Life’s a teeter totter

Everyone seems to have ups and downs these days. Some people I talk to are on the upswing, money in hand, traveling for fun, falling in love again at 75. For others, it’s a downer. Ailments, money issues challenged with financial fear, relocation or trumped by Trump.

It’s a wild time for the baby boomers and young alike.

Being alive seems to require a lot of courage and responsibility – and a sense of humor. It gives us goodies and takes them away. It’s awe inspiring, exciting and sometimes sad, depending on the day.

I watched a young man working so hard today in my yard. My mouth fell open seeing him labor so ambitiously from 7 a.m. on, with no food or coffee even though I offered. And while my brother is not eating much in the nursing home, I am humbled by his heroism. And at the same time I’m exuberant with spring.

So much texture to being alive. But, I cried this morning when I read that Dr. Sutton passed away. He was my beloved veterinarian for 20 years. He helped make my life safe and so kindly treated my animals. He made his services affordable. And so life goes… birth and death, celebration and grief.

Tonight I’m on my way to a birthday party while I just found out a friend asked her vet to help her darling old dog “pass away” gently. How to hold hope and sorrow both in our days? As Robert Karen says: “attending to the very feelings we so much want to escape holds a promise of a better emotional life.” So, in a full life, we attend to our wounds. But, Martin Seligman says that we shouldn’t ruminate too long on losses. And they’re both true.

So, sometimes I feel like the axis to a globe, with life’s ups and downs just trying to stay centered in the storm. Maybe it seems more like a teeter totter lately because of the rain or astrology or the economy or aging. Who knows?

While we enjoy Warriors games and the daffodils of spring, there’s also the underbelly of rents sky high while elders hold on by their fingernails. People cleaning houses while others fly to Italy.

Watching the ebb and flow of all our lives blows me away. How unflappable we try to be at times. In one week our hearts can break open or we might howl with laughter. And then, moments of amazing grace… like someone giving me an unexpected gift and someone else leaving a phone message with “I love ya” which came at just the right time. And then there’s my glee with the breaks in the rain coming just in time to walk the dogs!

“Watch the bouncing ball,” my mom used to say about life. Many of us have been humbled by divorces or deaths and the crazy political arena or money coming and most certainly going. I’m a little worn around the edges while other friends are on the beach in Mexico, but that’s the way the ball bounces. And simultaneously I have gratitude for so many favors. Going with the flow is a great art.

Every day has joy and a glance at sorrow. Like this morning I woke up from a hilarious dream. I was laughing so loud, sound asleep, whooping it up with an old friend chuckling. We were bent over, dying from uproarious laughter. I was in stiches roaring with such volume that the dogs were perched on my chest, ears perked, when I awoke. Still giggling and grinning from the dream, I reluctantly got up

I don’t know if it’s an omen, a sign of how people might greet me at the pearly gates or a reflection of the light hearted birthday party the night before. Life’s a teeter totter. So, be gentle with yourself, laugh or cry; deal with the ebb and enjoy the flow.

Maybe that’s why they say these days, “it is what it is.” I suspect it means acceptance.