Call to Prayer

On the wings of a snow white dove, let your heart soar and glide through life like water over rocks filling a lagoon of blue tranquil peace and serendipity. Take a moment to pick up the universal phone and call in your order of good wishes and a bright future. Embrace it all.

Photo by Javardh on Unsplash

Life is good.

Let the sun shine warm on your back as you cross the rocks to step into the azure water where coral wafts and waves, colorful fish weave infinity in the shallows, and the Creator gleams in pride at all that emerged from the primordial nothing of the Zen mind.

On the wings of a snow white dove, spread love and joy. We are not broken, we are perfect and whole — in tune with the frog percussion. and the trill of songbirds in the canopy of majestic trees – the ancient beings.

Love west to the mountains, east to the ocean, north to the colorful lights and south to the equator. Revel in all you’ve been given.

On our deathbed, we will all long to do it again. Everyone has. Everyone does. Everyone will.

It’s a potluck, a smorgasbord, a feast of such intensity that we can be blinded by it. Don’t. Keep your eyes open, put on the rose-colored glasses, and sally forth in harmony with your neighbor, with your enemy, with that person you don’t know. Love one another as I have loved you.

The desiderata – you are a child of the universe – oh, yes, I am. Born of stardust and the creative energy of millennia. I am. I will.

It’s what makes us human but long for creature comforts. We are sentient, but we are also just one of many life forms. Let us all live together as we forage our way as hunters and gathers of love to our inevitable transformation back to stardust and creative energy.

On the wings of a snow white dove, let us inspire those who come after us to fix the damage we cause and to enjoy the perfection of life in balance.

Oh Lord, hear my prayer.

My name is. . .

Hello.

My name is Connie Kinsey.

Enough with bitchin’ and moanin’.

Prepare to laugh.

I am often funny without intending to be.  However, with that said, I do have a goofy streak and I’d much rather laugh than the alternative.  I have always infused humor into everything I do – it’s my interface with the world, but I’ve noticed something the past few years:  I have been whining far too much.  I blame the Great Pandemic of 2020 and COVID.  Things have been bad.  And then they got worse.  And then they got dire.

Enough.  Just enough.  Whining is easy.   Any toddler can do it.

The past couple of weeks at work I have done little but try to wrangle deserved customer assistance from unwilling and incompetent vendors.  I have had to resort to unleashing my Inner bitch on the unsuspecting.  It’s not pretty and I’m not proud of it.  But I do have to admit it is effective.  When I go into Raging Bitch Mode, I’m told I’m terrifying.  I refer to it as “my hair is on fire.”  I usually get what I want when I go nuclear.

I am, honestly, slow to anger for the most part. I don’t do road rage.   I don’t lose my temper with shop clerks.  I don’t make rude gestures involving fingers.   It takes repeated affronts to unleash The Bitch unless the afront is racism, abuse, or some other egregious behavior.  Or calling me a liar or treating me as if I’m incompetent.  Those two are triggers, I will admit.  And I will knee-jerk.

But I am not here to whine about the weeks I’ve had with unruly machines.

I am here to reclaim my sense of humor.

I have a great one.  I can laugh at myself, and I can laugh with you.  I do try to make sure we’re all laughing.  I despise unsolicited criticism and laughing at the unsuspecting unless we’re talking about kids for the latter.  Kids are often funny without trying to be.  Their very existence makes me laugh. 

My default reaction is to laugh.  I used to laugh out of nervousness.  If I didn’t know what to say or do, I’d laugh, make a joke of it.  Turn my insecurity into shared humor.  I’m not sure that’s healthy, but I’m now more confident and I don’t do that any longer.  My laugh is almost always genuine.  I can find humor in the most unexpected of situations — funerals, deathbeds, psychiatric wards, airports, service departments, and doctor’s offices.  My divorce hearing was one big laugh fest – all of us cracking jokes and carrying on. I can laugh anywhere given even a modicum of opportunity.

I hereby reclaim my birthright to laugh.  To laugh often, sincerely, and kindly.  I will work to reduce my whining to a minimum and bring humor to every situation I can. 

To laugh is to release so many good hormones in the body, one can’t but help to feel better for some time afterward.  Only hugs from a loved one rival laughter for making folks feel better.

So.  Be forewarned! 

My name is Connie Kinsey.

Enough with bitchin’ and moanin’.

Prepare to laugh.

Twenty-nine Palms

I expected to love the desert.

I was born in Twenty-nine Palms, California which is part of the Joshua Tree National Forest. 

Robert Plant wrote a song titled 29 Palms. 

I feel the heat of your desert heart
(Feel the heat of your desert heart)
Leading me back down the road that leads back to you
.

We left that part of California when I was very small.  I have no memory of the place.  We did drive through the Painted Desert on our way back from Hawaii, but it was night and didn’t leave much of an impression.

Thus, I hadn’t seen my birthplace since a year or so after my birth. 

I had the opportunity nine years ago to go there and I did.  I have a photo of me at what was basically the Visitors Center for Twenty-nine Palms.  For some reason, they had a metal sculpture of Cinderella’s pumpkin coach. 

I am not making this up.

I have a photo.

The Cinderella Coach was the highlight.  Well, it tied with the small oasis. 

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