--
I'm going to a wedding soon and I find myself particularly excited about this one. I've been to weddings before but this one is different. Not like a theme wedding where everyone wears Star Wars or Star Trek outfits. No, this one will be my first and I hope not my last, same sex couple wedding. Squeeee!
This couple has been together for 15 years waiting for their state to provide the Equal Opportunity that everybody should have had from the beginning of this nation. I'm glad we've evolved as a nation and that I too see things differently than I did before. But this couple just makes you happy to be a couple too. They're a delight to be around and I'm over joyed and honored that we're invited. Their essence is a beautiful thing to experience. You know that they were just meant to be.
It led me to think back to Anita and my early days. Learning about each other and becoming us. We had many similarities and enough differences to keep us growing. Acting out of our damage as most of us often do, we found the pieces of the puzzle to become more than just healthy individually but developed a dynamic as a couple, an us that makes me flutter. This sparked a memory I'd not shared before and I'm surprised because I've loved to tell the sequences in our love story.
We're currently preparing to receive lot's of family and friends for July 4th. An annual event at our place. It's the season for our home to be a bed and breakfast, so to speak. We entertain, we accommodate, we host friends overnight from near and far. We invite neighbors for cookouts. We enjoy all of it.
So I thought, what is our essence? And this memory came right to the forefront. Waving it's hand like a grade-schooler who knows the answer to the math on the flash card. Me, Me , Meee!!!
---
On our honeymoon, we took a flight from Oahu to the Big Island of Hawaii. We wanted to do a helicopter ride over the volcano and drive around the island and go up to the observatory. Many of the things I got to experience when I spent four years stationed in Hawaii. One day, with no specific agenda, we strolled around in the city of Hilo. After breakfast with wonderful views of the ocean and far off mountains, we walked around, shopped a bit and took some photos in a seaside park. Soon after we happened upon a glowingly tanned Hawaiian woman, sitting on the sidewalk in a not too clean dress, who was playing an ukulele and singing a song with a joyous look on her face. There were no other street performers around and she didn't have a bucket or instrument case out for tips. She was just there, looking at folks and singing with a smile. She was radiating joy to say the least, I had to engage.
Her name was Grace and she was sometimes homeless and beyond the joy was someone who might have had some mental issues but chose hope over despair and joy over sadness. An older tall gentleman with a white beard happened upon us and Grace acknowledged Paul, having seen him around but not overly familiar. The conversation was candid and fun and it was lunch time, so Anita and I invited them to join us at a nearby restaurant.
We had an absolute ball. Breaking bread and learning about one another. We took some photos and exchanged personal info. I remember them.
It was a pleasurable experience and that, that is, the essence of us.
We like to share the experience, with others.
Wednesday, June 27, 2018
Wednesday, June 6, 2018
Swan Song
---
I have no productive thoughts...
Yesterday I found a similar pain, so severe that'd I'd experienced it only once before and oddly or maybe appropriately, 35 years later, it has the same source.
Words like betrayal and deception pervade and dominate my thoughts. They cut deep, beyond flesh or tissue or bone type pain, to my core. My very being is disturbed, unsettled, ill-at-ease.
All organisms seek to survive. To continue their existence and as Maslow's Hierarchy so accurately points out, we as a specie seek comfort in our surroundings and preferably until it permeates our core, our very being. Though the struggle, the challenges may aid in our growth along the way, we yearn, we seek peace, within and all about.
Trust is a word that if it were an element on the periodic table of human interactions, might possibly be the heaviest of all needs in successful, healthy relationships.
What is one to surmise of humanity. That it is good? In hope with optimism that good exists in all? Or that self service is the more dominant trait?
What is it truly that experience of life, the journey teaches us? That in the most basic of instincts, through survival we get ours and to hell with the rest.
We choose to focus on one or the other and approach all others with the attitude each provides.
Words, words dance around in thoughts, some productive, some destructive. who or what is in control of these words and their effect?
We each bear the responsibility for the energy we bring into a room. It is my hope that my swan song, my legacy to have brought a positive light into the darkness that we all entertain too often. I choose optimism as the best survival tactic in the best interest of self and society.
My experience teaches me that writing is the most therapeutic thing and in doing so I am finding myself able to choose productive thoughts. That at my core, in my innermost being, there is hope and optimism that outweighs the darkness and negativity that seeks to survive, dominate and produce it's effect on self and others.
Grant me the Serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
the Courage to change the things I can,
and the Wisdom to know the difference.
I have no productive thoughts...
Yesterday I found a similar pain, so severe that'd I'd experienced it only once before and oddly or maybe appropriately, 35 years later, it has the same source.
Words like betrayal and deception pervade and dominate my thoughts. They cut deep, beyond flesh or tissue or bone type pain, to my core. My very being is disturbed, unsettled, ill-at-ease.
All organisms seek to survive. To continue their existence and as Maslow's Hierarchy so accurately points out, we as a specie seek comfort in our surroundings and preferably until it permeates our core, our very being. Though the struggle, the challenges may aid in our growth along the way, we yearn, we seek peace, within and all about.
Trust is a word that if it were an element on the periodic table of human interactions, might possibly be the heaviest of all needs in successful, healthy relationships.
What is one to surmise of humanity. That it is good? In hope with optimism that good exists in all? Or that self service is the more dominant trait?
What is it truly that experience of life, the journey teaches us? That in the most basic of instincts, through survival we get ours and to hell with the rest.
We choose to focus on one or the other and approach all others with the attitude each provides.
Words, words dance around in thoughts, some productive, some destructive. who or what is in control of these words and their effect?
We each bear the responsibility for the energy we bring into a room. It is my hope that my swan song, my legacy to have brought a positive light into the darkness that we all entertain too often. I choose optimism as the best survival tactic in the best interest of self and society.
My experience teaches me that writing is the most therapeutic thing and in doing so I am finding myself able to choose productive thoughts. That at my core, in my innermost being, there is hope and optimism that outweighs the darkness and negativity that seeks to survive, dominate and produce it's effect on self and others.
Grant me the Serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
the Courage to change the things I can,
and the Wisdom to know the difference.
Broken Dreams
---
I awoke from a dream and hours later I'm still pondering all it alludes to. I don't dream every night or what I'd consider often, but when I do they're vivid and have profound meaning. In this dream...
I was married to my young sweetheart and we wanted kids. We weren't so fortunate early on and it took it's toll on our lives individually and on the marriage. If nothing else, all she ever wanted was to be a Mother. And me, I wanted to be happy and definitely reproduce.
I was 47, she was 45 and we were finally blessed with a son. We soon discovered that our one and only was deaf and blind and unable to speak beyond elated or terror filled shrieks. I felt confused, my prayers betrayed, somehow punished, like Job, but I clung to all that was good and we learned braille and to sign in the palm of each others hands. It was more than 24/7. It was learning to live an entirely different existence. For her, it seemed to come natural initially. It was beautiful to observe. They bonded beyond my ability, while I headed out the door most days to work and provide.
We both were so focused on him and his needs, all we had left at the end of the day was restless sleep at best. There was no us. It took it's toll on her. In my absence she'd grown weary and frustrated and resorted to wine and pills. She hid this amazingly well. I was oblivious, until...
In a black out, she passed out on the couch and in his free reign of the place, he turned on the stove. Fortunately it did not ignite and the Carbon Monoxide detector went off and automatically alerted the Fire/Police departments and me at work. She admitted her problem and went to rehab. I installed cameras and my Boss, Co-workers and friends in our condo building helped with Junior.
It was a struggle to say the least but I became hyper vigilant. This was my one and only and failure just wasn't going to happen on my watch. Every conceivable safety device and system was in place. Overlapping fail safes. Accountability and the absolute best people involved I could ever imagine that truly cared.
She came home, I was concerned about relapse, kept her under my thumb, hovered like a hawk and had people drop by in my absence. In her mothering nature and with the joy in his life, having stepped out here and there I finally relaxed enough to take a break, feeling confident all was in the past and would be well.
Away on a business outing, tragedy struck. I came home to sirens and smoke and people in the street. A fire on the 7th floor. She was brought out on a gurney, smokey ash on her face. Where's Junior? I was restrained.
In the days that followed, there were two theories that came out. One suggested that she relapsed and after the most amazing evening with him of dinner and play, she passed out, again. And with free reign he turned on the stove and this time it ignited. In fear for what he could not see but could smell and feel he escaped onto our balcony. When the flames sought the rich oxygen and the drapes became engulfed, he had no where to go but jump, into the abyss.
The other and the one proof was provided of, was that the video from the cameras I'd installed revealed that they had the best evening ever. Full of play and as was her nature to understand the child that came from her, she wore a blind fold and ear plugs. After eating they played with the sensory panel full of knobs and bolts and various textures that had been made by a friend who had an autistic child. They sat in the living room floor communicating and loving on each other as they rolled and tumbled and fell onto the pillows that surrounded them like a corral.
She carried him to bed, wore out from all the play. She hadn't tied him down. The image of him resting peacefully, un-tethered to was too good not to savor, if even for just a bit. He often had what appeared to be terrible dreams. To watch him endure them while tied down seemed unjust, too much to bear. All seemed right with the world. She went to the kitchen and poured a glass of wine, walked onto the balcony to reflect and celebrate a full circle, the cycle of life, feeling like the mother she always wanted to be. Having not consumed alcohol in a long time, she soon rested her eyes on the couch before planning to get up and clean up, finish tucking him in and go to bed herself.
He got out of bed, ventured into the kitchen and turned the knobs on the stove, this time igniting...
She didn't recover. She blamed herself. She was committed to an asylum, where she bit her tongue off and gouged her eyes out and jammed pencils in her ears destroying her eardrums.
She now lays in her bed, strapped down suffering from horrible dreams... broken dreams.
My son is dead, I can't communicate with her. I've moved on, I forgive her.
I awoke from a dream and hours later I'm still pondering all it alludes to. I don't dream every night or what I'd consider often, but when I do they're vivid and have profound meaning. In this dream...
I was married to my young sweetheart and we wanted kids. We weren't so fortunate early on and it took it's toll on our lives individually and on the marriage. If nothing else, all she ever wanted was to be a Mother. And me, I wanted to be happy and definitely reproduce.
I was 47, she was 45 and we were finally blessed with a son. We soon discovered that our one and only was deaf and blind and unable to speak beyond elated or terror filled shrieks. I felt confused, my prayers betrayed, somehow punished, like Job, but I clung to all that was good and we learned braille and to sign in the palm of each others hands. It was more than 24/7. It was learning to live an entirely different existence. For her, it seemed to come natural initially. It was beautiful to observe. They bonded beyond my ability, while I headed out the door most days to work and provide.
We both were so focused on him and his needs, all we had left at the end of the day was restless sleep at best. There was no us. It took it's toll on her. In my absence she'd grown weary and frustrated and resorted to wine and pills. She hid this amazingly well. I was oblivious, until...
In a black out, she passed out on the couch and in his free reign of the place, he turned on the stove. Fortunately it did not ignite and the Carbon Monoxide detector went off and automatically alerted the Fire/Police departments and me at work. She admitted her problem and went to rehab. I installed cameras and my Boss, Co-workers and friends in our condo building helped with Junior.
It was a struggle to say the least but I became hyper vigilant. This was my one and only and failure just wasn't going to happen on my watch. Every conceivable safety device and system was in place. Overlapping fail safes. Accountability and the absolute best people involved I could ever imagine that truly cared.
She came home, I was concerned about relapse, kept her under my thumb, hovered like a hawk and had people drop by in my absence. In her mothering nature and with the joy in his life, having stepped out here and there I finally relaxed enough to take a break, feeling confident all was in the past and would be well.
Away on a business outing, tragedy struck. I came home to sirens and smoke and people in the street. A fire on the 7th floor. She was brought out on a gurney, smokey ash on her face. Where's Junior? I was restrained.
In the days that followed, there were two theories that came out. One suggested that she relapsed and after the most amazing evening with him of dinner and play, she passed out, again. And with free reign he turned on the stove and this time it ignited. In fear for what he could not see but could smell and feel he escaped onto our balcony. When the flames sought the rich oxygen and the drapes became engulfed, he had no where to go but jump, into the abyss.
The other and the one proof was provided of, was that the video from the cameras I'd installed revealed that they had the best evening ever. Full of play and as was her nature to understand the child that came from her, she wore a blind fold and ear plugs. After eating they played with the sensory panel full of knobs and bolts and various textures that had been made by a friend who had an autistic child. They sat in the living room floor communicating and loving on each other as they rolled and tumbled and fell onto the pillows that surrounded them like a corral.
She carried him to bed, wore out from all the play. She hadn't tied him down. The image of him resting peacefully, un-tethered to was too good not to savor, if even for just a bit. He often had what appeared to be terrible dreams. To watch him endure them while tied down seemed unjust, too much to bear. All seemed right with the world. She went to the kitchen and poured a glass of wine, walked onto the balcony to reflect and celebrate a full circle, the cycle of life, feeling like the mother she always wanted to be. Having not consumed alcohol in a long time, she soon rested her eyes on the couch before planning to get up and clean up, finish tucking him in and go to bed herself.
He got out of bed, ventured into the kitchen and turned the knobs on the stove, this time igniting...
She didn't recover. She blamed herself. She was committed to an asylum, where she bit her tongue off and gouged her eyes out and jammed pencils in her ears destroying her eardrums.
She now lays in her bed, strapped down suffering from horrible dreams... broken dreams.
My son is dead, I can't communicate with her. I've moved on, I forgive her.
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