about work and meaning

Lofty title for a basic issue. If I'm not working, what am I doing? If I'm not doing, am I being? "We're human beings, not human doings." "Don't just do something, sit there!"

That made theoretical sense to me. What does it mean, though? In real life?

I still don't know what it all means but I know I don't much like finding out. Now that I'm experiencing the "being not doing" way of life, I understand why I avoided it for as long as I possibly could. It is depressing, frankly.

I don't really want to 'fess up to that. I mean, I have so much recovery and therapy and self-knowledge and Zoloft - how on earth could I be depressed? Then I remember that there is situational depression - there are life situations that are doggone depressing. Being out of work and unable to work full-time qualifies as one of those situations. And as my friend Susana pointed out, if Zoloft took away all feelings, I wouldn't be able to take it safely. Zoloft deals with chemical imbalances, not life imbalances.

So where am I? In limbo. Maybe I'll work, maybe I won't. I have two projects to focus on - one for pay, one for no pay. I can't really get excited about either of them. And I'm doing the MBA work and it takes up a lot of my time and energy. I can't seem to fill out the paperwork for disability even though I will need money fairly soon. And truly, I feel physically disabled. My hip hurts a lot, I'm tired and have no stamina. My back hurts if I walk or bend or sit too long. But I can't really come to terms with that big a life change.

"Surrender, Dorothy!"

(I'm Dorothy, if you haven't guessed.)

OK, let me tell myself the truth. Disabled doesn't mean unable. It means some more limitations on what I can do, not what I can be or am. It means I've arrived at a junction, a resting spot, the start of a new phase of my journey.

Coming to terms with this is psychically painful, if only because of all the noise in my brain about what does it mean for my future, my ability to have an impact, my day to day activities, my work life, my personality and tendency to isolate, who are my friends, where will I live, will I be poor, will I lose my house, will no one love me ever? Very noisy. Generally meaningless, now that I write it down. All "what ifs," that have no bearing on the facts today.

So what is relevant today? I need to focus on the next right step, the one right in front of me. And don't worry about meaning today. In the main, I've discovered meaning in retrospect, not in the present. How do I know then what today will mean a hundred tomorrows from now? I don't and I can't, so why worry about it today?

My work is not to find meaning today, my work is to do what is in front of me today, and be OK with that (and not be mean to myself!)

about fear and faith

There are times when I feel such deep terror about the future - will I have interesting work? Will I have enough money? Will I be alone? Fortunately, it no longer keeps me awake at night. Because at almost-48 years old, I have enough experience to make faith a reasonable bet. I have always had interesting work, enough money, and friends and family who love me. And while I have rarely anticipated what path I will end up traveling, the paths have been clear and illuminating.

Is a faith that relies on experience a contradiction? I prefer to think of it as a faith informed by experience, reinforced and validated by my 20/20 hindsight. Having faith that I would be OK no matter what happened took a lot of effort in my 20's. I had to pray fervently, using the Serenity Prayer as a mantra, sometimes for hours as I lay wakeful in my little girl bed in the tiny Village apartment I was blessed to secure.

That was one of my first lessons in faith in a power greater than myself and in the power of the universe to fall in place supporting my convictions and fulfilling my current greatest need. I got to Second Coming Records and talked to Andre, who had tried to call the realtor to say he'd accept the client they'd just sent. But the phone was out of order, and he decided he liked me more. So I got the apartment for $500 a month - at a time when I was working in the South Bronx and making $18,000 a year. It was a third floor walkup with three front windows, a fireplace, and a full bathroom with a half-size bathtub. There was a 4-foot square kitchen and a sort-of closet by the front door. If I stood at one point in the apartment, I could touch both walls. I felt so unbelievably lucky to have gotten it!

My first NYC apartment was right in the heart of Greenwich Village, on Sullivan Street between Bleecker and West 3rd Street, just up the street from the social clubs. I think they were part of the Gambino family empire. I'm sure I saw Carmine slobbing around in his bathrobe at various times. And often, there were folding chairs occupied by men in guinea T's or short-sleeved button-front shirts and baggy pants, just talking and smoking in front of the blocked-off glass storefronts. They never said a word to me, but sometimes nodded when I said hello.

At that time, the neighborhood was strewn with mafiosi in their 40's, 50's, 60's and beyond. There was the weird clothing store on Bleecker just east of 6th Avenue that could not possibly have made any money. I think the guy's name was Joey who hung out there and always said hello to me. Sometimes I'd see him on Sullivan Street or down the block at the sausage store. But mostly he was at the clothing store across from John's Pizzeria. I always thought he was not quite there, perhaps a little slow, but he was obviously well-loved and respected. And, as I said, he always greeted me and I him. I often wondered what happened to him after the clothing store closed and an Italian restaurant opened in its place.

It was a safe neighborhood because of the heavy Italian population, so even in 1982 when NYC was a rat-hole, I loved it. I was 24, of course, and no different from most other young people in feeling invincible much of the time. There were those times, however, when I would succumb to the paranoia that had developed during my final years of drinking. I was convinced I would be mugged or raped or murdered - on the street, in the subway, in my very apartment.

The apartment scenario was pretty easily dispensed with, because how could I be harmed on a block guarded by goombas? My faith in them was justified when traffic was blocked from coming up Sullivan while the NYU Law Library was being excavated from under Sullivan between West 3rd and West 4th. The traffic noise had been unbearable for a couple of weekends, with car horns and yelling and exhaust overwhelming the street until 3 and 4 a.m. because cars had to turn onto West 3rd instead of being able to go up to West 4th. Then one night, it was quiet. I looked out the window and saw an empty street. No one ever confirmed it for me, but the mob was still pretty connected in 1983 - and I'm sure the NYPD stepped in at a Gambino's request.

The other fears were not so easily dealt with. I remember walking from the #6 subway stop at 149th Street in the Bronx up to Leggett Avenue and the Bronx Frontier offices, and feeling so incredibly vulnerable. I was 23, 24, 25 - slim and cute. Cars would pass and slow, and sometimes men would call out "hey, chica" or whistle. I repeated over and over "God, let me feel your loving arms around me" and "surround me with your golden light." And amazingly, I would feel loving arms around me and I would sense golden warmth, and the fear would be gone. Another lesson in the strength of prayer, the reality of faith working.

I was willing to try it all because others told me it worked for them. And the Big Book and 12&12 said "this is the way to a faith that works." Boy, did I want such a faith. Having been at the utter nadir of life, hopeless and despairing, I did not want to return there. I needed a different way. I needed hope. And faith offers hope. Otherwise, it's back to the abyss of "is that all there is? and why the hell am I here anyway? what good is life?" I suppose that I make the choice every day to remain hopeful, to remain optimistic, to remain open to possibility, to remain curious about what happens next, and to remain confident that all will be as it should be.
Plus, every psychic I've ever gone to has told me that I will always have enough money. That's my ace in the hole...in case this God thing isn't real!

About The Devil Wears Prada

It was a horror film. The stuff of my nightmares. Those cinematic happenings were eerily reminiscent of actual real events in my life. Rushing around to clean the office before SHE comes in? Been there, done that. Hearing the personalization of everything as in "she was my biggest disappointment" - HER version was "who let me down?" Pompous, self-aggrandizing, an amazing sense of her own worth, and an entourage of handlers who felt the glory of her reflection as well as the fear of being dressed down, found wanting, failing, being cut off and cut down with a look or expression or moue of disgust, or even worse, a word or phrase. Felt that, hated it.

What is it about our society that fixates on celebrities? I have been up close and personal with some, and frankly, they are by and large obnoxious, self-obsessed, and rude to the mass of peons who occupy the planet. Not to mention often drunk or on drugs. Whenever someone tells me that a celebrity is a great person, I completely disbelieve it. The public persona may be lovely, but just cross that person and I firmly believe the claws will come out. Maybe there are some people they know for years from before they were famous and with them they can be themselves and lovely and everything. Mazel tov to them. I'm very happy for them. But I believe that they cannot let a new person in. They can let certain people get somewhat close - people who can talk to them carefully and inoffensively, and people who don't mind being treated like crap once in a while. Those people need to have thick skins and a clear sense that the celebrity really is more important than they are.

I'm bitter because I was unable to adjust and become a celebrity pal. I'm bitter because I was kicked out of my own mini-celebrity position at City Harvest and cast into the wildnerness. And so I condemn all celebrities. While still craving it for myself. Sad, sad humanity, that's me.