My own cross to bear.

Hi, I’m Alejandro and am new to the community.

I so enjoy reading your consistent writing.

Something that you do in your writing is to signal a special use of words by using capital letters.  I’m not sure I always get the distinctions you’re making, but I do get you are making distinctions that are essential for understanding what you are saying.

Love is like many words that cannot be defined completely.  It’s an interesting question why there are some words–really important ones– so hard to define.  Love is a quality in relationships.  It’s ordinary, we know about love, but love is also rare.     There are so many ways to make an attempt to define love and end up with a paradox.

We have a tendancy to look at things in terms of binary  opposites.  Very typically the stories we tell involve binary opposites.  The structure and organization of our stories follows the action or conflict between opposites; say good and bad.

So others can care deeply for you–even if it’s hard to put this caring feeling into words–can still misunderstand your intentions, fail to reciprocate or fit in relationship with you in ways that seem to make sense.

I had to pause when I read “something as ephemeral as love.”   I think what made me pause is I’ve been thinking about a recent post you did about loving only happens in the present.  I listened to you for awhile, so I know that “being here now” is a very important construct to you.  I responded to that post, but I hope you noticed that I’m pretty tentative about my views of time. Anyhow when I think of love it’s hard for me to keep only the present in mind.

I can’t define love–I don’t even think the word can be defined properly.  Why do I love you?  There must be reasons right?  LOL I’m not even sure there must be reasons, but I can think of many reasons for loving you.  What always pops into mind when I think of you is the kindness you show towards others.  So it’s like there’s a body of historical evidence.  There’s also a sense of projection into the future which goes something like: I know RicHARD, he’s good.  He’s been good in the past, he’s good right now, and he’s good to the bone.

Putting the word “good” in the mix tends to confuse things.  You have children.  Children are wonderfu, but they can be very naughty and unpleasant at times.  Apparently it took   my dear mother having a few children before she realised none of them is perfect all the time.  That lack of understanding made it pretty hard on the oldest child.  I remember my mother saying at varous times how the oldest would have her at her wits end and she’d punish her, but almost unfailingly it would turn out she was sick. 

 My mother told this story because it made her feel awful.  As a parent you know that bad or good love for your child endures.

Sometimes I think it feels like if you have to tell people how they can support you, then their support is not real.    How do you tell people that you need them to know what you need without your telling them what you need from them?   How can you ask others to give you what you don’t know you need?  LOL I ask those questions as if I’m asking you, but really they’re questions directed at me.  I’m not very good at relationships with others.  But I notice people who are.  And it seems they are very often good at being clear what they want from others.

Lots of us love you RicHARD.  Lots of us know that it’s very, very hard for you to ask anything of another.  Lots of us would freely give you anything.  Maybe lots of us won’t screw up as much as me, but we’ll all screw up sometmes.  There’s an old song if you ever use YouTube you can hear it there, “I’ll Take Care of You”  by Bobby Blue Bland.  Just thinking of the song because I can’t quite get at what I’m trying to say: It’s not just telling those who love you what you need, it’s also letting us give to you.

Love and expressions of love always seem a bit tentative, not that love feels tentative.  But love seems revealed in converation:  May I?  Yes you may.  Love seems somehow in the in between of those.

Tell us what you want.  Tell us what you need.  :-)

here, right here, right now – you have my support and yes, something as ephemeral at love. 

i’d believe you. 

I read this post on my email on my phone very early yesterday morning, but wasn’t at a computer where I could post a comment.  I thought of you much yesterday and today while i was at work dealing with the aftermath of this…..

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/01/01/aspen.banks/?imw=Y&iref=mpstoryemail

more of the same story can be found at either of our local papers….
aspendailynews.com or aspentimes.com

when people feel loved and understood and cared for, do they still lash out to punish others?? 

I wish the man in the linked story had been able to think of another way to be remembered by our community.  or another way to find peace for himself. 

I hope that he is indeed resting in peace with the knowledge that his plan didn’t physically harm anyone though it scared many and made their New Year finacially leaner. 

today, I am thankful that no one in my community was blown up by a bomb, especially my husband and some of my friends, who, being the first responders, were standing in very close proximity to those very devices that the bomb squad later destroyed. 

doug wrote this on a recent blog….

“How come I can feel you here
where I can barely breath
and I love you so much more
on that day
I think it might
all end?”

it spoke, oh so much, to me, who was wondering the very same thing last night as I counted my blessings, one of which was that adam was alive and well, beside me, breathing quietly in and out in his sleep. 

johnpowers – what a wonderful song.  thanks for the link.  I want to sing it to the whole world.  i want everyone who feels hopeless and sad or angry to hear it and know that their is a way to be remembered through love, through being loving. 

and here’s the link to doug’s post that I meant to link to in the above comment. 

rich – thank you for daring to be so open and vulnerable and human.  it’s gives the rest of us permission to do the same. 

my mother is going through a process right now and was able to ask for some help help from friends and family for the first time in her life recently.  it has been such a pleasure to be allowed to help, to have my help solicited and to have it be received with gratitude and without guilt or resentment or misunderstanding. 

I think people want to please each other, but often just don’t know how. 

Rich, I have read through your first blogs on this page, and I
appreciate you so much. You are walking the frontier of true manhood,
and by writing it here, putting it into the field like this, you are a
great example, leader, healer.

You have my loving support. Ashe.

DC

ASK and IT SHALL BE GIVEN

Rich, your love is a valuable gift which I will treasure, use well, pass along.
Sweet dreams.
DC

[quietly present with you in the process of asking for love]

[singing softly with amended words … “Seek ye first the Presence of Love, and its Blessedness, and all these things shall be added unto you, allelu, alleluia.

Ask and it shall be given unto you, seek and ye shall find, knock and the door shall be opened unto you, allelu, alleluia.”]

You are requester and receiver and vehicle -

and so it is!

Sylvia

RicHARD, I’ve never noticed your lack of thoughtfulness towards me.  But I sure noticed your response to me.  It put a big smile on my face.  I’m loving you right now.

Oh and your thoughts about stories is so right, especially the distinction that stories are the finger pointing towards the moon not the moon.  You’re a wise man.

Just read this now, Richard! You have my love and support! Thank you for being you, for opening up, for asking what you need! Indeed you are a loving person as others have written! Have a wonderful 2009!