Category Archives: Heart

Protecting My Heart From Love

When you have a relationship with a person who is not reliable you cannot let yourself fall in Love with a capital L. There are caring feelings and lots of fun but protecting your heart from the inevitable break has to part of the plan for the relationship. The big loves of my life have all been precarious. I knew going into them that there was danger. The test is to let someone into your inner family circle and be proud of your relationship. If that is not possible society says you should ditch them.

Continue reading

4 Comments

Filed under Growth, Healing, Heart, Love, relationships

A House is no Longer a Home When a Landslide Brings You Down

Part 1.

I started this story last Saturday after I took pictures of homes that are now red and yellow tagged and about to slide down one of the hills in San Pablo, CA. For 21 days it has rained and anyone living on a precarious slope in the Bay Area knows the dangers. One of the homes that is red tagged was actually built on the same spot that a former residence in 1973 tumbled down to its final fate. How people can build on hills or on fault lines just for a view in this area boggles my mind.

 

sinker

As I drove by and watched neighbours help each other load belongings into U Hauls I understood the feelings that everyone had. Fifteen years ago my home had been ravaged by fire and I too sat there looking at destruction that I did not have any control over. I cannot begin to tell you how one feels when devastation hits your inner core as you watch something you loved vanish in a few fleeting hours.

It was a cold January day and the kids were flooding the rink outside when I noticed our German shepherd, Snoopy racing in from the greenhouse with a huge plume of black smoke trailing him. If there is an emergency I am not the one to send to an EMT unit as I panic easily. I screamed for someone to call 911 and we simply thought a hose spraying a steady stream of water into the basement window was enough to contain the fire.

Continue reading

10 Comments

Filed under Healing, Heart, Inspirational, Journal

Promiscuity

There are some who might say that I have had way too many sexual partners in my life.  I have been tested and do not have any STD’s yet I know I have taken chances.  I think it has been a rather normal progression of people in my life and I like to think I have played it safe.  I look back at the journals I wrote during those times and I wonder what I was thinking.  I know I was imagining that this was the way to love.  My journey and documenting the stops continue to this day and I feel close to some personal truths.  My path is not for everyone but I don’t regret my life.

I had been divorced after twenty five years because the sex was terrible.  That really was the bottom line in addition to religious, personality and astrological differences.  So when I was free I went looking.  I actually found an affair while I was still married.  The Internet swept me into a world that still intrigues me.  Bruce was my first fellow and he gave me the kisses I was missing. My ex is still a fine friend but I needed more.  I found it and never looked back.

Continue reading

9 Comments

Filed under Addiction, Art, Dating, Destiny, Dreams, Heart, Love, Passion, relationships, Sex, Uncategorized, Writing

I’m Drinking Your Vodka Tonight

I had found it under your bathroom sink again. I found it behind your printer once. I found it in your file cabinet. I hated that you hid booze in the house. Once you poured it out. Once you let me put it in the cabinet. Once it killed you.

I put the last four bottles I found under the bathroom cabinet in the back closet. Then I cleaned that closet out and put the Vodka in the kitchen cabinet. It has been there a couple months. Tonight I am having a cocktail. A Pineapple/Vodka drunk. An ode to your life. A time to take you away from this world and out into the universe. Unfortunately the crash back to earth is not worth it. I don’t like the payback but you didn’t seem to mind.

It took me all this time to buy some Pineapple juice. Today at Walmart I found some cheap and that is just what I wanted. You and I had wonderful fun with our Pineapple Cocktails. We added a red cherry to mine and you switched to Grapefruit Juice because you were that kind of guy. We loved our cocktail hour. We loved to play but you had to have more. You had to have a pint of this Vodka a day. A pint. You wanted to transcend. So tonight I am transcending in your honor. Tonight I am remembering the joys of alcohol.

Continue reading

9 Comments

Filed under Addiction, Healing, Heart, Journal, Life Lessons, Love, relationships

Indigo Nights With Diamonds

I remember standing by the window in the parlor looking at the evening sky in the Blue Hour. It was the winter of our first year and I loved standing in the empty room watching the colors change before my eyes. I never noticed in L.A. or San Francisco, was I too busy, too young, was it smog? What the hell was I doing in middle of nowhere Minnesotain winter on a farm, broke, bruised, tired and so damned cold. Memories that flash like photographs, still frames of my life that suddenly become a movie in my mind.

That day the snow was different, it looked like whitecaps on the ocean from the wind, the sun had warmed the top then nights froze the waves in place. There was a crust and I’d gone out to walk on it earlier, to feel it crunch and see how far I sank. God how you laughed at me,  sinking thigh deep and struggling, the stubborn woman who wouldn’t turn back. Get it while I can, enjoy what I have, this new world and life I chose with you. I’m cold and tired but I have a new world. No, we have it.

Like the nights I had off in summer and fall when the colors soften and change, the birds settle in and the world gets quiet, I waited to watch that unbroken ocean of white. There were so few nights off during the Holidays but this night I had my time and my sights, I’m a watcher and magic is free. Slowly the night turned Indigo, deep, heavy purple-blue and the world was still early, no voices, no birds, no tires on the highway. Finally the yard light came on and I saw it, the ground sparkling everywhere I looked. It was as if someone had thrown millions of diamonds across the acre of lawn. It took my breath away and I stayed standing in the dark room, I didn’t want to look away.

Continue reading

13 Comments

Filed under Destiny, Dreams, Growth, Healing, Heart, Life Lessons, Love, relationships

The Love of My Life Has Renal Failure

It has been a very stressful last several months for me. Care taking for others has been taking its toll on me and now I get some very sad news.

When I was a child I had a stuffed animal. I held onto it so much that eventually, it began to fall apart. There was only so much my grandmother could do to patch it back together. There was many a leg-transplant and arm transplant. And the patches she made couldn’t sustain the continuous amount of holes that kept cropping up. One day I retired it, I was too old and it was also too old. It was a sad day nonetheless.

My old pal Sandy- or what now can only be described as a rag doll

Continue reading

7 Comments

Filed under Friendship, Growth, Healing, Heart, Inspirational, Journal, Life Lessons, Love

Abusive Relationships: Leave Before You Leave in a Bodybag


I think Adele’s video, “Set Fire to the Rain,” is a great example of a typical abusive relationship. It is actually difficult for me to watch, but I like this song… It does a very good job depicting the typical dynamics, the physical abuse, the screaming, punching, pushing, but what’s even more important is that it depicts the “making up.” The “making up” part of an abusive relationship is by far the sickest facet of the entire dynamic. In fact it is so painful to be without this person, the very person who causes the pain because, consequently, they’re also the only one who can make it go away- now that’s what I call a dilemna. Try putting up with this awful cycle for months and even years and tell me how your health is faring- non-existent I would say. If they don’t kill you,there’s a good chance you will kill yourself on purpose or by accident. 1 in every 5 female murder victims in the US are first victims of domestic violence.

Continue reading

3 Comments

Filed under Dating, Domestic Violence, Healing, Heart, Life Lessons

So The Holidays Are Depressing for Some People?

So The Holidays Are Depressing for Some People? That’s what I hear…and this year I might be joining the ranks of the Scrooges and the lonely who curse the holidays all the way to New Year’s Day. Why? Many reasons, but today I am going to talk about one reason in particular.

A week or so ago when I was tuning my guitar, I broke the E-string (the little one on the end). I have been so busy this past week I did not have time to get a new one until tonight. I finally made the long drive to the music shop, upon pulling into the plaza I was very confused. I looked from one side to the other but did not see the sign for Daddy Junky’s anywhere…Crap…So then I drove to the mall where I was lucky to find a set of generic strings at one of those big box “music stores” where not one of the clerks could help me figure out what strings were best for an acoustic/ electric- in fact, no one on staff knew anything about guitars or instruments at all!

Continue reading

2 Comments

Filed under Heart, Love, Motivation

I Flunked Self-Esteem Class

Today I flunked out of self-esteem class. And no. I’m not joking.

“I just don’t think I can get through to you. Don’t take it personally, but here’s a list of other therapists that might be a better fit. It was nice meeting you.” Are you serious? Good thing I didn’t take it personally- that would’ve been very detrimental to my self-esteem.

Upon hearing of my expulsion from self-esteem class, my other counselor -the one who recommended me for self-esteem classes- subtly asked me not to come back. I told her what he’d said and how I was confused as to what he meant by he couldn’t get through to me. I am not a child. I didn’t misbehave. I took the class seriously. As we conversed and continued to talk about other things she seemed to become very irritated with me.

 


Continue reading

3 Comments

Filed under Dating, Domestic Violence, Friendship, Fun, Growth, Healing, Heart, Inspirational, Life Lessons, Motivation, Passion, relationships

No Such Thing as Love Like in the Movies?

I have been told there is no love like in the movies. I disagree. For example, this weekend I went with my boyfriend to his family’s cabin in Vermont just over the border of Western Mass. It was a beautiful weekend, the fall leaves cascaded from the oaks and maples like delicate Chantilly drapery. Saturday afternoon, we road our mountain bikes to a summit where we had a picnic. It was perfect, he’s so sweet, he even brought my favorite, lavender champagne! To be honest, most of the weekend, we were cut off from the rest of the world holed up in the cabin’s foyer under its vaulted ceilings. It was so cozy by the roaring fireplace. The heat lit the room like a grenade in a fox hole.

Continue reading

6 Comments

Filed under Art, Dreams, Fairy Tales, Fiction, Heart, Love