Adventures of me, Lisa Southard: writer, gardener, forager, care worker, Tae Kwon-Do Instructor, Granma, and co-owner of 5 acres of pasture. Dreams take work!
There is weather today, I do note it: take a few moments to reckon the size of a cloud (big) and the frequency of rain (sporadic.) Centre of my interest though is a stack of magazines. Not the fashion kind. This is martial arts research. I'm not even sure what it is I'm looking for, but intuition calls loud. A range of old adverts skew some amusement. Contact pants, for example. Pants are not trousers where I come from. They are underwear. Professional contact pants: improved smirk value. But why would a person be likely to purchase a grappling hook and a lock pick set? For specialists and hobbyists only, the blurb assures. Guidance on the pheromone spray that attracts women against their better judgement? I doubt it works any more proficiently than the mysterious potion that defines your muscles while you sleep. But, then: I wonder is some sprayed on this paper? What was my intuition thinking, making this ghastly shout… Tea break time. There's a lot of words
Expostulate v (foll. by with) reason (with) esp to dissuade. This word has an old fashioned flavour. I feel it would be best used whilst sporting a monocle. It brings a nostalgia for the days when I would pack my children into my rickety car and commence on road trips visiting old country estates. We would swan the aged hallways and pretend, of course, that this was our home, and we really must chivvy the gardener as the roses have been too straggly this year. Our trip to Castle Drogo was, most memorably, on the same day that I forgot to put the shield on the hair clippers and quite balded my son. He was rather little and pale then: the effect was a post-chemo chic that caused people all day to usher us to the front of every queue. And we were too embarrassed to expostulate with them.
We live by the light of those we love, whether they are here or gone. That light is inextinguishable. To have the light and not the company is an adjustment process we call grief. Loss is a shadow, equal to the light. We adjust not to lose the shadow but to see both. Hard to bear - yet without darkness, light cannot show its full wonder. Let us look after each other, then, and value our days, our company, and live to leave vast shadows, and understand that pain is a strange gift, a tender, haunting, purposed gift. And if you are grieving: let your tears flow, let your anger shout, let yourself plead and deny and feel terrible: it is not an easy process. Know that other people know grief. Know that other people are hurt to see you grieve. Know that love is a fundamental response. There is no time limit to this adjustment process. No right or wrong way to feel. One day you will stand back and see that the shadow is proof to the strength of the light, a
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