A day for the dog that cleaned house

I’ve made good on the “Jumpstart to Summer” theme. At this moment, I am more tired than the most tired person on the planet, but I feel like a million bucks.

I sucked the marrow out of a three-day weekend and every used-up muscle and aching joint is a reminder that I love living a whole life (even if my million bucks feels run over by a truck.)

I had my first experience this weekend in being of assistance in the launch of a certain sailboat; now back to the lake for the season, including raising of the mast. I can add “Little Miss Mast Helper” to my list of essential skills.

I also made good on a couple of big chores I had on my list here in my neck of the woods, including digging a new 12 sq. ft. addition to my garden, and cleaning up yet another pile of old junk iron, cast off from yesteryear when this place was a working farm.

There isn’t enough room in the back of a half ton for what I dug out from alongside the barn during this latest and dare I say—final—mission to neaten up this farmyard so that it reflects my chi. It’s taken me nearly seven years to get to this point and yet something tells me the process is likely to continue.

I love my grandparents, however I am now convinced there may be hoarding DNA in my gene pool. (Chances are good though that I rewired the inherency with my land-clearing drive.)

I’ve discovered that digging a garden is a great way to solve the problems of the world, lash out at personal beefs, and fold up head laundry that has been strewn about in discarded, unorganized piles.

During the hours it took me to kick in the shovel, remove the sod, and haul it away, I dealt with the ridiculous price of gasoline, Monsanto’s seed monopoly, Toronto’s mayoral crisis, and last but not least hashed out a plan to repair the road to town, which has slumped into a below-grade donkey trail out here.

In a heightened moment of self-empowered problem-solving, I marched across the yard from the garden to the tool shed to find a pitchfork and upon stepping into the building came face to face with a fat, buck-toothed, ugly groundhog. 

Both alphas were bug-eyed for a moment, surprised and unsure of who was more dangerous. The groundhog’s bullish nature led to me to it too had just finished digging a hole somewhere and had become incensed by the unfixed problems of the world and was in the shed looking for the same pitchfork.

We glared at each other for a moment and then both of us made a beeline for the back corner of the shed where the pitchfork stood. I shouted, “This is my shed, get out!” The groundhog fired back a chortle of teeth-gnashing sounds somewhere around my feet as it scurried under the shelving and out of sight.

I grabbed the pitchfork and did a 180-degree turnabout, expecting to meet the rodent of my worst nightmare standing on its hind legs and holding the “Sawzall.” Instead the loser made a fast dash for the door and was gone in a flash of fuzzy tail.

I now suspect I have an unwelcome guest living under the tool shed. I wish you were here “Dot.”  I need you for that dog versus varmint “Jumpstart to Summer” sideshow.

Shaking my head at the family circus

 “SMH.” 

For those of you who have not yet been sucked into the vortex of cell phone texting and Internet acronyms, the three consonants stand for “Shake My Head.”

The letters also represent an Australian newspaper known as the Sunday Morning Herald, and likely also are a short form for other places or things in the world.

In my neck of the woods SMH is plain and simple. Shake my head. A lot. Sometimes SMH is accompanied by the closing of eyes, the gnashing of teeth, a sigh, a groan, a guffaw, or an expletive uttered both above and below the decibels detected by the human ear, a stomping of feet, and/or a throwing up of hands and arms in a gesture of surrender to the moment at hand.

I’m upgrading from a double to a queen-size bed and decided to mess with my bedroom chi in light of the change. 

I have wasted more time standing in the middle of the room contemplating redesign of the overcrowded space than I care to admit. Given that I only have 120 sq ft to work with, there are only so many options at my disposal. Leave it to me, though, to spend innumerable hours of my spare time fine tooth contemplating every inch. SMH.

Miss “Smartie Pants,” who is home from University for the summer, has suddenly become the expert on counseling me, akin to a reality show about hoarders. “You don’t need a bigger house Mom, you need to get rid of some stuff,” she said, chuckling.

SMH. (The peanut gallery comments came from the one whose heavy suitcase required an airplane of its own to fly it here last month.)

Nonetheless I probably could downsize. Moving my stuff from one room to the other isn’t exactly working.

Every time I put something in the “donate” pile I can hear my brother’s voice of reason whispering to me, “But you might find a use for that.”

Come to think of it, I have a pile of stuff my brother bought for himself at a garage sale in 2007 still stored in my shed. SMH.

As an aside, I did clean a bit of financial house recently when I decided to cancel my term life insurance policy—you know—the one you buy when you’re 25 years old that at the time cost peanuts.

I don’t know where the time went but I do know the monthly insurance payment skyrocketed at a recent renewal term, so I canceled it.

You should have seen the look on two of my offspring’s faces when I told them there was no pot of gold after I kicked the bucket.

“Now what are we supposed to do!” one of them blurted out, as if I was going to vanish into the mystic upon my next breath. Obviously they have forgotten that I am going to live until I’m 110.

I couldn’t help but laugh (followed by SMH) at the honest panic in the response to my tell-all.

I wonder if I should also tell the kids that I’m going to take all my “stuff” with me when I go. 

After all, maybe my brother is right. I might find a use for that.

Four little peppers make a good story

Erma Bombeck said, “Never have more children than you have car windows.”

How about, “Never take more small grandchildren with you to a restaurant than you have arms.”

Recently during a mid-week lull in my calendar of events I put the question to four of my grandchildren, who range in age from 4-7, if they would like to go to the local hamburger place with Granny.

I knew the answer would be unanimous before I finished asking the question. I’d like to think their response was based solely on being with the world’s greatest Granny, but I think fries and kids’ meal toys had more to do with the quartet happily saying “Yes!”

Nonetheless I was thrilled watching them all pile into the car with such enthusiasm. There wasn’t much else I wanted in that moment except that as I got closer to the restaurant and decided I needed a body harness to keep them from exploding from the car in the parking lot like the break shot after the eight ball.

However we made it safely into the restaurant at which point there was a 360 degree shift away from what they wanted to eat and straight to the prize that came with the food. They flitted about the toy showcase like bees in search of honey and I just stood there in awe of all that energy.

A bunch of older gentlemen seated at a table nearby expressed their amusement in loud and healthy guffaws.  I’m sure I heard one guy say, “it’s like nailing J-ello to a tree.”  Uh huh. 

Another man chuckled out something that included the words, “slinky,” “monkey”, “chipmunk,” and “slingshot.” 

Uh huh, that’s my brood too.

I finally nailed down the J-ello long enough to get a food list out of each of them and headed to the counter to make an order.

With my back turned, the four sprites made a dash for the soda fountain machine. When I turned around three of the little critters were giggling and watching as the buttons they were pushing allowed soda pop to run freely from the spouts.

I lassoed them in while pondering the quote by Gene Perret. “My grandkids believe I'm the oldest thing in the world. And after two or three hours with them, I believe it, too.”

I managed to keep them seated for about 10 minutes so they could eat their supper and in the meantime I asked one of my granddaughters if she had learned any new words in school that day.

“Sphinx,” I heard her say. 

“Really?” I said, rather impressed that Egyptian history was on a five-year-old’s education plate. “Sphinx?” I repeated.

“No Granny, ‘Spanx.’

“Spanx!” I blurted out, my eyeballs huge as melons, as I became aware that I still had mine on at the end of the workday.

 “You are learning about Spanx in school?!” I said, stunned.

“No Granny, Space!” We learned about Space,” she replied in an adamant tone.

I burst out laughing when I realized she’d said the same word three times. Perhaps it’s time Granny got an audiogram.

One little pepper needed my help in the bathroom and I left the seven-year-old in charge for two minutes. I came back into the room and my five year old grandson was making the leap from one table top to the other. When he saw the dark cloud of displease forming over my head he cleared the table and did a two-foot dismount, ran and sat down like nothing had happened.

I was getting older by the second.

I wanted to feed all of them loads of chocolate and then send them home to their mothers.

Instead we drove to Pither’s Point and watched from the car as the pelicans, geese, seagulls, and ducks took baths in the cold icy lake water. 

There are no words that do justice to the high-pitched glee that tumbled out of those little children when they were all piled up at the car windows saying “Hello” to the birds of spring. 

Wonderment and joy. That’s what little children are made of.

Looking forward to seeing you, grasshopper

 Life is about to change for the summer. That is of course if we ever GET to a summer season around here, but let’s not open on that line of chronic complaining this time around.

As I said, life is about to change for the summer. The change is vibrant, challenging, stubborn, bakes a mean cheesecake, leaves her bath towel on the floor, loves cats, has been known to leave three days worth of cereal dishes in her room but does her own laundry, stays up later than a vampire, carries an interesting conversation, favors rap and most of all adores her mother.

In a week, Daughter #3 will be home from University and for the next 3 ½ months the chores of dishwasher and meal planner—and for the first time since I moved here nearly seven years ago—the job of lawn maintenance will fall to the youngest of my offspring. Woo Hoo! 

If Melody Beattie has taught me anything about letting go, it’s about giving up control of “Big John,” the most awesome lawn tractor on the planet.

Daughter #3 has been asking to cut the grass for years and I’ve been a control freak about doing it myself. I’m giving up the reins.

I texted her just now with the breaking news. I figured she would be as happy as a lark. All I got back was “Ew.” 

Go figure.

Little does Daughter #3 know—“Ew” or not—there also will be goose poop detail.

By mid-summer my farmyard is a magnet for the flock’s depository. Currently there is just one pair of geese that have staked claims in bare patches of grass near the barn as they feed up before the laying season.

Of course I didn’t help the situation any. The first time I spotted them here a week or so ago, I threw sunflower seeds all over the place to show my support for their arrival.

Stay they did. Feed them and they will come, you fool.

While I was away at work, the geese and several of their cousins wandered hither, pooping and sunning themselves in the most inconvenient place possible—at my back door. As luck would have it I didn’t notice the goosey green turds until I had walked through several of them in my work shoes.

I’m not sure if the poop was a way of saying “thank you,” sort of along the same lines as when I find the dead mouse on the same step after a cat leaves it there for me, suggestive of an oblige for free room and board.

Nonetheless I am pleased to see my feathered friends whose resilience in these unpredictable and unsavory snow days lead me to believe they know something warm and good is just around the corner.

And as far as my grasshopper is concerned, the mother in me looks forward to seeing you step off the plane with that overstuffed suitcase.

It will take a team of wild horses to keep me from running screaming across the tarmac, my arms wide open for hugs and my enthusiasm eager to tell you how much I look forward to having my dishes washed, my supper made, and the grass cut. 

But first let’s eat pizza and watch “chick flicks.”

Welcome home lovey!

Be the thing that moves you forward

“As scarce as the truth is, the supply has always been in excess of the demand.”  How true. How very true.

This is a quote penned by Josh Billings, an American humorist who lived during the 1800’s. His real name was Henry Wheeler Shaw and in the day he was the second most famous humorist in the U.S., next to Mark Twain.

I’d never heard about Billings until last week, when a friend sent me an email with the above quote in it. I’ve thought a lot about Josh Billings since then and I’ve spent some time reading more about this man, who had a wonderful quirky sense of optimism and a wise stroke of words in his penmanship.

Right about now, as snowflakes continue to drib drab the mood of the collective, I’m up for just about any positive vibes I can get my hands on or my head wrapped around, as a warring mechanism against the doldrums of the lingering winter weather.

I was feeling so gunned down by the cold that I turned the corner and vowed with myself to spread sunshine instead of rain.

It all started when I saw a Facebook status Monday morning that read, “Allowing people to drain your energy with their chronic complaints is not kindness, it’s complicity.” How true.

If you are doing the “Spock” eyebrow thing about the word “complicity,” look it up.

Or better yet, look at controlling the things you can do something about and move away from worry about the things you have no affect over. 

I have a truckload of personal experience with co-dependency, a dysfunction I admit to in myself and recognize in others. I continue to teach myself in the language of letting go of it in my life.

Among the lessons? All the alarms go off when I find myself standing within ear shot of a chronic complainer and realize for the umpteenth time that I am a supporter of the negative “Nellys and Neds” of the world if I stick around as their audience. I want to be done with that.

Mike Dooley, a mentor for anyone seeking a positive lifestyle, believes that our thoughts become things and that we should think good ones. I’m a big fan. His daily email is the first good thought I read and absorb every day before I even get out of bed.

Dee Caffari, a British sailor, sailed by herself non-stop around the world in 2006 and 2009, and into the history books as the first woman to do that and to do it in both easterly and westerly directions.

In a radio interview Caffari talked about the greatest lessons she learned while out there, often at “Point Nemo.” (Spock eyebrow again? Look it up.)

Caffari admitted that her default setting was “to say what I don’t want to happen and what I don’t want to do.”

Sound familiar? 

She had to make a conscious effort to change to be a positive person to focus on moving away from what she didn’t want to happen and more toward what she did want to happen.

Repeat after me, girlfriend.  “There is no stronger woman than me, like a train coming down the horizon.” 

Old Man Winter, I insist you desist

“It’s like Chinese water torture—slow and relentless,” he said, sour-toned on the dragging carcass of winter.

I couldn’t have put it better myself in 500 words. But what the heck, I can try.

The weather has played me out and I don’t play out easily. I don’t give up easily either and yet soon—very soon—in fact, perhaps right this minute I’m going to recant everything I said a few weeks ago during a momentary lapse of sanity when I got all syrupy about the emergence of spring.

Little did I know that when I wrote “Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings the tune without the words and never stops at all,” that those feathers would molt, revealing a scrawny, half-frozen version of hope that is looking more and more like the wide-eyed demented New Orleans’ voodoo doll that I have sitting on my writing desk.

I think I’ve performed my “Yosemite Sam” temper tantrum three times this week, with each episodic fit involving a piece of winter clothing being stomped flat under my feet before I throw it down the stairs to the basement.

I even caught myself pointing a shaking finger at my scarf and my winter boots as I scolded them like small children for even thinking I was going to wear them again. Watching judgingly was “Millie the Cat” on haunches and with a squinty-eyed expression that said “the boss has lost it.”

Frustration over the lack of spring weather has reached its cold-hearted tentacles into my music library too. Instead of the usual upbeat and peppy tunes rocking my speakers, there’s “Country Girl Kiss-off” music blasting out all manner of “tell him to hit the road and to watch his back 'cause a country girl with an attitude always gets her revenge.”  Say what?

The weather has played me out and I’ve lost all good sense.

At the gas station the other day as I pulled my debit card out of the machine at the counter after buying more chocolate, I caught myself mumbling, “I was going to start eating right today but my ‘give a damn is busted’.”

I looked up to the store clerk whose saucer-eyed open-mouthed stupor meant I’d definitely been listening to “kiss-off” music way too much.

Stupid Old Man Winter.

I’ve even gone so far as to re-share a post to my Facebook page of the image of a snowman pummeled with knives and the caption, “Die, Winter, Die!”  What have I become?! 

Old Man Winter, the word is “enough.” Look it up.

And there I was, ready to pitch a suitcase into the back seat of my car and drive south until the butter melts until I realized I don’t have any holidays until August.

In her book “More Language of Letting Go,” Melody Beattie encourages that during the month of April we learn to identify and say what we want for our lives.

I’m pretty sure she isn’t talking about simple stuff like a little bit of warmer weather—but what the heck.

I want spring to come.

Listening to my inner voice is a sweet challenge

“When you don't know what to do, get still. Get very still until you do know what to do.” 

Oprah Winfrey offered this advice to graduates at Stanford University in California during her commencement address there in 2008.

And she was right. If you are quiet long enough to listen, this advice works.

I know it works because before I got still, I had been pulling out my hair for two hours writing and erasing what I’d written while growing increasingly frustrated by my lack of creative integrity for this column space. I’d about given up for a second straight week on my submission.

What I know for sure is that anyone who know me well, also knows I don’t mince words about what I believe in and what I don’t.

I believe in a magic of sorts; a realm of otherworldly wonders labeled as gut feelings, conscience, and intuition.

I believe these three musketeers don’t lie. Trust your instincts. I believe some things are true whether you believe them or not.

I think these soul bodyguards are everywhere and at work in all our lives in magical countless ways even if we don’t believe in fairy dust and the man in the cape who pulls a rabbit from his top hat.

But you have to get still.

Yet I, as much as the next person, still have much to learn about trusting my gut, my conscience, my intuition, and listening to these messages when they whisper to me in subtle and not so subtle ways in my life.

They are, in my belief, part of the Universal plan and these three musketeers are very patient sages. If I don’t follow their lead, they just hang around in the corners of my circus until the next best opportunity arises in which to flag me.

Of late, my intuition has been tugging at my thought process using chocolate as a motivator. Yes, chocolate.

Thanks to a friend who gets extra brownie points for paying attention to and being interested in the things I love, I now have a book that touts chocolate principles as metaphors for life.

(As a brief aside, I must confess that most mornings I eat a small square of milk chocolate with my coffee, before breakfast. I am passionate about my chocolate.)

“What if you could devour life with the same commitment and passion?” queries the book.

“What do you want? How can you make the right choices if you don’t know what you want or where you are heading?”

I’ve been so busy lately running with the “going with the flow” herd, that I think I might be headed in the wrong direction.

“Never assume that the herd knows where it is going; it usually doesn’t.”

Quite frankly, in my life, I don’t know what my answers are to any of these questions I’m being asked by my musketeers—but I’m taking stock.

How about you? What’s your chocolate?

Here's to the first day of spring

First of all I think “Old Man Winter” should read the book, “The Language of Letting Go.” I think the crusty cold curmudgeon has some serious issues.

Secondly, if he doesn’t let go soon, I will put on my “Gandalf” hat, slam my wooden scepter into an axe-handle deep snow bank, utter loudly “You Shall Not Pass!” and send winter into an abyss.

And thirdly—in the words of Forrest Gump—“That’s all I have to say about that.”

Besides, it’s March 20^th and no matter what else is going on outside, nothing can override the fact that this is the first day of spring!!

It’s due time to bang the drum for what I believe is to be an astronomically welcomed season. 

Emily Dickinson wrote some wonderful words of wisdom in her poems.  “I dwell in possibility . . .” is a favorite “Sage Emily” line.

“I dwell in possibility” sums up how I feel about what’s coming. Smell those rain showers, listen to that thunderstorm, see those daffodils peeking out of the flowerbed, and give me a rake!!  

Dickinson also wrote a fine little poem about hope.

Stand at the window and look outside at all the snow and repeat after me;

“Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings the tune without the words and never stops at all.”

My friend and I enjoy good conversation and of late, all the talk is centered around the harbingers of spring—those sights, sounds and olfactory markers that herald the long-awaited greener pastures, ice-out, and sailing waters.

There we are, sitting at the kitchen table swapping exciting stories about seeing clusters of newly awakened flies buzzing in the porch window and the odd ladybug or two that suddenly has appeared crawling up the wall while she spits green gunk from her bottom end. Signs of spring. Yes. We are overjoyed at these futuristic indicators.

I think most grown ups would agree that the coming of spring has been a celebratory part of life since childhood. Who doesn’t remember their own rubber boots in April puddles at ages five, eight, and 10? Or that twig stick used to make little river beds in the gravel that would drain the water puddles of melting snow and gush them flowing out of the yard.

What did you float and race in those streams?

For my friend it was half of a clothespin that called itself a boat. For me it was half of a matchbox or a little piece of cardboard. These were the heralds that spoke to us of spring.

Soon the palette of color that the sunrise bakes across the horizon of a melting Rainy Lake will fill us up. My mother’s geranium and moonflower seedlings already are germinated and soon the pepper plants will find their way through the potting soil and into the sunlight.

Today, I see the raven. This harbinger of spring sits on a fence post on the country road not far from the nest in the tree. He and his mate begin this guarding ritual in late February each year. Seeing them is a most welcome sight as they greet and brave the cold, holding on to the inevitable promise of warmer days and the laying of eggs.

Baby chicks, pussy willows, leaf buds on trees, green grass around the septic tank, and thawing smelly dog poop—yes—even that recycled harbinger of spring will soon have its moment in the spotlight.

I would even venture to say that seeing a spider in the house would be a welcome omen . . . but that was before I found one crawling on the inside arch of my foot while I was in the shower last night.

I thought it was sock fuzz until, when I tried to flick it off; it got stuck to my index finger. I had an immediate freak out in the bathtub as I tried to boil it off with the showerhead before it fell down the drain. Then I imagined it clinging to the drain hole until the middle of the night, when it would crawl up and out and be waiting for me on the toilet seat in the morning. Oh my.

Nevertheless, as Dickinson writes, “Spring Comes on the World.”

I sight the Aprils too, Miss Emily, and I dwell in the possibility of it all.  

Looking forward to a winter goodbye

I threw myself into deep snow on Saturday and lay there for 20 minutes in the silence of my neck of the woods. I had just finished snow blowing and I was tired and once again drained of any enthusiasm for winter.

In fact I’d had a run in with my snow blower, known in these parts as “Little John” when he knocked me down while I had the machine in reverse. Thank heaven for automatic shut off when I let go of the handles or I’d have been a real mess.

The knock down got me really crabby for a few minutes. I hated the world and the world hated me. Some choice expletives flew out of my mouth to nobody listening.

I’d also filled my brainless quota that morning when I forgot to put down the garage door and not paying attention walked by with “Little John” full out and blew half of the yard’s snow into the garage.

I had a “Yosemite Sam” fit and then decided to seek sanctuary in a snow bank and be grateful for some good stuff. I rarely get outright angry anymore and I didn’t like the feeling and needed a karmic rescue.

I was flung out like a discarded puppet in the snow, perfectly still and uttering many a “thank you” out loud to the Universe, when I saw a pair of ravens flying overhead. 

One of the black birds spotted my carcass and veered off its path, gliding in slow circles down, down, down, to get a better view of what it thought might be a tasty morsel.

I actually expected it might land nearby and I was ready as rain to jump up and scare the feathers off the winged beast if it tried to peck my eyes out like a scene from “The Birds.” 

Lucky for Mr. Raven, it decided to join its buddy that already had flown across the field and disappeared.

I laid there a few more minutes until the cold seeped into my ski pants and dropped my core body temperature enough to stir me to rise up and head for the house and a nice cup of tea, all the while searching the immediate grounds for any sign or suggestion that spring was in the forecast.

As I drew closer to the house I heard Bonnie Raitt’s sultry voice flow out of the stereo and through my mind, and I hailed her song to the harbingers of spring “I Got You On My Mind,” hoping the magic of my words would hurry Mother Nature along.

Old frozen dog poop unmasked and shredded by “Little John” lay about the yard like an old smelly friend as if to say, “just wait, I’ll let you know when spring as arrived.”

Touché “Dot.”

All I know for sure is that March 20^th fast approaches and at that dawn, even if it is snowing like the dickens, I am going to stand up and cheer, “Spring is here!”

Baby boomers have the floor

Van Morrison is singing “School of Hard Knocks” as I stare at my laptop screen dumbfounded at the blank page that is idea-deprived.

I do have material to call upon for inspiration including “Better than Sex – Chocolate Principles to Live By,” followed by the tried and true Mark Nepo and Melody Beattie editions. No light bulb moments here.

Now Van Morrison is singing “Enlightenment” and belts out, “Don’t know what it is.”

Hmmm.  Is he trying to tell me something?

A copy of “TurboTax” for my yet unfinished income tax doldrums day stares at me from across the desk. I groan when I think of the inevitability of calculating a “balance owing” number on line 483.

A report on women of the baby boomer generation—that would be me—is at my fingertips.

It says that baby boomer women have freedom, hectic schedules, resources, and a taste for quality.

Hmmm. I ponder that foursome for a while.

I am puzzled about resources. If we are talking about books and chocolate, I’m set up like a pyramid in Egypt.

Come to think about I have a lot of resources I can count on, although none of them include multiple polymer images of Sir Robert Borden or W.L. Mackenzie King. It’s a pity.

Freedom? Now there’s fodder for a 500-word essay—maybe 700 if I’m on a roll. But I’m still trying to figure out what freedom means to me, so that’s another story.

The report also states that boomer women grew up in an age of rebellion. Really? I can’t relate to that life stage—unless we’re talking about my uprising against ironing clothes.

That chore accounted for three-quarters of my weekly allowance when I was a kid, and I swore to myself that when I left for college I would invent wrinkle-free everything, including “Caldwell” towels.

Sadly someone else already had taken that brand name and ran with it all the way to the bank.

Hectic schedules? They are a constant and unrelenting thorn in my baby boomer underwear.

But I won’t complain too much. After all I am the first to agree that life is what we make of it.

However the fact that my current calendar is a combination of a Tasmanian devil in a sandstorm and two cougars in a gunny sack fighting over a piece of meat means it’s cruising for change. 

The report says boomer women aren’t afraid to take chances. Some things are true whether we believe them or not.

I take chances.

Boomer women are said to have a taste for quality. Hmmm. Quality can mean many things.

Quality time is a big one for me, followed closely by quality kisses and good dark chocolate. I like quality friends, too, who aren’t afraid to look me in the eye and tell me what’s on their mind. I like a quality connection.

And last but certainly not least—as Van Morrison’s song “Enlightenment” comes back ‘round again—I am reminded of an email sent by a new friend of mine who lives with his wife in a little town in southern Minnesota. He had commented kindly upon reading my column last week when I wrote about intuition.

“Will Rogers, a well-known American humorist back in the 20’s-30’s once said that some of us learn by reading, some of us learn by observation, the rest of us just gotta touch the electric fence for ourselves.”

Ah yes, Don. How true.

I am a woman of the baby boomer generation. I have freedom, hectic schedules, resources, and a taste for quality.

And sometimes I also have to touch the electric fence for enlightenment.

Woohoo!

Listen to the whisper that speaks the truth

If I would have been asked one week ago how I was feeling, I’d have used up an entire Kleenex box explaining my failure to launch what I thought was a simple plan. I was in “woe is me-ville” because I had to admit to myself and to others that I’d made the wrong decision.

There are two thought-provoking forces at work inside this human casing I walk around in every day. Both of these forces are important to my survival and my sanity and yet often they don’t see eye-to-eye, second guess each other, and stab each other in the toe to get what they want.

In fact, a great deal of the time these forces clash like Titans and Olympians in a joust of what each believes is in the other’s best interest.

The heart and the head.

Mine were dragging each other by the collar and my poor intuition got her knuckles scraped along the pavement until she backed off. I could have saved myself a whole lot of heartache if I’d have just wised up to her.

The funny thing is that, as I was driving down the highway two weekends ago to meet the source of my simple plan, my intuition was sitting in the passenger seat counting on both hands all the reasons why my plan wouldn’t work. But I played the ignore game and just kept my eyes on the road.

I find it incredibly interesting how, even though I advocate the importance of listening to one’s intuition, I look the other way when mine speaks to me.  I’ve preached the heeding of intuition to my children time and again through out their lives. I believe my intuition is always right. That whisper that begs to be heard and stands out from reason and logic. 

Some things are true whether we believe them or not. Intuition is one of those things.

And yet, I fully admit I can be notorious for ignoring intuition at times when I shouldn’t.

All I had wanted was a puppy—a little doggie to love and nurture and watch grow up and be that snowshoe and water dog I missed so very much.

How difficult could it be? And yet, nothing had changed in the busyness of my life since last fall, when after much debate I’d given “Cash” a chance at a better life by giving him up because I worked too much.

And yet there I was falling in love with that little puppy the moment I saw her and all the while my intuition was trying to make a case for delayed gratification. 

But I brought the puppy home anyway, loved her up, and in trying to meld her needs with my tightrope work schedule, almost immediately found myself trying to swim up a waterfall.

I really thought it was a simple plan, but I was wrong. Raising a puppy is not a road of responsibility to take lightly and as I now know, I am not ready for that road. Graciously, my adoption host understood my sincerity and my circumstances and has found that little puppy a forever home.

For a long while I wasn’t sure what my lesson was in this. What? from the awry of such a simple plan.

It turns out the lesson was not to second-guess the truth. 

Thanks to a little puppy named “Tula” for teaching me what I needed to hear.