Tag Archives: love

Taking stock …

and re-evaluating my thoughts, emotions, feelings, friendships; things in general.  I find myself in an odd position.  This time of year is very difficult for me.  I have, since the death of my husband, taken at least one day near his birthday, which incidentally, is tomorrow, off from work.

I never know how I will wake up … it could be the “well, just another day” mode, or the “hysterical, uncontrolled, inconsolable sobbing” mode.  So, I avoid contact with the human race during that time because I am most unpredictable.

I know that I am not the only person who faces such days with this outlook.  I would love to say that I am free from the memories, thoughts and flashbacks.

Actually, I could say that.

But I would be lying, and I am a terrible liar.

If I have learned anything, it is that it is good to know yourself.  I think I have that one nailed.  Unfortunately for my family and friends, I remain an enigma.

Sigh.

It makes me feel a bit disconcerted that, after all this time, the birthday of someone who has been dead for years still has the ability to effect me in this way.

Don’t roll your eyes.  Of course I loved him and miss him.  But over three years later?  Give me a damn break already …

I had planned to spend the day at my favorite waterfall and then at a lake that holds special significance to me, however, due to an appliance malfunction, I will be at home.

Might as well cook, since I’m going to be here anyway and possibly reap the side benefit of being able to torment the appliance deliveryman with the smell of red sauce simmering on the stove.

I can only hope that he doesn’t find me sobbing like a child.

How awkward would that be?

Either way, I will get through the day and be thankful for many things.  It doesn’t mean that I won’t lament over the things that hurt me, but those are less frequent than the blessings.

There is no point whatsoever in ignoring the white elephant in the room.

I miss my Jim; my Jamie.  I miss seeing his sweet smile on his birthday. I have not, as odd as it may seem, dreamed of him even once, since his death.  I suppose, on some level, I am grateful, for I would hate to wake each morning tormented by the past.

I am not big on torment … or pain … or sorrow.

Life goes on and we either live it leave it.

I choose to live it.  Even when it makes me sad for without sadness sprinkled throughout, how could I truly embrace the joy.

I am a Sagittarian optimist.  I am, even as the tears threaten to fall, looking for the silver lining.  The tears will still fall.  My heart will still mourn.  My thoughts will still stray.  But at the end of the day, I will believe that everything will be ok.  And it will be.

Glass. Half. Full.

It’s just the way I roll.

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sudden, immobilizing sadness …

is one of those emotions that catches me unawares.  When I least expect it, am most vulnerable to it, haven’t the strength to fight it; it strikes.  I don’t feel sadness everyday.  As a matter of fact, I rarely feel sad and yet …

there are moments.

Moments when it feels as though the whole of the world is upon my shoulders and my soul is stripped bare.

Then, out of the blue, a thunderstorm approaches.   I find myself on the back porch, tripod in place, waiting patiently for the the lightning; the strains of piano from my favorite music playlist, resounding through the darkness as the photographer in me readies for the beauty that seems to be displaying itself just for me ….

And then ….

much to my surprise and unexpected, heart-lifting joy …

the first lightning bugs of the season appear in their magnificent beauty.

I wonder, as I watch them flicker playfully among the trees and grass and rocks if they they know how much I have longed to see them.  How much I have missed them.

They are magical, as they blink and fade before my eyes.  I feel, at this moment, that they are here for the sole purpose to encourage me.  To give me hope and to lead me to a place that is full of light and beauty.

Do they know that I have been looking for them … waiting for them … wishing for them?

The lightning that encompasses the oncoming storm dims in importance as I find myself mesmerized by the display of mother nature’s incredible display of magnificence.

I am encouraged.

They encourage me.  I wonder if they know that … if they understand how much comfort they bring to me.

I wonder if they understand that I have been waiting for them, if they know how much they calm my overstimulated system, my aching heart, my yearning soul.

I can do this.

I can face that which paralyzes me … that which takes me back to a  desolate time when my heart shattered in my chest …. when time stood still.

We all have those things that bring us joy in the midst of sadness … friends who listen to our laments and judge us not.  We have them.

We often take for granted, at least I know I do …  take for granted that they will be there in our time of need, but we have them; and they are there, without fail, when we are vulnerable and struggling simply to breathe, to live, to move from one moment to the next …not to judge but only to hear our thoughts and fears.

No judgment.

No harshness.

No rebuke.

No unsolicited advice.

No condemnation.

Only understanding , often in silence, as we fight our demons.

I am thankful for the lightning bugs.

And I am thankful for the friends who tolerate me, even when I am intolerable.

I am blessed well beyond what I deserve.

Thank you, Lord, for the lightning bugs, for friends who understand me and for loving me even though I am, many times, unlovable.

I count my blessings and they are many.  While I am sorry that there are others who have stood in the rain, blinded by the sheer magnitude of the sorrow, they, as I have, have made it through the rain.

We are one, we are many and we are survivors in the midst of adversity, sorrow, death and pain.

We made it.

Amen.

Posts about Mother’s Day …

and how much we love and appreciate our mothers will likely be abundant.  My mother knows already how much I love and cherish her as I tell her every day.  My daughter tells me regularly that she loves me and shows it in a thousand beautiful little ways.

This post is, in a round-about way about Mother’s Day, and yet along a different vein altogether.

While for many, even those who have lost their mothers to death, Mother’s Day weekend is a time of tearful celebration.  It is a time to reflect on family, on love, on life itself.

But the celebratory spirit doesn’t reach everyone.

My heart is heavy tonight for those that I both know personally and those I simply know of, who have been unable to conceive a child.  A child that would be cherished above all else.  A child to complete the circle of life as far as they are concerned.

Imagine a day where children are celebrating their mothers,  mothers are celebrating their children and yet, for so many, there is no child to celebrate.

No hand print cards.

No artwork on the refrigerator.

No smells of talcum powder and baby shampoo.

Only an emptiness that threatens to consume them; mind, body and spirit.  A brokenness that soon leads to feelings of failure and inadequacy that fill each waking hour of every single day.   Knowing that they would give the last drop of blood in their body for a single moment of holding that tiny life, born of themselves, in their arms.

Imagine the anger and frustration, the anxiety, depression and psychological pain that comes from the anticipation followed by disappointment, month after year after decade until there is nothing left but a hopelessness that destroys everything good and pure in their lives.

It would, I imagine, be all-consuming and destructive on many levels.

Mother’s day, for them, must be like pouring salt in a wound, shattering an already broken heart.

Yes, my heart goes out to them and I am, even as I write this, crying openly for the hopes and fears that they harbor inside themselves.

I wish I could encourage them, hold them against my breast and tell them that everything will be ok.  But in their minds and hearts, everything is not ok.

So I will do the only thing I know to do … I will pray for peace, for hope, for the fulfillment of their dreams and the for the courage  to face whatever tomorrow may bring.  I believe, with everything in me, in the love of a faithful Heavenly Father and while I don’t always understand His ways, I trust him.

I know that such prayers are answered, for I have seen it with my own eyes, felt it with my own heart and rejoiced in the glory of it with my own spirit.

1John 14-15 ~ 14 And this is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask any thing according to his will, he heareth us: 15 And if we know that he hears us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him.

Hope is a good thing … and no good thing every dies.

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George Jones’ death …

took me back, in my mind, many years and unearthed several memories that I had suppressed.  As a kid, whether we were driving to church or going on vacation (for my Dad was in charge of choosing stations), there was one of two things on the radio; sports or George Jones.

At the time, I thought that surely, this was the worst thing that could happen to a person.

However, as I got older, and developed my own taste in music (and sports, though that is irrelevant in this post), I found that I listened to quite a bit of George.

Or “Possum”, as he was familiarly known.  It wasn’t the most flattering nickname, but in reality, he really did, somewhat resemble, a possum.

Sorry George, but as my dad is fond of saying, “the truth will stand when the world’s on fire”.

When I look at my LP collection, I find that there are several of his albums there.  When I still had eight-tracks (and for those of you too young to know what that is, look it up) there were many “George Jones” in that collection, too.

My dad was a fan.  I was always trying to impress my dad and win his approval, so I suppose that some of my “George admiration” came from that.  But at some point, I realized that I just plain liked his music.

I also liked Conway Twitty, John Conlee, Merle Haggard, Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings, Hank Williams, Dolly Parton, Willie Nelson, Reba McEntire, Loretta Lynn, Patsy Cline, Elvis and Lefty Frizzelle (just to name the ones that come easily, without stressing my brain, to mind).

So sue me.

The music today that calls itself country has little to do with what I grew up with.  As a matter of fact, it has little to do with music at all, but then, I may be biased.

OK, I am biased.  But so what?  Even though I have a hard time playing a note of music, I know what it should sound like.  I understand it on a personal level and appreciate it in the very basic way that one understands and appreciates it.

It is a huge, very consuming part of my everyday life.

But I digress.  I was talking about George and the impact his death had on me and I know, without asking, on my Dad.

I don’t consider myself immortal.  I believe with my whole being that, if I died right now, I would go to Heaven and I have no illusions about living forever.  But …

Seeing my idols and the people that I have “known” all my life die … well, that makes me think.

I don’t remember a time in my life that George wasn’t a part of it.  He was popular when I was born (or so I am told, as I don’t remember those first few days) and became moreso in the years to come.  And now he is dead.  His music will live on for decades and generations, but the man himself is gone from this world.  That is a sobering thought.

It hurts my heart nearly as much as when Andy Gibb died.  That was a black day in my life.  I loved him more than life, but he chose drugs over life.  Choices.  It all comes down, once again, to choices, BUT, I digress once again.

I cried like a child when, first Maurice Gibb and then again when Robin Gibb died.  The Brothers Gibb (Bee-Gees) were my favorites and remain so, even though only Barry remains.  Sometimes, when I think about them young and beautiful, singing their songs as only they could, I still cry. (If I keep this up, I will be crying before the night is out).

It was an end of an era for me, as it was when Conway died, as it was … then when Waylon died … then when Johnny died; well, this could go on for pages, but you get the idea.

The same can be said of George.  I’ll miss you, Possum, and will, most likely, cry for you now and again as well because … well, because I loved you, too.

RIP, George … RIP.

Who’s Gonna Fill Their Shoes?  Who, indeed?  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xi3GgoLtlWk

Wet roads and 18-wheelers …

isn’t my first choice when it comes to driving conditions, but considering what I have found myself driving in from time to time, it also isn’t my last.

I like to drive.

The mindless task of following the road is among my favorite things to do.  It doesn’t matter, really, whether it is barely a ditch carved out of dirt, a steep ribbon of pavement curving and winding into a mountain or long stretches of interstate that seem, at times, to fade into infinity.

My thoughts flow freely, my mind wanders aimlessly and I feel as uninhibited as the birds in the air when I am behind the wheel.  If the weather is so that I can put the convertible top down, the pleasure is multiplied tenfold.

The destination isn’t all that important; going somewhere specific,  heading nowhere in particular or coming home.

It doesn’t matter.

Heading home today from a weekend out of town, it didn’t occur to me to concern myself with the rain falling in torrential sheets, pooling on the already wet road.  It didn’t make me nervous or anxious or fearful … even when coming up behind the tractor-trailers spewing a nearly blinding mist up in the road, it didn’t occur to me.

I figure, at those times, the two choices are to either take my place behind them and suffer the constant barrage of what they throw up from the asphalt or speed up and pass them.

There was something ethereal about the verdant greens along the sides of the interstate, beneath the falling rain.  I had a hard time finding fault as long as I could see the yellow line and, at the same time, take in the sulking, brooding gray of the heavy sky above the greenery and blooming things of late April.

My intentions were to spend today hiking in the Smoky Mountains, however, the weather did not cooperate.  While I don’t mind taking a risk or two to get to the places I wish to see, I’m not going to invite disaster.

Hiking on the wet, steep, rocky trails alone would have been careless and while I have my moments of carelessness, I try not to make a habit of being so on purpose.

I started home in the rain and muck with a song on the radio and the highway stretching out before me.  When I came to the last few miles, a narrow country road (in my mind, “my road”), an offshoot of a country highway, I was stunned.

In the two days I have been gone, it seems that Spring exploded on Big Moccasin; the fields edging up to the base of Clinch Mountain are greener, fuller.  The high grass, dancing in the wind and the wildflowers, now abundant, unfurling their vibrant, colorful blooms without shyness or fear of frost took my breath away.

The sheer magnitude of the beauty of it, of home, of Spring, brought tears to my eyes.

I was reminded, once again, that no matter what I may have seen today had I stayed where I was, it wouldn’t have been any more beautiful than the height of spring in my own back yard.

On a larger scale than the peaks and valleys of Clinch Mountain, perhaps.  But not more beautiful.

It just goes to show that springtime in the mountains, irregardless of which mountains, is a stimulating treat for the senses.  As for the rain … well, nothing smells quite so wonderful as the Spring mountains after a rain, now does it?

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I know a trail shoot was succesful …

This gallery contains 25 photos.

when I come home filthy, covered in mud, bleeding from my brush with thorns and other sharp things of nature and smelling of the earth that I was crawling around on.  There are few things in this life that renew … Continue reading

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Being a parent …

has many challenges.  I’m not a new parent.  My daughter is twenty-two years old, but that fact has no bearing what-so-ever on reality.  I look at the people around me who have small children and I, on some level, feel sorry for them.

The only bloody nose I ever gave anyone was my girl’s elementary school principal.  It’s funny, in a sick sort of way, that I will take it and take it, whatever it may be, but when my child is threatened, I become a different human.  Or maybe I become less human and more animal, a mama bear, a she-wolf … whatever works.  What I do know is that I would go to the ends of the earth for her.

I am certain, beyond anything else, that were she to know I speak so of her, she would be mortified.  I don’t care.  Not one whit.  What I do care about is that she is happy.  That she is safe.  That she is where she is supposed to be at this particular moment.  I, in some ways, live vicariously through her.  She is so much of what I wanted to be.  A  musician, a fighter, confident and brainy.  I always hoped, as she grew up, that she would be herself and not like me.  That sounds overdramatic, I’m sure, but it is true.

I was so backward.  Being one who was bullied and too shy to stand up for myself, I spent much of my life alone.  I learned to be alone and, at some point, began to thrive on it.  I decided early on that I didn’t deserve to be loved and when someone said they did, I immediately assumed they were lying.  The sad truth is that they usually were.  It is like a line from a Billy Joel song that says “she’ll ask for the truth but she’ll never believe  you”.

But all of that being said, it doesn’t matter how old our children become, they are still our babies.  My mom said that to me, but until I had my own, I couldn’t understand it.  She is a wise woman, my mom.  A wise woman indeed.

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It’s not easy …

to look over decisions that we’ve made, roads we have taken, choices we have labored over only to find that they weren’t the right decisions, were the wrong turns and were bad choices.  But it is a constant in our lives.  Not every crossroad we come to will have an outcome that is favorable.  Sometimes, the results can be downright devastating.

If the only person such things effected was ourselves, it wouldn’t, I suppose, matter, quite so much.  But our decisions, our outbursts, our tantrums, our misdirects … they, like a long, intricate line of dominoes, fall, one against another, starting a chain reaction that can last for years and through multiple lifetimes.  Purity and innocence can be taken away so quickly that it would seem as though they never existed.

I have a wealth of understanding on making mistakes and living with them; learning from them.  Some of my mistakes have hurt no one but myself, others have touched the people I love the most, causing pain that was never intended, hurt that, though time has surely layered with a cushion, can never, ever, be completely erased.

I understand pain and insecurity.  I have known joy and heartache with equal measure.  I have lain, curled in a ball while sobs wracked my body to the point that I feared my bones would break and didn’t care if they did.  I have known despair and felt the icy fingers of death claw at my mind.  I have thought long and hard about how easy it would be to simply drift away into nothingness where life could no longer kick me senseless.

It is because of these things that I have more understanding than I wish to, that I stand now, with my head up and my spirit intact.  Life did not break me.  It bent me, at times nearly beyond redemption, but it did not break me.  I look around and see others that have been bruised and bent themselves.  They weren’t broken either, but none of us came out of the fire unscathed.  None of us came away from it all whole, but full of holes that left room for the pain and suffering of others to fill.

Because of my broken road, I have found compassion, I have found empathy and I have found beauty that is so stunning that, at times, it nearly breaks my heart.  And along the path strewn with shards of brokenness, I have found others, stumbling along trying to find their way.  And through discouragement, faith and determination, I was encouraged.  We are all, in one way or another, broken and simply knowing that makes me feel less alone.

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Matthew 12:20 ~ A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench

I haven’t been manic in months …

so I suppose I am due.  It has been a peacefully wonderful time in which my mind has been moving at a pace that is within the realm that is called, by the rational world, normal.  Unprecedented would be the word that comes to mind to describe the amount of time that has passed since the last episode.  I knew, however, that it couldn’t last forever.  It never does.  And curiously, I am glad to have my old friend back, at least for a time.

That doesn’t mean that in a few days I won’t be wishing for silence and a functionality that I can live with, but I have (and I can’t believe I am saying this) missed the wild and random thoughts that roll though my brain like an out-of-control revolving door.  Since I started art class, however, I have been in a state of normalcy.  It is foreign to me, this normal thought process, and it took a couple of weeks to realize that I could control what entered into my brain pan.  I am certain, as I have been certain of little else, that my friends haven’t missed the random, rambling, incoherent and often off the wall messages that they usually receive when I am on overdrive.

I was, I must say, somewhat surprised that a complete meltdown did not occur last weekend after taking my nieces to Chuck E. Cheese.  There are few things that have everything conducive to a manic attack as the flashing lights, loud, repetitive sounds and cacophony of smells and voices to induce a full blown manic attack.  I was rather perplexed that it did not trigger an episode;  perplexed, and yet grateful as there was much to do during the limited hours of that particular weekend.

In my experience, which unfortunately, is vast, sudden, unexpected change seems to be the biggest catalyst.  While I have gone through many changes in the past few months, I say again that an art class that I began in February has had an amazing impact on the ability to focus and thwart manic swings.  My art teacher, an enigma unto himself and a genius in his own right, has had more of an impact than he could ever know, on my officiousness to harness my thoughts into interpretive ideas.  Art has, without doubt, changed the way my mind works.

But as anything else in life, it has it’s limits and eventually, the substance that makes me who I am will become evident.  I have spent many months thriving on the racing thoughts and have learned to cope with what most people would find overwhelming and unbearable.  The things that seem intrusive to others, I thrive on.

There is nothing wrong with being different from everyone else.  As time passes, I realize that being the “odd person out” is more of an attribute than a handicap.  Imagine, for a moment, a world where everyone was exactly the same.  It would be a slow and arduous form of torture.  I can’t even fathom a world with people just like me.  I am certain that, were that true, we would brain ourselves with a hammer within a week’s time.

I knew yesterday, when I caved and began listen to Billy Joel’s “Always A Woman” that times, according to Bob,  they were a changin’.  I had refrained for a long time from the over and over and over, et al, replaying of that particular song and the moment that I made a conscious decision to play it was like admitting that I was warped.  It has been on repeat now for the past 36 hours.  It isn’t that it is my favorite song of all time, but that seems to have little relevance.

I suppose, more than anything else, I am talking to the millions of others who face themselves on a regular basis and run, screaming, in the other direction.  We are who we are.  We live as we live.  We think as we think.  We cope as we cope.  There is nothing, inherently, wrong with us.  We are who we are and if the world cannot handle us as we are, then the insecurity lies within the world, not within ourselves.  I am me.  The music I dance  to is mine.  Regrets are useless as nothing that has passed can be changed.  I am comfortable in my own skin, even when my skin seems odd.

Love me or hate me, I am who I am and irregardless of others’ opinions of me, will continue to march to the drum that my God plays for me.  I am not ashamed of who I was for without my past, my future would be irrelevant.

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Romans 12:2 ~ And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.

An extra chromosome …

changed my life, as well as the lives of many, many others.  Five years ago, my youngest niece was born with Down’s Syndrome.  She was a tiny, fragile thing who looked as though she would break with the slightest touch.  Her fragility, however, was short lived.  Before we knew what hit us, Gracie was not only growing and thriving, but had managed to wrap everyone who met her around her sweet little finger.  The first time she smiled at me, tears filled my eyes.  The first time she called me Nini, I cried.  The first time she put those precious little arms around my neck and lay her head on my shoulder, I lost it completely.

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The fact that Gracie has Down’s Syndrome is irrelevant to everyone who meets her.  Her charismatic personality and over-the-top laughter make it impossible to see anything but the beautiful spirit she exudes.  She laughs.  She loves.  She thrives.  She plays.  She cries.  She gets mad.  She is everything she’s supposed to be, but because of that little, bitty, extra chromosome, she is so much more.

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Just by being herself, she is an encourager.  It is simply not possible to be in Gracie’s presence and not feel a sense of love and acceptance.  It was evident from the start that she was one of God’s special gifts.  She is blessed in a way that makes her appear larger than life.  Her very being commands attention without ever saying a word and people migrate to her, surround her, find solace in her.  She is, without doubt or reservation, a formidable weapon against everything negative.

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She possesses an innate ability to turn lives around with her genuineness.    She is guileless in everything she does, having no agenda or premeditation.  Her sense of self is unrivaled and her confidence unwavering;  that, in itself, is a testament to the strength and beauty that is part of what makes her who she is.  There are many things I would change in my life were I given the chance to do so.  Gracie is not one of them.

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March 21 is Down’s Syndrome Awareness Day and the purpose of this post is as much to help raise awareness as it is to sing the song of Gracie.    I am more than I was before she came into my life, but not nearly as much as I will be in another five years.  My life changed, for the better, the day she was born and I will never be the same.

To read Watching Gracie Grow, click on the photo below:

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