Continued

[susandennis]

Before we move on to New York, I want to catch up on a few things that got left out along the way.

The first is a book. About the time I moved to Southern Pines, my girlfriends and I all found a newly published book called Our Bodies Our Selves. We did not read it, we devoured it. It was not a book to lend to your friends. Everyone had to have their own copy to read, re-read, research, check, and just have for comfort.

Looking back on it now, it's hard for even me to wrap my head around the importance of this book ... in so many ways. It explained so many valuable things that we never before even whispered about and it explained things we never even knew to ask. This was a time when you never ever talked about your period even to close girlfriends. Body parts and body functions were just not talked about and we didn't know much anyway. PLUS, when they were talked about, it was medically and everyone used the generic 'man' as the human example.

Here we had so much information AND the permission to talk about it all with each other and boy oh boy, I cannot tell you how those flood gates opened. And they never shut again. It was monumental. My first copy got so dog eared and taped up and just finally fell apart.





So I bought the Revised and Expanded version $4.95 and this one I cared for with kid gloves. I have donated most all my books over the years and have relatively few in the house today. But, I do still have my 1976 copy of Our Bodies, Our Selves.

In Charlotte, when I was looking for a new job after getting fired from the law office, I came upon this guy who was trying to establish a kind of What Color is Your Parachute guidance office. He wanted to sell me his services. I declined but part of his pitch was he had my close my eyes and imagine what my perfect job would feel like, look like, smell like, sound like. He had me describe the surroundings in detail.

I am not someone who does this kind of thing willingly. I'm just way too much of a skeptic but at the time I didn't have a good way to say no so I did it. I conjured up a scenario that felt good to me and described it all to him.

Not too many years later, I was in the middle of my work day when I was hit with two bolts. One was how much I was enjoying my job and my life and how cool it all was and the second bolt was how VERY much it was exactly like I pictured when that guy asked me to dream up my dream job. It freaked me out then and it still does today.

And, finally, a big part of my Charlotte non-work experience was the Charlotte O's. They were the AA farm team of the Baltimore Orioles and they played in a marvelous little wooden structure called Crockett Park.


(photo from http://www.digitalballparks.com/Southern/Crockett17.html)

I had season tickets in that blue section just behind the batter's box and that netting for every Summer I was in Charlotte except the last one. I saw soon to be famous (Cal Ripkin) and never to be famous (Durungo LeRue Hazewood) play night after night. All of us in the section were season ticket holders and a tight family. It was such fun. Minor League baseball is really the best baseball there is. You can see the best and the worst and win a free bag of groceries all on the same lovely Summer evening.

To Be Continued

Comments

[billinaction.livejournal.com]

I love that you still have the 1976 copy!

[susandennis]

And, it's soooooo outdated. I spent some time with it this afternoon and omg. It's wild. And amazing.

[becomingkate.livejournal.com]

I think I had that book! A later edition, but the title definitely rings a bell.

[roasted-beets.livejournal.com]

The Charlotte O's sound like or remind me of the Durham Bulls from the movie Bull Durham. The people arriving at the stadium in the evening looked magical and I would be much more of a baseball fan if I had ever experienced that.

Also, we lived in MD and went to an Orioles game during Cal Ripkin, Jr.'s rookie year. :-)

[susandennis]

It was very much like the Durham Bulls. Very much.

I sent Cal Ripkin to play for you!!

[gwendally.livejournal.com]

I do that visualization exercise with clients sometimes. I ask them, "It's five years from now. You've caught every lucky break. Things are going better than you could even have imagined. You're the happiest you've ever been. In fact, today is the best day ever. Now describe it to me." Then you ask them to flesh it out over the next two weeks. In the shower every morning, imagine every detail of that day. Where are you showering that morning? What did you just do last night? Where are you going next? What's the weather like? What car are you driving? What are you looking forward to doing? Build this vision out bit by bit.

The point is that people will do a much better job of realizing their dreams if they actually have a dream. It's really powerful. "If you don't know where you're going, any path will do" can be flipped upside down to "if you know where you're going, you can get there by any path."

[susandennis]

The thing that impressed me the most was that it worked on me even while I was poopooing the whole thing and thought the guy was full of shit.

[lifeinroseland.livejournal.com]

I think my fave LJ entry of mine was after I realized I was doing exactly what I'd dreamed up I'd like to do some day, just one night lying in bed.

Time to get on it again! Thanks for the reminder.

[rsc.livejournal.com]

It's too bad that Durongo LeRue Hazewood never became famous. That would have been one of the best names in MLB history.

[susandennis]

So so so true. I can still, today, hear the announcer singing it out. Such a great name.

[sweetmeow]

Right now we're back in Hilton Head, so I can't hunt up my copy of "Our Bodies Our Selves", and if I have the expanded edition or what. I can't remember just when I got it, except that it was a gift from my younger sister to me. It was after I was married, but before my son was born so it was in the '70s. I, too remember reading it voraciously - but not beginning to end, though I read everything - - it was just piecemeal. There also - - I think - - is another book in this Boston Women's Health Collective, but I can't remember the title, except that I think the printing is red. I'm so curious now....!

[zoefruitcake.livejournal.com]

I've never heard of that book but it sounds really groundbreaking