Ripples in the water

Isn’t it fascinating how ripples in a body of water work? This was an inlet so it wasn’t a pond or contained body of water and caused by the wind ,not a rock or pebble tossed in , but it is still ripples. I am constantly amazed by people in this world of ours who do not grasp the simple concept of ripples in a pond. They think, ” I can throw this pebble in that pond and it will go straight down and only affect the trajectory it took and the water under it, I don’t have to worry about anything else!” .Those ripples start and grow until the whole pond is affected and the ripples reach the waters edge. A lot of us are guilty of tossing a rock in and walking away thinking it did no harm and it might not have ,till the ripples reached the shore and upset  a fish or frog laying eggs or a kid in a boat caught off guard by the gentle rocking of the boat and falling overboard. Yes,that might be reaching a bit but metaphorically in life, we all do it, I’ve been guilty myself,never setting out to deliberately hurt anyone with my “ripple maker” but harm was done anyway. As humans ,we can’t go through life never tossing a “pebble” but we can try and think about the “ripples” that come from our throw and minimize the negative reactions and encourage the positive ones. ” Don’t get me wrong, I’m not just talking about a careless comment, I’m talking about life in general,everything we do does affect something or someone else. If we strike for a raise  well that money has to come from somewhere,if we vote with our emotions or traditions instead of our minds and common sense ,well,we have to deal with what happens if we’re wrong. I’ve never been able to understand those who have been discriminated against, turning around and doing it to someone else because they know how it feels,why do the same to someone else for that makes you just as bad as the one who originally discriminated against you ! I know, I’m not perfect but  life has taught me as I have gotten older ,that even the wisest among us, tosses a “pebble” without thinking from time to time so now that I have totally confused you, all I’m asking is a little common sense and thinking outside your own little world. True tolerance does not mean that the only good people in your life are the ones who believe precisely as you do and going to extremes in anything usually only leads to disaster! Remember the “ripples” and think as you walk along as to whether or not, that “pebble” really needs to be thrown.

Oh, to be beside the sea

 I bet you thought this would be another poem or cute beginning to another story but alas, it is only a “Whine” with very little cheese to be seen. I have fallen victim to the “Incredible Creeping Crud” aka a bad cold and since my Muse who is also stricken refuses to rise from her imaginary sick bed(muses are fictional people, get real!) , this is a creative as my ordinary fevered mind can come up with. As I hack and moan and groan and wipe my nose (thank you Kleenex!) , my ability to … uh,… see, how dry I am of literary genius right now.? Oh to be beside the silver sea and   sit my weary body down in the ocean and …oh heck, I’ll be back later when I am well and that imaginary Muse starts doing her job again!

Pondering possibilities

Perhaps , just perhaps sometimes, people are placed in our pathways to make us think or amuse us or just add an element of possibility at a moment when we can’t see beyond the end of our own noses, the infinite world out in front of us. We’re on a journey through life and for the most  part, we’re solitary travelers even in crowds of people but sometimes we connect with someone and we have a hand to help us over the hurdles our journey puts in our path. Some of us are lucky and wise enough to hold on to that person with all their heart and the journey becomes much less lonely but ,in my case, I am still looking for my travel partner. Someone asked me if I could go anywhere in the world i wanted ,would I go by myself and I said no. To me, seeing a new place or a wonderful sight, calls for a companion to turn to and say ,” Isn’t that amazing?” or ” How beautiful that is!” and sharing the treasure with another person. That’s not to say that I don’t enjoy some time spent being solitary but as fascinating as I may think I am, even Me gets bored with Myself and I from time to time.Opening oneself up to a possibility of a relationship means taking a chance on getting hurt and once you have been, doing it again is petrifying . I hear over and over how people once they started loving being single, found their true love ,well, if they truly loved being single, they wouldn’t have loved being with a partner again, now would they? Do I have the answers to my questions, not really but I am pondering the possibilities.

If I could have a tree

If I could have a tree that climbed towards the sky

That brushed the clouds and swayed with the wind

Whose branches were thick and safe and many

That held a multitude of secrets and ideas

That would let me play and imagine all day

And save everything it saw for me to see the next day

Never to criticize but only be a silent and loving companion in my imagination

To help broaden my view but allow me to look where I wanted to

To always be there, reaching up to touch the sky

Yet be firmly rooted in the warm soil of the earth

I think I’d never come down

48 hours all to my self?

Do I really have two whole days to myself? Well, maybe but in those forty eight hours, I have to perform certain tasks such as laundry and cleaning  and ,perhaps writing, that will consume those precious hours like a ravenous beast. Even my dreams stole a few minutes this morning and caused me to awaken quite before I was ready, not due to them being nightmares  but because my subconscious recognized the need to wake up and straighten up my abode and accomplish something so that when Monday comes, I will feel like I didn’t squander my time off with something so time consuming as extra slumber. The dream itself was actually quite entertaining and I really didn’t want to wake up because my dream had me ultimately in the position I want which is taking care of a lot of people under “my” roof. The roof in question in the dream was a huge old house of which my domicile was the top floor but it was built against a mountain which curved around the house to give the illusion that my rooms were the only building there. In the dream , I grow tired of unexplained utility bills which the landlord shrugs off with explanations of drafts and “It’s just always been that way!” so I decide to explore the “storage room” underneath  which is packed with junk, only to find other rooms and other floors beneath . These “rooms” and floors I come to find, have other people living in them who are also paying the exorbitant bills and indeed ,didn’t know that I lived above. Odd thing, a friend from my past ends up being one of the first couple I find and they are living right under me,Freud would have a field day with this dream but we all decide to clean up the mess and work on weatherproofing the house so we can have a better life living in this house. Not a collective type situation because I am still paying the bulk of the bills but  that bulk does get reduced because I’m not paying to heat or cool the outside air and neither or they. I wish i knew the end of the dream because the landlord had just shown up and we were discussing the strange and convoluted history of this unique house when as I said earlier,my subconscious woke me up! Oh well,  it was time, and so far, I have stripped the baby’s bed and play pen and picked up most of his toys in preparation to vacuum  and would still be doing such but my Muse reminded me that I promised to write something somewhere today and so I am. My nose is reminding me that I promised it to shower and my tummy needs sustenance  so enjoy your weekend and make the most of it like I plan to do!

Terrific tuesday!

Yes, it’s me so long ago and just look at how happy I am,sort of like today. Not really sure why because Monday was so stressful but who cares,I feel good,got my coffee,dishwasher is busy,laundry is going and the baby is being extra cute this morning. I may even traipse on over to the edge of the forest this morning and see what Penelope Possum and Caboose Bunne and the twins are up to. Perhaps the block is lifting and they can finally have their adventure , I hope so,it is rough being in a “holding pattern”! Sometimes, I think we get ourselves in the same fix,just waiting for something to happen so we can move on when we need to make things happen to break the inertia. So, enjoy the day and take joy from the small things ,they really do matter!

Embrace the day

Embrace the day and where it leads

Follow the rails on down the line

Roll in with the tide and out again

Run with the herd and travel their way

See new things and set your feet where they’ve never stood before

Open your eyes to wondrous things that have been overlooked before

Open your soul to believing in something bigger than yourself

And feel confident in your ability to handle anything life throws your way

Then tonight, when sleep comes to call, feel free to roam abroad in your dreams

Knowing you earned the night by not wasting your day

Travel 

Is Spring ever coming?

 I feel the need for spring today,perhaps because yesterday was so like spring and today is not. it’s back to being cold ,wet and rainy  and my spirits today mimic the weather. I am not in any stretch of the word , a cold weather type person. Snow is pretty but I much prefer it to keep its self way up north and never cross the Mason-Dixon line. I believe my ancestors were not cold weather people either  since the minute their feet hit the shores of New York, they skedaddled down to the Carolinas and points south! I love bright sunshine and warm breezes , fresh shimmering green tress and a rainbow of spring flowers bring smiles to my face every time I go outside during that glorious growing season called Spring!My logical self knows we need all four seasons and indeed, if we don’t have a harsh enough winter down here, the bugs eat us and our crops alive come summer but I don’t have to like it, just accept it.I guess I just need to get out more and keep putting one foot in front of the other and soon, when I look up, I’ll see the robins and know that Old Man Winter has  gone on vacation and Lovely Lady Spring has come to warm us all up and give us hope of renewal(oh hurry up woman!!)

Caboose the stubborn rabbit( a work in progress!0

 

Caboose was a very stubborn rabbit, the most stubborn in his whole family but it really wasn’t all his fault. He was the youngest in his family, indeed ,in the whole rabbit village,he was the very last born which had always caused the population to treat him like a baby rabbit even though, in his eyes at least, he was all grown up. It was always,” Caboose, don’t go out without your brothers!” or, “Caboose, let me get that for you,you’re too little to do that,let me help you!’ or his personal favorite,”Caboose, you need to grow up and quit acting like a baby!” which always puzzled Caboose as well as making him lose his temper because how could he grow up if every one persisted in treating him like he was a little baby rabbit,still eating liquified lettuce which he actually still liked but he had all his rabbit teeth and could even clean up his very own little warren. It might not be as neat as his brothers but it still looked good. Maybe it would look better if all his toys weren’t piled up in the closet but putting them in neat little rows made no sense to Caboose because he liked them all higgledy-piggledy but his mother still gave him the look when she opened his closet and they all fell out onto the floor!

Caboose wasn’t too fond of his name either and it really wasn’t his real name, that was Cabot Wallingford Bunne but since he was the youngest and the smallest and was always trailing along at the end of the line,his bunny brothers started calling him Caboose and that was that! His oldest brother Bert,short for Bertram who really loved his baby brother, would always tell Caboose, when he started getting upset about the teasing about his nickname, how important the caboose was to the “family train” and how sometimes,being the last to reach the destination meant you got to enjoy the trip longer which never failed to make Caboose feel better. Being at the end and the last sometimes meant getting the biggest rewards like the end of the bread loaf which was his absolute favorite thing because his mama made bread from scratch and sliced as they needed it so ,sometimes the end was the biggest piece and besides, his Granddaddy Jeremiah always told him the end was the best because it had all the vitamins in it to make him fast and being a fast bunny was sometimes a very good thing. Today it was good because ,even though he had been given very clear instructions not to go into the woods at the end of the clearing, he was going!

After all, he was very fast and very brave and he was so tired of being told not to do anything,they acted like all he was ,was just a big baby and he most certainly was not! The woods were dark and mysterious and very interesting and to a very small and stubborn young bunny rabbit boy, that was more tempting than a whole bunch of carrots, which were his second favorite food!

A cool breeze ruffled the treetops and sounded like an invitation to come on inside so Caboose hopped closer to the edge of the forest and stopped,suddenly nervous and wondering if this really was such a good idea and then the morning’s events came back to him and he could hear Delilah his older sister by five years telling him to stay close by because he was too little and he might get lost and off he hopped.

The coolness of the forest and the dim light slowed him down a little as he entered the dark confines of the woods. Strange noises and smells unsettled him a little but he was a very stubborn rabbit and this was his adventure so on he went,even though his paws trembled just a little and his nose was twitching like crazy and his right ear ,which always bent to the right and quivered when he was doing something he knew he shouldn’t, was vibrating like crazy!! A pine cone fell right beside him and he jumped a foot high!

“Ha ha, you almost jumped right out of your skin Caboose,you silly bunny!” Penelope Possum giggled loudly from her upside down perch on the tree branch right above his head. “Did you think it was the big bad wolf going to eat you for his supper?

 

Caboose liked his forest friends and most of the time he had a lot of fun playing with Penelope but this was one time he wished she’d been hanging somewhere else. His little bunny heart was still beating a mile a minute and he just knew if he told her where he was going, and didn’t let her go too, she’d run tell on him and that would be that! No brave adventure, no exciting tales to tell, just a stern lecture and a sore tail and more boring chores to do to keep him out of trouble so, what to do?Penelope was the youngest in her family too and sometimes she really understood his feelings because she too received the same treatment simply because she was so little so ,maybe,just maybe she might go along with what he wanted to do and they could both have fun exploring in the big dark forest! Not to mention, her eyes worked even better in the dim light of the overgrown forest floor!

The road not taken

 We’ve all done it, start thinking about your life and say things like,”if I could go back, I’d change this or I’d do that differently or I’d have gone down another road !” What if you went down that other road and when you got to the end ,you found out that just by changing your route that day,you caused an avalanche of catastrophe because you were in another area ? This scenario begs the question of just how important such a little thing as picking the very road you turn your car onto can affect the world around you. Phrases such as “being in the wrong place at the right time or being in the right place at the wrong time”  are said all the time but they really do mean something. By being at one aunts house one summer instead of the other , things happened which were traumatic at the time but they led to other things which ,in the end, brought me and my family a great deal of love and joy so, I guess I should quit worrying about the road I didn’t go on and be glad I made it to  the road I currently am on!