in from the chill

Autumn has a teasing paradoxical soul heaped with both gratitude and scorn, bountiful harvests of plenty and bereft fields littered with discarded misfits. Colourful and muted.  It flirtatiously engages you with its vibrant reds and yellows and then grounds you with it's russet tones.

Autumn has a soulful melancholy lament when the frost-nipped wind is allowed to bellow and moan, bending the trees desperately trying to hold on to their youth.  Brittle bone leaves rattle-cackle as they tumble on grey pavement.  On the other hand, chilly cheeks and rosy lips nipped by the invitation from  the brisk air remind us that there is life in its sharp eyed allure in its breath. 

It's turning cold.  Night drapes early, echoing a bluesy cadence.  Stars shimmer a vibrant delight, flirting with harmonic blues. Inside, embers glow heat.  Light flickers a welcome to cocoon under soft fleece, to sip tea, to sit close, to rediscover the meaning of growing old together. 

Come in from the chill.......sit close with me by the fire.  It's time to share a few secrets only spoken on a cold autumn night....Time to come inside to enjoy the comforts of cozy talk, red wool socks, of quiet love, of slow dancing.  Let us celebrate life as this paradoxical season shifts into hibernation. 

this week's Photo theme is "turning cold...."  For more interpretations and variations, check out Carmi's blog right here!

your presence

I awoke this morning

to a wooing dawn song of the birds.

Renewal all around me. 

Standing in the dark, alone

i looked out my window

to the other side of the river.

Mesmerized by the luminous streetlights

radiant amber reflections stretched out

like flickering candle flames 
on the surface of the water,

it felt like silent mercy in the sleeping calm.
It felt like light tapers you could walk on

Walk on........... 

I thought i saw your face rising from my memory,

your blue eyed serenity looking right into my soul.

I looked into your familiar smile.

I swear I heard you whisper serenity,

quietly beckoning me

across the rippling light

to the safety on the other side

You're almost within reach, my anam cara

my somebody closer.....

my reliable soul friend........

Rather than restrained by silent distance

I feel your presence all around me.

feeding me calm.

Are you quietly beckoning me

across the ladders of tapers

to the safety on the other side?

Or am I beguiled by a mirage of nostalgia

nestled in a long lost dream?



Reality is gifted in the light that carries us.  Even if it wavers in the currents of a river unfolding, we surrender so we can sail into the mystic, lost in the wonder of where it will lead.

intuitive understanding.....

We could talk for hours, you and I
painting life-picture stories.
I'd enjoy that. Would you?

We could talk forever,
adding bits upon bits of information
shedding a few skin layers
catching glimpses of commonalities
asking questions
piecing people puzzles together...
Your people puzzle
My jigsaw of a life....
Unfinished edges remain.
Unfound pieces left under the carpet
as we talk in circles
around and around and around......

for hours we could take turns treading water....
spilling our thoughts out in rambling words
listening to the uplift and downshifts of our vocal tones
watching expression ooze out of our pores
rippling spills of thought bubbles
floating in the air of new knowing....
Truth is within reach if we let our guards go home.

We share what we have gleaned of ourselves.
We share from our own viewpoint.
The more we gab and jab,
the more we grab hold of our common clay
our blended shades of light.
Formulating unique people prints.....
like finger prints but bigger.
shaplier
"wholier"
illumineer..... ing stories masking the whispers caught in the back of our throats....

What do you really want to say?
Tell me how you feel about it....

Out it pours.....
stretching back into the vaults of nostalgia
leaning forward into the foggy dreams of what may be
surrounding unfolding immediacy.
encompassing facts, ideas, thoughts,
feelings....
only the comfortable ones confessed.....
always remaining entwined in intellectual fabric
where trust knocks but isn't welcomed yet.

What about the discomfortable ones?
Why are they shamed into repression?

We can talk forever, filling each other with so much of ourselves and still not really know one another.
We could live side by side for years and still never break through to meaning.
We have the capacity to fill the airwaves right up to the invisibly tough boundary lines like the TV midnight weather lady who forecasts facts backed up by science....

high pressure, low pressure.....
stormfront lines on the horizon,
do we choose to remain in the safety net?
acceptable
expectable
predictable
controlled by intellectual calculations.

until....
until.....

something mysterious and holy happens....
paint splashes onto our life-story canvas
a new puzzle piece is revealed....
WE both grab for it because it is the same.
THEN! The weather predictions don't follow the weather lady's script!

The change in air pressure bursts the glistening thought bubbles floating in the air, and out spills common feelings
raining down on me and you....
revealing honesty from each tender drop.

In a split moment, our guards run for cover and we are left reflecting upon one another as Truth holds up the mirror.
"Not bad!
Not bad".....we cry as we see the imperfections displayed as beauty marks, sending shivering affirmation and acceptance. "What were we so darn afraid of??"

Knowing transforms into understanding.
Understanding blends into a feeling of communion.
Now, let's restart from here......
We can talk for hours from here......

Can I call you Beautiful?? Because you are......


For you my emerald friend Pip. My first attempt to capture Paul Tournier's "Meaning of Persons." Food for the soul. Level 5 communication is within reach when you intuitively understand? Level 5 touches the heart and soul of communion? I believe communion goes well with sip or two of cointreau. :)

essentials

thirst quenching....

water
human touch
belonging
freedom
salvation
affirmation
sex
faith
sweetness
fun
kindness
redemption
a caring voice
silence
an answered prayer


nourishment.....

soulfood
validation
friendship

family
recognition
new learning
empathy
loving like you've never been hurt
music and lullabies
freedom
peace of mind
human touch
God
intimacy
creative expression
fun
lovemaking
a prayer acknowledged

physical fulfillment.......

food
a safe haven
a good nights sleep
human touch
stress alleviated
fun
physical and spiritual connectiveness
exercise
silence
unconditional love
clothing
warmth
dancing like no ones watching
freedom
a pair of shoes
God
peace of mind
sex
the sound of music
meditative prayer


What needs are essential in your quality world?

Where does beauty fit in?
Is it a need?

What happens when our needs are not met?

Is what you are doing, thinking, and feeling
getting your needs met?

creativity

In your light

I learn how to love.

In your beauty, how to make poems.

You dance inside my chest,

where no one sees you,

but sometimes I do,

and that sight

becomes this art.

Rumi

Have you ever experienced the iridescent flow of creativity when the act of expression seems to come from the movement of an internal dance? The feeling is one of an alignment to a fresh air thinness, where freedom captures you in its magic. Sometimes we try so hard to be creative or to stretch our imaginations. Sometimes it even feels like mind zapping work because our energy to find that heartdance tangles in the tango of yearning.

There is a cross stitch step we often trip over in our desire to create. The wanting overpowers the action. Personal expectations and self-judgement blur the motion of doing, and of finding His dance of life hidden within us. We want to perform, paint, play out, poetize and as seekers of perfection, we lose sight of His gift of beauty and light where the soft murmuring passion quietly settles.

Perfection is not wanted on the voyage of discovery. Perfection is not found in the beauty of our artistry. When we touch on the blue-glass iridescence of shimmering possibilities, our grip on expectations loosens as the vision for our creations clarifies.

What interests me is the point where the illuminative transitional pull from feeling like the yearning seems to be choking the ability to produce anything of substance moves to a place where one enters the zone where creative flow alights. I believe it can be compared to experiencing early morning dawn after the 4 am dark night. Both are beautiful in their own way. Both are needed in the gestation of creation. Both can be dwellings where we are captured by the internal dance, if we don't find ourselves trapped in encircling yearnings. But, there is an indescrible essence where "aha" happens.....and the heartdance is found.

an evensong for a special friend

settling silence

new to the air once filled with

strummed songs sung in harmonious inebriation

animated hilarity soaked in remember whens

crowd circled catch ups of stories

carrying a fabric woven together

in late night star threads

and fluming plumes of smoke littered in crackling sparks

laughter from the step dancing fire

drawing us nearer into glowing merriment.

Now, as the embers die down

voices find hushed tones

quiet cadences capture late night truths

steeped in sleep as they slip away from the firecircle

into the cooling dark

leaving us lost in our own unchartered time.

I just wanna go on with you....

huddled in hip touching intimacy

our lips whispering truths

only spoken when honesty finds eternity

near the pulling tides of time.

I just wanna go on with you

into the late night

where treasured secrets feed the glowing red embers

of barefoot cuddled warmth under a sandy blanket

We'll feed the fire

and settle into the new silence

before dawn steals the mystery

when our own embracing sleep will find us.

Written for Sunday Scribblings with youthful remembrance. The prompt this week is "my nights." For more offerings, check out their site.

random yappy-ness

two simple threads

one is mine

the other is yours
begin to unravel in technicolour
wrapping like ivy around a trellis
leaving little purple blooms
in their wake.

I have a confession to make. I'm a random talker. In my mind it seems better than being a close talker or a slow starter or a non thinking talker I guess, but I believe it may be as irritating to some, especially those who have the strong need to begin and end one thought before they move onto another. Personally, those anal retentive types drive me to drink. In fact, when I find myself face to face with someone like this, I have a very difficult time focusing on the one note they need to play. I lose my train of thought. I have to really concentrate, especially if it's in a social situation, because my brain is tick ticking off in tangents.......so much so that i have to stifle the urge to WHOOOOSH.........take off on one of those topic tributaries.

I love the tributaries I guess.....stay on the main river and it's all been seen and heard before, but paddle down into an inlet and you never know where you'll find yourself.

It's not like I can't be linear when I'm communicating with someone. I am counsellor and trainer by trade for goodness sake. I have to be a bit disciplined. Though when I think about it now, the best counselling and training moments have been when things just flowed as it unfolded. However, as the lead in those situations I do have to be "on my game" or it would never make sense. I have to know what tributaries to pursue.

Writing is the same. If I want to get my point across, I have to stay within some kind of parameter or no one would read the tripe I write about. Not only that, I'd never finish anything. Random communication, whether it's speaking or writing has to have some concreteness to it. But if I had to describe my comfort zone, the place where I feel the most relaxed, it's when I don't have to reign myself in. I can let it fly, firing on all synapses without feeling like I have to slow down my ideas and thoughts.

I have a friend who used to be my supervisor and is now a sounding board support when I need him the most. What I love about him is his enthusiasm for ideas and his encouragement. He always takes the time to help me generate my abstract thoughts and the pictures in my head and somehow manages to encapsulate them and reflect them back to me. He allows me to be free to take flight, and I must admit that it always blows my mind when he is able to make some sense of what I have had to share with him! I always leave his office feeling so good.......especially after a long time in between connecting with him because as a random talker, I have a tendancy of storing it up until I have a chance to let it all hang out. Months can go by, and all of a sudden I wake up and have this unquenching urge to phone him and arrange to meet. It's like I've hit a saturation point and need to vent. Because he encourages me to use my brain and to unravel the ball of wool inside my head, I figure he must get some satisfaction out of the mental exercise. Or perhaps he's being nice. Maybe, he takes a swig of scotch just before I arrive in order to cope with my verbal discourse and then takes a nap when I leave!

Random talkers and thinkers definately need people in their lives who ground them. Thank God there are a few around me. What's interesting is that I am considered a "grounder" for some who seek me out. Maybe that's what mentoring is really about.

I also have a few friends socially whom I would label as random talkers. Its a breath of fresh air when I'm around them, and I have a feeling they feel the same way because they too can relax and let it flow as it unfolds. Tonight, one such friend was over for dinner......and it was an impromptu arrangement too. Personally I love spontaneity like that........to me it goes with the randomness. But for her, it was a huge deal to simple say yes on the spur of the moment. Maybe she also needed a night of random yapping. Well, I know she did, because we flew through 50 different topics all in one conversation. It was grand!


What is so interesting, and I realized this tonight in the middle of talking about something completely different is that most random conversations usually do have a theme, or they have a core to the subject matter which seems to rise up from the debris to be revisited time and again throughout an evening. This is what usually happens..........

The conversation will start up without any effort whatsoever.......usually beginning with sharing a common interest thing............"have you read that article..........." or "did you hear so and so interviewed the other day........." or "I saw something the other day and I thought of you because......" It's usually seems like it's going to be a one trick pony kind of chat, but with two random talkers? It turns into a buffet table covered in too many treats to consume. And yet, there is one big blossoming centrepiece which is revisited over and over. You just see it from different angles.

Tonight, the theme was the presence of faith and how it underlies all of our decisions, whether it's embraced or not. DEEEEEP! However it didn't have a feel of a dissertation. Rather, it was a culmination of shared thoughts that began the moment she arrived while standing in the kitchen as I poured the wine and prepared dinner and never stopped. It was GREAT.

Can I just make an aside point here in the middle of this post? Do you know difficult it is to write about random talking in a linear fashion?? HOLY! I have about 30 different examples and stories I want to explore and to share firing through my brain right now. Oh, and yes I have been asked if I was ever diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder.......by two random talkers! My response to them both? "I know you are but what am i??!" I mean really, who are they to ask such a question? :)

OK, back to the post......hmmmmmm.............



I'm thinking right now............right at this very minute.........that perhaps random isn't the way to describe it. From an insider view, it doesn't seem random at all. In fact, it seems more logical and more linear than other kinds of conversations. It just looks like it from the outside, because two random yappers somehow form a bubble around them. It's like the world has ceased as they connect on a level that transports. When you're in the bubble of thought, theres a union of the mind. Time races by unnoticed. Music playing in the background floats by. A whole drive somewhere happens without much gawking out the window of the car.

Most of the time, I'm aware of the fact when I'm with someone who isn't comfortable with this type of tete a tete. They find it tiring and mostly intimidating and if i'm not careful I can blow them away. I know this, because it's happened in the past when I have found myself on some tangent or am feeling restless and in need of a blood letting of thought. Can you see how writing and blogging is a friend for someone like me? It's a gift from the Big Guy, let me tell you.



Oh, I can spend inordinate amounts of time in my head and be very quiet. I love time alone not talking to anyone. I love spending time with someone I care about and not utter a word. I can putter about my day and not have a single indepth conversation and I'm completely fine about it. I hate talking on the phone, especially during the week after counselling/teaching all day long and when I'm in the middle of teaching a workshop, the last thing I want to do is head out for lunch with a group to rehash. I need to stay in the zone so to speak..........to stay focused so that I am at my best to lead a group through a learning process that will include many trips down tributaries.


Last night, one of the topics covered was my friend's recent trip with her husband to Victoria BC(who btw was having a random talk with my husband who I personally love having long undulating conversations with, he woo'd me that way). It's been many years since I spent a summer there working, so I had many questions and wanted to know much about their trip. She spoke of the long walk she and her husband took along the coast of the city. Such a beautiful place. Anyways, it reminded me of the boyfriend I had that summer and a walk we took and after my company had gone home, I started to unravel the memory.

We met in a bar. Nice start eh? Oh, and I should also add that he was a sailor. Yes, I met a sailor in a bar......big strappy muscle man sailor guy with a smile as.........? He asked me to dance. I consented. We danced one song and while we waited for the music to begin again, we began chatting........name, rank and serial number stuff.......for about 30 seconds and then he jumped into some topic of some sort and we were off to the races. We stood on the dance floor surrounded by others (can't remember if we danced again........I think we did) but we ended up talking and talking and talking, flying from one topic to another. We yapped for so long that all of his sailor buddies (who had dared him to ask me to dance) had left the BAR! After we got off the dance floor, we sat down at the empty table and continued until last call. We covered the gamut.....including as I recall a long conversation about morse code of all things! He had just placed first in some morse code competition, which personally I found hilarious but also curious about and given that his buddies had filled him up with good west coast beer, and given that he was way more extroverted than even me, he regaled me with story upon hilarious story!



A couple of weeks later, after he returned to port..........does this not sound like a dime store novel???.......... he called me and asked me out. We decided to meet downtown in Victoria at a tearoom since we lived on opposite ends of the city. We sat in the corner drinking tea..........drinking tea with a sailor!..........and the time flew by. We had much in common........ interests, where we had grown up, dreams etc. After what seemed like 5 minutes but was more like three hours, we closed the tearoom and headed out for a walk. Our random chatter accompanied us as we walked along the cliffs of the Victoria harbour taking in the view of Mount Baker located across the way in Washington state. The wind was blowing, the sky was big and the path we walked on was sometimes so narrow that we had to go single file. At one point, we crossed a crevice walking along a huge log. We continued sharing our thoughts over the din of the wind until we found an alcove cut into the side of the cliff looking outward.......big enough for the two of us to sit in and take in the view. It was breathtakingly beautiful.



We both went comfortably silent in the blare of the wind....the randomness had left us while we took in the view of the crashing waves and moving clouds. My own thoughts revolved around how large the universe looked from this vantage point and how small I felt in the middle of it. I also felt so alive and knew i would never forget the moment as i lived it. My random talking sailor? He turned to me and echoed my own thoughts.........."even though I feel so small right now in this big vast world, I feel so alive. There is no other place I'd rather be." Just what a girl wants to hear from her sailor man. :)

We had begun our conversation jumping around like two crazy people, but we ended up in just the right place. This is what happens most of the time with two random talkers. It may not look like they know where they are going, but for the most part they end up where they should be.

finding the lost highway....

Progress in our fast paced world is a twelve lane highway which allows us to get from point A to point B as fast as possible. Rarely is there anything to marvel at along the side of the straightaway but it doesn't matter really because the speed at which we are going doesn't afford us a chance to appreciate the journey anyways. Beginning to end.......lickety split! We have our music blaring, our hands free cell phones operating, and we are looking forward, forward, forward with our thinking and doing. Oh, that's fun isn't it? Personally, I love getting lost.

I don't know who penned this, but have always like it....."Life is not measured by the breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away." Driving on a straight and fast highway only allows for breathing. Taking a turn on a lost highway offers those moments which just may take our breath away. The true oxygen needed to stretch our minds is found on the bumpy potholed neglected little highways, which more often than not winds and bends along the shorelines where life is lived. It may take a lot longer to get from point A to point B, and sometimes we DO need to put our foot on the accelerator and get in the passing lane. But don't tell me there aren't days when you can afford to take the off ramp to find the serenity of a slower pace.


I don't live in a province where we have or need 12 lane highways, but I do live in one where the unwritten nickname is the "drive thru" province because most tourists zipping through New Brunswick are headed to Prince Edward Island or Nova Scotia..........both beautiful destinations. Our new highway system which was needed and is very welcome, is also so efficient that it lived up to the unwritten nickname. We are more of a "drive thru" province than ever before. Part of the old "Trans Canada highway," which theoretically links this huge country from east to west and back again sits comfortably just down the hill from home. In fact, I can see it from where I am writing this........through the trees between me and the Saint John River. I am very happy that all the transport trucks are gone........that the incessant noise of the highway when we first moved here has long gone. But I feel sorry for the tourist traffic in the summer who will miss the glorious beauty of one of the most scenic drives in this country.



My lost highway, which I treasure whenever i have a chance to travel it is what captivated me the first time I drove along it one early dawn many years ago......dotted with family run hotels, diners and fruit and vegetable stands........through the heart of the province where valleys of farmland met the shore of the ever changing river... where thriving sits next to poverty, where fresh paint rubs against the worn out lustre of not quite making ends meet......where village names represented both aboriginal and royalty........Nackawic, Penniac, Pokiok, Prince William, Sheffield, Jemseg, Fredericton, Lake George...... where unusual little businesses sat along the side of the highway in an unassuming way that you may just miss it the first time around because your eyes were on the road AND taking in life across the lane on the other side ........ where I watched the sunrise from my driver's seat while listening to Mark Knopfler's soundtrack from the movie Cal.... not knowing at that point I would end up settling here .... I was captivated by the feel and the look. I felt like I had discovered a place that had the potential to take my breath away often. Ironically, my first trip along that road was a drive thru trip.......we were on our way to Nova Scotia. But, the feeling I had ........ the sense I felt that I could easily live here permeated in a way that obviously formed the option in my thinking, which in turn became a reality.



I must add however, that there were MANY times when the old highway was a right pain in the arse. The frustration of getting behind a long convoy of Winnebago pressured even the most patient person. The incessant noise of the traffic used to impact our home life (we bought our house knowing the new highway was being built and the noise was only temporary). But as I drive the same stretch now, I am saddened by the loss. The little family run motels are mostly boarded up. Some have turned into residential spots for people living in poverty. The diners and general stores have disappeared. One of the most predominant produce stands, run by a local family for many years is up for sale. Who knows what will happen to it? People are too darn busy and too darn focused on the destination to care about life and learning along the shorelines.



There should be signs on the big efficiently boring Trans Canada that scrapes through the scraggy brush of this province away from the natural beauty of the land of the living that point the way to another route. They need to say something more than just "scenic route" because so much MORE happens when we discover the lost highway........we can rediscover ourselves. We can rediscover what is important in our lives because the lost highway is where the heart dwells. And if we can connect to the heartland, we will be left breathlessly smiling many times over.


ps. I've included these three photos which I have taken over the past year....samples of the beauty along the lost highway near me........ now how can this place be a drive thru province?

This week's prompt at Writer's Island is lost highway.........travel a few more by clicking HERE.

All caught up in the reverie

Every word is a symphony

Won't you believe me

Christopher Cross

A beautiful scene taken from my car on the way to work yesterday morning. That old song Sailing was playing on the radio........the serenity of the song met the serenity of the scene.

for Tara.

Lord of the Dance

When I was around 11 years old, I took modern jazz lessons once a week. I was in a large group of girls the same age taught by an older woman who wore flashy flowy dance outfits and had a perma grin on her face. Even at that age, I could tell her smile was covering a foulness sitting in her mouth. Now, didn't I write that nicely, because what I really wanted to write was that she had what some people refer to as a "shit eating grin." oooooops........I wrote it! How impulsive of me.

This dance teacher projected a sense of uppity pride because she was married to a man who was a TV host of a VERY local game show called Party Game. I think the prizes were dinner for 2 at KFC or something........Granted, the guy was well known in and around my hometown, but I highly doubt he was ever a household name across the country. Nevertheless, we heard about him during EVERY class. We were even given autograph pictures of him. Despite this weirdness, I LOVED learning modern dance. I loved the music and the atmosphere..........and learning new steps. I even loved wearing the black dance tights.



One night, about halfway through the year, we were learning a new routine which was going to be a part of the end recital. Over and over the steps we went, all of us concentrating on learning the beat and the moves. All of a sudden, flowy teacher lady stops the music and in her best musical voice said. "Everyone, I want you to watch how Dana is doing this......(so I continue, with a feeling of pride.........) because she's doing it all wrong. Don't do it like Dana.....OK, everyone......."


Honest to God! How mean is that? I felt like a piece of grime on the bottom of her snazzy jazzy shoe. It was devastating...............and yet maybe it was the beginning of me realizing that my idea of dance, and my ability to do a dance is uniquely my own interpretation? Can't make a ballet dancer out of a belly dancer right? I'd much rather be a belly dancer. Much more exotic, don't you think? And you get to wear all those bangles on your wrists and multi-coloured scarves........great outfits too that show off those tasteful belly button piercings I long to acquire.



I thought of this story today while I was jotting down a few thoughts on the "dance of life" realizing that we often find ourselves at a point where we think we have the steps down pat...we know the moves and the dips and the hip movement only to realize that the music had changed and a whole new dance is needed. We just get comfortable in our cha cha only to find out it's the step dance we need to master. Or........we can't get the dances steps AT ALL because for some reason God gave us two left feet and no rhythm that fits the mainstream.



Life is a never ending dance lesson. Life also seems to have a set of rules we all are supposed to abide by. If you're at one point in your life, the dance looks like this.................... If you're at another point in your life...........you're supposed to conform and shimmy like this. Just like the work world. Within the responsibilities and structure of the organizational chart of a business, one finds the dance one is supposed to adhere to. No improvisation is welcome. Just do the monkey dance, keep your eyes within the range of your piece of the dance floor and wiggle and jiggle along. It's like there is composed hierarchical order we are to adhere to.





If you're in the hierarchy, and this analogy seems (in my weirded out mind at least) to fit with every hierarchy formed by us anal retentive structure starved human beings......within cultures, countries, churches, religions..........hierarchies abound.....you're supposed to know your place. If you're living in the land where one does the WATUSI, for goodness sake don't be doing the HULA. Heaven forbid you step on the toes of a tap dancing fool when the music CLEARY indicates the soft shoe technique.


And yet.........we are born free spirits with the opportunity to express our individuality through our movements and actions. We are free spirits, equal in the eyes of God...........equal to try any and all dance moves. God didn't form the hierarchies and the structure which gobbles up equality did He? So, why is it that we continue to evolve into a mass of hierarchies where freedom of movement is completely frowned upon by the people around us?



Mike Yaconelli, whom I bet was a rascal of a man to listen and talk to, wrote a wonderful book entitled "Messy Spirituality" which I have loved reading. It's just a little looking book......one you could spin through in a blink, but then you'd miss out on many many thought provoking gems tucked in the personal stories he has shared about his ongoing learning of the movements to his own dance of faith, and of living a spiritual life. One of the clear messages I have taken away after reading it is that we are all unfinished and unpolished dancers. And guess what? That's quite alright. That's what God intended.......we are imperfectly messy, stumbling people trying to get our act together.............together.



Maybe we are all 11 year olds.........sometimes getting it wrong, sometimes getting it right, always keen to continue learning. It's an unbalanced way of looking at life which is difficult to accept because it would be so much easier if we didn't have to think....if we could just go into auto-pilot, turn on the proper tunes and move in some acceptable robotic manner. But, that's not living is it? No it's not! That's called BARELY EXISTING.

Yaconelli writes...
"Balance is a dangerous, illusionary characteristic and a temptress. Disguised as normal and sensible, it is silently destructive, crushing the unbalance of giftedness, taming the extremes of passion, smothering the raging fire of a genuine relationship with Jesus. Jesus was constantly being criticized for being unbalanced. Think about it: Jesus could have healed six days a week and not upset anyone. People would have been just as healed on the second day of the week as they were on the Sabbath. Jesus could have sat down with the temple leaders and quietly discussed his theological reasoning for not allowing the place of worship to become a carnival of commerce. Instead, he crashed in like a crazy man with a whip and knocked over the tables, screaming and yelling and creating chaos. He certainly could have been more balanced."

Living is messing up every once in a while. Living is getting it right every once in a while. Living is dancing like no one is watching..........with our arms flailing, our legs moving and our hearts soaring............to our own song. Wanna try a new move? I promise I won't tell you you're doing it wrong. Theres no wrong.......... Living is accepting the dance of others, and learning some moves from them. And all the while.......as we remain unbalanced, imperfect and in flight, trying to find our dance within the hierarchical structures of our society where the dance moves are supposedly painted on the dancefloor, isn't it great to know that all of us 11 year olds are in very good company?

Dance, then, wherever you may be,

I am the Lord of the Dance, said he,

And I'll lead you all, wherever you may be,

And I'll lead you all in the Dance, said he

fly me to the moon........

tulip dressed for dancing

That's life (that's life), that's what all the people say
You're ridin' high in April, shot down in May
But I know I'm gonna change that tune
When I'm back on top, back on top in June

I said that's life (that's life), and as funny as it may seem
Some people get their kicks stompin' on a dream
But I don't let it, let it get me down
'cause this fine old world, it keeps spinnin' around

I've been a puppet, a pauper, a pirate, a poet, a pawn and a king
I've been up and down and over and out and I know one thing
Each time I find myself flat on my face
I pick myself up and get back in the race
(D.K. Gordon, K Thompson) smoothly and with heart sung by Frank Sinatra
Can't you just hear him belting it out??

It doesn't matter where you are or what you're doing, music can transport, uplift, commiserate and celebrate. Songs, whether it's the message in the lyrics, the sensual beat of the melody or both has the ability to move you to a new locale with a tap of the foot or a snap of the fingers, and wish your were on the dance floor with a partner who can make your temperature soar.

Yesterday, it was Sinatra who joined me during my travels and who made me stop and wonder about this magic of music and how it can send rivulets right through your body. My goodness, the man could sing a sexified song. Not, in your face seduction........more innuendo........though not subtle either. Sinatra's songs, especially during the Capital Record years oooooozzze with sassy sensuality, with alluring appeal. The man could set a mood for ember setting lovemaking like no other.

No wonder I got lost driving yesterday. I was in fantasy land........swinging on a star, taking a boat to Miami, with the world on a string, sitting on a rainbow, up there where the air is rarified.........singing along dreamily.....searching for a rainbow.

Slow dancing nice and easy................does it everytime.

"Let’s take it nice and easy
It’s gonna be so easy
For us to fall in love

Hey baby what’s your hurry
Relax and don’t you worry
We’re gonna fall in love

We’re on the road to romance - that’s safe to say
But let’s make all the stops along the way

The problem now of course is
To simply hold your horses
To rush would be a crime
’cause nice and easy does it every time"

yes it does......everytime

enjoy........