Friday, January 25, 2013

No More Waiting

I am arriving at every turn

To see what is ahead of me.

From all sides I gaze at my own life

Without waiting I will pursue the days.

Like a master of ceremonies

I compose the rhythm and the rhyme.

I may arrive slightly late but I arrive

Gorgeous in every photo opportunity.

Friday, January 18, 2013

God and I

God and I are like two birds chirping love notes to each other. One begins a song while the other repeats the refrain. One catches the upbeat to a downbeat song. Together we chant the sacred tunes of the ancients as they trickle down from generations past.

In synchronicity, we sustain our stylish sound. God and I are like two love birds forever bound.

Friday, January 11, 2013

A Heaven Sent Message from the Past

Josie and I were newlyweds when our husbands entered their second year of medical school. We worked during the day providing financial sustenance to our family of two. We had our own apartments, our own cars, and our own snow shovels. In the upstate city of Syracuse, shovels were a necessity.

Our hopes of spending time together with our grooms faded after the summer honeymoon ended and medical school began. Most nights Josie and I slept alone while "the boys" studied in the library or wandered the hospital corridors waiting for the emergency that would offer teaching opportunities.

During those cold, wintry days and nights, Josie and I were inseparable. People assumed we were two single women painting the town. We were really married women with time to spend freely: movies, museums, tennis, walks in the park, dinners that we cooked from scratch, television with homemade buttered popcorn. Humor and friendship kept us sane. Our first year of marriage was a portrait in self-preservation.

After medical school, residency training sent our friends to Washington, D.C. We moved to North Carolina. We communicated often and shared our joys. She became pregnant and I became pregnant. She had two boys, five and three. I had two girls, five and four.

Then, unexpectedly, Josie got very sick and died tragically of colon cancer at the age of 32. My best friend. My sister. My soul-saver. Vanished.

Fast forward slowly, three decades plus. I say "hello" to the grandmother of my student from religious school. Shabbat services had concluded, and I still had my name tag on. She looked hauntingly at me and asked if I had been married to a man named Michael.

Sitting before me was the stepmother of my late friend Josie’s two sons, Adam and Joshua.

A physical tremor summoned the memories of my special friendship to swirl around my soul. Seven years ago, Sharon moved to Washington, D.C., to be near one of her daughters. We now live three blocks away from each other. Sharon holds the key to a past I had never forgotten.

No one really vanishes. The spirit of that person endures beyond time and space and guides us. Heaven does send us gifts. The past does return to the present. The future is again unfolding.

Friday, January 4, 2013

Transforming my Spine

"Transformation is possible," she said as she continued to ask me questions about my health, my body, my joys, and my fears.

"What did I want to transform?" I asked myself.

Less constrictions in my body and in my life.

Less compensating for my unusual spine.

Less holding on to habits that obstruct my “qi," my life force.*

Yes, transformation is possible this New Year and every New Year for every "body."


Beginning again opens up choice channels and available avenues for personal stretching.

"Transformation is possible for you," she said.

"Yes," I repeated. "Transformation is possible for me. I know that cognitively, and now I can feel the truth of that statement running up and down my unusual spectacular spine."

*Qi is the circulating life energy that in Chinese philosophy is thought to be inherent in all things; in traditional Chinese medicine the balance of negative and positive forms in the body is believed to be essential for good health.