"The Weather Is Here, Wish You Were Beautiful"

March came in with a whimper. Record highs and early pollen counts. It looked pretty when the daffodils in their pretty bonnets were so anxious to turn the faces skyward soaking up the warmth.

Now they look brown and shriveled. I know how they feel.

Early Spring is nice. Warm days just around the time we changed the clocks so we had longer days. Only they didn't last. The freeze came and March started acting like the bitch we know she can be.

Now it's gray days and cooler temperatures. But the early bloom doesn't seem to care. Magnolia and apple blossom alike, are in full flower. The trees are red and the willows are turning more verdant. They just couldn't wait.

I love how everyone speculates. We had a mild winter and so what will the consequences be? As if we have any say in the matter!

People try to hold back mother nature and anticipate what her next move will be. Alas, to no avail. If she's gonna slam you with a Tsunami, there is very little you can do about it except hope to be up high.

Last Fall I watched rivers in Pennsylvania, Upstate New York and coastal New Jersey overflow due to heavy rains, wiping out whole towns. Terribly tragic.

Instead of wondering when the next proverbial shoe will drop, why aren't we embracing this glorious gift that God gave us...a mild Winter and an early Spring. Maybe that's our gift for the tragedies of the flooding in our area.

When will people realize that the good things and bad things in our lives don't necessarily come with price tags? Maybe it is all just random and we should vow to embrace the bad along with the good instead of waiting for it all to come crashing down on our heads!

Because, eventually, it all comes crashing down anyway. It has nothing to do with what we think we deserve. It's all so much bigger than we are.

Acceptance is one of the hardest things for us to...well...accept in our lives. We need to stop worrying and start living. Enjoy the good and surround ourselves with love when the bad stuff comes.

I'll have to try to remember that when my soul feels like the shriveled daffodils.

"Playground in My Mind..."

So I had some unexpected time this morning and decided to go grocery shopping. I asked my husband if he'd drive "Miss Daisy" so he said only if I make a stop at the dry cleaner. No problem.


We set out on this dreary Spring-like morning ( I say "Spring-like" because it is not  quite official even thought the daffodils and crocuses are sprouting up everywhere!) and he took a route I was hoping he wouldn't. He passes my old house. In order to avert my eyes from too many painful memories, I look around at the surrounding streets. Madonna comes to mind. "This used to be my playground..." 


I saw the places I know like the back of my hand. I don't think there's one bit of my little village that doesn't hold some kind of acute memory for me. The sights, the scents are all there. 


Places I used to play, hide out, make forts, ride my bike. Even the places that  don't even exist anymore I think of as "the vacant lot where we used to play kickball" or where the A&P used to be. There are new facades or completely new buildings but they are all still fresh in my mind!


Where has that time gone? It would seem that the past 30 years are somewhat of a blur to me. And at other times, I feel every memory as if it all just happened. 


My first days of school when we would all pose for pictures with our new book bags and lunch boxes. First grade I had a Bugaloo lunch box and thermos.


The first signs of Spring when the days were longer and the air smelled so sweet and fresh.


The endless summers at the town pool and Robert Moses beaches. 


The hottest days in our apartment complex when the super would turn on the sprinklers and we'd go out in the middle of the grass in our bathing suits! Grass that I am sure hasn't felt the patter of little feet in decades!


Hearing my mother call my name out the kitchen window to get washed up for dinner: "Cyyynnnnnnthiaaaaaaa!" It was the only time she called me Cynthia.


My poodle Guy chasing cars. 


My brother fashioning ramps to do Evel Kenievel-type stunts with his bike with the banana seat.


An abundance of cousins and aunts and uncles and extended family and those who were not blood relatives but were family nonetheless.


Crossing Carll's creek and my library books not quite making it.


Ice skating on the "big" lake and the little ones.


Swimming in the canal. 


Clamming and fishing and crabbing.


Hanging out in a bar drinking root beer and Shirley Temples and having endless quarters for the jukebox. I loved Bad Bad Leroy Brown and Dark Lady. My father loved big blondes.


My first records, friends, crushes, heartbreak.


I am at an age now where most of my life has been spent as an adult yet these are the things that I hold on to. These are the things that come back so brilliantly that I wonder if they actually happened.


 We lived in an apartment complex and there were a lot of families.  First, Sally and her dad lived downstairs then Helen and her husband and the boys. Charlie was my age and my first real crush.  Joanne and Barbara and their "mysterious" (mysterious when you're seven) older brother Bobby, Lori and Lisa, Donna and Dawn.  The fire changed everything. Mr. Palmer and his daughter. There was the blind lady. The super and his  family of boys.(If there were sisters, I don't recall.) Darlene and Vinny and Little Richie. They had a cousin we called Tuna Fish. Betty, the nice lady that lived next to Joyce and Vito and taught me how to crochet and made a fancy crown for my First Holy Communion. Cathy and her sons. She used to cut our hair. The druggie lady across the way who had a kid that I stayed with sometimes while she went out (Until my mother told me I wasn't allowed over there anymore). I was probably in second grade! The lady who had an English setter named Cindy. I think the lady's name was Mabel. Guy and David. Connie. Chris and Danny. The other Joyce with the two boys. The kid who hit me in the head with a rock and my mother had a huge fight with his sister in front of half the complex. Bonnie and her sister who had CP and their creepy brother Kenny who told a story that gave me nightmares well into my twenties. Hemena (think that's her name). The lady that died (at least I think she died). I remember when they took her out she looked green! 


I wonder if this memory is real: I remember summer nights the families would take their lawn chairs and blankets and portable radios and the adults would laugh and talk and we would be outside in our pajamas. Some kids were catching fireflies or doing cartwheels or playing Parcheesi. The adults were most likely drinking.


Those days were magical to me. I can hear the sound track of seventies music playing in my head. I can hear Paul Simon singing "Late in the evening...and the music's seeping through." (The song is not from the seventies but the imagery takes me there.) I remember falling asleep to lilting laughter of adulthood. I longed to be grown up and and stay up late laughing "the way some ladies do..."





It's Springtime! Get out in the world and re-live your childhood!

Absence makes the heart grow...inspired?

So I took a brief hiatus. Not much a fan of that word. Perhaps sabbatical is a better choice. Or a much needed break from cyber-space.

How ever you choose to look at it, I was feeling the pressures of a too-busy life to make the time to sit down and sort out my thoughts.

I was rarely on the social networks. I played a minimal amount of Words on my smart phone but even that  became lackluster after awhile.

I am back and somewhat refreshed.

Two weeks ago, was "Fat Tuesday" and then the season of Lent began. As I have stated before, I am not the best at the "Faith" game. I have been trying to reconcile myself to my Catholic roots. It is very difficult. There are many Church doctrines that I disagree with and I am sure at least half the Catholics out there find it difficult to fully comply with some of the laws. But I am looking at it as a way through to my spirituality.

This quest has been going on since I was a child. I knew people of many faiths, mostly Christian based. I always envied my friends who just knew that there was a God and that all the bible stated was true. To just know like that...without question or doubt. Many had fear. My Evangelist friend read a story to me from the bible about Jesus and how light poured from him and his voice was like a running stream and she was terrified of this image and it made her love Him all the more. I just thought it was a beautiful story and a beautiful image of her savior.

Recently, going through what I have of late, I have come to realize that there is this Higher Power or Consciousness. For me, anyway. There is something out there besides the science of it all. Many will disagree. Many will become angry and many will try to tell me that I am saved. I don't know about that. It's not up to me.

I have read the  Bible. Well, most of it. Deuteronomy and Numbers and Judges  should be skimmed through. They don't really translate completely. There are some discrepancies. There are some stories that are repeated several times with different facts. I suppose this goes back to a time when people translated stories through generations without ever writing them down. By the time they were written down, they had been altered and embellished by the tellers.

But the essential story of Christianity, early Christianity, is so basic and repeated over in so many faiths that I have to wonder what all this fuss was about.

If we believe that Jesus was a man who walked the Earth before he was found to be the Son of God, we realize that all he wanted was for everyone to just get along. No matter what their background, race, social standing, sex, or behavior. He just wanted us to love one another and forgive each other for all our shortcomings.

That sounds like a wonderful concept. Imagine.

What's so terrible about a belief in something that abhors hatred of any kind. I heard something recently that Hate is not the Opposite of Love. Fear is the Opposite of Love. In the case of Jesus, this may be true.

I am reading a book on catechism and I squirm when I get to the parts that make most people, especially Christians, feel uncomfortable. Abortion, birth control, divorce, homosexuality, etc. Some of my closest acquaintances have had abortions, are gay, are divorced and re-married. I, myself, have delved into the reproductive sciences to try to conceive a child. I am staunch supporter of stem cell research and treatments. Many I know have conceived out of wedlock. The catechism will even have us spurn Yoga and other forms of spiritual enlightenment or esotericism. I've gone to psychics. I am not a follower of Satan. I believe that fear has stood in the way of progress in Christianity. If I am to believe what I have learned through my spiritual journey, God loves us no matter what. Jesus loved the leper, the tax collector, the prostitutes, the social outcasts. He abhorred pride and self-righteous zealots.

I hope and pray every day to someone or something. I find comfort in the fact that there is more...that when someone is gone they are not completely gone. It may be faith or wishful thinking. Maybe I am just another example of a sinner putting her own spin on faith so it conforms to her needs.

"You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one..."