A Red Rose For Me ...

Today was a strange, surreal day of introspection, coming to self-terms, and finding comfort ... on a very deep and profound level.  
  
I, a teacher (music, holistic, and humane education), realize that life places me in a position to always be teaching, even when doing so is the farthest thing from my mind.  Maybe we all are teachers; certainly we all are students ... of Life.  

This morning I went to the chiropractic clinic that has taken on the task of mending my body’s neurological system and some of its joints.  I expected there would be more people than usual at the clinic due to the media clamor about the imminent, colossal snow storm.  Yes, there were throngs of people ... adults and some little children too.  The place, usually serene with inspiring music playing, was full of human voices.  I knew I had to make the best of the situation and I took my place in the long line.  After a while, I really looked at some of the individuals.  I noticed that some of them were looking too.  I was overtaken by a feeling of community with these people ... all of whom were unknown to me.  Each one is there to be comforted, to find a few minutes of peace, to feel hope .  I realized that each one there has his or her own situation and health concern.  I was seeing through eyes that realized we are all creatures hoping for pain relief, a friendly word, and freedom from the grip of illness. 

There was a woman there with three little girls.  The children were very talkative and, surprisingly, not irritating as young kids can be in confined, crowded situations.  One of the children kept pointing at items people had or wore and would exclaim “phone”, “hat”, and then as she looked at my hands, “nail paint”.  As the line moved along, the lady with the girls moved too and they were one space behind me.  So when my table became available, they were next. I heard the mom say “Go to that one (table), next to the Girl”.  The Girl?  Yes, that’s what she called me.  I lifted my head up and said to her “I need to thank you for calling me a ‘girl’ at my age of ...”. She smiled and said “well, she is at a stage where she identifies everybody as a boy or girl"; the child spoke up and said “And I like her nice ponytail”.  

I’m relating all of this to, somehow, create a backdrop for some health info I received yesterday that relates to the ways cumulative heavy-duty stress can find ways to manifest into illnesses that have names -- names that can shake up the status quo, can re-shuffle the deck, can validate those Google searches for symptoms.   When I took the test and was alerted about the probability of diabetes, I thought about  the humor, profundity, implications, irony, beauty of life ... all these things and more.  As I left the chiropractic clinic today, I told the pleasant, helpful woman at the front desk what I had learned yesterday and she said “would it be OK if I say a prayer for your well-being”?  I nodded my assent and she clasped my hands in hers and said aloud a brief, sincere petition on my behalf.  How nice that was. 

I will continue my life-style of exercise and veggie-ism and meditation.  And I will do something more ... I will remember to love myself as a spiritual being.  I bought myself a beautiful Valentine that has a red rose on its cover and a loving message inside. 

Addendum:  6/15/14

I had learned that a high glucose reading could be related to other factors, as the first test was done during the very initial phase of what turned out to be a heavy asthma bout ... so the reading number, itself, was not definitive. More recently I was re-tested and am now on a diabetes med.  I have renewed respect for some advice given to me a couple of years ago by a wise person who said "cherish each day". Amen.  Yes, an attitude of gratitude!  

(Don't) Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow --

During my years as a child musical performer living in New England, one of the songs chosen for me to sing, in season, was Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow.  The first two blocks of lyrics are “Oh, the weather outside is frightful, But the fire is so delightful, So since we’ve no place to go, Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.  It doesn’t show signs of stopping, So I brought some corn for popping, The lights are turned way down low, So let it snow, let it snow, let it snow".  Then the words go on to be smoochie.  

Well, and this is quite believable in the Northeast, every time I sang that song on stage or radio, it would snow almost immediately.  Really.  So I got to really dislike the song and so did some other  people :)  Now, here in the South, when we have a snow event, that song stands on the side-lines of my memory and I envision it with its thumbs in its ears and its other fingers wiggling in mockery as it says in sing-song manner,  “nanni-nanni-foo-foo”; that’s the kid-style taunt that was in style back in the day.

I once wrote a brilliant blog post about snowflakes.  It was quite lyrical.  The gist of it was that there are two kinds of snowflakes: the big, friendly flakes that float down from the sky and gently land on your nose, forehead, and arms. They seem to be saying a smiling “hello”.  Often they are sent so that an oncoming snow event will appear to be benign (sort of like the harmless scout ants that are sent into a kitchen to precede a mass invasion by the entire voracious ant colony).  Anyway, the big friendly snowflakes are very pretty.  But then there are the little nippers – the small, fierce flakes that are driven from the sky en masse ... they sting and ping when they hit your face.  The little nippers mean business and they devote themselves to clogging driveways and roads and making five-foot snow drifts in some places.  

This is the South and Spring is supposed to be just around the corner ... I hope it is :)