Peace, Love and a little Rock n' Roll

Walking home from the physical education building after helping a group of young adults train for Special Olympics, I look up at the sky and ask, “Why?” Why, here at an institute of higher learning, am I physically fit, my mind active and expanding, why do others need to struggle so?

Traveling on a road in Galilee, disciples ask the Master, “Why was this man born blind?”

Exhausted and exhilarated after giving birth to my first son, my eyes fill with tears as I plead for answers. “What’s an anomaly? How does a child get Down Syndrome? What am I supposed to do next? Why him? Why me?”

Passing by the bathroom, I see two brothers, grown men now, their faces covered in shaving cream, laughing; joking; flexing their muscles in front of the mirror. The younger helping the older. Love overcoming all boundaries. I smile. All of my questions have been answered!

I have loved the freedom and constraints offered by 150 words! Here are a couple more from friends.

Carolyn–a dear friend who sits by my side each Sunday sharing her wisdom and smile writes:

My story is one of Joy in the world around me and of faith – mostly faith in other people, and that ultimately good will win. Small town girl escaping to a super university and discovering that there were others with major capabilities, dwarfing mine, and a whole new world to explore. Bolstered with high ideals and strong values, and extremely fortunate to meet a young man with a similar background, I embarked on creating a family and a home for them. To me a home is a refuge, and I’ve also enjoyed offering that on occasion to others. My goal is to be a warm and caring person, one to lift up others and let them know someone cares. I’ve yet to discover my purpose in life, and find myself discouraged at the constraints circumstances seem to have imposed, but I work at being joyful and moving forward in faith.

My sister, Cheryl, always one to take on a new challenge or adventure or meet a new person writes:

I ask the students I tutor, “What is a product?” It’s the answer you get when you multiply. I am a product — of all I have done multiplied by all those whose paths I have crossed. My life goals include meeting everyone and going everywhere. I am who I am partly because of my elementary classmates in Kentucky multiplied by my friend Angela in Arizona. The beauty of a bay in Puerto Rico multiplied by the friends I was with on that cruise formed me. The teenage students on a bus in Wales and amazing past roommates are factors in my life. Divorced parents, Korea, adoption, Tennessee, special needs daughter, creative son, Colorado, coworkers at a clothing store, Mexico, widowed neighbors — the factor list is innumerable. I am a product, and fortunately, a product is bigger than the numbers you started with.

My comment board is open 24/7 if anyone else has the urge to tell their story in 150 words!

“Writing for me, is an act of faith, a hope that I will discover what is meant by truth. I also think of reading as an act of faith, a hope that I will discover something remarkable about ordinary life, about myself. I the writer and the reader discover the same thing, if they have that connection, the act of faith has resulted in an act of magic. To me, that is the mystery and the wonder of both life and fiction–the connection between two individuals who discover in the end that they are more the same than they are different.”—Amy Tan author of “The Joy Luck Club”

Reading my friends “stories” this week has definitely resulted in an act of magic. I hope many more will keep posting their thoughts. It is a scary thing…I have blogged long enough to know that “ butterfly feeling” in the stomach, that begins the moment you push the “Post” button. I applaud everyone’s bravery in sharing a little part of yourself!

My sister, Cathy, has always been at my door for every happy and for every sad event of my life with a flower, a casserole or cleaning supplies. Of course, she put aside her fear and showed up to support my blog. She wrote:

Piece of Me

It started as a thought, I suppose. Definitely a desire of some kind. Then there was me. A little piece of those who came before. Brown eyes and a love of outdoors from Dad. Smooth skin and the joy of reading from Mom. Years pass. There is another thought, another desire, and a piece of me is born. Repeated seven times. A piece of me that loves to a be a mother but does it so much better. A little piece of my sense of humor personified into one who needs laughter to thrive. An obedient heart, working to be a peacemaker, a love of learning, a small measure of athletic ability, a need to talk, a desire to serve the Lord, trying to do my best; tiny pieces of me passed on with my DNA. Seven different pieces of me, magnified by their own uniqueness, that somehow make me complete.

My friend Katy is wise beyond her years and a source of so much inspiration to me on FaceBook—she is also an amazing baker and artist! She wrote:

I don’t know who I am yet. Maybe I never will. At least, not in this life. Maybe in my next, or next. Maybe by then I will be done living in this world, and can settle in the one I am most comfortable in. I can pretty much guarantee it won’t be this one. In that world, there will be obvious beauty in all things, the most intimate of friends to sit on the porch and rock with no matter how far they live, after all, we can get anywhere in the twinkling of an eye. We will sit back and laugh at how hard we made things on ourselves, and wonder how different our lives would have been if we knew then what we know now. Oh, how hindsight is everything, and nothing….yet now, in hindsight, maybe I do know who I am after all.

When I wrote of sharing a cup of coffee with an intimate friend, Ruthanne would certainly fall in this category—had we been alive in during the Salon days of Paris, she would have been by my side as we expounded our thoughts on “how things should be”—who knows maybe we were! Check out her blog at Floating Flair!

I was raised in a closed minded world. I would often run into the walls around my life but was too fearful of the man-god I was taught about to ever break free. When someone I love broke through, I gladly followed. I was introduced to new ideas and opportunities. I learned to accept everyone, but was challenged with the ability to leave regrets behind. I am learning to live in the now, and value a tomorrow. I continue on the quest to find peace with a desire for enough time to achieve it.

Please keep posting—they put a smile on my face and a tear in my eye-Magic!

I was born into the great open spaces of the West, in the Mile High City. I am happiest nestled up against a mountain, wrapped in a blanket, in front of a roaring fire. My imagination can soar to the strangest of places, so I keep myself grounded in the dirt of my garden. I love being surrounded by the hustle and bustle of a large family during the day, yet crave the quiet moments of solitude in the early dawn. My love and my kitchen pots can feed an army, but I find communion in intimate conversations over a simple cup of coffee. I can plow through the heaviest of books, however I often find truth in a four-line poem by Rumi. Through it all, I have discovered a God large enough to fill the universe and my longings and personal enough to be reflected in every person’s heart.

(My friend said I couldn’t do anything in 150 words—but I did, so there! Now is it your turn, I can’t wait to see what everyone comes up with!)

This is a DIY blog for all my readers, so humor me and play along…please.  Because, I can guarantee, even without the help of Reader’s Digest that I am closer to nuts than normal. Anyway, while perusing the March Digest and pondering on its deep and relevant messages about grizzly bear attacks and con men–intersperced with reminders of my impending incontinence, high cholesterol and constipation, I came across a great idea. Readers Digest had previously had a contest where they ask people to tell their story in 150 words. They had over 6000 entries. It is amazing what stories can be told in 150 words, which is basically a paragraph.  These stories were so touching (and can be read here or in your bathroom). Reading them made me want to hear my friends stories–in a paragraph. In this day of Twitter and Facebook posts, I realize that 150 words is an entire novel, but I think it can still be done.

So here is the challenge. Write your story and post it to your blog and then post a link here in the comment section. If you don’t have a blog then just post the whole thing in my comment section or email me a copy or post it to my FaceBook page or send it to Readers Digest. Just Do It!  Do it before Spring arrives….all authors have deadlines. I will post my own in a couple days. This is not a contest, unless it is really, really good then I will send you my last box of Girl Scout cookies. Did I say that 150 words is hardly anything…I know that I have written notes to teachers explaining my kids tardiness that have been longer than that! I can’t wait to hear your story dear readers!

One of the previous owners of my home, confided that she had never walked as far as the back fence in our yard or spent much time outdoors because she had a fear of spiders.  I was surprised, because I love my yard so much, but I was also empathetic, because I share her fear of spiders. And this house has spiders, lots of spiders! Fortunately, I have a very good exterminator and so I rarely ever see one. In fact, about the only place I do see spiders these days are in my dreams; the same dreams that have plagued me since I was a little girl. They are always the same and involve big spiders (usually dropping down my neck), tangled webs blocking my way and someplace that I really need to get to. They still lurk in the dark corners of my soul and lie deep in the cellars of my unconscious.

This dream has reoccurred so many times that it has become pretty self-evident what it is all about. Obviously, something that I fear is blocking the way to where I really need to be. In the same way, my friend was limited in the enjoyment of her home and yard by a fear that many may see as unfounded. But, unless you have had one of those big, hairy creatures drop down on you or reached around a rock and found yourself face to hourglass with a glossy, eight-legged widow even if just in your sleep, we can’t judge each other’s fears.

Ironically, it has been another spider that has helped me to laugh and move on. Living with a house full of skiers and one motorcycle rider has helped me to stare fear in the face as I have folded numerous “No Fear” t-shirts over the years and washed hats and gloves emblazoned with the Spyder ski-wear logo. Folding socks has caused me to ponder what it means to have “no fear” and matching gloves reminds me that Spyders are just an article of clothing.  The most important lesson I have learned from my family is that “perfect love drives out fear.”

Love is the “spider exterminator.” I have watched the love of the slopes drive out the fear of falling. The love of soaring beat the fear of jumping. The love of music cast out the fear of performing. The love of dancing overcome the fear of stepping on toes. The love of art and beauty conquer the fear of being unique. I have seen the love of freedom triumph over the fear of risk. And most importantly, the love of being one’s real self conquer the fear of judgment.

Coffee table books say a lot about a home and the people who live there. They say “We love art“ or “We love to travel” or “We love Marilyn Monroe.” In my case, my books tell my guests, “I love Paris,” “The Beatles are immortal” and “God is a big purple.” (Because I ‘found God’ at the National Air and Space museum watching a movie about the Hubble Telescope. So I bought a book with His picture in it and Steve’s response was “God is a big purple?”)  Coffee table books are never meant to be read—(how depressing of a job would that be?  You pour your whole soul into writing a book that people only look at the pictures-kind of like writing for Playboy magazine I guess). The images however can remain with us forever (speaking of coffee table books, folks). This is the case with the coffee table book I grew up as a child, “The Family of Man.”  Finding it again as an adult, brought back the same feelings of awe that I felt as a young girl.

“The Family of Man” was a photographic exhibit created in 1955 by Edward Steichen and displayed at the Museum of Modern Art. This exhibit featured 508 photographs, by 273 photographers, of people in 68 countries. The theme is “people!”  The poet, Carl Sandburg, explains in the prologue:

People! Flung wide and far, born into toil, struggle, blood and dreams, among lovers, eaters, drinkers, workers, loafers, fighters, players, gambler. Here are ironworkers, bridgemen, musicians, sandhogs, miners, builders of huts and skyscrapers, jungle hunters, landlords and the landless, the loved and the unloved, the lonely and the abandoned, the brutal and the compassionate-one big family hugging close to the ball of Earth for its life and being.

In a different place and time, Carl Sandburg was asked what he thought the ugliest word in the English language was? After thinking for a few minutes, he answered,  “The ugliest word, the ugliest word is ‘exclusive’.” Mr. Sandburg was the brother-in-law of Edward Steichen. The photographs showing the universality of the human experience must have also left a deep impression on him.   I have thought how I might answer a similar question, “What is the most beautiful word in the English language?” Many words come to my mind, Love, Patience, Peace, Tolerance, Hope. Even the word “inclusive” has been a powerful word as I have raised my son, Andy, in a much kinder world than existed during Mr. Sandburg’s lifetime.  However, the word I would choose as my personal most beautiful word is “human.” It is a word that describes each and every one of us, it includes our triumphs and frailties, our strengths and shortcomings and the experience that each and every one of us shares on this big, blue marble. It allows us to soar and to fall, to love and to anger, to pray and to curse, to laugh and to cry. As I have sought for an identity to guide the second half of my life, I have found no better word to describe where I hope to fit in. I am human, a member of the family of man. Fortunately, as a very young girl, my mom left this gentle reminder of this sitting on our coffee table.

**By the way mom, Amazon has the original “Family of Man” book going for 400 dollars-what happened to that book?

I was born into a family of medical professionals. My grandmother was a nurse at the same time that women were being given the right to vote. My mother is a nurse. My father was a microbiologist in the hospital lab. My aunts and even my uncle all carried the Florence Nightingale gene. Family dinners often included a large pot of Chicken Gumbo and stories of severed limbs and infectious diseases.

I loved looking at my dad’s discarded slides through my microscope when I was young, but that is pretty much where my interest in the family profession ended. I believe the healing gene is recessive. Early in my college career, I took a Meyers-Briggs personality test and the resulting printout confirmed my hypotheses with this statement “Don’t go into a caring profession.”  I have had to remind my children of this when they have had broken bones or have an illness that lasts longer than 24 hours. Most of our “sick” days have involved hot chocolate and time on the slopes, instead of soup and time on the couch. It is with this background, that I found my mind wandering when Pastor Mike suggested in a sermon this week that we should make our homes “mini-hospitals” or places of healing for those who may come through our doors.

So how does a person who is “not the caring type” make her home a hospital? In my case, I do what comes more naturally, grab a couple of letters on Microsoft Word and simply make it hospitable. Fortunately, I had already given this some thought in a previous blog where I wrote, The word hospital comes for the Latin word hospus meaning stranger or foreigner. Other similar words are hospitality, hotel, hostel, and hospice. In Medieval times, a hospital was the work of the church to provide a place of shelter for the visitor, the stranger and the infirm. So, two out of three I can handle. I can provide shelter for the visitor and the stranger (the infirm are always welcome too, but my medicine chest consists of Tums and bandaides).

As a matter of fact, this present generation has pretty much found themselves in the “hospitality business.” In the same way my family of origin discussed bodily fluids over a cup of coffee, we discuss tips and out-of-town guests.  So Pastor Mike, what I have been able to do is make my home a “hostel.” And it helps that whenever the pool cover is off, it smells like a Motel 6. I feel very blessed to have a few too many beds, a lot of towels and occasionally an extra toothbrush lying around (I will work on that). I love it when people come to stay. Perhaps, it was telling that growing up, one of my favorite movies was “The Inn of the Sixth Happiness.” Zac said it best when he recently told me that when he started his job at The Inn at Solitude his boss told him. “All you have to do is “be nice” it really isn’t that hard.”  So for the “poor wayfaring man of grief” or the teenager who needs a place to crash or for family passing through-I avoided the “caring” professions, but I will leave the light on and I promise to “be nice.”

(The Inn at Solitude and Rendevous Lodge-where Zac and Trevor practice being hospitable–for a price 😉

My girls gave me one of the best Christmas presents ever this year. It was a compilation of all my blogs in a book. Somehow, you feel more like a real writer when random thoughts are in book form—so in a sense, what they gave me for Christmas, was a vision for a new year and a new dream. As I read it, cover to cover, and watched my life unfold on its pages, it was also a little unsettling (and  revealing) to see the changes that three years brings to a person’s life. Then, yesterday, I picked up the Salt Lake Tribune and saw a column “Fifty Things I Have Learned or Relearned in the Past Year.”  Since midnight was fast approaching, I didn’t give this a great deal of thought, but I did scribble down a few of things that I “learned or relearned” in 2011. Thinking about the past year is a good “stretching exercise” to prepare for the actual work of looking ahead to the goals and ambitions for a New Year. Here is my list….

1. Your heart can’t be softened while the rest of your body remains tight and firm…just go with it!

2. I learned I can make toffee that doesn’t break your teeth.

3. Make new friends, but keep the old…one is silver and the others gold!

4. Throwing a pot is a thousand times harder than I ever imagined…(I am going to find my balance in 2012)

5. Evolution is probably the closest theory we will ever have for a “theory of everything!” People change, families change, societies change and adapt…nothing remains the same and that is how we grow and move forward.

6. What your grandkids have to say at your funeral reveals a lot about how you lived your life and what is really important!

7. The early debates in an election cycle are the best because they are about ideas, the later ones dissolve into character assassination and aren’t worth turning the television on for.

8. Blogging, Facebook, texting, iChat and cellphones are God’s compensation for having your children living all over the country (and frequent flier miles help too!)

9.  We all must succumb to “readers” at some point in our life—just buy lots of them so they are floating everywhere in the house.

10. Self-respect and freedom will always be more important than security.

11.Anticipation is half of the fun; surprises are just not all they are cracked up to be.

12. There are certain things you should not try as a grandma, re-learning the Hustle is not one of them.

13. Sibling relationships are the longest lasting relationship we have in this life, keep them strong.

14, Lunar eclipses and meteor showers are worth losing sleep over.

15. Faith is opening yourself up to possibilities; Hope give us the patience to wait for them to happen and Love is the power that keeps us all sane and moving forward in this life.

16. You are never too old to fall in love…even if you’re a great-grandma!

17. Friends accept you for the person you are, not who you were or who you may become…. Facebook and dogs are good filters to help keep track of this.

18. You don’t have to give birth to children to have them totally worm their ways into your hearts forever

I recently heard a story that I have pondered all day.  Alfred Bernhard Nobel, was a chemist, engineer and inventor. He held 355 patents the most famous being for dynamite. In 1888, Alfred’s brother, Ludvig, passed away. A French newspaper erroneously published an obituary, saying that Alfred had died.  The obituary stated, Le marchant de la mort est mort (The merchant of death is dead) and then went on to say, “Dr. Alfred Nobel, who became rich by finding way to kill more people faster than ever before, died yesterday.” Upon reading this, Alfred became very concerned that this would be the legacy that he left the world. Fortunately, Mr. Nobel had the gift of time to change this legacy… and his will. Upon his death, his vast fortune went to fund what we now are familiar with as the Nobel Prizes, the most famous being the Nobel Peace Prize.

Today, the Nobel Peace Prize was given to three women who have “rendered the greatest service to the cause of international fraternity…in the establishment and furtherance of peace congresses.” Three women who have sought to bring peace to their war torn countries.

Women are the world’s peacemakers. On this day of international peace and in this season of “peace on earth, good will to men,” I found myself reminiscing of a warm Christmas night in Tempe, Arizona. My Girl Scout troop had gone caroling. We had just learned a new song at school, which we all loved, “Let there be Peace on Earth and Let it Begin with Me.”  We wanted to sing it at every house we visited. Ironically, a war was raging, students were protesting at ASU where my Mom worked and my scout leader had a son serving in Vietnam. Somehow, though, it seemed like if we sang that song loud enough and with enough fervor, our little band of green bereted junior scouts could change the world. Somehow, it seemed that when we crossed our arms and grasped hands at the end of our meetings and made a wish that our collective will power could change things….and maybe we did. But, mostly what I remember from that night is that “peace begins with me.” That is why several years ago, I wrote this quote in the front of my journal. Thich Nhat Hanh, one of the greatest voices for peace in our day reminds us:

Our capacity to make peace with another person and with the world depends very much on our capacity to make peace with ourselves. If we are at war with our family or our society there is probably a war going on inside us also, so the most basic work for peace is to return to ourselves and create harmony, among the elements within us-our feelings, our perceptions and our mental states. When we have peace within, dialogue with others is possible.

During this season of rush, rush and so many demands, it helps to stop sometime during the day and find that place of peace within, that place where there is “harmony among the elements.” then we can go out and like the brave women honored in Oslo, we can be peacemakers in the world.

Each morning, I awaken to the sound of a flock of Canadian geese flying directly over my house, as they make their way from the cornfield on my east to the wetlands in the west. And in the evening, I watch as another flock returns to bed down for the night. This will go on for a month or so and then they will move further south for the winter. For me, the sound of geese honking is a signal to begin to “gather in.”  The screened windows are now shut, soup is once again on the menu and a fire burns in my kitchen fireplace. As the years move forward, “harvest time” seems more personal, it is something that is happening not only in my neighborhood, but also in my soul. It is a gathering time.

Even though my nest is hardly empty, I feel the change in the air as my own flock has headed south and east and to the mountains, flying over my house now, on the way to beds of their own. Fall leaves me with a happy feeling, a comfortable feeling, a nostalgic feeling and an unsettled feeling, all captured in the mournful sound of the geese. Journal in hand and wrapped in a comforter, I am beginning to once again ponder the lessons I have learned from motherhood, gathering, preserving and storing them away. (Another of life’s paradoxes, when you finally start to get the hang of what you are doing…everyone moves out!)

What began as a list of the top ten things I learned in my career as mother, has now been reduced to one or two lessons on love, that I hope will sustain me, not only through the remaining fall season of my life, but well into its winter. In the eternal law of the harvest, we reap what we sow and as mothers all we can do is sow seeds of love. Every changed diaper, every load of laundry, every fixed meal is love made visible. Every struggle, every heartbreak, every loss expands our own hearts so they can hold more.

 At this season of Thanksgiving,  it is not the austerity of the our Puritan ancestors, but the overflowing abundance of the ancient Greek cornucopia that speaks to my soul.  Like the horn broken from the nourishing goat, Amalthea, that became a source of unending nourishment and bounty, the cornucopia became a symbol of peace, abundance and a foster mother’s love. It is an emblem of all I hold dear in my own life. As I pull my comforter tighter around myself and the geese make one final pass over my house, my heart and hearth are overflowing.