HOW I KNOW

When I was nine years old, Tina came into my life. On my ninth birthday, to be exact. My parents had been asking me for weeks what I wanted for my birthday, and all I ever had to tell them by way of response was, “a kitten.” I wanted a kitten more than anything. More than a new doll or a new outfit or any new toy I could imagine. I just wanted a kitten. A soft, furry ball of fluff to call my very own, who would love me more than anyone or anything on earth – almost as much as I would love her.

We already had a dog – a lovely little poodle named Frisky. I loved Frisky, as did everyone in the family; but it was no secret that Frisky was my mom’s dog. It didn’t start out that way, of course. We got him as a family pet, because both Mom and Dad had grown up with animals and wanted my little brother and me to have the same experience. But since Frisky was a puppy when he came into our family, and since my brother and I were away at school all day and Mom was the one home taking care of him, he very quickly and thoroughly bonded to her, and before too many weeks had passed, there was no denying it – Frisky was my mom’s dog!

I loved our dog, of course, but dogs were rambunctious and playful and clumsy and … well, more of a boy’s pet, at least in my 8-year-old view. I wanted a pet of my very own, a kitty who would be bonded to ME, and who would think I was the greatest thing since … well, since warm milk! And I had the timing all figured out, too: my birthday is in June, which meant school was already out, so my kitty and I would have all summer to bond with one another, and she would surely be MY kitty indeed!

My dad was in the Air Force, and we moved around a lot, and as anyone knows who has ever moved even once, moving gets pretty complicated when you add a pet into the mix, and exponentially so when you add more than one. I understood that. In my mind, I knew that my parents’ consistent denials of my pathetic pleas for my own kitty-cat made sense; but in my little almost-nine-year-old heart, all I knew was that I WANTED A KITTY! I was obsessed with this yearning, so when Mom and Dad persistently questioned me about what else I’d like for my birthday, my refusal to name even a single other gift was no attempt at manipulation or guilt-mongering – it was just the only thing I could honestly imagine that I wanted!

Dad had been transferred to Midwest City, Oklahoma, and we had been staying in guest housing on base the first week or two of June. They had been searching for us a house to rent, and as it happened, we were approved and able to move in to our new abode on – yep, you guessed it – my birthday! Timing may not be everything in the life of a military family, but it’s a BIG thing, so there was really no choice, we HAD to move in to our house.

The movers came and unloaded all our belongings from the big truck, finishing in the late afternoon. They left behind the usual conglomeration of furniture and boxes all over the house, waiting to be put in order. With the dinner hour approaching, there was no time to rummage through the cartons and attempt to dig out the necessary kitchen equipment for my mother to prepare dinner – even if we had been able to find the nearest grocery store and shop for food – so Mom and Dad said they were going to get some hamburgers for us to eat for supper, and afterward we would at least find the boxes containing the bedding and be able to make up our beds for that night. Tomorrow would be soon enough to start unpacking and putting away everything else.

My little brother and I had already made a new friend who lived next door, so the parental units granted us the gift of not having to get back into the car to go with them to pick up dinner. (If you were an Air Force brat who had spent too many hours criss-crossing the country in the back seat of a Dodge station wagon with MY little brother, you would know what a gift that was!) So after securing the approval of new friend’s parents, Mom and Dad set off, waving goodbye to us as we happily played in the yard with our new friend.

Having never been terribly materialistic, and not prone to selfishness as a child, the thought had probably not entered my mind that this was, after all, still my birthday, moving day or not, and here it was, the day almost over, and I had yet to receive a single gift. If I thought of it at all, I just figured it was my own fault – I mean, they had repeatedly begged me for some clue, any clue, as to what I’d like to have as a present, and I had stubbornly refused to name anything except the ONE thing they had already decreed that I could NOT have!

I honestly don’t know how long they were gone, but my tummy was starting to rumble a bit when I saw the “Blue Bomb” – our family’s only-half-joking nickname for the Dodge – swing wide and pull into our driveway next door. My brother and I happily trotted over to the nearest side of the car to where we were playing, which happened to be the driver’s side, just as my dad opened the door and stepped out, familiar orange and white bags in hand. I didn’t even notice Mom get out on the other side until she called to me: “Cindy, come over here for a minute. I need you to carry this bag inside for me.”

I was a child who genuinely thrived on every opportunity to be a good little helper, so I cheerfully ran around the front of the car, expecting Mom to hand me an orange and white bag filled with burgers or fries. Instead, she had a small, plain, unmarked brown paper sack in her hands, with the top all crumpled down. I must have looked quizzically at her for a moment, because she said, “Well, here, take this. It’s for you.”

I reached out and accepted the bag from my mother, and at that very moment, the bag moved! Something wiggled inside the bag, and as I opened the top of the crumpled paper and looked inside, I heard a “mew” and a little furry head popped out! My mom and dad chimed in unison, “HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!” as I went into delirious shock and removed my brand new baby kitten from the brown paper bag!

She was a Siamese, she was eight weeks old, and she had clear blue eyes and a smushed-up little black nose, and I knew without a doubt that she was the most precious and beautiful thing I had seen on this planet during my entire nine years of life! She was so teeny-tiny that I named her Tina (don’t ask – it made sense to me at the time), and she became my constant companion from that moment forward! My intuition had been spot-on, and as it was summer and I had no school to attend, I was able to spend 24 hours a day with my new “baby” and she and I bonded like no other! She loved me almost as much as I loved her, and life was magnificent!

Tina wasn’t just a pet to me – she was more like an appendage, a veritable part of me. She slept curled up in the crook of my arm; she followed me around the house; she sat patiently in the steamy bathroom while I showered; she lumbered sleepily on the couch next to me when I watched TV; she even went outside into the back yard with me when I played. The next summer, I went away to summer camp, and Tina wouldn’t eat for days, so deeply did she grieve over my absence.

When Tina was four, my dad got transferred to England. I was very excited about getting to live in Europe … until I found out our pets couldn’t go. What kind of blasphemous hogwash was this? How could they expect us to be apart? This was a two-year assignment, what was I supposed to do, give away my best friend? Even when my grandparents generously offered to keep Frisky and Tina for the entire two years, I was not consoled. I cried and wailed and sulked and pleaded and begged to be allowed to stay with my grandparents along with Tina, but this time my parents would not budge. So off we went to “jolly old” with me being anything but jolly, I can tell you for sure!

Tina and I survived our two-year hiatus from one another, and although I had been terrified that she would not remember me upon my return, nothing could have been further from the truth – if it is possible for a cat to laugh, she positively did, and leapt into my arms, happily purring and nuzzling my chin as if we’d never been apart!

When Tina was ten, I went away to college. This separation wasn’t nearly as traumatic as the first one, partly because I was 18 and had a lot going on in my life, but mostly because I knew I was only going 100 miles away and would be back frequently. Besides, even though I was her “person,” Tina also loved all the other members of my family, and they loved her as well, and I knew she would be well cared for.

When I was in my twenties and got married, Tina stayed “at home” with Mom and Dad. By that time, she was 16 years old and it seemed kinder to leave her life intact than to try to haul her around with a young married couple from one rented apartment to another. I still saw her often, and we had each matured into a quiet, assured knowingness that we loved one another like nobody’s business and no longer needed to prove it by spending every moment together.

Tina turned 20 the year my son James was born. By that time, my husband and I had multiple pets of our own living in our own home, but I made a point of introducing Tina and the baby to one another. Some of my in-laws were fearful, spouting the old wives’ tale that cats suck the life out of babies, and other non-sensical – if well-intended – garbage, but I knew she would love him because he was a part of me. I was right. Whenever we would visit at Mom and Dad’s, Tina stayed right beside James, guarding him while he slept, and silently and stoically tolerating his ear-pulling and attempted eye-gouging when he was awake.

One day, when James was three years old, my mom called me early in the morning. She told me Tina wasn’t doing very well. She’d been to the vet, and he had said there wasn’t anything definitively wrong with her that could be treated, she was just very old and it was likely that her time had come. Although Siamese are the longest-lived breed, 23 was very old, even for a Siamese. I threw some clothes for James and myself into a small bag, left a note for my husband, and drove the 38 miles to my folks’ house through a haze of tears.

Tina had gradually developed cataracts over the years, making her clear blue eyes now a cloudy blue, but she when she heard my voice, she gave me her best version of a smile and a friendly, if mostly silent, meow. She knew I was there. She was resting on a big soft pillow Mom had put down on the floor for her in front of the couch in the den, because Tina had long since had difficulty jumping up on the furniture. So I sat down on the floor and gently scooped her up off the pillow and into my arms. She lifted her head as much as she could, while I lowered mine to meet her, and she nuzzled my chin as she haltingly purred. I knew it took more strength than she could afford, but it mattered to both of us.

In the three days that followed, I’m sure I must have laid Tina down long enough to go to the bathroom now and then. I honestly don’t recall. I gratefully allowed my parents to tend to James, and my husband came over every afternoon as soon as he got off work and hung out until he had to go back to our house and tend to the other animals. I don’t remember eating or drinking anything, although I’m sure I did, but those were things I could do with my best friend comfortably nestled in my arms.

On the third day, in the morning, before even the baby had awakened, Tina lifted her head up and looked me straight in the eye. She’d been practically blind for so long that it surprised me, but at that moment I knew she was seeing me. She looked at me and she loved me with all her might, and I loved her right back with all of mine. She felt my love, and she laid her sweet little head back down in the crook of my arm one last time, and I felt all her muscles relax as she closed her beautiful cloudy blue eyes and fell into her final sleep.

I knew this was the last time she would ever lay her head down and fall asleep in my arms. I had lost pets before, and there was always a terrible few moments of uncertainty where you wondered if they were really “gone” or not. But before that kind of thought even had a split second to form in my pain-saturated brain, I felt something else. Tina’s body had relaxed and her heart had stopped just a milli-second before, but then I felt something else. I can’t say I actually “saw” it, but it was as palpable to me as if someone had slapped me on the back – I felt her spirit leave her body. This is important, are you paying attention? Her body died, and a split half-second later, her spirit left her body!

I was raised in a Christian home, in a Christian church, and we definitely believed in life after death. More than any other, I loved the Bible passage that talked about the lion laying down with the lamb, for I took that as proof that animals also have a life after this physical one. I had believed that for all of my life. But this experience pushed me far beyond anything that could be encompassed by the word “belief.” This was not something to be believed; it was something I KNEW. I knew it the way you know you just hit your thumb with the hammer – “believing” has nothing to damn well do with it! It’s not unlike the difference between wondering what it’s like to be in love and actually being in love – it’s not easily explained in words, but when you know, you know!

From that moment forward, the whole trajectory of my spiritual journey was changed. What I had always accepted on faith, what I had always hoped, what I had always believed, I now absolutely, without a doubt, completely and solidly KNEW. For reasons I may never understand, I was granted the unspeakably amazing gift of witnessing this separation of body and spirit at the moment of departure, and it left me ineffably certain that the body is decidedly finite, but the spirit cannot die. Of course, in the twenty or so years that have transpired from that moment to this, I have researched and learned and meditated and intuited and even had one further confirmatory experience involving a pet; but it was that single moment in time that changed me forever. Once you know something, you can never go back and “un-know” it. And I know for a fact that spirit cannot die, it can only change locations.

So for those of you who have ever lost someone you loved – be they the two-legged or the four-legged variety – be comforted in knowing that the body is the only thing that can actually die. The euphemisms “pass away” and “pass on” are, as it turns out, quite accurate descriptions of what happens to us when our bodies die, because the spirit, the essence of who we really are – human OR animal – actually does pass away or pass on to another place, or another state of being, if you will.

Of course, my knowing can only serve to enhance your believing; but I wish for you that it might serve to assist in tiding you over until such time as you are gifted with a moment of your own knowing. Until then, Tina and I will be holding good thoughts for you!


~ Inspired by and dedicated to Elizabeth and those who loved her, and love her still. ~

PERFECT

I haven’t blogged in awhile. That is not because I don’t write – I do write, every day. And it’s not because nothing “blog-worthy” has happened – it does, almost every day. I guess I haven’t blogged in awhile because I just haven’t been focused on it, and because I’m not sure anybody reads my blogs anyway.

But today a friend directed me to another person’s blog, and I am so moved and inspired by it that I feel it’s time … actually, it’s long PAST time … for me to blog again. The blog that lit this spark of inspiration can be read here: http://www.danoah.com/2010/09/disease-called-perfection.html Read that blog. Or don’t. But if you don’t, what I’m about to write will be less meaningful to you.

I am not perfect. Most of the time I don’t bother to try to hide that fact. A lot of the time, I feel like there’s something wrong with me because I don’t CARE to be perfect, and I don’t even care to be SEEN as perfect. In fact, I don’t WANT to be seen as perfect. On this incredible, delightful, tortuous, winding, endless, joy-filled, pain-fraught path of self-discovery I have been consciously and intentionally traversing for 20+ years now, I have learned that “perfect” is ALWAYS an illusion when it’s some amorphous thing that exists outside your Self; a place you will be constantly striving for without ever arriving. “Perfect” as you perceive it in others or in the lives of others, does not actually exist. It’s a bit like an obstacle course on a circular racetrack – no matter how agile you are or how fast you run, you can never win, because if you ever do get anywhere close to the finish line, it absolutely WILL be moved!

I have learned to look for progress, not perfection. Anyone who’s known me longer than five minutes has probably heard me say that I may be miles from where I want to be, but I’m THOUSANDS of miles from where I started! Progress, not perfection.

And yet … I, too, sometimes make myself the victim of this insidious “infection of perfection.”

I look at my friend Becky’s house and I think, “Man, my poor old rundown fixer-upper of a house will NEVER look this good.”

I observe my friend Kathleen’s money management skills and I think, “Oh, geez, I will NEVER have the discipline she has, so I’ll probably never be able to retire.”

I consider the marriage of my friends Marc and Chila and I think, “Boy, oh, boy, all the good men really are taken.” And I simultaneously think, “Well, sure, if I looked that cute and hot and had as great a figure as she does, maybe I COULD find a wonderful guy like that!”

I sometimes make myself the victim in those scenarios. But the REAL me, the part of me that is mostly dominant these days, the part of me that knows the TRUTH, knows better.

The REAL me is very grateful to have a home of my own. The REAL me knows that the highest mountain is conquered one grueling step at a time, and my “fixer-upper” of a house can be fixed up into a lovely, comfortable home one project at a time.

The REAL me is very grateful to have a good job and enough disposable income to be able to have everything I need and a lot of what I want. The REAL me knows that I have come a long way in my money management skills, and I should pat myself on the back for my progress, and stop feeling bad because I have yet to attain the elusive “perfection.”

The REAL me is very grateful for the knowledge that everyone on earth is individual and different, and for every man who actually wants a stick-figure of a woman, there is another man somewhere who thinks plump and soft and curvy is WAY hot; for every man who is looking for a twenty-something supermodel type, there is another man out there who thinks life experience and inner beauty are far more appealing than any outer quality; for every “wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am” asshole roaming the earth, there are probably ten real men longing for a real connection with a real woman.

The REAL me knows that what I focus on expands, and that thoughts of gratitude are like bunnies – they multiply rapidly and at a seemingly exponential rate, so thinking otherwise just makes no sense.

So the upshot is that comparing oneself to others is not only futile, it’s frustrating and counter-productive. To paraphrase a thought from one of my gurus and favorite authors, Geneen Roth, it’s a hideous disservice to compare yourself with anyone else, because you are essentially comparing their OUTSIDES with your own INSIDES. You don’t know what that person struggles with, nor how their ugly empty lonely moments feel; all you see is the apparent perfection in the face they present to the world. It’s not like comparing apples and oranges – it’s way worse than that. It’s like comparing apples and motorcycles!

But I would like to take this discussion one step further. I would like to posit that while comparison perfect does not exist, there is a kind of perfect that does.

One day, my then 9-year-old son and I had planned a short walk to a park down the street from where we lived when a sudden cloudburst almost derailed our plans. We ended up deciding to go anyway. We plopped through every puddle along the way, we swung on the swings in the rain, we twirled ourselves around light poles and did our best imitation of Gene Kelly, we tilted our heads up with our mouths wide open to see how much rainwater we could catch on our tongues and nearly choked ourselves with the combination of water and laughter. When the rain started getting heavier and ominous storm clouds loomed, we ran all the way home, laughing and sputtering. We stripped our drenched clothing off at the door, wrapped ourselves in towels and then warm robes, and sat on the couch and drank hot chocolate until it got dark outside. That was a perfect afternoon.

Awhile back, having just finished spending three-and-a-half years holding down two part-time jobs while earning two bachelor’s degrees, graduating with a 3.97 GPA and without ever taking a single semester off, my mom and I flew up to Oregon and spent a whole week in a beautiful secluded chalet on the banks of the Zigzag River at the foot of Mt. Hood. We only went into town a couple of times – once to get groceries and once to get a pizza. We talked and we slept and we watched movies, but mostly we sat on the deck in silence and gratefully soaked up the pristine energy provided by the mountain and the trees and the river. That was a perfect week.

In the summer of 2008, my dad and I took a road trip to New Mexico. We visited the Alien Museum in Roswell and the Loretto Chapel in beautiful Santa Fe, and he took me to see the tiny house he spent his first six years in, and the little schoolhouse where he started his education. Knowing Dad’s lifelong fascination with railroads and trains, I arranged for us to take a little excursion. We got up early one morning and went into town to the Santa Fe Southern Railway station, where we boarded an old-timey steam-driven railway car. The seats and the entire interior were circa the late 1800’s to early 1900’s, and it was just like Dad had always dreamt of and pictured in his head. We opened the window and enjoyed the cool fresh air as our train slowly wound its way through the New Mexico foothills, eventually coming to rest at a tiny depot in a tiny town called Lamy. There, we disembarked and enjoyed a barbecue lunch provided by the railroad while sitting at picnic tables under some scrubby trees. The sun was shining, the food was good, and the look of satisfaction and sheer pleasure on my dad’s face was enough to make my heart feel like it might explode. After awhile, we re-boarded the train and made the entire trip back into Santa Fe in awestruck silence, just absorbing and wallowing in the unadulterated joy we were both feeling. That was a perfect day.

You see, before completely denouncing a concept like “perfect,” I think you have to define your terms. “Perfect” as applied to “how do I compare to others, or my perception of others” is always a futile endeavor. Since your view of others is incomplete and inaccurate, there’s just no way you or your life can ever measure up.

But if you think of “perfect” as something that exists inside every moment of your REAL life, if you stand still enough long enough to see it, then you will experience innumerable amazing moments of perfect. Perfect does not exist “out there” or “someday when.” Perfect only exists right here, right now. It’s only hiding inside the thin, illusory veil of imperfection, just waiting to be discovered, brought to life, acknowledged, and made real. Perfect is your birthright. Embrace it. Enjoy it. Revel in it. And most of all, be grateful for it.

OH, HENRY

Many years ago, in Mrs. Huff’s twelfth-grade honors English class, we read “Gift of the Magi” by O. Henry. I was touched by that beautiful story and have remembered it fondly ever since. But I have never seen a real-life rekindling of those emotions until recently.

A couple of months ago my daughter-in-law, DaLynne, turned 22. Last year, on her 21st birthday, she was pregnant, so the celebration was necessarily different than it might have otherwise been. So this year, my son, James, decided to make a big deal of his lovely wife’s special day.

He got together with a couple that they had, up to that point in time, considered their best friends. In the spirit of changing the names to protect the not-so-innocent, we’ll call this couple Roger and Debbie. Anyway, the three of them planned a big surprise party that was to happen at Roger and Debbie’s house. A cake was ordered, decorations were bought, and the guests were invited. A plot was hatched – a cover story, if you will – to lure DaLynne over to Roger and Debbie’s house. In actuality, it wasn’t that difficult, since the couples frequently spent time hanging out at one another’s homes.

The theme of the party was the beach. DaLynne loves the beach, so the cake had a palm tree and some shells on it, and all the decorations were beach-oriented. The day before the party, James made up some excuse and sneaked over to Roger and Debbie’s to help decorate. According to him, the decorations were incredible, although for reasons to be related momentarily, none of the rest of us ever got to see them. The money for the cake was handed over, and Debbie picked it up to keep in their fridge until the big moment.

Now here’s where the story gets a bit murky. The night before the big party, some kind of an incident occurred – fueled, I believe, by too many margaritas – that caused a rift between the two couples. This was not pleasant, but in the interest of giving his wife the birthday she deserved, James was willing to look past it and proceed with events as planned. Debbie, however, apparently decided otherwise.

When James stopped by the couple’s house the morning of the party (which had been scheduled for 2:00 p.m.), Roger informed him that they would not be able to host after all, and he was essentially given the bum’s rush and ushered out the door, looking back over his shoulder wistfully at all the beautiful decorations that had been intended to highlight this amazing day for his beautiful bride.

Bereft and not quite knowing what to do, James felt he had no choice but to spill the beans to DaLynne. She was upset that the surprise had been ruined, and none too happy with their friends; but most of all she was heartbroken to see how hurt her husband was over the failure of this beautiful gift he’d wanted to give her. Little could he have known that the gift of love that came from his heart was quite intact for DaLynne, and she couldn’t have been more touched.

So with an alternate plan to hold the party at DaLynne and James’ house, guests were hurriedly notified of the change in location, and James set out to go pick up the cake at Roger and Debbie’s house (hoping they would be cooperative at least about that), and to buy some food and drinks for the guests who were due in less than two hours.

No sooner was my son out the door than his wife got on the phone and got to work. She dispatched her mom to do some very quick shopping for beach-themed decorations, and called another friend or two and myself to come help decorate before James returned.

Not having seen the other home, I can’t say how it compared; but by the time James returned to his own home, suffice it to say it definitely had a beachy flavor, with streamers and crepe paper palm trees and beach-ball straws abounding. It was a reverse surprise for he who had tried to give the surprise!

DaLynne’s heart had been so moved by what her husband had tried to do for her, and so broken by his pain at having his plans foiled, that she did her very best to turn it around and give the joy back to him in what I considered a very ingenious and touching turnabout. The look on James’ face when he walked through the door was somewhat hard to read. He is a man of deep emotion, but not one given to public displays, and he absolutely detests being the center of attention; but I think the gesture of his loving wife found its mark in his heart. I know it certainly did in mine.

PRETEND BASEBALL

This past Saturday, I picked up my grandchildren for some “Nana time” with them. Well, I picked up the two older ones, ages 3 and 4 – the baby, at not quite ten months old yet, is a bit young to go play in the park and have lunch at McDonald’s, and Nana is not quite up to handling all three kids at once on her own! But I digress.

The park we went to is a small park near my home, and it has swings and picnic tables and a jungle-gym type structure with slides and climbing places and a tunnel to crawl through. This particular park also has a small baseball field.

First, we did the swings, where I discovered that if you can get both kids in adjacent swings, it is actually possible to stand between the two and simultaneously accommodate all requests to “push me higher, Nana!” That was fun, but I was grateful that about the time my arms started getting tired, the kids were ready to move on to something else.

The jungle gym was fascinating. Kids really love climbing and sliding and climbing again and crawling through a worm-like tunnel with cutouts in the sides for peering out. While I sat on a bench and watched with glee, they climbed and slid and crawled, periodically peeking out the holes with big grins on their little faces, until I would cry out, “Oh, no, you’re stuck in the worm … let them go, you mean worm!” which never failed to evoke uninhibited giggling followed by a hasty exit and a victorious stance to show that the victim had indeed escaped the mean worm, bringing delighted applause from Nana!

But I think my favorite part of our sojourn to the park was the baseball game we played. You see, we didn’t bring any equipment with us, unless you count sippy cups filled with cool apple juice as equipment. We had no baseball, no gloves, no bat. Indeed, the field itself wasn’t much of a baseball field, with no home plate, no bases, and no clearly defined diamond shape. But there was a backstop and a crude welded iron bench up on a platform immediately behind the backstop.

So we took turns. First Nevaeh climbed up onto the bench and sat with a look of joyful anticipation on her face unrivaled by any Yankees fan at a playoff game. Jayden then took his place at bat, hoisting his pretend bat high over his shoulder with a smile so radiant it could have powered every light bulb in town if it could have been somehow harnessed and connected to an electric grid.

Nana was the pitcher. I stared down the batter, furrowing my brow in my best fake-serious fashion. Then I slowly raised my imaginary glove to my waist, did my best imitation of a windup, and BAM, released the pretend baseball to glide with expert precision across the non-existent plate. Jayden swung hard and SLAM, hit a homer, way out and over the invisible fence around left field! Nevaeh leapt to her feet and hollered as pitcher-turned-Coach-Nana screamed, “Run, run, run,” to a very excited three-year-old. (As there weren’t any bases and no real demarcation lines, Coach Nana also had to point to the runner to indicate to him which way to run.) From roughly where third base should have been, the runner decided to take a shortcut to the bench to give his sister a turn, but that was just fine, since everybody knows that shortcuts are perfectly permissible in pretend baseball.

Next up, Princess Nevaeh. This one would be tougher. She actually managed a look of feigned consternation onto her beautiful little face as she raised her pretend bat to rest just above her delicate shoulder. Again I raised my glove and ball, did my best windup, and zoomed it right over the plate. But alas, the pitcher was foiled again as SLAM, Nevaeh hit a homer just as impressive as her little brother’s, this one gliding easily over the imaginary fence about fifty feet behind center field.

“Run, run, you can do it,” shouted Coach Nana. “That way, yeah, that’s it. Oh, my gosh, you did it! You made a home run!” The pride gleaming in those precious eyes had to have been visible from space.

I found out that day that pretend baseball is my favorite sport, eclipsing even Dallas Cowboys football. Of course, there are the obvious advantages – Nana never misses a throw or a catch and never has to run for the ball. But there’s more than that, so much more.

You see, pretend baseball exercises your muscles, but it also exercises less tangible things, like your imagination. In pretend baseball you have to “see” with your mind’s eye, and swing a bat that exists only in your thoughts to hit a ball that’s invisible to all but your soul. Every pitch is perfect and every swing connects, and every hit goes over the fence that we made up together.

But pretend baseball does more than provide a workout for muscles and imaginations. It raises little spirits to a lovely and unprecedented level. It gives a tiny person who’s still learning to use and coordinate her or his body the opportunity to feel big and strong and powerful and in control and successful! They get to “try on” what it feels like to be a champ, and they get a taste of glory. And last, but not least, Nana gets to be a participant in, and an exuberant witness to, the growth of little hearts and spirits. And no exercise on earth is better than that!

CLOUDEEBLUE

Okay, first things first – I will answer the inevitable question about the origin of the name “CLOUDEEBLUE.” Several years ago, shortly after getting my first computer, I had to come up with a name to use for my email address. My real name was “already in use,” so I started thinking about things that I like, things that mean something to me or say something about how I feel. As my mind drifted, I imagined myself lying in a lovely green field on the side of some unnamed hill somewhere, gazing up into the sky, feeling that all was right with the world. I watched as soft, marshmallowy clouds drifted by in a sky of dazzling blue, and I was filled with a sense of peace and wonder. “That’s it!” I thought. So I typed in “cloudyblue” as my choice for an email name, and, alas, it was “already in use” just like my actual name! Not to be dissuaded, however, I thought maybe I could get the name if I varied the spelling a bit.

Now, let me stop here and say that, as a wordsmith and a worshipper of language, one of my pet peeves is cutesy misspellings of common words, like “Krab Fest” or “Lazy Daze Sale” (although that last one could arguably be a well-placed double entendre). So the thought of doing precisely that with my own email name was something I wasn’t quite sure about. But I really loved the feeling of warmth and serenity that accompanied my imagined foray into that hillside scene, so I hesitantly typed in “CLOUDEEBLUE” and, lo and behold, that name was available!

I pushed the button to accept, and from that moment on, I have been using the moniker as my email name. Every time I’m in a store and see those blue pajamas with clouds floating on them, I smile. (I never got any of them, though, and I’m not sure why – maybe that’s a good thing for my next Christmas wish list!) And once, I even found a mouse pad with that scene on it, and I was near delirious!

So when it came time to pick a name for a blog, I naturally gravitated to CLOUDEEBLUE. The picture at the top of this page is not EXACTLY like the puffy-cloud-adorned blue sky from my meditation that first day, but it is a photo I took myself, from one of my favorite locations on earth – a beautiful, chalet-style cabin on the side of a mountain in Oregon – and it very much gave me the same wondrous “cloudeeblue” feeling.

As to what this blog will be, that’s something I’ve been contemplating for awhile now. I decided that I will write about the things that matter most in life – at least in my life – and always with the goal of following that “cloudeeblue” sense of deep-down inner calm and joy. You see, “cloudeeblue” isn’t an exuberant, loud joy; rather, it’s a quiet, all-too-easy-to-miss feeling, but a very important feeling, nonetheless. It’s important to find the sacred in the ordinary; the magic in the mundane; the “cloudeeblue” in the normal. It’s there. It’s always there. Sometimes you just have to look for it, and sometimes you have to look real hard. But it’s so worth it when you do. Let’s look together and celebrate what we find!