Shine

I like to toy with the thought

Of having you to me

Of spending thoughts and minutes

Of taking journeys

To the Music of the Sun….not necessarily the Blues

But perhaps interwoven chords of brilliance that don’t have a name or a genre

And a song so pure we can’t hear the sounds

But we for sure can hum that tune since the rhythm was born within

Times, spaces, our very cells

 

I like to toy with the thought

Of sitting in the shine of the moon…with you

And sensing the illuminations you would speak

Laced with words, but expressed with motion

Revealing to me the shadows, the illusions, and kindness of nights

And how we must see the primal vibrations without looking

But instead with sense and abandon…..

Sounds and temperature

Movements and overture

Catch and release

 

I like to toy with the thought

That my words… to you

Are experienced like celestial bodies above

Some of the sentiments new,  and some as old as time itself

Mysterious in meaning

Perhaps even obscure at times

And sometime much too far from refined

But maybe as you look and count

And lose count

And find perspective

You will find the glory in the stardust

Shared

Walking on coals…..

There can be no rebirth without pain,

and one must burn to begin anew

the cinders will glow

in a slow burn

to feed the fire

cauterize the wounds…

circumstance can have no victory

when destinies are intertwined

and even as the embers cool

there you will find me

sifting amongst the ashes

where i will find no sign of the you

and nothing of the me

only a transcendence that is we

Like a Rock….

Nobody I know can cling to a stone tighter than I can. No one I know can hold their breath underwater for a longer period of time. I am an exceptional athlete when it comes to these things. I avoid all instincts and silence the voices of doubt. I accept pain and punishment. I can carry a load of burden that would defy all expectation. My passion is strong. The winner will take it all. Only in the end I realize the game that was played was me and to the victor the spoils.

I have grabbed on to many stones in my life. I have tried all kinds, perfecting my skill.

I was young and inexperienced when I grabbed on to the first one. It was particularly heavy with its own weight. I did not choose this stone. It chose me. Seeing the lightness of my step, the slightly tarnished soul, and the naivete to believe that all was possible. Disney tales don’t lie do they? I grabbed that stone and held tight as if all my love could save it from the current. But the current was strong. The current was magnetic. I did not see the bottom but I lost my stone to a journey I could not follow.

For awhile, I was contented to look at all the other rocks in my path. Some had rough edges. Some were bright and I could see the sun in their gleam. Some looked sturdy and steadfast. That rock by the river shall not be moved. By itself. but you have to be careful and you have to watch out. Because some of those stones have planted themselves in the sand, slippery rotted leaves, and their foundations eroded by the river. You can sun yourself on these rocks, feeling warm and contented…..but one day they can give way. And you best not be caught up in your contentment because due to their own girth you are in for a deep and fast plunge that is suprising even for a rock. As try to grab hold somes you find yourself on the wrong side. Grasping at the underbelly of the rock that was buried in the muck, cleverly concealed for God knows how long. It was certainly there before you arrived. It breaks off in your hand. Pieces pelting your face. And you get mad. And you get angry at the rock….though it was you who was to blame for not checking everything out before you picked it. But you let it go because you cannot breathe and you are getting to the bottom of the river again.

As you make your way back to the bank, you realize you are cold and slimy for all your efforts. The decision to try a different shore is made. You find a even bigger more sturdy looking rock. This one is not going anywhere. There are so many nooks and crannies to explore. It will keep you busy for years. So busy you are looking at the structure of the rock, that you neglect to notice the sea of discontent storming all around it. Though you have the power to weather the storms, the rock believes the siren songs of another possibility…and you are swept out to sea like a tangled clump of seaweed. Sometimes when you sit on the shore you hear noises come from the rock, but you now know what sirens can do. Best to avoid calls like these.

Sometimes when you are sitting on the shore, trying to make sense out of your tangles of your life you notice a pretty stone. And if it is not the brightest shiniest thing you ever saw. You want to touch it. You want to put it in your pocket. But you know better. So you avoid it. But the more you avoid it, the harder it works to blind your eyes to the fact that you cannot have it forever despite the promises and the possibilities. You think to yourself what it put it on a chain and tie it around my neck. I have played with rocks before I know what I am doing. If I swim my strongest swim, if I adjust to the rock’s weight, if I give it my all then that will prove that I am deserving of it. But sometimes the stone is just so pretty and brilliant. Gleams in the sun. You won’t be the only one to notice. And someone will snatch it from around your neck. It will call to you but it doesn’t put up a fight. You are in the middle of the ocean and all your efforts were put into the care and keeping of that shiny, perfect rock…..that you forgot how to swim. And you sink, and you sink, and you sink. You have swum before and you can do it again….but you choose not to. And you sink to the bottom and just lie there. Because your heart is as heavy as all the rocks in you life.

But then something amazing happens. You are thrown back on the shore and everything begins to fall away. The scars are still there but they are softened by your time in the depths. And you hear a voice. It is soft at first but it gets louder. Then you realize it is your voice and it is screaming. And you realize…..if it is your voice and it is screaming….then it must be you and you must be alive. So you keep screaming because as long as you scream you are living. And you don’t care who hears. You grab rocks and stones by the handfuls and throw them all away from you until you are tired and the only rock you are left with is that little smooth pebble that is in your heart. Smooth because the beating of your heart and the coursing of your blood and the force of your will — they smooth the rough edges. The bumps, lumps, crags, projections are still there but they are dulled. And this time the only stones you carry are yours.

Tempests….

And though I dance in the rain

Under a sky that cracks

and obscures the stars with flashes of light

giving rise to the current beneath my skin…..

…..your storm rolls in and beyond

and here I remain……

Craving the warmth of your sun

Crushes….

I had once thought I was cursed. Cursed as a result of hurting another’s heart in the 5th grade…. and though it was not done out of malice….I was left cursed all the same.

The curse had followed me to junior high school….where I developed my very first crush on a boy who played the saxophone. I remember being too shy to tell him that everytime I saw him I had butterflies. I remember every time I saw him, it took me to some place very sweet like strawberries. I remember  every time I saw him……I had these feelings I didn’t know how to handle.

I had it in my mind that I never could actually speak the big heavy words…..I really like you, K.C…..‘like’ being such a serious thing in my 8th grade heart. The stuff of sweaty palms, heart flutters, and fear of a big scary monster with sharp teeth called…..Rejection. Being cursed already…..it was a devastating reality.

Despite the fear….I had to take action. As serious as action can get from an 8th grader.

I played clarinet….and my mom had put a lot of pressure on me to get first or second chair. But 3rd and 4th chair sat just that much closer to the saxophones. 5th and 6th chairs….they just totally knocked you out of the running. So I had to have that 3rd or 4th chair. Anything else….just wouldn’t do.

With 3rd or 4th chair well secured…..I could….in my 8th grade mind….send love in Keoni’s general direction. And if TV, movies, and storybooks had taught me anything…… somehow…someway….that love would be intercepted and returned. At the very least…I would be seen. And from there I would have a chance.

But I was done in by my curse.

I don’t know if I loved left and he went right…..or if the vibe was so strong it over shot. Or maybe a little bit of both. Whatever the real reason was…..sometimes the best plans get mislaid and go awry. But what ended up happening….was Gregg. The guy who sat next to K.C.. He asked me out.

And I was like wow. Totally unexpected. Epic fail. siiiiiigh.

I had always liked K.C…..because I had thought…..and still do to this day…..that he was a very nice boy. He had a kindness and a sweetness about him that I wanted to be mine. But it wasn’t meant to be.

I went out with Gregg. At the time, I had thought that the cumulation of Jr High love was the moment that you would get to hold someone’s hand. That was where I was at. Gregg was somewhere much further. When I realized this, after going on a date at Chick’s Beach…..I got out Gregg’s van and went to call my mama. Who sent my brothers for me……but more for Gregg. Fortunately, no one caught up to anyone. I was saved by my 8th grade indignation and naivete. And no barriers were broken in the making of this film. Total After School Special.

Fast forward about 25 years…..and as fate (or Facebook) would have it…..I speak to K.C. again! It was either that…..or maybe the love I had sent out into space had finally worked and he noticed me…finally!!!

I felt so fortunate. I felt so lucky. Here is my chance. If for nothing else…but to touch his face. Surely curses are meant to be broken.

And as if life was on my side….K.C. was scheduled to be in my…my podunk, dusty Texas town. It was total 4th chair plus 25 years, baby!

But 25 years…..are 25 years. And life happens. And K. C. has a girlfriend. And I just know that she must be beautiful and talented and the most shiny thing under the sun. And I am the china doll with a crack sitting on his mother’s shelf…..dusty and maybe valuable….but hard to see in the shadows.

But maybe…just maybe….God was being kind to me. I never got to give Keoni the kiss I have had for him for 25 years. I never got to hold his hand…..though I wanted to really bad. Even if it meant nothing. But I got this wonderful hug……a wonderful, familiar hug. And for maybe 6 seconds 25 years…..they melted away….and I was no longer cursed.

And I had the opportunity to touch his face. And I wanted so much to leave my hand there for a minute and just look at the face I had loved for so long…..but in that minute…..everything flooded back…..the rejection, the curse, the hope, the loss, the wish……….and the love.

So I had to let go…..even though I did not want to do it. Because I though I am now 40 years old…..that junior high girl…..the one with the curse….doesn’t steal boyfriends. Still gets the heart flutters. Still is plagued by the rejection monster. And still feels safer on the shelf….in the 4th chair…..looking longingly…..with a little crack in her heart…..where he still fits….and wondering about the girl who got first chair.

Sand in your hand….

and he asked how it was that SHE felt….And she was almost afraid to say for fear of being misunderstood…

I have felt like sand in your hand. In your hands, I am apart from the others…and the Beach that I know. But in your hands, I belong to you.

In your hands, I have felt my warmth in your palms, found my place in the heat of your sun, and felt held together when the winds felt the urge to blow.

As sand in your hands, you have felt my rough edges…..and I have felt yours. And I think…I believe….even when you clenched your fists more tightly…..but the more hard edged we feel or present ourselves to one another…. or go against one another….we find ourselves softer and more vulnerable every time. And it scares us.

As time goes on my sand in your hand becomes more fine, more soft, more powdery. It is the result of touching me with your fingers or cupping me in your palm….in an effort to be sure of me…..to know I am there. It is the result of your wringing your hands and trying to rub me off and out of your sight…..to rid the very feeling of me. But for all the times you try to throw me to the wind….I think even you know…..the finer, the softer, the more powdery it leaves me …irritatingly filling the cracks and crevices left by other more dangerous endeavors. Sometimes you open your hands and try to shake me off or blow me away. Escape for me is impossible and your efforts are wasted….because for better or for worse….I have infiltrated you and you have captured me.

A secret you may not know is….that even if you open your hand in the moonlight….you will always see me there shining…..not to blind you or burn out your eyes with brillance but maybe instead to let you see and feel a reflection in my glow…..and a hope that you realize how the most beautiful castles have begun with a hand and some sand.

 

Land of the Broken Toys

I hail from the Land of Broken Toys…..where I am the Queen.

It isn’t something to be advertised but instead a warning to be heeded by the unsuspecting. A special message to those dazzled by the manufactured bright lights used to distract and confuse to protect ones self and….. save the others.

It is not to say that broken toys are not capable of happiness. It does’t mean that they do not know what it was once like to shine in the sun. It is the memories of those days that are held close to the heart and secreted away lest the memory, like the happiness be stolen away or dashed against the rocks. Memories like broken toys tend to get dusty….and they taste bittersweet….

Once in a while….broken toys get lucky. Despite the dust and dullness, someone sees that glint in the eyes…..the worth that is resident but well guarded. And when someone notices enough to retie the broken string and give it a pull……the whole world can maybe notice too and hear her songs.

But sometimes broken toys don’t care about the whole world. Sometimes they want so badly to be able to trust that happiness is for everyone…..including them. To walk in the world of the believers and look through unjaded eyes and know what it is to fly. Because new and beloved toys have this natural ability…..and they do not have the memory of how they came to be. And surely…..and hopefully they would never know the pain of a kick, the desolation of despair, all the things that keep broken toys embedded in the bottom of the toy box as opposed to being held securely in the arms.

So the broken toy finds herself in an unfamiliar position. Maybe she is an ice dancer, learning again how to skate beautifully to please the one who found her again. But the splinters bite and remind…….

And she loses the glide and her figure 8s look like distracted 6s……

She sees the edge where the ice is thin…..and feels confused. Is it safer to remain a broken toy where disappointment lives….but is familiar….and therefore comfortable? Or does she trust that feeling that says…YES…..she too can fly?

So she flirts recklessly on the thin ice…..knowing it can give at any moment. Thinking in her disjointed logic that if she can manage the fear of falling thru the ice then all can be well. If she convinces the puller of the string that she could have pulled it on her own….all by herself…..then she cannot lose….even if she does….because then she knew it anyway……and she knows how this goes. She is more familiar with how the toys break and bend.. And it chokes her throat…..because it isn’t fair.

It isn’t fair to test and blind the one who found her and saw her. But she does it…..because she is broken. And scared. And terrified that she could be the reason that the string could be cut……but even more…….that she could lose the one that makes her feel real…….to the lies she tells herself.

First Year Nursing…..

And we knew……but we didn’t know.

 

You hear the warnings.

 

‘Nurses eat their young’.

 

‘You are only idealistic because you are new’.

 

‘You’ll get over that soon enough’

 

And as a nursing student, you wonder why. You have helped a sick one. You have help bring a new life in the world. You held a hand or a heart as someone left this world. And you know that you will never be like ‘that’.

 

You learn a lot more during your first year of nursing and things become a little more clear. You helped the sick ones 5 at a time. Having to prioritize who if any will get to dip from what you thought was an endless well of compassion. Time, compassion, and hospital goals, fatigue, and acuities mix well from time to time…..but not often enough.

 

You start the day with high hopes and sometimes you leave triumphant knowing that even Florence Nightingale would have been proud of you on that day. But more often….you leave tired, achy to the bone, unsure and scared that you didn’t do enough. Or maybe you missed a detail. You agonize that you might have spent more hours on charting then you did with patients. You fear the doctor’s wrath when you ‘inconvenience’ them with a detail you thought important but was deemed trivial. You absorb a patient’s or a family’s fury when things don’t go as well as they wanted to go. You hurt for them when you cannot make it right or take a wound, physiological or emotional, and make it all better.

 

You apologize to your family, because after school, everything was supposed to get better. You would have more time and emotion to give.

 

You might choose to put on a face for the world or you get angry because you knew this was what you always wanted to do but ideals are not equivalent to hospital policies or reality. No one has seen what you have seen. You cannot talk to anyone about it. You have to pretend you can slip easily back into a ‘real world’ when you leave the hospital, all the while know, what you left behind was as real as it gets.

 

HIPPA denies you closure when you gave your all to a patient emotionally and physically….and then cannot ask what became of them or learn a new lesson about the course of a disease or injury.

 

You are told that you are not going to make it if you don’t grow the tough skin, learn to work and get your sleep while trying to balance family, your life, and emotion.

 

That prioritizing can sometimes mean that you cannot hold a hand as long as you would like to hold it. It is not a choice between the chicken or the fish. Sometime it is a choice between life or death….and you may not even realize it. Sometimes it is a choice between preserving dignity or saving a life. And these choices and decisions are expensive…..emotionally.

 

The hospital is more concerned with your warm body with the RN, LPN, or CNA behind it, how many patients you can take before you break down physically, loudly protest, or just burn out. Only to be asked….but ‘where is your commitment to patients, your co-workers, or this hospital. It is a cruel carrot stick game. But you better be on your guard not to fall for it because fatigue will eventually win, your body eventually gives up, and God forbid a mistake can be made and the hospital will say you should have used your judgment and not come in. And you want to remark, well, you should not have called and begged me to pull that 5^th 12 hour shift in a row during my daughter’s graduation/birthday/wedding. The one I told you I was looking forward to so please don’t call me.

 

You get told that you should watch what you eat, drink, and how you sleep. Take care of your health. Be physically fit. Have a neat appearance after you have been vomited, pooed, coughed, or bled upon. And you ponder this after your fourth 12 hour shift, with no lunch, no break, feet throbbing as you drink your double caffeine coffee or energy drink eating donuts, sweets, or candy from what I refer to as the trough which is a bowl in which sugary, small, portable snacks are dumped into for snacking between patients so that your blood sugar doesn’t bottom out….just stay unhealthy and labile.

 

You live with the fear….of making a mistake. Any mistake. Any misstep.

 

And then you check yourself. Your fears, your patients, your family, your emotions, your commitment, your drive….what will it take to balance it out?

 

Sometimes things will have to give. And you lose one. A husband. A boyfriend. A family. Your commitment. Your drive. Becoming a nurse is like a long, difficult, painful, and taxing natural birth.

 

And we knew…..but we didn’t know…..and we still fight to be the nurses we want to be

 

And you pray….please, please, please God….don’t let me give in. And you realize how it is that you may become….’like that’.

 

***I wrote this in my first year of nursing.  I am now entering my fourth year.  There have been ups and downs.  Learning…..stagnant times too.  I live for the good nursing times.  I hurt for the bad ones.  I get angry at the extraneous poo put upon nurses that no other profession has to put up with. It was easier being a business analyst….but looking at how healthcare is operated….from a business analyst….and a human viewpoint….can be enfuriating at times.  But then there are the good times.  The hugs…the impact….the positive outcome….that no other profession has.

Looking Back……

I was born in 1969 which seems like eons ago…but a great time to be born. I was a child of both the 70s and the 80s….learned to be an adult in the 90s and 00s. (No…the adult part is not open to debate…hee).

I suppose I am no different than anyone else looking back at my age in thinking that the eras of my growing were so much better than what kids go thru today. But it’s my time. I am going to do it.

I remember playing outside. It was the best thing and the worst thing ever. My mom would send me outside with a pitcher and a cup. I could get water from the spigot outside so I wouldn’t be running in an outside and letting all the flies in.  Modern day child abuse I suppose….but hey….I am still here and relatively unscathed from spigot water with all its impurities, exposure to the elements, endless amounts of UV rays radiating my body, and possible abduction by strangers. Hee. I think the strangers might have had to pay my mom to take me back.

Some of the horrible bad things I did were run the spigot water too long so I could make a puddle to splash in. When the water got low, I would let the mud squish thru my toes because it felt good. People pay big money to get mud put on their bodies in a Spa these days. Had I only known to capitalize at the time. There is a muddy 70s kid out there making some change from what we both know to be a total pleasure.

I remember my mom cooking all the time. She had to do it. No microwaves back then. And this is going to sound so funny….but I was actually excited when my mom had to give us TV dinners. The came in little tin foil trays that went in the oven….FOR TWENTY minutes!!!!! It was the quick no fuss meal. Hee. My favorite was the Swanson turkey dinner. It had mashed potatoes…stuffing…..turkey….and a dessert of some unnameable fruit that one should never eat. Thhhpt. If you got the ‘man sized meal’ TV dinner….you got peas and carrots. Hee. If you ate the carrots and saved the peas…..you could shoot them like marbles outside later….or shoot them thru straws.

Coke….soda….pop whatever you call it. That was a special occasion. It came in a 2 liter glass bottle. If I remember right, this was about the time we were trying to change the country over to the metric system (and ‘new math’). It went over like a ‘Le(a)d Zepplin’ (whole other article….wooot!)  So back to the coke. You got a glass. And that was major special….saved for a movie night…..like when a Peanuts Special or Wizard of Oz or The Lion, Witch and the Wardrobe came onto TV. You got to stay up a little later….and if you were in our house you got a SPECIAL treat. Jiffy pop and apple slices. If you don’t know what Jiffy Pop is….lemme ‘splain. Again….no microwaves. It is like an aluminum pie plate filled with popcorn kernels and then covered with foil. You put it on the stovetop…..it would pop up and puff up and be beautiful. Coke, apple slices, jiffy pop and the peanuts…..I wish some would ask me on a date like that today. Someone might ‘get lucky’ then.

Remember when it was just that? Getting lucky? I was too young to get lucky during the 70s….and too young to know what it meant….but it surely sounded good as jiffy pop. But wow. ‘Getting lucky’ is sooo much better than ‘hooking up’….in my opinion. It was something you surely had to wait for…..like learning to tie your shoes. Try and try til you get it as close to perfect as you can get. Anticipation….it’s making me wait (snaps to Heinz and Carole King). Sometimes the anticipation paid off….sometimes it did not….but it was like Christmas and Birthdays that way. I am not trying to take anything from the ‘hooking up’ crowd….but truly….there is a skill and a sense of pride when you learn to tie your shoes……more so than when you Velcro on and off your tennis shoes. You get the cool sound…..for a second….but then you’re off….and anybody could have done that.

Something else I thought was kind of cool when I was a kid…..is that I do not remember much plastic surgery. You had to work with what you got. It is kind of empowering to know that the lips you kissed were yours….different than anyone else’s…not bought to look like hers or hers. And that goes for your breasts, your face, or any other part of your body. Not perfect….but yours. And people on TV who actually did have plastic surgery….did not admit to it. And messages were positive. ‘God don’t make no junk’ ‘I love you just the way you are’ (thank you Billy Joel pre Uptown Girl)

I used to hate those cheesy positive messages. My mom used to crossstitch up all that positive propaganda and display it all over my room. Pictures of Holly Hobby….nice little girls. Sugar and spice and everything nice. Hang in there!! We have those ‘inspirational posters’ today….pasted up all over the workplace. But they feel separate of my life experience. I feel like that scream at me….CONFORM! CONFORM! Here is your goal….keep reaching, sister! But the cheesy stuff my mom crossstitch….said…I was good. And keep being the best me I can be. Because doing that….contributes to a peaceful me….which contributes to a peaceful world…..one of which that I was a part….that loved me just the way I am. Love is…..

So the weird thing is….my mom stitched up cheesy propaganda. But even weirder thing is……it stuck.

Now I know that we all one day will look back on our growing up times with rose colored glasses. I am not so sure that it isn’t a bad thing.

Wishes…..

It is with delicious ache and anticipation

that I stand in a queue of many

hoping  to be the one to inspire your heart,

engage your mind,

ignite your desire

But I don’t want to leave it to hope

and nor do I wish to coax kittens out of trees

I keep praying that like a river…

your destiny flows….

…directly into me