Geometrically increasing pace

The pace of life and of new things increases geometrically. One new piece of technological hardware begats hundreds of new software applications - not only for that piece but for other pieces. And, the competitor has to keep up or lose business; so two or three or five new similar hardware items pop up - and each one has a different operating system with different programs to do the same thing. After a few years some of the competitors have dropped out of business and their products become obsolete. This is a minor glitch in the geometrically increasing idea.

When I finally finished college at age 35, Cobol II could be used as your language requirement. You seldom hear about computer languages any longer - programs in some of these languages translate ordinary words and numbers and boxes and pictures into the ideas you don't write on paper with pencils. And, we called them lead pencils - they are carbon and you don't need a sharpener.

Inventions and discoveries are abounding. Take Windows 7 for instance. Some technology just doesn't excite me. I don't play X-Box games (and is Nintendo surging ahead?), but I do have a Wii - a gaming device that I use primarily for exercise. And, now Windows 7 has arrived after extensive testing. I spent two minutes with it in Staples last week - now I crave a new computer with Windows 7 so that I can figure out how it does the things I like to do - better - worse - quicker (quicker is always better, huh?) - easier?

My Prius Hybrid can now be adapted to run on electricity alone. A gasoline engine combined with an electric system that has evolved into a different kind of car - one that has been available for some time. However, the Prius has made the idea more popular. It was state of the art. Now, almost every manufacturer is copying its system, adapting it, making it better, going one more step.

International relations seem to work the same way - a new election or coup and we're friends with a country that was our enemy. And, other countries fall into line with that thinking - so for a while, peace is more likely in that part of the world. Hillary Clinton must be exhausted - trying to form coalitions that cause a domino effect for peace and prosperity for all. One domino falls to the side, and the set-up has to be redone.

In my life, this increasing pace is new combinations of fibers for yarns, new operating systems for computers, new exercises on the Wii, new formats for banking (what happened to cash and checks?), new cleaning products (when all I wanted was something for these wood floors), and what happened to that product that I used to help remove or cover up scratches on wooden tables (does the Vermont Country Store carry it now?)?

I don't envy the young people of today. They have to know so much more than I did - along with most everything I knew then, too. Pregnancy was the direst consequence of sex with your boyfriend - now it's a fatal disease. I'm not saying that the world is moving too fast; what I'm saying is that I don't keep up. I have chosen my areas of increasing knowledge, and they are few. I look interested when others talk about things outside those areas. My friend, David Keill regularly writes on Facebook in a lingo that is outside my knowledge. So, I admit my ignorance and go on reading it anyway - maybe someday it will all make sense.

Keep on truckin', kids. The pace is getting faster and the race is getting bigger.

Today is different

Yesterday I was really down. I felt that I had lived all of life that I really wanted to live. I was okay with just dying last night. As I prepared for bed, I figured, well, I'll either wake up or I won't, and I don't want control over which happens. I took my normal medication, did my stretch exercise, knitted a bit, put on my CPAP mas and turned out the light. So, I went to bed, and I woke up today. I didn't die.

Today is different. Today promises the same heat, the same chance of thunderstorms, the same job (which I love most of the time), the same partner, the same bed, the same dent in my nose from the CPAP - but today is different.

Yesterday was sad. Today may be also. But, today's sad will be different from yesterday's sad - and I like different. Most of you know that I'm an eclectic person. I've had so many jobs that I don't remember many of them. I lived in lots of different houses. I have lots of different acquaintances. I've lived with lots of different money situations. I thought I wanted to try suicide once and got rid of everything that could be used to do it (about 25 years ago).

Today, one of my friends has an operation for cancer. Today, I go to work. Today, a yarn rep is coming and I get to see all the lovely new yarns. Today, my partner made my lunch. Today I woke up early. Today is different than yesterday. And, I appreciate that.

So, whatever the day brings, I choose to see it and be it and do it. And, if I'm down again tonight, I'll just eat something crunchy, pet the cats, and go to bed early. After all, tomorrow will be different.

It's all about me

It's all about me - but only in this blog. Elsewhere in my life, other people and other things take precedence. I listen. I smile. I cry. I work. I sleep in the recliner. I eat (a lot). I listen. I knit and crochet. I play on the computer. I listen.

What's really nice is when someone listens to me...when someone takes the time and interest to ask about me. Most of the people I know talk a lot about themselves, about their interests, about what happened in their day, about what they have accomplished during the day or during their lives. I don't talk fast. I don't interrupt (not often and with very few people). By the time I find an opening to speak, the conversation has gone far beyond me. So, I just don't talk.

That's why bits of my life just go unnoticed. Occasionally, I will talk during supper about who I saw at the shop or what new yarns arrived. Mostly, I smile and listen to others who speak faster and interrupt each other and talk loudly and trade stories. I'm interested in these things about which they talk. That's how I get most of my news and gossip.

However, conversation as an art is not part of this life. Take Facebook, for instance. We presume that others are interested in pieces of our lives. And, some people elicit more comments in response than others. We learn a lot about each other - unless we are quiet and just listen/read. Sometimes, it's hard to slip your thoughts into the flow of the world. Twitter, cell phones, text messages, blogs, Facebook, email, voice mail, IMs, and I'm sure new ways are being used that I don't know. The world is full of sound bytes and abbreviated word bytes and short takes.

I recently googled a friend named Mary Stuart, and a lot of the findings showed photos of the late Queen of Scotland. If your name is not Mary Stuart, I wonder how much you know of her story. If we use all these short forms of communications, what happens to our stories? We become like entries on a spreadsheet. You fill in the columns with information and PRESTO you are known. Stories are more than information; stories are metaphors and flashbacks to other persons' lives. Stories are universal. My thoughts and feelings at a particular time may fit your thoughts and feelings at a totally different kind of time in your life. Our concluding resolutions may be similar; our decisions may flow in totally opposite directions; but for a few moments, a few words, a few feelings, we were the same.

I like the stories - the facial expressions, the obvious feelings, the empathy and sympathy and antipathy, the way we are surprised by the storyline and the characters, and I like the endings that are usually filled with hope. I want you to hear my story, to see my grimace when I am sorting out what I felt and remembering what was said. I want you to laugh with me, cry with me, and be a part of my story.

A professor gave his students a one question final exam - pass or fail the course - some psychology thing. What is the name of the woman who comes in as you are leaving to clean this room? No one could answer.

What is your story? Does anyone know your name? Do you listen?

Contemplative thoughts about myself

Balance, things that bring you joy, fears, etc. That was my marching orders from my therapist last Monday. Now that I'm alone at the beach, I'm spending way too much time thinking about myself (Lee, that's directed thinking. When I'm alone in my mind without direction, I feel like I'm alone with an insane person.)

I've tackled mind mapping about creativity, love and balance. Now I want to work on fears. I've written some notes that ended in fears, but with mind mapping, you jot down words or phrases all over the page and then you link them. And, we're not really talking about fears of spiders (which I'm not) or things like that. We're talking about fear of being rejected so much that you don't do things - you know, the kind of things that therapists like to talk about.

Interesting. When I follow a thought to its logical conclusion, nothing is so bad after all. I always feared being a bag lady because I know how uncomfortable those homeless shelter beds really are...and I hate sleeping on the ground. But, we may all be homeless soon if the mortgage companies keep making idiotic loans; so why worry about just me. We'll all be in it together, and like penguins, we can huddle for comfort...at least until the domino effect happens.

And, like most of us, I have always wanted to be loved, remembered and contacted. The internet advertisers and the bulk mailers have shown me how much I am love and how much they remember that I bought something from then sixteen years ago that they contact me regularly asking if I need birth control medicine. Mind you, I'm 63, have had my tubes tied long ago and passed through menopause at least 20 years ago.

Did you know that, although men need prescriptions for their hormonal drugs like Vi...and Cia...., women can get a pharmacist to concoct a hormone cream that stimulates their desire for sex? No prescription needed. And, with all the medicines that we take nowadays (especially anti-depressants) that could be a much-needed service. I have the name in my little red book just in case.

As you might imagine, laughter and humor are two things that bring me joy. So, keep on truckin' friends, Laugh, know you are remembered and loved (or I wouldn't bother writing this blog), and check out your local pharmacies for the hormone cream.

Church down the road

The sign at the church down the road says "even the hairs of your head are numbered." While I realize that's only a partial quote of the verse, it sounds absurd by itself. Why would I want a number on every hair on my head. Partner says that it's just to mean that God cares about the most minute parts of us. Okay, got that.

Now, when God created, two marvelous things were included:
1. God gave humanity the right and power to say yes, no, maybe, I'll think about it, call me back tomorrow, hmmmmmm, and all sorts of answers in between. We can give these answers to God, to our fellow humans and to all the rest of creation.

2. God made all of creation co-creators. We have the ability to create - not necessarily from nothing as God did, but we can make new things. In fact, most of creation can make new things - trees from acorns, frogs from tadpoles, combinations of elements that are very different from their parts...you know all the examples.

What a tremendous leap of faith God had! To believe that creation would continue to do well and create new things. I've never been sure that God didn't create the evil in the world as well as the good; so I'm certainly not sure that we could create only good even if we tried. I know, I know, God looked at creation and said, "It is good." Okay, so define "good" - good as in without evil, good as in this works, good as in this might be interesting, good as in should give them some challenges. I don't know.

But, the major piece of this is that not only are we co-creators with God, we have the right and the power to not create, to be nothings, to do evil, to do good, to be nice today and not tomorrow. We have the right and the ability to say no when God asks (however that might happen) us to do something. Of course, I've been slapped up side the head with a two by four by God a couple of times when I've said "No" or "Not right now"; so you have to be careful about those answers. Equally, I've been abused and hurt by humans after I've said "Yes". Pick your battles.

And, listen: this is important!! It's easier to be forgiven than to ask permission.

So, just remember those two things: you are a co-creator with God and you have the right and the power to do evil, good and all things in between.

Listening

I spend a lot of time listening to frogs and crickets, to birds and waves, to the air conditioner and the air cleaner, to the shower and dishwasher, to the click of knitting needles or keyboards. But, I also spend a lot of time listening to voices - people talking around me. I don't seem to talk a lot any more.

As a friend said last night, I feel like an outsider. I will occasionally share my story, some pain, some funny, but not often. Conversations swirl around me without my really being a part of them. Sometimes they are about things with which I have no experience or knowledge - remembrances of camp or private schools or vacations or friends and playtime. Sometimes, the conversation flows along at a pace that I don't want to interrupt, jumping from one person to another to another with each person spurring their vocal horses to get into the minute piece of silence that signals another person can talk. Getting into those spaces is near impossible for me. So, I ride along on the edge listening to others talk about their lives. Almost a part, yet not really.

Last night I thought about the conversation - dreams of going places, doing things, plans for the future. Others have those - I don't seem to have any plans or dreams. I feel as though I'm just existing for a while. I knit, I've learned to crochet, I work a few hours a week, I do laundry, I clean house a bit, and I will be starting yoga next week. I have no need or use for the things I make. I buy yarn and I learn - for what? I don't even know. I'm just existing here for a while.

I have no desires that aren't fulfilled. I could wish to feel better; I'd like to ride my jet ski more, to kayak more. But, I have no long term goals or hopes or dreams or plans. Life is just flowing along.

Sometimes when I listen to conversations, I feel as though life is flowing around me and gently carrying me along with it like a piece of driftwood that slips along the edges of the river - not part of the current but moving still, immersed in the busyness of getting to the mouth of the river, but not going very quickly. The driftwood bobs along and lets the faster current get their first.

I think somehow in the last few years, I've retired from the hustle and bustle of living. In the process, I've also retired from some essential part of life, but I can't figure out what that is. I've bought things for enjoyment and use, but most days they are meaningless. Maybe that's what's missing - meaning. Like, where do I go from here?

sharecropper to driftwood

Interview questions from RevGalBlogPals

These questions are from an interview of Singing Owl published on the RevGalBlogPals Please go there and read this interview. This is a very interesting blog, and I enjoy being part of it.

Where do you blog?
23 acres of black dirtYou're here.

What are your favorite non-revgal blog pal blogs? Wounded Bird, Pseudopiskie, Badtux

What gives you joy? Music. Water. Silence. Yarn. Love.

What is your favorite sound? Cat purring

What do you hope to hear once you enter the pearly gates? First you have to believe that the pearly gates exist.

You have up to 15 words, what would you put on your tombstone? She lived. She loved. But, I love what we put on Mom's tombstone in the cemetery of the church that kicked me out for dancing and spurned her after she left my Dad: "Dancing with God, drawing deep breaths of the air of Heaven." (She died of emphysema.)

Write the first sentence of your own great American novel. The hurricane was beating against the sliding glass doors, and she hoped that they lived up to their warranty of stability in 160 mph winds.

What color do you prefer your pen? Black

What magazines do you subscribe too? National Geographic, The Sun, Bead and Button, Oprah, Time, Smithsonian

What is something you want to achieve in this decade? Continue living and being alive in that living.

Why are you cool? Because I have white hair and still do daring things.

What is one of your favorite memories? Being introduced to my partner at the lunch counter where we ate and not remembering anything past her holding out her hand and saying, "Hi, I'm ......" Surely, I must have answered, but I do not remember anything except being in love.

Anything else you've always wanted to be asked? How did you get here from there?

Let's talk about fear and sex

My partner is in NYC visiting her son. She was terrified before she left - for several days - about getting from the airport to his office in Brooklyn then to the hotel. She hurt her back rebuilding our deck and doesn't have the energy she once had; so she was rightly afraid of being lost without enough energy to think straight. But, she did all the right things. She packed lightly enough to use a carry-on bag and a small backpack. And, God provided the angel - the native NYCer who said he was going exactly the same way she needed to go. She had the courage to say, "I'm your new best friend." In just over an hour from landing, she was sitting at her son's desk. Thanks be!!

But, her fear just about did her in.

Those are fears of current events. I have fears of past events repeating themselves, and my fears sometimes make that happen.

When I was 14, a young man was taking me (supposedly) to the skating rink to meet other friends. Instead, we parked on a very deserted road in rural Mississippi. And, yes, I've probably told this story before...but this is a different twist. We necked for a bit - exciting for a 14-year-old to be with a guy in the service. Then suddenly he was in me and hurting me and I was screaming no no no. Afterward, he was terrified and so was I. At that time in Mississippi, they killed young men who did that to white girls. All I had to do was go to the doctor.

And, my brother had told that sex was the most wonderful accompaniment to love. I should cherish it. So, I made a deal with my rapist. If he would teach me how to have sex lovingly, I would not tell anyone. For the next two weeks of his leave, we made love in many ways. He treated me with kindness, love and gentleness. He defended me to my former friends who had told him I was "fast". Then he left, and I never saw him again.

My first alliance was with a woman who courted me for over a year. She took me to Arizona; she had a lover there and they continued that relationship. She had promised me the sky, the moon, the stars. But, she betrayed me not only by continuing the relationship but in other ways. And, she ultimately stole my car - my beautiful 1963 Bonneville convertible - dawn metallic blue with a blue top. Resentment? Who me? Only 24 years later.

I married 10 years later. The man loved my body and loved having sex with me. But, he also had sex with anyone who would stand still long enough. I began gaining weight as I lessened my drinking (totally sober 10 years, not drunk in 25 years), and when I reached 130, he quit having sex with me. He also became a drug addict and dealer and a thief. After seven years, he just quit coming home and we divorced. A man who promised to love me and care for me until death do us part - abandoned me after mistreating me in many ways for eight years.

Several years later, I married my best friend. We knew the sex between us was terrible, but we thought we could manage, and we truly loved one another. His resentment manifested itself through barbs and quips that cut. Sometimes, he would team up with my Mother for these. They would laugh; they thought they were making jokes. Early in the second year of our marriage he began to talk about leaving, and I would ask the questions: where are you going? how will you get there? what are you going to do that's different? The sex continued to be horrible, he continued to hand out barbs and leaving became a joke. Then he fell in love with the teacher across the hall and broke all the vows he had made.

So, tell me any reason I shouldn't have fear about sex in a committed relationship. The only faithful sex I've ever had was with the man who raped me. He treated me well. The others, those who promised before God to love and cherish me forever, treated me horribly and abandoned me.

Recently, I created a fight between my partner and me just to avoid intimacy.

I'm working on this. Right now, I'm using a book "Forgiveness" by Simon and Simon, 1991. Now I'm making connections and drawing conclusions about what has happened in the past that is affecting the here and now. Ultimately, they claim I will have forgiveness and a different relationship in the now. I sincerely pray that they are right because fear is a terribly debilitating thing.

Peace, Prayers and Love

When I am writing to internet friends or leaving comments on other blogs, I often sign off with "Peace, Prayers and Love" - I wish you peace, I will keep you in my prayers, and I send you love.

As sharecropper, my responsibilities are to care for those and that leased to me by the owner, to increase the wealth of my trust, and to return a portion of that wealth to the owner. I never capitalize sharecropper, for I am not unique, only one of the host of the world, who are also sharecroppers even though they may not know it. Coming from the farming world of the deep South, sharecroppers were not respected even though they served well. They gave much more than they got; some, however, were able to buy land and become landowners instead of sharecroppers (and I'm not sure how that plays into my metaphor). We did own our little bit of land, and I sold it to go to seminary - such a little bit that about all it did was to get me there.

First and foremost to me are the people in my life - my partner, my friends (those present, past and cyber), my co-workers, acquaintances, and so on throughout the world. What I do best is to love people. My love is not boundless nor is my energy to love. I am human (and sometimes I have to remind myself that I am). I get angry, I harbor angers from the past that spit out at inappropriate times. (12 steppers will recognize this as resentments.) Ridding myself of these angers and the fears that go along with them is a lifelong process. The steps don't do it for me, and God's time in removing them (with my help and the help of other sharecroppers) is not my time.

But, what I farm is the growth of Peace, Prayers and Love. Some years the crops are bountiful; some years not. The more I can multiply this wealth I've been given in trust, the more I am blessed with the same things. Some days I have peace in the kind we all consider - the quiet contentment of being that includes safety, fulfillment of my basic (and not so basic) needs, and love. Some days, I give love in abundance, and some days I turn the cell phone off, stay away from the computer and knit.

As a sharecropper, my leased land is not the earth, is not the wealth of things (although I seem to hoard lots of things), but my leased land is people. My energy goes into loving people. I'm a pretty good sharecropper; I've known about my leased land for most of my life. I've picked up bad habits and good practices along the way. My return to the owner has been good; I consider myself a successful sharecropper. Nonetheless, I am sharecropper. I do not own. I am a servant who is truly blessed with the return from my leased land.

Job, Justice, Fairness, God

You know the only thing I've ever been able to deduce about the story of Job in the Bible is that the rain falls. Good things happen, bad things happen. We attribute them to God or the Devil. But things change.

Today I feel good. Yesterday was awful. I was knitting with a wool that was new to me, and I could hardly breathe. Once I finished that project and laid it out in the sunroom, I could breathe. Anxiety? Allergy to the wool/dye in the wool? The wind? God? The Devil? Things change.

Some days are good; some days are not. A smile can make a lot of difference. A good laugh can make a lot of difference whether I can breathe well or not.

And, Job. Well, Job had it good. In fact, the Bible tells us, according to fellow blogger Lindy, that God had built a fence around Job and his family. OOOOOeeeee! Wouldn't you like one of those fences. Then I'd be able to breathe well all the time; my anemia would not affect my doing things; my restless legs would stay still; I could buy as much yarn as my garage could hold and enough beads to build a house.

Things change. One day that fence would be gone, and then, where would I be. Unused to any kind of calamity or bad event, unable to cope with adversity, non-compassionate because I'd never been hurt or hurting. Don't think I'd like that.

I'm reading a wonderful spoof on fairy tales and stories in general. Cliches abound. And, I know those stories. They have happened to me. You know those stories, too, because we don't have fences around us - at least not God-built fences. The rain falls. Bad things happen to good people. Bad things happen to bad people. Bad things happen. So do good things.

Blaming God or the Devil or Job won't make it any different. I try to just accept what the day brings and do what I can. I leave undone what would strain me too much. And, yes, I get angry and depressed and anxious and upset. And, yes, I cry and gripe. But, in the end, tomorrow is another day - a different day - maybe better, maybe worse, but another day. And, if tomorrow is not another day for me - well, hey, I won't know it because I'll be dead...and that's for sure different.

Why?

A good reporter always asks five questions (at least that's what I was taught in 1963): Who? What? When? Where? and Why? The first four are often easy to ascertain, but that fifth questions leads us into places that are unsafe - physically, mentally, emotionally, psychically. Often the places that Why? leads us are untrod ground.

Growing up on the farm, we called it new ground. First the trees would be cut, and the timber used in appropriate ways. Then the brush would be rooted up and piled into huge piles that were burned (remember this was in the 1940s and 1950s). Some of it was undoubtedly saved for kindling because we used a wood burning stove for heat in the winter. Stumps were included in this burning. Rocks were pushed and lugged out of the field. Only then could the tractor with it big turning plow get in there and make deep furrows in the land. The soil that turned up from below was black and wet. But, when it dried, it was as hard a brick...gumbo, it was called. The fields were turned and disked and harrowed. Then the rains came, and the ground was like black glue; it stuck to anything that touched it. When it dried, it cracked open in geometric shapes. Beautiful to a seven year old, but dreadful to our father farmers.

Except near the bayou, the soil would be turned, disked, and harrowed until it was black sandy loam - the stuff that farmers hold in their dreams. New ground. Lots of work went into creating new ground.

Lots of work often goes into answering Why? - the new ground of our minds...and lots of time. The answer doesn't always come. I will die never knowing why I like red so much or why I seem to need more...more of everything. Each time I answer a Why? question about myself, I change the answers to the other four questions. Who am I? Where am I? What am I? Yes, I realize that's only three of the questions: When? Time is so elusive for me. I understand God's time a little better as I remember the past and as I look to the future. I live in the present (most of the time), but When?

When am I in my life? Am I really a senior citizen? How do you measure years? Do miles count in that measurement? Does creativity count? How about love? When am I in the course of loving people? Near the beginning - the middle - the end or somewhere that I don't even really know? What I do know is that my computer (attuned to the atomic clock somewhere in the world) says that it is 8:13 pm on May 21, 2008.

My question then is So What? or Why does that matter?

My questions and thoughts about Lent

Lent. Lent. 40 Days not counting Sundays. The usual question from friends is "What are you giving up for Lent? The typical answers are chocolate, sweets, cigarettes, cussing, coffee (not too often). I once gave up Coca-Cola for Lent. Once.

Now we are three days into Lent and I have no Lenten discipline. We discussed this at dinner last night. One acquaintance is giving up some bad habits. That's a good start, but I'd just pick them up again after Easter the same way I did the Coca-Cola.

Traditionally Lent represents the 40 days that Jesus spent in the wilderness (desert). More than two months of his 3 year ministry was spent in the desert, perhaps the same desert where Moses and the Israelites wandered. I wonder if he went in circles like they did. Anyway. In the early church, those who were to be baptized at Easter had their own fasting and discipline to follow during Lent.

The apostles had their own Lent, each one different. Peter didn't know he could preach until after Easter. Mark was mostly a scribe until he wrote down the words and works of Jesus, the Christ. Matthew, the bookkeeper, was mostly good at keeping accounts before he gave us accounts of events and miracles. And, what happens to John, the Beloved? Exiled on Patmos, someone named John writes the most beautiful theology ever. Their Lenten disciplines varied...and some lasted a lifetime after Jerusalem.

Now, we think of Lent as a time of purging, fasting, giving up things. Others say that we should take on good habits or good works or special prayer disciplines during Lent.

I'm not good at giving things up. I'm not terribly good at taking on a discipline, like reading the Daily Office or even getting on the treadmill. And, if I'm going to give up a bad habit, maybe Lent is the motivation to do it, but can I keep it up?

So, here I sit. Pondering what I should do for Lent. This desert is hot and cold. The desert is dry with only a few oases. The desert is lonely at times and comfortingly quiet at others. I'm used to the desert, but.......

I guess I'm a strange one, but the resurrection doesn't mean a lot to me, and I don't believe in sacrificial atonement. I believe that the Incarnation was sufficient. Perhaps we needed the passion and the resurrection to keep the faith alive all these needs, but I just don't think it was necessary for salvation. Heretic that I am.

So, back to Lent. Purple - the royal color. We consider it as a time of mourning instead of a time of seeking in the desert. Yes, Jesus rejected things, power, godness, but isn't the desert for seeking?

I'm still in the desert - and likely to remain there. I know Jesus is with me, and I fear no evil (except maybe the presidential elections and global warming and violence everywhere). I think I'll keep on seeking. God called me long ago. I've answered that call in different ways at different times. Now I'm just puttering along from one oasis to another, seeking the companionship of those on the journey, assuring them of God's presence, accepting their company as right and good. I like journeying.

Tell me what you're doing for Lent. Thanks.

May the peace of God, which may not be exactly what you expect, be with you always.