Fly Like An Eagle

Posted on 2012/12/03 by JimR, Chaplain

I like Contemporary Christian services.  I played drums in the band for 25 plus years.  I like to hear songs that can be heard as Christian music from the lyrics like Steve Miller Band’s “Fly Like An Eagle”
As we live our lives time keeps on slippin’ into the future and every minute wasted is one more minute lost.  I want to fly like an eagle here and now.  Take a moment and meditate on the lyrics below.
Time keeps on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’ …

Into the future
Time keeps on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’ Steve Miller Band
Into the future
I want to fly like an eagle
To the sea
Fly like an eagle
Let my spirit carry me
I want to fly like an eagle
Till I’m free
Oh, Lord, through the revolution
Feed the babies
Who don’t have enough to eat
Shoe the children
With no shoes on their feet
House the people
Livin’ in the street
Oh, oh, there’s a solution
I want to fly like an eagle
To the sea
Fly like an eagle
Let my spirit carry me
I want to fly like an eagle
Till I’m free
Fly through the revolution
Time keeps on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’
Into the future
Time keeps on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’
Into the future
Time keeps on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’
Into the future
Time keeps on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’
Into the future
I want to fly like an eagle
To the sea Fly like an eagle
Let my spirit carry me
I want to fly like an eagle
Till I’m free
Fly through the revolution
Time keeps on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’
Into the future
Time keeps on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’
Into the future
I still feel I have much to do here on this earth.  No matter how this world turns out.  You do know the difference between the earth and the world?  Right?  I won’t go into it.  Look it up.
This whole world can implode and this earth will still be here with its survivors.  This earth is and has been here a lot longer than the world has.  Man has not always been here.  He didn’t evolve.  He was placed here.  I have many thoughts as to how since I know God created man in His image, but how many were created that were not created in His image?  I’m off on a rabbit trail here with a lot left unsaid, but suffice to say I believe the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob created me.  I abide as much by His rule as possible.
He can make me to fly like an eagle on His spiritual winds.  I’ve flown on them before and shall again.  It’s time to free the broken-hearted.
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The Nose Knows No Bounds

Posted on 2012/12/02 by JimR, Chaplain

Wanna feel helpless?  Try a nosebleed so bad you have clots coming down from yourNose Bleed sinuses as big as . . . well you get the picture.  That coupled with the fact that Libby isn’t familiar with Raleigh and depending on OnStar trying to find our way to Crabtree mall with our Aunt Doris.  I felt so helpless for both of them as I was in the back seat with a bath towel over my pinched nose.  Throw is running a red light and blaring horns and I would say it’s better than a roller coaster ride at Busch Gardens.  We did get there finally.  I hated having to leave Aunt Doris at Belks there.  Like shopping while riding one of those fancy carts wouldn’t be a splendid idea.  I still have to give moral support to Libby to get us out-of-town though Saturday evening traffic. . .during Christmas shopping time, no less.  I felt so bad for Libby.  I just couldn’t drive.  We finally made it to the last major exit before I-95 and stopped at a Bojangles so Lib could get something to eat and let her racked nerves calm while I sat there until my nose stopped bleeding.  The rest of the trip was uneventful, gladly so.

I apparently have a broken blood vessel in my right nostril which will need cauterizing.  I’m going to my ENT doc tomorrow if I can get in.  It bled some more this morning, but I’m being still and taking it easy.  Although not having bled so much this morning, I’m figuring it would take more time than I want to wait for it to heal on its own.  I’ve had some pretty bad sinus issues this past week which I believe precipitated this issue.  My BP is pretty much where it always is, so I’ve discounted that.  Ya’ll can still say I’m crazy, but I’ve not been sick until I took that flu shot.  Sounds like a long shot, eh?  But the head cold/sinus blockage, low-grade fever a couple of days right after tell me different.  The nose bleeds are an extension of the sinus issue.  To me, this as Spock would say, is logical toRex Hospital in Raleigh NC me.  I know this can sound gross, but I’ve bled through at least three bath towels, napkins, toilet paper and paper towels.  It started bleeding about thirty minutes before the show was over and I was put in a wheelchair and taken to the first aid unit headed by Rex Hospital staff.  Great bunch of people.  Very caring.

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Jars of Memories

Posted on 2012/11/21 by JimR, Chaplain

A little old lady shuffles across the floor passing her dogs which lie peacefully on the rugs scattered about the old home’s otherwise bare hardwood floors.  She carries in her heart this day the memories of life experiences that fills her heart with contentment and the knowledge she has done the right things as best she knew how.

The day is coming upon her that she knows she’ll leave her loved ones behind to carry on her legacy.  They have blessed her in the gates of the city.  She decides to take a look at some of those memories as she moves along into the kitchen pantry.

There on the shelves are memories.  Jar upon jar contain the many thoughts that she “canned” so that she may enjoy their fruits in her latter years.

Ah, the jar that contains the memory of her children.  The birth of each one with such pain, easily forgotten upon the sight of the crying one held up and given to her.  She cuddles each one tightly while checking their fingers and toes.  Yes there are ten each.  Feet kicking and arms flailing about, she calms them each one by one over the years as each new one comes into the world.  Such a precious memory jar she has there on the shelf.

The jar with memories of her husband is most precious.  He gave his all not only to her but the children as well.  He served her out of his love and concern for her.  The works of his hands were the extension of his inward self to her and their children.  He never gave up nor in to all the circumstance of life that were thrown at them.  He handled them all with great determination, because he knew it was his priority.  She knew he’d provide for this family of his.  Never any doubt entered her mind that he would not do so.  His love for her was perfect, as hers was for him.

There was a jar containing her childhood as well.  Her mom and dad were the ones who instilled in her the value of life and the desire to pave her own path into the world.  Negativity was not to be spoken in her home as she grew up with her siblings.  They all kept the best foot forward and did not accept less of others.  They learned encouragement from their mom and dad.  It carried on and this jar still remained fresh from those ingredients even to this day.

As she reviewed these memories in her heart as she took down each jar with her wrinkled hands and rubbed them ever so gently over the glass containing the memories.  The warmth of her hands only served to bring the contents to life more than ever.  She put the jar upon her chest to let them feel her heart beat as she lifted her head up with closed eyes getting the glimpses of those times in her mind like a movie screen replaying it before her.

Her heart was strengthened as she lifted one jar, then another.  She knew she’d done good.  None of the jars upon the shelves had gone bad.  They remain fresh and contained vital issuances of life to those who come after her.  She has done well in life.

She has done well.  All people who know her speak well of her and will do so for years to come.

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State of the United States

Posted on 2012/11/17 by JimR, Chaplain

I’m 62 years old.  Let’s just say I’ve been around a few years.  Not as many as some, but a lot more than most.  I grew up in a poor dirt farmer’s family as the oldest son.  We had no running water for the first ten years of my young life.  No bathroom.  That type of facility was an outhouse a short distance out back of the house.  My dad was industrious enough to drive a shallow well down through the floor in the kitchen and then built the counter around it with a sink and hand pump and a quart jar of water to prime the pump.  We had no TV until I was at least six or seven years old.  It was a big old square box RCA on a swivel base.  I remember the TV guy coming out every so often to replace a blown tube in it.  We lived on what we grew or killed.  Gardens were a necessity to have something to can and we had chickens for eggs and hogs for killin’.  Deer and squirrel were a staple during hunting season, too. 

My grand dad and grandmother had a cow for milk and butter.  There was a horse and a mule for plowing fields.  Tractors came along in the form of a Farmall Cub and later an Allis Chalmer.  There was almost the purchase of a Cockshuck.  Funny name I know, but it was a two row tractor and it was nixed because my dad didn’t think we needed one that big.

I remember as a five year old my grand dad taking me to the store up at the end of the road.  He would let me get a Coke and a Milky Way candy bar.  It cost about eleven cents, plus a penny or so for tax back then.  Gas was 28 cents a gallon.  Still that could be a lot to folks who depended on the sale of tobacco, wheat, corn and soybeans for income.  Some seasons weren’t all that productive.

I guess what I’m getting at is this generation hasn’t been introduced to the type of needs of those days.  They were “wants”.  They were “needs”.  We had to work for what we had and work we did.  We were fiercely independent.  Welfare?  Why that was a dirty word in my family and neighbor’s mouths. 

In a way I miss those years.  In a way I don’t.  I’m happy to live with the conveniences I’ve been able to obtain through the profession I have attained to.  The issue now is that with the present state of this United States of America I find it may necessitate I go back to this earlier lifestyle. 

I feel I may find this in the long run advantageous.  I’ve wanted to reconnect to the Earth.  It has its own sound in nature.  It delivers its own responses that can be measured in a way only someone who stops the speed-of-light lifestyle being lived today and listens for it.  I’m getting older and I’ve found the love of my life in Libby Compton, soon to be Rowe.  I can’t say that my previous marriage was for naught.  It made me realize the value of a loving woman who expresses it in a fashion that it make me feel undeserving sometimes.  It’s almost embarrassing for me to accept her love.  She’s a beautiful, young minded person inside and I don’t believe she’ll ever grow old.  She keeps me young. 

My concern though is for my sons who will not likely experience the real lifestyle of the way America used to be.  It’s changing to a socialist nation.  Government dependency is now common place and once this happens and dictatorial leadership could very well raise it’s head against the American Way of the past.  I weep for a great nation that appears to be dying into the past.  Once noted famous people have said our nation will not be defeated by an enemy from without, but from enemies working within.  It’s happening right now.

I refuse to relent to such dastardly machinations of underhanded leadership.

 

 

Posted in Days in Small, Family, Love, Old Age, Ponderings, Soulmate, Work | 2 Comments

Communion

Posted on 2012/10/28 by JimR, Chaplain

This morning Libby and I trekked out to church as we have started the habit of.  This church takes communion every Sunday.  The pastor and I talked of it this past Thursday and I understand their reasoning in doing so.  It is a solemn thing to do to partake of the Lord’s Supper.

Libby had not done so in several years, much the same as I.  We both went forward to take communion and Libby took hers and went to her seat.  I took mine and went to her side and sat down.  I noticed she was visibly touched.  She was lightly crying.  She later told me she was trembling when she went to take the bread and the cup.  God is truly taking it to heart her submission to Him.  I felt this morning as we took communion together for the first time that something in the spirit between us changed.  More solidification of our relationship took place.  It was more indication to me that we are supposed to be together at this time in our lives. 

Libby is a very sensitive person.  She hears God speak, but is in total awe of it that He would do so.  I’m very pleased to know her spiritual ears are tuned to His voice.

I cannot put into words the love I carry for this woman.  I am truly blessed.

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My Babies

Posted on 2012/10/26 by JimR, Chaplain

Okay.  Today its the Alabama Shakes.  They’re not as well-known as they should be, but “Hold On”.  They’re a great sound.

Today I have to write about my little girls.  They are in the order I took them into our home, Paige, then Sarah and lastly Fiesta.  They are three Papillons. 

I love Paige the most of all because she’s been with me through the thick and thin of the last four years.  When my then wife and I separated I cried when I had to leave her behind.  Then I got her back and we’ve been through many talks at night before Libby come to live with me.  Now Libby gets to listen to me.  Paige can sometimes sit and just watch me intently as if waiting for my beckon call, yet when I reach out she backs away.  It seems as thought she mimics my past marriage.  I reach out and she backs totally away.

Sarah came along about a year ago and I thought I’d not ever have another “heart” dog, but there she is.  This dog took to me immediately and is my constant companion, whereas Paige always had to have her space.  Sarah sleeps on the body pillow above my head at night and sometimes lets me know she’s there by licking the top of my bald head.  I had her trimmed yesterday.  She doesn’t ride with me often, but yesterday when we left Anita’s (groomer and good friend) Sarah climbed up on the console and got on my shoulders behind me and against the seat back and let the A/C blow on her while she looked out the window.  Every once in a while she’d press her head against my cheek like to say she loved me.

Fiesta came to our home just a few short months ago because Libby fell in love with her when we got Sarah.  So, when she came up for adoption I asked for her.  Fiesta sleeps on the mattress between Libby and me.  She is Libby’s constant companion.  Where ever Libby is, you’ll find Fiesta.  The kitchen, bathroom, on the couch.  It doesn’t matter, she’s there like she’s ate up with curiosity to Libby’s next move.

Life is full of mysteries, but it’s no mystery with these little companions.  They understand us and we, them.  Love is unconditional.  I like the principle of unconditional love.  It’s because of Libby and these babies of ours that I live each day to the fullest.

 

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To Become One

Posted on 2012/10/22 by JimR, Chaplain

As I sit here listening to Cold Play.  Yes, Cold Play.  I may be old, but I ain’t dead.  I’m also on my diet of chocolate chip cookies and diet Sun Drop at the moment, so bear with me.

I’m still not completely divorced.  For all intents and purposes, I am in my own thinking.  I moved on two years ago.

I have my three girls here around me.  Paige, Sarah and Fiesta are such wonderful companions.  If Libby were here all would be perfect.  I’m on vacation and she’s at work.

My thought this morning consists of thoughts of the days to come.  I’ve been with Libby for a while now and there is no lackluster anywhere in sight and likely won’t be.  She’s a gem.  It’s true what is said that the more you give the more you get.  I’ve given my life to her and she returns it 100 fold.  Two things she truly knows is to love unconditionally and to give of herself and she does so to a fault.  I’ve never thought I’d actually meet the dream woman of my youth, but she’s with me in the flesh now.  I can hear some say you two are in it for the sex.  With that being an important part of a relationship, it is more the end result of a working, living relationship before it ever gets to the intimate side of us.  We work together.  We play together.  We do things together.  The culmination of it all is “us”.  Making love has always been about the intertwining of souls to me.  That tying together of each other is the result of love and trust and freely giving of ourselves one to another.

I was in a relationship of marriage for 37 years without the last culminating part of the relationship because my spouse did not consider that important spiritually.  She only   thought of it as a physical act and limited herself to only when she felt like it.  I don’t hate her for that.  I would only remove myself from our bed and go to another room and cry for that lack of intimacy.  I would say I’m part and parcel to not being able to show her properly of that importance.  My frustration was more than I could bear.

To be honest, I was not looking for anyone else.  I had already consigned myself to living with that life as it was.  Libby coming along was what made me realize I didn’t have to live in mediocrity, at best.

In all of this we gave each other the open option to go our separate ways without prejudice only to find we were both compelled to return to each other on our own accords.  No coercement from one or the other.  It was a mutual decision to remain together after that.  It was the “if you love it let it go, if it returns, it’s yours” principle.

With this said, I have to say, Libby has made my life more interesting and fulfilling.  She has prodded me to excel as I prodded her to excel in her own right.  She’s been the tool of recovery for me.  She’s kept me alive.  I owe her my life.  I’ve never been more foundationally sound any other time in my life.  I was bordering on deep depression and was having anxiety attacks long before I met her.  I no longer have these issues as long as she’s with me.

As for the title of this post, I feel as though I will stay alive in this earthly flesh as long as she wants me to be.  I can’t leave her here on this earth alone.

We have so much to do together.  I want to travel with her.  See what she sees.  Feel what she feels.  Experience together only what two people can feel together that love each other like we do.

We go no where without hands clasped together.  She’s always touching me.  It’s important to her.  For me I enjoy touch.  It’s a most intimate form of love to me.  Touch is important to all humans and I cannot fathom people who do not like being touched in some form or other.  To feel the warmth of her skin next to mine.  Hand in hand or body to body.  The intensity of our bodies together is very highly sensational.  It touches not only the soul, but the spirit as well.  How else can a couple become one?

That’s what the coming day are for.  To become one.

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Too Young To Be Old

Posted on 2012/09/21 by JimR, Chaplain

To young to be an old man 

Or so I’m told.

It certainly wasn’t my plan

To reach this old.

But glad, I am to wake up

Still with body and soul

With grace in my cup.

God has granted me favor

Through Jesus my Savior

I can talk to Him anytime

He listens in sublime

Making my heart glad

I’m no longer sad

He gave me a lady

Who I call my baby

I love her dearly

Not just merely

This is what makes me young

Not old. . .

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Livin’ With Libby

Posted on 2012/09/14 by JimR, Chaplain

Libby.  The name evokes mischief.  She lives up to it too.  Her ex told her more times than a plenty “Everything’s not funny, Libby”!  But to her all things are funny.  I can attest to her emotional range, but she can find something funny in everything.  Including me walking into a closed bedroom door in the dark or a funeral.

Libby is a bright spirited creature with a smile that can make you scramble for sunglasses while in her presence.  Her beautiful bright eyes.  Her beautiful smile radiates causing you to smile no matter how glum you may be.  The Bible says not to hide your candle under a bushel.   She can’t.  It burned the bushel basket a long time ago.

She’s vibrant, loves to dance to music when alone by her self and sing along.  She knows the words to so many songs.  She loves to taste the finest of life yet can live with frying fat back and cooking up grits.  Our dining room contains a good variety of wines as well.

She’s been to Broadway plays, Las Vegas and the Redwood Forest.  She loves family.  She loves her daughter and son like no other mother could.  She loves her brothers and sisters, cousins, nieces and nephews with all her heart.  She love unconditionally.  I’m first hand recipient of that love as well.  It’s overwhelming to me.  I’ve never experienced such a person in my entire life.

She is inquisitive.  She’s always looking for the truth in a matter.  Tell her something she’s not familiar with and the next day she’ll come back and tell you all about it.  In that time between she has spent whatever time it takes to fully grasp what she heard.  I told her one time that Corvette owners don’t drive their cars in the rain unless absolutely necessary.  She didn’t think that I was serious, but the next day or so she comes back to me saying she now understands what I was saying.  She’d been on the internet researching just this subject to her satisfaction. 

She bright, intelligent beyond the norm.  She’s talented to an extreme.  She can bring dreams to reality.  I’ve seen her take and idea and actually make it happen when others would dismiss it as too hard or could not fathom the actuality of it.  Take today for instance.  She’s been on this for a while, but her grandson is two this week.  The birthday party is tomorrow.  She has been gathering information and material and baking goods for a couple of weeks now.  Really she started last night.  She’s baked two cakes in the shape of a pirate ship.  Two entirely different flavors.  She put glaze on them.  This morning she continued her quest to make cupcakes in chocolate and she whipped up her own icing.  She has one of the really old Hamilton Beach mixers.  Her mom worked for them back decades ago.  She ices the cupcakes and sprinkled blue sprinkles around the outside edges and some ground up Sandie cookies and sprinkled them in the top or middle of the cupcake.  She got a package in the mail today and had also bought some backup palm trees.  She put the palm trees on these “cupcake islands” with a pirate flag on each one.  The pirate ship cakes will have one of them decorated with skeletons onboard as though it were a ghost ship.  She’ll put rigging on them and all so by tomorrow she’ll be saying Aarrrrrgh!  Me matey’s.  They be Pirate ships sailin’ for the islands!  I was sent to the store for more food coloring for something I have no idea what for, but as I was leaving she was figuring out how to make an octopus cookie in green.  This illustrates her talent for baking, but it’s just one of her many abilities.

My old home is a mansion now, to me.  I can’t describe how much more livable it is.  It has a whole new look.  What was water stained walls from hurricanes past are now wallpapered and painted in colors from the palate of her mind.  Such vibrant shades of life that make the heart feel like nowhere else but home.  We have made this our home.  It’s beautiful.

She’s beautiful, stunning and no other can touch her.  She has my heart and I don’t want it back.

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A Note To Facebook Friends

Posted on 2012/08/09 by JimR, Chaplain

A lot of things going on in my life at the moment, but not so much that I don’t care about those of you who read my posts.  Some of you know what’s going on, some not.  Maybe I can share this sometime.  Libby has been my strength and I actually am doing quite well in all. 

What I’m saying is a couple of my liberal friends dropped me.  I know I’m conservative, but I’m also open to others opinions.  If you’re on my friends list , I’m not going to drop you because you say something that doesn’t agree with me.  It doesn’t change mine.  Really I’m not liking be affiliated with any political party or group.  I’m not against one race or the other.  I’m just NOT about anything in some respects.  One thing I do respect and that is what God says.  I’ve done some things in my life I’m not proud of, but He has always guided me correctly.  He has never left me.  With that said if you have ought with my opinion, please message me privately and I’ll answer.  I’ve been called strange before and it won’t be the last time.  I have to be what God wants me to be and for so many years I tried to be what I thought men thought I was supposed to be before God. 

I will only share one thing.  Three years ago I went through severe depression and anxiety attacks and went for counseling.  I can’t tell the whole story, but suffice to say I’ve come through it a stronger, better person.  Libby has stuck by me and has loved me unconditionally.  Today I feel the best mentally and physically I’ve been in a long time.

All of you that I’ve know since childhood and even you Corvette guys that are fairly new, along with my co-workers and such, I’m glad to know you.  You’re the fabric in my life that keeps me together.  I look for your comments and posts, no matter what they are.  I can be as serious or risque as the best of you. 

 

Posted in Divorce, Family, Health, Home, Love, Old Age, Spiritual | Leave a comment