Children Arrive With an Owner's Manual

We often say, "Our children did not come with an owner's manual." Why not?
Or did they? Did we not see it before our eyes and make use of it? Our parents, grandparents, aunts & uncles, and siblings with children are "the owner's manual." Do we access them for advice often enough? Are they readily available?

In days of old when multi-generational families lived in close proximity, their experiences and wisdom were easily accessible.  Now that we are such a mobile society, and so rarely live in multi-generational households we need a different way to pass down information and wisdom.


Create a notebook to record the raising of our children. Write down what our children to and our reactions. Write down how we solved problems, how we cleaned up messes. Write down advice that others give you. Be sure to write down any memories from your own childhood that our own children's actions conjure. Those memories will let your adult children know that you survived and learned from the struggle. 

When we do not record our processes of raising our children, when we don't write down what our children do that delights us and drives us crazy, we do our children and grandchildren a disservice.

The "Owner's Manual", your notebook, can be paper or digitial. When your grandchildren arrive, give a copy to the parents so that they may have the wisdom and experiences of their elders and be better informed of what is coming.

Clover

I am grateful 
For the beauty at my feet. 
When I stop 
And just be 
In the present moment, 
Beauty graces me eyes,
And I am blessed.
The clover smiles.
The grass blooms.
And I am grateful.
Sunlight shines for me
To see the beauty
All around me. 
I only need to stop,
And just be
In the present moment.

KOLN LETTERS

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Asking the Potato Bush for a Healing

The uninvited microscopic visitors that I have been having coffee and tea with for that past couple of days, waged a battle with my bronchial tubes. I coughed and hacked and coughed some more.

Our purple flowering potato bush whispered, "Come outside and I will help you."

I walked out, and the air immediately embraced me with her silky breath. I opened the gate in the old picket fence and stepped into the backyard. I touched the pink rose bloom that was smiling at me and asked it to help. I reached up to shake hands with our guava tree, asking that it also to help me. I walked around the guava and gave the Bird of Paradise bloom a big smile. I stopped, breathed in deep and turned toward the potato bush that now reached a height of 8 feet and is at least as wide. I held one of her leaves, gently with my thumb and finger. I closed my eyes, breathed in deeply, and asked it to help my body heal, to be a conduit from Mother Earth to bring me healing.

I could feel energy flowing into my arm. It felt like a loving embrace.

Before I opened my eyes, I heard the bees buzzing around the orange tree. When I opened my eyes, a bright ripe orange lay to the right of my feet. I thanked the plant people and Mother Earth. I went inside and ate the orange. My coughing had subsided when I first set foot into the backyard. It stopped when I held the potato bush.

I am blessed.

Grief Throws A Blanket

Grief throws a blanket

Over our heads,

And punches us in the stomach

So hard,

It knocks us to the ground.

Sometimes we’re afraid

To lift the blanket

And get up.

We hold our breath,

Not moving,

Wishing the grief

Would just go away.

But we have to get back up

On our own two feet

In order to remove

The blanket of grief.

We must stand up

And open our eyes,

Letting the tears

Clean our lenses

So that we can see

That we are still here.

The grief has not consumed us,

Completely.

When we stand up,

Our legs might wobble,

And our shoulders might shake,

But we will feel

Life

Flowing back in.

Trickster Mom

Today would have been,

Oh how I wish it could be,

My mother's 91st birthday.

Her name was Amadita

In the little village of La Jara

Adjacent to the San Pedro

Parks Wilderness

Of New Mexico, USA.

With her eyes aglow

She told me she had a pet prairie dog.

I thought that was cool.

I wanted one, too.

The adobe house she grew up in

Had no running water and no electricity.

I only experience that when I go camping.

One of her daily chores was

To take a bucket down to the creek

And bring it back full of water.

She hated the kitchen.

She preferred to work

Outside with the farm animals.

She married a Navy vet.

Who adored her.

We all did.

By the time I learned

She had another name

Besides, mom.
She had taken the Anglicized

White man’s version,

She was Amy.

She was a trickster.

She hid behind the doors,
In the closet,

Or under the bed,

And scare us

Whenever she got the chance.

I did it to our children.
I still do it to my spouse.

My mother used to make me laugh.

Often. Every day, and a lot.

We would talk for hours.

And laugh and tease for more.

She confessed one day,
After I came home from the war,

That she hadn’t read my letters

I sent her from Viet Nam.

She cried whenever one dropped

Through the mail slot.

She knew they wouldn’t make her laugh.

She was afraid one might say I died.

She died in 1986.

We put a license plate
On her coffin
And slid a bag

Of chocolate covered raisins

Into her hand,

For a snack,

On her final trip.

We wrote love notes
With permanent markers

All over her casket
So Saint Peter

Could easily see

Just how loved she was.

I miss her on days

Like today.

And then I laugh,

Remembering my

Trickster mom.

When Death takes my hand

When Death takes my hand

And lifts me out of my body,

She will kiss me and say,

"You have been a blessing

Upon the Earth."

She will embrace me

And then giggle,

"You made me laugh

So many times."

She will put her hand

On my heart,

Pull my head

Onto her bosom

And whisper,

"I cried with you,

Many, many, times

After I took your son."

Death and I will fly b

Beyond the Earth,

Beyond our galaxy,

Into the light.

Where our son,

My parents,

And my ancestors

Will shout,

"You have been a blessing

Upon the Earth!"

They will all embrace me,

Holding me tight,

And lovingly say,

"Welcome home."

Jeremy's "Call"

I received our son, Jeremy’s, “call”,

Late at night on the 23^rd of October 1992.
A dreaded knowingness hopped on my back.

I carried it into the trauma unit’s family room.

I turned off the light, sat on the chair, and shook my rattle.

My spirit guide put her arm around me.

“It is time,” she said.

We flew into the Lower World and stopped at a ledge

Overlooking an iridescent river.

We walked down a rocky embankment

To a rowboat, tied to a dock.

My spirit guide handed me a glowing orb.

“Give this to the gatekeeper,” she said.

We got into the boat. 

She stroked the oars

Slowly across the dark water

To the dock on the other side.

She helped me disembark. 

The bearded gatekeeper stood eight feet tall.

His arms were folded,

His eyes were stern.

I handed him the orb.
He took it with both hands 

And walked away from the opening. 

We entered the cave of waiting souls.

Jeremy came walking over to me.

I hugged him and then I sat on a large stone and cried.

He bent down and put his arm around me.

“It’s OK, Dad. I’m ready.”

I wiped snot from my nose with the back of my arm.

He became small enough for me to carry him out

Without being seen by the gatekeeper.

My spirit guide and I ran to the boat.

She rowed to the other side.

We flew out of the Lower World,

Through this world and beyond the Upper World.

Sadness overwhelmed me.

Tears clouded my eyes.

We were flying,

Flying higher and higher.

Grief had already wrapped its sadness around me.

I heard a loud snap.

A thin slice of light appeared 

In the void’s blackness.

It grew kinder and brighter,

Taking my sadness away.

Jeremy and I were engulfed in light.

He gave me a hug and walked into the opening.

“I love you, Dad,” he said as my parents took his hand.

The opening snapped shut.

But the darkness was not complete.

A Kindness took its place.

My spirit guide and I flew back into the family room.

I walked into his trauma unit

And looked at the brain monitor.

Jeremy’s body was brain dead.

I called the nurse.

Soon his room was filled with staff

Preparing his body for organ donation.

I cry on this day, the 23rd.
I cry because I miss him.

How Would My Great-grandparents Feel?

I want our grandchildren and great-grandchildren to be proud of their heritage. I want them to be aware of our ancestors' existence and culture. I know that the culture changes and sometimes gets lost as time moves forward. 
My adult children do not live in our house. Our grandchildren do not live nearby. Opportunities to teach my grandchildren about their ancestors and heritage is very limited.
How would I feel, (after I am dead) if one of my great-grandchildren wanted to learn about his heritage but when he went to ask, my relatives refused, saying that he was trying to steal the culture, that his blood was too diluted, that he did not live in the community, that he did not understand their ways, that he was too white?
I wonder how my great-grandparents feel.  

I can’t help but think that my great-grandparents would have wanted to teach me the Native ways. They would want me to be proud of my heritage. 

But my heritage has been stolen. Stolen by laws, stolen by White man's attitudes, and stolen by poverty, and stolen by fear. I know that my Native ancestors are from the New Mexico area. I do not know which tribe or pueblo they were from.

My soul longs for my ancestors. My soul longs for the songs, the dances, the worldview, and the wisdom that my great-grandparents would have given me. Their blood flows through my veins.

Heritage

Sometimes our heritage has parts

That were kept secret,

Or minimally mentioned,

Or not taught to us,

And not celebrated.

And sometimes we discover

Those parts were kept secret

To protect us from harm.

How then can we can we know

What our souls long for?

How then can we be proud

Of that part of ourselves?

How then can we really be whole?

Bixby Park Tunnel

When I was a boy,   

Nearly seven decades ago, 

I walked two miles 
To the beach 

All by myself. 

I walked down 

Junipero Avenue. 

I rolled my eyes 

Knowing how the locals 

Mispronounce it as 

One a pair oh. 

I’d cross Anaheim Street

And read the Cabart Theater Marquee

Looking for a pair of movies
I’d like to see.

I continued on
Passing by the California Bungalow houses

On my Independent Press Telegram

Paper route.
I’d watched the cars whizzing by

As I’d wait for the light on 7^th Street.

I’d pass Doctor Logan Jackon’s house,

Glad that I didn’t need to get a shot.

I crossed Broadway 

To the Park Pantry restaurant,

And hoped that someday 

I could afford to eat there.

I'd stroll through Bixby Park 

Scanning, Searching, and hunting  

For any friends who might 

Want to play at the beach. 

When there were, 

And when there weren't, 

I'd cross the park 

From one corner 

To the corner 

Of Cherry and Ocean.  

I'd descend the stairs 

Into the Bixby Park tunnel 

That went under  

Ocean Boulevard 

To the beach.  
I always found friends
Some I knew
Some I’d just met.
We'd play at the shore
And play tag with the waves.
Some kids had skim boards

Some had floats.
We’d play all day.

When we got hungry
We pull out the bologna sandwich

That we’d made at home.
Our teeth crunched the sand  

That the wind always,

Always, always blew

Onto our sandwiches.
When it was time to go home
I'd go into the tunnel
And back through the park.
I needed to be home
Well before it got dark.

I am sad 

That the tunnel 

Is no more.  

I suppose 

When children of ten 

Were no longer allowed 

To walk to the beach 

All by themselves, 

They sealed the tunnel, 

And the memories 

And only left a mural  

At the ocean side  

Of the tunnel.