Flo

Last night, well really, early this morning, I woke myself up laughing out loud.

It’s such a funny thing to do.  Having never done this before, I want to do it again – like when you turn in a circle, round and round, until you’re dizzy and fall down, only to jump up and do it again and again.   I want to wake up because I’ve laughed so hard in my dream that I’m laughing for real.  In the dream, I had the giggles and couldn’t quit laughing.  I had already wakened two other times and this time, I just lay there, really appreciating I could wake up this way.

It seems on most days, I can easily create a list of all I’ve done, accomplished and achieved.   And typically, if I need to do that, my planner does it for me. Weekends, I prefer no listing on my Treo, and I resort to pieces of paper, Post-its, stuck on the end of the granite bar.  In reality, I’d like to get through my weekend without a list, without my brain saying “snow tires*pedicure*Target*Sunflower Market-> you really didn’t do much today” as if I need to measure*validate*prove how I spend my weekend time.  Today I created the “list”, hoping I’d have a little focus and not spend the entire day watching movies.  I did about 1/2 the list and many little things that didn’t make it on the list – rakes and shovels from the summer to and in the shed, tires to the barn, and my favorite, feed apples to the neighbor’s horses and miniature donkey.  This donkey is a funny creature, coming to the fence to ensure receiving apples she can’t eat in one bite.  She takes a bite, chews, then takes another bite.  Polite-like.  Meanwhile, the two not-so-polite horses come over to steal her apple.  This little miniature donkey is white with brown spots and the first time the white horse came to steal her apple, she turned around and kicked at his face, both back legs high in the air.  She’d show him. Unfortunately, the height of her back legs, full extension, is lower than his head and she lost her apple.  I ran back home, cut up another apple into pieces her size, hurdled the fence and hand fed them to her, while I was nudged on the backside by her sorrel pen-mate (I don’t really know if she’s “sorrel” or not, but I do know that’s a word indicating a horse color and I think it’s brown!). 

This is what really mattered in my day.  Not the laundry, the conference registration, the vacuuming or the research on HP portable printers – what really mattered, was the fresh air and feeling those little donkey lips (are they called “lips” on a donkey?) touching my palm as she nuzzled around for bits of apple.

I prefer not to watch the news and normally I don’t.  Tonight I learn that Pakistan is in a state of emergency, that a group of girls at Oprah’s school in South Africa were sexually assaulted.  I get overwhelmed by the barrage of news.  So, I avoid it.  The issue with that, to me is my naiveness about world issues, because I can’t find a forum to do so that includes positives and negatives.

Not feeling so well, I’ve hibernated at home today with work being done on my computer and my phones.  I open a new catalog which starts “NAMASTE’, In peace and respect…” and those few words quiet the ragged edges of my mind.  Who ever thought a catalog could start with such calmness?

I have a to-do list that could be addressed – things like “study Spanish” or “balance checkbooks” dominate that list and carry a fairly limited amount of excitement.  My enthusiasm is missing.  Instead, I sit on the sofa, surrounded by my mail and three bassets.