Uh-Oh. Been Thinking Again.

I know it's a bit cliche, but losing Dad, going to his memorial with 500 of his closest friends, and seeing friends I hadn't seen in 14 years has got me thinking about Life, The Universe, and Everything.
The last time I saw some of these friends, we were 25. Now we're 39 and most of us have at least one child. But once we were together, it was as if no time had passed. There were just a few extra, smaller folks running around.
They all look beautiful. Sure, there are a few more laugh lines, a little extra flesh, but they are real and gorgeous women. Many have moved back to the same town we all grew up in. They have homes of their own, and send their kids to the same schools we went to. For a split second I imagined what it would be like to live there with my own family. Until I remembered winter, and that was the end of that. (We live in San Francisco, we don't do winter!)
So I started thinking: do I REALLY want to spend the rest of my life obsessing over my post-babies tummy? Or do I want to focus on, y'know, the important stuff. Like my kids, and my husband, and the dog, and my job that I really enjoy.
Yesterday I had my first training session with my supervisor/friend/former instructor. She's taking an intensive Stott training, and is passing it all along to us, gratis. (She's also given me a bunch of Lululemon clothes that don't fit her!)
Pretty cool.
Then I went to Gold's to teach my next class, and my supervisor there came over to give me a hug, and said some really sweet things about losing her own parents.
Last week, when I was in Boston, we kept talking about how we all felt dad's presence (see previous post), and I still feel him. When I start worrying about the small stuff, I can hear him telling me to relax, chill, it'll be OK. (Which is kind of ironic, because that's what I used to tell HIM.)
And it's working. Yes, the economy is in the toilet, we're at war, the country is deeply divided over political issues, it's cold and flu season, and the Raiders couldn't win a game if they were playing against a Pop Warner team, but my staying awake at night worrying about it all is not going to help. So, like the guide says, Don't Panic. All it does is raise the blood pressure.
So, it's OK to feel all the stuff that's going on inside of me. But I just won't get stuck in it. If I just let myself REALLY feel it, deeply, then it will pass.
Finally, in these past two weeks, I've had a chance to see Dad in a new way. He wasn't just the guy who got his finger caught in the mousetrap when he tried to set it (we ended up getting a cat, who didn't get along with the dog...it's a long story), or the man I had a sometimes rocky relationship with (but could always count on for a good pun or a bad joke). He was also the guy who was a mentor to his younger colleagues, a second father to our friends, and a guy who helped stop Logan Airport from expanding into a local neighborhood. I heard so many stories about him, and about the difference he made in peoples' lives and in the city itself. So I'm sad he's gone, but I know that he lived exactly the life he wanted.
And the next time I hear "Don't do that, you'll take out an eye!" I'll know he's nearby.