thao nguyen, originally uploaded by .sarahcass..

“Swimming Pools” – Thao with the Get Down Stay Down

We are sore the length of our bodies
We restore water we cry
We are nothing if not your granddaughters
We have been nothing but dignified

We, we brave bee stings and all
And we don’t dive, we cannonball
And we splash our eyes full of chemicals
Just so there’s none left for little girls
Just so there’s none left for little girls

Roll, roll, roll up your denim
We’ve got to pedal 10 hours south
They pour it down from their balconies
You’ve got to push all the doubt to the side of your mouth

We, we brave bee stings and all
And we don’t dive, we cannonball
And we splash our eyes full of chemicals
Just so there’s none left for little girls
Just so there’s none left for little girls

We are sore the length of our bodies
We restore water we cry
We are nothing if not your granddaughters
We have been nothing but dignified

We, we brave bee stings and all
And we don’t dive, we cannonball
And we splash our eyes full of chemicals
Just so there’s none left for little girls

“We don’t dive, we cannonball” this phrase caught me the other day. It carries feelings of freedom and uninhibitedness, both of which I’m finding elusive right now. I have had those things in my life and I am grateful for the memories and laughs.

I look forward to happy uninhibitedness in the future! Just avert your eyes please…it might not be pretty.

Here are a couple more songs:

“Bag of Hammers” – Thao and the Get Down Stay Down

“Beat (Health, Life and Fire)” – Thao and The Get Down Stay Down

Thao on MySpace

Thao Nguyen on Daytrotter

flying dreams 2, originally uploaded by klynslis.

Have you ever flown in your dreams? I hadn’t. Until last weekend, that is. Frankly, I felt cheated of the experience…maybe I wasn’t special enough or creative enough to be worthy of a flying dream.

I finally flew. But not in the way I had always imagined it would be…superman like, or bird like…soaring, arms outstretched, wind in my hair, feeling powerful and free.

Nope, that is not what happened.

In my dream, I finally took to the sky using a motion that was very similar to the breaststroke, frog kicks and all. Yikes! Graceful? No. Fluid? No. Fast? No. Awkward and slow? You bet. I remember thinking during the dream that I now knew why I hadn’t flown before….I had been doing it all wrong!! I had the wrong idea about how it worked and now that I knew the secret, I would be able to fly at will.

Upon waking, I had to laugh, it was such a silly feeling, floundering around in the air like that. I am not sure that I really want to fly again if that is how I do it.

Mallards Reflecting, originally uploaded by kanjigirl.

Starr and I took a nice walk Wednesday afternoon. It was a beautiful day, Starr was full of information, ideas and gossip. It was fun.

I posted this song last month, but it seemed to fit the day…well, mostly:

“Walk in the Park” – Oh No! Oh My!

sun glittered wing, originally uploaded by in touch.

I am in a dragonfly mood today. There are so many beautiful dragonfly pictures on Flickr, it was hard to choose…

Aiming toward the mark, originally uploaded by j_jyarbrough.

And just when I thought I didn’t have a decent song to add, these songs arrived in my email…thanks to Fingertips!

“When Water Comes to Life” – Cloud Cult

“Swimming” – Shelley Short

Reaching For The Clouds, originally uploaded by Jim-AR.

I saw her standing at the end of the hallway, the end that opens into the living room. It was a couple months after the accident, after Sunny’s tragic passing. I was rushing a bit, doing housework. I don’t remember if there was a reason for the rush, possibly just to be finished with the work.

I took the full bag of garbage from the kitchen and placed it in the garage. Returning to the kitchen, I realized that I had forgotten to grab a new garbage bag for the kitchen can. To the hall, turning right and taking a couple steps towards the living room before I notice that I am headed in the wrong direction. I stop short, and turn around back towards the laundry room where I keep those types of supplies. As I am turning, I look up towards the living room and there is someone standing there, female, mostly in silhouette, but I did see that her clothes were white. She was just standing there facing me, arms at her sides. I wasn’t shocked to see someone there, I didn’t think twice about it; I assumed that it was Starr.

Returning moments later to the kitchen, with garbage bag in hand, I expected to find Starr there, but the room was empty. Odd. Leaving the bag on the counter, I went looking for her. It had taken me less than 15 seconds to retrieve the bag, and I knew that I had glimpsed someone standing there. Starr was the only logical choice, as it is just the two of us who live here. As I start walking into the living room, she noisily comes up the stairs from her basement bedroom…wearing black.

I knew that there hadn’t been enough time for Starr to have gone from standing in the hall dressed in white, to coming up the stairs dressed in black in the time it took me to get a garbage bag and walk into the living room, but I had to ask it out loud anyway. “You weren’t just up here were you?”

“No, Mom. Why?” Well…and I tell her what I saw.

So, was it Sunny? This is my first thought. I don’t know. I do know that I saw someone, something. Beyond that, I just don’t know. Darkness suggested that it could be a vision of Starr’s future, the symbolism of black and white, darkness and light. A message that things will get better, that despite the overwhelming never ending sadness and uncertainty that we are currently experiencing, that there is and will be light in the future.

I haven’t seen her or anything similar since. However, Sunny and I did share a “Pappaw” dream, which I will post soon.

Sidenote: Daisies were Sunny’s favorite flower. I always imagined that she liked the white ones, but I don’t know for sure. I saw the photo above last summer and was reminded of her.

Pink lotus, originally uploaded by tanakawho.

I have decided to (try and) read Oprah’s book club selection A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose and (maybe) participate in the online classes.* I am less than 30 pages into the book, and …so far…Eckhart Tolle has said so many things that make sense to me. I don’t know if he is right, but I do know what I have felt and known since I was five or six years old. This is when I first remember thinking, there is more, there is something we are missing.

As I read this book last night, I was reminded of the Unitarian Universalist principles which include: The inherent worth and dignity of every person; Justice, equity and compassion in human relations; Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth; A free and responsible search for truth and meaning; The goal of world community with peace, liberty and justice for all; Respect for the interdependent web of existence of which we are a part.

I don’t know if it will continue to make sense and ring true to me, but so far I am pleasantly surprised.

*As you can see, I am a very decisive person!