Day 65

“Nothing is more memorable than a smell. One scent can be unexpected, momentary and fleeting, yet conjure up a childhood summer beside a lake in the mountains...” ~Diane Ackerman



Yesterday I went perfume shopping. I wasn’t shopping around I went with one specific scent in mind. I wore this scent for at least ten years before I was lured away by advertisements and whiffs of passing friends and strangers. I tried out many fragrances trying to find my new”signature” scent. Trying to find a new, maybe more sophisticated me. Since my venture into sophisticated scents I have collected quite a few and never quite found the “one”. Then recently, I had a whiff of my favorite scent from one of those magazine scent samples and all of a sudden I was transported back in time. It was like a hug of memories. There are a million great memories tied to that scent. Too many to list. How did I abandon It.? There are times when I’ve smelled something that has transported me to another time or place. For instance, the smell of a pipe, (vanilla tobacco especially) will always remind me of my father. I have a lot of those, as I’m sure you do as well. In my quest to be something else I realized that I was losing something that made me, me. I’m learning it’s all about embracing who I am. I'm loving and learning who I am. I’m appreciating me... the total package. I am elated to be on this journey. Oh, and my favorite scent, how apropos is called “Happy”.

Day 64

“So when you are listening to somebody, completely, attentively, then you are listening not only to the words, but also to the feeling of what is being conveyed, to the whole of it, not part of it.” ~ Jiddu Krishnamurti

I consider myself a very good listener. I am usually able to recall conversations and site dates, times even outfits. “You were wearing the blue shirt on October the 10th, at 9pm when you said….” I pride myself on being able to make corrections on someone’s memory of an event with minute detail. Well, I don’t really think that’s what a good listener is. I have a great memory but am I really listening. Do I give my full attention or do I just pick out key elements to hold in my memory. What brings this to mind is that a friend of mine “DB” was able to repeat something I’d said and convey the emotions with which I expressed it? I was amazed. I realized that this person really heard me. (My other friend “C” and I know each other so well we have our own listening language so that doesn’t count….sorry C) I recently heard or read somewhere that when you listen to someone you need to be absolutely present and give them your full attention. (I thought I had been.) After they’ve finished you repeat what you think you heard to make sure you’re not putting your own spin on it.( I think I am a spin master) I believe a lot of misunderstanding and hurt feelings I’ve suffered could be because I actually didn’t listen, or possibly the person I was speaking to was guilty of the same. Is it too much to give my undivided attention? Is that voice in my head, that’s waiting for my second to jump in, so loud that I’m not hearing? I am going to make a conscious effort to listen not just to memorize key points. I am publically apologizing to anyone I may not have heard and thought that I did. I will listen to you with my head and heart. I will be present. You will have my full attention. I will be exactly who I want you to be….

Day 60

“The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.” ~ Marcel Proust (French Novelist and Author, 1871-1922)


I’ve mentioned before my love of travel in a earlier blog. I want to see as much of the world as I can. I’m fascinated by peoples day to day lives, how they live, what they eat, all that "they" see as mundane thrills me. In Paris I ate crepes, shopped at Marks &  Spencer, and browsed antique shops and museums. In Jamaica I ate Jerk Pork, shopped at the craft market and climbed Dunns River and devoured the beach. I want to experience everything. The smells, the sights, the sounds. I don’t have to cross waters to experience any of this; it can be as close as a subway ride away. It can be as close as opening my eyes... I am actually starting to realize that lately my life has become a voyage. I am discovering the most exciting adventure….me. I am getting to know myself again and I'm feeling so comfortable sharing my discovery with the world at large. I think I stopped seeing myself as interesting. I let one day blend into the next, one year to the next. I stopped being my own adventure. It’s so easy to just accept and close your eyes. It’s easy to let your world turn gray. I’m starting to see my world in color once again. I’m starting to see what’s been there all along. It’s a wonderful feeling to be able to celebrate myself and find as much fascination in me as I do on a distant voyage. I think I will hold off on renewing my passport…I’m my own adventure for now.

Day 59

“Some luck lies in not getting what you thought you wanted but getting what you have, which once you have got it you may be smart enough to see is what you would have wanted had you known.” ~ Garrison Keillor


I’ve always considered myself a lucky person. I’ve never won lotto or a contest and the most I’ve won in Las Vegas was $50. Somehow, I have come to think of any setback as a way to take inventory, another way reason to make a list. Is luck getting what the other person has? Is luck having your wildest dreams come true? I don’t think so. Maybe real luck is learning to appreciate what we already have. Luck is appreciating the gifts that are given to us every day. Those gifts given without having asked for them. Seeing beyond the tangible to the place that is fulfilled by what we overlook… that’s real luck. Sometimes we keep expecting something big to happen and in doing that we stop seeing what’s right there. Our luck is our luck. It’s what makes us unique. It’s not what we read or see other people experiencing it’s what ” we” have, and being able to see that is what makes me feel lucky. I wouldn’t give up a minute of the past 49 years, or change my luck. Every second was filled with the luck that brought me here. I am consciously making the decision to see my luck and live it. I’ll still carry my lucky coins and maybe even purchase a rabbits foot, but all the luck I need I already have.

Day 57

If anyone has read even one my blogs you know I am a lover of quotes. I do so hope that one day something I say will be quoted as a pearl of wisdom :-). Yesterday while looking for a quote I found that there were just so many on the topic of "change" that I loved. I eventually picked one but couldn’t let go of these. Please accept this gift of quotes. I hope that they put a smile on your face, conjure a new thought or answer a question. I try to never forget that we already have all the answers that we need, sometimes we just need a jolt to find them. Quotes have done that for me from time to time, they've helped me find the pieces in my head.  Enjoy!!




Growth is a painful process.~Wilma Mankiller


Most people can look back over the years and identify a time and place at which their lives changed significantly. Whether by accident or design, these are the moments when, because of a readiness within us and collaboration with events occurring around us, we are forced to seriously reappraise ourselves and the conditions under which we live and to make certain choices that will affect the rest of our lives.~ Frederick F. Flack


Everything you now do is something you have chosen to do. Some people don't want to believe that. But if you're over age twenty-one, your life is what you're making of it. To change your life, you need to change your priorities.~ John C. Maxwell


Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek. ~ Barack Obama


The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change. ~ Carl Rogers


The most important thing to remember is this: To be ready at any moment to give up what you are for what you might become.~ W. E. B. Du Bois


To change one's life, start immediately, do it flamboyantly, no exceptions. ~ William James


The future has a way of arriving unannounced. ~George Will


If you have always done it that way, it is probably wrong.~ Charles Kettering

Day 56

If you want things to be different, perhaps the answer is to become different yourself. ~ Norman Vincent Peale


I often find myself wishing for change. Hoping that miraculously something or someone would wave a magic wand and make whatever it is different. Writing this blog has made me see that I, without realizing it have become the change I’ve been looking for. I have opened up a can of thoughts that have forced me to either make changes or seek solutions. The changes have been both subtle and monumental. You see, I’ve changed, and without design my world has also changed. Everything has shifted. I’m being presented more choices. New choices that make old truths no longer relevant. I am seeing myself in a new light and being forced to make these changes. It’s funny how we see ourselves as victims of others circumstances, ourselves as powerless. This perception is untrue. We “are” able to make our own differences and changes. The universe has recognized that I am willfully making a change and has shifted my world. Feeling in control of your destiny is a powerful thing. I get to choose, who, what, when, where and how. I guess I’ve always had this super power; I’ve always been a super hero but never knew it. Maybe my hot red birthday dress will have the ability to change into a leather cat suit (smile). Now, the super powers will also have to work so only my "inner" sex symbol is showing in tight leather from head to toe. Hmmmm….

Day 53

“Where misunderstanding serves others as an advantage, one is helpless to make oneself understood” ~Lionel Trilling
mis•un•der•stand•ing  [mis-uhn-der-stan-ding] –noun

1. failure to understand correctly; mistake as to meaning or intent.
2. a disagreement or quarrel

I have found that it is very easy to be misunderstood. Your best intentions can sometimes seem to spin out of control when perceived negatively by another person. I have always been someone that wants to please all parties in any situation. This behavior has sometime been to my own detriment. It’s very true that “You can please some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time but you can't please all of the people all of the time”. For me this seems horrible...you mean “I can’t please everyone?” I think it’s important to realize that you can only do your best and you can’t be responsible for someone else’s best. I often find myself in the position of peace maker to my own drama, where I should just be a participant. I think I’ll have find my inner “mean girl” when it comes to standing my ground. (At least my perception of mean). I need to be a bully for my cause whatever it may be. I no longer take on the sole responsibility for misunderstandings…after all…who put me in charge of the world’s feelings. I affectionately pass the torch.

Day 46

“The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy, or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers.” ~ M. Scott Peck


I’ve been speaking with a friend this morning about finding answers. What happens, I find, is that when you’ve solved one mystery/problem another pops up. I use to constantly think, “Is this ever going to end?”, “Will I ever get past this?”and my all time favorite “Why me??” One day I realized that whatever catastrophic problem I thought I wouldn’t live through, I actually had. Now, I’m talking about the problems as small as, “Will my daughter ever get out of diapers?” or “Will he, he or he finally get it??” to much larger issues. Well, I think you get the point. Throughout my life I have had one hurdle or another, both large and small, which I’ve gotten over. They would encompassed my every thought, had me sick, shedding tears, making me doubt myself, my present, my future. That really sucks. So, now when I am faced with something that I’m sure I will never get through, I look back at the worst thing that’s ever happened to me and remember that without even realizing…one day I just got up, got myself dressed, did all the mundane things and it was no longer attached to me. I do admit that while going through whatever it is a broken heart, a disappointment or any other life altering event, it’s hard to just shake it off. I try to remember that I will survive and it will be behind me and it always works out. Unfortunately or fortunately it’s also safe to say that that without a doubt, waiting around the corner, there will be another mystery or challenge, looking to give me a shake, but now getting past them are my small victories.

Day 44

"The Mirror"

“We suffer primarily not from our vices or our weaknesses, but from our illusions. We are haunted, not by reality, but by those images we have put in their place.” ~ Daniel J. Boorstin


I think I have witnessed a modern day miracle. Now, I do use the word miracle loosely but….
While on one of my many visits to IKEA, I was browsing the furniture and came upon a mirror. Now to the untrained eye this may seem like your run of the mill floor mirror, but it’s magic. You see , when I look in this mirror I am really at least 10 lbs thinner, everything is in the right place, I look dam good….LOL. I must confess I’ve visited the mirror often. Now I know this sounds crazy and I didn’t believe it myself...how could this be? One day while clothes shopping I went into the dressing room with a few dresses and there it was the IKEA mirror. I tried on the dresses and they all looked fantastic‼ The dress that I chose was a vintage slip, with spaghetti straps and lace insets. What a beautiful dress! Well, when I got home and tried on this beautiful dress in my mirror, I was horrified. What the heck???? What was I wearing??? What was I thinking??? How did my twins fit into this dress a few hours ago? Is that MY butt??? It was the MIRROR. Needless to say I’ve never worn the dress. So how does this translate to everyday situations? I find myself looking at things through a “magic mirror”. Things that otherwise would not look as favorable I somehow can distort into what I want to see. I suppose this could be a good thing in some cases, like pretending that medicine tastes like “raspberry flavored vodka”…lol. The problem lies in distorting bad feelings into euphoria. How many times have I made lemons into lemon aide? From now on I will look at lemons as lemons and not swallow the poison and think it’s a cocktail. After all I’m not the magic mirror.

Day 43

“We cannot change our memories, but we can change their meaning and the power they have over us” David Seamands


I have wonderful memories, as I’m sure we all do. Memories of being a child in Jamaica, of relatives, friends, loves, my daughter. These memories put smiles on my face and keep me connected to a past. I’ve now come to realize that there are also memories that keep you trapped in the past. These memories keep you stuck because you they prevent you from seeing present situations. It’s so easy to fool ourselves into believing that bad habits are memories. I am guilty of holding on to thing for longer than I should because I believe that if I’ve stored enough memories it must be a good thing. The truth is, is that all situations change and you have to be willing to change with them or at least recognize when the good memories are not being created.
I find change very difficult. I spend over a hundred dollars a month to store memories. When is it time to let go? When is it time to move on? I think this is not a question I will answer by January 4th…. I think I will try to be more aware and recognize sooner rather than later, when the party’s over. Besides all of this, I look forward to all of my wonderful memories that are being created daily. With any luck I will have to get a larger storage room.

Day 39

When I was a little girl my grandmother use to quote from this book “The Prophet” all the time. In fact, it was sort of her version of the cat in the hat… I grew up loving this book and I’ve always had a copy. I love sharing it with friends , so today when I am just not feeling too “Bloggy” I thought I would share a little with you. Have a great weekend!

Self-Knowledge

By Kahil Gibran

And a man said, "Speak to us of Self-Knowledge."
And he answered, saying:
Your hearts know in silence the secrets of the days and the nights.
But your ears thirst for the sound of your heart's knowledge.
You would know in words that which you have always know in thought.
You would touch with your fingers the naked body of your dreams.
And it is well you should.
The hidden well-spring of your soul must needs rise and run murmuring to the sea;
And the treasure of your infinite depths would be revealed to your eyes.
But let there be no scales to weigh your unknown treasure;
And seek not the depths of your knowledge with staff or sounding line.
For self is a sea boundless and measureless.
Say not, "I have found the truth," but rather, "I have found a truth."
Say not, "I have found the path of the soul." Say rather, "I have met the soul walking upon my path."
For the soul walks upon all paths.
The soul walks not upon a line, neither does it grow like a reed.
The soul unfolds itself, like a lotus of countless petals.