Call Me Mom

Sunday was one of those magical days. I have decided to choose it as my Mother’s Day this year since that day has proven to be a bit tricky for me. Three years ago my mother died on Mother’s Day after a long battle with Alzheimer’s. It somehow seemed very fitting and appropriate for it was her time to go. She had endured a long battle with the big A and thankfully she went peacefully in her sleep before the rest of her body deteriorated slowly and painfully.

Two years ago my son (at almost 16) picked Mother’s Day (MD) weekend to disappear from our home. We did not hear from him for several days and it was an agonizing time. Last year while attending a dear friend’s memorial service in Prescott, AZ, we got the call that again MD had been marred. Our son had been arrested and was being held in the county jail. So, you see, it seems like a good idea for me to designate my own Mother’s Day. In fact, it helps to do it this way so fate cannot spoil a day that does not yet exist if it is not named until after it has already happened. So I choose yesterday.

It was a glorious sunny day which has been rare here this year. I delighted in spending some time snuggled up in bed with my books and pen and paper. The afternoon included watching my daughter play soccer—one of my absolute favorite things.

After the game we picked up our boy and had a wonderful lunch as a family—something we have not done since he moved out of the house in early January. He looked good and healthy and actually seemed glad to be with us. We went to a Mexican restaurant where the service was slow, the food was mediocre, but the conversation flowed like fresh water. My favorite part, of course, was a bit of laughter and watching J’s million dollar smile spread across his face.

I loved being with my whole family. They are beautiful, amazing and definitely individual people. After lunch, we dropped J off, took M to a friend’s house and came home for the afternoon. I then experienced the icing on the cake for a Sunday. I curled up like a cat, purred in the sunshine and took the Sabbath seriously with a dead-to-the-world, good old-fashioned nap. Ahhh. What could be better?

So, I declare yesterday my Mother’s Day. I’m not sure I could ask for much more. Today I share my anniversary of 20 years with a wonderful man, my children are safe and healthy, I feel rested and at peace, there are flowers blooming outside and fresh tulips in my kitchen and yesterday God shined his light on me. Call me Crazy. Call me Simple. Or, how about this?—Call me Mom.

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Refusal to Journey

“The refusal to begin our journey doesn’t keep us from having one.” Julia Cameron The Sound of Paper

“Where are you at?” is the question posed in today’s reading by Julia Cameron. I am sitting in my bed on a Sunday morning once again contemplating whether or not to go to church. What is church anyway? It feels pretty holy here in my bed surrounded by my books, a candle lit, silence allowing for thoughts and meditation. But I digress. Where am I? I am sitting in the middle of my life. A life that has been full but at times has felt wasted, especially now that I see the potential and am open to the joy and expanse around me. But, you can’t go back and honestly I do not have regrets; for every moment has brought me to be the woman I am today. So, where am I?

The most present thought is that I have a month before me more open and waiting than I have had in a long time. I have finished my work at the graduate school for the year and I do not have a Soltura trip planned until the end of the month. The possibilities are wide open. So what shall I do? My writing instructor has suggested I send a piece to a couple of places for publication. Terrifying! Rejection looms on the horizon. Cameron says, “It is not the start, it is the finish that troubles us.” If I do not move, however, I may miss out not only on rejection, but on the possibility of success. This feels like when I considered returning to school a few of years ago. What if I could not do it? And, yet here I sit a full year after graduation, diploma in hand.

What do I fear? Missing out on something? Being hurt? Rejection? Those old words of ‘not good enough’ rattle around inside me. The conversation is running in my head. If you don’t start, how can you finish? If you don’t try, how will you ever know what you are capable of? If you don’t submit an article, how can it ever be published? Can I practice what I preach? I wrote just yesterday to Antony that “I don't think "calling" is past its time until we are toes up in the tulips.” So, if writing is my calling (at least for today), I guess I better keep at it.

So, one last look at the question “where am I?” I am sitting with the month of May before me. I am excited to have some space and time to reflect, to garden, to hang out with my family and maybe even to write a little and, even riskier, put a few writings out there for consideration. Whew!

After all, the journey will happen whether I think I’ve started down the road or not.

Common Cup

Although I have not been on the bus for a few days, the riders have continued to stay with me. A friend of mine e-mailed and said, “Based on the people you meet, have you considered taking another route?” I think his words were tongue in cheek, however, my immediate response was, “No way! These are my people.”

I find poetry much like the lingering images of my bus rides. I don’t necessarily understand what is being communicated, but the words and thoughts stay with me throughout my thoughts and dreams.

Two writings have been mingling in my mind for the last day or so that I would like to share here. The first are words from Sunrise Sister in response to “Chinese on the Bus.” The next is a poem from Elizabeth Barrett Brownings’, Sonnets from the Portuguese.

“The Chinese man - so willing to really, or even kiddingly, offer you a drink from a "common cup" - I, too, reach for the spiritual presence of God in each meeting. Are we more likely to share the "common cup" with a stranger than a person we "think" we know? Does the other person drink often from a "common cup" - making him eager to share the experience of communion with others?” – Sunrise Sister

“The face of all the world is changed, I think,
Since first I heard the footsteps of thy soul
Move still, oh, still, beside me, as they stole
Betwixt me and the dreadful outer brink
Of obvious death, where I, who thought to sink,
Was caught up into love, and taught the whole
Of life in a new rhythm. The cup of dole
God gave for baptism, I am fain to drink,
And praise its sweetness, Sweet, with thee anear.
The names of country, heaven, are changed away
For where thou art or shalt be, there or here;
And this…this lute and song…loved yesterday,
(The singing angels know) are only dear
Because they name moves right in what they say.”

--Elizabeth Barrett Browning

From what cup shall I choose to drink today? How about you?

Bandito on the Bus

Riding the bus exhibits an infinite clash of cultures and gives the imagination an opportunity to run wild. On this ride I was seated near the back of the bus just behind the rear door. It was slightly later than the normal rush hour ride. At one of the first stops, three young women (teenagers, no doubt) boarded and were all giggles and conversation. They reminded me so much of my daughter and her friends except that their heads were wrapped in colorful scarves, they glittered with lots of silver dangling jewelry and rapidly spoke in a foreign language. I wondered about their nationality and smiled to consider that teenage girls are teenage girls regardless of their birthplace.

Soon, they exited the spot where they had blocked my view of a man I have fondly dubbed the “bandito.” He was straight out of a spaghetti western with his swarthy good looks and clothes of black. Instead of cowboy boots, he wore heavy black shoes that were firmly placed across the empty seat beside him. The seat faced the back door of the bus and put him at a great vantage point for me to observe.

There was nothing particularly remarkable about his behavior until the bus started to fill and he nonchalantly, yet quite defiantly, kept his leg across the seat. Dressed in black jeans and a black coat with a grey hoodie underneath, he sat and cleaned his teeth with the corner of a matchbook. He did not look up and no one seemed to even consider asking him to move his foot. There were no available seats and soon two young men stood in the stairwell by the door. One had a military haircut and a canvas computer bag slung across his body. The other had longish hair and wore the typical accessory of many riders—headphones—on his ears. Both looked like they were heading to work downtown. The bandito lazily pulled tobacco out of his pocket and rolled his own cigarette as others stood around him. He mumbled to himself that the bus driver had called a stop the Garfield Bridge rather than the Garfield “Street” Bridge and it really seemed to annoy him. He appeared very attuned to what was going on around him while at the same time being totally in his own world.

Finally another man came back toward the empty seat. He also had weather worn skin and wore long dreadlocks covered with a navy bandanna. His hands and fingers were covered with tattoos and it was hard to say whether he was going to work or possibly to one of the homeless missions downtown. Interestingly enough, the bandito looked up, nodded toward the empty seat and removed his foot so this man could sit down. They shared a few words (again something about the bus driver’s inability to name stops correctly) and then the dreadlock man exited at which point Bandito firmly planted his foot back across the seat.

It was such a curious interaction to observe. Shortly after his seat partner left, Bandito glanced around (I obviously was not in his direct line of vision) and pulled a very tall can of cheap beer from his pocket, popped the top and began to take covert sips between stops. I found myself wondering who he was, why he would choose to let one person sit by him and not others. Was he really defiant, oblivious or possibly just uncomfortable? I considered whether prejudice might play a role and finally I mused about what would lead him to sneak drinks of beer on a bus at 9:30 in the morning. Who was this mystery man? Was he as surly and self-confident as he appeared? Or was he just one more lonely person trying his best to make it through the day?

Today I will close with this lovely prayer from Christine that speaks well to my bus riding experiences.

"Pray for Peace"

"Then pray to the bus driver who takes you to work.
On the bus, pray for everyone riding that bus,
for everyone riding buses all over the world.
Drop some silver and pray." -- Ellen Bass