Untitled Haiku

Silent walls witness

One heart beating alone here

Eyes awash with tears.

Hear My Prayer

Today is Blue Monday, and I’m back from a fun weekend with my daughter. I can’t seem to stem the tide of tears or remove the powerful clenching grip on my heart. The lump in my throat can’t be swallowed, and the mental film roll is in playback mode.

*****

I’m swimming as fast as I can, Lord, swimming with the current this time and racing freestyle towards joy. Hurtling downstream, not tilting at windmills on the banks of life. Going with the flow towards the moment when my life will change again, and again, and again, in very short order.

I’m losing my twin sons to college and gaining young men who will walk their own paths, each singing a different tune. They’ve been together since before birth, one kicking my heart with his underwater somersaults, one rocking my innards with gentle stretches. They are parting ways for the first time in their lives, as brothers, friends, adversaries, as fambly forever bound together. Beautiful boys who grew up knowing security, happiness, and rending sorrow. Who grew up stronger and wiser for it, whose eyes dance with laughter now but can still penetrate with daggers. Whose biting criticisms have wounded me to the core. Whose toothy smiles and wild laughter will be enshrined in my heart forever. I will miss those hungry boys in my everyday life, and their cries of, “what’s for dinner tonight?”

My daughter, too, will start a new chapter in her life, beginning as a beautiful bride, heart full of love, eyes bright with promise. That very same firstborn baby who came into this world one unexpected night when I thought I had indigestion, who spurred a wild ride to the hospital in a sports car that almost became a delivery room. Who made the nurses gasp with shock, made her daddy make a shambles of the tidy racks of scrubs he looted for his new daddy outfit, the one that would give him admittance to the delivery room. The baby girl who inspired love songs in my heart and midnight rockings, and heart-bursting pride watching her grow up. Who weathered storms of the soul and came out lovelier for it. She was mine once, for just a minute of motherly pride and passion, and now she begins her own signature path towards marriage and motherhood.

Thank goodness their brother will visit soon and witness these developments and put his funny grin and spin on it. And I can’t wait to see him wear a tux, say something poetic at the reception, rap us on the head with his philosopher’s stone, play his guitar and pluck my heartstrings till they nearly rupture with emotion.

The current is speeding up, Lord, and soon a threshold will be crossed. I have no choice but to be ready, and ready I’ll be, with smiles and jokes and laughter; and with hugs and tearful goodbyes and fervent pleas to please call. It’s the getting there that’s breaking me up, the missing hand to hold, the hug to comfort, the eyes to lock with mine and fill with tears, too. I will miss the peace to share, the winding road to walk together into the twilight of our lives.

I will remind myself to treasure the goodness of these days and the life I’ve been given. I will love my children forever. And I will make my own way with love, regardless whether love finds me. Bless us and keep us, Lord. Hear my prayer.

Dr. Seuss, My Time Traveling Companion

"How did it get so late so soon?
It's night before it's afternoon.
December is here before it's June.
My goodness how the time has flewn.
How did it get so late so soon?"

Dr. Seuss had it down.

I prefer to think that my saggy baggy elephant skin has recorded the touch of lovers lost, babies holding on for dear life, sweet earth smeared in abandonment of clean appearances. Time well spent, tears burning tracks, laughter scaring the crows feet away. Heat of sun, pearl shine of moon, lap of soothing silky water. Fragrance of sweet breeze, lash of regret, trust in another chance on this rocky re-balancing road of life.

"You're in pretty good shape for the shape you are in."

"Just tell yourself, Duckie, you're really quite lucky!"

"Today was good. Today was fun. Tomorrow is another one."

"I meant what I said,
and I said what I meant
An elephant's faithful,
One hundred percent."

Shopping the Blues Aisles

I've been working on a playlist the last two weeks, and though it's not complete, it's taking shape.

For my sons, two each of:

Twin Extra Long comforters

Twin Extra Long sheet sets & mattress pads

Jumbo extra fluffy pillows

Towel sets in coordinating colors

Trash cans

Shower totes

Laundry baskets

All Small & Mighty

Soft Scrub Scrubby Pads

Puffs Cool Designs for Back-to-School

Neosporin Neo To Go, including *free* first aid cases

Q-tips Perfect For On-The-Go

equate Ibuprofen tabs, 200 mg

Colgate Wave toothbrushes

And for me:

Beck's

Coffee, whole bean dark roast

Chocolate, with almonds and toffee

Amy's Organic frozen entrees, assorted

Dark sweet cherries with pits

Blue Bell Natural Vanilla Bean ice cream

Mother's 'The Original' Circus Animal Cookies

*Sob*

Warren Zevon (God rest his soul) singing "Keep Me in Your Heart" is stuck in my head.

But on the bright side, yesterday I bought bling in the form of earrings that are big peace symbols of a luminescent green, studded with rhinestones. Number 2 son is in Berkeley with big bro, enjoying cool breezes off the Pacific, and in possession of my camera, or else you would have to see these earrings to believe them. I've gone off the deep end. Number 3 son would agree.

And also yesterday I did some funny wordplay:

Let us roll all our strife and all

Our tartness up into one ball,

And tear our pasts with rough pleasures

Through the supple gates of heaven:

Thus, though we cannot make our paths

Stand still, yet we will make them baths.

I just about fell out of my chair laughing at my own cleverness. I laughed till I cried. And now I'm right as rain. Apologies to Andrew Marvell. Since he died in 1678, I don't think he'll mind.

Poor Poor Pitiful Me.

P.S. I forgot I have a camera phone, duh.

Aretha, You Rock My Soul

Thank you for stopping in today, Aretha. I've missed you! Especially, "Baby I Love You."

Life is Like . . .

Life may be less like a loop and more like a spool of thread, unwinding loosely from a snug, clean, trim beginning notched securely into the spool. Beginning colorful and whole and very short. Being pushed through the eye of a needle and pulled through gossamer silk, midweight cotton, heavy dirty jeans. Growing stained, unraveling, breaking, knotting, starting over again. Leaving small mended seams in its wake, and a few minor gaps. Going forward with determination sometimes interrupted by reinforcing backtracks and fanciful side trips. Emerging stretched, satisfied, mending job completed but not perfect.

Starting a new seam with a new cut and a new knot. Unwinding, always unwinding in ever-tightening coils that nevertheless get pulled forward, traveling through the fabric of life. Never questioning the duty of being a thread among many, always uniting two pieces of raw material into one garmet of radiance and beauty.

Reaching the end, the last inch on the spool, curly and bright, though somewhat compressed from the pressure of preceding coils, having accomplished what it was designed to do, and living that last inch in ultimate joy, having sewn and sown disparate pieces together in tactile harmony.

In an expanding universe, why must one question all of one or another, Saint or Bodhisattva? The thread would be enlivened, enriched by both. The thread wouldn't care if it comes back or not. (It will make a comeback as part of another thread but it doesn't need to know.)

What kind of chocolate?

Don't worry . . . be happy.

Shakespeare in the Garden

Some things are worth waiting for.

First Post

Nothing here yet, but there's still hope.

I await my Bodhisattva.