We have our bad times, those days filled with
gray and bruised thunderheads ready to burst with raindrops of frustration.
It’s in getting through the inevitable storms; riding the dark waves of our lives
to the safety of some waiting harbour that we realize the sun can still shine, just for us.
It takes a real strength to weather it all.
And we are that strong.
The stuff we’re made of is ultimately all that’s really needed to see us through to the other side.
And we will get there.
Although we can’t control the winds, we can carefully move the sails that will someday guide us home.
We have to hold on, just the 2 of us, if only for the three tender and beautiful hearts
we’ve been so blessed to receive in this life.
Everything will be alright.
So for now, just hold my hand
and don’t be afraid
to feel that at the end of the longest day, that the moon and stars are shining, just for us.

Healing Father,
so often my life is marred by anger and resentments.
I thank you today for the people who have stood by me in my pain.
I thank you for those who have heard, challenged, advised and loved me.
Their presence has given me hope and freedom.
I thank you, for you have let them carry me into the calm waters of your grace.
Amen.

Just thinking about the many people in my life that truly matter.
A special reading in church this morning made me understand that as strong as
I think I am, I too, occasionally need to be carried along.
Thanks to all that have cared enough to let me know that.
You know who you are.
Keeping the faith for a bit longer . . .

It’s only in the darkest of times
that you ultimately find out who
your real friends are.

No one knows what it’s like,
maybe even him
the days are like carbon copies of days gone by, yesterdays passed;
more of the same, the blooming of a thousand shades of grey
And life is grey; maybe it’s the only shade he knows . . .

No one knows what it’s like
maybe even me
as I take in his awkward smiles, I wonder just who they’re really meant for
Does he miss her?
Yes, he does, and he tells me so, in sotto voce syllables
I’m still unsure of what I must believe and choose to believe in him because
what’s left is all I have to believe in

No one knows what it’s like
Perhaps, God does, but He is forgetful too;
like the saving grace of His mercy, of dignity and compassion,
the sadness of detail, the complexity of why
And He cries,
for all fathers present and past, but maybe for a world He ultimately created
in love . . .

My father knows what it’s like
when it’s time for me to leave and
long forgotten tears of understanding reach his tired eyes,
tears I can no longer wipe away
because unlike him,
I already know what it’s like to say goodbye
And I do . . .

I’ve been thinking lately about how disconnected I feel regarding my father.
He’s been in limbo for so long now that I almost forget how to love the man.
I write this knowing full well I run the risk of sounding cold and emotionally apathetic, which I am definitely not.
But how do you find a way to love someone that for all intents and purposes is no longer there?
I care for him, God, I do and will forever remain his most vocal of advocates to ensure he’s treated with the utmost respect and compassion.
I owe him that and so much more.
Three years ago, I would have had a very hard time letting him go.
Today, I’m not so sure.
I want this thing to be over with for him, maybe for my sister and me too.
I want him to ‘get there’.
I want him to feel peace, not chaos; sunlight, not rain; happiness not despair; warmth and not apathy.
Anymore.
It makes me sad to write these words but I mean them in the best and most tender way possible.
These thoughts are always hanging off the edge of some deep and internal precipice of mine, wanting to fall off into some godforsaken abyss and be gone.
But somehow, they remain.
Until now, perhaps.
Maybe I’m writing these words in the hopes that they remove the chains that keep me from getting as close to him as I feel I need to be, loving him deep within my heart and not just on the pages of Smoke and Mirrors.
I waited on an older gentleman the other day that reminded me of my father some ten years ago.
He wanted to buy some cigars for his son who was celebrating his 30th birthday.
I wanted to tell him how lucky he was, how fortunate his son was that his father was still in good health, how life can change in the blink of an eye.
Giving advice on life to a man that could have been my father just didn’t make any logical sense to me.
It’s almost tragic how many things there are in my life that I no longer take for granted these days.
Like someone I love remembering my birthday.
Yeah, in a perfect world . . .
This isn’t a ‘poor me’ scenario because I honestly don’t feel that way at all.
I just wanted to let someone know just how precious certain moments really are.
I didn’t do that.
And the days go by . . . .

On most days my father wears a baseball hat.
Even when he was well if he wasn’t working he was wearing some type of baseball hat.
It was an intrinsic part of his daily get up.
It was usually the Red Sox, maybe the Celtics but NEVER the NY Yankees, God forbid, he would rather die than to be caught wearing one of those.
He still wears a hat these days although he would be hard pressed to tell you which hat he was wearing.
Truth be told, on any given day lately I’d have a tough time telling you what hat I‘m wearing.
I was talking with my sister Moe the other day and
she told me a very interesting story about our father and one of his ‘hats’.
She came down last weekend to see ‘Dad’ and wheeled him down to the quaint chapel in the nursing home for Sunday morning mass. She had called ahead to ask that he be cleaned up and shaved and dressed nicely, the proverbial cherry on the sundae, his baseball hat.
They got to the chapel where I’m assuming my sister knelt and said a prayer or two (thousand) . . .
As she sat back she noticed that Dad’s hat was sitting in his lap.
She swears she did not take it off, she was sure of that.
He took it off himself.
My sister took it as a sign that our father still acknowledges the fact that he is in a place that’s sacred and taking off your hat is something you do out of reverence and respect.
Maybe she’s right.
I took it more as a sign that says she and I will never be alone in this shattered ordeal that’s slowly nearing its very blue end.
Either way, I know that I wanted to remember the moment even though I couldn’t be there.
And though it’s doubtful that our father said one single prayer that morning, I’m confident that he left the chapel with more blessings than anyone else in the place.
And I’m positive he put his baseball cap right back on as he left.

I went to the candlelit chapel at Jenna’s college tonight for mass and heard the choir (which Jen is in) do this song.
I had goosebumps and tears in my eyes simply because they sing it so well and the song moves me so.
I also thought of a close friend that needs to listen to this.
I know she will cry but I am ultimately hoping it gives her some much needed light at this somber point in her life.
Close your eyes and listen . . .
Groban’s voice is an amazing instrument.

found this on the Jonathan Carroll website/blog.
written by 20th century German poet Rainer Maria von Rilke::

God Speaks to Each of Us

God speaks to each of us before we are,
Before he’s formed us then, in cloudy speech,
But only then, he speaks these words to each
And silently walks with us from the dark:

Driven by your senses, dare
To the edge of longing. Grow
Like a fire’s shadowcasting glare
Behind assembled things, so you can spread
Their shapes on me as clothes.
Don’t leave me bare.

Let it all happen to you: beauty and dread.
Simply go no feeling is too much
And only this way can we stay in touch.

Near here is the land
That they call Life.
You’ll know when you arrive
By how real it is.

Give me your hand.

- Rainer Maria Rilke

~going to try and get back to a state of blogging equilibrium here this week.
Life has been crazy. Thanks to all that have read and commented.
Much appreciated.
~m

My father is stuck.
Although it’s unlike Winnie the Pooh in the Honey Tree
or even a tomcat that’s climbed too high into an archaic but majestic oak, those types of ‘stuck’ are manageable to a certain degree.
It’s like he’s an enigmatic and unsolvable crossword puzzle, a stalemate of stalemates, a real life version of Bill Murray in Groundhog’s Day where every day is the same.
And though I repeatedly tell myself that it doesn’t bother me, deep inside it does.
Every visit it’s the same old thing.
I sit and stare.
I tell him stories.
I tell him about the weather and what I had for lunch.
I tell him what I’m making for supper.
Almost like it really matters.
It’s sad when I can’t even fool myself anymore.
I swipe madly at this insidious and maddening cobweb that has my father’s mind and memories
in its grip, deliberately refusing to let go of him.
I was sitting the other day watching him go in and out of sleep like a short-circuiting light bulb, his eyes methodically opening and closing; wax on, wax off.
I softly said, “Dad, what are you waiting for?”
He muttered something incomprehensible and shut his eyes, tired of trying to solve the puzzle, tired of my questions, tired of this confusing life.
And I can’t blame him.
He’s endlessly moored to this drab room in a city nursing home with no knife to cut the ropes.
I’m starting to feel lost as well.
Lost to him and so very lost for me.
I feel guilty after asking him the question and retreat to my dark corner of the quiet boxing ring knowing he shouldn’t have to answer a query such as that.
This is about him and not about a too selfish ‘Michael’ and his all too busy life.
But how does it finally end for this sad and fragile man?
Please, dear God tell me. Will you?
If I’m supposedly being taught some kind of lesson here, I’m really losing my patience and these days nothing seems to make sense. Nothing.
So maybe God listens.
Maybe.
Once again, I close my eyes on another day and I think, maybe tomorrow.
Yeah, right, maybe tomorrow . . .

A flutter of wings
in a world washed grey
closing tired eyes
slowly slip away

a fight against The will
learned tolerance to the pain
incomprehensible ruin
terminal drops of rain

the lack of understanding
invisible hands of a ticking clock
solitary hours moving away
shadows lost to the infinite dark

a moment of hope will surely find her
a millisecond of brilliant white light
a midnight angel to soothe her
freeing her soul to the black of night . . .

{for K}