Let it go already

My father died tomorrow on a day just like today. I gave him CPR with my compadre. She ventilated and I did the compressions. 1993. It felt invasive, weirdly intimate. I never got that close to him. This was unfamiliar territory in every way. Touching him? Pressing on his heart with all my might? Calling…

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De nada

  I admit it. I went into a foreign land, about to immerse in a new culture on my own only knowing two words in Spanish; hello and thank you. Not pretty. And its shocking how far those two simple words can bring a person into this rather friendly universe and into a small sea…

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Leave everything you know behind…

Lay yourself on the slab of openness and wait for the knife of my beauty to gash you so deep with the Beloved’s radiance that you can never recover. —Rumi TILICHO LAKE In this high place it is as simple as this, leave everything you know behind. Step toward the cold surface, say the old…

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Even squirrels get still…

I don’t know why I was so stunned to see a very large gray squirrel out of my Los Angeles studio apartment window. It was such a mystery to me how that happened. I only had TV news images of the LA riots or OJ Simpson evading police on the freeway in his white blazer…

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Who Am I?

I am Jen, female, 46.7 years old, white. I am a partner, sister, daughter, aunt, God mother, niece, cousin. I am an ex. I am the last of nine children. I am a friend, community member, teacher, guide, facilitator, retreat leader, business owner. I am one who dabbles in writing. I am Lithuanian and French.…

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Sometimes I Forget…

It was mid-morning, mid-week. I was feeling antsy. The voice said,  “take the bike to the ocean.”  Sometimes I listen to the inner tug. Sometimes other thoughts drown it out. This time, I knew to listen. The antsy, at first glance, was from feeling like this precious sabbatical is winding down…weaning out of the time-out…

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