Seasons pass, birds fly,
twinkling hues, circle of stars
A gift for your Soul.
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Love circles me, you
deep in swollen pink velvet
blush with pride, equals.
.
My throat is scratchy, every time I swallow it’s like a science experiment. I feel cold even though I am under three blankets. Oh wait, I shouldn’t be surprised, we’re back from our short vacation in the sun.
We are anticipating a snowstorm with wind and ice and I’m sure the clouds can just feel me smoldering with anger and resentment, like a fire just beginning to spread quickly.
The Universe can feel that I don’t want to live here anymore, the Winters are too tough for my aches and pain, Fibromyalgia has never been my friend but it is becoming my worst enemy.
I hate having to confirm a lunch date with my best friend in the morning although she totally understands. Will I be okay for getting up and out of bed? Can I dress myself and drive my car and meet her over salads sipping strong, strong coffee? I have NO energy and NO short-term memory. That is excruciatingly embarrassing to me, that is the worst part.
I will know that only tomorrow morning and even that is iffy. I can deal with this chronic pain disease much more easily in the Spring, Summer, even Fall but Winter? Oh, Winter is the devil of all evil, to me. He’s that bratty, bad boy, the one every grade school had who tried to make other kids’ lives unbearable, the bad boy brat that succeeded in torturing a grade.
Way back, when I was a child, we never had a “No Bullying Allowed” rule. We just had the town bully and everyone knew who he was. I can picture his face so easily in my mind as he grabbed my winter hat and threw it around the bus to taunt me.
Now, we are all grown-up, the bullies, the kids, those of us who care for our grown-up children and parents and dogs. We face problems every single day. The stress and tension are finally catching up with me.
I don’t smile much anymore. It’s tough enough to get out of my warm, comfortable bed with my dog lying beside me. Sometimes, I choose not to get out of bed. I’m okay with that.
Please, I don’t need platitudes or well wishes, I just need circumstances to change. I need a sign, I’ve been patient. Until now.
Yes, I will ask the Angels for help.
I will ask anyone for help. But, so far, nothing has worked. I’m so very tired. I want to curl up in my bed until I see that it is Spring. Things will change in the Spring, for the better. We will make it change, not now, not during the bleak, gray darkness of Winter.
The new us, starts in the Spring, 2015.
I always thought I hated Winter with such a passion just because of the harsh, brutal temperatures, the raw wind and the mountains of snow and the biggest evil, ice. For someone with no balance looking down at a sheet of ice and having nothing to hold to grip, is pure terror. Those reasons alone are enough to hate Winter but I figured out recently there was something else that I hadn’t put into words before.
Winter is gray, black and white, while the other seasons are filled with vivid colors in various things. I miss the bright bunch of wildflowers popping up in the meadow, multi-colored and alive, the rich crimson of roses trailing down a newly painted white trellis. The bright green of a neighbor’s lawn, glossy and spiked like army soldiers standing at attention.
It’s a very long Winter here, the snow will start falling any day now and it will last, at least, until late April. I don’t like it but I have no choice so this year I am accepting it, not fighting with it. Moaning and groaning about it hasn’t helped before and it only makes ME feel worse so why bother? I will keep myself happy doing something else, I will learn to bake or cook new things. Maybe, I will write a book.
I guess after the long Winter I appreciate the Spring even more. Oh, when the first bud of a purple crocus pops up, sometimes even through the snow we know the end of Winter is near. Soon the budding yellow leaves of a forsythia bush in our backyard will slowly begin to show themselves and I cut some stalks to bring inside the house. I put them in a tall, dark blue vase, the only one I will use, loving the contrast of dark blue and yellow. They stand proudly waiting to burst, happiness from the outside proud to bring us joy inside our home.
In the Spring and Summer the sun is out shining brightly against a baby blue sky. Colorful birds sing to each other, we listen to their songs, we watch their beautiful, petite bodies flash in front of our eyes with different colors. I will try hard to let the absence of color in the outside world not strip the color of my world as well. I’m sure I can do it, it will be fine. I’m looking at Winter with a different attitude. I’ll find color inside.
“
Well, little one,” said a Tree to a Reed that was growing at its foot, “why do you not plant your feet deeply in the ground, and raise your head boldly in the air as I do?”
“I am contented with my lot,” said the Reed. “I may not be so grand, but I think I am safer.”
“Safe!” sneered the Tree. “Who shall pluck me up by the roots or bow my head to the ground?” But, it soon had to repent of its boasting, for a hurricane arose which tore it up from its roots, and cast it a mere, gigantic and useless log on the ground, while the little Reed,
bending to the force of the wind, back and forward, soon stood upright again when the storm had passed.
Moral of Aesops Fable: Obscurity often brings security.
Nobody felt safe, we knew the world had changed and the power of us poppies were strengthened by the support of having one another. Sometimes, close friends would whisper their fears amongst themselves but mostly, we walked with our heads lowered, burrowed in heavy winter jackets as if their jackets were shields, our hoods covering our faces, of course they were. We hid beneath as many layers as we possibly could because deep inside we are scared to death, our new reality. We couldn’t lie, we were all in this together and that brought comfort to us.
Even when we didn’t watch the news or read the papers, the news would slip out like oily black ink and it would stain our petals, our brains and those images never, ever would go away. Fear was imprinted on our souls and there was nothing we could do to forget what we had seen or heard.
It was the devil’s handshake, some people called it, those who thought they knew better or pretended that they weren’t afraid, those boasting about how much money they had, their egos, over-inflated, grown-up bullies.
One old, grand big tree, we called “the monster” was mean to everyone,
a child, an elder grandmother, sweet white puppies. There was no excuse for that, the fat cow could not ever explain that away even if anyone wanted to listen but nobody did. Her justice will come in her own way, in tepid waters of muddy grass, sloshing through messy brown mud endlessly, never finding her way back. Homeless. Alone. Thinking she was smarter, because of her size and depth, stronger, more powerful than everyone else. All bluster, self-deprecating to hide the cruel reality of knowing not who she really was but how others truly saw her.
It escaped no one but herself. One day, even she, would look up from the ground and see herself, still strong, roots planted, with wildflowers all around her, petals of rose, pink,
yellow, and blue, laughing together, the sound of sweet angels in a club, chirpy birds were invited but the club had no room for her.
The tables had turned, it taken a long time but eventually karma had caught up. Our soft willows, loose wildflowers, dancing in the wind, singing songs, perhaps not in harmony, but with delight and passion, having fun, we felt sorry for that big old maid, that over-critical stump.
Alone, all alone in the middle of the forest, away from everyone else, while the rest of us could bend with the wind, smile at the sunshine with the lovely wind and whistles as a mere game of promise and friendship and love.
We were all friends, together, except for Her, that snobby tree, who criticized everybody, yet never looked inside her rotten, ugly, stump, its decay on the inside visible to those outside, its scent slowly, insidiously, reeking of week old trash, of judgment, of her.
The fragile willows, we, bent together, laughing, this way and that, in abundance, we knew we were all equal, all the same not better than one another,
that kept us together, happy. We trusted one another.
We were one united bunch of laughing flowers,our heads gloriously pointed to sun. The old, big tree stump, callous and mean, sat in shambles on the ground, broken, alone. we walked over its pieces and never looked back.When it rained all of us just bent a little lower and in the distance you could hear us not breaking but singing, quiet songs, happy songs in unison.
Here it is, on paper. I want to live in a state where there is much more sun
than there is rain. When the thought of Winter is a warm sweater or a light jacket. I don’t want to worry about sliding on the ice and breaking my bones, I can do without the word snow and wind chill for the rest of my life. Truly.
I will not miss the harsh wind howling through the trees and knocking furiously at my windows, tree branches attacking my house. I know that wherever I live there will be compromises I will have to make. There is always a trade-off.
Maybe there will be tornadoes that will scare me or hurricane season that I am certainly
not used to, I am pretty sure I would cower with one of those. I would want a safe room, stocked with canned items and a can opener and frozen bread I could defrost quickly, cereal and small boxes of milk.
It’s funny, when I pictured that I saw myself surrounded by my two little children but I don’t have little children anymore. Sometimes I miss that. My children are perfectly wonderful grown-ups and I am not thirty anymore. I am closer to sixty.
I probably should look for a town that has an active “Senior Center” (sorry, I just threw up in my mouth for a second) and good hospitals. It would be nice to be in a college town so I can be around all age groups.
The MOST important part is that I need to live by water, some coastal town. I don’t mean swimming pools, sorry hon, a desert town does not count. Anywhere along the coast
English: Beach at Sullivan’s Island in Charleston, South Carolina, USA. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
where it is warm (‘wrong’ Freudian slip.) I don’t want to leave my mom….but I will know when the timing is right. It doesn’t have to be tomorrow, it can be in five years, we will work something out. I will FEEL when it is right.
Something will come up, something always comes up. Eventually. Deep breathing and mindful meditation. My heart is open to new things. I’m not sure my husband is as ready as I am but when he is, when we both are and the opportunity presents itself, we will know. Well, one of us will for sure, and the other one will know when he takes time to get more comfortable with the idea. There’s nothing wrong with that, I wouldn’t have it any other way.
We have been married for twenty-six years, we’re a team, we are going to stay that way.
I’ve always considered myself a patient person, not always, mind you, but most of the time. I am certainly not patient or forgiving when I’m driving and someone cuts me off. I curse and hold up a finger. When our son was really young and asked what it meant I told him it meant “wait a minute.” He believed that for years.
I’m patient on supermarket lines, I’m patient with (most) people, I listen well, I like to think I’m a good, loyal friend. Indeed, I have high standards for myself and used to think everyone was like me but Life taught me that lesson the hard way several times over. How do you know differently if the way your family acts is the only way you know?
My friends are all very different from me but now what keeps us together is not lunch dates, meeting in the city on a weekend for brunch or long telephone calls but stupid text messages or IM’s. I confuse them all the time as my adult children roll their eyes and grimace.
I hate that, text messages to say Happy Birthday, text messages to say Hello, text messages to find out how a surgery went, text messages to show your deepest sympathy and one death announcement I had to read about on Facebook. It’s all the norm now.
Of course, my adult children, think I am old-fashioned and nuts. Beside that the iPhone to me is a strange and complicated piece of equipment, why can’t we just use the phone as the phone was really intended? To talk. It doesn’t seem popular anymore except for those of us “oldies.”
I will ask my kids to call their grandparents and they will do that responsibly but they will say “they weren’t home, we will try again later.” “Did you leave a message” I ask? A reasonable question, I think, and they look at me like the dinosaur that I am and say with a scolding dismay “Mom, our generation doesn’t LEAVE messages, we just try again later.”
It’s no surprise that I’m not good with change but I try as best I can. Knowing I’m not good with change makes me try harder than most. At this point in our lives my husband and I are waiting for change to happen, waiting for a clue to point us in the right direction on what we should do and where we should go in the future for the next chapter in our lives.
My friends say that “I will know it when it happens” and I believe that is true, but it has been a very long time and being patient has been getting harder and harder. I need to relax, look within and wait for the Spring. I think things will start to get clearer then. If nothing else, the dreadful Winter, will be over and Life will begin anew.
It won’t be long now, you know that, right? it’s just about time to go, maybe not now but we have starting thinking about it. Soon enough to leave the town where my children grew up, where we still currently live. Not quite yet but I have a feeling that this will be one of our last Winters here, maybe one more. I think that will make me hate the winter less, knowing it’s one of the last ones.
That doesn’t mean I will live in a warmer climate but it will mean I will live somewhere else, maybe by the coast, so at least the Summer will be enticing instead of just making me jealous. And, of course, I will be sentimental about this little yellow house packed full of sentiment and nostalgia. I will slowly be going through clothes and junk as I have started doing to save, donate or toss. I admit, I’m not doing very well. I’m going to blame the beautiful weather instead of my own reluctance to part with things.
Now, I’m in our town’s farmer’s market, on a not too hot Saturday, literally a perfect day.
We don’t get many of these days, maybe two or three for the season.Tomatoes, lush and orange seem to be bursting out of their skins; piled up high in clumsy green cardboard boxes, smiling in the sun, beckoning us to buy them. Perky blueberries giggling together, plums and carrots, I can’t resist their beguiling charm.
A young couple sits near me their little boy wearing a bright red shirt, blue overalls and mismatched shoes, his stuffed animal, a silver shark is thrown in the air for him and other children to catch and throw, again and again with endless energy. Their youngest boy decides he doesn’t want to play anymore, listens closely to the band and starts dancing on his own. It is thrilling to watch his complete and utter joy.This child, will go far, I think.
I ran into an old friend while listening to the wonderful local folk band singing old favorites. Could this really be one of my last summers here.? I have no real answer. I do know one thing, we cannot afford to live here much longer. That is the hard truth. Feeling a little sentimental but it also feels that it will be the right time to go and the right thing to do. Preparing to move, not now but perhaps in the Spring. Where to? I have no idea but this is my gut feeling. I’m no longer sobbing or fear stricken, I went through those stages. I need for the opportunity to present itself, I hope we’ll know what the right answer will be. I’m ready, our children are adults and It’s time to think about leaving and trying something new. I don’t feel conflicted anymore, it feels right, if only we knew where my husband would be working our lives would be so much easier.
It is time to go, funny how the Farmer’s Market lets me see it in a non-threatening and non-fearful way. We had our time in the sun when our children were three and five. Now they are adults, our son applying to medical schools, our daughter, a junior, wants to spend a summer in Spain and then study to be a lawyer.
We are older now, but not too old yet being among the young couples, we do not fit in anymore. Finally, it feels good. I struggled with this for many a month but now it feels right to entertain the thought of moving to a different place, living near water which is essential for me. It’s time for us to step aside. We will begin a new chapter of our lives feeling grateful for what we had in the past. I know, it won’t be easy, I will leave part of our souls here but change is good, it can be very good.That’s what I hope for, for my husband and me.
New times, new decisions, my voice will be heard. In the last twenty years, I have learned a lot, I’m a strong woman now. It’s my turn.
Nowhere To Go, In Time Or Place
I felt the tears of uncertainty and dread spring to my eyes. I quickly wiped them away with the back of my hand because if I didn’t they would stick to my face like hot glue. Change hasn’t happened in our lives for years but I know, in my gut, we will be saying good-bye to the world as we knew it, forever.
Saying good-bye to the past, yet clinging, pathetically, to the memories that I hold dear. Old memories that rust in time but bloom in my brain like day lilies.
Another chapter will be beginning but we don’t know when or where. Getting older is not easy unless you are a sweet, innocent child. Children love to turn another year older, there is no death in their future, just presents, and cakes with candles, hope, fun and friends.The aged lack hope universally.
For us, their parents or grandparents, it takes on a whole other realm of closing a chapter and warily beginning another, the last third chapter or the beginning of the end. We don’t celebrate parties in the same way anymore; birthdays come around, it feels like, every few months. There is no happiness in aging when you can’t go back in time. Even memories become stale, photographs, blurry.
Our bodies hurt, pain clings to us like Saran wrap on cheese, transparent, almost impossible to remove. It holds us hostage in our weary, broken bodies
I hold on to the wooden stair rail, going downstairs slowly, sticky over time, but now I am fond of the predictable stickiness in certain areas. I have walked up and down these stairs thousands of times, with sick babies, and naughty toddlers, with gleeful children and with young adults I was proud to call my children. I walked with my husband supporting me and me supporting him.
I am not sure of the timeline, of when we will leave. It could be as early as six months but it could be more like a year, maybe two. The jittery nerves inside me says it will sneak up on us like a deer crossing our path in front of our car in the dead of the night.
I have practiced saying good-bye to everyone I love and have to leave behind in my shaken heart. I will be leaving this home, this carrier of memories. I know I am on my way, still clutching to some false sense of security.
Entering into another phase of my life, of our lives. I have to control myself from me not to sob out loud. I know this tiny, white house which in six months could be painted navy blue or brown. I don’t know, I will never know. But it will never be my house again. My children will not grow up here, the trees we planted for the children will stay and the two big gray rocks other people’s children will climb on.
We are homeless, we have nowhere to go although we can stay for a little time in a few places but never like this again. The locks on the doors will be changed in two days, maybe three, new owners will eventually move in. The FOR SALE sign on the front yard seems to deface our property. It has already defaced our home.
A chapter in our lives is about to be over, a new chapter has not yet been written, the lines blur together. We are standing, clutching on to memories not yet ready or willing to create new ones. I am not sure I will ever want to make new ones.
We step aside, we cling to the naked walls and to each other with the depths of our depression in our hearts beating slowly.
It’s not here yet and I don’t know when it will be here but I sense that something good is on its way. I’m not sure what it is but I do have an idea and believe me, I am running on instinct only. Call it intuition but I’m smiling for the first time in a very long time.
Pretty flowers. Pungent smell (Photo credit: Zaqqy J.)
There’s a very good possibility that I could be wrong. Is there a chance I might be disappointed? Absolutely. Am I still going to publish this? In the past no, but now, definitely.
I take chances now.
I’ll start over and again if it doesn’t happen, I’ll just learn from the experience. Something good will happen sometime. If it isn’t this month or next it will be next year. Something is changing or about to change and I feel the it; I have the oddest feeling inside of me.
Remember the image of Mary Poppins putting her finger up to the sky feeling changes? That’s how I feel. My nose seemed to feel a scent that was different today, true, the weather was hot and sticky yesterday and today we are all shivering from the cold but I don’t think that’s it. I picked up on something, If it wasn’t hope, it was something else, something that is new or that I don’t know about, yet.
I’m patient.
English: Screenshot of Julie Andrews from the trailer for the film Mary Poppins (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I feel okay about this, I don’t feel terrified that I am going to jinx it, like I would have in the past nor do I feel stupid expressing my feelings even if they are just daydreams.
I feel proud for expressing my feelings for something so dubious.
Maybe I will feel disappointed if things change and I go deep into another sorrowful place. Then, I should remember that it took courage for me to even write something that was so personal and out of my comfort zone, that I put the words on this paper, hit “publish” and went ahead. No big deal.
I have lived in fear for too much of my life; it feels good to let go of every piece that I can.
I am buoyant, I can fly, sometimes it’s murky and cloudy, sometimes it’s brilliant and clear.
Whatever the weather, I’m still going to try.
‘Clear Blue Skies’ – Trwyn Du, Anglesey (Photo credit: Adrian Kingsley-Hughes)
My Life is getting old. Not just the years that have accumulated but the scenarios in my past and present, future too. If it’s not just one calamity after another, it’s another gross disappointment or health issue and the black cloud that looms above us. Circling us like black hawks over newly killed animals waiting to swoop down excited to eat.
Black Hole Sun (Photo credit: amira_a)
Yes, dear optimistic people, I do try so hard to project a positive image, I send healing thoughts and love to the Universe, I pray for good things for all and not just myself, I try to make a positive difference in the world in any small way I can. I smile, I care, I reach out, I do good deeds, willingly, lovingly.
What happens? Nothing much. If I can make someone laugh or smile that’s a definite plus, if I can offer an elderly person my arm to cross the street or to carry their grocery bags, that’s great, I feel good for a second. Then, that feeling goes away.
Day # 8 (Photo credit: .Nena.)
Poof.
Doing nice things is not the answer, I know, feeling good things will happen, is sure part of it but I’ve felt that for so long it is tiring me out. I have tried that approach for many, many months and I am burned out. I am exhausted, hoping, that life will take a turn for the better.
Here we sit, my brown pillow and in the house on a sunny day, lying on the bed with no energy. I could be doing many things but I have no energy, no will, just an overwhelming feeling of tiredness. I’m taking comfort in hiding, resting and blaming my Fibromyalgia for all that ails me and so much more.
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