“If there is something you see or sense as ‘broken,’ do you, without hesitation, try to ‘fix’ it– do you ‘surround’ it with healing– do you ‘watch and wait’ letting the universe play it out?”

Some will answer they do all three, moving quickly from one mode to another with all things coming into play. We who are “fixers” will rapidly move in to remedy the situation, which often consists of putting a “band-aid” on the broken item or soul, as it may be. But the heart says it is not “fixed” and the problem not solved. So we try to surround it with healing vibes, practical and long-lasting answers that will allow the brokenness to heal itself with a little guidance and compassion. Some things, however, are not remedied with either of the first two options and since the factor of the human heart, or the technology/intricacy of intertwined parts cannot be subject to “fixing,” the last option of watching and waiting for the natural forces of the universe to work it out becomes the most viable option of all. And why? Because of choice.

Two young girls stand washing dishes and drying them. The older of the two is in charge of washing and rinsing the dishes, the younger dries and puts them away. It is boring, mundane, and a chore to be done that neither enjoys. Self-absorbed silence surrounds each girl until the younger, in an effort to break the tedium states, “Two and two is five.” The older girl never looks up and says in a tired and bored voice, “No, it’s not. It’s four.” The retort comes, “It’s five.”

Now the older girl focuses on the younger one. “Don’t be stupid. It is four. Now shut up,” she says. The younger girl, realizing she has hit on something to break the silence, says once again, “It’s five.” The older girl now turns her full attention to the younger, still slowly drying dishes. The plate slips from her hand into the soapy dishwater and her voice gets louder, more strident. “EVERYONE knows two plus two is four. Are you an idiot? Four! Four!” A quiet, gleeful “Five,” comes from the lips of the younger girl. The tension mounts as eyes throw literal fireballs from the older girl to the younger one. A voice comes from somewhere, demanding quiet and that the dishes be done.

Quiet ensues with intense eye rolling, glaring, and the laughing eyes of the younger girl. Phase two begins. The older one trips the younger one to show prowess and power over the initial statement. Now the voice from somewhere is standing behind the two of them, breathing heavily over their heads. Fear of retaliation quiets the anger as each girl goes into survival mode. Obviously, the situation “fixed” itself.

The older girl had no desire to “fix” the misinformation spewed by the younger girl but put an end to it through superior knowledge, size, and age. She did not surround the younger girl with healing vibes but demeaned her, totally affronted by the obvious wrong conclusion of a math problem. But this wasn’t a math error–this was a problem that needed to be fixed (or so the older girl opined) and if she couldn’t “fix” it, she would wipe it out, so to speak. Neither worked, but the Universe stepped in and problem pretty much gone.

Now, the older girl has learned to jump in to fix things if possible. Then use kindness and compassion if that doesn’t work. Lastly, she will regretfully, step back and watch and wait, knowing there is little she can do because it is ultimately a matter of choice of the “broken” as to what will occur.

A rhetorical question, but one we woke up with wondering about. Do you carry band-aids around to try to help? Do you send out surrounding healing vibes? Or do you just watch and wait, trusting the Universe to provide whatever solution? Just asking. And by the way, the incident between the two girls happened over 60 years ago and yet is remembered vividly. That in itself has to be questioned, doesn’t it? Will that one ever be fixed? Shaking my head 🙂

NUMBERS are an integral part of every life on this planet–with maybe the exception of animal and plant life (and that is up for debate when you think about it). It starts when we are very, very young and stays with us to our demise. Personally, words are preferable to numbers in our case, and yet if we don’t adhere to the numbers, we will not make it. Period. The end. Fin.

We passed all math courses on a wing a prayer. How many wings and how many prayers are not important, but some college registrar’s office can tell you–they keep the numbers of all that. And we are guilty of passing this on to our children. We taught them to count pennies as little ones. We laughed when they would not trade in 100 pennies saved for one flimsy piece of paper we told them was worth the same amount. That held true at age four and was abandoned by age five as they realized the absolute truth. Our first grader was going to quit school after she realized this profound and universal truth because in her mind, if she could count high enough to make sure she didn’t get shorted at McDonald’s in her change, math was no longer needed. Besides, she was reading at a fourth grade level so why mess with the boring tedium of school. It was a hard go getting her to continue in school. She had a solid argument, we had to admit. Especially as we observed her peers and others.

We get up by numbers. The alarm goes off. Numbers tell us to fudge for another five minutes or bound out of bed to start the day. We keep count of minutes as we dress, eat, walk out the door. We get in the car to drive a number of miles that take a number of minutes, find a parking place that will take a certain amount of minutes, walk from there to the threshold of the place that will pay us a certain amount for being there. We watch the minutes on the clock so we know when to leave and make the calculated return trip to home. Ahhh…numbers!

We go to work out. A fellow sweater/healthy body personage asks how long we have been participating in this exercise regimen. We are asked how much weight we have lost or gained. What is our BMI? What are our inch losses and gains? Oh, yes! How many times a week do we work out and what in calories and cups and gram weight is our diet? Numbers–always numbers.

Do you have a social security number? A driver’s license? What is your age and do you have a pension plan? Do you have health insurance you can afford? Is your income enough to cover your rent, food, emergencies? What is your bank account number? Do you have a street address or post office box number? How old are you because it matters when you age and can qualify for medicare according to the numbers. Do you file taxes? What is your identifying number on your W-2? When is your date of birth? What time of day and what date did a love one or not-so-loved one expire and leave this world? How much was the funeral or cremation? Do you have a certain amount of life insurance for those left after your demise? How much is their stuff worth as you go through it? Dollar numbers, please, not sentimental value.

You buy a car. Or because yours continually breaks down and the cost (Number of dollars) to repair it now warrants the purchase. What year is it? How long is the warranty good? What kind of gas milage does it get? How much is the insurance? Numbers. Research the numbers.

Cave people dealt with this, too. The animal they killed and dragged in to feed themselves and or their commune is just about gone. Enough for one more meal. Time to go out and kill something else or they’ll face starvation. Peasants had to barter and trade to keep a certain amount of food and pay the king’s tax when he came for it. Settlers would survey their food stock, realize it was low, and have to find a way to replenish it, again, so starvation could be avoided. Enough flour and lard for a couple of more batches of biscuits so better find more. How many children you produce depends on how much help you need to keep that roof over your head and food in the bellies.

Today, we look in the refrigerator and evaluate–numerically. Hmmmm… three eggs left. Can two meals be squeezed out of three eggs? Enough milk for two more regular size glasses, but scrimping will make it three, possibly four. Turn off every appliance not being used to reduce the electric bill. Check if you really need that medicine or not. Numbers count. Numbers not being able to be manipulated or changed lead to homelessness, hunger, illness, desperation. Ahhhh…yes we are ALL math majors in life.

Numbers tell us how many people die in a mass shooting, a war, from a disease. Numbers tell you if you qualify for help, if you are going to survive. Even if you are cushy and without worries, the numbers rule. Think about it. And we are so very sad when the elderly get Alzheimer’s or settle into dementia. What ever will happen to them not knowing what time it is, or what date it is? After all, not knowing who the current president is, the year, the date are precursors to being housed in a nursing home. So sad. But numbers, as valuable as they are to our existence, leave us in a haze of not understanding. We have no clue what a six-figure salary would do for us. It is beyond our comprehension. And the national debt? We were overwhelmed with ignorance at billions and completely agog at trillions of dollars of national debt. Are we alone, here? On a more personal level, there are murders committed every day, mass murders, and the numbers overwhelm and leave us with statistics, not human souls once here and now gone. Remember Nagasaki and Hiroshima? Bombs dropped from a certain height, wiping out a numerous amount of human people and destroying lives, but…again, numbers.

Yes, we are numbers. We live by numbers, willingly or not. We know we are case numbers in every office we have had to be seen in. No, we don’t remember our passwords, can’t give you time frames for much of our lives, but someone, somewhere most assuredly can. So in that respect, we can ignore time, gladly. We will fill out our census form, where we will be counted once again. Whoo hooo! But will we write and make the #1 best sellers list? Probably not. Do we want to? The thought is entertaining but not motivation to slave away making it happen. We can thoroughly enjoy a friend’s success and being number one without having to be number one ourselves. Yes, we are reaching a point of being comfortable with numbers as we go to bed when we are tired, get up when we wake up, caring little for time numbers. We don’t desire mass amounts of money, just a comfortable enough living.

Numbers are often driven by need, and/or ego. Okay. We can live with that. We do enjoy winning two out of three (our weakness) but it won’t keep us up at night if we don’t. We laugh at people that keep track of the “hits” they get on social media, the amount of followers. We have a few dear and cherished friends. That’s cool and we can count on them and that is more than enough for us. So the numbers will tell us who will do what in the future via the process of projection, statistics, etc. But remember, with all the numbers we have, all the numbers we live by and adhere to–it only takes one or two humans to make it all or break it all. Now we will take two questions regarding our blog. (HAHAHAHA)

P.S. only 25 more blogs to go ROTFLMAO

So many things have happened–to all of us. To us as individuals. To our country. To… everyone has been touched in one way or another. Some more than others, some less. But here it will be shared the long-lasting and recurring theme that seems to pop up for everyone. Have we been thrust into an abyss from which there is little return, hope, moral and ethical decency? You may not wonder and know exactly what it all means for you–good or bad. Here the silence will be broken as we relate what it means to us.

We know the church, the government, so very many are corrupt. As it has always been, it always will be. Any sane, thinking person knows this. We think of women in the #metoo movement. They spoke out bravely, pursued justice. A recurring question is asked: “Why didn’t you speak up sooner? How do we know you’re telling the truth now?” Not to blame the questioner here, but this question is coming from white males, generally accused of acts against these women. It is also asked by church leaders and judges. Is that not an answer in itself? We pass their questions off as a weak defense for the actions they have committed against wives, children, the ones they call “sluts” that they bragged about scoring with in high school or college as their dads bragged about their sons’ conquests and the females lived in quiet shame because, after all, they “asked for it.” But what about those too small, too young, too afraid of retaliation in its horrific forms? The answer there would be, “What happens in the family stays in the family.” Or better, “You don’t understand, they really love you so keep your mouth shut.” Or the worst, “God will punish you for saying such nasty things.” And to be fair, is it any matter what age you were, what your station in life was, at the time of assault? No, a violation of one’s body is a horrendous violation regardless. The only thing worse is not being able to speak up or shield oneself. Being called a liar.

And then we take what is going on in our country’s highest office. We have a petulant, vengeful hater who demands retaliation for any who speak out against him. And he gets it. Just today, Lt. Col. Vindman was escorted out of the white house because he obeyed the laws of the land and spoke the truth–whether it was popular or not. Vengeance was sworn by the chief executive and was swift in coming. Our minds immediately were appalled that a man, a MAN, a purple heart patriot, spoke the truth and was slaughtered on the altar “I’ll show you” and he is gone, in a disgraceful and humiliating way. Why don’t women speak up? Look at the MAN who did and what happened. It chills the heart. What more abuse would a woman suffer from the SELF-righteous “pussy grabber”?

We let these things get to us. We do not ignore them. Why? Why not just “do what we can where we are”? Why not just spread kindness and empathy here in our little corner of the world? We try. But at night, the dreams come up of abuse, of being silenced, of retaliation by those in power over a child. It is like living and reliving the trauma over and over again. The fear, the pain, the closed mouth that dare not speak. Speaking and being punished for telling the truth. Then the interminable silence. And it kills us. We watch the retaliation that has begun a few short hours after the chief executive declared himself innocent. The majority of voters did not declare him innocent, he himself did. He spewed vitriol and hate, retaliation and profanity. He went to a prayer breakfast and said he didn’t buy the words of the gospels because they didn’t fit his plan for revenge. NO ONE SAID A WORD. Silence kills. Silence is assent to this galling behavior. And those of us who have been assaulted, attacked, traumatized, watch our worst nightmares we lived through live in this day, right now, on TV and social media. NO ONE SAYS ANYTHING.

Behind closed doors, MEN quake in fear of retaliation, not even thinking of those who will go down with them because of their silence. But NO ONE SAYS A WORD. No one said a word as other dictators with their demands for blind loyalty eliminated one by one those who would espouse truth. Hussein, Idi Amin, Mussolini, Putin, and most famously, Hitler. Paranoia? Not thinking that is reasonable to assume. Muslims are banned from our country. Latinx and others labeled as vermin. Now those members of Congress who stood for truth singled out for “very bad things will happen.” We are on the brink of a wave of genocide which will include anyone not loyal to the chief executive. Hitler did not just target the Jewish people. He targeted political opponents, LGBTQ people, the disabled–anyone he found to be disdainful or a voice for humanity and truth. And then, as now, NO ONE SAID A WORD, NO ONE SAYS A WORD. Children are caged, abused, records are being destroyed detailing the crimes against humanity as this is being written. ICE = GESTOPO. Pedophiles are laughed at, racist and hatemongers receive presidential awards and exoneration. Murderers are pardoned as part of the military. No notes are kept of presidential meetings with foreign operatives such as Putin. Legal requests are denied and the attorney general makes sure the law protects the chief executive above all and at all costs.

Look at what has happened, the lies and self innocence proclaimed, and then ask those that are at the mercy of those who would use the power they own and ask again, “Why didn’t you say something?” Why indeed. Church leaders encourage the patriarchal power. An example: our father served in WWII. He unknowingly followed his cousin across Europe, as his cousin was liberating those detained in concentration camps. When the war was over, the two realized they had always been only kilometers apart toward the end of the war. When asked by one of their elders what it was like liberating the detainees, both were silent. The cousin said, “It was unimaginable horror. I never want to see or talk of it again.” He cried and the father and his cousin shared a moment of horrifying remembrances of what they had seen without ever saying a word aloud. Later in life, our family was dining with the Southern Baptist preacher of our church in the San Joaquin Valley. The Watts Riots were on television. The dad and the preacher sat watching and the dad said, “You know there’s a cure for that. Just get out a machine gun and mow them niggers down.” The preacher NEVER SAID A WORD. Watching this, hearing this, our stomach churned and we had to run to the bathroom. A man who could not stomach what had happened in WWII was more than willing to watch it happen here in the USA. Not 200 miles away. We said goodbye after we threw up and walked home. We NEVER SAID A WORD.

So as we think about what has happened in the past weeks, over the time the chief executive has been in office, we reach out to all those traumatized in the past, now, and possibly in the future. We exhort you to SPEAK UP AND SPEAK UP. Our silence will kill us as surely as will this dictator. We must protect each other, those who still have no voice. Please help end the trauma, the revenge, the silence. Look at the people you love around you. It doesn’t matter what political party they belong to, they are still the people you love. Protect them. Be their voice if they cannot speak. Stop the pain, the hate, the foreseeable genocide of a free USA. Stand and SPEAK.

SILENCE KILLS

The djinns are loose today,

those djinns that steal the unsuspecting souls.

They taunt, they laugh, the play in the open–

rolling empty trashcans down a street,

pushing doors not quite shut open wide.

Chairs bang as they roll around, unfettered, unweighted.

Wind chimes play, then are banging against unseen forces,

heralding the power of the djinns.

Children watch from behind windows,

looking for reassurance from the adults that

warned of djinns and misdeeds.

Afternoon light lets some solace come to wondering souls

if this is their day of reckoning.

But if the djinns are still ravaging and raging with the dark,

is anyone safe?

Will anyone notice the snatched soul

that is taken in the dark, in the bed, from under the covers?

Is is just the children who are wary, becoming afraid?

Or are the adults who fostered the “fairy-tale”

just a little bit ill at ease, too?

Is there any safe place for anyone?

They tread silently,

their feet make no noise.

The bunnies and Logan are aware

but no footfalls betrayed them to each other.

The falcon flies above, searching

and silently surveys all.

The roos and bears look for homes

burned away, silently, noiselessly.

Ocean giants beach themselves,

stomachs full of plastic, trash–

silently, dying.

Unwanted dogs, cats euthanized,

silently crossing into the meadow.

Humans speak, expound,

pie-crust promises for the silent ones,

arguing, wailing, useless.

The silent have no dollars,

no voice to buy their lives.

Silently they tread

toward death and extinction.

Stasis can kill–

Or allow the seed of growth to germinate…

Don’t rattle the bones or thoughts.

Let the heart be quiet.

Even a roiling ocean

knows how to be placid.

He wears no mask–no need to smile,

just opens his mouth, waves his little hands;

they hang onto his angry words.

Defamation, lies, denying words said before,

he no longer needs a mask.

Those who have been prey-now wanting to be predators-

hang onto his promises, angry words directing hate.

They cheer to the sound of his lies, shushing consciences,

denying the culture of caring and kindness.

No lie is too outrageous, no blame too vile

as heroes, warriors of truth, are slandered and threatened.

He wears no mask–doesn’t pretend to care.

An ego so fragile, borne of incompetence, fear of ridicule,

dullness of mind responds with bullying, intimidation–

And the prey follow to become the predators.

It is sad, but evil will only wear a mask until it is accepted,

And the faithful watchdogs, sent to protect them,

save them from themselves, cannot corral the wanton sheep.

He wears no mask, calling for violence, expanding his realm

and evil knows no bounds as widows, children, those not white,

the poor–the vulnerable— fall, in pain, astounded at the vitriol

aimed at themselves when all they want is peace and kindness.

But they have spirit, power, united hope and strength.

He will have to wear the mask to avoid their combined wrath.

He will have to pretend at repentance, asking forgiveness.

But he has prowled without the mask too long.

Without the mask, all can see the spirit.

The time has come to see, acknowledge, remove the hater.

He does not wear a mask because it is accepted he is evil.

The prey who would be predators will fall beneath his heel

as the watchdogs encircle and save them before he can ground them into dust.

He wears no mask.

Believe what you see.

Rip off your mask and be the good

to counter the unmasked evil.

“Hey, Jeffy! What ya doin’?”

“Gonna get a turkey for Thanksgiving. Now shut up or go away!”

“You can’t get no turkey! You’re wacko!”

Jeffy, lying motionless, rolls his eyes and whispers, “I said shut up or go away, Nuff!”

Nuff, seven years old and full of energy and orneriness, plops down nosily beside twelve year old Jeffy who is trying to prove his true manhood by bringing in Thanksgiving dinner.

“How long ya been here?” Nuff questions.

Through gritted teeth, Jeffy whispers, “Shut up or I’ll kill you for dinner!”

Nuff shrugs, unimpressed but curious enough to be quiet and stay. The two boys didn’t move, even Nuff, trying to spy their prey. Yes, there was motion in front of them, but no turkey. Jeffy was determined and in for the long haul, while Nuff was simply passing time with him because there was nothing better to do. Then, “Hi, guys,” a soft voice says. Jeffy turns slowly to see who is there as Nuff breaks the quiet by saying loudly, “Hi, Tessie! We’re gonna get a turkey for dinner today!” Tessie smiles as Jeffy says, “Not we moron! ME!”

She puts her finger up to her lips, signaling Nuff to be quiet. He nods and turns back to watching as Tessie silently positions herself with the two boys and also starts watching. Jeffy looks over at her, almost smiles, and nods she is welcome. Tessie smiles back and the three of them wait. Pretty soon, another voice is heard. “Whaaaat yyyyou ddddoin’?”

All eyes turn to see four year old Tinker and everyone smiles. Tessie, at seven, “mothers” Tinker, and obviously he had missed her and gone searching. She whispers to him, “Jeffy is going to get us a turkey for today’s Thanksgiving dinner. Isn’t that great? Won’t that make Bonnie happy to have a turkey Jeffy got to cook for all of us?” Tinker nods enthusiastically. Tessie pats the ground beside her and he creeps in to lie quietly with all of them.

Time passes and Nuff sits up, declaring, “This is boring!” in a voice that shatters the silence and concentration of the others. This time, Jeffy turns and reaching up, claps his hand over Nuff’s mouth. “I told you to shut up or go away! Only you are making noise. You’re gonna ruin it! Now what ya gonna do? Stay here and shut your trap or go?” Jeffy demanded in a fierce whisper.

Nuff’s eyes glared at Jeffy over the hand covering his mouth. He started to get up, but Tessie stopped him, pulling him back down. “Just think! You could see Jeffy get a turkey. With your own eyes! Right here! And you could tell everybody all about it! Wouldn’t you be #1 for awhile! Are you willing to miss this?” Nuff thought it over, knowing Tessie was right. He would be the center of attention and he could tell the story over and over and…he quietly got down on his stomach to watch again, throwing Jeffy dirty looks.

Well, time passes and where they had been in sunlight when they started, now it was getting dark. Nuff and Tinker were dozing, Jeffy was looking desperate, and Tessie? She just stayed vigilant and kept watching, showing her belief in Jeffy’s quest and that he would most surely get a turkey. Suddenly a voice boomed behind them. It was Daniel, the patriarch. “What the hell are you guys doing?” he demanded.

Jeffy and Tessie started explaining, both filling in details for the other. Daniel laughed loudly and shook his head. Tinker looked scared and Nuff knew better than to be a pain around Daniel. Daniel walked around their prone bodies and stood in front of them. “Marlin Perkins is not going to deliver a turkey to you through the TV you little numbskulls. The wild animal show is over! You’ve been watching that TV for over 3 hours! What is wrong with you guys? Get up! Put your toy rifle away, Jeff! You guys go help Bonnie with dinner! NOW!”

All got up, Jeffy looking dejected. Nuff commenting about how stupid Jeffy was. Tessie taking Jeffy’s hand to comfort him, Tinker trying to disappear under Daniel’s penetrating gaze. Into the kitchen they traipsed and Bonnie, seeing the sad kiddos coming in, gave each a bear hug and assigned each something to do. She did pull Jeffy and Tessie aside, though, to say quietly, “Maybe next year, okay? And Jeffy? You can always go to the store with me to buy a turkey if we have to. Believe me, it is as hard to fight off the people to get one as it is to shoot one in the wilderness!”

Jeffy and Tessie smiled, Jeffy hugged Bonnie through his tears of shame and disappointment and said, “Next year. Promise.”

How do we handle the pain of others? We absorb it. We hurt. We get ill. We try not to. We know our hurting for them will not cure them, heal them. But maybe it will take some of their pain and ease them just a little? We hope so. We pray so.

We do not pray for a cure. We know we have no control in that way. We do not pray for them to be released from this life of their deep searing pain, be it physical or mental or emotional. We are aware, KNOW, that their life is to be lived–or not–according to their choices, their purpose now. But we feel it. It becomes a part of us, reaching into our deepest essence. No matter what we do, they are the navigator, the captain, of their life, their end, their destiny. Yes, some things happen out of everyone’s control, but we do not grieve for those happenings. They occur sometimes because of others’ choices, simple happenstances.

Realizing another’s pain, feeling it, is not always our choice. We would like to be sympathetic, without having to be empathetic. But that is not how we are wired when someone we see hurting, someone we love, looks at us, connects spirit to spirit. Something in us suddenly is there, with them, a part of them, knowing on a level we do not understand that this is more–so much more than they can carry alone. And so, we let it come to us, come in us, to say, without words, we are here–we are with you–you are not alone. When that happens, between them and us, no words need to be spoken. Hearts, eyes, say all that is needed. Then, then is when we hope they feel the pain less, and the love we want to impart.

One on one, we can touch gently, without holding, a simple connection. In the greater world, the world “out there,” we can try to do something like make sandwiches for the homeless and distribute them, donate blankets to the abandoned or lost animals in the shelter, write letters to change policies that harm people to the people who have the power to change the policies. We can conquer hateful rhetoric by expressing loving words, acting in kind ways, making someone we will never see again smile. It is small, but maybe they will pass on a moment of kindness, a smile, share hope for goodness. That is called doing what you can and where you can, knowing the world cannot be swayed by you alone, but holding onto the hope that combined kindnesses and caring will have that ripple effect until it becomes the change the world needs to fight hate and greed that hurt so many.

We saw our friend, traveled because our spirit felt the need to connect, let him know we cared. He yelled out he wanted to die. The cancer in his bones, his back, is excruciating. He’s considered old, in his 80s. He is a veteran, a father, a grandfather, a good friend–OUR FRIEND. The pain clouds his mind, his age adds to it, the fall he took yet again affects his mind. But when we said, “I love you,” his eyes became clear, looked into ours. He reached for our hand, we quickly took his. He pulled us close, with more strength than was normal. We told him our mutual friend sent her love also. His hand clutched ours tightly as those eyes suddenly knew us, understood. We sent as much strength as our souls had into that hand holding onto ours, as much love as we had without reservation, and opened our eyes to welcome his gaze, his understanding. In that brief, suspended moment in time, long, long, and yet so very short to others, to the world of time, we were one in spirit. Then he left us. He pushed us away with as much force as he’d pulled us close. His hand waved us away. He talked then, almost yelled, to another force, spirit, in the room. Still connected to him, we could feel with an intenseness so strong as to not be denied, the one spirit he spoke to. He begged her to take him, release him from his pain, from this world. The sudden darkness we FELT, the hovering, listening presence was hearing him. We were not afraid even though we knew she was Death, come to listen to him. We waited, listening to him and knowing it was between them. He cried out in pain, we felt the pain, and a nurse walked in. The time of connection with all was gone. We were asked to leave due to his agitation. We went back into his field of vision, kissed his forehead, as his tears wet our cheek from the pain. Again, we told him we loved him, waited. He waved us away once more. We said goodbye, knowing this was now between him and the spirit.

Our stomach roiled, we had to find a bathroom and quickly. Once there, the pain we had absorbed from him was wretched from us as we vomited and vomited. It hurt to get rid of it, but at least some of it we had taken from him was now hurtling down the toilet bowl. It was a relief for us, and we hope, for him. But what we had seen, experienced, will never be able to be expelled.

This happens to us. It is part of us. We have tried to reason it away, rationalize it, steel ourselves against the pain of others so we do not become ill, so we do not think and traverse planes of space and time to be with them over and over. We continue to feel them after we are no longer in their physical presence. We cannot block this. We have no boundaries we can establish to protect ourselves. Sometimes, the more we connect, the more we allow others to enter our sphere, we want to say, “We do not want to be your damned conduit! Your life is your own. Ours is ours. DON’T COME TO US! DON’T ENTER US!” But we cannot. We cannot block, set boundaries, back away, walk away. Our hearts open, let them in, and we cry and feel pain with them and for them. Yes, it is a detriment to our body physically as we get ill. Yes, we can’t help others if we do not take care of ourselves. Yes, yes, yes! WE KNOW! And without thinking, as an immediate reaction, not response, we empathize immediately. We feel, absorb, ache immediately. Without thinking, without taking time to observe or logically evaluate, we open us, our souls, wide open and share, connect.

Are we wrong? Probably on the spectrum, continuum, overall–we are. And maybe in the next life, we will not be so sensitive, so open. But today–today we will hang onto the look in our friend’s eyes when we connected and he knew us, without words, and felt free to reach to the spirit that could help him. If we helped, in any way, any way at all, it was good.

Wallace Stegner, author, wrote, “…it is a reduction of our humanity to hide from pain–our own or others.” We think he was right, but that is us.

Once upon a time,

a long long time ago,

there was a little girl.

Her age isn’t important, you know?

She climbed trees,

she busted walls,

waiting for the day

she would get big and tall.

She bided her time,

planning and plotting, you see,

for the day SHE would set the rules

and have adults bend the knee.

Days, months, and years passed

and she stayed the same age.

The body had grown,

but not her–only her rage.

She tried and she tried to get bigger,

but she just couldn’t grow.

Then one day her mama told her,

“I love you just like you are, don’t you know?”

So the little girl smiled,

she’d rather be loved.

But told her mama that some day,

she’d be a fire-breathing dragon, flying above.

They laughed together,

and inside the little girl smiled.

She had a dragon inside her–

she could wait awhile.