Tag: Understanding (Page 4 of 5)

I Am Home

December 25, 2012 / Tom

What, I wonder, could I have seen to have been left so blind.

We know that we cannot look directly into a solar eclipse as it will render us blind. That’s how I feel now looking back at my period of blindness and insanity. I was staring at something so completely unusual that I was blinded by it. Fear blocked my Sun and, as a result, only allowed me to see Her edges, Her corona, and it blinded me.

The Sun should be left to freely roam across Her lover’s sky. She should be freely left to follow the laws of a Universe shared by those who love Her. The mindless fears of man do not change who she is, it changes who man is. It was me who thought this world was flat and feared to sail to Her in the horizon. She did nothing. It was I who believed She would sink beyond my sight into the darkness when it was me, so stuck in the spot of my own creation, who choose not to follow her to keep the mornings close. She was just being Her, it was me who saw that as something other than what it was.

It has been said that a man is but a sum of all of his experiences. That is a choice and while it may be hard to make other choices in the throes of conditioning, it is not impossible. It’s overcoming fear to set sail toward that horizon not just to test your world’s flatness, but to reach a place you want to reach beyond the grip of fear and doubt. There will be fear in getting there. There will be doubt. Yet, when you land on the New World and press your lips to virgin sand you will know the reason you set sail to begin with. You love Her, you need Her, and you will risk great peril to get to Her.

If you’re lucky She will be shining brightly when you arrive. She will grasp your face and caress your lips with Her own. She will not leave you. She will create winds to press your sails toward your destination. She will crack through the mightiest of storm clouds to remind you that She is there and exactly what it is you are fighting for. She will burn your skin and crack your lips and then create the rains that will wash it all away. She will remind you that you are a man, a fierce and unbeatable man, and you will rise to every occasion just knowing that She is there. You will growl in Her presence and somehow, in some way, She will bring you to the height of your soul and show you a view that proves you that you are alive.

When you truly love a woman you will face your demons and even yourself. You will find those parts of you that darken the skies and cause you to shut your eyes and you will defeat them. You will beat back the winds and the rain. You will stand taller even in the throes of weakness. You will fall, pick yourself up, wipe the blood from your brow and sweat from your eyes. You will growl again and keep on coming for more. The fire in your heart will drive you forward, toward that horizon where your Lover sits and begs you onward.

Now, I will close my eyes and sit in stillness and know the truth. I will feel the heat rise up into my crown and be ready to share it with Her. Feel it baby, and know it where you sit. Do not let go of it, and hold it tightly to your breast and let it consume you. Your man is here. Your man is back, and he has found the world that you have shown him to be as you said it was. He will be that man you can’t take your eyes of off. He will be that man that makes you sweat at the slightest touch. He will be that man who so captures your gaze and steals your imagination. Yeah, I am home.

“Stop It”

December 18, 2012 / Tom

“Obstacles cannot crush me. Every obstacle yields to stern resolve. He who is fixed to a star does not change his mind.” – Stephen Covey

I felt a familiar stitch in my mind this morning, a painful cramping that drives me to my proverbial knees looking for relief somewhere. I felt the sting of something riddle my mind with doubt, and I began questioning everything. It’s something I have found is a familiar pattern; one I can trace back to the time when I was taught not only to doubt everything around me, but to also doubt myself.

The doubt starts here, within me. Although I am strong, I often believe myself weak. Although I have a lot to offer, I often feel myself worthless. Although I am kind, caring, and compassionate I often feel myself cold and heartless. I know who I am even as I get lost in the insanity of who I think I am. Actually, maybe the thought of who I am is part of who I am, and when I finally readily accept the Doubting Thomas I can finally accept the St. Thomas.

In that place I doubt that anyone, at any time, could love me, be faithful to me, and accept me. I struggle for aloneness, often telling myself that I am better off the lone wolf than part of a pack that will, at some point in some time, bare its teeth against me. There are others so much better. Fitter. Stronger. More confident. More able. The list goes on and on as to why I am not worthy of the very things I thirst the most for; love, companionship, devotion and loyalty. If I extend them to you, you will invariably bludgeon me with them at some point.

This belief, which has proven true at various places in my life, is my own creation that is like a chain that has always bound me to a wall that is too of my own making. I may want to get there, but the chain of my mind attached to the wall of my own attachment to the past and the false beliefs that experience has created. I can feel me run to open arms but then can feel the chain pull me by the neck back to where I believe I belong.

I belong back here. You belong out there. It’s safer that way. Safer for you, and safer for me.

This morning, as I felt that old, familiar chain tighten around my neck I felt something else too. Something unfamiliar but becoming more a truth than a piece of fantasy. I felt the warmth of love so intense that it could not be ignored for the chill of the steel wrapped around me. It caused me to stop, to look, and to listen. I could see her love reach out to me. I could see her eyes look right through the layers I had created to hide myself from her at least partially. I could see her hand touch mine and utter a command that would resolve me to ending this lunacy.

“Stop it.”

I could see her loving eyes looking into my own.

“Stop it.”

I could feel her hand taking mine and strongly demanding me to hold on.

“Stop it.”

I could feel her lips nearing mine while she whispered into my head.

“Stop it.”

So, I stopped it. I fucking stopped it. And to those of you who do not know how glorious that moment is when you achieve such a monumental goal think back to that scene in Rocky when a battered and bruised man wants nothing more than to tell his Adrianne the truth and she finds him. He has nothing left – no face, no strength, and no thought other than to tell the only person that matters to him how he feels.

And she finds him. She fights her way through the crowd, through her own fear and her own shyness to tell the only man she loves how she feels. She bares her soul to him in front of thousands yet it appears that there is only the two of them standing there, each baring their truth to the other and taking the chance. The world may have been watching but that didn’t matter. What mattered was the complete absence of boundaries, the complete dismantling of walls and the complete destruction of the chains that kept them from knowing the power of that moment. They lived for each other, and they let it be known.

Yeah, Rocky is not a sports movie to me. It’s a love story; a deep, passionate and meaningful love story. Still, enough of the story, let’s get back to a slice of reality. I could get lost in that story all day because I find great meaning to it. I can relate. J

So, I stopped it. I fucking stopped it. I was Superman there, standing on the railroad tracks stopping a speed freight train before it destroyed yet another perfect moment in my life. I stood my ground. I braced for impact.

Nothing happened.

Well, I shouldn’t say “nothing.” To quote one of my favorite books/movies (Peaceful Warrior), “there is never nothing going on.” So, in order to best describe it in the way I know how, let me use a metaphor (I apologize in advance) and let me start from a place where I realized that nothing stopped going on.

We stood there, my chain growing taut and the air becoming harder to force into my lungs. I could see her walking toward me. She wasn’t asking me to struggle with my own limitations to get to her. She wasn’t asking me to break the steel that bound me to my own limitations in order to touch her. She came to me. I could sense her fighting her own thoughts and own experience to get to me, but get to me she did. I marveled at her, feeling somehow pathetic as this remarkable vision made her way through the mud just to comfort me.

Something struck me at that moment. I was not pathetic here. We were both showing one another something, and we were both learning from one another. We both were challenging each other, and we both shared a love that no real boundaries could keep hidden. I had as much meaning to this story as she did. She didn’t just grab my hand for me, she grabbed it because she needed it. She just didn’t look into my eyes to cut through my own layers, she did so to cut through her own. It wasn’t just my truth she wanted to take, it was hers she wanted to give. In that moment she was searching for the same thing I was looking for even if she did not realize it. Hell, I didn’t realize it until it nearly destroyed me.

“Stop it.”

It wasn’t a command to me alone. It was a testament to a new reality. So I fucking stopped it.

So, as the train came bearing down on me and I extended my arm to “stop it” I felt something. I felt her hand on my shoulder. I felt her lips come close to my ears and I heard her whisper,

“Not going to happen.”

In that moment there was no train, no tracks and no need to be Superman. There was her, me, the chain and the wall. I looked at her, and her at me, and I knew. It was time to end it all, and to move on to the sequel where me and this woman…well…that’s a bit private.

Once upon a time she handed me a hammer. Others had tried, but I often found I could not wield their tool. Either they were too heavy, or too soft, or too long or too short. The hammer she gave me felt just right and I have used it to destroy many of the obstacles in my way to where I want to go. Yes, I have been fixed on a star and yes, I will get to where I want to go.

I can’t start by destroying the chain. See, that chain is my friend. It allows me to roam within its circumference, and to feel the taste of liberation even as it binds me to the past. It allowed me to see love walk toward me, and to feel the beauty of being the one. The chain also shows me the direction to the real obstacle in this continuing saga. The wall. The attachment I have to the past that, brick by brick, has created the largest obstacle of all. It’s an obstacle I may not completely destroy, but it is one that I will turn into something I can easily hop over when I need to.

In this mixture of metaphors and dreamy states of mind, there is one constant. Motivation. Love isn’t just a tool of acceptance, it is a tool much like a hammer that we use in conjunction with stern resolve to get to the destination we want to reach. We can either choose to knock down those walls or attach a chain to them. It’s all about choice, and it’s all about finding the resolve to overcome those very temporary moments when the obstacle seems too high to climb or too thick to demolish. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve come to that moment when I just didn’t think I could overcome the obstacle. I’ve given up, walked away, protested that I just couldn’t go on only to find the motivation to continue. Sometimes it has been despair. Others, it has been hope. Sometimes it has been fear.

It has always been love. Always. Despair comes from the failure to follow your loving heart. Fear is the feeling that love is absent even when it is staring into your eyes and holding your hand. It all is a belief in doubt, where the doubts scream at you that you cannot climb this wall until you find the strength to simply say “fuck it” and reach for the top. Love is the motivator and regardless of whatever tool it shows itself as at the end you will feel its power if you just “stop” the activity of forgetting.

Well, that sermon is over. I have a lot of stuff to do, including “stopping it”. I have love to make and dreams to fulfill and good times to create. I have mistakes to rectify, and a wall to tear down. Then, I have a chain to dismantle link by glorious link. Yeah, I’d say I have plenty to do.

Peace.

Go There, Be Happy (Poem)

November 11, 2012 / Tom

Who you turn to

In your time of need, that’s the One.

When lost in your sea of emotion

When the mind takes over

And proves to be an absent friend

The arms that comfort you

Are the arms where you should remain.

Who you talk to

In your moments of turmoil

When the world closes in on you

When the journey seems its longest

And peace seems some distant dream

That mind is the one you need know

The thoughts that should be cherished.

Comfort is not an illusion

It is a message.

A message from one heart to another

From your heart to the rest of you

That tells a simple story of love

and of where you need to be

And where you should return.

Go there, and be happy

Know it every day, every minute, every second

Even in those moments when very ground you tread

rumbles with its dissatisfaction.

Go there, and be happy

Knowing I go there with you

Sometimes with tears, sometimes with a beaming smile.

Go there, and be happy

Like flowers and grasses, bow your lips to the stream.*

And quench your thirst within the River.

I will see you there, someday.

*Rumi “Eternal Joy”

The Black Wall

November 7, 2012 / Tom

This was a vivid dream as real as any waking moment he had ever experienced. He walked alone a field so dark there was no form, and with each step a fear that there would be nothing which would hold him steady until the next foot fell. In the darkness he wondered, and there in the space within space he found himself questioning everything.

Off in the distance something shined like a star contrasting brightly against the emptiness. He approached warily, unsure not only of what it was but also unsure of the safety of the journey to it. In this darkness there was no security, only insecurity, and in this walk toward the light there was no guarantee that his feet would fall on steady ground. He couldn’t even see his feet, or the rest of him, let alone the ground that lie ahead. He just knew he couldn’t sit still, that he needed to move forward toward the star lit against the abyss. He wanted – he needed – to get to that spot where the light would show him all there was to see.

Slowly, almost painfully, he neared the light. He could now make out the form of a wall. It was a dark, black brick wall highlighted by a brilliant white mortar which reflected the light brightly. He could not see the source of the light, or the size of the wall but as he looked away the light only make the blackness surrounding him darker and more ominous. Somehow the wall itself made him feel both lonely and loved, as if somehow now he had found a purpose in the loneliness he had always felt and the hope that soon it would all end. So he pressed onward, painfully afraid of each step while joyfully hopeful in the journey.

The brightly-lit wall appeared to move toward him as he got closer as if it somehow sensed the fear he had in each step. It seemed to want to end his suffering although he thought it couldn’t possibly relate to such emotion. The wall could be nothing other than a wall, it had no ability to know him or his condition. It was just there, lit, tall, strong and unable to feel.

Soon he had to stop walking as the light began to hurt his eyes. It seemed to be harder to see in such bright, beautiful light than it was in the darkness. He had become so accustomed to the darkness that the light actually hurt him. He looked away, searching for comfort in the darkness while still desperately wanting to see the light. It was a slow, painful process, but soon he could look into the light without reaction. Then he could see a message written boldly in white scrawled across the wall. It wasn’t long from then that the message was clear.

“You may not live to see the end of this.”

He stood, frozen. The fear created within a lifetime came flooding to his face as his eyes began to let go a torrent of pent-up suffering. He dropped to his knees and sobbed. Yes, the end was near, and there was no certainty that he would live to see it.

As he sobbed uncontrollably he noticed through his blurred eyes the field in which he had walked. There were such beautiful flowers that extended as far as the eyes could see. Yes, he could see! Butterflies fluttered around him, some landing on his shoulders, others on his arms, still others on his head. They seemed to caress his soul, telling him “it will be all right, you are loved.” He looked out across the horizon not believing he had never seen any of this. The darkness wasn’t the only truth, there had always been this field, these flowers, the butterflies and the beauty that reached as far as the eyes could see. He had simply closed his eyes to it all, and when the smallest crack in his own blindness presented itself he found a light that lit the world. The journey hadn’t been a simple walk at all; it was his eyes being opened to the truth.

He turned to the wall that had given him hope and had inspired him toward his present moment. The light that had once lit it now lit everywhere. As he wiped his eyes and stood he read the message scrawled on it one final time. It had changed, and with a sigh and a swallow he read what it now said aloud.

“This is the end of it.”

He half-cried half-laughed at the revelation as a lone butterfly landed on his chest right where he now felt his heart beat loudly. He looked at her as she him and both seemed to know.

Love.

♥

The Gift of You (The Beach and the Ocean)

October 19, 2012 / Tom

“Touch me there, my love, and discover a truth worth finding” ~Tom Grasso

Sometimes he was like an island beach, and she was like an enormous ocean. He would hold on to his fears and she to hers. She’d be consumed by her identity of independence, of power, of depth and he his identity of pain, experience and a fascination with the destiny that left him here, as this island, longing for the sea. Both were so consumed by who they were that they failed to realize what happened when they touched at that place we call the “shoreline.” There, the ocean and the beach become one, and it is there that the greatest magic in the Universe turns water into a bit of sand and sand into a bit of water.

There is not much magic being the beach or the ocean. All it takes is an illusion and a desire to put that illusion above all others. Yes, we often put the illusion of who we are above the reality of who we are. We so identify with our waves, with our dunes, with our depth and with our coarseness that we neglect the wonderful experience occurring where the two meet. We are so dependent on the dream that we often tell ourselves that we love the dream and in the process destroy a dream far greater. We even suggest that there is nothing else as important to our existence as our identities and that we are done experiencing this existence beyond the boundaries we have created for ourselves.

There are times when I am so in love with being the beach or the ocean that I can not truly experience the shoreline. I will be so attached to the hot sand or the water’s depth that I will never fully know the experience of the place were the depths cool the sands, and the sands warm the water. If I hold fast to this notion, I will never see how much I love the ocean, or the beach, and I will never fully get to know that beauty that I AM.

We forget that many times the real strength, power and depth aren’t just found in the illusions of who we are, but in the ability to allow ourselves to enjoy the shoreline outside the box of who we think we are. It takes real courage and strength to give ourselves to another, to become the Lover, when we have created the idea of strength in only ourselves. It’s easy to pretend to have strength in separation when we find comfort there. It’s comforting to dream about truth in the separateness of I from you, of him from her, of me from us when that is what we have created. It takes no real courage to stand on your own two feet and stare the Universe in the eye when that is who you think you are. The real courage comes from stepping off the sand into the mud, of rising out of the depths into the that place that is neither water nor sand but a bit of both. We step out of our box into the wet sand and often feel fear we want to run from. It gives us great comfort to hide in our secure box and somehow suggest that it takes remarkable strength to be there.

We are free to experience this existence in the way we want. Free will, the beauty and the bane of the human experience, is the sole mechanism by which we convert our ideas and thoughts into a tangible reality. We can lie to ourselves that we have no shame there even as we put the proverbial fig leaf on our most private of areas and hide ourselves from one another. We are free to profess our strength and our power and our independence even as we display none of it. We cater to fear, some of which shows itself as unreasonable anger and some of which shows itself as unbending inconsideration. Other times that fear is demonstrated as pain, the sand suffering in not meeting the water, and the ocean suffering in not meeting the sand. So we attach ourselves to what we know…pain, fear, or some other false sense of security. We all seem to relive our chosen stories when we simply fear walking from the beach to test the waters where the waves kiss our sandy feet.

A chosen few seem to find great pleasure at the shoreline. They take a great risk in giving themselves to their Lover, but with that risk often comes great reward. There is Heaven in that place where Lovers meet, a certain paradise fraught with undertows, riptides and strong currents. Heaven can certainly become hell from time to time, but to those who brave their minds and their fears to walk in the surf ecstasy is the answer to the challenges of their humanity. Because they speak a language only their Lover can understand, those souls indulge their fears and find solace in one another. They learn to not only give to each other, but to take from each other. They can still be who they are as individuals, but they also find that the line where they meet one another is a place where they find a source of great strength both inside and outside of themselves. See, the shoreline doesn’t just exist where two souls meet, it is also the place inside ourselves were our fears meet our love, where our minds, hearts and souls all mesh into an undeniable passion for another person.

That passion is beautiful. That love is Divine. That expression of human fear creates such a wonderful manifestation of human potential in love. Take a chance if you will. Express it freely if you can. Give in to it if you are able. Even while we are fine in being alone and even as we love who we are, there is a certain wonderfulness in offering yourself completely to another being who is doing the same. Trust is the result. Faith is the byproduct. You are a gift, and it would be such a shame not to offer that gift to someone who would do the same for you and to someone who breathes you in with each breath, and who lives to be by your side.

Live this truth and find a foothold in the ocean tide where fear can’t last for long and faith abounds in the gift of love, companionship and of who you are.

The Short Story of a Simple Truth

October 18, 2012 / Tom

He just knew.

If anyone asked him why he was in love with her, he simply replied “I just am.” If someone asked him how he was able to deal with the distance between them he would reply, “I just do.” When his friends wondered how he could deal with the weeks between seeing her he simply shrugged and said, “I just can.”

His replies had become simple over the years. When they began he would describe elaborately to all who would listen how much he loved this woman. He’d demonstrate his loyalty for all who would watch, and he would get into long discussions describing his love for her when he was challenged. There was no doubt in anyone he knew that he loved her, and that he was her man, and he liked it that way.

He had mellowed over the years. Soon the distance between them would close, and the time between visits would be nil. They had been committed to each other for a number of years now, and the years had converted what were rough seas into calm waters. She had healed him and, in some respects, they had healed each other. Now this man and this woman walked together in ways many would never know, many times simply to be with each other in a moment that would become eternity.

His once elaborate protestations of love were his truth. He had never known such passion for another human being. He felt something when he saw her. He knew all he need to know when he was with her. He needed nothing when in her arms and asked for nothing in their moments of passion. He felt her in every breath and saw her in the beauty all around him. In their moments apart, he could feel her hold him in the pink-hued clouds of a summer sunset. He could hear her whisper to him in the sounds of a running stream. He would smile at the thought of seeing this or that with her, and would vow to bring her to these places in their moments together. He wanted her to see his world and to know him through these things. Once she was there with him he could revisit these places in her absence and remember.

Once he feared. He feared her and in giving himself to her. He fought her, and she fought him right back. He tested her, and she refused to accept the test. She was not them, she was beautiful and smart and everything he needed. The nightmares and demon-voices would warn him and he would react, and she would fight him hard. He hated those voices, and he hated the terrors they brought to him. He knew the truth, and he wanted to believe.

Then he resolved to embrace the truth and own it. He stood firm and fought back against the onslaught of fear and insecurity. This time instead of fighting him, she was fighting next to him, like a warrior princess alongside her prince standing with their backs against the wall ready to win or die trying. It was in this battle that they found each other, and where that unbreakable bond of trust and love was made whole. He learned he could trust and have faith in her without question and she learned of his incredible strength and resolve in love despite facing the haunting face of his own demons.

When the dust settled they were standing there, hand in hand with their lips embracing each other tenderly. There they found freedom, and there she taught him more than he had ever learned. He proved to her the depth of his love for her, and for her that meant the world. He would never steal from her who she was but would instead stand guard and protect her without question. He would not control her, he would fiercely protect her independence. He would never need ask her for a thing, for she would freely give of herself to the man she loved without worry and without question. The Yin and the Yang met there, where they stood, and that was enough for the Universe to sing loudly.

From then on, when someone asked him why he was in love with her, he would simply reply “I just am.” When someone asked him how he dealt with the distance between them, he simply replied “I just do.” When someone asked him how could deal with the weeks that spanned between their moments together he simply replied, “I just can.” They were simple answers, particularly for this man so known for his elaborate responses.

Yet they were elaborate to him. They were very detailed in describing the indescribable. They described the gratitude he had for the gift that was her. They described the salvation he found in a woman so strong that she not only fought him but fought for him. Those simple replies encompassed an eternity of emotion and a never-ending spring of love within him. He couldn’t describe any of this to them, and he felt no need to anymore. Instead, he would hold his tongue and find her. There he would hold her, kiss her, touch her and make love to her in a way that fully described how he felt. Their eyes would speak a language no one else spoke, and their bodies would dance to a song no one else heard. It did not matter to them here in that place where they stood, where they laid, where they danced together in unending ecstasy. They had found each other and they were present in the moment they had created. All else had ceased to exist.

In their lives they had found a short story of a simple truth. Their entirety, their Universe, and the enormity of who they were could be found in three simple words they never failed to speak to each other. “I love you.” Those words righted a world that had once gone mad. Those words solidified a truth that spanned a million moments. Those words rang true for the eternity they described and the Universe they created. They lived it, they breathed it, and it became everything.

♥

Lover’s Lament

October 16, 2012 / Tom

I need you to settle in next to me

Hold my hand

Put your head on my chest

Let your leg drape over mine

As you wipe these tears away.

Tell me it’s all right

That the numbness will end

That the cold shoulder isn’t cold at all

Just waiting for my warmth, my touch

As you bring your body close to me.

Show me that you love me

That you are true, that the rock on which I rest

Isn’t another figment of my imagination.

That you are real

And that you aren’t just another ghost being created by a lie.

Let me feel the sun again

Hear the church bells ring while the songbirds sing their tune.

Let me know some truth

In place of this loneliness, your love

In place of this fear, your steady gaze.

In ignorance the fumes of fear explode

In dismissal the eruption of sadness consumes

The Warrior succumbs to the battles of his mind

He cannot move from his stool

Or stand as the blows rain down upon him.

And so he loves…

Now, then, tomorrow.

And though he struggles alone against the tide

He will stand, eventually

And he will secure Love’s sweet victory.

I’ll Stand By You

October 13, 2012 / Tom

I’ll stand by you

I’ll stand by you

I won’t let nobody hurt you

I’ll stand by you

Take me into your darkest hour

And I’ll never desert you

I’ll stand by you

So the song goes. A beautiful expression of true love, a woman vowing her allegiance to her man. Equally beautiful is the man seems to have suggested a need for such help, for such devotion. His Angel has responded, and now he can heal without fear that she is abandoning him or judging him as so many others have throughout his life. He can focus knowing that his love is by his side, and will not leave regardless of the circumstance.

Wow. And yes, I am projecting. I know that, no emails need be sent to show me that wonderful light. So what, I’m a man who would love to have a woman who would stand by me regardless of the circumstance. Because I have been one who has not wanted it, and has pushed it away vehemently, I realize the beauty of wanting it. Maybe even to someday have it.

I also wonder if the singer is singing it to herself. What a better gift to oneself than to know you will never desert you. Yes, I’ve deserted myself many times over my life. I’ve abandoned my intuition, my beliefs, my values and my inner truth many times. I’ve left the love I feel within me at the door and acted like a moron in the quest of a security that could never exist anywhere but within me. I’ve clung to the cliff when all I wanted to do was jump off of it.

So, part of having someone standing by you is living in the knowledge that you are that someone too. You stand by you, you walk with you into your darkest hour. You sing love songs to you, and you adore the person you are. Someday, with a little luck and a lot of passion, the person you are in love with will stand by you too.

Don’t give up, never give up. Know with some practice that there will always be one person who will stand by you no matter what, and that is you. You are that special. As for that other person you’d love to share your life with? Well, that person is out there waiting for you. What you are searching for is searching for you. It will come. Somewhere there is someone wishing they had another person standing by them, and one day your paths will cross.

Be vulnerable. Be open. And when those paths cross for Pete’s sake embrace the moment.

The Broken Umbrella (Creative Writing Exercise)

October 2, 2012 / Tom

“Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.” ~Lao Tzu

It was just a solitary, broken umbrella. To the casual observer it meant nothing. It was refuse, trash, and needed to be discarded before the next home game. It had outlived its usefulness and could no longer serve its purpose. Soon, it would end up yet another anonymous object at the bottom of a landfill somewhere, decaying for a million years in the land of unwanted things.

Yet it stood there proudly, its bright red color contrasting greatly against the stadium’s somber grey concrete benches. It had been a couple of weeks since the team’s last home football game, and another was coming up in a few days. The maintenance crew was busy at work, getting the field ready and the stands prepared for the warm bodies that would give life to this otherwise cold landscape. Everyone there could see the red umbrella, but no one really noticed it. That is what happens when something becomes old and broken. The protector becomes garbage. The needed becomes discarded. To many who worked that field on this day that umbrella would become a harbinger of things to come. They, too, would become discarded when no longer loved, needed, or wanted. They, too, would be anonymous. Their bright color would fade into the grayness, and they would be forgotten.

This umbrella had, however, given a gift in its state of disrepair. It had been protecting a man and woman, lovers, as they sat and talked under the steady rain a few days earlier. They had been having trouble in their relationship, both feeling as if they had become broken and forgotten to the other. They both desperately wanted to work it out, to fix what had been broken, but neither would give up their anger. As the conversation became a debate and the debate became an argument, both began to lose sight of their truth. Soon, the innuendo became threats and it seemed like all would be lost on that cold, wet October day.

Suddenly, a gust of wind blew and the once strong umbrella bent in the middle. It’s bright red covering folded backwards, and its arms gave way to the pressure. Both became soaked instantly, but the man and woman stopped their argument as the rain became a torrent. They began to curse the umbrella and the rain, running for shelter in one of the open doorways that led into the bowels of the stadium.

Once reaching drier climes, the stopped to get their bearings and to regain their senses. As they wiped raindrops from their faces they looked at each other. The eyes, those gateway to the soul, met and suddenly the world stopped around them. Something clicked. She suddenly was that beautiful woman he fell in love with, and he was that caring man she loved. Their hands moved in unison as he moved the hair from her eyes, and she wiped some raindrops from his forehead. Their words stopped, their anger was gone and all that was left was the indescribable force that had brought them together. The resistance subsided, and they stood, man and woman, lovers again.

“A lot of good this umbrella was,” the man said, looking at the broken thing in his hand.

“You know, it’s been a long time since we’ve danced in the rain,” came her reply.

They looked at each other and smiled.

“Yeah, it’s been too long. Let’s go,” the man said. He grabbed her hand and the ran out onto the concrete heading towards the field. On the way, the man dropped the umbrella along the benches where it would stay until it was picked up by the maintenance crew a few days later.

The sounds of laughter and rain echoed within the walls of the empty stadium as the lovers danced and played in the rain. After a while their bodies would become cold and they would embrace to get warm. They both remembered how nicely their bodies fit together, her head on his chest, his arms around her, his hand holding her head tightly to that spot where his heart beat. It felt so good to remember how right this was. It felt so good to feel how perfect everything would be when they just leaned on one another.

He leaned down and kissed the top of her head. She, looked up at him, and they kissed like they hadn’t in quite some time. They held each other in this lover’s pose, remembering all along what made their world work. This, they remembered, was the Truth.

“Baby, take me home. I need you,” the woman whispered.

He took her hand again and they began to run to the stadium’s exit leaving their umbrella behind. In a moment that umbrella had given way, and the two would become one yet again. As the rain washed away their pain they remembered their love. Neither would recall what they were arguing about, and neither cared. Instead, they focused on the love they had rediscovered and the warmth they had given to one another on even the coldest of days. A gust of wind and a broken umbrella had provided a miracle of sorts, and one that would not be forgotten for the rest of their lives.

Even in breaking there is purpose, and even in getting wet there is hope. No one would know how important that umbrella was. It was picked up and put in the dumpster with the garbage but it had served an enormous purpose. Lovers who would find their eternal purpose that day owed it all to something they would never know and never remember. As their days became years and their years became decades it all made sense, and the man and woman never forgot to dance in the rain. And they never bought another umbrella.

♥

The Final Breath

September 28, 2012 / Tom

♥

He laid there, the immense pain in his chest beginning to numb under the realization that he was dying. Just moments before he was alive, enjoying the morning with his beloved, laughing about the memories they had created the night before. Now, he was sprawled out on the living room floor fighting for air, and wanting so desperately to talk.

She was there, above him, her hands holding his face as they had a thousand times before. The worry in her eyes was clear as she begged him not to leave her. “I love you baby, please stay with me. We never have to be apart again, I promise. Stay with me, I love you so much. Please…please.”

He wanted to talk, but the words just would not come out. He wanted to remind her that he loved her too. He wanted to bring her back to the many moments they shared. As her blue eyes cried the rains of hell onto him, he wanted to bring her back to Heaven, the place that they shared when their bodies meshed and their minds fell into each other. He wanted so badly to comfort her as she tried to comfort him by touching him, kissing him, and reminding him that yes, he was all she ever needed. All he could do, however, was lay there. As the tears streamed down from the corner of his eyes he could only stare at her and beg whatever gods there were that this would not be the end.

His desperate struggle for air began to settle as his mind drifted back to the first time he saw her. It was a picture, and her eyes had enveloped his senses and drew his attention. He couldn’t explain the feeling, he only could utter something to himself that he would say to her a short time later: “beautiful”. She stole his attention to the point that despite loving the mountains he did not notice them behind her. All he could do was look at her face, those eyes and that smile. He felt he knew her once, although he couldn’t say when. He also felt he needed to know her again, although he couldn’t say why. So, he sent a simple message, and then came her reply.

He could remember the reply, the poetic way she stated her emotions of the moment. He could feel her presence despite never meeting her. In a brave and courageous moment this man had sent that woman a message and she had replied. He knew then that something was happening within him.

A sudden shift brought him back to his reality. “I’m going to get the phone to call 9-1-1. Baby, please hold on!”

“NO!” he wanted to scream. “Please stay here with me. I need you baby, hold my hand. Kiss me. I don’t have much time left. I have so much I need to say to you.”

She was gone, and although only a few feet it seemed like a million miles had separated them. They had begun their relationship hundreds of miles apart, and although they had settled into a routine he could remember the pain of being separated from her. So many days had to be spent missing her and wishing she was there with him. In the early days he had often doubted that this woman could love him. He had often doubted that she could stay true to him. He often caved to the frantic fear of his mind created long before he ever met her. Even at its worst when they ended for a short time, she came back to him proving that he mattered, and that he had value to someone. She loved him, he could see it in her eyes and feel it in her touch, and now as he heard it in her voice as she frantically begged the dispatcher to get there as fast as he could. As she screamed at the phone, he only wanted her voice to become sweet again like it was when she said “I love you” or “come to bed baby”.

“Please sweetheart, let me hear you sing” his mind whispered as his mouth remained silent. “Don’t cry, just whisper in my ear and laugh. God, let me here that laugh please. I have a joke here somewhere, please just laugh.”

He could almost hear her laugh. It made him tingle to hear it. Her eyes would light up and her mouth would curve “just so”. It was no wonder everyone loved her so much. It used to drive him crazy, and he often felt in the beginning like she liked them more than she liked him. She paid more attention to them, and he felt relegated to a dark corner of the room. He believed she gave them more of her than she gave him, but once he began to listen and to see the truth he realized what a fool he was. She gave him so much more of herself than she had given anyone else. She loved him, and offered to him parts of her he was sure no one else had ever seen. She even gave him what he asked for, and in the process showed him the truth. “What a fucking idiot I was” he said to himself. “I want my fucking life back, I want to love her like she deserved to be loved from the first time we met. Please God, give it back to me, I won’t waste a second…”

God’s answer was a gasp for air and an intense pain in his chest. He shook his head angrily at the reply, and then focused as he had learned on the beauty around him. He could feel his children in his arms again as they had been as babies. He could hear them say “I love you dada” and feel their little hands take his index finger as they struggled to walk. He could feel them cuddled next to him when they got older as he read their favorite book. He could remember the lectures to his son about sports, the diatribes to his daughters about boys, the millions of laughs and the relatively small numbers of tears. He loved to make them laugh, and he would often make himself the butt of his own jokes to get them laughing hysterically. As he looked into his woman’s eyes something must have told her, “please tell my babies I love them. Please don’t ever let them forget.”

“I won’t. But you’re not going anywhere. You will tell them yourself.”

“God I wish” was his heart’s reply. His children were the first people he ever felt pure love for. They taught him what it was to love and be loved, and the woman who now cradled him softly taught him how right he was. His children gave him value as a father, she taught him value as a lover, together they taught him value as a man. Even now as he spent his last moments in this existence she was here, showing him his value and the true meaning of love. It wasn’t in the nifty words he could string together. It wasn’t in the sex. It wasn’t in the outward show of affection. It was in the truth that made all of those things possible, but not necessary. They were necessary to the ego, the truth was necessary only to itself and it owed something only to itself. He had understood that early on, but it took him time to get over himself to actually use it. His past had once so cluttered his mind that it stole precious moments away from him and from them. Moments made even more precious by their imminent end.

He could feel the end coming. Within him became a mixture of peace and pain, of darkness and light. He realized this interesting parallel in the life we all lead. It seemed what we call death is just like what we call life, a mixture of suffering and joy. Even now, as he suffered intensely amid the final pathway to peace he couldn’t go there. Not yet. He wanted to spend one more moment with this woman who had changed his life and brought the sunshine where none existed. For that he would bear whatever pain that had to be borne. He suddenly became calm, and the pain seemed to subside. This, as it had been his entire life, was the power of Love.

He looked at her and felt healthy. His breathing seemed to return to normal, and the pain in his chest subsided. He shook his head slowly, although he was not sure at what. It felt like the first time they met, with a mixture of excitement and anticipation followed by realization and love. Then she laughed, oh God she laughed. Through the tears and sniffles she laughed. His head, now on her thighs as she stroked his head and wiped the tears from his cheeks, shook a bit with each burst of laughter. He was able to lift his arms long enough to wipe her hair from her face and stroke the contour of her jaw line one final time. Suddenly, he found his voice for one last poetic verse to his lover.

“Baby, I love you. Since the dawn of time I have loved you. It may be here, or it may be there, but somewhere I will be loving you. Please, know that it is you, and it always has been you. I am grateful for last night, and for every night I have had with you. I am also very grateful for this moment and that it was with you. I love you…I swear.”

As she bent to kiss him, he closed his eyes, grateful that the last vision he would have in this lifetime was of her, his lover, his friend, his guiding star. They kissed sweetly with a passion that had never left. With that, he inhaled deeply and headed toward peace.

♥