I

I am in pain. Things were going so well and then the dreams started again. Shredded. Torn. Burned. Bleeding. Screaming. Smells. Sound. The ever present flashing red lights.

I am not thinking clearly either. I forget from one day to the next. I cannot assert my thoughts clearly to others. I think in movie lines. I cry several times a day.

I am sad at my situation. I try to alleviate pressure from here and there. I get poor responses from those who are supposed to be helpful. I don't get calls I want. I get calls I don't want.

I try to breathe. I try to be present and appreciate the air, the sounds, the warmth around me. Then the thinking gets confused and like searching on the internet for a term paper on the statistical probabilities of next years income formula and finding myself in ancient Egypt discovering Ahkenaten was the first recorded person to worship a single god. Fuzzy logic in my brain. Useless things that still remain. Years of asking "Why?", then ascertain.

I am weary. Of hearing "No" or nothing. I am weary of my lack of assets. I am weary of my prospects. I am weary of my fears.

I listen to pop music. I listen to blue grass. I listen to "oldies" rock tunes I grew up with. I listen loud and long. I sing my pain. I sing loud and long.

I sit quiet. I listen to my heart beat. I listen to my breath. My mind wanders and the sound of my internal riot picks up. I slow the noise, I turn it down. I listen to my breath.

This is tiresome. This is weary. This is me, wallowing.

I love my best friend. I love my children. I love my parents. I love my grandbabies. I do love the concept of conquering this shit, crushing it beneath my toe. Making this time in my life a healing. Accepting the feelings I have. Feeling it. Knowing intimately. Learning the texture of it. Letting the weariness pass away. I look forward to the refreshing feeling of what strength this will leave me with, like a steamy hot shower after completing a filthy job. Being clean of these times. Letting this negative black tar drain away.

I have, like most people, considered suicide, once in my life, long ago. The reasons are not important. I got to the edge then, and found that I am too damn curious. Most of you that know me have experienced this curiosity in me.

I am too damn curious to see what comes next.

Yelling

Do not yell at me any longer. I do not fear your wrath anymore, not like I did when I was little. And I never respected you for being angry with me. I am a grown woman who has fought you my whole life, in my head, in my heart and in making others 'be' you and then hating them instead. My hate runs deep, my heart is as cruel as yours. I would love them and cherish them and run them through with a blade of ice.

Hating you was never an option. Your lap was the safest place in the world. Your arms around me, smelling like Blistex and Old Spice, it was Heaven. It was perfect. It was Home to a vagabond girl that knew of boxes and moving and change, all too well.

Do not yell at me when you cannot see my eyes, so much like yours. You would learn fear, as I did when my eyes could see no higher than your elbow. Looking into your own eyes would paint a strip of fear in your heart as wide as the one you painted in me.

I love you and I respect you, but no more yelling. None. I am no more yours to yell at, than you are mine to abuse. Try learning to respect me, as a woman. Might heal us both.

Right now, all I feel is hurt, and the weary fear of my own creation. Right now, all I want to smell is Old Spice and Blistex, to feel safe.

Still I open my heart to you. I let you run me through, again, with your blade of ice. I try to remember. I try NOT to continue your Legacy.

I love you.

Clotho and Lachesis and Atropos

The Three Fates are really not well documented in mythology. There are the three hags in most tales of heros and legends. These are the Three Fates. Some say they are the daughters of Zeus, some say they are the daughters of Necessity. It matters not to me, they are part of too many tales not to be important.

Clotho is a spinner, she creates the moment of your birth, she spins the thread of your life. Is it golden and pure? Is it tattered and thin? Is it brown, grey, or a fine silvery thread that blows in a gentle breeze, like gossamer?

Suffering is part of those threads. Do you suffer? What is your tale of woe? Money. Love. Illness. Abuse. Neglect. Is your car broke down? Suffering is part. But so is happiness.

Are you rich in family? Are your pockets full of money? Do the dogs lick your toes just to watch you jump?

These threads can be woven into a tapestry of your life and either warm you and comfort you or feel like a wet blanket on a cold night. Are your threads rich in embroidery of joyful moments of peace? Your outlook is purely your own, she only provides the threads.

Lachesis determines the length of the thread. And the quality of life, or your destiny. Will you create ripples on the pond that span the world? Or will your ripples make your families life richer by your love and ability to knit wonderful booties every year at Christmas? Will your life bring happiness to millions? Or will you keep body parts in your freezer? Lachesis determines that with the creation of your thread. Free will still applies, but that thread is your destiny.

Dip a thread into a glass of water, it makes ripples. If you dip the same thread into a pond, not so much with the ripples. If you dip this same thread into the sea, the ripples are hardly noticeable. But some say if a butterfly flaps it wings in Brazil, it can create a tornado in Texas. Your presence has purpose. And you may never know what that is.

Atropos is the woman with the "abhorrent shears" to cut the thread. At times she does so with little notice. An infant that breathes twice and lays lifeless had a very short thread. Their lives were not meaningless, as their deaths were felt deeply by someone, somewhere. A prison guard wept bitter tears when this baby died, the prisoner only felt the pain of childbirth, her daughter meant nothing to her. She cared little for her own situation, the baby was only a burden.

My great-grandmother was over 100 years old when she passed. She saw the automobile evolve from a hand cranked bicycle-type gadget to a bat-winged door Ferrari. Her thread was long and rich. Full of learning and knowing and very busy fingers. She took her thread and made quilts that still warm us, even now, nearly 20 years since she breathed one last time. 

I have made a difference in someone's life. I don't know whose. But I have touched too many lives in precarious and dangerous places to not have made a difference. My ripples are unknown to me. I like to think they travel far. I know there are two wonderful men and wonderful young woman that travel the world. I have made a difference in their lives, and they have made a difference in mine. Those changes affect those they touch. So my ripples are in Cuba. My ripples are in Indonesia. My ripples are in Ghana.

I do not know if they are good and pure. I do not know if they are harmful. But so far, my tapestry appears to be rich and full.

Happy Thursday.

Sincerely

Sincerity is very difficult for some. It is second nature (so it seems to me) that lots of folks have a separate agenda when they speak to you. Either to glean information, or to make certain that your intentions are blocked. To what end, I do not always know or understand. Why would someone be so deliberate in their actions?

To say something to someone and leaving something withheld (that is not a sarcastic remark), is to lie to them, or be insincere. This is a very narrow path, to me. I love the sarcastic remark, and don't like to hurt people's feelings when my opinion is petitioned. Honey, where did you get that hair cut? At the dog groomers? -- Funny, yes, sincere, no.

I want to try something a bit less hard edged. Such as, darling you have such a pretty face, that hair cut is not flattering at all. This could hurt a person's feelings.  But should be considered as a more tactful way of being honest with someone. According to Franklin, even this is too much of a lie.

It is difficult to find the sincerity in myself without using humor and sarcastic tone. At that point I know I have failed to be honest with what is the center of me. This is the me that presents itself to the world, humor and sarcasm. It is funny and it does dance around the topic that is at hand. Therefore diminishing it's importance or lesson. This is also the character I present to my loved ones. This has shaped my relationships with them. With that in mind, can I please say something about your hair? It is very pretty and catches the light a glistens in a beautiful way. I think the waves in your hair show your character quite nicely. The way it is shaped does nothing to show off your good qualities.

How is this? I could not be more proud or more excited for both of you. You are both choosing paths that will challenge you and bring you great happiness. For this I am filled with love for you both. I hope with all my heart that your pains are few. But I will be here, as best I can, for you when you need me to be happy with you, and to hold you when Life hurts.

Today's reflection

“To be persuasive we must be believable; to be believable we must be credible; to be credible we must be truthful.”

~~Edward R. Murrow

Shadows

A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.

Oscar Wilde

I have spent a lot of time in your home, listening to your story, while I read between the lines. I have come when you called, even for a hemorrhoid that you have had for years, but now has a pregnant belly providing extra pressure. I have apologized for things that were not my fault, but it closed a ridiculous issue. I have smiled to keep your day nice, no matter what my day has been like. I have eaten crow publicly "No sir, I did not do as directed". I have patted those on the back that deserved it, as well. I knew a man I called The Airway God. But the thin veneer of bravado is very poorly maintained, even by the best of us. We put on our suit of armor, and our loud and comfy boots. Every item is a fragile piece of rice paper, even us ladies wearing makeup, waiting to be ruined by some unexpected bodily fluid. This is what happened to me. Blood saturated through my long standing suit of armor, and contaminated my body with God, only knows what. I have my last test this week. All clear so far. But the panic that set in, and was almost immediately was profound.

I have Combat-PTSD, so they tell me. Flashbacks, nightmares, insomnia and startle reflexes are common place for me. I can only read a few pages of a book at a time, it becomes too much information and my brain downloads the newly absorbed text and drops it out the bottom of my head. There is an abundance of advise to 'heal' from this, but my doc says, this stays with you forever. Learning to manage it is the key. The need for grounding is strong and leaves me with  a sense of isolation that can only be described as complete. There are voices in my head, whispering just out of range of detecting any words. Like exuberant roofers wanting to complete a task that has run two days over schedule.

Cortisol is your friend and your enemy. Too much and you rage like a bull elephant in musk, too little and you are deeply depressed, over eat and cry endlessly. Meditation is the best thing to keep your levels under control--CRAP. I can meditate for an hour, and in 30 minutes I am a black rage that has me at the verge of breaking my house to pieces.

I know I am taking my anger out on my housemates. I do not intend to, but I find that particular anger has a beginning, a middle and an end. The 'end' part is good, it suggests I may be done with my stress (open mindedness, makes any possibility present itself). I love them all, and I want to provide, but this extended leave has me in a position that no longer allows for such things.

This is my thought- when you hit rock bottom, there is nowhere to go, but up. And hey! it aint cancer. So there is that.

A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it.

Oscar Wilde

The Dog's Day

If I could be anything I wanted in the whole world, I would be one of my dogs. That sounds vain and ridiculous, but my dogs have it good.

I have three dogs, and a poodle. I cannot call her a dog, but will include her here as 'the exception'.

Napping is an art form here. Either lying in the sun, or stretched out in the middle of the floor, flat on their backs, napping is taken quite seriously. I adore that moment when the dog lays down on the floor, takes a deep breath, and moans long and soft, letting go of every care in the world. To slumber deeply for a few moments. They probably get 10 to 12 hours of sleep a day, mostly in short 15 to 30 minute periods. And never seem tired always vital and refreshed. I could live without the steady snoring, though. At any given moment, somewhere in the house, there is a dog snoring. The exception is almost always laying out, baking in the sun. If she were a person, she'd be overly tanned and wearing frosted lipstick, and that would be smeared all over her crooked mouth.

Eating is another thing. Timeliness is very important. If, at 7:02 there is no fresh food available, there is a dog attempting hypnosis on me. "You want to fill my bowl. You want to fill my bowl. YOUWANTTOFILLMYBOWL". But the food is really just grazed upon. One at a time, they mosey by the bowls, and take a few bites. Then slop water all over, so their slightly dirty  feet make darling little muddy foot prints in my kitchen. There is the occasional belch, and a wet whiskered nose shoved at me.

Playing. I have, at any given moment some sort of dirty, slobbered upon toy in the house. I actually don't mind. They are like gifts. They make dogs happy and can be thrown by dogs, or by people. Two of the dogs fetch, with single minded purpose. It took some work, but there is no longer competitiveness over who plays with what. There is a large variety of balls here, soccer, tennis, and football. The football is my favorite. The boy here has worked for years on his fetching and catching skills. It is astonishing to see him catch a football in midair. I have a small collection of ropes floating around here too. Two of them are fetching items, they get caught in the tree once in while. One is either used for tugging or untying the knot, over and over. It doesn't matter how often or how difficult a knot, she works at it tirelessly until it comes free (not bad for only being four months old).

I want to be one of my dogs. I want to learn that tranquil peace; that comfort of routine; that determined focus. To live completely in the present moment, as though there was nothing to worry about.

How the Garden Grows me.

If I had a formula for bypassing trouble, I would not pass it round.  Trouble creates a capacity to handle it.  I don't embrace trouble; that's as bad as treating it as an enemy.  But I do say meet it as a friend, for you'll see a lot of it and had better be on speaking terms with it.  ~Oliver Wendell Holmes

This sounds ridiculous to some, but I have learned quite a bit about Life just by gardening. Some things live and some things just don't, but there are some basic rules about what you do in the garden.

Soil. A steady base, with good drainage and room to grow as far as you need. (This could be a sticky wicket.) Not all plants need dirt, but a steady place to put their roots. Plants need good soil, you cannot grow an orchid from the dirt you've been pouring your old motor oil in. It is important to keep your soil free on contaminates and watch the amount of negative content gets in.

Food. Not exactly fertilizer, this is the other stuff that your plants eat, at a much smaller level. There is nitrogen and hydrogen and oxygen, and carbons and lots of other lovely things. Well, they are lovely if you are a daisy. Sometimes, these things such as worm poop, or even a nematodes corpse, could be as delicate as a crisp salad with flower petals or as sturdy as a peppercorn rubbed steak. Nourishment needn't come with a big extravagant meal, just a small  snack can sometimes provide all you need.

Water. About this time every year, my skin has been just a little bit drier than it was last year. My skin is amazingly dry. One of the reasons is because I go out and stick my hands in the dirt a few times a week. Just to make sure there is enough moisture out there. Living in any environment you live in you must absolutely give enough water to the plants. I lived in Oregon for years, I had a lovely cactus garden that sat in my dining room. I never watered it, it was able to get what it needed from the air surrounding them. This is not the case when I tried to keep a few "Air Plants" alive. Balance is very important.

Weeds. Let's face it, there are things that grow out of the ground that have pointy things in them like like to poke you in the feet and ruin your favorite sweater. But if Man had pulled every single thing that had points on it, we would never have the patience to watch a rose bloom. Or anything as tasty as blackberry cobbler. Perhaps we are too impatient with weeds, there is a reason for them, in the first place. They could just be holding the dirt in place.

Poop. Well, not one of Life's best topics, but lets just hold hands for a minute. Shall we? Poo gives the plants something to chew on while they bide their time getting big and strong and making you a lovely pumpkin for Halloween. Fertile ground is important, gives the mind something to do. Never be afraid to experiment with fertilizer, you may just find the perfect one, by accident.

Light. Every day has a certain amount of lightness and darkness to it. It is the balance of the planet, you cannot fight it. Wake, sleep, play, rest. Okay, you can fight it inside you, but it is as unhealthy as trying to grow moss in the desert. When you are gardening there is little you can do about how long the day is going to light. The plant knows. That's why the crocus and the hyacinth pop their pretty faces out before the last snow melts. That is also why certain things just will not grow if they don't get the direct amount of daylight, or darkness.

Finally, you must, absolutely must, just give up on some of your favorite plants, because they will not come back every year, no matter what hocus-pocus you do. Others, will come back over and over again, no matter how many times you dig them up, burn them or throw them away. Those little determined things, are called 'Family'.

Remember this-that there is a proper dignity and proportion to be observed in the performance of every act of life. ~Aristotle