The 100 Days of May

Well, at least that's what my friend Elaine calls it... the 100 Days of May. You know what I mean. That incredibly jam-packed time of year just before summer, in the all-too-few days before school gets out and vacations begin. The time when EVERYONE wants it off their list and on to yours! Just picture those monkeys jumping from back to back to back!

What's on your schedule this week? If it looks anything like mine, it's crammed with meetings, end of the year parties, award ceremonies, concerts, final rounds of sports matches, check-ups and all the things we want to get out of the way so we can have fun in the summertime! Whether you're in school or not, don't we ALL get that classic twinge of jealous anticipation of weeks on end of swimming, sun and just laying around? Ahhh, if we can only get there....to the beach, the mountains, the lake, or even the hammock in the backyard.

Only 81 days to go...

Celebrating Charlotte!

I'm hot, sweaty and tired, but in a great way! I have just walked the Komen Race for the Cure with my friend Charlotte and her 'Charlotte's Web' ... and we have the T-shirts to prove it!

When I met Charlotte, our sons were in the same first grade class. With her background in PR and mine in advertising, we hit it off right away, and breakfast soon followed. Over croissants and scrambled eggs, we began sharing the background of our lives, as new friends do. She was up front and upbeat in telling me of her diagnosis and treatment for breast cancer several years earlier. Already as 'survivor,' she was confident and optimistic ... and she made sure that I was not 'too busy' multi-tasking to get regular mammograms myself.

Now our kids are heading off to middle school, and Charlotte's celebrating a BIG anniversary... 10 years since her surgery! To mark the occasion, she planned to do the Komen Race and generously opened the invitation to us to join her. Anyone who's met Charlotte will tell you that the first thing you notice about her is her smile. And today, that smile was bigger than ever.

But it wasn't until she crossed the finish line in the lane especially marked for Survivors, received a beautiful single long-stemmed rose, and stood embraced by her husband Jim, that the truly major significance of this event really struck me. We all stood there watching with tears in our eyes as a volunteer snapped a picture of them together, capturing in a moment, the true essence of life. 10 years. A full decade. Time of waiting. Watching. Living. I was so proud to be there with her.

As we moved on through the crowd for a much needed bottle of water and the requisite t-shirt, I was struck by so many groups like our own. Groups of (mostly) women who walked in matching t-shirts of their own - all colors, shapes and sizes with fun names, corporate logos and serious messages. Women who support each other every day in so many ways. Mothers, daughters, aunts, cousins, BFF's as the kids say. Carving out a few hours out of their lives on a very early Saturday spring morning, coming together to create a force of thousands to make a difference in the lives of so many.

I have always loved that saying: "I am but one, but I am one," and one plus one plus one plus one...all add up to women making an incredible, powerful difference in one life after another.

Thank you, Charlotte for including me in your invitation. And thanks for each and every one of you who walked today and all the other days to make a difference.

Now I'm back home and it's time to do Saturday laundry. I've got to wash the gorgeous pink t-shirt that today became the most fashionable item in my wardrobe!

Stripping down and loving it!

No, don't get scared. It's not the clothes I'm wearing that are coming off. It's the clothes in the closet that never get worn. It's the 'fashion mistakes' I've bought that just never quite fit into my wardrobe. You know what I mean. You love it in the store, but when you get it home, what were you thinking! :-)

And it's not just about closets or clothes. I'm finding myself unloading, taking out, throwing away and giving up all kinds of things. "If you feel stuck, give fifty things away," I read recently. Well, it sounded like a good idea, and certainly something I needed, so I jumped right in. Out went the old never used waffle iron. The sheets that no longer match. The lamp I never really liked anyway. In fact, I've given away so many loads that now when I drive up to Goodwill, they ask "What have you got for us today?" Imagine that. I'm on a first name basis.

So what does all this mean? Spring cleaning, you say? Well, yes, I'm sure that's part of it. But in a bigger, even more important way, I've become aware that keeping too much 'old' keeps 'new' from coming in. Not necessarily new things, but change, new ways of being, new outlooks, new ideas. If, as Eastern medicine says, "the only disease is congestion and the only cure is circulation", then I'm getting healthy! Making space. Room to breathe. Clean, clear, open areas where air can circulate and ideas can percolate.

Why not join me? I'll be the one in the silver SUV pulled up to the curb and unloading at Goodwill. Got another load to go...

Balancing act!

I had coffee yesterday with my friend who's an amazing life coach, Melissa Grossman. As our conversation ran from one thing to another, we settled on the topic of balance - always an issue in our multi-tasking lives. "People forget that balance doesn't have to mean 50/50," she said. Boy is that the truth! People who say every thing is equally important in their lives, scare me! How can that be?

Anybody who's lived long enough will agree, I think, that sometimes balance is 80/20. Sometimes it may be 60/40, or 30/20/50 or even 20/10/30/50.... you do the numbers! If you picture a scale, I know that some days I have a watermelon on one side and about 10 bunches of grapes on the other. Balanced? Yes, but every day can be different.

How does your life balance? How do you make your numbers work? Add it all up, and what's the total weight of your life right now? If you don't like the way the scale looks, eat a few grapes and watch it change!