is to lightly run your finger over that person's soul
until you find a crack,
and then gently pour your love into that crack.
~Keith Miller
Friday, September 23, 2011
Every Season
Lyrics ~ Nichole Nordeman
Every evening sky, an invitation
To trace the patterned stars
And early in July, a celebration
For freedom that is ours
And I notice You
In children’s games
In those who watch them from the shade
Every drop of sun is full of fun and wonder
You are summer
And even when the trees have just surrendered
To the harvest time
Forfeiting their leaves in late September
And sending us inside
Still I notice You when change begins
And I am braced for colder winds
I will offer thanks for what has been and was to come
You are autumn
And everything in time and under heaven
Finally falls asleep
Wrapped in blankets white, all creation
Shivers underneath
And still I notice you
When branches crack
And in my breath on frosted glass
Even now in death, You open doors for life to enter
You are winter
And everything that’s new has bravely surfaced
Teaching us to breathe
What was frozen through is newly purposed
Turning all things green
So it is with You
And how You make me new
With every season’s change
And so it will be
As You are re-creating me
Summer, autumn, winter, spring
Jalepaños on hamburgers with sweet potato fries ... Stunningly delicious for dinner ... not so great to sleep on! I know I must have dozed some last night, enough. Fall is in the air and pushing summer to the very tips of the branches. It's the time of deep corals and rusty pinks ... Deep emerald and just a few tiny hints of the golden yellows and oranges browning before returning to the ground. I love Fall ... Autumn. I say I love at the beginning of each season, and it's true ... I do. Look at Sammy's eyes. His coat is growing back in soft as a lambs ear ... He has always had that freckle on his tongue. When I finish this little note I'm going to coax him into the bathroom and give him a shower ... We will both be sopping wet when the last suds gets shaken out! I'd love to wash him outside, but I know he'd go straight for the compost pile soon as I let him go. He loves to smell like dog. I'm cooking chili slow on the stove top today ... He'll be hoping for more then a smell of that!
The day awoke under a thick blanket of fog ... Dripping fog. I love morning walks in the White wisps ... Everything is Monet behind the fuzz of fog. Now, it's almost lunch time and I haven't had breakfast ... Steaming hot coffee and out the door!
"Stillness needs to come first. It happens in stages: stopping … breathing … listening … undoing. Then hope: the hard job of replacing the old recordings with fresh, life-giving possibilities, aspiring for a life that is more manageable, less distracted and scattered. And then faith: believing in a God that can deliver me to solid earth where I can begin to think, consider, cry, and heal. And ultimately, to dance!" ~ Philip Chircop sj
Tap this posts title to zoom to his site. Lots of great images and interesting thought there.
Could that be true? Stillness ... Then hope - that word I said I could not see an action associated with. That quiet word barely whispers to me. And hope for what exactly, even if it's a whole basket full of bunches of hope. These words ... More manageable, less distracted and scattered ... don't fit me. I would be over on the opposite side if these words were piled up on a scale. ... And then faith ... I do have confidence in the goodness of God, but I steer clear, mindful of the winds of chance and circumstance, of defining my deliver me to or fromq ... I thought I had an eye on the big picture, but now I see that my GPS screen can barely project a pink line between the here and there of today.
Today I can see rain piling big grey stacks of water up so high, and I am amazed to see water floating on air ... next week I'll be swimming in it ... or drinking it.
Today I can see a bath tub that wants to be clean and smudges on the refrigerator door ... the clock ticks, tonight we get to eat out, maybe I should bake cookies for after ... and it's time for another grocery list, don't forget the eggs this week 'cause there are none hiding in the back now.
Today I can almost see tomorrow, when I plan on planting Fall flowers in the freshly refurbished pots on the front porch ... And I'll think about an étagère in the garage that would be fun to spray paint with the remnants of that can. I am cleaning and reorganizing the garage slowly but surely ... It makes me sneeze and smile.
Today I can see me ... Thinking, considering, crying and laughing 'cause life is pretty amusing really (not too bad, kinda weird and messy, but ... it's actually rather nice ... ) and healing. I feel more comfortable with God ... That must be healing. I think it is. ... And ultimately to dance ... or to soar maybe ... my kids say I dance funny and maybe I do.
I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith
But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing. ~ T.S.Eliot
Here is a you-tube presentation on smart glass. Three is very interested in this technology right now. Have to say ... I love it. All the class rooms in our city schoolS use smart screens ... . Smart surfaces at home will be super cool.
Yesterday,
Two very sweetly told me what she is planning for a Christmas gift for me this year ... She wanted to ask my permission, at the same time didn't want to lose the sure joy of Christmas morning when I would open a surprise. She has been looking in to getting my blog posts bound in to a book. She wanted my permission to download and re-format this stuff ... She wondered if I wanted to go back through and add pictures or ... She didn't say this, but I think she was giving me the opportunity to sanitise some of my expressions ... . Almost all of 2009 is stored as drafts ... Lots of 2010 is also ... It's almost time to look back over 2011 and tidy it up too. She said if blogger goes down I will lose all of this content and it is true that I haven't backed up any of it since I began using the iPad. I haven't been happy with the photo additions since using iPad either. I just need to sit down with one of the laptops available in our family and brush up some stuff. Not sure how the MacBooks interface with blogger. On iPad I do not have any edit options ... No fonts ... No spell check ... Nada. And my photos have to be routed through photo bucket. She is suggesting a different photo option, because I do not like to add my photos to photo bucket. ... Anyway, the gift of a book is very thoughtful and a lot of fun. I always enjoy projects with Two. I asked her to set it up with some blank spaces so I can write some notes in and also so that I can add photos or scribbles or whatever's ... . I have frequently wished for a peek in to the lives of my grandmothers and my greats also. Sometimes you wonder where your people have walked. When my friend Lisa was dying, her one major regret was that there wasn't time to create a record of who she was so that her children could truly know her. Certainly, this blog has evolved to leave some of my footprints ... handprints ... what I think and feel ... what I see from here with my eyes and my heart.
Talking on the phone, which I never really like to do very much unless I'm out walking, I've mentioned www.pinterest.com to both of my sweet buddy girls. That's a little diversion my girls have me doing with them lately. It's an online bulletin board where photos, ideas, recipes, sayings (these little blocks with quotes in them are from that source) ... All kinds of girl stuff. I guess it's like a visual scrapbook. So ... Interest with a P in front.
And, I am so covered up in books right now ... Plus, I am super interested in running down some of the background information that fleshes out the stories of the miracles that Christ did during his ministry. I think he was very mindful about what he did, when he did, why he did, who ... All that. ... The story of the leper(s), the story of the loaves, of the water to wine ... All that ... Moses turned the water to blood, Jesus turned the water to wine. I think it means something and I want to think about each incident carefully.
I also want to complete my notes on Anam Cara ... Boy does that eat time! And id like to add some more ground notes ... aerodynamics next ... And it's finally cool enough to walk my dog again.
Yesterday I saw the doctor about my ear. Well, L had suggested candle-ing which I think is a hoot ... Basically genius too. An ear candle is a cone, of I think it's beeswax, that you light up and "stick" in your ear. The heat wicks the congestion out ... up into the hollow candle. So ... The "patient" lays very very still with a fire stick balanced in their ear. Sounds like fun, right? You can hear the siphoning and tiny popping sounds ... and you can feel pressure changes. Over the course of three days prior to seeing the doctor L stood by lighting up several candle sessions and making sure I didn't get burned by the ashes (they drooped over as it burned down, but stayed connected to the candle) ... immediate relief. I was really surprised. Anyway, by time my doctors appointment arrived I could tell my ear was on the mend. They did a hearing test in a sound booth. The doctor asked me what I would attribute my slight high decibel hearing loss to. I surprised and possibly offended him by laughing out loud at his question. I don't see many doctors professionally, but I did sense that he felt laughed at. That wasn't my intent at all.
The people in his office were calling me by my first name ... Which, of course brought my mother to mind. Thinking of my mother while I sat in the waiting room for a full hour with my ear pounding, reminded me of all the times she told me to turn it down or turn it off ... the music ... she said I was ruining my hearing. Well, guess what? Mom is right again!
"What's so funny about that?" he asked and I said, "I'm fifty three almost ... There was a lot of really good music in the seventies ... and later ... Airplane noise rocked (still does) ... and I use the uber noise attenuating headset when I'm in a twin, but I like to hear what a single engine is thinking about ... and ... honestly doctor ... between the earbuds and the headset providing things I want to hear and just all the life noise I would sometimes prefer not to hear ... I think I'm really okay with the wear and tear so far. Not laughing at your question ... just laughing at life." I smiled. He smiled. He looked in both ears, both nostrils, down my throat ... Wrote two prescriptions, told me to come back in a year for another hearing checkup. Now we have a benchmark. Nice guy. I may be using these ears for another many years ... Maybe it's time to start being more mindful. Four tore her MCL this weekend at the lake ... four kids on a tube fast as can be behind a boat. She is in a full leg brace 24/7 for at least the next three weeks. This morning she told me that it is difficult to maneuver in the bathroom. Other then knocking herself unconscious during a biking accident and perhaps some over zealous leg shaving incidents, she hasn't experienced physical roadblocks. No driving for three weeks is going to be a grind for her. Homecoming in a leg brace ... Ugh. Laughing with her buds while they fly over the water ... so totally worth it if that's what she wants to do. Life is for living.
Thinking about names last night ... Well, this morning at fourish. When someone uses my first name it always calls me back to being in trouble with my momma. When she is speaking to me she doesn't use my name ... The name that everyone calls me by, or even the deriviative that close friends may use. My small group of pilot buddies affectionately coined a nickname ... my name plus. My husband rarely says my name, and the kids call me mom, or momma when they want something. Legal documents show my first two names plus my married last name. My identification documents show my name plus my maiden name plus my last name. When I got married a lot of women were keeping their last names or hyphenating. I just dropped my first name ... The name that meant I was in trouble. My husband fill out all forms using it. I wonder how to get that tidied up. I don't like having a name that is longer then the space given to signatures! I don't like feeling like I may be in trouble when I'm visiting the doctor's office. I actually did get in trouble because I didn't answer when they called me ... Either I didn't know my name, or I couldn't hear ... That's what they thought. I like to hear people say my name. I like to say the name of people I'm talking with.
"When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. You just know that your name is safe in their mouth." Billy - age 4
When I see my name misspelled by people who know me, like my brother-in-law frequently does, it always seems so odd. Careless. As in uncaring. He is notoriously detail oriented ... I notice and shrug. I'm reading Elie Weisel's book right now too (and yes, the copy of Heaven is for Real is right here beside me and I promise to get to it tonight! ... But it's not a fifteen to twenty minutes worth of reading like you said it was!) ... The parents of one of my college friends had those horrible intentionally dehumanising tattooed numbers above their wrists in the soft skin. ... My mother doesn't chose to remember the names of my children. Really. She refers to them as the one who dives ... or, seriously, by a nickname she has chosen for them, or even as uhmmm, your son, or her coup de grace ... By the names of my brother's children. She calls him "your brother" when she is talking to me and he and I joke about it by referring to her as "your mother" when we talk with each other. I laugh about it, but I know it's really not funny. Names. Names are important. Now I am reading about the water to wine miracle ... Jesus refers to Mary as "woman" ... the commentaries indicate that this expression is intentionally distancing as Jesus begins the work of his Father. They provide excellent linguistic support for the premise that this wasn't disrespectful or even slightly hurtful towards his mother. She got it. Again, I wish I understood more languages.
This is the last thing ... Our soul. It is eternal. That's what I believe ... The details of that, large and small, I'm waiting to see, but I do believe it is eternal and I do believe it was created by God. When? I have liked to wonder about that for longer then I remember. An easy answer would be at the point of conception. My husband doesn't believe a body gets it's soul until it is being born. What about Jesus and John the Baptist, I ask ... He says they are special cases. I don't know. It doesn't really matter. As a mother, I can't think of abortions or miscarriages as just a loss of flesh and bone. We agree to disagree here. This I do know ... When I read Roots, I loved the way an African child received the gift of his name. And then, a few years ago I read in the book of Revelation where God tells us our name. I like that God has a name for me. I love thinking about how it might sound when I hear it ... for the first time ... for every time. Even now, with my DeAnn name, I listen to how it is said. Just like little Billy ... I think we all hear what is being said by how our name is used.
Tuesday, September 20, 2011
“The miracle is not to walk on water. The miracle is to walk on the green earth, dwelling deeply in the present moment and feeling truly alive.” ~ Thich Nhat Hanh
What is a miracle? This morning I've asked the people in my family this question. It surprises me to hear such very different perspectives under the same roof! The question goes well with grits and rainey Southern mornings.
I think a miracle is "an event" where a soul experiences the presence of God ... via our physical senses, or our intellect, or spiritually. I think a miracle is any time or place where we "walk" mindfully, like the first people did in the garden, with God. It seems like we have to quietly match pace with God for this walk, and I feel that this is what TNH is expressing. To walk on the earth, in this fallen state, wasn't the original design. It seems like communion was God's intent. Okay ... I've wandered to my definition: A miracle is any anything whereby mankind shares communion with God.
My husband says a miracle is an act whereby God expresses his authority over natural laws. He cited Biblical miracles like Moses with the plagues and the rod he struck the rock with. "Are births miracles?" I asked and he said he didn't believe so, because births are natural events. His definition seems to be very textbook ... I've looked up definitions today.
Because I believe God spun the universe in to motion, I not sure the natural law deal is satisfying to me. Natural laws are God's laws within that context and "miraculous" must be at his discretion ... Maybe top shelf laws so to speak ... Not laws which break or contradict other laws.
The leper was healed. He was unclean, and their laws required him to maintain his distance from people and to announce his uncleanness whenever someone was within earshot. Was he calling out "unclean, unclean" when Jesus came by ... Idk ... The text says he called out to Jesus and that Jesus healed him ... He said something like, If you are willing, you are able to heal me. I think the story of a miracle, like this story, tell a lot of stories. Yeah, seems to demonstrate Jesus authority over natural law, as miracles are defined, but there are other stories here that are actually relevant to me ... This is my miracle too ... All the miracles of Christ carry a meaning which I think is personal to each of us. According to the laws laid out in the Old Testament, touching a leper made one unclean ... They took the uncleanness of the leper upon themselves. That is where this particular miracle expands ... I recognised that I am spiritually unclean ... He didn't make a rule whereby I had to call that out to everyone, but he did make a way to come by me and I did ask Him to heal me ... And he took upon himself, my sins and the sins of us all ... To me, for me, for all of us, that is a miracle. He came and made a way for us to become clean ... and physical death loses it's sting right there. A miracle I can't see. Natural laws weren't involved beyond the first layer of this story, and yet the miracle penetrates through eternity.
Yes ... Weeding. I may be a natural born weeder.
Sammy came around and sat near me as I worked. It's hot and humid now ... Steamy still from the rain last night. That bed surprised me by being full of ants. I didn't plant impatients, poppers the kids call them because of their cool seed pods ... no impatients this year ... Watering them would have been too much effort on top of everything else. So ... This summer a few shallow weeds have taken hold ... and in the brick side walk too. Not like me. I have been looking the other way some, maybe more then I ought. This summer I focused on V, and on disciplining my stray thoughts away from unproductive tracks. I am trying to cover myself up with good stuff to think about when I wake up at night.
On flying ... Today I saw where one of my buddies who finished his CFI certif right before me ... The very day of the gear up matter of fact ... Well ... He's at the regionals now fully entrenched and ready to start bitchin' about overnights in Mexico. Yeah ... I started to lick that wound but I made myself stop. My husband asked me what I do around here to earn my keep ... Hmmm, was it last weekend or the one before. On Sunday he and I walked in to town together ... And I told him that something important to me recently died, and I'm just doing the best I can to reboot myself. It's really starting to feel like something I used to want to do ... instructing and commercial flying.
I remember when we moved away from Ft. Worth. I didn't want to. I was happy there with my two little children and friends to enjoy life with. Ft. Worth had been home to me ... The home I chose and I really loved those years there. When we moved to College Station ... I knew it was temporary and I was also working full time while L earned his PhD. Then over here. It took me awhile to adapt ... but I have. If we had stayed in Ft.Worth I woulda never learned to fly in the first place. I would have stayed in the box with my buddy girls over there. I don't know which ways I might have grown over the years, but not towards flying I almost certain ... We were girls with big hair and fancy closets. This has been a much better life for me. I would have resisted the change if I understood that you never go back, but I am truly thankful that I got to get out of that box. One of my college roommates lives over in Atlanta now ... I don't think we have enough in common to even make it through a lunch. Third husband is a pilot ... she loves to complain about how crazy his schedule is ... You start out a trophy wife and end up with a trophy husband ... .
Uhhh ... I thought I was thinking about better stuff but apparently no so much! What I was thinking is that even if I want to stay where I am so comfortable and happy ... now that is in an airplane ... Maybe I'll get a few years later and see that the fork in my road directed me towards where I really wanted and needed to be and just didn't have enough sense to find on my own.
Passive.
All this thinking about love and friendship and God and goodness ... all this sitting still. I feel a tension inside my soul I guess. I am certain that God doesn't ask us to be passive ... to spectate.
I'm still thinking about all the issues in the big 911 bucket. I thinking about the debates and what the contenders are saying ... and not saying. I am trying to see what they have actually done ... not that I believe that's a great indicator for what they might do next.
One of my kids is in a bit of stink with their dad. There is a disagreement with what was said about curfew. It's just a flash point really. Someone thinks they can handle more freedom ... someone else disagrees. An area where I have not been successful is negotiating the squeeze between the rock (aka Cat Daddy) and the hard places (aka 1-5). The kids ask me to speak up for them ... They know my mind is like a recorder ... I can regurgitate whole conversations months after the fact ... And yes, he did say 12:00. It's a bit of a mess. We all know the verses about submissive ... passive ... like a spectator.
Issues ... Little domestic house cat issues. Issues in the jungle for the big cats to sort out. Little dining room tables ... World stages.
I'm kinda glad my flower beds are weedy. Weeding I understand. Weeding is something that needs done but no one seems to want to do.
“Once while St. Francis of Assisi was hoeing his garden, he was asked, ''What would you do it you were suddenly to learn that you were to die at sunset today?'' He replied, ''I would finish hoeing my garden.''”
Monday, September 19, 2011
POETRY
And it was at that age...Poetry arrived
in search of me. I don't know, I don't know where
it came from, from winter or a river.
I don't know how or when,
no, they were not voices, they were not
words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent fires
or returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.
I did not know what to say, my mouth
had no way
with names
my eyes were blind,
and something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering
that fire
and I wrote the first faint line,
faint, without substance, pure
nonsense,
pure wisdom
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw
the heavens
unfastened
and open,
planets,
palpitating planations,
shadow perforated,
riddled
with arrows, fire and flowers,
the winding night, the universe.
And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
I felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke free on the open sky.
37 sparkly nails ... The girls saw this paint technique on "pinterest" ... Overty gaudy, but not for here where women wear all kinds of nail bling ... So, for fun today ... Tips done in "Crown Me Already", the base coat is "Totally Fort Worth" ... I'm not kidding and that was totally coincidental! Love that. V chose these colors and while she was browsing, I did pick up two other Texas towns ... I think they were San Antonio and Austin ... One was turquoise. This polish is OPI out of the Netherlands. I secretly really like it. When I am flying I just wear clear coat, so this is a new kind of silliness.
36one of the very best things I love ... A strong, hot, sweet, light cup of coffee. And if I pour a second cup I like to stir it up and put it in the refrigerator for later ... Drink it cold like the bottled Starbucks. I loved those bottled coffees in the cooler for charter flights ... Coffee is good. Sometime during college, after I started living by myself off campus in an apartment, my mother surprised me by giving me what remained of her set of Dessert Rose pottery ... It had been a wedding gift specifically to her from my daddy's mother. She had delivered her last child, Daddy's youngest brother who my brothers and I grew up with, and the way I hear it, she spent her last year in the hospital dying from cancer. Momma and Daddy looked after the baby and another Uncle who was a toddler at the time. Both of those uncles seemed always more like brothers to me and I took the blame for many a shenanigan gone awry cause they knew Daddy was a lot more indulgent towards his girl then one of those boys ... they woulda been in double trouble probably if the whole thing hadn't been my big idea that they barely got there in time to rescue me from ... I bet my Dad knew all along ... He was a softy. Anyway, the dishes. Momma used those dishes all through my growing up years. She and Daddy would frequently leave the dinner table with us kids finishing up ... Then Momma would check back to see everyone's plate was clean. Tommy would drink my milk if I would finish his vegetables ... Haha ... He's still like that, if it doesn't go in pico he doesn't want it on his plate! I can't remember ever getting caught burying vegetables in the kitchen trash can ... the possibility of throwing food away would never occur to my momma ... maybe growing up with those boys made me incorrigible. I was very very happy to have those dishes twenty years later. She had stopped using them and had them nicely wrapped up. There was just one coffee mug left ... and two cups with saucers. I drank my coffee from that mug ... it was comforting to hold those old memories right there in my hand. I felt pretty alone during those college years ... 'cept for Tommy, those boys were gone and Daddy passed during my junior year. That mug disappeared at church of all places ... The original Francescanware mugs were in short supply. A few years ago my husband, who knows I am sentimental about this set of dishes, saw the new run of this pattern and encouraged me to replace some of the missing pieces. I bought the mug. Every morning I drink my hot coffee from that mug ... and maybe tea later in the day. I'm thankful for my coffee ... Awesome coffee maker ... My dog hopping up on the window sill when he hears the grinder clicking on ... Quiet peaceful mornings to savor those first few sips ... and my mug that holds so many funny and sweet memories. I don't drink Folger's coffee, but their jingle "the best part of waking up is Folger's in your cup" ... genius.
Saturday, September 17, 2011
The ear is still clogged ... and that side of my throat has a line of raw that I imagine begins at the euschasian tube ... I don't want to visit with the Ears, Nose and Throat guy ... not because I don't like doctors or because I am afraid of bad news ... none of that. I don't like sitting in a waiting room ... and then later, on a table with crunchy paper and sterile stuff in glass canisters. I don't like somebody inches away from me peering intently into my body collecting more information about me then I would voluntarily share. I just don't like it ... you go in there and next thing you know they need to listen to your heartbeat. I've been very fortunate in life to be so healthy. The appointment is Wednesday.
Last night I kept on waking up because of that silly ear. I have to go get it seen about ... This is the downside of floating on my back with my ears in the water on the lazy river everyday little miss wanted to this summer. I floated and watched the sky blossom with afternoon showers ... I estimated the tops ... til it was too easy ... they went up only so high before they started back down ... . Along with the ear, I have white ovals around my eye lids where the Oakley's wrapped and the rest of the front of me is "brown as a raisin" as my momma would say. I know from experience that this was the last summer that I can hope for unlimited play time with one of my children. This was the summer when the scales began to tip back in the other direction ... away from them being little. Eventually, one of my five or their multiplier, will be fussing over my sunscreen etc., and maybe holding my hand to help me up on to a table with crunchy paper.
“Drink your tea slowly and reverently, as if it is the axis on which the world earth revolves - slowly, evenly, without rushing toward the future. Live the actual moment. Only this moment is life.” ~ Thich Nhat Hanh
... Just realized something about this (loop dream ... If thoughts of it keep on revisiting me, I may have to come up with a better name for it, because the loop, while super energizing fun, wasn't really what the dream was about) dream ... The GPS was programed with advice leading to that particular airport ... The intended landing spot and lunch at that specific place was the objective. Trust made this little dream flight possible. It's interesting to me, because I know myself, that I was able to fly to or really even towards an unknown location, and with a virtual stranger, is quite extraordinary ... It's amazing really, I woulda said impossible. Not being clear on an objective just simply doesn't fit with my personality ... I should note "how I rigidly used to be". I don't mind at all if someone else is driving, I even may tend to prefer it if everything is right, but ... me not believing I know where I am generally headed is ... just not me. Plus, the whole comfort with a stranger in this type setting is unlike me. And, I've had a lot of dreams where I was flying ... I've never let anyone else in my airplane in a dream ... Always single pilot ops. Here, in this dream, I was just flying &/or passenger-ing in the plane for the sheer unselfconscious joy of it ... I was flying to an unknown never before seen or imagined place and this morning the freedom and trust apparent there, makes me happy ... I smile at myself ... I smile at the dream picture of who I became in that airplane.
... How long ago was this dream? I can still close my eyes and see and feel this interior time ... it informs me. I sat there at that table and I did wonder what was up with my flying buddy. He programmed the GPS. The person I was wanted to sit down for a meal together ... That would have made sense to me ... We landed here to have lunch. The person I am now as I reflect on this wonderful dream is comfortable with not understanding the confusing parts of this dream. In the dream I sat ... Still ... without expectation, and waited ... unconcerned, completely at ease with all the unknowns.
Me, sitting still is a destination in and of itself. I have been trying to get here without knowing it. I am happy here. Still shelters my soul.
Over the years of remembering some dreams, I've learned that dreams like this one eventually make perfect sense. I like this spiritually still place. As for the dream ... What a wonderful place to sit and relax. This dream is gift ... one of my favorite treasures. To be in a sweet little plane, with someone I enjoyed sharing time and place with, to get to a lovely spot to relax ... it's good. I close my eyes and sit here ... drinking lemonade and enjoying the elegant simplicity of this shelter ... everything is perfect here. This is an interior happy place.
This morning during my quiet time I just thought of this.
Thursday, September 15, 2011
Thursday ... grocery shopping day. Before that I will clean out the refrigerator and pantry, making a list as I go, and thinking about meals for the week. Breakfast, lunches, dinner, snacks ... household items and seasonal things (like batteries and canned goods for hurrican season ... and s'more fixin's for a fire outside). This morning, after I got everyone off I sat outside and drank my coffee. This past Monday, on that field trip, I walked through an exhibit that had buttons to push to hear the call of several of the birds around here. I pushed everyone of them one at a time ... all familiar ... only a lucky guess could match the sound with the bird were it all up to me. I think I will start learning about birds now. I could hear probably ten different species from the front porch this morning ... and a Beech engine wooing overhead and a cricket clacking from deep in the pine straw ... a racing bike slicing by almost before I could look up. ... and I saw a seed helicoptering gracefully by just out of reach ... and a rainbow colored remnant of spider web blowing almost invisible between the columns. Sweet, light, hot coffee and a layer of white fluff filtering the morning sun. I sat out there last night to end the day ... almost a full moon. This morning I thought about the shrubs I will trim on Saturday and I thought about getting my flowerbeds ready for pansies ... and fresh paint for the front door.
Yesterday, after my walk, I noticed a hummingbird visiting the candle lantern I have hanging below the rose vine. Poor baby ... what a disappointment that must be ... a red lantern with a little citronella candle. I'm going to look for a hummingbird feeder when I go in to purchase the bedding plants.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
This morning a man with an ancient face knocked on my front door. At first I couldn't understand his words, but he was patient with me and eventually I understood that his truck was out of gas and he needed help. I do not know how people know to knock here, but I am glad that they do ... we usually have a few gallons of fuel in the garage.
He knew he was low on fuel at the start of his day, and had planned to go right to the gas station after he finished his work ... yard work for the neighbors across and over a few doors. I do not know them. The slope of their driveway tilted the gas in the bottom of his tank out of reach for a restart ... I told him I knew all about that! I thought to give him the gas in its red container and just let him bring it back by, but I could see that he wished I would walk with him, and I'm glad I did. He was so winded when we reached his truck that he needed my help with the refueling process ... then he needed to talk.
This past April his wife died. I could already see the pain that death can etch into a face. He is ten years older then she was ... he wasn't prepared for her to go first. I stood resting my arms where the window rolled down into the door of his truck, listening as he sat in the cab fumbling with an unlit cigarette and remembering their time together. Two tall cups of coffee in the cup holder and lottery tickets littering the dash ... otherwise tidy as it could be. Slowly, oozing like a deep wound, he told the story of her last night. She had had heart surgery and was doing great on her coumiden ... then he noticed she was listless and hot all the time. She told him the doctor had taken her off the coumiden. He insisted she see a different doctor and she had. She had been back on the prescription two weeks before she suddenly passed. He had been fanning her when he decided to call an ambulance. "Tell them to come with their lights, but no sirens blowing to wake up the neighbors" she whispered to him, "Tell them to bring oxygen ... I can't breathe." He blamed himself. He said he should have been paying better attention. He said her heart pumping that too thick blood had taken her away from him. Big sorrow filled tears followed the trails of his face. Dark brown skin pulled tight over his skull before recessing in deep folds at his cheeks ... he had no teeth ... not a one ... I noticed when I got him to laughing a few times ... and he is a blue eyed man which is sort of unusually for an African-American. He told me about the last few minutes they shared together in the hospital and later, about her funeral when their sons sat on either side of him. I said I didn't disagree with what he had figured out about the hard work of pumping thick blood, but that I respectfully believe there is a time to be born and a time to die ... and that when it comes right down to it, men don't really have much say there. I told him he could torment himself in that place where he wished he might have made a difference ... but surely the love they shared would beg him not to. By then I was wiping my face too. Eventually he told me that they have four children and six grandchildren ... three boys and three girls ... he was looking off into the trees when he said they weren't legal married. They wanted to be. He said they had had 34 years together ... with good times and bad times made better because of being together. He told me her first husband disappeared leaving her with two babies, but no divorce. She never could remarry ... legal. I told him I didn't think he'd have to explain that to God and he said that's what their preacher said when they went to him asking for help about her first marriage. "She got me going to church in the first place," he told me. It made him so very sad that they couldn't make it right before God and man. I told him I thought where there was the kind of love that I could sense they shared, surely God was also there. He was worried that they wouldn't be able to spend time together in heaven because he hadn't figured out how to marry her. We might not be able to find each other over there because we didn't get connected right. He is afraid that God will be angry about that. He said he could bear this a lot easier if he felt like he could just see her again ... someday ... where he longs to be ... over there with her. Seaching for words to ease his anguish, I asked him if he believed we have guardian angels ... he does. "Y'alls guardian angels must know each other ...and if God had to look away because this wasn't a legal marriage (as he fears) then the angels could speak for you both because I know they had to see the love ... but myself, I believe God saw the whole thing and judges a man's heart with grace." He laughed when I said as ornery as he is he probably had to have five guardian angels and everyone of them could give a good account. I asked him if he could ever feel her near and he said he could. I said I didn't know for sure, but I thought you could only feel your loved ones if God gave them special permission to walk across the bridge of love built between here and there. I said, "God knows all about love ... Of that I am certain." I told him I think their love will draw him towards her over there same as it did over here. And I said she wouldn't want him grieving himself to death like he is doing.
Coffee and cigarettes. Nothing tastes good. I remember how that is.
Later, with the sun hot and high, he asked me what my name is and I told him, DeAnn.
"DeAnn, can I tell you one more thing?" he asked.
"Yes sir" I said.
"Don't answer the door when a stranger is knocking on it".
"I already know that" I said.
"Well then why did you open the door?!" He starting laughing again when I smiled and said I was sure I could take him if I had to.
"May I say something to you?" I asked him, and he nodded. "The whites of your eyes are yellow ... that means your liver is not happy with you ... you can drink what ever you need to and smoke those stupid cigarettes if you want to ... too late for them to kill you, I bet ... but you have got to start drinking at least eight cups of water everyday ... you work outside, you should have a cooler of water with you ... and you've got to start eating something". He was laughing again, and mentioned a donut waiting at home for his meal. "If you were my daddy I would say at least 10 glasses of water everyday ... and no sodas, and real food ... man food, not that sugary nonsense! ... Fill up a milk jug and make yourself drink that everyday." He didn't make any promises.
"Thank you for the gas and thank you for listening to me today ... I guess I jus' needed someone to talk to."
Anam Cara
A book of CELTIC WISDOM
By John o'Donohue
First of all, this was the perfect book for me to read at this time.
There are 6 chapters and I will note here with in that structure. The book was checked out from the library ... It was so funny to feel my tension as I wanted to make notes in the margins as I have begun to do with some of my personal books. I think it might be fun for my children to later see which ideas resonated or paused me ... This is a book which will be very hospitable to handwritten musing in the margins. My idea is to make notes here, at True North ... Let the ideas sit for awhile then ask for a copy of the book for my birthday ... Re-read it with a pen in hand then compare that track through with these notes which will represent a second reading. So many of the ideas expressed here feel whole ... They relax in to me and go directly to a place that has been waiting to hold them. Some of the ideas I either don't understand, or I am less sure I agree with. The book, as a whole, is ... very beautiful, tenderly, thoughtfully written with the authority of integrated mind and soul. This was a smart, good-hearted man, willing to do some heavy lifting to arrive at these words. The book soothes me. Other then the Bible, I have never felt soothed by a book ... Yes, a poem ... a quote ... a passage or idea ... a story ... never the whole book. You know what? I think I am going to start looking for this as a used book. I will like the feel of the old paper better then then new process.
Prologue (notes, 14 Sept. 2011)
"It is strange to be here. The mystery never leaves you alone. Behind your image, below your words, above your thoughts, the silence of another world waits. A world lives within you. No one else can bring you news of this inner world."
" ... the galaxies dance out toward infinity ... under our feet is ancient earth ... in your thoughts, the silent universe seeks echo."
"you gaze into these word-mirrors and catch glimpses of meaning, belonging. and shelter."
"Their (Celts) sense of ontological friendship yielded a world of experience imbued with a rich texture of otherness, ambivalence, symbolism, and imagination. ... The Celtic understanding of friendship finds its inspiration and culmination in the sublime notion of the anam cara "
... anam = soul + cara = friend ... soul friend. Friend of my Soul, Friend to your Soul.
"The anam cara was a person to whom you could reveal the hidden intimacies of your life. This friendship was an act of recognition and belonging."
People wonder about soulmates ... this seems to me to be a soulmate. Maybe. by it's very nature, they are not able to be as big a presence in your life as you wish ... or maybe they are, I don't know. As a spouse ... maybe this is just cynical, but I wonder if it is even possible to maintain a very long term intimate relationship with a Anam Cara. It would be ideal, I just don't know if it is possible.
1 The Mystery of Friendship
2 Spirituality of the Senses
3 Solitude is Luminous
4Work as a Poetics of Growth
5Aging: The Beauty of the Inner Harvest
6Death: The Horizon is in the Well
To be continued.
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
It's the kind of Tuesday that feels like a Monday. Yesterday was spent chaperoning sixth graders through team building experiences. 7:30 to 5:30 ... then home to put dinner on the table. It was a long day, but a good day.
I'm at my favorite window drinking coffee and tapping out line items, "To Do" events on the yellow legal pad app ... The list is long ... longer then the day. This Sunday, I re-read the first third or so of The Goal ... A book essentially about constraints, flow models, critical path, productivity (it's actually an excellent book). My husband uses it in (I think) his senior design course ... or maybe project management. It is written as a novel which is a bit extraordinary as textbooks go. Anyway, sometimes I design his tests ... Writing questions pertaining to The Goal was how I spent Sunday after lunch. That and thinking about the sermon on evil. Today ... at my favorite window ... I see lush layers of green ... The last bits of green straining towards the morning light. Fall is coming up out of the ground. I can't see it from my window yet, but I know it's pushing this last bit of green towards harvest time. The pecan trees branches lean low with ripening fruit. In the rose vine the nests are silent ... Those baby birds are long gone. The golden garden spider is also done with her web weaving ... I have been looking for her all week. I'll blow what is left of that lacey lattice away when I get to the front porch part of that list today.
My checklist. My way of averting bottlenecks ...
... the black and white of today.
In a minute I will choose some music and I'll start checking off items while I look for the color between the black and white to do line items. Between the radials as my soul flys through this day.
While I typed this note a big red pickup drove by with big dogs barking excitedly. Sammy was happy to reply. I also saw a man running backwards up the hill ... People drive to this neighborhood to do their three or five miles inside this cocoon of green. It is beautiful here. H's dad just went by ... walking fast like he does ... and a very old lady walking very slowly in maybe her house robe ... I love that, she looked like a ghost floating by. That man on the scooter passed by ... sometimes he sings on his way home ... it makes me smile. Across the street, the lawn service that sprays chemical directives on their lawn did their thing and pulled away just in time for the mowing crew to arrive ... they will vacumn that stuff right up with the grass clippings ... the people who live there are not at home.
Their silence keeps me sleepless for I know:
Within that smoke their ash still falls as snow,
To settle on our flesh like fading stars
Dissolve into sharp sparks at break of day.
At dawn a distant shudder in the earth
Disclosed the flight of fire into steel,
The shaking not of subways underground,
But screams from inside flowers made of flame.
We stood upon the Heights like men of straw
Transfixed by flames that started in the sky,
And watched them plunging down in death’s ballet
Too far removed to hear their falling cry.
By noon that band of smoke loomed low
Upon the harbor’s skin and made us gasp;
A hand of smoke that in its curdled crawl
Kept reaching to extend its lethal grasp.
The harp strung bridge held up ten thousand souls
Who’d screaming run beneath the paws of death,
Like dusted ghosts that lived but were not sure
If they lived in light or only for a breath.
They’d writhed and spun within that storm of smoke
And stumbled out to light and clearer air,
To find upon the river’s further shore
No sanctuary other than despair.
The sirens scraped the sky and jets carved arcs
Within a heaven empty of all hope,
That marked its epicenter with one streak
Of black on polished bone where silver'd stood.
By evening all their ash had settled so
That on the leaves outside my window glowed
Their souls in small bright stars until the rain
Cleaned all of what could not be clean again.
We breathed that smoke that bent and crawled.
We learned to hate that smoke that lingered so.
We knew that blood could only answer blood,
And so we yearned to go but not to go.
Within that city shrines were our resolve.
We placed them where our grief would best anneal.
Upon our walls and trees their faces loomed
To gaze at us from time beyond repeal.
Their last lost summer faded into ash.
Their faces faded into name scratched stones.
Our years flowed into endless desert seas
Where warplanes prowled in search of bones.
In time their smoke and ash became but words
In stories told at dinner, told by rote,
Or in the comments made by magazines
For whom the "larger issues" were of note.
In time their faces faded with the rains,
The little altars thick with wax were scraped,
But still beneath clear plastic they endure
Reminding us that we have not escaped.
The poet knows himself only on the condition that things resound in him, and that in him, at a single awakening, they and he come forth together out of sleep. ~ Jacques Maritain
Sometime in May this year, I read a Mother's Day tribute written by Mr. Van der Leun posted on his blog, American Digest. There was something special about it ... my favorite Mother's Day thing this year. I remembered another of his ... something amusing about Levi jeans. What might google turn up I wondered ... turns out, bunches ... but for the time I had for it, just this one story on hypertext caught my eye ... and I read it, and it wasn't what I expected. Well, maybe it was ... I wanted, and found, an interesting well written story ... it was the mystical quality that sat me still. The story, The Arrival, is about a creative process (tap this post title for a link to the story). Reading the story actually did make everything around me quiet ... I could feel it, maybe I was holding my breathe, I don't know. Well, I wondered if this was just yodaesque writing skills, or if this was really a real true story. I ventured a note asking ... A note came back which said basically ... Yep, that's how it happened. The story. I was happy to know that it is a true story.
"How can I know what I think until I see what I say?" ~G VdL And this
"I am always suspicious of things that travel "into the mystic." Especially so when it involves my own experience." ~G VdL
I was happy because somebody who seems pretty normal wrote about this kinda weird stuff. I read it on a day when I was not feeling all that great. And ... I had been noticing that my notes here were telling me a sort of a weird story ... Hmmm, by that I mean, I can see what I really think when I read what I wrote. I can see a story here of my struggles ... and my joys. I can see me. I stay so busy being some precious ones momma, or an okay neighbor ... or whoever is under the hats that keep on showing up on top of my head ... .
I see a process here that moving through my days kept me from noticing. Not a creative process like Mr. Van der Leun is describing, rather ... I'm a bit self-conscious to say, maybe a healing process, but more too ... I see my soul better. I see my soul trusting God, and I know the miracle that is for me. And I have barely caught my breathe on that, and already I see that trust is just the foundation for some deeper mystery.
I see someone who had some disabling oowies, unfolding towards a more well version of her true self. I see someone who stretched a hand out towards the God bigger then words in a book ... hoping that my tiny hand could feel his touch. I really really like things that I can see. Feeling is a wilder thing then I have been comfortable with ... but I am relaxing in to it. Floating in the deep waters ... not fretting so much that my feet can't touch. It feels good most of the time. I know what mean.
So ... I was captivated by the story of an invisible process.
And then ... OMG ... These words. I like that someone said ... Okay, I'm up for it ... Let's see where this goes ... And hauntingly powerful words came to hold the place of the missing.
Friday, September 9, 2011
I'm busy thinking about some important stuff.
I'll probably write about my thoughts on Anam Cara next week. It is a good book to know. I would like for each of my children to look at it at the right time in their lives. I am certain that I will buy a copy of my own sometime soon ... It is a book which invites notes in the margins. I have three other books waiting which I am excited to open. I am happy for a time when reading whatever I want is perfectly okay.
The mornings hurry me through housework ... Then I read for awhile and write in my notebook. My handwriting looks almost unfamiliar. Then I work in the garage. The garage is getting my best attention. I am excited about how excellent it is going to look. Hahaha ... One of the areas already looks like shelving at Lowes. I like that. Yesterday a big box of nails fell from my hand as I tippy toed up to reach it. Nails went everywhere! I like those little clear plastic drawer units for nails and all that stuff. I have one ... It is full. Now I am waiting to find all the items that want to be in those little drawers so I can see how many I need and what sizes the drawers should be. I really like organization. I like seeing order arising from that chaos. I'm happy just thinking about it.
Last night when I woke up at two I couldn't get back to sleep. I had a lot to think about. I finally dozed off around five so I am tired tonight. I have a lot of the pieces for thinking about what I am thinking about and I feel very happy in general. I am so happy to feel so happy. Now I am even starting to feel like really singing again. It is a good feeling.
Tonight after the movie (we saw The Debt ... One of the best this summer) I played with the stargazers app on my husband's phone ... For some reason he has it but I don't ... Probably because I spend my iTunes budget on music. I love that app. I put it on his phone. It is on my wish list ... Next purchase for sure.
Last night my husband woke up and asked me what I was thinking about ... I gave him the short version. And asked him if he really thinks I am a "striver". He said he meant that I am very goal oriented. Yes, that is true. I like goals.
Last night I was remembering a little reminder I wrote to myself here about what be still actually means. Still is sorta difficult for me.
I haven't read this book ... I'm thinking about it. Tap my post title to link the author's site. There are reviews for the book there, a video hawking the book, several quotations by, I presume Moslem leaders (aren't those guys really in the best positions to curtail the evil that is terrorism ... Walk it rather then talk it, and maybe they are), and what might be links supporting the research for the book.
The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis. ~ Danté
Reacting hatefully doesn't make anything right ... So ... How? What? I'm thinking about that today.
"Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it. Hatred confuses life; love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it." ~M.L.King, Jr.
"Never in this world can hatred be stilled by hatred; it will be stilled only by non-hatred -- this is the law of eternal." ~Buddha
"Hatred is the madness of the heart." ~Lord Byron
"Anger, if not restrained, is frequently more hurtful to us than the injury that provokes it."
~Seneca
"Those who hate you don't win unless you hate them; and then you destroy yourself."
~Richard Nixon
"I will not permit any man to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him."
~Booker T. Washington
“Tolerance is the virtue of the man without convictions.” ~Chesterton
“Tolerance implies no lack of commitment to one's own beliefs. Rather it condemns the oppression or persecution of others.” J.F.Kennedy
“Dante once said that the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in a period of moral crisis maintain their neutrality” J.F.Kennedy ... Or maybe Dante.
“The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie - deliberate, contrived and dishonest - but the myth - persistent, persuasive and unrealistic” again ... Kennedy.
“Tolerance is another word for indifference.”
William Somerset Maugham quotes (English short-story Writer, Novelist and Playwright, 1874-1965 ... And another of his because it made me laugh when I saw it this morning ... “Love is what happens to a man and woman who don't know each other”) indifference is opposite love
I am trying to think about the unthinkable. During this time of quiet I've inadvertently seen several media presentations specifically produced because of 911 ... One was on conspiracy theories surrounding the attacks. The other, a movie, My Name is Khan ... I'll post a link to the trailer. For me it was a story of Aspergers Syndrome, but it's intent is to present the idea of American Moslem's as ... not all jihadists. Khan was a person who believed there are good people and bad people represented in each people group. Maybe, the conspiracy theory movie, Loose Change, presents a similar idea. What I notice in myself is an impatience with women of Moslem faith who have no ability to share about basic concepts of their faith ... while wearing the hijab with what looks like disdaining arrogance. With others I have sat and visited with locally, their donning of the hijab seems to be a statement of identification with their African ancestry ... again, with no working knowledge of Islam. It doesn't specifically bother me to see women wearing the hijab ... It is supposed to be a garment of dignity. What bothers me, is seeing the hijabwear women. There is no dignity in ignorance. The material presented by the conspiracy theorist ... It's hard to think about and it's hard not to think about it ... It's impossible to imagine the soul of one willing to shed the blood of 911. Hatred seems like the only possible motivation for such an unholy act. There is a labyrinth of truth leading to the inception of the 911 attack on humanity. Where is the truth of 911? That's on my mind. Also ... I feel not good about this country's character and goodness being used as a weapon against us ... And the loss of personal freedoms because of potential risks. My friend who lives on the border was telling me about two people who blogged about atrocities in Mexico being brutally murdered and their mutilated bodies hung on display on the brigde between our countries. She said our political rhetoric claims the Borders are safer then ever ... But she and I used to be able to walk across those very bridges. That guy who was a guy with a gun who the guys at my CFI school were buzzing about ... He had been detained from starting class with our group because he was down in South Texas trying to sort out the murder of a man who jet-skied (with his wife) into the wrong place. The border of Texas is not a safe place. I remember a few years ago some stories of border patrol agents who were on trial for the death of someone in a border dispute. Law enforcement people on trial for enforcing ... Things continue to deteriorate. There are plenty of examples in the Bible where God said not to tolerate wrong practices.
I read a poem I cannot forget. It hurts to remember it ... the words which began to arrive in a swirling snow the winter after.
I know hatred isn't holy. It can't possibly be holy in any person's religious lexicon. And yet ... The gash of this is unsuctured. I hear a call to tolerance, and of course tolerance is part of the sinew of our nation ... But the taste of innocent blood can't be swallowed. Shouldn't be swallowed.
Hegel ... "The wounds of the spirit heal and leave no scars." I see it true in a private part of my life ... The scars which encased my heart ... miraculously falling away. I yearn to come through the fire of this little personal hell without the smell of smoke clinging to my garment ... my shelter ... my dignity. Sometimes tolerance is simply intolerable.
I do hate the very idea of security personal at domestic airports ... screening American pilots ... . I do hate the idea of a mosque being built near the pain saturated ground where innocent lives ended at a jagged edge of an Islamic hatred. It doesn't seem right, because it is not right.
I trying to sort this out for myself. I think it's very important.
I heard that Perry's stance of gun control is "use both hands". Nice sound bite. Somebody needs to get their feet on the rudder pedals at very least.
Tap post title to zoom to wildfiretoday.com ... Who knew? ... There are several credible sites dedicated to monitoring and providing info about fires and fire fighting around the country.
My family is near Austin and NE of there. My brother says they can see the fires and that the vegetation that is not in the path of the flames is withering away from lack of water.
TX 304 runs through Bastrop, SE of Austin
This photo showed up on my fb page and I tracked it down to "Texas Storm Chasers" ... The State capital building is pictured. My friend in South Texas, 300 miles SSW of there says they've been smelling smoke all week. It aggravates me to see all the little stories creeping up about Gov. Perry's choice to cut financial resources to volunteer fire departments in Texas ... Pop shots from the peanut gallery ... Money, just like peanut butter, gets spread thin when in short supply. This is the same guy who opened up shelters in Texas to provide relief to those left homeless by Katrina. ... Geez ... I want to be well informed, but I get so frustrated by the spin cycle which seems unrelenting in news outlets.
Mom,
I found this today and thought you might enjoy it but I don't think it is by maya angelou... Two
“A Woman Should Have”
– by Maya Angelou uhm,Pamela Redmond Satran (actually)
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ..
enough money within her control to move out
and rent a place of her own,
even if she never wants to or needs to…
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ..
something perfect to wear if the employer, or date of her dreams wants to see her in an hour…
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ..
a youth she’s content to leave behind….
a past juicy enough that she’s looking forward to
retelling it in her old age….
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE …..
a set of screwdrivers, a cordless drill, and a black lace bra…
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE .
one friend who always makes her laugh… and one who lets her cry…
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ….
a good piece of furniture not previously owned by anyone else in her family…
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE …
eight matching plates, wine glasses with stems, and a recipe for a meal, that will make her guests feel honored…
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE …
a feeling of control over her destiny.
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
how to fall in love without losing herself.
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
how to quit a job, break up with a lover, and confront a friend without ruining the friendship…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
when to try harder… and WHEN TO WALK AWAY…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
that she can’t change the length of her calves,
the width of her hips, or the nature of her parents..
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
that her childhood may not have been perfect…but its over…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
what she would and wouldn’t do for love or more…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
how to live alone… even if she doesn’t like it…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW..
whom she can trust,
whom she can’t,
and why she shouldn’t take it personally…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
where to go…
be it to her best friend’s kitchen table…
or a charming inn in the woods…
when her soul needs soothing…
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW…
what she can and can’t accomplish in a day…
a month…and a year…
I'm reading a couple of books by John O'Donohue right now. Anam Čara and Eternal Echoes. His work is almost as comfortable and comforting as my favorite Enya songs. I'm pretty sure I'll transfer my notes from my little moleskin to here when I collect all my thoughts on O'Donohue's topic(s). Apparently, he was an admirer of Hegel's work, so I have had a little background work to do. Hegel is represented by some seriously strong thinking ... German. I'm not going to get too distracted with chasing rabbits just now. Here is one of the Hegel quotes which O'Donohue noted. I wish I had my keyboard set to type German. I think I'll see if I can arrange that ... I don't speak German.
Generally, the familiar, precisely because it is familiar, is not known. ~ Hegel Das Bekannte überhaupt ist darum, weil es bekannt ist, nicht erkannt.
... Supported by this thought from Gabriel García Márquez, "I know her so well now that I have not the slightest idea who she really is." (she ... His wife of thirty years)
When I saw that idea last night, I immediately thought of the chest of drawers that I sat with last week ... and of my husband. L refinished the chest with his dad back in the seventies. It has always been his chest and I've never thought to refinish it or even change the drawer pulls. As I said, I dust it and polish the mirror. I was going to paint a different chest of drawers, one that we found together, the sea glass color that I like so much.
The chest is still sturdy. I really like the new glass pulls and the fun paint color. I like the beachiness of the whole shebang. But what I really love about this particular chest is best seen inside the cabinet. The old wood is beautiful ... dense. The builder of this chest used only hand tools, elbow grease, and maybe a little love, in it's construction.
That is why I want to walk the trail, the Appalachain Trail, with my husband. I am ready to see who he has become. At his events I look across the room and see him, and I know he is not who he was thirty years ago. Who did we help each other become? I know in long term relationships people tend to acquire interpersonal baggage, nursing hurts, neglecting joys.
Now, we are coming to a new phase of our shared life. Something like retirement.
On the sidewalk after the rain.
The spider weathered the storm.
Thinking about this today as I tidy my house. Fall is in the air this morning ... 62°F.
The bud disappears when the blossom breaks through, and we might say that the former is refuted by the latter; in the same way when the fruit comes, the blossom may be explained to be a false form of the plant’s existence, for the fruit appears as its true nature in place of the blossom. The ceaseless activity of their own inherent nature makes these stages moments of an organic unity, where they not merely do not contradict one another, but where one is as necessary as the other; and constitutes thereby the life of the whole.
Preface to the Phenomenology of Spirit (1807). ~Georg Wilheim Fredrich Hegel
Just as little is seen in pure light as in pure darkness.
The Science of Logic (1812)
"Millions and millions of years would still not give me half enough time to describe that tiny instant of all eternity when you put your arms around me and I put my arms around youI" ~ Jacques Prévert
34this tropical storm, Lee, is pouring like those waterfalls I see on the AT. I am very happy to have the house windows open. Behind the silver water sheeting off the roof I see a blur of emerald green. 72° ... perfection.
33The country needs rain. We really need a system robust enough to steer it's way in to the edge of the gulf and shower out over the parched Southwest. Everybody wants water in their reservoirs ... Lots of people dread the storms that shoulder the rain. I guess that's a good metaphor for where I find myself. I was somewhat emotionally arid ... events supported by this tempestuous time in my life have hydrated my soul ... I fret about the devastation of what I was building ... I am both embarrassed by and grateful for the tenderness evidenced by the tears that pool and spill over my soul's gentle smile. I've always thought tears were an expression of anguish or pain ... I don't know what these are, but they are not that.
Today, I am thankful for the rain. So vital.
My oldest friend lives full time in the best lake house ever. It is perched so that you could fish off the front porch if you were of a mind to. Their boat hangs below. I love thinking of her there ... living on the lake I learned how to water ski on. The lake is there because a ring levy was constructed ... crops get thirsty even when mother nature is busy elsewhere.
New Orleans is inside a ring levy ... with pump stations spitting water outside the bowl. I am thinking about that today. Same basic idea ... Same storms. Well, anyway. Thank God for weather ... One of my favorite things!
Elegance is for tailors. Don't always believe in the numbers. There is always room for human judgment. - Albert Einstein
Insurer: It was pilot error.
Pilot: It was design error.
Insurer: I disagree. The pilot is at fault for trusting the designer.
Rules are made for people who aren't willing to make up their own.
You do what you can for as long as you can, and when you finally can't, you do the next best thing. You back up but you don't give up.
Never wait for trouble
If you want to grow old as a pilot, you've got to know when to push it, and when to back off.
~ Chuck Yeager quotes
I'm not thinking of wild in the context of unruly or disrespectful. I'm thinking of wild as free of unimportant restrictions. Not immoral, but natural, unsuppressed. As not tamed or dulled away from an authentic representation of one's true self. Wild, as a word has so many negative connotations. I'm thinking of it as a field of flowers or a waterfall ... or a night sky. I'm thinking of it as a natural state. Not as rebellion, but as basic, innocent ... Not in need of restraint or manmade convention.
I'm thinking about the story of early creation when God walked in a garden with his creation. A time when it was safe to sleep under a canopy of ancient lights ... A time before painted lines and table manners. That kind of wild.
I think this is why the wild horses are so appealing me.
I wonder how life might be were we free to be just who we were created to be. Seems like so much is lost wondering if this behavior is okay with strangers ... Am I laughing too loud? Is my stuff impressive? Do you like my hat?
I've liked the long walks on the trail. It's visually quiet ... Restful. I'll think about this some more. I guess what I'm thinking of is something like not watered down.
31L poked his head in while I was talking with my brother ... "Ask him about the car" he said, and I did. Shot from the hip diagnosis was probably a hydraulic clutch, out of fluid, inlet on firewall, check there first for fluid, hopefully there will be no air in the line, but if there is ... Blahblahblah. I think he is a genius. Problem probably solved he is ready for the next topic, which is what am I hearing from my boy (the one who is in school about an hour away from his uncle) ... "Well he has been way too scarce" my brother says "I know it takes some work to earn grades you can be proud of, but he needs some down time too". I know what the problem is ... "I told him to go drink some of your beer between semesters, but he didn't have extra gas money ... I know that for a fact ... and he will never tell you that 'cause it would sound like he was asking for money. He underestimated how many quarters it was going to take to keep the air conditioner blowing ... And no telling what else ... I don't think his finances will get much better anytime soon". I can tell by the extended silence that he had never thought of that. "Well, I'm just gonna havtah tell him if he wants to make his way over here, we'll send him home with a full tank ... ". He might accept that. My brother lost his two kids in a very messy, very ugly divorce ... his badly burnt hand is always stretching towards them. "... and tell L that he can call me back about the car if that's not it, but I don't want to be talking through you". That raised my eyebrows and made me smile at the same time. When I gave my husband the download on the car complete with that last bit, he said, "Did you tell him that you are the one who is going to fix it"? "No, because I am not". Yeah, it kind of did torque me. "Why not? You're a lot more mechanically minded then I am!" 32"Because I am a girl".
It's this way I'm feeling now ... It's really good. I don't want to think about it now ... Like this year, but I see this as excellent. This is a new perspective in action. I can feel the story of this response in me ... I had been doing stuff that made me feel bad, just because there is so much to do and someone has to do it. My husband works hard too, but I am not helping anybody out by doing stuff that makes me feel bad and fixing my feelings by just not feeling. I'm figuring that out.
30
I know I just wrote a note about my brother, but he called this morning and made my day. I'd like to remember it here.
After the usual chitchat about our mother and the system working in the gulf, I asked him how the beach was. His answer never wavers. Perfect. He always says his time at the beach was perfect. Did you find any sand dollars I wondered and he said after a brief while he quit looking. He's good at finding them ... if they were plentiful he'd have known it quickly ... and the hunt is more about checking for them then actually acquiring them. "The shoreline was without ripple" he went on to say that he saw only one shell and he mentioned only one other soul present in his morning stroll. A young woman with Downs Syndrome was sitting in a beach chair rocking back and forth with the waves. His voice conveyed the tenderness that his laughing eyes tries to mask. He said good morning to her and held out his lone find. She studied it for several moments before silently lifting it on an open palm back to him. "It's for you little lady" and she smiled as her hand closed around it. His was so happy to have a gift for her. My brother ... collector of smiles.
Friday, September 2, 2011
God figured out a way to sit in a seat that is small enough for me to see Him ... and He invited me to join Him at a table where I think He'd like me to find some joy.
... What I'm trying to say is my soul knows how to fly ... walking well is a totally different and equally challenging kind of experience. I want to add walking well to my soul's experiences.
I couldn't even see the airplanes through the trees on my walk in the woods ... there wasn't one single pilot who was able to see the beauty that was near the ground. There's some pretty good stuff down there too. I'm looking forward to seeing what God has set up at this little round table table.Notes from 11 July 2011
Yesterday was a rough day for a person who has had her eye on flight instructing as a way to spend her fifties down in to sixties. I had lunch with a buddy. He confirmed what I have thought must be accurate ... which is, if I don't instruct over here while we are here for at least another year, then I can pretty much forget flight instructing all together. Yeah, I knew that. It was interesting to hear someone say it aloud. I can not say it ... even when I am alone, without it tearing me up. It's interesting to me that just thinking about it makes my jaw tighten and my stomach tense like I need to throw up swear words ... . I feel angry about this. ... that's part of it. I could drive over to Georgia ... I'm pretty sure there may be a couple of students for me over there. I could maybe do that a couple of days a week, and really, that's probably what would suit me best. I don't want to spend so much time in an airplane that I miss helping my daughters create just the right dress ... or miss my sons' phone calls ... or my youngest's field trips. I really like fixin' them breakfast and making sure there are grapes and deodorant in the house ... I like being a mother and wife.
I think I may be a snob. All this high end training that I've patiently acquired was supposed to be for getting professional pilots started. Hahaha. Really. I hear these hobby pilots on the radio ... Making lunch plans with their buddies sounding so cool and so ridiculous ... or at social events where there is a cluster of professional men talking about their weekend exploits in the air. I just don't see myself as part of that community. My lunch buddy has worked with several of this type guy ... He says I will be surprised at how serious they are as students. He doesn't have a clue that those guys have wives who aren't going to want their husbands flying with someone like me. My guys see me as one of the guys. Guys just don't get it. When my FI was making choices about who to hire ... They needed a lot of people and he asked me for a woman's opinion about hiring a young, very attractive, equally qualified to the rest of the male applicants, candidate. He said she had showed the most initiative with post interview follow up. The big problem with her wasn't anywhere on her resume. Her big problem was she was drop dead gorgeous. As soon as I understood that I said I didn't think she should be penalized for her good looks ... I told him that I knew he must understand that good looks can be a huge burden maybe especially for a woman (He is a nice looking man ... like a poster for what a fighter pilot or an airline captain should look like ... even after they retire). I could read the surprise on his face. Beauty as a burden was a new idea for him ... but he got it immediately.
Working with kids who wanted to learn how to fly was perfect for me I thought. Not because I want to be anybodies mother, but because the huge age difference made it easy for me to be one of the guys. Old, very married to a highly successful man, mother to five children, serious about everything and especially flight instructing, all that ... Still doesn't off set fairly attractive and knows how to fly. Nobody wants their husbands spending a couple of hours a week in the airplane with me. They are already not keen on the whole airplane thing usually and certainly not with another woman in the mix.
That's just the truth. A woman my age in general aviation out here in the boondocks is a bit of a novelty ... . A burden that I just didn't see as a factor ... Because I knew if I trained with the guy I trained with that everyone would respect my accomplishments. Instead, I am blocked at the door by some little man who says those certificates are sweetheart deals. Yesterday, one of the senior pilots around here, a man of national statue in the aviation community, not a friend, but someone who has been a big encourager these past fifteen years that I've been flying, came in while my buddy and I were finishing up lunch. He asked me why I wasn't hired and I told him the reasons that the chief told me. He asked me what the historic issues were and I said I do not know actually.
I know I do not admire the gatekeeper ... How do you say I am unable to radiate what that guy seems to need to see. And maybe that is not even it. I told my buddy that I have accepted (and I have) that I am unhire-able, it's the why's and what could I have done differently that eat at me. I could have used contacts to force my way in I think, but I didn't want to. I'm not anybody's sweetheart.
My buddy said I need to get over it and drive to Georgia a couple of days a week. He said I was sounding a lot like a woman. : )
I am tired of thinking about this. I'm tired of it not working out. I am tired of not letting it go. It's almost always on my mind ... What should I do about flight instructing. Next week I'll drive over to Georgia and see if that might work. I told my husband that I believe that is the very last possibility and I haven't been ready to find out that it's not viable.
And I wonder, is God still trying to help me learn some life lessons here? What are they? I am willing to let flight instructing go ... we are very near the tipping point where letting go would provide some much needed relief. I am a little bit embarrassed by my passion for this thing. I sincerely want to do whatever God wants me to do with my everyday activities. I am extremely thankful for the sweet life I get to enjoy. I don't see this as a fly in the ointment. I see it as wanting to do what I'm supposed to do and flying has not let me go. I am willing to walk. I am willing to fly. Whatever. It is seriously cool to see the shape of ones heart changing. Painful, but cool.
25Sammy waiting on the back porch every morning with his best manners on 26today I feel sick ... Like stomach virus sick and my tummy is rumbling around ... I'm sipping my coffee just hoping not to throw up ... Headache. Ugh. I have fun lunch plans for today with an old flying buddy ... Probably going to have to cancel. I am thankful that feeling icky is extremely rare for me. Excellent health is likely the most valuable gift for people over fifty (like me). My eyesight has declined ... Which is okay, there's plenty I don't want to see. My hair has thinned but I still have more then enough for three women and less time to blow dry! These are little reminders that healthy is a gift. 27yesterday I found out that there are people who see a specific color associated with a number or a letter ... as in 3 may be hot pink and A may be coral. Ummm ... That's pretty neat. A woman who had won her state's spelling bee said it was easier for her because she could visualize the color pattern. Cool. I like the interior diversity of our minds. I think it makes God smile. There is a florist here in town who really stands out. His work is textured in it's variety ... the more time you spend looking the more delighted you become. He dares quirky additions which always seem exactly right. I lovelovelove it when his are the flowers in front of the pulpit on Sunday. His work always somehow honors the uniqueness of each element of the whole. His little shop has always been one of my favorite places in town. I think it's a huge gift that we humans are not all the same ... our gifts make us unique. Why we tend to want to hide in the herd I do understand ... I am thankful for people who are acting mostly like just who they are. 28H comes in to town and does some freelance work where she used to work. The girl's got skills. She was here for a second last week. She asked me about something personal and I replied by just closing my eyes and softly shaking my head no. "You can handle it" she replied, "When you're acting exactly like you, you can totally handle that!". Uhhh ... That is what I say. That is truly one of my core beliefs. She has a real knack for serving up my words and knew I didn't want to hear that ... she laughed as she reminded me ... . Eating my words ... fortified by being called back to what I really believe. God doesn't leave one hanging. We are able for what he puts around us. He never asks too much. So ... H, one of the people I cannot deny is a friend of my soul ... half my age, twice as sassy ... present in many of these 1000 gifts. 29 I may be feeling better ... Here we go with some loud music and a bit of house work. I love music ... It's so cool that you can't see it, but it is totally here. You can't see it but it can make you feel. I had an acoustical physics class in college ... I like to think of what the waves might look like if I could see them ... undulating waves flowing all around my house clicking my fingers, crinkling my eyes.
