| Sep 14 2011 |
09/14/11
Good afternoon, my dear friends, and patient readers,
I first want to tell you how very grateful I am for your kindness, and continued support, for in your 'hugs'; your'PM's'; your readership, and especially for your continued readership, as it both validates me, and grants unto me a purpose and a forum I would not otherwise have had. My sincere thoughts go out to you, and unwaivering thanks; may God truly bless you, and keep you and your's always safe, hidden under his wing, and in His care, with blessings for you for 'pain-free' days, and relief from depression, despair, and loneliness, as well as for harmony within your homes, happiness, and greater health.
You must please excuse me, my friends, as today, I am in such a complete agony, that I couldn't even seem to get out of bed, and, even though its summer, here in Florida, I have chills, headache, depression, and cannot seem to gather the strength necessary to eat, or move, or even think clearly; however, I know that I am not alone in this, as too many of you, my gentle readers, suffer daily from your own hells, not of your intention, nor of your desires. And are often so fully engulfed by it, that, nothing else seems to exist, or to matter. And all of this I know of only too well. What choice have we but to continue ? We have children, grandchildren, spouses, partners, friends, neighbors, pets who lovingly, yet forcibly demmand our attention; for even as they may try with all their hearts to understand us, yet they cannot fully understand us because we have the 'pain' that has no face; for it is a global pain that devours from within; often, I can literally feel some little part of me--inside--being ripped apart, and gnawed at by my new friends: Lupus/Fibromyalgia/Chronic pain, and Chronic fatigue, as well as my other illnesses.
But, it is to you, my dearest friends, and most loyal readers that I should resist this THING, and 'carry-on', until night, and the last dancer and musician have gone. And pause to gaze Heavenward to an empurpled sky full of tiny, welcoming stars, and feel --ever--the slightest of cool breezes that waft across my face, drying my tears. For many others, it is to stand silent beneath a large, glowing, lambent moon, to listen to the distant howl of the wolf, and, in it, there to seek some commonality with a more gentle Nature. For still others, it is to walk haltingly on some moon-lit beach of an endless sea, hearing the corruscade of laping, and crashing waves. To feel the soft sand under your feet, pausing ever to find in that crashing sea a gentle comfort.
For, in truth, the path we walk is a solitary one, a lonely one, marked only by our own footprints, seeing where so many had trod before us, with only the sound of our breath, and the feeling of our beating hearts for companionship.
For as I KNOW and do not know of my pain, surely I KNOW and do not know your's.
'Refrigerator Art'
To those of you who still have small children, and to the rest of us, who have--perhaps--only fond memory, all are familiar with this phenonenom, that of seeing posted upon the refrigerator--as if it were a gallery of love--along with the pictures and the magnets, are posted the accumulated, juvenile art works of our children.
No matter if these 'efforts' fall far afield of prediting future pre-Picassos, or, pre-mattisses, it really doesn't matter at all, for these 'offerings' are lovingly brought home as treasures, and, should be accepted as the treasures they indeed are.
Who cares if the people there rendered are larger than the houses there drawn, or, whether mom and dad are represented by stick figures, and the only difference between the two is that 'mom', inevitably has long sqiggles of 'hair, or that the family dog has all four legs on one side, or that the house is crumpled at the ends....it is, nevertheless a welcoming sight to see all stick figures smiling, and, tendrils of smoke rise from a chimeny ( whether the house has a fireplace, or not ! ).
There may--above--be scribbled clouds, but the sun is almost always represented by a giant, yellow circle, with rays extending from it every where.
Flowers and trees are but haltingly drawn, but are always green, with red and blue flowers as mere globs upon the scene.
Watercolors, and finger paintings are even more difficult to find, and to define; often it requires the parent to ask what everything is, and nod, approvingly, with that child's definition.
I remember--as a young child--of running home with my now crumpled and wrinkled drawings to present--as tough they were gold--to my mother and father, who grabbed me, hugged me, and kissed me, and as there seemed to be no other place to put them, they occupied places of honor on the refrigerator; there, anytime anyone was in the kitchen, which was--after all--the hub of the house, there the 'pictures' were, shown as some, grand, gallery paintings, worthy of the finest museum on earth.
What my folks did, was, among the myriad ways of love and attention, was, in putting my dreadful pictures on their refrigerator, was to make me feel happy, safe, and secure...and....loved.
And when, in time, the front of the refrigerator was full, previous pictures were carefully taken down, admired--perhaps--for the last time, and then replaced with others. For all I know, they were thrown away, although, I must confess, that in much later years, after my mom and dad had died, and I was looking through their dressers, I found old report cards, folders, and...drawings, that spanned more than half century, having been given to my folks when I was perhaps five or six. I hadn't known that they would actually keep some...why, I will never know.
Only, maybe, that these former refrigerator drawnings, drawn in love, had been kept by a love that had transcended the years, the changes, the moves, their health and situation, and...their eventual mortality.
Funny, that a long ago five year old's scribbling would outlast those whon I loved most in the world; there was no little irony in that notion, and I stared at those pictures in baffled amazement. So much time had passed that I hardly--now--could recognize any sense of myself in them...yet, faintly, I did; for there was my name ( naturally misspelled) on the border.
To yet see them brought back scores of memories, not just of them, or my mother and father, but to the cobwebbed recesses that was my childhood, and it made me brush back tears of gratitude, and of a specific time and space, when that five year old's world was much simpler, less scary, more protected, and so generally benign a reality, which is in stark contrast to a reality I know only as an adult does, in an uncertain adult world.
For while there may no longer be monsters under the bed, there are an abundance of them just beyond my front door; and these are monsters--no less horrific--that cannot be disspelled by a nightlight, a kiss, or of a bedroom door left ajar, with its welcoming light, and the sound of my mother's and father's voices that lulled me back to sleep.
These days, especially when I am in an animal's pain so complete and ravening, that it fairly takes my very breath away by its intensity and unendingness, I long for that far away and ago time, for, as a child, I was blessfully blinded to a future that lay ahead, hidden, and coiled-about, like some odious thing.
My dear and faithful friends and readers, should you still have children who have not as yet lost their innoccence, and who still bring home to you even the most inexplicable and dreadful art, I urge you to give it a place of honor that it so richly deserves...upon the front of your refrigerator; gather up your child, hug them, and kiss them, and ooh and ah over their submissions. For too soon, they will be as strangers to you, made strange by a new reality, a new society, by factors quite beyond your control.
In now these bleak and bleaker times, love is too often just tossed aside.
Please allow me to wish all of you wonderfully, 'pain-free' days, evenings of quiet contentment, and dreamy nights of restorative sleep, far, far and away from any monster, safe, and kept safe by love. 'Zahc/Charles'
Good afternoon, my dear friends, and patient readers,
I first want to tell you how very grateful I am for your kindness, and continued support, for in your 'hugs'; your'PM's'; your readership, and especially for your continued readership, as it both validates me, and grants unto me a purpose and a forum I would not otherwise have had. My sincere thoughts go out to you, and unwaivering thanks; may God truly bless you, and keep you and your's always safe, hidden under his wing, and in His care, with blessings for you for 'pain-free' days, and relief from depression, despair, and loneliness, as well as for harmony within your homes, happiness, and greater health.
You must please excuse me, my friends, as today, I am in such a complete agony, that I couldn't even seem to get out of bed, and, even though its summer, here in Florida, I have chills, headache, depression, and cannot seem to gather the strength necessary to eat, or move, or even think clearly; however, I know that I am not alone in this, as too many of you, my gentle readers, suffer daily from your own hells, not of your intention, nor of your desires. And are often so fully engulfed by it, that, nothing else seems to exist, or to matter. And all of this I know of only too well. What choice have we but to continue ? We have children, grandchildren, spouses, partners, friends, neighbors, pets who lovingly, yet forcibly demmand our attention; for even as they may try with all their hearts to understand us, yet they cannot fully understand us because we have the 'pain' that has no face; for it is a global pain that devours from within; often, I can literally feel some little part of me--inside--being ripped apart, and gnawed at by my new friends: Lupus/Fibromyalgia/Chronic pain, and Chronic fatigue, as well as my other illnesses.
But, it is to you, my dearest friends, and most loyal readers that I should resist this THING, and 'carry-on', until night, and the last dancer and musician have gone. And pause to gaze Heavenward to an empurpled sky full of tiny, welcoming stars, and feel --ever--the slightest of cool breezes that waft across my face, drying my tears. For many others, it is to stand silent beneath a large, glowing, lambent moon, to listen to the distant howl of the wolf, and, in it, there to seek some commonality with a more gentle Nature. For still others, it is to walk haltingly on some moon-lit beach of an endless sea, hearing the corruscade of laping, and crashing waves. To feel the soft sand under your feet, pausing ever to find in that crashing sea a gentle comfort.
For, in truth, the path we walk is a solitary one, a lonely one, marked only by our own footprints, seeing where so many had trod before us, with only the sound of our breath, and the feeling of our beating hearts for companionship.
For as I KNOW and do not know of my pain, surely I KNOW and do not know your's.
'Refrigerator Art'
To those of you who still have small children, and to the rest of us, who have--perhaps--only fond memory, all are familiar with this phenonenom, that of seeing posted upon the refrigerator--as if it were a gallery of love--along with the pictures and the magnets, are posted the accumulated, juvenile art works of our children.
No matter if these 'efforts' fall far afield of prediting future pre-Picassos, or, pre-mattisses, it really doesn't matter at all, for these 'offerings' are lovingly brought home as treasures, and, should be accepted as the treasures they indeed are.
Who cares if the people there rendered are larger than the houses there drawn, or, whether mom and dad are represented by stick figures, and the only difference between the two is that 'mom', inevitably has long sqiggles of 'hair, or that the family dog has all four legs on one side, or that the house is crumpled at the ends....it is, nevertheless a welcoming sight to see all stick figures smiling, and, tendrils of smoke rise from a chimeny ( whether the house has a fireplace, or not ! ).
There may--above--be scribbled clouds, but the sun is almost always represented by a giant, yellow circle, with rays extending from it every where.
Flowers and trees are but haltingly drawn, but are always green, with red and blue flowers as mere globs upon the scene.
Watercolors, and finger paintings are even more difficult to find, and to define; often it requires the parent to ask what everything is, and nod, approvingly, with that child's definition.
I remember--as a young child--of running home with my now crumpled and wrinkled drawings to present--as tough they were gold--to my mother and father, who grabbed me, hugged me, and kissed me, and as there seemed to be no other place to put them, they occupied places of honor on the refrigerator; there, anytime anyone was in the kitchen, which was--after all--the hub of the house, there the 'pictures' were, shown as some, grand, gallery paintings, worthy of the finest museum on earth.
What my folks did, was, among the myriad ways of love and attention, was, in putting my dreadful pictures on their refrigerator, was to make me feel happy, safe, and secure...and....loved.
And when, in time, the front of the refrigerator was full, previous pictures were carefully taken down, admired--perhaps--for the last time, and then replaced with others. For all I know, they were thrown away, although, I must confess, that in much later years, after my mom and dad had died, and I was looking through their dressers, I found old report cards, folders, and...drawings, that spanned more than half century, having been given to my folks when I was perhaps five or six. I hadn't known that they would actually keep some...why, I will never know.
Only, maybe, that these former refrigerator drawnings, drawn in love, had been kept by a love that had transcended the years, the changes, the moves, their health and situation, and...their eventual mortality.
Funny, that a long ago five year old's scribbling would outlast those whon I loved most in the world; there was no little irony in that notion, and I stared at those pictures in baffled amazement. So much time had passed that I hardly--now--could recognize any sense of myself in them...yet, faintly, I did; for there was my name ( naturally misspelled) on the border.
To yet see them brought back scores of memories, not just of them, or my mother and father, but to the cobwebbed recesses that was my childhood, and it made me brush back tears of gratitude, and of a specific time and space, when that five year old's world was much simpler, less scary, more protected, and so generally benign a reality, which is in stark contrast to a reality I know only as an adult does, in an uncertain adult world.
For while there may no longer be monsters under the bed, there are an abundance of them just beyond my front door; and these are monsters--no less horrific--that cannot be disspelled by a nightlight, a kiss, or of a bedroom door left ajar, with its welcoming light, and the sound of my mother's and father's voices that lulled me back to sleep.
These days, especially when I am in an animal's pain so complete and ravening, that it fairly takes my very breath away by its intensity and unendingness, I long for that far away and ago time, for, as a child, I was blessfully blinded to a future that lay ahead, hidden, and coiled-about, like some odious thing.
My dear and faithful friends and readers, should you still have children who have not as yet lost their innoccence, and who still bring home to you even the most inexplicable and dreadful art, I urge you to give it a place of honor that it so richly deserves...upon the front of your refrigerator; gather up your child, hug them, and kiss them, and ooh and ah over their submissions. For too soon, they will be as strangers to you, made strange by a new reality, a new society, by factors quite beyond your control.
In now these bleak and bleaker times, love is too often just tossed aside.
Please allow me to wish all of you wonderfully, 'pain-free' days, evenings of quiet contentment, and dreamy nights of restorative sleep, far, far and away from any monster, safe, and kept safe by love. 'Zahc/Charles'
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