Tag: Life

The day after…

TimLeave a comment

No, not the day after the apocalypse.

Rather, the day after posting a couple of times here on my blog, after a long time.

I even had someone from long ago say hello, whom I knew from the days that I was posting about the Netflix show, “Sense 8” twelve years ago…which was amazing because it stirred within me something way down deep, about human nature, about what it means to be human and alive, and emotional, empathetic, even empathic.

As for me today…well, this is why I’m writing now, right? This is what blog’s and WordPress and writing is all about, I guess.

I wish…I wish I could wave a magic wand and just make peace and love all over the world. Now I’m sounding like John Lennon (of the Beatles) who wrote the most beautiful song, “Imagine“.

Peace, love, like a dove…flies round the world, not knowing where, or if, or dare, to land.

Not knowing where, to alight, without fright, and to call it “home”.

Home, where the heart is, is a start. That’s our place to start, while we’re apart, most of us fluttering here and there not knowing where….to land, to take our stand…

And yet, hope lives! That’s the one thing that no one or no thing can take from us!

Hope lives, hope gives.

We ARE all one.

As well it should…

TimLeave a comment

It’s been a while…should I smile or frown without my crown?

What crown you ask? I’m glad you asked, or if you didn’t, well that’s ok, because today is really a very new day, to pen my thoughts, long since absent. Why is that, did I hear you ask? No matter, this is my task.

You see, Life as we know it, is actually not quite that, not at all a thing we can hang our hat. It is, rather, something else — more “Top-shelf” as my friend would say, and yet I sigh with a bit dismay. Not at life, I cannot do that.

I dismay because, well a dear friend died today.

There you have it! While it’s been a while, I can’t deny how difficult it is for me to still here write. I’m not sure why…old age perhaps? Well, I know many for whom that’s not something to slow them down! They become more prolific! Or is it…because they fear their death grows near? Most likely, I think. Not that that’s a bad thing — their increased action as that time gets close, before they become just another ghost, to have one last fling, to share their best, I think that’s good! As well it should.

As well it should.

Tumultuous Times…

TimLeave a comment

As I sit overlooking my patio into the stark white wall of the apartment building across from me, sun on it, blinding me. Hold on, I need to draw the drapes…

Ok, much better, but now I need to go find my computer glasses to continue….

Computer glasses on. Ok. Ready to go. Now I have to take a moment due to all the distractions to remember why I wanted to sit down to write this.

Ok…got it. Well, it’s 6:30 pm here in beautiful Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. I should emphasize “beautiful” because there is no smoke in the sky and the temperature is a relatively comfortable 26 degrees Celsius, or 79 degrees Fahrenheit…quite warm but NOT warm compared to so many other temperatures across the world right now! Right now a LOT of the world is in extreme heat…breaking all time records. Thousands of people are dying of heat stroke and exhaustion. This is climate warming just warming up they say. The worst is yet to come.

As for me this evening, I’m ever so grateful to not have to turn on my air conditioning. My fans are all I need. What a blessing.

I was going to turn on the TV to watch the latest news. I think it’s good to keep up on current events, but tonight I couldn’t do it. I thought, what if I was living 100 years ago…I might have a radio, if I was rich. Or 150 years ago — no radio then. In the evenings they had NO entertainment options, other than walking down to the town centre perhaps to see if there was something going on, but that was it! No movie theatres or TV or radio news, no phones or computers. All they had to do was whatever was pressing…get firewood or coal for the stove so they could cook tomorrow. Entertain the children or grandchildren. If the weather was good, sit outside and chat with FAMILY, gaze up to the sky — a sky that had, oh my, thousands of stars to see. Then off to bed, sleeping peacefully — not to be awakened by sirens or cars or garbage or delivery trucks clanging and banging, and….and……!

Sounds like another world doesn’t it? Well, it was OUR world not that long ago. How far we’ve strayed in the name of progress. Not that progress and technology isn’t good! It is, but we’re in a transition stage of history now that is pretty messy, rough and tumultuous.

We are living in very uncertain and difficult times. World war 3 could be just around the corner with the conflict happening between Russia and Ukraine right now! We could even see nuclear weapons being used! Even this medium, the Internet, could go down if we go into a World War, which is partly why I’m writing this here tonight, with hopes for the best, but fearful of the worst!

What can we do in the meantime? Get political perhaps. Write to the editors of whatever papers are still left. Have a voice on social media. Post on blogs like this. Look out for ways that we can make a difference while we can? Something, anything.

God help us all.

Tim

One DNA strand away…

TimLeave a comment

We all like to think, we’re rather distinct, but in fact we’re not, at least not as much as we like to think.

You see, DNA is a thing that distinguishes this from that. One stand, or even less in fact, makes you as different from this or that.

It’s not that we’re not unique. That’s it, in fact, that makes it such a feat, that little strand.

And so we stand, all proudly so! But this much we all should know — that a little strand of a thing so small, can make the difference between us all.

In the meantime, perhaps, look around you now – see, we’re each unique, and in that wisdom I beg you seek…

If we see all that we’ll have no fear, you see, or future tear, because we’ll see the good within us all and live our lives, I pray, with peace, or dare I say – love? For all.

Oh, so dear…

TimLeave a comment

I once was a desperate man. A desperate man, yes, I was.

Until I realized that desperate was as desperate does and that it would only bring me more because.

Because my situation, you see, was such that — a man suddenly without a home. A man suddenly without his children. A man suddenly without most everything then, made me useless and unable to do what I wished I could have done, to do what was left so desperately left undone, but I couldn’t because of she.

She held the rope tied tight around my neck.

She wrote the narrative of my days back then.

She decided everything to my dismay.

She is not a projection of my own dark mind. Not upon which a therapist would make their dime, not on me, oh no, oh no.

Yet, she. Still she. Sadly so, and upon this wretched earth I go with barely a day’s reprieve from the worst of her!

I’m done with SHE, I call her IT! I rid her gleely with my spit!

Yet she was IT, one time — a time very long gone I scarcely know. A sliver of the memory remains yet still, remains upon this hill of memories lost and barely gained, brings back, I must admit not just a little pain…

My heart does yearn for those better years. The time I tenderly held it, she, or her — my sweet, oh so dear.

Oh, so dear….

Still me…

TimLeave a comment

Today was a day that I wish I never lived.

Today was a day that I was grateful to be alive.

Today was a day, unlike any other.

Today was just today, and for that I’m grateful.

Nothing bad happened amongst the mix.

Nothing upset me more than this.

It was a nothing day, amongst the rest.

For that I’m grateful, although that wavers, the judgement upon it all can’t be.

Today, it was….still just me.

I should feel guilty for being so selfish, I should be fraught!

Ha ha! But I’m not, because, to be able to reflect upon my lot from today or tomorrow or yesterday on how to be…reminds me that I am…just still me.

The end…

TimLeave a comment

This space…life, as it grows dim, do I dare to let him in?

He has haunted me from my youth, since I awakened.

I was 8, a day which gives me fright. But I then saw there that life was IT.

This IT I’ve called it ever since. A blessing, one would or should suppose, but not for me all these years as I’ve posed.

Posed for what? To reach an age that today is defined from yesterday. I’m old.

We will, I hope, live much longer, but that doesn’t mean I’ll grow any stronger.

Rather, the clock defines us still. Will not, will wither, will it be it as it may.

Not to dismay, it is our plunder, our way upon this earth asunder.

As for me, I will stand up tall and take my fate, as much we all.

Slay me now or slay me yet, I take my odds on life’s sure bet, that we will know when to end the show and be as yet, another remembered.

Life…

TimLeave a comment

So many of us are tired, with Covid and with life, especially if we are older. Perhaps it is the bell ring of our time in this form of being that we call Life, nearing its end? As for me, I welcome the great, the best of sleep ever. This life tires me. There is no ultimate solace, no here and now release from its daily grasp upon our souls. Nothing other than our sweet repose, asleep, in peace, forever. 

To be able to see our end in such great light, surely brings us up to our lifelong fight, for this for that and the other thing. Time now, me thinks, to sing! It is not that which we have feared! Rather, I suspect, a thing to actually be revered.

Life, on the other side…

TimLeave a comment

Time to write. I have a dear friend recently diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer. She has 3 months to 3 years to live. Either way, it’s terminal and her time will be up. Fact is, our time in this form of being that I call, “Life” is short. Even shorter than we think, especially as we get older. When we are young, the time-to-the-end seems long, but as we age, that time distinction seems to shorten, which I suppose is natural and normal.

That said, we resist the notion of dying, and that is normal and natural too. In my experience, my resistance to dying and death was much stronger when I was younger. As I have aged, the thought of not-being is, I must say happily, not as daunting.

Here’s why I think this: Life is bloody challenging! Life for the most part it is a huge challenge and struggle, to do it right. And there’s the rub — “to do it right”. Doing it right for me here in Canada is completely different from how that is defined in another country and culture, like Egypt, or Zimbabwe. Every culture, every group of different people, have their own definitions of what, “doing it right” actually is. Even within our own culture we have big differences in opinion about how we should live our lives, which brings me to my main point.

If there are so many differing ideas and opinions about how we define living life well, what is the real value of OURS compared to THEIRS? I don’t think there is ANY value, idea or opinion about Life and how it should be lived that is any “better” than any others — anywhere. I’m not talking about stuff that includes killing others. THAT is another matter that I think boils down to common, fundamental human religious or political ideas, values and opinions — a topic for another time.

So, getting back to my point, I think that the things we hold true to and value, in the perspective of world-cultural viewpoints, are relative and perhaps even meaningless. This doesn’t mean that we need to give up on our particular world-views. Rather, recognize that the way that we think about some things are very relative, and realize that a new view gives us FREEDOM. Freedom to let go, to relax and to in some other way enjoy life — as it should be!

And when this form of being that we call Life comes to an end, I think for many older people — especially those very old or sick, it can actually be a relief — freedom from the pain and hardship. An end to this form of being called Life, yes, which is an unavoidable and inevitable end for us ALL eventually. We don’t know what’s on the other side! It could be glorious!!! That’s certainly what I’m hoping for…

What is the answer?

TimLeave a comment

Vainglory hope is the answer. How many people have been puzzled by life, hoping desperately to find an answer to the meaning of it all, but die before they find it? I think most, like 99.9 percent.

“Oh, Tim’s full of doom and gloom tonight!”. I may be. But you know, I’m 57 now (2016). 7 years ago, were it not for modern medicine, I’d be 7 years dead. What’s that all mean? That “God” has some plan for me, which is why I’m still alive today? I doubt it. If he has, I haven’t figured it out yet, 7 years later. I’d like to hope that God had some sort of special plan for me, but you know, at this stage of life and living, I’ve learned a lot, and am ok being a bit skeptical now.

The fact is, as I said above, most people die before they figure life out, before they have their epiphany, before they have the “Damascas Road” experience. That’s just the way it is. Why? I dunno.

What can we make of these dismal statistics? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. I don’t think we were created for “something special”, folks. Yes, we are each unique and wonderful human beings, but that’s as far as it goes, I think. Whatever we can give or do through to the end of today is itself a huge blessing. I know.

As the bible says, “For today we live and tomorrow we die”. Maybe that’s really it! If we can keep that in mind each day that we awaken, then we might make a difference in the lives of the people around us for that next day’s grace. If we don’t, well…no one will really notice. Oh well.

Today is all we have, folks. Tomorrow is a crap-shoot, a blessing if given…another day to make another day count for those around us. Let’s do at least that.