Libby


Lately it seems that Libby has taken on a new food fetish.  I’ve always added salsa to my Herdez Salsamac n cheese to give it some kick.  But she’s taken it to a new level.  Baby limas, black-eyed peas and scrambled eggs are not left to themselves without the inclusion of salsa.  She has put on a pot of pinto beans this evening.  Where will it all end?

She loves this particular brand as it has no sugar added.  It is more of a natural style of salsa.  It’s usually only found in the true Mexican section in our local supermarket, not down the isle with Pace’s, Old El Paso and the other assortment of Mexican style foods.  It was me that got her onto this brand, because I wanted to try something that appeared to be more authentic.

Libby is a beautiful woman with dangerous curves.  I wouldn’t have her any other way.  Not skin stretched over bones for me.  She wants to lose weight, but I told her she doesn’t have to, but she insists she needs to for reasons other than vanity.  It’s her health, therefore I support her wish to do so.

If this salsa is a sign of her desire, so be it.  This is not to say she hasn’t watched the calories and eating healthy foods.  She does.  It’s not the “salsa” diet.  It’s a part of what she’s doing, but it appears to play an important role in her diet to give her flavor she can enjoy.

Either way, I love her and support her in her latest endeavor, even though I find the salsa to be her “gone wild” food.  It’s cool with me.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Love Me Like. . .


It’s early evening

And I sit here alone

My love is in the bed

Sick with a cold.

My mind is hushed

My heart is open

With my thoughts

I blushed.

I love her so much

She’s my dream real

I love her touch.

Her voice so soft

In my ear

When she says to me

I love you

Like bees love honey.

And I say to her

I love you like

A fat baby

Loves cake.

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment

How I Feel Sometimes


I ran up the door, opened the stairs,

Said my pajamas and put on my prayers –

Turned off my bed, tumbled into my light,

And all because she kissed me good-night!

~Author Unknown

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Fly Like An Eagle


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.
Posted in Spiritual | Leave a comment

The Nose Knows No Bounds


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.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Jars of Memories


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.

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

State of the United States


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


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.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

My Babies


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.

 

Posted in Home, Love, Ponderings | Leave a comment

To Become One


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.

Posted in Divorce, Health, Love, Old Age, Ponderings, Soulmate, Spiritual | Leave a comment