oceans of thought

When we conect

2006-02-19T18:43:00.000-08:00

the Puritans had the idea that noone was to live outside a family. Being single was not only lonely it was deadly in their society. get sick and you starved or froze when there was no one to help you. Families lived in close contact with people and you moved as far as the next farm and helped as needed. Everyone had to pitch in often as a suvival mode. Family was everything to you. Kin mattered.

Now in today='s society we are luck to live in teh same state. Twenty miles is nothing; 2000 miles can be the norm. Fractured families and stress reign. We know the poeple on tV better than the ones we are related to. My students can tell me what tv charcters did in detail or what their favorite band had for dinner, but can't tell me what their parents like. If they even see both. i teach in rural areas but we still have 50- 70 % divorce rate. I have talked to many people and they are lonely. They are looking for conections and caring. The people feel isolated and alone. It is hard to see. They feel disconected and alone, drifting in a place where few care and less conect. this in the age of instant conection that at time can seem more barren than getting a letter to have and hold. That visit in person always seems better than the harried call that is hard to read and pushed. I bring flowers to a few women who have kids who don't. I tease I am the best adpoted grandkid they have. At times I am the best grandchild they have and they are not my blood family. We need better and more conection in this hurried age. There is a resturaunt that seats singles in groups and it is full people get to eat with others and talk and deal with people. Even my kids who marry quickly and get divorced or who have babies at 15 are looking for connections and love. We have a lot of technology but the people get lost and tha matters to the souls who are lonely. People need meaninhful contact with others. take a little time and reach out to someone. Considering where this is going it is an ironic message maybe that is why I posted it. Just maybe one person will reach out and like a ripple in a pond others will too. And all will feel a little more conected and a little less lonely.

So many people I have recently met are looking for quality human contact and not just superficial chatter. But in this huried age we also have to remember that to learn to like or love and trust someone will take time. That is a treasure we often are not investing in ourselves or in others.

Life

2005-09-06T14:23:00.000-07:00

In admist all of the chaos life goes on and we keep going. Sometimes life is funny and a bit bewildering and other times it is just funny. Like the wheel chair sitting empty at the bus stop. I like to see how it all works out. For me it always seams to work out in the end. It is just figuring out what will happen or when. The stangeness and the amount of time it takes to sort is amazing, but yet at times frustratingly slow. Them all of a sudden you are out and it is fine.

Infidelity

2005-08-13T15:19:00.000-07:00

Goldie Hawn's daughter said she didn't think that peope needed to be faithful. We could do it but her signifant other should but she didn't want to know if he didn't. Do but don't tell was the idea. There was a lady (loose term) in the paper who said she was incapapble of being faithful. She loved her husband and cared for her lover. She would not admit that she was unfaithful. It made her sad, she would feel guilty and hurt her husband who would either divorce her, or demand that she get rid of her lover. She was not into trading in the lover. Fidelity and commitmet is where?

Friend of mine still has her world rocked by being the center of a emotional affair at least. She was caught in the middle where the boyfriend fell for the woman he was trying to help. the boyfriend still cares for the friend but will not get rid of teh new person. So the question is does he really love the girl? The affair started innocently. The guy started to let the woman work for him and share his house due to the fact she didn't drive. The two got along famously. They like a lot of the same things, share the same humor and act goofy together. My friend watched and wondered and even asked if the two should be together and if she should go. Only to be told no. But sadly the two fell in love. In trying to help the woman the man began to talk to the woman and shared intimacies about his life and himself, the relationship and the rest. The woman liked the guy and used the knowlege well. The man never stated that he was his girlfriend's and that he was being untrue to her. It was both party's fault and the girl was left shoved out a little at a time. There is not easy way back for my friend. Sh expresses feelings of hurt and betrayal. She didn't keep the guy and wishes things had been different but she will live. It hurts and she is is frustrated.
The pain she has will end and the frustration is he went from her household to a new one with the woman he is rescuing. The pain of the girlfriend gone, is tempered by the by the excitement of the new perfect woman he is dating. Eventually all will lose and there are no winners with infidelity. Even if no one ever finds out. ALl we can do is be there and help where we can she has bad days but she will state people can and should be expected to be faithful. If they are not it is not the person you need for living a lie is not ok.

The three calm spots of a storm

2005-08-08T18:04:00.000-07:00

There are always calm spots before, during and after a storm rips in an area. The wind and rain often are not as scary as tha lulls in the action because the calm quiet are breathing spots for the violence to come. The last warnings that all fury will become unhinged shortly. Life can be like that too. Violence in dating, and illness, death all have disquieting lulls where you breath before the fury breaks loose.
The first quiet spot that people in a typhoon or even a tornado or water spout worry over is right before it hits.. The wind and rain often lash out and all is fine then an eerie calm descends on the area. This is when you should consider going for cover. I have waited out several storms. One where we had a tornado hit a few miles from camp with 200 girlscouts. The Strom had been building all night and warnings were given. We put the brownies in the basement and the camp leaders sat outside watching the lightening all around us. We laughed as we watched the trees bend and the rain fall and joked if it got calm we were in trouble. Sure enough it all of a sudden did. No wind, just some rain and a funny pressure it did this for a few minutes. The the storm broke with the tornado sirens blaring. Life does this before major events. Being told there is cancer or a death does this there is numbness before the full effect hits. You take the numbness it lets you get by. But a person often knows that is borrowed time.
The second abnormal calm is the eye of the storm this is the quiet center that is at every typhoon. It come over the island and where it is there is sun and a little rest for the soon the next half of the Strom is coming. So you scary about and batten the hatches and keep going again. S things are like this when you get a reprieve or a breather to keep going with a tough situation. It is understood that the center will not hold but the reprieve is nice to hit.
The third part is the point when the storm is past. It is often a hard thing it realize that the wind is down and the waves are not crashing on the shore. It is so unusual to what you hit it take the listener a while to understand that the strange sound is the absence of the storms fury. Then you have the process of rebuilding or seeing what is left.

The cube

2005-08-04T05:22:00.000-07:00

There is an exercise that is interesting to look at your life. You imagine a cube and come up with 5 words to describe it 2. Create a picture of a desert in your mind, note this The cube is also in the sceane you create. Add in a horse, note where it is with your cube and what it looks like and its actions. Then there is a storm in this picture. Where is it? Is s coming or going? Now by your cube is a ladder describe it and lastly there are flowers how are they laid out.
This is a snap shotof your life at this moment. My cube is a solid polishes fine grained sandstone in earth tones. It s big but solid foundation stuff. The cube is you. Mine is resting heavily on the sand. I have a traditional desert with the open expanses and wild life all over no cactus. It is pretty in an open sense feels lonely. This is your life. The ladder rests against the cube at an angle the rungs are about a foot apart and solid. There is a rung missing at the top. My horse is not here at the moment. That is the person you love. The ladder is your friends and where they are to you in your life. I lean and am leaned on by them. The horse is who I date and he is not here at the present time. I am not sure if he will return, I want him to return or who will I will find to join me. The flowers are all over in a blaze of color. These are the projects that you do and your creativity. Mine are scattered all in random with lots of reds, yellows, oranges. Some have neat gardens. My storm is over head but resolving. It is a scary thing with lots of lightening on the edges, dark sky, some wind, no rain. This is the problems in your life. There have been enough lately in mine. I am tired of them and hope they soon resolve. Time is a good thing for cancer, loss of friends, hurts, and the rest of the things that are not fun in this life time. Some day in a little while the storm will be on the Horizon and the landscape wont seam quite so lonely. I miss my best friend who is distant. That's the hard part. And some days I am a crabby kid who is tired of her mom having cancer and all of the responsibly of helping my mom stay independent, in a way it helped cost me my best friend. He may have left eantway who knows you only play the hand you have. Its been three long years with more downs than ups. I want things better for all of us. I grieve for a lot of things. Life is learning experience and I am tired of this lesson.
So give thye cube a chance and see what you life looks like to you. It can tell you a lot when you do this.

Life lines

2005-08-02T11:05:00.000-07:00

There was an article in the paper today about the strange weather at the coasts and the effects it is having on the creatures that live there. Many of the lives of the animals and fish are being disrupted by the warm sea and the significant drop in the plankton. The plankton are the base of the eco chain in the water and also for the land creatures. Now due to single event like warmth the rest of the life is out of balance in a large scale. Life for people is like that seemingly small actions can often throw larger things out of balance. A student of mine went swimming with 3 friends in a river. He didn't swim well and ended up in eight feet of water with tragic results. The friends left to get help with one under the water for 40 minutes. A family is mourning the youngest son. A school has lost a senior. A basketball team is missing a player who worked hard to get on the team. The ripples go on and on. Little things with big effects on the people who are here. The problem is once the act is done there is no reversals for it. The ripples will go on for years. Friends of ours lost a 32 year old son due to an unknown heart condition. Scott is missed and will be forever 32 in his parent's minds. But the potential he had and the adventures he should have done like becoming a scuba instructor ( he was good) will never come to light. Scott is still missed and remembered by the name my little nephew carries. But the sadness still felt by those who knew and loved Scott will always be there.

Sea Side

2005-08-01T12:11:00.000-07:00

Very few places let me feel at home as does the ocean. It is a place that slows me down or as close as I get. There is something relaxing to sit by the water and watch the timeless waves roll in and hear the surf roar. At night I love to sit on the steps down to the beach and turn down the lights and look at the stars on the dark sky. The pin points show up as a lighted carpet that has shown a thousand generations of sailors their way home or on to new adventures. There is something timeless as I listen to the waves and I have hit many of the major seas due to travels around this globe. The waters always feel like I am coming home to where my soul needs to be. It is a balance point to show me how hard I run my life. It is hard some days when I am land locked here in Ohio to not have that ageless rythem from the sea.