I Love My New Office(s)

Enclosing the balcony off of our master bedroom was my present to myself for getting through this year of breast cancer treatment. My first full day in my new office was wonderful! I love the views. When I looked at the dates of my first full day and when I moved in, I realized it was the end and beginning of a new month on the Jewish calendar. I also did some numerology with the other calendar dates & realized I moved in on a Hanged Man day (#12 in the Tarot Major Arcana) and I had my first full day sitting at my desk on a Death card day (#13).

Remember when I went into the hospital? In my stupor, wondering if I was going to make it out of there alive, I kept doing numerology with the room numbers. The number of the room I was in during my pain filled beginning there was the Hanged Man. It made me wonder where I was hung up and stuck repeating an old pattern and trying to get different results.

So of course I thought about the scam again. I'm still working through why that happened. What's really weird is I discovered that the scam happened the very same time on the Jewish calendar as when I fell into the hospital last year after my first chemo. Yeah, it's the yahrtzeit (1st anniversary) of the murders in Mumbai this week, which happened right after I got out of the hospital.

So the pattern I had discovered and conquered in the hospital had to do with giving my power away to authority figures. The pattern I discovered from the scam had to do with my fear around spending money on myself (on the new office) - and seeing Geoff as an authority figure that I had to please if I was going to spend all that money.

I was in a trance when I first gave my neighbor the go ahead to spend money on building the office. All I could think of after that was making Geoff feel ok about our money situation. (And making myself feel ok about spending all that money on myself.) I was in such a trance that I didn't even check out the letter or the check I'd been sent regarding the mystery shopper job. All I was doing was telling myself and Geoff - don't worry! - we've got the money! I've got a new job! We're going to be fine! (If I'd asked him to look at the letter, or asked my bank to do the same, we really would have been fine...)

So instead of $5K for a new office, I got a $9K new office (when you include the $4K loss from the scam) - which is still less than the $10K I was quoted many years ago by a company that specialized in making sun rooms. Doug, my neighbor/contractor was such a great support to me, helping me find windows at such a low price, you'd never believe it. Plus he actually gave me lots of stuff for free that he had sitting around his yard. I am really grateful to Doug for not only helping me clarify what I wanted so I could make inexpensive decisions that actualized my vision, but for giving me the emotional support I needed as well. He is very sweet.

If any of you want to do construction on your home or office, keep him in mind: Doug McCloskey 831-247-2687 - you won't regret it.

I went to the oncologist today. I've got a PET scan coming up. He told me it wouldn't show anything smaller than 1cm. When I asked him if CT scans showed less, he told me that they don't show lymph nodes which are 1cm. I asked him if he's concerned about the lymph nodes and he told me he was concerned about checking to see whether I have anything in my lungs, bones and organs.

So that's where I'm at. And I think it's good for me to be reminded of all of this. My life is precious and could be very short. Spending money on myself and getting a beautiful office just for me is worth every penny - even with the overage based in a scam. I want to make the most out of every day.

I'm also now working out of my friend's office which is another beautiful place that also gives me views of my favorite thing in nature: trees. She offered me this place for free through the end of the year all the way back in August. I wasn't able to take her up on her offer due to my own silly pattern of needing to take care of others while putting myself last. I was worried my clients wouldn't want to travel to the new officel. It took the scam and the need to save money to motivate me to take care of myself and I just love the office and feel so at home there. Both my new offices let me look at trees while I work.

So what's the Death card have to do with my first day in this new home office? Well, remember that the year I was diagnosed was my Death card year? The card symbolizes death & rebirth. Need I say more?

In Mourning Today

I did go into Thanksgiving with a miraculous chemo result to be grateful for and yet immediately went into terror over the attack of Mumbai. Today I am in mourning for all the lives lost but especially was touched deeply by the loss at the Chabad House there. I learned that the rabbi was first cousin of the rabbi in Monterey and those evil, inhuman monsters left both he and his wife and those who were visiting them, bound for another world. More of their story and photos of them can be seen here: http://www.chabadbythesea.com/news/article_cdo/aid/773691/jewish/Mumbai-Jewish-Family-Killed.htm

So I want to share my story of how I am connected to Chabad and why they mean so much to me. When I finally get to tell the story of the hospital experience, the first thing you'll learn is why I believe my Chabad Rebetzin, Mrs. Bailly Friedman saved my life.

Some of you know I grew up with 2 Jewish parents in a Jewish home where we kept Kosher (2 sets of dishes/silverware - separated into milk and meat & my mom bought kosher meat), we only celebrated the Jewish holidays, we had a Shabbos dinner complete with candles, wine and prayer on Friday nights and many times attended our Temple services that night. I'll never forget my dad's Shabbos presents when we were really little!

We attended a Temple where my siblings and I were bar mitzvah - which included learning Hebrew and leading an entire prayer service and reading from the Torah. We definitely had a good Jewish education thanks to my parents.

Despite all that we did, I felt a strong spiritual yearning and connection that wasn't tied to Judaism at all. In fact, I felt like I was able to learn all kinds of different religions and get something from all of them (which I did later in college). I was a bit anti-semitic now looking back because I didn't understand why I had to be different from everyone else and being Jewish really didn't mean more to me than this spiritual sense I had that was more New Agey and not really connected to anything.

Then I was introduced to Chabad. A friend of mine in high school and I were discussing spirituality and she said, well if you really want to get a great hit of spirituality, you've got to go to a farbrengen. What's a farbrengen? She tells me, it's where lots of rabbis sit around and drink vodka and tell stories.

So one night, we went to a farbrengen. I must have been 14 or 15 because I don't think we could drive yet. I'm not really sure. But this was a total mind blower for me. I saw rabbis that I didn't know still existed, with beards and black hats. The stories they were telling us and each other hit me with a truth I never heard before.

My friend and I were invited to spend Shabbos with a young Chabad couple. It was the first time I knew about what it meant to really do a Shabbos complete with all the rituals for an entire 25 hours and how much that gave to the experience. I felt like I had finally found a way to connect with Judaism in the way I was thinking wasn't there in that religion.

Unfortunately, being young, I was soon off to other things in my life but never forgot about that experience with Chabad. It wasn't until years later and having my own little children, that I found Chabad again - when we lived in Hermosa Beach. And when we moved back to Santa Cruz, I made sure to find Chabad again and felt like Bailly and Yochanon were sent to S. Cruz just for me. They ended up moving here only a few months after we did. And their kids were my kids ages, so Bailly and I hung out together and became great friends and I and my kids learned soooooo, soooo much from them that we'll never forget.

There are Chabad houses all over the world. These people have what's called, mesiras nefesh (look it up, it's a great term). They sacrifice everything and go out to live in places that have nothing that they need to practice their religion which is very rigorous and requires sometimes going out of town to get food and other things along with having to send their children away when they are still little to get the education they need. And why do they do all this? For people like me! Wow!

So when I heard that the Mumbai Chabad house made the ultimate self-sacrifice, I just wanted everyone I can touch to know how much Chabad means to me.

If you are Jewish and so inclined to say a mishaberach for me, my full Hebrew name is Chaya Ruchel bas Shoshana Fruma. Thank you!