What I am reading right now...

I had a gift card for Barnes & Noble that has been in my wallet for years....with a balance of about $3 on it! I went to the website, and browsed through the clearance books to find something I could buy without going over what I had on the card. I found this Deepak Chopra book about the life of Buddha. I only had to pay 55 cents more than what was on my card to cover shipping!

No matter what your religious beliefs or spiritual practices are, the story of his life is a fascinating one. After watching several documentaries about the Buddha, I'm enjoying this book. It uses the known information about his life as an outline for a beautiful imagined story.

Speaking of marriage....

Let's just start this post off saying that I have always been a big dreamer. I remember riding in the car one day when I was probably 7 years-old, looking out the window and thinking that I was going to marry Bruce Springsteen when I grew up. This seemed like a great plan. (Yes, I had a huge crush on The Boss.) I told my parents this, and then I remember them explaining that he was already married to a woman in his band. That was probably my first little broken heart experience. Ha. Seriously, I remember being so disappointed that it hurt. I may have even cried into the leather arm rest. Oh, Bruce, you sure were a looker back in the dia!

Now, if only a talented, mature, sane, sober, funny, honest, smart man who looked like this could come along, my heart just might find a way to go all aflutter again.

Mi Madre

Beautiful.

Photo credit: Betty Casale (My dad's mom.)

Forget 2 Years Ago...Try 40 Years Ago Today!

40 years ago today, my mom and dad were getting married. My mom was 19 & my dad was 20. He sold his stereo out of his car so they had gas money to get to Sevierville, Tennessee for their honeymoon. I know their marriage probably hasn't always been easy ( the words marriage and easy probably shouldn't even be legally allowed in the same sentence), but tonight they could have gone anywhere in the world to celebrate (they've come a long way, financially, since that August night of 1971), and instead, they chose to go to Sevierville to honor the last 40 years they've spent together. When I heard those were their plans, I just loved it. FORTY YEARS. I'm in awe and full of love for these two.

This is love: to fly toward a secret sky, to cause a hundred veils to fall each moment. First to let go of life. Finally, to take a step without feet.
— Rumi

That other day running underneath this one like an old videotape...

Perhaps the hardest thing about losing a lover is

to watch the year repeat its days.

It is as if I could dip my hand down

into time and scoop up

blue and green lozenges of April heat

a year ago in another country.

I can feel that other day running underneath this one

like an old videotape"

-Anne Carson

"The Glass Essay"

Vows

We got to our hotel, which was amazingly drenched in artistic history. Famous poets, writers, painters, philosophers stayed there and created and conversed in the room we slept in. D.H. Lawrence painted the windows in the bathroom where I got dressed in the early dark of the morning. The afternoon before, as we were checking in, I pulled a book off the shelf in the lobby and the page fell open to this poem. I read this as part of my wedding vows.

V

AND think, there will something come forth from us.
We two, folded so small together,
There will something come forth from us.
Children, acts, utterance
Perhaps only happiness.

Perhaps only happiness will come forth from us.
Old sorrow, and new happiness.
Only that one newness.

But that is all I want.
And I am sure of that.
We are sure of that.


VI

AND yet all the while you are you, you are not me.
And I am I, I am never you.
How awfully distinct and far off from each other's being we are!

Yet I am glad.
I am so glad there is always you beyond my scope,
Something that stands over,
Something I shall never be,
That I shall always wonder over, and wait for,
Look for like the breath of life as long as I live,
Still waiting for you, however old you are, and I am,
I shall always wonder over you, and look for you.

And you will always be with me.
I shall never cease to be filled with newness,
Having you near me.


D. H. Lawrence's poem: Last Two stanzas of "Wedlock"