Its an uncertain world out there

As we watch the news with horror, we hold our little ones a little closer
and become a little more afraid of the world out there.
We teach our children to share, to try to get along,
love and patience is the key and not violence and aggression.
Yet its exactly the opposite that the world portrays out there.
My soul shudders to think of the callous and desensitized world out there.
Where some day our little ones will be alone.
Should we stop watching the news? Should we withdraw from society
that seems to be going to hell in a hand basket?
How will we ever explain these atrocities against humanity to our kids?

Blue

It hits me out of the blue and boy do I get blue.
My arms ache to reach out and be engulfed.

I ache for the warmth that can melt away my sadness.
My body rocks to an ancient rhythm. The rocking of my body in a soothing
motion that remind me of my mother's embrace.

I ache for the love and the familiarity that is slipping away everyday.
I have loved ones around me, I am loved, I am cherished ...yet
its not enough. I miss the care and affections of the ones that are departed.

As the seasons turn,
I am reminded of their loss.
I see them in my dreams and sometimes I catch them
from the corner of my eye.
I hear their voice , calling my name and I reach my arms out...
trying to reach them.
Then I wake up and know...
that they are gone.
That begins the cycle of sadness that I have to push away everyday.

A loss is not of just a person,
but of moments, life, memories, a part of our lives.
It cannot be mourned and be moved on from.
It is something we deal with every day.
I decide each day I am not going to let it take me down.

And then....the blues hit....and boy do they hit.
My heart aches with the memory of my mother's embrace.
My father's loving hand on my fore head,
the way he tucked my strand of hair behind my ear,
how Mom got us ready for school.

How I took it all for granted ....and now....
I just wish I could go back and remember more details.
Yet all that I remember and miss most is her hugs.
His voice.
Their love.
My days ache from their loss.

I will smile and live and love....but part of me will always ache for them.

Loneliness

Loneliness is not just a state of mind as some people claim. I think it is a physical condition. Not all suffer from it constantly and yet all of us feel it in some form or another at some point or another in our lives. Whether you are single, married, kids, gay, straight, poor or rich. This is a condition that happens to creep up on us when we are least expecting it and punches us in the gut.

It is not the domain of the depressed or unhappy. Though they might feel it more strongly then others.
When your friends forsake you for their pleasure. When your spouse does not understand why you think something or want something or feel a certain way. You feel isolated, alone...misunderstood...
When a parent looks at you with confusion wondering why you said that. When you are in the middle of a crowded room and there is chatter all around you...yet no one seems to be talking your language.
You feel alone and thus lonely.

The worse is of course when you are all by yourself and all your loved ones or whom you think are your near and dear ones are too busy to spend some time with you. You might be brave enough to reach out timidly, afraid of being rejected or ridiculed.If there is a lack of empathy it drives you further inside and the shame of being needy just compounds the loneliness. Thus you put on a brave face and soldier on all the time feeling the dull ache of the growing hole of loneliness eating you from the inside out.

There are people who say they are happy to be alone. I wonder, is it all the time that they are happy. Don't they miss a human voice, a kind touch, a warm embrace or just a loving look? I am betting they do and they sweep the feeling away, telling themselves that feeling lonely is for the weak. Isn't that then just their ego telling them they are not lonely? In fact are they not just suppressing the reality? Some people fondly call it manning up!

To achieve great things people have been known to say they are faster alone. If you are a runner I guess you are. But in all other things...I believe no one person can succeed, there is always another nudging them along or making the path easier. It could be a parent , a friend, a sibling, a spouse and in some cases your employees. "No man is an island" said John Donne.

'No Man is an Island'

No man is an island entire of itself; every man 
is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; 
if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe 
is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as 
well as any manner of thy friends or of thine 
own were; any man's death diminishes me, 
because I am involved in mankind. 
And therefore never send to know for whom 
the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. 

MEDITATION XVII
Devotions upon Emergent Occasions
John Donne 

Explained-  Donne returns to his idea that 

“no man is an island,” indicating that 
everyone is connected to every other human being in some way. 

 Just as dirt and sand clods are part of the European continent, 

so too is each man part of the entire human race; 

the removal of a clod diminishes the 
continent,

 and the removal of a human life diminishes mankind. 

 Since every death diminishes the rest of mankind in some way,

 when the bell tolls for a funeral 

it tolls in a sense for everyone.

The glass in my eye is stuck...

The frame caught the corner of the other frame...
shattering the glass in an infinite number.
The crunching sound and the glint of glass that caught the light...
all happened in the blink of an eye.

The water spilt out of my eyes,
the glass had entered my eye.
The pain was immense...and yet...
there was no physical piece of glass in there.

Lying on the floor,
watching the shattered frames and cracked glasses around me...
I wonder how I arrived here.

The picture that was once a memento of a special moment,
now was covered in cracked glass,
just like the fractured love now that was once my life.

I often heard that everything comes to an end
and most often in life, I have lived the end of so much.
Yet, this was one thing I never thought would end.
The endless, honest love we shared that was the centre of my life.

Am I selfish that I want you to reach out to me?
Am I spoilt to expect a phone call?
Am I immature if I look forward to a heart to heart with you?
Can I not hope for a little understanding?
A little affection....a little satisfaction?

I do not know...but the pain of your distance and loss has entered
my eye...like the shattered glass on our picture together...and makes me
weep so often....for my eye has the glass of your memory stuck in it.....

The Shell of Emptiness....

I often wonder about the shell of a snail...

It carries this empty shell on its back, which happens to be its entire world.

If it is not carrying its empty world it retreats into it,

thus shutting the rest of the universe outside.

Does it know what its doing? Is it happy living such a life?

Is its existence better than most?

Is it ok to carry one's solitude and loneliness on their being, around them, enveloped by it.

Most people do strange things to rid themselves of this shell of emptiness.

Can they? In the end...I feel we all have this shell within us.

Even when we are with loved ones, we can see we are not alone,

but there comes a moment of clarity when we realize ...everything is flimsy..... its all temporary...

love, friendship, enmity.... all the relationships we have, have a limitation....

and in the end its just us....

we are responsible for our happiness and only we can light a candle in the darkness

of our hearts and create a semblance of joy...and make peace with out solitude.

We...like the shell of the snail...are destined to carry our solitude and loneliness in our selves.....

the only difference is the snail has no choice...we as beings can shrink the size of it and become comfortable with our shells of solitary confinements by making peace with them and

acknowledging them as well as giving it its due importance thus accepting its existence and

also recognizing its presence....ergo as we identify our burden....it becomes easier to carry ... we may not get rid of it but we walk a little taller..knowing it exists and always will...we came alone...we leave alone....what we have inside....will also be what we have to comprehend....alone!!!