About Me

I’m just happy to be here. It took me a half century but I’m starting to figure it out. A good life starts with good thoughts. Our brains are programmable and we set the code. Good thoughts in and bad thoughts out and so it goes. Like most people, I’m irreverent, spiritual, jaded and trusting. I’m learning to admit fault quickly and accept apology with grace. I haven’t always been the perfect mother but my love is strong and I’m thankful I taught my children to accept my own apologies with grace. I don’t think marriage is essential for happiness but since I bought into the institution in my twenties I’m pretty damn thankful that the second time around I picked a guy who loves me no matter how I look in the morning. And the fact that he still makes my heart go crazy is a nice bonus. Life’s simple. We just like to make it complicated. Why "Holy Spoon?" Because sometimes life just seems to be a series of misinformation and misunderstandings. When I was young my family called the slotted spoon the “holy spoon” and in my childish brain I believed it held some religious significance. I’m not sure why I thought God cared about what was in our silverware drawer.

Thursday, May 2, 2013

How To Kill Your Own Spiders is a Guest Blog by Amanda Bauer




How To Kill Your Own Spiders

 

I have done the unthinkable…I killed my own spider.

Now, to back up a bit, I hate spiders. HATE. For the first four years of my adulthood I have always lived with a roommate, and whenever there was a spider in the apartment-it didn’t matter where it was or how close I was to a shoe, I always had the roommate kill it for me. One roommate even took a picture of me on the couch, hiding under my comforter in one room while he was standing on a chair killing the huge and horrible spider that was dangling from our ceiling in the other room. Pathetic, right?

Fast forward to about a week and a half ago, when I found out that my current roommate would be moving back home and that I would be faced with living alone. A series of questions flooded me; first-who would kill my spiders?! And truthfully, how would I feel coming home night after night to an empty apartment? The idea of being alone with my self, having to deal with my thoughts and my life all the time scared me. I have spent a lot of time avoiding this scenario, and now that I would be forced to live alone with my self, whatever would I do? Who would distract me?

In the past, I had the misfortune along the way of dealing with people who took advantage of my self-respect, and the repercussion was that I came into my adult life putting more effort into showing other people how much self-respect I had, instead of showing myself. As a result, I found myself dreading spending a significant amount of time alone, as I didn’t want to face that. I feared having the time, too much time to get lost in my own thoughts and to have to deal with the lack of security I had in my own self and my own self-respect. However, the fact is that at the end of the day, you’re only responsible for yourself (my mother taught me that.) There were life lessons that I needed to learn, and whether I liked it or not-I was going to have to face them eventually.

No matter how old I am, I need to learn how to deal with me, and how to like and be comfortable with having that relationship with my self and to make it a priority. As a person, I’ve talked a lot about confidence and self care to other people, but I had realized that I was being a hypocrite. I wasn’t applying it to my own life to the best of my ability. I hadn’t been giving the necessary attention to the one relationship I have that will never go away (no matter how hard I try.) So what about that incessant need to prove myself to everyone else? I realized that the only person I ever needed to prove it to was the one person that needed it the most-me. I recognized that that quiet connection within myself would speak far greater volumes than any words I could ever say. And, that power and that confidence comes solely from the security that I have within myself. So, what better place to start that journey than in having my own place?

In the end, I came to the conclusion that living alone would be the best way to begin this growth and work within myself, and that I was more than ready for it. So, one of my goals in this new chapter of my life has been to finally kill my own spider. Low and behold, after a long chat with my mom about my newfound inner connection-I happened upon a spider in my room. Now, mind you, it wasn’t a small spider, but you know what I did? I squealed a bit…then grabbed my shoe and whacked the shit out of the thing! And you know what I call that? Killing your own spiders.

Amanda Bauer is an actress, writer, director and producer living in Los Angeles. She can be seen in The Myth of the American Sleepover (an Official Selection at the Cannes Film Festival, AFI and the Special Jury Award Winner at the SXSW Film Festival.) Her most recent film, Forev, will premier at the Los Angeles Film Festival 2013. She has appeared in Mad Men and other television movies and shows and has Executive Produced, Written and Directed her own web series, The Common Room.



 

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