Relearning how to relax

I am home from Cancun and I had a wonderful time with the girls and leaders of Troop 1900.  The girls were a joy as traveling companions and my daughter and I re-connected for the first time in a long while in a positive way.   I snorkeled for the first time and I realized that it is something I would like to do more often, as well as perhaps learn to Scuba-dive.  I love the beauty of the ocean, the diversity of life, the seamless co-existence of species--a sense of a grand design at work, and perhaps an acknowledgement of the transient nature of life.   I also realized that I no longer relax easily, that it took me nearly 3 days to completely decompress from the rigor of my daily life.  I found that even though I was having a wonderful time, that I could not put aside an underlying sense of angst that I left something important undone.  Truth is I realized as I swam with the swim turtles, hiked with the girls, and visited Mayan ruins, is that I am not important. I am merely a cog in the chain.  In the grand scheme of things it is not the individual but humanity that preserves.  I have always been comfortable in my own insignificance, perhaps I had simply forgot.  I am relearning.

Week 30--Conference Calls

Talking and thinking simultaneously for extended periods of time is hard work. It's exhausting, and perhaps something in our human evolutionary process we have not quite mastered. On an average day I spend at least 1-3 hour a day on a conference call, or a brainstorming type of meeting; the last several months (30 weeks) this number has increased to more than 3 hours a day, with two to three full days of my week committed to more than 5-6 hours of conference calls a day. I according to those type of courses that help define your "leadership style" have a collaborative style. Meaning I get my best work done by exchange of ideas, that I am somewhat "charged" up by interaction and like venues such as brainstorming, talking through issues, roadblocks and what if scenarios. Meaning I should be thriving in this type of environment. Yet I am brain dead at the end of the day and a little testy. Okay some days a lot testy.  My brain is mush.  I want to take it out of my head and simply toss it from hand to hand and drool. Yes drool, I want to be like my friends dog and have my ears scratched and lay in the grass and simply let autonomic responses take over.  I am learning that between these brainstorming sessions, I need time to let things settle around me, to allow my thought processes mature, and to formulate an action plan.  That more than 2-3 hours in a day of that sort of higher level of interaction puts me outside of my own comfort zone.   I am developing strategies to accommodate the information stream, to stretch this muscle.  I am always amazed by people who can function at this level for extended periods of time, who are always "on top of their game" we have several managers who retain the inputs from tens/hundrends of people, hour after hour, day after day, week after week, year after year with not so much as a blip in thier baseline.  Perhaps when this 100 week project is completed, I might gain a bit of this skill.  Next week I am going to Cancun for a senior trip with the girls of troop 1900, and I have decided that I am going to lay on the beach, drink copious amounts of diet Mountain Dew, and drool. The only decision matrix will be which swimsuit to wear and whether I should go snorkeling or lay on the beach and  read a book.

The Highest Peak in North America

I am finally beginning to play around with my Alaska photos--this shot of McKinley( far right) taken from Talkeetna River ( Tanaina Indian name meaning "river of plenty), one of the best views I have seen of the big mountain. I am connected to this land, perhaps it is true what they say about places getting into your blood.  I lived in Alaska from 1969-1974 and I have lived in Texas from 1974-to 2011, and yet when I return here I feel like I am coming to my place of origin, much like the salmon returning to where they were spawn.  Texas is home, and I love Texas and the life my husband and I have built, yet it this place where I return year after year for a visit that grounds me. There was snow on the ground the first week of May, and the river was swelling with water, I stood and watched my family walk this beach, my father, my sister, my husband and my niece search for flat stones to skip across the river.    I was memorized watching them.  I remembered being 6;  my fathers hand guiding my arm showing me how to cup the stone, to swing out, when to release the stone, and me holding my breath, counting the skips.  When my daughter my seven I watched my father guide my daughters hand; instructing her on the Art of Rock Skipping.  I wanted to hit pause--to stay in this minute a wee bit longer--to gather these memories together, to hear the laughter of my niece, my fathers good natured bellow, my sister relaxed and smiling, to record the quiet murmur of conversation of my sister and step mother, to hold dear the image of my husband as a child, intent on skipping stones.