I Am An Oak Tree.

I am an oak tree.

Anchored and foreboding;

Protective and growing.

Drawing my strength from the soil, the earth.

Reaching ever further with blossoms and new birth.

With small, seeded fingers towards the sun, the sky.

YET

Windows.

Rain drops falling.
Questions calling.
Ever coming, humming, running down the windows of this room.

Flooding the streets.
Flooding my thoughts.
Ever pressing, prodding, peering through the windows of this mind.

A Casino Paradigm.

Relationships are like a game of craps.

It is hard to know how the dice are going to roll.

Winners sometimes lose and losers sometimes roll the hard twelve with a solid bet.

Sometimes you just can chalk your losses up to the price of a good time while it lasted, but other times you walk away wondering whether the objective was to earn actual cash or just grow that shiny stack of red tokens.  If the lights and jingles have somehow numbed your discernment until we are all cheering and strategizing towards a disappointingly counterfeit payout.

But every day you are faced with the choice to either roll the dice for another round or to just cash out and walk away.

Thinkful.

For clean, blue sky; for grass that grows.
In my lungs; beneath my toes.
Of flower and nature, of weather and light,
I will be thinkful. And thankful.

For ice cream cones; for fast food stops.
Food in my pantry; in the school lunch box.
Of turkey and potatoes, of hot coffee, iced tea,
I shall be thinkful. And thankful.

For laughter and silence, for all in between;
For laundry that’s folded, a house that is clean;
For fingerprints and milk spills, for lost homework and grass stains,
I am thinkful. And thankful.

For memory lane and for yesteryear,
For hope in a future that’s not yet here.
Of opportunities given, of priveleges shared,
I shall be thinkful. And be thankful.

Thistle.

Love cannot a hero make,
Death cannot a sorrow take;
Deep within the fighting soul,
The thorny, thistled seed of more.

Words cannot a war be won,
Pleasures not a past outrun;
Faith along the slippery slope,
Grasping for redeeming hope.

Tomorrow cannot today rewrite,
Darkness not always swallow light;
Time and truth shall rise from sleep,
Soul and flesh will find relief.

Thumbs Up.

Ever since I was little, I have distinguished a difference between the hitchhiker that stands on the side of the highway with his thumb out and the one that walks and walks and walks and occasionally raises his thumb to the wind as a car approaches.  There is a world of difference, you know.

I have a chronic condition called Wounded Bird Syndrome.   It is a black hole of compassion for the underdog and downtrodden of society.  As a kid, I always picked the ugliest runt kitten from the litter because I feared no one else would.  I don’t know where I first contracted it, but it still flares up every so often, and I feel compelled to pour out my heart and resources to rectify some universal wrong that has befallen someone.

Peace On Earth.

I work in a salon and day spa now.  As we enter the holiday season, we are working like elves wrapping gift cards and stocking for the great influx of Memphis housewives that will be primped and polished into the Stepford standard.  I stumbled across an odd juxtaposition though.  In talking to the head of the massage department, I discovered that they are moderately slow during the Thanksgiving and Christmas season, and it is in January and February that their books began to fill.  Is it possible that as we light and trim our houses and trees, that we also highlight and trim ourselves in preparation for the house guests and the corporate parties and the many pictures taken?  And that only in the haggard aftermath of holiday schmoozing do we pause to note the tension in our shoulders and that dull ache in the lower back?  

Spellcheck.

You would think that parents have ample time to name their impending child.  Nine months, after all.  And yet somehow children are still given unforgiving and seemingly misspelled monikers that will be scrawled across their school papers and monogrammed across their foreheads until some sympathizing soul finds a justified and redemptive nickname.   

I have come across some of these parents over the years, and I feel a sense of obligation to help.  For the child’s sake.  For example, there was a family who wanted to name their daughter McLean, which despite looking like a low-cal menu item, actually rhymes with McShane.   I suggested that they go with Maclayne, which they did.  Whew!   Bullet averted.