Tag: Life

The Bucket List I Never Made, Come True

Shackelford Island Ponies

The Bucket List I Never Made, Come True

By Jane Tawel

September 13, 2021

I have never made nor contemplated making a bucket list. I have absolutely nothing against making one, and I love to hear about other folks’ items on their bucket lists. I find them incredibly revelatory and hopeful. And of course, like everyone, I play the game of “someday, I would like to….”  or “before I die, I want to….”.  When a person’s dreams die, they aren’t just old, they are dead, no matter if a physical body indicates otherwise. As The Bard says, “we are such stuff as dreams are made on, and our little life is rounded with a sleep” – all too soon that sleep comes, so have at it with those Bucket Lists while ye may!

So, when I kick it, you won’t find a hidden Bucket List among my many pieces of revelatory, self-incriminating written logs. Then yesterday, something happened; and though I never went in search of greatness from a list of To Do’s Before Doom’s Day, a Bucket List item was thrust upon me. Shakespeare once more, said it first: “Some are born with Bucket Lists, some achieve their Bucket Lists, and some have Bucket Lists thrust upon them.”

I am visiting the beautiful (there is just no other word for the topography here) State of North Carolina where one of my darling daughters works and lives with my grand-furbies, Artemis and Apollo.  Apollo is up and awake with me right now, being the young whippersnapper that he is, and he is bouncing all over the house waiting for his mistress to get up and feed him. I am forbidden to feed him, and if he bites my finger in hunger or starts chewing on the cord of my laptop, I am supposed to somehow catch him and shove him in his little time-out cage until said darling daughter arises to give him his breakfast. It’s hard being a Grand-meow who can’t spoil her dear grand-furby, but, the wrath of an adult child is nothing to mess around with I have found, being four adult-children down at the count. I love them more than my own life, but I miss them when they were little tykes and all I had to do was hold them tight when they were upset or kiss them when they were sad or laugh along with them at some silly thing that never made sense in hindsight but was just a way to joy in the moment. Now I am a helpless old thing against the tides and times that they have inherited from me personally and from my generation in general and from all the good and bad we try to control in the world and in ourselves with various degrees of success and failure. May the sins of my children’s mother not be carried on to the third and fourth generation*, but may I be forgiven the consequences of my mea culpas in their lovely, much-loved lives and futures.

My children all have Bucket Lists. They don’t share a lot of the items with me and that is as it should be. Bucket Lists should not be made into common currency or YouTubes, Tik-Toks or even movies with famous actors filling in for real people. Bucket lists should have a few sharable items: I would like to visit New Zealand. I would like to finish a Marathon. Stuff like that. But mostly Bucket Lists should be those hidden, cherished, held-close desires of the heart that let us dream of what might be in a perfect world, personal and public. They should be full of items that let us imagine being something other than what we are today, with a hope and prayer of doing at least some of those things.  Most importantly, Bucket List dreams should be about being all that we imagine the Human Being is capable of doing and being, whatever that might mean to me, or you, or my child, or your friend. And the lovely thing about a Bucket List is mine doesn’t have to be at all like yours to be valid and important.  Bucket Lists just might be the most uncompromised by cultural, national, or religious symbol of the most personal / communal Dream-Worlds of Endless Life Possibilities ideas in existence. I mean, isn’t Heaven really, just another word for Bucket List? Isn’t Heaven is also just another symbol for that endless eternal ability to be and do everything that the human divine soul was created to be and do? Isn’t the ultimate Bucket List really just another form of desiring a glorious, godly, divine, and endlessly available and possibility-enhanced Eternal Life?

A Bucket List is not just about creating an amazing future though, as I found yesterday. It is also about our deepest selves’ broken pieces being a little bit patched up; our short-circuits reconnected. The items on a list about things we want to do before we kick the bucket, reveal what got broken, or subverted, or short-circuited or stopped just that little bit short of realization. A Bucket List is not just about what may happen but what should have happened. We like to imagine a better future when we can’t deal with the bad stuff in the past or the present, (another reason so many religions got the underprivileged, non-wielding Bucket List folks, like slaves or minorities, living for Heaven, instead of focusing on what could be done about the present problems in their lives).  Thinking about the fact that we are still alive enough to have hopes, dreams and desires – big ones, like the ones on a Bucket List – return us to the possibilities we imagined when we were children; when we still had dreams, when as children we envisioned an eternal future without any limitations. Our Bucket Lists are about finally going skydiving, because we dreamt of flying like Peter Pan, when we were children; or  we want to check off a safari, and riding an elephant, because we imagined as children that we were wild animals roaming the jungles. When we were young, we romped together in our imagined worlds of play and  in our freedom from soul-sucking jobs, or relationships that were hard, or physical ailments that meant we were unable to walk or move without pain, let alone check off our list the desire to surf Maui. Bucket Lists return us to not just hope for the future, or a belief we can fix something in the past, but also to at least for one minute, a joy in the fact, that “where there is life now, there is hope”. Bucket Lists are really about suddenly being present to ourselves as valuable, worth-while, dreaming, hoping, believing beings.

Yesterday my daughter and husband and I took a ferry to an island in North Carolina with a lighthouse. Seeing lighthouses is literally on my husband’s Bucket List, and we were able to check that off his personal list, with the help of his beloved daughter, by seeing two of the beautiful lighthouses that still operate today. Lighthouses were created to keep sailors and ships safe from the world’s dangerous waters and unforeseen shoals.  Maybe Bucket Lists do the same for people. 

On our way to the island yesterday, we passed Shackelford Banks. And as our captain, slowly passed by the banks, there they were — my eyes are tearing up as I write this, and remember it now– just as yesterday without anticipation, I found myself silently crying as I saw something that I immediately knew had been on my Bucket List without my ever understanding it was there. There in front of me were three wild Shackelford ponies, one a foal still gangly and unsure in the shallows.

When I was about eight years old, and my parents were a mess and going through a divorce that they never told their four kids about, and at a time I didn’t realize how what another relative was doing to me wasn’t appropriate, and my childhood seemed to be getting snatched away from me but I didn’t know it, my father, gave me a book called “Misty of Chincoteague”. It’s a famous children’s book by Marguerite Henry. You should read it if you still have a bit of child in your heart, or at least get it for a child you know and love. Later, when my dad let me choose a pinto pony for my own, he let me call it “Misty”. After a few years of my broken family being in a strange existence that isn’t about Bucket Lists at all, my mom remarried and moved us away and I rarely saw my dad and never saw Misty again. I guess she must have died, along with my own childhood.

Yesterday I saw those wild ponies, not on the Chincoteague of my youthful book-inspired dreams, but on Shackelford Island, while I sat next to the dreams I never knew I had – a husband of thirty-three years and one of my own dear, beloved children, grown to adulthood with her own shared and private dreams and Bucket List items. And the little girl I was, Janie Karen, came rushing up to meet me in the sight of those horses, and I realized: “I made it. I made it here to see this – to see them – to see Misty—after all these years. I did it. I made the dreams I never knew I had come true.”

And I checked off an item from the Bucket List I have never made:

#1: I will keep my childlike faith. I will continue to imagine and dream and look for the wild ponies in life, where ever they may appear.

“And it shall come to pass, that your young ones shall be divinely inspired; and your old ones shall dream dreams; and all will have the ability to plan the future with imagination and wisdom.” **

© Jane Tawel, September 2021

*Deuteronomy 5:9

** Joel 2:28 (paraphrased by me)

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Our Little Life-Boats

by Jane Tawel

https://unsplash.com/photos/3ZFbnY2jXlg

Our Little Life Boats

By Jane Tawel

August 22, 2021

A long, long time ago and only yesterday, the materials for making my little life’s boat, were gathered in secret by the DNA of my Scottish, Irish, American Indian ancestors. But the real craft, the trued and tried boat itself, was crafted by the Great Crafter in the secrets that stretch back to the Beginning and stretch forward to the End of Time which never is. Like all carrying agents, large and small, puny and mighty, all that sail on this Ocean we call Life, or The World, my boat is unique and also it is exactly like every other little boat as well. My little boat, so small compared to others, yet just as specially made, will sail, in spurts and starts, or travel full-steam ahead, and go and go until the boat is moored someday as it was meant to be in the Eternal or until it crashes on the rocky shores of Ego or Despair. This is the truth about all sailing crafts, though many never know it because we either tie our boats up on shore, or we create a false shore in the water. But all true Truths try to teach us that our boats were made for motion in the ocean.

*

I am a little sailboat, who has long had the need for The Wind in my sails. I am lucky that quite early, I was taught what sails are for and what they are not for. I was as unlucky as many when my sails were brutally torn or holes were punched in the hull, the very soul of my ship. But I was not as unlucky as many, and I have managed. So, I have rebuilt my little boat many times with the help of others and that thing that true sailors call luck and that saints call grace.  I have kept my faith in The Wind, which no one can control, and yet it exists. I have often sailed in the right direction with the North Star and Morning Star as guides. I have often sailed in the wrong direction and lost my way. Mostly though, I regret to confess, I have mistaken a mirage of my safety while moored to the dock for what I was meant to live as life on a boat.

*

 There are many great ships that have sailed The Ocean, and sail it still, mighty and amazing in their superiority to most of our little folks’ small crafts. There are great ships with names like Caesar, or Pharaoh, or Titan of Industry, and many of these boats become enormous, powerfully engine-ed ships, making their way through The Ocean without need of The Wind, barely feeling the waves, never fearing the storms, and barely knowing they are moving at all, more like stagnant cities in the water than moving vessels. They put aside their sails and have no more need of The Wind. They take what they need from the Lands they conquer and leave behind. They take oil and slaves and buy more life vests than they could ever use; they sail their gigantic boats, boats that could house whole nations but only have enough room for one’s self. These have stopped being boats at all, and we look at those ships and we all want to have one of those ships, too. We want to be safe and saved and unafraid with everything we will ever need forever and ever, amen. And we look at our little tiny battered, torn-sailed little boats and we hate them and we hate us and we want to be them, the big safe ships. We look at the great steady cruisers and we long to have no need of The Wind; and we yearn to be in the Ocean but to control the way the Ocean takes us, like the great shipbuilders seem to do. And we forget that we are all created to be working sailors, not passengers. And we ignore what our heart tries to tell us, that even those with the biggest ships, will one day too find that The Ocean is bigger than they are. Perhaps when The Wind has wrecked the big ships upon the shoals of shallowness, or the sandbars of Eternal Truths, they too will long to once more sail a little boat.

*

Perhaps we will all, large and small, no matter how safe or how broken we think our boats are, someday find that The Ocean sends us an unlooked for buoy or a suddenly appearing piece of the Mast’s Wood; and we will each have one more chance to leave shore, and grab on to what The Ocean provides, and we will once more, like children, relearn a love of sending our little crafts out into The Ocean.

*

My boat’s sails have been tattered and torn so many times.  I was not born a good sailor, and perhaps that has saved me. I have had to rely on The Wind’s benevolent appearing and disappearing, on the Ocean’s grace in storms and dead calm. I have had to depend on the help of fellow travelers who sailed alongside me, sometimes just keeping me company in the loneliness of Ocean life, sometimes teaching me something vital about how to sail, sometimes showing me what not to do by their own foolish choices at sea, sometimes sharing a compass that helped me navigate. And sometimes there have been those fellow sailors who, with great love, have helped me pick up the pieces of my little boat that I had allowed to break apart when I hit some shoals, or had left to rot in dock. And every once in a while, there was no one to help me, but only Someone to whisper across the waves:

 “Fear not. Be still. Have faith. And know what you think you do not know. Don’t look at the waves. Keep your eyes on Me.”

*

I would like to say that I have been sailing The Ocean for six decades now, but I have mostly left my little boat docked uselessly in port. I kept thinking I was safer on shore, tied up to the Pier, with those I thought were peers and I felt already the salvation of knowledge of the things I had read about on “How to Sail” without ever needing to do the things it takes to set sail. I could tell you how to sail, but I rarely have experienced the thrill and dangers of sailing. So, I have spent a lifetime mostly feeling I should be happy that I had a little boat but never really knowing the purpose of my boat or why life seemed mostly rudderless and my sails sagged depressedly, longing for A Wind I would never risk meeting head-on.  I have mostly lived by peering out, rather than journeying out.  I have stayed on shore with all the best charts and maps but rarely finding the courage to launch my craft again and again, failure after failure, frightening success after frightening success, prophetically, mysteriously, in weakness and in strength, in death first and then life, baptized again and again by misadventure and death at Sea, and by setting my course, going into the Deeps, into the Pontus, into the waves left by The Wake of He who first Crafted and Who crafted the Sailor in me.

*

Last night there was a Red Sky and so I awoke today hoping for a sailor’s delight. But this morning the sky is still red- Warning! Warning! This morning the Ocean is covered over by Heavens which are a shade of red, red the color of shed blood; blood like the blood from two huge hands mangled by the nails of working His Boat and sailing The Ocean like no One has ever sailed it before or since, though we who know are supposed to have tried. And I am afraid. And I am uncertain I even know which direction to go. And The Great Sailor and all those before me who have managed to sail in His Wake are calling me to set out, while the sirens of safety in the numbers docked on shore make more and more knots in the ropes that tie me down.

*

What will my story’s end be? People call that a legacy, but most of us just leave with an unfinished story. I will not be leaving a beautiful houseboat, or massive warship, or richly outfitted yacht behind for those who carry on in The Ocean, those few who sailed close enough to my little craft to say, “I knew her” “My boat sailed for a time with hers” “I saw her boat on the shore”. I will have no lasting control over what becomes of those who carry on my boat’s DNA or those who may have learned something about their own boats by the teachings I have done or failed to do on “How to Sail”. But one thing I am learning. If I leave my little boat safely moored to this shore; if I am tethered to the sandbars of cares and needs and self and greeds; if I keep setting sail only to turn back again to dock my fears and doubts and insecurities and failings, instead of facing them head on, sailing into The Wind; if I do not daily, moment by moment, cure and polish and then test the seaworthiness of my little boat, I will never actually be in the boat. I will spend my Time, looking at my boat from outside of it. I will spend my Life, looking at my Life, from outside of it. If do not let the Winds fill its sails, my boat will never be what it was crafted to be. If I don’t let The Wind fill me, I will never be what I was Crafted to Truly Be.

*

A boat that is moored to the cares of the shore, can’t leave a wake. A boat leaves a wake when it is moving through The Ocean. We are each uniquely created by The Great Ship-Crafter to live life in the Ocean. We are given the ability to calm the waves and quell the storms, if we only have enough faith to start sailing, and once we start, to not look back at the sirens, and not look ahead at things that are mere mirages, but to point our little boats Due North, and let The Wind sail us towards what we were meant to call “Home”. Because if you are sailing The Ocean, one day you will wake up and realize that all along, you have been carrying your true home with you. Your little life’s boat has always been your Home.

*

 Despite what any of us try to tell ourselves, none of us has ever seen the Far Shore from this shore. It is only when we are in The Ocean, that we understand that we were neither created to stay safely on this shore, nor were we created to try to reach the other Shore. We were created to row as hard as we need, to crew alongside those who sail within our latitudes and longitudes, to drift when we can’t feel The Wind and wait for Her to fill us again, to float and enjoy the beauty that is above us, below us, and all around us as we travel; to navigate with both honest fear and wise courage, and above all to be at Home when we Move and keep Moving within in and upon The Great Ocean.

*

What will I leave in the wake of my life?  I pray that the flotsam and jetsam of my poorer decisions and weaknesses in sailing, will be carried away by The Great Ocean’s grace. I pray that my wake will leave a clearer sense of direction for those who sail behind me. I pray that there will be a small wake from my life’s little boat; a wake that leads others Due North, a wake that I leave when my boat is no longer seen by any but those on the Far Shore. I pray that above all, my wake will send waves to both near and far shores that swoosh with something that sounds faintly like something The Ocean would breathe, something like a person who had dipped her hands into the water and made small little circles of waves, something that sounds like what water would sound like if it were breathing in and out, ebbing and flowing. I hope that I will set sail enough times that my life-boat will leave a small little wake that sends waves gently lapping towards the world’s shores, and the children’s little life boats; a sound of waves in my wake that whispers something like this:

Shhhheeeeeee loooooved. Sheeeeeee whoosshhhh, llllllloved whiiiisssssh.  She loved. She loved. She loves. She loves. Love….. Love……Love……..

*

© Jane Tawel, August 2021

Life-Lines — a poem

by Jane Tawel

https://unsplash.com/photos/se3tHNszbkM

Life-lines — a poem

By Jane Tawel

March 19, 2021

*

When I was young,

my mind and heart

were intertwined

like scribbled lines.

When one is young,

separating scrambled lines

is the monumental task

of growing-up.

I failed at much of it

but some lines straightened,

into the miracle of

Due North.

The dots and dashes,

the broken, mended bits of line

Still encompass and still

compass me forth.

*

When I became

Two, and then more;

and “my” became “our”

heart, mind and soul;

We formed a new me.

And I took the bow of us in hand, and

formed a straight arrow;

a line, shooting, aimed,

undeviating in communion,

unswerving in love;

propelling my life.

A streak of light — 

like the tail of a comet.

My love for you

became the trued lines of fortune

in the palms of my hands.

My love for you was

a life-line branching out,

like the shoots of roots

from an unbowed, unbending tree.

Like a line with no end,

I became

my love for you.

*

Now I grow old

and the lines of my life

form circles.

Circling, and circling, and circling;

back and around, back and around…

and sometimes I grow dizzy,

and sometimes I become whole.

The center holds

in the spiral of my life.

© Jane Tawel 2021

Sky and Earth in Rain- 4 Poems

by Jane Tawel

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Sky and Earth in Rain

Four Poems

By Jane Tawel

March 13, 2021

Poem One

*

Sky’s brow sweats with labor;

the earth is replenished

with heaven’s pleasing perspiration.

Earth, in her turn, turns.

Round and round and round

flinging ocean, sea, and pond

back into Sky’s opened-mouth face.

Sky as Heaven, Earth as Gaia,

powerful in servitude to each other;

delighting in shared toiling.

Earth dances, opening herself up

to Sky’s rain and — 

both, so in love!

Heaven and Gaia merge,

symbiotic in creation.

*

Poem Two

*

The blues of sky are borne-away

and seeming dead in grey hues,

mourning clouds as black as burial clothes,

the world looks up at the bereavement.

Only the old folks will watch the sky

and know — 

Surprising endings make the best stories.

*

Ah, the sky’s eyes are tearing-up!

Only the parents know

the welcome oxymoron of the heavens’ happy tears.

Light, though hidden, eyes though clouded,

Love’s light, like the sun, never leaves the heart.

*

Rain is heavens’ tears shed in joy.

The skies know that nothing ever really dies.

The casket opens around the keening clouds.

The heavens resurrect themselves

pouring the gift of life

into earth’s open-armed delight.

*

Poem Three

*

The canopy of sky folds,

and through the gaps of cover,

all heaven breaks loose;

the earth is bathed from head to toe.

And dirty roots and filthy feet and pining pinnacles,

are washed with grace of falling rain.

*

Poem Four

*

The sky husbands the earth,

his seed pours forth,

and earth open’s up to sky’s embrace.

*

Love, given and received;

the over-whelming mystery of earth and sky,

true soul- mates, wed forever,

bearing all.

The earth opens to

all sky’s love -spent pourings.

And at earth’s breast

all children are fed.

New life from married bliss.

© Jane Tawel 2021

Our Shakespearean Year

by Jane Tawel

Points in Case

Our Shakespearean Year

by Jane Tawel

February 27,2021

Our Shakespearean Year “of our discontent” drags on as we have “much to do about nothing” and it looks as if “tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow will creep on at this petty pace, to the last syllable of recorded time”; mostly “signifying nothing”. “We have seen better days”. But on the plus side, we have learned that “we know what we are, but know not what we may be”; and while “the course of true love never did run smooth”, we humans are still “what stuff as dreams are made of”. Let’s remember even if we would never choose this, “some people have greatness thrust upon them”. As we approach a spring in which we wish things were normal again, let’s “Beware the Ides of March” and remember that “nature does require her time of preservation”. “To be or not to be” is a matter of staying safe, staying sane and staying diligent. If you think this “lady doth protest too much”, I apologize for my “lack of brevity”. Yet there are “more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in my philosophy”. But “friends, Chosen, countrymen, lend me your ears” but once more: “let us love each other more than words can wield the matter, dearer than eyesight, space and liberty”. “Love sought is good, but given unsought is better”. So keep masking, keep tasking, but remember if you are alive you have a “treasury of ever-lasting joy”. And to each of you “here, I hope, begins our ever-lasting joy” as “there is nothing good or bad but thinking makes it so”. “The miserable have no other medicine but hope” and now vaccines; so get yours as soon as you can. And when you despair turn outward, yes, “God shall be our hope, our stay, and our lantern to our feet”. Now I must go, ah friends, “parting is such sweet sorrow but I shall say good-bye, til it be morrow; my necessaries are embarked! Adieu!” When this is all over there are a few I must admit I am glad we will “be better strangers”, and my friends may not recognize me as I have become “as fat as butter”. But though the past year has often seemed “as tedious as a twice told tale”, remember that “love looks not with the eyes but with the mind”. So “from the records of our memories, we will wipe away all trivial records”, and keep “remembering such things as are most precious to us”. And frankly sequestering has reminded me that, “our lives, exempt from public haunt, find tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything”. “Thou seest, we are not all alone unhappy!” “I love long life better than my husband loves figs!” Oh folks, “the time of life is short, to spend that shortness basely were too long!” So “to thine own self be true” and just do something good for yourself today, because “nothing will come of nothing”. My “parting is such sweet sorrow” for me but but I know you are thinking, “for this relief much thanks!” But I thank you for your “flattery in friendship” since “I count myself in nothing else so happy, as in a soul remembering my good friends”! Be assured that “self-love, my friend, is not so vile a sin as self-neglecting”. So grab on to your best purpose today and believe, “it is not in our stars to hold our destiny but in ourselves”. “Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none. And Please — if you only remember one thing that Shakespeare said, remember this: “Thy life’s a miracle”!

(apologies to the Bard — Jane) (c)2021

No More — And Yet…

By Jane Tawel

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No More — And Yet…

By Jane Tawel

February 25, 2021

*

There are no pictures any more

and yet we long to be seen.

We live inside our own closed doors,

and silently rage against the routine.

*

There are no words we want to share

and work is just a grind.

And even those for whom we care

just often slip our minds.

*

The lives of grey inanities

are revelatory — true.

We miss our shared humanity

and hopeful, bright worldview.

*

The days go ever on and on

just one day like the other.

We long for plans to bank upon

and health that’s been recovered.

*

But I have found in all of this

both listlessness and sorrow,

that I have changed my own wish-list

for better days tomorrow.

*

I’ve learned to care more for my kin

and even those I don’t know.

I’ve found a greater love within

and hope that Love will grow and grow.

*

I’m not encouraging deceit

on just how bad it’s been.

But neither is it utter defeat;

I think there’ve been some wins.

*

So maybe take some time today

to focus on the “shoulds”,

of how to live in better ways,

to love and do more good.

*

For even while we’re stuck and scared

and feeling like we just don’t care,

as long as we have one last breath

we live in hope of fighting death.

*

If I lose sight of The Sublime

I die inside, before my time.

So though imprisonment’s annoying,

Today I’ll choose to do some “joying”.

I’ll count the “no mores” with some regret,

Then cling like crazy to the “yet”!

*

No more — and yet…. . . . . .

I have loved and been loved.

I have sung and danced.

I have listened and been heard.

I have won and lost and learned from both.

*

I am hopeful in a new day.

I choose to look for joy in small things.

I fan the flames of faith to believe there is One Who cares for us.

I breathe out and in and feel the warmth of the blood that flows through me.

My heart still beats as evidence that life is anticipatory.

There are those whom I long to be with and those whom I hope to know better.

Wisdom and knowledge are waiting for me to discover them.

Goodness lives beyond place and time and Love is forever alive in the Universe.

This tiny taste, this small sound, this faint feeling, this sweet smell — 

are each and all worthy of my honored attention.

Taste and know that life is delicious.

And while I can still see anything, I can imagine everything.

*

Friend, hope is here for the taking. No matter how dark it may feel, take hope in your hands today and make something — even something very small — but make something beautiful to light your way.

© Jane Tawel 2021

Once This Is Over

Horse Drawn Plow
“Horse Drawn Plow” by Tom Gill. is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Once This is Over

A Meditation

By Jane Tawel

November 7, 2020

Meditation 1

Once they, whoever “they” are, stop slapping our hands away, I hope they will see a hand reached out, straight and true, to show The Way.

Once they, whoever “they” are, find that fear can not lead, and hate can not win; I hope we will walk in peace.

Once “they”, whoever they were, embrace the love of “We”; we will find that as One, we live.

*

Once there, wherever “there” is, we must make all things beautiful.

Once there, wherever “there” leads, no one will feel alone.

Once there, wherever “there” may be, our joy will be full; and we will come Home to “The Here”.

*

Once this is over, whatever “this” is, I hope to plan again.

Once, this is over, whatever “this” is, I plan to Hope again.

*

Meditation 2

*

Once I believed that if I kept trying and working and winning, that I would get “There”.

Now, I know that if  let go, live well, and love true, that “Here” finds a home in my heart.

*

Once, I thought “They” should fix it, take care of it, change it, and do something.

Now, I know it has always been up to me to accept it, care for it, share in it, and Be Love.

*

Once I thought “This”, was all there was.

Now, I believe it is only the beginning,

and Goodness and Love have no end.

*

*

Once, I asked “why me?”.

Now, I ask, “why not We?”.

Let us put our joined hands together to the plow,

 and not look back, but gaze forward.

©Jane Tawel 2020

This Heart -a poem

This Heart — a poem

by Jane Tawel

“Chasm” by Swissendo is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0

This Heart

By Jane Tawel

September 7, 2020

*

This heart,

I can not hold.

Its beat escapes me,

Like the sound of a diffident drum.

*

And yet, I long to look somewhere,

to find the source.

In my mirror, perhaps?

Or in the stars or skies, 

or someone’s smile?

In the crevices of my childhood,

awash with bits of benevolence

amidst the scars 

deeper than the chasms of remembered wounds?

*

Or does this heart move and bleed apart from me;

a willing and unwilling partner,

a sometimes pacemaker of my soul,

keeping alive that which measures the motions 

echoed timelessly and in my time,

 in the clefts of consciousness

 chalked with crumbs

of stories, myths, and songs?

A heart may be, as one for all and all for one,

for heroes, villains, and all children born?

*

This heart, hidden in

The girth of eternity — 

I want to wrest it

From my chest

And see there in the last moments,

 the pulsing light of

That organ that best encompasses

The meaning of myself.

*

Not half a brain between us;

my heart and I yearn,

Not for grand ideas or vast knowledge,

But for the scratched-out wisdom

That comes only

With the pain of loss,

The shortness of the season,

And the hope of love.

*

This heart

That throbs foolishly

without sense;

calls to me to free it from

the prison of myself;

opening up riches

from my chest

to bleed its treasures elsewhere.

© Jane Tawel 2020

.

The Book Tree

The Book Tree

By Jane Tawel

August 9, 2020

GBR_0405.JPG

“GBR_0405.JPG” by Glenn Rose is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0

 

There is an ancient Book. It began as one life, The Tree of Life, the Tree of Jesse, and it has sent seeds throughout the world, which have taken deep roots, growing into a mighty, world-reaching forest of life-giving beliefs.

 

Some people have taken the Book Tree’s branches and turned them into tentacles to ensnare. Some have taken the Book Tree’s roots and poisoned them in their desire to destroy the Life that the Book Tree offers.  Some have worshipped the Book, and forgotten that a Book is just a book; and that it is always about something that is more real than any words on a page can hope to convey.  And some have used the Book Tree for personal gain and profit, cutting away the branches so the fruit can not be easily gleaned by those in need, but only gorged on by those hogging the sectioned-off branches.

 

There are many people who have taught me about The Book, some because they understood its meaning and some because they refused to. A person can learn from those who get it right and from those who get it wrong, and that is the wonderful thing about this Book; it is full of stories of people who got the messages in it right and those who got it wrong.  I have learned that the Book has stories about people who from the beginning of Time have been just like me – full of pride, full of brokenness, full of a desire to give in to the temptations of self-centeredness, full of fear, and full of need.  I have also learned from the stories that people have always been just like the best of humans that I know – full of courage in the face of danger, full of love in the face of hate, full of determination in the face of injustice, full of faith in the deepest darkness, full of hope in what we can not see yet, and full of something that can always be a little, better, a little higher than the beasts but always still a little lacking, a little yearning, a little lower than the angels.

 

I have learned in the Book that people have mostly gotten it wrong, but that as long as there is breath, there is the possibility of finally getting some things right. In the Book the only thing that counts is that you admit when you get it wrong and that you keep trying to get it right and that in the end, if you get it right, you’ll be okay. The Book calls this “forgiveness”.

 

I have learned that if you are my friend, that does not mean I should make your enemy my enemy.  The Book teaches that there is only one “team” that matters and that I should try to play for it; and that team is not in competition with any other team,  but  it is the one sharing with everyone else.  I have learned instead of keeping my heart hardened toward an enemy, that if I try to understand and have compassion for everyone, then I will have no enemies, but only brothers and sisters. The Book calls this “love”.

 

The Book has taught me that I, like all before and after me, have many choices of what to believe, but that if I want to believe what The Book teaches, then there is One Being that I should worship whose name no one knows but Who nonetheless, “IS”.  “I AM” is the sole consolation of The Book; there is no other prize, no other meaning than relationship with Holy Otherness. The Book is clear, and yet not comforting about this God.  The stories teach that there is a Creator of this world and of me (and of you); that there is a Parent who is Love; that there is a Conscience Reality that judges between Good and Evil; and that there is a Giver who loves to give what is truly Right and Good for the Created Planet and for the Creatures we are. That’s it.  That’s all we get to trust in about what we long to know.  Trusting in this and acting on it,  believing against all odds, and despite our lack of knowledge and assurance, is what The Book calls “faith”.

 

The Book has taught me that there were many humans that lived Good Lives, lives lived all in CAPS with exclamation points behind them; GOOD PEOPLE!!!! and that every single one of them sacrificed and suffered a lot to do the right things. The Book has taught me that it is these suffering servants who really get what this life on earth has to offer that is best of all;  and that the people who think this life is about getting more, earning more, hoarding more, of anything, including wealth or power, never really live as we were created to live.  We should feel sorry for these people, not envy them, at least that is what The Book teaches.

 

The Book has taught me there were many people who were saviors of their people, and that there was one person who lived a perfectly Good Life and he is The Savior of all. He was also the most suffering servant of all, so it is astounding that so many people since he lived on earth claim they want to live like he did. Of course, it is hard to come up with actual examples of any of us who have lived like The Good Man lived, but the point is, so many people keep trying to, and that has made all the difference ever since.

 

The Book has taught me to follow the example of all of the Good People in the World, even if they never have read the Book or know anything about the God in it. The very best person to follow in life is the One Perfect Human, but this person is a very, very, very hard person to follow.  He is a hard act to follow and at the same time, he is also exactly like me. And so, the Book teaches that I have great responsibilities, great need of forgiveness, and great hope of rebirth into the kind of Life that this particular Savior who is part of the Story of The Book, taught us about. This Man is what The Book calls “Son of God”.

 

The Book teaches me that every human comes into the world with a sense of right and wrong called a conscience, but that our conscience is a part of us like our hands or our lungs or our livers, and we can either care for and nurture our conscience or we can abuse and starve it, so that it becomes weak and sickly.  The Book teaches that there are universal laws that will lead to being the best sort of human our species can offer and that everyone knows these laws but also that everyone always wants to make new laws that aren’t good for everyone or to apply the laws to others to follow but not follow themselves.  The Book teaches that unless we follow the laws of caring for the planet and for all who live in it, then we are lost.  This is why the Book teaches that the one thing most hated by the God of The Book and by our own best natures, is our ability to turn Truth into Lies. The Book teaches that from The Beginning, when First Man and First Woman lied to The God and lied to each other, that that is when they began to die.  Lies are the roots of Death.  The Book teaches us that we can kill our conscience, that we can kill that very thing that makes us “like gods”.  This thing that is in all of us that we are to care for above everything else is what The Book calls “the soul”.

 

The Book teaches that though we may not see it clearly, there is beyond the mist and fog and in the darkest of darknesses, a Light of Truth that has no end.  This Truth can only exist as a Co-Creator with Love. And Love as a powerful force of Goodness and Truthfulness and Joy is that which will remain long after The Book is no longer needed, on earth as it is EveryWhere THE IAM of LOVE lives.

 

 

I learn from The Book about Life and what the stories in The Book do in my own life and my own relationships and my own Relationship, is a matter of how I live each day in The Garden. Like seeds planted, each moment, it matters on an unfathomable scale, how I choose to nurture those seeds, how I protect them from weeds and drought, how I nourish them, how I grow them, and how I trust in The Sun to freely give them Life.  The Book teaches that to whom much is given, much is required of her to give back, to give others, to give forth, to give freely.  Because The Book teaches me that there is nothing to fear if I keep my hand to the plow and the other hand outstretched to my neighbor and that I can live boldly and joyfully, like the other people whose stories are told in The Book. I can be at peace in this world with a “peace that passes understanding”.  The Book calls this “wholeness” or “shalom”.

 

I am so grateful to have found the Book, so many years ago now.  It is a compass that always points to True North, it is a map and a guide on The Way; it is a consolation in times of trial, a rod and staff when I err and need redirected; it is a wealth of good tales with stirring events and teaching moments, with characters that I can relate to, admire, and either cheer or boo; it is a source of eternal proverbs and excellent poetry; and it is an eternal clarion call to live justly and righteously in a world of naysayers. And greatest of all, The Book is a hint – a small little hint—that there is Someone who wants to know me and be known by me and that That Otherness called simply “I Am” is as real as the Perfect Love that I have always imagined truly exists.

 

The Book is a Tree, and we are the branches. Let me reach forth my own small branch so that even the small birds of the field may find shelter there. Let me be secure  in the Truth that The Tree produces enough fruit for all and let me share the fruits of my own small labors and my life so that all may live in the shade of  Love. Let the leaves of The Book be like leaves of a mighty forest bringing Life to the whole world.    May it be so for you and for me in this very moment ~~ Jane

 

But I am like a green olive tree in the house of God. I trust in the steadfast love of God forever and ever. (Psalm 52:8)

 

 

“The visions of my head as I lay in bed were these: I saw, and behold, a tree in the midst of the earth, and its height was great. The tree grew and became strong, and its top reached to heaven, and it was visible to the end of the whole earth. Its leaves were beautiful and its fruit abundant, and in it was food for all. The beasts of the field found shade under it, and the birds of the heavens lived in its branches, and all flesh was fed from it.”                        (The Book of Daniel 4:10-12)

(c) Jane Tawel 2020

 

Awkward Questions We Must Ask During This Pandemic —  Even if It Means Losing a Friend

image from Politico

Awkward Questions We Must Ask During This Pandemic —

Even if It Means Losing a Friend

By Jane Tawel

July 1, 2020

 

When I first became a mom and had my four wonderful children, now all grown and adulting, I loved being with them, caring for them, watching over them like a mother hen. And so most playdates included me. I was always a bit cautious about dropping my children off with other people, even if I knew them, was good friends with the parents, or possibly even was related to them. It wasn’t exactly that I didn’t trust them but….. I didn’t trust them. I mean I didn’t trust anyone but their loving dad, to truly love and watch-over and protect and care about my kids as much as I would. I never minded other parents dropping their kids at my house and was always a hawk on the sidelines trying to ensure safety to all the children, even the ones who were not mine. If I had to leave the swimming pool as a lifeguard, ALL the kids had to get out of the water (“But Mom we’re teenagers now”. “Too bad, out.”) The one time my kids were in a hot tub at a friend’s house, and I asked her to watch my kids while I went to breast-feed the baby, my daughter almost drowned right in front of my friend. Luckily her sister was there to save her. So, call me overprotective, call me a worry-wart, call me a helicopter mom — all true — if it was about safety and protection. I didn’t try to protect my kids from risk or failure, or learning or fighting their own relational battles — but physical safety — heck yeah! I believed that as long as I could, I would do my very, very best to protect them. Now, since they are young adults, the most I can do is caution and pray (and they will confirm I do plenty of both — still my job).

 

But then all the kids started getting old enough to want sleep-overs. It would have been rather weird for them if I had insisted that if they wanted to sleep over at a friend’s house, their mom — I — would have to sleep-over too. And of course, I didn’t do that. But I did often have to say no to sleep overs, especially if I didn’t know the family or other kids or parents that well. But even if I did know them fairly well, I would always have to ask this very awkward question: “Do you have guns in the house and if so, where and how to you store them?”

 

Asking someone if they keep guns at home is a bit like asking someone on a first date if that’s a pimple or a cold sore on their lip. Awkward! However, this thing about guns in this country is something people think very, very differently about, and so when you ask a very reasonable question, it feels intrusive because people see it as political. For me it had nothing to do with my view of guns or my view of my friends — it had to do with, “will my child be as safe as possible at your home, and do you consider this an important safety issue like I do?” This was something I had learned to ask as a careful, discerning parent, and yes, some people got offended, and yes, some people might have lied, and yes, some relationships fell apart even, but at the same time, asking might have made not only my kids safer but made those families safer too, if they found out they or their own friends were not treating gun ownership and storage with the seriousness it should be. I knew without a doubt, that even if it was an awkward conversation, I would rather my children and I be “safe and not sorry”. You see, my children’s lives are the most precious gifts I have ever, ever received and I wanted to treat them as such. I would never get another one of J, C, V, or G — my unique and oh, so special four children — and so I didn’t mind being considered a bit overprotective, even if it cost us a “fun time”; even if it cost us a friend.

 

Fast forward to 2020, and some of us who would rather be “safe than sorry” have got to start being “the careful parent” of our own lives and the lives of others. As Corona Virus continues to rampage through our nation, we may not be able to control other people’s foolishness or lack of care about their own or our safety — but we CAN control their access to us, do our best to not be unaware of or ignorant of their behaviors both in our presence and apart from us, and speak out when necessary. We do have the right, awkward as it may feel, and the responsibility to protect ourselves and our children, and our children’s children. We must truly take seriously any possible threat to our well-being, even if “those people” do not. But just like guns, some people see the safety precautions and their rights to do whatever they want with the weapons of this virus as a political issue. Don’t let them do that to you. It is not — any more than gun safety is a political issue. It is a life-issue and a safety-issue and an issue about how much we care about each other. And so it feels intrusive and awkward to bring the subject up, but if we start caring more about our health and safety and the health and safety of others, more than we care about our feelings or egos or politics, then we will make having these awkward conversations just one more part of the new normal. We will make asking the right questions of others a matter of caring about them, and we will willingly share with others what they need to know before they decide to meet with us. We will be honest, even with our most casual acquaintances and we will be truthful with ourselves when we ask, “is this event worth my giving up something in the future with people I love?” And dear, dear folks — we need to start having these conversations before we get together with other people.

 

And sometimes the hardest conversations are with the very people who are your best friends and your beloved family. Having to ask your parent or child, “by the way, before you come over, what have you done this week, how safe were your co-workers this week, and are you still wearing a mask and washing your hands like a surgeon”? Last week, when we were lulled into a sense of security (false as it turns out this week) that maybe we could have another couple over for a socially distanced, outdoors, bring your own food and utensils, keep it distanced and keep it short little get-together at our house, we made all the arrangements until I mentioned the time. Then my friend (who is 70 years old and has been quite careful about following all the protocols during the pandemic / quarantine) asked if we could make it later in the day since the day before we were to meet, they would be hosting a party for a friend’s son who was graduating high school and she would be hosting 30 -40 other people. Yep. True story. I was rather flabbergasted and yes, blindsided. So my hubby and I discussed it and I texted her a very kind, sweet text asking if we could delay the get-together and she was very kind and texted back, ‘of course we could’. But here’s the scary part — if she hadn’t mentioned it in passing, I would never have known how many other households I would be exposed to through her the very next day. I never would have known if she hadn’t let it slip that her “gun was loaded in an unlocked drawer” so to speak.

 

So here is the gist, the bottom line, the stern warning, the upshot, the please, please, please let’s all commit to doing this. We absolutely must start quizzing people about where they have been and with whom and for how long and what protections they used when they did it — BEFORE we get together with them. Remember that old adage that every one your mate has had sex with, you technically have also had sex with? Well, corona virus is like that, y’all, but the thing is — if you’re asymptomatic or have just recently been exposed — you don’t even know that you’ve “had sex” with the virus. So, abstinence is finally the right solution folks — and we do that by sacrificing pleasure for the long term health of all us, and by masking up, social distancing, washing like a surgeon, telling each other the truth, and making good (even when tough) decisions for those we love.

 

We can’t be embarrassed around each other or irritated if someone asks us about our exposure or if we have been following protocols with the Corona Virus — this is killing us folks! We certainly cannot keep being offended if someone asks us to follow the safety guidelines when we are with them and we must stand up to those who act offended by our desire to protect ourselves and our children from them — (do I need to say it again? THIS IS KILLING US.) Just like asking if someone’s guns are stored in a safe, locked lockbox, we have to start asking people if they have been “locking down” the threat of their corona virus possibilities. Just like I never believed (without proof) someone who would say, “oh don’t worry, I’ll watch your kids” or “how dare you ask, my kids would never do such and such” or “don’t worry I’m very careful with the gun I keep loaded in my bedside drawer” we can’t pretend that all of us don’t stretch the truth to protect ourselves from criticism or from having to change our behaviors. We can’t really keep expecting to believe that others are being careful to protect their own health or mine, unless we are willing to converse, and communicate, and dialogue. And we should not shy away from a little bit of questioning and a commitment to get some reasonable answers on the part of those we would like to be with.

 

I will promise to never be offended if family or friends quiz me about whether I am doing my part for their safety. I won’t get my hackles up even if my very own children say to me, “Mom, we can’t come over this Saturday because you went to such and such a place and were with such and such a group”. I know they are saying no to being with me in order to protect me and because they know how much I love them. They may understand my choices to do “such and such”, just like I might understand their choices or a friend’s choices and we may be perfectly fine, even in agreement with — even applaud — some of those choices to do things with other people or attend something that is important. BUT approval and agreement for each other’s choices as important enough to perhaps do something that risks our health, means that we will not be able to do “our things” together if it means we won’t be safe together — not until this horrible plague is over. And God willing, someday it will be over. Then — we can all literally and figuratively breathe easy, and “let the parties and concerts, and museum trips, and play dates and sleep overs begin!!

 

What it means to do the right thing right now by all that we have been entrusted with, is that we must be willing to be seen as overprotective if necessary, even if it costs us a “fun time”, even if we lose a friend, even if someone is offended. We just cannot risk the worst by hoping for the best. We absolutely must not send off our lives to a risky play-date situation or entrust our health to an unsafe sleep over. We must prove that we can trust each other, by honestly communicating with each other. And — If we haven’t already, we must begin to treat our health and well-being as the precious gifts they are. We won’t be getting any other lives with which to replace these very unique and special ones we have, and just like our children, our lives are counting on us to protect them.