Category Archives: Character

Character, Emotional Health, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Home and Hearth, Uncategorized, Wealth and Fame

More Houses, In Route From Here to There and Back Again

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“I sold that house, there, last week.”

“They’ve already moved in.”

“Oh, yeah, at closing. That’s the one with the tiger wood floor – imported from Brazil, got a good deal on it, nice light / dark stripe running down the board like this sample.”

“Exotic.”

“Now, this house here, we can go inside; it has bamboo flooring first time I’ve used bamboo, not sure I like it as well as the tiger wood.”

“I’ve heard it’s the new thing, a bit more green.”

“Supposed to be, but I don’t know.”

“Wow!  This is nice!  I do like the light color of the bamboo.”

“Come on upstairs.  Four bedrooms and a bonus room up there.”

“I love this cubby over the stairs, I’d put my desk here under the window and use it as a writer’s nook.”

“Everyone that has looked at this house likes that nook.  They say immediately, ‘I could put this or that here.’…funny thing, the realtors all said that wouldn’t go over well.  The plan had a two  story open staircase right here and called for a hanging chandelier,  I had the framers change it.”

“You have an architect and a designer?”

“I’m the designer.”

“You take the idea to an architect?”

“I do my own plans.”

Driving through the neighborhood:

“I built that house there, and the one behind it…

Now over here I had to wait to tear down the old rental and then add half a lot which I bought from the lady next door and then subdivide the new lot into two…This cul-de-sac we’re coming up on, I built these 5 houses about 20 years ago, when your dad was up here.  He helped me clear the property…

“The lady in that house?  That rancher? I didn’t build her house, but, she would vote for me for president if I ran.”

“She really likes you, huh.  You get to know her while you were building?”

“She has a nice little lattice work surrounding the patio out there in the backyard, you see?  She has an outdoor shower out there and she likes to go out the do her yoga and exercise and meditate in the outdoor shower.”

“Ah, you didn’t put windows in that side of the house you built next door?”

“I went in with two plans.  One was a split level, and this one is a cut out where the lower level roof extends about 10 feet further out than the upper level and the upper level has windows in the front and back, but none to the side.  No neighbors will ever be able to peep into her backyard.”

Driving through the larger community:

“I built that house… I have a permit out to build on this lot… This lot is planned for 5 houses, had to build a special water vault for that, should have gone for just four houses there… and, I can’t get the excavator to finish his job… remember when the garden used to be here?”

“And the rental?  Yes.  Did you build both of those?”

Affirmative grunt.

“It must be kind of satisfying to drive around town and see everything you have built, besides stuff you worked on while serving on the planning commission.  Do you know how many houses you’ve built?”

“Don’t know.  Probably about sixty, I haven’t counted recently.”

“I think we have seen about 12 or 14 today.”

“To tell you the truth, I think I am kind of reluctant to actually sit down and count.  It was kind of on that “bucket list” as you call it to build a hundred houses here before I quit and I’m afraid to count because I might fall short.”

“So, if you built 99 houses you fall short and are disappointed?  And if you built 101, you have over – reached your goal and have to stop?  I don’t think that is the idea of goal sitting and the bucket list.”

I think, in fact, gentle reader, that I am in the presence of a very modest, understated, specimen of the American work ethic and middle age success.

Character, Emotional Health, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Spiritual Well Being, Travel

Worth It For the View

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“Whatever would you want to go to San Francisco for?” I was asked by the older generation.  Many my own age were envious.  I could have enjoyed the company of several travelling companions had schedule and budget allowed.  After yesterday’s wanderings in the city, I now know.  I came for the view.  Chinatown was fun.  The food (butter cake, banana roll, rice and beef, stuffed shrimp at the wharf) a treat.  The cable car a must. The cheesy, top-off double decker tourist bus (though over-priced) provided much needed bearings for the city.  But the crowning moment for me was a stroll to the end of Fisherman’s Wharf and a wander out to the end of the pier.  I had already walked to the end of the Embarcadero, smelled the smells, shopped in the little shops, purchased a cable car music box for my mother (so I could tell her that’s what I came to San Francisco for).  I pressed forward.  Passed a sandy beach where two children built sand castles and a couple of die-hard swimmers trained in the cold water.  I rolled my toes in the sand without taking my walking shoes off and continued on my morning’s journey.  Just before the entrance to a wonderful military park, I veered right and followed an aging cement pier a half mile or so into the harbor.  By this time I had squirted a couple of honey straws and an individual peanut butter package into my mount to give me energy and keep me going.  The pier was wide enough for pedestrians and two-way cars to pass, but, motorized vehicles are no longer allowed.  On the way foot traffic was mild and I found myself mingling from a distance with single photographers and their tripods and a couple of serious fisherman.  There were, perhaps, a total of 12 people on the long, curving pier.  No one paid much notice to anyone else.  In the distance, Alcatraz Island rose out of the fog when the clouds parted and the sun came out.  The view was breath taking and breath giving.

I found myself saying, “This moment, this view, was worth the whole trip.”  At that moment, alone at the end of the pier and looking out toward the water, a sea lion surfaced, not more than twenty feet away.  He (or she) was coming straight for me, nosed up out of the water, blew (a friendly kiss, so it seemed) and then dipped and was gone.  What a moment!  What a view!

Character, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Travel, Uncategorized

10 Things revisited

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Today I ate Chinese food in San Francisco, something I have been longing to do since about 1995. Over two years ago I wrote a few blogs on the theme of 10 Things I Want to Do Before I Die  http://einefeistyberg.wordpress.com/2007/04/22/the-list-contains-10-ten-things-i-want-to-do-before-i-die/ It seems like an appropriate time to revisit that list and see if my focus has remainded true.

I wanted to return to Colorado before I died.  I returned to Colorado in 1997

I wanted to be a published author.  I have completed a 229 page novel, 40 pages are in progress on another, six pages of still another, 115 page children’s novel independently published; but, the only items I have published for pay are five newspaper articles.

I wanted to be the quintessential Proverbs 31 woman.  I still long for the day I can check all items off on this list

I wanted to mentor younger women and be mentored by older, wiser women. Some, but not enough

I began to say that my “Fantasy Island” would be performing on the stage at Red Rocks. Actually, performing anywhere would be fine

I wanted to find the best public education possible for my kids. K-12 is a wrap

I wanted to spend time around stages, microphones, studios and musicians.  Since all three of my children are musicians, and one owns a studio and lots of microphones, and I teach music and direct performances of children, I guess I can say this goal is thriving

I wanted to invest my life, make a difference in my world, and make a difference in the lives of others. May it continue to be so

I wanted to travel and see places unknown, via plane, and train, and auto, to experience “the good life,” in all its changing forms.  I am in the midst of living this goal.  Today I ate Chinese food in San Francisco. I arrived by train and have experienced the cable car, streetcar, double decker bus and walking tour.  One of my travel goals is to visit all fifty states.

Character, Emotional Health, Family, Goals and Dreams, Home and Hearth, Spiritual Well Being

House#1 in route to there and back again

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This is a sanctified house – not because the owners are Christian (they would cough and gag and chafe at such a suggestion inadvertently linking them to the conservative religious right); but because they are spiritual, deeply in touch with their dreams and desires and goals.  This house is sanctified because every inch, every nook and cranny, every photo and artifact exudes who they are.  Ultimately, consummately, they are fulfilling the purpose for which they came to be and it is glorious to witness.  And, they love each other…deeply, as largely as they are capable of and they are persons of great depth, thought capacity, artistry, and innovation.  This house is authentic, as are the people in it, and the books that line the shelves and spill into architectural heaps on coffee tables and nightstands.  So, I will spend my time here being authentic, and taking long walks in this wondrous, brick and red geraniums, old money and rich tradition neighborhood.  Oh, and playing the grand piano.

Character, Family, Home and Hearth

House Sitting

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Ooooo, breathe deep.  Stop and sigh, take a tour and view the portraits on the walls, the photos on the shelves.  Feel the cozy belonging way one feels while kneading toes into warm sand or thick carpet.  This is a house full of memory.  Far from ghostly or sinister, these are young memories.  Grand children birthed, coming home from the hospital, growing, learning, holding a spoon, taking first steps, climbing on tables and into  bathroom sinks and exploring toilets, playing with kitchen utensils, baking cookies, taking a nap.

There is a good spirit here, good karma, good vibrations, depending on your choice of vernacular.  The good vibes are emanating from my heart, my soul singing as I feel the spirit of generosity and bounty, and sense that my children have done well and have used their resources wisely.  Their strong work ethic and a commitment to the values of family and friendship have resulted in a well appointed , harmonious home.  This is beyond merely efficient, this is quality of life.

Quality of Life:  slate tile floor, measured, cut, placed and finished by my son, cupboards stocked with necessities , each needed item close at hand in its proper place.  Furniture chosen for form and function, uniquely suited to the space, floor plan, family personality and structure.

There are also deeper, darker, and richer memories that flood my mind and spirit as I pause before yellowed photographs.  Not the dark of somber or unrelenting, depressing clouds;  but dark like chocolate or dusky wine. These memories too, I quaff with bliss for they are vintage now, fully aged in life’s experience, in gratitude and tranquility.  The bitterness of failed or difficult relationships dissolves in the ferment, and in its place, like sweet soul cream, is the thankfulness for lessons learned, peace and tranquility, and thanksgiving for what life provides for the current day.

Character, Emotional Health, Family, Health and Long Life, Poetry and Prose, Spiritual Well Being

Saturday Prayers

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Dear God, show me truth.  Show me your will and direction for my life.  God, please grant me the power to carry it out rather than the constant worry and striving to make it happen on my own.  For my daughter; grant a deep and abiding knowledge of who you  are-and are meant to be- for her.  Grant that she be always a fulfilled and loved woman, peaceful and wise at heart whether single or in a relationship.  For my son; I ask that you grant him an awareness and revelation of truth:  who YOU are, God of the Universe, and who he is to be.  Give to my son power and strength and wisdom and boldness in the things of the true and living God.  For the one estranged, who, because of his raging and insults has become my enemy, I pray for the higher good to master him.  I pray he would have truth and beauty and self-awareness.  For my grown and settled children, I pray that you would continue to knit them together in a strong cord of love and ethics.  Bring out the best in them.  You have given each of them marvelous strengths.  Burst on them at every turn in beauty, truth, joy, the energy of life and love.  And for my friends, my listening ears; I pray your protection on them, that my “viruses”  would not attach to their “systems”, but that they would remain whole, beautiful, joyous, successful, and wise.  May it be.

Character, Family, Health and Long Life, The Petty Pace, The Rules, Uncategorized

Time Honored Baseball

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At the top of the fourth he turned to me and said, “I am really enjoying my father’s day present.” I was too.  Its been 30 years or so since the last time I baked in the sun or got damp and chilled in the rain at a JUCO game. In the space of 3 hours, we did both today- despite being well armed with umbrellas.

We found seats directly above home plate and were free to form our own opinions about the accuracy of the umpire and the strengths and weaknesses of the teams. By the top of the fourth the pace of the game was starting to pick up. He had already had 3 little naps in the stadium seat. I found out that he played baseball in high school. I remember when he coached our small town equivalent of little league summer after summer. I have known all my life that he was a starter on the high school basketball team, but I had never heard about high school baseball.

During the slow beginning innings where the pitcher merely threw strikes and there was little action in the field, I tried to beguile him with conversation, tell him about my seventh grade students who argued just this past week that you can catch a fly with an outstretched baseball cap because it is still attached (all this because I asked them not to be playing baseball in literacy class with detached player equipment- as in, water bottle and pea gravel). I took the counter position that the cap extends further from the hand than the distance allowed in the fingers of a glove.  He did not take the bait, just nodded and said, “Ummm.” Sometime next week he will probably tender his final position on the subject – after he has consulted the online rulebook.

Admittedly, there was more purpose to my invitation than just an early Father’s Day gift (I told him it would take a load off my mind if he would go to the game with me, because then I wouldn’t have to worry about what to get him for Father’s Day). Always the hard worker, my 75 year old dad has been working non-stop the past couple of weeks and exhausting the middle-aged men hired to help.  It was truly time for a holiday.  Baseball fit the bill.

After six innings of reflection I have concluded that baseball is a lot like life.  You spend months and years in training and a good deal of time nonchalantly standing around waiting; as a spectator getting a trifle bored, but you have to keep your head in the game, tensed, alert, and ready at a moment’s notice to make the all important double play-that makes your day or defines your life.

Character, Emotional Health, Family, Goals and Dreams

Happy Mother’s Day to Me!

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Happy Mother’s Day to me.  I am of all women, most blessed.  I like my three grown (nearly grown) children. I like who they are.  It is fun to be with them.  They are people of character and responsibility or budding responsibility; creative, witty, sensitive, thoughtful, articulate. I am looking forward to spending time with them this Mother’s Day; and with my 3.4 grandchildren.

Did they choose the career path I would have chosen for them?  Who can say?  I was not foolish enough to decide who they were to become or to micromanage.  I did know from the day they were born what they were:  they were treasures.  That is what they remain to me to this very day – TREASURES.

Character, co-dependence, Emotional Health, The Rules

Rule Number 3- Please Everyone

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I have spent half a century trying to please people; how about you?  Yes?

Well, as they say, “You can please some of the people all the time and some of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all the people all the time.” But, hey, it never hurts to try, right?  Maybe I will be the first one to be perfect, get it right all the time, please everybody and the whole world will love me-rise up and call me blessed.

I don’t think there is a thing wrong with pleasing people, with living peaceably with everyone.  I do take issue with peace at any cost – or with pleasing others to manipulate the outcome. At sometime in your life someone has probably said indignantly, “After all I’ve done for you, how could you……”  The words are designed to heap guilt, to convict the hearer to change his ways. If the recipient has stolen, embezzled, cheated or betrayed, perhaps a parent or spouse does have a right to utter this accusation.  But, usually, I think what the offended one means is, “After all I’ve done for you how could you not do what I wanted you to do?”  This is the type of thing Handel’s father spat when George F. decided to be a musician and composer rather than a barber.  When parents say this they often mean, “After all I’ve done for you how could you possibly think of being yourself instead of the person I wanted you to be?”

Recently I was accosted by an acquaintance whose basic communication was, “You are the meanest person in the world!  I knocked myself out for you! I did lots of things for you, whatever I thought was right for you, whether you asked or wanted it or not and now I am angry with you because you did not respond the way I wanted you to respond and do what I wanted you to do.  You didn’t do the job the way I would have done it.  You are not the gregarious personality I wanted you to be. You’re not even trying to be the person I wanted to help you become. I have piped and you have not danced.”  Funny thing, I didn’t even hear the piper.  I was too busy marching to the steady beat of a different drum.  Is this a good thing or a bad thing?

Character, co-dependence, Emotional Health, Goals and Dreams, Health and Long Life, Spiritual Well Being

Back to Square One

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Recently someone tried to convince me that starting over is never a good idea; it just doesn’t work. Essentially she was saying that one needs to just stay in the pit one has dug and continue plodding, maintain the status quo of the circumstances and people one finds oneself with. I understand the Biblical principle behind her adamance to never start over (Peter’s example of a sow returning to wallowing in the mud, or Paul’s question as to why the Galatians were returning to the weak and beggarly rules they started out with which led them from the school master to grace).

I also dislike being bumped back home or to the hospital as much as the next person playing Careers or Monopoly or other reality games. While I understand the necessity to refrain from continually running away and starting over, I have found that retracing one’s steps is often beneficial to ascertain why one went to the kitchen in the first place, what one was thinking of, desiring and wanting, before allowing oneself to be distracted by outside urgencies or circumstances and the daily stresses of life.

So, pardon me, if, in my mid-life quest to be all that I can be and all that my Higher Power asks of me, I decide to return to square one, a mile marker with clear directions.

Though it appears to some that I am starting over, I am actually still standing expectantly on the beach waiting for the next big wave – not just any wave, but a true quintessential pipeline, something I can ride all the way into port; “or be content to sail with God the seas,” as Emerson penned.