Notice I titled this “Older Lady” and not old lady? 61 years but still feeling like a kid in my brain. Not so much in my knees or shoulders. But my memories of being younger and stronger are so vivid that I sometimes cannot understand why I am not climbing hills as quickly or why it hurts when I jump off a ladder or step-stool. I must say that I am liking my wrinkles and crinkles though! I wasn’t sure if I would but I have always loved to photograph the faces of women over 40. It’s when our faces become storytellers. I haven’t written on this page since June! That’s just crazy and probably lazy but no words none-the-less. Seems like a birthday is as good a day as any to throw some thoughts together. I am without any doubt wiser than I was 40 years ago. Probably even 10 years ago. It seems to be one of the few benefits of aging. You get contented to lay down the battle axe and pick up a pen or paint brush. Which sometimes can feel almost as heavy but certainly less destructive. And that is pretty much where I have been for the past 6 months. In a sweet creative spot.

All of these designs and more are on my Society6 storefront:

Fun things are found here!

This year brought Jerry and I our first full year in the Blue Cape Cod. We saw a winter, a spring, a summer, and then came full circle to autumn, which marked that first year anniversary in the house, now a home. It’s been snowing this past week. Fluffy flakes of coldness that ice everything around us. The whole town looks like a wedding cake.
This past February I started working at our local library, which I adore beyond words. I found my way into new friendships, new volunteer roles, new newness, which I also adore. There is something so grandly simple about a town with only one stoplight.
Old friends came to visit this year, family too. There has been table load after table load of food that came out of the kitchen. Pies baked (of course, what is life without pie), wine opened, stories shared, and my walls still ring with laughter from all who have set around the table or under the shade of the sycamore in the backyard.
It’s been an emotional year as well. My mother died and a younger brother as well. I wasn’t close to my mother and didn’t feel the same mourning that others might feel at the loss of a parent. But I did mourn what I wished we could have had, who we might have been. And that is a strange grief indeed.
I have everything . . . I have Jerry and I have kids and now grand-kids. I have friends, wonderful, deep, life-long friends and we have worn each other like a perfectly frayed pair of jeans. Every inch of those friendships are soft and slightly tattered but so comfortable and familiar and easy to slip into.
I have new friendships that are blossoming. I am growing new tendrils that are attaching to the earth and trees around me here in Dayton. And they are anchoring me. I like how that makes me feel; safe and welcome.
I have this big Blue Cape Cod that is slowly awakening to having us live in its heart. It is absorbing our energy and filling up with our memories. It is becoming home.
So, those are just a few thoughts from an older lady . . . today starts another cycle around the sun, another whoop-em-up ride through an ever expanding universe. I like that I am here with you all at the same time.

My Dad died in April of 2003.  His name is Richard Red Hawk. He was an interesting and complicated man. And he definitely didn’t get everything right during my growing up. But his failings helped to shape him into the old, wise man he became before he died.

My dad took custody of his young children in the mid/late 1950’s when the idea of a mother leaving or a father having full custody was a rare thing. But he did it anyway and spent the next 20 years flailing his way through five marriages and A LOT of alcohol. He stopped drinking shortly before I left home at 18, sent off with a one-way train ticket and a suitcase from the reservation in Montana where we had been living. When he stopped drinking he refocused his attentions to the questions of life he carried in his heart and spirit. When the last child had been launched into the world he ended his 5^th marriage and began his final journey to find the answers to those questions. Part of the answers came through his marrying my stepmother Donna. She was without question the quietest woman he had ever encountered or married. She helped to bring stillness into his life and in that stillness he found some peace and direction. It was his longest marriage as well lasting 25 years. I am eternally grateful to her for being part of that peaceful place the he sought.

My days growing up with the less peaceful version of this man were interesting and crazy. We moved often and wildly around the western half of the US. Sometimes in Colorado, sometimes in Washington State, sometimes just wandering back and forth between the two. We lived in motels, we lived in mountain cabins, and one early summer we lived in a station wagon named Maxfield Parrish, after the painter, because the car was a myriad of blues like the paintings that Parrish created. We lived in big fancy houses and cute little bungalows, and once in an apartment where the only furniture we had were our sleeping bags and a little table made from scrap lumber that was just high enough to sit around on the floor.  At night we sat cross-legged around that table and drew pictures on it with colored pens by the light of a camping lantern. And in between all these “adventures” as he liked to call them, he married and divorced and married and divorced and married and divorced and married and divorced and he drank. It was a constant and unnerving roller-coaster for us kids. But we held on for dear life and tried to enjoy the ride, screaming inwardly when the ride hit the curves at a high velocity. I now know that I wouldn’t have missed the ride for anything in the world. It helped to shape him and it definitely shaped me. And just as I followed the deep and wide stride of his footprints through the Colorado snow, I now follow his advice the best I can.  Because you learn some serious lessons about life when it’s messy and complicated and bumpy and fast.

People are often asked, especially around Father’s Day, “What is the best advice your father ever gave you?” And that’s a good question. Most people don’t have to struggle to find an answer: Work hard in life! Be kind! Treat others with respect! Don’t take any wooden nickels!

I don’t have to struggle either.

My dad wrote this on the inside cover of a book that he gave me when I was 18:
The most important thing I can give you, I already gave to you: Life
What you choose to do with that gift is up to you. Don’t screw it up.

I admit I have indeed screwed things up along the way. But I have appreciated the gift of life he gave me. And if I learned anything from him at all it would be that it’s OK to screw things up as long as you fix what you break. He fixed what he broke over the years. He repaired all the damaged relationships but mostly he fixed himself and became a truly lovely man with a lot of wisdom and kindness to share. He showed me that redemption is possible, that it’s never too late to try something new or to do things better then you did them before.

In my cell phone it still says Dad next to the number that belongs to his house in Canada. When my step-mom calls me from there my phone lights up and says: Dad.
And for just a split second my heart takes an excited leap and I think I will hear my favorite words when I answer that phone, ‘Hey my girl! It’s Dad.”

Thank you Dad for all the adventures. It wasn’t perfect but it got me this far. And I still see some of your footprints ahead that I need to follow.

 

I have seen some comments and posts come across on Facebook and the webs about remembering what Memorial Day is all about. Reminders that this day ISN’T about the beach or barbecues, that it ISN’T about beers and hotdogs, that is ISN’T about getting an extra day off work, or having a three-day weekend to go camping. It’s  supposed to be about remembering those who died in the many wars our country has fought, honoring them and their sacrifice for our freedom. And I agree . . . kind of.

I hope that today everyone is enjoying themselves to their very fullest. I hope that those who love parties and barbecues are doing just that. I hope the beaches are packed with skimpily clothed people and that sandcastles are being built and beers are being popped open. I hope that people are camping and hiking or staying at home and working in their yards, putting in that new garden. I hope that people are at baseball games or maybe watching old war movies on TV, and  I hope that everyone is filled with laughter and joy and good food and are surrounded by love. Because THAT is what so many people died protecting and defending. THAT freedom to just go about your day enjoying all the moments no matter what those moments look like to each person. The white stones that line up in our cemeteries, the white crosses that cover fields in France and other European countries, the bones of those never found that lay in far away places, all belong to people, men and women, that died so that we can live such  free and open lives. I am sure that none of them wanted to die, but they made a choice, a decision to sign a contract, one that could take them far from home and possibly into the line of fire. Many gladly walked into those recruiting offices, especially after the attacks on Pearl Harbor in 1941 and again after the attacks of September 11, 2001. They knew they were going to face the enemy head to head. They knew there was a chance they may not be coming home. And they went just the same.

I like to think that all these men and women would want us to be living full, happy, joyful, productive, love-filled lives. They would want us to fully grasp and embrace the preciousness of this life we are so fortunate to live in our country. They would want us to go to the beach and the mountains or into our own backyards or the local parks and have fun! They would want us to laugh and run and play and relax and be able to do all those things without fear. I doubt that anyone on this holiday weekend worried about being attacked by bombs or a marauding army. I am pretty sure that most people didn’t get up and peek through their shuttered window to see if it was safe to go outside. Instead, we rose out of bed and maybe went out for a nice breakfast or loaded up the car to go to the park for a picnic and lawn darts or maybe got in a boat to go fishing or water skiing. And I am pretty sure that doing all these things is EXACTLY what those soldiers who lay in both marked and unmarked graves would want us to do.

I do hope that at some point today you stop for a moment and think about some of those people that never came home or if they did come home they came home in a box. I hope you will send a quick thank you out into the heavens and the universe and then I hope you go back to your barbecue or your beach party. I hope you will fill this day with amazing memories and that you create unforgettable moments that honor those who died. Because if we truly want to honor them we will do that by living grand lives, and we will bask in our freedoms, we will do good and kind things for each other, and we will love deeply. We will make sure that if there is some way for all of them to see all of us on this day, they will see us laughing, eating, living and loving every inch of our lives. And they will know that what they gave will have not been in vain.

Snail Mail. That is the title of the art piece above and while working on this art piece I started thinking about how important it can be to send a handwritten letter to someone, especially one that says ‘thank you’.
We no longer live in the age of letter writing and it is fast becoming a lost art. People send texts or emails or make a quick call but we really don’t write letters to each other anymore. I am as guilty of this crime as anyone else. And it’s sad.

Back in the 90’s I wrote letters to my Dad who was living in Pincher Creek, Canada. We exchanged letters almost every other week and now that he is gone I am so grateful for those written words, his written words that I can still hold in my hands. They are a visual reminder of our relationship, they carry the tone and cadence of our conversations, and they are treasures to me. They hold our affection for each other and demonstrate the growth of our sometimes troubled alliance. I am grateful that he came from that era of letter writing and enjoyed expressing himself through those letters.

My older brother Tim was often a troubled soul and he did 6 years in prison for drug related crimes. It was heartbreaking for me but he was literally my captive audience in terms of letter writing. We wrote back and forth over those 6 years and I have saved those exchanges. His letters were often filled with anger and frustration, feelings of persecution, resentment, and also hope for something better. He lamented the life he once thought he would have, felt great sorrow for never having married or had children. I was his sounding board, his voice of encouragement over those six years, often sending him funny comics or jokes that I found. I am not sure if any of my words carried any weight in keeping him grounded during his time in prison but they helped to ground me. Tim is now gone too, his death affected me greatly but I have his written words that reflect his broken soul and his struggles to find a peace that alluded him his whole life.  There is something comforting in re-reading them as it reconnects me to a much loved brother that was not mine to save. But that was long ago and I haven’t really written a true letter or note card in many years.

My friend Julie is very much alive and she sends cards out to her family and friends all the time, for every holiday, for every occasion. I want to be more like her but continue to find that the ease of texting or emailing or calling lures me from the pen and paper. I love getting her cards because they are the only thing in the mail box that isn’t shaped like a bill or a circular mailer. They aren’t junk. They are Julie. She has an address book that is filled with names and addresses of all her friends and since she and I have been friends since high school I imagine she has crossed out my address over and over and re-written it again and again as I moved around throughout the years. She understands the importance of writing even a quick note and mailing it off for someone to find in their mail box . A jewel from Julie. Every card she has ever sent me is in a special box that holds all the letters, cards, and notes that I have ever received from friends and family. I imagine myself as an old shut-in someday in the far future, just sitting by a warm fire with this box, pulling out all these words from my life and letting them cover me like a memory filled blanket. I am grateful for every word mailed to me. Julie’s words will still be there just as they were the day I opened her cards. And they will be there long after she and I are gone.

I am not too old to change. This year I intend to start writing note cards again and sending them to the people who are still here to receive them. Remembering to say thank you, to actually write the words to friends, family, clients, and perhaps even the person that delivers these letters, seems to be a way to truly feel gratitude. Technology is truly a blessing at times. Being able to quickly say thanks or hello can be a lifesaver in a busy, buzzing world. But there is and never will be anything as special as picking up your mail to find your name handwritten on the front of an envelope with a return address from someone you love. The excitement of opening that envelope is so overwhelming that you can hardly wait to get back to your car or in your door to break it open and read the words that another person has taken the time to write FOR YOU and TO YOU.

The art of writing letters is hopefully not on its death bed. Especially in terms of saying thank you to the people who are woven into our lives either through relation or through work. And when we say thank you to our clients with a handwritten note it states that we had time for them in that moment and we didn’t just think if them and then type out a quick email. We thought of them and valued them enough to take the time to put pen to paper, to lick an envelope, to carefully place a stamp, and to mail away to them our gratitude.

Now, where did I put my pen . . .

There is a quietness in the house this late Sunday morning. A stillness that settled in when the last car pulled away from the gravel drive. The past 4 days have been filled with the noise of boys, ages 1 year to a newly minted 14 year old. There was also the noise of grownups laughing and talking and reconnecting and finding time to just sit in the sun sipping cold beers and icy cocktails. There were screams and squeals and cries of, “FISH ON” or, “I CAUGHT ANOTHER ONE!!” that rang across the lake waters. There was the sound of T-Bone steaks hitting the grill and the pop of corks from crispy white and lush, deep red wine bottles. There was the cracking of Dungeness crab legs brought from the San Juan Islands by much loved family and the , “oh man, this is so good” sounds of eating spot prawns pulled from those same island waters. Every sound was a love song.

I am walking through the stillness of the house today and see unmade beds, piles of towels, and half deflated balloons. There are red stained wine glasses, mounds of half eaten sweets, and a brown dirt ring in the tub where one very dirty 7 year old boy took a much needed bath. The floors are crunchy with stepped-on baby crackers and grass and leafs from backyard play. My garbage can is heaped full and I am grateful the truck swings through tomorrow for pick up. The dishwasher is full and running a load but on the counter is another load just waiting for its turn. There are air mattresses to deflate and tuck away, toys to be put back in their cupboards, and balls to be stored away outside. And every task will, for me, be a labor of love.

Watching them all drive away I could only think, “I wish you were just getting here”.

Love looks like piles of laundry, half-drank cups of milk, and full garbage bins. Love looks like toys left on the floor and unmade beds, and dirty dishes.

Love looks like family.

I miss you all already.

 

This is our first spring here in our little town in the southeast corner of Washington State. My man, Jerry, of course spent many springs here as a boy and he has a primal connection to all the rebirth occurring around us. The earth is green; the very air is green. You can breathe in the chlorophyll and taste an earthy newness at the back of your throat. If you were to stop and roll around in one of the wheat fields you would rise up covered in that newness. If you were to stop and just lay in one of the wheat fields you would feel the earth giving birth to another year.

Winter is leaving. It’s letting go of the trees and they are relaxing from that grip and opening their arms to the sun and wind. Life is swelling at the tips of the swaying branches, tight buds just waiting to break out in song to a melody only they know, to a rhythm that signals the end of winter. I too am letting go. Letting go of the weight of loss and sadness. I have been grieving for the loss of siblings, parents, work I once loved, and a home in the city we left behind. And I am finding that I have a newness in me that is coming to life here in our little town. I feel the greening of my soul, the possibilities of all that is to come.

Hope is always at the heart of what I write about. Hope is the very thing we cannot live without, like air, hope is a life sustainer. Without air our body suffocates and without hope our soul is smothered, snuffed out like a candle.

Spring is the authentic, tangible embodiment of hope. Just when you think it couldn’t be any colder, any darker, any wetter, or any drearier, along comes a small green shoot to remind you that things will change. All it takes is that first crocus or daffodil to poke one little green arm out of the ground to test the air and we are giddy with anticipation for what will come next. It’s nature’s way of showing us what hope looks like even when we cannot yet feel it’s complete beauty. We know that the rest of that flower is there, under the dirt, in the dark, composing itself, preparing to rise toward the sun and fully open its whole essence, if only for a brief time. And it does that without questioning its purpose or reason. It does it trusting that the warmth and light will be there.

I don’t know what this year will bring me. I only know that what I feel right now feels very much like that little green shoot reaching out towards the warmth. I am tweaking some things inside me, in the dark part of me that I hope will soon bloom into something more colorful and bright. It’s Spring and if I just follow the patterns of all that is growing and awakening around me, I will be in the natural flow of hope. And what could be better than that?

“Wish on everything. Pink cars are good, especially old ones. And stars of course, first stars and shooting stars. Planes will do if they are the first light in the sky and look like stars. Wish in tunnels, holding your breath and lifting your feet off the ground. Birthday candles. Baby teeth.”
~ Francesca Lia Block~

We are wishers. We love to make wishes and have a thousand ways of making them. Wishes are really just hope and hope is the very thing that keeps us breathing one day to the next. Without hope we would lay down and expire. We would disappear from our own lives and then we would disappear from the lives of others. So we make wishes, in the form of prayer and meditation, in the form of chanting, in the form of blowing on an over ripe dandelion, or the toss of a penny into a fountain, and we hope for those wishes to come true. We hope for more hope.

I am never sure if my wishes really come true or that life simply worked out the way it was supposed to work out. And if my wishes didn’t work out where did  my wishing words they go?  Did they just float off into nowhere and are now stuck in the branches of trees or were they what cause the occasional transformer to blow on the power pole outside my door? And the ones that did come true? Were they granted by a benevolent God, or a kind, much-alive universe that just wants me to spin along with it into eternal happiness? Or could be that my wishes came true simply because while wishing, I visualized a reality that I was then able to create?  I know I have wished on countless stars, made promises to be a better person if, “just this one time”, my wish or prayer would come true. It’s funny, but while I know that many of my wishes must have worked out, I can’t always remember the details of specific wishes or their outcomes. Perhaps a wish journal is needed. A way to visibly track requests and results. If I had some data then maybe I could sort it all out and determine if wishing, hoping, praying, is even worth the time. I could spend my remaining years gathering data, putting it all into columns with calculations based on successes and failures. I could then run it through a computer algorithm and spit out some facts that would tell me if wishing is simply hopeless or incredibly hopeful.

But honestly, I think I already know an answer that no computer would be able to give. And I already mentioned it at the start of this little piece. Wishes ARE HOPE and hope is like the very air we breath. They are as real as the inhaling and exhaling of billions of humans in a beautiful dance of life on a blue planet that is often brutal in nature. We hope for so many things, from a chance to win a lottery, to a chance to find food for our hungry children. And that hope is more often then not disguised as a wish which in turn is more often then not clothed in a prayer or a meditation or a chant or in the blowing upon of an over ripe dandelion. When I blow on a dandelion I love to watch the twirling seeds flutter away, rising and falling on unseen currents, journeying off to places unknown. Those seed will find root again, to grow another chance for another human, or me, to make another wish. But even when there are no dandelions, I know I will find or use all the other ways we humans have to make wishes.
And some will be for me.
But today, I will use my wishes for you.

I was 20 when I had my daughter Leah. I seemed, to me, to be perfectly capable of having a baby but I really was far from that word. But at 20 you want to be grown up and what could possibly be more grown up then having a baby? I was a single parent, did not have much support from family, and had never had an example of what being a good mother looked like. I remember in my last month of pregnancy feeling so scared and wondering how in the world I could possibly do this. I would sit on the floor in a house I was renting in Anacortes, WA and cry my eyes out. I attended some birth classes, had a friend that was my birth coach, and tried to just have some faith that it would all be ok. I think I took pretty good care of myself, not really knowing much about being pregnant. I did smoke! I think a lot of pregnant women smoked back then. I remember the doctor saying it was fine and would keep the baby from being too big!! WHAT? Now when I think about that I cringe. But you can only do better when you know better. I know better now but there is a box we all carry that is filled with the weight of all the things we did wrong in our of ignorance and that box rarely contains self forgiveness.

I rolled past my due date as many first time mothers do. Then came all the suggestions on how to get labor going. The one that worked was chugging a bottle of castor oil. I spent the night sitting on the toilet (no pre-birth enema needed!) and by the morning I knew that the pain in my lower belly was no longer from the castor oil. The contractions became more regular throughout the day and I used the breathing methods taught to me in my birth classes. This was going to be a breeze! No drugs for me, no way, this was going to be a natural birth!

By the time that I was admitted to the hospital in Anacortes I was still chugging along with my breathing methods and feeling pretty confident. But as the hours ticked by the real work of labor began. What an incredible thing this is to try to push a big human being out of your body. But my body wasn’t up for the task and complications set in. First my labor slowed again and they had me get up and walk around. That didn’t help. Then her heart rate started to change so they decided I needed to be in a bigger hospital and shipped me via ambulance to United General in Sedro-Woolley , west of Anacortes. They felt this hospital would be better equipped to handle any further issues and they hoped that the ambulance ride would get things going again.

You lose track of time when you are in hard labor. And the little dreams you have between contractions are bizarre and yet strangely real. I remember the smell of people’s breath bothering me terribly and telling people to get out of my face when talking to me. I remember trying to get through each contraction, still not asking for medications, still wanting to have a ‘natural’ birth. When the urge to push comes along it is the most overpowering feeling. And it is also a huge relief because you are headed to the finish line. You are finally able to go with a contraction versus go through a contraction. I pushed and pushed and pushed until I was exhausted and again her heart rate plummeted. With each contraction it would drop so low and then slowly come back. I began to see the top of her head with each push. And then things totally tanked. She was stuck. They decide to do an emergency c-section. I remember them rushing me down the hall and saying, ‘DON’T PUSH” but that urge is so strong and the compulsion to bear down is primal.
In moments they had given me a spinal block, cut my abdomen open and pried a baby girl out of my body. Her head was pushed down into the birth canal and they had to give her a few good tugs to pull her back out, to pull her in the opposite direction of where she was headed. All I remember is the relief of hearing her cry.

It takes so many miracles to get born. And it actually takes a billion more just to get conceived and carried to term. It takes one sperm out of a million to reach one egg out of thousands and if it doesn’t happen at that precise moment in time YOU are not YOU,  YOU are some other YOU. The universe has been here for billions of years, there is an eternity before you and there is one behind as well. And miracle of miracles, everything had to roll out just right to bring each one of us here. We are the makings of so many uncountable, incalculable miracles. And most of the time we don’t even know it. We just take it for granted.

I remember holding her later that day, just her and me in a big empty birthing room. I was all blubbery and hormonal, buzzing on whatever meds they gave me but mostly just madly in love. Crazy, mad love for this little baby that was a girl, my girl. I swore to always love her and to tell her how beautiful and amazing she is. I swore she wouldn’t ever have to feel what I felt as an abandoned child. I swore to be good to her and kind.
I haven’t always kept those promises.

Except the one, the one to always love her.

Leah just turned 40. We survived the birth and all the years that followed. It wasn’t always easy or nice or lovely or peaceful or stable or any other words you might want to attach to raising a child. It was difficult. I was growing up just like she was growing up and I made big mistakes. But I also made some good choices and it is reflected in her now. She is an incredible mom, a strong woman, a sweet, kindhearted person, headstrong and true.

Happy Birthday baby girl. Your birthday was my ‘birth day’ – we made it through that day together. And we made it through many more together as well. You are my miracle – Miracles look like you . . .

I have been trying to refrain from posting anything that was truly politics based but it is becoming impossible to not say something about THIS ridiculous election cycle.

So, here is my main thought:

Quit freaking out!

Seriously, I see stuff on Facebook and in the media that could have a person thinking that it was the beginning of end times or something. We have some real yahoos running for President this cycle. In fact, there isn’t one of them that is worthy of a vote. But it looks like we will be going ahead with the election anyway. So, what we might want to do is remember a few things so that everyone won’t die of a stroke when their candidate doesn’t get elected and someone they hate does get elected. Frankly I can’t see a good side to any of the candidates unless it’s when they aren’t talking. They all sound so good when they don’t say anything. I love quiet candidates and politicians.

It takes a special kind of special to choose to run for President. Trump said it takes courage to run. I think it just takes a massive ego. And there isn’t one candidate on either side of the ticket that isn’t a bloated windbag of ego. Running for President in this day and age means you have to constantly talk about how amazing you are, how you have done all these civilization-changing things, how you are better than the next person, how you, you, you, you, you, you, are the ONLY reasonable choice there is for a thinking voter to make. It also means promising things that are impossible to actually manifest. But they make a candidate sound like they are a caring and compassionate person that only has the best interest of people in their heart. But they don’t have the interest of the people in their heart, they are on a self-motivated, ego driven path to find their own glory. Even Bernie. Everyone seems to think that Bernie is this meek and mild-mannered man who is altruistic and farts rainbows. He isn’t. He is as driven to force his view of life down everyone’s throat as Trump. He just does it without mentioning his penis.
And Hillary. Oh my. She truly is the most special kind of special in the world. That woman is a shape-shifter and can do it at the drop of a hat. She is not a bit different then any other establishment candidate running except she doesn’t have a penis to brag about but she is definitely married to a willie.

All I am really trying to wind around to saying is: QUIT FREAKING OUT about these yahoos. We have had some seriously crappy Presidents throughout our history and we have survived them all and we will survive this election cycle too. And the reason we will survive this election cycle is because WE THE PEOPLE will still be going about the business of pursuing happiness and also taking pretty good care of each other. But we need to start doing a better job of the taking care of each other part. It’s actually one of the sure fired ways to quiet down this insanely insane political jockeying for votes that rolls around every four years. If we started taking better care of each other then we wouldn’t be looking to the clown college in Washington DC to take care of things for us. All these promises that they make to us to buy our votes are empty and won’t bear fruit. The real change happens right here with you and me and our neighbors and our neighborhoods and our towns and our cities. Our government shouldn’t be this loud. Our politicians shouldn’t be this loud. We let them get like this. This is our fault. But we can change that. Our government and the people who sit in either the Oval Office or Congress have a pretty basic job that they somehow have twisted into something so complex that even they don’t know how it works. Their job is to provide us with protection (military, fire, police, medical) and maintain our infrastructures (roads, bridges, dams, electrical grids, etc.). But somehow they have found a way to keep vacuuming money from our pockets while convincing us that the sucking sound we hear is progress. Now everyone of course will have some response that sounds like, “but what about the poor people, or what about the elderly, or the infirm”? and my response would be, “What have YOU done about the poor, the elderly, the infirm”?

Our government has very successfully convinced us that if we give them enough money they will make everything better FOR us. We won’t have to do a thing, or lift a finger. How’s that working out so far?

What makes things better FOR THE PEOPLE is WE THE PEOPLE. We make things better for us by being present in each others lives and providing hours and money in our own community. I mentioned in a prior blog post about volunteer hours. There are over 300 MILLION people in this country and if just half of us volunteered that would be 159 MILLION volunteers and if those 159 million people just gave 4 hours per week that is 636 MILLION hours of giving in any week. Multiply that by 52 weeks and you end up with over 33 BILLION hours of giving. Those hours could accomplish great things. Great things that we would not have to look to the government or it’s windbags to provide.

All of us that were born here in America won a lottery. A birth-lottery. We were fortunate enough to be born in a free Western society that while not perfect, is still pretty darned good. We are free to invent, innovate, create, and share solutions to big problems everyday. No jack-booted soldiers will come kick in your door and  make you disappear. You can whine, bitch, and moan all you want about how horrible you think everything in this country is and how awful the President is and no one will cart you off to never be seen again or beat you in the public square. But my suggestion is we stop with all the whining, bitching, and moaning and remember that when we all won the birth-lottery it came with a very special addendum, it’s small print, but really important: Have gratitude, display gratitude, act grateful.
And the way to follow that small print is to give back in ways that make a difference in your community, in the lives of the others around you. You actually have an obligation as a birth-lottery winner to share that good fortune. And since there wasn’t a big cash prize with this birth-lottery, you are obligated to share of yourself. And to do it with gratitude and grace.

I for one am having the best time this election cycle. I cannot believe that I actually get to witness all these shenanigans and it’s given me some deep belly laughs. I am not worried about what will happen. I do know that one of these bozos will be elected. And in 4 years we will do it all over again. What I hope happens in those 4 years is that WE THE PEOPLE will get back to taking care of WE THE PEOPLE. I hope that all of us will remember that the real grassroots campaigns are those that don’t involve one single politician. It’s just us doing the right things for each other. PLEASE, find some time in these next 4 years to make a difference in your community. Let’s make our voices heard by what we do and that will help quiet the yelling and yammering that comes from our politicians. If we could start fulfilling promises to each other to take better care of each other we wouldn’t have to listen to candidates and elected officials tell us how they are going to bring us all a pony and tuck us in bed each night. We can have better by being better. We the People.

So QUIT FREAKING OUT about the election.

It’s going to be ok.

WE THE PEOPLE got this!!

Silly title – but not so silly subject behind it.

Election years in the US always seem to bring out the worst in all of us. We are flippant and lack compassion, we are unforgiving and rude. And then there are the candidates! I don’t even want to start on that, so I won’t. This isn’t a post about politics but another reminder during this hyper-charged season that we are actually just amazing creatures!!

We need to remember that we are all much more then what we hear from media, or politicians, or  government. We are filled with possibilities and potential, and creativity and hope. There are people doing prodigious things out in the world every day. We don’t know it though because it isn’t as news worthy as killings and racism, or as head turning as another Kardashian getting a lip wax. I too start to feel our failings as humans after watching the shenanigans of current events.

But then I see something like this:

Wooden, Hand-Cranked Music Machine

Do yourself a favor and watch this. Really, I love you all so much that I am sharing this so that you can actually feel really good about being a human full of creativity and art. We need to remember how incredibly amazing we all are, how creative, beautifully intricate, and masterfully designed (by God or Nature, either way we are awesome) we are. We are so beautifully intricate that one of our fellow human elements was able to create this beautifully intricate machine. Think about the thought it took to just come up with the concept and then think about all the thoughts it took to bring it to fruition. I for one am THRILLED that I am of the same species as this guy. And his devotion to making this happen reminds me how great our humanness is and how important art and creativity is to that human spirit.

We hear so much negativity everyday and forget how much goodness is being created by us, being shared by us, being innovated, and invented by us, us humans. Yes, we are flawed and do LOTS of stupid, thoughtless, unkind things. But we are also kind of marvelous.

How great we art.