Life and Expectations

Is is 5:30 AM and all is well. I love this time of day when the hustle bustle is quieted down and the darkness is starting to lift and it is quiet and soothing to the senses. Jack woke me to go outside for a few minutes and is now back in his bed, snuggled under his covers and already I hear the soft hum of his snoring.

Son fixed the small music box in here on Jack’s hut so I could play CD’s or even records if I wanted. Sometimes I just have the radio on in the background. Being as sensory as I am, music seems to fill me and I feel the beat within me coursing through my body. It energizes me.

I am so looking forward to Mama’s visit. We have been looking at places to visit while she is here.  Mama (my aunt) lives in St. Louis. I think that is a pretty area. I went up in the golden arch a few years back and that was quite an experience. I also rode on the steamboat. I loved it.

We all have expectations in life. Some actually turn out like we envision them and others go way off track. My expectations of Mama’s visit is that it will be great and I don’t anticipate it going off track either.

But sometimes our expectations fall short and we are disappointed and hurt. I have seen many like that lately and I wish I had the miracle cure but I don’t. I think when that happens, two things happen. We become disappointed that something we believed in so much turned out to not be what it appeared and then we have acceptance that this is just what it is and we move on past.

(click on the images to enlarge them)

Life is all a journey and the only life you can really save….is your own. Many will follow destructive paths and you can’t do a thing about them but you can do something about the choices you make. We are all given clarity on life at different times and so we don’t all come to the same conclusion at the same time, therefore we have to follow our path and just hope that those that are still behind begin to see the way.

Sitting here watching a travel show on how to visit on $40 a day. Much as I would love to visit Italy again, I do not see it happening any time soon. I wish someone would send me to check out places and spend $40 a day on food.  LOL

I was blessed to go with a church group to Italy. We went to Rome and Assisi and it was awesome. OMG. My dream is to go back one day before I die. The story is if you throw your coins in the Trev Fountain, then you will return to Rome. Oh Roma my Roma.  Well, you can be sure I did throw a handful of coins in.

We also went to the Pantheon. Oh my this whole area is rich with history and the architecture is to die for. I was totally on a spiritual journey. For many on this trip it was a shopping spree. For me, it was the journey of a life time.

We went to all the Cathedrals and to Assisi too. What amazed me most is the artwork. It is everywhere…on the walls, on the ceilings, on the floors.  And to see these things still preserved is awesome.

I would get lost in the beauty and they would have to come find me. But I would not trade ONE moment of that trip. I am disabled and it is hard for me to travel and right now I travel by watching it online or on the travel channel. But one day….my dream is to go back to Italy and see those places again.

Your life is YOUR journey. Are you making the most of yours or is it being side tracked by what others do?  Remember, you can not control what others do but you can control how you react to what they do and you can control what they do to you by avoiding those that bring negativity to your life.

So, the sun is shining and I have had my coffee and enjoyed a nice leisurely morning filled with peace.  I hope your morning was too.

The Hills Rang With The Sound Of Music

This past weekend was the 2011 Celtic Spanish Peaks International Celtic Music Festival. They say if you were in the right place you could hear the music through the mountains. So many talented people came.

Musicians came from all over and as the brochure says, it is music from the Appalachians to the Rockies. You can see more about it at http://www.celticmusicfest.com  These pictures are from the booklet they gave out.

I am so excited that Octoberfest will be this weekend. Son hopes to get my scooter going  hoping I can just go look and see it.  I missed the Celtic Festival and wanted to see it so badly. But, at least I got the book.

The other day, I had to go to our ER with severe back pain. One thing I am blessed with is that this ER is a trauma unit and has doctors from Colorado Springs and a helicopter to fly you out if need be. I love how this ER works. There is a phone when you go in the door and you pick it up and the nurse inside talks to you and you tell her what is wrong. The nurse or doctor, depending on how severe, will open the double doors and take you inside.

I also love a sign they have in the hospital. I joking asked them could they make the hands bigger.

And this is the CAT Scan machine they put me in. Isn’t it amazing what technology can do today. This thing can see inside you, see inside your lungs, your liver, your heart. I wonder can it see if your heart is broken.

You know, times are really hard for people. That was brought home to me when we went to Save A Lot and picked up a few groceries when I had to go to the doctor in Pueblo. Three different times, people came up to me while I was waiting on son to come out. I was sitting with the door open and Jack’s door open as it was hot. And those three people had different stories but all needed help and the biggest thing they asked for was food and I had none. It broke my heart. They did not ask for money…..they asked for food. Our country is in crisis and it seems like the end is not in sight.

I think about our country and those doing without food, clothing, heat and I think about the Native Americans in such peril and the street people who have nowhere to go. And I think, why is this country not coming together to help those in need. Maybe that is unrealistic but I think we should all be helping each other.

The day we had the yard sale, I sat in my chair and took pictures of the sky. The moon was as clear as if it were night-time. I loved it and then the jet picture…my little camera did awesome.

While we were sitting outside, enjoying the sunshine, my neighbors came to look and the little girl told us about their “Face” rock. When we got ready to go inside, I walked over to look. What an awesome rock. I LOVE it. It is about the size of a 3-5 year old curled up in a ball. Look at the faces on here and all sorts of markings. I asked where they found it but she didn’t know.

And last, but NEVER least, my mountains….my heart.

When I look at my  mountains, the world seems right. They are breathtaking. They are rugged and yet full of beauty.  And if you stand just right, you hear the sounds of music that only those in tune with nature can hear.

And now, this very weary lady hears her pillows and bed singing the song of the siren “come hither” and I am ready to sleep.

You Can’t Go Back Home Again

 “You can’t go back home to your family, back home to your childhood, back home to romantic love, back home to a young man’s dreams of glory and of fame, back home to exile, to escape to Europe and some foreign land, back home to lyricism, to singing just for singing’s sake, back home to aestheticism, to one’s youthful idea of ‘the artist’ and the all-sufficiency of ‘art’ and ‘beauty’ and ‘love,’ back home to the ivory tower, back home to places in the country, to the cottage in Bermuda, away from all the strife and conflict of the world, back home to the father you have lost and have been looking for, back home to someone who can help you, save you, ease the burden for you, back home to the old forms and systems of things which once seemed everlasting but which are changing all the time–back home to the escapes of Time and Memory.”
― Thomas Wolfe

I think we have all wanted to go back in time, to memories of times that felt so good, to a time of being safe and protected, of seeming to be happier and more carefree, or just to a time more familiar. But it never works. Why?  Because time has moved on and changed and it will never be the same again. We will  never feel the same emotions as we felt when we were a child at Christmas or traveling to our grandparents house or just doing the things we did some time back. We are no longer children and no longer the same person we were then and while those memories are wonderful to hold within us, they are not the reality of what life is now.

Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future.
John F. Kennedy

I think sometimes people can spend so much time yearning for “what was” that they miss “what is”.  I have seen people spend days, months and even years wanting to go back to what was and while everyone else around them is moving forward in life with new adventures, they are stuck in that rutt and can see no joy.  When we do that, we miss the adventures that have opened up in front of us.

When one door of happiness closes, another opens, but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us.
Helen Keller

I remember a dear friend, who has since left this world, who worked so hard one time wanting to bring the whole family together after many years and kept saying “it will be just like when we were little”.  I gently tried to tell her that everyone had grown and changed and to not set herself up for sorrow because it was not going to be the same. She assured me over and over that it was going to be wonderful. After the big weekend, I did not hear from her. Several days passed and finally I went to her home. She answered the door looking quite bedraggled and downtrodden. I hugged her and we went into the kitchen….our favorite place to talk and fixed a cup of coffee and sat at the breakfast table. I could see the crumpled up kleenex in her pocket and waited on her to tell me what happened.

As the tears poured from her eyes, she told me she was bitterly disappointed for the weekend had been nothing like she thought it would be. I just sipped my coffee and nodded my head for that was all she needed and she continued to tell me how one sibling no longer enjoyed laughing and joking and another one didn’t like all the foods she had prepared that they ate when little and another one spent their time watching the tv. She looked so forlorn and asked me where had her family gone. Then she told me she now knew what “you can never go home again” meant. That time had moved on and the closeness and fun they had when little was gone.

I told her that just because it was gone did not mean that the closeness and fun could not be there. It just simply meant they had to find new ways of having that closeness. We talked about the siblings and what they liked and what they did and I could see a light bulb go off in my friend’s eyes as she suddenly said “you know what. I just realized that my sisters and I all love to cook and my brothers love to eat”.  It was a common ground she had found. She had pushed so hard to make this “like it used to be” that she totally shut out any chance of what it “could be”.

After our visit, I was thrilled to hear that my friend had decided to try once more to bring her family together, only this time they were doing things of the present. She told me she had decided that the past was something nice to talk about and remember but that is all it was…..a memory.

I think we have all done this…tried to relive the past. The first time for me was profound sorrow and loss that I could not understand. I thought it would be just like it used to be but it was not. Now, son and I make more memories that will one day be the past and we try new adventures and fun instead of trying to recreate the old ones. One coming up is going to Octoberfest in LaVeta on the first of October.

Past memories can be wonderful treasures. They are like the beautiful china knickknacks we take down and hold in our hands and feel the beauty  and then when we are done, we place them once again on the shelf until we want to see them again. Living in the present does not mean that we can’t have the exuberance and excitement we had when younger…it is just a different kind…a grown up kind.

“We can never turn back the pages of time, though we may wish to relive a happy moment, or say goodbye just one last time, we never can, because the sands of time continue to fall, and we can’t turn the hourglass over.” – Unknown

Letting go is so hard for some people. They feel safe in the “old” way and are afraid of the new way. I think about children how easily they accept change with such an open mind. I think the older we get, the more rigid we become in our thoughts and actions.

“Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened.” – Dr. Seuss

I think what happens is we see the past through rose colored glasses and we are so convinced that it is so much better that we don’t allow ourselves to see the beauty of today. Opening our minds and our hearts allows us to accept the change that comes daily and to not feel like we are missing something because things are not like they used to be.

“Sometimes you have to let go to see if there was anything worth holding on to.” – Anonymous

If we hold on too tightly, we miss the present and when it is not as beautiful as we thought it would be to go back, anger and bitterness set in. Life is constantly changing and so are we, whether we realize it or not.

“The Tao Te Ching says, When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be. When I let go of what I have, I receive what I need. Have you ever struggled to find work or love, only to find them after you have given up? This is the paradox of letting go. Let go, in order to achieve. Letting go is God’s law.” – Mary Manin Morrissey

Beautiful Morning

Just had to share these pictures with you all. Woke up to this gorgeous sunrise. What better way to start the day.

Today, I wish you peace and joy and honesty. I pray that your day goes wonderful and that the people you run into treat you well.

Standing Up For What is Right

“Never be afraid to do what’s right, especially if the well-being of a person or animal is at stake. Society’s punishments are small compared to the wounds we inflict on our soul when we look the other way.” ~~ Martin Luther King, Jr

Turn on the news>>>read the newspaper>>>>> all around the world tragedies are happening. You can not read the news or turn on the television without reading of floods, tornadoes, hurricanes, sunami’s, earthquakes, murders, rapes, abductions, animal cruelty and the list goes on. And, if we are lucky, we read that someone is standing up for what is right>>>becoming a patient advocate, a listening ear, a relief worker, a rape crisis counselor, etc.

So, how do you decide what you stand up for?  The list is overwhelming. Standing up for injustice is important. Standing up for yourself is important. Standing up for what is right is important and standing up for the weak, downtrodden and injured are all important.

Today I want to share something that touches my heart greatly.

This is a picture I have shown before. She is my great-grandfather’s wife and her name is Alice. That is obviously not her real name as she is Native American, but that is the name she went by. Here Americanized Alice is trying to teach her daughter about her ancestry.

Did you know that South Dakota and American Indians across the nation are dying at greater rates than other races? They live with unemployment, poverty, discrimination, abuse and feel like there is no way out for them. And our government seems to be doing nothing for the first American people here. Feeling like you have nowhere to turn, no place to go is one of the most despairing things that can happen to you. Living with sorrow, grief, poor self-esteem, hunger, abandonment, alcoholism, loss, grief, trauma, depression, and feeling like no one cares for generation after generation has caused our First Americans to have a high rate of suicides. This is totally inexcusable.

If it were a rape crisis center in a big city, an abuse center, a rehab center, etc….money would be flowing  in to help with this injustice. But the country seems to have forgotten them and this is my stand today to try to tell the story.

video created by TheFWII

This is a video below showing Walter Littlemoon talk about the boarding school when he was little and the things done to him and to the other Indian children. They were Americanized….made to dress like the white people and even made to have their hair cut like the white man. Many will say that is nothing, but to Native Americans, their hair stands for something.

video created by  22331230

“Hair held great symbolic importance for many in many Native American tribes…… People in these tribes only cut their hair to show grief or shame…….Native Americans in some Plains and Western tribes continue to place great spiritual value on their hair, cutting it only when they are in mourning. “

Quote is from:   http://www.native-languages.org/hair.htm  (good site)

Can you imagine young Indian children being taken away from their parents and being forced to have their hair cut off. What confusion and trauma that did. All they would know is that it stood for mourning…..so who had died in their family?  They had no way to find out. The school was trying to eradicate everything Indian from their being.  How traumatic that was for the children. And the scars left have run deep and long and many today are still trying to deal with them and with the abuse. What did they learn?  They learned how to fight even with their own family for survival. And the hopelessness, the depression and despair have caused the Indians to have one of the highest suicide rates, almost four to one over other races.

I find it so unsettling that we as a world people, can not accept others just as they are. It seems we think they must act and be just like us. Diversity is a wonderful thing and when we try to force a culture on other people, we are in essence attempting to do cultural and emotional genocide of a race.  This is what happened  with the Native Americans in our country….. one state in particular I would like to introduce you to in today”s thoughts is that of South Dakota. Just  keep in mind that this  has happened all over our United States of AMERICA

We have allowed the First Americans to live in poverty and unemployment, which in turn is causing them to be living in despair….generation after generation of despair.

Wikipedia states:

“Reservation Poverty in the United States is defined as poverty among reservations, or “state or federally recognized, geographically defined areas of varying size over which Native Americans have the primary governing authority” Currently, almost a third of single-race American Indians live on reservations, totaling approximately 700,000 individuals . Indian reservations, as “the ultimate welfare state”, usually subsist on what the government provides, and little else Some of the poorest counties in the United States are contained largely on reservations.  Furthermore, on aggregate, American Indians living on reservations have lower incomes, education levels, and access to healthcare, and face significantly higher unemployment rates”

“The country’s 2.1 million Indians, about 400,000 of whom live on reservations, have the highest rates of poverty, unemployment, and disease of any ethnic group in America”  Native Americans remain at the bottom in almost every measurable economic category. Indians earn only a little more than half as much money as the average American-less money per capita than whites, blacks, Asian Americans, and Hispanics. Nearly one-third of Native Americans live in poverty, which is more than twice the rate for Americans in general. American Indian couples earn $71 for every $100 earned by all United States married couples.”

The suicide rate is four times higher on the South Dakota Reservation than elsewhere. It is mostly males, and is 86 percent across the united states. That is horrific. The government tried to, in effect do cultural and emotional genocide. Are we now going for physical genocide?

Here are some good articles about the suicide rate in South Dakota and across the nation. I wish I could make them clickable but don’t know how. If someone wants to leave me message with directions, I will gladly fix them. Until then, please copy and paste into your browser.

http://www.northern.edu/News/Pages/sept2011_suicide.aspx

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/09/us/09suicide.html

http://indiancountrynews.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=155&Itemid=114

How has this been allowed to go on generation after generation?  Why have they become,  in essence, a third world country?  We rush to help other countries in times of dire need and yet we ignore our own and make no mistake…they are our own and they are mine.

video by lakotaarapaho

What can we do about this?  For many, they will say “ok where do I send a check?”.  But the reality is, while money is good, there needs to be more done to draw attention to this. There needs to be a country-wide crusade to help the Native Americans and to find solutions for the suicides where the young people are disappearing daily from suicide. That brings tears to my eyes for I can not envision my sons feeling so hopeless and so filled with despair that they find it is more painful to stay in this world than it is to leave it.

video by jshields01

I hear people all the time say we should hear the cry of a child. What about the cry of a people? Why is no one listening?  Why is no one helping?  Why is our own government not helping?  Have we become deaf to the cries of those in pain?  I would say yes except we send billions to other countries to help them. I know the Creator of us all must weep when He sees such injustice.

video by  rebel072162

Standing up for what is right…for justice…for all.   That is what it is all about.

Integrity–One of Those Elusive Items

Integrity is something you either have or you don’t. There is no middle of the road. You can’t have integrity if you allow yourselves to do things you know are not right. Neither can you have it if you are passive and just say “oh well, not my problem”.

Personal integrity is one of the most valuable things you can have and yet many will sell their souls for the least little thing. I have told people before that “my personal integrity would not allow me to do this or that. Many call it our conscience. I think it is a little higher than that. It is a code of ethics to live by.

A friend of mine says this next statement a lot and I have found it to be so true:

“when someone shows you who they REALLY are….BELIEVE them.”

Many people today showed me “who they REALLY are”  and I BELIEVE THEM. Once you reach that plateau, you can move on with grace and peace and know that you have kept your personal integrity.

Oh I have a dream…have for a long time. A dream of a world that was a kinder, gentler place….a world that was filled with honest of heart people who cared about each other…..a world where competition and jockeying to get your position  no matter who you trample on  no longer happens……a world where you could take a man’s word and it was as good as a legal document….a world filled with laughter and sunshine and love……a world filled with integrity.

And you know what…that may not be this world right now….but the next world…will be and we will have to account for the things we do to others in this world. So, I shall continue to dream and while I am dreaming I will continue to BELIEVE the people who show me who they REALLY are.  .

Our Very Own Laurel and Hardy Episodes

Son and I are like Frick and Frack…..Laurel and Hardy and fortunately we both just die laughing once we realize what we have done. So, thought I would share some prime Laurel and Hardy episodes that have happened with son and I.  Now, keep in mind, we also like to spoof each other, so it really becomes a hoot around here. LOL

Episode one:   I was cooking chicken soup one day and had just gotten it simmering really well when son came in. He is telling me all about school and I am getting ready to put the last things in the soup when I turn around and he has a spoon and has just tasted it. He tells me it is pretty good but kind of bland.  I look at him, biting my inner lip and say “thanks. I will be sure and tell Jack (the dog), since that is his food”.   giggling.  He rushes to the sink and begins washing out his mouth. LOL

Episode Two:  We lived in the country and had pecan trees all around. Buzz, a friend that lived with us, loved to shell pecans and bag them. Well the season was long past for them to be falling off the trees. I go outside one day, wandering around looking at my plants and spy pecans all over the ground. Excitedly, I pick them up and put them in the hem part of my shirt until it is full and I rush inside and say  ”look …look what I found…Pecans!!!”  Well, Son and Buzz both get this really interested look and start to get up and come help get more when suddenly they sit down laughing. Buzz asks me where I got the pecans and I said “under that big tree there”.  They both sit back down and Buzz looks at son and says  ”where did you throw those pecans I asked you to take down to the fence row and put out?”  and he starts laughing and says “uhhhh, under that big tree right there.”   We all died laughing as we were all about to be out there picking up the old nuts under a SYCAMORE TREE no less as if we were harvesting our new  crop of pecans.

Episode Three:  Son comes to my door one day and says “how you feeling Mama?” I told him I felt ok. He heaves a big sigh of relief. I asked him what was wrong. He said “remember when you asked me to bring you your arthritis medicine?” I said “yes.”  He said “well I just discovered that I gave you the dog’s medicine and wanted to make sure you were ok”.  We called the vet and he said “oh it won’t hurt you. You might start barking but that is all”.  LOL

 Episode Four: We got a package in the mail filled with goodies…lotions, soaps..and all sorts of good smelling stuff. I was rummaging through it all and son went back into the other room. Well, inside the box were some of those flesh-colored squishy ear plugs that you can fit into you ear. I put them in my ears to see if they really worked and was sitting here playing on the computer. Son comes to the door and says something to me but I don’t hear him. He tries again and I still don’t hear him so he grabs my shoulder to get my attention. I look up and he is talking but I only see lips moving. I tell him “I can’t hear you son” and he gets this look and suddenly zooms out of the room and comes back with the flashlight and starts checking me for a stroke..since I have had TIA’s before. He checks my eyes and then he looks in my left ear. I look up at him and he is having a fit. I told him to look at me so I could read his lips and tell me what was wrong. He told me that he wanted his ear scope thing cause it looked like my ear had closed up and he thought I might have an infection. By now, I knew why I could not hear him but thought I would tease him. He tells me to get ready cause we are going to the ER. I sit there and he is pulling out the thermometer to check me and his ear scope thing and is talking a mile a minute and I can’t contain my laughter anymore. I reach up and pull out the earplug and said “wait son, I think if I take this out I can hear you”.  “giggling”  He looks at me and says he owes me and then starts laughing..

Episode 5: This story takes place back east when we lived in the south. My Jack wanted to go potty but every time I opened the door, he would back up and not go out. For a couple of hours during the night we repeated this until finally I put the leash on him and drug him down the 32 foot ramp and out into the yard. I am thinking the whole time that once I get him in the grass, he will go potty. So, I get him out in the grass, remove the least and he makes a mad dash back up the ramp and left me in the yard. We repeat this about two more times and finally I tell him he better hold it for the remainder of the nite cause I was not going out there again. He did until 6 AM. I opened the door, he stuck his nose out and smelled and darted out the door and down the ramp. I walk out there with him and what do I discover?  VERY big cat paw prints as in wildcat type cat. All I could think was…”oh great..you left me out there with the wildcat while you ran for the front door”. I might not have been so brave had I know.

Episode 6: One of my favorites. The boys and I raised each other. When they were teens, we had a possum under the house. He was tearing up stuff under there so the boys were going to get it. My youngest son lays on the ground looking under the house with his rifle and a spotlight. He shoots the possum, who was acting very strange and sick, and we think that is the end of the problem. Later that morning, we go to use the phone and it is dead. When the phone man comes out, my son has neatly shot the phone line in two.  I think it is hereditary.

Episode 7:  This story comes from when the boys were little. My youngest, who is three years younger than son here, is sitting in the living room with me talking about the dog. He is telling me “don’t Mandy’s teeth look good?” Mandy is our german shepherd. I say yes they do and about that time son here walks into the room brushing his teeth to remind me of something and my youngest son says “I brushed them with Bubba’s toothbrush”.  While I have spit coke down the front of my shirt laughing..son here has made a mad dash to the bathroom, spitting out toothpaste, drinking mouthwash and wiping his tongue. And my youngest son, who was about 8 at the time is looking totally innocent and does not understand what is wrong with his big brother.

Episode 8: And one more just for the fun of it. We lived on the other side of the mountain and in a house with a full basement remodeled that son lived in and I lived on the main floor. I was forever forgetting he slept days and would vacuum and he would come to the top of the stairs and tell me that he was going to complain to the landlord and would ask me “you do know someone lives down here right?”

Well one night I saw a spider on my floor and was trying to kill it. I was barefooted so was trying to squish it with the bottom of my crutch and did not realize I was going across the floor banging my crutch trying to kill the spider and the sound was going “thump thump thumpthump”  over and over. I finally catch the spider and kill him and turn around and son is standing at the door just watching. I almost jump out of my skin. I said “what?”  He said “I just wanted to know what the H you were doing up here. You are over my bedroom. I had begun to think you had taken up tap dancing.”    We both laughed.

Episode 9:  Son has poured drain cleaner down all the drains. He is in my bathroom and has rinsed all the drains to see if the drain cleaner has worked. I am standing by the sink and he is about to plunger the tub. He has one of those high-powered plungers. He hits the drain on the tub and next thing I know..stuff shoots out of the sink drain and covers me and him both. We stand there looking like we had been shot with paint guns only the paint was this awful brown gunk. Now, we had two choices…get mad/upset or laugh it off and you guessed it…we both busted out laughing and son said..”well, we might as well stay dirty until we get them all”.

Episode 10: And my fav from moving:  the washer flooded the breakfast nook and son and I were using towels to mop it up. Now you are talking two exhausted movers who have been working their hineys off. After we got all the water up with the towels …I looked at son and said  ”son, next time can we just mop the floor?”  He turned from a very frazzled man to laughing at the catastrophe that just happened.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Which Wolf Do You Feed In Your Life?

LIfe is full of wisdom even when the path is gnarled and full of potholes. My faith has always sustained me in the worst of times and I have learned many lessons along the way.

One lesson that bears repeating came in this wonderful quote:

“There comes a time in your life, when you walk away from all the drama and people who create it. You surround yourself with people who make you laugh. Forget the bad, and focus on the good. Love the people who treat you right, pray for the ones who don’t. Life is too short to be anything but happy. Falling down is a part of life, getting back up is living. Being alive is a gift, being happy is a choice..”

There comes a time in life we have to decide is what we are doing worth putting up with all the drama and people who create it in your life. I have decided that drama is an addiction. Some people can not live without drama in their lives. Everything must be a dramatic turn of events and each one fuels them until the next one. I have even seen people, when there was no drama…create drama because they needed the adrenalin rush it provides. Where some want the fly by the seat of your pants, drama in full action life….I desire the quiet rock seat, listening to the melodic sound of water tricking over the rocks, the birds singing in the background and the rustle of wildlife in the bushes.

For me, it is time to walk away from the drama and be around those that bring laughter and joy to my life. When one lives with chronic pain like I do, choosing what is the best for us becomes as urgent as going to the ER when feeling really bad. The negativity zaps our strength and weakens our immune system and so making a choice to leave the negativity, drama and the people who cause it one days becomes imperative for our life.

I think it was after lung surgery that I realized that I had to make choices in my life so that I would be around a lot longer. I had to find the things that kept my life as stress free as possible. That isn’t saying a little excitement is bad. It isn’t. But, excitement is not drama. Excitement is the feeling of anticipation over that box loved ones are sending you or the excitement over seeing family and friends. That is not drama. Drama is when something is always wrong or something bad is about to happen.or when a simple thing is turned into something dramatic when it is not.

My favorite example is someone I know from years ago who used to come in sobbing with dramatic emotional animations of one who has just lost their closest friend/relative etc and when you asked them what was wrong, they replied something along these lines……(are you ready?)   “My friend’s uncle’s brother’s wife’s friend died. I met them once last year and I am just devastated. *sob* *sob*”  She had nothing bad going on in her life and needed something dramatic to get attention for her “broken heart”.   Yes, it was sad the friend died, but my friend’s display was out of context for having met someone “one” time in a year’s time. And she actually went to the funeral and put on this display of emotion and hung close to the grieving family.

I have watched a lot of drama on the internet this past year and finally realized that I didn’t want it in my life anymore. I was tired of the same stories and same dramatic situations that never quite bore fruit. Now, if someone is really hurt, sick, upset..I am there for them. But, when you hear the same type drama over and over until you can just about mouth the dialogue as it is happening, it is too much drama.

This is one of my favorite stories. The meaning in it is wisdom beyond words. And the lesson is….whatever part of us we feed or put the energy into…that is what we will be.

The Two Wolves

A Cherokee elder was teaching his grandchildren about life.

He said to them, “A fight is going on inside me… it is a terrible fight between two wolves.

One wolf represents fear, anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, hatefulness, and lies.

The other stands for joy, peace, love, hope, humbleness, kindness, friendship, generosity, faith, and truth.

This same fight is going on inside of you, and inside every other person, too.”

The children thought about it for a minute. Then one child asked his grandfather,

“Which wolf will win?”

The Cherokee elder replied…

“The one you feed.”

I am a person of faith. I also believe that we all have the same higher power as some call it…whether you call that higher power God, Creator, Grandfather, Savior, Christ…no matter what you call that higher power, it is the supreme being and if we are not careful, we can become so rigid on faith and that ours is the only right way that it is as if we overdosed on viagra.

I learn many things from many religions. I have a very eclectic background on religions…born a Presbyterian, married a Seventh Day Adventist, divorced and became a Baptist, was a “Nature is God” person for a while, did not have a “faith” for a while and became a Catholic. What I learned was, there is a grain of truth in all but that my faith comes from a deep personal relationship with God, Creator, Grandfather, Savior, Christ, Mother Earth….and each one of the faith’s above gave me pieces upon which my foundation of faith is built.

 And this story above of the two wolves speaks to me for it tells of life and what choices we must make. Do we give into the hatred, jealousy, envy, greed, arrogance and all the other negative emotions and let them rule us or do we foster and feed love, joy, kindness, truth, friendship?  Which wolf do we feed?

I realized that my happiness is dependent on me. I have had many ask me how I could be happy being disabled like I was, living in the pain I am in and the trials I go through. And as is my standard reply….my happiness lies inside. If I depend on external things to make me happy, then when those things disappear..what will I do then?

I think we set ourselves up for failure in happiness because society has trained us to believe that if we just had that shiny red bike, we would be happy. If we had this wonderful home, we would be happy, or this beautiful outfit, we would be happy. And the joy and excitement last but a short time and then once again we are discontent. We see this a lot around the world now. This is probably the biggest thing that led son and I to seek a simpler life…one with less material things and more things like love and joy and family. And there-in began our quest to fill the dream for the future..the dream of a more simple life. A life without drama and negativity.

Amazing Technology

Just when I thought things could not get even more amazing, I watched my son as he helped my friend sassy back east  fix something in her computer. He used a program that Sassy had to download and then she give him permission to enter her computer and son went in and helped get the printer going for her…sort of by proxy. LOL.

I had to laugh when sassy asked how he shrunk so little that he could get inside her computer and then I thought ‘that’s where the mouse went!!!” I had visions of the mouse looking like this as he said:

“you want me to do what??? with that mouse???”

We discovered something about mice. They do not stay where there is no food so keep all the food put up where they can not get it and they will find a new home. We have all edible food in glass jars, plastic containers, the the freezer or fridge,  etc so that there is nothing to eat here

I really thought the mouse left when we woke up smelling son’s “soup” that he cooks all night in the slow cooker. I woke up thinking ‘WHAT IS THAT SMELL!”  before I realized it was the soup that had been cooking all nite. I am pretty sure I saw the mouse run out the back door with it’s bag packed too.

Now, back to technology. I got a kick out of listening to sassy as her computer was being fixed. As son was working, she was amazed to see her mouse moving by itself and see things open up on the page  or disappear. Talk about having a ghost in your computer. It was very interesting and makes you realize how easily Big Brother could do that. LOL  Either that or that was a VERY small mouse. LOL

Now on a different level, son went up to put shingles down on the roof and did a bang up job, getting very sunburned in the process. But we are ready for snow now.  I loved this shadow picture of him that came up when he took a picture of the shingles to show his brother, so he could ask him a question.

And here he is wanting me to “throw” something up on the roof to him. I looked at him with the same look as the mouse above and said “you want me to do what?????  It is nice he forgets I am disabled but that would have been a sight to see for sure, me throwing a hammer on forearm crutches.

And this is a picture of one table at the yard sale we had. As you can see, it was a beautiful, sunny day. We sold some, got rid of a lot of things we just were not keeping and then gave the rest to the neighbor for their Alzheimer’s sale. One of the things I love about Colorado is the sunshine. Oh what gorgeous days.

 

And so, the weekend is over and three weary beings are dragging around today. I am thankful we got rid of the mouse, so the mouse sage has ended and we are on to better things. There is always laughter in our house and fun for we choose it to be.

Thank you so much for the emails on the last blog post and letting me know how much you enjoyed the videos of the mouse. I too have laughed til I cried over them. The mouse sage was a good fun way to handle our invasion. I was about ready to adopt the critter when I saw son and Jack both stand there and watch this mouse as he “WALKED” across the room. Heck, I figured I might was well name him and put him as a dependent on the income tax forms. Shoot, I almost miss the little fella.

But things are calmer. Jack is sleeping all night now cause no wee critter is trying to invade his bed. There were a couple of times I was sure Jack was standing on top of his hut as I heard him do that high pitch squeal bark. And seeing son come running out in his BVD’s, forgetting he was not dressed when he heard his mama screaming something was in the bedroom has kept us both laughing for days.

And last, but definitely NOT least. This was a picture I took sitting outside at the yard sale. What an awesome pic it came out to be. I hope you like it.

Now I know….The Mouse Has An Agent

Well, today, we discovered why our mouse is so good at what he does. I have decided that he or she is an impersonator. That is why we can not catch him. He turns into various things to avoid detection. I could have sworn I saw some of Jack’s little stuffed animals moving around and thought I was just tired. Now I know, it was the mouse’s stunt doubles.

Today, son discovered this promo release and I know it is our mouse. It has to be. He is too good at what he does. Take a look. Can’t you see him saying  ”Mr. Demille,  I am ready for my closeup now”.

     

video by  AleRi8

I could have sworn I saw a union card tucked under his arm too. We will never catch him at this rate. Omg, he must be bringing in doubles for the stunts. No wonder that mouse was just stunned and jumped up to run away when son stuck his hand under the dresser to retrieve it.

And I think someone must have had a hidden camera and caught son and I the other day chasing that mouse for someone sent me a video clip showing our antics. Son asked me to hold the bucket and he was going to sweep the mouse off the shelf and I catch it in the bucket. Next time I get the broom!!!

     

this video is really not of son and I and was made by scovington67

So, here we sit a week later and that critter is still running around in here, eating all the peanut butter off of the trap. I swear he must be huge for I have these traps set so sensitive that we have a hard time getting them set behind the fridge and stuff cause they snap so easily. And yet, the next day, we find those traps licked clean. We have had to invest in another jar of peanut butter. I am wondering if maybe we should just buy the cheap kind, then they will come up to the trap and take one bite and go YUK and stomp their little foot and we will have them.

So, now I am down to serious business. I have on my wonder woman underwear and my wonder woman headband and have enlisted the help of the one I know that can help me with the critter problem. So, if you thought you saw something faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive…don’t worry, it wasn’t superman. It was

MIGHTY MOUSE

And his friend

UNDER DOG

 That will teach those mice to mess with a couple of old-time southerners. LOL