2015

Posted on November 28, 2015 by rangotti

Twenty-eight years ago, the universe gave me a gift. I was given the privilege of being the mother of an amazing daughter. Since the moment they laid her in my arms, I have adored her. We are so different in so many ways, it was always a mystery to me how she understood the things she did with no help from her mother. I am a tomboy, makeup confuses me, and I am totally devoid of any ability to be stylish or match colors together. My daughter is the exact opposite. She is stunningly lovely and from the time she was a small child, she picked out her own clothes, styled her own hair and had a special affinity toward shoes and purses. A dancer, cheerleader, interior designer, my daughter is very feminine.

The challenge for me as a parent was to let her be who she was and not try to make her into me. I am a very linear, direct thinker. My daughter’s thought process is like being on a tilt-o-whirl. Her mind goes from one idea to the next, it is something to behold and I wouldn’t want her to be any other way. My prayer while she was growing up was to always let her have the space to find her own way and to always accept her for who she is.

Emerging Designer of the Year

She is one of the most creative human beings I have ever met. Whether with a paintbrush, a CAD drawing, or her own feet in dance, she has always had a way to see things in her mind’s eye that I could only imagine and she is able to portray those images through whatever artistic medium of her choice. She is brilliant and I have always been amazed and sometimes intimidated by her. She is beautiful, successful and a wonderful person.

With the birth of a daughter, at some time a parent’s thoughts will turn to the future and the day she will get married. I don’t know why it is that way, but it is. I am no different. I remember that moment, looking down at this beautiful baby, hoping that I would one day see her wedding day. I remember wishing for my daughter that her wedding would be everything she wanted it to be: a beautiful bride, a heartfelt ceremony, a wonderful husband, a sunny day, surrounded by people who love her. All those things have come to fruition for tomorrow is my daughter’s wedding day.

There are so many things I want to tell her, so many things I want her to know. There are things I have told her over and over, but she doesn’t believe me. As she gets older, I hope she will someday see herself the way that I see her. My daughter is beautiful, capable, fierce, independent, intelligent, and creative. She has a presence that shows an understanding and awareness of the world around her that I have never had. She lights up a room when she walks into it, she makes everyone feel welcomed. She is gracious, charming and elegant. She is a force to be reckoned with and a joy to behold. She is a steel magnolia. And tomorrow she becomes a bride.

Who is this man she has given her heart to? He is kind, generous, compassionate, caring, funny, smart, and he looks at my daughter with a love that is tangible. I could not have envisioned a better mate for her. He believes in her and encourages her to reach for her dreams. He lets her be exactly who she is and does not try to change her into something that would destroy her amazing spirit. He is a wonderful human being. Like my daughter, my son-in-law is also a creative person. His paintings are so poignant, so thought provoking, his talent takes my breath away. Together, their lives will be filled with emotion, beauty, color, freedom, spirituality, and romance.

So on this eve of their wedding, the joy in my heart overflows. Tomorrow, I get to watch this child that I have loved with all my heart marry the man that fills her heart to completion. It will be an honor to see them pledge their lives to each other knowing that they are stronger together than either one is separately. Regardless of details, their day will be perfect because they get to be married to each other.

first communion jessica ~So to my wonderful daughter, I want you to know that all I have ever wanted is for you to be happy and have a well lived life. I want you to believe about yourself the things I know about you. You are unique. There is no one like you. I want for you to not be afraid to give your whole heart to the man you love, it is the key to being happy in your marriage.

~To Jessica and Ethan, here is my practical advice. Love each other. Treat each other with respect. Dance around your apartment. Talk to each other. Listen. Compromise. Remember how you felt at this moment. And if you ever have a dispute that you can’t seem to resolve, get naked.

And always remember that I love you with all my heart. It is an honor to be your mother.

Happy Wedding Day Jessica and Ethan!

Love,

Robin

Passion and Pixie Dust…

Posted on November 1, 2015 by rangotti

The other day, I clicked on my memories in Facebook and when I did, this old blog came up. When I read what I wrote two years ago about the person I wanted to be, I had to be reminded that I am that person. I have the characteristics I admired in my friends, I have grown and allowed myself to become what I wanted to be. However, just like with many lessons in life, sometimes things need to be revisited.

View from the porch with the fog rolling down the valley

A year ago, I came off sabbatical, got a fabulous house, moved into a fantastic new job that challenged me and had the thought of “I have arrived”. Hmmm, it is almost like I regressed and forgot all of those lessons I learned. I have been in this “stuck” headspace, feeling something deeply lacking in my life and divorced from any sense of community. I have been on autopilot. So I realized it was time to renew the blog, and write another manifesto for where I wanted to go now.
Recently, someone pointed out to me that it is my spirit and passion that draws people to me, not my intelligence or sense of adventure. It reminded me that my friend Matt once said, “Robin, you have this beautiful carefree spirit that you put walls around by intellectualizing. Let that spirit out. It won’t appeal to everyone, just the people who want to be in your life.” I think I need a little more practice on that area.

So I started writing the manifesto and asking myself some questions like, now what? Where do I go from here? Where am I going in this life next?

The first words I wrote on the page were that I want to live my life with integrity and transparency, honoring the strengths that I have found in myself and not making excuses for the weaknesses. I want my words to match my actions in everything I do in life. Two years ago, I set out on a journey that made me focus inward and that journey was successful in helping me to be the person I am today. Now, having met all those goals, in order to move on, I have to focus outward. How am I giving back to the world that has given me so much? What am I doing to make my community better; personally, professionally, locally and globally? And how do I allow that spirit and passion to be infused in everything I do? Because to live with integrity, I have to let that spirited, passionate woman come out in all the areas of my life.

Software designed to help people learn math.

Professionally, I have a pretty well articulated vision of what I want to do and who I want to be. With the help of a great group of colleagues from around the country, the vision remains crystal clear and I have no problem striving toward it because it flows from my passion. I want to be an integral member of a department that is willing to take pedagogical risks to research and find the best practices in mathematics education for all students for the 21st century. I don’t want mathematics to be a gatekeeper, weeding people out of STEM disciplines. I want it to be a gateway for any student who chooses to walk through the gate on their way to whatever career they desire. I don’t believe we will solve the problems of the world by doing the same thing over and over again. We need new ideas from places we haven’t thought of for humanity to move forward. That means more scientists, engineers, computer programmers, mathematicians that are from underrepresented groups in those fields. I want my voice to add to the conversation of how to make that happen.

Nana and Brody dancing in the kitchen

Baking Easter Cake with Brooklyn and Charlotte

Personally, I haven’t had as clear a vision. I just know that I have been feeling a soul-sucking lack of community lately. The only time I feel that I am fully connected and being myself is when I am around my grandchildren. With them, I am this carefree spirit, willing to take personal risks of looking stupid or failing, in order to achieve real connection with them. A whole continent separates us, so I don’t want to spend our precious time together having to peel through layers of social constraints. I am present with them, in the moment, and in the moment we don’t care what our hair looks like, how fit we are, or what our bank balance is. We are just there.

Joy

I listen to what their dreams are, take into account what they want and need, and then allow myself to be outrageously myself while I try to meet those needs in ways that encourage their growth. And through their failures and successes, I listen to their laughter which, in turn, floods my soul with happiness. We dance around the kitchen, bake cookies, go to the library, play in the park, look at nature, pretend we are horses and gallop around, we make mistakes and celebrate tremendous successes. The word that defines how I am with them is carefree. I am a Nana who is doused with pixie dust that I want to spread al over them.

Climbing Seminary Hill during the 7 Hills of Kirkland Ride

I want to find a community in which I can be that way, where I can let that spirit and passion be present and be accepted. Matt is right, to find that, I have to be that because people who will accept me will gravitate toward it. So my personal manifesto is to embrace my crazy. I want to be that person that lets her spirit and passion be first and foremost in her life. In looking outward, it is that carefree, passionate part of me that will impact my local and global community the most. There are lots of people in the world who are more intellectual than I am, who have way more financial resources than I do, who are more beautiful, more fit, more creative. But there is no one that has my unique spirit.

Rachel riding a coffee ride with me. I know I have made as much of a difference in Rachel’s life as she has in mine.

So who do I want to be? I want to be a Pixie Dust spreader. I want to be this carefree person who uses her passion (for adventure, art, cooking, travel, cycling, mathematics, learning, people, and whatever else happens to interest me) to engage with other people, especially those who have not had the same opportunities as I have, not for my own self-gratification but to give back to a world that has given me so much. I want to be a person who asks about other’s dreams and goals, who listens to what they need, and then who helps in whatever way I can as they make their dreams come to fruition. I want to be supportive when they struggle and I want to celebrate with joy the accomplishments of their hard work and watch as they thrive. I want to be a person who commits my time, resources and passions to people that are willing to try, to risk, to live. I want to give back to the world to honor all the people who did that for me.

“Community cannot for long feed on itself; it can only flourish with the coming of others from beyond, their unknown and undiscovered brothers.” ~Howard Thurman

Lesson Five: Be who you want to be

Posted on August 30, 2014 by rangotti

One of the best things about writing this blog has been all the responses I have received from people around the world. Some said “thank you for sharing so openly, it has helped me realize I am not alone”. Some have told me their stories. Others have asked for advice, questions such as “I am over my head in debt, how do I pay it off” to “I am not happy in my life but I don’t know how to change it, can you help”. I am not qualified to give anyone advice. I can only tell you how I dealt with similar problems.

One of my greatest take-aways from sabbatical is that I don’t just have to be who I think I am. I can be who I want to be. All my life, I have wanted to be this adventure girl. I wanted to be joyfully spontaneous and just willing to try things on a whim. I wanted to be athletic and participate in adventure sports such as mountain biking, kayaking, skiing off-piste, paragliding, climbing… you get the idea. I also wanted to be the sophisticated urban dweller and world traveler. I put those dreams aside when I had children and raised my family. I was responsible, a great high school teacher, a good university professor, a decent mother and wife. I took care of everyone. When I got divorced an moved to Seattle, I was a frumpy, middle class, 44 year old housewife from a small town in North Carolina, and I thought those kind of adventures were behind me. If you have read this blog, you realize that moving to Seattle was when I met Matt Tony, Ken, Rachel, Shaun, Deloa, Melinda, Rachelle, Keri and so many more great friends.. the list goes on and on here as well as all my friends from the Lounge and my own children, Patrick and Jessica who have cheered me and encouraged me every step of the way.

My friends opened my world and my mind to all the things that were possible, regardless of my age, weight, marital status, debt, … none of that matters. Those were all excuses to keep me paralyzed to whatever dysfunctional fear I happened to be harboring at the time. The one single thing I needed to learn was that all I had to do was try. I didn’t have to be perfect or even successful the first time, or the 27th time, I just had to keep trying. It didn’t matter if I was laughed at, judged, or taunted. I have learned that those kinds of limiting comments from other people aren’t about me, they are about the shallowness and fears of the person who is uttering them. I don’t take those kind of comments personally anymore. I am a different person. I am the person I have always wanted to be.

I set out on a journey to carve out a new identity. I thought that meant discovering who I am. It didn’t. I realized that it meant creating who I am. It is funny, as I have been reflecting on sabbatical and all the years since I moved to Seattle, my train of thought started with “I didn’t”, and “I am not” until about a month ago when trying to write this blog post and I asked myself, “so what HAVE you done?”. It was a perspective altering question.

I have rolled a kayak, climbed mountains, and jumped off those mountains in both a harness and with a wing on my back. I have skied through powder, down fall lines, under chairlifts and on glaciers. I have ridden bikes on several continents, in varied conditions with incredible people. I have ordered great wine and decadent food in restaurants all over the world. I have met new people everywhere I have gone and listened to their stories, learned about their lives, and shared the fires of the passions that light up their souls. I gave away all the trappings of my former life, my furniture, clothing, and emotional baggage. I have lived without a home or safety net to return to. I have fed endangered vultures from my hand both on the ground and while gliding in the air looking out over the Himalayas. I have traveled alone, with no plan and no itinerary, going where I wanted, seeing what interested me, meeting new people. I have faced loneliness, fear, isolation, sickness, different cultures, ostracization, and just about every human condition you can imagine.

When I read that list, what is clear to me is that I am not the person that I was anymore. I am strong, courageous, adventurous, athletic, urban, classy, loving, compassionate, giving, open… in other words, I am the person I have always wanted to be. How did I, a non-athletic, frumpy, boring, small-town, middle-class housewife do it? How did I learn to roll a boat, ski off-piste, order great wine, solo travel, talk to strangers, and give up all my possessions? The answer is simple, I tried. I set out on a course that was hard and just kept going. Overcoming obstacles, wanting to quit (many, many times), I learned and grew. I refused to stay in the dysfunction I was in and did the work necessary to have the life I wanted. Even though that sounds simple, it was the hardest, yet most rewarding thing I have ever done. I have no regrets.

Before I left on sabbatical, I had a chance to change course and stay in Seattle to be able to get the perfect house. I wanted that house so badly, I almost didn’t go on my journey because of it. The house was just an excuse to hide my fear however. Instead, I listened to my advisors and went on sabbatical anyway knowing that there would be another perfect house when I returned. I have thought of that house many times while I lived my homeless, nomadic life. In the last couple of weeks I started house hunting again. Guess what? THE house, the same one, was available and now it is mine. So for all my worry, I took the chance anyway and walked away from the safe choice. Now I have a house again or at least I will on Sept 15 and not just any house but the house I dreamed of. Until September 15, I am hanging out with my beautiful granddaughters waiting for their brother to come into the world any day now. So at the end of this incredible year, not only am I a new person but I will have a new home, a new job, and a new grandson.

It makes me happy to know that I am setting a great example for my grandchildren that life isn’t about limits, it is about challenging what limits us. Our biggest limitation is believing that we can’t change who we think we are.

Lesson Four: Order is Important

Posted on July 18, 2014 by rangotti

Everyone is different. Some people may thrive on chaos and lack of scheduling. Those people aren’t me. Maybe it is the mathematician in me, but I like order, I like planning, and I thrive on having a schedule. That doesn’t mean I am not adventurous or spontaneous, because I am certainly both of those things. There is lots of room in my life for flexibility and changing plans. But I enjoy the planning also.

One of the things I have been most influenced by on this year of self-discovery, is coming to understand that I like things orderly in my life. I like to get up at the same time every day, even on the weekends, I meditate, make my bed, exercise, and then make coffee. Every day. If I don’t, I am kind of floundering all day long, and nothing seems to get accomplished. It is like I didn’t shut yesterday off and I am still in it. I have to have a way to start my day with a routine, no matter where in the world I am. It works for me. It is kind of like resetting my life to a new day. The mistakes of yesterday are past, today I am starting anew. I reset my compass and then embrace the new day.

I also have realized that, although I am not a neat freak, I like order in my environment. As I start owning more possessions again, it makes me anxious. I am looking forward to having a house of my own again, at the same time, I am terrified of having to purchase furniture and decorate it. Clutter makes me crazy. There is peace in order. There is peace in having a small amount of possessions so that I know what I have and where everything is when I am looking for it. At least that is true for me.

One of the major lessons I have learned this year is that I want my life to be about simplicity That goes for the amount of possessions I own as well as where I end up deciding to live. When I lived in a high rise condo, it made my life difficult for the things I love to do. Just getting my bikes out was a huge chore. They were either in the storage unit or in the middle of my living room on the 7th floor and we weren’t allowed to take them in the elevator. Thus every time I rode, which was every day, it was this ordeal. It took a huge commitment on my part. Same with skiing, kayaking, etc. I want my life to be simple. I want a garage where I can work on my own gear, a small townhouse where I don’t have to do yard work but with outdoor space where I can have a container garden. Someplace that is easy to access the roads l love to ride, the water I love to paddle, and the mountain I love to ski on. I haven’t found it yet, but I am closer.

This year I learned that I want to spend less time and resources of my life taking care of “stuff” and have more to devote to taking care of myself and the people I love. Every day I want to practice mindfulness, letting go of attachment, reducing suffering (my own and others) and increasing happiness. I want my life to be about kindness and compassion. For me, I can’t do any of those things from a cluttered environment filled with a bunch of unnecessary stuff, and that includes both physical things as well as intellectual and emotional ones.

So I have this cleared out life. I cleared out my physical possessions, challenged the places where I was emotionally stuck, and got a new job to challenge myself intellectually. Now, how do I put the pieces back together again in a way that is conducive to how I want to live the last 1/3 of my life? That is the question.

TextMatt.com

Posted on February 19, 2014 by rangotti

I had a lovely meeting with my friend Sally yesterday. She wanted to hear about my sabbatical adventures. I told her about being in Spain and feeling like I was emotionally and mentally going backward and texting my friend Matt and saying “I am taking one step forward and three steps back” to which he replied “take bigger steps forward”. He always knew just what to say to make me laugh and put my issues into perspective. Sally was laughing at the story and said the same thing many of my friends have said. She said “I need a Matt to text when I am struggling”. To which I thought…don’t we all?

So we thought, why not a website? TextMatt.com. Why not indeed? In the absence of such a great website, today, I am trying to channel my inner Matt. There are a few women I can think of that need some Matt wisdom.

To Sally, Jessica, Heather, Rachel, Keri, Amanda, Tracy and all the other young women I know, some that I have spoken with recently. You are young women who are struggling to figure out how to do it all, to love deeply the men and women you care about, risk having and raising children, push forward in careers, struggle with worries about money and how you are going to accomplish everything. You think about the impact you are having on the world around you as you are managing the mundane of everyday life… Here is what Matt would say to you:

Embrace it all. All of those moments, put together like pieces of fabric in a quilt, is what will ultimately make up your life. Love, loss, careers, staying home with babies, cooking, cleaning, saving lives, teaching, jumping out of planes, skiing, getting a dog, playing softball, getting a PhD, going to China… each moment, together with the moments before it and the moment after it, become your life. None of it is wrong and every moment is as important as the last, whether you are cooking dinner, carting kids around, programming software, or marrying the person you love. All of it has value. Stop spending all the time worrying about doing it wrong and just do it. Because whether it is right or wrong, at least you didn’t let the moment pass by, unlived.

Many people live their whole lives refusing to take risks, sitting safely on the sidelines watching their lives go by, fearing the unknown of change, wrapped up in bubble wrap in a state of perfection which, underneath that façade is anything but perfection. They live in an endless struggle of wanting others to believe that their lives are perfect, afraid to show vulnerability, afraid to be real.

Matt would tell you to live a life that is sloppy, messy, and imperfect. Just let it hit you with all the struggles, joys, challenges and opportunities and embrace them all. Find sloppy, messy, and imperfect people to surround yourself with. People who accept you in all your crazy glory. You are strong and will get stronger as you get older. Don’t let anyone make you believe otherwise. Be true to yourself and keep dancing around the kitchen, unrestrained. Be vulnerable, authentic, whole, and wide open… people will think you are batshit crazy because of it, but Matt would say to you… batshit crazy is the best way to live your life.

Love the men and women you love, live the life that makes you happy, and never ever let anyone tell you that you are doing it wrong. Soon, the day will come and you will be looking back across the years at all you have accomplished. You will be watching those children become adults, with struggles of their own. You will be laughing about the adventures you had, remembering the people who have come and gone from your life, and being thankful that you were given this ride on the planet. You will look across your career at the lives you touched and impacted, whether directly through occupations like teaching and nursing, or indirectly through creating clean water or a better living environment of a newly designed house. And you will know that your lives were well-lived. There is no greater joy than that of a well-lived life. That is what Matt would say.

From me: I am so proud of all of you. I am grateful that you all came into my life. You have enriched my life and changed me as a person. I am a better person from knowing all of you. I know that when my time is up on this planet that there will be a generation of strong confident women who are impacting the world around them, making it better for the women and men of the next generation.

Oh, and Matt also says: Just say no to crack.

Letter to my older self…

Posted on February 5, 2014 by rangotti

So many people asked me to do this that I had to comply. Last week, I wrote a letter to my younger 25 year old self of things I would want her to know from what I have learned over the last couple of decades. A lot of people asked me to do the same with my older self, that is, what I would want my older self to know. Since I am 50, I decided to write a letter to my 70 year old self. I have to admit, I struggled with this one more than the last letter. Thinking about being 70 and entering the last couple of decades of life is harder than looking back and imparting wisdom on a younger Robin with a future stretching before her. I am not afraid of death, but I am afraid of getting old. When I get old and outlive my usefulness, I want to have the capacity to walk off into the wilderness where I can look up into the mountains that I love and just die. No fuss, no fanfare. Just the natural end of a life well lived.

Robin,

Wow, you’ve made it to 70. There have been many times in your life that you didn’t think you would ever see this day. Yet here you are. Hopefully, you have taken care of your health and are still active. Finally, you get to have that discounted ski pass at Stevens!!! Woot!! You’ve been waiting for that for 25 years. I hope you are still active enough to enjoy it. I hope you are skiing every weekday and get at least 50 days in.

Retirement finally came for you two years ago. I hope you stayed on track to have at least a million dollars in your retirement account. It will suck if you didn’t and you have to eat cat food to survive. My hope is that you learned from the lean years of paying off all that debt incurred during your marriage and have kept saving money. It is okay if people call you fiscally conservative or even if they call you cheap. It still beats having to survive off cat food.

I hope you kept on learning and trying new things and experiences, it is how you stay young. Try not to be like some older people and get too set in your ways. Remember Matt? Remember how much you learned from him all those years ago and the fun that you had? Don’t forget that you can learn a lot about life from people of all ages, so don’t be the old fuddy-duddy who thinks they have all the answers and won’t listen to anyone else, especially younger people. Be open, listen, learn.

And don’t forget, if you are lonely and think no one comes to see you, then get off your ass and go to see them. People want you to care about their interests, they want you to be interested in their lives and what they are passionate about. Go to your grandchildren’s games, graduations, weddings… call them, listen to them, make time for them. Don’t just sit around and bemoan that no one wants to visit with you because if you do, guess what will happen? No one will want to be around you. If you want people to be interested in your life, you have to start by being interested in theirs.

The twin granddaughters are about 23 now, graduated from college. Hopefully, you kept your word and have been taking them on trips every year to show them how big the world is and that you made that same commitment with your other grandchildren you had too. I hope you took them to Nepal, Africa, Myanmar, South America and let them see some of the remote places of the world. I hope you took them diving, paragliding, cycling, and I really hope you taught them how to ski. A great graduation trip might be a ski trip to the Alps or to Whistler where you can rent a nice apartment and your old lady self can go to bed early and where the grandkids can stay up and party all night. Remember that experiences are worth more than stuff, spend your money and time having experiences with them. It is the best legacy you could leave them.

I hope you are living in a place where it is easy to get around. A nice, one bedroom condo in an urban area. Easy to clean and you can spend your time going to the theater and concerts and have adventures easily. That way you can give up the drivers license and still have your freedom. Give up the driver’s license before you don’t want to, that way it isn’t an issue for your kids having to take it away from you. Make plans for the last years of your life. Pick out the retirement community and assisted living facility you want to be in now. You’ve worked your whole life to take care of your family, take care of them now by making those decisions for yourself while you still can so that you won’t be a burden to them in a few years.

The end of your life is coming. Just like with the rest of your life, you get to choose how you face it. Face it with grace, courage, and dignity. Choose to live your life on your terms, each day giving your best, caring for the people in your life, and remembering how much you are loved. Choose to keep having amazing adventures and always be thankful for how great your life has been. It truly has been an incredible ride.

No regrets, just go enjoy the sunset of your life.

Robin

Letter to my younger self…

Posted on January 26, 2014 by rangotti

I read a book a long time ago called “What I Know Now: Letter to My Younger Self”. I was in my office the other day working on a grant and saw it on a shelf and thought about what a great idea it would be to write a letter to my younger self. What would I want her to know? Then I realized it would depend on what age I was so I decided on writing a letter to my 25 year old self. At 25, I was in my second year of my master’s degree program. I remember wearing a tie-dyed t-shirt that my husband bought me for a birthday present to teach class in that day. I remember having a huge existential crisis over the fact that I was turning 25 and that seemed so old and grown up. I was already married with a 7 year old and a 2 year old but for some reason, turning 25 made me feel very old.

At 25, I had already put myself through undergraduate school and graduated Magna cum Laude and was driven to succeed in graduate school. Even though I had gone through a teacher education program, my teaching assistant position at a 4 year university felt like an internship where I was able to get more practice at being a teacher before teaching high school. I had the help of a great friend and math teacher Danny Lueck who passed away a few years ago. I remember those times sitting in my living room grading 120 papers and he would be giving me advice on how to grade them more efficiently so that I wouldn’t go crazy. He was a good friend. I would go on to teach public high school for over a decade before returning to graduate school again to get my PhD and moving into higher education. Along the way, building my career, I sacrificed a lot of my personal life. I don’t regret my education or my job path. It has allowed me to make an impact on the world, but it also came with a price.

Going through this letter-writing process was a great one for reminding me of where I was and where I am now. If you are over 35, I suggest trying this. Don’t just think of what you would say to your younger self, actually take the time to write it out. If you are under 35, I suggest writing a letter to your older self. Add 20 years to your age and tell that older you what you want them never to forget. Put it away and then read it again in a few years and see how you are doing. You could even make it a tradition every 5 years to go back and reread and then write a new letter. Just a thought.

Dear Robin,

I see you standing there, in front of that class of undergraduates who are barely younger than you. There are so many of them, looking toward you like you have the answers to all their problems in math. Yet you are standing there shaking in your shoes because you know you are going to screw up. Yes you will, so stop worrying about it. You will survive the embarrassment of calling a hypotenuse a hypothesis for a whole class until one of your students points it out. You will survive your first (and subsequent) altercation with students where you have to confront them on discipline issues. You will weather the storm on the first (and subsequent) time that someone complains about your teaching. The thing to remember is this: you are going to be a great teacher but that greatness doesn’t come without making a bunch of mistakes. Let go of the control and thinking you have all the answers, don’t be afraid to say “I don’t know but I will find out and let you know tomorrow”, and don’t be afraid to ask the kids “I don’t know, what do you think?” and let them come up with their own answers. They will learn more that way. Never back a kid into a corner, always give them a way out and a way to save face. Laugh at yourself, have sense of humor in your classroom, don’t take things so seriously.

That goes for your personal life too. You are far too serious for being 25 years old. Look at your two beautiful children, they need a mother that laughs and plays with them. They will grow up to be amazing human beings, your pride in them will know no bounds. I wish I could say you aren’t going to make any mistakes in raising them, but you are. They will love you despite the times you screw up. Play with them more, be unrestrained, show them how to have adventures. And while you are at it, have some yourself. It is okay to be concerned with your career, it is going to take you places you never imagined. But don’t let it get in the way of adventures. They are what fuels your soul. They don’t have to be big or cost lots of money, you just have to be willing to let go of control, not be perfect, and get lost in the moment of life.

Try not to spend all of your life being perfect. Someday that perfect life will shatter into a million pieces and you won’t know how to deal with it. The key to surviving that is to realize that imperfection is where the good stuff of life happens. Your life will start when you are willing to jump in and do stuff without fearing you’ll make a mistake. Fear is where the fun starts, it isn’t the paralyzing emotion that you think it is. Face what you are most afraid of head on with no hesitation. It will set you free.

You did a great job at 25, allowing yourself to trust your husband, have kids, build a great life. Those choices will make you very happy over the next 20 years. You will have no regrets about raising your family, living in the town that you choose, having the wonderful friends that you have. Never look back on that time with regrets, it is magic time, filled with wonder. Someday, after your life falls apart, you will build a new life, very different from that. It is okay, nothing lasts forever. You will move on. During that rebuilding time, my advice to you is try to let go faster. It really is the key to being happy. You have to learn how to recognize when a relationship is at its end and be okay with that. Cherish the relationship for what it brought you and look with anticipation at the next one that will come into your life. A relationship ends when it has fulfilled its need in your life and its ending opens up a space to allow you another one that will meet different needs.

A couple of things I really want you to remember:

Your hair doesn’t matter as much as you think it does, don’t waste so much time and money on it.
Stand closer to the fire. Don’t stand on the periphery of life, get in where it is warm, where life is happening.
Dance more and don’t stop singing. The day might come when you will forget how much joy these things bring to life so capture the joy while you can.
Make mistakes. It is how you learn and grow.
Take care of your body. You will spend money, time, and energy taking care of your house or cars while ignoring the one thing in your life that can’t be replaced, your health. Put your effort and energy into making sure the one body you have to go through this life with is always running in peak condition.
Take the harder road, make the more difficult choice. Yes, the learning curve is larger, but there is a reason the phrase “no guts, no glory” came about. The harder road is the greater opportunity. You won’t get where you want to be by playing it safe.
Don’t be afraid to embrace the people who come into your life for the gifts they are. And don’t be afraid to let them go when it is time.
Someday, you will meet some sketchy internet people, they are trustworthy. They will help you find your voice again.
Someday, in your darkest hours, you will meet someone who is going to change your life. He is young and it seems an odd friendship and you will question it many, many times. Don’t. Risk trusting this person, he will teach you how to play again after a lifetime of responsibility. He will teach you how to be strong. He will teach you about the person you want to be. He will help you find your soul.

You are going to have the best life ever. Live every day of it.

Robin

The 8 boxes…

Posted on December 15, 2013 by rangotti

Yesterday, I unpacked my suitcase for the first time since May. It was bittersweet, I hadn’t expected the mix of emotions it would bring. As I unpacked and put my stuff away in a new house, new room, I couldn’t help but remember my last apartment and the last time my clothes hung in a closet. I was a little overwhelmed by all the changes.

I think that not having a home to come back to made my time travelling both physically simple yet emotionally challenging at the same time. Travelling and knowing you have a familiar and comfortable place to come back to is very different from returning home to the unknown of having to find a place to live. Add on the fact that I gave up all my stuff, an act which was both freeing and yet again, ridiculously challenging emotionally, and it made coming home and unpacking my clothes this surreal experience. And yes, I found a great house and a super roommate. Now I just have to adjust to a totally new life.

For those of you that haven’t read the back story, when I gave up my apartment in May and then started traveling in June, rather than put things in storage for a year, I reduced all of my possessions from the last 50 years of my life to 8 boxes, my checked bag of clothes and a carry on, and some gear stored at a friends house (thanks Jason!). It was the hardest thing I have ever done. At least, it was the hardest thing I have ever done…until now.

Yesterday, I opened one of the 8 boxes. I had thought that it would be a fun adventure to see what I had saved. Instead, it felt more like opening Pandora’s Box. The box I happened to open had pictures of my kids, a wood bowl that my uncle made, a ceramic heart that my daughter made when she was in elementary school, a box my son brought back from Australia when he was a teenager. Similar to the experience of hanging my clothes in the closet, it was like a blast of memories rising up out of the cardboard. I took out the big pieces and set them on a shelf in my room and then closed the box without going through the pictures. I didn’t open the other boxes yet.

Today, my roommate and I are going to put up a Christmas tree. I took out the two boxes of ornaments that I had saved. Everyone that knows me, knows how much I used to love the spirit of Christmas. Those ornaments represent 50 years of family holiday memories. I have to admit, I am not sure I can open the boxes.

So what is my problem? I had this amazing experience over the past 6 months. I am a different person. I shed the memories of the past and stepped into my present and hopefully my future. I am happy and moving on. The problem is, I don’t want to go back to revisit the past at all, I want to avoid thinking about it and just continue on with my happy life. It isn’t that I want to erase it or forget it, it is all part of what made me who I am. I just want to keep moving forward. But there is one thing I know for certain, when something feels difficult and I don’t want to do it, that is the very thing that I need to do the most. The hard things show me what I still need to work on. Hmm it might be time for some brutal honesty here Robin. I hate it when I have to really reach inside for the hard emotional stuff. Okay here goes…

So I am looking at those boxes and part of me wishes I hadn’t saved anything… and that feels like a betrayal to all the people who gave things to me. For example, in one of those packing crates are the Shaker boxes that my dad made me before he died and I should feel excited to open them up. But instead, I am torn. On one hand, I have these possessions that have memories of the people I love attached to them, possessions like Shaker boxes and ceramic hearts from people like my dad or my kids. On the other hand, I have the memories and the love of the people, I don’t need “stuff” to feel that. In fact, somehow the “stuff” diminishes from that love. I guess what is confusing me is that, in the last 6 months, I have felt the love of the people in my life in a really powerful way and that couldn’t have happened with possessions detracting and getting in the way.

I guess when all the possessions in my life had been stripped away and all I had was the love of my family and friends, my whole life was just clearer and uncluttered. The love I experienced over the last half year felt like the pure essence of what we are as human beings. I want to make sure that I don’t lose that feeling in the trappings of “stuff” again. That is really what I am scared of. Because material things, even handmade Shaker boxes made with love from my dad, can never replace the time spent with the people I love and who love me. So even though I have those boxes, they aren’t more valuable than all the memories or the time I spent with my dad when he was alive. The mementos and things I have from my children aren’t anything compared to the time I have spent with them and the love that we share.

I guess I have come to understand how much of a distraction all the stuff we have really is. Obtaining and caring for possessions, working to pay for them, using them to substitute for emotions, buying things to fill voids in our lives, all those things distract us from what is really important in life which is loving the people in our lives and spending time with them. That is the greatest lesson I have learned and I never want to forget it again. That is what I don’t want to go back to. Ever.

So I guess I am scared that opening those boxes and reattaching to things will distract me from putting my emphasis on people. Today, opening those ornaments, is going to be a challenge, but I have to do it. Avoidance is never a solution. I just need to breathe, stay present, be aware and I can totally do this.

Saying thank you

Posted on December 10, 2013 by rangotti

When I was mired in my life-altering changes of moving 3000 miles away from my support system and getting divorced, I found keeping a “thank-you” journal useful in helping me see the world from a positive perspective rather than succumbing to negative thoughts. At the end of every day, I would write down 5 things I was thankful for. It was difficult when I first started but as I kept up the habit, I found that I would be mindful about things throughout the day that I was thankful for so that I had 5 things to write in my journal at night. It helped me to learn to be thankful for the small everyday moments that I sometimes took for granted.

Recently, I had the privilege and pleasure of visiting with my friend Marvin and his lovely wife Naomi in Boston. Marvin is one of my imaginary internet friends from my cycling forum and a teammate from Team Collin. I am always thankful for my internet friends and don’t tell them enough what they mean to me. They are men and women who have encouraged me, listened to me cry (virtually), stuck with me during the dark times, and helped me become the woman I am. Just like with any large group, you become closer to some people than you are to others. Those I am close to, I trust without question. Marvin is one of those people. He has stood by me even when I have tried to push away his friendship, listened with unconditional acceptance, given me fantastic advice, made me laugh, and is one of those rare people of impeccable integrity and honor. His lovely wife is just as amazing, intelligent, thoughtful and accepting as he is and I felt honored to finally meet her and get to know her. She is as fabulous as he has described.

Marvin and Naomi let me stay at their home and showed me the depth of their loving hospitality and I hope to return the favor someday when they come to Seattle. We had great conversations and fantastic food. Although I am a hopeless insomniac, I felt so comfortable at their home, I slept better than I have since I visited Len and Ella (also imaginary internet friends) last summer. I can’t thank them enough for all that they gave me.

Marvin and my other internet friends remind me of my brothers who are also men of incredible honor and integrity just like our dad was, it was how we were raised. I am currently staying at the home of my brother Rod and my beautiful sister-in-law Ada. Again, they have offered me their hospitality, warmth, acceptance and love. I can’t thank them enough. My sister-in-law also happens to be the best massage therapist I have ever had. She has such a depth of knowledge of her craft and can reduce me to feeling like an unraveled mitten in no time. Total bliss. Thanks Ada!

Aside from being blessed by their generosity, because I visited them back-to-back, I noticed the similarities in both Marvin & Naomi’s relationship and Rod & Ada’s. I was thankful to have the opportunity to watch both of these long term couples interact and it has given me insight into my relationships. There are few key elements in their relationships and the way they treat each other that stood out to me. In no particular order, these include respect, laughter, affection, appreciation/value, and trust:

Respect. Whether it is choosing a movie for date night or supporting the other in going back to get a massage therapy license, each of these two couples respected their partner’s opinion. There was no competition, no belittling, just an acceptance of the other as an equal being worthy of respect and working together as a team.
Laughter. They tease each other, laugh at each other’s foibles, and they know that the teasing from their partner is with love and free of malice. They have fun together.
Affection. They hold hands, look into each other’s eyes, stop to hug each other. There is a communication between them that requires no words. Daily intimacy is key in keeping their relationships alive.
Appreciation and value. They appreciate what the other does and value what they bring to their lives. Whether it is making dinner, doing laundry, giving a massage, allowing an out-of-town friend or relative to come visit, … whatever. Each partner, without the other present, would talk about how much they appreciate their mate, how being with them makes their lives better, and what a good person he/she is.
Trust. They trust each other with a tangible, fundamental trust that can’t be described. It is the backbone of their healthy relationships.

There are more intangibles that I can’t describe, these couples have been together for a long time, but those are the things that really struck me. And their relationships hold a mirror up for me for all my relationships, not just romantic ones. The people I keep in my life are people I respect and who show me respect in return. They are people who I can laugh and have fun with. They are people that give affection and who appreciate and value what I bring to their lives and in whom I value in return and who outwardly show that value and appreciation. They are people I can trust. Those things are all necessary elements of healthy relationships.

Reflecting on that made me feel pretty good about the relationships I have been cultivating. For a long time, I felt I had to be liked by everyone. I put everyone’s needs ahead of my own and would keep giving my heart to relationships with people that really weren’t into having a reciprocal relationship with me. That mentality allowed me to be taken advantage of in some pretty extreme ways. Now, basking in the love of the healthy relationships I have, it is easy to see how much my current relationships enrich my life and how destructive those former relationships were.

So thank you to Marvin & Naomi and Rod & Ada for allowing me to glimpse your lives. And thank you to all my wonderful friends and family. I appreciate you. You all add tremendous value to my life.

Adventure of the day…

Posted on December 3, 2013 by rangotti

Sorry for being so absent about writing this blog. I have been distracted by having adventures with a beautiful set of two-and-a half-year-old twins.

I have mentioned that for a long time I was stuck in longing for my old life back. Even though I kept plodding along seemingly moving forward with my life, my heart was still wrapped in memories of the past. To those looking from the outside, it might seem like that time of longing was wasted, but it wasn’t. Everything is a process. For me, letting go of my life took a period of grieving and mourning. It took me a while to go through that process but it was absolutely necessary to be able to actually move on. Even when I was mired in that process and it seemed like I was stuck, I have come to realize that I didn’t keep standing still and I am proud of that. I made some mistakes, had some successes, and even though my heart was caught up in another time, I kept moving forward regardless. Or maybe, it was just that my friends kept shoving me forward but either way the result has been the same. Here I am.

Today, I am packing to leave my son’s house after a lovely visit with my son and his beautiful wife and the two most amazing grandchildren in the whole world (I might have mentioned that before). Although I am sad to be leaving, this time it isn’t the soul-sucking sadness that it has been in the past where I was pining for my life back. This time, it is different. I know that I will wrap these memories up from this visit and all the love they contain and I will keep them close to my heart while I am living the life I am in right now at this moment, confident that I always have the love of my family. And I know that someday soon, Patrick, Heather, Brooklyn, and Charlotte are going to come to visit me in Seattle and we will make a whole host of new memories.

So I am heading to Boston to visit some friends and play tourist in a city that I have loved since I was a teenager in New England. Then I am heading to Maine to see my family and to do something that I never ever thought I would do. I am going to go to a party where I will see all my friends from high school that I haven’t seen in 33 years. I have had a few pangs of trepidation, wondering what to heck I am doing that for, but then I realize it is a great story collecting opportunity. And that is what life is, a collection of stories.

You see, high school isn’t for everyone and it certainly wasn’t a great time for me. Having been the victim of an early sexual assault as a pre-teen, I turned to drugs and alcohol at a very young age because I didn’t know how to handle the emotions of what had happened to me. My parents went through a difficult divorce, my dad remarried, and I just spiraled out of control. So my memories of high school and my friends memories of me aren’t the greatest. I wasn’t a very nice person. But here is the thing…I am not that girl anymore.

So I get to go back and meet these people again. I am a new person and so are they. We get to laugh and enjoy each other’s company. I will get to hear their stories of how their lives have evolved; stories of love and loss, joy and heartbreak. I want to listen and understand who they are as people. I want to know what touches their soul. It is an opportunity to make new friends all over again. So even with my moments of trepidation, I find that I am really looking forward to the opportunity. I want to see them with new eyes and an open heart and hopefully, they will be able to look at me the same way.

Then, after spending some time with my extraordinary brothers and their families, I am heading back to Seattle to see my beautiful daughter and her amazing partner Ethan and their new puppy. I am going to visit with my friends and do some skiing and spend Christmas at Tony and Ken’s beautiful home. I get to ride my bike and talk math education with Keri. I have to say, I am looking forward to being back in Seattle.

Everything is different. It is like my life is brand new. Every day is an adventure.

Life Divided by Zero

The Journey of Becoming Undefined

Category Archives: family