Not less than

 

I often find myself annoyed at some of the women in my past and today I think I realized why. My daughter put a blurb on social media saying not to be afraid to be yourself: silly, crazy, funny, etc.

The problem is that many women are not silly, crazy, funny, etc.!

They only act that way when they are trying to impress someone with their craziness, silliness, humor, etc. and it comes across forced, sad, and ridiculous.

There is nothing wrong with being yourself, but not when you define yourself with false standards.

When I was a girl and a young woman, women were supposed to be dainty, dumb and prone to be excruciatingly ridiculous. It implied that they needed to be taken care of and supposedly loved more because of their ineptness.  They were mostly seen in pairs, or more, practically joined at the hip, because being alone was dangerous. I remember throwing chess games in junior high and doing dumb things on purpose. It always made me feel embarrassed in the long run because I knew it was a ruse. And not a very good one.

If you really are that way then I suppose we should accept you for who you are. Perhaps feel a little sorry for you, or try to help you out in some way, but NOT emulate you, or imply that you are the real norm.

I belong to a local women's club and one of the things I really love about these women is their lack of artifice. They are wonderful women who are mostly independent, capable and truly themselves. They are not all alike, they sometimes make mistakes, but they do not define themselves as less than in any way.

They are simply good women being themselves.

Feelings

 

It is hard to imagine that something as insubstantial as feelings could have as much power as they do. 

My feelings are like a powder cask just waiting to be blown wide open. Ready to overwhelm me, or seemingly so. Although the long standing truth is that I have never had that happen, or maybe that I have never experienced wild uncontrolled feelings.

Once I had a very serious, extraordinarily quiet interlude where my feelings suggested I over imbibe a prescription and take a book out into the country to read until it worked. That failed. Mostly because I also have a very serious belief in fulfilling my responsibilities (or at least some of them) and I under estimated how long I would have before the prescription took effect.

That was over twenty odd years ago and I went through tons of counseling dealing with it, as well as making major life changes.

I no longer feel any need to shorten my life in any way.

I do feel like this year has performed some kind of black magical curse that has made me leap from an older woman to an old woman without any warning. Suddenly I am cold all the time, worn out after just a few minutes of unsupported standing, and think I could be content going from my bed to my recliner most of the time. Writing, painting, reading, eating - there isn't much more I really need anymore.

It could be medical. I have had and will have more doctor appointments with my primary care physician and a nephrologist, but I don't have any desire to go to extraordinary lengths to preserve this life which feels basically complete.

My best friend is facing the demise of a much beloved dog and having to make hard decisions as he goes along. He is willing to do almost anything to keep her alive as long as she doesn't suffer. Her impending death leaves me unbearably sad. I feel a connection to her that I have felt with nothing else. It seems that she embodies my feelings before this year, but I am ahead of her now even though I do not have any known diseases. 

I no longer have the stamina to go shopping, or hiking, or even grocery shopping without great exertion. I keep looking for improvement, but wondering if I am only imagining it.

Feelings! Which ones are real and which ones are simply the curse of an over active imagination?

Power

 

Power is a force that generally attracts, or repels people.

Go-getters are highly esteemed in junior high and high school. They are perceived as the ones most likely to succeed and that is probably true.

At that age.

As people mature the go-getters tend to split off according to the way they learn and adapt. They either round out their energy to accommodate the needs of the world around them, or they manifest as power hungry monsters drawing more and more into themselves.

Power mongers can be very successful, mostly because they are ruthless, but at their source they are insecure, dangerous people. Instead of perceiving possibilities and places for growth they tend to see the world as a series of threats to their own small world. What they perceive as growth is mostly within their own ego. Like an iceberg, what you see is only the top of something that goes to deep and dark places.

Great leaders are powerful because they see the bigger picture. They realize that greatness relies on even the weakest link being understood and utilized to its fullest capacity. People are attracted to great leaders. Compassionate power is seductive, because it allows everyone to feel great in their own sphere.

M is for the many things she gave me

She brings me comfort, joy, food, protection. She is love, the only way I know it. She gave me life!

No one can make me feel better than she can. If  I am sick, I want her near me. Always. If I am afraid, I run to her. When I need help I turn to her. Her words become the mottos of my life.

Yet, her words destroy my self confidence, build barriers between me and the rest of the world. She teaches me that I am better than others by birth, but never better than she is. She is god.

She molds me into her opinion of me and hammers that into place so firmly I do not see any other version. Not in the mirror, nor anyone else's eyes.

Of course she can't really do all these things. Deep inside I am still who I was born to be, but the only way that could ever emerge is through years of separation, miles of meditation, eons of work.

Decisions

 

Life is filled with decisions, most of them so trivial we never really give them a second thought.

Vanilla or chocolate? Red or blue? Hot or cold?  We just pick our favorites and fly right on by, but a few of them are not so easy and most of those involve people we love.

Should Johnny go to camp for two weeks or six? Does Sally really need a two thousand dollar bike?

Should Granny have a hired nurse, or go into some kind of care facility?

Is chemo worth the agony for the life it may prolong?

In the best of all worlds the hard decisions will have some obvious quality of life ramifications, but life isn't always in the best of all worlds.

Then we may be forced into making heart breaking decisions that are not so clear cut.

And knowing they are done with more love than anything else is all we've got. 

That has to be enough.

Disabilities

 

I think having a child with disabilities is difficult in so many ways.

The first is realizing and acknowledging that there is, or are, disabilities. Pretending they are not there, or that they can be subjugated by being pretty enough, or smart enough, or whatever, will not work.

Chances are pretty good that child will have some form of this disability for life and a parent's job is to teach them the best way to negotiate the world with it.

It is hard for the child, but it is also hard for the parents and any siblings. A lot of attention gets diverted to the one with the obvious problems and it's not always easy for siblings to respond in grown up, or even appropriate ways. They get asked to do and give up a lot in order to help their disabled sibling no matter how hard parents try to shoulder the bigger load.

The whole family learns to center around the one who has difficulties. In our home, homework took hours every night. There was endless repetition and experimentation trying to find what worked and what didn't. Even extracurricular activities had to be figured out.  Soccer was a gross motor sport that worked. Tennis was an eye hand coordination sport that did not.  Piano, taught one on one, helped with that coordination.

It never got easier. There was always a new challenge. Learning to drive, or should she even drive? Getting a job, how much could she handle and so forth and so on. There was school and there were tutors, but above all it took hours every day for everyone in the family to make it work -- even while they were working and going to school themselves.

Then the day comes when you have to step back and see if it worked and the horrible truth is that even this will take years of very difficult decisions before, or even if, that child can make it on his or her own.

For us it all jelled about forty.  Our daughter had a job she could handle and keep, an apartment she could afford and take care of and even met a man who was the perfect match for her. She has everything a person without disabilities might strive for. She just has to work twice as hard to keep it.

I am so proud of her. I am also proud of her siblings. They are truly empathetic, caring people, who learned a lot from this sister of theirs.  It wasn't easy. We all had to learn to give and take, to say no when we wanted to say yes and hang on to dreams that were never promised.

Seek and ye shall find

There is a Biblical phrase that concludes, seek and ye shall find. It is alluding to the kingdom of God, but I think it applies to most things in life.

If I am looking for the truth of something and I honestly look, it is likely I will eventually find it.

That doesn't mean I can willy-nilly make something up and prove it true. It must actually be true, but more things are true than it might appear if people are persistent.

People I know have an idea, or feeling, or wish, and then abandon it, because to get to the truth is often an almost unconscionable amount of work.  It requires a dedication of purpose, time and then blood, sweat and tears, to reach it. 

Not all things are worth that.

Some things definitely are and even though they may appear out of reach, they are only out of reach for those who do not have the required amount of persistence and perseverance.  

One example is child rearing: it is not all sugar and spice and everything nice. If there is a strong willed child, or child with disabilities of one sort or another, it takes an amazing amount of self control to give them what they need and withhold what must be withheld. Discipline is not a bad word, but it can feel bad when all you want to do is love someone. Rearing a reasonably happy, successful human being can be too hard for some people. They want to give and give and give when sometimes it is necessary for a child to learn how to struggle to survive and thrive.

I think this is why some people find things the rest of us believe are impossible. They are not willing to give up and yield to the easier answer.

Energy

I never thought mobility would be a problem once I found the right shoes and correct inserts, but it is.  I have found myself searching madly for something that will allow me to continue walking at the zoo, or in the woods, or even around the block.

I have almost zero energy and it's been this way in some regard almost all of my adult life, but it is much worse after the past year. It is possible I had a mild case of the Coronavirus last Spring, but I began sitting around more and more as time went on. Now standing even five minutes wears me out and causes pain in my lower back.

I keep thinking if I press on it will get better and sometimes it seems it is, but in micro-miniscule amounts.

Finding fulfillment

 

Beverly Clearly has died! 

My son told me when we talked on the phone yesterday and it hit me hard. As both a child and an adult who had children and has spent years volunteering in children's libraries, I value her books.

Henry Huggins was one of my favorites and who didn't love Beezus and Ramona!

Then I read she had two children, three grandchildren and one great grandchild and I found one more tie to her.

As a seventy plus woman with three children, five grandchildren and no great grandchildren I am aware of how precious children are. I never aspired to simply fill the world with children for the sake of doing that. I have always felt that along with bringing a child into the world it is my duty to help that child find fulfillment.

Finding another's fulfillment is not easy. It means exposing them to many things and then helping them focus in on those things they find most interesting. Fortunately for me, that is finding another's fulfillment. It gives me intense pleasure to help people find the books, topics, activities they love and then help them find ways of experiencing even more of whatever it is.

These things take time and patience. Although having lots of great grand children sounds romantic, it would make it almost impossible. One or two little chicks in a neighborhood of opportunities makes for better books and better lives.

PTSD

 

I grew up in a large extended family that included a nursing home so popular in a small town that it often had a waiting list of over forty people. 

My grandmother was kind and wanted each person treated like they were your own mother or grandmother and yet: I remember older ladies with sheets tied around their waists crying for help. They were confused and terrified and I was taught to feel sorry for them, even try to comfort them.

But how do you comfort someone who is homesick, confused, ailing and being forced to live out their days in the death warehouses we call nursing homes?

Grandma's Ladies home was one of the best, but it was far from perfect. I experienced small versions of this homesickness when I went away to college, but without the inability to do anything about it.

Today I fell asleep in the late morning and had the most terrifying longest dream I've ever had. 

I was sitting in my desk chair when I discovered I couldn't move my arms and my voice didn't respond correctly either. It was as if I had had a stroke. I cried out for help but a whole procession of people came and went around me without doing anything at all. 

I would recognize them and know they were kind people, but they would lean over and look at me trying to sob out, "help me." Then they would come to their own conclusions that did not include any kind of help. I was so terrified. I begged my sons, their friends, even my Dad and no one would offer me a hand. I felt like I would be okay if I could just get someone to help me stand up for a minute, but no one would.

This dream felt like it went on for hours and in fact I woke up nearly two and a half hours later, stunned, exhausted and terrified. It probably took me twenty minutes to feel normal again.

Thinking about it, which I haven't been able to stop doing all day long, has brought back all those memories from my childhood. Not the sweet afternoons listening to stories from grammas who lived in the eighteen hundreds, but the misery of the confused and homesick forced to live out their days in terror.

Love

 

Human beings are the most complicated creatures. 

My outer shell says very little about who I really am. Inside I can be anyone.

Human love starts with what can be seen, but that is only the harbinger of all that follows. Like a balloon, its reality is only complete by what is inside.

Falling in love with the outside, only to be disappointed by the inside is all too common in our world while truly falling in love with the inside can be an amazing experience.

That being said, it is important to remember who that inside is.

Chances are the inside will slowly morph as the outside does, but that is not guaranteed, nor are they guaranteed to match. Which is probably why love does not have to follow any linear, or predictable course.

There are so many kinds of love and all of them have the potential to be forever if it is true. I have to love what is. Not what I hoped, wanted, thought, or believed and that is both intense and complex. 

Whether it is the parent's love for a child, a lover's love for a lover, or a friend's love for a friend, it can be unique, enduring and precious and I have to be true to its actuality if I want that to happen.

Helo pods

 

Life is like an etagere with many levels, nooks and crannies. Each one with possibilities for wonder. In this world of seek and find, I set out wondrous amethyst geodes in places where they can be found.

There is another who used to be here with me, but I can't find them right now, In my mind's eye I see them sitting under a Bodhi tree, deep in meditation. The vines grow through them and there is a melding of life so that when they rise, the helo pods lie beneath them. Like eggs, they are a new combination of plant and person. It is a miracle with unknown ramifications.

The one who gives me the geodes now asks me to retrieve them. People are not ready for any of this. 

I see the people far below me, on the other side of an enclosure, like a pen in the zoo. They are playing on the sandy shore of a river and a polar bear is swimming towards them. I try to warn them that this bear is not a pet, nor is it trained, but, like children they innocently await its arrival.

They are doomed in spite of their innocence and I can do nothing to help them.

Suddenly I long to be back in my world, hiding beautiful geodes on glass shelves, but the helo pods will be hatching soon and a new world order is about to begin.

Transformation

Once, as a younger person, I think I really believed the world revolved around me. Not consciously of course, but in actuality. I expected things to go a certain way, be a certain way, feel a certain way, and when they didn't? I was sad, or hurt, disappointed, or even in despair.

Not that I believed in happily ever after. Oh no! That was for fairy tales.

To a point. 

Still, there was the dream, the expectations, the constant flow of television and movies showing me smiling people with straight teeth, blonde hair, and smiley faces, driving cool cars and living in nice houses without any hint that someone had to work to pay the bills, clean the houses, care for the lawns, teach the children.

Life was a series of small problems with an occasional tragedy thrown in that always turned out for the best. For me. Or I believed it should have been.

I don't believe that any more.

Now I believe that life flows out from me, a constant stream of possibilities that turn out one way or another, depending on what I really believe and do. Not what I wish, or dream necessarily, but what I "REALLY" believe. 

I'd like to say I believe in happily ever after, but you can't pull the wool over fate's eyes. Lip service just doesn't pack the punch that true believers do. I know some things will work and others will not. I know there is an end date on nearly everything and I also know that nothing is ever really gone. It is only transformed into something else.

That's certainly not a fool proof recipe for happiness, but it comes closer than other things for me.

Bliss

 

Joseph Campbell called it bliss, but that is only one specific way of looking at it.

It is that, but it is so much more.

It is what fills you, surrounds you, inundates you.

It is what you had in the womb on a scale humans seldom dare to dream of. 

You don't earn it, or deserve it. You can't make it, or own it.

You fall into it and it becomes a part of you, regulating the beating of your heart, the spinning of your thoughts, the space around you. It is an awakening of all your senses and understanding.

You do not own it. You cannot buy it. You really have no control over it except to open yourself and accept it when you become aware that it IS.

You may only get glancing experiences, but that is enough. And you may be swallowed whole by it without even realizing it.

However it comes to you, it goes beyond understanding into being.

Betrayal

 

Most relationships are based on trust, although I suppose they could be based on anything.

Need comes to mind. Once upon a time, marriages were a thing of need in a world that required much of either person, especially if they had children. That is true even today when most of us do not have to hunt our food or make our bread and clothing.

And I believe it is need that takes over when a relationship is not built on trust. We stay together, or stay with someone who does not fulfill more than physical needs if we feel we cannot do that alone.

Such relationships take their toll, especially if they are built on betrayal. 

Not being able to trust the person we live with destroys extemporaneous joy. It dims hope. It casts a pall over everything else.

Betrayal is perhaps the most enduring horror that exists. It creates a situation that says nothing is as it seems and the need to discriminate between truth and lies becomes a way of life that can harden the heart of even the gentlest of people over time.

It's a good day

 

After having a delayed and really unpleasant reaction to my first COVID vaccine, I went back to the doctor yesterday. She rearranged my medicine, prescribed a new allergy medicine and told me to hang in there.

Today, I rose from the first full night of sleeping in my own bed since probably last April. I woke up off and on, but never had to move to my recliner in the living room in order to breathe, or stop coughing.

Today was an almost normal day! It was warm enough to open the windows and go out in just a sweatshirt.

I took the bedroom fanlight apart and cleaned it all, then put it back together. I broke a bulb off in the socket and was able to fix that, then I wiped down the stove and ran errands in the car. I called my doctor to straighten out a problem with the pharmacy, fixed my easel, made a box for my paints and helped my daughter move chairs to her car that she is taking with her to Phoenix in June.

Who would ever guess that such homely things could mean so much, or be so welcome!

That's my boy!

I have always felt it is important to have some kind of musical outlet available, so I made sure each of my children took piano lessons and learned to play another instrument.

My daughter did better than I imagined with the piano, but did not take to the clarinet at all.

My middle son excelled at nearly everything he attempted and even had a double major including performance in college. 

My youngest son stuck with the piano and earned a gold cup in competition, then went on to play the trombone. He played that trombone with gusto and had the best decorated instrument in the junior high Christmas concert, but he appeared to be rather tone deaf. 

It never stopped him, though.

As an adult he taught himself guitar and even played songs in public that he wrote for his wife twice. He met me in Knoxville, Tennessee and played (and sang) Will you still need me when I'm 64 for my 64th birthday. It was so sweet, it melted my heart.

His wife represents musicians and he has played with many of them at social gatherings. I have always admired his enthusiasm, but never been overwhelmed by his voice.

Until today!

Today he called and sang and played for over an hour and a half for me and he was magnificent. I'm not sure what happened, but he has found his voice! Playing covers and even his own work, he entertained me and left me stunned. 

The guitar was strummed, picked and plucked in the most wonderful ways and his voice rang true throughout the morning. He says he thinks it's easier to play over the phone. I think it is unimaginable how much better he is after all these years.  I would go to a concert if he gave one and never believe this was the same little boy who played his trombone like a flat kazoo.

 

Responsive

 

I had my first Covid shot on Monday around noon. 

All went well. At first. I thought I was home free until Thursday night.

Feeling tired, achy and short of breath, I went to bed and woke up with a low grade fever.

It seems side effects can show up much later than the next day, but the nurse says the good news is that this means the shot is working.

Today I was nauseous and the fever was even lower.

None of these things are unbearable, but they do make me wonder what will happen when I get the second shot.

Six weeks

 

January 23, I asked if anyone wanted some very nice chairs and my daughter said she did. She said they would come pick them up in a couple of days. They just live fifteen minutes away.

Since then I have added a beautiful 6 by 8 rug and a very sturdy step stool. She wants those too. 

The trouble is that tomorrow is March 4th. and nothing has been picked up yet.

Some people might say, "So what? The chairs were already in your apartment, so what difference does it make?"

The answer is: a lot!

I don't like clutter and I live in a one bedroom apartment. I have half as many clothes as I have space for. I have empty cupboards and drawers. Minimalism becomes increasingly important to me as I age.

I wish I had never offered these to my daughter, but they are so nice and she doesn't have tons of nice things. Had I just placed a free ad in our local garage sale ads, this stuff would all be gone. I could have even sold it!

She swears they will come get it next week. I did finally tell her how important it is to me that it be gone, but I am struggling to remain polite and kind.

Beyond my own self

 

If there is such a thing as fate, or predetermination, I wonder why?

And if there is not, I still wonder why things happen the way they do?

All my life I have been giving up the people in my life. In the beginning my mother, father and siblings were the one constant. That ended in 1986 with my mother's death, followed later on by my father and brother.

My three children were my reason for living. We talked, played, did so many things together. Our relationship seemed as solid as rock.

And yet I was not a part of any of their children's lives in any long term way. Each one separated from me by totally different circumstances. Each one heartbreaking at some point. It seems that as I am the one common denominator there must be something wrong with me. And yet two of my children deny that.

Now, after four years of a madman running our country I find myself separated from the rest of my siblings, so my life is one long story of separation and abandonment. 

I have family of the heart. I am certainly not alone and yet I feel like some kind of animal who is constantly walking out of her tracks onto new trails. I dream of going home, but home does not exist beyond my own self.

I don't think I live in denial, but I certainly do live in a self-imposed sphere of existence that precludes things too painful to deal with. Whether those things are by choice, or not, does not seem to matter.

The body Frankenstein

 

Life is a science experiment.

Everyday I struggle with allergies to my environment, my medicines, and the timing of of those medicines.

Just because something causes terrible side effects when taken at night does not mean I should never take it. It seems that taking the same allergy spray at ten in the morning is very beneficial.

Just like taking my blood pressure medicine at night is most effective, but I have a bad reaction to all statins.

No one seems to be able to just tell me these things. I have to figure them out, or stumble upon them.

I love my present apartment. I also loved all the plants I once had here, but evidently I am allergic to rabbit foot ferns and the dust. If I don't keep the air filters constantly brushed, the floor vacuumed and avoid all kinds of sprays, I am constantly sick.

I can take medicine for wheezing, but eventually it causes other difficulties, so I had to stop. Only to discover that if I kick the heat up two more degrees the wheezing stops. 

I can eat a certain brand of toasted, lightly salted almonds unless I am unlucky enough to get the occasional bag that must be cooked in something different. Then I am allergic to them and my throat itches, even swells up some and I have to toss a ten dollar bag of nuts. And now I suffer whenever I eat a blizzard or Dairy Queen milk product.

The slightest change in things can cause me all kinds of problems and I begin to feel like a hypochondriac, but if I am one, then I am very good at manifesting real physical symptoms.

Pain

  

Pain sounds like a physical thing. A stubbed toe, a diseased organ, any of a million different physical manifestations and yet pain is emotional too. 

Pain is regret. It is missing someone who is gone.  It is not understanding. It is in the head, but in the body too.

I feel pain when I recall certain memories, or thoughts and that pain inflates an invisible space from my head, behind my eyes and all around my heart in my chest cavity, making breathing painful, breath jerky, even eliciting tears in my eyes

Pain is a real phenomena and I believe it can manifest real dis ease.

Bodily pain can often be healed with medical procedures, but emotional pain is so much more difficult to deal with. 

I cannot take a pill and change a situation. There are no injections that really eliminate reality. I cannot force myself to be something my being does not really embrace, or believe. 

I can change words, actions, places, even people, but that does not guarantee a change in feelings. 

Experience tells me all pain is real, but emotional pain is bewildering, almost magical in as much as it has no shape, color, size, or measurable boundaries, but comes with extreme power.

As a human being I must develop my own method of dealing with such pain, one that works for me, one that convinces my mind it is valid and no matter how much help people try to give me, it will only succeed if I allow it to.

Learning to control my own beliefs is the hardest thing in the world.

Family of the heart

 

I was so sick this past month that my car had to be jumped. 

Again!

I just couldn't get out and drive it and then the weather turned bad.

Really bad!

This has been a year of extremes, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised that yesterday and today I am feeling unusually peppy and happy. Compared to the rest of the year.

Nights are still bad. My sinuses worked overtime last night, but I slept okay upright in my recliner and that may be part of the answer.

I'm getting some real rest.

Without Trump in office and all the horror that accompanied him I feel like I am emerging from a nightmare, only exacerbated by the people in my family who seem intent on living their worst lives ever.

My children are doing fine. The rest?

Not so much.

It seems my health demands I rely on my family of the heart and quarantine myself from my siblings.

It is an adjustment.

Still, if I can feel like I did today, it is worth it!

Re-imagined

 

I suppose memories are very personal and should not be tampered with, but there is a certain type of memory that just grates on me.

It is the re-imagined, or reinvented memory that never existed in the first place.

Women who suddenly start referring to their mothers and fathers as mommy and daddy are in that category.

People who glorify relationships that were never that great, or make good ones sound fashionably hectic now when they tell stories irk me.

Just because some television show you watched made it look cool for you to act weird, or do strange things to your siblings, is not a good reason to re-imagine your history.

Life is what it is. 

It is not necessary to over emote, or create absurd scenarios to be cool.

Coolness comes from having the guts to be you.

Fame and fortune

I love a good movie, or play. I enjoy local athletes and music . These all seem like healthy ways to entertain people, keep in shape and fulfill the need of people to do what they are good at.

That being said, I do not find actors, athletes, or anyone else worthy of being treated like royalty - unless they are working towards the common good of humankind. Simply indulging themselves in excessive life styles does not make them special. It makes them self serving and greedy.

The idea that making a lot of money makes you a great person is founded on shaky ground. Making a lot of money can be the equivalent of storing all the neighborhood nuts in your yard while the neighbors go hungry.

Ideally everyone should do what they are good at, but if that is fleecing the flock, who needs it? There are other people who could  probably do similar things and still make the world a better place.

So I am not impressed with fancy cars and clothes, giant homes for one or two people, consumption for consumption's sake. I want to know what you give to the world, not what you give to yourself.

The neediest

Some people desperately need to be needed. 

Everyone thrives with attention, but there are people who believe that negative attention is more deserving than others.

They are the sickly ones, the ones who "work their fingers to the bone," the ones who always seem to be beleaguered by something or someone.

You and I may simply try to get through bad times like these, but there are people who thrive when they are miserable. They go out of their way to be put upon, to feel used, to look mistreated and abused. In fact, they egg it on.

Because they are never happier than when they are miserable.

Which makes them miserable people to be around.

That does not mean they don't have friends, or cheering squads. They do. These are the people they live for, the ones who fall into their "poor me" trap and egg them on.

Leaders

 

Leaders are imbued with voices that inspire listeners. They speak with authority, with boldness, with a surety that makes them good at what they do.

Leading.

The problem with leaders is that they do this very thing whether they are good leaders, mediocre leaders, or even bad ones.

They are used to receiving attention and commanding obedience.

Not quick to take the blame for anyone else's mistaken perceptions, or ideas, leaders are especially resistant to their own misperceptions.

Beware the leader who is absolutely sure of himself, because he is dangerous.

Better to have a leader who surrounds himself with good people and listens to them.

Me, me, me, meeeeeeeee

 

Know thyself.

I have heard that phrase since before I can remember, but it still confounds me.

There are absolutes about me that have never really changed. I am a very vivid dreamer and I remember a lot of my dreams. I am super sensitive to textures in both things I touch and taste. The idea of eating an unfrozen grape and feeling my teeth pop through the skin is nearly unimaginable for me, as is the texture of a lima bean, or meat like kidney or liver. I sleep best when covered in something not too heavy, but with enough weight to feel secure and my vellux throw is like a security blanket. I sort of swaddle myself in it in my recliner and it is very soothing. People who are unfair, unkind, or illogical upset me so much I will have nightmares after being around them.

I like the idea of people, but having to interact with more than one or two people for any length of time is so difficult I would rather be alone. I like sounds like whale songs, thunderstorms, and even some regular music for maybe half an hour, but I can drive for hours with no sound at all and be perfectly at ease. Anything that won't stop eventually drives me mad after half an hour or so. I am never going to be the person whose television runs in the background. I can't stand the noise. When there is sound I feel compelled to pay attention.

I have a soothing action I do by rubbing my thumbs or fingers together. There is a crisp feel and a squishy feel, but to me they speak of something past that is safe and secure, like an umbilical to the great mother. It is not something I choose, just something I find myself doing a lot of the time.

I know that I am intelligent. Some things are much easier for me than for many other people, but there are things I have problems with. Names and titles are difficult for me to remember, but I could tell you everything else about what I am reading, learning, or watching. Numbers are easy. I see numbers and patterns in everything. I even hear it in sounds.

I am very self conscious so my musical ability is really only for me.

I am loyal beyond loyal to those I love and respect, but have little tolerance for people who claim to be loving while really being self-serving and doing things that make them happy without really helping the one they love.

I consider myself a fair person, but I am also a judging person. I may not act on that judging part, but I feel it. And sometimes I do act on it.

At this stage of my life I think I am only fit to live with myself. I am often too tired to do more and too sensitive to be able to tolerate sharing a space too closely for too long and still be kind.

And I want to be kind.

Wonder and awe

I have to admit that when I die I expect to become part of the wind and water, sunshine and earth. Simply swept away into the great togetherness we are all a part of without realizing it now.

But what if a soul does continue on? What if there is some essence of me that has been before and will be again? What if those dreams I had as a very young child were flashes of memories?

Would there be any rhyme or reason for how I came back, or why? Is there actually unfinished soul business in the universe? Are any of the people in my life now also ones that I knew before?

Of course I'll never know for sure. I probably don't really want to remember. Waking up and seeing the flames covering my youth bed and wondering why they didn't burn this time, might be very traumatic to remember in any greater detail. Or the three white pigs with bloody mouths standing on top of me? Maybe not that beautiful round room with the big windows full of blue sky, but who knows what else came with that?

Chances are they were only dreams brought on by a very young impressionable child over hearing adults talking, but sometimes I wonder.

Did we find each other because we were looking? Will we find each other again when the life cycles are more in tune? Or are we simply trying to learn something that has not been learned?

I do not even begin to understand the universe, nor the laws that govern it. I know that matter is not created or destroyed, but I don't know if that includes the form that matter takes. There will always be wonder and awe and I think that is the beauty of creation.

Waiting

 

It seems my whole life has been one of waiting.

Waiting for my father to come home from work so we can have dinner.

Waiting for Grandma to finish washing the clothes so she can go to work and Aunt Lete and I can hang those heavy weight shirts and sheets on clotheslines sagging behind the house, then prop them up with long wooden poles.

Waiting for the butterfly to land so I can pinch his wings together and hold my prize for a few minutes that will intrigue my three year old eyes and end his short life even sooner.

Waiting for school to start and then to end, for summer to come followed by fall.

Waiting to be twelve then sixteen. Waiting for the boy I have a crush on to deliver the newspaper, or for the neighbors to invite us over to swim in their pool.

Waiting. Always waiting.

For the man I am engaged to, to come home from Vietnam. To find out if the house we put an offer on will be ours, or if I am finally pregnant at last -- and this time it will keep. Waiting to adopt the children who are to become our family.

Waiting for happy times, peaceful times, joyful times, sprinkled sparsely through what should be heavenly times.

And then the waiting ends. The children are grown. The marriage is over. The dreams are in the past. Hopes lay like wilted dandelions hung in dead daisy chains on limp stems from doorways that have long since closed.

All that waiting for things promised, things wanted, things hoped for . . .