Weary Christmas season

So tired tonight. Have accomplished some Christmas shopping and notice that most people are not in the happy holiday mood this year. Every party seems tarnished by an underlying sadness or is it me? Friends who are normally "gung ho" during the holidays seem to be pushing themselves to get into the holiday spirit. I wish that it were possible to take a pass once in awhile. I remember a cousin one year calling me and saying that she was too depressed to do Christmas, and could I do the holiday dinner? I did, it was lovely. She went to her bed for Christmas. That idea really appeals to me this evening. I should take to my bed this Christmas and dialog with the angels! John and Yoko weren't all wrong, they took to their bed and gave Peace a chance. What better way to celebrate Christmas this year!

On a more positive note, I do love hearing from old friends during the holidays, there is something about picking up the phone or dropping a line that is very satisfying.

Bah Humbug - Hallelujah

Not facing this holiday season with good thoughts. If it could only be about the celebration of the birth and life of Jesus Christ, but it isn't. And guess what, I helped create this commercial view of Christmas in my own home. There was something so inviting about doing the whole magical Santa tree thing with all the presents and filled socks. Trying to make up for what I felt was lacking in my own childhood but what I didn't realize was that what I remember most clearly about Christmas growing up was the people. The grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins all merry, laughing and breaking bread together. It was more about the gathering of clan and the sharing of food that was special. The gifts? not really. How can I correct what I created? How can I make these daughters of mine appreciate what is really important? Neither has even presented a wish list to me this year which means they really have all that they need. (Having said this, as a new teacher Kelly doesn't really make the salary to afford all that she needs in this expensive California) Any ideas?

A Miracle!!

It has been a month since my last blog entry and here are my sins. Just kidding, but I am amazed that a whole month has gone by. A month of having someone care for me - what a concept! Someone who cooks me dinner, watches my back, holds me, laughs at my jokes, comforts me when I am sad and so much more that I cannot say here in this blog.

A month that included him getting hurt, getting sick and missing his kids desperately. A month that included my angry teenager, unable to deal with disappointment with her boyfriend, taking it out on me and not wanting anyone else in her life, especially her mother, to have joy. A month that included my latest wish child dying before his wish could be granted. Ouch, that one still grabs my heart. A month that included corporate craziness, changes I don't understand, wondering how it will all turn out.

Do the pluses outnumber the minuses? Is this what life is all about? I truly cherish the wonderful moments that happened this month, Taize prayer service, a trip away with good friends, scrambled eggs and incredible muffins eaten in bed, wow! Meditating with my friend Lynn to send healing to her seriously ill friend.

But the biggest miracle just happened - my new love found an old friend who has been out of my life for 6 years. I sent him an email, hoping against all hope, that he would contact me and he did and I hope it picks up where it left off. It hurts to lose an old friend. He called me by my Italian name Giovanna. I like that. I missed him.

Uneasy day

Today I am in a state of unease. Uneasiness. I let go today of a situation that I cannot comment on here in my blog. I can only say that I struggled with the decision for months/years and today finally executed. And I have sadness about it but I am not asking if it was the right decision. I know it was and sometimes the right decision isn't the easy way out, is it? As usual, daughter Kelly doesn't agree with me as she is used to me taking care of everything always. Why do kids think their parents are superhuman beings? Hard decisions are just that - hard to make and hard to execute on.

The strange thing is the uneasiness, the sadness is bleeding into the whole day.

Even when you feel loved in this world, you feel sadness. I struggle with loving the good things and accepting the difficult things. Is there a cave nearby that I can crawl into and escape this sometimes difficult life?

What's love got to do with it?

The thought occurred to me tonight that when I was young I so feared death that I craved a love that would soothe my fearful soul, that if I could just find a man who loved me with his whole heart, that death would be held at bay.

This worked for awhile but what I didn't realize was that while he could soothe my fearful soul, nothing could prevent death. The death that came was not my own, but my beloved grandmother, grandfather, mother and his grandfather. I realized that love, human love cannot keep death at bay. It will come when it is time for us to go. I let him go when I realized he could not protect me from the pain and heartbreak that death brings us. I only sought after love that could not destroy me when it left me by death or otherwise. Nothing that could penetrate my soul.

Today, a new love is in my life. I know that he cannot save me from death, from loss. I know that he has penetrated my soul already in a short time. He can only give me this moment in time. I am allowing him to give me this moment in time and I treasure each moment, each smile, each embrace, each delicious moment in this lifetime. Life does not hold any guarantees or any promises and this brings me to Jesus Christ.

I realized tonight that my teacher Christ has been with me lockstep my entire life, through my parents untimely deaths, through heartbreak and loss and now when I have love in my life, Christ is standing back. I don't know why. I am not calling on his guidance as often, his support. Why? I need to get down on my knees and thank him for this glorious moment in time. This treasure. Thank you for bringing this love to me today, this moment, this hour, this minute. Thank you. Thank you for the loving friends and family members that I am so blessed to know. Thank you.

From Crone to . . . .

When I started this blog, I felt that I had become a wizened crone, the older woman with all the knowledge to dispense to the younger women in my life - my daughters, my friends. My friends laughed at me and shook their heads, you are still so vibrant and alive, how can you say that? I thought I was successful at creating the veil or wall around my heart.

Today I went to a new church, not my church of birth and watched folks carry cardboard signs that read one thing on the front of the board about something they had overcame and the reverse showed how with God's help, they were able to work through their pain. One woman held a sign that said, I used to have a wall around my heart protecting me from heartbreak. The reverse said, with God's help, my heart is healed and loving.

Today my heart is open and I find that this can only have been achieved with God's divine help. I did not consciously open my heart. I did pray to God for health and happiness. God answered me. Let me know a true heart I asked? He answered with a true heart. When I feel loved by the beloved, I am more loving to you, all of you.

Some people want to throw fear in the mix - what if? what if? protect your heart - don't let anyone in. Can you overcome the foreseeable heartbreak coming, they ask? Are you sure you want to do this thing? I can only say that this month has brought me more happiness, more love than I have had in years and if I only had this one month of love, than it is enough for now.

Bailey Boy and Mr. Bristol

This past week when I couldn't sleep I remembered how I acquired my two favorite dogs and how much love they gave and have given me. For some reason I kept waking up at 3:00 am and started remembering to help me fall asleep and with each dog, I fell asleep before the end of the story.

Mr. Bristol or Sir Harvey Bristol was our cocker spaniel from 1980 - 1996, a very long time for a cocker spaniel. He was such a handsome dog that our vet begged us not to fix him and to stud him out. We did once I think and we never did fix him but he was still very mild mannered and gentle which is interesting for a male dog. Ray created a video montage of all Julia's baby videos up until now and it breaks my heart to see Mr. Bristol a wizened old dog. I remember my friend Mark who was deathly afraid of dogs, just loving Bristol, comparing him to an old man. He called him Einstein and maybe he was. There is an author who talks about the Seat of the Soul - Gary Zukov, I think and he once spoke about animals being part of a pack mentality or pack soul mentality but every once in a while comes an animal who is just about to reincarnate into a man and you can tell by looking into their eyes how soulful they are and it's much more than that. Bristol is a person right now, I'm sure and he will be a special one for sure.

And now for Bailey - Bailey's Irish Creme - see the link to Bristol. Kelly came up with that link because I really wanted to name him Tator Tot because Pugs are notoriously couch potatoes. Bailey has been special from the moment we laid eyes on him. And he was born on Mother's Day to boot. He is also a gentle soul. Last week when I walked him at the beach, he walked over to a man and sat on his feet. Bailey never notices other people or dogs -he only has eyes for us usually and I thought this strange but when I talked with the man, I realized, it was no coincidence. The man has lost his pug, Wise Guy, a couple of years ago and couldn't bring himself to replace him. Bailey is around the same age as the dog he lost. Bailey went up to this man at least 4 times and I said, see that's a sign, time to get a new puggie.

Tweet tweet tweet

Isn't it interesting how we are all communicating with each other via the various technologies available to us, such as Facebook, MySpace, Linkedin, Twitter? I watched Mark update his status every couple of minutes and had to laugh - who was reading all of this? How inane is our world but then it prevents us from getting into these long winded conversations but still able to update people we know with what is happening in our lives. I think I like it, I think I don't like it. I don't know.

Taize Prayer

We're on this spiritual path this year and one of the suggestions Gretchen made was to attend the monthly Taize prayer service at Mercy Center. It was so beautiful, I cannot even properly describe it. The church was all dark when we entered, only lit by candlelight. The cross was laying on the alter not on the wall. There were harps, violins, piano and elderly nuns chanting. The church filled up to it's capacity. Voices joined into the chanting along with the nuns.

I recalled when I was 7 and making my first communion. I sat in the darkened church, only lit by candlelight, I had just finished my first confession and sat in complete silence, protection and as close to God as I have ever been in my life. It was pouring rain outside and I never wanted to leave. Last night brought up that memory. As close to God as I can be.

In the middle of the session, everyone got in line and went up to lay their forehead on the cross to unburden their fears. Diane pushed me, go on, go up at the very beginning so I followed Gretchen and Joe but soon learned that every single person in the church must do this. It's not like communion where only some take communion. I felt that the entire congregation went up to the cross. As the line finally shortened, Diane tapped me and said, do you want to go up again? I thought, what? go up again? why? as only a good Catholic girl would say, right because we only take communion once but I knew that Diane needed moral support to do this so I went and when I got up there, I realized that in my first pass, I forgot Kyle. I sighed and said, oh yes Lord, that's why I'm here again. thank you.

The other thought I had was this - women get it. The Nuns didn't need the pomp and circumstance of a formal mass to worship, to prayer, just chanting, light and the Lord. And guess what? there were a lot of men in attendance.

9-1-1

In her usual manner, Julia posed question after question about my father's death to better understand what happened. As I tried to explain the events of the day as I best remembered them, she asked me in frustration, why didn't anyone call 9-1-1? And it occurred to me that 9-1-1 didn't exist back then. I thought that most likely an ambulance or a coronor's wagen came but that we didn't have 9-1-1. It came as a shock to me that things that have been created or invented are just taken for granted, as if these things were always available to us. How many other things have been created in our lifetimes that we just accept? I'm not talking the big obvious things like cell phones, the internet, video's but the small things like 9-1-1, trauma teams, EMTs - when and how did all of this come to be?

Interesting enough, the next night on ER, they had a character that played the man who invented the system and brought trauma teams in. I wondered how much of this was true but if there was one person who really started this, God bless him and every other person who comes up with these ideas.

Synchronosity

Is this how you spell it? Not sure. Thinking that this could be called mini-miracles or glimpses of faith. Do you ever put something out there in the universe or whatever you want to call it and it happens? Friend applied to graduate schools. Another friend not connected calls me to go to lunch (first time in 8 years), drives down to Foster City and at the end, when I ask her about her son, says he's now admissions director at one of the schools my other friend applied to and he sent me an email the very next day. And who put it out in the universe - was it me? was it the friend? I don't know. I just know that it happens. One time I thought in my mind, I just want to read a book about St. Francis that was not written by the Catholic Church, unbiased. That Sunday, the front page of the pink section in the Chronicle featured St. Francis and listed all books about him, and noted those books not written by the church. I was mystified but did buy and read one or more of the books. San Francisco, St. Francis. I was born in the city of St. Francis. How fitting, how miraculous.

God must have spent a little more time on you

Heard this old NSync song on the radio driving home tonight from Di's house and I remembered how when I first heard it, I thought it was so beautiful and it made me think of one of my sister-in-laws who I just had talked to on the phone.

At the time, I thought she was definitely one of those people that God had spent more time on but reflecting back on it now, I think that all of my sister-in-laws are people that God spent alittle more time on. Penny and the tremendous love she has for her family, Diane and her easygoing but loving ways, accepting everyone and being open to everyone - so admire that quality in her, Karen and her caring/giving ways to her family and friends, her ability to get in and do the work, the volunteering, whatever needs to be done and lastly Sherry, whom I've spent years meditating with. I don't know her as well but I do know one thing, my brothers have picked the most wonderful women in the world. I love them all so much and we in the family are fortunate to have these people that God spent more time on. These courageous women, mothers, sisters, friends, daughters, wives - they are truly the best.

The Whole of Life

The start of 2009 is certainly a topsy-turvy of strong emotions. As I flew home from London, I watched a movie about a ghost of a husband who is trying to help his wife from beyond by connecting her with this dentist. It was appropriate to see flying home from London as the dentist is a Brit and the wife is American. Do the airlines think of things like this? The movie was entertaining but what I came away from the movie was this lovely little song by John Mayer. It strikes me that I like a lot of his songs - "Say", "Daughters", "Free Falling" and this song "The Heart of Life" that played at the end of the movie. It's lyrics so fit what I see around me. Julia downloaded it from iTunes for me and I listen to it now as I write.

A couple of weeks ago, my cousin Vince lost his little Pug Olive on my Aunt Rose's 85th birthday. Olive was a rescue that he had for a year and he was only getting her regular innoculations. An innocuous thing to do on a bright Saturday morning. You'd never expect that by nightfall, you heart would be full of pain, would you? My heart broke for him and his sister Jeanne, as they tried to be cheerful for their mom on her birthday.

This past week we celebrated the inauguration of Barack Obama into the presidency. The country was filled with emotion, awe, amazement - we were and are the most united I can remember Americans being since the Kennedy days. We will all remember where we were when the inauguration happened. As for Scratchy and me, we were in a vendor meeting from 8-10 a.m. - geez, what terrible timing!

But back to the song and the touching lyrics. I watch my daughter Julia struggle with the up's and down's of first love and loss and my heart breaks for her. I never realized when I had my daughters that you would suffer with them their losses of love. For some crazy reason, I thought that this was a private matter for them with their boyfriends, husbands, etc. I didn't know my heart would break along with theirs. I've seen it with my friends and their daughters too. All you think about is that little baby in your arms but as they grow, they are an extension of you and their joy is your joy, their pain is your pain.

Anyway as I think of Vince, Julia and Barack Obama, the lyrics strike me even more. "Pain throws your heart to the ground, love turns the whole thing around" "No, it won't all go the way it should, but I know the heart of life is good". Joy does return to us eventually after our hearts break open. Sometimes it takes longer than it should, I know.

Pray with me that the heart of this year 2009 will be good.

Thoughts while jet lagged

As I was returning from London this past Friday, looking out the airplane window, I remembered something Marjorie said about first entering the States from her native Scotland. (Marjorie owns the local tea place in Pacifica - Tranquilitea, if you ever get the chance, try to take in a cup of tea there - it is amazing.) Anyway, Marjorie commented that when she first landed in the States, she felt the energy of the busyness of the American people. The energy whizzed past her to and fro. I wondered as she told us this why she ever stayed here. How could you leave the calm of Scotland for the busyness of America? And where are we all running to and fro here? Although having just left London, the energy there is just as busy as the States, however, I do think there is more of a personal life for folks in London. They don't seem to have to be in the office at the crack of dawn and they leave for home at a reasonable hour. They seem to have a work-life balance. I noticed this when I worked at Barclays too.

Marjorie has created a little cozy respite here in Pacifica. Tranquilitea sits right by the bait shop on a very quiet, not heavily traffiked street. Marjorie lost her husband this past year and has to work now at another job as well as run the Tea shop. I hope she can maintain both but I don't know. She is now one of us busy American's, isn't she? When you walk into Tranquilitea, you feel instantly calm with the lavendar walls and white tables. I pray that Marjorie can maintain the peaceful Tranquilitea. I worry some days she won't be able to.