You forget.  It’s really a simple thing, this forgetting.  You do something, or think something, and moments later it’s gone.  Poof!  Gone.  Whole conversations are lost or changed or morphed into something entirely different from their original essence.

Take for instance the notion that I just spent half an hour constructing a lovely post, only to purposely wipe out the entire text with just a couple of keystrokes.  Control A, Delete.  It was that easy — and there’s no Oops! key in this software program.  No return.  No remembrance.  Just Gone Baby Gone.

I read once that in ancient days … when folks wrote their thoughts onto mashed up plant matter instead of The Internets … it was considered that our feelings and memories were kept in the stomach.  Questions and doubts were in the head.  The will was in the heart, the soul resided in the throat.  The Spirit was in the breath, mindfulness in the ears, observance in the eyes.

It all makes sense.  Especially the thing about memories in the stomach.  Already I don’t remember specifically what I spent a half hour writing, but I sure know the kick in the stomach feeling I had the moment after pressing delete.

I think great thoughtfulness must inhabit every sheet, every scroll of our ancient Papyrus writings.  By the time you harvested the plant, soaked it, smushed it, rolled it and dried it … you’d have a pretty good idea what you’d want to write on its surface.  Your inky words would spill onto your parchment and dry in the breeze.  They’d be stones of thought that would last a very long time before finally crumbling into dust.

Your words would be your strength.

I think we should write until we die.  On paper.  Every day.  Even if it’s nonsense and we forget how to form letters and our memories turn to pebbles in our stomachs.  Every day we should breathe our spirits onto paper.  Every day.

If we remember anything, may it be that for what we write now, it will one day be ancient thought.

The groomer called today with a reminder that Scarlett is overdue for a haircut.  I dunno.  I think she’s looking pretty classy.  Maybe just add a side-swept bang to add a hint of mystery — a bit of that come-hither naughtiness.

Of course, she’s been begging for a saucy little face-framing Dara Torres-style bob lately.  After all, they’re both fabulous swimmers, Scarlett reminds me.  Something that says, “I’m sporty and I know it,” she whines.   Gosh, it’s always so hard to decide on these things when it’s still August in Phoenix and our hair melts the minute we step outside anyway.  Do we go short and sassy, or stick with something that’s pony-tail versatile?  Such choices!

Well, I suppose it is time for a trip to the spa.  Besides, there’s nothing like a new do, a manicure, a pedicure and a nice whisker trim to make a girl feel like kicking up her paws.

What do you think?  Should we go for the bangs this time?

Hooray for the Happy Bunny Place.  Hooray and huzzah!

Toodlee-doot-tee-doo.  Happy Places for everyone.  Here’s a Happy Place for you … and one for you … and a grand one for you too.

Ah, to only make it that easy.  I talked on the phone with a friend today who’s going through a bit of a rough patch.  It’s that young mommy, waaay-too-much-on-the-plate thing that has flattened her to the wall and made her consider plucking her eyes out because the pain of it would help her think of something else.  She cried in my ear, great heaving, gulping sobs that gave her hiccups.  I didn’t know what to say.

Then I did a foolish thing.  I promised her that things would get better.  At least, I promised that in ten years, we would NOT be having this same conversation.  Of course, I didn’t mention that by then we’d be talking about her baby’s first bra or that our own boobs would be scraping our knees … or that we’d be trying to figure out why our ears and noses got larger the minute we entered our dotage.

I don’t know if I helped much, but by the end of our talk, she had stopped hiccuping and had moved on to something productive like pouring her second glass of chardonnay.

Yeah, that’s me — the Oprah of Happy Bunny Places.  And you get a Bunny Place … and you get a Bunny Place … and YOU get a Bunny Place!

I’m searching for a new hairdo.  One that will accentuate my beautiful eyes.  One that screams … “It’s Me and I’m Gorgeous!”  One that conversely is natural and humble.  One that DEFIES GRAVITY.

I’m taking this picture to my hairdresser tomorrow.

I’m done now with obsessing over the hair thing.  Yet one more (male) doctor confirmed this morning that I’m just gonna be a bald woman.  No big deal.  This doctor, however, tossed out the thought that a shorty hairdo might be attractive on me.  I give up on these doctor dudes who can look a terrified woman in the eye and tell her with all the matter-of-factness that it’s no big deal.  What hutzpa!

So, I’m done with the subject.  I guess being bald in the desert is not so awful.  Hey, maybe I’ll be cooler than my thick-haired sisters.

So, it’s on to brighter and more lovely ideas and notions.

The fan in my office has been squeaking lately.  Dan, my man, my hero, my fixer, changed it for me yesterday.  We found a suitable replacement at one of the big-box stores (we’ll talk later about big-boxes and why I think they were invented by Satan).  The new light/fan is lovely, stylish, and even has a remote.  A REMOTE!  I LOVE remotes.  They’re so … portable.  I can actually attach this one to my hip, as I did last night.  I thrust my hip toward my husband.  “Have you seen my remote?” I purred.

It was a good night last night.

In the dark, he can’t tell that I look like Cheetah.

I should be so lucky.  Chicken Hair!  Now, why didn’t I think of that?

Thanks to my dear friends and readers who were kind in their responses (please see previous post), uplifting, funny and generous.  Thank you all — and Yay —  HATS TO ALL!!!!

Each person who so kindly responded to my frantic plea will receive a free, all expenses paid, lovely DancingBirds.com baseball hat.  Suitable for those bad-hair days and perfect for Mall-walking or that early morning workout when you don’t want anyone to see your bed-head before you’ve showered.

I’ll send one out to Dave whose first-out-of-the-box response serves to remind me that acceptance begins with me.  One for Tom whose kindness is beyond measure.  One for Lisa whose concern made me laugh and cry and know that I’m missed when I spend a week dying on the couch.  (I’ll not brush my hair again without thinking of it as Chicken Feathers.)  Then, there’s one for each of Lisa’s dear girls who grew their hair for the sole purpose of donating it to others.  These are SPECIAL children.  Girls who’ve learned early on that the evidence of value lies in what we do for others … not what we GET from someone else.

In the meantime the hair saga goes on, but I have the image of a chicken now in my memory bank with feathers that any Dancing Bird would admire.  If only that chicken could teach me the Salsa … oh, life would be so complete.

It occurred to me this morning (as I was looking at yet another handful of falling hair) that among the three million women in America who are also currently losing their goldilocks (some as young as fifteen) and with more of us each day joining this elite club, there may be someone who has found some helpful remedy other than the abrupt notion of just cutting it all off and buying a wig.  Obviously, those in the wigged group don’t spend their summers sweating in Phoenix.  Not that I wouldn’t mind a couple of beautiful, I’d-never-guess-in-a-million-years, wiggy thing.  I’d not be opposed at all.  It’s just that wigs aren’t always compatible with 110 degrees and counting.

Also, my doctor’s pronouncement that because my father was bald, I’m also destined down that path just didn’t seem right.  It just didn’t seem like a correct analogy.  As the doctor told me his diagnosis, my head kept singing, “One of these things is not like the other.”  Now, don’t get me wrong.  If I’m gonna be a bald woman, so be it.  There are so many worse things in the world than fretting over being follically challenged.  Men deal with it handsomely, and there’s no reason women can’t as well.  I just felt I had received a dismissive and incomplete answer.

So, I wonder if someone else has walked away from a doctor’s appointment with that same nagging feeling of not having been fully informed?  I wonder if perhaps someone went on to find a lotion or potion or yoga pose that worked?  Maybe lighting some candles and saying a novena to the Saint of Falling Hair?  Maybe some veta-vita-vegamin that poofs up the hair and makes it all sticky so it doesn’t fall out of its little shaft?  Maybe some simple hugs and hand-holding until we each find our happy-bunny place of acceptance?  Something?  Anything?

I propose we gather all serious thoughts and publish them here on the website.  It’s all about helping one another succeed and doing so as gracefully as possible.  Hey, I’ll even send a lovely DancingBirds.com baseball hat to the most clever, least noxious suggestion.  So, pony up, ladies — and gentlemen too.  Let’s hear your remedies, your thoughts, even your admonitions to just suck it up and get over it.

Let’s see what we can do to help each other be the beautiful Dancing Birds we are … and perhaps learn a new step or two from someone else.

Anyone?

P.S.  I’ll leave this post up for a couple of days to give an opportunity for any and all passers-by to play.

After every meal, Wilson runs to Scarlett’s bowl to see if (oh, hope of hopes) she’s possibly missed something.  Some tidbit or morsel or lingering taste to run his tongue across.  Scarlett’s a master of bowl cleanliness, but nevertheless, Wilson runs to her bowl.  Every time.  This seven month-old puppy is a 55 pound, smiling, fur-flying box of hope.

I’ve not felt well lately.  For the past several days I’ve been under the weather, sleeping more than I’m awake, dreaming I have large hands squeezing around my chest.  Waking to some watery thought that I’ll be better tomorrow.  The couch is beginning to take on the shape of my shoulders, my hips, my indecipherable misery.  I’ve tried self diagnosis, starting with the usual benign things.  No fever, don’t have the scoots, no sniffles, no headache.  No fluish achy-breaky shivering under a quilt.  Nothing.  Just this crushing fatigue that sends me back to the couch over and over throughout the day.  Oh, and my hair’s falling out.  And I’m not much interested in my favorite consumables.

I think there’s something amiss.

Then I look at Wilson.  Smiling, wagging Wilson, off to check out Scarlett’s breakfast bowl the moment she pulls her head from it.  And he reminds me that there’s grand hope boxed up in each of us.  Okay, so what if I’m off my feed for a few days.  These things happen.  What’s important is that there’s this huge spark of hope that once I’m up and running again, I’ll quickly finish my new and improved synopsis, package it up with the first 50 and a nice cover letter and send it all off to some really nice agents I recently met.  Then I’ll run to the mailbox every day like Wilson runs to Scarlett’s bowl.  There may not be anything there, but looking is half the fun.

Thanks Wilson.  Thanks for reminding me that even if there isn’t a morsel in the bowl, it’s still worth that flying run to see for myself.

Stay well, everyone.  Stay hopeful.

Poor Miss Scarlett.  Tomorrah is anothah day.

Oh, please! … Can’t a dog and his frog get a little privacy?

… dancing for our suppers?  Don’t we all skitter in and out, looking for crumbs or worms or a nice arugula salad with those little cherry tomatoes, some crisp Feta sprinkled over the top and a splash of low-fat vinaigrette?  Don’t we all just want to avoid the claws of the cat and leave evidence of our existence on the hood of parked cars?  Don’t we all love to congregate, our toes curled around telephone wires, chirping away with one another?  Aren’t we all just these little birds?

That’s what I was thinking as the doctor told me yesterday that, yes, I’m losing my hair.  Alopecia, he called it. Right smack on the top of my head.

Great.

So I’m losing my hair.  My feathers.

Swell.

Okay, no panic … I’ve been bald before.  There was that time when I was a baby and my hair was all rubbed off the back of my head because babies do that.  Then there was the time I had brain surgery and my entire head was shaved.  Then there was the time I was going to show support for my best friend who had cancer and I offered to shave my head so we’d match during her chemo.  She said she’d never speak to me again if I was stupid enough to shave my head just because SHE was sick.  I said I’d just be spiritually bald then.  She liked that.  So, I’ll give that a half point for good intentions.

Ahhh … Hairless.  Featherless.  What’s a bird to do?

It’s all okay.  Because aren’t we all just little birds doing the best we can with what we have when we have it?  After a glass of wine and a good cry, I decided that if I get a couple of good wigs (I’m thinking Dolly Parton here), I’ll NEVER have a bad hair day again.  This could work out!  I’m thinking different colors … different lengths.  On days I feel ironic, I could wear an auburn wig to match my name.  On those sassy days, I could be platinum blonde.  I could find my husband out working all hot and sweaty in the yard and whisper into his surprised ear in some deep, smoky Marlena Dietrich voice, “Come, I vant to fock you.”  I could go Goth black whenever I feel a Sylvia Plath poetry mood coming on.  Then, when I want to be real, I could just be … just be … bald.  And I could lace my fingers into my husband’s and lay my naked head on his shoulder while we have a movie date on the couch.

Yeah, there are way worse things that could happen.  I can do this.  The one thing I keep telling myself — over and over — is to remember how to fly.  Always — feathers or not — remember how to fly!