Ethel Waters Archives - The Year(s) of Living Non-Judgmentally

Even though I talk to people about regrets at work, I have never written a blog post with “regrets” in the title. I guess you could say this (almost) five-year-old daily blog has no regrets.

At work — where I practice individual therapy, group therapy, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Narrative Therapy, and Motivational Interviewing — I invite people to let go of regrets, because regrets are about past actions (or inactions) and we cannot change the past.

In the spirit of the late Peter Sellers — who said that the only regret he had in life was seeing the movie The Magus –– the only regret I have, here and now, is installing the latest Apple update on my iPhone. Considering how long I’ve lived, only one regret is pretty good.

I have no regrets about the photos I took yesterday.

Here’s a Cole Porter tune about regrets, sung by the great Ethel Waters:

Any regrets? There’s room for them (and anything else) in the comments section below.

Miss Koplow regrets she’s unable to share a new photo expressing her thanks to all who helped her create this post and — of course! — to you. She lets go of that regret by sharing an old photo.

Am I blue?

I have some reasons to be blue, this morning:

More white-and-sometimes-blue snow is piling up around here, in Boston USA.
Mary — whom I was looking forward to seeing, after her return from a two-week vacation — won’t be coming in today to the hospital where we work together.
I’m going to be the only Social Worker On Call, all day, for the very large primary care practice where I do individual and group therapy.
I’m waiting on some possibly blue-making news from cardiologists of many colors, regarding future surgery on my red-and-blue heart.

I have reasons to be blue, but am I blue?

Am I blue, from the cold?

No, I’m not. I might be blue from cold, by the time I get to work this morning, but I’m not blue yet.

Am I blue, because I have a very unusual heart that pumps blood in unexpected ways?

No, I’m not. Medical people, when they’ve seen pictures of my heart, have looked at my fingers and toes expecting them to be blue (because of the strange route my blood takes), but I’m always pink (unless I’m outside too long in the !!&#@!!#@!! New England cold).

Am I blue, in any way, this morning?

I shall check in with myself — internally and externally — in this moment.

I have discovered two ways in which I am blue, right now.

Before I reveal those, will it make you blue if my thoughts turn to blues in the recent past?

I saw these blues last night, while Grammys for blues, rock, R & B, and other kinds of music were being awarded in Los Angeles, California.*

Here’s a link to the complete list of all the (probably-not-blue) winners of Grammy awards this year. It always makes me a little blue that more musical genres — like bluegrass — aren’t included in the Grammy awards TV show. However, it makes me the opposite of blue (whatever color that would be) to see, this morning, that some of my favorite entertainers won Grammys this year, including:

Chick Corea (appearing in blog posts here and here),
Weird Al Yankovic (appearing in the comment section of this here blog post),
Pharrell Williams (appearing in this blue-and-non-blue blog post AND consistently making me the opposite of blue with his song “Happy”) (including right now, as I’m composing this “Am I Blue?” post),
Joan Rivers (appearing in this here blog post), and
John Williams (whose music appears in this blog post).

As I’m looking at that list of winners of 2015 Grammy Awards, I’m noticing that a Black Jack AND a White Jack might both reply “NO!” to “Am I Blue?” this morning.

Is anybody out there saying, “YES!” to the question “Am I Blue?” … for any reason?

And, am I blue that I’ve gone such a long, slow distance away from those two ways I am blue, this morning?

NO! Here are the two ways that I’m blue, here and now: