My Father's Day

 The sun woke me up.  It was a school day.  Why weren't we all getting ready?

Why was everything so quiet?  I found my mother sitting up in her bed.  Aunt Doris was there. Why?

Very softly, mother said: “I have something sad to tell you Joanie.  Your father died in the hospital last night,”  I was eight years old.  None of this made any sense.

 I’m old now and, looking back, I see that moment as a preview of a life in which things are not expected to make much sense. And, I suspect we all live with one moment or another that keeps tapping us on the shoulder. Grabbing our attention. 

I’ve missed him every day. 

A Cross Appears

 

This cross is important to me.  It showed up on the front seat of my car shortly after I left the hospital after having a heart attack.  I never questioned how it got there as I preferred to    and accept it as a sign from the universe of recovery and hope. I kept it in the car.

Now that I have let go of the car, I’ve been thinking of what place I should make for the cross, or even, should I pass it on.  I haven’t decided yet.

The cross story is my personal way of feeling comfortable with the ideas about consciousness discussed and explained in the book “A World Appears” by Michael Pollen. The cross signalled that the material and non material world are united despite never being able to  "observe"  consciousness.  There is no "outside" spot.

Consciousness is what makes us human.  It binds us together in the ultimate community.  In me, its mystery evokes the beautiful feelings I had when I discovered the cross.

Secrets

 

Secrets.  Can you keep one?  Is there something you're itching to tell? ? Do you have some that remain, and will remain just with you?  I just finished reading "The Things We Never Say" by Elizabeth Strout.  (She is the creator of my favorite character in literature: Olive Kitteridge. ) Strout writes in a conversational tone.  Like the two of us are having lunch and she has a friend with an interesting story.  Is part of the joy of being a writer being able to tell as many secrets as you want about your characters.  Hmmm.

I've been deeply affected by what has gone unnoticed by me, or deliberately kept away.  And, I have a few stories I won't put down on paper and one I'll make room for in my grave.

I'll leave it at that.