It turns out that he wasn’t wearing a Kevlar Vest after all.
She thought that was it. She thought that was the reason that she couldn’t get close to him.
She was mistaken.
__________
They met several more times on the playground, played some games that neither of them knew the rules for, and ate more strawberries. Continue reading →
“It’s about how many times you keep coming back, working on the same lessons with the same people.”
“How many more times do you want to play the doormat? ”
“How many more times are you going to cry yourself to sleep because you don’t feel loved? ”
“How many more times are you going to deny who you are because you fear others won’t accept you?”
“Do you think these lessons can be learned by yourself?”
“Don‘t you think the lessons are learned through the relating to others?”
“I just see you giving lip service to all this stuff – the universe, God, karma, love, truth, authenticity. That’s great and lofty and swell and all, but when are you going to really act on this stuff you say you believe in?”
*From a conversation – Seeing My Path.
If I could manage to keep them from putting that 6 week-old Pomeranian puff ball with irresistible brown eyes in my arms, I’d be fine.
They cradled him like a newborn. They sprinkled Johnny Jump-Ups on his back. They cooed at him and loved him up.
And then the pleading started.
“Mom, he won’t get too big.” Continue reading →
Dear Universe,
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to write this book.
With grateful tears and a happy, excited heart…
Love,
Jesse
She never could get up on water skis. Oh sure, she tried.
Her dad was actually quite patient with her. She can remember the summer he drug her around the lake. He was steering the boat, looking back at her expectantly, motioning with his hands to “just pop up on those skis!”
She swallowed a lot of water. She kept getting in the lake and trying.
She just couldn’t do it.
Maybe she didn’t really want to water ski. Everybody else said they loved water skiing. She should probably love water skiing, too. That’s what everybody did in the summer. Continue reading →
Because a little girl’s imaginary pony can get so very hungry.
I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living, it’s a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope. Which is what I do, and that enables you to laugh at life’s realities. Theodore Geisel
Hey you!
Hang on.
This isn’t all there is.
If it feels thick and slow and hard to breathe, that’s because it often feels that way – especially right now. That thick feeling is offset by another feeling… of lightness.
That lightness comes if you let it – if you don’t try to attach to it. Don’t cling to the lightness out of fear. Let it come and go. Trust that when the lightness leaves, it will also return.
___________
There are glimpses of understanding.
Sometimes it all makes sense.
Go out under the moon and catch your breath.
Walk by yourself in a Spring rain and get soaked. Smell your skin and the wet earth and listen to the grass grow.
You will see that it makes sense.
Let a newborn baby wrap its tender hand around your calloused finger. Feel the energy in that tiny hand.
That makes sense.
The hardness makes sense, for without it, there is no appreciation for ease.
__________
Show us who you are. What are you hiding from? If you won’t let us see you, how can we come to know you and love you.
Open yourself up to the possibility of being loved for who you are – flaws and all. We all have them.
Ask for a hand, because we are all here for no other reason than to support and nurture each other.
Can you let another nurture you?
You don’t have to be so tough.
Let us see you.
Let us know you.
You deserve to be loved for who you are.
__________
Hang on.
It gets sweeter.
There is joy to be found in a morning spent pulling weeds or a night spent falling asleep on the couch getting lost in a book.
There is good spaghetti yet to eat.
There are children to watch grow and hikes to take.
There are flowers to be picked and friends to be made.
There is good wine to share.
There are mountains of buttery popcorn to be devoured while sitting in a dark theater next to your best friend watching a new summer blockbuster in air conditioning when it’s 98 degrees outside.
There will be phone calls from old friends who miss you.
There will be bright spots right around the corner.
Hang on.
I wanted to find out what happened to Lisbeth Salander – really, I did. I made it to page 532, out of 600 pages. I almost got there. In the middle of the book, where she’s attacked by the bad guy, I almost quit reading. I told myself, “Oh come on, you wimp, certainly there will be justice in the end. Keep reading.” But at about page 489, I’d walk by my nightstand and I’d swear the book was growling and baring its teeth at me. I felt the need to cross my arms in front of my chest to protect myself.
I returned the book – unfinished – to my girlfriend. She’d also loaned me the second in the series. “I’m sorry,” I muttered, “I can’t do it. It hurts to read it.” She knows me. She just smiled. I looked at her coffee table and saw another book that looked intriguing, and started to say, “How’s that one?” She politely stopped me and said, “You won’t like that one, either.”
*sigh*
I wanted to watch Javier Bardem in “Biutiful“. Last night I tucked the kids in and sat down for a rare treat – a grown-up movie. I made it through 50 minutes before my stomach started to tighten and I noticed my fists were clenched. It was raw and edgy and artsy and he was biutiful. I had to stop watching to protect myself from the anxiety I feel whenever I’m exposed to turmoil.
*sigh* Continue reading →
When her babies were small, she had an urge to knit tiny striped mittens with pink and green and purple fuzzy yarns. Now her kids wouldn’t be caught dead wearing handmade mittens. Friends were having babies who needed their precious hands protected from the harsh winter winds. She could make mittens for those babies.
She was waiting for her mom to teach her to knit.
He often found himself at a friend’s house on Saturday afternoons, and after swilling a couple beers, someone would suggest playing a pickup game of basketball. He’d laugh and say, “I’ll sit this one out. I’m lousy at basketball.”
He was waiting for his dad to teach him how to play basketball.
He’d read all he could find on SEO, blog traffic, building customer loyalty and what the experts had to say about making money on the internet. He’d finished his most recent course, made some progress and signed up for the next impressive looking webinar that would surely push his project over the edge. He lacked the confidence to believe that he had the skills and knowledge that would make his project a success. Continue reading →
On my third hike up the hill I was breathing hard, wiping the back of my neck and wondering why I wasn’t sitting on the front step with a cup of coffee.
Then she darted out from the tall yellow wildflowers. Startled, I said, “What are you doing here? Are you walking the hill with me?” She meowed and took the lead – for a bit.
She didn’t block my route, and I didn’t block hers. When the path was wide enough, we walked side-by-side.
We I chatted and talked of the flowers and the wide river and the scent of sage in the air. I told her it was nice to see her and that her presence made my walking more enjoyable and less of a chore.
Then she let me take the lead. We walked over the short flowers and around the tall ones, and when we got to the top she stopped and meowed. Continue reading →
Jenny made these guys with scraps of fabric, old buttons and polyfill. She stitches little grins on their faces. Some have one eye, others have two. When I asked Jenny what she calls them, she said, “They are Nice Boogie Monsters.”
She made one for me, one for Will and one for our cat, plus some extras, just in case.
They live in a ceramic bowl in the center of the purple dining room table. The wait patiently, some times all day, for one of us to walk by and stop to pick one up and squeeze it. I can’t seem to walk by that bowl without smiling.
__________
I know absolutely nothing about aromatherapy, but I do know the sense of smell is a powerful one. I could Google which scents are recommended for altering which moods and find the perfect combination of essential oils to elevate sad moods, and bring relaxation or a sense of calm into our home. Instead, I looked at the ingredients and combinations and just picked based on what I thought sounded good. Continue reading →
I found it at a thrift store in Bozeman in 1987. The silk label reads, “Mardi Gras – New York,” in a fancy script beside an image of a black mardi gras mask. The fabric is a brocade of black and midnight blue. 
The cut is classic feminine, putting curves where I don’t have them.
I bought it to wear to a costume party. The party was a spoof of a 1965 high school prom.
I wore black pumps, cat-eye glasses, and carried a black and white box purse. I curled, sprayed and teased my normally undone brown hair. After a couple glasses of wine, we decided we couldn’t add anything more to our costumes. On the way out the door, I took a look in the mirror and gasped. I looked like a taller, less refined version of Jacqueline Onassis.
I did not look like me.
My wardrobe at the time (it’s actually not much different now) consisted of flannel shirts, Levis and t-shirts. Most of the folks at the dance didn’t recognize me. Continue reading →
She’d had the filing cabinet since college, or maybe even high school. It was a bland almond color and it leaned to the right under the weight of all the files. It was a struggle to open the drawers. When she did, the drawer scraped against the metal sides of the cabinet, opening to reveal a mess of papers, their crumpled corners poking out of worn manila file folders.
There was no real organization to the drawers.
She had categorically filed in the beginning, but the sheer number of papers now prevented an orderly system. The drawers of the two-drawer cabinet could not hold any more folders. She was considering buying a larger cabinet.
Each filed note or paper represented a hurt, a slight, or a rude comment. She hadn’t filed based on intent. There wasn’t a drawer for intended hurts or a second drawer for accidental digs.
On rainy days, when the kids were busy playing, she’d go into her bedroom and slowly open a drawer. For some reason, she couldn’t resist re-visiting the hurtful comments written on the worn pages. Continue reading →
Love isn’t grand gestures, flowery platitudes, or mountains of toys. Love doesn’t require self-sacrifice on the part of the giver. Love doesn’t demand service from the recipient.
Love is an accumulation of many little acts.
