See you September

Thank you for the ride, September. Thank you for the thrills and chills, the highs and very lows. I am grateful and happy I lived through another birthday. The bittersweetness of a birthday without twin brother Mark physically around is on my mind actually all month and often throughout the year for many reasons, seasons, sports, news and weather updates, the laughter, loyalty and love.

Life goes on for 
those still living even though the mysteries of death, the why's and when loved ones transition into another existance is an age old heart aching experience shared by the living and the dead as well. 

LIfe or Death

 

Born to live, love, experience life every moment through crystal clear times when one thing leads to the other in sync with everything accordingly. There is a rhythm, structure, a set path before you. A predictable schedule, commitments and appointments. Then there are days when the view is blurred, things do not make sense and seem to be out of whack. You get on with it anyway and hope things work out and become clear and managable. Tides turn in surprising directions and we respond in kind armed with common sense and the hope and faith in better things to come.

For all of lifes certainties there are times we do not see coming like the death of a loved one. We are shocked when one day we are lunching and laughing, appreciating eachothers company and the next week you receive a call a seemingly ordinary friendly, loving call describing an intense medical diagnosis and bleak prognosis. You begin to realize the loved-one is trying to tell you their days are limited beyond ways we could have predicted. The pain is a blunt force to the head and heart. 

Word from a close family member leaves you numb as notification of the passing of our loved one sends shock waves over you like a tsunami of pain and disbelief. Is it more bearable to be prepared for the death of a loved one or is it somehow less painful to be blindsided by death. Either way, the death of a longstanding friend, a sister from another mother, is as sad and heart whenching as the satisfaction of knowing you shared so much life with such a special person. 🕊

Wonder

To maintain the wonderful sense of wonder through the years, through the times when we do not feel much like wondering what, why, where and how unless those questions are a matter of life and death. Maybe we simply get complacent, bored, jaded or luke-warm about life the world at large and it's many wonderous people, places and things. To maintain that magical wonder of youth at any age seems to be the key to staying young at heart rather than developing a particular blindness, tone-deafness or disensitivy to the savory and sweetness,  surrounding us.

I wonder how people get along in life without faith in something more than what is seen on this earthly plane. I wonder why animals do not talk and maybe grateful they don't except with their eyes, hearts and souls. I wonder why things like how people everywhere, are not cared for with more equality and respect. I wonder how the earth and all of its inhabitants came into existence among the vastness of the universe. 
I wonder how gravity, astronomy, physics, science and art operates and does the amazing mind-expanding things each  does. 

Where, when, who started it all? My faith in the author and creator of life answers some questions with broad strokes and sometimes with detailed information. Still, I wonder about the intricate nature of things and the dynamics involved but I am satisfied and at peace with the understanding that some questions will remain unanswered and the mysteries and wonders of life will go on.

Spiritual Dwelling

The business of death and dying is tricky business, death is tough on the emotions and involves core feelings, gut wrenching, reality-checking things. The finality of death can leave loved one's weary, winded, in shock, kind of numb and overwhelmed with grief.

Many fascinating aspects of death, the manner in which one die's, the age and other circumstances surrounding a death can have much bearing on the degree of mourning that takes place.

When the last breath of life is exhaled, the first breath in heaven, is inhaled- this is something I heard at a funaral years ago right around the time I most needed to hear it. It is an idea that I find very comforting, when there is a death that is close to me.

Mysteries prevail, as well as my faith in the presence of ultimate goodness, sacredness, life giving, spirit lifting perfection, a spiritual dwelling beyond human limitations and understanding.

Memories

Memories come alive and take over the present moment. In an instant a thought turns into a scene from the past, flashbacks tug on your heartstrings and leave you yearning for more of those moments we wanted to last forever, like the people who have preceeded us in death and whom we love so dearly, still ~

¡Feliz Dia de Los Muertos!

Death can be so dark, so painful to let go, to accept the death of a loved one, of people who seem to be taken from life too soon or whose life has simply run it's course. ~ FAITH in something beyond the limits of this magnificent, vulnerable world reach much further than our limited scope reveals. To see the light in the darkness of death means to celebrate the spirits of the dearly departed.  Death takes on a special light, glows happily in celebration of the dead- the flame flickers from candles and dances merrily along, acknowledging and remembering the dead now and the lives they lived, the love that remains and is still part of the living, and taken to heart by those who wish to connect with the dead. From the sorrow surrounding death, the grief and harsh reality of the disconnection, stark and cold, so final and black to looking through the lens of Mexicans who say; "Si!" ♥ ¡Feliz Dia de Los Muertos!!! y Dios nos bendiga a todos, los muertos y los vivos! God Bless us all, the dead and the living. ~                

Mary Ellen Mark talks about Vivian Maier