Truly Unconditional - A Love Story

With the flu running rampant in town, I was not surprised to find the doctor's waiting area over-full. As I stood for a moment by the front desk waiting for a seat to clear I had the opportunity to do my favorite thing: watch people. Scanning the back of the room I saw an eager face grinning and nodding at me. When we made eye contact her eyes lit up like sparklers on the Fourth of July and she motioned for me to come sit next to her.

As soon as I sat down she opened the coloring book she was working in to a new page and offered to let me color with her. The elderly man sitting next to her said gently, "Sally, lets not bother the nice lady, okay Honey?" I assured him that I was honored to be allowed to share in the fun.



"I like kitties best," she said as she thoughtfully eyed the box full of crayons on the table in front of her. "What's your favorite color? I like purple best."

"That's really neat, Sally," I said, "because that's MY favorite color, too!"

Sally already had the purple crayon in her hand, poised to tint the flowers on her page. She only hesitated a second before she handed it to me.

"You can go first." she said as she patted my hand, and for the next while we colored and giggled as only little girls do.

Sally and I finished one set of pages and were about to start another when the nurse came out and called her name. With loving patience the kind old gentleman helped her gather up her crayons, books, and sweater while the nurse waited for him to escort his wife of 63 years into the exam room.

"To love a person is to learn the song that is in their heart, and to sing it to them when they have forgotten." - Anonymous

Photo courtesy of www.dhs.ri.gov I wish I'd thought to take a picture of the real couple.

A Cherokee Story - Two Wolves

One of my very best friends in the world sent me this.

Two Wolves

One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people. He said, "My son, the battle is between 2 "wolves" inside us all.

One is Evil. It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.

The other is Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith."

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather: "Which wolf wins?"

The old Cherokee simply replied, "The one you feed."

My wonderful friend signed his note:

Bug
Lux et umbra vicissim, sed semper amor
- "Light and shadow by turns, but always love" –

It is unbelievably rewarding to have your children let you know that they GET IT when they grow up. It makes all that time wading through the sludge of the teen years more than worth the effort.

I love you, my Bug. Thank you for .... everything.

Peace, Blessings, and Always Love.

Pushing through the storm...

I am a problem solver. I've learned that no solution is possible without a solid plan, so we've come up with one for My Girl (Since that's what I call her most of the time anyway, that's what her new handle her is going to be, by the way. "Daughter" just sounded too aritificial.):

1. GED classes because there is no way she'll be able to thrive in public school and she won't allow me to teach her at home.
2. Get a job. She will not be allowed to lay around all day long doing nothing. For the time being, starting Monday, she will be working for me. I'll teach her some secretarial skills like filing and accounting (what little I know about it, anyway!). In the mean time, she's to continue to apply at other places to obtain truly gainful employment.
3. Complete her community service hours.

The plan settled my mental stresses, but my emotional stresses were still pretty unsettled. However, I have now reached an emotional place where I am mostly OK. All of the prayers and good wishes that have come in are SO uplifting and encouraging. The icing on the cake, though, came from my efforts to encourage and support Angela Williams Duea over at angelawd. (As a quick aside: I love that her name is phonetically Angel Awed because she has such a strong faith and I know she is surrounded by loving angels and is awed by the strength and peace they give her.) I was typing a comment on her "I'm not in Minnesota" post (go read it if none of my post makes sense, it will help) and all of this just came pouring out. It came from somewhere so deep inside me that I know that MY angels were helping me find the words I, myself, needed to hear. The next thought was that I needed to share it with all the wonderful earthly angels here.

I truly believe, in my heart of hearts, that this wonderfuly kind and loving God who put us here and allowed us to bond and love so strongly would not just, POOF!, make it all disappear when we reach his doorstep.

I KNOW - absolutely and beyond any doubt - that my loved ones are still around me. I KNOW that I feel them, smell them, hear their words in my heart when I'm lost and their joyous laughter in my celebrations.

I KNOW that they are together and know each other; and I KNOW that even those with whom they disagreed in life are there and loved because to be in God's presence is to find the perfect peace, understanding, and knowledge beyond all earthly pettiness.

And when it is my time to go home, I KNOW that they will be there waiting for me with arms wide and I will be enfolded in a love that is beyond all imagining.

THAT is what my faith is to me. It is the peace, comfort, and hope in which I to walk every day. It is the life preserver that I cling to when I feel that I'm drowning in a world of pain, turmoil, and uncertainty. It is the hand I reach for in the dark, the sunlight that shines through the storms that this human existence spawns.

My faith is the air I breathe, the water I drink, and the pillow on which I lay my head each night knowing that no matter where I wake up in the morning, I AM LOVED.

I wish you all the peace and calmness I have found today through your love and God's grace.

Virtual Therapy for the Soul: MAY YOU BE BLESSED

I was going to post a thing today about this painful, ugly, gut-wrenching family drama I'm currently embroiled in. I've been really agonizing over how to deal with it and I was thinking that I'd call on my blogging family to help me sort it out. The post was full of venom and anger, evoking only hurtful thoughts and potentially unhealable damage. Then my wonderful email friend, Margie, sent me this. As I watched and listened, the anger melted away from my soul and was replaced with something new. Something calm. Something warm and comforting.

I'm going to rework my post (yes, I still want your advise and input) and get it out sometime in the next few days. For now, though, I'd like to share this with you. You may have seen it before, but I'd really like you to take a moment to watch it one more time and really consider reevaluating something in your life that is ugly, hurtful, or painful. I'm praying that you, too, can begin to let go of that hurt and pain, and in so doing...

MAY YOU BE BLESSED
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