1. I believe in love. I believe that you can love anyone. I believe that love, when it is not poisoned with reciprocal expectations, enhances both the lover and the one who is loved.
2. Pain is a weird teacher. Pain has so many manifestations that often we don't see what it is that the pain is trying to tell us. Pain can be so brutal that we forget altogether to look for the real cause. We look to kill the symptom or find ways to avoid the pain.
3. Procrastination is so seductive. It joins forces with pain and helps create ways to avoid whatever it is that we are suppose to do. Procrastination is a symptom that is immune to our desire to kill it. Procrastination is a whore that steals all the money in your wallet and leaves you with the crabs, without giving you the satisfaction of an orgasm.
4. Playing with my grandkids is so much fun. They remind us why we are here: to play.
5. I am amazed by how everything changes when we get out in nature, away from the frenetic pace of the city. My mood changes as my body begins to resonate with the rhythms of the forest, or the ocean, or the lake.
6. I used to be very religious. I wanted to be a Catholic priest and spent 4 years in a junior seminary. I learned how to connect with Spirit. It was a great education, with way too much guilt thrown into the teaching about God. The fear of God eventually stifled my spiritual growth, forcing me to look elsewhere for a connection with Spirit.
7. When I was in grammar school, I used to think that I was the only “real” person in the universe. God put me here to test me. I don't believe that anymore. God is not testing me or anyone else.
8. I love the deep purple color you find on purple velvet plants. I like colorful things. I remember watching Jeremy (my first son) coloring a picture. I asked him why he was painting the sky blue. He said, a wee bit annoyed, “because the sky Is blue.” “No it's not.” was my reply. “Go outside and tell me what color the sky is.” He came back giggling, “its orange, I didn't know the sky could be orange.” He colored the remaining sky orange. Then he started to color the clouds gray. When I asked him why, he said because he wanted to and that he was not going to go outside to see clouds of a different color. I love to see how people learn.
9. People are fascinating to me. There are so many nice people that are eager to engage in conversation, share their story and share their time.
10. Dancing with abandon is so healing, so energizing. I like to put on some music and let my body move with it, organically, rhythmically. I let my arms feel the spirit of the music and dance with it. I hold it in my arms and carry it up and down, then release it to have it come back again.
11. I travel in the spirit world and converse with guides and helpers. They tease me constantly, ensuring that I don't take myself too seriously. I remember being invited to a very significant ceremony. When I started to regard the ceremony as serious, I got a pie in my face. Life is too important to take too seriously.
12. Family is important to me. I am torn between wanting to be close to my kids, my siblings and my cherished friends. And yet, having them be apart from each other gives me space and helps me remember just how much they mean to me.
13. I like playing with words and creating stories. Crafting words that elicit emotion brings stories to a life of their own.
14. I miss my son and others who have died, even the four legged ones. Death sucks! In spite of that, Death has taught me the importance of life and how wonderful it is to be alive. Eda Bea died on 28 January 2011. My heart misses her.
15. I am grateful for all of my experiences, even the painful ones. They have all taught me important life lessons. Gratitude helps clear my view of the world and how I fit into it.
16. I know that my body is in its 72 year of life. And yet, I do not feel old. I am still the same person I was when my body was very young. I have acquired more experiences and earned more wisdom. I look in the mirror and I see an older version of the me that used to be. But I still only see me. I look out of the same eyes I have always had. I touch with the same hands that made bows and arrows out of sticks and string, crocheted a tostada, held my son's little hand, rubbed my dying son's head, and hold hands with my mate for life.
17. I felt the life force jolt away as we killed our first 3 Viet Cong. They were 3 young boys carrying a wooden box along the beach. They were within our sights and within the deadly range of our 5 inch gun. All too soon afterward, a mother's wail would tear the night sky when she got the news that her son was dead. I know that wail. I left the navy as a conscientious objector after my second tour in Viet Nam. From July 4th 1978 until June 1992 I could not watch fireworks or hear the name, Viet Nam, without wanting to cry. I did not know, in 1072, that I, too, would wail for those boys. Visiting the Viet Nam memorial was so healing.
18. Writing a book about my experience in Viet Nam is healing, although painful, at times. I find that I need to include fiction in order to tell the truth.
19. While attending architecture school, in Albuquerque, in 1976, I went to the Frontier Restaurant for breakfast. I did not see what I wanted on the menu. I asked the person behind the counter if he could make something special for me. The person behind the counter asked the manager and my breakfast burrito has been on the menu ever since. I was at the Frontier in May 2008 and thanked the manager (who is still there) for keeping it on the menu.
20. Why do we watch movies that are filled with violence with such eagerness and fascination? I find that it makes my body stress in unpleasant ways. Ways reminiscent of my time in Viet Nam. Most of the time, I can hold the violent fantasy in my hand, for a while. But, as the violence escalates, it oozes through my fingers, down my arms and begins to eat my stomach from the inside out. I don't watch violent movies out of choice.
21. Sometimes I wake up late at night and see that the moon is full and shining brilliantly. The moonlight fills me with delight and I often feel like dancing in the moonlight, La Luna and me.
22. We share Mother Earth with so many other beings. It is so sad that so many have assumed that Mother Earth was created for our irresponsible pleasure, without regard for the other beings who are nurtured by the Great Mother. We really are not more important than the four leggeds, many leggeds and no legged beings. We need to relearn how to talk to the Rock people, Tree People and other people who share the blessings of Mother Earth.
23. Imagination is what propels us forward and helps us connect with Spirit. Without imagination, nothing would exist. No thing, nothing at all. Imagination is the horse upon who's back we ride in our efforts to create our lives. With this horse we gather thoughts and actions which enhance the lives of those we come in contact with.
24. I feel that we live in a “reverse” world in which we take that which is healthy and normal and distort it. Then we take that which is immoral and hate filled and we glorify it and its perpetrators. We train young men and women to kill for an idea. The idea is warped because it is based on the misconception that people are unrelated, unconnected, unlovable. They are “other”. We glorify warriors and their hate filled actions. We mark our history by battles won and lost.
We take what is natural, our bodies, and we misconstrue them to something that should not be seen. We look at babies and are so taken by their beauty. Then, as they grow, we hide their bodies and our own. Why? It's a cruel joke. We all know what we all look like naked. Yet, we pretend that we cannot know and we should not see. If we were all naked, all of the time. We would not lie to each other, as much. We would not war with each other as much. We need naked honesty.
25. The divine feminine is what has been missing in our patriarchal society for far too long. The world has been out of balance. Our world needs music, art, love, compassion, and nurturing far more than guns, money, greed, the need to be macho. I teach my children and grandchildren to honor and nurture their feminine side, their artistic, musical side. Our overly competitive society over-supplies the masculine side of life.
