"Final Gifts." Remembering Our Loved Ones in a Good Way

As we remember the passing of dear President Carter at the age of 100, a remarkable and generous and kind honest man, I’d like to share my experiences about the book, “Final Gifts”. I have carried this book with me for more than 25 years now. I recently came across a review of the book as I was wandering the internet this evening. Years ago after my sister passed away, a colleague shared this book with me. I bought the book and kept it with me as a tool for helping myself and others. I have also gifted it to others. The guidance became my companion through my mother’s passing as well as my father’s. I recommend it to help in understanding the veil between the preparation a soul experiences as they ready themselves for crossing over, and as those in the next world prepare to receive them. Each person experiences death and dying in different ways based on their life and their beliefs and their experiences. I realize this and only share here from my own experience, with no expectations of others.

Sometimes there is no time or opportunity for preparation to be made with a loved one before they pass, as happened in my life with both of my younger sisters. Sometimes there are maybe hours, days, weeks and even months of holding a loved one in your heart and sitting with them as they go through the experience of dying and leaving this world for the next. Many of us experienced loosing loved ones from outside a room or window due to covid during the tragic pandemic. I had the blessing of being with both my mother and my father. This lovely little book, along with my special prayers that I carried with me, brought me a deeper appreciation and understanding of what I was witnessing in my parents, in myself, and in other family members as we walked through their final days together. These experiences are always close to my heart at this time of year, as my father passed in the month of November, 2018, four days sfter his birthday, at the age of 93. My mother passed away in the late evening of Christmas Day, 2015, she was 84. she would have turned 85 on January 31, of 2016. My sister Diana passed away in November of 1995, she was only 45. My sister Barbie passed away at 46, in January of 2000. I’m the oldest, my mother gave birth to four children in five years. When I was 14, in 1963, a baby brother was born.

My experiences of loosing good friends, spiritual sisters and brothers, and clients over the last many years to covid and illnesses, alcohol and drug addiction, has also been heavy on my heart. Processing the passing of dear loved ones is never over and happens in stages as you know. This time of year always offers new experiences for me, moving in stages that are some times just too many and too overwhelming to even grasp.

As I experienced saying goodbye to each of my parents separately and under different conditions, my ability to be with them and hold them close was possible because i chose to be with them. i put them both first before my work. I had gratefully learned from previous years of training and education and preparing myself through studying this book and others like it on death and dying. Dr. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, for example, a Swiss-American psychiatrist, and pioneer in near-death studies and trainings in my mental health counselor career to assist clients with grief and loss issues. Other useful research materials and authors as well, that are not necessary to name here and now. It’s this little book however, "Final Gifts", with stories presented by hospice nurses, that touched my heart so deeply and in a personal capacity to help me understand how to learn, over time, to let go and say good bye.

The book review here is thoughtful and I hope you find it helpful in a good way.

https://maggiecallanan.com/interview_bedard.pdf

The Colors of Gratitude

Photo taken July 18, 2024, of my vegetables and sweetpeas, in a basket I have had for years and use for any number of things. The lovely swing my husband made for me almost twenty years ago now.

The Colors of Gratitude.

Written July 21, 2022.

Wild flowers grown from seed.

Sometimes I wish life’s wisdom showed itself as abundantly.

Then I remember the small seeds in the dark soil, no color or scent.

The work, the time for the gift of the nutrients of nature to do their work. The sun light, the rain, to do it’s work.

I have work to do for myself...to give myself time to listen gently, to hold on to, to be kind with and listen to each budding thought and feeling needing attention.

Working to be with the discomforts and distractions, the unwanted chaos, the confusion within and outside the world.

Letting in the nurturing Love, Light and Rain provided each of us with abundance. Letting go. Weeding out the energy of the no longer needed, no longer useful weight of darkness.

With conscious intention and choice to accept myself, I create a path, a furrow, a safe space to grow. To begin again, to do the necessary work.

The new energetic burst of colors emerge and surround me. The next steps of my life and what needs to be done takes hold.

Lifting my soul as the flowers sprouting and bursting from the dark soil.

Quiet, Peaceful, Wisdom.

Glowing. Glistening.

The Colors of Gratitude for my blessed life.

Photos of my wild flower garden taken 7/21/19.

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The Constance Swing. Photo 3/9/2020

Chaotic Energies: Personal Responsibility through Meditation.

 

Edited and reposted on 11/16/25.

I struggled significantly in my early learning years. I had a long nine month bout of pneumonia at age nine that set me back in terms of learning. I was passed on to the fifth grade even though I had missed most of my fourth grade year. I understood quite young that I needed to become a self taught individual if I was going to survive school, my family, and my life.  From teaching myself jewelry making, to making my own clothes, to inventing creative ways to survive and graduate from high school. At twenty three I taught myself Lamaze child birth practices from a library book before it was being taught in the United States. I was carrying my first child. By the time my second child was born, Lamaze classes were being taught through the Red Cross and other organizations. After I discovered the teaching of Dr Maria Montessori from a friend, I became very excited to share her teachings with my mother. She and my sister, Diana, gave me a beautiful book by Dr. Montessori for Christmas that same year, it was 1972. I soon found myself taking courses, teaching my two very young daughters what I was learning and receiving my Montessori Teaching Certificate by 1976. I made sure both my children knew how to read  and write before they were enrolled in public school. I consider Dr. Montessori my first mentor.

I was pretty much an outcast in school in terms of receiving any assistance for my disabilities. When I was young no one really knew about, diagnosed, or addressed ADHD or Dyslexia in young children. Therefore, I basically self taught myself in just about everything I know. Thank goodness for my grandmother for her teachings, and my parents who gave me life. They nurtured me and always supported me. I turned to those who would be my life long mentors by researching the library and seeking knowledge for myself that would afford me healthy pathways to my spiritual, emotional, mental, and physical development. One of my favorite books in high school was a gift I had received of a hard cover dictionary.

 When I learned about Transcendental Meditation in the early seventies, I took a class at the local community center and went on to continue practicing mediation on and off all of my life. Never really understanding what it was I was doing or how it might be helping me, It just felt right. I learned and practiced yoga from a book and didn't take a class until my early forties. In the early nineties I read and studied "Women who Run With The Wolves" by Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estés. She soon became one of my beloved mentors and still is. I used her teachings as part of my thesis work for my MA degree. 

I received my masters degree in human development with specializations in child development, parent education and community work at Pacific Oaks College, finally completing my thesis in 2002. I began my BA work in 1995. Pacific Oaks College has a main campus in Pasadena, California and until recently had out reach campus in Seattle. I completed both on line and in person courses in Seattle and Pasadena. The staff were very respectful and inviting. I developed friendships and acquired nurturing relationships with my professors, who became my mentors for many years. Their dedication to me as my eventual thesis chairs gave me the courage to become who I am.  They never let up on challenging my writing, and while it all drove me mad and often to tears, I am forever grateful to them! I learned of the college at an educational fair I attended while studying at Skagit Valley College, where I received my associates degree in early childhood education. I enrolled through applying for grants and loans which are now all paid off. 

"Grounded in its social justice heritage, Pacific Oaks College prepares students to be culturally intelligent agents of change serving diverse communities in the fields of human development, education, and related family studies. Pacific Oaks is committed to providing and promoting a diverse and inclusive environment for all students, faculty, and staff, where each person can succeed professionally regardless of race, ethnicity, culture, nationality, gender, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, marital status, or ability. We believe diversity and inclusion enrich the educational experience of our students, faculty, and staff and are necessary to prepare all people to thrive personally and professionally in a global society." https://www.pacificoaks.edu/

Over the years, since the early nineties, I have studied the works of and taken courses from Dr Caroline Myss, author of "Anatomy of The Spirit".  I first began listening to her audio tapes before reading her book and taking a two day course with Dr Myss. She has been another respected mentor for years now. 

I have read several books and articles and listened to many audio presentations by Pema Chodron, Tibetan Buddhist nun and teacher, now 84 years old. I make sincere efforts for myself to understand and practice her teachings, and the teaching of all of my mentors. I have used Pema's practices of understanding our shared humanity of harmony and chaos within ourselves in my professional work with individuals as a licensed Mental Health Therapist and a Reiki practitioner the whole of my professional career.

These past few weeks I’m again listening to Pema Chodron's audio “Coming Closer to Ourselves” (please see reference below). I would like to share my thoughts and recommendations for supporting chaotic energies you might be feeling and noticing in your body,  as part of a collective experience of discomfort and distress that may be affecting all of us at this time. I have been feeling more intense levels of both these types of energies lately, which leaves me feeling confused and hopeless. I find I need lots of space between tasks for quiet and calm.  I need lots of meditative moments of quietness. 

How I make decisions about how I might spend my day are often about making choices that are less active rather than more. I’ve found myself over focused, with a feeling of necessity, on the tragedy and chaos of world events and political wranglings which cause more and more internal distress in me. I need lots of reminders that I actually do know what to do. That through my learned and lived experiences that have led me to my Elderhood years, I do know how to make safe decisions and create calmness for myself.

 How and what do I choose to pay attention to...if any of it? What do I let go of as a matter of sanity in my own life? I recognize these on going inner questions and conflicts as being driven by something Pema Chodron calls,  “Ubiquitous Nervousness.” A term she often refers to in her talks, shared from her Buddhist teachers. We all carry some level of nervousness within us. The question is what do we do with it?  I’ve decided to share some personal practices that have been helpful to me over the years. I hope my experiences are helpful. 

At this writing I've been fully retired from professional work now for just over two years. Writing has become something that I find joyful and it keeps me mentally and emotionally active by enabling me to continue to stay connected to my years of practicing and reflecting on my own healthy self care. I have six grand children from the ages of 11 to 23 years old. I volunteer as a member of Friends of the Library in our community. I have a community garden plot that I love working in. I am enjoying new friendships through an International Grandmother's Circle that I was invited into about three years ago now. I have a full, rich life with my beloved husband. A beautiful and grateful life. However, I still feel overwhelmed by the world's chaotic turns and exhausting events. I need to practice self care...daily...to not be consumed by it!!

Pema Chodron's gentleness is refreshing, as is her intelligence and humor, as she guides you to understanding the purpose of practicing meditation. She describes her own experiences on how to be gentle and kind with yourself by accepting yourself just as you are right now. Her teachings as a Buddhist nun and teacher of Buddhism are about practicing meditation by bringing or settling into and staying with yourself with honesty. Developing clarity and courage as you become aware of your own feelings and thoughts at a deeper level. She guides us to consider being open to both the harmony and the chaos within. Learning to understand how to accept the tension of the duality of positive and negative emotions which are as she states, both just energy. 

Nothing to do beyond noticing and being curious about the energy in your body and the thoughts and emotions that arise. Becoming aware of whatever arises and letting go, as a practice of being with the energy. Staying with it, not trying to get rid of it or change anything as a necessary solution, which can often show up in ourselves as impulsive behaviors made to dispel the discomfort by attempting to get rid of it.

 I trained in Aikido, a modern form of Japanese martial art, for a short time. I started learning from a book. A friend introduced me to a dear soul who was trained in the art. He also happened to be a Baha’i. Through correspondence he eventually came to visit me and offered me a few instructions, giving me a book with steps to practice. I learned several movements and techniques that taught me how to make a conscious choice, through subtle movement and situational awareness. I learned to sit with the internal discomfort and let it pass, before ever acting or responding to the uncomfortable situation. I learned to make fewer, less harmful acts towards myself as well as others. I found these practices kept me safe in many situations in my life over the years, when I remember to practice them. 

The word remember is a verb: "to have or be able to bring to one's mind an awareness of (someone or something that one has seen, known, or expected in the past)." Oxfords language Dictionary.

I have come to appreciate Pema Chodron’s work because I’ve found it aligns in many ways with my spiritual beliefs and experiences. I have been a seeker of religious truth since a young child. I began going to church with neighbors, my parents did not have a church that they attended. When I was in the fourth grade my grandmother took me to the United Methodist Church where we attended Sunday school for a while and where I was given my first Bible which I still have and treasure. I began studying the Baha'i Writings and in the Spring of 1974. I was especially intrigued my the principle of "progression revelation" taught in the Holy Writing. There is a Baha'i teaching that states, "One hour of reflection is worth 70 years of pious worship." (Bahá’u’lláh, The Kitáb-i-Iqan, (The Book of Certitude, p. 238). There are no directions on how one should meditate in the Baha'i Writings, just that the practice brings you closer to understanding yourself as a spiritual being. 

I have learned for myself that I need some guidance as it relates to meditation and my path to my own spiritual practices and development. In the book, “Paris Talks”, a question was posed "What is meditation in reality and how do we meditate? ‘Abdu’l-Bahá explains the process in simple and clear terms: "It is an axiomatic fact that while you meditate you are speaking with your spirit. In that state of mind you put certain questions to your spirit and the spirit answers: the light breaks forth and the reality is revealed. You cannot apply the name ‘man’ to any being void of this faculty of meditation; without it he would be a mere animal, lower than the beasts." ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Paris talks, pg 174-175. https://www.bahai.org/library/authoritative-texts/abdul-baha/paris-talks/

In learning meditation as it relates to one’s self emotionally and spiritually, Pema states, “Emotions are the combination of energy and thought. You let the thoughts go and what’s left is energy. This is the practice, not the solution, but the practice of meditation”.  I recommend studying her work, resources are below. In my opinion her teachings on the practice of meditation and her guidance in general can be considered a self care choice leading to a deeper calm. Something that I surely need and as I practice have found it to be very helpful in finding joy and a deeper meaning to my decisions and life's choices. 

One more way to define this principle and practice of choosing a meditation practice as an act of self care is to consider it as choosing to take a “Five Step Self Time Out” for yourself. This is a term my husband coined years ago as he was working with families. The Self Time Out Tools are very effective in breaking down the principles by using "feeling language" that is so often difficult to find within ourselves when we are overwhelmed with anxiety, frustration, anger and fear. 

As a retired mental health counselor, I’ve studied and written about these insight tools extensively now along side my husband, Chuck Britt, for over 27 years. Along with my Life skills and lived experiences, in the work I have done to support myself with the guidance and help of my incredible mentors over the years, I have come to believe in the practical application of the Self time Out Tools first hand. I have witnessed hundreds of individuals and families go through transformational healing using the tools. We have been offering free and printable materials on our website at https://www.selftimeout.org. 

As I become aware of the struggle and discomfort in my body, I can choose to reflect and ask myself, what do I feel, what do I need? I can ask, are my choices in this moment life giving, joyful and confirming, or are they life threatening and full of fear, anger and confusion? Very subtle meditative questions that can be a beginning to sitting down and moving closer to yourself.

Meditation then becomes more about learning to not struggle with the uncomfortable feelings of push and pull, for and against, natural dualistic thinking, as Pema Chodron describes it. But of actually discovering a curiosity about oneself. Do my choices bring comfort or escalation within myself and my relationships with others? Do my choices give me less turmoil and fear or a more relaxed sense of calm as I make decisions and go about my day? 

The practice of noticing my feelings and needs can be a gentle shift of awareness. As uncomfortable as it might feel, remember it’s only energy flowing within the body. I can stop at any given moment and address that energy in my body. As I do so, I will have more information to choose from about my feelings and my needs to make a plan to take care of myself, to be with myself, gently, listening to my feelings and needs. This  shift helps me to feel less anxious as I become more self aware and less distracted. This is the foundation of a "Five Step Self Time Out".  

Meditation and self reflection can serve as a way of noticing what I am feeling and needing as a pathway to reducing chaos and increasing joy in my life. These practices have become a part of my daily self care for quite some time now. They serve my spiritual, mental, emotional and physical needs in predictable patterns that have served to guide my choices over time. 

Maybe these practices effect me in the same way learning to ride a bike did when I was a kid. Neurological pathways of development, connecting and reconnecting throughout the body, at every step. Practicing what I've learned from my mentors over the years and being supported by the practical use of  insightful self care tools, has created patterns within my being that keeps me balanced and supported, for the most part, in feeling confident in myself and my choices in these my Elderhood years.

 I know what it feels like to fall off the path. I know what it feels like to get back on the path. I can choose to continue to practice what works for me in my Elderhood years. How do I address my fears and confusions about what it feels like to be getting "older".  Sharing my writings, my stories, and my self care practices with you here, helps me stay connected with myself and with my life as I walk this path and learn to balance the chaos about what Elderhood means for me.

 The most recent book that I am reading now is titled, "Elderhood" Redefining Aging, Transforming Medicine, Reimagining Life. By Louise Aronson MD. 2021. She is a graduate of Harvard Medical School, a geriatrician, educator and professor of medicine at the University of California. It is a 450 page textbook. 

Here are a few more resources you may find helpful:

Pema Chödrön (Standard Tibetan: པདྨ་ཆོས་སྒྲོན།, romanized: padma chos sgron, lit. 'lotus dharma lamp'; born Deirdre Blomfield-Brown, July 14, 1936) is an American-born Tibetan Buddhist. She is an ordained nun, former acharya of Shambhala Buddhism and disciple of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche.Chödrön has written several dozen books and audiobooks, and was principal teacher at Gampo Abbey in Nova Scotia until recently.  She retired in 2020.

Pema Chodron https://www.soundstrue.com/products/coming-closer-to-ourselves (from Sounds True publications, soundstrue.com)

Pema Chodron A talk from Sounds True: “Unconditional Confidence, Instructions for Meeting any Experience with Trust and Courage.”

Pema Chodron “The Places That Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness. A Guide to fearlessness in Difficult times.”

I suggest reading any of Pema Cohodron's articles in the magazine, Lions Roar. The most interesting current article of Pema’s is:https://www.lionsroar.com/from-suffering-to-awakening-3-ways-to-transform-your-emotions/ you may need to create a free account.

Finally often in Pema Chodron’s talks she will refer you to her recommendations for readings that led her to becoming a Buddhist nun and one of the main writings and authors she refers to is on the subject of “negative negativity”. 

One such writing link is at: https://www.thezengateway.com/culture/choegyam-trungpa-working-with-negativity 

Clarissa Pinkola Estés (née Reyes; born January 27, 1945) is a Mexican-American writer and Jungian psychoanalyst. She is the author of Women Who Run with the Wolves (1992), which remained on the New York Times bestseller list for 145 weeks and has sold over two million copies. 

Caroline Myss (pronounced mace; born December 2, 1952) is an American author of 10 books and many audio recordings about mysticism and wellness. She is most well known for publishing Anatomy of the Spirit (1996). She also co-published The Creation of Health with Dr C Norman Shealy, MD, former Harvard professor of neurology. Myss describes herself as a medical intuitive and a mystic. 

Maria Tecla Artemisia Montessori (/ˌmɒntɪˈsɔːri/ MON-tiss-OR-ee; Italian: [maˈriːa montesˈsɔːri]; 31 August 1870 – 6 May 1952) was an Italian physician and educator best known for her philosophy of education (the Montessori method) and her writing on scientific pedagogy. At an early age, Montessori enrolled in classes at an all-boys technical school, with hopes of becoming an engineer. She soon had a change of heart and began medical school at the Sapienza University of Rome, becoming one of the first women to attend medical school in Italy; she graduated with honors in 1896. Her educational method is in use globally in many public and private schools.

The Kitab-I-Iqan: The Book of Certitude. "A treatise revealed by Bahá’u’lláh in Baghdad in 1861/62 in response to questions posed by one of the maternal uncles of the Báb, translated by Shoghi Effendi and first published in English in 1931." https://www.bahai.org/library/authoritative-texts/bahaullah/kitab-i-iqan/ 

The official website of the worldwide Baha'i community: https://www.bahai.org/

"Blessed is the spot, and the house, and the place, and the city, and the heart, and the mountain, and the refuge, and the cave, and the valley, and the land, and the sea, and the island, and the meadow where mention of God hath been made, and His praise glorified." Bah'u'llah. https://www.bahaiprayers.org

Photo at the top was taken at Deception Pass State Park, Salish Sea the Summer of 2017. Homelands of the Coast Salish People and where my husband Chuck and I were married on January 2, 1999.

Lower photo was taken at the Quileute River as it runs into Rialto Beach the Summer of 2019. Homelands of the Quileute Tribe.

7/04/24 “Turn away from the latest distractions and come home.”

NOTE: Today is July 4, 2024. I am updating this writing from June 25th and sharing some further insights. Originally written to share adout summer and how I now need to protect myself from the sun with a hat due to my age. The pretty hat here is a gift from my beloved husband♥

I'm not able to celebrate Independance Day with much joy today. Im freightened because of the direction we are going right now. I am very cognizant of the responsibility each and everyone of us has at this time to stay alert and build community wherever we can that is safe and nurturing and healthy for our children and grandchildren!

Therefore, I am going to try and make since of a few things for myself with my updated writing today about what I am feeling at this moment in time after the last few years of the many changes that have occurred in my life.

2021 was the first year of our semi-retirement (fully retired) at the end of June in 2022. It coincided with the selling of our home and business of 24 years and our move to Sudden Valley which occurred in December of 2020. The plan to move started with my back going out for the first time in my life and the realization that we could not care for a three story house and business on a 1/4 acre lot any longer. We put our house up for sale and it sold in three weeks. There were very few homes for sale that would give us the freedom to "age in place" so we began looking at condomniums. They were few and far between as well. We found one we liked and in just two months we had put our home up for sale and moved to our new place.

Well the first few months were very difficult. I was still healing, could not drive yet and the move had exhausted us to say the least and it occurred during covid. The year of 2021 was also the first heat dome I'd ever experienced. After the heat dome experience in 2021 my husband and I decided to use some of our retiremnent funds to have heat pumps installed in three of the rooms of our new condominium. We were put on a waiting list and finally in the spring of 2022 we had air conditioning and a much more economical heating system. The electricity and heating system had gone out five separate times in the winter of our first three months and it was very costly at that. With only electric heat, when it went out it got pretty cold after eight hours on a snowy day. So to offset no heat at all we used more of our retirement savings to have a gas fireplace installed so we had heat when the electricity went out. We learned quickly that the electricity going out in Sudden Valley was an all too common experience in the winter.

I am updating my writing today to gain focus on my life at this point, right now. Maybe my experiences and story of my life in general might be helpful to others. For example, recently in the past year I've been noticing how my diet effects inflammation in my body and how I'm gaining weight, which has never been an issue for me before the age of 70. I will write more about how I am trying to manage this issue in a later post.

Here then is the little updated vignette about how I needed to change how I spend time in the sun came about.

Before my seventies the warm weather and even very hot sun was never much of an issue for me. I love the sun! Here in the PNW we sun worshipers gravitate to any sun we can get. I was raised in Northern California from the time I was 2 1/2. My mother is from Colorado and my father, who was born in New Mexico, was raised in the pan handle of Dalhart, Texas where I was born. When I moved to the PNW the climate was very different and while I love it here and really do like the rain, I quite enjoy the sun, the smells of the dry land and the heat of the day.

Climate change has changed much in the way I believe we need to choose to take care of our Mother Earth and ourselves. Tracey Chapman writes in her song, The Rape of the Earth, "The sun is hotter than ever before," and that was in 1995, from her New Beginnings album. Long time big fan of all of her music! So anyway, on the day the amount of time I spend in the full sun, even in the PNW changed, I really did not realize the damage to my skin until the next day. I've learned that because my skin is thinning, I burn more easily. When we went to Bowman Bay on my birthday at the end of May in 2022, I did not wear a hat all the time and I was surprised the next day to discover that my face had sun burned. My forehead and nose later peeled and my lips burned causing blisters that took over two weeks to heal. Very unusual for me. So...Wearing a hat is a must! Sunscreen of course. New ways to consider self care.

The other thing I noticed is how easily the heat effects my body in general. In June of 2021 when we learned the heat dome was coming we went shopping for cooling fans at the hardware store. This was still during covid remember and we did not go inside stores at all or on any regular basis. We needed to make sure we had plenty of food, fruits and veggies and ingredients easily prepared for simple protein meals. With no ice maker I made ice all week filling up the one tray we had, while making batches of green tea to keep in the fridge. I gave Chuck a haircut at his request! Really not sure what the expected and unprecedented 95-105 degrees over the next few days would be for us here. We learned we could not go for walks after trying to go out in 90 degree heat. We limited the times of days we chose to walk. Not something we would have ever considered in the past.

Somewhere too there is much to share about what happened in 2023 and the first six months of 2024, however Im still processing the last year and a half which as I think about it has been stable finally and continues to be filled with blessings and grace from God as we build friendships in our new community while at the same time continue to nurture ourselves and family and long time previous friends ♥ I have done quite a bit of writing recently and getting back to writing on my blog this last year or so has been very inspiring for me and does actually reflect my thoughts on life over the last year and a half.

While I now believe that these experiences might be about the thinning of my skin as I age, along with the many transitions of what it really means to slow down and do better self care as we practice aging in place, my gravest concerns are the choices we make together to take care of each other. It is of course about Global 🌎 Warming and what we need to understand about our choices...which ARE real...all of it is frightfully real and it is certainly not business as usual...by celebrating our freedom with out conscious awareness of what we are all facing. Now. At this time in our lives!

We each have a responsibility to ourselves, to each other, to the least among us, to our children and grandchildren and to all of humanity to stand for the right and freedom of choice to continue to build a peaceful society. A coalition of peace built on strength that nurtures each other in good and caring ways that were taught to us by our ancestors from their sacrifices...as we nurture and care and heal our blessed home...Our Mother Earth. Our collective community. A community free from anti bias retoric and brutal hatred and malice and violence at every single turn and corner. Peace to live in a non-violent society.

This is what The Grandmothers mean in their message: "Turn away from the latest distractions and come home."

I dedicate this writing today to all my beloved friends who are grandmothers and all I do not yet know who are standing strong in their heart power of home for themselves, their families, and humanity. Thank you for calling me back home today♥

The Light at Our Door

New mothers, mothers in delight, mothers missing their own, yearning a loss beyond words. Aunties, sisters, precious protectors and educators of our beloved children.

Grandmother’s with heavy hearts, feelings of sorrow untold. Mother’s gone before us.

Those who are childless, mothering the ever constant needs of humanity through birthing yourselves with your timeless gifts to the world.

We see you. We hear you. We are here.

We are mothers holding Light for our sacred ones, wherever they might be...whether near to our touch, far off and away or traveling with the stars. We hold close your precious wisdom in our hearts.

For your Light is ever present at our door.

We carry you always, even when we know it’s time to let you go.

Our children, all children, are gifts of wisdom that shine and grow within each and every soul.

Lifting us, teaching us, honoring us with each humble step taken along the way.

Each door that’s opened, each road traveled, each heartbreak you hold, each victory that unfolds.

We honor the Mothers, Grandmothers, Aunties, Sisters and Wisdom keepers who hold the Light steady with abundant joy and love beyond measure.

Flowing eternal, an endless treasure for all of our children.

Revised May 8, 2025.

Photo taken 5/7/2024.

Not Without Choosing

Let’s not Forget. Each day is a Ceremony. Each day is Holy. Healing continues through Awareness. The Earth Day Celebrations are not over. Planting seeds is Eternal. Our ancestral Grandmothers sewed them into the hems of their skirts. Over seas, through famine, and land migration…forced against their will. Yet they knew. Healing is an Act of Resistance.

Not Without Choosing.

Taught from one generation to the next. Prayers for Peace and Reconciliation must carry forward with each heart, into each new day. Through all our actions toward each other.

In all we choose to be.

Astrology says we are in a New Day. New Energy. Higher Consciousness is showering.

Strong upon us.

Ancient Indigenous Prophecy…is Now they say.

Full Pink Moon today. Pluto aligned with Uranus. Reflection, Meditation, Realignment.

Each day is a Ceremony of Healing.

Not Without Choosing.

Connie Bonner-Britt. Sspopii Aki meaing Turtle Woman. 4/23/24

My Blakfeet name was gifted to me by my Blackfeet sister, Cheryl Ibarra, Pikuni Aakii, Piegan Woman. It was in the Spring of 1998. We drove from Anacortes, Washington to Cheryl's home land on the Blackfeet reservation, in Browning, Montana. We traveled to visit Cheryl's mother, Margy. During those days of visiting, Margy adopted me as her daughter, and Cheryl and her two young daughters gifted me my name.

Photo taken March 3, 2023.

Whatcom Lake, Sudden Valley, WA.

Touching into The Soul

When I was in my twenties I bought Anis Nin's book "In Favor of the Sensitive Man, and Other Essays", 1976. Her writing introduced me to Rainer Maria Rilke"Letters to a Young Poet", and Otto Rank, "Truth and Reality, a Life History of the Human Will." I went to the library to find their work. This was during the time when I was studying the writings and theories of the pedagogy of Dr Maria Montessori for my teaching certification. My reading and insights gave me an understanding of my souls reality and my responsibility to my soul development. At that time I also was studying an Eastern Yogi philosophy book I found in a thrift store, "Fourteen Lessons in Yogi Philosophy", by Yogi Ramacharaka, 1931. I was taking transcendental meditation classes and in a transformational wilderness of the unconsciousness and on my own, often making poor choices and not fully taking personal responsibility for the consequences. Role models at this level of spiritual development were only in books for me at that time. The reality of transformation, the work of the soul, the development of self.

This morning I came across some writing that brought back these memories of my life as a young woman and my studies that gave insight and purpose to my many confusions of life that I was experiencing at the time. A process that is ever on going from one season of life to the next.

Here I am now, in the season of my elder years and for me, right now, over the last weeks and months, I have been sharing the mystery of life's confusions and gifts with my husband and friends. We have been sharing soulful insights trying to grapple with the tragedy of the wars of humanities creation, along side the joy and beauty of nature during this blossoming spring. Sharing life's gifts, and our individual and collective responsibilities.

Feeling thankful for trusting relationships and the memories of past and current soul work that continues through the seasons of my life. Like a flowing body of water that changes course and rushes in, creatng new streams. Streams of soul consciousness.

"Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer."

Rainer Maria Rilke

"For the only therapy is life. The patient must learn to live, to live with his split, his conflict, his ambivalence, which no therapy can take away, for if it could, it would take with it the actual spring of life."

Otto Rank

God’s Abundant Grace

For the last week we have been cleaning and rebuilding these three small framed garden beds. The surrounding ones are part of the community garden we have joined. In December 2020 we sold our beautiful three story home of 23 years that we purchased in 1999, the year we were married. It was built in 1926 and we were constantly upgrading and doing repairs and creating more beauty to our beautiful garden areas. We loved it! Where for all those years we served hundreds of individuals and families together as licensed mental health counselors, in the business space we created in the lower portion of our home, "Skagit Family Study Center" and our art gallery, "Ullulate Gallery." Where over those years our children and all six of our grandchildren have joyfully visited many, many times and both of our parents joined us together in celebration. In 2020 the pandemic was changing everthing for everyone. We had both turned 72 that year, me in May and Chuck in October. Our health needs were changing.

It was time to retire. We bought a one story condominium. I put us on a waiting list in February of 2021, to be a part of the community garden around the corner from us and along Lake Whatcom. We were 24 on the list. As we settled in it took a couple of years to adjust. Especially during the pandemic. Loosing close friends to covid, and this past June, loosing Chuck's brother to lung cancer, has been daunting for the family. In the last few months Chuck has begun to prioritize his years of poetry writing, preforming and media magic into his own utube site: "Chuck Britt Poems, Into The Neuron Woods". It's wonderful to witness!

To continue the community garden story...I bugged the lead person in charge of the list every so often and after three years we came to the top in January, 2024! We completed all the necessary paper work, agreeing to three pages of rules and paid the minimal annual dues. Since then we have cleaned the three unkept beds we were given, removed the old fallen fencing and completely rebuilt the framing. It's been very difficult work. We are focusing on safety for ourselves as we work. This week we are building fencing and a gate to keep away the critters. This morning I came across a piece of writing by Emerson. It reminded me to notice the blessings of the day as it ends and not let the hard work get in the way of the beauty of the deer wandering around our place and the redwing black birds singing along side of us as we work on our garden space together. Chuck said the sound of their singing is like listening to good jazz. Then there is the sound of the beautiful creek flowing along the community garden into Lake Whatcom. And just today we witnessed two magnificent great blue herons flying into the huge fir tree to greet us as we entered the garden to start our day.

After 25 years of marriage we continue to be filled with the beauty of God's abundant grace!

Here is the writing by Emerson that inspired me.

Finish Every Day

"Finish every day and be done with it. For manners and for wise living it is a vice to remember. You have done what you could; some blunders and absurdities no doubt crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; you shall begin it well and serenely, and with too high a spirit to be cumbered with your old nonsense. This day for all that is good and fair. It is too dear, with its hopes and invitations, to waste a moment on the rotten yesterdays." Ralph Waldo Emerson, The Letters of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Volume 2, 1836 - 1841

Blocks of Time

Over this past winter I have been creating these quilt block hangings from quilt blocks made by grandmother, Deedee mom, Audrey Mae Bonner. My grandmother was a quilt maker and these blocks were part of her precious belongings passed on to me by my father after she passed away September 6, 1976. She was born on July 17, 1902 in Argos, Indiana. She was 74 years old when she passed away in Santa Clara, California, where she had lived for many years. My last visit with her was in early 1973, before traveling to Anacortes, Washington, where I would live and raise my children for the next 20 plus years. Deedee mom had just returned from the hospital and I and my two young babies, ages nine months and three years, stayed with her for about a month.

Now that I am fully retired and turning 76 next month, I have found creative time to honor her quilt blocks by framing them in various colors of fabrics. Her quilt blocks here are hand stitched. The white muslin fabrics are made from flour sacks she would save. As a child and young adult I learned to sew and quilt from her. These hangings have been gifted to family members.

Calling All Grandmothers

We have to live differently or we will die in the same old ways. Therefore I call on all Grand Mothers everywhere on the planet to rise and take your place in the leadership of the world. Come out of the kitchen out of the fields out of the beauty parlors out of the television. Step forward and assume the role for which you were created: To lead humanity to health, happiness and sanity. I call on all the Grand Mothers of Earth and every person who possesses the Grand Mother spirit of respect for life and protection of the young to rise and lead. The life of our species depends on it. And I call on all men of Earth to gracefully and gratefully stand aside and let them (let us) do so. —Alice Walker Resources NPR Interview with Alice Walker, 2010 A Blade of Grass

By The Scent of Water Alone

By the scent of water alone, the withered vine comes back to life, and thus ... wherever the land is dry and hard, you could be the water; or you could be the iron blade disking the earth open; or you could be the 'acequia', the mother ditch, carrying the water from the river to the fields to grow the flowers for the farmers; or you could be the honest engineer mapping the dams that must be taken down, and those dams which could remain to serve the venerable all, instead of only the very few. You could be the battered vessel for carrying the water by hand; or you could be the one who stores the water. You could be the one who protects the water, or the one who blesses it, or the one who pours it. Or you could be the tired ground that receives it; or you could be the scorched seed that drinks it; or you could be the vine, green-growing overland, in all your wild audacity ...

Untie the Strong Woman Clarissa Pinkola Estes, PhD

A Prayer from The Night Chant A Navajo Healing Ceremony

House made of dawn. House made of evening light. House made of the dark cloud. House made of male rain. House made of dark mist. House made of female rain. House made of pollen. House made of grasshoppers. Dark cloud is at the door. The trail out of it is dark cloud. The zigzag lightning stands high upon it. An offering I make. Restore my feet for me. Restore my legs for me. Restore my body for me. Restore my mind for me. Restore my voice for me. This very day take out your spell for me. Happily I recover. Happily my interior becomes cool. Happily I go forth. My interior feeling cool, may I walk. No longer sore, may I walk. Impervious to pain, may I walk. With lively feelings may I walk. As it used to be long ago, may I walk. Happily may I walk. Happily, with abundant dark clouds, may I walk. Happily, with abundant showers, may I walk. Happily, with abundant plants, may I walk. Happily on a trail of pollen, may I walk. Happily may I walk. Being as it used to be long ago, may I walk.

House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/n-scott-momaday Prayer from the Navajo Winter Healing Ceremony translated by Washington Matthews in late 1900’s.