just real

I really love living in the Ozarks. As I look out my window, everything is kind of discombobulated and uneven. The natural world is not a manicured world here. It is interesting and alive with spirit. Being a child of the 60s, I totally embraced the no bra, no makeup, no pretense era.
The misfit that I am just fit in (well that is an oxymoron). Lets just say I found a little of myself in the movement. And you can take the girl out of the 60s, but you can't take the 60s out of the girl. Oh, I do appreciate the well groomed rose garden, but I find my imagination in the little purple flower popping up to say hello amid the just real. We have a world full of beauty queens and muscle beach types. We live in a world of superficial facebook relationships and fast food friendships. Oh how I long for the times we actually touched each other and thought and actually believed in "World Peace". A time before the world changed us, when we believed we would change the world. Now from the top of the rung to the bottom, we jockey for position with strong wills and weak imaginations. I am so grateful for my Ozark home. On a trip to the bank or the grocery store, I can spend more time visiting with neighbors than doing my errands. I am so thankful for the birds, the mountains, the weedy overgrown road sides, the slow moving and talking folks that couldn't give a rats ass what I drive or where I live. I can drive past the gym, straight to the coffee shop. I can forget to comb my hair and slip on a large sweatshirt to hide my bra-less frame and the people I meet will look at me in the eyes and stir my imagination with kind conversation. You can keep your CNN and Fox News, I prefer to get my whats up from Buck Pyatt or Barbara Harmony or one of many purple flowers growing up just to say hello, growing up through imagination and beauty.......just real.

green and ancient moments

Life is new everyday and everyday old.
Green grasses and new mini purple flowers,
shower my life with passion and wings.
Stone people with wrinkled stories give me
ground to hold me to truth and responsibility.
Wings for dreaming, roots for giving.
What a perfect union of mother earth and father sky, of green and ancient moments

bling bling arbor

We are close to spring in the Ozarks. I can reach my hand out and almost touch it. I hear the little hellos from the daffodils on the side of the road. I can envision walking in the Medicine Garden and feeling the rebirth all around me. I am aware that the redbuds and dogwoods are about to fill the garden of my life with extravagant beauty. And lilacs........the smell of fresh lilacs in large vases scattered thoughout the house, with the windows open and a gentle breeze filling my nest with the awareness of my own rebirth. I love lilacs and lilies of the valley. Lilies of the Valley, pure and innocence, just plain evidence of God's abiding love! I can still remember being a child and waiting for spring vacation from school, knowing that summer and freedom was right around the corner. I have never lost that sence of wonder and hope. My life has been filled with these moments and I am too stubborn to let hatred, negativity and evil overpower the love I feel all around me. The risen Christ, the hope of humanity, the Creator of this spring rebirth has not for one moment left me or you. The cold of life and winter may create in us doubt and pain. Do not be fooled by what shouts for attention. Listen to the small voice. A lily of the valley is more powerful than a storehouse of weapons. A small candle will always illuminate no matter how dark the surrounding. I pray for you today, that in your heart you may have hope and a glimpse of spring!