TIDES
There is an ebb and flow to my healing process. I have been aware of this for some time now, but the acceptance of it is new. I love the sea. There is something so reassuring about the rhythm of the tides. Like the rising and setting of the sun and moon, they are the Earth’s breathing. Life’s constant breath in our midst. The breath of our Source itself. Yet, I didn’t allow Source into the metaphor. I excluded the Divine by placing a seal of human conditions and judgment around my sea. Incoming tides were good. They meant fullness, moving toward joy, coming into wholeness,...
RITUAL
My dentist is still in the neighbourhood where I grew up, so three times a year I make the trek there for my regular check-ups. On my way to an appointment last week, I was waiting at a traffic light, looking up a hill where one of my mother's "bridge ladies" lived. When we moved across Canada to our new home on the West Coast my Mum wasted no time in finding ways to become part of the community. She joined the Newcomers' Club pronto and became part of a group of women who were all recent arrivals looking for friendship. They met every week to play bridge for the next 40+ years....
TIME
I need time. Time to sit quietly at my kitchen table and eat my food in silence. I need time, to eat my bowl of soup with a small spoon. I need the time it takes to put effort into keeping my focus on the moment so I can maintain an awareness of my jaw opening and closing, opening and closing, slowly, methodically. I do not count. I don't want the stress of rigidity. I need time to notice that my food tastes good. Not just the first two bites. Every bite until my bowl is empty. I need the time it takes to notice that my food has a temperature that feels a certain level of...
A (my) STORY
I can remember sitting on the bus, probably coming home from downtown. The sun was streaming through the window beside me and as I looked out into the bright light I immediately squinted. A searing pain shot through my eyes and then was gone. I didn’t pay much attention to this since bodies do offer up various assorted aches, pains and twinges that amount to nothing. As it turned out, it was not one of those. It was the first symptom of an illness careening way off track from its normal course. A sore throat came next and thus a descent into full blown mononucleosis began that would...
GETTING TO GRATITUDE
When life deals you a harsh blow, feelings of gratitude can go right down the drain. They're usually replaced with anger and that's okay - for a little while. But not forever! If you go on being angry too long it becomes destructive and self-defeating. Anger, if it's used well, is fuel that can propel you forward. It can help you get things done. As long as you're in control of it you can choose to channel it into productive activities. Whatever they are, they will ultimately help to transform your anger and help heal the hurt that caused it. That's a healthy outlet. But anger...
FLOAT
The constant movement of our world doesn’t allow much time to pause when someone we have loved dies. When my mother left this earth, there was a lot to be done and circumstances being what they were, we had to get right to it. My brother and his partner at the time were faced with dismantling the interior of our family home - a structure in itself, a sculpture of sorts. For a period of 42 years it was added to, chiselled at and repeatedly repaired, embellished, rethought and reworked. This natural process began on the day we pulled into the driveway of our new house, the endpoint...
POOL OF POSSIBILITY
When I was 24 years old life as I knew it suddenly and drastically changed. Over the course of three days I slowly became paralyzed and lost consciousness. It was July on the Canada Day long weekend, a time to have fun and celebrate my country’s birthday. I had just graduated from university and was looking forward to heading to Quebec to spend the entire summer in a French immersion program. More fun! As weakness and loss of sensation crept up my body, I didn’t realize that I was also becoming less and less aware. I couldn’t have known that fun was most definitely no longer on the...
A FLOCK OF SHEPHERDS
I had weathered a bad dream and survived my first night in GF Strong Rehab Centre. I had come from six weeks in an acute care hospital and now found myself in a new place I did not know or understand. There were new routines, new protocols and new rules I knew nothing about. There were the social codes and etiquette of a whole new culture I had yet to discover. There were going to be different expectations of me too, from all sorts of people in occupations I had never heard of. I felt enclosed in my experience of this new world and I was scared. I had been helped by the nurses to...
MIGRATION
I grew up in a simple house with a big yard. Yards aren't so important anymore. Kids don't play outside much and where I live old houses are taken down and new ones are built that are all house, no yard. Our yard was my mother's favourite playground. Over the decades I watched her turn it into a garden so glorious it radiated her life energy out into the streets. People walking up and down would stop and comment, beaming back the joy in their smiles. It was by no means a seriously coiffed garden - far too stuffy! It was semi-cultivated and landscaped according to designs that...
