Month: June 2023

Smile, It’s Friday

Happy Friday!!! I am not going to spend a lot of time with my favorites today because I am enjoying my time with some of my longtime favorite people. My favorite for today is my mouth guard which I resisted for years and thus paid to repair many a cracked tooth. My biggest fear, that as a claustrophobic person, I was concerned about anything that felt to big and clunky and “choke-y” in my mouth. And I certainly didn’t want to pay hundreds of dollars for it. And so my practical, kind, hygienist suggested this inexpensive, no frills, no-need-to-boil, dainty nightly mouthguard. It works. I love it. I no longer wake up with sore teeth or a sore jaw. I’m grateful to have finally broken down, and to have tried it, and at a $20 pricepoint, there is no reason not to try it. You can get this at any local drugstore or Walgreens: SleepRight Select-Comfort Dental Guard

Have a wonderful weekend!! See you tomorrow.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Seven Rocks

picture credit: CNN

Later this evening I will be travelling up to Virginia to reconnect with my seven best friends from college. We used to be really good about having a yearly reunion, but the last time we have had this reunion (or GW as we call it, “Girls Weekend”) was January 2020, when the coronavirus was just this weird virus happening over in China, that none of us knew anything about.

So more than three years later, all eight of us will finally reconvene, in person, again. And I am so excited. I have known these wonderful women for 34 years, since I was 18 years old. Imagine it – eight, 18-year-old ladies, just coming into early adulthood, connecting in college, and sharing funny, crazy college-age adventures together. (and yes, there were other friends along the way, but none of them seem to have “the sticking power” over the three decades that the eight of us magnets seem to have held on to, despite all odds) It is not lost on me, that as I am early entering into this next stage of my adulthood, I will be with seven of the women who helped me to enter into my first stage of adulthood, and who were there to support me, and to moor and anchor me, and to remind me who I am at my core, as I waded into the murky waters of becoming the adult woman, wife, mother, friend, and the overall person who I am today.

As anyone who has lived a life knows, none of us ladies knew what was in store for us, when we launched each other into the first halves of our adulthood. We had inklings. We had dreams. And all eight of us have experienced amazing, wonderful experiences, and also devastating events in our individual lives. This is just the way of life. But what isn’t always the way, is that not everyone has seven constants on their shores. Not everyone has seven giant rocks and pillars of support who have witnessed all of your milestones throughout your entire adulthood. Not everyone has seven people who know you intimately, and have decided to stick with you, and to focus on your lovely qualities and to mostly ignore your flaws. Such kind mirrors, long-time friends can be! Something in our friendship experience feels divine. Something about reconvening with these ladies right at this early empty nest period of my life, feels divine. Why wouldn’t anyone cling to the people and the experiences in your life which feel divine? There are seven strong pillars waiting for me to unite with them. We have survived storms and waves and calm and sunshine and even some battering among ourselves, and no doubt, we will continue to do so. Our shared friendship has withstood the test of time, and I believe that this combined friendship will help to see me (and us) through all of the next set of adventures in this next stage of adulting, and all the way through to the end of our journeys.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Journal Prompts

I have quite a few errands to do in the next couple of days, so my writing is likely to be sparse. Maybe I will just throw out various thoughts that I have pondered this week, and you may use them as your own journal prompts, if you are so inclined.

“How you start your day is how you live your day. How you live your day is how you live your life.” – Louise Hay (This is why I start my every day, communing with you all, writing on the blog. It’s good for me and it is good for my life. Thank you for enhancing my life. Ty. Ty. Ty.)

“The changes we dread most may contain our salvation.”– Barbara Kingsolver I have witnessed this fact in my own life, and in so many other people’s lives, too. Where are you feeling a constant agitation or resistance in your own life? Are there changes that need to be made? Are you in the way of your own salvation?

“Life is made of two dots and a dash. Make the most of the dash.” – Anonymous

Dash away, dash away, dash away all!!!! See you tomorrow. Please leave your answers to the journal prompts in my Comments, if you are so inclined.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Pawns in the Game

Did you ever feel like you were a pawn in someone else’s game? Did you ever look way up into the sky expecting to see the puppet strings and the puppeteer? What if you are that pawn, though? What if you are a pawn in the enormous, strong, beautiful hands of a brilliant, kind, masterful, omniscient player? Is it possible that in those times that you feel deep, intuitive impulses to do something for someone else, or for yourself, or to do something about a situation in your own life or in your community, it might actually be “the player” using your individual talents and your particular position on the board to elevate the overall masterpiece of the game? Is it possible that you are a major part of the game that is constantly leveling up?

I am a believer that we are a mixture of our own free will, and the overall will of the point of the game – love, creation, joy. We can be stubborn little pawns and we can say, “You know what? Nope. I’m not moving. In fact, I’m going to take a big step backwards, so there.” And the player says, “That’s okay. You do you. I have other moves that I can make with other pawns. The game will go on . . . . And by the way, I love you and I am happy that you are part of the game. When you are ready to take a step forward again, I’ll be here to lift you up.”

Picture credit: Dicebreaker

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Monday – Funday

I love our dogs. I mean, I adore our dogs. But Josie, our collie causes more fur-formed tumbleweeds than a major storm in the Mojave Desert. And our dogs can’t look out our glass sliders (which form most of the back of our house) without making absolutely sure to having their sloppy wet noses touch the glass. (And of course, our dogs are all three different heights: small, medium, and large) The bottom half of our sliders are translucent to opaque, on a regular basis.

My youngest son questions everything in life. (I wonder where he gets that from. Hmmm.) He once said, “I love our dogs as much as any of us do, but don’t you think it is kind of weird that humankind has evolved to have animals living with us, in our houses? I mean, does it seem a little strange?” (Despite agreeing with him, we all kissed the dogs and ignored our son the rest of the day. 😉 )

Bottom line is, I love my dogs and I love Oreos. They are worth the never-ending cycle of cleaning up after them. Have a great week!

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Soul Sunday

Good morning. Welcome to poetry day on the blog. May today feel like you are immersed in your own poetry.

I’ve been a little under the weather the last few days with a bug, and I’ve noticed that the strange blessing of feeling unwell is that it slows you down enough to notice things that you normally wouldn’t notice. The other day, after a big rainstorm, the sun was catching the raindrops on our screened lanai and made them dazzle in their reflection on the pool. I was so intrigued that I took a video of it.

After Many Springs by Langston Hughes

Now,
In June,
When the night is a vast softness
Filled with blue stars,
And broken shafts of moon-glimmer
Fall upon the earth,
Am I too old to see the fairies dance?
I cannot find them any more.

Readers, I am happy to report that I am not too old to see fairies dance in June. Are you?

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Tide Turns

“Never give up, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.” – Harriet Beecher Stowe

I think that this is the perfect description of what it means to finally “Let go and let God.” We usually fight tooth and nail to hold on to control of outcomes that we want to happen, and then, when we finally get to that exhausted, exasperated state of throwing up our hands in surrender, usually something which we never even could have planned for or foreseen occurs, and then “turns the tide”, as Harriet Beecher Stowe proclaims.

I’ve shared this story before, but it is worth repeating again. During the Great Recession we were stuck with an underwater house in a different state, where we never planned to go back to again to live. The house, which was once a beloved, carefully conceived treasure, became an enormous, nasty albatross around our necks. When I was complaining about the situation to a friend, she said, “You need to let this go.”

“I have let it go!” I pronounced a little too hysterically. “There is nothing I want more than to be done with this house and this situation.”

“But you haven’t let it go,” she said quietly and confidently. “Look at how your stomach flinches when you talk about it.” And she was right. And from that moment on, I did what I could towards the situation, but I let go of the outcome of it all.

And a very little while later, the house situation was resolved in ways that almost seemed miraculous, and it ended up benefitting so many people, besides just ourselves.

Use today’s blog post as a gut check for yourself. Is there something in your life that has you utterly and completely mentally and emotionally played out? Is there something in your life that is not resolving in the way that you want it to, despite all of your best and every efforts? Is there something that still makes your stomach lurch even when you tell yourself and others, that you don’t care about it anymore? Harriet Beecher Stowe is right. Hold on. This is just about the time, when the tide is bound to turn. Let go and let God. Everything is going to resolve for you, in ways you could never have foreseen. Believe it.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Pet Rock Friday

Good morning. I am still in a NyQuil haze. First I’d like to send a birthday shoutout to my aunt today. She is that “cool, stylish aunt” who everyone needs to have in their life. She bought me my first phone (rotary, pink) and took me to my first ever concert (Olivia Newton John). She’s always been incredibly supportive of my family and of my writing. I love you, AB!! Have a great day!!

I’ll cut right to the chase to my favorite for today because this damn virus allows me the energy of a sloth. Today’s favorite is the adorable Pet Rock seen above created by JellyCreativeCo on Etsy. I gave her to my youngest son who works remote, since he is already entertaining the idea of getting a dog for his new apartment that he moved into earlier this month. (I am totally to blame for this, I understand. We have three dogs, but still . . . .) Anyway, I hope that this adorable pet rock staves off the dog idea for a little while, since my son is still getting settled into his new digs, new job and new routine. The adorable pet rock comes with an adoption card and everything. Everytime my son looks at it smiling up at him, my son will remember that his mama is rooting for him. Good rock!!

Have a great weekend, friends!! See you tomorrow!

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Sick Day

So for the first time in I don’t know how long, I have come down with a respiratory bug. (That’s what I get for bragging about my self-proclaimed super immunity, and my fanatically religious zinc intake) I was supposed to be getting a massage today and obviously I had to reschedule it. However, I am going to a reunion at the end of the month to see my best college friends whom I haven’t seen since before the pandemic started, so I guess that it is a good thing to get this sickness out of the way. There is a Buddhist parable that basically states for regular peace and evenness and happiness, you shouldn’t make a judgment on anything that happens. Just think to yourself, “This could be good, or it could be bad.” And then just roll with it.

When I was a kid in Pittsburgh, the sick day starter pack was exactly as shown above, except for one thing. We had Mint Ginger Ale, and it was amazing. Mint Ginger Ale is the magic elixir for most viruses and flus. Do they even make Mint Ginger Ale anymore?

Time for me to get back under the covers, friends. Sick day for me. See you tomorrow!

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

This is the Beginning

“– what would you be doing differently in your life if we were approaching the end of the year, rather than the middle of it? Well for one, you’d probably be celebrating! Two, you’d also be doing all those things making sure all the loose ends of the year are tied up and setting intentions for the next year.” – Cassandra Tyndall

Happy Summer Solstice! It’s that halfway point in the year. It’s a great time to hit pause and use the light from the longest day of sunlight, to shine the light on where you’ve “been” in 2023 already, and to reflect on how you would like to close 2023 out. My husband loves to listen to the Gerry Cinnamon song below, when we are relaxing by our pool during warm summer evenings. Sometimes I think that he overplays it, but I will say these last few days I have woken up to the start of the song, playing on repeat in my mind. And it stirs me. Deeply. I hope that it stirs you, too. “This is the beginning of the rest of your life.”

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.