LOVE LETTER TO ME

Dear Lisa…I'm glad you grew up to become the Elise that your parents named you. It's a gift not given to all. See those 4 hands there? Your mother's hand holds your hand. Look at the tissue paper soft skin and the sparkle of the engagement ring on her hand. She has been wearing that ring since 1947. When you were conceived, I can assure you, it was a moment of flowing love just like the conception of your two sons. In that sea storm of loving energy, an egg and a sperm came together and in the union created a beautiful human being capable of deep and lasting love. Your parents did the very best they could, as do many parents, to give you a safe and loving place to grow until you felt confident you could take care of yourself. They made mistakes. They probably even messed you up around certain aspects of life…but you know in your heart, they did their level best…given the parenting they received. Life isn't easy on this Planet Earth. There are many sources of pollution…misinformation and misunderstanding. Some of your hardest lessons in learning came from your very own choices and some came from the dogma of cultural institutions like school, church and even your stubborn resistance to good parental guidance. You may not have much money and you may not be well traveled…but face it…you breathe in an atmosphere of love and love has a quality deep-rooted in Earth. It grows.

It was really fun to come across that carton box of old writings the other day. But what an eye-opener. I watched you read those short stories. I could tell you were a wee bit distressed when you realized that some of the writing rants from young adulthood sounded just like a few pages you wrote the other morning. Like an echo sent out from another location…you could hear the words as they resonated in the present moment with the same intensity . Why get peeved with yourself? You may have written some of your best material back when you were struggling to hear the whispers of the deep inner soul between school work, homework, work work, meetings with doctors, teachers, dog walking, cooking, shopping, driving kids to lessons, etc, etc. Remember when you boxed those pages up? You were mad. Raging hormonal menopausal mad…sick of trying to put words to my life and my love, I decided, shit…I'm sick of this. So for my 50th birthday, I boxed up all those writings and shoved them in a closet for no future reference. It was the year I caught the flu and ended up with congestive heart failure consuming all but 19% of my heart function. I had cardio-myopathy. That means an enlarged heart. I had to fight for my life and it meant fighting to hold on to love as well. Broken hearted and weak willed go together. When there is no passion behind one's efforts, the power to make manifest recedes and one becomes accepting of "well, I didn't really care about that anyway". And before you know it,,,nothing really matters. A numbness settles in and you may even stop listening for that quiet little whisper from your soul. Perhaps you begin to question even the listening.

I know you wanted to put that box away quickly after you finished that one little file. I watched you slip the file back into the box and put it way up high in the closet so it isn't in easy reach. The Queen of Tidy doesn't like our messes and listening across the years might take some time and it might be messy…very messy. But I am 62 year old Elise. She is not the same person even though some of the written words might be the same. Present moment Elise is not afraid of long hours and days alone. She doesn't mind not going out and about and she doesn't pile on distractions without thinking anymore because she knows her energies need to be managed a little more carefully. She doesn't blame Stephen for her own unhappiness anymore and she realizes the insidious nature of demeaning self talk. Much has been healed. So I have an idea.

Commit the image of Mom's hand holding my hand to your heart. She loves you. She has always loved you. And she will always love you. So maybe you didn't live the bravest most adventurous life of your teenage dreams…maybe you made some really stupid mistakes and stood frozen in fear too long to grasp at certain opportunities. Maybe you have a funky learning style that makes you unique and may have created untold difficulty for you in school. Maybe all that history went in to your failing heart. But now it is 12 years later. Your heart function is normal for a woman your age. Your children are wonderful fledged adults who stir you with pride and excitement for the gifts life may hold for them. Your expectations are more in line with reality and you are much more easily satisfied. You are a new old person! Let the image of handholding suggest that your older wiser self is now taking the hotheaded young adult writer's hand in hers. She is holding it in love…hand to hand.

Now again…lets bring down that box and dig through it a little deeper. Holding hands and joining hearts…we may waken the courage to explore the writing as the seeded center of a flower. Perhaps we will have a garden of poesies to appreciate. I love you. I hope I can encourage and support you and sense out the best of those flights of your fancy so many years ago. And we will be walking the path of light toward a longed for dream…the dream of writing a book that touches others with light and with love.                      

                                                           Sincerely, Elise