The thing I like most about being human, is the ability to ponder. Its a fact, that has recently been brought forth in my mind that everyone has an artist inside of them. The medium or direction that we use, is really the only difference – or whether we are embracing or shunning that artist.

The thing I like about the older masters, is that classical “art” for which they are known very heavily is typically NOT their only artform. They were seekers of art in everything.

It never ceases to amazing me to watch someone thriving in their art, to feel the energy and to embrace and soar with them – regardless of the medium. For example, this young girl – Nandi Brushell challenging one of her heroes in a drum off…. Watching her play the drums, watching the excitement in her eyes when he performs just for her…. watching her dance around the room in such glee and excitement….. Well it makes me understand how Da Vinci could have conceived of the Vitruvian Man – It’s humbling to me, how much in our “modern” “so advanced society” that we have rather dumbed ourselves down. … Not a judgement but an observation.

When things are a requirement for children, they learn the value in them, and embrace the dynamic to them, and the balance. They grow into adults with more rounded education, and knowledge seekers – as well as artists that have learned to balance climbing the mountain, pondering the universe, going inside to empathize from the heart, and always seeking the truth. This doesn’t seem to be the case in our “so advanced, modern society” — instead we complain about spending time with our children – at all – and how we feel underpaid to educate them. (a little bitter about a comment heard/read/referenced from P about a parent so happy about public schools opening, because they didn’t get paid enough to teach their child….. my comment to this is “Its called birth control – or better, go get one of those illegal seemingly unwilling hysterectomy that the ICE detentions are allegedly doing. perhaps you should have used it.)

Children are a gift, but what type of artistic things are they being taught? Its okay to risk life and health to go sit in a overcrowded classroom with an underpaid individual responsible for half babysitting and half education….. where the education is focused on “passing the test” not really on learning….. this is evident with a ten minute conversation with pretty much most folks, myself included under 50 in our country.

Perhaps if we focused on “where the childs expertise lives” to help get them excited and self motivated to learn — education would just be following along and helping guide to safer places – not a cesspool of germs likely to make the majority of the high risk folks – the ones that had “an education” have “knowledge” and generally, “have art” — but then they are the ones that will in the end suffer most, because not only are the high risk of “catching” but also of “dying” — almost seems like some sort of an organized plan to turn Americans into drones. I digress – and sorta into hot points of agitation. While its as much your “american right” to not wear a mask — its also your “american right” to not wash your hands after the bathroom. …. both of which are “gross” and not helpful in protecting some of our national treasures – the people over 50 that have knowledge we lack – and yeah I know the internet is full of knowledge — but its also full of money pandering idiots that are filling it up with nonsense making the knowledge harder and harder to reach. === Rant done.

Reaching to that inner artist seems to be an incredible way to draw out the innate curiosity in everyone. If its something you enjoy, and can be passionate about – whether its painting, cooking, or butterfly watching — you will be inspired to study/learn more about it. Humans have an incredible spirit of resilience, endurance, hope and curiosity. We also are very different beings one to another, so what lights my fire, is probably not all the same as my neighbor, and I know for a fact not the same as P. Its rather unrealistic to expect the same stuff to interest the same people. There is however, something for everyone.

I’ve been watching many of these nightly meditations from a friend in Houston – he hosts them nearly every night in Houston, virtually thru facebook. Last nights I caught a little late – and to be honest, many I watch the next day or so…. They never cease to heighten my healing, and to generally better connect me with the universe spiritually. There is also something about watching him in his element – his art, its just inspiring, it makes me more motivated to seek and to learn about mine.

Watching P when he struggles on coding or fixing something on the computer, another person in their artistic element. He just loves doing this, it brings him great joy and satisfaction – when we first got together, this was something he was interested in – but now he is truly an artist with a myriad of expertise, as well as the ability to understand and learn his limits and when he needs to go seek help.

Art isn’t about the work – its about the journey, and finding something you love and are passionate about that makes you want to come back to it again and again. You don’t start out “a great artist” – well most humans don’t…… it comes thru practice, learning, practice, development of skills, practice…. did I say practice? — Know thyself, its one of those quotes always applicable…. the biggest thing with Art is “knowing” what is your art – what makes your heart light, what is the thing you can do that makes all time become the true imaginary thing it is, and disappear as you are in your element….. in our “modern society” there are the most unusual art forms…. we have more avenues and venues and areas to explore and thrive — but this isn’t something we are focused on, so it falls by the wayside of “too busy to do this” …. when its kinda the most vital thing of all….

Someone recently reminded me that “bodies gotta move” – and this is true, for physical health – our bodies are not at all designed for the sedentary life many of us lead. They are designed to move – for hours, and hours a day. This helps with the physical health, and also clears out the emotional and mental filters — a little less helpful for them, but still.

Art – this is for our spiritual health, it works to help us direct and process our emotional and mental – it allows us to have a constructive, creative place to put those things. Sometimes art is destructive, clearing out old things, cleaning out old areas, while we want it to be a “produce things” – the universe is about balance, and it makes sense to me that for every “producer” there would be an equal number of “destructors” or people that find art in take things apart and reforming them – or just making the components available for the next artist.

How to help inspire more artists, how to help more people find their passion, their art. This is something I’ve felt for many years was a task of mine this lifetime. I have always thrived, and most enjoyed myself when I can see or spend time with someone in their art, some doing the things that make them passionate. Observing, thanking, and lifting up the spirit of people that are doing these things is sort of my artform. Making connections for them from artist to artist – sort of the artist that produces to the source that has a need of their production. This is what I find satisfying, and uplifting. This is where my art lives. Just gotta practice it more.

There was a book I read – or atleast listened to when I was working in corporate america called “good to great” — it mostly had alot of details in it that weren’t really applicable to me – its more about leadership style, it did however tell me alot about my leaders, and a frame of reference for accurately assessing them. The title though, always caught my eye.

I’ve strived for most of my life in a state of “good” and worked to make it “great” — had a weird epiphany about this …

Spiderweb that is somewhat appropriate to get back to the epiphany:

P got a new toy – 3D printer. He got it ridiculously cheap a while back by supporting a kickstarter. He and I have an arrangement with kickstarter, that he can pretty much support anything he wants, or feels is viable, because he has had so much success at finding ones that make me happy and our lives better. …. Sous Vide, Ice Maker, …. so many more I can’t even specifically recall – but its kinda a fun feeling having a mystery box arrive with something that you supported months/years ago when the people finally got it done, and it works and its just “so cool” ….

His plan for this weekend was to clear space in the garage to “set up” this new toy. When it got to evening Saturday and he just didn’t have activation energy, I chimed in with my little bit of it, and bolstered him up enough that we went out and made the space. He did the managing, I did the minioning and we got the space cleared enough for him to be satisfied that there was room.

Speed forward to Sunday – he got up early and set the thing up and made his first “endeavor” … Just like most of the projects P works on first, it was something for me. I don’t know why this is always a surprise to me, we have been married for 23 years, and its a consistent thing he does.

My epiphany is about the why behind this – its because he knows that I will nearly always be so so elated about it, and he will feel satisfied that he created something for me, finding validation outside of himself. This isn’t an exclusive feeling to him. I find this as well, I seek/crave validation from the people whose opinion I respect. This is sort of my own personal “good” to “great” — finding it much easier to validate a “great” if it comes from someone else – where I just view it as “good”

My own worst critic, and this also follows through to P, is myself. That internal voice that says: “its not enough” or “you can do better”

This is a time, when everyone is struggling to do “okay” — we are managing, I’m checking in and finding more and more people are honestly able to say “I’m doing okay” — but this seems like it isn’t the time for “great” … so How to take “okay” to “good” … maybe thats the sequel to that book 🙂 — okay no seriously I doubt it.

How do I take okay to “good” — how do I encourage other people to take “okay to good” — I feel pretty confident that once we are all “good” that we will be able to individually start striving again for “great” and that strive is an incredible empowering experience.

There was a scene in Young Sheldon – one of the shows that nearly always has so many feel good moments in it – where Sheldon tried to replicate the state he had under the gas for dental work, and the scientists in his room – many of them dead – tried to express to him that the best part of science isn’t the getting to the answer, its struggling along the journey.

Life is about the journey – this sounds so cliche but there is so much truth in it that its hard to disregard it. Right now, our journeys are stiffled, and restricted – but only the physical ones. The mental, emotional, and spiritual are all free to roam and expand and grow. We just gotta get the activation energy – particular for those of us that spend so much of our growth enjoying the physical – and I’m not talking about working out – just the physical proximity to other humans, and the tactile sense of exploration.

I wonder if that’s something I should explore …. The Physical journey – I bet there are some parallels between my physical explorations … travel, talking to people, exploring new places…. and the physical explorations of the friends I have that love biking, hiking, running, physical exhaustive activities …. maybe that’s how one goes from “good” to “great” in the physical sense…

Its early, and the coffee has just finished, so I’m going to work on striving to make today a “good” to “great” day.

Teenage mutant Ninja turtles – we had an alligator snapping turtle appear yesterday morning just off the edge of our porch. Crazy times. While I know it has been raining recently – or atleast a couple days, this guy was HUGE. I don’t know where he came from, there isn’t a normal water source for miles.

Amusing part to me, is that P — the animal/reptile lover — also the arguable far more observant of the two of us — completely missed this huge guy in the yard. As I was walking out to the car – I noticed him … Just off the edge of our walk path towards the car. I started pointing frantically, and P got out of the car and was shocked he had missed it.

Turtle is an interesting spirit animal to visit. It had some great messages, reassuring and comforting to me.

Because of the nature of this particular breed of turtle, and because there were four children in the yard just to the left of our house, I got P to tell the parent of these kids about the turtle – which of course the kids heard, and instantly had to come over to see it – so much for best of intentions. Also because the neighbor on the other side has a tendency to let her dog roam free in our yard, I kinda strong armed P into telling that neighbor – the crazy lady – about the turtle too – not wanting a pupper to be injured by this mysterious turtle.

We went out to run some errands, figuring the turtle would do what turtles do, and the neighborhood would likely be safe.

The ring at the front door – as well as the video surveillance we have in the front, alerted us to (as well as showing us precisely the activity and the conversations) our yard being suddenly swarmed by about 6 folks, being led by our neighbor – the crazy lady.

As we neared our house, about five so minutes later, there were two sheriffs stalking our front yard. I made the instant mistake of getting snippy with the police office — P had to shut me down (something I don’t let him do very often, but I always listen when he is doing it, and realized I was completely in the wrong.) I apologized to the police officer, and excused myself to carry in the rest of the stuff from our errands. P handled the rest of the encounter, which included the animal rescue folks that the police had called.

One other minor thing about the crazy lady, as I was walking inside, she says “I called the police” to which I replied “I noticed” probably with a bit more sarcasm than I should have – but to which she laughed?!? Really a laugh?

I was so so angry. The turtle was safe, it wasn’t doing any harm, it wasn’t hurting anyone. It was just resting, it was just in our yard. While ultimately, I feel that the animal rescue was the best choice, and they were taking it to the vet to get checked out as it seemed to potentially be in some distress…. I can’t help but be livid about this neighbor doing this…

This is not the first time, and I’m certain while we live here – it will absolutely not be the last time she decides to exert herself into others business. Its like the time she called the police on my brothers R & C for using a tape measure to confirm that she had INFACT hit one of their cars with her ginormous truck – she called the police and claimed that they were “threatening her” with a stick.

There are worse neighbors I could have, so I guess I should feel gratitude for the fact that she is just crazy. She has alot of family living in her house, and I’ve NEVER had any encounters with ANY of them, its almost like they don’t exist — I’d almost think that they didn’t if the four or five cars that appear and disappear most days from her driveway didn’t rotate position.

It definitely made for a rollercoaster of emotions night. On the plus side, it did enable me to sleep so soundly and restfully as I resolved to feel that the turtle was in capable hands, and getting medical care.

Had the chance today to talk to a friend, and share lamentations about the isolation being hard on social peeps. She was in need of some chatter, by a uncommon source, and I was happy to accomodate. I think we both got in a bit of time for emotional hugs thru conversation points.

It was super nice on one of our errands yesterday – to the farmers market down the road from my house – to be recognized by name, from one of the vendors that sells some of the skin care products that I buy. Its such a little thing, but its really a great feeling. We talked a bit, and she seemed to be doing well.

Its worth noting that the farmers market has grown significantly – but there were less farmers than I’ve ever seen — the booths were swarming with artisans. Of the twenty or so booths, only two were selling farm grown veggies. Crazy things.

I wonder what we will remember about 2020 in ten years. What will appear in the virtual – making the assumption that in ten years probably books won’t be printed anymore – history books about this time. Its an interesting thing to ponder.

The friend is going on a getaway to the beach – Port A – for the next two weeks. She mentioned about her concerns and how she is loading up on cleaning products to “sanitize” the place they are staying – a VRBO as soon as they get there. It will have a view of the ocean just steps away, so it really can’t help but be incredible therapeutic on so many levels. She has promised to send me pictures, and video of the ocean, and I’m a tad jealous of her trip, but mostly I’ll enjoy the comfort that the media provides without the risk of the trip.

Family just got back today from a camping trip. I can’t wait to hear from my favorite nephew how the trip was, he tells get stories – even at five. He has such a lively and energetic spirit it just makes my heart light everytime I talk to him. I am truly blessed to have him in my life.

It’s definitely a day of gratitude, and I’m swarming with happiness at the many blessings I have in my life.

Its fall! Gotta say I love fall, the coolness on that first day this week, when I was letting Starbuck out, and it was cooler outside than in…. it just lightens my heart. …. Well that is, before the little kid voice pipes up with “Hurrah Pumpkin” — but I digress.

I adore my stepmother. She is this good fairy spirit in my life that sort of floats around in the distance, and is there much like Glenda the good witch when you need her. In my youth, I’d come over to visit her, before my dad got home from work, and she would make this incredible no bake Cheesecake.

Its no secret that one of my top ten foods is Bagels with Cream cheese. I think I lived most of my early college career on a combination of McD’s and Bagels with Cream cheese. — Cheesecake falls into the “I don’t have to taste a bagel to get the same satisfying taste.

I had talked to B (stepmother) a few months back about her recipe. She hasn’t made one of these in years, and I think she was a little … resistant to give me the recipe when she pulled it out and found it so so full of very very “not healthy” ingredients. I had to enlist some of my charm and persuasion to get her to finally acquiesce and hand it over.

I’m not gonna lie here – as an example, one of the main ingredients in the cheesecake was “cool whip”– there was some work here. I’ve been praying over this recipe for a few months. Asking for intuition and guidance as to “how to replicate a healthier version” – Many dreams have come to me where I produced the thing with only the healthiest of ingredients — of course dreams are just that – a product of our hopes, beliefs and will all incorporated into one magical source. But I had a plan.

There are three parts to the perfect no bake cheesecake. One a perfect crust. Two a perfect filling. and Three time for one to connect with two, and become solid.

Activation energy is something I’ve been struggling with, and its one thing to have this amazing empowering dream about how to do something, and then wake with only the feeling of “amazing” “empowering” and no idea where the list of what was involved is, or how to start.

I waited. This is something I’ve worked on cultivating for twenty or so years. Patience. I have found recently that its an interesting thing to me…. minor digression needed here.

P&I have talked recently and he has specifically asked me to “not” call the anxiety experience I’m having PTSD or CPTSD which seems potentially a bit more applicable. – To be fair I’ve only been using them because they were “easy” labels to put on a something that I am feeling/struggling with that isn’t forthright to explain. So we resolved to use the expression “Light on” or “Light off” – meaning either I am in hyper fight or flight mode “Light On” or I’m in zen relax mode “Light off” or maybe the light is flashing like a disco ball (struggling to stay in zen and falling into bunny trying to sneak out the carrots from the yard) … On the one hand, I feel like I have a MUCH better appreciation for Squirrels and Rabbits, and the life they must live – on the other, I’ve lived my entire life basically that way up until this year. Healing takes place in Lights Off Mode, so I’ve been trying to learn to cultivate that as a more static occurrence.

As odd as this will be to say, I’ve noticed that alot of my “life tools” the ones I’ve worked so hard to cultivate or enhance, I just don’t know how at all to access in Lights off mode….. Patience, quite oddly is one of those. Lights off has its own set of things slowing down, but this is not at all like patience. Its a rhythm associated with time and experience. Patience is finding things for the mind to do, while not allowing the emotions to amplify while you wait. IE – remaining happy in the experience.

Well, I’ve gotten happy with being in “Lights off mode” and that’s taken significantly more effort than is probably reasonable. I am a stubborn spoiled princess after all. — One of my favorite tools from Lightswitch On mode is the ability to mentally multitask 15-20 things at once, and that is just NOT possible in Lightswitch Off mode.

Back to point. I’ve had these dreams – quite a few of them, with all the ingredients laid out that produced these perfect cheesecakes…. and my Lights off mode — I don’t remember them 🙂

So this week. I started to take a different approach, because after months of buying – and then Rebuying – expiration dates and all you know — all the ingredients to attempt to “make” this masterpiece…. I finally decided “Enough of that” and threw myself into more “conscious” thoughts of “how do I do this”

So Part one – the Crust. I knew it needed a binder, and I knew it needed a good bit of flavor, because I wanted it to be a great healthy replacement for the yummy graham cracker crust that the original had. My initial thought was to make something that I could enjoy eating like a granola if it didn’t work out as a pie/pastry crust — and my resolution was that if I could get it to work – it would also be highly leverage able for Pumpkin things – this engaged the inner child which was extremely helpful with remembering to work on the ingredient list, and also activation energy. Boundless energy of that inner child – this is something really good to leverage, particularly as it helps bring a temporary respite from emotional eating to satisfy her “I’m bored” tendency.

Just like the myriad and litany of supplements in my life over the past few years, crowding themselves in a community around the coffee maker — I suppose it’s a good thing that they do not require social distancing, because then they would be unable to spread their healthy goodness from one to the other. — I have also had a pretty consistent montage of “healthy easy to include” ingredients on my kitchen counter. Psyllium Husk, Flax Seed, Sesame Seed, Chia Seed, Powdered Raw Chocolate, Cocoa Butter, Cocoa Nips (can you tell I like chocolate alot), as well as an ever prevalent supply of every nut and seed in existence. – Sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don’t. – (Almonds, Walnuts, Pecans, Cashews, Pistachios)

I devised my first attempt – following the general principle of “KISS – keep it simple” and just used some nuts and seeds with a bit of oatmeal for the dry – then I consulted my housebound Oracle – aka P – for best kitchen tool to use for the application – we evolved the plan, and I proceeded. – Grinding them all into a almost like flour but mostly still somewhat solid mix.

The dry ingredients done, I moved onto the wet – these would need to bind it, but would also (due to the use of raw egg) prevent me from sampling prior to baking. I knew the mixture would require some sort of sweet – in order to make it tasty enough to be cravable, but also make it a type of granola alternative that would work in a pinch as a snack. So we went with egg, butter, and molasses – it made sense to include the seasonings with the wet – and since I had a plan for the taste, it was pretty easy to know to use Vanilla and Pumpkin pie spice. I will say, I’ve found recipes I’ve looked at so so timid with the use of spices, its almost like they are scared of them or something. This is a fear I’ve decided to chuck out the window. To quote a fav movie of mine “the spice must flow” — I have also found that while I’m certain it is possible to include “too much spice” — I haven’t gotten to that limit very much in my experimentation… and this is pretty much doubling sometimes tripling whatever the recipe calls for…. it has also helped that a few years ago I went on a “lets use up the spices so we can cycle them for freshness” kick – and even with my increases I’m struggling with this endeavor – Spices, even if you are consistently using them on the regular take a LONG time to run out of…. Kinda makes me wonder at the places that make a profit just selling spices? Where are all these tasty things going?!?

Dry ready, Wet ready – Oven pre-heated – I mixed, and pasted into the pan – with a little tiny extra left over to “sample” – this way if it tasted good I had my pie pan ready, and if not 🙂 well it was an easy clean up. The cooking time was pretty easy – I have some type of internal Voodoo about baking times – either that or its just a mental method that fortunately IS a leverage talent or skill – of knowing “when to fold them” — today seems overly abundantly full of my favorite colloquialisms – I guess its because I’m happy about the end result, and happy to be saving it here. Or maybe its not any more full, and I’m just having a “just keep swimming moment” and not even realizing it. Either way, I digress —

After baking came time to cool. We sampled the “side piece” and I was so happy with how it turned out! It would be great! — so I protected my new crust, let it cool completely, covered it and put it into the fridge. Activation energy for the day spent; and had to implement “child on a mission” to the next part – the filling.

Yesterday I woke up and had a billion appts – okay not a billion but my usual handful on Fridays. Got to spend time with R, which is always great, and by the time I got back and was able to breath and relax into the house….. the “feed me seymore” voice popped up and I went to the fridge – only to see my pie crust beautiful and waiting to be filled…..

Now I hate throwing away food – and I think after losing the ingredients twice in “Fridge debacle 2020” — I had alot of pent up sadness around this cheesecake — its not that the ingredients are overly expensive, but having to throw them away, with creativity unspent, well its the worst.

So I looked at this beautiful pie crust, and I checked the dates on the ingredients I knew I’d need – and they were perfect, but I realized this crust needed to be used “very soon” — not just the “soon” that is normal with “aka nfi how long” — but the “very soon” which is more synonymous with “now, right now, do it now” — So I paused. I wasn’t really hungry and this cheesecake wasn’t going to whip itself up — trust me I’ve tried doing a little dance, making a little love to get this thing to do the whole Sleeping beauty fairies in my kitchen, and it was apparently beyond my skills so I’d have to do the whipping myself.

I had a vision of what I wanted this to be, and I had a few ingredients I knew were required, and a few I suspected would be required, and then the whimsical “lets try this” — and I say a few, because its really only a couple of things 🙂

I consulted the oracle about which tool would be my best, and explained to him the concept and the idea. His recommendation in hand, and a few battles with some dead bugs and dust that had found homes in our mixer but had to be absconded before beginning….. We were off and running.

The idea was a whip cream like cheesecake, that would set enough to be cuttable – and be pretty of course, ascetics aren’t all of life, but they are a pleasing part of it . The thing about no-bakes is they are light and fluffy, and I was trying to replicate the cool whip aspect from the original, so it was Heavy on Heavy cream. I figured if it was a fall, I could back on knowledge of an amazing crust, and it would be eatable either way, cause I could taste this element before assembly.

Getting a texture that seemed okay, and a taste that seemed great – room temp cream cheese, 5% plain greek yogurt, lemon juice, lemon zest, vanilla, honey all mixed, and then a significant amount of heavy cream whipped in to bring it all together. The stuff tasted great, now the question became would it set or would I have to try attempt two with some gelatin mix – not a huge fan but something to help it set might be prudent.

Now on to step 3 – this was a little harder with the little kid bouncing up and down so excited in my head with “we did it we did it” — and me saying “hush we don’t know yet if its done” — but after two hours of implementation of “we know how to have patience, and it needs to set” – I got to break into it and it was beautiful. The first piece like all pies, is super hard to get out “pretty” but this was not a horrible thing, and the best part was it set up nicely even with only two hours.

I went back on hour three and it had set up even more firmly – so I’m certain today it have continued its journey on to firmness. It tastes yummy, and while its not overly sweet, its just great. It would take any type of drizzle one wanted for a cheesecake, and I’m 100% certain I could make a pumpkin flat cake and use this as a filling for it.

Success achieved. I documented my entire recipe, so I can do the precise thing again, and I’m so so happy about this… I had to call B and let her know last night, I took pictures and shared with a few others, but overall I’m just so happy it worked as I’d hoped.

Was talking to a friend yesterday – well she is a friend, but she is also the incredible lady that does my hair – has for many years – wow close to ten at this point. She was attempting to fix my “hot mess” that I am learning to enjoy at this point.

The warzone in my body between radiation, chemo, diagnostic tests, cancer, healing, praying – well sufficed to say, it has caused my hair to become switzerland and basically peace out. This has been double unfortunate, since earlier this very year I did a really cute highlights with the purple again the way I most enjoy – it looked great. But duck and cover times came, and … well when you have hair as dark as mine, and the cute purple eventually – yeah I can manage to keep it exceptionally long, but all good things must eventually come to an end – washes out, you are left with Ronald McDonald orange…. coupled with the Grey that has since I turned 30 started peeking out like a weed – I mean wild flower – in the spring. Sufficed to say, the little amount of hair I have had for the past few months is a hot mess of ridiculousness fighting for some semblance of consistency. …. The new chemo causes Alopecia which is a really spiffy word way to say “causes your hair to fall out and not grow back as fast” – Go medical. But I digress.

We are going to call her “M” – mostly because her name starts with M – and I recently watched Dr No and one of the best lingering characters thru all the james bond is M – so this is my own personal M —…

She and I were talking. Another spiderweb, but she mentioned she raises chickens – while this shouldn’t probably have been a surprise to me, she grew up on a farm in one of those… I don’t remember which one … states that grows alot of our food. She is going to give me a few of her fresh eggs this weekend, and I’m pretty excited about this. I have found in recent years that the brown free range eggs make my body the happiest. These will be the best so far, and hearing her talk about her chickens was just, well it made me smile and also it was a comfort. She is an incredible powerful soul, and I’m so glad I have her in my life.

As is usual when I go to see M – we talk – alot. We both love to talk, and I guess its one of those things for hairdressers and bartenders alike to listen, and share and talk. She recently had a baby – I say recent – the child is 18 months old, its such an exciting thing though, because she had alot of difficulty getting pregnant, and I was there with her, along the struggle and multiple IV treatments to eventually “win” — She is one of my heroes in this regard, because as hard as it was, and as many times as she considered, and pondered giving up, she had her eyes set on the prize and she kept fighting for it. It was one of her last “attempts” at IV where finally she was pregnant. I was so overjoyed with her, I remember how we bounced around her shop, and we talked, and I could just feel the happiness rolling off her at the time, throughout the pregnancy, and even after he was born. Some people are meant to be parents, M is one of those. I digress.

We were talking yesterday about “conditions” in our world. We were talking about those three versions of ourselves, and how in order to be happy all three of them have to be in harmony and happy. The young child version of ourselves, the teenage version of ourselves, and the adult version of ourselves. … I suppose, although I don’t know yet, that probably there is a variation version of adult self eventually too…. where its not just the “adult” self but the younger adult and the older adult self – so maybe eventually it becomes 4 or 5 versions — geez the family of me in my head just keeps growing.

We were talking about keeping them happy – and we mentioned about emotional eating – something we have both struggled with over time – her alot less than me – or she is just better at reframing for her child into non food things.

For the little kid in me, food has always been a fall back for comfort. I remember my mom telling me when I was a wee wee one, and she was visiting my father’s parents, that my grandfather hollered at her for giving me M&Ms – he tried to lecture her that she should have been giving me raisins or not any food at all. She and I have talked about this conversation many times over the years, each time taking some smaller and different truth out of it – but the fact is even at that very very young age – my young self LOVES foods.

When my trip was canceled – the one for my birthday in April – the one P had been responsible for planning and had aquessed to doing, for two weeks on the Oregon coast.. … that little part of me was irreconcilable. So emotional eating has been something I’ve been struggling with again, after a few years of feeling like “I got this” — suddenly the little part of me is like “we want pumpkin pie” – and I’m like … can’t we just take a walk instead? …. So in conversations with M we talked about this.

It felt good to talk with someone that is not overly younger, and not especially older than me… but also not family… (I adore my family but their struggles are very similar to mine) … Someone in my circle of incredible people, that was experiencing the same things, and understood them.

We talked about prayer – growing up in the way and community she did, its an integral part of her life and personality too. What name is described to that divine energy that makes up the space above, below and in between all that we know…. its there, and praying to it brings comfort, and understanding that we are not alone; never have been alone, and never will be alone. That we have support, and there is more love in the universe than we are able to possible fathom.

We ended our session with a hug. M is so so great – she is a huggy person too. We normally start and end the session with a hug, but its so hard in these times to understand other peoples boundaries and limits.

I read an interesting science article the other day about the fact that COV is less contagious than the measles or chickenpox. I don’t know if this is 100% accurate, and the truth is, its not really relevant. You catch things not by hugging. You catch things by being silly and not doing proper hygiene. Don’t go out when your sick, cover your body parts when you cough or sneeze. Wash your hands, and don’t be a dirty birdy.

Hugs are a part of life, they transfer energy from one person to another, and they help us both balance, and heal. Its like a warm fuzzy meal for the soul. The best baked homemade bread, with the warmest freshest best ingredient soup, on a cold day. They bring hope, they help inspire, and mostly they are a physical reminder of the same thing as praying. We are loved, we are not alone, and we have each other.

I saved this title, from another blog I did recently – I don’t think this is at all what I was intending this blog to be when I did that, but I feel this one says the best for the title. Hugs, Prayer, and eating for sustenance (not for emotions as much as the little Alethia in my head believes to the contrary)

I am so thankful for so many bright and beautiful people in my life that all have a story to share, and all have struggles that I can help them fight thru even if its just a quick hug, or a quick message, or a quick video chat, knowing that others are climbing their own mountain – well it doesn’t make my mountain any more or less, but it does make me realize I’m not alone, and together we can all get to the top of the mountain to enjoy the view together.

So I woke up super grouchy today. However, I was quickly pretty amused at myself, when I heard my intuition tell me inside “your alive to be grouchy?” So there is that. Even though I feel very grateful and very blessed, today was a day of “OMFG let me sleep”

I should backtrack – I was sleeping incredible well – like no middle-of-the-night-every-two-hour-pee trips…. we went to bed around ten, and it was 4am, when abruptly “Alexa” – we have other names for her in this house, that are much less flattering – in anycase, the woman – IDk I don’t feel like she is a woman, but since they gave her a female voice, we will call her ‘the woman’ – decided it was paramount to tell us via a loud beep, that the national weather service had issued a flood warning for Round Rock – could she not wait until 7am? oh wait, thats when they changed the warning…. could she not just hold the message? Or send it via text? No no, she had to make a loud chime interrupting my amazing sleep – in the middle of a cycle.

Sufficed to say, things went down hill from here. Could Not get back to sleep. Finally got back to sleep around 6am – and then again rudely awakened at 7:40 by ‘the woman’ the warning had been changed – which not at all a surprising thing, considering it hadn’t started raining yet!!

We had an appt at 10, so I had to drag myself out of bed far too early after falling back into restless sleep at 7:40 only to have to get up at 9 – and then fight with myself wanting to go back to sleep, but needing to rise.

Fine I rose, I was so so grouchy, I did a rage scream – it didn’t really help. Nothing seemed to make me less grouchy – until intuition voice in my head. Then things seemed to improve – well it might have been the coffee too 🙂 hard to say.

Had instance to listen to a group I liked a few years back – the group “Fun” – I kinda expected them to be more than a one hit wonder band, I honestly don’t know what happened to them – but I hope its having “fun” instead of making music about it 🙂 …. to be fair, their music was boppy and rather fun, but it was also kinda had some songs that were a tad depressing.

I’ve been working on increasing my exercise – well I should say, P has started an exercise program for himself – and I’m competitive enough that it has worked wonderfully to get my butt in gear and start doing “more” — we laugh about this, he is competitive in some areas, but just so very few – but I’m a life gamer – and everything is a fun game. I guess I’ll just be thankful for him doing this, because its making it much easier for me to motivate.

The brain soup has been getting a little worse – what I mean by this is that the words are just getting confused more frequently. It is not as bad as it could be, because usually I’m listening when I talk and I hear the wrong word when I speak it – but not always …. which makes for some interesting snafu’s of conversation. Luckily I’m blessed with very tolerant and adventurous people willing to help question and help me recognize when I “don’t” hear it….. Yeah I guess even I get tired of hearing my own voice every once in a while.

Its getting to be my favorite time of year – well really it kinda is – I love fall. The rain finally did come today, and we have lake mcneely again in the backyard – which is sort of amusing to watch Starbuck try and traverse it to get to his “favorite” spots. The lake is actually too deep even for him. It all came down so fast too – I guess the flood warning wasn’t such a bad thing – just well – unnecessary for those of us sheltering at home as much as possible.

Its a blessing to be able to be here, and still have emotions that are a full circle, mostly I’m just glad the grouchy didn’t linger, and that I was able to go back to happy go lucky me.

Having one of those days – which seems to have extended into a “few of those days..” = where up seems down, and down seems up. Super tired past few days — its one of those things where its super easy to say that I know this chemo makes me tired – however when I go the first few days and I’m not tired, its easy to get excited and happy that “oh its not making me tired this time” only to be rollercoaster’d back to “wait yes it is” when a week later it DOES.

Have had a few songs just sticking in my mind lately – this one – when I pulled up the lyrics just kinda made me laugh about how appropriate it is for the moment….. “The Remedy” by Jason Mraz — and also this one: 10000 Maniacs “These are the days” ….

So I don’t watch news, but P told me about the fact that there was a rally for 45 here at Lake Austin, and that in all the excitement but not paying attention – several boats sunk – that generally it was a chaotic mess of boats on water. Seemed like a striking parallel to me.

We went for our weekly adventure drive this weekend and D got to explore with us – was a little longer drive than usual, but man the sights were amazing. We found hills that from a distance looked like minimountains – and a wind farm. We ended up in Llano – and I have to say that the place seemed so interesting. Its the crossroads area of getting to and from alot of bigger areas in Texas, but its still so laid back. Texas towns are sorta interesting like this – it was a “new” area for P&I and D was sorta just along for the ride 🙂 It was a little longer than our normal drives, but it was kinda inspiring – I took quite a few pictures and video, and they came out pretty nice. These driving adventures are so incredible – they make me think of the song, another interesting thing when you look up the rest of the lyrics of this song and how appropriate it is for events happening now….. “Free your mind” by En Vogue

Today is Labor Day. It starts the holiday season in my mind, birthday extravaganza from August thru September and then on to the holidays. I don’t know yet what this year will hold, but I am very glad to be here to appreciate and experience it.

Everyday I’m greeted by the sun, and its a blessing to me to enjoy its warm rays, but I’m also super SUPER glad that fall is starting to peek about from that summer season – I can appreciate an 80 degree day so much more than 100+ — They both have their place though, and I’m blessed to have AC to keep the house comfortable and relaxing.

Here is to more fall sooner – I am super super excited about all the pumpkin things popping up all over 🙂 reminds me about all the fun things yet to come this year. Happy times, great memories, and lots of love and joy to be shared. Just gotta get thru these hump day things along the path.

That goes for personal history too… in the eyes of the writer that is….

Perception such a fascinating thing. Its like a rubics cube, or that old game Simon. While it “seems” like there is really only one way to play – there is actually not just one way to play, and history – even though it seems like it was “x” event that occured – its really not.

Events are the perception of the recipient. And the history, or the retelling of those events, are all about the perception of the person that is doing the telling.

Had one of my best friends come and spend a couple nights at my house the past few days. We had so many plans of what we would be doing, but we ended up blissfully just relaxing and talking. Talking about shared and individual histories.

Shared histories are even more interesting than just perception – from the perspective that each person has their own “history” and sometimes the two are so divergent as to seem “not possible” – when in reality its just usually a position of viewing.

I remember the first time my dad tried to teach me about perspective. – from an Art or drawing perspective – he is an architect, and this is a passion of his. I don’t recall “what” the object was, but there were two of them, and they seemed like totally different sizes to me… but he explained it was just an optical illusion – he showed me that they were infact the same size. Only my “perspective” made them seem different.

This same concept is so leverage for memory history. First for the one with the memory – as we age, somethings seem — larger than life — or smaller than life. Sort of like a person visiting Disney – verses a cast member working there for many years. Or a frame of reference on a rally from the 60s verses a rally from today.

The perception of “speed” of contact or communication from the 70s – like when you had to “reach someone” to tell them “something” – the fact that there were NO cell phones, no mobile communication, no mass available internet, not even pages — Just Payphones – or walking with your own two feet to their house. — and hoping they were there either to answer the phone or to hear the news – not having gone to someone else’s house to tell someone else about their own “something”

Verses today, where we can “see” if someone is online – and then we send them a message and we rather so inappropriately “expect” them to acknowledge, or reply or atleast “view” – because we can see that too – our message this instant…… Not 2 or 3 hours later (which at the time was the speed of light) — compared to our grandparents, who had to wait “days” to tell that specific someone that “something”

So days, to hours, to seconds within the blink of an eye – Perspective.

Speaking of blink of an eye — I noticed that one of my games was giving me a very very specific headache – which I found to be sourced from “not blinking enough” — I wonder if the universe will eventually grant us more eyes with which to see things 🙂 I suppose spiders have this fixed, but humans still lacking with only 2.

Its an interesting thing how once we grow up and our whole reality shifts, and changes to be able to accommodate different perspectives and different angles to our own perspectives – how “history” looks very different – our own that is…. and how we can see “things” that occured with new and very different eyes.

Its an amazing time for growing and learning. While its so easy to see the dirt and the dangerous twigs all around – its also an amazing time to see the diversity of the forest, and to acknowledge the benefit each of the trees bring us. Hopefully we can all avoid the bird poop 🙂 because I’ve noticed they are so so prolific right now in this forest of earth we are all sharing.

So many great and inspiring things have come to me the past couple of days… a young girl (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2RVjSlvTI5o&feature=youtu.be) issued a drum challenge to the drummer from Foo Fighters – she is incredible in her own right, but the guy actually responded – it was an amazing video drum off to watch – He is also the guy that posted a video recently in support of teachers https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNEhhDT–sc

The usual cat and pup videos with animals showing us how great life is, in case we forget during these turbulent times. So many people standing up for what they believe, helping other people be stronger, be healthier, get thru these times by binding together and helping each other rise. Its awe inspiring the power of the human spirit.

So many friends have shared their personal struggles with me – not just the ones of that are red hot category six ones on everyone’s radar, but just because the world is blowing up doesn’t mean that individual struggles are any less real. I’m so awe struck by how strong the people in my life are – how they are facing adversity, personal health, financial, family, life struggles and overcoming them – especially during these times. Life hasn’t stopped being life just because of all the struggles we are sharing.

I remember in the early stages of the pandemic having conversations with my nurse family members about the medical field, and the fact that “shutting” everything down was a way to “help” them develop and build protocols and procedures for handling these things…. Healthcare as a whole, those individuals work best under a set guideline – under routines and standard ops, its not to say they are any less creative people, but creativity flourishes best in a safe and stable environment. By shutting things down, it helped slow thing down a tiny bit to allow them to get a brief moment to build a “do this” and “don’t do this” type of thing – I recall the conversations with them about how several times a day the “protocol” would be changing, and how stressful this made things for them…. now that thing are … all be it less than ideal – but they have been under a rhythm for a bit – so they have a guideline for standard handling of “things” its alot less stressful, and that allows them to be more human – to breath a tiny bit easier. — Their struggles aren’t gone, but there is a minor tad of normality that allows it to feel less stressful. Thats somewhat the same with the rest of us…. working and thriving in our “duck and cover” type of situation.

Its just a wonder to me, to hear about the truly remarkable and creative things people are doing – to “thrive” in these conditions. Its like the times when you walk down the street and you see flowers budding up from the cracks in the sidewalk… finding a way to flourish even in rock hard environments.

While it is a tremendously challenging time to be alive and fighting the big C – its also such an empowering time. Hearing the successes, and the attempts to succeed of others is just my own personal challenge to work harder, and fight harder, to find ways to improve myself, and my environment.

I don’t have alot of resource right now, but I do feel blessed that I’m able to help a little bit in giving random message hugs to my loved ones, both the blood sort and the heart adopted sort.

I watched more of those episodes – Uncomfortable conversations with a black man – Emmanuel Acho is so timely in his message, so much trying to build a solid foundation towards a constructive solution by using the olive branch as a means to connect rather than a means to harm. The latest video was of a family – white parents that had adopted black and interracial children as well as their biological white son. Watching the children – all preteen to young teen age – interact and express their own fears and anxiety for their lives in our world, is both frightening and awe inspiring. These are the reasons that something must be done, its time for all the minor bread crumb steps of the past hundred years to finally resolve into a better world. A world where every human is able to feel safe, healthy and happy. I don’t have ideas about how to make this happen; in my normal fashion I have spent weeks mauling over in my head the angles of this problem. Perpetual visibility seems like the first and foremost solution, so I will continue to ponder, and continue to pray and continue to do my best to not be part of this problem anymore.

I’m pretty excited to have a house guest for the next couple of days, it will be an amazing opportunity to relax and enjoy harmony and reconnection. Plus I always get so excited about having someone to use the guest bed I got for my meditation room. Its only seen two other visitors so far, and I know this poor bed is lonely to have more folks try it out. There maybe something pumpkin in my future, I am just hoping for enough activation energy so that it doesn’t end up being those evil pumpkin muffins from Starbucks, but rather something I mold and craft. Have to build my own pumpkin things so I too can show the best sides of my humanity.

More lyrics from this song today…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhZULM69DIw

Its a good day. I feel happy. Pain is significantly diminished. Part of growing older, is that things make you acutely aware that they too have been growing older. Like the pots and pains as they age get “distinctive” badges of age, so too does my body.

Some days it’s hard to remember that these are — blissfully, happily, bouncing happy to be honest – NOT the big C…. they are just “life” and the pleasures of being alive.

Note to self, hurt and feeling bad can have a million sources, and isn’t it ironic that part of my mind wants to always say “well its just C” – when the beauty, the truly most exciting part is to realize, no its just weather, or pollen, or growing up…. Yeah team! I have made it to being a crotchety old woman!

A month or so back, there was this really cool soap – liquid soap – at my acupuncturist – it was a Dr Bronner’s lavender, and my skin just LOVED this stuff, it smelled incredible, and felt like someone was washing my hands with silk. So I searched it out, and in the process found they have ALOT of flavors of this stuff, not just lavender – so I got a small variety pack to “try them out” and decide if it was really lavender I wanted – I mean they have “rose” — I’ve been working thru these tiny bottles of flavors for some time and man, they are incredible. Everyone is slightly different, and still just yummy feeling and smelling. I don’t know if it makes it easier or more difficult to decide which I want to get in the larger bottle, probably I’ll just end up with the lavender anyway, but its been an interesting experiment and experience to go thru the options – like Rose, Eucalyptus, Unscented, Peppermint, Tea Tree — so many options so many potentials, and probably just going to stay with the first one that peaked my interest….

We watched “DR NO” last night – the first James Bond movie. P and I both agreed we probably hadn’t seen it before – or if we had, both of us were so young so as to not really remember it. Sean Connery so so young – Life was just very very different then. He went to get on a plane – and walked into the airport, and straight up to the gate, and onto the plane… things that will just not happen again. Life changes in the blink of an eye. I remember life before TSA – but I also recognize that it will never exist again.

Makes me aware of the fact that the changes, that we are moving thru now, will eliminate some things or transition them into new things — forever.

Was talking to a friend last night, about how this is a hard time, living, breathing, working thru these transitions is just very very uncomfortable. Most people don’t have tools for change. Its uncomfortable, and they feel the need to share their discontent with everyone as a means of minorly minimizing it – sort of like pouring a pitcher of water into a cookie sheet with sides – sure it doesn’t reduce the water, but the bulk of the pressure is distributed differently – its just right now, there are more people with full pitchers than in many times in history. This is one of those times when everyone is impacted.

I wonder what life was like before the first influenza outbreak – or before the plague. I’d imagine it was a similar thing to now – that some things just changed dramatically and became a way of life forever. We are in one of those times, but never before in my life have I seen so so many people coming together, and being willing to help each other.

That is not to say that “everyone” is doing this… but there are MANY more folks doing this, recognizing that for their own survival that they need the people around them …. than ever before.

There was an article recently about bacteria being able to survive in the vacuum of space for years – if they work together in a community to survive. This is the same thing I’m seeing and feeling from our current situations, I’m seeing more and more of people reaching out and helping each other, recognizing that this is how we all get thru, we give what we have, we take what we need, we talk, we share, we explore, and we learn.

Its really awe inspiring. It makes me think of all the make love not war demonstrations I have seen thru books, heard about thru individuals histories, and learned about thru cultural lore, during the 60s in protest to the vietnam war … but its on a more global scale, and it is impacting everyone. Its like the song, the times they are a changin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqvUz0HrNKY

Everyday I am thankful to be here, to enjoy this pain and discomfort with all of the people I love. Thank you Universe for granting me the strength to survive to experience this dynamic period of BS and discomfort, and to be able to watch the growth, and the power of the human spirit. Awe inspiring, awe inspiring.