heart warming

Five and Five

/ James Browning

Remembering how good early childhood was brings fond memories. While there was much chaos and heartache to come, those were peaceful times that preceded. Birth to seven years old is recalled as a carefree and happy time. My mind and spirit were not yet crowded with remembrances of how difficult and painful life can be could be. Back as a small child most of my focus was on playing, eating and sleeping. What a life! I am grateful for the sweet and dear memories from when I “was little”.  Here’s five (sayings) and five (images) that I hope serve as meaningful memory joggers for you as I found them to be.

I want to be in fifth grade again. Now, that is a deep dark secret, almost as big as the other one. Fifth grade was easy — old enough to play outside without Mom, too young to go off the block. The perfect leash length. Laurie Halse Anderson

…when you’re a kid, everyone, all the world, encourages you to follow your dreams. But when you’re older, somehow they act offended if you even try. Ethan Hawke

I am convinced that most people do not grow up…We marry and dare to have children and call that growing up. I think what we do is mostly grow old. We carry accumulation of years in our bodies, and on our faces, but generally our real selves, the children inside, are innocent and shy as magnolias. Maya Angelou

Critics who treat ‘adult’ as a term of approval, instead of as a merely descriptive term, cannot be adult themselves. To be concerned about being grown up, to admire the grown up because it is grown up, to blush at the suspicion of being childish; these things are the marks of childhood and adolescence. And in childhood and adolescence they are, in moderation, healthy symptoms. Young things ought to want to grow. But to carry on into middle life or even into early manhood this concern about being adult is a mark of really arrested development. When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty I read them openly. When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up. C.S. Lewis

I have found the best way to give advice to your children
is to find out what they want and then advise them to do it.
Harry S. Truman

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

The Rain Is My Dear Friend

/ James Browning

Sodden clouds, intermittent wipers and home, sweet home

I love the rain.

I don’t mean I grudgingly appreciate its ecological necessity. I don’t mean I’ve learned to tolerate it. I don’t mean I wait it out, flipping through the calendar to see how many more pages until the sun might break through. I mean I love it.

I love everything about it. I love falling asleep under a down comforter in the dead of winter with the windows thrown open to the hiss of rain. I love waking up to the soft aqueous light that is a painter’s dream and listening to the rush of water in the culvert. I love the thrum of rain against the house on a dark afternoon with potato leek soup simmering on the stove. I love the fine mist on my face, the way my skin feels soft and pliant and new in the rain. I love thinking of words to describe the thick, sodden sky: pearl gray, dove-gray, iron-gray, pewter, ashen, silver, smoke. I love my big green, knee-high Wellies. I love the intermittent wipers on my car.From “I Love the Rain” Laruen Kessler originally published in Oregon Quarterly  Winter 2001 http://laurenkessler.com/essays/i-love-the-rain/

I have posted two blogs in the last year and a half that were homage to rain. Like Ms. Kessler, I too love the long-lasting showers that quench the thirst of nature and awaken the happy part the child within me.

How long has it been since I walked in the rain just for the fun of it? About 10 hours! The good feeling that comes to me when raining fills a day goes back to my childhood. I have no idea how those times got fixed in my mine as so wonderful when I was little, but am grateful they did. It is an extraordinary feeling.
https://goodmorninggratitude.com/2012/03/20/onto-houses-and-my-windowpane/

I really do love the rain and the misty, overcast days when the hours are drizzled away. I feel safer on such days as even the robbers and burglars are not as likely to be active on a day when it is raining. There is such comfort for me from the constant drizzle and occasional thunder. I feel closer to life, softer inside and memories flow easier for me with a sweeter taste on such a day.
https://goodmorninggratitude.com/2011/05/01/loving-the-rain/

“Rain Sizes” by John Ciardi

Rain comes in various sizes.
Some rain is as small as a mist.
It tickles your face with surprises,
And tingles as if you’d been kissed.

Some rain is the size of a sprinkle
And doesn’t put out the sun.
You can see the drops sparkle and twinkle,
And a rainbow comes out when it’s done.

Some rain is as big as a nickel
And comes with a crash and a hiss.
It comes down too heavy to tickle.
It’s more like a splash than a kiss.

When it rains the right size and you’re wrapped in
Your rain clothes, it’s fun out-of-doors.
But run home before you get trapped in
The big rain that rattles and roars

Expressed simply, the rain is my dear friend. It cleanses me. It renews me. It enriches me. I hold rainy days in such high gratitude where I place things most precious to me.

The richness of the rain made me feel safe and protected;
I have always considered the rain to be healing — a blanket –
the comfort of a friend. Without at least some rain in any given day,
or at least a cloud or two on the horizon, I feel overwhelmed
by the information of sunlight and yearn for the vital,
muffling gift of falling water.
Douglas Coupland

You Bring Me Joy

/ James Browning

The years have not caused me to forget. Still there are remnants of feelings strong beyond explanation. You cracked me wide-open and I was never the same again.

Was it because you loved me so unwaveringly deep and passionately?

Was it because you were so exotic and intelligent that you were able to enter my heart so easily?

Was it because I filled your need to be loved?

Or you filled mine?

It was all these things and a hundred more. There was a time we found ‘home’ in each other’s arms.

Once in a great while a feeling of loneliness for you, and you only, still touches down to the quick of my heart. Always I smile with hope that you are well and happy. You married in your 30’s and our contact appropriately stopped not too longer after.

Maybe my memory has elevated what we shared to a fantasy beyond fact. Although our love covered a lot of years it was not long when measured in the actual length of time we spent together. But in weight of what was shared we took a trip around the world.

Times change.
People move on.
Some grow together.
Some grow apart.

Some like we knew each other at the wrong time. I was still a boy in a man’s body pretending he knew what he wanted and needed. I pushed you away because I was afraid to be cared about as much as you loved me.

Hidden away safely, even for the time being from myself, is the only physical memory I have of you: the gift you gave me of a small music box shaped like a heart with a beautiful photo of  you inside. It will go to my safe deposit box once I find it again.

I will always be grateful that once I knew you and for the space you occupy in my memories. The pain has long evaporated and today only a sweet memory remains. There has been no greater love in my life. I’m grateful that whenever I hear Anita Baker singing you always come to mind…

If I can’t see your face,
I will remember that smile
’Cause you’re the finest thing
I’ve seen in all my life.
You bring me joy.
From an Anita Baker’s “You Bring Me Joy” by David Lasley

Thank You Sherry

/ James Browning

It has been several weeks since I had visited my favorite used book store and yesterday was pleased to find the poetry section had been restocked. In among the dozen titles I picked from Kahlil Gibran to Susan Polis Schutz, was a loosely bound volume titled “2004 Senior Citizens Poetry” published by Southwestern Oklahoma State University. From the introduction I learned it was a class project for the twelve students whose signatures were within.

Thumbing through the volume last night it was the twentieth page that touched  me to the point of reading it over and over. Not knowing if I would find it, this morning I searched on-line for the piece discovered yesterday. Too obscure and unknown, nothing was found. Reading the lines again this morning I felt something this heartfelt should be put into the world for others to enjoy.

“Ghosts”

I dance in the moonlight and your ghost in my arms dreaming of what might have been.

I hope that life has been kind to you and that I am not forgotten.

I send warm breezes to kiss your lips that I cannot reach and I envy them.

Time and space has taken their toll, but the memory of you and our lost love lives in the secret places of my heart.

We cannot know what the fates have in store for us as the future has yet to be written.

I wonder, will the paths we choose bring us back to each other or further apart on divergent paths, never to meet again in this life.

I only know that my memories of you warm me like a soft blanket against winters cold grip, comforting me when I feel I can no longer stand strong against the hardness of life.

We will not waste our precious time on ‘what ifs’ but yet in fleeting moments they invade my thoughts without invitation and that is when I dance in the moonlight with your ghost in my arms.

Sherry C. Potter, Ponca City, OK

I searched Google for the author and found an article about medicine access by a “Sherry Potter” who identified herself by saying “I live in rural Oklahoma 8 miles south of Ponca City, Oklahoma. I am the mother of two children, five grandchildren and am going to be a great-grandmother in mid August”. From the references she made I assume that the article was about three years old and “Sherry” was somewhere in her mid to late 60’s.

She goes on to say “I was diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer in March of 2005… I was given just a few years and to date have far exceeded that time frame. All the doctors who are involved in my treatments have expressed their amazement that I have survived this long. I owe it to their treatments and investment in me as a person and my strong faith in my creator, as well as the many prayers made on my behalf.”

While writing this emotions have swelled up several times and I’ve come close to tears more than once. Inside is deep sentiment for this stranger who writes so openly of herself and her feelings. I dare not dig deeper for I fear I will find “Sherry” is not longer with us. For a heart so sweet and a mind so clear, I hope she is still around for her presence surely makes the world a better place. I am grateful to know her, even if ever so slightly. From a distance she touched me.  Thank you Sherry.

There are no strangers here;
only friends you haven’t yet met.
William Butler Yeats

Wind in the Trees

/ James Browning

I find what I go looking for. What I expect seems to manifest itself before me with great frequency. My thoughts shape my life more than any other single factor. Today I feel great and am loving life. With that spirit I choose to begin my day with a thought by Henry Drummond:

…to love abundantly is to live abundantly, and to love forever is to live forever…

With intention I hope to be more aware today than usual and live closely to the ending passage from the book “Contemplate” by Gwen Frostic, punctuated just as she originally wrote and published it:

Savor each moment of beauty –
The majestic – – and the simple . . .

Listen to silence – – –
that in itself
renders all words meaningless . . . . .

Feel the wind in the trees – – –
The ebb and flow of the tides – – –
Wild wings soaring high – – –
– – – the timeless rhythm of life . . . . .

Dream of stars shining over head – – –
– – of the mystic kinship
that underlies all life . . . . .

Keep a sense of wonder –
and of awe – – – –
– – – – forever

Some mornings I am nearly overtaken with gratefulness to be alive. I relish those days when I begin well and know whatever comes, it will be an outstanding day. What  joy to be conscious and able to witness and experience all I will get to smell, feel, hear, taste and see! Come pain or pleasure, trouble or ease, happiness or grief… it will be a good day. I am grateful to be alive!

You will find as you look back upon your life
that the moments when you have truly lived
are the moments when you have done things
in the spirit of love.
Henry Drummond

The Best of Us Forever

/ James Browning

Slowly I have arrived at an understanding of life that makes sense to me.  My conclusion is simple: love is all that matters!

A person is capable of living without many things and able to flourish, but love is essential.  Without love one slowly withers and dies long before a last breath is exhaled. Love makes us human and paints a myriad of color over the black and white of life.

Last night listening to oldies for about two hours it occurred to me that fame and money did not matter much to those rock stars who have passed on. The size of their homes, bank balances, the beauty of their spouse, the speed of their car, the fame achieved– all those things pale into insignificance to the splendor of what it is that makes us tick: LOVE!

Love does not make the world go around – it simply makes the ride worthwhile.

Love is not the highly commercialised circus we see on Valentines Day. It is much deeper and much more profound than sending someone a dozen roses at hugely inflated prices. It is much more than candle lit dinners and fancy chocolates.

We all yearn for that deep connection with others, those moments of bliss, joy, completeness. We crave to have more of those delicious moments we may have had with a romantic partner. Such moments seem so rare and forlorn.

We all remember the blissful moments when strangers have shared their love and made a difference. We all remember the feeling of gratitude in the eyes of someone whom we have helped. We remember how great it feels to do something for someone without expecting anything in return.

We cry when we see happy stories on our TV screens of families reuniting. Such stories touch our hearts and yet they are so rare, as we continue to get bombarded with so much doom and gloom by all the propaganda around us.

We remember the sheer joy of children playing and the love in their eyes. Our hearts skip a beat, we get goose pimples and we get teary eyed when we witness an act of sheer love, pure, unadulterated and unconditional. Such moments literally take our breath away.

Love is much greater than what we feel romantically. It is what makes us sing, dance and makes us human. From loveisallthatmatters.com

Never before has my heart, soul and mind been as open to love as now. Previously a time never existed where I could feel love as deeply or appreciate it has much. Life has polished me with grit and fine tuned my heart over time to be a vessel capable of containing love, appreciating it and pouring it on others. What a life changer! I am humbly grateful.

Life burns us up like fire,
And Song goes up in Flame:
The radiant body smolders
To the ashes whence it came.

Out of things it rises
With a mouth that laughs and sings,
Backward it fades and falters
Into the char of things.

Yet soars a voice above it-
Love is holy and strong;
the best of us forever
Escapes in Love and Song.
“Life” by John Hall Wheelock

Muffling Gift of Falling Water

/ James Browning

Often I have written about my love of rain and how it fills a crack in my soul like nothing else. A long, soaking shower makes me feel safe and protected for reasons I have never fully understood, but I love the feeling just the same. Maybe probing for the why of it would mess it up any way.

This weekend where I live is forecast to have the two days of the first good rain we have had in a long time. The land around is dry and parched. Everything green is suffering and lots of it is only barely clinging to life. So today I celebrate in advance the life-giving rain that is on its way.

From “Rain in Summer” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

How beautiful is the rain!
After the dust and heat,
In the broad and fiery street,
In the narrow lane,
How beautiful is the rain!

Across the window-pane
It pours and pours;
And swift and wide,
With a muddy tide,
Like a river down the gutter roars
The rain, the welcome rain!

The clover-scented gale,
And the vapors that arise
From the well-watered and smoking soil.
For this rest in the furrow after toil
Their large and lustrous eyes
Seem to thank the Lord,
More than man’s spoken word.

Near at hand,
From under the sheltering trees,
The farmer sees
His pastures, and his fields of grain,
As they bend their tops
To the numberless beating drops
Of the incessant rain.
He counts it as no sin
That he sees therein
Only his own thrift and gain.

Already I know people and the landscape will be more joyful next week than today. The green will burst forward for all to see and the outdoors will be a more pleasant place to work and play. Gratitude will be due Mother Nature and I have already begun expressing my part.

The richness of the rain made me feel safe and protected;
I have always considered the rain to be healing — a blanket —
the comfort of a friend. Without at least some rain in any given day,
or at least a cloud or two on the horizon, I feel overwhelmed
by the information of sunlight and yearn
for the vital, muffling gift of falling water.
Douglas Coupland

Other blogs about rain:
Loving the Rain « Good Morning Gratitude
Loving the Rain Part II « Good Morning Gratitude
Mother Nature Gone Crazy? « Good Morning Gratitude

Amid Pleasures and Palaces

/ James Browning

The past six days have had me traveling; first on business and the latter half of the week visiting a dear friend. Time has passed very quickly while hanging out with my buddy. He introduced me to several new people including one I feel a particular kinship with and hope in time we might become friends. Time will tell. 

Knowing I will be home in twelve hours is a good feeling. When I have been a way for a week or so, walking into my home is refreshing experience. It’s then I more keenly notice the house I live and what is in it. The feeling of that moment is gratitude for the common things that often get overlooked on a day to day basis.

There are shaggy asters blooming in the bed that lines the fence,
And the simplest of the blossoms seems of mighty consequence.
Oh, there isn’t any mansion underneath God’s starry dome
That can rest a weary pilgrim like the little place called home.
So where’er a man may wander, and whatever be his care,
You’ll find his soul still stretching to the home he left somewhere.
From “The Path To Home” by Edgar Guest

Whether it’s my bed, the coffee pot that I am accustomed to or unwrinkled clothes, I will be glad to get home.

Amid pleasures and palaces
though we may roam,
Be it ever so humble,
there’s no place like home.
John Howard Payne