Gray is The Color of My True Love's Hair...Now!

Ah, the joys of getting older. No I don't mean getting old, after all I may be gray but I'm not old! I suppose I could color my silver locks, but at least now where I am in my life I am perfectly happy with these gleaming silver locks.

Though gray is on that come-back trail, it is still unusual to see in women my age. I think that is a shame since when I was young the women who had silver or gray hair naturally were in my opinion the most beautiful, and the most comfortable with who they were. That's what is so frustrating about our youth centered society for me. We miss so much of that wisdom that comes with the white hair if we spend time being "young." Besides, I wouldn't go back to my younger years for anything! Even with all the age related junk, the lack of worry and normat teenage angst is a wonderful thing.

Peace, and Life's Choices

Quiet is
a bird in flight,
a smile,
in the blink of eyes.

Quiet can be
found -
alone,
or in many faces.
It
is centered on the
choices we make.

A New Story

This is the beginning of a story that I'm telling. A story of someone I have known for years. The story of my grandmother from what I imagined was a truly magical place...of course with a little imagination thrown in!

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The end of another week. Thursday is past, and it is the wee hours of Friday. I feel like I have been living here so much lately. Life here is quiet with few interruptions and no one to tell you how bad you were or how you might be a problem to their world.

I really love this time of the night because I feel a freedom from that culture I live in today. The one that only values money, beauty, or accomplishment. Many of us who live in the normal every day world find ourselves ignored, looked through as if we aren't even there, or ridiculed by both family members and the people those people that are our world.

Here in my office at night I can escape that world and create a small space just for me. This is where I dream and develop who I am, at least who I am on paper. It is here I develop my books, and here the dreams begin.

Some would probably say the dreams are either imaginary, or more visions than reality but I know they are visits from my past that can take me back to a time of real joy filled with the love of my Papa who always calls me back. Sitting here at the desk as I scrawl on my yellow pads I can smell the fires and all the smells of the circus that are like incense as I take them in and I can even almost touch the familiar things once more.

I can feel the wind of summer on my face and if I put my hands up to cover my eyes I know that world is there within the reach of my fingers - the fingers of that small girl in a world that seems to defy reality, and one that was totally mine. The world is my Papa's circus.

What is Your Life's Mission?

What do you believe in passionately? What is a thought or idea that you would stand up for even to a best friend or parent? These are two questions that I think many of of us never take time to consider, these days. Careers, jobs, families, and fun are what we live for...vacations and relaxation are the focus when work and responsibilities are on hiatus. That was true for me for many years until I started to really face who I was. As a young person I had a passion for those who had no one in their corner, those who were different and often picked on or ignored in our society.

Until just recently I didn't see it as a real passion until one single incident brought such clarity to who I really was that I started researching as many essays and writings on kindness that I could find. And what I discovered was there are hundreds and hundreds of them many of them by those who we might know as important figures in our world and history. I was certainly surprised as to the total focus on what seemed such a simple concept. I began to really examine what my own personal raison d'etre, might be. It just seemed to me that we run, or stumble through much of life just doing things day in and day out without having a center or reason why we do anything.

Many people over the centuries and throughout the world have given their children special names that spoke to who they wanted their children to be as they grew into adults. That meaning for a given name often was a lofty aspiration that over the years was to become a personal mantle that became the center of that individual's life. I have chosen a purpose just recently for my life from now on. It's a simple idea, but I think Henry James expressed it the best when he said, "Three things in human life are important. The first is to be kind. The second is to be kind. The third is to be kind."

We have way too many angry people in our world, people who hurt and belittle, or to whom the idea road rage, or any kind of rage in general is a constant mantra. Life is not simply to create wealth, or get ahead and leave a financial legacy for our families. But, it is to leave a real inheritance for those we touch every day, one that is centered in who we are to our very core. It often is thought of as patience, faithfulness, or even goodness but the best word that conveys the concept is simply kindness.

I have a long way to go to get past my own impatience and anger. Daily I still do and say things that I regret later. Though I have to admit I see the huge and gaping need for that kind of "gift" more and more in our every day lives. I'm not sure if I can pull of this major change. This kind of change can be a real challenge, but with so much hurt here it is an idea who's time has come - and it needs to be more than just a fleeting thought.

After Thoughts - Again, and Again

Whoever said failure is the mother of success didn't really have to live through the agonizing pain of losing part of yourself as your writings continue to belong to the paper you use to work for - but you aren't a part of it because the paper has been "discontinued." Someone's writing is an extension of who they are - at least it is that way for me! But though my writing is still there, I'm no longer connected. It's like the umbilical cord has been ripped out of my body and I've not given birth to the words yet!

This is what I call an "UGH!" situation, and it's one I have no control over. I'd love to use some colorful metaphors, but they really don't help - even thought they are a bit cathartic at the moment of conception. It's funny, each of my previous careers started out so good and ended in a dead end road type of liberating moment. They simply spin those wheels and go absolutely no where.

Why couldn't I have had the courage to do this crazy stuff when I was younger?! This is painful to do when you're suppose to be getting in that old age rut ya know!

I think I had better just disappear for the evening before I do even more analyzing of this wacked situation.