Friends

The Flower of Life

/ James Browning

Tibetan%20Yin%20Yang%20MandalaFor most of my life if a friend drifted away I felt what we shared was completely lost. Once in a while we’d get hooked up again at some point, but most often not. Then there were the romantic relationships frequently referred to as “not working out” even though for a time they may have worked well. That was then. My perspective is different now.

Love of any kind is never truly lost. It may end, fizzle out or be damaged beyond repair, but what came before never dies. Whether shared with a friend, lover or family member, whatever good existed will always survive. The fact that love once was, will always be a fact.

No matter how much heartache and pain may have followed, love is never wasted. It’s a gift one always get to keep. It’s important for me not to bundle what was positive then turned negative, into a completely terrible memory. I believe the ability to separate good from bad and appreciate both individually for what they were is a sign of maturity.

…”falling in love” is largely unconscious and by its very nature involves a considerable amount of idealization and projection. When we fall in love, we look upon the object of our desire as someone who will complete us or provide what we imagine we have always wanted or needed. For that reason… idealization always leads to disillusionment because another person cannot be a product of your imagination; he or she is always a separate, real person.

Coming to know and accept an other for who they really are is the practice of true love: becoming knowledgeable, witnessing, holding in mind, and repeatedly turning to the beloved with interest and willingness to enter into and resolve conflict, these are the components of true love. Often, love begins with a strong emotional attachment—a magnetic attraction, a “falling in love”—but not always. It can also begin in friendship. Over time, you feel fascinated that you can be close and trusting and different, all at the same time. This is the nature of love: the beloved is both mysterious (fascinating) and familiar (comfortable); we begin to see the world through someone else’s eyes. By Polly Young-Eisendrath, Ph.D. http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/living-love/201111/over-60-and-looking-love-why-not

Inside me there used to be a driving need not to be alone, especially in a romantic sense. In due course no matter how many friends or how deeply ‘in-love’ I felt to be, my discovery was I am always alone. Sharing my life and others with me does not change that fact. Accepting this was a doorway to greater understanding.

Bearing witness  to one another’s existence makes people feel less alone and therein lies a component of the magic of love. Love does not change the world so much as it changes how one views it. I am grateful for the love of friends, family and lovers, past and present, I got to keep which molded me to be the person I am today. Love is NEVER wasted.

Love is the flower of life,
and blossoms unexpectedly and without law,
and must be plucked where it is found,
and enjoyed for the brief hour of its duration.
D.H. Lawrence

Letter to a Heartbroken Friend

/ James Browning

33373_originalEDITDear _______,

Don’t worry about the future. It will unfold as it does, unaffected by your thought and worry. What is to be will not be swayed one millimeter by your anguish. I know you are heartbroken, but it is not love that is the source of most of your pain. Love is always pure and never the source of grief.  Given time, if you allow it, misery and sorrow will overpower the purity of your love and bury it in animosity and bitterness. Please don’t let that happen.

Deep grief sometimes is almost like a specific location, a coordinate on a map of time. When you are standing in that forest of sorrow, you cannot imagine that you could ever find your way to a better place. Someday you’re gonna look back on this moment of your life as such a sweet time of grieving. You’ll see that you were in mourning and your heart was broken, but your life was changing… Elizabeth Gilbert

Comfort and happiness, as enjoyable as they feel, are not catalysts for personal development. It’s the difficult times where fertile ground exists for our growth. Please do not hate your pain. Growth is always uncomfortable; sometimes even agonizing. Accept the hurting with a thankfulness for what was instead of a dread for what might or might not be again one day.

I wish I could tell you getting past your heartbreak will be easy. It won’t be. But if you intentionally let go a little each day, slowly your aching will ease. With effort you’ll be able to not think about your loss for a little while at a time and with practice your heartache will be out of heart and mind more and more. Progress will be slow, but certain if you make is so.

Giving her the space she has asked you for is a certain way to show your love to her. To cling and grab to hold on, will only shred into jagged pieces what was once shared. If there is more for you two to share, it will arrive in its due time and not one second before.

Peace and Love,

James

I am grateful for friends who are comfortable enough with me to share their deep private feelings. It is in a common trust and sharing of emotion and thought with others who “get me and I them” that healing and recovery is possible.

We crucify ourselves between two thieves:
regret for yesterday and fear of tomorrow.
Fulton Oursler

No Name Necessary

/ James Browning

On the set of 'Mai Tai.'A best friend is one of life’s greatest gifts. It’s one sometimes taken for granted until a moment comes when he or she does or says something amazingly insightful; something you need to hear, but are avoiding; something essential that you have not been able to find alone; something you need to see but are blind to.

Best friends are wonderful to share some of life’s greatest moments with, but their greatest worth is in the gray times; the days when no one else would understand but they do or else try very hard to. I am blessed to have such a friend.

friend 03

There is no name necessary. All that is needed to say is I have a best friend who I admire. He is wise for me when I am not, strong when I am weak and always there when I need him even if what he speaks is not always what I want to hear. I love you M. and am grateful for your friendship.

A best friend can see the different between
your fake smile and the real one.
unknown

Too Much Work and Not Enough Play

/ James Browning

rudolphEleven days off work has turned out to be one of the best experiences I have had in ages. Once again I am reminded that too much work and not enough play dulls my senses and washes the color from my life.  In the spirit of that statement I have taken the liberty of re-posting today from a Christmas past.

Originally Posted on December 22, 2011

Yesterday day at work I recited to someone an alternate version of a favorite Christmas song he had never heard.  With it fresh on my mind, I tried it out on two others who it turned out had never heard it as well.  So today it is getting shared here for the “betterment of posterity”.

I have no exact memory of how old I was, but my favorite uncle taught me this alternate version of “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” when I was still in elementary school.  It took him teaching me on and off for a full weekend before all the words were indelibly stamped in my brain where they have remained now for fifty years.  Here goes:

Randolph, the bow-legged cowboy
Had a very shiny gun
And if you ever saw it
You would turn about and run.

All of the other cowboys
Used to laugh and call him names.
They never let poor Randolph
Join in any poker games.

Then one day the bank was robbed
And sheriff came to say
“Randolph with your gun so bright
Won’t you guide my posse tonight?”

Then all the cowgirls loved him
As they shouted out with glee
Randolph the bow-legged cowboy
You’ll go down in history!

There are many alternate versions of Christmas carols and poetry of the season, but none I enjoy more than this slightly twisted version of “Twas the Night before Christmas”.  It is a reminder of what the season is truly about.

Tis the month before Christmas, we’re all going nuts;
With so much to do, there are no ifs, ands or buts.
Buy presents, hang tree lights, pop cards in the mail,
Send gift packs, thread popcorn, find turkeys on sale.

Decorations need stringing up all through the house.
And you haven’t a clue what to buy for your spouse.
School concerts, receptions, open houses with friends,
Long lineups, short tempers, tying up the loose ends.

With all our mad dashing, we’re reeling from shock;
Let’s stop for a minute and really take stock.
It’s crassly commercial, the cynical say;
If that’s true, that our fault… it’s us and not they.

Take time for yourself-though hard as that seems—
Enjoy your kids’ laughter, excitement and dreams.
Take a moment out now, don’t get overly riled,
Instead make an angel in snow with your child.

The shortbread can wait, and so can the tree;
What’s important to feel is a child’s sense of glee.
The holidays aren’t about push, rush and shove;
They’re for friendship and sharing and family love.

Hear the bells, feel the warmth, light up with the glow
Of a message first sent to us so long ago:
Peace, love and goodwill, and hope burning bright.
Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

Now is the time of heightened goodwill, of giving, of loving one and all.  It is a time of celebration of children; the ones we adults used to be, the ones we brought into the world and the one who was born in a manger over two thousand years ago.

Aldous Huxley wrote:  Most human beings have an almost infinite capacity for taking things for granted.  Without doubt that phrase was abundantly true about me during much of my life.  This year I have more Christmas spirit than I probably have ever had and the reason is two-fold and simple:  I have more love in my life than ever before and my gratitude for living is at an all time high and growing.

I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round, as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys.
Charles Dickens

Someone Who Knows the Song In Your Heart

/ James Browning

life-is-beautiful1A good friend with a mostly stoic demeanor but a soft and loving heart sent a piece to me this morning where what is below was taken from. He is one of those people you have to get to know in order to realize the depth of the human being. At the most unexpected moments he has a special way of touching my heart.

Too many people put off something that brings them joy just because they haven’t thought about it, don’t have it on their schedule, didn’t know it was coming or are too rigid to depart from their routine.

I got to thinking one day about all those people on the Titanic who passed up dessert at dinner that fateful night in an effort to cut back. From then on, I’ve tried to be a little more flexible.

I cannot count the times I called my sister and said , ‘How about going to lunch in a half hour?’ She would gas up and stammer, ‘I can’t. I have clothes on the line. My hair is dirty. I wish I had known yesterday, I had a late breakfast, It looks like rain’ And my personal favorite: ‘It’s Monday.’ She died a few days ago. We never did have lunch together.

Because we cram so much into our lives, we tend to schedule our headaches.. We live on a sparse diet of promises we make to ourselves when all the conditions are perfect!

We’ll go back and visit the grandparents when we get Steve toilet-trained. We’ll entertain when we replace the living-room carpet. We’ll go on a second honeymoon when we get two more kids out of college.

Life has a way of accelerating as we get older. The days get shorter, and the list of promises to ourselves gets longer. One morning, we awaken, and all we have to show for our lives is a litany of ‘I’m going to,’ ‘I plan on,’ and ‘Someday, when things are settled down a bit.’

When anyone calls my ‘seize the moment’ friend, she is open to adventure and available for trips. She keeps an open mind on new ideas. Her enthusiasm for life is contagious. You talk with her for five minutes, and you’re ready to trade your bad feet for a pair of Rollerblades and skip an elevator for a bungee cord.

My lips have not touched ice cream in 10 years. I love ice cream. It’s just that I might as well apply it directly to my stomach with a spatula and eliminate the digestive process. The other day, I stopped the car and bought a triple-decker. If my car had hit an iceberg on the way home, I would have died happy.

Now….go on and have a nice day. Do something you WANT to…not something on your SHOULD DO list. If you were going to die soon and had only one phone call you could make, who would you call and what would you say? And why are you waiting? I had a friend from high school that I was always going to call and never did. The other day her name was in the obituaries so we never had that chat.

Have you ever watched kids playing on a merry-go-round or listened to the rain lapping on the ground? Ever followed a butterfly’s erratic flight or gazed at the sun into the fading night? Do you run through each day on the fly? When you ask, ‘How are you?’ Do you hear the reply?

When the day is done, do you lie in your bed with the next hundred chores running through your head? Ever told your child, ‘We’ll do it tomorrow.’ and in your haste, not see his sorrow? Ever lost touch? Let a good friendship die? Just call to say ‘Hi’?

When you worry and hurry through your day, it is like an unopened gift….Thrown away…. Life is not a race. Take it slower. Hear the music before the song is over.

Thanks Jim, for the reminder and inspiration. I am grateful you are my friend! I love you.

A friend is someone
who knows the song in your heart
and can sing it back to you
when you have forgotten the words.
Unknown

Daryl’s House

/ James Browning

One of my best friends I share a deep love of quality music with wrote today and made me aware of a program I did not know existed called “Live from Daryl’s House”. The name sake is Daryl Hall of Hall and Oats who started the free monthly web show in late 2007, after having the idea of “playing with my friends and putting it up on the Internet,”. The show has since garnered acclaim from Rolling Stone, SPIN, Daily Variety, CNN, BBC, and Yahoo! Music. “Live From Daryl’s House” has been called a perfect example of a veteran artist reinventing himself in the digital age by collaborating with both established colleagues and newer performers.

The quality of Hall’s program blew me away; not just the music, but the unaffected conversation that is included. My first exposure was Gnarls Barkley/Cee Lo Green doing “Crazy” in Daryl’s home studio. It’s a favorite song with a positive message that most of what we fret and think about really does not matter. Good stuff you can check out here: http://www.livefromdarylshouse.com/currentep.html?ep_id=67

Lyrics taken from “Crazy”
I remember when I lost my mind
There was something so pleasant about that place
Even your emotions have an echo in so much space.

And when you’re out there without care
Yeah, I was out of touch
But it wasn’t because I didn’t know enough
I just knew too much.

Does that make me crazy?
And I hope that you are
Having the time of your life
But think twice
That’s my only advice.

Come on now, who do you think you are?
You really think you’re in control?

Well, I think you’re crazy
I think you’re crazy
I think you’re crazy
Just like me

My heroes had the heart
To lose their lives out on a limb
And all I remember
Is thinking, I want to be like them.

My day is off to a great start and hearing a new rendition of a song that always puts a good spark within accentuates my state of mind. It freshens my state of being to remember presence in the moment and appreciating its contents is ultimately all the best of life is. Thanks Cy (my friend) for putting light and melody into my day!

Music washes away from the soul
the dust of everyday life.
Berthold Auerbach

A Real, True Friend

/ James Browning

Being middle-aged can be a wonderful thing. By the time this fall season of life rolls around one has had enough life experience to potentially assemble some level of wisdom. It’s not automatic. Just staying alive to 40 or 50 something does not guarantee becoming more wise. If one pays attention though, some of the greatest gifts of life make themselves abundantly present and known.

It has been written that joy is the mirror reflection of grief, and conversely grief is the reversed likeness of joy. The more one knows of one, the more fully the other can be felt and comprehended. Nothing broadens and enlivens the joy of life more than a true and dear friend. Nothing makes a burden easier to carry than their loving are.

“A Priceless Gift” by Helen Steiner Rice

Friendship is a priceless gift
That can’t be bought or sold,
But its value is far greater
Than a mountain made of gold.

For gold is cold and lifeless,
It cannot see nor hear,
And in your times of trouble,
It is powerless to cheer.

It has no ears to listen,
No heart to understand.
It cannot bring you comfort
Or reach out a helping hand.

So when you ask God for a gift,
Be thankful that he sends,
Not diamonds, pearls, or riches,
But the love of a real, true friend.

When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing, not curing, not healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is a friend who cares. Henri J. M. Nouwen

Often while traveling on business, I take an extra day or two to visit with a friend when I am in their part of the country. For the last two days I have been blessed to hang out with my friend Sam in Cincinnati. It’s fascinating how a co-worker of years ago has become such a beloved friend over time. On a spiritual and emotional level no one “gets me” as well as he does. Beyond my ability to express fully my feelings, I am grateful for Sam’s presence in my life. “I love you Dude!”

If you live to be a hundred,
I want to live to be a hundred minus one day
so I never have to live without you.
‘Winnie-the-Pooh” (A.A. Milne)

Alive, Well and Living a Good Life

/ James Browning

Prior to moving to Oklahoma in the late 90’s, I worked part-time as a professional photographer and had the basement of my home finished off into a studio, darkroom and office. For a time I attained a high level proficiency and had more work that I knew what to do with.  Having gained a good reputation particularly for doing model portfolios and boudoir photography, there was an average two month wait to have work done. Those were the days 15-25 years ago when film was still king and digital had not achieved high enough quality to take over.

Recently I rediscovered some of the model photos I took back then and with the passing of time was now able to see them for the art they were. What really stunned me was the photography was better than I remembered and that was good for my self-esteem!

There was one particular model I enjoyed working with most and she was like a little sister to me. My family liked her and she and I worked together many times. Her name is “Sai” and she had an exotic and unusually beautiful look.  She was a natural poser and had the unique ability to be like a chameleon in front of the camera.  There are photos where it is difficult to believe she is the same person in each because she looks so different in them.

I got curious about what ever happened to her and encouraged by a friend, I went on-line to try to locate Sai. Finding an address last week that I thought might be her, I dropped a card in the mail last week. Low and behold, she called me yesterday.

We were both thrilled to get to talk to each other and catch up. Sai lives in Florida, is now 43, happily married to an architect and has two small children. What blew me away is that she has the photos we made up in her home just like I do. Her comment was “no one has ever been able to make me look the way you did”. I always thought the work we did was outstanding and was pleased to find after all these years she thought so too.

Sai said she will email me photos of her and her family and I look forward to seeing them. In the days when we worked together she was not particularly happy and talked about being lonely at times. I am grateful those days are in the past and happiness has found her. Locating Sai was a wonderful early birthday present. I am thankful to have found my “little sister” alive, well and living a good life.

Friendship is a Golden Chain,
The links are friends so dear,
And like a rare and precious jewel
It’s treasured more each year…

It’s clasped together firmly
With a love that’s deep and true,
And it’s rich with happy memories
and fond recollections, too…

Time can’t destroy its beauty
For, as long as memory lives,
Years can’t erase the pleasure
That the joy of friendship gives…

For friendship is a priceless gift
That can’t be bought or sold,
But to have an understanding friend
Is worth far more than gold…

And the Golden Chain of Friendship
Is a strong and blessed tie
Binding kindred hearts together
As the years go passing by.

“A Golden Chain” by Helen Steiner Rice

Need Washing?

/ James Browning

It fascinates me how a friend who has passed on can continue to give to me long after he is gone. Sometimes it’s a memory of a special moment or something that was said. At other times it’s when I notice a physical reminder like a gift or a keepsake. Now in the age of computers, I found the story below saved on my computer from when my dear friend Bill (know to close friends as “The Banger”) sent it to me. I am uncertain of the original source of the piece, but it’s a touching parable that connected me closely to my old friend in a moving moment.  

 

Need Washing?

A little girl had been shopping with her Mom in Target. She must have been 6 years old, this beautiful red-haired, freckle faced image of innocence. It was pouring outside. The kind of rain that gushes over the top of rain gutters, so much in a hurry to hit the earth it has no time to flow down the spout. We all stood there under the awning and just inside the door of the Target.

We waited, some patiently, others irritated because nature messed up their hurried day. I am always mesmerized by rainfall. I got lost in the sound and sight of the heavens washing away the dirt and dust of the world. Memories of running, splashing so carefree as a child came pouring in as a welcome reprieve from the worries of my day.

The little voice was so sweet as it broke the hypnotic trance we were all caught in ‘Mom let’s run through the rain,’ she said. ‘What?’ Mom asked. ‘Let’s run through the rain!’ She repeated. ‘No, honey. We’ll wait until it slows down a bit,’ Mom replied.

This young child waited about another minute and repeated: ‘Mom, let’s run through the rain’. ‘We’ll get soaked if we do,’ Mom said. ‘No, we won’t, Mom.. That’s not what you said this morning,’ the young girl said as she tugged at her Mom’s arm.

This morning? When did I say we could run through the rain and not get wet?

‘Don’t you remember? When you were talking to Daddy about his cancer, you said, ‘If God can get us through this, he can get us through anything!’

The entire crowd stopped dead silent. I swear you couldn’t hear anything but the rain. We all stood silently. No one came or left in the next few minutes.

Mom paused and thought for a moment about what she would say. Now some would laugh it off and scold her for being silly. Some might even ignore what was said. But this was a moment of affirmation in a young child’s life. A time when innocent trust can be nurtured so that it will bloom into faith.

‘Honey, you are absolutely right. Let’s run through the rain. If GOD let’s us get wet, well maybe we just needed washing,’ Mom said.

Then off they ran. We all stood watching, smiling and laughing as they darted past the cars and yes, through the puddles. They held their shopping bags over their heads just in case. They got soaked. But they were followed by a few who screamed and laughed like children all the way to their cars.

And yes, I did. I ran. I got wet. I needed washing.

Circumstances or people can take away your material possessions, they can take away your money, and they can take away your health. But no one can ever take away your precious memories…So, don’t forget to make time and take the opportunities to make memories everyday. To everything there is a season and a time to every purpose under heaven.

I hope you still take the time to run through the rain.

Thanks “Banger”! I love you, miss you and am grateful for the true friend you were and always will be to me.

In everyone’s life, at some time, our inner fire goes out.
It is then burst into flame by an encounter with another human being.
We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit.
Albert Schweitzer

Through It All

/ James Browning

Friends: they come and go.

If you’re lucky, you find a best friend and it works out perfectly, they’re always there for you and your relationship is always smooth.

But most people aren’t that lucky.

You find a best friend and it works out perfectly; for a little while.

And then problems arise, and friendships fall apart.

Sometimes an “I’m sorry” will fix things, but other times, it’s not that easy.

People aren’t perfect, they will get on your nerves, they will break your heart, and they won’t always meet your expectations.

You’ll learn who your true friends are when you’re making a wrong decision, and they don’t yell at you for it; they don’t try to force you to do something different.

They stick by you.

Posted today with abundant gratitude
for my dear friend Mel
and the comradeship we share.

When we first talked to each other
I knew we would always be friends.
Our friendship has kept on growing
And I’ll be here for you to the end.

You listen when I have a problem
And help dry the tears from my face.
You take away my sorrow
And put happiness in its place.

We can’t forget the fun we’ve had
Laughing ’til our faces turn blue.
Talking of things only we find funny
People think we’re insane-If they only knew!

I guess this is my way of saying thanks
For catching me when I fall.
Thanks once again for being such a good friend
And being here with me through it all.
Rachel Ellis