ReadyTo Roll!
Hi I am back from a great family vacation just missng the hurricane heading towards the Carribean! I am very eager to respond to all bloggers re my column "Why Not?" in "Her" magazine's first online publication! What would you like to do in your life and what might you think is stopping you? Feel free to write, and why not? :-) Thanks! Dr. Meami Caig
While you read this column, why not start fresh and throw out ALL the rules, creating your own? Why not change your name, why not go to Jamaica as a woman alone for three glorious nights an rediscover your Self in the surf, and why not try out for an on air radio job? Why not buy yourself a single fresh rose to keep right next to your bed every week and plant your nose in it daily drinking in the sweet smell, why not strap the kid's carseats into a zippy convertible instead of a station wagon, and why not change your hair color as often as you do the sheets?
I have done all of the above and more--most outrageously more, and so can YOU as we share these columns and your reactions to it together. My own story started when I could no longer stand to be called by my given name, "Mary Beth".
Six years and two toddlers into our marriage, I informed my intrepid husband that I was changing my name, and what's more, that I didn't know to what exactly but would inform him when I did. He immediately got a bottle of Harvey's Bristol Cream sherry out of the cabinet, put it squarely down on the kitchen counter, asked me if I needed him to pour me a drink and added, "So what are you going to be now, Olivia?"
The truth was, as a woman, a REAL woman who by then had given birth twice (and 21 years later now still has the stretch marks and the baby weight to prove it) I had outgrown my Catholic grade school name that had felt comfortingly conforming at the age of ten at the Academy of the Sacred Heart for girls amidst all the other Mary Margarets and Mary Catherines in our matching lace matillas at mass. But in my 30's, with a well-known, conservative local family and a husband whose corporate image did not exactly relish "stand-out" wives with crazy changed first names, I took a dare on myself.
I stood up emotionally and christened myself "Meami", which is symbolic for "I am me" when spelled backwards. It means I am NOT just someone's wife, mother, daughter or employee--and neither are you. In fact, the birth of this new column is all about YOU--challenging you to ask yourself each time you read it, "Why not?"
This new column is NOT about the same old yada yada yada screaming at you from most women's magazine covers about how to lose ten pounds, make lemon chicken for dinner and teach your kids French all while keeping your sex life active. It's about encouraging you to decide for yourself what your own personal "Why not?" questions are, anything from going back to school for that degree or going blonde.
We are not just "desperate housewives" hoping the plumber down the street will notice us if we package ourselves in the right bustier--in fact, if we listen to our own inner wisdom and ask ourselves "Why not?" we just might find we are not desperate at all but instead human souls trying to live day to day in this world making a difference just by being here. A wise friend once told me she believed the only reason we are born is to make our own unique positive contribution while on the planet, and to have some fun along the way. I invite you to answer me, to respond to this new column by writing to me on line and calling me on the radio, at 222-1013, asking for yourself: "Why not?"
