What does being an adult mean to you? And does the word have positive or negative connotations?

After an interesting twitter discussion, hot chick Janiece wrote about her take on the mythical adult; here’s mine.

I have always felt *old*. Controlled. Humdrum. Intense. Stressed. A bit melancholy. I’ve never been particularly good at relaxing, playing, letting go. Since I have been very young, I’ve tried to be the caretaker and the adult to those around me. The whole adult thing comes very easily to me, it’s acknowledging that life can be enjoyed that is a little tougher.

Certainly there are moments where I suddenly feel disoriented and think, whoa, wait — I’m just a kid playing house, how did I end up with my own grown kids?

Still, my life has mostly been a string of sobering moments that have made me painfully aware of my adulthood, my level of responsibility.

• At 15, I vividly recall helping my drunk father to bed, driving my migraine-stricken mother to the emergency room, and waiting up for my sister to return home from a school dance.

• At 25 I gave birth to my first son. My husband at the time slept through my labor and delivery and I realized how alone I’d be. Thank god for my sister and mom who were with me.
• At 27 my eventually-to-be-ex screwed up our money yet again, leaving us thousands of dollars in the hole, and me pregnant and destitute in a foreign country.
• At 30 I finally divorced the man, which cost me my faith, and moved halfway across the country with my job. My dad not-so-diplomatically informed me I needed to stop leaning on them emotionally, I was on my own there too, and I cried for hours.
• At 33 my youngest, at 5, had his worst asthma attack ever and ended up in pediatric ICU. Seeing him walk down the hospital hallway pulling an oxygen canister drove home my responsibility like nothing else.
• At 35, when he was 70, my father died. My mom, sister and I held each other up as we put his memorial together, and I closed down his consulting business.
• At 38, when he was 13, I held my eldest son through his first tonic/clonic epileptic seizure, then stood by as paramedics thought he wasn’t going to come back from it. He nearly died, and was not there for a very long time. It terrified me.
• At 40, when he was 15, I lived through several months of that same son’s violent, bipolar, psychotic break. (Related to previous? Probably.) Supporting a child through mental illness that I could not help and could not cure is perhaps the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, including the next…
• At 44, when he was 45, I lost my beloved husband to a sudden and unexpected heart attack. Saying goodbye to his cold, still shell and going on alone to support my family and continue my profession and my life was both a challenge and a comfort.

After those painful, transformative life changes I’m consciously trying to enjoy life more, to value family, friends, community and my own health and sanity. I’ve been an adult for everyone for a very long time, and now I choose to work less, to be less obligated, to be less well-behaved. I’ve kicked my kids out to a college apartment. I’m buying a condo and going to Europe.

I plan to grab onto life with both hands, travel, laugh, love and enjoy the ride.

I’ve always believed that if you do what you love with all your heart, you will find a way to make a living at it; the universe will provide. Last week, when Paulette and I were shopping (Shoes! Fabric! Wine! Furniture!), we stumbled across a serendipitous story of the universe doing exactly that.

When we walked into the the Gathering Fabric quilt store in Woodinville, we found some really gorgeous fabric neither of us had ever seen before. The designer, Julie Paschkis, had recently spent some time at the store and her story was fascinating.

Paschkis had been an artist and a children’s book illustrator for much of her career when one of the founders of In the Beginning Fabrics, an artisan fabric line, called her out of the blue and asked if she’d ever considered designing fabric.

Her response? “This is the call I’ve been waiting for all my life!” Or something to that effect. If she’d been recounting that response to a publisher, not a fabric store owner, her take on that might have been a bit different. Still, it was a heartening story of creative success.

Fortune favors the prepared. If a gallery or a boutique saw some of my metalsmithing, or a publisher saw a snippet of my writing, and said “I love it, I want more!” I’d be stuck. I am NOT prepared for the universe to drop fortune in my lap right now. Are you?

I think I need to work on that.

Yesterday I had a thought-provoking conversation with a friend, who will remain anonymous, about the concept of “brilliance”. I very much respect this person’s intellectual capabilities and achievements, although he/she is rather self-deprecating and feels that true brilliance is in another league entirely.

What is brilliance, truly? How do we measure and define it? It has often been identified by achievement in science, math, medicine, academia, literature.

Intelligence alone is an insufficient criteria. Brilliance is not a function of high test scores, talent or capability alone. Brilliance requires application. It requires hard work, perseverance, sweat equity, passionate devotion to a purpose.

On the subject of intelligence, however, the IQ metric has often been criticized as a culturally biased, one-dimensional measure of intellectual capacity. Harvard developmental psychology professor Dr. Howard Gardner argues that intelligence does not sufficiently encompass the wide variety of abilities humans display, and proposes an alternate theory of multiple intelligences.

The eight, multiple areas of intelligence Gardner suggests include:

Linguistic
People with high verbal-linguistic intelligence are gifted with words and languages. They are typically good at reading, writing, telling stories and memorizing words and definitions.

Logical-mathematical
This area has to do with logic, abstractions, reasoning, and numbers. People with this talent demonstrate reasoning capabilities, abstract patterns of recognition, scientific thinking and investigation, and the ability to perform complex calculations. This area correlates strongly with traditional concepts of “intelligence” or IQ.

Visual-Spatial
Those gifted with visual-spatial intelligence have a strong ability to visualize, conceptualize and translate ideas into design. This type of intelligence tends to lend itself to art, design and architecture.

Kinesthetic
Bodily-kinesthetic talents include control of bodily movement, capacity to handle objects skillfully, timing and the ability to train responses so they become like reflexes. Those talented in this area tend to perform well in acting/performing, building, athletics, dance, law enforcement, the military, even surgery.

Musical
Musical ability includes high sensitivity to sounds, rhythms, tones, music and may even include perfect pitch. The musically gifted are able to sing, play musical instruments, and compose music.

Interpersonal
People who have a high interpersonal intelligence tend to be gregarious extroverts, sensitive to others’ moods, feelings, temperaments and motivations, and work well in a group setting.

Intrapersonal
People with intrapersonal intelligence tend to be introverts and are skillful at deciphering their own feelings and motivations, strengths/ weaknesses, reactions/ emotions.

Naturalistic
Those with this skill are gifted with nature, nurturing and relating information to one’s natural surroundings.

I’d have to agree with this multidimensional picture of human capability. It shows respect for humans as many-faceted beings, with the ability to be brilliant, to be geniuses, in many different areas. The visionary artist, the star athlete, the consummate salesperson and the legendary philosopher are all brilliant in their own area.

Still, I submit that brilliance requires a combination of giftedness and devotion. The superstars in each area, the Nobel prize winners, Olympic athletes, National Museum artists, all wholeheartedly spend a lifetime pursuing their chosen profession.

I can say, without arrogance, that I have been blessed in the genetic lottery to be above average in a couple of the above areas. (linguistic and visual/spatial) Except where my profession is concerned, I am by nature a dilettante, so I have never devoted the time or energy to see what I am capable of.

Maybe I need to change that. Thanks, friend.

I am grateful that I live in a place and time free of drought, famine and disease, in a country whose standard of living ranks among the top 2% of the world.

I am grateful for indoor plumbing, electricity, spacious Western-style housing and all its conveniences, and my ability to drive or travel via boat, rail or air anywhere I need to go in hours.

I’m grateful for modern telecommunications. (I think.) I can call, text, picture-text or email anyone, anytime, anywhere. I can access the Internet anywhere via computer and handheld, and have Google and GPS at my fingertips.

I am grateful that I am a modern woman in a modern, free society. I can vote, drive, own property, dress as I prefer, work in any profession, marry and divorce as I choose (with the exception of a same-sex marriage) and have and raise children as I choose.

I am grateful that I live in a free country. I can speak as I choose, even if my words are unpopular. I can travel in and out of the country as I’d like, and live anywhere. I can choose to worship in any faith, or none at all, although, sadly, the latter choice is likely to disqualify me in the public eye from holding political office.

I am grateful for friends and family, and most especially for my amazing sons. I’m thankful for love, community, and hope. For work, medical care, and good health. And for the amazing future, full of possibilities, we have in front of us.

I am blessed.
___________

Prompted by a post from Hot Chick Janiece, who is also counting her blessings today.

Easter is a supremely religious holiday, and I am not a particularly devout person. The Christian Easter creed is:

Christ has died, Christ has risen, Christ will come again.

The act of belief, of faith in that basic, sacred divine progression is one I honestly wrestle with.

As most of my friends know, I self-identify as a Christian, albeit a very liberal, progressive, left-leaning one. I believe that the most important part of my faith is this:

And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second is this: ‘You must love your neighbor as yourself.’ No other commandment is greater than these. Matthew 22:30-31

I wholeheartedly believe that God is a positive, creative, loving influence in our world, and we Christians and other good men and women are God’s hands here on hearth. It is our responsibility, our sacred obligation, to love, serve, accept, encourage and give generously.

What I have a harder time with is the more metaphysical dimensions of faith.

I’m not sure I believe in a literal heaven and hell or eternal life, or verbal inspiration of the bible. (I do still believe it’s a sacred text, with many truths that stand through the centuries.)

I don’t believe in spiritual warfare, in angels and demons warring over our every action. (If there are angels, I think they have more important things to worry about than my F-bomb habit.)

While I certainly believe we humans have the power to destroy ourselves in any number of ways, I’m very skeptical of the second coming of Christ, and find any debate over pre- or post-tribulation rapture to be kind of ludicrous. (How about feeding the hungry instead?)

I can believe, in a symbolic sense, that Christ conquered death and hell to give us life. That Christ taught us, through sacrifice, what unconditional love is, and through him we can learn about love and selfless living. That Christ, as God made flesh, is a transformational bridge between the human condition and the divine that makes divine love accessible to us all.

With that, in spite of the stubborn blind spots in my faith, I can celebrate Easter.

Alleluia! Christ is risen.
He is risen indeed. Alleluia!