Thank you, Angels of the US Treasury;  your gift to me of my allotted $300.00 from my taxes this year (Tax What? kind of Refund?  Whatever), I have taken 2 steps towards becoming more environmentally responsible, and improving the quality of my life.

First, I realized that, in a jobless life and a rented house (thank you, HUDs Section Eight Program), I've got 3 address books, 5 schedule books, and countless pieces of paper, all over my floor.  To conquer this, I spent $100.00 on a now late-model Palm Organizer.  As I can put schedules, addresses, even Mindfulness group notes on it, I suddenly won't need all this paper, anymore.  Save a tree, but hey, now I gotta get the trash out.

I next, of course, spent another $100.00 on updating my trash hauler.  Face it, some companies are better at recycling, some are willing to take away more stuff.  I found a company considered "Green", and have contracted them.

Lastly, a trip to a local discount store yielded my first bicycle since childhood.  Keeping in mind that an ear infection has stricken me with vertigo and I'm too sick, at present, to ride it, that JOB (yeah, got one NOW) needed emissionless transportation to get me there.

Bicycle....Green Waste company....Palm Organizer.  I became a technologically savvy environmentalist, and even saved a cat from the local Humane Society, to add to my pleasure.

You be good to the likes of James Watts, if you see him, ya heah?

Gwennie in SC

For some time now, I've been miserable.  As I typed that word, I heard, "no, make it BIGGER!  You haven't just been PASSIVELY MISERABLE, you've been DIARHHEA MISERABLE".

This time, my thought IS right:  I have been MISERABLE...DIARHHEA MISERABLE.

I've put it out there, too.  Passed my miserable thoughts onto others, then wondered why I was isolated and alone and not sought after.

I want to say I've been a NICE girl;   I don't believe, any more, that I HAVE.

Today, what is next, is to challenge my thoughts.  I use lots of absolutes and I've never just let my thoughts be.  I've had emotional reactions to them, assumed their accuracy when they may have been triggered by stuff that isn't even me.

Today, I CHOOSE to change my path.  I CHOOSE to NOT touch the negative, and simply observe it.  I choose to grant it understanding and care, but not copious amounts of time or me.

I CHOOSE to be the woman I KNOW is here.  I CHOOSE to be different.  I CHOOSE to be more.

I came to Gaia, having been one of the first folks on ZAADZ.   Years later, I'd become serious about my writing/blogging, needed to network and hoped to find friends.

You see, I've been blogging, dealing with, interacting with ONLINE SINGLES.

Now 11years single, it's a rare thing, that I would glance at my inbox and NOT get a twinge of emptiness, when I got NO responses to my latest personal ad.  Week after week, year after year, I'd wrapped my self worth up, in how many men I'd insulted, because they couldn't spell the four letter version of my first name.

I have wanted LOVE;  I have come HERE, to write, to be real, to own what matters.  After all, anyone reading my writings before? 

Like asking those in bars, accustomed to reading a bottle label, the lonely singles I wrote in the presence of were NOT usually appreciative of my writings.

So I've been hanging out in the Land of Singles Bars Online.....

Heaven help me, I SOOOOO much prefer the fresh air HERE.

Namaste from
my little corner of Gaia

For months now, I've struggled with getting past my self-hatred.  Remnants from a life of pain surrounded me;  I haven't been able to dig out.  As I sat in this archeological refuse center, I have realized that there's one change I can make, today.

I have enough detergent for 2 loads of laundry.  Faced with at least 6 piles of clothes I absolutely hate?

I'm washing and putting away the clothing I love.

It seems silly, perhaps, but it's an act of respect and reverence, for me.  I've been enjoying, this early hour of the day, stacking piles of clothes, in front of me, that I LOVE.  I've folded them, smelled them, hugged them.

Clothes I don't like have been tossed to the floor behind me.  Having sorted through one stack of clothes, I decided what would make a good, NECESSARY bit, to wash, in one load.  Taking them to the washing machine and allowing them to wash, I return, now, to the Dead Pile, and swoop it up, placing it in biodegradable trash bags, for disposal.

I've considered taking these clothing items to a local charity;  they smell, I treated these clothes with hatred, and I don't want to pass that on. 

An imperfect solution, perhaps, but I know that, within hours, I will reach the World, in clothes I LOVE.  I will feel good about my appearance, good about me, and I will boost my confidence.

I will appear as I am.

More and more, I'm stopping destructive thought in my head, with the the following reminder;

"It only takes ONE".

How many times, in my past, was it ONE WORD, ONE GLANCE,  ONE IDEA, or even ONE VISUAL presentation, that TOTALLY seemed to change me?

Mine have been things like this:

"No"
A wink.
That my thoughts bear little resemblance to reality.
The sight of a plane, crashing into one of the World Trade Towers

Just ONE.

In wanting a mate, nowadays, I tell myself to BE AWARE;  After all, I JUST WANT ONE.  I'm not seeking to identify 50 possibilities..

Same thing, with other life choices.  It only takes ONE, to leap out, identify itself, and trigger a smile.

The Power of ONE.  It makes a line into a PLANE;  A painful boundary into a welcoming firmament..

Tonight, I write in italics;  tonight, I'm on a spiritual journey.  Tonight, I see what matters and what doesn't, truly and to me.

As of noon today, I began my first fast;  included in such is a fast from television and radio, though I'm allowing myself streaming Internet.  I also have committed to NOT making ANY outgoing telephone calls, nor writing any emails that require a response.

This 24 hours, I'm here to listen.....and oh, the noises I hear, tonight..

My window air conditioner, two years ago, sounded cheap and small;  tonight, it blares at me, like the sound I imagine, in a wind tunnel. 

I notice the moon, veiled heavily by dewy clouds, as rain passes from my area;  few bugs glint my screen door, and no moths seem interested in flitting about the lamppost.

I tried to convince my dog that it was time for bed, a few hours ago;  Sophie, like a little girl, was all playful and excited, avoiding being sent to bed in her kennel.  It ocurred to me that a lullabye might be worth trying to sing;  My once lovely voice crackled in dissonance within a few syllables, and I knew I wasn't to wax melodic tonight.

I can feel bitter gall in my mouth and throat;  my stomach must be suffering at the gastric acid.  I choose to live with the migraine that may stem from low blood sugar or caffeine withdrawal, as indicators of how it feels to be Alive, Imperfect.

I made three handwritten copies of various versions of Proverbs 3 these past hours;  As I pulled out my Spanish-English King James Bible, it occurred to me that I should read Proverbs 4.  There, as if putting a dour note to my creative use of intellectualism, I found admonishments as to the consequences of breaking my dedication to the lesson I'm being taught.

I hear, inside, that I'm being spit up, like Jonah upon the shore, within the short days and weeks to come.  I've lived my Wilderness time, I've survived the Darkness of the Whales belly, and I am yet ominously exited, by what is to come.

I imagine what it will be like, to eat, possibly dip in Tension Tamer tea, the birdseed bread given to me by my church;  I smile a soft half-smile, seeing myself voraciously and yet, sensuously admiring every succulent morsel.  Texture, temperature, sweetness and bite all shall mean more and different, when they are to come.

(to be continued)

0700--Sure I'm dying.  I've pecked the "E" key on my laptop so hard, so many times that the thing is popping off.  I'm going through withdrawal now, having not had anything to eat, nothing to drink but water........ok, and I just took an Abilify, for good measure.

The monkey on my back is now all the awful things I want to say to all the folks who, real or imagined, injured me in some way.  I cannot for the life of me imagine why some of the transgressions placed upon my heart, body and spirit seemed so easily applied to me.

Not much for owning, am I?  I don't know how to turn a deaf ear to others, and so I've suffered by my own choice.  I suspect I would have had a better life, as an insane Salieri or a pol sitting aesthetic.

Then too, I ache.........I want to know where these humans that have crossed my path got to be so hardened, so ugly.  The molester.......the wife beater.......the rapist......the fat boy in high school who offered me the family beach house on Cape Cod if only I'd let him lay atop of me during the Preakness.......

We all ache......and I just cry.  No point in blaming now;  every tortured soul from my past yearns for Salvation.......for a spot in Heaven........Goodness, any momentary bit of Bliss would be better than how we've come to loathe ourselves.

Like good servant Pastor Katherine on Maundy Thursday, I willingly would gentle them all, by washing their feet and anointing them with oil.

No one deserves Kindness more, I think, than the Torturers.

(to be continued)

Dear Dear World and God;

I understand why, every now and then, some choose to fast.  The deprivation of food was actually THE EASY fast;  doing without television and radio, or outbound telephone calls has been truly humbling.  I had no idea, how all that noise masked the loneliness I've felt.

Now, though, I have RESPECT.  I sit here, writing the best writings I've done in months, knowing that I can hear The Divine, rather than commercials for mass produced distractions.  It hasn't occurred to me, to check to compare my bossom to anyone elses', I have luxuriated, over the feel of foam as I did my dishes, in preparation for this time..

The physical fast has been challenging;  I don't like a dull headache, all around, and yet, at some point, I had to let go of the tension that produces many of them.  This also meant letting go of analyzing other peoples' motives, when I didn't want to face my own.

I have found compassion and a slowness to criticize;  I've found that I'm not so willing to be who I am not.  I have found that music is the red-headed woodpecker, knocking for food on the telephone pole outside my bedroom window, and I love that cacophony so much better than any Buddy Rich drum solo...

I understand, too, that to repeat this fast too often, would be to lose the spiritual and thought-insight I've gained.  As I was bulimic in my teen years, this cannot become a way of purging or self-mutilation..

I understand now, that if tv and multimedia go away, I can subsist on so little.

There is so much more to life, than what I have done without..

Like my crochet, my life is varied and full, colorful and rich.