Time marches on and does not waver, does not stop.
The intensity and the inevitability of aging threatens to overwhelm my happier self.
I want to be as young in my body as I am in my spirit.
I was born an old soul with a fiery, fighting spirit.
My soul now calls my spirit to take her place among the crones.
My spirit rebels even as my body, tired and weary, longs to simply be still and be whole.
She cannot be young.  So my body resolves she would settle for still, free of aching and longing.

Set me on a road, dear God, that leads up into the mountains.
Let me wander, untethered and at peace.
Let me walk in the quiet and marvel at the beauty and the grace of living things.
Let me capture my restless spirit in the breath of the wind
And settle her down in the curve of the mountain path
To listen to the ancients
And be as one of them
Constant and alive
Holding the light as it sinks in the west
Breathing out the pain of age by breathing in the gratitude of living.

----September 15, 2019

Little Bird grew restless in the nest.
It was crowded and noisy and messy.
The Wind called, "Come away with me and see the far away world. You were meant to fly!"
So Little Bird flew to the Wind and the Wind carried her far, far away.
She flew over the sea to the other side of the world and back again.
She flew over mountains and deserts and fields.
She flew through storms that were dark and dangerous and frightening.
She flew to the top of high cliffs and mesas where she could see for miles and miles.
She flew to places so sad that her heart ached with sorrow.
And she flew to places that were so beautiful that she was breathless and no melody could come to her mouth to sing of the wonders she beheld.
She flew until her wings were ragged and torn.
She flew until she was full and then weary of flying with the Wind and the storms and the skies.

Little Bird flew back to the nest.
She had heard Mama Bird calling in her dreams.
Mama Bird had never stopped watching the skies and she smiled when Little Bird came home.
She sat upon an old high branch alone in the evening sun.  Her feathers glowed in the fading light with all the colors that ever were made.

"What have you learned from all your miles of flying, Little Bird?"

"I have learned that I am resilent," said Little Bird, happy to have learned such a big idea.
"Ah, yes!", said Mama Bird, "That is an important thing to learn."
"And what else did you learn, Little Bird?"
Little Bird thought about all she had seen and all that she had learned.
And she said, "I have learned that there are storms that try to swallow me whole and storms that try to send me the wrong way.  There are storms that try to break my wings.  But there are also storms that are only in the sky and the rain never reaches the ground."

"And?", asked Mama Bird, her bright eyes glowing with that knowing Mama Bird light.

Little Bird looked up to the high branch.  Night was falling and all she could she was a shadow where Mama Bird once sat. Night was coming and Mama Bird would soon be gone.

"I learned that I miss you, Mama Bird!! I miss your wings and the way they held me close to your beating heart and kept all the storms at bay!  I miss the sound of your song in the morning when the day is new and everything is possible.  I miss the way you showed me how to fly even though it meant that I would go far, far away!"

"And what else, my little love, my little chickadee?"

"I learned that there are other wings, Mama Bird - all over the world - who will hold me if I need.  They do not feel like your wings, Mama Bird, but they are good wings, safe wings, wings filled with love!"

"And?"

"And I have wings for holding, too!  My wings can shield other Little Ones and keep them safe when the storms come!  Little Ones who never had Mama wings to hold them close. My wings, even though they are worn and torn and some of my feathers are broken - my wings can wrap around the Little ones who are afraid and give them shelter."

"And what of God, my little Love?  What did you learn of God when you flew so far from home?"

"Oh, Mama Bird!  I learned that God is everywhere!  He is in the mountains and in the valleys.  He is in the storms and in the calm.  He is in the pain and the sorrows and He is in the joy and jubilation. He is in the eyes of the Old Ones and the hearts of the Little Ones.  And I can hear his song everywhere I go."

"Yes! Now you have it, Little Bird.", said Mama Bird, a laughing sort of sound in her singing voice.

Little Bird heard her wings take flight with a soft, rustling sound, like a whisper and a prayer.  She looked up to the high branch but she couldn't see Mama Bird anymore.  Her night had come and Mama Bird had flown on.

"I love you, Mama Bird!!", Little Bird cried out into the night.  "I love you!  I always did and I always will!"

Far away, out where the stars were shining, Little Bird heard Mama Bird singing.  Long and low and full of joy and tenderness and peace, Mama Bird's song echoed across the skies,  "And I, you, Little Bird - my love, my chickadee!  And I, you."

She sat in a chair with her back straight and her head hanging down
A young woman.
Though maybe not so young.
(Everyone seems so young to me on the days when my bones are aching and I am tired.)
She was pretty and delicate and had small hands with fingers that tangled and untangled themselves
As though they were keeping rhythm to a song inside her body and couldn't be still.

"How are you?" I asked.
Because I knew little else to ask but that.

"I'm doing okay" she answered.
She drew in a breath, with a tiny shiver, like a baby who is done crying and needs to sleep.
Her head lifted just enough for her eyes to meet mine.
For just a flash of a second, a nanosecond, a fraction of a blink of time,
A great well opened in the depths of her eyes, a window unshuttered,
And I could see in to a soul holding a candle of pain.

Quickly, the curtains were drawn tight. The chasm closed and all was still.
Her hands twitched and her breath drew in and held.
So brief was the moment, I might have missed it had I not been looking for her eyes.
But I had.

I felt a cracking in my chest, an opening up in my core, a small burst of flame and hot tears in my eyes; my soul coming forth.

I reached out to touch one of her small, dancing hands.
To let her know that I had seen and understood.
"Me, too," I said.
She looked to see if I was being truthful or fair
I knew that she knew.
"We see one another.  Your pain and mine."

Those of us that hold candles behind curtains drawn tight
See the light in others, brief but sure.
In all our hiding, in all our putting on our best faces and pretending that the pain is controlled or gone,
Our pain reflects itself back to us in eyes of others.
Like a window on a dark or rainy night.

I touched her because I wanted her to know that she was not alone.
And I wanted to be not alone.
To acknowledge that we are, so many of us, doing okay while not doing okay.
That candles of pain still are light that shines out to others.
That there is a place where light reaches - from you to me to all the young women with small and restless hands, moving forward, moving, coping, hanging on.

For my friend Bobbi waiting for a word

Autumn leaves
And winter follows
And night comes on so early.
Morning is a series of snooze alarms ringing and ringing and ringing again
Because my body is too slow in the chilly air
And wants to stay inside the nest of blankets and flannel sheets
To keep on dreaming.

Autumn finds me still in childhood anticipation of
New shoes and new pencil cases
And new teachers of new lessons
That might change the course of things and turn the page
On old stories that I want to leave behind.
I look for new friends on the old playing field and
Hope that I can finally be less different
And more alike-able.

Autumn finds me still in the thrill of later years
Twisting the schedule of week in and week out to free time
To be out in the falling leaves, sleeping in the chilly grass
Falling in love with the whole wild world.
Walking up mountainsides and seeing the breathless wonder
Of the world laid bare by the naked trees and the falling leaves.

Autumn finds me still in the longing of the days
When I stood waiting for the bus to stop at the corner
To let the children off.
Just to see their faces and hear the stories of their days,
Lighting up my hours of fog and fatigue
With memories of the wonders of childhood beginnings
And the grace of love that moves up and down and over and through
The generations of the fall leaf catchers and daydreamers.

Autumn finds me now at the start of the waning,
The coming to terms
And the reckoning of all that has been lost with all that I have gained.
I want to dream.
I want to wander out into the falling leaves and dance to the beat of the different drummer
That has always been me.
To be free at the closing as I was at the start
Of the tethers of grown up things that I have carried as I should but need no more to shoulder.
I want to play in the fields that are turning golden and calling to me to run.

Autumn leaves
And winter follows
And night comes on so early.
I am full.  I am satiated.
I am ready for sleep.
I am ready for dreams.
I am ready for wonder.
I am ready to roam out to where the cold meets the warmth
And the heart explodes with the ending and the beginning.
                   ---------for Bobbi, for my father and for my children, October 2013

The beauty of dreams.........

I haven't written anything here for a very long time.  Life has kept me too busy and too caught up.  I have been missing it - my writing.  All of my writing has been missing from my life.  And it's a part of me that is constantly pawing at the surface, trying to find its way out.  I have a new song, slowly growing inside with a whole concept and lines coming together little by little.  I have several poems brewing.  I have thoughts, thoughts, and more thoughts fighting for my attention, longing for some avenue of expression.  And I have this little voice that keeps whispering in my ear, saying "You know you'd feel better if you'd just get off your duff and let us out."  So here I am.

I had an experience today that brought about one of those clear and shining epiphanies that seeks a place to be heard.  An epiphany that wants to be thought out loud.  I want to share it.

A young woman, a coworker, who has become very precious to me, shared with me a dream she had.  She has had this dream once before, and it visited her again last night.  She said she dreamed that she was in a park - a beautiful place, so beautiful that it is one of those places that is only found in dreams.  And she was playing with her two year old son.  Her partner was sitting on a bench near by and there was another little boy, standing near him, watching her at play with her son.  The little boy just stood and watched.  Her partner finally asked the little boy if he could help him find his mommy.  And the little boy said, "No.  I'm watching her play with her other little boy."  Several years ago, my friend lost a child during pregnancy.  He was growing and moving and they were eagerly anticipating his birth, when he suddenly stopped moving and they discovered that he would be stillborn.  She still grieves for that little boy, everyday.  I can see it in her eyes.  Her grief does not govern over her, but it is always there.

I sat close to her and touched her arm and tried to be as still as possible.  She was allowing me the privilege to see a part of her soul.  I was so touched by her trust.  I could see her dream as clearly as if I had dreamed it myself.  The park, the color of the trees, the sunlight moving in the grass, and I could see just a brief glimpse of that little boy, who he was and still is in her heart.  Huge tears spilled over her eyes and down her cheeks.  She was so moved in the remembering of the little baby she lost and by the whisper of him from the place where he has gone.

I came to realize how beautiful this thing is - this ability we have as humans to dream like this.  What an incredible gift it is!  I said, "He's telling you he's alright."  And she cried, "I hope so! I hope sometime, I will see him again." 

And the epiphany for me was this:  it does not really matter where this dream came from.  Either way, it is an incredibly beautiful thing.  Perhaps it is a message.  I believe that such messages happen, though I know many people do not. I believe that there is but a very thin veil that separates us from those we love who have gone on before us.  And if there is a way that their essense comes back to us - in dream or vision or guidance or protection - that truly is powerful and exceptional beauty.  And if, as many folks would say, the dream was just her mind's way of creating a picture to comfort her - how cool is that?!  How amazing and awesome that her mind can do that - create a beautiful and lasting picture that connects her to a soul she only got to hold for a brief but profound part of her life.  Either way - it moves me very deeply.

I have been thinking about my father these days.  So much and so often.  Yesterday marked four years since he died and went on ahead.  I am so lonely for him sometimes.  But so many times, he comes to me in such beautiful ways.  In the way my sons express ideas, in the way my sister smiles, in the rising notes of a violin, in the very love I feel when he is in the middle of one of my childhood memories.  This, too, is beautiful.  The way my mind can hold him so closely.

I am reminded of Langston Hughes' poem about dreams - "Hold fast to dreams for when dreams go, life if a barren field frozen with snow."

I was humbled by my friend's dream and in her willingness to share it.  And I am grateful to have been allowed in to see it.  I have been saying, "Thank you" all evening.

Peace and love and light y'all.
I'll be back again soon.  I hope you will be, too.
Thanks for listening.

Catching up on thanksgivings!

It's amazing how quickly time can get away from a person. When I least expect it, I catch my breath and realize a whole week has passed, then just as quickly, a whole month turns into months turns into years. My grandmother, who was a very wise woman, always told me not to rush any single stage of my children's lives or my own because before I knew it - like a blink! - they would be past and gone and I'd be wishing for time to slow down. She was very right. I am a week behind on my thanksgivings, but I remember then, day for day, and so I will take the time now to catch them up.

I have been quite sad the past couple of days, with sinking spirits and low, weak energy. I am struggling with coming to terms with, for lack of a better word, disappointment. I am still processing the great disappointment I have suffered this past year with the ending of my marriage and the realization that the man I married was not the man I had come to know but someone else entirely. I am not anywhere near done the work I need to do to move on. I am still a long ways away from forgiveness. Slowly, in little pieces, I process what I can handle and otherwise keep my head down and keep moving through daily life. I am working through another disappointment. Newer. And I feel sore and tired. When you hold someone in great esteem and then discover that your ideal of them is not the reality of them, the disappointment can feel like the ground under your feet has suddenly started shifting and cracking and lurching away from what feels safe. So it is for me in the past year.

I share all this because I have learned that when the ground beneath my feet is unsteady and uncertain, working at turning the focus of my heart and my spirit and my energy toward those things that remain solid and steady and continue to bless me - those things will hold on and be the ever-present safety net that will not let me hit ground from which I cannot rise: my children, my mother, my brothers and sisters, my faith, and my undying hope that someday I will fully understand and accept the lessons that I am meant to learn. With that so much in my mind, I want to start catching up with my blessings: last Saturday and each day this past week.

Saturday, November 5: I slowly cleaned my house today. In bits and pieces spread out across the day, I worked little by little to pretty up the environment that I call home. I am grateful for all the pictures I have in my house - all over the house. They remind me of the life I have lived and the love that I have been able to give and have been so fortunate to have had in return. Pictures of my great-grandparents when they were young. And of my great-grandmother in the later years of her life - oh! how she could tell a story! Pictures of my grandparents on their honeymoon and later with my children. Pictures of my children: Daniel in his kindergarten graduation get-up, his lifelong friend Justin with his mischievous grin smiling behind him; Jacob swinging on a rope swing in New Zealand; Daniel and his beautiful wife, Tiggy smiling at one another; Jacob and Daniel when they were little, hugging one another; my brothers and sisters and me when we were little and all dressed up in our matching Easter outfits; my father with my two sisters at my cousin Carrie's wedding, smiling and so happy; my whole huge family and extended family at my niece, Jennifer's, wedding; Daniel and Jacob in May the weekend that Daniel graduated from UNC-W and Jacob graduated from Wake Forest (on the same day!!); my sweet little mama and Jacob at Jacob's UNC graduation in May of 2010; my friend Bobbi and me up at the "old house" at the foot of Roan Mountain; my friend Cindy and I sitting on a rock by the river across from her house in Tryon; one of my patients and her new baby and her husband and me, all grinning up at the camera just a short while after I delivered that baby into this world............ I have lots and lots of pictures. They are visual reminders that I am a very lucky woman. And I am grateful for that reminder. Not just in these days when I am not feeling so lucky, but always.

Sunday, November 6: I hiked up to the top of Elk Knob today with Dan. Elk Knob State Park is not far from where I live and I have been wanting to get up there and see if I could indeed make it to the top. I wore a knee brace, pulled tight, and did not try to rush it. There was an open understanding that it was okay for me to turn back whenever I wanted or needed. The trail is only 1.8 miles but it sure felt longer. (Yes, I am very out of shape). Baby came along for the hike, too, and was busy taking in all of the millions of smells that dogs process every second, even when they're moving. It was a beautiful day. And, when I reached the summit, I was absolutely elated!! It's pretty darn incredible up there. You can see Mount Rogers up in Virginia, Roan Mountain over in Tennessee, Grandfather Mountain, Mount Mitchell, and the South Mountains way off in the distance. The sign at the top said that on a clear day, you can see Pilot Mountain from up there, way down by Winston-Salem. I couldn't quite make it out, but an older gentleman up there said he thought he could. It was breathtaking. The hike down hurt a lot. My knee does not handle "down" very well. But it didn't give. And it saw me all the way back to the car. I was reminded of my younger years and all the time that Dan and I spent hiking the mountains, camping, backpacking, rock climbing. I am grateful for this old body and the way it saw me through today. And I am grateful for a friendship that has lasted through 33 years and has survived much loss (grandparents, then each a parent, friends), divorce and remarriage for each of us and each another divorce, financial hardships, and all the curve balls that life will slam at you from time-to-time. It is the mutual adoration for our two children that has kept our friendship intact and allowed us to forgive each other our short-comings and accept each other for who we are, as we are. I am deeply grateful for that.

Monday, November 7: I am limping today and sore from yesterday's hike. I have moved slowly all day, guarding each step and trying to stay mindful of how I put my foot down before I put weight on this messed up knee. I am very ready for sleep and think that I will not be up too late. My Baby-girl as I call her, the sweet lab mutt that I adopted 5 years ago, is very patient with my slow moving. She sits close to me and sighs. Her presence is a balm against the loneliness that I might feel where it not for her company. She is a warm and calm energy. I love her dearly. She sat by the bathtub while I soaked my swollen knee and watched me closely to assure herself that I was alright. I believe what they say about the healing power of animals. She heals me every day. My traveling companion and my sounding board, she never disagrees with all my rantings (though she sometimes closes her eyes and drifts off in boredom if I go on too long!). She was a blessing to my life when I moved to Virginia and found myself hours away from friends and family, in a place unknown, on my own. She has continued to be a blessing. Thank you, God, for sending her to me when I needed her.

Tuesday, November 8: I am worse today. I had a long talk with my mom and was trying so hard not to whine, but whine I did. At least for a little while. My mama only lets you whine for so long! The ache in my knee worked its way out and up into my hips and groin and into the big muscles of my body. I am feverish and feel like I am getting the flu. I know this will pass. It is just part of it. My mom and I talked for a long time about depression. In our talks, she helps me remember non-medicinal ways to fight it, beat it, work with it, manage. My mother is a very special woman. Especially when I am hurting, I am so grateful to just hear her voice. I am blessed by her wisdom, her love, and her example. Thank you, Mom, for that special Mom touch you have. Even over the phone, its healing power is one of the most powerful things I know in this life. I love you.

Wednesday, November 9: Home during lunch for a 30 minute nap and a nap at the end of the workday before supper. I am grateful for napping. I would not have survived nigh on 16 years in practice without that skill. I learned it when I was small, came to depend on it when I had babies, and trust it to see me through another 10 years or so of baby catching.

More later. I still have Thursday, Friday and today to go. I'll get there.

Peace all.

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