Category Archives: challenges

Concrete walls and a machine that goes “ping”

6 Comments

There are no four walls that contain more joy and more misery than a hospital. A place of healing can quickly become a place of sadness with the reading of a few numbers or a somber look on a Clinician’s face.

The four walls that currently contain my mother are filled with uncertainty and questions. She is being kept comfortable and pain-free and the staff have been attentive and kind. But there is still a shroud of nagging doubt – a cloud that hovers over my mother’s hospital bed threatening to flood the room with reality.

The machines beep, the fluids continue intravenously and the revolving door of doctors, nurses and visitors continues to spin. Kind words are spoken, prayers are uttered and friends become more like family.

Thank you all for the words of support and the hugs sent across the blogosphere. It truly means a lot. And even though the embrace is not tangible, I can still feel it.

A long and bumpy road

18 Comments

I haven’t been able to spend much time with my words for the last few days.  My mom went into the hospital on Thursday morning and I have been spending all of my days with her.  She is quite sick and we’re not sure where we go from here.

It’s a helpless feeling watching someone lie in a hospital bed, looking so frail, and knowing that I can do nothing but sit and keep her company.  I have done a bit of reading, but more than anything I watch her sleep.  In her current world of tubes and medications, she dreams a lot and talks in her sleep.  I lean forward and strain to hear what she is saying, but nothing she says is very intelligible.  I’d like to think that somewhere in the haze of her drug induced suspension of consciousness that my father is whispering in her ear from his place beyond our world and keeping her company as she sleeps.

Almost as much as I miss my writing, I miss reading all of your words.  Our family has a long and bumpy road ahead, but I hope I can find some time to distract myself from reality and lose myself in the happy land of WordPress.

I am on my way back to pass my day entombed by the drab walls of the hospital and listen to the beeps and hisses of the monitors.  My words still churn in my head, but now they form prayers for my mom.

Find your wings

16 Comments

I had a completely different post planned for today, but after talking to a friend that I haven’t seen in a while, my whole mindset changed.

wings(image credit: photo-dictionary.com)

I believe we all begin our journey of life with a full set of wings. I’m not talking about Angel wings, but invisible pinions that give us a chance to rise above ourselves and discover new horizons. Somewhere along our path, our wings may be clipped.  They may mutate from their original form and, although we still embody the same freedom of originality, our chance to soar becomes stifled and we miss some of that ability for latitude.

Life can be a daunting journey, fraught with challenges and roadblocks, but those feathered appendages help us maneuver beyond those obstacles with little effort.  They give us room for movement that may not otherwise be possible allowing us a chance for an alternate illusion.

Our mere existence on this planet can be described as a roller coaster, a flurry of adventure and blurry images that stream through our line of sight at Mach 4.  Somewhere in the blistering speed of that coach car we miss the visions we should be focusing on and get lost in the overwhelming barrage of outside interference.  We are inundated with life.  We become a victim of its vicious nature and forget to allow ourselves the power to fly because we become saturated with apprehension and doubt.

If you allow it, life will over-stimulate your senses and it will swallow you whole.  It will envelop you and wrap your waking moments, keeping you mummified until you surrender your power at the end of a tumultuous and exhausting day.

Find your wings.  Give yourself permission to feel that freedom again and take your life back.  If the path you are on does not feel like the path you chose – fly.  Rise high above it and give yourself a new perspective of your life.  You may find that you still had those wings all along but you just forgot how to use them.

Hard pressed to share – Trifecta post

30 Comments

Divorce existed in their near future.  Her words still hung heavily in the air and pummeled his eardrums with the weight of their meaning.  It had finally been uttered aloud and it was no longer an idle threat that they were reaching the demise of their relationship.  The reality suffocated him.  His gambling had driven a wedge between them and he refused to get help for a problem he didn’t think defined him.

As he entered the casino, the familiar sound of bells and machines soothed him.  He was home.  He had never felt more at ease than he did in this concrete tomb of cacophony.  Each of the dealers knew him by name but he only took that to be a sign of professionalism and not a reflection of addiction.  The Craps table beckoned and he succumbed to its welcoming embrace.

The dice were magical.  His fours ‘hard-ways’ hit over and over and the stack of chips increased exponentially in front of him.  New rollers took their place and his stack continued to grow.  Luck was certainly being a lady tonight.  After what must have been hours he asked dealer to color him up, he collected his chips and cashed them in.

casino cash

He was given the high-roller suite and stood on the balcony with the wad of bills.  He didn’t want the cashier to tell him how much he had won when he cashed out.  The wind tousled his hair and in one swift movement he cast the money over the edge of the balcony.  The rain of bills spread swiftly through the air and littered the ground below.  The crowd preparing to enter the casino pecked at the bills like chickens at their feed.

She may have taken half of his life, but she wasn’t getting half of his winnings.

~

Written for the Trifecta challenge (and the photo was taken on my one and only cruise – I didn’t win the money, but my friend did!)

On to this week’s one-word prompt which, this week, is inspired by the recent arrival of the Hong Kong monsoons and the start of April in general.rain (transitive verb)
1: to pour down
2: to give or administer abundantly <rained blows on his head>

Please remember:

  • Your response must be between 33 and 333 words.
  • You must use the 3rd definition of the given word in your post.
  • The word itself needs to be included in your response.
  • You may not use a variation of the word; it needs to be exactly as stated above.
  • Only one entry per writer.
  • If your post doesn’t meet our requirements, please leave your link in the comments section, not in the linkz.
  • Trifecta is open to everyone. Please join us.

Good luck!

I’d do whatever it takes – Trifextra Post

37 Comments

The treatments were grueling. Her body was showing the signs.  My support was unending, but I don’t think she realized that.  I shaved my head the next morning.  Actions speak louder than words.

~

Trifextra: Week Sixty-One

This weekend we’re asking for exactly 33 words including an idiom somewhere within.  Examples of idioms include – add fuel to the fire or wear your heart on your sleeve.  You can find more examples and a definition of idiom here.  Good luck!

I have a feeling I’ve answered this before – Daily Prompt

5 Comments

The Daily Prompt asks us: Have you ever truly felt déjà vu, the sensation that you’ve already had the experience you’re currently having?

I have experienced deja vu many times and each time it feels somewhat unnerving.  The feeling that you’ve been in the same situation in some alternate reality, knowing or feeling that you can predict the next couple of seconds, is an interesting phenomenon.

I am a believer in reincarnation, so perhaps my willingness to fathom the anomaly is somewhat justified.  And maybe I am just using reincarnation as an excuse to believe there is a potential reason behind an inexplicable occurrence.  I don’t know why it happens, or how it happens, but that doesn’t change the existence of the eerie feeling that I succumb to on the odd occasion.

deja-vu

(image credit: ghostwiki.blogspot.com)

It is possible that souls who are linked throughout different lifetimes are brought into the same types of situations to deal with them at another time and another place.  I have experienced some strange moments where I could completely justify that belief.  There would be no other reason to accept the course of action that ensued to make anything else seem plausible.  There was an instinctual understanding of the other person that I could not have known prior to that day, and, thinking back on that day, I am still mystified.

Have you ever experienced a predicament like deja vu that you couldn’t explain?

Where did I go?

25 Comments

Perhaps it is the late arrival of Spring weather and the snow still blanketing my lawn.  Or perhaps it’s the amount of work I have piled on my desk that seems to keep accumulating.  Regardless of the reason, I don’t feel like myself.  I don’t feel any impending sense of doom, I just feel like I’m suffocating, drowning in the things that are going on around me and I can’t seem to come up for air.

It’s a disturbing feeling for me.  I’ve always been the one to hit things head on and face each challenge as it comes.  I’ve never wallowed in self-doubt or self-pity, but these last few weeks have painted an Picasso-like portrait of a person quite different from the paint-by-numbers picture I’ve seen in the mirror all my life.  Each day I would fill in the missing colors and paint the spots with the hue that best represents my mood.   Generally the colors were bright and cheerful.

009

I thought I was back on the path to being myself again on Sunday after sitting on my deck and soaking up some sun for an hour.  As I lazily looked up into the afternoon sky, the ring around the sun seemed to reflect my feeling of something lurking out there, waiting to descend.  The old saying goes “ring around the sun or moon, means snow or rain are coming soon”.  One quick look at the weather forecast confirms possible accumulation of 2 cm of snow on my birthday.

I am hoping the anticipated appearance of Spring will happen soon.  Once the aroma of freshly awakened earth and the sound of spring birds start to permeate the air, I am confident that my mood will sing and soar with those birds.

If anyone has any nice spring weather you can spare – I’d be happy to send you my address.  🙂

The Days I need to learn to forget

14 Comments

Life moves at a million miles an hour.  And so many times I feel engulfed by its pace and overwhelmed by the many things I have to balance on a daily basis. It feels like several days attack me all at once, but I have to learn to step back and change the pace of that onslaught.

There are always two days in every week that I should learn to ignore.  With everything I have going on in my life, these two days do nothing to help me live in the moment.  Yesterday and tomorrow always weigh heavily on me and distract me from the here and now.  I focus too much on what I didn’t accomplish yesterday and think forward too often about what is waiting for me tomorrow and I forget to live in the present.

TodayTomorrowYesterday

(image courtesy of babydearlyn.blogspot.com)

I need to embrace each day as an opportunity to live life to the fullest and accept whatever challenges may face me on that one day.  There is no sense in worrying about what tomorrow will bring, because I will never truly know that.  And  there is no point in reliving yesterday, because it is over.  I cannot change the past.  It will reflect itself in my present, sure, but I can choose how much power I give to that reflection.

I need to lay yesterday to rest and not consume myself with thoughts of tomorrow.  I must give myself permission to meet the obligations and promise of each day with an open mind and an open heart.  One day at a time will let me absorb all of the life that day has to give without being consumed by the days that lay behind or lay ahead.  Those days, I cannot change.

My favorite saying (and my email address in short form) is Carpe Diem – Seize the Day.  Life happens – there is nothing I can do to stop the moving freight train of time and only I can choose how I ride that train.  I can look out behind me and see where I’ve been, I can look ahead and ponder where I am headed, or I can embrace the vibration of the life flowing through the train and live in the moment. The choice is mine.

Today, I am making the conscious choice to forget all of the things I didn’t accomplish at work yesterday.  I cannot go back and do anything differently.  Today, I am making a concerted effort not to think about the fact that I will be sitting  in my office on Sunday catching up on the paperwork that has eluded me this week.  Today, I am going to empty sap from the buckets hanging from those towering Maple trees.  Today I am going to shovel the remains of Mother Nature’s perverse sense of humor from my deck and sit in the sun with a glass of wine in my hand.  Today, I am going to live only for today.

How will you live your day today?

She cannae take any more, Captain. She’s gonna blow!

29 Comments

People handle stress in very different ways and each of us have varying extremes when it comes to our breaking point.  Some are lucky and are able to desensitize themselves to the perils that compound normal levels of stress, while others become weighed down and feel like they are shouldering the burdens of the world.  I am perched precariously in the middle.

I have a pretty high tolerance for stress.  I can quell the volcano of emotion that begins to rise by merely separating the things I can control from the things I cannot and putting out those smaller fires, one by one.   I don’t always win that battle but I do make a concerted effort to not let things bother me that are out of the grasp of my command.

But stress has a funny way of being able to continue a slow burn without any alarms going off.  It smolders behind walls and can ignite spontaneously when it recognizes the slightest bit of exhaustion or defeat.  Exhaled oxygen will spark the embers and the fire of stress breathes new life.  I didn’t feel the heat emanating but the flames got the best of me and, when the inferno had died down slightly, the fiery beast had etched its charcoal marks deep under my skin.

volcanoes_geothermal_energy_212

(photo credit: earthtimes.org)

My tension is now stored neatly in large charred knots under my shoulder blades.  The volcano of stress is no longer spewing lava and lighting fires as it goes, but it is laying dormant under my muscles, reminding me that it has the power to erupt with the slightest sign of newly induced tension.  Any rupture in my otherwise calm facade will bring bubbling magma to the surface and give new life to that slow burn.  Time for some deep breathing and a calming glass of wine!

How does your stress affect you?  Is it an easily controlled burn, or does it rage out of control?

Excuse me, I’m trying to scurry here….

16 Comments

The Daily Prompt has asked this question: Do parties and crowds fill you with energy, or send you scurrying for peace and quiet?

When I was younger crowds never bothered me.  I went to concerts and enjoyed the combined energy that only a crowd could produce.  But as I’ve gotten older, I have achieved an extreme level of distaste for feeling like a turtle caught in a school of fish.

turtle-amongst-school-of-fish

(photo credit: twistedsifter.com)

That mass of people who hurtle themselves in all directions seem to have no awareness of those around them and give me the sense that I have lost control of my own trajectory.  Malls are especially unsettling for me and I avoid them like the plague, especially during the holidays.  Although there is greater risk of credit cards being compromised with the advancement of hacker technology, I am happy to sit in the comfort of my own home and shop online for those gifts that cannot be purchased locally.

A small party with an intimate group of friends is bliss.  I tend to relax and am able to be myself, allowing my goofy personality to take center stage and I feel more comfortable asserting my need to be the life of the party.  That assertion becomes non-existent in large groups and I get a growing sense of discomfort feeling like that lost turtle again.

Give me a subdued night with good friends, good food and good wine any day.  My life now is about developing those close relationships with people who matter to me.  I don’t miss the feeling of being a pinball in an arena sized game and playing hide and seek with friends in a crowd of 20,000 people.