stories of my life in Tucson AZ and NYC

Saturday, May 31, 2008

“Happy Adventure Dreams”


Tucson painting by Felix Pasilis


7:22 am, Saturday, May 31, 2008
“Happy Adventure Dreams”

(they say life is coming up for roses for all of us now, so is it starting now)

Well what a night of dreams I had! I never had so many and such vivid dreams. I feel as if I spent the night visiting another universe, or a distant shore, because I was in such another place. Even tho I only remember the first dream I had, before I turned off the light and went to sleep for real, my hunch is it set the tone for the rest of the dreams, which I do not remember. I mean it was all a kaleidoscope mix of all the elements which are in my life. Nothing not down to earth took place in it. At least in that first dream. It was the quality of the dream which was so different. And I am assuming the same kind of dreams went on all night. Because I feel like I have been gently dumped back home, after quite an excursion, quite a night, quite a life of dreams; I had a big night, a huge night. But I have a hunch, from the feeling I had when I woke up, that all the dreams were as satisfying as that first one. I woke up with peaceful feeling. I wasn’t in conflict with myself in that first dream, which made it so satisfying. I had my cake and ate it too, and then made the choice which I knew was the right choice. Hahaha I was realistic in my dream. But it was the right kind of realism. I didn’t feel like I was denying myself. I just thought “this is how it is.”

I don’t remember any of the dreams of the long night which followed, but my hunch is I must not have been in conflict with myself, no matter how dramatic and vivid they were, event filled, story filled. As hard as it is to imagine, I must have sailed thru all kinds of stories and dramas, and events, and remained in harmony with myself. It’s hard to believe because I am someone who can be in conflict with herself just from getting out of bed to fetch a glass of water.

If this is the new age, then this is great. I guess I had always pictured a conflict-free life, as one where nothing happens at all. It never occurred to me it could be the reverse. That there would be far bigger adventure, far bigger choices, more expanded events, much more life going on. But if I am not in conflict with myself, then all it is, is thrilling. It just means life without limiting myself. That’s really what happened in the first dream. I wanted what I wanted and I went for it. And I had it and I loved it. And then I made a realistic choice and changed my mind. And I was satisfied with my choice. That is what I mean by saying I had it all. I know what it is, it is a world without guilt. You just try out every experience you want, you have every experience you want. It is like a feast. It’s like having a huge appetite, and up for everything, and an incredible feast laid before you. Life as the buffet of all buffets. And you have whatever you want. And dance with whatever boy you want to. And all the boys are wonderful and there may be one you like a lot. But at the end you say “I’ll go home with this one, but thanks for the wonderful evening.”

And so after my night of dreams I am gently deposited on the shore, with waves gently lapping at my feet. I feel like Odysseus home from wondrous enchanted travels, opening my eyes to the sweet sunshine. Except I am opening them to sweet sunshine in sunlit Tucson backyard, a world of morning doves calling and sparrows flittering around. Nothing could be more peaceful than the scene out my yard. And how nice to open my eyes to it after a night of great dreams, instead of a night of nightmares. Of happy enchanted adventures.

And who knows, maybe this is a taste of how it will be for all of us before the Mass Awakening, two years down the line. Our life will be changed to happy enchanted adventures, instead of how it has been. Dare I hope I am (and all of us too) are all emerging from conflict with ourself, since that seems to be the ticket to all new happiness.

It just feels like a new morning to me....

Wednesday, May 28, 2008

I am running for office


Tucson painting by Felix Pasilis

Wednesday, 5/28/08, 5:58 AM
“I turn in my petition”


Well it is one moment before 6 am on desert. Morning dove is calling. Birds are twittering in nests. I do not see any out and about yet. The sun must have risen above mountains, because leaves are lit up, but floor of my yard is still is shade. O the first sparrow has arrived. And there is a big quail. I think it is happy miracle that now the quail arrive each morning in my yard, it gives me such a thrill to see them. They are the size of pigeon, which is big for my yard. Pigeons are huge compared to the other birds in my yard, when pigeons arrive the other birds scatter. My birds are little. The quail looks lordly or king-like because it has a crown. The crown actually looks like a helmet or visor the Vikings of old wore. It is red, and has something coming out from the middle of it, like long hook.

For me it is such an honor when they visit my yard. I don’t think they live here, but who knows! It’s possible they built a nest in the huge tree in middle of yard, where all the birds have their nests, like a big apartment building in New York City, where so many families live. I don’t know who does live there, I just know I always see birds flying into or out of that big tree. By big I do not mean that tall. Desert trees do not grow that tall but they grow very wide, there are big branches sticking out sidewise. Almost all desert trees are at eye level, which is why you watch so much of the birds’ activity. It is one of the neatest things about the desert, that you and birds share the same world. When you are outside, they are always flying right past your head, and when you look out the window you can see their whole life.

Well even tho I only had 5 signatures to my petition and I knew Cora’s husband Floyd would sign too, and I had planned to have him sign before I turned it in-- since the minimum number I needed was 3, I decided yesterday to just get it all over with already. I had finally bought my clipboard for carrying around my petition but I never took it out of the bag. Because yesterday I got email from Ted, the member of our Ron Paul Tucson group, who has been supervising and helping me in becoming PC for Ron Paul.

PC means, I now find out, precinct committeeman. Which now means, I find out, I guess an officer in the Republican Party in my voting district. Precinct means a person’s voting district. Everyone who votes at the same place you do, is in your precinct. What a committeeman actually does, I have no idea. But I am assuming it is the bottom rung of being an officer in Republican Party. I would be allowed to vote which plans we want in our platform here in Arizona and which candidates we want on the ballot. Since this is a Ron Paul Revolution, I am guessing that we are trying to be a power bloc within the Republican Party. I don’t see how the Arizona Republican Party alone can bring world peace, altho the same thing is going on in Republican party in every State. But we sure can work for liberty here in Arizona, and join the Ron Paul Revolution in other States for liberty at the federal level.

I am just guessing about all this, because all I know is a call went out to every member of our Tucson Ron Paul group to run for precinct committeeman, and I simply answered that call. I had no idea what a PC was when I answered the call. And I did not even know it meant running for office. I thought I was gathering signatures on petition for the sake of gathering signatures. It wasn’t till I showed up at GOP Headquarters to get my petition and affidavit, I found out it means I was running for office. Which of course takes it to much higher level than standing on a New York City street corner, getting signatures on petition, which is something I used to do all the time in my early twenties, and which I watched my mom and dad do my whole life.

For me it meant I had to have a minimum of 3 Registered Republican or Independents who live in my voting district, sign my petition. Which now that I turned it in yesterday and read what we all signed to-- how interesting that neither me, nor my 4 fellow signers, bothered to read it. It is in fact a petition for me to be on the ballot for September 2nd GOP Primary and then in General Election on November 4th. Who knew!

The affidavit I had to fill out and have notarized with it, wasn’t as hard to fill out as it looked. There were just blanks for me to restate what it is in the petition. The name of the office I am running for, Precinct Committeeman. The number of my district, 102. That I want to be on the ballot in primary, I had to give the date again, and in the general election I had to give the date again. (O there is that quail again! what a trip he is!) And then I had to say how long I have lived in this County, and how long I have lived in this Precinct, and sign and date it.

O a sparrow has arrived on my desk, he flew in from the doorway. There are no toast crumbs for him, he had to fly out window.


Luckily for me the girl at the Elections Office for Pima county was completely helpful. I had received so many warnings on email that if all was not done perfectly it would be disqualified. "Even if you photocopy the petition and the lines are not exactly the same distance apart it will be disqualified." And who knows that may yet happen when the petition is sent to where it goes now. But girl at Pima County Elections Office had zero desire to disqualify me, she just wanted to help me.

I had tried to fill out the Affidavit myself before I realized it had to be notarized. And the only part I understood was “sign your name here and date it.” So I had done that two weeks ago. It turns out that is the part which has to be done in front of the notary. But since she notarized it for me, she had no problem with it. “Aren’t I supposed to sign in front of you” I asked. “OK you can sign it again above” she said. And she checked it all for me and had me sign and fill out things I hadn’t noticed, “put your address here” she said. She was great.

I can’t say the elections office was exactly hopping, maybe because it was the day after Memorial Day week-end. And I have never been in a Tucson municipal building which is so fancy, maybe it was recently built. You entered into huge hallway, which had not one soul in it. By a huge roundtable desk area which had not one soul in it. Which was carpeted and looked out on nice garden with tables and chairs, floor-length wide windows looked out on it.

I appreciated that huge desk area with not a soul in it or around it because two people had changed their registration to be eligible to vote for me. And we decided I would put the date they signed my petition 10 days after they changed their registration, so the registration would go thru. So I put the date 5/25/08 next to my friend Jim’s signature and next to my neighbor Rick’s signature. I found out from reading Rick’s signature that his real name is Ricardo, who knew! And I learned Cora’s last name because she had forgotten to print it in the space next to “print it!” Her husband Floyd is Norwegian and it is Norwegian sounding name, like Luntz. Cora is actually Mexican/American from South Tucson. She and I both have last names now, because of our husbands, which are very different from our family last names.

After the huge lobby area, with huge desk area, and huge windows looking out on garden with tables and chairs, all very fancy and not one soul in it at all, you walked down a hall, and there was door which said Pima County Elections Office. Which also seemed to be deserted, you did not hear a sound or see a person. But that lovely young woman arrived instantly I did, and she sure helped me a lot.

Hahaha it was all like a ghost town, but a very very fancy ghost town.

Not one bit like Tucson municipal offices are like.

Obviously our town has come into money and this is what they are building now to house their city and county employees.

Bill waited in the truck in parking area behind, he didn’t want to come in with me. “Just do everything right!” he called out when I set off. “Wish me luck!” I said. But when I left she gave me a receipt or certification, small piece of paper, saying I had done all this. I put it in my purse, and I raised my hands high as I approached the truck. Not a soul was in the parking lot either, altho some cars were parked there. “Your wife is running for office” I called out to Bill, “I am now on the ballot. You can now address me as ‘your majesty office holder.’” And we set off for Fort Lowell swim pool to finally have our swim. “Don’t you have to campaign like Hillary Clinton is campaigning?” he asked. “I don’t think so” I said, “that is if anyone is running against me, I don’t know if anyone is running against me.”

And then late in the afternoon I emailed Ted “Success!” and told him it was all accomplished and thanked him for all his help and he was proud of me. And said his wife is having a birthday party for him on June 7th and she asked for his email list so she could invite the Ron Paul members to it. And he said he doesn’t want any gifts, and I am invited. And sure enough there was an invitation from his wife Jacqui.

I'll ask Jim and see if he wants to go, but the party is at 7 pm and Jim goes to bed at 8 pm.

Also Ted said he started a group for PCs for Ron Paul to meet and plan together, and do I want to come to that meeting.
I'll have to press the link he gave in his email to find out about that.

So I guess today marks the beginning of my new adventure into public life.

Love, Annie Precinct Committeeman (to be)

Monday, May 26, 2008

“Sonoran desert early morning”


"Purple flowers bringing on the Butterflies"
painting by Margot Rose, posted on her blog, with comment
"94 Degrees, probably last day of season for painting out doors"
(little did any of us know, it would turn freezing 2 days later)

6 AM, Monday, May 26, 2008
“Sonoran desert early morning” (first holiday summer weekend)


It is Monday but not Monday, because this is holiday weekend. So Monday is another Sunday but even more intense, because it is the second Sunday in a row, and because the public swim pools are closed for the holiday. However it is a beautiful early morning. The big bad desert summer is on its way, sposed to arrive within few days, but right now, right this moment, it is glorious. It is cool delightful wonderful beautiful perfect morning. The birds are all singing. The green leaves are translucent green light. It really does feel like heaven on earth has arrived, this is the world of paradise.


The bluest of skies, the brightest of yellow sunshines, everything anyone could want.


And who knows about the big bad desert summer. It arrived last week and we all giggled to each other and said THE HEAT IS ON. And then there was the most surprising development in the world. A very bold, very big freezing storm blew in, temps dropped 50 degrees in one hour. For 3 days we shivered and turned on space-heaters and dived into long-sleeves and got out extra comforters to sleep under. It was darkly cloudy, and it rained off and on. We swam in freezing cold water in the public pools, and were so happy when hot water in shower ran down our back. We went from too much heat, too much sunlight, too much of everything one loves, to not one bit of it at all. Only animals in their fur coats delighted in the sudden extreme change of weather. So now that the morning of paradise is back, and tv is showing advent of BIG HEAT arriving day after tomorrow, we have new attitude. It turns out we are desert rats, and do not want cold cloudy summer. I did not mind it when I was kid and we summered in the Adirondacks, because I had summered there ever since I was born, I was 3 months old when they first took me for summer in Adirondacks, and I spent the next 12 summers there. I had no idea summer could be anything else, my only experience of summer was in this mountain hamlet.


And the 3 days the storm blew thru Tucson last week was exactly like summer in the Adirondacks. And as much as I love and miss the beautiful northern woods, the beautiful Adirondacks, with their wondrous lakes and those pine tree forests-- there simply is nothing like blue sky and sunshine, and being able to wear a minimum of clothes and have that lovely air blowing all over your skin. I would not trade it now. All the pics my dad took of me as kid in Adirondacks, show me in dungarees and flannel shirt. Yes obviously there were beach days but it wasn’t a summer of beach days. I’m not saying it was 90 percent like that wild storm which blew into Tucson last week, but it easily could have been half and half. That is what the weather was like when the sun wasn’t out, and the sun was not out a lot.


The Adirondacks is an enchanted paradise too, and I am glad I have it locked away in my mind and can revisit it in my mind whenever I want. But I would not want a summer now which is all about trying to keep warm. That is what the Tucson winter is all about, and why we long so much for it to end.


But it’s nice to know the Adirondacks is still there keeping on keeping on. Like the Pine Barrens in New Jersey, it is undisturbed wilderness, and nothing seems to change that aspect of it. Even if I no longer want to summer in a northern paradise, it’s nice knowing that wondrous world of waterfalls still remains as pristine as ever. And the wondrous hardy folk who live there, still reign over this glorious kingdom, and the animals, so many animals, are undisturbed.


But Annie is desert rat now and I live in the land of sunshine. Here it is a constant dance with the sunshine, the sunshine is your lover, you are always embraced by it. It kisses you when you wake up, and holds you in its warm sweet loving arms all day long. Yes the Adirondacks is great, and so are the mountain men and mountain women who live there. It is like the Scottish highlands. But a whole life of being loved by the glorious sunshine, from morning to night, day after day, a world which dazzles with light, and the crystal clarity of desert beauty. And birdsong as crystal clear as in a concert hall. What can you say, we are given an incredibly beautiful planet to live on, with every possible kind of climate terrain and delight. If you want to canoe thru beautiful northern waters, with mountains rising on either side, and those sweet little islands in the middle. And sandy shores to swim on where the lakes gently lap. And that sweetest thing of all, the soft sandy lake beach, with lake in front of you and mountains around you. Or you can be sparrow hip-hopping from branch to branch, here in the cool lovely morning of Sonoran Desert with lovely sun kissing you.

There is every kind of paradise on our planet. The Sonoran Desert and the Adirondack Mountains are only two of the choices, but there are hundreds even thousands of variations of paradise on this sweet planet of ours. Eddie lives in Caribbean paradise, Helen, his sister, lives in Pacific paradise, and when I read Isak Dinesen’s book “Out of Africa,” I swooned at the description of her paradise. There is no forest like the primeval African forest, that is where all the fairy tales began. The animals who live deep in that forest are the most wondrous kingdom of all. That is where Alice’s wonderland takes place, and the world our children’s books are filled with. Where the Great Hare of the Forest lives with his family, he is the Mayor of the forest so very important. No one ever sees him. But if you are very deep in the forest, where no one ever goes, and you are very lucky, you see him strolling with his family, his wife in front with him, his children behind. And you hold your breath. O that primeval African forest, where Babar lives with Celeste, where Curious George hangs out. That forest is like no other, it is the heart of our planet.


But we inhabit where we inhabit, and for me it is the world of morning doves calling to each other all day long. And sparrows hopping from branch to branch right out my window. We live very intimately with the birds here. They are our constant companions. They are always arriving on my window sill and hopping in to eat my toast on my desk. When I sit here looking out my window, it is they who I constantly see flying about, sitting about, landing about, being about. They are always in that tree right out my window, they love that tree. They chirp and play with each other all thru the cool early morning and when it gets too warm, they go back to their nest and doze. They love sleeping in the warm sleepy sunshine, in their sweet happy nest. And inevitably I guess our life mirrors the life of the sparrow. We too are up at dawn, delighting in the cool summer morning and going about our activity whatever it is. And we too siesta when the afternoon becomes too hot and drowsy, in our own cool comfortable nests.


Just the simple life of a sparrow on the desert but it suits me to a T. And a sweet little fluffy doggie sleeps on my bare toes as I write this, with fur as soft as feathers and all his happy warmth. Lit up iridescent green leaves right outside my window, sparrows chirping as they hop along the ground, soft feathery dog on my bare feet. Ours is the simplest of all the paradises on our sweet planet, and we are the sparrow and morning doves who inhabit it.

Sunday, May 25, 2008

“diary of a revolutionary”


Golden Eagle Soaring

Sunday, May 25 2008, 5:41 AM

“diary of a revolutionary”

So much has happened. The lawyer who is suing me dismissed the case. Mazel tov! I am still involved in the huge process of trying to change my perception. Which still seems like an impossible thing to happen, I mean how does one ever succeed at this?! But at least I am trying and you don’t know what will happen when you try. To me it seems like trying to swim across the Atlantic Ocean. But hey! I have taken my first strokes, I am on my way, we'll see what happens. At least I have a big project I am working on, I am trying to swim across the Atlantic Ocean. But that is just an image. It means I can’t see the other side, and it appears like vast impossible distance between where I am and where I want to end up. In fact I know nothing about the ocean I am trying to swim across, all I know is I am doing it. LOL I guess my childhood dream of being Esther Williams swimming the Channel manifested after all. But not at all as I expected.

And on the political front I am now running for office, which is an astounding development for me, Naturally it does not compare to swimming across the Atlantic Ocean, which is where my whole inner life is now. But still, the last thing I ever expected to do was to run for office. And I guess it too is embarking on a new adventure. And at least it is something I can communicate to others about. I can’t really communicate to anyone about trying to change my perception, even tho it feels like the biggest thing I have ever tried to do. Because unless someone is engaged in it too, how will they understand what I am talking about? It would either frustrate them or bore them to read about it. I did write two stories about this experience and sent it off to Rick in New York, who loves my writing so much. And what I got back was an email “why don’t you write about your early days in women’s liberation, that is social history, everyone will want to read about that.” Which is a very polite way of saying “this bores me, but I’d love to hear about women’s liberation starting off.”


Yes women’s liberation starting off was very interesting. It too was a revolution in consciousness. But it would mean talking about something which happened back then. And the revolution in consciousness I am engaged in now is so much bigger. Plus it is what is happening now, it is how I spend my days now, I am in the midst of this now. I am actually actively trying to topple an old perception for myself, to allow the new one to show forth. It feels like climbing a mountain.

And as much as I love and adore Rick, he's the greatest friend a girl ever had. Is he really interested in how women changed their consciousness back then, or is this all about sex and gossip. After all we were all wild hippy chicks back then. And yes we were sleeping around. We weren’t sleeping around for the sake of sleeping around, we were all looking for boyfriends. Rick is 20 years older than I am. Telling him about my experiences in women’s liberation back then, back then when I was one of those hippy chicks, in a group of hippy chicks, back in the late ‘60s, was his only entry into a world he knew nothing about. Vivian’s editor back then at the “Village Voice,” sent her to one of our meetings to find out “what these chicks are up to?” And for Rick, especially because the women’s liberation movement yielded so much results in the world he is in, academia, I mean it turned into something, those meeting back then -- the combination is kind of irresistible to him. He wants to know all about those hippy chicks back then who did this. What tantalizes him is knowing we were wild hippy chicks sleeping around, and did this thing. Because I was close to Rick during this time, he is one of the few who does know it. What I am trying to say is, even if I were to try to gratify Rick’s curiosity and actually wrote about what it was all like back then, I don’t believe it interests him our transformation in consciousness back then, which yielded this movement. He just wants to read about wild hippy chicks sleeping around while making a revolution. LOL he is a guy, he is interested in what interests guys.

As for the Ron Paul Revolution, the reason I am running for office, I really have no idea how to think about it? I am so used to having two sides of my life which never touch. On internet I am totally involved in the Ron Paul Revolution and when I watch political news on tv and it is something I do think about a lot. But I am so used to having 3 sides of my life which don’t really overlap very much. My internet life, which is all politics and centered in the Ron Paul Revolution, which I guess can best be described as going to meetings on the net, on a political news forum. Then my Tucson life, which is swimming and shopping, mostly grocery shopping. And then my inner life which is new age transformation. O and writing, I forgot about that. The thing about running for office is it is a nexus between my internet life and my Tucson life.

It means I have to get signatures on a petition and try to get them done right, and fill out an affidavit and have it notarized, and bring both down to Pima County Recorders Office, all the way downtown, and do this all before June 2nd, the deadline. And then I will be on the ballot for the Republican Party Primary on September 2nd, since the Ron Paul Revolution now seems to be about taking over the Republican Party in each of our States. I am willing to do all this. Altho I am not used to having a big out-in-the-world life in Tucson. Usually I go swimming, grocery shop, and come home and that is that. Everything else takes place in my house, in my mind. I engage with the world thru internet and email, or television.

I definitely do feel pushed out of my little nest, and I know it is just a start. I will have to show up at meetings with the other members of the Ron Paul meet-up group who are also running for office, to plan our strategy and activities. And what happens when I am elected! I will have to show up at stuff too. It just seems funny to me, that while at exactly the same time, I am going so much deeper into my own mind, to try to make this transformation, which seems so incredible to me, which still seems utterly impossible to me, but I want it above everything else in the world. At the exact same time, I, who have not been an activist since the early days of women’s liberation, am actually going to be a political activist again. Have a new life of political activity, trying to make a revolution here in Tucson and Arizona.

Willy-nilly I am doing it.

I can’t not do it.

I will be an office holder in the Republican Party, and who knows what that will mean. It sounds so VIP. Which is funny for me because my mind and heart have been so engaged in other things. I have been treating it as chores of daily living. “I have to write out check for my electric bill, call home insurance and have them look at cooler, why it is making that awful noise, take my affidavit to bank and list of signatures and have it notarized and take it downtown to Pima Recorders Office.” I have been treating it as something I have to do to get it off my mind, to have it taken care of. But it is a political revolution. And I will have a lot to contribute by being part of it. I may be inept at running for office, but I have thought about the Ron Paul Revolution almost 24/7 for solid year, and been on internet about it for good block of every day. I just never expected I would get up from internet and do something about it....

But I, who was in women’s liberation, should know better. I know there are meetings and there are actions. I haven’t joined any of the actions for Ron Paul before. But the call came to run for office in Republican Party, and I answered that call. So obviously this is part of my destiny right now too.... I am starting a new life, lol a life in politics....

Thursday, May 22, 2008

“New Age Shop Talk”



Tucson painting by Felix Pasilis

Thursday, May 22, 2008, 6:25 AM

“New Age Shop Talk”

For Jan, with love Annie

I am going thru changes. This is the first time I have actually felt it happen. It is like being pushed down a birth canal, or being relocated, or on a jet plane to somewhere. I mean I can feel the transportation happening. These haven’t been ordinary days. Each day has been one of movement, as if I am on a wagon train moving out west.


I do wake up in a different place each morning and know I spent the previous day traveling. A wagon train is a good metaphor, because when it is pictured in the movies, their whole house is really behind them in their covered wagon. They are arriving out West but taking their whole house with them. And so much daily living goes on, they are always preparing food, and having meals, or socializing around campfires, and taking care of pets and children. They’ve already forgotten their life in the settled city they came from, those stores, those neighbors, those schools for their kids, their church. And they don’t know where they will arrive at, they are setting out to unknown. Their whole life takes place on the road now, that is their community, that is where they live their daily life.


But there is no road, they are pioneers. They are making their way thru uncharted wilderness, to god knows where. They don’t know where they are, just that every day they travel. And they don’t know where they will wind up. And so there is big emphasis on ordinary daily life routines. The preparing of meals, the washing of clothes, the feeding of children, everything to keep up a semblance of normal life.


It’s funny I can understand their minds now. There are too many unknowns in it. You can see them all pretending life is normal, trying to have normal life. But a completely unknown future lies ahead, there is ever-growing distance from their past, the present is all they have. And the present is one of transportation.


It is odd that I am going thru this and so is everyone else in the world, whether they are aware of it or not. And I bet the conversation on the wagon train was not one bit about what they were going thru. I don’t see how they could, it is too inexpressible. Their conversation would have to be about ordinary life. What are you going to fix for dinner? Or the bedtime story they will read their children. Or tucking them in at night. And coffee in the morning. And washing dishes. Or about their clothes. These would be where their thoughts were. And they would all talk to each other as if they were each leading perfectly ordinary lives and this huge thing were not taking place. Husband and wife would not talk about it to each other. He would talk about what he fixed, and how he fixed it, and what he will fix tomorrow. Maybe very occasionally two women would have a very quiet conversation about their experience, what this experience is, but not often. In the evenings they would all entertain themselves with song or story.


But everyone would know this is a momentous trip.


That’s a little like what this experience is now. I know we are on the move. I know each day we are moving and I know each morning I wake up in different place. I know each day is transportation. And it’s not as if I can see destination off in the distance, but we must be getting close to it, or accelerating faster towards it. Because I am starting to get glimmerings of the process by which we will arrive there. In other words I know we are in the process, and I am having a glimmering of how this process will work, and how it will deliver us there.


It as if before, my ideas of destination, and my ideas of process of how we will arrive there, were romantic fairy tales. I can see why I didn’t believe them completely, as much as I wanted to believe them. I believed them the way you believe a fairy tale. But there was too much enchantment in them for them to be real for me. As if you would be whisked to this enchanted place and then find yourself in an enchanted place. There is nothing wrong with believing them and I believed them with all my heart. It was offered to me and who would turn it down! No one turns down paradise when it is offered them and are told it is within reach, just a little bit ahead on the road.


LOL how long have we been told, “it is just ahead.” To be a New Ager means each new year is filled with promises made to all of us. “This will be the year” we are told “that all of paradise is yours.” And so we dream of paradise and have stars in our eyes, and set off with joy for the new year. And a point did come, after many years of this, when everyone started to wonder “are these promises going to be delivered on?” But we had all reached the point of no return. You couldn’t not believe in the promises anymore, you had hitched your boat to those promises.


But it became a bit of “waiting for Godot.” On one hand we were so hungry for these promises, it was all we had. On the other hand, so many years had gone by and paradise had not happened. But I guess there was too much reality in spirituality, too much evidence spirituality was real, to even think about not being on this voyage. But I will tell you the truth. We were promised constantly “paradise is just ahead, it will arrive this year,” and the fact is paradise never arrived, and I don’t think anyone believed it ever would. Except for the famous date given in the Mayan Calendar. We could all believe in 2012, because the proof of the pudding of that, was always years away.


But I will say now, we are on our way. I can feel it. I can see it. I know it. Something really is happening. And now that we are undergoing it, I see it is not one bit like the fairy tale I imagined. I see how the destination is not a fairy tale, and the means by which we reach it is not a fairy tale. There is no enchantment involved. You are not whisked into anything. There is no whisking. It is all about changes in the mind, changes in perception. It is literally about having a new perception. And that is what is going on right now, we are all in the process of changing our perception. That is the whole story in a nutshell. We are actively changing our perception, and we are the active agent in it. Annie is not being whisked to paradise, but she is involved in changing her perception. Which turns out to be a very specific, very concrete, very real thing. No fairy tales! no enchantment! no whisks! No promises held out and then not delivered on.


Because we are the ones who are doing it. Hahaha it turned out it was all up to us, that we would do it. I have no idea where I am in the process. How could I? All I know is I am in the process. Which seems to mean for the first time I am aware there is an old perception and a new one. I know my old perception, I have had it my whole life. It’s just that for the first time I am aware that there is a way of perceiving differently, that I could see in a new way, that I could perceive in a different way. And I am aware that what I would see, would be different from what I see now.


When I was just in the world of old perception, which would be until two days ago, I didn’t think of it as “the world of my perception.” I just thought “this is the world, period!”
Yes I know I had read long texts proving to me this is not so, but those texts (I realize now) are just blueprints. If you want that house, you have to build it, the blueprints don’t give you the house. That was another part of my fairy tale thinking about this all. I studied the blueprints and thought “where is my house!” The title of the blueprints was “this is your new house.” And I actually believed, whisk! one day I would walk right into it and was frustrated it never arrived.


But a blueprint is like a map. I still can’t believe I pored over those maps and thought it was the real thing, mistook it for an actual landscape. Thought “Why is this not my landscape now! You promised if I studied these maps, this would be my landscape.”


I’m not so sure now if that is exactly the promise which is made, altho it is sure the promise I heard. All I know is yesterday and the day before, is I realized there are two perceptions, an old one and new one, and the two perceptions are opposite, or at least very very different. And paradise lies in having the new perception. Altho some of my fairy tale ideas of paradise aren’t there in quite the same way. I no longer have images what paradise will be like, or I mean what the new perception will bring. This is exactly as far as I’ve gotten. I know from the blueprints I studied at the start of all this, that the new perception will show a perfect world. But perfect may be a blueprint word. It may turn out to mean you see everything as fine, and it holds steady at that. It may just mean the world is fine.


I am still in a place of transportation. I am like those wagoneers, those pioneers, I am in transit. I know the world the old perception showed me. And really the biggest change I have made, is instead of calling it “I know what the world is like,” I do now call it “I know the world the old perception showed me.” That is the big change over the past two days, and that is a tangible idea for me. Plus I have some awareness now there is another perception, which would show me a different world, a world which is fine. Whatever fine means.


I still really have no idea what the new perception will show, but I do know I want the new perception. That is another big change, I want the new perception with all my heart, above everything else in the world. Because if it is possibly true, that you could see everything as fine all the time, your pets are always fine et cetera, why not go for it! How could I want anything else! What else could I possibly want than things be fine for me always. Maybe that is what perfection is.


It was nice having all these fairy tale dreams, but when push comes to shove all we want is life to be fine always, for us and for everyone and for everyone we know and all their animals, for every living being on the Planet.

Tuesday, May 20, 2008

"Harry's Birthday"


Tucson painting by Felix Pasilis

Monday, May 19, 2008, 7:53 AM
“Harry’s Birthday”

Today is Harry’s birthday. I sent him card on email yesterday. I thought maybe it was yesterday. I didn’t know the exact date, I knew just about when, and he thanked me and said “it is tomorrow.” I was glad I was so close, also that I did it was day before rather than day after. Because this year I really paid a lot of attention to my birthday, it was a huge deal to me, and I noticed it builds and builds and builds, and seems to climax the day before. Then your birthday is, and it is. And then the next day it is over. Birthday consciousness does not last after your birthday, but it builds as you near your birthday.

This past birthday consciousness was so intense for me because a few years after we moved to this house, I found a channeled book, I don’t know where, my neighbor Kay lent it to me? or I got it out of library? It was by one of those names which were popular back in the early ‘90s but you never hear that name anymore, and I don’t even remember who it was. And I don’t even know who the being who channeled it to the woman claimed he was.

It’s funny now thinking back, when I first began devouring New Age literature, first discovered it, how I didn’t even bother to try to have an inkling of who the channeler was. I remember reading the Michael books and I have no idea who Michael said he was. I think this guy may have been Kyros, some name like that and I don’t know who Kyros said he was. He may have channeled to some woman named EZ Knight.

I guess I was just starved for the information. All I cared about was the information. I devoured every book I could get my hands on. Took everyone out from the public library, bought everyone I could find in Bookman’s, the used bookstore, and borrowed from my neighbor Kay her whole new age library. I read them all. It’s possible I may have just finished doing A Course In Miracles, so I wasn’t looking for help with my problems in these books, A Course In Miracles had given me that. I was reading all these books as gum drops. For me A Course In Miracles was the 3 course meal of the New Age, and all these others were the delectable assortment of desserts.

Altho I did find one which was very deep and had very deep impact on me, and gave me a lot of understanding.

But most were just gumdrops. They were fun, they were interesting to me, and usually I took away one morsel from each one.

The morsel I got from the Kyros book was he said “you don’t have to get older, aging goes two ways, you can get older or you can get younger, and if you don’t want to get year older then don’t celebrate your birthday.” I read it a week before my birthday and I decided to do it. I didn’t celebrate my birthday that year and to my amazement I stayed the same age for two years. My birthday happened and I didn’t get a year older, I was the same age. After that I really started to fool around with my birthdays. I decided if I celebrated them early, I would get younger. By celebrate I meant, since Kyros didn’t explain, just be conscious it was my birthday. So I celebrated them a day early, or few days early, even one year two months early. I told people it was my birthday when it wasn’t. And on the day of my birthday I didn’t tell anyone. And if someone asked me when my birthday was, I gave the wrong day. I kept it in April but always few days earlier.

Since I have been doing this for the past 14 years, ever since I read that passage in Kyros’ book right before the birthday that year, you can imagine how intense it was for me this year, to actually celebrate my birthday, to allow all my birthday consciousness to fully arise, instead of suppressing it. I hadn’t had a birthday in 14 years. It was huge having a birthday. It seemed so incredibly huge to me. It was far more intense than Christmas. It was big.

I realized everyone goes thru this on their birthday. For anyone else it is an ordinary day, but for the person it builds for two weeks and it is huge. And I wanted to make more of an effort to remember when my friends have their birthday, and to send them card on email before or on it. I wanted to be part of their huge birthday experience, to acknowledge it.

A lot of interesting things happened because I believed what Kyros said in that book, and either did not celebrate my birthday at all or began celebrating it much earlier. When I had stayed the same age for two years when I first tried it, I did celebrate it few days early after that, to get few years younger. I had decided I would go back to 33 and stay there. And the result is, I really had no idea how old I was. I had lost track somewhere along the line. I know that few years after I began to swim at Fort Lowell pool when Jill was supervisor there, she came up to me with her clipboard and paper on it, saying “Parks Dept is doing survey on how old the swimmers are, how old are you?” And I looked her straight in the face and said “33 years old.” And she looked back at me and clearly did not believe me. But I clearly reiterated it, “I am 33 years old” and she wrote it down. But I could tell she didn’t believe it, by which I thought “I must not look 33, I wonder if this thing is working?” But by that time I was totally locked into it, I didn’t want to get older and if this was the way, I would do it. Oddly enough 8 years after that I was playing in the water at Racquet Club with a little girl, we were swimming and playing, I guess it was in the evening. And she said “how old are you Annie?” and I chirruped out “30, I am 30 years old.” And she looked me straight in the face and said “you don’t look that old.” Which made me giggle under my breath for about 10 minutes. “I don’t?” I said. “No” she said, “you look much younger.” “Thanks” I said.

I don’t know why I decided to have my birthday this year on my birthday, to celebrate my birthday. I guess suddenly I just did not care about getting older or younger. Plus age had lost all reality for me. Once you have totally fooled around with how old you are for past 14 years, and really have no idea how old you are, nothing is locked in concrete anymore, nothing is in cement. It is all immensely fluid in your mind.

Every year I would get birthday phone call from my kid brother on my birthday, and altho until this year, it was not the day I celebrated it on. And he would also have a comment on my age. To him it was completely real, whatever age I would be according to the arithmetic. In his phone message he would always empathize with whatever emotions he thought I was having about my birthday. Either he would say “it’s not a big one so you must be fine with it,” or, “wow this is a big one, I hope you are ok about it.” But since I hadn’t had any birthday, other than buying myself 5 presents at the mall the month before, I had no emotions about it. LOL my brother had all my emotions for me.

It is something I will have to talk about sometime, what the experience is like when we live in a totally different reality from our mom and our brother. There’s something very muffled about it, as if you are at the bottom of a deep well, and they are way up somewhere else, calling to you with the old reality. And you very faintly hear their murmurings, and know what they are referring to, but it is just not where you are at anymore. It doesn’t penetrate, as if they are talking to themselves. They are talking to you but it doesn’t reach you, so it is like a conversation between themselves. Altho strictly speaking the new reality is at a much higher vibration. So their words may be muffled to your ears, as if you are in a deep well. But probably we are all very high up in a tree when they call to us from the ground with the old reality...

Sunday, May 18, 2008

"Healing"

"Everything is coming up roses"

I wrote this story yesterday morning, about the afternoon the day before
About me and Ellen at swim pool
Good news, my Lulu is fine


Saturday morning 8:30 am 5/17/08
“Healing”


Well it hasn’t been the easiest of past few weeks, but yesterday my happiness bubbled up again. Gosh it felt so good to be happy again, I had forgotten. It just felt so good. I was so happy to be happy again.

And I guess I owe it all to Ellen. I had just finished my swim, and was near the ladder to get out, and looking around for Bill to let him know. When a woman who was swimming under water emerged right next to me, I realized she had swum under the ropes from the next lane to get to where I was, because I was right by the ladder to get out of pool, she wanted to climb out of pool. But when she emerged, she had Ellen's face. And I hadn’t seen Ellen in a very long time, maybe before the winter even started, back in the autumn.

I met her when I belonged to the Racquet Club, we became friends there, and saw each other regularly. We both joined the public pools at same time, few years ago, when they lowered their prices drastically and became so affordable again. But we don’t always swim at the same public pool. Plus obviously we have different hours. Maybe Ellen swims after work in the evening, or arrives at Billie's pool at 11:30 and leaves by 12:30, and we don’t show up till 1:30. Whatever it is, we hadn’t seen each other in long time and hadn’t expected to see each other, were very surprised to see each other, and happy about it.

And practically the first thing Ellen said to me was, “the last time we saw each other Annie, I had that back pain, and you did something to take it away, and I never had it again for 6 months, and it just came back, can you do something again.”

It was the perfect thing to ask me at the perfect time. I had finished my swim 15 minutes early, and didn’t really know what to do for those extra fifteen minutes. Plus it is something I love to do, take away someone’s booboos. I love the process of it, the doing of it. Plus I was totally caught up in healing Lulu and doing a miracle for Lulu. I was into healing, it was my whole life. For someone to ask me to do a healing is just what I wanted to be asked.

I asked Ellen if she wanted in the water or out in the sunshine, and she said “whatever you did last time.” And I remembered we had done it in the lane together, in the water, because I kept giggling the whole time “someone will think we are lesbians,” and Ellen would giggle back “fine with me.” Ellen is a lesbian and lives with Andrea. And Billie is nice enough to give them a family membership too, to treat them as married couple and get the family membership.

I really didn’t remember how I had done it last time. At first I thought Ellen should float, and then I would run my fingers on her back. But when we first tried that I realized that is impossible because of course Ellen has to breathe, breathing is a big part of it. I had her take off her bathing cap, it seems like the air would have to run thru her hair. Ellen said “can we talk?” I said “you can talk, but I can’t.” Because of course my healing is all about connecting minds with Ellen. What I do specifically is let her love me in my mind, let Ellen say “I love you” to me in my mind. That’s basically the whole thing. But I have to hear Ellen saying “I love you” in my mind the whole time, I have to hear Ellen in my mind.

I’m not exactly sure what Ellen did. I don’t think she walked across the pool, because it seems we floated together, but her head and shoulders were out of water. Maybe we swam together, in some kind of fashion. All I know is I put my body right behind her, as if I were hugging her from behind. That’s why I thought the lifeguards would think we were lesbians, but I didn’t care, and I knew Ellen didn’t care. And then what I do is put my hands and fingers all over her back, as she is saying “I love you” in my mind.

But what I did differently with Ellen yesterday, what I had never done before with anyone, and I guess I have done this 7 times before, with various people. Is I used my head too. I can’t believe I did that. It is such an inspired thing to do. It all must be because of trying to heal Lulu. There was so much healing energy in my head, from all my prayers for healing for Lulu, plus everything I had done to work miracle for Lulu. So I think I kind of locked my head against Ellen’s back, as if I were butting her, kept it in place there more or less, as we floated down lane together. Plus used my hands and arms to run them all over her back and shoulders. I had my eyes closed of course. And also what I did differently this time, is I didn’t stop at her back, shoulders, and arms. I put my hands all over her head, all over her face (I just reached around her neck), her shoulders, even down to her legs occasionally, and the sides of her fat behind. But mainly her arms, back, shoulders, and reaching around to her face, and top of her head. I was very relaxed and secure, assured. Again because of all the healing energy for Lulu, because I had spent the past two weeks working on helping Lulu in my mind, and even with pets on her back too.

I don’t know how I knew it, but I knew I was furnace of healing, and I could just relax and spontaneously do whatever I wanted and it would all work, I knew it would work like a charm. As I said to Ellen before we began, “O good, I am even better at it now than I was then.” And I told her before we began and when we finished, “not only will this take it away now, but it will never come back.” Can you imagine I said that. Where did I get that idea, that confidence. And yet I knew it. And so we did that all the way down the lane. And when I finally stopped, I knew it was enough, and opened my eyes, it seemed we were beached against the rope to the other lane, that is where we wound up. And Ellen just swooned. She opened her arms wide, and either threw her head back or forward, I don’t remember, and swooned, and said “I am so relaxed.” She swooned into the water 3 times in her relaxed bliss.

It was nice for me I was happy. Ellen said she couldn’t even finish her swim because the pain in her back was so bad and now it is all gone. She was so happy and so was I. I said “this is favor to me too Ellen, because I want to heal my puppy dog, and it gives me confidence I can do it.” And she said I am a cosmic person, and an amazing healer. Can you believe someone said such nice words to me, I was tickled pink.

And then we giggled together at the end of the pool. I said “you are a cosmic person too Ellen, look at the cosmic dream you had.” I had posted it on the internet. When I had seen Ellen last in the pool, I had said something like “today begins a new step, a big step, towards the mass awakening on our planet, it all begins today.” And she said “I just remembered the dream I had last night” and she told it to me. And I knew it was prophetic. At that time I wasn’t writing, it must have been during the winter or something. I was just taking down communication from my Higher Self on my New Age blog. So of course I wrote down Ellen’s dream the next morning and had my Higher Self interpret it.

Of course Ellen had forgotten all about her dream, she had no idea what I was talking about, but she did not want to admit it. I giggled and said “I posted your dream on the internet, on my new age blog, if you want to know what you dreamt, I can give you the link, are you on email?” “Yes” she said “I am.” “OK give me your email address and I will send you the link to your dream on internet.” I don’t know why it amused me so much that Ellen would have to press a link on internet to find out what she dreamt.

But whatever I had done in my healing of Ellen sure had a healing effect on me. It simply removed all the dark clouds in my mind. It was exactly as if the Sun came back in my mind, all the joy and happiness flooded back in.

I said to Ellen “I call my New Age blog ‘In and Out of this World,’ isn’t that a perfect name, because it includes everything in the world and everything out of it.” I don’t know why, it suddenly seemed like such a good name, in the pool giggling with Ellen after the healing. I have never once in my whole life before, complimented myself on anything. I have never even once noticed anything that way. It was as if before I was always too up close and personal and in my face, to ever notice anything about me. LOL it’s as if I was a big fly, always flying into my own face, and bugging me, and pestering me. I don’t like saying this, but I think it may be the truth. I think I have always been a huge pest to myself. But suddenly standing at end of lane with Ellen, both of us so happy from our healing, for that one instant (who knows how long it will last) I just was not a pest to myself. I actually saw the name of my New Age blog with appreciation. I thought it was a good name. “Isn’t it a good name!” I said and giggled and giggled. “Yes!” she said, and giggled and giggled.

So then we went into the shower room together and Sherry was there, just starting to take her shower and wash her hair. And starting to tell me the newest episode in trying to get new car tire for her VW car. I said to Ellen “you can share my shower,” and she said “I want to go into Billie to get paper and pencil to write down my email address.” I guess she is curious to read her dream on the internet. And it was the perfect switch to make, to hear Sherry go into details about the odyssey of getting new car tires.

It was very pleasant and amplifying to wash my hair and hear Sherry so excited about locating the new car tires for her car and learning how to read the date stamp on the tire. It’s really why you need an assortment of friends, each one completes you in another way.

WATER OF LIFE

by Layla (Flora Edwards)

post script, of course the person heals themself, I just join minds with them in doing it

Friday, May 09, 2008

“Miracles”


Dove and Hawk by Layla (Flora Edwards)

Saturday, May 10, 2008 6 AM
“Miracles”


Lulu is picking up. Dr Kaufman didn’t find anything wrong with her when he examined her last week. But we had taken Lulu to him because she had been really out of it for past two weeks. And she continued to be out of it this past week. Bill and I both got scared and of course I was praying for her nearly non-stop. But when there didn’t seem to be any improvement I decided to try to perform a miracle.


This is quite a big deal for me. When I first moved to Tucson 16 years ago, I found a book in the New Age section of the public library called “A Course In Miracles.” The month before I had read a book there, called What is the New Age. I had never heard of the New Age back in New York City. And I guess that book was about all the major channelers at the time. I did not know what a channeler was. It was about the books channeled by these major channelers, what the books said. Maybe it had a chapter on each one. There were not many major channelers when that book was written in the 1980s, the book was short, and the chapters were short. And I imagine they gave some quotes from each book which was channeled. I don’t remember anything in the book, but one quote from one book had a huge effect on me. It was only 3 sentences, 3 short sentences. But instant I read it, my heart which had been filled with stress and fear, peace flooded in. It had total effect on me. That peace was so delicious, so heaven sent, such an answer to a prayer, so wonderful to experience, that of course I memorized the name of that book and looked for it in the library. It turned out to be “A Course In Miracles,” and those 3 sentences turned out to be the Prologue to it. And it said this is a book to take away fear and replace it with peace. I wanted it.


I had zero interest in doing miracles of course. It never crossed my mind to want to do a miracle, I didn’t even know what a miracle was, all I wanted was peace. My years before I left NYC had been filled with trauma and the trauma had followed me to Tucson. And even when I was not going thru an ordeal, I did not know when the next one would come. I desperately wanted peace, I wanted peace more than anything else in the world. It seemed like it was written for me, this huge 660 page text, on how to have peace instead of fear.


The book was a lot more than I bargained for in every possible way. I renewed it 3 times and then went to the bookstore and bought it. First of all it promised all kinds of things. Every dream come true you could possibly imagine, was promised. Things you didn’t even dare dream of were promised. ‘What the world offers you is so awful, and what you can have is so great, why not go for it’ the book said.


So many things in the book were offered at once. I went into a tizzy of bliss at knowing all the possible wonderful things I could have, unimaginably wonderful. As Irene said when she started to read it, “it all sounds too good to be true.” And at the same time, every single sentence I read was evaporating fear and allowing peace to replace it.


The book was having a huge effect on me, and I loved it beyond measure. It was very important to me that it was written in logic. Every statement he made, as out of the world as it sounded, he proved with logic. There was nothing he said, he did not prove. And I knew I was reading the clearest most brilliant mind I had ever read. Plus your heart recognizes truth too when it is spoken, it resonates. You will believe truth when it is spoken, I discovered, because of the resonance in your heart, but you don’t wholly believe it, until your logical mind lines up behind it too. And this book did both.


At same time, the book did another thing, and I guess for me it was the most profound experience of all. It told me all about me. The book claimed I don’t know myself at all and know nothing about myself. And then it went and told me all my deepest darkest secrets, things I had never, and would never, admit to myself. And of course I knew that is true, we all know our deepest darkest secrets which we will never admit to ourselves. And then it explained to me why none of this is true. It told me all the horrible ideas I had about myself, and where they came from and why I believed them, and proved that none of them were true, not one single horrible idea about myself was true. You’ve had these horrible ideas about yourself your whole life, your whole life has been covering them up and trying to pretend they are not so, you think your real self is rotten to the core. This is where the book really hit me where I lived. Not one deep dark secret was hidden from this author. He brought every single one, even the deepest and the darkest, into the light. And plainly showed me why it was not true. I had never experienced so much love in my whole life. I had never been loved that way. I had never been understood before. And understood with such love, such high appreciation of who I was. He loved me far far far more than I loved myself and he understood me totally.


As psychotherapy it was totally effective. Once every single deep dark secret is brought into the light, and it is proved to me it is not true, it is a total cleansing. I changed my beliefs about myself on the spot. I now believed I was good and lovable instead of rotten as evil and unlovable. And once those secrets are brought to light and the means by which they got in there are brought to light, they can’t get back in. I was washed clean and could not be fouled again. You could say I was saved, saved from myself.


There was a lot more in the book than that but of course that was the most emotional part for me. Mainly the book seemed to be claiming what you think is reality, is not reality. And in fact reality is perfect. And if you want perfection, all you have to do is move from unreality to reality, and it is all there for you.


Which is a tall order to prove. But of course he did. By the time I finished the whole text I believed him. And then I did the Workbook, a lesson a day for a year, and read the Manual for Teachers, which was only 30 pages. And then I was done.


And then I knew I had to make a decision. Either everything he says is insane, or everything I learned about the world is insane. I couldn’t believe both at the same time, because everything is the opposite. I had to make a choice for myself who to believe. It was a scary choice, because according to everything I had believed my whole life, what he was teaching was insane. I was scared I would be insane if I decided to believe it. But the book had had a huge effect on me. It was as if my mind had been filthy dirty muddy streaked windows, before I began reading it, you could barely see out and all was distorted and ugly. And as I read the book it was like washing the windows of my mind clean. I began to see so much clearer. I actually experienced my mind clearing up. Clearer and clearer and clearer as I read the book. And by the time I finished, the windows of my mind were perfectly clear, perfectly clean, absolutely beautiful and the light streamed in. I used to wash my windows back in New York and there is nothing as beautiful as freshly washed windows. Nothing. All beauty can arrive to you, everything is clear and beautiful and filled with light. All that light rushes right in.


So I spent a whole minute trying to decide whether or not to believe it, when it was all over. And I was scared to decide to believe it. But I decided to. It was like crossing a river to another side. And once I crossed over, I never looked back. It felt completely natural and right. I was happy with my decision. I had made the right one for me.


And then I spent the next 16 years trying to practice everything I learned in the book. Trying to put it into practice, trying to live that other reality, to the best of my ability.


None of the huge promises he had made of the magnificent gifts I would get if I simply put this into practice, decided to choose it and believe it, ever seemed to arrive. Altho I became steadily happier and more peaceful. And yes traumatic ordeals still did enter my life. One gift I got which was very nice, is it totally changed how I see the future. When you are a child, and for a long time after that, I don’t know how long, maybe close to 30, you see the future as this wonderful paradise right ahead of you. As a kid you can’t wait to grow up and have it all. Your eyes, your mind, are always fixed on that glorious future, when your life will be perfect paradise. And one thing the book did give, is it restored that to my mind. It was one thing I did believe whole-heartedly, that radiant, joyous beyond belief, happy beyond belief, all dreams come true future awaits all of us. I wasn’t able to undo the past as he wanted me to, altho I tried. But I certainly did believe completely in our glorious future. I still do. It is a given for me. Which has a seltzer-like bubbling effect on my mind. I am always in a constant state of anticipation, I can’t wait. It is exhilarating, it exhilarated my mind.


The single thing I did not pay attention to in the entire “Course Of Miracles,” the 660 page Textbook, the 365 lessons in Workbook, one for each day of the year, the 30 page Manual, was anything having to do with miracles. I took a whole course in miracles and ignored everything having to do with miracles. Miracles never entered my mind. Other than the proof for them and the explanation of them. I mean I had zero interest in miracles. I was interested in everything else, it just never crossed my mind to want to do a miracle.


Until yesterday. I wanted to do a miracle and heal my dog, from whatever it was which was making her act so weird. I wanted my dog to be fine. And the only way I could see to do that was to do a miracle, heal her with a miracle. Dr Kaufman was unable to help Lulu, he didn’t find anything wrong and didn’t know how to help her.


I said to myself, “I took a course in miracles, I tried to practice the course for 16 years, I should be able to do a miracle now, and I want to do a miracle.” But I didn’t know how to do a miracle, and I didn’t know what a miracle was. I had some idea I would say something in my mind, and then I would turn over and see Lulu as glowing and perfect again, instead of looking so out of it. But in any case I snuggled in with God and chit-chatted with God. And God said “yes let’s do a miracle together, we will heal Lulu, that will be our miracle, it is not hard Annie, you can do it, let’s do a miracle together.”


And what finally inspired me, tipped me over the edge, made me want to do the miracle and believe I could, is when God said “look how much people suffer when they lose their pets, you can save everyone from this suffering, don’t you realize when you do a miracle, you do it for all, the whole world, you will be saving everyone’s pets.” And of course I want with all my heart for no one to go thru that suffering, it is the worst suffering of all. I discovered the way for me to ask for a miracle was to include others in it, so the miracle I asked for is that Lulu and Beanie (my dogs) and Zack and Sarah (Jan and Harry’s cats) are perfect always and live forever.


Now I understand why he said in the Course, “you can’t ask for a miracle for yourself, only for others.” Once I included Jan and Harry’s pets in my miracle, I was able to ask for it. And God said, thereby it goes out to the whole world. Good!


And then I just lied there snuggled in God’s arms (in my mind) and thought about miracles. Everything I had read in my book about it, or what I had seen in Hollywood movies about Jesus performing miracles, or even what I had read in books about Jesus, where a small part was about his performing miracles. I had to have some idea of what a miracle was, and some example of someone who had performed them. I was trying to concretize ideas in my mind, make it real for me.


And while I was thinking about miracles lying in God’s arms, God said “why stop at this one, why not have lots of miracles, we can have lots and lots of miracles.” And then when my mind had drifted off to thinking about something totally different, I distinctly heard God say, out of nowhere, “you can even have a miracle about money.” Money is something which has been worrying me a lot lately. Because I haven’t figured out how, after I pay this next credit card bill, how I will have any money left in my bank account at all. And the money I get each month does not even pay for that month’s expenses.


And I actually perked up and lent an ear, it was said so clearly, crisply, and decisively “you can even have a miracle about money.”


All of this took place yesterday afternoon, so you can see why.. when I was at the computer in the evening and the phone rang and the girl said “this is Amanda from product research.” And I instantly said “please take my name off your list.” I had been getting 20 calls a day trying to sell me something, and now I automatically say “please take my name off your list,” and they say “OK” and hang up. But Amanda didn’t say OK and hang up. I said 3 different ways “please take my name off your list.” And she said “you did a survey for us several months ago.” And I said “O I remember, I was nice enough to do that survey, but that doesn’t mean I want you to call me and sell me something, please take my name off your list.” But to Amanda’s credit, she didn’t give up on me. Instead she said, “well after you did the survey, your name and phone number were put into a raffle and we did the drawing and you won, you will get a $500 gift certificate to department store in Tucson.”


Well you can imagine how embarrassed I was. Amanda had called me up to tell me I won a $500 gift certificate to department store in Tucson, and all I had said to her was please get off the phone and don’t call me again. I was afraid she would take it away from me. But instead she was wonderful to me. I apologized every which way from Sunday for how rude I had been to her. But she kept saying “it is nothing, you should hear the phone calls I get, I’ve been talked to much worse than that.” She was completely sympathetic and understanding, kind and forgiving, she was wonderful. Of course I didn’t tell Amanda I had just spent the whole afternoon trying to do a miracle for my dog, and thinking about miracles, and even being told I would get a miracle about money, and I was doing my best to believe in miracles, that I can do them, that I can succeed in healing my dog, that I can work a miracle and heal her. But I did tell Amanda all this very elliptically. I said “Amanda, you are the answer to a prayer. I spent $167 at Lane Bryant two weeks ago and was so upset I had done that, when I have car repair bills and property taxes to pay, that I said ‘I will never go shopping again for as long as I live!’ It is so sweet of you to give me $500 gift certificate to department store. And maybe my husband will even be willing to buy something, he is never willing to buy anything. But the real reason you are an answer to a prayer, is because there are things I want to help others (I didn’t want to tell Amanda about my dog, I didn’t want to confide to anyone that Lulu was having problems, the idea of saying it aloud scared me, that it would make the problems more real, and I wanted to evaporate them). So I just told Amanda, “I have been praying for a miracle to help others, and you calling me up to say I won $500 gift certificate, means to me I will get my miracles. And I want them so much. You are an angel, Amanda. An angel is a messenger from Heaven, and that is what you are.”


I really believed all this. I believed my phone call from Amanda saying “you won the raffle,” meant I would get my miracle for Lulu, and I would get miracles, that I would get everything God promised as I lay with my head on my pillow. But of course what I want above everything else in the world is for Lulu to be perfect again.

And I did believe it because of Amanda’s phone call, I believed in miracles.


Then Amanda said “Jared will come to your house to give you the gift certificate and he will do a demonstration of the Blue Air Filter at the same time.” And I thought ‘O no, there is a catch in all this.’ I said “Amanda, I agreed to take Crystal’s survey on the phone when she asked me to, because she promised it would only take one minute and she was true to her word, it only did take one minute. Tell me honestly, how long is Jared’s demonstration going to take place? Is it 15 minutes?” And she said “yes, it is 15 minutes, no longer!” I said “I can do that.” She said “he will do the demonstration and because he works for our research company you will answer questions about what you think about it.” I said “OK, I will have my husband answer the questions, he has good opinions, he is a technician and scientist, and he believes in health, he will have good opinions.” She said “Jared is a great guy, he is really nice, you will like having him.” She said “your choice is 8 PM this evening or 8 PM tomorrow evening.” I said “tomorrow evening is better and 8 PM is the perfect time for us,” she apologized because it was so late.


And we got off the phone and I told Bill about the phone call altho I am sure he heard a lot of my end, because I was exclaiming. I hadn’t told Bill anything about A Course In Miracles, about miracles, about God, about doing a miracle to heal Lulu. My husband is just not New Age. Each time I try to tell him anything, he said “I don’t want to hear it, tell your friend Jan, she is into all this stuff.” But he was very excited about the $500 gift certificate because he said “It means your luck is changing Annie, once your luck changes all kinds of good things come your way. I saw it with my dad. If you were a gambler in Las Vegas and you received this phone call you would know your luck changed and go right out and gamble.” And he said “I definitely think you should play the lottery tomorrow, we may start to have money again, and if we do, I will go to art school at the U of A, I will be able to afford painting classes, I would get a Bachelor of Fine Arts there, I would be able to paint from the figure again, and be around other artists, this would be very good for me. Your luck is changing and I will be able to afford that. Absolutely play the lottery tomorrow.”


“Do you want anything from the department store? a baseball cap or a Wildcats tee shirt? or new pair of Levis? or pair of shorts?” “No, I don’t want anything” he said. And then he said “we need a new vacuum cleaner, none of our vacuum cleaners work, if they have one on sale for $89 let’s buy it.” I said “it’s a $500 gift certificate and I don’t need anything, we don’t have to buy the cheapest vacuum cleaner, we can get a good one, let’s see which department store it is for.”


And then he went back to happily planning all the new wonderful things which will come into our life now that our luck changed, all the new opportunities it opens for us. It was great to see my husband so happy and upbeat and enthusiastic. He was in the middle of mopping all the floors, it was such hard work, such unpleasant drudgery. And it sure brightened him up, thinking how much he wanted those art classes at U of A. He even said “I will get my Bachelors in Fine Art, I will have to buy a computer, because I will have to write papers on art history and professors want the papers sent to them on email, that is how they do things these days..”


And I will admit Lulu seems to be on the mend. My idea of a miracle was like the fairy godmother in the Disney movie “Cinderella.” Where she waved her wand, said abracadabra, and instantly the wagon with 4 mules, turned into fancy gleaming coach with 4 beautiful black plumed steeds pulling it. And Cinderella’s dress turned from rags into a beautiful gown with stars on it.


But I remembered just before I fell asleep, in a book I had read about Jesus back in New York City, when he first began to do miracles a father had said to him “my son is dying, will you heal him.” And Jesus said “yes.” And the report was brought back that the son was on the mend. And Jesus asked “at what hour at what minute, did he start to begin to feel better?” And it was at the minute and the hour that Jesus did the miracle.


And so I realized a miracle is not abracadabra, total transformation in an instant, but begin to mend. And I was actually able to see signs that Lulu had begun to mend.


And I remembered what he had said in A Course In Miracles. “The reason I want you to do miracles and why you must do miracles, is not that miracles are important in and of themselves, but it is by doing miracles you will have evidence that everything I tell you in this course is true, miracles witness to the reality of what I tell you, they are your evidence.”

“And that is why you must do them, you need that evidence to believe it.”


It never occurred to me I needed evidence, I had reached the point when I did believe it. But what rang in my ears last night as I remembered that, is that miracles are evidence. Evidence I can see. And so if my miracle for Lulu works, I will see the evidence for it, I will see with my own two eyes Lulu is fine.


And I will admit, winning a $500 gift certificate to a department store, when I have never won anything in my life, is evidence of something....


post script, I wrote this when I first woke up, now it is 9:30 at night. Lulu has been acting normal all day. Mazel tov! My miracle may have worked, thank God.
Love and kisses, Annie

10 PM Jared never showed up. We waited two hours. Fine with me. As Helen said it was the phone call from Amanda which was miraculous.

Tuesday, May 06, 2008

"Lulu"

WATER OF LIFE
a painting by Layla (Flora Edwards)


“Lulu”

Friday, May 2, 2008, 6:44 AM

Lulu goes to the vet at 9:40 this morning, Bill is taking her. They are going to Dr Kaufman who was her baby doctor. Altho Lulu did not live with us when she was a baby. She was Mike's dog. We did not get Lulu till Mike’s wife and baby back in Florida decided to take him back, and he said we could keep Lulu. We had been baby sitting her for the previous year, because Mike was in apt. which did not accept dogs. I don’t know how old Lulu was when she first came to us, I guess 3 years old. She was such a wild thing then, and had had such an adventurous life.


Originally things had started off well for Lulu. Mike had adopted her as puppy in Arkansas, he was then living with his second wife and her little daughter, and between them there were a lot of animals. There was Elvis which I guess was her dog, older than Lulu, and a cat, and lots of other animals. Lulu came from the sweet Arkansas woods, where her favorite thing was to walk across waterfalls. Lulu has those huge paws and can walk across anything.


When Mike was accepted into aircraft school here-- that means fix the airplanes, the outside, the skin of the plane, Tucson has the top school in the country for that-- the whole family arrived in their van, and spent the first night or first few nights camping out on Mount Lemon, because what motel will accept all those animals!


But they found an apartment very fast in Tucson which accepted all their pets and Mike began school. And his lovely wife stayed home and took care of the animals. Her little daughter was in school here, the nursery school at the air force base.

And then they moved to Avra Valley where they lived in a mobile home. But there was no fenced-in yard, so I guess Lulu was tied up on a very long rope. I know occasionally when Mike had time, he did take Lulu to the desert for fun and romps and long runs. But Lulu wouldn’t come back, he had to chase her all over the desert.

And at home Lulu was an escape artist. She didn’t like being kept in house, or tied on long rope. Basset hounds are well known for being escape artists. And I did finally get to see it with my own eyes. But fortunately for me, it was the reverse. We had Lulu and Skipper then, we were baby sitting Lulu. When we decided to give up that old couch, which was an old couch when James gave it to us, away to charity, since Bill had bought another second-hand couch from the lady he did yard-work for. When the men from the charity came to take it away, we wanted to have the front door open so they could easily get the couch out. So I brought Skippy and Lulu into my room here, and shut the door, while the men were in the living room struggling with the couch. And the instant Lulu realized she was locked in my room with me and Skippy and could not get out, could not get into the rest of the house, she simply flew over my desk, out the open window into backyard, and marched herself into the kitchen from the back door. She did not want to be away from the action, she did not want to be imprisoned, she wanted the run of her house. And so I simply sat on my other couch, holding Lulu by the collar, as we watched the men carry the old couch out the front door. And then I closed the door after them and let Lulu go. I was very lucky “escape artist Lulu” wanted to escape back into her home, she loved her home with us.



However almost as soon as Mike and the whole family moved to Avra Valley, his wife broke up with him. I don’t know the problem. He was Bill’s friend from aircraft school. Mike was very young, just in his mid twenties. I guess he went to the topless bars at night with the guys from aircraft school, they were all his age, only Bill was much older than all of them.



In any case she broke up with him, and Mike met a woman in a bar who has a little son, and he and Lulu moved in with her and her son, in a different mobile home in Avra Valley. And she worked and Mike worked, and probably Mike went to the bars in the evening too. And Lulu is an escape artist. I guess someone would open the door a crack for an instant, or a window for an instant, how can you not open your windows in desert heat! or on desert at any time of year! In any case the report would come back that Lulu was seen on Avra Road, which is the single big road which runs all thru Avra Valley, all the motor homes are scattered near that. And apparently Lulu would march herself along Avra Road for as long as she wanted, and when she got hungry and thirsty, she would simply walk in the open door of some house or motor home, where whoever lived there would be delighted at her arrival, give her big drink and offer her all kinds of food. Her favorite was pepperoni pizza. And when Mike would finally locate her, she would be eating pepperoni pizza and the owner would ask if he could keep Lulu. She was well-liked.


Eventually it didn’t work out with that woman either, and Mike had finished aircraft school and they gave him a job and an apt, but the apt did not accept pets. And that is when he called Bill and asked if Lulu could stay with us until he found an apt which accepted dogs, and Bill said yes. Clio had recently gone to Heaven, we just had Skippy then, we had room. And Mike brought Lulu, the huge bag of dry dog food he said Lulu loved, and a very long wire. He said Lulu is an escape artist, and even tho we have fenced-in yard, huge, when we open the front door for even an instant, she will escape out. So we should attach her to that long wire in our back yard. And the first morning Bill walked Skipper, he did, he wound it around a tree and put Lulu on it, and went out to walk Skippy. But I heard Lulu crying, she didn’t like being attached to it, and I asked my Higher Self, and She said “let Lulu off she isn’t going anywhere.” And then because Lulu was so totally wild, my Higher Self said, “just lie on the bed, let me talk to you in your mind, let me love you and Lulu in your mind, she will pick up the vibe and it will relax her and settle her down.” Which is just what happened. Lulu flew up on the bed next to me, and I petted her while my Higher Self crooned love to her in my mind.


It worked like a charm. Lulu was transformed. Bill came back with Skippy and said “you let her off!” “Yes” I said “she is not going anywhere.” At that time I was feeding Skippy, “Skippy” brand dog food. It is the most delicious of the canned foods and was the only kind Clio was willing to eat. Before that I had to cook cheeseburger for her every night. It turned out Lulu hated the Iambs dry dog food Mike had brought, that huge bag, 50 pounds, which sat in the house for a year. Lulu either liked that petite can of gourmet dog food I found for her, or delicious people food. So that is what I served her. And I gave her full freedom, she had that huge backyard we have, and, as Bill said “the 3 bedroom dog house” we live in, and a side yard. And she was able to spend her days with me on the bed, with my Higher Self crooning love to her. Skipper was Bill’s shadow, and would be wherever Bill was. Except at night when Bill went to sleep, then Skippy liked to come in and sprawl next to me on the bed. Skipper was a huge wolf, not a real wolf, maybe part tho. A huge silver-haired beautiful shepherd x, with some wolf. Who we had adopted at the pound a year after we moved to Tucson and few months after we moved into the house.


We had Clio then, she had been with us in New York City, and Clio gave Skippy a hard time at first. Which he accepted, he let Clio boss him and deny him what he wanted. But Skippy is ten times her size, and one day he decided not to put up with it. He simply pounced on Clio and that was that. She was a small slender shepherd x, who had problem starting fights she could not finish.


After that Clio made Skippy’s whole life an entertainment package. She amused herself from morning to night playing tricks on him. Skippy, a desert dog who looked exactly like the desert wolf, had found himself a real little Italian firecracker, from Little Italy in New York. She was Latin to her toes. She would grab a cookie from the bowl of dog cookies. She had no interest in that cookie. But she would bring it into the middle of the carpet of my back bedroom when I was watching TV. Because she knew Skippy’s routine. She knew when Skippy would arrive to ask to be fed, or arrive for some other reason. And sure enough Skippy would arrive to innocently remind me he wanted a meal. He ate like a horse and liked to be fed 5 times a day. The instant he would arrive at my doorway, she would growl and carry on about the cookie, as if he had arrived to steal her cookie. Which is ridiculous, there was a huge cookie bowl in the kitchen, he could help himself to one whenever he wanted. And Clio had zero interest in hers. But she would keep that up for half an hour, until she got bored with game. Having a huge snarling fit each time he tried to make one move into my room.


She played games and tricks on him all day long. But mainly her favorite thing was to race the fence when a car drove by in the alley. She loved to race the fence with the car and shriek her head off as she ran with abandoned glee. Clio was the fastest dog in the world. She would stretch out her front legs and back legs and simply fly. She was a tremendous athlete in all ways. She was such a good ball player, that back in New York City, when a former professional ball player down on his luck, was throwing the ball for Clio, he pointed out Clio knew how to field the ball better than many shortstops, she knew how to situate herself in front of the ball. It is true Clio could catch anything, tremendous fly balls, even curves. She was an outstanding fielder. A little boy told me Clio should play for the Yankees, they could use her.


But when I had my huge fenced-in yard in Tucson, and Skippy from the pound for companionship, I stopped taking Clio to play ball in Tucson. Because she had new sport, racing the fence, each time the car drove down the alley. She would race out of the house each time she heard a car beginning to arrive, and be at one end when it started to arrive. And race it down the long alley on our side of the fence till it reached the end, and then keep barking at it. She had a ball. And when Skippy arrived he did it with her. But Skippy is a total klutz. He would run in the wrong direction, collide with Clio and knock her over. She would pick herself up with disgust. Skipper was the worst athlete in the world. I would try to throw him one very easy grounder in the yard, and he would chase the ball all over the yard before he got it. Clio would watch with total disgust.


After a long time of car chasing, both dogs would come in and sit like book-ends on the early american couch, that was the couch Bill bought from the woman he did yardwork for. Clio would be at one end, Skippy at the other, and they would stay like that till I went to sleep and Skippy would come in and sprawl next to me on the bed.


In the morning when I woke up and poured myself a cup of coffee and got out a muffin to have with it, Skippy would arrive. He wanted the coffee, light and sweet. He wanted the muffin. So I would put it on the floor for him and go make myself another. He usually managed to get half the other too, half my second cup of coffee, half my second muffin-- you know how good dogs are at that! You always weigh which will make me happier? To have it for myself? or let them have it, so I can have the happiness of their happiness? And you always choose happiness of their happiness.


Even tho Skipper was not old, a few years after Clio went to Heaven, he went to Heaven too. Bill’s Higher Self told him it was because he missed Clio, he wanted to be with her. She had made his whole life a wondrous party, and she was a sweetie pie too.


When Lulu arrived Skippy had a companion again, but it wasn’t the same as his Clio. But Lulu gets along with everyone, she is so easy going. Skippy’s solution when Clio went to Heaven was to adopt Bill, he never left Bill’s side. And Lulu liked to spend her evenings cuddled up with me on bed, as I watched tv or read. The problem was when Bill went to sleep. Skippy would come in to evict Lulu, so he could get on the bed and sleep with me. He would come into my room and order Lulu off the bed. And I guess for the first month or two, she obediently obeyed his order. He would arrive, order her off, she didn’t want to leave, but she would get off. Skipper would get on. Bill was sleeping on the early american couch then, he liked the air blowing in from the screen door. And Lulu would just cling to him like a whippet, I don’t know how she did it. She would sleep with her “daddy.”


But one night Lulu decided, “why do I have to get off Annie's bed, just because Skipper says I have to, because he wants it.” She decided to stand her ground. This turned out to be a huge mistake. Skipper simply jumped up on the bed anyway, huge big Skipper who weighs a million tons, and is big as a wolf. And Lulu was in the corner next to the bed terrorized. She was afraid to move a muscle, she would not leave. I had to call Bill to come in and rescue Lulu. And after that when Skippy came in late at night, and said “time to get off, I want the bed!” she couldn’t get off fast enough. She went in to sleep with Bill, she hung on to his back like a whippet.


I think then Bill began to take Lulu on his walks with Skippy. The long walks, in the morning. But 9 months later when Bill went to the pound and rescued Happy-- Happy had been a stray his whole life, was emaciated and faded and had given up. He was so traumatized when we got him, he could not even eat. He would just nervously eat out marrow bones. I bought gazillion marrow bones for his first 6 months with us. And of course Skippy bullied him, Skipper was a bully.


But Happy was just Lulu’s age, and Happy was Prince Charming. Lulu fell in love with him at first sight. He was the loveliest being who ever was, he was a dreamboat. She and Happy would start to play in the backyard, and of course Skippy would try to join in, he didn’t like being excluded, he was jealous. But Skippy is such a huge klutz, plus a bully, all he would do would be to ruin the game. Then he would come in and order Happy off the marrow bone Happy had been enjoying. And Happy would have to cower in a corner, while Skipper licked it out with relish in the middle of the room.


Bill would try to walk all 3 dogs together, but that is when Happy would get his own back on Skipper. Happy had a trick. Which I wouldn’t have believed if I hadn’t seen it with my own two eyes: It must have been after Skippy went to Heaven, when Bill took Lulu and Happy for huge walk in wash at Fort Lowell Park. I must have gone along on the walk too. And when we got back to the parking lot, the car had a flat. Bill had to change the tire, or there was something he had to do to the car. Happy was on a very long leash, attached to Bill’s belt. I had Lulu on another very long leash. Happy’s leash was really long, Bill had bought climbing rope to extend it, so Happy could have maximum freedom on the walk. And Happy got bored as we were all standing around the car, it was taking long time. And then very casually, with no vibe at all, as if he was just taking the air-- completely casually and apparently diffidently-- I noticed his walking around, as we all waited, wasn’t random. He wasn’t like Lulu, just walking and sniffing and looking. He was actually-- altho it was practically undiscernible to see, his attitude was so casual and lackadaisical-- but in fact he was walking in wide circles around Bill, and the long leash was being wound around Bill. It had finally reached the point where if Bill took one more step, he would be lassoed and fall over.


And I found out from Bill that is what Happy would do to Skipper during the long walks the 3 dogs did with Bill. Skippy would be on that long long long leash, happily walking with Bill. Lulu is in a dream world of her own, and would keep trying to veer off in another direction. Her idea of a walkie is to march herself into every open door to house she sees along the way. Only Skipper is good as gold, and would behave himself perfectly on walk, would walk like normal dog, march along with Bill. What Happy would do, would appear to criss-cross randomly, but the next thing anyone would know, Skipper was completely lassoed and would fall over. And be furious as a huge bumblebee. And Bill would try to untie Skipper, but Skipper has mental problems, he would attack Bill. Happy would turn the whole walk into a catastrophe.

After that Bill walked Skippy and Lulu together in the morning, and took Happy out for his own walk in the evenings.

Then on Christmas, maybe 6 months after we had Happy, out of nowhere, Skippy woke up perfectly fine. As always, he had his big cup of coffee with me, light and sweet, and his blueberry muffin, and Bill took him out for his walk. He was fine on his walk and loved it. But just outside the house, on the way in, he had some problem, he lied down. And that night he went to Heaven. Bill was devastated.


And to console himself he decided to devote himself to Happy. I heard him tell Happy “you will have all the treats Skipper had and more.” And this is true. He took Happy on 20 mile hikes thru beautiful desert. They hiked all over. Happy had everything, he had glorious life. I would take Lulu out each morning for little walk around neighborhood and we’d watch Bill and Happy, Happy would be riding shot gun in the truck, return from their glorious morning at Fort Lowell Park. Happy had been taken for glorious 3 hour outing in the beautiful wash behind Fort Lowell Park. Happy had the life of riley. Very occasionally Lulu was invited too. And very very occasionally she got to be special girl, she got to go in the red truck, be taken to Butterfly Trail on top of Mount Lemon for hike in the woods, or be taken on wonderful outing of her own. But Happy’s life was made out of fabulous treats, Lulu only got that infrequently. What she got was little walks around the neighborhood with me, which she loved too.


She didn’t get to be special gal all the time and have the wonderful life, till Happy went to Heaven on Bill’s birthday (ouch!) year and half ago. And then Lulu got it all, set off in red truckie every day. But Bill went to the pound and came home with Beanie two months later, few weeks before Christmas. And altho Bill took both dogs for many special wonderful times on the desert, Beanie is too much of a handful. He is a shrimp who thinks he is a goliath. Little Beanie will attack any dog which moves. Eventually Bill just took him for long walk in neighborhood thru our own wash. Because Beanie will get into the face of any dog they pass behind its own fence. The dog comes out to bark at Beanie, and Beanie is right in his face, and Bill can’t pull Beanie off. They have to go on a walk which doesn’t pass any dogs, which is nearly impossible. Bill is a saint to take Beanie for his walk each morning. Each time a dog is in his own yard, they have to veer off and change direction.


But Lulu became Bill's girlfriend during those two months of dark unhappiness when Happy had left us for Heaven. He spent the morning drawing at Fort Lowell Park, he was there all morning, and Lulu was his art partner. She lounged on the bed next to him while he watched tv. They slept together every night. He became very close to Lulu and took her everywhere with him. Whatever errand he went on, whatever store he went to, whatever he needed to get done, Lulu went with him.


Even when we went to Sunflower Market to go grocery shopping he said “can Lulu be invited too.” And either stood outside with Lulu while I shopped or came inside and sat at the little table with her.


When Beanie arrived, we knew Beanie was too much of a baby to be left alone at home, he needed his sister. And so Lulu stopped being invited when Bill and I went off to shop. But he still invited her along when Beanie and I were home. She goes to gas station with him, to auto supply store, to the charity store to look for books, or to Ace hardware.


Beanie is such a star it appears Lulu is eclipsed, that she is the moon to his sun. But appearances are deceiving. Beanie is such a bright star, such a totally joyous being, his joy is so effervescent and bubbles up. Just me getting out of bed and heading to kitchen for snack, is cause for Beanie to somersault with joy across the huge living room. He lights up all of our lives and Lulu’s too. Beanie is the answer to a prayer, when the darkness came, when Happy left us. He has filled our home, our yard, our life with brightness and joy, for Lulu too, for all of us.


He is the light of our life and arrived just before Christmas, the great Christmas present Bill brought home for all of us.


Lulu became transformed and so did Bill and Annie. Happiness personified had entered our home.


And altho Bill dotes on Beanie, how can he not! Lulu is still his girlfriend, they eat together, they sleep together, they watch all the games together, they are as close as two peas in a pod.


And I realized Lulu takes care of all of us, she takes care of Bill, of me, and Beanie. She is the mother of our home, and queen of the dogs. She is the velvety moon who watches out for all of us, who embraces the planet of our home with her sweetness, tenderness and love.... And shines the light by which we see in the dark, the lovely jewel in the night sky, to remind us all is well.... It is she who blesses all of us with her sweet warmth and keeps the tides in their place and the rhythm of our days...