Listen to the sound of silence

Sometimes silence is the only peace you will find. I went home Friday to discover my missing cat in the basement. He was sitting by the cat entrance and unresponsive to voice. I took him gently upstairs but moving him caused him to vomit.

I called around and let some of the kids know he was sick. Best Girl and her kids showed up to tell him good by. He was responding to pets and and comfort by moving his ears and closing his eyes but never a sound or attempt to move. I turned up the heat and put him in a crocheted star blanket I had made then laid him by the vent to keep him warm. He refused all food and water. That is my test for my animals. If they will even try to take water or milk I will try to get them to the vet to heal.

I decided to give him the night to see if he would recover but the results were the same in the morning. If you moved him he vomited and if you offered water or food he did the same. He was just barely breathing.

I sat with him, petting him and telling him what a great cat he had been. He would have been 12 on the 12th, he was a Mother's Day kitten. Saturday morning I packed him carefully in a box for travel and took him for a last ride. My caring vet and his wife helped me set my friend's spirit free.

Timone was born under a boat. His mom crawled out the dryer vent to have her children naturally. We called that batch "The Boat People". The biggest, fuzziest tortiseshell with the longest tail was destined to be King of Cats. I claimed him for myself while he was still wet and scraggly looking.

Being the most perfect cat with the longest tail, he took to his inherited duties seriously. The entire universe was designed to display him to perfection and he moved to enhance the universe with the beauty of his every motion. In his noble wisdom he allowed humans to seek their joy in caring for him and suffered himself to be petted for their comfort and happiness. He never harmed anything we brought home and always remembered a King's duty is to his subjects. If one of the animals was ill or one of his humans was disturbed he warmed them with his presence and soothed them with his royal purrs.

I know we live forever but it's hard to say good bye to friends. He was the last of the original five that moved into this home. Except for me. I confess to a bout of self pitying loneliness and a loud cry in my heart that screamed for the past to be made present. I'm over it and moving on.

Sunday I went for a ride on the bike and had the joy of a beautiful day but, having no one to share it with, I am still really Riding Solo now.

Love is just a four letter word

Crap. It happens. Why do bad things happen to good people? Why do good things happen to bad people? Who decides if it is good or bad? Humans.

I recently discovered that I eat shit and live. That the by-product of most living forms, when applied to the proper place in the proper manner, is love. In its real form crap fertilizes our crops so they grow in the abundance needed to feed more people. It's how we replace what we take from the soil to nourish it so it will feed us again and again. Without it the soil is depleted and grows pitiful plants that barely feed the deer. We need that shit. It grows our roses as well as the thorns in our lives.

In its spirit form crap is the flat tire on the way to work, the catsup on the white shirt of our life. Let's go with that one. You are having a nice dinner with friends and, SPLAT!, there it is, bold and red on the front of your nice shirt. Now what? You have three choices - ignore it, wipe it up, cover up with a napkin and hope you can get it out later or run to the loo and carefully run cold water through the spot until it clears, pat it or blow dry it as best you can and return, mostly spot free but slightly damp, to your dinner.

What happened here? You had to change direction or go on wearing catsup on your shirt. In most cases, you had to move. You changed gears from what you were doing to doing something actively different, at least for a time.

When life is good humans and animals tend to come to rest. They develop patterns of behavior that become repetitive because they bring the most pleasure with the least effort. It's normal and it's ok but it's dangerous. A deer using the same trail gets careless and, BANG!, he's venison dinner. A human, a creature built to seek food and walk all day hunting and gathering, uses the same roads all the time, knows the traffic patterns and the timing on the lights then one day someone from out of the area comes flying through and WHAM!, he's finally getting some pay back for the years of car and health insurance. The whole family goes through some changes.

When you are needed to help with a special assignment from the Divine Love he moves you to go the way he needs with an unavoidable change in your life. He teaches you what you need to learn and then he will point you to where you are needed. It will be a place where something or someone needs loving help from you. It will be a situation you understand fully and can, with full understanding and compassion from personal experience, help them cope with. It will be a place where just being the way you are is going to be exactly what was needed.

Things in your life have moved you in the direction you need to go, taught you the things you needed to learn and given you the caring heart and understanding for another in that situation to help them over the hump. That's not bad. That is good.

Sometime then, when things look like shit to you, just remember it's just another form of love to help you grow to be the best you possible. When you lovingly correct a child to protect it or teach it, it may look like a crap deal to the kid, you know it's love. It's all in the way you look at it. The Divine Love only creates good lovingly for each of us. It just sometimes what is lovingly needed is a good dose of fertilizer.

You do not have to change one thing about the way you are right this minute. If he put you there you are what he needs you to be to deal with the situation. Divine Love does not care how you dress, what your habits are, how much education you have, who your parents are or how much money you have. It knows when you are the best one to send.

Do whatever comes to you in a day lovingly and kindly for yourself and others and you will be going the direction he needs. If he needs you to go that way and you choose to go cussing and swearing and dragging your feet, as we all tend to do as we see something as shit in our lives, that's ok too - as long as you are going.

He isn't asking you to change, he is asking you to change direction. How much more important do you need to feel than being the one person who can do something so specific for the Divine Love that it is putting you on the path you need to follow in such a way that you can not mistake it? When you have no other direction to go then go ahead knowing it is the right way for you.

Around here we say, "Watch out for the whale!" If you feel like you are unable to go any direction but one and you don't want to go that way so you feel you are stuck, you feel depressed, angry, frustrated and confused as to why all this that is forcing you that way has happened to you - it might just be that he has a plan and you have to go THAT way. That confined, dark, nasty feeling may be a virtual whale he has sent to get your attention.

It might look like shit, but love is also a four letter word.

PS I love you

What do people do that live alone? I have been learning this over the last year.

First I did things the way I had for the last twenty because it worked for us and I could stay on auto pilot. As I healed I learned that I can do what ever I want, most times, that I enjoy doing.

One of the lessons I have been being taught over and over the last five years is SLOW DOWN and enjoy each tiny pleasure as it passes. Take whatever time I need to just enjoy being alive. To contemplate, to sit in the shade and breathe our fairly unpolluted air, to really hear the birds singing and the chime ringing in the whispy breeze. I'm slow but I am finally getting it. I'm built for comfort, not for speed...LOL! I am not an engineer, a builder, a doing something all the time person. I am the reminder that things get done even when you take time for yourself.

One night I sat out just to sit out and watch the moon. It was my favorite, the cresent with the star off the bottom tip. It was beautiful.

Last night I burned off the pile from redoing the house so I could mow more easily around the fire pit. I got to do it my way, just before dark so the wet would bake off the wood from the rain and I could go back out after I got Jeanette off to work and enjoy the flames in the dark. I even got the guitar out and played and sang, stuffed head, sore throat and all, just because it's what I love to do.

I had the two dogs and one cat hangin' with me so I could take a break and pet them or scratch the winter fur off them. It was cloudy so the fire didn't have to compete with the sky for my attention.

A friend to share it with was missing. Thank you all for being here so I can share it with you.

Do a little dance, make a little love, get down tonight!

They teach us, in our rider education courses, not to watch the wheel of the bike in a u-turn. You have to physically turn your head in the direction you want to go and fix your eyes on where you want to end up. The rest of your body will guide the bike properly to make the turn, no matter how tight it seems.

Actually trying this manuver takes faith in your instructor and trust in yourself to try it the first time. The Goldwings we ride are not small. They don't have the world's smallest wheel base. To believe that big bike will make a 12 foot turn in the road and not hit the gravel shoulder really takes trust - or (big OR) experience. You can't get the experience if you don't try it yourself.

You have to trust that he knows what he is telling you a truth. You have to believe the instructions are correct. You watch the instructor do the manuver. You can watch six other people on bikes just like yours do the same turn and still feel, "Not me, I can't do this!" You lack faith in your ability.

But it's finally your turn. You are paying attention now! The instructor looks right at you and says, "Turn your head, look at the spot next to the cone you want to end up beside, give her some gas and go for it."

You get your head turned on your neck, sight your cone, the front end turns with your upper body, you give it a little gas and let the clutch out slow, always looking where you want to go and WOW- if the bike doesn't just GET THERE! All by itself! You never looked at the front wheel even once. Not even at the handle bars. It worked!

You put your foot down and stop, feeling pretty surprised and proud of yourself. Wow! I did it! Never even hit a cone. The instructor smiles at you and you grin back then you ride back over to the ranks with the rest of the class.

This is a new understanding, a new Knowing, of the ability the student has with his machine. It is real and it changes the way they handle the bike for ever after.

When you teach something real by showing others how to do it there is a joy to it every time. When that newbie has the light go off in their head, learns that they can do this and sends you that smile of appreciation and new confidence it brings a feeling of joy to you.

You have to look where you are going to get where you want to be. When you look to the Divine Love within you each day, loving and being loved with it, you don't have to watch your feet. The act of turning to that loving guidance makes it seem like everything just - WOW - happens all by itself!

Listen with your heart, not your ears, see with your loving spirit, not your eyes of judgement, reach out to others knowing the right answer is always love. What is the loving thing to do?

I have a joy on days when I get the connection right inside myself that has me dancing and making music again. When I know I am doing the loving thing for me and for my loved ones I feel no fear of a wrong decision. I wish to experience it everyday and I wish the joy for all of you.

The body is your motorcycle, the spirit is you and the way to get where you are going in the easiest way is to look where your heart is leading you.

Do something you love doing today just because you love being alive and able to do it! Savor the feeling you get. That's the way to begin. Start now!

How deep is your love?

I am busy thinking, praying and watching miracles around me. I offer a poet in my place. Edgar A. Guest

THE MAN WHO COULDN'T SAVE

THE MAN WHO COULDN'T SAVE
He spent what he made, or he gave it away,
Tried to save money, and would for a day,
Started a bank-account time an' again,
Got a hundred or so for a nest egg, an' then
Some fellow that needed it more than he did,
Who was down on his luck, with a sick wife or kid,
Came along an' he wasted no time till he went
An' drew out the coin that for saving was meant.

They say he died poor, and I guess that is so:
To pile up a fortune he hadn't a show;
He worked all the time and good money he made,
Was known as an excellent man at his trade.
But he saw too much, heard too much, felt too much here
To save anything by the end of the year,
An' the shabbiest wreck the Lord ever let live
Could get money from him if he had it to give.

I've seen him slip dimes to the bums on the street
Who told him they hungered for something to eat,
An' though I remarked they were going for drink
He'd say: "Mebbe so. But I'd just hate to think
That fellow was hungry an' I'd passed him by;
I'd rather be fooled twenty times by a lie
Than wonder if one of 'em I wouldn't feed
Had told me the truth an' was really in need."

Never stinted his family out of a thing:
They had everything that his money could bring;
Said he'd rather be broke and just know they were glad,
Than rich, with them pining an' wishing they had
Some of the pleasures his money would buy;
Said he never could look a bank book in the eye
If he knew it had grown on the pleasures and joys
That he'd robbed from his wife and his girls and his boys.

Queer sort of notion he had, I confess,
Yet many a rich man on earth is mourned less.
All who had known him came back to his side
To honor his name on the day that he died.
Didn't leave much in the bank, it is true,
But did leave a fortune in people who knew
The big heart of him, an' I'm willing to swear
That to-day he is one of the richest up there.

Make 'em laugh, make 'em laugh

He said I could forward it, I just wanted to let you see a little of why he amuses me so.

To those who were concerned, or, completely out of the loop...

I awoke one morning, in the cab of my truck, like many another morning. I was on the state line between Illinois and Wisconsin, ready to begin another arduous day of driving to and fro.

But the fickle fates had something else planned for me. A sharp, nearly debilitating pain in my groin. Moving difficult, climbing in and out of my truck bordering on nearly impossible. Some of you know that I have something of a higher than average pain threshold, probably from running my head into solid objects on a regular basis as a child.

Well, this pain stopped me, left me nauseous and sweating. The first thing I did? Call an ambulance? Nope. Take pain killers? Nope. I immediately called my wife. Maybe I needed a second opinion. Perhaps I needed confirmation that I was in a ridiculous amount of pain.

She, apparently, could hear the suffering in my voice and told me to head to the nearest hospital. This seemed as good idea as any, so after packing a bag reflexively, (I’m a professional traveler after all) I called a taxi and had them cart me off to the nearest hospital, that being Blank in Waukegan Illinois.

The cab ride tested my pain threshold as the car in question had no suspension to speak of and, of course, I stressed the need to hurry. The driver did as requested, but I found out that the city of Waukegan’s road maintenance budget was seriously under funded. Each bump lanced more pain through my abdomen.

Soon enough however I reached the afore mentioned hospital. It was very early in the morning and there was almost no wait to get through the doors. No, the admissions process was very prompt. It was every thing else that took all day.

They put me in a bed in the ER, had me drink some barium so I would glow in the dark for the CT Scan, took as much blood as I could spare, then made me wait.

And wait.

And wait....

Some time after noon the guys over in radiology fit me in, bombarded me with gamma rays and turned me into the Incredible Hulk. . . . no...wait. Scratch that. I’m not large, green and violent...or at least not large and green...the violence comes later. But they did zap me for a few minutes, then sent me back to the ER to wait for about 2 more hours.

The results came back. A minor, if painful infection in gastro-intestinal track was the verdict. Painful, but not life threatening. They were all ready to give me a prescription for pain killers and send me on my merry way.

Perhaps them making me wait all day was to my benefit. I had just gotten dressed, gotten my discharge papers and was packed up and ready to go! Woohoo! I was literally passing through the door of my ER room when the nurse flagged me down and turned me around. I was not pleased. She had me return to my room and await the return of a different doctor. I think I saw a doctor previously, but he was a blur and I did blink once or twice, so I could be mistaken.

The new doctor showed up a few minutes later and told me that while, yes, there was indeed a minor and painful infection, the infected area was my appendix. Painkillers and antibiotics probably weren’t going to cut the mustard. No. The appendix would have to come out, and he could have me in surgery in 15 minutes.

Well! Great! What the heck! Lets get a small, fairly useless bit of me, cut out! I didn't have anything else planned for the day.

Sure enough, a few minutes later I was back in the smock with my rear flapping in the breeze and being zipped off to be prepped for surgery. The last thing I recall was that someone was strapping my legs down. Then….nothing.

It was reported later to me that whilst on the verge of becoming conscious again in the recovery room that I went briefly psycho. It took 4 people to hold me down, and another to reinsert the IV that I had torn from wrist. It seems I desperately wanted the picture of my daughter from my wallet. It was completely inexplicable and wasn’t really lucid, but that was how it was reported to me.

Needless to say, they gave me more drugs.

Later I awoke properly in a room, conspicuously alone. Clearly it was a two person room, but they didn’t want me going psycho on any roommate. And really, who could blame them. It was late by then, and I slept intermittently throughout the night, taking a Vicodan when the pain got the better of me.

Early in the morning my wife arrived sometime after my first meal in over 30 hours; Surprisingly good for hospital food. After waiting till well into the afternoon for the doc to finally release me, my wife took me home. Already I was feeling better, and there was far less pain.

We arrived home and shortly after my daughter and dog followed suit. I will be laid up for a couple of days while I complete my recovery, but I expect it will be fairly uneventful.

Thanks for reading my ramblings.
#1son

Think I'm gonna have a son

It's funny just how quickly you can go from a trusting spirit of love in a human body to going, "Shove over and let me show you how this should be done, Creator!"

My #1son, the truck driver, woke with abdominal pain yesterday. He called his wife and she brow beat him into going to a hospital in northern Illinois. He could not drive and took a cab to the ER. Once there they said he had a gastro intestinal infection, put him on antibiotics and gave him some pain pills. They ran him through some tests, just to be sure, and ended up taking out his appendix last night. I had two messages on the machine when I got home from work from #1daughter in law telling me the bare bones of this.

I had my appendix rupture when I was 12. I know how bad peritonitis is. I know how severe the pain is just before that happens. I know how it is to be alone and dealing with being too drugged to be coherent. I don't believe anyone should be alone and doing paperwork on drugs in a hospital. I think hospitals are a great place to get really sick from mersa, staff and strep infections. I was Not happy. Now what?

Knowing that all life is treasured and each form of it cared for in the best way to bring it willingly back to the creator I prayed for healing for my son and safety for his wife as she drove to join him - NOT!!!!!

I called until I found the right hospital to discover he was already in surgury. I called his wife and gave her the contact numbers. I called my mom and my sister and my Eldest Daughter and Best Girl and anyone else I could think of to get the prayer wheels spinning.

I had my clothes in the washer and was digging out my credit card to go flying to his side and leaving messages to see if Eldest could get there first, she is a little closer. Pretty much I was just out of control and ramming on down the road to get to the boy I love. About half way through the first round of calls I realized I was getting even further out of control.

Until the spirit of Scotty perfects the transporter I wasn't going to be able to get there even by the time he was out of surgury. There were other people and hands taking care of my son. He is 32, not 12. His wife is who should be at his side.

My place is back up to their team, not team leader. If they have car trouble or get messed up traveling I can fetch the car hauler and get them home. If they can't get home for some reason I can get the dog or the #1grandgirl and keep them if needed.

I sat down to the table and hung my head. Then I cried. I realized why I was blowing up and crashing. Dad went in '02, stepDad went in '03, the mate is just barely gone in '06 and my only son is down and I can't really get there and I can't change anything if I do get there and I didn't like it one bit.

Then I prayed. I didn't dicker but I didn't beat around the bush. I wasn't going to like seeing my grandgirl lose her dad and my daughter in law lose her loving mate. I know I was over reacting but I know what infections are out there and how wrong "just an appendix" operation can go.
Just leave me this young man in my life please. I am lonely now. This one makes me laugh, leave me him, please.

And today, in the beauty of the sunshine and the reality of the DIL getting there safely the stress is off. He is fine and - barring infections - going to be back up and around quickly. They should be just fine coming home tomorrow or whenever.

My panic seems amusing today. Silly Moms, ya know. Except to me it was such a tearing at my heart need to do everything I could to be there for my son and his family that I was half out of my mind.

I guess I still have some growing to do.

Wishin' n hopin'n thinkin'n prayin'

There have been many things in my head lately and on my heart. I have been reading, writing, studying and thinking. I keep feeling like I am developing spiritually not only "outside the box" but that there is no box for me.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think that is bad, I just think I will have to discover much on my own that has probably been done before and better by others because I am not finding the others that have done it the way I feel led.

As a confirmed gender rule defying female, social convention flaunter, and fairly wild child in life and continuing that self even in my spiritual life I finally found one little book that spoke a word to my spirit. My MOM loaned it to me! ACK! You should find this stuff in the dusty back bin of a library or something so you have the joy of discovery, but my Mom got to be the messenger here.

If you don't fit in any of the boxes out there for spirituality, try "The Barbarian Way" by Erwin Raphael McManus.

P.S. Cyrus, bless you for the sharing and the precisely perfect timing, you will like this one.

Well, it's spring time in the rockies

And I'm full o' mountain dew.
Spring in Michigan has been post-poned

It was almost like a song

I forgot to tell you that if you click this and the one I did two posts ago that it will come up in a printable size.

Have fun!

I've seen fire and I've seen rain

but I never saw a frozen flower before.

I had been glad to see the crocus' bloom and they had just finished when my daffodils and Narcissus bloomed out full. We had a hard rain and the next day we dropped to freezing-POOF! My daffodils were all tipped over, leaves flopped to the ground. When I went outside for something I looked more closely and realized the flowers were in full bloom still.

Normally a frozen blossom goes brown and then dies. These showed no sign of damage at all. I walked over, flipped one upright by the stem and discovered they were daffycicles...

The sun shone through the luminescence of the iced petals like stained glass. They already look so fragil and frail but now the shatter factor added to that delicacy in a way I find hard to describe. I picked one and took it in to show the nephew, niece in law and grand neice.

They were there to fix a broken basement step for me and do some easy plumbing in exchange for the mate's pool table. C2son and family have just moved into their new home and the "family" pool table will be available to all of us still in their finished basement party room. It feels right. The older grand kids got a table and the younger ones don't have room for one. It's like the bike. I can hardly use it, I won't sell it and I didn't know what else to do but I need the room for people to stay over in, it had to go. This feels right to me.

The Bother in Law was out to do the sump for me last week and I spent two different days wading in water up to my calves on the cement floor. I was using the portable pump, a length of hose and two pieces of down spout left over from the guttering to run water out of the basement. Once was at, ohhhh, 1:30 am-ish...ew. It was fun visiting with Bro2 while he installed the new pump.

Yesterday I shared time with the Sis and family there. What a great dinner, our favorite; scalloped potatoes and ham au gratin and cooked to crunchy with glazed ham and pineapple. Yum! C1boy did the easter eggs filled with candy and hidden for the little ones. It was fun.

I visted with KMA on the way home. We had a great chat and I got to see her drawings of her dream retirement home. It was a nice time. Two pots of coffee worth of visiting enjoyed!

Jeanette's kids are now in their own housing. One family finally got the deal done on the place they were trying to buy. They moved in last week. The other family took an apartment in the city of Countyseat. Both males have jobs now but one of them fell and shattered the top of his tibia, he is working in pain and a brace while it heals. Why? Because, like many of us, he feels he needs the money and can't take the time off to heal. His girl was working but it was part time, a 20 mile drive and a babysitter math problem. She is looking for work closer to home.

Jeanett's car is giving her fits. It's a beater Chevy and we can't figure out why it gets all wacky at speed. They have fixed ball joint, tie rods, and etc. It still gets a shimmy over 40 mph.

Jeanette has been issued her building permit and is taking bids on the house right now. It's so hard to be half here and half there and the rest of your stuff gone or way over there. We are just waiting for the right contractor and solution to present. She is so homesick. I remember how it makes your heart hurt to have been not just self supporting but even caring for others and then to find yourself homeless.

There is a mortgage company ready to go her the loan - but only on a completed house. The contractors are bidding and will build it - only if she gets a building loan. It's more paperwork to everyone, call the bank, the mortgage company, decide what we can cut, get more paperwork to everyone, more bids, more time wasted piddling around while you try to get to work, see the grands who are in a new school, do your laundry, shower, try to have a life and all the while all you want is to run into YOUR HOME, slam the door and throw yourself on the bed to have a good cry. If they put a roof on it, she'd move in tomorrow.

Today she was the hero for me. I am back to work. She calls and says we have no water, could the filter be plugged? I have a simple, undersized in-line filter on the water pipe in the basement. I talked her through changing the filter, still no water. She has double checked the water valves, now what? She asked where it's wired in and I directed her to a box I think is it. We have never had this problem so I am guessing.

She pops it open and gets a spark. I had to replace a sump pump last week, this is not good. The floor is still very damp. Still, she bravely went ahead, decided she saw the problem, closed it up and we had water again! Yay! It's not the pump!

Double YAY! She didn't blow herself up either. Now I am sitting here wondering if she shut off the outside faucet....hmmmmm?

There have been multitudes of situations for the four families of us that could have erupted into huge messes but the solutions are coming as fast - and in some cases even faster than- the percieved problems. Every need has been met.

We aren't rolling in dough here, in fact I haven't let the cash get this low in a long time. But just when I think maybe this time it won't happen, here comes help. Money, food, labor, talent, friendship, counseling, a break for the stress. It just keeps working out. I told them I would be covered no matter how low I went financially as long as I was doing as I was directed. It's my "show me" kind of heart that so loves that part of this experience. My friend can't help but see that no matter how low I get, in my heart or my wallet, that something uplifting carries me over the rough spots. Always has, always will.

A good 'bo always walks with his head down but to find the way out you have to look inside yourself, to the mystery of the life that you are and connect with the source of all life, the Divine Love. Pour out your heart there then reach out to help others in need and your life will be rewarding and meaningful. Not always easy, but always more deeply satisfying.

"The beauty of the blossoms frozen in time, never aging, never dying, glows with the appearance of life but they will never create life from their seed. " ( I thought that up!)

There, a "real" post. Hugs to you all.

Every now and then

when the world steps in
Stealin' all our time away
It soon takes so much, we forget to touch

I'm just saying - Love is all you leave behind you and love is all you can take with you when you go.