Monkey Bars and Optimism

There has been lots of progress on the house. My sister Trish and her boyfriend spent the weekend with me and we filled up many many hefty garbage bags with trash and clothing to be sold, and cleared off at least half a dozen shelves of magazines and old papers. The important thing is that we attacked a room that I'd been planning to start clearing out for months, but which had always ended up overwhelming me and sending me running back to bed. Now I'm able to continue the task on my own. The living room is slowly filling up with objects to be sold. I don't know how the liquidator (it sounds like The Terminator - I guess it is in a way, it'll be a termination of my old life - maybe I should start calling him The Initiator because it'll lead to the beginning of my new life) is going to manage finding space to display everything, but neither one of them seemed to think that would be a problem. Today Wayne and Arlene came and helped me haul everything out to the driveway for the garbage and recycle pickup tomorrow morning. They also filled their car with bags of recycle materials to be dropped off on their way home.

My daughter-in-law Brenda is flying in from Seattle a week from Wednesday for a few days to help me with the sorting and clearing out, and then my good friend Kate is flying in from Texas on June 19 to not only help with that, but also to help me start looking for an apartment. That's a big step. I already know what I DON'T want (I don't want anything depressing with cottage cheese ceilings and shaggy carpets - I did all that in my youth) and I'm beginning to make a list of what I do want. I'd like to have a 2 bedroom 1 bath so I can have an office that would double as a guest bedroom, I'd like a building with security, I want lots of closet space and storage (I had a walk-in closet with my studio, so I should be able to have one with an apartment), it would be nice to have a deck or patio, it has to be on the ground floor or have an elevator, I'd like an exercise facility on the premises, covered parking space, wi-fi, lots of light....I can have that, right? I'm willing to pay a little more so that I can be happy. I'm too old to compromise on my comfort! I don't know yet if I'll be able to find a 2 bedroom in my price range, but I'm going to look for one and be optimistic. Besides, maybe it's like that old saying that nature abhors a vacuum. If I end up renting an apartment that's a little bit more expensive than what I had planned on, then doesn't that mean I'll end up finding a source of income that's a little bit more than I'd envisioned? Why not. Today I'm optimistic and positive.

There are many things that are helping me get through this period of my life, and one of them is having monkey bars. That's what Art Mortell calls them. I try to give each day a certain structure and to do certain things which help focus me and give me the strength to stay on top of my challenges, like climbing monkey bars in a playground. My monkey bars consist of: daily meditative nap in the middle of the day; making lists where I can cross things off; 20 minute walk at sunset; writing a daily journal; listening to my body and resting when it tells me I need to; letting people help me (this is a first for me and it has turned out to be my most important monkey bar); working on at least one room in the house every day; concentrating on not being externally driven. These are just a few of them. Everything is helping.