It has been a long while since I sat down to write, nay to disgorge all that I have been carrying around with me. The losses, the triumphs and the day to day mundaneness of a special life. It has been 3 years, 5 months and 10 days since the man I committed my life to flew the coop. Seems like yesterday, seems like a lifetime. I have fallen in some form or another twice since then. I have had "crushes" innumerable times since then. I have learned to forgive my humanity and all that it entails....mostly. I have given and given and given until my guts bleed, literally.
As I embark on the latest ship to the latest chapter of this novel life, I am up to my ankles in debt, have been blessed over and over again with the kindness of friends and I miss the hell out of my family, I have been brought to my knees and lain face down in the dirt more times that I care to recount. People that I had no idea even existed 4 years ago have borne witness to my tears, my blood, my ecstasy, my laughter and to round it all out my abject confusion. I believe that I have been seen at my worst and my absolute best more in the past couple of years than the first 50 or so.
So where does that leave our heroine?? Quite possibly on the precipice of the greatest love and adventure of all. More than likely certain that the best is yet to come and with an underlying excited terror akin to that of a toddler taking her first sustained walks and not quite ready to burst forth into an all out delighted run. Forgive my ramblings, I have always been a bit of an extremist, so I am told. Let's just break it all down to these few words. I am loving and honoring who and what I have become. I am still becoming. Life holds way more joy than sorrow than it has for a long, long time and I am in the throes of new love. Let me further state that it all feels a bit deeper, truer and fuller than previously felt. Thanks for listening folks, I will get back to you when I am running.
Thursday, January 9, 2014
Wednesday, August 28, 2013
Crazy
crazy
1.mentally deranged; demented; insane.
2.senseless; impractical; totally unsound: a crazy scheme.
3.Informal. intensely enthusiastic; passionately excited: crazy about baseball.
4.Informal. very enamored or infatuated (usually followed by about ): He was crazy about her.
5.Informal. intensely anxious or eager; impatient: I'm crazy to try those new skis.
Yes, I have been crazy, most likely I still am ( though I could care less about anyone's new skis). I have been crazy with grief, confusion, in love, with frustration, with pain, with joy with other's opinions of how I bump along trying to do my best at any given moment to make sense of a frequently senseless existence. I do know that my pivotal desire is to be of service to those around me in any way that I can manage on any given day. I have asked for help, I have been given help. I am taking as good care of myself as I can, though it is a far cry from what I have been able to do in the past. I have removed other crazy people from my daily existence, have found relief from doing that but still am confused about where detaching with love and abandonment leave off and begin. I am immersed in an ocean of equal parts of joy and despair, with a modicum of insanity in the mix. I desire wholeness and structure, but find myself choosing the very things that destroy both. I am happiest when allowed to serve my community and find myself crippled and betrayed by my body and mind. I struggle with the knowledge that my current inability to change some of my more self destructive habits will likely have me leaving this earth way before I think I am done here. I guess that is the essence of powerlessness. Which is a feeling that follows me around most of the day, and not in the good way. I can feel the sparks of change burning in my heart and pray constantly for a conflagration of transition to alight and consume this craziness that plagues me.
I am bolstered by my knowing that every time in my life that I have been in the soup of craziness, that there is always an awesome unimaginable (and I have a vivid imagination!) outcome and change that comes over me and those whom I associate with. But while swimming in the soup, whether it be a desperate dog paddle or a lazy back stroke, I find it hard to be patient and tolerant with my process. So as I drink my green smoothie boosted with chia seed, hemp protein and bee pollen while smoking a cigarette (I told I was crazy....) I pray yet again for sanity to fill up my cup again and for my life to get bigger and for communion with those that I love the deepest. So off I go to do some energy work on a little scared doggy while eating a piece of white cake with almond joy frosting that a friend made. Told you I was crazy.
Saturday, September 8, 2012
Anniversaries and such
Today would have been Doug's 60th birthday, I celebrated by going to bed last night @ 5:20 and with a couple of short interruptions, slept for 11+ hours, up this morning at 4:30 AM, aching from a fall yesterday and recuperating from 4 migraines in about 24 hours. I felt guilty to take so much of my precious time sound asleep but I am sure that I will be better off in the long (and short!) run for it. The kitchen is clean, a roasted chicken bubbling away on the stove for tonight's chicken soup supper and I am showered, dressed and enjoyed the dawn as it crested over the mountains this morning. I wrote Doug a little note on FB to acknowledge his natal day and sent his twin brother a birthday greeting. As is usually the case I wrote what came to me and it was "You are irreplaceable".
It is true, for all our challenges, ordinary and extraordinary, for all the time gone by without him, even in the face of a new and different love in my life. The space left by the essence of that man who was, as we all are, unique, precious and incapable of being filled by anyone else. God made that one of his divine mysteries, I have been told and I believe. Regardless of how awesome, unique and precious the next friend, child, lover or spouse who comes along is, they are not the one you lost. While I spend my times these days doing my work, taking care of myself and my loved ones and dreaming of the next chapter of my life, trying to serve my Creator to the best of my ability with a loving and honoring partner by my side, these anniversaries from my former life catch me up in a net of memories wonderful and not so....
While I understand that our only way is forward, I find myself taking the luxury of looking back and imagining what my life could have been like had all the loved ones that have passed on out of this world, stayed for a little while longer, my mom, my lost babies, my husband and many dear friends. It brings on the thought of how many opportunities I miss to spend more time with the ones that I still have here. The decision to stay in the Southwest, made mostly by gut instinct and more than a bit of praying, meditating and trying out the Northwest near my family for a short time, has proven to be a mixed blessing. I have a job that almost supports me, gives me autonomy and frees me up to continue to build my private practice, I have new friends, a supportive Bahai' community and a new loving partner. I don't have, close physical proximity to my children and grandchild, nearness to the remaining vestiges of my family of origin, the ocean, old friends or the seasons displayed in the fashion to which I have been accustom to them for most of my life (I really don't miss snow though). I don't have the familiarity of person, place or home that I once enjoyed. Those things are just as irreplaceable as Doug is. And just as impermanent.
I don't have the answers to any of these dilemmas of faith and spirit, just a few comments....
One, I have learned that while there is never enough time, love, money, will or faith there is always more of these, in fact more than can be imagined, if I just keep connected to God and grounded on this little planet.
Two, that while I have learned to do most things better and differently, that the learning is always just beginning. There will be lessons until my dying breath, if I am anything like all those that I have been honored to witness take theirs.
Three, that as long as I am open and willing that I will never run out of unique and precious humans to put my arms around and hold, even if for but a minute.
Four, that again if I am willing and open, I will be enfolded in arms that love me until the day that I return back to my Source.
And five, that I can shut out from my heart a myriad of opportunities to experience many irreplaceable moments if I am not constantly vigilant to see God in everyone who crosses my path.
So, today I celebrate the love and life that I shared with my sweet sweetie even as I extend my hand heart to another unique and irreplaceable loving man, and of that I am glad.
It is true, for all our challenges, ordinary and extraordinary, for all the time gone by without him, even in the face of a new and different love in my life. The space left by the essence of that man who was, as we all are, unique, precious and incapable of being filled by anyone else. God made that one of his divine mysteries, I have been told and I believe. Regardless of how awesome, unique and precious the next friend, child, lover or spouse who comes along is, they are not the one you lost. While I spend my times these days doing my work, taking care of myself and my loved ones and dreaming of the next chapter of my life, trying to serve my Creator to the best of my ability with a loving and honoring partner by my side, these anniversaries from my former life catch me up in a net of memories wonderful and not so....
While I understand that our only way is forward, I find myself taking the luxury of looking back and imagining what my life could have been like had all the loved ones that have passed on out of this world, stayed for a little while longer, my mom, my lost babies, my husband and many dear friends. It brings on the thought of how many opportunities I miss to spend more time with the ones that I still have here. The decision to stay in the Southwest, made mostly by gut instinct and more than a bit of praying, meditating and trying out the Northwest near my family for a short time, has proven to be a mixed blessing. I have a job that almost supports me, gives me autonomy and frees me up to continue to build my private practice, I have new friends, a supportive Bahai' community and a new loving partner. I don't have, close physical proximity to my children and grandchild, nearness to the remaining vestiges of my family of origin, the ocean, old friends or the seasons displayed in the fashion to which I have been accustom to them for most of my life (I really don't miss snow though). I don't have the familiarity of person, place or home that I once enjoyed. Those things are just as irreplaceable as Doug is. And just as impermanent.
I don't have the answers to any of these dilemmas of faith and spirit, just a few comments....
One, I have learned that while there is never enough time, love, money, will or faith there is always more of these, in fact more than can be imagined, if I just keep connected to God and grounded on this little planet.
Two, that while I have learned to do most things better and differently, that the learning is always just beginning. There will be lessons until my dying breath, if I am anything like all those that I have been honored to witness take theirs.
Three, that as long as I am open and willing that I will never run out of unique and precious humans to put my arms around and hold, even if for but a minute.
Four, that again if I am willing and open, I will be enfolded in arms that love me until the day that I return back to my Source.
And five, that I can shut out from my heart a myriad of opportunities to experience many irreplaceable moments if I am not constantly vigilant to see God in everyone who crosses my path.
So, today I celebrate the love and life that I shared with my sweet sweetie even as I extend my hand heart to another unique and irreplaceable loving man, and of that I am glad.
Sunday, August 12, 2012
Learning to shed
We have been dealing with a lot of shedding around here of late- animals shedding fur, seeds shedding shells, snakes shedding skin (with the assistance of a scalpel) walls shedding cabinets, floors shedding tiles, trees shedding ripe pods. And as I observe and accept all this shedding in the mundane world around me, I strive to shed all those things that keep me too insulated, prevent me from growing, serviceable parts still attached to the parts of me that have died, the layers in my psyche that threaten to spill out things I am am attached to, coverings and veils that hide the bedrock of my soul and the thoughts, ideas and plans that can either lay on the ground or be gathered up, ground up and made into a nourishing substance. A long lot of metaphors, but every one of them apropos to the life I find myself in right now.
The interesting part of this process for me is that the more I shed, the more me I find. The lonely me who believed that crumbs of love were enough to sustain me finds a festal board of love of all kinds laid before her every moment. The wise woman me who stealth-fully practiced her craft while staying within the conventional system of medicine, now unapologetically works her skills with all whom she comes in contact with. The faithful me that held unspoken conversations with her Creator constantly, continues to do just that while bringing in service to her faith community and intoning prayer and devotions for an hour a morning with my future intended. The little girl me who trusted no one and was ashamed of her sadness, fear and joy, now has all those emotions witnessed, attended to and held sacred by others and a constant loving companion. The self abrogating me that sits in judgement of myself, weakening my strength in the world with constant thoughts of sloth is allowed voice and gently reminded that she is not lazy, shiftless and worthless. The scared me who denied her own radiant beauty in the world now unashamedly accepts declarations of how stunningly gorgeous she is, wrinkles, scars and all. The wounded woman that I am and will continue to be as I reach for wholeness, who believed it when told that she was generous to a fault and that she needed to be needed, has finally accepted that generosity of heart, time, money and love can never be a fault and that needing to be needed is what we are all here to aspire to, it is how we grow into selfless servants of our God.
So dear friends and lovers, think about what you are watching be shed. It may be that dog and cat fur could make wonderful sweaters, it certainly cradles baby birds in their nests well. Seeds can only grow into fruit when they sacrifice their protective shells, dead snakes can contribute to the adornment of an awesome hat. When cabinets fall off the walls, all those things stored in them may find more interesting, accessible, beautiful places to reside for a while. When tiles pop off of floors, it may be time to change the foundation of where you live. When mesquite pods are lovingly and carefully harvested from the ground, stored correctly and handled correctly, you can create sweet, complete nourishment.
Think, pray and meditate on that which you are being called to shed from your being, with every surrender the blazing glory of your preciousness and purpose will be revealed to yourself and the world. And that folks is never a bad thing.
The interesting part of this process for me is that the more I shed, the more me I find. The lonely me who believed that crumbs of love were enough to sustain me finds a festal board of love of all kinds laid before her every moment. The wise woman me who stealth-fully practiced her craft while staying within the conventional system of medicine, now unapologetically works her skills with all whom she comes in contact with. The faithful me that held unspoken conversations with her Creator constantly, continues to do just that while bringing in service to her faith community and intoning prayer and devotions for an hour a morning with my future intended. The little girl me who trusted no one and was ashamed of her sadness, fear and joy, now has all those emotions witnessed, attended to and held sacred by others and a constant loving companion. The self abrogating me that sits in judgement of myself, weakening my strength in the world with constant thoughts of sloth is allowed voice and gently reminded that she is not lazy, shiftless and worthless. The scared me who denied her own radiant beauty in the world now unashamedly accepts declarations of how stunningly gorgeous she is, wrinkles, scars and all. The wounded woman that I am and will continue to be as I reach for wholeness, who believed it when told that she was generous to a fault and that she needed to be needed, has finally accepted that generosity of heart, time, money and love can never be a fault and that needing to be needed is what we are all here to aspire to, it is how we grow into selfless servants of our God.
So dear friends and lovers, think about what you are watching be shed. It may be that dog and cat fur could make wonderful sweaters, it certainly cradles baby birds in their nests well. Seeds can only grow into fruit when they sacrifice their protective shells, dead snakes can contribute to the adornment of an awesome hat. When cabinets fall off the walls, all those things stored in them may find more interesting, accessible, beautiful places to reside for a while. When tiles pop off of floors, it may be time to change the foundation of where you live. When mesquite pods are lovingly and carefully harvested from the ground, stored correctly and handled correctly, you can create sweet, complete nourishment.
Think, pray and meditate on that which you are being called to shed from your being, with every surrender the blazing glory of your preciousness and purpose will be revealed to yourself and the world. And that folks is never a bad thing.
Tuesday, July 3, 2012
Me letting you take care of me
I have spent the last 9 days letting others take care of me, not just in the sensitive new age way, like "Let me take care of you, man! But in the walk me to the bathroom, wash me in the shower, wake me up for pills and put warm wet compresses on my infected incision way. It has been a study in surrender and accepting love. The kind of love that I can dish out, but that I find very difficult to take in. I had Jesse holding my hand while the nurses struggled, with decreasingly optimistic chatter to get a working IV into me. On the 4th try, after a particularly excruciating and unproductive skewering, a nurse who was prone to singing things like "teeny, weenies, teeny weenies!!" over and over again finally got a small but useable catheter in my left foot. Yes, my foot. They had to get special permission to place it there, but place it they did. As I squeezed his hand for support, Jesse whinged a bit with the 3rd and 4th attempts. We sat together waiting for the surgeon to arrive, Kent arrived from his doctors appointment so I got to be entertained with clean jokes from his favorite free office magazine and we engaged in some more hand holding, only I wasn't having to have sharp objects shoved into me during the palmar embraces so it was nicer.
When I was taken to the OR, I was very awake and aware, to the point of joking with the nurses, who asked why I wasn't working there with my vast OR experience, I told them I would think about it after I had had time to heal. When I woke up from the anesthesia, I knew for certain that working for a hospital was below the bottom of my list of things that I ever wanted to do again in my lifetime.
After a few weeks of accepting help and caring, I have found myself ready for the me I know to be in here to emerge and take charge of my own life again. Of course somehow my own life has morphed into one where room has been made for another person, one who has his own needs, ways of operating in the world and a desire to serve my every whim. I find it lovely, scarey, fascinating and all and all confusing. Confusing only in the fact that while I have been loved deeply in the past, the depth of adoration, tenderness, willingness and honesty of this man in my life feels unsurpassed by my previous relationships. I feel that all my partnerships up to this moment were testing grounds for what God has laid at my door presently. I thank Doug, Bennett and Jim for helping me grow and develop into the woman who could recognize who Kent is and the infinite spiritual potential of what the us that we are becoming holds. I also am grateful for all the experiences and relationships, good and bad that my sweet man has endured to become who he is.
I have no doubt that we stand to face many difficult challenges together. I also know without a doubt that together we can change our small corner of the universe in unimaginable and infinite positive ways.
I am filled with wonder, certitude and a deep abiding gratitude for this chance to share a love with the potential for service to each other and ultimately to all those lives that we touch.
It is such a paradox of feelings to be standing on the threshold of commemorating the death of the man who changed me inexorably for the better while celebrating this new love that God has so mercifully and compassionately blessed me with.
So as I revel in the joys and tribulations of all this, the laundry still has to be done, the bills paid and the dogs fed and breakfast cooked and consumed, it is a perfect melding and the mundane and the mysterious, and I couldn't be happier to be the who, what and where I am.
When I was taken to the OR, I was very awake and aware, to the point of joking with the nurses, who asked why I wasn't working there with my vast OR experience, I told them I would think about it after I had had time to heal. When I woke up from the anesthesia, I knew for certain that working for a hospital was below the bottom of my list of things that I ever wanted to do again in my lifetime.
After a few weeks of accepting help and caring, I have found myself ready for the me I know to be in here to emerge and take charge of my own life again. Of course somehow my own life has morphed into one where room has been made for another person, one who has his own needs, ways of operating in the world and a desire to serve my every whim. I find it lovely, scarey, fascinating and all and all confusing. Confusing only in the fact that while I have been loved deeply in the past, the depth of adoration, tenderness, willingness and honesty of this man in my life feels unsurpassed by my previous relationships. I feel that all my partnerships up to this moment were testing grounds for what God has laid at my door presently. I thank Doug, Bennett and Jim for helping me grow and develop into the woman who could recognize who Kent is and the infinite spiritual potential of what the us that we are becoming holds. I also am grateful for all the experiences and relationships, good and bad that my sweet man has endured to become who he is.
I have no doubt that we stand to face many difficult challenges together. I also know without a doubt that together we can change our small corner of the universe in unimaginable and infinite positive ways.
I am filled with wonder, certitude and a deep abiding gratitude for this chance to share a love with the potential for service to each other and ultimately to all those lives that we touch.
It is such a paradox of feelings to be standing on the threshold of commemorating the death of the man who changed me inexorably for the better while celebrating this new love that God has so mercifully and compassionately blessed me with.
So as I revel in the joys and tribulations of all this, the laundry still has to be done, the bills paid and the dogs fed and breakfast cooked and consumed, it is a perfect melding and the mundane and the mysterious, and I couldn't be happier to be the who, what and where I am.
Can I just say that having a man in my life who wants nothing more than to make me smile every morning is disconcertingly lovely. I spent the day (yes the entire day) rearranging my home space, healing room, dining room, living room and bedroom. It would appear that my inner wisdom is calling me to purge, shed and move. It feels as though I am getting ready for more to move into my life and to advance my work. It is exciting and compelling. I feel so very blessed.
Sunday, June 3, 2012
Full moon musings
Occasionally when the moon is full or close to full, I have a night like tonight. My body is tired around the edges, but my mind and heart are wholly awake. I fell asleep for a little while, and had a dream that ended with the realization that Doug was dead, really, truly gone. His dead face flashed before me with a new level of finality. I wasn't sad, just momentarily shocked and dismayed. How tenuous and short life is really, we go about our businesses, making plans, having dreams, seeking truths, being lost, perceiving that we have all the time in the world. We don't and no matter how tightly someone may hold us, no matter what we might wish and hope for, death will come and scoop us up when the time is right for God, not necessarily when it is right for our loved ones or for that matter ourselves. Jesse came here today to visit and to care for me this week when I have surgery on Tuesday. Kent will be with me also but this was planned way before we came together. It is a comforting to know that the two men who care for me the most are willing to shore me up as I surrender to this trauma. I know that I am loved to distraction by one of them, I also know that I am deeply known by the other. Amy is also staying for an extra day to provide transportation and support. lucky woman, I am.
After supper tonight, the 4 of us were sitting in the courtyard, saying goodbye to the day and enjoying the quiet of the night. The talk turned to loss, three of us are the survivors of spousal loss, in all 4 loved ones gone, a sobering and heart connecting fact of our collective lives.
So, I lay in the comfort of my bed and a loved one's arms and find no rest, only an uneasy mind and eyes that will not surrender to the night. I have learned that nights like these usually have something to teach me, even it is only how much I need sleep to function well. So I get up, make a cup of cocoa and I write. I used to read, but for some reason, emptying out my mind seems to work better than pouring more in there, even if it is just a trashy novel.
I am unimaginably grateful for my life and it's intricacies right now. It's not that I don't have challenges, I do, more than ever. Things like not spending enough time with people I truly love, not staying connected with family and friends the way I feel best about, not serving my community enough, not praying enough, not a lot of things. But in spite of my perceived failings, I have awe, wonder and true happiness for the first time in a while. I love my work, I have gotten a lot accomplished, I have kept promises to my patients, I have finished the mundane chores of my job, I have fit people in for the treatment that make them feel better, I have had friends visit and I have loved like I have never been hurt.
I have loved hard and allowed myself to be adored, I am surrendering to this next chapter of my life, whatever else that it might hold. I guess I might need some sleep to get through it and so I return to my bed to be drawn in and held close.
After supper tonight, the 4 of us were sitting in the courtyard, saying goodbye to the day and enjoying the quiet of the night. The talk turned to loss, three of us are the survivors of spousal loss, in all 4 loved ones gone, a sobering and heart connecting fact of our collective lives.
So, I lay in the comfort of my bed and a loved one's arms and find no rest, only an uneasy mind and eyes that will not surrender to the night. I have learned that nights like these usually have something to teach me, even it is only how much I need sleep to function well. So I get up, make a cup of cocoa and I write. I used to read, but for some reason, emptying out my mind seems to work better than pouring more in there, even if it is just a trashy novel.
I am unimaginably grateful for my life and it's intricacies right now. It's not that I don't have challenges, I do, more than ever. Things like not spending enough time with people I truly love, not staying connected with family and friends the way I feel best about, not serving my community enough, not praying enough, not a lot of things. But in spite of my perceived failings, I have awe, wonder and true happiness for the first time in a while. I love my work, I have gotten a lot accomplished, I have kept promises to my patients, I have finished the mundane chores of my job, I have fit people in for the treatment that make them feel better, I have had friends visit and I have loved like I have never been hurt.
I have loved hard and allowed myself to be adored, I am surrendering to this next chapter of my life, whatever else that it might hold. I guess I might need some sleep to get through it and so I return to my bed to be drawn in and held close.
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