Hello all, 

Four more long sleeps and we step across the threshold into March.    

I’m curious if Mother Nature will wake up and encourage the lambs to graze their way across the pastures during March 1.   Or if Mother Nature will believe the lions have a voice to be heard, encouraging their strength, resilience, and courage to roar through the winds in the treetops. 

The thing so magical is that if we listen, deeply listen, we will see, hear, and feel the gentleness and the boldness simultaneously.    We will witness the most delicate, fragile elements of Mother Nature resting on the footpaths cut into the frozen tundra by hooves moving to stay warm, moving to be stronger than the winter that has long buried green grasses and is hibernating new buds for several more weeks.   

I marvel that the leaf held on to the tree limb long after other trees decided it time to let go of what had been.   And then I find the leaf courageous in choosing before the fullness of sunshine, rain, and warming temperatures, that it was time to let go and prepare to make room for the new.     

I pause and notice the harmony.    The gentle leaf and the frozen tundra fitting together beautifully.    

Happy March!  May you feel Spring within reach!

Namaste’

The Creases Now Speak

Mary

In Mary’s nausea-induced stupor, she thought she was dreaming about her mom.

“Mary needs your support” the female voice exclaimed.

“I don’t know what else to do” was the king’s reply.

Mary was a junior in high school applying to the business management program at the University. She had the grade point and the financial means. What Mary didn’t have, though, was experience in a business environment, or at least someone influential who could write a recommendation letter, along with a donation to the school.    

The admissions advisor had taken to Mary. Instead of rejecting her application, the advisor told Mary that if she could get a summer office job, she would be accepted into the program.

Mary had been trying to find employment for several weeks. She was discouraged, frustrated, and eager to lash out at her mom when her mom asked if she could do anything to help, even if it was simply to make Mary’s favorite comfort food meal. “A stupid meal isn’t going to help me get into the program, mom!  You don’t understand!”    As Mary started to head to her bedroom, she turned to her mom. Turning her tears into ice daggers, Mary coldly said to her mom “I may not get into the program of my dreams, but I WILL NEVER be a maid like you!   I WILL do something worthwhile with my life!” 

A few hours later, after another family dinner at which her mom had fussed and tsked, Mary started down the stairs to grab a book she’d forgotten.  That is when she heard her mom say, “Mary needs your support.”     

Mary’s mom was asking her dad to help Mary get a job. As Mary listened to their conversation, she heard her dad say “it’s a tough world in business.  You must have thick skin.”     

“You don’t think your daughter has any?  I would hate to see her in a meeting with your boss!”  Said Mary’s mom.

Mary’s dad chuckled and then his tone became serious again. “The business world will shorten Mary’s quality of life.”

“She wants this, James. Not realizing her dreams will shorten her quality of life even more.”

Mary wondered if her mom wasn’t only talking about Mary’s dreams.   

“You need to help your daughter make this happen James. Set aside your personal feelings and get our daughter a summer job.”

Two weeks later Mary was preparing for her first day as a data entry intern at a small firm.

Four months after her mom told her dad what we would do, Mary received her acceptance letter into the business program.

Twenty-eight years later Mary would repeatedly hear “your mom was so proud of you” as they filed in line past her and Henry, to Patricia and Edward, and then to her dad who stood in one of his distinguishing suits looking more broken than the kings who just signed over their kingdoms.

Mary felt the words about her mom being proud were spoken with as much sincerity as the parrot- repeating words “sorry for your loss.”       “You didn’t give her a brain aneurism so why are you apologizing?” was what Mary really wanted to say. Instead, Mary smiled, expressed appreciation for their kind words, and vowed to herself never to say “I’m sorry for your loss” to anyone else again.

Fast forward, As Mary lay on her side in a fetal position under the comforter, willing her body to overcome the need to grab the small pail now a permanent fixture in their master bedroom, she realized she wasn’t dreaming.   It wasn’t her mom saying Mary needed someone.   She also knew it wasn’t her dad.

Her dad never cried    At least never in front of her and Patricia     Not even when their mom died    Not even when they each tossed a clump of dirt onto her casket     Not even when they helped their dad stand after everyone else left the graveside, slowly walking him to the car holding elbows of a now hollow man who never did fill back up with life after that.   

The male voice she now heard saying “I don’t know what else to do” was crying. Her Henry. Patricia was telling him Mary needed his support    She couldn’t hear everything, only snippets.  “Not. Her mad. Never. Tears. Not even. More than I have. Afraid. Dying.”

When Mary heard footsteps outside the door, she longed to roll over and put her back to the doorway, but moving her body meant the person on the other side of the door would get to hear Mary’s wrenching as she vomited. Laying still kept the nausea at bay.     

Mary felt the shadow standing at the doorway. She could sense the shadow step closer, and knew it wasn’t Patricia by the way it didn’t start fussing to empty the pail or refill the water bottle.    

Henry had moved into the guest bedroom when Mary began responding to the chemo. Vomiting, headaches, sensitivity to light, fatigue, hair loss, nail loss, constipation when she wasn’t experiencing diarrhea, numbness in her hands and feet, mouth ulcers, and Mary’s favorite – brain fog.   It was enough that the rest of her body was experiencing a hostile takeover. The one thing she could always count on was her sharp and quick mind; now she couldn’t even count on remembering yesterday.

She waited for Henry to speak. Just when she thought he had left the room, she felt the bed move behind her. Suddenly she felt an arm reach over her hip and felt his body very gently move towards her back    She could barely hear him as he asked if he was hurting her if she was ok.

“Hold me” Mary managed to speak. “Tighter.”

When she felt Henry spooning her body, she asked him not to let go. Henry squeezed her close, promising her he never would.

As Mary drifted off to sleep, she dreamt of her mom. Her mom was reaching out and pulling Mary into her lap.