The year end and the New Year are like a two-sided mirror, and I stand in front of it. In one side I see my own reflection, to see the other side I have to step through the looking glass. The decision is mine, do I continue to look at a reflection of the familiar, or take a leap of faith and step through to a new world?
What’s on the other side? Maybe it is just more of the same, but it could be a strange new world where nothing is familiar. It could mean that someone raised the stakes when I wasn’t looking, or it could be a wondrous land unlike anything I’ve ever known. Either way, through the looking glass means excitement and adventure—the reflection is security and safety.
But does the mirror reflect only the familiar? I’m reminded of an exercise in my Train the Trainer: Building Creative Caregivers workbook. The "Mirror Exercise" is designed to sensitize participants to how hard it is for a person with dementia do perform simple tasks.
The Mirror Exercise (from Building Creative Caregivers):
• You need a hand mirror, pen and paper
• Hold the pen in one hand and the mirror in the other, reflecting side out slightly above your shoulder
• Locate your hand and pen in the mirror
• Looking only in the mirror, draw a house on the paper
• After you draw your picture write your name on the paper
Try the exercise and you learn that sometimes you are in unfamiliar territory even when you don’t take a chance. The reflection may not be as safe as stepping through the looking glass.
Life changes and evolves every day. Sometimes the changes are internal as we struggle with meeting our daily emotional needs. We face external changes as we wake up each day to find our world has changed. Sometimes the changes are upheavals—the test results came back positive, a loved one passes away, a home is destroyed by fire or tornado; while other changes are subtle—another gray hair, bad dreams, indigestion, gained another two pounds.
The only thing we can really count on is that today will not be exactly like yesterday or the same as tomorrow. We cannot stand still while everything moves around us. Instead, we are swept along life’s journey at breakneck speed.
So back to the original question—look at the reflection or step through the looking glass? Maybe it doesn’t make any difference. It depends on what we see in the reflection and whether we can look at it from a little different perspective to keep it interesting.
If I step through the looking glass, the world may change drastically—for better or worse. If my choice is through the looking glass, I must be sure the entire goal is not to find my way back. This choice doesn’t have to be made on New Year’s Day, it needs to be made when the time is right. I’ve stepped through the looking glass before, and when I can do it without regrets, I’ll step through it again. For now, I’m happy looking at the reflection in a different way. That’s enough excitement and adventure for me.
Copyright © December 2010 L. S. Fisher
http://earlyonset.blogspot.com
Showing posts with label New Year. Show all posts
Showing posts with label New Year. Show all posts
Friday, December 31, 2010
Sunday, December 26, 2010
The Day After Christmas
Ever thought about how the day after Christmas is so different from the night before our biggest holiday? Before is filled with anticipation, excitement, and preparation. The day after is clean up the mess time, work on leftovers, procrastinate about undecking the halls (sounds like a New Year’s Day project), and maybe a twinge of depression that the big day is over.
This year, the day after fell on Sunday, so the normal “day after” seems to me like it’s on overdrive. The house is quiet—holiday music seems so “yesterday” and I just couldn’t Face the Nation this morning. Why would anyone want to hear that squabbling on the day after Christmas?
Overnight, more snow fell—okay, we already had a white Christmas so I’m ready for it to stop. I decided to stay home instead of braving the slick roads to go to church this morning. Instead, I watched Joel Osteen on TV.
Joel’s message this morning, “Enjoy the Journey,” really hit home with me. The gist of his message was how we get too busy to enjoy the simple things in life. He talked about how we rush through life in anticipation of the big events and don’t have time to savor the small moments that make the memories. We need to squeeze time in our busy schedules to spend with family and loved ones, instead of zapping our energy with work and obligations.
I guess if a busy man like Joel Osteen can take time to savor the moment, it should be easy for me. When I examine my life, it seems to be mostly hectic, and too often hectic turns to frantic. I’ve just kept piling on obligations until they’ve taken on a life of their own. For the past week, I haven’t worried about all the things I should be doing, but have pretty much just shoved them aside. For once, my holiday has been respite from responsibilities.
Holidays were especially hard during the ten years of Jim’s dementia. Christmas activities pretty much confused him and he didn’t like the house being changed with decorations. When he was in the nursing home, he enjoyed the small Christmas tree I put in his room.
Each year is different in some way. If nothing else, the kids or grandkids are getting older. After our family get-together this year, my oldest grandson got behind the wheel of the family vehicle to drive them home. It doesn’t seem that long ago that we bought him Woody and Buzz Lightyear for Christmas.
While some really relate to the ho-ho-ho and jolly part of Christmas, others are filled with dread as they struggle to establish new traditions, or wonder how they will put on a happy face for everyone else. There’s a lot of internal and external pressure to be merry at Christmas. It’s expected.
As far as Christmas, I think I’ll just go with Joel Osteen’s idea to “Enjoy the Journey.” Each Christmas is different, but that doesn’t mean it is necessarily better or worse. The Christmases that may have seemed the most challenging at the time yield happy moments that turn into cherished memories. I can still see Jim wearing his Kansas City Chief’s shirt, mesmerized by the fiber optic tree. When I walked into his room, sometimes he would turn to me and his eyes would light up.
Life’s journey seems to be flying by and Christmas is a mile marker. Christmas is over, again. Now, it’s time to think about how to make the most of the 365 days of 2011. No one but me can put the “happy” in my New Year, but I might as well start with this day after Christmas. No time like the present to make a memory.
Copyright © December 2010 by L. S. Fisher
http://earlyonset.blogspot.com
This year, the day after fell on Sunday, so the normal “day after” seems to me like it’s on overdrive. The house is quiet—holiday music seems so “yesterday” and I just couldn’t Face the Nation this morning. Why would anyone want to hear that squabbling on the day after Christmas?
Overnight, more snow fell—okay, we already had a white Christmas so I’m ready for it to stop. I decided to stay home instead of braving the slick roads to go to church this morning. Instead, I watched Joel Osteen on TV.
Joel’s message this morning, “Enjoy the Journey,” really hit home with me. The gist of his message was how we get too busy to enjoy the simple things in life. He talked about how we rush through life in anticipation of the big events and don’t have time to savor the small moments that make the memories. We need to squeeze time in our busy schedules to spend with family and loved ones, instead of zapping our energy with work and obligations.
I guess if a busy man like Joel Osteen can take time to savor the moment, it should be easy for me. When I examine my life, it seems to be mostly hectic, and too often hectic turns to frantic. I’ve just kept piling on obligations until they’ve taken on a life of their own. For the past week, I haven’t worried about all the things I should be doing, but have pretty much just shoved them aside. For once, my holiday has been respite from responsibilities.
Holidays were especially hard during the ten years of Jim’s dementia. Christmas activities pretty much confused him and he didn’t like the house being changed with decorations. When he was in the nursing home, he enjoyed the small Christmas tree I put in his room.
Each year is different in some way. If nothing else, the kids or grandkids are getting older. After our family get-together this year, my oldest grandson got behind the wheel of the family vehicle to drive them home. It doesn’t seem that long ago that we bought him Woody and Buzz Lightyear for Christmas.
While some really relate to the ho-ho-ho and jolly part of Christmas, others are filled with dread as they struggle to establish new traditions, or wonder how they will put on a happy face for everyone else. There’s a lot of internal and external pressure to be merry at Christmas. It’s expected.
As far as Christmas, I think I’ll just go with Joel Osteen’s idea to “Enjoy the Journey.” Each Christmas is different, but that doesn’t mean it is necessarily better or worse. The Christmases that may have seemed the most challenging at the time yield happy moments that turn into cherished memories. I can still see Jim wearing his Kansas City Chief’s shirt, mesmerized by the fiber optic tree. When I walked into his room, sometimes he would turn to me and his eyes would light up.
Life’s journey seems to be flying by and Christmas is a mile marker. Christmas is over, again. Now, it’s time to think about how to make the most of the 365 days of 2011. No one but me can put the “happy” in my New Year, but I might as well start with this day after Christmas. No time like the present to make a memory.
Copyright © December 2010 by L. S. Fisher
http://earlyonset.blogspot.com
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Dick Clark and a New Decade
I hardly ever stay awake to welcome in the New Year, but I did this year. Of course, the only reason for me to watch TV until midnight is to witness the ball drop in New York City. Dick Clark, known for years as America’s oldest teenager, looked amazingly handsome, but his slow, measured speech was hard to understand.
Dick Clark’s faltering words reminded me of the changes in Jim’s speech when dementia caused him to develop aphasia. Jim’s hesitant speech was filled with repetitive phrases and eventually turned into silence. Late in the disease, it was hard to remember the days of intriguing conversations and shared jokes.
Dick Clark’s impaired speech was caused by a stroke in 2004. Eighty-year-old Clark has made an amazing recovery.
“They were debating on TV this morning about whether it is really a new decade,” my friend said.
“I’m no mathematician, but I can tell you that the decade will start next year,” I replied.
I learned the lesson of time from a Trivial Pursuit game years ago. The question: What date is the first day of the 21st century? I didn’t even need to think about it—I had always puzzled over why the years started with 19, but the show on TV was “The Twentieth Century.” I thought the trick was that the 2000s were the 21st century.
“January 1, 2000,” I said.
“Wrong,” my brother-in-law Dennis replied. “January 1, 2001.” After a lengthy discussion, we decided the card was a misprint. After all, Henry Salveter, our cooperative attorney at the time and one of the smartest men I ever knew, always said he was born the last day of the last month of the last century and his birthday was December 31, 1899.
Later that night, I lay in bed thinking about it and suddenly realized the card was correct. When time began, the first year would begin at 0 and twelve months later would be 1. In grammar school we all learned that 101-1=100. Lo, and behold, the new century would begin in 2001.
I discussed the turn of the century, before it happened, with my brother Mitchell. He mulled it over in his logical way and asked me, “When do you think the parties will be?”
During the countdown to 2010, I noticed Dick Clark missed a few numbers, repeated a few, but was back on track by the time the ball dropped and he said, “Welcome to the new decade.”
Technically, it’s not a new decade, but logically, you would not say welcome to the decade of 2011-2021, would you? It doesn’t really matter what happened between years 0-10.
If Henry Salveter knew that 1900 began a new century, and Dick Clark says that 2010 is a new decade, it’s good enough for me.
It is best if we use our hearts to define time. The decades we’ve lived through are our past and what makes us who we are. The decades in the future define who we will become. But in the grand scheme of things, it is today that is most important.
Happy New Year and have a great decade. And, hey, if 2010 doesn’t work out for you—just start your new decade next year.
Dick Clark’s faltering words reminded me of the changes in Jim’s speech when dementia caused him to develop aphasia. Jim’s hesitant speech was filled with repetitive phrases and eventually turned into silence. Late in the disease, it was hard to remember the days of intriguing conversations and shared jokes.
Dick Clark’s impaired speech was caused by a stroke in 2004. Eighty-year-old Clark has made an amazing recovery.
“They were debating on TV this morning about whether it is really a new decade,” my friend said.
“I’m no mathematician, but I can tell you that the decade will start next year,” I replied.
I learned the lesson of time from a Trivial Pursuit game years ago. The question: What date is the first day of the 21st century? I didn’t even need to think about it—I had always puzzled over why the years started with 19, but the show on TV was “The Twentieth Century.” I thought the trick was that the 2000s were the 21st century.
“January 1, 2000,” I said.
“Wrong,” my brother-in-law Dennis replied. “January 1, 2001.” After a lengthy discussion, we decided the card was a misprint. After all, Henry Salveter, our cooperative attorney at the time and one of the smartest men I ever knew, always said he was born the last day of the last month of the last century and his birthday was December 31, 1899.
Later that night, I lay in bed thinking about it and suddenly realized the card was correct. When time began, the first year would begin at 0 and twelve months later would be 1. In grammar school we all learned that 101-1=100. Lo, and behold, the new century would begin in 2001.
I discussed the turn of the century, before it happened, with my brother Mitchell. He mulled it over in his logical way and asked me, “When do you think the parties will be?”
During the countdown to 2010, I noticed Dick Clark missed a few numbers, repeated a few, but was back on track by the time the ball dropped and he said, “Welcome to the new decade.”
Technically, it’s not a new decade, but logically, you would not say welcome to the decade of 2011-2021, would you? It doesn’t really matter what happened between years 0-10.
If Henry Salveter knew that 1900 began a new century, and Dick Clark says that 2010 is a new decade, it’s good enough for me.
It is best if we use our hearts to define time. The decades we’ve lived through are our past and what makes us who we are. The decades in the future define who we will become. But in the grand scheme of things, it is today that is most important.
Happy New Year and have a great decade. And, hey, if 2010 doesn’t work out for you—just start your new decade next year.
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