Just for Today

It's no accident, (your name here), that when you look closely into the eyes of another, the very first thing you see, is yourself.  That when you hold their hand, you can feel your own warmth.  And that when you give of yourself, you give to yourself.  Because, quite simply, both you and they are me.  Let's get it started, uh-huh -      The Universe

I received this email today. I kind of love it.

The Arrival of Spring

My lilacs are in bloom and the fragrance is sweet. They won't bloom if they do not get exposed to extreme cold. Funny how that works. They are purple. Spring around here has all the Joshua trees in bloom, rarely seen, but this year brings few lilac blossoms. In years past, the bush was loaded with lilac blossoms. I am grateful for the beautiful ones which did bloom. My bulbs are not up yet, but one daffodil came through in full bloom already. The yellow color was like the sun and the light. I really enjoyed its arrival. Nobody can hold back the roses this year. They are well to an explosion of color. Already the Joseph's Coat rose which is yellow red and orange is coming out. The quail seem to be everywhere and I even saw a bird's nest on my mesquite tree. What season is my life in now? Is it the Spring or the Fall? Fall and Winter were so unkind this year. I am glad they're gone.  It's difficult to be in the moment, but dwelling on the past or planning for the future is not what Spring is about. Welcome Spring.

"I consider every single day to be the single most important day in the history of forever. So far." --Tut "Notes from the Universe"

Korea & The Years Which Led to Now

Nuclear weapons might come from North Korea? They might come to my country? That information from today's news makes me stop and think. First of all, I have got to turn off the television news again, for awhile, because it is just too stressing. Secondly, it makes me realize that I might as well live each day as if it were my last. That's what one of the grieving books I read told me to do. It sounds rather reasonable since I sure don't know when any body Else's time will come (or my own). I do feel less afraid about dying, but I also feel energized to go on living. I think today I will pray for all the people in Korea. I will pray for their health and happiness (both North and South Koreans). I know the leader of North Korea lost his father recently. It seems that this son's grieving is connected to our future.
From what I have learned, how one grieves directly relates to how one will go on living in the future. What does the future hold for me? I know my past very well. I know I was born in the 60's.  So many things which happened in the 70's (no less than revolutions) brought my love to me.  I read George Orwell's 1984 and that date came and went in my life. I bought my first computer in the 80's.  It connected me with the entire world, even Korea. I watched Stanley Kubrick's "2001 Space Odyssey." That date came and went in my lifetime and the new millennium began and 9/11 happened. Then 2012, the year of the dragon, took my love from me. Here we are in the year of the snake, 2013, and I'm still waiting for things to get better or things to get even worse. Somehow I know I must stop waiting. To the extent that I do not control the world (and this is to a very large extent), I have to  hope my prayers will be heard.  In the mean time, I'm going to pray.

"What Dreams May Come"

Good days and bad days--I have them both. Today was an interesting day which gave me some strange hope and good memories. I went to the hospice thrift store and bought a book called The Force Is With You: Mystical Movie Messages That Inspire Our Lives. Money from the thrift store goes to pay for the workings of this hospice group and I have attended several of their grief groups so I am happy to support them by frequenting their store. Somehow when I saw Stephen Simon's book I knew it would contain the movie "What dreams May Come" as part of the commentary. It did.
This movie was always one of my favorites. I can remember watching it and being so comforted by the depiction of the after life. It was so beautiful and artistic. My love was an artist and I can honestly remember watching the images, like paintings, and thinking one day those images would be important to me. They are.
Since my love always had failing health and was not a young man, I knew that one day I would probably have to face his death. I was grateful for this film because I had never really imagined the post-death future as anything but clouds before I saw the film. Parts of the movie were filmed in Glacier Park, Montana. My love and I visited this park years ago and I can still remember how beautiful it was.
Anyway, the author tells us just how difficult it was to get the movie made and how important it is for him to this day. In the book he provides an anecdote about a little girl who saw the movie just two days before her death and how her father related that upon viewing the film she had "relaxed." She had asked to see the film and it was no small thing for her to view this newly released film at the time.
If you saw the film, you remember that Annie, the  mother of two, commits suicide after the death of her two children and then a few years later the death of her husband. Simon says that he believes we choose our lives before we come to earth. He believes that we choose the events which will occur in our lives because we have particular lessons to learn. In the case of suicide, Simon says that we create our own "hell on earth." "Annie is living in a nightmare version of her life with Chris because this is the karma that she has chosen in order to work out her issues over having taking her own life." Surely suicide is a living hell for everyone it touches.
When I look back on the love of my life and the issues he might have been working out in this life, I can see the issue of love and justice at every turn. I would like to think that my issues include fear and acceptance. Only time will tell and possibly I will not figure this out during my life. Either way, I want to choose something really beautiful with the time I have left.

Not Much To Say

I cleaned the kitchen today. I spent hours on the internet searching for the right Banh Mi recipe. I watched Trisha Yearwood's show on the Food Network. Not much else to report. M.

We Will All Get Low

I watched the most amazing movie tonight. A man had a funeral for himself before he died and wanted everyone to come. Actually, what he really wanted was to confess his sins and ask for forgiveness which he did. He had made some really bad mistakes in his life (I can relate to that) and locked himself away from everyone to punish himself.
Earlier in the day, I went to the library and read about grieving again. I read some amazingly sad things about grieving like women who cut off their pinkie fingers part way to acknowledge their own pain. Other women allow themselves to be burned with the bodies of their beloved (no longer practiced). After many tears and a good amount of reading, I came to see that all this pain will not be in vain. There are many paths to follow, but I have the choice to create something new. This time in my life has something to do with accepting my own mortality. It's something we all know will come for us too, but I can't say I think about it much or seriously. One of the writers compared death to birth with all its confusion. Suffice it to say that I will never be the same.

Cherry Blossoms and the After Life

One could see the cherry blossoms by the side of the road today. The lavender in my garden is blossoming. The temperature reached into the 80's (Fahrenheit). It's strange to watch Spring descend from the heavens. Still, it always returns. I have to be grateful. I ate dim sum today and thought about the Chinese people. I drove many miles to do my grocery shopping. This is a year of Asian cooking for me. The market I went to did not disappoint. Of course, I bought incense to honor my ancestors (and my love).  I suspect that if we are reincarnated, it is from the Chinese. I spent the day grocery shopping for bamboo shoots and pork. A man helped me at the meat counter. I could hear him speaking Chinese to the butcher for me. I was very grateful because I don't speak Chinese. Maybe someday I will, but for now, English and Spanish are all I really have. I am lucky to live in a world filled with many languages. I know that his accent was what first made me fall in love with my man. Coyotes don't have accents (that I know) so I must go to save my dogs from the coyotes as that is all I can hear right now.