They Couldn’t Carry a Tune in a Bucket

Posted on September 19, 2014 by Kami

Friday Letter to My Kids –

Dear J, J, L and L,

I hesitate to bring up this particular subject. It makes me squeamish. And I tend to cringe automatically with even the thought of it.

But, if I’m going to stay honest with you in these letters I can’t put off this subject any longer. You probably already knew this but had buried it in the deep recesses of a closet somewhere.

Our family can’t sing to save our lives.

Oh, sure, individually some of us have beautiful voices, but combining them together constitutes a crime against nature.

Surely you remember “Jumbo Elephant” or “The Train Song.”

My favorite and most memorable of the songs we sang together, hands down, goes like this:

“When we’re helping we’re happy and we sing as we go,

For we like to help mother for we all love her so.

Tra la la la la la laa, Tra la la la la laa,

Tra la la la la la laa, Tra la la la la laa.” ~ Wallace F. Bennett

Dad and the four of you would sing those words with the enthusiasm of a cow giving birth to twin calves and in about the same pitch.

Even with the piano accompaniment some of us couldn’t hit the right notes. I’m not sure why that happened. Sad, though, since your Dad in particular loves good music. What we sang was not good and whether it counted as music is still up for debate. Even “Happy Birthday” sounded painful and more like a dirge than a celebratory song. Ah, well.

My selections, although I don't mind Dad's at all.

My selections, although I don’t mind Dad’s at all.

I used to get irritated by those huge families (think Osmonds, Pointer Sisters, Jackson 5, King Family, Everly Brothers, Celtic Spring and countless other local families) that performed publicly, singing or playing multiple musical instruments. I liked to envision their four a.m. wake up calls so the whole famdamily could practice for three hours before school. And then, surely, afternoons required another three or four hours of lessons and practicing. Oh sure, they smiled while they performed, but in real life, at home, I’ll bet it was sheer misery for all involved. Or not. Maybe they loved music so much and were so good at it that no sacrifice seemed too great. It could happen.

That was what I told myself at least. I suppose it made me feel better about our non-musical abilities as a family.

A bit tinny and not exactly in tune, kind of like our family.

A bit tinny and not exactly in tune, kind of like our family.

I think I also feel badly for never providing piano lessons, or singing lessons, or music lessons of any kind. We had a piano! (I blame money and my own laziness and too many moves.) I find it silly that we didn’t make music a bigger priority. Big L, you did learn to play clarinet in Junior High and went on to High School with it but then gave it up for more important and interesting things. And you taught yourself, with a few months help from Dad, how to play piano. You found success in spite of your parents being musical slackers. Good for you! And Big J, you also taught yourself a few songs and even memorized them.

We still have that ancient guitar, missing its strings, leaning on one side of the piano. And on the other side, a violin that needs serious work that no one has a clue how to play. We are a strange music loving, non-musical family.

A sampling of the Classics.

A sampling of the Classics.

You poor kids lacked exposure to most any other kind of music except Classical, movie soundtracks and easy listening (i.e. elevator music) when you were younger. How weird is that? Sure I own a few albums; Paul Simon, John Denver, Kenny Loggins and the like. But Dad’s LP collection spans the millennia from Beethoven and Bach, Holst to Haydn. He went out on a limb with Classical Gas and Moody Blues, but they had their roots in the Classics, so it made sense.

I’m glad you finally discovered the Beatles and Alternative Rock, and every other musical genre out there. I’m happy that you’ve wandered around and partaken of the musical menu and found ways to let many different kinds lift and enhance your life.

And I’m grateful that Big J, with your mega bass speaker taking up the entire trunk of your car, completely understands the importance of turning the volume down when you enter a neighborhood. Mothers everywhere thank you.

I like to think that you all have a sense of humor about music, too. It would be impossible not to after singing along with our family in six different keys at the same time.

Laughingly and lovingly yours,

Mom

"Bluebird of Happymess"

“Bluebird of Happymess”

 ~~~~~

 

“Ducks in the pond quack a happy song,

Mother hens cackle the whole day long,

Birds in their nests and wind in the treetops,

All join in singing a happy song.”

~ Music for Young Americans, Book 2, by Berg, Burns, Hooley, Pace and Wolverton

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Categories: Family, Friday Letters, Music, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

The Mosquito Host

Posted on September 17, 2014 by Kami
Dinner time gorging.

Dinner time gorging.

With nearly a year’s worth of rain falling in less than one day our little desert morphed into a mosquito breeding factory.

Just answering the front door lately requires rapid-fire reflexes and a quicker than a kid selling wrapping paper open-shut technique.

The last thing you want is a mosquito or two wafting about the room you’re sitting in. Very seldom do you hear the high-pitched warning zzzzzzzzz as they move in for the kill. They’re usually silent as they sneak in for a landing behind your knee or elbow or ankle. By time you realize you’re losing blood it’s too late. The itching commences.

Growing a massive army. (Image: James Gathany, CDC) - A New Model for Predicting Outbreaks of West Nile Virus. Gross L, PLoS Biology Vol. 4/4/2006, e101.

Growing a massive army. (Image: James Gathany, CDC) – A New Model for Predicting Outbreaks of West Nile Virus. Gross L, PLoS Biology Vol. 4/4/2006, e101.

I’ve read books that describe swarms of mosquitos so thick in some regions of Alaska that an animal or a human can suffocate in a cloud of them. I kid you not! Relatives of those little monsters must have caught a jet stream and landed here, troops amassing by the millions daily.

I’ve wondered, ever so briefly, if they’re indirectly related to the flying monkeys from Wizard of Oz. Mean little things carrying off young girls and small dogs. Don’t laugh, it’s possible. Mutations in evil creatures take on hideous transformations. Think “Alien” or “The Green Hornet.”

Forget taking the littles with their oh-so-succulent-soft-skin to the park for swinging or sliding or building sand castles. That is unless they like pink Calamine lotion and you don’t mind them looking like they have the chicken pox.

When someone walks a dog around the park I now recognize the arm flailing they’re doing not as a frantic wave to a friend, or a signal for help, but an actual life-saving maneuver to keep from getting carried away by swarms of flying blood drinkers. Zombie apocalypse scenarios are so passe’ nowadays.

I have no idea who to give credit to for this amazingly accurate photo.

I have no idea who to give credit to for this amazingly accurate photo.

To guarantee total terror, I’m dressing up as a mosquito this year for Halloween. Even Dads will run screaming in fright. I expect that haunted houses will sport a few of the evil black winged buzzing terrors for that extra horror factor.

Oh sure, I soak myself in some top of the line brand of mosquito repellant before I venture out on my morning walks, which helps only slightly. I feel a bit like a movie star with miniature mosquito paparazzi in my face, and around every corner, waiting for a vulnerable bit of skin to show itself so they can go all crazy over it.

I also suspect they’ve developed a liking to citronella scented anything and actually use it as a way of pinpointing vulnerable human targets.

repellants

These just aren’t repulsive enough to the little terrors anymore.

What we really need is a new breed of mosquito repellant, Nuke Em Howitzer 4000 sounds ominous doesn’t it? I’m sure the military could come up with something sufficiently deadly and give it a great acronym: BSA: Blood Sucker Annihilator. Or maybe KILL: Kreepy Insect Life Limiter.

Costco could market their own brand of Mosquito repellant/poison and call it West Nile Begone Extra Lethal in gallon sized spray bottles. Sure you might feel a little woozy for a few minutes, but at least you’d be able to reach your car without inhaling more than three or four of the pests.

Where did the helicopters raining down insecticide overnight disappear to? I’ve heard them in years past. Probably grounded by mosquito hordes weighing down the wings or filling up the engine compartment and gumming up the gas tanks.

More menacing than Zombies and flying monkeys.

More menacing than Zombies and flying monkeys.

I just want to take the garbage out without “Jaws” theme music running through my head as I dodge the little blood suckers.

Never before have I wished for the dry heat to return like I have this year. I suspect the mosquitos have something to do with the trajectory of that hurricane that’s pumping even more moisture into our normally dry state. You laugh, but these little dudes have conniving and vicious written all over them. I wouldn’t rule out weather manipulation as part of their arsenal.

A mosquito’s been hovering around the room for a while now. Probably taken a half a pint out of me already. Too bad we can’t harness their evil powers for good and turn them into phlebotomists.

I’m itchy. I think I’ll go hide under a really thick blanket until mid October.

 ~~~~~

Joke of the day: “I sprayed a mosquito with mosquito repellent and now he’ll never have any friends.”

 

Categories: Humor, Nature, Outdoors | Tags: , , , , , | 4 Comments

Where My Heart Is

Posted on September 16, 2014 by Kami

It’s Gratituesday!  I’m feeling grateful that I have a roof over my head, particularly with the looming remnants of yet another hurricane threatening a second deluge in the desert.

Dorothy Gale from The Wizard of Oz whispered, “There’s no place like home.” And Pliny the Elder said, “Home is where the heart is.” If you combine those two ideas you could say, “There’s no place like where your heart is.”

photo-25 copy 8

It’s a tiny quilt. eight inches by sixteen inches or so.

I made this miniature wall quilt a while ago. I like to think that it symbolizes all my different homes.

No, I don’t own multiple homes. Let me explain.

The Home I Grew Up In

At seven years old our family moved from a two bedroom house into a much bigger home. I consider both of them as my childhood homes where so many memories happened. About a decade ago Dad and Mom built a house in the town Dad grew up in. I found out it isn’t the place, but the people who make it home.

“I believe that one can never leave home. I believe that one carries the shadows, the dreams, the fears and the dragons of home under one’s skin, at the extreme corners of one’s eyes and possibly in the gristle of the earlobe.” ~Maya Angelou

The “After I Left Home” Home

I had three or four different spots I called home after leaving my childhood home. Those all felt temporary, and I never really made those places homelike. Dorms and student apartments don’t have many homey touches, yet each still served as home. I hung my “hat” there, I slept there. Nearly everything I owned in the world fit into that tiny space. When they tore down one of those buildings years later I felt a twinge of melancholy, but nothing devastating.

“Home is people. Not a place. If you go back there after the people are gone, then all you can see is what is not there any more.” ~Robin Hobb

The “I’ve Lost Count of All the Moves We’ve Made” Homes

photo-24 copy 33

Is there an ideal home?

I’ve had more than a few addresses since marrying MSH. I’ve known some people who can’t wait to unpack after a move, feeling unsettled until they’re surrounded by their “stuff.” I always hesitated to unpack it all, wishing instead for a fresh start, for less stuff surrounding me, requiring attention, needing dusting, cleaning and maintenance.

We’ve lived in tiny and big places, in between places, hot and cold places, weird places, new and old places, remodeled and mobile places. We’ve also had a couple of spells where we didn’t have an address, semi-homeless, staying with a variety of relatives while the dust settled and life sorted itself out.

I do wonder what it’d be like to stay in one place for twenty or thirty years. Would I get restless? Would I wish for a change? Would I feel content or would I find a need to remodel every so often? Or would I be completely and totally delighted and settled?

“Home wasn’t a set house, or a single town on a map. It was wherever the people who loved you were, whenever you were together. Not a place, but a moment, and then another, building on each other like bricks to create a solid shelter that you take with you for your entire life, wherever you may go.” ~Sarah Dessen

The Home I Carry With Me

I suppose that’s why my favorite home is the one I carry with me. I sometimes think of my body as the real home and the me inside it as its resident. I’m the one whose brain and heart feel twenty-ish years old, while the me everyone sees, this outer shell that looks and moves like someone much, much older, is just a house. I’m the turtle and this body is my shell.

Does that sound silly? Maybe it is. But it works for me. This home could probably use a new paint job, a bit of foundation work, and my plumbing isn’t always up to code. It definitely has some creaks and odd nuances. But it’s the house I’ve been blessed with and most of the time it doesn’t leak. So I think I’ll stick around in it and see what happens over the next few decades. The me that lives inside of it will always feel young and snarky.  At least, I hope so.

“Make a home for yourself inside your own head. You’ll find what you need to furnish it – memory, friends you can trust, love of learning, and other such things. That way it will go with you wherever you journey.” ~ Tad Williams

The Nicest Word

The word Home feels warm and comfy, welcoming and wonderful. I feel lucky, blessed really, to have lived in so many places and enjoyed multiple sorts of lives in and around them. I’m a lucky woman. After all, “there’s no place like home.”

 

The Oz series talk of silver not ruby slippers, (which show up better on film.)

The Oz series of books talk of silver not ruby slippers, (which happen to show up better on film.)

 

 

 

 

 

Categories: Gratitude, Gratituesday | Tags: , , , | 4 Comments

Only Contortionists Need Apply

Posted on September 15, 2014 by Kami

“Why is the ground coming up to meet my face?” I remember thinking as I fainted one day while walking from one classroom to another at university during the Paleozoic Era.

Fainting with dramatic flair.

Fainting with dramatic flair.

I had it backwards of course. The ground didn’t meet my face, my face met the ground. And it’s nothing whatsoever like that fake fainting you see in the movies or on television, swooning and conveniently falling backwards.

No warning signs preceded that strange experience. No dizziness, lightheadedness, tripping, wooziness or injury. Just “wham” and a face plant.

I compare it, oddly, to my two brief experiences of being in very minor earthquakes. (No I’m not a seasoned quake veteran like you Californians.) When something that’s normally solid and steady and unmoving begins to undulate and sway, nothing makes sense. It’s as if Left trades places with Right, or North wearies of being true and turns into South.

Something in between those two experiences happened to me Sunday evening. It also included that slow-motion effect you see in the movies. That, I can tell you, actually does happen.

stairs

Not the actual stairs, but very similar.

My favorite one-year old had woken from her afternoon nap cheerful and ready for play. While carrying her downstairs to the family room the ground under my right foot moved and I had suddenly had nothing underneath me except my left foot, which was behind me and still midair coming down from the last step I’d taken. The right leg sailed forward ahead of my body and the left leg did something the design of the human body never intended. It folded up behind me. My body had no choice but to attempt to follow both legs.

Did you know the laws of physics prohibit motion in two directions at once? There’s a hefty fine for violating that law. And I was about to pay big time.

Binkies really do make that thwapping sound if you listen. Think Maggie from the Simpsons.

Think Maggie from the Simpsons.

The only really important part of this whole slow motion scene is that my left arm continued to keep the one-year old secure and unharmed. I’m pretty certain an angel must have caught her because she ended up gently sitting on the stairs, thwap thwap thwapping on her pacifier, completely unphased and a bit curious as to why we were sitting down so suddenly.

Meanwhile I was attempting to make sense of the pain and odd location of various parts of my body. My toe felt turned inside out and resided somewhere under my back. My knee, I was certain based on signals being sent from it to my brain, had no more connections remaining to the leg above or below it. And my hip had skittered across the kitchen floor and lay huddled, whimpering behind the refrigerator.

Can you say OUCH!

Can you say OUCH!

I wasn’t sure if attempting to move anything seemed prudent. But pretending to be a Russian gymnast or one of those freaky contortionists didn’t seem like a good option either.

Very slowly and with great effort, I convinced my hip to talk to my knee, which coaxed my toe to remove itself from my backside. Then the pain really took hold. Fortunately, I remembered to breath and didn’t pass out or puke or get woozy.

After a few minutes I could move my knee a bit more. It miraculously didn’t seem to be broken or displaced and was, I could see clearly, still attached. The hip just seemed content once again in its normal position and orientation.

The toe felt like it might explode.

An hour later, after some icepacks on the toe, I felt almost normal. The swelling hadn’t gotten too bad and I thought perhaps I’d only sprained it. Eighteen hours later, after some ibuprofen and some restless sleep, the toe looks bruised but hopefully, just needs a few days of rest and elevation. I may end up needing an x-ray of the toe if it doesn’t cheer up in the next few days. But that might not need to happen. Sadly, no long meandering morning walks for this woman for a bit.

ibuprofenAs for breaking those laws of physics? Yeah, I’m paying the price. Parts of me I didn’t know existed hurt today. And parts I knew I had but didn’t know could experience pain, also ache.

I’m happy to pay such a price if the favorite one-year old escaped unscathed. We were both blessed not to break anything, not to hit our heads, not to have to deal with blood or mayhem.

Maybe I need the extra R&R&R. (Yes, three R’s.) Maybe it’s the only way I’ll slow down enough to do some reading and writing and resting. Maybe I’ll take a day and watch all three Lord of the Rings movies (extended version) or the entire BBC Sherlock series. Or I’ll just read. And sleep. And let MSH baby me. And take ibuprofen every four to six hours.

Happy Monday!

 

Categories: Family, physical health | Tags: , , , , | 10 Comments

That Monstrous Mama Of Yours

Posted on September 12, 2014 by Kami

Friday Letter to my Kids:

Dear J, J, L and L,

Parents want to leave a legacy for their children, something of themselves that lives on in future generations. I’m afraid I unintentionally passed on a not so stellar legacy to you four kids.

My temper.

As you know I’m just about the calmest person in the world.

Until I’m not.

Like me, more Looney than tunes.

Like me, more Looney than tunes.

Then I’m like some Tasmanian devil/nuclear bomb of emotional messy destruction.

Witness the dented pan, or two, in the kitchen cupboard, a defunct Scrabble game and the memory of a few holes in the wall from various projectiles. Not to mention a phone call or two I made to evil bullying spawn of Satan children or their parents. The rock/lawn chair/anything within reach launching into to the swimming pool incident needs to permanently self-destruct from all our memories. And, a few others I simply won’t elaborate on due to the statute of limitations time frame thingy. (kidding, kidding…)

No one will believe me if they read this. No one. I barely believe it myself sometimes.

The Incredibly Green Hulk, temper tantrum personified.

The Incredibly Green Hulk, temper tantrum personified.

That’s how calm I usually feel. That’s how cool and collected I come across. The idea of your mother, mild-mannered Clarkette Kent with glasses, turning into a raging, maniacal foaming at the mouth, bad words unleashed kind of person just won’t register as realistic in anyone’s brain matter. Unless they’ve experienced said transformation. Maybe Superman is pushing the metaphor, I should have compared myself with The Hulk, I suppose.

I’m going somewhere with this. Stay with me here.

Loving the illustrations!

Loving the illustrations!

Big L gifted me this children’s book a few years back, Monster Mama, written by Liz Rosenberg and delightfully illustrated by Stephen Gammell. It’s been a favorite of mine. (Second only to “Are You My Mother?”)

Why is it a favorite? Well, aside from the near perfect rendering of my likeness in astounding living color, it seems more realistic than most children’s books about how mothers really are. I love how accepting the son is of his mother’s differences. Also, the two sides of this particular “fictional” mother get equal billing.

Side One

She’s a tender-hearted, sensitive mother who teaches her sweet son profound lessons.

“Always use your powers for good, never for evil.” ~ Monster Mama 

Side Two

She has mother bear killer instincts to protect and defend. When Patrick Edward found himself dealing with some hoodlums

“Monster Mama heard the echoes of his roar. She zoomed out of her cave like a fast-moving freight train and sailed over the creek in one graceful leap.”

Howling, thundering, snapping and red-flamed eyes ensued and justice meted out.

The difference between Monster Mama and myself lies in the appropriateness of her response to stress, versus the often massive inappropriateness of my response to stress. Her lashing out seemed measured and appropriate in defense of her son.

tasmanian devil real

An actual Tasmanian Devil.

I, however, simply explode based on an uncontrolled amount of emotion and frustration not specifically aimed, usually, at anyone in particular. (Hence the wall damage instead of personal injury.) And, I wasn’t always defending or protecting, usually just venting in a rather loud, obnoxious and embarrassing way.

This isn’t the kind of legacy I wanted passed on to you. And yet, several, if not all of you, have this tendency to explosive projectile anger vomiting.

It’s not pretty. Remember?

A more productive, or at the least, a safer way to deal with stress and anger might be to let off a little pressure every day, or every hour, or when the need arises. Instead of doing what I do, which is holding it all in, keeping all emotions stuffed into some tiny box in the back of my brain somewhere, where the pressure builds and builds until nothing can hold it back. And BAM! Whoever unluckily resides in the vicinity when the last straw falls, last bean weighs in, last nerve gets stepped on, catches the wrath of Khan or Kami.

A cliche', I know. But still true.

A cliche’, I know. But still true.

I’m still, even all these years later, prone to monstrous explosions of stupidity and yelling. You’d think I’d have outgrown the temper tantrum thing by now.

Truly. If you can get a handle on the whole out-of-control temper thing, you’ll be waaaay better off.

I know. I know. It’s like having an alternate personality lurking in the dark spaces. It doesn’t feel like there’s anything you can do about it. Like trying to keep a teapot from screeching once the water starts boiling full steam ahead.

I hope you’re more successful at taming your anger demons than your mother.

The last page of this lovely book says what I have always felt for each of you.

“No matter where you go, or what you do,” she told him, “I will be there. Because I am your mother, even if I am a monster – and I love you.” ~ Monster Mama

I feel monstrous amounts of love for you. Beyond anything you can yet comprehend. Please know that.

All my love,

Your Monster Mama

"Bluebird of Happymess"

“Bluebird of Happymess”

 

“Speak when you are angry and you will make the best speech you will ever regret.” ~ Ambrose Bierce

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Categories: Family, Friday Letters | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Whateverness

Posted on September 10, 2014 by Kami

I skipped out on writing a Gratituesday post yesterday. Not that anyone would notice except me, really. It’s not like me. Even if I don’t write anything for a week I always, always, always post something I’m grateful for on Tuesdays. But nope. Not yesterday.

Part of me said to myself that Monday’s post about the “Twenties” could serve as my gratitude offering for the week. Part of me doesn’t want to think of things I’m grateful for lately.

Who could be uncheered by a sunrise like this?

Who could be uncheered by a sunrise like this?

Why would I do that? What is it about human nature that makes me want to wallow in whininess and self-pity rather than pay attention to the abundance surrounding me. Or maybe it isn’t human nature at all. Maybe it’s just my own personal nature, prone toward the negative. It’s an ongoing battle, most days holding my ground or even gaining some ground. Other days the foe pushes harder than my stamina and will power. Then I find myself mired in the old, all too familiar ground of smudged glasses, a fog in the air, stuck knee-deep in depression and meh.

Does it matter that I pushed through the tiredness and volunteered with MSH at a food bank for a few hours  yesterday? He thought it would do me good, give me some perspective. I’m sure it did somehow deep down. I tried, later, to compose a post about the experience, but found my heart had stayed closed off to the experience as well as any potential good I could have gained from it. Shelves got stocked, meals made available, families and individuals got served. Now my muscles ache and my back hurts. I should have felt a sense of satisfaction, of joy, but nope. Nada.

Veggies in my future?

Veggies in my future?

Does it matter that I dug out my seed collection and, in an act of extreme faith, even for a desert gardener, put seeds into the ground early in September? I try to envision radishes pushing up through the soil, imagine beets with their tiny red stems poking though, lettuces for future salads, carrots with their furry tops, pea vines winding up the wall. Do you think it will really happen? Or will I fail to keep the soil moist enough over the critical week or two of seedling spouting? Will the temperatures soar and bake the now saturated ground along with the tender shoots of my offering of faith?

Just after shaking off the pond water.

Just after shaking off the pond water.

Did today’s face to face encounter with a coyote stir something in me, make me feel more alive and lighter? As I said, “Oh, hello there!” and those gray eyes looked through me, judging, assessing, weighing the danger, did I wonder at such a confrontation? Perhaps, a bit.  And only minutes later, when the geese complained at the coyote’s invitation to breakfast, did anything stir in me as they flew overhead, the sunrise backlighting them just so? I took a photograph to share and smiled a little. That’s something. The whole day ought to have brightened at such an occurrence, my heart should have jumped and laughed out loud at the very least.

Maybe I’m behind on my sleep. Maybe I need to take vitamins, eat more fruits and vegetables, drink more water. Maybe I need some hours lost inside a book, oblivious to my surroundings. Maybe it’s time for some extreme sanctuary, silent meditation or exceptional prayers. Maybe I need a few days camping, saturating myself in pine-scented oxygen and unfettered starlight. Maybe I think too much. Maybe I think about the wrong things. Maybe I need some serious chocolate. Who knows.

Looking for calmer waters.

I’m just trying to make sense of my life, and some days honestly, there’s very little sense in it at all.

In my decades long war with depression, I’ve learned to remind myself that what I’m feeling is temporary. That I won’t feel like this forever. Days will get better, laughter will come easier, I’ll feel like being around people soon enough. There’s no need to give up hope.

I declare today a mental health day for myself. I’ll be gentle with and generous to myself. I’ll rest and renew and find a toehold to push myself back up to solid ground. I’ll reread some of my gratitude journals. I’ll push harder on the heavy door that’s shut everything out and open up my heart to the possibilities around me.

~~~~~

Turns out today is World Suicide Prevention Day. Far too many people have weeks and months and yes, even years of lassitude, depression, stress, trauma, the weight of the world on their shoulders, and general inability to cope or find help. It turns out hope does exist. Please educate yourself so that you can help someone who needs a light shining in their dark hours. Or educate yourself so that you can see your way to a source of light and hope and healing. God bless.

 

 

 

 

Categories: Hope, Mental Health | Tags: , , , , , , | 2 Comments

It’s Raining Twenties From Heaven

Posted on September 8, 2014 by Kami
Pennies from Heaven?

Pennies from Heaven?

Thirteen years ago, this month, MSH had just landed a contract out-of-state at a facility that had something or other to do with the airplane industry. He’d had a ton of gigs that lasted various lengths of time and I seldom kept track of what exactly each involved. On the morning of September 11 he called me, told me to turn on the TV, and the world changed. A couple of weeks later he drove back home, his contract ended abruptly along with hundreds of other contractors and employees. A similar scene unfolded all over the country that fall and winter.

Months and months and months and months later, I forget now how long, no other contracts came available, no other work opened up. All our reserves siphoned away, all our options dried and cracked like a Phoenix river bed.

I took a sales position that brought in enough to cover a couple of the utilities. I took on other manual labor as well. MSH took what work he could get, but it utilized none of his decades of experience in the computer industry. Not a nice memory to look back on, I can assure you.

Surprisingly, a few bright spots shine through the dark, hopeless feeling of that time.

One ray of light in particular stays with me.

Occasionally, unpredictably, an envelope would show up taped to our door, a twenty-dollar bill tucked inside. No writing on the envelope. No clues whatsoever where it came from.

Twenties from Heaven

Twenties from Heaven

Twenty dollars bought a grocery cart full of fresh produce where I shopped. Gratefully that’s usually how we used that gift.

Tucked inside that envelope, along with the crisp or crinkled bill, a bit of hope and a sliver of love. I never had any way of thanking whoever thought to send such caring our way. The timing of it always caught me off guard, usually on a day of discouragement and exhaustion.

If I didn’t already believe in angels before those twenties started showing up on my door, I certainly became a believer afterwards.

Whoever sacrificed that amount for us and taped it to our door may not have had wings or known how to fly, but they most surely wore a halo shining with human kindness and glowing with sensitivity.

Almost every time I use a twenty-dollar bill all these years later, I’m reminded of those twenties that blessedly and magically came our way.

When I start to think that the world holds little of goodness in it, or I get discouraged by life in general, I simply remember back to those envelopes on my door and feel grateful for good people, the real gifts from heaven.

~~~

This song kept rolling through my head as I wrote today… Might have something to do with the record rainfall we’ve had today in the Phoenix area. Or it could have been a message I needed to hear. I’ve included the original version by Bing Crosby as well as a cover by more recent artists.

I’m wondering if it needs to make a comeback.

Enjoy.

Or if you prefer a more current rendition here’s the Paul Anka and Michael Buble cover of Pennies from Heaven.

(Here’s the lyrics.) 

A long time ago
A million years BC
The best things in life
Were absolutely free.
But no one appreciated
A sky that was always blue.
And no one congratulated
A moon that was always new.
So it was planned that they would vanish now and them
And you must pay before you get them back again.
That’s what storms were made for
And you shouldn’t be afraid for

Every time it rains it rains
Pennies from heaven.
Don’t you know each cloud contains
Pennies from heaven.
You’ll find yor fortune falling
All over town.
Be sure that your umbrella is upside down.
Trade them for a package of sunshine and flowers.
If you want the things you love
You must have showers.
So when you hear it thunder
Don’t run under a tree.
There’ll be pennies from heaven for you and me

~Arthur Johnston and Johnny Burke

Categories: Hope, Mondaze | Tags: , , , , , , , | 11 Comments

Found: The Music to Your Dance

Posted on September 5, 2014 by Kami

“Humorous but very intelligent words to live by: Do not argue with a spouse who is packing your parachute.”

Friday Letter to My Kids – Sept. 5, 2014 –

Dear J, J, L and L,

I gotta tell you how happy it makes me that you’ve each found and married the perfect person for you.

You’ve found the music to your dance, the glove to your hand, the screen to your keyboard, the horizon to your sunrise and the ocean to your beach.

That’s so happifying!

A couple of you took a long and circuitous route in locating that person, but the journey seemed a necessary part of the finding for you. A couple of you found love early and without hesitation. Either way, I’m thrilled to see you each content and loved and cared for so well.

Original art by Kami

Original art by Kami

I lucked out too because I totally adore each of your spouses. They’re cool people, confident, calm, easy-going, and fun to hang out with. It’s like I got a set of bonus kids just for showing up.

I love seeing how your spouse loves, cares for, admires, helps and cherishes you. Even better I’ve observed a synergy where they make you a better person, a richer, more well-rounded, more vibrant human and you have the same effect on them. Your eyes light up around your sweetheart. Your whole countenance brightens. You seem more you.

I’m not delusional. I know marriage isn’t all roses, chocolate and champagne. Each of you and your spouses each seem well suited and well matched for the challenging and occasionally uphill path of the commitments you’ve made. That fact alone does my heart good and lets me rest easier. Knowing you’re loved and in love and in it for the long haul makes me smile.

Already it seems you’re light-years ahead of where your dad and I were even twenty years into our marriage. It’s like you figured out the right way to pull off a marriage by watching us stumble around like dingbats. From what I can tell, you’re doing an awesome job at this whole married thing.

I can’t seem to get this scene out of my head from the movie “Princess Bride.” Maybe it’s simply to remind me to laugh more often at and in my own marriage.

Here’s the quote:

“Mawage.

Mawage is wot bwings us togeder tooday. Mawage, that bwessed awangment, that dweam wifin a dweam…

And wuv, twue wuv, will fowow you foweva…

So tweasure your wuv.” ~Princess Bride

I hope you laugh often with each other. That’s definitely served as my saving grace over the past few decades of married life.

Here’s the one really great thing I figured out: it only gets better over time. You think you can’t love them any more than you do now, but you will. And in a ways that’ll surprise you.

I’m excited for what awaits each of you as couples. You’ve picked the scenic route and that will make all the difference in your travels together. Enjoy the ride!

Love found you all and in that finding life begins again and again and again.

 

Lots of love,

Mom

"Bluebird of Happymess"

“Bluebird of Happymess”

(Happymess with an “M” – not a typo.)

~~~~~

“A good marriage is where both people feel like they’re getting the better end of the deal.” ~ Anne Lamott

 

 


			

	
						

																
						Categories:  Friday Letters					
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A Certain Angle of Light

			

			Posted on September 4, 2014 by Kami			


				

				
photo 3-5 copy 4Moisture pushes ahead of the straggling remnants of hurricanes limping far inland from the Pacific, bumping up against the northern and eastern mountains.


photo 1-5 copy 6A traffic jam of clouds fills the sky with swirling masses of whites, grays and blues.


photo 4-3 copy 10Cloud sculptures twist and swirl while light plays a melody in concert with the sound of distant geese calling out their imminent arrival.


photo 2-4 copy 3Dozens upon dozens of rabbits rush around drawing too much attention to themselves,  making use of the cooler morning hours.


photo 1-6 copy 3Sun breaks through the tangled muss of fluff with bits of light but little color.


photo 2-3 copy 5


Small birds twitter, tap, chatter, sing, peep, mimic, flit, flutter, flap, hum and tweet.


photo 4-5 copyLarger birds sit in silent patience.


photo 3-6 copy


A pair of hawks sweep low and silent along a path searching for the unaware and unwarned.


photo 1-5 copy 6I walk, finding more than animals, birds, sky, water, shades of green.


photo 2-2 copy 22I listen for solace and a different kind of silence.


photo 5 copy 4I look for something within myself as I walk the dawn.


photo 1-4 copy 20Thoughts clarify with each step I travel through this oasis.


photo-24 copy 29I gather courage and hope as I pass the creosote, palo verde and acacia.


photo 4-4 copy 2Each morning I claim sanctuary, and emboldened, face the day.




			

	
						

																
						Categories:  Nature, Outdoors					
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Pumpkin Spice Zombie Apocalypse

			

			Posted on September 3, 2014 by Kami			


				

				
latte
Pumpkin spiced whipped cream.


There. I got your attention just by typing two words: Pumpkin Spice.


What a silly thing.


I feel like that person who pretends to throw a ball to a dog and laughs maniacally when the pup runs off after nothing.


Or worse, like the weather forecasters here in the Phoenix area who throw out these few words before a commercial break, “Is there rain in our forecast?” We get so excited when there’s even a ten percent chance of rain. Bump those odds up to fifty percent and we’re deliriously happy. Actual rain produces a state of nirvana and brainlessness causing people to drive into flooded washes.


So it is with Pumpkin Spice. Now that it’s September everyone goes gaga for the stuff.


Last week I could have gotten your attention with three words: Ice Bucket Challenge. But that was so last week or the week before. Now everyone’s just tired and morphing the thing to unrecognizable configurations. Cool though that it generated so much information and donations.


Maybe to take it up a notch and generate a bit more interest someone could do a Pumpkin Spice Ice Bucket Challenge. What do you say, Letterman? Kimmel? Fallon? Brangelina? POTUS?


I’ll send you a free Pumpkin Spice candle if you do. (You’ll just need to pay a small shipping and handling fee.) But totally worth it. Really.


It’s EVERYWHERE!! It’s like Invasion of the Body Snatchers only with pumpkins and spice. A quick search will result in pumpkin spice everything: donuts, pudding, cookies, cupcakes, peanuts, mousse, seltzer water, marshmallows, coffee creamer, brownies, cream cheese, Hershey’s kisses, smoothies, malted milk balls, syrup, potato chips, granola bars, ale, pancakes, Oreos, and yes, even (heaven help us) pumpkin spice butter. Butter? What has the world come to?


zombie pumpkins
Pumpkin Spice Zombie Apocalypse! Run!!!


How do we know it’s not a Zombie Apocalypse disguised as pumpkin spice?


Just as a side note, I’m also not a fan of the FALL SALE especially since the temperatures are still over 105 and no way in heck am I donning boots or a scarf for at least another three months. Maybe I’m just slightly bitter that I live where there are only two seasons,”broil” and “toast.”


I do kind of miss the autumn thing, but I try not to dwell on it. That’s why all this PUMPKIN SPICE stuff is driving me crazy, you can’t not see it, hear it, smell it, read about it.


Whatever happened to apple? Yes, Apple. I wrote about that last year and you can read it here if you want a more reasonable approach to alternate fall flavors and scents, such as Apple and Caramel perhaps.


To prove that I’m not a total pumpkin Grinch, for your reading and laughing pleasure, I’ll insert a pumpkin joke (which I found here if you want to look up more.)


One day two pumpkins, who were best friends, were walking together down the street. They stepped off the curb and a speeding car came around the corner and ran one of them over. The uninjured pumpkin called 911 and helped his injured friend as best he was able. The injured pumpkin was taken to emergency at the hospital and rushed into surgery. After a long and agonizing wait, the doctor finally appeared. He told the uninjured pumpkin, “I have good news, and I have bad news. The good news is that your friend is going to pull through. The bad news is that he’s going to be a vegetable for the rest of his life”.


I apologize.


Great pumpkin jokes don’t seem to exist. This was the best I could manage.


If I had a phenomenal pumpkin spice recipe I’d insert it here. But, alas, I have none. Feel free to submit yours in the comment section. I can’t promise I’ll do anything with it, but you never know.


Autumn leaves. (NOT pumpkin spiced)
Autumn leaves. (NOT pumpkin spiced)


I’m hoping to go camping some time next week, in the actual mountains to get a real taste of Autumn! Maybe, just maybe, a few leaves will have considered changing colors and I’ll snap some pictures or bring home a twig or two filled with autumn hues.


In the meantime, I’m trying to block out all things Pumpkin Spice and moving on with my life in spite of such niggling little things.


On the bright side, I won’t have to shovel snow in four months! Take that, Pumpkin Spice!


 

			

	
						

																
						Categories:  Humor					
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