dianegclark

The last two Saturdays, I’ve had the opportunity to go riding with the Homestead girls. Broken Wing Ranch ministries is letting the girls and volunteers ride with them, horse therapy. God knows I need all the therapy I can get. We only have two girls right now at Homestead and only one of them really likes to ride, so we all get to benefit.

Last Saturday, Donna, Kortney, Dacia and I rode. Kourtney and Dacia went on the trail ride while Donna and I pet the other horses and waited. It is lovely out there so we enjoyed ourselves. The other horses enjoyed the attention, too.

The last half hour, Donna and I rode. I was disappointed in myself that I had to use the steps to get up there. I rode BuckEye. The second I got in the saddle, my anxiety kicked in. Karen, the ranch owner, said he could feel every bit of anxiety in me. Therefore, he didn’t trust me. Thanks, Buck Eye, not helpful. He tolerated riding me around the arena even though it was muddy and he had to put in a lot of effort. As I calmed down, he started following my leads more. We went around the outside of the arena in circles and then stayed to the inside when Donna and the helper gal started trotting around the outside path. So Karen pushed me outside my comfort zone and made me direct Buckeye to go in circles and then back up. It made me anxious again. I finally said I was done so she let me get off of him.

Yesterday, I had planned to go and just pet the horses and hang out again, then decided not to go til later as we were going to go to a bonfire after. Alicia called and said Karen wanted me out there and I would be riding. So I went. I love the drive out there anyway. I had the windows down and sang Chris Stapleton at the top of my lungs. Its a beautiful drive, highway 57.

I got up on ol’ Buckeye the second I got there. I had pet him a couple of times before I got on and he turned his head away from me. Sorry, buddy, I’m not your favorite rider. As soon as I got on, we headed out for the trail ride. I just took charge and he followed my lead.

The first part of the ride, I nervous chattered with Karen tons. I hope she recognized that’s what it was. Alicia and Kortney were on the other horses. They were quiet from a full day of cleaning rentals for a friend. Buckeye and I did fine. The trail was beautiful, out through the prairie then through the woods. I calmed down greatly until Karen said we were headed for hills and that Buckeye tended to stumble. She said I needed to lean back in the saddle and hold the reins back so he wouldn’t try to trot downhill. That was a little nerve wracking as we then went up and down many hills across creeks and gullies. I got used to that and then Buckeye decided he was hungry and kept stopping to eat grass and take bites out of tree limbs. I wasn’t supposed to let him do that but the stinker kept doing it anyway. Then he got the bright idea he would trot. He tried repeatedly even though I did all the right things to make him stop. He tried everything he could to take advantage of my inexperience.

I enjoyed the ride even with the anxiety. My legs did get sore in weird places because the stirrups weren’t fit perfectly since I’m so short. But overall, I was very glad I went and glad I pushed out of my comfort zone.

Afterwards, we drove further down highway 57 the other direction, through Grandview plaza to intern Jamie’s house on old highway 40. She and her husband had a bonfire going and we roasted hotdogs and marshmallows for s’mores over the fire. It was a lot of fun. Jamie and her family are a blessing.

I i I attended the peaceful protest today against racism and injustice after the killing of George Floyd by excessive police force. I was invited to the facebook event last night. This morning, I got up late and when I heard my daughter stirring around upstairs getting ready to go, I knew I couldn’t sit in my middle class white privilege on my beautiful deck and just keep scrolling. I knew I needed to go stand with others. If I couldn’t give two hours of my life to stand up for injustice, who am I?

It breaks my heart to hear about racism and discrimination. Not just by police but by landlords, business owners, teachers, administrators, politicians, all those who use their power unfairly. It exists daily for our black brothers and sisters. As I have read again and again, the fear they have to feel just for the color of their skin, it breaks my heart.

I couldn’t stay silent and scroll by anymore. Liking, even sharing, even commenting on a post is not enough. Sometimes I get caught up in feeling helpless, not knowing what to do. I need to get educated. Today, I needed to go and stand. And march. And chant.

This was not a protest against police. I know enough from my training that the police are forced to make very quick decisions moment to moment day in and day out that most of us couldn’t even fathom. They also live in fear for their lives every moment of every day. They put their lives on the line for each of us every day. After awhile, because of what they see and experience, their brains start to narrow. They start seeing things as all or nothing, people as good or bad. They start seeing danger in every interaction. They develop hyper vigilance and adrenaline that causes them to react in ways that cause mistakes. They stop seeing people as people in order to survive emotionally. They shut down. They suffer. They are looked down on if they reach out for help. I read a beautiful post written by a retired officer that I wanted to repost because it explained perfectly what officers go through. But the article said that this incidence wasn’t racism.

Let me be clear. What happened to George Floyd was not due to PTSD. It was racism. This man made a decision and went against his training to do the unthinkable. All it would have taken was for one of the other officers to say, I got him, let up. This is the injustice we marched for. Against the officers who stood by. Against the witnesses who taped it and stood by. Against the legal system that hesitated to act immediately to bring justice.

The system is broken. Departments need funding for training, funding for treatment for PTSD, for the stigma of getting help to stop, for officers to step up to and for each other. For all of us to step us and say, you can’t do this any more. For the training and help and support they need to happen.

I went through training as an educator. To examine my own opinions and behaviors. I was observed and given feedback specifically in treatment of race. That’s the kind of training needed. Statistics taken and evaluated and changes made. And bad people fired.

Racism does not just exist in the police. We see it in life and death situations because the police have the ability to use violence in order to keep us safe. But racism exists everywhere. It exists in our hearts. We have to start by reaching into our own hearts. We all hold prejudices. We have to start with examining our own fears, our own beliefs, our own attitudes. We have to speak up when we hear racism and injustice. We have to act.

My heart breaks when I hear stories of black people living in fear, fear for themselves, fear for their children. My heart broke today when i turned around and my black friend said she was surprised to see me there. My heart broke when the leader of the protest talked about being stopped in the middle of the night after attending a funeral and was made to lie down just because of the color of his skin, here in my community. My heart broke to see the the young black kid carrying a sign today that said, “Stop killing us.”

But I was proud. Proud of everyone who showed up today on short notice. Proud of my officer friends standing by this morning, to protect the protestors from the traffic. I saw you clapping along with the chants. I saw you giving a the bullhorn to the leaders to use. I heard you, Director, your statement saying you will not stand for this kind of behavior here.

Today was a start. A start of a long conversation. I want those who are treated unfairly to feel safe to speak up. I will help them be heard. I want to educate myself. I want to make a difference. My brothers and sisters, black and white, my police friends, I stand with you all. No more injustice. No more blame. No more silence. Black lives matter.

Emmet turned four today. We went to his birthday party but we sat on the other side of the fence about ten feet away for COVID safety purposes. Leah and Dave worked so hard to make it special. I think the boys had fun. Emmet looked sad to me quite a bit but he was also tired. It was extremely emotional for everyone with mixed emotions of sadness and great joy. Overall it was a success, I think, the best we could do with social distancing.

We greeted the boys through the window. They were very excited to see us. Leah said she has explained all of this as best she can to Emmet as they’ve had lots of friends do distance visits. After the window greeting and getting set up at our table out back in the side yard, i went into the bathroom and cried hard. It was so heart wrenching to not be able to hug them. Then I pulled it back together.

The kids fixed our plates, a wonderful meal of bbq brats, and put them on a table by the gate that we then picked up and ate on a table on our side of the fence. The boys played with little cars in the dirt then Leah put their homemade cardboard cars on and they had races. Henry was so cute as he’d run forward then slowly backed up every time. They were like turtles when they fell and had to have help getting up.

The boys seemed pretty unaffected by us not being able to touch them for the most part. Toward the end, Henry started naming us and putting little cars through the fence as gifts for us, sort of like consolation prizes. I was “Maw” yesterday. Emmet counted us several times and kept coming up with five (there were four of us).

As we were winding down to leave, Henry kept coming up to the fence with his little arms spread to give us his goodbye hugs. I had to walk away.

The end was hard. We said goodbye through the window. Emmet put the sweetest little expression on his face and mouthed the words “I love you” over and over. He looked so sad. I felt like my heart was being crushed. I miss him so so much.

Henry giggled when i went over to his window. His smile helped me get in the car and make our getaway, waving through at Emmet in the other window, his little face looking sad to see us go. It’s hard to say good bye regardless when we’ve had a good visit.

I haven’t blogged in awhile partly because I am currently writing two books. One book, COVIC 19, isn’t necessarily for publication, it is for me to process and someday look back at, maybe share with the grandkids. Since the virus has been the biggest thing in my life besides seeing clients again, and private issues, I haven’t had tons of other things to blog about. Every now and then I share a chapter or two from COVID 19.

The other book is the story of another “Haven” girl. It will be similar but also different from “She’s On Her Own”, not just because their stories are different, but because they have very different personalities and voices. This one skips around a lot with some twists. I think it will be more of a memoir. She’s On Her Own was too, really, very little was fictionalized.

So. The only other interesting thing that is happening right now is the music. The album is out. Released. Available on pretty much all music platforms. Scott and Chad and also Dave have put hours upon hours of promoting and marketing. We have a virtual street team of people who help us share on social media. We are making lyric videos and music videos and do “live performances” of the songs. We started a You Tube channel. We paid to get some reviews and they are very positive. We are getting a lot of views and great feedback. The sales are…. ok. We are in the process of pressing vinyl, 200 collector copies that will come out in August. We are promoting one song at a time as we go. We have no idea when we will get to perform live or what that will look like. We anticipated more radio attention and more interviews, etc. That isn’t happening, most likely due to covid, but who knows?

I am mostly just involved in the “live videos” (besides sharing on my facebook and instagram pages). This is a new experience for me. Chad lays down the acoustic guitar video track and sends it to Dave. Dave records his lead vocals and sends it back to Chad. Chad videos himself singing his parts, some leads, some third above harmony. He sends it to us. We listen with headphones and sing our parts, separately. I either double up the third above with Chad or sing the fifth above harmony. Scott sings the third below. I have never sang for a “camera” before. It is not easy! Then I have to completely lower my expectations for how I sound singing a harmony part by myself when I play it back. We send it all to Chad and he puts the videos together and then blends it before we “release it”. It is supposed to look like we did a zoom call and just all sang together, sort of like the Brady Bunch or something. That’s what the artists do that you see like that. It isn’t live.

So we practice and we watch and we share and we promote and we wait. I believe in the music, the sounds, the harmonies, the vocals, but most of all, the messages. I want the music to be successful. I think for all of us, that means that many will be blessed by it and enjoy it, be uplifted by it.

So help us out with that on all our platforms and websites and social media.

I’m writing another novel. It’s called COVID 19. I don’t think I’m writing it for publication, more just for me. It helps me journal all this. Who knows, maybe someday the grandkids will ask what this was like. I can let them read this.

Here is chapter 11 that I just wrote.

Chapter 11

What week is this?  4? 5? Who knows. They are talking about relaxing the stay at home orders after next week, to get businesses reopened and restart the economy.  People are saying this is all a conspiracy or something the media has cooked up or made worse than it is. Is that people’s paranoia? Denial? The direct reports we get from a local Dr. who is in NY volunteering is that people there are dying like crazy.  My niece in my hometown says it is insane there. Our community is slowing down the spread because we are staying home, most people are taking this seriously. But the numbers are still going up. I am against letting up. We can do this a while more to keep people safe.  One person ill or dead is too many. I know that is easy to say when my finances and those of my immediate family are not effected.  

The whole thing continues to be surreal.  Day to day, all is well in my little world.  I have a beautiful home, a loving, fun husband, things to do, good things to look forward to.  I do miss the grandkids. But I am actually interacting more with my immediate family that I did before.  Hell, I even called my Dad last night!

I was just sitting with Scott on the lower patio a few minutes ago, basking in the sunlight, philosophizing.  We didn’t do that all that often before. I asked him, besides seeing the grandkids in person and hugs, what are we really missing?  He reminded me that we are sitting in an unknown, not knowing what will happen in the future, when or if life will return to normal. I agreed, said it’s like sifting sand beneath us.  It seems ok here on the surface, but underneath it’s completely unstable, capable of change, insecure. Anyone close to us could get sick at any time. We could. And we may not recover.  Underneath that, for us, because of our faith, is the feeling that even if bad shit happens, we will not fall apart. It will be ok. It is ok with our souls. People who don’t have that faith must really be feeling it.

I’m still tired, lack energy, feel slightly depressed and unmotivated.  It isn’t too hard to try to change my thinking, to be grateful, to do something that brings me joy, facetime someone, write, go to happy places in the house or yard, sing, praise.  But it is hard to find motivation to exercise or clean. All I really want to do is eat and nap. I now officially weigh more than I have ever weighed in my entire life. And I don’t really care!  I was hot sitting in the sun and Scott asked why I didn’t go in the house and change into my shorts. I wanted to just strip down to my underwear and keep sitting right where i was. I told him the truth, first, the shorts were all the way in the house and I didn’t have the energy, and second, my shorts all have tight waistbands.  Not happening. So I drummed up the energy to move to the shade, on the deck. I am now writing and then will read for awhile. I’m trying to dredge up the energy to clean the kitchen. I had a burst of energy yesterday and deep cleaned three rooms of the house.

So I keep moving forward, one day at a time. When that is too hard, I take it hour by hour.  And look for something to be grateful for, something to do that brings joy. And I give myself permission to just chill.  Motivation will come again and I will capitalize on it when it does. When this all goes away, I will lose the weight. Or I won’t!  It’s ok!

Yesterday I saw on facebook (I spend an inordinate amount of time in that false virtual world), that Ann Frank and her family of 7 spent 761 days in a 400 square foot space.  If she did that, I can surely do this.

We are doing ok over here. I’ve never been more grateful for our comfortable home and outdoor areas.

We are both quarantined, believing that the stay at home order needs to be taken seriously. We try to avoid going to the store and take lots of precautions when we do. We are shopping two weeks in advance but inevitably need something within a week. We are shopping for mom, also, and a week out is the most we can get her to plan.

We do go for walks but try to go to less populated places. We have gotten carry out food from several places. Other than that, we stay home. Scott is working from home. I am seeing clients and doing all my clinical supervision, graduate supervision and Homestead groups from home by zoom.

We eat together every evening at the island watching HGTV or outside on the deck then lounge around on the couches in the evenings and binge watch netflix and try not to snack although we almost always cave.

We are getting along fine, a few rough moments here and there but from what we are hearing from others, we have it made. We have taken up some new hobbies, board games and ping pong.

I am doing a lot of writing, this blog, my professional blog, and a new novel about the virus that is helping me cope. I have the sequel to She’s On Her Own on hold because of difficulties getting a hold of the gal in prison who wanted her story told, but have approached another graduate about her story.

I do something to promote the practice, the book and now the music, soon to be released, every day. I am practicing what I preach and doing my self care, physical exercise, water, trying to eat right (failing at that one), a hot bath every day, meditation, yoga, of course daily prayer and journalling. I have coffee dates with friends more days than not.

We do lots of family FaceTimes. It isn’t the same with the grand babies but we are grateful for it. I feel closer to the kids than ever. We see mom almost every day and are treating the two households as one since none of us are really going anywhere. We are also closer than we were before.

I’m not saying this hasn’t been difficult. I write about the real struggles in my COVID-19 book. I’d like to make that a blog but it involves others so I’ll keep it to myself for now.

I think we can keep this up for awhile. I hope we are making a difference in keeping our community and circle safe.

How are you spending your quarantine?

Either it is being quarantined, or his being our only dog now, losing Rex, whatever it is, I have completely bonded with Diego. I love him and appreciate him so much more.

Diego has always greeted me excitedly in the morning. Now since we wake up late and slowly, he comes to bed and cuddles with us for a few minutes. Then when I’m going to the bathroom, he presses up against my legs for loves. I used to have to protect Rex from getting knocked over. Now I can focus on Diego’s joy.

Diego loves to play outside. He invites us to come with him often by acting like he wants to go out and then not going and looking up with expectancy.

Diego lays at my feet while I do my quiet time in the morning.

When on the bed or the couch, he sleeps on his back. He used to not let me, but now does let me scratch his tummy. He loves to have the fur on his back next to his tail scratched.

Rex was a one person dog. Diego loves Scott unquestionably. But Diego is now a two person dog. He checks on me, lays near me awhile, then checks on Scott and lays near Scott awhile.

Diego makes me happy and I’m glad we have him. I love him.

The plan for the book launch party changed a little with the stay at home order, but that didn’t stop us. Doing it online turned out to be fun.

I set up my favorite corner with the music stand holding my phone and iPad, one to record (didn’t work) and one for the facebook live. Then we had “Sophie” on Scott’s iPad next to me. And Scott played the music through the Bluetooth speaker from his phone. Cass called and then messenger video’d in the middle trying to figure out how to connect with us which made me drop the phone and laugh. I was nervous but with the mishaps and casualness of it, it turned out great. It made it seem fun and that came across.

I made an agenda and then when i went over it with Scott about a half hour before, I completely changed it up. I added a lot and winged it. I could see people coming on and their comments. We only had 21 live views but today, about 20 hours later, we have had 330 views and 7 shares. Positive feedback.

I watched it back right after it got done. I hadn’t planned it this way, but somehow, with me looking at the iPad which was off center, it looked like I was looking at the screen with Sophie on it. Which was cool.

The party got great reviews and comments. I can’t wait to see how it does for the book sales as people continue to watch it and then help out by liking and sharing. I have never written or promoted a book before so this is all new territory. I feel like the sales are all still happening in our circle so the challenge is to get it outside our circle. Promoting it on 4 social media platforms, two blogs, and author pages isn’t taking it far enough. I have mailed 6 copies to referring agencies and approached one top reviewer and will approach more. I found an author with a very similar book that has done well and sent her a copy. The launch party idea came from her. I have a list of more ideas from my research that I haven’t completed yet. If anyone has other ideas, please let me know! Spread the word! It isn’t about my success or even the success of the book, it is about getting the story out, raising awareness, and glorifying God.

The video can still be found on facebook.

Baths are glorious. I recognize that not everyone has a wonderful soaker tub like I do. And some people don’t like baths no matter what. But if you have a tub, I encourage you to fill it up and get in it!

I usually use some type of Epsom salts, either lavender bubble bath by Dr. Teal’s, or Dr. Teal’s lavender Epsom salts. If I use plain Epsom salts, I add essential oils. My favorite besides lavender is peppermint. It wakes me up. Lately, I have enjoying target brand Himalayan Epsom salts. They have a lovely soft scent.

Baths are relaxing. They are a great place to meditate. I take one every day. You should too!

Ok, we are all in the same boat about our hair. We have no way to get it cut professionally. I may get brave and let Scott get out the clippers for my sides.

I need to look presentable for teletherapy. Professional too. Well, professional for me.

I’ve been experimenting with different styles. Here are some variations. (I’m also working on selfies which I am terrible at. When choosing hairstyles try not to take into account makeup, lighting or selfie angle). I would like your feedback on each.

My attempt at side French braiding which I don’t know how to do.

My standard top pony tail.

Pinned behind the ear.

Down, needs a trim badly, only gonna get worse.

Badass Pink-like push up that I wear for shows.

Head band look. Also have a variety of scarves I can use for this.

Down, trimmed a little more.

Sloppy standard pigtail, sides need trimmed.

Side pigtail.

Which one do you like?