Empty...

They hadn’t drawn him wide enough to add a heart.

He was a stick figure and thus had no depth or width

He was merely a doodle in the margin of someone’s imagination.

But Oliver wanted so badly to be a real boy.

She wears silver bangles...

It's the sound they make that announces she's in the room.

She uses her hands to punctuate her words as she speaks and the bracelets dance around on her wrists.

I listen as she talks and the bracelets tinkle.

I close my eyes and remember my childhood and the sound of the wind chimes hanging from my grandmothers back porch.

Ode to childhood...

It was in the time before the wheel chair.

Things were still possible and dreams could still come true.

Fairy tales still had happy endings and the world made sense.

It was a time of innocence and bliss.

Then came the doctors and hospitals and fear.

And childhood was no more, replaced by heartbreak and loss.

And the dreams were now nightmares and the stories had no happy
endings and innocence no longer applied...

My Grandmothers ring...

She gave it to me on my 18th birthday.

I'd never seen her wear it, not once.

The gold was a rose gold with a design so intricate you could almost imagine little elves had craved it.

It held the most beautiful moonstone I had ever seen.

In the right light you would swear it wasn't even there, just the glow of it remained and you'd  have to reach out and touch its smooth surface to reassure yourself it hadn't just up and disappeared...

"Bella Luna" she called it; beautiful moon.

I rarely wore it, too afraid that I'd lose it or damage it.

And so it sat in a box for 20 odd years

Last week I gave it to my daughter.

She of the will of iron, the brave of heart who embraces all things in life.

She who colors outside the lines and dances to her own drummer's beat.

I gave it to my daughter and that minute she put it on and she has worn it ever since.



Lemon tea...

                                    

When I was a little girl I had trouble with my tonsils. I had a lot of sore throats...

Grandma would make me a cup of her special feel better lemon tea with a big spoonful of honey and I would fall asleep while she told me stories about fairies and princes and happily ever after's...

I remained blissfully unaware until recently that each one of those cups of tea contained a stiff shot of Grandpa's whisky...

The box...

It sat on the shelf of the bookcase for as long as I can remember.

I never really thought too much about it or what was in it, it was just there.

Sitting next to the bowl of wax fruit and  the battered copy of  The Fannie Farmer Cook Book

When my mother died it took me quite a while to go through her things and when I did my heart just wasn't in it at the time.

Then I came to the box.

It was filled with small pieces of all sorts and colors of scraps of paper and on each one she had written a wish, a prayer.

Some were big, some small, some were long, some were short.

Some just one word.

But there they were hundreds of hopes and wishes and prayers all slipped  into the old oak box.

Quietly waiting in the hopes that one day they would be heard and answered...




Laura
May 15, 1943-February 6, 2016

Human concerto...

                      

She held the instrument close.

She wanted the notes of her life to accompany the music of her soul.

She wanted all others to listen to their own music and applaud loudly.

Then perhaps someday everyone might listen to the strains of
each others melodies...

and delight in the symphony of humanity.