About Seeing the Light....

‎"We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light." ~~Plato
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This phrase has been on my mind all week...as I watch Paul Ryan try to deny care to the elderly and Cantor hold Joplin hostage for disaster aid ...I keep thinking....What and who did not teach them how to see the Light....to have compassion...
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( and yes, this is my little piece of Heaven....where I ponder these things...everyone should be able to have even a little garden...an oasis to ponder such things....)

Sick One at the Door....

[Click the Title: Sarah McLaughlin "Arms of an Angel"]

Late one night this weekend a sick emaciated cat arrived at our door. People always think that nurses have Vet training, we have had many sick critters arrive at odd hours.( Here is the short list, all kinds of rabbits, a pregnant Skink, a chicken with a head injury, a turtle that suffered a bad meeting with a garbage disposal, a three legged hedge hog and on and on). My big manchild of a son, 6-6, carried the wounded slip of a creature up to his room and made her a bed . I had had her in a carrier with towels and blankets, I recieved a scowl and a lecture on my"bedside manners". There has been much scurrying and sleeplessness, caring for this little damaged creature, warm milk, kitten food, water sweetened with gatorade. The 7 pounds of skin and bones and sunken eyes ; I know she will be tended and loved and fluffed and fattened in no time. By 5am this morning my son announced she had a name, Violet.

But what struck me was that when the cat was brought to us, my first thought was let this be Something that I can handle because there is no money for vets and fancy drugs and treatments.It is the same emotion that floods me and my neighbors when someone is sick, because so few of us have insurance. And the other emotion that flooded me was that someone abandoned this creature left it to fend for itself, no food or water, no protection. And I found myself flooded with more emotion, as aren't we all abandoned at this point....on our own to take care of our own. There have been no signs and no one looking for this little creature...She has been discarded, set adrift in a world that she can not navigate. No one should be set adrift.

I see that President Clinton has written a book called" Giving". I am struck that the book might need a Primer, called Caring. I worry that we are losing our Compassion , our ability to Care. And people that do not Care certainly do not Give, This Regime has certainly schooled us on Abandonment. And people that do not care or give, do things like Discard those that are Most Vulnerable.

Violet is asleep in my son's favorite chair, and Xena our Elderly Princess Cat has walked by with looks of disdain , and Yellow Dog has nervously checked on the wounded cat every few hours, and now is asleep like the exhausted nurse that she is...

So my apologies for light blogging this weekend, we were tending a Little Life.

Hard Times, Painful Lessons

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"I have come to believe, over and over again, that what is important to me , must be spoken, made verbal and shared even at risk of having it bruised or misunderstood. "
Audre Lorde
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There are times in your life when you need to sit down with an older wiser soul and be handed a cup of very strong tea and some strong wisdom.And this summer, I am indeed at such a point....and I stumbled onto this quote and it suddenly put many things in perspective. As a mom I try hard to teach my son that his words and beliefs are valuable. As a mother I also have taught him sadly there are times you do have to stand up for what you believe, as well as know that there may indeed be consequences.And yes, sometimes the consequences are painful. We study and read alot of Ghandi, Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King,because they were the Masters of Troubled Times. They were the ones that knew when and how to speak and how to say what needed to be said. We have have no such Voices today to Lead or Guide us through these Dark Times.

Alot has to do with the Times that we are living in , Bullying has become a respected "Art Form". And bullying of women,minorities and people that are suffering is condoned and often even embraced with glib pride. Elizabeth Edwards attempted to explain this on Hardball to Chris Matthews a few monthes back as she battled Ann Coulter. She tried to explain to Chris that the Battle is that we live in a Culture where Certain People have empowered themselve with Hate. And I heard her loud and clear, it is dissappointing that we even are seeing it in the Progressive Side of Life. We need to be able to look at each other with eyes of compassion, not judgement.

I have had all parts of My Being called into question this year, and not just by Repugs. A Neighbor, a liberal informed me that my pacifist Buddhist side was not helpful in fighting this Regime, and this was told to me with a great degree of Anger. I was stunned. And she also went on to condemn me as an 'inadequate protestor", because I do not go to rallies or protests, the "Ones that Matter, the BIG Ones." I tried to explain that Not all people can go due to Health reasons or Financial, but that there are many that find other way to help Bring Change. I told her that it will take all of us finding our own abilites and gifts to make the Needed Changes happen. We all need to look in the Mirror and see who we are again, and that we are no better or worse than our neighbor.Yet we all are suffering and struggling.

We are indeed in hard times you can be called into question for being too "liberal" or not "liberal" enough. Or if you raise Concerns and your "Motives" can be questioned by people that you thought were on the same path. This is concerning and yet I think this is what the Bushco Regime wants, chaos on the playground. They want People not able to play or work together, because they are too busy looking and judging the Differences and not embracing What we all have to Work For or Towards. Divisions Created by the Cultural Shift created by this Greedy Regime. We must Embrace What Matters again, listening to each other, taking the time to find Empathy and Compassion.

My Grandmother used to say "Pick Your Battles", and pick them carefully, and you can "fight with words, but you don't always have to yell, you can speak softly and sometimes you can say nothing at all ....As long as you are true to yourself and what matters". All of us have been on a Hellish Path this past 6 years. But somehow we do have to find a way to Walk Together Again. Unity is about having enough empathy to know that we need to navigate the treacherous path together and not judge each other's shoes or trekking skills. And I say this because we have Miles to go....

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[Please Click the TITLE it is Bono &MJ Blige again "ONE", it is a song about "Unity" Listen Very Carefully to MJ's Part it is Powerful]