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This Woman's Journey~Words from the Path~~~Joys from the Journey~~~Songs from the Water~ November 19 ~♥~In Thanksgiving~♥~Garden Meditation by Rev. Max Coots Let us give thanks for a bounty of people. For children who are our second planting, and though they grow like weeds and the wind too soon blows them away, May they forgive us our cultivation and fondly remember where their roots are. Let us give thanks; For generous friends, with hearts, and smiles as bright as their blossoms; For feisty friends, as tart as apples; For continuous friends, who, like scallions and cucumbers, keep reminding us that we've had them; For crotchety friends, sour as rhubarb and as indestructible; For handsome friends, who are as gorgeous as eggplants and as elegant as a row of corn, And the others, as plain as potatoes and so good for you; For funny friends, who are as silly as Brussels sprouts and as amusing as Jerusalem artichokes; And serious friends as unpretentious as cabbages, as subtle as summer squash, as persistent as parsley, as delightful as dill, as endless as zucchini and who, like parsnips, can be counted on to see you through the winter; For old friends, nodding like sunflowers in the evening-time, And young friends coming on as fast as radishes; For loving friends, who wind around us like tendrils and hold us, despite our blights, wilts and witherings; And finally, for those friends now gone, like gardens past that have been harvested, but who fed us in their times that we might have life thereafter.
For all these WE GIVE THANKS. November 15 On Gay MarriageToday all over the country people are coming together in a show of solidarity in support of gay marriage. I think that no one has addressed this more eloquently or passionately than Keith Olbermann. Please take the time to watch the video, even if you are not a fan of Keith Olbermann. Watch it if you believe in LOVE!
BELOW IS THE TEXT OF THIS MESSAGE: Olbermann: Gay marriage is a question of love Everyone deserves the same chance at permanence and happiness SPECIAL COMMENT By Keith Olbermann Anchor, 'Countdown' updated 9:13 p.m. ET, Mon., Nov. 10, 2008 Finally tonight as promised, a Special Comment on the passage, last week, of Proposition Eight in California, which rescinded the right of same-sex couples to marry, and tilted the balance on this issue, from coast to coast. Some parameters, as preface. This isn't about yelling, and this isn't about politics, and this isn't really just about Prop-8. And I don't have a personal investment in this: I'm not gay, I had to strain to think of one member of even my very extended family who is, I have no personal stories of close friends or colleagues fighting the prejudice that still pervades their lives. And yet to me this vote is horrible. Horrible. Because this isn't about yelling, and this isn't about politics. This is about the human heart, and if that sounds corny, so be it. If you voted for this Proposition or support those who did or the sentiment they expressed, I have some questions, because, truly, I do not understand. Why does this matter to you? What is it to you? In a time of impermanence and fly-by-night relationships, these people over here want the same chance at permanence and happiness that is your option. They don't want to deny you yours. They don't want to take anything away from you. They want what you want—a chance to be a little less alone in the world. Only now you are saying to them—no. You can't have it on these terms. Maybe something similar. If they behave. If they don't cause too much trouble. You'll even give them all the same legal rights—even as you're taking away the legal right, which they already had. A world around them, still anchored in love and marriage, and you are saying, no, you can't marry. What if somebody passed a law that said you couldn't marry? I keep hearing this term "re-defining" marriage. If this country hadn't re-defined marriage, black people still couldn't marry white people. Sixteen states had laws on the books which made that illegal in 1967. 1967. The parents of the President-Elect of the United States couldn't have married in nearly one third of the states of the country their son grew up to lead. But it's worse than that. If this country had not "re-defined" marriage, some black people still couldn't marry black people. It is one of the most overlooked and cruelest parts of our sad story of slavery. Marriages were not legally recognized, if the people were slaves. Since slaves were property, they could not legally be husband and wife, or mother and child. Their marriage vows were different: not "Until Death, Do You Part," but "Until Death or Distance, Do You Part." Marriages among slaves were not legally recognized. You know, just like marriages today in California are not legally recognized, if the people are gay. And uncountable in our history are the number of men and women, forced by society into marrying the opposite sex, in sham marriages, or marriages of convenience, or just marriages of not knowing, centuries of men and women who have lived their lives in shame and unhappiness, and who have, through a lie to themselves or others, broken countless other lives, of spouses and children, all because we said a man couldn't marry another man, or a woman couldn't marry another woman. The sanctity of marriage. How many marriages like that have there been and how on earth do they increase the "sanctity" of marriage rather than render the term, meaningless? What is this, to you? Nobody is asking you to embrace their expression of love. But don't you, as human beings, have to embrace... that love? The world is barren enough. It is stacked against love, and against hope, and against those very few and precious emotions that enable us to go forward. Your marriage only stands a 50-50 chance of lasting, no matter how much you feel and how hard you work. And here are people overjoyed at the prospect of just that chance, and that work, just for the hope of having that feeling. With so much hate in the world, with so much meaningless division, and people pitted against people for no good reason, this is what your religion tells you to do? With your experience of life and this world and all its sadnesses, this is what your conscience tells you to do? With your knowledge that life, with endless vigor, seems to tilt the playing field on which we all live, in favor of unhappiness and hate... this is what your heart tells you to do? You want to sanctify marriage? You want to honor your God and the universal love you believe he represents? Then Spread happiness—this tiny, symbolic, semantical grain of happiness—share it with all those who seek it. Quote me anything from your religious leader or book of choice telling you to stand against this. And then tell me how you can believe both that statement and another statement, another one which reads only "do unto others as you would have them do unto you." You are asked now, by your country, and perhaps by your creator, to stand on one side or another. You are asked now to stand, not on a question of politics, not on a question of religion, not on a question of gay or straight. You are asked now to stand, on a question of love. All you need do is stand, and let the tiny ember of love meet its own fate. You don't have to help it, you don't have it applaud it, you don't have to fight for it. Just don't put it out. Just don't extinguish it. Because while it may at first look like that love is between two people you don't know and you don't understand and maybe you don't even want to know. It is, in fact, the ember of your love, for your fellow person just because this is the only world we have. And the other guy counts, too. This is the second time in ten days I find myself concluding by turning to, of all things, the closing plea for mercy by Clarence Darrow in a murder trial. But what he said, fits what is really at the heart of this: "I was reading last night of the aspiration of the old Persian poet, Omar-Khayyam," he told the judge. It appealed to me as the highest that I can vision. I wish it was in my heart, and I wish it was in the hearts of all: So I be written in the Book of Love; I do not care about that Book above. Erase my name, or write it as you will, So I be written in the Book of Love." © 2008 msnbc.com November 05 Congratulations AmericaI am proud to be an American tonight!
It is a great day and I have a vision of a bright future!
Thank you to everyone that voted and made this historic election possible!
Sending knowledge & love to President Obama!
September 28 on my way back...
I am settling in here in Florida. I have decided that I am going to continue try and make a life here in Florida, instead of trying to run seeking to recover what I left 10 years ago. I am back on track believing completely that I create my own reality. I was telling myself that before but not totally committed to the concept. So, with the continued help of my higher self and those that love me enough to point out my inconsistencies, I am back on the forward and upward path!
I have made some new friends. I am getting out and taking pictures, enjoying sunsets and the beaches. I am back to seeing the beauty around me and loving every minute of it!
Thanks to my friends that have been sitting here on the beach waiting patiently to see if I would return. Your love and encouragement continue to nourish me!
On politicsThis may be my only political post this season. I was a Hillary Clinton supporter but the process chose us another candidate and I am now fully behind Barack Obama. Everything else being equal, and we all know that it is not, I will ALWAYS and FOREVER vote for the candidate that is going to maintain integrity and balance on the Supreme Court. I will always vote for a women's right to choose. I will always vote for a candidate that will support stem cell research, the first great hope that many with chronic disease have EVER had. I will always vote for the candidate that will represent ALL Americans.
And I will say only one thing about Mr. McCain's choice for vice president... I find it insulting, at the very least, that he thought that women would follow Sarah Palin like the Pied Piper. Did he really think that we would believe that any ovaries in the White House would be good enough????
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