Farmer In The Dell

I love farmer's markets.

 

Everything about them fascinates me.  I slow down and totally lose track of time as I enjoy walking from vendor to vendor and talking to each one of them about the unique products they are selling whether it's veggies, fruits, honey, cheeses, breads, soaps or food being cooked to order.

 

Yesterday it truly felt as if the weather had turned a corner and while it was a bit chilly the sun was bright and increasingly warm as the day progressed.  People with their children and dogs and friends and neighbors strolled and chatted each other up at the weekly farmer's market held in the Palisades section of Northwest Washington, DC. 

 

Everybody was just so darn happy to be outside and enjoying the nicer weather!  You could feel the relief in the easy manner of people greeting each other and the slower pace of checking out the market's wares whether it was sampling apples, biscotti, or asking questions about the young herb plants.

 

 

It's kind of similar to everyone having their own lemonade stand and making a go of it with their best products whatever that might be.  Making time for activities you enjoy can be one of the steps you take when rebuilding your life after a loss.  For me, farmer's markets create a healing feeling.  They reinforce for me that we are part of a larger community focused on being supportive and giving back.  Creating extra special karma if you will.

 

That might sound kind of fruit and nutty to you but I like the idea of people making things with their hands whether it is farming or sewing or jewelry and then coming together to share their talents.

 

People selling at farmer's markets always take a lot of pride in what they've made and much of what is sold at farmer's markets is organic or at least pretty close to it and I feel I'm doing my body and brain a favor when I buy healthier more natural foods that are closer to the sources of where they were grown and in my small way I'm also helping an entrepreneur who is trying to run a small business.

I was especially happy to find a vendor selling peach blossoms which are some of my favorite blooms to have in the house during spring and I also bought a few young lettuce plants for myself.

Score!

In Honor Of The Oscars

In honor of the Oscars last night, I'd like to give out a personal award.

Last night's Academy Awards speeches seemed to me to be particularly emotional, expressing the gratitude of recognition, the fulfillment of dreams and deep thanks for the years of incredible support that people received while working on their ground breaking film projects. 

It brought to mind for me the role that others play in our lives during difficult times and reminded me that support groups around the country are on the front lines of our communities, doing the nitty gritty, down and dirty and painful work of helping us put one foot in front of another as we learn to live with the unexpected challenges that life has brings us.

 

In my case, I'd like to give out a personal award, The Best  Support Group award to Widowed Persons Outreach (WPO) located at Sibley Hospital in Washington, DC.  The people at Sibley who run this incredible program are the unsung heros of bereavement work and I'd like to draw the curtains aside a bit to reveal that grief support groups are not strange secretive gatherings of people who wallow in their sorrow and loss.

 

Best Support Group Award

No indeed.  They are groups of compassionate people dealing honestly and directly with the confusion that grief brings.  I spent almost two years as a participating member of the WPO support group and then after leaving the support group I spent many years later as a volunteer trying to give back the unconditional support WPO gave to me.

I learned a tremendous amount from the other widowed members of the group and also the amazing people who ran the group while I was there.  One person I would like to give a shout out to is Julie Potter, a calm and patient woman with so much insight that she reminds me of  a wise Buddha.  WPO taught me how to slowly gather the shattered pieces of myself and figure out how to best to put them back together in a way that gave me worked for me.  The group gave me the strength to help myself and my grieving young son.   

 

Whether it's alcoholism, gambling, overeating, drug addiction or grief, I believe that others who are traveling the same unpredictable path as ourselves can often offer the greatest amount of inspiration.

It may seem slow and incredibly painful but I found that when you sit and share your story with others facing the same issues, there is a sense of relief that you have finally found people who understand the depth of what you are feeling and how hard it is to handle.  In searching for a way to begin healing, support groups offer a safety zone because you find you are not alone in your emotional turmoil. 

 

Many people are uncomfortable with the emotional pain of grief.  As a result, family and friends are sometimes unsure of what to say or how to be helpful.  Support groups are the places where we can let it all hang out, revealing the thoughts and feeling we might not want to tell others because they might not get what we are really telling them.

 

You deserve to talk through your feelings and get them off your chest.  It's all part of starting a healing process.  By letting your emotions come to the surface and then working through them, you acknowledge and face your changed life and find others who are also dealing with the same sorts of issues.

 

Each grief may be individual but you shouldn't feel that you have to handle it all by yourself.  Support groups can be a crucial first step when you find yourself unsure of how to deal with a personal crisis.

It's Snowtime!

After days of hearing the local weather people forecast that lots of snow was headed our way, it really happened!  Flakes began to fall around 7 pm last in Washington, DC and it remained steady throughout last night and continues into this morning.

 

I measured 14 inches of snow outside my door and I have yet to see a snow plow come into my neighborhood.  Oh well. . .  The federal government is shut down and so are schools along with most businesses.

 

Yes, my friends, a day off from work is a healing day!!

 

Here's what my part of the world looks like today:

A Blanket of Snow

Pristine Street
No Snow Plows Yet

Hard to Get Front Door Open When 14 inches of Snow Lay In Its Path
 

Strength Through Sharing

Sharing my stories, and those of others, can entertain, offer strength and inspiration and sometimes minimize the isolation that is felt in relationships or personal crisis.  I share to bond, to reach out, to reveal that I am vulnerable just like you.

No one knows when someone else's story will unexpectedly touch your life and help you gain a new perspective on a subject that you thought you knew enough about but you really didn't.  Someone else's words can bring new understanding to the life and death issues of physical and emotional survival and help you see things differently.

 

My son's girlfriend works at The James House in Richmond, Virginia and through her and this YouTube video below that a friend recently posted on Facebook I am becoming knowledgeable about the amazing work they do in their counseling, bringing hope to the lives of people who are emotionally, physically and sexually abused and/or stalked. 

 

The steady and important work of The James House, a non-profit organization (their services are free and confidential) which this year is celebrating its 25th anniversary, is to heal and to empower and to offer an independent and safe future. 

 

In this video you will meet a thoughtful and articulate woman named Samina Abdullah who is a community organizer at The James House.  Samina is a down-to-earth kind of person who is wise beyond her years and acts as an agent of change for her part of the world.  Or as she describes it, "I don't feel responsible for the whole world.  I feel responsible for my own little bubble."  Don't you love that idea?

 

Her thought makes me realize that I can be overwhelmed by what is happening in the world at large when all I really need to do is to focus on my little part of the globe.  We can start in your own communities, find our passions, whatever they are and follow them.  Do what you can do and do it the best way that you can.

 

When in doubt, just take the next small step:

 

 

It's A Wonderful Life

This time of year I am always on the lookout for when "It's Wonderful Life," is airing on television.

I could buy the DVD of this holiday classic but that would take the spontaneity out of it for me.  I like the surprise of turning on the television and finding it already on, or in the case of this past Friday evening, I caught it right at the very beginning.

I know that it's not a diverse film, I know that many things that happen in this film are dated and wouldn't be said or wouldn't happen today but I think "It's A Wonderful Life" is popular for other reasons.  The story's core message rings true today for all of us whether or not a particular group of people is featured in the movie or not.

It doesn't matter what gender or race you are or where you live or what you do, whether you are a parent or married or single because here's the message of the movie:  each person's life has a purpose.

 

We are George Bailey.

 

We may not know the effect that our life has on another person's but rest assured it does.  Each one of us is here on Earth for a reason and our life does make a difference and touches so many other lives.  The big things and the small things that we do and do not do not only affects our life, but also the lives of many others.  Please remember this idea when you are having a bad day and nothing seems to be going right.  You are probably doing something good and you just don't realize it.

 

Jimmy Stewart & Donna Reed star in "It's A Wonderful Life"

In the movie, "It's A Wonderful Life", we see that the town of Bedford Falls would have been known as Pottersville if it were not for George Bailey and the Bailey Savings & Loan offering help to the community.  Also when George is a boy he saves his brother, Harry, who then grows up to be a War Hero, from drowning in an icy pond, and George also prevents the pharmacist, Mr. Gower, from giving poisonous pills to a customer.

But George doesn't think twice about the good works he has done.  This is just the way he is wired.  Then one Christmas Eve a large amount of bank money is misplaced and he is desperate to find it. When he can't, all he can see is criminal charges and jail time in his future.  He decides he will be worth more dead than alive and then George starts thinking about suicide.  He drives to a bridge but before he can do anything, a man jumps into the river and George jumps in to save him.  After they both get out of the river, the man reveals himself to be Clarence, George Bailey's guardian angel. 

 

I love Clarence!  He is a great character with his large sleeping shirt and talk of earning his wings in Heaven for when he first arrives on Earth he is only an AS2, Angel Second Class.

 

This gem of a movie opened two weeks before Christmas in 1946 but it didn't do very well.  It wasn't until 1974 when it began airing on network television that it gained a huge following.  Ever since then the movie is shown during the holidays and is a wonderful reminder that life is all about love and taking care of each other.

As Clarence writes in his thank you note to George: "No man is a failure who has friends.  Thanks for the wings.  Love, Clarence."

Strangers Become Friends

When walking down the street, with a destination in mind, lost in my thoughts about work or something happening in my personal life, I admit that I am not always aware of the people around me.

I know that physically there are groups of people or singular people walking towards or past me, but the details of what they are wearing or what they look like are an instantaneous blur.

It's not because I am walking and texting.  If I hear the ping of a text received on my phone and I need to answer it, I move out of the path of the pedestrian traffic and use my telephone keyboard in a self-made safe zone by an office building or a sidewalk bench.

I know that there are people on the sidewalk with me or in a store or a restaurant and I make sure not to bump into anyone but I'm not always looking at people and spontaneously saying "hello" or smiling.  Most of the time I think I am unaware because I need to be somewhere or need to get something done and it is almost as though I am on my own express track.

 

Photographer Richard Renaldi Poses Jenny Wood & Dominek Tucker
Photo Courtesy CBS News

I can't imagine what it would be like if I was walking down the street and a photographer asked me to stop and pose with someone I didn't know at all.  A total stranger.  Someone I might never see again.

 

I'd like to think that I would stop and that I would enjoy the spontaneity of the moment.  The unexpected things that happen to me sometimes make me stop and laugh at the amazing adventures that life can bring.

 

It's fun and it gives me a lift.  We all need those moments, don't we? . . .Those moments when the walls come down and maybe, just maybe, we're vulnerable in our actions.  And when we are vulnerable we are usually our most authentic selves!!

 

Watch this short CBS On The Road piece and see what these strangers on the streets of New York City discover about the human connection:

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18563_162-57596845/new-york-photographer-turns-strangers-into-friends/

Kindness In a Me, Me, Me Culture

No matter what our age or place in life, we always remember the people who are kind.

 

For instance, during the homily of a friend's funeral, I found myself sitting by myself because I had a arrived a little late and my friends were in another part of the church.  As I listened to the beautiful words of the priest's eulogy, I put my head down as tears began to roll down my face.  I will never forget the simple gesture of the woman sitting next to me who gently put her hand on top of mine for a few minutes.

 

Simple acts of kindness remind us that we are all in this together and if we help each other out, it will go a little easier.  Plus, being kind makes you feel better about yourself.

 

There have been a lot of stories in the news recently about bullying.  Not just regular ole bullying that has been around since the beginning of time, but fierce, relentless, coldhearted bullying that continues to the point that the targeted person takes their own life.  I'm not going to go into all the factors that drive this new kind of bullying although I have my own theories. 

 

Kind behavior is not a show of weakness. Kindness and manners can be thought of as the same thing.

 

 

 

Which is essentially, acting on the idea that life is not all of about you or me.  Kindness is thinking beyond yourself to how the other person feels. 

 

You might not think being kind is important until you are on the other end of someone else's mean behavior to you.  And then, very quickly, you have a light bulb moment and you then probably get it.

 

According to Letitia Baldrige, who was Jacqueline Kennedy's chief of staff in the White House and America's number one best-selling authority on manners, when a child asks "Why do I have to be kind?" the answer should be careful but immediate.

 

Baldrige says that like a winning pitch in a baseball game, The Golden Rule should be tossed out as an answer whenever possible.  "The Golden Rule?", says the child.  "Why are you making such a big deal out of this?"

 

"Yes", says the parent.  "Here is The Golden Rule: Think how you would have felt if you were in his/her place and a stranger helped you -- just like that.  You'd be grateful!"

 

Baldrige advises to avoid nagging children about being kind or constantly using their good manners for that turns a positive into a negative.  "A child who is constantly told how bad or selfish he/she is will start to believe it and not care about the rewards of kind manners," Baldrige writes in her book, Letitia Baldrige's More Than Manners! 

 

Instead, whenever an opportunity presents itself to point out or make an editorial observation about someone else's kindness or good manners, you might say to the child, "Wasn't that great of him/her to do that?"  Or maybe, as the parent, you can show your child what it is like to pay it forward.

 

Holding the door for another person, saying hello, saying good-bye, keeping your mean thoughts to yourself, saying please, turning off or putting away your cellphone when someone is talking to you, helping a disabled person across the street.

 

It's a mad, mad, mad world out there sometimes and the little things, such as kindness and good manners, only take a few minutes to practice and they make life run so much smoother!

 

 

 

Newtown On Labor Day

Today is Labor Day and I have the day off from work.  YEAH!!! I hope you do too!

Maybe you are planning to go to a friend's house for a special holiday meal or you are going to cook for your family.  Or maybe you're just hangin' at your own house catching up on personal projects.  Or maybe you're going to go to an afternoon picnic or watch a community parade.

 

In Newtown, Connecticut today, there will be a parade.  A parade of love and community and healing.

 

 

It will be same parade that thousands of residents have watched and marched in since the town first held it's Labor Day parade in 1962.  But this year's parade is different.  There were doubts about going ahead with the parade given the deep tragedy that residents experienced on December 14, 2012 at Sandy Hook Elementary when 20 first graders and six adults were massacred by a lone gunman. (http://crylaughheal.blogspot.com/2012/12/newtown-connecticut.html)

 

Many in Newtown didn't think it was appropriate to hold a Labor Day parade this year when so many in their community are still trying to process their loss and rebuild their lives.

 

It is difficult to know what to do next when a life is lost; especially in Newtown where their losses happened in such brutal and cold-hearted manner.  I have found that in the midst of mourning there comes a point when you experience what I call the push-pull of  the healing process.  You know life is different; that life will never be the same without your loved one, but you also begin to search for a way to move forward with your life.  

 

I think Beth Caldwell, head of the Newtown Parade Committee, explained it best when she told the Associated Press (in the story below) that Newtown, in planning this year's Labor Day parade, wanted to be "respectful of what happened and still offer an avenue of celebration" for the residents. 

Labor Day is traditionally the last weekend of summer, a last hurrah of sorts.  Labor Day is also seen as a time of transition from summer to fall, from vacation to school.

Please read below in the link to an Associated Press story in The Boston Globe about Newtown's touching transition on this Labor Day, as it slowly moves from a terrible tragedy to a new kind of healing that I hope will get stronger with the passage of time.

http://www.boston.com/news/local/2013/08/31/with-parade-newtown-reflects-how-healing/x1O6IICVDovinXuc86W6qO/story.html

Sonia Sotomayor

I am a big believer in the idea that when someone offers you a helping hand that you should turn around and offer your hand to help someone else.

It's the right thing to do and haven't you also found that you always get more out of life when you become actively involved and emotionally invest in it?  I know I do!

I'm guessing that U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor practices this same philosophy because she recently went back to her childhood roots in the Bronx, NY and spent the day with young children from the Dream Big program at Environment Day held at Fordham University.  Dream Big is a four to six week summer arts enrichment program for elementary school aged children program at local schools and community based organizations.

US Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor reads
to the children at the Dream Big program

Sotomayor had a rough childhood.  She was born in a public housing project, her father was an alcoholic and she was diagnosed with juvenile diabetes when she was eight years old.  After her father died when she was nine, her mother worked as nurse and raised Sonia and her brother, Juan.  The power of education was something their mother emphasized over and over to them and it was Sonia's ticket out of the Bronx.

 

She was inspired by Nancy Drew books (my favorite too!) and those books plus watching Perry Mason on television lead to her wanting to become a lawyer and ultimately the first Hispanic to become a member of the Supreme Court.

"My dream is that each of you finds your dream and that it comes true," Sotomayor told the children.  "And I hope that when you reach your dream, you'll write me a letter and you'll tell me."

Despite her very busy schedule on the Supreme Court, Sotomayor frequently returns to the Bronx, which she calls her "beloved world," to stay involved with her dynamic community, to give back what she has learned so far in her life journey and to help inspire children to achieve goals that may take them beyond their neighborhoods.

"Don't give up chasing your dreams," Sotomayor said.

 

Giving to others can offer us a view of ourselves as strong and valued and needed.  Whether you come from the Bronx or you are in a place where you are trying to rebuild your life, I hope Sonia Sotomayor's tenacity inspires you to stay on your path and continue to follow your passions wherever they may take you and don't forget to help another person along the way.

A Merry Christmas Message

Merry Christmas

Dear Readers,

May you and your loved ones have a very Merry Christmas!

The holiday season may remind you of a special person who is no longer with you just as I am reminded of my husband who died nine years ago.  Our lives have been forever changed and so have we. 

But there is always hope for a renewed future; a future that we can purposely rebuild so that we may move forward.  You are not alone.

 

We bring our loved ones with us as we slowly figure out our new lives and as we do, we find ourselves remembering them with the healing powers of smiles and tears.

 

Thank you for reading Cry, Laugh, Heal and may you find peace and happiness in your journey.

Newtown, Connecticut

 

Murdering a child is an unspeakable act.

 

Yesterday's horrific tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT., which involved the shooting of 27 people, including 20 young children, leaves us asking questions about our culture and praying for the parents and the community at large.

 

As a parent myself, I try to place myself in their situation, but I cannot begin to fathom the depth of pain and shock those parents are experiencing.  My heart goes out them and I wish we could take it all away.

We must talk openly about this incident, as hard as it is, for in the talking perhaps we can prevent this kind of tragedy from ever, ever happening again.

In an effort to promote a sense of comfort and healing, I am sharing an excerpt from an article by Barbara J. Paul, PH.D.,  on this very sad subject:

Special Issues for Parents Losing A Son or A Daughter
By Barbara J. Paul, Ph.D.

Whether your child was two or thirty-two, the death of a child is perhaps the most difficult of losses.  The grief following the loss of a son or a daughter is intense and prolonged.  Why is it different from other losses?

It differs from other deaths for several reasons.

1.  It is not in the natural order of things.  Parents do not expect to outlive their children.  We tend to believe that children (of any age) don't die.

2.  The child is biologically and emotionally a part of the parent.  When a death occurs, the parents feel that part of themselves has died.

3.  Parents feel that the future is gone with the loss of a son or a daughte.

4.  The loss is shared by both parents but their reactions and resolution may differ.  Couples often depend on each other for support but overwhelmed by their own loss, it can feel impossible to support their partner.

Parents lose not only a part of themselves, but their role as a parent and nurturer.  They lose the future grandchildren or may lose contact with existing grandchildren.  These losses add to the grief.  Equally devastating may be the parents' loss of faith or belief system.

Reaction to the loss of a son or a daughter

The reaction are similiar to those of other losses, affecting parents physically, emotionally, behaviorally, and often spiritually.  For many parents, the assumptions they had about the world and how it functioned do not fit with the reality of the death of their child.

 

While each person handles grief uniquely, parental bereavement may last many years.  Particularly in the early months, parents describe rheir emotional state as either feeling totally numb or  experiencing all emotions at the same time.  Trying to make sense of what happened and finding meaning in living become major tasks.  Guilt and anger are strong and normal emotions.

 

Grief is a process, often cyclical in nature, not unlike a roller coaster ride.  One is on the ride with no control over the course.  The peaks and valleys do lessen in intensity and frequency and eventually parents find ways to adapt to living without their son or daughter in their life.  When parents are able to create an internal representaion of the child that they can caryy with them, they are able to live more fully.

Is age a factor in parental bereavement?

Yes.  The younger the son or daughter is, the more parents are involved in the cring for that child.  Daily living and routine is affected and simple tasks can become overwhelmingly painful.  Parents feel the enormous emptiness of the home and every aspect of their life.

 

With an adolescent or young adult living at home, parents are still involved with many aspects of their child's life and family routine.  These parents feel strongly about the death occuring just as the young person was beginning to live life.  Their children have begun to develop lives separate from home, and parents often look for contact and connection with the son or daughter's friends.

 

With an adult son or daughter, the daily routine of theparents may not change, but they face other challenges.  Following the death of an unmarried child, parents have to deal with settling the child's estate, their belongings, and residence.  This can be very complicated, depending on their knowledge of the child's social and financial circumstances.

 

For the parents of a married son or daughter, it is often a schock for them to realize that they are not legally the next of kin.  All decision-making power is technically in the hands of the spouse.  When a good relationship exists between the in-laws, most issues can be worked out.  When the relationship is poor, it may be helpful to have a third party as a mediator.

Being All In

 

 

 

 

 

This holiday season, I am appreciating the endless decorations of bows, bells and evergreens, listening to the traditional Christmas music that seems to be playing everywhere and trying to find wonderful presents for those that I love.

 

I've been to a few Christmas parties and also donated to schools and other groups who are dependent upon help from others so that they may continue their community work that is so crucial to helping men, women and children who are homeless and without a place to go for regular shelter and meals.

 

I am trying to give of myself and think positive thoughts because I know if I put myself in that mindset then I will act positively and carry on in a meaningful way.

 

I know there is no right or wrong way to celebrate the holidays, there is just what we are comfortable with and what we feel is right for ourselves.

 

But I still don't feel that I'm "all in" to the Christmas spirit.

 

Maybe I'm overthinking it and I should just allow it to happen rather than wondering why I don't particularly feel it.  I'm not sure.

 

Maybe it's that I feel emotionally spent by personal situations where I am constantly trying to be supportive but it doesn't seem to be making a difference.  That is a hard one.  I think we all have come up against that kind of situation.  I am trying my best, and so are others, but at a certain point, you can only do so much.

 

I guess at the end of the day, it's really all about love.

 

How are you feeling this holiday season?

Keegan -- The Opposite of Loneliness

Marina Keegan

Marina Keegan had something to say and she said it extremely well as a writer for the Yale Daily News.

Before graduating from Yale this month, Marina wrote the below column to her classmates, reflecting on her positive college experience, her sense of life's possibilities and the nervousness of going out into the real world and following her dream of being a writer.

As the mother of a recent college graduate, I recognize what she was feeling when she wrote this beautiful column and have heard some of the same thoughts from my son.  Tragically, Keegan's prescient words have become more poignant since the news broke that Keegan died a few days after her May 21st graduation in a car crash on her way to a vacation house on Cape Cod.

Keegan definitely had something to say and her wisdom speaks to all of us:

The Opposite of Loneliness

By Marina Keegan

We don’t have a word for the opposite of loneliness, but if we did, I could say that’s what I want in life. What I’m grateful and thankful to have found at Yale, and what I’m scared of losing when we wake up tomorrow and leave this place.

It’s not quite love and it’s not quite community; it’s just this feeling that there are people, an abundance of people, who are in this together. Who are on your team. When the check is paid and you stay at the table. When it’s four a.m. and no one goes to bed. That night with the guitar. That night we can’t remember. That time we did, we went, we saw, we laughed, we felt. The hats.

Yale is full of tiny circles we pull around ourselves. A cappella groups, sports teams, houses, societies, clubs. These tiny groups that make us feel loved and safe and part of something even on our loneliest nights when we stumble home to our computers — partner-less, tired, awake. We won’t have those next year. We won’t live on the same block as all our friends. We won’t have a bunch of group-texts.

This scares me. More than finding the right job or city or spouse – I’m scared of losing this web we’re in. This elusive, indefinable, opposite of loneliness. This feeling I feel right now.

But let us get one thing straight: the best years of our lives are not behind us. They’re part of us and they are set for repetition as we grow up and move to New York and away from New York and wish we did or didn’t live in New York. I plan on having parties when I’m 30. I plan on having fun when I’m old. Any notion of THE BEST years comes from clichéd “should haves...” “if I’d...” “wish I’d...”

Of course, there are things we wished we did: our readings, that boy across the hall. We’re our own hardest critics and it’s easy to let ourselves down. Sleeping too late. Procrastinating. Cutting corners. More than once I’ve looked back on my High School self and thought: how did I do that? How did I work so hard? Our private insecurities follow us and will always follow us.

But the thing is, we’re all like that. Nobody wakes up when they want to. Nobody did all of their reading (except maybe the crazy people who win the prizes…) We have these impossibly high standards and we’ll probably never live up to our perfect fantasies of our future selves. But I feel like that’s okay.

We’re so young. We’re so young. We’re twenty-two years old. We have so much time. There’s this sentiment I sometimes sense, creeping in our collective conscious as we lay alone after a party, or pack up our books when we give in and go out – that it is somehow too late. That others are somehow ahead. More accomplished, more specialized. More on the path to somehow saving the world, somehow creating or inventing or improving. That it’s too late now to BEGIN a beginning and we must settle for continuance, for commencement.

When we came to Yale, there was this sense of possibility. This immense and indefinable potential energy – and it’s easy to feel like that’s slipped away. We never had to choose and suddenly we’ve had to. Some of us have focused ourselves. Some of us know exactly what we want and are on the path to get it; already going to med school, working at the perfect NGO, doing research. To you I say both congratulations and you suck.

For most of us, however, we’re somewhat lost in this sea of liberal arts. Not quite sure what road we’re on and whether we should have taken it. If only I had majored in biology…if only I’d gotten involved in journalism as a freshman…if only I’d thought to apply for this or for that…

What we have to remember is that we can still do anything. We can change our minds. We can start over. Get a post-bac or try writing for the first time. The notion that it’s too late to do anything is comical. It’s hilarious. We’re graduating college. We’re so young. We can’t, we MUST not lose this sense of possibility because in the end, it’s all we have.

In the heart of a winter Friday night my freshman year, I was dazed and confused when I got a call from my friends to meet them at EST EST EST. Dazedly and confusedly, I began trudging to SSS, probably the point on campus farthest away. Remarkably, it wasn’t until I arrived at the door that I questioned how and why exactly my friends were partying in Yale’s administrative building. Of course, they weren’t. But it was cold and my ID somehow worked so I went inside SSS to pull out my phone. It was quiet, the old wood creaking and the snow barely visible outside the stained glass. And I sat down. And I looked up. At this giant room I was in. At this place where thousands of people had sat before me. And alone, at night, in the middle of a New Haven storm, I felt so remarkably, unbelievably safe.

We don’t have a word for the opposite of loneliness, but if we did, I’d say that’s how I feel at Yale. How I feel right now. Here. With all of you. In love, impressed, humbled, scared. And we don’t have to lose that.

We’re in this together, 2012. Let’s make something happen to this world.