Legacy

This has been a heck of a year so far. I've lost several friends and acquaintances to breast cancer and several more to heart attacks and accidents. Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse, a call, email, text or Tweet would come about someone else's passing. The memorials and funerals have truly exhausted me, but they have gotten me thinking about legacy a lot more than ever.

My reality is this: I am a breast cancer survivor. Since there is absolutely no cure for this disease, the chance that it could come back with a vengence and take me away from my family is very real. Other than some meories and a few blog posts, what will be left of me after I'm gone? And what will those life left-overs say about me and what I did with my time here on earth?

The frineds whom I lost recently ranged in age from 21 to 65 years of age. Their legacies include their children, their writing, their advocacy and the promise of what life had in store for them had they been here still to live it. They leave behind husbands and wives, children and Internet sisters, girlfriends and parents, relatives and friends who all remembered them "when" - when they were alive and kicking, doing their thing and living life like they had all the time in the world. Sadly, they didn't. How will the memories of who they were live on?

A few days ago, I was asked to write a bio for a presentation this spring. I was warned that writing about myself can be difficult - which I already knew, but I really had no idea why until I sat down to write this particular bio. Most of the people reading it will know me from the world of martial arts, although the award is for teaching outside the dojo. The truth is that I'm more than just a teacher and a karateka, but if you only see me in a gi or behind the podium in a lecture hall, you'd be none the wiser. The difficulty in writing about all you do and all you are, I found, is all about what NOT to include. Who wants their bio to read like they are a superhero?

But isn't that what we all are? Nobody just does one thing all their life - be that world politics, a more mundane day job or heading a fabulous yearly fund-raiser/event. We're all much more of a multi-faceted entity than how we can describe ourselves to someone we're meeting for the first time.

So this is who I am: mom, ex-wife, wife-to-be, advocate for at-risk youth, college professor, karate student and instructor, track coach, former soccer coach, dancer, wanna-be drummer, rabid Prince fan, editor, writer, publisher, photographer, track star, best friend, payer of tuition, chief cook and dishwasher, dog walker, cat litter-scooper, blogger, dreamer - still, none of them completely capture my essence.

What I want people to know about me when I am no longer here for them to get to know for themselves is not the sound of my voice or my love of R&B. I want folks to know about my passion for doing what is right - be it in the dojo or with people who expect to learn something from me in the classroom or for folks who stumble across my breast cancer blog. I want people to know that I felt things while I was here - and that I tried my best to do something to help right as many wrongs as I could.

I've learned a little something from every person I've ever come in contact with, too. All of it - the good and the bad - have helped mold me into the person writing this today. As I learn more lessons, I have come to understand that I am still a work in progress - and I hope to be until the day I draw my last breath.

Thanks for being a part of my progress, dear reader. Thanks for letting me be a part of yours, too. But thanks mostly to the wonderful souls who have gone on. The facets you let shine were appreciated more than you could ever know.

Exodus: Piles of Stuff

My son will be moving to his new place in four short days. Located about five minutes from his college campus, his house will be the semester home to my almost 18-yr-old and two other college guys. Sigh...

I'm a planner by nature. Since he decided on the college he wanted to attend, I've been buying toiletries and other things he'll need for school a little at a time. Suffice to say that in late August, there is a big pile of bags, boxes and storage bins in the middle of his bedroom. I think he has enough body wash, deodorant and lotion to choke a small farm animal.

But as the time for the pending move draws closer, each trip to his room to add something else to the pile feels a little more melancholy. Part of it is the realization that my "little" boy is well on his way to adulthood. Part of it is the flashback to my own pile of college necessaries as my college move-in day drew closer. My parents had taken me shopping to get a little fridge, a stereo with a cassette player (don't laugh) and a typewriter, but it's only now as I get ready to untie the apron strings myself that I identify with what they might have been thinking as the pile started getting bigger. Did my mom ask herself if she'd given me everything I needed emotionally to survive in the world outside of our little town? Was dad secretly wondering if I'd remember to eat on a regular? Did they worry that I'd be a menace to my room and dorm mates with my quirky habits? Were they concerned that I wouldn't study but instead party like it was going out of style? I know all these things have crossed my mind in the last few weeks - and more.

Still, Friday will be here before you know it. And although I concern myself with the minutia of new towels and bed linen and making sure his new laptop is college-ready, I know I'll miss seeing him every day. I'm sure that drive back home after the last part of the pile has been transfered from his bedroom in our house to his bedroom in his new one will be a long and probably even a sad one. But I also remember making a "Temple U or Bust!" sign on a sheet of paper that I couldn't wait to stick in the back window of the van before we headed off to my college all those years ago - as well as the excitement/anxiety over what the future held that my pile created. I know my son is feeling that now, too. And I'm most happy about that :-)

Of course, I say that now. I very well may be in a tight ball, rocking myself to and fro on Saturday, though. Hey, don't judge...

As the Financial Abyss Looms...

Sounds like a soap opera title, right? Pity it is the sad state of affairs that is Capital Hill.

And sad it is. What's the big deal about the raising the debt ceiling anyway? Or I guess I should ask what's the big deal about raising it NOW? As it's been done at least 15 times over the last 20 years, it floors me that this particular congress is having such a hard time sorting it all out. And while the three sides point fingers at each other, most Americans I know are getting a bit PO'd by their posturing and whining - and getting to the point where they're ready to toss the lot of them and start from scratch.

It's like our elected officials have forgotten the very reason they are in Washington to begin with: to represent and protect the best interests of their constituents. But as the markets here and around the world hit the skids and the neediest of us all (the poor, elderly and disabled) may not get social security, ADFC and disability payments on time, they bicker. In their many television interviews, all of them have on their little flag lapel pins, though. I guess they don't want us to forget that they are true patriots, maybe.

Note to Congress: if the NFL owners and players can sit down at the table and work out their differences, you can to. Play ball!

Graduation Eve

Cap and Gown pick-up? Check!

Tomorrow is the day. At least it is supposed to be. As the ceremony is scheduled for outside and it is supposed to rain all day, graduation day may actually be Friday. They will once again try for outdoors then, but, since it is supposed to rain then, too, it might be moved to the auditorium instead. We'll be nice and dry, but the powers that be only give each graduate two tickets then instead of four. My son has two biological parents, two step-parents and three siblings. How that will work I have no idea...

I'm not stressing, though. I'll see him flip his tassel. cheer a little and cry a lot. It will be what it will be.

But no rain would be nice, though...

The First "Last"

This is the picture I took of my son this morning - his last day of high school. Kinda teared up a bit...

Tonight is his last high school performance ever. He's choreographing and performing in two dances. Pretty sure I will be bawling by the end of the second one...

Kind of a bitter-sweet time, here. Part of me is happy he's graduating and moving on to bigger and better things. Part of me misses the ages and stages we've experienced as he traveled from diapers to tying his own shoes, to dating and teen angst to licensed driver and soon-to-be college freshman.

Friday is his senior prom. OMG, I better run out and get some more tissues...