The Boston Girl : Becoming A Woman.

Becoming a woman.  A loaded statement if there ever was one.  I sometimes think back on my childhood and how I dreamt for my own money and the ability to choose and cook my own food and what clothes I wore all the time.  Ha!  What little I knew.  Adulting is hard!  It has its perks aka no curfew on Fridays or pizza for breakfast, but overall, the trade for the opportunity to pay bills and fix my car and do my own laundry isn't worth an unsupervised all-nighter and carb overloaded brunch from time-to-time.

Throughout my career vacation and book reading extravaganza, I've been inspired and moved by the characters I've met in each book. The most recent book that really touched me was "The Boston Girl" by Anita Diamant. The themes, tragedies and triumphs of this story brought me to tears and had me laughing just a bit, but overall it made me SO grateful to be a woman in an era when the quest for equality is present and mutual respect for women of any status is encouraged.  The women in this story lived during a time when their vote and their voice didn't matter and it wasn't easy.

The story takes place in the early 1900's in Boston.  Boston.  I heart Boston.  I'm convinced a piece of my heart still lives in Boston.  I visited while I was in college and it is a magical city.  The history, food (Cheers! - be still my heart), waterfront view, energy and cute Harvard boys rowing on the river all the time made it basically my heaven.  I loved every minute of being there. For this small town girl, the Boston version of city life was and is one that I dream of often.  One of the best parts of Boston is the historical district.  I caught a glimpse of it when I went to Cheers! to have dinner one evening.  Big, beautiful Victorian homes that took my breath away. I would love to say that the characters in the book were residents of these types of homes, but they were not.  They were a blue-collar Jewish family that did everything they could to survive living in their sufficient and very small flat.

Whenever I read a book I always look for themes that I can use in my own life and possibly a future blog post (nerd alert).  This book is full of themes that struck me to the core: women's rights, depression, death and mourning, religious respect and equality, family history and love.  Never ever forget the love.

The main character of the book is a grandmother who is giving her granddaughter a personal history of her life as a young Jewish girl in a family that had its struggles and much happiness.  As I read this book I thought of my own grandmothers and what they would tell me about being a young woman in their day and age.  What did they worry about?  What mattered to them?  What boys were they kissing before they met my grandfathers?  What was their love story and how did they know they had finally met the one they were going to marry?

There were a couple of specific quotes that I wanted to share with all of you and why they were memorable for me.  I won't tell you where they lie in the grand scheme of the book so there is still an element of surprise for the plot.

"When I look at my eighty-five-year-old face in the mirror today, I think, "You're never going to look better than you do today honey, so smile."  Whoever said a smile is the best face-lift was one smart woman." This is beautiful.  There are so so so so many days that smiling is the last thing we want to do.  How do we keep a smile on our face when we've had a major disappointment?  How do we smile through the tears when we've lost a loved one?  How do we smile when the bank account is depleted and the fridge is empty and the car needs gas?  Well, we just do. Fake it to make it.  If we really got technical and scientific, we would talk about the fact that there are muscles in our face that need stretching just as much as those everywhere else.  Stretch them, my lovelies!  Put a smile on your face and embrace the beauties and blessings of your life even amidst the storms.

"She said she felt better talking to someone she could see, someone who cared about her.  "The time I almost died in that bathtub, what kept me going was the look on your face and Irene's and that wonderful nurse.  I could see how worried you were, not angry or disappointed.  You just didn't want me to die.  And afterward, too, you never looked at me with anything but love: no pity, no judgement.  You made it possible for me to forgive myself."  Phew.  I so wish I could tell you the story behind this, but you'll have to read the book to understand the significance of this statement.  Even typing it brought a lump to my throat. In my own life, I have been immensely blessed with so many kind, patient friends and family members who have stood in front of me and embraced me and proved to me how much they cared. In our insanely BUSY and technology-driven world, it is very easy to shoot someone a text and tell them we care, but the human-in-front-of-human interactions are SO critical.  I loved the reference to looking at someone with 'anything but love.'  That is a magical moment, no matter the relationship or its status.  The connection that one can feel when their friend, family member, lover looks at them to convey their compassion is electric. It can save the day.  It can calm the heart and soothe the soul. When was the last time you felt that electricity in your own life? Thank the person. Hug them back. Say, "I love you."

"Women used to think we were supposed to act as if nothing had happened, as if losing a baby you wanted wasn't a big deal.  And if you did say something, people told you that you'd forget all about it when you have a healthy baby.  I wanted to punch them all in the face."  When I wrote my blog post "In My Life" I talked about some conversations I had that inspired me to write the post.  One of those was a conversation with my dear friend who has multiple angel babies waiting for her in heaven.  This week I witnessed the pain that is being felt by another friend who is facing the one year anniversary of her angel baby returning to heaven.  Women are still facing the grief and pain that surrounds bearing and losing children.  Medical advances are vast compared to 1925, but pregnancy and birth is still risky business and takes great faith.  I commend my darling friends for their great strength and faith as they face their life of saying the number of pregnancies vs. living children.

"The Boston Girl" is a book that I will not forget for a long time.  It gave me a perspective and appreciation for becoming a woman. I am LUCKY to have a vote, a voice, an education and a career that I enjoy.  I am also LUCKY to have my health and an understanding of how I can cope on the days that aren't so easy.

The moral of the story:  Becoming a woman in 2015 hasn't changed much from 1925.  The scenery and fashion has changed, but ultimately, we still have trials and triumphs and hope for sunshine and happiness after the storm.  Keep looking life in the face with love.  Never EVER forget the love.

Until next time, my lovelies.
-R
 

Create Your Own Sunshine.

Happy weekend, my lovelies! I can honestly say that this week has been the most mentally taxing in my career vacation adventure, yet so full of sunshine. I won't burden you with the seedy details, but I will share some things I have learned.  But, first....behold....the final photo and the spring version of my hair pictures with Kel-Z Photography.  Rose petals, pink, sunshine in Ogden, happy Ray.  I loved shooting this one because the sunshine was peaking through the trees and we had to get a little creative to make it just right and not too glary (totally a word) and squinty. 

Life tends to make us glary and squinty at times.  I try really hard not to play my redhead cranky bitch card ALL the time, but man, it's not easy when life is turned upside down and I just want to crawl in a hole and cry.  I've had a lot of people tell me that I've handled this latest adventure with grace and poise.  Oh, if only that were true.  I mean, my life seems pretty super awesome on social media because I get to sleep in and do whatever the hell I want; however, that is such a sliver of my life.  In reality, it has been a ginormous test of my coping skills that I learned in organized therapy as well as a religious fundamental test to the nth degree.

There is a hymn in the Mormon hymnbook that has the following line, "when sore trials come upon you, did you think to pray?"  Whenever I sing the song and come to that line I think about the long list of prayers that have been said by me and for me when I have had sore trials in my life.  I am always a little leary when people say "we're praying for you!" because I tend to question it with some, especially on social media, because it can come across trendy and fake.  But, when I see blessing after blessing falling out of the sky and the sunshine that lands in my lap, I have to eat my words and ask for forgiveness because then I know someone (probably everyone) is praying for me.

This week I learned a really great lesson about creating my own sunshine.  I am a creature of habit (thanks, Mom), but at some point the MUNDANE of habit gets to me and I take a polar opposite approach and go a tid bit batty.  I'm sure you can relate.  Be honest with yourself....we all have that in us about something.  Dishes?  Cleaning the guest bathroom?  Sorting socks?  Anyway, my biggest survival method during all of this adventure has been routine.  As much routine as I can have to stay on task, but this week all of my usual routine was so painful.  I picked up the phone to call my mom and this is what she said, "You need a change of scenery adventure. Your usual routine is making you crazy (ier) so figure out a way to change it up so that you don't go nuts this week.  As soon as she said that I started thinking about coping mechanisms that I haven't used a lot during this adventure, but have worked in the past.  At the top of this list is coloring.  I am talking about straight up kiddie coloring in a princess coloring book with fresh new Crayola crayons.  Let me show you....

The change of scenery adventure that day turned in to a grand scavenger hunt of super secret locations that I knew nothing about before that day.  I was incredibly grateful for my tour guide that sent me to some of the most beautiful places in our area. I was also grateful for a new Disney Princess coloring book and a peaceful spot to color away my troubles.  Who says Cinderella, Snow White and Sebastian the Crab don't cure the crazies?  Like I said before, if there was ever any doubt that prayers weren't being said and answered on my behalf, times like this proved me wrong.  Oh. So. Wrong.  

The second coping mechanism that I haven't taken a lot of advantage of during this adventure is being around kiddos.  I've seen my auntie loves a few times in the last five months, but not a ton and I was starving for the simplicity and hilariousness of kid world.  Lucky for me, I happen to know a super cool kindergarten teacher with the BEST group of 5 year-olds and she has been quick and grateful to have me in her classroom to volunteer and participate.  This week I spent 3 days in kindergarten.  To most that sounds insanely exhausting (IT IS), but for me it was so much sunshine.  There is absolutely no time to be worried about the future when you have cute faces telling you how pretty you look (apparently they DO notice when I put on my eyebrows and mascara), hugging you at random and letting you test them on ABC's, numbers and sight words as well as lead a construction paper craft with googly eyes (eek!).  And let's be honest, there is a lesson to be learned when you have a little person who has a meltdown over glue stick and you think, "Honey, you're 5.  Your life is glorious and gives no reason for tears over glue.  Let's stop crying and continue on with the craft."  

When I knew that this moment of sunshine was a true gift from God was on Thursday when a student presented me with a thank you note and treat from his mom that thanked "Miss B's fantastic friend" for being in the classroom in her absence.  As I stood there and read it I had to hold back the tears (there's no crying in kindergarten) and it made my whole week.  So much sunshine right here, my lovelies.  So very much.  

The cure to my inner uneasiness this week really was crayons, super secret change of scenery adventures, mamma thank yous, cute kiddos of the 5 year-old kind and SO MANY construction paper Pete the Cats with googly eyes (someday I will write a whole post about the joy I find in googly eyes).  

The future is bright and my emotional bucket is filled because I took some sound mamma advice to heart.  Shhhh....don't tell her I admitted she was right on social media.  

The moral of the story:  Sunshine doesn't just come from the sky.  It comes from all around us and can turn an upside down week right side up in NO time.  

Until next time, my lovelies.  

-R