Musings on a Monday Afternoon

I just looked out my kitchen window while making a sandwich and tea and saw what appeared to be a cloud of billowing smoke rising from my the neighbors' yard over my fence. Two of their little boys were scurrying around (roughly 8 and 7 years old). One of them looked a bit agitated. The older one ran towards the source of the problem with a large flat yellow plastic item. Perhaps the cover to a toy chest. My first thought was, "great, they've started a fire." I didn't have a clear view because whatever it was, it was very close to the fence on the other side. If it was a fire, my fence, which is wooden, would shortly be ablaze which would have signaled me to place a 911 phone call. However, apparently, whatever it was, it stopped once the yellow lid was dropped on it. Perhaps it was a fire and this child knew enough to go find a giant snuffer to put it out? I don't know. All I know is I lingered at the window long enough to watch their little faces relax as they looked down into that corner of the yard. Apparently, whatever it was, it was now over.

Being more relaxed myself, I paused to peruse the faces of the boys and I mused how the eldest looked so much like his mother. Then I noticed that all along, one of their other boys had been sitting inside a play car (there are a total of 5 boys and 1 girl next door). The little one, about 1 year in age has straw colored hair and it dawned on me how much his features are like his father's. This produced a warm inner smile in me. The recognition of the awesome magic that a parent must feel when they see themselves in tiny form, smiling back from a face that is not their own. I imagined the sheer awe at knowing that your genes, your parents' genes, their siblings's genes, and on and on, are now residing within that tiny person. And when you are no longer here, this tiny person will live on with your eyes, your teeth and hopefully escape your family's history of diabetes.

I have chosen not to partake in this passing of the genetic baton. But at that moment, while looking out my kitchen window, procreation and parenting made sense. I understand the drive that makes so many people want to do it. Children really are a blessing. Even if they might accidentally be burning down your fence.

Really?

The things I learned this weekend could make your head explode.

My Christmas Poem.

You Prob'ly think this Poem's about You.

Your love have I always chased down.

for years I kissed your feet.

I lingered here; there followed you

never ever feeling complete.

I joined you at the equator

where I melted in the burning sun.

My boots did not shield me from freezing

When through Antarctica we’d run.

Disheartened and in shatters

In a dark room alone I mused.

“would I ever be a person

who’s emotions you’d not abuse?”

the answer came from my candle

as it flickered to light breezy draft.

My transparency was suicidal,

my obstinance - clinically daft.

so it’s taken me quite by surprise -

the reaction to my retreat.

you seem sullen and shaken and cross.

cold attentions though previously unseen.

never garnered I more a reaction

than I have since the day I refused

to have anymore dealings with your kind;

choosing no more to be misused.

Your slack jaw and wide eyes are laughable

as on Christmas you bend to the tree

noting emptiness there in the space

where there used to be presents from me.

it amazes me you cannot fathom

whatever brought on this change.

you have stomped and cursed and hollered

but the truth of the matter remains

that you have as much care for my feelings

as a toad might have care for a fly

and you’ve given your own misdealings

every pass, every sickening decry.

Yet you paint me as a villain -

a shrew, a miser, a witch

but I’ll have you know that I’m over you.

"Merry Christmas", your favorite bitch.

Little Red Shopping Cart

I bought this little red shopping cart from a neighborhood shop up in Washington Heights back about 15 years ago. I bought it so when I went grocery shopping 6 flights down and 4 blocks away, I could roll my groceries home with ease. I remember that when I bought it the rubber smelled funny. Like it had come from a warehouse where there had been a fire. It smelled of smoke and ash. It was so bad that hosed it down in my Manhattan bathroom with soap and water - on two separate occasions. Still, the smell remained. I rubbed stuff into the rubber handle - Febreeze, other sprays, perfumes. Still, it kinda smelled. So eventually I locked it deep in a closet and only brought it out when I needed it. It was being punished for smelling bad.

Eventually I met my husband and we got married and moved into our house out in New Jersey. I brought the little cart with me. By then it didn't smell so much but I could detect remnants of that smell on it if I got close. I couldn't bear to part with it. It symbolized my independence. My New York singlehood. My attempts to deal with the difficulty of hauling things around Manhattan with no car, no help - self-sufficiency in a high lacquered red sheen with rubber wheels.

Here in New Jersey, it has lived in the closet in my husband's office. I thought there might be a time to bring it out and use it for this or that. But in suburbia there's very little call for carts of this type. So for the past 6 years it has just been lodged inside his closet. Punished for being unnecessary.

Today I have pulled it out because I'm taking it to Brooklyn. My mom, now newly single for the first time in over 43 years, has been learning late life lessons in self-sufficiency. She needs this cart more than I've ever needed it. I think it will see the light of day much more in its new home. Oh, and the smell seems to finally be gone.

It's got me thinking how much life changes us, the people around us. If you told me, 15 years ago, when I bought this little cart, that I would one day be giving it to my mom so she can do her grocery shopping, I would have looked at you sideways and sucked my teeth. No way. How can that even be possible? I could not have known then what a strange rite of passage was going to take place in the future. But here I am. About to hand off my little red shopping cart to my mom. Perhaps I will be writing about it again 15 years from now? One never knows.

Introduce Yourself

I wish the me I don't know would come out and introduce herself to me already.

Obesity

Make no mistake about it - obesity doesn't kill. The things that lead to obesity are what kills. The things that eat you up inside making it nearly impossible to become less obese - those things kill you. Obesity is a symptom of a much larger problem. As usual, everyone wants to cure a symptom.

Strange Calm

I felt the need to post today. I think I'm having a strange transcendental experience. I need to blog about it. I guess I'm hoping that if I just write, it will begin to coalesce into something I might actually be capable of verbalizing.

For the past few years I have had quite the traumatic, dramatic ride. I've been all flailing arms and stomping feet and gritting teeth. Unhappy about the way my marriage has turned out, restless, acting out, carrying on, jumping up and down, running in and out. Ruminating about a different life. Practicing the new one in my head, except it changed regularly. Unhappy that my "career" was still to be seen after years of pursuit. Unhappy that my dad has died and suffered terribly. Unhappy that my mom suffered terribly and is now very dependent on me. Yet, a fascinating thing has occurred - I feel fine.

It's as if I had been suffering from a horrible illness and had fevered delusions and sad declines but now I am recovered. I think I owe it all to a combination of therapy and the rediscovery of my Buddhist inner self. I've been reading Pema Chödrön's "When Things Fall Apart." Perhaps it too is responsible for this feeling of calm that has come over me. But I think it's more a matter of "when the student is ready, the teacher will come." I think I've been arriving at this point for a few months now.

I am still working on my voice and I have a few projects I'm attempting to put in motion. There is music I'm slowly learning despite the numerous interruptions in my schedule. I hope to speed up the process in the New Year when I'm done with the B.A. I've been completing. I am no longer unhappy in my marriage. I have been seeing my husband with a new found admiration and gratitude and my life doesn't have the grey pall over it that it seemed to have just a year ago. I have found a rare, rare thing. Acceptance. I don't know how long it will stay or if this is just a resting area on the way to some other state of being, but it feels good. It feels right. It's not a sad, "my life sucks but I think I'll keep it" acceptance. It's things-really-are-better-than-I-thought acceptance. I am living my life as I want. I am free to pursue my dreams. And whether or not any of those things pan out, I have the opportunity. That is an incredible gift.

And speaking of gifts, I finally love my voice. For years I fought with it and didn't think it was good enough or "right" enough or "worthy of being heard." So, part of my failure has come from hiding myself away in shame. Shame, if you do not know it, is a master, monster emotion. It is one of the most destructive of all emotions. Shame, I have come to realize, has been an undercurrent throughout many of my years. What an incredible waste! I know this now. But, alas, I couldn't know it until I knew it. And that time is now.

I love me. I finally do. I love me when I'm doing what I "should" and when I'm doing what I "want" and when I'm doing what I "need". I love me in all my unlabeled variations. Others can judge me if they want, they haven't walked in my shoes. I have only done what a flailing, shameful, scared woman would do. And now... well now maybe I will do less of that and more of what my true pure soul craves.

I feel that I am about to enter a period of using more of my energy to forward my true self and hopefully spend less time catering to all the things that steal me of my energy and authenticity. It doesn't make my life more perfect. But it makes me happier. And calmer. Imagine that.

Being skinny does not automatically make you healthy!

I just read some internet posts where people were arguing "Is fat sexy?" Of course, as you'd expect, the vast majority of people said that it isn't. A bunch of other people said things akin to "beauty is in the eye of the beholder." But the one thing that kept coming up over and over no matter which side of the argument I read (and something that has irked me for years) was the notion that it was better if a person were "a healthy weight." Why does this irk me? Because I happen to think that the whole obesity epidemic is bullshit. It makes my skin crawl to know that if a fat person and a skinny person walk into a room, the skinny person is automatically assumed to be "healthy"even if they're holding a cigarette or their 4th beer.

I think it's the greatest hypocrisy ever that people have been brainwashed into believing that being thin is healthy. In theory, it should be true. But as an overweight woman, I think it's safe to say that throughout my life, most of my friends and colleagues were what you would call "healthy weight" individuals. Yet, for every 10 of those people, I could name 1 who actually worked out regularly and 1 who ate healthy on a regular basis. The other 8 smoked, abused a drug or two or did harmful things to their bodies to maintain that "healthy weight". So then, I ask, how is it they get the "healthy" seal of approval and I don't? I am heavier than those 10 friends but I've never smoked, I work out pretty regularly and I generally make attempts to eat healthy. I have had bouts with bulimia in the past and decided that it was healthier to just let the food remain in my belly than to hurt my throat and digestive system by throwing it up. Yet, I know this is a weight management tool many skinny people employ. How is that healthier than just allowing yourself to be somewhat heavier?

I think the media attention around weight has reached a point of hysteria. I can't turn on my TV without hearing how we all need to be thinner for our health. Biggest Loser makes my stomach turn. Yes, those people should try to take off weight. It is healthier to weigh less. I'm not arguing that the extra weight is good for you. I'm arguing that it's gone too far and people seem fine with watching someone practically kill themselves for several weeks on TV to be thin and that is deemed acceptable. Frankly, I've tried to lose weight the sensible way - watching what I eat and exercising. It is nearly impossible. I was successful one time and that was only after I committed to a year where I would eat one meal a day (which I would break down into 2 or 3 tiny meals) and I worked out daily for 2 hours. It took a whole year and finally 40lbs came off. I did this during a year when I was taking a break from singing because that 2 hours would have been practice time and I just couldn't fit both activities into a normal day. Do most people understand what it means to work a full time job, have a life and still manage to put aside 2 hours a day to go to the gym (plus time getting there and back) and to obsess all day every day about NOT eating? No. Until you've lived like that for a year, to only lose 40lbs, you don't know. You can't imagine giving up that much of your time and energy when there is so much more you'd rather be doing.

I've come to the conclusion that for people like me, maybe we need a kamakazi weight loss approach. Maybe we need several weeks at a camp where we're being deprived and where a drill sargeant is in your face screaming to make you sweat for 8 hours a day. That might be the only way I'll ever get all this weight off. I DO think that there are many people out there who CAN'T take off weight without going to some extreme measures. And THAT can be unhealthy and impractical and, unless you have a lot of money or get on a show like Biggest Loser, you're just not going to have that chance. So I get mad when I hear skinny people on TV who have never really had to lose a substantial amount of weight, doling out advice about how it's done. Maybe the formulas don't work for a lot of people and what makes them unhealthy is their ever desperate attempts to lose the weight.

The NIH doles out money to whatever research is "sexiest" and for the past 10 years it's been very en vogue to do studies on obesity. The numbers get skewed in a lot of these studies and there are misrepresentations. Why? Because people need to keep this going because it's paying bills. Insurance companies love it because they're hoping soon they can justifiably charge heavier people more money - after all, there is scientific proof. It's all such utter bullshit.

If they were really that concerned about obesity, they would begin creating obesity institutes. Much like Heart Institutes and Cancer Institutes. Places where the obese could go and their insurance would pay for that boot camp approach that would help them lose the weight. But instead someone wags a finger at them, hands them a list of healthy food and sends them home. Most insurance companies won't even pay for a gym membership. Think about that for a minute. If they really wanted to put a stop to it, they could incorporate real weight loss strategies into the fabric of the health care system. They want to label it an "epidemic" but then they won't provide any solutions. They just want to keep the wheels turning on this one. It's a lot like the "Just Say No" campaign. How many drug addicts were helped with that one?

I'll end this with one more thought. Education is great for prevention (usually). But once you have something you are labeling an epidemic, it's time for intervention. Talking about broccoli and exercise probably won't help. Giving people access to the tools they will need to become healthier might. If NIH and CDC can dole out millions for the study of obesity, then why not use that money to create weight loss centers that, much like cardiac rehab centers, could be tailored to prevent future costly diseases associated with obesity? What's that? It's just more fun to point fingers and berate the fat person? Yeah, I thought so.

Absence of Faith

This past year or so have been difficult for me. I tried to keep a good outlook when my mom was sick and I doggedly and determinedly got her through her illness but I neglected my father in the process. I put him totally on a back burner and then when he went to the hospital I felt guilty. I feel guilty now that he's passed that maybe, if I'd been giving him some of the attention mom was getting from me, he would still be here. I would have maybe discovered he'd stopped taking crucial medications. I would have maybe taken more of an interest in his financial problems. Instead, the few times he came to me to complain about his hardships, my answer was basically, "let's just get mom through the end of her treatments and then we'll sit down and figure out what to do about your problems." And I meant it. I couldn't deal with both of them drowning at once. I needed him to keep himself afloat long enough to get mom on dry land, then I was gonna come and get him too. But before I could do that he drowned. And I feel horrible. And it's made me question everything.

I feel hollow. I feel like I let down my dad in the worst way possible. On top of being mistreated by my sister for most of a year and feeling depressed about that. On top of being burdened with mom's illness and his own runaway diabetes, his oldest daughter was putting him on a back burner. Who was there to care for my father in his final months? Did he feel alone and scared? I think he did. One day when mom and I got out of her chemo session he looked like he'd been crying in the car. At first I thought it was something that had happened, a phone call, a fight with someone we didn't know about, but I could tell he was deeply unhappy. He put on a brave face, but I made a mental note to ask him about it. That must have been around early December. Weeks went by and he was just getting more depressed, I could tell, but I still kept saying in my head, "mom only has treatments now till end of January, then I will sit down and talk to dad." A couple of times I basically told him to suck it up till then. I said mom needed us to be strong for her and we would deal with the rest of our problems once she got through all her chemo and radiation. I wonder if that made him feel even more desperate. I worry I made him even sadder. He didn't make it. January 19, 2009 came and knocked him off his feet. He wouldn't quite get back on them and then April 27, 2010, he was finally completely bowled over. And so was I.

I hoped he'd get at least well enough to have a talk with me about all that. So I can tell him I was sorry if I'd neglected his well being over mom's. I wanted to ask him if I'd failed him somehow. But for most of that year all I could do was be there, tell him I loved him and once or twice sing to him. I remember him at his 66th birthday, when he was well enough to show his appreciation to all his friends who showed up. He cried and pointed from his heart to all the people in the room. I know he loved us all for being there. He felt love for us and us for him. I felt he loved me too but sometimes I felt he was still a little angry at me for not coming to save him sooner when he was drowning.

It's very unfair. He didn't deserve anything that happened to him. And I don't think I can believe in the God he prayed to all those years. That God he held sacred above all other things could have given him a few more weeks till mom's treatments were over. I would have sat down with him and gone over his finances, maybe then he would have divulged that he stopped taking his Plavix. I would have insisted he get back on them immediately and maybe, just maybe, what happened didn't have to happen. God could have bought him a few more weeks but chose not to. Why?

People will say that he was a grown man. He should have gone to his doctor. He should have done this or that. But mom had become a full time job. He had no time or energy for anything else. I totally get how his own health got away from him. I lament not having been paying closer attention. One day he called me, when mom first got sick and told me she was a tyrant. She expected him to be there all the time. Demanded too much of his attention. I went all tough on him and said, "Look... she only needs this from you for a few months to maybe a year. You can do it. When I was a little girl you would make me sit at home with her while you went off to your church meetings and stuff. If I could put up with her all those years, you can do it for a few months." It was kinda tough to say this to my dad, but at the time I needed him to suck it up and deal with the situation. Now I regret it. I had no idea it would kill him. I think it did. It literally killed him. He was not cut out for it.

And so I have lost my faith in a greater good. I have lost that innocence that says, "things will somehow work out." As far as I can tell, it's all very horribly random. Worse than that. It's all horribly clustered. One person gets more than their share of misery while another gets more than their share of happiness and good fortune. Whoever said life wasn't fair knew about this clustering. And yes, there are reversals of fortune and changes in fate. But those seem pretty random too. So what is there to have faith in? A moving target? Cuz that's all I see now. A moving target. No way of knowing when end of the arrow you will end up with or for how long or how deep. Totally fucking random.

I don't know what I'm supposed to do with this new information after a life of being told to have faith in the Lord. He will provide. Provide what exactly?

Love My Friends

I love my friends well. I love them with all my heart. If they will allow me my imperfections, my lapses into total self-absorption and sometimes even my utter cluelessness, they find that there are some things I can offer. I may not be there every day. I may not be there for big things but you know what I’m there for almost always? The little things. The hidden things. After the birthdays, weddings, graduations, deaths and births, I am there to listen to what they were really thinking or feeling while they were smiling for all the pictures. I’m there to hear them out. When they are joyous beyond compare and they feel no one can feel that with them, I’m there and I shed tears of joy with them and jump up and down. Because I really feel that with them, not because I pretend. When they are devastated and crying on the floor, I will get down there with them and cry too while I hold them, because I know that feeling and I want to get them through it. I love my friends. I may not be there to paint the walls or move the furniture or get the car out of the ditch – that’s another friend. But I’m there when they need somewhere to go with them where even they don’t want to go. As I write this I realize it is a shame I can’t do that for my family. They want me there for the birthdays and the weddings. I've made most of them, but missed several. If I’m not there for those they think I do not care. But they’re very wrong. I won’t try to explain it to them. It’s too bad.

Hypocrite

I hate hypocrites. Always have. At the age of 10 I told dad I wasn't going to play into the church games anymore because everyone I've met there is a hypocrite. But you know what? I just read my last entry and I realize I'm a hypocrite too. Congratulations, Me! It's sickening to realize you're just as bad as everyone else.

I read all that ranting about my sister using people as pawns and how I think she's all instinct and survival and then a little voice in my head said, "who are you kidding?" Damn that little voice. It's right. I've been all instinct and survival for as long as I can remember. I want desperately to think I can be better than that. I want to think I can overcome years of guarding myself and trying not to disintegrate under the weight of my psyche but I too am just scratching by the best I can. Scratching and hanging on. All nails and upper arm strength, just like in the movies, one slip away from a serious crash.

To my Lover

December 19, 2009, 9:05 am

I have so often -
in my head -
deemed you beneath me.
(it is sad to say out loud)
Thinking too highly of myself
you have been too dull of wit
too unpolished a stone
a wild stag in the woods
too happy to run
unaware of the chase
in the forest of its youth.
Still, I cannot help but regard you
as excellent.
Because.

I have so often -
in my skin -
marvelled at your fingertips
as they remade my body
into a priceless objet d'art.
while also molding it into an Olympian,
championing hours of passion
with the stamina of gods.
(the heights to which you inspire)
The electric confluence of our lips
has neared transcendence
and several times surpassed.

I have always -
in my heart -
guarded my soul,
keeping the matter
under tight lock and key.
yet each time you look me in the eye
you gently unlock it and peer inside.
There you see where you have your place in me.
Tenderly you brush my cheek.
I, knowing it’s okay,
Leave that place unlocked for you and you alone.

--Celia Castro

Erasing My Father

Thanksgiving afternoon, after packing up the food to take to dad, I had a task to perform. One which my mom’s been asking me to accomplish for a couple of weeks. Before dad got sick there were creditors at his back. (Some might not want to admit this about a parent, but I know before he got sick, we had talked about ways to handle it but then things happened and he didn't get a chance to fix it.) Now that he’s incapacitated and cannot speak for himself, they have been calling the house regularly. We’ve spent months explaining the situation. We’ve told countless collectors that he is in no condition to speak to them, write to them, show up and make arrangements with them… nothing. What part of weak heart, failed kidneys, impaired thinking, difficulty speaking, uncoordinated limbs and needing months of recuperation are they having a problem with? We offered to send hospital documents to them and they didn’t e even want them. They just wanted to “speak with him”. So finally, after consulting a lawyer a couple of times and getting advice, we decided it was time to take my dad’s booming baritone voice off of the answering machine.

There are no words to describe the inner tumult this sent me into. I didn’t have any outward tears or long discussions about it. But I spent weeks hearing my father’s voice in my head. Remembering every rise and fall of his voice. How his voice would swell and deepen whenever he was in his role of “locutor” for a church function. How he would pause at certain points during a prayer service. How, if he was telling a joke, his baritone became more tenor and slightly mocking and you could tell when he was anticipating laughter to follow.

In my head I heard his singing. I heard him singing when he was serious and when he was mocking himself, becoming a caricature of a grand singer. I heard calling me when I used to hide in the closet and wait for him to find me when he got home from work. It was a game we played my whole childhood. He would come through the door and I would always hide in the tall armoire in my room. He would come in, “cuncuna mamana”, he would sing, and he would whistle (Do, do, do, do Dooo(8ve up) Laaaa). I have been hearing that whistle all week. That whistle incited a squirming and burrowing inside the armoire as I tried to hide behind the clothing, while in anticipation. Because I knew when he finally found me he would grab me, pull me out and cover me with kisses.

His voice was only ever angry a few times that I can recall. Mostly it was a voice filled with love and compassion and understanding. Among the many beautiful things about my dad that have been taken by this illness, is his voice as I knew it. The message on the answering machine was priceless. I couldn’t just erase it. Instead, first I re-recorded it twice, for safe keeping. Then I finally got around to erasing it. But the moment when I hit the button and started to record the new outgoing message felt like I was undoing something forever. I thought to myself, “I’m erasing my dad. Oh God. I’m erasing my dad.” I didn’t cry. I simply went into the living room and told mom and Sandra it was done and we should go visit him now. I didn’t want to dwell on it on Thanksgiving. But now, two days later, I had to write about it. Because that voice is one of the dearest things I’ve ever heard. And at least I can still hear it in my head. I still hold out hope I will hear it sound like that again someday soon.

Wise-Ass-Dom

"A man will never be as in love with you as he is with himself."
"If you do find a man who loves you more than himself - run - it's a trap."

-- Alice Carots :)

So sick of you.

Antiquated
Loathsome
Exasperating
Self-serving
Sanctimonious
Impostor
Oblique

Feel Good Day

Emancipated
Freed
Liberated
Flying
Floating
Moving
Changing
Dancing
Twirling
Skipping
Jumping
Excited
Animated
Me.

Mess.

I have been playing it safe and sheltering myself for the past few years. Suddenly I feel an urge to break free and take risks. However, this seems to be a fine line I'm not able to walk. I think I'm creating drama now just because I'm so unbelievably bored and dissatisfied with my life. I can see where I might be landing. It's a long way down.

Procrastination

I am procrastinating. And I know it.

I came home ready to start putting together study notes for biology, check over my math homework, read all the World Literature assignments and prepare tomorrow's homework. Those were my intentions. Instead I've completely rearranged my farm on Farmville (a virtual reality game on Facebook), spoken to my mom, eaten very healthy food (at least there's that) and contemplated tackling the world literature assignment. I'm still contemplating it. I gathered the stuff then realized one of the articles which I've already made notes on is missing. I think I left it upstairs. With my bum foot I don't relish the thought of climbing the stairs to find it but I can't finish the homework without it. So, what am I doing? Sitting here writing this instead.

Oh, and I called my friend David a few seconds ago cuz he's usually very good about returning phone calls and texts and he hasn't this week. Wondering if he's okay.

Aside from that I just don't feel terribly motivated. But I've now procrastinated for a good 2 hours. It's probably time to stop it. I will go upstairs and see if I left that article there.

Yep.

That's what I'm going to do.

Now.

Now.

I mean... now.

Glass

Glass. 9/26/2009, 7pm.

Shards of glass are what remain
In the bottom of the well that once housed a spirit.

Fragments of light reflect from those pieces
But the light is absorbed by the dark.

The initial crash reverberated throughout the well like a bass drum
Thunderous (murderous) and loud; but the well, from above, seemed still.

Tiny feet of despair pulverize that glass into sand,
Sand soon to be heavier than the well can contain.

At this unfathomable depth , the well will sink further still into the earth,
Seeking the legendary water table which might quench its ancient thirst.

Instead it will find hot molten lava to transform its profound cargo
Into liquid glass indistinguishable from lava except in its vain hope.

Unimaginable, unthinkable, unspeakable hope.
Of perhaps being cooled again into pure, crystalline, radiant glass; one day.

Dad

Today is Pedro Castro's birthday. Well, it's after midnight now so technically it was yesterday. I'm just looking back on the evening and beaming with pride and love and gratitude. My father is truly an inspiration. He has taught me so much about the human spirit. What it means to be gracious and kind and truly loving with your whole heart. The kind of love that is unselfish and always remembers to treat others with respect. That is who he's always been. And today I saw how much this just IS who he is.

In his weakened and sometimes confused mental state, he has no time for being anything more or less than his true self. And today there was so much of him there. Even as he sat in his wheelchair looking slimmer and smaller than he used to, the man inside is still evidently totally there. He was teary eyed and choked up and weepy when he saw how many of his friends came to see him on his birthday. When the singer/guitarist sang for him, he was very touched and cried. And at a couple of points today he tried, even though his speech is not that great yet, he tried to thank everyone. He said that he felt the value everyone felt for him and that he felt the genuine love. And I believe he was truly grateful.

But the moment that really made me see how much of my dad is beautiful despite his recent sickness happened before the party. It's a bit of a difficult story but I want to say it because it says so much about the man I call my father with pride. Mom and I were taking him to the bathroom. From outside, where dad couldn't see her, a girl was giving us instructions on what the easiest way to replace his adult diaper was. Mom and I aren't good at this. The nurse usually does it. She explained an easy way to get the job done. (He has to wear them even though he goes to the bathroom just fine.) Anyway, we did it and we said thank you to the girl for showing us a very easy way to get the job done. As we wheeled dad past this girl, even though he hadn't even seen her, he'd figured out who it was who'd been talking through the curtain and he said "thank you, thank you."

It might seem a little sad to someone reading this. But it made me smile deep inside. Here is this man in what is his weakest hour. He's got his pride. He's not happy that he has to put up with things like diapers and wheelchairs and being in a nursing home. He would rather be healthy again and be home. But he hasn't let all of this get in the way of his ability to thank people when they help him out or help us help him. His spirit of gratitude was not touched by the heart attack or the other injuries. He's still as gorgeous in his soul as he's ever been. And that moment made me realize why he is so loved by so many. So when we went downstairs to greet his friends and he started to cry, I knew it was a well deserved cry for him. He should feel the amount of love we were all giving him. Because through the years he's always given so much to everyone he's ever met. If only by letting them know that they mattered for a few seconds.