Keep Trying

Kids are so much smarter than we grown-ups.

If a kid likes to swing, he'll stand by the swings, or if he is lucky, he'll be swinging in one himself. That's where you meet swingers.

If she likes to slide, she'll be in line to go down one, 'cause guess what? You got it! That's where you meet sliders!

Once in a while you see a kid standing by the sandbox. Those kids don't like sand or they'd be inside, but they don't want anyone feeling left out. That's okay too.

The point is, if you want to be happy, you've gotta go where you are happy to begin with.

Just keep doing that, even if you change your mind about where you want to be.

It's the wanting that's important.

Listen To Mom, Well, Some Moms

Speaking to people in ways they can understand is the first and most important part of playing well with others.

You have the right to call god by whatever name he gave you, or to simply express the feeling in your heart that this world we live in is so utterly magnificent and well ordered that it precipitates a feeling of awe, or to even not think about these things at all.

It is when people start believing that burning people at the stake, or stoning them, or shunning them, or bombing them is an act of some god that it becomes incomprehensible to me.

Reaching out with a helping hand, feeding the poor and caring for the sick, these are universal signs of good will all people understand when they are not blinded by hate and fear.

We are all in this together whether we like it or not. Remember how your mother used to say, "You will all learn to get along, or else!"

She was wiser than you might think.

Bits And Pieces

I brought one Christmas ornament to Illinois from North Carolina and today I bought it a tree!

Life is like that sometimes.

I start out with a whole and add bits and pieces to it, or I start out with a bit and had a whole to it, which of course makes the whole just a piece of the bit.

I tend to think big things are whole and the smaller other things appear to be, the more likely I am to consider them less than whole, but that definitely isn't true.

Each thing, each person, each thought is always part of something larger even as it is a whole concept unto itself.

I am me. Add me to the siblings in my family and I become a part of that whole. Add us siblings to a family with mom and dad and it is part of another whole and on it goes.

It goes the other way too.

My nose is part of me, but when I cut it off to spite my face, my nose is a whole missing part, as would be a finger, or finger nail.

We are not simple celled creatures, but even those can be broken down.

Isn't this world amazing? It's kind of like some giant hand began crocheting, or knitting DNA and RNA and what all and just kept going and going and going.

Does that mean if the right thread is pulled, it all unravels?

Close Encounters Of The Worst Kind

I was at the laundromat when a woman sat down at the counter across from me. I was reading Sanctuary by Faulkner, yes I'm trying another one of his books, she was reading the editorials and interrupted me to point out a political cartoon. I thought this was a little bit of a strange thing to do with a stranger, but I politely looked at it and smiled. It was okay. She then tried to start a conversation with two women doing laundry across from us and when they left soon after, she turned back to me. I thought, okay she is lonely. I can read Faulkner later.

Big mistake.

What seemed like a play for attention started out talking about our children. Nothing wrong with that. In fact her oldest daughter was about the age of my daughter, but she still had two at home and one who was a freshman on full scholarship at a very strict Christian college. I was sucked in and before I quite understood what was happening realized we were engaged in a very subtle game of one upmanship. I honestly wasn't even aware of it at first then I noticed this uncomfortable feeling of wanting to impress her. I asked myself why?

She told me how perfect her daughter was, good grades, great athlete in several sports, full scholarship to this perfect college, and never even thought about sex or dating, but, well, she had a messy room at home. That was it! The admission of a minor fault in order to impress me with how impossibly perfect this child was. Since I could see where it was going I tried to hold back. My kids are grown. I'm through. Whatever they do now is up to them and I am completely happy with where they are. Some of that is my influence, but a lot of it is their own hard work and I don't get any credit for it at all. I just mentioned my children were all grown and out of the house.

She went on to to tell me how they adopted their son from her sister and how he was only going to junior college and might have to work a little harder, but then he was adopted. That kind of blew it. I jumped in with both feet and buried myself. I said two of my children were adopted and one was a lawyer. She immediately said her older daughter was a lawyer. I said that was great, but I wasn't feeling good, I was still feeling very annoyed, so I fell hook, line and sinker into her trap and said mine was a public defender who opted to become a stay at home dad with his new baby. She countered with her daughter, who could have become a trial attorney, in fact was at the top of her class and probably should have, but she didn't want to spend her life setting criminals free!

It was about this point in the conversation when I realized what was going on and opted out, but not before one attempt at reason. I said not all people charged with a crime are guilty, that our whole system is predicated on the idea that we are innocent until proven guilty and didn't she think people needed attornies for that? Of course not, she said, most people are guilty, or they wouldn't even be suspect.

What did I expect?

Before I committed the crime of throttling a middle aged housewife in a laundromat and ended up needing a lawyer myself I backed up and simply asked how old were the other children. She began going on and on about them and the fact that one was a wrestler, working out as we spoke in order to lower his weight a half pound before the match coming up. He walked in somewhere in the middle of her discussing him and she went on to tell me about a girl who wrestled on his team and who embarrassed the boys and even undressed in the locker room. I wanted to say that it took a lot of guts for a girl to undress in a boy's locker room, but the kid was turning six shades of red as him mother talked about how the girl seeing him stark naked because he forgot she was there. Of course I really do realize how difficult it can be to have a girl on a wrestling team, especially when the kids are 14 and 15 years old and why anyone expected them to share the locker room is beyond me, but I had the good sense, and really a lack of opportunity to even talk about that, because she was off talking about other personal things as if the boy was not sitting there with us at a counter in a public laundromat while his mother aired all their dirty laundry for anyone nearby.

I usually enjoy talking to people I don't know, but I will be more careful in laundromats. They seem to bring out the worst in us.

Outside The Inner Circle

I spent most of my life "at home." It was a choice I made consciously and adamantly and I am not in the least bit sorry for that, but now I wonder if I might have also done a bit more along with that.

Not just a job. I had a great job once my children started school. Teaching preschool is something I enjoyed immensely and was well rewarded for in so many ways. I just look at the people who seem the happiest and they are those who are the most secure and independent.

It seems that the broader the base, the more likely people are to be satisfied. Today my base is much broader than it has been for my entire life.

I have several different irons in the fire that bring me satisfaction and it is that satisfaction coming from more than one, or even two, places that makes me feel I really deserve it. I no longer am just a good teacher, or just a good mom, which sounds funny because those are no small things, but I am also good at some other things and I see that in many small ways.

Of course that is true no matter what we do in life, but when those sources come from outside the inner circle, somehow they feel more validating to me.

I guess variety really is the spice of life.

Happy Thanksgiving

I have been at Thanksgiving dinners where they go around the table and ask everyone what they are thankful for. I like that idea. It kind of preserves the reason for the day in its highest form in my opinion.

I would have a hard time knowing what to say now, though. I am thankful for so many things in my life and they all seem to link together into one long continuous chain of security and joy that surround me as I enter my sixth decade for real now. I used to wonder if I was middle aged, but now I have to laugh, because I think I somehow missed it altogether and went from young to old. I mean I don't feel old, but if you just look at the years I've racked up, there are a lot of them.

I am thankful for my tiny apartment. I finally found a place just the right size for me. It is what I've dreamed of for years. Just enough room to do those things I do and small enough that I don't waste energy or money heating, or cleaning it.

I am thankful that I am still useful and can be a contributing member of this world.

I am thankful for my family, children, grandchildren and friends, and even one special friend who all make me feel loved and glad to be around.

I am thankful for my little dog even when he is a nuisance, because his love is always unconditionally huge.

I am thankful that I am finally writing and people are reading what I write, it is more satisfying than I ever imagined it would be.

In a world where people are still suffering and starving and worried about so many bad things, I live in a world that is almost fairy tale perfect. A world where little boy cuddles come in jars that can be pulled from shelves whenever they are needed and dreams still fall from the sky like waterfalls of stars.

Brrrrr...Baby It's Cold Outside

I had to get my ice scraper out for the first time this year. It's cold up here in the north!

But I don't have to walk anywhere right now and my car has a heater and my heart is overflowing with joy, so, "Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!"

Actually it isn't snowing, it is raining, which isn't as pretty, but better since my children are on the road today driving in for Thanksgiving.

The dog is finally using his puppy pads, reluctantly and obviously as a last resort, but I'll take that. It works.

Emails are coming in with loving thoughts and wishes and that makes my day even sweeter.

It doesn't take much to make me happy and yet as I say this, I feel like I have so much that it is not a valid statement.

I don't know if my joy is relative, or simply the wisdom produced by years of not feeling happy, but again, I'll take it for whatever it is. It also works.

That I know is wisdom.

Right now, in this moment, my health feels okay, my heart is full of love and my life is fulfilled. I don't suppose I can ask for more than that.

A Taste Of Honey

In today's world many of us are dreaming of our ten minutes of fame and hoping it will actually be forever after.

It may never be that, but you may get tastes of it all the time and be so busy you don't even notice.

Wouldn't it be better to know it than to miss it altogether?

Think It Through

So you don't want to have a full body scan before getting on an airplane. Maybe you are one of those who wants to organize a boycott against this. People count on this kind of thinking. It is American arrogance.

Boycott unfair laws. Boycott ideas that you don't agree with, but be sure you realize what you are boycotting. You are not the only intelligent being in the world. There are others who realize if they can stop the scanning by getting you to boycott it, it opens the door for their own less savory plans.

They're willing to die for their beliefs. Are you willing to die for this particular one?

Even more importantly, are you willing to risk killing everyone your plane takes with it when it crashes, burns and explodes?

Is something like a body scan worth all this?

Bending Wills

I am trying to re paper train my dog. A big part of the problem this month has been that I should not have been running up and down the steps three or four times a day to take him out.

Well, actually if I had been able to run, things might have been different. I was barely able to hobble and consequently ended up injuring my knee, my hip and my shoulder while trying to keep pressure off my foot. My sister finally rescued me and took my dog home with her until I picked him up Friday night.

He prefers going out, but if we are going to live together, it is imperative that he learn to use his papers and be happy with that. I put the paper on a little tray by the front door, but he never used it. He finally left a little pile in the middle of the living room, but I have no idea where he peed. Surely he must have done that since Friday, right?

Yesterday I confined him to the bedroom with me. My computer is in here and so he is not alone. Still he has not used the puppy pad!

I realize I am going against everything he believes in with this process, but the alternative is unthinkable. That would be getting rid of him. I don't know how I would do that. Besides he was paper trained for three years before he started going outside, so it is not something he is unfamiliar with. It is just something he doesn't like.

Bending wills - not an easy thing to do, even for someone as bull headed as I am.

This Or Something Better

I know that if I am not enough for something in any way; not smart enough, sophisticated enough, pretty enough, thin enough, just not enough, then that becomes a wall between real fullfillment and me.

Over striving to breach that wall and make myself enough for whatever it is, is pointless, because I might be able to do it for a while, but not forever. There are innumerable ways to achieve satisfaction and joy in my life. I don't need to focus on the few negative ones.

So many of us grow up thinking there is a finite amount of wonder in life. We think we must grab the golden ring and hang on for dear life, because there may not be any more of them coming up. We trap ourselves with the first golden ring that comes along, or the next golden ring that comes along, or the only golden ring we are skillful enough to catch and we decide to make do.

What a travesty making do is! It is like wanting to play tennis and settling for one of those little paddles with a ball on an elastic band. Or craving pizza and settling for a tomato. Or wanting a great big hug and petting the dog. There is nothing wrong with any of these alternatives. They just aren't the full blown, hugely satisfying, wonderful solution.

Yet, people settle like this all the time, fearful that something just as good or even better might not be waiting for them.

I remember wanting things as a child. The wanting was so delicious it had a life of its own. Then, sometimes, I got something similar and so the wanting was over...kind of...but not really. It wasn't exactly disappointment, it just wasn't absolutely satisfying..

That kind of thing is the golden thread that ties me up and trips me up and keeps me from ever really having the opportunity to find what I really want and need. It is better for me if I remove my finger from the thread and allow myself to float free and find my own level.

That is where I belong.

In The Best Of All Worlds:

Love is defined for me before I even have a sense of self.

Those first cuddles and snuggles set the tone for the rest of my life and so do the next sixteen years.

If my caretaker is sensitive to my being, I learn so much!

I learn it is okay to have needs and expect them to be met.

I learn it is okay to express my needs without fear of retribution, or ridicule.

I learn it is okay to have ideas and to explore my world with great abandon.

I even learn it is okay to make mistakes and expect some kind of loving discipline.

The world is warm and loving and rational - in the best of all worlds.

It Feels So Good

In "Madeleine" I love the line, "We love our bread. We love our butter, but most of all we love each other."

And I think we love each other in bits and pieces the same way we love our bread and butter. It is always eaiser to love the parts I understand and agree with.

The rest? Not always so easy.

If I were to make two columns and label them, things I love about you and things I don't love about you. The second column would be more about me, than you.

Love. It is so simple and so intricately complicated.

It just feels so good. It's a shame to go on thinking it comes from somewhere else when the only place it goes is to your heart where it started in the first place.

Now I'm An M

I love the way children think. Left to their own devices they almost always put the best slant on everything. My grandson notices everything. He started dressing himself when he was around three years old and loved putting on his clothes and socks.

Why? Not because his feet were cold, or he was particularly proud of the fact that he could do it, but because they were "S's!" In his world "S" meant super as in super hero, superman, spider-man.

They came for a visit not too long ago and he informed me that he is no longer an "S" now he is an "M." I forgot to ask, much to my shame, but I'll bet "M" stands for Mega-tron, or something else big and awesome.

You and I may be small, medium, large, or even extra large, but he is more and so are most children. They haven't grown down into mediocrity yet.

Beyond Beyond

The center point. I must find the center point, beyond inside me, beyond my thoughts, beyond the rationale of my mind. It flows through me like the drop of a roller coaster on an old rickety wooden trestle. Taking my breath away, lifting my heart into my throat, dropping my stomach into oblivion, it draws me in.

Yearning, aching, like a hollow tube running through my center it connects me to something I cannot quite remember, a place, a feeling, a being beyond the veil that flows over me like the ocean at high tide, or the sun when it emerges from behind a cloud.

The ocean drips from my eyes and the light burns holes in me so that the scent of evergreens can invade my senses.

I am one with everything. I am more than one, I am an explosion of love, a blinding blast of feeling that makes my heart burn with need and if I don't connect to that place where the love energy flows outward, I will be immolated by this oneness.

I am cocooned by this nothingness, this aching, this place beyond beyond.

Come. Join me, because there are no words for this place. Walk into me and feel this oneness. Breathe for me and let me be your heart. Fall into this place with me and we will rise together, into the mist, the warmth, the void that fills everything.

Adorable

I am constantly amazed at the sweetness of people and the things they are willing to do for others.

Just about the time I decide things can't get any sweeter, someone does something else that is absolutely adorable and I wonder if I am just getting so old and jaded that I am over rating these acts, or if I just know amazingly beautiful people.

I think it is the latter.

Frills

One of the things I always liked about math classes was taking things down to their lowest common denominator, or most compact point. Sometimes I like that when I write too. It can be a challenge. How do I say what needs to be said efficiently and still keep it clear?

I like living this way. Getting rid of all the extraneous stuff so that life is as simple as it can be. There are just so many things to deal with in this world, why complicate it?

That all being said, there are things that simply enrich life. They may appear to be frills, but they are the frills that are somehow soothing and pleasing. The difference between just having air to breathe and air that carries the scent of a pine tree, or the ocean.

I suppose the need for these things vary from person to person. Not judging someone else's needs is sometimes difficult, but it's one of the secrets for playing well with others.

Amazing Personas

How often am I amazed at the difference between someones public image and who they are if I know them personally?

Honestly, sometimes I would not even recognize them as the same person if I didn't already know them as both.

I suppose that could be said of me, too. If you only know me as your teacher, or a volunteer at a public place, or one of my persona's, would you know who I was?

Watch small children role playing and I think you will understand more about what I am saying. We all have the ability to be who we are in the moment. It's what makes a name so important. Give someone a baby name and they will often live up to it. Give someone a highly formal name and they often feel responsible for acting that way.

I happen to like this phenomena. I have many sides and it is a relief to get to be some of them without all the baggage that being my public me comes with. Unfortunately, after a while I develop relationships with people in all areas and that in and of itself changes things. Once more I have a set of standards that I feel I must live up to.

For example: a teacher needs a bit of decorum and confidence that make it possible for her students to relate to if they are really going to accept and understand what she is teaching them. An on-line persona can be the silly, carefree girl that is always in here, but feels compelled to hide when people see that I am a mature, older woman.

Most of my choices are not particularly thought out, they really are pieces of me waiting in the wings for their time in the light. I just wish most of them had more time.

The Wreck Of The Me

"Down by the station, early in the morning..."

Uphill, uphill, uphill, I feel like the little engine who almost can't.

The train that follows my foot is starting to yield to all the creaks and cracks that comes when one part is not working right and the ride is too rough.

Having to potty the puppy three to four times a day, means going up and down staircases in slow agonizing steps as I try not to put any more pressure than I absolutely must on my sore foot.

Last night my knee began throbbing and refusing to bend correctly.

That threw my hip out of joint and it began to pound ferociously no matter whether it was standing, sitting, or lying down.

And, last but not least, my shoulder, which has been bad for a while joined in this tangled wreck and kept me up all night long.

Unable to lie, sit, or stand comfortably, I swallowed pain relievers that went down like sugar pills and worked even less effectively until I remembered I had a vicodin left over from my kidney stones, (what a pain this growing older is both literally and figuratively) and at last was able to fall asleep for a while.

This morning my sister drove up and picked up my dog so I can recuperate from this flare up before I destroy the rest of my joints!

"Chug, chug, toot, toot, off we go!"

The Fountain Of Youth

Long ago, in the mists of time, a little girl wandered up into the mountains. There she met an old woman who could not reach the apple she desperately wanted to eat, so the girl climbed up in the tree and got it for her. It was as simple a thing for the girl to do as it was impossible for the old woman whose joints were becoming gnarled and whose right foot was all swollen and whose every step was an agony.

To repay the kindness, the old woman told the girl about a spring hidden in a grove surrounded by huge boulders. There she could make one wish and then she must immerse herself in the spring and it would come true. The girl hugged the old woman and thanked her but really didn't feel she had done anything that deserved a reward.

She was curious about that spring though and went to great pains to find it. Then, standing right on the edge she thought about what she would wish for if this were a real magical place. While she was trying to think, her mind wandered as it was wont to do and she began thinking about how much fun it would be to splash and play in that water and that led to other things. She could see herself sitting in the shade of the nearby oak, loving her dolls and writing out little stories to share with her friends, thinking about how happy they would be. She imagined them hugging her and all of the adventures they could have together. She thought about how much fun it was to wander around in her small world, up into the mountain and down through the forests and she got so involved with her thinking that she slipped and fell into the water.

Climbing out, she was a little sorry that she hadn't made a wish first, but then she really knew there was no such thing as magic. And from there, she went on to live her life. Loving the water, watching the tides go in and out, the waves undulating in the sunlight, or raging in the storms. She married and raised a family, as happy as any mother could ever hope to be and when they were all grown, she began writing stories that she shared, but always she was on the move. Exploring her world and the world around it until one day she found herself on a mountain staring up at an apple that was just out of her reach.

Her bones too weary to climb any more trees, but her heart still imagining that anything was possible when along came a little girl, almost out of nowhere, who climbed up and got that apple for her. It was as easy for that little girl as it was unthinkable for the old woman. She remembered the spring and the gift an old woman had wanted to give her, so she drew the girl close into the shade of an old oak tree and spun her a tale of magic waters and wishes come true and sent her on her way.

Somebody Older

I remember reading a poem once whose point was the there is always somebody older than me. I liked that idea even then when most of the world was older than me. I still like the poem, but I am often one of the oldest people wherever I am now and I'm discovering it really doesn't matter.

We all grow at different rates and there is usually someone who got there before me. Maybe it's just because I am a slow mover, or maybe it is just because there are so many things to do and see, I can't do them all at once. Whichever it is doesn't really matter.

It mostly matters that I make connections with others and keep on learning.

I am learning that the real definition of old is a cessation of learning.

The art of living seems to be to keep pushing the boundaries and so what if one day I go over?

It's been a glorious ride!

Carefree And Easy Going

Remember how you used to share all your secrets with your best friend? Well, not quite all of them, there were some things we all just knew not to talk about.

My mother had a way of raising her long penciled in auburn eyebrows high up into her forehead and saying, "If you only knew."

Nobody wanted to know more than I did.

I used to try and imagine what she would say if I could get her to talk. I thought maybe it would be those same thoughts I had too and never felt I could share with anyone. Growing up in the fifties wasn't all Leave It Too Beaver and Mickey Mouse Club. In order to maintain that kind of easy going care free-ness there had to be a list of things no one ever thought about, or heaven forbid, spoke of.

The trouble was, I thought about them. That in itself was pretty traumatizing, but I was an intelligent child. I never ever spoke about them. If I had, I suspected that I would have suffered the same fate as the flies my grandmother chased down all summer long, always saying, "Filthy creatures," as that fly swatter swept in for the kill.

Grandma knew what was good and what was bad. If someone she loved did something bad, she would say, "That just breaks my heart." She didn't play cards, or drink and she had a picture of Jesus with his sacred heart stuck to the outside of his chest that caused me great consternation. One time I asked about it and she, being rather busy at the time, said something vague about things he talked about.

So, I grew up, not really easy going, and certainly not carefree, but alive and relatively unscathed by the flyswatter. Unfortunately I still had those thoughts and I certainly was not going to talk about them to anyone.

After over fifty years of not talking, I violated that sacred code and -- I talked! I shared those things with a friend and no great flyswatter descended upon me and my heart, although in my mouth for a while, was not ripped from my chest.

For the first time, I know what it feels like to be carefree and easy going!

Don't wait as long as I did.

Reasons Like These

It doesn't matter how old I am, if I have a reason to get out of bed, life is good. Remember what it was like to get up on Christmas morning, or your birthday, or any really special day? That is the feeling I shoot for!

It can be as unique as an email where someone writes, "How have I missed thee?!?" or as sweet as, "Oh how I cherish your sweet words." It can be funny like my little dog licking my nose then wagging his tail when I growl at him. It can be the sun shining in through the tree outside, or a phone call from one of my children.

I need reasons to get out of bed and my life has been supplying them for quite some time now.

I used to think people who had reasons like these were just lucky and that is surely part of it, but there is more to it than just luck. I need to cultivate those things that please me and make me smile. They are truly priceless.

Never taking anything for granted is a wondrous way to live. Not being afraid to let the world know how I feel can be embarrassing, but mostly it reflects back to me in heart stopping echoes.

You'd be amazed at the things that can happen to an ordinary life.

Just Be Yourself, It's Quicker

Striving to do and be things that I am not, or pretending an interest in things that are not truly important to me is courting disaster. Settling for "less than" when it comes to friends and lovers is an even bigger disaster. No one should be settled for, we all deserve better than that.

I'll admit that it is difficult for most of us to find someone who truly adores us and who we really adore back, but that is who should be in that very inner circle where our souls stand face to face. It is such a sensitive area, there may not be many people who ever really belong there. In fact there may only end up being one who belongs there.

So why be somebody you aren't when you already have so many people to meet and places to go and things to do?

What if you "settle" for something less, something that fits into the world's ideas of what is good and never find it for yourself?

Because whatever it is that fills you up to overflowing is the only thing that will ever make you truly happy.

It is your bliss and it is worth the search.

The only tools you need are honesty and yourself, whoever and whatever you are. Then just go out there and do your thing. The journey itself is absolutely amazing. Sometimes that's all there is and when that is true?

All is truly everything.

Parenting

Life is such a balancing act.

Somewhere between allowing the child to seek his own level and believing that as the twig is bent, so will the boy grow, is a fine balance we commonly call parenting.

It is scary to think that the only requirement for being a parent is a lusty connection that may, or may not have any thought behind it and for this act you are rewarded not with a gold cup, or a puppy, but a human baby!

That baby, as it was for you and I when we were babies, relies on his "parent" to teach him how to live in this world and our responses, whether they are carefully thought out, or mere whimsical reactions, can decide whether or not he will live, eat, play and love successfully, or struggle for the rest of his days.

Children don't need cool parents, or funny parents, or "in" parents. They don't need parents to be friends and pals and playmates, although there is a time and a place for all these things in a balanced life. Children need parents who teach them the real rules about a real world that will cut them off at the knees without any compassion at all if they screw up as adults.

This is probably the hardest job any of us will ever attempt and nobody seems to want to really talk about it. It isn't a popular subject. Children are not little science projects, or adventures in babysitting. They are real live, tiny human beings who will someday grow up to be parents themselves and what we give them will decide the ways many of them will suffer through depression, or face impossible work standards, or deal with huge health issues.

I wouldn't build a house without a good foundation, so why would I want to send my child out into the world without something equally substantial?

Everything Is Relative

If a millionaire had to pay $200,000 for every trip to the doctor's office, he might begin to understand what it means to those of us on limited incomes with no insurance. In other words, if everyone had to pay 20% of their monthly income for one office visit then maybe that would even things out -- or not.

Of course it really wouldn't matter because the millionaire, although he may have more eloquent and costly expenses, would never have to forgo food, or gasoline, or heat in order to get an antibiotic, or allergy medicine. First of all, money has privileges. Many very rich people can simply call their doctor and get what they want over the phone.

The other day someone asked me if I didn't have to have insurance now and since it couldn't be denied me, why didn't I have it? Well, having to have insurance, and being able to get it, and being able to pay for it are not the same thing. The insurance companies have a way of evening things out for those of us they consider un-insurable. If I could afford to put 25% of every month's budget into just the insurance, I could afford it too. That just wouldn't leave me any money for food, or the most generic of generic prescriptions, or actually going to the doctor afterwards, because insurance like that doesn't pay for office visits.

Everything is relative.

For many of us medical care is not really an option. We are the real middle class. We don't qualify for any help and we don't make enough to make ends meet without trimming out all the frills.

When going to the doctor for gout is a luxury, you have reached our level.

The Real Way

Everything is relative.

No matter how good things are, I can find something to be unhappy about, but sometimes the scale does seem to be tipped in really frustrating ways.

I go for years trying to achieve some particular goal and when it arrives it is accompanied by baggage that has nothing to do with it at all.

I might expect a few gray hairs, or perhaps a wrinkle, or two. After all I am no spring chicken, but other things just seem unfair. There is that word again, fair. I know that there is absolutely no reason to expect fairness. There are many people all over the world who suffer through much worse things than I do, but my little world forgets that.

My world becomes accustomed to things being a certain way and I learn to deal with them. Just when I think I have things pretty much under control, something else pops up to show me how little control I really do have.

It is inconvenient. It is embarrassing and sometimes it is just simply painful. I suppose these are the "tests" that poems and literature write about all the time. Am I really as "whatever it is I think I am" as I like to believe? It all sounds much more romantic to read about than it feels in actual life.

There is so little romantic about real pain if I am the one experiencing it. The romance is all on the side of observation, whether that observer is me, or you.

Maybe that is why stories are written. When reality cannot be changed, then it is a sort of panacea to write about how noble, or sweet it can be to deal with it, and of course, it helps to sell the story if there is some romance too.

Fairness

Sometimes I wonder where human beings ever came up with the concept of fair.

It doesn't seem to be one of those things that really exists in nature. At least, not so that I can recognize it as a naturally occurring phenomena.

No where have I found the law of fairness. As close as I can figure out, it is a coping mechanism for living in groups, where weaker members are valued for something other than their strength, or cunning.

You can follow all the rules and still not be fair. Some might even consider it a weakness factor in the game to be top dog. Fairness requires judgment calls, compassion, intelligence.

Brute strength, monetary power, vicious cunning, all are tools of those clawing their way to the top. Look at herds of animals. The bull male dominates until he becomes too old to hold his own. Then he is virtually ostracized and forced to leave the herd, often being eaten by predators, or starving to death on his own. In a world where everything was fair, he would be given at least as much care as he had provided good for his herd, but that is not a factor.

Finding the value in working for the highest good is not an easy concept to demonstrate, or maintain. It requires an intelligence and vision that goes beyond today and maybe even a lot of tomorrows. It means doing the hard things for the right reasons and doing them under adverse conditions sometimes, often without anyone else noticing, or even appreciating what is being done. In fact, the fairness factor does not even guarantee you will not be persecuted, or ostracized yourself.

Fair is an evolutionary concept that fascinates me.

Finding The Dream

Sometimes it is necessary to stop dreaming the dreams I am supposed to dream and dream the ones I want to dream.

Of course I need to know what those are and that's not as easy as it sounds.

The day I was born, the world began molding me into the sort of person I was "supposed" to be. I'm not sure how it knew that when I hadn't even had time to voice any opinions yet, but it did.

It twisted and tugged, pushed and poked, shaping, not just my hair and my body, but also my mind. By the time I was three I already had a list of things I could not do because I was a girl and the oldest and was bigger than my younger brothers and sister. Before I was eight that list expanded to include things we couldn't afford, and things my body was supposedly not shaped right to do. By ten, the list was limited by the other things I had to do that took up the time and money that might have been there if the first things were not a necessity.

Sometimes people along the way would ask me what I wanted to do, but I knew there were certain things I should never aspire to, not even think about and, being a good child, and perhaps not assertive enough, I never breathed a word about those things.

So I lived a pretty good life and had three awesome children and always pushed most of those niggling odd dreams to the back burner where they wouldn't take the heat of a world that really didn't want me to color outside the lines, or make waves, or rock any boats.

Now I'm finally old enough that people figure I shouldn't have enough vim, vigor, or power to make any of those things a problem. They also think I am still young enough they don't have to watch over me.

I am free for the first time and it is glorious!

Filling In The Holes

I love the children of the world, those sweet innocents who find joy in the moment and look with big eyes at those who hurt them, not understanding why anyone would do that, but thinking it must have something to do with them.

Wonderful children who never really grow up because their childhood is ripped out from under them by harsh people who do not understand what children need.

Sweet children who function at some of the highest levels in an adult world when all they still want is to have those holes drilled into them spackled with love and filled up.

People who spend their entire lives trying to measure up and never understand that they have done it a million times over.

I struggle to find the words to express their beauty to them in stories they will understand. I ache, sometimes, to be a mirror of the magnificent creatures they have become. I write and write and write, because I never seem to find the way.... when all I want is to take their hand and lead them into the light of understanding where they can feel the love so strongly that there will never be any more questions.