Wednesday, September 10, 2008

FALLING

Fear is a funny thing. I found myself with no fear. None at all. I did not even think of the safety things that would keep me from needing to be afraid. I even suppressed the since of pain. This was not a conscious thing, but the letting go of all the little taunts that enter my mind as I go about my day. “Be careful this or that will hurt you.” – “Don’t do this because this or that is going to happen if you do.” – “You better watch out this is DANGEROUS!”, and many others. I just did not hear them anymore. As if some how I was not aware that anything could hurt me.

I had noticed that my natural hesitation was gone, but I did not know to what extent it had evolved. Until… I set the ladder to get on a roof. I know how to set ladders. I know that the center of gravity needs to be in line with the feet of the ladder, placing it so the person on it has a solid foundation to get up on the roof. I know that ladders can slip. I know that as you shift your weight onto the roof the ladder is your anker to the ground and will support you IF it is set up properly. I know all this. But some how this day all my learning, all my caution was not there.

I set up the ladder, evaluated it, I don’t know why, incorrectly, setting it 8 feet out away from the building at a ridiculous angle of about this angle. Ridiculous! I hopped up and got to the top.
As I stepped off the ladders footing slipped on the cement pad
and through me off the roof backwards.


Roof I fell off

Retaining wall my back hit

Again as I say I still had no fear. I thought to myself as I was falling, “Well, I guess I won’t be doing this project for a while. I guess I will need to finish the quilt.”

I laid there for about 5 minutes assessing what I had done to myself. I had fallen back first against a fence and slid down to hit my ribs on the base retaining wall. I could feel that my ribs were probably broken and as I tried to move I knew that my left foot had hit the cement pad then been hit by the ladder rung and was pinned under the ladder.

I yelled for my neighbor but it was 7:30 pm and he was already inside and could not hear me. I was at the very back of the yard in a little alcove, so even if someone came in the back they would not see me. I yelled for a while but everyone was in for the evening. So I tried to move--again with no fear! The pain overwhelmed me a few times, but I managed to untangle myself from the ladder, find a long stick and assess if my foot or anything else was broken. It took half an hour from when I fell to get to the front of the house to the phone. Tiny step and wait, tiny step and wait all the way.

The thing that amazes me is that at no time was I afraid. No since that I would die, no since of anything but getting help, assessing the damage and figuring out what to do next.

I have spent a lot of time thinking about how to prevent things like this from happening. But I never realized that fear is not what really is experienced when something real happens.

Fear is the anticipation of something happening--amazingly useless.

Caution and clear thinking are much more useful.

No fear-- just good judgment.


Quilts I designed and made while I recovered.

This quilt was for the new baby of a construction company family.

This one was so his big sister would not get jealous.This quilt was in my Great Aunt Aurora's sewing from 1950's. She had mail ordered the kit. She had done the first two children and I finished the rest and hand quilted it. What a joy to see it finished. This one was for a friend who loves frogs.

Sunday, September 7, 2008

The Smiling Sugar Bowel


I have a Blue Willow sugar bowel, snowy white and blue
It keeps my sugar for me ‘til I want it too.

I fill it with cute little white sugar cubes,
which come neatly in a row.
Unlike crystal sugar that piles up like snow.

When the cubes fill it up the little top sits on it askew.
They jumble up in its plump little belly
waiting for the coffee to brew.

My little sugar bowel smiled up at me
with its hat tilted to one side
Its the little white cubes glistening.
Its smile opened wide.

"I’m ready for your coffee now,
with snowy cubes anew
Bring on the steamy brew and
you will see what I can do!"

Ode to the Orange I, II, III


Oh! Little Golden Orb of Sunshiny Pleasure
You bless us at Christmastime with your cheerfulness.
In springtime nestled in the leaves
Your tiny white flowers perfume the air all around
With a thick and sweet honey fragrance.
In your first days you are tiny and green,
But you grow into plump sunny joy by winter just when we need you.
Dimpled yellow-gold spheres hang like Christmas ornaments
On the tip of a shiny leafed branch.
Heavy with sun and rain and golden goodness
A good shake and you come tumbling to the ground.
The scent of your skin fills my hand
As I rescue you from the fallen leaves
My fingernail breaks the surface of your golden peel
Like sprites, your fragrant oils jump into the air
They will not be lost to my hungry mouth!
Your soft spongy white fills my nails
The silky pungent oil turns my hand shiny orange.
I save your peel or another treat.
If I am careful I do not spill even a tiny bit of the precious juice
That lies inside your perfectly sectioned belly.
(Is your belly button an iny or an outy?)
Covered with a thin white paper
Your sections open to reveal golden droplets filled with juice.
Your essence fills the air and my mouth waters in anticipated Joy!
I pull out a smiley wedge
Pop it full on to my waiting tongue.
My teeth sink into the golden droplets
The juice runs down my tongue filling
My mouth,
My nose,
My consciousness with pure joy.
Whole, sliced into wheels or smiles, fresh or cooked, candied or jellied
Oh! Little Golden Orb of Sunshiny Pleasure,
Full of color, scent, sweet taste,
Healthful Christmas pleasure on a cold rainy or snowy day
You are the best!
Merry Christmas 2006


Ode to the Orange II


Oh! Precious orange so round and bright
Keep us healthy all through the cold winter night

Your succulent little wedges make us smile
All the while making our insides free of bile

O little wonder of the winter
How do you do it?
My nose is not stuffy
My throat is not sore
My chest can breathe deeply
In the cold snowy air.

Even though you don’t grow here
You think of us all summer
Making your little green orbs
That turn orange to brighten
Our Tum Tum Tummers
May all the winters be brightened with your presence
While we gleefully unwrap all our presents.

Christmas 2007
Ode to an Orange III

Oh little orb of happiness
You sweetness we do cherish
We roll you like a piece of dough
And squish you until at last
We prick your wrinkly rind
With peppermint so strait and fine
And suck sublime fruity minty sweet juice
Until you look like your skin is loose.

Our tummies full we turn a new
To find a few clove blossoms
all dry and brown
That fill you skin with a heavenly smell
As we push them into your little shell.
We tie a bow and hang you low and
As you dry your fragrance fills our closets.
We can ignore smell of the world out side
Because your beauty fills our world
With joy and pride.

How can we thank you for such bliss?
We will plant you with a kiss
Of heaven, earth, and stars above
To show you how much we love
The joy you bring at Christmas time
2008

Fair and unbiased



The American media have prided themselves on their objectivity and fairness. Recently, I have become aware that this pride has left them open to being manipulated by those who would lie to get their way. Because of the media’s need to feel they have been fair to everyone they allow anyone to speak without going through the material for lies. This may seem like censorship but in fact it is responsible reporting. Allowing someone to publicly speak untruths is the same as promoting the lie. Letting raving, lies, misdirection and flat out deception air is unconscionable.

Fair and unbiased should give the media the responsibility to search out facts and present them without attachment. FACTS? Yes, real facts they do exist and should be what is in the news. This is our right to a free press. Allowing someone to guilt the media into airing or printing something that is outright a lie is breaking the contract with the people. The media is the watchdog of our rights. Why are they not functioning that way?

Saturday, September 6, 2008

Bubbles

Bubbles
BeautifulFragile
TemporaryMemorable
Just like us.
We remember the beauty
We are thankful for it.
As we should be for each other
Remember that you are also like
the bubble
Make the most of the time
You have with each other.
Thank goodness for the Beauty
Of each moment.

Is guilt really guilt?


Is Guilt Really Guilt?

I feel uncomfortable when I realize I have made a mistake.
I feel bad when I haven’t done something that I feel I should have.
I have difficulties doing other things until I apologize for a wrong done to someone else.
I feel dirty if my house is not vacuumed and dusted.
When I am too tired to do the dishes or to busy to water the garden I am not happy with myself.
I feel shame when I eat two packs of cookies in 4 days just because they were there.
Is this really the big G --Guilt?
No.
Don't sweat the little things. These are not guilt, but your own need for order and consistant behavior with your values.
Guilt is not these uncomfortable feelings. Guilt is much more than that. It is the recognition that you are not as nice as you thought you were. Guilt is the full recognition that you have done something to someone or something that has damaged them forever. Guilt is the realization that you will willfully do things that you know are wrong.
Forgiveness comes when you fully recognize this and try your hardest not to do the things that harmed others by your actions or inactions. This try and the attempt to make the wrong right is the path to forgiving yourself and when you can do this you don’t need to be afraid to continue your life. If you don’t come to this forgivness there will always be a weight on Your Being that will stop you from doing.

Make things right in your life, recognize what part you had in it, change what you can, ask for forgiveness when you can’t change it, and forgive yourself for being weak enough to have done it.Your life will be better for it and so will the lives of all around you.

Friday, September 5, 2008

Morning Glories

Morning Glories




I was in my vegetable garden and I pulled up 375 Morning Glory seedlings. It made me think of the 6 or so other times I have weeded that bed and had the same results. I just plug along and pull them up, one by one, and soon the dormant little siblings of theses little two leafed heart-shaped green bits of fetal blue and purple flowers are popping up everywhere.

Well, it all started when my neighbor planted Morning Glory to cover the front of a large yellow 2-car garage. Boy! Did it look beautiful! The flowers came in large blue buds that twisted out to unfold a large blue flower that turned first purple then pink as it matured. Spectacular!

Several years later it was a full cover for above the garage doors, but long tendrils crept into my rose hedge and up over my plum tree as well as covering the fence between our yards and creeping into every little crack in the wall of the shed.

One day the neighbor behind me said “You probably need to do something about that Morning Glory. It is blooming INSIDE your shed! I turned and looked and sure enough the flowers were right there in the window.



So when my neighbor moved he pulled down his Morning Glory and left the garage bright and clean. We needed to have a gardener come and clean it off the fence and behind both garage and shed and then poisoned it so it would not come back. But still it popped up in the rose hedge. It had put down roots deep in the thicket where we could not reach. That was not too much of a problem because when the long tendrils snook out of their hiding place they quickly get snipped and that was that.

But the birds had some ideas about this plant too. My back fence, all the way across the yard, grew 3 pretty little Morning Glory seedlings last year. I let them grow because the blossoms are so beautiful and the plant covered the chain link fence so nicely, but I did not take them down in the fall nor did I clean up the seeds that dropped. Boy, was that a mistake!

Now I have a constant job of cleaning out these little cloven-hoofed shaped leaves that pop up all over my vegetable garden.



I think they are timed released. In April I pulled 175, In May I pulled 200 twice. (I am counting them just not to be so bored). Then in June there were 350, now in July, I got 375 all from the same place--all just seedlings. Those three Morning Glory plants I let go last year were very happy in my yard!

Well, I was just thinking. Discordant behaviors in your life are like the Morning Glory plant. Some are even beautiful because of the excitement or even pleasure they bring, but they have such a high cost. If indulged in they plant seeds of disharmony that are much more destructive than the discordant behaviors itself.

So weed your garden of behaviors every day or they may cover over your life with the blossoms of disharmony. You may have a Morning Glory patch too big for you to handle and all other thing you do in your life may be covered over!

Waiting for Water

Waiting for Water


Water is the universal solvent. It dissolves almost everything given its own time. I was washing dishes today and picked up a spatula that someone had used a scrubbing pad on. It had a little mark where the food had been and even tiny scratches all around the food mark where someone had scrubbed to get the food off. I do not know when this was done, but I could clearly see the mark that the stuck-on food had left. It could have been days, weeks even years ago, but I saw it today.

I wonder if that person who so desperately wanted the food off that spatula knows that I know it was scrubbed. I wonder if he/she knows that their efforts can be seen so far into the future.

How many times have we done something in a rash moment of impatience that made its mark deep into the future?

Waiting for the water to soften the food so it could be wiped off easily with a soft cloth would have been the way to not let the stubborn food leave its mark on the spatula. Similarly if time is given its way all things that seem impossible are softened to be easily dealt with. But are we patent enough to wait for this? This person was not and the mark will be there for the life of the spatula.

I wonder if our impatience is like that.


Thursday, September 4, 2008

Tomatoes on the vine

15 pounds of tomatoes off one plant

Dried all into to these two little jars

Arn't they cute


If you don't know what I think you will now.
Why I don’t listen to both sides anymore.


As a child I was taught to listen to both sides of an issue in order to get perspective. I have diligently done this all my life. The news media is forever getting two opposing sides to talk about issues. It has been a rule that there are always at least two sides to every situation. Honesty was always implied, both sides merely having legitimate differences of opinion or differing facts.

BUT…I have become aware that devious desperate people will propose fictitious arguments (LIE) to confuse and sway people to their side.

The tobacco company to keep their product on the market, the polluters to keep from paying for the damage to their neighbors and the environment, bosses to keep from paying the women in their employ an equal wage, the president to get us into a war, and the list goes on . . . . . . . . . . . . .

This week is the Republican convention. I have always watched both sides. I have been an independent voter, but as I watched the opening event, the choice for vice president, I heard my first bold face lie. That was enough for me.

The Democrats will raise taxes on Exxon’s windfall profits not on the middle class, and 6 years in a state legislature, 2 years in the Senate is more experience than years of running a small town or being governor of a large state full of caribou! The choice of a 42 year old woman who has domestic credibility and limited public service plus the old lie that the Democrats will raise taxes was the last straw.

When they said and I quote “America loves an underdog” I knew they were not seriously going to put out any facts but just play on sympathy. DON’T BELIEVE IT! Choose the party that gave us a surplus not the one who killed our children, and took our jobs and SPENT that surplus plus gave us the largest deficit ever. When will we wake up?


I will not be listening to the other side this time. Global warming is more important than protecting Exxon from playing us back the money they bleed from our economy. Having 2 people who have devoted their whole lives to public service and the presence of mind to have advisors that are smart not just on their side is enough!

The Republican Party is devious desperate people who are proposing fictitious arguments (LIE) to confuse and sway people to their side.

I don’t believe advertizing or the Republican Party or any of its representatives any longer so I will not listen even to counter their arguments. I won’t even be listening!


LIES are LIES.
THE REPUBLICAN PARTY IS LIEING!
DON’T LISTEN AMERICA!