Freakishly Short - Toes and All

LesbosOnTheCouch by Beth C, one of the Lesbos
-The other is temporarily up and about...frolicking somewhere in the snow...

Ok, it has been more than a month since I've posted. I've wanted to. I've wanted to write…but the flow just seemed to have …II…paused…

Actually, that is not what happened…I just got too busy…mostly in my head. And then there is this...

My love has taken off – she's flown away for a trip, a vacation, a break…Life is like the wind –sometimes blustery and stormy and a full blown squall with gusts that can knock you right off your feet…sometimes it just flows and twists. Lately life has been a stormy winter wind.

I see that the petals on the flowers have begun to fall from the flowers in the vase.

I see that my middle toe is pretty small. All of my toes are really small-   but for some reason, my middle toe is the same size as my pinky toe.  The thing about my toes…they have the same waving capabilities as my hand. That is, I can wave hello and good bye with my toes…and that is a good for many reasons.

Yes, I get don't get as bored as other people do.  I always have all kinds of things around me to amuse me…sometimes it's my job or the people at work. Sometimes it's My love or my friends. Sometimes it's my toes…or the wind or my freakishly short arms…or strange sounding words…phalanges…phalanges…

The thing about my toes- they are always there. Sometimes, especially in the winter – and always when I am at work – they are inside shoes or boots. At home I feel especially free and happy. My toes come out of their socky abode and wave to a passerby…and to me

Life is not very different from my toes.  Just like my toes, life is always out there. We can cover it up an ignore it –but  it doesn't just go away; no matter how much we might try to pretend that we are not a part of it – we are…Like our toes are part of our feet.

So we laugh and drink and eat and pretend we don't care…but deep down – that toe, that little toe in the middle of my foot, it is there.

I am taking a course now- it is helping me with my emotional eating…you know, that knee jerk response to unpleasantness ---where's the chocolate?

It really is helping me. I realized at the very beginning of the course that I didn't even know when I was really hungry – or when I just needed something to calm and comfort…How sad is that? I knew that I ate when I was sad, depressed, happy, frustrated, angry, excited, nervous, afraid, annoyed…but I didn't realize that all of that  had hidden the one true signal that my body was giving me when it was time to eat – when I a am hungry. In my life experience, I was always – am always hungry.

I've learned now that that feeling of being empty and needing to fill the gaping hole wasn't really hunger – It was emptiness.  An emptiness that needs to be filled by something other than food…

What does this have to do with my toe? Well, nothing really – just an observation ---just like the eating had nothing to do with needing to eat – with physical hunger…

We can connect anything to anything ===

And I do…to My love---who is off in flight, playing in the distant snow…and not sitting here on the couch with me and my phalanges. I love you. I miss you. My toes and I wish you enjoy yourself and think of us...My toes are waving you hello and may peace be with you...

The Year of the Dragon...I Pray...

LesbosOnTheCouch by Beth C, one of the Lesbos

(please forgive me if I have misunderstood any that I have aligned with)

Two thousand and eleven, it is, it was and now it is not. Time is here and not here all the same. The Chinese year, this year, 2011, was the year of the rabbit…2011, over and gone. Two thousand and twelve, it is the year of the dragon.

Rabbit, as defined by Webster's on line dictionary- any of various lagomorphs that are born furless, blind, and helpless, that are sometimes gregarious, and that include especially the cottontails of the New World and a small Old World mammal (Oryctolagus cuniculus) that is the source of various domestic breeds.   

Rabbits are herbivores that reingest their own droppings. Rabbits are soft and cuddly. Rabbits might be quick and energetic – but they are prey animals and so fearful and quite helpless in the face of danger.

This year is a year of strength…The year of the Dragon, two thousand and twelve seems to already hold more promise. A dragon, dragons are strong fearless creatures.

Dragon, as defined by Webster's on line dictionary- a mythical animal usually represented as a monstrous winged and scaly serpent or saurian with a crested head and enormous claws. For many, Dragons have major spiritual significance. ''In many Asian cultures dragons were, and in some cultures still are, revered as representative of the primal forces of nature, religion and the universe. They are associated with wisdom—often said to be wiser than human…

Yes, 2012, from here –end of 2011- looks like it could offer a doorway to positive change.

Please do understand – I am grateful for the sun and the moon and the stars. I love that our Creator had given me my Love, my children, my boys, my friends –my life. But 2011, with all its goodness has been so filled with pain and the ache of loss…The ache of long term loss, the forever ache of the death of loved ones.

My aunt Ellen…she's gone and left a gaping hole in my heart and soul…and now Sara…mother of mine and so many others…She was taken, too – ripped from the earth and our lives in a violent storm of crashing metal and fire.

These two women--- as strong as they were and as loving and wise…they left us at the age of 64 and a few months…What did they know and why did they both choose to leave at this time? Were they as the rabbit – blinded by the soft fresh grass, the sunshine and the call of the birds? They did fall prey, each to her own tragic end. The year of the Rabbit; it is over.

For those of us for whom faith, facts and coincidences help us make sense out of the nonsense and grasp the impossible -Sixty four is: The maximum number of strokes in any Chinese character, the number of sexual positions in the Kama Sutra, the number of codons in the RNA codon table under genetic code, the number of crayons in the popular Crayola 64 pack, the number of demons in the Dictionnaire Infernal, in chess, the total number of black (dark) and white (light) squares on the game board, the atomic number of gadolinium, a lanthanide, and the name of a song by the Beatles.

For both my Aunt Ellen and Sara, it is the age that they will never live beyond. For them 65 does not exist.

I pray that for those of us they left behind, 2012 will be a year to live; A year to live? What do I mean by that?

They are gone. From both Ellen and Sara, there are lessons to learn about life and about death.  I do not believe that if Ellen was healthy she would have chosen to end her life at 64. But after looking at the possibilities, she did choose to end the fight and the struggle and the pain. She chose to die. She believed that her death was preferable to pain.

Sara – she definitely did not choose this time to die. For Sara, every day was an adventure and a thrill. Life was to be embraced and enjoyed – Each day to be lived as if it might be the last…And this is what Sara was doing up until the moment she was taken…

And this is what I will take from these two magnificent women-

v  To live life, each day as it is the last.

v  Not to struggle to survive, but live until it is time to go

v  To be kind and giving

v  To love and love some more

v  Enjoy health, body, mind and soul

v  See…the world has so much beauty

v  Love is to give and to receive

v  Do – until it is impossible to do more

v  Rest and get up and start again

The year of the Rabbit – passive and prey; it is over. And in this year, this year of the Dragon – I will be fearless and strong with the primal strength of the Dragon as my talisman. I will fly and try to channel their collective wisdom…and live. I pray to the Creator to show us all -especially those left in this puddle of tears- I pray for the strength, the wisdom and the faith of the Dragon.

**Drawing by my talented son, Ya'ir Preiss

Sara is gone

LesbosOnTheCouch by Beth C, one of the Lesbos

I am one of the luckiest people that I know. I have had many mothers throughout my life time --- and Sara was one of these. She was one – she was always one.

Sara was one. She was one and she was one and only in so many ways. I’ve know Sara and Avner for over 32 years. They adopted me in Syracuse while we were trying to study and learn and grow in the snowiest and coldest place I’d ever been.

From the very beginning they took me into their home, into their hearts. Sara sensed right away that something was missing in me – she sensed my need and she put herself out there, selflessly and wholly. She put herself to me fully and without hesitation. She was the first to hold me tightly and not let go – ever.

She was the first to teach me that I was loveable and worthy of love. She held me and no matter what I said and no matter what I did… she held me – and in many ways, she sustained me.

She talked to me openly and honestly. She was one of the first to open me up and give me safe haven. Their home in Syracuse became mine, their boys became my brothers. In Syracuse, every holiday, every event, every birthday and celebration, I was included…I was included, I was surrounded, I was engulfed and I was loved as I was an unconditionally. Sara saw something in me that I didn’t yet see in myself.

I don’t know how or why she did it. She spent so much time with me, helping to heal and become whole…She saved me from myself more times than I care to remember… – she saved me from so much, most of which she did not even know, -or care… What I had done, what had happened to me – this was only important to her, because it was important to me…but she taught me, she tried to teach me, that I was more than my past. I was more than my pain.

This is the Sara that I have been so very blessed to have known. This woman, a true mother of the earth…Sara was warm and alive. She taught me what it meant to be a mother first hand…she talked to me about things that no one else dared or bothered to speak of. Sara was the first to accept and understand –everything…she ‘got it’ all.

Sara was fearless in every way. She was fearless in the way she lived, in the way she loved and in the way she expressed herself. She was not afraid. She knew that life is a gift. She knew that time is precious. Sara did not believe that time spent giving and loving and talking was wasted time. All time spent, a gift… and this gift she shared with me in a way that can only dream of understanding. Share was fearless. Share was generous. Sara was warm and loving. Sara treasured life. I consider myself to have been so luck – so blessed. Sara shared with me her most treasured gifts – her family, her love and her time---her time cut short.

I believe that we are better people for having known Sara…and now…

Sara has left us. It is impossible to grasp. Sara – fearless, loving and strong and bold is no longer here to share and be.

Blessed be Sara in death as she was in life.

Monday Morning Ughs with a SLAB

LesbosOnTheCouch by Beth C, one of the Lesbos

In the morning, I wake up. I don’t want to go and I think that nothing can actually get me out of bed. What could possibly be so important that I need to leave this nice warm space?  My Love’s breathe warm on my face.  Her lips parted slightly smiling at me as I open my eyes…

Then something strikes me in my hollow head and the words begin to play…Whatchu laughin at? My Love says to me. 

I don’t even know but already I can hear the beginnings of words sounding in my ears…She says, I am thinking of making another lasagna. Do you feel like it? If you don’t want to eat it, you can take it to Stig. I bought a nice fresh slab of regatta cheese. What do you think?

What do I think…I think that I am just slightly west of insanity and a bottle of chardonnay! Work – what is wrong with me? Why do I have to go? And what's that word slab- where did it come from?...S L A B…hmmmmmmm.

Stig is always hungry he can always eat- and so can I…but I am no longer supposed to be eating everything whenever I want. I have to put up boundaries and not be extreme. Lasagna is apparently now 'extreme'. Coffee is 'extreme'. Chicken is 'extreme'. Obviously chocolate is 'extreme'…but dried fruit and honey too? And bread and potatoes and spaghetti and milk and wine and – beer and -What is a poor starving girl with an eating disorder called, I-like-to-eat, to do?

 …Funny, my eating is extreme, but everything else in my life is so balanced?! ..My mind is off wandering again- where was I? Oh yeah-

She said I can give Stig some lasagna, that might make the day better… yeah, that could be a good reason to get out of bed and go to work on a Monday morning – Stig is my work buddy- my work twin, if you will. He is everything that I am not. He is male. He is tall. He is dark. He is a kid – not even past the middle of his twenties. He’s athletic and most of all – he gets me – and we have fun…Sometimes so much fun that if I have had enough valium, life at work would almost be a three ring circus.

Let me give you a fresh, straight off the weather report example…

I get to work in the morning – it’s raining in my office – yes, you heard right, raining. That might not sound so bizarre - except that our office is on the second floor of a three story building! It is literally dropping large plop plop drops into the bucket that someone has so nicely wedged into the space behind the desk of one of my work colleagues. The carpet on the floor is swollen with water under and around my desk and hers. A light fixture is hanging precariously down from above where the ceiling tile has mysteriously disappeared…And it smells, oh yes it stinks- it reeks,  – it is just plain foul smelling and malodorous!

Stig, my fine hairy friend has a stuffed nose. He cannot smell the rot…but he can see that work is not something that will be easily accomplished in this mess.

That was Monday… Friday – the stink is gone and the water has mostly dried up, for now. Someone shoved the light fixture back in the ceiling and The Boss has sent the Coo to yell at the landlords…They mostly shrugged…rain can’t be stopped- water not their fault…

During the week, workers could be seen going up to the roof, playing with electrical wires, putting up emergency exit signs that point to an exit less wall…one even came into the office and said- we are doing this for you…As if having a dry office is some outlandish expectation.

Another week comes and goes, tomorrow will again be Monday morning. My Love's breath will warm my face and we'll make each other laugh…I won't want to get up…but I will…who knows, maybe the sun will have dried up all the rain…

One thing is for sure, I will go into work and play my part- rain, electrical wires and wind will not keep me in bed, yet again.

The Garden or, Oh, My Back!.

LesbosOnTheCouch by Beth C, one of the Lesbos

I thought that this day wasn't really here. I actually thought this day had no business in my life and wasn't going to come…and yet here it is.

My Love has decided to spruce up the garden with some winter bulbs. She ordered hundreds of them – literally and today we decided to plant! (Actually, today they got here. Today I am home. Today we both had some work we wanted to avoid. Today there was some housework we really wanted to avoid. Tomorrow it is supposed to rain.)

My Love was out there first, sorting the darn things. "Could it be I've overdone it?" she asks. "I mean could I have ordered too many bulbs?"

Never my Love, we can do this and the garden will be even more beautiful! Never mind that the people we rent from seem to be getting restless, pestering our lawyer and wanting all kinds of paperwork and other stuff…A sure sign in my mind that they want us to leave…a sure sign in my Love's mind that they are bored.

I went outside and was given the task of 'turning the soil' - because if we don't turn the soil it won't turn itself. My Love started placing the bulbs were they were meant to be…Do you have any idea how many bulbs are hundreds of bulbs? Well, let me just say that the garden looks like a mole's New Year's Party! I am quite certain that our landlords will not be so thrilled if they show up before the spring, when the winter bulbs are to bloom…We've taken their nice weed infested front yard and hoed and weeded and turned the soil!

Anyway, I hoed… (No kidding, I hoed.) I turned the ground inside out for what, 15 whole minutes. Then I went inside to get some water. Then I went inside to look for something (where did I just put that hoe?) Then I came out and asked my Love some questions. Then I told her that maybe I could do this for another half of an hour. Then I realized that I couldn't, so I started grunting louder and making some suggestions that I knew she wouldn't like…

Soon my Love said that I should go write. She really didn't want me to have a back ache latter…Go in and write….

So here I sit at my computer writing about the day I didn't want to come. The day when my back lasts for forty five minutes of garden work? No, the day that my attention span is so warped that garden work bores me to moan and groan and make dumbass suggestions, happy to have my Love – a full five and one half years younger than me still enthralled with planting bulbs, sure that my advancing age and belly are keeping me inside…

I am such a snake!

And More Double D!!!....

LesbosOnTheCouch by Beth C, one of the Lesbos
...and more Double D.

Surely the Commander and Chief of the Men’s League had some agenda. It was highly uncharacteristic of him to request a meeting when such tension between the sides was at such a high point…He must have something planned….

Again Jane’s mind wandered. - Commander in Chief Dward. Oh, he was a handsome man, but his tender looks were deceiving, as was everything about him.

Jane hadn’t gotten to be Second Cowander on her outright knowledge and Judo abilities alone. That uncanny ability to perform hundreds of different tasks simultaneously – while her mind would focused on one something else in particular She could be teaching her JudoJuniors, or lecturing to the higher echelon… and all the while forming a new method or plan or theory that could – and often did, change the way of the world that she and the WFM had formed. How they all went about their daily duties and what exactly their goal was to be, this was a large part of Jane’s philosophies put into practice. Indeed Jane’s brilliance was one of the main and most vibrant sources of the force behind the Woman’s Forward Movement.

Jane, still lost in thought had already gotten into her transporter, checked the controls and spoke through her panmittter to base and programmed the coordinates of the clandestine meeting into the transporters guiding system.

“Ready Jane,” her transporter responded upon receiving the hand that that was so familiar these past few years, mission after mission. In a matter of minutes, Second Cowander Jane Double D had reached her destination –A cave hidden deep in the recesses of moon plane II.

The landing just outside the cave was barren. Either Dward hadn’t arrived yet or had come early enough to manuever his transporter to shelter. Double D suspected the latter. It was unlike Dward- Commander In Chief- to be late for anything, especially a meeting that he himself had requested. D walked up to the entrance of the cave, waiting a moment for her eyes to adjust to the darkness before entering. From the entrance she could see Dward kneeling by the altar. For a very short moment, Jane saw not Dward the Commander in Chief of the Men’s League, but Dward, long time Judo companion and favourite foe on the mat…No one could challenge he moves –no man had the nerve, the substance to challenge her the way he had.

Most of the men, upon seeing Jane on the mat, resplendent in her Judo Whites fell weak in the knees at the very sight of her goddess like body, flowing and strong – and then proceeded to severely underestimate the strength of ‘the woman.’’

Not Dward- He may have let his hormones, his affections and prejudices get the best of him off the mat –but on the mat he knew –Double D was one of the best, the quickest and the most knowledgeable Judoists to practice in this century- if not greater!

"Dward."

"Double D."

They exchanged the embraces of old friends, and D was relieved not to have to engage in immediate contra-contra tactics…maybe they could avoid a confrontation of the forces, after all.

Dward, who was the host- the initiator of this meet, offered the wine. "So what's this about Dward? Wine, secret meeting…Why the call to arms? You can't possibly think we passed the bad air?

"D, slow down. First friends, then foes…I see you wear the pin of 2^nd Cowander. Congratulations. I understand this puts our meeting at different level-But Jane Double D…How can we just skip the part where our histories and attractions offer us respite from the possibility of conflict between our 2 sides.

"Dward, ever the man and the manipulator of womankind… How can we talk of affections when the possibility of air strikes and even all-out war stand in the balance…?"

"But Jane, that's just my point. We must, for the sake of averting war, make love."

The reference to the past was not lost on Double D. She has been remembering the days before the great Split that separated the men and women. The times when she and Dward fought on the same team, shared the same goals and dreams.

Dward and Double D fall into a pensive silence- both lost in a barrage of memories as they sit side by side on the stone bench that lines the dimly lit cave.

Dward turns to Jane and lifts a tentative hand to finger her pin. Jane, prepared for such a move executes a flip, chop and hold- Dward, gasping and laughing is on the floor- Janes knees in the soft of his neck, arm contorted in the air.

 ....

LesbosInTheCar

LesbosOnTheCouch by Beth C, one of the Lesbos

We all give objects human characteristics --- I know that we all do this. And My Love and I are no different…for us, our car is one of those objects and I do declare our car has opinions of its own and maybe its opinion isn't exactly those of My Love and I…

The other day while we were on the way home, we were driving up the winding and curving road to our home, and our car starting beeping. You know that beep. Not the old time beep of the horn, but the beep of beep beep – (meaning beep, something is wrong beep something is wrong, beep, fix me, beep, fix me - Fix me!)

Beep – but there was nothing wrong with the car – The mechanic says it is just an ''electrical issue'. I disagree. I think it is my car making a statement. Why did it choose to make these loud beeps just as we were going up the winding and curving road?

Car dear, we have to talk.

The car ignored me and continued to beep up the road.

Now listen here. My Love and I are not straight.  The car went quiet. There is just nothing straight about us…and you belong to us, you are our car.

The beeping was reduced to one beep every other turn and curve.

We like the curvy twists and turns. We live a winding and curving life. The thing about curves and turns – you cannot see what is coming up next. With the winding and curving road, life is just full of surprises…some good, some not so good. Living the lives we live full of curves and twists seems to give us a hope and a fullness that we lacked before we knew each other – before we had you, dear car.

Our bodies curve and turn. Our bodies twist and turn and bend to meet every challenge life has to offer. My Love and I bend and twist with laughter. Our time together is joyful…and we are who we are and this curviness fills us with laughter and joy.

Face it car, you can't beep at every curve, twist and turn and be our car. We are the LesbosOnTheCouch, and to you, we are the LesbosInTheCar…You are our car. So stop beeping and Get Over It!

Amazingly enough, the car stopped beeping. I guess she gets it. I guess she's happy to. Who knows, maybe she is one of the Lesbos too.