STILL CRAZY AFTER ALL THESE YEARS

It was the brilliance of momentary decision when he said “I do” and she said “I do too, and that began the journey of seventy years of light- hearted experience and on the job training.

The boy with the little blue car came home from the War in the Pacific and sat on her front porch for two weeks until she agreed to marry him.

Older and wiser heads said it would never last. They were too young, they had no money and no jobs.

Seventy years later they are still going strong, which goes to show you can’t believe all the older and wiser heads.

CHILDREN OF CHRISTMAS

A VALENTINE FOR MY HUSBAND

“How do I love thee let me count the ways” Robert Browning wrote these words to Elizabeth Barrett early in the 19th century.

Have you ever sat and listed the many ways and reasons you love someone? It’s quite difficult isn’t it? It keeps changing day by day and as more and more time goes by, you find more and more ways and reasons to care for someone. The reasons won’t be the same as when you were in the first heat of competition for his affections.

I love you for your kindness, and for the way you remember and celebrate each and every tiny holiday. I love you for knowing that people would rather receive a present than a gift card at Christmas, even if it is a very small package. (Of course, diamonds don’t take up much room.)

I love you for caring how I feel, and insisting upon carting me to every appointment even when I would rather drive myself, when I’m shopping for groceries, (even Nordstrom) and waiting patiently till I complete my mission without hanging over my shoulder.

I love you for being cheerful, even if it is too early for me to wake up and I just wish the world would go away.

I love you for writing real paper & pen letters to all the kids and grandkids instead of e-mail. (You have been told that you may alone in doing this.)

I love you for seeing a problem and insisting on fixing it immediately, even if I might wait and think about it. ( Another large tree came out today and two new ones will go in this week. I would probably have waited a bit longer to remove that lovely plum tree.)

I love you for admitting when you don’t know something. (I don’t always do this).

I love you for realizing we are different and not caring.

I love you for proving that right and left brain people can live happily together without killing each other.

I love you for loving me.

The first Valentine I received from you was when I was sixteen. I had just memorized Robert Browning’s poem in Mr. Cummings second period English class, and fresh in the throes of first love. This will be the 68th Valentine, and those ‘fresh throes” are stronger than yesterday. Happy Valentine’s Day Dr. Advice.

“At the end of the day, only kindness matters.”

PEOPLE OF THE SUN

“People of the Sun” oil painting by kayti sweetland rasmussen

What is this painting asking us: Are we blind to Life’s possibilities? Are our lips sealed to prevent the dissemination of heretic thought?

The rising sun is obviously our touchstone, without which we would forever wander in the terrors of darkness.

Now put this in the context of today’s life.

Do we stumble through life without taking every advantage offered us in the way of work, play and love?

Are we quiet in the face of dissention? Do we keep our opinions to ourselves for fear of disagreement?

The sun gives new life, light, warmth and hope.

Possibly the painting is saying “The darkness is over, it is a new dawn, and you can escape fears of the night.

THE FOUR MANIFESTATIONS OF BEAUTY

“Sachiko With Bamboo” watercolor painting by kayti sweetland rasmussen

“With any form of beauty, there are four levels of ability. This is true of painting, calligraphy, literature, music, dance. The first level is Competent.

We were looking at a page that showed two identical renderings of a bamboo grove, a typical painting, well done, realistic, interesting in the detail of double lines, conveying a sense of strength and longevity. Competence is the ability to draw the same thing over and over in the same strokes, with the same force, the same rhythm, the same trueness. This kind of beauty, however, is ordinary.

The second level is Magnificent. We were looking a another painting of several stalks of bamboo. This one goes beyond skill. Its beauty is unique. And yet it is simpler. It conveys both strength and solitude. The lesser painter would be able to capture one quality but not the other.

The third level is Divine. The leaves of bamboo are now shadows blown by an invisible wind, and the stalk is there mostly by suggestion of what is missing. And yet the shadows are more alive than the original leaves that obscured the light. A person seeing this would be wordless to describe how this is done. Try as he might, the same painter could never again capture the feeling of this painting, only a shadow of the shadow.

The fourth level is greater than this, and it is within each mortal’s nature to find it. We sense it only if we do not try to sense it. It occurs without motivation or desire or knowledge of what may result. It is pure. It is what innocent children have.

Turning the page was a painting called Inside the Middle of a Bamboo Stalk. . It is the simplicity of being within, no reason or explanation for being there. It is the natural wonder that anything exists in relation to another, the viewer to the painting.”

This fourth level is called Effortlessness. It is like the effortlessness with which one falls in love, as if actually being two stalks of bamboo bent toward each other by chance of the wind. The two have become inseparably one.

(With thanks to Amy Tan for borrowing some of her words.)

GRANDMA, GOD AND AIMEE, 2.

Aimee slipped unbidden into my dream last night, which brought to mind my grandmother’s fascination with her.

Aimee Semple McPherson was a Los Angeles evangelist and media celebrity from the 20’s and 30’s, the largest among a flurry of religious salesmen, all of whom were selling salvation, a commodity always in demand, and which costs them nothing to supply.

In Aimee’s philosophy, God, being Love, desires only that His children be happy, and they cast money into the collection box with reckless enthusiasm to assure them of that happiness. “Just give a little more” she would cajole, and they did.

Aimee’s call to Love offered an eternal Costa del Sol, liberally supplied with food, drink, sex and sun. Evil had no place in this ethereal paradise.

Grandma was a liberated woman seeking a new source of religious interpretation, and was enchanted with the notion that another woman could supply it. LIfe was not easy for my grandmother at that time; a single divorced woman raising two young daughters, while working and running a rooming house in the middle of the Great Depression.

The spiritual bubble burst for Grandma, a highly moral woman, when Aimee became romantially involved with her secretary, who was also married. This was simply too much for Grandma.

They had donned their swim suits and went for a swim on the Southern California beach, when it was reported that Aimee had been kidnapped. The town went crazy with worry over their favorite God-fearing darling, sending out dozens of people, even dragging the ocean searching for her body, and at least one man drowned in the failed effort. A ransom note was delivered, clarifying the terrible news that she had been kidnapped.

A month later, Aimee came walking in, swearing that she had been kidnapped, tortured, and turned loose in the desert to find her way home alone, though her physical condition belied it.

As the money poured in from grateful followers of her Four Square Church, her Temple filled to capacity but without Grandma. She rightly felt that she had been duped, and that Aimee was merely another false Wizard of Oz, hiding behind a shiny curtain.

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ATTAINING BALANCE THROUGH MEDITATION

Meditation doesn’t have to involve sitting cross-legged on the floor trying to clear your mind. The pleasure of losing oneself in something beautiful or meaningful such as art or music answer this need abundantly.

Elizabeth Gilbert’s memoir, “Eat, Pray, Love” tells about her four month visit to Italy where she grew several sizes larger, while exploring the joys of spaghetti in all its meltingly delicious forms. The next four months were spent in India learning to meditate while sitting in a dark cave clearing her mind. I prefer to look at something beautiful or thought-provoking.

“Meditation” Bronze by kayti sweetland rasmussen

This quiet bronze is very peaceful to me. It invites stroking, and it encourages me to close my eyes and breathe deeply, much as one would while in the practice of yoga.

Oil Painting by Brad Young”

This large oil painting hangs in my friend’s home and I would go to her home just to stand and study the painting. It is by her son, Brad Young, and I don’t know the title, or even if it has a title, but it is thought-provoking. I’m sure everyone sees a different image from mine, and I too, can see something different each time I see it. When I photographed it, I was able to turn the image into various directions, and found that it was intriguing, however it was viewed.

This is what art should be; a visual feast to enjoy forever. Something to give balance to our lives.

LOVE’S PHILOSOPHY

With a nod to Percy Shelley:

The fountains mingle with the river
And the rivers with the ocean;
The winds of heaven mix forever
With a sweet emotion;

Nothing in the world is single;
All things by a law divine
In one another’s being mingle—
Why not I with thine?

See the mountains kiss high heaven,
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister-flower would be forgiven
If it disdain’d its brother:
And the sunlight clasps the earth,
And the moonbeams kiss the sea—
What are all those kissings worth
If thou kiss not me?

THE JOURNEY

Life is a journey.

Road Leading Nowhere

Far From Somewhere

Road Leading Somewhere

The road is long. We all need somebody to love.

GUIDE FOR THE PERPLEXED

Broke and heedless when young, not so broke and somewhat more careful in our present lives, we’re mostly invisible to the young who are battling their own storms. We have reached the stage of life where ambition, like promuiscuity, is most pleasant when experienced vicariously. Case in point: I can’t remember the last time in my life I found myself truly fascinating. Don’t laugh. That is sad stuff. You should be able to look in your mirror and see someone you might at least like to get to know.

Of course today my nose is red and dripping, and I feel miserable. I could blame my cold on the plane ride, because I have been known to catch every germ known to man on an airplane, but I prefer to think it is because of all the people I kissed at my youngest daughter’s wedding last weekend. Much nicer to think you caught it from people you love instead of fellow passengers you will never see again.

But this is supposed to be a guide to aging, for which I am well qualified, due to my long adulthood.

We learn from Kahlil Gibran: “I have learnt silence from the talkative, toleration from the intolerant, and kindness from the unkind—-” Never stop learning, it causes the brain to explode into a real mess, and life is hard enough as it is. Pick up on all those old and perhaps dead mentors, you might actually learn something. (If only to keep your mouth shut.)

If you think someone you know has not faced adversity, you simply do not know them well enough. Everyone has something and it is likely to be worse than yours. At any rate, no one likes to listen to all your aches and pains and medications. I can’t stress that last part too strenuously. Old people love to tell you about all their nicks and bumps. Just smile and change the subject.

If you receive an invitation, even if it is to accompany your husband/wife to the gas station, GO! And if you don’t get invited anywhere, go by yourself. Try not to miss out on Life, the dance is over too soon.

Many years ago, I met a charming woman in her 80’s who was so interesting I told my husband that that was the kind of old lady I wanted to be. In typical Dr. Advice fashion he said “You’d better start now.”
Very good advice. Practice charming, or at the very least congeniality.

Lastly, never miss an opportunity to say I love you.