Dear Dad…

Hi dad…as you know, today is Father’s Day…just wanted to finally put all I hold in my heart for you down in black and white.  I know it’s been over 24 years since I last saw you and not a day goes by that I don’t think on that.  Not a day goes by that I don’t recall some bit of something that reminds me of you.

I suppose I could sit here and recount how my life has evolved in the years since we last saw one another…but I’m certain you already know.  Perhaps I could fill this page with volumes of childhood anecdotes relaying just how wonderful a Father you were…and how very much you’ve influenced my life…then again, you already know this as well.

Just how do I put into words the more intangible gifts you’ve blessed me with…how do I describe your amazing spirit…how you always carried a ready easy smile for everyone…your passion and compassion for others…always sincere, deep and heartfelt.  I may not ever recall the myriad of toys or trinkets, that I’m certain I begged you for, but I will never forget your spirit.  You touched so many lives through your countless acts of simple kindness and humanity…no matter how little we had, you always made room for others who had less.  Today it is the fiber of who I am to always make room for one more…thank you.

For a man who left school in the ninth grade, you were one of the most intelligent grounded people I’ve ever known, and yet you fostered my creative soul.  I can only imagine what work it was to balance trying to instill a sense of responsibility without crushing my incredibly free spirit…but you did.  Thanks to you I still have that sense of adventure…of all things possible…I still dream big beautiful dreams…all with a sense of purpose and direction.

You experienced so much overwhelming pain in your life…losing your young wife at 26…leaving you with two small girls.  It was up to you to explain to us that mommy wasn’t coming back, and then you had to pick up the shattered pieces and move on.  I saw that loss never quite left you…and changed who you were on a very deep level…but you never stopped loving or seeking.  Through you, I learned what a truly deep love is…and that, even when that love is taken away, you don’t close your heart off…you pick up…move on…and continue to live your life full of love.  They say that women choose men who are like their Fathers…and I couldn’t be happier or more proud to say that I am with someone just like you.

So today, while others journey to see and celebrate their dads, I just wanted to let you know, what I never had the chance to tell you while you were here on earth…and to say thank you for raising a beautiful adult…and thank God for blessing me with you for a Father.

Happy Father’s Day Daddy…

I’ve been tagged!

I’ve been tagged for my first ever MeMe…which I’m not thoroughly certain I understand, but I am going to go with the “Rules”

The Rules are simple:

Step #1 – Link to the person who tagged you.

Pfffffffffffftttttttttt this is a HUGE pleasure…and an honor that she tagged me…so thank you Not a Mean Girl! (clicky on her name for the link!…you will love her blog!)

Step #2 – Write Five Fun/Interesting Facts about your self

5 INTERESTING AND FUN FACTS ABOUT JUSTENE:

1.  I have saved two lives…both from drowning…the first was a six year old girl who got caught in  one of those plastic inflatable doughnut things with the leg holes in them… when it turned over, leaving her immersed upside down in the pool. The second was an adult male friend of mine that I took to the ocean…he could only passably swim (I found out after the fact) and had NEVER swam in an Ocean before…he got caught in a riptide and swept off shore…I had to get him back in and through the riptide while he thrashed about the entire time.  Oh and did I mention he was 6′3″ and I am 5′2″…thank god I am a VERY strong swimmer!

2.  I used to impersonate Marilyn Monroe…it started out as a Halloween dare…and soooo many people loved it…they kept asking me to do her for contests and such.  I kept winning and ended up impersonating her for about 3 years…yes I have pics HERE

3.  The most fun job I ever had was working as a Balloon Delivery Clown….I got to dress up as a Clown…Honey Bear or various other Characters and go sing songs and deliver balloons to a WIDE variety of people…IT WAS A BLAST!!!!  Two things I learned…LOTS of kids DON’T like Clowns…and business men will tip you ANYTHING if you promise to only leave the balloons and NOT sing! hahahaha FAT CHANCE! I ALWAYS opted to sing…hey that’s what I was being paid for! *grin*

4.  I have had two life long dreams…the first is to someday own a B&B…I have had the good fortune of running two and know in my heart of hearts it will happen and it is what I should be doing…it speaks to every aspect of my personality and my soul.  Dream two is to someday sing Jazz and Blues in small venues.  I have a beautiful voice and have won awards for singing…performed on stage and in competitions…but my ultimate dream is to sing in small clubs and coffee houses….I don’t even care if I get paid…I just want to sing!

5.  I once facilitated the funding for a Habitat for Humanity House.  I was watching the Oprah show one day and she posted the locations for a bunch of Habitat Houses her Angel Network was looking to have funded.At the time, I happened to be working for people who were in a position to be able to fund the house…so I made the connections and the house was built!

*Big Sigh*  That was NOT easy but it WAS fun!

Step #3 - Tag Six Other People and link to their blogs. Then let them know you’ve tagged them by twittering/Plurking them or leaving a comment on their blog.

Here are my six People and their Blogs! (click on their names for the links to their blogs or go to my blog roll)

1. It is an absolute pleasure to link this first person Soren …his blog, without fail, informs and many times challenges me to look and strive beyond what is…to what could be.

2. Wow another favorite…this woman has a beautiful soul and she shares it so eloquently in her own words.  Thank you Isis

3. This blog is a wonderful fun read…well worth the skip on over to say hello to Jeffrey

4.  I love reading this blog…it’s written by a really wonderful person…who just happens to kick ass! Yeah I said it! So thank you for all your great posts Devyl Gyrl keep em coming!

5.  This blog is bent more toward the technical side of life…and doesn’t begin to reveal the AMAZING woman behind the blog…my fondest wish is that she start another more personal life blog…if she does…WATCH out world! She is one of the most beautiful people I have ever known…drop by and say hi to Twila Marie

6.  This blog is the beautiful journey of a woman who is a slave…leave your pre-conceived notions aside and read!!! It’s an amazing journey…thank you for sharing it with us Aislinn

The Journey of tears…river of thought

Noise…a barrier for listening

talk…intangible to action

thought …an elusive stream…ever present…ever flowing

Alone I mute external noise

Alone I silence speech

Alone I let the river flow on…

listening to my soul

asking questions of my life

thinking

flowing

the river rises from deep within and floods my senses

tears

coursing rivulets of thought over the planes of my cheeks

soaking my skin

I hold my breath like a dam

my hand goes to my eyes

trying to force the river of thought back

it flows on through my fingers…

the dam breaks

my hands softly meet in supplication

I bow my head to them

I pray for a peaceful journey

Difficult Customers…

This is a tough one to write…so many thoughts floating around as to where I should or could go with this….and yet here it is.

We have this customer at our store…she’s a right pain-in-the-ass! She’s likely in her sixties and I guess can’t get around much on her own legs…so she uses one of our “mart carts”…you’ve seen them…little powered scooters with a basket up front for groceries etc.  That’s all well-and-good but she also insists on bringing in her two yapping little beasts…a yorkie and a pomeranian.  All these two dogs do is yap yap yap from the minute they get in the store till they leave…well come to think of it…she doesn’t shut up either!  She doesn’t shut up…but her attitude is one of superiority…like she owns the world and you in it.

She shows up daily and hangs around for hours…riding that damned scooter up and down the isles…and picking out stuff that she only ends up leaving behind at the register…as though she’d ultimately used her superior judgment and deemed those items not to her standards. GROAN!  A lot of the items we have to “claims”…because she puts them in the cart with those damn dogs and the law says we have to.

There’s a collective moan when she comes into the store…we’re all plain tired of her coming in and pushing her proverbial weight around and breaking rules and policy…in general wreaking havoc!  She’s become a regular topic in the lunch room…well her and those damn dogs…and no-one wants to really “cash” her out…since she’s so difficult.

Well yesterday was no different than any other day at our store…except AFTER we closed!  I had ended my shift right at closing…lucky not to have to stay the extra half hour and zone all the shit people carelessly toss about when they’re in the store…so I headed to the shopping lot next store to hit the grocery store…only to discover they were closed….arrgghh.   I trek back up the incline to our store to meet the person who said they’d give me a ride…but by now I’m locked out of the store and must wait on the bench outside for said ride….so I decide to call a taxi to get home.

While waiting for the taxi…I notice a few stragglers pull up and try to get into the store…not knowing we close at 9 on Sundays…we have small talk then they leave.  Then this mint green van pulls up…and I instantly know who it is…earlier in the day I’d been informed that “she” had been living in our parking lot for a month or so in that van.

I sat in mute observation as she descended from the van…a heavy older woman…with flowing waist length gray hair.  She pauses for a few moments…outside the vehicle door…to run her hands through her long hair and catch the cooler air in it. She adjusts her rumpled clothing and leans in to scoop up her companion…the yorkie…then closes the door and gingerly makes her way across the parking lot to our entrance.  It’s a silent traverse filled with the weight of her life’s journey.  This is a human who’s story I do not know…yet I see the anguish of where she is right now.  She’s aging and her limbs do not support her as they used to…and all she has left in the world are her two dogs and her mint green van.  This night I read the pain…solitude and anguish in her movements…her body. My heart and soul melt.

This woman is no longer that pain-in-the-ass customer no one wants to wait on…she is a homeless human being…adjusting to yet another journey in life…even at this later stage. The veil of judgment drops and I’m blessed with seeing beyond the limitations of the expanse of a register.  The tetonic plates of my paradigm shift with the realization of this person..this human being’s experience.

Perhaps it’s because I was homeless not too long ago…that I feel this connection…or perhaps it’s just because I’m also human.  Either way…my heart and soul connect to this solitary figure…and return changed.  She is no longer that pain-in-the-ass with the yapping dogs, that spends hours in the store…only to buy a few paltry items.  Her star was illuminated this evening…gifting me with the light of her journey….and I am blessed.

Those dogs are her life companions…she is literally fighting for her dignity..so if she casts a bit of superior attitude our way…well HELL we can handle that!

Each person that comes into your life brings something…something deeper than the facade of what they’ve learned to present.  Though it’s not UP to us to dig past that facade…it is always to our benefit that we do. The verdant soil is always worth cultivating.

So the next time you’re in line and chatting up a “cashier” and she’s super friendly and perhaps even a bit flirty…take a moment…she may be me.  I’m not friendly because I HAVE to be…I’m friendly because I choose to be…and I like engaging people beyond the facade…getting to touch who they genuinely are.

This woman is a tough cookie…a hard shell (understandibly) but I promise this…the next time she comes through my line…she will be treated with respect and reverence..as all should be…nothing else matters…dignity is but one of the few things she maintains…and it is not up to me to dismantle that.

Her gift to me is…reminding me that even difficult customers have lovely life lessons to  share.

An invitation to joy…

I have been most fortunate over the years to have met some truly wonderful souls…many of them children. If you pay attention children will teach you more about yourself, and this world, than you could possibly dream of teaching them.

Each of us is born a clean slate…over the years… it is what and who we encounter in life…that writes on that slate…altering how we present ourselves to this world. However…we are also born with our own unique spirit…that goes far in determining how we process what comes our way…filter it…and return it to the world in our own voice.

As adults we accumulate much flotsam and jetsam…often clogging up how we filter things and causing us to not be quite as curious and open as our younger selves…leaving one to miss out on much of what naturally brought joy to our lives as children. This is where children teach us important life lessons…such as staying curious and being joyful.

Today I encountered one of the most enchanting little souls . He was all of year at most…hanging about his brother’s hip…his brother’s arm wrapped about his waist as he helped his mother bag her things with his other hand. Here is this child surfing about the backof his brother’s hip, all gangly arms and legs, just taking in the world from his own little vantage point. At first I thought what caught my eye was how his brother just sort of loosely held him about his hip and how the child just seemed to be content to hang out there…going with the flow…getting a bit tossed around as his brother occasionally shifted his weight. Something just kept drawing me to him and at one point he was just close enough to another shopper that he could reach out and just graze the corner of her purse…his face erupted in pure JOY…his mouth opened as if the biggest belly laugh would come tumbling out…all for being able to reach out and touch this woman’s purse. The most incredible thing was that he didn’t break out in huge unabashed giggles…it was a silent soulful joy…all his…pure pleasure.

My heart lurched…I was taken in and could not stop watching this little joyful soul and…for a few brief moments…get lost in his enchantment. I caught his eye and again he tossed his head back and opened his mouth to those big fat silent belly laughs…causing me to smile and giggle with his infectious joy.

When the family was finally finished and ready to go…I just had to stop his mother and tell her what I had observed…her face broke out in a knowing grin…and she said he was the most easy going baby she’d ever known. I’d opened the flood gates…his older brothers couldn’t stop telling me of how amazing their little brother was! They told me how he got the unusual tiny bruise on the bridge of his nose…one of them had accidentally hit him with their fishing pole. The whole family simultaneously said “and all he did was look at us and break out in giggles”. The way they said it showed the gift this child brought to his family and to this world…they were as enchanted and filled with wonder as I. It was so obvious this child changed the dynamics of his little family with his pure joyful spirit. The force of that spirit was so captivating that he not only affected his immediate family but also others such as myself.

This small child , with this enchanting gift, reminded me how lovely it is to to stay open and welcome these moments into our lives everyday. He blew away the fog about my brain engaging my synapsis…sending signals to my own spirit…an invitation to JOY.

Evening

This evening

of solitude

sand softly relents

to my thought filled tread

recalling

one soul yielding to another

High moon cradled

in the trailing vapor

of a warm summer day

soft mist

caressing my skin

memories of fingertips

tracing lazy love patterns

distant sound of ships

calling to one another

voices in the dark

leaning in

whispering

catching the breath

the calm

surface

of the vast expanse

inviting

reflection

one gaze mirroring the other

air laden with

the brine of

life

evocative
of

the salt

of skin

a solitary shadow

ahead

familiar form

still quickens

the pulse

an invitation

to another

evening

I hold pain

This is certainly not what I had thought I’d post for my first real blog entry here, but it is what it is.

I’ve been walking around for a few days now feeling out-of-sorts…in general…just down. I fight being in this place because I know historically what that means for me…and it’s not good…so here I am…tired…down and exhausted from the struggle to stay positive.

I woke up this morning with this phrase dancing round my brain “I hold pain”. So I’m going with it. I hold pain inside my body…I hold pain inside my heart…I hold pain inside my mind and I hold pain inside my soul.

I don’t like that I hold pain…but I own it. Merely saying I own it isn’t enough though….it’s like “owning” it just makes it a stagnant thing…and I need and crave fluidity. I want to progress, move on, learn….flow.

So here I sit thinking of ways to put motion to inertia…that I may feel the breath of positive thought and life once again…but this pain keeps wrapping it’s tentacles round me…leaving me motionless and sad.

I breathe in and think “I can do this” , I exhale and try to release. I breathe in and think “I’m worthy”, I exhale and try to believe. I breathe in and think “All is well”, I exhale and try to feel the flow.

Release, release, release…please Justene…just release…for this moment…for this day…just release…let it all go…surrender the pain…detoxify.

I’m leaving this as is…my life is a work in progress…deal with it

Love in the Season of Apple Picking

Love in the Season of Apple Picking
I wrote this piece this past October…it was inspired by the most enchanting encounter with this lovely child.
Have a wonderful day!
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You

You

cosmos

particle

grain

seed

germinate

thought

breath

whisper

pulse

quicken

rush

vibrate

long

touch

linger

desire

sensate

connect

bloom

thrive

inspire

dream

open

universe

cosmos

My soul would not retract

My soul would not retract

quantiify

measure

is it ounces

killograms

is it

perception

is it drams

what I knew yesterday

I know not

today

the measure

of love

we touch

the void

and return changed

quantify

this exchange

I’m lifted

gifted

there lies no

compare

eternal

external

may we

be given

to share

aahhh

the beauty