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Old, Like My Nope-Won’t-Do-It Vacuum Cleaner

July 19, 2019 by terrypetersen

It’s paradoxical that the idea of living a long life appeals to everyone, but the idea of getting old doesn’t appeal to anyone. (Andy Rooney)

My vacuum cleaner and I have more in common than I like to admit. Two of my toes are bound together after a mishap in my living room, and the electrical cord on my vacuum cleaner is held together with enough tape to stock a hardware store.

The vacuum and I both wheeze around too much dust.

“Come on!” I call to it. “One more time over the shag carpet.”

As an inanimate object, its answer is a weak whirring sigh.

If I were asked to follow my double-jointed youngest granddaughter’s exercise routine, my sigh would be similar.

Older citizens have limitations. Physically. Not when it comes to a capacity for giving and caring. We can live locked inside our pain or despite it. My grandson calls me a wrinkled kid because I get down on the floor and play with him. Perfection isn’t required. Not when imagination fills in the gaps.

Imagination, hope, love—gifts inanimate objects don’t have as they age. I pray to continue to learn, to celebrate possibilities hidden inside each new crease.

 

 

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Sight or Vision: Reaching for Perspective

July 13, 2019 by terrypetersen

Experience teaches us only one thing at a time—and hardly that, in my case. (Mark Twain)

Wow! I see individual leaves on the trees. A male and female goldfinch at the birdfeeder. Sky, blue with white slivered memories of larger clouds. All seen through dark sunglasses. The world no longer appears wrapped in fuzz.

Not to my cataract-free eyes. My brain remains as scrambled as ever. How many places have my thoughts run as I drive a few miles along a familiar route? Past politics. Into man’s inhumanity to man. Through global warming. My stomach considers lunch and dinner preparations—I should have stopped for breakfast.

There’s a speed indicator on a pole. How long has that been here? I pass this way often enough to drive it blindfolded. Okay, almost. The number on my speedometer drops. Into a one-thing-at-a-time ordinary pace.

Ugliness remains. I look at it differently. I can be peace by joining others who live love. By not giving up. My cataract-free eyes have sight yet can continue to seek vision. Wisdom, it is earned. Never an automatic right.

 

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If Only (A Poem)

July 8, 2019 by terrypetersen

If civilization is to survive, we must cultivate the science of human relationships – the ability of all peoples, of all kinds, to live together, in the same world at peace. (Franklin D. Roosevelt)

If peace were a bird, it would fly through heat or wind.

It would thrive in a nest open to storm.

 

If peace were a mountain,

it would stand patient,

constant, firm for centuries.

 

If peace were a tree, it would begin

as an acorn, unafraid of darkness,

then grow to house birds,

and reach for mountains.

 

Peace. It transcends

mountain borders,

and allows foreign bird species

to nest together.

 despite unseen possibilities.

 

originally published in For a Better World

 

 

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Inside and Outside the Hospital Window

July 1, 2019 by terrypetersen

hospital bed in intense color with parking lot below

Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans. (John Lennon)

Spaghetti with homemade sauce, salad, a special bread, and tapioca for dinner. The pudding is the kind that sticks to the bottom of the pan, not the pre-packaged stuff that requires no more than the opening of a plastic lid. I wanted to make something special for my husband. A just because.

My timing could have been better.

“I’m feeling a little queasy,” he says after eating a much smaller quantity than usual.

Somehow queasy is understated. By the next day he is dehydrated enough to pass out at the emergency room entrance. As his inadequate support I go down with him.

The crisis ends. One healed moment at a time.

And I sit at the computer knowing life is not mine to control. I can give. I can look a homeless person in the face and offer food or money, listen to a friend when I would rather open a book or take a nap. Act or React.

Perhaps all I can do sometimes is have a vague outline for the week and an open heart.

Right now, I have plans to learn to be more flexible, “with a little help from my friends.”

Thanks to all my friends who gave more than a little help.

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Enough: A Poem

June 22, 2019 by terrypetersen

Our deepest wounds surround our greatest gifts. (Ken Page)

Enough

Enough, such a curious word

to ponder on a solstice day.

Enough light, dark, pain, success,

orchids, and weeds. Illness and health.

Does enough thrive on my dinner table

or include food for a child I will never meet?

Does enough stop at my ego or begin there?

Perhaps, this is not a question to answer.

But, a journey to live.

 

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Fog, Sun, and Hope: a poem

June 17, 2019 by terrypetersen

There are two ways to slide easily through life: to believe everything or to doubt everything; both ways save us from thinking. (Theodore Rubin, psychiatrist and writer)

Fog in sky, fog in mind and heart

Bare, black trees stand out inside a low cloud. Fog.

Headlights hide the vehicles they lead

 

until they arrive close enough to be

seen by other drivers.

 

In political fogs fact and factoid blur. Alternative facts,

lies that wear well-constructed masks. Fear wins.

 

Each lie repeats often enough to be used as light beams for

followers. The mask asks folk to scoff non-believers.

 

And the non-believers respond with taunts, point out stupidity,

lack of logic, inconsistency. A no-win war begins.

 

In the natural world, sun, blue, and clouds reappear.

Black trees remain leafless. Headlights become optional,

 

a choice. Drivers can see without them. Can eyes open

and human roots join for change? Must fog live in all seasons?

 

Or can sun live despite fog? As headlights point out need,

can drivers carrying hope respond with an ear instead of censure?

 

Yes, I hear where you stand, those who would

destroy the poor and give to the rich, but I disagree.

 

Peace for the world.

Eventually. Please.

 

(originally published in For a Better World 2019)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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LAST VISIT TO THE HOUSE I CALLED HOME: A POEM

June 10, 2019 by terrypetersen

The one thing I need to leave behind is good memories. (Michael Landon)

So many things clutter our attic. I find my wedding dress, yellowed with age, and remember a poem I wrote after my parents died:

LAST VISIT TO THE HOUSE I CALLED HOME

Dust encases the old homestead.

Encyclopedias from 1963,

boxes of unused pencils,

 

skeins of yarn with faded fifty-cent

mark-down stickers,

a broken clock.

 

Most of the saved items are gone,

Dumpster and shredder items wait.

Bags of cancelled checks

 

on Mom’s closed account.

She died years ago.

Dad’s will to maintain dissolved, too.

 

In the back yard his loss leaked

into the naked, open space

leaving it flat, withered.

 

Before the property grew sullen,

I planted seeds for annuals that sprouted into

a tiny-stemmed miniature garden.

 

They dwarfed next to tomato vines

Dad tied to hand-cut posts.

Sunlight coaxed

 

white blossoms into green and then red fruit.

Inside the house Mom made soups that

took all day to blend the chicken

 

with onions, carrots, celery

into a fragrance that filled every nook.

I try to recall an ancient, lingering scent

 

but it was taken for granted

too long ago. I find my wedding gown

in an eaves closet,

 

zipped in plastic.

I had changed my name and moved on.

The yellowed department-store receipt

 

remains attached to the wire hanger.

I wipe off the grime and carry what-was-me

into what-is-me now.

 

The door locks for the last time.

The sun leaves a sliver of itself

on a pink horizon,

 

a visible color beyond reach,

like memories, both dark and light,

locked inside things left behind.

 

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Cooperation: One Step Down, One Step Up

June 2, 2019 by terrypetersen

Cooperation is the thorough conviction that nobody gets there unless everybody gets there. (Virginia Burden)

Among Facebook’s satirical cartoons, pet pictures, brags and complaints I see a post that jolts me. Someone I know has lost her home to a tornado. Several other people declare themselves safe.

Global warming. Yes. It affects weather. That cause can’t be abandoned. Cleanup help for victims remains. Now.

My contribution seems small because it is small. Yet if it helps another living creature it isn’t nothing. The whole isn’t up to me—not if I’m on a team for the good of all.

A small stained-glass angel picture hangs from my back window. Rain mists our backyard. The grass is a swamp. The angel reminds me that blessings remain. Somehow.

Suffering is part of the human experience. Peace fits in the picture when someone, somewhere brings a moment of light long enough for other individuals to see that light exists. For anyone. For everyone. As soon as we learn to share a goodness no one individual can own. Sounds simple.

Too bad simple isn’t easy. It is possible…

 

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Integrity, Please!

May 27, 2019 by terrypetersen

If you have integrity, nothing else matters. If you don’t have integrity, nothing else matters. (Harvey Mackay)


When people learn I had two books published, The Curse Under the Freckles and Stinky, Rotten Threats, they often ask if I get writer’s block. Uh, yeah, plenty of times. Especially when I try to write sunshine when I have mud in my shoes, socks, and brain. Heart and head, mind and pen need to be connected first. Somehow.

I tread water on a Sunday afternoon as dark skies invade the blue. The dark wins for now. I know blue lives on the other side, but for how long? I heard news earlier about someone who was accused of a crime. From what I’d understood about the situation, it seems to be a setup. Why? I don’t know.

Save the world—if only I could. Law. Three letters in one word is nowhere near enough. My paper remains blank. No answers.

One hug for a friend. Hope. Many prayers.

In the meantime, I swim through water or through injustice. Giving up is not an option. Peace and integrity are. May they win.

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Limited Vision: So, Who Knows Everything?

May 20, 2019 by terrypetersen

Faith is taking the first step, even when you don’t see the whole staircase. (Martin Luther King Jr.)

A limping dog blocks traffic as he fights to get to roadkill, the dead animal no longer recognizable. At an exercise class two people share difficult places in their lives with me. The news blasts one horror story after another.

The May sun shines on all. I just had another birthday. Another beginning. A step forward.

My glasses are adequate, barely, during the daytime. At least until after cataract surgery I avoid driving at night. Hearing aids help if I want to hear the phone, a conversation, opportunities to learn or give.

However, sweet, bitter, and sour affect everyone—and everything. All I need to do is listen to other people’s stories. And see their sharing as a gift.

One step, to embrace this moment. The whole staircase? Mine is cluttered now. No way can I clear it all at once.

May there be adventure and serendipity along the way. May we find peace together. By seeing one another as individuals, by listening. Heart and ears wide open.

 

 

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