This Morning 4/7/12 Sage Advice

Mothers and Daughters

What is it about when mothers and daughters visit?  The refusal to remember that we can just be adults together seems to be an ongoing tense dynamic.  It doesn't seem to matter what either says; it is always framed in the context of a controlling mother or a rebellious child!

Well, so it goes with the latest visit - regrettably.  

Perhaps this is just the last stage of the separation process.  Life is a process of letting go between the holding on - the natural reaction to all the losses encountered along the way.  It's not easy to grow up whether you are 21 or 51!

Sometimes the less said, the better.  Sage advice to heed.  Indeed!

This Morning 4/6/12 Moon Poem

The Moon

Last night the Grandmother Moon had on her best smile and blessed us in her fullness and energetic transfers of white moon beams.  When I looked into the sky at her round body, streaks of light and strings of moon-breeze traveled across space dodging asteroids and satellites to touch my face lightly like a sacred feather.  We poured her water and prayers, and while she drank, we drank also.  It was an exchange, a shared experience with a body of massive stone some 250,000 miles above the Earth, yet present completely in my backyard.

This Morning 4/5/12 Astro - logy

Every day in April reminds me of someone's birthday!  My birthday is coming up in less than two weeks, but I have so many friends from my past who were born in April.  We used to have an Aries Women Club back in the day!  We are a rare and wonderful breed - hah!

I'm not into Astrology so much anymore, but see it more as a fun way to reflect on the predictability of human nature.  It is fun, as well, to find commonality with people through Astrology.  It's not a science in the way that biology is.  But if that's the case, it does make me wonder why, then, the name, "Astrology."

According to http://etymonline.com:

astrology 

late 14c., from L. astrologia "astronomy, the science of the heavenly bodies," from Gk. astrologia "telling of the stars," from astron "star" (see astro-) + -logia "treating of" (see -logy). Originally identical with astronomy, it had also a special sense of "practical astronomy, astronomy applied to prediction of events." This was divided intonatural astrology "the calculation and foretelling of natural phenomenon" (tides, eclipses, etc.), and judicial astrology "the art of judging occult influences of stars on human affairs" (also known as astromancy, 1650s). Differentiation between astrology and astronomy began late 1400s and by 17c. this word was limited to "reading influences of the stars and their effects on human destiny."

Well, there you have it!  It was once considered a true science alongside the more predictable star watching or astronomy.  Judging from the time frame - between the 14th and 17th centuries - the Renaissance was a time of awakening to many aspects of life as "magical" and the influence of nature upon human nature was certainly being explored.

More to come on this interesting subject...

This Morning 4/4/12 April Day

What a beautiful day!

These 70-degree Spring days are why it is so worth the usual trudge through Winter.  This Winter was not trudging by any stretch - more like wading - but just to walk outside in the morning in my bare feet, no coat or sweater, into the sweet smells and music of the birds makes me feel great!

So this very brief posting this morning is just to acknowledge in writing that it's time to leave the indoors, get the garden planted, and put oil and gas into the lawn mower.  Or better yet, buy one of those GREEN MOWERS.  Yes, that is what I will do!  I've been meaning to switch from the gas-powered mower to the push/green kind for a few years now.

The other Spring thing I must do is get my bicycle up to par and start riding to my job, which is only 5.5 miles down the road, across the mountain, along the highway and into a small driveway!  Sounds a little daunting, but I will attempt it a few times to determine the safety issues, if any, and then decide how the benefits outweigh the risks.

Have a beautiful April day!

This Morning 4/3/12 Devaluing Money

Devaluing Money

Currency is a medium of exchange.  Throughout the world the value of currency is generally counted in terms of money.  The exchange rates of those different forms of money are calculated based on a number of factors.  For a relatively simple explanation of the determinants that influence exchange rates, go to this website.

I can tell you, though, the Euro is worth 25% more than the US Dollar this morning.  The Swiss Franc is worth 10% more and the British Pound 38% more.  It's interesting to notice these things, although I don't consider it anything I necessarily want to know!  I'm more interested in seeing and using currency from a different perspective.

The medium of exchange - sans money - is operating constantly in our lives, whether we notice it or not.  From a thank-you gift from a company to coupons; from trading jewelry with a friend to formal bartering of services.  I have ongoing exchange of services for my piano tuning, my car repair, my handyman-type household needs, and website maintenance.

I believe in the cause of devaluing US Dollar money as a primary exchange currency because of the disparity between the classes.  If more people could exchange services for food, housing, health care, and educational opportunities, I suspect the  economic racism that exists in this country would be replaced by the necessary acknowledgment of basic human rights and responsibilities around the table.  Efforts in small communities around the country have been in existence for decades to further this cause. Local economic strength is an important motivator for citizens within a community to exchange inside their own communities.  This kind of alternative currency offers money discounts and exchange rates that keep the local economy vital.

Examples of this model include:
Ithaca Hours (NY)
BerkShares (NY)
NC Plenty (NC)
Milk Money (CA)
River Currency (WI)

This idea is universal.  In bailed-out Greece, the New York Times reported in October 2011 on

"a growing network here in Volos that uses a so-called Local Alternative Unit, or TEM in Greek, to exchange goods and services — language classes, baby-sitting, computer support, home-cooked meals — and to receive discounts at some local businesses.  Part alternative currency, part barter system, part open-air market, the Volos network has grown exponentially in the past year from 50 to 400 members.  It is one of several such groups cropping up around the country, as Greeks squeezed by large wage cuts, tax increases and growing fears about whether they will continue to use the euro have looked for creative ways to cope with a radically changing economic landscape."

As one who has finally begun a steady job where the wage earned has comforted my growing uncomfortableness with the economic issues in this country, I understand the need for even more alternative ways of allowing people to survive and thrive respectably without money as the primary currency.  

This Morning 4/2/12 Sisters

Sisters

In the nearly five decades I've known my sister, she still surprises me. I know her well, but our adulthood has given us reasons to grow apart at times and we've changed and molded into who we are without either of us necessarily noticing.

In Paul Simon's song, "The Boxer," there is a great verse:

Now the years are rolling by me; they are rocking easily
I am older than I once was; younger than I be
But that's not unusual
Lord, ain't it strange; after changes upon changes
We are more or less the same
After changes, we are more or less the same

I've always loved this verse and felt the truth of it.  But today, I am not so sure.  I spent yesterday with my sister and after the closing paragraphs, spent quietly talking in her car at our appointed rendezvous spot in a parking lot, I found her anew.  Some ten miles from where we were raised, suffered abuse together, slept in the same bed for seven years, laughed and cried together, saved each other innumerable times, and got out from under the suffocating pain, I believe we have changed.

We are stronger, we are resilient, we are fiercely independent, we are possessive of our own truths, we are lionesses of our own prides, we are looking for the good in life, we are setting a strong example for our daughters and sons, we know our worth, and most importantly, we are very consciously choosing how to define our lives.

These changes and refinements of our personalities have come at great internal cost and reward.  Being sisters has made one thing very certain though - we will always know how to find each other again and again; and always, safety is ours, no matter how we change.

This Morning 4/1/12

When Dawgs Bite

Attending a musical event can be a time to enjoy, to unwind, to reminisce, to learn and to forget our troubles.  Music has the rare ability to dig deep into our emotions, evoke memories and feelings, and to inspire new ones.  It can make us cry and laugh simultaneously for both the bitter and the sweet.  It is a healing salve, a calming force, a tornado and a river full of tears.

When I walked into the concert setting last night to hear a band of Dawgs play their new-grass/bluegrass/jazzy hearts out, I didn't expect to have mine nipped and chawed on.

I tend to be exuberant to a fault.  One might call me an "enthusiast."  I go with the prevailing, most "up" feeling and ride it like a wave, in all its powerful strength and grandeur.  I'm demonstrative and easily generous with verbal and nonverbal feedback.  All these ways of relating can embed me into the center of attention sometimes, which is wonderful if there is a loving, safe reception.  But, on the contrary, it also positions me to be an easy target for those less able to digest this aspect of who I am.

I go to great lengths to protect my spirit from disruption.  I don't drink alcohol or smoke dope or hand out my phone number to anyone I don't know.   There are specific things I do mentally and spiritually to keep myself intact before I enter a crowded room.   However, last night I forgot to preserve my space and became a target of more than one person's raised eyebrows and sideways glares.

What can I say?  It was my former husband onstage playing at the place we had met 20 years ago.  I was excited, and dealing with my own less "up" uncertainties with my enthusiasm. Hence, I was shown later through a dream the truth of these encounters and how Then-me is not Now-me.  And why it shouldn't be.

I'd like to blame it on the music.  In fact, I do.  Music takes us back to wherever we were emotionally when those songs were most important in our lives.

Although drama doesn't move me anymore, I do, occasionally, encounter it.  Last night, I had a little bite from the drama Dawg.  Fortunately, it takes so much less time - minutes, in fact - to shake it off and see my way clear.

That is the blessing of not listening to the same music over and over, throughout decades.  I think I will start giving away my old record collection.