Marti Miller-Willoughby
contributing writer
November
Directions
FALLING BACK, FALLING
DOWN, & FALLING UP
expect to soon find a big red warning flag dangling from my hips
as I waddle to and fro.
The confectionary parade that begins with Halloween candy and
ends with January resolutions gets a giant kick-start in November
with all the Thanksgiving preparations of testing and tasting new
recipes designed to entice family members into sharing another
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meal. This Thanksgiving will be especially filled with reasons for
giving thanks – thanks for the trials, the triumphs, and the mirahere must be something spectacularly special about a month that
cles of healing; thanks for the renewed health of family and friends; thanks for the
includes National Doughnut Day and Thanksgiving and Veterans
losses that draw us ever closer to our God in those moments of quiet and not-so-
Day and is designated National Adoption Month. Like a cherry
quiet desperation; thanks for answered prayers of both “yes” and “no” and even
on top of an already delicious sundae, November now gives us an
“not now”; thanks especially for the love that gathers around our overladen tables
extra hour of snooze/drool/snore/stare-at-the-ceiling time on its
each holiday season.
very first day this year. November 1st is falling back day! Daylight savings time is
Unfortunately for me, falling back time also leads to some falling down time,
put to rest for at least a few months. The downside of this, of course, is the obvious
as evidenced by the aforementioned food consumption and a few other things...
lack of sunlight in our days as fall and winter descend like dark woolly blankets,
Every year I promise myself that Christmas shopping will be completed in October.
covering some of us with snuggly warmth and others of us (the flip-flopping sum-
Yeah, right - not one single bauble, trinket or gift book has been purchased. Not
mer lovers) with trepidation and rays-less anxiety. I also begin the dreaded falling
even a list has been generated. Evidently I enjoy self-sabotaging with to-do goals.
back to my sweet tooth overload tendencies.
I have the same goals for birthday gift shopping, too. My daughter’s anniversary of
I find myself falling back to cookies, cakes, pies, cupcakes, doughnuts (one
birth was in August and I still have yet to hone in on a great commemorative gift
cannot in good conscience ignore the national celebration that comes only
in celebration of my labor for her. And my poor son’s November birthday gift often
twice per year by not indulging in at least one hot mess of rounded perfection),
gets pushed into December and wrapped in a Christmas package.
and other fat and sugar laden horrors with the appetite of a food-deprived,
We’ve covered falling back and falling down. Maybe a quick leap into falling
tapeworm infected “womaniac.” And no, I do not exaggerate here – I am confessing a
up will help save the day. Of co urse the first thing to tackle here is how exactly
well-loved sin that gets advertised broadly when my pear shape grows in direct
does one fall up? It’s rather easy – ever get tripped up by a tread on your way up
proportion to what I feed it and then fail to counter with aerobic exercise. And, not
the stairs? I believe that counts as falling up. Or at least let’s use it for illustrative
unlike the WIDE LOAD warnings we encounter on the highways and byways, I fully
purposes anyway.
OCTOBER 2015
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