The Year the Earth Stood Still

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A lack of transparency marked 2016.The great entertainer upstaged the protagonist and all the prognosticators got it wrong. On a smaller, but no less relevant scale, I got it wrong too. From the political scientist whose misrepresentation of himself initially struck a chord to the photographer whose lens was almost always out of focus, I desperately held on to what I thought was a better reality, until I didn’t. In this case, the trees were replaced by the parking lot but the blades of grass that sprung up from the spaces in between represent renewal and promise in 2017.

Have a good one.

Hurricane Serena

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Had I not gone through the last 6 months, with just slight chest pain, a few days that I thought I could not survive and a handful of sleepless nights, I would not have understood what it is like to stand on the other side of a tennis court with Serena.

In the infamous words of the great Oz: nobody, just nobody, gets in to see the Wizard., Translated from Freudian psychology that means you have to pay your dues. But isn’t it the kicker when you know your dues have been paid, and the great and powerful Oz is a Freud – I mean fraud.

I have personally come to believe in that grasshopper who hopped unexpectedly into my container of non-toxic hair dye, became coated with the damn stuff and suffered for at least an hour before it croaked.

Well of course I checked on him/her, several times, moving it from place to place thinking if I were this grasshopper where would I like my last few moments of gasping for breath and damning myself for my last hop on earth to be?

I finally settled ‘it’ into the butterfly garden, in a bed of green leafy threads to cover me. Kinda like the refuge I take between my organic comforter and sheets when ‘I take to my bed’ as I did, as Dorothy did and I suppose Serena does, when we just can’t fight anymore and we settle in for what is.

Too Much Baggage – Let Er Go!

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June and July proved to be the deciding months I anticipated. Life re-balanced in relationship to myself and others with renewed vigor and anticipation. Goals that were set months ago were realized according to plans.

We all need to learn the lessons associated with letting go. Seems like we push against those lessons in spite of knowing how they (ultimately) benefit us.

Ease on down the road.

May I?

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May and June.

The absence of the usual. Undergrounded. Suspended in another reality to lament. How to find meaning in the awful, the absurd, the uncalled for, the necessity.

I’m sick with me. Down for the count. Sick and dumb. Because if you think one way, thinking another doesn’t happen.

I am homesick for me. I’m here feasting on that royal burger, twisting the night away and knowing the difference between a $5 milkshake and bullshit.

Love you Quentin.

Was There A March?

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Loosening or strengthening connections or are we managing, floating or outright avoiding? People take notice, pay attention – is it environmental stressors or the choices we’ve made or refuse to accept. Is it the fear of loss and aloneness or is it the imagination of an overthinking eccentric hellbent on creating head drama, feeling alive, loved and adored? Which is the most economically sound emotional position? What is your core issue, your bottom line and does it change over time?

People take notice – was there a March?

The Agony and The Ecstasy, Truth and Redemption, Karma and Atman

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Love doesn’t hold on, Don’t lie to yourself, Damn, I don’t want to repeat this shit.
So I asked my best friend to help me understand the other person; I’ve trusted his good judgment, his perspective unlike mine – for years. And, for years he’s listened to my agony and ecstasy, desire for truth and redemption and believe you me ‘I can’t make this stuff up’.
We’ve woven our lives together through the exchange of escapades, mind f***ks, free associations and ridiculous
scenarios. We’re also careful not to bruise one another when we think we know what to say to help. There is absolute respect between us and his suffering is mine, maybe mine also his.
He bought himself a day old box of heart shaped chocolates; I bought myself a dozen beautiful roses. We know how to take care of ourselves through the potential storms, the accepted disappointments, the tsunamis.
We make the connection, we trust the connection, we check in and ask the hard questions.
We never have to ask ‘Do you love me’.

Will this year end in the same way last year did?

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Could it be that you have not had thirty years experience but one year’s experience thirty times.
You know what feels right; you know what feels wrong. But how do you go about living the right and letting go of the wrong?
Plant your feet on the ground, pay attention to your inner voice and what your conscience is saying. Raise up to yourself.
Say YES when you want to say yes; no when you don’t. Be impeccable with your word and take responsible for your choices, there are consequences to everything.
And above all, don’t shy away from conflict or fear – move through it, that’s what Big, Brave people do.
There’s no one way or right way for everyone.

It’s Almost Thanksgiving

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What a glorious Fall this has been. The colors were magnificent this year and the air crisp and clean. The promise of a new year is closing in and with it the wonder of the unknown. Just when you think you’re free from the past – it comes back to bite you in a text. Can we ever find comfort in the past and live fully in the not knowing what the future brings?
I ruminate, I write, I do – all of which to say is I try to live most fully, most ethically, most rightly for myself.
I am not a simple person living in a complicated world. I am fraught, at times, with anguish – negativity, regret. What we do with all of that is what matters, not that we ‘have’ it. It’s not us, just synapsis firing at random. We are not the diagnosis – that’s just a way of simply talking amongst ourselves hoping for a shared understanding.
Really, if you want to understand – listen between the words, discard the labels and be thankful you are who you are in all your glory.

Is A Promise Of Nothing Ever Good Enough?

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Is a promise of nothing, a promise of something?
Let’s define a promise. Let’s say a promise is a concept predicated on a statement, deed or behavior not ever to be broken. So a promise of nothing or of ‘no something’ is a promise void of direction, focus or goal. Let’s say an agreement is a legal term for a promise. Is what we exchange in commitment vows a promissory note of something and, what is that something that we are promising?
Pre-nuptials spell out something related to tangible goods, but what are we spelling out with our promises?
What is the something never to be broken? Is a promise of nothing or something ever good enough when not spelled out?

First Post Ever

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Well no, I guess that’s not completely true. I have a collection of short stories entitled ‘Conversations’ (to be published posthumously – with the profits going to every starving, rescued, needing to be neutered animal large or small out there on FB). So, (and I understand beginning a sentence with SO has become acceptable grammar, right AEF?) I’m ready to share my observations about relationships. Names have been changed omitted or forgotten. Resources are now a vague memory, because I’m sure this stuff has been said before (thank you Mr. Rogers), but the context often escapes me or gets confused with actual life experiences of mine. So briefly:

By far, the most relevant relationship is the one we nurture and abuse with ourselves. In a planet too close to its demise for daily comfort, we humans think of ourselves as somehow special, entitled, smarter than the rest – you get my drift. Since none of us gets out of here alive (and it is a true observation of mine that in a large crowd, I take solace in knowing that all these people will be dead one day when I think I will be too) and, what I’m really embarrassed to share is this – when I realize that important people die too, I feel a surge of confidence in my ability to do it without a big deal. Anybody else out there thinking this way? Maybe not.

So here’s the point. Take care of yourselves while you are here, it’s a time limited journey and even if you do (believe in) reincarnate the chances are slim to none you’ll remember any of what you have learned this time around – it gets too confusing and all you get are glimpses anyway.

In my Second Blog, I’ll talk more about how I think we should do that Yoda, Mr. Yamaguchi, Pema Chodron and Wayne Dyer thing.