roller coaster ride

too near the edge for tasting

ending beginning

“As you go about your day, notice the mirror faces around you and feel the muscles of your own face. When you feel a bit of stress or tension, allow the ends of your mouth to curve up, lightening heaviness; softening the energy within and around you as you share the gift of your smile. 

A smile can carry you lightly through an entire day.”

Florence Ondré

Water colored blah
Inside, outside, all around
Human goo, got flu?

Sunny Sunday
Beach breezes blowing coolness off the Atlantic
New roses, pink and petals fluttering
Riotous red Cardinals brightening georgeousness of greens hedges and tree leaves;
Trilling exciting new summer songs
People parading with surfboards under wetsuited arms
Bicyclers pedaling by; leaving trails of sunshine smiles as they speed along
Strollers taking in the sun on a pleasant constitutional
Babies happily babbling to the tune of perambulation
Neighborhood dogs calling bow wow hellos to each other
Dining al fresco, a mid day highlight
Enjoyment afoot

And then they roll in, sweeping sun from view
At once, in a moment’s time span, it is grey and misty
And all cools.
Goodbye May
Hello June

Nap time is nigh

“We are all wanderers in the desert; at heart, searching for the oasis of companions in kindness.”

Florence Ondré

It’s one of those days today.
Fuzzy brained and feeling covered with a big blanket of velour, I know I’m awake yet half of me is asleep somewhere in the cosmos..
What is in retrograde today?
No matter how well I’ve worded or worked, whatever is done winds up having to be redone.
A red sock finds it’s way into a load of carefully sorted whites; buttons pushed to answer phones disconnect instead; in the best of intentions of recycling, checks wind up in the shredder with the envelopes in which they came and books with intriguing titles are begun which seem to have a familiar ring as you delve into the second or third chapter only to find yourself realizing, “My God. I’ve read this one already!”
Yes. Today was one of those days.
An email sent to me by my friend, Carol, made me think enough to want to share with others. 
So, I cut, pasted, eliminated the naggy part at the bottom which usually attempts to guilt you into sending to ‘10 of your best friends’ and threatens with some kind of negative reprisals from the Gods of Bad Luck if you don’t. Then I added a personal note, a quote of my own and, after making sure it was all in order, sent with Light & Love.
Minutes later, I get a reply from my friend, Ben, thanking me for the lovely thoughts and discreetly pointing out a small error in my own quote. “I think you meant to type it differently… not sure,” writes he ever so lovingly giving me a heads up. He knows I’ll go crazy over the mistake if left uncorrected.
I’m a stickler for spelling and live in fear of looking like an uneducated schmuck for ‘putting i before e after c,’ leaving out any of what should be double letters or writing ‘there’ when i mean ‘their.’ 
You get the picture. 
Perfectionism is one of my challenges in many things and the rules in English class still ring in my head.
Yet, as diligent as I may try to be, electronic components of energy zip in and zap my best efforts, sending out half words crunched together, missing first letters of words and a nice word picture of me as either lunatic, space cadet or unintelligent.
“A writer?” I can hear people whisper in my head full of critiques. “Is she delusional?” 
‘Tsk tsks’ slip across the ethernet and I cringe thinking, “I can’t believe I just sent that out! Yeah, great. Nice to be quoted as the poet who can’t spell…or spellcheck!”
I can’t believe that my perfectly worded AND SPELLED missive wound up with a glaring word crunch- in red no less-size 20 type!
What is left to do?
Of course. Out goes the follow up e in which I edit the quote, spell the offending word correctly and fix the wordbotch glitch.
And then thank AOL once again for an oops which gave me yet another opportunity to grow in humility, let go of perfection and practice of patience with the wonderfully flawed process of being human…in an electronic age.

Wild fear ebbs and flows
Today is time in between
Where there’s breathing room.

“Tears soften human edges.”

Florence Ondré

It is said that we are all one; a part of one another; unique, individual yet the same; like limbs of a tree.

Pondering this thought over the years has taken many twists and turns as with each life experience, I’ve faced gnarls and windbends, whorls and snapping breaks of the branches of my own tree.

It never ceases to amaze me how varied human leaves look, sound, act, react or cease in the storms that this tree of life weathers.

Bending in sweetness to birdsong as a winged one alights in softness on a sturdy shoulder; swinging low with bountiful harvest of luscious ripening of the seasons, holding fast in the face of fierce storms, arms held akimbo reaching for light in the darkness and growing into fantastical shapes with aching, arching of years of survival in all life’s gales and gasps show the simplicity and intricacy of patterning on which one comes to depend for framework. A how-the-world-should-look-and-be in what is named normalcy.

Yet where one might suspect sapling flexibility there may arise oaken solidity unbending; fertile fruit bearing females may fail, male monoliths may moss, and where willows weeping-wend low they may wildly wail warning and warring while weathering the world.

How can it be that if we are all indeed one, there is such diversity, intensity and perversity on the tree of life?

One is tempted to be lulled into a false sense of illusion that leads to expectations of drops of kindness falling gently on leaves being met with kindness of receiving; joy shining in sunshine returning bright, reflective joy; compassion greeted green with whispering breezes empathetically enfolding and satin sadness shaded by the underside of understanding of silver soft leaves.

It is not always so, this vision of how things which seem to have always been will always be.

Therefore questions crop up as behaviors metamorphosis in conditions of global warming, economic explosions and scorched earth wars wreak havoc on the roots of our foresty home. 

Chaos of color collapses into challenge to change beyond accustomed seasonal sensations.

Where green at its worst, was envy, it is now greed. Riotous Autumnal ruby reds are flames of fury; buttery yellows of golden years turn into fears for future and burnt browns and siennas represent shades of balefulness.

How can our roots hold fast while limbs have been arched in agony, twisted beyond recognition and broken in breach of faith while the trunk of our tree of life is interminably tested?

Can we, arms of this essential elm, embrace each other and weave together a tapestry of stronger support so that we all may live long and well enough to see other bebranched beeches benefit; palms together play; willows whisper wonder and gingkos give the gold of memory for hickory heirs yet to spring forth?

Will we want to wake up enough to branch out in saner directions; to bring our best to the borrowed time in which we’ find our firred and furrowed forest and are we willing to look deeply inside the bark of ourselves to become aware of and acknowledge our shortcomings and see the lunatic in limbs gone gaga?

Can we manifest peace and perfection without courage for a good look at our family tree and, in the middle of madness all around us, when found to be outrageously out of control; whacked out in our own wilder-ness, can we honestly own our own behavior, see our common roots in “out of my tree’ behaviors and answer, without shame or blame, with perhaps a shower of light, the tree trimming question, “From what branch of the Crazy Tree did you fall?”

Morning truck sputters

Baby birds awake and sing

Rhythmic consistence