Light

Much like the scent of pine and peppermint, Jesus is in the air.  Whether you choose to believe in Jesus as God or not we might all agree he was a real man who rocked the status quo.  I’m not inviting discussion of his followers and those who created church in his name or where individuals stand on the God/Man/Both decision.  There is plenty of that around elsewhere!  I simply maintain in any case that Jesus was a revolutionary person of deep love, conviction, and grace.  The dude totally took his world by storm in his teachings about inclusion and peace.  I love that he strolled around fishing wharfs, town wells and gathering places using words and stories to bring change.  He sought no particular positions of power.  I think Jesus was a teacher who knew a lot about light.   

     

The noun light is defined at dictionary.com (I list the first two entries).
1.  something that makes things visible or affords illumination.
2.  (physics)
     a. luminous energy, radiant energy, electromagnetic radiation to which the organs of sight react 
     b.  a similar form of radiant energy that does not affect the retina, as ultraviolet or infrared rays

Light has been a topic of life since forever (often contrasted against darkness - see last week’s blog).  But we humans seem to forget over and over, generation after generation, again and again that light is ours for the seeing, for the fostering, for the remembering, for the accepting.  That which affords illumination exists from all time and has never stopped existing.  We just have to open up our physical and metaphorical eyes to it. We have to know light is there even at night when the sun has set.  Your light cannot be taken away.  Not by poverty.  Not by cold winter.  Not by injury.  Not by laws.  Not by another person’s anger.  Not even by death be it peaceful or in torture and execution.

I think what does happen is that we stop seeing our light and the light in others.  The more I have the gift of practicing and teaching yoga, the more I see its effectiveness in moving us into our luminous radiant energy, the energy that shows us the way to what is unchanging and infinite.  From this place inside ourselves we are able to clearly see the light in all. 

In yogic philosophy, the things which cause us to see incorrectly or not at all are named the Five Afflictions.  Wrong sight is rooted in ignorance (avidya), pride (asmita), unfettered desire (raga), extreme aversion (dvesa), and fear of death (abhinivesa).  Which of these do we fall into throughout our lives, throughout a day?  Oh, to cure ourselves of ignorance and pride!  Imagine freedom from attachment to or senseless rejection of things!  Joy, to see ourselves as infinite creatures residing in finite bodies!  How is this done – I propose meditation on light.

Illumination

Come Oh, Come E Man

you well know five holds blind us

love makes visible

 

 

 

 

 

Darkness

One cannot ignore the pervading darkness this time of year.  Dusk arrives, a daily surprise, as the traditional work day ends.  Dinner feels formal in low light eaten under electric dimmer switch sponsored lights.  The envelope of night sky seals us completely in black by eight o’clock. 

 

Five entries define the noun darkness at dictionary.com.
1.  the state or quality of being dark:  the room was in total darkness
2.  absence or deficiency of light:  the darkness of night
3.  wickedness or evil:  Satan, the prince of darkness
4.  obscurity; concealment:  darkness of the metaphor destroyed its effectiveness.
5.  lack of knowledge or enlightenment:  heathen darkness

 

Both darkness and light offer their own gifts, but the longing toward light seems innate as does darkness’ connection to things evil or lacking enlightenment.  The absence of light renders sight difficult, often impossible, making opportunity for unseen thieves, unidentifiable predators, general vulnerability.     

Darkness is the topic of conversation for the season of Advent.  This dance between opposites is not new:  darkness and light have been in relationship since early people lived in knowledge and awe of the rhythms of Mother Earth.  Earth moves through winter darkness into light.  Ancient Celts prayed for the sun’s return with its life-giving light, warmth and assurance that Spring would come.  In contemporary Christian tradition songs of longing, waiting, patience, and hope still drift to the heavens. 

People discern that light comes to our world from a Source that offers itself freely.  In this awareness, people await the arrival of something important, necessary to our very existence, essential to dispelling darkness.  Whether we see the event to come as the arrival of a person, a season, or a powerful transformation that occurs inside each individual we have a sense of expectancy uniquely rooted in hope.  Hope much like the wait during pregnancy for what one cannot see growing in the darkness of the womb. 

Darkness during winter months and December’s longest night, the Winter Solstice, reminds us that not knowing has its own lesson.  Darkness says be patient and aware in the not-yet time.  Be attentive for light that comes.  The quest to light up darkness is tangible in our artificially illuminated lives.  The tougher quest may be to seek light in darkness in its representational evil or lack of knowledge.  In our not-having, wait a little longer times we have great opportunity to learn, to meditate, and to prepare for the Light our trust resides in.    

 

                         Darkness

                         dark deep in sightless soul un-light long, seek illumined hour

                         welcome warmth wrapping oneself with hides

                         skins borrowed for hunts and births

                         bring forth to learn comfort, songs beneath cold star shower

                         extended nighttime tells quiet awaiting Sun

                         still sky Solstice stretches December

                         day of Rome’s tenth month decreed as if they held power

                         divine yearning young eve knows so black

                         afore mortal man tried to scribe

                         sacred story named Source before language ere flower

                         gazed into the darkness and called forth

                         the Word was God. Light. You.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Conscious

I hold no delusions of “roughing it” in the mountains this weekend even with absence of television and computer.  I hiked mildly rugged terrain wrapped snuggly in a coat and shod with warm leather boots.  I welcomed winter cold air that filled my lungs and chilled my nose pink knowing the loop trail would return to a cabin with electricity and hot water.  I am conscious of myself and my thoughts as I left urban surroundings for isolated higher elevations. 

The adjective conscious is defined at dictionary.com.
1.  aware of one’s own existence, sensations, thoughts, surroundings, etc.
2.  fully aware of or sensitive to something;  conscious of one’s faults
3.  having the mental faculties fully active:  conscious during an operation
4.  known to oneself:  conscious guilt
5.  aware of what one is doing:  a conscious liar

Mice are part of mountain trips.  We don’t ever actually SEE the creatures just their rice-sized droppings in a corner, beneath pillows, and under a sink cabinet collaged with bits of torn toilet tissue.  Some sweeping and bicker-banter about the inconvenience typically initiates my family to a mountain weekend. 

 

Not so this past weekend.  After the typical poo patrol we enjoyed a simple day capped off with cocoa.  While we slept, a rascally rodent climbed to my coat (an unsolved mystery since the coat was hanging on a wall hook far from the ground).  That little scamp found the fluffy lining of my coat’s hood, just as I do, compelling for comfort.  The mouse chewed a hole through the exterior and the lining then excavated pats of white fluff!  When I found the scene in the morning my words were full of fury.  I love that coat!  I’ve only had it one season!  Evil mouse! 

 

As I swept the mess I meditated on my surroundings and the situation.  I brought thoughts as questions.  Can I feel angry?  Yes.  Is a mouse criminal for being a mouse?  No.  Was the mouse conscious of destroying something that does not belong to him?  No.  Was I letting a mouse with no conscious thought ruin my morning?  Yes.  Could conscious watching of self identify the real problems:  assumption and attachment?  Yes.

 

Because we humans are conscious beings, we can watch ourselves.  My reaction sprang from attachment to a “perfect” coat.  My reaction was also rooted in assumption:  that ten noisy feet scared such critters away.  The mouse not only gnawed a hole in my coat but in my self-soothing false belief that mice only roamed the home when people were not in it. 

 

The truth:  I will uncomfortably accept cohabitating with mountain mice.  I will mend the coat and find it warming despite imperfection.  I embrace the tiny lesson in living as a conscious being.  Every self-watching moment serves us on a path to mindful, conscious living.  As we learn clear seeing of our own self, however small each glimpse might be, we become more aware of and sensitive to our actions. 

 

 

After Vexation

limbs stretch through a hole

sentient animal finds true

light shines on what is

 

 

 

 

Lucky

Counting blessings may lead to thoughts about lucky.  I feel lucky to have electricity, water flowing from indoor spigots, clean clothes.  I consider myself lucky to be married to a faithful husband whose love and commitment allow me to securely reciprocate my own love and commitment.  I feel lucky to have been born in the United State of America.  I am lucky to have good friends, bright children, the opportunity to practice yoga, a pile of food to look forward to Thanksgiving Day.  Some of these things are in my life by chance, some involved past and continued determination on my part.     

Lucky is defined at dictionary.com as an adjective meaning
1.  having or marked by good luck; fortunate
2.  happening fortunately
3.  bringing or foretelling good luck

We might admit there is randomness to every person’s life.  Events, people, resources, and options arrive or depart without our conscious choice. I’ve read versions of the following Chinese Folktale that address events as good or bad.  This one is from "The Power of Mindful Learning," by Ellen J. Langer.

A man who lived on the northern frontier of China was skilled in interpreting events.  One day, for no reason, his horse ran away to the nomads across the border.  Everyone tried to console him, but his father said, "What makes you so sure this isn't a blessing?"  Some months later his horse returned, bringing a splendid nomad stallion.  Everyone congratulated him, but his father said, "What makes you so sure this isn't a disaster?"  Their household was richer by a fine horse, which his son loved to ride. One day the son fell and broke his hip.  Everyone tried to console him, but his father said, "What makes you so sure this isn't a blessing?"  A year later the nomads came in force across the border, and every able-bodied man took his bow and went into battle.  The Chinese frontiersmen lost nine of every ten men.  Only because the son was lame did the father and son survive to take care of each other.  Truly, blessing turns to disaster, and disaster to blessing: the changes have no end, nor can the mystery be fathomed.

We each know the moment we are in and perhaps recall some we have passed through.  Often hindsight gives perspective only cumulative events can offer.  Knowing, like the Chinese father, changes have no end nor can the mystery be fathomed is a challenge when life seems not lucky.  Never can it be said that it is lucky to be ill or sad or lonely or in poverty or abused.  The grand mystery of it all seems truly incomprehensible.  But, when I reflect on my life, never has a truer statement been made than the Dalai Lama XIV’s words, “Remember that sometimes not getting what you want is a wonderful stroke of luck.”   

Columbus didn’t get his path to India.  Generations later we celebrate American Thanksgiving.  In its tradition, I wish abundance to all this week and always. 

 

 

 

Meals

My fridge often fails to offer successful meals.  Never mind that it only extends to me things I have put into it. I embrace an external entity to blame for mediocre meals I’ve offered of late.

 

The noun meal is defined as any of the regular occasions when a reasonably large amount of food is eaten, such as breakfast, lunch, or dinner or the food eaten on such an occasion.

 

My daughter attended a talk to volunteer with a group providing meals for the homeless.  The organization offers a magnanimous 4,500 meals a week on a budget of $2,000.  Her group will provide 260 persons one dinner.  These were the guidelines to the youth:  offer a protein, starch, vegetable, dessert.  Make it healthy.  And give from your heart.  Do not provide merely food but also love and compassion.  The homeless kitchen’s mission makes my lamenting feel like the squeaks of an ungrateful mouse living in a cheese factory.  On the other hand, listening to kids brainstorm ideas illustrated that they had no idea what it really takes to put together meals.

 

I am deeply grateful to have plentiful food.  I thankfully procure fresh, green stuff and avoid sugar and empty, processed carbs.  Healthy food and nutrition have been my hobby for years but somehow, regrettably, my sizzle fizzled.  I’ve lost the emotional satisfaction once mingled with making meals, perusing recipes, plotting perfect pairings.  I miss the joy it used to bring.  I don’t remember how to offer my heart alongside a lightly salted chicken breast and its steamed friend, broccoli. 

 

Meals can indeed serve self and caloric sustenance.  People gather at table to offer and receive.  Through emotional eating, baby nutrition, snacks and sippy cups, my meals evolved in phases both fulfilling and frustrating.  I now find myself squarely seated at the helm of family meals for five.   Sandwiched between work that I adore and kids’ activities they enjoy, volunteer commitments and household management, a reasonably large amount of food for breakfast, lunch, or dinner often feels like a distraction instead of a mission.  My mind voice is screaming, “You cannot be burned out.  This is important stuff!”   

 

I need recharging, maybe from a tradition honored as people sit to sup:  find gratitude.  (Even for cheese toast and sliced fruit for dinner?)  My knowledge about the science of food in the body won’t disappear.  But maybe I can release the “perfect meal” and lower the temperature on the pressure placed on meals.  Sounds delicious.  But like many delicious meals, rejuvenation might take more time than I want.

 

Leftovers

ho hum lunch munch meal fare

past time, prepared titanic pot

same yet today not so yummy

seated similar chummy bench

served hot, chewed, swallowed

simultaneously divided due

two big bowls sit after through

tastes changed as body slept

cells crept up, stirred to death

from the surface sloughed off

washed away, plate from goo

became new (unlike the food)

staid without change in hunger

eaten, want keeps growing alive

 

 

 

 

Sabbatical

This morning, I wavered between AWOL and sabbatical to name my thoughts.  My recent absence from musing was not deliberate but time that got away from me on one hand and was tendered from me by the demands of life on the other.  Monday morning would arrive, fill up like a bucket dropped in a swimming pool, sink into afternoon and evening, then float into Tuesday without any writing.  Today, I return from sabbatical with full fall splendor and a calendar with a bit of space left on it.

 

Among several, Dictionary.com offers the following entries for sabbatical.
1.  (adjective) of or pertaining or appropriate to the Sabbath
5.  (noun) any extended period of leave from one’s customary work, especially for rest, to acquire new skills or training, etc.

I took a one month period of leave from my customary writing to keep myself sane.  I do nurture myself with writing, but I knew if I frantically coveted bits of time by forcing the issue I would start acting mean, resentful, impatient.  That much I have learned about myself.  When I step too far away from life as a mother/homemaker I lose touch with how important those roles are for me. 

 

I remain, as we all do, an individual who must care for my own self, too.  But I know falling into unbalance (even toward positive pursuits) will topple the blocks of me.  One can become over attached to beneficial activities, too!  My life flows best with essential foundation stones in place.  Rest and suitable food are paramount followed by getting five people where we are supposed to be, prepared with what we need, in enough time to not feel frantic.  In the last four weeks that’s all I could manage.

 

We all have some version of a daily pie chart with 24 slices, each one hour.  We experience the tug-of-war it can take to keep that pie divided among life’s demands.   Let’s not trick ourselves into thinking we can squeeze 26 hours out of our 24 hour days.  Let’s also go easy on ourselves in terms of how much we should realistically expect to get done.  Rest is not a last thought, not time wasted.  Rest is essential.  In the biblical story of creation, God took time to rest – hence the origin of the word Sabbatical.  What more permission do we need?

 

 

Period of Leave

appropriate as the seventh day
look at that which is

done.

find it good

one in holy acts making should
alive in that which is

done.

know enough

actions always not essence stuff
see all that which is

done.
not over divide

in truth of Devine self-love reside

bow to that which is

done.

man made last

Maker did not say, do more fast
accept that which is

done.

day sufficient

work time tic to appropriate end

today that which is

done.

not tomorrow

let a next day not long to borrow

discern that which is

done.

offer rest

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Kindness

Last week I waited in carpool line amidst fellow kid-fetchers, each of us in various motor vehicles watching bicycles or those on foot drift past.  The day decked us in gorgeous array – sunny, eighty degrees, gentle breeze.  My van windows were open.  I crept forward, letting my foot rise off the brake ever so subtly progressing toward the sidewalk where chatting children waited. 

Then came the honking.  HONK.  HONK.  HOOONNNNK.  I looked at a small parking lot where some folks choose to leave their cars and walk up to the school.  A mammoth white SUV was blasting its horn at a small car driven by a granny-looking lady who was clearly a bit confused about where she should park, exactly.  The Grandmother moved through what unfolded as a three attempt effort to back into a space as the female driver of the SUV whaled on that horn over and over.  I was so disappointed in the absence of kindness.  Who could really be in such a hurry as to not see the old lady was TRYING?  The whole event was only, maybe, three minutes and they both drove away scattering a cloud of ugly energy.  I couldn’t help but wonder what the children with the horn-honker learned about kindness.

Dictionary.com defines kindness.
1.  the state or quality of being kind
2.  a kind act
3.  kind behavior
4.  friendly feeling; liking

I feel that definition offers nothing without defining kind.
1.  of a good or benevolent nature or disposition, as a person
2.  having, showing, or proceeding from benevolence
3.  indulgent, considerate, or helpful; humane
4.  mild, gentle, clement

Perhaps we might each consider kindness.  We cannot let anger and hate overtake the collective spirit of our world.  Every little thing we do adds to the united life-force of humanity.   Haters don’t seem to be scared to flip the finger, shout profane words, launch car bombs.  Why should we be afraid to hold open doors, let others out in traffic, wait and breathe deeply as a confused person parks a car, be pleasant to a cashier, tip generously, offer “please” and “thank you” liberally, look people in the eye and smile.  I assert that piles of little acts weigh as much as one big one! 

We wrongly think ourselves powerless much of the time.  On the contrary, we have so much power that we wield without thought of ourselves or others.  Power to heal and to hurt with so much as a word or our hands, a smile or a honk, a moment of silence, a song.  People power can pulse the universe with joy or junk it up with hostility.  Kindness is necessary.  Kindness is a gift to ourselves and to others.  Kindness is powerful.        

Humanity

praise human hallowed power to pray

preach and prune

about beauty, lost wandering without

knowing the scale

tips to the flip side of goodness as we

flood the light side

with abundant acts, kindness apostles

 

 

September

Monday can be slow to unfold.  Sleepy eyes and heads that long to stay pillow prostrate abound in my house.  An odd motivation helps me get up – it is trash and recycling day which I DO NOT want to miss.  Pick up time is early and if that truck passes us by there is no second chance like I had for the school bus when I was a kid living just before a cul-de-sac.  I have boundless gratitude for the sanitation services of my city because dealing with refuse is something very important!  In addition to the thanks in my heart this morning as I trolleyed trash to the roadside there was lightness in my skin also.  Cool air, without aid of inside air conditioning, was touching me for the first time in weeks.   Whoopee!  September is here offering, as it usually does, liberation from the heat of August.

 

September, a noun, is defined at dictionary.com.
1.  the ninth month of the year, containing 30 days.

 

Interestingly the same site gives the word origin as from Latin septem meaning seven – so called because it was the seventh month of the old Roman calendar which began the year in March but was replaced by the Julian calendar reform in 46 BCE.

 

September brings a settling into the school year’s tardy bells, field trips, homework, and friend-filled days.  We embrace fall recreation soccer, televised college football games, the new apple crop, beloved jeans, and blessed cooler temperatures.  Newness accompanies all of this that is exciting.  We plan our days differently with increased routine.  Meals might change as temperatures arouse more cooking and less local melon.  Darkness slowly gains ground on light as we mark time toward the Autumnal Equinox (Saturday, September 22, 2012 in the northern hemisphere) when day and night are nearly equal in length.  A stroll no longer ends in boundless sweat and biological need for a popsicle.  Early morning breezes bear a chill that tickles every tiny hair on our limbs and makes us wrap our arms around ourselves with delight.

 

Welcome September, nifty ninth month named seven.  I, for one, am glad you are here.     

Cultivating September

dangling brown stem stalks offer no more
as once plump rouge tomatoes cage ripened
muscadine vines now last to proffer sweet
fruit and apples of faraway orchards posing
orbs last sugary lick yield from earth moving
toward darkness cool inviting fall that fades

into autumn months bodies who long for slow
Virgo nights stilled under cloud covers mound
carrots, cabbage, cauliflower furrow ground
forestall sturdy cloth coats keeping limbs
warm stretch toward today’s task, plow under
stick cucumber vines, squash that gave out

 

 

 

Whoopee

Driving through rural Georgia, radio airwaves offered a honky-tonk country music station.  In one song, a smooth-singing, southern accented crooner related the glories of being a county man, something about tractors and strong arms and other virtues I cannot recall.  What I do remember is that when the song was over I wanted to  holler a “yeehaaw” or a “whoopee” to celebrate the juke-jamming, boot-tapping rhythm and mood of the music.  The look my kids gave me as the sound left my mouth revealed that perhaps they had not heard me whoop before.  I told them each to try it.  Their first attempts arose as the pathetic, self- conscious sounds of little city kids trying to satisfy their potentially crazy mom.  But after a few more tries and some encouragement to bring it to the sky we really had a good time hooting a call that filled our car with revelry.  Whoopee. 

Dictionary.com offered an entry for my unusual word today, whoopee.
1.  (interjection) used as a shout of exuberant joy.

Some music can move you:  different kinds of music, different kinds of inspiration.  I’m not certain if we have a local station that plays the hoe down style we found parading through the pines of pastoral Interstate 20, but for that moment it was perfect.  We were bored.  The road was still long ahead of us.  The music was fun and gave us a reason to make some noise in an otherwise muted space.

 

We simply do not encounter many socially appropriate opportunities to let the lungs loose and shout with exuberant joy.  Unless you count sports games, which might be close but much of that shouting is meant to make athletes motivated for improved performance - different from whoopee just because a song made you want to bellow.  Or the sky was so perfectly blue and spread out over the day’s start you wanted to celebrate.  You got the job you wanted.  The person who just ran a red light did not hit you.  A friend woke up from surgery. A neighbor helped jump start your dead car battery.  Or you have the needed number of bread slices for lunch sandwiches.  A place landed safely. 

 

Joy is jumping out of cracks and crevices in life and I propose bringing the energy of the place up with the sounds of our voices celebrating more often, especially if we are in the space of our car or house where no one can wonder what we’re doing.  If in public, perhaps the voice is one of the heart where we are free to shout “whoopee” anytime.

Holler

lips and lungs getting garrulous, hilarious

what if publicly expelled, downright yelled

by some crazy lucky lady who took a swig

of metaphorical caramel latte, high energy

tongue jig of joy lapping karma juke box

sure shooting true she hooted whoopee

hooray for me and a life swill that fills full

now, maybe moments sound celebrating

 

 

 

Empty

My brood has lived an exhilarating, exhausting flurry of hot, school-is-out activity for the last three months.  We wrapped our arms around summer and squeezed every drop we could out of it.  So much that today - the first day of the school year - arrived with very little energy for fanfare.  We attended open house events to find classrooms.  We packed our new book bags with supplies.  But today dawned much like those before, albeit with a wake up in the dark, and presented itself as new but subtle.  In its wake I find myself in a house that is empty. 

Following are the first four entries offered at Dictionary.com to define empty.   
1.  containing nothing; having none of the usual or appropriate contents
2.  vacant, unoccupied
3.  without cargo or load
4.  destitute of people or human activity

The house is unoccupied by humans except me sitting in a foreign quiet surrounded by motionless marks of cohabitants, various belongings not of my choosing.  It feels so long since a morning with just me in it stretched out its hours like hands, strong and soft, as if asking to come along on a slow walk.   

I know from recent conversations and FB postings that there are many levels of empty being felt by folks wishing their kids off to school.  How do we approach empty?  The quiet makes us listen perhaps in ways we have not had time or energy or desire to do in some time. 

Empty can be like a piece of paper on a spiral bound tablet.  The previous page flipped over was full of things we checked off a list – accomplishments that took a day, like clearing a closet of outgrown clothes, or maybe the better part of a year, like completing a 200 hour yoga teacher certification class, or maybe a week, like a trip to the ocean, or maybe eighteen years, like raising a baby to become a college student.  We listed, prioritized and reprioritized, we deleted, we added, we made the page fit as much as we could.  Now on a new page we may have none of the usual contents.  Instead a canvas on which to paint, new work opportunities to embrace, new friends to make, old friends to cherish,  a blank space to sit with empty as long as feels right.

I like the feeling of empty to make room for the “What’s Next.”  But empty is also wonderful as “What Is” right now.  Empty may be the just right thing for this moment which, like all the others, offers itself to us as the present.

Bare

empty of thoughts, noise not

no boo hooing barely knowing

what we dare doing, taking

bites and chewing, spewing

eschewing while brewing, see

solitude moments arrive

strive to swallow, exhale

expound sound of breath

breadth of gone, a new day

Adolescence

I recall the difficulty in understanding and accepting oneself during the years of adolescence.  The constant flow of body changes, navigating which social spaces to occupy, constantly comparing among other kids and feeling oneself coming up short on wardrobe, body appearance, financial status, family rules, whatever – all this could set off a stream of simultaneous self-doubt, sadness, glee and fury.  I feel finding oneself a difficult companion in puberty may be foreshadowing of trying to understand one’s offspring during these developmental years!  Adolescence is on my mind as I traverse it once again as a parent.

Dictionary.com defines the noun adolescence.
1.  the transitional period between puberty and adulthood in human development, extending mainly over the teen years and terminating legally when the age of majority of reached; youth
2.  the process or state of growing to maturity
3.  a period or stage of development, as of a society, preceding maturity

In many ways it feels the same.  I see a child changing into an un-kid, more a grown up looking person than a baby.  Parent and offspring now physically see eye to eye but it is merely a height issue as most other things are not so “eye to eye” at all.  I find myself wanting to go to my own room to be alone with my feelings.  Once there I stew.  Have I done something wrong to make my family member act this way?  Did I say something stupid?  Can’t everybody just try harder to get along?  It is so unfair that my time cannot be to do whatever I want with nobody telling me I have to be responsible!  I just want to yell at everybody.  I need to talk to a friend.  And let’s not forget how I long to avoid coming up short on anything – seriously, I am doing my best. 

Sound flash-back familiar? 

I see that the questions I’m sequestering myself to ask are much like my queries of twenty years ago and likely the wonderings just yesterday for my kid.  Perhaps this is a part of a continuing process or state of growing.  The definition of adolescence offers the word maturity quite a few times.  That may be what I need to ponder while I wish all this growing stuff could just be easier.

 

Adult Essence

taller skin, longer limbs, stretched to the edge of a ledge of emotion

spewing livid language lava, a new land to explore later after cooling

old school moves or new school sneakers knowing what to wear out

whimsical whiff of grown up wonderings wound with kid size dreams

friendship bracelets plait to exchange sometimes becoming too tight

slight tingle tells love sweet expansion of self-worth, daughter dating

dance moving music of maturity’s beguiling promises prior to growth

change an individual guarantee given freely of endocrine secretions

seguing transition time telling tootle-ooo to youth preparing to leave

Experiment

I’m conducting an experiment called Life.  Proving and disproving in equal parts.  I can be impulsive instead of methodical.  I arrange things in proper order trying to please.  I gather materials, read instructions (sometimes followed and sometimes ignored), watch what happens and record what I am able in words.  On the cusp of this day I am struck by the trial and error of this experiment and how random a lot of what comes and goes in life feels. 

Experiment is defined at dictionary.com.
1.  a test, trial, or tentative procedure; an act or operation for the purpose of discovering something unknown or of testing a principle, supposition, etc.
2.  the conducting of such operations, experimentation
3.  (obsolete)  experience

Seriously, doesn’t life feel that way sometimes?  That we are consciously or not conducting a tentative discovery procedure as we gather our resources and move through our days testing theories.  We have certain ideas of how things should or could be and we head in the direction they point, adding and mixing and stirring new ingredients of locations, persons, experience.  Much of what we think is sure may turn out to be no so.  Many reactions we don’t expect come to pass. 

We learn.  We find success doesn’t always mean a good outcome.  Being alone is a blessing sometimes.  A person can love unconditionally.  Being a present parent is a giant pain but totally worth it as an investment in a child.  Chocolate makes most things at least a bit better.  A lot of who dies and who lives is unfair.  Really, all kinds of things are totally unfair and there isn’t much use in wanting life to be fair (I long to disprove this to no avail).

I’d like to know how the experiment turns out, if I am doing the right things.  Conflictingly I am in no hurry to get to the end.

                This Is Just a Test

Tubes percolating, gravity driven floating zygote in novel dark drifting
gifting some lass and lad with life they are not prepared for no matter
what books read or written baby blows the lid off beakers and boobs

Booboos heal and scab and without kneecaps who feels the hard floor
searching for more crumbs dropped, soon scooped and licked, weighed
record whose eye color and seeing size and proper scale of proportion 

Pudgy marshmallow roast middle grade toaster treat kisses, noble gas
devil may care about safety spectacles, beer goggles instead teen time
we lack listening when told by old and bold because we think we know

Better get the whole body figured out, read the right tome while home
with a secret between Danny and Sandy amid songs longing and leather
not a touch too much or too little heat to keep the heaping heart full

Cooking and changing, creating balanced solutions without blowing up
tiny cup of toxic concoction offered by hereditarily engineered science
become light one flowing, growing daily dropper full of faith at a time