The Invitation

Tuesday, November 29, 2016 Poetry Tuesday No tags Permalink

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It doesn’t interest me
what you do for a living.
I want to know
what you ache for
and if you dare to dream
of meeting your heart’s longing.

It doesn’t interest me
how old you are.
I want to know
if you will risk
looking like a fool
for love
for your dream
for the adventure of being alive.

It doesnt interest me
what planets are
squaring your moon…
I want to know
if you have touched
the centre of your own sorrow
if have been opened
by life’s betrayals
or have become shrivelled and closed
from fear of further pain.

I want to know
if you can sit with pain
mine or your own
without moving to hide it
or fade it
or fix it.

I want to know
if you can be with joy
mine or your own
if you can dance with wildness
and let the ecstasy fill you
to the tips of your fingers and toes
without cautioning us
to be careful
to be realistic
to remember the limitations
of being human.

It doesn’t interest me
if the story you are telling me
is true.
I want to know if you can
disappoint another
to be true to yourself.
If you can bear
the accusation of betrayal
and not betray your own soul.
If you can be faithless
and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see Beauty
even when it is not pretty
every day.
And if you can source your own life
from its presence.

I want to know
if you can live with failure
yours and mine
and still stand at the edge of the lake
and shout to the silver of the full moon,
“Yes.”
It doesn’t interest me
to know where you live
or how much money you have.
I want to know if you can get up
after the night of grief and despair
weary and bruised to the bone
and do what needs to be done
to feed the children.
It doesn’t interest me
who you know
or how you came to be here.
I want to know if you will stand
in the centre of the fire
with me
and not shrink back.
It doesn’t interest me
where or what or with whom
you have studied.
I want to know
what sustains you
from the inside
when all else falls away.
I want to know
if you can be alone
with yourself
and if you truly like
the company you keep
in the empty moments.

-Oriah Mountain Dreamer

Keep the Book

Sunday, November 27, 2016 Uncategorized No tags Permalink

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There are two people you’ll meet in your life. One will run a finger down the index of who you are and jump straight to the parts of you that pique their interest. The other will take his or her time reading through every one of your chapters and maybe fold corners of you that inspired them most. You will meet these two people; it is a given. It is the third that you’ll never see coming. That one person who not only finishes your sentences, but keeps the book. ❤️

Second Sight

Tuesday, November 22, 2016 Love, Poetry, Poetry Tuesday, Uncategorized No tags Permalink

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Sometimes, you need the ocean light,
and colors you’ve never seen before
painted through an evening sky.

Sometimes you need your God
to be a simple invitation,
not a telling word of wisdom.

Sometimes you need only the first shyness
that comes from being shown things
far beyond your understanding,

so that you can fly and become free
by being still and by being still here.

And then there are times you need to be
brought to ground by touch
and touch alone.

To know those arms around you
and to make your home in the world.
just by being wanted.

To see those eyes looking back at you,
as eyes should see you at last,

seeing you, as you always wanted to be seen,
seeing you, as you yourself
had always wanted to see the world.

– David Whyte
from Pilgrim

Continue Reading…

Principle, Dignity, Self-respect

Monday, November 21, 2016 Life, Uncategorized, Wise Words No tags Permalink

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I read this and struck a chord with me.
‘You know, originating from a small town in ‘fill in the blank’—one of the areas that likely made a difference in this election—I didn’t realize until just this week how much all the learning, and the travel, and the business, and the experiences, and simply having the opportunity to live as a citizen of the world, as opposed to the citizen of just one country, has been about so much more than pleasure and fulfillment. It’s been about living an intelligent, curiosity-driven life. It’s been about growing. And expanding. And experiencing. It’s been about seeing. And feeling. And exploring. And you know what it’s really been about? Not the money and the success and all—that’s really just the superficial stuff—it’s about principle. And dignity. And self-respect. And options.’

One of the best things I’ve done is travel and live in different parts of the country.  I grew up in a very homogeneous atmosphere.  Everyone, and I mean everyone was a WASP  (white Anglo-Saxon Protestant).  I went to one of the largest high schools in the state, yet in my graduating class there were only two black students and none of any other race/ethnic background.  I didn’t know it while I was growing up, but I lived in a sundown town.  Sundown towns, sometimes known as sunset towns or gray towns, are all-white municipalities or neighborhoods in the United States that practice a form of segregation by enforcing restrictions excluding people of other races via some combination of discriminatory local laws, intimidation, and violence.  What I also didn’t know when I was growing up is that there was a very active branch of the KKK in town as well.  Now, if someone asks me where I grew up, I give a vague answer such as northern Indiana.  I don’t want to be associated in any way with such a place, lest someone mistakenly think that I am a prejudiced bigot.

“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime.”

― Mark Twain, The Innocents Abroad/Roughing It

Home

Friday, November 18, 2016 Life No tags Permalink

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I like this idea, and I’m only half-joking. Although going for a drive would only stress me out.  I really don’t enjoy driving (even though I have a fun to drive car.)  Anymore, traffic is just so bad in this town.  It’s grown so much in the 20-ish years I’ve lived here.  I just realized that this is the longest I’ve lived in one place- one city- in my whole life.  I also realized that I consider it home.  Someone asked me where I was spending Thanksgiving and I said “home” and I meant Indy, not the place I grew up.

Although it’s weeks (months? years?) like this that make living in a tiny house in the middle of the woods sound more and more appealing.  I’d make a pretty good hermit, as long as I had books and wi-fi.  🙂  lake-whatcom-cottage-2

This is How We Heal

Wednesday, November 9, 2016 Life, Thinking, Uncategorized, Wise Words No tags Permalink

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I awoke this morning to a total shock. And then I wondered just how naïve I really am – and how much of a bubble I live in. How did I not see this coming? How did we not see this coming?

I am painfully aware that I live within a bubble of privilege. There are so many out there –my friends of color, of different ethnicities and nationalities and religions, my LGBGT friends, my friends with terminal illness or disability, my friends who live in poverty – who do not have the benefit of that bubble.

This vile, misogynistic, racist man  has been elected president of our country. Which means that the majority of the people around us believe this behavior to be acceptable. Which means that we collectively excuse and condone it. Which means that we’ve accepted the culture we’ve been raised in and we’re okay with shining a light on it and still refusing to shut it down.

The America I know, the America I believe in, is better than this. We are better than this man and his party built on a platform of divisiveness and hatred. We are better than this rhetoric of division and misogyny and racism.

Buddha once said “I never see what has been done; I only see what remains to be done.” No matter what world we wake to tomorrow, we have work to do. We have compassion to spread, we have kindness to spread. We have friends to protect, we have families to support. We have understanding to practice, patience to build. We have life, so much life, and we have to shine bright lights on those whose lives and the importance of them, have taken a backseat for far too long. We have rights to fight for and so many people to love. So much light to chase. We cannot heal a wound, a split down our center, by ignoring it, nor by running away from it. Only though the work we must complete can we heal, only by giving our hearts and kindness to all those that need it most, only by loving, openly, wildly, freely, can we progress.  At our centers, we are all the same and we must not forget this. We cannot abandon hope when the lights dim low, we cannot sacrifice our tenderness when grace goes unanswered. Love. More. ❤️

Continue Reading…

One Hour, Fifty Years

Monday, November 7, 2016 Life No tags Permalink

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This is so me! As I adjust to DST, I think it’s bedtime when 7 o’clock rolls around. 😉 this may be a useful coping mechanism for tomorrow, Election Day.
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I’ve already voted early, and while may parents always felt it was gauche to say who you voted for (I have no idea why) I can proudly say that I voted for Hillary Clinton. Not that my vote will matter much, because this conservative red-neck state I live in will go to Trump. Still, it made me feel better.

Tomorrow I won’t be online, watch tv, or listen to the radio. It’s just too upsetting. So instead I’m going to drink a glas of wine, listen to music, soak in a bubble bath, and real a good book. Oh yeah, and fall asleep at 7:30. 😊

In the words of Andy Borowitz, “Stopping Trump is a short-term solution. The long term solution, and it will be more difficult, is fixing the educational system that has created so many people ignorant enough to vote.” There are a multitude of reasons why Donald Trump should never, ever, ever be elected president of the United States, but I fear that simply defeating him at the ballot box will not be enough to stem the tide of emboldened racism and bigotry that seems to have affected our society at large.

If

Sunday, November 6, 2016 Books, Life, Movies No tags Permalink

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“Death is a strange thing. People live their whole lives as if it does not exist, and yet it’s often one of the great motivations for the living. Some of us, in time, become so conscious of it that we live harder, more obstinately, with more fury. Some need its constant presence to even be aware of its antithesis. Others become so preoccupied with it that they go into the waiting room long before it has announced its arrival. We fear it, yet most of us fear more than anything that it may take someone other than ourselves. For the greatest fear of death is always that it will pass us by. And leave us there alone.”

“We always think there’s enough time to do things with other people. Time to say things to them. And then something happens and then we stand there holding on to words like ‘if’.”
― Fredrik Backman, A Man Called Ove

The trouble is, we always think we have time, done we? It’s a lie we tell ourselves that allows us to put off doing the things that frighten us. It’s a lie that keeps us from living our most authentic life. It’s a lie that makes us weep with regret when we finally realize it’s too late. Because sometimes it really is too late.

i just read this book this weekend, as I needed a diversion. But, like many good novels, it also prompted me to think. A book didn’t have to be non-fiction in order to teach you something. I also discovered that there is a movie based on the novel, and I definitely want to see it soon.

Everything in this life is linked. Everything.

Lily and the Octopus

Monday, October 24, 2016 Awww!, Books, Life No tags Permalink

“I think of how dogs are witnesses. How they are present for our most private moments, how they are there when we think of ourselves as alone. They witness our quarrels, our tears, our struggles, our fears, and all of our secret behaviors that we have to hide from our fellow humans. They witness without judgment.” –Lily and The Octopus by Steven Rowley

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I’ve outlived several pets, and all that grieving has taught me that if you want to continue to love and be loved by animals, you’ve got to learn to manage the pain of that loss.

Lily’s owner, Ted, is a single man. There are flashbacks to his last rocky human relationship, but mostly we learn that Lily completes him. Thursday nights they talk about cute boys, Sunday nights they eat pizza and Friday nights they play Monopoly. And Lily talks, too. Her words come out in enthusiastic flurries, with every sentence in all caps and every word followed by an exclamation point, as when they’re eating ice cream together: “WHAT! IS! THIS! CLOUD! THAT! YOU’RE! LICKING! I! LOVE! TO! LICK! THINGS! WOULD! I! LIKE! TO! LICK! THAT!

Only when Ted starts to lose Lily does he see that, while he’s indeed loved her more than anything, he’s also used her to keep himself out of the other parts of life: romance, family, and work.

“Because dogs live in the present. Because dogs don’t hold grudges. Because dogs let go of all of their anger daily, hourly, and never let it fester. They absolve and forgive with each passing minute. Every turn of a corner is the opportunity for a clean slate. Every bounce of a ball brings joy and the promise of a fresh chase.”

Keep a box of tissues by your side as you read this book; they’ll come in handy, trust me. I typically read before bed, but after two nights of sobbing uncontrollably while reading, I decided that this was not bedtime reading material for me.  😉  I’m not good at crying, whatever that means.  I was taught not to cry and by taught I mean punished if I did.  So for years, I didn’t cry.  Now I do cry, but it is a painful, gut wrenching experience, and I rarely cry in front of anyone else.  And even though this book made me cry, it also made me laugh.  If you love dogs, this is a must read.

Continue Reading…

Like a Shot

Monday, October 17, 2016 Wise Words No tags Permalink

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Well, not a literal punch. I’m a lover, not a fighter. But I can pack a “punch” just the same. 😉

One of my many favorite Shakespearean quotes:

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Both

Wednesday, October 12, 2016 Uncategorized No tags Permalink

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This pretty much says it all. It’s so mentally and physically exhausting being both.

Tired {Poetry}

Tuesday, October 11, 2016 Poetry Tuesday No tags Permalink

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I am so tired of waiting,
Aren’t you,
For the world to become good
And beautiful and kind?
Let us take a knife
And cut the world in two –
And see what worms are eating
At the rind.

-Langston Hughes

This seemed particularly fitting to me with the amount of vitriol and anger simmering just under the surface of society right now.

Every Single Woman, Every One

Sunday, October 9, 2016 Life, Thinking No tags Permalink

“By now many of you have probably heard the tape or read the transcript of the conversation between Donald Trump and Billy Bush. Some people are dismissing it as “guy talk” and “locker room banter.” Let’s be clear: Calling this “guy talk” is an insult to all of the good men and boys out there. This is what rape culture looks like and sounds like. And Billy Bush’s laughing along is also what rape culture looks like. I was raised by a republican and a democrat. This is NOT about politics. There are millions of good men who would never demean women and girls like this.” -Brené Brown

Make no mistake, ladies. Trump may be the face of your rapist, but Pence is every judge who made sure he got away with it.

Ever since I listed to the recording, so many thoughts about it have been swirling around in the back of my brain. If Trump was a black man, he’d be called a thug. But because he’s a rich white man, it’s labeled “frat boy behavior”. What? And people are all up in arms about his lewd language. It’s not the language we should be convened with, it’s his deeds. He is describing being a sexual predator. If you left the crude words out and still described the same behavior, it’s still horrible.

Continue Reading…

No Matter What {Poetry}

Tuesday, October 4, 2016 Poetry Tuesday No tags Permalink

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No matter what the world claims,
its wisdom always growing, so it’s said,
some things don’t alter with time:
the first kiss is a good example,
and the flighty sweetness of rhyme.

No matter what the world preaches
spring unfolds in its appointed time,
the violets open and the roses,
snow in its hour builds its shining curves,
there’s the laughter of children at play,
and the wholesome sweetness of rhyme.

No matter what the world does,
some things don’t alter with time.
The first kiss, the first death.
The sorrowful sweetness of rhyme.

-Mary Oliver

He Was So Beautiful {Poetry}

Tuesday, September 27, 2016 Poetry, Poetry Tuesday No tags Permalink

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He Was So Beautiful

(After Alice Paalen)

 

He was so beautiful
every day
his smooth brown face
his hair cropped close
silver and coal
stolen from narrowed eyes
from looks of scorn
amid the cypress
he walked next to water
the egrets nest hidden


secrets are beautiful
between four lips
three black words
on a crumpled white page
in a pocket in a drawer
so many wings
unable to fly
I urge you to visit Charlotte’s website and immerse yourself in more of her poetry and photography.  You won’t regret it. She is one of the many talented writers, photographers, and artists that I call a friend.  I’m hoping some of that talent will rub off via association.  😉

The Ruins

Monday, September 26, 2016 Learning, Photography No tags Permalink

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“The Ruins” combines several of my favorite things: parks, fountains, statues, and architecture.  One thing you can say about Indianapolis is that we have some very lovely parks.  The Ruins are located in on of my favorite parks in town, Holliday Park.  I spent so much time there when my son was young.  It has a wonderful playground, a nature center, and many hiking trails.  Perfect for burning off the excess energy of an active boy!  Also a perfect place to take photographs.

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The Ruins have a fascinating history.   in 1898, New York’s first skyscraper, the St. Paul building had been built. It was located at 220 Broadway. One of the outstanding architectural sculptors of the day, Karl Bitter,designed the façade of this building as well as that of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. On this façade were three massive statues made of Indiana limestone. The statues, called “the Races of Man” representedthe African-American, Asian and Caucasian races laboring together as they appeared to hold the skyscraper on their backs. In the 1950’s the owners of this building, the Western Electric Corporation, decided to build a modern skyscraper on the site. Seeking to find a new home for the sculptures, they held a competition among cities for a plan to display and preserve them. Indianapolis among other cities and universities, presented a plan: to place them in Holliday park.

The design submitted and later implemented by this city was a reproduction of the façade of the building’s entry including original facing stone, doorways and the ledge that upheld the figures, each one of which weighed 8 tons.

Last week I heard a story on my local NPR radio station that mentioned The Ruins.  Over the years they had fallen into disrepair, but a rejuvenation project has just been completed.  I think it’s time to re-visit one of my favorite places in town.  I’ll even make sure to bring my camera.  🙂

Autumn

Sunday, September 25, 2016 Good Things No tags Permalink

Every leaf speaks bliss to me, falling from the autumn tree.

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Nature’s peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves.

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Thy bounty shines in autumn unconfined, and spreads a common feast for all who live.

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Lessons I Have Learned From My Damage {Poetry}

Tuesday, September 20, 2016 Poetry Tuesday, Thinking No tags Permalink

Damaged people love you like you are a crime scene before a crime has even been committed.

They keep their running shoes besides their souls every night, one eye open in case things change whilst they sleep.

Their backs are always tense as though waiting to fight a sudden storm that might engulf them.

Because damaged people have already seen hell.

And damaged people understand that every evil demon that exists down there was once a kind angel before it fell.

– Nikita Gill

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When you’re damaged, you learn to take what’s given to you and be grateful for it. You learn that love is not a game, and cherish it. You learn how to appreciate the smallest things people do for you.

Because when people have gone through wars that have left them broken, they understand how fragile life is. They understand how they must make the most of it. And most of all, they understand how important it is to always be kind.