YKYW - Nursing Student Blog

I didn’t write this, but I wish I had.

All up and down my street I can smell stuffing and spices. It’s quiet outside, and very still. There’s little traffic today. The air is warm but autumnal. This little warmth is a grace note between one measure and the next. Winter hasn’t come yet, but it’s on its way. This is the last of the harvest time. A time to let ourselves be filled and renewed.

Grace.

What an odd thing.

We speak of “saying grace,” of being “full of grace.” Dancers have it, poor losers don’t. It can be both mercy and charm. To be full of grace can mean to have the indulgence of God, to be sanctified and elevated through some mysterious and luminous inner quality. It can also mean simple thoughtfulness. It is the wedding of mercy and wisdom. It is care. We practice it when we are charitable to others. We experience it in our lives in moments of clarity and understanding; when a kindness is done to us undeservingly, or when, after an undeserved ill turn, we find acceptance after all. Forgiveness? Surely that.

All I have sought this year is grace. The grace to accept change and responsibility. The grace to let things pass from me that need to pass, let things die when it is time for them to die. Where I have done wrong, and I have done it, I have prayed for the grace to make amends, but I am not graceful. I have prayed for the deeper grace of understanding, and been answered with more questions than I know how to ask. I have harrowed the dead soil of my heart with only the good graces of others to sustain me.

In the end, it is not something I can hold, but only something that comes to me, passes through me, a state of existence. I have dug deeply into myself, given of myself, hoping to find it, and found that it isn’t something I can keep by holding it. Only by giving it away.

If we reap what we sow, I have sowed better seed than I believed I possessed, for I’ve reaped the rewards of better friendship than I deserve. My friends, my family, they are whatever grace I possess, and I am sorry I don’t often have the words to say it with all the grace it deserves.

But I am grateful for it.

For all of you, I wish comfort. To those returning to family, and to those separated from it. To those who will be gathering in, and to those who have nowhere to gather.

For everyone nursing new lives, new projects, new loves through the shadowy part of the year, I wish banked hearth-fires and tight bonds. Cherishing what we have doesn’t make it last one whit longer, but awareness of it is a rare gift. That’s grace, too. Allow it.

For those mourning loss, separation, or absence, I wish you comfort and peace. That which dies feeds new life. We cannot pass through such holocausts unchanged, but we can trust that the raw and burnt bones of our inner landscape will, someday, be clothed once again in new green. One of the mysteries of grace is that it is true regeneration.

A few of you have, over the past year or two, become more dear to me than my own hands, or the work of my hands, and when it comes to saying it I’m as dumb as any beast in the field. But I’m saying it now. Thank you. I have so little to give back, so little to weigh against so much gratitude and hope. So little to give back in return for what you give me.

Even to those of you I don’t know: you are the reason I speak into the dark. This is the only way I will ever meet so many of you, but I am glad to have found you here.

When I think about it, it’s profound. This is all the time you will ever have, and yet you choose to spend a little of it with me.

A well-known fact of grace is that at times it comes even to the undeserving. Thank you for that.

by naamah_darling

If you are looking for something special to do for National Breast Cancer Awareness Month this October, consider this beautiful piece from Storypeople. It’s called “Lifetime”. Here are the words:

We’re here to end it,
I said & she said, No,
we’re here to begin it
& then she turned &
opened her arms
& everywhere I could see,
there were people,
like bright birds, calling
with a thousand voices

& suddenly I understood.
Here is where it begins.
With all of us, together
giving our daughters
a world worth loving
for a lifetime to come.

From the site: All profits from the sale of this print, both here on the site & at our gallery partners worldwide, will go to fund breast cancer research for as long as it takes to find the Cure.

Be sure to check out his other stuff. It’s amazing!

Tomorrow morning, SK and I are heading to California for a week to celebrate our birthdays.  We’ll be in San Jose, San Francisco, Napa, Monterey, and Mendocino.  From a sunrise hot air balloon ride, to winery tours, and sunset dinners overlooking the ocean, it is a dream vacation.

But then, dream vacations becoming reality shouldn’t surprise me since finding the love of my life is already one dream come true.

Thank you, SK, for this dream and all the others that I will share with you.

Pauly’s starting a lot of trends around the blog-o-sphere right now, and this is my attempt to rip off one of his ideas:  The 10-minute update!

I’ve been really bad about updating lately because I keep getting behind on my entries.  Something new happens, and I think to myself “I cannot blog that until I blogged what happened three days ago.”

So, here’s ten minutes:

I’m so thrilled about SK’s good news.  She called to tell me about it as I was rushing around, getting ready to leave for school.  While I was excited, it didn’t really hit me until I was on my way home that afternoon.  I was listening to the radio, and heard a commercial for The 3 Day.  As it ended, I had goose bumps on my arms and a lump in my throat.  The next song on the radio?  Live Like You Were Dying, by Tim McGraw.

I started crying.  And I’m not talking about the ’single tear running down my face’ kind of crying either.  I’m talking about the ‘gut-wrenching, stomach in knots, can’t see to drive’ kind of crying.  I finally pulled over and cried away all the worry and fear that had been building up since last October.

See, when I told the story about how I met SK, I didn’t mention that I later found out part of her reluctance to go to the concert with me was that it was her first day on chemo.  When she didn’t have a drink at dinner, I didn’t really think anything of it.

The next day, as we sat in her living room, she explained to me that she was on chemo, and I learned about leukemia.

As the final tears slid down my cheeks, I picked my head up off my steering wheel and sensed that taste of fear leave the back of my throat.  It sounds like such a cliché, but I swear that a 500 pound weight had just been lifted off my chest.  I took my first full breath in 15 months.

A couple of weeks ago, I fell even more in love with SK. What was so special about that night, you ask? We went to a dedication ceremony for an elementary school. I bet you’re thinking, “A school dedication? How boring! What could a school dedication ceremony possibly have to do with loving your girlfriend?”

Well, my friend, this wasn’t just any school dedication ceremony. The community decided to honor SK’s grandparents for their tremendous contributions to the area, and named the school to honor them! I am lucky that SK shares her family with me.

The ceremony was beautiful, emotional and inspirational. After it was over, the children flocked around her grandparents and asked them to autograph their programs. Even the teachers were lining up just for the opportunity to shake their hands and exchange a few simple words of kindness.

So what does any of this have to do with my love for SK? It’s simple. These are her roots. The very same people whose contributions to North Texas have been so significant that they had a school named after them are her grandparents. In her family, the tradition of generosity extends beyond well-intentioned promises into something greater. This is her heritage, and so much a part of the wonderful person she is to everyone around her that “SK Elementary” is probably just a few years down the road.

We arrived in Vegas on Saturday, and had to deal with a pesky car rental company. We had a reservation, but they were out of cars! Instead of dealing with the headache and starting our trip off on the wrong foot, SK found a good deal at another car company and we headed to our hotel.

The Paris in Las Vegas is beautiful! Be warned though - the walk from the parking garage to the registration counter is killer when you’re hauling luggage. The rooms are large and roomy, and we even had a view of the Bellagio fountains.

We had lunch in one of the restaurants inside Paris called Mon Ami, Gabi. We drank champagne and made googly eyes at each other over French toast and eggs benedict. After spending some time, uhm, settling into our rooms, I headed over to the Bellagio to play some poker and then met Pauly and Sanscour for the first time. If you are interested, you can read more about it in my poker blog, or check out Pauly’s version.

Sunday we decided to go see the Hoover dam. I probably would have enjoyed it more if we didn’t have to sit in traffic. They are doing construction on the road, and they make you go through a security check point like you just came over the border. Learning more about history was nice, but the coolest thing about the Hoover dam? The little chipmunks (or whatever they are) that will actually eat out of your hand! The view during the drive was pretty, but I decided I like my mountains green and covered in trees.

Once we got home from over sight seeing mission, we had to start getting ready for Zumanity. We had dinner at the Gallagher’s Steakhouse. Whispering to each other over candle light, we talked about the year and reminisced over our early dating stories. The steak was tasty, but the best part of the meal was the green beans. Fresh and crisp, oh so tasty! Just make sure your kissing partner eats some too, because they were heavy on the garlic!

Our seats to Zumanity were awesome! We were in the first row of chairs, with the love seats in front of us. We considered getting tickets in the front row of love seats, but for some reason we were under the impression that there were in groups of 4, and we had no desire to sit that close to another couple. But, our view was awesome and right near the center.

As for the show, if I hadn’t seen any other Cirque du Soleil shows, I probably would be raving about how much I just loved this show. I guess I went in expecting something…more. Don’t get me wrong, it had some very sexy scenes, and definitely managed to crank my engine, if you get my meaning! But, SK’s whispering in my ear had a lot to do with that…Hubba Hubba.

What was I talking about? Oh right, Zumanity. The hula hoop girl in her Catholic school girl skirt was smokin’, and the water scene with the two topless women slipping across each other…yummy. There was even eye candy for the ladies (or gay men)! SK and I even commented to each other about the hotness of this one male performer. Sounds awesome, doesn’t it? And, while it was cool, I guess I expected something more like Varequi, only naked. But, there were lots of boobs, dildos, fruit, and sexy men and women, so how bad could it really be?

We had an afternoon flight on Monday, so we checked out of our hotel and planned to do a little gambling after brunch. Pauly came out to join us, and we were so swept away in the conversation that we had to rush to the airport! As he put it:

It’s always fun to spend time with people you have common interests in… I mean Jaxia loves playing poker and loves women. I happen to love both too. It some weird twist of Six Degrees of Pauly, I discovered that SK was childhood friends with Beano, one of my good friends from college. Small world, huh? Seriously, how random is that? I meet someone I played poker online with for the first time and her life partner lived across the street from a guy who was in my fraternity and I followed Phish around in Japan with.

SK and I decided that 3 days and 2 nights is not enough time in Vegas. Hopefully we can plan a longer trip next time we go.

I’ve learned that traveling together is a true test of relationship compatibility. If you can spend that much time together and still not get on each other’s nerves, then ya’ll really have a chance of making it. SK is a great travel companion. We can spend hours in the car together and never turn on the radio. We both hate waiting at the airport, so we wait until the last minute to go to the terminal. She likes the window seat, and I like the aisle. She doesn’t mind when I want to stop and read all the signs.

Sometimes it’s the little things that make me smile, and remind me how great we are together.

Some nights when I cannot sleep, I lie in the stillness and listen to the sound of your breathing. My eyes trace the lines of your face, the curves of your body, and at the very moment that peace washes over me, you snuggle into me and pull my hand tight across your chest. Burying my face into your neck, the soft scent of you engulfs me and the sweetness carries me away.

I read once that the ancient Egyptians had fifty words for sand & the Eskimos had a hundred words for snow. I wish I had a thousand words for love, but all that comes to mind is the way you move against me while you sleep & there are no words for that.

From Storypeople by Brian Andreas

48 hours from now, we will be in Vegas celebrating our anniversary and watching Zumanity.

You know you’re jealous!

At the time, I didn’t really think of it as a miracle. But looking back on it today, I realize that’s what it was – a miracle.

Miracle - an extremely outstanding or unusual event, thing, or accomplishment

The circumstances in and of themselves were probably not miraculous – in my life, yes, but not in general. The miracle was cloaked in words. She asked me, “What are you thinking.” And I said: (more…)

I had never known, never even imagined for a heartbeat, that there might be a place for people like us.
-Denis Johnson, the last line from Jesus’ Son

As most of you know, I am not a morning person. Usually, the mother voice in my head has to do a lot of poking and prodding, threatening and cajoling in order to get me moving in the mornings. This morning, while if I were being watched Sliver-esque style would appear the same, was so totally different from anything that I’ve ever experienced that I feel compelled to write it down.

I lay there, snuggled up warm under the blankets, and dawn came creeping into the room. The coming day teasing my eyelids, I gradually became aware of my own body against someone wonderful. I moved my pillow closer to hers and pressed myself to her, reveling in the simple pleasure of her warm skin on mine. I buried my face in that perfect place between her neck and shoulder, immersing myself in the delicious scent that belongs only to her. The joy of being there with her washed over me and that is when it hit me – “This is where I am supposed to be.” When I am with her, I experience a peacefulness that I have never known before – a sense that the world will find her comfort and the raging storms will find their serenity. I have never felt so…safe. Having found in her the feelings I’ve spent a lifetime searching for, I couldn’t bring myself to spoil the beautiful intimacy - the softly whispered sleepy words of love that I recall now with a secret smile.

Do you remember Herman’s Head? The TV show from the early 90s?

Louise : {to the waiter} And I’ll have a tropical drink with a little umbrella in it. {to all}
Don’t you just love when you take the little umbrella home, you put on a
little doll’s hat and pretend you’re the largest song and dance man?

{Everyone looks at Louise, stunned}

Louise : Oh my God, I’m the only one.

Most of my life, I’ve felt that alone. Not lonely, no, there’s a difference. Alone. Like nobody else in the world “got” me. I don’t feel like that anymore. In my early morning haze, I came to the realization that even if she had never danced in a little doll’s hat with a paper umbrella, she would understand my need to do something the rest of the world would consider strange. There is no doubt in my mind…she would clap and cheer me and even join my silly dance. If that is not perfect, I don’t believe it exists.

I am right where I need to be.

First posted to my LJ on Nov 23, 2004