Tag Archives: Beyond Cliche’s

The Inch Worm

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Downsizing of Dreams

My life moves ahead in Fits and Starts 

I am the Inch Worm

  Folding in half for each step ahead

    Vulnerable, easily squished

      But I am not the Inch Worm

        Because I have Skin

          A backbone that aches

            Pain lets me know

              That I am alive

                I taste Joy in this

                  Velvet Morning

                    Pink Skies give Way

                      To a Brand New Day

                        To Inch Ahead.

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Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out.

Vaclav Havel-Czech Playwright and President

Volunteers in a Dangerous time …

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(Folk festival etiquette for volunteers—or social norm tips amongst crazy IMG_6048creative folk festivallers)
“May I join you?” the question from long dreads that fall from the tall black felted top hat, as her blue meal plate balances in left hand and walking stick in right.
“Yes,” I reply, then add “You don’t look like an ordinary volunteer.”
“I’m not sure how to take that.”
“None of us are ordinary volunteers,” simultaneously from the aging grey haired hippy, accrued pot (or beer) belly, loud red flower shirt.
Trying to politically correct my opener I add, “Last year I noticed that a few of the artists ate in the volunteer tent.” (She looks more like a performer than one of the 1,800 usual volunteers)
“Well, last year I was a performer.” She fesses … and puts in a promo for her current weekly gig at Angel’s Cappuccino. (Aha, I was right.) And then quickly I chastise myself that it’s not about being right/wrong. This woman in the black pleated mini-skirt and hat sits down directly across me, ready for conversation.
“That’s the best hat I think I’ve ever seen,” an 18 yr old starry eyed girl gushes to my new found dinner partner and receives a huge grin thanks in return. Why didn’t I think of that? While social graces are different in every setting, compliments are always acceptable.
The ancient words I’d read and adopted that morning were to give encouragement to the tired, and I realize one fatigue comes from trying to fit in with the surrounding culture, without being swallowed up whole.IMG_0259
Earlier that day the meal coordinator came to ask for extra bodies to help with food preparation, but then asked if we were vegetarian, as we would be working with meat. The other girl bowed out, but I said, “I’ve worked in operating rooms for over 30 years, I’ve handled a lot of meat.”
Faux pas number one …

Later under a perfect summer evening, Bruce Cockburn sings Lovers in a Dangerous Time, and I’m left to ponder some of the artificial social dangers created which add stress. What was Bruce thinking when he wrote those words, along with:

These fragile bodies of touch and taste
This vibrant skin — this hair like lace
Spirits open to the thrust of grace
Never a breath you can afford to waste
… …
When you’re lovers in a dangerous time
Sometimes you’re made to feel as if your love’s a crime —
But nothing worth having comes without some kind of fight —
Got to kick at the darkness ’til it bleeds daylight
When you’re lovers in a dangerous time

Cockburn’s response was:
“When I wrote that, I was thinking of kids my daughter’s age. She was quite young at the time. But, for any given individual, the world has always been a place where you could die. That’s the baseline. At times we can ignore that, more than other times. There are times when fear is in the air, and, of course, there’s always people around willing to exploit that, and enhance it, if need be.”(1)

It appears I was a volunteer in a dangerous time! But as Red Green used to say, “Keep your stick on the ice, we’re all in this together.”
I’m letting go of taking things too seriously.
And the curried beef was fantastic that evening!

(1)-from “Bruce Cockburn: Interior Motive” by Mike Boehm, Los Angeles Times, 22 November 1994. Submitted by Nigel Parry./Google search

Our Daily Becoming

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The person inside struggles to get out
Eyes open … head shakes in terror … non-recognition … fear …
IMG_5790And my heart drops to my toes … this is not my friend
The next day …. I see her in those same eyes, my friend has returned
The intensity of the ICU waiting place…
The question lingers for me, Where has the she been in this time of unconsciousness? … while body fights for breath, tracheal tube blocks words from lips … but, this last evening, she responds with slight smile, the eyes are hers … lips shape words that cannot yet be voiced.
Intensive care—a reason for the name. Three other heavily monitored people share this sacred space … under heavy equipment security … machines record and alarm. The machined man diagonally across … at one point … seven staff members rush into his cubicle … curtains close to keep us out … and yet in the crack I see … syringes inject another fight for life. And the next day another body occupies the bed.
And sometimes I want to ask the nurses not just to look at the machines, but to look into my friends’s eyes … to know the person inside …. the beautiful person she is … and I cannot ask them that, as they are busy saving lives … but I myself can do that, I can look into her blue eyes and express caring.
… jazz vespers at church next to the heart hospital … as the melody begins … the minister speaks of the music’s power that transcends the cares and speaks to the soul … and it does.
And back to hospital room, back to hotel … and we discuss on patio in beautiful evening, in beautiful city, under full moon the heavies of life … over white wine … and we contemplate the recognition of who is the person … and how we have been challenged with the homeless people, the nameless faceless people, the hospital bed people, the walking on the street people… and a mouse sneaks along the edge of the patio … we are startled … no screams, but we do move back one table… and then someone else asks us “Do we have change so he can buy something at McDonald’s?” And we cannot walk by him, he has entered our space … I ask him his name, he is Keith … we ask if he has a place to stay, as my friend is looking for change … and gives him a bill … he assures us he will not buy wine … and she hands him the bill … he leaves and we look at each other and marvel at the day … so many people on this planet … our desire to be known … our desire to be cared for … our gratitude in life … being one of many walking the face of this city, this planet … from long hospital corridors, to musicians on the street, to biking the city, to our friend … the intricacies, delights and beauty of the day.
Wow, was all we could say … and God is good.

Our Daily Becoming
 
Adam Clay
Like animals moving daily
 through the same open field,
it should be easier toIMG_5734 distinguish 
light from dark, fabrications 
from memory, rain on a sliver 
of grass from dew appearing 
overnight. In these moments
of desperation, a sentence
 serves as a halo, the moon 
hidden so the stars eclipse 
our daily becoming. You think 
it should be easier to define 
one’s path, but with the clouds 
gathering around our feet,
there’s no sense in retracing 
where we’ve been or where 
your tired body will carry you.
Eventually the birds become 
confused and inevitable. Even our 
infinite knowledge of the forecast 

might make us more vulnerable
 than we would be in drawn-out
ignorance. To the sun
 all weeds eventually rise up.
 Poem from Poem-a-Day/ Poets.org by Adam Clay
  
 
 

THE BIG PICTURE – size small

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       In the end what matters most

             How well did you live

            How well did you love

      How well did you learn to let go.              Balinese proverb

I get these moments of great clarity when I feel as though I have conquered the mystery of life. The younger I was for these aha moments, the more open I was to accept them. The experience that comes with aging has clouded my clarity with skepticism.

While it was still dark this morning I woke with a sense that I should write down some of these thoughts I’d had … and then I realized I have often felt that way, and frequently I have written the ideas down. Sometimes I have been delighted, at other times I wondered what made that seem so brilliant in the night?

Breathing, living, loving …. as I mix this into every day life of eating, sleeping, interacting, I see that we are all searching for a deeper meaning, for more aha moments … I think we want our lives to be a part of something bigger. (I want to stay in the AHA)

One of my favourite walks takes me up a ridge, and from where I can see the Rocky Mountains span the horizon. When I have these times of feeling too suppressed in my little life I climb the ridge—I call it my perspectives walk.

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A bench waits for me, it overlooks the town and the mountains in the distance, and I ask God to have tea with me. Often I just sit there, sometimes I read, sometimes I listen to music, sometimes I write …. but I need to ponder the vast solid rocky mountains, the bigger picture … and when I look down at my town, I see the little vehicles like Tonka trucks along the roadways, busy little ant like people scurrying about with all the tyranny of the urgent, and I am reminded of the verses:

I lift up my eyes to the hills, where does my help come from  Psalm 121 NIV

For even if the mountains walk away and the hills fall to pieces,                                                             My love won’t walk away from you      Isaiah 54:10 The Msg

After pondering the truth of these words, I am able to descend, for I have gained a new perspective on the immensity of life. I carry those words with me … till next time …  like everyone else, I have a standing invite to sit on that bench. And what surprises me is how seldom it is occupied. 

Not another Bloom Where You are Planted?

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After the flood devastation of 2013, the landscape of Southern Alberta has changed forever. (Till the next “Hundred Year Flood.”) Boulders have been moved by the flood waters.  Tonnes of rocks have been lifted and moved. Trees uprooted, relocated.

Majestic and special spots have been altered forever …. “Danger, the bank has been undercut” read the sign on my favorite bench, before it was removed for safety reasons.

IMG_3439Undercut Bank along the Bow River

These are small issues compared to the loss of homes and property. A week after the waters had poured over its banks…. roses bloomed where flood waters had raged.

Some of the land I’d stood on a week prior, was now laying on the receded river bank fifteen feet below me. The vegetation had moved down as well.

In Banff National Park, wildflowers bloomed this past summer; but I wondered where blossoms would be showcased next year.

Bloom Where You Are Planted, takes on new meaning.

What about Bloom Where You Have Been Washed To, or Where The Wind Has Blown You, or Where You’ve Been Shoved  or Bloom Where You Have Fallen?

Grief like a tsunami ravaged my life in 2005 …  and now I, along with many others,  have been given a new twist to that bloomin’ challenge. I have not been tenderly replanted, I have been washed up on a different shore. Can I still bloom?

There is much beauty to be found every where, even in this new territory of loss. How do you meet the Bloom Where you Have Been Planted challenge?

The post-flood roses were more beautiful than ever.IMG_3445