Equilibrium and Sparks

“This he [she] feels, is my proper vocation, this is the optimum, the law, the life for me to live. Here I find the degree of equilibrium, safety, calm and leisure which I need, or here I find the challenge, passion, fight, and hardship with which my soul’s energy expires.”

~ Pg. 256 Par. 1, The Varieties of Religious Experience William James

Making fruit salad this morning is a proper thing to do for breakfast. It is when I got to the pineapple, after the strawberries, that I thought about Dad. He was the one that showed me how to cut up a pineapple. He grew up on the California Santa Monica Pier.

His mother gave him his own stand on the pier selling pineapple. She set him up good for a young teen. He cut up the pineapple and sold pineapple on a stick.

All profits were his to keep. Along with diving off the end of the pier for two bits, or body building at the original Muscle Beach, his stories where nice to hear while he taught me just this skill.

All togther again…

It took some time but I have brought all three stencils together again.

Lovely hearth

It was a cold winter’s night, like this one, when I heard a soft knock on the door. I was alone. I did not see my kitty Dudea around. When she gets outside she makes a similar sound on the front door when she wants in.

“Ok Dudea, just a minute!”

I got off the couch from the warmth of the fire while reading a book and listening to some Jazz. Yes my blissful moment was interrupted. I opened the door. I looked around and I did not see my kitty,

“Hello, it is very cold tonight. The rain is coming down. I only have this scarf to keep me warm. I smelled the fire smoke from you home. Would you mind if I stood in front of your fire to warm up?”

I blinked and then blinked again.

“Sure!”

He came in the house with a push of the wind and the smell of the earth came in with him.

“Oh what a lovely hearth you have my dear!”

“Thank you!”

The elf then became very still and quite. He has been with us for about five years now. I do not bother him. I only touch him to clean him. I have heard that the “little-folk” come and go and sometimes stay. Their time frame is much different then ours.

This evening is much like the one five years ago when our little elf came to rest; by the fire, by our hearth.

Miles away…

Going through the motions of the Christmas season.

Not wanting to spend more money on presents

Not wanting to spend time with the family

I like the cold and a fire in our fireplace

Something has passion around here!!

I feel like steam all the time

Melting, questioning and dreaming.

The cold cools my fire within.

I feel like steam all the time

Melting, questioning and dreaming.

An Image of Mother’s Passing…

If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance. – G.B. Shaw

My brother called to tell me mom passed. There were few tears to shed. A year before I shed my tears knowing that this day would come soon enough. Giving birth and waiting for death are so much alike in their ways. One waits and endures through the pain while caught in the eternity of this waiting. It passes. Human beings are born and then they die.

The funeral director was called by phone to come and receive my mother’s body in death. They arrived quickly. A gurney was brought into the house. The man asked if my father and I would like to join my brother downstairs.

“Many family members find it hard to witness their loved-one’s bodies being placed on a gurney.”

My father and I stayed. I watched as the mortician picked my mother up as a bride over the threshold. Her body hung down lifeless. A vivid image of Christ on the cross came to mind. Then she was placed on the purest white sheet I ever saw. Then they wrapped it round her. She was the center of a beautiful white Lilly. My father bent over and kissed her, I followed and kissed her, and he followed again. Then she was gone.