Oh Teeth - a poem

Oh teeth, why do you hurt me so?

I do not think you're wise.

I brush, I floss, I check you up

yet when I bites, I cries.

Hot or cold, I sip & wince;

my food enjoyment dies.

The black hole sucks my life away

despite its teeny size.

Oh tooth, I would not pull you out

if I have my preference.

I like the way my mouth looks

without holes in the fence.

But teeth, the pain may drive me mad

when it crawls into my sinus.

So if tooth = pain, your wisdom

I will settle for one less.

Releasing the past - Happily

The benefit of moving into a smaller space is the impetuous to release a lot of stuff.  A lot of stuff. 

In order to release, there must be sorting. And when one is sorting, one spends a lot of time staring at the accumulated stuff.  (and one remembers the commercial about stuff to keep stuff in.)  And one wonders how the heck did I get All.  This. Stuff? 

Most of the stuff is about happiness, right?  We keep mementos because they remind us of achievements and happy times.  We purchase things because we think having them will make us happy.  Or using them will make us happy.    People give us things to make us happy.  (though nobody can really MAKE anyone be happy. )  Sometimes we buy things simply because we are happy.

Remember all those possibilities?  Craft projects and cookbooks and material and patterns; wood and nails and designs.  Cabinets and filing bins, dividers and tabs and inserts, pens and folders, business cards and receipts.  Oh and the outfits purchased or made for dances and interviews, auditions and celebrations.  That tie.  Those shoes.  The earrings!

So when we're releasing all those accumulated items we no longer use  --  throwing away that rosebud from high school; shredding the old address books; donating the skinny jeans of the past - it feels like we're throwing away that potential for happiness.

Why would we give away all that happiness?

Because those are just memories.  And happiness, like love, is infinite.  We don't just get the happiness of the past.  Nor do we only feel happiness if we fulfill those past dreams.  We can feel happiness right now.  New happiness.  Bright happiness.  Not the dingy, distant memory of happiness. 

But If we fill our closets and thus our minds with the happiness of the past, there is no room, no mental space, to reach for happiness now.  Happiness today.  Happiness tomorrow.

No one can make us happy.  No thing can make us happy.  But we sure can feel happy, dreaming and doing, buying and making, or even just creating new possibilities.  We need room, we need space to create more happiness now. Today.  And tomorrow.

So let it go.  Give it, sell it, junk it, shred it.  Release it.  If for no other reason than to  make room in your closet for new shoes.  New books.  New folders.  New projects.  New happiness.

I hope you have a great and happy day!

-Lila

The Little Things - a ramble

The sight of my keyboard sitting casually next to my drum makes me deliriously happy.   And I realize Richard Carlson has it wrong.  We should sweat the small stuff.

The "big" things are nothing but a whole bunch of little things, built one on top of the other.  Whether it's training for sports, or learning a new mental skill, we do it step by step.  Learning to walk leads to hand eye coordination leads to sharp shooters and artists.  Every journey starts with the first step.  A beach is a pile of individual grains of sand.  It's not all the straws, but the final straw.

Physics or metaphysics, life all comes down to one, single, little thing.

Experts, the ones we really admire, can pick out all the little things: the type of cocoa bean and where it's from; the combination of spices; the single note in the chord.  It is the little hidden jokes that make the whole show (or book) funny.  It is the single line or thought which, replayed, brings the story together.  The taste, the instrument, the voice, the color, the stitch or the smell.  The little, individual, thing.

If it weren't for the little things, we would have no variety.  Without variety, we would have no favorites.  Granted, we might then have no communication issues, because we would all be seeing the same thing with the same appreciation.  But then, we would have no individuality either, and therefore, we would not be human.

Being human is all about the little things.

It's the little things that make something not exactly right, whether it's the lyrics in the second verse, or the too perfect angle of the roof.  We chide ourselves because we're judging.  We don't wish to settle, but we know there is no "perfect" match, whether it's in parts, or partners.

But there is an individual perfection - in the combination of the little things.  And that's what we're really looking for.  A look within blue eyes, to match the smile on ruby lips, to go with the brown hair that parts in exactly the right direction, accompanied by the smell, the voice, the habits, the phrasing, the way of walking, the laugh, the height.  It's all the little things together, answering to all of our senses.

My keyboard makes me happy, as it sits near my drum for me to see while I type on another keyboard which also makes me giddily happy - because of the way it feels, the way it sound, the way it looks, and of course the fact it's part of a happy little laptop.  It is very near to perfection.  Which means to me my future happiness must include keeping these things (the keyboard, the drum, the laptop) near.  And to keep these things near, I must use them.  Make them part of my life, not just trophies on the shelf, or against the wall.  Otherwise the little things become big things, mementoes.  Things of the past.  Signposts, sure, but distractingly full of little "was"es and might-have-beens.   Sad, poignant, over-with little things.

I want my little things to be moving forward.  In use.  Constantly improving.  And happy.  Like me.

The magic, the life, the happy is in the little things.

I hope you have a great day, every little moment!

-Lila

Soapbox of Perception: Fairy Tales & REAL true love

If you have known love, you have known the pain of loss.  Whether that love is familial or passionate; codependent or independent; for people, places or things; there's always pain when there is separation.

Love is painful because there is a balance.  For all of the height and security and joy in love, there is an equal depth and despair and desolation in love's loss.  Connections and faith aside, the lack of love's physical presence is wrenching.  If our senses are unable to feast upon the object of our love, we are bereft.   As humans we are prone to being, as the song says, "addicted to love", but it is one addiction for which there is no rehabilitation.  When we lose our current drug of choice, we have two options.  We can love again.  Or we can't. 

For me, the choice is pretty clear.  Because I grew up on fairy tales.

There is a lot of controversy surrounding fairy tales.  Disney's light hearted treatment versus the original Grimm horror stories (complete with "adult" subtext).   The daydreaming girl versus the hardworking woman.  The brainwashing moral that all a girl has to do is be kind, virtuous, and a good housewife.  Versus "First he put me on a pedestal, and then he asked me to dust it."

And the common perception is, those sweet little princesses just sat around and sang while they waited for a man to rescue them.

Which is a load of crap.  And I can say that, because I too have spouted the anti-princess line.  I was wrong.

Yes, the princesses sang, at least in Disney's versions.  Yes, there was daydreaming and it usually involved a handsome lad.  They were teenagers.  But none of them just sat around and waited.

Many of the princesses survived tragedy -- often the loss of one or both parents, the loss of a home, and/or the transition of their whole world.  Cinderella, for example, went from pampered and much loved daughter to slave.  Her whole identity was stripped from her and her father never stood up for her.  Snow White lost mother and then father and was ordered killed.  Tiana lost her father.  Rapunzel never even knew her family; her identity hinged on the way she was treated by the witch.  Princess Elsa endured the worst sort of tragedy.  Her parents loved her and  taught her to imprison herself.   Then they died.

For some, the tragedy wasn't as seemingly intense.  Belle's family life seemed pretty decent, with or without siblings.  Aurora had a fine childhood, whether with fairies or with parents.  And it doesn't appear Ariel had to do a lick of housework.  But even Belle, Aurora and Ariel wanted more than the life they had.  They knew they deserved more.  If they were willing to go for it.

Whether the imprisonment was actual or spiritual, each girl had a situation they wanted out of.  Perhaps the dreaming was a form of escapism.  But dreaming doesn't free a person, no matter how many stars you wish upon.  You have to believe.  You have to have the strength of character to grasp the chance when it rolls by.

Cinderella, constantly berated by the female role-models in her life, still made a wish.  When it came true, she believed she had the right to her good fortune.  However unreal it felt, she not only danced with the prince, she presented herself again to get the glass slipper.  She demanded her dream come true, and her dream was love.

When Snow White was offered her life, she ran - not back to the home she knew, but away and to freedom.  And still she dreamed of romance and kindness.  Even after 3 more murder attempts, she was open to love.

Belle imprisoned herself for one love.  And by being open and accepting and expectant, she received another.

Ariel dared a scary bargain because she believed in love and she believed in herself enough to expect love in return.

Aurora trusted that no matter who she was, she could be true to love.

Tiana and Elsa conquered their own fears and allowed themselves to love.

All of those princesses rescued themselves by opening to love - and not just, or not only, the romantic love.  They had to love themselves.  Love their dreams.  Love the life around them, or at least be open to the possibilities.   Even though they had lost love already.  Even though some of them might have been happier, in the short run, to shut down their hearts.  Any one of them could have turned their back on hope, believed they deserved their imprisoned existence, and stayed dreaming forever.  Instead, they chose to be open.  To love.

Who could be better role models?

 When I first met these girls, my tragedies of love lost were limited to pets and boyfriends, outgrown clothes and misplaced books.  Since then, I have loved and lost homes, vehicles, jobs, friends and family.  And while some of these losses were voluntary, and while I do believe in connections, and while I do have faith that nothing is ever truly lost from us, still any loss is painful.  Time heals and still, it is painful.  Memories dim, and still... 

Isolation is so very tempting.  Because the more we are open, the more we expand.  The more we expand,  the more we get to feed our addiction.  And oh, it is true.  The more we love, the more we feel loss when that love is gone.  The more we feel the change of every leaf, the flap of every bird's wing.  The more we mourn the simplest of things.

But a bookworm with an absent minded father can take the reins when the time comes and change her world.  A mermaid can leave her home behind for the chance of something more spectacular.  A weary house-slave and a hard working waitress can both gather the energy to dance at the ball just to keep their dream alive.  They worked.  And they loved.  And they have happily ever after.

Because it isn't about loving a specific item or being.  It is simply about love.

The happily-ever-after isn't in the object of our love.  It is in ourselves.

Therefore.  I can keep my heart open and accept all sorts of love, be it family or friends, eros or agape,  animate or inanimate, seen or unseen.  I can love and lose and love and lose again.  Because I believe in myself.  And I have the strength to keep expanding, to keep believing,  to ask for and work for and accept my dreams, to turn my frogs and my beasts in princes, and to have my happily-ever-after.

I am a princess.   Are you?

- Lila (who wishes you a loving day.)

List of Favorite Fairy Tales versions:

Favorite Tellings  (traditional tale, mostly)	Favorite Retellings  (a different spin)	Favorite Others
Let's Pretend (http://www.artsreformation.com/records/) This is the recordings of the tales, in theatrical format.	Cameron Dokey  - author (especially Midnight and Golden)	Wyrd Sisters  (Terry Pratchett)
The Glass Slipper (Charles Perrault)	Spindle's End (Robin McKinley)	10th Kingdom (mini-series)
Sleeping Beauty (Disney)	Ever After (movie)	Fairy Godmother (Mercedes Lackey)
Tangled (Disney)		Enchanted (movie)
Beauty (Robin McKinley)