanting this for a long time, and she has been working very, very hard to show her teachers that she is ready.  She wanted this so badly.  I am proud of her hard work, and I am also glad that she had to work for it.  I want her to know the feeling of accomplishment of working hard, of delayed gratification.

A lot of things come really easy to Daya.  Sometimes too easily. She is very clever and ahead of her age in maturity and independence. She learns quickly. She has high standards for herself.  I do not have to push her at all in school- she is highly motivated already. She does her work on her own.  The dreadful ELA test is coming up, and she asked me if I could email her teacher asking for a copy so she can study and prepare more.  I told her not to worry about the test- but she wants to do well.  She wants to get into honors in middle school.  She is driving herself to excel.  All I have to do is support and encourage her, and tell her I am proud no matter what.

I see every single day how dance has helped her.  I see it in her confidence, her physical health, her social health, her mental and spiritual health.  I see it in her joy. I knew this would be the outcome- that's why I started her early and have been consistent about her lessons. She loves it.   She is always practicing.  The studio is a wonderful environment.  The dance team is very community-focused, which I like.

My Sneaky-Mom Plans are in full effect though- I have Planned Ahead.  When she hits middle school, I want her BUSY.  I want to know where she is, what she is doing,  I want her involved in something positive.

And I am thinking about high school as well.  She wants to go to a performing arts high school, and I also want that for her.  It's a much better environment.  I would absolutely LOVE for her to get in to LaGuardia.   If she works hard enough, I think she has a real chance.  But if not, there are other arts high schools.

The money, the sometimes hectic schedule of getting her to and from class- it is all worth it.

Pre-Pointe class

Selfish

Carey wrote a post in which she mentions being selfish.  Except that she's not selfish.  Not at all.

The whole use of the word "selfish" is, to me, greatly mis-used.  It has a negative connotation. No one is "selfish" for taking good care of themselves.  We must take care of ourselves. Like Carey, I require a lot of alone-time.  And quiet.  I definitely need much more of this than the average person.  I go nuts if I don't have solitude to reset and recharge. And so I take this time that I need in order to remain stable.

That certainly does not make me selfish.  Doing things for myself, pursuing and nurturing my interests and likes- for me as a person- is not selfish.  Being my own person is not selfish.  Having boundaries is not selfish.

Not wanting to have any more (or any) children is not selfish.  I cannot stand when people tell women they are selfish for not wanting children.  Not everyone does, and that is absolutely fine! I do not believe in constant self-sacrifice at the expense of your own well-being. There is a balance here that needs to be maintained.  If you are doing your best with what you have and what you know, there is never any reason to feel guilty or selfish.

Selfish is an overall lack of regard, care, or concern for others, or your advantage at another's expense.  You can still take care of yourself, meet your needs, pursue your interests etc while being mindful and caring towards others.  Selfish is making decisions based  on what you want as the primary motivation with little, or lack, of concern for others who will be affected.  Selfish is the world revolving around you.  Selfish is putting your wants and needs ahead of others with little or no concern and reciprocation.  Selfish comes from a place of "It is all about me and others must revolve around me." Selfish is self-importance over others' importance.  Selfish is entitlement.  Selfish is a lack of gratitude. Selfish is arrogant.  Selfish is a lack of empathy. Selfish is dismissing other people and their perspective. Selfish is blaming others for your drained energy when you are the one not taking care of yourself.

We need a different word for healthy self-care.  We have to stop using the word "selfish" to refer to something that is healthy, normal, and essential.

Mothers especially need to nurture themselves, as we do a lot of care-taking for others. I have Daya do as much for herself as possible, as much as her age and capabilities allow.  Children have needs that they are not able to meet themselves, which change as they age.  Yes, as parents we do have to meet those needs before our own- that is true- however it does not- ever- negate our own needs or require us to completely sacrifice ourselves as the people we are.  Besides, everyone knows that if Mom is happy everyone is happy.  :)

Be good to yourself.  Be kind to yourself.  Be your own best friend.  Do not judge yourself, or speak to yourself in a way that you would not speak to someone you love.

Energy Cultivation

I started meditating regularly about 20 years ago, when I was in college. The first meditation I learned was a basic chakra meditation I found in a book.  It was my "gateway meditation".  I was hooked.

Since then, I have experimented with all kinds of meditation- guided meditation, silent meditation, laughing meditation, chanting mantras, visualization meditation, staring at a candle flame meditation, contemplating death meditation, focusing on the edge of a blade meditation, japa meditation, breathing meditation, walking meditation, stillness meditation, fasting meditation, full body relaxation meditation, alpha and theta brainwave meditation- these days I have yet to meet a meditation I haven't tried in some form.  And I love all of it.  I am a verified meditation junkie.

Depending on what I need and where I am, I switch around my meditation practice.  But all of them bring me to that deep place of peace, joy, and serenity, that place of divine connection.  Unless I am really upset, I can access that serene place very easily. It has absolutely and dramatically changed the way I think and what my mind focuses on. It gives me structure to get through difficult moments.  It augments my positive moments. It has changed me from linear into holographic. One of the great benefits of meditation is that it teaches you to not judge yourself, to be gentle with yourself.  In turn, that extends to not judging others.

I had a lovely insight at yoga the other day. Before class I was relaxing with my hands in anahata chakra mudra. And in that space between my hands, I felt a lovely strong energy of deep love...a vortex... and I can visualize and put things in that space, in that energy. People, situations, places, whatever or whoever I want to hold in that space and pass that amazing energy to.

Mornings

This will sound odd, but I really like my current morning routine.  Even though I am naturally a night owl.  As life changes so do mornings.  And my mornings have gone from really difficult to really easy.

My first alarm goes off about 5:30ish.  I snooze it- several times. This is the signal for Isis and Furball to come swarming over to say good morning. (Pebbles is confined to the bathroom overnight, which makes life a thousand times more wonderful.) Then my (optional) ipad alarm goes off and scares me.  I shut that off.  Actually, I should just disable the damn thing, it is annoying and unnecessary. Then my phone alarm goes off and tells me point blank to wake up for work.  That is at 6:12.  I usually don't get up for another 15-20 minutes.  This is the time I should be doing my morning meditation.

Bathing at night....with cats

If Daya is up before me she will come make sure I am up.  If I am up before Daya, I will wake her up. Yesterday morning when I woke her up she literally fell out of bed head first.  I'm not sure how she managed that, but she did fall out.  We both thought it was hilarious.  It is good to start the day laughing.

We both bathe at night, so mornings are short and simple.  We each do what we need to do, gather what we need for the day. We usually have very little drama or stress.  Daya gets breakfast at school, if she wants it. The Bus Alarm goes off at 7:05. We are out the door.  Daya likes to chat on the way to the bus stop- about school, dance, dreams she had during the night, whatever is on her mind.  She gets the bus and I go to the subway.  I get to work right around 8.

 On the lookout for the school bus

My wheels

I like being in the office early- it is quiet and few people are around.  I get my first cup of tea and do my makeup at my desk, while I check my email and calendar, and see what I have going on for the day.  It is a very nice relaxing ritual.  Then I get my second cup of tea and I am in full swing.

Tea and Urban Decay

  

When Daya was a baby and mornings were much more difficult, I made a Control Journal.  It was so great because I didn't have to think, and I got to cross things off a list.  I found my old Word document with my routines from Feb. 2007!

Evening Routine

Morning Routine

After Work Routine