This morning I awoke to a picture and a story a friend has posted on Facebook of a humpback whale. This is what it said:
A female humpback whale had become entangled in a spider web of crab traps and lines. She was weighted down by hundreds of pounds of traps that caused her to struggle to stay afloat. She also had hundreds of yards of line rope wrapped around her body, her tail, her torso, a line tugging in her mouth.
This is her story of giving gratitude.
Read moreI was having an online chat with a friend of mine and she
was wondering how I managed to stay so positive with my limited ability to
leave my home. She could remember how hard it had been for her when she was
confined to her home for 8 weeks post hip surgery. It was one of those
questions that I knew the answer to, but at the same time made me reflect on
the last 3 years since RGRTA eliminated the bus route servicing our area and
virtually eliminating the paratransit services (aka LIftLine) to our
neighborhood.
Read moreThe last couple of weeks have been frustrating in some respects. Liftline has told me they were following RGRTA, RGRTA says there eliminating the route was due to a decrease in ridership. The town told me it is a county issue, the county ignores me, the state tells me it is a federal issue and that i need to request the ADA be expanded so that my services can be restored. I feel as if everyone who has the power to make a change is telling me not my responsibility. So the other day I had to sit down and ask myself am I doing my best. Right now, I think I am. I have started a petition locally. Am working on a letter to my Congressional representative, a letter to my local newspaper and investigating who are the national disability rights groups. This is no longer about me or my town, this is now about ensuring that what happened to me will never happen to anybody else.
Read moreZoe and I are starting on a new adventure as we learn about breast cancer and work our respective ways through this journey. As i have been thinking about how overwhelming it can be to think about how are we going to make me through this, I found myself thinking about something Jack Canfield spoke about in the movie "The Secret". He said, “Think of this, a car driving through the night. The headlights only show 100 to 200 feet ahead, and you can make it all the way from California to New York, driving through the dark because all you need to see is the next 200 feet.That’s how life tends to unfold before us.
Read moreThe first assignment sounded so cool, except I do not have magazines in the house L -- so that down, I was feeling kind of stuck and non-creative. Perhaps because I was tired. So laid down took a nap, made these breadsticks out of canned biscuit dough, rolled them in butter, baked them, then bathed them in a garlic, salt, oregano butter sauce and served them piping hot with a festive salad, you know one of those kinds where you empty the refrigerator in it, and ate that with a bowl of pasta a friend made tossed with a marinara sauce that has been passed down in his family. Nothing like authentic Italian sauce – so much different then what you buy in a jar. I may never be able to do that again.
Ok, so full stomach, rested (well slightly), and feeling light in my spirit I started thinking about who I would want to see or spend an hour with. Do I have to pick just one? Can’t do that.
Read moreIt’s amazing what a nap and a grilled cheese sandwich will do. having been gone since what for me is the crack of dawn this morning (7:30 am), I came home, completed some errands and was bound and determined I was going to journal today if it was the last thing I did. But the last thing I wanted to do was write in my journal. All I wanted to do was take a nap. But it’s 8:30 pm you can take a nap now. Sure, I can. No, you can’t. Yes, I can. And the healthier side of me took control and I curled up in bed for what was either going to be a long nights sleep or a good nap. The nap won out as I woke up hungry. So after fixing myself a grilled cheese sandwich and a diet mountain dew, I could begin to think about what my being unique. Chewing my sandwich and sipping my soda gave me an opportunity to think about where I wanted to start with my thoughts on uniqueness.
Read moreOk, so where do I start. Norma Rae, Freedom Writers, oh so many. But the one that always inspires me is rabbit proof fence. I love the character of Molly Craig. Yeah most of the stories are about real people, but this was a girl who was 14 at the time and traveled with her two cousins 1500 miles to get home after being taken away from her family. The first time I watched the film I remember cheering for her the entire time. There were moments I so understood her indignation. I cannot imagine being fourteen and being taken away from your mother and the only home you have ever known. I guess in that situation I am lucky in that I do not consciously remember my birth or foster parents. I do not consciously remember being moved to the next family. I am sure at some level, those feelings and memories are imprinted, but unlike Molly, I was not old enough to remember. I can’t imagine the indignation of having to have someone I do not know wash me or tell me what to eat or how to pray or how to do anything in my life. I am so grateful for that. I could understand the renaming of Mr. Neville as Mr. Devil as he was the one who destroyed families and lives in what he believed were their best interest as he sought to breed the aborigine out of people. I found myself getting angry at how those in power were making choices for others about when they could go home, when they could buy shoes, when they could see family members. Ok, so Molly didn’t know a lot of these things, but you could still understand how witnessing the abuse and punishment of others who had been taken to Moore River was enough to make her say I am not going to tolerate this. I am not going to conform to their teachings. Where so many of the others who had been taken here conformed, Molly stood up and said no and in her own way, using her own knowledge, her intuition, her spirit, everything she had learned from her mother and the other women in her clan about tracking, hunting and survival she outsmarted everyone for months and found her way home.
Read moreI think what is strong and good in my life is what sees me through most things. I think one of my strengths is my patience with me and others. I know that I and others am works in progress. I do not expect myself or others to be transformed over night. Nor do I expect others to be as committed to their evolution as I am. I tend to be positive. I allowed myself to get hurt pretty deeply and went through this time of intensive healing and transformation. Ever since I removed myself from the cave in which I had been living, thank you Aristotle, I have become increasingly used to living in the light.
It is an amazing thing that happens when you take the shackles off your soul and begin loving yourself and cleansing yourself of all the lies that you had internalized.
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