Been here before…

Together they rise each morning
Inextricably joined as one
Shaking off the images of night
They seek to start the day anew

Different they are one from the next
One rational, one emotional
Yet their futures are intertwined
Each essential to the other

Today the past is behind us
Time to move on says one
The other replies it’s too hard
Too many good memories

Each desires to follow its nature
Only to hurt the other
And so the battle continues
A conflict of mind and heart

As kids we were all taught to share. Despite all our misgivings, the grownups said we had to share, because it was nice, they were our friends/family etc. Little wonder that as we age we cling to what’s ours. We stake our claim in whatever way we can over our surroundings. We seek out spaces that are ours.

As teens we start to assert our ownership over our rooms (if we’re lucky enough to have one to ourselves) claiming privacy by shutting the doors and decorating the walls to our liking to ensure all who do enter have no doubt as to who lives there. As we get older this territorial nature extends to things like our computers, our bathrooms, our cars.

So attached do we become to this idea of “what’s mine is mine” that we can become enraged at what we see as the smallest infringement. Circumstances that force us to accomodate others in our space rapidly become burdensome as the longing for one’s own returns. Even though we know that sharing is part of human interaction, it still gnaws at us to have to give up even a small piece of our space.

All I have to say is “2 more weeks and I get my bathroom back (for a while)”

From a word, a touch
A flash of recall
Reminders of nothing
A false sense

A familiar moment
Like never before
Not even a single trace
Erased truths

A time long removed
Brought right back
Past becomes present
All way too real

Last year I looked at people’s fascination with the future and to that end, I provided a list of methods to “tell the future”. Here are some more wacky ways I have since discovered:

• Cleromancy - Predicting the future based on randomness by casting dice or dominoes.
• Geomancy - A method of divination that interprets markings on the ground, or how handfuls of dirt land when someone tosses them. One tradition consists of sketching sixteen random lines of dots in sand.
• Haruspicy - divination by the inspection of the entrails of sacrificed animals, leading to:
• Hepatoscopy - divination based on the livers of sacrificed sheep
• Pyromancy - Here the diviner observes flames, from a sacrificial fire, a candle, or another source of flame, and interprets the shapes that he or she sees within them. Deriviatives include:
• Alomancy - divination by salt, one type of which involves casting salt into a fire
• Botanomancy - divination by burning plants
• Capnomancy - divination by smoke
• Causinomancy - divination by burning (non-specific as to the object burned)
• Daphnomancy (also, Empyromancy) - divination by burning laurel leaves
• Osteomancy - divination using bones, one type of which involves heating to produce cracks
• Plastromancy -  divination using turtle shells; in China, this was done by heating pits carved into them
• Scapulimancy - divination by scapulae (shoulder blades of animals); in Asia and North America, this was done pyromantically
• Sideromancy - divination by burning straw

It’s a strange world, though of course many of these are coming from ancient times. I wonder if anyone still tries to use these methods.

The faces and names
We once knew so well
Are now blurred and faded
From lack of use

Years have passed since
But still we can share
The memories of a time
Now long gone

So let us venture now
Down this abandoned path
And maybe we will find
New friends there

A recent discussion I had with someone regarding their labour day plans was met with a large amount of disdain - “Why would we wait for Labour Day?? We do work all year long”.

While I can admit they have a point about not waiting for a special day to undertake projects, it seems they also missed the part where Labour Day provides a willing source of volunteers to assist with projects allowing for perhaps even larger scale projects to be accomplished.

Sure people should be volunteering to help out communities and other groups during the year. No question about that. But the truth is many of us don’t. And Labour Day provides an opportunity for organisations seeking help to get some higher level attention and draw volunteers to them. It could provide a good recruitment starting point - suck in those helpful souls that show up to labour for you.

It works even at home. Should we wait for one day a year to do stuff around the house. Hell no! For most people all the stuff can’t possibly get done in one day. But, again, Labour Day is a good time to rally your troops to get to a project that may be larger than the usual.

My house project was emptying the washroom, cleaning the walls, stripping some of the damaged paint (water damage from hurricanes) and painting the walls with new bright cheerful paint including some more water-resistant paint in one area. Something that needed doing but not likely to get done on our average weekend day.

So let’s not discount the value of a dedicated Labour Day.

I got thinking about celebrations today. Not major milestone occasions like birthdays or weddings (tho of course wedding fever is in the air in my family), but the small things that often go unnoticed.

My mother got the cast off her arm this week having broken her wrist 5 weeks ago. It’s not fully healed so she still has to wear a splint but getting rid of the cast gives her back a certain amount of mobility. Worth celebrating? I tried tracking down the people who had been in Belgium with me on AFS over 10 years ago - I managed to find about 10 of them and have exchanged email addresses and restarted communications. How about that? Is that worth celebrating?

As children we rejoiced over every accomplishment as though we had walked on the moon. Every task successfully completed was call to show Mummy and Daddy and get a hug. But as we get older we lose that enthusiasm and only think of the big things as worthy of celebration. In the process I think we lose a little of ourselves.

Life’s accomplishments, like many other things, seem to follow the 80/20 rule. 80% of our life’s achievements are a result of only a small portion of the things we do. Those are the major moments that we have no problem celebrating. But what about the millions of little things that fill the rest of our life? The little things that help to make us who we are may in fact be more important than the one-off landmarks that we choose to let define us.

Just a thought.

Considering the official hurricane season is a couple weeks away, you would expect people to be prepared. I have no doubt, however, that today’s rain storm caught most people off guard.

Luckily, there wasn’t much wind associated with it (I don’t think) but the rain fell and fell and fell some more. Don’t know if we had as many inches as the Northeast U.S. has been suffering from but I am sure that we will hear about the flooding.

Of course, the comment I kept hearing was how we needed the rain after the drought we’ve been having but personally I would prefer more frequent lighter showers than the deluge we had today.

And the worst part was that I didn’t even get to have my nice cuddly day under the blankets because by 9 a.m. the rain had stopped, the sun had come out and the temperatures went right back up to the usual summer heat, now with the torturous humidity thrown in.

Looks like summer is truly here.

To laugh is to risk seeming foolish.
To cry is to risk seeming sentimental.
To go towards someone is to risk involvement.
To expose one’s feelings is to risk exposing one’s deepest self.
To present one’s ideas, one’s dreams to the crowd is to risk losing them.
To love is to risk not being loved in return.
To live is to risk dying.
To hope is to risk losing hope. 
To try is to risk failing.
But one must take risks because the greatest danger in life is to risk nothing at all. 
He who risks nothing has nothing, is nothing.
He can avoid suffering and sadness but learns nothing, feels nothing, cannot change nor develop, can neither love nor live.
Chained by his certainty, he becomes a slave, he abandons his freedom.
Only those who risk are free.

- Translated from French, Aunthor unknown