Pam and I had a great time in New York City after our New Jersey adoptee retreat over a year ago, and we often fantasize about going back. We stayed at the Yolo Hotel which is like taking a Virgin Airlines flight and never leaving the ground. Think purple lighting.

The other day we were talking about our lives and…uh…bitching about everything. You could have given either of us a lemon that day and we would have turned it into a bomb and ruined something with it. Our panties were in a mutual bunch.

Why?

I have no idea. Maybe the wind was blowing weirdly or it was too hot or we were both tired or living lives as humans in female bodies. It’s not all that strange to be in a bad mood, but it’s a pain in the neck because we both know our brains are creating these feelings and yet we both felt stuck in the flow of yuck.

It’s so great to have a friend who gets you so you can, together, climb to the light. This is one reason Pam and I created Flourish, so adoptees could find each other and have climb buddies.

It’s more fun to bitch when you can also laugh with someone.

“You know what we’re like?” Pam asked after we’d been at it for a while.

I took a deep breath. I knew it was going to be good. We were about to get nailed to the wall in some spectacular manner. “What?”

“We’re like two women in Central Park with their heads deep in garbage cans.”

I laughed and laughed. She was so right! I live in paradise and yet all I could smell and see that day was garbage! It was 100 degrees outside and paradise was flipping hot and the dirt under the plants looked like it wanted to blow away. The plants looked limp and exhausted. The wind was blowing and it was inviting fire. Paradise felt ugly and wrong.

What I wasn’t seeing was that this was a hot afternoon, and that night the temperature would drop fifty degrees. What I wasn’t seeing was that there was no fire. What I wasn’t seeing was that I was on the phone with my friend, laughing, while the plants waited for water which, eventually, would arrive because I have a hose.

I was so deep in my thoughts that I wasn’t paying attention to my heart or my feet. I was so busy looking at the garbage of my car is dirty and my laundry is unfolded and I had mint chip ice cream for lunch instead of standing straight and seeing, Holy cow! I’m in Central Park! My car is dirty because I went to the beach every day this week! My laundry is unfolded because I went to the beach! I had ice cream for lunch and it was the perfect treat!

Laughing at myself is the best. Today when I was feeling annoyed because the mint was dying (I mean, come one, who can kill mint? What is wrong with me?) as I watered the plants in the garden, I thought about having my head in the trash can in Central Park. I thought about all the garbage I was looking at, focused on, smelling. I thought about how funny it was that I’d chosen to put my head down in there when I could be taking in the best of New York, the celebration that is Central Park.