The Whole Soul

Last night we sat in a circle.
I and this room full of older women (and one man).
The chit chat of the early evening rolled
around in big blue waves,
menopause
and the AARP and for a moment,
I, feeling quite alien
looked down at the floor
in nervousness, in shame.
I hurried to catch my breath,
having run late once again.
In the car I inhaled a grocery store sandwich
 picked up on the way and my
pulse having long since quickened with the thought of tardiness.
I studied my green and blue plaid
ballet flats,
the veins poking out of the tops of my feet indicating
a deep need for rest and then
Marcia lit the chalice
and I was sucked back into the room
and my breath slowed,
my pulse paced itself,
and the weight of my life dissipated.
In my exhale, the quick of a match,
the burst of flame, the space became, officially anyways,
sacred.

What in the hell am I doing here? I thought at first,
just as I do every week
but deep in the end of my pinkie toe,
I that knew besides with you,
resting here in this circle of women,
in the arms of all that is sacred and holy,
is where I belong.

Process theology was the talk of the evening
and buddhism, hinduism, and sufism.
Emerson, modernism and postmodernism too.
The Oversoul.
The Whole Soul.
The Whole world.
Everything in it including
you and I
wrapped up together into one giant,
sparkling,
web of life.

I don't get it, one woman kept saying and inside,
Inside I shook my head a little
Because I always seem get it,  deep in my bones.
For me it's easy,
in that circle we speak my favorite language and
if you listen close enough,
God is there.

I drove home in silence,
the smell of truck exhuast on the freeway unable
to dirty my thoughts and
up over the hills there to the West
the moon hung high in the sky like a small silvery white
eyelash
falling on some cheek of the world
holding us safe
and I felt God then
and thought of you.

Iris

Blue is the color of you.

Like water, the Puget Sound

all crystalline and endless shimmer. 

I remember driving up Highway 101 with you

the Sound to our left, east-like

a giant never-ending plate of glass

as cobalt and honorable as your eyes.

Funny sounding Native names 

like Chimicum

dotted the roadside and old pine 

firework stands sat rotting away in April's rain.

Almost to Port Townsend

a lake on the right, to the East where

hundreds of Canadian geese flocked 

and flew 

and lived,

and here a place

you found joy.

I remember when you made this discovery

how excited you were

and we drove there together

and we watched them fly in

great aerial waves of white and silver and cerulean,

swarming above, a great
silent blessing.

I never cared much about birds before,

let alone Canadian geese. But you had learned 

to love them then,

to see the beauty in their winged dance.
So too then, did I.

And then,
then you died...

and there they were.

Everywhere above me,

all of sudden it seemed the geese,

and the pidgeons, and

the seagulls and 

the blackbirds.

All of them

flew by me, in front of me,

around me and above me in large swoops and 

V formations and I wondered then what I know now,

was it a sign?

Maybe you were still nearby. 

Tonight I sat in the bathtub 

thinking about what a hard winter it's been.

Feeling slightly lost, confused

and alone.

I wasn't thinking about you right then,

not really. I was reading 

one of my many dozen poetry anthologies

and I came across this poem

and then I thought of those Canadian geese

and of birds

and of you

and I felt again like I do whenever I see 

them flying above me, that 
maybe you are here somewhere after all, 

taking away my breath
and guiding me home...

Not Swans

by Susan Ludvigson

I drive toward distant clouds and my mother's dying.

The quickened sky is mercury, it slithers

across the horizon. Against the liquid silence,

a V of birds crosses-sudden and silver.

They tilt, becoming white light as they turn, glitter

like shooting stars arcing slow motion out of the abyss,

not falling.

Now they look like chips of flint,

the arrow broken.

I think. This isn't myth-

they are not sings, not souls.

Reaching blue 

again, they're ordinary ducks or maybe

Canadian geese. Veering away they shoot 

into the west, too far for my eyes, aching

as they do.

Never mind what I said

before. Those birds took my breath. I new what it meant.

February 18th...

is, or should I say, was, my great aunt Larry's birthday. She was my grandmother's sister and died at least a decade ago; I can't really remember now. She lived in Chicago all of her adult life in an apartment with her brother, who has also long since passed, and waited tables almost until the day she died. She was in her late seventies when she passed, I think due to complications from a stroke. I can't remember what year this was' all I can seem to recall how sad my mom was. She and Aunt Larry had always been close as my mom didn't always get along with her mother very well. At the time of Aunt Larry's death, my grandmother had recently lost her husband of many decades to a heart attack and was suffering from early-stage Alzheimer's. After Aunt Larry died, a few years later, my mom too. And then, three years after the death of her second daughter, both of her children having died in automobile accidents, my grandmother, then sufferning from late stage Altziemers, exhaled her last raspy breath and let death come too.


Today all that remains of this side of my family is my brother and I. Neither my Aunt Larry or her and my grandmother's brother had children or families of their own. My mom's birthday is the day after Aunt Larry's and i twas only after both of them had died that I could remember who's birthday was the eighteenth and who's was the nineteenth. In any event, tomorrow is Aunt Larry's birthday and Friday would have been my mom's 57th birthday. It's strange to think that it's been several years now since she died, and that I've almost gotten used to her being gone most of the time. It's strange to think about those months and years where thoughts of what I imagined in my mind the accident to have been like and of her last living thoughts were all that invade my mind most every waking minute. It's strange to think that I have gotten used to seeing little things ten thousand times a day that remind me of her and it's strange that when one of my regular customers who has hair that looks just like my mom's did comes in, that I do a double take to this day and stare at her from behind when she's not facing my directions for minutes on end.


At church there is always a big bouquet of flowers at the front of the sanctuary that differs from week to week. Congregants donate these flowers in memory or celebration of loved ones and a note is put in the order of service sharing who the flowers are for. This Sunday I will be bringing a giant bouquet of tulips in memory of my mom. I wasn't sure of what sort of flowers to bring, only thinking that I wanted them to be colorful because my mom was vibrant and lived life to it's outermost edges on most days her body existed. A friend suggested tulips, reminding me of how in high school my mom ordered 500 tulip bulbs and planted them in our front yard, creating a floral sea people from all over the neighborhood would walk by at dusk to stand for several minutes and admire the beauty before them.


My mom had a way about things; beautiful things. She loved and appreciated beauty in all it's forms... and I like to think I inherited this from her.  She saw the beauty in everyday things, big and small, and was beyond gifted at being thankful for these things and for being in the moment and forcing those around her to be as well (I'm still working on mastering this). In the last five or so years of her life, just like the tulips she so loved, she bloomed so beautifully that to those of us who knew or came in contact with her, it was blinding at times. She continued doing the things she had always done to make the world a more beautiful place such as gardening and volunteering and baking for friends and painting and singing in the community choir and teaching art to children and sailing to troubled teenage boys... but she did even more. She moved to a new town, in a new state. And she made new friends; a lot of them. She danced took up folk dancing and started soup dinners and play readings with her neighbors. She had boyfriends! She discovered after more than two decades of trying, how to love her autistic son in the ways that he needed and after years of strife, she became his best friend. While always having been a lover of learning and people, she became adventurous and courageous in a new way and it was here in this place of wild abandon and courage, that she found herself.


When I think about my mom being taken so suddenly and so violently from the life she so loved, and from us, the people who so loved her, I truly do believe that she was at peace with the world. Yes she had her frustrations, things she was unhappy about or annoyed with, but she had found that place that so many of us spend our lives searching for; that place off deep inner peace and solace and happiness that cannot be budged or eroded but unhappy occurances or circumstances. She had become that woman who walked into a room and people gravitated towards. She had become the person she was put on the planet to be after years in an unhappy marriage and a career which brought her more frustration than joy. I tell myself that because of this, because of the fact that she had become so self-actualized, it was okay in some respects for her to go. She had succeeded in making the world a better place and she had found inner peace and joy in doing so.


My mom had one sibling. A sister named Gail. When Gail was twenty one she was killed in a car accident; just like my mom was at fifty. A lot of times I worry this will be my fate too.  My mom never talked of Gail and when she died, I remember telling someone that I would always talk of my mom and never let her memory die like she had with Gail. But I don't talk about her really. There are only a few souls on the planet but with whom I broach the subject of my mother, probably because it is the most precious subject in the world for me. I have this fear I think that when I talk about her, little pieces of her that I have held onto so tightly with all my being, might escape my grip and I will lose her. 


On Friday Ro is taking me out to dinner. I think I will have a piece of cake for desert in celebration of my mom and maybe toast to her and all the many gifts, in addition to life, that she has given me. I will think about her wearing that sweatshirt she loved dearly that embarrassed me endlessly as a teenager; a sweatshirt that said, "Practice random acts of kindness and senseless acts of beauty." I hope that if you are lucky enough to still have your mom nearby, or a phone call or email away, for my mom's birthday and for me, you will tell them how much you love and appreciate them or at some point in your day Friday, practice a random act of kindness in memory of my dear old mom. 


Namaste.

February 16th, 2000 and ten.

Just another Tuesday morning at Richmond Manner...

Breakfast...

Yoga Pants...

A dog and his friend...

Jewelry, perfume, chocolate...

My favorite green bowl. 

It's February already, and almost halfway through this funny month of differing days. I'm sitting at a coffee shop in the hills far from home thinking about spring coming. Last week we saw a few days of sun and as much as I expound to hate the heat, the warmth on my skin felt good. It felt fresh and new and exciting. It felt like something thick and heavy had been lifted and it brought a sense of hope, a sense of faith in the goodness and the transformative power of a season's change. One of my customers who's garden is the stuff Better Homes and Gardens magazine spreads are made of told me of some sort of bulbs coming up in his garden. Around town, little spots of green can be seen poking out through the soil, ready to brave another year. I have retired my wool jackets for the season mostly and purchase a lovely lightweight grey number than just might be one of my favorite jackets ever a few weeks back. So I will try to relish this time. These few months when every day's weather is a suprise sometimes even from hour to hour, and not try to think about the depression that is sure to follow when the weather goes from cool and sunny to just plain hot. Hot and sticky. Last summer had some hot, most miserable days and I spent several nights sitting in a bathtub of cold water trying like hell, and in vein, to cool off even just a bit.


The thought of days like these make me want to move north somewhere, anywhere. I don't remember Portland ever being humid before and last year it just seemed to feel sticky most of the time. Gone were the 75 degree days of my childhood, to be replaced by temperatures over ninety on many days, humidity dripping heavily in the air. In any event, here I sit in my new grey jacket enjoying a hot americano and looking out the window at little bursts of pink popping up on the tips  of tree branches across the street. Yes, today, I will just try to look out the window at today and not worry about last year or the coming summer or anything of the sort. Instead I will focus on this exact moment as it happens, on the dogs walking by outside, the folky Natalie Merchant song I've never heard creeping from the speaker above me, the heat radiating from the fireplace next to me, and the quiet, calm company of a room full of strangers. May you take some time to do the same.


Namaste.

Cool Blue Her

Sometime after you lost your best friend

and I mine

I tried to step in but

my feet were never able to come close to being

big enough

to fill your mamma's shoes.

Sometimes

after she died

we'd go out and eat pizza

I'd buy

you'd eat

and I'm fairy certain our thoughts

floated along the same stream together

silently.

Sometimes

on barren holidays

we'd drive out to Dad's house

I'd read

you'd eat

and I'm farily certain our thoughts

would fly then too

along an even purple skyline together

silently.

Sometimes

on your birthday

I'd bake cookies

and bring you Captain Crunch

knowing all the while,

these thing never tasted so good

as when they were passed

from her weathered hands

to yours.

Now I work mornings

and you nights

the times we commune

few and far between

and the strained, sometimes phone calls

scream silently of a

shared loneliness on either end.

So I don't call much

I don't write often

I visit rarely

and if it's true what they say,

if actions speak louder than words

then

I don't love you.

Hear me when I beg with

this written whisper,

don't be fooled by

my cowardly inability to jump

deeply

into loving anymore.

In truth, I lay alone in the dark often

my thoughts

wondering about

you.

And so I just want to say

that I love you,

love you deeply and

that unfortunately

I also love quite 

quietly.

When we lost our cheerleader

I grew scared

to love

even you,

to love especially you,

the only other one left

the one who reminds me most

of that cool blue her.

By Mary Oliver...

Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting--
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

The Journey

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice--
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do-
to save the only life you could save.

Today...


I went to breakfast with a fairly new, albeit very good friend of mine. We told each other funny stories and talked of our self-doubts over coffee (me) and diet Coke (her)... and then as good friends do, reassured each other of our good-enough-ness. I ate runny poached eggs with potatoes and lots of salt and toast with jam, she an egg white omelet, hold the cheese, with veggies and dry toast. This probably helps explain why at almost the same height, I am carrying several dozen more pounds than she. Truth be told, while I sometimes lament the fact that I'm not thinner, I kind of like the curve of my hips the slim of my waist and the fullness of my breasts.



I sat next to another woman named Emily at church this morning after breakfast. We have just very recently befriended each other and I learned today that this Emily has, I think, two sons and grew up Unitarian as well. Emily cries most weeks at church. Sometimes she cries during the music, sometimes during the readings, sometimes during the sermons. It seems to me that she must be carrying around a lot of pain and hopefully, joy too around inside of her to have so many emotions so very close to the surface. Or maybe she is just so courageous that she is able to let her emotions be what they will instead of hiding them away from the world like I so often do. Whenever I go to the antique mall, one of my favorite places to get lost in, I see little fancy embroidered handkerchiefs and I think of Emily. I think next time I go, I will buy a few for her.



After church I went to a coffee shop and did the Sunday crossword puzzle. I almost completed the whole thing! There's an equal level of satisfaction and frustration that comes with doing well on a crossword puzzle but not completing it entirely. Sadly, I can count on one hand the number of times I have completed one. However, I have faith that if I continue to do them, someday I will be as good at them as my mom was, and as good at them as her mom was.



After coffee I went to Target. While there to buy toilet paper and face wash, I came out with a few more items than were on my list. I purchased Boots Bergamot bubble bath which came in a glass jar and a lovely gray nightgown and matching robe. I'm lounging in them as we speak. After Target, I went to New Seasons and got lots of fruit, apple-cabbage salad, and of course, for those days when my job makes me want to throw in life's towel, chocolate hazelnut gelato.



When I got home, I put away the groceries, did some dishes and cleaned up the kitchen a bit. I will do a few loads of laundry, and maybe if I'm feeling really ambitious, brush little Shumbi's teeth tonight before bed. I would give him a bath too, but I just scrubbed the shower walls and well, I don't feel like doing it all over again today.



Surprisingly, today has been the first day in weeks when being home alone feels more like solitude than loneliness. Slowly but surely, I'm trying to get a hold of this being-on-my-own thing and I'm hopeful that as time goes by, I will get more used to the silence that constantly surrounds me, the extra responsibilities that come with being the sole person in a household, the sole owner of a pet, and that this hollow, endless aching to be near another person will diminish a bit. I'm trying my damnedest to stay focused on those great conversations with friends like those I had at breakfast this morning, those connections I make with new people like Emily at church that spawn the web of my life just a little bit broader, and better recognize the quiet, silent times as opportunities for appreciating all the blessing I do have and meditating on the things that I would like for my life in the future. I hope that some point in your day today, or sometime this week... that sometime on a regular basis, you too are able to find time to be in silent solitude and quiet, peaceful reflectiveness, letting if even for a few moments, what will be, be.

Namaste.

I was sitting at my desk today, trying to write something, anything, and coming up with what seemed like ten thousand starts and ten thousands pieces that went nowhere. If I had been writing by hand, the garbage can would have been full of crinkled up paper balls of frustration. At some point, my fingers slowed to a halt and rested themselves gently on top of the smooth, worn keys. It's insanely cold out today and for some reason, the world seems a little quieter on days like this and for a few moments I sat listening to the silence, and then you came to me. I settled into this place for a while and tried to let other thoughts come to me, tried to let ideas spring to my fingertips so that I could produce something, anything of remote value but just like the many other times I sit down to write about the world, my mind insisted on racing wildly in thoughts of the past, thoughts of you.

Sometimes I think about the last Thanksgiving we shared together, the one where you made salmon for yourself and a turkey for Oliver and I even though you had recently decided to become a vegetarian. I found myself thinking about this today. I loved that little carriage house you were renting with it's exposed wood beams and wall to wall, waist to ceiling height windows in the kitchen looking out over your glorious garden. Isn't it funny how I can remember sitting at that old dining room table of grandpas with you and Oliver like it was yesterday yet can't even seem to remember my own name half the time these days. God that house was so cosy and warm and I remember I would always pick one end of the couch and curl up with that blue and purple striped fleece blanket of yours. I would sit snuggled up for what would seem like hours doing absolutely nothing and not be bored. Occasionally we would chat about this or that, and occasionally I would rouse myself up for a game of scrabble or some of your homemade apple pie, but I would also spend a lot of my time visiting you settling in to silence. I miss this. I miss your company and your voice and your words and your wisdom and your love more than I've ever missed anything in my life, but I also miss your silent presence; the way I could be with you for hours and days and not have to say a single word if I didn't feel like it. I miss you telling me from a small age that I saw the world in a way that was quite different from a lot of people and that I had an artist's eye. I miss you understanding that my vision is one of peace and love for the world and not of simple naivete like so people have and continue to accuse me of. I miss your shared belief in the universal salvation of all souls; the belief in the goodness and godliness of people.



And so these are the things I was thinking earlier today as my fingers came to a slow stop and I sat quitely listening, looking at the things in the room around me. On the shelf to my left, your father's record collection. And on the floor beside me, family photo albums chronicling a family intact, years of happiness and wholeness; time's long since gone now. I looked up onto the shelves in front of me and saw the birdhouse you painted and used as a mailbox at the house on Tillamook street. I saw the linoleum block print of of your face that you made when you did a sort of Andy-Wharhol-eske art project with your students. And I saw your old phone book, the black one that looks like an old rotary dail on the front.

It's so cold here today that they, whoever they are, are saying that it's supposed to get down to fifteen degrees tonight. Fifteen degrees! I can't ever remember it being this cold here. It reminds me the stories you told me once about when you and dad lived in an apartment in college with no furniture and no heat. How you went to a wood shop class at the local community college where other students where making mailboxes and bird feeders and how you and dad made a couch! How Grandma Lau came to visit you and being unable to snuggle up on the blanket that you guys studied under to keep warm, bought you a space heater. I remember you telling me how your one luxury during those years was buying a newspaper and a coffee and doughnut to share every Sunday. I've never known a life like this and so in this way, my life and yours were/are quite different... except for the fact that you saw the world in the same way I do, with an artist's eye. Save for the fact that we shared a belief that the purpose of our existence was to leave the planet a better place than it was when we arrived on it. Save for the fact that life needn't be spoken of between us most of the time because their was always a common underlying set of shared beliefs and viewpoints and understandings. Save for the fact that you loved me more than I will probably ever comprehend and for the fact that I loved and adored and admired and respected you and still do. Save for the fact that you and I, we were family in every single sense of the word.

I know it's silly that I have this dumb little blog that nobody reads and that nine times out of ten, when I try to write something about the world, it always turns into something about you, something for you, something to you. I suppose this means I refuse to be done with you yet. You left me and this world quite suddently many years ago now, and I still can't seem to let you go completely. I'm sure I never will. So I sit at my desk swaddled in silence on cold winter days and write letters to you even though I know you aren't there and won't ever be there to read them... but yet and still, you are the one that my fingers always seem to end up typing about. You. You, you, you. For me, it will always and forever be a most blessed life thanks to a most amazing you.

A few things...

Apple pie. Copper sink. Curly hair. Flowers. Grapes on the vine. Swing sets. Green gate. Beagle. Piano. Grandma. Pottery. Stencil. Fingernails. Wood floors. Fireplace. Chocolate cake. Tea parties. Hats. Roller skating. Camping. Ocean. Sand. Rain. Fall. Painting. Kitchen cabinets. Driving. Friends. Soup dinner. Play readings. Wooden boats. Twirling. Compost. Quiet. Pesto. Salad dressing. Bagels. Salmon. Knitting. Drawing. Charcoal. Pen & ink. Mixed media. Watercolor. Washing machine. Bug. Waving. Scarves & hats. Kayak. Bridges. Mountains. Views. Snow. Sledding. Corn dog nuggets. Dusk. Crossword puzzle. Scrabble. Kosh. Arguments. Glass door. Wall of art. Sketching. Doodle. Cordless phone. Vaseline lotion. Vegetarianism. Small towns. Birdbath. Christmas lights. Rocking chairs. Front porch. Ice cream bowls. Books. Mystery. Masterpiece Theatre. Clue. Sorry. The Un-Game. Pistachio pudding. Old people. Grandpas. Choir. Claw foot bathtub. Volkswagen van. Road trip. Tijuana. Florida. California. Oaxaca. Beaverton. Grand Canyon. Four Corners. Seattle. Port Townsend. Fireworks. Christmas carols. Ocean. Mothers. Daughters. Families.

...that remind me of you...

Namaste

The sun has risen for the day and even though it's cloudy and the skies are gray, I'm sure it's out there somewhere. It's still dark in my house. I've made a French press of Ethiopian coffee, the are curtains drawn, and am sitting by lamplight. Shumbi is curled up near by taking a rest after the past hour or so of chasing a fly around the living room. Last night I went for a long walk around North Portland with a friend and I discovered soon into our stroll that a light sweatshirt and rain jacket were not enough to keep the cold and the wind out. A few miles into our trek, the muscles in my legs began to cramp up in protests, yelling at me for being so foolish. It was at this moment that I realized we are really in this cold, dark, damp quiet for many months now, that fall and that Oregon, have indeed re-arrived.

Autumn has always been my favorite season and I have my favorite trees around the neighborhood that are almost exploding with colors bursting from their branches out into their leaves and finally floating down gently into piles on the sidewalk and parking strips. I love that I get to wear wool socks again, big cozy sweaters, and eat soup for dinner any time I am so pleased. And even though it is a season of dying, if feels every year for some reason, like coming home again. It is when I think about my family most and feel most domestic. It is when I want to cook on Sundays and bake on Mondays and smother Shumbi with endless hugs and kisses on every other day. I would give just about any worldly possession I own, or the whole lot of them, to have a fireplace to sit and read by. This, in my book, would be really living.

In a few weeks the leaves that haven't already withered up and died will have done so, and the trees will stand stark and thin, ready to bravely face the storms that will come. The skies will be eternally gray and the rain will be coming down more often than it will not. And it seems that every year at this time, no matter how much I try to fight it, the gratitude and joy I feel with the coming of fall, melts too easily away at the realization that painful anniversaries and the holiday season is quickly approaching and my heart will begin to ache a little harder than normal for awhile. It's the time of year I relieve many horrible moments including getting the worst phone call of my life, when I can hear myself over and over again in my head screaming like I have never screamed before, "what are you talking about, what are you talking about?!" It's the time of year when I think about going through my mom's sock drawer and throwing those without mates away, putting nice ones in a box for goodwill, and keeping a few pairs for myself. It's the time of year I think about my brother suddenly losing his only true friend in the world and my father sobbing uncontrollably when he saw pictures of his first love at her friends house a few days after my her death. It's also the time of year I feel most connected to nature and the time of year I want to take care of people most and give them love in whatever way I can, and yet, the time of year when I feel painfully abandoned by all that I once knew as good and safe and home.; the time of year when I most want someone to take care of me. This year, in an attempt to counteract the sad thoughts and empty feelings of longing that always seem to wade into my heart during moments I least expect them, I've decided rather than spend November and December quietly and miserably mourning, I'm going to make every effort to expend any extra energy I have left after work to doing things for other people and not being as self-involved as is apparently in my nature. My church is hosting a day shelter for homeless families and if I can swing it with my work schedule, I hope to be a homework helper to some of the kids from these families and one Sunday soon, hope to be able to pull out my mom's scone recipe and serving platters and make a giant brunch for these families.

Fall signifies not only a season of dying, but also a time of reflection and of change. It is the time of year when many of us think back over the previous year and ponder what we have or have not accomplished, what we have learned, and most especially, what we would like to change about our lives in the future. This year, I find myself feeling changed inside quite significantly. This was the year that I after many years of hopeless searching and frustration as to what path to take in life, have found my passion and my purpose. It has been thrilling and heart warming and comforting and feels like coming home to the place I was always supposed to be. And yet, having made this discovery, it is terrifying as well because now that I know what it is I'm supposed to be doing with my life, I have to actually do it and this is going to take a giant, actually many giant, dollops of courage and willpower on my part. To be honest, I'm scared in a way that I've never been scared before. I feel as if I'm about to put any potential I think I might have to the test; that I'm about to jump headfirst into the ocean and don' t even know if I can swim. I'm curious as to next fall, what I will have learned on my journey and where I will be finding myself if I do indeed follow the advice of Emerson and obey thyself.

Often we find ourselves having to deal with unexpected change, unwelcome change and fall signals a time of year when some of us try to make peace with these changes. I have several friends right now in the midst of unexpected life changes from new living situations, the breakup or sudden growth of relationships with a partner, friendships that are painfully withering away, to loss of income. What I have learned in this past year the most, is the one thing that I find myself continuing to learn year after year and that is that we aren't really every completely alone in our struggles and our joys. Chances are, someone we know, or someone they know, may be going through life changes and circumstances that relate quite well to our own. It is only in honesty and frankness and a willingness to connect with other people and desire find blessings in the good and bad parts of our lives, that we can find peace. If there is one phrase that rings truer than all others in my life, it is that one cannot change the past. What is done is done. What will be will be. Change is indeed inevitable and bad things do indeed happen to good people. Life is a journey and a struggle and less often a joyride. If this then is true, the only opportunity we have at finding happiness, is to understand that there is something to be learned from everything in life, that there are indeed blessings amid sorrow, that we are all in this together, and that if we follow what our innermost voice tells us to do, we will usually come out on top. Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "Trust thyself. Every heart vibrates to that iron string. Accept the place that the divine Providence has found for you; the society of your contemporaries, the connection of events." Trust thyself. Trust thyself. Trust thyself, and accept your place in the world. It is only when we stray from these things, when we cannot accept and be who we are amid what feel a world of critics, and when we are angry or bitter about our place in the world, that life becomes a endless, miserable chore instead of a joy and a blessing.

I have decided I am going to try to spend this next year working towards the place I feel the Divine Providence has found for me, no matter how scary it may seem, and be thankful for it. Yes, I am mostly miserable in my job as it is, but there are many many blessing to be found there and these things are what I must stay focused on. I know that many who know me think this sudden surge of religion and faith in my life signals insanity or don't understand who I am becoming, but I will continue to do and speak about and focus on all that concerns me, and not worry about what other people may think. As Emerson said, every true man is indeed a cause and I will be mine. And I hope that you who are reading this spend this season of change and reflection thinking about how you will do the same and not forget that to which your life is committed.

Namaste.

And another thing...

It's four 4:51am...
...I like it this time of day; it makes me feel like I have a secret place I go to while the rest of the world sleeps. I like that it's quiet and calm and there is enough space to be in the world, and think about being in the world at the same time without having to just go, go go. I like to walk the dog just before dusk when the world is coming alive and drink coffee out of a mug while I stroll.

...One of my employees texted me a stupid question at 4:10am this morning. I would like to fire her for having this little consideration for me and my work-life balance.

... Fall is my favorite season. It feels the most like home and makes me want to sit in front of a fire all bundled up and eat tomato soup and grilled cheese all day. It also makes me miss home and important people most dearly and makes me want to go back in time.

...I've been reading an exceptional amount lately. I think my brain is craving some sort of intellectual activity other than that I partake in at work. I count the days until payday each week so that I can buy a new book. Two more days...

...My friend is a stay at home mom. She has a blog about her life with the kid and husband and dog and it bursts at the seams with love and happiness and contentment. Growing up, I always thought my life at 29 would be exactly what hers is and today, it seems a world away. I can't begin to understand what it must be like live in her shoes and I often feel like we are living on completely different planets. I think she is really living... and I am just surviving.

...My life's secret dreams: to paint a mural on the side of a building; to be a documentary filmmaker; to have a giant tree surrounded by birds tattooed up my side; to ride a tandem bicycle from Canada to Mexico or from Portland, OR to Portland, ME; to own a bakery or cafe called Quaint with my best pal; to be in the roller derby and wear fishnets; to be a published author; to wake up and know how to play the guitar without having to actually have to learn how to do this; to have my own line of stationary; to live in a fully restored craftsman bungalow; to be able to finish the Times crossword puzzle on Sunday; to not be so thoroughly exhausted all of the time that I can do something about making even one of these dreams a reality...

...Sometimes I think I need to get my head out of the clouds and face reality. Often times I think I would be happier if I let my head spend more time in the clouds.

...I know that I am better than my job. That I am not entirely capable of all it entails, and yet entirely capable of so much more. I wish my customers, employees... and the rest of the world did too.

...I just bought the most delicious loose-leaf earl grey tea from New Seasons. Last night for dinner I had two mug-fulls with honey and I'm craving more right now.

...It's 5:06am... on my day off... and I've been up for several hours now. Sometimes I wonder what it's like to not live with constant, sleep-denying anxiety.

... I am coveting a fancy pair of ladies outdoor roller skates. I desperately want to be that crazy lady in St. Johns who people see cruising around town on her flashy skates and laugh at. I think in a few months, you would be able to bounce a coin off my ass if I made this dream into a reality.

...but then again, let's be honest; I was never one who was too concerned about the state of my glutes.

...Shumba is snoring loudly right now. Sometimes when he is curled up in his little bed I wish it were bigger and I could crawl in with him. Sometimes I just lay on the floor next to him and rub his belly and he purrs like a cat.

...If I could go away to seminary tomorrow and be ordained in not too many years from now, I would do it in a heartbeat. I am excited beyond belief to get this chapter of my life started, and saddened beyond words because it means not knowing if or when I might ever return to Oregon again. I don't think any place will ever feel truly like home to me. I love it here.

...I don't dream about fancy clothes or red-soled heels; I dream about having a pair of Jack Purcells' in every color of the rainbow. This would equal happy happy, joy joy.

...I'm a much better friend than I am family member. This keeps me up at night.

...Golf is a game, not a sport and mushrooms are a fungi, not a food.

...I'm actually feeling like visitng with that big gray box in the living room now. I wonder if Project Runway is on...

Words to live by...

"I must be myself. I can not break myself any longer for you, or you. If you can love me for what I am, we shall be happier. If you cannot, I will still seek to deserve that you should. I must be myself. I will not hide my tastes or aversions. I will so trust that what is deep is holy, that I will do strongly before the sun and moon whatever inly rejoices me, and the heart appoints. If you are noble, I will love you; if you are not, I will not hurt you and myself by hypocritial attentions. If you are true, but not in the same truth with me, cleave to your companions: I will seek my own. I do this not selfishly, but humbly and have dwelt in lies, to live in truth... if we follow the truth, it will bring us out safe at last."

" When good is near you, when you have life in yourself- it is not by any known or appointed way; you shall not see the face of man; you shall not hear any name- the way, the thought, the good shall be wholly strange and new. It shall exclude all other being... We are then in vision... The soul is raised over passion. It seeth identity and eternal causation. It is percieving that Truth and Right are. Hence it becomes a tranquility out of the knowing that all things go well. Vast spaces of nature; the Atlantic Ocean, the South Sea; vast intervals of time, years, centuries, are of no account. This which I think and feel, underlay that former state of life and circumstances, as it does underlie my present, and will always all circumstance, and what is called life, and what is called death."
"God is here within."

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Message to Mom

When I think of you, you look just like you do in this picture; curly gray hairs flying about in every direction, tanned skin, and small wrinkles around your eyes. Your teeth were perfectly straight, your nose thinner than my own, and your lips, full and shaped like mine. Your fingertips were slightly pointed (I got Dad's), legs any woman would die for, and a slight droop of the chin that had come with age. All together, you really were quite beautiful I think. You were one of those who aged gracefully and looked lovely with your halo of silver curls. I couldn't wait to see you as an old woman because you wanted to be rebellious and grow your hair long; wear it in a bun you said. Remember when you came to visit me in college and I flat ironed your hair?! Your head looked like a gumdrop. The next day you took my friends and I ultimate sledding on Mt. Hood and on the way home we stopped at A&W an ate corn-dog nuggets and root beer floats. They thought you were so cool.

Tomorrow is my birthday. I'm throwing myself a party this weekend and will be spending the day tomorrow with my two favorite women on this earth. It's supposed to be a happy day, and it will be I'm sure, but really I'm sure I will spend this birthday, just like every other, wading around in thoughts of you.

Tomorrow is my birthday and there's nobody to bake me a cake these days; not one made with as much love as you used in any event. Friends of mine; amazing, close friends you have never met but would love, tease me endlessly about my sweet-tooth. They don't know that just like my entire being, this love of sugar is a creation of your own doing. The pies aren't as fun to bake anymore and the candies aren't as sweet to eat without you to enjoy them with.

Tomorrow is my birthday and all I really want in the whole entire world, is to spend it with you. Instead I will try to distract myself with the amazing people in my life who love and care for me incredibly, but I will be thinking about that little white house in NE you took me home from the hospital to. About how I was born during my favorite season and was almost two weeks late; about the breakdown you had at a restaurant a few weeks before I was born when you couldn't fit into the booth they tried to seat you at. About how I was born just before dusk, my favorite time of day. About the checkerboard cakes you used to make me every year with M&Ms on top. About birthday parties at Grant Swimming Pool or Oaks Park. About that birthday sleepover in the fifth grade that went horribly wrong. About the pictures of me as a baby in your arms shortly after I was born. About you helping me move away to college on my 18th birthday and about how surprised I was when you had tears in your eyes as we said goodbye.

Really what I'm feeling, is that I wish it was Thursday and that my birthday didn't really happen at all because all I can think about is how I wish I was spending tomorrow with you. Thank you for birthing me and for having been my mom. Thank you for allowing me to be here and be so blessed and for helping me to become the person I am. Thank you for leading by example and in your last years here, showing me what true courage looks like by jumping right out of your own unhappiness into a future that at the time, was unknown. Thank you for showing me the importance of following one's heart and inner voice before all else and for being so creative, and generous, and nurturing to those around you. Thank you for always siding with the underdog, for fighting for what you believed in and for learning to love yourself first. I hope to someday be half the woman you were. And I suppose last but not least, on the eve of yet another birthday, I just want to say thank you for this glorious life and for having been you.

Handsome Devil

God I love this little man...

Dear Mom,

This morning I sit in my new yellow jacket, a color you once told me I looked sickly in and have avoided ever since, in my favorite coffee shop in Portland. I love my new jacket, and decided that if wearing yellow makes me happy, who cares if my skin looks pasty and ill; I think you would actually like how I look in it, or at least the smile it makes me feel inside.
In any event, I wasn't thinking about you at this moment until I spread some jam on my bread and there was a little chunk of butter left on the knife and they both found themselves spread there together, a thick swirl of pink and yellow on my baguette. And this funny little thing,reminded me of you because you liked jam and butter together on your bread and I, generally do not. It made me think of how when you would toast us jalapeno bagels for breakfast and spread the cream cheese on them in thick, uneven globs and how it drove me nuts; how I would always take my finger and re-spread the cheese to make it even and uniform around my bagel. How when I have my thumbs pointed inward on the steering wheel, they look like yours. How I wonder if your friends would recognize me without the crown of your curls on my head anymore. How I both love and hate to drive your car because it's not the same without you beside me. How I think of you every time I see a mother and daughter together and how much I want to say to them about about their good fortune in that moment. How I worry about having children without you there to give me guidence and direction and feedback and encouragement. And on and on and on...

And this is how it happens generally, the moments when you come to me; flashing suddently like lightning across my brain and through my heart, blindingly bright and unexpected. Only unlike lightening, you linger inside me for minutes, hours, days even; years on end now. As horrible as it sounds, sometimes I wish the thoughts of you would leave me as soon as the appear so that I can function in my daily life a little better without being bogged down with sadness of my loss of you. Alas, I suppose maybe this is god's way of encouraging me to see the glass half full and be happy for the flashes of you in my life instead of sad for the moments that will never happen; to remember to see the bigger perspective and be grateful.

A few weeks back in church the sermon was about all of our 'Cloud of Witnesses,' a term from Hebrews 12:1; those that have come before us and shaped our lives, our existence and our faith and who even if maybe not here in physical presences, surround us in spirit and witness our and encourage us to race forward in out lives with patience. In my life, this could is formed of many people who are no longer here such as you and your parents, but also by people I never knew but who have shaped the way that I think and feel and am in the world such as MKL, Gandhi, Thoreau, May Sarton, and many, many more. In any event, in thinking about these great cloud of witnesses that surround all of us, the reverend encouraged us to remember when we were young, and our mothers called us to dinner in the summertime; called us home and to be in this moment and know that this is part of who we are, this helped form the cloud of witnesses in our lives. And it was all I could do to not sit in that pew and bawl my eyes out because I wanted so badly in that moment for you to be sitting there next to me, just as I do every other Sunday and in millions of other moments in my life.

I suppose I am in still in the stages of grieving over the loss of you, because more times than not, thoughts of you may be momentarily happy, but leave me feelings sad and more than a bit vacant inside. I hope that someday, I will be able to remember when you called me to dinner and smile, and just smile, and not want to cry too. But in reality, I doubt that this will ever happen; that I will ever find peace in the loss of you so suddentely and violently from my life, that I will be able to let go of the anger I feel inside for your loss of life and you getting robbed of the many wonderful moments we all thought were ahead of you.

I have always been someone who believes that things happen for a reason and have been known to spout these words to friends who may be having a hard time in life for whatever reason or another. That was until you were ripped from my life without explanation and my faith in goodness and reason was questioned like never before. Right after you died, people would say this to me and it created a deep rage inside of me towards them in that moment, what I thought at the time was them making excuses and being inconsiderate. Only now, five years after your death, can I truly see, that your dying, has indeed served a purpose in my life (and I'm sure many others) and that I have grown exponentially in ways that I never would have had this not happened to you, and to me. I wonder, do you know that while in life you taught me more than any other, in death, you have taught me lessons and helped me see things that I don't know if I would have known or understood if you were still physcally here. It is my suspicion that this is true for others who knew and loved you as well.

As I sit here drinking my americno and eating my continental breakfast, I wish you were breaking bread with me on this rainy Wednesday morning because there's something I desperately need to tell you; that for the first time ever, I know exactly why I am here and exactly what I am supposed to be doing with my life; I have realized my path. I was beginning to wonder if this would ever be and had resigned to the fact that I might be an eternal wanderer who has a lot of likes, but no true intended path. Now I know differently; that I have been called to do something amazing, or at least I think so. This realization has brought a sense of calm and peace to me that I have never known as well as a sense of anxiety and stress over these new intense feelings of pressure to live up to my destiny and be in the world in the way that I am meant to be. I want to say all of these words to you because I know you would understand and be more elated for me than another human will ever be and in my future moments of self doubt, would push me forward from behind and keep me on the path I'm supposed to be taking. I am working to find peace in the knowledge that while you may not be here in physical presence, in most moments, I know what you would say to me, I can still hear your words floating around out there somewhere, everywhere.

But I suppose in the end, this realization of my intended path in life, only came as a result of your death as well as other obstacles I have faced in my life. It is indeed true that that which does not kill you makes you stronger and the clarity of sight which your death has brought to me is at times astounding. I think while not here in presence calling me to dinner, or putting cream cheese on my bagel for me, or waving to strangers with me in your convertible, your spirit is working it's magic in my life just as it did in your presence and when I am with the spirit of life or god or whatever the hell people want to call it/him/her, which in reality, I always am, I am with you as well. And as much as it can hurt that I can no longer see you or hear your voice, it brings peace that on this mothers day week over five years after your body left this place, to know that you indeed, are still right here inside of me.

Silk

Oh
can i tell you
how i unreeled that day
like silk from a loom?
The fabric of me
wound so tight
that alas i flung out over you loose and free
wrap yourself in me
i begged, come home here come deep inside
and let me
drench you
with my lvoe. And wasn't it pure beauty
how the world disappeared
around us melting everything
but those delicate bow lips
and your warm honey skin? And did you notice
as i wove
colorful ribbons of silk around you
in shades
the world has never seen?
The deepest of purples
most dandilion of yellows
and grassiest of spring greens,
shades
only ever detectible
to a lover's eye.
And
shhh
i have to tell you
how i relished
that only you saw
when finally and at last
i flew. Oh
how i fear
the moment
my silk spins to wool
my colors to gray
and i can't be in this world
any longer with you.

Two Left Feet

i met oliver for dinner tonight
bought him salmon and chocolate cake when he finished work sometimes i want to call him ollie but that’s what only you called him
i'm afraid it will make him uncomfortable it will bring about that tortuous silence we have both become so versed in
the stuff that speaks so violently loud that together we swim in thoughts of you
memories that are okay in quiet dark aloneness but too scary together i'm missing my art companion your homemade pesto and apple pie
and thanksgiving dinners us three together
you and i playing scrabble and him snoring on the floor i still have those purple slippers you knitted me for Christmas in the back of my closet
the felted two left feet that never quite shrank enough and flop around when i walk in them
he wears his grey ones around the house i know but i can’t bear to look down all of the time and think of you
so tonight we ate our chocolate cake together and talked of work and the weather
while all along I was thinking how very much he still needs you to call him ollie and tell him to tuck his shirt in and wear his nametag at work
it’s not the same when it comes from me
so this has become the dance we waltz together
round and round we go from silence to small talk and back againfor fear of getting too close and losing the only other one left

Fall Baby

When the sun begins its retreat after dinner but before dessert, excitement swells
For this girl born on the first day of Autumn hasn't yet forgotten of which season she came
Together now you and I stroll hand in hand as the velvety evening breeze musses my hair and freckles your rosy cheeks for one last time
The sugary smell of sweet peas and aroma of freshly clipped grass grows my grin wide with pleasure and tickles your nose crazy I know
Children down the street scream and yelp with glee and happiness of another glorious summer day done
September is here and summer will finally begin to loosen is stifling hot grip
Soon the leaves will begin to ripen into old age and wither
first growing chartreuse in color and then as scarlet and bloody as an August sunset
I will shake out my wool sweaters in anticipation of all things warm and cozy
As memories of cold nights spent toasting marshmallows in the fireplace and plucking the last few grapes off the vine bring me back to home
I can't wait for big fat raindrops to kiss my eyelashes hello again and drip down to the tip of my nose Fall is almost here and I am happy again.

Threetwentyfouram

sitting alone
in the dark drafty silence
rest has again escaped me
words, thoughts, ideas
encompass my brain and body so immensely
that a compulsion to bleed them onto the page,
to purge out all of the worry and anxiety ensues.
Those things that keep me too sick and full
to sleep the night through have reappeared
for a multitude of years now
and i have thus become an expert at the exact melodic hum
a symphony of passing cars makes,
the crickets choraling the way they only do while most of the world sleeps.
Would Alanis sing how ironic it is
that someone who is often scared of many her own thought
now spends nights unaccompanied and swimming in thick, heavy, dark aloneness
a silence so tremendous it shouts out
that while a life may be full of other ones
we are brought here to sing our very own aria
and then curtsy out.