For The Love of Romance

I once fell in love with a 4 year old cat. When my heart tumbled, she was in the bottom row of ASPCA cages at the local pet store. Her eyes captivated me, as well as her big, pink ears. After buying food for my 2 cats, I said good-bye to Miss Pink and said a prayer for her speedy adoption. I cried the whole way home.

3 weeks later, needing more cat food, I found Miss Pink still on the bottom row. I fell on my knees in front of her cage. She had waited for me to come to my senses and realize I belonged to her. Because true love should never be ignored, adoption proceedings started that day. Bold-faced lying and bribery were part of the proceedings, as my residential 2-cat limit had to be circumvented. Within days, she was adopted by a kind friend and handed off to me in the pet store parking lot. I snuck her into my home and named her Romance. 10 years later, the love affair continues.

As with all successful love relationships, compromise and sacrifice must be offered. Tomorrow, I will sacrifice my summer wardrobe on behalf of an outrageously priced tooth extraction for my dear Miss Pink. A molar is infected, causing pain and the pronounced deterioration of her little heart. Why spend stupid sums on a 14 year old cat? Because I owe her. I owe her for every moment of joy she has blessed me with. I owe her for every motor-boat purr and every tear she has let me drop on her coat. No new skirts or sandals or summer beads are worth the exchange for a love of mine to be in pain. For the quality of her remaining days to be anything but the best I can give.

We are here for each other's salvation. Human, animal, plant and Mother Earth herself. If it is in our power to ease pain and offer love, we must not shirk that sacred duty. We must not turn our backs on golden opportunities to save our souls through service to others.

Clearing Clutter Continued

Dear Don,

I'm clearing more clutter. I uncovered my studio table, recycled a mountain of paper, emptied drawers and weeded through my music collection. I moved things around and rearranged. Again. Call me obsessed. Call me insane. I can't stop this quest for zen, this quest to lighten my inner and outer load. This morning, while brushing my teeth, I got more answers as to why I continue clearing. Whoever gave me the answers wanted you to know as well.

I was told we are constantly evolving. We are constantly changing. We are meant to never lose sight of our dreams, never give in to stagnation of soul and spirit, never cease to uncover our glorious, individual essences of God. But the world is heavy and our duties are heavy and we can easily slip into waking unconsciousness where we become numb to our beautiful gifts and talents. Where we cease to be aware of the changes within.

When we have changed and evolved, through good seasons and bad, we need to weed out the inner and outer representations of our lesser-evolved selves. Because we are not the same anymore. We are more open to new opportunities, new adventures, new avenues to bliss. If we have let go of who we used to be, 3 years ago, 3 months ago, or even 3 weeks ago. Shoes, dishes, music, artwork, clothing, dusty collections, tools, and general crap we haven't used or worn or acknowledged in too long, all represent our lesser-evolved selves and are holding our new selves in an old pattern. Holding our new selves back from moving forward. Because that general crap is no longer symbolic of who we are right now. That crap is no longer facilitating our evolutionary path to the bliss and the dreams and the talents we are meant to offer right now. Yes, the shoes may still fit, the tools may still function, the dishes may still be pristine, but if they are not a true reflection of who we are in 2007, they are literal and figurative dams stagnating the flow of our lives. Our ever-evolving lives. Our purposeful and peaceful lives.

Don, it's about letting go of who we were in order to embrace, at a full run, the fabulous beings we have morphed into. We can only know and embrace those beautiful beings if shackles and shoes of former selves have been weeded out and put to the curb.

While There Is Still Time

If there is something that needs to be said, say it. If there is something that needs to be done, do it. If you have a dream, pursue it. If great adventure is calling, answer the call.

If you are holding back, holding on or holding in, let go.

Give hugs. Give praise. Give all you've got.

Practice kindness.

Offer forgiveness.

Recognize grace.

And never, ever, withhold love.



Because tomorrow, the next hour and the next minute may never come. For Christopher, the 45 year old, charismatic man and father to Hannah, whose funeral I will attend tomorrow, the end came unexpectedly and swift. Those that knew Chris are aching for one more minute, one more word, one more laugh, one more chance to bask in his sunshine and tell him how much he meant to them. Because we all assumed we would have plenty of time. We all assumed wrong.

Vow to say it, do it, and pursue it. Let go of grievances. Let go of fears. Offer your best self to the world, while there is still time, still breath in your lungs and still so much love to give.

Beauty Lives Everywhere

Sea Obsession

Lately, the sea is calling me. And I live no where near it. Being a grand lover of woodland landscapes, fresh water creeks and leaf-litter carpets, it confounds me, this new and sudden obsession with the sea. Its colors and textures and sounds and treasures. Pale blue sea glass. Conical shells. Sand in my shoes. Salted, wrinkled fingertips. Meditative, repetitive foam-capped waves. Sun and wind and odors of wetness. In my waking dreams, I am lying on the shoreline, baptized repeatedly by the flow and the ebb. Welcoming and releasing, birthing and dying. Surrendering to each cleansing surge and retreat.


Unlike the compressed safety of the woods, the sea is wide open. There is no where to hide when standing on a shoreline. There is only exposure and vulnerability and the need for daring to face the unyielding elements. To face the storms and not be dragged to the bottom of the final frontier. To survive and thrive and wring happiness from a storm-soaked heart and mind. This is the message of my obsession. This is the challenge I have asked for as I seek spiritual growth and inner strength. To know when it is time to exchange the woods for the sea and witness my evolution in the face of high winds and unruly waves. To expose myself on the shore of the unknown and come away knowing I was never vulnerable to begin with. Because everything is survivable when faced in the wide open. When faced head on. When faced with the truth in my heart.

"Stop hiding", calls the sea. Be willing to risk exposure. Be willing to risk the previously unthinkable, vulnerable adventure. To risk the great love, the great dream, the great release of old wounds. "Stand on the shore, lie on the shore. Just be willing to show up and get wet", calls the sea. It asks me to be willing to face what must be faced, then marvel at the treasures that wash up at my feet.

COEXIST

Ironing With God

Yesterday, fueled by rare domestic inspiration, I ironed. I am overcome with the need to remove wrinkles from my wardrobe or table linens on a seasonal basis at best, and yesterday the season was upon me. Now, every summer t-shirt is crisply hanging from a wooden rod in my closet, neatly arranged next to my newly pressed summer pants. I gazed at my accomplishment at length, knowing full well the likelihood of a repeat performance of this wrinkle-free zone may take an act of God. Or an act of desperation.

Not desperation for perfectly smooth cotton, but desperation for Universal wisdom. It seems, while ironing, my Higher Power dropped by for a Universal chat. It took advantage of the quiet, meditative state I was in, turned the volume down low on my Nora Jones CD and sent streams of assurance, understanding and inspirational pearls into my brain.

I ironed as long as the inspirational one-sided conversation lasted. It lasted long enough to finish my summer wardrobe. It lasted long enough to calm my nerves. It lasted long enough to achieve a deep sigh of relief in the center of my heart.

My Higher Power told me that chaos is a means to cut through the fear that holds me back. That chaos is actually a direct path to my betterment. That vulnerability exposed in the chaos is needful for me to birth a new way of living. That my ego will, in the end, submit to the changes it fears the most.

My Higher Power told me that patience is needed for anything worthwhile to manifest. It told me to not pull up new growth by its roots and for pity's sake, stop questioning if what I've planted really is growing. It is.

My Higher Power told me the only one I have to trust, ever, is myself. If I trust myself, I will only attract trustworthy people into my life. My Higher Power reminded me, again, that all answers lie within my own heart. Because my heart is mentally, emotionally, physically and spiritually connected, in every chaotical nano-second, to the Source, the One, the Mother-Father God. Connected to the Higher, Omnipotent Power that cares enough to direct the growth of each blade of grass, each sea creature's fin, each feather, each bone, each follicle of fur, and each moment of my life. My worthwhile life. My sacred life. My life of spectacular grace.

My Higher Power told me to be still more often. To iron more. To meditate more. To make myself more available to the ever-present streams of Universal wisdom, assurance and inspiration. Not only will my wardrobe improve, so will my inner peace.