Watch Out, It's Poetry Month!!

April's Fool
C.K. Armistead 4/1/2016

And I wonder
Sometimes
If I am the only one
Who isn't paying attention
And missing the joke.
Everyone else is laughing,
And I wonder why.
Sometimes
I am afraid they are
Laughing
AT me,
Which I feel bad about,
IF you laugh WITH me,
I don't mind a bit.
My heart isn't exactly
On my sleeve,
But I can still be
Hurt.
Pretty deeply
When you're not looking
I cry all over the
Pages
And rain words
Like tears
Until I feel
Well again.

The Stuff Of Life
C.K. Armistead
4/2/2016

"Do not squander time,
It is the stuff Life
Is made of"
Or some similar thing
Said the sundial
Shown on
Gone With The Wind
I have always wondered
About that.
Time is such a fickle commodity.
Running fast as Spring storm water
Or as slowly as the proverbial
Molasses.
Slowly, and wearily
Ticking by
When life is hard upon us,
When we are sad,
Or waiting for news
Rushing and roaring
Right past us
When there are things
We need to do,
When we are with the ones
We love and do not
Often get to see.
There never seems to be enough time
To just hug the stuffing out
Of the ones you love so much
That are usually far away
Never enough time
To stop and say
I love you,
I really do.
My life would be SO much less
Without you in it,
Even if you are usually
So far away
 Physically.
 So, all of you
That I rarely see,
But who mean
So much to me,
(And I hope by now
you all KNOW who you are.)
I love you, I really do
My life would be SO much less
Without you in it.
Really.
Please know that it is true.

The Thief
C.K.Armistead
4/2/16

Time is a thief
We all know this.
You look up  one day
And the face staring back at you
Has wrinkles
And your hair is grey.
You think about things,
And it seems they happened
Only yesterday.
But it's been more
Than 30 years.
You aren't that old yet?
Don't feel too cocky.
Time's stealing your life away, too.
You just haven't noticed yet.
Why all this musing on time today?
Well,
Thirty years ago today
My Pop died.
He's been gone now
Longer than I had him with me in my life.
I was 26 years old.
Already married,
Already not living at home,
But still his Baby Girl.
His Sugar Foot.
Katie Didder.
Only HE got to call me that.
Nobody else better try it.
No matter how much
Of life Time steals away,
That little girl
Who loves her Pop
Is still here.
Still trying
To make him proud.

Spring
C.K.Armistead
4/3/2016

Warm inviting sunshine
But the breeze still has an edge
Trees still not quite leafed out
But daffodils blooming under the hedge.

Spirit yearning to stretch and grow
Yet flesh resistant to trust
That new, flickering, struggling glow
Afraid to stand and shake off the rust.

A season of such contradiction
Of profuse, expansive bloom
And sudden, freezing contraction
Of hope in the light,  but full consciousness of the gloom.

Lord of Springtime, Lord of love
Strengthen our trembling hearts
That we may show the world your love
And spread peace to all its parts.

And Do You Know?
C.K. Armistead 4/3/16

We speak so seldom
Hardly seems we could be
Friends.
Yet, I believe we are.
Your smile makes my heart happy
Your adventures are of interest
Even though you are not
Right here
In my everyday life.
So many of you,
Friends and family
Both.
That live in my heart
And always will
Though we don't often
Connect.
And do you know
That you are loved?
I hope you do
Because you are.
And do you know
It matters not
That we aren't close
You are still cared for.
Your presence matters
To me in this world.
Don't forget that
Please.
I've lost one who did forget
Who thought he was all alone
When he was surrounded by
Love.
Please remember
You are loved.
You are.
And do you know how dearly?
Do you?

Planting Dreams
C.K. Armistead
4/4/16

Spring air stirs the soul
Calls me outdoors,
Sets me to dreaming of beautiful
Flowers
Fragrant herbs,
And pleasant shady
Evenings
In the garden
With you.

Soil amended
New plants planted,
Prayers said for their
Prosperity.
Achy back and sore knees
Water bill going higher
All for the dream
Of fragrant beauties
Found in this garden
If Nature so pleases.

Brutus Waiting

C.K.Armistead 

4/5/16

He sits by Daddy's  chair

Ears up

Listening,

Bright eyes watching. 

He's always up to make a new friend,

But his eyes

Are watching 

For Mama.

He's  well behaved,

Quite polite,

Greeting all who greet him,

Never pestering those that don't

He always seems a happy boy

But oh, when Mama comes out,

You've never seen such joy!

If he could, he'd twist and shout

A Good Night For Sleeping
By C.K.Armistead
4/5/16

"It's so windy,
It's a good night for sleeping."
My Pop used to say.
I used to think he was nuts.
All I could hear
Was the old tree outside (and above)
My bedroom creaking, groaning,
And moaning like Marley's ghost
Thought it was coming for me
For sure.
But Pop loved the wild song of the wind
Loved the whispers of the places
It had been
The power in that invisible
Breeze
That could bend and even buckle
Mighty trees.
Even now,
When the wind is especially high,
I remember Pop
And his anticipation
Of being sung to sleep
By the song
Of the wind.

Awake 

By C.K. Armistead 

4/6/16

To wake up

To move, stretch,

Feel with your body

That your mind

Has come online again.

My body often resists,

Telling my brain 

To shut up,

I need more time.

Perhaps, rather, it is

My mind

That  seeks to stay

In the carefree realm

Of slumber, 

Where no demands are made, 

And no responses expected. 

To be awake, aware of the world 

Around us

Implies a responsibility 

To interact with that world.

There are things We must do,

Responses we must make 

If we are to function properly 

In the world 

Both for our own comfort, 

And that of others.

If we seek to remain 

Asleep,

We don't fulfill our side

Of the bargain with

Society 

That allows us all to live 

With at least some degree

Of peace.

We must, therefore, 

Be awake and aware,

And do our share

Of the work

Of civilization. 

So that the agents of

Chaos

Are not allowed

To destroy those 

Who cannot defend 

Themselves

Those who need their rest

And trust the rest of us 

To watch over the safety 

Of their sleep.

The Cyclical Nature Of Time
C.K. Armistead 4/7/16

Birth.
Life.
Death.
Waking,
Doing,
Sleeping.
Childhood,
Adulthood,
Old age.
We begin with little
But potential
Add knowledge
And experience
Every day.
End up full
Of emotions
And knowledge
But out of time
To share them
The trick is
To make the most
Of the middle
Life
Doing
Adulthood
The time to collect knowledge
And experiences,
But also to share them
So that old age
May be spent
Relishing them.
And all those
Who we met
Along the way.

Peaceful  Place

By C. K. Armistead 

4/8/ 16

There is an astonishing 

Amount of peace

To be found in one's own

Garden.

Never mind the awful amount

Of work involved in establishing 

And maintaining it

The blooms

And the birdsong

Bring such balm

As offsets all the toil.

A "Good" Tired
By C.K.Armistead
 4/9/16

Achy,
But not sore.
Weary,
But capable of more.
Awake,
But not wired.
Satisfied -
It's a good tired.

Goals set
And accomplished
Challenges met
Feeling astonished
That the race is done,
Our tasks are complete
We have won
We rest replete.


Dark Is His Path
By C.K.Armistead
April 11, 2016

When the sky
Turns ugly
And the wind whispers
Of threats coming
I turn my eyes
To the horizon,
And see the storm
Approaching.
I remember then
A line from an old hymn
"And dark is his path
On the wings of the storm."
About God's nearness
Even in turbulent times.
Still
It seems he does have
A very rugged and dark
Path
To come to save us
Along the flanks
Of that boiling,
Dark,
Flashing,
Howling
Storm.

Hurry And Worry

C.K. Armistead  4/12/16

The phone rings incessantly. 

On more than one line.

No sooner dealt with,

And it rings again. 

Time I do not have, 

For I am due 

At the service desk

Where a line of customers  wait.

All afternoon, 

One question after another,

One smile after another. 

Often they come with worry,

And because of information we have,

They leave with a smile.

There have been enough of those today

To make the hurry worthwhile.


Writing
C.K.Armistead 4/13/1
When staring at a blank page
It seems time drags like the last ice age
When ideas finally pop
You write so fast your hand will drop
Lifeless into your lap
Before you run out of creative sap.
If you try to force the muse
She will pout and flatly refuse
No words will flow, none will fit
What you produce will sound like, well, Sh*t.
When at last the muse agrees,
Writing will become a breeze
Images and words will show it
You are and always have been a poet.


I suppose these next lines count as a poem.  I wrote them today in honor of a friend's birthday:

To my friend Ron:
I can't make collages or do video
 Words are the only art I know
 So from my heart I will say
 I wish you a very happy Birthday

Perhaps I should rather say
 Greetings and felicitations on your natal day!


Is That Me?
By C.K. Armistead
4/14/16
Sometimes the mirror
Startles me.
Who is that lady?
The one with grey hair
But a cute haircut,
And who is in better shape
Than I thought I was.
Is that me?
Really?
Because I feel
Clumsy and big
Even though I am
But little.
I feel like the awkward teen
Who wrote angst filled verse
And dreamed of making
A splash in the world
But was afraid
Of her own words.
Who is that confident
Woman
Looking back at me?


For The Birds
C.K.Armistead
4/14/16

Dear Starling in the pecan tree
Bleeping and clicking like
An electronic device at me
Please be so kind as to take a hike.
Your incessant noise is most unpleasant
And the St. Francis statue below you
Doesn't look good wearing your excrement
Kindly find another loo!

Dear Blue Jay creaking on the fence
I know you only want a bath, you see
Please know that I won't take offense
If you make use of our birdbath facility.
I only ask that you take care
And don't fling the water everywhere
I'm not sitting that far away,
And I must look presentable at work today.

Dear Mocking bird scolding the squirrel
Please realize that he doesn't care.
You can scold and dive and whirl
And he'll just stop and blankly stare.
Please take your loud shenanigans
Away, I fiercely plead
For I have to begin all over again
This page I've been trying to read.

Dear Robin singing from on high
You alone are welcome here
Your song so lovely makes me sigh
It is a pleasure to my ear
If those others would so pardon
Us, and be on their merry way
Joining the pigeon squadron
 Off to find the next full feeder of the day.

Dear Sparrows flitting everywhere,
You may stay as well, I guess.
Your merry play without care
Eases much of my stress.
Though most of you can be a pain,
The yard would be lonely without you
So please, come back and visit again
But don't use St. Francis for a loo!

Come With Me!
C.K.Armistead
4/15/16

Come with me!
Look!
See?
It's all here in a
Book.
Adventures galore
Trips to a faraway shore
Rich and satisfying lore
Will leave you begging for more
Just one more
Story.
Please?
I'll go right to sleep,
I promise,
Just one more story
Too help me keep
My dreams alive tonight?
Please?
Listen...
Once upon a time
In a kingdom bright
A little dragon
Wouldn't say goodnight
He began to weep...
Because he didn't
Want to go
To sleep.
Sleep, little dragon
Don't you know?
All of us will watch
Over you
And wait for tomorrow
To hear your stories anew.
Away with sorrow,
Away with fear,
Sleep, little dragon,
You have friends here.

Symmetry 

By C.K.Armistead 

4/17/16

Symmetry  is supposed to be 

Attractive to the human mind

But it is evident to me

That my face is not

The symmetrical kind

My left eye is at a tiny bit

Of an angle

My dimples seem to sit

In something of a tangle.

It makes my smile quirk

With a twinkling sort of grace

And so it seems to work

For my particular face.

Spring Rain
By C.K. Armistead
4/18/16

And the rain came
And the waters rose
I feared for the safety
Of the new plants
Those not yet anchored
In the newly placed soil.
But they seem fine
Growing and prospering
In spite of the rain.
Perhaps because of it.
Just as we dread the dreary
Stormy times
Fearing for the safety
Of our tenuous connection
To this life
Yet they seem to bring
Deep nourishment
To our souls
Helping us flourish
In the end.

Remembrance
C.K.Armistead
4/20/16

Every year
April 19th brings
The sounds, the sights,
The feelings
Back.
The shock
The hurt
The tears.

Even now, sometimes
I see the ruin
Of that building
In my mind
And I remember
Families torn apart,
Our community's heart broken.

The day brings back
So much sadness
Those injured,
Those lost
Especially the children
Who never  had a
Chance to grow up.

It also brought gifts
The gift of love
In the face of  hatred
The gift of courage
In the face of terror,
The gift of healing
In the midst of broken hearts.

That day showed us all
Both how awful humans can be
And also how marvelous,
How loving and sacrificing
Humans can be.
That day taught me
That I, too, was now
An Oklahoman.

(In honor of the 21st anniversary of the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in downtown OKC.)

A Very Special Gift

By C.K.Armistead 

4/20/16

Perhaps the best gift

To come all unexpected  from

That sorrowful April  day

Is the musical gift

We have found

Since becoming a part

Of the choir.

In truth and in symbol

The harmonies 

We partake in 

Are a gift of fellowship 

And worship 

A wonderful unity

Found in that blend

Our individual voices

Into one.

Every week since

That awful day

We have been safe

In the midst of that

Harmony 

In the midst of our family 

Of faith.

Which if not for tragedy 

We might never

Have truly found.

Music is both worship

And prayer

Giving blessing

To both listeners

And singers.

A beautiful expression 

Of our love for God

And one another.


2016
By C.K. Armistead
4/22/16

I sit and stare at the screen
Sadness everywhere, it would seem.
So much loss, I want to scream
I truly wonder what it all means.

Once upon a time, Don McLean
Sang about the Day the Music Died
This year, to me, it seems,
Is the YEAR the artists died.

So many sad losses, one after another,
And on a personal note, we lost my mother.
Is there a plot out there to smother
Creativity?  Big Brother?

We will survive this year, I hope
Without losing anyone else so dear,
I don't know if I could cope
And despair is what I fear.



The Payoff
By C.K.Armistead
4/23/16

Now all the hard work
Of mowing and weeding
Is done.
We can relax
And maybe have
A little fun.
Sitting with a drink in hand
Surveying the beauty
Our efforts command.



Beware
By C.K.Armistead
4/25/16

The clouds are massing
To the Southwest
The teams are out tracking
The weather's brewing a mess.
Let us pray with all our might
That the Tornado monsters
Pass us by tonight.
With the ice balls they fling
And their terrible teeth
They destroy everything
That falls beneath.
This is one little town
That's had more than it's share
Of toothy tornadoes
And ice-ball filled air.
We've seen this misery all before
So tornadoes, just take yourselves
Right away from Moore.


Muses
By C.K.Armistead
4/25/16

Whimsical and inconsistent,
Oh, wordy spirits,
Hear my complaint!
You lead me on
Keep me awake all night,
Only to vanish
When I need you,
When I have time to write.
All night I hear poems,
Or clever dialog,
Interesting plot diversions,
But by morning, they are gone.
Trying to write them down at night
Is worse than trying to catch a sprite.
Whenever paper, pencil  or screen are close by
Those beautiful words and images fly.
And will not return until once more
I lie trying to sleep and listening
To my husband snore.

Calm Restored
By C.K. Armistead
4/26/16

The noisy meteorological show
Has finished it's bluster,
Gone somewhere else to rumble and blow.
And I  have my tidy world again
Where all is well and safe
Where nothing can harm
Or scare me
My happy place.
For you are here,
Your arms enfold me
There is no fear
When you hold me.


Happy Birthday, Mom
By C.K.Armistead
4/27/16

You aren't here anymore
Where I can send you things
Or call you up and say
I hope your day was wonderful
And I love you.
So,
Happy Birthday, Mom,
I miss you.
I survived another round of
Bad weather last night
Matt's doing well,
He sends his love.
I got to spend time with
Amy and her little girl
The last time I was
Back in California.
They are both well,
 And Amy's husband
Is a good man.
I went out there
To say goodbye to you
And to see where you and Pop
Are remembered formally
Upon this earth.
The place looks nice, all the trees
Are bigger, LOTS bigger than when
We said goodbye to Pop.
Not so easy to see downtown
From there anymore.
But the wind whispers stories
Through those trees,
And I bet Pop would love the place.
Mostly,
You are both remembered and loved
In our hearts,
All four of us,
and anyone else who ever knew you.
I miss you both,
And I hope you are together,
Because someday,
I want to see you both again.
And I hope you'll be proud of me
Of all I am,
Of all I have done,
Even though it isn't for wealth or fame,
I have made lives better.
I DO make lives better,
One little bit at a time,
Every day,
Every time I go to work.
Sometimes in a very quiet way,
A lot like you did.
I learned a lot about
How to be kind
From you.
I really miss you,  Mommy-Mo.


Sleep
By C.K. Armistead
4/28/16

Thou elusive sprite,
I'll catch thee yet!
My eyes shut tight,
The bedclothes my net.
Even though you do scorn
My company,
Long afore morn,
Mine ye shall be!
Leave off the aches that plague
Leave off the sniffling nose
I must fatigue assuage,
Before sanity goes.
Quiet,  thou clacking brain,
And peace, ye racing thoughts,
Let peaceful calm remain
And let sweet sleep be caught.



Escape
By C. K. Armistead
4/29/16

When reality is just a bit too much
I find a better place to look
For comfort, distraction, and such
I simply sit and read a book.
Doesn't have to be the paper kind,
Even though those are very nice
If it's electronic, I don't mind,
As long as there's power for the device.
Sometimes, I find myself dreaming
And making up my own tales
Instead of just reading,
Against harsh reality, writing prevails.
I crawl into my cozy world
And visit with old friends
Until my ennui is cured
And I can face life once again.


Seeking Sanctuary
(A poem based on Beauty and the Beast 1987)
By C.K. Armistead
4/26/16, edited 4/29/16

Catherine's thoughts one stormy night:

How I wish I  could go Below tonight. 

The wind is high,

The clouds are ripe, 

There's going to be

A storm up here.

I wish I could be 

Where candle flame

Glows cheerily

And everyone knows my name.

I wish I could go there

To my safest place where

I'll come to no harm 

When I  see his face

And rest in the safety

Of his arms.

Old Friends
By C.K.Armistead
4/30/16

I stumbled across an old friend today
An old TV show I used to love
When I was very young
And full of dreams.
This show, I should say,
Is not something girls are "supposed"
To have liked
In that era, when I was young.
It involved rockets and space ships
And rescues
And I am sure far more boys watched it.
But I adored it.
Never did I feel I could not
Be one of the daring crew
That went out and saved
People in need.
Not that I WANTED to,
But I felt I could have.
I just adored the machines
And the things they could do.
These old friends reminded me
Of a couple of other
Favorites.
One that I never let go of
And another I had almost forgotten.
One was a giant robot
Controlled by a young boy
The other was the crew of a Starship
Whose adventures I've followed
Forever after.
Because they made me dream
Gave me hope
Made me wonder how
We could get to a world
That much better than this one.
Yep. I was a geeky fangirl
LONG before it was cool.

For All The Saints

This Sunday is the day our church celebrates all the faithful who have gone before us into that unknowable land beyond this world.  We remember them, the ways they touched lives while they were here on earth, and how their examples and deeds continue to touch lives. 
Not just the "official" saints, but the everyday saints, the ones you probably have in your own life. 
We remember Sunday school teachers we have known, family members, neighbors, friends, people whose love and caring influenced our lives.  We remember them.  They live on, both in that land beyond, and in our hearts.

After the service at church this morning, I found a text from my sister telling me that our aunt had passed on into the nearer presence of God.  We were afraid this was coming.  She had been very ill, and had lost interest in things that she used to be very involved in.  Not a shock, but still a sadness.  Won't get to hear her heavily southern accented voice again, she won't hug my neck again in this life.  But she is still with me.  She lives on, just as my Pop, my Uncles and cousins who have gone on.  The impressions they made on the lives of others live on.  They are remembered, and remembered with love.

There is a movie out right now that I highly recommend, especially to those who have recently lost a loved one.  The Book of Life is a lovely tale, well told, of love and loss,  and the triumph of love.  In this movie, the afterlife is explained as containing two kingdoms.  Not Heaven and Hell, as we sometimes think of them, but the Land of the Remembered, and the Land of the Forgotten.  The Land of the Remembered is colorful and beautiful, and there are fiestas every day.  The Land of the Forgotten is bleak and colorless, and everyone  there is very quiet and sad.

My aunt will forever dwell in the Land of the Remembered.  She touched SO many lives.  In the town she (and for the last 20 plus years, my Mom) lived in, she is surprisingly well known.  People knew we were relatives, and on our last visit, my sister and I were asked repeatedly how our aunt was doing, and heard many stories of how very much she is loved.  Nearly everyone I met in that town who knew her, adored her.  She was so loving and giving, and until very recently made birthday cakes for LOTS of the people in town.  She taught Sunday School at one of the largest churches in town, and there are legions of former students who will never forget her caring and her teaching. 
All of us in the family will remember her with love for the many wonderful vacations we spent being overfed and spoiled by her.  I have a few recipes that she gave Mom over the years, and all of the congregation of the 11am service at St. Paul's Cathedral in Oklahoma City should call her blessed, because she gave me the recipe for Sausage Balls.  Nearly every time Matt and I did refreshments for the "After the 11" fellowship, I took Sausage Balls.  If I didn't, there were disappointed people who always looked forward to them.  So, all my fellow St. Paul's 11 o'clockers, please say a prayer of thanks for the life of Margaret Smyly, who helped teach me how to always bake with love.

On this day set aside in the church to remember those gone on before us, please think about those folks that you remember from the past, not just family, but friends, coworkers, teachers, anyone who made a difference, however small, in your life.  Remember them, say a prayer of thanks for their lives on this earth, and thereby know that they always dwell in the Land of the Remembered.

I leave you with the words to this hymn we sang today at a baptism.  It is a bit saccharine, but the last verse is so very true.  There are hundreds of thousands still today who do the right thing, the good thing, the difficult thing, the thing Jesus asked his followers to do.  They love their neighbor and show it in their actions.  Like my Aunt Margaret.  May we all do the things that will keep us in the Land of those Remembered with love.


I sing a song of the saints of God,
Patient and brave and true,
who toiled and fought and lived and died
for the Lord they loved and knew.
And one was a doctor, and one was a queen,
and one was a shepherdess on the green:
They were all of them saints of God - and I mean,
God helping, to be one too.

They loved their Lord so dear, so dear,
and his love made them strong;
and they followed the right for Jesus' sake,
the whole of their good lives long.
And one was a soldier, and one was a priest,
and one was slain by a fierce wild beast:
And there's not any reason, no not the least,
why I shouldn't be one too.

They lived not only in ages past,
there are hundreds of thousands still,
the world is bright with the joyous saints
who love to do Jesus' will,
You can meet them in school, or in lanes, or at sea,
in church, or in trains, or in shops, or at tea,
for the saints of God are just folk like me,
and I mean to be one too.

Words by Lesbia Scott
From the Episcopal Hymnal 1982, # 293 

What Scares Us

Many things are common fears among humans.  The dark, being alone, spiders, heights, enclosed places, all these are pretty common phobias.  We are also afraid of dying.  We don't think about it much, at least not usually when we are younger, but we don't really like the idea.  When we are young, it is inconceivable that anything could cause our existence to cease. We are vibrant, full of life, invincible.  Or so we believe.  The older we get, the more experiences we have of loss, or our own illness or injury, and Death becomes more real.  When we lose a loved one or even an acquaintance near our own age, no matter how old we are, Death becomes more real.

Death was a very real presence to all ages of people in the past.  Medicine was not so advanced, people were not so well-nourished, life was in general more dangerous, and more people died at younger ages.  Even in my generation, Death was a real presence during my late childhood and early adolescence.  There was a war going on in Viet Nam, and it consumed the lives of many men and some women the same age as my siblings.  Both my brothers had friends go off to serve.  Both knew some who did not come home.  They were both in engineering programs at UCLA, and because their grades were good enough, they had deferments.  (They were both also nearly blind without their glasses, as am I.  Only my sister has good distance vision.)  Every night on the news, we heard counts of wounded, dead, and missing.  Every night.  They don't do that with the wars today, but even though we have lost far too many, and had too many injured, the sheer number of injured and dead over the course of Viet Nam is staggering.  It still seems shocking to me that I thought of those counts as a normal part of a newscast when I was growing up.

There are a few things I fear.  I don't really fear confined spaces (like elevators), but I am very uncomfortable in them.  I have a lot of respect for fire, but I don't really fear it.  I have learned not to fear the dark, (unless I am alone on an unfamiliar street, or in a place like my old neighborhood in California.)  I dislike climbing on ladders because my uncle and my Pop both died after falling off ladders.   Right this minute, I am afraid to try to lie down and go to sleep.  I woke up choking last night, and for a few seconds, until I got whatever had gone the wrong way cleared, I was afraid I was going to die.  I could not get enough air in.  I am afraid it will happen again, and this time I won't be able to get the gunk out of my throat.  This has never happened before.

All day this has been perking along in the back of my mind.  I have distracted myself most of the day with things that needed doing and with reading and fooling around on the Internet, and haven't let it come to the forefront of my thoughts.  But now, bedtime looms, and I need my sleep because I have to work all day tomorrow.

My faith tells me I don't have to fear what will happen to me when I die, but I still don't want to go yet.  I have too many things undone.  There are too many messes in this house that I don't want other people to have to try and sort out.  Especially my husband.  I don't want to leave him. I really don't want to leave him all these things that need to be sorted and dealt with.  I told him we had better go together, because I don't want to go alone, or go on alone without him.  He just says we have to do what we have to do, and it isn't our decision anyway.  He's right.  (He's usually right, but don't tell him I said that. )
There are things I have not done, places I want to go that I have not gone, people I care about that I don't want to leave behind because they just might need me.  There are SO many more songs to sing, and poems to write, and books to read.  There are movies I want to see that are not out yet!  I want to see the rest of They Live Among Us!  But mostly, there are people I care for who may not know it, and I have to do a better job of letting them know.  Not telling them.  Showing them.  It isn't easy.  Actions speak louder than words because words of support are easy to offer.  Acts of support and concern are harder to accomplish.

I may have been flippant and frivolous today online, but it was only to cover the darker things clamoring around in my subconscious.  Thoughts of how much time I have wasted, how many I have hurt, those are the things that have truly been on my mind today.  Yet I still spent most of the day in avoidance behavior.  Of course, I had to wait on the plumber, and wait for him to finish his work before my time was really my own today.  Then, there was the generally run down feeling (now getting even worse) because I could not sleep for more than about an hour and a half last night.

Well, I can't avoid this particular fear much longer.  I shall set up the coffee pot so I can take a thermal carafe of good coffee to work tomorrow.  (I share, of course.)  I'll take the guaifenesin and the antihistamine and anti inflammatory,  brush my teeth, wash my face, etc.  Then I'll try to go to sleep.  Wish me luck.

Here is a picture of the new kitchen sink that I was waiting on the plumber to install, by the way.