The Best, Exotic....Life

I was writing on another topic this week but switched gears after watching "The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel".  I dragged my husband to it (and I do mean drag), but he owed me a "chick flick" after all the manly movies I have endured.  He lived.  It is a stunning, gorgeous film that added a trip to India to my bucket list.  (I was already headed to Nepal to trek in the Himalayas, so might as well stop by then.)


On rare occasions, movies hit you with the right message at the right time and this was one of those times.  It is about 7 men and women who are in their golden years, all of whom are at crossroads in their lives for one reason or another.  They are looking for a new beginning, medical treatment, closure to the past, new companions, cheaper retirement living or the chance to see and experience something different.  They all found their way to India and the The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel.  They also found it wasn't quite as the brochures advertised.  That's where the real story began.


I loved all of the characters but two in particular caught my attention:  Evelyn (Judi Dench) and Jean (Penelope Wilton).  Evelyn was recently widowed and has discovered that she will not be left much as her husband had a lot of debt.  She doesn't want to move in with her children and sees India as a cheaper, fresh option.  Jean and her husband Douglas (Bill Nighy-adore him) have loaned their retirement income to their daughter and are hoping for a payback but are unsure they will get it.  India appeared to be a cheaper, nicer option for senior living.


So amid dust, disrepair, a "third-world" country, different food, different culture, and being a minority, it is sink or swim, thrive and live or shrink and die.  Long story short, Evelyn gets a job, walks doesn't ride, explores, learns, adapts, cries, laughs and finds herself happy and content in her new and different circumstances.  Jean, on the other hand does none of that.  She complains, treats people poorly, sees nothing but the bad, refuses to embrace anything new or even leave the hotel, and longs for the comfortable past and the comfortably planned future.  She ends up with her money back, headed back to England in first class to her comfort zone, but leaves without her husband and all of her time there wasted.


I found it an interesting exercise to put myself in that situation, especially at that stage of life.  Try it.  What would you do if your were dumped off in a strange, new place and had to live.  Would you excel?  Would you quit?  Would you try?  Imagine if you succeeded, what would you have gained.   


Of course you are saying "I don't have to get dumped in a foreign country necessarily, to learn like that."  And that's right.  Birth, starting school, graduation, college, parenthood, jobs, new locations, marriage, divorce, deaths:  all can provide the same foundation for learning.  It's what you do with the opportunity and how you move out of the comfort zone.  It's how much you grew as an individual and how many others you helped a long the way.  Imagine the expansion of life, and the fullness and joy of experience if you seized all of those uncomfortable, learning moments and conquered them.  What a blessing in the end that would be not to have lived a myopic life, but to have vision of the grand scheme and your place in it.  I think that's what deathbed contentment might feel like.


My favorite quote from the movie comes from the ever positive, optimistic owner/manager of the hotel Sonny, who continually tells his guests:

Everything will be all right in the end.  So, if it is not all right, it is not yet the end.

I would highly recommend watching the movie.  I will probably get some texts saying, "Are you kidding me? Slowest, most boring movie ever."  That's ok, probably just weren't ready for the message.  Just out of curiosity, you may want to ask yourself why.  As for me, I'm resolving to pack my bag everyday in search of the wonder, lessons, and fulfillment called life.  Later Mates!

Life is a Highway.......

Life is a Highway...

Ever wish you had that little compass Capt. Jack carries around?  You know the one...it appears to be broken but in fact shows you the direction to where you want to go.  That might have been handy for me over the past, oh say, 45 years!  More on that thought in a bit.

Yesterday I got the joyous thrill of traveling to Seattle to get my car out of hock after shipment from Hawaii.  I'm highly bonded to my car, and call it the "ugly pet" thanks to the many scars we have managed to give it over the past several years.  It has pulled a jeep five miles out of the worst, rutted roads I've seen at South Point in Hawaii, Haley banged it up twice, I banged it with sugarcane when I found out I was divorced, it banged over lava rock 1 1/2 feet high to avoid getting run into, and it curb checks basically everything in sight.  It's the prefect vehicle to take a journey in.

The trip started at 4 in the morning to get to the airport. I actually have no idea what time it is anymore because I haven't made the 4 hour time adjustment from Hawaii yet, so I just went with the flow.  Because I am a cheapskate and had to book a last minute one-way ticket, the flight went from Salt Lake City through Phoenix, then to Seattle, then the drive from Washington, through Oregon, and finally to Idaho.  Five states in 18 hours by myself...pretty cool.

Passed out the first flight, drank Diet Dr. Pepper the second, and arrived in Seattle wired and tired. Forty Five dollar cab ride later and I was reunited with the pet.  Couple of different problems at that point:  Getting out of the Seattle port (the Matson guy just said stay on the road.  Sage advice there) and the pet's navigation system not agreeing to participate until we were on the highlighted route.  

Eventually I did get on a route that pet said was OK, but I really didn't recognize it at all.  I didn't remember that huge over-water causeway, but that road construction looks familiar, the lake looks familiar but the huge ski resort?!?  Where did that come from!  And how do you work the cruise control again?  And what time is it?  Car says 11:30, phone says 3:30, kindle says 2:30.  Just by looking outside with the light, aspen trees and such, I'd say....October.  Time to just trust the car. 

Yup, I'd entered the "I have a 13 hour drive ahead and I'm already tired" stage.  Funny things start playing on your mind like, how do they name towns.  Yakima...some guy on Lewis and Clark's expedition says "I'm sea sick, stop the canoe or I'm gonna Yak-i-ma....(boot..didn't have time to get it out before he yakked).  Signs are funny too.  One said "Mt. Rainier straight ahead, Mt. Adams in the distance".  I could only see one and it was distant.  I was pretty sure however that Mt. Rainier blowing it's top would have been newsworthy even in Hawaii.  Hadn't seen robins for a while, or deer roadkill, or sagebrush.  It was really a beautiful drive with plenty to stay awake with while it was light.

Sunset revealed that without 3G in Eastern Oregon and Southern Idaho (really?), I was pretty well stuck with my own thoughts for seven hours in the darkness.  I thought about the journey I'd been on and I started to pull ironic facts together.  I was born and raised in Utah and live there now, we lived in Arizona for a year, Jeff went to school in Oregon, we lived in Idaho for 15 years, and the twilight zone kicker was that the flight leaving Phoenix in the gate next door at the exact same time was to Kona, Hi, my most recent beloved home.

All of those places have huge memories, pain and joy.  Individually, each takes some time to process.  All heaped together, it was overwhelming to remember and feel all of those emotions of an entire lifetime.  Needless to say, a not night person was wide awake.  I thought about all the failures I've had, and all of the pain that circumstances and choices have had on my family and friends throughout my life.  I almost couldn't remember if I had done anything right.  

I realize it is those thoughts exactly that ruin anywhere else the road leads us.  However painful it is, lessons learned provide the navigational system.  You input the data good or bad and keep on going.  If it's good, you have to trust it.  Cross roads are always a good place to input some new data of course, and pay attention to the signs. 

Some things may not look familiar, but believe you just missed them the first time around.  Learn, and next time you can pick up even finer details.  Just like the beautiful things I saw during daylight, life can NEVER be measured without remembering the good and feeding on it.  Use it as fuel so to speak and continue on the journey vowing to find and create more of that.  The magical compass exists and it will take you exactly to where you believe you should be going.  

Life is a highway and...I'm gonna ride it all life long.  What an amazing journey it is.  Now take the time to jam to one of my favorite songs, I promise it will make you smile.  Later Mates! 

Mahalo

Aloha and Mahalo to all my friends and family that have tolerated me, stuck by me, and loved me through the years!  I love and appreciate every one of you!

Genesis

Genesis

"Better to not know which moment may be your last.  

Every morsel of your entire being alive to the infinite mystery of it all!"

Captain Jack Sparrow:  Pirates of the Caribbean On Stranger Tides

Wow has it been awhile since I have blogged!!  Sooo many changes have taken place it is almost overwhelming to think about.  Drama, drama, drama.  Quick synopsis:  Remarried Jeff, quit my full-time job at Kona Community Hospital, and moved from Hawaii to Cottonwood Heights, Utah to rebuild our family.  That pretty well sums it up.  Nice, boring, uneventful life.  I'm not quite sure what I would do if my life was calm...probably create a new mess just for the fun of sorting it out.  It's a pirate's life for me, savvy?  

Now that I have a bit more free time, I'm going to start writing my blog again a couple of times a week as I have a whole bunch of new material to work with.  Might take me awhile to be interesting again, but hopefully the rusty, writing wheels will start cranking.  I'll use Capt. Jack for some inspiration of course, because nobody says it better in that twisted, warped way that speaks to me.  Be afraid, be very afraid.

I titled this post "Genesis" because in the beginning...wait...,....when was the beginning?  Was it birth?  Graduation?  Marriage?  Oregon?  Arizona?  Idaho?  Hawaii?  Utah?  Kids?  Divorce?  Remarriage?  Will it be Death?  Does the beginning actually ever end?  Thankfully for me no, or during those darkest of moments, I would never have the faith that we could begin again to rebuild, mend, or heal from pain and circumstances that may have to a certain extent, been beyond our control.  Big beginnings or little beginnings.  I have no choice, this is a new "Big" beginning for me and my family and I HAVE to start over in many respects.

One thing is for sure:  In the beginning, something was created good or bad.  How's that been working out for you.  Or have you been working on it at all.  I believe that procrastination contributes to the bad because negative energy is spent in believing something won't work or in settling for status quo.  I'm as guilty of this as anyone.  Life never remains stagnant, it's either moving forwards or backwards.  Creating a positive new beginning moves it forward in a timely manner.

Maybe it's comfortable not to begin again for a minute, a day, a year, a lifetime.  And where will you be at that point.  It's all created starting now, no wait...now, or now.  Every second is precious, how much do we allow ourselves to waste before we begin to create.

My ringtone reminds me all the time,  "So if your tired of the same old story, Oh, turn some pages."  Begin, and start now.  "How do  I start" you may ask?  Here's a quick tip.  Earl Nightingale was once asked how he managed time.  He said, 'Time can't be managed, it can only be filled.  Write a new list of what you want to accomplish every day and work through it.  What you don't get done, do on tomorrows list.  But always work."

Begin, create, laugh, cry, live, reward, care, serve:  don't waste and do it all over again everyday.  Value the good, purge the bad, honor your values and beliefs and always move onward and upward.  I love the Hawaiian word "Aloha".  It means hello, and good bye.  It means love and affection.  To me, it means always evolving, never a firm beginning or ending, only moving forward with the best of emotions and behavior.  
I resolve to do it, do you?  

Now, bring me that Horizon.....