If you want to know why

Here we are, poised, as if nothing is wrong.  

It's Easter Sunday.  I wear my new bonnet and white patten leather shoes.  I hold a rose I have just cut from the bush behind us.  Dad is an avid gardener and the bush is lush with blooms.

Mom is thin, thinner than I have ever seen.  I think she looks beautiful and I love my new dotted-swiss Easter dress.  Mom makes sure I have a brand new dress every Easter Sunday.

In a while, we'll go to church.  We are Bapitst.  We'll sit on the third row where we sit every Sunday, Daddy by the aisle, then Mama, then me.  I'll have to pay attention because Daddy will want to know what I heard the preacher say later on.

At home this afternoon, Daddy will grill steak and bake potatoes.  We'll have hot Mrs. Baird's dinner rolls with butter and sweet iced tea.  It'll be so good, my skin will jump up and holler Allelujah!

A month of Sundays goes by and today is Mother's Day.  Daddy took me to the florist yesterday so I could buy Mama a present.  He gave me the money I could spend and he sat in the car.  I bought an orange miniature rose bush in an ivory French Provincial vase.  It's plastic not real, but it will last forever.  

After dinner I give her the flowers and she L.O.V.E.S. them.  I'm really proud of myself.  On these kinds of days, I almost feel my skin letting down.  I think maybe I don't need to worry all the time.

But before my food gets through my bowels, I hear it:

     "Stupid Whore!"  Daddy's yelling.

     "Stop it, Gene!" Mama's crying.  And Daddy's pushing her down the hall, stiffing his finger into her breast bone, shoving her shoulder back with the palm of his hand, slapping her face and calling her all kinds of ugly names until she falls.  Then he throws the roses, vase and all at the wall beside her head.

I run to her.  I pick up the roses, their wire roots jutting through green florist's foam.  The whole bush has fallen out, but the vase has not broken.

Fifty years later, taking the gift down from the secretary in my Mother's room, I finger the vase, blow dust off the orange blooms.  

      ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Will you spend $50 to help me help women like my mother become formidable, deny such abuse and thrive? 

Come to my benefit luncheon, book reading and signing at Viva! Books, Jan 11, 2014.  Most proceeds above costs go to benefit the Kendall County Women's Shelter.

Click here for event details.  

Call 210.826.1143 to reserve your space. 

Make a matching donation online here: Kendall County Women's Shelter  
Please mention "Viva! Benefit" when you make your donation.

Being Present with guest artists and commentary

"Three Tongues," Suzanne Copleston.

Image used with gratitude & permission of the artist, copyright Suzanne Copleson, 2013.  All rights reserved. Please visit Ms. Copleston's website here to view more of her beautiful work.


Present Love

Let love come unbidden
  in each moment's unfolding,
  like petals that open up around our feet
  the instant we step upon the ground.

Let us meet others in the present--
  fresh,
         uncluttered--
  our hearts and minds reflecting
  Love's heart and mind.

Let us not diminish into
  small views and perceptions,
  but step into our fullness,
  shaking off the dust of fear,
  separation, and outcome.

We awake in present love.

Desire only to reside there,
  buoyed by awakened sisters and brothers,
  a circle of love that vibrates,
  rippling outward, in a

      constant now.



Guest Poet, Tina Karagulian from her collection Under the Papaya Tree, Black Rose Press, 2013.  "Present Love" used by permission of the poet.  All rights reserved.


Centering Prayer is one way of "waking in present love."  This method, taught by Fr. Thomas Keating, uses a centering word or phrase one chooses for the practice to bring the mind back to the present  and to the practice of contemplation.  I began to incorporate this method into my spiritual practice decades ago after reading Fr. Keating's book, Open Mind Open Heart.

Microcosmic focus on beauty is another way of being present and awake, as in this photograph.  The artist, Georgia O'Keefe is said to have stated (paraphrased) that no one sees a flower, really.  

In her poem, Ms. Karagulian urges us to "let love come unbidden."  This line is most interesting to me as I have spent a good amount of energy throughout my life calling love, seeking love, practicing unloving behavior and calling it love.  

In other words, being consumed by what is not Love, because as this poet suggests, Great Love comes unbidden.  It simply is.  

And it is fully present to us by grace when we awake.


D. Ellis Phelps

I. WAS. SHOCKED!

Photo courtesy of Samm Cox via Creative Commons; some right reserved.

In late July this summer, I hit the floor--throwing up.  Now this is an event I wouldn't usually choose to share publicly.  Bear with me.

After wet towels, a failed attempt at using a  ten year old suppository drug for nausea (yes, my bowels had joined the circus), and several hours of said event:  me, unable to get up, shaking uncontrollably, and with no signs of bodily control forthcoming, I begged my befuddled hubby, Earthman, to take me to the emergency room.

We arrived at the newly constructed Baptist Emergency Hospital in under ten minutes.  This is the hospital we trusted.  This was our hospital of choice. This was the CLOSEST hospital.  

As I could barely speak, Earthman asked the receptionist, "Do you take Blue Cross Blue Shield?"  This is the name of the company to whom we pay almost $2,000 per month for health care coverage. We have a PPO, which means we can choose our preferred provider from the insurance company's list of in-network providers without asking permission from a primary care doc.  We also have a $2,500 annual deductible for each of us.  I never meet this deductible.  This expense equals approximately $29,000.00 annually out of our pockets.

I cannot say enough good here about how quickly and carefully the nurses and doctor on call helped me to feel better.  After I'd given blood for routine lab work, urinated in a cup, answered a hundred questions between gags (do you know when you had your last tetanus shot?), absorbed two intravenous bags of normal saline and some very effective anti-nausea meds into my bloodstream, used every warm blanket they had in the warmer, and tried to keep the violent chills that assuaged my body from levitating me off the gurney for several hours, Earthman drove me home.

Thirty days passed.  The familiar "explanation of benefits" from our beloved insurance company came in the mail  I'm thinking, Betcha I met my deductible this time.  Wrong.  They had processed my claim as though I'd received services from an out-of-network provider.  The amount "I might owe the provider" line read:  $6,851.37.

I. WAS. SHOCKED!

Here's the point:  we had failed to ask the receptionist the right question.

The question all of us must remember to ask and tell all of our family members to remember to ask no matter what crisis or emergency we are facing is this:  

ARE YOU AN IN-NETWORK-PROVIDER & IS THE DOCTOR AN IN-NETWORK PROVIDER?

I picked up the phone and dialed Blue Cross.

Claims Rep:  "It's all about the codes.  See?"

Me:  "Well.  No.  I was throwing up my eyeballs."

Claims Rep:  "Because they are so new, the provider you chose did not file and become an in-network provider until three days after your visit."

Me:  " Isn't there a way to grandfather this visit in?  Remember how we used to change our grades from a C to a B?  Just takes an eraser and some balls!"

Claims Rep: "Ask the hospital billing department if they have another provider number under which they can submit this claim.'

Me:  "Huh?"

Claims Rep: "Plus they did not classify your visit as an emergency."

Me:  "It's an emergency room.  It says Emergency Room in bold, cobalt blue, neon lights right on the side of the building.  Plus, IT WAS AN EMERGENCY!"

And so the conversation went with the claims rep and then the same with the hospital billing rep who was quite helpful and finally understood that I was suffering from a pronounced panic attack and needed her immediate attention.  She agreed to appeal the claim and would talk to the codes person about what codes they could use instead that would change the outcome of my "explanation of benefits."

I don't know how it worked, but it did.  I now owe the hospital roughly $850.  I'll have to finance this stomach ache, but I'm okay with that. 

Here's what is not okay: that the emergency room intake person did not instantly say, "Yes, we do take Blue Cross but we are not yet an in-network provider" and further explain what that would mean to us before they offered me treatment, further giving me directions to the nearest in-network provider emergency room.   Also not okay:  that the insurance codes are not clear and can be manipulated and are so nebulous in their interpretations so as to potentially cost me $6,000.00.

The fine print:  all of this is my responsibility to know.  When I am well and before I seek treatment, I am supposed to read every term and condition (how many times have you clicked "I agree" without reading these?) of every policy I own or contract I sign.  In this case, I am also supposed to make a list of preferred in-network providers and hang it on the frig with my list of meds or carry it in my purse and then when I am deathly ill and perhaps my caregiver is beside himself with worry, I am supposed to remember said lists.

Okay.  Will do.  God forbid I'm unconscious.

beside this road

vultures 
come    and go

what follows

swarm
&      stench

hollow 

cage

crouching

beside this road

later      the hogs
will come     & take

these     remains 

Road Crew: four working; 25 watching

How many vultures does it take to keep the byways cleaned of carcass?  I count twenty-nine here, the most, by the way, I've ever seen concentrated on one roadkill in my neighborhood.  Must be slim-pickings this fall.

One Shamanic practitioner I know calls them the Peace Eagles, indicating their medicine.  In the Hill Country, we call them the Road Crew.  

I can just see them wearing their little florescent vests with the reflective strip and yellow hard hats.  The three closest to the carcass work to clear the mess with shovels.  The fourth one, further from the carcass, but still nearer than the others, leans on his broom.  The ones nearer the fence and on the ground have just finished their shift of shoveling and are headed to the ice house for beer.  

The ones sitting on the fence are supervisors.  They graduated from A&M. :)

Making Room for George: A Love Story (Balboa Press, 2013)

George

My first novel, based on real events, is a story of transformation.

Bet Kinders’ father-in-law, George, is in trouble. His girlfriend is stealing from him and, it turns out, she has a pimp who’s threatening his life. While something has to be done, George moving in with Bet and her husband, Steve could prove to be more than the family can bear.

Making Room for George explores how relationships shift in one woman’s life under the influence of sexual ambiguity, marriage and motherhood, parent-child role reversal, and redefining partnership. The book examines the roles played by upbringing, cultural pressure, addiction and self-denial in these relationships.

Readers will be moved as Bet confronts her own demons, finds the way to self-acceptance, and learns the meaning of true love.

This is a love story, tender and bittersweet. Readers, especially women, will rally behind, and be inspired by the heroine’s journey out of denial and into self-actualization.


View all my reviews

Guilt & Shame personified: a poem and commentary

"Shedding Shame," Katarina Silva 
image used with gratitude & permission of the artist,
copyright Katarina Silva, 2013
All rights reserved

Please visit Ms. Silva's website here to view more of her powerful work. 










Guest blogger and poet:
Kyndall Rae Renfro
with commentary by D. Ellis Phelps


Guilt, be slain, you false accuser,
ha-satan, retreat, you devil . . .
. . . or, might I show hospitality
to my enemy? Give welcome at the door?
What gift is hidden in your lurking
presence? None! None!
cries my wounded child, huddled in fear,
but, “Shh, shh, I will protect you from
our visitor, even as I feed him bread.”
I turn towards the intrusion,
I want you dead and gone!
But I look into your malevolent eyes instead
and wonder what you’ll teach me
as I refuse to cave under torment.
You were going to come in anyway;
might as well seat you at the table
where I can see and study
rather than be stabbed in the back.
Your lips curve in sinister smile,
but I have unnerved you, being so forward.
I will force you to speak clearly.
No sleepy whispers in black masks,
no sneaking in through bedroom window.
You will sit here in my lamp-lit rooms
and I will hear your case, unflinching.
In the inner folds of your long coat
there is a tiny but brilliant diamond.
I can tell by the way you finger the lining
of your gruff garment and by the stance
of your defensive posture that
though you’ve come to pillage and plunder,
you’ve got a prize of your own.
All the stealing intended to distract me
from noticing that what you are hiding
belongs to me. I recognize its glint.
Even through folds of fabric,
it lets off a shine–
it is the small and righteous truth,
searing as the sun, that shame
attempts to hide. It is the gift
of my own vulnerability; it is the treasure
of being who I am without any fear.
Friends: You do not have to bar the door or
wield a weapon; just out-trick the trickster, knowing,
Shame never visits your house
without a diamond in his trench coat.

               Kyndall Rae Renfro


A teacher once said (and I believe this), that guilt is a form of self-inflicted punishment that allows the “guilty” to continue some hurtful behavior (toward herself or another), that the feeling of guilt is a signal to cease that behavior and ask forgiveness (of the self or another).

I really struggled to grasp the meaning of this teaching. I learned, like you, that guilt is also a teacher and that I have much to learn from the experience of it.

After my current understanding of guilt as “permission to repeat hurtful behavior,” arrived, I made a vow to banish guilt from my life by amending my behavior. Yes, I had done some things to others for which I needed to ask their forgiveness, but most of the damage I had done (and sometimes continue to do), I did in the form of insidious self-destruction: Anorexia, alcohol and drug abuse, engagement in toxic relations and on and on and on. In my recovery, guilt is not welcome; only acknowledgement of a mistake made and a new intention to change the mistaken behavior. Over and over again. That is all.

             D. Ellis Phelps

Stillness: the best medicine

How rare.

Traffic chugs along in streams.  Sirens scream.  Dishes, children, ambitions demand attention. 

Our caffeine and adrenaline saturated blood surges through arterial rivers.  Daily news, daily chores, daily posts.

Behind heavy lids past midnight, minds wander the subconscious but we do not rest.  Our culture is hooked on doing, hooked on “connecting.”

Do we have more or less for all of this?  I say:  less. 

And deep social anxiety is the tragic outcome.

I received an email today from a prominent social change network that (paraphrased) said:  “We were hacked and shut down for several hours.  To be shut down for an entire day would be disastrous!”  Of course, they asked for a donation from conscious supporters to keep this from happening again.

Please, shut it down.  Please, let us all shut down.  Go outside.  Sit.  Dig our feet into the mud and lean hard against the trunk of the oak.  Listen and breathe.

what i learned today

that twenty minutes of contemplative prayer/meditation can completely relieve the perception of pain previously unrelieved by medication

what I learned today

that, given fresh rain and a full moon, a lily pad will grow ten to twelve inches in one day (of course, this is a barrel cactus bloom and not a lily)

what i learned today

that a man who believes he must kill to survive cannot risk an open heart

Raising the Energy of Love: Affirmative Practice

                                          Artist Unknown

“Prayer is most effectively sent when each person in the world ‘raises their energy of love’ by imagining a scene where the peoples of the world are living in peace…I have decided to call out to my fellow global citizens.  Let us pray by putting our hands together in the prayer position.  [You must] start praying for yourself, [then] something will definitely change in yourself.  And when more and more of your fellow men [and women] change in the same way, your surroundings will change, society will change, the country will change and the world will change…”

                                             Masaru Emoto 

Try using these affirmations as a way of "raising your energy of [Self] love."  At first, these may seem simplistic statements, redundant even.  But if you allow yourself to simply focus the mind in this way, paying attention only to these words, taking a deep breath between each line or phrase, focusing on the breath and bringing the mind back when it wanders to focus only on these words and the breath, you will notice a shift in your vibrational frequency for the better.  This is subtle work, but its effect is powerful.  

If possible, find a quiet space.  Perhaps you will light a candle to signify sacred time.  No worries if you have only five minutes.  Practice affirmations for five minutes then.  Try repeating the affirmations several times daily as a practice for training the mind.  Then, when apparent crisis seems present, you will be able to summon the affirmations as a way of calming and centering. 

If you find that you do not believe what you are saying (reading) in the affirmations, simply tell the mind, "I notice that my mind does not yet believe these statements.  Nevertheless, I state them now as Truth, denying the power of any disbelief."   

I am breathing now

I am breath

I am the breathing

I am forgiving now

I am forgiven now

I am the forgiving

I am whole now

I am the wholeness

I am the whole

I am healing now

I am the healing

I am the healer

I am opening now

I am open now

I am the opening

I am aligning now

I am aligned now

I am the alignment

I am present now

I am the present

I am the Presence

I am flowing now

I am the flow

I am the flowing

I rock

I am rocked

I am the rocking

I root

I am rooted

I am the rooting

I reach

I am reached

I am the reaching

I touch, I am touched, I am the touching

I stretch, I am stretched, I am the stretching

I lengthen, I am lengthened, I am the lengthening

In wholeness All is Unified, Here is now, Now is here, All is Now.

 

What if...

"Wizards" drawn on weave silk interactive, generative software

What if my art, making art, being in my studio, with, present to myself, present to my Self, present to the Creative Life Force is not about making money or gaining recognition at all.  What if it is about doing my soul-work?  What if it is literally, physically about saving my life?