Stop…can I just stop for a while?  Stop to live the moment?  Take in what's right there and not look to tomorrow, or even the next moment?   Can I take in the beauty and majesty of the natural world?  Can I look into the eyes of another human being and "know" them? Can I breathe and be grateful for each inhale and exhale I take?  Can I put down my phone, Facebook, Twitter, all the fucking rest of it and find the real?   Can I love, really love…unconditionally?   Can I realize my oneness with the Universe...with YOU?   Can I???

Life and death and life…

I was fortunate to spend a lot of time outside on this glorious weekend.  The Universe kept sending these messages about life and death.

 On a long bicycle ride yesterday, I arrived toward the end of Route 8 in Boone County.  A farmer was plowing under his fields that had been harvested. (biggest John Deere tractor I've ever seen.)  The smell of freshly tilled soil permeated the air…and me.  God I love that smell!  Just weeks ago, that field was full of life and green

Today while hiking through a woods, I stopped and mindfully watched as leaves on the trees let go of their grip and floated gracefully to the ground to nourish the soil for new life in the spring.  It was poetry in motion.  Did you ever just watch a leaf leave a tree and float to the ground from start to finish?  It's a mystical experience.

That's how I want to go when the time comes.  To just let go and gracefully float down to the river and let it take me home.

Autumn snuck up on me this year.   Most of September was sunny and warm…and bright.  Then all of the sudden, temps dropped, clouds rolled in, days got shorter.  How to slow down with nature, how to let go of the things that need to go, how to choose the leaf among many that will be my new path.

It's Sunday night, April 27th (i think) and I'm a little f'd up on beer and wine so take this for what it's worth.  It's been a pretty long week so what the hell.  

My dear dad had what we hoped with be relatively routine hip replacement surgery on on Monday…a week ago tomorrow. Well, routine turned to shit hitting the fan on Thursday and a return to surgery today.  He developed a bleed and his leg grew three sizes in diameter and hard as a rock.  

He's been in severe pain for the past three days.  It's been tough to watch.  (tougher to watch was the nurses putting in a catheter. all decorum is lost in a hospital)  

So…my siblings and I…thank GOD for brother and sisters…have been keeping vigil all week.  Things seem to be under control after the second surgery.  He's in good hands, both physically and metaphysically so in my soul, I know all is well.  Just this damn ego keeps getting in the way telling me otherwise.  

Which explains the beer and wine.  Another glass and my ego won't have a chance anymore tonight.  

But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept, she stooped to look into the tomb and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. They said to her, "woman, why are you weeping?" She said to them, "because they have taken away my Lord and I do not know where they have laid him." Saying this, she turned round and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus.

Jesus said to her, "woman, why are you weeping? Whom do you seek?" Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, "Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away." Jesus said to her, "Mary." She turned and said to him, "Rab-bo'ni!" (which means Teacher) Jesus said to her, "Do not hold me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brethren and say to them, I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God."

Happy Easter

!

The spiritual guides I follow said this was going to be a pretty wild and crazy month or so.  Wow, are they right.

First…the cold weather just won't give it up.  New record low this morning.  Woke up to snow on the ground yesterday morning.  WTF!!  

Then there's my boss, exec director of our agency for the past 23 years who drops the bomb on us that she's leaving the organization at the end of the year.  Whoa…talk about changes ahead.  This on top of all of the other craziness that goes on there every day.

Dad's getting another new hip on Monday, so next few weeks we'll be helping him get back up and active.  Greatest man I know but patience isn't one of his strong points.  It'll be interesting.

Full moon eclipse this week, one of the planets in retrograde, all kinds of cosmic crap going on.

Hang on tight folks…we still have a few more weeks of this to go!

Anyone who lives in the upper 2/3rds of the North American Continent will readily admit this past winter was one of the coldest, snowiest, and LONGEST in a quite a while.   Last year at this time, flowers were blooming, the trees had leaf coverage already and spring was in full swing.  It's taking Mother Nature much longer to wake from her winter hibernation this year.  While there are buds on the trees and the annuals in my garden are starting to pop up, on a cloudy evening such as this, you would be hard pressed to know it was April in Northern Kentucky.   Still too many cold days interspersed with the brief teases of warmer weather.  

From someone who is convinced their trip to the planet was unintentionally detoured from being dropped in a much warmer climate…this winter was a challenge.   I think there must have been some cosmic switch before birth and someone a little closer to the equator is wondering why they are sweating their ass off and dreaming of a northern climate.

Have to mention (brag) that the University of Kentucky Wildcats are in the finals of the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament tomorrow night.  Talk about cosmic switches.  NOBODY saw this coming (accept maybe Ashley Judd)…making it all the more fun.  GO CATS.

It's Friday.  Took a mental health day off work.  Actually, I was pretty much ordered to take off today.  We've been pushing it pretty hard lately and we're short staffed.  The next two months will be super busy so trying to re-charge the battery before the big push.  Breathe in, breathe out.

Got up early.  Awesome yoga class.  Then sat at the coffee shop for a couple hours reading.  Ran into an old friend who now lives out of town.  Great to see her again.  Treated myself to a massage.  For anyone who has never got a massage, I highly recommend it.  Good for body, mind and soul.

Settling in for a little meditation.  Then to top of the day, off to a local craft beer tap room to sample some of their offerings.

It's a good day.

"Be soulful,
be kind,
be in love." - Rumi

I'm back…for anyone who might have read any of my past musings.  Crap mostly.  But it's mine, so I claim it.   If I can commit to posting a least once a week, that would be good.

The long, cold winter has delayed spring a bit in the Ohio Valley.  Temperatures are warming and Reds Baseball Opening Day was yesterday.  Weather cooperated, St. Louis didn't.  Cardinals 1, Cincinnati 0.  But 164 left to play.

Spent time with two wonderful new friends the past 2 days.  The Universe seems to know when you get worn out and sends two gentle souls to walk with you…for how long, I don't know.  But blessed to know them both.

The next weeks and months will be a time of change…there's always change going on but this will be some major seismic shifts I think.   I'll take the advice of Thich Nhat Hahn and "breathe, smile, and go slowly."

Namaste.