My daughter used to say that there was a cloud of chaos surrounding Adrian and me. There was always an emergency, a problem, or a project to engross us. And when there wasn’t, I found us one.
Sometimes I feel as if I spend half my life waiting for something to happen. When everything is the same, day after day after day, I get bored and then depressed.
A new challenge is what I like best—something big I can dig into with all my energy, optimism and knowledge: Applying for (and getting) a job I don’t have the qualifications for. Starting a business (tried that one several times). Getting a PhD (not as much fun as it first seemed).
Helping someone else fix their problems is also stimulating: I helped a friend beat out his competitor for a promotion in one company I worked for. I tried to save my first husband from his self-destructive impulses. Adrian and I moved my father and my ex-mother-in-law—both in their nineties—up from Florida and New Jersey to an assisted living facility near us in upstate NY.
Over the years, Adrian’s four sons provided problems for us to solve—at least, three of them did. The fourth worked at keeping a low profile. So did my daughter, who wanted anything but the life of continual change that I chose.
Even a game of poker can provide the stimulation I crave. In general, I take games very seriously and have to remind myself to keep things light. I spent a day at my daughter’s this week, and we were playing scrabble with my thirteen-year-old granddaughter, who was winning.
I kept studying the scrabble dictionary, looking for creative ways to use the seven vowels I was stuck with.
Then the men came in from barn chores at the farm—my seventeen-year-old grandson and his father.
It was time to make lunch.
Was I gracious in saying we should quit and declare my granddaughter the winner? Or was I happy to have an excuse to end a game I had no chance of winning?
My daughter says I never let her win at games when she was a kid. But I did learn how to do that with my grandkids.
I guess I’m getting old and mellow.
Now it is routine that suits me best. My biggest challenges come when I face a blank canvas on my easel. That is excitement enough.
Adrian was my partner in the adventure of life, as we moved from the east to west coasts, from the north to south and back again. He helped me lug paintings to galleries, celebrate my success with a pitcher of margaritas, and clean up the mess from disasters.
We liked our little cloud of chaos.
In its own way, it kept us both sane.
