Saturday. The laundry is washed, dried, folded and put away. My bread is in the oven. Sheba is underfoot, of course. I send her out with a bone. She is happy. Life does not need to be hard.
That is what I am learning today. Life does not have to be hard. You put one foot in front of the other. You take a step. You reach out, if you can, and touch someone. You breathe in and out. You stay and live in this moment because that is all that is open to you. And it is good….living in the moment.
I have to confess that I am having a difficult time with everything lately. Perhaps it is because I am right on the cusp of RETIREMENT. My life is going to change. The word CHANGE is enough to scare the beejees out of anyone. Maybe I need to change the way I talk to myself….the things I tell myself, the words I use.
Then, there is the weather. I am sure that I can feel every drop in the atmospheric pressure. I feel every shadow of each cloud as they pass over the sun. It is no fun to feel your heart in your mouth. I think I would prefer my foot. Well, I can still joke. That is something.
So this guy suggest that I surround myself with white light. Then I could enjoy whatever energy is around. That is a lovely thought…to enjoy whatever there is. It is what I try to do when I embrace heavenly chi. I hold this protective shield around me. Seeing it in my mind’s eye makes me feel better already. Letting the words fall from my fingers eases the fear. Sometimes I drop out and nap like Sheba if I can. Escapism is not a bad thing.
Vulnerability is not a bad thing either. How else can God know what you need if you don’t tell? I know he is all knowing and all that, but he is a busy fellow. He has a large flock. Sometimes all he needs is a whisper. Other times you have to scream. OVER HERE, GOD!
Screaming definitely makes me feel better, even if it is only in print. It releases my stagnant chi. My chest is relaxed and I can breathe. Maybe now I can find that notice to renew my license plate. It is due tomorrow. I will find it. I am not behind. I have time. Sit, stay and dine. Everything is copacetic.
So what do you do when you are as restless as a bunch of puppies? You do this. You do that. You are about as successful as they are trying to get on a too high a deck. You get nowhere except more restless.
So I talk to myself. Settle. STAY. I pour myself a glass of wine. I sit before my keyboard. I tap and tap. Relief is near. Order comes. Have you ever felt this way? I know that I can’t be the only one. What do you do when you feel like this?
I know that this is not the time to balance my bank account or pay the bills. This is not the time to look for objects misplaced or lost. It would only make things worse. Talking about it with other people seldom works because they cannot feel what you feel. Maybe that is why tapping out the words helps me. It gives me validation. And the tapping of the keyboard is rhythmic.
Physical comfort helps. The AC is on. I like to blame everything on the weather. I am sure the barometric pressure affects us. I am not going to take all the blame myself. I have to be kind to me, for who else knows what I need? Above all, I need my own special kind of humour to weather life’s slings and arrows. If I don’t have that armor, I could be seriously wounded.
I’m missing my guy. He’s out somewhere on some lake in his sailboat doing a man’s thing with a couple of other guys. Sheba is missing him, too. We will go out for a long walk to soothe our restlessness. With luck and phone reception, we might hear from him.
I was awake this morning before dawn. Some of you must know of these early awakenings. I tried and tried to fall back to sleep but cannot. So I tried to stay and be content. But I cannot.
So I rose, made myself a cup of tea and watched the first amber glow of the day in the sunroom. I made peace with my feelings. I made friends with my ghosts. We drank tea together. I sat and stayed. I breathed.
The morning came. I did my 18 heavenly moves. I surrounded myself with divine chi. I felt its warmth protecting me. Calmness came amid my mind’s chaos.
There is power in movement, in the doing, first one limb, then another. The cobwebs and ghosts leave with the sunlight. First one, then another, to have tea or maybe lunch at Somewhere Else. They will probably come back another day. I will let them come. I will set the table. I will use my fine china and we will honour each other. Namaste!
Order is in the order for me today. I rise, stretch and do my 18 heavenly qigong moves to the sunrise. It is so fresh and still in the early morning. I have to thank Sheba for rousing me out of bed. She is quite insistent. Get up! Feed me!
And so I did. And so starts another day. I breathed and moved in the light of the rising sun. I felt my breath slowing down, saw the robin on the fence and heard the stillness of the universe. My breath deepened and my heart stopped its fluttering, my eyelids dropped.
All is copacetic. I am relaxed and in the flow. I feel the order within me. I am not behind. I have time…to put one foot in front of the other, to do one thing at a time, to walk and not run. I have time to breathe, to stay here now, at this time, to be with me.
I am taking miniscule steps towards order, finding places for things, finding pleasure in the doing, finding kindness for myself. And I am grateful.
The skies are grey this morning but at least the air is not as heavy. Funny how heavy the grey can sit on your shoulders, pressing you down. Funny how old feelings can come washing back over you and then you realize how important it is to be in the now of time and to live and create new feelings in the present moment.
I did my qigong routine from memory, all the 18 movements. Practice did make perfect in this incident. I breathed in and out, visualizing the sunrise, feeling the calm and the beginning of a new day…pushing out the chaos of my mind. And the sun came, uncertainly at first, darting in and out of the clouds. I raised my arms, embracing heavenly chi. It formed a protective shield around me. And I knew that all is copacetic.
Breakfast is done. The dishes put away. The day and life begins again, however where or how I am. I do not want to wait for all my ducks to be in a row. That day may never come or if it does, it will not stay. I have time and I am not behind but I do not choose to wait. There is no pleasure in the contemplation of perfection but it is satisfying to move, to do and make progress, even if it is only an inch.
I am pretending I am the new FlyLady, buzzing around with my purple duster, putting things in order, not obsessing, just doing. I am surprised to feel joy in the doing, in the folding, in the putting away…..There is comfort in the cleaning and drying, in the smoothing and folding and putting things away. It is almost like finding the heart in myself again.
The sweat is running down my face. I’m sitting on deck stairs, catching the gentle afternoon breeze. I can hear Sheba panting on the deck. I lean against the side railing, closing my eyes. I can hear the whoosh of the traffic, the drone of a lawn mower.
The bread is done. The loaves are cooling on the rack. Sheba’s life jacket and her mats are washed in soap and water, rinsed and drying in the sun. Amazing how much her things can stink up the car. Amazing what a little soap and water can do.
We went out to Elbow Sunday for our first sail of the year. The mast went up and we got the boat in the water. But that was as far as we got. For one reason or another, the sail wouldn’t go up. So we gave up on thoughts of sailing that day. We ate our lunch on the beach. Sheba sat in the wet sand, dressed in her life jacket and nowhere to sail.
After lunch we got help and took the mast down, loaded the boat and got it out of the water. After an hour or so of packing and loading up, we headed home. And after another hour or so we got home. You might say we had a day of nothing or just frustrations. But I just said: That’s life.
I’m sitting in the kitchen now, tap, tapping away, keeping my heebe jeebies at bay. Sweat is dripping down the sides of my face. I wonder if other people get them. I suppose everyone has their own demons or else they are lying.
The AC is now on. Its coolness is soothing. The sweat recedes along with the ghosts. I sigh one big sigh, feeling stronger, dreaming sweet dreams of sailing.
It’s not even 7 am yet. The sun is out and it is already hot and humid. I have already been awake since 4:30. Too early to get out of bed. Sheba is stretched out on the cool wooden floor at the foot of the bed. She is stretching her boundaries.
At 6:00 I decided it was a waste of time staying in bed. It would have been fine had I been content. But I was not. Such is life now and again. Everything changes and this, too, shall pass. So for now, I will stay and embrace it. I can still tap out my words and feelings. Perhaps I can free myself.
I padded out to the kitchen. I hear Sheba retching and soon out came her breakfast, eaten in too big of a haste. What a mess! But she is lapping it all up again. I turn my back and let her do her thing. Sometimes you just have to. Life can get like that. I wipe the floor with damp paper towels.
I am tapping out my words on the deck. The birds are chirping. A crow cawed. Sheba is at my feet listening. The words are coming from my fingertips. What a blessing! What a relief! I can still make life work. I try not to think too much. I just try to move.
Yesterday we went for a long bike ride. I pedaled with my heart in my mouth. I pedaled with heart and metal. I pedaled with success. We celebrated with coffee at the Broadway Roastery.
There was not enough tables with umbrellas. We would sizzle under the hot sun. So we moved Rod’s cargo bike under the shade of the trees and used it as a bench. It was a lovely way of enjoying our coffee and watching the people come and go. But I do think he need to add some pop up trays for our coffee.
So you can see that even not so great days are in reality great days. It is in our minds and hearts to decide what they can be. I try my best and that is all that I can do. It is enough.
So far today, I have not try to put any order to my office. The day is hot. The neighbour’s music is loud and insistent. I cannot think. My blood sugar is low and I am getting cranky. I put on Pavarotti & Friends 2 on my portable. I put it on the deck and crank the volume up. I like to see how she likes it, she who wants to hear the birds sing. So much for kindness and compassion. My words are not going according to my intentions!
It is a little later. I am bolstered by some crackers and walnuts. I am a little mellowed by a glass of wine. Pavarottie & Friends are done but the beat is still going strong next door. It is all right. Everything is copacetic. I am done with tit for tat. There is no satisfaction in it except deafness. And I cannot afford to lose any more hearing.
I am being kind to myself, not going down or up the spiral staircase of anger. I no longer hold any feelings of irritation. I really do not want to hurt others in the same way that I am hurt. That is what compassion is. It is not an easy thing to practice. So often I want to give the other person a taste of their own medicine. There, you take this or that! See how you would like it.
I am remembering Karen Armstrong’s talk on compassion. The beat is going on louder next door. Ahhh, human frailties! We so crave for attention and love and yet we do not know how to love. I am so happy to have seen Karen’s talk. Otherwise, I do not know where I would be.
I am looking at the flowers before me….pastel colours of pink, blue, yellow and white. The flowers came from a genteel woman’s celebration of her 90th year. She holds the key to the United Church in Maidstone, Saskatchewan, Canada. I guess you can guess what kind of woman she is. The colours of the flowers soothe and calm me. Sweet pastels!
Kindness is such an easy and hard thing. It is in your choosing. Have you been kind today? Enjoy this poem on kindness by Naomi Shihab Nye. It is truly awesome.
Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.
Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
It is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.
The music next door has stopped. Sweet peace!
I was thinking about Benjamin Franklin and his 13 virtues this morning. I was thinking that I need to move a little faster towards order. No use getting all these ideas and plans but no action. Without any movement there will be no change. There will be no order.
I was thinking about all this as I was coming out of the bathroom. I looked out the living room window and there was Benjamin Franklin, making a house call! I took that as a sign of great magnitude. Wow! Whatever thou can conjure in the mind, you can bring forth. Maybe I should get a lamp like Aladdin’s or a Ouija board.
Seeing Ben did shake me out of my inertia. I am sure that the plumber was also shook up to see some woman aiming a camera at him as he was getting out of his truck. He seems to be held captive momentarily on the steps.
Having been reminded of my goal to pursue order, I set to work…dishes, floor, laundry, walking Sheba, bathing Sheba, cleaning her mats, lunch, more dishes….. Wow, I’m amazed by myself! Now I face my hardest challenge, my office. For some unknown reason, psychological block, I have not been able to put it in order since the beginning of time.
I stumble and stumble every time I decide to do this chore. I am overcome with unease, unable to make a start, a move in the right direction. Perhaps I should stop thinking of it as a chore. Maybe I can visualize myself as the FlyLady (http://www.flylady.net/) with a purple feather duster instead of Tinkerbell and her magic wand. Whooosh! In one purple swoop, my desk is dust free and clean, the pens in their holder, the papers in their proper folders in the cabinet…everything in order.
Would that not be nice if we have a magic wand or feather duster? Alas! we mortals must do the hard work. So I shall go now and make a start. I shall at least try my best at the moment. I will not be behind. I will pay my bills and file them in their proper folder. And perhaps my friend Ben will come to help again another day.
