I am generally healthy individual.  I have worked with kids for so long that it is rare that I get the colds and yucks that the little and large pumpkins pass around.  Thus it is rare that I trundle off to the emergency room or doctor for much of anything.  My back was in such bad shape for two days that I was convinced there was something else wrong and this went to the ER after a lunch meeting on Friday.  A CT scan revealed nothing and it was all deemed a pulled muscle.  I haven’t had a pulled muscle, torn something that brought me to tears in years and usually it is an ankle that gets twisted and torn.  Finally, after 24 hours of muscle relaxants and mega doses of Ibuprofen, I can stand up straight and walk with only twinges of pain.  Sitting is still a problem so I won’t be writing much because my typing while lying down is less than attractive.  However I did manage to take the trash out and make coffee this morning.  For once, though, I won’t push it.  This being in pain stuff is not fun at all and I will take care until it heals.  Rest, drugs, rest, drugs.  A boring life but there it is.  I should be fine by tomorrow.
And so it goes.

I am broken.  Pulled muscles in lower back.  Went to ER yesterday and was given pain meds that impede typing.  Back when I can focus.  This is incredibly annoying.
And so it goes.

It was one of those nights…
You know the kind
not awake enough to do anything
but not quiet enough to sleep.
Whatever waking up
looks like on those morning afters
that’s what I did
still exhausted.

I am in favor of removable body parts.
In my younger years
I thought it would be clever
if reproductive organs
could be removed until one
wanted or needed them.
Now I would like to remove
my mind and put it in a jug by the bed.

Some would suggest
I leave it in the jug by the bed.

And so it goes.

On October 2, 2006 Charles Roberts shot and killed 5 school girls, wounded others and then took his own life in a one room school house in the Old Order Amish community of Nickel Mines in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.  That’s the short of it.  However, the long of it is far more complicated than that.  What struck us, the society at large, most was the reaction of the people of the Nickel Mines.  Forgiveness is as a much a part of the daily life of these Old Order Amish as breathing.  Many, indeed most of us wondered how they could forgive a crime of such violence and magnitude.  The media, of course, had a feeding frenzy.  Pundits felt compelled to comment either positively or negatively on the “healthiness” of this forgiveness.
The book Amish Grace:How Forgiveness Transcended Tragedy (Kraybill, Nolt, Weaver-Zercher, John Wiley and Sons, 2007) “explores the many questions the story raises about the religious beliefs that led the Amish to forgive so quickly.  In a world where religion spawns so much violence and vengeance, the surprising act of Amish forgiveness begs for deeper consideration.”  Forgiveness seems easy on the surface, but it isn’t.  I wrestle with it in my daily life.  Especially now.  There are moments when I find the peace that comes with forgiveness and slowly but surely they come closer together than they used to.  This book was not a quick read for me.  I picked it up, read a few pages, and then put it down as I absorbed the words, their meanings and implications.  There are lessons here although they are not meant to be lessons but rather explanations of one community’s, one culture’s response to tragedy.  This is a community in which “presence” and “being present” are tangible activities.  They are not meant to “fix things” because indeed there is no fixing.  This is a community that does not publicly tear its hair or rend its garments but instead goes about daily life and finds peace in the routine of that and comfort in the very definition that is community. 
I don’t buy many books.  I only buy the ones I want to write in and read over again.  I won’t return this one to the library until I have my own copy.  There is much here to think about.  How different would life look if we forgave rather than sought vengeance?  How would it look if we did not seek retribution?  How would it look if we hoped without expectations?  What is justice and how should it be made manifest?  The answers for the Amish lie in their faith and their community and their Ordnung.  That is their way.  And for someone, who like me, is seeking, this volume illuminates a path, shows where the boulders are and invites me to find my own way around them.

I try to mix it up here.  I find it helpful to exercise my mind in that way.  It would be too easy to dwell on a single issue.  Thus I make an effort not to make every entry a book review or a political rant (You miss those don’t you.? Still watching West Wing.  Still hoping that Jed Bartlett shows up in the REAL White House.  Just so you know.) or dwell on the stupidity of the work place or glow about the joy of working with children or  feed the NE Ohio obsession about the weather.  But I must say the early hours of this morning were truly spectacular.
The haze and grey that usually hangs in the north coast sky were lifted for a moment at 5:30 a.m and the definition of glory  provided the ceiling for our morning constitutional.  Colder than it’s been since winter arrived, the crisp air was still and felt warmer than the thermometer read  The moon was perfectly round in the swept clean sky.  Oh I know – the kids will be crazy with the full moon, and the boss will continue to be clueless and Washington will be politics as usual – but for those silent fifteen minutes the world was a clear and perfect gift.  To whoever might be listening, thank you.
And so it goes.

I have a confession.  I play Pogo games.  I can manufacture several reasons why or excuses, take your pick.  I don’t like Crossword puzzles much.  They always feel as though they have language of their own.  However, I love playing Boggle and Scrabble and since those games are solitaire games, I play them on line, either with a cheating computer or non-cheating humans.  The same holds true for euchre and backgammon.  I argue that they exercise my brain and are good for me.  I can’t say the same thing for the puzzle games, Zuma and Bejeweled which don’t take much thinking but are point and click and rather mind numbing rather than mind stimulating.  I’m not proud of this current obsession (and yes, I confess, it is an obsession) but there it is.  I could argue that these silly games give my mind a chance to wander and rest but they really are a waste of time.  I get the same sort of mind wandering washing dishes or running the vacuum or dusting or just sitting still (which has enormous value, I think.)

One of the many YA authors I admire is Laurie Halse Anderson, author of Speak.  She suggested recently in her blog, Madwoman in the Forest, that we have a blog-free February.  She poses the question how much time do we spend on the computer and is it time well spent.  Given that I have just started blogging again and find it healthy, I am not stopping.  In addition to that, so much of my work happens on the computer that I can’t just shut it off and hide the laptop for a month. As much as that is appealing froma work perspective, I need to work and pay the rent. I connect with people via email the way I used to with the phone and I am not willing to put those friendships and relationships on hold for a month no matter how short it is.  But….I can stop playing internet games. 

So there it is, beginning February 1, no more internet games.  None.  I wish this felt like no big deal.  It doesn’t.  It feels like a very big deal.  My hands are twitchy just thinking about it.  Now isn’t that embarrassing and a clear indication that this must be done. 

Can you evaluate the time you spend with electronics?  Can you cut time on the computer or other electronic devices and spend it more productively?  Can you?

And so it goes.

On Friday it was discovered that the boiler that heats the library was broken and there would be no heat.  We managed to work through Friday and Saturday, the sun was shining after all.  But Monday was the question as we knew the temperature was going to drop.  When I arrived at work on Monday it was FREEZING in that building. In another effort to lower the carbon footprint, I keep my little home at 66 and everyone had decided that I would be the gauge to determine if we stayed open or closed.  I checked the fish tank for ice floes and then posed the question, “What the hell are we doing here?”  That was enough and the library was closed Monday and Tuesday while things were repaired.  Much as I would have liked another day off, the heater folks got the old clunker up and running so it’s back to the salt mines today.  Drat!

The two days were well spent, catching up on reading and making wonderful soup and trying a calamari recipe that was horrid.  However, much as I grouse, I am ready to return.  I miss my library and my work.  It is times like these that I know I am in the right profession.  I have relished the peace and solitude, immersed in a book entitled Amish Grace by Kraybill, Nolt and Weaver-Zercher.  Never fear, there will be writing about that in the not so distant future.  But that notwithstanding, I am ready to return to the world, blustery and bone-chilling as it is this morning, and see what mischief I can make.  Let the games begin!

And so it goes.

I do not remember when I first began thinking about simplicity, about what it means and how one achieves it.  I think perhaps it has always been a concept, idea, desire that floated through my conscious and unconscious mind.  Nor do I remember when I began to think of solitude but that too has rolled through my adult consciousness because I have for thirty-seven years had so little of it.  But now that I have the ability to live both, I feel it is time to put these concepts, ideas, desires in the front of my living.

Solitude is something I now have in abundance.  While the children are in and out and certainly in my thoughts, they are adults and my concerns for them are different than when they were babies and children and teens.  Solitude however is not as simple as being alone.  Solitude implies productive moments of prayer or thinking or writing or meditating.  Solitude is a full life.  It is a life lived well.

Simplicity is also a life lived well.  It is not denial but rather making choices that allow space for giving to others and the sharing of self.  Every act becomes a conscious one.

For me and my sisters poverty is freedom, and the less we have the more we can give. Poverty is love before it is renunciation. It is not that we cannot have luxuries. We choose not to have them. This freedom brings joy, and joy enables us to give in love until it hurts.

- Mother Teresa

I made a conscious choice when I moved to take only what I loved and what belonged to me.  Thus my life is uncluttered by stuff.  My next conscious choice was to grow things – a small plot of vegetables, a pot of basil on the windowsill.  I do not grow all I consume.  I think I would like to maybe some day.  I would certainly like to grow MORE of what I consume.  I seek to simplify my footprint on this earth – to make less of a mark.  Thus I recycle now and have succeeded in having only one bag of trash each week.  Now I must make a conscious effort to give more – not money perhaps but self.  Where can I volunteer that allows for prayerful and thoughtful service….hmmmm.

My plans for yesterday included writing.  The universe had other ideas.  An early morning walk was startlingly warm.  The conversations of the birds, something that hasn’t been heard in the land in months, shocked the pooch and I to such a degree that we looked around in wonder.  One of us rolled happily around in a patch of grass.  Change the First:  Forget sitting inside.  We’re going for a long walk as soon as the very basics of house cleaning are done.  The Universe had other plans.  A quick trip to the grocery store  turned into “Mom will you come to the mall with me.  I want you to look at a set of pots and pans on sale at Penney’s.” There’s three hours of my life I’ll never get back.  My hatred of malls is only rivaled by my hatred of …uhm, I can’t think of anything I loathe quite that much.  Oh well still time for a long walk.  Change the Second (Rudiments of house cleaning still not done.)  “Mom, will you proof a paper I wrote.”  Sure, I said, thinking this one would be a quick one because child #1 writes well and aside from sentence fragments generally gets the job done.  WRONG!  Good grief.  Move this.  Change this and for heaven’s sake support THIS! There’s another three hours I won’t get back.  Oh well, there’s still time for a walk and the birds are still singing. Time for a quick lunch and then outside I promise myself and the pooch.  By the time the rudiments of house keeping were done and lunch consumed the day had become gray and gloomy and the birds had all returned to wherever the birds go when the temperature drops and the sky grown dim.  Rats!  The good news is that the temperature at 4 a.m. was in the mid 40s and it might stay that way long enough for us to get a walk in in daylight.  For now, I am enjoying a quiet morning and am not making any plans at all.  It’s easier that way.
And so it goes.

It’s been a long week (even with a Monday holiday) or should I say a week full of long days.  If I write tonight I will only kvetch so I will spare you THAT.  Long week or long days, today the sun shone and I had a moment to stand outsideand it felt wonderful, a reminder that there will be days of eating lunch outside or actually taking a break to read in the sun for 15 minutes.  And THAT reminds me that I should start thinking about – dum de dum dum – summer reading.  Arghhhhh!  Nope, not thinking about it now because tomorrow, I rearrange the office.  Heaven help me!  I’m going to bed!
And so it goes.