Altar for Grandmother

This week at E's school, the older kids displayed their Day of the Dead Altars; Tombstone sized collections of artifacts representing a dead love ones life. There were many pictures of WWII veterans along with hand made hats, playing cards, scratch tickets, menorah's and crosses, Oreos and snickers (favorite foods). It was hard to pass by these alters without remembering our own losses and the detritus which remind us of them

Altar for Grandmother: For my grandmother's alter, there would be plastic curlers and bobby pins, a large can of hair spray, the girdles she wore for most of her life, washed each night, and then hung to dry on the shower curtain rod. I would place a large black pocket book right in the middle of the display; the suitcase sized one filled with lipstick, sen sen, gum, tissues, scissors and nail cutters, change and bills, pens, paper and ruler, perfume, nail polish, an extra pair of underwear and nylons, address book, rosary beads (two pair), wooden and silver crosses, pears, apples, rolls from the diner that went uneaten, sugar packets, as well, and ketchup in packages. There would also be three deck's of cards, poker chips and bingo chips, coupons, newspaper circulars, a wrench, a knife or two, a screw driver, and three bottles of orange soda.

The pocket book, which weighed at least 20 pounds, would enable two adults and a child to survive a flood, snow storm, typhoon or a fortnight lost in an urban jungle. Grandmother was well prepared if anything.

On her alter, I would also include a package of white flour and sugar, olive oil, garlic and eggplants, a can of tomato past, and onions for the cooking she did every day and a picture of my grandfather with whom she spent a lifetime Also, I would put the two wrist watches she wore - one on each wrist - during her ten year stint in the nursing home. There would be the dentures she abhorred but kept in the house dress pocket in case they were needed for a particularly tough piece of meat or unexpected company and the witch hazel, vinegar, aspirin, and aloe which could cure all but the most persistent of viruses, aches and sprains. All of these things I would sit on the orange and brown afghan she crocheted each evening while watching the 11 O'clock news.

Prayers for Angel Baby

What part of your body do you despise? Is it the back of the eyes during a migraine, the thick belly than hangs over the belt, the scar that runs the length of the torso? What would it take for you to love each limb, organ, twitching ligament in its imperfect entirety? What would it mean to be so beloved and appreciated by yourself?

Angel Baby undergoes brain surgery tomorrow. The skull, not quite large enough, needs rebuilding to make room for her growing brain. Angel Baby has blue eyes that shine with laughter and halo of golden hair to frame a soft face. She can be sensitive and cares very much what others think of her, whether or not she is beloved, good enough, deserving, beautiful (And who of us do not have such cares?)

Yes, I want to tell her as if my words could make her know her worth, you are quite beautiful. Tomorrow, mother and father will sit in the waiting room at Children's Hospital with all the others waiting for children to emerge intact from procedures that no child should have to endure. It is Angel Baby's second surgery. The first was before she could walk. Back then, Mother sat in the chair meditating as she waited a lifetime for the surgery to be over. In the waiting and meditation, mother entered the river of fear but was not swept away. After the current tore at her heart and pulled her thrashing underneath, she emerged gasping for breath no longer alone but connected all those who had sat before her in that same chair.

I imagine the wildest of geese will hold Angel Baby while she sleeps, transporting her to a soft sweet place and then back again into mother and father's arms. She will know her beauty (my prayer for her), even as her face swells and aches and bandages cover her shaved head, through our love.

What compassion can you find in your own heart to know your beauty, wholeness, connection to all who have sat in this chair before you?

My Undoing

In order to practice asana (yoga poses) as a meditative path, you'll need to learn how to let go of habitual responses to physical and mental distractions during practice. This will allow you to shed unnecessary effort in each pose, which will ultimately lead you to the feeling of effortless effort. Developing effortless effort transforms your practice of asana from mere exercise into a yogic journey toward absorption into your true infinite Self. John Schumacher

I practice my own undoing early each morning before the sun comes up, the dog has been walked, the child fed. Yoga does my undoing through the release at the root of the tongue, the grip of the right ribs, the letting of breath into the torque of the left shoulders. Undoing the knots of resistance to (inevitable) change, uncertainty, loss, and kindness, allows the breath to flow more deeply in the lungs, makes me aware of space in the body, peels back layers of self-doubt, regret, and shame encrusting the Soul. In that final back bend of the morning, when the sky is taking up a steely light, I let loose the birds from my chest and join them in song and flight.

Know Your Hunger

If I do not know my hunger, how can I feed myself? If I do not know my emptiness, how can I know love? If I do not know my illness, how can I heal? There, in the quiet darkness, is where I find myself, my compass, my knowing, which shows me what to do next.

What She Thought of When She Thought About Going Home

It might have the anniversary of my grandmother's birthday the other day; we are not quite sure what year she born. She spent the last ten years of her life in a nursing home.

When she thought about going home, Philly imagined walking up the back steps to the upstairs apartment with no pain in her knees. She carried a paper bag of groceries from the Start Market and entered a clean, if cluttered, kitchen. If she was tired, she could sit at the kitchen table and have a Kent, sip sweet coffee, soften a hard biscotti in the milk. The windows would be open allowing an autumn breeze to flow through the entire house; it was just the right temperature for making sauce. Not like the sweltering days of August when just turning on the front burner made her sweat.

The wist party at Knights of Columbus Hall would be starting up after the summer break. Philly, Carmela, and Nancy would go to Catholic Daughters meetings, once a month, to plan for the Halloween party, the holiday bazaar, the cape cod retreat. She would dress up as a Spanish dancer this year, long black veil made of lace pinned to her teased blond hair.

At home, she wouldn’t have to share a bedroom with a woman who groaned throughout the night or the one who snored whenever her chin dipped into her caved-in chest. She could move, effortlessly, in and out of the tub, up and down the steps, and look forward to preparing the salted cod for Christmas Eve dinner.

Hungry for a Blessing

Today I hunger for a blessing, a hand on my chest, forgiveness for my small mindedness. I bravely search for beauty in the brokenness, the ache under the ribs, the emptiness that remains. Can I be more like the oak, who gently let's go of everything that is dear to her even as the wind turns to winter and only the thinnest of nectar flows through her veins? She mourns the passing of paper thin leaves bursting with color as I mourn the bruised and fragile skin of my grandmother's shins. What did grandmother bless when she sat in the wheeled chair, a watch on each bent wrist marking a time that no longer existed for her; the wooden spoon to stir the sauce, the oil rising to the top, the stains on apron that would not be washed away?

What Remains

Through the empty branches the sky remains.
It is what you have. Rilke


I see the leaves changing color. The reds merging into the green, leaf litter on the earth, cool mornings. After the fall and the first frost, after your love leaves you, the cancer ravishes, the storm passes, the sun turns to the moon, what endures? What remains after everything else has passed through your fingers, like sand, as it always does? The sky, the sky, the sky...the sky remains and it is all that you need.