"WE ARE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER...THIS JOURNEY ON EARTH. HELP ME TO EXPLORE JUST WHAT IS GOING ON AND WHY! I DEFINITELY HAVE MY OWN IDEAS! THIS SITE IS DEDICATED TO ALL WHO ARE SEARCHING AND STRUGGLING FOR ANSWERS TO WHAT AND WHY. MAY GOD BLESS AND SURROUND YOU ALL WITH HIS WHITE LIGHT. BUT I NEED EVERYONE'S HELP! WILL YOU JOIN ME?"
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Fiona Robyn's "Thaw"! FREE Online Novel!
My name is Ruth. This is my story.
From: Fiona Robyn (fiona@fionarobyn.ccsend.com) on behalf of Fiona Robyn (fiona@fionarobyn.com) http://www.plantingwords.com// http://twitter.com/readthaw
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Thaw
Monday the 1st of March, 2010
Greetings!
Meet Ruth. She doesn't know if she wants to carry on living or not, and she gives herself three months to decide. Her diary is my novel, Thaw, and you can read it for FREE, beginning today.
Why am I giving a novel away for free? Because I am a writer, and I want to share my characters and their stories with as many people as possible. And maybe, if you enjoy it, you might want to read more of my books.
Become a follower of the blog page now. Follow on Twitter. Join the Facebook page. Forward this email to your novel-reading friends. Thank you.
Over to Ruth.
These hands are ninety-three years old. They belong to Charlotte Marie Bradley Miller. She was so frail that her grand-daughter had to carry her onto the set to take this photo. It's a close-up. Her emaciated arms emerge from the top corners of the photo and the background is black, maybe velvet, as if we're being protected from seeing the strings. One wrist rests on the other, and her fingers hang loose, close together, a pair of folded wings. And you can see her insides.
The bones of her knuckles bulge out of the skin, which sags like plastic that has melted in the sun and is dripping off her, wrinkling and folding. Her veins look as though they're stuck to the outside of her hands. They're a colour that's difficult to describe: blue, but also silver, green; her blood runs through them, close to the surface. The book says she died shortly after they took this picture. Did she even get to see it? Maybe it was the last beautiful thing she left in the world.
I'm trying to decide whether or not I want to carry on living. I'm giving myself three months of this journal to decide. You might think that sounds melodramatic, but I don't think I'm alone in wondering whether it's all worth it. I've seen the look in people's eyes. Stiff suits travelling to work, morning after morning, on the cramped and humid tube. Tarted-up girls and gangs of boys reeking of aftershave, reeling on the pavements on a Friday night, trying to mop up the dreariness of their week with one desperate, fake-happy night. I've heard the weary grief in my dad's voice.
So where do I start with all this? What do you want to know about me? I'm Ruth White, thirty-two years old, going on a hundred. I live alone with no boyfriend and no cat in a tiny flat in central London. In fact, I had a non-relationship with a man at work, Dan, for seven years. I'm sitting in my bedroom-cum-living room right now, looking up every so often at the thin rain slanting across a flat grey sky. I work in a city hospital lab as a microbiologist. My dad is an accountant and lives with his sensible second wife Julie, in a sensible second home. Mother finished dying when I was fourteen, three years after her first diagnosis. What else? What else is there?
Charlotte Marie Bradley Miller. I looked at her hands for twelve minutes. It was odd describing what I was seeing in words. Usually the picture just sits inside my head and I swish it around like tasting wine. I have huge books all over my flat - books you have to take in both hands to lift. I've had the photo habit for years. Mother bought me my first book, black and white landscapes by Ansel Adams. When she got really ill, I used to take it to bed with me and look at it for hours, concentrating on the huge trees, the still water, the never-ending skies. I suppose it helped me think about something other than what was happening. I learned to focus on one photo at a time rather than flicking from scene to scene in search of something to hold me. If I concentrate, then everything stands still. Although I use them to escape the world, I also think they bring me closer to it. I've still got that book. When I take it out, I handle the pages as though they might flake into dust.
Mother used to write a journal. When I was small, I sat by her bed in the early mornings on a hard chair and looked at her face as her pen spat out sentences in short bursts. I imagined what she might have been writing about - princesses dressed in star-patterned silk, talking horses, adventures with pirates. More likely she was writing about what she was going to cook for dinner and how irritating Dad's snoring was.
I've always wanted to write my own journal, and this is my chance. Maybe my last chance. The idea is that every night for three months, I'll take one of these heavy sheets of pure white paper, rough under my fingertips, and fill it up on both sides. If my suicide note is nearly a hundred pages long, then no-one can accuse me of not thinking it through. No-one can say, 'It makes no sense; she was a polite, cheerful girl, had everything to live for,' before adding that I did keep myself to myself. It'll all be here. I'm using a silver fountain pen with purple ink. A bit flamboyant for me, I know. I need these idiosyncratic rituals; they hold things in place. Like the way I make tea, squeezing the tea-bag three times, the exact amount of milk, seven stirs. My writing is small and neat; I'm striping the paper. I'm near the bottom of the page now. Only ninety-one more days to go before I'm allowed to make my decision. That's it for today. It's begun.
Continue reading here. Follow on Twitter. Join the Facebook page. Help me spread the word and forward this email to your friends! Thank you!
----------------------
Warmest wishes,
Fiona Robyn
--------------
www.fionarobyn.com
Labels:
"Thaw",
Fiona Robyn
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Rancho Camulos,- in Piru, CA Paranormal Investigation
January 23rd, 2010: APRA was invited to conduct an investigation of Rancho Camulos in Piru, CA with the International Paranormal Research Orginization IPRO & San Diego Ghost Hunters SDGH. This footage was shot during the walk through and Investiagtion of Rancho Camulos with the American Paranormal Research Association APRA.
Special Thanks to Rob & Anne Wlodarski, IPRO & SDGH !!!
Still Photo's: Bridget Odien
Commentary by: Brandon Alvis
Music: Gregorio Allegri , Brandon Alvis
www.apraparanormal.com
Labels:
paranormal investigation,
youtube.com
Friday, February 26, 2010
$5 Challenge! At Living With Lindsay
$5 Challenge!
Are You Up for the Challenge (Again)?
This challenge is sponsored by Living With Lindsay and I challenge all my readers to participate! I'd really like to see some names of blogger friends in that linky! I, myself, may participate if I can get to the next town where there's a dollar store! Come on! Are you up for it?
Lindsay states.
"About this time last year, the economy was in the tank, and we were all looking for ways to add some Spring decor to our homes without breaking the bank. I wanted to prove that we could stretch $5 more than we thought. I challenged my readers to create new Spring decor for their homes using only $5 worth of products from the Dollar Store - the Five Dollar Challenge.
This year, things aren't much different, are they? Sure, the economy has rebounded a bit, but we are all still more conscious of each dollar we spend than we were several years ago. Well, are you up for the challenge (again)?
I'm excited to announce the 2nd Annual Five Dollar Challenge! I was blown away at the creativity you guys displayed last year. My Mr. Linky from 2009 has expired (boo hiss!), but there were over 150 entries in last years challenge. And have I mentioned there are prizes?
This year the rules are largely the same:
- Create a new Spring decor item for your home using only $5 worth of items purchased at a dollar store - i.e. Dollar Tree, Dollar Store, Everything's $1.00, etc. The $5 does not include sales tax.
- You may use the following supplies *if* you already have them on-hand - paint, glue, paper, fabric, tools.
- On or before March 25th, post a tutorial for your new craft on your blog. If you don't have a blog, please email me photos and a written tutorial to LivingWithLindsay@gmail.com and I will find a way to display it for you.
- On March 25th, come back to my blog and link up your tutorial to the Five Dollar Challenge post that will go up that morning. Any entries that do not follow the rules will be disqualified (and I'll feel like a big, honkin' jerk).
- A panel of esteemed judges (JJ from the Blah Blah Blahger, Emily from Remodeling this Life and Gina from The Shabby Chic Cottage) will select five entries to put forth to the Living With Lindsay readership for voting.
- YOU guys will vote for your favorite of the entries. One winner and one runner-up will be selected to win the prizes (which are gonna rock, I must add).Got it?
If you have any questions, please post them below, and I'll answer within the comments so everyone has the same information.
If you are up to the challenge, please announce it to your readers! Help me spread the word by posting the below button in your sidebar:
Woo hoo! I can't wait!"
Labels:
$5 Challenge
Friday Follow! Join Us!
Let's make this year the best ever for blog followers! Spread the word about Friday Follow by grabbing our button for your blog and come celebrate again every Friday. Feel free to also send out a tweet, blog, stumble or share the news in your own special way!
Welcome to the Seventh Friday Follow celebration hosted by One 2 Try, Hearts Make Families and Midday Escapades! We invite you to join us every Friday to get more blog followers and to follow other interesting blogs. It is all about sharing and having fun.
Here's how YOU can join the celebration:
•* Link up your blog name and URL using the MckLinky below. Only need to add on one blog to be seen on all the blog hops.
•* Follow the Friday Follow hostesses listed in the first 3 slots.
•* Follow as many blogs as you like
•* Comment on the blogs telling them you're from Friday Follow
•* Follow back when you get a new follower through Friday Follow
The Blog Hop is the same at each of our three hosts blogs so you do not have to add your blog at each site. Just one - but you can follow each blog. Follow a few or follow them all.
The list is new each week. The links do not carry over. Please link up each week for new participants to find your blogs. The list is only open to add your blog links on Fridays. It will be visible all week to visit the blogs listed.
Labels:
Friday Follow
Thursday, February 25, 2010
8 Ways Illness Can Be A Spiritual Practice
Courtesy of Beliefnet.com
8 Ways Illness Can Be a Spiritual Practice
By Toni Weingarten
Though illness can be scary and unpleasant, there are spiritual gifts to be found in it.
Most people think of illness as inconvenient at best, tragic at worst. We focus on what we are not doing: our normal daily routines, work, outings with friends, being physically active, time with family. Yes, illness is a time-out from our normal lives of health and activity, but it needn't be time 'lost.' Illness can be a fertile time if you can focus your attention away from what you do not have, and focus on what it offers in abundance.
Even if your illness is one from which you may not recover, making it a spiritual practice will imbue your journey with rich rewards. Here are eight ways to turn physical infirmity into a sacred time of life.
Slow Down and Watch
"Healing happens in the slow lane," hospital chaplains tell patients. Think of life like film, 24 individual images moving rapidly in sequence to create the illusion of action. When illness makes you slow down, you have a rare opportunity to view each individual moment of your life on its own, and see how you unconsciously string moments together to create patterns of behavior. This new view gives you the chance to reorder moments into new and healthier patterns of behavior.
For instance, when I was bedridden for 3 months last year with pneumonia, I realized how I had grown used to being able to rush to rescue someone with a problem. I spent my precious energy on others and thus depleted myself, contributing to my illness. Weak from illness, I couldn't rush to anyone's aid and had to rescue myself. It felt healthy and I've since made it my practice to give others a chance to resolve their own issues, and fix my own first.
Practice Acceptance
Spiritual practice is about bowing to and saying 'yes' to the reality of life, even when that reality is illness. During my pneumonia, my daily mantra and spiritual practice was the phrase, "It is what it is." When I came to fully embrace this concept, I felt a deep sense of peace with my situation. I gave into my newfound understanding that my illness was as much a part of God's plan for me as my health. And, I used my energy to heal instead of struggling against my unpleasant reality.
"I believe that fighting or doing battle with any disease creates strong emotional currents that feed and strengthen the condition," says hospital chaplain Brent Davis. "What we resist, persists."
If the truth of your situation is you won't get better, accepting this frees you to make good choices for yourself in these circumstances, and to be honest with loved ones. It also frees your heart to feel God's love.
Let Yourself Be Held
The man lay on the bed in the emergency room, writhed in fear, as doctors worked to save him. I stood by his bed and gently stroked his brow and told him, "Let us hold you now. You are in good hands with the doctors and God. You don't have to struggle so hard here." He calmed down. I stood in the corner and prayed, knowing that God was holding him, and me. This man did survive and I learned about putting my fate in God's hands.
Often we feel we need to be in control of our lives, to constantly hold ourselves up - or what, we'll crumple to the floor? The reality is that much of life is out of our hands. We need to let ourselves be held by others - by the medical staff, by our families, by God. We need to let ourselves be cared for. We need to receive unconditionally and be fully vulnerable.
Keep Your Faith
A serious illness tests our faith. Even when doctors tell us eventually we'll recover, illness can seem to drag on interminably and we sink into despair; our current reality of pain, immobility, and weakness blot out our memory of health. Have faith that you will get well, especially if your doctors tell you so. Practice having faith that "the land of wellness" exists. Believe in your own recovery.
During my pneumonia, I came to imagine myself on a shipwrecked raft at sea. While I couldn't see land (health) I knew that it was out there and believed that I would someday wash up on its shore. As I slowly recovered, I had glimpses of it in the distance and my spirits rose; in my mind I rode the crest of wave towards this far shore. Then my strength waned and I imagined myself in the trough between two big waves, and I could only see water all around me. I kept faith that the waves carried me towards health, even if I couldn't see it. I held fast to my faith, as I would to a raft at sea, until I did indeed eventually wash ashore, stand up on shaky legs and slowly walk back to my life. Hold tight to your faith.
Have a Beginners Mind
"Part of my journey with cancer is giving myself opportunities to be a learner again," says musician Eileen Hadidian. "One of the most powerful ways to experience playing and teaching music without striving towards perfection is to become a beginner again on a new instrument. I let go of abstract expectations of having to achieve a goal by a certain time, and remember why I am taking lessons: for the joy of it."
For Eileen, her journey through cancer has taught her to let go of her attachment to product and outcome - the opposite of what she normally does as a professional musician. Now, she is experiencing the pleasure of music for her own healing.
Be Present
"The most common things I hear from people with serious or life-threatening illnesses is that it has taught them to live more fully in the present, to savor each day, and appreciate all the little things more," says hospital chaplain Bruce Murphy. "Just going for a simple walk can bring a sense of wonder for someone who has been bedridden."
I remember when I started to recover from illness, I felt a thrill whenever birds flew past me, as I sensed their "alive-ness" as keenly as I felt my own. I felt awed to be part of the web of life.
Be OK with Silence
Silence is the goal of many spiritual retreats and practices, and silence usually exists in abundance during illness. There is the silence at home when the rest of the household is at work and you are alone. There's also the silence of a hospital room (other than the machines beeping and medical staff, of course) between visiting hours.
Surrender to the silence and find what it has to offer. Look for the sacred in it. Rather than fear silence as an empty void, feel God's enveloping embrace in it. Cleanse yourself in the silence and use it to heal. Silence can be a mirror of your heart and soul, reflecting back to you what lies deep within you. If you can fill your heart with acceptance and self-love then the silence can sing to you of the Divine within and around you. Listen as it affirms that you are fine as you are - illness and all - and that you need do nothing but be there, resting and healing.
Find the Positive in Negative Space
If you've studied art, then you know that what makes a painting powerful and effective is not only the objects the painter depicts, but the negative space between those objects. Can you imagine a family portrait without defining spaces between family members?
Your life is also a work of art, and the pauses between the peak actions of your life say a lot about you and help shape your overall being and journey. So instead of feeling concern that you are in a period of down time amidst your otherwise active life, look to how this period of reflection and inactivity can give deeper meaning to the actions that bracket it - and how your illness may, eventually, redefine your activities. Embrace this negative space - it is something, far from nothing.
Labels:
MENTAL ILLNESS,
spiritual,
Toni Weingarten,
wellness
Be The Candle
Be The Candle
Courtesy of Beliefnet.com
A 100-year-old woman on how to make the rest of your life count.
By Naomi Drew
"There are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it."--Edith Wharton
"My advice to this generation is -- give of yourself. There's no one who can't give something."--Mathilda Spak
Of all the people I have ever interviewed Mathilda Spak has to be one of the most extraordinary. At close to 100 years old, Mathilda is out there volunteering every day from morning till night. This feisty lady has more energy than people half her age even though she has severe arthritis and suffers from black-outs. Yet Mathilda completely relishes life. As she told me, "I'm having a ball!"
Every day Mathilda either takes a bus or gets a ride to one of her many pet projects. Pay attention to the following words of wisdom from this rare gem of a woman. People like her don't come along very often:
"I made a promise to my mother that I would work on myasthenia gravis-the fatal debilitating illness she died from-till I found out what caused it and how to cure it. I have been asking questions ever since. Twenty-five years ago I started a research project and we are getting closer to finding out the causes. We have been able to cut the death rate from 85% to 5%.
"I also work at the Children's Hospital in Long Beach, California. When babies who have been abused are brought to the clinic, their soiled clothes are thrown out and they end up being released wrapped in a towel. Can you imagine? When I saw that, I lost my temper. I told the people at the hospital, These children need decent clothes! So they put me in charge. I convinced a yarn company to donate skeins of yarn. Now I have members of different churches knitting beautiful blankets and sweaters for the babies. I also get donations of new clothing. Now every single baby goes home properly clothed, with a pretty new blanket.
"I also fund-raise for the City of Hope. Each year we have a Grand Prix fundraiser for 20 different charitable organizations. Hundreds apply to be included but the rule is that each organization can only participate every three years. A few years ago I made a deal with them to keep myasthenia gravis on their schedule every year. How did I convince them? I told them that I am in my nineties and I can't afford to wait around three years between cycles.
"I try to fit it all in. What I can't do at the office I take home. You have to stay busy, otherwise you get stagnant and you start to feel sorry for yourself. I also serve as a guide for the Long Beach Symphony, helping out when the children visit from schools.
"I got started on this path because my mother taught me from the time I was a child that you must always give back to the community in service. We had a little store in a poor neighborhood and my mother was always helping people. I learned it from her.
"There is a lot of goodness in people waiting to come out. One day I was on my way to work. I got off the bus and blacked out. Our office is in a very poor area of the city. Two down-and-out men came over and helped me. They could have stolen my purse and run away, but they didn't. I looked at them and said, Are you hungry? And they said yes. So I asked them come with me to the diner across the street and eat. But the men said, They won't let us in. And I said, Oh yes they will!! Watch! We went inside together and I would not take any guff from the waitress about serving them. We had a nice breakfast, then I gave the waitress a $20 bill and told her that she had to feed these men till the money ran out, and I would be back to check. The men ate all week long.
"I live every minute of my life as if it is the last, and I enjoy every second. I have two rules: At my funeral, anyone who sheds a tear will be haunted because I have lived a great life. The other rule is to continue my charity work.
"My advice to this generation is-give of yourself. There's no one who cannot give something. You can take care of a child, volunteer, help your neighbor. No excuses. My mother taught me you never say can't, and that's how I live. I have to walk with a cane. Big deal. So I buy myself fancy canes.
"Only by giving do you get back. My mother also taught me to only use the dollar for what good you can do with it, and to never turn away a hungry person.
"I get people to do all kinds of things. I go to the nursing home and have the older women knit for the babies. If someone says they can't help out, I ask for one Wednesday. But people started saying, don't let Mathilda ask you for one Wednesday or you'll be doing one Wednesday for the rest of your life! I have one man who has been doing one Wednesday for 40 years."
May Mathilda's story spark in you and your children a desire to get out there and make a difference. If you already are, please encourage people you know to join in. More than ever, the world needs all of us to care about each other and demonstrate our care through our actions. Small deed or large, what most matters is opening your heart and making a difference in any way you can.
Labels:
Be The Candle,
volunteer
Eat To Beat Diabetes
Eat to Beat Diabetes
Incorporate these three foods into your diet proven to lower risk of diabetes.
By Abigail L. Cuffey
The good thing (if there is one) about type 2 diabetes is that it can often be prevented. In fact, several foods have been linked to doing just that. To protect yourself, have some…
1. Coffee
People who drank three to four cups a day (regular or decaf) had a 25 percent lower risk of diabetes than non–coffee drinkers, according to Australian research published in the Archives of Internal Medicine. What’s more, each extra cup of coffee slashed the risk by an additional 7 percent.
2. Nuts
Women who noshed on nuts or peanut butter at least five times a week had a 20 to 30 percent lower chance of developing diabetes than those who rarely ate them, says Harvard research. Nuts are rich in healthy fats and magnesium.
3. Whole Grains
Experts at Harvard also found that people who ate a lot of fiber-rich cereals, breads and other grains had an almost 40 percent lower risk of diabetes than those who ate them only once in a while. The fiber in whole grains may help keep your blood sugar on an even keel.
Labels:
diabetes,
healthy,
nutrition,
Woman's Day
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
5 Scary Times For Your Heart
Our resident cardiologist, Arthur Agatston, MD, told Prevention that the first question he asks patients when they walk in his office is “How’s the traffic?”
It’s not small talk but a valid medical query. Being stuck in traffic raises blood pressure and triples heart attack risk. So if a patient has had a tough commute and her BP is elevated, he’ll recheck it later in the appointment. There are other surprising situations and times when the chance of heart attack rises dramatically. If you or someone you know has a history of heart trouble, here’s when to be watchful.
1. First thing in the morning
The risk of heart attack increases 40% in the morning, Harvard researchers estimate.
As you awaken, your body secretes adrenaline and other stress hormones, increasing blood pressure and a demand for oxygen. Your blood is also thicker and harder to pump because you’re partially dehydrated. All this taxes the heart.
Protect yourself: Build some time into your schedule so you can hit the snooze button and wake up slowly. If you’re a morning exerciser, warm up thoroughly so as not to additionally stress the heart. And if you’re on a beta-blocker, take it before bed so the medication is at full strength in the am.
2. On Monday mornings especially
Science shows there’s good reason to dread the first day of the work week.
Twenty percent more heart attacks occur on this day, probably because people are stressed and depressed about returning to work.
Protect yourself: Relax on Sunday, but try not to sleep in. Getting up early on Monday after sleeping late Saturday and Sunday can raise blood pressure even more because your body is fatigued and its natural rhythms are out of whack. Try to maintain a regular sleep/wake schedule all week.
3. After an indulgent meal
A five-course, calories-be-damned dinner can have an immediate impact on your heart health. Studies show that high-fat, high-carb meals constrict blood vessels, making blood more prone to clotting.
Protect yourself: If you must indulge, keep your portion sizes reasonable. A daily aspirin will also help prevent blood “stickiness.”
4. During unusually vigorous exercise
Having a heart attack while shoveling snow is a classic example of this.
The heart attack occurs because the victim isn’t accustomed to that kind of effort and stress hormones skyrocket, causing blood pressure and heart rate to jump.
Protect yourself: Regular exercise protects your heart. But increase your intensity level gradually.
5. At the podium
From the heart’s perspective, public speaking can be similar to unaccustomed exercise.
Extreme nervousness raises blood pressure, heart rate, and adrenaline levels, all of which can make the presentation itself a secondary worry.
Protect yourself: To counter these effects, some of my patients take a beta-blocker before speaking, flying, or doing anything that makes them overly anxious.
Labels:
heart health,
Yahoo.com
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Friday, February 19, 2010
An American Hero-Irving Petite
Related Article:
Colville Indian Reservation
Irving Petite filled his books with stories of possums, coyotes, birds and the lessons of nature learned from the land in every season.Photo courtesy of Steve Akers - IHS Class of '65
A Life in Love With Nature - The ‘Issaquah Thoreau’
By Joan Newman*
Reports of the occasional bear or cougar in our neighborhoods stir memories of the local wildlife in Irving Petite’s engaging books, written on his ranch up Tiger Mountain Road, where he lived pretty much off the land for over 40 years.
He and a partner bought 165 acres of logged-over land there in 1941, and built the ranch and a family of wild, semi-wild and domestic animals who often shared Petite’s cabin and enriched his love of the natural world.
No pink doggie bows or studded collars for companions of the man who emerges in his books and in his family’s recollections.
He delighted in animals’ personalities and respected their independence. His cabin became their haven and his ranch yard their park.
In his best known book, “Mister B” (Readers’ Digest Association, 1960), he tells of hearing the loud “bear music” of cubs suckling and vocalizing in a shallow den under a log.
One day, he heard the screams and screeches of a cub who had been rejected or abandoned. When Petite found the source of the noise, the little black bear grabbed his arm, climbed up his body and nuzzled his neck as if suckling.
Petite took the cub home and raised him like his own, always fascinated by the cub’s insatiable curiosity and vocal repertoire.
As the cub grew, the most difficult part for Petite was Mister B’s craving for affection. When Petite milked his cow, the cub climbed his back and “mumbled” into his neck.
When he got too heavy, Petite would shrug him off and give up his left foot to be gnawed on instead.
Petite’s niece, Sue Morris, now of Seattle, remembers being chased by the young bear, who wanted to play, though she didn’t.
Morris also remembers a day when the young bear “got mad” and trashed the cabin.
“He opened the refrigerator and rummaged around and then he found flour and threw it around all over the kitchen,” she recalled. “He wanted HIS food – the fruits and vegetables and sorghum that Uncle Irving fed him.”
When Petite returned, he looked around tolerantly and said, “Oh, I’d better get his food together for him.”
In “The Elderberry Tree” (Doubleday, 1964), Petite wrote of a pack rat which moved into his cabin.
At night, she noisily dragged and dropped trophies she had brought inside, carrying them in and out of her hiding places over his bed.
Her treasures included an unbroken Japanese tea set, sardine cans and a cracked sunshade, as well as sticks and branches. Some mornings, if he was out of dry kindling to start the fire, Petite stood on a chair and raided her stash of twigs.
Of course, Petite had plenty of room on his ranch and in his heart for not-so-wild life, too.
In “Life on Tiger Mountain” (Doubleday, 1966), he tells of a sow he called “Ungodly” moving in. If the cabin door was open, she went in. If it wasn’t, she forced it. Petite would then oblige her by scratching under her chin.
Petite was known locally for his goats, said his nephew Mike Petite, who lived there as a child and who now lives with his children on what was part of the original property.
“He must have had 50 goats in the barn,” said Mike. He also remembered a goat which was raised in the cabin.
Petite milked many of the goats in the cabin during winter weather.
When a neighbor went into the service in WWII, he left his goats with Petite, who combined the herds.
Sue Morris remembered Petite letting them forage up Tiger Mountain and calling them back home in the evening.
“He would just call them and they would all come!” she said.
Petite enjoyed times with his nephews and nieces. They would go up to what they called “Big Falls” on their creek.
They went to a bench behind the falls, or slid down rocks below into a pool to swim. Mister B sometimes joined them there.
Morris remembers taking naps in the cabin with “Man,” an orphaned deer raised by Petite.
She would wake to see “those big, brown eyes peering” at her. The deer was “just like a dog,” she said. “He panted like a dog and even chased cars.”
Petite grew a big garden, picked wild blackberries, canned cherries and peaches and made jam every year.
When his ranch income was not enough, he made and sold fence posts, hop poles and shakes from downed lumber and snags left behind on his land.
He substituted as a mail carrier on Issaquah Rural Route 2 and free-lanced for the Seattle Times.
He wrote articles on composting and recycling, among other topics, as well as four books about life on his mountain, and another about a boat trip to Alaska.
He filled his books with stories of possums, coyotes, birds and the lessons of nature learned from the land in every season. He was sometimes called a local Thoreau — after the famous American writer Henry David Thoreau — a title Morris said he would have enjoyed.
In 1984 Petite moved further away from population growth and development to the Colville Indian Reservation, where he lived for 20 more years. Mister B had been killed by hunters early on and Man, the deer, with a full head of antlers, had been driven in the back of Petite’s car to the Woodland Park Zoo.
A great niece, Sara Petite of San Diego, is a singer-songwriter whose debut CD “Tiger Mountain” contains three songs written for her Tiger Mountain grandmother, Jacqueline Petite, Irving’s sister-in-law.
A ballad “Uncle Irving” seems to express the affection and sometimes amusement his family felt for Petite’s way of life.
The refrain goes: “I know you don’t believe me/But Uncle Irving said,/“That chicken house is freezing cold!/Now there’s chickens in the bed.”
The Issaquah History Museums has several copies of Irving Petite’s books, now out of print, in the archives at the Gilman Town Hall.
Some copies are available through various online sources and in King County libraries.
Petite died in his sleep Nov. 27 in Keller, a town on the Colville Indian Reservation in Ferry County. He was 84.
This is one of any year's rarest days. But every day has this same quality. There has never been a time when something of beauty was not happening -- whether it be as commonplace as the sound of rain moving forward on leaves across the nearby forest ... or the upsurgence of puffball mushrooms ... or simply the smell of apples or of grass. Nothing of Nature's can I label "trivial." Just to watch the sun come up, to walk out in the full moon's light strikes my soul till it vibrates like a tuning fork ...
From "Life on Tiger Mountain," 1968
*Joan Newman is a docent at the Issaquah History Museums.
How To Love Your Heart*
Hearts everywhere are reminding us that February is the month dedicated to celebrating love and heart health.
NaturoMedica held their second “Girlfriends’ Talk” at the end of January, where more than 100 women joined the NaturoMedica doctors for an afternoon discussing many topics concerning women including hormone balancing, bone and digestive health, and the prevention of cardiovascular disease.
Many were surprised to learn that over 50 percent of heart attack victims and 80 percent of patients with heart disease have normal cholesterol levels.
Heart disease is the number one cause of death for men and women in the United States and protecting the heart clearly goes beyond simply treating high cholesterol.
More advanced testing is now available to help identify those at risk for cardiovascular disease that may have previously gone undetected.
How do you know if you should request further testing? Advanced Testing is recommended if you meet two of the following criteria:
• Men over 44, Women over 54
• Family history of heart disease
• History of high blood pressure
• Currently obese or overweight
• Elevated LDL or triglycerides
• Low HDL
• Inflammatory disease (arthritis or autoimmune disease)
• Smoking
• Sedentary lifestyle
There are easy ways to help keep a healthy heart. Here are some top heart healthy dietary supplements:
• Fish Oil: Rich in essential fatty acids, fish oil is one of the most popular and scientifically supported dietary supplements. These heart healthy fats help reduce inflammation and triglycerides, two well known risk factors for heart disease. The health benefits of fish oil go beyond the heart to support the nervous system, joints, mood and inflammatory diseases.
• CoQ10: This vitamin helps with energy production in every cell in the body. It is a potent antioxidant that protects cell damage and aging of the organs. CoQ10 is helpful for those with high blood pressure, irregular heart beats and congestive heart failure.
• L-carnitine & acetyl-L-carnitine: The amino acid delivers fuel to the cells especially the heart. This nutrient can be helpful for chronic fatigue and depression as well as those with a wide variety of cardiovascular conditions.
• D-Ribose:This sugar was first studied for endurance athletes who found it reduced muscle recovery time, pain, stiffness and fatigue.
*from The Issaquah-Reporter
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10 Lessons From A Broken Heart*
By Susan Piver
While writing my latest book, The Wisdom of a Broken Heart, I thought long and hard about heartbreak—my own and my friends’. Since then I’ve learned even more about what it truly means to be heartbroken and what's actually healing.
Manage Those Obsessive Thoughts
Heartbreak from lost love is different than other kinds of heartbreak. When a person suffers a loss, it is normal to feel grief, remorse, and tremendous sadness. But when your heart is broken by a relationship, additional qualities come into play: Ridiculously potent shame and loss of self-esteem. Completely unpredictable and unmanageable mood swings. And most notably, obsessive thinking. Awake or asleep, you cannot stop ruminating on your situation, what caused it, and what you might have done differently. It can feel as if your own mind has turned against you.
To counter-balance these very difficult things, it is important to learn a meditation practice, some way of relating to your thoughts—not to control or fight them, but to allow and observe them without allowing them to sweep you away. Mindfulness practice allows you to place your attention where you would like it to go and, with the mind of heartbreak, this is job #1.
Beware The Advice Books
There are basically two kinds of books offering standard advice for working with heartbreak—and neither seems particularly helpful.
The first kind is what I call the “You go, girl!” category. (The great majority of breakup books are aimed at women….) The general idea behind these is something like:You need to forget about him or her. He/she simply couldn’t deal with your overwhelming awesomeness. Go out with your friends, get some cocktails in you, maybe go for a cute new haircut and Move On!!
Actually, this isn’t terrible advice. It might not get at the deep well of real grief that one experiences during a breakup, but still, it can be good to remember that you are an amazing person, to hang out with your friends, and generally pay attention to yourself in a good way.
The second kind is pretty terrible, though. This is the kind of book that says: There is something wrong with you. That is why this happened in the first place. You carry unhealed childhood wounds and/or thought the wrong thoughts and will keep “attracting” the same heartbreak until change. If you can think only the right thoughts, you can avoid ever having your heart broken again.
I think this is harmful advice. It assumes that sadness isn’t supposed to be a part of life. It is. It assumes that you can control love. You can’t. It also assumes that you know what’s best for you. I don’t know about you, but experience has shown me over and over again that what I think will be good or bad for me often turns out to the opposite. Plus the possibilities and wisdom you find in life from looking at it rather than pre-scripting it are so much huger than you can ever imagine.
Actually Lean Into the Pain
There is a third approach, however: You can lean in to the pain. Open to it. Feel it. Let it touch your heart and soften you. Accept that you’re on a journey and that it’s leading somewhere, only you don’t know where.
When you relax with what you truly feel by allowing it—without telling yourself any story about what it all means—you create an enormously expeditious path to healing.
Heartbreak Makes You More Capable of Love
When your heart is broken, it is broken open.
One of the most notable things about heartbreak is this: You can feel everything. Anything can—and often does—touch you. Your own pain affects you, but so does the pain of others. Their joy touches you too. You don’t have to think about it or reason it out: “Wow, he just lost his job, of course he must be sad, I feel terrible for him,” you just feel it, as if it was happening to you. The same goes for others’ happiness. Your heart is completely open and in a way, more alive, responsive, and sensitive—more loving—than ever before. So in a weird way, heartbreak makes you more capable of love. Even though it doesn’t feel very good at first.
So basically, what this means is that your heart is indestructible. It can never actually be broken.
Heartbreak Is Inevitable, So... Relax!
This one sounds like a bummer, and in a way it is, but in a way, it’s not. There is no relationship that will not end in heartbreak. Whatever you enter into will dissolve—either because someone changes his or her mind about the relationship or, of course, because someone will die. Appreciating the impermanence, difficult as it is, teaches you how to appreciate and honor the preciousness of love.
Plus, since it’s inevitable, you can stop bracing yourself with worry and relax….
You Will Get Over It
There has never, ever in the history of humanity (as far as I know) been a single reported case of an unchanging feeling. Feelings are always changing. What is tormenting you now will, someday, simply be a memory. I promise you that.
In fact, you can test this out for yourself. The next time a particularly painful feeling rises, look at a clock, preferably with a second hand. Try to hold on to this feeling exactly as it is, for as long as possible. If you feel it begin to slip away, try to bring it back. See how long you can do this before the feeling is simply replaced by some other thought, like I wonder if dinner is ready or maybe it’s finally time to start that course is neurobiology. Seriously. Was it ten minutes? Two? 61? Whatever it is, you simply can’t feel it forever, even if you try.
Depression and Sadness are Different
When Gloria Steinem was interviewed about the death of her husband (to whom she had been married only a short time), the journalist asked her if she was depressed. “No,” she said. “I’m not depressed. I’m sad.” When asked the difference she answered, and I’m paraphrasing, “When you’re depressed, nothing has any meaning. When you’re sad, everything does.”
When your heart is broken, sure, you may become depressed, but the overwhelming feeling just under it is tremendous sadness, which is tender and gentle. Although it doesn’t feel good (at all), it is earthy, alive, and real. You suddenly find yourself in a world where you can see beneath the surface of things. You can see the reality beyond conventional thought. This is very valuable.
Love Does Not Equal Safety
When most people say they're looking for love, what they usually mean is they are looking for safety by seeking another person who can help them stop worrying: about not having enough money, growing old alone, or feeling undesirable. This is not a nice thing to do to another person. It is completely normal and human to be afraid and seek comfort from others—but this isn’t love. Love is never safe. It is fierce and unpredictable and impossible to domesticate. You can’t make it your slave because it is simply bigger than you. That’s why it’s so awesome.
Faster Healing = Feel the Feelings
American Buddhist nun Pema Chödrön gives this pithy instruction on working with strong emotion: “Feel the feelings and drop the story.” This is the most concise, direct, and accurate prescription for working with heartbreak I’ve ever heard.
Give Love and You Will Feel Loved, Always
There is a way to have love in your life everyday, all the time.
All the self-help books about love (some of which are incredibly deep and helpful) are nonetheless about how to get love, with the idea that once you get it, you can return it. None of the books (really—none) are about how to give love.
That's kind of strange, don’t you think?
The way to always have love in your life is to stop waiting around for someone to give it to you and instead just start giving it. You can always, always give love. Whether it’s by stopping to listen to a disheartened colleague, volunteering at a hospice, or simply taking a few moments to think about those you love and hope they are well, the possibility of giving love is always there. In this way, you can create love wherever you go until you are living within love. There is no need to wait for anything or anyone.
BTW—this, giving love, is the secret and infallible formula for healing a broken heart. You return it to love, but from a position of power and generosity. You see that love is always there.
Susan Piver is the bestselling author of "The Hard Questions: 100 Essential Questions to Ask Before You Say ‘I Do,’ " and the award-winning "How Not to Be Afraid of Your Own Life." A graduate of a Buddhist seminary, she writes the relationships column for Body & Soul magazine and is a frequent guest on network television, including The Oprah Winfrey Show, Today, and The Tyra Banks Show. She lives in Boston. For more info: susanpiver.com
*Courtesy of Beliefnet.com
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Welcome Fellow Friday Followers!
Welcome to Friday Follow! Please leave a comment so I can link back and follow you also! Thank you for visiting and following me! I love meeting new people and discovering new blogs! If you'd like to join in, just click on the button above!
And please visit and follow my other blog, Ladyhightower's Meme Castle!
Happy Friday Follow!
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Thursday, February 18, 2010
PSI Dreams-CoastZone Newsletter*
Psi Dreams:
One of the former directors of Project STARGATE, Dale Graff discussed his research into the esoteric aspects of dreams such as precognitive, lucid, and shared dreaming. While he noted that paranormal phenomena, which he simply calls "psi," can take place in both the waking and dream state, it is the latter format that is most accessible for the average person. "When we are asleep, we are naturally concerned about our welfare, whether we realize it or not," Graff observed, "and our sleeping mind starts scanning around to see what's going on." According to him, cultivating that information is merely a matter of practice and attentiveness
In detailing the steps that a person can take to develop precognitive dreams, he explained that they first must be accepting of the possibility for such an experience. From there, he suggested creating a dream journal as well as going to bed with the intention of remembering your dreams. Graff noted that this is like "sending a signal to your subconscious mind that you really are serious about this." After some practice, Graff said, the next step is to set up an objective such as having a dream where "something unique will catch my attention" in the days after the experience. For maximum effect, he said, one wants the dream to be brief and among the final dreams of that night's sleep, thus allowing for the best clarity.
"If more people kept records of their dreams," Graff mused, "they'd be surprised about how often friends of theirs, spouses, or loved ones would have the identical dream." He stressed that these "shared dreams" do not merely contain patterns but actually possess truly unique information that defies scientific explanation. On lucid dreaming, he advised that people develop a trigger to use, inside the dream, to alert themselves to the fact that they are no longer in the waking state. He said that such a trigger could be as simple as looking at their hand while in the dream. To decipher a repetitive dream, Graff advised looking at its content, how one feels when they wake up, and the time span between the dreams as potential clues to its message.
Oscar's Sixth Sense:
In the fourth hour, Dr. David Dosa talked about "Oscar," the cat who senses death. Dosa explained that the feline, who resides in a Rhode Island home for terminal dementia patients, will show up in a patient's room and hold a proverbial vigil until that person passes away. "As one death has become 2 and 4 and 8 and 12, it's been pretty hard to ignore," Dosa said. In total, he speculated that Oscar has predicted around fifty to sixty deaths. Rather than being frightened of a visit from Oscar, Dosa stressed, the vigils from the cat are well received by the family members of dying patients.
*Courtesy of CoastZone Newsletter
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Wednesday, February 17, 2010
Faith!
God didn't promise days without pain, laughter without sorrow,
sun without rain, But he did promise strength for the day, comfort for the
tears, and light for the day.
If God brings you to it, He will bring your thru it.
Worry looks around; Sorry looks back.
Faith looks up. This angel is sent to you.
(Photographed in the Vatican ..not retouched)
HAVE FAITH!
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