Than Most People

Life is really funny.  A friend just texted me again. She called me three weeks ago.  I was having a coughing frenzy and told her I will phone her back the following day, which I did.  No response.  Three weeks later, she texts me again.

"Let's set a date to talk. I miss you."

I wrote back.

"I long for the days when someone just picked up the phone to check in with a friend.  No date, no agenda."

They have time for friendship. I suppose I should begin compiling my list of WHAT I DID, WHAT I WILL BE DOING, ACCOMPLISHMENTS, you know, things to talk about.  I better use their time well.

Or, maybe just hibernate.  I like myself a whole lot better than I do most people.

The Dissatisfied Buddhist

In a conversation today, a friend living in Ontario told me he just finished a week plus at Vipassana.  If you are familiar with these retreats skip this section. If not, let me explain.  Vipassana is intense.  You meditate most of the day and night.  Sitting for hours at a time.  Followers find it to be emotionally upsetting, draining, and then...ultimately peaceful.  One such friend mentioned before his retreat that he wanted to know what a peaceful meditator looked like.  I suggested that he not think about how things look.  Society is way full of everything telling us how to be.  How to pump ourselves up, make ourselves important.  Just look at all the selfies. That should tell you something.

Individuality is important.  Truly being who you are and on purpose.   Family member did his retreat over ten years ago. He was so exhausted, he fell over and hit his head, bleeding a bit.  He didn't think this type of meditation was for him. He prefers to be out on the water.  Everyone finds their place.  What works for them.

I've told my students repeatedly, meditation is just one way.  There are others.  Sample them and see what works.  Personally, I find the growth in drinking establishments a true sign of the immense stress people are under. Much of it is their own doing.  Buying into a belief system that doesn't work for them.  Then they go to a bar of some sort where no one can hear another speak.  Everyone overdrinks and the communication ends.  I find it funny albeit it very sad from a sociological perspective.

Dissatisfied Buddhist.  Isn't everyone?

Again

Sometimes it just catches up with her.  The children are grown and living their own lives.  She recently relocated.  Her old, somewhat fragile social network has changed.  She doesn't know where she is.

Again.

The Happiest People

The happiest people i've met, regardless of their profession, their social standing, or their economic status, are people that are fully engaged in the world around them. The most fulfilled people are the ones who get up every morning and stand for something larger than themselves. They are the people who care about others, who will extend a helping hand to someone in need or will speak up about an injustice when they see it.

Wilma Mankiller - The first Female Chief of the Cheroke Nation

February Ponderings

I'm reminded of the mid 70s more and more.  Sitting through the Watergate hearings for days.  In 1972, while working in a hospital in the D.C. area, my supervisor told me I had to shake hands with Richard M.Nixon when he came to visit George Wallace.  Wallace had an assassination attempt on his life and was brought to the hospital where I worked.  I didn't want to have anything to do with Nixon told her that.  She insisted because no one else was available, or was conveniently absent.

Fast forward to 2018.  We have a sociopath who blatantly lies about everything. He can't keep staff.  Simply put - he isn't well.  It is believed by many, that he is a crook.  That he committed treason.  These are scary times.  Sad times.

Fast forward to 2019.  So what do we do with all of this?  We stand up.  We speak out!  We demand that government change.  That it be totally focused on the people.  If you haven't figured it out yet - well, you aren't ready for a healthy government.  It takes a certain degree of health to maintain it.

I'm at my desk in the studio gazing out to at least a foot of solid iced snow. The sun is shining and I see something moving beyong the trees. Probably a squirrel.  Bigfoot?  The temperature has risen from -2 to about 18.  My long down coat keeps me toasty warm.  Oatmeal baths and lots of lotion ensure my skin isn't raw.  It is a bit dry. And boots are always by the door.  The garage is a constant 55 degrees so I am quite spoiled getting into my comfortable car.

The tall pines in front of me facing south in this back room are impossible to see in their entirety standing by the window.  There is a forest full of them.  It is time to put out the trail camera to find out who is visiting me at night.  Is the doe back?

It was more than just a thrill seeing her a few weeks ago in all her splendor.  I haven't seen the three legged buck yet. Neighbors say he has quitea rack.  Since I am the Fb administrator for our road, I need some good photos for our pages.

Soon, we will plan our block party.  There are about twenty-five homes on this street, most of which are a cape cod variety.  Just like the kind of home in Baltimore where I grew up.

Stay warm.  The ground hog ensures spring is near.

Tom Brokaw Was Offensive?

Tom Brokaw was offensive?  Really?

We've gone way too far with this political correctness.  It has gotten to the point any comment one makes that may be different from yours is 'offensive.'

Maybe this is the greater question. Do all cultures assimilate when they move to the US? Did folks coming into the US from England assimilate?  How about the Chinese?  Japanese?  African-Americans?  Did your family assimilate?

English was our spoken language after we destroyed Native American culture. I admit it is frustrating to have to push #1 for English when trying to access a business on the phone.  It is frustrating to speak to people in other cultures with strong accents.  It is getting easier now.  It always does.

Both sides need to work harder when new folks come into our culture.  I would hope we would welcome them.

Let's get off Brokaw's back.  This is just plain silly.  To do otherwise is to severely limit one's free speech and the liberal/so called progressive types are going over-board on this. Way over-board.  It's becoming like an auto-immune disease, one that continually attacks itself. You're reading way too much into this.

Tom Brokaw offense?  Hardly.

Only When People Are Prepared

"The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy. 

            - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

If you know me well - really well, you will know that I like people who stand up. Egos, self-aggrandizement and Fb braggers are a total turn off.  Thank you to my friends who posted some neat quotes.  I do love reminders. But the ones above are favs of mine.


"That government is best which governs least;" and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which I also believe,—"That government is best which governs not at all;" and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have. Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient."

— Thoreau, Civil Disobedience

Only when we all become self-leaders will we even have a chance to truly change things.  Until then, the bullies, those who seize powers and steal government money will rule.  Have things really changed over time?  Really?

Consider your dome.

17 Years

The moment I said it out loud, was the moment it was time to go.

I'd remembered reading a book about leaving one's home so they could move forward and survive, but the name of it escapes me.  The words do not.

"Come, it is time to go."

It was a story about primitive people living in South America. I believe they were the Yanomami people. They moved from place to place following the destruction of their forests by American corporations.

I was also leaving because of destruction but of a different kind.  Destruction of my marriage.  But this didn't begin at the time the marriage completed.  It began long before we said our vows.  It began with two young people, who hardly know themselves, much less each other.

The ins and outs of the reasons I wanted to end this were more about our differences than our similarities. I was incredibly young at nineteen when we met.  My father had walked out on my parents twenty-five year marriage. He never told us he was leaving.  The U-Haul truck backing into our tiny driveway told the story.

At sixteen I knew what abandonment felt like.  I knew it at twelve when my father refused to talk to me for three months.  People have their problems and I was just in the middle of them.  Undeveloped emotionally, I hoped I wouldn't repeat their history.

It was 'time to go.'

There have been a few such times in my life when I recalled those six words.  One was when my last child left home for college.  As a parent, you are more excited than you can image to see your children grow.  You gave your child wings.  They are ready to emerge from the cocoon, to fly.  You couldn't be happier for them.  You know this day will never come again. That they are gone for good. Forever.

You hold that moment in a special place in your heart. You are thrilled about their growth; they are everything a parent could hope for.  Kind, motivated, bright.

The other time I uttered the six words was when I left my marriage.  When I summoned the courage to speak the words outloud,  there was no turning back.

My son was twenty three and going to south America with the Peace Corps.  I had moved out of our family home two years before.  He's been gone for a year living his dream.  My daughter has just graduated from college.  She was moving to Boston to get away from the pressure she felt when her father and I ended our twenty-eight year marriage.   I wasn't going to be a place holder anymore.  Waiting for my husband to atttain all his degrees and certificates.  Waiting for my beloved children to take their flights.  It was time to live my own dream.  I was going to live in the Great Smoky Mountains of western North Carolina.

It was the first time in my life when I took a leap.  Alone.

Friends

Friends.  That is one of the most dear words to my heart.  This past weekend, I watched as my two granddaughters interacted.  They are three and five.  The five year old has always been very protective of the three year old.  Teaching, nurturing, protecting.

But the cutest, most dear moment happened when they got in a wooden toddler bicycle.  The two year old sat in front with her feet on the wheel bar.  The five year old sat behind her holding her in place and moving from room to room.  Both girls were barefooted.

As their Nana, I was imagining what it would be like in a few years when they both could ride their bicycles together.  The older one would pedal with the younger one sitting on the handlebars.

Both parents and this Nana would hope for the best while the girl cousins had a blast outfitting in helmets and shoes.

It just doesn't get any cuter than this.