HONING AN INDOMITABLE SPIRIT
Birding with Grandma's Opera Glasses, Antiques Roadshow Fail, Tae Kwon Do Redux, The Fonz is The Best, R.I.P. Dorothy Hoffner & Bobi
“What I have realized is that when I was younger, I was who I thought I should be. Now, at 77, I am becoming who I am.” - Henry Winkler
Hiya Friends,
Hope you’re all hanging in there and listening to the birds sing. If not, I highly recommend this activity in times of trouble because, as I mentioned in a previous post, bird songs are good for our mental health.
This week my Merlin bird app (Shazam for bird calls), picked up one of the cutest birds I’ve ever seen—the Vermillion Flycatcher ⬇️. Fun Fact: The Vermilion Flycatcher's genus name, Pyrocephalus, literally translates to "fire-headed."
Can you stand it? So dear! I want to steal this bird’s look for my fall wardrobe. I’m thinking a cherry red wool cap, orange sweater, and a brown coat. Thoughts? To be clear, I haven’t laid eyes upon this bird . . . yet. Most of the birds in my yard congregate in thick bushes and I can’t really make them out. That is, until a few days ago, when I dusted off my grandma’s vintage mother-of-pearl opera glasses* to take a closer look and . . . Eureka! These 70-year-old binoculars were a total game-changer. Not only can I zoom in close on many feathered friends, I look very fancy while doing it.
*About these opera glasses: Years ago, I took a couple of things, including Grandma’s opera glasses, to be appraised at Antiques Roadshow in Spokane, Washington. Prior to this trip, I’d been a big fan of the show. I didn’t necessarily think I’d hit pay dirt per se, but I imagined it would be a hoot to immerse myself in the Antiques Roadshow experience. How wrong I was.
The whole trip proved to be a disastrous odyssey that requires its own dedicated post, but the short version goes like something this: After flying from LA to Seattle, driving several hours to Spokane, and waiting in interminable lines for hours and hours on end, a very snooty appraiser totally Miranda Priestly-ed me. She eyeballed Grandma’s binoculars over the top of her spectacles and smugly said, "The problem with these things is, nobody uses them anymore.” That was it. She all but swatted me away like a gnat that had drifted into her orbit.
I felt my face burn with rage and Jared had to drag me away before I shouted, "REALLY? WHAT ABOUT THAT MUSKET OVER THERE? OR THOSE ARROWHEADS? ISN'T THE POINT OF ANTIQUES $%^&!@#$ ROADSHOW TO HAVE USELESS STUFF APPRAISED?"
Later, our rental car caught fire. As you may have guessed, Antiques Roadshow is dead to me now. But I love the binoculars and, contrary to what Ms. Snooty Pants Appraiser had to say, I now use them every day.
ATTEMPTING TO HONE MY INDOMITABLE SPIRIT
I think I’ve mentioned that I’ve reenrolled in Tae Kwon Do after a 40+-year hiatus at the same school I attended from ages 7 to 10. The owner of the studio, now in his 80s, teaches my class! I’m not being hyperbolic when I say that this is one of the most physically and mentally challenging things I’ve done in forever. Not simply because learning a martial art is difficult at 50+, that much is certainly true. What makes it extra demoralizing, in addition to physically exhausting, is the fact that I’m in class with mostly black belts.
Apparently the “beginner” adult classes at this studio are “mixed level” and therefore, I’m surrounded by Tae Kwon Do Masters. We literally refer to an advanced practitioner of Tae Kwon Do as “Master (Last Name)”. And what this means is, there is no basic training. I just watch a bunch of masters do their thing and try to mimic their movements. One might call this an immersion teaching style like when people say, “If you want to learn Portuguese, move to Brazil!”
Occasionally a Master will take pity on me and quickly demonstrate a move or a sequence before I’m tasked with replicating some approximation of the move multiple times across the studio floor. Imagine standing on the beach next to someone circling their arms to show you how you swim before you wade into the water. Most of the time, I’m flailing and failing miserably. If you’re wondering why I’m even doing this, I’ve asked myself the same question. It’s not like I plan to become a Tae Kwon Do Master. I just like trying new things, or, in this case, retrying an old thing. I’m amazed that my body can handle the very intense work out and that I can still walk the next day. And when I’m not totally lost, the movements are invigorating and remind me of dancing. I love to dance.
I should probably take more than one class a week, but the studio is pretty far from my house, and Jared and I share a car. I thought about finding a school closer to home, which I may still do, but in the meantime, I’ve started watching YouTube videos to learn the basics. The nice thing is, most of the videos are geared towards kids, which is much more my speed.
The other day, I followed along to a class for kids on YouTube and the instructor had a segment called “Word of the Month”. That day, the word/phrase was “indomitable spirit,” defined as “our ability to keep moving forward and to keep pursuing our dreams and goals despite any resistance we might encounter, including failure.” 💡
It was a well-timed pep talk and encouraged me to keep on going even when the going gets tough. It also reminded me that Tae Kwon Do training as a child taught me that I was capable of things I never thought possible—like breaking wooden boards with my hands and feet and beating boys in sparring matches.
I’ve abandoned several projects and pursuits in my life, usually when I decided that whatever I was doing wasn’t good enough. But I don’t want to be that person anymore. I’m slowly finding joy in showing up and staying open to learning and evolving. Perhaps that’s a helpful byproduct of aging. In yoga, that attitude is called a beginner’s mindset, which fellow Substacker Jenny Johnson wrote about in her newsletter Root & Rise. I really love the chart she included that shows the difference between an expert’s mindset and a beginner’s mindset. One of the symptoms of the expert’s mindset is to be “Prideful” and “Afraid of Looking Foolish.” 😬 That’s totally me every week in Tae Kwon Do.
HENRY WINKLER IS AN ILLUMINATOR WITH AN INDOMITABLE SPIRIT
I came across an interview in The Guardian with the always humble and delightful Henry Winkler, discussing his new memoir, Being Henry: The Fonz . . . and Beyond. It’s definitely going on my to-read list.
If you’re of a certain age, chances are you grew up watching Happy Days. It was one of my favorite shows as a kid, and when I was around 10-years-old, my friend Nikki’s stepmom, Harriett, brought me and Nikki to the office with her at Paramount Pictures Studios.
Several hit shows were in production on the lot at this time including, Happy Days, Mork & Mindy, and Laverne & Shirley, and our plan was to catch a glimpse of our favorite TV stars. Unfortunately, most of the shows had “closed sets” that day, which meant Nikki and I weren’t allowed inside during filming. That, however, didn’t deter us from lurking outside the soundstages armed with pens and paper for autographs.
For a while, we didn’t see much action. Then the actors who play Lenny (Michael McKean) and Squiggy (David Lander) wandered past. We said hello and asked for autographs. Squiggy scribbled his name quickly and practically threw the paper at us while Michael McKean lingered and kindly chatted with us for a while. He was a complete mensch.
Soon, the Happy Days set broke for lunch and we met nearly the whole cast save for Scott Baio (phew!). Everyone was lovely and gracious, but the real stand out star of that day was Henry Winkler AKA The Fonz.
I read an article in Sunday’s New York Times called, “Give the Gift of Your Attention” where the author classifies humans into two groups—diminishers and illuminators.
Henry Winkler is an illuminator. He sat with us for nearly an hour, asking questions about our lives and made us believe he was actually interested in what we had to say. I suspect that he was sensitive to children’s needs because he suffered from undiagnosed dyslexia as a kid and never felt seen or heard by the adults in his life.
As a child, Winkler struggled with learning, leading his parents to nickname him “dummer hund”, or dumb dog. He recalls being left alone in their Manhattan apartment in his early teens at the weekends and instructed to study. On their return, his father would lay his hand on the top of the TV to see if it was warm: “It was more important that he punish me if he felt the warmth of the top of the television than it was to help me because I wasn’t understanding what I was learning.”
Harry hoped his son would take over the lumber business, but Winkler had other plans. He loved acting, something he attributes to never feeling seen or heard by his parents. On finishing school, he studied theatre at Emerson College and at Yale School of Drama. He struggled to learn lines, for which he was roundly mocked, but he was undeterred. “I live by two words,” Winkler states. “Tenacity and gratitude. I was extremely single-minded.”
Winkler’s career has had a lot of highs and lows. Acting jobs dried up for a long time. He started a production company and co-wrote a series of books for kids until his old Happy Days’ pal Ron Howard, cast him as the hilarious inept lawyer Barry Zuckerkorn in Arrested Development. Recently he earned critical acclaim as the acting teacher, Gene Cousineau on Barry and now he’s finally healing from the pain of his childhood .
Seven years ago, Winkler also embarked on a course of therapy, which he says finally helped him locate the confidence that was bullied out of him as a child. Writing his memoir has further helped him to lift the fog and live “in the here and now. You never stop learning. What I have realized is that when I was younger, I was who I thought I should be. Now, at 77, I am becoming who I am.”
Talk about an indomitable spirit! Just goes to show that it can take a while to free ourselves from the thinking and habits that hold us back, but it’s never too late to try.
R.I.P., DOROTHY HOFFNER & BOBI
This week, I’m sad to say goodbye to some truly inspirational souls who were paragons of longevity and brought us all tons of joy. Dorothy Hoffner, the 104-year-old skydiver passed away on October 10th, just weeks after her record-breaking jump. I loved this tidbit in her obit that suggests that she too was an illuminator: “During her interviews, she asked reporters about their lives and appeared uninterested in talking about her upbringing in Chicago in the early 20th century, after World War I had ended and as an influenza pandemic was raging.”
And Bobi—The Worlds Oldest Dog—has passed away at 31-years-old. I wrote about Bobi’s heroic origin story and how he narrowly escaped death in a previous Substack post. He’d lost all his brothers and sisters at birth and I hope now they are all reunited and frolicking together on the other side.
"Despite outliving every dog in history, his 11,478 days on earth would never be enough, for those who loved him," wrote Dr. Karen Becker.
Okay. That’s a wrap for today. If you enjoyed any of my musings, hit the ❤️ button or leave a comment. I always love hearing from you. xo H2
I love the fonz! I didn’t know this about him! His learning disability and the visual of his dad touching the tv to see if it was warm made me really sad. So glad he found his genius in his own carved path.
The idea of diminishers and illuminators... that’s basically how I’ve weeded through my friends as I’ve gotten older! Can’t have many of those diminishers, whose got time for all those types of friends?!
Always a delight to read your well crafted and often funny articles! Thank you!