Moving Day

When I think of all the things that could possibly go wrong on moving day, I sit here and feel truly blessed. Finding help was easier than I thought. The transition of utilities was made in just a few phone calls. Organizing was very, very easy because I had moved only three months ago and hadn't really felt comfortable enough to unpack wholly.

Then today I heard the present landlord will be here on the premises tomorrow and the angst went through the roof. Our last conversation left little in the shadows. I laid my cards on the table and he was very animated in his response. He even bordered on threats. When I point blank asked him if he was threatening me, he backed down immediately. So the prospect of another bout with him has made the day drag on. I am not convinced he is done talking yet. So what seemed like clear sailing is now in question.

No matter. This place and its memories will be laid to rest as of noon tomorrow. A happy new beginning awaits. And as I ponder on the possibilities of situations gone awry, I am grateful that I pretty much know how the move itself will play out. There won't be any vehicles burdened so much that their tires might give out...

or worse!

See you when I get settled...

Trading Lives

Lately I've been thinking a lot about the past. I'm sure it has more to do with the fact that I'm facing a milestone birthday than anything else. Although... I have been working on issues that crept all the way back to what I call the Dark Ages.

Yesterday I was thinking about my childhood. Memories are fragmented at best. It always amazes me that some people can describe incidents in their childhood as if it happened just a day ago. And sequence? Forget it! The cart, the horse - I can't tell which was first.

One thing I remember with crystal clarity though is my yearning to be someone else and somewhere else. I suppose we have all had our moments where that is a preference. But for me, it was an obsession.

I was a voracious reader in the early days. I am thinking it took me to those places I longed to be. And I devoured the written word as if it were the most delicious dessert one could imagine. I had learned how to read well before I entered school. By second grade I was reading at a sixth grade level they believed. No book was too large or difficult for me to attempt.

My writing ability was discovered by one of my teachers. She would come to be my first fan and shower me with praise and encouragement. By third grade I had found poetry and the likes of Ernest Hemmingway, Robert Frost, Emily Dickinson, Edgar Allan Poe and so many others I will not bother you with.

I would have rather died than miss a day of school. (You don't hear that much any more.) It was my element, my solace, my hope. It was the place I could dream my dreams and be myself. It was the place I buried my nose in a book and wished I could one day write like Frost and Dickinson. I carried that idea for a very long time: to write like the great authors of the world.

Fast forward thirty years...

I had finally found a job where I could thrive. It wasn't the ideal job at the company, but there was hope for advancement. I had settled in a small town and gotten a job at the local newspaper. It wasn't a fancy job like reporter or anything, just a lowly typesetter. That typing class in high school was good for something.

On a crisp beginning-of-Fall day just before Labor Day weekend I entered the editor's office with a manuscript in hand. I was very shy and reserved. My eyes kept checking out his shoelaces. Nearly inaudible I said, "I write. Would you take a look at this?" His response made me feel as though I had made a mistake. "Everybody writes around here," he said, and then he laughed. I felt like running away. I felt like I was five years old all of a sudden. He said that he would and I went back to my work with a reddened face and very little hope.

I told no one. It was as if saying it out loud would make it disappear. I couldn't bear that thought. The long weekend dragged by and the further into it I got, the more convinced I was that I should never have given him the piece I wrote. How could I ever go to work again if he thought it was garbage?

Tuesday came and I entered work to find a note on the monitor of my computer. "Come see me immediately when you get in to work," it said very simply. It was from the editor. My mouth went dry and I felt dizzy. My stomach began to churn and I nearly started to cry. My heart pounded out of my chest.

With the note in hand (I don't know why) I entered his office. He turned and noticed it was me. For the next few moments I was in suspended animation positive I was dreaming or, at the worst, hallucinating. He walked back and forth very fast. His voice raised decibels. His arms were waving back and forth and suddenly it dawned on me what he was saying. "This is award winning stuff! Do you realize that?" And as the realization of what he was saying crept into my consciousness, I nearly fainted.

With weeks of work with the graphics department, the article finally made its debut on the front page of the Saturday edition. It is reserved for the human interest story of the week. Given my own column after that edition came out, I was an instant celebrity. All my years of dreaming had paid off. I had arrived.

And if I thought that was special, it paled in comparison to what was waiting for me. Without my knowledge (or permission), he entered the article into competition. Several awards were granted to me, one complete with an awards banquet in Boston.

With hindsight having perfect vision, I now know it was too much for me to bear at the time. I remember talking with him in one of those days following all the commotion of awards dinners. I told him how I wished I could write like Frost or Dickinson. Even the awards didn't convince me. He asked me, "So what's wrong with being SallyRose?"

Like them, he explained, I had my own style of writing. I had my own perspective and way to tell the story. Indeed, that is what made them who they were. He said I should always strive to be the best me and to set goals for myself so I could push my own envelope. He also said that once you have written and other people know the gift you have, it isn't yours alone any more. You have an obligation to share it.

All of that scared me. I didn't know how to become, to flower. And so I ran away always looking back to what may have been... until recently.

I know now that I had to do what I had to do. There are no regrets. But his words linger in my heart. I no longer wish to be the Frost or Dickinson. I no longer wish to indulge in trading lives. My life is wonderful. It has its glitches. Who's life doesn't? But I know now that I am better by far than I ever was and look forward to being better in the future. Now why would I want to trade that? Everything has come full circle... it just took a little longer than I expected.

The Root of Emotion

Emotions are funny little creatures that seem to contain a life of their own. I've always wondered where they come from and why a certain emotion will pop up sometimes when it's an inappropriate time. And I've always had a difficult time determining what the roots of emotions are.

How is it that some people have such great control over their emotions and others simply cannot do it. What is it that makes one person cry and another one laugh when faced with the same situation? But perhaps the most awkward scenario for me to understand are those people who are either filled with emotion or totally lack it altogether.

The emotion-filled person shows all their feelings, happy or sad, laughing and crying, angry or grateful. To me they are free spirits that have some unknown key to the universe. The emotion-free person, on the other hand, expresses nothing, seems to feel nothing, and tends to make others uncomfortable in their presence. It's as though emotionless equals lifelessness.

I think perhaps the worst disservice to the world in general is that somewhere, once upon a time, someone found it necessary to label feelings as good or bad. Cheerful is good, but never be angry. That's bad. Grateful is good. But for the love of God, don't let anyone ever know you're disappointed. That's selfish.

One of the greatest pearls of wisdom I ever heard was that 'feelings are feelings; feelings aren't facts.' I may feel angry but that does not necessarily make me an angry person. Feelings come and go. They drift in and out just like our thoughts. In fact, our thoughts control who we are and what we do. And besides, feelings never hurt anyone. It's the behaviours attached to feelings that hurt others. "Oh I couldn't help it. I was angry." Such hogwash!

It still doesn't answer the original question above: Where do the emotions come from to begin with?

I believe that all emotions arise from the soul's desire to protect itself. It's the installed human version of an early warning detection system complete with radar of its own. It is programmed for survival above all else, and so it sends out 'signals' to the brain in the form of emotions to trigger a response from the host to either take action or remain as is until there is further information. They have the same function as the heat sensors in our skin. They prevent us from 'burning' or 'freezing' our emotional life.

When the soul, inner being, subconscious, the heart (call it what you will) is content, the natural flow of emotion is happiness, contentment, gratitude, caring, giving, loving. But when it feels as though it is in danger or threatened somehow, the flow is sidetracked and meanders to places it really doesn't want to be and spawns confusion, anger, hurt, betrayal and pain. When the heart can right itself and become calm, the rhythm slides back into a natural energy flow and for the time being is once again happy.

I'm sure there are 'professionals' who would laugh, perhaps sneer, at my simplistic view of life and emotion. But I've done it their way and I can say with absolute certainty that it doesn't really matter what happened a half century ago. It doesn't matter who did what or why. What matters is how I handle it. All the analyzing in the world didn't bring me peace. It didn't give me the power to ground myself, to center with my own being.

In their eyes I was broken. I needed to be fixed. I wasn't allowed to just be. I was given pablum treatment, but was told to submit to their ideas as if I was incapable of having an idea of my own.

There was nothing wrong with me that meeting myself on honest and equal ground didn't fix. The answer lay within me every step of the way. I just didn't know how to access it. I didn't learn right and wrong from my parents. I was born knowing it. I was perfect... and still am even in my imperfection.

The world has its way with you whether you like it or not. It can tarnish you or it can strengthen you. The choice is yours. It always has been. But if you listen within... really listen... you can find your way out of the darkest corners and enter a place filled with light and good, happiness and peace.

The heart is the seat of all wisdom. Be attentive to it. Listen well. Heed its warnings. You, too, can come to know a new freedom and a new happiness. Be still and know it is possible. Then venture forth into your new life filled with infinite possibilities.

Godspeed...

Canned Wisdom

There is a purpose for everything and everyone. Our eyes are blinded many times and we cannot see it, but it doesn't mean it isn't there. How I yearn for different days. Not necessarily days gone by, not necessarily future days, just different ones.

In the blink of an eye things can change so fast. We're left wondering what happened and how did we get to where we are. Many people I know just say, "It's all in God's plan. Don't worry about it." But when you're in pain it only sounds like so much lip service so they don't have to listen to you further. At those times, I withdraw and seek solace elsewhere. In the final analysis, it is God who provides the relief.

But as humans, are we so busy in our lives as to not quietly listen when someone is obviously in pain? Too often we spout off our little one-liners as if to just say them will bring instant recovery. What those little quips and quotes say to me many times is, "OK. I'm tired of listening to you now. Here's some half-hearted wisdom. Think about it and shut up." (And yes, it's all done with a smile on the face and a well-practiced look of compassion to accompany it.)

Or really, am I being too harsh on those who would seek to comfort me? Perhaps there IS wisdom in those one-liners after all due to their intrinsic simplicity. Maybe... and I'll go out on a limb here... maybe it's the simplicity I need, the simplicity I don't see, the simplicity I truly crave. And maybe that is what my God gives me to wake me up to how I analyze situations and pick them apart.

I search for guarantees. I know this much about myself. In an unsafe world I seek safety and it seems to me that safety is hidden inside guarantees. And yet the greater part of me knows that the only guarantee in life is change. That provides little solace when I am grasping for a pledge of assurance. Risk is, and always has been, dangerous to me. Seeing things through to the end has always meant that I know what will happen each step of the way. Feelings of desperation seep in when glitches form themselves out of the primordial ooze of the flow of life.

And yet, in those moments of clarity, I see the reasons behind each breeze of change that has swept itself over my life. What seemed like disaster was truly a blessing in disguise. So why worry? Why convince myself I have the need to know every working in every step of the way? Why reject the simplicity handed to me so generously and freely?

The canned wisdom should be packaged differently. It should come in glass jars so I could see it more clearly... Oh my God! I'm doing it again....

The Rainbow Mind

The LORD smelled the pleasing aroma and said in his heart: "Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though every inclination of his heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done." Genesis 8:21

"Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth." Genesis 9:16

Rainbows. They bring the hope of tomorrow, the promise of non-judgment, the knowing that we have a loving creator. They expand our awareness in a way that shows each of us that we are all, indeed, connected. Their explosion of color helps us to realize the diversity of the universe in all its splendor.

Perhaps when we are doubtful and afraid we could remind ourselves to think in rainbows. They could gently assure us that in the fabric of life our own fine thread is important and necessary and that without it, the textile could be irreparably impaired.

Thinking in rainbows... it could be our newest best friend.