In Memorium

Kay Yow
1942-2009

Making the Human Connection

Recently, I read in my son’s blog that during one of the darkest periods of his life, he blogged. He wrote about daily mundane things and, while he was suffering, he did not focus on that so much as the daily steady beat of life. He said he didn’t know if people were reading his blog or not (I was) but that just the act of steady writing helped him. It makes one think about the power of the sounds we use to communicate with others….sounds are the tools we have and we shape them into recognizable and meaningful words. We say or sing or sign these sounds/words and somehow even if there is no one else in the forest, the vibration of that heartbeat carries to others to make that human connection. My theory is that almost all of us (true hermits may be disqualified here) are searching for that inter-twine-ed-ness with other living, breathing beings. Rock stars, writers, teachers, even engineers have some clawing from the heart that is reaching for a connection, that shared common beat. Performers often connect with huge crowds….most of us connect with a handful of individuals…but the need and the result are the same. We want that human connection. It can lift us from slumping in the dark, deep pools and it can add to the joy when we throw our arms wide and our head back in celebration….and it can keep that inter-twined heart beat going…steady….one human to another.

At the Playhouse

Last night, we took our daughter and her husband out for Mexican food and then to the local Golden playhouse. The play was called “Shining City” and was the story of middle aged angst…dramatically told…and set in rainy Dublin. Not at all cheerful, I think it the play should be called “Depressionville.” We left at intermission. The four of us would have felt better had we spent the ticket money on extra margaritas.

Plethora of Deer

It was about 2:30 a.m. last Friday and I was unloading the dishwasher, taking out the Christmas china we had used at the New Year’s Day open house.  Suddenly, I realized the outside lights were on …and since they are motion sensored, I decided to see what had walked by…could have been a coyote, a mountain lion or a neighborhood dog.  I knelt on the living room sofa and with a thumb and forefinger, gently lifted the window blinds about three inches, from the bottom up.  There they were….five beautiful mule deer intent on finding and nibbling whatever is under our big crabapple tree.  The four large and one smaller deer moved gently, mostly head down,  from spot to spot and I got to observe them unnoticed.  A mule deer has large ears that stick straight up most of the time.  But the most distinctive marking, in my view, is the almost perfect oval on each of their backsides.  Most deer have a powder puff tail…but not these.  Each tail is about 10 inches long, ending in about a three inch point of black deer hair.  The top part of the tail, where it meets the body, is the same brindle color as the deer body.  But the middle part of the tail is white, within the white ovoid shape on the backside.  Anyway, these beautiful and graceful creatures held my stare for about seven or eight minutes and then I gently lowered the blind and eliminated my peep hole….went back to finish taking clean dishes out of the machine.  About 15 minutes later, I eased the blind up again….but no deer.  And they were nowhere on the street, nowhere within my field of vision.  All I could think was, “How lucky am I?  I saw them, soaked up the scene, at exactly the right moment.  Had I lifted the blind at any other time, they probably would not have been there and provided me with their show. ”  I knew then that this was the right start to 2009….it’s going to be a year filled with a plethora of right moments…..I just know it.