jalléCafe

The relaxing power of Spring snow

It snowed in the mountains on Wednesday. Then where I hiked on Thursday, the sun warmed the day up to summer-like temperatures.  I was struck with the contrast of early growing green plants with winter white mountain tops. 

You don't see that here every day! 

I took a long, deep breath and loved the feeling of it. 

Then Friday as I came in from a jog, I smelled something new and wonderful in my apartment.

Sure it wasn't me!

Searched around to find what I'd spilled or left open. 

Turned out it was my open bedroom window.  Flowers outside it white as snow and scented like a full open bottle of your favorite, sweet perfume. 

You don't smell that here every day!

I took another long, deep breath.

The pleasures & unexpected twists of Spring.

Remember to feel joy

Today, we lost a woman we loved.

I met her during my first-ever business lunch when interviewing for a "real" job after university.  And that single hour played a large role in my choice to - rather oddly as a journalism major - decide that a large corporation in the middle of nowhere was a great place to start my career.  A fortunate influence for the long-term, as it turned out.

Such an articulate woman. I wanted to use her own words here.  Yet I have them mostly from conversations.  So I searched my journals and found this from after our last lunch together - only some weeks ago:

I want to remember - to write here - what she told me. 

That there is a connection between movement, your physical well-being, your mind - and joy. 

That joy matters.

That you need to find ways to think positively for the purpose of finding it.

In joy, is life.

A decade ago, when we lost my father to a different version of the same ridiculous disease, I remember that he spent his last hours at home walking from window to window. Taking joy in the view of his own, simple back yard.

My friend also said that she wanted to tell others - especially women starting their careers - to remember to feel the simple joy of expressing yourself.  Of being yourself.

She didn't have enough time to do it. What I will remember is that whether you have eight months or eight decades, it will seem life passed by in an instant.

I promise to spread her message to others - in the full spirit of joy of having known her.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My first love affair

From the moment the rugged, half-shaved, grubby, beautifully-sleek man grabbed that magical statue and sprinted for the head of the dark, damp, bat-ridden cave, I was in love with Indiana Jones. 

My first movie hero.  And we all know that first loves last forever.

Of course it probably helped that Harrison Ford was the best looking man alive at the time.  I have my standards!  But it was adventure and courage that pulled me effortlessly into what is still to me one of the best opening sequences in a film, ever.

Indiana J was about risk and humor and vulnerability and full-living.

On Monday, I saw Raiders of the Lost Ark at a business meeting. Yes, in a conference room!  I had the great pleasure hear about the journeys of more sleekly-dressed people who had taken an adventure together over the last 18 months. How it felt to go from there to here.  The ones who had done it with openness, risk and full-life exploration showed a power and connection between them that I found nearly humbling. You can build something - even in the distanced, professional world - so beautiful and valuable that it will change your perspective, build you up, and thereby last. I am proud to have been a small part of the catalyst for that.

The power, it occurred to me, lies in the deeper understanding that grows when you are so committed to a quest that you make yourself vulnerable.

Nearly every great adventure needs the support of others. To reach a treasure chest, you share things that might put you at risk. Not risk of death like for IJ.  Risk of more scary daily things like looking silly, or giving the other person too much control, or losing your position.

Shared with some instinct and maturity, openness may be exactly the quality we need to find our jewels in the dark cave.  Someone asked me recently if I was open to love.  I hesitated.  I think the real trick is to be open to life.

It starts there.

And then for sure it helps a lot when a a nice strong Indiana Jones goes into that dark, scary, bat-ridden cave first sometimes and gives you the push you need to run like hell when you get so close to beauty that you are afraid to move in that moment of vulnerability.

A hand that grabs yours just when you sense the next steps could bring the walls crumbling down in your wake.

That is the moment of real magic.

Indiana Jones & Jill. ;)

 

 

 

How to marry a millionaire

I've paid bills now 75 months as an entrepreneur.  At least half of those 75 with my inside voice asking wryly  - again - why I follow these crazy life-complicating ideas like starting a business.  Justified or not, my stomach always tightens. Got to add it up and hope that - as you think you have planned but you can always be wrong - it can all be paid.

Ugh.

I wrote a note to a friend right afterwards this time. I noticed it was longish - like I was expressing something in the fast flow of words without saying what I really felt. What I felt was RELIEF. Past that again - on to real living!

I've not touched the subject of money much on this blog.  Love, yes. Meaningfulness, yes.  Dreams, yes.  But money? That's a scary one.

We are rich in the Western world compared to people in developing countries.  Really, truly rich. And money does not buy happiness, we say.  Yet in reality, if you cannot pay your bills where you live, it can be darned stressful can't it?  Not to mention how it speaks to your self-worth.

On the positive side, money gives us some power to do things in this world and for the people we love, for our lives.  And that's reality, too. It's a responsibility we each have to figure out our own way.

This week - wearing my comfy old gym clothes - I found myself 1000% happy while jogging in the woods along a stream. And that cost me nothing, right? Well, except all of the preceding steps and investment and risk and moments of stress and joy that gave me the chance to be there in those woods on that day.

So I hoped I might learn something about how to more easily put at my fingertips all things to buy when I stumbled across How to Marry a Millionaire this weekend. I mean,  Betty Grable, Marylyn Monroe and Lauren Bacall sure must know something. As it turned out, they were as complicated as me, just wearing more lovely dresses!

Sometimes I think money is a lot like romance - a tangled web of love and uncertainty depending on how you handle it.

And I'll take such real life instead of a Hollywood movie any - well, most! - day(s).

 

Birthday fusion

It will take me a while to say thank you personally to the already lovely list of people who have sent me birthday wishes today.  Here in Europe, the custom is for the birthday girl herself to organize a celebration.  I, of course, didn't get that at first because in the USA your friends and family do that for you - and it might even seem egoistic to do it yourself!  So the first couple of years here, my friends all wondered why they were left-off of my (nonexistant!) invitation list. :) 

Today, the celebration of my 49th year, I try a little cultural birthday fusion. I send this link as a gift to my friends and family.  Alanis Morrisette, You Learn. This is my favorite theme song about living. Some years ago, Alanis - like any great musician can do - helped me get through a dark period in my life.  I thank her for that - and all of you for the wonderful support you've given me in this nearly half-century. No one does anything beautiful alone!

And Alanis gets one more credit:  thanks to her, I do indeed walk around naked in my living room.

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