funny, isn't it?
by jeanne charters

Recently, I met with a hypnotherapist for a very interesting exploration of my psyche. What I decided was that I’m not quite screwed up enough at this time to warrant the expenditure required to continue her services. I will keep her phone number in my back pocket, however, in case I unravel at some point in the near future. Sobbing and drooling are not activities I choose to engage in for any length of time, you know.

One exercise she did with me intrigued me a lot. I was lying on a sort of massage table on my back. Soothing New Age music played discreetly in the background. She asked me to close my eyes and visualize the most beautiful and safe place I could imagine. She suggested a beach…perhaps a lake…perhaps high up in the mountains. This exercise was to connect me to the spirit I choose to call God. (Frankly, it’s shorter than calling Him/Her “Great Creator”, “Spirit of the Universe”, etc.)

The purpose of this exercise is to give the person an anchor so that, whenever he or she feels frightened or insecure, they can touch their thumb to their forefinger, close their eyes and go to this favorite place and connect with God and their own soul.

I put myself on the beach with the waves rolling up on the shore. Next, I was sitting beside a placid lake in the Adirondacks. Then I took a climb up Mt. Pisgah. They were all wonderful spots to visit for a while; but after each visit, I found myself coming back to one spot…my own front porch. Funny, isn’t it, that sometimes it takes an exercise like this to truly appreciate what’s in our own backyard…or in my case, front yard?

I sit on my front porch every day of the year when I’m home, excepting maybe January through March, around 5:30PM. Sometimes, I’m with my husband. Always, I’m with my dog. Sometimes, I have a cup of tea…sometimes (more often), a glass of wine. If Matt’s not there for catch-up-on-the-day conversation, I take a book or magazine out with me.

I sit there when the weather is balmy and when the storms are raging in my front yard. One condition soothes. The other excites.

When the wind really rips and the lightning and thunder turn the sky to a dark background for heavenly fireworks, that’s when I believe God is showing me his power. I know then I’d better watch my P’s & Q’s and not tick Him/Her off too much.

When the wind is so still that the trees seem frozen in time, that’s when I feel I’m learning the hardest lesson of all for me to learn…that of patience.
Last night, I was sitting there with Matt and Poncho. Matt put on a CD of beautiful Celtic music and the trees were moving in exact time to the lilt of the music. Just as the last strains of the disc ended, the trees ceased their sway. I took that as a sign…that God was at peace with me and, also, that it was time for me to start dinner.

My favorite time on my porch is when the wind turns the tops of the tall poplar trees to dancing ferns swaying high above me. I put my head back on my chair and gaze at them as they wave to and away from each other, sometimes intertwining their branches and then pulling away like future lovers in a coy first-date flirtation.

Matt and I talk sometimes of selling our house and buying a condominium downtown. It’s tempting to think of walking out on the streets of Asheville for groceries, coffee, a movie or entertainment. I think someday, we will do that.
You see, this house is bigger than we need. I don’t like to clean it The yard work is constant and everything we want requires a drive somewhere. Our neighbors live far enough away from us that we don’t really make the effort to know them well. That’s by choice. What’s not by choice is that no family lives close. All visits require an airplane ride. This kind of isolation is new to me; and though I have good friends around the world, few of them live nearby.

Those are the downsides.

However, there is my porch.

When we bought this house nearly four years ago, our dear friends Nancy and Harry gave us a plaque to hang on our porch. It reads…

If you’re lucky enough to live in the mountains, you’re lucky enough.

Harry wasn’t lucky enough to live in the mountains for very long. He died three months after they relocated from upstate New York to Hendersonville. However, the plaque remains and sometimes, I can feel Harry’s spirit sitting with me on my front porch.

What does he say to me?

Be grateful, Jeanne, for this time of your life…for this wonderful front porch…for what truly are the golden years of your life. Wish I were with you.
Me, too, Harry. Come sit with me and have a drink on my magic porch.

Jeanne Charters is a former V.P. of Marketing for Viacom Television. She started her own award-winning broadcast advertising agency in 1990. Jeanne lives in Fairview with her husband, Matt Restivo. [ charmkt@juno.com; 828-628-0023 ]