Best of Summer ~ Hot Dogs

Posted on July 12, 2015 by Sandi LoConti

If you live in northern Bergen County you know I’m going to talk about the cart outside Ehmer’s in Hillsdale. You know I’m going to talk about the smoky smell of the variety of hot dogs, sausages and wursts wafting down Broadway. I’m talking about that moment that comes each year when you know like you know you’ve got to start the summer off right and get over there for a dog and a cream soda. My Father and Cookie were the officiators of that moment for many years.

Mostly, though, when you think of the Ehmer’s cart you’ve got to talk about all that happening under the watchful eye of Dolores Santucci. The matriarch of the cart for the last 15 years is out there six days a week no matter the weather. And if you think it’s only for the summer, think again.

Standing at the cart is a shared local experience usually enhanced by music from the American Song Book, mouthwatering anticipation, and people from all over the county waiting patiently and cheerily eavesdropping on Dolores’ conversations.

Dispensing wisdom, quips and good humor she truly understands living her life the way she wants her story told. If you don’t use it you lose it she’s fond of saying when asked what keeps her going. This is what you do for your kids, if they’re good you help them out, if not you throw them out. Needless to say no one’s been thrown out…well maybe a customer once or twice. Make sure you read the signs…

Walk across the street to the memorial park and enjoy your feast, do some people watching and just get caught up in the delicious nostalgia.

Soul Cleanse

Posted on June 14, 2015 by Sandi LoConti

Many people suffer at different times of the year, most common is around the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays. I won’t say I suffer, but I become nostalgic, and mournful, and something…between Memorial Day and Father’s Day. It may seem an odd time but it is steeped in loss, and remorse and second guessing. It’s also filled with hope but it takes a minute to get there. It usually culminates in a long discussion with my Father on Father’s day on the way to the Cape but this year is different, I won’t be taking that ride until a few weeks after Father’s Day.

Instead I will spend some time with my dearest friend and niece Carly doing a 5k color run. Don’t get excited, I’ll be walking but still… I’ll be among people and laughter and joy instead of having the same discussion I’ve been having for the last decade. There is a time to hold on and there is a time to let go.

As if to set in stone this is a time to let go, I happened to attend a funeral mass yesterday for a business associate’s father. I didn’t know the man but I’ve known his son for fifteen years. I’m not sure why I decided to go but it was enlightening and emotional and bought me clarity on so many levels. Normally I am steadfast emotionally at these things but I was tearful at the love shown, the grandchildren left behind, the music, the ritual of the mass, and the regret that my father’s passing was so very different. It became more and more apparent that his legacy was left exclusively in our hands and what an enormous responsibility we had taken on. The fact is his legacy is ours to treasure we are not responsible for it, we didn’t create it. It is only up to us to tell his truth.

There is no greater energy than the energy you find within a church or temple or any spiritual place of devotion. It blankets you whether you are of the sect or not. I love the feeling but I’ve let go of the need to participate as part of the flock. So many questions whirl around me are answered by my knowing that “God ain’t mad at me”. As Lincoln said, “When I do good I feel good, when I do bad I feel bad. That is my religion.”

I’ve been journaling my thoughts and revelations over the past two weeks and more and more I’m drawn to the words of one of my Lime Sisters, “My grip is loosening.” Thank you A’Driane Nieves for the generosity of your truth and your talent, you can’t begin to know the legacy you are creating. I am grateful for your friendship and sisterhood albeit from afar. I miss my Lime Sisters and their unbridled energy. I need a tribe…

My journaling has brought many revelations about introverts vs extroverts, fear, loneliness and motivation. How to begin, when to know if it’s smarter to keep on going or walk away. What brings joy and what the hell is my purpose.

I’ve come to realize that my purpose comes at a cost. When you are a go to person and people get what they need they go away. They go away whole and better and joyful and grateful but they do go away.

I’ve also come to realize that my concentration should always be on the ones who stay and become family. Concentrate on the ones who come back and share their wholeness and a bit of themselves with me on a higher level of equilibrium.

I’m grateful for those wonderful people who let me vent, or rant, or withdraw but don’t freak out as if the world was going to end. I’m even more grateful for the people who reciprocate what they have gotten without missing a beat. The dear Aunt M’s continue to support and enrich my life.

And so my soul cleanse these past few weeks has been difficult and rewarding. It has been emotional and joyful. It has cemented my story the way I want it told. My six word memoir, a woman of substance who shared, still rings true to me. I am looking forward to letting go that which is no longer mine and embracing that which belongs to me.

Mindfulness

Posted on May 17, 2015 by Sandi LoConti

I began learning about mindfulness many years ago under incredibly tumultuous circumstances well before it became the catch phrase of the decade. It’s been tossed around by everyone it seems but the people I trust most to toss it around are Louise Hay , Jon Kabat-Zinn and the staff at Green Mountain at Fox Run.

My definition, the one I’ve been honing for several decades, is “stay in today”. I know it’s pretty broad and I’ve narrowed it down quite a bit myself but in essence if you stay in today so much angst can be alleviated. You know how big a fan I am of angst, distant cousin to drama and worry.

I started with affirmations and learning the power of the mind body connection. I suffered terribly from anxiety, and hopelessness, and bad luck and on and on. My turning point was a gift from my best friend as I was lamenting the guardian angel energy that kept himself out of trouble she suggested it might not be guardian angel energy it might be my energy… What? I had energy? Turns out I have extraordinary energy.

I’ve been working diligently on and with mindfulness for the last decade. My health has improved, my life has improved, so many good things come my way that continue to surprise me and I live in gratitude.

Enter a wonderful weekend in Vermont to validate the things I’m doing right and hand me on a silver platter more ways to improve my life. Ways to banish the cortisol!!!! Evil hormone that it is, maker of belly fat and thief of sleep, can be counteracted with mindfulness. Of course there’s more to it but if you start with mindfulness, if you stay in today, in the moment, and look up from the damn phone..l mean engage with your life, you will be amazed at what happens and what you’ll see.

One of the biggest ah ha’s was mindfulness eating. How the hell does a foodie not live in that space all the time? When I’m eating something fabulous I’m definitely mindful but my problem has always been not being mindful to my hunger cues and getting to the sugar drop stage of no good can come from even opening the refrigerator. I know you’ve seen it, you keep reminding me…

For the last month I’ve been practicing listening and following the cues and hopefully you can attest that there has been an improvement. No bail money has been required, not once. What a relief, to us all.

I began meditating in earnest many weeks ago and continued the practice while in Vermont. It’s one of the methods they endorse for most everything. There was a fabulous chair at the end of our hallway that called me each day. Finally I listened and though it was on the way to one of the outside entrances, no one bothered me, it was sunny and warm and light and quiet. If I had my way I would have hauled that chair home with me. Just sayin.

Mindfulness walks have always been my thing. I don’t take my phone, I don’t listen to anything but the world around me. I love hearing the birds each morning, I love the sounds and smells coming from open windows and I never want to miss someone calling my name to say hello. The only time I’m not fully engaged is when I have my camera, then I’m focused on the world around me in a different way. Its old school, you have to look through the lens and your vision is narrowed to within the frame. I’ve been known to wander through fairs and markets and gardens and crowds with my camera and I am so grateful for what seems to download. I see things through a completely different filter and it continues to surprise me.

Rooting yourself to the earth is yet another way to practice mindfulness. I’m sure I have an unfair advantage being a gardener. I love the smell of the earth after the rain, I love the digging, the planting, the weeding, hell I even love hauling the damn boulders out of the back shade garden. I know…

Being mindful allows for a different perspective, it’s non-judgmental, you can imagine the pain others have that make them act the way they do. It doesn’t condone bad behavior but it creates a better understanding at times. It’s a weight lifted, not everything is yours, you don’t have to attend every argument you’re invited to and you can begin to be kind to yourself. You can learn how fabulous you really are and you can begin to weed out those who don’t believe in you and your new way of thinking.

I believe that mindfulness comes best to those who serve. Themselves first, then serving others brings a continuance of good coming to them that you won’t want to give up. I’m pretty sure the only thing that you’ll be giving up is the cortisol contamination, the excess worry about things that mostly never happen and the abuse you give yourself for what you believe you caused or created when really you simply weren’t paying attention…Now you are and you will begin to see the power that is you. I remain ever grateful for the ability to stay in today.

Food

Posted on May 10, 2015 by Sandi LoConti

Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” Michael Pollan

That’s pretty much what it comes down to but somehow life gets in the way. Enter a little fireball named June with a quick wit and a way of pausing before giving you the answer to some questions you never even knew you had and you start to put things in perspective. Because yes that’s another thing it comes down to. What is it? One’s relationship with food of course. Because it’s never about the food and yet it’s always about the food… How the hell to get around that lovely paradox.

Agatha Christie once said “when engaged in eating, the brain should be the servant of the stomach.” For me it was not about the eating but about the hunger recognition which led to a scene out of a Snickers commercial. I can go until I’m shaky, sweaty and hangry so consider yourself forewarned. The number one way to start dissecting the paradox is to reset the barometer by listening to your needs, what a concept.

There is a hunger scale that starts at you’re so hungry you’ll eat anything and goes through to you’re painfully full and may even feel sick. Throughout our weekend at Green Mountain at Fox Run we were privy to the pendulum effect. There is a balance to everything they give you but a recognition that you’re probably not operating in that balance. The hunger scale is a perfect example, balance begins at you feel you’re getting hungry and it’s time to think about what to eat and ends at totally satisfied; hunger is gone and you won’t be hungry for hours.

What they provide are delicious meals, snacks, a hunger hutch, amazing well water from the tap, coffee, tea and condiments. What they don’t provide is a list of what you should and shouldn’t eat. People come looking to be told what to eat, to be controlled in what they think is an uncontrollable situation. But at GMFR they are not the boss of you…you can be trusted, you know yourself better than they do, you are in charge of your own possibilities.

What they also provide is the science you need to understand your gut, your relationship with food and the food itself. Michael Pollan also said, you are what what you eat eats. Do you know what you’re eating eats? Cheetos never ate anything…see what they’re saying. A fabulous Vermont Cheddar on the other hand…

I am a foodie and a fabulous cook. I have never been one for Cheetos or any really highly processed foods. My sister lovingly…refers to me as Sister Nuts and Berries but even with real food you can get to that point of overeating because you’ve starved yourself albeit unknowingly. And speaking of starving yourself, do you know what your body does when it doesn’t know when it’s going to get its next meal? It SAVES EVERYTHING….can a sista win?

Yes, a sista can win through mindful eating:

Tune into your hunger and appetite.
Focus on the food and how you feel as you eat.
Be aware of the aroma and appearance of the food. If you don’t like it stop eating it.
Eat slowly and savor each bite chewing thoroughly and concentrate on taste, temperature and texture.
Check your level of fullness and degree of satiety. Check for the pause, if you put your fork down check in.
Enjoy the eating experience.

Think it’s going to happen overnight? Ruth Reichl said in Delicious, “I am telling you that if things can change for the worse, the opposite is also true. But only if you open yourself to the possibilities.”

I am at a definite advantage in that I live alone with no others to accommodate, I love to cook so I know exactly what’s going in my food and I’m a pain in the ass if I don’t like something I simply don’t eat it. Not everyone has that advantage.

It would be impossible to relay all the info we received on food and its benefits here in this post. If you walk away with anything it is the balance and the pause you should be concentrating on, not the missteps. Reichl also said in Delicious, “Change works both ways. You must accept those moments, experience them, and let them go. Because if you allow yourself to get stuck in that minute, nothing will ever change.”

Three weeks later I continue to process all the glorious information we received and put it to use as well as I can. I balance my carbs and my proteins and eat a ton more plants. Friday is still pizza night with homemade dough and organic marinara and plain ol mozzarella. I still use butter and a touch of cream in certain things and yes I still enjoy my pinot noir each night. But the shift has come in the timing, the amounts and the complete enjoyment.

“Life itself is the proper binge.” – Julia Child

Movement

Posted on May 3, 2015 by Sandi LoConti

Once upon a time a long time ago when I lived in a third floor walkup with only on street parking, played racquetball at lunch and danced all night I was incredibly fit, shocking I know. The importance of movement at that time was irrelevant, I was having a blast.

Fast forward several decades, I leave it to you to figure out just how many decades, I am round. No doubt you’ve noticed. Through complacency, tumultuous times, yo-yo dieting and a lack of motivation I have become…round. I go back and forth between how the hell did this happen and it is what it is. No it’s not…and I know exactly how this happened. Now what to do?

Enter the best kept secret in Vermont, I’m pretty sure they really don’t want to be the best kept secret so look here, and life as I know it is changed forever. Not overnight, not in the gym, not in boot camp, but in real life, my life. I am beginning where I am, what a concept.

LynnAnn Covel is the dynamo leading the fitness department. She is trained in several areas of expertise and has been at Green Mountain at Fox Run for the last 26 years, well here you read it:

An energetic and inspirational leader, she heads up our fitness department, lending her own special touch and motivational skills to help women learn to love physical activity. Through her personal training and L.I.F.E. (Lifestyle Integration for Empowerment) program, LynnAnn provides personalized fitness programs and strategies needed to facilitate changes that make all the difference in “taking it home and making it work.”

Here’s the thing about LynnAnn, you would never know that she’s been at this for the last 26 years. She brings a freshness to each day, she has an amazing sense of humor that goes right to the crux of what you think you want to use as an excuse and her pragmatism leaves you thinking, well shit of course I can do this…

Add to that the now famous LynnAnnisms and you’re pretty much set:

Your pace is THE pace.

Something is better than nothing.

I’m doing this for me and no one can take it away.

I’ve been playing around with functional fitness as a way to incorporate movement into some of the many things I do all day. Things like walking the dog, really walking the dog. She’s not that happy about it especially on the weekends when we continue up the hill instead of making the right. Things like stretching when we get back using the porch steps, she sits on the step above where I’m stretching and gets a cookie at the end. She’s beginning to like that part.

I found myself watching my Nutriblast whirring around for the minute it takes and thought I’ll do pushups against the sink while I’m waiting. I do squats to get the clothes out of the washer and dryer (front loaders).

I took my first yoga class at GMFR and loved it. Imagine looking out a huge cathedral window at Okemo as the sun sets and the candles scattered around the room come into their own as your first class. I mean really is that a tough act to follow or what? Best I can do is sun salutation right out of bed. But hey, something is better than nothing, am I right LynnAnn?

She stresses finding something that will work for you on a personal level, something you enjoy, some way to make it work. We had a bit of a mindfulness walk one morning and I couldn’t help equating that to my photo walks. When I’m behind my camera I’m so busy looking around that I lose track of time. God knows how many steps later I feel like I got my fitness in without even noticing.

We practiced ti chi one morning which I thoroughly enjoyed. I took a ti chi class several years ago and really enjoyed it then too but didn’t quite know where to take it after that. I could never remember the sequences so it fell by the wayside. Fast forward, lot of that going on, through the magic of Amazon Prime I’ve downloaded several ti chi classes through TIVO. It’s all just magical this universe I’m living in.

Growing older is inevitable but aging is optional said someone recently, damned if I can remember who, but that resonated with me. That along with something LynnAnn said about saving for your physical future needs to go hand in hand with saving for your financial future. After struggling to recover my financial future I can certainly see the benefit of recovering my physical future as well. My gratitude runs deep…

On our final day in Vermont we took a walk in the woods, it was the only time I felt it appropriate to bring out my camera so enjoy some of these wonderful last moments spent in Okemo State Forrest.

Ordinary Legacy

Preserving moments in time through thoughtful words and images.

Category Archives: In the Company of Women

Best of Summer ~ Hot Dogs

Soul Cleanse

Mindfulness

Food

Movement

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