Posts
It’s a process.
After years of talking about it, writing about writing about it, procrastinating and retreating from baby steps taken, I finally began the chapter-to-chapter work of manifesting my manuscript. I started November 1st, from scratch. I completed 50,000+ words by November 30th. My second NaNoWriMo win. (The prize is personal satisfaction. No money.)
For so long I just wanted to write it, beginning to end. I didn’t get to the end. There’s so much story left to tell, it’s just getting juicy. I can begin to see two distinct books arise and which will be first.
The best part of getting so far along in my writing is discovering my process for completing it to publication. Whew! That’s huge. Now that I have the complete story, I can outline the drama. It's totally backwards from what I expected. Write the story first, then outline. From the outline, I’ll be able to rearrange the scenes logically. I forget how planned and logical I am. I may be an “artist”, but I am so so logical.
Once the scenes are logically arranged, then go back and work up the details scene-by-scene. Most likely, sticking to the to the flow of the subplots for consistency.
Then finesse the writing.
Isn’t that funny. Opposite of my intuitive ideas. Worry about the quality of each sentence absolutely last.
A plan. Somebody probably wrote a book about this. Probably a great how-to. Some of us like to believe we invented the idea of sweet with peanut butter. Sure, someone else came up with the peanut-butter and jelly sandwich, but this is organic peanut spread with pomegranate-infused strawberry jam. This is the MasterRabin step-by-step guide to manifesting a novel.
Thursday, December 1, 2011
Thursday, November 3, 2011
NaNoWriMo 2nd Time
I just want to express within the hallowed space of a public blog that I CAN NOT START WRITING!!!!!
Exhale. Deep breath. Longer exhale. I'm in my second NaNoWriMo. This time tackling, from scratch, the novel I've been talking about since 2007. Out wit the old chapters, in with the new inspiration. By November 30th, it'll be done. Just one thing...I haven't started.
I'm sitting at the computer. I'm stuck. This is why I did the Landmark Forum in 2008. I make this doggone thing so doggone significant. My Evil Ego Twin, she's a real you-know-what. She's on my shoulder insisting I am simply not big enough, not good enough and definitely not ready to take on THIS novel. It's too big and I am too small. Who do I think I am? A writer? "Hah!!" She laughs.
That's my Evil Ego Twin. I just needed to share her with you. We're wrestling over my integrity, my life.
My promise is to write 2000 words tonight. Her promise is that I'll be stopped by insecurity.
Thank God I know who wins.
It's great to allow my Evil Ego Twin to be heard outside my head. She seems small when I type her out and share. When I let her run free in the darkness of my fears and doubts she's large enough to disable.
Check out my page and progress throughout the month of November. I'll begin updating my word count after November 10th.
Exhale. Deep breath. Longer exhale. I'm in my second NaNoWriMo. This time tackling, from scratch, the novel I've been talking about since 2007. Out wit the old chapters, in with the new inspiration. By November 30th, it'll be done. Just one thing...I haven't started.
I'm sitting at the computer. I'm stuck. This is why I did the Landmark Forum in 2008. I make this doggone thing so doggone significant. My Evil Ego Twin, she's a real you-know-what. She's on my shoulder insisting I am simply not big enough, not good enough and definitely not ready to take on THIS novel. It's too big and I am too small. Who do I think I am? A writer? "Hah!!" She laughs.
That's my Evil Ego Twin. I just needed to share her with you. We're wrestling over my integrity, my life.
My promise is to write 2000 words tonight. Her promise is that I'll be stopped by insecurity.
Thank God I know who wins.
It's great to allow my Evil Ego Twin to be heard outside my head. She seems small when I type her out and share. When I let her run free in the darkness of my fears and doubts she's large enough to disable.
Check out my page and progress throughout the month of November. I'll begin updating my word count after November 10th.
Saturday, October 29, 2011
Heaven on Earth
My first night and morning alone in over a month. I'm not gonna say marriage isn't for me, but waking up to only my thoughts and Chocolate sleeping at my feet seems closest to how imagine my mornings in heaven.
Saturday, June 11, 2011
The philosophy: Wish Only Well
I've only glanced around the main site. A first glance saw nothing that disturbed me, but I am not promoting the site. I just stumbled on the philosophy while checking on a recount of the 100th Monkey story.
A short version of the story is that there were monkeys on an island. A few learned to wash their sweet potatoes before eating them. (Sometimes the story is told around monkeys being taught to wash coconuts by researchers after a nuclear bomb was detonated on a Pacific island repopulated with monkeys to see how they fare.)
The young learn. Their parents learn. A few family members learn. At some point, parabolically, the 100th monkey on the island learns it. Suddenly, the entire population of island monkeys do the same. Instantaneously. Mass transformation. A new morphogenetic field that they all now have access to and/or live inside.
As a human being, if this is so, my daily thoughts and actions contribute to the growth and development of my species.
Even if my actions don't transform the world, they transform the world of those around me and with whom I interact. Reason enough to be purposeful, deliberate, loving and free.
I've only glanced around the main site. A first glance saw nothing that disturbed me, but I am not promoting the site. I just stumbled on the philosophy while checking on a recount of the 100th Monkey story.
A short version of the story is that there were monkeys on an island. A few learned to wash their sweet potatoes before eating them. (Sometimes the story is told around monkeys being taught to wash coconuts by researchers after a nuclear bomb was detonated on a Pacific island repopulated with monkeys to see how they fare.)
The young learn. Their parents learn. A few family members learn. At some point, parabolically, the 100th monkey on the island learns it. Suddenly, the entire population of island monkeys do the same. Instantaneously. Mass transformation. A new morphogenetic field that they all now have access to and/or live inside.
As a human being, if this is so, my daily thoughts and actions contribute to the growth and development of my species.
Even if my actions don't transform the world, they transform the world of those around me and with whom I interact. Reason enough to be purposeful, deliberate, loving and free.
Sunday, June 5, 2011
Healing with color. How it works.
Recently, I made prayer a consistent part of my daily life. At first, it was weird. All I'd ever seen were people who would speak a name, identify a need, a wish or an outcome and perhaps add a scripture or other authenticating phrase requesting God to intervene. For me, this was flat. Let me confess up front that I am not gifted with quick references to the Word.
I see colors, a representation of vibrations. Vibrations being a representation of health. I might begin praying for a friend in words, asking that she have peace in her life given that she is stressed beyond her coping mechanisms. As I say this prayer in words, I begin to see her with a flash of pink around the outside of her frame. Then red begins to stand out on her body and it locates itself quite clearly on her left side, center. I don't try to figure out what it represents or if it is some particular organ, I just notice it.
The next thing that happens is I'm lead to bring in some other color in a very particular way. Bolts of yellow just along the outer edges of the red. They push into the red and release it through her central nervous system to the top of her head where suddenly I sense an indigo that absorbs the red and transforms it into a green or pink or golden rays that emanate from her body. Don't get too caught up on the particulars that I described since it is a fictitious representation of the types of things that have been happening lately.
The best was yesterday. Two new things happened.
First, a new color. I was praying for someone. Archangel Michael was present and guiding me. I let my ego step aside to watch what happened before my mind's eye. There was a rust-red-gold-brown color that I have never seen before. It is a color that does not exist for us. Don't worry too-much if it sounds other-worldly. The simple science of color is that the spectrum we see is quite circumscribed relative to what exists along the electromagnetic spectrum. My mind's eye perceived this new color washing away energy at this person's feet. Of course, I speculate on what's happening, but there is no way to truly know. It is fabulous just to witness it in the way I do.
Second, a new healing. I've been confronted for a couple days now. God has been forcing me to clean out a few lingering old habits that I was taking my time giving up. Evidently I didn't hear the timer pop. Play time is over. I heard that my healing talents were needed and my pussyfooting around and playing with them as if they are a cute little hobby needs to end. With that, to emphasize the importance, I suddenly saw an image of a man I truthfully did not recognize. I'd like to say it is someone I don't know. What's more accurate is that I did not recognize this person in the state in which their vibrational shadow appeared to me.
It was filled with and blotches of black. I let the colors do their thing and acted as facilitator. Yellow lightning bolts struck at the outer aura loosening up the black blotches. Green and yellow attached to the red to transmute it. Soon, I began to see cracks in the overall aura such that a new glow of yellow tinged with a radiant glow of an unrecognized pink-purple began to glow like a sun. Intuitively I knew an illness was getting cleared out and most likely a mental illness. I understood, again intuitively, that this is a three year process.
In his real life, this healing process may look like fortuitous meetings with a person who refers him to a better doctor than the one he's been seeing. It might be as mundane as urges to exercise suddenly followed in the second year and later discovering a supplement that his brain function for the best, ushering a new period of optimized health.
I have no idea how it works.
I'm just delighted to play around in what some might call my active imagination. I call it the energetic field.
I see colors, a representation of vibrations. Vibrations being a representation of health. I might begin praying for a friend in words, asking that she have peace in her life given that she is stressed beyond her coping mechanisms. As I say this prayer in words, I begin to see her with a flash of pink around the outside of her frame. Then red begins to stand out on her body and it locates itself quite clearly on her left side, center. I don't try to figure out what it represents or if it is some particular organ, I just notice it.
The next thing that happens is I'm lead to bring in some other color in a very particular way. Bolts of yellow just along the outer edges of the red. They push into the red and release it through her central nervous system to the top of her head where suddenly I sense an indigo that absorbs the red and transforms it into a green or pink or golden rays that emanate from her body. Don't get too caught up on the particulars that I described since it is a fictitious representation of the types of things that have been happening lately.
The best was yesterday. Two new things happened.
First, a new color. I was praying for someone. Archangel Michael was present and guiding me. I let my ego step aside to watch what happened before my mind's eye. There was a rust-red-gold-brown color that I have never seen before. It is a color that does not exist for us. Don't worry too-much if it sounds other-worldly. The simple science of color is that the spectrum we see is quite circumscribed relative to what exists along the electromagnetic spectrum. My mind's eye perceived this new color washing away energy at this person's feet. Of course, I speculate on what's happening, but there is no way to truly know. It is fabulous just to witness it in the way I do.
Second, a new healing. I've been confronted for a couple days now. God has been forcing me to clean out a few lingering old habits that I was taking my time giving up. Evidently I didn't hear the timer pop. Play time is over. I heard that my healing talents were needed and my pussyfooting around and playing with them as if they are a cute little hobby needs to end. With that, to emphasize the importance, I suddenly saw an image of a man I truthfully did not recognize. I'd like to say it is someone I don't know. What's more accurate is that I did not recognize this person in the state in which their vibrational shadow appeared to me.
It was filled with and blotches of black. I let the colors do their thing and acted as facilitator. Yellow lightning bolts struck at the outer aura loosening up the black blotches. Green and yellow attached to the red to transmute it. Soon, I began to see cracks in the overall aura such that a new glow of yellow tinged with a radiant glow of an unrecognized pink-purple began to glow like a sun. Intuitively I knew an illness was getting cleared out and most likely a mental illness. I understood, again intuitively, that this is a three year process.
In his real life, this healing process may look like fortuitous meetings with a person who refers him to a better doctor than the one he's been seeing. It might be as mundane as urges to exercise suddenly followed in the second year and later discovering a supplement that his brain function for the best, ushering a new period of optimized health.
I have no idea how it works.
I'm just delighted to play around in what some might call my active imagination. I call it the energetic field.
Saturday, June 4, 2011
Colorful Healings
A short blog to report that since the Angel Reiki attunements, my healing sessions are almost entirely with the use of color.
My intercessory prayers consist primarily of seeing some part of the body in a particular color and recognizing that the color is in need of adjustment. Intuitively, the correct colors make themselves known. It is as if my presence is merely to facilitate their work.
More later...
My intercessory prayers consist primarily of seeing some part of the body in a particular color and recognizing that the color is in need of adjustment. Intuitively, the correct colors make themselves known. It is as if my presence is merely to facilitate their work.
More later...
Monday, May 23, 2011
Timing is the Message
Saturday the world was due to end. I spent the day at a workshop. At the event I learned that they’ll be offering a new workshop entitled: “Direct Access: Creating the Life You Really Want”. I signed up immediately.
The next day I attended a Reiki workshop. Year's ago this same instructor gave me access to a Reiki infused with the energy of the Archangels. Over time and due to other endeavors, the access to the Angelic Wisdom and guidance dissipated. It took a couple years, but the timing was finally right for myself and the instructor and the course was offered yesterday. The energy experienced during the attunement was amazing. Already I’ve begun to see areas for self-healing that were previously hidden from me: For one, my impatience. And, not entirely surprising, my desire not to alienate others or appear too different. This latter helped me appreciate why my intentions to share Reiki are met with an inner resistance to actually put action behind ideas, to lead more classes and heal more individuals. For a single day, it feels like quite a lot of revelation. My practice of Reiki is reinvigorated!
Which brings me to today: My books arrived. Two books assigned as part of the week long study of the Slave Trade in Barbados I'll embark on this July.
The timing is the message!
Saturday, register for Direct Access. Sunday, study Angel Reiki. Monday, readings on the Slave Trade. The universe conspires, again, to use timing to send a message. This year will provide an opportunity for intense healing of self and others. Connections will be made. Ideas will gel. Perhaps books finally written.
What matters to me is reconnection to Spirit, the experience of the Divine. This weekend portends a year of intense growth and development.
Earth is still here and my body still on it, but perhaps the predictions were right. My soul has swept up into a rapturous journey.
The next day I attended a Reiki workshop. Year's ago this same instructor gave me access to a Reiki infused with the energy of the Archangels. Over time and due to other endeavors, the access to the Angelic Wisdom and guidance dissipated. It took a couple years, but the timing was finally right for myself and the instructor and the course was offered yesterday. The energy experienced during the attunement was amazing. Already I’ve begun to see areas for self-healing that were previously hidden from me: For one, my impatience. And, not entirely surprising, my desire not to alienate others or appear too different. This latter helped me appreciate why my intentions to share Reiki are met with an inner resistance to actually put action behind ideas, to lead more classes and heal more individuals. For a single day, it feels like quite a lot of revelation. My practice of Reiki is reinvigorated!
Which brings me to today: My books arrived. Two books assigned as part of the week long study of the Slave Trade in Barbados I'll embark on this July.
The timing is the message!
Saturday, register for Direct Access. Sunday, study Angel Reiki. Monday, readings on the Slave Trade. The universe conspires, again, to use timing to send a message. This year will provide an opportunity for intense healing of self and others. Connections will be made. Ideas will gel. Perhaps books finally written.
What matters to me is reconnection to Spirit, the experience of the Divine. This weekend portends a year of intense growth and development.
Earth is still here and my body still on it, but perhaps the predictions were right. My soul has swept up into a rapturous journey.
Saturday, April 2, 2011
Reiki and Writing
What may look like smog to outsiders in the Los Angeles basin, is really a haze of screenplay dreams that we all breathe in and incorporate into our cells. If you are within an hours drive of the Hollywood Sign you can't escape the occasional flash of certainty that a blockbuster screenplay is inside you waiting to be set free.
Yesterday marked the beginning of Script Frenzy, an international challenge to write a screenplay. The competition is entirely with oneself as all who finish win. Last November I took on a related challenge sponsored by the same organization and completed a novel in a month. I'd been suffering from writer's block for two years and hoped the freedom to write with abandon without the usual urgings to edit and make perfect would help. It did. I completed my 50,000+ novel with hours to spare.
Tonight I started my first draft of a screenplay. I downloaded free software.
All the tools it takes to get the lead out and make our dreams come true. Daily prayer and Daily Reiki are making a tremendous difference in my ability to write. Three years ago I began writing scenes for a book on a young African-American spiritualist descended from nine generations of spiritualists and healers.
Tonight I began the screenplay. The hope is that a friend's advice will prove true. Writing out a screenplay version will provide a great skeleton upon which to put a novel's flesh.
Post-blog note: I was looking up old blogs about the Luzca novel. The funny thing is I began writing at the exact same time three years ago.
Yesterday marked the beginning of Script Frenzy, an international challenge to write a screenplay. The competition is entirely with oneself as all who finish win. Last November I took on a related challenge sponsored by the same organization and completed a novel in a month. I'd been suffering from writer's block for two years and hoped the freedom to write with abandon without the usual urgings to edit and make perfect would help. It did. I completed my 50,000+ novel with hours to spare.
Tonight I started my first draft of a screenplay. I downloaded free software.
All the tools it takes to get the lead out and make our dreams come true. Daily prayer and Daily Reiki are making a tremendous difference in my ability to write. Three years ago I began writing scenes for a book on a young African-American spiritualist descended from nine generations of spiritualists and healers.
Tonight I began the screenplay. The hope is that a friend's advice will prove true. Writing out a screenplay version will provide a great skeleton upon which to put a novel's flesh.
Post-blog note: I was looking up old blogs about the Luzca novel. The funny thing is I began writing at the exact same time three years ago.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
More Compulsive Addictive Writing
I signed up for the NaNoWriMo Script Frenzy. Writing 100 pages for a screenplay. I'm always in awe of circumstance, coincidence...fate.
A night of jazz, a friend brings a friend. He's a screenwriter. I'm a new novelist. He says scriptwriting software might be just the thing to get my next writing project organized.
I'm ready! I've signed up to turn the novel I've blogged about tons of times into a screenplay to get the thing better organized. Working backwards. Screenplay first, details and literature later. I've signed up to write a screenplay in April.
It's ridiculous, silly, maybe straight on stupid! I simultaneously will work, live, play, build up a website and business and take another Landmark seminar. And hopefully see my honey now and again.
Whoohoooo! Anyone else in for a screen play? Check out Script Frenzy!
A night of jazz, a friend brings a friend. He's a screenwriter. I'm a new novelist. He says scriptwriting software might be just the thing to get my next writing project organized.
I'm ready! I've signed up to turn the novel I've blogged about tons of times into a screenplay to get the thing better organized. Working backwards. Screenplay first, details and literature later. I've signed up to write a screenplay in April.
It's ridiculous, silly, maybe straight on stupid! I simultaneously will work, live, play, build up a website and business and take another Landmark seminar. And hopefully see my honey now and again.
Whoohoooo! Anyone else in for a screen play? Check out Script Frenzy!
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Don’t fight the Universe
At the beginning of the school year I found out I'd be teaching mostly government and a couple economics classes. Usually it's the reverse. I LOVE teaching economics. Don't get me wrong, I love teaching period, so teaching Government works, too. Given I have a law degree, I suppose it actually makes more sense.
But when I read the newspaper, it's the Business section I go to first. My favorite magazines? Kiplinger's, Wired and The Economist. I don't have time for subscriptions, but they're my go-to fav's when I'm in the airport or planning a relaxing day of pleasure reading.
I contacted the school's counselor, the scheduler, and asked to switch it back around. Why are they giving the new teacher my favorite classes??? Last year 3 Econ, 1 Law and 1 Gov. This year 3 Gov, 1 Law and 1 Econ. Though I initially considered fighting it, I just went with it.
Realizing that my Government instruction wasn't as beefy as my Econ, I signed up for professional development opportunities. My district was offering a series of lectures and materials on Constitutional Communities. I signed up. Then I saw something for a workshop series I'd considered year-after-year. This time I participated. The experience broadened my teaching.
So when an opportunity to apply for several grants for social studies to travel and study abroad showed up, I was in the spirit of it all and applied. Making a long story only slightly shorter…Because I was reassigned more government classes, I took on new professional development which made me a better candidate for the study abroad programs.
In July I'll spend a week studying the slave trade in Barbados.
Don't fight the universe. Just let it bless you.
Robin Davis Fesseha, JD, NBCT
Reid High School
Monday, March 21, 2011
Reiki III times 3
Getting and giving Reiki attunements starts a twenty-one day transformation anew each time. The more of them you give, over time the less intense the cleansing experience may become, but there's always something new. It's the power of growth, of change and transformation. Can we admit that it is addictive? A wonderful design feature of the human being to help us evolve.
This past Saturday I was hit with a desire to tune up my Reiki healing energy. It started with a morning Reiki self-treatment to relieve a little stress I'd let build up over the rior week. After a few minutes of hand positions, I reached over and picked-up a spectacular green citrine point I purchased last New Year's Eve's Eve and placed it on my heart while I sent myself Reiki to calm and balance my energy.
Out of the blue, I started thinking about my experiences with Angel Reiki. I'd wanted to take this course from the same instructor who'd given me my Reiki Master attunements four years ago. The occasional energetic tune-up via giving or receiving an attunement always deepens the ongoing healing--a power burst. Knowing she gives the Reiki series a couple times a year through the local college I was curious to see when the next might be scheduled. Probably weeks or months away. I went online. She was holding a Reiki Master course the following day.
I signed up and sent off an email letting her know I'd be in her Reiki Master class a third time and that I wanted to take her Angel Reiki course. I didn't just want to take it, I was clear I would take it and we just need to work out the details! That strong an intention.
Yesterday's review of the Reiki Master course was phenomenal. The energy in the room, dynamic! We've got an Angel Reiki course scheduled for May 22nd and June 5th!
But the blessings from the course have already begun. I love the intense twenty-one days that follow. Already, I have experienced an incredible burst of healing for the planet. I sat in a crystal grid with my Shaman stones and a citrine point during nightly prayer/meditation. I was suddenly moved to draw the cho-ku-rei three times on my third-eye with the citrine's point. A new symbol that has come to me several times in the last few weeks then appeared in my mind's eye and I saw it go into the earth, wrap around and through it, and then I felt an intense healing energy surround the planet. New and powerful! And this is just the first day.
Oh, and one other note.
Reiki and religious practice. As noted in my last blog entry, my prayer life has become a daily practice. I was praying, but I wasn't moved to read The Word, The Bible. Tonight, there was a natural shift. Before my prayer time, I was enjoyed several passages of Luke and John. Folks sometimes wonder if Reiki takes away from religious or other spiritual practices. Truthfully, I sometimes ask myself the same. My experience however is always the same. It only deepens the religious context of the spirituality you already practice.
Fabulous!
Daily prayer.
Daily Reiki.
A life that works.
This past Saturday I was hit with a desire to tune up my Reiki healing energy. It started with a morning Reiki self-treatment to relieve a little stress I'd let build up over the rior week. After a few minutes of hand positions, I reached over and picked-up a spectacular green citrine point I purchased last New Year's Eve's Eve and placed it on my heart while I sent myself Reiki to calm and balance my energy.
Out of the blue, I started thinking about my experiences with Angel Reiki. I'd wanted to take this course from the same instructor who'd given me my Reiki Master attunements four years ago. The occasional energetic tune-up via giving or receiving an attunement always deepens the ongoing healing--a power burst. Knowing she gives the Reiki series a couple times a year through the local college I was curious to see when the next might be scheduled. Probably weeks or months away. I went online. She was holding a Reiki Master course the following day.
I signed up and sent off an email letting her know I'd be in her Reiki Master class a third time and that I wanted to take her Angel Reiki course. I didn't just want to take it, I was clear I would take it and we just need to work out the details! That strong an intention.
Yesterday's review of the Reiki Master course was phenomenal. The energy in the room, dynamic! We've got an Angel Reiki course scheduled for May 22nd and June 5th!
But the blessings from the course have already begun. I love the intense twenty-one days that follow. Already, I have experienced an incredible burst of healing for the planet. I sat in a crystal grid with my Shaman stones and a citrine point during nightly prayer/meditation. I was suddenly moved to draw the cho-ku-rei three times on my third-eye with the citrine's point. A new symbol that has come to me several times in the last few weeks then appeared in my mind's eye and I saw it go into the earth, wrap around and through it, and then I felt an intense healing energy surround the planet. New and powerful! And this is just the first day.
Oh, and one other note.
Reiki and religious practice. As noted in my last blog entry, my prayer life has become a daily practice. I was praying, but I wasn't moved to read The Word, The Bible. Tonight, there was a natural shift. Before my prayer time, I was enjoyed several passages of Luke and John. Folks sometimes wonder if Reiki takes away from religious or other spiritual practices. Truthfully, I sometimes ask myself the same. My experience however is always the same. It only deepens the religious context of the spirituality you already practice.
Fabulous!
Daily prayer.
Daily Reiki.
A life that works.
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
An Anniversary
One month ago, I realized that my world needs to work for everyone in it. I'm not first to notice the truth in this. The idea isn't news. Yet, something shifted a month ago.
The recent experiences with a family member passing, two--now three--members of my family hospitalized within a few months time and the general stress that exists for friends, family and neighbors as the world transitions into a new economy overwhelmed me. I'm so grateful it did.
It renewed my commitment to prayer.
The recent experiences with a family member passing, two--now three--members of my family hospitalized within a few months time and the general stress that exists for friends, family and neighbors as the world transitions into a new economy overwhelmed me. I'm so grateful it did.
It renewed my commitment to prayer.
Sunday, February 20, 2011
New View
So different now. It started with my Aunt passing away in October. Then my 87-year-old grandmother was hospitalized, followed by a brief stay in a nursing home to recuperate before being allowed to return home. Then, just a couple weeks back, my mother was hospitalized for a week. Through the reflection of my aging elders, my own "aging" is sharply in focus.
Lately, hearing an old song brings on a different kind of nostalgia. In the past, I'd hear some old rhythm and blues or pop tune from my youth and fondly remember where I was or what I was doing decades back. I might remember being in the park for a huge family gathering with BBQ, volleyball, bikes and lots of running. Other times a first date, a kiss, a party, a walk with friends or just sitting around my room listing to 45s or 33s without a care in the world would come to mind.
Lately, though, when I hear some old beloved tune, I am struck by the fact that an old world is gone. It is as if there has been some permanent break I haven't experienced before. Before the break, I experienced myself as this continuity of an always-getting-older me that was just a few days, weeks or years away from a younger, care-free, can-get-back-my-high-school-figure-if-I-wanted-to me.
Over these last few months the reality of being mid-forty, headed-to-fifty has sunk in like bricks dropped in a sauna. Or maybe like bombs hitting an island or planes hitting skyscrapers. There's the life before and then the new, different life after. You can't go back. You can't pretend that things haven't changed. An entirely different point of view colors everything.
It isn't that nothing good lies ahead. I've enjoyed a great life and don't imagine that I am less incapable of creating fun, joy, success, love and beauty in my coming-quickly fifties as was done in my twenty and thirties. What is clear, though, is that it will not be an older version of the past. The break is realizing, internalizing that I'm not an older twenty or an older version of me at thirty.
It's a different life.
It's a different me.
Different rules.
Different goals.
Different mind.
Different body.
Shortly, I'll be all excited again about the possibilities and options I get to create for this maturer Robin. Some new impassioned life that invigorates. Right now, I'm appreciating this opportunity to mourn. Maybe even enjoying it a little. A little.
A different mood.
I feel like mourning a while.
Lately, hearing an old song brings on a different kind of nostalgia. In the past, I'd hear some old rhythm and blues or pop tune from my youth and fondly remember where I was or what I was doing decades back. I might remember being in the park for a huge family gathering with BBQ, volleyball, bikes and lots of running. Other times a first date, a kiss, a party, a walk with friends or just sitting around my room listing to 45s or 33s without a care in the world would come to mind.
Lately, though, when I hear some old beloved tune, I am struck by the fact that an old world is gone. It is as if there has been some permanent break I haven't experienced before. Before the break, I experienced myself as this continuity of an always-getting-older me that was just a few days, weeks or years away from a younger, care-free, can-get-back-my-high-school-figure-if-I-wanted-to me.
Over these last few months the reality of being mid-forty, headed-to-fifty has sunk in like bricks dropped in a sauna. Or maybe like bombs hitting an island or planes hitting skyscrapers. There's the life before and then the new, different life after. You can't go back. You can't pretend that things haven't changed. An entirely different point of view colors everything.
It isn't that nothing good lies ahead. I've enjoyed a great life and don't imagine that I am less incapable of creating fun, joy, success, love and beauty in my coming-quickly fifties as was done in my twenty and thirties. What is clear, though, is that it will not be an older version of the past. The break is realizing, internalizing that I'm not an older twenty or an older version of me at thirty.
It's a different life.
It's a different me.
Different rules.
Different goals.
Different mind.
Different body.
Shortly, I'll be all excited again about the possibilities and options I get to create for this maturer Robin. Some new impassioned life that invigorates. Right now, I'm appreciating this opportunity to mourn. Maybe even enjoying it a little. A little.
A different mood.
I feel like mourning a while.
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Sunrises
Sunrises seem to take forever when you're waiting for one. In the space of time it took the eastern skyline to go from gray to magenta to a hint of pink, I realized how much I've always hated to start my day without the sun greeting me first.
I just might try something new beginning now! Get the day warmed up for the sun's entrance. Instead of letting the sun make the day worth my time, I'm gonna try out having each of my days worth the sun showing up to witness it! I'll get the day going for it's entrance. Now that would be something different!!
I just might try something new beginning now! Get the day warmed up for the sun's entrance. Instead of letting the sun make the day worth my time, I'm gonna try out having each of my days worth the sun showing up to witness it! I'll get the day going for it's entrance. Now that would be something different!!
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