Welcome to my World! I love to absorb my surroundings and people watch. I am fascinated by and embrace all walks of individuals. We all vary in our idiosyncratic ways yet are ultimately the same, striving to forge our way through this journey we call life, in the hopes that we might each self-actualize along the way.
Allow me to introduce myself. I am a writer, competitive long-distance runner, mother of four. I love challenging myself in all endeavors I engage in. I write novels. I run 100-120 miles per month and participate in races, half-marathons, full marathons and obstacle courses across the United States. have four children: a 25-year-old son, a 23-year-old daughter, a 21-year-old daughter and a 16-year-old son who is in high school.
I love to explore my surroundings and can often be found venturing out on lengthy treks of up to twenty-nine miles to traverse: mountains, streams, waterfalls, deserts, canyons, beaches and anywhere else that I can connect with nature to feel her pulse and be fed by her wisdom. Even the streets of the metropolis cities hold wonder for me, with their unique flow and energy.
I hope that you enjoy browsing through my web site for a glimpse into my world of never-ending adventures, perils and awakenings.
Cindy
Some of you have enjoyed learning a bit more about me through a series of articles that Cheri Endsley wrote about my writing and self.At first, I wasn’t even sure I wanted to post the articles here, not sure if anyone would be interested in them.But the feedback I’ve received has indicated that folks like what they’ve read, and for that, I’m grateful.
If you’d like to view the forth and final part of the article, it can be viewed here:
Some days just don’t go the way we planned.Take mine for example.
This morning started out well enough, right on schedule with getting done the things I needed before heading to the dentist’s office—not exactly my favorite place to visit.Now mind, you, mine is a very conscientious dentist who prides herself on making sure that her patients feel no pain while sitting in her chair.But today I knew I was going to be uncomfortable, for I was going in to have my temporary crown removed and the permanent one seated.
Gives me chills just thinking about the process.
Oh, and did I mention that since I was short on time, I had vowed to make sure that I made it through the procedure without the benefit of Novocain, which would have taken longer?Seeing as I have a fairly high pain tolerance, I figured this was doable.After all, I’d done it in the past.
Well, the temporary crown came off easily enough, but when they began poking around and scraping the old cement off with that gawd-awful metal pointy tool they have, the shockwaves of pain began shooting straight through my tooth and overwhelming my mind.But I was determined to stick to my plan to make this a quick visit.
The dentist noticed me stiffen and asked if I was okay or needed anything to dull the pain.My nails attempting to puncture the lovely armrests to her oh-so-comfy-but-I-so-don’t-want-to-be-here chair, I smiled through the discomfort and told her I was fine and to please proceed.
Good lawd, there are times I wonder why I do things like that!
So, the dentist continued, rubbing the sensitized remains of the now-exposed tooth, scraping more, while sending more electric currents of pain shooting through my mouth.Somehow I managed to make it through all of that.But when she asked her assistant to spray the area with what I knew would be water straight out of a freezer, and then blow air straight from the Antarctica on it, I had a momentary mental image of me bolting out of the chair and running out of the office screaming, “Never!” But again, my self-control kicked in, and I found myself smiling as I looked at the sweet assistant with the awaiting demonic instruments and said, “Whenever you’re ready.”
I swear there was a momentary glimmer of delight in her eye before she began spraying and freezing the area over with her ice-cold water and air, blown through the little tube that I hope would somehow get tied in a knot so it would be rendered useless.But luck was on her side not mine, so the cycle of rinse, blow, freeze, rinse and blow some more was repeated until…well…until I had more visions of bolting out of the chair.
Throughout all this, I had slipped into some bizarre chant in my head that if I endured, it would all be over soon, just as soon as they asked me to bite down on the permanent crown to set it.And so I endured and was more than giddy with gratitude when the dentist took out the new crown to show me, before getting ready to check to see if it fit properly.
Now, I won’t bore you with the details of how that fitting went down, other to say, that I ended up leaving the office with the exact same temporary as I had entered with.You know, the one that could have stayed right in my mouth, without my having to endure all that I did if only they’d known that the permanent one didn’t fit quite right.But alas….
Leaving the office, I tried to view the positive, as I’m prone to do, and noted that I was way ahead of schedule.
Yippee!
Of course, the fact that I felt like I’d been on the losing end of a horrible battle didn’t make me feel any better.But, sucking it up I made it through the remainder of my day, trying not to worry over what ramifications my not having gotten the permanent crown set today might cause, seeing as I am to report for jury duty this coming Monday. This was the whole reason they were setting the permanent one today to begin with.
So much for best-laid plans.
Now I’m wondering how long my having to serve on jury duty might keep me from being able to get back to the dentist and if the temporary will stay put for that amount of time.
At the end of today, I left my Pilates class, exhausted, and was thrilled to be heading home—finally.I no sooner got in the door and went to take a refreshing long drink of water than the temporary crown, the one that I had endured all the pain earlier in the day for, popped out.
Holy crap!Really?Are you kidding me?
Looking at the clock, I noticed it was a quarter to six, causing a cold panic to envelope me.
What if the dentist is gone for the day? That means she won’t be back until Monday.Oh, lawd!
Dialing as fast as I could, I called the office and was relieved to hear the receptionist pick up.I quickly filled her in on what had happened, and she told me to come in—right then.
Relieved, but near tears at the thought of having to go through again what I had earlier, I reluctantly got in the car and made my way through rush-hour traffic.Arriving at the office half an hour later, I had the option of enduring once again without the benefit of Novocain or of having it take longer.I opted for without painkillers and got to go through the whole lovely process for the second time in the same day!
Lawd almighty, what next?
Well, I’m home now, crossing my fingers that the temporary stays put this time and hoping I don’t have to report in person to jury duty on Tuesday, so I can go back to the dentist and have her set the permanent crown in place. But this time...you can count on it…I’m opting for Novocain no matter how much extra time it takes.
Well the articles on my writing and me are certainly coming out in rapid-fire.The first two of the four-part series debuted last week, and now the third part in the series has just been posted.You can find it here:
Discovering that I was to be featured in a column was flattering enough, but to learn that story would be stretched out to encompass four separate parts was not only a surprise but also a real thrill.I’m quite pleased with the way the journalist put the piece together and hope readers will enjoy learning a bit more about me as they read it.
I’m wondering if any of the rest of you have conversations with friends, etc about how challenging it can be to make one’s self fully understood when writing emails, typing texts or conversing via the internet.Recently, a good number of my friends and I have shared times when our intent was misunderstood by the recipient.The results were hurt feelings or the person reacting in a defensive manner, thinking we were angered or lashing out at them.
So how do we go about making our point clear?Many, myself included, have resorted to actually writing out our emotions in parentheses, following certain statements.And then there’s a whole other issue of when someone thinks you’re upset and shouting at them because you put a word in all caps, meaning to emphasize but not “yell” it at them.
Under the best of circumstances, communication can be challenging.But when we take out the face-to-face element and replace it with writing messages back and forth electronically, things can get…well, frankly…they can get rather messy.
So how do we avoid falling into the uncomfortable potholes of miscommunication?I’m not sure that’s entirely possible.But we can reduce the number of instances if we take the time to slow down when communicating with others via written form.If before we hit the send button, we take an extra minute or two to read back what we’ve written to ensure, as best we can, that it accurately conveys what we intended to say, then things should go smoother. In reality, they won’t always go as we had hoped.And in those cases, the best we can do is reach out to the person and try to make ourselves better understood.
With how society is leaning more and more heavily on electronic forms of communications, this is no longer an option but rather a necessity.
