Joy or Sorrow (Terri Hendrix)

An update on Mom:

Thanks so much to all for the thoughts and prayers - I spoke with Mari last night about 7:30 p.m. and all seemed to be stabilizing. I had asked her to ask the doctor what percentage the lung collapse was (20 - 25% is manageable) - his reply was 5% (sheer relief at hearing that number). They continued to take X-rays to determine what the procedure would be to handle - in the meantime, Mom is on some serious pain medication, which is keeping her comfortable and immobilized to prevent more damage to her already-compromised lungs...

Mari called me this morning a bit before 9 and said the hospital was releasing Mom - they finally left about 11 a.m. (after waiting 2 hours for paperwork to be resolved). They should get the test results back in 3 to 5 days - thinking very positive...

P.S. Thanks to Melanie for the picture inspiration! - I couldn't make the one she sent work, but this one is similar... <3

SONG: Joy or Sorrow by Terri Hendrix

BOOK: The Anatomy of Hope: How People Prevail in the Face of Illness by Jerome Groopman

POEM: Hope by Lisel Mueller

It hovers in dark corners

before the lights are turned on,

it shakes sleep from its eyes

and drops from mushroom gills,

it explodes in the starry heads

of dandelions turned sages,

it sticks to the wings of green angels

that sail from the tops of maples.

It sprouts in each occluded eye

of the many-eyed potato,

it lives in each earthworm segment

surviving cruelty,

it is the motion that runs the tail of a dog,

it is the mouth that inflates the lungs

of the child that has just been born.

It is the singular gift

we cannot destroy in ourselves,

the argument that refutes death,

the genius that invents the future,

all we know of God.

It is the serum which makes us swear

not to betray one another;

it is in this poem, trying to speak.

QUOTE: "Hope is the feeling we have that the feeling we have is not permanent." ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Right Now (Van Halen)

Daily Om

September 2, 2008

Right Where We Are

Enlightenment At Home

Many spiritual seekers feel called to far-flung places across the globe in the interest of pursuing the path of their enlightenment. This may indeed be the right course of action for certain people, but it is by no means necessary to attaining an enlightened consciousness. Enlightenment can take root anywhere on earth, as long as the seeker is an open and ready vessel for higher consciousness. All we need is a powerful intention, and a willingness to do the work necessary to moving forward on our path.

In terms of spiritual practice, at this moment, there are more tools available to more people than at any other time in history. We have access to so much wisdom through the vehicles of books, magazines, the Internet, television, and film. In addition, the time-honored practice of meditation is free, and sitting quietly everyday, listening to the universe, is a great way to start the journey within. There is further inspiration in the fact that the greatest teachers we have are our own life experiences, and they come to us every day with new lessons and new opportunities to learn. If we look at the people around us, we may realize that we have a spiritual community already intact, and if we don’t, we can find one, if not in our own neighborhood, then on-line.

Meanwhile, if we feel called to travel in search of teachers and experiences, then by all means, we should. But if we can’t go to India, or Burma, or Indonesia, or if we don’t have the desire, this is not an obstacle in terms of our spiritual development. In fact, we may simply be aware that our time and energy is best spent in our own homes, with our meditation practice and all the complications and joys of our own lives. We can confidently stay in one place, knowing that everything that we need to attain enlightenment is always available right where we are.

A few months ago, I stumbled across the Carrie & Danielle website and have very much enjoyed: the Daily Q & A, their blog, the profiles - each reading gives me a better sense of their priorities, which helps me better connect to who I am. As Dar sings, "sometimes I see myself fine, sometimes I just need a witness" - nothing like a cyber-soundingboard (even if they don't know it) upon which to bounce ideas and feelings.

The recent inspiration was motivated by something Danielle wrote last week (in italics below) - I continue to struggle with weight issues (written previously about here over a year ago), but I feel as if something clicked this time.

We’ve all heard it before.

You. Are. What. You. Eat.

It is so simply profound that we’d like to call your attention to it today and ask you this: are you trans-fat soaked chips in a plastic bag? Or are you a juicy mango mama grown with love?

What we put into our bodies doesn’t only show up on our gut and our butt, it radiates through our tone of voice, our complexion, our clarity of mind, our relationships, and our creative expression. Garbage in. Garbage out. Healthy in. Healthy out.

Your genuine self is unprocessed, Grade A, four-star nutritious.

THIS WEEK: It may seem cheesy (pun intended), but imagine yourself as a meal. Are you French cuisine or lentils and creamed butter served in a pottery bowl? Are you a bushel of apples, dark cocoa, or a Christmas dinner with all the trimmings? This week, before you bite it, bake it, or get it to go, ask yourself, “Is this me?”

You are what you eat.

Feed your soul.

As I just wrote this morning in a book to deliver to a dear friend tomorrow:

Dear _____,

Day/Week/Month 1 again... sigh... - well, at least that's been our mindset up until now...

I suggest we recalibrate our thought processes... and embrace the struggle/journey/challenge - just because we'll never be perfect (speaking for myself only!), doesn't mean we shouldn't stop trying. Being mindful of meeting our needs (physical/emotional/spiritual) keeps us tapped into tangible ways to move forward, positively, along our path - feed the soul indeed... <3

To paraphrase Danielle's delivery: Feed. My. Soul. - that's my new tattoo... as well as my new mantra... :-)

SONG: Right Now by Van Halen

BOOK: Fifty Ways to Feed Your Soul by Rosemary Cunningham

POEM: Alive Together by Lisel Mueller

Speaking of marvels, I am alive

together with you, when I might have been

alive with anyone under the sun,

when I might have been Abelard's woman

or the whore of a Renaissance pope

or a peasant wife with not enough food

and not enough love, with my children

dead of the plague. I might have slept

in an alcove next to the man

with the golden nose, who poked it

into the business of stars,

or sewn a starry flag

for a general with wooden teeth.

I might have been the exemplary Pocahontas

or a woman without a name

weeping in Master's bed

for my husband, exchanged for a mule,

my daughter, lost in a drunken bet.

I might have been stretched on a totem pole

to appease a vindictive god

or left, a useless girl-child,

to die on a cliff. I like to think

I might have been Mary Shelley

in love with a wrong-headed angel,

or Mary's friend. I might have been you.

This poem is endless, the odds against us are endless,

our chances of being alive together

statistically nonexistent;

still we have made it, alive in a time

when rationalists in square hats

and hatless Jehovah's Witnesses

agree it is almost over,

alive with our lively children

who--but for endless ifs--

might have missed out on being alive

together with marvels and follies

and longings and lies and wishes

and error and humor and mercy

and journeys and voices and faces

and colors and summers and mornings

and knowledge and tears and chance.

QUOTE: "We are indeed much more than what we eat, but what we eat can nevertheless help us to be much more than what we are." ~ Adelle Davis

To Make a Long Story Short (Willie Nelson)

I first heard of the Six-Word Story when a friend of mine who's on Flickr tagged one of his photos with the term... and it led me to finding out about an entire category of such pictures/descriptions that qualify:

Ernest Hemingway was once prodded to compose a complete story in six words. His answer, personally felt to be his best prose ever, was "For sale: baby shoes, never used." Some people say it was to settle a bar bet. Others say it was a personal challenge directed at other famous authors.

Then I heard about the new book (below) dedicated to the phenomenon - "I was hooked. Gotta love Google!".

Chuck Klosterman: "Nobody cared, then they did. Why?"

Adam Schlesinger: "We still don't hear a single."

Keith Knight: "I was a Michael Jackson impersonator."

Hannah Davies: "Cursed with cancer. Blessed by friends."

Zak Nelson: "I still make coffee for two."

Scott Birch: "Most successful accomplishments based on spite."

Rip Riley: "No wife. No kids. No problems."

Amy Sedaris: "Mushrooms. Clowns. Wands. Five. Wig. Thatched."

Me: "Who knew? so many? so creative?"

And even more here...

SONG: To Make a Long Story Short by Willie Nelson

BOOK: Not Quite What I Was Planning: Six-Word Memoirs by Writers Famous and Obscure by Larry Smith, Rachel Fershleiser (Editors)

POEM: Curriculum Vitae by Lisel Mueller

1) I was born in a Free City, near the North Sea.

2) In the year of my birth, money was shredded into
confetti. A loaf of bread cost a million marks. Of
course I do not remember this.

3) Parents and grandparents hovered around me. The
world I lived in had a soft voice and no claws.

4) A cornucopia filled with treats took me into a building
with bells. A wide-bosomed teacher took me in.

5) At home the bookshelves connected heaven and earth.

6) On Sundays the city child waded through pinecones
and primrose marshes, a short train ride away.

7) My country was struck by history more deadly than
earthquakes or hurricanes.

8) My father was busy eluding the monsters. My mother
told me the walls had ears. I learned the burden of secrets.

9) I moved into the too bright days, the too dark nights
of adolescence.

10) Two parents, two daughters, we followed the sun
and the moon across the ocean. My grandparents stayed
behind in darkness.

11) In the new language everyone spoke too fast. Eventually
I caught up with them.

12) When I met you, the new language became the language
of love.

13) The death of the mother hurt the daughter into poetry.
The daughter became a mother of daughters.

14) Ordinary life: the plenty and thick of it. Knots tying
threads to everywhere. The past pushed away, the future left
unimagined for the sake of the glorious, difficult, passionate
present.

15) Years and years of this.

16) The children no longer children. An old man's pain, an
old man's loneliness.

17) And then my father too disappeared.

18) I tried to go home again. I stood at the door to my
childhood, but it was closed to the public.

19) One day, on a crowded elevator, everyone's face was younger
than mine.

20) So far, so good. The brilliant days and nights are
breathless in their hurry. We follow, you and I.

QUOTE: "Brevity is the soul of lingerie." ~ Dorothy Parker

A Frenchman for the Night (Jimmy Buffett)

For a friend recently returned from Paris - loved the postcard (ooh la la... :-)

SONG: A Frenchman for the Night by Jimmy Buffett

BOOK: A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway

POEM: Monet Refuses the Operation by Lisel Mueller

Doctor, you say that there are no haloes

around the streetlights in Paris

and what I see is an aberration

caused by old age, an affliction.

I tell you it has taken me all my life

to arrive at the vision of gas lamps as angels,

to soften and blur and finally banish

the edges you regret I don't see,

to learn that the line I called the horizon

does not exist and sky and water,

so long apart, are the same state of being.

Fifty-four years before I could see

Rouen cathedral is built

of parallel shafts of sun,

and now you want to restore

my youthful errors: fixed

notions of top and bottom,

the illusion of three-dimensional space,

wisteria separate

from the bridge it covers.

What can I say to convince you

the Houses of Parliament dissolve

night after night to become

the fluid dream of the Thames?

I will not return to a universe

of objects that don't know each other,

as if islands were not the lost children

of one great continent. The world

is flux, and light becomes what it touches,

becomes water, lilies on water,

above and below water,

becomes lilac and mauve and yellow

and white and cerulean lamps,

small fists passing sunlight

so quickly to one another

that it would take long, streaming hair

inside my brush to catch it.

To paint the speed of light!

Our weighted shapes, these verticals,

burn to mix with air

and changes our bones, skin, clothes

to gases. Doctor,

if only you could see

how heaven pulls earth into its arms

and how infinitely the heart expands

to claim this world, blue vapor without end.

QUOTE: "You may wonder, 'How can I leave it all behind if I am just coming back to it? How can I make a new beginning if I simply return to the old?' The answer lies in the return. You will not come back to the 'same old thing.' What you return to has changed because you have changed. Your perceptions will be altered. You will not incorporate into the same body, status or world you left behind. The river has been flowing while you were gone. Now it does not look like the same river." ~ Steven Foster

The Wonder of Birds (The Innocence Mission)

Continued introspection, as I straddle the line between last week's exhiliaration and this week's exhaustion - thought the following relevant for more than a few reasons. Every evening at dusk, the neighborhood birds gather on trees a few blocks from my home, to roost through the night - in passing, they appear to be giant white magnolia blossoms... until one rustles a feather or decides to relocate. "Grace will be ours" indeed - when I revel in the magic of this sight, I truly believe it already is...

SONG: The Wonder of Birds by The Innocence Mission

BOOK: Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott

POEM: Why I Need the Birds by Lisel Mueller

When I hear them call

in the morning, before

I am quite awake,

my bed is already traveling

the daily rainbow,

the arc toward evening;

and the birds, leading

their own discreet lives

of hunger and watchfulness,

are with me all the way,

always a little ahead of me

in the long-practiced manner

of unobtrusive guides.

By the time I arrive at evening,

they have just settled down to rest;

already invisible, they are turning

into the dreamwork of trees;

and all of us together —

myself and the purple finches,

the rusty blackbirds,

the ruby cardinals,

and the white-throated sparrows

with their liquid voices —

—ride the dark curve of the earth

toward daylight, which they announce

from their high lookouts

before dawn has quite broken for me.

QUOTE: “A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer; it sings because it has a song.” ~ Maya Angelou